Although it is widely believed that high quality judgements and operational readiness involve experiential as well as analytical processing, field studies are rare in decision research. A series of empirical studies were therefore directed at studying the underlying affective and cognitive processes in risk, feelings, and operational readiness within a military setting. Three different projects are reported, and altogether 8 different military samples participated. Mixed methods and designs were applied, ranging from the classical 'psychometric risk approach', panel data, and field experiments. This work suggests that perceived risk among military personnel relates to risk exposure, qualitative aspects of the hazard, and to anticipations of anxiousness. Risk perception seems less affected by anticipatory/experienced emotions or experimentally induced affect. In general, this work supports the notion of 'affective rationality' in subjective risk perception and operational readiness.