I'm going to go against the popular opinion here and tell you it is possible to internally transfer(I WOULDN'T recommend it tho.) Especially given your tenure with the Air Force and your experience, you would stand out from the other applicants. I would consider other options first but if you are dead-set on UT then it might be worth it personally to you to take the risk.

I have a slightly similar story to yours being a non-traditional student. I already had a degree in Business and Finance from another school out-of-state and worked in the finance industry for a few years before making the decision to follow my passion which was CS. I was accepted to UT and was finishing up the pre-req for CS External Transfer at another school(was just Deriv. Calculus at the time) and was placed in Undergraduate Studies and was told that I could just transfer in when I came out for orientation in the summer.

Unfortunately after having left my finance job and moving across the country, I was told that I could not transfer into CS immediately and that I would be forced to apply next year in the Spring. The admissions counselor was misinformed that I had spoken with since this was right after the major became super competitive and transferring internally was pretty much deemed impossible. Needless to say I was dejected but chasing your dream is never supposed to be easy so you can't just give up on it (especially given I had already moved across the country).

I basically worked my ass off for a year working 30+ hours a week(needed to get in-state tuition) and took the hardest math/science courses I could sign up for. I ended up with around a 3.7 UT GPA and applied hoping for the best and miraculously I was accepted.

What I am trying to tell you is that internally transferring is NOT impossible but I would not recommend it. If I had to do it over again, I would of just applied to other schools CS programs since the stress of handling everything was hard to manage at times.

That being said I loved the CS department at UT. I'm surrounded by geniuses on a daily basis and constantly feel like the dumbest people in the room. The students and faculty are some of the nicest people I've had the pleasure of meeting and are always willing to help out and spread their knowledge to you.

I wish you the best strangeloop and feel free to PM me if you have any questions. Wherever you end up, I'm sure you will be great.