Decentralize and Conquer: Brown Pushes for More Autonomy in New Doctrine Publication

Aug. 18, 2023 | By David Roza

The Air Force’s success in a future conflict will depend on “clear communication of intent, shared understanding, trust, and empowerment,” Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. wrote in an Aug. 16 memo to the force. The memo accompanied a new Air Force doctrine publication on mission command that Brown hopes will help leaders understand how to empower subordinates to make decisions, a skill he believes will be essential in a possible future conflict where units may find themselves isolated from command.

“Though the USAF doctrine has historically focused on decentralized execution, the operational environment the last few decades have instead typified centralization at all levels,” the new doctrine publication states. “However, future contested, degraded, or operationally limited environments may impede these efficiencies, necessitating a pivot towards decentralization.”

The memo and doctrine come at a time when the Air Force is preparing for a possible future conflict against China in the Pacific, where vast distances, robust anti-aircraft weapons, and signal jamming could force units to act with greater autonomy. One of the tenets of that shift is Agile Combat Employment (ACE), the operating concept in which Airmen and aircraft disperse from a central base to smaller, more austere locations in order to complicate an adversary’s targeting.

For concepts like ACE to work, however, Airmen need to be well-versed in the principle of “mission command,” whereby Airmen are empowered to make their own decisions in line with their commander’s intent in an uncertain, complex environment.

“Armed with shared understanding, subordinates can make effective decisions consistent with commander’s intent to protect and preserve the force and generate combat power even if they have lost contact with higher echelons,” the publication says.

tacp — Tactical Air Control Party Airmen with the 3rd Air Support Operations Squadron from Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska, watch as a MH-60S Seahawk takes off July 22, 2015, at Andersen Air Force Base South, Guam. U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Alexander W. Riedel

The new publication is meant to guide leaders towards adopting the mission command mindset. In the past, Brown wrote, he has witnessed “friction between bold leadership, in the spirit of mission command, and the guidance our Air Force has outlined in our instructions and regulations.”

Leaders can foster a climate of mission command based on five principles, he added:

Character: building mutual respect and trust in line with the Air Force core values

Competence: proficiency in performing duties, which builds trust

Capability: the unit’s processes, feedback mechanisms, and other organizational functions for establishing a culture of mission command

Cohesion: a unit’s degree of camaraderie and morale

Capacity: the overall measure or degree to which a unit can operate according to the principles of mission command

Pursuing those five Cs, the doctrine publication states, can help ensure subordinates grasp the commander’s intent (the ‘what’ and ‘why’ of a mission), that commanders trust subordinates to devise the ‘how’ to fulfill their intent, and that all parties have a shared understanding of acceptable risk levels.

The doctrine publication includes historical case studies of mission command. One is retired Lt. Gen. Marshall Webb, who on Sept. 11, 2001 was a lieutenant colonel and operations officer for the 20th Special Operations Squadron. Webb was ordered to report to McGuire Air Force Base, N.J. with seven MH-53 Pave Low rescue helicopters, where he received the simple instruction to “go help Americans!”

“Understanding his brief, but unequivocally clear commander’s intent, Webb and his crews began flying life-saving missions into ground zero at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon without requiring nor requesting additional guidance from higher headquarters,” the publication states. “Though extremely fatigued and dogged by numerous challenges, they overcame adversity, performed their mission, and achieved commander’s intent.”

The doctrine publication cautions that mission command does not mean commanders should abandon their responsibilities or unnecessarily ignore established tactics, techniques, and procedures. It also may not applicable in all situations, and it cannot be achieved “without developing a command climate of mutual trust,” the doctrine says.

Creating such a climate does not happen overnight, Brown noted in his memo.

“While this publication will help build a common understanding of mission command across the force, the culture of mission command doesn’t happen just because it is written in our doctrine,” he said. “I believe building confidence in mission command, for both leaders and Airmen, requires daily execution in simple scenarios ahead of a complex challenge in conflict.”

USAFE Boss: Ukraine Won’t Get the F-16 Until 2024—And Proficiency Will Take Years

Aug. 18, 2023 | By John A. Tirpak

Ukraine won’t get a basic F-16 capability until at least 2024, and developing proficiency with that aircraft “could be four or five years down the road,” Gen. James B. Hecker, commander of U.S. Air Forces Europe and Air Forces-Africa, said Aug. 18.

“It’s going to [take] at least until next year until you see F-16s in Ukraine,” Hecker said at a virtual meeting of the Defense Writers Group.

According to multiple media reports, within the past few days President Joe Biden’s administration gave the necessary official approvals needed for a consortium of countries led by Denmark and the Netherlands to start training Ukrainian pilots on the F-16. The U.S. has also provided formal assurances that it will fast-track any requests from those countries to transfer their older F-16s to Ukraine that they are trading out for newer aircraft like F-35s.

Yet Hecker downplayed the significance the F-16s may have in helping Ukraine combat Russia’s invasion, saying the capability won’t be a “silver bullet” but will simply ease Ukraine’s use of air-to-ground weapons already being provided. His comments echo previous remarks from Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Army Gen. Mark A. Milley, who have said F-16s won’t be a “game-changer” or “magic weapon,” respectively.

“What the F-16 will give them is, it’s going to be more interoperable with the current weapons that we’re giving them now,” Hecker said. “Right now, weapons that we’re giving them have to be adapted to go on the MiG-29 or go on the Su-27, or something like that.”

The U.S. has provided Ukraine with weapons including the AGM-88 HARM anti-radar missile, which has been seen flying on Ukrainian MiG-29s, which Hecker called “a pretty capable aircraft.” However, Ukraine has asked Western nations for F-16s in part because the MiG-29 is a Russian design and parts are difficult to get to keep the fleet flying.

The air-to-air and air-to-ground weapons provided by NATO nations and partners are “already interoperable” with the F-16, “so that will help out and give them the added capability. But it’s not going to be the silver bullet, [that] all of a sudden they’re going to start taking down SA-21s [Russian surface-to-air missiles] because they have an F-16,” Hecker said.

Hecker added that the cadre of pilots undergoing F-16 training are very junior and will need seasoning to become proficient with the fighter—they “barely have any hours at all. So they’re not currently fighting in the war,” Hecker said.

POLITICO reported that Ukraine has selected 32 pilots for F-16 training, but only eight are sufficiently proficient in English to begin training. The others are “getting language training in the U.K.,” Hecker said.

“Then they’re going to get a little bit more training on propellers, and then go down to France and fly in the Alpha Jet for a little bit,“ the USAFE commander added. “That all is going to take time. And that’s probably not going to happen before the end of the year. So that takes a while to make that happen. So that’s why it’s going to be at least until next year until you see F-16s in Ukraine.”

Hecker’s prediction matches comments from a Ukrainian air force spokesman, who said on state television this week that F-16s will not arrive this autumn or winter. John Kirby, a spokesperson for the National Security Council, had previously suggested the fighters may arrive toward the end of 2023, but that timeline was seen as ambitious.

Whenever the F-16s do arrive in Ukraine, reaching proficiency will take even more time, Hecker warned.

“To get proficient in the F-16, that’s not going to happen overnight. You can get proficient on some weapons systems fairly quickly. But ones like F-16s, it takes a while to build … a couple squadrons of F-16s, and to get their readiness high enough, and their proficiency high enough. I mean, you’re talking, this could be four or five years down the road.”

In the short term, the F-16s “will help a little bit, but it’s not the silver bullet,” he repeated.

U.S. officials have consistently downplayed the significance of F-16s in the Russia-Ukraine war. Kirby noted in July that “it’s not our assessment that the F-16s alone would be enough to turn the tide.”

The fighter would offer benefits, though. Hecker said that F-16s with AIM-120 AMRAAM dogfight missiles will likely just push Russian forces back a bit further. The NASAMS (National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile System) is already in service with Ukraine, and the rounds of that system are AMRAAMs modified for surface launch.

Ukrainian F-16s with AMRAAMs could shoot down Russian aircraft, “but all Russia has to do is stay out of the range of the AMRAAMs,” Hecker said, noting the Russians have already started doing that and adapted by moving command posts further away from the front lines when a new, longer-ranged artillery system or other weapon is introduced.

Importantly, F-16s won’t be able to “chase down” Russian aircraft over Russian territory, “because you’ll get shot by one of the Russian surface-to-air missiles,” Hecker said.

Overall, Russia’s failure to quickly achieve air superiority after its full-scale invasion was a surprise to USAFE, Hecker said, noting that Russia built Ukraine’s air defense systems and likely had good insight into how to defeat them.

“I think that most everybody thought that [Russia] would be able to take out the IADS (Integrated Air Defense System) in Ukraine such that they were going to … be able to get air superiority,” he said.

And while air superiority is a tall order, Hecker indicated that Russia “kind of gave up on that pretty early on.” The Russian air force has lost dozens of aircraft in the fight and as a result has seemingly decided not to fly within range of Ukraine’s air defenses, he added.

Instead, Russia adapted by sending unmanned aircraft bought from Iran and cruise missiles launched from bombers at targets in Ukraine, without risking further combat aircraft or crews. Those tactics have proved “relatively successful,” Hecker said, because while Ukrainian air defenses knock down most of the incoming drones and missiles, some still get through.

As for the state of Ukraine’s ongoing counteroffensive, Hecker acknowledged that “it started off a little slow [but] we’ve seen it pick up slightly since then.”

Russia has slowed that progress in part by heavily mining areas, forcing the Ukrainian forces to methodically neutralize them, Hecker added.

Space Force Gets Its First Targeting Squadron. Here’s What It Will Do

Aug. 17, 2023 | By David Roza

A new unit activated recently at Peterson Space Force Base, Colo., is the branch’s first-ever targeting squadron, designed to scope out adversary space capabilities and present options to the joint force on how to neutralize them.

“Today is a monumental time in the history of our service,” Lt. Col. Travis Anderson, commander of the 75th Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance Squadron, said in a press release about its Aug. 11 activation. “The idea of this unit began four years ago on paper and has probably been in the minds of several U.S. Air Force intelligence officers even longer.”

Space systems are made up of three elements: the satellite, the ground station that commands and controls it, and the signal that connects the two, retired Space Force Col. Charles Galbreath, senior resident fellow for space studies at the Mitchell Institute, told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

“My interpretation of space targeting is understanding all of those elements for an adversary system and then being able to make recommendations on what would be the best way to counteract that threat system,” he said. “In some cases, that may mean sending a jamming signal from our Counter Communications System, or it could mean putting a JDAM on a building somewhere to destroy the command and control or the end user.”

The 75th ISRS is part of Space Delta 7, the operational intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) component of the Space Force. While its sister squadrons also perform ISR and likely have targeting elements, the 75th consolidates targeting expertise and acts as a focal point for stakeholders who need that information, Galbreath said.

Before the Space Force launched in December 2019, Air Force intelligence officers often served just a single assignment in space, which precluded a robust corps of experts in the field, he said. The 75th is likely one of several new stand-ups to occur in the near future as the Space Force develops ranks of specialized experts.

“Having a squadron like this creates an opportunity for true depths of understanding of the threat environment,” he said.

Assessing space systems can be a difficult task. For example, dual-use satellites may present a challenge for intelligence officers trying to assess threats—China may claim that a robotic arm attached to a satellite is intended for space debris removal, but it could also be used to grab and disrupt other satellites.

Air Force space operators-turned commercial space executives expressed a similar concern during a panel discussion hosted by the Hudson Institute in July.

“Commercial operators become targets when they support the DOD,” Even Rogers, former Air Force space operator and CEO of the space technology company True Anomaly, said at the discussion. “In fact, I suspect that there are some incentives that would cause commercial operators to be targeted first as a strategic off-ramp in a broader conflict, because it is a gray zone, there is uncertainty about whether the United States intends to defend and protect … commercial providers.”

Other challenges include locating a satellite and its ground station, and determining what information its crew needs to operate and where its orders come from. Working together, the 75th ISRS and other intelligence organizations can fuse “a consolidated picture of what makes an adversary threat system tick, and therefore how can we best defeat it?” Galbreath said.

This illustration created for the Space-Based Weapons section of the “Competing in Space” unclassiﬁed report depicts space-based anti-satellite systems that target other space systems. Concepts for space-based anti-satellite systems vary widely and include designs to deliver reversible and irreversible counterspace effects. National Air and Space Intelligence Center illustration by Justin Weisbarth.

As adversary space capabilities become more sophisticated, so too must U.S. counterspace capabilities. Future operators may need to use cyber or electromagnetic spectrum weapons to target enemy satellites, especially when ground stations are tucked away behind an anti-access/area-denial environment such as mainland China. The problem is that the U.S. does not have many counterspace weapons at its disposal, especially compared to its main rival.

“China has already fielded an alarming array of operational counterspace weaponry” including ground-launched kinetic weapons and lasers, cyber capabilities, and electronic warfare weapons, Galbreath wrote in a June paper on counterspace capabilities. The Chinese People’s Liberation Army is also developing space weapons that could attack with robotic arms, electronic warfare, or lasers.

The U.S. defense against such weapons must include establishing international norms of behavior in space, resilient space system architecture that can withstand attack, and exceptional space domain awareness, Galbreath said. But it must also include strong counterspace capabilities.

“The United States has largely shunned the thought of fielding space weapons since the end of the Cold War,” the retired colonel wrote. “However, recognizing space as a warfighting domain means any serious effort to achieve space security must include space weapons.”

At least one such system is on the way. In April, Chief of Space Operations Gen. B. Chance Saltzman promised Congress a “substantial on-orbit capability … in full spectrum operations” by 2026, though he did not provide many details on what that capability might look like. Galbreath argued that the U.S. needs an architecture of multiple new counterspace systems to protect its space enterprise.

In the meantime, the 75th ISRS will analyze existing threats and how to counter them—the latest addition to the “mighty watchful eye” lauded in the Space Force official song.

AFCENT Unveils a New Patch to Recognize Partners as Part of ‘Transformed’ Command

Aug. 17, 2023 | By Chris Gordon

Air Forces Central has unveiled a colorful new patch to acknowledge the significant role U.S. allies and partners play in military operations in the Middle East.

Lt. Gen. Alexus G. Grynkewich, the commander of Air Forces Central, said the move is an overdue recognition that coalition partners are an integral part of AFCENT.

“We’ve got a group of people that have been working together on various missions for 30 years, and we don’t actually have something that we can all say is our patch, where we’re working together,” Grynkewich told Air & Space Forces Magazine. “And so that’s what we’ve tried to create.”

Military patches can carry significance, whether it is showing pride in serving with a specific unit or showcasing joint commands.

This one is largely green, a color long associated with Islam, with a burst of yellow representing the sun and desert and a blue star, the historical Air Force symbol.

For AFCENT, the process of getting a new patch approved in a bureaucratic organization like the U.S. military was surprisingly easy. The command went to Air Force’s heraldry department, which is responsible for patches and the processes, and encountered only a few hurdles.

Grynkewich said the design was centered around being “historically significant and culturally appropriate.”

As the U.S. military footprint in the Middle East has shrunk in recent years, building partnerships has become an increasing important element of CENTCOM’s strategy. That has put a premium on getting Arab members of the coalition to work together and encourage military cooperation with Israel, which in 2021 was shifted from the U.S. European Command area of responsibly to CENTCOM’s.

Airmen in the Middle East already carry a number of hats. Officially, AFCENT is the 9th Air Force, tracing its lineage back to a World War II unit that fought in Europe and North Africa as part to the Army Air Forces. Members of the command have worn both Air Forces Central and Ninth Air Force patches.

AFCENT’s new patch, in contrast, recognizes the 18 countries that all work together in the Combined Air Operations Center at Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar, whose personnel can wear the patch.

“As we’ve transformed this command to focus on the long term, and on campaigning, in addition to being able to run day-to-day combat operations, we’re really trying to expand that coalition presence across the entire headquarters,” Grynkewich said. “The intent would be it was something that any of the coalition partners including the U.S. could wear on their uniforms.”

There are practical limitations: there is only so much space on a someone’s arm. AFCENT hopes to eventually create one patch to represent the 9th Air Force, Air Forces Central, and coalition partners.

“As you think about how you integrate those partners better into all of your different processes and into what your activities are in the region, it just becomes kind of a natural evolution that our minds all shifted to, oh boy, you know, we’ve actually got something here that’s pretty powerful,” Grynkewich said.

U.S. Air Force Lt. Gen. Alex Grynkewich, 9th Air Force (AFCENT) commander and Combined Forces Air Component Commander (CFACC) for U.S. Central Command, center-left, poses for a photo with senior national representatives from coalition and partner nations during the unveiling of the new coalition and combined forces central emblem August 16, 2023, at Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar. U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Daniel Brosam

Space Force Deactivates One Space Surveillance Satellite, Sets Plans for Two More

Aug. 17, 2023 | By Greg Hadley

The Space Force declared “mission complete” for one of its space surveillance satellites and took it off operational status last month, ahead of another satellite joining the constellation next year.

The Geosynchronous Space Situational Awareness Program provides the Space Force with the ability to track and characterize objects in geosynchronous orbit. The first two satellites launched in 2014 and were accepted into service in 2015, and the second of those, GSSAP Space Vehicle 2, is no longer operational after it was transferred from Space Operations Command to Space Systems Command.

According to an August release from SpOC, the satellite was past its designed service life and was deactivated to “make way for new more advanced technology in the space domain.”

There are now five active GSSAP satellites left—after the initial two, two more launched in 2016 and become operational in 2017, followed by two more in January 2022 that reached IOC by April of that year.

Two more are still to come. The SpOC release noted that they will launch in 2024 and 2027.

GSSAP satellites operate in near-geosynchronous orbit, roughly 22,300 miles above earth, and have the ability to maneuver, allowing them to observe more and more closely in an orbit where most satellites remain locked in place relative to the earth below.

That maneuverability comes at a price, though. Lt. Gen. John E. Shaw, deputy commander of U.S. Space Command, noted in a July event with the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies that operators have to think “in terms of months and years of where they’ve going to maneuver these GSSAP satellites” given the limited store of fuel onboard.

The way the Space Force has planned and fielded its satellites up to this point, once a space vehicle is out of fuel, it’s done—there is no way to refuel in space.

“The way we’ve been doing space operations since the dawn of the space age, we’ve been doing it wrong,” Shaw said, arguing there could be a “fundamental doctrinal shift” toward more “dynamic space operations.”

“We can’t have those constraints in the future. And so we’re trying to articulate a requirement to the Space Force that we need to be able to have sustained space maneuver for those platforms,” Shaw added.

Specifically, Shaw cited a goal of 2028 for having sustained space maneuver. Vice Chief of Space Operations Gen. David D. Thompson has also endorsed the idea of the branch using commercial capabilities to “service” satellites in orbit. In April 2022, Space Systems Command revealed plans for an experiment for refueling small satellites in geostationary orbit. And in September, SSC held an industry day to see what the commercial sector is working on for assured access to space, including on-orbit servicing, maneuver, and debris removal.

How a Combat Camera Airman Trained Ukrainians to Save Lives—and His Hopes to Save Even More

Aug. 17, 2023 | By David Roza

Barely a week after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, Air Force Master Sgt. Gregory Brook led the first non-government U.S. surgical team on the ground into the Eastern European country.

Out of an old Soviet gymnasium in an undisclosed location, the team from the nonprofit Global Surgical and Medical Support Group (GSMSG) taught tactical combat casualty care to local civilians. About 50 Ukrainians showed up the first day, then 150 the next, and it kept growing.

“It was packed to the gills, so we started running multiple classes a day,” Brook told Air & Space Forces Magazine. “I think as of [July 24] we’ve trained about 60,000 Ukrainians directly.”

A reservist with the 4th Combat Camera Squadron, Brook went to Ukraine in his civilian role as operational deployment director for GSMSG. He still receives messages from Ukrainians who used the skills taught by him and his team to treat those injured in the conflict.

“We’re a year and a half into this war and people are still carrying that forward and training other people,” he said. “It became this kind of exponential thing that continues to pay dividends in terms of saving lives.”

GSMSG team members conduct tactical combat casualty care training for a group of Ukranian civilians and health care providers at an undisclosed location in March 2022. Photo courtesy Master Sgt. Greg Brook

Ukraine is just the latest in a long line of conflict zones where Brook has worked, both in his civilian role with GSMSG and as a Combat Camera Airman. He embedded with Army Special Forces teams conducting counterterrorism operations in Afghanistan; helped refugees in Syria; set up medical clinics in Guyana; and covered humanitarian aid efforts in east Africa. When the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan kicked into high gear in August 2021, he ditched a vacation in Spain so he could help organize flights for evacuees with GSMSG.

“In two days I went from being on vacation in Barcelona to being in Afghanistan … again,” said Brook, who witnessed service members, veterans, and civilian volunteers go above and beyond to help strangers in need during the evacuation.

“Everybody was doing everything they could to help everybody else out,” he said.

Life before ‘Service before self’

Growing up the son of eastern European immigrants in a poor neighborhood in Boston, Brook had low grades, a hot temper, and no plan for life. He joined the Air Force in 2006 partly for steady employment, health care, and other benefits.

“Where I’m at now in my life, I really wish I could say I was motivated by patriotism and these ideals of service, but that would be a lie,” he said.

Brook went from carrying cases of beer as a Boston bartender to carrying F-22 fighter jet parts as an avionics maintainer. More importantly, he worked alongside Airmen who had fought in Iraq or Afghanistan and lost friends there.

“In that period of time, terms like duty, honor, and the Air Force core values stopped being nebulous ideological concepts,” he said. “They became things I saw in people who lived these values. They exemplified them, and I want to be that kind of person.”

combat camera — A U.S. Air Force pararescueman, assigned to the 83rd Expeditionary Rescue Squadron, performs patient transfer of a simulated casualty from a U.S. Army CH-47 Chinook to medical staff from Craig Joint Theater Hospital during a personnel recovery exercise at Bagram Airfield, Afghanistan, Feb. 27, 2018. U.S. Air Force Photo by Tech. Sgt. Gregory Brook

Brook grew up snapping pictures around Boston, so when he found out he could take photos for the Air Force in the public affairs career field, he leaped at the chance. He then honed his skills to apply for Combat Camera: combat-ready public affairs Airmen who must be skilled with both rifles and cameras. In 2014, he was accepted.

“It has been far and away the most amazing job I’ve ever had,” he said.

Work towards a solution

Throughout his travels in the Air Force, Brook said he regularly saw service members and civilians go above and beyond to help the local populations—a security forces Airman trying to get school supplies for children living in a refugee camp in northern Syria, or pararescuemen volunteering to set up medical clinics in east Africa.

“That’s something you’ll see any time you’re deployed: people look for ways to help the local populations out … which I think speaks to the quality of American service members generally,” Brook said.

It was during a deployment in Syria that Brook first heard about GSMSG, a group of health care providers, many of whom are current or former service members, who deploy to conflict zones and humanitarian disasters to treat patients and train local providers. Brook got involved and worked with the group in Guyana, Afghanistan, and Ukraine.

Even beyond that aid, Brook is now working with British service members and the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense to develop a training program for troops to identify symptoms of post-traumatic stress. Mental health is a personal topic for Brook, who has a box in his desk drawer filled with 30 metal bracelets, each commemorating a friend lost to combat or suicide.

“There are a lot of people who should be alive that are not for any number of psychological reasons,” Brook said. “I think that the faster we can figure out what’s causing this, the faster we can work towards a solution and pressing it.”

Figuring that out means understanding both the science of mental health and the policies that shape its treatment in both the Department of Defense and the Department of Veterans Affairs. Brook is currently studying neuroscience and behavior at Columbia University’s School of General Studies, and after he graduates, he said he may study law or medicine.

“I’m interested in ‘What’s the way in which I’m going to be able to have the most impact on this,’” he said. “The goal is to end the veteran suicide epidemic, and my education is in furtherance of that goal.”

Earlier this year, Brook was tapped to receive a Tillman Scholarship. Named after Pat Tillman, the professional football player-turned Army Ranger who was killed by friendly fire in Afghanistan in 2004, the scholarship is awarded to spouses, veterans, and service members who want to make the world a better place.

“The reason I wanted to become a Tillman scholar was primarily because of that network, that amazing group of people who are interested in solving so many problems,” he said.

It all goes back to what inspired Brook to stay in the military in the first place.

“From my perspective,” he said, “the point of military service is how you can help other people.”

Tech Sgt. Gregory Brook, 1st Combat Camera Sq., Air Force Public Affairs Agency, U.S. Air Force, Joint Base Charleston, S.C. sits in the back seat of an F-16 Fighting Falcon D-Model flown by the 55th fighter squadron, 20th fighter wing, Shaw AFB, S.C while performing duties as an aerial combat photojournalist for training and tactics validation. (U.S. Air Force Photo by Tech. Sgt. Gregory Brook)

A U.S. Air Force F-16C Fighting Falcon conducts refueling operations with a KC-135 Stratotanker, assigned to the 340th Expeditionary Air Refueling Squadron Detatchment 1, over Afghanistan in support of Operation Freedom’s Sentinel, March 11, 2018. (U.S. Air Force Photo by Tech. Sgt. Gregory Brook)

A U.S. Air Force pararescueman, assigned to the 83rd Expeditionary Rescue Squadron, communicates with a U.S. Army Task Force Brawler CH-47F Chinook during a training exercise at an undisclosed location in the the mountains of Afghanistan, March 14, 2018. (U.S. Air Force Photo by Tech. Sgt. Gregory Brook)

A U.S. Air Force Guardian Angel Team, consisting of pararescuemen, combat rescue officers and survival, evasion, resistance and escape specialists, assigned to the 83rd Expeditionary Rescue Squadron, Bagram Airfield, Afghanistan, conduct a high altitude, low opening military free fall jump working with a C-130J Super Hercules flown by the 774th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron, Bagram Airfield, Afghanistan, March 23, 2018. (U.S. Air Force Photo by Tech. Sgt. Gregory Brook)

A U.S. Army Task Force Brawler CH-47F Chinook flight engineer sits on the ramp while conducting a training exercise with a Guardian Angel team assigned to the 83rd Expeditionary Rescue Squadron at Bagram Airfield, Afghanistan, March 26, 2018. (U.S. Air Force Photo by Tech. Sgt. Gregory Brook)

U.S. Special Forces and Afghan Special security forces work and train together in eastern Afghanistan, winter 2019- 2020. (U.S. Air Force Photo by Tech. Sgt. Gregory Brook)

A U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster III assigned to the 816th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron on the ramp at Bagram Air Field, Afghanistan, Jan. 29, 2018. (U.S. Air Force Photo by Tech. Sgt Gregory Brook)

STRATCOM Boss Touts Value of Bomber Task Forces: ‘Everyone Likes a Bomber in Their Region’

Aug. 16, 2023 | By Chris Gordon

OMAHA, Neb.—The U.S. Air Force’s Bomber Task Forces have become an increasingly important way of reassuring allies who depend on the American nuclear umbrella, as well as a major tool for power projection, the head of America’s strategic forces said Aug. 16.

“It seems as though everyone likes to have a bomber in their region,” Air Force Gen. Anthony J. Cotton told reporters at U.S. Strategic Command’s annual deterrence symposium. “It shows our resolve in showing that extended deterrence is alive and well when it comes to the United States.”

China’s growing nuclear arsenal, North Korea’s burgeoning nuclear program, and Russia’s nuclear modernization program have worried the U.S.’s non-nuclear allies who depend on Washington for their protection.

The U.S. has relied in part on diplomacy to try to assuage those fears. In April, for example, South Korea President Yoon Suk Yeol concluded an accord with President Joe Biden that reaffirmed that the U.S. is prepared to use nuclear weapons to defend South Korea. In return, Seoul restated its commitment not to develop its own nuclear arsenal.

But Bomber Task Force deployments, which can last weeks or even months, use just a few aircraft to provide a tangible reminder of America’s security commitments.

B-2s from Whiteman Air Force Base, Mo., recently embarked on their first overseas mission since a roughly six-month safety pause that ended earlier this summer, deploying to Iceland and already flying over the Arctic Ocean. Meanwhile, B-1s deployed to Europe this summer, flying from the Baltics to the Balkans and firing a JASSM long-range cruise missile on a range in the Middle East.

The B-52s, which are over 60 years old, operated out of Indonesia for the first time in June, and are currently deployed to Andersen Air Force Base, Guam.

“It shows that while we’re going to have legacy systems, the readiness of those legacy systems is alive and well,” Cotton said.

Last month, the U.S. had B-1s and B-52s in the Indo-Pacific at the same time on different Bomber Task Force missions.

“In terms of our allies and partners, let’s not forget, it’s not just about the nuclear umbrella, the extended deterrence umbrella, it’s about the conventional capability that this nation wields,” said Air Force Maj. Gen. John Nichols, the director of operations for STRATCOM. “I define it as showing up at a time and place of our choosing, when we want to, how we want to, in good coordination with our allies, and in the geographic combatant commands to maximize the effect.”

Bomber Task Forces, which began in 2018, have replaced permanently deployed bombers overseas and have been held up by Pentagon officials as a way to operate with more flexibility while being less predictable.

“The number of bombers that we’ve had actively out on Bomber Task Force missions across the globe is extraordinary—over a dozen at one point in time, almost every geographic combatant commander was being affected,” Nichols said.

“It shows the strategic reach that we have,” Cotton added.

Gen. Anthony Cotton, head of U.S. Strategic Command. Air Force photo by Trey Ward

MQ-9 Pilots Learn To Take Off and Land Via Satellite in ACE Push

Aug. 16, 2023 | By David Roza

MQ-9 drone student operators are now trained to land and take off via satellite, dramatically shrinking the footprint of personnel and equipment needed for Reaper operations.

Previously, Reapers have been flown by operators in faraway ground control stations but launched and recovered by Airmen closer to the runway. Now, the autopilot function known as the Automatic Takeoff and Landing capability (ATLC) can perform those tasks on its own, though it still requires a human crew to ensure safety of flight, Denise Ottaviano, a spokesperson for the 49th Wing at Holloman Air Force Base, N.M., told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

Students at the 49th Wing, the formal training unit for the MQ-9, demonstrated their skills from July 14 to July 24 at ACE Grand Warrior, an exercise where they landed two Reapers at Grand Forks Air Force Base, N.D. It was the first time the wing performed an entire mission under complete satellite communication control.

“The crews launching … are new to the launch and recovery realm,” Capt. Isabelle Perry, director of operations for the 29th Attack Squadron, said in a recent press release about ACE Grand Warrior. “This is important because they’re very young aviators in this field, flying in unfamiliar airspace, with a brand new mission set and they’re killing it.”

mq-9 reaper — A MQ-9 Reaper flies over Holloman Air Force Base, New Mexico, Aug. 13, 2020. U.S Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Christine Groening

The exercise marks the latest development for ATLC, which the Air Force Reaper community has pursued since at least 2021, when the 556th Test and Evaluation Squadron proved the drone could take off and land without local ground control. In 2022, Airmen took the capability further by hopscotching a Reaper from Hawaii to Guam to Palau as part of the exercise Valiant Shield 2022.

The key advantage of ATLC is its smaller footprint. Past Reaper operations required sending about 55 maintainers with ground control stations, ground data terminals, and other equipment. Exercises like Valiant Shield and ACE Grand Warrior proved it can now be done with just 10 Airmen and a pallet and a half of gear, small enough to fit aboard a CV-22 Osprey or C-130 Hercules.

“There’s this monumental change in mindset, that I don’t need to pack all this stuff up and go,” Lt. Col. Michael Chmielewski, commander of the 556th TES, told Air & Space Forces Magazine last year. “I can go places just with a very small piece of maintenance equipment and less amount of people.”

The same mindset applied at ACE Grand Warrior, where just 10 maintainers from the 9th and 29th Aircraft Maintenance Units traveled to Grand Forks to sustain the visiting Reapers. The bite-sized deployment lines up with the Air Force’s push towards Agile Combat Employment (ACE), the operating concept in which Airmen and aircraft disperse from a central base to smaller, more austere locations in order to complicate an adversary’s targeting.

One tenet of ACE is Multi-Capable Airmen, where Airmen pick up skills outside their usual job specialty in order to reduce their footprint and promote redundancy if their unit takes casualties in a future fight.

At ACE Grand Warrior, Ottaviano explained, two of the avionics technicians who traveled to North Dakota were trained on satellite communications launch and recovery operations, engine runs, maintenance tasks, and pre- and post- flight inspections, which are typically performed by crew chiefs. The Airmen also used towing tractors and aerospace ground equipment already available at Grand Forks to further reduce their logistics tail.

“We just need a small box of tools, a plane or two, and a little box that helps us control the plane,” Staff Sgt. Ramon Chanhafen, an MQ-9 crew chief who traveled to North Dakota, said in a video about the exercise.

About 56 MQ-9 students took part in ACE Grand Warrior, where they ran the gamut of Reaper mission and training syllabus sets, including intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance; close air support; air interdiction; strike coordination and reconnaissance; basic surface engagement; kill-chain operations; and basic airmanship.

Today, all MQ-9 operators being trained at the 49th Wing are certified to conduct ATLC in a simulator, Ottaviano said. When graduates arrive at operational squadrons, they likely take part in “top-off” training to be certified on ATLC in live flight.

“Our future plans are to certify all students to conduct ATLC as an actual flight,” she said.

As the Air Force Reaper enterprise picks up ATLC, it should make coordinating future training exercises much easier. Unmanned flights through national airspace has “historically been tedious to coordinate with all the appropriate agencies,” Ottaviano explained. ATLC streamlines the process by removing the launch and land crew, along with the requirement for C-band or Line of Sight operations, since ATLC focuses on only satellite communications.

“This by itself frees up additional manpower and helps to narrow the focus on one type of communication frequency, thereby making the MQ-9 more agile and more flexible to conduct worldwide operations at a moment’s notice,” she said.

Air Force Picks Startup to Build Blended-Wing Body Prototype for Flight Testing by 2027

Aug. 16, 2023 | By John A. Tirpak

The Air Force has picked aerospace startup JetZero to build a prototype Blended-Wing Body (BWB) aircraft for testing and demonstrating new technologies, the service announced Aug. 16. The aircraft is to be assembled by 2026 and flight testing will begin in 2027.

“This is a prototype/demonstration project,” Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said at an event announcing the decision hosted by the Air & Space Forces Association. “It is intended to accelerate the next generation of the large aircraft the Air Force needs in the future. … There’s a real potential in this technology to help increase fuel efficiency significantly. That’s going to lead to improvements in not just the efficiency and capability of our force, but also in our impact on the climate.”

The Air Force is the largest consumer of fossil fuels in the Department of Defense, which is itself the largest consumer in the federal government.

Though not specifically aimed at the service’s Next Generation Air-refueling System (NGAS) effort, the BWB prototype will likely have relevant lessons and use for that program. Specifically, it will play a role in shaping Air Mobility Command’s upcoming Analysis of Alternatives (AOA) for the future tanker program, said Maj. Gen. Albert G. Miller, AMC’s director of strategy, plans, requirements, and programs.

The program is also aimed at bolstering the defense industrial base and “maintaining our edge over China. And there is a lot of commercial interest in this technology,” Kendall said.

Ravi I. Chaudhary, assistant secretary of the Air Force for energy, installations, and the environment—and under whose office the BWB aircraft will be managed—said it offers promise for the Air Force’s Agile Combat Employment model, with high potential for extending range in the Indo-Pacific theater, an ability to operate off short airfields, and a high payload relative to fuel consumed.

Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall announced the selection of JetZero to build a prototype Blended-Wing Body (BWB) aircraft at an Air and Space Warfighters In Action event hosted by the Air & Space Forces Association at their headquarters in Arlington, Va., on August 16, 2023. Photo by Mike Tsukamoto/Air & Space Forces Magazine

Chaudhary told Air & Space Forces Magazine a goal of the program is to achieve 30 percent fuel savings over a comparably-sized tube-and-wing transport, although JetZero’s website suggests the improvement will be as high as 50 percent.

Officials didn’t specify a designation for the aircraft; Chaudhary speculated it will be something like “XBW-1,” but it will not be a traditional “X-plane,” even though NASA is a principal government partner on the program.

Northrop Grumman is one of Jet Zero’s corporate partners on the project, and the aircraft will be fabricated by Northrop’s subsidiary, Scaled Composites, at its Mojave, Calif., facilities.

JetZero co-founder Tom O’Leary said in an interview that the funding for the project amounts to $40 million from the Air Force in fiscal 2024, and that private investors are putting up a matching mount. That will hold through the next five fiscal years, during which the Air Force plans to put up $230 million in funding. O’Leary would not disclose how much private investment is going into the jet in total, but said there has been strong interest from airlines.

In an artist’s concept and desk model shown at the announcement, the prototype aircraft was shown wearing Air Mobility Command markings. Flight testing planned so far will follow traditional lines, exploring the aircraft’s envelope and characteristics like flutter, and follow-on testing may include some operational-like experiments, Miller said. However, the aircraft will not have a rear-opening cargo door, and in fact, no “apertures” for cargo loading are so far included in the design, O’Leary said.

The two engines, which will be mounted on the top rear of the fuselage, will be Geared Turbo Fans (GTF) built by Pratt & Whitney, but O’Leary declined to specify which variant has been selected.

The Pentagon’s Defense Innovation Unit put out a solicitation to industry for the BWB aircraft in July 2022, and the Air Force provided more details in its Climate Action Plan in October. The Air Force Operational Energy Office is taking the lead on the project because of its potential to drastically reduce fuel consumption and carbon emissions.

“The effort aims to mature BWB technology and demonstrate its capabilities, giving the Department and commercial industry more options for future air platforms,” the Air Force said in a press release.

The aircraft’s “increased efficiency will enable extended range, more loiter time, and increased payload delivery efficiencies; capabilities that are vital to mitigating logistics risks,” the Air Force said.

The BWB concept is not new—the Air Force has experimented with large-scale flying wing aircraft since the Northrop YB-35 in 1946, and Boeing and NASA conducted a demonstration program as recently as 2007-2013 with the subscale X-48 demonstrator. The B-2 Spirit and B-21 Raider bombers are also examples of flying wings.

Asked why it has taken so long for the BWB to be taken seriously by the Air Force and become a prototype program, O’Leary said it was “the cost of fuel,” which has given the program “a sense of urgency,” as well as the effects of global warming, which “can no longer be ignored,” he said.

The BWB is also maturing now because of “more recent technology advancements in structural design, materials technology, manufacturing, and other areas have made large-scale production achievable,” the Air Force said in a press release.

Specifically, the BWB concept is applicable to aircraft types—theater lift and air refueling—that collectively account for 60 percent of the Air Force’s annual fuel consumption, the service said. JetZero unveiled its concept for a BWB tanker, dubbed Z-5, this spring and claims that its design has the potential to reduce fuel burn by 50 percent over conventional aircraft. The company also said it will compete for NGAS.

“Today’s announcement marks another game-changing milestone for the Air Force in our efforts to maintain the advantage of airpower effectiveness against any future competitors,” said Chaudhary.

The technology is expected to have significant application to commercial industry as well, potentially offering benefits to passenger and air freight companies by increasing interior space while decreasing fuel costs.

O’Leary said a commercial variant will “almost certainly” have folding wings, the better to operate from modern airports, but the prototype is not required to have them.

The top-mounted engines are expected to both reduce obstacles around the aircraft at ground level and deflect noise up and away from it, allowing a potential commercial variant to operate on routes now closed to airliners because of noise. That effect will also have the effect of reducing the aircraft’s detectability in a military setting, Chaudhary said.

As for whether the BWB will be stealthy, Chaudhary demurred, saying “we’ll see.” Observability will be among the characteristics measured in test.

The BWB project will be a collaboration of the Department of the Air Force, NASA, the Defense Innovation Unit, and the Pentagon’s Office of Strategic Capital.