Photos: NATO Wraps Up First-Ever ‘Ramstein Flag’ Exercise in Greece

Photos: NATO Wraps Up First-Ever ‘Ramstein Flag’ Exercise in Greece

Oct. 18, 2024 | By Greg Hadley

To the likes of Red Flag, Green Flag, and Black Flag, now you can add Ramstein Flag. 

NATO Allied Air Command wrapped up its first ever “Flag” event at Andravida Air Base, Greece, last week, after more than 130 fighters and other aircraft from 12 countries took part in a large-scale, live-fly, first-of-its-kind European exercise. 

From Sept. 30 to Oct. 11, NATO fighters conducted around 1,100 sorties, primarily focused on counter anti-access/area denial and integrated air and missile defense missions, according to a release from U.S. Air Forces in Europe. Among the participants: USAF F-35 fighters from RAF Lakenheath, U.K., and KC-135 tankers from RAF Mildenhall, U.K.  

The U.S. Air Force hosted its first Red Flag exercise at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev., in 1975—49 years ago— with the goal to “train as you fight,” using large-scale, realistic environments and adversaries to help hone Airmen’s aerial combat skills. 

Over the years, the concept expanded around the world, with Pacific Air Forces hosts Red Flag-Alaska exercises multiple times per year. NATO and its members regularly conduct air exercises, but Ramstein Flag took things up a notch, designing the exercise “to provide realistic combat settings,” according to a NATO Allied Command release.

“Ramstein Flag signifies the future of NATO exercises, focusing on current and future threats,” said Gen. James B. Hecker, head of USAFE and NATO Allied Air Command. 

In addition to the U.S., the exercise included participants from Canada, Hungary, Poland, Romania, United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, France, Portugal, Greece, and Sweden. Fighters included F-35s, F-16s, Gripens, Eurofighter Typhoons, F-4E Phantoms, and Dassault Rafales. 

Ramstein Flag will now become a “routine” event—the next one is already scheduled for spring 2025, a USAFE spokesperson told Air & Space Forces Magazine. Whether that event will also focus on counter-A2/AD and IAMD is not yet clear, but Hecker has said he considers both missions crucial, drawing upon lessons learned from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, where neither side has been able to obtain air superiority, leading to a brutal war of attrition.  

Both the U.S. Air Force and NATO are investing more in large-scale, realistic exercises . USAF made building up such events part of its “re-optimization” for great power competition initiative, with the intent to practice “complex, large-scale military operations.” But allies are also in on the push. Last summer’s German-led Air Defender 2023 was the largest air exercise in NATO’s history, and this summer, NATO held its first ever one-on-one fighter competition at Ramstein.

NATO Scrambles Fighters, Ups AWACS Flights to Protect Romania from Russian Incursions

NATO Scrambles Fighters, Ups AWACS Flights to Protect Romania from Russian Incursions

Oct. 18, 2024 | By Chris Gordon

BRUSSELS—NATO is stepping up its air defense efforts on its Eastern Flank, top alliance officials said Oct. 18, just one day after allied warplanes scrambled in response to an incursion into Romania’s airspace.

“Allies agreed that air and missile defense remains an alliance priority,” NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte told alliance defense ministers at NATO’s glass-enclosed headquarters. “This is all the more important given Russia’s war against Ukraine, which has resulted in multiple NATO airspace violations, including just yesterday in Romania.”

Fighter aircraft from multiple NATO countries were scrambled after what was likely a drone breached Romania’s airspace, an allied official told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

“This is all part and parcel of our enhanced vigilance,” the official said.

There was another airspace incursion on Oct. 19. Two Spanish F-18s and two Romanian F-16s were scrambled.

The airspace violations represent a continual challenge for the alliance as missile fragments and other projectiles have landed in alliance territory and cut through its airspace as Russia wages a full-scale war just to NATO’s east.

NATO Allied Air Command, led by U.S. Air Force Gen. James B. Hecker, has stepped up the alliance’s air policing efforts since 2022, the year Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine. The U.S. has also deployed fighters on NATO’s eastern flank and conducted exercises with allied forces aimed at more realistically confronting a Russian aerial threat.

Recently, NATO began conducting additional flights of its E-3 Sentry Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft to better surveil the Romanian airspace against Russian threats. The E-3s, one of the few platforms NATO owns as an alliance, began their increased presence Sept. 29, NATO said.

The “reinforcement of NATO air surveillance” in Romania came at the direction of U.S. Army Gen. Christopher Cavoli, NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander Europe, who also heads U.S. European Command, to “monitor Russian military” activity, Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin said.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III speaks with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, Oct. 17, 2024, at NATO headquarters in Brussels, Belgium. Photo by Chris Gordon/Air & Space Forces Magazine

The flights “strengthened Romania’s ability to respond to the increased air activity in the vicinity of its border,” NATO said in a release.

The E-3s are operating over alliance territory out of Preveza air base in Greece and NATO’s air base in Geilenkirchen, Germany, where the E-3s are headquartered.

“We’re forging NATO’s most robust defense plans since the end of the Cold War, and that will help ensure that we have the forces and capabilities to any contingency—that includes air and missile defense, which are crucial for defending the allied airspace,” Austin told reporters at the conclusion of the summit before departing to Italy for a meeting of the Group of 7’s ministers of defense.

Space-Based Targeting Challenges Nothing New for NRO, Deputy Director Says

Space-Based Targeting Challenges Nothing New for NRO, Deputy Director Says

Oct. 17, 2024 | By Greg Hadley

The scale and pace of providing intelligence to military forces is changing, but the deputy director of the National Reconnaissance Office said Oct. 17 that the agency is drawing on decades of experience to meet the challenge.

Speaking at an event hosted by the Mitchell Institute of Aerospace Studies, Troy Meink frequently cited the NRO’s history when describing how the intelligence organization is tackling new challenges. 

Established in 1960 to manage Air Force, Navy, and CIA reconnaissance efforts, the NRO’s very existence remained classified until 1992. Even after that, many of its activities remained shrouded in mystery, but in recent years, the agency has taken a more public role in the Pentagon’s growing space enterprise. 

Perhaps the NRO’s most high-profile effort is teaming up with the Space Force to provide ground moving target indication (GMTI) and replace legacy Air Force platforms with new satellites. Exactly who will control the satellites and how fast the intelligence community can provide data to service members is still up for debate, but Meink argued the NRO is uniquely positioned to support the mission. 

“We’ve been looking at operational support, looking for moving targets, really, almost since the first Gulf War,” Meink said. “ … This is just an extension of, to be honest, what we’ve been doing for many years. And we’re working closely with, obviously, [Air Force Secretary Frank] Kendall, [Chief of Space Operations Gen. B. Chance] Saltzman, and the entire Space Force staff to deliver that capability.” 

Specifically addressing concerns about whether the NRO can provide targeting information at tactically relevant speeds, Meink said the agency has experience moving fast. 

“I think it’s important to note that many of the timelines we’re talking about today, the NRO was already supporting. This is a new phenomenology, this is new capability, but it’s not new mission for the NRO,” he said. “The timelines that we’re talking about here is not something the NRO has not been worrying about for many decades.” 

Particularly since being declassified, Meink added, the NRO has worked on tighter timelines. 

“The good thing is, we’re not starting from scratch. The NRO’s been around for a long time. We’re a highly classified organization. The last 30 years, it’s been more open, and that’s come with a lot more direct support for those missions that require that timeline,” he said. 

Still, Meink acknowledged that the GMTI mission his agency is working on with the Space Force will require speed and scale on a whole new level, to encompass everything from how the new satellites are tasked, how the data is processed and fused with other sources, and how to manage the sheer volume of information coming in. 

To address some of those issues, the NRO has invested in cyber and artificial intelligence, increasing its computing power and hiring data scientists to identify what levels of AI it will need at different points in the process. Commercial industry will also play a role. 

“A big part of us is now we don’t have to develop [AI technologies] from scratch. In many cases, we’re just adapting them to our environment,” Meink said. 

Another major challenge is just how rapidly the NRO needs to adapt to keep up with the state of the world. 

“The rate of change, given the threats we face, how fast that threat is evolving, how fast the demands for capability that not only the NRO but the entire space industry is seeing, requires a rate of change that’s really faster than maybe almost since the beginning of the NRO,” Meink said. 

Many of these challenges are not unique to the GMTI mission. Meink cited similar lessons from another joint NRO-Space Force venture, SILENTBARKER, a new space situational awareness satellite that launched in September 2023. 

“You’re integrating a new capability into a very large enterprise. How does that data flow to everybody who needs it, on timelines? … It’s one of those things, as you field new capability, how do you incorporate that into a very large, diverse ground infrastructure? That’s probably been some of the biggest lessons learned there.” 

Headbands That Can Take Vital Signs: Air Commandos Try Out High-Tech Fabrics

Headbands That Can Take Vital Signs: Air Commandos Try Out High-Tech Fabrics

Oct. 17, 2024 | By Shaun Waterman

High-Altitude, Low-Opening (HALO) parachute jumpers from Air Force Special Operations Command are sporting new headbands, woven from advanced fibers that measure and report the wearers’ vital signs, transmitting the data to a tablet or other device nearby. 

“We can measure body temperature, heart rate, and SpO2 [blood oxygen saturation] and wirelessly transmit that data to the team leader,” said Alexander “Sasha” Stolyarov, CEO of Advanced Functional Fabrics of America (AFFOA), a Defense Department-supported nonprofit manufacturing innovation institute.

It’s potentially life-saving information for HALO jumpers, who can suffer from hypoxia and hypothermia due to the intense cold and thin air at high altitudes. 

It’s also the product of “a beautiful marriage” between the Department of Defense and the private sector, said Tracy Frost, director of the DOD’s Manufacturing Technology Program. 

To be clear, explained Stolyarov, there is no widget buried in the headband.  

“We integrated the sensors in a distributed way within the fabric that makes up the headband itself,” he said. “So if you’re looking at the headband, it looks just like a regular headband. It stretches and twists.” But that fabric, and some flexible plastic strips inside, comprise the sensors that actually do that measuring—emitting the light and detecting it bouncing back at different wavelengths—the chip that does the computation, and the antenna that sends it wirelessly to the tablet.

“It’s all in the fabric,” he said. 

That gives the headband, worn unobtrusively underneath the HALO jumper’s helmet, a big edge over wristwatch-type wearables which suffer from “user friction” and can be rendered inaccurate by the wrong kind of movement.  

An official with Air Force Special Operations Command confirmed HALO jumpers had tested the prototype headband but declined to comment further. 

The HALO jumper headband is just one of a slew of new clothing items made possible by advanced functional fabrics. (Stolyarov doesn’t like the term “wearables” because of the clumsy plastic items that phrase brings to mind).  

Advanced clothing can do more than gather data; it can also respond, Stolyarov said.  

Because Air Commandos need nimble fingers, they often eschew the kind of thick gloves needed in extremely cold temperatures. AFFOA has prototyped a sleeve worn over the forearm that reacts to extreme cold by warming, raising the temperature of the blood before it reaches the fingers. It also makes thinner, less constricting gloves more feasible, he said.  

But that’s just the beginning.

Fabric that can sense and respond could help protect pilots, compressing or expanding to help ensure proper blood flow during high-G maneuvers.  

“Imagine a T-shirt that provides you and your healthcare provider with real-time meaningful information about how you’re doing in the real environment,” he said. “But you don’t feel like you’re being interrogated by medical equipment. You’re just wearing a T-shirt that you can actually throw in the laundry. … That kind of user adoption is what I think we’ll get to in five to 10 years.”

Further into the future, Stolyarov predicted that clothing could be designed to deliver treatment on the fly. “If the data tells me my wearer is sick, maybe I need to inject some drugs. That’s the next level. … You’re really talking about completely new materials that then enable completely new applications,” he said. 

AFFOA is one of nine Department of Defense-sponsored Manufacturing Innovation Institutes scattered across the country. 

Another six are sponsored by the Department of Energy, and the Department of Commerce sponsors a 16th—all focused on different technology areas. 

The nine DOD-sponsored institutes cover industries from AFFOA’s textiles to digital manufacturing, design/automation and robotics, and biotechnology, said Frost.  

They were established in the 2010s with a two-fold purpose: To try and rekindle domestic manufacturing, which since the 1990s has outsourced most textile work to low-labor cost countries; and to focus on high-value, high-tech production. By doing so, the U.S. military ensures it can rely on a domestic supply chain, especially for cutting edge technology products. 

A Physiological Status Monitoring (PSM) Headband developed by AFFOA. Courtesy of AFFOA.

The institutes straddle the uncomfortable new reality of 21st century technology, where commercial, consumer-driven innovation, because of its scale, can outpace government-led efforts to develop technologies for national security. 

Frost said the institutes always strive to facilitate the development of technologies that are dual use: Developed to solve a national security problem, but useful in addressing the much larger consumer market. 

“They’re a beautiful marriage between addressing defense needs and addressing commercial needs and marrying up Department of Defense needs with commercial interest in developing new product lines and continuing to innovate,” she said. “There’s a big recognition that working together doubles our investment and our chances of reaching success in transitioning these technologies.” 

The United States lost almost one-third of its manufacturing jobs between 2000 and 2010. More than 64,000 factories closed, manufacturing capital investment and output suffered, and the productivity rate dropped. 

By 2016, when AFFOA was founded, “we had really lost our manufacturing base in textiles, because [since the beginning of the century] a lot of that work started going overseas to lower labor cost countries like China and other East Asian countries,” explained Stolyarov.  

It would be pointless to chase that low-value production, he added, so AFFOA set out to create a U.S. textile manufacturing base “differentiated based on technology. And what that means is having unique capabilities, being able to produce fibers and fabrics that no one else in the world knows how to produce.” 

The U.S. already led the world in laboratory-level capabilities, Stolyarov said—in addition to fabrics that can store data and do computation, its universities are able to synthesize “fibers that can change color, fibers that can store energy. There are fibers that can detect chemical and bio hazards.” 

U.S. universities had already produced fibers and fabrics that demonstrated all these capabilities, he said.

“Where we’ve struggled [as a nation] is in translating that into a manufacturing base, getting from the lab to the factory floor. …  [In 2016] no one had actually shown that you can produce these things on industrial manufacturing equipment,” he said. 

AFFOA and the other innovation institutes were set up to bridge that transition, Stolyarov said. “In a nutshell, we set out to work with our manufacturers to transition innovations that are taking place in academia or even maybe startups that are wanting to create companies out of those innovations, and help those founders and help those manufacturers harness the innovation that’s taking place here to create a manufacturing base.” 

AFFOA and its collaborators are experimenting with a variety of methods and patterns to incorporate conductive fibers into a fabric. Photo: Janet Preus
B-2 Bombers Strike Houthi Targets in Yemen

B-2 Bombers Strike Houthi Targets in Yemen

Oct. 17, 2024 | By Chris Gordon

BRUSSELS—U.S. Air Force B-2 Spirit stealth bombers struck Houthi targets in Yemen on Oct. 17, in a raid designed to degrade the group’s nearly yearlong campaign to disrupt global shipping in the Red Sea, Gulf of Aden, and the Bab El-Mandeb Strait, the U.S. military said.

It was the first time stealthy B-2s, worth upwards of a billion dollars an aircraft, have been employed against the Houthis, U.S. officials told Air & Space Forces Magazine. Other U.S. Air Force and U.S. Navy assets were also involved in the operation, U.S. Central Command said in a statement.

The B-2s—at least two, but officials did not say how many B-2s participated in the mission—struck five “hardened underground weapons storage locations,” said Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin, who is here for meetings at NATO headquarters. The targets “contained various advanced conventional weapons,” CENTCOM said, including “missiles, weapons components, and other munitions used to target military and civilian vessels throughout the region.”

The heavy B-2s were able to strike with greater force than is possible with the fighter jets and drones used in prior attacks. The larger-payload weapons delivered by the B-2 are designed for destroying underground targets. 

“This was a unique demonstration of the United States’ ability to target facilities that our adversaries seek to keep out of reach, no matter how deeply buried underground, hardened, or fortified,” Austin said. “The employment of U.S. Air Force B-2 Spirit long-range stealth bombers demonstrate U.S. global strike capabilities to take action against these targets when necessary, anytime, anywhere.”

The B-2s dropped 2,000-pound BLU-109 JDAM guided bombs, a person familiar with the matter told Air & Space Forces Magazine. Battle damage assessment is ongoing.

CENTCOM forces have conducted nearly daily operations against Houthi aerial and seaborne drones and ballistic and cruise missiles—both intercepting weapons and launching preemptive strikes before the group can launch their attacks. A rotating series of U.S. aircraft carriers and warships have been deployed off the coast of Yemen to protect vessels and conduct strikes against the Houthi forces that control most of Yemen. Still, the Houthis have managed to strike multiple commercial ships.

The Iranian-backed group has attacked vessels in the Red Sea region in what it says is retaliation for Israel’s military campaign against Hamas that began after Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. The Houthis are part of a network of Iranian-backed groups in the region that includes Lebanese Hezbollah, Hamas, and Iranian-backed Iraqi militias, which have attacked U.S. forces in the region at least 180 times since last October.

“To deter the Houthi mindset is a challenge,” a senior U.S. defense official told Air & Space Forces Magazine before the latest airstrikes occurred. The Houthis benefit in some sense by attracting attention. Military confrontation, the official said, “gives them a voice.”

U.S. and British forces have previously sought to degrade the Houthis capabilities, and Israel also has conducted airstrikes in response to Houthi drone attacks on Israel.

“Our whole goal is to keep the lines of communication across the ocean free for international trade and keep the Houthi threat from targeting innocent mariners, disrupting trade and free flow of commerce,” the senior defense official said. “But as far as deterrence, I’m not sure it applies to Houthis like it classically would to maybe a different rational actor.”

Iran has less influence over the Houthis than other groups it supports, experts say. The Houthis produce many of their own weapons components themselves and are less reliant on components from Iran, which still supplies the group with high-end materiel, the official said.

“Our assessment right now is that the Houthis maybe do more indigenous production of things than we previously maybe gave them credit for,” the official said.

In recent months, CENTCOM commander Army Gen. Michael “Erik” Kurilla has pushed for a more robust, “whole of government” approach to containing the Houthis. On Oct. 17, the U.S. sanctioned multiple companies, vessels, and individuals for helping supply the Houthis with weapons, the State Department announced.

“We will continue to make clear to the Houthis that there will be consequences for their illegal and reckless attacks,” Austin said.

Army Seeks New Space Capabilities for the ‘Tactical Edge’

Army Seeks New Space Capabilities for the ‘Tactical Edge’

Oct. 16, 2024 | By Greg Hadley

The Army is doubling down on giving Soldiers better access to space capabilities—and insisting none of their efforts to advantage their troops will duplicate work by the Space Force. 

“Our top priority is: How do we deliver that capability responsive to the warfighter?” said Lt. Gen. Sean A. Gainey, head of Army Space and Missile Defense Command, during the Association of the U.S. Army’s annual conference. “How do we continue to get after more tactical solutions that allow our Soldiers to maneuver around on a battlefield—different areas, different times, [with] smaller weight platforms.” 

Col. Peter Atkinson, space division chief at Army Headquarters, said the Army is investing in new space-based gear for communications, intelligence, and position, navigation, and timing. 

“This year, we started the fielding for mounted and dismounted assured PNT receivers,” Atkinson said. “And in [fiscal] ’25 we’re going to scale that across the Army, giving [Soldiers] the most capable, most reliant PNT receivers the force has seen.” 

Atkinson said the Army is also “moving out” to provide Tactical Intelligence Targeting Access Nodes (TITAN) ground stations to enhance situational awareness and give Soldiers targeting data from satellites and high-altitude assets. And the Army is experimenting with new satellite communications terminals that will be able to connect to multiple satellite constellations, giving troops more options and increased reliability. 

The Army effort mirrors similar programs elsewhere: The Space Force is seeking $228 million to fund research and development of its own hybrid SATCOM terminal in 2025, the Navy has a program called Satellite Terminal (transportable) Non-Geostationary, or STtNG, and the Air Force Research Laboratory is pursuing something called Global Lightning.

Lawmakers complained earlier this year that the military services need to better coordinate these efforts.

But Atkinson said the Army is working with the Space Force as it plans for new equipment. 

“Everything we do is in partnership with Space Force,” he said. “We want to make sure that all of the efforts of Army Space are complementary. So we’re making sure to reduce any redundancy, duplicative efforts, and that’s been a major focus through the requirements process.” 

The Army released its Army Space Vision for multi-domain operations earlier this year, including plans to increase its space specialists and to establish a new enlisted career field. That prompted a spirited debate with experts from the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, who argued in multiple op-eds that the Army is duplicating the Space Force’s effort, wasting resources, undermining cooperation, and favoring its own forces over joint capabilities.  

At AUSA, Atkinson did not directly reference those critiques, but he did reiterate the Army’s case for keeping its own native space capabilities. 

“It’s really important: Since the establishment of Space Force, what is the Army’s role?” Atkinson said. “It’s really critical for the Army to dominate on the land domain, to integrate multi-domain effects and multi-domain capabilities and … make sure that the warriors on the tactical edge have access to those capabilities.” 

Col. Don Brooks, Space and Missile Defense Center of Excellence commandant, discusses the role of Army space in multidomain operations alongside Lt. Gen. Sean Gainey, U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command commanding general (right); Command Sgt. Maj. Maurice Tucker, 1st Space Brigade command sergeant major (left); and Col. Pete Atkinson, Army Space Division chief, G-3.5.7 (second to right) at the Association of the United States Army’s Annual Meeting and Exposition in Washington, D.C. on Oct. 15. (Photo by Lira Frye)

Col. Donald K. Brooks, commandant of the Army’s Space and Missile Defense Center of Excellence, said space-focused Soldiers are needed to ensure space capabilities are integrated into land forces to ensure warfighters have access to space capabilities on the battlefield. 

“Army Space is land-centric, providing scalable, mobile, expeditionary and forward postured forces in contested and austere environments that are able to keep pace with maneuver forces in support of large-scale combat operations in the multi-domain environment,” he said. 

“Our primary focus is to go forward into the theaters,” added Command Sergeant Major Maurice Tucker of the 1st Space Brigade. 

The Army has held to this view since at least 2021, when Brooks, then commander of the 1st Space Brigade, told Air & Space Forces Magazine that if a unit has “roles and responsibilities at the tactical and operational level, I think it could be retained and should be retained.” 

But Charles Galbreath and Jennifer Reeves, both retired colonels and now senior fellows at the Mitchell Institute, countered that argument in a September essay, saying it reflects an “underlying mindset … that if the Army doesn’t directly control it, they can’t trust it to deliver their desired effects.”

“While it is understandable that an Army commander would feel this way, this is the antithesis of joint integration at a time when no one service will ever fight by itself,” they wrote. 

Brooks said the Army and Space Force continue to have a strong joint relationship. “We’re very complementary to each other, and how we fight across the tactical, operational and strategic levels of warfare, on the operational side and the institutional side as well,” he said. 

Air Force to Help Maintainers Better Understand Mishaps—If They Can Keep It Secret

Air Force to Help Maintainers Better Understand Mishaps—If They Can Keep It Secret

Oct. 16, 2024 | By David Roza

The Air Force is rolling out a new initiative aimed at helping aircraft maintainers prevent mishaps, so long as they sign a nondisclosure agreement (NDA) to keep it to themselves.

Under a new annual privileged safety information (PSI) training, Active, Reserve, and Air National Guard maintainers across the service would be prepared to receive the full picture of mishap events—including factors, findings, causes, and recommendations—so that they have a better understanding of what caused them. After the training, maintainers would have to sign an NDA, a contract not to share confidential information.

“The confidentiality provided under Safety Privilege underpins the success of our mishap prevention program by allowing Airmen and Guardians to provide a full accounting of mishap events without danger of disciplinary action or public release,” Air Force spokesperson Ann Stefanek told Air & Space Forces Magazine in an email. 

“Without privilege, we don’t quickly get to the root cause of a mishap, and mishap prevention is critical to mission readiness and our national security,” she added.

The NDA requirements are common in the aircrew community, where PSI training and briefings “quickly instill lessons learned across the force by confidentially sharing mishap data,” Stefanek said. Air Force Chief of Safety Maj. Gen. Sean M. Choquette pushed to expand the training to maintainers in August in response to an uptick in aviation maintenance-related mishaps, Stefanek explained.

“Annual safety privilege training will be provided to allow access to mishap data and ensure protection of the data,” she said. “Installation safety shops will manage the process and ensure maintenance-related mishaps and trends relevant to the unit’s mission or aircraft are shared.”

No one can be required to sign the NDA, Stefanek added, but those who don’t sign it would not be allowed to access any PSI and “would not be as fully equipped to help prevent mishaps and injuries.”

A U.S. Air Force maintainer works inside the air intake of a Norwegian air force F-35 at Ramstein Air Base, Germany. NATO countries are now integrating to be ready for future conflicts. (Air & Space Forces Magazine photo by Chris Gordon)

The popular unofficial Facebook page Air Force amn/nco/snco first shared news of the training last month, and Air Force Times verified the reports Oct. 14. The training comes amid a yearslong trend where news of aircraft mishaps often first appears in photos posted to social media, particularly the Air Force amn/nco/snco page.

“Perhaps the Air Force is tired of accidents getting out and Congress, Media and the Public demanding answers,” the page’s moderator wrote in the initial post about the PSI training and the NDA requirement.

Stefanek did not immediately respond when asked by Air & Space Forces Magazine to provide a copy of the NDA maintainers would have to sign; nor when asked if the new training and NDAs are also aimed at reducing the number of photos of aircraft mishaps that wind up on social media. But even if they are, one crew chief said the training could help maintainers gain a better understanding of what causes mishaps.

“I think it will aid in obtaining the full picture as a lot comes with a mishap,” the maintainer told Air & Space Forces Magazine on the condition of anonymity. “By that I mean major mishaps being a ‘Swiss cheese’ effect, and usually not due to one major misstep but an accumulation of events or missteps that can build into a perfect storm.”

Maintenance training is sometimes one of those missteps. After a contractor walked into the moving propeller of an MQ-9 drone during ground tests last year, an Air Force investigation found she was not properly trained on how to approach a running aircraft, had received conflicting guidance about the no-enter zones around the drone, and was unfamiliar with the handheld device she was operating at the time of the accident.

By making the entire account of a mishap more readily available, the Air Force could hopefully prevent future accidents, Stefanek said.

“The aircraft maintenance career field has never regularly received this type of training, and that’s a gap in our hazard and mishap mitigation effort,” she said. “When it’s happened in the past, it’s generally been at the local level only, so those lessons learned are harder to implement Air Force-wide.

“NDAs are already required for access to PSI,” Stefanek added. “This requirement is an effort to bring aviation maintainers into the same trusted fold to prevent mishaps.”

All 6 Air Task Forces Now Activated; Combat Wings Will Follow

All 6 Air Task Forces Now Activated; Combat Wings Will Follow

Oct. 16, 2024 | By Greg Hadley

The Air Force activated the last of its first six Air Task Forces last week, breaking new ground it its plan for how the Air Force deploys forces overseas.

Air Force Global Strike Command activated the 21st Air Task Force at Dyess Air Force Base, Texas, on Oct. 8, and Air Force Special Operations Command activated the 11th Air Task Force the same day at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Ariz. The other four Air Task Forces stood up at various Air Mobility Command and Air Combat Command bases last month.

After years of “crowdsourcing” deployments and assembling deployed units piecemeal overseas, Air Force leaders are shifting to a system where Airmen deploy as units, having already trained and worked together.  

Air Task Forces are only an interim step in that shift, however. The long-term aim is to build two dozen Deployable Combat Wings, command elements organized to lead forces into combat theaters. Instead of drawing Airmen from 60 or more commands into a single deployed unit, the ATFs and DCWs will train and deploy as a unit, developing relationships and trust ahead of time. This builds on an earlier experiment, in which the Air Force sent so-called Expeditionary Air Bases overseas beginning about a year ago. 

By the fall of 2026, Deployable Combat Wings will begin to replace the ATFs, providing full teams that should be able to pick up and deploy from just one base.

The change has more to do with how deploying units are assembled than how they train. “We’re still training for wartime tasks, but we are training more together and that’s the distinction between the ATF and the current Expeditionary Air Base,” said Col. Thomas Walsh, the new 21st Air Task Force commander.  

Each Air Task Force will have four elements: 

  • A command team with expeditionary air staff and special staff that work directly for the commander
  • A combat air base squadron to handle base support 
  • One or more mission-generation force elements, such as a fighter, bomber squadron, or special warfare squadron, to provide combat power 
  • Mission-sustainment teams to support each mission-generation force element, including all sustainment and protection forces. 

The 21st Air Task Force’s command element and its combat air base squadron, commanded by Lt. Col. Nathaniel White, are both located at Dyess Air Force Base. 

“The 21st CABS has the responsibility to integrate the functions that you would normally see within a mission support group, along with airfield operations, munitions, and medical, to become the unit of action,” White said, noting that the unit will include personnel at Joint Base Charleston, S.C., as well.

The 11th Air Task Force stood up in July at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Ariz., and held its formal ceremony Oct. 8, with Col. Brett Cassidy taking command.

“The typical timeline for activation is often on the order of a couple—or even several—years. Yet, here we are after only a few months,” said Cassidy. “Our rapid activation represents Airmen aggressively driving forward the vision of our leadership.”

The Air Force first announced locations and plans for Air Task Forces in May:

  • Air Mobility Command activated the 12th Air Task Force at Scott Air Force Base, Ill., in September 
  • Air Combat Command activated the 13th Air Task Force at Joint Base San Antonio, Texas; the 22nd Air Task Force at Fairchild Air Force Base, Wash.; and the 23rd Air Task Force at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, N.C., in September. 

The first three ATFs will be ready to deploy by October 2025, and the next three will be in line to relieve them six months later, in April 2026. By activating now, the units’ Airmen will join into the new deployment rotations known as the Air Force Force Generation model, or “AFFORGEN.” The model cycles units through six-month phases of increasingly complex training until they are in zone for a six-month “commit” phase. Then the cycle repeats, beginning with a reset phase. 

Far-Flung Guardsmen Still in Southeast as Hurricane Recovery Continues

Far-Flung Guardsmen Still in Southeast as Hurricane Recovery Continues

Oct. 15, 2024 | By David Roza

Army National Guardsmen and Air National Guardsmen from as far as New York and Alaska deployed to the southeastern U.S. in recent days in response to Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton.

Milton made landfall Oct. 9, just two weeks after Helene, which made landfall on Sept. 26 and devastated western North Carolina. Soldiers with the Florida National Guard were surprised to find themselves helping with another state’s disaster relief.

“Florida typically receives the donor states to us, due to being the first impacted state,” Lt. Col. Brian Cooper, commander of the Florida Guard’s 1-111th General Support Aviation Battalion, said in an Oct. 13 press release. “This one was historic because of the size and nature of this hurricane, affecting numerous states at a great deal of speed. So, what we felt as an impact [in Florida] ultimately impacted those states as well.”

Florida troops traveled to North Carolina under the Emergency Management Assistance Compact, which lets National Guard units from different states help each other out. They hauled food and water, conducted search and rescue, and cleared roads of fallen trees and debris so that first responders could get through. 

The Guardsmen from other states make a big difference when Guardsmen in the state being helped can’t mobilize because their own houses have been destroyed, the press release noted. But the Florida troops had to get back home fast to prepare for Milton as it rapidly grew stronger.

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Florida Army National Guard Soldiers with the 1-111th General Support Aviation Battalion conduct flight operations in Florida amid Hurricane Milton response efforts Oct. 10, 2024. (Courtesy photo)

“We had to work very fast to get our Soldiers back home so they could pack up [for extended duty] and be here in Orlando by 6 p.m. on Sunday and integrate with the 856th by Monday morning,” 2nd Lt. Brandi Ruth, a quartermaster officer with the Florida National Guard, said in an Oct. 9 release. “The 356th’s Soldiers had about two or three days of downtime—at the most—after Helene, and not everybody got that downtime.”

Spc. Yetel Fugon, an automated logistics specialist with the Florida National Guard, voiced a similar experience.

“This activation is kind of crazy,” she said in the same release. “There are a lot more missions coming through than I’ve seen with [Hurricanes] Debby and Idalia. [Temporary flood control devices] are much needed and there were thousands of requests for tarps after people’s roofs were damaged during Helene.”

More than 3,000 Guardsmen from more than 20 states arrived to help distribute food and water, clear roads, and search and rescue, a separate release noted. 

“Their help has been extremely beneficial,” Army Lt. Col Arthur Gaines, Florida Joint Force Headquarters Deputy Director of Military Support, said in the release. “The reason we sent out such a large call is because we were preparing for a Category 5 storm and fortunately for us it did not impact Florida to that scale.”

Originally the response included 50 Alaska National Guardsmen, but only 13 made the trip after the hurricane’s impact was less disastrous than anticipated, according to Alaska news station KTUU. Closer to Florida, the New York Air National Guard’s 105th Airlift Wing used one of its C-17 transport jets to fly 41 New York Army National Guard Soldiers and 10 Humvees to the Sunshine State to help with the recovery effort. 

Also from New York Air National Guard were Pararescuemen from the 106th Rescue Wing, some of whom flew in on one of the wing’s HC-130 transport planes. Other aircraft included at least two UH-60 helicopters from Louisiana; one from Virginia, and a CH-47 helicopter from the Colorado National Guard.

New York Air National Guardsmen from the 106th Rescue Wing respond to Hurricane Milton. (Facebook photo/106th Rescue Wing)

In total, the joint resources sent to Florida included 31 UH-60, HH-60, CH-47 and UH-72 helicopters, over 570 high-water vehicles, 13 boats, thousands of troops, and dozens of trucks, according to one release.

“The FLNG has been graced with an incredible show of support across Guard Nation, and we are truly grateful for the willingness, responsiveness and flexibility displayed by our partner states,” the Florida National Guard said in a statement.

In total, about 9,000 Guardsmen from 20 states including Florida responded, according to Maj. Gen. John D. Haas, Adjutant General of Florida. Together, they rescued 330 people and 39 animals; cleared 2,316 miles of road and 5,989 cubic yards of debris; provided 796,248 meals ready to eat; 992,124 boxes of water; 54,000 tarps; and 38,377 bags of ice.

It’s been a busy few months for the Florida Guard, who also responded to Hurricane Debby in August and took part in a major training exercise right before that. 

“We’re tired. I’m not going to lie,” Col. Blake Heidelberg, director of military support, Florida National Guard, said in an Oct. 12 release. “We’re worn down and we’d like a break.”

But the work continues in Florida, North Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, and southwestern Florida, where more than 11,000 National Guard Soldiers and Airmen were still conducting Milton and Helene relief missions as of Oct. 13. Guardsmen are delivering food, water, and generators, as well as hay for livestock, and helping locate the remains of storm victims.

More than 755 people were rescued in North Carolina alone, 219 of whom were hoisted to hovering helicopters. 

“We train for situations like this, but actually being out there, saving lives and removing people from dangerous conditions really hits home,” Florida National Guardsman 1st Sgt. Pedro Montero said in a release. “Our Soldiers are dedicated to helping the community, and there’s no greater honor than stepping in when people need us most. These aren’t just strangers we’re helping — these are our neighbors, our families.”

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Soldiers assigned to Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 124th Infantry Regiment, 53rd Infantry Brigade Combat Team, deliver water, meals and non-perishable goods to senior citizens in the Spanish Lake community in Port St. Lucie, Florida, Oct. 11. (U.S. Air Force photo by Tech Sgt. Chelsea Smith)