Promotions for New Staff Sergeants: Fewest in 27 Years

Aug. 8, 2023 | By Greg Hadley

Just 9,000 senior airmen were selected for promotion to staff sergeant this year, a 17.4 percent selection rate—numbers unseen since the years following the Cold War.

The Air Force Personnel Center disclosed statistics for the E-5 cycle Aug. 8, and plans to release the list of selectees on Aug. 10 at 9 a.m. Eastern. It will be the smallest list since 1992, and represent the lowest selection rate since 1997.

It’s also the second consecutive tough promotion cycle for E-5. Last year, just 9,706 Airmen were promoted from a pool of 45,991, for a 21.1 percent rate. At the time, it was the lowest rate since 1997.

The numbers tell the story of strong retention amidst a recruiting crisis. When more Airmen stay, competition for promotion intensifies and opportunities for promotion are squeezed. Promotions to technical sergeant were also low this year: The Air Force announced earlier this summer that just 14.5 percent of eligible staff sergeants were selected for promotion to technical sergeant, also the lowest rate since 1996.

Slow promotion rates are likely to persist. Air Force officials said last year they anticipated lower-than-usual promotion rates lasting several years. Officials believe too many Airmen were promoted in the past with insufficient experience to be effective senior noncommissioned officers, and that a course correction was needed.

“The majority of the experience decline was attributable to the Air Force trying to achieve an enlisted force structure with too many higher grades,” Col. James Barger, Air Force Manpower Analysis Agency commander, said in a statement at the time. “We also found that experience levels would continue to decline unless the Air Force lays in more junior Airmen allocations and fewer E5-E7 allocations.”

The goal: Reach a healthier grade distribution by 2025.

Meanwhile, promotions to senior NCO grades are improving. Rates for master sergeant and senior master sergeant ticked up this year.

The promotion slowdown for NCO grades is the most drastic in a generation. Not since the end of the Cold War, when the military forces shed 700,000 troops in less than a decade, have promotions been so slow, according to RAND.

Air Force Staff Sergeant Promotion Statistics

YEAR	SELECTED	ELIGIBLE	PROMOTION RATE
2023	9,000	51,717	17.40
2022	9,706	45,991	21.10
2021	15,660	44,663	35.06
2020	13,864	33,341	41.58
2019	14,235	29,179	48.79
2018	15,669	30,651	51.12
2017	14,181	32,006	44.31
2016	16,506	39,064	42.25
2015	13,269	39,260	33.8
2014	9,403	36,739	25.59
2013	11,212	34,078	32.9
2012	13,448	33,060	40.68
2011	11,337	26,549	42.7
2010	13,518	28,510	47.41
2009	15,223	30,574	49.79
2008	12,209	28,098	43.45
2007	15,130	36,608	41.33
2006	13,298	37,071	35.87
2005	14,614	36,405	40.14
2004	13,625	33,306	40.91
2003	13,651	27,416	49.79
2002	19,448	30,880	62.98
2001	20,793	32,170	64.63
2000	19,605	38,654	50.72
1999	16,053	44,109	36.39
1998	11,033	48,719	22.65
1997	9,854	52,820	18.66
1996	9,541	57,523	16.59

Data from Air Force Personnel Center

USAF Plan: Keep B-1 Credible Through New Pylons, Stress Testing, and More

Aug. 7, 2023 | By John A. Tirpak

The Air Force Life Cycle Management Center has no set date in mind for retiring the B-1 Lancer, but it does has a multi-pronged approach for keeping the famed bomber credible until the B-21 comes online, focused on:

Parts obsolescence

Wear and tear

Capability for new weapons

Brig. Gen. William Rogers, program executive officer for bombers at AFLCMC, told reporters at the Life Cycle Industry Days conference July 31 the Air Force has dropped its 2018 bomber plan that called for the B-1 and B-2 to retire in the early 2030s, and instead will keep those aircraft viable until the stealthy B-21 is ready to replace them.

The new plan is called a “Bomber Capability Roadmap” and directs investment to combating “obsolescence and diminishing manufacturing sources, which is a key concern of ours on those aging platforms,” Rogers said.

“It’s a common problem across the entire Air Force fleet as aircraft get older,” he noted.

For the B-1 in particular, Rogers said his focus is on making sure the fleet remains capable of sustaining operations and giving military and civilian leaders options, allowing the swing-wing jets to “retire gracefully.”

“How do we ensure the structural aspects of the aircraft … and then, also, what are those key capabilities?” Rogers asked.

One such capability may be using the B-1 as a platform for testing hypersonic weapons. Boeing has offered the Air Force a modular pylon system that could enable the B-1 to do just that, potentially reducing the test load on the B-52, which is entering an intense period of testing new radars, communications, navigation, and engines.

“At this point, we’re really working to first prove the engineering and development work to see if it’s really a viable capability for the B-1,” Rogers said. “We’ve been working with Boeing, [which] has an [independent research and development] pylon that we call the Load Adaptable Modular (LAM) pylon.”

Joe Stupic, head of the B-1 division under Rogers, said the service has conducted ground testing on the pylon, which snaps munitions in like “Lego.”

“If you look at the bottom of the B-1, It’s got a nice round bottom,” Stupic said. “But trying to stick a conformal pylon on it is very hard to do. So what Boeing did was created basically something that could be adapted to any station on the plane with the kit that comes with it. So it’s adaptable, to whichever station you want to mount it to. So that’s the beauty of it.”

Rogers said the program has been successful so far in that a variety of weapons have been successfully mated to the pylon. Stupic said ground tests have studied vibration testing, loads, and “box drops of some JDAMs” as well as with large and heavy shapes.

A flight test carrying “something big” like an inert AGM-183 Air-launched Rapid Response Weapon (ARRW) will be tested in the “September-October timeframe,” Stupic added.

A model of the Boeing Load Adaptable Modular Pylon for the B-1 Lancer is displayed in Oklahoma City. — A model of Boeing’s Load Adaptable Modular Pylon for the B-1 Lancer is displayed in Oklahoma City. Photo by John Tirpak/Air & Space Forces Magazine

Stupic also said AFLCMC is working around measures that were taken to render the B-1’s external hardpoints inoperative under the START treaty, so they couldn’t carry AGM-86B Air-Launched Cruise Missiles externally.

He said there’s “still the structure where you can mount a pylon and that’s we’re doing the work around to get these pylons hanging, but there’s no more wiring, no more power, no more cruise missile control box. It was all ripped out for the START Treaty. So, a lot of work to wake it up again.”

At the moment, the Air Force is focused on using the LAM pylon for testing weapons, Rogers said. He demurred, however, when asked if it could have other uses.

”Ultimately, we’ll see where the Air Force wants to go; if they see the value or not from an operational perspective,” he noted.

Stress Test

Full-scale structural fatigue testing on a B-1 fuselage carcass and wing is also underway at Boeing’s Tukwila, Wash., facility in order to get ahead of the fleet and see if there are “potential risk areas,” Rogers said. That step that was skipped in the 1980s in the urgency to field the B-1.

Rogers could not quote how many hours the static articles have on them, but the testing has been successful, with nothing to suggest “we’ve got a hard, hard wall ahead of us that we’ve got to work around,” he said.

“Now we’re in the phase where we’re probably going to shut down for approximately the next year and really go through both the fuselage and the wing from an inspection standpoint, and documenting, looking for any of those safety problems or issues,” Rogers said.

At the moment, stress testing on the B-1 wing has progressed to the point where it has more wear and tear than the rest of the fleet, Rogers said. But still more has to be done for officials to get a better sense of the wings’ likely service life—likely another three or four years of testing.

The fuselage is further behind and will likely need five or six more years of stress tests, Rogers added.

“We’re keeping the fleet safe until the B-21 shows up,” Rogers said. “… We can keep that plane flying. It is just hard work.”

Structural issues found by the stress test—cracks, separations, etc.—are being addressed on a secondary structures repair line at the B-1 depot at Tinker Air Force Base, Okla., Rogers said, which keeps more of the remaining B-1s in service and shortens depot time.

Digital Twin

The Air Force also has two B-1 carcasses that have been disassembled at the National Institute of Aviation Research at Wichita State University, Kan., for the purposes of creating digital twins.

“Pretty much all the structural parts” have been scanned twice, Stupic said, to create computer-aided design/digital twins of the B-1 that can help predict structural issues and create a baseline for upgrades.

So far, 4,000 of a planned 51,000 CAD models of the B-1’s structure have been completed, he said.

“And what my engineers intend to do is use those better CAD models for real aircraft, [and] bounce them against the drawings from the 1980s that may or may not have ever been updated,” he noted.

Drawings were rushed for production in the 1980s, he said, and “now I have a model that is good for re-procurement of part ‘X,’” that can be provided to the Defense Logistics Agency, which can then use them for parts competitions.

“Anyone can bid on the darn part because it is not something you need” to reverse-engineer 1980s drawings to build, Stupic explained. Modern processes can rapidly reproduce the needed parts and “we are hoping that will reduce our cycle times,” he said.

While the second digital twin, which looks at large structures, is not expected to yield the same level of structural fidelity models as the real-world stress test at Tukwila, “if the results from [the stress test] starts matching, maybe we don’t have to flutter that wing at Tukwila, maybe I have enough correlating data in the digital model that it’s good enough to use in scenarios like this,” Stupic said.

He added that “everything is cycle time, now. My pitch to my folks is, ‘cycle time in weapons integration and cycle time in software releases.” The B-1 is about to have its first agile software release this fall, he added. “Cycle time is a competitive advantage in this environment.”

Air Force Finds Hazardous Chemicals in Some ICBM Facilities

Aug. 7, 2023 | By Chris Gordon

The Air Force has found hazardous chemicals exceeding acceptable levels at two launch control centers at Malmstrom Air Force Base, Mont., and has ordered an immediate cleanup, according to an Air Force memo obtained by Air & Space Forces Magazine.

The Aug. 4 memo summarizes the results of air and swipe environmental testing that was done as part of the Missile Community Cancer Study and written by Col. Tory Woodard, who commands the U.S. Air Force School of Aerospace Medicine (USAFSAM).

One of the purposes of testing was to search for polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in some LCCs, the underground bunkers where missileers work in 24-48 hour shifts, and in other facilities.

PCBs are “probable human carcinogens” according to the Environmental Protection Agency, which adds that they “have been demonstrated to cause a variety of adverse health effects.”

Not all of the samples have raised alarms. Three hundred air and swipe samples were taken at Malmstrom’s Launch Control Centers and Missile Alert Facilities and 279 of these yielded “non-detectable results,” an AFGSC spokesman said. No PCBs were detected in any of the air samples.

Two launch control centers appear problematic. Of the 40 swipe samples taken there, 11 contained PCBs. Nine of those samples were below acceptable levels. Two of those samples were above acceptable levels, prompting the Air Force to take immediate action.

“Based on the initial results from the survey team, which discovered PCB levels above the cleanup threshold designated by law in two of our facilities, I directed 20th Air Force to take immediate measures to begin the clean up process for the affected facilities and mitigate exposure by our Airmen and Guardians to potentially hazardous conditions,” Gen. Thomas A. Bussiere, the head of Air Force Global Strike Command, said in a statement. “These measures will stay in place until I am satisfied that we are providing our missile community with a safe and clean work environment.”

PCB production was banned in 1979, but the intercontinental ballistic missile facilities are decades old. A Global Strike Command official familiar with the study previously told Air & Space Forces Magazine the Air Force began phasing out PCBs at ICBM facilities in the 1980s.

Former missileers and other personnel have long been concerned about the risk of cancer stemming from their duties at the base. Those worries were reinforced when a presentation detailing cases of non-Hodgkin lymphoma, a blood cancer, at Malmstrom appeared online earlier this year.

Bussiere ordered a review of the issue, which led to the Missile Community Cancer Study overseen by U.S. Air Force School of Aerospace Medicine. The study has two parts: environmental sampling and an epidemiological study, which will take 12-14 months to complete, to assess cancer rates.

Members of the study team carried out initial visits in February and March at the ICBM bases to understand what they should look for and where. The Air Force’s three ICBM bases are Malmstrom Air Force Base, Mont.; F.E. Warren Air Force Base, Wyo.; and Minot Air Force Base, N.D. The ICBM silos themselves are spread out over vast fields that reach into five states.

Among the potential dangers, the study teams found stickers indicating the presence of PCBs in older electronics.

“They were broadly used across industries in electrical, heat transfer, and hydraulic equipment and can persist for long periods in the environment,” Air Force Global Strike Command said of PCBs in a statement.

Swipe tests involve gauze wetted with a solution run over surfaces and then analyzed for suspected contaminants. But PCBs are not the only concern. In addition to the air and swipe samples from Malmstrom, water and soil sampling has been done to test for radon, organic phosphates, and other hazards.

“The water and soil samples for Malmstrom and all of the test data from both F.E. Warren and Minot AFB sites have not been received and analyzed yet,” the AFGSC spokesman said. “We expect to have that data complete in a couple of months.”

The team also conducted additional testing to identify any hazardous conditions related to indoor air quality. Samples will identify if there are any harmful levels of carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, ambient temperature, and humidity.

Officials said the planned environmental monitoring is extensive—roughly 2,000 samples per base, Woodard said in an interview in June. Environmental sampling at Malmstrom was done June 22-29 by experts from USAFSAM and Defense Centers for Public Health, according to Woodard’s Aug. 4 memo.

“Our team will work with appropriate leadership and agencies to help further investigate, advise, and assist in developing clean-up, follow-up and medical recommendations based on the above findings,” Woodard wrote of the presence of PCBs.

Woodard promised “a thorough look at all environmental and occupational hazards.”

New Rules to Speeding Up Mental Health Care Referrals for Airmen, Guardians

Aug. 7, 2023 | By Greg Hadley

Airman and Guardians seeking mental health care have access to a new referral system intended to accelerate accesss, the Department of the Air Force announced Aug. 7.

Under the new system, made possible by the Brandon Act, signed into law last December, service members can request a mental health referral for any reason by notifying their commander or an enlisted supervisor at the E-6 paygrade or higher. Commanders or supervisors must immediately contact the mental health clinic and request an appointment for the member by the following day, according to an Air Force release. Appointments can be in-person, online, online, or over the phone.

Detailed of the Brandon Act “Commander/ Supervisor Facilitated Referral Program” first appeared in a memo posted to the unofficial Air Force amn/nco/snco Facebook page. An Air Force spokeswoman confirmed the memo’s veracity to Air & Space Forces Magazine.

According to the July 28 memo signed by Secretary Frank Kendall, the program will be implemented in phases. Phase 1 applies to all Active-Duty service members, including Guard and Reserve members on orders of more than 30 days. Phase 2 applies to Guardsmen and Reservists on orders of 30 days or less.

Phase 1 is already implemented, the Air Force spokeswoman told Air & Space Forces Magazine. She said more guidance is needed from the Office of the Secretary of Defense before the Phase II can launch.

The memo states all requests for mental health evaluations referrals must be honored, regardless of impact on mission or location, and service members do not have to tell their commander or supervisor why they are requesting the referral, though the commander can speak with the member when they make their request.

There is no limit on the number of referrals a service member can ask for, and the results of the evaluation will not be disclosed to a supervisor unless there is a “safety, readiness, or duty concern,” the memo said.

The new program does not require Airmen and Guardians to go to their commanders to get mental health help—they are free to seek independent self-referrals on their own. And it doesn’t change commanders’ and supervisors’ ability to direct subordinates for mandatory evaluations.

All referrals under the Brandon Act must be fulfilled by a “privileged [mental health] professional,” according to the memo, not a chaplain or a military and family life counselor.

The Brandon Act is named after Navy Aviation Electrician’s Mate 3rd Class Brandon Caserta, who died by suicide in 2018. His parents were driving forces in crafting and passing the legislation through Congress, and undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness Gilbert Cisneros Jr. signed a policy in May directing the services to implement the law.

“I spoke with the Caserta family and listened to their experience,” Kendall said in a statement. “They bravely shared the story of their son in hopes to help save others. We must honor their spirit and remind every supervisor and leader in the Air Force and Space Force of their duty and legal obligation to help fellow teammates who ask for assistance.”

“As leaders and supervisors learn about the Brandon Act, we hope it lifts the stigma that some have when asking for help,” said Patrick Caserta, father of Petty Officer Caserta. “Asking for help is an act of courage and mature judgement—in our call with Secretary Kendall, we believe we have the right leaders to help lead the change and improve our military and save lives. We want to thank Secretary Kendall for embracing and implementing the Brandon Act. We appreciate the hard work that he has and continues to do for our Airmen and Guardians.”

The Navy and Marine Corps announced they were implementing the Brandon Act last month. The Army has yet to announce that it has fully implemented a program.

Suicide prevention and mental health continue to be a pressing concern for the Air Force and Space Force, along with the rest of the military. Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III implemented recommendations from an independent review committee this March, and the Department of the Air Force has a cross-functional team responsible to identify barriers to mental health and resilience for Airmen and Guardians.

KC-46 Update: Where Things Stand With Every Deficiency

Aug. 7, 2023 | By Greg Hadley

DAYTON, Ohio—More than six years after the Air Force identified the first serious deficiency on the KC-46 tanker, six Category 1 deficiencies still remain and a seventh was downgraded to Category 2 in April, said Col. Leigh Ottati, chief of the KC-46 program office—the first public announcement of that development

Ottati detailed the deficiencies still plaguing the Pegasus during the Life Cycle Industry Days conference last week and shared updated timelines for resolving some of them.

The Air Force defines a Category 1 deficiency as one which “may cause death, severe injury, or severe occupational illness; may cause loss or major damage to a weapon system; critically restricts the combat readiness capabilities of the using organization; or result in a production line stoppage.” Category 2 defects, meanwhile, “impede or constrain successful mission accomplishment.”

The Government Accountability Office noted seven Category 1 deficiencies on the KC-46 in January 2022, and 19 months later none have been fully resolved. The Air Force worked with subcontractor GE Aerospace to develop a software fix for issues with the KC-46’s flight management system, Ottati said, but while the fix appears to be working it remains under observation.

“We’re going to do that for a period of time to make sure that all the software fixes that are out there are working, which they have been, and then we’ll close that deficiency completely,” he said.

RVS 2.0

The most prominent problem for the KC-46 is its troubled Remote Vision System, the camera and video system boom operators use to refuel other aircraft. The Air Force claims two Category 1 deficiencies related to the RVS, one of which causes the other. In certain lighting conditions, the boom operator is unable to see the receptacle clearly, and that can result in damage to the receiving plane if the boom scrapes against that aircraft. Aircraft like the B-2 and F-22 that have special stealth coatings are particularly susceptible to damage. The planned fix, a brand-new system RVS 2.0 solution, isn’t expected to be ready until 2025, Ottati confirmed. Contractor Boeing offered its first look at RVS 2.0 to Air & Space Forces Magazine late last year, saying it hoped to field them by October 2025.

“We still have challenges and schedule risks with RVS 2.0, but right now, we’re working closely with Boeing and their main subcontractor, Collins, on continuing to progress well with that, and intending to complete the development in late ’25 as previously reported, and then go straight into retrofits,” Ottati said.

Once RVS 2.0 is ready, Boeing will retrofit the Air Force’s KC-46s at Cecil Airport in Jacksonville, Fla., with the process taking about two months, Ottati said.

In the meantime, Boeing and the Air Force are still trying to close out the last “critical action item” from RVS 2.0’s critical design review, which has been ongoing since June 2022.

“The last critical action item had to do with the FAA certification plan for the commercial off-the-shelf cameras that are in the RVS 2.0 solution,” Ottati said. We’ve been working very closely with Boeing and the FAA on that and we have a good path forward and expect to close out that last critical action from CDR this quarter, so by the end of September.”

Stiff Boom

Another deficiency identified more than half a decade ago is “stiffness” in the refueling boom—certain aircraft that can’t produce as much thrust, such as the A-10, cannot provide enough force to keep the boom in place during refueling.

The problem is the boom’s actuator, which “drives the boom out in the telescope direction, and then when a receiver connects with it, the receiver drives the boom back into sort of a nominal refueling position,” Boeing KC-46 Program Manager James Burgess previously told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

Rather than redesign the entire boom, Boeing and the Air Force have opted to redesign the actuator, but developing a compliant actuator has proven difficult, Ottati said.

“We just recently had a Test Readiness Review meeting with Boeing and [subctontractor] Moog, and there’s still some challenges with [the boom telescope actuator redesign],” Ottati said. “Right now, we’re still expecting an early fiscal 2025 completion of the development for BATR [the telescoping boom actuator replacement]. And we have some margin until we can start retrofit, because of the long lead items for the retrofit portion. But we’re still struggling a little bit with the BTAR schedule and working closely with Boeing and Moog to make sure that we don’t eat up that margin that we have between the finishing of development and the start of retrofit, based on again, those long lead items.”

Quality Deficiencies

The remaining Category 1 deficiencies are all related to KC-46 product quality, Ottati said.

One is related to the tanker’s auxiliary power unit’s drain mast on the outside of the tail, which could potentially crack or break loose. The Air Force previously downgraded that deficiency to a Category 2, believing it had an interim fix, but backtracked after cracks continued to appear, Ottati said. Boeing is developing a long-term fix—“a newer, more robust drain mast, beefed-up APU doors,” Ottati said, but USAF is being cautious before declaring the problem solved.

“[We want to] make sure we have the right data, the appropriate data to ensure that we’re not seeing the same excessive vibrations and cracking in APU drain masts,” Ottati said. “And I say appropriate data because it’s primarily at high speeds with the boom lowered that we were seeing those kind of vortices in the back of the aircraft that were causing that vibration. So I want to make sure we have a significant amount of flight hours showing that those drain masts are not an issue any longer. Maybe six months or longer before we will look at potentially downgrading those and downgrading that one as well.”

Another deficiency is bad seals, that lead to fuel system leaks. Boeing officials say they’ve redesigned the valve seals to make them easier to install, and both Boeing and Air Force officials say they’re seeing far fewer leaks as a result.

But Ottati said he’s not ready to declare that deficiency resolved either.

“We’ll analyze in the next six months if that’s one we could downgrade and close at some point,” he said. “I don’t want to close … prematurely. I want to make sure that we have the right fix and plan for the retrofit for the entire fleet that’s affected.”

The final product quality deficiency relates to cracks in a drain line. “It’s a drain line that comes from the receptacle of the KC-46, through the flight deck, and then exits out the bottom of the aircraft—primarily for any excess fuel or water or anything like that to make sure that it doesn’t stay within the receptacle and drains,” Ottati said. “And what we’re seeing is because of the design, in cold temperatures with remaining water or fuel in the line, that drain line was cracking, creating the potential that there could be fuel on the flight deck.”

Progress on that fix has been slowed by the need for FAA certifications, but Boeing is hoping to begin flight testing a solution in the next month or so. After that, Ottati said, the Air Force will finalize the design and retrofits will begin.

Tyndall Finally Has Its First Four F-35s. What Happens Next?

Aug. 4, 2023 | By David Roza

TYNDALL AIR FORCE Base, Fla.—The first three F-35 fighter jets assigned to Tyndall Air Force Base, Fla., arrived there Aug. 1 after a cross-country flight from Luke Air Force Base, Ariz., and a stop for gas in Fort Worth, Texas, marking a historic milestone for the base, which, five years after being leveled by Hurricane Michael, is transitioning from an F-22 pilot training base to a centerpiece for the Air Force’s operational F-35 enterprise.

The jets are assigned to Tyndall’s historic 95th Fighter Squadron, which reactivated in June after a four-year hiatus. A fourth F-35 arrived Aug. 3, making a four-ship for the ‘Boneheads,’ a nickname which dates back to World War II.

“I was able to look to my right and see the two other F-35s with the tails painted in the Tyndall checker pattern, and then I looked to my left and I could see Tyndall, Panama City, and the airfield,” Lt. Col. Hunter Powell, commander of the 95th Fighter Squadron and one of the three pilots who flew in on Aug. 1, told Air & Space Forces Magazine. “That was when you kind of realize ‘this is a big moment.’”

tyndall f-35 — U.S. Air Force Col. George Watkins, 325th Fighter Wing commander, prepares to exit an F-35A Lightning II at Tyndall Air Force Base, Florida, Aug. 1, 2023. U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Stefan Alvarez

Barring further F-35 production delays, the 95th plans to grow to 16 aircraft by the end of summer 2024 and reach its full operational capability with 24 primary assigned aircraft and two more in reserve by the middle of 2025. Two other squadrons of equal strength will round out the 325th Fighter Wing, making Tyndall the first base in Air Combat Command where the host unit is an operational F-35 wing. That arrangement will make Tyndall a one-stop shop for deploying F-35s downrange as part of the Air Force’s new force generation model, AFFORGEN, where pilots, aircraft maintenance, command and control, and base support elements deploy together overseas.

“This is the Air Force’s vision for how we deploy in the future,” said Col. George Watkins, commander of the 325th and another of the three pilots to bring Tyndall’s first F-35s home Aug. 1. “This team trains together, day in and day out, and then deploys together to go set up a wing somewhere, instead of individual units sending squadrons and falling in under a different commander that no one’s ever met.”

Though the wing is far from full strength, the 95th can still sharpen its skills with the aircraft it has on hand. Over the next few months, pilots will practice basic fighter maneuvers, basic surface attack, and suppression of enemy air defenses (SEAD). The squadron received its first surface-to-air missile threat emitter late last month, an Expendable Low-cost Integrated Training Emitter (ELITE) that will be put to good use helping pilots prepare for their “bread-and-butter” SEAD mission, Powell said.

In the wake of Hurricane Michael and with Tyndall having previously been a primarily air-to-air focused base, the 325th will have to develop electronic warfare ranges in order to put on robust SEAD exercises. The wing expects to receive more threat emitters over the next few months to start making those ranges a reality.

“We joke that we have the entire range in our office right now,” Powell said, referring to the lone ELITE already delivered.

Tyndall can fly the basics for now, but “the more jets you can fly at a time, the better it is for advanced tactics,” Watkins explained. Luckily, there are plenty of nearby units to help. Just 90 miles west of Tyndall lies Eglin Air Force Base, which hosts the F-35-equipped 33rd Fighter Wing. More F-35s are also due to arrive at the Alabama Air National Guard base in Montgomery and the Florida Air National Guard base at Jacksonville. Tyndall also hosts major annual fighter exercises such as Checkered Flag, Weapons System Evaluation Program-East (WSEP), and Combat Archer.

“What pushes us over the edge of success here are the integration opportunities,” Powell said. “That integration turns our four-ship into 12, 16, 24 ships of awesome high-end training.”

Still, there may be challenges ahead as the F-35 presence grows at Tyndall. The 325th Fighter Wing does not want to end up with many more pilots than aircraft at the base, which would limit opportunities to fly. But personnel management plans can be disrupted when F-35 deliveries are delayed due to production issues.

“When the jets get delivered or whether any modifications are needed, those are all things that are outside of our control,” Powell said. “If one of our assumptions changes on the aircraft side, then we have to go back and re-calculate what we want to do [on the personnel side], but some of those personnel wheels can’t be turned off.”

The balancing act is a challenge, but “that’s part of the nature of the beast,” he said. “It is what it is.”

Another challenge is scheduling: while the training airspace over the Gulf Coast is massive, staking flight time for all the various military aviation units that share it may take some doing as more F-35s arrive at Tyndall.

“I won’t say there’ll be zero pain points, but that comes with the territory,” said Col. Chris Bergtholdt, commander of the 325th Operations Group. “We’ve got a process and everybody works through what the priorities are for that month.”

An F-15 and F-22 pilot, Bergtholdt flew one of Tyndall’s few remaining Raptors to its new home at Joint Base Langley-Eustis, Va., late last month. The colonel is a product of the 43rd Fighter Squadron, the only formal training unit for the Raptor community, which has put down roots in the Florida Panhandle over its years at Tyndall and then at Eglin in the wake of Hurricane Michael. Seeing it move to Virginia, which will be the new home of F-22 training, is bittersweet.

“Every Raptor pilot to this point had gone through that squadron,” said Bergtholdt, who will learn to fly the Lighting II in a few weeks. “It’s certainly sad to see that mission leave the Panhandle … but the F-35 is a great aircraft and it’s great to bring flying back here to Tyndall.”

Unlike other F-35 units standing up across the Air Force, Tyndall has the additional challenge of being in the middle of a sweeping reconstruction effort after Hurricane Michael. Under a plan known as ‘Installation of the Future,’ the Air Force seeks to rebuild the base so that it can withstand future Category 5 hurricanes and be safer, stronger, and more efficient than before.

The plan includes state-of-the-art combination hangar/headquarters for each of its three F-35 squadrons, but those are not expected to be finished until 2026. In the meantime, the squadron will work out of temporary facilities while negotiating congestion, construction, and a lot of paperwork. Besides jets and pilots, fighter squadrons also need pens, pencils, warehouses full of spare parts, containers for taking those spare parts on a deployment, computers, paper shredders, and myriad other tools and materials.

“There are all these little nuts and bolts and that takes a lot of work to prioritize, shop on these government equivalents of an Amazon list, and then supply your squadron,” Powell said.

The work adds up, but wing members are excited to help write a new chapter in the history of Tyndall and the wider F-35 enterprise.

“Every day is a milestone,” Powell said. “We’re under a lens in a good way: everybody is looking at the great things we are doing, and everything we do is a big growth step.”

Watkins, who once had a similar role as Powell while leading Hill Air Force Base’s 34th Fighter Squadron as it transitioned to F-35s in 2015, held the same view.

“It’s the people who make the culture and the people who make the Installation of the Future,” he said. “So even though our facilities are going to be Hurricane 5-rated and our jets are going to be top of the line, I’m really excited to see where our Airmen take us.”

Lockheed Could Adapt F-22 Stealth Fuel Tanks for Other Aircraft Like F-35

Aug. 4, 2023 | By John A. Tirpak

DAYTON, Ohio—The low-drag, stealthy fuel tanks and pylons Lockheed Martin is developing for the F-22 are potentially applicable to other aircraft like the F-35, the head of Lockheed’s Integrated Fighter Group told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

Lockheed executive O.J. Sanchez and the Air Force’s director of fighters and advanced aircraft also said the Air Force’s hefty investments in F-22 capabilities over the next seven years will migrate to the Next Generation Air Dominance program and other platforms and won’t go to waste when the F-22 retires.

“There is an applicability” of the low-drag tanks and other capabilities being developed for the F-22 to the F-35 and other aircraft, said Sanchez, vice president and general manager of Lockheed’s integrated fighter group, who oversees the F-22, F-16, and T-50.

Sanchez does not speak for the F-35 program and did not specify that platform as a confirmed user of the F-22 upgrade technologies.

Speaking at the Air Force’s Life Cycle Industry Days conference, Sanchez said, “That really is the kind of thinking that we talk about every day as an industry partner; is, ‘how do we do this integration work the best we can so that there’s opportunities for reuse on other platforms?’”

In its fiscal 2024 budget documents, the Air Force said the long-range tanks, which can be jettisoned, will give the F-22 a much-needed range boost in the Pacific theater. They presumably could do the same for the F-35, while simultaneously reducing the burden on aerial tankers. Stealth tanks and pylons for the F-35 would need specific design, however, to harmonize with the aircraft’s stealth shaping.

The F-35 Joint Program Office did not immediately respond to queries about potential stealth fuel tanks for the F-35.

Sanchez could not characterize the degree of cross-pollination between F-22 and F-35 but said that Lockheed is “looking across … the airpower solutions, and if there is an applicability [on another platform], we will do everything we can to build that capability in.” The Air Force’s program offices can then decide whether they want that capability, he said.

The Air Force is on the cusp of deploying the stealthy fuel tanks, an infrared search-and-track system, and other capabilities on the F-22 that will allow it to “go further, sense further and shoot further,” Sanchez said. That’s the Air Force’s vision for the F-22’s remaining service life and “we’re aligned with that and we’re going to do all we can to help bring those visions to reality,” he said.

The Air Force plans to upgrade the F-22 to keep up with adversary capabilities through around 2030, at which time the NGAD is expected to begin replacing it. The Air Force’s fiscal 2024 budget request forecasts spending $9.06 billion on new capabilities for the F-22 through 2030, on top of the cost of operating the fleet.

The F-22 is also the threshold platform for the AIM-260 Joint Advanced Tactical Missile, about which conference panelists would say little. The missile’s existence was revealed at the conference in 2019, at which time it was forecast the JATM would be operational in 2022 or 2023. The Air Force has only acknowledged that testing is underway.

Brig. Gen. (Maj. Gen. Select) Dale White, program executive officer for fighters and advanced aircraft, said the Air Force plans to keep the F-22 at the cutting edge of air-to-air technology through its remaining service life, and that it will serve as a technological “bridge” to the NGAD.

“We continue to modernize and sustain” the Raptor, White told reporters at the conference. He noted improvements such as the infrared search-and-track system, “advanced weapons, extended range capabilities, Link 16, Mode 5 IFF (Identification Friend or Foe), resilient [navigation], low drag tanks and pylons; all those things are still a key focus.”

White said “we’re making tremendous progress on all those capabilities” on a fighter modernization roadmap that will “address the requirements of today and that bridge” to NGAD.

White also noted that the F-22 and NGAD will fly together in a combined test force at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., the better to practice the techniques, tactics, and procedures necessary to achieve air superiority.

Asked to explain why the Air Force should continue to lay out huge sums for F-22 modernization when it will retire in just over seven years, White said “you can’t turn your back on the threat.”

“The threat gets a vote,” he added. “And so we have to focus on that, making sure we have the capability to address today’s requirements. And then, as we work on future activities, it’s tomorrow’s threats.”

The technologies that go into the Raptor’s modernization will also apply across the portfolio, he said.

“To assume that things that what I do on F-22 won’t feed into the technology maturation or future capabilities; that’s … probably a bad assumption,” he said. Lessons learned on preserving the F-22’s edge will apply to other platforms, if not the “specific” hardware, he said. These include the IRST, electronic warfare, and other capabilities, he added, noting that such capabilities could apply to non-tactical air programs as well.

“At the end of the day, we still have a threat we have to address now,” White insisted. “The F-22 represents our ability to address that threat and it will continue to be the bridge to NGAD, and in order to do that, we have to keep it modernized; we have to keep it lethal and operationally viable.”

New ‘Air Mobility Teams’ Can Help USAF Move Faster—If the Kinks Get Worked Out

Aug. 4, 2023 | By Greg Hadley

This summer’s massive, Pacific-focused Mobility Guardian 23 exercise helped showcase a new way to make air mobility more nimble—and also how the new idea can be improved, the head of the Air Expeditionary Center told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

Air Mobility Teams mobilized for Air Mobility Command’s signature exercise provided an extra level of agility for the force, said Maj. Gen. John M. Klein Jr. in an Aug. 4 interview.

“[We’re] force packaging and taking a small team of Multi-Capable Airmen, primarily consisting of aircraft maintenance, aerial port services, and when we can, a vehicle maintainer and some command and control expertise,” Klein said. “So we’re going to force package those into these Air Mobility Teams that are now able to lift and shift and go to where they need to go.”

Air Mobility Teams have been used before—a team deployed from Yokota Air Base, Japan, to Kanoya Air Base last year, and other teams participated in Exercise Defender Europe in May 2023. But Mobility Guardian not only demonstrated the promise of the idea, but also the kinks that must still be worked out.

“With the Air Mobility Team concept being so new and nascent, they are not as equipped as they need to be,” Klein said. “So we’ve got to get them organized. We need to standardize their training, particularly for team leads. And then we need to make sure they have the right equipment so that they can remain connected. The concept has really taken off. There is some standardization work to do and some policy work to do so that they have the appropriate guidance, so we put all of them on the same sheet of music in terms of their composition, their authorized equipment, and their skill sets.”

*Maj. Gen. John Klein, commander of the U.S. Air Force Expeditionary Center speaks with AFA Executive Vice President Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg, USAF (Ret.) on Aug. 3, 2023. Photo by William Healey*

Specifically, Klein highlighted command and control as an area the Air Expeditionary Center is focused on improving based off the lessons learned from Mobility Guardian.

“A lot of our command and control systems are controllers at the air operations centers. They don’t fully yet understand the capability that they had,” Klein said. “And so [the Air Mobility Teams] were put in situations where they had to work 24 hours, where the team was really only designed to work one aircraft at a time for 12 hours. So they had to stretch themselves out a little bit, in order to keep the mission happening.”

Connectivity was another issue. Without tactical, beyond-line-of-sight communications equipment, the teams were sometimes left to scramble to keep up.

“In a few of our instances, the aircraft were just dropping in on them as part of other exercises that were going on in the Pacific,” Klein said. “And they did not have advanced awareness that that was what that station’s workload was going to be. A couple of instances where they did get a little stretched because they didn’t have really the visibility, the awareness, the connectivity they needed to understand what was coming in.”

The issue of connectivity runs both ways—air operations centers need to maintain contact to ensure they can put teams in the right places, Klein said.

“These teams are very limited assets, right?” Klein said, noting that AMC’s two Air Mobility Operations Wings can muster around 12 AMTs between them. “So what happens if you lose one, they just kind of fall off the network? Now you’ve lost the capability or the ability to communicate with them and send them to the point of need.”

Within the Air Force’s operating concept of Agile Combat Employment, leaders have placed an emphasis on “commander’s intent”—trusting lower-level Airmen to use their best judgement and act without waiting for explicit orders from commanders who aren’t on the ground.

Getting Air Mobility Teams better connectivity through things like satellite communications equipment won’t lessen the need for commander’s intent, Klein said.

“Having the ability to command and control these teams is not necessarily telling them exactly what to do,” Klein said. “It is to maintain awareness of their location and having the ability to put them where we need them. And once they’re there, they are empowered to execute commander’s intent.”

Air Mobility Teams also shouldn’t be confused with Contingency Response units, which bring more of their own equipment with them, Klein noted. To that end, prepositioning equipment like fuel, forklifts, and trucks at different places throughout the Indo-Pacific region will give the teams more flexibility in where they can go and what operations they can support.

More broadly, Mobility Guardian was a critical step in the Air Expeditionary Center’s effort to refocus its efforts after several decades of supporting operations in the Middle East, Klein said.

“I think the fact that we are getting out into the Indo-Pacific is a good thing,” the general said Aug. 3 during an AFA Warfighters in Action webinar. “The vast majority of our force right now is extremely familiar with the CENTCOM area of operations. There’s some of us, that’s dominated our whole career, so we know that theater like the back of our hand. We need to become as intimate with the Indo-Pacific theater.”

Life Lessons from the SEAC: ‘Start Talking About the Value of Service’

Aug. 4, 2023 | By Jackson Triplett

Media influence and the lack of a “generational commitment” to public service are clouding the perceptions of many young Americans, Senior Enlisted Advisor to the Chairman Ramon Colon-Lopez said Aug. 1.

Nearing the end of a 33-year career spent as a special operator and senior enlisted leader in the Air Force, Colon-Lopez argued that service to one’s country offers intangible benefits young people would gravitate to—if they knew what they were.

“We are saturated in a highly negative environment,” Colon-Lopez said. “As a nation, we can help each other out and start talking about the value of service.”

The SEAC’s comments come amid polls showing declining public trust in the military and perceptions that the Department of Defense is becoming too politicized. Those perceptions appear to be taking a toll on recruiting, as the Army, Air Force, and Navy all expect to fall short of their recruitment goals for 2023.

With his retirement approaching fast in November, Colon-Lopez reflected on critical moments in his career, starting when, as a college freshman at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Conn., he passed by a recruiting office and made a snap decision.

“I decided to just go ahead and make a U-turn, pull in, and go to a place where I could get some independence and discipline,” he said. Just one recruiter was in: an Airman.

“His name was Tech. Sgt. Derek Reason,” Colon-Lopez recalled. “This man was very genuine. He laid all the cards on the table. … I mean, he basically stood that ground so consistently, and the way he executed his duties was really what told me that I was in the right place.”

After joining the service, Colon-Lopez found a mentor in his first technical instructor who modeled the values that would become Colon-Lopez’s own personal pillars of leadership: intellect and humility.

“Another person that was very impactful in my career was my technical instructor, Staff Sgt. Tim Herrick. … He acted the part, he looked the part, and he was certainly the part,” Colon-Lopez said.

Exposure to that professional competence and Herrick’s “experiential credibility” had a deep impact on Colon-Lopez. “You need to be able to be smart enough to be able to think rationally through problems. And a lot of it is knowledge,” he noted.

However, to Colon-Lopez, that intellect and knowledge must be tempered by humility. His boot camp experience clued Colon-Lopez into the ethos of the “keen, quiet professional” that his instructors embodied.

“Get in the area, and get the experience,” he said. “You need to do things well to get that credibility. And once you have that credibility, don’t let it go to your head. Make sure that you stay humble throughout the process.”

To gain credibility and stay humble, Colon-Lopez cited the importance of another one of his “evergreen” leadership pillars: courage.

“Always put yourself out there and really test your capabilities to see what you’re capable of and what you’re not capable of,” he said.

In 1994, Colon-Lopez was serving in a logistics role at Randolph Air Force Base in Texas. In his mind, though, he was ready for a different challenge.

“If I was going to be in the service, then I wanted to take the path of the warrior. And that is why, when the opportunity came up to me again, from another influential person in my career—Senior Master Sgt. Garry Lewry—he asked me if I ever thought about it.”

“It” was the opportunity to become an elite Pararescueman, or PJ.

“It’s the best decision I made in my life,” Colon-Lopez said.

Leaning on those leadership principles helped Colon-Lopez complete PJ training and advance in his career—but new challenges arose. Combat experiences left invisible marks on him and his brothers in arms.

“My spouse was noticing changes, especially after a prolonged exposure to combat,” Colon-Lopez recalled. However, his fear of appearing weak, and the culture surrounding it, held him back from seeking professional medical help.

It took a “series of missteps” to his family and career, as Colon-Lopez put it, to compel him to actually get help.

“It wasn’t until I finally got the help that I needed, that moment, that wake-up moment, that slap to the face … that said, ‘you know what, you should have done this about 15 years ago.’ And you should listen to other people again,” Colon-Lopez said. “And I felt the one thing that I hold most sacred, and that is humility. I let my ego [get in the way], because of the persona that I was supposed to live by, of a terrible warrior, that ‘we don’t get help, that help is for the weak.’ And boy was I wrong.”

Fast forward to today, and Colon-Lopez drew a connection between the military’s recruitment troubles and perceptions around mental health and the military. In a profession with the inherent risks of combat, young Americans are balking at what they perceive to be the costs of mental health that come from serving in the U.S. military, the SEAC said.

“They don’t want to be ‘broken,’” he said. “There seems to be a consistent drumbeat that says ‘combat time, too much combat, time away from home, alcoholism, PTSD, or suicide’” as a narrative for military careers.

But Colon-Lopez sees prospects getting brighter.

“We’re improving,” he said. “A lot of us have been pretty open on the things we got wrong, and that helps.”

The military has seen some small signs of progress in its suicide prevention efforts. The latest annual report noted a decline in suicide rates for the Active-Duty, Guard, and Reserve components, and preliminary data on 2022 showed the total numbers declining for the Guard and Reserve while staying basically steady for the Active-Duty.

Colon-Lopez hopes that greater service-wide engagement on the issue will continue to help “de-stigmatize certain things and create a better quality of life” for service members and their families, who are then better positioned to serve as ambassadors of the commitment of the U.S. military.

“I’ve always stated that we are our best recruiters,” said Colon-Lopez. “To be able to be exposed to someone that came from that same place that you came from, and open your eyes, that even though you may be living in this environment today, that doesn’t have to be the case for the rest of your life. Because you can have a way out.”

Colon-Lopez cited himself as a prime example of that.

“I have clearly experienced meritocracy for what it is,” he said. “You put in the work, you best your opponents, and you rise up to the occasion.”

Through that meritocracy, helped along by “evergreen” pillars, Colon-Lopez believes the U.S. military is still well-equipped to overcome the challenges facing the services today.

“The fix is for us to really tell the story of what service means to a lot of different people,” he said. “And I think it doesn’t necessarily need to come from the service members, but from people who have benefitted from our actions in different places.”