Despite Inflation’s Bite, China Set Record for Defense Spending in 2022

Feb. 15, 2023 | By John A. Tirpak

While most of the world lost ground in defense spending in 2022—mainly due to inflation—both China and many nations in Europe achieved real growth, and China’s spending level set a record, according to analysis by the independent, London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies.

China’s spending and “military modernization remains the principal area of concern for Washington,” the IISS said in a summary of its findings.

The seven percent increase in China’s defense spending from 2021 to 2022 is its largest in “absolute terms” going back 30 years, according to the report. In real terms—accounting for inflation—China spent $16 billion more in 2022 than 2021. China’s neighbors, particularly Japan and South Korea, significantly increased their own defense budgets in response.

China’s reported spending is also significantly less than its actual spending, because it does not count many expenditures, such as certain kinds of research and development, space, and civil/military investments as being defense-related. The country’s self-reported defense spending was $242.4 billion in 2022, but the IISS estimates its actual military outlays were closer to $360 billion.

Those numbers still don’t take into account the fact that China spends far less on pay and amenities for its troops than other countries, with more of its funds going toward procuring hardware and conducting research and development.

At $766.6 billion, the U.S. still outspent the next 10 countries combined on military accounts, but its relatively lavish spending on pay and amenities and its higher costs of goods, relative to command economies like China’s, accounts for some of that imbalance.

Russia’s military spending in 2022 was self-reported at $87.9 billion, but the IISS said its true spending is likely well more than double that figure, at $192 billion, and again, its spending on pay and benefits for its mostly-conscript forces is well below that of other countries.

Inflation’s Bite

Inflation dominated any discussion of defense budgets in 2022, IISS said, noting that although many countries announced new investments and increases in spending based on absolute amounts, global defense spending as a whole declined in real terms for the second consecutive year.

“Soaring inflation has wiped billions from the real value of these investments and caused global defense spending to contract in real terms for the second consecutive year in 2022,” the report noted.

Using 2015 as a base year, “the effective purchasing power of global defense spending has been eroded by almost $850 billion, cumulatively, since 2017,” and by about $66 billion just in the last year, the IISS reported. “As inflation abates, policymakers will have greater scope to pursue procurement priorities, but will still need to balance threat drivers against lingering fiscal challenges.”

Globally, the nations of the world are spending more on defense and getting less. While they laid out $2 trillion for defense in 2022, that bought only $1.69 trillion worth of military goods and services measured in 2015 constant dollars.

The IISS also noted an increase in the use “off budget … special funds” as countries seek to rapidly increase their military spending. Such measures “reduce accountability and transparency” and complicate efforts like the IISS’s to collect comprehensive information, it noted.

On a regional level, “European defense spending increased in real terms for the eighth consecutive year, although the rate of growth has slowed markedly from 3.5 percent in 2021 to 0.8 percent in 2022, again because of inflation effects,” the IISS said, noting the response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

In Asia, China’s new aircraft carrier generated headlines, and “its investments in additional and more complex naval vessels continues apace, while its air force is also improving its capabilities: numbers of J-20A combat aircraft have increased further and China has begun to field advanced military aircraft with domestically produced jet-engines,” the IISS said.

In response, Japan is increasing spending while also seeking “new partnerships, including with the U.K.; and Australia continues to work with the U.S. and U.K.” to obtain nuclear-powered submarines.

In the Middle East, where countries are typically high-spenders on defense, budgets collectively shrank about two percent per year, in real terms, for the last three years. Saudi Arabia and Turkey, for example, spent 8.7 percent and 6.9 percent less, respectively, on defense in 2022 than in 2021.

Keys to Space Resilience: It’s More Than Orbits, Says DOD’s Plumb

Feb. 15, 2023 | By Greg Hadley

The Space Force made resilience its No. 1 priority in 2022, with proliferated constellations of satellites a focus of this program to ensure systems remain operable even if some elements are lost. This year, resiliency is “baked into all the conversations,” said assistant secretary of Defense for space policy John F. Plumb, but the service now takes a more expansive view of the term.

“I think it is recognized now throughout the department that resilience isn’t just proliferated orbits,” Plumb said Feb. 14 on one of AFA’s Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies webcasts. “That may be part of it. But if your ground segment is one station, that’s not resilient at all. That’s not resilient against adversaries, that’s not even resilient against a power failure, perhaps.”

Resilience is more complicated than it seems at first, Plumb said. “There’s a lot of pieces to it,” he said. “It is one of these things that if you start to pull the thread, you can go farther and farther upstream on any particular piece, and you’re like, ‘Wow, this isn’t resilient.’ So there’s a lot to be done, but you can’t do everything.”

Concerns about ground stations as a potential “backdoor” through which adversaries might attack Space Force assets using cyber attacks have also been cited by Chief of Space Operations Gen. B. Chance Saltzman. Plumb acknowledged those risks, and said the Pentagon must do more to harden all its systems against cyber and related attacks.

“We have to get past the idea of just a fence or a shell. We have to do defensive depth. The [Cyberspace Solarium Commission] would say that’s not just for satellites, it’s for all infrastructure,” Plumb said. “How do you do defensive depth of your satellite systems, both on ground and in space, so that even if an adversary has some access, the ability to do damage is minimal?”

Defense in depth joins “Zero Trust” as two key cybersecurity terms now being applied to space systems. Both apply to continuously verifying any user seeking access across a network, and minimizes the impact of any single breach.

Retired Air Force Gen. Kevin P. Chilton, who moderated the conversation with Plumb, noted that resiliency also applies to launch. Almost all Space Force launches today lift off from either Vandenberg Space Force Base, Calif., or Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Fla. A few launch from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia.

“All three launch infrastructures are on the coast and they’re fixed, and so a little vulnerable to attack more than, say a mobile launch capability or an airborne launch capability,” said Chilton, a former head of Air Force Space Command. “Imagine some of these smaller rockets maybe being able to launch from inland locations—the deserts of Nevada, California, places like that,” he said.

Now the explorer chair of the Mitchell Institute’s Spacepower Advantage Center of Excellence (MI-SPACE), Chilton noted that the U.S. has traditionally avoided inland launches, but added, “The Chinese and Russians certainly do that. They launch from deep within their borders.”

Plumb agreed, saying different kinds of infrastructure could match the missions of different launches.

“There’s a fundamental difference between large [heavy rockets to geosynchronous orbit] and what some of these smaller commercial providers look like they might be able to provide, especially to [low-Earth orbit], with a smaller rocket, smaller footprint,” Plumb said. The question then becomes “How can we kind of use that diversification for resilience not only of our infrastructure, but potentially in some future situation where you actually trying to launch on response?”

Lawmakers have expressed strong support for “tactically responsive space”—the ability to launch satellites quickly following attacks or losses in order to rapidly reconstitute capability. That’s not easy, Plumb said, but added: “You’re going to see us trying to dig into that.“

Even looking beyond the U.S.’s own borders, Chilton pointed to the importance of allies and partners in ensuring the Pentagon has assured access to space—in addition to a whole host of other benefits.

“I think a lot of folks don’t appreciate the fact that geography matters. And so you know if you want to surveil the southern hemisphere space domain, you’ve got to be in the southern hemisphere,” Chilton said. “Unless you’re having a satellite on orbit, but even that has its limitations. So … our allies are going to be critical to not only space domain awareness, but perhaps launch resilience, perhaps some counter-space capabilities that they could bring to bear that would help protect our Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines, and Guardians that are operating this domain.”

White House Says Latest Downed ‘Objects’ Were Likely Benign

Feb. 14, 2023 | By Chris Gordon

After days of worry that mysterious objects shot down while flying over North America over the past week might be Chinese spycraft or even alien airships, the U.S. intelligence community indicated Feb. 14 that they may be “totally benign” commercial or research balloons.

“The intelligence community is considering as a leading explanation that these could just be balloons tied to some commercial or benign purpose,” said John Kirby, the National Security Council’s strategic communication coordinator.

In a spate of shootdowns Feb. 10-12, Air Force jets destroyed three “objects” in successive days with four AIM-9X Sidewinder missiles. One missile missed its target. The shootdowns followed the downing of a large Chinese surveillance balloon Feb. 4 off the coast of South Carolina after it had crossed the entire continental United States.

Kirby offered the fullest public explanation to date by the Biden administration about the origins of three objects, which were downed over Alaskan waters, over the Yukon, Canada, and over Lake Huron in the Great Lakes. Kirby said the U.S. does not believe the objects were connected to the Chinese government’s spy balloon program or even engaged in intelligence collection against the U.S.

“I want to caveat that we haven’t found the debris,” Kirby added. “We’re still doing the best we can with the observations that were made by the pilots, with the flight profile data that we’ve tried to collect.”

Officials said the missile that missed its target was fired by a Minnesota National Guard F-16 over Lake Huron Feb. 12.

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark A. Milley, speaking at a news conference in Brussels with Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III, said that after the first Sidewinder missed, a second AIM-9 hit the object, which officials have said was flying at about 20,000 feet altitude. The miss was first reported by Fox News. Milley said the U.S. tracked the errant missile as it fell “harmlessly” into the lake and that the surrounding airspace and water had been cleared of any civilians that might have been harmed in the engagement.

While the U.S. is still investigating the objects that were downed, there seems to be a ready answer as to why so many were detected in rapid succession. Radars can be programmed to filter out data on slow-moving objects so users can concentrate on fast-flying threats. That made it harder to detect balloons moving at the speed of prevailing winds. After the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) discovered the Chinese spy balloon in late January and early February, the filters were turned off, revealing objects that in the past would have been ignored, NORAD commander Air Force Gen. Glen D. VanHerck said Feb. 12.

After the massive Chinese balloon traversed the U.S. for a week, it was finally shot down off the coast of South Carolina on Feb. 4.

Kirby said an interagency team set up by President Biden would soon determine new parameters for addressing unidentified aerial objects. U.S. defense and intelligence officials, including VanHerck, briefed the Senate Feb. 14.

After the briefing, Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said he wanted the government to develop better procedures for dealing with unidentified airborne objects in the future.

“There is not anywhere near as formal a process as there probably should be,” Warner told reporters.

Air Force Launches First ICBM Test of 2023

Feb. 14, 2023 | By Greg Hadley

Air Force Global Strike Command conducted its first intercontinental ballistic missile test of 2023 on Feb. 9, launching an unarmed Minuteman III from Vandenberg Space Force Base, Calif.

The 11:01 p.m. launch, supported by Airmen from the 91st Missile Wing at Minot Air Force Base, N.D., included a test reentry vehicle that landed some 4,200 miles away in the Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands, according to an Air Force release.

The test was part of routine missile testing and and “not the result of current world events,” the release said.

“These test launches verify the accuracy and reliability of the ICBM weapon system and provide valuable data to ensure a continued safe, secure, and effective nuclear deterrent,” the release continued.

It was the first launch since the Air Force a pair of ICBM tests were conducted over three weeks in August and September, the only two test launches of 2022. The 91st Missile Wing supported both of those tests as well.

The launch also followed by less than a week the Feb. 8 display by North Korea of up to a dozen ICBMs during a military parade, adding to a tense peirod in which:

which prompted South Korean leaders to publicly suggest conducting nuclear drills with the United States, or even developing the south’s own nuclear weapons program.
U.S. Strategic Command informed lawmakers Jan. 26 that China officially surpassed the U.S. in total land-based nuclear missile launchers—though the American nuclear triad still comprises greater stockpiles of missiles and warheads.
Russia started deploying tactical nuclear weapon-armed ships in the Baltic Sea for the first time in 30 years, according to a Norwegian intelligence report.

The Minuteman III entered service in 1970, and will remain in use until the next-generation LGM-35 Sentinel, formerly called the Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent, is mission capable. Sentinel is scheduled to reach initial operational capability in 2029, with full operational capability following in the 2030s. Realistically, that means the Air Force will likely operate the Minuteman for at least another decade.

To Surge Weapons Production, Air Force May Accept Less Efficiency

Feb. 14, 2023 | By John A. Tirpak

The Air Force wants its suppliers to make weapons faster—and it may have to accept less efficiency as the price of the surge production capacity needed for a modern fight, Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown, Jr. said Feb. 13.

The service is analyzing the weapon stockpile levels it requires for modern conflicts, looking for a balance between inexpensive, less-sophisticated munitions and high-end weapons, Brown said during a talk hosted by the Brookings Institution.

The service is doing “deeper dives on these [issues] to take a really hard look at where we are, from a munitions standpoint,” Brown said.

Over the years, Brown noted, weapons purchases have been structured to be “very efficient,” but “in some cases, to be able to move forward, we have to probably be less efficient.”

Brown’s remarks echo comments from Pentagon acquisition and sustainment chief William LaPlante and other defense leaders who have said the U.S. military must shift from “just-in-time” weapons production—which is efficient but geared for peacetime consumption—to a Cold War-style footing wherein munitions manufacturers have extra capacity in order to surge production for wartime usage.

This is less efficient, but the rapid drawdown of U.S. munitions being provided to Ukraine has highlighted the lack of depth in U.S. weapons production capacity and raised alarm on Capitol Hill that manufacturing is out of synch with world events.

Brown said the Air Force needs to keep in mind the experience of World War II, in which the supply of goods was critical to victory. “COVID taught us a few things about supply chains,” he noted.

However, “we’re also in a different place because of technology, where you’re able to do … digital engineering … and modular capabilities, to be able to do things a bit faster,” Brown added, referring to Air Force initiatives to rapidly design new weapons with modular features, allowing a mix-and-match capability to configure weapons with different seekers, warheads and propulsion systems.

Making munitions modular and with an open-systems architecture can potentially speed up design and production. The Air Force has issued several requests for information to industry to offer ideas on implementing such ideas.

“I’ve … had a chance to visit some of our industry partners to see how they’re … looking at automation and the ability to build weapons a bit faster than we have in the past,” Brown said.

While Air Force inventories are “in a decent spot,” Brown said he won’t be satisfied with mere sufficiency.

“I want to make sure we have an overwhelming advantage,” he said.

The Air Force is looking for “that balance” between “highly capable weapons that are very expensive, but you may not have that capacity,” and the less-costly, level-of-effort weapons to prosecute a long-term campaign, Brown said.

Analysts have predicted a war with China over Taiwan could require hitting upwards of 50,000 targets, and a high tempo of airstrikes could empty munitions bins in less than two weeks.

The Air Force also needs its Joint All-Domain Command and Control system to be functional, so that it can make the best use of the munitions it has, Brown said.

The JADC2 element is critical, as hitting “moving targets at scale is really important.” Brown said there’s a danger of a mismatch, in which “you can have a bunch of targets [with] no munitions, or a bunch of munitions and no targets because you can’t move the information.”

Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall has supplemented his seven “operational imperatives” with task forces to study future requirements in three “cross-cutting” operational areas that underlie all other activities: munitions, airlift, and electronic warfare.

The Weapons Functional Integration Team is co-chaired by Brig. Gen. Jason Bartolomei, the program executive officer for weapons and head of USAF’s armament directorate, and Col. Christopher Buckley, chief of weapons development and requirements in the Air Force Futures shop.

Each of the cross-cutting teams is co-led by an acquirer and an operator in order to ensure that what USAF buys is operationally suitable and arrives within a relevant timeframe. The teams also have heavy input from industry, who provide context on what is realistically possible.

Each of the cross-cutting teams is also developing a roadmap of their focus areas, charting the planned deployment of new capabilities and the sunsetting of old ones no longer deemed credible or relevant. The weapons team is building its roadmap, which is classified.

Bartolomei told Air & Space Forces Magazine in a January interview that the roadmap is iterative and continually updated, but that an early version informed the fiscal year 2024 defense budget request.

NORAD: F-16s Intercept Russian Bombers and Fighters Near Alaska

Feb. 14, 2023 | By Chris Gordon

U.S. warplanes intercepted four Russian aircraft operating near Alaska, the Department of Defense announced Feb. 14. But the U.S. stressed the Russian mission was not unsafe or provocative and the aircraft did not pose a threat.

On Feb. 13, two Russian Tu-95 Bear-H strategic bombers and two Su-35 Flanker-E fighters entered the Alaska Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ), North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) said in a statement. The Alaska ADIZ serves as an early warning buffer for North America that includes international airspace, and NORAD said that Russian aircraft did not enter American or Canadian airspace.

“This Russian activity in the North American ADIZ occurs regularly and is not seen as a threat, nor is the activity seen as provocative,” NORAD said.

In addition to the two F-16s fighters that intercepted the Russian aircraft, NOARD had other assets backing up the mission including two F-35A Lightning II fifth-generation fighters, one E-3 Sentry airborne warning and control system, and two KC-135 Stratotanker refuelers.

Russian aircraft have conducted long-range flights that enter the ADIZ for decades, and American planes have routinely been sent to intercept them. The last incident occurred in October 2022, when Russia flew two Bear-H bombers into the ADIZ which were also intercepted by American F-16s. However, those bombers were not accompanied by Russian fighters as they were during this latest mission.

The Tu-95 is a large propeller plane that has been in service since the 1950s. U.S. intercepts of the Bear and other Russian aircraft were commonplace during the Cold War. In 2007, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered long-range flights of strategic bombers to resume, and NORAD intercepts of those aircraft have occurred with varying frequency since then.

“Since Russia resumed out-of-area Long Range Aviation activity in 2007, NORAD has seen a yearly average of approximately six to seven intercepts of Russian military aircraft in the ADIZ,” NORAD said. “These numbers have varied each year from as high as 15 to as low as zero.”

According to NORAD’s statement, it expected the most recent Russian flight. It was unclear if NORAD had any intelligence of the specific Russian actions on Feb. 13 or was awaiting a Russian mission after a months-long lull in Russian activity in the ADIZ.

NORAD was originally created by the U.S. and Canada in 1958 to help defend the continental U.S. against Russian bombers. The command said it did not believe the Russian flight was an attempt to probe America’s air defenses after the recent shoot-downs of a Chinese surveillance balloon and other objects by NORAD and U.S. Northern Command.

“NORAD also assesses that this Russian flight activity is in no way related to recent NORAD and U.S. Northern Command operations associated with airborne objects over North America during the last two weeks,” the statement said. “NORAD routinely monitors foreign aircraft movements and as necessary, escorts them from the ADIZ.”

US Must Counter China and Russia in the Middle East, AFCENT Boss Says

Feb. 13, 2023 | By Chris Gordon

The top Air Force commander for the Middle East supports the Pentagon’s broad shift in focus toward countering China, but sees a role for his command to help reassure regional allies and enhance the U.S. military capabilities in the region, he said Feb. 13.

Lt. Gen. Alexus G. Grynkewich, commander of Air Forces Central (AFCENT), said at an AFA Warfighters in Action event that Chinese investments, arms sales, and oil purchases have enabled Beijing to increase its influence in the region. But he has sought to counter those efforts by demonstrating the U.S. is a more dependable partner than China and Russia.

“We’re the enduring partner, we’re a partner of choice for them, we want a deep relationship based on shared interests,” Grynkewich said. “That’s much different from the Chinese approach. Unfortunately, we can always depend on the Chinese to be Chinese. Because when they show up, they’ll be transactional. You don’t get the depth of a relationship and after a few years are gone and the bridge they were building or fighters that you bought are falling apart.”

Earlier, Grynkewich told reporters at the Center for a New American Security that the U.S. had detected a Chinese balloon in the region last year, but it did not pass near U.S. military bases in the region and it was not clear if it was a surveillance or weather balloon. He declined to provide additional details but noted that other Chinese balloons have occasionally been detected transiting the Middle East region.

Grynkewich’s efforts to bolster the U.S.’s stature in the Middle East come amid concerns in some regional capitals that the area is becoming less of a priority for Washington than in past decades, when Washington’s principal focus was on counterinsurgency.

To strengthen its military capabilities in the region, CENTCOM and its components have sought to strengthen partnerships with nations in the region. They have experimented with the use of drones and other forms of innovation. And they have taken advantage of show-of-force exercises, like the recently concluded Juniper Oak multi-domain exercise with Israel, or quick injections of additional fighter aircraft and rotations of bomber task force missions.

“It does us well to think beyond our particular geographic region and think about the impacts of things that could happen outside of it,” Grynkewich said. “The place where we do that mostly is with respect to Russia and China.”

Even as the Pentagon focuses on China and Russia, the Middle East region presents complex challenges. That means Grynkewich’s job requires diplomatic skills as well as military acumen.

Iran has supplied Russia with drones for Moscow’s war in Ukraine. In return, it may be getting cash and military technology—Iranian news agencies claim the regime will receive Su-35 Flanker fighter jets from Russia, which would significantly complicate the threat Iran poses from the air. Iran currently has an aging air force dating back to the days before the 1979 revolution that overthrew the U.S.-backed Shah.

Commander of Air Forces Central Command Lt. Gen. Alexus G. Grynkewich, and Air & Space Forces Association President and CEO Lt. Gen. Bruce Wright (Ret.) discuss issues facing Central Command and the USAF at a Air and Space Warfighters In Action event, Feb. 13, 2023, in Arlington, Va. Photo by Mike Tsukamoto/Air & Space Forces Magazine

“The other interesting dynamic is in a way it is flipped,” Grynkewich added. “Who is the client state and who is the benefactor? I never thought that I would see when Russia was beholden in some way to the Islamic Republic of Iran, but that is kind of the dynamic that you have.”

Iranian-backed militias also present a threat. Grynkewich told reporters earlier in the day that Iran had planned to attack Saudi Arabia last year but pulled back when media reports of the intelligence about the threat came to light and the U.S. sent F-22 fighters to the region.

“The threat picture when you think about Iran has changed substantially from what it was even just five years ago,” Grynkewich said. “I don’t want to overstate the analogy, but in many ways, it’s very similar to what you would see in the Indo-Pacific from an operational level challenge. You have large numbers of ballistic missiles to hold your bases at risk, and the launchers for those ballistic missiles are protected by advanced integrated air and missile defense system that rivals anywhere in the world.”

Overall, Grynkewich said that while the Middle East may no longer be the focus of budgets or news stories, it is still a dynamic geopolitical landscape that matters, particularly in respect to America’s pacing challenge.

“China thinks the Middle East is important,” Grynkewich said. “That probably means we ought to think the Middle East is important.”

Brown: Air Force Can’t Let Uncrewed Aircraft Get Too Expensive

Feb. 13, 2023 | By John A. Tirpak

The Air Force is “going down the path” toward much greater use of uncrewed aircraft but must be careful not to overload them with capability, lest they become too costly, Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. said Feb. 13.

Speaking at a Brookings Institution event, Brown said the Air Force is looking for “much more capability for uncrewed aircraft,” and sees them collaborating with the fifth-generation F-35 and future Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) fighters, potentially being controlled from other platforms that are in the vicinity of the fight.

But the Air Force must be “pragmatic” about the cost, Brown noted, particularly for those Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCAs) that are meant to be “attritable,” meaning they are inexpensive enough that their loss would be acceptable.

“At what point do you say, this is no longer ‘attritable’ because you’re putting so much capability into [it]” Brown said. “They’re almost as expensive as the crewed aircraft. … You’re spending so much money and then you go, ‘OK … you want to get that one back. … So we’re looking at how we define these.”

Over the course of the hourlong discussion, Brown touched on a host of other topics, including speculation that a fight with China could come in the next few years; the ramifications of the recently downed Chinese surveillance balloon; the difficulty of getting Congress to let go of older systems; and the upcoming fiscal 2024 budget.

Uncrewed Aircraft

Echoing previous comments from other leaders, Brown said the direction the Air Force will chart for CCAs should become clear in the fiscal 2024 defense budget set to be unveiled next month.

“As we look into our future budgets, there’s three aspects of this,” Brown explained.

“There’s the platform itself. [Then] there is the autonomy that goes with it. And then there’s how we organize, train and equip to build the organizations to go with it, and we’re trying to do all those in parallel,” Brown said. Air Combat Command is known to be exploring how future squadrons might be structured to combine both crewed aircraft and the CCAs that will work with them.

The Air Force thinks a CCA “can be a sensor. It can be a shooter. It can be a jammer.” But is now primarily focused on “how [it is] teamed with a crewed aircraft,” Brown noted.

The service is looking at whether a CCA could be operated from the back of a KC-46 or from the E-7 Wedgetail warning and control airplane the Air Force is hoping to accelerate to service, or “from a fighter cockpit,” Brown said. “We’re thinking through those aspects.”

He added that the development of CCAs will have to involve “some level of risk,” in order to find out what works and what doesn’t, and there will be iterations of the capability.

“It may not work exactly” at the outset, “but we’re going to learn something, each evolution, as we go forward. And I think that’s the way we’ve got to … think about … Collaborative Combat Aircraft,” Brown said.

ACC chief Gen. Mark D. Kelly has said that the CCAs, which will be autonomous, need time to be integrated with crewed fighters so that pilots can become comfortable that they will do what they’re told and not create any hazards to flying or the mission.

Budget Big Picture

While CCAs will form a key part of the Air Force’s 2024 budget, some uncertainty remains over the Pentagon’s overall topline in the coming year, given growing appetite among some lawmakers for cuts counterbalanced by threats posed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s aggression along several fronts. Brown declined to predict a growth in funding but did say he saw “some positive things” along those lines.

But “I tell you, no matter what the topline is, we’ve got tough decisions to make,” he said, echoing consistent warnings from Kendall that the fiscal 2024 budget request will include hard choices between new systems and extant ones.

“I would really not like to see a … yearlong continuing resolution, because all we do is give our adversaries a year to move forward,” he added. “We have a number of new starts in the FY [2024] budget, and if we go to continuing resolution, we can’t start those.”

He added “you just can’t buy back time.” The Ukraine situation and the balloon shoot-down have “helped to sharpen our focus,” he said.

Progress on Capitol Hill

Brown’s signature “accelerate change or lose” mantra is starting to gain traction in Congress, particularly when it comes to retiring older, less relevant platforms to invest in new ones—but the service is hampered by having more secret programs than the other services, he said.

“It’s hard to make a transition, to let something go, to retire something, if you can’t see what the future looks like. And so I’ve spent a lot of time engaging with members and their staff to … provide them unclassified talking points associated with we’re trying to get done,” Brown said, noting that Congress finally relented and allowed the Air Force to start retiring A-10s in the last year.

China

Amid intense speculation as to if and when China might make a move against Taiwan—with a litany of predictions ranging from 2024 to 2027 and beyond—Brown said such conjecture is “not necessarily helpful” and the Air Force is preparing to fight “today” as well as “next decade” and every time in between.

He did say he does not believe that a conflict with China is “inevitable,” as long as the Air Force is postured to deter and, if necessary, to defeat aggression from China or elsewhere.

That, he said, is “what we’re really trying to … do,”—“to make sure we’re going to be ready, and that’s where the real focus is … and think about it with a sense of urgency.” He also said the Air Force is striving not to “fight the last war” by being innovative and thinking frankly about “how conflict might evolve.”

With regard to China, he said the Air Force is also trying to think “asymmetrically.”

Brown offered limited comments about the Air Force’s Feb. 4 shoot-down of a Chinese intelligence-gathering balloon, as well as other unidentified objects this past weekend.

“We as a military have the responsibility for homeland defense. And we take that seriously,” he said.

The balloon and other recent airborne objects “got all of our attention” and spurred a drive for “better scrutiny of our airspace,” he said. Warning radars have been adjusted to slower-moving objects “which means we’re seeing more things than we would normally,” he said. “But we don’t fully appreciate … [or] understand exactly what we’re seeing.”

As Ukraine Begs for Aircraft, US and UK See Jets As ‘Post-War’ Need

Feb. 13, 2023 | By Greg Hadley

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy continues to campaign for Western fighter jets to help counter Russia’s invading and occupying forces, but high-ranking defense officials from the U.S. and U.K. both suggested last week that a transfer of F-16 combat jets are not planned for the near term and might even wait for a post-war “rebuilding” of Ukraine’s military.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defense for international security affairs Celeste Wallander and U.K. Minister for the Armed Forces James Heappey both emphasized during virtual events with the Center for a New American Security think tank that discussions about upgraded airpower for the Ukrainians were focused on the “long term”—and both indicated that the long term may stretch beyond Russia’s all-out invasion, which began roughly a year ago.

Those indications come even as British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has said he wants to start training Ukrainian pilots on Western aircraft as soon as possible. Sunak’s pledge came during a visit by Zelenskyy to the U.K. in which he once more made the case for upgraded aircraft, calling them “wings for freedom.” The British government said it will train pilots on NATO-standard aircraft and will investigate what fighters it might give Ukraine, while not committing to any transfers.

On Feb. 9, Heappey said during a CNAS event that starting pilot training now is in anticipation of potential future needs.

“At the end of the war, Ukraine will almost certainly need to rebuild … within its military, it will need to rebuild and very obviously that rebuilding will probably be through the procurement or gifting of large amounts of NATO-caliber kit,” Heappey said. “And so a conversation was had with the Ukrainians about the state of their air force and what they had got in terms of trained pilots that might be more than they need, given the number of planes that they’ve got remaining in service. And so an opportunity presented itself to start training Ukrainian pilots on the jets that they may have as a post-war air force. And that was the decision that we made.”

A day later, Wallander said the Pentagon’s aid for Ukraine can be broken down by immediate needs drawn from U.S. stocks and more long-term capabilities that will be procured from industry over time. In that first “bucket,” Wallander put artillery, air defense, and ground systems. In the second, she mentioned “airpower” as something Defense Department officials are considering, but not for the immediate future.

“Ukraine’s got to move on to a modern military to have that credible combat power. … And we’ve also worked with industry, not just on making sure allies and partners have the capabilities they need, but that we are able to plan for that kind of capability for Ukraine,” Wallander said.

“Because when there is a either a negotiated settlement or Ukrainian success on its own in taking back its territory, there will be a change in the conditions. Hopefully, Russia will wake up to the fact that it cannot defeat Ukraine, and there will be a drawdown in the intensity in the fighting and that will create an opportunity for Ukraine then to build a longer-term credible defense capability, including airpower, including to complement what it’s doing in ground capabilities and air defense capabilities.”

However, Heappey did leave open the possibility of transferring jets during the war based on Russia’s actions.

“If the consequence of the pilot training is that other options are available to our political leaders later in the year in response to another Russian escalation or outrage—and we have to be clear, each time that a threshold has gone through … it is the way the Russians prosecute this war that breaks the taboo. It’s not the U.K. breaking the taboo, the U.K. simply is the first to respond to whatever outrage the Russians have committed,” Heappey said. “And so as the Prime Minister said, everything’s on the table. But ostensibly, the training of pilots is not with any immediate commitment to donate jets.”

Wallander also mentioned training as a consideration for long-term aid, something Pentagon officials have repeatedly raised when asked about the potential transfer of F-16s. A bipartisan group of lawmakers tried to include funds in the 2023 National Defense Authorization Act dedicated to training Ukrainian pilots and maintainers on American fixed-wing aircraft for air-to-air and air-to-ground combat, but the provision was not included in the final bill. In a Feb. 13 virtual event hosted by the Brookings Institute, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. said it would theoretically take two to six months to train Ukrainian pilots on Western fighters.

But while Wallander and Heappey argued that airpower upgrades will likely be a post-war move, advocates say the Ukrainians need better aircraft now to survive the war.

“Unless Ukraine acquires a replacement fighter force of Western origin in the coming months, it will lose the ability to defend its airspace and support its ground forces, and without control of their airspace they will lose,” retired Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, dean of AFA’s Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies previously told Air & Space Forces Magazine. “Some have raised the practical challenges of pilot training, supply, maintenance, etc. The Ukrainian Air Force can overcome these challenges.”

Providing Western aircraft and more advanced air-to-air missiles would enable Ukraine to defend its cities and infrastructure against punishing missile and Shahed drone attacks, analysts say.

“The Ukrainian Air Force fighter force needs modern Western fighters and missiles to sustainably counter the VKS,” the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) wrote in a November report, referring to the Russian Aerospace Forces. “Russian pilots have been cautious throughout the war, so even a small number of Western fighters could have a major deterrent effect.”