Space Force Satellite Control Network Is In Urgent Need of Upgrades, Watchdog Says

Space Force Satellite Control Network Is In Urgent Need of Upgrades, Watchdog Says

April 11, 2023 | By David Roza

The Space Force system for controlling U.S. government satellites is in urgent need of an update, and the branch also needs an up-to-date plan for delivering it, the Government Accountability Office said in a report published April 10.

The Satellite Control Network (SCN) is made up of 19 antennas stationed around the world, from Diego Garcia Island in the Indian Ocean to the village of Oakhanger in southern England to Schriever Space Force Base, Colo., where the primary control center for SCN is located.

SCN operators use the antennas to track a satellite’s location, collect its health and status reports, and send signals to control its subsystems such as power supply, antennas and mechanical and thermal control. These functions are collectively called tracking, telemetry, and commanding (TT&C), and satellite users across the federal government rely on the Space Force’s SCN operators for TT&C support.

The satellites controlled by the SCN support a wide range of important activities such as positioning, navigation, and timing; intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance; missile warning and missile defense; communications; weather; and research and development, the GAO noted in its report. But as space becomes increasingly crowded with government satellites, the growing demand for SCN operations has fallen on an aging antenna network that is difficult to maintain and too small to meet the need. 

“The SCN makes over 450 daily contacts with satellites,” GAO wrote. “Satellite users who rely on the SCN and whom GAO interviewed said that this increased demand, and resulting limits on system availability, could compromise their missions in the future.”

The problem is not new to the Department of Defense, which has known of the challenges facing SCN capacity since at least 2011, the GAO wrote. The military even developed a plan in 2017 for the long-term sustainment of SCN. However, the large reorganization of the military’s space authorities that occurred after Space Force was launched in late 2019 meant that the Life-Cycle Sustainment Plan (LCSP) is in need of an update to match the current organizational structure. The Space Force initially estimated an update the LCSP would arrive by the fall of 2022, but that update is yet to materialize.

“Without updating the LCSP for the SCN in a timely fashion, Space Force will not have sufficient information to appropriately plan and budget SCN sustainment efforts in the future,” the report states.

satellite control network
The 23rd Space Operations Squadron operates the largest of eight global U.S. Air Force Satellite Control Network remote tracking stations at New Boston Space Force Station, N.H., Sept. 16, 2022. U.S. Space Force photo by Airman 1st Class Kaitlin Castillo.

Part of the challenge affecting the SCN today is that its antennas can maintain contact with only one satellite at a time, and not for very long before the satellite passes over the horizon and out of contact, as Air & Space Forces Magazine has previously reported.

This has led to a scheduling system where SCN users contact the Space Force’s 22nd Space Operations Squadron to request a contact time, and the 22nd SOPS uses a prioritization matrix to schedule a time and assign operators from the  21st or 23rd Space Operations Squadrons to carry out the contact, the GAO report notes.

The problem is that as demand for SCN support grows and supply of contact times does not keep pace, scheduling conflicts occur and are exacerbated by unexpected outages, maintenance needs, or emergencies like recovering a satellite that has drifted out of its planned orbit. There were 15,780 scheduling conflicts from January 2021 through June 2022 alone, GAO noted. And as the current antenna infrastructure ages, SCN operators have to choose between maintenance needs and satisfying demand. Deferred maintenance can lead to antenna failures, one of which lasted 18 months before it could be restored to function.

Outdated infrastructure further aggravates the problem. The Space Force has had to pay a manufacturer to create a production line for making replacement parts for obsolete SCN equipment, GAO noted, and branch officials at Schriever Space Force Base, the primary control center for SCN, said the power infrastructure there is so out of date that “efforts to maintain current operations at the base are unsustainable and mitigation efforts are close to exhausted.”

How to fix it

The Space Force is aware of its growing SCN problem and has several efforts for fixing it. One effort is called the Satellite Communication Augmentation Resource (SCAR), a phased-array antenna that would allow each antenna to contact 18 to 20 different satellites at the same time rather than the one-at-a-time limit imposed by today’s parabolic SCN antennas. It would also cost less to operate the SCAR system, but the technology requires further development, a prototype is not expected until 2025, and operational units may not be available until the 2030s.

In the meantime, the Space Force is working to expand SCN capacity and make SCN scheduling more efficient. These include using five National Oceana and Atmospheric Administration antennas to help boost capacity, though it will take until the end of fiscal year 2024 for necessary upgrades to be finished. The Space Force is also exploring using commercial antennas to increase SCN capacity, though the number of commercial antennas available would depend on how many could meet government bandwidth and cybersecurity requirements.

Meanwhile, the Space Force is also looking to make its scheduling system more efficient by replacing its current “manual and labor-intensive process” with a cloud-based system, GAO wrote. The branch also plans on yanking out 80 percent of the current number of old modems, decoders, and data processors and replacing them with new, lower-footprint systems that would cut down on maintenance time by 20 to 25 percent.

However, some of these changes were not included in the 2017 Life-Cycle Sustainment Plan (LCSP), and the GAO report authors worry that could throw off the Space Force’s implementation of the plan. Branch officials say an ongoing challenge has been delineating between headquarters staff and field commands as to who is responsible for the overall SCN architecture and how those responsible can assess new systems or augment the current architecture, the report states.

Though the Space Force is working on an update for the plan, officials say it has been delayed due to reasons “including updating SCN budget information and an unclear process to finalize the LCSP,” the GAO wrote.

The need to finalize and implement the plan is urgent as the Space Force expects the number of satellites requiring SCN contacts to more than double between 2019 and 2027.

Thule Air Base Gets a New Name: Pituffik Space Base

Thule Air Base Gets a New Name: Pituffik Space Base

April 11, 2023 | By Greg Hadley

The northernmost U.S. military base in the world has a new name, and it’s even harder to pronounce than the old one: Thule Air Base was renamed Pituffik Space Base on April 6. 

Pronounced “Bee-doo-FEEK,” the new moniker reflects the Inuit native people’s name for the settlement where the Greenland base was built and recognizes the base’s primary role in support of space missions.

Located nearly 700 miles north of the Arctic Circle, Pituffik has been home to U.S. Air Force personnel since the early 1950s, where its strategic location makes it vital to missile defense and space domain awareness. Pituffik hosts the 12th Space Warning Squadron and its Upgraded Early Warning Radar, and Detachment 1 of the 23rd Space Operations Squadron, which does telemetry, tracking, and controls dozens of satellites. 

Pituffik’s original Inuit residents were forcibly relocated in 1953, a history that remains controversial in Greenland to this day. 

The base’s former name, Thule, came from explorer Knud Rasmussen early in the 20th century, a reference to Greek and Roman maps that cited a mysterious northern island called “ultima Thule”—named for an ancient Greek explorer who sailed far north and landed on an island whose name he heard as “Thule.” 

“This renaming represents our wish to celebrate and acknowledge the rich cultural heritage of Greenland and its people and how important they are to the sustainment of this installation against the harsh environment north of the Arctic Circle,” Chief of Space Operations Gen. B. Chance Satlzman said at a ceremony unveiling the name change. 

Greenlandic Minister for Foreign Affairs, Business, and Trade Vivian Motzfeldt attended the ceremony and hailed the change as important for Greenlandic culture. 

“With the decision to rename, the U.S. has demonstrated its respect to the friendship between us, recognizing cultural heritage, and the history of the base,” Motzfeldt. “I hope that this day will serve as an example of the ability of great nations to listen to even their smallest neighbors. … Today the U.S. has proclaimed to the world, that here lies Pituffik Space Base, where even this far north, there is a people, and they have a name for the place from where we keep watch over all our peoples.” 

About 140 Airmen and Guardians are stationed at Pituffik, plus some 450 contractors, civilians, and military personnel representing Denmark, Canada, and Greenland. The base is completely locked in by ice and mostly shrouded in darkness for nine months out of the year. 

Pituffik got some rare public attention in the past year, hosting late night TV host and comedian Stephen Colbert for a special in December and F-35 fighters, which landed there for the first time in January. 

Pituffik is the latest Space Force installation to be renamed. Others include: 

  • Peterson Space Force Base, Colo. 
  • Buckley Space Force Base, Colo. 
  • Schriever Space Force Base, Colo. 
  • Cheyenne Mountain Space Force Station, Colo. 
  • Patrick Space Force Base, Fla. 
  • Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Fla. 
  • Vandenberg Space Force Base, Calif. 
  • Cape Cod Space Force Station, Mass. 
  • Cavalier Space Force Station, N.D. 
  • New Boston Space Force Station, N.H. 
  • Clear Space Force Station, Alaska 
  • Kaena Point Space Force Station, Hawaii 

Los Angeles Air Force Base, Calif., which hosts Space Systems Command, is expected to be renamed, as well. No word yet, though, on when that might happen. 

Watch and Read: All the Videos and Transcripts from AWS 23

Watch and Read: All the Videos and Transcripts from AWS 23

April 11, 2023

The 2023 AFA Warfare Symposium held March 6-8 in Aurora, Colo., brought together dozens of the leading voices shaping the Air Force and Space Force of today and the future.  

You can access the entire program via on-demand video and complete transcripts starting now, with every keynote session and panel discussion. All sessions are listed here.

Keynotes

Panel Discussions

  • Senior Enlisted Advisor to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Ramón “CZ” Colón-López; Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force JoAnne S. Bass; and Chief Master Sergeant of the Space Force Roger Towberman, “The Enlisted Imperative”
  • Gen. Kenneth S. Wilsbach, Commander, Pacific Air Forces; Gen. James B. Hecker, U.S. Air Forces in Europe Commander; and Lt. Gen. Nina M. Armagno, Director of Staff, USSF, “Airmen & Guardians in Demand: Meeting the Need”
  • Lt. Gen. John P. Healy, Chief of Air Force Reserve; Lt. Gen. Michael A. Loh, Director of the Air National Guard; Brig. Gen. Neil Richardson, Deputy Director of Operations, Strategic Deterrence and Nuclear Integration, Headquarters Air Mobility Command; and Maj. Gen. Clark J. Quinn, Deputy Commander Air Forces Central Command, “Building High-End Readiness: Deploying Under the Air Force Generation Model”
  • Gen. B. Chance Saltzman, Chief of Space Operations; Gen. David W. Allvin, Vice Chief of Staff of the Air Force; Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force Joanne S. Bass; and Chief Master Sergeant of the Space Force Roger A. Towberman, “Warfighting from the Homefront: Senior Leaders Perspective”
  • Lt. Gen. Alexus G. Grynkewich, commander of Air Forces Central Command; Lt. Gen. Scott L. Pleus, deputy commander of U.S. Forces Korea; Maj. Gen. Derek France, commander of the Third Air Force; and Brig. Gen. Anthony J. Mastalir, commander of United States Space Forces Indo-Pacific, “Defending Forward Bases”
  • Gen. Mike Minihan, commander of Air Mobility Command, and Gen. Duke Richardson, commander of Air Force Materiel Command, “Logistics on the Attack: The Build Up and the Delivery”
  • Gen. David W. Allvin, Vice Chief of Staff of the Air Force; Gen. David D. Thompson, Vice Chief of Space Operations, “Joint Warfighting Requirements: The Forces Needed to Fight and Win”
  • Andrew P. Hunter, the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition Technology and Logistics, and Maj. Gen. Steve Whitney, the Military Deputy of the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Space Acquisition and Integration “Answering the Warfighters’ Needs”
  • Gen. John E. Hyten, USAF (Ret.), former Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Gen. Glen D. VanHerck, commander of U.S. Northern Command; and Lt. Gen. John Shaw, deputy commander of U.S. Space Command, “Evolving Threats: Protecting the Homeland”
  • Col. Charles B. DeBellevue, USAF (Ret.), the highest scoring ACE of Vietnam War and last American ACE; Col. Lee Ellis, USAF (Ret.), Vietnam War POW (1967-1973); and Lt. Col. Gene Smith, USAF (Ret.), Vietnam War POW (1967-1973), “Lessons from Vietnam: 50 Years Later”
  • Lt. Col. Elizabeth Blakeman, co-lead of Air Combat Command’s Sword Athena program; Kristen Christy, resilience trainer with Fortify the Force; and Maj. Bridget Pantaleon, Family Life Action Group, “United Forces and Families”
  • Lt. Gen. Leah G. Lauderback, deputy chief of staff for intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance and cyber effects operations; Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Kruse, director’s advisor for military affairs at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence; Maj. Gen. Gregory J. Gagnon, deputy chief of space operations for intelligence, “Threats, Targets, and Intelligence Advantage”
  • Retired Maj. Gen. Kimberly Crider, former mobilization assistant to the Chief of Space Operations and Acting USSF Chief Technology and Innovation Office; Bill Torson, warfighting architect for Kessel Run; Col. Alan “Doc” Docauer, chief of command and control/intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance operations for Air Combat Command; Col. Frederick “Trey” Coleman, commander of the 505th Command and Control Wing, “The New Air Operations Center”
  • Lt. Gen. Jim Slife, deputy chief of staff for operations; Lt. Gen. Brian S. Robinson, commander of Air Education and Training Command; Maj. Gen. Jeannie M. Leavitt, chief of safety for the Department of the Air Force, “Ready to Fight: Flying Hours, Flight Safety, and Training the Next Generation of Pilots”
  • Brig. Gen. Jeffery Valenzia, DAF Advance Battle Management System Cross Functional Team lead; Col. Frederick “Trey” Coleman, commander of the 505th Command and Control Wing; retired Lt. Gen. Dave Deptula, dean of the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies; Heather Penney, senior resident fellow at the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, “Optimizing C2 to Assure Kill Web Dominance”
  • Lt. Gen. Tony D. Bauernfeind, commander of Air Force Special Operations Command; Lt. Gen. Alexus G. Grynkewich, commander of Air Forces Central Command; Lt. Gen. Michael A. Loh, director of the Air National Guard; Maj. Gen. Derek C. France, commander of the Third Air Force; Col. David Pappalardo, French Air and Space Attaché, “Agile Combat Employment: Are We Ready?”
  • Retired Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, dean of the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies; Gen. Mark D. Kelly, commander of Air Combat Command; Lt. Gen. Stephen N. Whiting, commander of Space Operations Command; and Lt. Gen. Alberto Biavati, Italian Air Force Operational Forces Commander, “Every Threat a Target”

Industry Panels

  • Maj. Gen. R. Scott Jobe, director of plans, programs, and requirements for Air Combat Command; Brig. Gen. Dale R. White, program executive officer for fighters and advanced aircraft; David Alexander, president of the aircraft systems group for General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Inc.; and Mike Benitez, director of product for Shield AI, “Advancements in Collaborative Combat Aircraft CONOPs”
  • Willy Andersen, vice president of multi domain-special programs and capabilities at Boeing’s Phantom Works; Jon Norman, vice president of air power, requirements and capabilities at Raytheon; and Doug Young, vice president and general manager for strike programs for Northrop Grumman, “Global Strike”
  • Chad Haferbier, vice president and division manager for multi-domain operations of Leidos; Lance Spencer, client executive vice president for AT&T Global Public Sector; Joseph Sublousky, vice president for joint all domain command and control at SAIC; and Col. Frederick “Trey” Coleman, commander of the 505th Command and Control Wing, “Operationalizing ABMS-JADC2”
  • Maj. Gen. Heather Pringle, commander of the Air Force Research Laboratory; Andre McMillian, vice president of sustainment operations for military engines at Pratt & Whitney; Brian Morrison, vice president and general manager of cyber systems at General Dynamics; and David Tweedie, general manager of advanced products at GE Edison Works, “Transitioning to a Wartime Posture Against a Peer Competitor”
  • Willy Anderson, vice president of Boeing’s Phantom Works; Renee Pasman, vice president of integrated systems for advanced development programs at Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works; and Gregory Simer, vice president at Northrop Grumman, “Defining the Next-Generation Air Dominance Family of Systems”
  • Brig. Gen. Luke C. G. Cropsey, the Air Force’s program executive officer for command, control, communications, and battle management; Elaine Bitonti, vice president and general manager of connected battlespace and emerging capabilities mission systems for Collins Aerospace; Dan Markham, director for Joint All Domain Operations / Advanced Battle Management System in Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works division; retired Lt. Col. Ron Fehlen, vice president and general manager for Air Force and Space Force programs at L3Harris, “Operationally Focused ABMS”
  • Jason Brown, professional services manager for Google Public Sector; Joel Nelson, senior director for strategy and business development for Space Systems at L3Harris; Kay Sears, vice president and general manager for space, intelligence and weapon systems for Boeing Defense, Space & Security; Lt. Gen. DeAnna M. Burt, deputy chief of space operations for operations, cyber, and nuclear, “Defining Resilient and Effective Space Order of Battle and Architectures”
  • Ryan Bunge, Vice President & General Manager Resilient Networking and Autonomy Solutions, Collins Aerospace; Thom Kenney, Technical Director, OCTO, Google; Brad Reeves, Director for C4I Solutions, Elbit America, “Defining Optimized Resilient Basing”
  • Paul Ferraro, president of air power at Raytheon Technologies; Dave Richards, senior director of precision weapon systems and precision targeting solutions at Elbit America; Mike Shortsleeve, vice president of strategic development at General Atomics Aeronautical Systems; Maj. Gen. R. Scott Jobe, director of plans, programs, and requirements for Air Combat Command, “Achieving Moving Target Engagement at Scale”
Massive German-Hosted Air Exercise Will Feature 220 Aircraft, Simulated Combat

Massive German-Hosted Air Exercise Will Feature 220 Aircraft, Simulated Combat

April 11, 2023 | By Chris Gordon

JOINT BASE ANDREWS, Md.—U.S. and European allies will conduct a massive air exercise in Germany this June on a scale unseen since the end of the Cold War, military officials said.

Some 220 allied aircraft and 10,000 personnel will take part in Air Defender 23, against the backdrop of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. 

Around 100 U.S. aircraft, all from the Air National Guard, will come together with allied planes to practice combat, distributed operations, and degraded command and control. U.S. F-35s, F-16s, F-15s, A-10s, KC-135, KC-46s, C-130s, and C-17s will all take part, as well as hundreds of Airmen from 35 states.

The exercise will include mock enemy aircraft, known as Red Air, as allied “Blue” crews train how to fight with each other against a potential foe. 

“Blue will be killing and Red will be killing,” ANG director Lt. Gen. Michael A. Loh told Air & Space Forces Magazine on April 5. “Everyone will see a little bit of Red.”

German-Led, NATO Heavy

Air Defender will mostly take place in Germany, but planes will also operate from forward operation locations in the Czech Republic, Estonia, and Latvia, and airbases across the continent will host participating aircraft.

A German military spokesperson stressed that the exercise was organized by Germany, not NATO headquarters, but it will include support from the alliance, and 22 of 24 participating countries are NATO members, along with prospective NATO member Sweden.

NATO has stepped up its air policing efforts in Eastern Europe since Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Many countries in the alliance, including Germany, have also pledged to strengthen their military posture, including their air forces.

“We have to take responsibility to stand up and say ‘OK, we are ready to defend the alliance,’” Chief of the German Air Force Lt. Gen. Ingo Gerhartz said. 

Gerhartz, who has headed the Luftwaffe since 2018, was the driving force behind Air Defender, taking inspiration from the Defender series of large-scale ground exercises, said retired USAF Gen. Jeffrey L. Harrigian, who led U.S. Air Forces in Europe and NATO Allied Air Command from 2019-2022.

Gerhartz has also pushed to modernize the German air force, which will be boosted by a deal signed last year for 35 F-35 stealth fighters. 

Harrigian said European allies saw a need to modernize their air forces even before Russia’s invasion. The dangers were highlighted at a 2019 NATO meeting in which the alliance deemed Russia a “threat” to security in the region, which enabled regional air forces to gain support for better equipment and training.

“That was a key political decision,” Harrigian told Air & Space Forces Magazine. “Because if we mass legitimate capabilities, it’s going to deter Russia, and they’re not going to want any part of what we could potentially do to them. And everybody got it.”

USAF Goals

While the idea for Air Defender is not wholly American, it will be a large-scale test of some of the U.S. Air Force’s new operating concepts, such as Agile Combat Employment—when Airmen and planes disperse in smaller teams to operate from remote or austere locations.

The six U.S. F-35s set to participate in the exercise are from the Vermont Air National Guard, which deployed to Europe last summer as part of NATO’s enhanced air policing mission. 

The F-35 and its stealth technology are closely guarded secrets, which can make international operations more of a challenge. When two F-35s landed and parked in front of Loh and Gerhartz at Andrews recently, reporters were cautioned not to take pictures of the planes from certain angles. 

“There’s too many people that can say ‘no,’” Loh said. But the ANG’s previous F-35 deployment “broke down those initial barriers,” he added.

Loh said he hopes Air Defender will have “more and more data sharing more and more people working on each other’s aircraft.”

Another skill the USAF plans to work on in Air Defender is the ability of aircrews to operate with some degree of autonomy—in contrast to the top-down campaigns the Air Force has conducted in the Middle East, with missions carefully coordinated by air operations centers in the region. 

“It gets us out of what I would call the legacy mindset of CENTCOM,” Loh said.

Another closely related goal is encouraging quick thinking under fire.

“At some point, we’ve got to train before you can actually do it,” Loh said. “It doesn’t matter what it is, A-10, KC-135, are they going to be able to go ‘OK, I’ve lost our comms, everybody.’ I know what the initial plan was for today. Can I set myself up and do it as an aircraft commander, with a full crew, and take off and go make the next mission?”

Massive Scale

Though NATO and its members’ air forces have been increasing the number of air policing patrols and defensive drills, Air Defender will bring throngs of aircraft to bear in way that is not possible on a day-to-day basis.

“We need to exercise at this larger scale,” retired Gen. Phillip M. Breedlove, the former NATO Supreme Allied Commander, told Air & Space Forces Magazine. “We do not do it often enough.”

Gerhartz, whose nation will have around 60 aircraft participating and will provide logistical and command and control support, agrees.

“We have to be much more capable of defending the lines and it’s not just about talking or showing slides,” Gerhartz said. “We have to prove it, we have to demonstrate it.

“How do you inform Russia? Well, we won’t write them a letter. I think they get the message when we deploy.”

Air Force Flies C-17 as Command and Control Platform in ACE Experiment

Air Force Flies C-17 as Command and Control Platform in ACE Experiment

April 11, 2023 | By David Roza

Airmen took a C-17 from the 62nd Airlift Wing on a new mission earlier this year by using the transport jet as a mobile command-and-control station for coordinating simulated air and ground operations at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev. The experiment could pave the way for field commanders to have more options for controlling a battlespace as the Air Force retires its current fleet of aging command and control (C2) platforms.

“Our work offers some additional alternatives or resiliency” as the E-7 Wedgetail comes online to replace the E-3 AWACS, Air Force Maj. Paden Allen told Air & Space Forces Magazine. “You can only make airplanes so fast, so then the question becomes: while we’re waiting, what are some other things we can do to build the resiliency of our C2 enterprise?”

As the commander of the C2 division of the 422nd Test and Evaluation Squadron, Allen oversaw the experiment at Nellis, which took place in late February during Black Flag 23-1, an operational test for new capabilities and tactics. 

C2 refers to a commander’s ability to maneuver forces to accomplish objectives, Allen explained. Battle management is a tactical subcategory of C2 where battle managers give specific directions to specific warfighters, a bit like a stage manager coordinating a theater production, Allen said.

The Air Force relies on multiple platforms both in the air and on the ground to form a theater air control system. These include ground-based Control and Reporting Centers (CRC) and Air Support Operations Centers, alongside airborne E-3 AWACS and E-8 JSTARS platforms. Much of the technology used in these platforms comes from the 1970s or 1980s and is outdated or bulky, Allen explained, which makes moving ground-based elements like the CRC around a dynamic battle zone a time-intensive prospect.

“Our time frames are about one to three days to get everything packed,” said Staff Sgt. Hannah Fisk, a weapons director with the 422 TES. “And that’s not even the set-up once we get to the location we need to be at.”

Those long time frames hurt the Air Force’s ability to move quickly, Fisk explained. Mobility is a central tenet of the branch’s strategy to disperse operations so that it is more difficult for adversaries to select airfields to target. The good news is that there is plenty of modern technology available that the Air Force can use to perform C2 without the bulk of older equipment, Allen explained.

“We took off-the-shelf equipment, things that the government either already has, or could easily go get today, pieced it all together and with a bit of computer science, bam we were doing more than we could previously and it is a lot lighter, leaner and faster,” he said. 

command and control
United States Air Force and Army service members disassemble the Command and Control Element after Black Flag 23-1 operations at Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada, Feb. 23, 2023. U.S. Air Force photo by Airman 1st Class Josey Blades

The lighter footprint was evident at Black Flag, where all the equipment necessary for C2 took up just two jump seats in a C-17 or the trunk of an SUV, Allen said, whereas a bulky CRC may take multiple C-17 trips to move to a new location. The Black Flag experiment left plenty of space for the jet to haul troops and cargo if the mission calls for it, he explained.

Integrating that equipment onto the C-17 required coordination with a Joint Communication Support element from U.S. Transportation Command, as well as maintainers from the 62nd Airlift Wing. It was the first time Senior Airman Anthony Vargas, a COMM/Navigation Systems Journeyman with the 62nd Aircraft Maintenance Squadron, helped turn a C-17 into a battle management platform.

“My hands were full prior to takeoff as I had to ensure all the aircraft’s radio and navigation systems were operational and I assisted the testing personnel with cables and connectivity,” he told Air & Space Forces Magazine. “In flight, I monitored aircraft systems to ensure they were working so the testing could run smoothly.”

During the exercise, Fisk and Tech. Sgt. Megan Wolfe, another weapons director aboard the C-17, worked with Allen and ground-based C2 Airmen, who operated from a Mobile Tactical C2 vehicle, an SUV equipped with radios and computers. Allen oversaw a ground team of Pararescuemen and Tactical Air Control Party Airmen working to recover a simulated downed pilot while Fisk coordinated fighter jets flying overhead both in support of the recovery mission and as part of a larger air-to-air fight. 

Fisk found that she could still do her job despite working with just a laptop and radios, but there were a few bumps along the way. One of the challenges was that the internet connection which she relied on to stay in contact with Allen would sometimes drop out. Those problems are part of what makes exercises like Black Flag important, Allen said.

“It was one of those situations where you ask somebody ‘how strong do you think the internet is going to be? And they’d say ‘well I don’t know, we haven’t really tried it,’” he said. “Just in the course of a couple days we captured a lot of information that goes to Air Mobility Command, Air Combat Command as well as TRANSCOM, so next time we can do it even better and be that much more capable.”

command and control
Maj. Paden Allen, 422 Test and Evaluation Squadron Tactical C2 Division commander (left) and Master Sgt. Jose Mejia, 422 TES Joint Terminal Attack Controler division section chief, provide command and control capabilities on the way to a Black Flag 22-1 mission on the Nevada Test and Training Range at Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada, May 12, 2022. U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Zachary Rufus.

Both Fisk and the C-17 crews learned from each other how to perform C2 aboard a new aircraft. Fisk learned more about how a C-17 crew works by having to share a radio with them, and the C-17 crew learned from Fisk how to fly in certain ways to ensure better connectivity for battle management. Allen said conventional AWACS flight crews and battle managers know how to coordinate those two missions because they have trained that way, but a transport crew like that of a C-17 does not necessarily have the same experience.

“It’s kind of like doing something in a car and communicating with the driver while you’re doing it,” he said. “When a C-17 or a C-130 was created, this was not something that they had in mind necessarily, so there was a lot of very quick learning that had to happen between Hannah and the rest of the mission team and the C-17 crew.”

On the maintenance side, Vargas said the experience broadened his perspective on the Air Force mission.

“I am tasked to solely work on communication, navigation, electronic warfare, and mission systems,” he said. “Seeing these new capabilities firsthand, I felt much more connected to the mission. Seeing the air battle managers work reminded me to keep being accepting of these changes and upgrades to the C-17.”

Allen said this was the first time he was aware of a C-17 being used as a C2 platform, though the Air Force has a history of using the C-130 in the C2 role. For example, during the Vietnam War, the branch used C-130s as Airborne Battle Command and Control Centers platforms, and EC-130Es carried that mission set into the early 2000s. With the rise of Agile Combat Employment, some of those old capabilities have been rediscovered.

“There is a lot of building upon the shoulders of people who fought in World War II and Vietnam, but now that we have new technologies, new capabilities and a lot of very smart Airmen who can integrate these things quickly, we are seeing a lot of this rapid innovation to bring more capabilities to bear and inform commanders,” Allen said. 

The future of command-and-control may look far different than the Cold War-era AWACs and JSTARs, the major said. In the meantime, you can expect to see C2 Airmen pop up in more unconventional places.

“You can take your phone on an airplane, on a boat, in a car, that’s really what we’re talking about here with the technology we are trying to solidify,” he said. “You take your cell phone anywhere in the world, and we’d like you to take C2 anywhere in the world, anyway you want to get there.”

Space Force CTIO: Let’s ‘Leap Over’ Tech Debt and Start New

Space Force CTIO: Let’s ‘Leap Over’ Tech Debt and Start New

April 11, 2023 | By Greg Hadley

While leaders have touted the Space Force as the U.S.’s first digital service, it still faces plenty of technological shortcomings, Chief Information and Technology Officer Lisa Costa said recently. And instead of trying to update all of its outdated IT, the service might be better served by simply starting fresh and building from scratch, she suggested. 

Such an approach, referred to as “greenfielding” within the IT community, would be similar to how the Space Development Agency has established its own processes for acquiring and launching satellites, Costa said April 5 at the Mitchell Institute’s Spacepower Security Forum. 

“I fundamentally believe that we will get ahead much quicker if we don’t try to dig ourselves out of tech debt, but we just leap over that and move to software-defined everything and modern systems that keep evolving over time,” Costa said when asked about previous comments that the Space Force may need seven years to mature its digital systems. “[SDA director Derek M.] Tournear, that’s exactly what he’s doing, and it’s really a great initiative. And I think that’s the same thing that we need to do in terms of digital infrastructure.” 

Starting fresh instead of building on what has been used “would make monetary sense, return-on-investment sense,” Costa added, before noting that doing so would run counter to the Pentagon’s typical style of doing business. 

As things currently stand, Costa outlined three priorities her office is pursuing to upgrade the Space Force’s digital infrastructure. 

ION 

While much of the Space Force’s first few years have been defined by establishing organizational structures and connections, the service now needs to focus on ensuring those structures can integrate digitally, Costa said. 

“So we have Space Systems Command, right?” said Costa. “We need to help them connect in a high bandwidth … low latency way to, for example, the Space Warfighting Analysis Center. We need to be able to link them to Space Training and Readiness Command, so that they can provide model-based systems engineering models to STARCOM so that training materials can be developed for Guardians, and so that they can then take that training material and have Guardians developing tactics, techniques, and procedures and conceps of operation. And then that gets translated to [Space Operations Command]. So we’re not only doing the vertical, physical piece but also the functional integration piece.” 

That high-bandwidth, low-latency connection will be the Integrated Operations Network, the base IT infrastructure on which the service’s digital efforts will rely. ION will be crucial, Costa noted, especially given the Pentagon’s notoriously slow networks. 

“I can’t emphasize enough—I could implement [artificial intelligence] today,” Costa said. “But I couldn’t even read an MPEG-4 file on my desktop that someone sent me last week. So exactly how are we going to be running AI and deep learning algorithms without enabling the entire force to be able to do this instead of just small enclaves being able to do it?” 

Costa later compared ION to “the foundation and all the plumbing that has to be done” while building a house. 

“That’s kind of the dirty work, and no one really wants to get involved in that,” she said. 

An operational planning team to drive ION came together last November, Costa said, and a request for proposals from industry will go out in late April. 

Enhanced UDL 

For years now, the Space Force has worked to build its Unified Data Library—a single integrated repository of space-related data. 

But while Costa praised the UDL as a “great initiative,” she also said that as currently designed, it is insufficient. 

“It was never designed to take on the at-scale data needed and being provided by commercial entities,” Costa said. “And so we have built a series of requirements for ‘Enhanced UDL’ and that request for proposals I believe is coming out early in 2024. So the focus of that particular RFP will be on allowing us to have discoverability, accessibility, and at-scale processing.” 

The Space Force has requested $56 million for the so-called Enhanced UDL in its 2024 budget, according to news reports.

“Spaceverse” 

Perhaps the most ambitious project Costa’s office is pursuing is the “Spaceverse,” a digital environment connecting Guardians from across commands and units and giving them more immersive training and operational experiences. 

Often compared to the “metaverse” virtual environment, Spaceverse is a needed asset for Guardians, Costa argued. 

“They sit there for 12-hour shifts, and they watch 24 open screens and text messages coming up,” Costa said. “And all of the integration of that information is happening where? It’s happening in their brains. Imagine the exhaustion of walking out of that place after 12 hours. We have got to do this a different way. And one of those ways is meeting our Guardians where they come to us from. Our Guardians have been training for their jobs for their entire lifetime, because they have been gamers.” 

Through the Spaceverse, Guardians will be able to interact with space in a way that they simply can’t right now, Costa said—and the service is working alongside other agencies like NASA to further develop the concept. 

But while Costa noted the allure of Spaceverse, she also sounded a note of caution. 

“We could spend billions of dollars on the concept of Spaceverse, and it wouldn’t run,” Costa said. “None of it would run, because we don’t have the infrastructure to run it on. And that’s why ION is so important.” 

F-15Es Deploy to Kadena as F-22s, F-16s Head Home

F-15Es Deploy to Kadena as F-22s, F-16s Head Home

April 10, 2023 | By Chris Gordon

F-15E Strike Eagles deployed to Kadena Air Base, Japan in April, joining F-35s to bolster the Air Force’s fighter fleet on the strategically important island in the western Pacific.

Meanwhile, the F-16CMs and F-22s that were previously forward deployed to Kadena have returned home, according to their respective home bases. The Air Force is rotating fighters through Kadena as it sends the aging F-15C/D fleet back to the United States after more than 40 years of permanent Eagle operations on the island. Save for the A-10, the Air Force has had every active type of fighter aircraft cycle through Kadena in the last five months: F-15C/Ds, F-15Es, F-16s, F-22s, and F-35s.

“Modernizing capabilities in the Indo-Pacific theater remains a top priority,” Kadena Air Base’s 18th Wing said in a news release. “This reception of advanced fighter aircraft at Kadena ensures the 18th Wing remains postured to deliver lethal and credible airpower to ensure the defense of U.S. allies and a free and open Indo-Pacific.”

On April 8, F-15Es from the 336th Fighter Squadron at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, N.C. touched down in Okinawa, according to the Air Force.

That same day, F-22s Raptors and Airmen from the 525th Fighter Squadron assigned to Kadena headed home to Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska. On April 10, F-16CMs from the 480th Fighter Wing returned to Spangdahlem Air Base, Germany.

Kadena’s two-squadron F-15C/D fleet, 48 strong before the drawdown began, is gradually being sent to the Boneyard or Air National Guard units. The Air Force has promised to put newer and more advanced fighters on Kadena to make up for the lack of a permanent presence.

In November, the Alaskan F-22s were the first new rotational unit deployed to the key southern Japanese island, which lies some 450 miles from Taiwan—the closest U.S. airbase to the self-governing island China claims as its own. F-16CMs later joined the Raptors in January 2023.

In March, F-35s from the 355th Fighter Squadron at Eielson Air Force Base, Alaska deployed to Kadena. After a roughly two-week overlap, the F-16s and F-22s have now departed. F-22s were originally supposed to replace Eagles as the Air Force’s main air-to-air fighter, but further production was cancelled in 2009. Kadena’s F-15s are the last Eagles in service in the Active-Duty force. F-15Es are multi-role fighters, unlike the original F-15.

“The F-15E is a proven combat platform that brings some unique capabilities into our already formidable mix of aircraft here at Kadena,” Col. Henry Schantz, 18th Operations Group commander, said in a news release.

The F-22s had an eventful deployment to the western Pacific, becoming the first fifth-generation fighters to deploy to Tinian and the Philippines. JBER said the aircraft flew 1,100 sorties during their four-plus month deployment. The F-16s stayed around three months and their deployment generated fewer headlines. The deployment of F-15Es and F-35s —along with the remaining F-15C/Ds—ensures Kadena will have a mix of fourth- and fifth-generation aircraft for now.

Boeing: Developmental Flight Testing for the T-7 Expected This Summer

Boeing: Developmental Flight Testing for the T-7 Expected This Summer

April 10, 2023 | By John A. Tirpak

Developmental flight testing of the T-7A Red Hawk advanced trainer will likely begin this summer, as ejection seat issues that delayed the program seem headed for resolution soon, according to Boeing and Air Force sources.

Problems with the ejection seats prompted USAF and Boeing to slow the program down in December, delaying production deliveries until the second half of 2024. The seats did not behave as expected in tests with pilot manikins representing the smallest class of potential pilots.

“We anticipate EMD (engineering, manufacturing and development) flight testing will begin this summer after receiving the military flight release,” a Boeing spokesperson told Air & Space Forces Magazine. “We continue to progress on T-7 escape system testing. Along with the U.S. Air Force, we have compiled a lot of data that shows we are moving in the right direction.”

The spokesperson also highlighted March 29 testimony from Air Force acquisition executive Andrew Hunter, who told the House Armed Services tactical aviation subcommittee that “we did have a substantial achievement in February of getting through performing a sled test dealing with some of the issues of the escape system that we were hung up on.”

Clearing those tests “would allow us to get to a military flight release and begin the developmental testing, so we are now moving forward from areas where the program had gotten stalled,” Hunter added.

Boeing has built five T-7As and continues to fly T1 and T2, which were built before program award, to gather data. But the other aircraft are awaiting clearance to fly, and the Air Force Director of Operational Test and Evaluation has barred any military pilots from flying the T-7A pending resolution of the ejection seat issue, preventing government flight test activities from being initiated.

Although built on “production” tooling, T1 and T2 are not fully representative of the eventual operational aircraft. The three other aircraft are.

The ejection seat issue arose at the same time as separate concerns about flight controls, and the combination prompted the program delay, but the flight control problem was resolved several months ago.

Sources told Air & Space Forces Magazine the Air Force either improperly evaluated data gathered during earlier ejection seat testing, incorrectly instrumented the manikins, or both. A reassessment of the data, combined with the testing Hunter referenced, now show that the seats are compliant, the sources said.

T-7A
A manikin ejects from a Boeing T-7A Red Hawk in June during ongoing qualification tests of the ejection system for the T-7A at the Holloman High Speed Test Track (HHSTT) at Holloman Air Force Base, New Mexico. U.S. Air Force photo

The Air Force removed T-7 procurement funds from its fiscal year 2024 budget request, thinking it would not be able to start production due to the ejection seat delay. The service could not immediately say if it has any plans to reprogram funds in 2024 to get production underway sooner.

According to its budget justification documents, the Air Force plans to build 94 T-7s over the next five fiscal years at a cost of $2.205 billion. Production begins with 14 aircraft in fiscal 2025, followed by 21, 23, and 36 in 2026-28, respectively.  Funding starts at $330.6 million in 2024 and ramps up to $834.2 million by 2028. To complete the planned buy of 351 aircraft is estimated to cost a total of $7.65 billion, including funds appropriated thus far, and assuming the planned aircraft are purchased.

The T-7A is the first USAF aircraft being designed to accommodate small women, and ensuring the ejection system works for their body types has been flagged as a potential problem for some time.

The Government Accountability Office, in its 2021 Weapon System Annual Assessment, said the T-7’s ejection seat was one of two “primary” risks to the trainer’s development, and in the following year’s report, pegged the ejection seat as a “top” program risk.

The next major programmatic milestone for the T-7A is planned for November, when Pentagon acquisition and sustainment chief William LaPlante will decide whether the aircraft can enter Low-Rate Initial Production, known as Milestone C. Aircraft delivered after that decision point would arrive in late 2024.

In December 2022, a Boeing spokesperson told Air & Space Forces Magazine that the company was working with USAF “to re-baseline the schedule” for flight test and production, which would take into account supply chain issues and labor shortages that have also afflicted the program.

Biden Administration Defends Afghanistan Withdrawal Decisions in New Report

Biden Administration Defends Afghanistan Withdrawal Decisions in New Report

April 6, 2023 | By Chris Gordon

On April 6, the White House issued its account of the decisions that preceded the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, as Congress is moving to investigate President Joe Biden and his administration’s decision-making during the crisis.

The 12-page summary largely blames former President Donald Trump’s administration for putting the U.S. in a weakened position with the Taliban. It also faults the Afghan government and its security forces for allowing the country to rapidly fall into the hands of the enemy in August 2021.

The summary, however, does not discuss the recommendations from top military commanders that the U.S. retain 2,500 troops in the country while trying to negotiate a better agreement. Nor does it note the assessment by the Pentagon’s Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) that the withdrawal of Western contractors hobbled the Afghan air force as it struggled to hold the line against Taliban fighters.

Separately, the Department of Defense sent its long-awaited classified Afghanistan After Action Review to Congress.

The classified after action review has long been completed but had not previously been shared outside the executive branch. National Security Council Strategic Communications Coordinator John Kirby told reporters neither the Pentagon document nor another classified review by the State Department that was also sent to the Congress would be made public.

The 21-year-old Afghan conflict is still the subject of a politically charged debate. A year and a half after the U.S. withdrawal, the Taliban remains in power, women and girls have been barred from schools, and the country is mired in poverty.

The White House summary argues the U.S. accomplished its main objective of defeating al-Qaida and the difficulties in Afghanistan accrued over multiple administrations.

“The president’s decision to end the war in Afghanistan was the right one,” Kirby said. “The United States had long ago accomplished its mission to remove from the battlefield the terrorists who attacked us on 9/11.”

Republicans, however, accused the Biden administration of mishandling the withdrawal and withholding information.

“President Biden made the decision to withdraw and even picked the exact date; he is responsible for the massive failures in planning and execution,” House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul (R.-Texas) said in a statement. “It is also unfortunate it took my subpoena threat to prompt the administration to finally provide the classified after-action reports from the Afghanistan withdrawal.”

The White House document was written by Biden’s National Security Council. Kirby said Biden provided his personal input. As vice president, Biden was skeptical of the military’s push to send reinforcements to Afghanistan. But the crux of the White House’s case is that the new administration inherited a difficult situation.

“President Biden’s choices for how to execute a withdrawal from Afghanistan were severely constrained by conditions created by his predecessor,” the White House document states.

The U.S. only had 2,500 troops in the country when Biden took office. The White House also notes the Trump administration had reached an agreement with the Taliban that pledged U.S. troops would leave the country by May 2021—an agreement made without consulting the Afghan government.

Subsequently, when Biden took office “the Taliban were in the strongest military position that they had been in since 2001, controlling or contesting nearly half of the country,” the White House document states.

The White House also argues the Afghan government was to blame for its defeat. “President Biden urged the Afghan government to take steps to harden the resolve of the Afghan forces,” the document states.

But U.S. military experts warned before the withdrawal that a rapid and total withdrawal of U.S. military and contractor support would undermine the Afghan military’s morale and its ability to use airpower against its foe.

“If we don’t provide them some support they certainly will collapse and that is not in our best interest,” Gen. Frank McKenzie, then-head of U.S. Central Command, told the Senate Armed Services Committee in April 2021, four months before the withdrawal. “So I am concerned about the ability of the Afghan military to hold on after we leave, the ability of the Afghan Air Force to fly in particular after we remove the support for those aircraft.”

A scathing report from the SIGAR released last month cited the lack of contract maintenance support for the Afghan Air Force as a key blow that led to the Taliban gaining more control as the U.S. committed to heading for the exits.

While the White House did not find fault with its own decision-making, it noted the intelligence community failed to accurately forecast how events would unfold.

“As late as May 2021, the assessment was still that Kabul would probably not come under serious pressure until late 2021 after U.S. troops departed,” the document says.

“Clearly we didn’t get it right,” Kirby said. But “the purpose of it is not accountability,” he added, but “understanding.”