NORAD Fighters Intercept Russian, Chinese Bombers Near Alaska

July 24, 2024 | By Chris Gordon

Russian and Chinese bombers and fighters were intercepted off the coast of Alaska by American and Canadian fighters on July 24, marking a rare case in which aircraft from the increasingly aligned U.S. adversaries jointly ventured near U.S. territory.

Two Russian TU-95 Bear and two Chinese H-6 strategic bombers flew a mission the Alaska Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ), a buffer zone in international airspace near North America, NORAD. The event was the first time Russian and Chinese military aircraft entered the Alaska ADIZ at the same time, a U.S. defense official told Air & Space Forces Magazine. It was also the first time Chinese H-6s have encroached on the area, the official added.

American F-16s and F-35s and Canadian CF-18s were involved in the intercept, along with support aircraft, the defense official said.

“The Russian and PRC aircraft remained in international airspace and did not enter American or Canadian sovereign airspace,” NORAD said. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin III told reporters at the Pentagon on July 25 that the Russian and Chinese aircraft came within roughly 200 miles from sovereign U.S. airspace.

The Russian and Chinese bombers were on a combined patrol, flying together from the same Russian base, a person familiar with the matter told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

“This Russian and PRC activity in the Alaska ADIZ is not seen as a threat, and NORAD will continue to monitor competitor activity near North America and meet presence with presence,” NORAD said.

“I applaud the efforts of [U.S. Northern Command] and our great Airmen, who are always at the ready.”

Russia and China have become increasingly aligned against the United States and its allies since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

“This is first time that we seen these two countries fly together like that,” Austin said. “If it happens again, if there is any kind of challenge from any direction, I have every confidence that NORTHCOM [U.S. Northern Command] and NORAD will be at the ready.”

The Russian government provided their own account of the mission on July 25.

“Tu-95MS strategic bombers of the Russian Aerospace Forces and the Hong-6K strategic bombers of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Air Force conducted a joint air patrol over the Chukchi Sea, the Bering Sea, and the northern part of the Pacific Ocean,” the Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement. “Russian and Chinese crews practiced cooperation while carrying out an air patrol mission in a new area. The Su-30SM and Su-35S aircraft of the Russian Aerospace Forces provided fighter cover.”

The Russians said the mission lasted five hours.

“I applaud the efforts of [U.S. Northern Command] and our great Airmen, who are always at the ready,” Austin said of the U.S.-Canadian intercept.

China has bolstered Russia’s military industry by providing it with microelectronics, machine tools, and other dual-use components, which have helped produce Russian weapons for its war in Ukraine. In 2023, 90 percent of Russia’s microelectronics imports, critical for the production of missiles, tanks, and aircraft, came from China, according to U.S. officials.

China has also provided nitrocellulose, a compound used to make explosives, as well as satellite imagery that Moscow has used for its invasion of Ukraine. At NATO’s 75th Anniversary Summit in Washington earlier this month, the 32 allies called on China to “cease all material and political support to Russia’s war effort.”

The U.S.’s latest Arctic Strategy, released July 22, also called out increasing Russian and Chinese military cooperation near North America. “We’ve seen growing cooperation between the PRC and Russia in the Arctic,” Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks told reporters earlier this week, using the acronym for the People’s Republic of China. She noted that China has become a “a major funder of Russian energy exploitation in the Arctic.”

The presence of the Chinese aircraft in the U.S. Air Defense Identification Zone was not unexpected. Last August, Russia and China conducted a large naval flotilla near Alaska that was shadowed by U.S. Navy ships. And Air Force Gen. Gregory M. Guillot, the head of NORAD, told the House Armed Services Committee in March that Chinese air operations in the U.S. Air Defense Identification Zone would likely come “as early as this year.”

The Russian Defense Ministry said the mission “was not directed against third countries.”

Editor’s Note: This article was updated on July 25 to include comments from Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III.

First Airmen Graduate from Army Warrant Officer Instructor School

July 24, 2024 | By David Roza

The U.S. Army Warrant Officer Career College at Fort Novosel, Ala., usually trains Soldiers in the fine art of being warrant officers, who fill technical rather than leadership functions. But among one recent class of instructors were four Airmen who later this year will help train the Air Force’s first batch of new warrant officers in 66 years.

The Airmen—Master Sgt. Vernon Boyd, Master Sgt. Ryan Lawrence, Master Sgt. David Elliott, and Senior Master Sgt. Kayleigh McAviney—graduated July 19 from the Train, Advise, and Counsel Officer Certification Course, the first Airmen in history to do so.

In the Army, TAC officers prepare Soldiers for the responsibility of being warrant officers, and the new Air Force TAC officers will help prepare Airmen for the job later this year at the newly-opened Air Force Warrant Officer Training School at Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala., just a two-hour drive north of Fort Novosel.

The Air Force and Space Force are the only military services currently without warrant officers, but today the Air Force sees the reintroduction of warrant officers as a way to maintain an edge in two fast-moving technical fields: information technology and cybersecurity.

In the enlisted and commissioned officer ranks, Airmen often have to take career breaks for leadership and development roles as they rise through the ranks. The warrant officer track offers a different path.

“With perishable skills, like cyber, like IT, where the technology is moving so rapidly, folks who are experts in that can’t afford to be sent off to a leadership course for eight or nine months,” Alex Wagner, assistant secretary of the Air Force for manpower and reserve affairs, said April 9.

About 490 Airmen across the Active-Duty, Reserve, and Guard components applied for the warrant officer school which will train two eight-week classes of about 30 candidates each. The first class starts this October and the second in early 2025. After inheriting its warrant officer training from the Army decades ago, the service is using the reintroduction to develop a brand new regime, Maj. Nathaniel Roesler, the school’s commandant, told Air & Space Forces Magazine earlier this month.

“We’re not trying to make warrant officers into better cyber operators,” he explained. “They come to us with those skills, with years of practical experience. What we’re doing with them is building them into … the Air Force’s leading professional warfighters, technical integrators, and trusted advisors.”

In other words, what makes a warrant officer a warrant officer is not only technical knowledge, but also communication skills, legal awareness, ethical decision-making, strategic understanding, and emotional intelligence—skills that will be particularly important as Air Force warrant officers navigate a bureaucracy that has not dealt with their kind in decades.

“They will have an outsize impact,” Roesler said.

Graduates of the Train, Advise and Counsel Officer Certification Course, recite the TAC Officer Creed during a graduation ceremony at the Holman House in Ozark, Alabama, July 19, 2024. (U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Evan Porter)

To get there, instructors will need to show them the way. The four Airmen who attended the TAC officer course put their joint warfare skills to good use to overcome the lost-in-translation moments that happen when troops from different branches, each with unique jargon and protocols, serve together.

“Attending an Army training course for the first time presented unique challenges, such as translating Army-specific language, acronyms, and processes, which were different from what we use in the Air Force,” one of the graduates, Master Sgt. David Elliott said in a July 22 press release. “I overcame these challenges by creating a personal glossary of terms and frequently consulting my instructor and my Army classmates.”

Another graduate, Senior Master Sgt. Kayleigh McAviney, said “the greatest benefit came from understanding the intricacies of how the Army and each specialty utilizes their warrant officers.”

The new instructors are eager to put their skills to work this October.

“We are receiving highly competent, driven, subject-matter experts, and giving them eight weeks of deliberate training,” Elliott said. “They will graduate and show up to commanders eager to show them the value warrant officers will provide.”

Air Force Generals Tapped to Lead National Guard Bureau, TRANSCOM, AMC

July 24, 2024 | By Greg Hadley

A trio of Air Force lieutenant generals are in line to gain a fourth star, as the Pentagon announced their nominations for top roles at the National Guard Bureau, U.S. Transportation Command, and Air Mobility Command.

Lt. Gen. Steven S. Nordhaus has been tapped to lead the National Guard and become a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, succeeding Army Gen. Daniel R. Hokanson. If confirmed, Nordhaus would continue a 30-year tradition of the Air Force and Army trading off the top spot on the NGB.

Nordhaus is currently the commander of the 1st Air Force, or Air Forces Northern, and the head of the Continental U.S. Command Region for NORAD. An F-16 pilot by trade, Nordhaus is a member of the Air National Guard and has commanded a Guard squadron, detachment, and wing, as well as time as commander of the Air National Guard Readiness Center. He also had stints as executive assistant and director of operations at the National Guard Bureau.

Air Forces Northern has members from the active duty Air Force, Air Force Reserve, and Air National Guard, but most of its aircraft come from Guard wings. The Pentagon also said President Joe Biden is nominating Maj. Gen. Michael L. Ahmann to succeed Nordhaus. Ahmann, also a Guardsman, is currently the director of programs and requirements at the Guard Bureau.

If confirmed, Nordhaus would be responsible for advocating for more than 430,000 Guardsmen and guiding the Guard as it faces ever-growing demand for its services.

Lt. Gen. Randall Reed, deputy commander of Air Mobility Command, has been nominated to take the lead of U.S. Transportation Command, succeeding Air Force Gen. Jacqueline D. Van Ovost.

Reed, a former KC-135 instructor pilot, has commanded at the squadron, group, wing, and Numbered Air Force level. He has more than 3,500 flight hours in the C-141B, KC-135R/T, B-1B, RC-135V/W, E-8C, C-130, C-5A, C-5M, and C-21. He arrived at AMC in May 2022.

If confirmed, Reed would keep the number of Airmen in charge of combatant commands at four, tied with the Army and ahead of the Marine Corps and Space Force.

TRANSCOM is in the early stages of implementing a new Global Household Goods contract for moving troops’ belongings around the world. The command will also face pressure to prepare for the complex logistics that would define any conflict in the Indo-Pacific.

At AMC, Reed and commander Gen. Mike Minihan emphasized the importance of mobility forces in great power competition with the likes of China, executing more maximum endurance operations and conducting a massive “Mobility Guardian” exercise in the Pacific in 2023.

Now, AMC is poised to get entirely new leadership. Lt. Gen. John D. Lamontagne has been nominated for a fourth star and to take over as commander of AMC.

Lamontagne is currently the deputy commander of both U.S. Air Forces in Europe and Air Forces Africa. Both a C-17 and KC-135 pilot, Lamontagne has a deep history with AMC and Scott Air Force Base, Ill. In the 1990s, he worked there at the Tanker Airlift Control Center and the Civil Reserve Air Fleet program, and in the 2010s, he served as deputy director of operations for AMC and commander of the 618th Air Operations Center, the nerve center of AMC.

Having commanded at the squadron, group, and wing level, Lamontagne also had joint stints as the deputy director for the J-5 and as chief of staff for U.S. European Command.

At AMC, he’ll be succeeding a larger-than-life presence in Minihan, while likely trying to continue his work in boosting connectivity across the entire mobility fleet.

His new deputy will likely be Maj. Gen. Rebecca J. Sonkiss, who has been nominated for the job and a third star. Sonkiss is currently deputy at another component command, Air Force Special Operations Command.

Also nominated July 24 were:

Air Force Maj. Gen. Michael L. Downs to be lieutenant general and associate director for military affairs at the Central Intelligence Agency. Downs is currently the vice director for the Joint Staff.

Air Force Maj. Gen. Evan L. Pettus to be lieutenant general and military deputy commander at U.S. Southern Command. Pettus is currently the commander of the Twelfth Air Force, or Air Forces Southern.

Space Force Brig. Gen. Devin R. Pepper to become major general. Pepper will stay in his job as deputy chief of staff for strategic plans and policy at Supreme Allied Command Transformation, NATO.

AMC Is Working on Analysis of Commercial Refueling. Can Retired KC-10s Help?

July 24, 2024 | By John A. Tirpak

Air Mobility Command has explored the idea of commercial refueling to supplement its tankers and is working on more analysis—including potential use of retired and stored KC-10 Extenders—commander Gen. Mike Minihan told lawmakers July 23.

Testifying at his last House Armed Services Committee hearing before retirement, Minihan was asked by Rep. Mark Alford (R-Mo.) about commercial refueling, with Alford arguing the Air Force should embrace the concept. Minihan agreed that there is “value” to the arrangement and said AMC is coordinating with U.S. Transportation, having done the “initial first work” on the idea.

Alford noted that many KC-10s are now retiring to the “boneyard” at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Ariz., and could supplement the Air Force’s tanker fleet as commercial tankers.

“Yes, sir,” Minihan agreed. “There’s enormous value in aircraft that have the potential to provide readiness in the commercial sector.”

“The important first work has been done,” he added of AMC’s commercial refueling efforts. “The analysis on the oversight and the certification is what’s next, and we now have enough data to do that.”

Yet Minihan also cautioned that it will be important to “make sure that with commercial refueling, that we don’t decrement the readiness of those in uniform flying the tankers.”

Air Mobility Command was not immediately able to clarify Minihan’s last remark, but it may have been a reference to the number of operational air refuelings aircrews do, and whether handing some of those events off to a commercial provider would reduce training sorties and experience levels among uniformed operators.

“Those three bins of analysis are what need to be initiated and are being initiated,” Minihan said. “And then I think we’ll be able to get to a point where we can make a holistic approach to commercial air refueling.”

There are two commercial aerial refueling companies—Omega Air and Metrea—now serving the U.S. military and other customers. They can refuel aircraft conducting training or in exercises but cannot refuel them in combat. Metrea recently acquired retired KC-135 tankers from Singapore and France and performed the first commercial air refueling of an Air Force aircraft—an RC-135—just a year ago. Omega Air followed with more in December. Commercial air refueling services have been operating for nearly three decades.

A commercial KDC‐10 tanker aircraft refuels a U.S. Air Force F‐16 Fighting Falcon from the 51st Fighter Wing, enroute Commando Sling 23 at Paya Lebar Air Base, Singapore, Nov. 6, 2023. Courtesy Photo

The Air Force’s retirement of the KC-10, reaching its final stages, was driven by budget pressures to reduce the number of logistical tails it maintains and not because of dissatisfaction with that tanker’s performance. In fact, the KC-10 achieved a mission capable rate in fiscal 2023 of 80.4 percent, and as the service’s largest tanker, it also had a cargo capacity roughly equivalent to that of the C-17.

KC-10s in commercial hands would likely be a welcome addition to the Civil Reserve Air Fleet, which U.S. Transportation Command can call on in a time of national crisis to supplement the organic air mobility inventory. Civil carriers agree to be part of CRAF in exchange for routine contracts to carry cargo and passengers for TRANSCOM. The KC-10s would need no modifications to be able to conduct either commercial air refueling or cargo missions.

An industry official said KC-10s on call for CRAF would be “a Godsend if you need to clean out [a lot of cargo] or [passengers] somewhere in a hurry, like in a NEO [noncombatant evacuation operation],” and help the Air Force with its hub-and-spoke Agile Combat Employment logistics concept.

Another B-1 Back from the Boneyard: Air Force Regenerating Second Lancer in Four Months

July 24, 2024 | By Greg Hadley

The Air Force is resurrecting yet another of its B-1 bombers from the “Boneyard” at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Ariz.

On July 2, an aviation photographer snapped images of a B-1, tail number 86-0115 and nicknamed “Rage,” taking off from Davis-Monthan. A service spokeswoman confirmed to Air & Space Forces Magazine on July 24 that the bomber had been regenerated by the 309th Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Group and was being flown to Tinker Air Force Base, Okla., for updates and depot maintenance before being added back to the fleet.

“At the request of Air Force Global Strike Command, Air Force Materiel Command is in the process of regenerating a B-1B to replace aircraft -0126, which was undergoing heavy structures repair development at Boeing-Palmdale,” the spokesperson said. “Analysis determined regenerating an aircraft in AMARG storage could be accomplished faster, at lower cost and risk, than continuing the Boeing repair project.”

According to other photos captured by aviation enthusiasts, Aircraft 86-0126, nicknamed “Hungry Devil,” was assigned to Dyess Air Force Base, Texas. The Air Force spokesperson said the B-1 was at Boeing-Palmdale as part of an effort to develop a depot-level repair process for the Forward Intermediate Fuselage (FIF).

The spokesperson declined to say when “Rage” will finish repairs and return to the operational B-1 fleet, citing operational security concerns.

This marks the second B-1 regeneration in just a few months—in March, the 7th Bomb Wing at Dyess announced it was resurrecting a bomber nicknamed “Lancelot” to replace a B-1 that caught fire during an engine run in April 2022, resulting in a massive fireball that sent shrapnel flying hundreds of feet and the total loss of the aircraft.

Still another regeneration may be needed soon. A B-1, tail number 85-0085, crashed at Ellsworth Air Force Base, S.D., in January, which severely damaged the aircraft. The spokesperson said a final decision on the Ellsworth aircraft’s disposition—whether it can be salvaged or not—is still pending.

Should another regeneration happen, though, the Air Force will have resurrected three of the 17 B-1s it retired between February and September 2021, four of which were to be maintained “in a reclaimable condition,” Air Force Global Strike Command noted at the time.

While Congress repealed prohibitions on retiring B-1 bombers as part of the 2021 National Defense Authorization Act, lawmakers have passed other provisions mandating a fleet of at least 92 bombers in the Primary Mission Aircraft Inventory, and forbidding the Air Force from modifying the designed operational capability statement for any B-1 squadron so that it can reduce capability or personnel—moves that could compel the Air Force to replace any B-1 incapacitated by mishap or years of hard flying.

The AMARG at Davis-Monthan regularly reactivates aircraft for the Pentagon, NASA, and partner nations. Aircraft sent to the Boneyard can be maintained in different conditions, depending on whether the Air Force wants to preserve the option to un-retire them. Generally speaking, the AMARG removes explosive devices, such as ejection seat motors, upon intake, then fills fluid lines with a preservative oil, closes off openings to keep animals and birds from nesting in the aircraft; and cover the cockpit, intakes and exhaust with a spray-on latex preservative to diminish the destructive effects of sun and heat.

Defense Leaders: We Need to Invest in Space, Unmanned Systems for the Arctic

July 23, 2024 | By Greg Hadley

Facing increased threats in the Arctic and growing concern about U.S. gaps in the region, the Pentagon will invest in more space-based and unmanned assets, defense officials said this week as they rolled out a new strategy for the region.

“A key focus … is championing investments that will enhance our awareness of threats in the region,” Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Arctic and Global Resilience Iris Ferguson told reporters July 22. “We want to make sure that we have the right sensing architecture and the right communications architecture for command and control.”

Since 2020, the Department of the Air Force, the Army, and the Navy have all released Arctic strategies calling for more investment in the region, and former U.S. Northern Command boss Gen. Glen D. VanHerck and others have noted a lack of funding for domain awareness.

Those concerns gained prominence in early 2023 when a Chinese spy balloon flew over the U.S. and Canada, including time near the Aleutian islands. More recently, new NORTHCOM commander Gen. Gregory M. Guillot revealed in March that Russian bombers approached American airspace from the northeast for the first time in two years. He also warned that the Chinese are likely to send warplanes near Alaska as soon as this year.

“The Arctic is perhaps the shortest and least defended threat vector to North America, and that’s what makes it so important,” Guillot’s deputy, Army Lt. Gen. Thomas Carden, said July 23 at an event hosted by the Wilson Center.

With Russia and China cooperating more and more in the Arctic, the U.S. needs better technology and infrastructure to sense threats and communicate them, officials say. Much of the infrastructure in place dates back to the Cold War, and the harsh conditions of the region take a toll on both buildings and equipment.

“It’s not like those sensors can exist in the Arctic, without some hardened, climate-controlled infrastructure,” said Carden. “You know, I spent a lot of time early in my career training for operations in the desert, and we used to have a say, ‘Life’s hard in the desert.’ I’ll tell you, life is harder in the Arctic, and we’re learning that very quickly.”

Installations like Pituffik Space Base are slated to get millions of dollars to modernize, Ferguson said. Meanwhile, the DOD is also eyeing sensors that can handle the conditions—and make it such that human operators don’t have to brave them as much.

“Domain awareness missions are well suited for uncrewed systems approaches in all domains, so sensing missions, ISR, etc.,” Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen H. Hicks told reporters July 22. “So this is a clear area where we can apply some of what we’re doing in the department. The features we’re looking for there are endurance, not putting humans at risk in a harsh environment. But at the same time … you have to ensure that even those uncrewed systems are survivable long enough at least to endure or are so inexpensive, that their attritable nature is still worth it for the mission you’re putting them on. So that means a lot of research and development and testing, and that’s where we’re focused in this area.”

GA-ASI and Inmarsat Government collaborated to deliver an enhanced high-latitude SATCOM solution, which allowed MQ-9 to fly north through Canadian airspace and past the Arctic Circle’s 78th parallel for the first time in history on September 2021. Image courtesy of General Atomics

Space also features prominently in the new strategy, with mentions of possible new missile warning/missile tracking, communications, and weather satellites, as well as more and more use of commercial satellites.

The Arctic’s location at the top of the world can mean spottier satellite coverage, requiring more polar-specific systems. DOD will work on those systems, while also trying to leverage partnerships to keep costs down, officials said.

“It’s an area that we haven’t invested in to date as much because of the inclination of our geosynchronous orbits,” Ferguson said. “We have to actively invest in the Arctic region in particular, we’ve been working over the last several years to leverage these kind of commercial assets to include testing and development … with our Air Force Research Lab.”

The Space Force has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in Next-Gen OPIR Polar for missile warning in the region, and the Space Development Agency is putting many of its satellites in polar orbit as well. The department is also working with NATO ally Norway to put a communications payload on a Norwegian satellite that will soon launch.

“This is actually a mission where the U.S. DOD, the Norwegian [Ministry of Defense], and Inmarsat came together to provide the capability way cheaper and way faster than any of those entities could have done by themselves,” Maj. Gen. Odd-Harald Hagen, the Defense Attaché at the Royal Norwegian Embassy, said at the Wilson Center event.

Meanwhile, the Department of the Air Force has helped companies like SpaceX and OneWeb to invest in polar coverage, Ferguson said, and the results have been encouraging. Now the next step is making sure operators can access those networks.

“What we’re trying to do is field hybrid SATCOM terminals for our users so that they can access multiple constellations,” she said. “That’s the next round. You have the satellite capabilities and the commercial capacity, but you need the users to have their terminals to be able to access it.”

While satellites and unmanned systems may play a key role moving forward, Air Force Maj. Gen. Benjamin R. Maitre also noted the importance of boots on the ground and manned platforms, trained to handle the Arctic’s unique challenges.

“We’ve stationed really the largest number of advanced tactical fighter aircraft, fifth-generation, within the Arctic, and that’s just us,” said Maitre, the director for concepts and strategy in Air Force Futures. “If you add in our allies like Norway that also operate the F-35, that is a compelling robust presence that we have in the Arctic.

“… With Norway, we’ve worked a lot with how we operate F-35s in cold weather, where we have a lot to learn from our allies. In Sweden, we’ve talked about dispersed operations in the Arctic that they’ve lived in a real fashion for over 50 years that we can still learn from. And with Canada, we’ve looked at dispersed power generation and what that means in these remote sites in a cold environment.”

Minihan: AMC Will Fall Short of ‘25 by ’25’ Goal to Better Mobility Aircraft Connectivity

July 23, 2024 | By John A. Tirpak

Editor’s Note: This story was updated July 24 to properly identify the source of several quotes; to correct the level of funding needed to reach AMC’s connectivity goal; and to clarify that Gen. Minihan did not say to what level the AMC fleet will have connectivity by 2025. Air & Space Forces Magazine regrets these errors.

Air Mobility Command will not meet Gen. Mike Minihan’s goal of equipping a quarter of its fleet with modern connectivity and situational awareness gear by fiscal 2025, but it remains an urgent need, he told lawmakers July 23.

Minihan, making his last appearance before the House Armed Services Committee as AMC commander, said achieving the “25 by ’25” goal by the end of his tenure in the next few months “regrettably, is not possible.”

Rep. Joe Courtney, citing staff members, said it would take $500 million to reach the 25 by ’25 goal, which would provide crews with urgently needed situational awareness. The upgrades were not included on the Air Force’s unfunded priorities list because the service is trying to do away with such off-budget requests, and Chief of Staff Gen. David W. Allvin felt that spare parts were a higher priority, Lt. Gen. David H. Tabor, director of programs, said.

The level actually achieved before his his self-imposed deadline is unclear, but when pressed by Rep. Mike Waltz on the state of upgrades, Minihan did say they would be spread evenly across the fleet to different kinds of aircraft. But as long as the fleet is short of full connectivity, it’s “vulnerable,” he said.

“We are behind” Minihan said, pledging that AMC is doing everything it can “to catch up.”

The connectivity package is different for almost every type in the inventory, he said, meaning there’s no one-size-fits-all unit, but most are a “roll-on” set of pallets.

The failure to have already achieved this urgent capability is due to “decades of under-investment in mobility,” Minihan said, which was thought acceptable as long as the U.S. operated in a permissive environment.

The upgrades will allow aircraft “to tie into the tactical data links that the joint force uses, and we will be able to tie back to all the command-and-control echelons that the joint force, the combatant commands, [and] certainly my team that runs an Air Operations Center that’s globally engaged every day back at Scott Air Force base, would be able to tie through to all of that,” he said.

The “precious first moments of conflict are sure to be dynamic, and it is critical that our most relied-upon assets have the connectivity, and therefore the awareness, to put our joint force in a position of advantage,” Minihan said.

The connectivity he’s seeking would include fast download speeds and detailed data such as the security situation at the destination, potential air-to-air and surface-to-air threats, availability of fuel at the destination, the ability to rapidly divert, and the ability to see where safer landing places, with necessary support, are available, under combat conditions, he said.

Recent noncombatant evacuation operations in Afghanistan and Niger have proved the utility of the upgrades on equipped aircraft.

“What we’re finding out now is, when an airplane takes off from Europe to go do a mission down to Niger, is we’ve got instant connectivity. We know the current status of the airfield. We know the current status of the of the joint force,” he said. “we know the security measures. We know the fuel state. We know the cargo state, and that ability is an absolute game-changer. It both helps with effective, effectiveness and efficiency, but most importantly, it helps with the security of Americans, you know, both the air crew and those on the ground.

Such connectivity “would have been wonderful to have during the Kabul evacuation. We didn’t. So what we’ve demonstrated is we’re taking those lessons learned, we’re backing it up with data, and then we’re moving forward with affordable capabilities that exist now that don’t require massive modifications to the airplanes, and we’re having wonderful effects in the airspace and on the battlefield,” he added.

The NEO in Niger will provide “another set of data points when it comes to that roll-on kit, and we’re incorporating all those lessons learned into everything we’re planning for the fall. There’s some big exercises going on this fall, and then, most importantly, into the summer exercise series in the Pacific that’s going to happen in 2025.”

He added that the Air Force is running out of time to do the upgrades. “Simply put, the longer we wait, the more risk the nation incurs, and the more expensive it is to solve it,” he said.

AMC is coordinating with the Air Force’s command, control, communications, and battle management efforts to integrate airlift with the Joint All-Domain Command and Control push, Minihan added.

The upgrades are a prerequisite for success in a Pacific conflict, he said.

“What we can’t do is ever put those teams in a position where they’re relying on nine-hour old intel to make the decisions,” he asserted.

Without the connectivity upgrades, mobility forces will be blind to troop movements and lack battlespace awareness, he warned.

B-2 Test Launches New Low-Cost Anti-Ship Weapon at Warship in the Pacific

July 23, 2024 | By Chris Gordon

The U.S. military conducted an unusual exercise recently during which a U.S. Air Force B-2 Spirit stealth bomber helped sink a decommissioned U.S. warship in the Pacific using relatively inexpensive GPS-guided bombs.

As part of the massive RIMPAC maritime and air exercise, the U.S. sunk two warships with live-fire weapons: the ex-USS Tarawa, an amphibious assault ship, and the ex-USS Dubuque, an amphibious transport dock, in what is known as a SINKEX.

SINKEXs are training exercises in which decommissioned naval vessels are used as targets. This year, the USS Tarawa was hit by the U.S. military’s top-shelf maritime strike weapon, the multimillion-dollar stealthy Long-Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM), which was fired from a U.S. Navy F/A-18F Super Hornet.

But the USAF also came to play, and in a novel way.

Along with Navy assets, the B-2 “proved a low-cost, air-delivered method for defeating surface vessels through a QUICKSINK demonstration,” the U.S. Third Fleet, which is responsible for U.S. Navy operations in the Pacific, said in a July 22 release.

“The B-2 was used to help sink the Tarawa,” a spokesperson for the Third Fleet added in an email to Air & Space Forces Magazine.

“This capability is an answer to an urgent need to quickly neutralize maritime threats over massive expanses of ocean around the world at minimal costs,” the release said.

After two decades of intensive bombing during the Global War on Terror, QUICKSINK and LRASM demonstrate just how much the Air Force’s focus has shifted despite the ongoing conflicts still raging in the Middle East, including some involving U.S. forces.

“This is a sign of the Air Force’s renewed focus on maritime strike, which it had walked away from after the Cold War ended,” Stacie Pettyjohn, director of the defense program at the Center for a New American Security, told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

QUICKSINK is a system now mated to JDAMs, the near-ubiquitous air-to-surface GPS guidance kit for bombs. It has additional guidance to turn those weapons into ship-killers, offering more value for money and giving commanders more options, the Navy and Air Force say.

“Torpedoes, such as the heavyweight MK-48, are still the primary method used to sink enemy ships,” the Air Force Research Laboratory (ARFL) says of QUICKSINK. “New methods explored through QUICKSINK may be able to achieve the same kind of anti-ship lethality with air-launched weapons, including modified 2,000-pound class precision-guided bombs.”

An F-15E Strike Eagle at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla. with modified 2,000-pound GBU-31 Joint Direct Attack Munitions as part of the second test in the QUICKSINK Joint Capability Technology Demonstration, April 28, 2022. QUICKSINK successfully destroyed a full-scale surface vessel as part of a demonstration in the Gulf of Mexico. U.S. Air Force photo by 1st Lt. Lindsey Heflin

Pentagon and open-source wargames have shown precision munitions, especially LRASMs, would be expended quickly in a conflict with China, in perhaps a few days. Torpedos are also expensive and can only be deployed by a few Navy platforms. The new Joint Strike Missile (JSM) is on its way in the coming years, but that still leaves room for a wide variety of anti-ship weapons in between.

“Both standoff and penetrating maritime strikes are needed to create the volume that’s going to be required to deny the first attempt by the PLA Navy to invade a friend such as Taiwan or elsewhere in the South China Sea,” said Mark Gunzinger, director of future concepts and capability assessments at the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies.

QUICKSINK capabilities are not brand new, with previous tests being conducted by fourth-generation F-15E Strike Eagle fighters in 2021 and 2022. The program is still a “technology demonstration,” according to AFRL, not a front-line weapon. Whatever the precise weapon, U.S. military leaders have noted that munitions stockpiles have been an easy place to save money. But Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which has stressed Western and Russian defense industries to near their breaking point, along with the prospect of the U.S. being involved in a conflict to repel China from seizing the self-governing island of Taiwan, have shown just valuable munitions are.

“It would be impossible to fight and win against China from only long-range,” Pettyjohn said. “It is also hard to generate sufficient mass over a period of time with standoff strikes.”

“QUICKSINK would complement existing anti-ship missile procurements and provide a much lower-cost weapon that could be bought in large numbers,” she added. “It would, along with LRASM and JSM, provide the Air Force with a range of maritime strike options that can be launched from different ranges.”

A QUICKSINK munition could also be especially valuable in disrupting undefended enemy logistics vessels such as cargo ships and oilers, which often lack their own advanced air defense systems, Pettyjohn added.

The latest test occurred during RIMPAC, which is the world’s largest maritime exercise, with 25,000 personnel from 29 nations participating, bringing with them 40 surface ships, three submarines, more than 150 aircraft, and 14 national land forces exercise in and around the Hawaiian Islands, June 27 to Aug. 1, according to numbers from the Third Fleet.

With the U.S. military focused on a possible flight with China over Taiwan, the U.S. has been trying to ramp up LRASM production. The missile is a derivative of the JASSM long-range cruise missile, which is made on the same production line by Lockheed Martin. But with tight government budgets, even if production could be ramped up, LRASMs are still pricey. The missiles cost upwards of $3 million a copy, which make them cost-prohibitive to buy in massive numbers, Gunzinger and Pettyjohn said. The Air Force plans to buy 115 LRASMs next year and around 550 by end of the decade.

“The Air Force and the DOD simply can’t buy enough of them to meet requirements,” Gunzinger said.

Gunzinger, a former B-52 pilot who focused on assessing capabilities to counter anti-access and area-denial (A2/AD) threats in different civilian positions, said the Pentagon and the Air Force are rightfully looking at developing cheaper, short- and medium-range standoff weapons, as stealthy aircraft cannot fly completely unfettered in contested airspace.

“Having a portfolio of different maritime strike weapons that includes high, low, and medium options is ideally what is needed,” Pettyjohn added.

As for QUICKSINK, the system has been in the making for a long time. In 2004, Pacific Air Forces practiced employing JDAMs against the ex-USS Schenectady in an exercise known as Resultant Fury some 20 years ago, and U.S. Airmen have been targeting ships for over a century.

The ex-USS Dubuque and ex-USS Tarawa were sunk on July 11 and July 19, respectively, just shy of the anniversary of Army Air Service Brig. Gen. Billy Mitchell’s sinking of another decommissioned vessel, the captured German battleship Ostfriesland, on July 21, 1921—one of the most significant events in the evolution of airpower.

“The most effective—and efficient—way to kill ships is from the air,” said retired Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, who was the two-star director of air and space operations for Pacific Air Forces during its 2004 Resultant Fury test and is now the dean of the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies. “The Air Force has a history of maritime attack, and it should double down on that history with appropriate funding support from the Congress.”

USAF Moves Fighters to Create a ‘Super Squadron’ of F-16s near North Korea

July 23, 2024 | By Unshin Lee Harpley

The U.S. Air Force is shifting nine extra F-16 fighters to its base closest to the Demilitarized Zone that splits North and South Korea, creating a so-called “Super Squadron.”

The fighters are coming from Kunsan Air Base in the southwestern part of Korea to Osan Air Base, located only 50 miles south of the DMZ.

The 36th Fighter Squadron at Osan will go from 22 jets to 31 with the additions, according to a base release. The transfer will be a yearlong test for how to “maximize combat effectiveness,” with the service evaluating its impact on sortie generation, maintenance, and manpower.

“This test is an opportunity for us to see if squadrons of this size increase our training effectiveness while also increasing our combat capability if deterrence fails,” Lt. Gen. David. R. Iverson, 7th Air Force commander and U.S. Forces Korea deputy commander, said in a release.

Airmen from the 36th Fighter Generation Squadron park a U.S. Air Force F-16 Fighting Falcon at Osan Air Base, Republic of Korea, July 9, 2024. U.S. Air Force photo by Airman 1st Class Chase Verzaal

Along with the fighters, some 150 Airmen including pilots, engineers, and combat support personnel are relocating to Osan base. The bases are roughly 100 miles apart.

“While we execute this test, we understand these changes may present some challenges for our Airmen and Families,” Iverson added, saying leaders are working to mitigate those impacts while “increasing readiness and war fighting capability.”

The other fighter squadron at Osan Air Base, the 25th Fighter Squadron, remains the only internationally based unit to hold onto the A-10 aircraft. While the exact timeline of how long the Air Force will continue operating the attack aircraft at the base remains uncertain, the fleet has a maintenance contract with several South Korean firms until 2029.

With the increased F-16 presence at the base, some analysts have suggested the USAF may retired the A-10s from the peninsula earlier than originally planned. Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall has described the A-10 as “increasingly obsolete and very difficult to maintain,” as the service has been pushing to gradually retire the fleet.

A U.S. Air Force F-16 Fighting Falcon lands at Osan Air Base, Republic of Korea, July 9, 2024. U.S. Air Force photo by Airman 1st Class Chase Verzaal

The shift in F-16s to Osan is the latest move by the Air Force to adjust its fighter posture in recent months. PACAF’s 2030 Strategy, released in September 2023, noted that “our current basing posture, optimized 70 years ago, adversely affects our ability to rapidly respond to natural disasters and man-made crises today” and pledged to re-optimize the command’s basing.

Earlier this month, the Pentagon announced it would base 36 F-15EX aircraft at Kadena Air Base in Japan to replace the base’s remaining F-15C/Ds. Over the last several years, in preparation for the retirement of the 48 F-15C/Ds at the base, the service has been rotating fighter deployments to the strategic base in Okinawa, only 400 miles east of Taiwan.

The service is also adding four dozen F-35As to Misawa Air Base to replace its 36 F-16s, making it the first foreign base in the Indo-Pacific to host USAF F-35 fighters and the second overall, after RAF Lakenheath in the U.K.

“In the last year and a half or so, the world has become a very dangerous place,” former PACAF Commander Gen. Kenneth S. Wilsbach said early this year, citing burgeoning concerns regarding China, North Korea and Russia which he considered a Pacific nation.

Osan received its first F-16s back in 1988, after Kunsan became the first overseas base to convert from F-4 Phantom to F-16s in 1981. The Air Force’s latest modernization effort aims to upgrade the F-16 fleet with 22 modifications to include a new radar with active electronically scanned array and Center Display Unit-technology. Kunsan received its first upgraded F-16 last year.