DOD Aims to Improve Missile Defense, Modernize Nuclear Weapons as ‘Backstop’ of Deterrence

DOD Aims to Improve Missile Defense, Modernize Nuclear Weapons as ‘Backstop’ of Deterrence

Oct. 27, 2022 | By Chris Gordon

The Department of Defense unveiled updated defense, nuclear, and missile defense strategies Oct. 27 that outline a fundamental shift in the world’s nuclear weapons threat. DOD states that nuclear weapons underpin U.S. strategic defenses and that America will continue to invest in its nuclear forces.

According to the 2022 National Defense Strategy, Nuclear Posture Review, and Missile Defense Review, China is the biggest long-term threat to U.S. security, or the “pacing threat,” while Russia poses significant challenges in the near term as the “acute threat.”

During the 2020 presidential campaign, President Joe Biden said he would work toward a policy in which the U.S. nuclear arsenal’s “sole purpose” would be to deter or respond to a nuclear attack. However, following concerns from U.S. allies, the new Nuclear Posture Review, or NPR, continues the policy that the U.S. could use nuclear weapons to deter or respond to enemy non-nuclear attacks by conventional, biological, chemical, or even cyber weapons.

“The NPR affirms the following roles for nuclear weapons: deter strategic attacks; assure allies and partners; and achieve U.S. objectives if deterrence fails,” the document states. It does not define a “strategic attack.”

According to DOD’s new strategies, the U.S. must retain a strong nuclear arsenal and improve its missile defenses.

“Our nuclear weapons remain the ultimate backstop for our strategic deterrence,” Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III told reporters.

The documents warn that China’s and Russia’s nuclear forces and missiles present unprecedented dangers.

“By the 2030s the United States will, for the first time in its history, face two major nuclear powers as strategic competitors and potential adversaries,” the NPR states. “This will create new stresses on stability and new challenges for deterrence, assurance, arms control, and risk reduction.”

The Nuclear Posture Review represents a significant departure from Biden’s original “sole purpose” goal.

“As long as nuclear weapons exist, the fundamental role of U.S. nuclear weapons is to deter nuclear attack on the United States, our allies, and partners,” the new U.S. nuclear declaratory policy states. “The U.S. would only consider the use of nuclear weapons in extreme circumstances to defend the vital interests of the United States or its allies and partners.”

The Nuclear Posture Review says the U.S. will modernize its nuclear forces. The DOD will “fully fund” and field the Long-Range Standoff weapon, B-21 Raider nuclear-capable stealth bomber, and Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile. The stealth F-35A Lightning II will become a “dual-capable” aircraft that can carry nuclear or conventional weapons.

“We concluded that nuclear weapons are required to deter not only nuclear attack, but also a narrow range of other high consequence, strategic-level attacks,” the NPR states. “This is a prudent approach given the current security environment and how it could further evolve.”

The documents answer some lingering questions regarding the DOD’s plans for future weapons systems.

The Long-Range Standoff weapon (LRSO) will be introduced and be able to be deployed from F-35s. The LRSO will replace the AGM-86 air-launched cruise missile.

The LGM-35A Sentinel, formerly known as the Ground Based Strategic Deterrent (GBSD), will replace the current Minuteman III ICBM “one-for-one” to “maintain 400 ICBMs on alert.”

The B-21 Raider stealth bomber will replace the B-2 Spirit. The Air Force will acquire a minimum of 100 B-21s. It will also upgrade the existing B-52 Stratofortress.

The U.S. will field the updated B61-12 nuclear gravity bomb.

“Although the U.S. nuclear arsenal remains safe, secure, and effective today, most systems are operating beyond their original design life, risking system effectiveness, reliability, and availability,” the Defense Department said in a fact sheet accompanying the release. “Today, much of the U.S. nuclear stockpile has aged without comprehensive refurbishment even as the geopolitical environment has deteriorated.”

Some nuclear programs are due to be canceled. The DOD plans to end the development of the nuclear-armed Sea-Launched Cruise Missile-Nuclear (SLCM-N) program.

The U.S. also plans to retire the B83 nuclear gravity bomb along with the B-2.

Trump administration’s 2018 NPR embraced the SLCM-N and B83 programs, but a senior defense official told reporters Oct. 27 that the SLCM-N was “unnecessary” and the B83 was “obsolete.”

“Our inventory of nuclear weapons is significant,” Austin said when pressed on the moves. “We have a lot of capability in our nuclear inventory.”

One of the first steps the Biden administration took when entering office was extending the New START treaty that limits U.S. and Russian long-range nuclear arms by five years until 2026. The administration has said it wants to reduce nuclear weapons’ role in U.S. defense policy. However, the NPR says “peacetime dialogue” is necessary and that NATO must retain its nuclear capability.

The document says Russia has up to 1,550 “accountable deployed warheads on strategic delivery vehicles,” in line with the New START treaty’s prohibitions, “as well as nuclear forces that are not numerically constrained by any arms control treaty.” The NPR points to Russia’s stockpile of “up to 2,000 non-strategic nuclear warheads” and Moscow’s pursuit of “several novel nuclear-capable systems designed to hold the U.S. homeland or allies and partners at risk, some of which are also not accountable under New START.”

The Biden administration’s decision not to shift to a “sole purpose” doctrine for the U.S. weapons comes in the wake of Russia’s renewed invasion of Ukraine and Moscow’s bellicose attitude toward Europe. The NPR’s language suggests that if Russia’s goal was to weaken NATO with its aggression, Moscow’s aims have backfired.

“Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the occupation of Crimea in 2014, NATO has taken steps to ensure a modern, ready, and credible NATO nuclear deterrent,” the NPR states.

China has also been rapidly building up its nuclear arsenal and increasing its threats toward Taiwan since Biden first suggested the U.S. might change its nuclear policy. The U.S. nuclear policy says China, also known as the PRC, “likely intends to possess at least 1,000 deliverable warheads by the end of the decade.”

The overall trend is clear, according to the review.

“While the end state resulting from the PRC’s specific choices with respect to its nuclear forces strategy is uncertain, the trajectory of these efforts points to a large, diverse nuclear arsenal with a high degree of survivability, reliability, and effectiveness,” the NPR says. “This could provide the PRC with new options before and during a crisis or conflict to leverage nuclear weapons for coercive purposes, including military provocations against U.S. allies and partners in the region.”

North Korea, which possesses nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles, is also a danger that the United States would respond forcefully to if necessary.

“Any nuclear attack by North Korea against the United States or its Allies and partners is unacceptable and will result in the end of that regime,” the NPR says. “There is no scenario in which the Kim regime could employ nuclear weapons and survive.”

The new nuclear policy strikes the Trump administration’s view that the role of nuclear weapons was to “hedge against an uncertain future.”

The Biden administration’s NPR says the U.S. will “ensure a safe, secure, and effective deterrent.” While nuclear weapons could be used in a non-nuclear conflict, the document is clear the U.S. does not take the use of nuclear weapons lightly.

The NPR says the U.S. will “adopt a strategy and declaratory policy that maintain a very high bar for nuclear employment while assuring allies and partners and complicating adversary decision calculus.” In addition, the strategy outlines some non-nuclear threats to the U.S. and its allies.

China and Russia are “working to augment their growing nuclear forces with a broader set of kinetic and non-kinetic capabilities, including cyber, space, information, and advanced conventional strike.”

The Defense Department sees nuclear weapons threats from China and Russia as problematic, given their substantial missile capabilities. Since the DOD last issued a Missile Defense Review, also known as the MDR, in 2019, “threats have rapidly expanded in quantity, diversity, and sophistication.”

DOD says ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, hypersonic weapons, and uncrewed aircraft systems represent a significant threat to America’s security interests. China and Russia, and to a smaller extent North Korea, represent a risk to the U.S. homeland.

The Missile Defense Review says any attack on the U.S. territories would not be distinguished from strikes on American states. The U.S. island of Guam is a major military hub in the Western Pacific that may be within range of Chinese missiles.

“Within the context of homeland defense, an attack on Guam or any other U.S. territory by any adversary will be considered a direct attack on the United States, and will be met with an appropriate response,” the document says.

The DOD acknowledges that its current missile defense is not comprehensive enough and that the U.S. must develop improved integrated air and missile defense systems. The threat from cruise missiles is particularly acute, the MDR says.

“Gone is the primary focus on rogue state ballistic missiles that defined the 2010 review and programs and budgets for years following,” Tom Karako of the Center for Strategic and International Studies said in an interview.

The document, however, lacks unclassified details on specific defenses DOD hopes to add.

“Although the public version of the review leaves several things to be desired, it nevertheless advances several critical mission areas,” Karako added, referring to the MDR’s focus on a more comprehensive view of missile defense, the inclusion of UAS threats, the increased focus on the U.S. homeland and Guam, and the push for more distributed operations.

The new policies state that the U.S. cannot rely on defenses alone to protect itself and its allies. Ultimately, America will fall back on its nuclear arsenal if necessary.

“In such a circumstance, the United States would seek to end any conflict at the lowest level of damage possible on the best achievable terms for the United States and its allies and partners,” the 2022 NPR states.

B-1s Carry Naval Mines for Bomber Task Force Mission

B-1s Carry Naval Mines for Bomber Task Force Mission

Oct. 27, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

B-1B Lancers deployed to Guam for a bomber task force joint training mission with the Navy, with Airmen and Sailors practicing loading and releasing naval mines from the B-1s.

The naval mine exercise, or MineX, took place Oct. 24, staged out of Andersen Air Force Base, according to a release from Pacific Air Forces.

As part of the exercise, Sailors from Navy Munitions Command’s Pacific Unit built and delivered the Mark-62 Quickstrike mines, then worked with Airmen from the 28th Munitions Squadron to load them onto the B-1s.

All told, an undisclosed number of B-1s were loaded with 21 mines total, each mine weighing about 500 pounds. A B-1 can carry up to 84 of the mines.

“MineX missions require close coordination and integration between the Navy and the Air Force,” Col. Chris McConnell, 37th Bomb Squadron commander, said in a statement. “As one of the aircraft capable of releasing mines, we have to work with our Navy partners to understand where those munitions need to be placed to meet the desired objectives.”

McConnell also stated that as part of the mission, the B-1s flew alongside “Navy partners and allies,” though PACAF did not specify what other aircraft or partner nations were included in the mission.

The exercise marks a quick start for the B-1s’ bomber task force deployment on Guam. An undisclosed number of the bombers from Ellsworth Air Force Base, N.D., arrived there Oct. 18. It marks the second time this year that B-1s have been deployed to Guam and the first BTF mission in the Indo-Pacific this fall.

The Ellsworth B-1s are no strangers to naval mine exercises, though. Just this past August, a B-1 from the 28th Bomb Wing was loaded with a Mark-65 Quickstrike mine and flew from Ellsworth to off the coast of California, where it dropped the munition. A similar exercise took place in 2014.

B-1s from Dyess Air Force Base, Texas, also dropped Mark-62 Quickstrike mines as part of  Exercise Baltic Operations in 2018.

None of those B-1 exercises, however, took place in the Indo-Pacific, where the Pentagon has placed an increased emphasis as of late as part of its strategic competition with China—the Air Force and Navy did work together during Exercise Valiant Shield in 2018 and in 2019 to load and drop naval mines.

The B-1B is capable of carrying up to eight Mark-65 Quickstrike mines, which weigh 2,000 pounds each.

New National Defense Strategy Mum on Force Structure

New National Defense Strategy Mum on Force Structure

Oct. 27, 2022 | By John A. Tirpak

The new, public version of the National Defense Strategy, unveiled by Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III on Oct. 27, calls out China as the U.S. military’s “pacing threat” but offers no force-sizing construct nor any specifics about numbers of forces the U.S. needs to carry out its goal of deterring China, Russia, and other potential adversaries.

One of the biggest differences between the 2022 National Defense Strategy and the 2018 version put out by the Trump administration is that the new document specifically names China as the main threat against which U.S. forces must prepare, Austin said, with Russia a secondary but “dangerous” concern. The previous NDS referred to engaging in “great power competition” with near-peer nations.

The People’s Republic of China “is the only competitor out there with both the intent to reshape the international order and, increasingly, the power to do so,” Austin told reporters Oct. 27 at the Pentagon. Russia is labeled an “acute” threat, a word Austin said was chosen carefully to explain that while “Russia can’t systemically challenge the United States over the long term,” its “reckless war of choice” against Ukraine “does pose an immediate and sharp threat to our interests and values.”

Austin characterized the Ukraine war as “the worst threat to European security since the end of World War II,” which has made the danger posed by Russia “very clear for the whole world.”

Unlike previous strategies, the NDS rolled out by Austin doesn’t offer a pithy force-sizing construct summary such as “win-hold-win” or the ability to fight two major regional theater wars, and it sets no goals for numbers of Navy ships or other benchmarks of military capability. Defense officials, however, said there are “strong linkages” between the strategy and the fiscal 2023 defense budget request and future investments.

A senior defense official briefing the press ahead of the rollout said the department continues to wrestle with how deterrence will work in a world with three major nuclear and conventional powers. The old models of deterrence in a bi-polar world were developed over decades of study involving academia, he said, so the new model will take some time to develop.

“This is new territory for us,” he said.

As for a force structure model, the official would only say the strategy seeks to answer the question: “How do you successfully fight one adversary while having enough reserve to hold the other at bay?”

Another official said force sizing is being shaped by the Joint Warfighting Concept activities. She said the Marine Corps’ “Force Design 2030” study is a good example of the “creative” work being done in the Pentagon to envision the capabilities needed in the future.

Austin said “we went through a force posture review very early on,” and there are “incremental adjustments from time to time to that force posture.” He said “we have the ability to rapidly deploy capability to Europe—and you saw that exercise at the very beginning of this conflict, as we deployed … heavy forces from the United States to Europe very, very quickly.” This was possible because of the work done in the European Defense Initiative, he added.

“We’re confident that we’ll have … the force to be able to execute our strategy,” he said, adding that “we continue to focus” on recruiting.

The long delay between the “interim” NDS released in 2021, the classified version sent to Congress in March, and the unclassified version released Oct. 27 was attributed to “assessing the calculus” of how things have changed due to the Ukraine conflict, senior defense officials told reporters on background. However, they also said that analysis “validated” the assumptions and concepts developed before the Ukraine war started, and that the NDS has remained largely intact despite it.  

The text of the NDS also says that while the U.S. is structuring for deterring China and Russia, it will also be able to undertake smaller military actions without degrading overall deterrence capability.

Austin said the classified version of the NDS “has been our North Star” since it was delivered to Congress and that it provided the foundation for the fiscal 2023 budget. The Pentagon has been “laser focused” on the China threat “since Day 1,” and Austin noted that he set a China Task Force early in his tenure to “produce a range of recommendations to focus the entire department on the China challenge.”

The NDS is also “very clear-eyed about other serious threats,” Austin said.

“That includes North Korea’s expanding nuclear and missile capabilities. And meanwhile, Iran is moving ahead on its nuclear program, supporting dangerous armed proxies and even exporting drones that Russia is using to terrorize Ukrainian civilians.”

The Pentagon also remains “vigilant against the ongoing threat from global terrorist networks as well as from climate change, pandemics, and other dangers that don’t respect borders,” Austin said.

Broadly, the strategy aims, in order, to defend the U.S. homeland; deter strategic attacks against the U.S. and its allies; “prepare to prevail in conflict when necessary”; and “build a resilient joint force and defense ecosystem,” Austin explained.

In service of those goals, the NDS touts “integrated deterrence,” referring to integration among the services, with other parts of government, and with allies and partners.

The strategy calls for investments in capabilities and technologies that “strengthen the 21st century combat-credible U.S. military” by making it “ready to tackle the full range of threats,” Austin said.

Austin also said the NDS “emphasizes the day-to-day work of ‘campaigning,’” which he defined as “conducting and sequencing military activities that, over time, shift the security environment in our favor.” Such activities include U.S. exercises, deployments, and wargames held with allies and partners to cement relationships with them and to develop joint strategies.

The “seamless integration” of U.S. capabilities “across all domains … and theaters … [and] the full spectrum of conflict  should make it “crystal clear to any potential foe” that “the costs of aggression against the United States, our allies, and partners far outweigh any conceivable gains,” Austin said.

The new strategy is “nested” within the National Security Strategy released in mid-October and “for the first time” was developed in full integration with those preparing the Nuclear Posture Review and the Missile Defense Review, Austin said.

Much of the NDS is oriented around the world as it will look in 2030. In the introduction, Austin echoes President Joe Biden’s National Security Strategy comment that this is a “decisive decade.” Asked how the NDS is gauged to react to nearer-term threats—particularly the threat of an invasion of Taiwan by 2027, or even next year—a senior defense official said, “we really tried to look across time periods” and to develop a strategy across three successive future years defense plans, which are five years long.

The NDS sets a framework for “evolving” forces and capabilities with new investments, the official said.

“We’ve really tried to balance our approach to risk across all of those and across the entire joint force,” he asserted. “And I think if you look through the … President’s budget submission from last March, I think you’ll see this is pretty nicely done, right? You see a really big emphasis on building a combat-credible force. You also see an emphasis on readiness, for example,” with $135 billion earmarked for readiness accounts.

That shows that the Pentagon is mindful of the need to “manage risk in the near term, as well.”

The fiscal 2023 budget request “included more than $56 billion for air power platforms and systems,” Austin said, “and more than $40 billion to maintain our dominance at sea, and almost $13 billion to support and modernize our forces on land,” with another $34 billion “to sustain and modernize our nuclear forces.”

He also touted that the request includes $130 billion for research and development, “the largest R&D budget number in DOD history.”

The strategy outlines that the Pentagon is also “working in new ways with our industry partners, including by strengthening our supply chains in our defense industrial base,” Austin said.

LaPlante on Why Weapon Production Constitutes Deterrence

LaPlante on Why Weapon Production Constitutes Deterrence

Oct. 26, 2022 | By John A. Tirpak

One of the biggest lessons to emerge from the war in Ukraine is that weapons that are in production constitute a credible threat to adversaries, whereas weapons that are merely experimental—or are not actually being made in numbers—are not, according to William LaPlante, the Pentagon’s head of acquisition and sustainment. He said those lessons “amplify” the priorities his organization is pursuing.

“Production is deterrence,” LaPlante asserted at an acquisition seminar sponsored by the Potomac Officers Club in Tysons, Va., on Oct. 26.

Guiding his decisions during his term as the No. 3 executive at the Pentagon, he said, is the urgency of the China threat and providing equipment that’s useful in “a real, high-end fight” such that the U.S. can back up its rhetoric with relevant hardware in the hands of operators.

LaPlante said China has been gaining on the U.S. for 20 years in military technology and that the situation is “bad in space, bad in cyber, bad in EW [electronic warfare].” Ukraine has driven home the reality that “we can’t just think of [high-end warfare] as something that might happen five or 10 years from now,” but potentially in the “next year, or next month … That’s the takeaway.”

China is “really good” at modern warfare, he said. “They can do the kill chain. They’ve figured that out.” He said that “anybody who says … ’it’s not as bad as you think’—you’re wrong.”

For LaPlante, “All that matters is getting [equipment] to warfighters at scale,” he said. “If you don’t get into production, it really doesn’t matter. That’s one thing that’s hit home” as a result of the Ukraine war.

Deterrence is based on “the three C’s,” he said: “communication, capability and credibility.” It’s essential that “the other side”—whoever that is in a given situation—“understands what you mean and intend,” he said.

“If you say, ‘we’re going to hold them at risk,’” it has to be backed up with the goods, LaPlante asserted. He later added that “deterrence does work. It’s working right now with NATO and Ukraine. NATO is not at war. Hopefully it will not be at war. But I think part of deterrence is also production lines.”

In space, for example, “if the adversary can see that you can produce smallsats off the line in a couple of days, so that if they take out a hundred of them, you can put up another hundred of them in three weeks, that’s deterrence.”

With Ukraine, the conversation has turned to “how many more precision weapons do the Russians have? How many more do we have? Once you realize that a country can keep going into its magazine, and has production, that’s deterrence.”

The war has also illustrated that “You can’t predict ahead of time what you’re going to need. You can try, but you’ll be wrong half the time.” He said, “Who’d have thought in 2022 that we’d need Stingers, right? That production line stopped in 2008.” Similarly, the M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) was last in production from 2014 to 2017, and the U.S. is drawing down its stocks rapidly in providing the weapon to Ukraine. After the war against ISIS, the perceived need for AGM-114 Hellfire missiles was also deemed to have fallen.

“So be humble about predicting what you think you’re going to need. What you have to do is hedge your bets,” LaPlante said.

That means the U.S. is going to have to keep production of some systems going even when stockpiles are solid, and “we’re going to have to pay for it,” he said.

LaPLante noted that “we’ve gone to this just-in-time delivery [scheme] like Wal-Mart … Don’t have any inventory; ‘inventory is waste.’ Cut out redundancy, tooth to tail. Remember all this? Well, what could go wrong there? Nothing … until we have Ukraine.” In that fight, “if you can’t get something in three years, nobody cares.”

The Pentagon needs to remind itself “that the resiliency of the industrial base means you have to pay for it; you have to plan for it, and you have to be willing to put in place measures that you might not even be able to prove” will ever result in being used.

However, regardless of the theater, he said, integrated air and missile defenses are going to be key. Ukraine, with the help of its partners, has “MacGyvered” several kinds of sensors with weapons to produce functional air defenses, he said. But it needs more.

Regarding new weapons, LaPlante called himself “a nerd. I love prototypes. [They’re] interesting. They’re fun for all of us in Nerdville. But it doesn’t really help the warfighter … So I’ve really been focused on delivering … capabilities.”

He said he’s glad to see the Pentagon doing more prototyping and experimentation, as “we were not doing very much of that back in 2014-15 when I last served. Now, to everyone’s credit, there’s so much going on.” But he added that there’s “an excess of it, really.”

Regarding hypersonics, for example, he said, “the ugly truth is … we’ve never been in production with hypersonics in this country, ever. Hypersonics have been in the [science and technology] world for forever—60 years. It’s been the ‘weapon of the future’ for 60 years. Whereas the Russians and Chinese are in production.”

He admitted that “I’m going to be tuning out when you talk about doing a test” of a hypersonic system by the Air Force Research Laboratory, DARPA, etc. “When you get into production, then I’m going to start paying attention.”

His second priority is delivering capabilities “in a way that’s sustainable and cost-effective.” He said it’s “well known” that 70 percent of a weapon’s lifecycle costs are in sustainment, and the support system has to be there if they are to work.

And, “it doesn’t matter if you can’t train to it,” LaPLante said.

He emphasized that it no longer makes sense to think of the defense industrial base as separate from that of the rest of U.S. industrial base. They are one and the same, he said, and the Pentagon must use all the sources it can to achieve its goals.

Finally, he said he’s been concentrating on “workforce, tools, and education,” but acknowledged that the Ukraine situation has consumed “about half” his time since taking up the post in April.

Referring to the weapons provided to Ukraine, LaPlante also pointed out, “The stuff works. For all the criticism we give ourselves, the stuff works, and it works really very well.” The world has seen that, and there is also deterrence in that fact, he said.

With HIMARS, “it takes three 18- to 20-year-olds, not trained very much, to use it, and it’s very powerful.”

Armagno: ‘Call-Up Structure’ for Commercial Satellites Could Mirror Civil Reserve Air Fleet

Armagno: ‘Call-Up Structure’ for Commercial Satellites Could Mirror Civil Reserve Air Fleet

Oct. 26, 2022 | By Amanda Miller

The commercial space industry has proven its potential value to the military since Russia invaded Ukraine—and not just in the fighting. But the Defense Department won’t be able to subscribe to every commercial imagery or communication service and may instead benefit from “some kind of a call-up structure” for satellites, said a top Space Force general.

USSF Director of Staff Lt. Gen. Nina M. Armagno suggested the idea Oct. 24 at the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics’ ASCEND Conference in Las Vegas, joining a panel of experts to talk about the government’s use of commercial space assets or services in a conflict.

Not only has the commercial space industry—and its satellite imagery, in particular—informed decisions on the ground in Ukraine, it’s delivered a new degree of transparency that David Gauthier of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency said factors into countries’ “deterrence calculus.”

“It forces a bad actor to realize that with the transparency commercial remote sensing provides, they cannot hide their actions anymore from the world,” Gauthier said. “Satellite imagery can deter entire nations from harming us at a nation level.”

The best way to ensure a strong, competitive commercial market, said Steve “Bucky” Butow, space portfolio director at the DOD’s Defense Innovation Unit, will be to “make sure that we’re using these tools every day in an appropriate way as a complement to our tactical and strategic capabilities.”

Recognizing, however, that the department may not be able to “afford to put every good idea on contract as soon as the good idea comes out,” Armagno said—“or maybe we don’t recognize that it’s a good idea that we’re going to need in two to five years”—she cited as an example the arrangements with commercial airlines to call up the Civil Reserve Air Fleet for military transport.

“It’s actually so essential to how our nation fights. Maybe we need some kind of a structure for space,” Armagno said. “Some kind of a call-up structure would be very interesting to explore.”

Amid concern that commercial satellites could become military targets, Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen H. Hicks has said the department is considering how to compensate the companies for potential losses.

Boeing Posts $2.8B Quarterly Loss in Defense Business Attributed to KC-46, New Air Force One

Boeing Posts $2.8B Quarterly Loss in Defense Business Attributed to KC-46, New Air Force One

Oct. 26, 2022 | By Chris Gordon

Boeing reported a $3.3 billion loss in the third quarter of 2022, driven by deepening woes in its defense business, the company announced Oct. 26. Boeing’s defense, space, and security sector lost $2.8 billion in cost overruns on fixed-price development contracts.

The aerospace giant’s financial difficulties were highlighted by a $1.2 billion hit to the KC-46 Pegasus tanker and a $766 million loss on the VC-25B, better known as the new “Air Force One,” according to Boeing’s chief financial officer Brian West. Boeing also recorded losses on its USAF T-7A Red Hawk trainer, the Navy’s MQ-25 Stingray, and NASA’s Commercial Crew program.

“We’re not embarrassed by them,” Boeing CEO David L. Calhoun said of the cost overruns on an earnings call. “They are what they are, and we intend to deliver against these contracts and satisfy our customers.”

For years, Boeing pursued a strategy of offering aggressive bids for fixed-price development contracts. Those contracts put Boeing on the hook for extra costs associated with developing the programs. Calhoun conceded that was largely a mistake for the company.

“Eight-five percent of the business is doing pretty well,” Calhoun said of the defense side of the Arlington, Va.-based company. “It’s these fixed-price development programs that, unfortunately, we’re working our way through. We had to account for recent performance, including a reassessment of our forecast cost to complete. There’s no doubt about it.”

Losses on the KC-46 have now run up to over $6 billion. The Air Force’s initial contract for the aircraft was $4.9 billion.

West said the defense business’s issues were “primarily due to higher estimated manufacturing and supply chain costs as well as technical challenges.”

The KC-46 program encountered a substantial setback when Boeing and the Air Force announced that the Remote Vision System (RVS) 2.0 update would be delayed until 2025, 19 months more than previously planned. RVS 2.0 will be required for all KC-46s to fix problems with the current system used to operate the main refueling boom. Because the fix to the RVS also includes upgrades to display resolution and cameras, Boeing is on not on the hook for all costs. Instead, some will fall on the Air Force, though the company and the service have declined to get into further detail. The company said the KC-46’s issues stem from parts shortages and labor instability.

The new Air Force One jet ran into more trouble after the company signaled the program was getting on the right track earlier in the year. Boeing said the new costs stem from a tight labor market and supply chain issues. Security clearance issues for workers on the highly classified project make the labor issues particularly acute. Boeing agreed to a $3.9 billion contract for the new Air Force One after pressure from former President Donald Trump, who thought the price was too high.

The T-7 contract award followed a bid by Boeing of $9.2 billion to produce the Air Force’s new trainer that will replace the stalwart T-38 Talon. That deal, however, has cost Boeing more than anticipated and run into delays.

Trump got personally involved in the Air Force One contract cost, and Boeing agreed to produce the two VC-25B aircraft at a lower cost than initially planned.

“Well, it turns out our critics were right,” Calhoun said in an interview with CNBC. “We didn’t get enough price. That’s fairly obvious to all of us. In the meantime, we haven’t taken any of these fixed-price development contracts, and it’s not our intention to ever do so.”

Boeing recently made changes in the executive team of its defense division, also known as BDS. The company had a falling out with regulators and the general public following deadly crashes of its 737 Max commercial airliner, which was temporarily grounded. Boeing reported strong demand for the 737 Max, its marquee civilian airliner, in the third quarter of 2022. It has resumed deliveries of its 787 Dreamliner wide-body jet that had been halted after manufacturing defects.

While Boeing cited inflation as one factor driving its losses, the company did not try to blame the issue for all its troubles. The Department of Defense has signaled it may be willing to make adjustments for inflation to companies with fixed-price contracts such as Boeing. However, Calhoun or West did not raise the issue on the call with financial analysts despite repeatedly being pressed on Boeing’s defense losses.

After years of instability, safety, and quality concerns, Boeing’s main focus now is delivering what airliners and the Air Force have already ordered.

“I think that the thing we have to keep in mind is that our mandate is to stabilize and now deliver very important products to our customers who need them,” Calhoun said.

SDA Working on ‘Translators’ to Connect Transport Layer to Other Networks

SDA Working on ‘Translators’ to Connect Transport Layer to Other Networks

Oct. 26, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

Some of the satellites that will form the planned “backbone” of joint all-domain command and control may include “translation” payloads to let other satellites feed their data into the Pentagon’s massive mesh network, the head of the Space Development Agency said Oct. 25.

SDA is still committed to establishing common standards for networking and communications on the planned National Defense Space Architecture, director Derek M. Tournear said at the Mitchell Institute’s Spacepower Security Forum. Of particular importance will be the Transport Layer, which will be responsible for providing data and connectivity to countless platforms across the U.S. military.

That ability to link sensors and shooters across the globe is what will make the Transport Layer a key component of joint all-domain command and control, the Pentagon’s ambitious effort to create a military Internet of Things, Tournear said.

But while common standards will be crucial to avoiding “vendor lock” and allowing different contractors to compete for Transport Layer contracts, Tournear suggested that SDA will also look to incorporate other satellite systems, both government and industry, into the data network via “translator sats.”

“A translator sat is a satellite that will be able to basically talk to the SDA Transport Layer and talk to either the commercial or other government agency providers’ layer so we can do that translation to move data from one network onto the other,” Tournear said. “And there’s a lot of reasons you may need to do that. … While not the preferred, that’s another option that we have available to be able to use the SDA Transport layer to tie this whole mission together. The whole mission, in a nutshell, is to get the right sensor data to the right shooter at the right time. And that’s how we enable that.”

Tournear later clarified that such a “translator” likely wouldn’t be a dedicated satellite, but instead a payload, either on a satellite launched as part of the NDSA, or as part of another satellite architecture.

SDA is already “working with our partners” on the translator concept, Tournear added.

Such a capability may be necessary even as SDA has looked to establish common standards. For networking, it is asking contractors to follow standards established by the Naval Research Laboratory’s Space Research Group called Nebula—which stands for “networking beyond the upper limits of the atmosphere.” It also has adopted optical communications standards, “to make sure that my walkie talkie talks to their walkie talkie,” Tournear said.

“We actually have with [the Naval Research Lab], we have developed a test lab so that folks can bring their optical terminals to NRL to demonstrate that they can plug and play with our optical standard, as well as other vendors’ optical communication terminals, to make sure there is no vendor lock situation and it’s all interoperable,” Tournear added.

Yet even with those standards, satellite constellations are already in orbit that may not have the necessary equipment. And there are other reasons why a contractor or agency might not meet the standards.

“You have some of the commercial networks up there and some of the commercial ISR data providers, they may not have either the capability or the ability to put an optical comms terminal that matches the SDA Transport Layer, or, frankly, they may not be able to meet the Nebula standards because of crypto requirements and things like that, which is not an easy thing to solve,” Tournear said.

That’s where the translation payloads come in, but three technical challenges have to be addressed, Tournear said.

First, the vendor running the satellite architecture would need to launch at least one satellite with an optical communications terminal to link up with SDA’s Transport Layer. Then, “what you need is a Nebulizer and a de-Nebulizer,” Tournear said—a way to take networking protocols and put them into SDA’s Nebula standard format so that data can be shared.

“We’re developing generic … software development toolkits for the Nebulizer and the De-Nebulizer that then third-party vendors could take, and they can use that as a starting point and to integrate that in with their system,” Tournear said. 

Finally, the vendor and SDA will need to work out cybersecurity issues to ensure that the data being passed is safe, but “that’s something that has a lot of different types of solutions,” Tournear said.

As SDA works on those problems, “translator sats” won’t be part of the agency’s very first launches, scheduled for the coming months. But Tournear hinted that they could be in orbit in the coming years, starting with the planned Tranche 2 Demonstration and Experimentation Satellites, or T2DES.

“This isn’t set in stone, but likely some of those satellites would be demonstrators of different translator sats for different constellations,” Tournear said. “So those would be in your [2026] timeframe.”

Working from ‘Clean Sheet,’ China Building Up Space Power at ‘Incredible Rate,’ USSF Leaders Say

Working from ‘Clean Sheet,’ China Building Up Space Power at ‘Incredible Rate,’ USSF Leaders Say

Oct. 25, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

China is building up its space capabilities at an “incredible rate”—and it has done so by embracing needed principles the U.S. has historically been slow to adopt, top Space Force officials said Oct. 25.

Speaking at the Mitchell Institute’s Spacepower Security Forum, both Vice Chief of Space Operations Gen. David D. Thompson and Space Development Agency director Derek M. Tournear used the analogy of a “clean slate” to explain how the Chinese have been able to rapidly build out their architecture of satellites.

“What the Chinese have done is they have started with a clean sheet and they have built a military space reconnaissance strike enterprise that starts in space, with the ability to collect intelligence—now, by the most recent count, more than 260 ISR satellites,” Thompson said. “They have connected data relays. They have created their own global precision positioning, navigation, and timing system, the BeiDao, to the tune of 49 satellites today. And they have demonstrated that they learned the importance and the value of space power, and they intend to use those capabilities against us should it come time.”

That clean slate has been particularly important when compared to the U.S.’s own satellites. In recent years, Pentagon officials have frequently expressed concern that existing American military satellites, while providing exquisite capabilities, are relatively few in number and largely defenseless—“big, fat, juicy targets,” as Air Force Gen. John Hyten once referred to them, or “Battlestar Galactica,” as Tournear put it.

In contrast, the focus in future plans has been on proliferated constellations of cheaper, less capable satellites that, taken together, provide a mesh network and greater resiliency. In many ways, Tournear has led the charge on that front with SDA’s planned National Defense Space Architecture.

The two keys of the approach, Tournear said Oct. 25, are proliferation and “spiral development”—constant, regular updates to the architecture instead of waiting years to meet requirements.

“They clearly have embraced those pillars … before we have,” Tournear said of the Chinese. “And that’s kind of their model going forward, and they use that. And so the only thing I’d say about that is they also didn’t have all of the legacy that had given them the exquisite capabilities up to date. So they kind of started with a cleaner slate [and] were able to do that.”

Tournear was quick to note that the U.S.’s space architecture was born out of the time and technology in which it was fielded, and Thompson added that the Pentagon has done “a tremendous job” of adapting that architecture as needed to “push those space capabilities and effects … as far down as we could to individual Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, and Marines in some cases.”

As a result, Thompson argued, the Pentagon still has an advantage in space with the existing architecture. But the gap is closing.

“They are building and fielding space capabilities at an incredible pace. … Their latest version of BeiDou, they have built and fielded over the course of about five years,” Thompson said of China. “Their space capabilities are still not quite as good as ours. But they are really, really, really good.”

When asked if the Space Force is projecting a timeline for when China might match or surpass the U.S. in space, though, Thompson demurred.

“I can’t really sit here and tell you today, at this point in time, when will they be a threat? They are a threat today,” Thompson said. “Are they better than us? Are they not as good as us? Will we win—will they win? Are we at parity? I can’t say that. All I can say is they are a serious challenge. They are a serious threat. They are serious about what they need to do. Their capabilities are close to ours. We simply need to do what we need to do, to continue to resource and field new capabilities, resilient capabilities, train our forces and be prepared, first to deter, but if necessary, to win.”

Former Defense Secretary Ash Carter Dies at 68

Former Defense Secretary Ash Carter Dies at 68

Oct. 25, 2022 | By John A. Tirpak

Ashton Baldwin Carter, who served as the 25th Secretary of Defense from 2015 to 2017, during the presidency of Barack Obama, died Oct. 24 at the age of 68. Carter served in national security roles and held numerous academic research, teaching, and leadership positions.

During his tenure as Defense Secretary, Carter directed the anti-ISIS special operations and air campaign in the Middle East—”Operation Inherent Resolve”—which ultimately led to the defeat of ISIS in Iraq and Syria. He also opened combat jobs to women and permitted transgender individuals to serve in the U.S. military.

From 2011 to 2013, Carter was deputy secretary, charged with managing the department’s response to the Budget Control Act sequestrations and reform of the Pentagon’s export control system, which had stymied some commercial and many military exports. He also directed the U.S. military’s “shift to Asia,” which put greater emphasis on the Indo-Pacific and reapportioned U.S. forces accordingly.     

From 2009 to 2011, Carter served as undersecretary of defense for acquisition, technology, and logistics. He counted as one of his signature accomplishments the provision of more than 1,000 Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicles to U.S. troops, who had been taking heavy casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan from roadside bombs and improvised explosive devices (IEDs). He also oversaw the selection of the KC-46 in the KC-X aerial tanker competition and instituted the “Better Buying Power” acquisition reforms.

From 1993 to 1996, under President Bill Clinton, Carter served as assistant secretary of defense for international security policy, crafting nuclear policy, particularly as it applied to the former Soviet republics and North Korea; and working on other strategic issues. He oversaw the 1995 extension of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, the 1996 Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, and “Project Sapphire,” which removed nuclear weapons and fissile material from several former Soviet states.

Carter ordered the opening of all military jobs to women in 2015 after a three-year study, which determined in part that many military women were already serving in combat positions, but were not receiving commensurate pay, career recognition, command opportunities or appropriate decorations due to their non-combat specialty codes. The change permitted women to compete for special operations, fighter pilot, and other frontline combat positions.

In 2016, Carter lifted a ban on transgender personnel openly serving in the military, saying anyone who could meet the military’s standards “should be afforded the opportunity to compete to do so.”

Graduating summa cum laude from Yale with degrees in physics and medieval history, Carter worked in the Congressional Office of Technology, returning to the John F. Kennedy School of Government in 1984 to chair the International and Global Affairs faculty.

Carter did research on quarks and charmed particles at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory and the Brookhaven National Laboratory. He was a Rhodes scholar and received his doctorate in theoretical physics from the University of Oxford. He did postdoctoral research at Rockefeller University and the MIT Center for International Studies. He taught at Harvard University from 1984 to 1990.

He received five awards of the Defense Department Distinguished Public Service Medal, as well as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Joint Distinguished Civilian Service Medal and the Defense Intelligence Medal.

Carter wrote 11 books on ballistic missile basing and strategy, missile defenses, international security, and defense management.

At the time of his death, Carter was the director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, where he taught public policy.