Air Force Offering Even More Enlistment Bonuses for Certain Career Fields—Here They Are

Air Force Offering Even More Enlistment Bonuses for Certain Career Fields—Here They Are

Facing a tough recruiting environment that Air Force Recruiting Service commander Maj. Gen. Ed Thomas recently likened to a “week-to-week dogfight,” the Air Force has expanded its list of jobs that are eligible for initial enlistment bonuses, hoping to entice more potential Airmen.

All told, 22 Air Force Speciality Codes are now eligible for some sort of enlistment bonus—some for four-year contracts, some for six-year deals, and some for both. 

That marks a dramatic increase from the beginning of fiscal 2022, when just nine AFSCs were on the list. In April, the Air Force added six career fields, followed by more on July 11. The bonuses will be available until Sept. 30, 2022.

Many of the career fields added this week are in maintenance and offer $6,000 for six-year contracts and $3,000 for four-year deals. The speciality codes are:

  • 2A634, Aircraft Fuel Systems
  • 2A636, Aircraft Electrical & Environmental Systems
  • 2F031, Fuels
  • 2M031, Missile & Space Systems Electronic Maintenance
  • 2M032, Missile & Space Systems Maintenance
  • 2M033, Missile & Space Facilities
  • 2T331, Mission Generation Vehicular Equipment Maintenance
  • 2W131, Aircraft Armament Systems

Bigger bonuses ranging from $12,000 to $20,000 are available to those who sign six-year contracts for computer-focused fields including:

  • 1D731A, Network Operations
  • 1D731B, Systems Operations
  • 1D731D, Security Operations
  • 1D731E, Client Systems Operations

The Air Force is also still offering a “Quick Ship” bonus in which an already fully qualified applicant will get $8,000 to fill a short-notice Basic Military Training vacancy and ship out within five days or less. Thus far, AFRS said in a release, 178 recruits have taken advantage of the Quick Ship bonus.

The Air Force’s expansion of enlistment bonuses comes as all the services are experiencing recruiting challenges, a trend that has started to receive widespread media attention. Even as end strength is projected to decline slightly in the year ahead, recruiters are having a hard time convincing the small pool of eligible young adults to sign up.

At the same time, the Air Force has also recently expanded its list of career fields eligible for retention bonuses, a potential sign that the sky-high retention rates seen during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic have started to slip.

That high retention, however, has had lasting effects. The service announced earlier this month that it was expecting lower promotion rates for certain enlisted noncommissioned officer ranks due to high numbers of eligible Airmen and a shift in force grade structures.

AFSCCAREER FIELD6-YEAR BONUS4-YEAR BONUS
1A8X1Airborne Linguist$20,000Not Applicable
1D731ANetwork Operations$12K-$20KNot Applicable
1D731BSystems Operations$12K-$20KNot Applicable
1D731DSecurity Operations$12K-$20KNot Applicable
1D731EClient Systems Operations$12K-$20KNot Applicable
1D731RRadio Frequency Transmission Systems$6,000$3,000
1N3XXCrypto Linguist$18,000Not Applicable
1T0X1SERE$40,000Not Applicable
2A534Refuel/Bomber Aircraft Maintenance$6,000$3,000
2A632Aerospace Ground Equipment$6,000$3,000
2A634Aircraft Fuel Systems$6,000$3,000
2A636Aircraft Electrical & Environmental Systems$6,000$3,000
2F031Fuels$6,000$3,000
2M031Missile & Space Systems Electronic Maintenance$6,000$3,000
2M032Missile & Space Systems Maintenance$6,000$3,000
2M033Missile & Space Facilities$6,000$3,000
2T331Mission Generation Vehicular Equipment Maintenance$6,000$3,000
2W031Munitions Systems$6,000$3,000
2W131Aircraft Armament Systems$6,0003,000
3E8X1EOD$50,000Not Applicable
9T500Special Warfare Operator Enlistment$50,000Not Applicable
9TE/MAIAny Mechanical or Electrical Aptitude Area$6,000$3,000
AFRS QUICK SHIPAny AFSC$8,000$8,000
USAF Announces 12 Outstanding Airmen of the Year for 2022

USAF Announces 12 Outstanding Airmen of the Year for 2022

A selection board considered 36 nominees representing each of the Air Force’s major commands, direct reporting units, and field operating agencies, along with Headquarters Air Force, selecting the 12 winning Outstanding Airmen of the Year based on “superior leadership, job performance, and personal achievements,” according to a news release.

Chief Master Sgt. of the Air Force JoAnne S. Bass first revealed the winners’ names July 12 on Twitter. The winners include:

  • Air Force Special Operations Command: Tech. Sgt. Brandon S. Blake, detachment superintendent and registered respiratory care practitioner, 720th Operations Support Squadron, Birmingham, Ala.
  • U.S. Air Forces in Europe-Air Forces Africa: Senior Airman Demarion N. Davis, emissions security manager, 48th Communications Squadron, RAF Lakenheath, England.
  • Air Force Global Strike Command: Senior Airman Monica Figueroa Santos, nuclear command and control operations senior controller, 341st Missile Wing, Malmstrom Air Force Base, Mont.
  • Air Force District of Washington: Master Sgt. Kade N. Forrester, infrastructure flight section chief, 11th Contracting Squadron, Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling, D.C.
  • Air Combat Command: Senior Master Sgt. Megan A. Harper, operations superintendent, 379th Expeditionary Security Forces Squadron, Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar.
  • Air Force Reserve Command: Tech. Sgt. Brianne E. Kelleher, command language program manager, 655th Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance Group, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio
  • Air Education and Training Command: Tech. Sgt. Alexander W. Messinger, standardization evaluation noncommissioned officer in charge, 802nd Security Forces Squadron, Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland, Texas.
  • Air Mobility Command: Senior Airman Steven C. Peters, emergency medical technician, 60th Healthcare Operations Squadron, Travis Air Force Base, Calif.
  • Air National Guard: Senior Airman Kristina L. Schneider, fire protection journeyman, 179th Airlift Wing, Mansfield Lahm Air National Guard Base, Ohio.
  • Pacific Air Forces: Senior Airman Caden A. Soper, F-15 avionics journeyman, 18th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron, Kadena Air Base, Japan.
  • Airman Supporting U.S. Space Force: Senior Airman Christopher T. Thao, network operations technician, 50th Communications Squadron, Schriever Space Force Base, Colo.
  • Air Force Materiel Command: Tech. Sgt. Jennifer G. Thomas, Air Force vehicle fleet manager, 441st Vehicle Support Squadron, Joint Base Langley-Eustis, Va.

The Outstanding Airmen of the Year program debuted at AFA’s 10th annual National Convention in 1956, and the association has continued to shine a spotlight on the outstanding Airmen from each major command every year since.

The Air Force Association will recognize this year’s 12 Outstanding Airmen of the Year during its Air, Space & Cyber Conference in National Harbor, Md., in September.

Lawmakers Push for Air Force to Embrace New Immersive Training Tech Even Faster

Lawmakers Push for Air Force to Embrace New Immersive Training Tech Even Faster

In many ways, the Air Force has embraced new technologies such as augmented and virtual reality for the service’s training in recent years like never before—pilots, maintainers, even commanders dealing with suicidal Airmen have started to participate in programs designed to engage them in new ways.

But the service can move even faster and more aggressively to adopt these technologies, advocates say—and lawmakers have agreed, inserting language into the 2023 National Defense Authorization Act that would seek to prod the Air Force’s efforts forward.

In the committee report accompanying its version of the NDAA, the House Armed Services Committee commended the Air Force’s “progress in deploying digital training infrastructure” but expressed concern that the service “may not have sufficient plans in place to integrate digital training infrastructure into its training organizations and commands at a speed that aligns with the pace of software development.”

To address that concern, the report calls for the Secretary of the Air Force to brief Congress by March 2023 on a “service-wide plan to transition digital training infrastructure into the appropriate Air Force organizations as soon as technical readiness will allow.”

Such directive report language is not legally binding like language included in the bill itself, but Pentagon officials typically “regard it as a congressional mandate and respond accordingly,” according to the Congressional Research Service.

In particular, the committee is asking the Secretary to include details on future support and sustainment plans for digital training infrastructure; plans to include immersive tech such as virtual, mixed, and augmented reality; and ways to unify efforts across the Air Force.

Already, Air Education and Training Command uses tech company Dynepic to maintain a platform called MOTAR that keeps track of disparate augmented and virtual reality training programs across the command and maintains a digital training record for individual Airmen.

In running that platform, Dynepic has seen support from lower-level Airmen and high-level leadership who want to embrace that kind of training even more, CEO Krissa Watry told Air Force Magazine. But hurdles persist—bureaucracy, skeptics, and a lack of any single organization to lead the charge in pushing it forward.

“Any time you have new technology, and it’s moving at a rapid pace, you have folks that just aren’t quite up to speed yet,” Watry said. “And so maybe they have their projects and they think they’re the latest and greatest. But one thing with the agile software mindset is you have to be willing to sometimes scrap stuff and move forward with a new way or a new vision. And I think that’s one of the key areas, is you need a flexible infrastructure, stuff that allows for technology to be rapidly tested, fielded, and even swapped out with new stuff.”

Tech companies have frequently bemoaned the Pentagon’s acquisition process, which they say is outdated and moves too slowly for rapidly evolving software, and many smaller companies have fallen into the “Valley of Death,” where new innovative technologies are demonstrated but never become programs of record.

Dynepic wants to help small businesses leveraging VR, AR, and other digital training to cross that valley, Watry said.

The company also wants help organizing a system that at the moment lacks a top-down authority. MOTAR is an Air Education and Training Command requirement, but other Air Force major commands don’t have the same access, even as they conduct operational training, too.

“We’ve tried to be that glue, through our conversations and meetings, to pull in the other operational commands, because all the Airmen want to use it,” Watry said. “But then they’re like, ‘Well, is this an enterprise capability?’ Is this something that—am I having to pay for it on a unit level, which is the way it currently works? Or is this going to be an enterprise solution, and then we have to pay for the custom stuff that our command needs? When you’re talking about ACC and Global Strike and AMC and all those other commands and AFSOC, I guess they’re looking for unity of effort. They would like unity of effort, but they’re still just a single command, and they’re like, who’s in charge?”

Dynepic would like to see a program office set up to oversee and organize such virtual training, Watry said. Looking to push for more coordination, and for faster and more widespread adoption across the board, Dynepic’s leaders met with members of the HASC readiness subcommittee during the NDAA-drafting process to push for directive report language.

“We believe that [training is] highly effective, not only for technical training—your maintenance training, air traffic control, pilot training—but for even just [emotional intelligence]-style training, or a lot of the other areas of use around even just, how can they maybe escape from the environment they’re in and be able to relax better? So there’s a number of different pathways for extended reality to be used in the U.S. military that will make Airmen better. That’s the goal.”

In those meetings, they got positive responses, said consultant Ryan Crumpler, a former HASC staff member.

“When I was on the committee as a professional staffer, this is something that we focused on, which is how to get more training bang for your buck,” Crumpler said. “And the only way to do that is through kind of novel approaches. You just can’t buy enough flight hours or tank miles or full spectrum training miles or whatever your measure of efficacy is. So I think staff and members were receptive.”

It also helps, Crumpler said, that such training could be adapted or adopted from commercial tech companies, an increasing area of emphasis for top lawmakers.

“It nests nicely with the broader push that Congress has made to go more commercial … instead of waiting years and billions of dollars for a bespoke system that’s built through the traditional acquisition process,” Crumpler said.

House Passes 2023 NDAA With Funds For Ukrainian Pilot Training, Protects Sentinel ICBM

House Passes 2023 NDAA With Funds For Ukrainian Pilot Training, Protects Sentinel ICBM

The House of Representatives passed its version of the 2023 National Defense Authorization Act on July 14. The annual policy bill includes a $37 billion increase to the top line of the Pentagon’s budget and a number of provisions that will affect the Air Force and Space Force.

The final bipartisan 329-101 vote capped two days of deliberation on the House floor as lawmakers debated and voted on more than 600 amendments.

While NDAAs set policy and authorize funds, they do not appropriate the money the Defense Department spends. Still, they give Congress oversight of the Pentagon and are regularly considered “must-pass” legislation.

“For over six decades, the NDAA has served the American people as a legislative foundation for national security policymaking rooted in our democratic values,” Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), chair of the House Armed Services Committee, said in a statement. “Today’s successful vote marks another chapter in that history—with considerable gains for those currently serving our country in uniform.”

Among the amendments approved as part of the deliberation process was a provision from Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) to authorize $100 million to provide training to Ukrainian pilots and ground crews to become familiarized with American aircraft. Ukrainian pilots and defense officials have pleaded for the U.S. to provide them with aircraft such as the F-16, and while thus far the Biden administration has rejected those calls, Kinzinger’s amendment was agreed to in an uncontroversial voice vote.

Other amendments adopted by voice vote include one from Rep. Cliff Bentz (R-Ore.) that would limit the number of F-15s the Air Force can divest, at least until the service provides a report to Congress on the number of F-15s—including F-15Cs, Ds, Es, and EXs—it plans to buy and retire in the next five years, broken down by year and location, as well as an assessment of the negative impacts of such retirements and plans to replace those missions.

Kinzinger also introduced another amendment that was eventually approved as part of a larger package that prohibits the Air National Guard from retiring the RC-26 Condor, a tactical ISR platform, despite the fact that ANG leaders say it costs millions of dollars to maintain and other, cheaper technologies such as drones can perform the same missions. 

But not all amendments were approved. Rep. John Garamendi (D-Calif.), a senior member on the House Armed Services Committee, introduced one that would have suspended funding for the LGM-35 Sentinel, the Air Force’s modernization program for its intercontinental ballistic missiles, and instead extend the aging Minuteman III to 2040. That amendment was soundly defeated by a 118-309 vote.

Earlier in the legislative process, the House Armed Services Committee also voted against forcing the Air Force to hold a competition for its so-called “bridge tanker.” One thing the House NDAA would do, however, is force the Air Force to upgrade, not retire, its oldest F-22 fighters, despite the service’s request to divest them.

The NDAA also includes a provision from Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colo.) that would establish a separate Space National Guard, a move that was also approved by the House last year before being left out of the compromise version of the bill crafted with the Senate. This year, however, a bipartisan group of a dozen Senators have already proposed legislation supporting a Space Guard.

Finally, the House NDAA partially addresses the Air Force’s unfunded priorities list by adding $978.5 million to procure four more EC-37B Compass Call electronic warfare aircraft plus nearly  $379 million for weapons system sustainment—shy of the $579 million included in the UPL.

The bill does not, however, add any more F-35As for the Air Force, leaving the service’s much-reduced purchase of 33 fighters unsupplemented.

With the NDAA through the House, the Senate must now pass its version of the bill before legislators from the two chambers can craft a compromise bill in conference to vote on and send to President Joe Biden.

“I am glad to see the FY23 NDAA pass the House with overwhelming bipartisan support. However, our work is not done—we will continue to improve upon this bill in conference to ensure that this legislation gives our warfighters what they need,” said Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), the House Armed Services Committee’s top Republican.

Last year, that process lasted longer than expected. The House passed its version of the bill on Sept. 23, but the Senate struggled to do the same, to the point where leaders from both chambers finally unveiled a compromise bill on Dec. 7, bypassing the usual conference process. That bill cleared both chambers by Dec. 15 and was signed into law shortly thereafter.

Australia, US, UK Seek ‘Seamless’ Defense Industrial Base

Australia, US, UK Seek ‘Seamless’ Defense Industrial Base

Following meetings with U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III, Australian defense minister Richard Marles said the two countries and the U.K. are working toward creating a “seamless” mutual defense industrial base to draw on the capabilities of all three countries for future defense systems.

Speaking with defense journalists at the Australian embassy in Washington, D.C., Marles, who is also deputy prime minister, said “the focus of the meetings this week” has been to “to collaborate more closely” on defense procurement; specifically, “artificial intelligence, hypersonics, and counter-hypersonics” as well as the previously announced sale of nuclear attack submarines to Australia by the U.S.

“We are building a technology coalition,” Marles said.

Military collaborations under the previous administration will continue under the new administration in Canberra, Marles said. These include previously announced cooperative efforts in hypersonics research, munitions development, use of Australia’s Woomera test range by the U.S., and Australia’s acquisition of F-35 and F/A-18 fighters, among other programs. Air Force B-2 bombers are deploying to Australia for an exercise.

“We see hypersonics and counter-hypersonics as a critical technology; it’s one of those that we’ve identified in the context of AUKUS,” Marles said, “in terms of sharing the technology … and collaborating more in the future on developing the technologies. So we certainly see this area as a significant priority.”

“It is essential that we are developing those technologies for our respective defense forces,” he added.

He contined that the AUKUS nations are seeking “to move from interoperability to interchangeability” in defense hardware” and that Australia’s aim is “not competing with the U.S. [defense] industrial base, but complementing it.”   

Marles shot down rumors of Australia seeking to buy B-21 bombers once the aircraft has emerged from development and is in production, saying without elaboration that no such discussions have taken place.

“Announcements will be made in the first quarter of 2023” about the specifics of the submarine deal, Marles said, which will also include U.K. participation as well as what Australia will do for submarine capability while it’s waiting for the new boats. The current class of boats will likely be service-extended, but that won’t be the only solution, he said. He suggested that other new AUKUS cooperative defense programs will be announced in early 2023 as well.

Marles said he doesn’t view the “Quad”—Australia, India, Japan, and the United States—as a “Pacific NATO,” as China has accused the countries of creating. The group is “not an alliance, not a security alliance” but instead “four like-minded countries working together” to promote democracy and prosperity in the region, Marles said.

“It’s not for any other country to say who we should work with,” he asserted.

Asked if he expects the group to grow, he said he expects the members will “want to grow what it does … and grow the agenda.” But he noted that one of the first official acts of the new prime minister was “to attend a meeting of the Quad. That’s very much an indication of our commitment to that architecture and the potential we regard for that in the future.”

Two More B-2 Bombers Arrive in Australia to Train With RAAF

Two More B-2 Bombers Arrive in Australia to Train With RAAF

Two more B-2 Spirits arrived in Australia on July 12 in support of a bomber task force mission as U.S. Airmen trained alongside personnel from the Royal Australian Air Force.

The new bombers join two others that arrived July 10 at RAAF Base Amberley. All four B-2s are from the 509th Bomb Wing at Whiteman Air Force Base, Mo. The bombers’ deployment will help support the Enhanced Cooperation Initiative under the Force Posture Agreement first signed more than a decade ago by the U.S. and Australia.

“Training and operating with our Australian partners has been an absolute blast,” Lt. Col. Andrew Kousgaard, commander of 393rd Expeditionary Bomb Squadron, said in a statement. “Since our advance team hit the ground over a week ago, U.S. Airmen have integrated with their Australian counterparts in every specialty: fuels, logistics, maintenance, aviators, you name it.”

Airmen from the 131st Bomb Wing, the Missouri Air National Guard’s associate unit of the 509th Bomb Wing, are also in Australia.

While the bombers and Airmen are in the Indo-Pacific, they plan to conduct training for “hot” refueling with Australian equipment as well as aerial refueling with RAAF KC-30s, Kousgaard said in a release.

“We simply cannot operate effectively by ourselves in this environment, and learning to effectively integrate with our partners is absolutely critical to success,” Kousgaard said. “We’re training against that ‘tyranny of distance,’ alongside our Australian partners on this deployment, and that experience is truly invaluable.”

A Whiteman B-2 became the first bomber of its kind to land at RAAF Base Amberley in March, but in the week since July 10, the stealth bombers have become a frequent sight in the skies near Brisbane.

B-2s previously flew over Australia in 2020 as part of training during a deployment to Naval Support Facility Diego Garcia. This past June, B-1B Lancers that deployed to Guam conducted hot pit refueling operations with the RAAF.

This also won’t be the first time an RAAF KC-30 has refueled USAF bombers. The tanker refueled an American B-52 during testing in 2017 and B-1Bs during an exercise in 2021.

CSIS Cruise Missile Defense Plan Would Cost Less Than CBO’s, Reduce Need for Fighters

CSIS Cruise Missile Defense Plan Would Cost Less Than CBO’s, Reduce Need for Fighters

U.S. Northern Command’s homeland cruise missile detection and defenses must be upgraded to respond to new threats, experts say, and a major D.C. think tank proposes a multi-layered defense that would require fewer Air Force fighters in the air and use new E-7 Wedgetails, the report’s authors told Air Force Magazine.

The report, “North America Is a Region, Too,” by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) proposes a solution costing hundreds of millions of dollars less than a 2021 Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimate, and top Pentagon brass are listening.

“The problem begins with the threat, and the threat has already voted,” Tom Karako, director of CSIS’s missile defense project, told Air Force Magazine before the start of a July 14 conference on cruise missile defense.

“The threat has voted to include much more of what we would call air defense challenges, be they UAVs, be they cruise missiles,” he explained. The challenge of “air defense and cruise missile defense for the homeland has always seemed both overly expensive and perhaps pointless.”

Previous defense doctrine held that cruise missile defense was not necessary because a cruise missile attack would be coupled with a nuclear attack. Therefore, strategic nuclear deterrence was sufficient to deter both threats.

The CSIS report makes the case that cruise missile defense must be uncoupled from strategic nuclear deterrence given adversarial development of precision-guided missiles and the proliferation of long-range standoff cruise missiles.

Russia is one of the countries capable of striking the U.S. homeland with its new, low-flying, stealthy AS-23 cruise missile.

In Senate Armed Services Committee testimony May 18, head of U.S. Northern Command Gen. Glen D. VanHerck described how Russia’s new weapons complicate his command’s ability to defend the homeland with current capabilities.

“Russia has fielded a new family of advanced air-, sea-, and ground-based cruise missiles to threaten critical civilian and military infrastructure,” VanHerck said.

“The AS-23a air-launched cruise missile, for instance, features an extended range that enables Russian bombers flying well outside NORAD radar coverage—and in some cases from inside Russian airspace—to threaten targets throughout North America,” he explained. “This capability challenges my ability to detect an attack and mount an effective defense.”

Air Force Brig. Gen. Paul J. Murray, deputy director of operations at North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), speaking on a CSIS panel, said NORAD is looking at plans similar to the CSIS report for its own homeland defense design.

“The homeland is no longer a sanctuary,” he said, noting that the command sees Russia as the most important current threat but adds China as a threat by 2030.

“The threats that we face are not just from cruise missiles. We have threats from the sea floor all the way up to space,” he said, noting that adversaries have built and demonstrated conventional munition capabilities to reach the U.S. homeland in just the last five to six years. “That, I think, has also put a sense of urgency in this.”

Army Col. Tony Behrens, deputy director of the Joint Integrated Air and Missile Defense Organization (JIAMDO) of the Joint Staff, said the threat against the U.S. and Canadian homelands has proliferated and so has the cost to defend against it.

“Our adversaries have invested in the development of these threats through hypersonic technology, subsurface maritime capability projection, where cruise missiles can come at the homelands from any direction and across multiple directions simultaneously,” Behrens said.

Five Layers of Defense

The CSIS report calls for “layered defense in depth,” or integrated layered defense, instead of the perimeter-based defense and use of only the sensors carried by a fighter jet.

“We don’t try to defend everything, but we do try to defend a few things very well,” said Karako, describing a departure from legacy missile defense architectures to one that can provide up to several hours of warning time.

Matt Strohmeyer, a CSIS military fellow and co-author of the report, said the CSIS model builds on NORTHCOM/NORAD work done in recent years to develop global threat awareness using commercial-based space sensing from proliferated low Earth orbit satellites.

Strohmeyer said a proposed first layer would integrate data sources to get an earlier warning of when an adversary might be moving in the direction of an offensive attack.

Leveraging artificial intelligence, the first layer will look for “a change in pattern of life.”

“It’s understanding if you have a bomber base, or if you have a submarine base, what does the normal pattern of life look like at one of those locations?” he posed.  

Strohmeyer described how artificial intelligence would be used to detect a change in the normal numbers or movement of assets at the base and trigger a human study of the data to discern intent and deterrent response.

A second layer is known as the “21st Century DEW Line,” referring to the Cold War array of Arctic radar stations that provided distant early warning. The CSIS layer would use over-the-horizon radars to see thousands of kilometers farther by bouncing radar rays off the ionosphere. Australia uses the technology in its Jindalee Operational Radar Network (JORN).

While the radar would not be capable of providing high-fidelity imagery of the threat, the early detection could give hours of warning time and complement what space-based sensors are able to detect.

“The types of threats that we’re seeing emerging right now—threats like low-altitude cruise missiles, long-range cruise missiles—are difficult to be able to see and identify where they come from,” Strohmeyer said. “They can be launched from bombers—bombers that could launch and go any direction; they can be launched from submarines; they can be launched from surface combatants.”

An overlapping third sensor layer would integrate existing Federal Aviation Administration radars and other sensors to maintain custody of, or follow, the threat over North America.

A fourth layer, called Prioritized Area Defense or PAD, chooses a few areas of the United States to defend well as opposed to the CBO’s proposal for a perimeter defense of the entire continental United States. CSIS panelists said the debate about what should be covered, such as military assets, leadership, or population centers, has been ongoing for decades. A PAD radar coverage model in the report clusters the radar networks in U.S. coastal areas including the mid-Atlantic up to the Northeast and much of the Pacific coastline, with a cluster in the South.

A network of tower-based radars and electro-optical/infrared sensors would cover 500 km in diameter with 19 different sensor towers. Each PAD would have medium- and long-range surface-to-air missile interceptors rather than fighter aircraft to provide kinetic defense against an incoming threat.

Similar to the PADS, a fifth layer, called Risk-Based Mobile Defense, can be positioned where the threat is deemed to emanate from. In an Arctic response scenario, the risk-based platform can help forward-deployed fighters and be used in tandem with the E-7 Wedgetail, the Air Force’s next investment in airborne early warning.

Those “five layers together get us that defense in depth,” said Strohmeyer. “So, we’re not just waiting with a catcher’s glove to receive cruise missiles at the last second, but we’re trying to influence those cruise missiles throughout their entire life cycle.”

An Affordable Solution

To defend against cruise missile threats, CBO found in a February 2021 report that DOD would have to spend between $75 billion and $465 billion over 20 years.

The CSIS report says integrated layers of defense can be done over the same period for half of the low-end CBO estimate, roughly $32 billion, and be paid for over eight fiscal years not exceeding $2.5 billion per year, Karako said.

“[The CBO’s] particular architectures are, I would say, constrained by some assumptions, and that’s what really drove them to some really, really big numbers,” explained Karako, who said the CBO relied heavily on expensive fighter jets and one type of sensor.

“They’re using fighter aircraft, primarily as the tracking, combat identification, and engagement mechanism,” he said. “It’s expensive to keep fighters in the air all over the continental United States, all the time.”

Karako said the Air Force budget already includes money for over-the-horizon radars and that adopting a homeland missile defense strategy like the one proposed by CSIS would actually save Air Force resources.

“Having some fixed or semi-fixed assets in the homeland will help alleviate the strain on the fighter aircraft,” he said. “[The CBO] would have a ton of expensive fighter aircraft flying circles around CONUS all the time, and they can’t go do other things.”

The CSIS cruise missile defense strategy is also built in a way that it can expand to new missions in the future, either up to the level of hypersonic missile defense or down to cover the threat posed by unmanned aerial systems.

Karako said the long-range interceptor proposed in the CSIS model is the MK41 Vertical Launching System, which is being used to develop the hypersonic Glide Phase Interceptor.

“We’ve used this common launcher so that when that capability arrives, you can just pop it right in the canister,” he said, describing the Mark 41’s shipborne missile canister launching system.

Strohmeyer said the CBO report and the new CSIS report are promoting debate in defense analysis circles about how to design homeland defense affordably.

“We can now say, ‘Hey, there’s ways that we can do this affordably as well,’ to create not only a capable defense, but a credible deterrence,” he said.

Karako said the threat posed to the U.S. homeland is no longer theoretical. Russia used more than 2,800 missiles in the first 125 days of its war with Ukraine, and many of those missiles were cruise missiles.

“This isn’t some boutique niche capability. These are the weapons of choice time and time again,” he said. “As we say in the report, it’s coming soon to a theater near you, here in the United States.”

Environmental Review of Space Command’s Ala. HQ Site Finds ‘Minimal’ Adverse Effects

Environmental Review of Space Command’s Ala. HQ Site Finds ‘Minimal’ Adverse Effects

An environmental assessment by the Department of the Air Force found that adverse effects of building the headquarters of U.S. Space Command at Redstone Arsenal, Ala., would be “short-term and not significant.”

A favorable environmental assessment should have been all Redstone Arsenal needed to lock in the selection, but after investigations by the Defense Department’s Office of Inspector General and the Government Accountability Office, the DAF must also revisit aspects of the selection itself

The DAF selected the Army post in 2021 as its “preferred alternative” to house the newly reconstituted unified combatant command. Then-Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper had scrapped the original search before it concluded and directed the DAF to start over with a process borrowed from Army Futures Command that let local communities self-nominate. 

However, government officials from Colorado—where the command has its temporary home at Peterson Space Force Base in Colorado Springs—have objected to Alabama’s selection, arguing that former President Donald Trump picked the site as a political favor and that the DAF failed to consider some important factors.

Already, one member of the delegation has raised objections to the draft environmental assessment, saying it contains a factual error and only considers new construction.

As it prepares the final environmental assessment, the DAF will also take into account “concerns regarding full operational capability” along with housing affordability and the availability of child care and support for members of the military and veterans, it said in a statement accompanying the release of the draft assessment.

The draft environmental assessment posted online July 13 for a 30-day public comment period includes reviews of six sites: Redstone Arsenal; Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M.; Offutt Air Force Base, Neb.; Peterson; the Port San Antonio technology and innovation campus in Texas; and Florida’s Space Coast Spaceport.

The command’s proposed 464,000-square-foot office building and additional 402,000 square feet of parking will accommodate 1,450 to 1,800 personnel. The building is envisioned as having a “dignified architectural character without excessive ornamentation” to “convey the importance” of the command’s mission, according to the DAF’s environmental assessment.

The assessment accounts for the “impact of 1,800” personnel on land use, resources, transportation, and other factors. It found that the proposal would have “no significant impacts on the human or natural environment,” according to the report’s abstract. The figure of 1,800 accounts for “a potential but not yet approved number of National Agency Representatives and contractor personnel supporting USSPACECOM missions who might be co-located with the permanent HQ.”

The assessment found that the cumulative effects of the work on soil erosion, water runoff, hazardous waste, and noise at Redstone Arsenal “would be minimal since the projects are generally dispersed over a wide area. It should be noted that the expected impact to air quality, which has a broader [region of influence], would be minimal even with the increase in construction activities and use of combustion engine equipment.”

Members of Colorado’s congressional delegation have sent letters to the DAF raising objections to Alabama’s selection. They’ve cited suspected unfairness, and the GAO’s investigation found that Peterson had been identified as the preferred location before a meeting took place with White House decision-makers.

Colorado’s delegation has also cited the longer time they say the command would take to reach full operational capability, or FOC, there.

Sen. John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.) said in an interview in April that getting to FOC in Colorado might take a matter of months, whereas in Alabama, it could take years. 

The environmental assessment clarifies that in “the final stages of the selection phase, the importance of quickly reaching [FOC] was discussed by senior leaders and considered as a fifth decision factor” along with “mission, infrastructure capacity, community support,” and costs to the DOD. The report doesn’t include time estimates to reach FOC at each site.

Hickenlooper released a statement July 14 taking issue with the review, saying it “did not consider the prospect of renovating existing infrastructure at Peterson Space Force Base (SFB) in Colorado Springs, despite seeking to accommodate a similar number of personnel to the building’s current capacity.”

The statement also said “the draft review mixes up weather threats in Huntsville and Colorado Springs, inaccurately stating that tornadoes are a ‘high’ threat at Peterson SFB.”

In reply to a request for comment on the statement, a DAF spokesperson said, “We encourage the public to utilize the public comment process as part of the environmental assessment.”

Hickenlooper, too, encouraged the public to take part.

This story was updated at 6:43 p.m. Eastern time to include statements by Sen. John Hickenlooper and a Department of the Air Force spokesperson.

Ukraine Flies ‘Suicide Missions’ With MiGs, Awaits U.S. Decision on F-16 Training

Ukraine Flies ‘Suicide Missions’ With MiGs, Awaits U.S. Decision on F-16 Training

On Capitol Hill and at the Pentagon from June 19 to 25, two Ukrainian pilots described the challenges they face flying outdated, analog MiG-29s on the front line of a war against sophisticated Russian jets.

They were asking for F-16s and the training to fly them.

Ukrainian pilots describe their sorties as “suicide missions,” according to one Ukrainian pilot who gave only his call sign “Nomad” for operational reasons in a video interview with Air Force Magazine.

“Every one of us understands that we have lack of capability in old airplanes,” said Nomad, who was not part of the group in Washington, D.C. “The Russian airplanes have much more capabilities. They usually fly beyond visual range. They usually use missiles that have a range of more than 80 miles.”

Nomad described the story of a pilot friend on a recent night mission in the eastern Donbas region who flew with no radar, searching the night sky for a dogfight with a Russian fighter, limited to heatseeking missiles at visual range. On countless other missions, Nomad said, by the time a Ukrainian pilot has seen the Su-30 or Su-35 jet he is up against, “it has already fired.”

“Each pilot in Ukraine is eager to start training on F-16s,” he added.

Nomad is the only Ukrainian pilot in the United States right now, part of an Air Force leadership program at Columbus Air Force Base, Miss., that began before Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, but he regularly speaks to fellow Ukrainian pilots. In spite of his pleas to return and enter the fight, Nomad’s leaders ordered him to stay in the United States and finish the program.

“I am a backup plan,” said Nomad, explaining that the Ukrainian Air Force hopes he can be among the first Ukrainian pilots to enter F-16 fighter training. “I’m ready to go.”

Nomad said the MiG pilots in his group fly two to three sorties per day in planes with 1980s technology against new Russian fighter jets.

“My guys, they were struggling fighting against Russian pilots in advanced airplanes,” he said.

“We talk a lot about American pilots,” he continued. “They train a lot. They fly a lot. They have a lot of experience, and they have really nice airplanes to fight against someone. So, everyone wants to fly an F-16.”

He added: “That’s the reason why we are really highly motivated to train on F-16s.”

Col. Yuri Ignat, chief spokesperson for the Ukrainian Air Force Command, told Air Force Magazine that Ukraine has at least 30 pilots with sufficient English-language skills ready to travel to the United States for fighter pilot training along with the corresponding engineers and maintenance teams, if a deal can be struck.

“To learn the first stage of takeoff and landing and flying from point A to point B, it will take a few weeks, but to learn how to fight on it, to learn how to use missiles, we will take around six months,” Ignat said by videoconference from Ukraine’s Air Force headquarters in Vinnytsia, Ukraine.

Ignat said the Ukrainian Air Force flies in squadrons of 12 aircraft, and it believes two F-16 squadrons plus reserve platforms would turn the tide of the war with Russia. He said transfer of F-16s, either by the United States or another nation, would ultimately require U.S. approval.

“We are defending our cities with fighter jets, those cities like Zaporizhzhia, Mikolaev, the cities that are under the Ukrainian control,” he said, referring to front line cities threatened by Russia in the south and east of Ukraine.

“We also will need these fighter jets to use for the de-occupation of our territories,” he said. “We are not speaking about attacking territories, but we are speaking about de-occupying those that are Ukrainian.”

Ignat said the Ukrainian Air Force would follow the lead of nearby Eastern European nations such as Poland and Romania that have already made the transition from MiGs to F-16s and have flown both platforms together.

Concerns about sufficient runways are misplaced, he said, because Ukraine is flying its military missions out of civilian airports during wartime. Polish F-16s and American F-15E Strike Eagles have participated in exercises in Ukraine, using Ukrainian runways, in 2018 and 2019.

Both Ukrainian airmen said a principal reason Ukraine seeks F-16s is the airplane’s ability to conduct suppression of enemy air defenses (SEAD) missions.

Ignat said Russian media and social media are already spreading news stories about the possibility that Ukraine can receive modern American jets.

“It makes them nervous,” Ignat explained. “Because they understand that as soon as Ukraine will have modern jets, that will help us to destroy their ground air defenses that are located on the occupied territories of Ukraine and which they are using to strike targets in our territory.”

He added: “That will basically leave them without the control of the air, and they will run away immediately.”

The F-16’s ability to carry long-range missiles reaching 100 km will also keep Russian bombers at bay, he said, and prevent more civilian attacks like those that have killed Ukrainians at a shopping mall and recreation center in recent weeks.

But the Defense Department and White House have been silent about the possibility of F-16 training.

“On training of pilots, there are no current plans to train Ukraine on any air platform other than those that they are using every day effectively in the battle right now,” a senior defense official said in response to a question from Air Force Magazine at a July 8 Pentagon briefing.

Legislative Efforts

A Ukrainian defense official who spoke to Air Force Magazine said the June delegation visited the Pentagon and met with Nathaniel Adler, principal director for Russia, Ukraine, and Eurasia policy, in addition to representatives of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

The delegation also met with more than a dozen representatives and senators from both sides of the aisle, including Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., who is co-sponsoring legislation that would finance the training of Ukrainian pilots.

Also in the House, an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act would authorize $100 million to provide training to Ukrainian pilots and ground crews to become familiarized with American aircraft. It doesn’t say who would provide the training. A July 11 letter from the Air and Space Forces Association called on members of the House rules and foreign affairs committees to support the amendment.

“Since it appears the War of Russian Aggression on Ukraine will continue for an extended duration, our nation must prepare now to ensure a long-term, steady flow of sophisticated weapons so our Ukrainian allies may continue to repulse this invasion,” the letter said. “In no area is this more important than the air.”

AFA argued in the letter that the inevitable attrition of the Ukrainian Air Force would eventually lead to Russian air superiority.

“This amendment may provide the military capabilities necessary to keep the Ukrainian Air Force in the fight,” the letter said.

A Ukrainian defense official who was part of the June delegation said U.S. concerns about escalation with Russia were voiced repeatedly.

“Ukraine is not afraid to attack and to fight back—maybe America should not be afraid also to fight back,” Ignat said in an effort to counter the American government concern.

“There is no way we will give up on Ukraine,” he continued. “And for the U.S., if Ukraine loses, it will be a big loss in terms of the global development of democracy, in terms of leadership in a free world.”