Austin Warns Academy Grads of Adversary Tests; Kendall Says Transformational Change Is Coming

May 25, 2022 | By Abraham Mahshie

Blue skies graced Falcon Stadium in Colorado Springs, Colo., where 973 Air Force Academy cadets graduated May 25 and began careers facing unprecedented challenges and technological advances. There, commencement speaker Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III warned that adversaries are testing America’s values.

“Today, America’s adversaries are testing the very values that you swore to defend,” Austin told the new second lieutenants. “You’re here to defend America’s security and win America’s wars. But we’re also here to safeguard America’s values.”

Austin pointed to two examples: Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s aggressive behavior in the Pacific.

The defense Secretary gave five pieces of advice, including the importance of teamwork, which he described in terms of U.S. allies and partners.

“America’s unrivaled network of allies and partners is so important,” Austin reflected. “They’re crucial to what I call integrated deterrence. They extend our strength; they magnify our power; and they deepen our security.”

Austin commended the graduates for withstanding the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, which restricted graduates to their dorm rooms during their sophomore year, and told them that the world they face will require discipline and innovation.

Of the 973 graduates, 16 represent 15 countries, including lesser-known American partners on the African continent such as Cameroon, Madagascar, Rwanda, and Niger; and Central Asian and Indo-Pacific countries including Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Kazakhstan, and Thailand.

Graduates were 73 percent male and 27 percent female, and 31 percent represented minorities. Of the graduates, 461 were rated, including 417 pilots, 11 combat systems officers, nine air battle managers, and 24 remotely piloted aircraft operators. Another 382 graduates were non-rated, and 94 graduates commissioned into the Space Force. Three graduates cross-commissioned into the Army and six into the Marine Corps.

Three cadets received scholarships for advanced degrees in the United Kingdom, including two Marshall scholarships and one Holaday Scholarship, while two more cadets received fellowships at Stanford University.

“I know that you’re ready because I see Academy graduates shine every day,” Austin said. “When I travel the world from Eastern Europe to the Indo-Pacific to remote bases, I see young lieutenants and captains just like yourself.”

Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said cadets will face transformational change in their careers.

“You begin your service just as we are entering a new and more dangerous strategic era,” Kendall said.

“You are at an inflection point in history,” he added, noting the shift from counterinsurgency to great power competition in the past two decades. “You must be prepared to do your duty in an environment that features the greatest strategic challenge we’ve seen in a lifetime, my lifetime at least. And some of the most significant technological changes in the history of warfare.”

Kendall said graduates’ Air Force careers will be dominated by the National Defense Strategy‘s pacing threat of China, just as he faced the Soviet threat when he graduated from the Army’s U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y., in 1971.

“You, too, will face a strategic, well-resourced threat that is doing all it can to be able to defeat the Air and Space Forces that you joined today,” Kendall said. “I believe that you are ready.”

Air Force Medical Service Reviewing How Teams Can Be ‘Lighter, Leaner’ in Future Conflicts

May 25, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

As the Air Force presses forward with its concept of agile combat employment, relying on small teams of multi-capable Airmen to operate in austere locations and move quickly, the service’s surgeon general is considering ways the Air Force’s medical personnel can also become “increasingly modular, lighter, [and] leaner,” he told lawmakers May 25.

The Air Force Medical Service, led by Lt. Gen. Robert I. Miller, has been repeatedly tested in recent years, first by the COVID-19 pandemic and then by the evacuation of Afghan civilians in the summer of 2021. And in those crises, medical Airmen “played a crucial role in supporting the demands of the Department of Defense and our Nation,” Miller said in his written testimony to the House Appropriations defense subcommittee.

AFMS helped to transport patients critically ill from COVID-19 and established field hospitals at multiple locations to assist Afghan refugees.

But moving forward, Miller wrote, the medical service is “re-imagining the design and future of our readiness capabilities.”

“We must build on past success, but be willing to break the cultural norms that say, ‘things have always been done this way,’” Miller wrote. “We are exploring and challenging our previous decisions about the size and types of clinical teams, and how to best train and sustain their skills. We believe innovation and fresh ideas will enable us to be more resilient and expand these teams’ capacity within the current AFMS end strength total.”

As part of that re-imagining, AFMS is undertaking a pair of reviews on critical medic response capabilities: forward-deployable teams and the Expeditionary Medical Support system.

In the first case, the service is looking to move away from a “one size fits all” approach for its ground deployable medical teams so that they are more adaptable to combatant commanders’ needs, Miller said. As part of the review process, Miller said, AFMS wants to “validate [teams’] size, scope and capabilities relative to the future fight and technological changes.”

On the second front, the Expeditionary Medical Support System (EMEDS) is essentially a tent-based field hospital, equipped with “modular, medical response packages and equipment” for use in humanitarian aid, disaster relief, or in wartime. The Air Force Medical Service has kept the system ready to go for both the COVID-19 pandemic and for assisting Afghan refugees, Miller noted.

Still, “the EMEDS was initially designed two decades ago,” Miller wrote. “It is time for a full review of the capability, exploring needs related to increased modular functions, operations in contested and degraded environments.”

Both review processes will be completed before the end of 2022, Miller wrote, with a goal of providing commanders “with greater flexibility and range of options with advanced care that is highly mobile and ready to operate in the most challenging of environments.”

Operating in contested and degraded environments is precisely what the Air Force has said agile combat employment, or ACE, is aimed at accomplishing—creating so-called “multi-capable Airmen.” AFMS has its own version of multi-capable Airmen as well—the Medic-X program.

Medic-X has been going for several years now, aimed at teaching Airmen in non-patient care career fields “to provide base-level medical support” in events like mass casualty scenarios where traditional medical capabilities are overwhelmed, by taking vital signs, administering IVs, or documenting care.

Such skills could be necessary in future conflicts, Miller argued, when medics may need “to hold and treat patients in deployed settings for longer periods than in the past. We are actively evaluating how our teams can remain agile and leverage technology to provide trusted care.”

INDOPACOM Condemns ‘Destabilizing’ North Korean Missile Test as Biden Returned From the Pacific

May 25, 2022 | By Abraham Mahshie

North Korea conducted it’s 17th round of ballistic missile tests of the year May 24, including a believed intercontinental ballistic missile, in the skies over the Pacific while President Joe Biden was returning to the United States from the region.

U.S. Indo-Pacific Command reported that the tests did not pose an “immediate threat” to the U.S. homeland, while Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III called his South Korean counterpart to reassure the ally.

Biden concluded his five-day Pacific trip to Japan and South Korea May 24 under high alert that North Korean may conduct another ballistic missile test, and the north fired three rockets in violation of UN Security Council resolutions according to press reports. The first was believed to be an ICBM, the second failed in mid-air, and the third was a short-range ballistic missile.

“The missile launches [highlight] the destabilizing impact of the DPRK’s illicit weapons program,” read a May 25 statement by INDOPACOM. “The U.S. commitment to the defense of the Republic of Korea and Japan remains ironclad.”

Likewise, Austin called his South Korean counterpart May 24 to discuss responses to the DPRK ballistic missile launches.

“The two leaders strongly condemned today’s missile launches and pledged to work closely together to address the serious threat the DPRK’s provocative actions pose to the peace and stability of the Korean Peninsula, the region, and the global community more broadly,” the Pentagon said in a statement.

The White House was prepared for the possibility of ballistic missile tests by North Korea, and Biden’s travel itinerary highlighted U.S. and Pacific ally readiness with a May 22 stop by the president to the Air Operations Center’s combat operations floor at Osan Air Base, South Korea, where the threat from North Korean ballistic missiles is tracked.

“The fact is that deterring threats and underwriting stability is as vital today for not only the Peninsula but for the world,” Biden said during the visit.

In a May 21 joint statement with South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, Biden emphasized the U.S. commitment to defend the Republic of Korea.

“President Biden affirms the U.S. extended deterrence commitment to the ROK using the full range of U.S. defense capabilities, including nuclear, conventional, and missile defense capabilities,” the statement read.

Three Cadets Receive Degrees—But No Commissions—After COVID-19 Vaccine Refusal

May 25, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

A grand total of 973 Cadets graduated from the U.S. Air Force Academy on May 25, with the vast majority commissioning into either the Air Force or the Space Force. But for three in particular, the day was destined to end with a degree but no immediate future in military service.

Those three Cadets have continued to refuse the COVID-19 vaccination, putting them at odds with Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III’s order that all service members get the shot or receive an accommodation.

As a result, the U.S. Air Force Academy Board, made up of Academy leaders, decided during their standard review of the class of 2022 to let those Cadets graduate with a bachelor of science degree but not allow them to commission into the Air Force or Space Force, the Academy confirmed in a statement.

The statement, however, does include the caveat that the Cadets won’t be able to commission “as long as they remain unvaccinated.” Lt. Gen. Richard M. Clark, superintendent of the Academy, has set a deadline of Aug. 1 for Cadets to begin a COVID-19 vaccine regimen or face disenrollment, potentially leaving a small window for the refusers to reverse course.

Originally, the number of seniors refusing the vaccine was reported to be four, but one of the Cadets decided to take the vaccine.

Because of their inability to commission into the Air Force or Space Force, the three remaining Cadets could be on the hook to reimburse the government for their tuition costs, similar to how other Cadets removed from the Academy as juniors or seniors owe either service obligations or tuition repayment.

That decision, however, has yet to be made and will be determined by the Secretary of the Air Force, the Academy said in its statement.

According to the Department of the Air Force’s most recent statistics, the department has separated 399 service members over their vaccine refusals. Thousands more have seen their requests for religious accommodations be denied, leaving them with limited options—get the shot, appeal to the Air Force surgeon general, or start the separation/retirement process. If their appeal is denied by the surgeon general, as more than 2,700 already have been, the service members have five days to start the vaccination process or face separation.

The overwhelming majority of Airmen and Guardians, however, have gotten vaccinated—some 98.6 percent of those on Active duty.

Joining their ranks May 25 will be 937 Cadets commissioning as well as graduating—843 into the Air Force and 94 into the Space Force.

Of those 843:

417 are scheduled to attend pilot training.
11 are scheduled for combat systems operator training.
9 are scheduled for air battle manager training.
24 are scheduled to be remotely piloted aircraft officers.
382 will be in nonrated career fields.

Also included in the graduating class are 16 international Cadets—appointees from foreign countries that have spent four years at USAFA.

Guam Would Get Command Center With Integrated Air Picture in Missile Defense Agency Budget

May 25, 2022 | By Abraham Mahshie

The strategically important U.S. territory of Guam would get 360-degree sensor coverage, missile defenses, and a command center in a plan put forth in the Missile Defense Agency’s fiscal 2023 budget request.

MDA director Vice Adm. Jon A. Hill made the case for the array of new defensive systems during a May 23 event at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C., after highlighting all the capabilities that would be located on the island if Congress approves the plan.

“Location does matter,” Hill said. “If you just go look at where Guam is on the map, it is inside an area that is absolutely tactically relevant,” Hill said of the Pacific island that is 2,500 nautical miles from mainland China and home to U.S. military installations including Andersen Air Force Base and Naval Base Guam with its Polaris Point Submarine Base.

“You’ve got repair facilities there. We’ve got the Marine Corps there. We’re going to be stationing long-range fires there. It needs to be defended,” Hill said.

He said Guam is not yet defendable against ballistic, cruise, or hypersonic missiles. The fiscal 2023 budget request, which is now before Congress, seeks to close that gap and to prepare Guam to be the most forward Pacific site in the defense of the U.S. homeland.

“If you were to pluck out the most important thing about what we’re going to do on Guam, it is going to be that command center,” Hill said.

The planning and budget for Guam answers the needs outlined by the commander of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command Adm. John Aquilino, he added.

Guam’s Command-and-Control Center

Hill considers the defense of Guam to be the MDA’s second-most-important priority behind homeland defense against ballistic missiles from rogue nations. MDA’s budget requests $539 million for architecture work and for design and development of multiple land-based radar systems and procurement of weapon system components.

“If you look at how you fight the battle in the INDOPACOM region today, it’s fairly dispersed in terms of command and control,” Hill explained. “So, you really need to have an area that brings in all the space and land-based and sea-based assets from a sensor perspective and fuses that data and then selects the appropriate way to go after it.”

Aquilino and his team will be part of the development process, ensuring that the command-and-control center is appropriately laid out for mature technologies and the technologies of the future.

Part of MDA’s vision is giving the INDOPACOM commander a single integrated air picture.

The Air Force already has the data streams, he said, and the command-and-control center will bring them together in a way that is operational to the warfighter.

“Yes, it is a challenge. I think it is the hardest thing we’re going to do, and that is the most important aspect about Guam,” Hill said. “You could talk about radars and launchers and weapons all day long, but if we don’t get command-and-control right, none of that will matter.”

Defense of Guam

Guam is currently protected by the Army’s Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) ballistic missile defense systems and a Navy ship at sea providing forward defense.

Building on Guam’s layered defenses would add Patriot missile defenses to the THAAD battery and relieve the three to four Navy ships required on rotation for protection of the island.

“What MDA will do from a mission space perspective is leverage the Aegis fire control for ballistic missile attack and for hypersonics,” said Hill, referencing the SM-3 and SM-6 sea-based missiles now used for ballistic and hypersonic missile defense, respectively.

Patriots and THAAD would be part of an Integrated Air and Missile Defense Battle Command System (IBCS) along with Sentinel radars and Indirect Fire Protection Capability Increment (IFPC) missile interceptors.

“So, we’ve got it from top all the way to bottom in terms of that layered defense,” Hill said.

Finding sites for all the new military infrastructure remains a challenge for defending Guam. Only 27 percent of Guam’s land is available for use, Hill said, and all the services are competing for space.

The island is the size of the city of Chicago, and maintaining its beauty is vital to the tourism sector that forms its lifeline. But MDA has installed radars, interceptors, and missile systems while preserving the natural beauty of Hawaii and Alaska.

“When I say difficult, I’m talking about siting—the fundamentals of where you’re going to place this equipment,” Hill said. “I’m also talking about respecting the beautification of that island, right? We don’t want to go into a major tourist area and just overmilitarize.”

Likewise, an adversary can target static systems, so missile defense systems will be a modified version of current mobile offensive varieties. Likewise, studies are underway to determine if the command-and-control center will be made mobile.

“When I lay it out, in the end, I think it’s good for Guam to have that capability,” Hill said of the decision to go with mobile launchers, which have fewer missiles and add logistical considerations, such as fire control and reloading.

Hill said MDA is in the final stages of selecting some 19 sites to position assets, but defense of Guam can fully operationalize under the fiscal 2023 budget request.

“You’re going to have to deal with ballistic missiles. … You’re going to deal with cruise missiles, and you’re going to deal with hypersonic threats,” Hill said of the challenges of defending Guam. “So, that’s really what’s reflected in [the budget] is that sort of capability on the island because it deserves to be defended.”

General Electric—A Reliable Partner from the Very Beginning

May 25, 2022

In 1941, Gen. Henry H. “Hap” Arnold of the then-U.S. Army Air Corps, personally reviewed a jet engine patented by Sir Frank Whittle flying on a Gloster E.28/39 aircraft. Impressed by its design, Arnold arranged for a Whittle engine to be brought back to the U.S. and tasked General Electric (GE), known for its work on turbosuperchargers, to use the Whittle design as the foundation for developing the first U.S. jet engine. Arnold’s request for a new jet engine launched a partnership that continues today, with the ongoing development of GE’s XA100 designed for the F-35, along with thousands of GE engines that power the current Air Force fleet.

“The primary challenge of the day was that engines lose power at higher altitudes where air density decreases,” said Darin DiTommaso, vice president of engineering for GE Edison Works, GE’s advanced military products organization. “GE had developed a turbosupercharger that demonstrated the ability to reduce the amount of power loss at higher altitudes, so the U.S. Army Air Corps selected GE to develop an engine we called the I-A.”

At the time, GE’s development of the I-A engine was a secret program. So secret, in fact, that the engineers tasked with the project became known at GE’s Lynn, Mass., plant as the “Hush-Hush Boys.” The engineers succeeded, as the I-A engine first ran on April 18, 1942, and flew six months later in October 1942, powering the Bell XP-59.

The rapid development of the I-A engine put GE on its trajectory to becoming a world leader in jet propulsion technology. The investments made into the I-A’s research and development laid the foundation for the future success of several engines, including the J47, the world’s most-produced engine.

“Jet engine development is one thing, but it’s another to mass produce it on a regular basis,” DiTommaso said. “We developed a supply chain and cultivated the relationship between our engineering and manufacturing organizations, enabling the J47 program to produce more than 35,000 engines, primarily for the F-86 and B-47.”

General Electric employees work on the J47 engine at the company’s Lockland plant in 1950. General Electric photo.

Longevity soon became a trademark of GE’s engines.

By 1959, GE’s J85 engine powered the first flights of the T-38 trainer, an aircraft that remains in service today. Another GE engine, the J79, famously powered the F-4 Phantom for the Air Force, a handful of which still fly today internationally.

“That longevity validates the quality of the J85 and J79 designs, which reflects on the quality of our engineers, product support team, supply chain, and operators on the manufacturing and assembly lines,” said DiTommaso. “Technology continually improves, and key deliverables and requirements change. We’ve adapted our designs as requirements asked for much more fuel efficiency and thrust, but the true value of an engine like the J85 is really in its simplicity and low cost.”

GE further benefited from its participation in the 10-year “Great Engine War” competition with Pratt & Whitney from 1984-1994.

“Competition forces you to collaborate with the customer in order to fully meet their needs across a variety of challenging requirements,” DiTommaso said. “As a manufacturer, you have to listen to the customer—in this case the Air Force—to deliver what they want at the time they want it. Our collaborative relationship builds trust so that when things don’t always go perfectly, you can still work through issues together.”

GE’s advanced F110-129 engine has been significantly improved to adapt to the unique demands of the F-15EX, with increased airflow, jet engine efficiency, a three-stage chord blisk fan, and an advanced radial augmentor to reduce complexity, improve maintainability, and increase the life span of parts.

The trust developed between GE and the Air Force directly empowers pilot success in major military air campaigns, such as Operation Desert Storm.

“About 80 percent of the U.S. and Allied aircraft in Operation Desert Storm were powered by GE, more than 5,000 engines in all,” DiTommaso said. “We supported the F-16s, F-117s, F-18s, A-10s, Blackhawks, and Apaches as well as military transports. No matter the aircraft, our goal is for the pilot to never have to think about the engine so they can focus on their mission.”

GE is continuing that mission today, innovating to develop the world’s first-ever flight-weight three stream adaptive cycle engine—the XA100—to bring next generation technology to the cornerstone of the Air Force fleet, the F-35.

“The Air Force expressed the need for better fuel efficiency, more thrust and thermal management, and the XA100 delivers, bringing 25 percent better fuel efficiency, 10 percent more thrust, and twice the thermal management capability,” DiTommaso said. “The first engine-to-test campaign is complete and we’re now in the second phase of our second engine-to-test campaign at Arnold Engineering Development Complex. We’re very pleased with how it’s performing and looking forward to an opportunity to bring that capability to the field.”

DiTommaso is confident that GE’s military business, because of the relationship it has cultivated with the Air Force over its 75-year history, will continue to flourish into the future.

“Our relationship with the Air Force is built on a series of successes and close collaboration,” DiTommaso said. “Today, GE and its joint venture partners power around 40 percent of U.S. Air Force aircraft, and we continue to be a key strategic partner in improving their existing fleet’s sustainment and readiness. We’re going to continue listening, collaborating, and delivering innovative technologies and products that will keep our Air Force leading the world. GE is honored to play our part and looking forward the next 75 years.”

Space Force Unveils Uniform Tweaks, OKs Neck Tattoos and More

May 24, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

The Space Force released updates to its appearance and uniform policies May 24, detailing more permissive regulations governing tattoos, facial hair, and makeup.

Among the various changes the Space Force is making from the Air Force’s policies, the new Guidance Memorandum allows Guardians to have a single neck tattoo—as long as it is authorized, does not exceed one inch, and does not pass a vertical line drawn from the beginning of the ear, essentially keeping it to the back of the neck.

Like the Air Force, the Space Force will also allow one tattoo per hand in the shape of a ring, no more than 3/8 of an inch wide.

“There are no other size or placement limitations on tattoos” as long as they comply with Department of the Air Force regulations, the memo adds.

The Space Force will also allow male Guardians to have longer mustaches, extending 1/4 of an inch horizontally from the corners of the mouth. That’s in line with proposed changes from the Air Force, which currently limits Airmen to mustaches that don’t extend beyond the corners of the mouth. A leaked Air Force memo detailing the same standards as the Space Force circulated on social media recently, but no official changes have been announced for the older service.

On top of that, the Space Force will allow male Guardians to wear cosmetics such as foundation and concealer, though “only to cover scars or blemishes.”

In addition to those grooming and appearance standards, the Space Force memo also laid out several new uniform policies and pieces for Guardians’ Air Force dress uniforms, while the Space Force waits for its own version.

Those changes were previewed by Chief Master Sergeant of the Space Force Roger A. Towberman earlier this year in a video message sent to Guardians in which he said the moves were intended to “space it up a little bit.”

Among the tweaks, Guardians will now be able to wear the service’s enlisted rank insignia as available. They can also swap out the buttons on their service dress coat to ones that feature the Space Force’s “Delta, Globe, and Orbit,” switch their nameplates to hexagonal ones, wear new U.S. collar insignia also featuring a hexagon, and sport the new Space Force Service Cap Badge on wheel and bucket caps.

Finally, the memo also allows Guardians to purchase gray shirts and black bottoms to serve as PT gear “in lieu of the Air Force PTG pending release and availability of the official Space Force PTG at a Guardian’s home station military clothing sales store.” The clothing, however, can feature only one small visible trademark logo per item, and the back can either be blank or feature a Space Force logo or Delta.

“Guardians have been waiting a long time for this policy to drop, and I couldn’t be happier to get it out there and start getting this stuff on the shelves,” Towberman said in a statement. “I appreciate their connection, which brought us these ideas, and the character they’ve shown waiting patiently for us to work through the policy process. It’s time to space it up.”

The Space Force’s work on its own service uniforms continues. The final design has been approved, Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond said in April, but testing and production still has to happen, and that could take some time as the military and the broader U.S. deal with supply chain issues.
Raymond did, however, model the new service uniform during several recent hearings before Congress, featuring several small tweaks and a better fit than when the uniform was unveiled in September 2021.

Air Force E-7 Promotion Rate Hits Lowest Point in Years

May 24, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

The Air Force Personnel Center announced May 24 that just 14.8 percent of eligible tech sergeants were selected for promotion to master sergeant in the 22E7 promotion cycle, marking the service’s lowest E-7 promotion rate since at least 2010.

All told, 4,040 technical sergeants were selected to become master sergeants out of 27,296 eligible candidates—both the lowest number of promotions and the highest number of candidates going back more than a decade, according to data compiled by Air Force Magazine.

In a press release, AFPC credited the drop in promotions to a “recent enlisted grade structure revision conducted by the Department of the Air Force” that resulted in a 0.5 percent decrease in master sergeant authorizations.

At the same time, record-high retention that accompanied the start of the COVID-19 pandemic drove up the number of eligible candidates, the release noted, creating a historically selective year.

An AFPC spokesperson confirmed that the final figure of 14.8 percent is the lowest promotion rate the service has had for E-7s since the 2019 cycle, when the Air Force switched to its current system of using promotion boards to evaluate all candidates. Prior to that, the service used some form of testing as part of its evaluation process.

Yet even prior to that, E-7 promotion rates generally stayed above 20 percent in the decade prior. The exceptions were in 2013 and 2014, when force reductions slashed the number of promotions. Even then, however, the promotion rate stayed just above 15 percent—the lowest it had been in decades, according to Air Force Times.

Direct comparisons between the most recent numbers and those from under a different promotion system aren’t “apples to apples,” the AFPC spokesperson noted.

The full list of those who earned promotions this cycle will be posted at 8 a.m. Central time May 31, AFPC said in its release. However, many on social media noted that the list was prematurely posted May 23 on myPers. Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force JoAnne S. Bass acknowledged the mistake in a Facebook post.

“In this digital age, we are going to have information leaks, and it’s easy to share without thinking. We must do what we can to prevent that, there’s no doubt about it … promotion lists, operations, missions … we need institutional rigor online,” Bass wrote. “Concerning yesterday’s spillage … I appreciate the Airmen who held fast and allowed command teams the time to properly notify their people.”

While Bass asked for Airmen to avoid looking at the list, copies have already been widely shared on unofficial Reddit and Facebook pages, where hundreds of Airmen have seen them.

Air Force E-7 Promotion Rates Over the Years

Year	Eligible	Promoted	Percent Rate
2022	27,296	4,040	14.80
2021	24,721	4,676	18.92
2020	22,286	4,649	20.86
2019	19,422	4,733	24.37
2018	20,866	6,176	29.60
2017	20,169	5,166	25.61
2016	21,504	5,019	23.34
2015	23,619	5,301	22.44
2014	22,678	4,073	17.96
2013	37,608	5,654	15.03
2012	19,809	5,464	27.58
2011	19,538	6,618	33.87
2010	21,829	5,424	24.85

Space Force Can Only ‘Mitigate’ China-Russia Space Cooperation

May 24, 2022 | By Abraham Mahshie

The China-Russia relationship in space has serious security implications as the tenuous allies unite financing and know-how in an effort to displace U.S. space superiority and threaten America’s space architecture, according to a panel of experts at the recent China Aerospace Studies Institute conference.

The two countries’ space cooperation, including in the military realm, has become inextricable since 2018 and works against U.S. interests, said Kevin Pollpeter, senior research scientist at the CNA think tank’s China Studies Division.

“I don’t think we can separate China and Russia. I just don’t think that’s possible,” Pollpeter said in response to a question from Air Force Magazine following a panel discussion May 17 on China-Russia space cooperation at the National Defense University in Washington, D.C.

“While the countries do not have completely overlapping security concerns, they do share a strong desire to counter U.S. leadership, including in outer space,” he said. “What we need to do is, we need to mitigate whatever problems that relationship may cause for us.”

The two countries’ military space cooperation includes the areas of ballistic missile defense, space debris monitoring, and satellite navigation. The resulting exchange has included technology transfer, weapons sales, combined exercises, and compensating measures, Pollpeter said.

International Isolation Spurs Cooperation

Sanctions imposed on China following the 1989 massacre of pro-democracy protesters in Tiananmen Square began the space cooperation as China looked to Russia for the technology it needed. By 1997, the two countries’ leaders started regular dialogue that included a subcommittee on space. Russia faced a similar sanctions problem for which it sought Chinese help when the international community imposed sanctions in 2014 after the occupation of Crimea.

“Tiananmen resulted in a number of embargoes that took place that made [China] increasingly more reliant on Russia as a potential source of technology, particularly for dual use and defense,” said Pollpeter. “After Tiananmen, China started looking more to Russia, and Russia started looking more to China for help with supporting their own space program.”

Both countries have since claimed their union is the result of U.S. actions.

“There’s very much these sort of outward expressions here of how the U.S. is driving China and Russia closer together,” Pollpeter said, citing public statements on both sides.

China began cooperating with Russia on ballistic missile defense after the U.S. withdrew from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty in 2019. That same year, Putin said Russia would help China create a missile defense warning system, although open-source reporting has not revealed that such a system yet exists.

“There appears to be some sort of technology transfer going on,” Pollpeter added. “There’s been joint exercises—the Aerospace Security 2016 and 2017 involved joint air and missile defense planning and coordination.”

Russia has also provided China with S-300 and S-400 missile defense systems, and Pollpeter cited analysis that suggests the Chinese HQ-9 and HQ-19 missile defense systems are very similar to the Russian systems.

Another area of cooperation, space debris monitoring, may sound innocuous, reflected Pollpeter, but he explained that it has security implications.

“If you have a space debris monitoring system, then you actually have a space domain awareness or space surveillance system,” he said. “This very much has a military role in helping China and Russia better monitor U.S. movements up in space.”

Little is known about the satellite navigation cooperation between the two nations other than there are compatibility and interoperability activities between the Russian and Chinese equivalents to GPS—the GLONASS and BeiDou navigation systems. This includes the presence of augmentation stations in each other’s countries and performance monitoring.

“What they really want to do, then, is demonstrate that in a world where the U.S. and China could come into military conflict, they have an alternative,” he said. “They don’t have to rely on BeiDou exclusively. They also have the Russian system.”

China and Russia have also teamed up to submit, in 2008 and 2014, space arms control treaty proposals to the U.N. Conference on Disarmament prohibiting weapons in space, but Pollpeter says the resolutions have loopholes.

“There’s nothing there prohibiting storage or the research and development, and there’s no verification. So, lots of big faults with this,” he said. Likewise, the resolutions do not prohibit the use of anti-satellite. “This cooperation appears intended to portray both countries as striving for the peaceful use of space while doing little to constrain Chinese and Russian acquisition and use of space weapons.”

Space Force ‘On Track’ to Meet China Space Challenge

China doesn’t publicly discuss anything about its counterspace capabilities, and Pollpeter said it’s not known whether it and Russia cooperate in that area.

“A lot of it’s so opaque that when you get into something like counterspace, they’re not going to discuss that,” he said. “What China is developing is a capability that really is designed to threaten the United States space architecture from the ground all the way up to geosynchronous orbit.”

A 2018-to-2022 agreement only deepened the countries’ space cooperation.

The watershed agreement advanced Chinese and Russian cooperation on launch vehicles, rocket engines, space planes, lunar and deep space exploration, remote sensing, electronics, space debris, satellite navigation, and satellite communication.

Pollpeter doesn’t think the Space Force can disrupt the China-Russia joint effort.

“There’s really little we can do to separate the two countries, especially [on] the space side,” he said. “The distrust and, let’s say, to some extent, animosity of both countries towards the U.S. sort of precludes, at this point, that any of those efforts can be successful.”

However, the China space expert believed the Space Force is moving in the right direction to confront the challenge posed by China’s military space endeavors.

“Space Force has a lot of things on its plate in standing up, but I think we’re broadly on track with trying to meet those challenges,” he said.

“If you look at what Space Force is doing with looking at redundancy, resilience, those sorts of things—even coming up with new doctrine or concepts of operations,” he added—“those are the sorts of things that we need to start doing in space.”