China is Having a ‘Strategic Breakout’ in Space Too, USSF Intel Boss Warns

China is Having a ‘Strategic Breakout’ in Space Too, USSF Intel Boss Warns

May 2, 2024 | By Greg Hadley

A little less than three years after then-U.S. Strategic Command boss Adm. Charles Richard warned of China’s nuclear forces experiencing a “strategic breakout,” the Space Force’s top intelligence officer says the People’s Liberation Army have done the same in space. 

“The PLA has rapidly advanced in space in a way that few people can really appreciate,” Maj. Gen. Gregory J. Gagnon said May 2 at the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies. “I tried to think about historical analogies, about rapid buildups. I haven’t seen a rapid build-up like this. I was thinking about World War II, but even as I was looking more broadly, an adversary arming this fast is profoundly concerning.”

Richard’s assessment of Chinese nuclear capabilities in August 2021 came around the same time that reports first emerged of the PLA building massive nuclear silo fields and has become an oft-repeated term used by lawmakers and Pentagon officials ever since. 

In recent months, top military space leaders started using similar language. 

“Admiral Richard … labeled the moniker “breakout pace” for nuclear forces. He talked about the fact that, we thought they’d have 500 warheads, but they’re rapidly getting to 1,000,” Gagnon said. “The breakout pace in space is profound.” 

Gagnon’s comments come a week after U.S. Space Command boss Gen. Stephen N. Whiting said during a visit to Japan and South Korea that China is moving “breathtakingly fast” in space. They also build on remarks Gagnon and Chief of Space Operations Gen. B. Chance Saltzman made in March at the Mitchell Institute’s Spacepower Security Forum. 

“The PRC has more than 470 [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance] satellites that are feeding a robust sensor-shooter kill web,” Saltzman said. “… This new sensor-shooter kill web creates unacceptable risk to our forward-deployed force. This is something that most of us are just not used to thinking about.” 

Several years ago, Gagnon said, his warning to other Pentagon leaders and the public was that the Chinese could threaten U.S. satellites with missiles and non-kinetic weapons like high-powered lasers. But more recently, his concern has focused on how China is preparing to use space like the U.S. has—as an integral part of its military operations. 

“For the last two years, they’ve placed over 200 satellites in space, both years,” Gagnon said. “Of that, over half of them are remote sensing satellites—remote sensing satellites that are purpose built to surveil and do reconnaissance in the western Pacific and globally. … And the purpose of reconnaissance and surveillance from the ultimate high ground is, of course, to inform decisions about fire control for militaries. It’s to provide indications and warning of [U.S.] Sailors, Marines, Airmen trying to move west, if directed, to defend freedom.” 

Using space for ISR is something only the U.S. has been doing for years. Now, though, “that monopoly is over,” Gagnon said.  

And like the U.S., the Chinese are not content with only a few, technologically exquisite satellites, Gagnon warned. Rather, they are putting up so many satellites to proliferate just like the Space Force is trying to do—making it harder for an adversary to block the ISR and targeting capability. 

It is, Gagnon warned, “an architecture that’s designed to go to war and sustain at war.” 

The Space Force is countering that architecture with more sensors and a new squadron—the 75th Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance Squadron—for targeting space assets, their networks, and their ground stations. 

All told, Gagnon said, the service is using around 600 sensors around the globe to monitor around 1,000 “priority” satellites in orbit. That marks a rapid growth from just a few years ago, when the Pentagon had no more than a couple dozen sensors, and it gives the Space Force’s intelligence enterprise greater insight into how the Chinese and other competitors are working in space. 

When the Space Force first stood up, “we’re pushing out … six to seven maneuver alerts a month. ‘Hey, we saw something maneuver out there,’” Gagnon said. “Today, we’re putting out 11,000 a month.” 

US Needs Better Coordination, Cheaper Ways to Counter Drones: Pentagon Officials

US Needs Better Coordination, Cheaper Ways to Counter Drones: Pentagon Officials

May 2, 2024 | By John A. Tirpak

The U.S. needs a better-coordinated approach to defend against unmanned aerial systems but is at the mercy of local politics on the issue, Air Force Vice Chief of Staff Gen. James C. Slife told lawmakers May 1.

Asked by Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) how satisfied he is with the degree of coordination between the FBI, Department of Homeland Security, other government agencies, and the military services on counter-UAS capabilities, Slife was direct in his response: “Not satisfied.”

“Although the services coordinate effectively together, and leverage each other’s capabilities, every single locale has its own story,” Slife added. “And so, there is no national approach to counter this small UAS issue. It is local issue by local issue.”

Air Force officials have been extremely tight-lipped about what they’re doing to thwart drone operators who fly their small craft near or over domestic Air Force bases, where they could conceivably fly drones into the path of aircraft, conduct surveillance, or cause other problems. In March, for example, The War Zone reported that unidentified drones repeatedly swarmed Joint Base Langley-Eustis in Virginia over the span of several months.

Officials have said a menu of counter-UAS capabilities have been developed, to include RF jamming guns and other devices that cause the drones to lose contact with their operators and land vertically. A series of ad-hoc ordinances have sprung up in some locales but not others, preventing a uniform approach to airbase security.   

“We’ve been having some testimony and some hearings—some open, some classified—about UAS challenges,” Sullivan said. “Obviously, they’re a threat in combat, but increasingly, they’re also a threat to our installations both at home and overseas. Addressing this threat requires an awful lot of coordination. … I worry a little bit that we’re maybe not really coordinating.”

Asked by Sullvian, Slife noted that he and William LaPlante, undersecretary for acquisition and sustainment, are leading the Pentagon counter-UAS effort.

Together, they co-chair a panel and a “Tiger Team” that reports to Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III on UAS defense, and there are “a couple other forums that do this. And all the services are part of that forum that [LaPlante] and I co-chair.”

Last week, LaPlante said during a Center for Strategic and International Studies event that counter-UAS needs urgent attention, given the increasing role of drones in state-on-state conflict. Drones are a cost-imposing tactic on defenders, and he said the U.S. spends up to $100,000 to destroy just one uncrewed air vehicle, which can be launched in large swarms.

When the U.S. helped Israel shoot down some 300 drones and ballistic missiles in April, it used air-to-air missiles, ground-fired Patriot interceptors, and ship-fired Standard missiles, among other weapons, all of which have a price tag likely higher than the targets they were intercepting.

It’s “getting too expensive” to deal with attacking drones that way, LaPlante said. The Pentagon needs counter-UAS weapons that can be successful at less than $10,000 per round, he said.

On the same panel, undersecretary of research and engineering Heidi Shyu said her organization, in concert with DARPA, the Army, and the Navy, is pursuing high-powered microwaves, lasers, and other directed-energy solutions to address the lopsided cost of missile and UAV defense.

New Air Force PT Uniforms to Hit Shelves in July

New Air Force PT Uniforms to Hit Shelves in July

May 1, 2024 | By Chris Gordon

The Air Force’s new physical training uniforms will hit shelves in July, an official said May 1.

The Air Force’s new workout apparel has been a long time coming. The clothing set was first unveiled in 2021, with a promised 2022 debut. But supply chain issues delayed its arrival multiple times, according to the Air Force. But finally, Airmen are expected to be able to buy the new uniforms in July, Army & Air Force Exchange Service (AAFES) spokesperson Chris Ward told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

In the meantime, the new PT gear has been rolled out to Airmen at Basic Military Training, an Air Force spokesperson told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

The new Air Force PT uniform consists of a jacket, pants, and two types of shorts—one for running, and the other for all-purpose wear. The workout T-shirt is grey with the Air Force logo on the upper left chest and a stylized “Air Force” pattern across the back.

The new uniform looks much like the old PT uniform, introduced two decades ago. But like most civilian workout attire that has come along in the years since, the new Air Force gear is less bulky and features “performance” fabric that is billed as softer, quick-drying, and moisture-wicking. It also comes in men’s and women’s styles, unlike the old unisex uniforms which were criticized as noisy and heavy.

The military began modernizing PT uniforms about a decade ago when the Army introduced new workout gear that was more in line with civilian attire. The Navy soon followed in the late 2010s. The Space Force recently debuted its first PT uniforms for Guardians in the life of the young service. The Air Force’s introduction of its new PT uniforms leaves the Marines as the only service without a new PT uniform after the USMC ditched plans for a redesign in late 2023.

Airmen still have time before having to purchase the new workout attire, as the Air Force has promised a four-year transition period before the uniform becomes mandatory.

Spectrum Warfare Wing Adds Two New Squadrons to Handle Growing Mission

Spectrum Warfare Wing Adds Two New Squadrons to Handle Growing Mission

May 1, 2024 | By Greg Hadley

The Air Force’s 350th Spectrum Warfare Wing added a new squadron April 25 and will activate another May 2—expanding the structure of the service’s lone spectrum warfare wing as it looks to grow its numbers too. 

The 563rd Electronic Warfare Squadron, which stood up at Joint Base San Antonio, Texas, is “really focused on developing software capabilities for electronic warfare,” 350th commander Col. Joshua Koslov told reporters in a May 1 briefing. “They’re the first folks that have focused specifically on software for EW, not a weapon system or some sort of electronic warfare waveform type of thing.” 

That focus will solve several problems the wing and the broader Air Force faces in EW, an area in which leaders have acknowledged they let their focus slip in recent decades. 

“Our operational-level tools that we use as a force to plan, integrate, synchronize, and collaborate electronic warfare effects are basically nonexistent,” Koslov said. “And so we’re building that capability with this unit and those coders are going to be able to develop those tools that the joint force needs in order to execute in a wartime situation.”

The wing needs tools to parse through the “mountains of data” coming from adversaries in order to spot their strengths and weaknesses, Koslov said. That task falls to the 388th Electronic Warfare Squadron, which will activate at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla. on May 2. The 388th’s analysis will help make sure “that the combatant commands have the confidence that what we provide to them will achieve effects in the battlespace,” said Lt. Col. Timothy West, the squadron’s soon-to-be commander.

In the fast-changing and hotly contested arena of EW, making sure the right effects are used on the right targets requires tight coordination with the intelligence community, West said. 

“A huge part of our mission is under validating and verifying the information we receive on Red based off of what we know about the electromagnetic spectrum, and what we know Red is doing and comparing that with known data from the IC,” he said. “And so … based on an adversary that’s completely agile in the spectrum, how do we know when they’re spoofing us versus when that’s a real capability that we now need to develop a target for and go forward from there?” 

U.S. Air Force Col. Josh Koslov, 350th Spectrum Warfare Wing commander, speaks during the activation ceremony of the 350th SWW’s first detachments Robins Air Force Base, GA, Oct. 25, 2023. U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Ericka A. Woolever

Neither squadron will be very big to start, Koslov told Air & Space Forces Magazine. But the hope is to grow them over time—150 to 200 people each within two to three years. That’s in keeping with one of the 350th’s main challenges: a lack of personnel. 

In April 2023, Koslov said during an AFA Warfighters in Action event that he had more than 200 civilian and military vacancies in the wing. A little over a year later, he said they still have a “tremendous number” of open jobs. 

Yet while neither new squadron will bring a surge in manpower to the 350th, they are part of a dedicated buildup in the wing’s architecture, helping to define missions and showcase where more jobs are needed, Koslov said. 

“The wing is very much still a work in progress,” he said. “Just in the past year, we have stood up six units in my time here. And I predict that the wing will continue to grow, probably by at a minimum of another four units … but there’s probably some room for more than that as well.” 

Kadena Adds More Stealth Fighters Amid ‘Increasingly Challenging Strategic Environment’

Kadena Adds More Stealth Fighters Amid ‘Increasingly Challenging Strategic Environment’

May 1, 2024 | By Unshin Lee Harpley

F-22A Raptors from the 27th Fighter Squadron at Joint Base Langley-Eustis, Va., recently arrived at Kadena Air Base in Japan, bolstering the fifth-generation airpower at the closest U.S. military installation to Taiwan.

“Amid an increasingly challenging strategic environment, it is vital that we continue to retain modern capabilities to ensure peace and stability across the Indo-Pacific region,” a base spokesperson told Air & Space Forces Magazine on May 1.

For a year and a half now, the Air Force has rotated fighters through Kadena to replace and supplement the base’s aging fleet of 48 F-15C/D fighters, which are slated to return to the U.S.

The latest F-22s join other Raptors from Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii, that arrived in March. Kadena is also currently hosting F-16s from the South Dakota Air National Guard’s 114th Fighter Wing and from the Minnesota Air National Guard’s 148th Fighter Wing.

The spokesperson added that the F-16s are being maintained and operated by Guardsmen, including at least some from the 114th Fighter Wing. They did not say if any personnel from the 148th Fighter Wing are at Kadena as well.

There are still original F-15s remaining at Kadena scheduled to retrograde to the U.S., the spokesperson added. They declined to offer details on how many Eagles are left or the planned timeline due to operational security.

Located just 400 miles from Taiwan, Kadena is a key strategic location and can swiftly deploy fighters for Pacific Air Forces exercises. F-15s have been at the base, on the island of Okinawa, since the 1980s. Since the Air Force announced its plans to withdraw them in October 2022, the service has kept a steady-state fighter presence by rotating all variations of Air Force fighters except for the A-10 Thunderbolt II.

In the latest exchange, F-15s from the California and Louisiana Air National Guards that deployed to Kadena in October are departing the location, as are F-35s from Hill Air Force Base, Utah, that arrived in November.

The newly arrived jets “will work in conjunction with additional heavy and reconnaissance assets that are both augmented to and stationed at Kadena to support the defense of Japan and maintain regional stability,” the spokesperson added. While they declined to specify the exact number of aircraft currently stationed at the base, recent photos of an elephant walk at the base show a diverse array of types, including tankers, UAVs, reconnaissance aircraft, and some two dozen combined fighters.

The U.S. has been expanding its deterrence efforts with Japan against China’s growing military expansion and increasing hostile activities in the region. In the last month alone, the USAF conducted two separate exercises with Japan and regional allies.

President Joe Biden hosted Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida at the White House in April, followed by a “first of many” trilateral summits with Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. the next day. The leaders expressed concerns over China’s “dangerous and aggressive” behavior in the South China Sea in a joint statement.

‘We Need to Modernize’ IT at Air Force Depots, Vice Chief Says

‘We Need to Modernize’ IT at Air Force Depots, Vice Chief Says

May 1, 2024 | By Unshin Lee Harpley

Questioned by lawmakers on the state of the Air Force’s maintenance depots, Vice Chief of Staff Gen. James C. “Jim” Slife said April 30 that the service is investing in IT and data infrastructure to better sustain new software-intensive platforms—while acknowledging that there is still work to be done to bring the facilities up to modern standards.

“We have a roadmap for depot modernization,” Slife said at a House Armed Services Committee hearing. “We recognize that we need to modernize these. Part of this is the IT systems, making sure we have a heavy investment in the data underpinning that is required for all our sustainment work, but it’s also the basic hardware that goes into the depot.”

The service currently has three Air Logistics Centers:

  • Warner Robins ALC at Robins Air Force Base, Ga.
  • Ogden ALC at Hill Air Force Base, Utah
  • Oklahoma City ALC at Tinker Air Force Base, Okla.

“The Air Force has absolutely no intent of stepping back from any part of the three air depot construct that we currently have right now,” said Slife. “In terms of what the sustainment center is doing to modernize and make sure that our organic depots remain relevant, we’re investing heavily in data science and data application in all of our systems.”

Slife did not specify if the roadmap the Air Force is working from is the 20-year plan announced in 2019 or a more updated version. In late 2021, lawmakers challenged the service to craft a more immediate, detailed five-year plan.

Several months later in mid-2022, the Government Accountability Office released a report detailing challenges across Air Force and Navy depots that directly affect readiness by reducing aircraft availability for operations and training. Problems identified in the report included deteriorating equipment and facility conditions, insufficient supply support, and problems with diminishing manufacturing sources and parts obsolescence.

Amid these challenges, the Air Force also has to upgrade its entire sustainment enterprise to handle new aircraft like the F-35 that many have described as a “flying computer.”

“With respect to specifically Hill, in the Ogden ALC, that is front and center for most of our flight fighter platform,” Slife said. “And most of our fighter platforms, particularly the newer ones, as they come on, are very software intensive. One of the things that we really value about at Hill, is the heavy investment in software engineering that goes on there, and the government architectures that they’re able to support and turn capabilities onto our frontline fighters a whole lot faster than perhaps our adversaries would.”

The 309th Aircraft Maintenance Group at Ogden has more than 2,000 personnel handling damage repair, inspections, technical orders, and other maintenance for F-16s, F-22s, and F-35s—a critical mission for the Air Force’s broader pivot toward great power competition.

Ogden is not the only depot investing in new technology, though. Slife also cited increased use of data science at the Warner Robins ALC, saying it helped reduce down time for the hefty C-5 Galaxy transport aircraft.

“For us, one of our problem children was the C-5,” Slife said. “The Warner Robins ALC has decreased the C-5 cycle time going through depot, by over 300 days. Part of the way they were able to do that is very similar to what the Navy is doing, is packaging the work, making sure all the parts are ordered and packaged ahead of time, so that when an airplane comes into the depot, all the parts are there. There are no diminishing manufacturing source issues to worry about, and we’re able to get those airplanes in and out of the depot more quickly.”

Beyond the three main depots, Slife also noted that service maintains “a number of partnerships with commercial depot service providers” across the Indo-Pacific region. These regional facilities mitigate the logistical challenges of transporting aircraft to and from the continental U.S.—and could be increasingly important as the Air Force looks to up its presence in the region in the coming years.

“It gives us the capacity that we need, number one. Number two, for those forward based fighter platforms, it saves us from having to drag them all the way across the Pacific Ocean and back,” Slife said. “Plus, in times of conflict, it provides added companies available to us. So, while we rely most heavily on our organic depot capacity, we do have a global network that we rely on as well.”

Air Force Vice Chief of Staff Gen. James Slife testifies during a House of Armed Services Committee hearing for fiscal year 2025 budget request for military readiness, Washington D.C., April 30, 2024. (U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Stuart Bright)
National Guard Boss Warns of Potential ‘Critical’ Fighter Shortage

National Guard Boss Warns of Potential ‘Critical’ Fighter Shortage

May 1, 2024 | By David Roza

The head of the National Guard warned that a shortage of fighter jets, pilots, and maintainers in the reserve components could leave the military short-handed in a possible conflict. 

“We’ve got a 60 fighter squadron requirement,” across the Air Force, Army Gen. Daniel R. Hokanson, the Chief of the National Guard Bureau, said April 30 at a House Appropriations defense subcommittee hearing. “We have 25 of those in the National Guard, and our ability to retain that capability when we’re already short fighter pilots and maintainers will be critically important in the next coming years as we start to modernize our fleet.”

The Air Force is retiring several of the Guard’s aging A-10 and F-15C/D squadrons in an effort to fund modernization, but lawmakers worry there are not enough new replacement aircraft to make up the difference.

“I’m very concerned about the lack of, frankly, assets within the reserve components, especially on the Air National Guard side, to be that complementary force to the Active duty right now,” Rep. Mike Garcia (R-Calif.) said. “I think we’ve gotten below or are approaching below critical mass on some of the platforms that are being allocated to y’all.”

Garcia emphasized the importance of “getting the right equipment at the right levels to the Guard, to the Reserve units,” so that “you’re not just seen as the ugly stepchild to the Active duty side.”

A U.S. Air Force pilot assigned to the 158th Fighter Wing, Vermont Air National Guard, performs pre-flight procedures in an F-35 Lightning II during William Tell 2023 at the Air Dominance Center located at the Savannah Air National Guard base in Savannah, Georgia, Sept. 12, 2023. U.S. Air National Guard photo by Master Sgt. Morgan R. Whitehouse

But achieving that balance has proven difficult. Last year, both chambers of Congress introduced bills that would have required a minimum of 25 fighter squadrons in the Air National Guard, developed a plan to modernize and recapitalize the entire Guard fighter fleet by the end of fiscal year 2034, and a plan to field Next-Generation Air Dominance fighters in the Guard. 

Neither bill passed into law, but a bipartisan group of lawmakers pushed the Air Force to transfer Active fighters into Guard and Reserve units until the defense industry can produce more new fighters. Not doing so, they argued, could result in losing experienced, expensively-trained pilots and maintainers if reserve component squadrons are shuttered.

“Fleet leveling temporarily balances fighters across Active duty, ANG, and AFRC squadrons to allow time for industry production capacity to catch up with demand,” members of Congress wrote in a December letter to Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall. “Most importantly, fleet leveling prevents the closure of fighter squadrons across the Total Force, thereby preserving critical capacity that would otherwise be forever lost.”

Hokanson advocated for the same strategy at the April 30 hearing.

“With significant fighter pilot and maintainer shortages in the Air Force, we believe through temporary cross-component aircraft transfers, we can retain the critical fighter capability in all 25 of our existing fighter squadrons until aircraft procurement efforts can replenish them,” he said.

In the meantime, the general is pushing for F-15EX and F-35s to help the Guard fleet keep pace with its Active counterparts. The National Guard’s fiscal year 2025 unfunded priorities list includes six F-15EXs and six F-35s that the Air Force cut from its own budget request. 

The 12 new jets will help “make sure that we can continue to field these units so that we don’t create what we call a bathtub where we don’t have enough capability at the most critical time as we face challenges from our competitors around the globe,” Hokanson said. “We’re working everything we can to get those airframes as fast as we can.”

The head of Air Force Reserve Command, Lt. Gen. John P. Healy, took a similar view, arguing that the Reserves need to have “proportionally modernized and concurrently fielded” platforms to serve as an effective back-up for the Active force.

“We absolutely want to see that continue … so that we’re able to have fifth-gen aircraft participating as a surge capacity in a fifth-gen fight in the future,” he said at the hearing.

MH-139 Suffers ‘Critical’ Cost Breach; Sentinel ‘Halfway’ Through Its Review

MH-139 Suffers ‘Critical’ Cost Breach; Sentinel ‘Halfway’ Through Its Review

April 30, 2024 | By Greg Hadley

While the Pentagon is halfway through its review of the Air Force’s new Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) program in the wake of “critical” cost and schedule overruns, the service has declared a similar issue for the helicopters meant to provide security and transport across those ICBM fields. 

The Air Force recently notified Congress of a “critical” Nunn-McCurdy breach on the MH-139 Grey Wolf program, a spokesperson confirmed to Air & Space Forces Magazine. The Nunn-McCurdy Act requires the Pentagon to inform lawmakers if a program incurs a cost or schedule overrun of more than 15 percent.  

Any breach over 15 percent is considered “significant,” while a breach of 30 percent is considered “critical.” Programs with a critical breach require certification from the Secretary of Defense to continue. 

Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Calif.), chair of the House Appropriations defense subcommittee, first revealed the MH-139 breach during an April 30 hearing, noting the ongoing Sentinel breach as well. 

“We need to understand the implications of both of these breach reviews for fiscal year 2025 and beyond,” he said.  

While the Sentinel breach was related to ballooning costs and years of delays, the MH-139 breach was caused by the Air Force’s decision in its 2025 budget request to slash the projected fleet from 80 to 42 aircraft—which caused the price per aircraft to rise significantly. Overall procurement costs, however, dropped $1.1 billion. 

The cuts to the MH-139 came “due to fiscal pressures and considering remaining service life of the UH-1N Huey,” an Air Force spokesperson previously told Air & Space Forces Magazine. 

The Air Force had planned to have the MH-139 provide transport for senior leaders, executive airlift in the National Capital Region, and aircrew survival training in addition to its ICBM patrol duties. With the cuts, the service now says the Grey Wolf will only be used by nuclear security forces. 

A militarized version of the AW139 helicopter, the MH-139 can fly faster, higher, farther, and with more weight than the UH-1N, which Air Force budget documents say have “significant capability gaps in the areas of speed, range, endurance, payload capacity, and aircraft self-protection.”  

However, issues with Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) certification several years ago caused the Air Force to delay purchases, and the Pentagon’s Office of the Director of Operational Test & Evaluation (DOT&E) has warned in its annual report that the Grey Wolf might fall shore of “operational effectiveness requirements.” 

Now, the office of the undersecretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment must conduct a review of the program to certify that: 

  • The program is essential to national security. 
  • The root cause of the overrun is clearly understood. 
  • New cost estimates are validated by the Pentagon’s Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation shop as reasonable. 
  • There are no lower-cost alternatives to the program. 
  • The program is a higher priority than other programs that must be reduced or eliminated to pay for the overrun. 

Sentinel Review to Finish by July 

While the MH-139 Nunn-McCurdy process is just beginning, the Sentinel ICBM program has been in it since January and is now “halfway” done, Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment William LaPlante told lawmakers in a separate April 30 hearing. 

Under the law, LaPlante noted, his office has 120 days after the submission of the President’s budget to complete its review. 

“So that deadline for us, roughly is July 10 or so,” he said. 

While Air Force leaders have repeatedly said they believe Sentinel must continue to replace the aging Minuteman III missiles that have been in service since the 1970s, LaPlante said no outcomes are being ruled out of the review process, including the program being canceled or certified to continue with modifications. 

LaPlante declined to share any preliminary findings from the review, but he did note that, in his own opinion, the Sentinel program suffered from poor communication between the prime contractor Northrop Grumman and its subcontractors, a lack of competition for the contract, and massive costs associated with the ground element. On the last point, Air Force officials have also noted that because Minuteman was put into service so long ago, its basic infrastructure needs to be massively overhauled, and the Air Force and industry have no recent experience with a project of that size. 

LaPlante also noted issues with Sentinel’s integrated master schedule, or lack thereof. When he started in the summer of 2022, he visited Hill Air Force Base and determined the program lacked a reliable master schedule, nearly two years after the Air Force had awarded an Engineering and Manufacturing Development contract to Northrop. 

“By the time you’re six months after a Milestone B [decision], you should have an integrated master schedule,” LaPlante said.  

Kendall: Air Force Expects 100 CCAs Operating Within Five Years

Kendall: Air Force Expects 100 CCAs Operating Within Five Years

April 30, 2024 | By John A. Tirpak

Though the Air Force plans to buy as many as 2,000 Collaborative Combat Aircraft through the late 2030s, only about 100 will be built by 2029, Secretary Frank Kendall told lawmakers April 30. After an initial award last week, more CCA contracts will follow on a roughly two-year tempo, he said.

During a House Appropriations defense subcommittee hearing, Kendall was asked how many CCAs will be in service and how soon.

“We’ll have over 100 on order or delivered by the end of the [Future Years Defense Program]; that’s for Increment 1,” Kendall said. The FYDP covers the next five years, ending in fiscal 2029.

Kendall noted that he has provided a “planning figure” of 1,000 CCAs. “That’s just really to reflect the fact that we’re serious about this, it’s going to be a significant part of our force structure,” he said.

The Air Force announced Anduril and General Atomics as the finalists for the first increment of CCAs on April 24. The two companies beat out aircraft primes Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman for the award, but the service said those companies can compete for the second increment on their own dime. The Air Force has declined to disclose details of the Increment 1 contracts, including their dollar value.

Kendall has said up to 2,000 CCAs might be in the Air Force’s long-term plans. But he told lawmakers that the “ultimate number is going to depend upon all the costs, portability [of technology to and from other platforms] and a number of other factors.”

Regardless, Kendall called CCAs a “fairly transformative change to going away from the individual fighter pilots all out there at risk together, to giving our fighter pilots a wingman.

“It can be attrited to a degree—it’s intended to be survivable—but attritable,” he added, meaning the drones can be lost in acceptable numbers. “That will give us a wide range of tactics and techniques that we currently can’t utilize.”

Asked how many CCAs will be acquired for every crewed fighter, Kendall said two to five is a likely range, but that “we won’t do it for every single fighter, probably, at least not initially.”

Kendall’s desired cost of a CCA will top out at about $25 to $30 million, he said; a “fraction” of the price of a crewed fighter. That would be about a third of the cost of an F-35, which came in at about $80 million each under the most recently-negotiated lot.

Air Force officials have said a contract for Increment 2 is expected to be awarded in 2025 or 2026, but that platform has not yet been defined. Service officials said it started out as being an “exquisite,” high-end, stealthy platform, but the service went back to the drawing board after wargames showed that large numbers of low-end CCAs were more valuable in a Pacific conflict than small numbers of high-end versions.

“The way the program is structured, it has multiple increments; they’re about two years apart,” Kendall explained in the hearing. Increment 1 is meant to go “quickly to production,” he said.

“We expect to have those aircraft in production within a few years and have deliveries before the end of the five-year plan,” he said.

Those first aircraft will “allow us to learn a lot; they’ll give us an operational capability,” Kendall said. “There’ll be a second increment coming along a couple of years behind that one. And we are particularly looking for international cooperation with that second increment.”

Boeing developed its MQ-28 Ghost Bat—also called the Airpower Teaming System—with Australia, and the Air Force has shown interest in that modular, uncrewed aircraft. The U.K. and other international partners are also working on their own autonomous aircraft. Kendall said he and Chief of Staff Gen. David W. Allvin have discussed cooperation with several allies.

Pentagon acquisition and sustainment chief William LaPlante has noted that producing the same platforms or munitions in multiple countries would enhance coalition surge capability and interoperability, and provide a powerful deterrent if such items were produced at scale.   

The “secret sauce” that will “enable us to be more rapidly integrating with our allies and partners” is the fact that the CCA will generate a “government-owned reference architecture that we control,” said Allvin at the hearing.

“And so, as we are seeing advancements in the technology, we can maybe set the pace for how we can integrate and work with our allies and partners.”