Loyal Wingman or ‘Untethered’ Drone? Why Not Both, Industry Leaders Say

July 21, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

FARNBOROUGH, U.K.—As the Air Force moves forward with plans to team manned and unmanned systems in the future, the service might be best served by pursuing platforms that can function on their own as uncrewed aircraft—but are still capable of working as “loyal wingmen” to manned systems.

So said several executives of top defense contractors at the Farnborough International Airshow this week, emphasizing flexibility in how these new aircraft would be able to operate.

The question of how the Air Force should approach the concept of manned-unmanned teaming has been an open one. Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall has endorsed the idea of unmanned combat drones, designed to work with manned aircraft and “run plays” called by the pilot. He’s also called for up to five drones to fly alongside fighters.

Other ideas proposed have run the gamut—some have focused on just one “loyal wingman” to extend a fighter’s sensing range or potentially carry more weapons, while others have called for swarms of drones to go with each jet, each performing different functions. Some are based around the drones being autonomous, functioning independently, while others envision the drones performing preprogrammed tasks as directed.

“The Air Force has made comments around ‘loyal wingman’-type operations, manned-unmanned aircraft. We’re fully engaged with that,” Boeing Phantom Works vice president and general manager Steve Nordlund told reporters. “Our concept around that is it’s not about a platform and surrounding that platform with a swarm of UAVs. We believe in swarm technology. What we really want to do is be untethered from the platform and to be able have the autonomous vehicle go where it’s needed, regardless of where the platform is.”

Such an approach would provide “flux ability” for operators, Nordlund added.

“So if there’s an aircraft in a different vicinity that has a need, … the unmanned system can respond to that,” said Nordlund. “So that interoperability piece becomes really important; the level of quantity becomes really important; how that handoff happens is really important. So those are a lot of the things we’re working on, both procedurally as well as the technology.”

Nordlund’s endorsement of an “untethered” system echoes comments made by John Clark, the new head of Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works program—earlier this month. Clark said the company had done analysis that determined that the best approach was a “distributed” team with uncrewed aircraft working in a “detached” way.

But Nordlund went further in saying the system should be set up so that the uncrewed aircraft can still come back to the manned one and act as a “loyal wingman” if needed.

“I want the flexibility to be able to serve that mission that is at hand that day and be able to do both of those. Tethered when it needs to be tethered, untethered when it needs to be untethered, is what I think our customer would desire to see,” Nordlund said.

One of the contractors that has frequently been connected to the “loyal wingman” concept is Kratos. Its Mako and Valkyrie unmanned aircraft have been tested as part of the Air Force’s Low-Cost Attritable Aircraft Systems and Skyborg platforms, demonstrating key characteristics such as autonomy, affordability, and the ability to fly alongside manned fighters, translating data.

And Jeffrey Herro, a senior vice president in Kratos’ unmanned systems division, also endorsed the idea of the drones being able to function on their own and within a teaming concept.

“I view these systems like we have as yet another tool in the arsenal of the pilot in command of a manned aircraft,” Herro said. “You might say this is another airplane. Well, it is, but it is actually just another toolset in his cockpit, potentially. It just happens to be off board in another airplane. … That’s one way to do it. These things can also be reasonably more autonomous and a standalone system to accomplish particular mission sets.”

Such flexibility could offer intriguing opportunities when it comes to planning and executing operations, added Robert Winkler, vice president of Kratos’ corporate development and national security programs.

“I think it’s really important, that idea of disaggregating sensors and platforms for a disaggregated strike package,” Winkler said. “And [then] it comes together at the right time. It doesn’t have to launch from the same location, but you can make that package on the fly.”

Kendall, Brown Address the Question of Nuclear Weapons in Ukraine

July 21, 2022 | By James C. Kitfield

Editor’s note: This story was updated at 11:29 a.m. Eastern time to clarify Brown’s remarks. Brown did not acknowledge currently training Ukrainian pilots on U.S. fighters. Rather, he acknowledged continued conversations about potential future support to the Ukrainian Air Force, to include training “in various capabilities and capacities.“

ASPEN, Colo.—The question has darkened the counsels of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in recent months to a degree arguably not seen since the Cuban Missile Crisis: If Russian President Vladimir Putin uses a tactical nuclear weapon to gain the upper hand in its already historically bloody slog of an invasion of Ukraine, how should the U.S. military respond?

For the audience of senior U.S. officials and national security experts at the Aspen Security Forum, it was a question that Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. had seemingly spent considerable time pondering.

“That’s really a hypothetical question, and I can’t tell you how we should respond because it’s up to the President to decide,” said Brown, a featured speaker at the forum that began July 19. “As a member of the Joint Chiefs and Chief of the Air Force, which controls two legs of the strategic nuclear triad—ICBMs and bombers—my role is to discuss possible options and the risk associated with each if the President should request them.

“First we need to understand the message we want to send, keeping in mind that it’s all about deterrence. The goal is not to get into a broader conflict than exists today. We also need to pay a lot of attention to risk—so that options don’t lead you down a slippery slope of escalation.”

Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall has also been thinking about the use of nuclear weapons in ways that he finds reminiscent of his decades as a Cold War warrior in government and private national security jobs.

“For a long time, Russia has had a doctrine of increased reliance on tactical nuclear weapons, so as we watch the Ukraine war evolve, everyone is very conscious of the fact that they have that capability,” Kendall said, also speaking at the Aspen forum. “I haven’t seen any evidence that they actually plan to use nuclear weapons, and it would definitely be a mistake … I’ve always thought that nuclear weapons are just inherently so destructive and dangerous. The only time they’ve ever been used was by the United States, and we used them for the purpose of bringing an end to an incredibly devastating conflict.”

Wars change the course of history, and the first state-on-state aggression and cross-border invasion in Europe since World War II has focused the attention of military and national security experts worldwide. As the discussions at the Aspen forum made clear, U.S. military experts are already using the Ukraine war to go to school on Russian military capabilities, even as they contemplate what lessons potential adversaries such as China are drawing from the conflict.

“Everyone is learning from current events in Ukraine. Russia is learning something, as is Ukraine. The United States and China are also learning, along with the rest of the global community. We’re only four-plus months into the war, and it’s by no means over, so there are more chapters to be written,” said Brown, who noted how quickly the Western alliance unified behind the most punishing economic sanctions on a large country in history as an early lesson. That has profound implications that are being studied closely not only by the United States and its NATO allies, but also by potential adversaries such as China. “From a military perspective, we’re also paying close attention to how Russian forces initially proceeded and how the Ukrainians reacted. And while it’s not a new lesson, we’re seeing clearly the value of air superiority and the reality that it’s not guaranteed.”

Indeed, the Russian military’s failure to quickly gain air superiority over the Ukrainian battle space despite a seemingly overwhelming advantage in aircraft numbers remains one of the enduring mysteries of the war. Part of the answer may be in the thousands of Stinger and other man-portable air defense missile systems that Western nations flooded into Ukraine. It also seems likely that U.S. intelligence overestimated the capabilities of the Russian air force. Regardless, the failure played a major role in Russian forces’ failure to take the capital of Kyiv, and their subsequent retreat from western Ukraine.

The lesson in the critical importance of establishing air superiority is one the Air Force needs to refocus on, Brown noted, as the service moves from two decades of conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan, where it enjoyed a permissive air environment, to a focus on great power competition with the likes of Russia and especially China.

“We’ve operated in the past 20 years in a realm where air superiority was not contested,” Brown noted, and enemies such as al-Qaida in Iraq, the Taliban, and the Islamic State “did not have air forces or air defenses, and those are capabilities the Air Force will have to deal with in the future. Because air superiority is critical in allowing for freedom of movement for your ground forces. So we’re seeing in Ukraine that permissive air environments are not going to be the future.”

Another lesson cited was the critical and increasing role that space capabilities such as satellite surveillance and communications, and offensive and defensive cyber operations, will play in modern warfare. U.S. assistance to Ukrainian forces in the cyber realm, for instance, is largely credited with helping Ukraine fend off persistent Russian cyberattacks on critical communications nodes.

The Ukraine war has clearly demonstrated that “cyber offensive and defensive operations are critical to helping you communicate and move information, and deter and change an enemy’s behavior and confuse them by putting out deceptive information,” Brown said. “Because all modern militaries are highly dependent on moving information in order to impact decisions, and they need to protect that information, there are plenty of opportunities going forward in the cyber realm.”

Perhaps the preeminent question that shadowed discussions at the Aspen Security Forum was what lessons Beijing is taking from the Ukraine war and how those might impact its plans to reunify with Taiwan, by military force if necessary.

“I hope the lesson China is getting from the Ukraine war is that the economic consequences of such an act of aggression are extreme, and should be avoided at all costs, and the West needs to stick together [behind sanctions] to make sure they learn that lesson,” Kendall said. “China should also see that invasions intended to result in quick wins may not be successful, and you can get bogged down in a long campaign that you are not prepared for. I also hope that Taiwan is gaining lessons from the Ukraine war that can help them be successful in their own defense.”

Pentagon, Under Mandate, Creates New Office to Investigate and ‘Mitigate’ UFOs

July 21, 2022 | By John A. Tirpak

The Defense Department is standing up a new organization to investigate unexplained aerial phenomena, particularly where it potentially affects military activities, the DOD announced July 20. The move was directed by Congress.

The new organization is the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office, or AARO, which replaces the Airborne Object Identification and Management Group. AARO will report to the undersecretary of defense for intelligence and security, Ronald S. Moultrie. The AARO itself will be under the direction of Sean M. Kirkpatrick, most recently chief scientist at the Defense Intelligence Agency’s missile and space intelligence center.

The organization is mandated by the National Defense Authorization Act of 2022, which contained language directing the Pentagon to create a formal organization to routinely investigate UAP as they affect defense activities. It was spurred by hearings wherein the Pentagon was unable to explain video obtained from Navy F/A-18s, ships, and other units of unknown flying objects that came close to U.S. military platforms and activities.

Defense witnesses speculated at the time that UAPs could be adversary nation systems unknown to the U.S., or something else. The Pentagon has avoided characterizing UAPs as extraterrestrial in nature, but has acknowledged such a possibility, as the services do not think the performance of the objects observed to be within the technological capabilities of China, Russia, or other nations.

“The mission of the AARO will be to synchronize efforts across the Department of Defense, and with other U.S. federal departments and agencies, to detect, identify, and attribute objects of interest in or near military installations, operating areas, training areas, special-use airspace, and other areas of interest,” the Pentagon said.

The AARO will also, “as necessary … mitigate any associated threats to safety of operations and national security. This includes anomalous, unidentified space, airborne, submerged and trans-medium objects.”

The new organization is also to coordinate its activities with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

The new organization’s “main lines of effort” include:

Surveillance, collection, and reporting of UAP-related activity.
Identify UAP system capabilities and their design.
Conduct intelligence operations and analysis of UAPs.
Mitigate and “defeat” UAPs.
Provide governance for UAP-related activities.
Obtain science and technology of unknown systems.

Air Force Acquisition Boss Says Service’s Need for New Systems Is ‘Pretty Sharp and Pretty Urgent’

July 21, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

FARNBOROUGH, U.K.—Air Force acquisition chief Andrew Hunter sees the need for faster design and development cycles for the service—they just likely won’t happen as quickly as his predecessor pushed for.

As part of a panel discussion at the Farnborough International Airshow, Hunter laid out his view of an Air Force acquisition and sustainment enterprise very much starting to take advantage of cutting-edge capabilities such as digital design and 3-D printing after years of futuristic promise.

But he stopped short of calling for new innovations to be delivered at breakneck pace. Will Roper, on the other hand—who preceded Hunter as assistant secretary for acquisition, technology, and logistics—made waves by calling for the Air Force to build new fighter models every five years, leveraging digital engineering, agile software development, and modular, open architectures.

Subsequent Air Force leaders, however, have backed off those aggressive timelines. Secretary Frank Kendall, in particular, made it clear that it will take longer to develop platforms such as the fighter at the heart of the Next Generation Air Dominance program.

Hunter, for his part, called Roper’s goals “challenging,” but also indicated his support for moving faster and with more urgency.

“Our hope is that we will be able to have a faster pace in delivering new systems, new products. My predecessor in this job talked quite a bit about the goal to get there, and he had some very challenging parameters about how rapidly we were going to produce new fighter aircraft and aircraft. … But I do think we can definitely see a faster pace of adoption,” said Hunter. “And we see the need for it. So from an Air Force perspective, there is a need for new systems that is pretty sharp and pretty urgent. Particularly when it comes to uncrewed aircraft, there’s a lot of work to be done in that space.”

Like Roper, Hunter also strongly endorsed the potential of digital engineering, whereby digital models of new platforms are designed, constructed and tested. In particular, Hunter pointed to common design tools as especially useful because they allow for industry and government to integrate and collaborate more easily.

“When it comes to projects where we’re really early on and we’re engaging with multiple industry partners and multiple design houses and their teams that support them underneath … being in the same design tool [means] the government can evaluate what’s happening and what the quality of the design is and its predicted performance with its own people in the same tool,” Hunter said. “Not with a stack of paper that has to be FedExed to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base and delivered by 5 p.m. on a Saturday. It’s just instantaneous because we’re working together on it. And what that drives, it drives a more agile development and design process.”

Such an approach isn’t notional, Hunter said—it’s currently being used as part of the NGAD program

“And it’s not just with a contractor that’s already been selected,” Hunter added. “It’s with multiple competitors. So I think it’s helping us drive a more competitive process, even in areas of government procurement where traditionally competition is hard to get.”

Digital engineering could also improve sustainability, he added, as designs can be tweaked, modeled, and simulated thousands of times to maximize efficiency before they’re actually built.

But it’s not just digital engineering that Hunter sees as a technique of the future being deployed now. He also pointed to the Air Force’s use of additive manufacturing as a modern industry innovation that has made its way into the service.

“Even on old aircraft … we can resurface parts. So as parts get worn, we use a cold spray technique to lay down new layers of metal on an existing part and essentially bring it back to a like new condition, and put it back on the jet,” Hunter said. “The performance is restored … to almost like new condition and have it go on for years. And there are cases where a lot of those parts are challenging, if not impossible, to buy spares. They’re no longer in production. So it’s a really critical capability.”

All told, innovations like those are pushing Air Force depots to look more like “factories of the future,” Hunter said. And while there’s still some older “specific tooling” that is used for certain aircraft, the overall approach is shifting to one based on modern industrial innovations.

Raymond: Space Companies ‘Helpful’ in Russia-Ukraine War

July 20, 2022 | By James C. Kitfield

ASPEN, Colo.—Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond offered some of his early observations on the role of space activities in the war in Ukraine.

After nearly a three-year pandemic hiatus, many of the world’s top national security and foreign affairs officials gathered in Aspen, Colo., for the Aspen Security Forum beginning July 19.

The towering peaks that surround this verdant valley deep in the Rockies offer the ultimate ivory tower from which to contemplate the strategic challenges that lie ahead for the nation. Even this bucolic setting, however, cannot dispel the shadow cast by a world afire with a major war in Europe, resultant energy and food insecurity, and rising political instability across the globe.

“We all see the icebergs,” said Anja Manuel, executive director of the Aspen Security Forum, in opening the conference. “The question of how are we going to turn the Titanic will be the theme that runs through all the panels in this forum.”

Raymond began the discussion with his thoughts on the crisis on the minds of every participant: Russia’s unprovoked, nearly-five-month-and-counting war of aggression against Ukraine. The creation of the Space Force two-and-a-half years ago was itself acknowledgement that at least since the 1991 Persian Gulf War, space has played a critical and increasing role in virtually every major conflict and is a warfighting domain increasingly contested by adversaries such as Russia and China.

“A lot of people ask me, ‘What are the lessons learned that’s come out of Ukraine? It’s too soon for me to sit up here and say, ‘Here’s all the lessons.’ But there are a couple of observations that I have,” said Raymond in the forum’s first “fireside chat.”

The first observation he highlighted was the fact that space is critical to the conduct of modern warfare, whether in terms of precision targeting with GPS-guided weapons or satellite surveillance and intelligence that has created a battle space in Ukraine that some experts believe is one of the most transparent in history. “So my first observation I’d say is that space is important. And we have certainly seen that in this conflict. And I would also say that commercial space has been very important in providing capabilities that have been helpful to Ukraine.”

Indeed, the commercial satellite system Starlink, owned by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, has extended a critical communications lifeline to Ukrainian forces despite repeated Russian attempts to black out the country both with kinetic strikes and cyberattacks. Starlink satellites flying as low as 130 miles above the battle space beam down high-speed internet access, allowing front-line Ukrainian troops in the hotly contested east to communicate with a chain of command that stretches hundreds of miles.

Other malign activities by Russia and China were also high on Raymond’s list of challenges. In November 2021, Russia tested an anti-satellite missile that destroyed one of its own aging satellites, creating 1,500 pieces of space debris that Space Command is now having to track as they hurtle through the vastness of space at 17,000 miles an hour. “What Russia did was a very destructive act—what I would say is an irresponsible act,” Raymond said. As the “space traffic control” center for the world, he noted that hte Space Force has to track that debris and warn other nations when it threatens their space assets. The amount of space debris it tracks has increased from 22,000 objects to nearly 50,000 just in the past few years.

The Russian anti-satellite test follows a similar test conducted by China in 2007 that created 3,000 pieces of space debris. “Of that 3,000 pieces of debris, almost all of it is still up there, and, in fact, we warned China recently that [one of its satellites] was about to hit a piece of debris that they created with that 2007 burst,” said Raymond. “So we are really working hard to establish a rules-based order in space, because today one of our challenges is there are very few rules. It’s the wild, wild West. The United States, working with our allies and partners, is thus trying to develop norms of behavior for what is safe and professional. Because it is irresponsible and unprofessional to blow up a satellite and litter the space domain and threaten the use of that domain by every nation. Space underpins every instrument of our national power.”

SASC Wants Space Force to Report on Strategic Priorities

July 20, 2022 | By Amanda Miller

The Senate Armed Services Committee asks the Space Force to develop a “comprehensive strategy” and formalize a plan to achieve its priorities in the SASC’s version of the 2023 National Defense Authorization bill, which the committee released publicly July 18.

The committee also wants reports from the Space Force on officer personnel management and its plans to create the hybrid “Space Component,” which would include both full-time and part-time Guardians in a single organization, rather than setting up a separate Space Force reserve.

The SASC’s desire for an overarching space strategy follows a request in the fiscal 2022 NDAA for a broad review of space policy across the Department of Defense. That review is supposed to cover “the threat to the space operations of the United States” and an assessment of its policies “with respect to deterring, responding to, and countering” those threats. The new strategy review, if included in the final NDAA, would require the Secretary of the Air Force and the Chief of Space Operations to “jointly develop strategic objectives required to organize, train, and equip the Space Force” in order to:

Achieve U.S. “space superiority,” defined as “the degree of control in space of one force over any others that permits the conduct of its operations at a given time.”
Provide dependable space-based global communications; command and control; and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance for combatant commands.
Ensure “the retention, development, and deployment of Space Force capabilities to meet the full range” of the combatant commands’ space requirements.

The committee’s directions would further require the Space Force to detail its objectives and plans to achieve them in terms of its budget, ground-based infrastructure, space architecture, and systems acquisition. This requirement would include detailing those assets owned by other DOD organizations that the Space Force would need in order to achieve its objectives “efficiently and effectively,” and also the leadership requirements in terms of general officers and senior executive civilians needed to achieve those aims.

“The U.S. Space Force is the only entity equipped to develop and lead a comprehensive strategy for integrating space warfighting into U.S. defense strategy,” said AFA President Lt. Gen. Bruce Wright, USAF (Ret.). “The Air & Space Forces Association applauds the wisdom and leadership of the Senate Armed Services Committee in recognizing this fact.”

Wright said AFA had campaigned for such a report, seeing it as necessary to help the fledgling service establish the department-wide heft to achieve all the objectives of an independent armed service focused on the space domain. “Guardians of all ranks are the world’s most able space operators,” Wright said. “A strategy and architecture to ensure U.S. space superiority not only today but well into the future is an essential step in establishing the strategy, funding, and objectives of this newest and critically important branch of the armed services.”

The SASC’s NDAA would also require the Space Force to turn in reports on:

Officer Personnel Management and the Development of the Professional Military Ethic in the Space Force to include professional military education, attributes expected for each grade, key assignments along defined career tracks, and how the proposal to reorganize the Space Force’s military personnel into the combined full- and part-time Space Component will affect officer development.
Study of Proposed Space Force Reorganization examining the creation of the Space Component including the “feasibility and advisability” of exempting the Space Component from the conventional “up or out” officer advancement model and whether similar desired outcomes of career flexibility might be achieved via a more conventional component structure.

The House of Representatives passed its version of the 2023 NDAA on July 14.

Fourth Ukraine Defense Contact Group Meeting Adds HIMARS, Avoids Aircraft, Pilot Training

July 20, 2022 | By Abraham Mahshie

Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III held his fourth Ukraine Defense Contact Group meeting virtually from the Pentagon on July 20 amid practically a standstill on the Ukraine front lines in the eastern Donbas region. Austin announced a new presidential drawdown transfer of sophisticated rockets but no aircraft or pilot training.

The Russia-Ukraine war was entering its sixth month as casualties mounted on both sides for marginal gains in a grueling artillery battle, Austin and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Army Gen. Mark A. Milley told defense reporters.

Despite a recent Russian operational pause and increasing Ukrainian attacks on supply lines with new precision weapons, Russia had consolidated gains in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, a precursor to annexation plans, according to NSC coordinator for strategic communications John Kirby at the White House on July 19.

Austin expressed hope that four more High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS), to be announced this week by the White House, and promised air defense systems will dial back losses and lead Russia to the negotiating table.

“The security assistance that we are rushing to Ukraine is making a real difference in real time,” Austin said in a media briefing following the meeting with more than 50 countries backing Ukraine.

“Ukrainian forces are now using long-range rocket systems to great effect,” he added, noting that DOD is working closely with Ukraine on the careful use of limited quantities of precision ammunition such as the Guided Multiple Launch Rocket System (GMLRS) used with the HIMARS system.

Milley said 20 partners had provided Ukraine with HIMARS and that more than 200 Ukrainians had been trained on their use. Austin also said coastal defense capabilities, such as Harpoon anti-ship missiles, helped prevent a Russian amphibious assault on the vital port of Odesa.

Leading the contact group discussion was Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov, who a day earlier told the Atlantic Council that Ukraine was benefitting from the 12 HIMARS committed by the United States but would need “at least 100” more to change the course of the war.

“We need weapons fast, and in sufficient quantities,” Reznikov told Atlantic Council’s John Herbst, who previously served as U.S. ambassador to Ukraine. “We’re using HIMARS systems precisely like the scalpel of a doctor [in] surgery.”

DOD has been praising Ukraine’s use of the HIMARS and Multiple Launch Rocket System (MLRS) for weeks, and Milley gave examples of how Ukraine had hit Russian supply lines, command-and-control nodes, logistical networks, filled artillery, and air defense sites to slow Russia’s advance.

“These strikes are steadily degrading the Russian ability to supply their troops, command and control their forces, and carry out their illegal war of aggression,” Milley said, stressing Russia’s failed military objectives since the Feb. 24 attack on Kyiv was repelled.

“For 90 days, the Russian advances have amounted to six to 10 miles,” he said. “In the near term, the Russians will likely continue using heavy artillery bombardments to achieve their limited gains in the east. However, these tactical gains have come at an incredible cost in terms of Russian casualties and destroyed equipment.”

Austin did not give a clear case for how Ukraine can turn the tide quickly without air support. Instead, the Secretary said the contact group had shifted gears to sustain Ukraine for a battle that may extend into the winter, when Moscow will increase its war chest from gas sales to Europe and Russian forces can more easily dig in.

“As we’re even more focused on Ukraine’s near-term needs, we’re also looking ahead to provide Ukraine with the capabilities it will need for deterrence and self-defense over the longer term,” Austin said.

Milley, likewise, said the contact group discussed ways to assist Ukraine to “sustain the long fight.”

“This fight will likely continue to be protracted,” he said. “How can we best arm and train them so that they can continue to defend their country and exhaust the Russian military machine?”

Air Defenses Delayed, Aircraft Not Included

Two National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems, or NASAMSs, promised by President Joe Biden July 1, are not expected to arrive for “several months,” a defense official told Air Force Magazine on July 8. The systems are expected to give Ukraine reprieve from cruise missile attacks against civilian targets and to open some space for the Ukrainian Air Force.

Defense Department leaders had until July 20 avoided talk of providing aircraft or pilot training ever since DOD dismissed out of hand a March offer from Poland to provide its aging fleet of MiG-29s. Meanwhile, U.S. lawmakers who met with Ukrainian fighter pilots in June called on the Biden administration to authorize training for Ukrainian pilots on how to fly American combat aircraft such as F-15s and F-16s.

An amendment passed in the House version of the National Defense Authorization Act promises $100 million for training on American aircraft. A similar provision does not yet exist in the Senate.

The Ukrainian Air Force told Air Force Magazine recently that it has 30 pilots ready for such training, if approved. Members of Congress said the Biden administration still views the transfer of American aircraft and pilot training as “escalatory” with Russia.

Austin dismissed a serious discussion of pilot training in the near term while admitting that HIMARS would not turn the tide of the war.

“The HIMARS alone will not change—win or lose—a fight, but it’s the integration of a number of capabilities that we have provided and are looking at providing down the road,” he said.

“In terms of predicting where we’re going to be with pilot training in months or years, I won’t venture to do that at this point,” he added. “Their Air Force does have a capability as we speak, and they’re using some of that capability on a daily basis.”

Added Milley: “We look at all kinds of options to present to the Secretary and the president, and there’s been no decisions on any of that, but we do examine a wide variety of options, to include pilot training.”

Airbus, Boeing Reveal New Progress on Autonomous Refueling

July 20, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

FARNBOROUGH, U.K.—The defense contractors vying for the Air Force’s tentative “bridge tanker” program updated the status of their aerial refuelers this week at the Farnborough International Airshow, citing new capabilities aimed at automating the refueling process.

Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall has repeatedly said the likelihood of a competition for the service’s “bridge tanker” program has gone down in recent months, a seeming endorsement of Boeing’s KC-46 Pegasus and a blow to the LMXT, the alternative proposed by Lockheed Martin and Airbus.

Lockheed Martin, however, continues to state publicly that it believes there will be a competition for the KC-Y program meant to “bridge” the gap between the end of the KC-46 and a next-generation refueling family of systems.

“Our expectation is that the Secretary and the department will continue to go through the requirements and that we’ll have the opportunity to compete fairly,” Erin Moseley, Lockheed Martin’s vice president for strategy and business development for aeronautics, told reporters.

At the same time, Moseley sought to highlight the differences between the LMXT and the KC-46, saying they would “complement” each other and that the LMXT would demonstrate “real technological advances … that could also then segue into what [a future tanker] might look like.”

Airbus cited some of those new technologies developed for its A330 MRTT, on which the LMXT is based. Specifically, the contractor announced that its fully automatic air-to-air refueling system has achieved new milestones, successfully collaborating with the Republic of Singapore Air Force and receiving certification from a Spanish agency to conduct operations in daylight.

Airbus has been working on the system for several years now. It is designed to reduce the workload of the boom operator by using software to fly the boom automatically, keep alignment between the boom tip and the receiver receptacle, extend and retract the telescopic beam, and initiate and terminate the refueling process, all while the boom operator monitors the process.

On top of that, Airbus introduced a new program, Auto’Mate, aimed at developing, testing, and integrating technology that will allow for autonomous air-to-air refueling. The company is hoping to test that tech by 2023.

In response, Boeing revealed that the KC-46 Pegasus tanker has conducted flight tests demonstrating autonomous boom aerial refueling, but in a briefing with reporters, senior regional director of international business development for Europe and the Americas Tim Flood declined to share any more details about that testing, including when it occurred or what exactly it demonstrated.

“This is all part of our ongoing internal development program,” Flood said. “We’re bringing a range of features, including autonomy, to the KC-46, and as part of that broader development and flight test program, and we’re incorporating these types of new improvements and testing them.”

At the same time, Flood seemed to downplay the importance of making sure the KC-46 can autonomously refuel.

“It’s not the only important thing to provide the Air Force,” said Flood. “It’s all about providing capability for aerial refueling. So right now the U.S. Air Force has delivered over 80 million pounds of fuel [with the KC-46], so it’s not hampering the success to deliver.”

The Air Force has been pursuing automated and autonomous refueling for years now, and autonomous refueling operations, for both tankers and receivers, was listed as a potential requirement in the service’s recent request for information starting the new Advanced Aerial Refueling Family of Systems program.

Boeing does have some experience in the field. In 2009, the Air Force Research Laboratory gave the company a contract to explore the technology, and in 2021, its MQ-25 drone completed its first aerial refueling of an F-35C as part of a Navy program.

But when asked if Boeing could apply what it had learned from the MQ-25 for the KC-Z program, Flood demurred. Instead, he emphasized that the contractor’s main focus is on delivering the KC-46. The program has been plagued by issues, most prominently with the Remote Vision System, but the Air Force has closed the preliminary design review for the system’s successor, RVS 2.0, and Flood said the company is now on a “steady path” in that regard.

As for Boeing’s second priority, “we’re really excited about KC-Y,” Flood said. “We’re going to focus on what that requirement looks like, what the Air Force strategy is, and then focus on that.”

Czech Republic Plans to Buy F-35 as New Fighter, Would Be 16th Customer

July 20, 2022 | By John A. Tirpak

The Czech Republic plans to buy 24 F-35As, which would make it the 16th nation to either buy F-35s or announce the intent to do so and the 10th member or soon-to-be member of NATO to select the jet.

In a July 20 Prague press conference, Czech prime minister Petr Fiala said the nation has “decided to enter into negotiations with our U.S. partners for the acquisition of the fifth-generation, supersonic F-35 multirole aircraft.” He also announced that the country will seek to buy Swedish infantry fighting vehicles. These moves will strengthen the Czech Republic’s armed forces “for decades to come,” he said. The country is interested in the F-35A conventional takeoff version.

The aircraft will replace 14 leased Swedish JAS-39C/D Gripen fighters, which will serve until 2027. The Czech Republic was also considering the Eurofighter Typhoon and the Gripen JAS-39E, which has been upgraded with new capabilities. Notably, the Swedish offer would have allowed the Czech Republic to retain at no cost the Gripen C/Ds it has been using.

In addition to the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps, the F-35 is flying for Australia, Denmark, Israel, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, the Republic of Korea, and the U.K. It has been officially selected by Belgium, Finland, Germany, Poland, Singapore, and Switzerland. Canada has announced that the F-35 is its “preferred” choice for a new fighter, and negotiations are underway with Greece.

Turkey was a founding F-35 partner but was ejected from the program when that country purchased Russian S-400 air defense systems. Other users objected because the arrangement would have allowed Russian technicians the ability to observe F-35s at various ranges with their own equipment and potentially reveal vulnerabilities in the jet’s stealth properties.

Industry sources said the F-35 is under consideration by “several” other European nations and that some current users are exploring options to increase their inventory or planned buys.

Czech Defense minister Jana Cernochova said her government has authorized her to negotiate until October 2023 but that if an agreement isn’t reached on pricing by then, the F-35 isn’t necessarily off the table. She also said the Czech Republic is inclined to get a deal soon because the price of materials is increasing. The country wants F-35s to fill in closely behind the Gripens, indicating a desired delivery in 2027.

Gen. Karel Rehka, Czech Republic chief of staff, said the F-35 will remain “highly competitive” with other world fighters at least into the 2040s and perhaps into the 2060s.

“We’re really looking at the long term,” Rehka said in the Prague event. The F-35 is a multirole platform, but “it’s part of a … network on the battlefield; not just a fighter or bomber but … a platform that can serve as a command-and-control center and at the same time a very advanced sensor and spy aircraft.”

A Lockheed Martin spokesperson said the company is “honored the Czech Republic government is interested in the F-35” and will provide any support needed for “discussions about an acquisition.” Any further comments will have to come from the two governments, she said.

“We are confident the F-35 offers unmatched value as the most capable and lowest-life-cycle-cost aircraft, while delivering the strongest long-term industrial and economic opportunities compared to any fighter on the market,” the spokesperson said. The F-35’s selection by so many countries in the alliance makes it “the foundation of NATO and European alliance’s next generation air power.”