Proposed NDAA Would Let Air Force Retire More Tankers, C-130s

June 7, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

The seven subpanels of the House Armed Services Committee are set to begin marking up their respective portions of the 2023 National Defense Authorization Act in the next few days, and one is considering letting the Air Force make cuts to its number of tankers and C-130s.

The subcommittee on seapower and projection forces released a summary of its markup to reporters June 7. Included in its provisions are two requirements setting minimums of at least 466 air refueling tanker aircraft and 271 C-130s.

Both numbers would represent a reduction in fleet sizes, something Air Force leaders have pursued for years now as part of their efforts to divest legacy aircraft and modernize.

As of Sept. 30, 2021, the Air Force’s tanker fleet stood at 539 planes, according to data provided to Air Force Magazine. The vast majority of those are KC-135s and KC-10s, older aircraft that Congress has previously blocked USAF from retiring quickly.

In the 2019 NDAA, Congress set the floor for total tanker aircraft at 479, a total endorsed by U.S. Transportation Command. However, Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said during a recent Heritage Foundation event that he wanted to cut the fleet down to 455 aircraft.

In its 2023 budget request, the Air Force asked to retire 13 KC-135s from the Guard and Reserve while buying 15 new KC-46s, for a net increase to the tanker fleet.

The C-130 fleet, meanwhile, is slated to take a cut in the budget request. The Air Force wants to retire a dozen C-130Hs and buy four C-130Js.

As of Sept. 30, 2021, the Air Force had 285 C-130Hs and C-130Js in its inventory, with all the C-130Hs in the Guard or Reserve. Previous NDAAs had approved a minimum fleet of 279 aircraft, meaning the reduction of eight proposed by lawmakers would match the number of divestments proposed by the Air Force.

Lockheed Martin, L3Harris, Northrop Grumman Get Stand-in Attack Weapon Contracts

June 7, 2022 | By John A. Tirpak

Three contractors received 90-day, $2 million contracts to begin work on the Stand-in Attack Weapon, or SiAW, one of the Air Force’s next generation of air-to-ground munitions. Lockheed Martin, L3Harris, and Northrop Grumman got contracts for the work out of a five-competitor field that also included Boeing and Raytheon Technologies.

It was not immediately apparent whether the three companies will do competitive or complementary work under the contracts, which were awarded May 25. The five contenders were deemed the only ones qualified to do the work according to an Air Force statement from May 2021.

Lockheed Martin said its contract is to perform integration work for SiAW and that it will produce hardware over the next five years, which the Air Force will then test and evaluate for possible production.

The Air Force has budgeted $1.9 billion for SiAW development over the future years defense plan starting in fiscal 2023 and continuing until 2027. The fiscal 2023 request is for $283.2 million, and development funding is expected to peak in fiscal 2026, with $718.2 million planned.

“We’ve been asked to present an open, agile, and digital weapon that can be rapidly upgraded through digital engineering,” said Bryan Gates, senior manager of Northwest Florida Operations for MFC’s air dominance and strike weapons unit.

“This is an open system architecture, with a digital design, that allows us to bring in different pieces and parts from subcontractors [and] other companies to develop this weapon,” and the Air Force will decide that mix, Gates said. The Air Force is also pursuing modular approaches involving air-to-air missiles and uncrewed aircraft to derive greater flexibility and adaptability from its future force.

In a press release, Lockheed Martin linked to a YouTube video showing an F-35 launching six SiAWs—four from underwing stations and two from its internal weapons bays. The weapons fly straight ahead and then straight up before the video ends. Gates said this flight profile is typical for weapons that will travel some distance before striking their targets.

“If you’re launching from any type of distance, you’re gonna get some altitude to derive your target solution,” he said.

The video suggests the SiAWs can be volley-launched and guide to their targets simultaneously. Gates declined to say what kind of guidance the weapon uses, referring any operational questions to the Air Force.

While the Air Force plans the weapon for use on the F-35, “I would stay away from” saying it is the threshold platform, Gates said. “It depends on what the Air Force wants to do with it.”

As an open-mission systems round that can be digitally re-tuned and improved, “that would mean that they can use it on whatever they want to use it on.”

The SiAW apparently builds on work done with Northrop’s Advanced Anti-Radiation Guided Missile (AARGM) for the Navy, itself a derivative and expansion of the AGM-88 HARM air-to-surface anti-radiation missile. USAF’s initial acquisition strategy was to pursue the weapon sole-source from Northrop Grumman, but in April 2021, it decided to open the program to other contenders.

Gates said Lockheed Martin’s offering includes “the ability to have pieces or parts rapidly upgradeable within the weapons” that can address a changing threat. The Air Force will “decide on seekers, motors, internal warheads, internal parts to the weapon, and as the threat changes, we’re able to change those parts of the weapons.”

The contract calls for “leave-behind materials after 60 months,” which Gates said will be “weapons for the Air Force to use … and move forward into production.” He described the contract as a “rapid prototyping” type. He could not say how many assets the Air Force will have to work with at the end of the five-year development phase. He could not speak to program milestones.

Gates noted that Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr.’s mantra of “accelerate change or lose” and said, “that is what this program is all about: taking mature technologies, making sure we’ve got them … digital … upgradeable … affordable and beneficial to the warfighter.”

He noted that under the “One LM” rubric, other divisions of Lockheed Martin contributed to the offering; notably the Advanced Development, or “Skunk Works,” unit, which used its “Star Drive” digital design technology, which he said was “heavily leveraged” for SiAW.

If the SiAW goes into production, Gates said it hasn’t been decided where it would be built. But the goal of the digital design “was to shorten the developmental timelines … turn it over to our production facilities and … turn out weapons as quickly as we can.” He added that Lockheed Martin is “excited to partner with the Air Force and get this done.”

Study: Combine Missile Warning, Tracking Constellations Into One Multi-Orbit System

June 7, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall has made missile warning and tracking a priority of his tenure, and agencies across the Pentagon are working on a number of efforts to handle that mission from space.

But instead of relying on a less coordinated approach, one that forces programs to compete for funds, the Defense Department—and particularly the Space Force—would be better served by integrating their efforts into one multi-orbit system, a new study from AFA’s Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies recommends.

The issue is especially urgent because of the continued proliferation of new kinds of missiles, said the study’s author, Christopher Stone, during a virtual event June 7. Technologies such as hypersonic weapons and fractional orbital bombardment systems exploit gaps in the U.S.’s current missile tracking infrastructure so that the weapons can’t be tracked completely by radars on the ground.

Meanwhile, the Space Based Infrared System, flying in highly elliptical and geosynchronous Earth orbits, provides good missile warning, Stone said, but lacks the fidelity for persistent tracking.

Persistently tracking missiles from the moment of their launch to their landing is crucial, said Col. Miguel A. Cruz, commander of the Space Force’s missile warning delta, Space Delta 4, during the virtual event.

“Missile warning is about bells ringing, missiles are coming, duck and cover, right?” Cruz said. “Missile tracking is about custody of a target. It’s about being able to look at that target and pass that information to a shooter that will engage it. And so there’s a nuance there. I think in our culture, as we’re moving forward [we’re having] the realization that we’re not just bell-ringers, that we’re actually contributing to a much broader engagement.”

When it comes to missile tracking, “the good news is that we have three different entities in government looking at this problem,” Stone told reporters in a June 6 briefing. “They’re looking at it, though, from a competitive vantage point, not an integrated development [vantage point].”

The Space Development Agency, scheduled to transfer to the Space Force later this year, has already spent years working on the National Defense Space Architecture, a massive constellation of hundreds of satellites in low Earth orbit for missile warning, communications, data coverage and sharing, and other uses.

The launch timeline for the Tracking Layer of the NDSA, which will handle missile warning and tracking, places it in orbit by 2025 or 2026.

The Space Force, meanwhile, is working on the Next-Generation Overhead Persistent Infrared System, the eventual replacement to SBIRS that will also fly in highly elliptical and geosynchronous Earth orbits. The service is also working on a network of satellites to go in medium Earth orbit.

Finally, the Missile Defense Agency is working on its own missile tracking system, the Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor. Like the NDSA, the HBTSS would consist of satellites in low Earth orbit. The first two satellite prototypes are scheduled to launch in March 2023.

And while MDA director Vice Adm. Jon A. Hill has told lawmakers he wants HBTSS to integrate into the SDA’s Tracking Layer, Stone noted that “they initially were not designed that way” and remain as separate line items in the budget.

Rather than let those programs continue to develop separately, competing for funding, Stone’s study recommends combining elements from each to form an architecture with satellites in every orbit.

“Each of those organizations view their project as the answer, and that it’s resilient and cost-effective and everything and that everybody else’s is not, and that’s just part of the industry competition, no problem,” Stone said. “But I think it would be best if we took … a little bit of all these things, and we would have the capability, I believe, to achieve all those required attributes that’s lacking in today’s system.”

The advantages of such an approach are clear, said Davin Swanson, chief engineer in space and C2 systems for Raytheon Intelligence & Space.

“There’s the resiliency aspect, mainly through orbital diversity of the multi-layered approach,” Swanson said. “Having a multi-layered approach allows you to tune the sensor designs of each layer according to the optimal portion of that missile warning, missile tracking requirement set, depending on the orbit that that sensor is in. And it requires and it allows a shift away from the current paradigm of a small number of exquisite high-value assets to a more proliferated architecture where you’ve got more vehicles, different orbits.”

With the wider coverage of higher orbits and the higher fidelity of lower ones, such a system would ensure persistent missile warning and tracking, Stone and Swanson said. And it would also address the need for resiliency, an attribute emphasized by Space Force leaders, especially as countries such as China and Russia have demonstrated kinetic and non-kinetic threats.

“Just having hundreds of targets at LEO is not sufficient with an adversary who’s building a deep magazine of kinetic weapons and a multi-layered attack architecture across the spectrum,” Stone said. “We need to be able to plan for a survivable construct that can live through that sort of thing. And so instead of just having everything in one orbit, with everybody’s targets there to be hit, it’s best to have multiple layers and have a defense in depth approach.”

Stone also argued that if satellites in different orbits are integrated and work together, it will reduce the number of satellites needed overall—the Tracking Layer is currently slated to start with 28 and expand, and the planned MEO constellation could have 36 or more.

“If you want to do it the way that I recommended, you … don’t have to have the hundreds of satellites at LEO, the 36-plus at MEO, and five at GEO. You’ll need the five at GEO to have the global coverage, but as you go lower, as you integrate them all into one system, just three different orbits, you’ll need less satellites,” Stone said.

However, Stone also pushed for those satellites to be equipped with more advanced technology to increase their survivability against anti-satellite weapons. Such technology could include new propulsion methods and systems, or perhaps decoy satellites, he said.

Such additions, though, would drive up cost—an issue that retired Gen. Kevin P. Chilton, Explorer Chair of the Mitchell Institute, predicted would be the biggest hurdle to implementing Stone’s recommendations.

“I don’t think technology will be the pacing factor. I think the technology is there, and I think we will continue to improve it, and with this architecture, we’ll be able to update it more easily with reduced launch costs,” Chilton said. “Funding is always going to be cussed and discussed at [top levels of government]. … It’s a risk trade-off about how much you’re going to put up and how you’re going to do it. And so I think that’s where the big debates will be. But at the end of the day, there won’t be a debate on the need for these capabilities, in my view.”

Raytheon Announces Headquarters Move to DC Area

June 7, 2022 | By John A. Tirpak

Raytheon Technologies, the No. 2 defense contractor, will move its corporate headquarters to the Washington, D.C., area this fall, the company said. The announcement came just a month after Boeing announced plans to do the same. With their arrival, all of the five top defense contractors—including Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics, and Northrop Grumman—will have their headquarters in the National Capital Region, with four of them in Northern Virginia.

The move will give Raytheon executives and employees “agility” in supporting government customers “and serves to reinforce partnerships” that will advance defense technology, the company said in a press statement. The DC area boasts three international airports, rail centers, and major highways, offering “a convenient travel hub for the company’s global customers and employees.”

Raytheon’s new HQ will be in Rosslyn, part of Arlington, Va., just across the Potomac River from the District of Columbia and an eight-minute cab ride from the nearby Pentagon. Boeing will locate at existing company offices in Arlington a few miles further south and east; Northrop Grumman is near Tysons Corner, Va., about 12 miles from downtown D.C.; General Dynamics is in Reston, Va., some 21 miles away from downtown; and Lockheed Martin’s headquarters are in Bethesda, Md., about eight miles from the District boundary.

Raytheon is moving from its longtime perch outside Boston, Mass., near Hanscom Air Force Base—which manages many of the Air Force’s electronics programs—and a Massachusetts technology corridor. Raytheon acquired United Technologies and its Pratt & Whitney engines unit of Hartford, Conn., and became Raytheon Technologies in 2019, vaulting it to the No. 2 defense contractor behind Lockheed Martin.

Boeing is moving its headquarters from Chicago, having moved there from the Seattle, Wash. area—where its main factories are—in 2001. The given reason behind the previous move was to be more centrally located to Boeing’s extensive network of suppliers and to take advantage of the lower costs of operating in the greater Chicago area.

Industry officials have said Pentagon leaders have required more frequent face-to-face meetings with defense executives in recent years. Former Pentagon acquisition and sustainment chief Ellen Lord required such meetings quarterly or even monthly, and deputy defense secretary Kathleen H. Hicks is similarly keen on such engagements.

Andrews Is 4th Base Tapped to Get New MH-139 ‘Grey Wolf’ Helos

June 7, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

The Air Force has selected Joint Base Andrews, Md., as the next location to receive the new MH-139 helicopter. If the selection is finalized, the Grey Wolf will replace the aging UH-1N Huey and expand the installation’s fleet size.

In a June 7 release, the service said Andrews will receive 25 of the new helicopters. Currently, the base’s 1st Helicopter Squadron has 21 UH-1Ns. As a result of the increase, the manpower needed will also rise, from 235 personnel to approximately 310.

An environmental assessment needs to occur before the final basing decision is announced. The Air Force release projects that the assessment will finish in the summer of 2023.

Once Andrews gets the MH-139, it will join Malmstrom Air Force Base, Mont., Minot Air Force Base, N.D., and F.E. Warren Air Force Base, Wyo., as bases with the new aircraft. Malmstrom is scheduled to get the helicopter first, followed by F.E. Warren and Minot.

At each of those three locations, the Grey Wolf will primarily be used to patrol sprawling intercontinental ballistic missile fields. At Andrews, however, it will assist in missions such as transportation of government officials and distinguished visitors around the Washington, D.C., area as well as emergency evacuations and search and rescue.

In addition to its four permanent homes, the MH-139 will also have its formal training unit at Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala., a decision announced in 2020.

The Grey Wolf is slated to provide a major upgrade over the UH-1N, capable of flying faster, higher, farther, and with more weight. The UH-1 has been flying since the Vietnam War, attaining iconic status.

However, the new airframe has run into some issues. In 2022, the Air Force cut its buy of the helicopter completely as fielding was delayed by issues with Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) certification. That has resulted in a lengthy delay, according to media reports, that is still being worked out.

Still, the Air Force’s fiscal 2023 budget asks to buy five MH-139s, and officials say the plan remains to buy 80 of the helos. In addition to Malmstrom, Minot, F.E. Warren, and Andrews, previous reports have indicated that Fairchild Air Force Base, Wash., and Yokota Air Base, Japan, may also receive MH-139s in the future.

Taiwanese F-16 Crash Lands at Honolulu Airport After Luke AFB Training

June 7, 2022 | By Abraham Mahshie

Editor’s note: This story was updated at 1:06 p.m. Eastern Time on June 7 to include the information from a Defense Department official; and at 6:27 p.m. to include details from another DOD statement.

HONOLULU—A Taiwanese F-16 crash landed at Honolulu’s Daniel K. Inouye International Airport on June 6 on its way back after conducting training at Luke Air Force Base, Ariz., according to local media reports.

The fighter jet reportedly made a hard landing at 2:45 p.m. local time after its front landing gear failed to deploy. The pilot was not injured. The nose of the aircraft was visible, pinned to the 4R runway with commercial aircraft diverted until a crane could remove the aircraft.

A Defense Department official confirmed to Air Force Magazine than “an F-16 hard landing occurred at Honolulu International Airport. The incident is under investigation.” DOD officials later said, in a statement:

“[An] F-16 aircraft declared an In Flight Emergency … June 6 at approximately 1500 p.m. HST. The pilot was evaluated at the scene” then taken to a “military treatment facility for evaluation.”

Taiwanese media reported May 26 that four F-16s had landed in Honolulu en route to Luke Air Force Base for training, their identifying markings covered. Taiwan has previously requested from the Pentagon a Pacific Coast training center for its aircraft, which require some dozen aerial refuelings to reach the Arizona training center from the island, which is situated 100 miles off the coast of China.

Tensions between China and the United States have risen in recent weeks after President Joe Biden gave vague assurances during a trip to the region that the United States military would become involved should China invade Taiwan. Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III and other defense officials regularly state that China is the department’s pacing challenge.

Taiwan is administered independent of China, but it is not recognized as a separate nation by the U.S. Department of State.

The U.S. One China policy recognizes Beijing as the only government of China, but the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act provides that the United States will adequately arm Taiwan to defend itself. In recent years, Taiwan has purchased millions of dollars in U.S. defense articles to protect itself from a potential invasion by Beijing.

U.S. military leaders have estimated that China could be militarily prepared to invade Taiwan as early as 2025.

U.S. Pacific allies, including Japan and Australia, are bracing for the possibility of supporting the United States should a conflict with China arise in the Taiwan Straits.

Chinese UAV Industry Creates New Challenge for the US Air Force

June 6, 2022 | By Abraham Mahshie

China’s growing capability in the production of unmanned aerial vehicles, along with its lack of end-user restrictions, will require the U.S. Air Force to ramp up counteroffensive measures, panelists and attendees at the recent China Aerospace Studies Institute (CASI) conference told Air Force Magazine.

“That’s one of those things that scares me,” Brendan Mulvaney, CASI director, said in an interview.

Mulvaney believes that high-power microwave energy directed at a swarm of cheaply produced Chinese unmanned aerial vehicles is not enough to defeat the threat.

“We’ll be able to take out a whole bunch of drones, but I don’t know that that’s applicable everywhere, all the time,” he added.

The lower cost and lack of end-user restrictions means lesser developed countries can purchase and employ UAVs much in the same way Ukraine has used them to great effect against a better armed and financed Russia.

That possibility means added lethality to any nation or armed group desiring to target U.S. assets in the future.

“A smaller nation very well could have a whole ton of drones that we just haven’t thought about,” said Mulvaney.

The UAS threat, enhanced by China’s growing defense industry capability, was one of the themes discussed during a May 17 panel discussion on China-Russia cooperation held at the National Defense University in Washington, D.C.

“If you buy Chinese equipment, they’re not setting up restrictions on how it can be used, and where it can be used,” said David R. Markov of the Institute for Defense Analysis. “That is a benefit in particular parts of the world, particularly for unmanned aerial systems.”

Markov cited Saudi Arabia’s use of the Chinese UAV Wing Loong II, which can carry up to 480 kg of payload on 12 wing hard points, in operations in Yemen.

As of January 21, the State Department reported $126 billion in foreign military sales to Saudi Arabia, including high-end missile defense systems like the Patriot and Apache, Chinook, Blackhawk, and light attack helicopters.

None of the sales included U.S. armed drones.

The State Department says the United States works with the Saudi-led coalition to support the government of Yemen against Houthi rebels, but the U.S. still worked with Saudi Arabia “to minimize civilian casualties in this conflict.” Such worries have slowed or stopped Congressional foreign military sales in the past, perhaps leading Saudi Arabia to turn to China for its drones.

China Displacing Russia in Defense Technology

China’s technological development, in part boosted by years of cooperation with Russia’s defense industry, has positioned the Chinese defense industry on the cutting edge of new war technologies like UAS.

“China is really now a pacing threat for technology development around the world,” said Markov.

“China’s goal has been able to try and capture a significant portion of the market, and they’re particularly targeting the markets where the Russians are in central south and Southeast Asia,” he added. “China will continue to shape the direction and the character of these regional competitions.”

Markov expects China to supersede Russia in the African market as well, where a number of dictators and Democratic governments alike have gone after opposition and terrorist groups with unintended civilian casualties.

“On the arm sales piece, I think we’re gonna see China see a huge opportunity in markets where it previously hadn’t succeeded,” Markov assessed.

Markov said the proliferation of Chinese unmanned platforms will soon be a problem for the U.S. Air Force.

“The price point is so cheap, and the operating costs are so low that many of these countries can’t afford not to buy from China,” he said, pointing to Azerbaijan’s heavy use of UAS during its 2020 conflict with Armenia.

“We’re not doing nearly enough to deal with the unmanned systems problem,” he added. “I’m not sure we’re set or geared to think about that problem, and certainly not in the countermeasure side of the house.”

C-17 Guard Crew Honored for Valor During Kabul Airlift

June 6, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

One New York Air National Guardsman received the Distinguished Flying Cross with Valor, and five of his fellow Airmen were awarded an Air Medal with Valor on June 4 in recognition of their actions aboard a C-17 during the noncombatant evacuation out of Kabul, Afghanistan, in August 2021.

Capt. Matthew McChesney, an instructor pilot with the 137th Airlift Squadron and a pilot with Delta Airlines in his civilian life, served as the aircrew commander for the mission and received the Distinguished Flying Cross, the nation’s fourth-highest award for heroism.

Other members of the crew—Lt. Col. Andrew Townsend, Capt. Jonathan Guagenti, Tech. Sgt. Joseph Caponi IV, Staff Sgt. Evan Imbriglio, and Staff Sgt. Corey Berke—got Air Medals, and Tech. Sgt. Byron Catu, the flying crew chief for the mission, previously received the Meritorious Service Medal.

As part of Operation Allies Refuge, the Airmen from the 105th Airlift Wing and their C-17 were diverted from a previous mission in South America to fly a Special Operations Aviation Regiment MH-47 Chinook helicopter and 22 personnel from Al Dhafra Air Base, United Arab Emirates, to Hamid Karzai International Airport, according to an Air Force release.

Initially, the C-17 had to turn back from Kabul, as the Taliban overran the capital city, the Afghan military collapsed, and hundreds of desperate civilians swarmed the air field.

But on their second attempt, the flight crew, call sign Reach 824, was able to position their aircraft to circle Kabul waiting for an opening to land—in part thanks to refueling from a KC-10 and its crew.

On final approach, the C-17 faced small arms fire from the ground, with one round striking a winglet. Upon landing, the crew unloaded its MH-47 Chinook and 22 personnel within 40 minutes amid a chaotic environment.

Gaugenti, one of the copilots on the mission, said in an Air Force release that the crew was later informed that the helicopter and personnel they transported into Kabul were able to move “over 800 people out from the countryside who otherwise would not have made it to Kabul.”

Over the next two weeks, Reach 824 returned to Kabul several times, evacuating 348 people, and, in their final mission, transporting the bodies of 13 service members, killed in a suicide bombing, from Kabul to Kuwait.

“I am grateful there are Americans who step forward to serve our nation, to kiss their families goodbye to join the fight, to tell their employers, ‘I know what we do is important, but right now my nation needs me, and I have to go,’ ” Army Gen. Daniel Hokanson, chief of the National Guard Bureau, said during the ceremony recognizing the crew of Reach 824. “It is nothing short of inspiring to be in your company.”

Reach 824 is the latest group of Airmen to be recognized for their bravery and valor during the airlift out of Kabul. Four Airmen who crewed a different C-17 were awarded DFCs in April after flying out 153 U.S. citizens, allied partners, and vulnerable Afghans as crowds still swarmed the flightline in some of the most chaotic moments of the operation.

US Remains Leader in Emerging Technologies, But China Makes Some Gains, Study Finds

June 4, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

When it comes to key emerging technologies like additive manufacturing, artificial intelligence, and space, the U.S. remains the leader in innovation, according to a new study prepared for the Air Force.

Analyzing hundreds of million of patent applications from across the world, the report from the RAND Corp. found that in six areas—Additive manufacturing (AM), AI, space, quantum, ceramics, and sensors—where there have been surges in interest over the past few decades, U.S. inventors have typically been “first to file in areas of technological emergence, far more often than other countries,” the report states.

That lead in patent applications has held up even against China, which Pentagon and Air Force officials have repeatedly called their pacing challenge and main priority.

The report’s authors also looked at technology areas where the U.S. has led the way, only to then be followed by China.

“The time difference between when this emergence happens in the U.S. and when the emergence happens in China, in these cases, is typically [nine to 10] years,” Richard Silberglitt, one of the study’s authors, told Air Force Magazine.

“When it’s the other way around, in the very few times that somebody other than the United States is the leader in the first emergence, when it’s China, the United States doesn’t always follow. Sometimes China has an emerging technology and the United States, inventors in the United States don’t care about it, so the United States doesn’t follow. But when the United States does follow China, typically we’re right on top of them within [1.5 to 2.5] years. And within [one to two] years, it’s hard to tell who’s ahead.”

The study was commissioned by the Secretary of the Air Force’s office, Silberglitt said, as part of “the big question of, how’s the U.S. doing relative to other countries in technology?”

The answer would seem to give some reassurance about the U.S.’s advantages in areas that many experts say will be crucial to the future of warfare.

But Silberglitt noted that the study does contain some insights that require further analysis.

For one, the authors looked at instances when the U.S. and China had surges in similar areas within a few years of each other—so-called “close emergences.” It then broke down which country typically had more early patent filers, which “may indicate which country is leading the technological competition in these emergent subclasses,” the study states.

“For these close emergencies, which it turns out are a tiny percentage of all of the emergences, [two] percent … but in this very, very small case of the U.S. and China emerging at almost the same time, we found that there’s a difference in who has the earliest patents,” Silberglitt said.

From 2001 to 2008, the U.S. typically had the edge in filing first, leading 95 percent or more of the time. From 2009 to 2017, however, that trend reversed, with China leading the majority of the time, though not by as wide a margin.

While the U.S. remains the technological leader by total number of first emergences, “China and the United States are now approaching parity, or in some cases the United States is falling behind, in areas of close competition,” the report states. Some of that phenomenon could be caused by a pattern Silberglitt and his co-authors have noted.

“In the U.S., when you see an emergence, a surge of patent applications in a particular area, it’s typically pretty gradual. I mean, it goes up exponentially, but it goes up over a very long time. It takes about 20 years before it reaches saturation,” Silberglitt said. “With China, our experience has been that it’s a much, much shorter time. … So if you have two S curves you’re comparing to each other, and one of them’s more gradual and the other one goes up faster, who’s going to have more early applications?”

There also could be another pattern at play.

“Typically when China has an emergence, it’s very focused,” Silberglitt said. “If you look at the other areas that are connected in this network, there’s not so many of them. Whereas with the U.S., when you see one of these emergences and look at the other areas that are connected, there’s a host of them. So in other words, the U.S. inventors are trying to apply their applications, we infer, to many, many, many areas, as broadly as possible. And the Chinese inventors are focusing on some areas which may be the areas that the government is most interested in.”

The impacts of those differences are still to be determined. Among the next steps recommended by Silberglitt and his co-authors is further study into the quality of the patents filed across countries, going beyond just the raw totals counted in this analysis.

And moving forward, it also remains to be seen if the Pentagon and the Air Force can become more rapid adopters of commercial technologies and innovations—leaders have frequently complained that the Defense Department’s outdated acquisition policies prevent it from being on the cutting edge, especially with small- to medium-sized companies.

In that regard, the RAND study provides a potential roadmap, identifying 36 such companies that have been early filers for patents in emergent technologies—their names, however, are not included in the public report.