Between Retiring Old Aircraft and Modernizing, Guard and Reserve Watch for Readiness Gaps

March 10, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

Aging aircraft, limited sustainment funds, and still in-progress modernization are combining to cause concerns about readiness gaps in the Air Force Reserve and Air National Guard, leaders said during the AFA Warfare Symposium.

The Air Force has continually sought to retire old aircraft in recent years, saying the moves are necessary to free up funds for modernization efforts such as the F-35 and KC-46. These potential retirements would likely have an outsized impact on the Guard and Reserve—their fleets have higher percentages of legacy aircraft such as the F-15C/D, A-10, KC-135, and C-130H.

“As [Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall] said, the average age of the Active-duty fleet is 30 years,” Maj. Gen. John P. Healy, deputy to the chief of Air Force Reserve, told Air Force Magazine. “Ours is a touch more mature, at 33 for the average. But 44 percent of that fleet is beyond its expected service life.”

Reserve leaders are in “lockstep” with their Active-duty counterparts in encouraging the Air Force to modernize, Healy added, a sentiment echoed by Air National Guard chief Lt. Gen. Michael A. Loh.

But as those modernization efforts unfold, some are concerned about gaps developing between old systems going away and new ones coming online. In September 2021, Healy’s boss, Air Force Reserve commander Lt. Gen. Richard W. Scobee said, “in a perfect world, it would be heel to toe—you would have one butting up against the other”; before adding that, “on a regular basis, I am reminded we do not live in a perfect world.”

At the time, Scobee said he felt confident about the Reserve’s ability to work through any gap shorter than a year by sharing aircraft among units. Healy added in March that the three components of the total Air Force are all working together to align transitions “heel to toe.”

“There was discussion, and the great thing about the discussions as they go on in terms of how are we going to manage this from an Air Force perspective, … the fantastic partnership between the Active duty and the Reserve, and the Guard, for that matter, allowed the conversation to go on, to ensure that if there is a case where we might be talking about a cut or divestiture in any certain aircraft, that they understand that the base of mission needs to be covered,” Healy said. “And that’s the terminology we’re using. We’re not going to have any bases uncovered.”

Such transitions are currently happening at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, N.C., where the Reserve’s 916th Air Refueling Wing is swapping out KC-135s for KC-46s.

And there are plans for more. Healy pointed to the recent decision to base Reserve KC-46s at March Air Reserve Base, Calif., and Loh referred to the plan to integrate F-15EXs and F-35s at five different Guard locations in the coming years.

“Right now we have a couple EXs that are running through tests,” Loh said. “The performance that the pilots have relayed to me, because I’ve talked to them—it’s exceptional. Great airplane. So we’re going to bring it on as fast as we can get it from under contract, and the contracting piece is going through right now.”

But even as the Guard looks to move fast in acquiring new fighters, its current fleet is showing its age badly—Loh remarked to reporters that 22 Guard F-15s are “grounded right now because of just service life.” This follows comments he made in September 2021 that 20 of the aircraft were grounded because of cracked backbones.

Repairs aren’t simple fixes, either, due to a limited budget.

“We do have some gaps in readiness, and here’s where I need your help in advocacy, and I’ll just put it to you that way,” Loh said during a symposium panel discussion. “Our weapon systems sustainment accounts continually come under pressure. Last year in 2021, we were funded at 87 percent. In [2022], right now, it’s down to 79 percent, and we’re still sitting on a [continuing resolution].”

Flying hours are also down, Loh noted, to the point that some Guard pilots have had to stop flying before the end of the fiscal year. Taken together, all these factors form a challenge to readiness that he admitted “keeps me up at night.

“That bow wave is hitting right now, and all of those are challenges that require resources,” Loh said. “And we’re gonna get after those gaps: modernization, recapitalization, weapon system sustainment, and flying hours. All of them require resources.”

Russian ASAT Demo Tested US Space Command’s Nascent Domain Awareness

March 10, 2022 | By Shaun Waterman

The Russian test of an anti-satellite weapon system in 2021 gave the newly relaunched U.S. Space Command the chance to showcase its growing ability to perceive and understand the space domain, its commander Army Gen. James H. Dickinson said.

When the Russians launched a maneuverable kill vehicle atop a Nudol missile Nov. 15 and destroyed one of their own defunct spy satellites, “I was very pleased with how the command responded,” Dickinson told an audience online and in person at the Atlantic Council.

He highlighted the exercise of “space domain awareness”—the ability to perceive, locate, track, and interpret the intentions of moving objects in space. “We were able to detect and characterize and decide what had happened in a very, very short amount of time [and] … provide that type of information to our national-level leadership,” Dickinson said.

He credited “two years of hard work,” since U.S. Space Command stood up again in 2019 after a 17-year hiatus. He added that the time had been spent “developing processes [and] bringing talent into the command.”

Space Command is a combatant command, with its own area of responsibility, or AOR, that starts just above the atmosphere and extends outwards in all directions.

“Enhanced space domain awareness is my top mission priority,” Dickinson said, adding: “We spend an incredible amount of time trying to understand what we’re seeing in the space domain in terms of battle space awareness.”

Part of what made it so hard, he explained, was that the sensors the command was using were mostly not designed for space domain awareness but rather for missile defense or Earth observation. He said they had “exquisite” capabilities “that allow us to look into the space domain … And while they may not have been originally designed or invented for space domain awareness, that additional capability that they have has really been something we’ve been trying to leverage. And bringing that into an integrated architecture is a big challenge,” he said.

One issue was that missile defense and other traditional surveillance sensors were positioned to detect things launching from the surface rather than approaching from deep space, Dickinson said. But as NASA and commercial enterprises started to think about returning to the moon and even crewed voyages to Mars, it became clear that U.S. Space Command needs space domain awareness in deep space.

“That’s the challenge we have, is having the ability to look outward like that. Because, quite frankly, you know, if you look at our architecture, right now, we’re pretty good at looking down and in towards the Earth. We have to look at how we turn around and start looking outward,” he said.

One way to do that is by leveraging private sector capabilities, he said, which Space Command was doing through its commercial integration cell in Colorado Springs, Colo. “Space domain awareness from looking up terrestrially is all about location, location, location, right? So you have to have sensors in certain parts of the world where you can look up and see what we’re … interested in. And so being able to leverage the commercial market has been very powerful,” he said.

Engaging multiple commercial partners could augment U.S. Space Command’s own capabilities or allow it to focus on something else. “They’re looking at something that we don’t necessarily have to look at or decide on. And so we can look at something else instead.”

Watch, Read: Nuclear Deterrence and Global Stability

March 10, 2022

Retired Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, dean of the Air Force Association’s Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, moderates a panel discussion with Gen. Anthony J. Cotton, commander of Air Force Global Strike Command; and Lt. Gen. Thomas A. Bussiere, deputy commander of U.S. Strategic Command, on “Nuclear Deterrence and Global Stability” during the AFA Warfare Symposium on March 3, 2022. Watch the video or read the transcript below. This transcript is made possible through the sponsorship of JobsOhio.

Lt. Gen. David Deptula, dean of the Air Force Association’s Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies: “Well, good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to this session of the 2022 AFA Aerospace Warfare Symposium. As you can see, to my right, we’re privileged here to have some very distinguished leaders with us to discuss nuclear deterrence and global stability. Let me just take a couple of sentences to set the scene for you. It should go without saying, but it needs to be said that America’s nuclear forces are the bedrock of our nation’s security and key to preserving global stability. But let’s face it, our nuclear enterprise is old, and it’s in need of modernization. That’s why programs like the B-21, GBSD, long-range standoff weapon, and nuclear command, control and communications modernization are so important.

“As all of you know, we’re working extra to execute these modernization efforts at the same time that Russia is developing and deploying next-generation nuclear weapon systems. And China’s in a breakout. I just read about that this morning. They’ve actually sort of triggered some internal lever that sees them perhaps doubling their nuclear stockpile over the next few years. So while these developments might serve as an obvious warning to many about the need for the U.S. to remain committed to its own nuclear modernization efforts, there are also some who are quite vocal in arguing that we should be building down our nuclear forces, not recapitalizing.

“So bottom line, we’re here today in interesting times. And that’s why I’m so very pleased to be joined by two of our nation’s key leaders in this realm, Gen. Anthony Cotton, commander of Air Force Global Strike Command, and Lt. Gen. Thomas Bussiere, who’s deputy commander of the United States Strategic Command. So welcome, gentlemen. Thank you both for taking the time to be here. And not only that but what you’re doing in your respective commands. You both command a lot of respect, and it’s well-deserved. So what I’d like to do to kick this off is to give you both the opportunity and make a couple of opening comments, and Gen. Cotton over to you.”

Gen. Anthony J. Cotton, commander of Air Force Global Strike Command: “Thanks, Dave. Well, first of all, I’d like to say thank you to AFA. Orville, thanks for the invite. But more so thanks for the invite of all the men and women that are sitting in the audience that got a good opportunity to kind of hear senior leaders and describe what’s going on in the world today and hear from that vantage point and that point of view. So thanks for being able to do this for the years and years that you guys have been doing this. It’s exceptional.

“So to my right, though, I have to kind of give a shout out to Tom Bussiere. So Tom and I kind of go way back. We actually survived the numbered Air Force commanders and Global Strike Command together. And it was awesome. I had 20th, and he had eighth. And we’ve been friends even before then. And we continue to be incredible friends today. So thanks, Tom, for everything that you’re doing as deputy commander out of STRATCOM.

“You know, you highlighted it, right? The world has changed. I think that’s an understatement. I don’t like to be the guy that says I told you so. And I won’t, because I think all of us kind of knew that the underpinnings of what could happen was always there. But you know, we shifted our posture within within Global Strike Command. When you say ‘nuclear enterprise’ for us, I’d like to say that I’m not necessarily the nuclear deterrent force. I’m actually the strategic deterrent force, the strategic arm, lon-grange strike capabilities, both conventional and nuclear, that represents the United States Air Force in the department, and as the JFACC to the commander of U.S. Strategic Command, being able to present those forces. So being able to do that in a conventional and nuclear, if required, sense, is what we’re all about. And that’s what makes up Air Force Global Strike Command.

“You know, I think we must maintain our nuclear capabilities. You said it, David, right? I mean, we kind of are where we are. You know, everyone keeps saying, ‘Well, you know, well, how quickly are you going to be able to modernize?’ And we can talk about that in some of the questions and answer sessions. The fact of the matter is, I wish I was already 15 years into it. But we’re not. That being said, I’m comfortable of where we’re going and the developments that we’re taking. But yes, it would have been a nice, a nicer opportunity to say, ‘Hey, we’re at the end of our nuclear modernization right now.’

“You talked about it. Back when I was the 20th Air Force commander, I would tell you that I don’t know that we in 2015, that we really were thinking that … by 2035, or by 2030, that the Chinese would have 200, you know, not mobile 200 land-based ICBMs. We weren’t thinking that, right? 2018: Well, maybe 2035; 2021 and 2022, we’re sitting here talking about in … by 2030, they might have an arsenal of over 1,000 weapons. That’s how quick they’re advancing in their capabilities — at an incredible pace. And you’ve heard that all through the day. I think everyone in the audience knows this, but I think it’s worth relaying. Global Strike Command is, I repeat, is the long-range strike capability of the United States Air Force. We are all of the strategic bombers in the free world. We are all the land-based ICBMs in the free world. We are responsible for two legs of the triad. So I think everyone needs to kind of take a step back as Airmen, and Guardians because Guardians as well support us, to understand that fact — that the Department of the Air Force is responsible for two legs of the triad, which is fundamentally foundational to the national security of this nation. And we need to understand that.

“And the world notices us, whether on the conventional side,[garbled] bomber task forces that support all the COCOMS. I think there’s nothing nicer than seeing our allies and partners fly up on the wings of Andy’s bombers when they’re doing bomber task force missions throughout the globe. Because our AOR is the globe. And we’re able to prove that day in and day out. On the ICBM side, being able to have 24/7, 365-day umbrella coverage to not only the United States but to allies and partners, being able to describe or show our capabilities through tests when we launch out of Vandenberg Space Force Base. Those are things that are noticed, to be frank, more by the international press than even by our own U.S. press. So it shows that we’re making a difference. We’ll talk more about modernization. I was going to talk about that. But I’ll pause there and then we can talk about the modernization of the weapons systems in the in the Q&A. But I’m incredibly proud to be here and representing the strikers of Global Strike Command.

Deptula: “Tom?”

Lt. Gen. Thomas A. Bussiere, deputy commander of U.S. Strategic Command: “Thank you, sir. I’m gonna kind of categorize my opening comments in kind of three big buckets. First, some thanks. And then a little bit on the threat and then a little bit on the need for modernization. So, first of all, thanks. You know, before I do that, I think the first time I met Gen. Cotton, I was the IG doing a nuke surety inspection on his wing. So that was our first meeting. That was kind of fun for me.”

Cotton: “Nothing like a nuke surety inspection.”

Bussiere: “So thanks. I want to echo Gen. Cotton’s thanks to AFA from a slightly different angle. So bringing together Airmen, Guardians and their leadership teams and coupling that with the experts in industry is really a recipe for success. So I know it’s the standard, but to the Airmen and Guardians in this room and the leadership teams, take advantage of networking with each other, between the two services as well as with our industry partners, because when the chief says innovate or lose, that innovation resides in this room and with our industry partners. So that’s kind of point No. 1.

“Second, to Gen. Cotton and the Air Force, obviously, as the air component to U.S. Strategic Command, Gen. Cotton’s responsible for two-thirds of the triad. And the strikers do that in a multitude of ways, whether it’s the ICBM force or the bomber force, sustainment and oversight of our NC3 systems. But probably just as important, if not more important, the stewardship and oversight of the, I would purport to be, the most important acquisition programs in the Department of Defense. So all that coupled together is right here in this forum in Orlando.

“The next thing I’d like to, for a moment if you’ll indulge me, is this second, this minute, 150,000 soldiers, sailors, Airmen, Marines and Guardians are standing the watch, providing that bedrock of national security for our nation and our allies every day. And they’ve been doing that for decades. We tend to forget about that. We don’t necessarily forget about the importance of the mission. But I’d like you all to sometime today take a few seconds and silently thank and think about those warriors that do this every day, and many of them are in this room.

“So Gen. Deptula talked about the threat a little bit. I don’t think you have to go too far back in the last couple of weeks to realize that the world is a unique and dangerous place. Whether we’re talking about the Soviet Union’s, now Russians’, arsenal and the recapitalization of their strategic forces, which last year, the president of Russia articulated in the high 80%. And … those are those systems accountable under the New START Treaty. What we have to maintain cognizant over is the fact that there are a multitude of nontreaty-accountable nuclear weapons being developed and proliferated in the Russian arsenal. And that’s growing every day and every week. And that doesn’t account also for the exotic systems that the president of Russia highlighted in public in the last few years, which if you don’t know about those, then I invite you to ask Mr. Google about them. For China, I would say that 10 years ago, their public narrative and their rhetoric match their force posture and their nuke enterprise. I’d say that fast-forward to the 2020s, where we see them today and in the future, as Gen. Deptula mentioned, it’s no longer congruent with their public statement of why they have that arsenal, and we’re seeing a rapid diversification and expansion of their nuclear capabilities.

“And we can discuss at length the differences between our treaty obligations and mechanisms of security with Russia and the fact that we don’t have those with China. And then last, to be the master of the obvious, if you believe that the bedrock of our national security is the strategic deterrence forces, which I do. If you believe that the world as we see it today is a dangerous and an ever-expanding threat base, which I do, then you can agree with me that the recapitalisation of the nuke enterprise is absolutely essential in all three legs. And hopefully, we’ll have an opportunity to discuss that during our comments today. So thank you.”

Deptula: “Well, thanks very much, Gen. Cotton. It might be pretty basic for some people, but I think it’s pretty important and useful to ground folks in the core arguments regarding why we have a triad. So could you just kind of hit on those basics? For not just the audience here but those who might be watching this and we can help educate? You know, the naysayers and others.”

Cotton: “Yeah, thanks, Dave. So when we talk about the ‘triad’ in this conversation and the rhetoric that’s going back and forth on whether or not you need one or not, I think presenting forces to the commander of STRATCOM for all three legs and being able to provide options for him to be able to provide options to the president is key and fundamental. So when we talk about the land-based ICBM leg, we’re talking about the responsive leg. When we talk about the bomber leg, we’re talking about that leg that can be seen, that can be a generated force. What people don’t really talk about is how each one of the legs — and of course, the third leg being the SLBMs in the subs that is the donor leg that the United States Air Force doesn’t own — but what we don’t talk about a lot is how each leg of the triad complements each other, how each leg of the triad, actually, or can be hedges for the other leg … to ensure that we’re maximizing what Adm. Richard as the commander of STRATCOM can present to the president. Right?

“So when you — and oh, by the way, it must work because our adversaries are doing exactly the same thing. Right? … The Chinese has announced that, you know, that they have, not a fledgling triad, that they have a triad. Right? The Russians have a triad for the exact same reasons on being able to complement each of the other legs. So this argument that if you — which I don’t agree with; I want to maximize the options that we can provide as the provider of the force and present the force to STRATCOM, who then presents it to POTUS. I want to be able to maximize those effects to be able to do that. And I don’t, you know, it’s really hard to kind of figure out how you can do that when it is not a triad. And when you say, ‘Well, will a diad work?’ I’ll say to that, for me, I think the answer is no.”

Deptula: “No, it’s very good. Gen. Bussiere has often said that we’re talking about the triad, but NC3, your nuclear command, control and communications, is the fourth leg of that triad. That would be a quad, I guess, but whatever.”

Cotton: “A quadad.”

Deptula: “Yeah, it clearly is a crucial part of the modernization plan. And obviously, nuclear command and control, if there’s anything that ought to be secret, really secret, it’s that, but can you talk a little bit about a broad scheme of modernization for NC3?”

Bussiere: “Yeah, absolutely. I guess I’ll just expand upon your comment about the fourth leg of the triad. You know, the credibility of our strategic deterrence forces is in the three legs of the triad. The credibility of our ability to deter is in our ability to command and control it. So over many, many decades, we have developed and fielded, both in the Air Force and in the Navy, 204 systems that account for NC3 that are currently on the books. And over the last [garbled] years, the Department of Defense, the Air Force and the Navy has gone to great strides to acknowledge and account for those systems and make sure that their readiness and operational utility is extended into the future. It was so important to then Secretary Mattis that he directed the stand-up of the NEC, the NC3 Enterprise Center in Omaha, so the commander of STRATCOM, Adm. Richard, is also the commander of the NC3 Enterprise Center, which accounts for that connective tissue between the Air Force systems and the Navy systems both for today and the future. I’d offer to you the expertise in this room and then the industry partners are going to be the future for what we call NC3 Next.

“So not only do we have an obligation to maintain the current 204 systems today at full operational capability, but there has to be a graceful transition into the future. So you can think about, I think it was the chief that said this morning, when he came in the Air Force, he was a captain before he had email. So think about how we’ve developed our NC3 systems to do command and control decades ago, and then think about the technology we have today. And so how we’re going to transition and take advantage of the technologies and the innovation that industry and the Air Force and the Navy have both from operational perspective and a technical perspective and merge that into what we’re calling NC3 Next, and couple it with JADC2 that the Department of Defense is doing with the services, is absolutely essential.

“But we can’t lose sight of the fact that we have to maintain our current full operational capability today as we gracefully transition to those systems. All that I’ll offer is if the ‘NC3 Enterprise Center,’ ‘the NEC,’ is a new term for you, we’d invite you out to get educated on that, both from a component perspective and then from a joint perspective.”

Deptula: “Thank you. And Gen. Cotton, as the strategic deterance landscape is changing markedly given proliferation issues, actions by Russia and China and the increasing role of technology, could you walk us through a bit about what other actors are doing when it comes to building their own nuclear weapons capabilities?”

Cotton: “Yeah, let’s start with China. I mean, you alluded to it in your opening comments, so, you know, and I spoke of it as well, so think about where we thought the minimal deterrence rhetoric that was being articulated in the mid-2010s. Right? Minimum deterrence; 2015, from where I alluded to being a commander of the 20th Air Force, where you know, the talk was, ‘We don’t need to worry about that until about 2035-2040s.’ Then I become the deputy commander of Air Force Global Strike Command, and that moves to 2035. I’m the commander of Global Strike Command, and now it’s 2030. They are building their arsenal at a rapid pace.

“So from that perspective, seeing the H6N, for example, as their nuclear-capable bomber, saying that it has extended legs, seeing that they’re actually now doing air refueling. Where if that was a regional notion in the past, why now train your crews on air refueling capability and etc. Seeing hypersonics being introduced for China. Let’s move to Russia. So, Russia: 80 to 85% complete on their nuclear modernization. And we’re just beginning.

“So that’s just two of our, you know, what I call our near-peer adversaries that we’re dealing with, with capabilities that are actually, you know, quite dire if you really think about some of the capabilities that they have presented. And you heard Tom talk a little bit about some of those capabilities as well. So 85%, 80 to 85% complete, and their modernization over the past 20 years, when we were in the desert, they were still modernizing their force. A China that is a true triad nuclear-capable, probably no longer a minimal deterrent, China. Then we look at Iran. I think Iran is sitting at about, I think they just announced that they have kept capacity and capability for 60% in uranium enrichment. North Korea, who is thinking the month of January launch seven ICBMs, or I’m sorry, ‘space venture tests.’ And you know, and even recently, in the month of February, you can add to that number.

“So, it’s real. Right? So that’s why it is imperative, it’s very important for us to continue with the rigor that we are right now and modernizing our force.”

Deptula: “It’s a real challenge. You heard the NORTHCOM commander earlier in the prior session talk about while China may be the pacing threat, Russia right now has the preponderance of nuclear weapons. But now we see China getting to the point with accelerating, just like you talked about, that we’re facing some serious challenges. Gen. Bussiere, in that regard, my sense is that the Cold War paradigms are in need of some major update. This may be especially true given that past understandings we had with our adversaries just might not translate to the current climate. I’ll toss out a concern that we might not fully understand what China’s going on and thinking about their no first-use policy, for an example. Everything Gen. Cotton just said, given what he said, what does that mean for the U.S. as we seek to ensure that we’ve got a modern relevant strategic deterrence strategy?”

Bussiere: “So I think we’ve had this conversation a few times in the past year. I’ll kind of reverse the order there a little bit. So I would offer that any discussion of how we’re going to approach the threats that we see today and in the future has to start with a recapitalized, modernized triad that’s underpinned with our ability to command and control it. So that’s a given in this discussion. Because if you don’t have that as a premise, then the discussion of how we’re going to deter two near-peer adversaries plus the regional actors gets somewhat skewed and gets derailed pretty quickly. So I’ll offer that as the first thought.

“The second piece I’d like to intellectually challenge everyone is if you go back into the ’60s and ’70s, whether it was, you know, at the time the RAND Corp. or other think tanks or other industry or academic partners, there was an unbelievable effort of intellectual energy looking at how we are going to develop the theories of deterrence, vis-à-vis the Soviet Union, now Russia. Well understood, a lot of documentation, a lot of literature, even though we may not necessarily have that conversation as much as we should now, I think it’s being rebirthed. And I’ll offer to you that it’s being rebirthed in Gen. Hecker’s organization both, at SAS and SANS, and I think there’s some school of advanced nuclear deterrence studies students here at AFA this year.

“But our ability vis of the service, whether it’s the Air Force, the Navy, Army, Marines, or our Guardians, or it’s the joint force or OSD, it has to start, I think, in the Air Force and the Navy, with the operational experts that can come up with theories of how we’re going to develop a model to deter two near-peer adversaries that have the capability. They have their own rheostat now. You know, we’ve had the luxury of, for decades now, of having our ability to dial the rheostat up on primarily the conflicts we’ve been fighting in the Middle East. We’re now facing two near-peer adversaries there that have their own rheostat of escalation that is not only nuclear but multiple domains involved in that. And so how do you approach that from a peer-to-peer perspective, and now couple that with two near-peer adversaries, potential adversaries, that we have to deter, and I’d offer to you, that we have to deter in different ways. So innovation is not just operations, not just new weapon systems, innovation is intellectual power that we need in the Enterprise also.”

Cotton: “Dave, can add?”

Deptula: “Absolutely.”

Cotton: “One of the things I think is going to be important for us as Airmen and Guardians, because whether or not you’re in the Enterprise or not, you are in the Enterprise as Airmen and Guardians. You, as members of the Department of the Air Force, are going to have to be able to articulate what it means to own two legs of the nuclear triad. Because every one of you in this room own two legs of the nuclear triad. Right? And if we can’t get there as a service to have, because I remember what Gen. Goldfein used to say. He says when you’re in a room as an Airman, and now Guardian, folks are going to look at your tape that says United States Air Force. They’re not actually looking at all of this that’s sitting up here. Right? You have to be able to articulate who we are as a department. And as a department, we own two legs of the nuclear triad and the majority of the NC3 systems by the way.”

Deptula: “Very good. Gen. Cotton. What were the key drivers pushing DOD to develop a new generation of triad capabilities? I mean, let’s face it: Minuteman 3, B-52, command and control—all of these are decades old. But, so are we talking about sustainment challenges, a diminishing pool of support vendors or the basic viability of the systems?”

Cotton: “Well, so the systems are viable. What we want to do is ensure that we never reach the expiration date. So let’s talk about the weapons systems a little bit. So for the Minuteman 3, for example, the sustainment challenges, they’re real. It was a system that just celebrated its 50th anniversary not too long ago, on the backs of young Airmen, by the way. The maintainers out in the missile fields are incredible. The ICBM operators who operate them are incredible. The defenders who defend them are incredible. But it’s on their backs. It was a system that was, I mean, it’s an incredible weapon system. The Minuteman 3 is an incredible weapon system. It was designed for a 10-year lifespan. Right? So it was designed using 1960s technology; 1970s technology, then, is modernization.

“So if you think about that, it’s really, really hard to take what we would see as what we do in a 21st century, in an open architecture system, to be able to just do basic maintenance and things of that nature to support that weapon system. It was never even designed in. But like I said, those incredible Airmen in the northern tier that are monitoring them each and every day are keeping them viable. So that’s one.

“And you’re right. You know, I was joking in the audience here earlier. I said that I might need a component that’s the size of what’s holding that rail, and there’s no one out there that makes it anymore. And the supply line no longer has it. So you reverse engineer it. Right? So … how do you get a vendor … in the audience to say, hey, I need 500 components of this piece of aluminum. They said sure, I’ll make it 10,000. I don’t need 10,000 of them; I need 500 of them. Well, OK, that’s great, I’ll charge you, you know, imagine what that cost will be in just building that one piece of equipment. … So that’s why modernization of the Minuteman 3 absolutely has to happen. … No, we’re past that. We’re past that. What I find that’s interesting in the conversation about GBSD: We’re five years into the program of record of GBSD, of the replacement of the Minuteman weapon system. So let’s stop talking about it like we’re trying to figure out if we’re going to turn it into a program of record. It is a program of record. It is the system that we need to replace the Minuteman weapon system. And the team, many are in the audience, are doing an incredible job to do just that.

“For the B-52, as we talk about the B-52 and its CERP program in replacing and modernizing its radars, modernizing its avionics. We just recently announced the engine contract on putting new engines on that airplane. You know, people pick on the B-52 and its age all the time. You know, it’s funny, I was just telling someone, so we’re getting ready to celebrate its 70th birthday. So for all but five years of the United States Air Force’s life as a service, there’s always been a B-52, except for five years of its life. And guess what? There will be until 2050. So the modernization efforts that are going into the B-52 is incredibly important for strategic deterrence.

“The B-21, the B-21, is a penetrating and daily flyer that we have to have, and it will be the preponderance of the bomber force moving forward. As we drive down to a two-tail force, that will be a B-52 updated version of the H model, as well as the B-21. That’s what the United States of America is going to have as a bomber force, the two-bomber force. Incredibly important for the conventional role as well as the nuclear role that it will play. LRSO to replace the ALCM, the long-range strategic weapon that will replace the ALCM. Incredibly important, as Gen. Bussiere has mentioned, in the modernization of the nuclear force. Let’s see what else, I think I’ve captured all of them. … So when we talk about, I have to do that, because every weapon system that I own is getting modernized. That’s great. I wish we could have done it earlier. But I’m happy that it’s happening now.”

Deptula: “Very good. Thanks for that. Now, Gen. Bussiere, could you give us kind of a system-by-system breakdown of when this modernization is going to be complete?”

Bussiere: “So I’d like to dovetail off what Gen. Cotton just said and kind of approach your question, Gen. Deptula. So what Gen. Cotton just said about the air and land leg of the triad also is true for the maritime leg. So we’ve seen the ICBM Minuteman 3 fielded potentially for 10 years, now at 50. We talked about B-52. And we can’t forget the Ohio class has been extended to 42 years of service, and that’s a different dynamic when we’re talking about haul pressure on the boomer fleet. So if you look at the B-21, the GBSD or the Columbia class that’s underpinned by our ability to command and control it. You know, it has served our nation well. Our current triad and our current NC3 equipment has served our nation well. And it has underpinned our national security and that of our allies and partners. It was built in a different world. It was fielded in a different world.

“So as we look at the world as we see it today, the threats we see it today and going into the future, this one, underscore underline and bold text, the fact that we need to recapitalize the triad and keep it on schedule to not only keep it operationally relevant to account for the vanishing vendors, the increase, the sustainment cost, but to meet the threats of the future. So it’s not just a mechanical, operational or vanishing vendor challenge. We always step back from that which is real and look at the operational requirement within our nation’s triad and what the threat is presenting, and … we don’t have any more operational margin to continue to life extend these programs.

“So I’m sure I don’t see Gen. Bunch out here, but I’m sure he would not want me to go program by program and challenge his acquisition programs. But I can tell you right now, both from the Air Force side and Navy side within the department writ large, we are happy and pleased to see the emphasis both from the Air Force and Navy perspective, as well as in the department’s perspective to make sure we field these capabilities on time.”

Deptula: “Well, thanks very much. Unfortunately, we’ve come to the end of this Aerospace Warfare Symposium event. And I think the audience will agree with me that we’re blessed to have both of you serving in the positions that you are. We thank you for what you have done, what you continue to do and what you will do in the future. So please join me in thanking our two guests this afternoon.

“And just as a reminder, we’re gonna have our final event of the day with former Google CEO Eric Schmidt on accelerating artificial intelligence, and that’s coming up here at 4:40. So we’ll see you then.”

Training Could Help Build Trust in Autonomous Systems, Industry Panel Says

March 10, 2022 | By Nick Adde

Autonomous systems will emerge as critical in future fights, according to industry and military representatives who spoke at the AFA Warfare Symposium. They said they’re convinced of the fact.

But before this happens, they believe, Airmen, Guardians and other troops must know they can trust these machines to work without distracting humans from their missions.

“We know that autonomous systems can lead to cost savings [and] better use of our workforce across our air forces and services across the joint force,” said Air Commodore John Haly, the Royal Australian Air Force’s air and space attache in Washington. “But there clearly are implications in what and how we do things,” said Haly, who moderated the discussion.

Unmanned systems might someday assume integral roles in the daily operations tempo, said Chris Pehrson, vice president for special programs at General Atomics Aeronautical Systems.

“It’s going to be a disaggregated network, and they’re all going to be feeding data with precision timing and precision communications and … really bringing all that together for a shared situational awareness,” Pehrson said. “Again, trust is the foundation. We have to build that trust—that it’s not going to put our own crews in danger.”

An approach that allows for rapid training may help foster that trust, said Tony Bacarella, vice president of advanced programs at Elbit America. “That allows you to go into a synthetic environment to get the training on these multiple missions and environments,” Bacarella said.

Synthetic environments can also help in improving AI algorithms and human-machine teaming, Bacarella said. “We [at Elbit America] have done that. And we think it’s important … to have the AI [artificial intelligence] trainable.”

While such synthetic testing can streamline the engineering process and thus improve cost effectiveness, Krystle J. Carr, senior director of autonomous aviation and technology at Boeing Defense, Space, and Security said real-time testing is also essential.

“That doesn’t mean you don’t ever bend metal, that you don’t fly and test your prototypes to make sure that what you’re seeing in the digital environment is real,” Carr said. “But you can do a lot digitally at first.”

The panel agreed there would likely be no one-size-fits-all approach to full integration of human-operated and autonomous systems. The machines and their human counterparts must be able to communicate clearly, just as the nations partnering with the U.S. should as well.

“We think the future really comes down to, there’s going to be a bunch of different solutions and a bunch of different areas that are going to need tools from every company to make a successful route forward,” Bacarella said.

“As an Australian, with the United States [and] all of our friends and partners around the world, we will always sound like we have an accent when we talk to each other,” Haly said. “But if we can build systems that don’t have a digital accent when they talk to each other, we give ourselves the preconditions for the interoperability and interchangeability that fundamentally we need if we’re going to meet the challenge of the day.”

The ‘Insidious’ Enemy—Preserving Combat Performance

March 10, 2022

After decades of combat flying in the harsh Middle East environment, the Air Force embarked on an aggressive program to deal with an insidious problem that steals aircraft performance, greatly increases maintenance requirements, results in higher fuel consumption rates, and increases emissions. The culprit, the constant erosion and corrosion of high pressure compressor (HPC) and turbofan (TF) blades due to environmental particulates (EPs). These small particulates include sand/dust, smoke/pollutants, sea salts, volcanic ash, and rain droplets that slowly erode and corrode compressor blades, thus reducing engine performance and fuel efficiency.

To mitigate excessive compressor blade wear, and potentially save hundreds of millions of dollars, Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) launched a test and evaluation program to identify protective coatings for vulnerable compressor blades. After years of research and analysis, one coating consistently outperformed all others and was competitively down-selected for use on USAF aircraft.

That coating is BlackGold® by MDS Coating Technologies (mdscoating.com).

Rudimentary protective coatings for HPC blades first appeared in the 1980s. However, one could argue that protective coatings trace their lineage to early aviation professionals who place metal strips on the leading edge of propellers to protect them against erosion from sand and dirt. The same concept applies to BlackGold®—protect the most vulnerable parts of blades from the harsh effects of EPs. Each turbine blade, or more accurately “compressor airfoil,” is not unlike the airfoil of an aircraft wing.

The blade’s camber, thickness, and chord define the airfoil’s performance, and each compressor section consists of numerous airfoils that manipulate the airflow for optimum performance. Unfortunately, airfoil shape (chord, thickness, or camber) is degraded by EPs over time and the airflow becomes sub-optimized. That change in designed airflow leads to performance reductions, loss of fuel efficiency, greater emissions, and eventually necessitates maintenance to replace the compressor blades. BlackGold® is specifically designed to greatly reduce the impact of EPs on HPC and TF airfoils.

Today, MDS Coating’s BlackGold® technology has advanced to the point where a polished ceramic-metallic coating, approximately one-third the thickness of a human hair, is applied layer-by-layer to portions of or the entire compressor airfoil in high-vacuum plasma chambers. This process results in coated compressor blades with previously unimagined hardness and ductility that resist the effect of EPs. This allows engine performance retention, reduced maintenance, greater fuel efficiency, and reduced emissions over an engine’s time-on-wing.

A combat example of EP erosion impacts was experienced by the US Marine Corps CH-53 fleet in the early days of OEF/OIF. Compressor blade erosion due to sand and dust (see Figure 1) was so great that engine changes were required after a fleet-wide average of approximately 100 hours. The tremendous maintenance burden and shortage of spares threatened CH-53 combat operations. To stem the attrition, a protective coating from MDS Coating was expedited into service. The impact was immediate and dramatic as engine time-on-wing soared, and in some cases, reached over 20-times the initial fleet average with numerous engines exceeding 2,000 hours engine time-on-wing. Fleet-wide, coated engine time-on-wing averaged a 10-fold increase to over 1,000 hours in the harsh Iraqi combat environment. This success story set in motion additional MDS Coatings research and development that resulted in today’s next generation coating, BlackGold®.

Figure 1: (Left) Uncoated blade with 113 hours or 3 months’ time-on-wing. (Right) Coated blade with 2,022 hours or 40 months’ time-on-wing.

Despite the operational success of the U.S. Marines, timely adoption of advanced coatings by sister services lagged. While the Department of Defense was slow to adopt the advanced coatings, the commercial sector was not. Spurred by rising fuel costs and high maintenance costs, investments in blade coatings provided a rapidly implemented and inexpensive solution with a short return-on-investment timeline. The business case was simple: If coated blades retain their shape longer, performance and fuel efficiency are retained over non-coated engines. This point was proven by a large U.S.-based commercial carrier when it adopted the BlackGold® coating for its Boeing 737 fleet. A side-by-side, 38-month comparison of an uncoated and a coated CFM56 engine (the commercial version of the KC-135R’s F108) revealed a performance and fuel efficiency divergence at the 20th month of monitoring. By month 34, the fuel efficiency difference was a staggering 1.3% and approximately 0.7% average over the 34 months of operations in favor of the coated engine. It is important to remember that time-on-wing for modern turbofan engines can exceed 10 years, and the savings in terms of maintenance and fuel is significant. To date, over 6 million blades are in service worldwide, and given rising fuel costs, the future of BlackGold® is bright!

With an FY2020 $8 billion dollar fuel bill and the current rising fuel costs, the Air Force is rapidly moving forward with certifying the BlackGold® coating. With the strong support from AFRL’s Advanced Power and Technology Office (APTO-RXSC) and Air Force Operational Energy Office (SAF/IEN), the certification process for BlackGold® is scheduled for the two highest fuel cost airframes—the C-17 and the KC-135 in FY22. Initial AFRL estimates for the C-17 conservatively put savings at $13.5 million per year. Translate that fuel savings across the Air Force and the potential is savings is staggering. And this does not include maintenance cost reductions due to potential time-on-wing increases. A significant portion of uncoated HPC blades are unserviceable and require replacement during rebuilds. BlackGold® coated blades are expected to drive blade replacement to near zero allowing for a second “tour” of the blades.

In the coming years our warfighters will need every advantage in a near-peer fight, and BlackGold® is one of them. Every aircraft in the Air Force inventory can benefit from HPC and TF protective coatings, from fighters to bombers, from airlifters to tankers, from helicopters to special operations platforms. For the operator—performance retention is critical, a guarantee that when you need it, the engine thrust is at its peak. For the maintainer—significant reductions in maintenance generated by compressor blade replacement due to EP erosion and corrosion. For the taxpayers—reduced sustainment costs, freeing up funds to support other needed programs. For the OEM—an enhancement for their already outstanding engines that will only grow their reputation for supporting the warfighter. And finally, for all—reduced emissions that will greatly contribute to reducing atmospheric carbon and other pollutants.

INDOPACOM Commander Says Ukraine is a Wake-Up Call to the US, Cautions ‘This Could Happen’ in Taiwan

March 9, 2022 | By Amanda Miller

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine provided a wake-up call for U.S. officials who should now recognize that if China has designs on Taiwan, “We have to look at this and say, ‘Hey, this could happen,’” said INDOPACOM’s commander Adm. John Aquilino.

Aquilino was among the Defense Department officials who appeared before the House Armed Services Committee on March 9 to answer questions about the circumstances in the region.

“We need to be more forward. We need to be more robust,” Aquilino said. That includes his top unfunded priority of a system for the defense of Guam.

China “is the most consequential strategic competitor that the United States has faced,” Aquilino said, and its government is willing to “uproot the rules-based international order to the benefit of themselves and at the expense of all others.”

HASC chair Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.) said the U.S. should “attempt to be a balancing force to keep the peace in Asia,” especially with regard to the independence of Taiwan.

“The belligerent language that China has been putting out recently is, you know, very, very dangerous,” Smith said. “We could easily see a China-Taiwan situation in the same way we now see a Russia-Ukraine situation.”

Aquilino, addressing the U.S. policy of strategic ambiguity toward Taiwan—of not saying whether the U.S. would defend it— said some people believe clarifying the policy would serve as a deterrent, “and there are some that would believe that it would be an accelerant.”

He perceived pros and cons to both, saying, “We ought to look very closely.”

At the same time, “trend lines” in regards to U.S. military ties with India “are moving in the right direction,” noted Ely Ratner, assistant secretary of defense for Indo-Pacific security affairs.

Smith wanted to know in part how the U.S. could strengthen its relationship with India and how the U.S. should adjust its activities in the Indo-Pacific.

“Russia and China, as we know, are actively engaged in many parts of the world,” Smith said. “The competition here really is to build broad support amongst partners … to show that partnering with the U.S. and the West is the better option for, frankly, all countries than partnering with Russia and China.”

Ratner said the U.S. partnership with India is making “historic progress” despite India’s reliance on Russia for weapons. The U.S. and India “continue to integrate and operationalize our day-to-day defense cooperation and logistics, enhance information sharing, and grow our bilateral cooperation in emerging domains, such as space and cyberspace,” he added.

The U.S. is “doubling down” on its network of allies and partners in the Indo-Pacific, Ratner said. “With the U.S.-Japan alliance as the cornerstone of regional peace, we’re deepening our defense cooperation with the Japan Self-Defense Forces, optimizing our alliance force posture, and integrating the alliance into a broader regional security network of like-minded nations.”

Another priority Aquilino mentioned is “integrated and resilient, sustainable [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance] capabilities—a network that links all of that together and displays it for all forces on the battlefield in a consistent way; and then ultimately the ability to close those kill chains with the correct weapons and fires.”

The “speed and pace” at which countries such as China, Russia, and even North Korea are developing hypersonic weapons are, in part, driving Aquilino’s desire to defend Guam.

In order to “be able to posture forces in places that matter with the right capabilities,” the U.S. military “focused on Guam as a strategic hub,” Aquilino said. “The area in the Indo-Pacific is expansive—half the globe and a lot of it water,” he explained. “About $11 billion worth of construction, as we work through our posturing of our forces, … will end up on Guam, and we have to protect it.”

ULA Won’t Need Russia to Finish Atlas V National Security Space Launches

March 9, 2022 | By Abraham Mahshie

CAPE CANAVERAL SPACE FORCE STATION, Fla.— A United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket, powered by a Russian-made RD-180 rocket motor, blasted off on a crisp 68 degree Florida day into clear blue skies March 1, carrying the GOES-T National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration satellite into orbit. Seven years after Congress ordered ULA to find another source for its rocket motors, this launch comes at the lowest point in U.S.-Russian relations in decades.

And though ULA will soon be cut off from further supplies due to sanctions imposed on Russia after it invaded Ukraine last month, ULA and Space Force officials say they don’t expect any National Security Space Launches to be affected.

Later this year, ULA is set to transition to the new Vulcan Centaur rocket, powered by a pair of Blue Origin BE-4 engines. But in the meantime, ULA will continue launching payloads, including National Security Space Launches (NSSL), with the Russian-made RD-180 first-stage engine.

U.S. Space Force Space Launch Delta 45 commander Brig. Gen. Stephen G. Purdy Jr. said the current crisis and heightened tensions with Russia show how maintaining and expanding America’s space architecture can be threatened by reliance on adversarial actors such as Russia.

“It’s very interesting about having to depend on a foreign supplier,” he told Air Force Magazine during a visit to Patrick Space Force Base, Fla.

“Launch is a big issue,” he said. “You see that right now with the Ukraine activity. The Russians are holding the OneWeb satellites, and they’re not going to launch it.”

ULA plans for Vulcan Centaurs to begin launching sometime in 2022 from Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and Space Launch Complex-3 at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.

“As we manage the transition to the Vulcan launch system, all necessary RD-180 engines to execute the Atlas V flyout are safely stored in our factory in Decatur, Alabama,” ULA spokesperson Jessica Rye told Air Force Magazine in a written statement.

“We have agreements for technical support and spares, but if that support is not available, we will still be able to safely and successfully fly out our Atlas program,” she added.

A U.S. Space Force spokesperson told Air Force Magazine that Russia’s pullback from space cooperation will not affect NSSL.

“The Space Force does not expect Russian noncooperation in space to affect NSSL launches,” the spokesperson said in a statement.

“The Space Force has four remaining Atlas V launch services,” the spokesperson noted. “All RD-180 engines needed for Space Force missions are in ULA’s possession. Additionally, the Space Force is fully supporting ULA’s development of the Vulcan Launch System, which does not use Russian engines, for future launches.”

“There’s just a few left,” Purdy assured of the launches remaining under his purview.

“This has all been laid in and planned,” he added. “The Vulcan program exists for the purpose of getting off the RD-180 engine, combining the best of the Delta IV and the Atlas V into a new, partially reusable rocket that ULA will use to take us forward.”

Purdy echoed Secretary Frank Kendall’s past statements, saying, “We’re not concerned from that front. We built in a path ages ago, and that’s executing per plan.”

How the Pentagon Says It’s Tackling Inflation in Its 2023 Budget Request

March 9, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

Concern over inflation has impacted the Pentagon’s planning for the fiscal 2023 budget request, the Defense Department’s top financial official said March 9. But, the budget is “substantively” complete, and space figures to be a foundational part of it, he added.

Comptroller Mike McCord, speaking at the McAleese conference, teased that there is a “projected date” for the release of the 2023 budget, which has been delayed for more than a month. But that date hasn’t been finalized, and McCord said he still hopes to have the National Defense Strategy, also delayed, rolled out before the budget request.

When the budget does come, many observers will be focused on how it addresses the recent spike in inflation, which has reached record highs. If the budget is built off an assumption of continued high inflation, it could be a “downer” for the stock market; but if it quotes an escalation of just two percent, it could be criticized for lowballing the number and being unrealistic, analysts have said.

“One other thing that’s new for us: having to worry about inflation again, for the first time, certainly since the housing bubble, the housing crash, and the Great Recession of 2008,” McCord acknowledged. “But, actually, it’s been much longer than that that we’ve had to seriously track and worry about inflation. So that’s been a big part of what I’ve been working on in building the [2023] budget, but also just a day-to-day challenge that is not one that we’ve had before.”

At the same time, McCord argued that the commonly cited measure of inflation—the consumer price index, which has risen 7.5 percent in the last 12 months—is not applicable for the DOD. Instead, he cited the GDP Price Deflator, which measures inflations based on prices of goods and services produced inside the United States as well as exports, as a metric that is “fairly accurate for us.” McCord claimed the GDP Price Deflator is “not running at anything like 5 percent.”

“We are not facing 7 percent inflation in the Defense Department,” McCord said. “Now, what’s going to happen in the future, obviously, if I knew that, I would be doing something else for a living. But the big concern that we’ve had, that I’ve had, is catching up. Inflation is a here-and-now thing; we build budgets one year at a time, and inflation tends to get looked at [as] inflation from ’22 to ’23.”

The last time the Pentagon’s budget experts formulated key economic assumptions that inform the budgeting process was more than a year ago, McCord said—before he was confirmed to his position. In this budget cycle, he and his team worked to update those assumptions.

“The biggest near-term concern that we have, really, is the inflation that did occur in [2021] that was higher than projected, inflation that is occurring in [2022] that is higher than projected,” McCord said. “So my emphasis has been on getting us caught up on that as best we can.”

A failure to do so would result in a budget where prices are already outdated. McCord compared it to shopping for groceries, only to arrive at the checkout and realize “prices have changed, everything we put in the shopping cart was priced over a year ago [and] are no longer accurate prices.”

For the general public, perhaps the most urgent concern about skyrocketing prices is gas—fuel costs have reached all-time highs, and those costs are expected to remain high as President Joe Biden has banned the import of Russian gas, coal, and liquefied natural gas into the U.S.

The Defense Department is the federal government’s largest consumer of fuel, but McCord indicated that soaring gas prices won’t affect the budget like other inflation.

“Of course we track the fuel market. We consume 75 percent of the federal government’s energy, so we are very much interested in fuel prices,” McCord said. “We don’t control fuel prices. We can’t impact fuel prices. We are big enough to have a big bill, but way too small to have any impact on the markets. But that has its own mechanism—basically me working with DLA to adjust prices that we charge and then messaging Congress if we need more or less money for that.”

Just as rising fuel costs won’t directly impact the 2023 budget, McCord also said Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which led to Biden’s import ban, is not substantively altering the budget.

“I want to emphasize that it is not, it’s not a budget that was rewritten at the last minute because of what Putin is doing in Ukraine,” McCord said. “There’s been a lot of reasons, I’m sure familiar to all of you, about why this is taking time.”

Still, McCord acknowledged that Putin’s actions likely will affect how the budget is received by the public, pointing to support for increased defense budgets in Europe in recent weeks.

“I do think that public views are going to change,” McCord said. “And it clearly was shocking to a lot of Europeans to see full-scale war on the European continent. Clearly, if you look at Germany, for example, what could be more striking than their sudden change, and I think a welcome one. But I think that there’ll be a not-quite-as-dramatic impact, but a similar directional … impact in the United States.”

McCord’s comments were short on specifics about what will actually be in the budget, but he did offer a brief preview, highlighting the importance of the space domain.

“I would say … space … is probably emerging in our internal reviews as the most important foundational area for everything that we’re doing, everything that we need to be doing, whether it’s versus China, versus Russia, anybody else,” McCord said.

For fiscal 2022, the Space Force requested a $17.4 billion budget, roughly a 13 percent increase year over year. The appropriations bill currently being considered by Congress would boost that total to $18 billion.

Kelly: Russian Air Defenses Work Well for Ukraine

March 9, 2022 | By John A. Tirpak

Ukrainian forces are making good use of their Russian-made air defense systems, and Russia’s slow progress in Ukraine is an indication of how important it is to have air superiority, Air Combat Command boss Gen. Mark D. Kelly said March 9. However, the U.S. needs new weapons to equip its fighters because adversaries are getting better at detecting even low-observable aircraft.

Speaking at a McAleese and Associates conference in Washington, D.C., Kelly said Russian S-300 and S-400 air defense systems are “operating pretty well, operated by Ukrainians.” Unconfirmed reports indicate dozens of Russian aircraft have been shot down in the week-old invasion of Ukraine. Russia has also bogged down due to “logistical challenges [and] morale challenges,” Kelly said.

But “one challenge they do not have [is] … an air base defense challenge. They just don’t, because they operate layer upon layer upon layer of S-300s and S-400s, as well as SA-23s, etc.” These nested air defense systems have provided Russian forces with good protection against air attack, Kelly said.

“The Russian Air Force has not adapted agile combat employment, for a couple of reasons,” Kelly assessed.

“One, my opinion, they’re not capable of doing it,” he said. “Two, they don’t need to. They can operate pretty … safely from their main air bases with that layer of air defense over them.” But he said Russian air units are “struggling with [using] Russian systems [without] adhering to Russian doctrine. And we see the challenge that they have, but we also see the challenge of what happens if your joint force is organized, trained, equipped to operate with air superiority and not remotely designed to operate without air superiority. What happens when you don’t have it?”

From an historical perspective, Kelly said, “what keeps me up at night” about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is the “escalation” danger.

“Dictators, faced with a choice of either losing or using chemical weapons, choose not to lose.”

Kelly said one of his near-term priorities is providing new weapons to equip ACC’s fifth-generation aircraft.

“We’ve invested a lot of … time, effort, and money into building a low-observable force,” Kelly said. But the investment will be worthless if those aircraft have to get into “everyone’s observable range” to launch their weapons. Without longer-ranged munitions with better sensors, “we will not get a good return on investment from this low-observable fleet.”

The F-22, he said, was built “to kill Russian Flankers, period.” But it’s a “different timeframe” now, with “a different threat and geographic region, which means now I need to go further. I need to sense further. I need to engage further” than the F-22 was originally designed to do.

Kelly said he’d like to have the E-7 Wedgetail capability, or something similar, as soon as possible.

“We cannot generate sufficient sorties” with the E-3 AWACS, even when it’s operating close to its home base and with “the finest sustainment enterprise on the planet,” Kelly said. “I don’t care who makes it,” but the Air Force needs to refresh its airborne moving target indicator capability as soon as possible.

Asked whether the F-35 will be a suitable close air support platform, Kelly said the Marine Corps, which needs the aircraft almost exclusively for that purpose, has “voted” for it. The F-35 will be better than previous CAS platforms because of its ability to see through clouds and obscurants from a safe altitude, and to place ordnance exactly where it’s wanted without putting the aircraft, pilot, or ground troops in peril. Russian aircraft, he said, cannot do this, based on operations in Ukraine.

However, Kelly rejected a suggestion that Joint Tactical Air Controllers should be phased out, because “you still need … eyes on target” and the capability of Battlefield Airmen, “within arm’s reach of that battalion commander,” to assess a situation and request the right solution.

He also said that in Red Flag exercises, he’s increasingly seeing commanders choosing to keep F-35s in the battlespace, even after they’ve released all their weapons, because of the value of battlefield information they can gather with their ground- and air-sensing capabilities, and then pass that information along to the rest of the force.