How Brown Plans to Battle Bureaucracy: Radical Transparency, More ’Horsepower’

March 7, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

It’s been more than a year and a half since Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. ascended to the role of Air Force Chief of Staff, and in that time, he’s repeatedly said he wants to transform the service in bold ways to make it ready for the future.

Speaking at the AFA Warfare Symposium in Orlando, Fla., however, Brown admitted his efforts have run into a familiar Pentagon problem: bureaucracy.

Brown previously tried to target the Air Force portion of the sprawling Defense Department bureaucracy as part of his series of Action Orders—issued in December 2020. The orders detailed what Brown believed needed to be done to implement his mantra of “Accelerate Change or Lose.”

Modifications to those action orders were released in February, and included a candid assessment of Action Order B, focused on bureaucracy.

“After over a year of analysis and work, significant progress on this action order has proven elusive,” the order reads. “More specifically, current Air Staff decision-making remains cumbersome, slow, allows ‘soft vetoes’ without accountability, and prioritizes compromise and consensus over decision quality. Mired in hierarchical processes and content with the status quo, the Air Staff must adapt to mission command and collaborative approaches to address the 21st Century threats and competitive strategic environment.”

In a March 3 media roundtable, Brown detailed just how bureaucracy has been hard to kill, despite the Action Order.

“I knew bureaucracy was going to be hard. I guess I’m not completely surprised because people don’t like change,” Brown said. “And I think the challenge we also had, because of COVID … [with] not everybody there in the office, you don’t have that dialogue that goes back and forth.”

A team tasked with implementing the Action Order was organized under Lt. Gen. S. Clinton Hinote, deputy chief of staff for strategy, integration, and requirements. But looking back now, Brown said, that team didn’t have “enough horsepower behind them to be able to do the things we needed them to do.”

Now, the team has been moved under Vice Chief of Staff Gen. David W. Allvin, “so he has the visibility and he can actually drive things,” Brown said.

As part of the modified Action Order, Brown also pledged “radical transparency,” and in pursuit of that, called for the Air Staff to “ensure wide dissemination [and] provide clear understanding of CSAF intent” of key decisions and documents.

That will start with memos from Brown detailing decisions made and priorities set—it’s necessary, he said, because final decisions aren’t always treated as such.

“When a decision occurs, if you weren’t in the meeting, how do you know that decision happened? Because too often what I found is, there’s a decision made and then the staff determines we want to actually re-litigate the decision, because they … may or may not have agreed with the decision in full,” Brown said.

Having memos laying out records of decisions will decrease uncertainty and speed up the actual implementation of those decisions, Brown predicted.

“I’ve had examples of ‘You want to explore the decision that the Chief’s already made.’ Well no, we’ve already made a decision,” Brown said. “Now it’s time to explore how we implement it.”

As part of the decision making process, Brown added, he welcomes different perspectives and arguments—he just wants them to be voiced publicly, not in the so-called “meeting after the meeting” when staffers will share thoughts in smaller groups.

“I’m gonna have the meeting after the meeting, in the meeting. If you have a difference in opinion, don’t hold it,” Brown said. “Speak now or forever hold your peace, because we’re going to move out on some of these.”

In pursuit of that, the modified Action Order directs the Air Staff to primarily use Microsoft Teams for unclassified collaboration and meetings, with email, conference calls, and in-person meetings as backups. Using Teams, Brown said, will allow more voices into meetings and hopefully encourage more discussion in the moment.

Still, the challenge remains daunting.

“I think, of all the action orders, this will probably be one of the most challenging ones, because it’s a cultural shift,” said Brown. “But I think we’ve got to do this in order to make decisions faster and really flatten communication across the staff and really across the Air Force.”

Space Force Tests Health Monitoring Data to Replace PT Tests

March 5, 2022 | By Amanda Miller

Top leaders in the Space Force enthusiastically reviewed their experiences wearing continuous health monitors that could form the basis for the service to do away with conventional PT testing.

They said in press briefings at the AFA Warfare Symposium on March 4 that the black health monitoring rings that quite a few Guardians wore were part of a pilot program that’s helping the service flesh out its “holistic wellness” concept. The wellness program won’t rely on annual PT tests anymore but instead monitor the troops’ health all year round. Several senior Air Force leaders also were seen wearing the rings, but an Air Force spokeswomen said she could not confirm if the Air Force also is considering replacing its regular PT program.

The Space Force leaders want the program to ultimately amount to “more than just a physical training test like I grew up doing in the Air Force, where we ran and did sit-ups and pushups,” said Brig. Gen. Shawn N. Bratton, commander of Space Training and Readiness Command. STARCOM is one of the Space Force’s three field commands, generally equated to an Air Force major command.

Bratton, STARCOM senior enlisted leader Chief Master Sgt. James P. Seballes, Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond, and Chief Master Sergeant of the Space Force Roger A. Towberman all wore the rings.

“We think there’s something that this data provides,” said Bratton. “We’re trying to figure out, how do we aggregate that? How do we think about that? If a Guardian is conducting fitness activities throughout the week and meeting certain milestones, maybe we don’t need to do a test on [an] annual basis if they’re meeting a standard and we can keep track of that through the ring.”

Bratton expected the planning to take another year or two.

The ring’s sleep monitoring feature seemed to have made the biggest impression on all the leaders.

“It makes you very conscious if you get enough sleep, and not even if you just got enough sleep, but if you got quality sleep,” Seballes said. “If you’ve ever woken up before your alarm clock when you’re just laying there with your eyes closed, it knows the difference. If you’ve met your mark, it gives you a little crown in the morning.

Continuous assessment is one of three prongs to the service’s approach, said Towberman, a self-described “gear weirdo.” Other aspects include fitness; and culture and education.

A Guardian’s wellness may be designated green, amber, or red “so that the chain of command and the Guardian know where they’re sitting all the time with regard to readiness,” Towberman said.

Raymond found the sleep monitoring most gratifying:

“It made me much more aware of my sleep, and how much I was sleeping, and the patterns of sleep,” Raymond said. “I’m getting personal here, but if I ate a late dinner, I didn’t sleep as well, because my heart rate didn’t go down as fast at night.”

Towberman perceived a wider benefit, that of cohesiveness—“a thing that binds us. And it’s impossible not to start gamifying,” he said.

Referring to Raymond: “I’ll say, sir, what was your sleep score last night? And he wants to know mine,” Towberman said.

“So we’re building this community, this culture, of fitness where in a fun way people just immediately start taking care of each other. They’re connected.”

Putin ‘Surrounded’ by US and NATO Air and Space Power, says AFA Expert Panel

March 5, 2022 | By Abraham Mahshie

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has united NATO and proven a robust U.S. air and space capability that does not require a no-fly zone, but invasion could have been deterred if the U.S. had stronger air power, said experts at an AFA Warfare Symposium panel on the European theater.

“Our Airmen and Guardians surround the Putin regime,” said AFA president and retired Lt. Gen. Bruce “Orville” Wright, noting that the Air Force presence extends from the eastern flank of NATO to the far east of Russia in the Indo-Pacific region.

“We have everything we need in the context of watching everything that the Russian military, the Putin regime military is doing today,” said Wright. “He, again, is surrounded, certainly vertically, in a three-dimensional way in the integration of our space and air capabilities.”

Dean of the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies retired Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula highlighted that sanctions did not deter the Russian military invasion of Ukraine.

“We’ve lost that conventional deterrent capability,” he said, citing a smaller Air Force than in past decades.

“Sanctions won’t affect current military conditions,” Deptula added. “It’s only U.S. military strength that would have deterred Putin’s aggression.”

Nonetheless, Deptula pointed out that sharing of U.S. Air Force ISR with the Ukrainian Air Force once the conflict began has allowed Ukraine to withstand a 4-to-1 disadvantage in air power with Russia.

“That information sharing gave them the momentum early on,” he said. “And to a significant degree, allows them to deny the Russians air superiority, along with the Russians own demonstrated military incompetence.”

In part, Ukraine is using the ISR data to target a miles-long unprotected resupply convoy, firing from an unmanned Turkish TB2 medium-altitude, long-endurence drone. To date, Ukraine has reportedly destroyed some 50 aircraft and 30 helicopters plus a number of drones.

Of Putin’s failure to take control, Deptula remarked: “He’s completely violated the principal tenet of modern warfare being that the first priority has to be securing and maintaining control of the air.”

Retired Maj. Gen. Kimberly A. Crider, who formerly served as Space Force chief technology and innovation officer, said space is already integrated in NATO’s defense and Russia deterrence.

“Vandenberg Space Force Base, [Calif.] has NATO liaison and exchange officers there on the floor of the Combined Space Operations Center working side by side, day to day, every day, coordinating on the needs of those theater operations in support of those combatant operations,” Crider said.

The multinational Combined Space Operations Center (CSpOC) at Vandenberg also interacts regularly with the emerging NATO Space Center at Ramstein Air Base, Germany.

“We know that this is an important capability for sharing information among allied partners, for coordinating support to NATO operations, and we have a very active engagement,” she said.

Moderator and British Air and Space Attaché RAF Air Commodore J.J. Attridge summed up the Russian mindset, which he said has historically been rooted in self-interest.

“Putin’s self-interest has brought the coalition together and NATO [is now] … stronger than before, and it’s unified the world,” he said. “So, thank you, Mr. Putin for that.”

Spark Tank 2022: Plan to Save Water, Fuel Crowned Winner

March 5, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

Project Arcwater, a package of technologies aimed at helping Airmen live “off the grid” by generating their own power and water, was selected as the winner of the 2022 Spark Tank competition on March 4.

In the final event of the AFA Warfare Symposium in Orlando, Fla., seven “celebrity” judges listened to pitches from six finalists presenting their ideas to improve the Air Force, in a competition modeled after the popular TV show “Shark Tank.”

Undersecretary of the Air Force Gina Ortiz Jones, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown, Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond, Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force JoAnne S. Bass, and Chief Master Sergeant of the Space Force Roger A. Towberman all served as judges, alongside guest judges Sharon Leite, CEO of the Vitamin Shoppe, and Rachel Kuhr Conn, CEO of Productable.

In the end, the winning pitch came from Senior Master Sgt. Brent Kenney, who touted the use of solar panels and a water harvester instead of diesel generators and prepackaged water to save money and space for Airmen operating in remote locations as part of the Agile Combat Employment model.

“Imagine this: You’re on a mission with your team in the middle of nowhere. You have a tough job ahead and unfamiliar territory, but the space to take what you need is limited,” Kenney told the judges. “What do you cut? Fuel? Water? Tools? Teammates? Is your choice the right choice? … The most precious resource we have in mission-planning is pallet space. Pallet space determines what goes and what stays.”

Project Arcwater will take up 60 percent less space and be 78 percent lighter than the equipment currently used, Kenney claimed. It will also be 96 percent faster to set up and cost 98 percent less to operate for a standard mission.

Pressed by Towberman on how he would convince skeptics to place their trust in his system, Kenney said education will be key.

“We have this negative connotation when we think about ‘green.’ We go back to like 20 years ago, we think of a sub-version of what that is. That’s no longer the case. This technology is here. It’s available for us to solve these problems,” said Kenney. “And I think it’s educating that middle management, that leadership to say, ‘Hey, this is a viable option.’”

Kenney’s pitch earned the votes of Brown, Bass, and Towberman, while Jones, Raymond, and Kuhr Conn voted for “Custom Facemasks for Fighter Pilots and Beyond,” an idea from Maj. Ryan Sheridan of the 10th Air Base Wing to use technology commonly found in dentists’ offices to create silicone inserts for pilots’ oxygen masks.

With a tie, Air Force Chief Information Officer Lauren Barrett Knausenberger was called to take the stage and huddled briefly with the judges before declaring Project Arcwater the winner. Project Arcwater was also voted as the “fan favorite” of the competition in an online poll.

For more information on the six finalists in this year’s competition, read Air Force Magazine’s series highlighting each idea:

Maj. Giselle Rieschick, 99th Medical Support Squadron, Nellis Air Force Base, Nev.: “Blood Delivery by UAV”
Maj. Ryan Sheridan, 10th Air Base Wing, U.S. Air Force Academy: “Custom Facemasks for Fighter Pilots and Beyond”
Matthew Correia, Air University’s Eaker Center, Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala.: “DAGGER: Developing Airmen and Guardians with Games for Enhanced Readiness.”
Maj. Allen Black, 412th Test Wing, Edwards Air Force Base, Calif.: “Project FoX (Fighter Optimization Experiment)”
SMSgt. Brent Kenney and TSgt. Matthew Connelly, 52nd Fighter Wing, Spangdahlem Air Base, Germany, “Project Arcwater”
Cadet Grant Schlichting, U.S. Air Force Academy: “Aerial Tow Rehookup”

Air and Space Force Chiefs: Defense Industrial Base May Be Too Fragile to Surge Production

March 4, 2022 | By Amanda Miller

The aerospace industrial base could pose a risk to U.S. national security because of lack of parts for aging systems, inattention to the future workforce, and the uncertainty that’s historically surrounded the success of space companies.

Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. and Space Force Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond addressed issues at the AFA Warfare Symposium in Orlando, Fla., on March 3.

Raymond cited a report by the Air Force Research Laboratory and Defense Innovation Unit that called the industrial base “tactically strong but strategically fragile.” He said in the past, proposed activity in the space sector has fizzled out.

“We need this to materialize,” Raymond said.

The report “State of the Space Industrial Base 2021: Infrastructure and Services for Economic Growth and National Security,” published in November 2021, posits that increasing Pentagon spending on commercial space technology would prompt private investors to invest even more. Its authors deemed that sustaining investors’ confidence was a “major concern” requiring “urgent action.

Raymond told the crowd at AWS22 that the Space Force perceives “opportunities for a national-level vision on the industrial base.”

On the Air Force side, Brown says he worries about the age of the fleet and “manufacturing resources where the company that actually built … whatever it is doesn’t exist anymore.” Not only is he concerned with DOD’s external suppliers but “bits of our depot as well that may not be effective.”

“If we had to surge, we’d be challenged,” Brown said.

The ability to diversify—to work with more, smaller companies—could help.

“They’re all patriotic, and they want to work with us, but we can’t make it so hard,” Brown said, referring to the hassle of navigating the DOD’s acquisition processes.

Brown also brought up the future workforce as “something we need to pay attention to” by emphasizing education in the STEM disciplines of science, technology, engineering, and math.

“We do not want it to atrophy,” Brown said. “We want that workforce to be here when we need them.”

Former Google CEO: AI Will Be ‘Force Multiplier Like You’ve Never Seen Before’

March 4, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

The Defense Department needs to upgrade its IT, add more software specialists, and empower certain programs to be more innovative—especially when it comes to artificial intelligence, the former CEO of Google said March 3.

Eric Schmidt, who led Google and its parent company Alphabet from 2001 to 2015 and chaired the Defense Innovation Advisory Board, delivered a keynote address at the AFA Warfare Symposium in Orlando, Fla., offering what he called several “blunt” criticisms and recommendations for the Pentagon.

“In the tradition of the military, I will be direct and I hope that’s OK,” Schmidt told an audience of Airmen, Guardians, and industry leaders. “If I look at the totality of what you’re doing, you’re doing a very good job of making things that you currently have better, over and over and over again. But I’m an innovator. And I would criticize, if I could say right up front, that the current structure, which is an interlock between the White House, the Congress, the Secretary of Defense’s [office], the various military contractors, the various services, and so forth, is a bureaucracy in and of its own. And it’s doing a good job at what it has been asked to do, but it hasn’t been asked to do some new things.”

Schmidt did note one exception to that criticism—the B-21 Raider program. Praising the Rapid Capabilities Office, Schmidt said the Air Force developed the new stealth bomber in a “new and innovative” way.

The challenge now is to take that approach and apply it to programs across the DOD, Schmidt said, especially to non-hardware platforms.

“Every time you try to do something in software, one of these strange scavenging groups within the administration takes your money away. It’s insane,” Schmidt said. “The core issue here in the military is you don’t have enough software people. And by software people, I mean people who think the way I do. You come out of a different background, and you just don’t have enough of these people.

“These are hard people to manage. They’re often very obnoxious—sorry, welcome to my field. They’re difficult. They’re sort of full of things, but they can change the world, and a small team can increase your productivity of whatever you’re doing.”

This issue is particularly glaring when it comes to artificial intelligence (AI), Schmidt said. And not only does the military lack the necessary personnel, the defense industrial base does too. Touring the symposium’s exhibition hall, Schmidt said he only saw “like two AI companies, … and by the way, they’re the little ones in the corner.”

Just like the B-21 program has been innovative, there are some examples of good software development, Schmidt said, pointing to Project Maven, a DOD AI project that ignited controversy among Google employees, but which Schmidt said has had “very successful classified use in the right ways.”

But Project Maven was just one project, and “to be very blunt, you don’t have enough people, you don’t have the right contractors, and you don’t have the right strategy to fill in this,” Schmidt said of the Pentagon’s work in AI. “We need 20, 30, 40 such groups—more, more, more. And as that transformation happens, the people who work for you, the incredibly courageous people, will have so much more powerful tools.”

Schmidt’s intense enthusiasm for artificial intelligence is born out of his belief that “AI is a force multiplier like you’ve never seen before,” he said. “It sees patterns that no human can see. And all interesting future military decisions will have as part of that an AI assistant.”

Schmidt is hardly alone in predicting AI will have a seismic impact on warfare. But advocates say they’ve also encountered resistance and inertia within the Pentagon.

Such doubts are preventing the U.S. military from fully embracing AI’s possibilities and forcing service members to “spend all day looking at screens doing something that a computer should do.”

Potential uses include precision weapons targeting, precision analysis, and autonomous systems, Schmidt said. But to get there, there’s something the Pentagon has to do first.

“The real problem you have is that you don’t have enough bandwidth, … which no one ever tells you this,” Schmidt said. “Your networks, excuse the term, suck. You’ve got to get the networks upgraded. You just have to, because all of these things depend on that kind of connectivity, right?”

Schmidt’s comments were met with applause from his audience—the issue of poor network connectivity and IT systems is a constant source of frustration among Airmen and Guardians.

Yet despite all this, perhaps the biggest issue facing the Air Force’s software and AI efforts isn’t really about software.

“We love to talk about strategy, and we need more money over here, and by the way we do, and we need more partnerships over here, and yes we do, and we need more of this over here, and every state has to have its money and all of that’s fine,” Schmidt said. “But what we don’t have and we need a lot more of is the kind of talent to drive this world.”

To attract and retain talent, Schmidt said, the military needs to empower innovators instead of holding them back, granting them a certain level of autonomy to make decisions and take risks. In that regard, his comments echo ones made by Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr., who has made empowering Airmen one of the key themes and goals of his tenure.

Legacy Aircraft Are Aiding US Response to Ukraine Crisis. They Still Need to Be Retired, CSAF Says

March 3, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

In the weeks leading up to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last week, flight trackers noticed the skies over Eastern Europe filling with U.S. aircraft.

Tankers such as the KC-10 and KC-135 and ISR planes such as the E-8C JSTARS, RC-135, and RQ-4 all flew over eastern NATO allies including Poland and Romania, presumably supporting intelligence-gathering efforts before the Russian attack.

All these airframes are ones the Air Force is currently seeking to retire—its 2022 budget request called for sending 18 KC-135s, 14 KC-10s, 20 RQ-4s, and four E-8Cs to the boneyard.

The use of these planes for such an important mission highlights the tension currently facing the service: The Air Force says it needs to get rid of such legacy aircraft to modernize, but those same aircraft continue to be called upon frequently.

“This is the conversation I have inside the building on balance and risk between the combatant commands and their current demand signal,” Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. told reporters at the AFA Warfare Symposium in Orlando, Fla. “Because if it was up to them, in some cases, they’d want us to keep all the stuff. As we keep it, it gets older. It’s more expensive to operate. And so we’ve got to make some transitions there, and then at the same time, look at how we operate differently.”

Brown has previously acknowledged that retiring legacy systems will mean assuming some risks. And at AWS, he said the debate over those risks continues.

“We hear people talk about, you don’t want to operate like we did for the last conflict or contingency. We’ve got to … leap ahead and start thinking how we would look at things differently,” Brown said. “So there’s a balance, and there’s a bit of tension, and if there was no tension, I would be concerned. And I think there’s good dialogue that goes back and forth between the service Chiefs and combatant commanders.”

Brown’s continued belief in the need to retire old planes and modernize is rooted in the fact that China remains the pacing threat to U.S. airpower—Russia is a short-term threat by comparison, he said, cautioning against letting its recent actions dictate long-term plans.

Brown said he can’t let “a near-term event completely reshape everything else we need to do for the future.”

“Does it add additional things into context? Yes, it does,” he added. “And you know, the things we’re looking at with the last National Defense Strategy [are] the same kinds of things we’re looking at with the current National Defense Strategy we’re drafting, and I don’t see that it’s going to drive a major shift in anything we’re doing because the capabilities that look into the future don’t really change.”

That’s not to say the Air Force should look to dump all of its legacy airframes right away. Citing one of his favorite slogans, Brown noted that to provide “airpower anytime, anywhere,” the service will have to “balance between capability and capacity” and maintain enough flexibility to fulfill what is asked of it.

“I think when you look at current events today with Russia and Ukraine and our pacing challenge, we’ve got to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time,” Brown said. “And we’ve got to really think about how we preserve some of that readiness while at the same time, assure and deter.”

US Should Define the Critical Infrastructure It Wants to Protect, Says General in Charge of Homeland Defense

March 3, 2022 | By Amanda Miller

The U.S. needs to prioritize the protection of certain critical infrastructure in light of potential cyberattacks and the fact that both China and Russia possess peer-level nuclear weapons, said the general in charge of homeland defense.

The commander of U.S. Northern Command Air Force Gen. Glen D. VanHerck spoke at the AFA Warfare Symposium in Orlando, Fla., on March 3. VanHerck, also the commander of the North American Aerospace Defense Command, said the current “strategic environment” represents a shift.

“The strategic competitors that we face today have watched the way that we project power for at least two decades, if not longer than that, and they understand if we’re allowed to project that force forward, that won’t turn out well for them,” VanHerck said. “So they’ve developed capabilities below the nuclear threshold with the idea that they can delay [or] obstruct our force … or destroy our will.”

That’s resulted in other countries “ruining our decision space and our deterrence options from the homeland, especially, and it’s decreasing our senior leaders’ decision space,” he continued.

“And why we’re worried about that is the risk of strategic deterrence failure goes up dramatically.”

Therefore the U.S. needs to start “figuring out what we must defend” by defining the critical infrastructure that if attacked, could “bring us to our knees in a crisis or conflict,” VanHerck said.

“And that’s a broad decision across the interagency, in my mind, that requires some significant analysis looking at, “what are those key infrastructure areas that we need to focus on, and why do we need to focus on them. Is it to protect our finance capability? Is it to protect energy and economics?”

VanHerck mentioned that laws prevent the government from collecting intelligence inside the U.S. that could shed light on “which pieces of key infrastructure might be vulnerable” and said the command is building relationships with Congress, the National Security Council, and U.S. Cyber Command to try to figure out how to deal with that issue.

Details Emerge on New Unmanned Long-Range Bomber and Fighter Projects

March 3, 2022 | By John A. Tirpak

The Air Force’s “4+1” fighter plan is still intact despite Secretary Frank Kendall’s new “imperative” to develop a fighter-like unmanned airplane, and the Air Force is well into developing a concept of operations for a new unmanned long-range bomber that might be attritable, if the price is right.

The 4+1 plan—a roadmap for fighters that includes the Next Generation Air Dominance system, the F-35, the F-15EX, and the F-16, with the A-10 as the “plus one”—“is still valid … as part of near-term plans, … even mid-term plans,” Kendall told reports at the AFA Warfare Symposium. That’s because “it’s early … to commit” to uncrewed combat aircraft of the scope he’s contemplating.

In his keynote speech, Kendall said the NGAD system “will include a crewed platform teamed with a much less expensive, autonomous, uncrewed combat aircraft employing a distributed, tailorable mix of sensors, weapons, and other mission equipment.” It will “very much be” a “system of systems” approach for air-to-air combat, he said.

The unmanned bomber, on the other hand, is “more speculative.” There’s “more work to do” to flesh the idea out, he said. He clarified that the aircraft he has in mind isn’t necessarily an unmanned version of the B-21, which was “designed with an option to be unmanned.” But it could be.

The unmanned bomber is to have “comparable range” to that of the B-21, with a “payload to be determined,” but it must be “operationally valuable and cost effective.” It might accompany the B-21, he said.

The new bomber is in “concept definition,” he said. He maintained that it is a classified project, and while it will be “acknowledged,” not many details will be forthcoming. It will likely get underway with funding in the fiscal 2024 budget, he said.

The new aircraft would not substitute for any of the 120 or so B-21s now contemplated, Kendall said. It would be “additive” to the planned bomber fleet, but he specifically declined to discuss any numbers.

Both projects will rely on the Skyborg program, the DARPA ACE (Air Combat Evolution), and Australia’s Advanced Teaming System as “technology feeders,” Kendall said.

“How exactly those programs will transition hasn’t been sorted out, yet,” he added. “But obviously, they’re part of the overall picture we were looking at when we decided to move in this direction.”

In his keynote speech, Kendall said he’s looking for an unmanned bomber concept that would be half the cost of the B-21 and told reporters later, “I’d love to have it be less than half. I’d love to have it be a quarter or an eighth.” But half is “the minimum we should shoot for at this point.” It’s crucial that the Air Force “reduce the unit cost of the aircraft in the inventory” because, he asserted, all the manned aircraft on the books aren’t affordable in the numbers needed.

The B-21’s ceiling cost, under the contract with Northrop Grumman, is $550 million in base year 2010 dollars, or $713.6 million in 2022 dollars.

It wasn’t a “detailed analysis” that led him to the half-cost figure, Kendall said, but “I have an awful lot of experience with weapon systems and their cost.”

The B-21 will be the “mainstay” of the bomber fleet, Kendall predicted, offering cautious optimism that the program is doing “reasonably well” and that “we may end up buying more than we’ve currently planned.”

The Air Force “is going to need perhaps more long-range capability … at some point in the future,” he said.

Randall Walden, head of the Rapid Capabilities Office that is developing the B-21, told Air Force Magazine the unmanned bomber has to “match” the B-21 in terms of its “range, endurance, speed” and to also “extend the strike capability” by flying ahead of the B-21 in contested airspace. It has to be far less costly because “we would take more risk with an unmanned system that is not as expensive as the manned system.”

There’s “a pretty wide swath of things that could fit” that description, one of which is an unmanned B-21, he said. The aircraft may have to have large wings to carry the fuel necessary to do the mission, he said, but cost is the key variable.

“Once you put cost on there, just like we did with the B-21, that really tells what the design’s going to be,” Walden said.

Kendall noted that the B-21 followed the Next Generation Bomber project that was dropped because it was far larger and “cost about twice as much” as the B-21, noting, “we ended up with … a more affordable option.”

Walden said if companies can get “close” to the half-price level, “we’re interested.”

The Air Force has been working on an operations analysis to determine what the right number of unmanned bombers would be, but “we’re not there, yet,” Walden said. “The analysis will give us more insight.”

Asked if the new unmanned bomber could spell the beginning of the end for manned bombers, Walden said, “I don’t know. We’ve been doing bombers a long time. They’ve all been manned, and they’ve all been from the air. But that doesn’t mean you can’t do global strike from other means.” While he didn’t elaborate, the Army has been touting its land-based hypersonic missile as an instrument of “long-range strike,” and China has been experimenting with an orbital bombardment system.

The advantage of a manned bomber, though, is “you can actually recall it, if you choose,” Walden said.

After the concept of operations is set, there would be discussions with companies as to whether
“they … can build it,” Walden said.

“We’ve got the top-level requirement from the Secretary of the Air Force” to get things rolling, Walden said. There would be a risk-reduction phase followed by a preliminary and critical design review, and “from there, you figure out the source selection criteria by which you would downselect.” The RCO is “pretty good at doing that piece in a relatively fast way,” he said.