Pringle Wants Fresh Eyes on Air Force Lab’s Work for Space Force

Sept. 21, 2021 | By Shaun Waterman

Air Force Research Laboratory Commander Maj. Gen. Heather L. Pringle is bringing fresh eyes and outsider perspectives to the storied lab, and she’s hiring a new executive to ensure that it will serve the newly created Space Force as well as it serves its traditional customers in the Air Force.

Pringle announced the creation of the new post of deputy technology executive officer for space science and technology shortly after assuming her command in June 2020, saying the official would act as a “single focal point” for Space Force customers. Then in September 2020, she quietly appointed Kelly Hammett, who runs the lab’s Directed Energy Directorate, to the role in an interim capacity. The DE directorate is one of four elements of the lab that have been administratively transferred in whole or in part to the Space Force—the others being the Space Vehicles Directorate, the Rocket Propulsion Division, and the Systems Technology Office of the Sensors Directorate.

But Hammett was “dual hatted” as DE director and deputy TEO for space, Pringle said. “He has another full-time job, but he has been doing and is doing a phenomenal job of bringing together our entire space science and technology portfolio, ensuring that it’s well aligned with the Space Force’s strategic priorities and that we’re meeting what our Guardians need for the future of warfighting,” she said.

The deputy TEO for space chairs a new Space Science and Technology Board that the AFRL leadership created to better integrate space and Space Force priorities across the entire portfolio of the lab’s activities.

Pringle added that the hunt for a full-time, permanent appointee to the new post “is ongoing right now. I don’t have the results of that yet, because we’re still in the middle of it,” she said.

Pringle has also made a series of hires of outside experts, using new authorities for enhanced remuneration recently provided by Congress. She said she had appointed “highly qualified experts” as strategic advisers in five key areas where they will “ensure that our science and technology portfolio is at the cutting edge and we’re bringing in those outside ideas.” The five areas and the respective appointees are:

Data-driven decision making: Medy Agami
Autonomy: Jean-Charles Lede
Modeling, simulation, and analysis: Jamieson Gump
Communications and networking: Aniruddha Karmarkar
Microelectronics: Yadunath Zambre

Pringle has made bringing in outsiders something of a trademark, said AFRL Command Chief Master Sgt. James “Bill” Fitch, because she understood the benefits of a fresh perspective.

“I’m not a traditional Air Force Materiel Command guy,” he said. (AFMC is the home command for AFRL.) “I’ve never been in this command or in AFRL. I’m an operator by trade—that is my background.

That background—and the focus it brought onto the warfighter as the end user of AFRL technology—was the reason he got hired two months ago, Fitch explained. “She’s such a maverick. She wanted an outsider—she wanted somebody that could, as an operator, come in and look at how science and technology is being done and is being grown and evolved and how it’s going to be applied to the warfighter.”

ABMS Will Need ‘Continuous Improvement,’ Will Never Be a ‘Shiny’ Finished Product, General Says

Sept. 21, 2021 | By Greg Hadley

The Advanced Battle Management System hit several speed bumps this year. First Congress cut the fiscal 2021 budget request in half, effectively cancelling a planned demonstration. Then the Air Force’s first-ever chief software officer quit, citing a lack of support for funding as a cause. Finally, Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall has criticized ABMS as not inadequately “focused on achieving and fielding specific measurable improvements in operational outcomes.”

Kendall asked tough questions on the Air Force’s joint all-domain command and control (JADC2) strategy, acknowledged Lt. Gen. S. Clinton Hinote, deputy chief of staff for strategy, integration, and requirements. “In some cases, our answers weren’t that good.”

But Hinote said a new approach to command and control is essential. “I don’t know how the future Air Force, the future Space Force, the future Joint Force wins without JADC2,” Hinote said.

Brig. Gen. Jeffery D. Valenzia, ABMS cross-functional team lead, led off a discussion at AFA’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference by asserting two core assumptions—first, that the current command and control system is inadequate against China, and second, that in order to compete and defeat China, a new system is needed.

“The hard part is ABMS does not deliver a shiny platform on the end of a ramp when it’s done,” Valenzia said. “Instead, it’s a continuous improvement.”

User input is, therefore, a crucial component of that continual improvement, said Ross Niebergall, chief technology officer at L3Harris Technologies.

“We’ve got to get something into the hands of the user that they can pound on … and give feedback,” he said. “But we’ve got to be in this continuously and recognize that the product is never finished and that’s the way it should be built in the first place.”

Lt. Gen. Duke Z. Richardson, the military deputy in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics, in a separate conversation, said ABMS should be viewed not as a single program but as a “portfolio of programs.” He said Increment-1, the first ABMS product, was needed even “if we do nothing else.” The same is true of Increment-2. They are all “worth doing,” and they will work together to gradually build a future ABMS, he said: “We’re not waiting for some big bang.”

The problem is that iterative development is out of sync with traditional weapons development and acquisition processes can take years to define requirements, solicit input, and sort through bids. Technology moves too fast for that approach.

“As soon as we get those new incremental improvements, technology is moving at a speed that we have to continue to iterate,” said Steve Nordlund, general manager of Phantom Works at Boeing.

Retired Brig. Gen. Richard S. Stapp, chief technology officer at Northrop Grumman, said the solution is to rethink the fundamentals of how acquisition is organized.

“We’re hitting a time where [Pentagon acquisition officials] don’t necessarily know exactly what requirements they want,” said Stapp. “They don’t know. So this almost has to go back to a threat-based system that says, ‘We have a problem. Here’s what we want the outcome to look like.'”

Modern software apps and smartphones are made better by on-the-fly updates, which can improve performance, security, or usability. Those apps make use of the technologies ABMS is trying to employ, such as artificial intelligence, access to the cloud, and more.

“I think people get wrapped around the complexity of what we’re talking about with ABMS and JADC2,” he said. “But everybody in here is using a cell phone that is using vast amounts of data, vast amounts of artificial intelligence. You essentially command and control your whole life [using] a single device.”

As an example, Stapp pointed to fraud alerts issued by credit card companies such as Visa, using artificial intelligence to spot anomalies in purchases and alert users.

“If you can imagine us doing the same thing … to look at our space systems observing adversaries, [and] understand their habit patterns every day, then start to understand what’s normal [and] what’s not normal,” Stapp said—then those systems can “notify warfighters when they see anomalies.”

New Guardians, Unit Transfers Will be Delayed With CR, Space Force Says

Sept. 21, 2021 | By Abraham Mahshie

The incorporation of 350 new Guardians into the Space Force and the transfer of units and missions, including satellite communications capabilities from the Navy and Army, will be delayed if a defense budget does not pass by Sept. 30, Space Force leaders indicated.

“We might get delayed a little bit if there’s a CR [continuing resolution],” Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond said at the Air Force Association’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference in National Harbor, Md.

“We are going to be [starting the transfers] this year beginning 1 October, as long as the law allows and the budget passes,” Raymond said. “We’re gonna bring these units from the Army and Navy over—this is the first tranche.”

Vice Chief of Space Operations Gen. David D. Thompson told Air Force Magazine on Sept. 20, on the sidelines of the conference, that he expected the delay to happen despite the small cost associated with the move. Thompson cited the required new budgetary authority from the pending National Defense Authorization Act, which is still moving through Congress.

Still, Raymond said the legwork with the other services is done.

“Over the last year and a half, we have worked with the Army and the Navy and the Air Force to determine which capabilities come over to the Space Force,” Raymond said at ASC. “The intent was to consolidate, increase our operational capability, to increase our readiness, and to do so in a more efficient manner.”

Space Force transfer units — Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond announced the first Navy and Army units slated to transfer to the Space Force during his keynote address at AFA’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference on Sept. 21, 2021. Screenshot photo.

The Naval Satellite Operations Center and U.S. Army Satellite Operations Brigade are among the units transferring with global assets spanning the continental United States, Hawaii, Guam, Germany, and Japan.

Among the CONUS naval assets that would shift to the Space Force in fiscal 2022 are the Navy Satellite Operations Center at Point Mugu, Calif.; NAVSOC Detachment A at Prospect Harbor, Maine; NAVSOC Detachment C at Finegayan, Guam; and NAVSOC Detachment D at Schriever Space Force Base in Colorado Springs, Colo.

While retaining its core missile defense and GPS land maneuvering capabilities, the Army’s transfers of units and capabilities to the Space Force are more extensive.

Stateside, the Army’s 53rd Signal Battalion, Detachment A, at Fort Detrick, Md., and the 53rd’s Detachment B at Fort Meade, Md., will move over, as will the Combined SATCOM Support Center offices at Peterson Space Force Base in Colorado Springs, Colo., Regional SATCOM Support Center-East at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Fla., and Regional SATCOM Support Center-West at Peterson.

In the Pacific, the Army’s 53rd Signal Battalion, Detachment D, in Wahiawa, Hawaii, and the Regional SATCOM Support Center-Pacific at Wheeler Army Airfield in Hawaii will shift.

In Europe, the 53rd Signal Battalion, Detachment C, in Landstuhl, Germany, and the Regional SATCOM Support Center-Europe in Stuttgart, Germany, will transfer. The 53rd Signal Battalion, Detachment E, at Fort Buckner, Japan, is also slated for transfer.

Thompson said the units and missions would continuing performing their functions for their home service and lose no operational capability. The service members, who are in many cases administratively assigned to the Space Force, would still serve in their roles even though their transfer to the Space Force may be delayed.

Congress is expected to pass a continuing resolution by Sept. 30 to keep the Defense Department funded, but that will not allow any new programming authorities until the fiscal 22 NDAA passes both the House and the Senate and is signed by the president.

AI Algorithms Deployed in Kill Chain Target Recognition

Sept. 21, 2021 | By Amanda Miller

Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall alluded to an event in which artificial intelligence helped to identify a target or targets in “a live operational kill chain” in his remarks at the Air Force Association’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference in National Harbor, Md., on Sept. 20.

Kendall offered the description as an example of his “No. 1 priority,“ which he said is investing in “meaningful military capabilities that project power and hold targets at risk anywhere in the world.”

Kendall said that in 2021, the Air Force’s chief architect’s office “deployed AI algorithms for the first time to a live operational kill chain” involving the Air Force’s multi-site Distributed Common Ground System and an air operations center “for automated target recognition.”

He said the event represented “moving from experimentation to real military capability in the hands of operational warfighters.”

Kendall did not provide details of the mission but said the broad intent of the new capability is to “significantly reduce the manpower-intensive tasks of manually identifying targets—shortening the kill chain and accelerating the speed of decision-making.”

Air Force spokesperson Jacob N. Bailey told Air Force Magazine in an email, “These AI algorithms were employed in operational intelligence toolchains, meaning integrated into the real-time operational intel production pipeline to assist intelligence professionals in the mission to provide more timely intelligence. The algorithms are available at any [DCGS site] and via the [DCGS] to any [air operations center] whenever needed, so they’re not confined to a particular location.”

The Defense Department has acknowledged further need to gather intelligence from afar as well—in addition to holding targets at risk—in pursuing its “over-the-horizon” strategy of monitoring Afghanistan for terrorist activities. Kendall said the evacuation from Kabul included “continuous surveillance from space and the air.”

In July, Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III said DOD had “significantly” stepped up its number of AI efforts over the prior year. The department preceded that acceleration by adopting five “ethical principles” for AI development and use.

Longer Ranges, More on an Airframe: Imagining a New Era of Weapons Needs

Sept. 21, 2021 | By Amanda Miller

Munitions needed in a near-peer competition, especially with China, may call for longer ranges, and aircraft may need to be able to carry more of them. Defense industry executives made these projections among others in a panel session Sept. 20 at AFA’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference in National Harbor, Md.

Range and Scale

Squaring off with a technologically advanced and well resourced military, “You no longer have that sanctuary that maybe you [would] have on some third-world battlefield,” said John Martins, director of international programs for missile systems maker MBDA. “Specifically, you introduce the air threat as well as a potential threat that can protect themselves.” Martins could foresee “a degree of standoff”—sufficient range to thwart a response—“becoming a requirement.”

Retired Air Force Maj. Gen. Jon A. Norman, vice president of customer requirements and capabilities at Raytheon Missiles & Defense, mentioned range to match the long distances over bodies of water such as in the Indo-Pacific region but cautioned that “not every war fight requires a two-and-a-half-million-dollar exquisite solution,” he said. “What is that right weapons mix of both direct attack and standoff that we need? Not every weapon needs to be hypersonic, thousand-mile—but we do need that within our arsenal.”

Mark Altobelli, director of Boeing’s Phantom Works, expects the scale of munitions to go up in terms of both numbers needed and how many can fit on one airplane.

“When you walk out the door and your bomber has four, maybe eight hits, that’s nice. And I think it’s great, and we need that,” Altobelli said. “But what does it mean when he walks out the door with 20 or 30. And what does it mean when a fighter walks out the door—an F-15E or and F-25[E]X—carrying five or seven standoff weapons?”

Virtual Testing

The industry executives expect more testing to take place in virtual environments, partly in the interest of efficiency also in that of secrecy.

As an example, “A lot of us are working on long-range hypersonics,” said Raytheon’s Norman. “It costs a lot of money to test one of those, and there are very limited locations [where] you can test those, and the availability is incredibly limited.”

Then when such a test does take place, he said, “If I’m an adversary, I’m looking forward to the notifications to mariners and aircraft of when you’re doing that test so I can park [advanced geospatial intelligence] … right there to watch you test that.

“So let’s do that the fewest times as possible. Let’s do it in a virtual environment. … I think there are ways to get after this, but it’s time to stop sitting back, and it’s time to probably throw the rock and make some decisions on what those next-generation, those revolutionary capabilities we need are.”

Setting Requirements Soon

Norman suggested that locking in capability requirements and cost estimates sooner rather than later “will also help the services selling it over to the Hill,” he said. “And it certainly helps us, within industry, [in] designing toward that specification point.”

New approaches such as digital engineering and model-based systems engineering are an area “where we’re going to see great savings,” Norman said. “So let’s pick that capability that we want, get it out to the industry, come back with your best ideas, and move forward on in it.”

Space Force Uniform Prototype Has Diagonal Buttons, PT Uniforms Are Black and Gray

Sept. 21, 2021 | By Amanda Miller

The Space Force’s very first member unveiled the service’s first prototype service dress uniform Sept. 21. Its dark blue coat—almost black—with upturned collar, closes with a diagonal row of six buttons.

Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond brought two Guardians onstage to model the prototype during his speech at the Air Force Association’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference.

But first, Raymond announced that the USSF’s PT uniform is being wear-tested. Previewed in a video by an Air Force Academy grad who competed in track, the uniform includes black shorts with a version of the service’s delta logo in white; and a gray T-shirt bearing the stylized words “Space Force” in white on the back.

The six silver buttons on the coat prototype represent the service’s establishment as the sixth branch of the U.S. Armed Forces. A video showing some details included the buttons bearing the Space Force’s delta logo, mirror-finish U.S. pins worn on the collar, and silver braid near the cuffs.

Raymond said the service will accept “comments and tweaks” in the coming months before the uniforms go into wear testing.

For their combat uniform, Guardians will continue to wear the Operation Camouflage Pattern uniform, or OCP.

https://twitter.com/SpaceForceDoD/status/1440058302113533964

Chief Master Sgt. of the Space Force Roger A. Towberman announced enlisted rank insignia, featuring deltas and elongated hexagons—another nod to the USSF’s sixth-service status—Sept. 20.

The Space Force stood up Dec. 20, 2019, followed incrementally by its three field commands—organizational equivalents of the Air Force’s major commands—with the most recent, Space Training and Readiness Command, activating in August. Raymond called Space Force a “flat organization built for speed,” without additional command layers the likes of Numbered Air Forces.

“All the big, innovative companies said, if you’re big, you’re slow—and you’re not going to be innovative,” Raymond said.

Raymond said the Space Force now has 6,490 Active-duty Guardians, with more than 500 enlisting directly into the Space Force. This year it became the 18th member of the Intelligence Community.

Space Force uniform prototype. Staff photo by Mike Tsukamoto.

Air Force Turns to Startup for Help Implementing Zero Trust Tech

Sept. 21, 2021 | By Shaun Waterman

The Air Force is trying out a new tool to help implement its zero trust information technology architecture through an AFWERX research contract with Silicon Valley startup Illumio.

The Small Business Innovation Research Phase 2 contract follows a Phase 1 award in March. No figures were released in the Sept. 20 announcement.

The award will be used for pilot projects throughout the Air Force and Space Force, Mark Sincevich, Illumio’s federal director and SBIR lead, told Air Force Magazine by email. “The SBIR Phase II award is meant for research and development projects that will help the Department of the Air Force refine and bolster their deployment [of Illumio’s tools] and ultimately their Zero Trust architecture at large,” he said.

The company is working with the Department of the Air Force Zero Trust Task Force to identify key pilot projects, Sincevich said, adding that “any Air Force or Space Force base” would be able to access the tools.

Zero trust networks make it harder for hackers to move inside a network once they’ve penetrated its walls. By interrogating traffic at every juncture as it tries to move inside the network, zero trust systems raise barriers against intruders and create more opportunities to challenge and expel them. Zero trust architectures typically have three characteristics:

Each part of a system, whether a location or application, is walled off from the others;
Users must authenticate themselves continuously; and
Additional layers of security are added to protect the most valuable data in the system.

Speaking at AFA’s Air, Space, & Cyber Conference on Sept. 20, Lt. Gen Timothy D. Haugh, commander of the 16th Air Force, which is responsible for the cybersecurity of the service’s networks, called zero trust “a foundational technology” that, when implemented, would enable mission-critical data from sensors and weapons platforms to be moved around securely and ensure that security threats and vulnerabilities on any network could be mitigated in a timely manner.

“It’s critical for us to be able to do that [implement zero trust], so that we are able to operate in contested environments and trust our data,” Haugh told a media roundtable, noting that the weapons systems currently in use by the Air Force “weren’t built with the [cyber] threat in mind” and are, therefore, vulnerable to hackers.

“If we have a zero trust-based network, those threats as they’re discovered look different to us, because [zero trust] gives us freedom of maneuver within those networks into how we mitigate that threat,” he said.

“We’re pleased with the progress, but it’s got to go faster,” Haugh concluded.

The zero trust approach was made mandatory for federal civilian agencies in President Biden’s May 12 executive order, and the following day, the Defense Information Systems Agency [DISA] published a DOD reference architecture for zero trust, laying out how networks can be built in accordance with zero trust principles.

“The intent and focus of zero trust frameworks is to design architectures and systems to assume breach, thus limiting the blast radius and exposure of malicious activity,” Brandon Iske, DISA’s chief engineer for its Security Enablers Portfolio, said in a release announcing the DISA publication.

Then Illumio tool being deployed under the SBIR award is called Illumio Core. It provides both micro-segmentation—a way of slicing and dicing the IT network so that attackers cannot move freely around, even after they have penetrated the outer defenses—and a risk-based application “heatmap” that shows how the applications on a network are communicating with each other and highlights potential vulnerabilities.

“Zero trust is a strategy and not something that can be ‘achieved’ by one technology alone,” said Sincevich. “With that said, micro-segmentation is a crucial pillar of any zero trust strategy because it stops [cyberattackers] … from moving around to reach high-value assets. When attacks can’t spread, their impact is dramatically reduced.”

‘Unsatisfied’ with Hypersonics Progress, Kendall Questions USAF’s Strategy

Sept. 21, 2021 | By John A. Tirpak

Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said he’s “unsatisfied” with the pace of progress in Air Force hypersonics programs and even “the degree to which we’ve figured out what we need from hypersonics.”

Speaking to reporters at AFA’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference, he said he’s “pretty clear” on how China and Russia plan to use their hypersonic missiles, which experts say are ahead of U.S. programs.

“They’re moving very quickly,” Kendall said of Chinese and Russian hypersonics efforts. “They clearly see the value.” Describing hypersonics as among a number of “asymmetric approaches” to force structure that China and Russia are taking, he said the Air Force must first define which “target set we want to address” with hypersonic missiles, then make the case for why hypersonics are “the most cost effective way” to attack those targets. There’s still “a question mark” about that, he said, though he admitted he hasn’t seen “all the analysis that has been done to justify the current program.”

He acknowledged progress but concluded, “I would like to see it be better,” he said.

The Air Force has yet to hold a successful all-up test of the AGM-183 Air-launched Rapid Response Weapon (ARRW), a boost-glide system that is accelerated to hypersonic speed by a rocket then releases a hypersonic glide body. While captive-carry tests have been conducted on a B-52 launch aircraft, the missile has failed to fly on its own at least twice.

The Air Force is also pursuing the Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile, a smaller, air-breathing weapon that could be small enough to be launched from fighter aircraft.

Mark Lewis, the head of defense research and engineering during the Trump administration and an expert on hypersonics, has said the Air Force will have to address thousands of targets in a hypothetical Pacific war but has only funded about a dozen ARRWs. That means it would have to be very selective about what targets it uses the missile for. Lewis set a DOD-wide goal of building hypersonic missiles “at scale.”

Kendall said he believes the industrial base needed to build hypersonic missiles in quantity “will follow” as the program matures.

“I think if the [funding is] there … the industrial base will respond,” he said. Although there’s been “mixed results with boost glide vehicles,” Kendall said, “I think we will get there.” The Air Force can do things to accelerate the program, he said, “but we have to solve the problem first of where we’re trying to go, and then get there as quickly as possible.”

16th Air Force Boss Says No to Direct-Commission Civilians. Airmen Are a Different Story

Sept. 21, 2021 | By Shaun Waterman

With 36,000 cybersecurity job vacancies across government, the cybersecurity human capital crisis has been called a national security threat. But Lt. Gen. Timothy D. Haugh, commander of 16th Air Force, a key cyber command, says he has all the people he needs.

“We have the Airmen we need in our force,” he told a media roundtable at AFA’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference. “We have the right talents. We have the right skills. … We have the right Airmen, and being able to apply them to the right problems is a key area of work.”

In fact, Haugh said, he hasn’t needed to use new direct commissioning authorities approved by Congress.

“The National Defense Strategy told us first and foremost: Do better with what you have,” Haugh said. “So we’ve really taken that to heart.” The Air Force prioritized cutting-edge cyber and information operations capabilities and matched that with investments in recruiting and training.

“We’ve created some of the capacity to do operations in the information environment [through] decisions we made to stop doing other things and invest in [cyber and information operations capabilities],” Haugh said. While the leaders of civilian cyber agencies use social media on a near-daily basis to implore cyber defenders to join them, the main problem Haugh faces in human capital terms is keeping the talent he had trained and developed, he said. “When I say we have the Airmen we need, I’m really saying we have the talent. You’ve got to be able to retain that. And there’s no doubt that is a challenge within the career fields we have in 16th Air Force.”

Trained cyberwarriors could easily double or even triple their salaries by moving to the private sector, Haugh said. But making sure his workforce gets training and hands-on experience with the latest cyber tools helps keep people interested. “We want to ensure that they know we’re investing in them, they know we’re going to give them world-class training,” he said. “And we have to continue to enhance our infrastructure so it’s world-class and is able to adapt with them.”

While Haugh said the Air Force has not yet needed “direct commissioning” authorities to recruit civilian cyber professionals directly into a senior officer role, he is using similar authorities to promote enlisted Airmen into the junior officer ranks.

“What we have really focused on are the direct commission programs from our enlisted … force to officers,” he said. “In many cases we know we’ve got enlisted Airmen with just absolutely amazing talents, skills, and degrees. And so what we’ve done there is to actually use direct commissioning programs that allow us to accelerate successful [enlisted] Airmen to officers, and that’s been our near-term focus.”

Direct commissions like those help strengthen leadership and retention, he said. “What we’re able to do there is take somebody with hands-on experience, put them in a leadership role, and allow them to continue to advance. So we know we have talent. We want to keep that talent within our force and also empower them to continue with whatever their goals are.”

Haugh said he saw no need to directly commission civilian experts. “That’s not an area yet that we’ve been focused on, because we’ve been really successful with the Airmen we have in those roles,” he said.

He added that the training given to his personnel now includes instruction about how to recognize disinformation and how to validate news reports they might see shared on social media. “That’s certainly a skill every American needs,” he noted. “We’re starting with the Airmen in the United States Air Force and the Guardians in the Space Force to provide them the right tools … so they can identify disinformation.”

Military leaders have long acknowledged that the campaign against disinformation—even that coming from foreign adversaries—is a whole-of-nation activity that the military cannot fight alone, and Haugh said he wants his Airmen to tackle disinformation on a personal level.

“We all have to be good watchdogs,” he said. “If somebody in my family puts out bad information on their Facebook page, I am duty bound to tell them: That’s not accurate; here’s where you can go to get relevant [accurate] information. And we can’t police that across the board, but I would like every one of our Airmen to feel like they own their particular span of control.”

Haugh said Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III had declared that defending the integrity of U.S. elections was “an enduring Department of Defense mission” and said 16th Air Force was ready to play its part. “The more that we stay sustained on the cybersecurity threats and the disinformation threats from all of our adversaries, the better … positioned we are, so that we can support DHS and FBI and the states’ [governments] in a much more coherent way.”