USAF Chief Master Sergeant Dies at Ali Al Salem

Aug. 5, 2021 | By Greg Hadley

The superintendent of the 96th Force Support Squadron died in a non-combat-related incident at Ali Al Salem Air Base, Kuwait, the Pentagon announced Aug. 5.

Chief Master Sgt. Tresse Z. King, 54, of Raeford, N.C., died Aug. 3 while deployed as part of Operation Inherent Resolve. The incident is under investigation.

King previously served as superintendent for the 374th Force Support Squadron out of Yokota Air Base, Japan.

According to a University of Colorado press release, King was promoted to Chief Master Sergeant in 2016, during halftime of a college basketball game in which her son, George King, was playing. She served in the Air Force for nearly 30 years.

King is the second Airman to die in a non-combat incident in the Middle East in recent months—Lt. Col. James C. Willis, a RED HORSE commander in the New Mexico Air National Guard, died June 26 at Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar. Last September, a pair of Airmen died at Ali Al Salem Air Base in separate accidents involving ATVs in the span of three days.

All told, five Airmen have now died as part of Operation Inherent Resolve since the start of 2020.

Air Force Invests $60 Million More in Startup Building Mach 5 Jet

Aug. 5, 2021 | By Greg Hadley

The Air Force has made another investment in hypersonic aircraft, teaming up with venture capital firms to give a $60 million contract to startup Hermeus, which is looking to develop a jet that can travel at five times the speed of sound.

The deal, awarded July 30 and announced Aug. 5, is not the first time the Air Force has invested in Hermeus—a year ago, the service and the startup announced a contract worth $1.5 million to look into modifying the company’s still-in-development aircraft for the future Presidential and Executive Airlift fleet, most notably Air Force One.

Now, USAF is making a broader investment in Hermeus and looking into other potential uses for reusable hypersonic aircraft.

The contract sets five objectives for Hermeus to meet within the next three years, including scaling and flight testing a reusable hypersonic propulsion system, building and testing three of the company’s Quarterhorse concept aircraft, and providing wargaming inputs for the Air Force to use in strategic analysis tools.

After three years, the Air Force will assess the company’s progress, maturation of the technology, and how well it aligns with the service’s priorities.

The deal is funded in part by the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center’s Presidential and Executive Airlift Directorate as well as the Air Force Research Laboratory. Hermeus has not said when it hopes to produce its first commercial jets.

“One of our goals in supporting companies like Hermeus is to expand the defense industrial base for both aircraft manufacture and hypersonic propulsion development,” said Brig. Gen. Jason E. Lindsey, the program executive officer for Presidential and Executive Airlift, in a press release. “Ultimately we want to have options within the commercial aircraft marketplace for platforms that can be modified for enduring Air Force missions, such as senior leader transport, as well as mobility, ISR, and possibly other mission sets.”

Hermeus has already successfully tested a subscale version of its propulsion system and has said it hopes to develop a 20-passenger jet capable of reaching Mach 5, or more than 3,800 miles per hour.

By comparison, the VC-25A, which operates under the call sign “Air Force One” when the President is aboard, tops out at around 630 miles per hour. Exosonic, another supersonic aircraft company the Air Force has invested in for senior leader transport, only predicts speeds of Mach 1.7. While Concorde, the commercial aircraft which launched in 1976 and flew until 2003, reached speeds just over Mach 2.

Hermeus says its Mach 5 jet could make the trip from New York to Paris in just 90 minutes, compared to the seven-and-a-half hours commercial airliners typically take.

The Presidential and Executive Airlift Directorate is looking to invest in commercial high-speed passenger travel as part of its “Vector Initiative.” The industry has seen a surge in interest as of late, with United Airlines announcing plans to offer supersonic flights beginning in 2029.

Beyond use as a hypersonic Air Force One, though, Hermeus’ technology could prove useful to the Air Force in other realms.

In a recent policy paper for AFA’s Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, Executive Director Douglas A. Birkey specifically cited the commercial development of supersonic aircraft as potentially important for the future of command and control, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (C2ISR) aircraft, especially as the Air Force looks to deploy its Advanced Battle Management System.

“The advantages are straightforward and speak to many of the Air Force’s concerns regarding the long-term viability of its legacy C2ISR fleet,” Birkey wrote. “From an operational perspective, supersonic cruise at extended range, a capability all of the proposed jets in this class purport to achieve by virtue of their civil mission goals, would allow a C2ISR aircraft of this class to deploy with utmost speed and rapidly cover vast operational ranges.”

In addition, supersonic aircraft would face reduced risk from enemy threats and could free up limited space at strategic installations by virtue of their range and speed, Birkey wrote.

New Hypersonic Missile Production Timetable Hinges on Failure Review

Aug. 4, 2021 | By John A. Tirpak

Getting the Air-launched Rapid Response Weapon hypersonic missile into production before the end of fiscal 2022 depends on quick resolution of last week’s failure of the missile to make its first flight, the Air Force’s program executive officer for weapons said Aug. 4.

A failure review began immediately after the July 28 attempted test off the coast of California in which the rocket motor did not fire after separation from a B-52 test aircraft, said USAF weapons Program Executive Officer Brig. Gen. Heath A. Collins during the online Life Cycle Industry Days seminar.

“We’re just coming up on Day 7” since the failure, Collins said, adding that he did not have an update on why the missile failed.

The review will determine if the failure will affect the desired “early 2020s” initial operating capability. With a “quick and rapid resolution,” the transition to production can still likely happen by this time next year, but that requires at least two all-up successful tests of the weapon, he said. If the investigation is “prolonged, … or drives anything excessive from a redesign perspective, which we don’t know at this point, … it may impact our ability to meet the next test window,” Collins said.

For now, “We are still postured … to transition to award and production by the end of fiscal year 2022.” Lockheed Martin is the contractor for ARRW, and the company recently submitted its production proposals for the missile. The Air Force asked for $161 million in its fiscal 2022 budget submission to build 12 ARRW missiles.

Collins said Lockheed Martin’s $225 million loss on a classified program, reported in its second-quarter results last week, was not related to ARRW. Meanwhile Kenneth Possenriede, Lockheed Martin’s chief financial officer, unexpectedly resigned his post this week without giving a reason. Stock analysts speculated that it had to do with the write-down.

ARRW has experienced several test failures already. Collins said an April failure’s cause is understood, that a fix was made, and that the problem did not occur again in last week’s test. “The corrective action was sufficient and working,” Collins said. An Air Force press release noted that although the missile’s motor didn’t fire, the test demonstrated a successful release from the launch aircraft. It unfolded its fins and established navigational links. The test missile was not recovered.

Asked how many tries Lockheed Martin gets before the program is reconsidered, Collins said ARRW is the only boost-glide hypersonic missile the Air Force has on contract and that the program is constantly being “evaluated” for success.

“We also knew at the beginning this was a rapid-prototyping, … risky program,” Collins said. If not for congressional authorities to use streamlined program management and skip traditional methods, “we would not be where we are today.” Collins said the “mid-tier acquisition” approach was the right one for ARRW because it is appropriate for rapid prototyping and “new technology.” He said the Air Force will work through the root-cause investigation and get back to flight testing as soon as possible.

If ARRW proves unworkable, Collins said, “We certainly could go back to HCSW,” the Hypersonic Conventional Strike Weapon the Air Force curtailed in February 2020. The HCSW had been through its critical design review at the time the Air Force stopped the project, which had some common elements with Army and Navy hypersonic programs.

But, “You’d have to trade that with the amount of cost and schedule” it would take to get HCSW back up and producing hardware, he said.

Collins, who is also director of the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center’s Armaments Directorate, said the directorate is “tracking” language from House appropriators that would cut $44 million from the program line that funds ARRW and the unrelated Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile—an air-breathing, as opposed to a boost-glide system—and said that if the change becomes law, “that would impact” a contract award because lowering the quantity purchased would raise cost per unit. The language raised concerns that the Air Force would enter production before the missile’s bugs have all been worked out. The directorate is working to increase transparency in the hypersonic programs, he said, and will split up ARRW and HACM funding lines in the future.

Frank Kendall Ceremonially Sworn in as Air Force Secretary

Aug. 4, 2021 | By Greg Hadley

Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall has been on the job for a week, but on Aug. 4, he made his ceremonial entrance to the office, getting sworn in by Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III at the Pentagon.

Kendall was administratively sworn into the position July 28, two days after the Senate voted to confirm his nomination, ending a drawn-out process that included three legislative holds from senators. His arrival gives the Department of the Air Force its first permanent leader since January, replacing former acting Secretary John P. Roth.

In a letter addressed to Airmen and Guardians released shortly after he arrived on the job, Kendall revealed his mantra as “One Team, One Fight.”

Kendall wrote that his “overriding priority” as Secretary is to deter and, if necessary, win a conflict with a peer competitor, specifically China or Russia.

“I know first-hand what it means to face a capable, well-resourced peer competitor,” wrote Kendall, an Army veteran. “For over a decade, I have been sounding alarms about the threat to U.S. interests and U.S. military superiority posed by military modernization programs of China especially, but also of Russia.”

Kendall also emphasized joint force responsibilities and cooperation as part of his “One Team” mantra.

“All team members deserve to be treated with respect and dignity and to serve in an environment in which they can grow and thrive,” Kendall wrote. “We must all do everything we can to help our fellow teammates be successful—our Nation’s defense requires it.”

CSAF Outlines the Air Force’s New Deployment Model

Aug. 4, 2021 | By Brian W. Everstine

The Air Force is overhauling its force generation and deployment model. The aim is to provide a standardized schedule that both Airmen and combatant commands can understand while also providing enough down time for rest and training.

Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr., in an exclusive interview with Air Force Magazine, outlined the new Air Force Force Generation (AFFORGEN) model, which he said will be “better aligned with how we present Airmen and airpower to support the joint operations, while at the same time, it actually preserves some of that readiness, not only for today, but for the future.”

The model, which the Air Force expects to reach initial operational capability in fiscal 2023, is broken down into four “bins,” each lasting six months for a total 24-month cycle. These include:

“Available to Commit.” This is when a unit is deployed, or ready to go at a moment’s notice for things such as short-notice task force or dynamic force employment deployments. “Commit is our traditional, you’re deployed, or you’re on the bubble, you’re ready to go,” Brown said.
“Reset.” After the six-month deployment or standing-by for operations, these Airmen will have six months to come home and take a breath. “Reconnect to your family, but also look at your basic skill sets you need to, depending on what the commitments are, if you got deployed or not. So it’s a chance for you to reset,” Brown said.
“Prepare.” After six months of rest and a focus on the basics, Airmen will then rotate into a six-month phase in which they increase their preparation for a possible future deployment. “Now you start to up your level of training and expanding beyond just your unit and start to work with others,” Brown said.
“Ready” After preparing, the next six-month phase will have Airmen in a “ready” phase in which the focus is on high-end, more intense, multi-unit training. This would include things such as participating in a certification exercise with multiple wings, capstone exercises such as Red Flag, Red Flag-Alaska, or the USAF Weapons School. This is the time to ensure Airmen at peak readiness are able to move back to the deployment, or “Commit,” phase.

While the goal is to have AFFORGEN reach IOC in fiscal 2023, some units are already starting to move toward it, because the Air Force can’t just “flip the switch and go, ‘OK, … so we’re starting today,’” Brown said.

“The thing that this is going to help us out with is, our United States Air Force is very popular,” Brown said. “And so we get asked, we get pulled into a lot of things. But I want to be able to use this to have a little bit of discipline about how we do things, how we communicate to the Joint Force, so we can preserve readiness.”

Under previous force generation models, such as the air expeditionary force, the Air Force was often stretched thin, with high demand, low dwell time, and low corresponding readiness.

“We would actually rip ourselves apart to satisfy all the requirements,” Brown said. “And what we found is each of the [major commands], depending if you are fighter vs. bomber vs. ISR vs. mobility—we’re all doing things just a little bit differently.”

The Air Force needs to standardize its force generation model across these MAJCOMs, Brown said.

“Part of our discussion with the MAJCOM commanders … was, ‘We’ve got to have a standard model that we all use, that we can talk about, and be on the same page, particularly as we talk to the Joint Staff,’” Brown said.

As the Air Force moves toward Agile Combat Employment and begins operating from different locations without the same established presence that Airmen are used to at major Middle East bases, the deployment model of a fighter unit needs to align with that of combat support units to better enable those operations, Brown said.

“Think about it: For the past 30 years, we’ve been going to the same bases, and things are already established,” he said. “Well, we’ve got to look at these things differently now. This is why Agile Combat Employment comes into this factor as well, because you’re going to go someplace that may not already have everything set up. It’s going to be fairly austere. You’ve got to have that capability to be able do this and to align the aviation package with the agile combat support.”

Details Released About Pentagon Attack that Left Officer Dead

Aug. 4, 2021 | By Greg Hadley

Law enforcement officials identified both the officer killed and the suspect who died in an Aug. 3 attack at a bus stop outside the Pentagon. Officials also announced that a civilian bystander was injured during the incident.

Pentagon Force Protection Agency officer George Gonzalez was at the Metro bus platform outside the building’s main entrance Aug. 3 when the suspect, Austin William Lanz, 27, exited a bus and attacked Gonzalez with a knife “immediately, without provocation,” according to a series of tweets from the FBI’s Washington field office.

A struggle ensued, the FBI stated, in which Lanz mortally wounded Gonzalez then used the officer’s weapon to shoot himself. Other PFPA officers engaged Lanz, and gunfire was exchanged, with Lanz dying at the scene.

The FBI also stated that a civilian bystander was injured during the incident but did not specify whether the person was shot and if so, whether the person was shot by Lanz or PFPA officers. The civilian was transported to the hospital and later released.

In a series of tweets Aug. 4, the PFPA remembered Gonzalez as a “die-hard” fan of the New York Yankees and a “gregarious officer, [who] was well-liked and respected by his fellow officers.”

An Army veteran, Gonzalez also served in the Federal Bureau of Prisons and the Transportation Security Administration before joining the PFPA in 2018. He held the rank of Senior Officer. The Army issued a tweet Aug. 4 commemorating Gonzalez, saying, “We mourn the loss of Officer Gonzalez and salute his life of service and bravery. Rest In Peace, Soldier.”

We mourn the loss of Officer Gonzalez and salute his life of service and bravery. Rest In Peace, Soldier. https://t.co/R5lKyM9tMW
— U.S. Army (@USArmy) August 4, 2021

“His life was one of service,” White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said at a press briefing. “A veteran of both the police and the military, he lost his life protecting those who protect the nation.”

According to reports from Military.com and The Associated Press, Lanz, a Georgia resident, briefly enlisted in the Marine Corps in October 2012 but was dismissed within a month and never earned the title Marine.

He had a history of criminal behavior, including an April incident in which he was arrested for breaking into a neighbor’s home then attacked two sheriff’s deputies without provocation in the intake area, according to the AP. Online court records show he was charged with aggravated battery on a police officer, unlawful acts in a penal institution, obstruction of law enforcement, and terroristic threats/acts, in addition to criminal trespassing and burglary charges, but posted bail in May. The charges against him are still listed as pending.

Kelly: Downed Airmen May Have to Get Themselves to Safe Areas

Aug. 4, 2021 | By John A. Tirpak

The combat search-and-rescue mission will be extremely challenging in a fight against a peer adversary, and the focus may have to shift to downed Airmen finding their own way to safety, Air Combat Command boss Gen. Mark D. Kelly said Aug. 3.

The future of CSAR is “a tough, tough equation,” Kelly said during a Life Cycle Industry Days seminar run by the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center. The mission may have to change given the long distances and enormous expanses of water in the Indo-Pacific theater and the “speed, the vulnerability, and the range of our current rescue platforms.”

Air Combat Command is “looking at it from the lens of … how much can the isolated personnel get themselves out or get themselves to a place where they can be recovered, as much as how the recovery force is going to get to them.”

He noted that if a pilot needed a stealthy F-35 to get to a well protected location, “it’s going to be tough to get in that same chunk of airspace with the [rescue] equipment we have.” The challenge is to come up with “avenues and means for the isolated personnel to help themselves, if at all possible, to get to a more opportune location” for recovery.

Many rescue operations have been spearheaded by an A-10 flying top cover for the recovery and managing the movement of CSAR assets into and out of the rescue area. The A-10 was “great” at this in Afghanistan and Iraq, and Kelly said many lives were saved because an A-10 “took charge overhead.”

But he also said the Air Force’s planned inventory of A-10s is “more than enough” to meet its close air support and other needs and that the seven squadrons the service will retain into the early 2030s is not the way to build the Air Force of the future. Lacking stealth, the A-10 can’t get into those areas where a fifth-generation jet such as the F-35 can go.

“The fact of the matter is, as we sit here today, I have exactly zero A-10s in the Middle East, for a couple of reasons. One, the distance is too far to go from our Middle East basing to places like Afghanistan, over the horizon. Two, the threat in and around Syria—the Russians’ air defense systems—[is] too great to operate in, so we essentially had to bring them home.”

Given the considerations of distance and threat, and applying them “to places like the Asia-Pacific, the distances just become greater and the threat becomes infinitely greater,” Kelly said, indicating the A-10’s ability to help with CSAR in that region will continue to diminish. While he respects the “phenomenal performance” of the A-10, there’s an “ever-decreasing of the niche areas where it can operate, day in and day out.”

The Air Force will put new wings and avionics on 218 A-10s, which Kelly noted is 34 more than the F-22s in inventory, but of them, he emphasized, “I have zero engaged.”

For Korea, where one A-10 squadron is available to defend the demilitarized zone, seven squadrons is not only “more than enough,” it’s “more than the South Korean peninsula can hold,” in terms of locations to base the jets.

Kelly said China is “our pacing threat. If we’re going to keep pace with what they’re doing, … you’re not going to do it by refurbishing a fleet of 40-year-old, single-mission, 210-knot airplanes. You’re just not, regardless of how much they’re loved and the great performance they’ve done.”

USAF Not Looking at ‘MQ-Next’ as a Direct MQ-9 Replacement, Outlines Reaper Upgrades

Aug. 3, 2021 | By Brian W. Everstine

The Air Force is starting to field some enhanced capabilities for the MQ-9 Reaper fleet that will better prepare it to operate in more denied environments while also moving away from the idea of an “MQ-Next” direct follow-on for the remotely piloted aircraft.

While the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center has released two requests for information looking at future RPA capabilities, those requests for information were just “market research,” not the beginning of an MQ-9 replacement, said Col. William S. Rogers, the program executive officer for intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, and special operations forces, during a virtual AFLCMC media event Aug. 3. One RFI looked at what type of multirole RPA members of private industry could produce, and the other looked at airborne sensing and high-value asset protection.

“We’re really providing information at this point, up to Air Force futures and the Air Staff, [to help] them try to decide how that future medium-altitude UAS capability could fit into the overall force design for the Air Force,” Rogers said. “So, at this point, short answer is there’s no direct replacement termed MQ-Next.”

In the meantime, AFLCMC has laid out its timeline for an overall suite of updates for the MQ-9, called the “MQ-9 multi-domain operations,” or M2DO configuration, which includes improved communications, increased power, autonomous takeoff and landing, and eventually increased use of artificial intelligence to make the Reaper more relevant in a high-end fight.

“The M2DO configuration is really envisioned to mature the MQ-9 and really keep its relevancy through the planned divestiture of the MQ-9 later in the 2030, 2035 timeframe,” said Col. Mike Jiru, the senior materiel leader for the Medium Altitude UAS Division at AFLCMC. “So as we’re experiencing right now, the MQ-9 conducts both a counter [violent extremist organization] mission and then looks at missions in what we’ll call the ‘gray zone.’”

This, for example, includes operations conducted by the recently stood up 25th Attack Group now operating out of Romania. These missions, in more contested environments with Russia nearby, are “obviously very different than the original design criteria of the MQ-9, which was air dominance wherever it flew. So given that, there’s recognition that we have to do something to ensure that the MQ-9 remains relevant. It’s never going to be a penetrating ISR asset that’s going to go into China or anything like that,” Jiru said.

First, M2DO is focused on improving the MQ-9’s ability to communicate. This includes bringing on the Link 16 datalink and improving its command and control “resiliency” through the use of different waveforms and an improved modem both within the aircraft and with the ground systems. Additionally, AFLCMC is looking to bring on open mission systems, including the Stellar Relay computer system, as the first internet protocol “backbone” for the aircraft, with interfaces at each pylon “enabling a really plug-on-and-play sort of aspect,” Jiru said.

The Air Force is also looking to double the amount of power the MQ-9 can distribute so it can bring on “an enhanced suite of mission capabilities” and have the ability for high-power computing. This “opens up the ability of the MQ-9 to be a host for significantly advanced artificial intelligence algorithms and autonomy algorithms,” he said.

AFLCMC is working with the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center to support its development of a “smart sensor,” with demonstration expected in exercises over the next year that will serve as “both a cornerstone for the department’s development of a suite of autonomy algorithms, but then also looking at how does an MQ-9 as a surrogate vehicle help inform the future development of AI and the integration of that AI into the overall fight,” Jiru said.

The Air Force is already bringing on anti-jamming GPS capability, with retrofits underway.

“So that suite of M2DO configurations really is what the Air Force is depending upon to ensure that the MQ-9 remains relevant in its expanding role through the 2030-35 timeframe,” Jiru said.

The Air Force is planning on installing the M2DO configuration on 71 aircraft, but that is a “dial” that will be adjusted depending on budget constraints, he said.

Below is a schedule for upcoming MQ-9 enhancements:

Anti-jam GPS: Fielding underway
Enhanced power: Fielding to begin in the first quarter of fiscal 2023
Command and control elements: 2023
Link 16: The first quarter of 2024
Stellar Relay: The third quarter of 2024.
Automatic takeoff and landing for the MQ-9 fleet is also in a continuous development effort over the next several years, Jiru said.

Protest of HH-60W Upgrade Contract Could Limit, Delay New Systems for the Helicopter

Aug. 3, 2021 | By Brian W. Everstine

The Air Force is assessing the impact of a judge’s ruling contesting the award of an almost $1 billion contract for HH-60W Jolly Green II upgrades to determine if the service can delay some upgrades or not do some of them at all. The new combat rescue helicopter is preparing for initial operational testing and evaluation.

A U.S. Court of Federal Claims judge recently supported a Sierra Nevada Corp. protest to the February sole-source contract award to Sikorsky for a suite of upgrades to the brand-new helicopter. The upgrades would include new systems such as countermeasures, anti-jam GPS, blue force trackers, and data links, among others.

Sierra Nevada Corp. claimed the Air Force violated competition rules when awarding the contract to Sikorsky, calling on the Air Force to accept multiple bids, Inside Defense reported.

Col. William Rogers, the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center’s program executive officer for intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, and special operations forces, said during an Aug. 3 virtual media event that the Air Force’s legal and contracting teams are assessing the options going forward on the upgrades.

“We’re working through the impacts and what the ruling truly means in terms of if there are certain things we could do or won’t do in terms of capability upgrades,” Rogers said.

A joint Air Force and Sikorsky team in April wrapped up developmental testing, and the Air Force is now in an “in-between stage” of addressing some issues before initial operational test and evaluation begins in October. This includes making sure the system’s data is ready and ensuring crews will be in the right place. Additionally, the Air Force is doing some advanced testing on the helicopter’s radar warning receiver and getting the aircraft’s gun ready for testing after some “challenges” in earlier tests.

The Air Force Operational Test and Evaluation Center was able to conduct some operational tests on the HH-60W during developmental testing, including capabilities such as air-to-air refueling. About 36 percent of the IOT&E test points have already been collected.

IOT&E is expected to start in October and run through March 2022.