Pratt & Whitney Outlines Vision for Renewing the B-52

Aug. 5, 2021

The Air Force has set an ambitious goal for the B-52 Stratofortress: Update the aircraft for the modern battlefield so the legendary bomber can continue flying combat missions at least 100 years after its first flight. Central to the Air Force’s plan are new engines, which should slash maintenance and fuel costs while delivering significantly improved mission performance and reliability.

“There’s never been a better time to upgrade the B-52 with a modern commercial engine that will provide huge benefits to both the warfighter and the taxpayer,” said former B-52 pilot, retired Lt. Gen. Michael R. Moeller, who is now Vice President for military engines and integrated customer solutions at Pratt & Whitney.

Emerging weapons systems and technologies, evolving mission requirements, and budgetary necessity make the case for engines that deliver better fuel burn, more electrical power generation, and lower life-cycle costs while reducing environmental impacts such as carbon and noise emissions.

Today’s B-52 is a lot like the one Air Force Maj. Gen. Andrew J. Gebara, the director of strategic plans at the Air Force Global Strike Command, piloted early in his career. But once new engines are on board it will be “a very different B-52 than what I flew as a lieutenant.”

With nearly 70 years of experience in the B-52 world, Pratt & Whitney could yet again have the best solution for powering this aircraft. It’s offering the award-winning PW800, which Moeller said is the right fit, offering best in class fuel burn, maintainability, and will be the most sustainable option on the table. Additionally, the size and weight savings of the PW800 avoids the significant integration risks of larger, heavier engines.

A B-52 powered by eight PW800s would meet the Air Force’s goal to extend the jet’s range by up to 40 percent and increase time on station—or loiter time—in the bargain Moeller said.

The Air Force’s request for proposals (RFP) for the engine replacement program, issued in May 2020, stated a requirement for 608 new engines, which would equip all 76 of the B-52 bombers still in its inventory. The service wants a modern, reliable commercial engine in the growth phase of its life cycle and intends to mount them—as in the past—in pairs, with four engines on each wing. To hold down development costs, Air Force leaders ruled out changing the engine configuration or making any significant change in size. The intent is that these engines will essentially be one-for-one replacements with minimal integration work, and no impact to the aircraft structure.

“The replacement engine must have good physical and performance fit,” said Moeller. “It should provide affordability with low integration risk. It should have life-cycle cost benefits, significant savings in fuel-burn, and operate without scheduled overhauls over the life of the program. Overall, maintenance should be significantly less than the current engine. And the PW800 demonstrated all these capabilities through data-based digital engineering during the Air Force’s integration study.”

One unstated benefit of the PW800 is that it’s in the “sweet spot of its life cycle,” Moeller said. The Air Force will want an engine that is sustained by commercial market volume today and decades into the future. The Service doesn’t want an engine that is nearing its commercial sunset and is unsustainable in the future because the commercial market disappeared. The “sweet spot” is that period when a product is in its growth phase with an active commercial market for decades to come. This ensures spare parts availability with a pool of experienced maintainers working with a global sustainment support structure for the life of the program.

Chris Johnson, Vice President of Fighter and Mobility Programs, said, in addition to being in that “sweet spot,” the PW800 is perfectly matched to the mission. “The PW800 is a combination of the right thrust, the right physical size, and very low weight to provide all the required aircraft performance with exceptionally low fuel consumption,” he said.

Pratt & Whitney’s PW800 engine is a proven commercial product, promising 30 percent less fuel burn and saving some 5,400 pounds of weight per aircraft. **Pratt & Whitney**

The PW800 will stay on wing for decades longer than the RFP requires, Johnson said, and will meet or exceed every capability requirement. While the engine is almost the same dimensional size as the legacy TF33, the combined weight savings over eight engines is 5,000 pounds. That means less wing stress, improved fuel efficiency, and increased capacity for under-wing payloads.

No other option delivers so much weight savings, Johnson said. “The nearest competitor is over 3,000 pounds heavier than the PW800 [for all eight engines],” Johnson said. The other competitors are as much as 6,000 pounds heavier.

As a modern, commercial engine, “the PW800 is fundamentally designed for long life,” said Paraag Borwankar, associate director for PW800 customer programs at Pratt & Whitney. “This design philosophy means the engine won’t require its first overhaul until well beyond the expected life of the B-52 program.”

The PW800 features large access panels to facilitate inspections and a modular design that supports quick access to swap out line-replaceable units (LRU), ensuring rapid intervention capability for Air Force maintenance crews and high mission-readiness rates.

For those rare cases where more extensive maintenance is necessary, Pratt & Whitney has invested $30 million in its Bridgeport, W.Va., maintenance, repair, and overhaul facility, which is dedicated to working on PW800 engines.

“The thing about this program is that the PW800 just works. It really does,” said Johnson. Not that this was easy or without effort, he added. “We’re integrating an electronically controlled entity into what used to be a hydraulically controlled aircraft,” Johnson explained. It’s complex, but a workable challenge. “The system engineering works. It’s all been pretty seamless.”

The Air Force will rely on the B-52 for decades longer as the stand-off element of a multi-level bomber strategy. In hotly contested airspace, the B-2 Spirit and stealthy F-22 and F-35 fighter aircraft will penetrate air defenses and attack as “stand-in” forces, while B-52s and B-1s, without their radar-evading properties, will be used as “stand-off” forces, firing weapons from a safe distance and benefitting from the increased range and loiter times the PW800 will deliver. B-52s can also serve as nuclear-capable bombers and for close air support of ground combat troops, as was frequently the case in Afghanistan and Iraq.

“We understand the critical role the B-52 plays in defending our country and protecting freedom around the world,” Moeller said. “We’re committed to providing a propulsion solution that keeps the B-52 operationally viable for decades to come. And we look forward to the opportunity to continue this partnership with the USAF to power the B-52 with the PW800.”

Air Force Superintendents to Get New Titles

Aug. 5, 2021 | By Greg Hadley

The Air Force is changing how it refers to the top enlisted Airmen in detachments, squadrons, and groups.

Starting Oct. 1, Superintendents will instead be referred to as Senior Enlisted Leaders, or SELs, according to a memo from Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. and Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force Joanne S. Bass.

The memo, dated Aug. 4, which was posted to the unofficial Air Force amn/nco/snco Facebook page and independently confirmed by Air Force Magazine, states that the change “better synchronizes us with Joint Force doctrine, practices, and culture.” The Navy and Army both use the title.

“Today’s modern threats call for a new level of teaming and partnerships to defend the security of our nation,” the memo added. “To support this mission imperative, it is important that our duty titles reflect the key leadership roles many of our senior noncommissioned officers serve in.”

Superintendent as a title has usually been given in the Air Force to a chief master sergeant or a senior master sergeant who serves as the top enlisted leader in a division or unit. There are more than 770 group superintendents in the service.

There will be no change in pay as a result of the title change, and no enlisted evaluations closed out prior to Oct. 1 will need to be modified, the memo added.

“We intentionally chose to avoid waiting to make this decision,” Brown and Bass wrote in the memo. “As a service, we will keep accelerating positive change, when and where it’s needed, to align us towards our Air Force goals and priorities.”

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.”