Most USAF Fighter Mission Capable Rates Rise in Fiscal 2020, Led by F-35

May 24, 2021 | By John A. Tirpak

The Air Force’s fighter fleet, led by the F-35A, turned in a better overall mission capable rate in 2020, even with limitations imposed by the pandemic, than it did in 2019, according to figures provided to Air Force Magazine. The F-35’s MC rates soared, and rates even improved for the F-15C, which the Air Force is anxious to divest because of its age. The F-15E’s MC rate declined, however.

“Mission capable” rates describe the percentage of jets in the inventory that are ready and available to do at least one of their assigned missions over a period of time. “Full mission capable” is a measure of how many aircraft in a fleet are ready to do their full complement of missions over that period.

The F-35A’s mission capable rate leaped from 61.6 percent in fiscal ’19 to 76.07 percent in FY ’20, according to Air Force figures. The program was helped largely by additional funding toward spare parts, a greater percentage of the fleet being of a more recent and less problem-prone vintage, and a greater number of depots being opened, Joint Program Office director Lt. Gen. Eric Fick told the House Armed Services Committee in April.

“Many of our earlier-lot aircraft require modifications, and we are working through retrofits with fleet customers to optimize the timing of these modifications to minimize operational impacts,” Fick said. “Government and industry teams are working to accelerate an affordable long-term solution” to F-35 readiness “while maximizing near-term F-35 availability for training and operations. These changes are driving a steady increase in aircraft full-mission capable rates, and we anticipate fleet availability will continue to climb as F-35 maintenance systems and best practices mature,” he said in testimony.

At the McAleese and Associates defense conference in mid-May, Fick said the sustainment cost of the F-35 is an “existential threat” to the program and that the effort to reduce it is his highest priority.

AIR FORCE FIGHTERS’ MISSION CAPABLE RATES

Fighters	2019 Mission Capable Rate	2020 Mission Capable Rate
F-15C	70.05%	71.93%
F-15D	72.45%	70.52%
F-15E	71.29%	69.21%
F-16C	72.97%	73.90%
F-16D	70.37%	72.11%
F-22A	50.57%	51.98%
F-35A	61.6%	76.07%

Source: USAF

The F-15C and D fleets, which the USAF has described as urgently in need of replacement because they are flying beyond their planned service lives, turned in mixed results—MC rates of 71.93 percent and 70.52 percent, respectively. That was better than last year for the F-15C, when it achieved a 70.05 percent mission capable rate; and worse for the F-15D after achieving a 72.45 percent mission capable rate in fiscal 2019. The Air Force is buying the F-15EX to replace the F-15C/D, as the most expeditious way to replace capacity in its fighter fleet. The bulk of the F-15C/D fleet dates back to the 1980s and early 1990s.

The F-15E’s MC rate also fell, from 71.29 percent to 69.21 percent.

The F-16C and D fleets averaged MC rates of 73.90 percent and 72.11 percent, respectively; improving on the fiscal ’19 rates of 72.97 and 70.37 percent, respectively.

The F-22A scored only a slight improvement in fiscal 2020 over the previous year, with a rate of 51.98 percent versus 50.57 percent in FY’19. The Air Force recently signaled that it will begin phasing out the F-22 circa 2030 due to the small size of the fleet and its labor-intensive low observable systems.

The A-10, which is undergoing a re-winging program, scored an MC rate of 72.04 percent, a slight uptick from fiscal 2019’s 71.20 percent.

The Air Force was not immediately able to provide specifics as to why its MC rates had shifted.

Then-Defense Secretary Jim Mattis directed the Air Force to reach an 80 percent MC rate on its F-15, F-16, and F-35 fleets by 2016, but the service did not achieve that goal, and has since assessed mission capability in broader terms pertaining to unit readiness.

Guard Prepares to Quit Capitol, 5 Months After January Riot

May 24, 2021 | By Amy Hudson

The National Guard’s mission in Washington, D.C., is coming to an end, the Pentagon announced.

“These Airmen and Soldiers protected not only the grounds, but the lawmakers working on those grounds, ensuring the people’s business could continue unabated,” Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III said in a statement. “They lived out in very tangible ways the oath they took to support and defend the Constitution.”

More than 25,000 Guard members from all 54 states and territories deployed to the nation’s capital following the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol, which left five people dead and delayed the counting of electoral votes, the final step to ratifying the 2020 presidential election. Pentagon spokesman John F. Kirby said on May 24 there are still about 1,000 Guard members in the Capital but could not say how soon they would all go home.

Although the Pentagon has extended the deployment several times at the request of various agencies—the U.S. Park Police, U.S. Secret Service, Capitol Police, and Washington, D.C., Metropolitan Police—the number of troops deployed to the region has steadily declined. With no additional requests to extend, the dwindling number will gradually drop to zero.

House leaders released a $1.9 billion security supplemental earlier this month that would give the District of Columbia Air National Guard $200,000 to set up a quick-reaction force that would stand ready to respond to threats to Capitol Hill. The QRF was one of the recommendations made during a security review of the Capitol, led by retired Lt. Gen. Russel Honoré, earlier this year.

But the Pentagon has no plan to put in place a quick reaction force right now, Kirby said, explaining that the Pentagon is still reviewing recommendations made by Honoré and his team.

“It’s been a trying but telling year for the National Guard,” Austin said. “Between natural disasters, civil unrest, and an ongoing pandemic, our Guardsmen and women have been tested time and time again. And each time, they have performed magnificently. So magnificently, in fact, that it would be all too easy to take their service— and that of their incredible families—for granted,” he continued. “We won’t do that, of course, because we know we will continue to call on them in times of need. As these troops depart for home and a much-deserved reunion with loved ones, I hope they do so knowing how much the nation appreciates their service and sacrifice—and that of their families and employers. I hope they know how very proud we are of them.”

F-16s Could Still be Flying Into the 2070s

May 23, 2021 | By John A. Tirpak

Based on Lockheed Martin’s backlog of F-16 orders, planned upgrades, and the recent revelation that the Air Force plans to depend on the fighter into the late 2030s, the F-16’s sunset years now could come in the 2070s, or later.

Lockheed Martin’s backlog of 128 F-16s—all for foreign military sales—won’t all be delivered until 2026, and the company anticipates more orders may be coming. With a potential service life of 40 years or more, those jets could be flying into the late 2060s or later. The type first entered service in the 1970s.

“There are 25 nations operating F-16s today,” said Col. Brian Pearson, Air Force Life Cycle Management Center lead for F-16 FMS, in a May 17 press release. Lockheed’s Greenville, S.C., F-16 manufacturing and upgrade facility, which will start turning out new F-16s in 2022, “helps us meet the global demand” for F-16 aircraft, he said. Lockheed moved its F-16 work from Fort Worth, Texas, in 2019 to make room there for expanded F-35 production.

Since the new line opened, AFLCMC’s security assistance and cooperation directorate “has seen an uptick of our partner nations requesting detailed information and requests for U.S. government sales,” said Col. Anthony Walker, senior materiel leader in the international division.

The 128 jets are for Bahrain, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Taiwan, and another country the company declined to name, although Croatia and the Philippines have been mentioned as customers. These aircraft will be in the Block 70/72 configuration, which includes new radar, displays, conformal fuel tanks, and other improvements over the Block 50/52 version, the most recent flown by USAF. Lockheed is building F-16s at a rate of about four per month at Greenville.

India is also considering buying an advanced F-16 version Lockheed has dubbed the “F-21,” which Lockheed touts as having a 12,000-hour service life; roughly 50 percent more than the ones the USAF flies. At normal utilization, 12,000 hours is about 32 years of service. India would produce those jets indigenously. India is looking to buy 114 fighters, and Lockheed is partnered with Tata to build the jets if it wins the competition.

Gregory M. Ulmer, Lockheed’s vice president for aeronautics, told reporters in February the company sees a potential for 300 additional F-16 sales not yet on the books, some of which will be to “repeat” customers.

The increased foreign interest may be related to the USAF’s hints over the last two years that it will continue to fly the F-16 beyond previous plans, thus reassuring customers that the parts and support pipeline for a large number of aircraft will persist.

Those hints turned more concrete in recent days. Talking points drawn up for USAF Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. about the service’s future fighter force plans, obtained by Air Force Magazine, indicate the Air Force expects that “600+ late-block F-16s will provide affordable capacity for the next 15+ years,” in both competitive and permissive combat environments. These aircraft will in fact be the USAF’s “capacity force,” the documents say, and will serve as a “rheostat,” meaning their total number can be adjusted up or down depending on the success of the F-35 program and a separate F-16 replacement now known as the Multi-Role-X.

The Air Force considers “competitive” to mean airspace that is reasonably well defended by aircraft and surface-to-air systems. “Highly competitive” and “denied” airspace would only be penetrable by fifth-gen and sixth-gen aircraft with extremely low observable qualities.

Although the fiscal year 2022 budget request, to be released May 28, will reveal some details of the Air Force’s new force structure plans, Brown said at the recent McAleese and Associates defense conference that the meat of the plan will be spelled out in the fiscal ’23 budget.

In the near-term, the USAF plans the divestiture of all the F-16 “pre-blocks” of aircraft, meaning all those that remain in its inventory of the Block 15-25-30 versions.

Lockheed received an indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract in January worth up to $64.3 billion for production of new F-16s for FMS customers, as well as upgrades of 405 jets in foreign hands to the F-16V configuration, which is similar to the F-21 model proposed to India. These modifications will include “new radar and other upgrades to make them similar to the aircraft that will come off the production line,” AFLCMC’s release said.

The large omnibus contract creates a baseline F-16 configuration for all future production, with the Air Force acting as the agent for FMS customers. Each country will sign a separate contract for unique or custom equipment they want on their particular jets. An Air Force official said the arrangement “simplifies and accelerates” the FMS process for countries wanting to buy the F-16, “so we can get it into their hands faster than has been the case in recent years.” The approach is needed because of the increased expected demand for the airplane, he said. It also reduces the cost of the jet by allowing vendors to make larger, more economic quantities of parts and structural components. The work will also integrate the Joint Mission Planning System/Mission Planning Environment software update.

The contract specifically mentioned work for Bahrain, Bulgaria, Chile, Columbia, Croatia, Egypt, Greece, India, Indonesia, Jordan, Morocco, Korea, Oman, Pakistan, the Philippines, Poland, Romania, Singapore, Slovenia, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates.

Japan flies an F-16 variant, called the F-2, but it performs all work on that type.

More than 4,550 F-16s have been delivered to the U.S. and allied countries since the 1970s. The late Michele A. Evans, Ulmer’s predecessor as Lockheed VP for aeronautics, said in September 2020, the company sees a possibility “of getting up to 5,000” F-16s built. She also said the company views the F-16 as an entrée to its F-35, for countries that are not yet ready to adopt the fifth-generation fighter, but may wish to later.

Brig. Gen. Dale R. White, the USAF’s program executive officer for fighters and advanced aircraft, called the F-16 an “enduring, highly capable compact fighter that will have a large role in many partner nations’ security for years to come.”

Congress Questions if All Costs Considered in U.S. Space Command Basing Decision

May 21, 2021 | By Amanda Miller

Some members of Congress are questioning whether the Air Force truly took all costs into consideration when making the decision to relocate U.S. Space Command from Colorado to Alabama.

Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-Colorado Springs) asked the commander of U.S. Space Command Army Gen. James H. Dickinson on April 21 whether the cost of building a “secure” or “survivable” communications infrastructure—something already in place in Colorado Springs—had factored into the choice.

Colorado Springs has long been a hub of DOD’s space operations, and several of the state’s elected officials have objected to the basing decision in which the DOD invited communities to nominate themselves to host the headquarters. Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs was one of the six finalists, and Colorado officials have since said they think the choice was politically motivated and due diligence was lacking in the search.

The DAF led the search process, which is now the subject of two investigations: one by the Defense Department Office of Inspector General and one by the Government Accountability Office.

During an April 21 House Armed Services strategic forces posture hearing Lamborn suggested that building a new communications infrastructure could cost $1 billion, and asked whether that had been accounted for in the Air Force’s decision.

Dickinson acknowledged the current infrastructure at the provisional headquarters at Peterson “is satisfying the mission requirement now” and “if we are directed to move, that that type of infrastructure would be built.” He didn’t address the cost or whether it was taken into account in the search.

Then on May 18, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Florida), chair of the House Appropriations military construction, veterans affairs, and related agencies subcommittee, asked for a “total cost estimate” for the headquarters relocation, “how many fiscal years that would take, and also did the Air Force take into consideration relocating the required infrastructure and network nodes?”

Air Force Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Installations, Environment, and Energy Jennifer L. Miller described the cost estimates made for each location as “general,” did not address specific infrastructure other than buildings, and did not provide the estimated duration.

She said that in the department’s general estimates, the cost to locate the headquarters at Redstone Arsenal was $100 million less than at Peterson.

“When we narrowed down the six, we sent out a site survey team to each of the six candidate locations to validate each of the data that we pulled in advance against the square footage required,” Miller said. She said members of the Space Force’s Space Operations Command had to move off base at Peterson to make room for the command and described the associated leases as “high cost.”

Wasserman Schultz replied, “I appreciate your response but continue to be concerned about the way the entire process was handled, and I look forward to the IG report.” The DOD’s IG announced in February that it would investigate how well the Air Force “complied with DOD and Air Force policies during the location selection process” and whether it used relevant and fair scoring for costs and other factors.

Meanwhile, at the request of Lamborn, Congress’ Government Accountability Office agreed in March to investigate the decision-making process and “matters related to the methodology and scoring” that led to the selection of Redstone.

The Air Force started the search process in 2019, announced a first round of six finalists, then started over again in 2020 while never explaining why. This has led Colorado’s members of Congress to suspect then-President Donald J. Trump of intervening as a political favor heading into the 2020 presidential election.

The Air Force said at the time of Redstone Arsenal’s selection that Huntsville scored highest in “factors related to mission, infrastructure capacity, community support, and costs to the Department of Defense.”

The DAF did not immediately respond to Air Force Magazine’s query on whether the cost of the communication infrastructure was taken into account.

ABMS, in New Phase, Prepares To Start Fielding

May 21, 2021 | By Amy Hudson

The Air Force is ready to start buying some of the technology that will make up the Advanced Battle Management System, moving the program from theory into development.

“Nearly two years of rigorous development and experimentation have shown beyond a doubt the promise of ABMS,” Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. said in a May 21 release. “We’ve demonstrated that our ABMS efforts can collect vast amounts of data from air, land, sea, space, and cyber domains; process that information; and share it in a way that allows for faster and better decisions.”

ABMS, which was conceived as a replacement for the canceled E-8 Joint STARS recapitalization program, is envisioned as a network of sensors and connected technologies intended to promote rapid data sharing among a plethora of weapon systems. ABMS is really a new way of fighting that will provide the “backbone of a network-centric approach to battle management.”

Brig. Gen. Jeffery D. Valenzia is director of Joint Force Integration and head of the cross-functional team responsible for establishing the manpower, resources, and doctrinal infrastructure for the ABMS program. “Command and control is as timeless as warfare,” Valenzia said. “As the character of war changes, so, too, does the art and science of C2. In a data-dependent and data-saturated world, victory belongs to the side with decision superiority—the ability to sense, make sense of a complex and adaptive environment, and act smarter, faster, and better.”

Under this next ABMS phase, the Department of the Air Force’s Rapid Capabilities Office will begin to field and install equipment and software on existing military aircraft, beginning with new communications “pods” for the KC-46 Pegasus tanker. In effect, these will become an airborne hotspot connecting USAF’s fifth-generation F-22 and F-35 fighters so they can communicate with each other in real time.

Will Roper, who was then USAF’s assistant secretary of acquisition, predicted in December that the KC-46 pod was the most likely ABMS capability to be deployed soon. And, Air Mobility Command boss Gen. Jacqueline D. Van Ovost alluded to a new concept of operations for tankers, now dubbed “Capability Release #1,” during an April virtual event hosted by AFA’s Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies. “Why wouldn’t we change the calculus by doing different things, moving away from the antiquated view that AMC just brings stuff when they’re called … to be a maneuver force inside the threat ring?” Van Ovost asked.

In addition to outfitting the KC-46 with the communications pod, Randy Walden, program executive officer for the Rapid Capabilities Office, said the department is gearing up a host of other new digital capabilities.

“To build ABMS, you must first build the digital structures and pathways over which critical data is stored, computed, and moved,” he said in the release. “The Department of the Air Force needs a smart, fast, and resilient ‘system of systems’ to establish information and decision superiority, and ABMS will be that solution.”

The Air Force will invest $170 million this fiscal year in ABMS and wants to ramp up funding over the next five years.

But lawmakers remain skeptical. “While the committee continues to support the Air Force’s new approach to command and control, the committee notes that the ABMS requirements and acquisition strategy remain unclear,” wrote members of the Senate Appropriations Committee in November 2020.

The Air Force department’s 2022 budget request, expected out next week, may add clarity to its investment plans. Senate appropriators last year directed the Air Force to “submit [with its 2022 budget request] a report summarizing all related programs in communications, battle management command and control, and sensors that fall within the ABMS umbrella across the future years defense program.”

The Air Force has said the first phase of the ABMS program would last into the early 2020s, but Congress also wants a more specific timeline for when the program will reach initial operational capability.

Program managers emphasized in the May 21 release that “the goal is speed and utility,” falling in line with Brown’s directive to “accelerate change or lose.” As such, whenever possible, components of ABMS will be derived from commercially available technology, requiring a close working relationship with industry. As of late last year, there were nearly 100 companies involved in the program.

“This ability gives us a clear advantage, and it’s time to move ABMS forward so we can realize and ultimately use the power and capability it will provide,” Brown said in the release.

2 Key Defense Studies Focus on Science, Tech, and Diversity

May 21, 2021 | By Amy Hudson

The Defense Department must invest in its science and technology enterprise if it hopes to maintain an advantage over peer adversaries, and two reports due out this summer will outline exactly how it plans to accomplish that, DOD’s chief technology officer told House legislators.

The master plan for research, development, test, and evaluation infrastructure is due to Congress by June 30. It will include a summary of science and technology infrastructure across the department and highlight existing and emerging military RDT&E missions and the modernization investments needed for each.

The second report, due Aug. 31, will assess diversity in the department’s research and engineering workforce, said Barbara McQuiston, acting undersecretary of defense for research and engineering, during a May 20 House Armed Services cyber, innovative technologies, and information systems subcommittee.

Both reports were mandated by the fiscal 2020 National Defense Authorization Act, which directed the Defense Secretary to work with the services to compile the scopes of work, cost, priority level, schedule, and plan for each project. Congress also sought answers on what policy barriers could be holding back RDT&E plans.

In assessing the DOD’s research and engineering workforce, Congress wants to understand the proportion of women and minorities currently employed; the effectiveness of existing hiring, recruitment, and retention incentives for women and minorities; and the effectiveness of recruiting and retention programs in DOD labs once those individuals have completed initial DOD-funded “research, programs, grant projects, fellowships, and STEM programs,” according to the legislation.

Great power competition, in particularly with China, is driving Congress’ and the Pentagon’s interest in research and development, covering a range of technologies from energy and microelectronics to hypersonic weapons and digital engineering. One technology of particular interest to all is artificial intelligence, which was the subject of a massive study completed late last year by the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence. McQuiston said DOD is still reviewing the recommendations, which include creating programs for developing DOD’s own AI specialists, but also enabling those in the private sector to become involved in part-time service, along the lines of the National Guard or Air Force Reserve.

“There is a lot more work that needs to be done, especially in STEM, [and] in science education and in recruitment and diversity of the workforce,” said McQuiston.

F-15EX Wins Some, Loses Some in Northern Edge

May 20, 2021 | By John A. Tirpak

The F-15EX both shot down some adversaries and was shot down itself during the recent Northern Edge wargame in Alaska, and work is underway to analyze the results of its first appearance in the major force exercise, according to a test pilot who participated.

Statistics such as the mission capable rates of the aircraft have not yet been tabulated, but the jets flew a combined 33 sorties during the exercise from April 28-May 14.

The two first-of-their-kind F-15EXs—being used for concurrent operational and developmental test—played in Northern Edge only two weeks after they were delivered to the Air Force. The goal was to see if they could play the part now met in the Combat Air Forces by the F-15C plus add some capability to that mission, according to Lt. Col. John O’Rear of the 84th Test and Evaluation Squadron.

Among the test points were how the F-15EXs could integrate with F-15Cs as well as larger forces, including fifth-generation F-22s and F-35s, O’Rear said.

“We flew them with two-ships of F-15C models, two-ships of F-15E models, … two-ships of EXs supporting other fourth-gen [flights], and integrating with the F-22 and F-35,” he said.

Though the F-15EXs “tallied some kills while they were up there,” O’Rear acknowledged there were also some losses.

“If you go into any large force exercise and you come back with everybody—with no blue losses—I would probably say that your threat is not as robust as it needs to be, in order to get the learning,” he said. Northern Edge was meant to be a multi-service exercise against a near-peer threat having some low-observable capabilities.

Although O’Rear couldn’t speak to the incidents where the F-15EXs were shot down, “in this kind of environment, most of your blue ‘deaths’ are probably going to be outside of visual range, just because of the threat we’re replicating,” he said. Visual range dogfights are “not something that happens a whole bunch.”

The jets also exercised the Eagle Passive Active Warning Survivability System, an electronic warfare suite meant to buy the jet more survivability against modern threats. It was the second wargame outing for the EPAWSS, after a Black Flag exercise In December 2020 at Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada.

“We’re still gathering data” on how the EPAWSS performed, but the initial, “anecdotal” results “look promising,” O’Rear said. “In general, it’s looking like it was on track for what we were expecting to see” at Northern Edge.

The exercises pitted about 50 Red team aircraft against a like number of Blue forces, he said. The EPAWSS “was able to integrate in a large force environment with multiple sources of … radio frequency being transmitted across the airspace … It was able to process that.”

In addition to the self-protection features of EPAWSS, a test point was to see if it could help stealthy F-22 and F-35s operating in proximity. The additional jamming “can help the F-35 get closer to the adversary,” O’Rear said. “The more clutter, the more electronic attack you have out there, the more difficult it is for enemy sensors to work through that.” The EPAWSS was able to integrate with “a coordinated electronic attack throughout the force package.”

The exercise also imposed severe jamming of communications and Global Positioning System data, compelling pilots to operate around those limitations and rely on “contracts” with other USAF aircraft, aircraft from other services, and ground fires to “be where they’re supposed to be” at the appointed time, O’Rear explained.

The F-15EX has “full air-to-ground capabilities,” but those were not exercised in the wargame, he said. “The EX’s primary goal was to go up there and execute the current C-model mission.” It performed air dominance as well as homeland defense missions, he said.

The threat was meant to be one ”where we don’t have the ability to go out … and take zero losses,” he said.

The point “is not winning every match. It’s to learn where our weaknesses are and how we mitigate those capability gaps,” added O’Rear.

In connecting with other-service assets in a “degraded ops environment,” he said, “we saw a lot of places where we’re doing really well, and places where we need some work.” Alternative communication methods included Link 16 and “gateway options” in which an interpreter aircraft translates the special waveforms of stealth aircraft to each other and fourth-gen aircraft. There was “redundancy and effectiveness across the entire force package,” he said.

Capabilities that the F-15EX adds to the F-15C are its fly-by-wire system; two extra weapon stations—which O’Rear said was “pretty impressive” in the overall mix—an updated cockpit with touch-screen color displays; EPAWSS and advanced radar capabilities.

“I’m a big fan of the touch screen,” he said.

Planning for the F-15EX’s participation in Northern Edge started more than a year ahead of time, he said—long before the aircraft were delivered, or even built.

“We set the milestones” for the EX test program “over a year ago,” he said. The test team looked at whether they thought they could be ready in time, but inserting the EX into a large-force exercise—the next one won’t happen for two years—was an opportunity too valuable to pass up, he said. The EXs were used to evaluate new tactics and techniques as well as being put through their paces.

Northern Edge is different from a Red Flag, O’Rear explained.

“You have the option to use baseline tactics, but the emphasis is not just getting upgrades for [Combat Air Forces] wingmen and flight leads. It’s to go out there and do high-end tests in a high-end, highly-contested, and degraded environment, and to see if the new tactics we’re developing are helpful or a hindrance.”

The F-15EX has been touted as being capable of carrying and launching “outsize” air-to-air and air-to-ground munitions, but none of these was exercised, even in simulated form, during the event. However, a B-52 involved in the wargame launched a simulated AGM-183 Air-launched Rapid Response hypersonic missile during the exercise.

Another lesson re-learned, O’Rear said, is that the various services have a different language that must be learned to properly coordinate. “Everybody has their own doctrinal language,” he said.

DOD: As Covid-19 Threat Persists, Vaccines Grow More Crucial

May 20, 2021 | By Amy Hudson

Senior military leaders are stepping up efforts to encourage service members to get vaccinated against COVID-19, even as the Defense Department rolls back mask mandates and other regulations.

“The greatest proximate challenge to our nation’s security is coronavirus disease 2019 [COVID-19],” wrote Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen H. Hicks and Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Air Force Gen. John E. Hyten in a May 20 memo to the force. “The Secretary directed the department to act ‘boldly and quickly’ to defend the force against the disease, and we thank you for taking action to do so. But, the threat of COVID-19 to our nation and our allies and partners has not yet abated.”

Since the beginning of the pandemic, more than 285,000 DOD personnel have been diagnosed with the disease and nearly 350 have died as a result. As of May 20, just 29 DOD personnel were hospitalized with COVID-19—the fewest since June 12, 2020, according to Army Lt. Gen. Ronald J. Place, director of the Defense Health Agency, in a May 20 briefing with reporters.

Some 44 percent of the Active-duty force is now fully vaccinated, and 58 percent have received at least one dose. That’s up from a month ago, when 37 percent of Active-duty service members had received at least one dose, Place said. Since April 19, all DOD personnel, along with their beneficiaries, have been eligible for vaccination.

DOD Vaccination Data

	Army	Marine Corps	Navy	Air Force	Service Member Total*	DOD Civilian **
Partially vaccinated	195,195	22,357	43,877	49,298	310,727	63,029
Fully vaccinated	220,154	75,140	223,876	204,200	723,370	235,177

*Space Force data is accounted for in Air Force. **DOD civilian data includes federal employees who received vaccinations through DOD providers or self-reported that they have been vaccinated. (As of 5 a.m. May 19, 2021; Defense Department data)

“Vaccination is critical to defending against COVID-19,” Hicks and Hyten wrote in the memo. “Used together with testing, hand washing, and other mitigation measures, vaccination can prevent people from getting COVID-19 and keep them from getting seriously ill if they do get the disease.”

The DOD memo encourages commanders to educate troops about the safety and effectiveness of the three vaccines authorized for use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. “One initiative that has significantly increased vaccination rates is ensuring that personnel who are uncertain about whether to be vaccinated are able to speak with medical professionals about the benefits of vaccination and the risks of getting COVID-19,” the memo states. “These opportunities enable individuals to ask questions and build confidence before making the choice to get vaccinated.”

Terry Adirim, acting assistant defense secretary for health affairs, said the department is not tracking individuals who decline the vaccine, adding that the rates of members declining likely “reflects what we’re seeing out in the civilian sector.” Adirim said there are no plans to make the vaccine mandatory for DOD personnel for now, while the vaccines are under provisional emergency licenses, but that could happen once the vaccines are fully licensed by the FDA.

When asked if DOD is close to reaching herd immunity, Price reiterated that COVID-19 remains a threat.

“The fact that we’re still having infections every single day in the hundreds, and the fact that we still have 29 people in the hospital, that’s 29 too many,” he said. “So, no, I don’t think we’ve reached a point where our efforts need to stop. Our efforts stop when we’ve eliminated people dying from disease. Our efforts stop when we’ve eliminated people being admitted to the hospital for this disease. Our efforts stop when this stops being a negative aspect to the way that commanders do commander business. I don’t think we’re close to that yet, so that’s why the efforts at every level of the department are still here.”

Latest Small Business Tech Contracts Include Airborne AI, VR Training

May 20, 2021 | By Amanda Miller

Recent Department of the Air Force Small Business Innovation Research contracts include technology research and development projects ranging from artificial intelligence to edge computing to augmented reality.

As one of 11 federal departments that take part in the Small Business Innovation Research program, the Defense Department funds research and development by U.S. companies with fewer than 500 employees with the intent of speeding up the creation of “promising technologies that can help the Air Force accomplish its mission,” according to the Air Force’s SBIR website.

Phase I awards are usually $50,000 to $250,000, for either six months or a year, to give the company a chance to prove the idea’s “merit, feasibility, and commercial potential,” according to SBIR.gov. Phase II awards are usually $750,000 for two years. Phase III awards are to help the companies transition their SBIR-funded research and development into commercial products that may, in turn, become part of the defense supply chain. Phase III awards can’t be funded with dollars set aside for SBIRs—that money has to come from mission budgets or the private sector.

“We have bolstered our relationship with nontraditional industry since partnering AFWERX with our Small Business Innovation Research Center of Excellence. We have awarded over 2,000 contracts worth $700 million dollars to 1,400 small businesses with over 75 percent of these being new partners to the Air Force,” Kristen Baldwin, deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force for science, technology, and engineering, told members of the House Armed Services subcommittee on cyber, innovative technologies, and information systems May 20. “Our SBIR contracts are also attracting matching funds, and performers are receiving follow-on investments at a ratio of $5 for every SBIR dollar that we invest.”

The SBIR program hasn’t yet posted all the recent awards on its website. Meanwhile, the Air Force’s latest solicitations for ideas are almost entirely in the area of artificial intelligence.

From AI in the sky to augmented reality for flight, a roundup of some recent award announcements:

Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence company SparkCognition Government Services of Austin, along with partner Intrinsic Enterprises, received an award to study “how AI can be used to optimize training programs and improve overall mission readiness,” according to a May 12 news release.

“Through this contract, we’re exploring how to use skill and augment team members for the mission at hand—particularly in the case of improving pilot training,” said Logan Jones, SGS president and general manager, in the release.

Airborne Machine Learning

Intelligent Artifacts of New York received a Phase I award to conduct research and development in pursuit of “airborne machine learning that meets strict technical standards for safety in aviation,” according to an April 22 release that did not include the contract amount. “One of the most difficult hurdles in satisfying aviation safety standards is the ability to trace predictions back to source data.” Te company’s new category of “traceable machine learning” does just that, CEO Nick Cianciolo said in the release.

Edge Computing in Space

Loft Orbital of San Francisco received $750,000 under a Phase 2 contract through the Space and Missile Systems Center to build and test a prototype of a satellite data processor. The contract doesn’t cover a launch, but Brian Bone, Loft Orbital’s director of federal business development, told Air Force Magazine the company may independently pay to put the processor into space. Another $750,000 in private matching funds rounds out the total $1.5 million project.

Bone described Loft Orbital’s business model as “mission agnostic” and “space infrastructure as a service.” The company arranges through a network of third parties the satellite buses—which have become so “commoditized” Bone now considers them a “supply chain item”—as well as mission payloads and launches.

With an edge processor onboard, a satellite could start processing data before sending it on to a cloud, sorting through images of ships at sea, for example, to identify cruise ships, tankers, or fishing vessels. Or a fleet of military ships crossing the Taiwan Strait, Bone said.

Digital Engineering

Raft LLC of Reston, Virginia, received two Phase II contracts through AFWERX for automated software development and hardware-in-the-loop pipelines, according to a May 17 release.

The awards are meant to accelerate the goals of the Department of the Air Force’s Platform One cloud software development platform. “These pipelines will increase the availability and value of data generated by sensors and operational equipment in both connected and air-gapped environments,” according to the release.

Supply Chain Security

Eclypsium of Portland, Oregon, received a Phase I SBIR through AFWERX to demonstrate whether its “enterprise device security platform” could protect against “vulnerabilities and threats hidden within devices,” according to a May 7 release, which did not provide the contract amount.

“With ongoing supply chain attacks burying deep into critical information technology assets, little-known firmware and hardware components stand as some of the highest impact, most unguarded threats facing modeling organizations,” according to the release.

Respiratory Monitoring

Linshom of Baltimore received a $748,000 Phase 2 SBIR through the Air Force to “advance sensor, software, and monitor technology” for a dual-purpose device to “practically deliver a respiratory profile to the patient bedside” with information including the patient’s respiratory rate, tidal volume, inspiratory/expiratory ration, minute ventilation, and rapid-shallow breathing index,” according to an April 29 news release.

“Dual purpose” refers to the applicability of the technology in the private sector as well as in the military. “Lack of comprehensive, portable and inexpensive continuous respiratory monitoring at the patient’s bedside is a major gap in clinical care as the vast majority of complications (75 percent) have a respiratory component,” according to the release. Battlefield uses may also prove feasible.

Immersive Flight Training

GridRaster of Mountain View, California, received an award through the Air Force for “large scale hyper-realistic immersive simulations and training of pilots and support crew,” according to a May 6 release, which included neither the contract phase nor amount.

“The traditional pilot training environment is significantly expensive, not flexible, offline, not easily scalable, and comes with inherent risks,” according to the release. Augmented reality and virtual reality, on the other hand, “can be even more effective as it provides a near real-world combat operation environment.”

Augmented Reality Platform

BUNDLAR of Chicago received a Phase I contract through AFWERX to study a “no-code solution to create, edit, and access” augmented reality, according to an April 29 release that did not include the contract amount.

Editor’s Note: The story headline was updated at 10:40 a.m. on May 21. The awards are contracts, not grants.