Civil Air Patrol Moves into Second Year of Continuous COVID-19 Relief Support

Civil Air Patrol Moves into Second Year of Continuous COVID-19 Relief Support

The Civil Air Patrol on March 24 marked a full year of continuous support for COVID-19 pandemic relief, delivering thousands of vaccine vials, thousands of test samples, and millions of meals across the United States.

CAP, the Air Force’s auxiliary, aligned with First Air Force for Defense Support of Civil Authorities missions to help domestic missions. COVID-19 relief is the CAP’s biggest mission in more than 70 years.

“These missions are making a big difference in our local communities, our states, and our nation,” said Maj. Gen. Mark Smith, CAP’s national commander and chief executive officer, in a release. “Over 41,000 volunteer days have been logged in our biggest endeavor since World War II. On top of that, volunteers and staff have innovated to conquer pandemic-imposed roadblocks to ensure we get the business of CAP done.”

As of March 24, CAP has delivered:

  • 2,803 units of blood
  • 8,209,955 meals
  • 1,154,681 pounds of food
  • More than 2.6 million masks
  • 177,407 test kits
  • 116,792 test samples
  • 7,493 vials of vaccine

While the pandemic forced CAP to shut down most of its regular on-site activities for much of the pandemic, 75 percent of its 52 wings are in the second of a three-phase remobilization process.

On March 24, as CAP marked the anniversary of support, seven wings conducted missions including providing support at vaccine distribution locations, collecting blood, and delivering personal protective equipment, among others, according to the release. 

Watch & Read: AFA Shares Videos, Transcripts from virtual Aerospace Warfare Symposium

Watch & Read: AFA Shares Videos, Transcripts from virtual Aerospace Warfare Symposium

Video recordings from this year’s virtual Aerospace Warfare Symposium are now free to watch, featuring Acting Secretary John P. Roth, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr., and Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. Jay Raymond in conversation with famed astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson.

Complete transcripts are also available for the sessions above as well as these two panel discussions:  

  • “The Guardians We Need,” with Space Force Vice Chief of Space Operations Gen. David D. Thompson and Chief Master Sergeant of the Space Force Roger Towberman
  • The enlisted perspective with Senior Enlisted Advisor to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Ramón Colón-López, Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force JoAnne S. Bass, and Towberman

Also available: mission domain engagement sessions focused on munitions, electronic warfare, hypersonics, autonomous systems, and joint all-domain command and control and the Advanced Battle Management System.

More sessions will be released over the coming days. Check Air Force Magazine’s vAWS 2021 page for the latest releases.

Watch, Read: CSAF’s Fireside Chat with Mackenzie Eaglen

Watch, Read: CSAF’s Fireside Chat with Mackenzie Eaglen

Watch the video or read the transcript of the fireside chat with Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr., Chief of Staff of the Air Force; and Mackenzie Eaglen, resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, during AFA’s 2021 virtual Aerospace Warfare Symposium.

AFA Chairman of the Board Gerald R. Murray: “It’s my pleasure today to introduce the Chief of Staff the United States Air Force, Gen. [Charles]. Q. Brown [Jr.]. Gen. Brown’s vision of accelerate change or lose is seen throughout this week’s symposium. His action order calls for the Air Force to speed up its decision making processes. It emphasizes the importance of understanding the strategic power competitions between the US, Russia, and China. And it states that the service must be ready for future budget constraints by developing affordable, analytical, defensible, and congressionally supported for structure. Joining Gen. Brown to moderate this fireside chat is Mackenzie Eaglen. She is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where she works on defense strategy, defense budgets, and military readiness. General Brown and Mackenzie, over to you.”

Mackenzie Eaglen: “Good morning, Chief. How are you feeling today?

Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr.: “I’m doing great.”

Eaglen: “Thank you for joining us today, and all of our viewers. It’s a pleasure to be with you. I’m going to jump right in and talk about the most important, I think, priority for any Chief, which are people, and Airmen and their families in particular. I think there’s a shared consensus in Washington about there being a window of opportunity to address a variety of social challenges confronting America, but particularly the United States military in particular. We know that the Secretary of Defense has ordered a stand down of 60 days to talk about extremism, racism, and diversity in particular. We know that some active and former service members participated in the capital riots on January 6. And of course, I don’t need to remind you that you’re the first black Chief, you’re making history in the job. You’ve spoken up after the death of George Floyd, you’ve talked about having sons in your, in their 20s. And so I’m wondering if you can talk about specific ideas, you know, you’re in the job less than a year now. You’ve been handed a full plate. Can we start with extremism and racism in particular, and your thoughts on what you can do that’s tangible going forward?”

Brown: “Sure. Well, first of all, I appreciate you being with me today, Mackenzie. It’s a real pleasure. What I often think, and I’ve thought about this really, throughout my career: It’s the oath I took when I first came in. As a matter of fact, as a freshman at Texas Tech, the first night I had to take an oath when I got my ROTC scholarship. And then the oath I took when I got commissioned. My father commissioned me, and so it was pretty, pretty important, and following, you know, history of service. But it’s also our core values of the United States Air Force. And I really, I use that as my foundation to think about all these, these social factors that you’ve outlined. And I think about that for our Airmen as well, about what right looks like. And it’s us that, all of us that rose our right hand to take an oath to serve and support and defend our constitution of the United States against all enemies. And then our core values. And between the two of those, that really, as I said, sets the foundation. And then from there, I’d look at, I’m also, and I laid this out in ‘Accelerate change or lose,’ is the environment where all Airmen can reach their full potential. The Airmen and their families. And what, what detracts from our Airmen and their families from reaching their full potential are some of these social detractors, where there’s extremism, or racism, or racial disparity. And so as we look at extremism, so we have the stand down. And what I found over the course of the summer, normally with a stand down we’re going to need to do, and the stand down, less so with a stand down, but the conversation that happened over the course of the summer really opened some eyes. And not only did it open eyes, but it also gave an opportunity for those that may have felt a little bit oppressed, or didn’t really, their voices were oppressed, a chance to speak up. And so I think that’s probably valuable, because it actually allowed us an opportunity to identify that we do have a problem. And as good as we are as the United States Air Force, we still have the reflection of society, and in society, some of these things exist.

“With that, the steps we’re taking really on extremism piece, I think we’re in the first, first part of this. And there was a DOD Diversity and Inclusion Task Force led by former [Air Force] Secretary [Barbara M.] Barrett, and we had 15 different recommendations; the last two of the 15 were on extremism. And that report came out in late September. And so even before the events of January 6, this was already on the mind of the force, and it’s on, you know, even more so now, after the sixth. I’d also say, you know, the meaningful things we were able to do on racial disparity and racism is the independent review, racial disparity review that we completed and published back on 21 December, and there’s several steps in there. One, the culture, how we do our talent management and, and how we look at those aspects of how we take care of Airmen and families. And the last piece of that, you know, the first review was really focused on African Americans. Just this past week, we announced we’re going to do a second review that opens it a little more broadly to other ethnic groups and gender. I really wanted to, with Secretary Roth, Acting Secretary [John P.] Roth and Gen. [John W. “Jay”] Raymond, use that. You can’t judge improvement if you don’t know where you, where you are. And so part of this is to be able to use the first report and the second, the second report to kind of set a baseline, so we can actually have something, a benchmark, to start from, to ensure we’re going to improve. And that’s what my focus is, and putting in your various programs under review with our Diversity and Inclusion Council. I think all those are aspects that will help us improve. But I often think it takes leadership as well. It’s just not a good program. It takes some level of leadership and action by our Airmen, as well.”

Eaglen: “So, you just raised the Diversity and Inclusion Council specifically, and the task force, of course, as well, led by former Secretary Barrett. Can you share with the audience what you’ve learned from those findings, and if there’s any new ideas that can be implemented in the near term?”

Brown: “Well, as we went through… diversity and inclusion councils were being run by, Gen. [David] Goldfein started those, reenergized them, when I was still as the PACAF commander. And I was, as a senior African American officer, I was part of that council. Now I get a chance to help share that council. And what I found is, we we’ve moved from talking about demographics to actionable type items. We’ve stood up barrier analysis working groups that represent different diverse groups of our Air Force, and through that, they have a voice to feed information into us. And one really good example is women’s hair. The women’s initiative team, I mean, they had a full-out campaign. Photos, I mean, I got the complete package. And by the time I got the package, I go, so what else do I need to do, because you know, the staff was still going to staff through the package, but we got full … yeah, well, you know, ponytails and braids, they can go longer than we’ve done in the past. And that’s an example of where, you know, listening to our Airmen, hearing their voices, and be able to take action on those. And it’s addition to, how we take a look at the opportunities, and going back and looking at some of our, you know, for example, access to pilot training, or rated career fields, to look at the methodology we use. And one example that I was not aware of until a couple of years ago, is, for those that are trying to get a pilot slot, if you have private pilot time, that bumps your score. OK, and if you don’t have the money to do that, you may not have the opportunity to bump your score. I know for a fact, when I was in high school, my parents didn’t have money for me to get private pilot time. At the time, I wasn’t interested in being a pilot, but even if I was, that was going to be out of the question. And that may put some of our diverse backgrounds at a disadvantage. And, and I think those are areas we’re looking at, to change some of our policies, because we may be excluding different parts of our force, unknowingly, just because it’s a pattern, or something we’ve had in place for a number of years. And that’s been really the beauty of the summer and this review is, we’ve actually taken a look at some of these, and found that there may be some things in there that are actually preventing some of our Airmen, not from giving them the opportunity to give them advance like we want to give them, to reach their full potential.”

Eaglen: “Well, I sure am glad after your first semester in ROTC when you thought for a moment you might get out, that you stayed in. I‘ll just leave it at that. Now, are any of these points, particularly just pivoting quickly back to diversity and extremism, racism, excuse me, and extremism? Because I think this will come up again, in our question about sexual violence. If you think that the UCMJ is a viable path to address some of these issues, or for policymakers to amend the UCMJ?”

Brown: “That was, that was one of the recommendations. That was, I think, the 15th recommendation of the 15 I highlighted, to look at UCMJ. I think there are aspects of the Uniform Code of Military Justice that actually play into this. Good order and discipline. And if you have detractors in our organization that make it uncomfortable for you to come to work each day, that impacts good order and discipline. I do think we have to take a look at, you know, the definition of extremism. And that’s been a conversation as we get ready for our stand down. You know, how do you define it, and we’ve done some good work, we’re sending out to our leadership teams to help, when we have, working with the Office of Special Investigations. And a psychologist that actually outlines what it is, because there’s a little bit of a gray area there. And depending on where you know, where you stand, you may not see extremism, and you know, we want to be able to identify the characteristics of what extremism looks like. And so that, I mean, that’s important that we understand that. To go with UCMJ, to make any determination, or how you might use UCMJ and in make it stick it, if, in fact, extremism has been found inside the force.”

Eaglen: “I thought at his nomination hearing, Secretary of Defense [Lloyd] Austin’s story of being in the 82nd Airborne and experiencing it firsthand was powerful, and how it was sort of missed, you know, in the early stages.”

Brown: “And that’s the thing, particularly at a leadership level, you may be sheltered from some of this information, you just don’t see it. Or it’s kept in a low profile, and it spikes at a certain time and you get surprised, and that’s the point. We don’t want to get surprised.”

Eaglen: “Exactly, like any good boss. So, along these lines of, you know, health and well being of the force, you know, rising suicides a concerned in the Air Force, they’re a concern across the uniformed services. They’re even a concern in some cases, in the National Guard, depending on the service, and over the past two years, the number of Airmen dying by their own hands is rising. It’s something your predecessors also grappled with. The former Chief and Secretary, I remember running out to the Air Force Academy this time last year when there were two suicides in a week at the Academy, at the start of the, the pandemic. So this is obviously a challenge across your organization, but for you specifically, I know that you’re thinking about this. There was a stand down, ordered by your predecessor also to talk and address suicide and suicide prevention, and resiliency. So are you continuing what he started? Are you thinking differently about this? How can you make it better, particularly as the pandemic drags on for a whole year?”

Brown: “We are continuing. So the resiliency tactical pause, where we were able to allow kind of a one-day or stand down over a period of time, we’ve encouraged our units to continue to do those. And so part of this is team building, getting to know the Airmen that you work with. And how do you know if an Airman is having a, tough to know if an Airman is having a bad day if you don’t know him, you don’t spend time around him. It’s even more challenging in a pandemic, when you’re doing most of, some of these things virtually, you don’t have that same human connection. And so that is one part of it. The other is, from a prevention standpoint, is, we’ve taken some of our training and made it family friendly. And back in the fall, the intent was to actually get some training out, not make it with all the acronyms, all the, you know, military briefers, but really invite family members to some of our suicide awareness training, because they may be the first sensor in some cases. You know, a family member who spends a lot of time around somebody, knows them, and knows that there’s something that that’s bothering him, or eating at him. And you’re more, maybe more inclined to share, if you’re struggling with something, with a family member. And giving them the tools of who to call, what to bring, bring folks in. The other is, we started Operation Arc Care back in November. And it’s really a focus of all of our resiliency tools that we have across the Air Force, and we have a number of them. I think the challenge we have is, they may be spread out across the force. And so what we don’t want to have is an Airman who goes to office to office to office and then falls through the cracks because they get tired of trying to find help. And what I’ve asked our team to do as we do this, and we’re working to look across all our resiliency tools and agencies that support, and then, come April, we want to actually kind of figure out how we consolidate those. And some bases have already been able to do some of that. Then make that more universal across the force, so that we don’t have Airmen falling through the crack. And we make it easy. I told them, let’s think about the life of an, the day in the life of an Airman. If you had issues, how difficult would it be for you to actually go talk to somebody. If you’ve got to go through six steps to get there, you may give up after a couple steps. We don’t want to do that. We want to catch them on the first step. And this is why family members and, really, the rest of the folks they work with have to, the Airmen they work with. We need to know each other, and the better we know each other, the better we can be a sensor to prevent future suicide.”

Eaglen: “I agree with that. You need a battle buddy, so to speak. So returning again, briefly to the Uniform Code of Military Justice, I raised sexual violence. It’s something that has come up repeatedly in the confirmation hearings for Secretary Austin and now Deputy Secretary of Defense, Dr. Kathleen Hicks, members of the Senate raised this issue more than I think I’ve ever heard it come up on Capitol Hill. They’re advertising now to leaders in the Department that Congress is poised to go ahead and change the UCMJ as it specifically relates to sexual assault and sexual violence, saying, you know, basically, we’ve given you about a seven year window. You know, however many Chiefs ago, they said no, we want to keep the commander in, essentially, in the in the loop, in the decision making process when there are cases filed and complaints made. And Congress is not, they’re only seeing the numbers tick up. Men and women, of course, are victims of sexual violence. I think it’s probably underreported for both. But as of late, there have been some high-profile female murders and deaths, in particular, as a result of sexual violence. Obviously Vanessa Guillen at Fort Hood, but Senator [Mazie] Hirono, raising, the SASC hearing with Dr. Hicks about a Navy sailor who’d been found in a Dumpster, just that week prior. So it continues to happen, it’s not just at Ft. Hood. And you know, there have been a variety of surveys talking about this. So, I want to talk about how to help victims, but I first want to hear your thoughts on how to just prevent this, before there’s a victim. What do you think that can be done so that people don’t become victims? And then, of course, your thoughts on, is it finally, if Congress says, we are going to take the commanders’, we’re going to change the authority of commanders, your thoughts on that, if you have any?”

Brown: “Well, the most important thing, and we’ve, we focused on, you know, support to the victims, we’ve focused on accountability. I think we really need to increase our focus on prevention. And again, it goes to the environment where all can reach our full potential, and how do you take those detractors out of the, out of our units, and it really takes strong leadership. You know one of the things to think about is we can build a, you know, as I said, there’s a lot of good ideas that come out the Pentagon, not all the good ideas that come out of the Pentagon are good ideas when they get to the field, to our Airmen. And it really requires leadership. So I can, we can craft a very good program inside the Pentagon and feel good about ourselves. But it takes leadership at the lower level. And this is why the dialogue has to happen with our leadership of how best to do this, and with our Airmen. They’re most impacted by this, because they’ll give us good feedback. And that’s one of things I enjoy. When I travel, I usually have a lunch or a breakfast with Airmen, with a group of Airmen, and we spent time talking. And, you know, one of the areas that they highlighted to me was, they really, they just want their leadership to care. And if they care, then they will actually pay attention to these kinds of things and root it out before it happens. And so that’s important, I think the other thing that we, one of the areas we are doing to kind of assess, or at least help us better understand ourselves. And it started really in our basic military training, is an assessment. So you don’t have kind of a one-size-fits-all training, you really kind of talk to the Airmen, talk to them about their background, their previous experiences, and so you have more tailored training to better prepare them as we walk into these types of … to help prevent, because the bulk of our sexual assaults happens in that younger demographic, you know, 17 to 24. And the better we can prepare them, and the junior leadership above them, the better we can, we can actually prevent some of these from, from happening in the future.”

Eaglen: “So, the Secretary of Defense, he’s talked about the pacing threat is China, he talked about his about his priorities. And he’s talked about, you know, his priorities, including, you know, departmentally why, but also personally, and sort of as a department, it’s, you know, pandemic relief and response, it’s climate change, diversity and inclusion. But then personally, he’s talked about, of course, defending the nation broadly, taking care of people, and teamwork. And it seems coronavirus, though, is front and center, that even the White House wants more leadership and assistance from the Department of Defense. Obviously, it’s usually in a supporting role to state and federal and local authorities, but I’m wondering, you know, how the Air Force is doing, how you’d grade your service? And what changes do you see going forward for the Air Force, because, let’s say the pandemic recedes somewhat this year, and things get back to some sort of new normal or relatively new normal. What’s different because of COVID. I know in basic training, at boot camp, for example, the Marine Corps found that screening for all upper, for COVID has eliminated all upper respiratory infections from boot camp, so no one goes to sick call anymore. I would think that would be something you’d want to keep, right?”

Brown: “Well, you know, one thing the, since, really, about this time last year as we really started getting into pandemic, the beginning parts of a pandemic, the Air Force not only taking care of ourselves, but our Total Force being able to support, from a COVID perspective. My hat’s off to our, our medical professionals inside of our not just the Air Force, but across the Department of Defense, Total Force, because they really stepped, stepped forward. And, you know, as we walked into this, we all had pandemic plans, but not to this level. I don’t think any of us ever expected this, is 100 year event. And so my hat’s off to not only our medical officials, but really all our Airmen. Because we had, actually, we kept the mission going. And I’ve been asked the question, ‘What did you quit doing as an air force?’ I don’t know that we really quit doing anything, but we’re doing a lot of things differently. And, and that’s what I take away from this experience. Sometimes you have to have a, kind of a, somewhat catastrophic event. As tragic as COVID is, but it really helps us to reflect on how we do things day to day. And we’ll find there’s some things that we’re doing probably better than we were before, in some cases. But I also think there’s some stressors as well, particularly for our dual income, dual military families, small children, school-aged children. Those are factors that many of us, you know, weren’t thinking about just over a year ago. As I look to the future, you know, what I see is that at some point we’ll get past this, it’ll change, I think some of the dynamics that, how we work through things. But we’ve got to stay focused right now. And that’s, you know, as this new administration and new secretaries, defenses come in, are focused on COVID and COVID mitigation, in getting vaccines. As a matter of fact, I had my second vaccine on Friday, and, but we’re still gonna have to wear a mask, we’re still going to have to social distance. Because we have to get everybody to a point, not just in the United States, but you’ve really got to think of around the world. And so our focus has to continue.”

“The one thing I wanted to make sure we continue to do, though, is look at the things that we’re able to do differently. And let’s not gravitate to what we were doing before COVID and take a step backwards, particularly if it’s a positive step, that actually makes us better as an Air Force. And I think there are some areas that, you know, we’ve been innovative. And innovation is not all about technology, sometimes. You just think about our basic military training. We dipped a little bit, we opened up a second location, and we kept on going. We’ve been fairly successful to keep the bulk of the force safe. You know, we’ve had folks that have gotten, gotten COVID. But by and large, very, very few deaths from, from our Active-duty members, challenge maybe for some of our civilian force, and that that’s been disheartening. And uh, but we’ve got to continue to work through this and continue the mitigation going forward at the same time, thinking of new ways of how we would do our mission that will help us post-COVID.”

Eaglen: “I’m really glad you raised that, because sometimes it feels like—I’m a mother of four young children—and sometimes it feels like people making pandemic choices are not, don’t have young children in their home. Of course, the Department of Defense and its contractor work force are essential workers, right? You are as important as the grocery store clerk and the garbage man. And many ways, even in other ways as well. And yet what I, a lot of military families were raising concerns to Congress early in the pandemic saying we’re essential, and yet we don’t have child care. We need to go to work, and yet, how are we, if we’re not… I know that’s something that that’s been of great interest to, to military families. So let’s pivot please, to ‘Accelerate change or lose,’ your vision statement and document. I’ve written about it, I’ve thought about it, I’ve read it several times. I thought it was fantastic in its frankness, in its brevity, which is hard to do at your level, I think sometimes. We talked about this in the greenroom. And you know, it’s focused on Airmen, of course. You have a series of action orders that came out of that, so not just this vision statement, you left it on the table, but you have specific tasks associated with how to move forward with your ideas. So if you could talk a little bit about how you developed it, and you know, your thinking behind it, and how you’d grade yourself so far?”

Brown: “Sure. Well, as I knew I was coming in to be the Chief, you know, and having talked to some previous Chiefs and other service chiefs, you’ve gotta figure out what is your timeline to get things done. Four years may seem like a long time, but it’s not a long time, I’ve already been in a job almost seven months now. And from that perspective, you can either wait a year to study, or you can go, here’s what I think needs to happen. And so I had a small team that work with me to write ‘Accelerate change or lose,’ we had some outside entities that work with us as well, even on a title, and we had a couple different titles, and some good feedback and actually want to ‘Accelerate change or lose,’ because I really felt that we needed to move faster in certain areas. And if you wait too long to study, that you can always study the problem. You know, someone had told me once, anything you don’t want to do, you just continue to study. And so what I really wanted to do is actually lay a marker down and be very candid about it, because that’s just the way I’m open, transparent, maybe to a fault sometimes. But I wanted to lay that out. But then at the same time, wanted to go, ‘What are the things I want to focus on?’ And these are things I’ve always thought about, you know, our Airmen, which is the, you know, the beginning of the, with action, or a I’ve always hated bureaucracy, I like, it just frustrates me, it really frustrates me to watch how slow things happen sometimes when we know we can do better. And it’s not just that at my level here at the Air Staff, but it’s out in the field as well, and I just sent a letter to Airmen here this week on that very topic.

“Then I think about competition in the aspect of, this was really built on my time with the national defense strategy, walking into the Pacific Air Forces about six months after the national defense strategy came in, and just felt like we were not probably moving fast enough and understanding our adversary enough to what makes them tick. And then I just also thought about, you know, as my job as the, as the Air Force Chief of Staff is, we’ve got to look to the future. And if I can’t explain what the future looks like, and where we need to be, and the risk associated with not making that change, then I’m not gonna be successful as a Chief. So how am I doing? I’ll let the folks in the field to judge a little bit. I there’s always room for improvement. I think there’s some positive things, but I also think we’re changing a bit of the culture of the Air Force about how we approach some of these. And a cultural change takes a bit of time, and you will have some naysayers, you’ll have some friction points. But I’ve got to be, as I’ve always said, be persistent and consistent on the focus I have. And you can get through what I call the five stages of no: Hell no, no, we’ll think about it. Not a bad idea. We should have done it already.”

Eaglen: “I’m taking that to my house.”

Brown: “Yeah. And so part of that is getting through all five stages. And I’m going to be persistent and consistent on this throughout my tenure, and I do think I have support from the majcom commanders and other leaders across the Air Force. And when I talk to Airmen, you know, by and large, I think they’re excited. They see an opportunity, but we’ve got to continue to push to deliver and that that, to me, is the most important thing. As long as we’re making progress, and our Airmen can see progress, that to me is what I would say a positive, great. If we start backsliding, you know, that’s what I’m going to mark myself down for. So I think we’re doing some good things, but always room for improvement.”

Eaglen: “As you you’ve told me previously, not everyone gets a vote, and that is quite the culture change, I think at the Pentagon where often, you know, I’ve heard lead civilian leaders like Kath Hicks and Michéle Flournoy and others say, like, the strategies that have come out of the department until the NDS, you know, it was sort of lowest common denominator, because we have to get to yes with all these different stakeholders, and it would be exciting to see what you can do when you don’t have to do that.”

Brown: “Well there’s those I have to work with outside of the Air Force, as well.”

Eaglen: “Sure. So it seems, you know, it comes up repeatedly, that being commander of Pacific Air Forces has really shaped, I think, not, it’s not the only job that has shaped you as Chief, but it seems to have, well, one could well-timed with national defense strategy, this administration reaffirming the pacing threat of China, and, and your having just been in theater. So you know, can you talk about, you know, there’s a lot of jockeying among the services to be relevant. And I don’t think it requires explaining, but maybe it does, I think. You know, how well the Air Force is positioned with the operational concepts in the war plans, specifically related to the Asia-Pacific area. And how you think the service and the department and the broader public appreciate the urgency? You know, the first word of your vision is accelerate change, you know, to move more quickly? Does everyone share your urgency?”

Brown: “Well, you know, that’s why I put ‘or lose.’ Because if you don’t appreciate the fact, and it could be a slow erosion. But you don’t want to wake up one day and figure out that, if I could have, would have, should have. And so that’s why, you know, when I look at, you know, or lose, you know, and we can continue at the same pace. But I really got a chance to see how our adversary, particularly in China, in the Indo-Pacific region, how they were advancing. When I look at kind of where we are, I think there’s confidence that we’re pretty well postured. The one thing we do have, that our competitors don’t have, is a good range of allies and partners. And because I’ve served most of my time as a general officer either overseas or commands that were focused overseas, many of the air chiefs I already knew, because we kind of grew up together, or I served with them, or their counterparts, in different locations. And having that network is very helpful. It’s also the concepts we have that we’ve gotten really, I think, really the Air Force is embracing. It really started back, it really start well before me with Gen. [Herbert J. “Hawk”] Carlisle when he was PACAF commander, with Rapid Raptor, continue to grow, and agile combat employment is more than just a fad. It’s really how we think and how we operate. And again, this is a cultural shift. Because you look at the past 20, really 30 years since Desert Shield, Desert Storm, we’ve gone to a number, we used to go on to one location, the base already exists, things already there, you’ve just got to bring your own personal gear. Now we’re looking at … how do you operate from an austere location? What if you don’t have everybody that, you know, you didn’t have have room to bring everybody or everything? How do you get a little creative and innovative and look at things a little bit differently? And that’s driven a lot of, I mean, what I’ve seen over the course of the seven months I’ve been in this job, plus what I was doing at PACAF, was to see how our Airmen, if you give them the opportunity. There’s things we’re doing, the one I keep highlighting is, you know, I’ve hot-pitted an F-16 hundreds of times. But I’ve never seen anybody hot pit a KC-135. And in fact, when I went to Al Udeid and got a chance to see that, it cut the air refueling, refueling time on the ground by 75%. And that was our Airmen coming up with some of that. Just giving them the opportunity. And that’s what agile combat employment and multiple capable Airman, these opportunities that’ll make us better to compete against our, and really to deter. And so it’s understanding how we operate in the region, how we work with our partners, the exercises we have, not just in the Indo-Pacific but also in Europe, and really around the world. And building those relationships and the same concepts, I think are valuable to put us in a much better spot when we used to talk about great power competition.”

Eaglen: “So, thank you for raising agile combat employment, because we were going to discuss part of that, and your, your Washington Post op-ed with Gen. [David H.] Berger, commandant of the Marine Corps. He’s also been a disruptive change agent for his own service with Force Design 2030. You two seem to have that in common, where you want to make big, bold decisions and move quickly to execute. And I think it’s, I applaud your effort. So I wanted to get to the op-ed in a moment, and sort of the reaction to it, and how you two just, were you in the tank or in the hallway, how did it come about? But also, you know, dynamic force employment, if I could just pivot off the agile combat deployment. I know that the services are thinking through how to continually be operationally surprising to friends and enemies alike around the world. I know that was important to [Defense] Secretary [James N.] Mattis when he was in the job is, are you thinking about a new force presentation model for the Air Force?”

Brown: “I am, and partly so we can weave a little bit more predictability in, in how we actually offer up forces to the joint team. What I don’t want to do is actually get to a point, and this is why we think over, over the past several years, we continue to give and give and give, which is good, we have flexibility to give the air power. But sometimes you got to be a little rigid on certain things. And from this aspect, the building model, so we can actually better track our future readiness. Because I think we, right now, we have a hard time as an Air Force articulating, you know, our near-term or longer-term readiness and how it impacts modernization. And by having a force generation, force presentation model, it’s better, easy to, much easier for us to articulate that, and show the impacts of, OK, we can deploy earlier, but you’re gonna leave a hole someplace else. And because we don’t have that model, we have a hard time laying it out. And partly because the diversity of the Air Force and capability across the Air Force, the challenge I also saw is we have different, kind of somewhat different models between the different major areas, and that drove a challenge for us to be able to articulate, you know, the impact of readiness for the future. And so this is going to help us kind of build a tempo that’s predictable. And then we can use our dynamic force employment, but if we follow the business rules we have, and do it for a short time, it’s readiness enhancing, and then you’re able to put that capability back into its normal training cycle. I find value in that, the team’s been working pretty hard on that, and we’re already working through aspects of that. And when you’re seeing that, like our bomber task force, we just had a dynamic force employment, too, that went to the CENTCOM area of responsibility. The second one just went, went back home here in the course of the past week or so. So I see opportunities there to operate just a little bit differently than we’ve operated in the past.”

Brown: “I hear Airmen cheering everywhere who are watching you now, talk about a little more predictability, a slightly moderated operations tempo, because it seems like the Air Force has been flat out for three decades, doing no fly zones in the 90s, all the way through two wars. And I mean, it’s been like a Super Bowl every day, I think, for the Air Force. So I applaud you for doing that. As somebody who also thinks about this, more data is kind of what you’re saying, you’re going to be able to get more measurable data to help make the case for a more moderate tempo, which I really applaud, and readiness, you know, the definition, it’s not a shared definition. I think you discovered that. So how did the op-ed with Gen. Berger come about? And what’s the reaction to it? Because I thought it was tremendously well done. I thought you were saying all the right things. When I interpreted in my own words, accelerate change or lose, and that point you just raised, I called it the global Jenga model. All the services are putting in, pulling out different components, but there’s not one person who can look across the enterprise and see, you know, are we solving a decision now, but we’re hurting man and machine in the five-year budget plan, and etc. So I have coined it for you, you can steal that. What has been the reaction around town? And are you, how do you feel about that op-ed?”

Brown: “I feel pretty good about it. You know, the commandant and I actually, I would say somewhat kindred spirits, because we think a lot about, alike about this, we’ve talked about it. He called me in my process to, going through confirmation. And just in the meetings that he and I have had, we’ve had some of the same conversation. I’ll also say the other service chiefs, we all have had similar conversations, but he and I have really hit it off on, on this. And I just sense that, as you said, because I’ve used that same term of Jenga puzzle. But that was when I was at a combatant command, as air component, because what I saw was, you know, stuff in Indo-PACOM going different location and it was a Jenga puzzle, things are getting pulled out, now you’re trying to figure out how, how do you take your piece parts and still, you know, assure and deter and compete? And so the real focus for us is, how do you actually do a better job of, as you make the decisions of the day, show the impact of future readiness and future modernization? And I don’t know that we have a good model to do that. Now we have a lot of data, I think that there’s ways we can actually build the tools to do that so you can actually take a look at what’s going to impact this particular combatant command, how it impacts the other combatant commands, how it impacts the national defense strategy, how it impacts, near term service ratings, future readiness and feature modernization. And then, you know, that way you do a better job of your, your Jenga puzzle analogy of being able to go, if I pull this piece out, how does it impact everything else? And you might go, maybe you don’t want to do that. And really, it’s about risk. And articulating the risk, you know, not only for today, but the risk for tomorrow. It’s easy to articulate the risk for today, because you can see it, the risk for tomorrow, you got to have some data to kind of back it up to model and, and to model the simulation to be able to understand it. And that’s, that’s what I’d, you know, like for us to be able to get to as a department. You know, I think we can get there. But it’s an important aspect, ensure we don’t take all the risk in the future, because it’s not only gonna impact future Airmen, future service chiefs, but future combatant commanders as well. And we’ve got to make sure that we’re paying attention to that across the board.”

Eaglen: “I applaud it. More data is always my favorite. And you talked about balancing risk among stakeholders, uniformed, civilian, legislative, politicians, and others. And I shared that with you. Of course, a famous, sort of a refrain you hear often in the Pentagon is modernization today is readiness tomorrow. And so as part of the article you wrote with Gen. Berger, you guys alluded to the, I think, the consensus in Washington, which is to cut legacy systems, right? Although until recently, that had been an ill-defined concept. I think, tell me your thoughts, a legacy system is one that doesn’t add value to a current operational challenge identified in the national defense strategy. But I would welcome your clarification on what you think is a legacy system, and you know, what that actually means. And then, you know, if you were the king for the day, and you could divest of all the legacy systems you have in your mind that the Air Force currently keeps on the books, what would that look like? And how would it be different for you, as Chief?”

Brown: “I’ve really thought about the question of, you know, defining a legacy platform, because we have a, B-52, we’re gonna keep for a while. And particularly when you say legacy, your first mindset is old. And I really think about it from a capability perspective, is the capability going to be relevant today, relevant tomorrow? And if it’s not gonna be relevant tomorrow, or it’s gonna be, you know, overly expensive to make it relevant for tomorrow, then to me, that’s kind of legacy, that we’ve got to, you know, it’s not gonna be something we use 10, 15, 20 years from now. So that’s how I kind of look at the definition. You know, if I were king for a day, you know, I don’t know if I pick a specific platform, or capability. But I really would, this is where I think data and analysis is important, and I lay this out in ‘Accelerate change or lose,’ and, as I’ve shared with others, my degree is in engineering, I’d like to see the data. Because that’s not gonna, you can give me a really good brief with a lot of emotion, but emotion is not going to convince me. You’ve got to show me the facts. And if you show me the facts, that helps me to, you know, and I’ll ask questions. And what I like to do with our staff here is, I like having, you know, I like people to be in the meeting, I want to be part of the conversation, I don’t want to get presented: Here’s the answer. And, because at some point, I have to go defend that answer. And if I don’t believe in it, I’m going to have a hard time defending it. And so I don’t want to have things already, you know, the cake completely baked and all I get to do is put the frosting on it. OK? So, part of this is the analysis we would do with the wargaming. And that’s the beauty of how we separate our programmers out with our A5, with our Air Force futures, it’s kind of, define the future, analyze that, and then that’ll help us look where we want to be in the future, and then get a look to where we are today. And how do I make that transition? And then how do I articulate that and articulate the risk going forward? So you know, I don’t, that’s why I don’t know, if I, if I came in with a, you know, a big knife and started slashing things, I think I’d probably mess it up by myself, which is why I really want to have the analysis to do that. And this is something we’ve got to do better, and be able to articulate that as we engage with all of our key stakeholders. Internal to the Air Force, inside of the Pentagon, with our congressional members and staffs, and then also with our industry partners as well.”

Eaglen: “So, right. So that’s, you know, your predecessors have tried valiantly to find, to free up more dollars for modernization by divesting or retiring or truncating programs or existing fleets and inventories. They’ve also tried to cut Active-duty end strength to free up money for modernization, and they found that the smaller force cost more and so there were no dollars freed. And so I encourage you to keep tilting at this windmill, but I just want you to know that it’s been tried with some mixed success. The Air Force I think has had a harder time than the other services, you know, for a variety of reasons, that again, predate you but you have to deal with those consequences. But also, you know, iron on the ramp, you know, makes members of Congress feel comfortable, they like to know that, that it’s there. So, I know you think often about getting the support of Congress, to, getting the data, making the case, and then getting their support to make those difficult trade-offs and decisions, to then actually be able to keep the money. As I think, in her confirmation hearing, Dr. Hicks talked about that. A service shouldn’t be penalized when they make the trade-off or the hard choices, that they should be able to actually keep the money and again, that doesn’t always happen. And then, something I, a theme I picked up in the defense bills from Congress, their report language was, you know, we’ll let you divest, but we want to see the follow-on capability, even if it’s not an airframe or it’s not actually iron on the ramp. Those are your three challenges in actually doing that. Do you feel well positioned to make that case this year, and to move the needle a little bit with Congress, in terms of some divesting of legacy systems?”

Brown: “I think we have an opportunity. And part of that opportunity is how we engage. And you know, what I, what I found, and I could be wrong on this, and I’m sure my predecessor tried, but I’m pretty open and transparent, and really wanted to engage with our members in Congress and their staff much earlier in the process than I think we have in the past. Matter of fact, in the course of the past week, I’ve had, met with congressional delegations in three, three different meetings this past week, where I spent a better part of four to five hours with, with members and staff. That to me is to be able to have time to talk to them about what it is we’re trying to do. We don’t have the final decision yet. At least, as I said … I can make a decision on my level, but it’s got six or seven different layers before it actually becomes the decision, when it comes out in the NDAA, in the appropriations bill. And so how do I help that decision making is by information, and by talking about the forks in the road that we have to deal with as an Air Force. And the challenge we are in, and how we work this together. Because I really think it is, it’s working together to allow us to do this. I can’t go over there and convince Congress, I’ve got to make them part of the process. And the earlier we engage as an Air Force to be able to talk about what we’re doing. The other aspect of this is that we have, the Air Force has more classified programs than any other services. How do we one, get classified briefs to the members and staff, but also simplify some of it, so you can bring it down a classification level or two. So they can talk about it more broadly. And for those unclassified for them. The more we do that, that builds the confidence that we have a plan, it’s executable, that we can work on together. And to me, that’s the most important, the dialogue that goes back and forth. And I felt like in the three engagements I’ve had this past week, very positive. You may not get to exactly what I want, but it’ll be better than getting nothing that I want. And so it’s really how we how we work this together with, with all these key, key stakeholders.”

Eaglen: “I think that’s really, it’s, um, there is no easy button or silver bullet. It’s the shoe leather approach, knocking on door after door of member after member and staff after staff, and I know it’s exhausting as Chief, and time consuming, but it’s how you get to success.”

Brown: “Well, I think it’s time well spent. It really is. And I’m gonna keep doing it and keep approaching it from that perspective.”

Eaglen: “And you got to fly this week.”

Brown: “I got to fly the KC-46.”

Eaglen: “That’s exciting. So are you finding, as we wrap up our conversation, are you finding then sort of across the stakeholders in Washington, all of the ones that we’ve talked about, Airman, civilian leadership at the department, congressional members, are you finding the receptiveness to faster decision making? I mean, the bureaucracy isn’t, it’s everywhere, right? It’s, you know, the Hill, as you just talked about the six steps. Do you feel like you can, you are making progress, and you can see more ahead?”

Brown: “I think we are making progress. But it’s, it’ll be challenging. I mean, I realize that, but I’ve never, I’ve never shied away from a challenge. And if I, if I, if I was gonna shy away from a challenge, I wouldn’t have taken this job. So the, I really just want to make a difference, and I think we can make a difference to move forward faster in certain areas. And so there’ll be some areas where we can make some decisions faster, there’ll be some that will, but we won’t be able to.  What we’ve got to do is be able to show some level of success as we make some easy decisions. And once you do that, you know, you then build some confidence and it goes from the, you know, the early adopters to the laggards. You know, we’ve got to get some early adopters onboard and share with them and get them to help advocate with us. Because we’re all part of this together. Our national security is not just on, you know, on the shoulders of the Chief of Staff of the Air Force or the other service chiefs. But it’s all of us together that have an interest in this. And the way we work together on this, and make progress together, and understand, you know, what’s out there in the future, and really appreciate that, will help us move, move faster. And know there’ll be some that’ll be the laggards, and some that will take a little bit longer. But the more we we’re able to show some level of success, I think the bigger we’ll be in the long run.”

Eaglen: “Well, sir, you seem the right man for the job at the right time. I’m encouraged by your ability to not let the tyranny of the now and the urgent to crowd out your inbox and your priority list. I wish you great success on this road to accelerate change. I don’t want you to lose, so I’m just going to put a period after accelerate.”

Brown: “Neither do I.”

Eaglen: “Thank you for joining me today. It’s been a pleasure. I really enjoyed it.”

Brown: “My pleasure as well. Thank you.”

How Air Mobility Command Wants its Airlifters and Refuelers to Fight

How Air Mobility Command Wants its Airlifters and Refuelers to Fight

Air Mobility Command has big plans to overhaul its gray-tailed heavies for the high-end fight, turning airlifters into command and control assets and possibly putting air-to-air missiles on tankers.

The long-term planning is a shift away from the idea of keeping mobility assets away from a fight, using them instead just as delivery platforms for other combat forces.

AMC boss Gen. Jacqueline D. Van Ovost addressed concerns about the future of mobility and the idea of doing “something out of the box,” during a March 31 Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies event, saying, “Why wouldn’t we?”

“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.

Retired Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, dean of AFA’s Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, interviews Air Mobility Command boss Gen. Jacqueline D. Van Ovost during a virtual Aerospace Nation event on March 31.

Several exercises and training events have shown that aircraft such as C-17s, KC-135s, and KC-46s have these capabilities. During an advanced battle management demonstration last year, a C-17 dropped Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missiles using a roll-on pallet. The idea is that instead of dropping weapons at a forward base to then be loaded on a bomber, the C-17 itself can drop the weapon in the air and Air Force Global Strike Command crews would then be in charge of command and control once it leaves the aircraft, Van Ovost said.

AMC will test having the C2 control on the airplane itself in an upcoming ABMS demonstration, she said.

“Instead of dropping them on a ramp somewhere at some island, we’re just dropping them in the sky, and after they drop out of the sky, someone else lights them off and takes them to the target,” she said.

AMC is looking forward to attritable systems, such as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s Gremlins small unmanned aircraft, to show how C-5s and C-17s could launch these types of systems for both offensive and defensive counter air. The Gremlins can “actually be recaptured and rearmed on board,” she added.

As part of the ABMS experiment last year, an AMC C-17 used its on-board antennas and other systems to direct a Marine Corps High Mobility Artillery Rocket System. In that scenario, the artillery system rolled off the C-17, received its target information from the aircraft’s system, fired, and rolled back to “move before getting killed,” she said.

The command’s newest aircraft, the KC-46 tanker, has been selected to carry the first released system as part of the ABMS effort—a pod that can be strapped on to provide resilient command and control. The aircraft was picked because it “has the pipes, it’s got antennas” that are ready for the system, she said, though the KC-135 could likely get a system like it in the future.

In a fight, the tankers will need to be flying near the action anyway, supporting fighters, so using them as a command-and-control system, either as the primary or a resilient backup, just makes sense, Van Ovost said.

“When I think about where our airplanes are, they are forward in the fight. So, why wouldn’t we put a capability that’s a pod that fits on the airplane, or that rolls on the airplane, because we have the size, weight, and power to do it and we’re out there anyway,” Van Ovost said.

In a high-end fight, mobility aircraft will be targets and will need improved defensive systems beyond the existing countermeasures. Aircraft such as the C-17 and KC-46 already have hardpoints on their wings, so it is “not a stretch to think that we could put one or two missiles on there for self defense for ourselves.”

AMC is preparing for its largest exercise, Mobility Guardian 21, next month, which will further demonstrate some of the new capabilities and tactics. This year’s version is scheduled to take place in multiple locations in the northern United States, with the focal point on the Alpena Combat Readiness Training Center in Michigan, where the main scenario will focus on humanitarian assistance and disaster relief in a contested environment. The 2021 event will be smaller than previous iterations, with about 1,500 personnel from five major commands and representatives from other services.

The exercise will include field artillery, defensive counter air, cyber threats, and other scenarios. AMC crews will need to enter a contested area, provide humanitarian assistance, get out, and then transmit data forward, Van Ovost said.

“We’re doing the pieces, we’re not going to solve everything at once,” she said. “But what we want to know is, in these experiments and in these future games where these are playing, do they make a difference? And so, we’re going after that analytically, and some of the key problems we have to solve to get there, and from that we’ll learn whether or not we want to proceed.”

Boeing Delivers Improved Security Systems for ICBM Launch Codes

Boeing Delivers Improved Security Systems for ICBM Launch Codes

Boeing announced April 1 it has delivered the first upgraded cryptography units to the Air Force to improve launch code security for the service’s intercontinental ballistic missiles.

The upgraded units improve encryption for the codes as well as security by eliminating the need for in-person code changes at the approximately 400 remote missile alert stations, Boeing said in a release.

“Currently, these routine code changes require a team to travel to each launch facility and each change can take upwards of seven days to complete,” said Ted Kerzie, director of Boeing’s Strategic Deterrence Systems, in the release. “This upgrade eliminates the need for travel and reduces the amount of staff, resources, and time needed down to just a few hours.”

The ICBM Cryptography Upgrade II “will increase security during code changes by reducing the frequency of open sites by 75 days annually while reducing associated labor costs,” according to USAF budget documents.

The Air Force has allocated $170.5 million for the program, with procurement expected to last through 2023 and full operational capability scheduled for the second quarter of 2024. It is an upgrade to the Data Transfer Unit system, which was installed in 2017 at ICBM sites, replacing legacy cartridge systems in the alert stations.

Global Strike Command Wants VR Refueling Training for B-52 Pilots

Global Strike Command Wants VR Refueling Training for B-52 Pilots

The Air Force wants to turn to virtual reality to make their B-52 pilots proficient at aerial refueling.

Air Force Global Strike Command’s innovation hub STRIKEWERX has kicked off a challenge to have industry, government, academia, and even individuals create a mixed reality training system for its Stratofortress pilots to practice receiving fuel. The goal is for pilots to learn the skill more quickly and with fewer expensive real-world flights.

The Mixed Reality Air Refueling Challenge began March 16 and runs through April 13, with a selection event planned for early June, according to an AFGSC release. The Air Force said it could fund all, some, or none of the ideas, based on their effectiveness.

The challenge wants proposals to include a human-machine interface, in the form of a replicated flight deck control, with an automated virtual instructor. It should also have biometrics for accurate feedback, and the model should be reconfigurable for other aircraft, the release states.

“This challenge brings together virtual reality [and] physical components the pilots can touch and get feedback from, biometric sensors such as eye tracking, and artificial intelligence to replace an in-person instructor pilot that provides a complete solution for training pilots,” STRIKEWERX Director Russ Mathers said in the release. “We are honored to help develop a unique solution that strengthens AFGSC and the B-52 mission.”

The difficulty of refueling is a main reason for additional training sorties in the B-52 community. Additionally, maintenance and weather issues complicate the training process. No current AFGSC simulators allow a pilot to learn the “fine motor skills and visual perception of movement” needed for the process, the release states.

New Report Tracks Counterspace Capabilities of World’s Militaries

New Report Tracks Counterspace Capabilities of World’s Militaries

More of the world’s militaries are reorganizing their command structures to prepare for future wars in space while coming up with ways to counter satellites directly or to interfere with satellite communications, according to a report out April 1.

In the 2021 edition of Global Counterspace Capabilities: An Open Source Assessment, the nonprofit Secure World Foundation rounds up the publicly known or suspected activities, plans, and likely technological capabilities of eight spacefaring militaries in categories from weapons that target satellites in orbit, to jamming of satellite communications, to cyber attacks on satellite ground stations.

As satellite technologies such as GPS have become integral to military activities, more militaries have started figuring out ways to protect their equipment in orbit and on the ground. To elude outside interference, while also being able to disrupt others, is to achieve “space superiority,” according to the report.

The U.S. military established its 11th unified combatant command, the U.S. Space Command, as well as the U.S. Space Force in 2019. More militaries had already reorganized their space entities in recent years or have done so since.

Below are the countries outlined in the report along with their counterspace capabilities:

China

China reorganized its space and counterspace forces in 2015 and placed them, along with electronic warfare (a.k.a. jamming) and cyber units, under the new Strategic Support Force.

Counterspace capabilities: China has tested rendezvous and proximity operations between satellites in low-Earth and geosynchronous orbits but apparently without “an actual destructive co-orbital intercept of a target,” according to the report. Up to three development programs could lead to, or already have led to, a direct-ascent anti-satellite weapon to physically target satellites. China can likely interfere with some satellite communications but doesn’t appear to actively do so.

Details of China’s likely development of directed-energy weapons such as lasers are “scarce.” It is building more ground-based radar stations and telescopes to track and characterize space objects for space situational awareness.

Russia

Russia reorganized its “space forces” in 2015 under the Aerospace Forces responsible for space launches, ballistic missile warning, satellite control and space surveillance networks, and anti-air and anti-missile defense, according to the report.

Counterspace capabilities: Russia has tested rendezvous-and-proximity operations including maneuvers suggesting that a Russian satellite is observing a U.S. reconnaissance satellite. Russia is “almost certainly capable of some limited [direct-ascent, anti-satellite] operations” but isn’t yet likely to pose a “critical threat” in this regard. It has upgraded its electronic warfare systems that jam GPS receivers in local areas. Russia likely can jam uplinks to communications satellites.

With likely international help, Russia tracks a catalog of space objects rivaling the U.S.’s. It’s system is “slightly more robust” in listing objects in high-Earth and geostationary orbits, according to the report. Russia’s ground-based laser ranging system for tracking satellites could serve as a directed-energy weapon to dazzle satellite optics, while Russia is also developing such a weapon carried by airplane.

Iran

Iran announced its Aerospace Force’s new Space Command in April 2020 after the launch of an apparent cubesat.

Counterspace capabilities: Iran has demonstrated interference with commercial satellite signals. Its launch vehicle or ballistic missiles could form part of a direct-ascent anti-satellite weapon, but Iran isn’t thought to be trying that. It may be able to track satellites in low-Earth orbit.

France

France reassigned control of its military satellites from its space agency to its military in 2019 while elevating a command within the country’s air force and renaming that service the French Air and Space Force.

Counterspace capabilities: France wants to fill gaps in its space situational awareness by partnering with other countries in the European Union. Government officials have mentioned the idea of equipping French satellites with lasers to dazzle or blind unfriendly satellites that get too close.

India

India created the Defence Space Agency and Defence Space Research Organisation in 2019 to respectively coordinate among the three branches of the armed forces and perform research and technical support.

Counterspace capabilities: India demonstrated in 2019 that its missile defense system could intercept a low-orbiting satellite. It is expanding its network of facilities for tracking space objects. It may be developing directed-energy weapons but evidently not for counterspace purposes.

Japan

Japan established its military’s Space Domain Mission Unit in 2020 to gather space situational awareness in the interest of tracking and protecting Japanese satellites. Expected to grow to 100 people by 2023, the unit will coordinate with U.S. Space Command.

Counterspace capabilities: Japan’s ballistic missile defense system may be able to reach low-orbiting satellites but hasn’t been tested in this capacity. The government is discussing whether to build a satellite to “intercept foreign threat satellites.”

United States

The United States gave U.S. Space Command responsibility for “space warfighting” and the Space Force responsibility for “operating, training, and equipping” forces in 2019.

Counterspace capabilities: The U.S. has demonstrated technologies that could form a co-orbital anti-satellite weapon and has demonstrated its ship-based anti-ballistic missile interceptor against a satellite. Meanwhile, the U.S.’s ground-based interceptors “have the most potential capability” in the role, putting all satellites in low-Earth orbit within reach, according to the report.

The Space Force’s Counter Communications System Block 10.2 for jamming geostationary satellite connections came online in 2020, the service’s first offensive weapon system. While continuing to lead the world in space situational awareness, the U.S. is upgrading its network of ground-based radar stations and telescopes and adding new ones while also agreeing to share data with other countries and “looking to leverage commercial capabilities.” Like Russia’s, the U.S.’s laser ranging equipment for tracking satellites could dazzle or blind the optical sensors of Earth-imaging satellites.

The report cites North Korea’s ability to jam civilian GPS “within a limited geographical area” and acknowledges that its ballistic missiles could conceivably be developed into a direct-ascent anti-satellite weapon.

Not mentioned is the United Kingdom Space Command announced in 2020.

“The United States has long known, long recognized that access to and freedom to maneuver in space is a vital national interest, as you said. It underpins our national security, it underpins our intelligence efforts, it underpins our treaty verification, it underpins our economy. … It underpins every instrument of national power,” said Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond at AFA’s virtual Aerospace Warfare Symposium in February.

“The challenge is that the access to space and freedom to maneuver in space can no longer be treated as a given. We have to be able to protect, because there are threats that exist today,” he added.

Watch, Read: Raymond and deGrasse Tyson Talk Space

Watch, Read: Raymond and deGrasse Tyson Talk Space

At the Air Force Association’s virtual Aerospace Warfare Symposium on Feb. 25, Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond laid out in plain language the serious threats facing U.S. and allied space capabilities. In a spirited discussion with renowned author and astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, the space Chief and the Scientist shared their common view of the value, opportunities, and vulnerabilities of space in the modern context.

Watch the segment or read the transcript below.

Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond: “Hey, Dr. Tyson, Jay Raymond. How are you, sir?”

Neil deGrasse Tyson: “Yeah, excellent. Sir, it’s great, it’s great, it’s great to see you.”

Raymond: “It’s great to see you as well, and I just want to, first of all, say thanks to the Air Force Association for providing us this venue, and more importantly I’d like to say thanks to you for agreeing to participate with me. I’ve had an opportunity to chat with you in person in your office, you are masterful at bringing very complex topics down so the average person like me can understand it and I couldn’t ask for better teammates here, so thanks for…”

Tyson: “Yeah, yeah, you’re an average person. Yeah, sure (laughing). Yeah, so I was, what I wanted to do was, if I could just sort of open up with some perspectives that I carry as a scientist, but also in a way, as sort of an emissary of the public, right? Because we just sort of watching, and rose up out of the, you know, from the firmament came the Space Force, at least that’s how people think of it, and I wanted to make sure that people understood. I think most in this audience know what I’m about to say, but if this gets posted online, it’d be nice to just sort of put it out there that many people’s first thought was that if the government creates a Space Force, then that’s a first step in the militarization of space. And all I can think of is the movies where there are sort of laser weapons and this sort of thing. And I’ve tried to remind people, or alert them, perhaps for the first time, that ever since Sputnik, space has been recognized as a strategic asset, or rather a strategic location. And so for the past 60 years, space has been the place for reconnaissance satellites, and, and navigation and, and so, so it’s not a new thing. It’s actually an old thing that is finally getting recognized in the way it needs to be, in terms of, within the, sort of the umbrella of national security. And I also try to remind people that, you know, often when people think of warfare and they think of space, they think of weapons and soldiers and armies and fighting, and, and they’re defending us, and I think to myself, well, it’s more than that. Of course, all right, wherever you have assets that you value, you will want to protect those assets, and who are you going to call, right? And if they’re national assets, you’re going to call a national, a national group to defend that, and that would be the Department of Defense. So, what do we have in space? We have satellites, of course, that monitor weather, climate, of course those are different: Your weather is what happens today and your climate are the trends over time. We have satellites that currently monitor, agriculture, checking rain. The, the humidification of regions and how that’s changing. We’ve got communication satellites, and of course, we have navigation satellites, among others. And when I think of communication satellites, you know, it’s not just, am I getting my live news broadcast from Europe? No. There’s like, Uber uses satellites, OK? So the value of our space assets is not just the cost of the design and launch of that one satellite, it’s the commerce it enables, which is rising through trillions of dollars of our commerce, and our economic stability. So, I can say to myself, OK, I don’t want anything bad to happen to that. And no matter where I am on the, sort of the peace-war spectrum, I don’t want anything bad to happen to that. And so, so at some point, we’ve got to turn to you, sir. And I’m going to ask you, do you foresee threats to our space assets? And because the total value is, is what I described, the total, meaning that it has to us in our way of life. So, do you foresee threats, and if you do, on what timescale, and are you equipping yourself to handle that? So I want to put that in your lap.”

Raymond: “First of all, I couldn’t agree more with, with your opening remarks. The United States has long known, long recognized that access to and freedom to maneuver in space is a vital national interest, as you said. It underpins our national security, it underpins our intelligence efforts, it underpins our treaty verification, it underpins our economy. And as you mentioned, there’s a growing, significantly growing economy in space between here and the lunar surface, estimates of over a trillion, trillion dollars over the next handful of years. It under, it underpins every instrument of national power, and we’ve long recognized that. The challenge is that the access to space and freedom to maneuver in space can no longer be treated as a given. It, it, we have to be able to protect, because there are threats that exist today. And if you look at it, China, which is the pacing threat, and Russia, and others, but primarily China and Russia, are doing two things that are concerning. First of all, they’re developing their own space capabilities to have the same advantage that we currently enjoy by integrating those capabilities into our, our way of war and our way of life. The other thing that’s very concerning is that they’re developing a spectrum of threats to negate our access to space, and they keep our nation, our allied partners, and, from being able to achieve those benefits. Let me put a little sharper point on that. Today—so this isn’t a future thing, this is today—there are robust sets of jammers that can jam both communication satellites and our GPS satellites, our navigation and timing satellites, if you will. Both China and Russia have directed energy weapons today. They have multiple systems that can, think lasers, that can blind or damage our satellite systems. Both China and Russia have missiles that they can launch from the ground and kinetically, kinetically destroy satellites in low Earth orbit in a matter of minutes. We saw that in 2007, very visibly, when China shot down one of their own satellites. Russia has a system called Nudol. It’s a similar system. It is designed to destroy satellites in low Earth orbit, as you said, where we have some pretty important capabilities. And both are developing capabilities on orbit that are concerning. I talked very publicly this year for the first time, about a Russian anti-satellite system. I referred to it as kind of like a nesting doll, where there’s a doll inside of a doll, inside of a doll. We’ve all seen those. Well, Russia launched a satellite right up next to one of our satellites, opened up, if you will, and released another satellite. We saw this before, this behavior before, a few years back. And that second satellite has the capability of releasing a projectile, and we know it is designed to kinetically, to kinetically destroy U.S. satellites in low Earth orbit. China, today, on orbit, has a satellite that has a robotic arm. That robotic arm can be used in the future to grapple, grab a satellite, if you will. And then there’s also cyber threats that we’re concerned about. So that threat spectrum exists today. It is very broad. It is robust that both China and Russia are continuing to develop those threats, and it’s something that we have to protect against today, and that’s why the establishment of the United States Space Force is so important. We are purpose-built to stay ahead of that growing threat.”

Tyson: “Yeah. How do you handle inquiries that sort of feel like the, the dandruff problem, and that’s the only way I can think about it in simple terms, where as you go up to someone after you learn they’re using a dandruff shampoo, and you say, you say to them, ‘Why are you using it? Why are you using a dandruff shampoo?’ You don’t have to answer it. They don’t have dandruff because they’re wearing, they’re using the dandruff shampoo. So I’ve got people saying, you know the world is basically at peace among superpowers, so, so why… will people take for granted that things are at peace, not knowing and not realizing that you’re there on the frontlines, maintaining that peace and our access to space. So how do you, how do you, how do you address that? Because they might say, ‘The budget is huge, it doesn’t have to be that big. We don’t need it.’ And, well, yeah, yeah, and do you need your dandruff shampoo, either, you know, I’ll take it away and watch how fast the dandruff comes back. So, yeah, how do you, how do you jump into that conversation?”

Raymond: “Yeah, well first of all, I’m lucky that I don’t have a dandruff problem, so I’ve got that going for me. (Tyson laughing). So thanks for bringing that up there, Dr. Tyson. Let me just say, it’s kind of like deterrence. Our, our primary mission is to deter conflict from beginning or extending into space. We don’t want to get into this fight, and if we can deter conflict from beginning or extending into space, we think we can deter conflict from spilling over into other domains. And so we want to do that from a position of strength. We cannot afford, you talked about the cost of space. If you look at the overall Department of Defense budget, the cost of space—although every taxpayer dollar is precious and every taxpayer dollar has to be spent wisely—the cost of space is a very, very small portion of the Defense Department budget. And oh, by the way, space is a huge force multiplier. Space enables us to do things with, that the other services can do with smaller force structures because they have integrated space to their advantage. We cannot afford, as a nation, to lose space. That’s why the space force is so important. We’re not going to lose space. We’re the best in the world of space, and we are running fast, the Guardians are running fast, to be able to stay ahead of that threat to determine from a position of strength and make sure that we don’t have dandruff.”

Tyson: “So, you comment that we are leaders, OK, that makes a good soundbite. But just moments ago you said that you’re noticing these capabilities, in particular, Russia and China and perhaps latter-day participants in space will, will also be so capable, and now we are responding to threats. So if we’re responding to threats, that means the threat pre-dated our capability. And I bring this up only because when we reflect on our history, exploring space, let’s go back to our golden age of space exploration, the Apollo era. We, as Americans, we reflect on that as, well, we’re explorers, we’re leaders, we’re Americans. ‘Mericans. And, but if you really unpack what unfolded over that time, the Russians, the Soviet Union, beat us at practically every metric that mattered at the time. You know, the first satellite, the first non-human, animal, the first human, the first space station, the first person of color—a Cuban person, of course in the, in the, in the communist bloc. The first docking for, you know, there’s so many things that they beat us at. And my read of that era is we were good at responding, because we were coordinated, we were not so tribalized, for example, as we are today. We said, oh my gosh, this is important. Let’s do this. And then we responded to each one of those threats, ultimately leapfrogging where the Russians left off. And we landed on the moon, and then we said, ‘OK, we win,’ but in fact, that’s not how that arc went. So, what assurances do we have that we’re going to stay out front, rather than sort of dragging behind, saying, ‘Oh we’ve got to do that, or let’s do that because they’re doing it.”

Raymond: “Yeah, so there’s, there’s no assurances. That’s why, that’s why this is, this business is so important. It is too critical to our nation to not be the leaders. And so, I would agree with you. I’d push back a little bit. We have been the leaders in space. We are the leaders in space. The end of the Soviet Union, we clearly have had, we’ve got the best capabilities, we’ve integrated those capabilities to great effect. GPS is the gold standard, for example, across the world. I mean, we have the best capabilities, and there’s no doubt about that. That threat has recently reemerged, if you will, over the last, you know, we saw in 2007 the visible detonation of a satellite, by the, by the Chinese, or destruction of a satellite from a missile launched on the ground. So now, although we have the world’s best capabilities, we now have a new mission area. And that’s that you can’t just launch a satellite, build a satellite, an exquisite satellite, launch it and assume that it’s going to be there forever. You have to be able to protect and defend it. That’s the new mission area. That’s why the United States made the decision to both stand up both the U.S. Space Command, the operational arm, the warfighting arm, and the Space Force, which is the, the organize, train, and equip arm. Where I think we lead, I think commercial industry, and you talked about this in your opening comments that, you know, the, the economic advantage that is provided from space. Our, our commercial industry is the best in the world. You look at what’s going on across commercial space, the U.S. is leading in that, in that business in almost every in almost every metric. If you look at our partnerships, the value of partnerships today is way greater than it was in the past. You didn’t need partnerships in the past, and our partnerships that we have with our closest allies are second to none in delivering advantage. And then I would suggest to you that, our people. We have incredible people in the Space Force, we have handpicked, handpicked every single person that came into this force. And if you look at what we’ve brought into the force, what we brought in are space operators, engineers, acquisition, intelligence, cyber and software coders. That’s it. It’s, every single person that was handpicked to come in this service has a role in deterring conflict from beginning or extending into space, and to win if, God forbid, if deterrence were to fail. Those people are spectacular. And in the Space Force, we took an opportunity to develop, because we’re starting with clean sheet of paper, we took an opportunity to develop a human capital strategy built for the 21st century, where we can bring in the talent of America, diverse talent, we can develop those folks, retain those folks, and, again, do that purpose-built for the domain in which they operate.”

Tyson: “Yeah. You make a really excellent point there that I want to sort of further develop here. So what you’re saying, I don’t want to put words in your mouth, but what you’re saying is that, as we move forward, our security will be measured not solely by how many missiles are packed in the silo, but how many scientists and engineers and coders you packed in, in the programming room. And so this is a change of the face of modern warfare, if you will. And if that’s the case, because I happen to know that scientists are cheaper than missiles. So if that’s the case, how do we continue to move forward with by far the hugest military budget in the world, that of the United States? How much of that is sort of legacy of how wars used to be fought, you know, let’s bring in the battleships, and bring in the marching armies, and if that’s not who’s threatening us today, what, what is going to happen to that budget as we go forward, or what’s your vision of that 10 years out, 100 years out?”

Raymond: “So first of all, if you look at the National Security Strategy and the national defense strategy, it outlines a very complex strategic environment, an environment that has global challenges, multidomain challenges. And, and, and challenges that move very, very fast, at great speeds and across great distances. When we decided to establish the Space Force, it was not just space for space sake. This was about our national security. It’s a national security imperative, and this is about making sure, as I’ve mentioned before, that we can stay ahead of that threat. I mentioned briefly earlier that, again, every taxpayer dollar is precious. Let me, let me give you a story to bring this to life a little bit. Back in World War II, the Air Force had 1,000 bombers to go with nine weapons, nine bombs on each bombers, so 9,000 bombs going after one ball bearing factory. And on a good day, about 100 of those bombs would strike close, somewhere close to the target. Look at where we are today. You can take off a bomber, with multiple weapons, and hit multiple targets all very, very precisely, and the way you do that is you integrate multidomain capabilities into that bomber—space and cyber. Again, that’s that, that advantage that that integration provides. So, if we lost space, do we have 1,000 bombers in our Air Force today? We don’t. So that’s why I said we can’t afford to lose space, and we’re not going to lose space. It’s too important to us. And most importantly, again, if we can assure our access to space, a vital national interest, then we are, feel that we can deter conflict from spilling over into the other domains, which we desperately don’t want.”

Tyson: “Thanks for that ball bearing example. That’s, I think, one to be repeated when that topic comes up. When I think of space, also, there’s a lot of sentiment in the public. These are people who don’t really do their homework, but just react to a news headline. The idea that, ‘Oh my gosh, now the military is going to weaponize space,’ and I tell people, there was a U.S. Space Command that was living within the Air Force. And so this, at least for the moment, was a horizontal shift, almost budget neutral. And just confirm if this is correct, a budget neutral shift, so that the Space Force can be thought of with its own priorities as we move forward. And it seems to me that greatly resembles what happened just after the Second World War, where the Air Force itself was a sort of a wholly contained sub branch of the Army, the U.S. Army Air Force, and then the Air Force sort of slid over to the side. And it was kind of obvious, you know, command and control was different, the training of the soldiers was different. And so no one questions that move today, looking back on it. And so I bring that to the face of people who were saying, ‘Why do we need an Air Force?” But would you agree with what I just said there.”

Raymond: “So first of all, I would say right off the bat, space is a warfighting domain just like air, land, and sea. And so an, example years ago, you know, we, we are a maritime country. And commerce and trade flow sailed over the oceans, if you will, and we had a Navy to be able to protect that ability to do that. The Army operates, best Army in the world, operates on the ground, on the land domain. We have an Air Force that operates in the air domain. And, as it has clearly been recognized that space is a warfighting domain, we now have a service that is focused on protecting and defending that domain, and all the benefits that we talked about upfront about that. We did have a service, we did. The Air Force was responsible for the vast majority of the space mission, although the Army has space capabilities and as the Navy, and there’s Marine capabilities as well, but the Air Force was largely, had the largest portion of that. And what the United States decided to do was to act on an opportunity, to not wait until we were playing catch-up, like your question from before. This was, ‘Let’s take the opportunity while we’re still ahead, while we’re still the best in the world at space, and focus this new service, to be able to move at speed. To stay ahead of that growing threat, and not respond to it. So what we’ve seen by elevating space to an independent service, that was largely resource neutral, there is no additional manpower associated here, this was all came out of hide, and the dollars spent to establish the Space Force were just a few 10s of millions of dollars. This isn’t, we’re not talking huge, huge budgets here this was largely taking dollars that existed and shifting it into, into this independent service. What it has allowed us to do, though, as you elevate that, it elevates the chief of the service as a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, it elevates our, our voice in requirements. It elevates our ability to compete for dollars to get resources for those capabilities that are so vital to our nation. It elevates our ability to develop our own people, and to attract and retain, assess, recruit, and retain those people. So on all metrics, we have seen just in this first year, significant increase and significant goodness by having this, this new service.”

Tyson: “I have more of a subtle question that just occurred to me in this moment. So, if you, you mentioned earlier how important our commercial space has been to what we are as a nation, and, and we lead the world. SpaceX most visible among them in leading this effort. And let me go back to the Second World War, where, OK, the Army needed Jeeps. OK, so they knock on Chrysler’s door and they say, ‘Can you turn this assembly line on,’ I’m simplifying here, of course, ‘and roll Jeeps off.’ OK, yes. And so that, there goes the contract, out come the Jeeps, and, and the military did not have to make their own automobile factory to do that. OK, so there are efficiencies that came about because of it. As we go forward, I will presume that that’s the kind of relationship the military would want to have with our, with our, the business base of our space assets here in the United States. But to the extent that businesses have become multinational, then it’s no longer sort of our own, our own assets is it? It’s sort of, it has consequences globally. So I’m just wondering, what does that look like going forward, if you want to reach for a company that that happens to also do business in China or, and or in Russia, and now they’re going to do some work for the military?”

Raymond: “So it’s a great, great question, and one that we’ve put a lot of thought on, and one that I think offers us a lot of opportunity. The first year of, of the argument, we’ve been, the Space Force was established 14 months ago, so we’re 14 months old, and when the initial planning was taking place, what we thought we were going to do was spend about 18 months planning for this Space Force, and then we’re going to stand it up. So if that was the case, I’d be sitting here today with you and I would say, you know in about three or four months, we’re going to, we’re going to actually start doing something. Well, we actually started 14 months ago we built an entire service in that period of time. And we, we’ve moved at speed. This second year is all about integration, and integrating this force. It’s driving the car that we built. And as we drive that car, the key pieces of driving that car is integration, and integration with commercial industry, integration with the interagency, and integration with our allied partners. And we think there’s huge opportunities in all cases. If you look at historically what has been commercially viable in space, it was commercial launch and large communication satellites. The barriers to entry to space and an increase in technology that allows smaller satellites to be more operationally relevant has now said that almost every mission that we do in space has a commercially viable path. And so, we want to build a very fused connection with commercial industry. We’re a small service, and we think we can do that, and with the, this is a terrible word to use in the commercial space business, but the explosion of commercial space things that are occurring, as you highlighted, provides us a great opportunity. The other big piece of this is that we have an opportunity with our allied partners. And so, in this first year of standing up an independent Space Force, we’ve also set up some partnership offices. And we have inked [a memorandum of understanding], for example, with Japan, to put a hosted payload on Japanese satellites, to provide capability at a reduced cost and increase the speed of when we can launch it. We did the same thing with Norway. We put, we’re going to put two communication payloads on two Norwegian satellites. It saved us over $900 million, just shy of a billion dollars, and will get us onto orbit sooner. And so as we design this force, and that’s one of the critical things that an independent service does. It, it designs its force structure. As we design that force, we want to design it in a way that capitalizes on this new business model that has emerged, that that produces satellites off of a production line, rather than the one-off, handmade wooden shoe that takes years and years and years to build. And we want to build this coalition-friendly from the beginning, to allow our international partners to invest, and we think that partnership is key to deterrence and key to our strength.”

Tyson:  “Is there any thought given, I’m sure there is, but what kind of thought is given, to the 1967 Space Treaty. I read that treaty carefully. It’s very sort of Kumbaya, you know, it’s space will be a peaceful place. And when I first read it, I was, yeah, yeah, that’s how it should be, that’s the future. And then as I got older and a little more cynical, I thought to myself, you know, people can’t get along on Earth’s surface. What possible confidence do you have that just by going into space, everyone is going to be friends? And so I, I was saddened that I came to that realization, but that’s, you know, given the tribalism we’ve seen, especially in recent years, I don’t really believe that space can be thought of as a peaceful domain until that’s demonstrated to happen here on Earth’s surface. My point then to you is, I do remember there was one cause, or one phrase, that allowed the peaceful use of outer space to include the capacity to defend your assets. So, is anything the Space Force doing today in violation of the Space Treaty, or is there a new space treaty that’s going to be necessary for the 21st century? How much, what kind of thinking is, is, along those lines? I think of it almost like the Geneva Convention, as an attempt to guide the, the principles and engagements of war.”

Raymond: “So today, Dr. Tyson, space is the wild, wild West. There really is no rules. The Outer Space Treaty that you mentioned basically says you can’t put a nuclear weapon in space, or weapons of mass destruction in the domain, and you can’t build military bases on planets, and that’s about it. Beyond, besides that it’s the wild, wild West. I get asked a lot, I frequently get asked, you know, what, as you are establishing this service, what capabilities do you want your successors to have? And my first answer to that, besides capabilities, is I would like my successors to have some rules of the road, on how you operate in space. It is not safe and professional for Russia to put a, a threatening satellite in close proximity to a U.S. satellite. That’s not responsible, safe, professional behavior. And so, we’re working with our partners to develop these norms of behavior. We’ve been exercising this, we’ve been wargaming it. We’ve made some really good strides, and we operate to demonstrate that good behavior. We operate in a way that demonstrates that we’re not violating any treaty. In fact, we’re the most transparent and voluntary service in the world in space, we share data broadly, we warn China that they’re about to hit a piece of debris that they created when they blew up their satellite in 2007. We want to keep that domain safe for all. And so I really believe there’s an opportunity here to, to develop some norms of behavior. Now I’m not naive to think, as you’ve stated in the question, that those norms of behavior are going to, you know, solve all the, all the ills that might occur in that domain. But I do think it will help us identify those that are running the red lights as we drive this car. And I’m hopeful to, I’m hopeful to be able to, working with our allies and partners to develop some norms of behavior that we operate with today, and will continue to operate with tomorrow.”

Tyson: “Sir, you need the trust but verify, you need red light cameras up there, and if anyone runs the red light, you’ve got them, and you know exactly where they’re coming from and where they’re going. I want to highlight something just, again, I think anyone listening live to this wouldn’t need this exposition, but I think some others might. You mentioned directed energy weapons versus kinetic weapons, and directed energy, I can actually characterize all of the history of warfare in one sentence. OK, it’s: I have energy over here, and I want to put it over there. That is the decision any warfighter makes, for every, practically every decision, for every action they take. From, from a bow and arrow, I have energy here in, you know, cocked into the string, it goes to the arrow, the arrow takes the energy to a target. Same for a bullet. Same for a missile, same for any of this. So, in a directed energy weapon, you’d have a laser or some other electromagnetic pulse, it sends energy from one point to another, and a kinetic kill, a kinetic impact is, the object, your weapon is moving so fast it does not need an explosive in order to do damage to its target, because the kinetic energy is sufficiently high to do whatever it needs to do on impact. So just as a, that’s my preamble to my question to you. It seems to me that a directed energy weapon keeps the satellite intact, you just sort of disabling a circuit board or something, or jamming it, whereas a kinetic weapon makes a big mess in space, and I’m thinking to myself, it makes a big mess, that would take us out, but it would also take out any adversary, because you’re not controlling where all these little bits and pieces are going. And so, all I can think of is in the First World War, when someone says, I have an idea, let’s use chemical gas weapons. Yeah, what an idea. So then they spray it onto the field, and then the wind direction changes and it comes right back at you, and then it becomes, OK, let’s rethink that one. So, so, I don’t know, I guess this isn’t the question, I’m just sort of putting it in your lap: Why does anyone want to completely destroy a satellite if it if it contaminates the sandbox for everybody?”

Raymond: “It’s irresponsible behavior. We don’t want that to happen, and that shouldn’t happen. If you look at the 3,000 pieces of debris that was caused back in 2007, we’re still tracking that. It’s in low Earth orbit. It’s in, it’s in the orbit that the International Space Station is in. And so we work very hard each and every day, we act as the space traffic control for the world. We track 27,000 objects in space today. There’s probably about a half a million that we can’t track because they’re too small. Of that 27,000 objects, about, just shy of 4,000 now are active satellites. And if you think about it, when I last talked to you on “Star Talk” just a couple years ago, the number of satellites were 1,500. And if you look at where this is going with, with proliferation of low Earth orbit satellites, you know, you’ve got the company you mentioned, SpaceX, with the, with their proliferated LEO constellation has over 1,000 satellites on orbit now, and that’s, that’s just been launched this year. So if you look at the numbers that are happening, that are being launched, it’s getting more congested, and the trends are going up significantly, because there’s other companies, as you mentioned as well. So we are all about keeping that domain safe, we do not want, again, to get into a conflict that begins or extends in the space and, and we would encourage responsible and safe behavior in the domain, just like we do in the air domain and on the sea.”

Tyson: “Yeah, I’ve got to emphasize something you just said, all right, you just said, that, you gave a number of stuff you’re tracking in space, and some small fraction of that number were active satellites, which means most things you’re tracking is junk, junk in space. And I joked that, you know, the reason why we haven’t been visited by aliens is because they saw the junk that’s in orbit around the Earth, they said we’re not going to land there, they’re going somewhere else. So, let me just ask then, if I were to, sort of, put on your portfolio, things that it’d be nice if the Space Force made a priority, it might be to sort of clean up space. I know you don’t want to be thought of as sort of the sanitation workers of space, but if the space domain is something we all care about, then, inventing some innovative way to get the debris out of space could be something very useful for the future. And I want to add to that. What about asteroid defense? So I hear you’ve been protecting the whole world, not just the United States, and that’d be the noblest thing you could possibly do, in my biased humble opinion.”

Raymond: “I would agree. We want to keep the domain safe and limit debris. And I think if you and I could figure out a way to clean up all that debris that’s moving so fast and over those vast distances, let me know, and I’ll invest with you, because we’ll be well off.”

Tyson: “I’ll get to work on it now.”

Raymond: “What we are doing, and one way to solve the debris problem is not to create to bring in the first place. So, you know, warning people about potential conjunctions, having better engineering standards, so satellites don’t break apart at the end of life, having better launch standards so when you launch rockets into space, you don’t also litter the domain with debris, and so we’re working a lot with that. We also signed [a memorandum of understanding] on the asteroid work, we’ve signed an MOU with NASA to share information more broadly. That largely falls in their, in their mission set, but I do think there’s partnership opportunities and we’re working on that. I know we’re getting really close on time, and if you would allow me to turn the table, I want to ask you a question if you could.”

Tyson: “Oh, I’m sorry, I hogged all the time. It’s not every day I’m, in, you know, hanging out with you, so, OK, bring it on.”

Raymond: “So here’s the question for you: When I was up in New York with you in your studio for “Star Talk,” you are masterful at bringing the very complex down to easily understandable ideas. One of the challenges that we face in space is that, we have a saying, that a satellite doesn’t have a mother. You can’t see it, you can’t touch it, you can’t feel it, you know, it’s hard to have that connection, but that connection is really real. How would, how would you suggest that we communicate this thing that’s not tangible better to the American people so they understand just how reliant they are, and just how vulnerable those capabilities are, if we don’t protect and defend?”

Tyson: “OK, here’s what you do: You get “Saturday Night Live” to do a skit where they systematically remove things from a person’s livelihood and life, and home life, that was enabled or empowered, or, or conceived, for our having access to space. And basically by the end, they’re left in a cave, you know, sending smoke signals or something. I mean, I think it wouldn’t, you don’t have to be too clever in the marketing of this fact. I hate the word marketing because it implies you’re, you might say something that’s not true, but everything that you say would be true about what it is you can no longer do, in modern time, that we all take for granted. And so it’s a matter of moving what we take for granted into something that’s front and center in our lives. And by the way, the fact that we take it for granted, that’s overall a positive fact, because it meant we’ve absorbed it into our existence, and it becomes transparent to how we live our lives. I don’t have a problem with that, but if you simultaneously stand in denial of its value to you, that’s, that’s where the problem is. So yeah, it’s your, is it an ad campaign? I don’t know, I’m out there trying to do it. So maybe we need more.”

Raymond: “OK, sir, I’ll tell you what. I’ll join you on the stage at “Saturday Night Live.” You work the invite, and I’ll be there with you. Sir, I can’t thank you enough, it’s always it’s always a pleasure to chat with you, I really…”

Tyson: “Can I get to one last, I know we’re running short on time, I just, who introduced us? Orville Wright introduced us? What, what? Someone named Orville Wright? OK, and so I was looking at my notes and I actually own an original letter from Orville Wright, and I’m assuming the gentleman who introduced us is not 150 years old. So if you give me a moment here to share my screen, I want to show you a letter written by Orville Wright, and here it goes. I think I’m doing this right. I’ll read it to you. December 19, 1918. Orville Wright, Dayton, Ohio. And this is a letter to the president of the Aero Club, Aero Club of America, and here it goes. ‘My dear Mr. Hawley, Thank you for your very nice telegram remembering the 15th anniversary of our first flight at Kitty Hawk. Although Wilbur, as well as myself, would have preferred to see the airplane developed more along peaceful lines, yet I believe that its use in this great war will give encouragement for its use in other ways.’ And so let me end screen share there. So I put that up to make the following point, that I don’t, I know of no force operating on the ambitions of a next generation, than people looking up into the night sky, and thinking, what is there, how can I participate in its discovery? The entire STEM spectrum, science, technology, engineering, and math is all represented there, and these are the fields that when they’re stoked in an economy, will generate the entire next generation of economic value to a nation that embraces it. So for me, the Space Force can lead the way in people’s ambitions to want to, to want to, to want to create a future that we all dreamt of, and somehow, has not yet arrived.”

Raymond: “Yes sir. That’s a great, great way to wrap it up, sir. Thank you very much. It’s been an honor to serve, share this virtual fireside chat with you.”

Tyson: “Thank you.”

Watch, Read: Defending the Homeland

Watch, Read: Defending the Homeland

Watch the video or read the transcript of Gen. James H. Dickinson, U.S. Space Command boss; Gen. Glen D. VanHerck, commander of United States Northern Command and North American Aerospace Defense Command, take part in the “Defending the Homeland” session from AFA’s 2021 virtual Aerospace Warfare Symposium, moderated by retired Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, dean of AFA’s Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies.

Retired Lt. Gen. David Deptula, dean of the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies: “Well, as anybody reading news headlines knows, the U.S. faces a range of threats to our homeland, not least of which is a raging pandemic that continues to devastate our country. Looking abroad, the new long-range conventional strike weapons under development by America’s peer competitors pose a severe challenge to America’s defenses. Aggressive moves by China and Russia to seize territory and destabilize our allies and partners menace our collective security. These actions underscore the vulnerability of elements of our defense that we once took for granted. Our ability to leverage existing and emerging technologies and work collaboratively with our allies and partners will go a long way to determining our ability to anticipate and respond to threats to our homeland. So with that as context, let me introduce our panelists. As the commander of U.S. Northern Command, and North American Aerospace Defense Command, Gen. Glen VanHerck leads to departments with primary responsibility for homeland defense and aerospace warning. Prior to assuming this role, Gen. VanHerck served in multiple leadership positions, including director of the Joint Staff. Gen. James Dickinson is the commander of U.S. Space Command, the 11th and most recently established unified combatant command. Gen. Dickinson has had a lengthy career in Army artillery and air defense, and has previously served as commanding general of the Army Space and Missile Defense Command. Welcome, gentlemen. It’s a real pleasure and a privilege to have you join us today, and I’d like to start by giving Gen. VanHerck the floor, followed by Gen. Dickinson, for a summary of your thoughts on meeting the challenges of defending our homeland and a way of life.”

Gen.  Glen D. VanHerck, commander of North American Aerospace Defense Command and U.S. Northern Command: “Well, Gen. Deptula, thanks. It’s an honor to be here with you today. Thank you to the Mitchell Institute as well, and the Air Force Association for putting this on. It’s a great opportunity to talk about homeland defense, candidly, it’s something we don’t talk about enough, that’s dramatically changed in the last five to 10 years. And so I look forward to talking about that with you. You mentioned a complex environment. Absolutely it’s a complex environment, the most complex I think we’ve ever seen. You talked about that. What I would tell you is, two peers we’ve never had, really, two peers. Two nuclear-armed peers. One with significant capabilities to strike the homeland now, and one with intent to absolutely develop capabilities to strike the homeland in the near future. And so, let me talk about that. Quickly, first, I would say we’re challenged across all domains, and I’ll let Gen. Dickinson talk to you about the space. I’ll talk more, but what makes this problem even more dynamic and interesting is how interwoven we are economically, especially with China, and the challenges that presents for us as a nation. 

“So let me give you a little bit of a take on how I view the battlespace, if you will, and the threat to the homeland. Since the [Berlin] wall fell 30 years ago or so, and we’ve really been focused on fighting forward. We’ve developed capability strategies, plans, all with the assumption that assume forward power projection was a given pretty much, and it has been. We’ve had a unipolar world, with the United States really as the single sole superpower, if you will, but that is changing right now. While we’ve been projecting power forward, our competitors, primarily China and Russia, have watched that and they’ve taken notes on how we are able to project power and military influence around the globe. They realize they don’t want to fight that fight on their terrain, in their battle space. And so they’ve developed capabilities to hold the homeland at risk, with the idea that they’ll destroy our will to fight, they’ll limit our ability to project power forward from the homeland, so that in a regional fight they can get that objective accomplished before we can get ourselves into the original fight. Some would question that, I would tell you in discussions this week with the intel community, I’m even more convinced that is the case. And if you look at capability being developed, especially by Russia right now, and stated intent by Russian leaders, you can read that for sure. So you put capability together and you put intent, and I think you pay me to plan for such as a circumstance where they might be able to attack the homeland. 

“So where we are today, in my mind, we’ve been focused on VEOs [violent extremist organizations], this command was born out of the VEO threat after 9/11. Initial focus was exactly that, Homeland Defense focused on VEOs and defense support of civil authorities for incredibly challenging natural disasters and those kinds of things. That changed after Hurricane Katrina, with a defense support of civil authorities mission, and then after nine, after the NDS came out, the National Defense Strategy in 2018, we’re back to focusing this command on homeland defense, especially peer competitors. But what I’ll tell you is we have work to do, because we still approach problems regionally, we plan, strategize, we manage forces regionally, we need to think about these problem sets globally, I think we’re still to stove piped with our data, data that’s not getting shared in a timely enough manner at the operational and strategic level to have influence, deterrence influence, especially in the competition phase. I think we are very reliant, and to reliant for defense of the homeland, on our nuclear deterrent. Make no doubt about it, the nuclear deterrent is the bedrock and foundation for homeland defense. But there’s a growing gap right now between the nuclear deterrent and my ability, conventionally, to deter and defeat. And that’s where I’m worried about, because I need decision space for senior leaders, and options for the senior leaders in, in competition, more importantly in crisis, and conflict, so that we can de-escalate, if required, to defeat. We need to think more broadly about our systems and our development. We tend to be focused in developing and acquiring things that are one-dimensional. BMD [ballistic missile defense], for example, sensors that only support BMD. We have to expand our horizons much more broadly to think about capabilities, as we produce, that can not only do BMD, but they can give us domain awareness from counter UAS [unmanned aircraft systems] all the way to space monitoring and ballistic missile defense and cruise missile defense. And so that’s where you’ll see that that we’re going. I think we’re too focused on kinetic end-game defeat, that we need to be balanced between a conflict mindset for strategy and planning, and a competition mindset and creating deterrence in day-to-day competition. So that’s where I think we need to go. 

“I think we need to go to a global perspective, and everything must be viewed in a global perspective that starts with global strategies, global plans, global force management. Candidly, I would say that we’re doing regional force element allocation. We don’t have enough resources and capability today to hand resources over to individual combatant commanders to utilize for long periods of time. We need to think differently and have strategies where combatant commanders can share resources to generate effects, especially in the competition phase. So that’s where I’m focused. Looking beyond deterrence, deterrence by punishment. What I would tell you is deterrence by punishment is our nuclear deterrent. It is our conventional capability to leverage global influence and power. But both of those, in my mind, are, are too late in the process and they’re reactive in nature. I’ll give you an example of what I mean by deterrence by denial, versus deterrence by punishment. Absolutely deterrence by punishment is our nuclear capability. But if you take our deterrence, with our Ballistic Missile Defense capability, which is deterrence by denial, and you put those two together, deterrence by punishment is the cost imposition of a competitor or adversary taking an action, and then their decision calculus, whether they can actually be successful of achieving their objective, and you put those two together, that’s an extremely powerful deterrent. And that’s where I’m gonna be focused, and that starts with just domain awareness, which is my priority line of effort. That comes with sensors that are all around the globe, from undersea to space and cyberspace. And they give domain awareness, that is shared and that domain awareness, much of it exists today, Gen. Deptula. I’m not talking about highly expensive additional capabilities. Certainly we need to continue modernizing, modernizing and moving towards space as soon as we can. But much of the, the awareness exists today, but it’s in stovepipes. It’s not analyzed in a timely manner where operational commanders and strategic decision makers can actually utilize it for influence. What we need to do is take that domain awareness, put it in some type of a cloud mechanism, machine learning, artificial intelligence applied to it. And that’s what I call information dominance, the ability to operate inside our adversary’s OODA Loop. 

“Once you have information dominance and you just distribute that data to the right decision makers, whether that be at the tactical level to the strategic level, that’s what I call decision superiority. We tend to focus now, especially JADC2, and you could wrap a bow around what I’m talking about and call it JADC2 if you want, but we tend to focus on the kinetic kill capability of the end-defeat, the tactical portion, for utilization of this information. I see the incredible value is moving further left, getting further left of launch, being able to impact their decision calculus during competition. That’s where you create your deterrence. And then in a crisis situation being able to operate inside their OODA loop to affect their decision calculus, and certainly in a conflict, being able to use, utilize it for kinetic defeat, if we need to do that. I’m encouraged by what’s going on, U.S. Space Comm, Gen. Dickinson and his team are moving in the right direction for this domain awareness, and I look forward to continuing to partner with him. This is all about decision superiority and giving decision makers the opportunity to make those decisions and have decision space. Now for me, I don’t think we need to defend everything, Every piece of critical infrastructure is unaffordable and unachievable, but we need, do need to decide what it is we must defend must defend kinetically, and then look for alternative methods, such as the use of the electromagnetic spectrum and deterrence by denial, through information through getting further left of launch to create capabilities to keep us in that competition phase. I’ll sum it up real quick: I think we need to go faster. Thirty years ago, the department, and, and led the way, NASA led the way, today that is reversed. Industry and other agencies outside the department are leading the way. We need to change how we think about acquiring systems, how we think about moving forward with building capabilities, and allow innovation that’s being conducted elsewhere to lead the way, and take advantage of that. That requires a little bit of risk, it requires Congress assuming a little bit of risk, and the department changing our cultures. So I’ll pause there, and allow our calls there, and allow Gen. Dickinson, and I look forward to taking your questions. Thank you.”

Deptula: “Over to you, Gen. Dickinson.”

Gen. James H. Dickinson, commander of U.S. Space Command: “Hey, good morning, and thanks to Gen. Deptula for having me today. Great day to be in Washington D.C. and having the opportunity to speak to this group, and thanks to the Air Force Association for the invitation and for the Aerospace Warfare Symposium for hosting it. Always a great day to be able to talk about space. I know you’ve had. Gen. [John W. “Jay”] Raymond and Gen. [David D.] Thompson talk, I think if I heard, yesterday. And so I’m going to give you a perspective from the combatant command, the warfighter perspective, and I think it’s important as we start that I always like to kind of talk about where we are with space, with respect to everything that we do in society today, and that’ll dovetail well into our support to the homeland, for, for Glen VanHerck and his team. So really, you know, you don’t have to go back too far to figure out when, when space became such an important part of our military, but you know, in everyday life we see it with the GPSes that we use is probably the best example, in terms of capability that we depend on every day. Looking at your iPhone, looking at your maps application, where do you get to. That’s all been provided for many years, to, to, to our American public, and it’s very important, very important, and that’s probably the most visible one, if you will, that we provide every day. But don’t, you only have to go back, about 30 years, because we’re celebrating the 30th anniversary of the Desert Storm, and I look at Glenn in the camera here, and probably you too, Dave, and where were you 30 years ago, and uh, when all that happened with Desert Storm. And you look at the use of space for that war, with regards to GPS, really the first wide use of GPS for the military, and really satellite communications. I think we had close to 80% of the theater communications ran through satellite communications on orbit. And even today, you know, you could make an argument that we’re even more reliant on space for our operations, our ability to forward project across the globe. And just look at the recent events that have happened over the last 24 hours rely upon GPS satellite basecom, communications and precision navigation and timing. So all very important, we rely on it each and every day, and thus we need to protect it. 

“If you look at the commercial space growth, it’s amazing to see the growth in that particular area, with more than 800 satellite communication payloads on orbit today. And the Starlink or the SpaceX’s Starlink constellation that has more than 1,000 satellites in orbit today, and really, looked at the expansion of our cislunar and beyond. Over the last couple of weeks or last month, you know, we’ve seen China’s rover now in orbit around Mars, preparing to land in May or June, you’ve got the United Arab, Arab Emirates’ Hope spacecraft that entered the Mars orbit on 9 February, really the fifth country to reach orbit around Mars, to include ourselves, China, India, and Russia. So amazing amount of interest, as well as expansion, commercially into the space domain. So really, so, protecting and defending it, and those of our assets and our allies and partners, is really the major role that U.S. Space Comm plays today. So if you look at really the strategic environment, and we know that it has changed, you know, the competition with Russia and China. You know, our American way of life that’s fueled by the space, our space capability. Space is now, without question, a warfighting domain. You know, our response as a nation has been very impressive and fast when you look at the fact that we stood up an 11th combatant command, that I have the honor of commanding today, as well as the establishment of the sixth branch of the service, the Space Force. All of those, those two capabilities just in and of themselves, as postured as well for today and for tomorrow, as we look to protect the homeland, of utilizing space assets. 

“So if you look across our adversaries, Glen touched on it just a minute, a few minutes ago, but I’ll talk a little bit about space. You know, we know that China and Russia, our competitors, are really developing a lot of counter-space capabilities. There’s numerous examples of Russia and China deploying systems that can hold our U.S. Space capabilities at risk. So the common question really outside of military circles, sometimes when I’m speaking, I find is, so why have we military, militarized space. And, well, the answer is we really haven’t. Our competitors have. And our response to that is what I just described, in terms of the actions that we’ve taken as a nation. So China has a significant capability, if you will, to deny our advantages in space. They continue to develop a wide range of counter-space capabilities, and really, they’re looking to hold our assets at risk. You just have to look back as late as 2007, if you will, with their on-orbit anti-satellite test that they conducted, and they intend to continue to pursue that type of technology. So when you, when you look at Russia, if you turn the page to Russia, last year alone we saw the Russians conduct at least three, or conduct three anti-satellite tests. Direct ascent, ASAT tests, which can hold at risk our small satellites in low-Earth orbit. More than ever, you know, with those two threats alone, and I won’t deep-dive into each one of those countries specifically, but just kind of a broad brush that I gave you, that just highlights the fact that we need to work more closely, and side by side, with U.S. NORTHCOM and NORAD, along with our other combatant commands, in the defense and protection of those capabilities on orbit. So to kind of wrap up, you know, we do share a common history with, with NORAD NORTHCOM, you know, back during Desert Storm. If we go back 30 years, there was a U.S. Space Command, and that transitioned from U.S. Space Command after 9/11 to U.S. Northern Command for all the right reasons. And so, we do share a common bond in terms of our history, and as we stood back up at Peterson Air Force Base, and being next-door neighbors there with Glen VanHerck and the team we are, we’re working side by side to make sure that we are able to conduct the protection of the homeland in an efficient and deliberate manner. So again, thanks for having me today. I look forward to your questions.”

Deptula: “Well, very good gentlemen, thank you very much for those summary remarks. And Gen. Dickinson, yeah, I remember exactly where I was 30 years ago today, because I was the chief offensive air campaign planner for the air campaign for Desert Storm, so I was pretty busy putting together attack plans for the next 24 hours. And actually, on this date we were in the wrap up, the final four days where our ground forces went into Kuwait to reestablish the occupancy of the rightful sovereign owners of that state. And, as Gen. [Chuck] Horner used to say, Desert Storm was the first space war. Now, that might have been a little bit of an exaggeration, but it certainly started things, because those GPS systems that you mentioned actually guided those tanks and armored vehicles out in that featureless desert. So, it is a, it’s a good reminder to show just how integral space is in all of our military operations, and certainly more so today than ever before in the past. Well let’s dig down a little bit deeper into this topic area, and let me start with a question to you Gen. VanHerck. In a speech last fall, you made the point that when it comes to defending against hypersonic weapons, we need to start thinking of homeland defense in terms of deterrence by denial. Can you elaborate a bit on this point, and how should the pace of technological development determine the U.S. military’s response?”

VanHerck: “Thanks, Gen. Deptula, Sure. So I do remember that speech, and it was, it was a symposium on hypersonics where the majority of hypersonics discussion was around offensive capabilities, and I wanted to flip flop the discussion a little bit and think about defensive capabilities specific of our homeland from hypersonics, which are being fielded both by Russia and China as we speak, or have been fielded. From a defensive perspective, it concerns me to, basically with my NORAD hat, be able to provide attack assessment and warning. We’ll get that initially, but the attack assessment and endgame defeat of hypersonics is a significant challenge, and Gen. Dickinson will tell you that. We’re working closely with [Vice Adm] Jon Hill at the [Missile Defense Agency], as well, to get after this, but I believe as, as I earlier said, a lot like BMD, a generating capability that puts doubt in their mind about achieving their objective by, by striking either nuclear or conventional hypersonics delivered nuclear payload. I’m a firm believer that our nuclear deterrent is the deterrence by that, but conventional payloads, we need to think further left. We need to be inside their OODA loop, we need to be able to posture forces and message to create doubt in their mind about utilizing these capabilities to attack the homeland, to achieve their objectives. And so that’s what I really mean by deterrence by denial, it’s, it’s doubt about the success that they can actually achieve, ultimately. And when you combine both those, as I said earlier, that’s extremely powerful. With regards to the pace of technological development, absolutely, we should, we should be utilizing and pacing with technological development, development in commercial industry, and we’re going in the right direction. We’re not going fast enough for me. And what we need to do is go faster, or we run the risk of our competitive advantage eroding, or continue to erode. I’m not gonna say we’re a peer in every, in every domain with China and Russia, but certainly in many domains we are, but that will continue to erode if we don’t utilize technological developments that are ongoing within the commercial sector, especially in Silicon Valley and many of our defense industrial partners. And so it’s clear we have to go much faster. I hope that answers your question.”

Deptula: “Thanks very much. Let’s turn to Gen. Dickinson. A few weeks ago, U.S. SPACECOM published your commander’s strategic vision document, in which you noted that our homeland defense increasingly relies on space. Could you go into just a bit more detail about SPACECOM’s role in defense of the homeland?”

Dickinson: “Thanks Dave. Yes, absolutely. Got that new strategic vision out on the street, and I’m glad that it’s picking up some traction. I will tell you that I think there is a direct correlation between the security of the U.S. and our ally assets and space and the homeland security. They are inseparably dependent, I think, upon that. I mean, I just, in my opening comments, talked a little bit about our increasing economic dependence on space capabilities, and that’s in line with our military dependence as well on space capabilities. So you know, when you look at our, our ability to provide that to, to the warfighter, you know, some of those examples include position navigation and timing. And as you mentioned, GPS and Desert Storm, I’ve got a few stories myself on that, in terms of what was provided to us. Very elementary at the time, but absolutely a combat multiplier. But we have PMT, we have missile warning, we provide search and rescue information, things, something we don’t talk about a lot, but we need to, is the fact that we provide Glen some humanitarian assistance and disaster relief support, satellite communications, weather forecasting, climate monitoring, etc. etc. so it’s, it’s very important that we understand, you know, how, how critical that is to our way of life here in the United States, and around the world. And, as I mentioned in my opening remarks, we’ve got our adversaries our competitors, trying to hold those capabilities at risk. So really, I think defending, defending our space capabilities, and that’s the mission we have been given to protect and defend, is therefore critical, the defense of the homeland, for both the American way of life, and for that of our ability to defend ourselves.”

Deptula: “Well thanks very much for that, and I think it’s, it’s pretty incredible how ubiquitous space has become across the board and it is something that is just simply accepted as being there. And I think it’s extraordinarily important that U.S. Space Command has been reestablished with a focus on defending those capabilities, because they are so critical to U.S., not just national security interests, but day-to-day living by each and every one of the citizens the United States. Gen. VanHerck, last month NORAD tracked to Russian maritime patrol aircraft that entered the Alaska Air Defense Identification Zone. Now, we all know that this isn’t something new, that in fact NORAD last year conducted more intercepts of Russian aircraft than it has in many years. Why do you think the number of Russian interceptors has increased, or intrusions have increased? And what’s Russia seeking to gain from engaging in this kind of behavior?”

VanHerck: “Gen. Deptula, I’ll answer that last question first. They’re uh, they’re trying to establish norms and, and deterrence. This is the competition that I alluded to earlier in my opening remarks, and that’s exactly what Russia is doing. Over the last few years, they, they’ve modernized their force, they’ve continued to build infrastructure and capabilities in the Arctic, and what they’re doing is they’re establishing what they would feel are norms and standard operating kind of procedures, and trying to flex their muscles and regain prominence, if you will, on an international platform. As far as why this has happened, and that’s one reason, I would say that the second reason, and this is really important to point out, is I talked about the global nature of competition today. And I’ll give you an example. As you well know, we’ve changed how we do our bomber operations. And we did continuous bomber presence for 16 years or so. Now we’re doing bomber Task Force missions and they’ve been very, very successful. They’ve increased the readiness of our Global Strike Forces. They’ve given combatant commanders around the globe the opportunity to have effects and influence on a more recurring basis as the department has asked for, through dynamic force employment. What I would tell you is the global nature of that problem, what you see, is as Gen. [Tod D.] Wolters or Adm. [Philip S.] Davidson utilizes a Bomber Task Force for influence in their AOR, you’ll see an equal and opposite opportunity or response out of the Russians that, oftentimes, will occur in my AOR. And so I think you’re seeing, kind of, a little bit of a tit for tat, as we have changed our operations. You see a little bit of that with the Russians, as well. So it is a global competition. Now I go back to my point of thinking about this globally in understanding of global strategy and thinking about global impacts, the worst thing that we could have happen is trying to generate an effect in somebody else’s AOR and they are, and I have a strategic mission failure in my AOR, as, that’s what we’re trying to prevent. Thanks, Gen. Deptula.”

Deptula: “Well, staying on the Arctic area of responsibility for a minute if we can, Gen. VanHerck, it’s becoming increasingly clear that the Arctic is no longer the neutral buffer that it once provided. What steps is NORTHCOM taking in order to sense and respond to potential threats emanating from the Arctic?”

VanHerck: “Great question, and thanks for the opportunity expand on that. First let’s talk about why the Arctic is changing, real quick. Well the environmental changes certainly creating opportunities for, for all nations to get access, and have economic influence through either transiting through the, the Arctic or have access to the incredible resources. Russia, a large percentage of their economy is driven by access and influence in the Arctic, and China’s wanted access as well, and they call themselves a near-Arctic nation. With that said, what we’re doing is we’re aligning our priorities to the 2019 Department of Defense Arctic strategy. What that requires for me is really persistence to be able to compete. I’ll go back to that competition thing. It’s the ability to compete in the Arctic. And what that requires is the ability to have persistence, and that means I need communications capability. Communications is incredibly challenging north of 65 in the Arctic. We’re working with Congress and Space Command and others. I’m encouraged by where we’re going, we’ll have communications capability up there within the next year or so. Not only communications capability that benefits the military, it’ll benefit industry and the civilian partners, as well, and the natives in the Alaska region and across Canada. Additionally, to have persistence you need access and fuel. Right now, I have a stated requirement for fuel north of Dutch Harbor, Alaska so that we can have Navy and Coast Guard vessels with more persistence and prolonged operations in the Arctic. Working closely with our Canadian allies for infrastructure, infrastructure to house military capabilities, such as aircraft, early warning aircraft to give us that domain awareness that we’re talking about, and we’re also working hard with the services. I’m encouraged that all the services are coming up with their Arctic strategy. We’re expanding opportunities to exercise. You’ll see exercises next month, that’s part of my campaign plan, and I just released a strategy as well, so I’d encourage you, those who have access to a classified network, to take a look at that, and we’ll have an unclassified version coming out as well. Thanks for the opportunity.”

Deptula: “You bet. Gen. Dickinson, those Russians have been pretty busy. In December, Russia conducted a new anti-satellite missile test using a direct ascent missile, designed to destroy small SATs in low Earth orbit. How common are these tests and beyond the handful of countries that currently possess this capability, are other countries developing in anti-satellite missiles?”

Dickinson: “Well thanks, Dave, you know, just in 2020 we saw Russia conduct three separate anti-satellite tests alone. I mean the first was a DAA-sat test that we saw in April, then Russia released an on-orbit projectile near one of our, their own satellites, in July and as you mentioned they conducted a second DAA-sat test in December. And additionally in February of 20. And we saw Russia conducted an on-orbit testing, near, near a U.S. government satellite, so just like in any other domain, this type of behavior, you know, I would categorize as, as dangerous. And as you said, we’ve seen tests from other nations, and not just direct ascent anti-satellite tests or missiles, but other security threats in space. This includes kinetic-kill vehicles on orbit, and even electronic warfare capabilities. All this reinforces, you know, the idea that we need to promote responsible behaviors in space and really establish norms that allow for the safe use of that domain for both us, the United States, as well as our allies and partners.”

Deptula: “Well thanks for that, let me ask you a bit of a follow up. The cost of missile defense and early warning capabilities are projected to rise over the next few decades. Could you elaborate on SPACECOM’s role in missile defense, and what is SPACECOM doing to maximize the benefit of existing technology for long term gains in this area?”

Dickinson: “Uh, sure. So you know SPACECOM, you know, is a key supporting combatant command for the missile defense community, you know, as the functional management office or FMO the missile, for missile warning, US SPACECOM, through our component Space Operations Command, part of the U.S. Space Force, operates, you know, the satellites as well as our ground based radars, for early warning to our missile defenders and shooters throughout, not only maybe the homeland, but also the globe. And so, in the unified command plan of 2020, U.S. Space Command was declared the global sensor manager. So what that means is we’re responsible for the planning, managing, and conducting of operations of assigned DOD space domain awareness, missile defense, and missile warning sensors. So, in our role as a missile warning functional management office and global sensor manager, you know, we are the lead to interface and advocate for the enhancement of the DOD missile warning systems, missile defense, and space domain awareness sensors. So that’s kind of it in a nutshell, what we contribute, a big mission, a large mission for the command and one that we’re doing each and every day.”

Deptula: “Well thanks for that. Gen. VanHerck, last year NORTHCOM and NORAD launched the Pathfinder program to modernize the systems used to process data from the radars and other sensors that we rely on for homeland defense. Could you expand a bit about just what this program seeks to achieve, and do you think it could be a model for other programs inside the Department of Defense?”

VanHerck: “Yeah, so it’s, Pathfinder is actually the name, to be clear for everybody. And it’s a unique capability that we worked with DIU to fill quickly, that essentially takes an ingest, aggregates data from multiple systems. Data that would, in the past have been, what I would say left on the cutting room floor, and not analyzed or assessed in a timely manner, or it would have been data that was stove piped through an individual system, individually analyzed. And so the Pathfinder program uses machine learning to help us analyze that data from multiple systems—not only military systems, but commercial systems, other government agency systems, as you fuse that data. Let me give you an example of how this can be really successful, to kind of put it into perspective. And so, if you remember in 2015, Gyrocopter flew down in the National Capital Region from the north and landed on the White House lawn. When you go back and look at that scenario, when you look at the systems to monitor the National Capital Region individually, no single system at full awareness or saw that Gyrocopter. We took Pathfinder and applied it to the available systems, the actual data and utilized Pathfinder capabilities to assess that data, and sure enough, there that Gyrocopter was, and it was easily detected by that point. This gives us the ability to utilize existing data systems, going back to where I’m talking about domain awareness and information dominance today, to relatively affordable situation, analyze and assess that data. And now it’s just a challenge of getting to the right decision makers at the right time. I absolutely believe it can be a model for the Department of Defense. It lays the foundation for improved data-driven decision making and enhanced capability, and we’ve, we were using it today. It’s out in our fields and in our sectors right now. Historically our sectors were very manually driven, phone calls to pass data, etc. Today we fuse all that data together, and we’re seeing the picture much more real time, and much more in a, an automatic type of digital environment.”

Deptula: “Well very good. Gen. Dickinson, one of the goals that you identified in your strategic vision document was to integrate commercial entities into SPACECOM operations. As commercial entities are playing an increasingly prominent role in U.S. space operations writ large, how do you envision that they could contribute to homeland defense?”

Dickinson: “Well Dave, just as I discussed with missile warning, mission space capabilities you know are critically linked to our ability to protect and defend the homeland as a theme that we’ve talked about this morning. I think it’s equally important to understand that given the size and the complexity of the operating environment, we simply, simply can’t go it alone. Our partnerships with our allies, and with our friends in the commercial industry, are central to successful military operations in the space domain. We can’t operate effectively in space without our commercial partners, and we can’t protect and defend the U.S. homeland without those space capabilities. Our commercial partners are fully in, are fully part of the integral link between space and homeland defense. This concept is so important that I’ve outlined it in my, as, in my commander’s key tasks and my strategic vision. Yeah, one of our functional components, the combined force base component command, which is out of Vandenberg Air Force Base, is leading the effort with our commercial integration cell, where we currently have nine companies that are integrated out there at Vandenberg, and we’re looking to expand that each and every day. And we’re also working with the intelligence community, really, quite frankly, to build a stronger commercial partnership there. And then my J-5, or my strategy, plans, and policy directorate, as working to secure key engagements with our commercial and industry partners, to ensure that we are able to communicate our strategic and operational challenges we face. So the commands J-8 that we’re proud to have stood up now and working very hard, plays a key role for us in capturing and prioritizing our requirements that our service components need to source. So, industry can help, help us see how new and developing technologies open up our options for our requirements that just weren’t possible before. So a pivotal part for the command is the integration of the commercial industry into our operations.”

Deptula: “Well thank you for that. Now Gen. VanHerck, in recent weeks, we’ve witnessed the tragic consequences that result from breakdowns of our vulnerable power grid. What kind of contingencies is NORTHCOM developing with respect to threats to our nation’s power grid from electromagnetic pulse or EMP attacks?”

VanHerck: “Thanks Dave. Absolutely. I get paid to think about all kinds of those contingencies, and that’s exactly what we’re doing, and doing that in partnership with Homeland Security and other agencies across. Let me talk to you how I would approach that, and that did make me reflect on vulnerabilities and opportunities, as well, to prepare the department for such circumstances as you just described. So the way I would approach this initially would be from a standpoint of continuing to defend, if it was a nefarious actor, to ensure that we defend our homelands, and my NORAD hat that’s Canada and the United States, in my NORTHCOM hat, certainly it’s going to be the United States. So there if there is an ongoing tactic, attack to make sure we’re postured to defeat or defend against any potential threat. The next thing I would be concerned about is my future ability to continue my mission, so my ballistic missile defense mission, for example, and ensuring there’s no negative effects that have impacted ballistic missile defense, continuity of government, continuity of operations, surge layer force protection, my ability to do Noble Eagle, all those things would come to mind really quickly. And so we think about those, and exercise and strategize how those fit into an overall plan to defend. And finally, an absolutely no fail mission is I must be ready in such a situation to provide defense support of civil authorities. And so that’s how I would flow thinking about that. I’m encouraged that we’re starting to think about this at a more broad government level. It’s because of the threat I started off with and described, and potential intent. I’m encouraged that we’re going to have a whole of government, exercises, top-tier exercises that will exercise taking a look at what you’re talking about. One of the exercises, and it’s still a few years away, that I’ve asked for is the flip flop. Typically these exercises are based on natural disasters and those kinds of thing, for, for an interagency, where I’m always wearing my support hat. It’s important for us to conduct exercises where it is an attack on the homeland, where I am the supported commander by other agencies as well, and to iron out those types of command and control, and responses that would be needed to the event that you described. Thank you.”

Deptula: “All right, well we’re coming to endgame here, and for both of you. The U.S. is likely to face many years of budget constraints. If you had just one minute to tell Congress which your top priorities are, please take one minute each, and tell us just what those top priorities are. Gen. Dickinson, why don’t you go first.”

Dickinson: “Thanks Dave. So, I got to tell you, it’s a different position for me now as the combatant commander. I really look hard at, obviously, what, what the services are doing in the space domain and what they’re procuring, but what I’m looking very carefully at is developing the requirements that we need to fight and win in space domain. And so as I look at the requirements, and producing those for the services to look at, I’m very interested in making sure that we continue with our investments in the integration of space domain capabilities, data fusion, processing, integrated command and control, and spacewalk warfighting capabilities. And really at the bedrock of that are the, underpinned by all that will be the robust cybersecurity posture to protect and defend those technologies. But it is, it’s a different perspective for me now, being able to look across, you know, all commercial-type activities as well as what we’re doing in the services, and really develop those requirements that I need in order to get the assets that I need for, for my mission.”

Deptula: “Thank you. Gen. VanHerck?”

VanHerck: “Thanks, Gen. Deptula. On the 16th of March, I’ll testify in front of the SASC and cover exactly what you’re, you’re asking me to cover here. Increased domain awareness is the top of my apple. As I said, that’s from undersea, to sea, land, air, space, cyberspace. And taking that domain awareness, utilizing capabilities to provide information dominance. We need to set the foundation now, because using machine learning and artificial intelligence will absolutely challenge some policy decisions. We need to set that foundation right now so that we’re, we’re ahead of the game, and we don’t field capabilities where there’s concern about machines providing solutions and opportunities for us in the military dimension. We need to focus on competition, competition as whole of a nation. Whole of a nation, long term, with a focus on China. Right now I think we are getting that way, I’m encouraged by what I’m seeing. But this will require a whole of nation effort to get after the problem long-term to compete. An integrated, integrated synchronized strategy to get after that. To go faster, faster, and accept a little bit of risk to be able to go faster within the department. You know, to go fast, you have to fail at times, and I believe that’s acceptable. So, you get back up on your feet and keep going. So, that’s what I would tell them that’s crucial for us.”

Deptula: “Well thanks very much, Gen. VanHerck. And gentlemen, we’ve come to the end of this virtual Aerospace Warfare Symposium event. Thanks again to both of you for your comments on these issues, and clearly from the discussion today, it’s very evident that SPACECOM and NORTHCOM are very fortunate to have you both leading these critical commands. So on behalf of all, all of us at the Air Force Association, we wish you the very best, and from the Mitchell Institute of Aerospace Studies, we hope that you both have a great aerospace power kind of day.”