Air Force Association Celebrates 75th Anniversary

Feb. 3, 2021

The Air Force Association is celebrating 75 years of educating, advocating, and supporting the U.S. Air Force and U.S. Space Force.

AFA was incorporated on Feb. 4, 1946, to form a grassroots network across the country to educate the public about air power and to advocate for the Air Force to become a separate military service branch. Less than 18 months later, in September 1947, the Air Force gained its independence.

Under the leadership of Gen. James Harold Doolittle, its first president, and generations of volunteer and professional leaders since, AFA became a critical advocate and supporter of air power, space power, and the means and resources needed for a ready and robust national defense.

“Over the years, AFA developed a strong foundation for supporting Airmen, Guardians, and their families; providing a voice in Washington to advocate for things like recognizing the Outstanding Airmen of the Year, or resourcing the Community College of the Air Force, as well as a place in local communities; providing awards and scholarships that build valuable ties between our military forces and the local communities that support them,” said Gerald Murray, AFA Chairman and 14th Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force. “Another of AFA’s many little-known accomplishments was its advocacy in 1964 for the creation of a ‘sergeant major of the Air Force.’ In in 1967, that initiative was formalized when Chief [Paul Wesley] Airey became the first Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force. Decades later, I followed in his footsteps.”

Today, the Air Force Association’s education and advocacy work continues. AFA produces the Air Force’s premier professional development events, the Air, Space & Cyber Conference and Aerospace Warfare Symposium, which each attract thousands of attendees and the full participation of top Air and Space Force leaders.

AFA operates the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, the nation’s only think tank dedicated to the advancement of air and space power and related concepts, and it publishes Air Force Magazine, the association’s premier publication. AFA also operates two of the world’s largest and most dynamic programs for attracting and developing student interest in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). AFA’s CyberPatriot and StellarXplorers STEM programs use fun, team-based competitions to interest students in careers in cybertechnology and engineering. AFA’s Wounded Airman Program provides life-changing assistance to seriously wounded, ill, and injured Airmen and their families. And its COVID-19 Assistance Fund provides support to those service members and their families adversely affected by the fallout from the global pandemic.

“AFA has been the force behind the forces for the last 75 years,” said AFA President, retired Lt. Gen. Bruce “Orville” Wright. “It’s the privilege of a lifetime to be able to dedicate my time and energy on behalf of Airmen, Guardians, and their families. Having already served my country, what higher calling could I have than to serve those who continue to serve us. To my friends and families who still wear the uniform, you know who we are. We’re AFA, and always on your wing.”

To learn more about AFA and our history, please visit our website or check out this timeline highlighting some of AFA’s greatest accomplishments from the January/February issue of Air Force Magazine.

Space Force Makes Its Pitch to Woo Other Troops

Feb. 3, 2021 | By Rachel S. Cohen

Active-duty Soldiers, Sailors, and Marines will soon be able to apply for jobs in the Space Force, as the new service begins to include people outside of the Department of the Air Force for the first time.

The Space Force is looking for about 30 members of the Army and Navy departments to come on board this year, before ramping up to several hundred next year, Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond told reporters Feb. 3.

Military employees recently outlined the plan for transferring those troops, the majority of whom will come from land- and sea-focused backgrounds in ballistic missile defense, space surveillance, navigation, and satellite communications—missions that now largely fall under the Space Force.

“We’re going to need that joint expertise,” Brig. Gen. David N. Miller Jr., the Space Force’s deputy chief operations officer, said in an online town hall Jan. 28. “You have an advantage, coming from another service, that we need to latch onto. We value that warfighting experience that you may bring from the Army, from the Navy or the Marine Corps. We need you to stay focused on building that warfighting mentality into the space cadre.”

The application period opens in early spring, followed by a review of applicants’ performance records late that season. Those chosen to transfer will hear back early this summer, and the Space Force hopes to start welcoming troops from the Army and Navy in late summer or early fall. Officials did not provide specific dates for each part of the process.

Troops who volunteer to join the Space Force under the limited inter-service program are separate from the organizations within the Army and Navy departments that the Pentagon is planning to move into the Space Force starting in fiscal 2022, as dictated by Congress. Military officials have said for months that they are nearing a decision on those groups that will fall under the Space Force, but have not announced a final plan.

“We’re looking to bring individuals in that are not necessarily in those units or missions that are planning to join Space Force in FY-22,” said Matt Jobe, a senior policy analyst in the service’s personnel branch. “Those individuals that are in those signal battalions or satellite operations centers, those will have opportunities in ’22.”

Service members who are part of units that are moving under the Space Force won’t automatically transfer—they must volunteer to join on their own.

Air Force members, largely from Air Force Space Command, started formally becoming Guardians last year. As of this spring, the Space Force plans to have around 6,400 Active-duty uniformed members across the globe and will total around 16,000 military and civilian employees.

Space Force career experts outlined potential job paths for Guardians during the Jan. 28 presentation, pitching positions that can take service members around the world and job stability as people stay in one line of work for years at a time. Many transfers will need to go through at least some mission training once they join the service, they said.

When newcomers from the Army and Navy arrive to the space operations field, they’ll likely start in two areas: orbital warfare and space electronic warfare, said Col. Chris Putman, a career field manager in that area.

Orbital warfare entails commanding satellites and “moving the spacecraft on orbit, both to protect the missions that they perform … or to prevent the adversary from taking actions on orbit,” he said. Space EW personnel jam electronic signals to stop others from using the electromagnetic spectrum in space, and protecting those same wavelengths that U.S. assets need to communicate.

The Space Force also wants to train experts in space battle management—the people who direct on-orbit operations more broadly—and space access and sustainment, or the people who handle rocket launch ranges, testing, network management, and more. Troops can pursue careers in intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, cyber operations, and acquisition as well.

“You will see two primary career fields that we need, and that is network operations and defensive cyber operations,” said Col. Jon Smail, the Space Force’s senior cyber officer. “We won’t be doing expeditionary [communications operations], and we won’t start with offensive cyber operations, but we are planning in the future to have that capacity.”

The Space Force isn’t necessarily off-limits for troops in jobs that don’t fall in the space lane—say, an Army infantryman or a Navy drone pilot. USSF in fiscal 2022 will start considering how to bring those people in, and hopes to have a firmer plan in 2023 to open the Space Force to anyone who wants to join, according to Jobe.

Officers and enlisted members who sign up for the Space Force start the clock on a three-year service commitment, Jobe added. That’s long enough to complete fresh training, make sure people have adjusted to their new work, and set them up for future promotions.

“We want to do very deliberate development with each individual that joins Space Force,” Jobe said. “We are not looking for box-checking.”

Soldiers, Sailors, and Marines who transfer in will keep their same rank, said Rob Romer, the Space Force’s deputy for strategic human capital planning. A pending promotion that is finalized “should travel with you,” he said, though it may delay the transfer process. Retirement plans would remain the same as well.

Officials are still ironing out the details of how to move people across the Defense Department, as top Space Force leaders reiterate they don’t want to “break” the other armed forces to build their own.

“We’re trying to do what we can to smooth this process out,” Romer said. “I know that one service goes a lot faster than the other service, but we’re going to work with all of the services to be sure that we understand the timelines, and if there’s a way to … speed things up, we’re all for that.”

Austin Orders Stand Down to Address Extremism in the Ranks

Feb. 3, 2021 | By Brian W. Everstine

Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III on Feb. 3 ordered a military-wide “stand down” over the next 60 days to have units discuss extremism in the ranks, the Pentagon announced.

The stand down, similar to the Air Force’s 2019 resiliency tactical pause to address suicide and a 2018 stand down for aviation mishaps, directs individual units to select a day to cut back on its operations to discuss the growing problem, according to a Defense Department release.

“It’s got to be a leadership issue down to the lowest levels, small unit leadership all the way up to (Austin),” Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said in the release. “So if you consider it a leadership issue, then maybe there will be some potential solutions there to allow us greater visibility.”

The stand down comes as senior DOD officials have said the department is struggling to grapple with the problem of extremism in its ranks. Garry Reid, the Pentagon’s director for defense intelligence, said last month in the aftermath of the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol that though DOD policy expressly prohibits personnel from actively advocating supremacist and extremist ideology and causes, there has been a rise in incidents.

“All military personnel, including members of the National Guard, have undergone a background investigation, are subject to continuous evaluation, and are enrolled in an insider threat program,” Reid said, referring to those activated to protect the inauguration and the nation’s capital. “Simply put, we will not tolerate extremism of any sort in DOD.”

A senior defense official said last month the FBI notifies DOD of about 200 cases per year that are being investigated, though that number encompasses all criminal investigations and doesn’t specify which are extremism related.

Supremacist groups have actively targeted troops already in service, and have tried to enlist already active members, the official said.

“We know that some groups actively attempt to recruit our personnel into their cause, or actually encourage their members to join the military for purposes of acquiring skills and experience,” the official said. “We recognize that those skills are prized by some of these groups, not only for the capability it offers them, but it also brings legitimacy in their mind to their cause—the fact that they can say they have former military personnel that aligned with their extremist and violent extremist views.”

Some of those arrested in connection with the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol, and those in attendance, have included veterans, current National Guard members, and at least one Active-duty service member. Following the incident, a group of 14 Democratic lawmakers sent a letter to the Pentagon’s Inspector General urging a deep investigation into “instances of white supremacist and violent fringe extremist activity within the military.

“Beyond the insurrectionist attack on the Capitol, it has been widely reported that white supremacists are joining the military and permeating the ranks,” the senators wrote. “Although some recruits with extremist views attempt to join the military, it is also common for this destructive ideology to take hold during military service. The spread of white supremacist ideology is dangerous for the military and threatens to rupture civil-military safeguards that our democracy requires.”

During his confirmation hearing on Jan. 19, Austin said he would immediately work to rid the military ranks of extremism.

“If confirmed, I will fight hard to stamp out sexual assault, and to rid our ranks of racists and extremists, and create a climate where everyone fit and willing has the opportunity to serve this country with dignity,” he said.

Plans to Draw Down in Germany on Hold as New Administration Considers Options

Feb. 3, 2021 | By Brian W. Everstine

Plans to significantly reduce the U.S. footprint in Germany are now on hold as the new administration reviews the decision and its impacts, the head of U.S. European Command said Feb. 3.

In July, then-Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper and EUCOM boss Gen. Tod D. Wolters announced that DOD would remove nearly 12,000 troops from Germany, shift F-16s from Spangdahlem (the base’s only flying mission), and halt plans to move tankers and special operations forces from England to Germany, among other changes. The announcement came after former President Donald J. Trump repeatedly stated his desire to reduce the U.S. footprint in Germany.

Wolters told reporters in a teleconference that planning for the moves immediately stopped once new Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III took charge. Wolters would not say how far along the changes were in planning.

“There were so many pieces and parts to the plan, we could probably sit here for weeks and guess on the depth and how far along we were,” Wolters said. “But in all those cases, there were branches and sequels with multiple options. So, I will just tell you that the new administration has comfortably stated to us that we need to conduct a thorough review, cradle to grave, in all areas. And then after they’re allowed to conduct that review, we’ll go back to the drawing board.”

Austin has hinted at making changes to the plan. According to a Pentagon summary of a Jan. 28 call with German Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, Austin said Germany is a “great host for U.S. forces” and “expressed his desire for a continued dialogue on U.S. force posture in Germany.”

Wolters said the DOD review will provide a “comprehensive look at all of the options, from A to Z, and [then DOD will] take a strategic and operational examination of each and every one of those impacts.”

When the move was announced, it drew immediate criticism from lawmakers, and the fiscal 2021 National Defense Authorization Act aimed to block funding for the change until the Defense Department provided details on the timeline and justification.

Wolters would not provide a guess on what the decision would ultimately be, saying the White House will “deliver us a decision. Don’t know what that will be. … I’m a smart military member, so I want to make sure that I give my senior civilian leadership the appropriate maneuvering space to make the decision that they need to make so that we can collectively go forward in the future.”

Air Force Establishes Office of Diversity and Inclusion

Feb. 3, 2021 | By Jennifer-Leigh Oprihory

The Department of the Air Force on Jan. 11 officially stood up its Office of Diversity and Inclusion, according to a Feb. 2 release.

The office’s job is to cultivate an “equitable environment for all Department of the Air Force personnel” by finding and fixing “policies and procedures” that might have adverse impacts on underrepresented troops, and eliminating “barriers and other practices” that might impede their careers in the Air and Space Forces, according to the release.

The release also credited “the task force and Office of Diversity and Inclusion” for playing a role in the department’s crackdown on potentially offensive heraldry and honors and new disciplinary data tracking requirements.

Acting Senior Advisor on Diversity and Inclusion Tawanda R. Rooney—who formerly served as deputy director of the Secretary of the Air Force’s Concepts Development and Management Office—is leading the office, which is being staffed by a diverse “cross-functional team” of Air Force and Space Force personnel and civilians, according to the release.

“The Department of the Air Force is committed to enabling all Airmen and Guardians to thrive in a diverse and highly inclusive environment,” Rooney said in the release. “Our office will lead this charge and continue all the good work the Task Force initiated. Diversity and inclusion are warfighting imperatives and we need to capitalize on all available talent by enabling a culture of inclusion where every member is respected and valued for his or her identity, culture, and background.”

Lt. Gen. Brian T. Kelly, deputy chief of staff for manpower, personnel, and services, first announced a plan to transition the Air Force’s Diversity & Inclusion Task Force—which was formed in June 2020—into a permanent “Office of Inclusion, Diversity, and Belonging” at the Air Force Association’s 2020 virtual Air, Space & Cyber Conference last September.

Video: AFA on YouTube

However, the release noted, the new office was formally created in response to recommendations from the Office of the Secretary of Defense and from the Air Force Inspector General’s 150-page deep-dive into racial disparities within the department that was published in December.

EUCOM Moving Ahead with Massive ‘Defender Europe’ Exercise Despite COVID-19

Feb. 3, 2021 | By Brian W. Everstine

U.S. European Command is moving forward with its biggest exercise—expecting about 31,000 personnel from 26 countries—despite the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, but officials are ready to scale back if health concerns require it.

The annual Defender Europe exercise will bring together air, land, and sea participants to operate in 12 countries from the Baltics to Africa in late spring and early summer. Last year’s exercise was originally planned to be one of the largest military training events in Europe since the end of the Cold War, but it had to be dramatically scaled down as COVID-19’s spread shut down much of the world.

“It’s an all-domain exercise, it’s going to demonstrate our ability to lift and shift large forces over large swaths of territory,” said USAF Gen. Tod D. Wolters, commander of EUCOM and NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe. “As we speak, planning is ongoing and we’re all very, very excited about embracing the exercise.”

The massive amount of personnel and wide range of countries expecting to participate will be complicated, as different nations have handled the pandemic in different ways and travel restrictions remain. Wolters said officials examine these issues daily.

While the goal is to keep the participant level at 31,000 “ready, willing, and able to touch all 12 separate nations,” Wolters acknowledged in a teleconference with reporters that “with each passing second we realize there may come cases where we can’t do that.”

The command has scheduled “cutoff points” in its plans, milestones where if certain metrics related to COVID-19 aren’t met the exercise can downsize or change.

“We make decision points all the way leading up to the exercise to get as much as we possibly can out of the exercise when we do ultimately start it,” Wolters said.

Pleus: US Capitol Attack Reverberated on the Korean Peninsula

Feb. 3, 2021 | By Jennifer-Leigh Oprihory

While the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol Building happened thousands of miles and a literal ocean away from his office at Osan Air Base, South Korea, 7th Air Force Commander and U.S. Forces-Korea Deputy Commander Lt. Gen. Scott L. Pleus said the event’s aftershocks were felt on the Korean Peninsula.

“People … here are watching, just like people all across the world, right?” he said during a Feb. 2 installment of the Air Force Association’s “Air and Space Warfighters in Action” virtual discussion series. “So for all of us that are … deployed, whether we’re PCSed or we’re actually … in a deployed status, what happens in the United States affects us, because that’s where our families are, that’s where our hearts are, that’s the flag we wear, that is the flag we gave an oath to. And when you see something like that where you see extremism, it is not only incompatible with our service, it goes against our moral fabric.”

Video: Air Force Association on YouTube

Chief Master Sergeant Philip B. Hudson, 7AF’s command chief master sergeant, added that conversations have been happening within “private organizations” in the Osan community—including its AFA chapter—about how the events of Jan. 6 uniquely reverberated with different people.

Hudson said he observed multiple cases in which people who might’ve thought they were in opposition to one another came to realize they shared a perspective but “just had different words to describe it.”

“As long as you know that … we[‘re] all over here for the same reason—one is for ‘fight tonight’ and defending South Korea, our partners, but also, to represent America, and the very best of America forward in a foreign country,” he said.

Hudson praised Osan’s Airmen and Guardians for keeping the Air Force’s core values front of mind and putting them into action, both in their host-nation interactions and with each other.

This is the very attitude that Department of the Air Force leaders encouraged Airmen and Guardians to espouse in a Jan. 13 letter condemning the attack.

“As military and civilian Airmen and Guardians, we have a job to do,” the letter stated. “Guided by our core values, the American people expect us to be disciplined and focused on defending our country. Our actions build the sacred trust placed in the military by American citizens, but our actions can also erode our credibility as an institution. You are called to exhibit conduct of the highest standard.”

Defense Department leaders have publicly acknowledged the U.S. military is confronting an influx in extremist personnel, Air Force Magazine previously reported.

Pleus credited former U.S. Forces-Korea Commander Army Gen. Robert B. “Abe” Abrams with creating a safe space for American citizens under his purview to share their candid feelings about hot-button sociopolitical issues following the killing of George Floyd in police custody last May.

“From the very beginning, here in 7th Air Force and U.S. Forces-Korea, Gen. Abrams has made it absolutely clear that our American citizens have the right to publicly discourse with what is going on, and more importantly, that they have the ability … to do that as a common standard procedure here on the Korean Peninsula,” he said during the webinar.

To facilitate this, Abrams got formal permission from Washington to host protests within USFK facilities, a move that Pleus called “unheard of.”

This effort paved the way for a June 4, 2020, protest at Osan and a June 11, 2020, demonstration at U.S. Army Garrison Humphreys, Military.com reported at the time.

Pleus also praised Abrams for underscoring the fact that issues within American society can impact U.S. military readiness overseas.

“We mentioned the tensions can be pretty high here in the Korean peninsula, and Gen. Abrams … said, ‘Hey, we are not immune just because we’re not in the country from this kind of discourse causing a problem … to our readiness, to our morale, and to the fabric of our military culture,” Pleus said.

Red Flag 21-1 Readying Airmen, Guardians for Great-Power Competition

Feb. 3, 2021 | By Jennifer-Leigh Oprihory

The 2021 iteration of the annual Red Flag combat air exercise at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev., is focused on great power competition, two of the minds behind the event told Air Force Magazine on Jan. 29.

“In the past, what we have done is we’ve had a kind of nebulous enemy out there that we’ve fought—somebody that’s challenging, somebody that … provides those problem sets and tries to punish our mistakes,” 57th Wing Commander Brig. Gen. Michael R. Drowley said in an interview. “But over the past few evolutions of Red Flag, we’ve really tried to take a National Defense Strategy approach, and tie the scenarios that we’re putting our participants through [to] real-world operations that they may see, either in Europe or the Pacific. So that way, if the flag ever goes up, they are that much more prepared for combat.”

With 27 unique scenarios (a mixture of offensive and defensive situations) inspired by the 2018 National Defense Strategy, this year’s exercise kicked off Jan. 25 and will run through Feb. 12. About 2,400 people are taking part, and USAF aircraft representation includes the A-10, F-15E, F-16, F-22, F-35, B-1B, and B-2, according to a Nellis release.

In addition, the Space Force is “applying both offensive and defense space capabilities in an integrated fashion with everyone else,” while the Navy is contributing EA-18G Growler electronic warfare aircraft, the Army is providing some manpower for “operational level command and control,” and the Marine Corps is providing “tactical command and control,” said Col. William A. Reese, commander of the 57th Wing’s 414th Combat Training Squadron, which heads up Red Flag and Red Flag-Rescue.

According to Reese, the multi-dimensional threat picture enabled by the integration of such a wide array of aerial assets enhances the U.S. military’s effectiveness against neer-peer adversaries.

New Year, New Challenges

Red Flag also incorporates aggressor forces across multiple domains, including MiG aircraft, as well as information and cyber aggressors, according to Drowley.

“They’re shifting their focus and their ability to replicate in all three domains—in air, space, and cyber, and …. to include surface threats—where we can now challenge our joint team, our coalition team, and if there’s a flaw in our plan, those aggressor forces are gonna find it, and they’re gonna exploit it, and they’re gonna punish us for those mistakes,” Reese said. “It is quite a battle.”

The exercise is also presenting participants with more challenging targeting scenarios, he added.

“We’ve made some efforts on our target side—specifically on the air-to-ground targets—where we’re doing things that make them harder to find, and we’re injecting exercise scenario-isms that will force our joint and coalition air component to think a little bit more agile while they’re flying,” Reese said.

This forces participants to use threat information, “package objectives,” guidance from the air component commander, and the level of risk that leader is comfortable taking to make “in-flight, real-time” choices. Following each scenario, he explained, these troops will debrief about the calls they made, “the cascading effects,” and how they can improve.

“It is amazing to watch our young Airmen and our young Guardians make real decisions that seem tactical in nature, but they indeed have strategic-level impacts, based on that senior leader commander’s guidance,” he said, adding that witnessing these troops succeed and make mistakes are both rewarding, especially since the latter “is exactly what this environment is for.”

Red Flag 21-1 also boasts twice as much airspace as last year’s exercise.

“The airspace for the Nevada Test and Training Range is amazing—it’s a national gem—and for us to have the ability to fight in an airspace that’s 120 miles by 100 miles, wide and long respectively, it’s unlike any other place that we have available to us,” Reese said.

Staying COVID-19-Safe

However, this year’s exercise looks a bit different due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition to participating forces from the U.K. and Australia opting to just send personnel vs. aircraft, Reese said that in order to mitigate exposure risks, masks are mandatory, hand washing is happening, there’s “disinfectant everywhere,” and briefings are broadcast to multiple rooms at a time to reduce the amount of people who need to be in close quarters with each other.

“The way that we have all of our meetings, all of our transportation, all of our briefings and debriefings, they’re all organized in a way that we put the risk areas into formations … ,” Reese said. This way, if someone tests positive for COVID-19 during the exercise, their formation can be benched while other, unexposed individuals, can continue to participate, keeping the training events on track.

Evolving with USSF

According to Reese, the Space Force’s standup hasn’t significantly changed the mechanics of Red Flag. This year’s exercise trains participants on the same kinds of offensive and defensive capabilities as pre-Space Force iterations of the event.

However, he noted, Red Flag, as an institution, is prepared to evolve in tandem with the young military service.

“As they continue to migrate and train, organize, and equip in their own different fashion, we’ll continue to adapt and evolve with ’em,” Reese said.

Drowley praised the exercise’s evolution into a truly integrated, multi-domain event.

“What today’s Red Flag accomplishes is … very tactical-level capabilities that have that operational feedback and strategic impact, where we see the layering of kinetic and non-kinetic, we can see how space enables fighter platforms, and how bomber platforms enable cyber effects, and how cyber facilitates both of those,” he said. “And so, what the team experiences now from the spectrum of just either putting a bomb on a target or the consequence management of what that means to the larger fight is just incredible compared to what Red Flag used to be. And that’s not to say it wasn’t great, but the critical thinking that we have applied now and the expertise to bring all those things together—it’s just superb.”

Despite Big Budgets and New Entrants, Industrial Base Gets a ‘C’ from NDIA

Feb. 2, 2021 | By John A. Tirpak

The health of the U.S. defense industrial base only received a “C” grade in the National Defense Industrial Association’s second annual assessment, and may get a lower grade still when more recent data, including the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, are compiled, NDIA leaders said Feb. 2.

The “Vital Signs 2021” report shows the industry facing “multiple headwinds,” NDIA president Herbert J. “Hawk” Carlisle said in a video teleconference to announce the findings. The data, based on polling of more than 1,400 NDIA member companies, found that even though demand for U.S. defense goods is high and production lines are humming, it’s getting harder to find cleared or skilled workers, and member companies are facing a tougher time dealing with cyber intrusions and government-mandated cybersecurity measures.

The data were collected as “we were just going into” the COVID-19 pandemic, which imposed challenges on production lines, parts supply, and communal work environments, Carlisle noted. New data reflecting trends since the pandemic will be available in the summer, he said, but he expects the industry will have a more pessimistic view in the next round of polling.

Some results about COVID-19 are already in, with about 70 percent of respondents saying they’ve seen a moderate or large impact to their business because of the pandemic and 12 percent saying they don’t expect their businesses to return to 2019 levels.

The NDIA did not include any recommendations with its findings. “We wanted to get the data out there” to inform congressional and public debate, Carlisle noted. Recommendations about what to do to help the industrial base “will come later,” he said.

The “C” grade is a fraction higher than last year’s assessment, also a “C.” NDIA members saw big gains in demand versus last year and 2018, and productive capacity and “surge readiness” were up significantly from 2018, although down from 2019. There was also a tick up in perceived openness of competition.

The biggest negative trends were in the political and regulatory environment, followed by supply chain, innovation, and industrial security. Members are also pessimistic about the number of home-grown science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) experts. Carlisle noted that the majority of advanced degrees in STEM awarded by American universities are going to foreign students, including those from China, many of whom end up returning to their home countries. Similar results were seen in availability of skilled workers.

Only 20 percent of respondents said it was “not difficult” filling STEM jobs, and only 24 percent said it was “not difficult” finding skilled workers, such as machinists, electricians, and trades, etc., according to the NDIA data. Of those responding, 38 percent said it was “extremely difficult” finding workers with security clearances.

Carlisle said the low marks in political climate and regulation stemmed in part from chronic continuing resolutions in Congress, which he noted have been used in 11 of the last 12 years. When Congress keeps defense money going with a CR, pending a new official budget agreement, “you can’t do new starts, can’t do increasing quantities,” Carlisle noted.

“There will be challenges” in the coming years as well, with a “tightly split House and Senate,” he said.

While Congress and the Pentagon have labored to streamline regulations and introduce new contracting methods, “it takes a period of time to get a rules change to go with it,” Carlisle said. Legislative change “doesn’t automatically happen,” and there has to be education of the acquisition workforce and time to implement the revisions.

“It’s a difficult challenge, working with the government,” Carlisle said, because in the case of the Pentagon, it “holds all the cards, … they are the overseers, the dispute resolution,” and that breeds frustration.

“It’s getting better, but there’s a lot left to do,” he asserted.

Wes Haulman, NDIA senior vice president of policy, said the Pentagon is taking action to draw in new commercial entrants in defense contracting.

“They need to recruit and retain for the defense industrial base,” he said, and “they are pulling out all the stops by creating innovative contracting vehicles—pitch days and other things—to try to bring people in,” but the barriers to defense contracting remain.

“It’s a monopsony; many suppliers and one big customer … [the government is] judge, jury, and prosecutor when they don’t think a company has followed the rules. So getting those rules right is essential.” For example, the government has barred using certain companies, like Huawei, from supplying cyber equipment to defense contractors, but there’s still no approved list of vendors to meet new cyber requirements, Haulman said.

Polling also indicated frustration among companies that said even when the government strives to draw in new entrants and small businesses, it’s still a tough push to get a product from one of those companies beyond experimentation and prototyping to being designated as a major defense program, Carlisle said.

While “pure player” defense industry contractors like Lockheed Martin haven’t suffered too much as a result of the pandemic, Carlisle said he expects “huge” repercussions from the pandemic on companies that do both defense and commercial work, notably Boeing.

“It is going to be a factor for many years to come,” he said, affecting suppliers at every level, including engine makers, materials suppliers, and others.

“I think the government is going to have to find a way, using the [Defense Production Act] and other means, to keep the supply chain vital, vibrant, innovative, and moving forward,” Carlisle said. He expects the true scope of the effect of the slowdown in the commercial sector on the defense sector to be represented in next year’s report. However, on the flip side, he expects the commercial space enterprise to “help support” the defense space enterprise.