Space Force Details OCP Uniform Requirements

Aug. 27, 2020 | By Brian W. Everstine

Members of the newly created military service focused on war fighting in space will officially wear a camouflage pattern developed for war in Afghanistan.

The Department of the Air Force on Aug. 24 released a memorandum stating that the Operational Camouflage Pattern is mandatory for all members of the Space Force beginning April 1, the Air Force’s date to finally phase out the Airman Battle Uniform in favor of the OCP pattern. Space Force members will wear “Space Blue” name tape, Space Force badge, and grade insignia, with a full-color U.S. flag, according to the memorandum. Space Force occupational badges are mandatory, with optional occupational and qualification badges and patches.

“Our uniforms are the first visual cue of our identity as a service,” Chief Master Sgt. Roger A. Towberman, senior enlisted advisor of the Space Force, said in the release. “Adopting the OCP worn in the joint environment reflects our role in the joint warfighting effort, and we incorporated Space Force-specific colors and configuration to establish our own independent identity.”

Morale patches are not authorized on the OCP uniform, and there’s a maximum of two patches to be worn on the left sleeve and one on the right. Following the Air Force’s example, T-shirts and boots will be Coyote Brown. Members will wear patrol caps, with name tapes attached on the back, and officers will wear the rank insignia on the front.

The new memorandum, which largely follows Air Force guidance outside of the “Space Blue” accoutrements, only addresses the use of the OCP uniform. No similar guidance for dress uniforms has been released.

Towberman, during an Aug. 26 appearance at the virtual Air Force Sergeants Association conference, said those entering Basic Military Training to join the Space Force will begin receiving their blue name tapes on Oct. 7, and though the trainees will largely follow Air Force BMT, there will be some adjustments.

Space Force Waiting on Capitol Hill for its Ranks

Aug. 26, 2020 | By Brian W. Everstine

The Space Force was getting ready to announce its enlisted ranks, with chevron designs in the works, until a former Sailor got in the way.

Space Force Senior Enlisted Adviser Chief Master Sgt. Roger A. Towberman said the new service wanted to announce the new enlisted ranks for the service, but a proposed amendment to the fiscal 2021 National Defense Authorization Act by former Sailor Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas), which calls on the Space Force to use U.S. Navy ranks, put that on hold.

“We’ve got to let that law, that legal system, play out and so until it plays out, there’s really no point moving forward,” Towberman said at the Air Force Sergeants Association’s virtual conference Aug. 26. “We’re ready to execute. I’m ready to be a master chief if that’s what the law says I’ll be. We’re ready to pivot and do something else if we’re asked to do something else.

“So, until that plays out, there just really isn’t any news. I know that’s frustrating to folks, we really would have preferred to have an answer by now,” he added.

For the foreseeable future, Space Force enlisted ranks will be “E-1 to E-9,” Towberman joked, adding that those who cross over to the new service from the Air Force will maintain their current rank title. The Space Force is still working through the 9,000 Airmen who in May applied for the 6,500 spots in the service.

“For those junior grades in particular, it means they’re still gonna be called Airman even though they’re in the Space Force, because we just don’t have any other options right now,” he said. “I would have preferred to have moved forward, but that is what it is.”

The Space Force does have chevron designs that it is “ready to release to the field” in focus groups and in a survey to current enlisted members, though “we’ve held back on that as well, waiting on clarification on what does this law mean? So, if this gets passed, does that mean we use Navy chevrons? I don’t know, and so there’s no point wasting people’s time looking at different chevron designs if we’re gonna wear Navy stripes.”

The service is “excited” that there’s interest on Capitol Hill about enlisted personnel, he added.

Towberman spoke extensively at the AFSA event, discussing issues like the future culture of the service and how it will handle military education. Foremost to the service, Towberman said, is building a Space Force that looks like America at large. Building a new military branch means there is an opportunity to create it without barriers that block minority Americans from joining and progressing. One questioner focused on the makeup of American astronauts, which historically have not included a representative number of minorities.

“Diversity makes the team better,” he said. “We don’t need to get people to want to do this. They want to do it. What we need is there needs to be no barriers. There are young girls, young African Americans, young Latinos all over America who are into space. Somehow, they walk away at some point because of barriers.”

The comments come as the Department of the Air Force is reviewing its promotion and military justice processes for racial biases. The Space Force is now looking to build its career progression, promotion, and retainment processes needed to “make sure the pathway is open,” he said.

“We need to honor their excitement with paths that are open to them,” he said. “Our aspiration is to build a force that looks like America. … We all have the same opportunities to the same end state, but every person’s journey is different and every person’s journey has different hurdles to clear.”

It’s too early in the Space Force to outline what things like promotion rates, number of assignments, etc., will be. This creates some uncertainty for those looking to join the service, and Towberman said it “doesn’t offend me” if prospective members choose to go elsewhere. The Space Force’s goal is to be different, and “better for some people. The goal is to design a service that is specific unto itself, so that for some people they feel like they belong there.”

One area that is coming into focus is professional military education, Towberman said. The Space Force needs to develop its own people, so over the next “couple years” it will have its own PME process, including “minor changes” to leadership schools on Space Force bases today. The schools will be similar to Airman Leadership Schools, and will give the same credit that has “full reciprocity” with the Air Force system, but there will be some “space flavor.” The Space Force NCO Academy will remain at Peterson Air Force Base, Colo., with the current academy there transferring to the new service in October. The Senior NCO Academy will stay the same in the “near term” with personnel still going to Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala.

Basic Military Training will change in October, with blue name tapes issued to future Space Force members starting Oct. 7, though the trainees will go through basically the same training process with some adjustments.

“What we want is, from the beginning, for space personnel to know that they’re not in the Air Force. That’s important,” Towberman said. “It has to be different enough. Like, ‘My experience was different than yours,’ but a lot of things are going to be applicable. … We have the greatest NCO corps in history. We know that doesn’t happen by accident, the Air Force has done a lot of work to build that NCO cadre, so we’re going to use as much of it as we can. Fundamentally, we still have to stand on our own eventually, so we’ll do that.”

Air Force Global Strike Command to Host Women’s Leadership Symposium

Aug. 26, 2020 | By Jennifer-Leigh Oprihory

Air Force Global Strike Command’s third Women’s Leadership Symposium—to be held virtually from Sept. 1-2—will tackle the promotion of diversity and inclusion within its ranks, the unique issues women Airmen face at work, and how all of that impacts retention.

The event’s theme is “Courage, Curiosity, and Community,” and it aims to equip the major command’s Airmen “to reorient, reinvent, and reimagine AFGSC by using their innate courage and curiosity to be free-thinking, bold, and irrepressible leaders who foster communities centered on dignity, respect, diversity, and inclusion for our entire team,” its webpage states.

Women comprise 19 percent of Global Strike’s manpower and 20 percent of USAF’s Active-duty force, making them “the largest underrepresented group” in the service and major command alike said A3/6 Directorate Chief and 2020 event chair Maj. Kim C. Rigby in an Aug. 25 interview with Air Force Magazine.

“When we really look at issues that impact them [and] what barriers we face to service, we start uncovering a lot of pieces,” she said. “We start peeling back that onion, and a lot of times, those policies that may be in place or those restrictions or barriers, when we’re able to lift those for women, they oftentimes benefit everyone.”

Discussion topics will include imposter syndrome, detecting and combating unconscious bias, team-building, confidence, mindful leadership, and more, she said.

“We’re also going to touch on diversity, inclusion, and intersectionality as another key piece and why those are important skills and important pieces for every leader’s toolbox,” she noted.

Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force JoAnne S. Bass—the first woman to hold that position—will keynote the event, Rigby said, and other speakers will include:

Chief Master Sgt. Melvina A. Smith, 8th Air Force’s command chief master sergeant and the Joint-Global Strike Operations Center’s senior enlisted leader
Air Force Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence, Surveillance, Reconnaissance and Cyber Effects Operations Lt. Gen. Mary F. O’Brien
Gwendolyn R. DeFilippi, USAF’s assistant deputy director of manpower, personnel, and services, and the strategic director of the Department of the Air Force Barrier Analysis Working Group
Maj. Alea Nadeem, a DAF Barrier Analysis Working Group’s Women’s Initiative Team chief

Air Force Research Laboratory Commander Brig. Gen. Heather L. Pringle will also address the Global Strike community via pre-recorded remarks, Rigby added.

She stressed that the event is open to all Global Strike Airmen, civilian employees, and contractors—regardless of their sex.

“When we look at the number of women in the Air Force, you know 20 percent and 19 percent are small numbers,” she said. “We need that 80 percent … to be strong advocates and allies for their female partners, so we definitely want to make sure that men are in the conversation, that they understand what’s going on, and that we hear their voices as well.”

And while the command sees the event as an educational opportunity, Rigby said Global Strike also hopes it will cultivate mentorship.

“There may be a leader out there who you didn’t know of because you potentially … were in the missile fields …,” she said. “There might have been someone whose speech, or topic presentation, or story really resonated with you, but they were someone under the 8th Air Force umbrella, and maybe your paths wouldn’t have met. So it opens up different opportunities for mentoring and networking as well.”

According to the command, Airmen who are interested in attending the event should:

Sign up here. Registrations that come in after Aug. 25 are not guaranteed “due to anticipated attendance,” the command noted.
Use the link provided in the RSVP confirmation email to ask permission to join AFGSC’s private event Facebook group.
Once membership in the Facebook group is approved, “they’ll be able to view everything live from the comfort of Facebook, wherever they choose to watch,” Rigby said. Videos of each symposium session will also be posted in the group so individuals who can’t watch them live can still access the content at their convenience, she added.

20th Air Force initially founded the event, but AFGSC adapted it into a Majcom-wide endeavor so 8th Air Force Airmen could also take part, Rigby explained. The first two all-AFGSC events were held in 2017 and 2018, respectively, at Barksdale Air Force Base, La., she said.

“We have a leadership team that is dialed into these issues, that is supportive, and that wants to hear our voices,” Rigby said. “Getting to work closely with [AFGSC Commander] Gen. [Timothy M.] Ray and see his vision for [the] Women’s Leadership Symposium has just been phenomenal, and I just wanna let everyone know that … from the top down, you have a team that is looking out for you, that is engaged in this, and wants to continue events like this.”

Air Force Global Strike Command originally planned to hold the event in-person at Barksdale in March, but had to postpone it due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

However, Rigby said, by reworking the event to rise to the coronavirus challenge, the command ended up dramatically expanding its reach.

“Platforms such as Zoom [and] Facebook Live gave us exactly what we needed to reach a larger audience, do it virtually, and the benefit of that is we don’t have to have folks travel during the current pandemic, and we can also reach a much larger audience than we originally forecast to have live here at Barksdale,” she said.

Brown: Air Force Suicides on Pace to Reach 2019 Level

Aug. 26, 2020 | By Brian W. Everstine

The Air Force is on a path to match its 2019 suicide level, despite a service-wide tactical pause and efforts to curb the spread, as stresses related to COVID-19 have added to the problem, the service’s top officer said Aug. 26.

“One of my concerns here is COVID adds stress and we are, from a suicide perspective, we are on a path to be as bad as last year,” Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. said during an appearance at the Air Force Sergeants Association virtual conference. “And it’s not just an Air Force problem. This is a national problem, because COVID actually adds some additional stressors, and I would say the fear of the unknown.”

In 2019, a total of 137 Airmen took their own lives—a 33 percent jump from 2018, prompting the service to order a service-wide “tactical pause” during which wings slowed operations to discuss suicide and issues Airmen might be facing. Service leaders said the pause, and ongoing discussions, helped bring the issue forward as a major concern in the Air Force, but the pace has not abated.

Brown told Airmen watching, “I’ll be honest with the collective, we’re struggling to figure out how to deal with this.”

Research has shown that relationship problems often are a key factor, and the Air Force is trying to determine the best way to address that. An unnamed major command has been establishing a way for Airmen to seek help from a chaplain or mental health professional at a separate base to make the process more anonymous, and Brown said USAF also is looking at possible outside agencies to provide help.

“It’s very hard if you want to go see the chaplain or mental health, and you just want to keep it private, just need somebody to talk to,” Brown said. “And then [you’re] going to see [them] at the commissary, at the BX, at the gym, … how can you reach out to another location, with somebody who doesn’t know but has an expertise that can help you, or someone outside the military you can talk to if you’re having some issues.”

As part of the AFSA event, Brown took submitted questions from Airmen for the first time. The topics included:

COVID-19 Impacts

Once there is a vaccine and “we go back to what I would call our regularly scheduled program,” Brown said he wants to ensure the service can take the best lessons learned and change how it operates. For example, production at Air Force Basic Military Training was cut roughly in half in the beginning of the pandemic, but now it’s back to almost full production, and the lessons it learned will be part of how BMT runs more effectively in the future.

“It’s just doing things differently [to] get the job done,” he said. “The key aspect for this is how do we document the things that we’re doing differently, and we make that kind of the way we’re going to do it in the future. We don’t take a step backwards.”

Race-Related Issues

The Air Force is looking inward, trying to determine how best to deal with race relations. Brown said “difficult discussions” are occurring in wings and the Inspector General is studying how race impacts both promotions and military justice. There are some changes that can happen quickly, but others will take time. “Partly it’s a cultural shift, at how we operate, how we think,” he said.

The service has received tens of thousands of responses to surveys and other inputs as part of this discussion. The response to these, and related actions, will happen over time.

“What we don’t want to do is actually over promise and under deliver [and] … come back and go, ‘Hey, we can’t support that anymore,’” he said. “We’ve got to be methodical about this, so we can make it sustainable over time.”

Future Budgets

Despite recent budget growth, the reality of the COVID-19 pandemic and the future economic outlook means the service cannot expect future spending increases. No matter the outcome of the November elections, Brown said he expects the budget topline to go down or stay flat.

For now, he does not forecast the service to have to conduct “force shaping,” or a reduction of personnel. “As a matter of fact, we’re trying to maintain the strength we have. Ideally, you’d like to get more, but our most expensive asset is our people,” he said.

The Air Force will follow the guidance from the Defense Department and national leadership with regards to force structure changes in both South Korea and Germany, he added.

Barksdale Changes Course, Evacuating Bombers Ahead of Hurricane Laura

Aug. 26, 2020 | By John A. Tirpak

As Hurricane Laura strengthens to a Category 4 storm, Eighth Air Force is moving most of its 47 or so B-52 bombers at Barksdale Air Force Base, La., to other locations and putting base personnel at HURCON 2, the second-highest storm readiness level, rather than evacuating personnel, a 2nd Bomb Wing spokesman said.

Barksdale, which hosts 8th Air Force, Global Strike Command, and about half the Air Force’s B-52H force, is located in northwest Louisiana, almost directly in the path of Laura, which is predicted to skirt the Louisiana/Texas border after making landfall the night of Aug. 26. The National Hurricane Center predicted Laura will still be at about Category 1 strength, with winds up to 95 miles per hour, when it reaches the vicinity of Shreveport and Bossier City, where Barksdale is located, the morning of Aug. 27.

“I need the Airmen of Team Barksdale to take this seriously,” 2nd Bomb Wing Commander Col. Mark C. Dmytryszyn said in a message to base personnel. “Ensure you have adequate supplies and are prepared to weather this storm.”

https://www.facebook.com/TeamBarksdale/posts/3666660576700947

Ellington Field Joint Reserve Base, near Houston, Texas, is expected to take a heavy but not direct hit from Laura. It has moved its MQ-9 Reapers and F-16s—which normally sit alert at the facility—into hangars to ride out the storm, a spokesman said. The base, which hosts Reserve units from all services and the Coast Guard, also “stands ready” to serve as a forward air relief and logistics site after the storm, “as we did after Hurricane Harry and Ike,” an Air Force Reserve spokesman said.

Barksdale B-52 Evacuations — A B-52H bomber takes off from Barksdale Air Force Base, La. on Aug. 26, 2020, ahead of Hurricane Laura, which is expected to bring high winds and possible water damage to the base on Aug. 27, 2020. The destination of the bombers was not disclosed for reasons of operational security. **Photo: USAF**

Global Strike Command does not confirm or deny the presence of nuclear weapons at any base, but Barksdale’s B-52Hs have a nuclear mission with the AGM-86B Air-Launched Cruise Missile. The spokesman declined to comment on the configuration of the bombers as they depart the base, and would not say where they were headed until they arrived, citing operational security.

In the runup to the arrival of now-Tropical Depression Marco and Hurricane Laura, the base remained at Hurricane Condition 4, but the base commander upgraded that to a HURCON 2, on a scale where the lower number indicates greater danger, as Laura gained strength. At HURCON 2, destructive winds are expected within 24 hours, and base personnel are expected to have secured outdoor objects, prepared their homes with protective measures and emergency supplies, and prepared go-kits for short-notice evacuation, although the plan remains for personnel to “shelter in place,” the spokesman said.

https://www.facebook.com/TeamBarksdale/photos/a.118546114845762/3664259906941014/

Low-lying areas on base are being protected with sandbags, the spokesman said, though he was not immediately able to say what measures would be taken to protect aircraft down for maintenance and unable to fly.

In 2005, Barksdale suffered moderate structural damage and downed trees as a result of Hurricane Rita, but Laura is expected to arrive with stronger force.

Laura is expected to push a storm surge of more than 20 feet along the western Louisiana coast, and surge as much as 30 miles inland in some places, according to the National Weather Service.

Roper: ABMS Experiment to Highlight Complexity of Future Warfare

Aug. 25, 2020 | By John A. Tirpak

The next Advanced Battle Management System experiment is meant to demonstrate the extreme complexity of a future war, and the need for analytic systems that can make sense of it all, Air Force acquisition chief Will Roper said.

Speaking during an Aug. 25 online “Ask Me Anything” streaming event, watched by over 1,000 people, Roper spent 90 minutes making the case for ABMS, calling data “more important than bullets” and predicting that future combatants won’t be willing to go into battle without their own version of an “R2-D2” automated assistant to feed them information and share it with other fighters.

The next ABMS experiment, called an “onramp,” is set to run Aug. 31-Sept. 4. Two combatant commanders—the head of U.S. Space Command and U.S. Northern Command—will be the “supported and supporting” chiefs of the experiment.

“There’s going to be so much happening that no one’s going to be able to keep up with it. And that’s exactly why we need digital enablement, to help these future warfighters in what’s going to be a very complicated event, but not nearly as complicated as what a future war’s going to be,” Roper said.

While much of what happens in the space element of the exercise is classified, Roper allowed that “we’re going to be holding space systems in denial, in very much a representative way that a real-world threat could, and require U.S. Space Command to continue to operate [under] those simulated attacks; both to keep space operations ‘clean and green,’ but also to support other domains of conflict.”

There will be simultaneous simulated attacks on national critical infrastructure, which NORTHCOM will have to defend against, using fighters and ships to “beat down simulated cruise missiles.” Also playing will be a “hypervelocity gun weapon system” that will provide point defense and protect “highly critical assets with a deep magazine.”

“Those things” are not the point of the experiment, even though they’ll make good copy and PowerPoint presentations in various post-experiment “hot washes,” Roper said.

“I think the overall challenge, … the real point of the exercise, is that there’s going to be so much happening at so many different locations concurrently, you can’t keep up with it,” he added. That in turn will compel participants to use and trust analytic systems to develop a comprehensive picture of the battle.

“How do these two commanders have situational awareness? Well, today, in truth, you can’t. You’re going to be doing that through hundreds, if not thousands, of people making phone calls.” The experiment will “create a clear signal” that what’s needed is “ways to simplify what these commanders see, and analytics let me do that.”

The experiment builds on the last onramp, run last December, which in turn proved to be a “great trial run” for the COVID-19 pandemic response, Roper said. Then-NORTHCOM commander Gen. Terrence J. O’Shaughnessy immediately said he’d prefer the experimental system to the one he was actually operating with, which Roper called a win for the concept.

The initial system “worked for … something as critical as responding to this pandemic, taking complicated data, number of people infected, resources available, … finding a way to synthesize all that.” Now, he said, “We’ve got to show that we can do that for a contested warfight, and if we get that right, by the time we get to onramp 3,” commanders will be clamoring for the system.

Asked to assess how Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. will likely view ABMS, given that his predecessor, Gen. David L. Goldfein, was a champion of the system, Roper said he expected Brown to promote it as well.

“Gen. Brown has hit the building with a force,” Roper said. Having come from Pacific Air Forces, dealing every day with the “very capable” China threat, “he’s bringing in a focus that we must change or we’ll lose, and that’s exactly what we need. And the pivot that we’re making in ABMS, caring more about the data than just the platforms, … that’s exactly what we’re going to need his leadership to continue championing.

“If you want a prediction from me, based on my interactions with him, his litmus test is going to be, ‘what do we need to fight and win in a high-end fight against China and Russia? And if we need it, then we’ll do everything we can to ensure we have it. And if we don’t need it, then we’ve got to get rid of it with extreme prejudice, because it’s taking away resources to do more winning things.” Brown’s urgency will be “exactly what we’re going to need … to get us through the scale-up phase” of ABMS, Roper added.

Efforts so far have focused on the “startup” phase of the system, Roper said, but now it has to be broadened.

In the scale-up phase, “we’re going to lay enough foundation so that it actually forms a road you can drive on.” He added that the end of scale-up will be evident when “enough communities have that personal experience where they can say … the system pushed me this data and it’s exactly what I needed.”

Roper said there will be no lead system integrator on ABMS, as it needs to behave as a system more like the internet than a platform.

Being able to master the U.S.’s own military capabilities to the greatest effect and be agile will be essential to compete with a China, Roper said. China is expected to double its Gross Domestic Product in the coming decades, with a population that will yield a greater number of talented people than the U.S. can match, and this will demand a system like ABMS.

As for those who maintain that the U.S. has succeeded so far militarily by having better-quality personnel with better training and equipment, Roper said the speed of future warfare will likely negate that advantage.

“If we’re not prepared, … human advantage … may be the first bullet in a presentation that begins, ‘back in the days when we had human advantage,’” Roper maintained.

Roper’s worried ABMS will be viewed as “‘cool tech that will is driving, and it’s innovation and the T-shirts and hoodies side of the Air Force and Space Force,’ and that couldn’t be further from the truth.” He said the Pentagon is “not a bastion of risk-taking right now. This is a five-sided coffin of conservatism,” with an allergy to radical ideas.

“If we fail, this won’t be tried again for years, and who knows how far ahead our adversaries will be? We’ve got to get this right,” Roper said.

Chinese Military Alleges U-2 Flew Over Training Exercise

Aug. 25, 2020 | By Brian W. Everstine

The Chinese government is alleging an Air Force U-2 overflew a People’s Liberation Army training exercise, claiming it was a provocative act in a purported no-fly zone though U.S. officials dispute the allegation. At the same time, the Pentagon is warning allies of China’s military modernization and spreading influence.

The Chinese Defense Ministry said the U-2 “severely disrupted regular Chinese training activities,” and ignored bilateral guidelines on aerial and maritime safety, according to Reuters. U.S. officials say the flight was within international rules.

“China is firmly opposed to this and has made solemn representations to the U.S.,” the spokesman said, without providing details on the flight path or location of the drills, the news agency reported.

Pacific Air Forces, in a statement, said “A U-2 sortie was conducted in the Indo-Pacific area of operations and within the accepted international rules and regulations governing aircraft flights. Pacific Air Forces personnel will continue to fly and operate anywhere international law allows, at the time and tempo of our choosing.”

While China alleges the U.S. is watching its exercises, the U.S. Navy and allies are mid-way through the large-scale Rim of the Pacific 2020 exercise, with more than 50 individual training events occurring. While China and Russia have previously shadowed U.S. ships in this exercise, there has been no apparent maritime presence so far this year, USNI News reported.

The alleged incident comes as Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper is traveling through the Indo-Pacific on a trip to show the U.S. commitment to the region. Esper, in a Wall Street Journal op-ed published Aug. 24, warned of the growth of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army—a military allied not with a country but instead with the Chinese Communist Party. The PLA is modernizing and spreading its influence in a way that is “inimical to the interest of the U.S. and our allies.”

“The Communist Party’s emphasis on indoctrinating, modernizing, and tightening control over the PLA shows how China’s leaders view the military as central to achieving their objectives,” Esper wrote. “Prominent among these is to reshape the international order in ways that undermine globally accepted rules while normalizing authoritarianism, creating conditions to allow the Chinese Communist Party to coerce other countries and impede their sovereignty.”

The U.S. military has responded, through the National Defense Strategy, by modernizing its force through new technologies, and strengthening its relationship with allies.

“Unlike Communist China, the U.S. stands for a free and open global system, where all nations can prosper in accordance with shared values and longstanding rules and norms,” Esper wrote. “And unlike the armed forces of the U.S. and our allies, the PLA is a loyal tool of the Communist Party. As such, I urge all countries to examine—and consider curtailing—their relationships with the PLA to make sure they are not helping advance the Communist Party’s malign agenda toward our collective detriment.”

Editor’s note: This story was updated at 5:25 a.m. Aug. 26 to include a quote from Pacific Air Forces.

Air National Guard Completes Iowa Storm Damage Cleanup

Aug. 25, 2020 | By Alyk Russell Kenlan

National Guardsmen in Iowa played a crucial role in cleaning up after a storm with winds up to 140 miles per hour hit Cedar Rapids earlier this month, uprooting trees, knocking down power lines, and causing power outages across southeast Iowa.

Within 24 hours, Airmen from the Iowa Air National Guard’s 185th Air Refueling Wing Civil Engineering Squadron based in Sioux City joined Army National Guard Soldiers in Cedar Rapids to clear the way for the power company to restore power.

“I’ve seen storm damage before, but I have never seen it for miles and miles, like this,” Senior Master Sgt. Dave Twohig, 185th Air Refueling Wing, said in an Aug. 21 press release.

The weather that hit Iowa on Aug. 10 is called a derecho, a storm characterized by hurricane-force winds that runs in a straight line across a wide area. The storm earlier this month cut power for 16,000 people, and Alliant was still working to restore power to 800 people as of Aug. 24, said Capt. Ramah Husidic, Iowa National Guard public affairs officer.

The storm toppled cornfields to such an extent it can be seen from space.

“The Guard provided valuable assistance we needed to help get our customers back on as quickly as possible,” Alliant Energy spokesman Mike Wagner said. “There was street after street after street, just lined with tree branches. In some areas, the piles of branches were almost as tall as our big trucks.”

The Air Guardsmen, equipped with chainsaws and skid loaders, allowed cleanup teams to quickly move through neighborhoods and make sure repair teams could get everywhere they needed to.

“Coordinated work with the National Guard, counties, and cities helped remove nearly 28 million pounds of trees and debris,” Wagner said.

Twohig said that helping fellow Iowans is one of the reasons he is in the Air Guard. “This is what it is all about to us,” Twohig said in a press release. “Everywhere we go, people are waving and honking. It’s been humbling.”

Husidic said the National Guard has now completed its cleanup mission and is preparing for the next time their help is needed.

Guard Aircraft Watching California Fires as Blazes Continue to Spread

Aug. 25, 2020 | By Brian W. Everstine

Air National Guard reconnaissance aircraft are tracking the spread of record fires across California, with unmanned and manned aircraft providing video to help with the response.

There are more than two dozen major fires and lightning complexes across the state, with 615 total wildfires ignited since Aug. 15. All told, about 1.3 million acres have burned across California, according to Cal Fire.

The California Air National Guard’s 195th Wing’s 234th Intelligence Squadron is using video feeds from MQ-9s and at least one RC-26 that have been flying above the fires, as well as damage assessments and predictive analysis to inform crews on the ground, according to a 195th Wing release. The MQ-9s and RC-26 are in addition to specially equipped Guard and Reserve C-130s that have been flying daily, dropping fire retardant on fire lines across the state.

Airmen from the 234th Intelligence Squadron view live footage of wildfires from MQ-9 and RC-26 aircraft on Aug 20, 2020, at Beale Air Force Base, Calif. **Photo: Master Sgt. David Loeffler**

Airmen in the squadron’s processing, assessment, and dissemination cell compare the live video feed from the aircraft to Google Earth and satellite imagery to report the extent of the damage almost instantly.

“Through predictive analysis, we can take into consideration the weather, wind patterns and terrain to determine how quickly a fire may encroach upon a nearby city,” Technical Sgt. Matthew Rubio, the PAD cell team lead, said in the release. “This information we provide allows the incident commanders to make decisions that can save life and property.”

The biggest of the state’s blazes is the LNU Lightning Complex Fire, which has burned 352,913 acres and was about 27 percent contained as of Aug. 25. The fire forced Travis Air Force Base to evacuate aircraft and personnel, though the base returned to normal operations on Aug. 24. Airmen from the base’s 60th Civil Engineer Squadron activated to assist nearby firefighters to battle the blaze.

As of Aug. 24, the California National Guard had deployed more than 660 members to help fight fires across the state, including engineers who have built bridges to help emergency responders, according to a release.