First Step to Modernizing Air Force Tech School: Free Wi-Fi in the Dorms

Sept. 27, 2023 | By David Roza

The Second Air Force, which oversees BMT, tech school, and other training programs, wants to move its enlisted technical training beyond classrooms and PowerPoint slides, but first it must implement what many civilian schools take for granted: free, widespread wireless internet access.

Many students at tech school, where enlisted Airmen train in their job specialties after Basic Military Training, have to pay $55 per month for Wi-Fi in their dormitories, without which they have limited access to coursework.

“They should be able to learn on demand anytime, anywhere, whenever they’re ready to do it,” Maj. Gen. Michele Edmondson, commander of the Second Air Force, told reporters on Aug. 22. “If they want to go back to their dormitory or sit outside at a picnic table and practice what they learned that day or prepare for a lecture the next day, we give them an environment where they can do it.”

Six locations within Air Education and Training Command (AETC), to which the Second Air Force belongs, now provide Wi-Fi in dormitories at no cost to Airmen. Two new investments of $18.5 million and $25.8 million should expand that access to new locations. All of AETC’s 15 main training locations are expected to be online by the end of fiscal year 2024, followed by geographically separated units.

Expansion is expensive; installing no-cost Wi-Fi at Sheppard Air Force Base, Texas, alone took $6.5 million. But officials there say it has improved student retention and attention in and out of class. Edmondson said campus-wide Wi-Fi is the foundation for modernizing tech school.

“We can make the environment something they’re used to learning in, rather than saying, ‘come sit in a brick and mortar classroom eight hours a day, in a desk, with an instructor standing in front of you with a whiteboard and PowerPoint slides,’” she told reporters. “That’s not how they’ve been learning in school.”

The general referenced her own 13-year-old daughter answering science questions while watching video lessons at home. The Second Air Force must adapt to the learning model its trainees grew up with so that Airmen can hit the ground running when they arrive at tech school, Edmondson said.

“I’m not saying that we’re going to 100 percent across the board look like every high school classroom in America, but there is a lot of goodness we can learn from that,” she said.

tech school — An Airman assigned to the 362nd Training Squadron, Detachment One, reads instructions from a tablet while performing a knowledge check on Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter, simulator at Joint Base Langley-Eustis, Virginia, July 16, 2021. U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Sarah Dowe.

The Second Air Force is pursuing several changes to make enlisted education more personalized, such as allowing instructors to tailor the training pace to each Airmen and giving Airmen access to course materials through tablets, audiobooks, videos, or augmented or virtual reality.

The personalized model is showing promise at Keesler Air Force Base, Miss., where cyber Airmen have “a degree of choice about direction and pace of their pathway, which often results in completing the curriculum more quickly than in the past,” Edmondson told Air & Space Forces Magazine. Some students with previous cyber experience are graduating early after demonstrating they have the skills to do so.

Wider access and self-paced learning also seems to be making a difference at Sheppard, where maintenance trainees interact with virtual C-130 aircraft. Instructors are seeing improved performance compared to students in the past, who were limited to purely hands-on interaction with aircraft.

“The Airmen, when it came to doing their hands-on tasks throughout tech school here, were far more competent,” Tech. Sgt. Kyle Ingram, a curriculum development writer at Sheppard, said in a 2022 press release. “They knew exactly where to go and what to do on that aircraft right then and there. You only had to tell them what to do, and then they knew exactly where to go and what to do in that procedure.”

Edmondson said her command has learned much from the 19th Air Force, which oversees flying training and recently reformed undergraduate pilot training with a greater emphasis on self-paced learning, virtual reality, artificial intelligence, and increased simulator time. A key takeaway was developing faculty to keep pace with the new technology, new changes, and to “understand the ‘why’ behind what we’re doing,” she said.

Other changes are in the works. One idea is to use artificial intelligence to analyze Airmen’s learning records and give commanders real-time knowledge of “the training readiness of the force,” one press release explained. A unit of AETC known as Detachment 23 is building an application within the learning management system myLearning called MOTAR (Member Operations Training Analysis Reporting) to pursue that idea.

“Our vision, all the way up to the Air Force chief of staff, is for commanders to be able to log in on one system and view their commander dashboard,” detachment commander Maj. Jesse Johnson said in the release. “This is going to tell them the readiness of the entire force right then and there.”

333rd Training Squadron cyber warfare officers complete cyber tasks in the cyber escape room inside Stennis Hall at Keesler Air Force Base, Mississippi, November 10, 2021. U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Seth Haddix

Edmondson also hopes to integrate nutrition, sleep hygiene, and physical fitness into tech school so that any health gains made by Airmen in BMT do not stop after graduating. But pursuing all these efforts will take time, money, and, in some cases, major renovation of the Air Force’s IT infrastructure, which many critics say is outdated and dysfunctional.

“Current informational technology infrastructure does not support the most relevant existing or emerging instructional approaches and technologies due to limited connectivity, access, speed and reliability,” Marilyn Holliday, a spokesperson for AETC, told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

Not all changes will be high-tech: even just having tables with dry-erase boards can “completely change the dynamics of a classroom,” Edmondson said. Still, from now through mid-fiscal 2024, the Second Air Force will be focused on modernizing its facilities by expanding access to Wi-Fi and possibly remodeling or building anew.

With modern infrastructure in place, Edmondson wants fiscal 2025 to be a year of “aggressive transformation.” Within five years, she hope all technical training units will be up to speed and ready to keep pace with evolving modern weapon systems.

The command has spent about $35 million over the past fiscal year focusing on Wi-Fi and classroom and infrastructure updates, with another $57 million earmarked in fiscal year 2024. The Second Air Force is targeting maintenance, security forces, cyber, and intelligence training for now, but the scope could expand in the future. The command oversees about 16,000 tech school students across 265 Air Force specialty codes.

“It’s a monumental undertaking, so this isn’t something that is going to happen overnight,” Edmondson said. “I think we’re really optimistic though … five years from now, holistically this enterprise is going to look significantly different.”

How a Government Shutdown Would Affect Airmen and Guardians

Sept. 27, 2023 | By Chris Gordon

With a government shutdown looking increasingly likely on Oct. 1, Active-Duty Airmen and Guardians will still report for duty. But things will be far from normal.

For weeks, defense officials have warned of the impacts of a continuing resolution (CR), a short-term stopgap to keep the federal government funded. Now, the Biden administration and defense officials say that is the best hope to keep the military running normally and to pay the government’s bills, including paychecks to service members.

“The shutdown is the worst thing that could happen,” Deputy Pentagon Press Secretary Sabrina Singh told reporters Sept. 25. “We’re hoping that Congress can find a way to avert that, but planning for the worst.”

The Air Force and Space Force are under broad DOD-wide guidance, which is being distributed across the Department of Air Force, according to an Air Force spokeswoman. That means troops are in line not to receive paychecks and thousands of civilian employees will be furloughed under the Pentagon’s “Contingency Plan Guidance for Continuation of Essential Operations in the Absence of Available Appropriations.”

“Military personnel on Active-Duty, including Reserve component personnel on Federal Active-Duty, will continue to report for duty and carry out assigned duties,” the document says. But they will not be paid on schedule unless some legislation is passed that continues to pay troops, as has been the case in the past. And service members would have to cover some work that is normally done by furloughed civilian workers.

“Troops would go without pay,” Singh said. “Military families would be impacted, of course. For folks that are not getting paychecks, that impacts how and when you can buy groceries, childcare—all of these things. Commissaries would be closed on bases.”

Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) and other Republican Senators have put forward legislation that would provide “funds to pay members of the armed forces” if an agreement is not reached and passed by midnight on Sept. 30. A separate bill aiming to pay troops sits in the House. The White House says the best solution is to fund the government.

Legislators should “work in a bipartisan manner to keep the government open and address emergency needs for the American people,” the White House said in a Sept. 26 statement. The Biden administration added a shutdown “would prove disruptive to our national security.”

Most civilian employees of the Defense Department would be furloughed—they would not report work but eventually receive back pay—as they are deemed “not necessary” to support limited, approved activities, including some civilians employed overseas.

“We’re just sending them home and saying, ‘you’re not essential,’” undersecretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment William A. LaPlante said at an event at the Center for Strategic and International Studies Sept. 26. “It’s just, it’s just horrible. There’s really nothing good you can say about it.”

Roughly 45 percent of DOD civilians are exempt because they are essential under the DOD’s guidance or they are not funded by annual appropriations, according to defense analyst Jim McAleese.

But a shutdown would be particularly troublesome for the Air Force and Space Force, which want to modernize their forces despite Congressional gridlock.

“If the government shuts down, testing will stop and acceptance by the government of equipment when it is finished and ready to be accepted stop,” said LaPlante, who served as the Air Force’s acquisition chief in 2013 during another shutdown, which he said all but put a halt to F-35 and munition production.

Recruiting and “initial entry training” would continue under current DOD guidance. But how a shutdown could affect things such as flying hours is unclear. For Airmen and Guardians, many normal activities, such as temporary duty travel (TDY) would be canceled—including for many senior military officers. The Air Force spokeswoman said DOD guidance was being distributed across the Department of the Air Force so commanders and leaders are prepared implement it if directed.

“It’s just extremely disruptive,” LaPlante said.

While Democrats and Republicans are at odds over who is at fault for the funding impasse, both sides say troops and DOD civilians have been caught in the crossfire.

“Senators and congressmen often like to say how much they support our military members—now they have an opportunity to show it,” Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska), a co-sponsor of the legislation, said in a statement.

U-2 Makes First Flight with Updated Avionics, Navigation, and Comms

Sept. 27, 2023 | By John A. Tirpak

An Air Force U-2 Dragon Lady has flown with its new updated avionics system, Lockheed Martin announced Sept. 26. The open-mission systems hardware and software update should carry the aircraft through the rest of its planned service life.

The Avionics Tech Refresh (ATR) updates the U-2’s communications and navigation capabilities and features a new mission computer with an open mission systems standard. It will allow the aircraft to communicate with networks and platforms in all domains and “at disparate security levels,” according to a Lockheed release.

In addition to the new avionics systems, the U-2 received new cabling, software, and displays that should ease pilot workload by “enhancing presentation of the data the aircraft collects to enable faster, better-informed decisions,” the release added.

Lockheed won the ATR contract, worth $50 million, in 2020.

During the first flight with the new system, the test U-2 performed low-altitude functional checks.

The flight “is a significant moment in our journey to rapidly and affordably field new capabilities,” Sean Thatcher, Lockheed Skunk Works U-2 ATR program manager, said in a statement. The new open architecture will allow the aircraft to integrate with the Joint All-Domain Operations battlespace, he said.

Lockheed plans to make the U-2 the first fully OMS-compliant fleet, Lockheed said.

Follow-on testing will “solidify a mature software baseline before mission systems are introduced to ensure both functionality and interoperability to meet operational needs,” the company said in a press release.

The Air Force plans to retire its fleet of 27 U-2s in 2026, and the semi-autonomous Northrop Grumman RQ-4 Global Hawk a year later, but the Air Force has not discussed a replacement for the two very high altitude intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance platforms. Instead, officials have suggested their ISR missions will transfer to space-based assets.

Congress has blocked previous efforts to retire the U-2, and for years even prevented the Air Force from retiring the wet-film Optical Bar Camera system used in the U-2 for decades. The system was finally retired in favor of a digital system in July 2022.

The Air Force is said to already be operating a secret, stealthy, uncrewed aircraft successor to the RQ-4 and U-2, called the RQ-180, but the service has declined to discuss it. Sources say the aircraft was built by Northrop Grumman, and that its success with the type helped the company win the B-21 bomber contract in 2015.

The U-2 is based at Beale Air Force Base, Calif., but there are detachments of the aircraft operating all over the world. The jet flies at altitudes up to 70,000 feet on missions that can last up to 11 hours. Lockheed’s depot for the U-2 is at Air Force Plant 42 in Palmdale, Calif.

Experts: US ‘Owes It’ to Ukraine to Provide F-16s and Long-Range Missiles

Sept. 26, 2023 | By Unshin Lee Harpley

Top experts and observers stressed the importance of air superiority in Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine during a Sept. 26 forum in Washington D.C.—and pushed hard for the U.S. to supply Ukraine with advanced weapons as quickly as possible.

Howard Buffett, chairman and CEO of the Howard G. Buffett Foundation, and Michael O’Hanlon, senior fellow and defense analyst at the Brookings Institute, shared their opinions during the the 2023 Knight Forum on Geopolitics.

Buffett in particular focused on air superiority, a hotly debated topic during the conflict. Russia has used drones and cruise missiles to bombard Ukrainian forces and cities, while Ukraine has used air defense systems to down dozens of manned Russian aircraft.

Ukraine’s air force, however, has been unable to control the skies with its smaller Soviet-era fleet, and the U.S. only recently agreed to expedite the transfer of American-made F-16s despite months of requests from Ukrainian leadership—and it will likely be months before those fighters are ready. In the meantime, Ukraine’s counteroffensive has ground out small but steady gains at a high price.

“We’re asking Ukraine to fight in a way we’d never fight,” Buffett said. “In the Gulf War, we flew thousands of sorties for several weeks, dropping 88,000 tons of bombs before we sent a tank or Soldier forward. Our country would not engage in a war without achieving air superiority. … So, the idea that you’d expect Ukraine to go on the counteroffensive without the right equipment and support? Our strategy appears to allow Ukraine to fight and die but not to allow Ukraine to fight and win.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited Washington D.C. last week, pressing for more aid including long-range missiles. During the visit, the Pentagon announced a $325 million aid package which included more artillery, ammunition, anti-tank weapons, and air defense systems.

According to multiple media reports, President Joe Biden did tell Zelenskyy that Washington will provide Kyiv with the U.S.’s Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS). That announcement has not been made official, however.

ATACMS can be fired from a mobile launcher with a range of around 100 and 190 miles depending on the variant. Some of the models carry cluster munitions, which are small bombs that scatter over a large area when they explode. Kyiv has repeatedly asked the Biden administration for the long-range missiles to help attack and disrupt supply lines, air bases, and rail networks in Russian-occupied territory.

During Zelenskyy’s visit to D.C., Pentagon Press Secretary Air Force Brig. Gen. Patrick S. Ryder said the Pentagon is anticipating an arrival of several Ukrainian pilots in the U.S. for English-language courses, which will be followed by F-16 training at Morris Air National Guard Base, Ariz.

Pentagon officials have frequently cautioned that certain weapons systems like the F-16, ATACMS, or the M1 Abrams tank will not be “silver bullets” for Ukraine. And during the forum, O’Hanlon cautioned that it is challenging to predict the precise impact of such weapons. But that does not mean they are not worth providing, he added.

“As a defense analyst, I don’t know how well it would work once we provide the F-16s and the ATACMS, but I think we owe it to the Ukrainians to give them a try,” O’Hanlon said. “Because in pure defense analyst terms, it’s pretty hard to predict what the effects will be of any additional, incremental increase in assistance. But we don’t know that they’ll fail either.”

The debate over America’s aid to Ukraine has reached another pivot point in recent weeks, as U.S. lawmakers consider the fiscal 2024 budget. Buffett also noted that Zelenskyy’s approval ratings are declining as the conflict persists, and he argued there are critical supplies and support that should have been delivered to Ukraine sooner and in greater quantities. Highlighting the need to understand Russian President Vladimir Putin’s motivations, he argued Putin’s pursuit of expansion poses a continuous threat to Ukraine and the stability of Europe.

“If you understand Putin—and he’s giving you plenty of history to understand him—when you show weakness, or you play into his hand the way the U.S. did in the last NATO conference, you are just emboldening him,” said Buffett. “And knowing the fact that Putin won’t stop, I think that it’s as much of a fact as you can state, he’ll be on the doorstep of Europe when Ukraine falls, and we’ll be fully engaged because we can’t abandon our most important allies.”

Buffett further argued that the U.S. and its allies’ current approach sets Ukraine up for potential stalemate when they should be pushing for victory.

“I believe we could have ended this war in three to four months if that’s what we had decided to do as the U.S. and allies,” Buffett said. “I see how poorly Russians were prepared in the beginning. However, we gave them a chance to regroup. We gave them a chance to think about their mistakes and learn from their mistakes. So if we continue to do what we are doing, if we continue at the same level we’re doing it, it’s not enough for them (Ukrainians) to win. And why would we continue to invest in something, that we’re failing to provide what it takes to win. That’s not very smart. We need to step it up now, give them what they need, so they can gain air superiority.”

Pentagon Acquisition Boss: China’s Defense Base Is ‘Really Impressive’

Sept. 26, 2023 | By John A. Tirpak

The Chinese defense industrial base seems to be doing better than that of the U.S. because it has a streamlined path from development to fielding of new weapons, it places more “bets” on competitive technologies, and it doesn’t have a large legacy inventory with which it has to work, Pentagon acquisition and sustainment chief William LaPlante said Sept. 26.

Speaking at an event with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, LaPlante said, based on his observations of open-source information, that China has an enviable cycle time—‘how long it takes for them to go from … deciding they want to develop something to when it’s fielded, and fielded in numbers.”

In both developing and fielding new high-end capabilities, the Chinese defense industrial base is “really impressive,” LaPlante added.

Moreover, it’s “not just one thing. They place multiple bets. We don’t do that. We very rarely will place multiple bets. In other words, having three different development activities going on. We used to do that. We don’t [anymore,]” he said.

The reason the Pentagon doesn’t typically pursue multiple approaches to solving its operational problems is the cost, he added.

“Our budgets are where they are” he said. “We don’t have the luxury of doing that anymore.”

The multi-pronged approach to development creates an advantage because one concept may be good enough to survive the process, he said, and that creates an opportunity to go into production with a slightly different system as well. That, LaPlante has said previously, complicates an adversary’s decision-making and imposes cost by requiring them to counter a variety of effects and not just one.

Once China’s industry has developed a system, “a winner or the winners go into production, and they field at a high degree of numbers. That’s … what it appears like from the outside,” LaPlante said.

There’s a tendency to paint the Chinese as “10 feet tall,” said LaPlante, but the U.S. should not “project our ways of doing [things] on them.” Still, “it does seem” that China enjoys an advantage from their approach.

Part of China’s speed may also stem from the fact that “they were starting with more of a blank sheet. If you have a large number of legacy platforms” as the U.S. military does, “you can’t do everything at once,” he noted.

Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall has cited this disparity in speed and numbers in production as one of the reasons the service is attempting to keep competition in development programs like the Collaborative Combat Aircraft program, certain munitions, and other efforts, as long as possible.

LaPlante said the key to CCAs and the Pentagon’s nascent “Replicator” programs is not that they are a huge leap in technology, but that they’ll be built in quantities of thousands.

During his 17-month tenure as the acquisition and sustainment czar at the Pentagon, LaPlante has made a mantra of “producing in numbers,” saying that hot weapon production lines are a deterrent while high-end technology still in the laboratory is nearly irrelevant in that context.

“What I’ve been emphasizing the last year and a half is that what matters really … is production. Because if you don’t get these things into production, you don’t field them at scale. You don’t have the supply chain,” LaPlante said. “So right now, we’re at the minimum production that … we can do, and maybe in some ways below it.”

The U.S. does plenty of science and technology, through the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and Defense Innovation Unit, among others, he said. But in the pursuit of prototypes, “we minimized actual hard-core development.”

As an example, he noted that the B-21 bomber as one of only a “very few” programs actually in development right now.

That decline in development over the past several decades is due in part to the contraction of the supplier base—with just a few companies left now capable of building fighters, or airlifters, or aerial tankers or vertical lift. Such an outcome “was not an accident,” LaPlante noted.

In 1993, then-Pentagon acquisition czar William Perry gathered defense industry leaders together to urge them to consolidate since the Cold War had just ended and there wasn’t going to be enough business for all military vendors to remain viable—a historic moment now referred to by industry officials as the ‘last supper.’

Indeed, since the end of the Cold War, the defense share of Gross Domestic Product has shrunk, LaPlante noted.

In 1987, “the defense budget was roughly 6-7 percent of GDP,” LaPlante noted. “That would be twice the defense budget we have today. We’d have to have roughly a $2 trillion defense budget today to have what we had in 1987.”

‘Don’t Let the Wing Down’: Strike Eagle Crews Recap ‘William Tell’ Fighter Meet

Sept. 26, 2023 | By David Roza

Capt. Andrew ‘Pañic’ Munoz was in a tight spot. The F-15E Strike Eagle pilot and his weapons system operator, Capt. George ‘King’ Welton, had run out of air-to-air missiles 15 minutes into a simulated battle where they had to defend a lane of airspace against a mix of F-22s, F-16s, and other jets flying adversary ‘red air’ tactics.

Though the battle was not real, the stakes were high, as Munoz and Welton were representing the entire 4th Fighter Wing in a competition against other fighter units from across the Air Force. If they failed here, it might affect their standings for the rest of the meet.

But then, like an old-fashioned cavalry charge, help arrived in the form of Capts. Noel ‘Takeout’ Zamot and Sean ‘Wolf’ Sutedjo, who took off 15 minutes late after swapping jets due to an aircraft malfunction. The fresh crew arrived with a full set of missiles, and while they lacked a datalink providing situational awareness of the battle, they worked together with Munoz and Welton to take down the opposing jets and eventually win the scenario.

“We were able to work as a team between the two-ship to use their missiles and provide them with the awareness that they needed in order to target and protect the lane,” Munoz told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

The late arrival of Zamot and Sutedjo was just one memorable moment from the William Tell Air-to-Air Weapons Meet, where Air Force fighter crews, maintainers, and intelligence specialists from Virginia to Hawaii gathered at the Air Dominance Center in Savannah, Ga., from Sept. 11-15 to see who was the best in the air-to-air business.

U.S. Air Force aircraft from across the active duty, Reserve and Air National Guard park on the flight line during William Tell at the Air Dominance Center located at the Savannah Air National Guard Base in Savannah, Georgia, Sept. 14, 2023. U.S. Air National Guard photo by Master Sgt. Morgan R. Whitehouse

A historic meet, William Tell was held about every two years from 1954 to 1996 but was discontinued with the exception of a 2004 revival to commemorate the contest’s 50th anniversary. The Air Force’s renewed focus on near-peer conflict in contested airspace was a major reason for bringing the contest back. But after a 19-year hiatus, many pilots today had never heard of William Tell.

“When my squadron commander walked up to me in April and said ‘We want to send you to William Tell and we want you to build a team,’ I had to say ‘What is William Tell?’ Munoz said. “Learning the history of William Tell made me realize that this was bigger than myself, bigger than the team.”

The meet included one-on-one basic fighter maneuvers (BFM); air combat maneuvering (ACM), where two-ships of ‘Blue Air’ identified and engaged unfamiliar red air jets; a gunnery contest where participants shot their aircraft cannons at a banner towed by a Learjet; and fighter integration, where participants worked together to defend an airspace against formations of red air.

Meanwhile, maintainers competed to see who could safely load missiles onto an aircraft fastest, while intelligence Airmen conducted mission planning and threat analysis on the ground and air battle managers worked on command and control from overhead. Meet planners warned that competition was the best way to simulate combat stress, but Munoz, who has flown on several deployments, was skeptical at first.

“Fast-forward to being at the step desk before going to fly and I had this pit in my stomach … I don’t want to let my team down, I don’t want to let the wing down, and I don’t want to let myself down really,” he recalled. “It made me a believer.”

Most of the 4th Fighter Wing contingent came from the ‘Chiefs’ of the 335th Fighter Squadron, where the goal is to achieve ‘the chief standard’ of excellence—and for the most part they hit the mark. The team performed well in ACM and BFM, where, despite being the youngest fliers on the team, Zamot and Sutedjo defeated a more experienced crew. They also flew well in the fighter integration event, where the Strike crews showed their expertise in defensive counter-air (DCA). But the ‘integration’ piece was easier said than done.

“We have great tactics, techniques, and procedures for executing our own DCA, but mixing that in with two different other aircraft was definitely a challenge, especially with the limited amount of time that we had to mission plan for it,” Zamot said.

william tell — A U.S. Air Force crew chief assigned to the 4th Fighter Wing, Seymour-Johnson Air Force Base, North Carolina, inspects the weapons rack on an F-15E Strike Eagle during the 2023 William Tell Competition at the Savannah Air National Guard base in Savannah, Georgia, Sept. 11, 2023. U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Zachary Rufus

There were two other F-15 units at the meet, the 366th Fighter Wing flying F-15Es from Mountain Home Air Force Base, Idaho, and the 104th Fighter Wing flying F-15Cs from Barnes Air National Guard Base, Mass. The 4th bested the 366th, but the Air Guardsmen claimed the overall top F-15 Wing and Superior Performer award. Though they went back to Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, N.C., empty-handed, the Airmen from the 4th were still proud of their performance.

“I think that we executed to the chief standard when we went down to Savannah,” Zamot said. “Every event that we showed up to, we were the premier Strike Eagles down there, and we beat two F-35 squadrons” in the overall scores.

They also stuck together as a team: Zamot said the 4th Fighter Wing maintainers had the loudest group of fans in the building during the weapons load competition, where the 4th defeated the 366th. Competition aside, the meet was also a chance to build connections among Eagle pilots, especially as the older C models retire and the new F-15EX editions come online.

“After the results were released, we had all of the Eagle dudes together and had about a two-and-a-half hour tactics talk, which was awesome,” Munoz said. “We got to talk through how we are merging the community together for the future. Those crews will go back to their base and spread the knowledge that we shared.”

Air Combat Command, which ran the competition, brought in retired Lt. Col. James Harvey III, a Tuskegee Airman who in 1949 won the first ever trophy in what would later become William Tell. Seeing Harvey there, along with an impressive number of colonels and generals, brought the significance of William Tell to life.

“I hope that we bring it back so that we can continue the legacy of William Tell,” Munoz said.

Air Force Picks Northrop Grumman for New Stand-in Attack Weapon

Sept. 25, 2023 | By John A. Tirpak

The Air Force has awarded Northrop Grumman a $705 million contract for a three-year program to develop and test the classified Stand-in Attack Weapon (SiAW), a supersonic air-to-ground missile which will be used to clear a path through adversary air defenses and take out high-value targets in potential future conflicts.

Under previous, classified competitive Phase 1 contracts to Northrop, L3Harris, and Lockheed Martin, the Air Force was looking toward a five-year development and production program that will provide SiAWs to operational units by 2026. The F-35 is the initial platform for the SiAW, and the Air Force has indicated the B-21 bomber may also carry the weapon.

“During the next 36 months, Northrop Grumman will further develop the weapon, conduct platform integration and complete the flight test program for rapid prototyping in preparation for rapid fielding,” the company said in a press release. “Work will be performed at the company’s Northridge, Calif., facility” as well as its “factory of the future” missile integration facility at Allegany Ballistics Laboratory in West Virginia.

Northrop’s SiAW builds on its Advanced Anti-Radiation Guided Missile (AARGM), which in turn succeeds the AGM-88 HARM (High-speed Anti-Radiation Missile). The HARM, which entered service in the 1980s, was used with great effect during Operation Desert Storm by quickly homing in on and destroying ground-based search and track radars before they had a chance to move to a new location. The weapon was so effective that Iraqi radar operators were deterred from turning on their systems, knowing a HARM would likely arrive a few seconds later.

According to Northrop, SiAW is meant to “defeat rapidly relocatable targets” that are part of an enemy’s anti-access/aerial denial system, but industry and Air Force officials have said SiAW’s target set will go beyond air defense radars and include:

command-and-control sites

ballistic missile and cruise missile launchers

GPS jamming systems

anti-satellite systems

Other high-value or fleeting targets.

The SiAW is also supposed to be faster than HARM and be effective against targets at greater range. Northrop’s website says the SiAW addresses “gaps created by 2025+ threats.”

Despite the weapon’s longer range, the term “stand-in” indicates that it operates within an enemy’s defended airspace. Since the 1980s, the effective range of integrated air defense systems worldwide has multiplied.

The SiAW will have multiple seeker sensors and use GPS in addition to other navigational systems. The missile employs tail control and has “enhanced survivability,” Northrop said.

The SiAW will have an open architecture “that will allow for rapid subsystem upgrades to field enhanced capabilities,” according to Northrop. While the Air Force has not disclosed its SiAW acquisition strategy, service officials have said that those companies not selected to develop the weapon will have a chance to propose later upgrades for it.

The contract covers Phase Two of the program, a Middle Tier Acquisition effort utilizing digital engineering. In Phase 2.1, a guided vehicle will make a flight test, while Phase 2.2 “concludes with three additional flight tests and the delivery of the SiAW leave-behind prototype missiles and test assets,” the Northrop release stated.

Air Force funding for SiAW in fiscal 2023 was $283.3 million, with peak funding of $718.2 million expected in 2026.

Trailblazer Maj. Gen. Jeannie Leavitt, First USAF Female Fighter Pilot, Retires

Sept. 25, 2023 | By Unshin Lee Harpley

An Air Force trailblazer’s career came to a close this weekend, as Maj. Gen. Jeannie M. Leavitt, the service’s first female fighter pilot, retired after 31 years in uniform.

The retirement ceremony for Leavitt took place at Scott Air Base, Ill., on Sept. 23. U.S. Transportation Command boss Gen. Jacqueline D. Van Ovost—one of only three women to ever lead a combatant command—officiated and reminded all in attendance of the legacy Leavitt has crafted.

“[Jeannie] had to cope with a constant demand to be in the spotlight, because of her many firsts, something that’s not representative of who Jeannie is,” Van Ovost said. “She much prefers to stand back, behind the scenes to guide and mentor. To take care of the people and the mission—[that’s] the true purpose behind her continued dedication to service.”

Leavitt’s Air Force journey was indeed marked by numerous “firsts,” challenging preconceived notions about the roles women could play in the military. She was the first woman to enter Air Force pilot training for fighters in 1993. Later, she made history as the Air Force’s first female fighter pilot. She was also the first woman to command a combat fighter wing, the 57th Wing at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev.

Maj. Gen. Jeannie M. Leavitt, Department of the Air Force Chief of Safety. Photo by Mike Tsukamoto/Air & Space Forces Magazine

Throughout her career, she accumulated over 3,000 flight hours, including operational missions like Southern Watch, Northern Watch, Iraqi Freedom, and Enduring Freedom. Most of her experience was in the F-15E Strike Eagle.

Van Ovost reflected on the hurdles women encountered in combat roles during the early 1990s, noting that simply altering policies wasn’t enough. Gaining acceptance and recognition were separate struggles, she added, and Leavitt played a pivotal role during a time of a significant change, breaking barriers that had long kept women out of combat fighter pilot roles.

Throughout her career, Leavitt was a strong advocate for women in aviation and encouraged young women to pursue careers in the Air Force and aviation—four such pilots appeared in a video tribute during the ceremony.

Her commitment to challenge stereotypes went beyond the military, as she collaborated with Disney on the ‘Captain Marvel’ film to narrate her Air Force journey and share a more accurate portrayal of a lifetime dedicated to service. Yet Leavitt’s aspirations were never solely about personal achievement, Van Ovost said.

“On behalf of all of those who journeyed beside and behind you, thank you for having the courageous character necessary to pave new roads for others to follow,” said Van Ovost.

Leavitt’s final assignment was as head of the Air Force Safety Center, overseeing the entire Department of the Air Force’s aviation, occupational, weapons, space and system mishap prevention and nuclear surety programs and policy.

Air Force Gets Its First ‘Electric Air Taxi,’ Six Months Ahead of Schedule

Sept. 25, 2023 | By Greg Hadley

A sleek, futuristic, six-rotor aircraft stood behind a red ribbon at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., on Sept. 25—marking the latest milestone in the Air Force’s involvement in the “electric air taxi.”

The electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft from Joby Aviation was unveiled at Edwards a full six months earlier than originally planned when the Air Force Research Laboratory announced a contract extension with Joby in April valued at up to $131 million with options for up to nine aircraft.

The aircraft arrived at Edwards last week and has already conducted three “hover” tests, Joby Executive Chairman Paul Sciarra noted at the ribbon-cutting ceremony. A second aircraft will arrive in early 2024, Sciarra added.

The Sept. 25 ceremony marks the first time the Air Force has accepted delivery of an eVTOL aircraft, and a release from Joby claimed it is believed to be the first delivery of any electric air taxi anywhere in the U.S.

“Today’s delivery is a hugely significant moment for Joby and for our industry,” Sciarra said. “But more than that, it’s a validation of the long-term vision of the Department of Defense.”

That vision has included development from the Defense Innovation Unit and the Marine Corps, but the Air Force in particular has heavily invested in eVTOL since 2020 through its “Agility Prime” program as part of its AFWERX innovation arm.

In that time, the service has awarded hundreds of contracts to stimulate development in the eVTOL industry, which has seen intense commercial and government interest. Potential uses range from “flying taxis” in cities to search and rescue missions and short-range airlift for the Air Force.

The Air Force’s Emerging Technologies Integrated Test Force and 412th Test Wing will collaborate with Joby and NASA to test the new aircraft.

“NASA and AFWERX are both trying to advance technology around air taxis,” Wayne Ringelberg, the chief pilot at NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center, said at the ceremony. “Although we’re looking at different aspects of missions for these aircraft, there are several areas that overlap, and it’s in those areas of overlap that we’ll gain efficiencies in learning about these kinds of vehicles.”

The Air Force in particular is interested in studying the aircraft’s potential use for “short-to-mid range cargo operations at low operating costs and just-in-time delivery constructs,” an AFRL spokesman previously told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

It will also be used to support operations at Edwards’ test ranges, transporting personnel around the 470-square mile base, the spokesman said.

“We will utilize the 412th Test Wing’s world-renowned risk management systems to conduct flight testing and evaluation of eVTOL technology in a safe and agile manner,” Maj. Phillip Woodhull, commander of the Emerging Technologies Integrated Test Force, said.

Agility Prime has taken several major steps this year. In April, Air Force pilots took command of a Joby aircraft for the first time, remotely piloting the five-seat airframe through its full flight envelope at the company’s Marina, Calif., facility. In July, AFWERX announced another deal with Archer Aviation worth up to $142 million for up to six of the company’s aircraft.

On Sept. 19, AFWERX broke ground on the service’s first-ever electric aircraft charging station at Duke Field, Fla., in partnership with BETA Technologies, another electric air taxi company. The charging station will be able to fully recharge an aircraft in less than an hour, according to an AFRL release, and will be completed just a few weeks before BETA’s airframes start arriving at Duke Field for testing.

“There’s no doubt that the electrification of aviation is going to be a critical piece in the broader energy transition,” Col. Douglas P. Wickert, commander of the 412th Test Wing, said at the ribbon-cutting ceremony. “And I’m proud that we get to the opportunity to contribute to a sustainable future for humanity.”

Joby’s aircraft has scored a high-altitude mark of more than 11,000 feet and a speed of more than 200 miles per hour, with a projected range of around 100 miles.