Ousted Air Force chief cites dissension in Pentagon

[Galrahn]

Not sure who has been watching, but In From the Cold has been putting together an investigative report on the nuclear weapon mishap at Minot last year. The blog has published two in the three part series. It is a very interesting read and the kind of investigative journalism more common in the new media than in the old.

I thought it was interesting that today the Air Force blocked the blog. There is a lot talk regarding "new media" of which blogging qualifies. I think it is noteworthy the day after blogs discuss the Air Force declaring war on the other services in the upcoming budget year, the Air Force decides to declare war on what is probably the most popular Air Force blog in the states. It is obviously not a big deal, but I do get the impression it is a sign of the mindset:

When you hate the message, attack the messengers.

I have to say I continue to be underwhelmed by the Air Force PR machine. They have some of the best commercial advertisements you can find for recruiting purposes, but the service seems to trip when dealing with domestic criticism and challenges.

[selil]

The story reads much like you would expect.

This is classic though, "When you have a difference of philosophy with your boss, he owns the philosophy and you own the difference," Michael Wynne said.

GovExec Story

[Norfolk]

I have to admit to some sympathy for the former Air Force Secretary and the Chief of Staff on their point of not risking the U.S. Air Force's Command of the Air.

Now, I do not believe that Secretary Gates would take an unjustified risk of losing command of the air by holding F-22 procurement to the currently planned 187 aircraft, instead of the figure that the Air Force was seeking (and publicly and aggressively advocating for). It seems beyond doubt that Mr. Gates was correct in insisting upon the resignations of the Air Force's very top leadership, as the Air Force leadership seemed intolerably indifferent to present and foreseeable military and operational needs and requirements, but indeed it failed to address let alone rectify serious institutional problems as well as embarking upon a very consciously zero-sum effort to gain the resources it sought at the complete expense of the other Services.

But, in so far as Command of the Air may potentially be put at risk in the longer-term by limiting the procurement of the F-22 (and letting the line go cold), the Air Force leadership has a point that this is something that should not be put at even slight risk. Is there a peer competitor now or in the foreseeable future to oppose the Air Force (or Navy) in the Air? The short answer is No. The long answer may not be so comforting. Both Russia and China produce aircraft that are quite the equal or in some cases even the superior of the F-15/-16/-18s, and these aircraft as often as not have much newer airframes. And in the case of PLAAF pilots, 160-180 flying hours in elite fighter regiments and divisions are becoming the norm - approaching or roughly comparable to their U.S. counterparts. Additionally, more advanced aircraft continue in both development and production - and will exceed F-22 production by rather large margins.

However, the biggest threat to the F-22 may not be so much in the air as on the ground; not only the F-22's unique capabilities but the hand-picked men who fly them should allow the F-22 to dominate the air at least as well as the IDF's F-15s did over Lebanon in the 80's. The problem is, with a relatively modest, even small force of F-22s based at only a relative handful of locations, the F-22 force's vulnerability to missile attack or sabotage is heightened. That vulnerability increases from slight or modest to substantial if the F-22's have to redeploy to forward bases much closer to, or in even inside, an Area of Operations. Attrition is still la bete noir of Airpower, even if it were to take place on the ground instead of in the air. F-15Es (whose aircrew have to split their time between training for bomber and fighter tasks/missions) and F/A-18's (even the SuperHornet) are not necessarily so superior to Su-27/30/35 and J-10/11, etc. as to remove the possibility of an aerial war of attrition between them.

Furthermore, both the American Way of War, as well as the planning assumptions of both the U.S. and its Allies, tend to take US Air Superiorty for granted, and this has all sorts of consequences and implications all over the place. To paraphrase the old 19th Century ditty about the Maxim Gun, so much of Western military planning at least implicity assumes or relies upon more or less unchallenged American dominance of the sky that said planning assumptions could be characterized by saying, "Whatever happens, We have got, American Airpower, and They have not."

As such, it is unsettling that F-22 procurement and deployment will be so limited, especially considering both growing doubts over the actual capabilities of the F-35, when it is finally ready for production, and the gfact that the F-22 is barred by U.S. law from export (again, partly the fault of security lapses of some American Allies). Truth is, many (perhaps most) American Allies do not really believe in the F-35, but for them the alternatives are either the Super Hornet, the Typhoon, or the Rafale; put another way, the enthusiasm for the F-35 tends to be less than overwhelming. Especially as the costs may be getting quite out of control. American Allies may be able to stomach the expense and delay (partly their own fault) of the F-35 programme as long as it turns out something along the lines of the how the hi-lo mix of the F-15/F-16 twin track in terms of relative cost and capability; they may just plain drop the entire F-35 programme in dismay and frustration if it turns out to be another F-14/F/A-18, where the ultimate expense and capability of the latter largely negated the point of the two-track effort in the first place.

If conditions within the US Air Force in particular, and resource constraints within DoD in general, have forced the SECDEF to make a decision to place at even slight or modest risk beyond the foreseeable future the American Command of the Air, then conditions must be fairly serious indeed.

Edited to Add:

Sorry for the long post, but this is something that's been bugging me for a while now, and I hadn't really gotten the words to express my concerns. Not sure that I have even now. My apologies.

[slapout9]

Norfolk, don't worry to much Uncle Bob (SEDEF Robert Gates) was a Missile man when he was in the Air Force so he understands what is going on. Air power is guided missiles!!! launched from airframes (any will do) until we get something better. With that in mind it is a bad move to put alot of money in Super Dupper Airframes. Like I have said many times before all you need is a platform to launch a missile. Only the warhead needs to get to the target not the entire airframe Even if we had the money to spend it is a poor choice to risk airframe and pilot over hostile area or air space when all you need is a missile. Many in the Air Force understand this and if Uncle Bob hangs around long enough you may see some of them come to power and you will see a more powerful Air Force that is more useful and costs less. Aviation Week article from 2002 with quotes from Colonel Warden on how Air Force will become 90% Unmanned Combat Air Vehicles....http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/gener...s/aw070854.xml

[Fuchs]

Air superiority won't nearly mean as much in the future as in the past.

You can destroy a bridge or an airfield up to 300 km deep with guided missiles.
You can interdict railway or road movements with killer drones a.k.a. loitering munitions.
You can do meaningful reconnaissance and ECM missions up to 50 km deep using cheap, quantity-produced drones.

Some air forces try to adapt to the TBM threat at least against the upper end, but Western armies seem to fail to prepare against heavy MRL and small drone threats (not the least because of small wars attract much of their energy, budget and imagination away from conventional wars).

An F-22 would probably be helpless like a raptor in a bee swarm.

The missile/drone technology will not address all requirements and it's not completely new, but it will be able to fulfill a wide range of air power roles even against enemy so-called air supremacy.

If I was head of the U.S.A.F., I'd much less care about the F-22 than about new, low munition cost (lower than a Stinger shot) battlefield air defenses.

[slapout9]

If I was head of the U.S.A.F., I'd much less care about the F-22 than about new, low munition cost (lower than a Stinger shot) battlefield air defenses.

Hi Fuchs, that is a very good point!!

[wm]

Air superiority won't nearly mean as much in the future as in the past.

You can destroy a bridge or an airfield up to 300 km deep with guided missiles.
You can interdict railway or road movements with killer drones a.k.a. loitering munitions.
You can do meaningful reconnaissance and ECM missions up to 50 km deep using cheap, quantity-produced drones.

Some air forces try to adapt to the TBM threat at least against the upper end, but Western armies seem to fail to prepare against heavy MRL and small drone threats (not the least because of small wars attract much of their energy, budget and imagination away from conventional wars).

An F-22 would probably be helpless like a raptor in a bee swarm.

The missile/drone technology will not address all requirements and it's not completely new, but it will be able to fulfill a wide range of air power roles even against enemy so-called air supremacy.

If I was head of the U.S.A.F., I'd much less care about the F-22 than about new, low munition cost (lower than a Stinger shot) battlefield air defenses.

When I think of F22s and F35s, why do I have visions of French knights struggling against a hail of English arrows at Crecy, Poitiers or Agincourt? Sometimes the best tech is not hi-tech.

[Entropy]

Norfolk, don't worry to much Uncle Bob (SEDEF Robert Gates) was a Missile man when he was in the Air Force so he understands what is going on. Air power is guided missiles!!! launched from airframes (any will do) until we get something better. With that in mind it is a bad move to put alot of money in Super Dupper Airframes. Like I have said many times before all you need is a platform to launch a missile. Only the warhead needs to get to the target not the entire airframe Even if we had the money to spend it is a poor choice to risk airframe and pilot over hostile area or air space when all you need is a missile. Many in the Air Force understand this and if Uncle Bob hangs around long enough you may see some of them come to power and you will see a more powerful Air Force that is more useful and costs less. Aviation Week article from 2002 with quotes from Colonel Warden on how Air Force will become 90% Unmanned Combat Air Vehicles....http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/gener...s/aw070854.xml

I have to disagree with almost everything in this comment. "Airpower" is certainly not guided missiles and no, not any airframe will do. Missiles cannot do everything. There are limitations imposed by the laws of physics (particularly for air-to-ground weapons) that limit the utility of missiles or necessitate the utilization of tactics to employ them properly - tactics which are highly dependent on the capabilities of the airframe. In the Air-to-Air arena, the F-15 and the F-22 can utilize the exact same missiles, yet the F-22 handily beats the F-15 every time despite the fact that all other factors (training, starting positions) are equal. One might suggest, therefore, that airframe capabilities matter.

As for UCAV's there are many technical hurdles still to go, particularly with the comm link which must be completely secure, redundant and immune to jamming and interference (aircraft falling out of the sky like predators sometimes do is a bad thing). UCAV's would depend on either satellite or LOS comm links which introduce vulnerabilities that manned aircraft do not have. These challenges and others which will go unmentioned probably will be solved at some point, but I don't think the 90% figure is coming anytime soon.

In my mind (and I would love CAVGUY's opinion on this), making tanks unmanned would be much easier than a fighter aircraft. Without the necessity to protect a four-person crew, an unmanned tank would be smaller , lighter (and hence more deployable), possibly cheaper and expendable. An unmanned fighter would put one less pilot at risk, but an unmanned tank would put four fewer soldiers at risk.

Fuchs,

If I was head of the U.S.A.F., I'd much less care about the F-22 than about new, low munition cost (lower than a Stinger shot) battlefield air defenses.

What is this mystery weapon that you speak of that is cheaper than a Manpad? MANPADS have limitations which is why they are cheap, but even here the AF takes the manpad threat very seriously and continuously upgrades its IR-missile countermeasures - much more than the other services, in fact, except for the special ops aircraft.

As for your other points, yes fixed targets are very easy to destroy - it's the mobile targets that have been vexing air-to-ground planners for two decades now and is a big reason persistent ISR platforms were originally created. Drones like predator work great in permissive environments, but they cannot operate without air supremacy (See here and here).

WM,

When I think of F22s and F35s, why do I have visions of French knights struggling against a hail of English arrows at Crecy, Poitiers or Agincourt? Sometimes the best tech is not hi-tech.

I'm not sure why you would think that, but then again I think the comparison is fundamentally flawed to begin with.

I am not disputing the desirabilty of air superiority. However, a "one trick pony" is unlikely to win in the long run. At Poiters, Edward the Black Prince need a detachment of mounted forces to complete the victory and cover the archers when they ran out of arrows.

Assuming the F-22 is a "one trick pony," which it is not, why is that inherently bad?

The point I was making with my references to the British victories during the Hundred Years War is that technology, in and of itself is not decisive. The British won because of skilled leadership and tactics.

That is undoubtedly true in mostinstances to a point, but there comes a time when technology trumps training. Additionally, the argument against having better technology than our adversaries seems to carry the assumption that our side will always have superior training, tactics and leadership.

Steve,

People forget sometimes that the majority of aircraft lost over NVN were knocked down by anti-aircraft guns. SAMs drew a great deal of attention, but AA was impossible to jam and could be harder to knock out. And in CAS you can spend a fair amount of time down in the AA zone (unless you're using expensive standoff munitions...something that might not always be possible). While an A-10 can survive multiple hits, I don't think it's really clear that an inherently unstable fly by wire aircraft like the F-22 or F-35 could. And if not, will the AF (and other services) be willing to risk those high-dollar assets for a mission that they're not too crazy about to begin with?

Today's CAS ain't your daddy's CAS. I don't understand the myth that persists that CAS is something that inherently is best delivered at low altitude from a slow aircraft. One only needs to look at what's currently going on in theater to put that myth to rest. CAS is both more effective and more accurate when delivered from medium altitudes utilizing precision weapons and sensor technology. This is out of the envelope of most AAA and at the edge of the MANPAD threat which is not only safer, but also allows the pilot to to place more concentration on what's happening on the ground.

[Fuchs]

Fuchs,

What is this mystery weapon that you speak of that is cheaper than a Manpad? MANPADS have limitations which is why they are cheap, but even here the AF takes the manpad threat very seriously and continuously upgrades its IR-missile countermeasures - much more than the other services, in fact, except for the special ops aircraft.

Starstreak costs much less than a Stinger and has some secondary utility against LAFVs, for example. It's completely immune against known countermeasures (its operator could be deterred with counter fire, though).

But I thought more of autocannon-based systems like 35/1000 with ABM and RWR/IIR/UV/(LL)TV/LRF-based FC.
To date there's no system in use in the U.S.Army or U.S.A.F. that is useful against a 5 kg photo recon UAV at 500 m altitude. The marines at least have their 25mm gatling on some LAVs.

[wm]

When I think of F22s and F35s, why do I have visions of French knights struggling against a hail of English arrows at Crecy, Poitiers or Agincourt? Sometimes the best tech is not hi-tech.

I'm not sure why you would think that, but then again I think the comparison is fundamentally flawed to begin with.

I am not disputing the desirabilty of air superiority. However, a "one trick pony" is unlikely to win in the long run. At Poiters, Edward the Black Prince need a detachment of mounted forces to complete the victory and cover the archers when they ran out of arrows.

Assuming the F-22 is a "one trick pony," which it is not, why is that inherently bad?

If the 100 Years War analogy isn't appealing, perhaps a better comparison would be the hi-tech ME-262 flying against the mid- to low-tech B-17s of the 8th Air Force. The numbers just weren't quite there for the Luftwaffe to gain victory from its wonder weapon's advantages.

As to the one trick pony being bad, consider the owner of the carnival where you go see that one trick pony perform. If he doesn't have concession stands, rides, games, and other acts, he's not going to survive very long especially when the crowds leave right after seeing the pony's one trick. Of course, ticket prices could be set pretty high to make some money, but then the size of the crowds will be much lower because a lot of potential customers won't be able to afford the price of admission; this is a short term view that, on its own, has little or no long term sustainability.

By the way, has the AF resolved the F-22 comms issues yet?

Due to security considerations, the access to information provided by some of the most advanced sensors currently available in theater is highly restricted. For example, intelligence and situational picture generated by F-22 Raptors cannot be transferred to F-15s, F-16 or AWACS even if both units are participating in the same operation. As stealth aircraft, F-22s are not equipped with conventional datalinks such as Link-16 which can be easily spotted by enemy SIGINT. Instead, they use a unique stealth-qualified, narrow-beam Intra-Flight Data-Link (IFDL) designed to relay data and synchronize a situational picture only among the Raptors. As this stealth datalink is incompatible with all other communications devices, Raptors cannot communicate with any friendly aircraft.

[Steve Blair]

Today's CAS ain't your daddy's CAS. I don't understand the myth that persists that CAS is something that inherently is best delivered at low altitude from a slow aircraft. One only needs to look at what's currently going on in theater to put that myth to rest. CAS is both more effective and more accurate when delivered from medium altitudes utilizing precision weapons and sensor technology. This is out of the envelope of most AAA and at the edge of the MANPAD threat which is not only safer, but also allows the pilot to to place more concentration on what's happening on the ground.

I understand that....but I also understand that things don't always go as planned. We've run short of munitions before. And there will always be times when a lower approach may be mandated for one reason or another. But...<shrug>