This article first appeared in Aviation Week & Space Technology.
An early look at the U.S. Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) reveals major force and capability alterations that are being described as “high-g changes in direction, and high-g causes pain,” says a senior U.S. Air Force official.
Moreover, the pared-down, reshaped, multifunctional forces under consideration are expected to cost $50–60 billion over five years above the planning target of no real growth in defense spending through Fiscal 2015.
The Pentagon analysis does point to growth in some areas, says David Ochmanek, deputy assistant secretary of Defense for force planning. A longtime Rand researcher, he is now in the “engine room” of the QDR.
Asked about his assessment of U.S. military might if the QDR recommendations are adopted, Ochmanek replied, “I think there will be enough forces to handle a war on the Korean peninsula and against Iran at the same time.“
How that might happen is illustrated by the F-22 force that is expected to be capped at 186 [187 minus one destroyed in a crash].
“You dont need F-22 for both simultaneous wars — just the biggest one,” Ochmanek says. “With programmed modernization of the rest of the force — specifically the F-35 — it is deemed adequate to deal with other regional threats. The judgment was made that the mix was adequate.“
U.S. Air Force Lt. Gen. Harry Wyatt, 3rd — a former Oklahoma judge who is now director of the Air National Guard (ANG) — will not argue for more F-22 production, but he does contend that ANG units must train with the same equipment as the regular Air Force; otherwise they could become irrelevant. Moreover, he says reserve components will be critical in long conflicts when troops must be rotated regularly.
The singular features of the F-22 are critical for missions such as cruise missile defense. They include an operational altitude of 65,000 ft., supercruise and the ability to find small, stealthy targets with the Raptors infrared search-and-track, electronic surveillance, sensor fusion, beyond-line-of-sight communications and advanced radar arrays.
“This is not a call for more F-22s,” Wyatt says. “Im only interested in capability,” but that needs to start moving into the reserves and ANG soon. He believes that a bridge of fourth-generation aircraft would help, but only if they are equipped with fifth-generation sensors like those on the F-22.
Read the rest of this story, groove to the “assassin’s mace,” see how the Lightning II keeps its wings up and check out the Blue Berets’ “dream machine” from our friends at Aviation Week, exclusively on Military.com.
– Christian
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
I didn’t know the F-22 had IRST system. Anyone have info on this system?
thx
“ANG units must train with the same equipment as the regular Air Force; otherwise they could become irrelevant.”
This doesn’t make a lot of sense. Why does doing what the active duty Air Force and the Air Force Reserves do, but with less training and funding and relevance to your most frequent operational mission (in the the ANG’s case, domestic use in disasters and to deal with the risk of terrorist attacks by air), make you relevant?
Relevance comes from being best at doing something, not from being third best at doing something.
In Iraq, one of the big areas where the National Guard had an edge was civil affairs. Many guardsmen had practical experience running civilian businesses, participating in politics, and serving as state and local government administrators, all important to the civil affairs jobs in Iraq. A much smaller percentage of active duty military personnel have any significant experience in responsible positions in civilian life.
In recent campaigns, the ANG’s relevance has been concentrated in the low glory, intense need areas of transport flights and air tanker operations. The ANG has done best where the ANG has served in roles that compliment the active duty force with different equipment, not roles that compete with the active duty force in the jobs the active duty force sees at the core of its mission.
If the ANG wants to be relevant it needs to find a niche, and that niche is very likely to be one other than one that the active duty Air Force equipment is optimized to fill.
Put another way, in the area of air to air combat and enemy territory strike missions, the stuff the F-22 is optimized to do, the ANG isn’t relevant now and probably never has been.
The lesson of Top Gun was that very intensive training produces big rewards when operating jet fighters. The ANG will always be at a competive disadvantage in the capacity to do prolonged intensive training. There is no shame in this; it is simply a fact. If you want to fly state of the air fighters in front line combat missions, join the Air Force, not the ANG.
On the other hand, were it to find a niche the Air Force doesn’t fill, perhaps drawing on its civilian general aviation experience (e.g. spraying herbicide on opium fields with crop dusters, or engaging in air taxi and recon missions with very small manned aircraft like the RC-12), it might find itself to be highly relevant.
“You don
Clear example of how these idiots don’t have a clue what they are talking about. We are unlikely to get enough F-35s quickly enough to do all the things they are inteneded to do much less what the F-22s we aren’t getting were supposed to do.
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Given the fact that legacy aircraft(when upgraded with current technology)can still be quite capable, and that UASs have shown that they can take over roles once taken by manned aircraft, is it really necessary to acquire 5th Gen fighters in the numbers that the Air Force requires? Would it make more sense(given political and budgetary considerations)to acquire new legacy aircraft and UASs to back up the relatively small numbers of procured 5th Gen aircraft?