.Jane’s World Air Forces: United States Air Force
From the euphoric heights of a seemingly unchallengeable doctrine of "Aerospace Power" after the first Gulf War that held out the promise of making land warfare obsolete, the US Air Force (USAF) at war today serves primarily as an airlift and close air support provider to land and special operations forces in drawn-out counter-insurgency operations.
Beyond Iraq and Afghanistan, however, the prospect of military action to disrupt suspected nuclear weapons activities has re-ignited long-standing controversies over the effectiveness of strategic bombing campaigns and reopened old contentions among the services. Many senior Air Force leaders and Department of Defense (DoD) officials believe that modern airpower alone is capable of sufficiently damaging dispersed and hardened nuclear facilities, while senior Army and Marine officers fear that air attacks on their own would fail, leading to major land campaigns requiring significant levels of national mobilisation and hard to earn public support.
Nonetheless, efforts are underway, principally within the Air Force, but also within the Navy and Special Operations community, to ensure that capabilities are available if required. These include advanced Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) for targeting both air defence and nuclear infrastructure and for Battle Damage Assessment and re-targeting between strikes. Other efforts are addressing weaponeering, such as developing conventional precision deep earth penetrating munitions, along with long range Combat Search and Rescue (CSAR) to recover downed aircrew.
The 2006 Quadrennial Defense Review, meanwhile, represents a significant departure from previous emphasis on technology-dominated, high-intensity warfare by addressing the tactical aviation, tanker and airlift shortfalls which have emerged since 2001. Trends include advancing joint close air support concepts and the exploitation of air and space-based ISR assets for the benefit of joint operations. But even as the Air Force contends that futuristic satellite programmes are useful in battling modern threats like terrorism and insurgencies, the service is also asking for serious funding to modernise large tactical fighter, airlift, tanker, CSAR and ISR aircraft fleets.
In order to become more affordable and expedite delivery, the Air Force has opted for smaller numbers of more capable aircraft from a wider spectrum of sources. For example, the fighter fleet in 2025 will be based on the enhanced capabilities of the F-22 and F-35 in numbers considerably less than the F-15s and F-16s they will replace, while the elderly KC-135 tankers of today will likely be replaced by a mix of fewer, but much more capable multirole platforms from both Boeing and Airbus.
Relying on a smaller force has sparked scepticism and debate inside and outside the Air Force, with many critics stating that numbers do matter. A smaller fighting force, no matter how capable, can still be outnumbered and defeated by anti-air threats, just as smaller numbers of tankers and airlifters will mean fewer assets being deployable due to maintenance, training and fleet positioning, and crewing issues.
Like the other services, the Air Force is struggling to keep procurement programmes on track in the face of a cash crisis brought on by massive war-related expenditures across the DoD. Several key aircraft programmes are in jeopardy due to the cost of over-runs, technical problems and extended delivery delays. Escalating counterinsurgency requirements are also causing critics in Congress and elsewhere to question the ultimate value of extremely expensive, highly advanced modern aircraft, with many Representatives and Senators much less willing to accept traditional assurances from the Air Force leadership.
The Air Force response is a vociferous, if not particularly confident, campaign to convince Congress that "Air Dominance" is still relevant and vitally important to national defence. Air Force advocates regularly make the case that increasingly capable high-tech air threats in the form of advanced new Russian aircraft and air defence systems in the hands of potential rivals such as China and Iran demand continued introduction into service of more effective air platforms like the expensive F-22A and the problem-plagued F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF - now called the Lightning II for specific US service).
The USAF is attempting to set out its role for the future by expanding operational boundaries into space. The president has indeed designated the USAF as the lead force in furthering security operations in space, and the air force has aggressively pursued projects like the laser-based Transformational Communication Satellite System and Space Based Radar as space becomes the newest source of excitement and ambition within the service. Fiscal Year 2006 budget plans increased spending in this area to USD9.9 billion, about 9.6 per cent of the total air force budget. The Air Force is also seeking to exploit 'near space' and the use of lighter-than-air vehicles as communications links and sensor platforms at altitudes in the range of 20 to 100 km as lower-cost alternatives to unmanned aerial vehicles and satellites, and directed energy weapons like lasers and energy beams are of keen interest.
Jane's
Beyond Iraq and Afghanistan, however, the prospect of military action to disrupt suspected nuclear weapons activities has re-ignited long-standing controversies over the effectiveness of strategic bombing campaigns and reopened old contentions among the services. Many senior Air Force leaders and Department of Defense (DoD) officials believe that modern airpower alone is capable of sufficiently damaging dispersed and hardened nuclear facilities, while senior Army and Marine officers fear that air attacks on their own would fail, leading to major land campaigns requiring significant levels of national mobilisation and hard to earn public support.
Nonetheless, efforts are underway, principally within the Air Force, but also within the Navy and Special Operations community, to ensure that capabilities are available if required. These include advanced Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) for targeting both air defence and nuclear infrastructure and for Battle Damage Assessment and re-targeting between strikes. Other efforts are addressing weaponeering, such as developing conventional precision deep earth penetrating munitions, along with long range Combat Search and Rescue (CSAR) to recover downed aircrew.
The 2006 Quadrennial Defense Review, meanwhile, represents a significant departure from previous emphasis on technology-dominated, high-intensity warfare by addressing the tactical aviation, tanker and airlift shortfalls which have emerged since 2001. Trends include advancing joint close air support concepts and the exploitation of air and space-based ISR assets for the benefit of joint operations. But even as the Air Force contends that futuristic satellite programmes are useful in battling modern threats like terrorism and insurgencies, the service is also asking for serious funding to modernise large tactical fighter, airlift, tanker, CSAR and ISR aircraft fleets.
In order to become more affordable and expedite delivery, the Air Force has opted for smaller numbers of more capable aircraft from a wider spectrum of sources. For example, the fighter fleet in 2025 will be based on the enhanced capabilities of the F-22 and F-35 in numbers considerably less than the F-15s and F-16s they will replace, while the elderly KC-135 tankers of today will likely be replaced by a mix of fewer, but much more capable multirole platforms from both Boeing and Airbus.
Relying on a smaller force has sparked scepticism and debate inside and outside the Air Force, with many critics stating that numbers do matter. A smaller fighting force, no matter how capable, can still be outnumbered and defeated by anti-air threats, just as smaller numbers of tankers and airlifters will mean fewer assets being deployable due to maintenance, training and fleet positioning, and crewing issues.
Like the other services, the Air Force is struggling to keep procurement programmes on track in the face of a cash crisis brought on by massive war-related expenditures across the DoD. Several key aircraft programmes are in jeopardy due to the cost of over-runs, technical problems and extended delivery delays. Escalating counterinsurgency requirements are also causing critics in Congress and elsewhere to question the ultimate value of extremely expensive, highly advanced modern aircraft, with many Representatives and Senators much less willing to accept traditional assurances from the Air Force leadership.
The Air Force response is a vociferous, if not particularly confident, campaign to convince Congress that "Air Dominance" is still relevant and vitally important to national defence. Air Force advocates regularly make the case that increasingly capable high-tech air threats in the form of advanced new Russian aircraft and air defence systems in the hands of potential rivals such as China and Iran demand continued introduction into service of more effective air platforms like the expensive F-22A and the problem-plagued F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF - now called the Lightning II for specific US service).
The USAF is attempting to set out its role for the future by expanding operational boundaries into space. The president has indeed designated the USAF as the lead force in furthering security operations in space, and the air force has aggressively pursued projects like the laser-based Transformational Communication Satellite System and Space Based Radar as space becomes the newest source of excitement and ambition within the service. Fiscal Year 2006 budget plans increased spending in this area to USD9.9 billion, about 9.6 per cent of the total air force budget. The Air Force is also seeking to exploit 'near space' and the use of lighter-than-air vehicles as communications links and sensor platforms at altitudes in the range of 20 to 100 km as lower-cost alternatives to unmanned aerial vehicles and satellites, and directed energy weapons like lasers and energy beams are of keen interest.
Jane's
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