Back to news

September 19, 2018 | International, Aerospace

Bombers, fighters and tankers unite: Will the Air Force rebuild composite wings to fight near-peer foes?

By:

The Air Force has spent the past few years gearing up for a near-peer fight against adversaries with high-end air forces that match their own. While new doctrines and technologies occupy much of the planning for such a shift, another type of preparation is needed: reorganizing wings and squadrons.

One possibility on the table is a return to composite wings.

In the early 1990s, the Air Force organized the 366th Fighter Wing out of Mountain Home Air Force Base, Idaho, into the service's premier “air intervention” composite wing. For roughly a decade, the wing flew fighters, bombers and tankers with the goal of meeting the challenges of a post-Cold War world order — where conflict could arrive anywhere, anytime.

“They were ready to pack up and go fight as a unified team,” Lt. Gen. Mark Kelly, commander of 12th Air Force, told a crowd of Air Force leaders Monday at the 2018 Air, Space and Cyber Conference in Washington, D.C.

“But that was disbanded, and part of it came down to money," Kelly said. "The cost per flying hour of trying to sustain the small-fleet dynamics there didn't look great on spreadsheets.”

But Kelly argues that financial assessment was faulty. The quality of the training airmen were getting was being compared to the day-to-day operations at other bases around the Air Force. In reality, it was more comparable to the day-to-day training at Red Flag — a two-week, advanced air combat training exercise still held several times a year in Nevada and Alaska.

“Frankly, the training they were getting compared more to Red Flag daily ops," Kelly said. “And that would be a good problem to have and a good construct to be able to build.”

The Air Force is rethinking how it constructs wings and squadrons, as well as how it deploys airmen, as it shifts to better align with the 2018 National Defense Strategy, according to Kelly.

As it stands, “airmen only come together to fight at the line of scrimmage," Kelly said.

For instance, before airmen arrive at a forward base to fight against insurgents in Afghanistan, they may have a unified command at the squadron level, but a unified command at the wing level is severely lacking.

Additionally, airmen preparing to deploy today benefit from a surplus of “spin-up" time. They know when their unit is scheduled to deploy and have the luxury of training to meet that challenge well in advance.

“That's a luxury that we cannot rely on in great power competition,” Kelly said.

Organizing some aircraft and airmen into composite wings could provide the training and deployment structure necessary for fights against modern militaries, Kelly said.

The composite wing concept was heavily pushed in 1991 by then Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Merrill McPeak, according to his biography on the Defense Department's website.

McPeak wanted to organize wings by their mission-set, not aircraft type. According to his “air intervention” doctrine, a wing deploying for a near-peer fight should have all the aircraft and airmen it needs to accomplish its mission with limited, or possibly no, outside support.

This meant one wing could potentially operate electronic warfare aircraft for the suppression of enemy air defenses, bombers to lay waste to enemy fortifications, fighters to engage in air-to-air combat, and tankers to refuel them all.

After the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, however, the old composite squadron idea was mostly discarded. The 366th Fighter Wing was restored to fly F-16Js, and the consolidation of the Air Force's KC-135 and B-1 forces led to the reallocation of the wing's bombers and tankers to McConnell AFB, Kansas, and Ellsworth AFB, South Dakota, according to Mountain Home's website.

But composite wings, and the idea of sustainable fights with more or less autonomous Air Force commanders, is back in vogue.

Funding was one of the biggest challenges to composite wings back in the day, but the reasons for that unit structure are better appreciated now as concerns about China and Russia preoccupy defense planners.

To fuel a restructuring, steady funding will be key, according to Kelly. He projected the Air Force's shift to great power competition will continue to be a focus of the defense budget into 2021 and 2022.

But regardless of the funds Congress ultimately appropriates for the Air Force in the coming years, restructuring for a near-peer fight needs to happen, Kelly said.

“This has to happen regardless of if we have the force we have today with only one more airman, or the force we need with tens of thousands more airmen," he added.

https://www.airforcetimes.com/news/your-air-force/2018/09/18/bombers-fighters-and-tankers-unite-will-the-air-force-rebuild-composite-wings-to-fight-near-peer-foes

On the same subject

  • Italy defense minister commits to F-35 after calls to suspend program

    May 29, 2020 | International, Aerospace

    Italy defense minister commits to F-35 after calls to suspend program

    By: Tom Kington ROME – Italy's defense minister has thrown his weight behind the F-35 program to counter demands from within his coalition government to suspend purchases of the aircraft to help Italy's coronavirus-stricken economy. Lorenzo Guerini said he “confirmed that the program would continue,” after calls from Italy's Five Star party to halt F-35 purchases for a year as Italy seeks cash to help rebound from the virus, which has killed 33,000 in Italy. In an interview with Italian publication Formiche, Guerini said defense spending was often slashed during economic crises, but claimed cuts to Italy's planned 90-aircraft buy would hurt high-tech jobs and damage an industrial sector which “offers very significant economic returns to our nation.” Italy has currently taken delivery of 15 F-35 aircraft including 12 F-35A's and three F-35B's. Final assembly of the aircraft occurs at Italy's own facility at Cameri Air Base in the north of the country, which is due to become a maintenance hub for the aircraft. Guerini hails from the center-left Democratic Party, which is a minority partner with the Five Star party in a coalition government formed last year. Previously, Five Star had governed alongside the anti-migrant League party. Five Star has had a turbulent relationship with the F-35 program. Prior to first entering government in 2018 it vowed to scrap the program altogether, before giving ambiguous signals about the aircraft once it was in power. Italy's coronavirus outbreak, which started in late February and prompted a strict, nationwide shut-down, has only now eased, with most restrictions on movement dropped on May 18. But after two months of lockdown the economy is in tatters, from manufacturing to services to tourism, which accounts for 13 percent of GDP. The government has been slow off the mark to pay furlough wages and economists see GDP shrinking by up to ten percent this year. In late March, 50 Five Star members of parliament signed a motion backing a suspension of ongoing F-35 purchases for one year to free cash for health spending. “We would also consider renegotiating and resizing this program,” one Five Star member in the group said at the time. In his interview, Guerini backed F-35 but also supported Italy's historical alliance with the United States and NATO, which was thrown into doubt by an April poll asking Italians which countries they considered “Friends”. Some 52 percent indicated China, followed by Russia on 32 percent and the United States on 17 percent. Compared to a similar survey carried out in 2019, China leaped 42 percent, Russia by 17 percent, while the U.S. dropped 12 percent. Asked which country Italy should ally with in the future, 36 percent said China while only 30 percent said the United States. The survey followed very visible visits by Chinese and Russian doctors to Italy to help during the virus outbreak. Last year, Italy announced plans to sign up to China's controversial Belt and Road global trade routes plan, incurring criticism from U.S. diplomats, who warned the program was designed to help China more than its partners. https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2020/05/28/italy-defense-minister-commits-to-f-35-after-calls-to-suspend-program/

  • Rising B-21 production costs lead to $1.6B charge for Northrop

    January 29, 2024 | International, Aerospace

    Rising B-21 production costs lead to $1.6B charge for Northrop

    CEO Kathy Warden also said the company is working with the Pentagon to try to bring down costs for the over-budget Sentinel nuclear missile.

  • Lithuania to buy US helicopters to bolster NATO capabilities in Baltics

    July 8, 2020 | International, Aerospace

    Lithuania to buy US helicopters to bolster NATO capabilities in Baltics

    By JOHN VANDIVER | STARS AND STRIPESPublished: July 7, 2020 STUTTGART, Germany — The U.S. plans to sell six UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters to Lithuania to boost allied quick response capabilities in a region regarded by some security analysts as one of NATO's most vulnerable. The deal, which will also include a full stock of related Black Hawk gear and weaponry such as M240H machine guns and missile warning systems, is worth $380 million, the Defense Security Cooperation Agency said in a statement Monday. The Black Hawks will help Lithuania support U.S. and NATO forces' “rapid response to a variety of missions and quick positioning of troops with minimal helicopter assets,” the statement said. The deal was announced as Lithuania modernizes its armed forces, and one year after the former Soviet republic entered into a new security agreement with the U.S. that calls for closer defense cooperation. “The proposed sale of these UH-60 helicopters to Lithuania will significantly increase its capability to provide troop lift, border security, anti-terrorist, medical evacuation, search and rescue, re-supply/external lift, combat support in all weather,” the agency said. Lithuania, which shares borders with the militarized Russian exclave of Kaliningrad to the south and Russia's strategic partner of Belarus to the east, is considered by many security analysts to be one of NATO's most exposed members. Of particular concern is a 40-mile stretch of land along Lithuania's border with Poland, known as the Suwalki Gap, which, if seized by Russian forces in the event of a conflict, could result in the three Baltic states being cut off from the rest of the alliance. NATO in recent years has added multinational battle groups in Lithuania and the other Baltic states, Latvia and Estonia, as well as in Poland, to act as deterrents against potential Russian aggression. The battle group in northeastern Poland is led by the U.S., and is particularly focused on security around the Suwalki Gap. https://www.stripes.com/news/europe/lithuania-to-buy-us-helicopters-to-bolster-nato-capabilities-in-baltics-1.636600

All news