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F-15E vs. F-15EX Women Pilots 40 |Inside Weapons School 47 | The Promise of Skyborg 50 30 INTERCEPTS Great Power Competition Turns Up the Heat on Overflights |44 November 2020 $8 Published by the Air Force Association STAFF Publisher November 2020, Vol. 103, No. 11 Bruce A. Wright Editor in Chief Tobias Naegele Managing Editor Juliette Kelsey Chagnon Editorial Director John A. Tirpak News Editor Amy McCullough Airman 1st Class Bailee Class 1st Darbasie Airman Assistant Managing Editor DEPARTMENTS FEATURES Tech. Sgt. Taylor Chequita Wood 2 Editorial: 8 Q&A: Balancing Act Cifuentes, an Generating Fires, instructor at the Senior Designer Not Hype Lt. Gen. David S. Nahom, USAF deputy chief of staff Weapons School, Dashton Parham By Tobias Naegele for plans and programs, speaks with John A. Tirpak preps an HH- Pentagon Editor about balancing immediate and long-term readiness. 60G Pave Hawk Brian W. Everstine 3 Letters helicopter for a Gunsmoke com- Digital Platforms 6 Index to 30 Joining Up on the F-15EX petition at Nellis Editor Advertisers By John A. Tirpak Air Force Base, Jennifer-Leigh 10 Verbatim The Air Force prepares to welcome the first new F-15s Nev., in 2019. Oprihory since 2004. See “Humble, Senior Editor 12 Strategy & Policy: Approachable Rachel S. Cohen Brown’s ABCDs and 36 Rare Elements of Security Experts,” p. 47. USAF’s Bottom-Up Production Culture By Alyk R. Kenlan Manager Eric Chang Lee 14 Airframes The U.S. moves to ensure a robust supply chain for rare-earth elements—beyond China’s control. Photo Editor 18 World: Friendly fire Mike Tsukamoto death; Space Force 40 Erasing Artificial Barriers looks forward; Eglin By Amy McCullough Contributors F-35 crash; and Lukas Autenried, more ... The Air Force is making it easier for women to be John T. Correll, 29 Faces of the Force aviators—and to keep flying should they choose to Robert S. Dudney, Mark Gunzinger, 71 Airman for Life have children. Jennifer Hlad, Mississippi 44 Close Encounters of the Familiar Kind Alyk Russell Kenlan congratulates CMSAF JoAnne Bass By Brian W. Everstine Competition with Russia intensifies across the 72 Namesakes: Ellsworth Northern Hemisphere. 47 Humble, Approachable Experts By Jennifer-Leigh Oprihory ADVERTISING: Kirk Brown For USAF’s Weapon’s School, teamwork is the recipe Director, Media for excellence. ON THE COVER Solutions 52 The Promise of Skyborg 703.247.5829 [email protected] By Mark Gunzinger and Lukas Autenried SUBSCRIBE Low-cost attritable UAVs raise the ante for adversaries & SAVE seeking to challenge USAF. Subscribe to 56 Balloonists in the Family Tree Air Force Magazine By John T. Correll and save big off Staff Sgt. James Sgt. Staff Cason the cover price, The first chief of the air arm was a pilot—but not an A Russian fighter plus get a free airplane pilot. buzzes a USAF membership 62 Air Force Association Almanac B-52. See “Close to the Air Force Encounters of the Association. Compiled by Chequita Wood Familiar Kind,” p. 44. 1-800-727-3337 Statistics, awards, and history. Air Force Magazine (ISSN 0730-6784) November 2020 (Vol. 103, No. 11) is published monthly, except for two double issues in January/February and July/August, by the Air Force Association, 1501 Lee Highway, Arlington, VA 22209-1198. Phone (703) 247-5800. Periodical postage paid at Arlington, Va., and additional mailing offices. Membership Rate: $50 per year; $35 e-Membership; $125 for three-year membership. Subscription Rate: $50 per year; $29 per year additional for postage to foreign addresses (except Canada and Mexico, which are $10 per year additional). Regular issues $8 each. USAF Almanac issue $18 each. Change of address requires four weeks’ notice. Please include mailing label. POSTMASTER: Send changes of address to Air Force Association, 1501 Lee Highway, Arlington, VA 22209-1198. Publisher assumes no responsibility for unsolicited material. Trademark registered by Air Force Association. Copyright 2020 by Air Force Association. NOVEMBER 2020 AIRFORCEMAG.COM 1 EDITORIAL By Tobias Naegele Generating Fires, Not Hype he U.S. Army is developing long-range missiles and artillery territory). It means moving those weapons on ships or trains at to extend its reach for great power competition. minimal speed. It means everyone knows what you’re moving, T It’s a bold play for relevance at a time when the United when, and where. True, once in theater, you can hide in a bunker, States is shifting its focus from the dirty business of counterin - a warehouse, a tunnel, or under a bridge. You can dart out, fire surgency to the looming strategic threats from peer competitors a few rounds, and then hide again like the Iranians and North across the Arctic, European, and Indo-Pacific theaters. But, it is Koreans. You’ll have to—you won’t have much ammunition with the wrong course for a modern joint force facing growing threats you for subsequent fires. in virtually every domain. That’s not eicient or stealth. The Army has this much right: The ability to launch long- Stealth is flying in, undetected, with a B-2 bomber laden with range precision strikes is critical to deter aggression and hold a bellyful of precision-guided bombs that can obliterate a dozen adversaries at risk. They’re right, too, that tightly connected, targets on one run. Talk about eiciency! Need more firepower interoperable systems capable of sharing data in real time will and can’t risk taking on anti-air defenses? Fly in a four-ship of be critical to complicating the threat picture for adversaries and B-1s or B-2s and launch your stando weapons from afar. You’ll that America’s joint force should work together to develop the have more range, more kinetic firepower, less risk, and greater ability and capacity to shorten kill chains. precision. You’ll also have second chances, should initial shots That, after all, is what joint all-domain command and control miss. That’s not true in the Army scenario. is all about: leveraging connectedness, computing power, and Think of it: The closer you can get to the target, especially a artificial intelligence to automate and accelerate decision cycles. mobile one, the more likely you are to hit it; the further away, the But the Army is wrong that these factors point to the need for more time and chance there is for something to change. 1,000-mile surface-to-surface weapons—the Army’s anticipated The Army’s cost argument is similarly specious. These weapons “mid-range capability”—or long-range hypersonic surface-to-sur- don’t exist today; they must be developed, tested, procured, and face missiles that can travel thousands of miles, a throwback fielded; doctrine needs to be developed; a logistics chain built; to the Army’s Cold War-era strategic force, forces need to be diverted and trained to operate when it had Pershing II intermediate-range The Army is missing the and defend it. Then, it needs to be integrated nuclear missiles. point. This is not eicient with the other services’ command and control “It’s a strategic weapon,” says Lt. Gen. Neil architecture to plan and deconflict the use of Thurgood, of the Army’s Long-Range Hyper- —or stealth. those weapons. Those are all real costs that must sonic Weapon. “It’s not long-range artillery.” be calculated into the total. And for what? To field a second-rate But does it add value to U.S. defense? Or is this really just about solution to a problem the Air Force and Navy have already solved. seeming relevant and winning the fight for resources rather than Though air defenses have gotten better, so has Air Force deterring and defeating adversaries? stealth. Low-observable aircraft are designed to penetrate and Army leaders cite three reasons why launching long-range destroy enemy defenses, then pave the way for less costly, more missiles from mobile land-based launchers is advantageous: amply armed follow-on forces. They can fly home, reload, and n Range. They see a need for missiles that can counter the be back on station within hours. anti-access/area-denial ranges of Chinese and Russian weapons. By contrast, a handful of mobile launchers can fire a handful of n Stealth and mobility. They argue such missiles and launch- missiles. Once they do, they’d have to go hide for a while. It’s not ers can be inexpensively hidden under camouflage or in tunnels. like they can dash to a mobile weapons dump to restock them. n Cost. A mobile launcher is more aordable than a ship, Army leaders argue that increasingly sophisticated and long- submarine, or bomber aircraft. range defenses hold at risk military bases within that range. All three fall well short of the target. Last January’s Iranian missile attacks on two U.S. bases in Iraq True, mid-range 1,000-mile missiles would extend the Army’s demonstrate how dangerous such attacks can be. Ironically, it’s battlespace—but to what end? The Army can’t maneuver over the Army’s mission to defend those air bases. The Army could that distance, which is more than twice the range of a Black be investing today in base defense but isn’t. It’s trying instead Hawk helicopter and a week’s drive in typical combat vehicles. to replace those bases with its own organic fires. To fly that distance would require multiple aerial refuelings by They miss the point. Mobile launchers can’t provide all the helicopter or a formation of Air Force C-17s. other things an Air Force base does—services like moving More to the point, shooting guns and missiles at that range ammunition, food, and fuel, delivering close air support, and can be done more eiciently and eectively from the air.