Orlando AFA Forum
General Joseph W. Ralston
Commander, Air Combat Command
Charting the Future of the Combat Air Force
Orlando AFA Symposium
February 16, 1996
I am pleased to be with you today. ACC is honored to be a part of
sponsoring this symposium. Of all of the great AFA symposiums around the
country, I really believe this is one that does the best job of bringing
the senior leadership of the Air Force and industry partners together.
That is a very important aspect of our process.
We have to communicate between industry and our Air Force in better
ways than we have. You don t do that with RFPs and proposals. You don t
do it with requirements. We ve had some great requirements writers, the
best in the business being here today General Bob Russ, General Jimmy
Adams and General John Jaquish. I know enough about that process as I ve
written a couple in my life and it is an imperfect process at best. You
must have the personal interaction between industry and the military
like we have had here the last couple of years to do that.
Yesterday, the Chief gave us the vision of where we are going as an
Air Force of the future the intellectual underpinnings of that vision.
This morning, Secretary Widnall gave us a good look at what your U.S.
Air Force is doing around the world. I would like to talk with you about
Air Combat Command s future and the programs important to Air Combat
Command and our Air Force.
I have to set the stage a bit before I do that. Many in this audience
were around in the 1970s, which was the last time that our military
establishment faced the type of budgetary pressures anything like we are
experiencing now. In my view, we made some decisions that were not very
good in the 70s. We elected to keep every base that we had open. We
elected to keep every squadron that we had on the books. The budget
wouldn t support that and the only way we could do it was to cut flying
hours and to cut spare parts.
As those of you who were around at that time know, that was a
disaster. At the time, our pilots in Tactical Air Command were getting
7-8 flying hours a month. They were not combat ready. They knew they
were not combat ready, and they left the service in great numbers. We
had to retrain a new "Six Million Dollar Man" by going through
the whole cycle again. Our maintenance people, who like nothing better
than to fix broken airplanes, would go to the spare parts bin and there
were no spare parts. They were demoralized. Retention suffered and we
were in bad shape.
Those of us who were squadron commanders during the 70s said,"If
we are ever in the position to face that same situation, we ll make a
different set of decisions." That is why you have seen the Air
Force closing bases as painful as it is. We have taken squadrons off the
books, going from almost 40 wings to 20 wings, and we cut our bomber
force by two thirds. As painful as that is, it gives us the flying hours
and th spare parts to make what we have truly combat ready. We have done
that and I think it was the right decision to make.
We do not want to cut Operations & Maintenance funds anymore.
Yet, we must modernize for the future. At best, we are in a zero-sum
game. I say that to set the framework as we approach the Fiscal Year
1998 Program Objective Memorandum. With all of the programs we have
funded today and, as you know, we have made significant cuts to this
point we are facing today a $4.5 billion disconnect bill just for the
programs that we have on the books. If anyone comes forward with a new
grand idea, we re going to have to kill something in order to proceed
with the grand idea, no matter how good it is. I believe the "blue
suiters" have an obligation to tell industry: "When you are
about to spend your discretionary dollars on a program, it certainly
needs to be one that has some prayer of success in terms of the overall
funding."
With that in mind, for those programs that Air Combat Command feels
are important to our future and ones we have fully funded today, if
anything else pops into that line, then something I m going to talk
about is going to have to pop out. That is the framework for today s
talk.
First of all is the F-22. I don t need to spend a long time on the
F-22. As the Chief said yesterday, it is our number one modernization
program, certainly in Air Combat Command and in the Air Force. We need
the F-22 not to provide air superiority for Air Combat Command and not
to provide air superiority for the Air Force, but to provide air
superiority for America. It will do that for the first half of the 21st
Century. That is not an overstatement. It will be around that long. We
have to keep it on track. It is absolutely fundamental.
The F-15 has served us extremely well for a number of years. Many of
you have heard me talk about that before. It has been airborne now for
24 years. That is not when it was designed. That is not when the
technology was frozen, but it has been airborne for 24 years. Yet, we
are still nine years away from the first combat F-22 replacement.
We have to do a few things to the F-15, but we can t do much. We need
to upgrade the radar. The APG-63 radar has been a great radar and has
served us very well, but again, it is 1960s technology while we are late
into the 90s and going into the 21st Century. So the upgrade is very
important to us in order to get a handle on the cost of ownership.
For the LINK-16, General Dick Hawley did a magnificent job when he
was AQ [Air Force Acquisition] in getting the price of JTIDS [Joint
Tactical Information Distribution System] for LINK-16 down to an
affordable level. We suffered a little hiccup in the program, but we are
still strongly supportive of LINK-16 capability on the F-15. I believe
General Muellner will keep MIDS on track as he has promised me, and that
we will get an affordable MIDS program so that we can put LINK-16 onto
our F-15s.
Theater missile defense is the second program the Chief talked about
yesterday, and a revolutionary system is the Airborne Laser [ABL]
program. Air Combat Command has fully funded it to the concept
demonstrator and we are looking forward to its flight in 2001.
ROCC and SOCC the Region and Sector Operations Control Centers
modernization doesn t sound very exciting to many, but to General Joe
Ashy as CINC NORAD and to myself as a former NORAD region commander, it
is absolutely critical that we do that modernization. For the first time
in history we have fully funded that effort. How many of you in this
room are doing work on a 30-year-old computer? We just don t. We can t
do that any longer in the ROCC. We ve got to do better.
Let's go to our airplane programs within force application. The A-10
is still serving us extremely well and will continue to do so as far
into the future as I can see. We need to do some mods to the A-10. We ll
add embedded GPS and the Army has bought thousands and thousands of
EPLARS [Enhanced Position Location Reporting System] radios. I think it
is very important that our primary close air support airplane is on the
same radio net as the Army with their EPLARS radio. So we have a funded
program to put EPLARS onto the A-10.
For our Block 30 F-16s, night vision goggles and the lighting that
goes with that and our weapons capability with JDAM [Joint Direct Attack
Munition], wind-corrected munitions, and JSOW [Joint Standoff Weapon],
are very important. For the same reasons we are looking at EPLARS on the
A-10s, we have a funded program for EPLARS on our F-16 Block 30 and 40
programs.
I would also like to see LINK-16 on the F-16. Perhaps there is a way
that you can do both. I saw last evening there is some technology where
with a single box you can do EPLARS and LINK-16. I am not saying that is
the answer, but it certainly is some innovative thinking we need to
pursue and see if we can do that. The same is true on our earlier model
F-16s where we are looking at the munitions improvements.
We have our Block 50 F-16s with the HARM [High-Speed Anti-radiation
Missile] Targeting System [HTS]. We are extremely pleased with the
system, and as you travel around the world and talk to the Block 50 HARM
Targeting System squadrons, without exception, they are very pleased
with the system, and it is doing extremely well. We are developing some
innovative tactics. For example, through the IDM [Improved Data Modem],
a non-HTS F-16 can receive a relay from an HTS equipped F-16. This
information is so good, the wingman can use it to lock a Maverick
missile on the target. This tactic is working very well.
On our bomber programs, a priority for the B-1 is the conventional
munitions upgrade where we need to give i modern munitions capability
and allow it to carry JDAM and the CBU series. The defensive systems
upgrade program is very important. We have to get this on the airplane
so it can face the threat in the 21st Century. I don t know exactly what
the answer is as it is fully funded right now. We are certainly looking
at IDECM [Integrated Defensive Electronic Counter Measures System] as
one of the possibilities for the B-1.
For BVUD, the virtual umbilical capability, Congress in FY 96 added
some dollars to the budget to give us an interim capability so we can
drop a JDAM-like weapon without having to put 1760 [data bus
architecture] on the airplane. At least from Air Combat Command s
perspective, we think that is probably a smart hedge to give us
precision attack capability within the next two years.
The B-2 is also a very important program for us, lest anybody believe
that I am not a strong B-2 supporter and a strong supporter of our
bomber force. We are working very hard to bring the B-2 on board with
the capability that we all need. By next summer, we will have the GATS/GAM
[GPS Aided Targeting System/GPS Aided Munition] capability on it, and we
intend to demonstrate it at that time. We still have over $1.5 billion
of our RDT&E to go on the B-2 program before we have a good
operational capability. The Congress added $493 million and those
decisions will be made in Washington on how to spend that, but certainly
we have at least that much funded to give us the existing program and
the spare parts we need for our 20 planes.
For our weapons which we have already talked about, the JDAM is a
real success story and I m sure General Muellner will talk more about
that in a moment. We are strongly supportive of the program and have
fully funded it. The same is true for JASSM [Joint Air-to-Surface
Standoff Missile]. We have a program and we have funding. The
Sensor-Fused Weapon is a very important program and one that we are very
high on, and the AIM-9X is also fully funded.
Within our surveillance and reconnaissance area, we have Joint STARS
[Joint Surveillance and Target Attack Radar System]. The Secretary
talked about Joint STARS and its successful deployment to Sarajevo. We
flew the 50th sortie in theater yesterday, breaking the record that
George Muellner established in Desert Storm. It is doing great things
for us, and we are very happy with the results.
The E-3 AWACS Extend Sentry program is critically important for us.
Every CINC around the world wants all of our AWACS all of the time. They
can t have them, but we are doing what we can to provide as many sorties
as possible and are upgrading AWACS with Extend Sentry and the RSIP
[Radar System Improvement Program] program is important to do that.
I'm not sure exactly wherewe are headed on RIVET JOINT. We need some
additional RIVET JOINT aircraft. If the Air Force were king, I m sure we
would do that. Congress added some money to reengine the existing ones
and that is an expensive program. We must do some work to sort out
exactly how we approach that as we go into the months ahead.
I'm very proud of the UAVs [Unmanned Aerial Vehicle] and the people
in the 11th Reconnaissance Squadron at Nellis Air Force Base and Indian
Springs [Nev.]. Secretary Perry [Honorable William J. Perry, SECDEF] was
out there about two weeks ago and he was kind enough to give me a call
after he d had his visit to tell me that he had been a fan of UAVs for a
long time. When he talked to the squadron commander at Nellis,
Lieutenant Colonel Steve Hampton, he said Steve was the most
knowledgeable individual he had ever spoken to about UAVs. He called to
tell me how impressed he was with the briefings and where the program
was. That is exactly what we wanted to do when we stood up the program
and get some people who work with UAVs every day to learn the challenges
and the ways of integrating those systems into our force structure.
The C-130Js are very important to us because we have a sizeable C-130
fleet that will be aging out of service, and we need to bring the C-130J
on board. I am excited about the "J" model and what it can do
for us.
I've talked a lot this morning about hardware because that is the
nature of the audience here, and I thought it was important to give you
an update on the programs we think are very important to the future of
our Air Force and Air Combat Command. Even though I ve talked about
hardware, our people in Air Combat Command today are performing
magnificently around the world. Today we have 5,500 people who are TDY
either to Southwest Asia, Turkey, Bosnia, Haiti or SOUTHCOM. They are
doing a great job and our combat readiness is at an all-time high.
I also can t close without acknowledging the great contribution the
Air National Guard and the Air Force Reserve have made to our mission.
We just flat could not do it without the magnificent contribution across
the board.
I am extremely proud of our numbers in Air Combat Command with 94
percent of our squadrons rated C-1 or C-2. That is a very enviable
number. But a number that I am even prouder of is that 96 percent of our
Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve squadrons are C-1 or C-2. So,
they are doing a great job.
That is all I have for you, and I certainly look forward to
entertaining any questions you may have.
GEN. SHAUD: We first have an organizational question. What is
and what will be the relationship between Air Combat Command and SAF/AQ
in selecting funding assets and how does the priority practice really
work?
GEN. RALSTON: As in all of our better processes, we operate as
a team and we work closely together. Air Combat Command sets priorities
in terms of unfilled needs and requirements, and we try to be specific
and publish those for the system. We also know that they are impacted by
programmatic decisions, and we don t want to do something that could
break a program that is doing well.
We may have to dip into one of our higher priority requirements to
fund a program that is still a requirement, but we don t want to break
it. We have to work issues in an iterative and a teamwork way. We are
doing that and feel very good about it. General Muellner will give you
his perspective on that when he gets up.
GEN. SHAUD: In your opinion, should the CINCs be given greater
control over the resource allocation process?
GEN. RALSTON: I applaud the Goldwater-Nichols initiatives, and
we have a stronger military today because of it. The greatest aspect of
the Goldwater-Nichols Act was to make the CINC in charge of his AOR. He
is the undisputed leader in that area. We have a structural balance to
maintain, though. The best CINC is one who concentrates on how to fight
the war this afternoon. As a nation, that is what we pay him to do.
Sometimes they are not equipped with the staff that they need to look 20
years into the future and to spend time concentrating on it. The
services probably have a better role to play in that regard, but once
again, it is not an "either/or" situation. There needs to be a
partnership and teamwork arrangement as we do that. The present process
is working well in that regard.
GEN. SHAUD: Recently, the White House said the Defense
Department is going to expand its forthcoming Deep Strike Study to take
a harder look at trade-offs between long-range bombers, land based and
sea based tactical air power and missiles. Do you have any initial
thoughts on this study or thoughts to share about it?
GEN. RALSTON: I think it is proper that the study take place
and that they do a good look at it. I am certain that it will build
heavily on the Heavy Bomber Study which was completed last year. Air
Combat Command and the Air Force were full participants in that study.
We looked at many of those issues at that time. I am certain they will
get a fresh look and the process should continue and proceed.
GEN. SHAUD: What is the status of the B-52 and how long do you
think it will remain a combat asset?
GEN. RALSTON:My personal view is that the B-52 will remain a
combat asset for a long time. We have looked at its service life and
worked very closely with Boeing. It s an interesting statistic that the
average B-52H has fewer flying hours and fewer landings than the average
Boeing 767 in the commercial fleet. The B-52 has a lot of life left in
it. It will last for a long time. I see no present plans to retire the
B-52 for well beyond anybody s lifetime in this room, except the cadets
perhaps.
GEN. SHAUD:As a final question Sir, can you provide us with
your thoughts on the future hardened, deeply buried target mission?
GEN. RALSTON: That is a tough problem and one that we have
worked for decades. It is a problem that is not insolvable. Desert Storm
brought to the forefront the best of our requirements and industrial
processes. When we needed a munition that could go into deeply buried,
hardened targets, in spite of not being able to have solved that problem
for decades, we put together a team between Lockheed and Texas
Instruments that developed the GBU-28 in about 21 days. It is something
that was tested; it workd; and it was employed in combat. It certainly
may not be the ultimate solution, but it is a combat capability we have
today to do the mission and that is all I would say.
GEN. SHAUD: We thank you very much and congratulations on your
new assignment.
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