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-Signs, Portents, and the Weather-
The USAF Absorbs A Wake-Up Call - Strategy Page
2008-06-23
Everyone is down on the U.S. Air Force these days. Long criticized as being dethatched, and obsessed with developing and buying the latest (and most expensive) aircraft and technology, the air force was largely a victim of its own success. Critics should not forget that the U.S. Air Force has been the main reason the U.S. has dominated the skies, worldwide, for the last 65 years. That was no accident, it took a lot of effort and imagination. A certain amount of myopia regarding jet fighters, and how to shoot down everyone elses, was necessary to obtain that air supremacy. Without it, winning on the ground is difficult, if not impossible. Let's not forget that the zoomies are, above all, winners.

But the air force generals have burned a lot of bridges behind them. The army, navy and marines all have their own air forces, and resent constant air force attempts to take control of everything that flies. This latest flap, involving the firing of the Secretary of the Air Force (a civilian) and the Chief of Staff of Air Force (the senior officer, in effect the military commander of the air force), was the tail end of years of growing dissatisfaction with how the air force thought of itself. The other services believed the air force had an inflated view of what air power could accomplish. The air force long preached, and practiced, the concept that wars, or at least ground battles, could be won from the air. The other services disputed this assertion, but the air force made a powerful case, especially when there wasn't a war going on, and constantly got th biggest chunk of the defense budget. That did not go down well with the services either.

Then came a big change, when GPS guided weapons began to show up a decade ago. It wasn't just the JDAM (GPS guided) bombs, but GPS guided rockets and artillery shells, plus laser guided missiles from UAVs. While the air force loved technological change, the GPS revolution turned out to be a bit much. Suddenly, the air force was not needed as much for its traditional ground support missions (there has been little air combat since the 1970s). Consider the numbers. One JDAM bomb does the work of 300 dumb bombs, and does it with much less risk to friendly troops on the ground, or to the aircraft dropping the bomb (which can now do so at high altitude, out of range of gunfire.) That's great news, except that it means much less work for the air force. One heavy bomber and a few jet fighters can provide all the air support needed for Iraq (or Afghanistan). Air force commanders have to order F-16 and F-15 pilots to stay at high altitude, to avoid getting hit. For a "combat pilot", that hurts. The only warplanes allowed to go down and dirty are the A-10s, which were long scorned by the pilots of "fast movers" (jet fighters.) No more.

The air force has been so successful that there are no more aces (pilots who have shot down five or more aircraft.) It's not that the U.S. Air Force pilots are not capable, it's just that no one wants to take them on. It's seen as suicidal. In the current war, the air force had to come up with a combat badge for support troops, because the only air force personnel getting shot at where the airmen who volunteered to help the army out with logistics and security jobs on the ground. Air force pilots seethe at the injustice of it all; airmen truck drivers who have seen more combat than fighter pilots, and have the combat badge, scars and war stories to prove it. It really hurts.

The air force also took a lot of heat for screwing up their strategic weapons units. The ICBM troops, in particular, had been treated poorly in the last two decades, and had lost the discipline and thoroughness they had long been famous (or infamous) for. This all came from the era (1950s-60s) of General Curtis LeMay, a very capable, and over-the-top SAC (Strategic Air Force) and later Air Force commander. Many air force old timers trace the current problems to the post Cold War trend of officers acting, and thinking, more like business executives, than "fighting generals" like LeMay.

It's future shock time for the air force. The other services, and the Secretary of Defense, agreed that the air force was not handling it well. The new leadership (the new chief of staff is a transport pilot) is expected to ease up on the F-22 obsession, and pay more attention to UAVs and reconnaissance for the army, as well as air transport and electronic warfare. But many air force officers believed in the goals of the former management, and are not taking well to all these changes. So it's not over yet, but the air force has, as far as the other services are concerned, received a long overdue wake-up call.
Posted by:GolfBravoUSMC

#23  Rummy had a war to prosecute - one he didn't really want if stories are true since he thought it would be a mess and that transformation (including that bloodbath) was more important.

Give him credit -- he and Cheney held off Colin Powell and State better/longer than most could have managed.
Posted by: lotp   2008-06-23 19:41  

#22  There's going to be blood (figuratively speaking) in the halls of the Pentagon before this is over.

Probably a long time coming, and not just in the AF, either. Damn shame G-Dub stuck with Rummy as long as he did...if Gates had been brought in earlier, he'd probably have already swung his ax and we'd have a really big crop of smart, aggressive bird colonels in their mid and late thirties and generals in their early forties.
Posted by: Ricky bin Ricardo (Abu Babaloo)   2008-06-23 19:35  

#21  WOT > WAR FOR OWG-NWO > WAR FOR THE ANTI-"STATUS QUO" = ANTI-COLD WAR STATUS QUO, among other "Critical Mass" premises.

DILEMMA for the USDOD > iff no one wins the GWOT = WAR FOR GLOBALISM/OWG-NWO,etc vv the CAPTURE OR DEATH OF OSAMA BIN LADEN BY EOY 2008-JAN 2009, WILL THE USAF revert back to being a US-ONLY = NATIONAL/NATION-SPECIFIC "AIR FORCE" [Cold War definition], as opposed to being a DESIRED
"AEROSPACE" = future OWG "SPACE FORCE", e.g. STARFLEET COMMAND???

US-ISLAMIST GEOSTRATEGIC STALEMATE > the USAF may had precluded any need to transfer its FIXED WING = CLOSE/CONVENTIONAL WARFARE AIR SUPPORT MISSIONS back to the US Army, BUT WILL "STALEMATE" SIMUL PRECLUDE ANY NED FOR REQUIREMENT FOR THE USAF TO BECOME AMERICA's SOLE "SPACE FORCE". DITTO as per US NAVY as per the USMC to the Army vv OWG-NWO???
"STALEMATE" = NO NEED FOR OWG-NWO = "GLOBALISM/
GLOBALNESS" = A LOT OF AGENDAS ARE GOING TO GET STOPPED, IGNORED, OR DISCARDED = A LOT OF IMPORTANT PEOPLE ARE GOING TO BE PISSED OFF.

* Shades of OLIVER STONE'S "JFK" > DONALD SUTHERLAND as THE COLONEL to Kostner's GARRISON >
"Who makes the HUEY helicopter...FB-111TFX/JTFX ... OIL ...GOT A LOT OF PISSED OFF PEOPLE [at POTUS JFKennedy], MR. GARRISON"!

IMO, US-GLOBAL CONVENTIONAL WISDOM = NO ONE + NO SIDE [Political-Indistrial-Governing ELites] TRULY WANTS A "STALEMATE" IN THE WOT.

Lest we fergit, RADICAL ISLAM > 9-11/WOT + REGIONAL-GLOBAL JIHAD = WAR TO SAVE ISLAM FROM USSR-STYLE SELF-OBSOLESCENCE + IMPLOSION.

All together now, wid LEFTIST-GLOBALIST feeling > D *** NG IT, OLIVER STONE, WE WANTED THAT TEXAS-SIZED ASTEROID TO HIT!
Posted by: JosephMendiola   2008-06-23 19:09  

#20  The only place the Air Force got it really right was in intelligence, and only when it worked in coordinated facilities with Army and Marine components. I worked at several of those. SAC intelligence was strictly interested in targeting nukes and degrading air defenses. TAC Air was all for "airspace control", with a secondary, "if we have to" attitude of supporting the other branches of service. The Air Force is being forced to adjust to multi-mission requirements that some generals are too "proud" to take on. Fire them, let some of the young blood rise to the top, and let them get it right.

I've been at one or two bases where the command structure got sloppy, and most of the senior officers lost their job after the last Operational Readiness Inspection. It's not pretty. There's going to be blood (figuratively speaking) in the halls of the Pentagon before this is over.
Posted by: Old Patriot   2008-06-23 16:16  

#19  I understand that the B-1 does some of its most effective work at under 1,000 feet. And without dropping a weapon.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble   2008-06-23 15:51  

#18  Old Spook, a rational command structure would divide the assets along mission lines. Close Air Support should be a function of Army Aviation which should control the assets suited to it (attack helicopters, A-10s, armed UAVs). The AF can support with B-52s and B-1s. It is a matter of degree. If you need to take out a machine gun or a mortar that is harassing the troops, Army Aviation should do it. If you need to take down something bigger, say someone's command & control structure or a nuclear weapons facility, that should be an AF function. The armed Predators and their big brother Reaper have let the genie out of the bottle. CAS is going to become a do it yourself business, no matter what the brass would like.
Posted by: RWV   2008-06-23 14:49  

#17  JFM, a lot of the problems in air-to-air combat in VietNam were self-inflicted by the ROE, among other things, requiring visual identification of the target. Missiles were designed to shoot the enemy down at long range. One of the truly stupid moments in American aviation was taking the F-14, a fleet defense platform with the AWG-9 / Phoenix missile combination lethal to >100nm and trying to make a gunfighter out of it. That is like taking a M16 to a knife fight and using it as a club.
Posted by: RWV   2008-06-23 14:37  

#16  Give the Army the A-10s and close support missions. They heave to work tight with Army units anyways - and are most effective combined with attack helicopters and artillery.

And FYI, the Army has been managing airspace just as hard as the USAF: Missie Defense is tha ARMY job, as are the US SAMs. And thats all coordinated with artillery fires (you do not want to be there when a TOT arrives in your airspace), attack and air-assault helicopters, tactical ELINT aircraft, smaller transports, and UAVs.

Having integral ground attack support from Harrier jets AND helicopters seems to work pretty well for the USMC.

Time to give those to the Army, and put a WO-2 at the stick.

Let the USAF flyboys stay above 12000AGL where they are comfortable operating, and out of the way of the people doing the real fighting down in the dirt where it matters: the Army, Marines and USAF tactical controllers.
Posted by: OldSpook   2008-06-23 14:28  

#15  If the Air Force had had it's way the A-10 would be gone and we would have fewer armed UAV's. That's why Gates rolled some heads.

This WOT is mostly down and dirty. Like Raiders of the Lost Ark you don't bring a fancy sword to a gun fight.

I suspect the pyrotechnics at Tora Bora were supplied by Buffs, another plane the AF wanted to scrap.

Left to their druthers the AF would have over 100 B-2's, nearly 400 F-22's and Lord knows how many F-35's.

The poor ground pounders would be trying to figure out how to maneuver the bad guys into an open space with perfect timing so a B-2 from Kansas can bomb the B-jeebers out of them.
Posted by: GolfBravoUSMC   2008-06-23 14:20  

#14  Look, every service has its warts, skeletons and vulnerabilities - even the Marines who I respect deeply. But, the Air Force deals with a multitude of interesting issues such as space, nuclear technology, logistics, refueling, etc. that don't even enter the Army lexicon. Not to down-grade the Army since it has its own unique set of issues to engender the most competent deadly fighting force the world has ever known. But don't think that the Air Force can some how be relegated to the occasional air drop or tactical take-out of some terror cell using an A-10. Binny still has the shakes from the Buffer(ing) he took at Tora Bora and there will always be more requirements like that. All our services have comlementary and overlapping missiion requirements. The vision should be how to best equip and plan those missions so everyone is in synch and not over occupied.
Posted by: Jack is Back!   2008-06-23 14:01  

#13  #6 RVW - Amen, sir. Mike SAC 78-84

Dittos Gents....OAFB '71-73.
Posted by: OyVey1   2008-06-23 13:51  

#12  Unlike the German industry under Speer, the Japanese relied upon lots of small factories, often mom and pop type operations to fabricate parts that would in turn be trucked or delivered to the major assembly plants for war production. The area fire bombing in Japan actually did result in a drop in productivity and compounded the Japanese problem with the stripping of housing for workers within reasonable distance from their industrial plants. Of course, like nearly all of America's opponents, there was strict attention to the Geneva Convention for our boys, thank you Justice Kennedy.
Posted by: Procopius2k   2008-06-23 13:00  

#11  JFM: Think Robert Strange McNamara. (Actual middle name taken from his mother's maiden name.)

Guns, we don't need no stinking guns, we got unreliable missiles that are useless at close range. The North Vietnamese used tactics designed to take advantage of these weaknesses.
Posted by: GolfBravoUSMC   2008-06-23 12:53  

#10  Besoeker, I recently finished the book Flyboys by James Bradley. It, in part, describes LeMay's brilliant and risky decision to use unescorted low-altitude night fire-bombing. He only had a hunch (no real intelligence) that there was a gap in the Japanese air defense (between 5,000 and 10,000 feet, IIRC). Further, he removed most/all of the gunners and their ammo so the bomb payload could be increased.

Most pilots and what was left of their crews on the initial mission to Tokyo thought he was insane and they fully expected to die that night. He gave the order for the initial bombing raid without the knowledge of his commander, Chief of AAF Hap Arnold, so that if the mission failed, Arnold could make him the scapegoat and allow the AAF mission in the Pacific to continue. Helped save millions of lives.
Posted by: Erk   2008-06-23 12:50  

#9  Rwv

I knew it (I am a warbird enthousiast, BTW a gold mine: http://www.spitfireperformance.com/ ). I was speaking about the fact that the USAAF staff thought possible in the first place that B17s could survive unescorted in the German sky (otherwise they would have reverted to night bombing or stuck to missions in fighter range).

Also, when you think about fighter designs initiated through a requirement from the USAAF and the tactics needed for them when meeting German fighters, they were not adequate for escorting bombers. If prior to the war teh USAAF had thought B17s would need to be escorteded it would have gone for planes very different to the Thunderbolt or the Lightning.
The exception was the Mustang but as you know it was the British not the USAAF who were at the origin of its design.

About Vienama I was not speaking about total losses but air to air. I agree with the restrictive ROE. But you have to remember that the Americans fought on plane who let a moke trail behind it (making it easy to spot), without a gun and that the other designs were still worse. Also this plane (the Phantom) had been "imported" from the Navy.

Posted by: JFM   2008-06-23 12:12  

#8  JFM, the problem in WWII was the disparity between the ranges of fighters and bombers. The B-17 loss rates were the result of flying daylight missions beyond the range of fighter escort to bomb the industrial complexes in the German heartland. Under Bomber Harris, the Brits burned the cities at night.

Losses in VietNam had more to do with restrictive rules of engagement than loss of qualitative edge. You can't shoot down an enemy that won't come up to fight. Most of the American fighter losses came from surface to air missiles and ground fire encountered in ground attack missions. There was an electronic warfare aspect to the loss rates.

But, yes, in recent years, the AF senior leadership has been self-absorbed and focussed on appearances rather than its erstwhile mission "to fly and to fight".
Posted by: RWV   2008-06-23 11:00  

#7  Problem for the Air Force is that in its first phase it took seriously Caio Dudet's theories according to which, "bombers ever get through" and evedy other component of the Armed Forces (be it other services or fighters) is only awaste of scarce resources. This led to America entering WWII with the best bombers in world and mediocre fighters (1942 P40 had the performance of a 1940 Spitfire or Me109). This led to 8th Air Force getting slaughtered (25% bombers downed in a single mission, with many others badly damaged and with casulaties) as the USAAF sent its B17s unsecorted believing they could protect themselves. It lead to USAF loisng the qyualitative edge it once had over Communists Air Forces as the kill ratio went from 13 to 1 (Korea) to 3 to 1 (Vietnam, 2 to 1 in 1973, at a time the Navy using same models was making mincemeat of its opponents) due to wrong doctrine and the emphasis on intercepting nuclear bombers instead of in building real fighters.

In a second phase (the Fighter Mafia phase) the USAF has been unable to replace the B52 and has donce little in the ground attack deprtmant (Warythog is 30 years old). I don't even mention the neglect of its transport fleet. More than in fighters teh emphasis has been on stealth. However when a B2 is two billion dollars a pop, simple maths show that the mere wear and tear for the round trip between America dn Afghanistan (even without factoring risk of being downed) was much higher than the value of the target. In the meantime the Air Force is still flying the ageing F15s and F16 who are now inferior to some of their potential opponents. So we shouls speka of Sytelth Maffia instead of Fighter Maffia.

What the Air Force seems to have been unable to do in all of its history is to assign itsalf as goal not the success of USAF but the success of America's Armed Forces
Posted by: JFM   2008-06-23 10:38  

#6  RVW -

Amen, sir.

Mike SAC 78-84
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski   2008-06-23 09:59  

#5  The problem for the Air Force and all the other services was the lack of natural environment for decades. When a real war showed up that lasted more than a couple months all the dinosaurs that evolved from the 'theoretical' war against the Soviet Union stood out. It's been adapt or perish, amplified by institutionalized attitudes that refused to acknowledge the 'real world, real war'. The Air Force which was very good at Beltway Wars has come out least able to adapt to the war environment we have been engaged in for seven years. It forgot that the only reason to exist is to fight that kind of war, the one outside of bureaucracies, and that in the end it is still about the doughboy, the GI, the grunt with a bayonet on the end of rifle that occupies and controls ground. If you're not supporting him, why the hell are you here?
Posted by: Procopius2k   2008-06-23 09:06  

#4  the new chief of staff is a transport pilot

sigh.. when will they get over this and call him what he is - a SPECIAL OPS pilot and a test pilot. The guy flew MC-130, AC-13O and PAVE-LOW. Major league "in the weeds" and combat mission flying.
Posted by: OldSpook   2008-06-23 09:06  

#3  The only warplanes allowed to go down and dirty are the A-10s, which were long scorned by the pilots of 'fast movers' (jet fighters.) No more.

Gee I wonder where we've heard that before? (1st comment there)
Posted by: OldSpook   2008-06-23 09:02  

#2  If you have ever watched the movie "Twelve O'Clock High", you know all you need to know about SAC. The ARCLIGHT briefings for missions in VietNam were lifted directly from the movie, even down to the big target map in the front of the auditorium that no one can read. To be in SAC was to be a consummate professional. Everything you did was monitored, evaluated, and graded. You, as the nuclear deterrent, were the keepers of the fire and the defenders of America. You were at war even when everyone else was at peace. You were proud of your service and, even though you complained constantly about the "chicken****", proud to be in SAC. That pride died when the bombers were placed under the command of the fighter pilot centric Air Combat Command. ACC and its predecessor TAC never cared about nukes and the strategic deterrent mission. Air Force senior leadership has been in decline since the days of Merrill McPeak and has forgotten its primary mission of defending America. The F-22 obsession is just the most visible symptom of the rot.
Posted by: RWV   2008-06-23 08:56  

#1  This all came from the era (1950s-60s)

1950's....? They only became a seperate service in 1947. Appears to be an institutional problem. On General Curtis LaMay. He was one of the greatest heros of our time. Brought out of Europe after VE Day as the fix it man for Japan. He was sent to the Pacific to take over the failing bombing effort. He threw out high-level B-29 surgical "precision" bombing which hit little, and put the new aircraft down at much lower altitudes with a carpet bombing fire storm effort. Highly effective, killed scads of the little buggers and helped end the war in the Pacific.
Posted by: Besoeker   2008-06-23 08:17  

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