Inside Pentagon
The Pentagon has outlined its first-ever, 30-year plan for modernizing its tactical air forces, a document that points to aggressive goals to integrate unmanned aircraft with a growing fleet of fifth-generation fighters.
The 26-page plan, obtained by sister publication Inside the Navy, assumes annual spending of $29 billion per year beginning in fiscal year 2016 for tactical aircraft in the Navy and Air Force. It projects a 177 percent increase -- about 500 aircraft -- in the unmanned aircraft inventory as well as a 350 percent increase -- an additional 1,000 aircraft -- in fifth-generation fighters over the next decade.
The plan also reveals that the Air Force’s F-22A Raptor will conclude its service life around 2025, and notes that the Navy’s investment in strike-fighter aircraft will be slashed after FY-13 when the service stops buying F/A-18E/F Super Hornets and prepares to ramp up production of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. Inventories for the Navy and Air Force will decline by about 10 percent over the next 10 years.
The plan also notes that a “sizable investment” will be made toward the development of a multirole, unmanned sea-based platform, ramping up to $7 billion in fiscal year 2020.
“The Navy is conducting analysis to determine key capabilities for this future, sea-based unmanned aerial system (CVN UAS),” the report states. “Options cover a wide range, to include a high-endurance ISR [intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance]/strike platform for irregular warfare and a stealthy aircraft to defeat advanced air defenses.”
The aviation plan is the product of multiple high-level reviews and reflects work done in the just-released Quadrennial Defense Review, FY-11 budget and the newly restructured JSF program.
The Pentagon plans to more than double its medium-class unmanned drones from 300 in FY-11 to more than 800 in FY-20, a 177-percent increase. As part of that, the Air Force plans to buy 48 MQ-9 Reapers per year between FY-11 and FY-18 and 39 RQ-4 Global Hawks during that same period.
The Air Force is modernizing its command-and-control fleet and is reviewing what a future platform might look like since those aircraft are expected to reach the end of their service lives before 2040. The report leaves the door open for the service to replace a portion of its C2 and ISR fleet -- including the E-3 Airborne Warning and Control System, RC-135 Rivet Joint and E-8 Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System -- with unmanned aircraft.
“It is possible that advances in UAS designs will allow unmanned systems to replace those aircraft,” the report notes.
The report also backs up claims by Defense Secretary Robert Gates over the last year that the Pentagon will field hundreds of fifth-generation aircraft by FY-20. The Air Force alone is expected to buy slightly more than 600 F-35 Joint Strike Fighters by that time and, coupled with the Navy and Marine Corps, more than 1,000 are expected to be on the books. The numbers come in addition to the Air Force’s fleet of 187 F-22A Raptors.
But the Air Force will begin exploring a follow-on for the F-22A toward the middle of the decade, in anticipation of the original fifth-generation fighter reaching the end of its combat life around 2025. Over the next 10 years, the Air Force plans to spend $1.9 billion to modernize the F-22A with advanced sensors and stealth features, according to the report.
By FY-40, almost all of today’s legacy force will have retired and the department will have begun recapitalization of the fifth-generation force. However, the report does not detail what a follow-on to the F-22A or F-35 might look like.
“These far-term recapitalization plans cannot be defined with any understood procurement plans for the JSF,” the report states. “It is anticipated that a family of systems -- mixes of manned and unmanned aircraft -- will shape the future fighter/attack inventory.”
As noted in the recently released Quadrennial Defense Review, the Pentagon is reviewing its long-range strike options, including the Air Force’s Next-Generation Bomber. “Range and payload requirements for a successor system are still under investigation,” the report states.
The Air Force is expected to spend about $1 billion on the bomber effort in FY-15 and could be spending as much as $4 billion on the effort in its FY-20 budget, depending on the results of the current studies.
As for intratheater airlift, the Air Force will continue buying Lockheed Martin C-130J cargo haulers in the near term. Down the road, however, the Pentagon is exploring a “family of airlift systems that would provide complementary capabilities with respect to maneuverability and sustainability.”
In the strategic airlift realm, the Air Force plans to continue flying C-5s and C-17s well into the 2030s. Down the road, the Pentagon would likely program funds to develop a C-5 replacement aircraft. -- Dan Taylor and Marcus Weisgerber
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