Inside Defense
March 4, 2010 -- Defense Department leaders this week began in earnest an effort to hammer out a plan to modernize its bomber force, an effort that will be supported by three outside contractors, according to two Pentagon officials.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates called for the study in December as a follow-up to an assessment of potential long-range strike capabilities conducted last year in support of the Quadrennial Defense Review.
On March 1, Ashton Carter, the Pentagon acquisition executive, chaired the kick-off senior-level working group that will guide the yearlong study. The goal is to determine what combination of joint persistent surveillance, electronic warfare and precision-attack capabilities -- launched from either penetrating or stand-off aircraft -- will best suit U.S. operations for the next three decades.
“This is a big, big undertaking,” said a Pentagon official involved in the effort.
Sources familiar with it said the study would match the effectiveness of different capability mixes against various scenarios to refine recommendations on how to proceed. A key near-term goal, these sources said, is to provide by June recommendations that could influence the fiscal years 2012 to 2017 Pentagon program blueprint.
The working group includes leaders from the Pentagon's policy shop, the office of Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation and the Joint Staff as well as other key stakeholders in a future bomber program, such as representatives from the Air Force, the Navy, U.S. Strategic Command and U.S. Pacific Command.
The Defense Department has hired three contractors to do some of the heavy lifting for the study, Pentagon officials said. They are the RAND Corp., the Institute for Defense Analyses and Johns Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory.
The Defense Department has a lot of recent experience examining how to modernize its long-range bomber fleet, Pentagon sources said.
While previous studies have focused on what a future bomber might be capable of in terms of range, payload and speed, the current undertaking is widening the aperture and asking a broader set of questions, said one Pentagon official.
“This study is looking at what kind of different bombers might we have and how do those interrelate with electronic warfare and air- and sea-launched standoff weapons and persistent surveillance. If you bring it all together, what is the best portfolio for meeting operational requirements,” said the official. “It is not looking narrowly at the bomber, but the bomber in a context of a family of systems or a system of systems.”
Last month, the Pentagon published its new blueprint for the future -- the Quadrennial Defense Review-- that called for the military to expand upon future long-range strike capabilities.
“Enhanced long-range strike capabilities are one means of countering growing threats to forward-deployed forces and bases and ensuring U.S. power-projection capabilities,” the QDR states.
The review also mentions related efforts under way. The Navy, according to the QDR, is exploring options for expanding the capacity of future Virginia-class submarines to conduct long-range strike as well as to commence field experiments with naval unmanned aerial system prototypes.
The Air Force also is considering options for adding survivable, long-range surveillance and strike aircraft to its fleet as part of an incremental bomber modernization plan, according to the QDR report. -- Jason Sherman