Category: Defence Intelligence

Source: United States Air Force

WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Ohio (AFNS) —  

The Air Force Materiel Command continues to make progress on the lines of effort identified in its 2023 Strategic Plan as it develops, delivers, supports and sustains the war-winning platforms and capabilities our warfighters need to succeed.

“Our Air Force relies on AFMC Airmen to deliver capabilities and maintain our installations across the enterprise. The strategic plan ensures we are leveraging all the tools and talent at our disposal to do this effectively,” said Gen. Duke Z. Richardson, AFMC commander. “We continue to focus on enterprise solutions, digital materiel management, and collaboration with every MAJCOM for every weapon system as we look ahead and align our efforts to deliver on the blueprint for the Air Force of the future.”

The AFMC Strategic Plan, released early 2023, identifies four key lines of effort supported by cross-cutting attributes of speed, strength, endurance, balance, flexibility and coordination. The lines of effort are:

• Deliver Integrated Capabilities – Drive the integration of research, development, test, sustainment, support, and infrastructure to maximize readiness and lethality for each individual capability, and across all capabilities.
• Strengthen Our Team – Advance the professional and personal development, retention, resilience, and innovation of our workforce so every AFMC Airman and Guardian can achieve their full potential.
• Revolutionize Our Processes – Implement enterprise solutions, Digital Materiel Management, and other methods to revolutionize critical processes in support of the mission and warfighter.
• Amplify Warfighting Culture – Connect every AFMC Airman and Guardian to the mission and focus the materiel enterprise on delivering capabilities and services in support of operational execution and deterrence.

Each line of effort directly supports AFMC’s ability to enable Department of the Air Force priorities as it supports the warfighter through innovation, delivery of enterprise solutions, and ensuring every individual reaches their full potential.

“As I’ve said in the past, in the machine of our nation’s defense, we are the powerhouse,” Richardson said. “We need to continue to find ways to be more effective and quickly leverage every available tool to create systems and processes to keep us competitive with our pacing challenge.”

Throughout 2023, AFMC teams marked several successes aligned to each Line of Effort in the plan. Below are just a few of the actions taken during the past year to ensure the command is optimized for the future.

Line of Effort One – Deliver Integrated Capabilities:

• Re-optimizing for Great Power Competition: AFMC teams, with the Department of the Air Force, began efforts to bolster and integrate the work of every Center within the command toward delivery of the force design capabilities needed to deter, or fight and win if necessary.
• New Software Directorate Created: A single software engineering collaboration organization was established within the Air Force Sustainment Center to integrate the command’s software ecosystem capabilities to Air Force priorities and rapidly address the growth in volume and complexity of software-enabled weapon systems. The stand-up of the directorate eliminates duplication of efforts and aims to provide real-time solutions faster and more efficiently to meet the needs of the warfighter.
• Wargames and Exercise Participation: AFMC personnel participated in multiple wargames and enterprise exercises, collaborating with hundreds of operators and subject matter experts from across the Unified Combatant Commands, Defense Agencies, National Laboratories, and other component services to assess the command’s ability to deliver capabilities to sustain the legacy force and deliver future needs. Training exercises helped test the command’s logistics enterprise to ensure sustainment readiness and the ability to support conflict deterrence and power projection against pacing challenges.
• Aviation Support Equipment Management Flight Established: A cross-major command collaboration led to the establishment of a new Aviation Support Equipment Management Flight in the 440th Supply Chain Operation Squadron, 735th Supply Chain Operations Group, Langley AFB, Virginia, which will embed with supply teams to lead enterprise management activities. The maintenance-focused flight will reach full operational capability in Fiscal Year 2025. Current efforts include foundational work to populate equipment maintenance documentation and health status to provide decision-level data to teams. The goal is to detail process guides, identify policy gaps, and address constraints and inefficiencies in activities.
• Spark Tanks Ignite Innovation: Spark Tank competitions ignited the innovative spirit inherent in AFMC Airmen who proposed hundreds of solutions to improve the mission across the command and the Department of the Air Force. Two AFMC innovations were selected as Department of the Air Force Spark Tank finalists, with impactful potential in flightline resupply and cyber assessment. An innovative digital design optimization idea won the AFMC-level competition, with the potential to reduce waste by identifying issues early in the acquisition process.

Line of Effort Two – Strengthen Our Team:

• Digital Innovation and Integration Center of Excellence Establishment: A new Digital Innovation and Integration Center of Excellence was established in conjunction with the Air Force Institute of Technology to help accelerate integrated capability delivery through Digital Materiel Management across the materiel lifecycle and functional disciplines through education, research, consulting and best practices. DIICE will generate digital solutions centered on model-based systems integration efforts that result in improved execution of weapon acquisitions and support.
• Improved Personnel Processes: AFMC improved accessions and retention across the command in 2023. The organization overcame time-constraining barriers to bringing new civilian hires on board faster by allowing earlier reporting while official transcripts are processing. The command also reduced hiring timelines by 54%, optimizing processes to bring new talent to the team faster.
• Civilian Sponsorship Program Revitalization: AFMC revitalized the command Civilian Sponsorship Program to support new employees through job transitions and help build unit resilience, with the goal of enabling employees to be effective in their new roles faster.
• Spouse Support Program Created: A new AFMC Civilian Spouse Placement Program provides another avenue for employment opportunities for those spouses subject to a Permanent Change of Station, helping those who are eligible and qualified to attain employment at new locations.

Line of Effort Three – Revolutionize Our Processes:

• Digital White Paper Published: The release of the AFMC white paper, “Digital Materiel Management: An Accelerated Future State,” established a shared vision on a new approach to accelerating the acquisition life cycle through models, data and collaborative infrastructure. This digital-first approach, which emphasizes close collaboration between government, academia and industry, aims to ensure the U.S. can surpass adversaries in fielding, sustainment, and modernization.
• Digital Acceleration Task Force Established: A new Digital Acceleration Task Force will drive the implementation of Digital Materiel Management across the enterprise while accelerating the Department of the Air Force’s digital transformation efforts. The DATF is working closely with the Digital Transformation Office, other services, and industry partners to develop collaborative digital environments, establish industry consortia, create a digital playbook, and secure and structure life cycle data.
• Digital Materiel Management Industry Association Consortium Created: AFMC spearheaded efforts to establish a new Industry Association Consortium to unite experts from the Department of the Air Force, Army, defense industry and academia to collaborate on Digital Materiel Management and Digital Transformation solutions. The IAC will enable a cooperative framework across the engineering, program management, contracting, logistics, financial management, and test and evaluation fields.
• Lean Processes Executed: AFMC implemented several lean processes, led by the Financial Management Directorate, to create a comprehensive, command-informed approach to the current Air Force publication waiver process. This led to the evaluation and waiver of more than 400 moderate and low-risk compliance items across 15 financial management series publications, saving manhours and helping to reduce bureaucracy-laden capability delivery timelines.

Line of Effort Four – Amplify Warfighting Culture:

• Blueprint to Bombers Keynote: Richardson’s keynote address during the Air Force Association’s 2023 Air, Space and Cyber Conference, used the B-21 Bomber program to highlight AFMC Airmen impacts on each aspect of the capability delivery process. In his speech, Richardson outlined how the B-21 program exemplifies AFMC’s commitment to delivering integrated capabilities, covering all aspects of the life cycle, from research and development, through acquisition and testing, to long-term sustainment and support.
• Workforce Threat-Informed: Ongoing efforts are helping to create a fully threat-informed workforce across the command. Multiple current intelligence briefs at all classification levels were developed and distributed command-wide in 2023 to generate greater awareness of the adversary threat and ensure the workforce understands the criticality of what they do to combat these in their daily work.

Throughout 2024, AFMC will continue to work actions aligned to each Line of Effort as it remains committed to ensuring the Department of the Air Force remains ready and able to meet current and future threat needs. Cross-department and defense industry collaboration will remain critical to success as AFMC continues to focus on horizontal integration of capabilities and enterprise solutions.

“Our nation and our Air Force rely on AFMC to deliver war-winning capabilities, project power to deter our adversaries, provide sustained support, build infrastructure, and develop technological solutions for our warfighter needs,” Richardson said. “The Strategic Plan will continue to guide our success, powered by the outstanding Airmen and Civilians across the command. Together, we are one AFMC, powering the world’s greatest Air Force.”

Source: United States Air Force

SAVANNAH AIR NATIONAL GUARD BASE, Ga. (AFNS) —  

Throughout the course of two weeks, nearly 260 personnel from the Vermont Air National Guard’s 158th Fighter Wing left the snow, sleet and freezing temperatures of a New England winter and made their way to the sunshine and more moderate climes of northern Georgia.

These Airmen were not, however, on vacation—they were joining other Airmen and civilians from across the country to participate in the Agile Combat Employment exercise, “Maple Thunder” which ran from January 22-February 3, 2024.

“ACE is short for ‘agile combat employment’ and it’s a phrase we’ve been talking about in the Air Force for a couple of years now,” said Dr. Sandeep Mulgund, senior advisor to the deputy chief of staff for operations at Headquarters, Air Force, the Pentagon. According to Air Force doctrine, ACE requires a revolutionary change in how the Air Force thinks about and conducts operations within the modern operational environment. It is a model that the 158th FW has been implementing for close to a year.

“Building on their last major exercise in March 2023 [when the 158th FW trained at Fort Drum, New York], the Green Mountain Boys and their mission partners across the Air National Guard, and in the joint force, increased the complexity in this event to tackle, head-on, the challenges that come with pivoting from ACE into execution of the air tasking order,” Mulgund said. “Maple Thunder has raised the bar on how we sharpen our skills at ACE.”

Skills employed during last year’s exercise, such as simultaneously flying combat sorties from multiple locations and recovering and restoring an air base, were some of the exercise objectives. To sharpen these skills, Airmen are “deployed” to austere environments outside of their normal operating areas.

“We’re practicing the forward deployment of forces in theater from a main operating base. In this case, the Burlington International Airport, to a forward-operating site,” said National Guard Bureau exercise director Lt. Col. Robert Peel, an F-35 Lightning II pilot assigned to the 134th Fighter Squadron, 158th Fighter Wing. “We have taken over the CRTC [Combat Readiness Training Center] here in Savannah, as our FOS.”

According to Peel, there are more than a half dozen sites, known as clusters or contingency locations, that fall under the FOS and any one can be used to position Airmen to quickly aid in a combat situation. One of those locations that the 158th utilized during Maple Thunder was in South Carolina at the North Auxiliary Airfield at Joint Base Charleston. Nearly a three-hour drive away from Savannah, the north auxiliary site is a desolate location meant to mirror an austere environment in which to operate. To mimic actual hardships of deployed situation, seven other units and/or civilian entities joined the Green Mountain Boys in the exercise.

One of the hardship scenarios created for Maple Thunder was the need to refuel the F-35s in harsh or unfamiliar locations. To do this, a forward area refueling point needed to occur.

FARP establishes a way for Airmen to effectively refuel aircraft in remote locations when air-to-air refueling is not possible or when fueling stations are not accessible.

Service members and C-130 Hercules aircraft from the Rhode Island Air National Guard’s 143rd Airlift Wing, in North Kingstown, and the Connecticut Air National Guard’s 103rd Airlift Wing in Windsor Locks, as well as a KC-130J assigned to the Marine Aerial Refueler Transport Squadron 234, Marine Aircraft Group 41, 4th Marine Aircraft Wing, Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base, Fort Worth, Texas, provided FARP capabilities.

The importance of FARP capabilities is that they allow for aircraft refueling at a distance closer to their Area of Operations than their main operating base. Although not a new concept, this is a milestone for the Vermont Air National Guard.

“This is the first time we’ve performed a FARP with our F-35s,” said 158th Operations Group commander, Col. Michael Blair. “You’re quickly getting airborne and getting to the job sooner without having to waste time going to a base that’s farther away.”

From providing FARP capabilities, to combat communications set-up, other participants that took part in Maple Thunder were the 232nd Combat Communications Squadron, Abston Air National Guard Station, Montgomery, Alabama; 282nd Combat Communications Squadron, 104th Fighter Wing, Westfield, Massachusetts; a U.S. Marine Corps KC-130; and ALIA, an electric aircraft provided by Beta Technologies (via AFWERX, the innovation arm of the Department of the Air Force), South Burlington.

With multiple units participating, there were many moving parts throughout Maple Thunder. According to Mulgund, “Lessons learned from this exercise will support the evolution of ACE capabilities, doctrine and training to meet the demands of an air fight against a peer adversary.”

Source: United States Air Force

ARLINGTON, Va. (AFNS) —  

Chief of Staff of the Air Force Gen. David W. Allvin presented the 2022 Koren Kolligian Jr. Trophy to Maj. Brady J. Augustin, during a ceremony at the Pentagon Feb. 7. 

The award is named after 1st Lt. Koren Kolligian Jr., an Air Force pilot who was declared missing when his T-33 Shooting Star disappeared off the California coast Sept. 14, 1955. Presented annually, the Koren Kolligian Jr. Trophy is the only individual flight safety award personally presented by the CSAF.

“Our family has been honored to be invited to the Pentagon to attend every ceremony since the awards inception in 1958,” said Kyle Anderson, a member of the Kolligian family. “What may have seemed like any other day in your [Augustin’s] life, we view as an act of heroism resulting from the Air Force’s commitment to education, training and safety — and your skill, composure, and resilience under pressure.” 

In March 2022, while supporting operations for U.S. Air Forces Europe, Augustin, then an F-16 instructor pilot with the 31st Operations Support Squadron at Aviano Air Base, Italy, experienced an incident during takeoff in a combat-configured F-16CM Fighting Falcon. During the takeoff, he felt the aircraft settle to the left on the runway. Deciding he was past takeoff abort speed, he determined the best course of action was to complete the takeoff and then assess the situation. 

Once at a high key of 10,000 feet, Augustin coordinated with multiple agencies to conduct a conference hotel call pertaining to what he thought was a blown tire. All parties determined the correct course of action was to conduct a landing using an approach end cable arrestment. However, while Augustin was preparing for the landing, the airfield management team discovered a separated left, main landing wheel on the runway during a foreign object debris sweep. 

Augustin was directed to abort his approach and perform a low pass in front of the tower to provide a visual of his landing gear. The low pass confirmed his left main landing wheel had completely separated from the aircraft. 

In coordination with key personnel, Augustin was provided the two options: conduct a controlled ejection or conduct a gear-up landing. With a low fuel state complicating an already harrowing matter, he accepted the risk to land gear-up. The aircraft touched down just feet beyond the second approach end cable. Once it came to a stop, Augustin raised the canopy and safely egressed. 

 “It was an incredibly unusual circumstance that had a lot of different ways that it could have gone poorly quickly,” said Augustin. “But due to the exceptional actions by the team at Aviano Air Base in Italy, we were able to salvage [it into] a somewhat normal crash landing and save an airplane, and we all made it home that night.” 

Allvin lauded Augustin for his calculated actions in the face of danger.

“Major Augustin showed incredible skill and ingenuity in a difficult and dangerous situation,” said Allvin. “He was calm, cool, and collected – exactly what we have come to expect from our aviators and all the Airmen who have earned the prestigious Kolligian Trophy.”

Source: United States Air Force

ARLINGTON, Va. (AFNS) —  

The Secretary of the Air Force has reimplemented the Voluntary Retired Return to Active Duty Program in an effort to leverage the talents of our highly trained and experienced officer and enlisted military retirees to help minimize the service’s critical manning shortages. Application window opens Feb. 8, 2024.

Applications must be submitted by Jan. 31, 2026, and the program allows up to 1,000 retired officer or enlisted personnel to active duty at any given time. Additionally, under this VRRAD program, the period of active duty service is limited to no more than 48 months. Personnel will only fill vacant active duty authorizations. Retired applicants selected for Extended Active Duty can expect to return to active duty anywhere from 4 to 6 months from their date of application.

“The VRRAD program is a strategic enabler to embrace experienced talent, tapping into a valuable resource of retired members to fill critical roles to close the gap against our peer competitors,” said Lt. Gen. Caroline Miller, the Deputy Chief of Staff for Manpower, Personnel and Services.

Retired officer applicants are limited to Line of the Air Force commissioned officers retired in the grade of captain through lieutenant colonel. Officers who volunteer to return to active duty under the VRRAD program will primarily fill vacant rated staff, active flying staff, Officer Training School, Squadron Officer School, and Jeanne M. Holm Center academic staff. While all members that meet eligibility may apply, we are targeting the following Air Force special duty codes:

Retired enlisted applicants are limited to members retired in the grade of staff sergeant through senior master sergeant. While all members that meet eligibility may apply, the following AFSCs are being targeted:

1C171 – Air Traffic Control
2G071 – Logistics Plans
2T377 – Fleet Management & Analysis
3F071 – Personnel
3P071 – Security Forces
4A271 – Biomedical Equipment
4E071 – Public Health
4N071 – Aerospace Medical Service
4R071 – Diagnostic Imaging
7S071 – Special Investigations
8R000/8R200 – Recruiter(s)

Information about the Voluntary Retired Return to Active Duty Program, to include detailed official program guidance, eligibility criteria and application requirements, can be found here.