Despite some lawmakers and analysts’ criticism that the Air Force’s light attack experiment may have run its course, Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC) continues to push for new light attack aircraft to support coalition aircrew training and assist with armed overwatch.
Brig. Gen. David Harris, AFSOC’s director for strategic plans, programs and requirements, said the command is interested in utilizing the light attack platforms for two missions sets. The first is to support combat aviation advisers who work and train with U.S. coalition partners, which is what the latest request for proposals supports, he said Monday during an Air Force Association Mitchell Hour event in Arlington, Va.
The service’s Oct. 25 solicitation indicates up to six turboprop aircraft will be procured, split evenly between the Sierra Nevada Corp. (SNC)/Embraer A-29 Super Tucano and the Textron Defense [TXT] AT-6 Wolverine, with contracts to be awarded by year’s end. Those platforms will be stationed at Nellis AFB, Nevada, and Hurlbert Field, Florida (Defense Daily, Oct. 25).
While AFSOC only needs a few aircraft for that mission, it will be crucial to have those turboprops available so that combat aviation advisers can more accurately train and advise foreign partners who are operating those aircraft or similar frames, Harris noted, adding that the advisers who are forward-deployed must have “a Ph.D understanding of that air-to-ground integration” to relay to the partner nation.
“You could probably train light attack in a lot of different aircraft, but if our partner is flying [turboprop aircraft such as] an AC-208 or an AT 802, in order to reduce the risk of that aircrew member, I want to make sure that he is best trained and best equipped to fly that platform specifically as he goes forward,” Harris said.
AFSOC is also looking at a second mission set for light attack that would be “a larger purchase buy” of a capability that could help better support SOF disaggregated troops on the ground, Harris said. The Air Force is continuing its experimentation and inspecting platforms in pursuit of that second mission set, he said, adding “I don’t think we’re there yet” in terms of identifying the correct capability for that mission.
Air Force Assistant Secretary for Acquisition, Technology and Sustainment Will Roper shared with reporters earlier this month that the service was investigating how light attack platforms could contribute to an AFSOC armed overwatch capability, though he noted that they are not one and the same mission set.
“Is it formally … the Air Force position as of today? No. But I see it going that way,” he said at a Nov. 12 Defense Writers Group event in Washington, D.C.
AFSOC currently operates a number of platforms that can perform armed overwatch, such as the General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. (GA-ASI) MQ-9 Reaper unmanned aerial system or the Lockheed Martin [LMT]-built F-16 fighter, Harris said Monday. But the addition of an off-the-shelf turboprop aircraft could help provide a wider focus area to support defensive troops on the ground, and complement the MQ-9 and F-16’s varied capabilities, he added.
Roper noted that operators who participated in the light attack experiment shared its potential both for the armed overwatch role and for helping to provide a networked communications system that allows troops to cooperate across coalitions. The Air Force has been moving forward with the Airborne Extensible Relay Over-Horizon Network (AERONet) program, which would provide a new combat system that provides video, chat and command and control capabilities to partner nations via a portable, transferrable radio system.
“I truly appreciate this connectivity issue is just so debilitating,” Roper said. “That extends all the way to our allies and partners, and the way that we build networks today – where you build a bilateral one with every single mission partner – is not going to work.”
The AEROnet program that has emerged from the first stage of the light attack experiment has been supported by operators for that reason, Roper added. “Having real planes flying is a great way to do that.”
Lawmakers criticized the Air Force for apparently slow-rolling the acquisition of A-29s and AT-6s earlier this year during fiscal year 2020 appropriations markups (Defense Daily, May 22). Aviation analysts have had mixed opinions, with some questioning the service’s desire to procure off-the-shelf turboprops when it must also buy next-generation technology for high-end fights and others lauding the opportunity to add a low-cost-per-flying-hour aircraft to the fleet that can free up more sophisticated airframes and maintain a close-air support capability.
When it comes to the ongoing scrutiny and concern about the light attack experiment overall, Roper noted that he joined the Air Force shortly after the light attack experiment began, but he believed that “in hindsight, we should approach experimentation more like a scientist, meaning that one round of experimentation is probably not going to be sufficient to answer all the questions that we would ask.”