The Air Force and the Defense Department need to flip the cost curve as well as the time curve for what it takes to acquire and develop new technologies as 12 years to acquire a weapon system is “way too long,” according to a key officer.
Air Force Global Strike Command (AFGSC) chief Lt. Gen. Stephen Wilson said Thursday he wants an approach more like Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC), which he said rapidly brings capability to existing platforms. Wilson gave an example of how AFSOC put a new radar targeting pod, basically a Small Diameter Bomb (SDB) with a laser seeker head, and went from idea to flying on a C-130 in five months.
Wilson gave an example, in comparison, of how the Air Force discussed upgrading the software on the B-1 bomber in 1996, going from an 80/86 computer to a Pentium 90. He said while that sounded good in the mid-1990s, it wasn’t delivered until 2004, and the technology was already one generation behind when the process began.
“There’s where we have to think differently,” Wilson told an audience at an Air Force Association (AFA) Mitchell Institute event in Arlington, Va. “That’s why this agile development, bending the cost curve, bending the time curve, is absolutely essential to how we fight in the future.”
After seeing how AFSOC deployed new technology, Wilson said his airmen did a demo last year with a B-52, took the same targeting pod, but without a weapon to go with it, and beat AFSOC’s time. Wilson said his airmen went from idea to test in four months.
“How can we take existing platforms, other capabilities, and adapt them for what we currently have,” he said.
Wilson also reaffirmed the service’s commitment to having both its variant of the F-35 and its new Long Range Strike Bomber (LRSB) capable of deploying nuclear weapons.
“I think both of those are important for the future,” Wilson said. “The world is changing…Our adversaries, as they develop capabilities, I think it is important for both our bomber platforms and our dual-capable airplanes to have that capability.”
The Air Force plans to have its fourth block of the F-35A conventional variant nuclear capable. Former Air Force chief of staff retired Gen. Norton Schwartz has argued that the Air Force should scrap that plan and divert the savings to the LRSB.
Hans Kristensen, director of the nuclear information project at the Federation of American Scientists (FAS), said Thursday this could save the Air Force hundreds of millions of dollars in upfront costs, in addition to long-term savings due to needing to build fewer of the new B61 nuclear weapons in the future as they will be deployed from fewer aircraft.
Wilson said although the LRSB will be “nuclear capable,” it will be declared conventionally for initial operational capability (IOC). Wilson said the LRSB will be nuclear certified two years after IOC.
Kristensen said there is a difference between nuclear capability and nuclear certification. An air platform cannot deploy nuclear weapons before it is certified, Kristensen said, as certification requires not only the skills of the pilots and other airmen handling the weapons, but the proficiency and the capability of the aircraft. This also includes things like the computer programming, electronic and mechanical interfaces, Kristensen said.
Certification is not free, Kristensen said, adding that cost estimates for F-35 nuclear certification have ranged in the area of $340 million. Sequestration-related budget cuts have tightened DoD budgets and the military is about to enter another round of sequestration in fiscal year 2016 unless Congress intervenes. After a platform is prepared for certification, Kristensen said, the platform must actually deploy a weapon with a dummy warhead. Kristensen said the certification process is a long one that takes many months.
The F-35A Block 4 portion is slated to be compatible with the new modification of the B61 nuclear weapon known as the B61-12. The B61, which entered service in 1961, has four existing variants: B61-3, -4, -7 and -10 with 825 total bombs in inventory, according to FAS slides.
Kristensen said the B61-12, a gravity bomb, is expected to be ready by 2020. The F-35 joint program office (JPO) did not respond to requests for comment and F-35 prime contractor Lockheed Martin [LMT] was unable to respond to a request by press time.
Kristensen said the Air Force has two types of nuclear weapons: gravity bombs and air-launched cruise missiles. The service is adding a tailkit to the B61-12 to make it more accurate and lethal. Kristensen said both the F-35 and the LRSB will carry the B61-12 while the LRSB will carry the new cruise missile, if the Air Force gets its way. The current air launched cruise missile, the AGM-86B/C developed by Boeing [BA], has been in service since 1979.
The F-35 is developed by Lockheed Martin with subcontractors BAE Systems and Northrop Grumman [NOC].