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54–106 PDF 2009

S. HRG. 111–198 

THE CURRENT AND FUTURE ROLES, MISSIONS, 

AND CAPABILITIES OF U.S. MILITARY AIR POWER 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AIRLAND 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 

UNITED STATES SENATE 

ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

APRIL 30, 2009 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Armed Services 

( 

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 

CARL LEVIN, Michigan, Chairman 

EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts 

ROBERT C. BYRD, West Virginia 

JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut 

JACK REED, Rhode Island 

DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii 

BILL NELSON, Florida 

E. BENJAMIN NELSON, Nebraska 

EVAN BAYH, Indiana 

JIM WEBB, Virginia 

CLAIRE McCASKILL, Missouri 

MARK UDALL, Colorado 

KAY R. HAGAN, North Carolina 

MARK BEGICH, Alaska 

ROLAND W. BURRIS, Illinois 

JOHN MCCAIN, Arizona 

JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma 

JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama 

SAXBY CHAMBLISS, Georgia 

LINDSEY GRAHAM, South Carolina 

JOHN THUNE, South Dakota 

MEL MARTINEZ, Florida 

ROGER F. WICKER, Mississippi 

RICHARD BURR, North Carolina 

DAVID VITTER, Louisiana 

SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine 

RICHARD D. DEBOBES, Staff Director 

JOSEPH W. BOWAB, Republican Staff Director 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AIRLAND

JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut, Chairman 

EVAN BAYH, Indiana 

JIM WEBB, Virginia 

CLAIRE McCASKILL, Missouri 

KAY R. HAGAN, North Carolina 

MARK BEGICH, Alaska 

ROLAND W. BURRIS, Illinois 

JOHN THUNE, South Dakota 

JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma 

JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama 

SAXBY CHAMBLISS, Georgia 

RICHARD BURR, North Carolina 

(II) 

C O N T E N T S 

CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF WITNESSES 

THE CURRENT AND FUTURE ROLES, MISSIONS, AND CAPABILITIES OF U.S. MILITARY

AIR POWER

APRIL 30, 2009

Page 

Bolkcom, Christopher, Specialist in Military Aviation, Congressional Research 

Service ................................................................................................................... 5 

Hawley, Gen. Richard E., USAF (Ret.), Former Commander, Air Force Air 

Combat Command ................................................................................................ 13 

Nelson, Hon. Bill, U.S. Senator from the State of Florida ................................... 17 

Watts, Barry D., Senior Fellow, Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments ..................................................................................................................... 17 

(III) 

(1) 

THE CURRENT AND FUTURE ROLES, MISSIONS, AND CAPABILITIES OF U.S. MILITARY AIR POWER 

THURSDAY, APRIL 30, 2009 

U.S. SENATE, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AIRLAND, 

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES, 

Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:02 p.m. in room 

SR–222, Russell Senate Office Building, Senator Joseph I. 

Lieberman (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

Committee members present: Senators Lieberman, Hagan, 

Begich, Burris, Inhofe, Chambliss, and Thune. 

Also present: Senator Bill Nelson. 

Committee staff members present: Leah C. Brewer, nominations 

and hearings clerk; and Paul J. Hubbard, receptionist. 

Majority staff members present: Madelyn R. Creedon, counsel; 

Creighton Greene, professional staff member; and William K. 

Sutey, professional staff member. 

Minority staff member present: Pablo E. Carrillo, minority investigative counsel. 

Staff assistants present: Mary Holloway and Brian F. Sebold. 

Committee members’ assistants present: Christopher Griffin, assistant to Senator Lieberman; Christopher Caple, assistant to Senator Bill Nelson; Jon Davey, assistant to Senator Bayh; Michael 

Harney, assistant to Senator Hagan; David Ramseur, assistant to 

Senator Begich; Brady King, assistant to Senator Burris; Anthony 

J. Lazarski, assistant to Senator Inhofe; Sandra Luff, assistant to 

Senator Sessions; Clyde A. Taylor IV, assistant to Senator 

Chambliss; and Jason Van Beek, assistant to Senator Thune. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, 

CHAIRMAN 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Good afternoon. The subcommittee will 

come to order. 

In this meeting of the Subcommittee on Airland, we’re going to 

follow on a hearing we held on March 26, in which we talked about 

our ground forces. There are two hearings intended to broadly explore our country’s current and future roles, missions, and requirements for the land- and air-power forces of our military. Today, we 

turn our discussion to America’s military air power. 

We are now contemplating a number of major decisions that 

would affect the organization and capabilities of American military 

2 

air power for some time to come. Earlier this month, April 6, Secretary of Defense Gates announced a series of recommendations 

that he would make to President Obama for the Fiscal Year 2010 

Defense Budget, which we’ll get in a while. Those included proposals to end production of the F–22 Raptor and the C–17 

Globemaster, to add funds to procure unmanned intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) systems, and to delay the production of a follow-on bomber. 

Today, we’re privileged to have three informed and experienced 

witnesses who I look forward to asking to assess the recommendations that Secretary Gates made, and, in particular, to discuss the 

implications of these recommendations for the operational capabilities of the air-power units of our military. 

Many of our colleagues here in the Senate, including myself, 

have expressed concern about some of the specific proposals, particularly regarding the F–22, the F/A–18 E/F, and the next-generation bomber. I believe it’s essential that Congress assess these recommendations against the obvious reality, which is the immediate 

budgetary constraints, but also the less obvious reality, because it’s 

slightly longer distance, which is the operational requirements for 

air power in the years ahead. 

I also look forward to hearing from the witnesses an assessment 

of the long-term requirements for air power, in this sense, about 

how we can better anticipate emerging capabilities that will affect 

us in the future. I’m particularly interested in our witnesses’ 

thoughts about how we should respond to and anticipate follow-on 

technologies to the unmanned aerial systems that are now providing full-motion video surveillance over the battlefield, something 

that could not have been contemplated even a few years ago. 

If we look out 10 or 20 years, the composition of our air forces 

could be dramatically different than it is today. Looking to future 

threats, I’m concerned about the growing density of anti-access capabilities that are intended to limit the freedom of maneuver that 

American air power has enjoyed in recent times, and I’m concerned 

about the apparent vulnerability of U.S. military operations to such 

threats as the cyber warriors who attack our computer networks. 

In short, I hope this afternoon’s discussion will inform the subcommittee as we go forward, after the President submits the budget for the Department of Defense (DOD), to make our own authorization recommendations to the full committee and the Senate as 

to how best to invest in capabilities, near-term and longer-term, 

that will protect the security of the American people. 

I thank the witnesses for being here. I look forward to your testimony. 

Now, Senator Thune. Thank you. 

STATEMENT OF SENATOR JOHN THUNE 

Senator THUNE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for calling 

this hearing to examine the current and future roles, missions, and 

capabilities of U.S. military air power. I want to thank our esteemed witnesses, as well, for appearing today. The topic of our 

hearing today is of the utmost importance to me. 

We’re here on the occasion of Secretary of Defense Gates’ April 

6, 2009, press conference on recommendations he’s making to the 

3 

President on the Fiscal Year 2010 Defense Budget. I’m a strong 

supporter of Secretary Gates and admire his courage to restructure 

a number of major defense programs. It’s long been necessary to 

shift spending away from weapon systems that are plagued by 

scheduling and cost overruns to ones that strike the correct balance 

between the needs of our deployed forces and the requirements for 

meeting the emerging threats of tomorrow. I also greatly appreciate that Secretary Gates continues to place the highest priority 

on supporting the men and women of the U.S. Armed Forces. 

Having said that, I do have some fundamental concerns. One 

question I have in terms of military aviation, and from the standpoint of military necessity, is Secretary Gates’ plan on air power 

modernization too unbalanced in favor of short-range fighters 

versus long-range strike aircraft? 

On October 7, 2001, when Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan started, early combat operations included a mix of air 

strikes from land-based B–1 Lancer, B–2 Spirit, and B–52 Strato 

fortress bombers, carrier-based F–14 Tomcat, and F/A–18 Hornet 

fighters and Tomahawk cruise missiles launched from both U.S. 

and British ships and submarines. During that war, U.S. aircraft 

had to operate at far greater distances than they had in past conflicts. U.S. air power may have to do the same in future wars. 

Furthermore, during the major combat phase of Operation Iraqi 

Freedom, B–1s carrying 24 Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAMs) 

provided round-the-clock, on-call, precision-fire support for coalition 

ground forces. The integration of JDAM and laser-guided bombs on 

long-range bombers has dramatically increased their effectiveness 

in conventional operations. 

U.S. air forces operating in Asia and the Pacific might well have 

to travel several times farther than U.S. forces typically had to 

during the Cold War. The need for aircraft that can loiter over the 

battlefield for long durations to find emerging, fleeting, or otherwise time-sensitive targets in support of ground forces, for example, 

appears to be growing. The possibility that, with his proposal, Secretary Gates may have struck an inappropriate balance in favor of 

short-range systems versus long-range strike aircraft is perhaps no 

better reflected than in what he wants to do with the next-generation bomber program. 

As part of Secretary Gates’ plan to modernize our strategic and 

nuclear-force capability, he proposes to discontinue the development of a follow-on Air Force bomber until we have a better understanding of the need, the requirement, and the technology, and examine all of our strategic requirements during the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR), the Nuclear Posture Review, and in light of 

post-Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) arms-control negotiations. 

Aside from the position I laid out just a moment ago, I have a 

couple of other questions here. The first is: How does Secretary 

Gates reconcile his position on the next-generation bomber with 

prior statements he recently made on the military need to continue 

that program? Just a few months ago, he wrote in the Foreign Affairs journal that the U.S. ability to strike from over the horizon 

will be at a premium in future conflicts and will ‘‘require shifts 

from short-range to long-range systems, such as the next-generaVerDate Nov 24 2008 10:01 Dec 23, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00007 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 Y:\BORAWSKI\DOCS\54106.TXT JUNE PsN: JUNEB
4 

tion bomber.’’ He made virtually the same statement during a 

speech at the National Defense University, and also in the firstquarter edition of the Joint Force Quarterly. 

Also, as Secretary Gates urged on April 6, there must be a ‘‘better understanding of the need, the requirement, and the technology.’’ The original decision to pursue a next-generation bomber 

was already fully vetted in the 2006 QDR. Recognizing the importance of the evolving strategic requirement for global strike aircraft 

based outside the theater, the QDR directed the U.S. Air Force to 

field a follow-on to the B–2 by 2018. Until the 2009 QDR is completed sometime this summer and released next year, the 2006 document is the only framework we have for judging how well the 

military’s air-power capabilities meet national requirements. 

Moreover, Secretary Gates’ current position on the next-generation bomber appears undermined by recent statements from several 

currently-serving combatant commanders, provided in response to 

questions from me, to the effect that it is important to continue developing that program. 

Finally, Secretary Gates’ proposal to base decisions on our current strategic and nuclear-force structure, including the next-generation bomber and post-START arms-control talks, appears problematic. While seemingly reasonable on its face, waiting until a 

new START is negotiated and ratified by the Senate could literally 

take years. Appearing before the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace last fall, Secretary Gates himself expressed concern 

about how long the original START negotiations took and what 

that meant for the follow-on START about to be negotiated. The 

lead START negotiator, likewise, indicated recently that the followon treaty could already be slipping to the right. 

Related to my concern on whether Secretary Gates’ plan on airpower modernization may be unbalanced in favor of short-term 

fighters versus long-range strike aircraft are questions I have on 

his proposal on the F–35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter (JSF). 

Under his plans, Secretary Gates is recommending going from the 

14 aircraft bought in fiscal year 2009 to 30 in fiscal year 2010, with 

corresponding funding increases from $6.8 billion to $11.2 billion. 

The Secretary’s proposed commitment to JSF also requires us to 

confront serious questions about that aircraft’s high cost and affordability. The F–35 variants for the Navy, Marine Corps, and Air 

Force will cost more to procure than the older tactical aircraft each 

Service is to replace, and the costs of the F–35 program have increased 47 percent since 2001, from $65 million to $105 million per 

aircraft. 

To sum up, in terms of military aviation, I, as I’m sure other 

members of this subcommittee and the public, have serious questions about whether we are effectively institutionalizing and enhancing our capabilities to fight the wars we are in today and to 

address the scenarios we are most likely to face in the future, while 

hedging against other risks and contingencies. 

Mr. Chairman, I look forward to hearing from our witnesses 

today and look forward to the opportunity to ask some questions. 

Thank you. 

5 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you, Senator Thune, for that very 

thoughtful opening statement. I think you framed the questions 

very well. 

Again, thanks to the witnesses. As is the custom of the committee, we’re going to start with the more-or-less inside witness, 

Mr. Bolkcom, a specialist in military aviation at the Congressional 

Research Service (CRS), where he conducts nonpartisan, objective 

research and analysis for Congress. Thanks for the work you’ve 

done, and we look forward to your testimony now. 

STATEMENT OF CHRISTOPHER BOLKCOM, SPECIALIST IN 

MILITARY AVIATION, CONGRESSIONAL RESEARCH SERVICE 

Mr. BOLKCOM. Thank you, sir. 

Chairman Lieberman, Senator Thune, and distinguished members of the subcommittee, thanks for inviting me to speak with you 

today about military aviation. As requested, I’ll address DOD’s current and projected aviation capabilities and if they’ll ensure that 

U.S. needs are met. 

The only effective way to judge military aviation is in the context 

of strategy. What do we want our aviation forces to do? As you 

mentioned, sir, on April 6 Secretary Gates stated that he believes 

that DOD needs to rebalance its spending to make military forces 

more effective against what he calls ‘‘hybrid warfare,’’ a simultaneous spectrum of conventional and irregular conflict. Fighting terrorists, insurgents, and other nonstate actors is challenging, and 

increasing our competence against threats suggests new tactics 

and, potentially, new weapons systems. These weapons systems, in 

many cases, would have different capabilities than today’s weapons, and their distinguishing characteristic may be an emphasis on 

simplicity and low cost. 

Some fear that rebalancing the force toward irregular warfare 

will mean reducing DOD’s most capable weapon systems, making 

us vulnerable to our most proficient adversaries. These same observers fear that DOD is too focused on the current war and not 

sufficiently mindful of the need to sustain capabilities such as 

achieving air dominance against modern air forces. Others embrace 

Secretary Gates’s proposal. They note that our air forces have 

dominated every conventional foe that they’ve faced over the past 

25 years, but have struggled with irregular warfare. Some argue 

that the country can’t afford weapon systems we don’t need and 

that our warfighters deserve weapon systems optimized to the 

threat that they face. 

As a rough blueprint, Secretary Gates suggested that 10 percent 

of overall defense spending would focus on irregular warfare, 50 

percent on state-on-state conflict, and 40 percent on what he called 

‘‘dual-purpose forces.’’ If one were to rebalance aviation forces, it 

appears that a different spending ratio may be in order. 

Few aviation assets appear to be unique to irregular warfare. 

Very small or nonlethal weapons are perhaps more germane to irregular than state-on-state conflict. Another example might be an 

off-the-shelf lightly-armed turboprop aircraft. Also, investing in 

Special Operations forces that train and advise allied nations on 

how to better use their air forces against insurgents is another option. 

6 

1Thom Shanker. ‘‘Pentagon Rethinking Old Doctrine on 2 Wars.’’ New York Times. March 15, 

2009. 

Boosting irregular capabilities might require 10 percent of aviation spending. Similarly, there appear to be few aviation assets 

unique to state-on-state conflict, and our air power might be rebalanced by spending 10 percent of the aviation budget on these assets. Delivering nuclear weapons, prevailing in aerial combat, and 

defeating advanced air defenses are clearly relevant to state-onstate conflict, but have little, if any, application to irregular warfare. 

It would appear feasible to reduce aviation forces unique to these 

missions if they were found to be in excess of force levels dictated 

by the QDR and other strategy guidance. Savings from these reductions could be invested in dual-purpose or counterinsurgency aviation. 

Most aviation assets are dual-purpose, and these assets might 

consume up to 80 percent of aviation spending. Precision strike, 

close air support (CAS), ISR, and airlift are examples of missions 

germane to both conventional and irregular warfare. 

A review of recent experience in Iraq and Afghanistan shows 

that commanders in the field have successfully adapted aircraft designed for state-on-state conflict to the counterinsurgency mission. 

In conclusion, it appears that the upcoming QDR and attendant 

congressional oversight offer an opportunity to ground our battlefield commanders’ adaptations in a coherent strategy. By considering the projected threat environment and matching air-power capabilities to national goals, a strategy-driven process should yield 

aviation forces that are both effective and cost-effective. 

Mr. Chairman, this concludes my remarks. It’s been a pleasure 

to speak with you today. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Bolkcom follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT BY CHRISTOPHER BOLKCOM

Mr. Chairman, distinguished members of the subcommittee, thank you for inviting me to speak with you today about military aviation. As requested, I will address 

the Department of Defense’s (DOD) current and projected aviation capabilities and 

whether they will ensure that U.S. needs are met. 

INTRODUCTION

As a rule, aviation forces are procured and operated as part of a strategy. Military 

aircraft are just some of the means, or resources which DOD employs to achieve its 

goals. When policymakers ask questions such as: 

• Should we buy more bombers? 

• Is there a fighter gap? 

• Is DOD aggressive enough in fielding unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs)? 

• Do we have sufficient long-range cargo and aerial refueling capability? 

the answers should depend entirely on what specific needs military aviation is projected to meet. 

Today, these needs are expressed in the 2006 Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR). 

Until the 2009 QDR is completed sometime this summer, the 2006 document (and 

associated strategy guidance) is the only framework for judging how well DOD’s airpower capabilities meet national requirements. Yet it appears foolish to use the 

2006 QDR as a rigid template, because the 2009 QDR could include new or different 

national objectives which would strongly influence military aviation. For example, 

one potential change in the 2009 QDR that could strongly affect judgments on airpower capabilities is the elimination of the longstanding requirement to successfully 

fight two simultaneous or nearly simultaneous major theater wars.1 This requireVerDate Nov 24 2008 10:01 Dec 23, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00010 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 Y:\BORAWSKI\DOCS\54106.TXT JUNE PsN: JUNEB
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2 In 1993, in the aftermath of the fall of the Soviet Union, Secretary of Defense Les Aspin 

conducted his ‘‘Bottom-Up Review’’ of defense capabilities and found that although the threat 

from the Soviet Union had largely abated, the United States still faced noteworthy military 

challenges. Among other requirements, the Bottom-Up Review concluded that DOD must be prepared to defend its Persian Gulf allies without diminishing its ability to also defend South Korea 

from a North Korean attack. When first recommended, the need to prepare for two simultaneous 

major theater wars was criticized by many as overly ambitious and unrealistic. (Andrew 

Krepinevich. ‘‘Assessing the Bottom-Up Review.’’ Joint Forces Quarterly. Winter 93–94.) Others 

believed the two-MTW objective was a rear-guard action to preserve military force structure at 

a time when much of the country wished to reduce military spending to achieve a ‘‘peace dividend.’’ (‘‘Financial Realities Drive Aerospace Consolidation.’’ Aviation Week & Space Technology. 

May 1, 1995.) 3 ‘‘Building Top-Level Capabilities: A Framework for Strategic Thinking.’’ Briefing to Senior 

Level Review Group. August 19, 2004. 4 2006 QDR, p. 19. 

5 ‘‘DOD News Briefing With Secretary Gates From The Pentagon.’’ News Transcript. Office of 

the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Public Affairs). April 6, 2009. 

ment predates the QDR process, has been included in every QDR, and has a profound impact on military aviation force structure.2

It is difficult, and perhaps not particularly useful to try to predict all of the 2009 

QDR’s potential findings. One overarching trend, however appears to run through 

a number of high-level DOD studies and planning documents, and appears highly 

useful to informing assessments of DOD’s airpower portfolio; namely, the need to 

rebalance military acquisition plans to field forces that are as capable against nonstate actors, as they are against conventional foes. 

In the spring of 2004, DOD’s Strategic Planning Guidance found that the United 

States is well positioned to deal with a conventional military adversary. Increasingly, however, the United States may find itself facing nonconventional foes, for 

which it is not well prepared.3

The 2006 QDR picked up on this theme. As depicted in Figure 1, below, the 2006 

QDR noted that ‘‘the Department is shifting its portfolio of capabilities to address 

irregular, catastrophic and disruptive challenges while sustaining capabilities to address traditional challenges.’’ 4

In a press conference detailing DOD’s key recommendations to the White House 

on the proposed Fiscal Year 2010 Defense Budget, both Secretary of Defense Robert 

Gates and Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. James Cartwright emphasized the concept of ‘‘hybrid’’ warfare, a mixture of both high-end state-on-state 

conflict, and irregular warfare.5 DOD’s leaders made it clear that they didn’t think 

in terms of fighting either conventional or irregular warfare but in terms of addressing a spectrum of simultaneous conflict. Secretary Gates estimated (admittedly 


430air1.eps
8 

6 ‘‘Non-state actors’’ is an umbrella term that refers to a number of armed groups such as political terrorists, narco-traffickers, paramilitary insurgents, and even international organized 

criminal organizations. These terms are not mutually exclusive. Paramilitary groups can, for example, engage in narco-trafficking, terrorism, and crime. For example: ‘‘International terrorism 

is known to be linked closely with the drug trade and criminal organizations. . .’’ (Lt. Gen. 

Gennadiy M. Yevstafyev. ‘‘Unmanned Aerial Vehicles in Classic and Terrorist Wars.’’ Moscow 

Yadernyy Kontrol. July 5, 2004. pp. 77–82.) 7 A more complete treatment of this topic can be found in CRS Report RL32737. 

8Lt. Gen. Michael W. Wooley, Commander, Air Force Special Operations Command. ‘‘Application of Special Operations Forces in the Global War on Terror.’’ Air & Space Conference 2004. 

Washington, DC. September 14, 2004. 9 Ibid. 

crudely) that up to 40 percent of DOD’s budget would be spent on military forces 

that are equally pertinent to irregular and conventional warfare—‘‘dual purpose’’ capabilities in his words. Secretary Gates’ and General Cartwright’s comments appear 

to be completely consistent with the 2006 QDR’s findings that DOD must be positioned to address an increasingly broad array of military challenges, many of them 

outside the realm of classic state-on-state conflict. It is within this context—the balancing of military aviation to effectively address ‘‘hybrid warfare’’—that DOD airpower can be most effectively assessed. 

THE CHALLENGES OF IRREGULAR, NON-STATE ACTORS 6

Combating non-state actors presents a broad array of challenges to U.S. military 

forces. Planners tend to readily grasp the obvious operational challenges, but 

shouldn’t overlook the need to re-vamp both tactics and doctrine, and while also 

being aware of the costs involved. 

Operational Challenges 

Military planners have a number of tools at their disposal to attempt to find, identify, track, capture, or kill terrorists, insurgents and other non-state actors. A survey of counterinsurgency and anti-terrorism efforts indicates that in general, military aviation plays a prominent role in performing these tasks. Airpower has proven 

very valuable in contemporary (e.g., Iraq, Afghanistan, Philippines) and historical 

(e.g., El Salvador) counterinsurgencies. The most critical missions appear to be persistent surveillance and reconnaissance, aerial insertion of troops, close air support, 

combat search and rescue, medical evacuation, and tactical airlift and resupply.7

Achieving air superiority and attacking military targets on the ground—missions 

at which today’s aviation forces excel—are also important to counterinsurgency and 

other non-state actor operations. These missions don’t however, typically require the 

high performance characteristics of the combat aircraft that DOD is currently procuring and developing. Non-state actors do not have the resources to effectively challenge even modest air forces. Thus, aircraft best suited to addressing irregular warfare may emphasize long endurance, slower speeds, and may often, if not typically, 

be unmanned. 

Compared to the armed forces of a nation state, non-state actors are relatively 

easy to defeat in direct combat. Non-state actors typically lack the equipment, training and discipline that define a state-based military force. Actually engaging in direct combat with non-state actors is, however, the core operational challenge. Nonstate actors typically don’t wear uniforms. Indeed, they generally strive to integrate 

themselves into the local civilian population. Thus, target identification is very challenging. Non-state actors rarely mass into easily recognizable formations. They typically lack large infrastructure or obvious logistics processes. Therefore, non-state actors present few ‘‘high value’’ targets for U.S. forces. This challenge has not been 

lost on DOD leadership. For example a former Commander of Air Force Special Operations notes: 

For many years, though, there’s been a concern that intelligence collection capability basically rested in the ability to find a tank or an artillery 

piece hiding in a grove of trees. The problem now becomes how to find individuals hiding in groups of people. . . This presents a huge problem for us.8

The leadership and structure of many non-state organizations are opaque. Such 

organizations might be diffuse and operate over long distances. Al Qaeda, for example, often operates through partner organizations which might be small and have 

fluid leadership. One DOD leader has said ‘‘When we kill or capture one of these 

leaders, another one steps in and quickly takes their place.’’9

Once identified, non-state actors are often difficult to engage due to concerns over 

collateral damage. Even conventional state-on-state conflict presents collateral damage concerns. When one party is actively trying to shield itself behind noncombatVerDate Nov 24 2008 10:01 Dec 23, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00012 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 Y:\BORAWSKI\DOCS\54106.TXT JUNE PsN: JUNEB
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10David Ochmanek. ‘‘Military Operations Against Terrorist Groups Abroad.’’ RAND. 2003. 11Thomas R. Searle. ‘‘Making Airpower Effective against Guerrillas.’’ Air & Space Power Journal. Fall 2004. 12Wooley. Op. cit. 13Lt. Gen. Sir Gerald Templer, the British High Commissioner to Malaya. As cited in David 

Ochmanek. ‘‘Military Operations Against Terrorist Groups Abroad.’’ RAND. Santa Monica, CA. 

2003. 14The Sociology and Psychology of Terrorism: Who Becomes a Terrorist and Why? A Report 

Prepared under an Interagency Agreement by the Federal Research Division, Library of Congress. September 1999. P.68. 15 A more complete treatment of this topic can be found in CRS Report RL31741. 

ants, however, delivering weapons with extreme precision and minimum effects 

takes on increased importance. A RAND study summed up the operational challenges: 

. . . ferreting out individuals or small groups of terrorists, positively 

identifying them, and engaging them without harming nearby civilians is 

an extremely demanding task. Substantial improvements will be needed in 

several areas before the Air Force can be confident of being able to provide 

this capability to combatant commanders.10

Mindset Challenges 

Successfully combating non-state actors and irregular warfare will likely require 

different training, tactics, doctrine, political strategies, and potentially rules of engagement, than are optimal for conventional military warfare. Collectively, these 

changes may combine to require a different politico-military mindset for senior decisionmakers. 

The U.S. military, policymakers and the general population, desire short conflicts, 

with clear success criteria, exit strategies, and decisive victories. In a conventional 

setting, ‘‘victory’’ typically entails an adversary’s unconditional surrender. But nonstate actors may define victory as not losing; their continued existence is a victory. 

This mindset characterizes several Palestinian terrorist groups that fought Israel’s 

occupation of Palestinian territories. In most cases, they themselves cannot achieve 

rapid, decisive victory, so they follow a strategy of protracted war. According to one 

scholar ‘‘. . . insurgent, terrorist and criminal organizations consciously design 

themselves so that our military and police forces cannot rapidly and decisively defeat them.’’ 11 Others note that ‘‘even dying for their cause intentionally or voluntarily is perceived as a victory (for terrorists). It’s a different paradigm than the traditional military concern for limiting casualties.’’ 12 This is characteristic of groups 

such as Hamas and al Qaeda that employ suicide tactics. 

In a conventional warfare setting, state-based armed forces guided by the laws of 

war typically attempt to avoid civilians or shield them from the war’s consequences. 

When combating non-state actors, however, civilians may need to be engaged at an 

unprecedented level. Winning the ‘‘hearts and minds’’ of the local population, or at 

least not alienating them could become a large part of the overall counter insurgent, 

or counter terrorist strategy. 

Terrorists and insurgents require at least tacit, if not active, support from the 

local population to operate effectively. In the words of one British general responsible for counterinsurgency operations ‘‘The shooting side of the business is only 25 

percent of the trouble. The other 75 percent is getting the people of this country 

behind us.’’ 13 However, the military activities at which today’s Armed Forces excel, 

such as precisely destroying buildings or vehicles, may work counter to this ‘‘hearts 

and minds’’ strategy. According to one study ‘‘counter terrorist military attacks 

against elusive terrorists may serve only to radicalize large sectors of the (Muslim) 

population and damage the U.S. image worldwide.’’ 14

Cost Challenges 

Almost by definition, non-state actors employ weapons and methods that are inexpensive, when compared to training, equipping and employing a military force. However, the cost to defend against non-state actors, or to combat them, can be high. 

For example, terrorists can acquire manportable, air defense systems (MANPADS) 

for as little as $5,000. If a terrorist succeeded in shooting down a commercial airliner with this shoulder-fired missile, the immediate cost of losing the airplane 

would be over $100 million, and the indirect costs much higher. Further, fielding 

technologies on commercial aircraft to defend against this threat could cost the 

United States $10 billion in acquisition costs alone.15 The ‘‘cost-exchange ratio’’ of 

fighting non-state actors is not in the United States’ favor. 

10 

16Thomas McCarthy. National Security for the 21st Century: The Air Force and Foreign Internal Defense. School of Advanced Air and Space Studies. Air University. Maxwell Air Force 

Base, AL. June 2004. p.67. And Thomas R. Searle. ‘‘Making Airpower Effective against Guerrillas.’’ Air & Space Power Journal. Fall 2004. 17David A. Fulghum. ‘‘Russia Sells SA–20 to Iran.’’ Aviation Week & Space Technology. December 15, 2008. 

A BALANCING ACT

There is a strong consensus in defense circles that airpower is one of the United 

States’ great military advantages. As mentioned earlier in this testimony, however, 

many observers are increasingly concerned that military aviation is focused too 

much on the demands of fighting conventional foes to the detriment of irregular 

warfare, and that ‘‘the challenge for the Air Force is to re-shape its forces to increase their relevance in small wars, while maintaining the capability to win major 

conflicts.’’ 16 In other words, in this view, a balance must be struck. 

Arguments for maintaining the current focus 

Supporters of DOD’s current modernization plans—which largely reflect forces required for state-on-state conflict—say that the F–22, Joint Strike Fighter, F/A–18E/ 

F, and other ‘‘high-end’’ platforms are still required for state-on-state conflict, despite U.S. preeminence in this area, and that new concepts of operation, new organizational schema, or technology upgrades may increase these systems’ applicability 

to counterinsurgency and irregular warfare challenges. Those who support DOD’s 

current aviation modernization plans could argue that fluid threat environments are 

nothing new. Platforms with long development timelines and long operational lives 

often must be modified and used differently than originally intentioned so as to keep 

pace with new threats and military objectives. It is much more difficult, to take the 

opposite approach, they could argue. From their perspective, DOD can’t develop 

technologically less sophisticated weapons systems to address unconventional 

threats, and then improve these systems in the future if more high tech threats 

arise. 

While ‘‘low-tech’’ insurgents and other non-state actors appear to deserve more attention than in the past, the United States shouldn’t slight its traditional military 

strengths, ‘‘conventional’’ aviation supporters argue. DOD has evolved from a 

‘‘threat-based’’ to a ‘‘capabilities-based’’ planning framework. Threats can change, 

but the military capabilities the Nation desires, tend to have a longer life-span. The 

ability to achieve air dominance is a key military capability the U.S. must maintain, 

supporters of DOD’s current aviation plans say, and the U.S. must be capable of 

conducting this mission in the most stressing scenarios; such as a potential conflict 

with China, for example. By preparing for the most stressing case, in this view, the 

U.S. can more than satisfy lesser included cases, such as air dominance missions 

against non-state actors. 

Russian SA–10, SA–12, and SA–20 surface-to-air missiles (SAMs) (also called 

‘‘double digit’’ SAMs) are a concern for military planners due to their mobility, long 

range, high altitude, advanced missile guidance, and sensitive radars. The Russian 

SA–20 has been likened to the U.S. Patriot PAC–2 missile, but with an even longer 

range, and a radar that is very effective in detecting stealthy aircraft. Military planners are concerned that a country with only a handful of these SAMs could effectively challenge U.S. military air operations by threatening aircraft and disrupting 

operations from great distances. The transfer of such weapons to countries such as 

Iran, are particularly worrisome.17

A variety of new technologies and military systems could exacerbate the ‘‘doubledigit’’ SAM challenge. First, commercial information and communications technologies are enabling adversaries to better network the elements of their air defense 

systems. This allows them to disperse radars, SAM launchers and other associated 

platforms throughout the battlespace, and to share targeting information among 

launchers. This, in turn, suggests that radars may be used less frequently and for 

shorter periods of time, complicating efforts to avoid or suppress them. Second, terminal defenses are being marketed by a number of international defense companies. 

These radar-guided Gatling guns are designed to protect ‘‘double-digit’’ SAMs or 

other high value air defense assets. These systems could prove quite effective in 

shooting down missiles aimed at enemy air defenses. Third, Russia and other countries have developed and are selling Global Positioning System (GPS) jammers. 

Over varying distances, these low-watt jammers may degrade the GPS guidance signals used by many U.S. precision-guided munitions (PGMs) to augment inertial 

guidance systems, reducing their accuracy. 

If these double-digit SAMs are protected by an enemy air force equipped with advanced Russian or European combat aircraft, the military problem becomes dire, say 

11 

18 ‘‘No S–300 Delivery To Iran’’ Moscow Times (as reported by the Associated Press). April 16, 

2009. 19Steven Zaloga. World Missile Briefing. Teal Group. Inc. Fairfax, VA. February 2008. 20 In an April 7, 2009, press conference, Secretary Gates estimated that ‘‘the intelligence that 

I’ve gotten indicates that the first IOC for anything like a fifth-generation fighter in Russia 

Continued 

supporters of DOD tactical aviation. According to press reports, a joint U.S.-Indian 

Air Force exercise, called Cope India, illustrates that pilots from non-NATO countries can receive excellent training and execute advanced air combat tactics. When 

flying advanced combat aircraft such as the Russian-designed SU–30, such well 

trained pilots could effectively challenge U.S. Air Forces, some say. 

Arguments for Rebalancing 

Most would agree that DOD still requires advanced aircraft to deter and fight tomorrow’s potential conventional conflicts. However, many argue that the efforts and 

resources expended to develop and produce these aircraft are not balanced with current and foreseeable conventional military challenges. The ability to achieve air 

dominance is a key capability that DOD must sustain, but against whom? Air dominance was achieved in about 15 minutes over Afghanistan and Iraq, some say, and, 

for the most part, with aircraft designed 30 years ago (e.g., F–15s, F–16s, F/A–18s). 

The stressing air dominance scenario described above may require some of the 

aircraft currently being developed by DOD. However, how many of these scenarios 

might realistically emerge in the future? Many would agree that a potential conflict 

with China could be one such challenge, but other credible examples are very difficult to imagine. Those who seek a rebalancing of military aviation argue that the 

proliferation of advanced SAMs has not occurred, and will likely not occur in the 

future, at the rate predicted by DOD. 

Despite being on the market for over 25 years, Russia reportedly has only managed to transfer double-digit SAMs to six countries (Bulgaria, China, Czech Republic, Germany, Greece and Kazakhstan), three of which were Soviet client states at 

the time of the sale. Further, rebalancing advocates would argue, Russia has been 

threatening to sell double-digit SAMs to Iran since the early 1990s, in part, to increase its leverage vis-a-vis the United States in the region. No deliveries have yet 

been reported in the open press, and in April 2009, senior Russian defense officials 

stated that Russia has not delivered SA–20s to Tehran.18

While these weapons are clearly dangerous, they are also expensive, and require 

extensive training to operate effectively. This has arguably slowed the proliferation 

of these systems, and may also do so in the future. Russia reportedly attempted but 

failed to sell SA–10 and SA–12 SAMs to Chile, Egypt, Hungary, Iran, Kuwait, Serbia, South Korea, Syria, and Turkey. These countries have opted instead to purchase either U.S. SAMs, or more modest air defense systems. According to one wellknown missile analyst 

Russia has traditionally played a significant role in worldwide SAM export. But Russian SAM sales have taken a nose dive since their heyday in 

the 1970s and 1980s. Particularly disappointing has been the very small 

scale of sales of the expensive high altitude systems like the S–300P and 

S–300V. The Russian industries had expected to sell 11 S–300P batteries 

in 1996–1997, when in fact only about 3 were sold. Aside from these very 

modest sales to China and Greece, few other sales have materialized. Combined with the almost complete collapse of Russian defense procurement, 

the firms developing these systems have been on the brink of bankruptcy 

in recent years.19

Those who wish to rebalance military aviation also argue that the proliferation 

of, and threat from advanced combat aircraft is also overstated. Building, operating, 

and maintaining a modern air force is much more expensive and resource intensive 

than fielding advanced SAMs. Few countries have the resources and national will 

to develop and maintain an air force that could challenge U.S. airpower, they argue. 

Some say that advanced Russian and European aircraft being developed and fielded 

today may compare well to 30-year old U.S. combat aircraft, on a one-to-one basis. 

But aircraft don’t fight on a one-to-one basis. Instead, they are part of a much larger 

airpower system. This system is composed, for example, of combat, intelligence, surveillance, airborne warning and control, aerial refueling, electronic warfare, and 

mission control assets. The importance of well trained pilots and maintenance personnel, which take considerable time and resources to create, cannot be over emphasized. 

No other country has an airpower system on par with the United States, nor is 

one predicted to emerge.20 Therefore, some argue, today’s DOD’s tactical aviation 

12 

would be about 2016, and in China would be about 2020.’’ CRS has conducted numerous studies 

on the implications of advanced Russian and Chinese fighter aircraft for U.S. forces. See, for 

example, CRS Report RL30700 for a more comprehensive treatment of this topic. 21Marcus Weisgerber. ‘‘Air Force Funds Study to Determine Light-Attack Plane Requirement.’’ Inside the Air Force. April 3, 2009. 22Ochmanek. Op Cit. 

programs can be safely reduced in order to free up funds to address other military 

challenges, and thus bring scarce resources more into balance. The resources saved 

from these cuts to DOD’s most advanced aviation programs could be used to invest 

in capabilities more applicable to combating terrorists and insurgents, or to conduct 

homeland defense. 

CONCLUSION: WHAT MIGHT A REBALANCED FORCE LOOK LIKE?

Given the challenges of combating non-state actors, and if it were agreed that 

aviation forces should be rebalanced toward irregular warfare, what capabilities 

might such a force posses? As a rough blueprint, Secretary Gates suggested that 10 

percent of defense spending would focus on military forces devoted exclusively to irregular warfare, 50 percent of the budget on forces focused on conventional warfare, 

and 40 percent on ‘‘dual capable’’ forces. 

In the case of aviation forces, the ratio of capabilities in each warfare domain 

might be different than Secretary Gates’ suggested 10–50–40 construct. Owing to 

their inherent flexibility, and the growing relative importance of sensors, communications and targeting technology vis-a ́-vis aeronautical performance, military aircraft can be effectively used in a number of different roles. Only the most specialized 

aviation assets are likely to be unique to a warfighting domain, and therefore, a 

more balanced spending on aviation forces may look more like the classic bell curve 

depicted in Figure 2 below, with aviation forces spending apportioned in a 10–80– 

10 percent ratio. 

Uniquely irregular 

A brief review of the use of military aviation against non-state actors suggests 

that there are few platforms, weapons, or processes unique to irregular warfare. 

Very small munitions that minimize the chance of collateral damage would arguably 

be more pertinent to irregular than conventional warfare. Another example would 

be an off-the-shelf, lightly armed turbo-prop aircraft for attacking non-state actors. 

Such an aircraft is now being studied by the Air Force’s Air Combat Command.21

Reducing the number of advanced combat aircraft in the Service’s inventories and 

replacing them with some number of these much less expensive aircraft or with 

armed UAVs could garner considerable life cycle cost savings. 

Perhaps the aviation capability most obviously peculiar to irregular warfare is an 

advisory one: the mission of training and counseling allied and partner nations in 

the employment of their airpower against insurgents and non-state actors. This mission, called Aviation-Foreign Internal Defense (A–FID) is performed by a single 

squadron in the Air Force Special Operations Command (the 6th Special Operations 

Squadron). According to one expert, ‘‘One of the most important roles that U.S. 

forces can play in the fight against terrorist groups is to train, advise, and assist 

the forces of other nations in counterinsurgency and counterterrorist operations.’’ 22


430air2.eps
13 

23 CRS interviews with Air Force pilots deployed to Iraq. March 2009. 

Yet, the 6th Special Operations Squadron is composed of approximately 125 personnel and operates on an annual budget ranging between $2 million and $5 million. Rebalancing DOD aviation capabilities toward a more robust counter insurgency role may entail expanding and strengthening DOD’s A–FID capabilities. 

Uniquely conventional 

There also appear to be few aviation resources unique to conventional, state-onstate conflict. Delivering nuclear weapons, penetrating and defeating advanced air 

defenses, and defeating modern air forces are missions clearly germane to state-onstate conflict. It would appear feasible to reduce the aviation forces unique to these 

missions if they were found to be in excess of force levels dictated by the QDR and 

other strategy guidance, and invest the savings in dual purpose assets or assets optimized for irregular warfare. 

Dual Purpose 

Most aviation missions that apply to irregular warfare also apply to state-on-state 

warfare: close air support, precision strike, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, medical evacuation, stealthy insertion of troops, just to mention a few. For 

some missions, the requirements for irregular warfare are more taxing than the requirements for state-on-state conflict, and these requirements will set the standard 

for aviation capabilities. In other instances, the mission requirements for conventional warfare will be the most taxing. A review of recent experience in Iraq and 

Afghanistan indicates that commanders in the field have been successfully adapting 

and employing weapon systems designed for state-on-state conflict in their fight 

against insurgents and other non-state actors. For example, large, ‘‘strategic’’ bombers have conducted close air support missions. Electronic warfare aircraft such as 

the EA–6B Prowler and the EC–130 Compass Call have been used to detect and 

jam improvised explosive devices. Air superiority fighters, having no enemy to fight, 

have been used as mini-Airborne Warning and Control Systems, providing real-time 

coordination and assembly of strike packages to attack time-sensitive targets.23

In conclusion, it appears that an opportunity exists today, through the upcoming 

QDR and concomitant congressional oversight, to ground battlefield innovation, such 

as described above, in strategy. This process is designed to match airpower capabilities to meet national goals in the projected threat environment, and field an aviation force structure that is both effective and cost-effective. 

Mr. Chairman, that concludes my remarks. It’s been my pleasure to address you 

today. I look forward to any questions you may have. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks, Mr. Bolkcom. That’s a good beginning. 

Now we’ll turn to General Richard Hawley, retired from the U.S. 

Air Force after serving as commander of the Air Combat Command. Since retirement, General Hawley has served in a variety of 

advisory capacities, including his work in support of the 2006 QDR. 

General, thanks for being here. We look forward to your testimony now. 

STATEMENT OF GEN. RICHARD E. HAWLEY, USAF (RET.), 

FORMER COMMANDER, AIR FORCE AIR COMBAT COMMAND 

General HAWLEY. Mr. Chairman, members of the subcommittee, 

it’s my pleasure to be here, and I look forward to this discussion 

of the future roles, missions, and capabilities of U.S. military air 

power. 

By way of introduction, I am a graduate of the United States Air 

Force Academy and Georgetown University. I served on Active 

Duty for 35 years, retiring in 1999, as you mentioned, as commander of Air Combat Command in Hampton, VA. My combat experience is as a forward air controller for the 4th Infantry Division 

in Vietnam, where I learned something about the application of air 

power in irregular warfare. I’ve accumulated about 1,000 hours in 

a multi-role, multi-service F–4 Phantom II, and a like number of 

14 

hours in the single-service, single-mission F–15 air superiority 

fighter, where I learned something of those competing concepts of 

fighter design and acquisition. I’ve also flown the A–10, C–130, C– 

141, C–17, B–52, B–1, and B–2 as a pilot, and I’ve flown as an observer in most other Air Force airplanes. 

I served for 2 years as the Principal Deputy to the Under Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition, and, as you mentioned, in 

2005 as a member of the Defense Acquisition Performance Assessment Project and the DOD Red Team that supported the QDR. 

Since 1999, my perspective has been broadened through work as 

an independent consultant, mostly in support of the aerospace industry and U.S. Joint Forces Command as what they call a senior 

concept developer. So, I hope that my testimony can be helpful to 

the committee as you consider the President’s proposed budget for 

2010. 

In my mind, that budget seems to be more noteworthy for what 

it probably will not contain than for what it will. It will not propose 

funding, as you mentioned, for additional F–22 air superiority 

fighters or C–17 strategic airlift aircraft, and it will not propose 

funding for development of new combat search-and-rescue or longrange strike capabilities. These omissions have major ramifications 

for the future of U.S. air power, and the first two will be irreversible. Therefore, I would like to focus these few comments on the 

proposal to end production of the F–22 and the C–17, and hope 

that your questions will allow me to address the other major 

issues. 

The Air Force is responsible for development of capabilities to 

gain and maintain air superiority over the battlefield and to provide strategic airlift capabilities that allow our Armed Forces to respond rapidly to global crises. To fulfill those responsibilities, the 

Air Force conducts rigorous analyses to determine the attributes of 

these aircraft. They will need to successfully accomplish their missions over their expected 30- to 40-year service lives. 

In the case of the F–22 and C–17, these analyses were presented 

to Congress, and, after long and thoughtful debate, Congress approved funding to develop and subsequently field these aircraft. 

Both are without peer in their respective mission areas, and are 

the envy of every air force in the world today. 

Having developed these capabilities, the Air Force is then 

charged with advising the Secretary of Defense and Congress on 

the number required to successfully support our National Security, 

National Defense, and National Military Strategies. 

The Air Force conducts an equally rigorous analysis to support 

its conclusions with regard to this important question. In doing so, 

it is guided by direction from the Secretary of Defense concerning 

the number and nature of the contingencies for which it must prepare forces for employment by the combatant commands. Although 

that guidance evolves as the threats to our Nation evolve, it has 

consistently required forces able to support more than one major 

regional contingency while still defending the Homeland and deterring other would-be aggressors. 

As a participant in those analyses regarding the F–22, I can assure you that the number required to conduct operations in two 

major regional contingencies against adversaries who are capable 

15 

of contesting our control of the air is 381. That number is sufficient 

to equip 10 operational squadrons with 24 aircraft each, along with 

the supporting training base, test aircraft, and some attrition reserves. 

Others in the Air Force and the Joint Staff have conducted mobility studies that set the number of C–17s required to support our 

defense strategy at 205. But, those studies did not consider the 

planned growth in the size of the United States Army and Marine 

Corps. 

To my knowledge, there is no analysis that would call into question these requirements for F–22 and C–17 aircraft, but the recommendation to the President and Congress is to close both production lines after building just 187 F–22s and 205 C–17s. 

The recommendation on the C–17 seems to be based on a dated 

analysis of the requirement, and for the F–22 on no analysis whatsoever. The F–22 recommendation rests on an assertion that we 

cannot afford to equip our airmen, on whom we rely to gain and 

maintain air superiority, with the best weapons that our defense 

industrial base has developed. Rather, we and they are asked to accept the risk of sending them into the fight with weapons designed 

for an entirely different mission. I find that logic suspect. Federal outlays in 2010 will be about $3.5 trillion, while keeping 

the F–22 and C–17 lines open, so that a closure decision could be 

informed by the QDR, and a review of our national security strategy, would cost less than $4 billion. In my view, these recommendations, if implemented, will preempt the full and open debate that should precede any major change to the force size and 

construct. A force of 187 F–22s may be sufficient for one major regional contingency where our control of the air is contested by a 

competent adversary, but there will be no reserve left to help deter 

an opportunistic aggressor elsewhere in the world. Should the 

President and Congress conclude that our forces should be sized to 

deal with only one contingency where our control of the air is contested, that will be an appropriate time to terminate production of 

the F–22. Until then, in my view, the actual requirement is for 381 

aircraft, not 187 or even 243. 

As to the C–17, I find it difficult to believe that the requirement 

can remain stagnant, even as the forces that must be deployed and 

sustained grow substantially in number. 

Thank you for this opportunity to share my views on these important issues, and I look forward to your questions. 

[The prepared statement of General Hawley follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT BY GEN. RICHARD E. HAWLEY, USAF (RET.) 

Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, thank you for this opportunity to 

discuss future roles, missions, and capabilities of U.S. military air power. By way 

of introduction, I am a graduate of the United States Air Force Academy and of 

Georgetown University. I served on active duty for 35 years, retiring in 1999 as 

Commander of Air Combat Command at Langley Air Force Base in Hampton, VA. 

My combat experience is as a forward air controller with the 4th Infantry Division 

in the central highlands of Vietnam, where I learned about the application of airpower in irregular warfare. I accumulated about 1,000 hours in the multi-role, 

multi-service F–4 Phantom II, and a like number of hours in the single service, single mission F–15 air superiority fighter, so I understand the difference between 

those competing concepts of fighter design and acquisition. I have flown the A–10, 

C–130, C–141, C–17, B–52, B–1 and B–2 as a pilot, and as an observer in most 

other aircraft in the Air Force inventory. 

16 

I served for 2 years as the principal deputy to the Under Secretary of the Air 

Force for Acquisition and in 2005 as a member of the Defense Acquisition Performance Assessment Project, studying the problems we face in that area. Also in 2005, 

I served as a member of a the Department of Defense Red Team supporting the last 

Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR). Since 1999 my perspective has been broadened 

through work as an independent consultant, mostly in support of the aerospace industry and U.S. Joint Forces Command as a Senior Concept Developer. I hope that 

my testimony can be helpful to the committee as you consider the President’s proposed defense budget for 2010. 

For the subject of this hearing, that budget promises to be more noteworthy for 

what it will not contain than for what it does. It will not propose funding for additional production of F–22 air superiority fighters or C–17 strategic airlift aircraft, 

and it will not propose funding for development of new combat search and rescue 

or long range strike aircraft. These omissions have major ramifications for the future of U.S. airpower, and the first two will be irreversible. Therefore, I will focus 

these opening comments on the proposal to end production of the F–22 and the 

C–17, and hope that your questions will allow me to comment on the other issues. 

The Air Force is responsible for the development of capabilities to gain and maintain air superiority over the battlefield, and to provide strategic airlift capabilities 

that allow our armed forces to respond rapidly to global crises. To fulfill those responsibilities, the Air Force conducts rigorous analyses to determine the attributes 

these aircraft will need to successfully accomplish their missions over their expected 

30- to 40-year service lives. In the case of the F–22 and C–17, those analyses were 

presented to Congress and, after long and thoughtful debate, Congress approved 

funding to develop and subsequently field these aircraft. Both are without peer in 

their respective mission areas and are the envy of every Air Force in the world 

today. 

Having developed these capabilities, the Air Force is then charged with advising 

the Secretary of Defense and Congress on the number required to successfully support our National Security, National Defense, and National Military Strategies. The 

Air Force conducts an equally rigorous analysis to support its conclusions with regard to this important question. In doing so, it is guided by direction from the Secretary of Defense concerning the number and nature of the contingencies for which 

it must prepare forces for employment by the combatant commands. Although that 

guidance evolves as the threats to our Nation evolve, it has consistently required 

forces able to support more than one major regional contingency at a time while still 

defending the homeland and deterring other would be aggressors. 

As a participant in those analyses regarding the F–22, I can assure you that the 

number of F–22s required to conduct operations in two major regional contingencies, 

against adversaries who are capable of contesting our control of the air, is 381. That 

number is sufficient to equip ten operational squadrons with 24 aircraft each, along 

with the supporting training base, test aircraft and some attrition reserve. Others 

in the Air Force and the joint staff have conducted mobility studies that set the 

number of C–17s required to support our defense strategy at 205, but those studies 

did not consider the planned growth in the size of the United States Army and Marine Corps. 

To my knowledge, there is no analysis that would call into question these requirements for F–22 and C–17 aircraft, but the recommendation to the President and 

Congress is to close both production lines after building just 187 F–22s and 205 C– 

17s. The recommendation on the C–17 seems to be based on a dated analysis of the 

requirement, and that for the F–22 on no analysis whatsoever. The F–22 recommendation rests on an assertion that we cannot afford to equip our airmen, on 

whom we rely to gain and maintain air superiority, with the best weapons that our 

defense industrial base has developed. Rather, we and they are asked to accept the 

risk of sending them into the fight with weapons designed for an entirely different 

mission. 

I find that logic to be suspect. Federal outlays in 2010 will be about $3.5 trillion, 

while keeping the F–22 and C–17 lines open, so a closure decision could be informed 

by the QDR and a review of our national security strategy, would cost less than $4 

billion. In my view, these recommendations, if implemented, will preempt the full 

and open debate that should precede any major change to the force sizing construct. 

A force of 187 F–22s may be sufficient for 1 major regional contingency, but there 

will be no reserve left to help deter an opportunistic aggressor elsewhere in the 

world. Should the President and Congress conclude that our forces should be sized 

to deal with only one contingency where our control of the air is contested, that will 

be an appropriate time to terminate production of the F–22. Until then, the actual 

requirement is for 381 aircraft, not 187 or even 243. As to the C–17, I find it difVerDate Nov 24 2008 10:01 Dec 23, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00020 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 Y:\BORAWSKI\DOCS\54106.TXT JUNE PsN: JUNEB
17 

ficult to believe that the requirement can remain stagnant even as the forces that 

must be deployed and sustained grow substantially in number. 

Thank you for this opportunity to share my views on these important issues. I 

look forward to your questions. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you, General. That’s what, in our 

world, we tend to call straight talk. I appreciate it, and we’ll have 

some good questions for you. 

Senator Bill Nelson has stopped by, which I appreciate. He is a 

member of the full committee, not a member of the subcommittee, 

but asked if he could make a statement and leave some questions. 

I’m happy to recognize you now. 

Senator BILL NELSON. I just have two questions, Mr. Chairman. 

I’ll leave them with you, and I appreciate your doing this hearing. 

STATEMENT OF HON. BILL NELSON, U.S. SENATOR FROM THE 

STATE OF FLORIDA 

Senator BILL NELSON. The bombers, long-range strike aircraft, 

fall within the jurisdiction of the Strategic Forces Subcommittee, 

which I have the privilege of chairing, and we’re going to look at 

this issue of the next-generation bomber and Secretary Gates’ decision to postpone or cancel the goal of a next-generation bomber by 

2018. We’re going to look at it in detail during the course of our 

Strategic Subcommittee hearings. 

So, thank you for letting me come, and thank you for letting me 

submit a couple of questions to you. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks, Senator Nelson. I think you’re technically right about the jurisdiction. Obviously, we may get into the 

bomber question here because of the expertise of the people who 

are before us. 

Let’s turn now to Barry Watts, who’s a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments (CSBA), and served in 

the United States Air Force and as Director of Program Analysis 

and Evaluation (PA&E) in the Office of the Secretary of Defense 

(OSD). 

Mr. Watts, thanks for bringing all your experience to the committee today. 

STATEMENT OF BARRY D. WATTS, SENIOR FELLOW, CENTER 

FOR STRATEGIC AND BUDGETARY ASSESSMENTS 

Mr. WATTS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and members 

of the subcommittee. 

I’m going to focus my remarks on the subject that was just mentioned, the bomber issue. Perhaps it would be useful to begin with 

just a historical observation that speaks to context. 

When the first President Bush, in 1992, shortly after the end of 

the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union, made a decision to end B–2 production at 20 airplanes, as best I can understand the underlying rationale, it was looking at the platform 

strictly as a nuclear delivery system; and that’s, indeed, what it 

and the B–1 and the B–52 had been designed primarily to do. 

The conventional utility of the platform, I don’t believe, was really taken into account, and the jurisdictional division between the 

other subcommittee and this one emphasizes the degree to which 

bombers tend to fall, conceptually, between the cracks for us. 

18 

The B–1, B–52, and B–2 have never dropped a nuclear weapon 

in anger, but they have been used in every war since Vietnam to 

deliver conventional munitions. As Senator Thune pointed out, 

starting in 1999, when we brought the JDAM onboard the B–2 and 

integrated it for the campaign against Serbia, adding conventional 

precision to those platforms, it increased their utility, in the longterm, significantly. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. So, let me just clarify what you’re saying. 

You’re saying that the bombers don’t have just strategic value to 

us, but conventional, as well. 

Mr. WATTS. We’ve used them primarily in a conventional role 

even though the three that we still have in inventory were designed exclusively for nuclear roles. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Right. 

Mr. WATTS. So, it’s a very flexible platform. It has, if you will, 

dual utility. We seem to have trouble making decisions based on 

both ends of the spectrum, rather than just one or the other. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. So, you’re making a case that this subcommittee actually does have jurisdiction here. 

Mr. WATTS. I think so, sir, yes. [Laughter.] 

You should. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Go right ahead. 

Senator THUNE. I really like this witness, Mr. Chairman. [Laughter.] 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Just based on what you said, maybe both 

subcommittees have jurisdiction. But, don’t spend your time on 

that. Go right ahead with your statement. 

Mr. WATTS. I was just going to go back to the decision to defer 

a next-generation bomber, and not just production, but even development of the platform. 

When I was running PA&E back in 2001 and 2002, I tried to get 

some traction in the Pentagon for making trades across the Service 

boundaries that balanced capabilities, in the very sense that Secretary Gates is advocating. I must say that, in a general sense, I 

can only applaud what he’s trying to do, and perhaps add the comment that I think it’s about time somebody tried to make those 

kinds of balanced decisions across a lot of different programs. 

With respect to the next-generation bomber, my divergence of 

opinion with the Secretary has to do with the rationale that was 

stated on April 6, which was that the need, the requirement, and 

the technology need to be better understood. My position, simply 

put, is we’ve studied that issue to death for the last decade—the 

Air Force, OSD, and everybody else under the sun—and I think, if 

you look to a rather stealthy platform that operates at high altitude, high subsonic mach, and perhaps is armed, in addition, to 

give it the survivability that it might need against advanced air defenses to get in and out, that the need, the requirement, and the 

technology are all pretty much in hand and reasonably well understood. I certainly can elaborate on all three of those. 

With respect to the need, my basic feeling is that this country, 

because of its global responsibilities, does need a credible capability 

to hold targets at risk anywhere on the globe. If you give me a platform that has a 2,500- to 3,000-nautical mile combat radius from 

the last air refueling, you indeed can reach any point on the globe. 

19 

If future targets happen to be in defended airspace with advanced air defenses, the only platforms that we have today that 

have a serious capability of being able to execute those missions 

would be the 20 remaining B–2s. They are getting a little long in 

the tooth. They were originally designed back in the early ’80s. 

Steps have been taken to enhance their capabilities. But, I think 

the time is due to look to a new platform and move ahead. 

I just remind you, we actually built 21 B–2s, and we lost 1 on 

takeoff at Guam last year. That’s a reminder of something that I 

think we’ve lost track of in our thinking about operational requirements. Attrition occurs even in peacetime, much less in wartime. 

That suggests that residual 20-airplane fleet is very thin. 

With respect to requirements, I’ve looked at a number of conventional scenarios. Most of them emphasize the need for long reach. 

For example, you just don’t get forward air bases or you encounter 

the kind of anti-access-area denial capabilities that the People’s 

Liberation Army 2nd Artillery Corps is developing, and those kinds 

of challenges mean you’re probably going to need much longer 

range than we have with the short-range fighters, even with air refueling. 

The other requirement that I want to touch on is the need to deal 

with time-sensitive targets, targets that are emergent, that are 

fleeting, that are only there for a short period of time. Our adversaries now understand pretty clearly that if the U.S. forces know 

where a particular target or aim point is, we can put a precision 

weapon on it very quickly and efficiently. 

So, the name of the hider-finder game in this context becomes, 

over time, the natural thing for our adversaries to do is to try to 

deny the precision targeting information to us. So, a classic example would be a hidden mobile missile launcher. You really can’t 

find it until it comes out into the daylight or nighttime, tries to go 

to a predetermined launch site, launches its missile, and then runs 

back to hide and rearm. That suggests a need to be able to persist 

inside defended airspace and wait for those targets to reveal themselves. That’s the core design requirement that I have gotten to in 

trying to think about this weapons system. 

Lastly, as far as the technology is concerned, I believe most of 

it really is in hand. An awful lot of the avionics, the low observability technology, and things like it, can be found in the JSF 

today, in the F–22, and other fifth-generation platforms that we’ve 

been building. 

Let me end by just saying I strongly agree with and support Secretary Gates’ repeated pronouncements, up until April 6, that we 

need to begin moving more in the direction of long-range systems 

and away from short-range systems. But, the obvious point that I 

think has to be made is, if we are only going to be buying JSFs 

for the foreseeable future, it’s hard for me to understand how we’re 

going to start to make that shift towards longer-range systems. I 

think the time is really here to go ahead with a new long-range 

strike system of some sort. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Watts follows:] 

20 

PREPARED STATEMENT BY BARRY D. WATTS

INTRODUCTION

On April 6, 2009, Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced eleven programmatic decisions he planned to recommend to the president for inclusion in the 

Pentagon’s fiscal year 2010 budget. These decisions represented an attempt to reshape ‘‘the priorities of America’s defense establishment’’ via a ‘‘holistic assessment 

of capabilities, requirements, risks and needs.’’ Gates’ stated goal was to shift the 

Defense Department’s strategic direction. 

Having failed to generate momentum for a similar rebalancing of priorities across 

the boundaries of the military Services during my brief tenure directing the Office 

of Program Analysis and Evaluation in 2001–2002, I applaud what Secretary Gates 

is trying to do. In fact, I agree with all his programmatic choices save one: the decision not to pursue a development program for a follow-on Air Force bomber at this 

time. Even in this case, my disagreement is not over the decision itself but the reasons given for it. If Secretary Gates had said that developing a next-generation longrange strike system (LRSS) is simply unaffordable at this time in light of more 

pressing needs and priorities, I would have been inclined to defer to his judgment. 

But the rationale Secretary Gates offered was that the Pentagon needed to wait 

until there is ‘‘a better understanding of the need, the requirement, and the technology.’’ My view is that the need, requirement, and technology are all reasonably 

well understood. Indeed, all three have been quite clear for some years. 

THE NEED

What is the need for a new long-range strike system? Since the collapse of the 

Soviet Union in December 1991, the United States has been—and remains—the 

world’s only global military power. At the core of the U.S. position is the capability 

to hold at risk, or strike, targets anywhere on the globe within hours-to-days. Currently, this capability is widely understood to mean primarily the capacity to do so 

with conventional precision munitions. However, it need not be limited to non-nuclear weapons. While the B–2 has, thankfully, only delivered conventional weapons 

such as the Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM), the aircraft also has a nuclear 

mission. 

With regard to conventional long-range strike, the United States first demonstrated a genuine global reach on January 17, 1991, the opening night of the first 

Gulf War (Operation Desert Storm). As part of the initial Air Tasking Order for the 

air campaign, 5 B–52s launched from Barksdale Air Force Base (AFB) in Louisiana 

and delivered 35 Conventional Air Launched Cruise Missiles against targets in Iraq. 

Since then, the B–2 has demonstrated the same global reach. During Operation Allied Force in 1999, B–2 bombers, launching from and recovering at Whiteman AFB, 

MO, mounted 45 successful sorties against Serbian targets. These sorties delivered 

some 1.3 million pounds of precision munitions, mostly JDAMs. 

The other significant change in the utility of the older B–52 and B–1 since Allied 

Force in 1999 has come from equipping both bombers with inexpensive precision 

munitions. During the major combat phase of Operation Iraqi Freedom, B–1s carrying 24 JDAMs provided round-the-clock, on-call precision fire support for coalition 

ground forces. The integration of JDAM and even laser-guided bombs (LGBs) on 

heavy bombers has dramatically increased their effectiveness in conventional operations. 

However, for targets located deep in enemy territory—meaning more than 1,000 

nautical miles from the last air-to-air refueling—the only air-breathing strike platforms the United States possesses today with reach and survivability to have a 

chance of successfully executing such missions inside defended airspace are the 20 

surviving B–2s. But even with upgrades to their signatures, how survivable will 

these 20 B–2s be in coming decades against advanced air defenses? The B–2, after 

all, was designed in the 1980s and achieved initial operational capability (IOC) over 

a decade ago. Moreover, the crash of the 21st operational B–2 during takeoff at 

Guam in early 2008 is a reminder that attrition can and does occur even in peacetime. 

Global strike is a critical mission for the U.S. military—a strategic ‘‘business’’ in 

which the United States needs to retain a credible and dominant capability. Longrange, penetrating strike systems provide, among other things: a hedge against 

being unable to obtain access to forward bases for political reasons; a capacity to 

respond quickly to contingencies such as the failure of a nuclear-armed state; the 

ability to base outside the reach of emerging adversary anti-access/area-denial capabilities; and the ability to impose disproportionate defensive costs on prospective 

U.S. adversaries, as the bomber leg of the nuclear triad did on the Soviet Union 

21 

during the Cold War. Addressing these needs constituted much of the rationale behind trying to field a next-generation bomber by 2018. Granted, the 2018 IOC was 

ambitious. The early or mid-2020s would probably have been adequate. But to end 

the 2018 bomber development effort at this time appears to be a short-sighted decision. 

The need to move ahead with a penetrating, follow-on LRSS to the B–2 has historical roots that reach back to the early 1980s. At White Sands in 1982, the Assault 

Breaker program demonstrated the feasibility of combining wide-area sensors with 

missile-delivered terminally guided submunitions to attack tanks and armored fighting vehicles deep in an enemy army’s rear echelons. This demonstration argued 

that, sooner or later, military systems exploiting Assault Breaker technologies—‘‘reconnaissance-strike complexes’’ as the Soviets called them—would be able to dominate large areas from long ranges with precision fires. This prospect, in turn, posed 

a long-term challenge to U.S. power projection capabilities based on short-range 

strike platforms and forward bases. In the hands of prospective U.S. adversaries, 

reconnaissance-strike complexes offered the possibility of holding at risk American 

forward bases such as Kadena AFB on the island of Okinawa and even carrier battle groups operating in the Western Pacific. 

When the Office of Net Assessment’s 1992 preliminary assessment of the late 20th 

century military-technical revolution—more widely known as the ‘‘revolution in military affairs’’—appeared in 1992, even the U.S. military could not claim to possess 

the kinds of reconnaissance-strike complexes Soviet military theorists had been forecasting since the 1970s. Today, however, China’s 2nd Artillery Corps is developing 

area-denial/anti-access capabilities that could compel U.S. power projection forces to 

operate from distances of 1,000 nautical miles or greater from the Chinese mainland. Granted, from the Korean and Vietnam wars to the current conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, the U.S. military has been able to rely primarily on in-theater 

bases and short-range strike systems to project power in distant overseas theaters. 

Looking ahead to the second decade of the 21st century, however, it seems clear that 

the era in which the United States could get away with forward basing for power 

projection by short-range systems is coming to a close. As Secretary Gates himself 

stated in an article in the January/February 2009 issue of Foreign Affairs, the Chinese military, among others, is fielding a range of disruptive systems to blunt the 

impact of U.S. power, narrow the United States’ military options, and deny the U.S. 

military freedom of movement and action. 

The force-structure implications of these developments for the United States are 

also clear. China’s growing anti-access/area-denial capabilities will, as Gates wrote 

in his Foreign Affairs article, ‘‘put a premium on the United States’ ability to strike 

from over the horizon . . . and will require shifts from short-range to longer-range 

systems, such as the next-generation bomber.’’ Moreover, this article does not constitute the only occasion when Secretary Gates articulated the need to shift from 

short-range to long-range systems. In a speech at the National Defense University 

in September 2008, he used virtually the same language to support the need for a 

follow-on LRSS. It is difficult, therefore, to see why, in April 2009, a better understanding is suddenly needed of a ‘‘need’’ that appeared clear as recently as January 

is suddenly called for. 

The pre-April 2009 Secretary Gates is right. The U.S. military needs to begin 

shifting its force structure more in favor of long-range systems. However, investing 

exclusively in short-range systems such as the F–35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) in 

the near term is not going to bring about the needed shift. 

THE REQUIREMENT

What would we want a new long-range strike system to do? What would be its 

primary mission requirements? In 2008 the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments took another look at these questions. The resulting report identified six 

generic scenarios for conventional operations that a new LRSS should be able to address. Of these six scenarios, four appear to be the most important in defining the 

requirements for a new LRSS. They are: 

(1) Situations requiring a sufficient radius of action from the last air-refueling point to reach targets deep in defended airspace; 

(2) Conflicts in which there is a need to strike targets at intercontinental 

distances from the continental United States because in-theater bases are 

not available; 

(3) Missions requiring the survivability to persist in defended airspace in 

order to prosecute emergent and time-sensitive targets; and 

22 

1 Barry D. Watts, ‘‘The Case for Long-Range Strike: 21st Century Scenarios,’’ CSBA, 2008, pp. 

19–30. This report is available online at http://www.csbaonline.org, as is CSBA’s 2005 report on 

the same subject, ‘‘Long-Range Strike: Imperatives, Urgency and Options.’’ 

(4) Operations in which U.S. forces must have the radius of action to be 

able to operate from beyond the reach of anti-access/area-denial capabilities.1

The first, second, and fourth of these scenarios emphasize the range or reach of the 

platform. For these scenarios a straightforward design goal would be a combat radius of 2,500 nautical miles from the last air refueling at altitude in benign airspace. 

The third scenario, by contrast, arises from the natural responses of intelligent 

adversaries to U.S. precision engagement capabilities. Since Operation Desert Storm 

in 1991, American adversaries have become acutely aware that if U.S. strike platforms can locate a target, they can hit it with conventional guided rounds such as 

JDAM or a LGB. The logical response has been to use hiding, concealment, movement, and relocation to deny U.S. forces the precise targeting information weapons 

like JDAM require—or at least limit the amount of time their high-value assets 

would be exposed to American precision fires. A mobile missile launcher that moves 

rapidly from a concealed location to a firing position, launches its missile, and then 

returns to a hidden position is a classic example of a time-sensitive or emergent target. It is this problem that leads to the requirement that the next LRSS be able 

to persist or loiter inside defended airspace so as to be nearby when such targets 

do expose themselves. Thus, the basic requirements that a new long-range platform 

should meet for conventional operations do not appear to be particularly mysterious. 

Without the reach and survivability inherent in the four generic scenarios, one could 

not justify the likely costs—at least $15 billion—of developing a new LRSS. 

Additionally, CSBA’s 2008 report argued that the platform should also have some 

capability for delivering nuclear weapons. The B–52, it is worth remembering, was 

designed exclusively for nuclear operations. Like the B–2, the B–52 has never delivered a nuclear weapon in anger. Since the late 1960s, however, B–52s have delivered conventional munitions in every major conflict in which the United States has 

been involved. If the next long-range LRSS can meet the range and survivability 

requirements for conventional operations outlined above, there seems no compelling 

reason to make the platform conventional only, so long as the costs of hardening 

against electromagnetic pulse are kept under control. After all, some electromagnetic hardening of the platform will be needed in any case. Again, the core need 

that a new LRSS must meet is to be able to hold at risk, or strike, targets anywhere 

on the globe with whatever weapons the contingency requires. 

THE TECHNOLOGY

How mature are the technologies that would be needed to develop a new LRSS 

able to satisfy the generic scenario requirements just described? If the system is optimized for high-altitude penetration at high subsonic cruise speeds, the requisite 

aerodynamic, structural, and low-observables technologies already exist in B–2 and 

fifth-generation fighters such as the F–35. Only the engine technology to achieve 

both long range and a supersonic dash capability to avoid being run down by enemy 

interceptors is not yet in hand. This vulnerability to enemy fighters is the main reason why the (now retired) F–117 and B–2 have operated exclusively at night when 

inside enemy airspace. 

How might this vulnerability be addressed in a new LRSS lacking a supersonic 

dash capability? The logical answer is to equip the platform with advanced air-toair missiles and the sensors to provide sufficient situational awareness for the LRSS 

to be able fight its way into, and out of, defended airspace. Much of the required 

sensors and other avionics already exist in the JSF. 

Another major design choice is whether to make a new LRSS manned or unmanned. Given the current state of the art, one suspects that situations could arise 

in which a manned platform would be preferable. On the one hand, a manned platform would enable strike execution to be aborted right up to the very last moment. 

On the other, an important vulnerability of an unmanned LRSS would be the possibility that sophisticated adversaries could interfere with the data links used for 

oversight and remote control of the platform. Such interference has not, so far, 

emerged as a serious problem with intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance 

platforms such as Predator, Global Hawk, and Reaper in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

However, both the Russians and Chinese are not only well aware of this vulnerability, but have the technical potential to exploit it themselves or sell the capability 

23 

to others. Thus, one would want to think twice about making a new LRSS exclusively unmanned. 

CONCLUSION

The need for a need for a new LRSS has been fairly clear for some years. Up until 

April 6 of this year, this need appears to have been understood by Secretary Gates. 

Equally clear are the operational requirements that a follow-on LRSS would need 

to meet and the maturity of most of the requisite technologies. As with a new tanker for aerial refueling, the Air Force and the Office of the Secretary of Defense have, 

for one reason or another, been unable to reach a firm decision to move ahead with 

a new LRSS for nearly a decade now. This is a strategic choice that cannot, and 

should not, be deferred any longer. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you, Mr. Watts. It was very interesting testimony. 

Let’s do 7-minute rounds of questioning. A vote may go off 

around 2:45 p.m., but if we do it right, I’ll ask my questions and 

run over and vote, and we’ll keep this going. 

Mr. Watts, let me ask you to develop the argument for not agreeing with Secretary Gates to really push off investments in a longrange strike-plane bomber. Develop, a little bit more, if you will, 

as you have somewhat in your testimony, the argument for what 

Secretary Gates calls hybrid warfare and give us a little history for 

the extent to which the bombers have been used in hybrid/conventional warfare or as compared to strategic conflicts. 

Mr. WATTS. In general, starting with Operation Desert Storm, 

you had very small numbers of bombers delivering proportionately 

larger amounts of the ordnance. As we’ve moved into precision conventional munitions, the weight of the number of tons of ordnance 

delivered has become less important than the number of aim points 

you could cover. I’ve had no success predicting the contingencies 

that we end up facing as we go into the future. We’ve spent a lot 

of time and energy projecting future scenarios and future contingencies, but, in general, long-range platforms, particularly ones 

with a fair degree of survivability, are just very flexible things. You 

can use them to support ground forces. 

This occurred very dramatically in 2003 during Operation Iraqi 

Freedom. If you go back and review the 3rd Infantry Division’s 

after-action report, I think it would not be an exaggeration to say 

that the people on the ground loved the JDAM. It was there, on 

call, when they needed it, and it provided the kind of precision fire 

support that the Army did not possess at that point in time. 

Now, guided Multiple Launch Rocket System and other precision 

munitions have finally started to enter the Army’s inventory, so 

they have their own precision organic indirect-fire support, in addition to the airplanes. But, the ability of those B–1s, with 24 

JDAMs, to just hang out overhead and drop on Global Positioning 

System (GPS) aim points on call was really important and impressive. That was high-tempo combat operations, but that capability 

can be used day-in and day-out, even in hybrid conflicts. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Let me ask you to come at this in a slightly 

different way. In your testimony you specifically say, ‘‘missions requiring the survivability to persist in defended airspace in order to 

prosecute emergent and time-sensitive targets.’’ What new technologies would have to be developed to make this possible? Are 

they in reach? 

24 

Mr. WATTS. I think the sensing technology and the computational 

capabilities you would need onboard the platform are being put 

into the JSF as we speak. So, I don’t think there’s a great stretch, 

in terms of the technology that would be required. 

If you go back in the history of the JSF, there was a discussion 

early on about simply relying on offboard sensing for finding targets. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Right. 

Mr. WATTS. We ended up going in almost the opposite direction 

in providing a very sophisticated or all-the-way-around the airplane sensing capability and advanced electronically scanned 

radar, with the underlying computational capability onboard that 

airplane and the ability to be able to upgrade that capability incrementally over time. I think the technology’s here, sir. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. If you were writing the defense budget for 

next year, understanding that you disagree with the recommendations of Secretary Gates, what would you put in for the long-range 

strike systems for the bombers? 

Mr. WATTS. An amount of money, sir? 

Senator LIEBERMAN. No, that’s an unfair question. What would 

be your goal? By when would you like us to be able to do what? 

Mr. WATTS. The 2018 goal was very ambitious. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Right. 

Mr. WATTS. If you stick with the kind of high-subsonic, high-altitude platform that I’ve describe, and you run a very disciplined development program, I think in another 10 to 12 years you ought 

to be able to reach initial operational capability. The problems of 

mission and requirements creep in the programs are certainly an 

issue. 

One of the alternatives to what I’ve described, that the Air Force 

and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency have talked 

about, would be a hypersonic cruise vehicle, mach 6 to 8. There, 

you are stretching all kinds of technologies—material technologies, 

engine/propulsion technologies—and at best, people have discussed 

being able to get there by the 2030s or maybe even as late as 2040. 

But, if you don’t do that kind of development, if you focus on the 

kinds of mission requirements I’ve described, I think, by the earlyto mid-2020s, you could field something. I have talked to some of 

the companies about, ‘‘Tell me how much the development costs for 

a very disciplined system might be.’’ Most of the voting seems to 

be under $10 billion. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Over what period of time? 

Mr. WATTS. The development period of the airplane would be 8 

to 10 years. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. That’s very interesting. I invite you to give 

us more detailed information afterward. 

General Hawley, do you have a quick response to this GatesWatts debate on the bombers? 

General HAWLEY. Yes, sir. I would share an anecdote that occurred late in my Active Duty career. I was having a discussion 

about bombers with the Commander at Training and Doctrine 

Command, my Army colleague across the river, and he was wondering about their capability to drop these precision-guided munitions we were then calling JDAMs. I said, ‘‘Bill, one of these days, 

25 

bombers are going to be providing CAS to your troops on the 

ground.’’ It was not long afterward, in Afghanistan, when bombers 

were providing CAS to our Army forces on the ground and to that 

outfit we called the Northern Alliance. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Right. 

General HAWLEY. So, this idea that they’re only useful in strategic contests is very dated. In my view, we’ve come full circle. At 

the beginnings of modern air power in World War II, bombers were 

the platforms we used to destroy targets on the ground and fighters were the things that got them to the target and back. In between, we went through a period where bombers couldn’t survive 

against terminal defenses; and so, we used fighters to get into the 

target, destroy the target, and then get out. We’ve now come full 

circle. We’re at a point where the primary role for our fighter force 

should be to get the bombers to the target, because of the payload 

advantages that have already been mentioned, their ability to loiter 

over the target. As a fact in Vietnam, the most valuable thing I 

could get was time on station from somebody with a bomb because 

that’s what my forces on the ground needed. They needed the bomb 

to come down at the right time and the right place. Today’s bombers can do exactly that. So, they are certainly high-utility systems 

across the full spectrum of modern warfare. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Excellent. Thank you very much. 

Senator Thune. 

Senator THUNE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

If I might come at that question a slightly different way, and this 

would be to Mr. Watts or General Hawley. In your view, is the 

present bomber fleet sufficient to hold targets deep in defended airspace at risk over the next 25 to 30 years? Because absent a commitment to any kind of a next-generation long-range strike capability, that’s what we’re talking about doing. 

General HAWLEY. Senator, I think your question gets to the heart 

of the issue that Congress is going to have to wrestle with as they 

consider these proposals, which is: What kind of a future should we 

prepare our forces for? You cite the timeframe of 25 or 35 years. 

That’s a long time. As my colleagues have said, we’ve never been 

very successful at predicting what kinds of engagements we will 

find ourselves in, 20 or 30 years hence. 

In my view, those 20 remaining B–2s are the only part of the 

bomber force that is likely to be able to penetrate and do the job 

that we expect of this class of weapon systems against any serious 

adversary, 20 or 30 years hence. 

The challenge for Congress, I think, and for DOD, is to balance 

this vision of the future and what kind of adversaries we may face 

against the cost to mitigate that risk. That’s a difficult issue. In my 

view, we are out of balance in the current proposal, and we are underestimating the seriousness of the threats that we might face in 

that timeframe. 

Senator THUNE. My assumption is that if, in fact, this decision 

with regard to the next-generation bomber were to stand, we would 

have to do significant upgrades, probably, to both the B–2 and perhaps the B–1. The Sniper pod that was added to the B–1 has even 

improved the targeting and the capability of that aircraft to provide 

the CAS that you talked about earlier to our troops in places like 

26 

Afghanistan. But, what kind of investments would you expect to 

see in all of our current platforms in light of this announced decision on the next-generation bomber? What is our alternative plan 

to upgrade the existing capabilities that we have? I think what you 

were probably getting at is the stealth capability of the B–2. But, 

are there things that can be done to the B–2 and the B–1 that 

make them capable of survivability into that 25-year timeframe I 

mentioned? 

General HAWLEY. Certainly, there are continuing improvements 

to the B–2, and my understanding is that Congress and the Air 

Force have been together on developing programs to continue to 

modernize the B–2 and the B–1. It’s not that these airplanes aren’t 

going to be useful, it’s just, will they be what we need against a 

very competent adversary? The assumption that I think is underlying many of these decisions is that there isn’t going to be a really 

serious adversary out there; therefore, what we have will be useful 

in the vast majority of contingencies that we’re likely to face. There 

are many things that can be done to make all of those platforms 

more capable and more survivable in some set of circumstances. 

But, if we, as a Nation, believe that we need to be prepared for 

the more difficult challenge of a serious adversary with well-funded 

and well-planned forces, then we need something beyond the current bomber force, and that’s the next-generation bomber that has 

just been put on hold. 

Senator THUNE. Do you think the assumption is that the threat 

matrix that we face in the future is going to consist more of a lowend asymmetric type? The assumption underlying this recommendation, if we are going to have a high-end conflict/threat out 

there in the future, would seem to make a pretty compelling argument for at least the development of this next capability. So, is 

your view that the assumption that is being made is that we aren’t 

going to need that type of capability because the threat’s not going 

to require it? 

General HAWLEY. Yes, sir. In my view, these decisions reflect an 

assumption that anticipates an outcome of a QDR and a national 

review of our strategies that forecasts a future in which we will 

have few, if any, adversaries who are near peer or can field nearpeer forces. 

Senator THUNE. How does that square with the well-documented 

belief that countries like China are developing more sophisticated 

air defense systems? It just seems to me that if you look out there 

in the future, and I think most of our combatant commanders 

would tell you the same thing, that we’re going to need this longrange strike, because some countries are developing air defenses 

that are much more sophisticated than anything that we’ve encountered in the past, and the ability to penetrate those and to have 

the kind of range and persistence to loiter over targets seems to be 

almost a given. I guess I’m trying to figure out where are the recommendations coming from, based on what I think most people see 

over the horizon. 

General HAWLEY. You probably have access to even better intelligence than I do on where some of these nations are going with 

the forces they’re developing. So, let me share a little experience 

with you from my past. Vietnam was the theater in which I was 

27 

a participant, and I would just remind the committee that in Vietnam we faced a third-rate adversary fielding an air force of about 

200 airplanes at any given time, and we lost over 2,200 fixed-wing 

airplanes in that contest. 

If you go into one of these fights unprepared, you are going to 

suffer horrendous losses. We suffered horrendous losses in Vietnam, and we did so because we went into that fight ill-prepared, 

ill-equipped, and ill-trained. As a result, we wound up with a lot 

of good people who were held as prisoners of war for a long period 

of time. My fear is that we are so confident of a future absent a 

serious adversary who is willing to either field those kinds of 

forces, or sell them to someone else who we wind up being engaged 

with, that we’ll pay that kind of price again. 

Senator THUNE. Mr. Watts, anything to add in that discussion? 

Mr. WATTS. To go back to your earlier question, which was, ‘‘Do 

you think the existing bomber force can be confidently relied upon 

to carry us through the next 20 or 30 years?’’, my answer would 

be no, I don’t think so. 

Senator THUNE. Okay. My time is up, thank you. 

Senator HAGAN [presiding]. I know we all need to scoot and vote 

in a minute, but I did want to ask a question along the same line. 

I agree with Secretary Gates’ insight to leverage the capabilities 

that are conducive to our ever-changing operational environment; 

specifically, counterinsurgency operations, the high- and low-intensity asymmetric warfare, and the other types of irregular warfare. 

We need to continue to augment ground operations with effective 

air support, unmanned aerial and ground vehicles, and reconnaissance capabilities that are flexible to conduct across the full spectrum of operations. 

General Hawley, going forward, what air platforms do you think 

are best suited for the operational requirements that we’re talking 

about, now and in the future? 

General HAWLEY. You need a range of platforms, in my view. We 

have always fielded a mix in forces with capabilities to allow us to 

accomplish our missions in a variety of scenarios. We’ve never had 

the luxury of saying, ‘‘We’re only going to fight one kind of war.’’ 

So, we’ve fielded a mix of systems, and I think we should field a 

mix of systems, going forward. We need some that are optimized 

for that ground fight, Air Force support of the ground fight, which 

is the role I played as a forward air controller in Vietnam. That’s 

the role of the A–10 today. That’s what we buy Predator airplanes 

for, in order to provide the forces on the ground with that staring 

view of the target that has proven so valuable in the current fights. 

Then you need another set of capabilities to guard against the war 

that you hopefully want to deter. 

I would put a high premium on conventional deterrents. I think 

we’re in a pretty good place today. We’ve been through the years 

when we were threatened with nuclear annihilation. We are now 

at a point where no serious country is willing to take on our military, because of our dominant conventional capabilities. The only 

people who can threaten us are terrorists on the ground with roadside bombs. In my view, that’s a pretty good place to be. I’d like 

to not reverse our course and get back to the point where people 

28 

are willing to take us on in a conventional fight, because that’s the 

most expensive kind of fight we can get into. 

Senator HAGAN. Mr. Watts and Mr. Bolkcom, any thoughts? 

Mr. BOLKCOM. I agree with the General. We clearly want to field 

a range of forces. I want to point out, relative to the conversation 

we just had about bombers, I think the important thing is replacing the capability, augmenting the capability, sustaining the capability, and not necessarily a particular platform. We do tend to forget about the Navy in these sorts of discussions. I don’t understand 

why we aren’t seriously looking at a long-range naval-based airplane. Bombers fly from this great sanctuary called the United 

States. Fighters are vulnerable, as we heard this morning in the 

full committee, to this anti-access threat. Certainly, carriers may 

be vulnerable as well, but they have the freedom of movement and 

standoff. 

As we think about long-range airplanes, one advantage of a longrange naval aircraft is a higher sortie generation rate than flying 

all the way from the contiguous United States to combat. 

So, I’m not advocating that, but just trying to plant the seed in 

your mind as we think about these long-range standoff anti-access 

capabilities, it’s not necessarily just fighters versus bombers, but 

maybe fighters and bombers and carrier-based aviation. 

Mr. WATTS. If I could just add to that, Steve Kosiak, one of my 

CSBA colleagues, and myself looked at the JSF, in particular, a few 

years ago, and with respect to the carrier version or the carrier 

variant, it really wasn’t going to extend the legs off the deck of the 

strike capability by adding an F–35. Something like that in the Unmanned Combat Air Systems program looked very attractive to me 

on the ground, so that if you could get 1,500 nautical miles out and 

back, as opposed to 500. That would preserve the value of those 

large aircraft carriers and all of the supporting ships that go with 

it a lot more than just fielding another short-range fighter that’s 

more low-observable, certainly, than the FA–18E/F. 

So, there are clearly options on the Navy side that could be very 

usefully explored. 

Senator HAGAN. Thank you. 

Senator LIEBERMAN [presiding]. Thanks, Senator Hagan. 

That worked well. I’ll proceed until someone else comes back. 

General Hawley, you made a very strong case against the recommendations to basically terminate production of the F–22s and 

the C–17s. It seemed to me that you were making two big points. 

First, is that those recommendations are not supported by the 

analysis presented. Second, it would be more advisable to wait 

until the QDR was completed before making those judgments. Go 

back, if you would, and just spend a little more time making the 

case that there’s not really analysis that Secretary Gates presented, at least on April 6, that supports the termination of the 

production of the F–22 and C–17. 

General HAWLEY. Yes, sir. As I told you, I participated in the 

original analysis that arrived at the 381 figure; 381 is the number 

that would equip 10 squadrons with 24 airplanes each, and it 

would provide a sufficient force to deploy for 2 nearly simultaneous 

major contingencies where we faced an adversary with a significant 

29 

air-to-air and surface-to-air capability. That was the threat that we 

were supposed to plan for at the time. 

Since that time, there have been a lot of studies that looked at 

how many F–22s we needed. I know the committee is aware of 

many of them. I think the most recent one was done by W.W. 

Brown; and I believe that number came out at 260. Clearly, that’s 

less than my 381 number, but they had different assumptions. As 

the Chairman knows, the outcome of any study is dependent upon 

the assumptions upon which it was undertaken. But the lowest 

number, that I’m aware of, that anyone has arrived at through serious threat-based analysis is 260, well in excess of the 187 that 

we’re being asked to accept. 

That’s why I say there is no analytical underpinning to the number. As you say, I think it preempts any subsequent analysis that 

will be done in support of the QDR, which is just beginning, for delivery to Congress about this time next year. So, we’re making an 

irrevocable decision in advance of the analysis that Congress requires DOD to undertake each 4 years in order to support our ongoing strategy for the new administration, and it occurs in advance 

of what I’m sure will occur over the next number of months as the 

new administration’s review of our National Security Strategy and 

the supporting National Defense Strategy and National Military 

Strategy. To make an irrevocable decision which does not rest on 

any known analysis appears to me to be imprudent. It would be 

prudent to continue production and give ourselves the option to 

make that decision a year hence, when it will be much better informed by both analysis and a new strategic formulation. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Do you assume, in light of what you’ve just 

said, that the decision on the F–22 and C–17 were really made for 

budgetary reasons? 

General HAWLEY. I do think that’s a major part of it, that there 

was a budget ceiling that people had to live within. Of course, 

we’ve all been part of that drill. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Right. 

General HAWLEY. I certainly have. But, I do think there’s a little 

more to it. I think there’s also an issue involved in these escalating 

prices for all the things we buy, our acquisition problems, where 

we have encountered a total failure to be able to develop and deliver weapon systems on time, within budget. I think DOD has concluded that, in order to make the F–35 affordable to three Services, 

it must be produced in large quantities, and that every F–22 that 

we buy is an F–35 or so that we won’t buy, and that that will increase the unit cost. So I think we’re sacrificing operational capability for acquisition efficiency. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you. I have more questions, but I 

welcome Senator Chambliss back, and I call on him at this time. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. I kind of like that line of questioning you 

were on, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. I just was setting it up for you. [Laughter.] 

Senator CHAMBLISS. General Hawley, what priority would you 

give to the ability of the United States Air Force to maintain air 

superiority and air dominance for our ground troops? 

General HAWLEY. Given my background, I’m probably biased, 

but, in my view, it is the top requirement for the Air Force. It is 

30 

the first thing that the Air Force is asked to do for the Joint Forces 

Commander. In any contest that we were involved in, in my Active 

Duty career or since, the first things that are required to go forward are air superiority platforms. The last time we faced an adversary where we thought we might encounter a serious air-to-air 

threat, I was in the Pentagon as the Deputy Director for Operations. The first platforms we sent forward were F–15s, which were 

only capable of air superiority. Why? Because that’s what the Joint 

Forces Commander asked for. Central Command Commander 

wanted to make sure that he could defend his airspace. 

So, it is the highest-priority mission that the Air Force can do 

for Joint Forces Command. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Has the F–22 been pointed to, over the last 

decade, as the next-generation fighter that was going to allow us 

to maintain air dominance and air superiority? 

General HAWLEY. People call the F–22 program a Cold War relic. 

The program began in 1991, coincident with the first Gulf War and 

after the collapse of the Soviet Union. DOD and Congress supported development fielding of this program throughout the postCold War period. It is the platform that was designed to assure 

this country’s ability to provide air superiority over any battlefield, 

and it is the envy of every air force in the world, at this point in 

time. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Was not the JSF intended to complement 

the F–22, rather than replace the F–22? 

General HAWLEY. I was also involved in the decisions to design 

the F–35 and establish its requirements, and that’s exactly right, 

sir. The F–35 was conceived as a complementary system to the

F–22, with the F–22 providing the capabilities to ensure that the 

F–35 could penetrate, survive, accomplish its mission, and return 

to base. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Mr. Watts, you’re a former fighter pilot. You 

were PA&E in, I guess, 2000, when you left there? 

Mr. WATTS. It was 2002, sir. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Excuse me, 2002. That was the point in time 

when the F–22 buy was set at 183. Do you know of any analytical 

reason that that 183 number was arrived at then, or was it purely 

budget-driven? 

Mr. WATTS. My understanding was that it was purely budgetdriven. The Air Force was essentially told, ‘‘Given the cap on the 

program, the total acquisition program, you can produce as many 

as you can under that cap.’’ Early on, they thought they were going 

to get a lot more, up in the 220 range, but it’s turned out to be 187. 

So, yes, sir, it had nothing to do with requirements. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Okay. 

General Hawley, do you know of anything, based upon your contact with DOD during your years on Active Duty, which I understand ended around 1999, but you’ve remained in close contact 

with the Pentagon since that time; has there been any discussion 

or confirmation, from an analytical standpoint, with reference to 

arriving at the military requirement of 183 aircraft, now 187, for 

the F–22? 

General HAWLEY. No, sir. 

31 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Now there appears to be another budgetdriven question about the termination of the line. Is it not normal 

to have some analysis for terminating a line, versus deciding to terminate the line and then do your analysis after the fact, which appears to be what the Secretary is doing here? 

General HAWLEY. In my experience, when we have terminated a 

production line, it has always been the result of some kind of analysis. Seldom has it been purely a budget-driven decision. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Are you familiar with the Secretary of the 

Air Force’s continual statement over the last several weeks and 

months that the new military requirement for the F–22 is 243? 

General HAWLEY. Yes, I am. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Do you know of any analysis that went into 

arriving at that number? 

General HAWLEY. I know that the Air Force arrived at that number because they thought they could support the current strategy 

with 243 airplanes at a moderate risk level, as the current chief 

of staff has described, but it provides no attrition reserve capability. So, over time, that capability would erode to a high-risk 

force. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Dr. John Hamre, whom all of you know, testified this morning in another hearing that with a contingent of 

187 F–22s, by the time you take out planes for testing, by the time 

you consider planes that are in depot maintenance, you’re going to 

wind up with combat-coded airplanes roughly in the range of 125 

to 135. Is that a fair assessment, General Hawley and Mr. Watts? 

General HAWLEY. The formula for sizing the force is, it takes 

about 100 airplanes to field a wing of 72 operational airplanes, so 

that’s a pretty close number. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Okay. He also said that, over the course of 

the next 30 years for which this plane is going to be called on to 

give us air superiority and air dominance, we’re going to lose about 

a plane a year. That’s the norm that you can expect. So, we’re looking at, long-term, having somewhere around 100 F–22s that are 

going to be combat-coded, that are going to be expected to fill the 

role within the air expeditionary units. What kind of risk is that 

going to place us in? 

General HAWLEY. In my view, it’s a high risk. Given that that’s 

likely the number, about 100, we must understand that you never 

are able to deploy all of those airplanes. In my experience, you 

shouldn’t expect to be able to have more than about 75 percent of 

that force available in a surge basis to support a combatant commander who faces a serious threat. So, it’s even less than 100. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Okay. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you very much, Senator Chambliss. 

Good line of questioning. 

Senator Burris, welcome back. Do you want to proceed now? 

Senator BURRIS. Give me a couple of minutes, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. I had a few minutes left over, so I’m going 

to tide over. 

Let me approach this F–22 decision from this point of view. 

We’ve been talking the terms that insiders, people who live with 

this, talk about whether this is a wise decision, to terminate the 

32 

line, or not. But, I think, in terms of the large canvas and the 

broad paintbrush, the explanation given, or at least heard from 

Secretary Gates’ decision, was put in the larger context of we have 

to support the fight we’re in. The fight we’re in is irregular, it’s a 

hybrid, we can’t do everything, and we have some pretty good tactical air fighters, and we have the F–35 coming on. The F–22 isn’t 

really related to the hybrid fight. Give me your reaction to that. 

Maybe we’ll start that argument, Mr. Watts. In a sense, we’ve 

touched on it, but I wanted to just clarify and ask you to respond. 

Mr. WATTS. A comment that has circulated around Washington 

about the F–22 is, ‘‘Well, we haven’t deployed it in any of the current fights.’’ 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Right. 

Mr. WATTS. The implication is, that shows that it just is irrelevant to the current fight. But, I don’t think we’re building it to deal 

with nonexistent air forces in Afghanistan, for example. I think 

we’re looking further downstream into the future, at emerging 

threats. There was an Air Force exercise called Cope India, a few 

years back, where we took some of our better F–15s out there to 

do some training against the Indians and discovered that they had 

taken some older Soviet airplanes, made some local improvements 

to them that were very effective, and they had really trained their 

pilots up to a very high level of proficiency. My impression—I’m 

sure General Hawley could add to this—was that we were surprised at how good they turned out to be in that particular exercise. It’s those higher-end problems that I think we ought to be 

thinking about and focusing on when we discuss both the F–22 and 

the F–35. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Is it an investment we are making now primarily against the rise of a high-end or major peer competitor like 

China or a resurgent Russia? 

Mr. WATTS. The Russians have done an awful lot to incrementally improve the Flanker over the years, and it’s a fairly formidable adversary, right now, today if you had to face it. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. General Hawley, how about this, fit the

F–22 decision into what seems to be the overview that Secretary 

Gates presented us about the budget recommendations he made. 

General HAWLEY. It’s clear that the F–22 isn’t going to be very 

useful in an irregular-warfare fight. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Right. 

General HAWLEY. But, while we’re in the irregular-warfare fight, 

we also need to maintain our deterrent posture to make sure that 

somebody doesn’t take advantage of our preoccupation with that 

fight to threaten our interests elsewhere. That’s where the F–22 

comes into play. By the way, the F–22 isn’t the only thing we buy 

that isn’t suitable or tailored to an irregular fight; there are lots 

of other things, as well. We need those things to make sure that 

we continue to maintain a credible deterrent posture to keep people 

from taking advantage of us when we’re preoccupied with situations like Iraq and Afghanistan. 

We are a global power, and we have global interests, and that 

means we have global vulnerabilities. These investments in systems like the F–22, in my view, are investments in deterrents, just 

like we invested in our nuclear capabilities throughout the Cold 

33 

War that successfully deterred adversaries from ever attacking us 

with nuclear weapons or engaging our interests with nuclear weapons around the globe. It is the same equation. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Mr. Bolkcom, do you want to get into this? 

Mr. BOLKCOM. Yes, sir, I’d love to, thank you. I think that, in 

terms of the risk question and trying to keep it at a big-picture 

level, General Hawley outlined what he sees as an operational risk 

of not buying more airplanes. Others share that view. I think there 

are a couple other risks, and actually, Senator Chambliss touched 

upon one. Another risk is creating another high-demand/low-density asset. If we have only 100-odd of these airplanes, do they become another very expensive aircraft to operate and maintain? The 

Air Force is trying to avoid small fleets of expensive airplanes. 

This morning we heard at the full committee, another risk, as 

Dr. Krepinevich sees it, of wasting assets. On the other side of the 

equation, do you potentially risk buying more airplanes that are 

overdesigned for the threats you face? He saw that as, potentially, 

a strategic risk. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you. 

Senator Burris. 

Senator BURRIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

General Hawley, are you also saying that we should not complete 

the C–17? 

General HAWLEY. To the contrary, I think that the C–17 requirement, as stated, which is 205 aircraft, may be based on an outdated analysis. The analysis that came to the 205 number predates 

the currently planned expansion of both the Army and the Marine 

Corps. I find it hard to believe that, with a far bigger Army and 

Marine Corps to deploy and sustain, that wouldn’t affect the outcome of a mobility requirements study; and hence, the 205 number 

is probably very conservative. 

Senator BURRIS. I was down at Scott Air Force Base, are you familiar with that? 

General HAWLEY. I am very familiar with Scott Air Force Base. 

Senator BURRIS. It was a little, small country town, a suburb of 

my hometowns of Centralia and Belleville, IL, just by way of fun. 

It was just a little Air Force landing field. I went down to Scott 

Air Force Base the other day, and it is a major development down 

there. So, were you ever at Central Command (CENTCOM) down 

at Scott? 

General HAWLEY. I have visited Scott. I’ve spent time with the 

commanders at Scott. I’ve also flown the C–17. I took delivery of 

a C–17 at Long Beach and flew it to Charleston, some years ago. 

It is a marvelous airplane. 

Senator BURRIS. It’s a major expansion, Mr. Chairman. We’re so 

pleased to see what they’re doing. General McNabb is down there 

as commander for U.S. Transportation Command (TRANSCOM), 

and, I tell you, I had a great experience in visiting that base and 

looking at the expansion that’s going on there, and I hope there’s 

something in the budget to keep Scott up and running. I haven’t 

seen all of the budget, but we have to make sure that Air Force 

operation stays there because that’s where all the sorties have 

flown from for TRANSCOM, coming out of there. 

General HAWLEY. Right. 

34 

Senator BURRIS. I want to ask a question to Mr. Bolkcom, in your 

opinion, should we be using some of our other threats as baseline 

for the design or for our defense posture? There is concern that 

military aviation is focused too much on the demand of our fighting 

conventional forces, is that a problem? 

Mr. BOLKCOM. Sir, I think that what Secretary Gates is trying 

to do is position our current and future military, as he sees it, 

against the threat environment, as he sees it. He makes it clear he 

sees it as a spectrum of simultaneous threats that require rebalancing, potentially away from conventional state-on-state conflict 

towards more irregular conflicts. So, I think that is a clear direction by the Secretary. 

Senator BURRIS. Would any of that include this high-tech-type 

warfare that we’re moving to? Is that where we’re headed now, to 

a technological warfare arrangement? 

Mr. BOLKCOM. Sir, I think that’s not a bad way of phrasing it. 

The proliferation of off-the-shelf commercial technology, like GPS 

and cell phones and the like, make unmanned aerial vehicles 

(UAVs) accessible, not only to state actors, but also paramilitary 

groups like Hamas. As General Hawley pointed out, we’ve driven 

even our state actors away from fighting us force-on-force, and 

they’re resorting to anti-access sort of threats, trying to keep us 

out, which oftentimes might include systems like you’re describing. 

Senator BURRIS. So, are we to start budgeting? Are any of those 

requests in this 2010 budget that we’re looking at? 

Mr. BOLKCOM. I think all of us are trying to extrapolate with 

very little information, but I think the tea leaves suggest what Secretary Gates called a rebalancing towards some of these irregular 

capabilities. 

Senator BURRIS. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks, Senator Burris. 

We’re a little out of order, but, Senator Begich, you’ve not had 

a chance yet, and then we’ll go back to Senator Thune. 

Senator BEGICH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

If these questions have been answered, I apologize. I’ll start with 

the refuelers. 

There is some discussion of having the air refuelers as kind of 

multi-role aircraft; some call it ‘‘floors and doors and everything 

else included.’’ Can you give me just some comments on that? Are 

we overbuilding for those refuelers? In conjunction with that, under 

Secretary Gates’s proposal, we will not continue adding to the C– 

17s; is it wise then to have these kind of multifaceted facilities, or 

should we be doing the C–17s and have a more streamlined refueler? These are some of the multiple questions around those 

issues. I’ll look to the General and Mr. Bolkcom and Mr. Watts, in 

that order, if you don’t mind. 

General HAWLEY. Our refuelers have always had multiple capabilities. They’ve been able to evacuate medical patients, and they’ve 

been able to carry pilots. To my knowledge, the Air Force has never 

paid a lot for those capabilities; they’re relatively modest add-ons 

to an airplane that is configured and designed to be a refueler. 

They’re valuable capabilities, they’re very useful in some cirVerDate Nov 24 2008 10:01 Dec 23, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00038 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 Y:\BORAWSKI\DOCS\54106.TXT JUNE PsN: JUNEB
35 

cumstances, and they can augment the airlift capabilities that our 

primary designed airlifters, like the C–17 and the C–5, give to us. 

If we constrain our airlift force to 205 C–17s, augmented by the 

surviving C–5s that are going to be modified, then these multi-role 

capabilities of the new tanker, if we ever get a new tanker, will 

probably prove to be very valuable. 

The challenge for our airlift operators has always been to figure 

out the operational concept to use the tankers’ multi-role capabilities for those medical evacuation or airlift purposes. But, the current commander at Scott says that they’re working on that, they 

know how to do it, and they want these tankers to have those 

multi-role capabilities so that they’ll be there to augment their airlift capability. 

Senator BEGICH. But it shouldn’t be a substitute for C–17s. 

General HAWLEY. It is not envisioned to be a substitute; it is 

strictly a complement, a reserve capability, if you will, when you’re 

operating in extremis, and your C–17 and C–5 capabilities are completely committed elsewhere. 

Senator BEGICH. Okay. 

Mr. BOLKCOM. I’d echo almost everything I just heard. They are 

different platforms. The C–17 and C–5 provide an outsize/oversize 

carrying capability for oddly shaped, large things we need, like helicopters or small artillery pieces, or even a tank. There’s no way 

anything else is going to carry that but the C–17 or the C–5. So, 

our aerial refueling capabilities provide a great augment, as the 

General just mentioned. I think it’s on the order of about 3 percent 

of our organic million-ton-mile-per-day capability, so it’s a twofer, 

and it makes sense. 

One thing I just want to point out, and I think the General made 

this point, about expanding the Army and the Marine Corps, and 

how that could put increasing stress on our C–17 force. I think that 

makes a lot of intuitive sense, except I would like to point out that 

I don’t think the purpose of increasing our ground forces is because 

we want to deploy more of them faster, but to relieve the personnel 

tempo by creating a larger pool of these foot soldiers who need to 

deploy. So, I don’t think the operations plans have changed. I don’t 

think that we are planning now, because of the growth of the Marines and the Army, to get them there faster. But, that might be 

something worth looking into. 

Senator BEGICH. Thank you. 

Mr. Watts, do you have anything to add to this? 

Mr. WATTS. The only comment I’ll make is Jim Roche, who was 

Secretary of the Air Force from 2001 into early 2005, is a former 

colleague and a long-time friend, and, while he was Secretary of 

the Air Force, one of his recurring nightmares was, ‘‘What if I have 

to ground the C–135 fleet or the KC–135 fleet?’’ All the Services 

depend on that air-refueling capability. So, I guess I’m less concerned with the additional capabilities you might get with those 

platforms than the fact that, over the last decade, we have not 

started recapitalizing the tanker fleet. I really just think that’s an 

important issue. 

Senator BEGICH. On the issue of the refuelers and the whole idea 

of split purchasing; any feedback that you want to give on that? 

36 

I’ll start with Mr. Bolkcom, because he looked anxious, it was 

like a test; he pulled out his pen, he’s already writing the answer. 

So, you’re first. 

Mr. BOLKCOM. Thank you, Senator. 

The administration has been pretty consistent that they’re 

against a split buy. The argument against a split buy is that it 

costs more money upfront. You may get savings down the road 

through competition. But, you definitely will incur more operations 

and support costs by fielding a heterogeneous fleet with two different kinds of airplanes. 

I have heard some interesting arguments for a split buy. One, of 

course, is potentially an industrial-base issue. 

Senator BEGICH. You mean in preserving the industrial base? 

Mr. BOLKCOM. Yes, sir. 

Senator BEGICH. Okay. 

Mr. BOLKCOM. I think maybe an argument with a little more 

traction is that, ‘‘Well, if you’re in a hurry, you can have two lines 

running and procure them faster that way.’’ CRS doesn’t take a position, of course, but those are some of the arguments. 

Senator BEGICH. The arguments. 

Mr. BOLKCOM. Yes, sir. 

Senator BEGICH. General? 

General HAWLEY. We’ve operated a multiple number of tankers 

for a long time in the strategic role. We have the KC–10 and the 

KC–135. The Air Force’s tanker plan is to eventually repeat that. 

They envision this current round of competition to fill the kind of 

medium-sized tanker with a subsequent buy, later on, of another 

kind of tanker, which would do the KC–10 end of that mission. So, 

there are multiples already. Most of these things are maintained 

under contract or logistics support, so I don’t think the argument 

that they’re going to cost more to support holds a lot of water, because mostly we just use the existing support capabilities that 

these things are capable of in their commercial variants. Both of 

them have commercial variants. 

To me, the argument for a split buy is merely, ‘‘Hey, we need to 

get on with this.’’ There seems to be a political obstacle to getting 

a tanker in the field, and this would allow us to get past that political obstruction and begin to build anything, the warfighter needs 

these things, and they need them now. Our tankers are 50 years 

old. They’ll be 75 or 80 years old before we get to retire them, even 

if we start building a tanker today. 

The downside of a split buy is that it requires you to fund two 

lines of production over a long period of time, and that’s a lot of 

money each year, because there’s a minimum production quantity. 

That would require a commitment from DOD and Congress to 

maintain that kind of funding support to buy 25 up to maybe 30 

tankers a year in order to maintain the 2 production lines. I think 

that would be the biggest challenge. 

Senator BEGICH. Thank you very much. 

I’ve run out of time, but if you have a very quick comment? 

Mr. WATTS. No, sir. 

Senator BEGICH. Thank you very much. Thanks for your answers. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you, Senator Begich. 

37 

Senator Thune, back to you. 

Senator THUNE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Let me ask a little bit about fighters. In a limited defense budget, would buying more quantities of legacy aircraft, such as your 

F/A–18s, F–15s, and F–16s help mitigate a strike fighter shortfall 

in our tactical aviation wings? 

General HAWLEY. As you might expect, during my time on Active 

Duty, particularly as Air Combat Command Commander, we examined that a lot. I think, if we had addressed this question 10 or 15 

years ago, the answer might be yes. Today, I think it’s no. We’re 

too far down the road. The F–35 is going to be a great airplane for 

all three Services. I think it would be a serious mistake to undercut 

that program by trying to fill holes in the forest today with legacy 

airplanes. 

Senator THUNE. They’re retiring F–16s already, though, and 

they’re going to be retiring them at an accelerated rate, here in the 

next few years. F–35s are probably not going to be rolling out soon 

enough to replace those, and we have lots of installations out there 

that are going to be probably missing a mission for a while until 

the F–35s are there to replace the F–16s. I guess that was the context of my question; does that, in your view, not make sense to 

have that kind of bridge between the current technology and the 

legacy aircraft in the next generation with the F–35? 

General HAWLEY. In my view, the problem is that when you buy 

one of these airplanes, you’re going to have it for 30 years, maybe 

40. It’s a very long-term commitment. If we buy three or four or 

five or six squadrons of these things, that means they’re going to 

be in the force in 2050. I don’t think they’re the right airplanes to 

have in the force in 2050. 

Senator THUNE. Mr. Bolkcom? 

Mr. BOLKCOM. Sir, I understand the Air Force and the Navy’s 

calculations for their projected fighter gap. I’ll point out that it’s 

based on some assumptions. One assumption is that we continue 

the current utilization rate of the fighter force. That may or may 

not come to pass. Another assumption is that the UAVs that we’re 

buying in large numbers now aren’t included in that mix, when 

they’ve mixed those numbers. If one does believe that Reapers and 

Predators provide some air-to-ground capability that would otherwise be provided by fighters, perhaps the gap would be a little less. 

That said, I agree with what the General said about the length 

of time in the fleet. I’ll just point out that the fighters we fly today 

tend not to have active electronically scanned array (AESA) radars, 

joint helmet-mounted queuing systems, and some of the latest-generation countermeasures. Certainly, adding those to some already 

very good platforms would increase capabilities. 

Senator THUNE. Digressing, for a moment, to the next-generation 

bomber; I had an extensive discussion with General Hawley about 

that but Mr. Watts, you’ve written extensively on that subject, 

about the need to develop a long-range strike capability. If I could 

get you to give your take on the direction that the President wants 

to take on that next generation bomber capability. You mentioned 

that you didn’t think that the current generation of bombers could 

fill that 25-year timeframe we talked about earlier. But, maybe just 

your view of why they are coming to the conclusions and making 

38 

the assumptions they are about delaying the development of this 

new aircraft. 

Mr. WATTS. My impression is that there is still considerable disagreement about whether to go forward, particularly within portions of OSD. If I think back about a lot of the studies that have 

been done over the last decade, there seems to be, on the part of 

some involved in thinking through what you might really wish to 

develop and procure, a tendency to get mesmerized by technology 

promises further out on the horizon. 

My focus, to go back to the beginning, is that those 20 platforms 

you have left—the B–2 force—it’s just hard for me to believe that 

those are going to satisfy, in the long-term, our requirements to be 

able to hold targets at risk, even in defended airspace, over the 

next 2 to 3 decades. 

You did touch on the issue of things that could be done to improve the existing platforms. I would just add, in the case of the 

B–2, the computational capability onboard the airplane is something that’s been debated back and forth, and that would really 

provide a significant increase in the capability of that airplane. The 

processors that were originally put into the airplane were basically 

286 IBM processors. If you had a 286 laptop and took it to your 

local lending library, and asked them if they wanted it, they 

wouldn’t, because it won’t even run Windows. So, that kind of a capability, which you do see in the JSF is one of the paths in which 

you could really improve the utility of that platform, going forward, 

if you wished. 

Senator THUNE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Again, I want to thank the panel for their great testimony. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks, Senator Thune. 

I have a couple more questions, and if my colleagues, Senator 

Begich or Senator Burris, want to, we can go until about 4 o’clock. 

As I indicated briefly in my opening statement, one of the more 

important developments in recent years has been the demand for 

and capability to provide persistent full-motion video surveillance 

to ground commanders from the air. It’s quite remarkable. Some of 

those systems have not even completed the normal research and 

development cycles, although that’s happened before, remembering 

the contribution that fielding the Joint Surveillance Target Attack 

Radar System (JSTARS) made in the first Persian Gulf War, even 

though that technology had not yet fully completed development at 

the time it as pressed into service. 

I wanted to ask you, are there broader implications from these 

technological developments for the contribution of aviation to irregular warfare? Related to that, are there systems that you think we 

should be developing and fielding that would take greater advantage of the ability to persistently see the battlefield? 

General Hawley? 

General HAWLEY. You mentioned JSTARS. In addition to full-motion video being of great value in the theater, we’re also finding, 

more and more, that the forces on the ground really appreciate the 

ground-moving-target indicator capability and the synthetic aperture radar (SAR) capability, the high-resolution SAR that some of 

these airborne radars, like the JSTARS, can provide. They’re of 

great value, both in the realtime application and in the forensic 

39 

analysis of the product as they try to track down some of these 

bomb layers back to their lairs so that they can get the bombmaker 

rather than just the bombplanter. Those capabilities are extraordinarily valuable to the forces on the ground. 

One thing we could do is continue to modernize these wide-area 

surveillance platforms, the JSTARS being the primary one in our 

inventory today, although the Navy has some very capable platforms, as well, with upgraded radars and sensors, communications, 

and that onboard computational power that Barry mentioned for 

the B–2, because these modern radars, the AESA radars that are 

now available, form the heart of the F–22 and the F–35. Those 

same technologies hold great promise to provide enhanced capability for our forces on the ground in these areas of high-resolution 

SAR, not only for the take that provides, both the ground-moving 

target indicator and the radar pictures that they provide, but also 

the ability to increase and gain leverage from these other systems 

that look at a much smaller area, like the Predator, because you 

can provide that broader situational awareness so that they can be 

better targeted. 

So, that is an area where I think we could focus. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Good. 

Mr. Bolkcom, do you want get into that one? 

Mr. BOLKCOM. Thank you, sir. 

The one thing I’d like to add is, over time, in conventional stateon-state conflict, we have seen some friction between the Army and 

the Air Force over some aviation capabilities. CAS is one area 

where there has been some friction. What I see is, when we need 

to engage these nonstate actors, irregular forces, oftentimes the observe, orient, decide, and act loop is very tight and compressed. I 

see the Army moving pretty aggressively towards fielding their own 

UAVs that are organic to their small units, that they can control, 

and that they can use all the time; they don’t have to wait for an 

air tasking order. I don’t know yet how much encroachment or friction we’ll see with the Air Force, who likes to control some of the 

larger UAVs, but I see that a potential area where Congress might 

want to keep an eye on that. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Okay, thank you. 

Mr. Watts? 

Mr. WATTS. I certainly support what General Hawley said on the 

growing utility of these systems. It really does hinge increasingly 

on, for example, AESA radars and things of that sort, and the ability to pull the information into central command-and-control facilities so you can really integrate it. 

We have come a long way over the last decades. Indeed, the use 

of UAVs for surveillance and persistent reconnaissance is really 

one of the areas in which you could argue Dr. Krepinevich’s revolution in military affairs. The Services really have gone forward fairly smartly and done what needed to be done. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. I agree. We were talking earlier about how 

you can’t predict what the next generation of conflict is going to be; 

where the enemy’s going to be, or the nature of conflict. But, obviously it was not so long ago, in the 1990s, when some people were 

saying that all we needed was air power to win wars, right? I know 

that none of you, at this table, would say that. It was an overstateVerDate Nov 24 2008 10:01 Dec 23, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00043 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 Y:\BORAWSKI\DOCS\54106.TXT JUNE PsN: JUNEB
40 

ment. Now, of course, there’s a danger that people will say, ‘‘Oh, 

this is all boots-on-the-ground.’’ But the truth is that it really is 

joint warfighting. 

I can tell you, just having heard your answer to this last question, General, a couple of us went down to visit General Petraeus 

in Tampa, CENTCOM, just for a whole review of his area of responsibility. He went back and showed us a fascinating diagram of 

the battle for Sadr City and the different elements that were involved; U.S. ground forces, Iraqi ground forces. It was quite fascinating to see. Overhead, there was the JSTARS aircraft, and 

there were some drones there, too, that played a very critical role 

in a remarkably diverse series of assets that achieved a great victory for us. 

So, I don’t know if you want to comment on that. 

General HAWLEY. Well, it is. It wasn’t just Fallujah, but it’s increasing since Fallujah, the ground forces’ reliance on these systems, because it gives them the thing that, as a fighter pilot, I 

craved most, which was situational awareness. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Right. 

General HAWLEY. It’s hard to appreciate how valuable it is to 

know what’s going on around you. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Right. 

General HAWLEY. These systems give those troops on the ground 

the ability to have situational awareness about what’s going 

around, who’s moving where, and in the forensic sense, who moved 

where, so that they can then go do their job better on the ground 

and eliminate some of these threats to the civilian populations that 

we’re trying to protect, and to our own forces. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Yes. 

I agree. I think, too, probably one of the more prominent conclusions today, and I think you made the case well, is the role of the 

long-range strike forces in irregular warfare, larger than most people would intuitively think. Then, of course, this tremendous role 

of ISR on aircraft in the irregular wars that we’re fighting now. 

Senator Begich, that’s all that I have. 

Senator BEGICH. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I have 

one other area. Let me make sure I do this right. 

I’m going to have to flip back and forth between the report, Mr. 

Bolkcom, that you had prepared and determined that it’s the Joint 

Striker Fighter, the F136 alternative engine. I’m a new member, so 

I don’t know if I’m enjoying the reading or finding it interesting, 

but in this one I’m trying to figure out on the F135, which is the 

replacement that’s been selected by DOD, from your review, is that 

engine capable of doing everything we need, as the replacement? 

Then it’s going to lead to a couple more questions, so I want to kind 

of prepare you. So, keep that answer simple so I can go to the next. 

Mr. BOLKCOM. The answer is yes. 

Senator BEGICH. Okay. Thank you. 

Now, I’m going to lay out what I think I understand of the facts, 

and correct me if I’m wrong, then again it leads to questions. The 

F136, back in 1996 or 1997, Congress said, ‘‘We want to have an 

alternative, we want to have some competition.’’ They funded some 

development, over $2.5 billion. DOD’s never been a big fan of that, 

but it’s been in there to create another alternative. Now DOD has 

41 

made the decision that we’re going with the F135, but we’ve now 

invested in this alternative. Is it fair to say that when you add alternatives or you have competition like this, of two engines that 

have the capacity to do the job, isn’t it going to drive down the 

price? What was Congress’s original purpose in 1996? Wasn’t that 

part of it? 

Mr. BOLKCOM. Yes, sir. There’s a number of arguments for the 

engine. One is the idea that if the fleet is grounded because of a 

problem with one engine, you have another. That may or may not 

be a strong argument, in one’s mind. But the economic argument 

has to be the dominating one. You hope, over time, you will recoup 

the savings of your upfront investment. There’s been a number of 

analyses done about how many engines we’re going to buy and how 

much the upfront investment is going to be, how much we’re going 

to save through this competition, and all these thing depend on exactly how we couch the competition. Is it just for procurement only, 

or, as in the Great Engine War, as they call it, do you also compete 

the operations and support contracts? 

So, a lot of it has to do with how you orchestrate this competition. 

Senator BEGICH. What’s the predominant future utilization of 

which engine type by the Europeans and our allies? 

Mr. BOLKCOM. I don’t know if I can answer that authoritatively. 

I believe, as the only engine that’s part of the program of record, 

they plan on acquiring the F135. 

Senator BEGICH. I’m interested in what they’re planning now, 

but what they’re really planning into the future. 

These are my words, so you can acknowledge them or just ignore 

them, but the way I read this is, Congress set a course of competition; DOD didn’t do it. They did all the money for planning. They 

basically said to Congress, ‘‘We’re doing that. We’re doing that research.’’ But, at the end of the day, they stuck with the F135 without even competing the development of it or the building of it. Is 

that how I read your report, or am I missing something? 

Mr. BOLKCOM. No, sir. I think that’s exactly the rub. I think it’s 

the law that they fund this airplane with funds that are appropriated, and they have not requested that money over the last couple of fiscal years. 

Senator BEGICH. Okay. 

I’ll leave it at that, only to say thank you. It’s a very interesting 

read, and I guess, Mr. Chairman, that’s one before my time. You 

were here in those years, and I’m just thinking it seems that, at 

some point, the competition would make so much sense, especially 

on a simple engine design. I say simple, and it’s not simple. But, 

I mean in the sense that it’s an engine, especially when Congress 

gave direction, not just 1 year, because they authorized money 

throughout the process. It’s not just a 1-year quirk; it’s a multipleyear desire by Congress. It just seems odd that they would just ignore that and do what they want to do. 

So, I’ll just leave that. But, I appreciate the information. This is 

very good information for me. Thank you very much. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you, Senator Begich. 

42 

Thank you, gentlemen. I want to mention that Senator Bill Nelson came in and he left two questions. One, we really covered, 

which is a comment on your current state of technology maturity, 

need, and requirement for long-range bombers. Second, he talks 

about the fact that bomber aircraft are the only recallable nuclear 

capability. Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles and SubmarineLaunched Ballistic Missiles when launched, cannot be recalled, and 

he wanted a comment on that issue, and, generally, your views on 

maintaining a nuclear-capable bomber. 

If it’s okay with you, I think we’ll submit that formally to you, 

General Hawley and Mr. Watts, and ask for a short statement, in 

writing, which we’ll add to the record. 

[The information referred to follows:] 

General HAWLEY. The concept of a nuclear deterrent force based on a triad of 

Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs), Submarine-Launched Ballistic Missiles 

(SLBMs), and manned bombers has been one of the most enduring and successful 

strategies ever developed for our Nation’s defense. When combined in a balanced 

way, the unique characteristics of each leg of this deterrent triad make it nearly 

impossible for any adversary to launch a nuclear attack on the United States without suffering from a disabling retaliatory strike. The manned bomber contributes 

several unique capabilities to this triad, one of which is the ability to be recalled 

after launch. Bombers can also be placed on various levels of alert, to include airborne alert, an attribute that proved of enormous value during diplomatic confrontations with the former Soviet Union. Bombers are also able to locate and attack mobile or movable targets, an attribute that may be of growing importance when dealing with emerging threats such as those posed by a nuclear armed Iran or North 

Korea. Department of Defense proposals regarding development of a next-generation 

bomber are likely to be heavily influenced by the outcome of strategic arms limitation discussions with Russia. Should those discussions result in a significant reduction in our nuclear warhead inventories, there may be no requirement for a nuclear 

delivery capability in a next-generation bomber, so long as the B–2 continues to be 

sustained and modernized. 

Mr. WATTS. The most obvious situation would be nuclear strike. ICBMs and 

SLBMs are not recallable, whereas with a manned bomber the President could call 

off the strike within the last few minutes. The additional time that would be provided for a change of mind is, of course, limited. For an ICBM it would be a maximum of 20–25 minutes. But in the latest Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments bomber paper, I argued that these few minutes might be psychologically 

desirable even if the extra decision time they might buy the President is actually 

quite limited. 

A related observation is that senior military leaders are still reluctant to unleash 

armed robots in the battlespace. That’s why the Air Force insisted on adding a data 

link to the Low Cost Autonomous Attack System, which was a small lethal unmanned aerial vehicles that used laser radar to identify targets and attack them 

on its own with a conventional warhead within a limited area (roughly 50 to 100 

square kilometers depending on the range to the search area). The idea of a robotic 

bomber flying around with a nuclear weapon will probably be even more discomforting and unacceptable to both military and civilian leaders. These reservations 

are cultural and psychological, but they are real nevertheless. 

In the case of an unmanned long-range strike system (LRSS) carrying conventional precision weapons, a data link enabling human operators to tell the system 

whether or not to attack a given target would be highly desirable. Naturally, a lot 

of sensor information from the platform would have to be available before the 

human could make a go/no-go decision. Therefore, even this modest step beyond 

Predator. Reaper, et cetera, would involve vulnerabilities inherent in the data links 

between the remote operator and the vehicle. On the other hand, there would be 

no pilots lost if an unmanned LRSS happened to be shot down. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. I thank you very much. It’s been a very 

helpful hearing, from the subcommittee’s point of view. As I said 

at the outset, I think it will inform our work here on the authorization bill. 

43 

We’ll leave the record of the hearing open for 10 days for additional statements that you may want to submit to the record and 

any questions that any other members of the committee have. 

You’ve done us a real service today, and I thank you for that. 

The hearing is adjourned. 

[Questions for the record with answers supplied follow:] 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY SENATOR SAXBY CHAMBLISS

F–22 AND C–17 PRODUCTION

1. Senator CHAMBLISS. General Hawley, you comment in your written statement 

that, ‘‘Should the President and Congress conclude that our forces should be sized 

to deal with only one contingency where our control of the air is contested, that will 

be an appropriate time to terminate production of the F–22. Until then, the actual 

requirement is for 381 aircraft, not 187 or even 243.’’ Do you agree that both F– 

22 and C–17 production should be continued until the Quadrennial Defense Review 

(QDR) properly analyzes the future requirement for these systems, in light of our 

national security and military strategy? 

General HAWLEY. In my view, ending production of the F–22 and C–17, when coupled with recommendations to terminate programs to modernize our long-range 

strike and combat search and rescue capabilities, and to cancel the second airborne 

laser development aircraft, represent a major change to our national defense strategy. Such major strategic shifts have historically occurred only after a vigorous public debate and with concurrence of Congress in execution of its oversight responsibilities. These decisions do not appear to have been informed by any public debate. 

Instead, they are the product of deliberations conducted entirely within the Department of Defense (DOD) by a small group of senior officials sworn to secrecy. Notably 

absent were those senior military officers currently responsible for executing the affected missions. Moreover, we should not expect the pending QDR to produce an objective analysis Congress can use to judge the wisdom of these changes. It will, after 

all, be guided by the very same officials who developed the recommendations you 

are discussing. Therefore, I hope Congress will seek a much broader range of opinion and analysis than that produced by the QDR as it considers these issues. 

While some of the changes being contemplated could be reversed in time, the option to fully secure our ability to provide air superiority and strategic mobility will 

vanish when the F–22 and C–17 production lines are shut down. Therefore, it seems 

prudent to extend production of both systems until Congress and the public have 

had an opportunity to debate the wisdom of these de facto changes to our national 

defense strategy. 

UNMANNED AERIAL VEHICLES AND INTELLIGENCE, SURVEILLANCE, AND

RECONNAISSANCE PLATFORMS

2. Senator CHAMBLISS. General Hawley and Mr. Watts, there is a real and growing concern that hostile air space could deny access to our manned and unmanned 

airborne intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) platforms. As we saw 

in Georgia recently and as is the case in numerous other countries, air defenses are 

robust enough to preclude the use of non-stealth unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). 

Even against older surface-to-air missiles (SAMs) and 3rd and 4th generation fighters which most all developed nations possess—as well as some undeveloped nations—most every UAV we have in the inventory is completely vulnerable. Now and 

for at least the next several years, only the F–22 has the ability to ensure access 

to this type of airspace and allow our UAVs to operate freely. Both the fiscal year 

2009 supplemental and proposed fiscal year 2010 budget request contain additional 

funds for UAVs and manned ISR platforms on the order of billions of dollars. Of 

the platforms that these budgets would procure, none of them will be full-fledged 

stealth platforms comparable to the stealth capability of the F–22 and F–35. 

In your judgment, does the ‘‘UAV surge’’ that Secretary Gates is recommending 

we undertake make sense given that these systems may very likely be denied access 

to key locations outside of our ongoing operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, and how 

does this inform the need for 5th generation stealth fighter aircraft to ensure access 

for our manned and unmanned airborne ISR platforms? 

General HAWLEY. I fully support DOD’s proposals to improve our ability to provide surveillance and reconnaissance of the battlefields. In fact, they probably do not 

go far enough in some areas, such as modernization of our Joint Surveillance and 

Target Attack Radar System (JSTARS). But as you point out, none of these systems 

44 

that have proven so critical to the success of our forces on the ground can operate 

effectively against even modest air defenses. That is why production of the F–22 

should not be terminated until Congress has had an opportunity to examine the implications for our defense strategy and accepts the assumption that we will not be 

tested by more than one adversary capable of seriously contesting our control of the 

air. In examining that assumption, I hope Congress will recall our experience in 

Vietnam, where we lost more than 2,200 fixed wing aircraft to a fairly modest deployment of surface-to-air and air-to-air defenses. 

Mr. WATTS. The current inventory of wide-area, high-end ISR platforms—primarily Predator, Global Hawk, and Reaper—are not particularly stealthy platforms. 

So far as I know, none of the three just mentioned incorporate low-observables technologies. Consequently, they are quite vulnerable to modern SAM systems such as 

the Russian S–300 and S–400 SAMs. If the United States hopes to be able to operate these kinds of ISR systems inside airspace defended by current and future 

SAMs, there are two options. 

First, we could begin moving toward stealthy unmanned ISR platforms. Northrop 

Grumman claims that its X–47B drone (pictured above) will begin initial flight tests 

in the fall of 2009. In other words, DOD is already developing low-observable UAVs. 

A possible action for Congress in this regard would be to accelerate fielding these 

sorts of ISR platforms. In the long run, it seems likely that the United States will 

need to pursue these kinds of ISR platforms in any event. 

Second, one could consider using F–22s—or later, F–22s and F–35s—to eliminate 

advanced SAMs, thereby enabling U.S. forces to employ non-stealthy UAVs such as 

Predator and Global Hawk in enemy airspace, or to operate manned ISR platforms 

such as JSTARS close enough to enemy targets to be useful. My sense is that the 

appetites of the combatant commanders for more ISR is insatiable. They will always 

want more than they have. Hence, Secretary Gates’ ‘‘UAV surge.’’ But to use a temporary, hypothetical ‘‘window of vulnerability’’ for non-stealthy UAVs as an argument for buying more F–22s strikes me as a weak argument given the ongoing development of UAVs like the X–47B. Frankly, given all the other priorities, I am inclined to argue that the most sensible response would be to fully fund programs like 

the X–47B and ensure that the Navy presses ahead with the Unmanned Combat 

Air System (UCAS) program. UCAS would provide the Navy’s carriers with a survivable ISR platform having much longer legs than F/A–18E/Fs, thereby beginning 

to address emerging anti-access/area-denial systems aimed at holding U.S. carrier 

battle groups at arms’ length. So I would recommend patience rather than trying 

to solve the vulnerabilities of current ISR UAVs in the fiscal year 2010 defense 

budget. 

[Whereupon, at 3:53 p.m., the subcommittee adjourned.] 

Æ 


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