Skip to main content (Press Enter).
 News
    
        Photos

    Week in Photos

    Air Force TV

    Commentaries

    Features

    Art

    About Us
    
        Air Force Senior Leaders
    
        SECAF

    CSAF

    CMSAF

    Biographies

    Fact Sheets

    SECAF Reading List

    CSAF Leadership Library
    
        CSAF Leadership Library 2022

    CSAF Leadership Library 2021

    CSAF Reading List Pre-2020 Archive
    
        2018 CSAF Reading List

    2017 CSAF Reading List

    2016 CSAF Reading List

    CSAF Leadership Library 2023

    CMSAF Leadership Library

    50 Years of the CMSAF

    Adjunct Professors

    Air Force Strategic Documents

    Arctic Strategy

    Empowered Airmen

    State Licensure Portability

    Careers

    AF Federal Advisory Committees

    AF 75th Anniversary

    Policy Updates

    AF Content Management

    Contact Us

    AF Sites
    
        Site RegistrationU.S. Air Force LogoAir Force

        Policy UpdatesNewsroomReoptimizationBIOGRAPHIESAF Senior Leaders      Reserve Airmen, PACAF distribute ops for AFFOR exercisePublished Feb. 19, 2021
                    
                    By 713th Combat Operations Squadron Public Affairs
            **JOINT BASE PEARL HARBOR-HICKAM, Hawaii (AFNS)  --**Reserve Airmen from the **713th Combat Operations Squadron** supported Headquarters **Pacific Air Forces** thousands of miles away for an Air Force Forces exercise, Feb. 3-11. More than 25 Reserve Airmen worked via distributed operations from**Beale Air Force Base**, California, with PACAF’s AFFOR staff at **Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam**, Hawaii.
“This was about 713th (COS) Airmen taking personal pride and initiative to ‘accelerate change’ and overcome adversity,” said Col. Xaviera Slocum, 713th COS commander. “When told just three months prior that our squadron couldn’t travel to Hawaii for the exercise, our Airmen used their innovation skills to turn our Beale AFB facility into a distributed ops node for PACAF and still accomplish our mission.”
Hawaii and PACAF’s COVID-19 safety protocols made travel and on-island participation from the 713th COS near impossible. The idea of distributed ops came up in November, and both planners and leadership worked with PACAF to figure out a way for the Reserve unit to participate in the exercise from Beale AFB.
“We needed to find a way to effectively support ops, follow Beale policies, and keep everyone safe,” said Maj. Jen Old, 713th COS senior intelligence officer. “Our planners worked with public health and other organizations to get us the right facilities and come up with a schedule that met communication checks and exercise training. They did a lot of great coordination and planning.”
For the 713th to effectively participate, it needed to align its communication infrastructure and technology with PACAF’s.
“A big concern for PACAF and the 713th was our communication situation at our Beale facility, and whether or not we had the connectivity to plug into processes at Hickam,” Old said. “Many agencies with the **9th Reconnaissance Wing** and **548th Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Group** at Beale AFB stepped up to support our squadron in a big way. The 9th Communications and 48th Intelligence squadrons jumped at the opportunity to help bring our networks up and running which increased our communications capabilities to a point where we were confident of our connectivity back to PACAF.”
With communication systems at Beale AFB aligned with PACAF’s, 713th Reserve Airmen were able to integrate and support their active duty counterparts for the exercise, much as they have done for years using on-island participation.
“We learned a lot about reach back support and distributed ops from this exercise,” said Lt. Col. Frank Welton, PACAF Air Ops and Special Capabilities Division deputy chief and Exercise PACAF Battle Staff deputy director. “We were able to smoothly team with the 713th (COS) to co-lead battle shifts, key meetings and briefings via distributed command and control.”
Exercise PACAF Battle Staff Air Ops agreed.
“While there are lessons learned from this exercise when it comes to distributed ops with Beale (AFB), we were able to have that reach back and coordination with the 713th (COS),” said Lt. Col. Josh Schecht, PACAF C-17 Standardization/Evaluation Program chief and Exercise PACAF Battle Staff ops planner. “The connectivity was such that we made the 713th (COS) the lead for a number of taskers and relied on their continuity of expertise when it comes to the AFFOR.”
Distributed ops from Beale AFB will now be an option for the 713th COS to provide AFFOR support when it comes to future PACAF exercises.
“Our Reserve Airmen know, to succeed in future competition and conflict, operational agility and operational resiliency will require a distributed C2 capability,” Slocum said. “For the 713th COS, creating the ability to participate via distributive ops is a revolutionary and historic event. PACAF counted on the 713th to create and test this system to allow us to bring our seamless AFFOR expertise and I am incredibly proud of our Airmen for coming through with five-star customer service. I am confident this is just the beginning as we gather our lessons learned and grow our capabilities to support PACAF exercises from home station.”
One of the 713th COS’ missions is to augment PACAF’s AFFOR staff during a crisis or contingency. In order to stay ready when called upon, the unit annually participates in a PACAF AFFOR staff exercise.LR 



USAF 



AF 



Air Force 



610th Air Operations Group 



713th Combat Operations Squadron 



10 AF 



Tenth Air Force 



PACAF 



Beale Air Force Base 



Joint Base Pearl Harbor Hickam 



9th Reconnaissance Wing 



548th ISR Group Featured News
        Senior Leader Priorities
                SecAF, CSAF, CMSAF begin Indo-Pacific trip focused on ACE
                    
                    DAF leaders talk budget, reoptimizing the force
                    
                    DAF leaders speak at National Character and Leadership Symposium
                    
                    DAF members recognized during BEYA STEM awards
                    
                    DAF senior enlisted advisors discuss Airmen, Guardians in the fightInnovation
                F-16s arrive to be modified for autonomous testing
                    
                    AFWERX director discusses role of tech startups, quick innovation in Great Power Competition
                    
                    DAF delivers lethality at the speed of data during Project Convergence Capstone 4
                    
                    DAF welcomes industry partners to HQ development program
                    
                    DAF announces Spark Tank 2024 finalistsMAJCOM News
                Safety enterprise announces new mission, vision, goals in 2024 strategic plan
                    
                    Air Combat Command welcomes new commander
                    
                    USAFE-AFAFRICA commander discusses Integrated Air, Missile Defense during Munich Security Conference
                    
                    Flosi to AFMC family: Embrace change, make every day count
                    
                    AMC rises to increasing global tension
 Quick Links
AccessibilityContact UsEqual OpportunityFOIA | Privacy | Section 508Information QualityInspector GeneralJAG Court-Martial DocketLink DisclaimerNo FEAR ActOpen GovernmentOSI Tip LinePlain LanguageQuestionsResilienceRSSSite MapVeterans Crisis LineCareers
Join the Air ForceAir Force BenefitsAir Force CareersAir Force ReserveAir National GuardCivilian ServiceConnect
            Get Social with Us
            
            Official United States Air Force Website
    Hosted by Defense Media Activity - WEB.mil