America's Airpower Is at Risk

In July 2014, I wrote a column that included this troubling paragraph: "With a few teeth-clenching exceptions (the Korean War's MiG Alley battles), since 1944, American land, sea and air forces have enjoyed the military and diplomatic benefits of U.S. air superiority. Unfortunately, in 2014 there are strong indications that America's air advantage is diminishing."

On July 29, 2024 (10 years later), Air & Space Forces Magazine online interviewed U.S. Air Force Vice Chief of Staff Gen. James C. Slife. This Ukraine war-informed quote struck home: "We used to make the claim that since 1953 no American has been killed by air attack. We can't make that claim anymore," Slife said. "It calls into question, 'What does air superiority actually look like?' [Does] it look like 30,000 feet over the Yalu River (Korea) in 1953 or does it look like below 3,000 feet with quadcopters with a hand grenade slung to the bottom of them? I think the answer is: It's all of the above."

Slife isn't addressing an esoteric military tech issue or arguing over a definition. He's addressing a huge problem that confronts the entire U.S. military.

Let me explain the milspeak background. Military analysts generally recognize three levels of air control within a combat zone. "Air supremacy" means complete domination of the skies. Obtain "air superiority" (aka air dominance) and you can basically conduct air, land and sea operations at will. Enemy planes lurk but cannot "prohibitively" interfere. "Air parity" means combatants control the airspace above their respective ground forces.

Air superiority provides a military that obtains it with immense tactical and operational flexibility. Air dominance and space dominance -- space meaning satellites and other orbiting platforms -- give commanders war-altering strategic capabilities. A nation with dominating air and space power can quickly respond to inevitable military setbacks and intelligence failures, like surprise enemy attacks that escaped intelligence detection.

In war prevention diplomacy, they give the nation possessing these advantages the power to deter aggressor action.

Here's an example of operational advantage: In 2001, the U.S. used its air dominance to deploy air and ground military power in land-locked Afghanistan. B-52 bombers, with Green Berets on the ground providing targeting information, destroyed entire Taliban battle groups. By December 2001, the U.S. had airlifted airborne infantry brigades into Central Asia -- air supremacy protected the C-17 transports carrying the troops.

But the use of drones in Ukraine and the Iranian proxy wars against Israel indicate the U.S. air and space advantage has diminished.

How far has it diminished? We don't know. But senior military officers know it has.

Gen. Slife provided an operational example of the high-tech vs. low-tech dilemma: "Now, clearly, you're not going to be sending F-22s out to find a DJI quadcopter with hand grenades underneath them. And so we have to think about a broader definition of what air superiority actually looks like and how we achieve it."

DJI is an acronym for Da-Jiang Innovations, a Chinese company manufacturing inexpensive drones.

The Ukraine war, the Iranian proxy wars and Azerbaijan's 2023 offensive against Armenia demonstrated the power of low-altitude, cheap but deadly drones.

The USAF already uses numerous combat drones, but they tend to be mid- to high-altitude unmanned aircraft that handle conventional aircraft missions. Slife advised the U.S. to learn to use small drones along with conventional airpower.

I've called that "integrated ground to air to space power."

My 2014 column noted American air superiority faced budget cuts. New technology (like drones) challenged America's aeronautical engineering and "pilot training" advantages.

That column's last line: "American air warriors believe a 'mix' of piloted aircraft, like the F-22, operating with a 'package' of drones and flying smart munitions, may be the way to retain the air advantage won in 1944."

I had multiple sources for that, among them a USAF colonel and F-15 pilot who had experimented with various drone "wingmen" -- i.e., drones flying as part of a formation.

Washington defense mavens have a new buzz phrase: "cost-effective mass." Undersecretary of the Air Force Melissa Dalton used it in a recent Brookings Institution speech. She argued mixing cheap, low-level drones (unmanned platforms) with current USAF aircraft could "provide us with that cost-effective mass" (i.e., sufficient airpower) in a potential war with Communist China.

Yes.

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To find out more about Austin Bay and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at www.creators.com.

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