MC-12W Liberty
The MC-12 aircraft is the Air Force's newest manned intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance platform (ISR), providing near-real-time ISR. Nearly $100 million has been obligated to bring up to seven MC-12 aircraft beginning in January 2009. The modified C-12s -- designated MC-12W -- will be deployed to the CENTCOM area of operations this April. The crews will be on a six-month deployment schedule, ensuring there is always enough manpower for the mission. The first aircraft will be equipped with an L-3 Wescam MX-15 sensor and an undisclosed signals intelligence payload.
On 01 Jull 2008 the Secretary of Defense decided taht the Air Force shoud proceed with procurement of 37 “C-12”class aircraft to augment unmanned systems The configuration includes both Full Motion Video (FMV) and SIGINT capabilities. Their mission is to provide Direct FMV and SIGINT to ground forces, AF Processing, Exploitation and Dissemination (PED) forward deployed. SAF/AQ tasked Big Safari to procure and modify aircraft as quickly as possible. The projected delivery of the first modified C-12 aircraft to ACC is 01 March 2009.
In September 2008 the Air Force and Air National Guard officials agreed to establish a temporary mission qualification training detachment for the MC-12 aircraft at Key Field in Meridian, Miss. This mission, conducted by the Mississippi Air National Guard, will help bolster the Department of Defense's intelligence gathering capability in Operations Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom. Other airborne systems provide wide-area video, real-time playback and downlinks to troops in Afghanistan and Iraq include the US Army's Shorts C-23 Constant Hawk and the US Marine Corps Angel Fire platform.
This mission, designated Project Liberty, will train approximately 1,000 students during the next two years at the 186th Air Refueling Wing, located at Key Field. The 186th ARW will conduct total force mission qualification training for this program, providing the manpower and facilities for the training unit. The 186th ARW will continue performing its current air refueling mission through 2011, operating the KC-135R Stratotanker while conducting Project Liberty training.
There's an insatiable demand in theater for full-motion video imagery produced by the Air Force's high-flying, loitering craft. But there is also great demand for other forms of ISR, as of September 2008 the Air Force was buying 37 RC-12s. They want them quickly; they want them now, so the first seven of them were to be in the field by the end of 2008. Using these small aircraft to do ISR is a whole new mission for the Air Force.
On October 22, 2008 Marina Malenic reported in Defense Daily that the Air Force planned to purchase and modify nearly 40 Beech C-12 Huron manned aircraft over the next year and could purchase even more of the lightweight twin turboprop planes in the following five years to provide more intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) capability to troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to documents detailing the service's upcoming six-year spending plan.
In April 2008 Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates established a new task force last week to ensure the Defense Department is doing everything possible to provide intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) assets to support warfighters. The Secretary of Defense established on 18 April 2008 the DoDwide ISR Task Force to identify and recommend solutions for increased ISR in the USCENTCOM AOR. On April 21, 2008 Gates told officers at Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala., he created the task force to give the ISR issue the same level emphasis that another task force he established has put on mine-resistant, ambush-protected vehicles. “My concern is that our services are still not moving aggressively in wartime to provide resources needed now on the battlefield,” the secretary said during a speech to Air War College students. “While we have doubled this capability in recent months, it is still not good enough.”
Gates expressed frustration at the pace of progress, slowed by people “stuck in old ways of doing business” who make instituting change “like pulling teeth.” The new task force will move the intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance issue to the front burner as it explores “more innovative and bold ways to help those whose lives are on the line,” he said. Getting more ISR support to deployed forces “may require rethinking long-standing service assumptions and priorities about which missions require certified pilots and which do not,” Gates said. “For those missions that still require manned missions, we need to think hard about whether we have the right platforms,” he said. Particularly in environments where the United States and its partners have total control of the skies, “low-cost, low-tech alternatives” may provide the basic reconnaissance and close-air support needed, he said.
Gates recalled the introduction of unmanned aerial vehicles in the 1990s, when he was director of central intelligence. “The introduction of UAVs around this time meant far less risk and far more versatile means of gathering data, and other nations like Israel set about using them,” he said. “In 1992, however, the Air Force would not co-fund with CIA a vehicle without a pilot.”
As he called today for out-of-the-box thinking about how the military can operate in the most sensible, affordable way, Gates said it’s time to recognize the role unmanned aerial vehicles play in intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions -- and how much more they can contribute. “Unmanned systems cost much less and offer greater loiter time than their manned counterparts, making them ideal for many of today’s tasks,” he said. He noted a 25-fold increase since 2001, with 5,000 now in the military inventory. “But in my view, we can do -- and we should do -- more to meet the needs of men and women fighting in the current conflicts while their outcome may still be in doubt.”
Gates told reporters he had given the task force “some pretty short deadlines.” Its first report to him is due next week, and Gates wants its complete job wrapped up in 90 days. “I have found that perhaps the most effective way to get things done around here is to put pretty short deadlines on things -- and then force them,” he said. So in the weeks ahead, the task force will hone in on two key areas: determining what ISR resources can be moved into the combat theater, and ensuring commands there are making the best use of what they already have. Gates said he wanted the team to take a worldwide inventory of the department’s ISR assets – manned and unmanned aircraft, satellites and ground-based sensors, among them – to see if some can be moved into the combat zone.
The Air Force responded primarily by increasing its unmanned aerial system (UAS) purchases and activity. For example, the service accelerated MQ-1 Predator combat air patrols (CAP) four times during 2008, and the first MQ-9 Reaper deployment occurred in July 2008 -- one full year ahead of schedule.
