Light Attack Experiment - Phase 1
In February 2017 Pentagon officials called on defense contractors to demonstrate ‘shovel-ready’ jets that military leaders could use for immediate, low-end combat in the Middle East, Defense News reported. “We are going to formally invite industry to participate,” Air Force Gen. David Goldfein said. Service officials said that the demos will help finalize the decision for which aircraft will become part of the OA-X program record, the news outlet reported. “Bring us what you have that fits the basic criteria of what we’re looking for,” he said, adding, “this is not something we’re looking to do a lot of research and development on.”
The Air Force wanted commercial, “off-the-shelf” aircraft ready for immediate deployment, Goldfein said. The idea was to divide the effort among combat missions, acting Air Force Secretary Lisa Disbrow said. “This concept could free up higher-cost, higher-performance platforms from doing low-threat missions,” Disbrow said, during a speech at a recent Air Force Association symposium in Orlando, Florida. The concept demos will take place at Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico, Defense News noted.
The service claimed to be taking a more economical approach with the upcoming fly-off. “We want to see if there’s a business case there,” Disbrow said. In a 2009 paper, Maj. Steven J. Tittel argued that, “fielding a lightweight ground attack aircraft could enable the US Air Force to redeploy the bulk of its legacy fighter fleet to home stations and resume non-contingency operations.” Service officials hoped that a fleet of cheap, accessible and efficient aircraft could give some of the service’s other jets, such as the F-35, F-22, and F/A-18, some reprieve, with reduced annual flight times, “and thereby extend expected service life.”
Within the service, the jury was out as to whether the strategy would be as effective as it appeared on paper. Air Combat Command head Gen. Herbert ‘Hawk’ Carlisle said on 25 February 2017 that the OA-X program may not be the best use of Air Force resources. Redirecting a substantial portion of air operations to lower-cost aircraft could reduce the load on legacy aircraft, but they may not be effective in the evolving threat environment of the Middle East. “Depending on what the OA-X looks like, would it be viable in the environments that we’re going to try to operate in?”
Lt. Gen. Mike Holmes was nominated as ACC chief to replace Carlisle in September 2016 and took a slightly different track when talking about OA-X. “The question is,” he said, “how do you afford it?” Holmes noted “The counter question is, how can you not afford it? Or, can you afford not to because of the operating cost difference?... “Right now, the thing that’s growing faster than inflation and eating up space in our budget is operating costs.”
It just looked better politically for local forces to do Washington’s bidding while most American troops stay home and the US contributes airstrikes with conventional aircraft and drones. This has become the ‘playbook’ of Middle East operations since Hillary Clinton’s tenure as US Secretary of State and the 2013 decision by Washington to not send new battalions of ground troops to Syria.
The first phase of the Light Attack Experiment took place in August 2017 at Holloman AFB, with four models of light attack aircraft. This was not a competition, not a fly-off of any sort, and there was no acquisition program of record. Industry teams supported the government team and kept pace with experiment schedule. Even though there was no guarantee for a light attack program at the end of this experiment, industry came to the table because of the valuable feedback they are receiving from all the government teams.
An OTA [Other Transactional Authority] is a legally binding instrument more like a commercial-sector contract between the government and industry. OTAs encourage collaboration and promote innovation from non-traditional defense contractors as well as traditional industry partners, thereby allowing the assessment of commercial off-the-shelf light attack aircraft.
The Air Force had a multi-phase Light Attack Experimentation Campaign which grew out of the Close Air Support Experimentation Campaign. The Air Force Materiel Command’s Air Force Strategic Development Planning and Experimentation Office led this Campaign. Air Force personnel flew participant-provided, experiment-suitable aircraft in scenarios designed to highlight various combat missions and associated tasks at Holloman Air Force Base, New Mexico. Highlighted missions include close air support, air interdiction, combat search & rescue and strike coordination and reconnaissance. The assessment will include employment of commonly-used fighter/attack aircraft weapons in order to assess capabilities of off-the-shelf aircraft for traditional counter-land missions.
On March 8, 2017, Gen. David L. Goldfein, Air Force chief of staff, issued a memorandum stating that the Air Force Strategic Development Planning and Experimentation Office at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base would lead a campaign directed at the Air Force’s light attack capabilities. Just five months later, the SDPE office, along with representatives from Air Combat Command, Air Force Materiel Command, Air Force Special Operations Command and Air Education and Training Command were on the ground and in the skies over Holloman Air Force Base, New Mexico conducting a light attack experiment.
Industry members were invited to participate with aircraft that may meet an Air Force need for a low-cost capability that is supportable and sustainable. The Air Force will analyze data received from vendors seeking to participate in the experimentation campaign and then invited selected offerors to participate in a live-fly capabilities assessment.
During the first week of the experiment, Air Force pilots flew basic surface attack missions in Textron Aviation’s AT-6 Wolverine turboprop, as well as in Sierra Nevada Corp. and Embraer’s A-29 Super Tucano. Air Force pilots also completed familiarization flights in Textron Aviation’s Scorpion jet, as well as in Air Tractor Inc. and L3 Platform Integration Division’s AT-802L Longsword.
The Air Force established vendor parameters in the initial invitation-to-participate earlier this year. Industry members were asked to propose aircraft that could potentially meet an Air Force need for a low-cost capability that is supportable and sustainable. Scenarios during the experiment are designed to highlight aspects of various combat missions, such as close air support, air interdiction, combat search and rescue and strike coordination and reconnaissance. The experiment includes the use of weapons generally used on fighter and attack aircraft to evaluate the participating aircraft’s ability to execute traditional counter-land missions.
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