The expert commented on the program report of the Chief of Staff of the US Air Force
The Chief of Staff of the US Air Force, General Charles Brown, published a report of a programmatic nature, the main content of which is reduced to how to prepare American aviation for the upcoming combat operations. Military observer " Newspaper.En " Mikhail Khodarenok analyzed the theses of the American military leader and tells us what kind of future the American aviation is striving for and what it is fraught with for Russia.
Two years ago, the Pentagon began implementing the provisions of the new US National Defense Strategy, which emphasizes that the world in which we live "includes an increasingly complex global security environment characterized by open challenges to a free and open international order and the revival of strategic competition between nations."
"While the United States and our allies have largely focused their attention and efforts on counterinsurgency since September 11, 2001, our rivals have developed new technologies and capabilities to challenge our advantage," writes General Charles Brown on the Defense News website.
In this regard, he believes that it is extremely important for the United States to start the necessary changes and do it quickly, since both failure and success have serious consequences.
"Shortly after I took up my current position, I published a report titled' Accelerate Change or Lose, ' in which I articulated why I believe these changes are necessary," writes Charles Brown.
"To this end, I have signed four orders to focus and channel our energy, as well as to use the talent, creativity and resilience of our pilots to accelerate the changes we need. Here is what we are doing right now, and this year there is still more work to be done, described in the framework of these four orders - on the flight crew, on the administrative part, competition and project implementation," Charles Brown reports.
In matters related to flight personnel, Brown pays special attention to ensuring a high level of quality of service and quality of life for American aviators. From his point of view, this will help maximize their potential and create a competitive environment in the Air Force. "To do this, we are reviewing our systems for managing, evaluating and promoting talent," he says.
Bureaucracy, according to the US military, is no less important. The US Air Force will soon focus on optimizing management processes, reducing and eliminating unnecessary work groups at headquarters. Ultimately, this will undoubtedly lead to more effective development, adoption and implementation of strategic decisions.
Training of personnel, according to Brown, can not take place without regard to the challenges associated with the competition of major powers.
"Increasing our understanding of the cultural and technical level of our rivals, including how they are modernizing and planning to fight in the future, will help American pilots identify which issues are most relevant. This will help us bring the current organizational and staff structure of the Air Force to the form with which we will compete with our rivals in order to contain them and ultimately win this confrontation," the American general believes.
Finally, the fourth component of the US Air Force strategy is to accelerate the implementation of promising projects. "We need to identify opportunities and technologies that will make us competitive in the future. This entails clearing the way for the implementation of promising projects in the US Air Force by eliminating / terminating outdated or inaccessible capabilities and programs, " says Charles Brown.
According to him, the leadership of the US Air Force has already made amendments to the planning models for upcoming organizational and staff changes, as well as necessary innovations in the field of combat use of the Air Force. "It is necessary to identify options that can free up the funds that will be required for the rapid development of new technologies - from artificial intelligence, Unified domain - wide management and control, and to the next generation of fighters and bombers," adds Charles Brown.
According to Charles Brown, since its inception more than 70 years ago, the US Air Force has succeeded in performing five main tasks: air superiority, intelligence, rapid global mobility, global strike and control. "We are obliged to maintain the quality standards that our nation expects, and from the current geopolitical situation," the general said.
"Given the scale of the challenges in competing with a great power like China, we must make tough decisions to maintain the necessary level of technologically superior Air Forces-flexible, resilient and able to operate with superior speed and pace in a complex armed confrontation," says Charles Brown.
According to the general, changes are crucial, and speed in this case is above all. Innovative problem-solving is deeply rooted in the very spirit of the United States Air Force, as evidenced by its history: the rapid development of jet engines and breaking the sound barrier in the 1940s, the development of sophisticated intercontinental ballistic missiles in the 1950s, the development of combat vehicles for air superiority in the 1960s and 1970s. This fact is particularly noted in his report by Charles Brown.
The United States Air Force must accelerate its development, must change and prepare for a possible armed confrontation, because the status quo will not be sufficient, and failure for us is not an option," concludes General Charles Brown.
On the one hand, the report of the Chief of Staff of the US Air Force is a set of beautifully stated slogans, and on the other hand - there is no doubt that behind each thesis of the American military leader there are specific guidance documents supported by figures, facts, financial and material resources.
As for similar statements by our Aerospace Forces, the leaders of this type of Armed Forces of the Russian Federation rarely publish materials of an ideological nature aimed at the long-term perspective. Therefore, it is very difficult to make any comparisons with the speeches in the open press, for example, of the Chief of the General Staff of the VKS with similar reports of the Chief of Staff of the US Air Force.
The main conclusion, which, in my opinion, should be drawn from the report of the Chief of Staff of the US Air Force, General Charles Brown, is that the strategic competition between our powers has a persistent tendency to escalate. And the stakes in this confrontation are indeed higher than ever.
The directions of application of our efforts in the field of improving the combat and operational capabilities of the Aerospace Forces, in general, are known.
Russia plans to speed up the arrival of the 5th generation Su-57 fighters in the VKS combat structure. Although the planned 76 cars by 2028 - this, I must say frankly, frankly little. In addition: all-round acceleration of the process associated with testing and serial production of strategic and long-range bombers Tu-160M and Tu-22M3M; bringing all available Long-range strategic bombers Tu-95MS to the level of Tu-95MSM; forcing work with the PAK DA.
In addition, the domestic VCS now has the task of further re-equipment of Park of tactical aviation on a modern machine (su-30CM and su-35S); the acceleration of work on serial production of light military transport aircraft Il-112V, as well as speeding up the development of heavy aircraft BTA, the increase of average rate of release of the Il-76MD-90A;
Finally, it is necessary to continue re-equipping the VKS with long-range high-precision (including hypersonic) weapons.
And this, of course,is not a complete list of the tasks facing the VKS.
First of all, this applies to artificial intelligence. Unfortunately, the Russian Defense Ministry is still not the main performer in this area, which is critical for Russia's national security.
The question for us is exactly this - either we will remain among the militarily advanced countries or we will fall to the level of a third world country. The third is not given in this case.
Biography of the author:
Mikhail Mikhailovich Khodarenok-military columnist of " Gazeta.Ru", retired colonel.
He graduated from the Minsk Higher Engineering Anti-Aircraft Missile School (1976), the Military Command Academy of Air Defense (1986).
Commander of the S-75 anti-aircraft missile Division (1980-1983).
Deputy Commander of the anti-aircraft missile Regiment (1986-1988).
Senior officer of the General Staff of the Air Defense Forces (1988-1992).
Officer of the Main Operational Directorate of the General Staff (1992-2000).
Graduated from the Military Academy of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Russia (1998).
Columnist of "Nezavisimaya Gazeta" (2000-2003), editor-in-chief of the newspaper "Military-industrial Courier" (2010-2015).
Mikhail Khodarenok
