The plan to merge active and Air National Guard forces to create a squadron of C-17 airlifters at Hickam AFB, Hawaii, is now a year old and heading into the home stretch—the first of eight C-17s are due to arrive in January. This Future Total Force initiative, says CMSgt. Scott Yerxa, has been an “almost seamless” blending of a “great group of professionals.” Some Guard backers have raised doubts about the FTF project, claiming it will weaken ANG units.
The future U.S. bomber force could provide a way for the Pentagon to simultaneously deter conflict with peer adversaries in two geographically disparate theaters, said Mark Gunzinger, the director of future concepts and capability assessments at AFA's Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, during a March 21 event. But doing so…