A New Type of Fight: The Air Force
is working with its sister services and coalition partners on a study called “Effective Warfighting in a Contested Environment.” The ultimate goal is to focus the overall discussion on what it takes to operate in a contested environment, recommend new strategies, tactics, and approaches to operating in such an environment, and come up with a list of materiel solutions that can be implemented in the next three to five years, said Randall Walden, director of information dominance programs in the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force Office for Acquisition. Speaking at AFA’s Air & Space Conference Sept. 18, Walden said most Air Force operators have never operated in a non-permissive environment. So, officials need to figure out “what capabilities we believe have been degraded and how we can adjust our tactics and/or materiel solutions to allow us to buy back some of that in a contested environment.” The study kicked off in July and is expected to be completed in February.
The Space Development Agency says it’s on track to issue its next batch of missile warning and tracking satellite contracts this month after those awards were delayed by the Pentagon’s decision to divert funds from the agency to pay troops during this fall’s prolonged government shutdown.
