Requirements for new technology need to be grounded in experiment-driven reality instead of intuition, said Maj. Gen. Robert McMurry, the boss at the Air Force Research Laboratory. As it stands, “We drive requirements higher than we need to … This is what we think we need to have,” he said at ASC16. If USAF anchors requirements in experimentation, it starts with a “more achievable” baseline and ensures higher success rates. This issue of requirements, coupled with a hypercompetitive environment in contracting and a culture that shuns mistakes at every cost, is hurting the final deliveries and expenses of new technologies, said McMurry, who took over at AFRL four months ago. The most important priority for a program, McMurry said, is its success.
The Air Force is leaning toward a less-sophisticated autonomous aircraft in the second increment of the Collaborative Combat Aircraft, the services chief futurist said. He also suggested that the next increment of CCA may be air-launched, a la the "Rapid Dragon" experiments conducted by the service in recent years.