Air Force Global Strike Command, USAF’s new nuclear-centric major command, will be considered successful by its leadership when each of its airmen truly realizes the importance of their daily tasks in executing the nuclear bomber and ICBM missions successfully, Lt. Gen. Frank Klotz, commander of Air Force Global Strike Command, said Wednesday at AFA’s Air & Space Conference. “When we achieve that, I think we can say that we are approaching success,” Klotz told conference attendees. It doesn’t matter if the airman is pulling a security detail around a weapon storage area, maintaining an ICBM, or flying one of the nuclear-capable bombers, the same imperative applies for adherence to the missions’ extremely high standards and discipline, he said. Since “perfection” is actually the measure that the Air Force has in place for the nuclear mission, Klotz said mission execution “is something that you have to pay constant attention to.”
A top Pentagon tech official called on industry this week to help the military develop “lighter, more efficient” directed energy weapons designed to go on aircraft and conduct special operations missions or down drones—areas where the Air Force’s directed energy efforts have been quiet as of late.