“I believe we should boost the size” of the Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve, Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Welsh said in an interview with Air Force Magazine last week. “I think we can keep more capacity in those components,” and “if we move more force structure into the Guard and Reserve, that’s great.” Welsh acknowledged that the reserve component is less costly to maintain, but he insisted increasing it must not be done “right now … at the expense of the active component.” He explained, “The analysis we’ve done shows that that would be a bad idea and we can show how that would hurt mission capability, not help it.” Ideally, he would like to grow the Guard and Reserve “proportionately” with the Active Duty “to operate that force structure, that hardware.” But the active component is “at a red line … We’re going to break it if we go any smaller,” he added.
The new defense reconciliation bill includes $7.2 billion for Air Force and Navy aviation accounts, almost half of which will buy more F-15EXs. While electronic warfare, drones, connectivity and airlift all get attention, the F-35 was conspicuously absent from the package, with no explanation given.