The U.S. Air Force is studying how many more fighters, bombers and other aircraft it might need to counter growing threats from China and other potential adversaries, service leaders said April 24.
The force structure review, which is due to be finished in August, is designed help the Air Force determine what its size should be to carry out the Defense Department’s new national defense strategy, which calls for building a more lethal military to address the return of great-power competition.
“The last thing we want to do right now is get smaller,” Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Goldfein told the Senate Armed Services Committee. “We need to work with this committee to get larger and make sure that we can source the number of airframes, the maintainers, the people and the squadrons we need to adequately support the strategy.”
A high operations tempo over the past 27 years has strained the service, offering more of a case for a larger aviation fleet, Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson testified.
“I think the review that we’re doing is probably going to show that we need more force structure than we currently have,” Wilson said.
Among the specific matters the review is examining is whether the Air Force should increase its planned purchase of 100 Northrop Grumman [NOC]-built B-21 Raider bombers. Goldfein said he expects the review to show the Air Force needs more.
“Right now, what we know is that the minimum is 100,” Goldfein testified. “I fully expect that the requirement is going to be above that.”
The Air Force also wants to expand its fighter force, which shrunk from 134 squadrons in 1991 to 56 today. The service has a total of 301 operational squadrons for aviation, space, cyberspace and other missions.
To shore up its aging fleet of A-10 Thunderbolt II close-air-support aircraft, the Air Force is already looking into speeding up the delivery of new wings, Wilson said. While the Air Force’s fiscal year 2019 budget request would re-wing eight to 12 planes, a faster rate could help prevent any aircraft from being grounded, she said.
The Air Force plans to release a request for proposals for new wings in the current April-to-June quarter (Defense Daily, April 12).