By Marina Malenic
The Air Force yesterday unveiled details of its Fiscal Year 2010 budget request, with large increases for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) and other irregular warfare-related weapon systems.
“Our emphasis is what we’re doing in today’s fight and what we’ve done for rebalancing both the end strength dollars and our operational focus,” Pat Zarodkiewicz, the Air Force deputy budget director, told reporters at a Pentagon briefing.
“What we’re buying is very much in support of current needs and the joint war fight that we’re engaged in today,” she added.
The service plans to purchase 24 General Atomics Aeronautical Systems MQ-9 Reaper unmanned aircraft, five Northrop Grumman [NOC] RQ-4 Global Hawks, five Bell Helicopter Textron [TXT]-Boeing [BA] CV-22 Osprey for Air Force Special Operations Command and 12 more modified MC-12 Huron twin-engine turboprop aircraft for manned ISR missions.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates last month recommended terminating or ending production on several major Air Force programs, including Lockheed Martin [LMT] F-22 Raptor fighter jets at 187 aircraft. The budget request released yesterday reflects those recommendations–with $46 million designated to begin shutdown of the F-22 production line.
Retirement of aging tactical aircraft is also budgeted. According to Zarodkiewicz, the air service will save some $355 million in FY ’10 from the retirement of 250 tactical aircraft, including aging F-15s, F-16s and A-10s.
“The emerging mission area is in ISR,” she said, “not in tacair.”
However, the budget request does not include money for a new light-attack aircraft. Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz has mentioned that the need for such a program is currently under review.
About $1.2 billion has been requested for modifications of the B-1, B-2 and B-52 bomber fleets. Gates has delayed making a decision on starting a next generation bomber until two major reviews of Pentagon weapon systems are completed.
Gates last month also proposed terminating the Air Force’s troubled Combat Search-and-Rescue (CSAR) helicopter replacement program and examining a potential joint capability. In order to keep its current CSAR fleet of Sikorsky [UTX] HH-60 Pave Hawk helicopters fully capable, the service is requesting $90 million to purchase two new HH-60Ms.
The Air Force has also requested funds for eight L-3 Communications [LLL] Joint Cargo Aircraft. The service is in the process of taking over management of the program from the Army. Meanwhile, plans for shutdown of the Boeing C-17 Globemaster airlifter production line are under way, according to Zarodkiewicz.
The service is tilting its munitions procurement toward three major programs: the Lockheed Martin Hellfire missile, the Boeing Joint Direct Attack Munition and the Small Diameter Bomb, which is being developed by a Boeing-Lockheed Martin team. All three have proven valuable for their precision strike capabilities, according to Air Force officials.
However, no funding was requested for the Joint Air to Surface Standoff Missile by Lockheed Martin.
“We’ve delayed the next procurement lot until testing is completed this summer,” Zarodkiewicz explained. The program has recently suffered several test failures, which program managers have blamed on faulty fuzes.
“It’s not terminated, but it must go through testing before additional funding can be allocated,” Zarodkiewicz said.
Gates’ decision to end development of the $19 billion Transformational Satellite communications system in favor of the purchase of two more Lockheed Martin Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) satellites is also supported in the Air Force request.
“The decision to procure additional Advanced EHF and wide-band gap-fillers means that we’ll have far greater capability for the warfighter in the near term,” said Zarodkiewicz. “AEHF is ten times more capable than the current systems.”
The service is also requesting $315 million for the Global Positioning System to make its satellites capable with the Galileo global navigation system being developed by the European Union.
Another $439 million has been requested for systems design of a KC-X aerial refueling replacement aircraft. A contract award is planned for the middle of FY ’10, according to Zarodkiewicz.
Per Gates’ guidance, the F-35 Lightening II Joint Strike Fighter program by Lockheed Martin is also fully funded. However, the Air Force has again not requested funding for the General Electric [GE]-Rolls-Royce F136 propulsion system to serve as an alternative to the Pratt & Whitney F135 engine for the future JSF.
“The department doesn’t believe it’s necessary–it’s not just the Air Force,” Zarodkiewicz said. “The studies that were done by DoD said that the current engine is robust and reliable, and we didn’t have a good business case to make the sizeable, multi-billion dollar investment in the second engine.”
Lawmakers have consistently added the money for the second-engine effort.
Overall, this year’s Air Force top line shrinks a bit relative to the prior year’s budget request–down by nearly a billion dollars to $160.5 billion. The request for “Overseas Contingency Operations”–previously know as the “Global War on Terrorism”–that covers costs directly related to operations in Iraq and Afghanistan is for $16 billion.