Nineteen months into Russia’s war on Ukraine, its lessons are shaping how the U.S. Air Force thinks about combat over Europe.
The conflict is pushing the Pentagon to deal with tactics as a substitute of the strategic-level chess moves which have defined the U.S.-Russia military relationship in Europe because the end of the Cold War, Gen. James Hecker, the Air Force’s top officer in Europe, told Air Force Times in a recent interview.
Not are allied air forces passively circling over Europe for the sake of visibility. U.S. pilots and their counterparts now use air policing missions to practice offensive and defensive maneuvers along NATO’s eastern border.
Struck by Russia’s inability to regulate Ukrainian airspace and Ukraine’s inability to totally secure it, NATO has begun working through the small print of how it will maintain ownership of its own skies while breaking through enemy defenses to secure more airspace.
Hecker said his top priority has change into determining find out how to counter air and missile defenses, electronic jamming and other anti-access, area-denial (A2/AD) capabilities, as they’re known in military parlance, that might keep the U.S. out of Russian territory.
And it’s a fundamental focus of U.S. and allied discussions at NATO’s highest levels.
A revamp of NATO’s regional security plans led by Army Gen. Christopher Cavoli, the pinnacle of U.S. European Command and certainly one of the transatlantic alliance’s two strategic commanders, has spurred a brand new take a look at how member militaries would fight future wars if deterrence fails.
Those are “geographically specific plans that describe how we are going to defend key and relevant places in our alliance” against Russia and terror groups, Royal Netherlands Navy Adm. Rob Bauer, chairman of NATO’s military committee, said in May.
To the best extent seen because the end of the Cold War, he said, the alliance is setting goals to develop the capabilities it must thwart specific threats, like hypersonic weapons and unmanned vehicles.
“Together this family of plans will significantly improve our ability and readiness to discourage and defend against any threats, including on short or no notice, and ensure timely reinforcement of all allies,” NATO said in an announcement at its July 11 summit in Lithuania. “We’ve committed to totally resource and often exercise these plans to be prepared for high-intensity and multi-domain collective defense.”
A more in-depth look
For the allied air forces, that requires a more in-depth take a look at find out how to defend their very own airspace and gain access into an enemy’s. Delegates from each member nation began answering that query at NATO’s first weapons and tactics conference, or “WEPTAC,” at Ramstein Air Base, Germany, July 17-28.
Officials discussed the aircraft and weapons that the alliance would wish for the counter-A2/AD mission in Europe, and hashed out techniques airmen would use in the sector, Hecker said.
U.S. Air Force officials have pointed to unmanned aircraft, stealthy and long-range assets, and electronic weapons as options to distract or destroy defensive systems and clear the way in which for more traditional combat aircraft.
“We did a variety of the tactical-level planning for that sort of mission,” Hecker said. “We’ll use that planning to really do rehearsals and practices as we proceed our enhanced air policing on [NATO’s] eastern border.”
U.S. airmen have begun honing those moves in training sorties with European aircraft on the eastern flank, he said. It’s one example of how allied airpower has evolved alongside the conflict across NATO’s border.
After Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, armed NATO jets flew around-the-clock air patrols to discourage the conflict from spilling into other European nations. That kept Russian forces at bay but arguably left NATO airmen less ready for conflict, Hecker said.
“If you happen to just do circles with missiles on board, you’re not actually practicing what you’re going to do in combat,” he said.
Once leaders were convinced that the alliance’s airspace was secure, airmen modified tack. Now pilots on patrol also participate in anti-access training along NATO’s border — pairing the deterrent value of an air patrol with the tactical value of real-world practice.
NATO may also put those tactics to the test at a serious latest training exercise, Ramstein Flag, in Greece at the top of 2024, Hecker said.
“We don’t wish to go to war with Russia, and I don’t think they wish to go to war with us either,” he said. “But we want to make certain that we now have the forces able to deterring them, in order that nothing bad will occur.”
NATO will search for other opportunities to check out latest tactics in large exercises, particularly people who mix multiple varieties of aircraft for more realism, Hecker said.
Those events could include Ukrainian pilots at the top of their training to fly the U.S.-built F-16 Fighting Falcon, he added.
POLITICO reported Aug. 4 that eight Ukrainians who’re fluent in English are able to learn to operate the fighter jet once a syllabus is created by a coalition of European countries and approved by the USA. It’s unclear when that may come to fruition.
Ahead of Ramstein Flag, U.S. Air Forces in Europe will proceed attempting to reform the classification rules that hinder the way it shares combat data with others in NATO, from satellite imagery to targeting information collected by the F-35 Lightning II fighter jet.
“There’s things that we could share in terms of A2/AD that might make us more integrated … and we could do the mission higher, in the event that they knew the capabilities that different countries had,” Hecker said. “We’re getting through a few of those barriers and we’re in a position to transient certain folks on a few of those capabilities, so we will fight higher … as a team.”
Hecker also desires to make sure the alliance could perform its combat objectives even when its communications are disrupted. And U.S. airmen can learn from Ukraine’s success at keeping its military aircraft from being targeted on the bottom, by continually moving and maintaining a light-weight footprint, he said.
The growing catalog of coaching events are a part of a brand new era on NATO’s path to grow national investments within the alliance’s mutual defense since 2014.
Asked whether the U.S. should commit additional air squadrons to Europe, Hecker as a substitute pointed to a different sign of those investments: the rising variety of European countries which have signed onto the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program.
Inside the following 10 years, Hecker said, greater than 600 F-35s can be spread across the continent — only 54 of that are slated to be American.
“The European NATO allies are really stepping as much as the plate and taking it seriously,” Hecker said. “I feel you’re going to see, over the following several years, higher tactics, higher integration, and all which means higher deterrence.”
That growing commitment can ensure a powerful military presence in Europe without relying too heavily on the Pentagon, whose top priority is sending forces to discourage Chinese aggression within the Pacific.
“You’re never going to have as many forces as you wish … but I feel we’re sitting in a fairly good position immediately,” Hecker said of U.S. airmen in Europe. “I feel everyone understands where we’re with the National Defense Strategy, and it doesn’t get very heated during those discussions.”
Rachel Cohen joined Air Force Times as senior reporter in March 2021. Her work has appeared in Air Force Magazine, Inside Defense, Inside Health Policy, the Frederick News-Post (Md.), the Washington Post, and others.