By Robbin Laird

Nuclear deterrence is back on the agenda for NATO and the United States.

The buildup of the Russian missile arsenal, short, medium and long range, with clear violations of INF limitations are designed less to create a so-called anti-access and area denial capability than an arsenal designed to make the recovery of classic conventional deterrence seem beyond reach in Europe.

The anti-access and area denial bit is really about defending the Kola Peninsula, the largest concentration of military force in the world as well as the always-vulnerable “European” Russian area.

But with the gaping holes in European defense capabilities and the with the United States working to repair the focus on the land wars, there clearly is a major gap in a credible continental conventional deterrent force.

In this sense, the ability to combine hybrid warfare means, significant offensive strike missiles, and an ability to blend in low-yield nuclear weapons in the mix are designed to give the Russians flexibility in coercing European states.

With such an approach, how can European states, European NATO and the United States enhanced a credible warfighting approach, which can deter the Russians?

I looked at ways the United States might approach answering this question in an article which I published last year. There a dealt with a range of options facing the United States in terms of reinforcing nuclear deterrence within Europe against the Russian nuclear and missile modernization efforts.

But it is not just about the United States; but it is also about the European nuclear powers, Britain and France, and we have dealt with those dynamics of change in our forthcoming book, The Return of Direct Defense in Europe.

For a number of European states, they have participated for some time in a NATO nuclear sharing effort, in which those states arm combat aircraft with a nuclear weapon provided by the United States and have available a core capability which can be used in sync with NATO concepts of operations. The current NATO nuclear sharing policy is built around a policy whereby the United State forward deploys a small number of nuclear warheads which could be operated by non-American NATO assets in time of war. These non-strategic weapons would be deployed by dual capable aircraft (DCA) maintained by certain NATO allies, including Germany.

DCA aircraft are specially configured for a nuclear mission including special radiation “hardening,” to make their electronics more resistant to the electromagnetic pulse and other radiant energies associated with a nuclear explosion. Also involved, is special training for DCA pilots for the nuclear mission as well.

Germany faces a twin transition challenge with the coming retirement of its Tornado aircraft. On the one hand, there is the platform itself; on the other hand, there is the nuclear mission which that aircraft currently delivers for Germany.

Of course, Germany could simply walk out of the nuclear sharing NATO effort, and replace Tornado not as a DCA but with a single conventional only platform.

But as Rafael Oss noted in an article published by the European Council on Foreign Relations on April 30, 2020:

Without dual-capable aircraft in its arsenal Germany could still contribute to the alliance’s SNOWCAT (Support of Nuclear Operations With Conventional Air Tactics) programme by having its non-nuclear Eurofighters escort allied dual-capable aircraft. It could also continue to participate in the high-level Nuclear Planning Group and related forums in which all NATO members apart from France confer on issues associated with nuclear forces.

But its influence on nuclear matters within the alliance, including arms control and disarmament, would diminish considerably.

The “détente” portion of NATO’s basic policy of combining deterrence and détente – traditionally of great interest to Germany’s political left – would lose an important champion.

The loss of Germany’s influence might even extend beyond the nuclear realm: the US, France, and the United Kingdom would be unlikely to continue consulting with Germany in the informal Quad group if it is unwilling to share either the financial or the nuclear burdens of collective defence and deterrence.

Germany abandoning its dual-capable aircraft could even mark the beginning of the end for nuclear burden sharing in NATO.

Public opinion in the three other countries that contribute dual-capable aircraft to the nuclear mission – Italy, Belgium, and the Netherlands – is even less enthusiastic about nuclear deterrence than it is in Germany.

If Germany were to quit, such allies may eventually follow suit. In turn, other NATO members with more favourable views of nuclear deterrence, like Poland or Romania, might seek bilateral agreements with the US to satisfy their security needs.

Either way, the alliance’s deterrence and defence posture would become even more beholden to Washington.

Finally, failure to replace the Tornado could affect the future of arms in Europe. Cold war arms control was not driven solely by moral concerns, but also by practical considerations centring around particular weapons. As the international arms control architecture crumbles, Europeans rightly lament the ending of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty and the less-than-certain future of the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty.

But moralistic arguments alone will hardly entice Russia to the negotiation table. Without forward-deployed US nuclear gravity bombs and European dual-capable aircraft to carry them to their targets, NATO would have much less to offer in exchange for Russia’s estimated 2,000 tactical nuclear weapons.

But what then are the options to replace Tornado DCA with another aircraft?

The first and most obvious choice is the F-35.

This is the aircraft which the United States and a number of European allies who participate in the nuclear sharing mission will use moving forward in the decade.

In an article which I wrote in 2017, I laid out the way ahead with regard to the F-35 and nuclear deterrence.

There is much to be said for such an option for Germany, and two former Luftwaffe air chiefs provided a hard-hitting case for acquiring the F-35 in part for this mission set.

But Germany chose for defense industrial base reasons to not go down this path.

Its decision was to pursue the Future Combat Air System program with France which is designed to replace Eurofighter and Rafale by 2040.

This means that either one simply does not replace Tornado, or argues that Eurofighter can subsume Tornado functions and you simply build more of them.

Project Centurion for the RAF does subsume some of the weapons load outs on the Tornado for the modernized Eurofighter. And clearly, Germany can leverage the fruits of Project Centurion.

But the RAF is buying F-35 and not only that is a major stakeholder in the program, and working F-35s with Eurofighters as an air combat dyad.

The second option would be to develop a DCA Eurofighter.

For Germany, if they would remain a nuclear player, they would face the challenge of achieving nuclear certification of the Eurofighter in the United States. This would entail as well significant training for the DCA mission, also to be conducted in the United States.

Airbus made the case that the Eurofighter could be certified by 2025 which would meet the projected deadline for retirement of Tornado.

This was almost certainly an optimistic projection, but there remains a number of questions about the weapon to be carried at what altitude and what mission profile. The altitudes at which Tornados fly a nuclear mission versus the altitude at which Eurofighter would do so are so different the question would not just be one of certification, but of effective combat operations as well.

A third option, which purportedly the one taken, will be to buy Super Hornets for the nuclear mission and Growlers for the EW mission. 

Recently, the defense press has asserted that the German government has approved a mixed buy of Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornets, EA-18G Growler electronic attack aircraft, and Eurofighter EF-2000 fighters for the Luftwaffe to replace its remaining fleet of 90 Panavia Tornados.

Even though the defense press has announced this, the German government has not. Even more to the point, Germany will see an election, a new Bundestag, a new Defence Committee within the Bundestag, and the ever-challenging budget process to sort through all of this.

Nevertheless, the prospect is an intriguing one and raises a number of key questions.  

How will the German government play out its nuclear policy in the years ahead?

How will its new nuclear capable aircraft dovetail with those other members of the nuclear club in Europe who will be flying F-35s?

France is not part of the integrated nuclear club within NATO, but how will the German engagement mesh with any evolving French nuclear policy?

The Growler buy is interesting on many levels.

At the International Fighter Conference 2019, a senior Luftwaffe officer made it very clear that the EW mission was a central one for his Air Force.

At the same conference, Eurofighter made a splashy announcement of their EW build out of their aircraft. Obviously, the Luftwaffe preferred a flying aircraft to a briefing chart version of the Eurofighter.

What made the Luftwaffe go down the Growler route?

Then there is the question of partners.

The only force which flies the Super Hornet and the Growler other than the US Navy is the RAAF.

Might new partnerships emerge from the Luftwaffe operating the Growler, up to and included working on Australian training ranges?

The Eurofighter modernization is also interesting.

Much of the technology envisaged in the “new” version of the Eurofighter already exists on the RAF’s aircraft.

Does this presage a closer working relationship between the Luftwaffe and the RAF in shaping the evolving Eurofighter fleet, up to and including participation in Tempest?

And Germany and project Tempest is interesting to think about, for the project is more about leveraging 4^th/5^thgeneration aircraft and shaping the way to 6^th generation than building a new fighter.

And with SAAB’s as well as the Italian’s participation in the project, this looks more like a renovated Eurofighter coalition than anything else.

And then what are the implications then for FCAS?

At a minimum, the Germans would expand their options and enhance their position vis a vis the French in shaping a way ahead for 21^st century air combat.

Other questions are posed by one user of the Super Hornet, namely, the RAAF.

Former Chief of Air Force, Air Marshal Brown has highlighted that the shift from the Hornet to the Super Hornet was a significant one as the RAAF was faced with the challenge of handling securely a data rich aircraft.

Working through those security and data managing aspects of the aircraft could provide a useful learning curve for the Luftwaffe going forward.

And Brown provided another interesting aspect of where the learning curve might help the Luftwaffe as well.

“With regard to the Growler, it is not about flying with the F-35 as far as the Growler is concerned, for the F-35 clearly does not need it; but the Growler can be and will be used in many other situations. Also a two-seat aircraft has the advantage of being able to evolve it’s roles to take far more advantage of second seat.

“We do not need pricey UAVs, which look like manned aircraft; we need cheap expendable assets. And the Super Hornet as a two-seat aircraft can evolve into a good asset to launch and control such assets, or to command assets launched by other aircraft as well.”

The projected dual buy of Super Hornets and Growlers could have impacts on other German procurement decisions, notably, the Pegasus versus Global 6000 options. Northrop Grumman is the prime contractor for Pegasus, and also the key provider for the EW systems onboard the Growler. Presumably, there would be synergy between Growler and Pegasus which could be leveraged.

And historically, Luftwaffe EW operators have trained with the US Navy at NAWDC. In my recent interview with CDR Brett Stevenson, the Commander of HAVOC, we discussed the potential German acquisition of the Growler as well. I would like to say, the CDR reminded me, but if you do not know a fact, you can be reminded of it, that the Germans are long standing partners with the US Navy as well in EW. The CDR noted that there is a long-standing exchange officer program with the Luftwaffe at VAQ-129, the Growler training squadron. This means that UK and German legacy EW training via Tornado plus the Australians would add up to an EW coalition being trained in the evolving and developing 21st century approach to EW.

Given that both Triton, and Growler are key stakeholders in the way ahead for fleet ISR and tron warfare, German operators of Pegasus and Growler could almost certainly be part of the US Navy reworking its EW/ISR/CR concepts of operations.

In the increasingly focused effort on integratability, no platform fights alone.

This why ANY platform decision must be considered from its impact on the evolving capabilities for the future fight; and not just on a stove-piped short-term solution.

Featured Photo: A German air force Tornado from the Tactical Air Force Squadron 51, Schleswig Air Base, Germany, breaks away from a KC-135 Stratotanker from the 100th Air Refueling Wing, RAF Mildenhall, England, after receiving fuel over Germany, April 29, 2020. 

RAF MILDENHALL, SFK, UNITED KINGDOM

04.29.2020

Photo by Tech. Sgt. Emerson Nuñez 

100th Air Refueling Wing Public Affairs

By Robbin Laird

The Germans had a clear opportunity to acquire F-35s as their Tornado replacement aircraft and chose not to do so.

Unlike other Tornado users, namely, Britain and Italy, the F-35 was put aside in favor of a new Eurofighter replacement option known as the Future Combat Air System.

This created a gap on the nuclear mission side of the ledger, because Tornado is the aircraft currently configured to execute Germany’s nuclear mission.

I will deal with that platform replacement option in the next article in this series.

Virtually all of the press has focused on the new combat aircraft to replace the French Rafale, and the German Eurofighter.

The Merkel government has gone out of its way to emphasize the importance of this program and solidarity with France in pursuing the program.

Whatever this new combat aircraft will be when it flies later in the decade, the approach signed on to by the German government is much more ambitious than that of a new combat aircraft: it is about building the networked force, while the United States and a number of allies are now pursuing a kill web enabled integrated distributed force.

Airbus Defence and Space  has a major role in the Future Combat Air System or FCAS, precisely revolving around working the integrated, networked air combat force and the ability to work manned and unmanned aircraft in coordinated operations.

For example, in an interview which I did during the International Fighter Conference held in Berlin in November 2019 with Bruno Fichefeux, Head of FCAS for Airbus Defence and Space:

“He argued that there were two ways in which Airbus Defence and Space was addressing the opportunities within and eternal to the FCAS program.

“First, for each of its key platforms such as tanker and A400M, they were shaping road maps for the development of the platforms which highlighted ways to enhance their capabilities within an integrated and connected battlespace.

“Second, they are shaping technology streams which are designed to deal with the different challenges within manned-unmanned teaming.”

This is an interesting approach but the networks will not be built de novo.

They will leverage current and evolving networks, plus building new wave forms.

Certainly platforms, wave forms and networks are not the same thing, so that any build out of force capabilities by the FCAS partners will have to work with the platforms they have, or they will buy, or they will develop.

And because the kill web networks being built are platform agnostic, the focus of FCAS surely cannot be to exclude non-French or non-German platforms that they might buy, or the need to deal with the platforms entering or operating in Europe, which are not simply built by the French and the Germans.

With the launch of the first phase of FCAS, the German and French governments indicated that Airbus will work with Thales on shaping a combat cloud capability for the FCAS system, but funded at a very restricted level.

As Pierre Tran noted in an article published earlier this year:

Thales welcomed the French and German launch of a technology demonstrator for a Future Combat Air System, with the electronics company winning a key role, Patrice Caine, chairman and chief executive, said Feb. 26, 2020.

Thales will partner with prime contractor Airbus on work on the “combat cloud,” one of the five key work areas on FCAS, he told a news conference on 2019 financial results.

Launch of the demonstrator program was “great news for Europe,” he said.

“This is a great agreement… with a significant role” for Thales.

The combat cloud is intended to provide an extensive network of communications and command to link up a next generation fighter, remote carrier drones, and other elements in the combat air system.

An initial budget of €14.5 million ($16 million) has been set for work on that combat cloud, news agency AFP reported, specialist publication Journal de l’Aviation said Feb. 20.

Some €91 million has been earmarked for initial work on the new fighter jet, led by Dassault Aviation as prime contractor and Airbus as partner.

Studies for a new fighter engine, led by prime contractor Safran and its partner MTU, will receive an initial €18 million.

Prime contractor Airbus and partner MBDA will receive an initial €19.5 million for work on remote carriers, which are intended to penetrate enemy air defense in the first wave and support manned fighter jets.

Some €6 million is earmarked for overall management and simulation. Funding of €4 billion to 2025 is expected, with a total of €8 billion by 2030, AFP reported.

As I noted in an article on the key question of how the FCAS combat cloud will fit into a world of a fifth generation enabled combat force, and the spread of 5G technologies, I underscored: “while all the analyses of the FCAS approach have focused on its launch or its feasibility in terms of the capability of France and Germany to actual build such a program, there is another key aspect: how will the FCAS combat cloud come to terms with the two 5s – fifth generation in the defense domain and 5G in the commercial domain.”

To an outside observer, this should mean that Airbus Defence and Space is keen to work manned-unmanned teaming, data integration, mission integration, and “combat cloud networking.”

This is exactly what the German sovereign SIGINT system ISIS built by Airbus to fly on the PEGASUS represents.

On PEGASUS, the Bundeswehr has invested significant funding under the SLWÜA program to mature Airbus Defence and Space unique SIGINT payload.

Specifically, Airbus has developed the ISIS-Airborne SIGINT Mission system along with it’s subcontractor Hensoldt; the ISIS-Ground C2 System and would provide support to the program in terms of modernization, training systems, flight line support equipment and engage in the combat learning process associated airborne remotely piloted software upgrades.

Airbus designed the ISIS system to integrate uniquely on a HALE platform such as Global Hawk or Triton.

The NATO SATURN wave form would be used to work the EW links from aircraft to the ISIS-G where mission payload operators would configure the EW Network with all EW C2 occurring in ISIS

In other words, rather than waiting for a decade from now, Airbus could have an operational system for the German government onboard an operating HALE system.

With the additional advantage of co-learning with the US Navy, Triton will be the US Navy’s mainstay SIGINT asset replacing the EP-3 and will be operated at Sigonella where AGS currently operates from.

Cross-learning is clearly available and this cross learning is crucial as Triton is shifting the Navy from a sortie generation ops mentality to a global orbital con-ops approach.

This clearly is a learning process for operators, network operations and data management with deliver to the right place at the right time to make the best decision.

If FCAS is to be more than briefing slides, combat learning in the near term needs to drive the networked enabled force. Operating PEGASUS with an Airbus payload provides precisely that.

When the decision on AGS was first modified, the concept was that there would be a variant of Global Hawk and a manned variant built around an A-321. The reasons for not building a manned variant of AGS still hold today; the remotely piloted options is a better one in terms of area wide surveillance, data generation and transmission to ground, air or surface platforms or data centers or ISR exploitation sites for rapid decision making.

Since the German government has committed itself to FCAS and manned-unmanned teaming in a cloud-based system is seen as part of that effort, the future is now in terms of down-selecting a cloud-based remotely piloted aircraft able to team with manned systems.

Choosing the Global 6000 provides less persistent coverage, and less radius of operations and reduced data collection.

It also is not moving you down the FCAS path.