Vice Adm. Gene Black, commander, U.S. 6th Fleet discusses Exercise Sea Breeze 2020. USS Porter (DDG 78) is participating in the exercise.
Sea Breeze is a U.S. and Ukraine co-hosted multinational maritime exercise held in the Black Sea and is designed to enhance interoperability of participating nations and strengthen maritime security and peace within the region.
NAPLES, ITALY
07.20.2020
Video by Petty Officer 2nd Class Jacob Stanley
AFN Naples
According to a story published by Anderson Air Force base, Guam on September 11, 2020,
U.S. Indo-Pacific Command forces are participating in exercise Valiant Shield (VS), Sept. 14-25, on Guam and around the Mariana Islands Range Complex.
Participants include USS Ronald Reagan (CVN 76), USS America (LHA 6), USS New Orleans (LPD 18), USS Germantown (LSD 42) and multiple surface ships — approximately 100 aircraft and an estimated 11,000 personnel from the U.S. Navy, Air Force, Army, and Marine Corps.
Valiant Shield focuses on integration of training in a blue-water environment. This training enables real-world proficiency in sustaining joint forces through detecting, locating, tracking, and engaging units at sea, in the air, on land, and cyberspace in response to a range of mission areas.
“Exercises such as Valiant Shield allow U.S. forces the opportunity to integrate warfighting concepts such as all-domain strike group operations in a joint high end warfare training environment to continuously improve joint lethality,” said Rear Adm. Michael Boyle, director maritime operations, U.S. Pacific Fleet. “It is vitally important that we demonstrate to our allies and partners our strong commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific.”
The participating forces will exercise a wide range of warfighting capabilities and demonstrate the inherent flexibility and capability of U.S. naval fleet operations and integration of joint forces.
The range of capabilities include maritime security operations, anti-submarine and air-defense exercises, amphibious operations, and other elements of complex warfighting.
In coordination with military medical personnel and public health personnel, every aspect of Valiant Shield 2020 has been analyzed to ensure the appropriate mitigation measures are taken against COVID-19. The planning focused on protecting service members and their families; preventing the spread of the virus to U.S. forces, local residents, allies, or partners; and ensuring warfighting readiness in order to accomplish assigned missions.
The lessons learned from exercises like Valiant Shield assists U.S. forces in developing regional and global power projection capabilities by integrating warfighting concepts that provide a full range of options to succeed in defense of U.S. interests and those of its allies and partners around the world.
Valiant Shield is a series of military exercises that promote integration among joint forces. Each successive exercise builds on lessons learned from the previous training to enhance complementary capabilities and develop new tactics, techniques, and procedures. This training will provide the deterrence and stabilizing effects of a force-in-being, ready at the outset of a contingency, without the need for force buildup or extensive mission rehearsal.
This is the eighth exercise in the Valiant Shield series that began in 2006.
Unlike the Chinook, medium lift helicopter, the CH-53K is capable of being refueled while in flight.
If you are looking for speed, range, and heavy lift delivery to an insertion point, the CH-53K is a unique combat asset in the US joint force.
The photos below show the CH-53K King Stallion successfully plugging into a funnel-shaped drogue towed behind a KC-130J during aerial refueling wake testing over the Chesapeake Bay (Pax River, April 6, 2020).
And this refueling capability is part of why the King Stallion is an important capability when considering how to get to the fight with the right kit, at the right time and to make a combat difference.
It is not about building Walmarts any more such as in the Middle East land wars; it is about shaping effectively crisis management events.
In the German case, we looked at how to compare the Chinook and the CH-53K for the German forces, and the two offer very different options and capabilities.
As we pointed out in a comparison of the two platforms as options for the German forces:
If this was the Cold War, where the primary focus was really upon moving support around Germany to reinforce the direct defense of Germany, then there might be a compelling case for the legacy Chinook.
But that is not what Germany is facing in terms of the return of direct defense in Europe.
In our forthcoming book, The Return of Direct Defense in Europe: Meeting the 21st Century Authoritarian Challenge, we focus on the major challenges facing the allies in terms of defense against the Russians in terms of the Poland-to Nordic arc. Within this arc, the challenge is to move force rapidly, to reinforce deterrence and to be able to block Russian movement of force.
Germany faces the challenge of reinforcing their Baltic brigade, moving rapidly to reinforce Poland, and to move force where appropriate to its Southern Flank. In the 2018 Trident Juncture exercise, German forces moved far too slowly to be effective in a real crisis, and it is clear that augmenting rapid insertion of force with lift is a key requirement for Germany to play an effective role.
This is where the CH-53K as a next generation heavy lift helicopter fits very nicely into German defense needs and evolving concepts of operations. The CH-53K operates standard 463L pallets which means it can move quickly equipment and supply pallets from the German A400Ms or C‑130Js to the CH-53K or vice versa.
This is not just a nice to have capability but has a significant impact in terms of time to combat support capability; and it is widely understood that time to the operational area against the kind of threat facing Germany and its allies is a crucial requirement.
With an integrated fleet of C-130Js, A400Ms and CH-53Ks, the task force would have the ability to deploy 100s of miles while aerial refueling the CH-53K from the C-130J.
Upon landing at an austere airfield, cargo on a 463L pallet from a A400M or C-130J can transload directly into a CH-53K on the same pallet providing for a quick turnaround and allowing the CH-53K to deliver the combat resupply, humanitarian assistance supplies or disaster relief material to smaller land zones dispersed across the operating area.
Similarly, after aerial refueling from a C-130J, the CH-53K using its single, dual and triple external cargo hook capability could transfer three independent external loads to three separate supported units in three separate landing zones in one single sortie without having to return to the airfield or logistical hub.
The external system can be rapidly reconfigured between dual point, single point loads, and triple hook configurations, to internal cargo carrying configuration, or troop lift configuration in order to best support the ground scheme of maneuver.
If the German Baltic brigade needs enhanced capability, it is not a time you want to discover that your lift fleet really cannot count on your heavy lift helicopter showing up as part of an integrated combat team, fully capable of range, speed, payload and integration with the digital force being built out by the German military.
It should be noted that the CH-53K is air refuelable; the Chinook is not.
And the CH-53 K’s air refuelable capability is built in for either day or night scenarios.
A 2019 exercise highlighted the challenge if using the Chinooks to move capability into the corridor.
In the Green Dagger exercise held in Germany, the goal was to move a German brigade over a long distance to support an allied engagement. The Dutch Chinooks were used by the German Army to do the job.
But it took them six waves of support to get the job done.
Obviously, this is simply too long to get the job done when dealing with an adversary who intends to use time to his advantage. In contrast, if the CH-53K was operating within the German Army, we are talking one or two insertion waves.
And the distributed approach which is inherent in dealing with peer competitors will require distributed basing and an ability to shape airfields in austere locations to provide for distributed strike and reduce the vulnerabilities of operating from a small number of known airbases.
Here the CH-53K becomes combat air’s best friend. In setting up Forward Operating Bases (FOBs), the CH-53K can distribute fuel and ordnance and forward fueling and rearming points for the fighter aircraft operating from the FOBs.
Being a new generation helicopter it fits into the future, not the past of what the Bundeswehr has done in the Cold War. It is not a legacy Cold War relic, but a down payment on the transformation of the Bundeswehr itself into a more reactive, and rapid deployment force to the areas of interest which Germany needs to be engaged to protect its interests and contribute to the operational needs of their European allies.
For our report on the CH-53K, see the following:
By Pierre Tran
Paris – France may be a middle rank military power but the head of state pursues an active foreign policy, seeking to be a bridge over troubled waters around the world.
President Emmanuel Macron has strengthened political ties with Greece, opening the way to the prospective sale of Rafale fighter jets to the Greek air force, part of Athens’s drive to re-arm its forces.
But that diplomatic, military and commercial victory will have poured more fuel on fiery relations between Macron and his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
There is something highly personal in the row between Macron and Erdogan.
The Turkish leader spoke clearly Sept. 12 when he told Macron to be careful: “don’t mess with Turkey.”
Erdogan spelled out that warning in a speech to the nation, marking the 40th anniversary of army general Kenan Evren seizing power in a military coup in 1980.
Erdogan has steered Turkey through deadly conflicts in Iraq, Libya, Syria, and other points of tension around the Mediterranean.
France is also playing an active role in those armed struggles, as countries bordering the Mediterranean are clearly in the Paris back yard.
To make it clear it was personal not political, Erdogan called on Macron to consider the clock was ticking and his term as president was running out.
French voters go to the polls in 2022, while Erdogan was re-elected in 2018 and can stay in office for two five-year terms.
Macron was a surprise candidate in the May 2017 election and won on a reform ticket. Then along came the coronavirus.
Erdogan was speaking in response to Macron calling on European partners to act firmly with the Erdogan administration, making clear that was not an attack on the Turkish people.
Macron was speaking ahead of a meeting of leaders of seven Mediterranean nations, held on Corsica, dubbed in France as the island of beauty.
French relations with Turkey have been troublesome for some time.
Nicolas Sarkozy, the then president, called on Ankara to assume responsibility for the massacre of Armenians in 1915, and campaigned for a French law to make it illegal to deny the slaughter took place.
That draft legislation failed to make it on the statute books, but the message was clear to the Armenian community in France.
France has also refused Turkey joining the European Union, a struggling community of nations but still an economic force to be reckoned with.
Turkey may also be a key member of NATO, holding a strategic position with the Middle East, North Africa, and Western and Eastern Europe within reach.
But in Macron’s view, that alliance is brain dead.
For the Elysée office, a reflection of that lack of mental activity can be seen in NATO declining to back French allegations a Turkish warship switched on its targeting radar on a French warship while on a Nato naval mission in the Mediterranean.
In Beirut, Macron was hailed as a force for political reform when he flew to the Lebanese capital in the wake of the deadly explosion last month.
That warm welcome in the street was abroad, while French critics said Macron should stay at home and deal with the deadly spread of COVID 19.
At home, the pandemic has led to a spike up in unemployment to 4.5 million jobless, and Macron has unveiled a €100 billion recovery plan.
At a time when Germany is seeking an orderly hand over of political power, Macron can claim to be the European trouble shooter in world affairs, now he has focused upon Turkey and the Turkish-Greek conflict.
Turkey is a regional force, with which France must deal.
How to do so is hard, given the bitter relations between the two leaders.
Featured photo: NEW YORK, USA – SEPTEMBER 19, 2017 : President of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdogan (L) shakes hands with President of France Emmanuel Macron (R) during the 72nd session of the UN General Assembly in New York, United States on September 19, 2017. (Photo by Kayhan Ozer/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images)
By Australian Defence Business Review
An extensive construction program to upgrade RAAF Base Tindal in the Northern Territory to be able to better support and operate new RAAF and foreign air power capabilities has commenced.
The $1.1 billion project will see almost every element of Tindal’s infrastructure, services, and facilities upgraded.
These include a major airfield works and associated infrastructure project which will see the runway and taxiways lengthened and widened, a new air movements ramp and terminal, a dramatic increase in aviation fuel storage, a major re-investment in the base’s electrical, water and sewerage services, and will provide additional living-in accommodation for RAAF personnel posted to the base.
Also planned are new facilities to accommodate the F-35 Lightning II fighters of 75SQN, new visiting squadron headquarters building and accommodation, and facilities to accommodate the MQ-4C Triton maritime UAS.
The longer runway, larger fuel farm, and increased air movements ramp will allow up to four KC-30A MRTTs to be based at Tindal during major exercises or operations in Australia’s north.
“Over the next decade, the planned works will further enhance Defence air combat capability and our engagement with allies and other nations through the conduct of joint exercises, including our Enhanced Air Cooperation with the United States Air Force,” Defence Minister Senator Linda Reynolds said in a statement.
The “RAAF Base Tindal redevelopment project will also address critical upgrades to base engineering services including power, water, and sewerage to support current and future projected demands on base infrastructure.”
The runway will be lengthened from 9,000 feet to 11,000 feet and the shoulders widened from three metres to 10.5 metres to accommodate large aircraft wingspan overhang, while the taxiways will also be widened to accommodate the larger aircraft. These larger aircraft include bombers, tanker, and transport aircraft that may be deployed to Tindal as part of the US Force Posture Initiative.
The runway will have an operational readiness platform at each end, while the new air movements ramp and terminal will be located north of the current ramp.
Work is expected to be complete in 2027.
This article was published by ADBR on September 8, 2020.
The author of this article was Andrew McLaughlinR
Members from the 243rd Air Traffic Control Squadron with the 153rd Airlift Wing Wyoming Air National Guard, deploy their mobile air traffic control tower equipment to guide multiple C-130 Hercules airplanes with the Wyoming Air National Guard to a tactical airstrip on July 14, 2020 at Camp Guernsey, Wyo.
The 243rd ATCS is one of only ten Air National Guard Air Traffic Control Squadrons located throughout the United States.
Their mission is to deploy and employ Air Traffic Control services worldwide and an important part of the Guard air traffic control mission includes establishing bases in locations without existing air traffic control facilities.
GUERNSEY, WY, UNITED STATES
07.14.2020
Video by Tech. Sgt. Jonathon Alderman
153rd Airlift Wing
By Pierre Tran
Paris -The Greek prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, said on Sept. 13, 2020 that a planned acquisition of 18 Rafale fighter jets from France would comprise six new and 12 second-hand units, with the first delivery due next year.
“It consists of six new aircraft and 12 which have been used slightly,” Mitsotakis told a news conference, AFP reported.
The first unit is expected in 2021, with the last to be shipped the following year, he added. No financial details were given.
The Greek announcement of a planned order for 18 Rafale underscored the importance of the prospective first sale of the French fighter jet to a European nation.
A drive to re-arm the Greek forces follows heightened tension with Turkey.
That tension is based on competing territorial claims over maritime access around Greek islands in the Eastern Mediterranean.
“Greece has announced its wish to acquire 18 Rafales,” armed forces minister Florence Parly said on social media.
“Excellent news for French aeronautic industry and a first: a European nation wants to acquire Rafale fighter jets.”
The next few months should lead to a contract for the Rafale, the armed forces ministry said in a Sept. 12 statement.
That fighter deal was part of a wider Greek drive to strengthen the services and arms industry. The 2008 financial crisis hit Greece hard, forcing a freeze in arms acquisition.
Besides the Rafale, the Greek prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, announced Sept. 12 plans to acquire four frigates, four MH-60R naval helicopters, heavy torpedoes, missiles for the air force, and anti-tank missiles for the army, said Greek media reports.
Four Meko-200HN frigates will be upgraded, and 15,000 personnel will be recruited over five years.
The planned fighter jet order will allow the Greek air force to retire the oldest Mirage 2000, to fly a Rafale squadron.
That fleet of French-built fighters would be formed from a mix of new aircraft and those previously flown by the French air force, said Greek media reports.
That Greek announcement caught the French arms industry by surprise, with one executive saying, “It is hard to know whether it is good or bad news.”
For the French aeronautics sector, the Greeks appeared to be bearing gifts.
A Greek order would boost the business outlook for the prime contractor, Dassault Aviation, which saw a production gap in 2024-27 for the fighter jet.
The COVID 19 health crisis forced the company to cut sales forecast of its Falcon, while development of a new 6X version of the business jet and further work on that family of civil aircraft weigh on company finances.
Export contracts are critical to Dassault and French subcontractors, as deliveries of the 28 Rafale for the French air force only resume in 2022 under the multiyear military budget law.
Dassault is negotiating for a fifth tranche of Rafale and has called on France to bring forward order and delivery of that batch. If France ordered that fifth batch in 2023, deliveries could be made in 2025 instead of 2027, keeping the production line busy.
Egypt, India and Qatar are the three foreign nations which fly the Rafale, which equips the French air force.
“This announcement illustrates the strength of the partnership that has linked the Greek air force and Dassault Aviation for more than 45 years, and demonstrates the enduring strategic relationship between Greece and France,” Dassault said in a Sept 12 statement.
Greece ordered 40 Mirage F1 from Dassault in 1974, 40 Mirage 2000 in 1985, and 15 Mirage 2000-5 in 2000.
In the latter deal, 10 of the Mirage 2000 were upgraded to 2000-5, with work subcontracted to local industry.
Tensions between Greece and Turkey heightened when Ankara last month sent the Oruc Reis research ship, escorted by warships, to search for oil and gas in Eastern Mediterranean waters claimed by Greece.
Each side has since held military exercises, and France sent two Rafales and two warships to back up Greece over the territorial dispute.
Dassault has delivered five Rafale to India out of the 36 ordered, and is delivering the fighter to Qatar. Egypt has received all 24 units.
The photo from the meeting with the French President and Greek Prime Minister is taken from the following article:
U.S. Air Force Capt. Kristin “Beo” Wolfe, F-35 Demonstration Team commander and pilot, performed at the 2020 Tri-City Water Follies air show Sept. 5, 2020, Kennewick, Wash.
The F-35 Demo Team headlined the event alongside the F-16 Viper Demonstration Team and the A-10 Warthog Demonstration Team. (U.S. Air Force photo by Capt. Kip Sumner)
According to a story published by the Tri-City Herald Staff on September 4, 2020:
Capt. Kristin “Beo” Wolfe spends 110 days traveling each year with the Air Force’s F-35A demonstration team that landed in Tri-Cities on Thursday.
She’s the first woman to command the team, and over the next two demonstration seasons will oversee 40 shows including this weekend’s HAPO Over the River airshow.
The Tri-Cities show will feature not only the F-35 team but a F-16 flyover, an A-10C Thunderbolt II, civilian piloted biplanes and more…..
The show was rescheduled from the last weekend in July, when it usually runs as part of Tri-Cities Water Follies which was canceled because of the COVID pandemic.
And earlier this year, the USAf published an article on Captain Wolfe as well.
By Capt. Kip Sumner, F-35A Lightning II Demonstration Team Public Affairs / Published March 04, 2020
HILL AIR FORCE BASE, Utah (AFNS) —
Starting with the 2020 air show season, Capt. Kristin “Beo” Wolfe, a second-generation fighter pilot and former F-22 Raptor pilot, will lead the new F-35A Lightning II Demonstration Team.
For most pilots, their first time stepping into an F-35 is their first time stepping into a fifth-generation aircraft, but for Wolfe, this will be her second experience with the service’s most advanced aircraft.
“I loved flying the F-22, but the F-35 is also a blast to fly, and it is the best multi-role fighter,” Wolfe said.
While Wolfe has over 900 total fighter hours in both of the service’s advanced fighter aircraft, she’s spent a lifetime around the Air Force.
Her father, retired Col. Jon Wolfe, served 28 years in the service as an F-4G electronic warfare officer before piloting the F-15C Eagle. By the time she attended college, she had lived in three countries and five states.
“I’ve come to appreciate a lot of different people, backgrounds and upbringings because of all the time I spent in those different places,” she said. “It was tough sometimes, trying to make new friends and fit into a new environment, but looking back, I really appreciated the growth it gave me.”
Despite her Air Force upbringing, Wolfe didn’t consider the military for herself until college. During her sophomore year, she realized she didn’t want a desk job; none of the corporate-recruitment pitches clicked, and she found herself watching military career videos, she said.
“Even though she spent her life in an Air Force family, we never expected her to join the military,” Maria Wolfe, her mother, said. “With her exceptional math skills and academic success, I thought she might pursue a career in the medical field.”
Her parents never expected her to join the military, so it was a shock when she asked her dad about serving with the Marines while visiting over the holidays.
“I didn’t get it at first, since there’s a lot of Marines at Okinawa, I thought she was just asking my opinion,” said Wolfe’s father. “But then it clicked, and I remember asking ‘You didn’t sign anything did you?’”
He told her to try the Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps for a semester, and if she didn’t like it, she could quit.
“But after a semester, I was sold. I knew it was what I wanted to do,” she said.
However, she still didn’t know exactly what she wanted to do in the military.
“I didn’t really know any pilots in the military except for my dad, so I started to research career options that offered a challenging career progression, travel opportunities and a variable day-to-day schedule. I quickly realized being a pilot was the perfect fit for me,” she said.
About a year into ROTC, Wolfe’s father remembers getting a cryptic email that just said, “Columbus, Vance, Laughlin?”
“Oh, Kristin must have gotten a pilot slot … Right after she commissioned and before she went active duty, I remember taking her to Norfolk (Virginia) and getting her two practice flights in the airplane she’d get her initial screening in,” Wolfe’s father said. “I talked to the instructor afterwards and he said that he had never seen anybody do so well that hadn’t been in an airplane before.”
After commissioning, Wolfe attended undergraduate pilot training at Laughlin Air Force Base, Texas, where she learned the meaning of being an Air Force aviator.
“It hit me when I did my first solo flight,” she said. “I remember being terrified that anyone would let me fly an airplane alone after only 11 or 12 rides. It seemed like an insane concept to me. But I realized that’s how the aviation world and the Air Force trains you; to ingrain those habit patterns so that those skills take over. I remember landing and thinking, ‘That was really cool.’”
After graduating UPT, Wolfe was selected to fly fighters, eventually graduating to the F-22 as her first operational aircraft.
“My decisions were never about specific interests or aircraft,” she said. “I would always ask myself ‘what’s the coolest thing I can do?’ or ‘what’s the most challenging thing I can do?’ The fighter community appealed to me the most. Looking at it now, I don’t think I’ll ever find another community that I’ll like as much as working in a fighter squadron.”
After flying the F-22 for three years at Joint Base Langley-Eustis, Virginia, Wolfe transitioned to the F-35A Lightning II and then the 388th Fighter Wing, the Air Force’s first combat F-35 unit, in 2017.
For some pilots, passion for flight is born in an early childhood memory, and for some, that passion is gained through their experiences. Growing up, Wolfe never would have imagined that she would become a fighter pilot, much less a demonstration pilot, but it’s an opportunity that she will remember for the rest of her life.
“Whether it’s flying low-levels in the snowy mountains of Idaho, flying in ‘Star Wars’ canyon in Alaska next to glaciers, being inverted at 300 feet or doing a pedal turn during the routine, those are the moments I love,” Wolfe said.
As the pilot and demonstration team commander, Wolfe will fly the demonstration routine for two years, serving as a role model and inspiration to those that are interested in pursuing military service or a career in aviation. Part of her and her team’s mission will be helping young men and women realize the possibilities available to them.
“If I could give advice to my younger self, or to anyone looking at what they should do, step outside of the box for a second. Don’t just think about what your next move should be. Go do something that you never thought about doing,” she said.
The 13-member team of F-35A maintenance, operational support and public affairs Airmen is expected to perform at over 40 different appearances throughout her two-year command. Each show with their own set of public appearances, media interactions and recruiting events; all in addition to practicing, planning and flying the demonstration routine. It’s a lot, but her and her team aren’t the only ones confident they’ll meet the challenge.
“Ever since she got into ROTC, she lit up the afterburners and never looked back,” her father said. “She’s still doing the same thing today and it’s been fun to watch. We’re looking forward to coming out and seeing how the team does.”
“I am over the moon excited about her new role as the F-35 demo pilot,” her mother said. “It gives me great joy to see her doing what she is passionate about, while getting to represent the Air Force in such a positive way.”
When asked about the challenges of being a female fighter pilot, she considers the question for several moments before answering.
“The jet doesn’t discriminate. The jet doesn’t know who is flying it, and it will always behave the exact same way,” Wolfe emphasized. “The fighter community is an extremely performance-focused field that’s based purely on merits and tactics. I don’t consider myself a female pilot, but a pilot that happens to be a female. I’m here to do a job, and that is to make this team the best out there, inspire people to be better, and to fly the F-35 as hard as I can.”
With the official Air Force certification behind her, and the first show of the season drawing close, Wolfe is also making sure that her Airmen make the most of this opportunity.
“I do hope that everyone on the team will take a couple glimpses to see how lucky we are to be able to do this, and that we don’t get caught up on how busy it can be,” she said. “There will be opportunities at every single air show for us to walk away and say, ‘That was so cool’. You add up two years of that and I think you can’t help but be thankful for the opportunity we have.”
