Since 2015, the NGAD 6th generation fighter program has been one of the immovable pillars of US Air Force planning. It was to take over from the F-22 Raptor, starting in 2030, to once again give the American armed forces indisputable air superiority for the next 20 to 30 years.
These certainties, it is true, were very comfortable, for the military as well as for the industrialists, since it was a question of applying, identically, the same recipes which made the success of the F-15 then the F-22, in the past. They have however been called into question by some, like Will Roper, when he led US Air Force acquisitions from 2019 to 2021.
For Dr Roper, the acceleration of the technological tempo generated by the return of strategic competition between super-powers would soon no longer allow the design of super-combat aircraft, which would be out of price, for one or two decades, the technological and operational perception, at the time of its design, simply being no longer current, when it entered service.
Si Will Roper was right too soon, it probably won't have been by much. Indeed, Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall has just given certain details on the root causes having led to a new reflection on the future of US Air Force fighter aviation, and the various declarations casting growing doubt on the future of the NGAD program, for a month now.
According to him, while he is certain of the development, in the more or less long term, of the NGAD program itself, he is much less affirmative, concerning the fact that it will be well articulated around a piloted fighter plane.
In this section:
For Frank Kendall, the CCA combat drone program has a high priority over the NGAD program
Indeed, for the Secretary of the Air Force, beyond the important budgetary considerations which hamper the execution of all USAF programs, the collaborative combat drone program, designated by the acronym CCA (Collaborative Combat Aircraft), is not only a priority, facing the NGAD, but it also conditions the future and the technological and structural choices which define the American 6th generation fighter.
Indeed, for the US Air Force, collaborative drones, whether attack, reconnaissance or Loyal Wingmen type, represent, at present, the only possible response to the operational and technological challenge posed by China and the People's Liberation Army around Taiwan.
Furthermore, the rapid advances observed in the areas of detection, including counter-stealth, air defense, as well as the cooperative commitments made by the Chinese Air Force, require us to rethink the traditional model of air superiority centered on highly technical piloted combat aircraft, such as the F-22 Raptor today, and as the NGAD was to be.
The war in Ukraine shows that the pilot is the weak point of air power in a high-intensity war.
In fact, the increased threat to combat aircraft would now have exceeded the threshold of sustainability for conducting a high-intensity air war over time, in the US Air Force's analysis. And it seems that it is the pilot who, in this analysis, would represent the biggest weak point in the current doctrine.
This weakness has been particularly highlighted in recent years by the air war in Ukraine. Thus, while the Ukrainian air force does not appear to lack the resources to receive new combat aircraft delivered by European countries, it is much more difficult as regards the crews who will have to operate them.
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