A group of 49 federal lawmakers – both bipartisan and bicameral – wrote to U.S. Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall this week calling for the use of fleet leveling to balance fighters across active duty squadrons and allow for production capacity to catch up to demand.
This attempt to preserve fighter capabilities would apply to Air National Guard (ANG) and Air Force Reserve Command (AFRC) squadrons, at a time when the Air National Guard is expected to lose fighter missions in short order. Within three years, the ANG could lose two fighter missions, reducing its combat capacity and cutting jobs. It’s a continuation of a long trend. Since 1987, the Air Force fighter fleet has shrunk by 60 percent.
“Our goal is to ensure invaluable fighter experience and capabilities can continue to be leveraged in support of our nation’s defense,” wrote the lawmakers. “Fleet leveling maintains existing fighter squadrons, preserves combat capacity essential to Great Power Competition, and allows procurement to catch up to demand.”
In many places, the choice for the Air Force is to either recapitalize older aircraft or, potentially, losing entire fighter missions. At the same time, it’s working to shed much of the ANG legacy equipment, such as older F-16s, A-10s and F-15Cs. However, the lawmakers pointed out that there is no plan to recapitalize those sudden gaps with more advanced aircraft, removing fighters without backfilling the force. The lawmakers argued that would put ANG squadrons at a loss during already heightened international conflicts.
“It takes more than a decade to produce an experienced fighter pilot,” the lawmakers wrote. “Unlike the active component, closing an ANG and AFRC fighter squadron results in the permanent loss of hundreds of deeply experienced personnel. That experience, and the millions of taxpayer dollars invested to train them, are lost forever. This loss also generates additional costs and training requirements to replace that experience. Fleet leveling the fighter force will ensure that the experience resident in ANG and AFRC fighter squadrons remains accessible for our Nation’s defense in this decisive decade.”
Currently, it’s estimated the ANG provides 27 percent of the Air Force’s fighter force. It’s also responsible for an outsized 94 percent of homeland defense missions.