This research paper addresses two of the important questions raised in the General Accounting Office report regarding the use of contractors in support of joint military operations. First, will a joint engineering and logistics service contract provide the combatant and service commanders any benefit over maintaining individual Navy, Army, and Air Force service augmentation contracts? Second, does current joint doctrine adequately address the use of contractor services i...

This research project addresses how I believe airpower should be employed in urban warfare to achieve operational and strategic results. I chose this topic because there is an apparent disconnection between how military planners and operators view urban combat and their awareness of airpower’s unique and potentially decisive contributions in this environment. This disconnect could prove disastrous for military forces operating on urban terrain. Urban warfare has been giv...

This study then examined Joint Publication 3-58, Joint Doctrine for Military Deception, and determined it could better incorporate the lessons learned from World War II. Current joint doctrine could be improved by underscoring the contribution that deception provides to surprise, the importance of integrating deception within all three levels of war, and the importance of exploiting an adversary’s preexisting beliefs when creating a deception story. Applying these World ...

I developed this thesis because I perceived a void in applying these themes—technology, force reductions, and futuristic visions—to command and control and to related impacts for staff structures. I seek concrete application of these ideas, rather than more rhetoric on what might be . . . someday. This paper represents my effort to peer into our future and see possibilities.

Each year the USAF prosecutes approximately 35 retirement-eligible members; 15 of them eventually receive a punitive discharge at trial. While the overall numbers are not significant, the people behind those numbers are. During my tenure as a trial and defense counsel, I have prosecuted or defended four of those individuals. The military justice system owes it to its members to ensure that justice is done in all cases. Each military member facing a court-martial deserves...

Organizational change strategies for acquisition are essential due to the enormity of change required of the acquisition community. The Congress and the DOD have made many previous attempts at acquisition reform, but most have had little effect. To make sure our current reform efforts make positive, lasting changes, we must transform the acquisition culture. To date, little attention has been paid to cultural change aspects. To that end, this paper offers some ideas for ...

This paper examines the current USAF criteria for inducting C-130 aircraft into programmed depot maintenance (PDM) based on the mission, design, and series (MDS) of the aircraft. An alternative approach using an analytical model is developed in an attempt to refine the current process.

From this basic research and meetings with Chinese experts both in the United States and in China, the team began to explore the various directions China might take in the future. This exploration is not a forecast of a specific future, but rather is designed to help the reader better understand the magnitude and shape of a rapidly rising Asian power. This power may be our friend or foe. Whatever it does become, the nation must be ready to engage it as a fellow member of...

The reader should know that the scenario presented in this monograph is not a forecast of a specific future but rather is structured to help the reader understand the magnitude and shape of Africa’s largest economy and the impact it has on the world. As we see in the 2009 global recession and credit crisis in today’s globalized world, a failure in Nigeria, like the failure of almost any other nation, could have serious repercussions across the planet. Whether Nigeria is ...

This study, Blue Horizons, was commissioned by the United States Air Force (USAF) chief of staff to provide “a new look at the future.” Specifically, the chief of staff asked the research team to provide “a common understanding of future strategic and technological trends for Air Force leaders to make better decisions.” The chief also sought to “confirm AU as [the Air Force’s] in-house think tank” and to improve the relevance of Air Force education to the decision making processes in Washington.

Present and future force presentation options include more than just the single air domain, for the presentation of Air Force operations now includes the air, space, and cyberspace domains.

With the ending of the Cold War, the apparent conclusion of many political leaders of states that war is hardly a practical tool of statesmanship, and the recent preoccupations of the American military on counterinsurgency, some people have wondered whether the original reasons for the founding of a separate air force are any longer valid. The original argument for the autonomous air force was that its Airmen would be the only ones whose perception was concentrated on th...

A historian’s occupational disease is to find old precedents for practically everything new that comes along. And that is true for remotely piloted aircraft (RPA) as well. In one way they are merely the continuation of the millennia-old human longing for methods of striking or observing one’s enemies while remaining safe. The purpose of this essay is to briefly explore that which is old, to dwell for a time on what seems to be new, and to conclude with some speculations ...

As leaders at all levels, our Airmen must be able to anticipate and appropriately respond to a complicated and fluid national security environment. Developing such Airmen will require stronger commitments to education and training on the part of the learner to the point where learning never stops. Fostering this highly favorable attitude toward learning is possible only if Air Force education and training programs address learners’ goals, motivations, social interactions...

The attractiveness of Adam Lowther’s study of American nuclear weapons policy is that it explains the complexities of the issue in very clear terms. It will help all readers understand the debate. In particular, it frames the issue of nuclear weapons in relationship to the most basic concept of primary importance—how we view American strength in the world.

Cimbala seeks to reestablish relations on nuclear weapons control between the United States and Russia. He briefly describes arms control history to illustrate the complexities of building agreements as well as to find a relationship that leads to the satisfaction of both sides. He makes the point that more than just good relations between Russia and the United States is at stake. He suggests that when both Russia and the United States reach agreement about nuclear weapo...

Drawing on the histories of three services—Great Britain’s Royal Air Force from 1918 to 1938, the Israeli Air Force from 1967 to 1973, and the United States Air Force from 1953 to 1965—Major Carter offers three case studies to determine if the cult of the offensive applies to air forces. He concludes that cults of the offensive have indeed influenced airpower doctrine in the past, and that detailed offensive planning and a critical evaluation of capabilities provide two ...

The authors assert that the lack of an effective cyberspace C2 structure critically reduces the responsiveness to combatant and joint task force commanders and increases the difficulty of integrating cyberspace capabilities into operational plans and execution. The traditional military hierarchies currently used for cyberspace C2 do not have the agility to deal with the high velocity of change that characterizes cyberspace. Instead, the authors argue for flexible organiz...