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1 [1] (October 5, 2020)

handle is hein.crs/govdcch0001 and id is 1 raw text is: F.- ' -iE S .,. & , October 5, 2020 Air Force Next-Generation Air Dominance Program: An Introduction On September 15, 2020, U.S. Air Force acquisition executive Dr. Will Roper announced that the Air Force had flown a full-scale flight demonstrator as part of the Next- Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) program. The announcement came as a surprise to many observers, both as the NGAD program was believed to be an early- phase technology development program unlikely to yield hardware in the near term, and because funding began two years ago, which is unusually fast to design and build a military aircraft. DOD had mentioned an interest in building a new X-plane prototype as far back as 2014, but it is not clear whether this led to the NGAD demonstrator. W ak th, NGcA\D N-otam The Air Force has said that NGAD exists to examine five major technologies that are likely to appear on next generation aircraft, with the goal of enhancements in survivability, lethality, and persistence. It has not specified what four of those technologies are. The one acknowledged NGAD-related technology is propulsion. Over the past few years, the Air Force has invested substantially in variable cycle engines. Other likely candidates include new forms of stealth; advanced weapons, including directed energy; and thermal management. The current engine on the F-35 and its variants expected to be on the B-21 produce a tremendous amount of electrical power that can enable new weapons. That could require advanced techniques to manage generated heat, so that it does not become part of the aircraft signatures and make the plane easier to detect. The technologies involved in NGAD are being developed to provide air dominance. Part of the program's goal is to determine how to achieve that end, independent of traditional ideas. NGAD could take the form of a single aircraft and/or a number of complementary systems manned, unmanned, optionally manned, cyber, electronic forms that would not resemble the traditional fighter. For example, a larger aircraft the size of a B-21 may not maneuver like a fighter. But that large an aircraft carrying a directed energy weapon, with multiple engines making substantial electrical power for that weapon, could ensure that no enemy flies in a large amount of airspace. That is air dominance. There appears little reason to assume that NGAD is going to yield a plane the size that one person sits in, and that goes out and dogfights kinetically, trying to outturn another plane or that sensors and weapons have to be on the same aircraft. Air Force NGAD is budgeted at $9 billion from 2019 to 2025. The FY2021 budget is $1 billion, with a request of $1.5 billion for FY2022. NGAD was originally mooted as a joint project between the Navy and the Air Force, and there is still some cooperation between them, but the two services have created separate NGAD offices. Yhatk Doe&~s Ube Right Ml e a,,',,0 Based on the movements of senior DOD officials, CRS assesses the first flight came on or about August 21, 2020. Some news sources have referred to this event as the first flight of a new fighter, and speculated as to the design and characteristics of such a fighter. However, it is notable that the aircraft was described as a full-scale flight demonstrator, not a prototype. The former phrase is used to describe an aircraft that is showing off some form of technology and is different from prototype, which indicates a more production-representative system. Figure I. Northrop Tacit Blue Source: U.S. Air Force photo. The history of full-scale flight demonstrators shows that they are not always followed by broader contracts. For example, in the early 1980s, Northrop flew a full-scale flight demonstrator in the Tacit Blue program. That was a single-passenger stealthy aircraft used to investigate operating a sophisticated sensor system in threatened airspace. Northrop built one Tacit Blue and did not wind up subsequently building anything that looked like it. Some of the technology explored in that program eventually went into JSTARS, an airliner-sized, nonstealthy sensor platform that had nothing physically in common with the flight demonstrator. Another full-scale flight demonstrator, the Boeing Bird of Prey, flown in 1996, was used to demonstrate stealth and other technologies. Boeing made one Bird of Prey and did not receive any contract publicly connected to the work that flight demonstrator performed. These cases illustrate the K~:> p\w -- , gn'a', goo mppm qq\ M , q 'M I 11LULANUALiM,