No 30-year-old drone wingmen: US Air Force eyes regular CCA overhauls – By Stephen Losey (Defense News) / June 14, 2024
The Air Force’s aircraft fleet is replete with fighters, bombers, tankers and other aircraft that are still flying after decades or even generations.
But the service’s planned collaborative combat aircraft — drones that will fly alongside crewed fighters — probably won’t last even a single generation before they need to be replaced or heavily overhauled, Chief of Staff Gen. David Allvin said Thursday.
Allvin, speaking at the Air and Space Forces Association in Arlington, Virginia, said planning from the start to regularly replace CCAs is the best way to keep their missions simple and costs down, so the service can field them in significant numbers.
“I don’t want a set of collaborative combat aircraft that’s going to last for 25 to 30 years,” Allvin said. “If it’s going to last 25 or 30 years, then it’s gotta do everything but make you toast in the morning.”
