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The Aerospace Force: Defending America in the 21st Century is a white paper and a key pillar to the new Air Force Vision. At the dawn of the new millennium, the Air Force is directing its strategic vision to meet the nation's requirements within a rapidly changing world. As a key pillar to the strategic vision, this document presents the Air Force view of the future of aerospace power. It pays tribute to those who led the Air Force into the air and then into space, and challenges the leaders of the next generation to take advantage of the synergies inherent in aerospace capabilities. It provides the conceptual foundation for the full spectrum aerospace force and establishes the context for the Aerospace Integration Plan that outlines the next steps the Air Force will take on its aerospace journey. The message of The Aerospace Force applies to the entire Air Force community, but this document is primarily for those of you who will be a part of, and will lead, the Air Force in the 21st Century. To succeed as tomorrow's aerospace leaders, your charge is to continue molding our air and space capabilities into a seamless force. Your support in the integration of air and space systems will lead to advances in our warfighting capabilities, new concepts of operations, and new technologies throughout the aerospace continuum. Your legacy will be a full spectrum aerospace force that is organized, trained, and equipped to control and exploit the aerospace continuum. It is our mission and our future-take us there.

Embroiled in a rapidly escalating conflict in Kenya against militant nationalists, the Mau Mau, and struggling with a lack of manpower and clear military strategy, the Chief of the Imperial General...

In response to the extraordinary international developments of the past few years, the Secretary of the Air Force published a white paper, The Air Force and U.S. National Security: Global Reach--Gobal Power in June 1990. Secretary Rice's paper describes a planning framework to develop Air Force capabilites which, combined with the capabilities of the Army, Navy, and Marines, will underwrite U.S. national security strategy. The changing environment offers significant challenges to the analysis commuity. To meet these challenges, the Air Force Center for Studies and Analyses is developing an analytical framework and a methodology for analyzing Air Force capabilities to provide Global Reach--Global Power.

The United States requires a national security strategy and a force posture that reflect the nation's economic and emotional capacity to implement the strategy. Recently published strategic concepts fail to accommodate these requirements. Current Secretary of Defense guidance to the Services is to develop a strategically balanced joint force capable of spanning the full spectrum of conflict. The U.S. Joint Forces Command interpretation of the Department of Defense vision is to expand military capability in an economic environment where defense budgets will almost certainly contract. In response, U.S. Joint Force and Army Capstone Concepts articulate development of a force that is not optimized toward specific threats but rather depends on rapid adaptability to threats as they are revealed. These concepts demand vigorous debate on their risk and affordability implications. This paper explores a risk-based approach to a strategically balanced force that assesses alternative postures and the viability of competing force concepts in mitigating national risk in a resource-constrained environment. This assessment also examines alternate definitions of balance and the continued relevance of U.S. conventional capabilities and nuclear deterrence.

With the creation of United States Africa Command and the resurrection of Seventeenth Air Force, some Airmen responded with trepidation. The African continent seemed truly unknown territory, and many believed that the United States had little prior experience conducting flight operations in the region. But as Maj Paul F. Spaven points out, such concerns are largely groundless. Airmen have been operating in Africa for decades, and rich possibilities exist for crafting an air strategy to serve US interests in the region. This groundbreaking study offers a thorough analysis of the context for USAF strategy making in Africa, followed by a synthesis of what that strategy might look like. The analysis occurs in three chapters, covering the geography of Africa, the complex and varied history of US- and European-air operations in the region, and current US activities and strategic guidance pertaining to Africa. The synthesis occurs in three chapters, covering the conditions the USAF can expect to encounter in Africa, a discussion of how Airmen should think about the area of responsibility, and an examination of the ends, ways, and means of a proposed African strategy. The study concludes that a viable Air Force strategy in Africa is properly based on modest ends that reflect US national interests on the continent that are themselves limited in scope. These modest ends require that correspondingly limited ways and means be applied in order for the entire Air Force approach to remain balanced. The ways should focus on missions that create conditions for African states to solve their own security issues, thereby increasing their legitimacy. The means should focus on building the capacity for long-term operations in Africa with access to airfields, a force structure that includes strike and transport aircraft specialized for the region, an Air Force organization tailored to the peculiar demands of the continent, and specialized cultural training for Airmen.

Since the Vietnam War, much has changed with regard to the Total Force and the structure of the Department of Defense. The Air National Guard, in particular, began many transformational programs designed to better enhance its mission capabilities for both state and federal missions. In fact, the Air National Guard evolved into an operational reserve necessary to successfully fight the nation's wars. Ultimately, the strength of the Air National Guard is built upon its greatest asset: its people. With people at the center of the equation, is there a best organizational construct in which to form an Air National Guard unit? If so, what might that unit look like? If not, might there be certain traits which resonate successfully within all the models? With these research questions in hand, the author began a quest for resolution on the optimum Guard organizational construct. When a researcher pursues new subject matter, there is the possibility that the research results may be significantly different than expected. in this case, through a myriad of senior officer interviews, multiple model case studies, an expansive literature review, and a thorough review of the challenges in new units, the research indicated that there is almost no limit to the number of successful types of Total Force Integration models. However, what the research did demonstrate was the importance of certain core threads necessary for any models to both survive and thrive. Because of these core threads, this study recommends a common framework for the way ahead for future integration efforts, which shall be presented as the Multimission Framework for Total Force Integration.,'