A certain smugness is apparent within naval aviation where planners are watching their F/A-18E/F catch an appropriations three wire while the U.S. Air Force's F-22 hangs on by its nose wheel. But the F-22's recent near mid-air with congressional appropriations should be a heads-up for naval aviation. The A-12 and the F-22 programs began around the same time, and yet the Air Force was able to garner four times the appropriations for the F-22 development, spend more money on the YF-22/YF-23 flyoff than the Navy had programmed for all three phases of its A-12 development program, and keep the F-22 alive while the A-12 was terminated because Secretary Dick Cheney did not believe it was necessary for national defense. In other words, if the Air Force, which has demonstrated a superior skill in keeping a program alive in a period of descending budgets is running into trouble, naval aviation should think hard about buying aircraft to fill its carrier decks.
Naval aviation claims that the carrier is dead without deep strike.Well, after two decades of looking for a manned-aircraft replacement for its deep-strike mission, there is none and the drawing board is blank. This should put senior naval aviation planners on Alert Five status: deep strike won't save the aircraft carrier. Only a sea-launched close air support aircraft can resuscitate naval aviation.
One might reasonably ask, what happened to the Navy's deep- strike mission? There are two answers: budget and approach. In 1980—four years before the A-12 program began—former Secretary of Defense William Perry (then head of Defense Development, Research and Engineering), told Business Week magazine that, by the end of this decade, missiles would be smarter than people. Former Under Secretary for Acquisition Paul Kaminski suggested in 1996 testimony that there were solutions to deep strike other than manned aircraft. Recent approaches to deep strike confirm this. The bombing of Sudan, historically a natural mission for deep-strike aircraft from an aircraft carrier, was given instead to cruise missiles launched by the black-shoe Navy cruising in the Red Sea.
When the Reagan administration took charge in the early 1980s, it implemented huge budgets that seduced many into believing that if you plan it, it will be produced. But by the time the Navy got serious about its A-12, the appropriations windfalls were disappearing. So desperate was naval aviation to buy the A-12 that it did not hear the missile mantra in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. Instead, in an attempt to finance the A-12, it violated the U.S. Constitution and statutes that made it a felony to contract without appropriations. Indeed, the A-12 was under contract for at least one and one-half years without adequate appropriations.
If it sounds as though the Navy is being singled out, let's not forget the Air Force's fixation on the F-22. When the Air Force began the F-22 program, then known as the advanced tactical fighter (ATF), it violated felony statutes by asking contractors to contribute money in anticipation of future contracts. The Air Force continued to violate these anti-deficiency statutes as the Fiscal Year 2000 House Committee on Appropriations Report recently documented.
As naval aviation prepares to battle for F/A-18E/F and Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) budget share, it should consider what its rival is doing. The Air Force also wants money for its share of JSF and for the F-22, and it has demonstrated a superior track record when it comes to capturing budget-share at the Navy's expense. Any back-of-the-envelope calculation shows that there is not enough money for all three programs. The Navy knows this but continues to risk all in this game of musical jets.
Naval aviation leaders instead should be discussing an aircraft that the service can afford and a mission that would give the aircraft carrier mission sanctuary: sea-launched close air support. It is the sole mission that cannot be performed by Air Force bombers, fighters, close air support aircraft, or for that matter, Navy cruise missiles. As U.S. policy evolves from defending against the Evil Empire toward a Pax Americana, a close air support aircraft not only would complement America's emerging world police force, but also would give the carrier Navy an aircraft the Navy could afford.
The Navy recognizes that it needs to provide fire support in the littorals, which is why it is developing the new land-attack destroyer (DD-21). But coastal fire support, particularly from "smart weapons" is not enough. Close air support is an undisputed requirement. The four battleships now tied up are evidence that weapon concepts do not last forever. The carriers can suffer the same fate unless naval aviation planners stop fixating on a deep-strike mission that competes with the Air Force and cruise missiles and design an affordable aircraft that can support the American cop on the world beat.
Mr. Stevenson wrote The Pentagon Paradox, published by the Naval Institute Press, and is the author of the Press's forthcoming chronicle of the A-12, The $5 Billion Misunderstanding.
F-22 Lessons Can Save the Carrier—and the Land-Attack Destroyer
By J. P. Stevenson