Recall the movie "Jaws," when Police Chief Martin Brody warns shark-hunter Quint that "We're gonna need a bigger boat"?

That, essentially, is the argument that some defense industry analysts are making regarding the selection of an aircraft to house the next Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System (JSTARS). The thrust of their argument is that, as the US Air Force modernizes the existing system, it should select an aircraft bigger than a business jet to hedge against future mission requirements that might demand greater aircraft capacity. If the Air Force buys that argument, it would rule out a business class-sized aircraft for a "recapitalized" JSTARS. However, carrying out the important mission of finding and tracking mobile ground targets in the future in a cost-effective manner may not require a "bigger boat" but, rather, a smaller, more affordable, and more effective aircraft. Let's see.

The current JSTARS installed in refurbished B-707s was fielded some three decades ago at the dawn of the information age. Now the costs to operate that old commercial aircraft continue to rise — its heavy use in the Middle East has exacerbated aging platform issues. Anticipating the system's obsolescence, the Air Force conducted an analysis of alternatives (AoA) a few years ago, and is embarking on a recapitalization program featuring a new radar carried by a more affordable and effective aircraft.

Robert Haffa is Principal of Haffa Defense Consulting in Naples, Florida. He is a retired Air Force colonel, a former Director of the Northrop Grumman Analysis Center, and an Adjunct Professor at the Johns Hopkins University in Washington, D.C.

Robert Haffa

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The Air Force AoA concluded that a new JSTARS could take advantage of the advances in information technology by hosting the radar and mission systems on a smaller, long-range business jet. The term "business jet" referred to something like a Gulfstream 550 — big enough to accommodate a crew of 10 to 13 onboard specialists, plus all the necessary electronic equipment such as sensors, processors and display screens. Going with a business jet for the JSTARS mission made a powerful business case. Rapidly replacing the aging 707s with a fuel-efficient and low-maintenance aircraft, when coupled with the ever-increasing demand for constant air-to-ground surveillance and battle management, promises huge dividends in operating costs over the life of the system. That a Gulfstream 550 burns fuel at a rate of about half that of a Boeing 737, and demonstrates a fuel flow less than one-quarter of the current 707 JSTARS, reinforces the AoA recommendation for a business jet solution.

Hosting the JSTARS mission on a smaller, more efficient business jet also means the Air Force can gain operational advantages over larger commercial aircraft:

Business jets are designed to operate at much higher altitudes (42,000 feet and above compared to 34,000 for a commercial jet), giving the radar a better look angle and significantly improving mission effectiveness. A business jet can take off and land on shorter runways, doubling the number of potential operating locations to provide greater mission adaptability. Business jets take up less ramp space at crowded forward airfields, providing more operational flexibility when deploying forces.

Thus, business jets bring a number of advantages to the JSTARS recapitalization effort. But what about the "bigger boat" argument? Does the Air Force need to buy more capacity in the JSTARS jet to ensure it will be able to adapt to future mission requirements? This discussion goes to what aeronautical and electrical engineers refer to as "SWAP": the size, weight and power of the aircraft needed to drive the system's components. Here the analogy is not a scene from a movie, but the shift from your personal computer to your smartphone that has more computational power than that on the first-fielded JSTARS.

Over the past 2½ decades, advances in radar and computer processing technology have allowed the Air Force to make dramatic improvements to JSTARS capabilities while reducing SWAP requirements:

Improvements to computational capacity and reliability on the JSTARS command and control systems have improved exponentially while the weight of those systems decreased. Data storage has increased over 1,600 percent while the weight has been cut in half. Similarly, data processing speed has increased a hundred-fold at a third of the size and weight. The JSTARS mission, performed by a crew of 18 today, could be done with a crew of 10 or fewer by exploiting improvements in processing power and advanced display technology. Modern digital radars and processors offer greater capability while requiring less SWAP.

This digital revolution has turned conventional thinking regarding excess capacity requirements for combat aircraft upside down. Rather than SWAP requirements increasing over an aircraft's life cycle, the application of Moore's law — holding that processing speed doubles every 18-24 months — suggests that the aircraft will become lighter over time as black boxes are replaced and upgraded. The JSTARS flying today illustrates this point. By exploiting advances in digital systems, the current 707 aircraft is about 3,500 pounds lighter than when it was first deployed. This ongoing revolution promises that capability will increase and potentially accelerate as next-generation microprocessors are fielded, while SWAP requirements stay the same or decline.

Allowing for some growth in capacity is prudent when considering an uncertain future with new threats or mission requirements, and the margin of 5 percent to 10 percent being suggested by Air Force planners seems about right.

In determining that a business jet aircraft has adequate capacity to recapitalize the JSTARS fleet, the Air Force has altered its acquisition mindset from the industrial age to the digital age — doing away with old-school thinking that relied on oversized commercial transport aircraft providing expensive unneeded capacity.

Expenses on a new JSTARS do matter. The program is being squeezed by budgetary forces as the Air Force tries to fund its top three priorities, the B-21, F-35 and KC-46A, while finding room for a recapitalized JSTARS. In that regard, it would be poor stewardship of scarce resources to invest in an aircraft larger than needed with diminished mission effectiveness, and that will be more costly to acquire, operate and maintain. JSTARS recapitalization does not need a bigger boat; in this case, small is beautiful.

Robert Haffa is principal of Haffa Defense Consulting in Naples, Florida. He is a retired Air Force colonel, a former director of the Northrop Grumman Analysis Center, and an adjunct professor at the Johns Hopkins University in Washington, D.C.

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