Conventional Air Defense

10 Pages 2391 Words

ld, currently trains much like the misguided football team--seldom, if ever, as a whole. Let us begin with a look at how we currently train.


Practicing Separately
A review of major Army and Air Force field exercises and advanced tactics courses reveals the missing "jointness" in air defense training. Two primary field and tactics training bases in the United States focus on Army Hawk and Patriot SAM training: Fort Irwin, California, and Fort Bliss, Texas. The National Training Center (NTC) program at Fort Irwin emphasizes combined-arms employment and effectively integrates Air Force close-air-support (CAS) assets like the A-10. However, no air defense aircraft, such as F-15s, participate in the combined-arms exercise. At Fort Bliss, the Army teaches advanced SAM tactics to experienced air defense artillery (ADA) officers in the 20-week Officer Advanced Course, but once more, integration of the other half of the air defense team is generally missing.3 A major joint training innovation, initiated in 1989, is the annual Roving Sands Exercise. Hosted by both Fort Bliss and Holloman AFB, New Mexico, it combines SAM training with air defense fighter participation. There are still significant feedback problems in the form of real-time kill removal for the SAMs and in the reconstruction of results. Despite this, the exercise is an outstanding forum for exchange of air defense ideas, capabilities, and techniques between not only the Army and Air Force but also the Navy and Marines, who also participate with SAMs and aircraft.4 As a result, one experienced F-15 pilot who has participated in both Roving Sands exercises to date judges it to be far superior to the air defense training experienced in Red Flag at Nellis AFB, Nevada, and Cope Thunder at Clark AFB in the Philippines.5 Another milestone is the Central Enterprise exercise in Europe (1987, 1988, and 1989), which was designed to evaluate new joint air defense employment concepts. This...