The Air Force plans to spend more than $6 billion on research, development, test and evaluation for its new CCA program and related projects over the next five years, including an experimental operations unit and an autonomy testbed that will support the initiative. The uncrewed platforms are expected to serve as robotic wingmen for Next-Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) fighter jets and other manned aircraft. The service is currently planning for 1,000 such systems.

“In many cases, we will tether [the CCA drones to manned platforms] in terms of range and speed and payloads and capabilities. And in other areas, we will untether in terms of geographic location, mission generation, to complicate both an enemy targeting scheme and what they have to keep track of and battle track. And then we will be able to congeal our forces to a time in place of our choosing,” Maj. Gen. Scott Jobe, director of plans, programs and requirements at Air Combat Command, said Monday at a virtual event hosted by the Mitchell Institute.

“There’s lots of different definitions … on what tethering and non-tethering means. But the short answer is, yes, we’re going to have all of those capabilities. So we’re going to have the ability to perform maneuvers in close concert with a fighter-type aircraft or NGAD platform itself. And then there are other cases where we will have [drone] swarms doing things on a platform to platform, CCA to CCA, or weapon-to-weapon collaboration level,” he said.

The uncrewed systems and supporting technologies developed by industry and government agencies must have those capabilities baked into them, noted Brig. Gen. Dale White, program executive officer for fighters and advanced aircraft, which is overseeing the CCA acquisition program.

“That flexibility can’t be limited by the design of the materiel solution. The flexibility has to be introduced at the mission planning level, which means the materiel solution has to be very open in terms of what it’s capable of doing. And that is one of the key focus areas. Because at the end of the day, when we employ these, we want to give the mission commander … the maximum capability and the maximum flexibility,” he said.

Maj. Gen. Heather Pringle, commander of the Air Force Research Lab, said modeling and simulation tools will help officials explore how the drones could operate both tethered and untethered.

Autonomy will be key when aircraft-to-aircraft communications are degraded by adversaries’ attacks in the electromagnetic spectrum, Air Force officials say.

“What we’ve done for our concept of operations and concept of employment have built in the ability to both have a human in or on the loop. And then also, when that doesn’t happen because of the contested electromagnetic spectrum that we anticipate, we still have built the capabilities from the mission planning perspective, from the rules of engagement, and from the autonomy perspective, so that these aircraft can still be effective in the fight. And so we built that into our attributes for both the platform and integration across the NGAD platform aircraft itself and the CCAs,” Jobe said.

The next generation of autonomy technology has to be able to account for electronic attacks and be “predictive” in terms of what it will do when it’s operating in environments where communications are disrupted, degraded, or intermittent, Pringle noted, adding that the tech needs to be reliable with AI ethics rules “baked in,” so that warfighters will trust the systems.

Maj. Gen. Evan Dertien, commander of the Air Force Test Center located at Edwards Air Force Base, noted that the service is already thinking through these safety issues as it conducts experiments with these types of drones and flies them over the United States.

“We’re working on … developing that autonomy, the flexibility to switch back between tethered and untethered. And when you have an unexpected break of your tethering communications, what do you want the autonomy to do? Do you want it to automatically return to base? Do you want it to posture itself to reestablish the connection? So as we’re taking baby steps right now, kind of crawl, walk, run [approach]. We’re working through all those kinds of different things. But we’re putting a framework in place to where you know safety is kind of your number one priority, and then you build on capability from there,” he said.

The Air Force plans to expand upon the autonomy work that’s already been done by AFRL’s Skyborg program and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s Air Combat Evolution (ACE) initiative, as it pursues a “core autonomy engine” that it can put on its future drones to run algorithms.

The service has been putting Kratos’ unmanned XQ-58A Valkyrie platforms and other drones developed by industry through their paces.

Next steps include additional experimentation efforts using modified F-16 fighter jets to test out new artificial intelligence and autonomy technologies that will support the CCA program.

In December, during multiple flights at Andrews Air Force Base, California, X-62A VISTA test aircraft equipped with algorithms demonstrated that AI agents can control a full-scale fighter jet and provide live-flight data, according to officials.

Additionally, the Air Force has big plans for its Viper Experimentation and Next-gen Operations Model (VENOM) project, which will also include F-16s that will serve as a “flying autonomy testbed” for the CCA effort, according to budget documents.

The Air Force is requesting $50 million for VENOM in fiscal 2024, and it plans to spend $121 million on the initiative in fiscal 2024-2028.

“The VISTA aircraft is great for the control of development, and we kind of have the safety wrapper to develop autonomy. [But] what you don’t have on that aircraft is a lot of sensors. So by getting it on the VENOM aircraft, you now have an AESA radar, you have electronic warning, you have all those things that where now you can expand your autonomy algorithm to react to the inputs that it’s getting to make decisions for you. So, it’s kind of the next evolution into scaling up what autonomy can do. And that’s what … the VENOM aircraft will help us do,” Dertien said.

Air Force officials have said they hope to have collaborative combat aircraft ready to be fielded by the time the manned Next-Generation Air Dominance system comes online. Last year, Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall suggested the NGAD platform could reach some sort of operational “capability” by 2030.

At the Mitchell Institute event on Monday, White declined to say when he expects CCA drones or the next-gen manned fighter will be ready for fielding, citing classification reasons. But he did note that “I don’t think we’re going to wait for an NGAD to roll out a CCA.”

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The CCA drones are expected to serve as robotic wingmen for Next-Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) fighter jets and other manned aircraft. The Air Force is currently planning for 1,000 such systems.

In fiscal 2024-2028, the service intends to invest about $5.8 billion in research, development, testing and evaluation for the main collaborative combat aircraft program, plus another $400 million or so for an experimental operations unit and an autonomy testbed that will support the initiative.

Over the next five years, the CCA program “matures and leverages relevant Science and Technology investments to reduce risk by conducting targeted development, integration and test activities,” per the budget justification books. “Activities will include the employment of digital acquisitions through the application of digital engineering, agile software development, and open systems architectures. Funding provides information technology/test/training infrastructure investments, operational concept exploration, technology studies, multi-domain integration, operational assessments, architecture development, and multi-level prototyping as well as program management support.”

The program “will conduct analyses, identify technology candidates, perform concept refinement studies, development, integration, prototyping, and demonstrations to reduce risk and mature CCA concepts and air superiority related technologies in support of the NGAD family of systems,” according to the planning blueprint.

Concept exploration, integration studies, technology risk reduction and prototyping are slated to begin in the first quarter of fiscal 2024 and run through the end of fiscal 2028 — the last year covered in the newly released budget justification documents.

The Air Force is requesting $392 million for the main CCA budget activity line in fiscal 2024. Annual funding would ramp up to more than $3 billion in fiscal 2028.

Meanwhile, a new Experimental Operations Unit program will focus on doctrine, organization, training, materiel, leadership, personnel, facilities, and policy concepts related to the CCA drones.

“The program activities will reduce risk to operations of CCA employment with crewed aircraft. Funding provides program management and test support, operational concepts and studies, and infrastructure investment for information technology, test, and training. The program will serve as early risk reduction for employment of CCA’s with crewed aircraft,” according to budget justification documents.

Cross-functional teams will be charged with conducting analyses, demonstrations and experiments to develop and iterate concepts of operations “to provide solutions to current and future air superiority capability gaps,” per the documents.

The Air Force is requesting $69 million for the unit in fiscal 2024, and a total of approximately $283 million for it in fiscal 2024-2028.

Another related program called the Viper Experimentation and Next-gen Operations Model (VENOM) project, will provide a “flying autonomy testbed” for the CCA effort.

“The program activities will reduce risk to CCA through test and demonstration of the autonomy reference architecture and autonomy skills on a man-on-the-loop aircraft. Funding provides program management and test support to mature autonomy architecture and software prior to transition to CCA. The program will enable testing of autonomy on a crewed aircraft to serve as early risk reduction for CCA autonomy,” according to the budget justification documents.

The Air Force is requesting $50 million for VENOM in fiscal 2024, and a total of approximately $121 million for it in fiscal 2024-2028.

The Air Force hopes to have CCA drones ready to be fielded when the manned NGAD fighter jet achieves operational capability, which officials say could occur in the 2030 time frame.

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