Both jets were supposed to be on the ground in Poland for a short amount of time — enough to get refueled or rearmed with inert weapons before taking off again. A broken jet is a real problem for the U.S. Air Force personnel temporarily stationed at Powdiz, and they response by immediately going into crisis mode.

It’s a perfect test for Operation Rapid Forge, a U.S. Air Force exercise held in Europe this July that was meant to test the service’s ability to rapidly deploy to partner nation bases — and in some cases, to live in the spartan conditions airmen could face in a battle with a near-peer adversary like Russia or China.

The exercise involved F-35s from the 88th and 419th fighter wings at Hill Air Force Base, Utah; F-15E Strike Eagles from the 4th Fighter Wing at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, North Carolina.; MC-130J planes from the 352nd Special Operations Wing at RAF Mildenhall, England; and C-130J cargo aircraft from the 86th Airlift Wing at Ramstein Air Base, Germany, and from the 317th Airlift Wing from Dyess Air Force Base, Texas.

Over a two-week period, those aircraft trained over Europe and made brief stops at Powidz, as well as Lielvarde Air Base in Latvia, Siauliai Air Base in Lithuania, and Ämari Air Base in Estonia, for refueling and rearming by U.S. Air Force personnel under strict time constraints.

“This is kind of expeditionary — getting people to learn and understand how to be in the field,” said Col. Donn Yates, the commander of the 4th Fighter Wing, which led and organized Operation Rapid Forge. “These are things that the mainstream U.S. Air Force have not done in a long time.”

Members of the 4th Fighter Wing deployed to Spangdahlem Air Base, Germany, lived and worked out of tents used for mission planning, communications, readying life-support gear and other functions.

Additionally, some personnel were trained as “multifunctional airmen” to take on multiple jobs while on the ground in Poland, Estonia and Latvia, such as driving refueling trucks, pumping JP-8 fuel into jets on the ramp and providing base security, among more specialized tasks like loading weapons or performing maintenance.

All were cut off from running water, hot meals and indoor toilets.

“The more it sucks out here — and you’re eating MREs [Meals Ready-to-Eat] and you’re pooping out in the Porta-John — the higher the morale is,” Yates said. “We had people out in Poland sleeping in hammocks and stuff, not because we had to but because I wanted them to feel what it is like to live in the field. And from that they feel like they’re really, really making progress to defend the nation.”

In the event of war

Under the latest National Defense Strategy, the Air Force is questioning the resiliency of its established bases and putting thought into how the service could establish a makeshift airfield or use partner nations’ bases to distribute assets should war break out.

“It is about combat-credible forward forces; that is, forces that are or can rapidly get forward, survive a withering Chinese or Russian assault, and blunt the adversary’s aggression,” Elbridge Colby, who co-led development of the National Defense Strategy, wrote in January 2019 testimony to Congress. “And it is about bases, operating locations and logistic networks that can perform their missions in support of these goals, even under heavy and sustained enemy attacks.”

Simply put, the Air Force can’t count on its installations to withstand the type of prolonged attacks that Russia and China could mount, and the service must be able to swiftly regenerate air power from alternate sites should its primary bases became unusable.

That problem was on the mind of Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Dave Goldfein during a July trip to Finland.

The Finnish Air Force disperses its aircraft among four bases inside the country, but all its aircraft can operate from Finland’s many “road bases”— basically a highway strip that is equipped to function as a runway. The service trains its personnel to secure and stand up road bases, and it regularly demonstrates its ability to operate from the bases during exercises.

The U.S. Air Force could learn from that, Goldfein told Defense News after the visit.

“While we do have a lot of bases, I don’t know which of those are going to be available for the time I need it,” he said.

“So I’ve got to be more agile than that, and it might be that I’m setting up a base that doesn’t actually exist. I have a long enough track of concrete, some source of water, and that’s all I’ve got, and now I have to rapidly stand it up and do all those key tasks,” he added. “Stand up a base, defend the base, receive forces, be able to connect into the command and control, and then be able to operate in a contested environment. They’re already thinking about that.”

One means of doing this involves pre-positioning equipment in Europe, as well as making key investments to partner nations’ bases to fund things like runway repairs and new hangars. Last year, the U.S. Air Force conducted a proof of concept for “deployable air bases,” demonstrating that airmen could transfer shipping containers full of equipment to Poland’s 31st Air Base in Krzesiny and set up a camp and airfield infrastructure needed to launch planes.

In fiscal 2020, the Air Force plans to spend $278 million to pre-position additional equipment throughout Europe and $241 million on construction efforts to support expeditionary basing.

Solving the F-15E problem

The first step to fixing the two broken F-15Es on the flight line at Powdiz was getting the air operations center to furnish the diplomatic clearances that would allow the U.S. Air Force to keep aircraft on the ground and to coordinate the transfer of repair parts into Poland.

Maintainers initially requested two C-130s filled with 15 pallets of equipment. The request was denied.

“They wanted the world,” Yates said. “And they’re like: ‘Negative. You’re getting one [C-130].’ ”

After some creative thinking, the maintainers were able to whittle down their request to seven and a half pallets, or enough to fit on a single C-130.

Once the equipment was flown in — another task that required coordination to ensure aircrew wouldn’t be removed from other responsibilities — the maintainers conducted a full engine swap in the field while simultaneously fixing the other F-15.

Yates declined to say how long it took to get the necessary equipment to Powdiz.

“They were able to respond relatively quick. Could we have responded quicker? Absolutely,” he said. “Everyone is patting themselves on the back and going: ‘Hey, this is what we’re built to do.’ But this is a real microcosm.”

For the F-35 pilots participating in the exercise — who did not live in austere conditions — the biggest challenges were sticking to a strict schedule and coordinating with both the 4th Fighter Wing and the foreign bases involved in the effort, said Lt. Col. Max Cover, an F-35A pilot with the 421st Fighter Squadron.

“Going into Lithuania, I’m talking to someone in the tower, so we have a language barrier showing up from the get-go,” he said. “Our taxiways are limited in terms of width and space and where you can set up [fuel] trucks. You have to have the required security perimeters for the aircraft, you have to have the required distances for intakes, exhaust, for the fuel itself.

“If you look at the way Siauliai Air Base is laid out, our options were very limited in how we did this. We had to execute on a single taxiway with a small concrete pad, and so we had to do it time-based, deconflicted with the Strike Eagles because if they showed up at the same time, it would have been congested and we wouldn’t have been able to do it.”

Although Rapid Forge presented an opportunity for F-15E and F-35A pilots to clock in valuable flight hours as they trained over Europe, Yates said the exercise was more important in terms of stressing the Air Force’s logistics enterprise and forcing young airmen to creatively solve problems — even if that meant working outside of the usual processes.

“Speed and tempo are going to be really important for us in whatever we do, whether its messaging, whether its operations, whether its basing, logistics and supply,” he said.

“As you’re brought up as a young flier — my background is F-15E — you just think about dropping the bombs and shooting the missiles or whatever, but you don’t think about the whole machine that puts you out there, ” he added. “But if you’ve been out there and you’ve seen these things, you know that the key to all operations is logistics.”

The alleged perpetrators had arrived to the town with one goal in mind: to destroy, record their action and vanish into thin air. The plan worked, despite some problems early on. As it turned out, the arson attack was not necessarily an act of vandalism. There is plenty of evidence to suggest that it could be a part of a complex hostile influence operation fitting in the modus operandi that Russian special services employ in their activities against the West.

In the aftermath of the Uzhhorod arson attack, a part of Hungarian infrastructure was damaged, the Ukrainian state was ridiculed and its capability to guarantee security was questioned. And all this happened in the middle of a harsh dispute Kiev and Budapest had been involved in for months over the right of minorities living in Ukraine, to use their language.

Additionally, the attack was meant to undermine relations Poland maintains with Ukraine and Hungary, as direct executors of the plan turned out to be Polish citizens.

This incident deserves a thorough analysis because it shows that Russian “hybrid activities” against NATO go well beyond spreading fake news or pushing manipulated narratives. The Russian hybrid warfare toolkit has more to offer, including aggressive activities or even inflicting physical harm.

Western countries have been waking up to the aggressive methods Russia uses against NATO members. Unfortunately, many people still have a limited understanding of what the term “Russian activities” really means. Their first thought would be “propaganda campaigns” or “spreading lies and disinformation through the media.” And they could not be more wrong. Such simplification is a huge mistake, potentially leading to the underestimation of a really serious threat.

In fact, apart from information activities per se, Russia carries out so-called hostile influence campaigns. These consume more resources and require the use of a multitude of methods. Main tasks are performed by Russian special services which — given the realities in Russia — are able to force any institution in the country to push its agenda. They carry out intelligence work, and “intelligence work” Russian-style quite often translates to “launching kinetic operations.” These aggressive measures can be used as part of hostile influence.

The Uzhhorod incident of 2018 prompted a response from Polish authorities. Poland’s domestic counterintelligence agency, ABW, soon identified the alleged perpetrators and the mastermind behind the attack. Their trial in a Polish court is pending.

As testified by the accused and found by the ABW, the arson attack had been meticulously planned. The group had communicated via encrypted messaging apps, they had used mobile phones purchased exclusively for the needs of that action and they had traveled in such a way so as to lose potential tails. During all that time they had been in touch with the brains behind the attack who had evaluated their every step, as well as the final effect.

The statements made by the accused and the findings of facts provide enough evidence to conclude that what happened in Uzhhorod was a well-planned operation intended to cause an international political sabotage. Presumably, it was carried out for propaganda purposes on the one hand, and for political ones on the other.

The trial also revealed the international background of the case. Michał P. (full name withheld under Polish privacy laws), a Pole in charge of recruiting the thugs for the attack and the “big fish” on the Polish side, stated that the order to engage in Ukraine had come from Germany. More specifically, Michał P. named a German journalist with ties to Germany’s far-right party, AfD, as the mastermind behind the operation. The journalist was supposed to have shared the plan of the attack with Michał P. The plan’s main points involved setting fire to the building of the Hungarian center in Uzhhorod and painting fascist symbols on its walls. So the version of events presented by Polish suspects — subject to initial verification within the investigation — indicates that the order to escalate tensions between Poland, Ukraine and Hungary may have originated from a German political party often accused of being pro-Russian.

The wicked plan had landed on fertile soil in Poland. The Polish trio engaged in the provocation turned out to sympathize with marginal or even almost nonexistent yet extremist groups active in the country. In fact, Michał P. himself used to have ties to the Zmiana (Change) party whose then-leader, Mateusz P. (again, full name withheld), has been awaiting trial for espionage and collaboration with Russian and Chinese intelligence services. The remaining two Poles belong to a far-right organization believed to be vulnerable to Russian influence and often exploited to undermine Polish-Ukrainian relations.

The Uzhhorod arson attack should raise the question about the extent of Russian influence in Western European countries. In fact, there are groups supporting the actions Russia undertakes against the Central and Eastern European countries, their sovereignty, and relations between Brussels and Washington. Members of such groups act in a way that is congruent with the Kremlin’s political aims. These include the polarization of political sentiment in particular countries, preventing them from entering into a close cooperation in areas the Kremlin deems as strategic, and impeding regional consolidation. Oftentimes, the said groups receive funding from Russia. The ultimate goal of its activities is to fuel tensions between particular countries (both locally and centrally) and, consequently, to undermine their bilateral and multilateral relations as well as make particular Central and Eastern European countries lean toward Russia.

The case presented herein is just the tip of an iceberg. However, it is an important tip, as it clearly shows that with the politics of Russia come real-life threats that go far beyond mere disinformation Western countries are so willing to point at. The Uzhhorod operation originated from a third country; it was well-planned and designed with the intention to spark political quarrels between at least three states; an exemplary kinetic operation in support of the Kremlin’s interests in Central and Eastern Europe.

In recent years, Moscow has become more and more brutal in subordinating the countries of the region to its political and business goals. It has been using as proxies those groups that for different reasons would be eager to help push its agenda against the West. We must be aware of the nature and methods of the Kremlin’s actions. Narrowing down Russia’s hostile activity to spreading lies in the media is a losing battle.

Stanisław Żaryn is a spokesman for Poland’s Minister-Special Services Coordinator.

Maj. Gen. Pasi Jokinen, who became the commander of Finland’s Air Force in April, oversees the transformation. The job has its perks: During U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Dave Goldfein’s trip to Finland in July — his first visit to the nation — the two officers took a break from meetings and sat backseat in two Finnish F/A-18 Hornets for a training mission. Goldfein later said the flight signified the growing trust between the two air forces.

Jokinen spoke on July 21 with Defense News, which traveled to Finland with Goldfein, about the service’s readiness challenges and its modernization priorities.

Tell me about your conversation here today with Gen. Goldfein.

Well, we talked about a lot of interesting topics. We talked about the operation environment and the Finnish Air Force and what we do here, and the cooperation with the U.S. and all that. He obviously was aware of a lot of things, but we went into very good detail about everything like that.

We know what’s happening here, we are strongly here, we are committed here and everything is running smoothly.

You said you talked about the operational environment for Finland right now. Can you characterize that, and is it changing?

Well, I think we have been using that word “new normal” after Crimea and after 2014, so activity in the Baltic region and in this region is in a little bit elevated level — let’s put it that way. And of course our eastern neighbor is actively doing things in Syria and eastern Ukraine. It has had some effects.

It seems that they have this big exercise cycle, [in] running the Zapad [exercise] and how they rotate the different regions. In 2017 we saw again this western Russia exercise, and it was noted. It was at peak activity level. Activity-wise, 2017 was the highlight, and now we are calmed down a little bit, but still we are above the level before 2014.

Is it fair to say that the number of intercepts peaked in 2017?

Yeah, well, when their activity is high, our activity is high. And of course the Gulf of Finland, which is the international airspace nearby our border, that’s one of the areas of interest. You used the word “intercepts,” though; that activity is there. I mean, of course then they are operating also in the other, the northeast and eastern border, but that’s a solid border. I mean, obviously they are on their side and we are on our side. Then the international airspace where we meet, OK. The Gulf of Finland is mainly transit for mainland Russia to Kaliningrad and back, and in the southern Baltic Sea, or the Baltic sea down more south, there’s more room to maneuver, do stuff like that. Here is the very narrow — long but narrow — corridor that normally there is no operational type of maneuvers, neither side, but it’s a transit. But we like to know who is going where and all that.

Then obviously one the things are that they do not always use transponders or flight plans. There are no flight plans, so we need to find out who is there. That has improved a bit over the years. The equipment is newer and they have the western transponders and they use them, so it’s a little bit better situation that we had a few years back, but it’s not 100 percent covered with the flight plans or transponders.

As you look across the entire Air Force, what’s your No. 1 concern? Is it budget? Is it what you’re seeing threat-wise from potential adversaries?

Well, I’m not concerned about the adversary. Things are relatively stable. We have good relations in all the directions, all directions there. Defense forces in general has been resourced relatively well. The readiness, of course, requires some money. And of course the Army has had a bigger transition the last few years out of the services, from a training organization into a readiness organization.

There’s of course a need for more money, for operating money also. And the government has been giving quite good money in the last few years. Now the future is not that bright. I mean, there’s some dark clouds there. I’m concerned. Of course, the main procurement program, like the HX [fighter replacement program], seems to be well on track, and I’m very happy about that, and that is their main priority, of course, to keep that in schedule and in budget for the procurement side of the house.

People have been — I don’t know if “stressed” is the right word — but they have been under pressure for the readiness, and we’ve also gotten more vacant jobs. We are recruiting people, people on the field and into the practical work— so the aircraft maintenance, the surveillance tasks. It’s very important that the recruitment works.

Aside from HX, are there other modernization efforts that you’re trying to keep on track?

Well, we are, before the HX selection, before the HX comes in. Right now we are working on our C4I system. But we have had quite a lot of new pieces there and they are IOC [initial operational capability], becoming FOC [full operational capability].

Then whatever solution or whatever HX candidate is chosen, there is a requirement to be able to process and handle all that [information]. So we are working that before so when selection is done and it’s actually coming in, the infrastructure is prepared for that. Obviously we need to then fine-tune it, depending on the selection, at the end of the day, but right now we are working on the basic infrastructure.

What has Finland already fielded? What is coming up that is still in the planning stages or in the competitive stages?

For the C4 side of house? Well, OK, we’ve got our sensors, relative new sensors for the surveillance sensors. And our networks and the infrastructure and the servers, kind of like the infrastructure there, both the networks and for the servers. They are relatively new.

So it’s there, and we are getting that into use as we speak or in the near future. Then it’s all about the processes and methods and how to handle the data and how to use the data. So that’s something that people in organizations need to learn. Not the hardware, but the people need to learn, so that’s something that we are working on. Then, when we get the HX here and we know what it is, then we do the necessary adjustments. And it’s obviously platform-specific and [dependent on] the requirements there. In all cases, we need to be able to be better in joint warfare inside Finland with data services and of course maintain the international interoperability portion, whether it’s about tactical data links or whether it’s other things.

Did you discuss interoperability with the U.S. Air Force with Gen. Goldfein?

Well, yeah, sure. Technology is one thing. You are interoperable and you can use the data and all that. But the processes [of] how you do it is one thing, but then there’s this policy side of the house, that if you don’t have the policy or to actually be there — interoperable all the time — then you just need to be prepared for that.

We are an independent nation. We are not a NATO member, and we are not doing common planning. We are operating as neighbors here. Our AOR [area of responsibility] and the EUCOM [U.S. European Command] AOR and NATO AOR, they are all overlapping or next to each other. Coordination and deconfliction [are] some things that we need to be ready to do. The policy is important and the SOPs [standard operating procedures] and all that.

The U.S. is interested in rapidly generating air power in times of crisis. How can the U.S. better defend its bases or set up new expeditionary air bases if needed? From what I understand, that’s something that Finland has the capability to do. Did that come up in conversation, and do you think that there are things that the U.S. can learn from Finland in that area?

In Finland, we have our main base. But yes, we can deploy and we can swarm, distribute our assets, and then have them under the command and control, and make centralized effects out of those distributed things. So yeah, that was talked about. Of course, it requires the ability to move and begin to move [your resources from the base]. It requires a good situational awareness and plans [for] how to do it, and then the timely execution of that. We’ve talked about the general concept, and yes, it was mentioned by Gen. Goldfein that they are looking for a more expeditionary mindset, that huge massive bases that you can generate the air power may not be the thing that you want to stick.

Finland is not that small [of an] area. There are smaller nations than us, but still in the global or the U.S. scale, it’s still a small area. The thing is to look for the agility and mobility and know what’s happening and do the right things from there, either move or disperse.

Is that a capability in which Finland continues to invest?

Yeah, it’s part of the HX program. So now the question is how much. It’s good for that fight that you distribute, but the main operation is get out there and do the job, then come back and you can go out again. That is the important thing — that you get the effect in the air, what you’re doing from the air or in the air.

Then it’s nice for the survivability part and all that to be distributed. That’s what we are still looking [at]. But then, to what extent? That is to be determined. We will find it out when the HX goes forward.

On HX, I understand Finland is looking for some industrial incentives. Has it become clear yet what each company might be willing to offer?

We are in the middle of the process. I don’t know whether the offers are final. We have the ideas that we are discussing. There is a requirement that we need to be able to do certain stuff in Finland, with the Finnish resources and [people with] Finnish passports. That is a requirement [that] is still there.

How do you think Finland will have to balance the cost of this project with the capability it wants?

That equation needs to be solved, but we have two years of time to solve it. We have the money — €7 billion to €10 billion. And we need to maximize the capability on that money.

Are you making additional investments in intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities?

There is a desire to have the proper amount of ISR. Obviously the HX is going bring something into it, and we also have a recent area there that we are investigating. Probably when there’s better visibility, when we are actually selecting and getting through HX, then we [will] know where the gaps are, and then we are going to fill them in [with] other programs.

While NATO leaders have not yet decided whether a single platform or a family of systems will take over the early airborne warning mission, “I think the most essential thing is the capability … be absolutely interoperable. I think that’s the key, that is the most essential thing,” said Lt. Col. Hans Growla, a crew member and public affairs officer for the NATO E-3A component in Geilenkirchen, Germany.

But Growla declined to comment on what specific technologies could be integrated into an AWACS replacement to grow its capability, citing sensitivities.

In June, the head of the NATO organization that manages the E-3A inventory told Reuters that the organization was racing against the clock to choose an AWACS replacement.

NATO plans to spend $750 million for the final service life extension of the aircraft, which would keep it flying until 2035, said Michael Gschossmann, director of the NATO Airborne Early Warning and Control Programme Management Agency. But if it delays making a decision on a replacement for too long, it could get stuck paying for additional work on the current E-3A aircraft.

“We have to get moving on this. We have to ensure that the studies move along quickly. We need a reality check,” he said.

One option, Gschossmann said, would be to purchase the E-7 Wedgetail, a Boeing aircraft currently operated by Australia, Turkey and South Korea. The United Kingdom also plans to purchase the aircraft. “That would give us a basic capability that could be expanded in the future,” he said.

Like the units that conduct Baltic air policing, the NATO E-3A component has found itself similarly taxed after the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014, with the number of surveillance missions increasing.

“There is a clear shift from training to real world missions/operations,” Growla said, with a growing presence over the skies of Poland, Romania and Bulgaria. “Flying in northeast Poland gives you a great view into the Baltic states. We don’t need to be physically flying in the airspace of the Baltics, we can stay a bit more south and see everything.”

Despite the high operational tempo, Growla said NATO’s E-3A component is making do with its 14 AWACS planes.

“The Ukraine crisis was starting when we were still deployed to Afghanistan. … [For a time] we had more or less two tasking, and then ISIL,” he said, using an acronym for the Islamic State group. “We were really busy.”

Currently, 17 nations participate in NATO’s early-warning-and-control force, which operates 14 E-3As and six E-3Ds: Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the United States. Canada announced in February it would rejoin the NATO E-3A mission, after dropping out in 2014 to cut costs.

Earlier this year, NATO wrapped up a two-year-long effort to modernize its E-3A aircraft, replacing the fleet’s 1970s-era flight instruments with glass cockpits that include five full-color displays and modern avionics that are easier to maintain.

One of those upgraded AWACS planes made the trip to Amari Air Base, Estonia, for an air show commemorating the Estonian Air Force’s 100th anniversary. It was the first open display of a NATO E-3A in Estonia, with visitors able to walk inside the aircraft to view the cockpit and crew stations.

“We want people to see the NATO asset that is flying more or less daily, touch it, and see the guys who are making their airspace safer,” Growla said.

More than 3,500 miles away, the airmen of Thule Air Base in Greenland were watching, dispatching real-time reports to the Combined Space Operations Center, or CSpOC, at Vandenburg Air Force Base, California.

Located on the northwestern coast of Greenland, Thule Air Base is the U.S. military’s northernmost base and the only installation north of the Arctic Circle. It is home to the 12th Space Warning Squadron, a cadre of Air Force officers and enlisted personnel that provide 24/7 missile warning and space surveillance using a massive AN/FPS-132 radar.

“In the case of the Russian launch, it was an advertised launch, and so information about the number of payloads and the launch location and intended orbit were published,” said Maj. Jason Bullock, the 12th SWS’ operations officer.

“We take that information and we use it to perform innovative mission planning to include computer modeling of how it will come through our coverage, and it helps us to task the radar in specific ways to direct energy in specific ways to ensure that we capture anything that comes through our coverage,” he told Defense News in a July interview.

Thule’s position on the globe and its radar’s 240 degrees of coverage — which projects over the Arctic Ocean and Russia’s northern coast — make it an ideal location to track intercontinental ballistic missiles and satellites in low-Earth orbit, including polar orbit satellites.

On a given day, the 12th SWS will record the trajectories of hundreds of satellites, including dozens of “high interest objects” that the CSpOC deems worthy of additional attention based on its country of origin, payload or mission, Bullock said.

It also keeps a constant watch for activities that may indicate the United States is under threat of nuclear attack via ICBMs or submarine-launched nuclear missiles.

Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Dave Goldfein visited Thule for the first time July 20, accompanied by Defense News. In an interview after the trip, he said he was struck by the spartan conditions and harsh environment of the remote air base. In the summer, days last 24 hours, and the sun never sets. In the winter, the opposite is true, with no daylight for months.

Finding “happy lights” said to boost serotonin stashed in the corner of a conference room is not an uncommon sight, and airmen get used to having only sporadic cellphone and internet access.

There is no nearby town, so all airmen — who are deployed for one-year periods — live in dormitories. Cars, equipment and the base’s 1960s-era generator are powered by JP-8 jet fuel. The base’s solitary runway — while still operational — is in need of repair, and whole hangars lay abandoned and unusable, their floors cracked and uneven due to being built on permafrost.

The AN/FPS-132 radar operated by the 12th SWS, which Bullock said is roughly 10 years old, is one of the newer pieces of technology on-site and has also undergone periodic software upgrades since being fielded.

But basically the facilities at Thule are “sort of 1960s technology,” Goldfein said.

“They’re doing a great job of taking care of them. But how long do you keep them up and running with the harsh conditions they live with?” he wondered. “That’s something I’ll be talking to our installations and environments folks and civil engineers just to give me an update on what our way ahead is. This is critical terrain. We’re going to be there for a while.”

Besides being a critical site for missile defense and space situational awareness, Thule hosts the Defense Department’s northernmost deep-water seaport and airfield. Those physical attributes are often overlooked when talking about the strategic importance of Thule, said Heather Conley, the senior vice president for Europe, Eurasia and the Arctic at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

“We have not thought more creatively about how to use Greenland,” Conley said.

“China has,” she added, pointing to the nation’s interest in building airports and research facilities in Greenland.

If the Air Force presses to modernize Thule’s infrastructure, it also will be on the heels of ongoing Russian efforts to do the same. The U.S. Defense Department’s new Arctic strategy, released in June, notes that Russia has “gradually strengthened” its presence in the region by refurbishing old airfields and infrastructure in the Arctic, establishing new bases along its northern coastline, and setting up a mesh of air defense systems, early warning radars and sensors.

“To ensure a credible deterrent for the Arctic, DoD must be able to quickly identify threats in the region, respond promptly and effectively to these threats, and shape the security environment to reduce or mitigate the prospects of these threats manifesting in the future,” the strategy states.

But although the strategy cites the challenges that Russia and China pose in the Arctic, it’s unclear whether the Department of Defense is ready make the investments in its Arctic bases necessary to maintain access and deter potential adversaries, Conley said.

“We need to move to implementation, but that’s where you don’t see the dollars in the budget,” she added.

Operating at the top of the world

On the top of a hill sits an austere building capped with two enormous radar faces. The site is home to the 12th Space Warning Squadron, but could easily be mistaken for a set from John Carpenter’s landmark 1982 horror film “The Thing.” Inside are airmen providing security and monitoring the radar feed, as is always the case.

No matter whether the 12th SWS is tracking a rocket launch or an ICBM, the mission starts with a cue from the Air Force’s Space Based Infrared System, or SBIRS, satellites, which can detect the heat signature of a launch. Then it’s time for the airmen of the 12th SWS to figure out how to best utilize the radar to gather as much information as possible.

“In the unlikely event that the radar believes it has detected a missile, it will go into sight-reporting mode and will direct extra energy on the object, and the crew will gather all information that’s available about the health of our system to determine if the sight report is valid, anomalous or under investigation,” Bullock said. The squadron will also collect information about the trajectory of the object; and if it’s a missile, what its impact location might be.

As data comes in from SBIRS, the 12th SWS will send a report to the Missile Warning Center at Cheyenne Mountain Air Force Station in Colorado Springs, Colorado, whose personnel will determine whether the object in question is a ballistic missile.

“As part of that, it’s critical that we perform our reports in a timely manner,” Bullock said. “We have very strict reporting requirements. Because by the time our radars detect an incoming missile, there is very little time to respond.”

It’s a high-pressure situation for the crews who work 12-hour shifts for three days at a time — and sometimes end up having to spend the night on-site when snowy weather makes it too dangerous to drive to and from the dorms.

The radar feed is controlled by three airmen, usually an officer who acts as crew commander and two enlisted personnel, who also make phone calls to other space and missile defense organizations, while keeping up with the latest intelligence reports and monitoring the health of the radar.

The United States has never been under attack by an ICBM, but false alarms do happen. “There are occasional times where an object would be returning to Earth in a ballistic trajectory, and the radar may interpret it as a ballistic trajectory, and so it will go into sight-reporting mode. It could be a decaying satellite [or] just a satellite in low-Earth orbit,” Bullock said.

Although the squadron’s primary mission is missile defense and missile warning, its secondary mission of providing constant space situational awareness keeps it busy most days.

“In some cases we will task the radar in a specific manner to ensure we get the object,” Bullock said. “All of our space surveillance goes to the Combined Space Operations Center and helps us to build what’s called an element set, which allows us to know where the object is in space and where it’s going. And that’s all collected in the space track catalog maintained at Vandenburg.”

But, speaking in Brussels on Friday, he said this depended entirely on Moscow “changing its behavior.”

“We will not mirror what Russia does and we do not want a new arms race,” Stoltenberg said. NATO continues to aspire to a constructive relationship with Russia, but at same time we must ensure we have a credible defense.”

Speaking specifically about the end of the INF, Stoltenberg added: “Today is the day when we see the final demise of the treaty and I regret that. However, we must find a right balance between being strong but without over reacting or reaching conclusions too quickly.We will react in a prudent and responsible way.”

He also placed the blame on Moscow for the expiration of the INF treaty, a landmark agreement of Cold War-era arms control signed by Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and U.S. President Ronald Reagan in 1987. The 1987 pact banned ground-launched nuclear and conventional ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges of 310 to 3,400 miles.

By banning medium-range land-based missiles, which are capable of reaching Russia from Western Europe and vice versa, the treaty aimed to avert an arms race on the continent. The United States announced last year it was withdrawing from the pact, accusing Russia of failing to comply. Moscow denies it has violated the treaty and says Washington is withdrawing because it wants to pursue a new arms race.

But Stoltenberg told reporters, “Russia today remains in violation of the treaty, despite years of U.S. and allied engagement, including a final opportunity over six months to honor its treaty obligations. As a result, the United States decision to withdraw from the treaty, a decision fully supported by NATO allies, is now taking effect.”

“I welcome the fact that NATO is united on this all the way and that all allies agree with the U.S approach. I am confident we will stay united.”

Russia, he insisted, bears “sole” responsibility for the treaty’s demise, adding that he “regrets” that Russia has shown “no willingness and taken no demonstrable steps to return to compliance with its international obligations.”

“A situation whereby the United States fully abides by the treaty, and Russia does not, is not sustainable,” he noted, confirming that NATO will respond in a “measured and responsible” way to the “significant risks” posed by the Russian 9M729 missile.

The Trump administration issued formal protests that the new Russian missile had been tested at ranges prohibited under the treaty. Stoltenberg said the deployment was part of a “broader pattern,” with Russia also more recently investing in new and advanced defense capabilities.

“Allies are firmly committed to the preservation of effective international arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation,” he said. “Therefore, we will continue to uphold, support, and further strengthen arms control, disarmament, and non-proliferation, as a key element of Euro-Atlantic security.”

An announcement was published online by the Defense Security Cooperation Agency. DSCA announcements are not final sales; if cleared by Congress, contract figures can change during future negotiations.

Canada is looking to buy 152 American-made radios, for $44 million. Known formally as the Multifunctional Information Distribution System – Joint Tactical Radio System, the radio is Link 16 enabled, an important capability for the NATO ally.

“Canada intends to upgrade its current inventory of CF-18 aircraft, CC-130J, and the Royal Canadian Air Force’s ground stations with the purchase of these MIDS JTRS (5) terminals to be fully interoperable with U.S. and allied forces to support and compliment joint operations in a net-enabled environment; have modernized electronic protection and secure, jam-resistant wave forms; and be capable of improved Link 16 message exchange and information fidelity including support to advanced weapon employment,” the DSCA announcement says.

Primary vendors are Viasat and Data Link Solutions, and some form of industrial offset is expected.

The report, titled “Cybersecurity of NATO’s Spaced-based Strategic Assets,” was produced by Chatham House, which is part of the Royal Institute of International Affairs, a policy institute in London. The paper, by Beyza Unal, was released July 1.

“There is an urgent need to study and address cyber-related challenges to strategic assets within NATO and its key member countries, particularly the cyberthreat to space-based command and control systems,” the report read. “The increasing vulnerability of space-based assets, ground stations, associated command and control systems, and the personnel who manage the systems, has not yet received the attention it deserves.”

The report highlights cybersecurity vulnerabilities to space systems used by countries in the NATO alliance, notably singling out commercial products used in military operations as a particular risk. These vulnerabilities can come from back-door encryption, supply chain security, and personnel and procedural practices, according to the report. NATO uses space assets to defend territory, peacekeeping missions, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, counterterrorism, and conflict prevention.

“There is an increasing need to apply higher-grade military hardening and cyber protection specifications to civilian capabilities that have the potential to be used in support of military applications,” the report read. “If military standards are not met, items procured from commercial industry with design flaws may expose NATO’s systems to additional vulnerabilities.”

The report also points to the importance of securing satellite terminals.

“Terminals located in ground stations constitute a critical vulnerability, as a terminal is an access point to a satellite and is usually not protected by authentication in order not to hinder operational actions,” the report said. “Terminals house software systems that can be compromised and require patching and upgrading.”

Data flowing between satellites, especially ground stations, can become vulnerable, according to the report.

“Adversaries infiltrating ground- or space-based systems could exploit weak software implementation, or the incompatibility of network or data transfer protocols in the chain,” the report read. “While the absence of data is easy to detect, the manipulation of data or erosion of confidentiality at such an interface is potentially more difficult to discern.”

Among the report’s recommendations is that NATO strengthen its cyber defense through increased collaboration between the public and private sector. This would allow for more timely information sharing of cyberthreats.

The report also urges NATO to emphasize that commercial manufacturers meet basic cybersecurity standards and possibly more stringent military protection standards.

“In the future, military systems will be increasingly connected to non-military systems,” the report stated. “This has important implications for the laws of armed conflict, as the combination of civilian, commercial and military capabilities in the cyber domain and space raises the risk that civilian capabilities used for military purposes qualify as legitimate military targets.”

The current dispute can easily escalate. Russia has already offered Turkey the Su-35 as a possible replacement for the F-35. Turkey is widening the dispute by threatening once again to attack Kurdish units in Syria that have aided the West in its fight against ISIS. Key U.S. senators have urged President Donald Trump to sanction Turkey further under the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act. Turkey might retaliate by denying the U.S. use of airfields, radar facilities, ports and intelligence-gathering facilities. If Turkey wants to retaliate against American allies who support the U.S. position on the S-400, Turkey can easily open the flow of refugees to the north.

The fundamental American concern about protecting F-35 technology is sound and is shared by other members of the international F-35 consortium. The basic concerns are threefold.

First, if S-400 radars are able to continuously track the stealthy F-35 when both operate near each other in Turkey, Russia may be able to better identify F-35 signatures and reduce its stealth advantage.

Second, the F-35 is a flying computer. If it connects with the computers that operate the S-400, F-35 digital advantages may be compromised. If one country owns both systems, it will be difficult to keep those computers disconnected. Russian technicians assisting with the S-400 would certainly try to gain information on the F-35’s capabilities.

And third, if the Turkish S-400s are connected to NATO air defense radars, Russia would have an insider’s view of the intelligence systems designed to defeat it.

Other American partners like Saudi Arabia, Qatar and India are also pursuing S-400 purchases, so the consequences could be worldwide.

Differences over price and technology sharing led Turkey to spurn several U.S. offers to sell Ankara the Patriot system, opening the opportunity for Putin.

Much of the responsibility for this deadlock rests with Erdogan. He distrusts Washington for harboring Fethullah Gulen, who Erdogan believes orchestrated the 2016 coup attempt against him. He also distrusts his own Air Force and may even see the S-400 as protection against them.

Before this dispute escalates further, it is useful to remember that Turkey is a crucial NATO ally. It hosts U.S. forces in a strategic location and has the second-largest military in NATO. NATO is also important to Turkey if not to Erdogan. Its military forces are integrated into NATO’s equipment and force structure. A divorce would be catastrophic for both sides.

Technical fixes to make the S-400 sale less onerous have been considered, thus far to no avail.

In similar, difficult situations in the past, technical adjustments have made the difference. For example, both the Carter and Reagan administrations proposed the sale of F-15s and airborne warning and control systems respectively to Saudi Arabia. Those sales were consummated only after a series of technical adjustments were made to protect Israeli security. The F-15s were sold with strict range, mission and deployment limitations. Similar conditions governed the AWACS sale. Without those sales, the United States would have been hard-pressed to fight Desert Storm.

Given the stakes, it is worth one more attempt to see if a series of technical arrangements can ameliorate the negative consequences and even turn the tables on Putin. Other European members of the F-35 consortium might be enlisted to convince Turkey to agree. For example:

• Delivery of the F-35s might be delayed until all Russian S-400 technicians leave Turkey. They might be given a year to give the Turks some basic training.
• The deal might be NATO-ized by having multinational NATO crews to operate the S-400.
• The Turkish S-400 could be prohibited from operating whenever their F-35s fly within the S-400 radar range.
• The S-400s could remain disconnected from both the NATO air defense network and the F-35’s computers. This would make the S-400 a much less effective air defense system; but that would be part of the price Erdogan would need to pay.
• The U.S. could seek to further improve the conditions of a Patriot sale to Turkey, giving the Turks a better U.S. option.
• The Turks might agree to allow NATO to exploit the S-400 to better understand its capabilities and liabilities.
• If Turkey could agree to conditions like these, it still might be possible to avoid a termination of the F-35 sale and avoid a major rift within NATO.

Hans Binnendijk is a distinguished fellow at the Atlantic Council. He managed the F-15 and AWACS sales to Saudi Arabia for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Less than a week later, Google decided to debar Huawei, a market leader in fifth-generation (5G) telecommunications technology, from some Android updates. The move meant that future Huawei smartphones could lose access to apps on the Google Play platform, as well as some security updates, when a new version of Android is launched later in 2019.

The White House views Huawei’s participation in the construction of its 5G network as a security risk, and this year the Trump administration has led a campaign to encourage allies around the world to impose similar restrictions. The case highlights the potentially transformative implications next-generation technologies, including 5G, could have on military conflict. But given its role at the leading edge of military and intelligence deployments, one organization is paying special attention to these trends: the NATO special forces community.

“The 5G debate is so important in helping us to understand why the president of [the] U.S. makes such a big deal out of it,” Rob de Wijk, director at The Hague Centre for Strategic Studies, told C4ISRNET. State actors who “win” the race to understand and embrace these technologies will control critical infrastructure and accessibility to it throughout the world, he said.

Special operations concerns

The NATO special operations community is considering the implications of the what the World Economic Forum and others have described as Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies. This includes an emphasis on intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance; artificial intelligence and machine learning; 5G/6G wireless connectivity; and the internet of things.

The NATO Special Operations Headquarters, located inside Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe at Mons, Belgium, is focused on these evolving threat dynamics, specifically in the wider context of the competition between Alliance member forces and near-peer/high-capability adversaries such as China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia.

Speaking to C4ISRNET, officials at NATO’s special operations’ headquarters explained how the organization accepts the presence of an “increasingly unstable strategic environment”, adding: “There is growing recognition that certain state and non-state actors seek to undermine the rules based international order by encouraging and enabling disorder and destabilization.

“The challenges faced by NATO today are multi-domain, trans-regional and span the spectrum of conflict, increasing uncertainty and making anticipation and attribution of threats more difficult.”

Hyper war

De Wijk, who is a member of the headquarters’ special operations steering group, explained to C4ISRNET how the advent of these technologies was creating a multi-faceted counter strategy.

He referenced a series of operational requirements for the NATO special operations community. These included the creation of superior situational awareness and situational understanding (generated by using sensors and data from diverse suppliers and from all military domains, including cyber and space); the application of anti-access/area-denial bubbles around friendly force assets to bolster defense; the employment of agile and autonomous defense systems for self-protection; extensive use of unmanned systems with low observability qualities; covert tactics to optimize the use of submersibles and SOF; attacking enemy A2AD capabilities through a concerted multi-domain, multi-level strategy; and coalition efforts to ensure Freedom of Navigation/Movement in order to challenge territorial claims which attempt to channel sea traffic or deny access.

According to de Wijk, big data and AI will play an increasingly critical role in processing information into actionable intelligence. “In war-fighting scenarios, resilient defense concepts should consider ever tightening Observe-Orient-Decide-Act loops that are highly automated, particularly given the development of smart, supersonic, and hypersonic weapons, and of swarm tactics. Those developments could radically change the face of war with important consequences for navies around the world,” he suggested.

This form of ‘hyper war’ would allow artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms to optimize decision-making processes, and potentially to take the human “out of the loop” in targeting cycles. Combined it would “drastically shorten [the time taken to move around] the OODA loop”. De Wijk said that, “governments willing to take humans out of the loop will have a decisive advantage. When you take humans out of the loop, it shortens the OODA loop dramatically. China and Russia are willing to do this… as opposed to Western countries.”

His message is similar to the future military leaders at the Pentagon have been describing in recent years.

Near-peer competition

As in the United States, any discussion of competition starts with China and Russia.

“China will not create a traditional bloc but will use its Belt and Road Initiative to create spheres of influence,” de Wijk said. “It will use debt trap policies for increasing its military footprint. Russia will try to establish a bloc made up by the former Soviet republics and will create new buffer zones including Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova.” He told C4ISRNET that the NATO’s special operations headquarters had only recently started discussions regarding the threat of Chinese and Russian interference to national sovereignty in eastern Europe and the Indo-Pacific.

The NATO SOF Commander’s Conference, held in Dublin in March, represented the first time that the international special forces community had met to openly discuss Chinese and Russian threats in these specific areas.

Special operations are likely to center around the execution of strategic reconnaissance missions in the future to ensure ‘free and open’ access to areas such as the Indo-Pacific.

“NATO must do it differently and in a clever way and we need SOF for that”, de Wijk said. “A new global power struggle is emerging. The [new technologies] will facilitate China’s rise and military dominance. Asymmetric response is only part of the solution. Traditional SOF missions will remain important but more emphasis should be placed upon inter-state conflict and peer competition.”

As a result, special forces must be prepared to identify and employ new tactics to maintain their operational relevance.

“New [tactics, techniques and procedures] could see SOF stealing drones from adversaries in order to detect their own systems. We have to think about it and be very creative to encounter new threats.”

Now, the NATO special forces community is considering its response to these requirements.

Meanwhile, Belgium’s Special Operations Regiment (which is represented at NSHQ) is weighing how it will operate across this rapidly evolving operating environment. Speaking to C4ISRNET, Capt. Jan Weuts, who works on capability development at the Dutch Army Special Forces Centre of Expertise for Special Operations, emphasized a shift towards more operations enabled by “human-machine” teams in order to support more “strategic cognition, decision-making and actions”.

Weuts said that next-generation technology types “could take SOF operators out of the [OODA] loop.” He noted that autonomous solutions including unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), unmanned ground vehicles, and unattended ground sensors could soon be relied upon to execute special reconnaissance mission sets.

“Military assistance and special warfare operations are only going to gain in importance,” Weuts said. He highlighted emerging potential in command and control, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities as well as AI. This includes accessibility to “tailored” social media analysis tools; collaborative mixed reality tool sets to support decision-making; and augmented reality systems capable of being integrated into head- or helmet-mounted displays.

Weuts also described how AI could assist in enabling the tactical use of swarms of drones to support urban warfare requirements and precision targeting. Such a solution, he added, could ensure redundancy with multiple air frames tasked with the same mission.

“AI-enabled UAVs and unmanned ground vehicles will become increasingly… important and fast. Moreover, this level of technology is also quite achievable by irregular opponents, so we have to start developing this capability now,” Weuts explained. However, with the risk of information overload, Weuts asked whether information would “distract or assist operators”.

U.S. outlook

Western states are likely to consider the consequences of power shifts associated with these new technologies.

As a result, the international special operations community must remain focused on exploiting next-generation technology such as big data, artificial intelligence and machine learning. However, how these teams can harness and understand these capabilities while mitigating the cognitive burden on operators already conducting highly stressful and complex tasks in austere conditions will be critical.

Such considerations were discussed at the U.S. Army Special Operations Command’s inaugural artificial intelligence/machine learning workshop at Fort Bragg, North Carolina in December. The workshop aimed to consider how artificial intelligence and machine learning could support future special operations in the “physical, virtual and cognitive” realms.

A statement from U.S. Special Operations Command described how working groups focused on more than 50 artificial intelligence and machine learning-enabled technologies to support sensitive site exploitation and processing, exploitation and dissemination; rapid target prioritization to enhance android tactical application kit to reduce operator cognitive load; multi-dimensional operational environment visualization for interactive multi-purpose range; multi-modal situational analysis; AI-enabled partner force selection; and secure app store for AI technologies.

“These capabilities could significantly improve overall force effectiveness,” it read. “Technologies that use AI and [machine learning] technologies have the potential to change the way our units operate in the current security environment. These technologies are not for the distant future but are prevalent today. The Department of Defense has the potential to seize opportunities against our would-be adversaries by capitalizing upon these capabilities in artificial intelligence and machine learning. “