Irregular Warfare Podcast - Aviation Advising: Access and Influence through Airpower

Episode Date: December 16, 2022

Subscribe to the IWI monthly newsletter by going to www.irregularwarfare.org! In this episode, we're joined by two guests to discuss how airpower can be a critical aspect of building partner capacity. Retired Brigadier General John Teichert and Colonel Tobias Bernard Switzer guests begin by highlighting past success of air advising and explaining aviation’s role in establishing access and influence with partner nations. They go on to explain how key air advising capabilities are being divested, presenting a capability gap between what combatant commanders are requesting and what the services can provide. Finally, they describe the implications of emerging technologies on future air advising and how models of air advising can adapt and be reprioritized. Intro music: "Unsilenced" by Ketsa Outro music: "Launch" by Ketsa CC BY-NC-ND 4.0

If we don't have access and influence or the ability to impact capabilities in lower-end host nations, then we automatically give up the ground that we would otherwise have to our strategic competitors who are very active in a variety of spaces that understand that those nations are looking for capability and looking for the development of an air enterprise and if we are absent because we don't have the structures to do so then they certainly will fill in that gap. It's not a function where you put a certain amount of input in you get a

certain amount of input out. I think of advising whether it's air or ground advising. The model I use is, you know, farming. You're going to go out and you're going to plant some seed. You're going to put some water, some fertilizer in, you know, at regular intervals, but then you just have to wait. And some people can't wait and they get frustrated. They look, nothing's happening. Welcome to episode 68 of the Irregular Warfare podcast. I'm your host Laura Jones and my co-host today is Jeff Vanoff. Today's episode explores aviation advising and how air power can be a critical aspect of building partner capacity. Our guests begin by highlighting past success of air advising and explaining aviation's role in establishing

access and influence with partner nations. They go on to explain how key air advising and explaining aviation's role in establishing access and influence with partner nations. They go on to explain how key air advising capabilities are being divested and present a key capability gap between what combatant commanders are requesting and what the services can provide. Finally, they end by discussing the implications of emerging technologies on future air advising and how models of air advising can adapt and be reprioritized. Rittier General Retired John Teicher recently retired as the Assistant Deputy Undersecretary of the Air Force International Affairs, where he oversaw the service's security cooperation portfolio. Prior to that, John was a senior defense official and defense attaché to Iraq.

He has been an F-15E combat pilot, an F-22 Test Pilot, Commander of Joint Base Andrews, and Commander of Edwards Air Force Base. He holds degrees from MIT and Stanford University, and is the founder and president of Capital Leadership, LLC. Colonel Tobias Bernard Schweitzer is an active duty Air Force Foreign Area Officer, a non-resident fellow with the Irregular Warfare Initiative, and an adjunct senior fellow with the Center for a New American Security. Formerly a Special Operations Helicopter Pilot and Combat Aviation Advisor, he has deployed in various counterinsurgency roles to Iraq, Central America, and Afghanistan, where he

commanded a NATO Special Operations Advisor Team assigned to train, advise, and assist the Afghan Special Mission Wing. You are listening to the Irregular Warfare Podcast, a joint production of the Princeton Empirical Studies of Conflict Project and the Modern Warrants II at West Point, dedicated to bridging the gap between scholars and practitioners to support the community of irregular warfare professionals. Here's our conversation with retired Brigadier General John Teichert and Colonel Tobias Schweitzer. Brigadier General John Teichert, Colonel Tobias Schweitzer, thank you so much for being with the Irregular Warfare podcast today.

Really excited to have you and share your expertise with air advising to our audience. Laura and Jeff, it's John. Thank you so much for having us. I've known Tobias for a while now, and it's a joy to join you guys with him today. Yes, thank you. Good morning, Jeff and Laura and John. It's a real honor to be here on the Regular Warfare Podcast, so thank you for having us. Thanks, gentlemen. We really appreciate it. So if you could just introduce for our audience to what air advising is, is it really just security force assistance or foreign internal defense, but done with airplanes? Or there are different types of specializations that exist to conduct air advising itself? Yeah, on the one hand, air advising is just advising, like you would think

of it in any other context. It's training, mentoring, other verbs that get after helping a partner nation unlock its aviation capabilities to get after a problem. But when I think of air advising, I think of it as something separate and distinct for the following reasons. The inputs, the required financial infrastructure, human capital, investments that are required to do so are enormous. And the time horizon as well to help grow a partner nation's air force, it really has to be measured in years, if not decades. And the time horizon as well to help grow a partner nation's air force, it really has to be measured in years, if not decades. And so I think that's something that makes it worth talking about separate and apart from other ground and security advising efforts.

So the Air Force has a very limited amount of air advising capability. It has two mobility support advisory squadrons, one focused on Latin America, one focused on Africa. And up until recently, it had the 6th Special Operations Squadron, which was focused on foreign internal defense and helping partners SOF develop some aviation capability. And then finally, up until recently, it had the 81st Fighter Squadron, which was charged with training Afghan A-29 pilots and maintainers. Those latter two units have been disbanded or in the process of, and that leaves the Air Force with very little professional air advisor capability to go out and conduct these missions on behalf of combatant commanders. I like what Tobias said there with respect to the temporal nature of this challenge and how it takes a while to have the access and the influence to properly relationships and an understanding of culture so that they can create and sustain that air enterprise in a way that makes sense both for our objectives as a

nation, but certainly for the host nation as well. That's great. Thank you, John. The Afghan Air Force was largely considered a success story in air advising, at least until the U.S. had to withdraw its contractor support. Can you discuss that particular campaign and what might be some other examples of successful air advising campaigns? I would love to jump in specifically to my firsthand experience for 14 months in Iraq as the senior defense official and defense attache, where I had seen the fruits of the labor of previous air advisors, both with the Iraqi Air Force and the Iraqi Army Aviation Command, two different services underneath the Ministry of Defense. What I saw there was extremely professional, capable aviators that had a Western flavor to everything that they did.

And I knew that those previous air advisors had been successful, not only because of the capability of those arms of the Iraqi military, but because of the nature of their culture and their alignment with us and with what we see as a more mature aviation enterprise. And to me, as I walked into an F-16 squadron in the Iraqi Air Force, I felt like I was in a US F-16 squadron. That's how tightly knit their culture had become because of the very hard work from folks in the past. But it's not just Iraq or it's not just Afghanistan, but I see new A-29s being a success in Nigeria because of air advising capability, or I see C-130s in Chile being successful because of air advising capability. And to me, the two primary objectives of our enterprise of air advising is to create capability now and for the long term that meets their objectives and our objectives, but also

that enables us long-term access and influence into those institutions? I think Afghanistan was a mixed bag, you know, from my perspective at the Special Mission Wing and observing and the Afghan Air Force. But, you know, without a doubt, we helped them get airborne, helped them, you know, use their assets, their Mi-17s to do resupplies, interdiction, air assaults, transportation. So without a doubt, a partner that would otherwise have beens to do resupplies, interdiction, air assaults, transportation. So without a doubt, a partner that would otherwise have been unable to do anything was able to unlock air power towards this campaign. Obviously, the campaign overall in Afghanistan didn't work out as the U.S. withdrew. But I think there's other examples as well. In the past, Columbia,

Plan Columbia, helping their rotary wing capability really made a difference. Going earlier back to a larger scale campaign, I think of El Salvador in the 90s. But even more recently, Jordan, Poland, the Philippines, these are all examples of where air advisors came in and were able to make a difference and again, unlock some of the air power that the country already had, or to help make the assets and capabilities that the U.S. provided to make those stick and help them actually employ them operationally. To kind of spring from that, can we talk about if air advising is platform dependent, or do air advisors have to be familiar with what the country has, or are we just bringing kind of Western airmanship and Western professional ethos to a foreign military in their air force or air capabilities? Yeah. So in my experience, you know, with the 6th Special Operations Squadron and then my interactions

with the Mobility Support Advisory Squadrons, I think when you have a professional air advisor who's, you know, trained in the cross-cultural competencies, is very experienced, can go into a situation, the partner nation air force that has dissimilar capabilities, dissimilar aircraft, can still go have a tremendous impact and effect. Obviously, it's easier if the country is using U.S. provisioned or U.S. purchased equipment, but that's not necessarily a showstopper. I'd say the biggest challenge for getting air crews into aircraft together from partner nation and U.S. advisors really has to do with how well the partner nation maintains their aircraft. If they are able to maintain airworthiness standards and we can still get

in the aircraft together. But in a lot of developing countries, you know, it's expensive to maintain aircraft. It's expensive to maintain all the paperwork and everything that we would need in order to fly. But, you know, even aside from being able to maintain all the paperwork and everything that we would need in order to fly. But even aside from being able to get into the aircraft together to assist operationally or train, there's still a million things that Air Advisors can help with. They can help with maintenance operations, airfield operations, mission planning. They can even break down barriers that exist within countries. We're all the products of Goldwater-Nichols and the Joint Force. But for a partner nation, Air Force, that doesn't talk to its Army counterparts,

who it's supposed to be supporting in an irregular warfare context, Air Advisors can help break down that barrier and get the Air Force to pick up the phone, to call the Army, to ask how it can assist or what it needs in order to be successful in the campaign. So I think there's still a lot that Air Advisors can do, even if they can't get in the cockpit and fly jointly with a partner nation. I agree with Tobias. I think we harm the potential long-term relationship with the host nation if we try to make them a carbon copy of the United States and the way we employ air power. Because it's not culturally relevant to them, and it probably doesn't meet their requirements, and it certainly is not sustainable.

I've seen extremely successful campaigns where we didn't have that platform in our inventory, but our air advisor went over and helped them use that capability in a way that was culturally relevant to them, and that met those requirements both for their nation and our nation. Just a quick story on that. A senior leader in the Army Aviation Command in Iraq was advised a decade ago by a colleague of Tobias and I. And when I went over there to start to develop a relationship with that gentleman, he literally started crying because of his fond memories of how those two had bonded, but also that they had met requirements together. And it was on an airframe that the gentleman on our side never had flown

before. But he was able to work alongside of this younger general officer at the time and integrate that capability into an air enterprise that didn't match what we do in the United States exactly, but was effective in a culturally relevant way to that host nation. And the results were extremely successful for Iraq and the Army Aviation Command. into our broader security cooperation enterprise so that we can use our assets to help aircraft or aviation assets fly and stay logistically relevant and capable. But it's not necessary, and it certainly is harmful if we try to make them a carbon copy of something that they can never sustain on their own. You've touched a couple times about being culturally competent and understanding how to employ the assets that a country may have in a culturally relevant way for their force. How much then does a professional air advisor have to understand language, the cultural context, the government within which they're working when they're in the host nation? And if we divest from that, is that professional cultural understanding going to be there?

Or are we going to be kind of more technically dependent and really just transfer technical skills? It depends on who we're talking about. If we're talking about security force assistance to Australia or with Japan or security cooperation with our NATO partners, I think there's such a longstanding relationship and cultural closeness to understanding that, you know, any airman can go do that and interoperate and do security cooperation. But when we're going further down the scale of aviation development and culturally more distant countries, that I think that's really where an air advisor or a combat aviation advisor is going to be of great value to be able to look at the situation and understand that, hey, we can't just replicate the U.S. Air Force or U.S. Army model

here. We have to take what is there and make it work in a way that the country is going to accept it. The partner nation military is going to look at it as a positive and not something that's trying to be imposed externally. So I talked about this decrease of air advisor capability the Air Force is going through right now. That's going to significantly hinder, in my opinion, the U.S. Air Force's ability to go out and make a difference in other countries that are developing and have weak governance and are facing a lot of internal irregular warfare type threats. Tobias, I appreciate you bringing up the idea that air advisors are not for these high-end countries that we already have an integrated relationship with and a cultural understanding with. We are there, like you said, to unlock aviation capabilities that wouldn't otherwise exist if we weren't there advising them.

And in those cases, it's extremely relevant to have a cultural and contextual understanding of how an aviation capability will fit into a nation's bigger picture and security construct. And if our air advisors lack those relationships or that cultural understanding, then they frankly will not be able to do their job tailoring that unlocked aviation capability to the needs of the host nation. I think from the outside, air advising is largely looked at as an Air Force role or an Air Force capability. But you both mentioned the role of the joint force in air advising. Can you talk through some examples of how the joint force gets involved with air advising specifically? think through where rotary wing expertise exists in the United States military, there is some in the United States Air Force, but there's certainly a lot more in the United States Army. But if you look at a host nation's defense construct, it may be the case that helicopter or rotary wing assets are far more integrated into the air forces of those countries. And the likely individuals from

our nation that will be able to influence that nation are also airmen. And so now you're looking at how do you look at what we would consider a different element of our aviation capability, but if it's going to work in a host nation, it needs to work in their structures. And that means now you may have soldiers and airmen working alongside of one another in a particular construct in that host nation to advise them in a way that makes sense for the Army and the Air Force in our construct, but in something like an Army Aviation Command in the host nation's construct. Yeah, I think you've touched on a really interesting point, which I think is a huge

weakness in the Department of Defense's approach to aviation security force assistance assistance, and particularly their advising. We're talking in an Air Force construct, but like John mentioned, there's a lot of capabilities we don't have in the United States Air Force related to aviation, which absolutely may be needed and brought to bear. I think of maritime domain awareness and maritime interdiction, rotary wing fires, other assets like that where we need Army, Navy, Coast Guard. Our NATO partners were very instrumental and helpful as we try to unlock the potential of the MI-17 squadrons and units and platforms in Afghanistan. None of that expertise resides in the Department of Defense at the time we went into Afghanistan and started providing

those things. I did see a good example of a joint force aviation advising at the time we went into Afghanistan and started providing those things. I did see a good example of a joint force aviation advising at the special mission wing. The Afghan special mission wing was a one wing of four rotary wing squadrons and a one PC-12 intelligence surveillance reconnaissance squadron as well. And both of those sides were mentored and advised by army aviators coming in to mentor and train the Afghans on the Rotary Wing side and the U.S. Air Force Sixth Special Operation Squadron aviators coming in to work on the PC-12 side. And it was all under one chain of command, one organization to do that. And then over time, we started getting other types of advisors from other services and coalition

forces as well. It was not without its problems. The cultural issues were not necessarily between the U.S. Air Force and the Afghans, but between the U.S. Air Force and the U.S. Army, sometimes butting heads about how we were going to conduct operations or under whose rules we're going to fly. But if those sorts of issues can get sorted out before advisors go downrange, I absolutely foresee a future and a need to have joint advisors working together, even with coalition, for the full package of capabilities a partner might need. We live in a world where the Air Force has recently divested from the only dedicated unit for air, foreign internal defense, and security force assistance. And you mentioned that there are ways that the joint force as well can do a better job

of preparing for these air advising missions. What do you see as the way ahead to maintain that critical capability to conduct air advising? So Jeff, I appreciate that question. I'm extremely concerned that because we're looking towards the future in strategic competition and pacing challenge, that we think that that always means the highest in capability is relevant to the fight. And there are times, certainly with a slew of allies and partners around the world, where they are on the front lines of strategic competition today, but their strategic competition is different than what

we imagine in a high-end fight, but they are trying to maintain sovereignty or their objectives or requirements in their own country and trying to understand how our pacing challenges fit into that or hinder them in their ability to achieve their objectives. And I think we cede a lot of ground by believing that the high-end fight is the only relevant capability that we have in this thing that we call strategic competition. And if we don't have access and influence or the ability to impact capabilities in lower-end host nations, then we automatically give up the ground that we would otherwise have to our strategic competitors who are very active in a variety of spaces that understand the host nations are looking for capability and looking for the development of an air enterprise. And if we

are absent because we don't have the structures to do so, then they certainly will fill in that gap. John, I want to ask you, you've sat in at higher level discussions than I've been in. So here's the thing I struggle with is the combatant commands have an insatiable desire for more partnerships, engagements, security cooperation, for good reason. They're very focused on their area of responsibilities and they see what you see. But when people take off their joint combatant commander hat, put on their service hat, there's a real tension there between what are my core missions? What do me, chief of staff of the Air Force, what am I held to account for? And one of the things I've kind

of struggled with is our chief and all the service chiefs, they don't get graded on how well the Colombian Air Force is ready to fight tonight or the Philippine Air Force. They get graded on what is the U.S. Air Force being called to do and how well can we do that? I think there's just always going to be a tension between wanting to do what John mentioned, which is help ourselves by helping our partners. But at the same time, I have an end cap strength. I have a limited budget. I only have so many people to go around. And so every Air Advisor or Air Advisor unit that I stand up and send out there is one

less aviator, maintainer, logistician who's, you know, doing our core mission. I'm just curious, you know, John, how you see that from your perch at the SAFIA and the headquarters Air Force you've worked for? Yeah, Tobias, that's a great question. And I think the answer is a bureaucratic one. And I don't mind sharing a little bit of the details of that, though it is certainly an organizational advocacy problem, I believe, at the headquarters of the Air Force level. From my perspective, all of the Air Force and Space Force's international portfolio, minus Air Advising, went through my prior organization, Air Force International Affairs, and that includes foreign area officers that tend to operate at the

strategic and operational level everywhere, mostly embedded in country teams working for the ambassador. And then secondly, exchange officers, which typically are embedded in the tactical and operational levels of the higher-end partners that have established air forces. And both of those types of individuals fell under that previous organization of mine, Air Force International Affairs. But Air Advisors did not. And they are the ones that complete the portfolio by operating at the tactical and operational levels with these lower-end partners that have less mature aviation capability. And they fell underneath the A3. And I don't know the history of that, Tobias, but I firmly believe that the

reason that the 6SOS and others are being divested is because they were part of a broader portfolio that was separated from its proper bureaucratic place in the hierarchy. And as a result, they didn't have an advocate. And so when push came to shove and resources were competed for, that they lost because they weren't in the right home. I think you're right that combatant commanders are clamoring for this capability. And so are ambassadors and country teams. capability, and so are ambassadors and country teams. And I think as they are concerned that we are divesting capability that they ultimately need now and will need in the future, that their advocacy for this capability will go a long ways to helping the Air Force prioritize properly what they need and we're responsible for to deliver. I'd want to jump in and just ask,

is part of the reason we're even have ask, is part of the reason we're even have this conversation and part of the reason we're seeing divestment is from kind of a lack of understanding of what the end goal of air advising actually is. Is it no kidding, I want this country to be able to fly this airplane at night low level. And once they have that capability, my mission is complete. You know, therefore it's capability driven. Or is the end goal of Air Advising just continuing American presence in certain strategically relevant corners of the world? Is the access and the influence that comes with partnerships the end goal of Air Advising So, Laura, I think it's both that we are providing capability. That's what the host nation has invited us to their country to do. But the larger fringe benefit is

a continued presence gives us longer term access and influence. And I go back to that Army aviation senior officer that was influenced by a young American air advisor. And now he absolutely loves the United States Air Force, and to some extent, the United States of America's principles and values, because of the impact that that one officer had on him at a pivotal point in his career and his life. And they, the Iraqis, don't pay for us to come over to provide long-term access and influence, or they don't pay for us to come over to provide long-term access and influence, or they don't desire for us to be there for that reason. They want capability, but our longer-term interests are extremely well-served by a focus on relationships and

access and influence that comes with presence that endures. And you really understand, I believe, in the minds of a host nation, how much we as a nation are committed to them by an enduring presence in their nation. And they want that long-term relationship because there are benefits that come with it, but there's huge benefits that come with it for us. So frankly, we do need to provide them the shorter-term capability that they desire as long as it meets our requirements and objectives. But the real benefit of air advising is the longer-term objectives of access and influence and commitment demonstrated by enduring presence. It's really a policy and foreign policy question of what we

want the air advisors to do. The capability gets us in the door and helps us maintain access. I think one of the challenges is if I invest a lot of airmen and resources into a country, build up its capability, you no longer control that once you've given it to them. And it may or may not be there when called upon, needed in a contingency, every country is going to make its own decisions. So that can be a challenge conceptually to try to understand like, what are we giving them? What are we trying to build and to what end? But regardless of that higher end goal, yes, the access and influence, the relationship, the information gained, you just can't get without being on the ground and shaking hands and spending

time with these partners. And if you don't build those relationships, you can guarantee they won't be there when you do need them when those contingencies do happen. My follow up to that would be then how do we measure that? How do we project success and give back to the host service, whether it's the Air Force projecting out air advising capabilities and say, look, this is working. This is the relationship that's built when, you know, relationships and access and influence don't necessarily fit into metrics of hours flown, sorties flown, pallets moved, armor expended, things like that. Laura, I've got two answers to that. Number one, we ultimately are there as a part of the ambassador's country team and that ambassador's

desires or objectives as defined in their integrated country strategy. And so I believe that talking to those ambassadors or using the defense attaches or the senior defense officials who work for that ambassador to truly understand not just what our air advisors, FAOs, and exchange officers are doing in the immediate term, but how that is part of the broader strategy of the single individual the president has designated responsible for activities in that country. And so that's one thought. And I think the other thought is an idea about scale. What we are talking about with respect to international airmen and guardians is an extremely small portion of our force that costs very little but has oversized influence. There's about 400 foreign area officers in the United States Air Force. There's about 300 exchange

officers in the United States Air Force. And we're talking about three squadrons between the 6th and the 711th and the 81st Fighter Squadron, that's an extremely small footprint for what the ambassadors would describe as huge opportunities for impact and influence in a host nation. And so I think as we make these arguments going forward, we have to help the Air Force senior leaders understand the scope of which this investment is required, which is tiny, and the impact, which is far greater than that, as defined by ambassadors or combatant commanders. This is always going to be a struggle for ops research and the analytical community to try to measure the impact because it's not a function where you put a certain amount

of input in, you get a certain amount of input in, you get a certain amount of input out. I think of advising, whether it's air or ground advising, the model I use is farming. You're gonna go out and you're gonna plant some seed. You're gonna put some water and some fertilizer in at regular intervals, but then you just have to wait. And some people can't wait and they get frustrated

and say, look, nothing's happening, nothing's growing, so we're just going to pack up and leave. You see also on the flip side where people get really anxious and want to show results, so they'll do the opposite and start flooding the ground with more seed, more fertilizer, more water, which in my opinion is sort of what happened in Afghanistan of providing too much capability, too much capacity, more than the ground could absorb or the part of the nation could absorb. And that can be catastrophic too, of showing no results or showing a negative impact of the advising. And so there's some sweet spot that the partner nation could absorb over a certain amount of time. And then obviously we're talking a lot about the limited capacity of the Air Force and the Department of Defense to deliver air advising.

And so, yeah, I think there just has to be a lot of dialogue from the country teams and combatant commanders to be able to show the impact of all this to the services to get them to embrace and understand why it's important. I think there's nothing you need to do to convince the U.S. Air Force that, hey, it's increased capability and capacity in the hands of our NATO partners or our really strong allies in the Pacific is to our benefit as well. But like John said, going further down the scale, why should the U.S. Air Force care about certain countries' aviation capabilities in Africa and Latin America or some of the more remote parts of the world? That's a tough case to make. And maybe we're just not doing as good

of a job as we could in the past. I think it has strategic implications, but it's a really tough question, Laura. I do think going back to the organizational structure, that going forward, rolling in air advising into the single location in the Air Force that is responsible for the rest of the international airman and guardian portfolio would help us to better define to Air Force senior leaders how this matters and how this fits into a broader portfolio instead of as it currently is a one-off in the A3. And this is a really good segue into our next question because the U.S. Air Force is a highly technical and very expensive approach to what an Air Force can be, but for many countries that doesn't apply. And so when we look at our

experience in Afghanistan and lessons learned there, but also as we look forward to advising other host countries in places like Africa and Latin America, how do we translate our capability to be effective in places that do not have the same expense or technical capability that the United States has? Now, great question, Jeff. And it is a passion of mine as I trained FAOs and exchange officers who went out into the various parts of this world to not be tempted just to create a replica of the United States Air Force or to be tempted by either a host nation's desire for prestige systems that they don't really need and certainly can't sustain, or a contractor's pitch that would prompt a senior defense official or a defense attache to desire to buy something

that the host nation doesn't really need. So to me, we've already talked today about plenty of examples with respect to A29s or MI17s, where these are lower-end systems that don't match things that we would rely upon in the United States Air Force or our higher-end partners would rely upon. But our ability to engage with the host nation with those far more relevant, less prestige, less technically capable systems that are matched to the host nation requirements and their ability for the long term to sustain those requirements is far more effective than just trying to cater to the prestige desires of a host nation. And so I agree with, I think, the premise of your question, Jeff, which is that we can't

be tempted just to create a model of the United States Air Force, which in no way will likely meet the requirements of a host and is unable over the long term to be sustainable, even if it appears in the short term like a country can afford it. They certainly won't be able to afford it for the next 30 years if we're not carefully tailoring capabilities to ability to sustain. John, you know, one thing you've written about in the War on the Rocks, and you've been writing prolifically about these topics, which I applaud and I've enjoyed reading, you know, you had to be the recipient of the relationship with the Iraqis after the F-16 purchase and sustainment contract from 2011 to 2016. I'm curious to know, is that an example of what you just talked about, an overmatched

capability that was inappropriate to the situation? And if so, I'm not putting words in my mouth, but it seemed to indicate that in your writing. How did that impact your ability to be the senior defense officer in the country afterwards? Tobias, that's a great question. And I think at the grand strategic level, those specific capabilities, the F-16 program was an albatross around the neck of the relationship between the United States and Iraq, because we've got these awesome American systems that weren't being used against ISIS, that were being flown as prestige systems, and became more and more obvious that the Iraqis could not afford as oil prices fluctuated over time, and maybe as corruption ate away at the ability for the MOD to afford any of its systems.

Just as an example, when we showed up in Balad, the bill not for the F-16 program for U.S. contractors, but for U.S. contractors to support the entirety of the base to allow one squadron of F-16s to operate was upward of $400 million a year just to run that base. So it wasn't even just that the F-16 program was ill-matched and unsustainable for Iraq, but predecessors were either unwilling or unable to wean the reliance on American contractors over time. And certainly when we sold them those F-16s in the beginning, or gave them to them, that we didn't set up a decreased sustainability model that can allow them to pick up more of the requirements of sustainability over time, which allows us to get out of the game of funding

$400 to $450 million a year in contractor support for a base to house a single squadron of F-16s. To me, you're spot on that that was a great prestige system that looked really good when Iraq had a certain amount of finances to buy those aircraft. But we really need to think about, more importantly, how do we sustain them over time? And how do we wean the host nation from relying on expensive U.S. contracts in order to keep those systems flying? You hit on a good point. I think I touched on this in the beginning when I talked about the massive scale that is required to build air power and aviation capability for what looks like a $1.2 billion sticker price for 36 F-16s, that's like going to the car lot and just seeing a $30,000 car.

But what you don't see is the shadow price, the hidden cost of all that, which John alluded to, $400 million to run an airfield, runway repairs, hangars, expensive specialized equipment, people to do all that stuff. And so a price tag of XX, you have to just imagine that behind that, there's a gigantic expense of people and money and time behind all that to make it happen. And so this is a point to policymakers who are making these decisions about what are we going to provide and provision these other countries is air advisors can't go after the fact and make that stick. I did talk to all the air advisor commanders that were in Iraq from 2015 and on, and they brought up exactly what John had mentioned, that it was too late to do anything. They had to sort of try to help as best as they could with this program

that the horse already left the chute. And there's really nothing they could do just from an air advisor. There's no magic that an air advisor can provide to make incompatible, unsustainable aircraft or platform or system work for a partner nation. So all that has to be really well thought of upstream. And, you know, to go to John's point of maybe thinking about integrating the air advisors into SAF IA instead of the headquarters Air Force A3, it's just being able to have that sort of expertise of people who can go out and assess a country and be at the table when platforms are being discussed and assessed and having, no kidding, subject matter experts be able to point

at why certain aircraft or platforms or technologies is not going to work in this particular situation and help guide the policy decision to something that's going to be sustainable. I could absolutely see experience air advisors being a part of that conversation in conjunction with security cooperation, foreign area officers. I think the natural follow up on that would be, is it realistic to decouple advising from the foreign military sales game or from kind of the industrialization that goes with that, because an F-16 or a C-130 or a Blackhawk is a pretty big carrot to provide some incentives for further partnerships at the strategic level. I saw a lot of horrible examples of other countries, strategic competitors,

systems sitting idle on the ramps or in the motor pools while I was in Iraq. And whether that was Russian aircraft or Chinese drones or Russian tanks, they had done themselves and the Iraqis a disservice because they hadn't thought through the sustainability of a system up front. Typically, in those systems, they gave the Iraqis systems, but they didn't give them the capability to allow those systems to operate over time. And that truly drives a wedge in a relationship and hinders the credibility of a country when their systems are sitting out there not being operated. And I think going back to what Tobias and I were just talking about, there is a way, if you think about it upfront, to help the host nation understand the longer term requirements for

them to pick up a greater and greater load of sustainability so that it becomes a system that will not just be a U.S. system operated by U.S. contractors over time that's extremely expensive, but something that matches with a host nation's budget. And I saw really good cases of that with respect to U.S. sustainability support of Iraqi Mi-17s or Abrams tanks, where our contractor support was in the single digits, but had reachback capability at the end of the contract, such that they had access to the logistics trail and the higher-end technology advice, if necessary. And so I think if you structure a program right up front, then it doesn't create the pitfalls that Tobias and I were just talking about. And I don't think universally we've done

a bad job at doing so. The Abrams tank and the Mi-17 were the two that I saw firsthand that were great examples. But I think an F-16 program and some other programs like that are horrible examples. But fortunately, our competitors are also doing a horrible job at helping a host nation have sustainable operational capabilities over the long term. You know, a lot of these countries are seeing value within unmanned systems and seeing potentially the prospect of air power on the cheap. And is that an avenue of providing maybe lower-end unmanned systems a way to change the game with air advising? Or could it potentially make air advising obsolete? I feel like on the U.S. side, we've restricted ourselves from exporting and proliferating this technology. And so obviously, other countries don't have that issue. We maybe lost an opportunity. I could absolutely see Air Advisors helping develop unmanned capability for partners. Those systems, those platforms are not cheap, they're not free, but it's possible that they may have a lower sustainment and build than other platforms. I'm curious to hear, what was the conversations that you had in your previous roles?

No, I appreciate that, Tobias. And at least what I see and what I believe is that unmanned systems are just part of a host nation's portfolio of aviation capabilities that air advisors can help unlock. And there is a high interest because of the likely less costly nature of these systems. And host nations are looking for support, not just to stand up that capability, but to then sustain that capability or integrate it into the broader aviation portfolio of that nation and do so at a way that keeps up with the technology that is changing very fast in this space. And at least in my situation in Iraq, I saw Chinese CH-4s that were delivered operational that within a matter of months were no longer flyable because the Chinese

didn't have something that we would call a total packet approach to make sure that the Iraqis could use those systems through air advising and sustain those systems via a logistics trail. I was saddened, though, as Balad was coming under attack fairly regularly and some of the U.S. contractors were leaving, that we tried to help the Iraqis stand up their scan eco capability that we had sold or given them over time. And the majority of those systems were sitting in boxes still in the shrink wrap that we delivered them in. And so to me, that's begging for a U.S. sustainability trail and air advising to use systems that they wanted and that they knew that they needed in a way that could put them to operational use instead of sitting in the boxes that we sent them in. Thinking about those very small,

limited-use, unmanned aerial systems, does that kind of change who we conceive of as an air advisor? Does now, you know, a ground operator that has scan-eo capability, is that now an air advisor that we can utilize, that we can bring into the fold and apply a certain model to and provide expertise perhaps to the joint force that way? So Laura, I absolutely believe that these other aviation capabilities are part of the broader air advisor portfolio. It's not just about flying fixed wing aircraft and sustaining them. We've talked today about rotary them. We've talked today about rotary wing. We've talked about air defense capabilities, maritime domain awareness. And I

certainly think that unmanned systems fall into this broader aviation portfolio that we're looking to unlock for a host nation in a way that meets their requirements and objectives in ours. And I think that it means that we need to think about the broad portfolio of what aviation capability is, especially for those lower-end partners, and how we best unlock it and the type of people that are required to do so. Yeah, I concur with John. You know, if there's one takeaway, you know, from all this, that aviation advising, aviation is much broader than the United States Air Force. And if we are going to unlock the potential in these countries, you know, we can't just look at the U.S. Air Force to do this. We're going to have to pull in joint and coalition partners to help, you know, bring out the full suite of missions and capabilities that a partner is going to need.

If the Air Force continues to deprioritize air advising, what do you see as the implications for the joint force going forward? prioritize air advising. What do you see as the implications for the joint force going forward? Yeah, I think it just leaves a hole in our portfolio, Jeff. I think that the joint force and those combatant commanders and ambassadors in their country teams desire all of these capabilities that they can call upon if needed for their particular situation. And I think if we divest this capability, then now while we still have the strategic and operational covered by foreign area officers, and we still have tactical relationships with exchange officers, we will lose the ability to unlock aviation capability and host nations

that need it at the lower level. And we will cede ground and access and influence to our strategic competitors. And that will be harmful to the ambassador's objectives and the combatant commander's objectives because they won't have those levers to pull anymore. Yeah, I agree. And I think we have to think maybe the Air Force and the Department of Defense just need to think creatively about how to get after this. And we've talked about defense contractors, they get beat up a lot, sometimes for good reasons. But I think on the other hand, from what I saw in Afghanistan, I think I saw a model for maybe what could be useful to help get after all the demand from combatant commanders, from host countries and ambassadors is the Afghan Special Mission Wing,

the preponderance of the bodies and people out doing the train, advise, assist mission were contractors, extremely highly skilled. A lot of them were very dedicated to the job. And there were probably 30, 40, 50 of us military advisors as well overseeing the whole operation. So I can see a model where if we can get to an advisor mission that we can contract out defense contractors who can provide this subject matter expertise and some of the training and put some military leadership on top of that mission and some key roles, that could be a way to take the few air advisors we have and sort of expand their reach and their ability to affect the mission. That will have to come with government contracting, oversight, training for those U.S. military members. One of the weaknesses I saw is a lot of us in the U.S. military didn't grow up understanding how to relate and how to utilize defense contractors. You know, they didn't work for me when I was lieutenant colonel at the time. You know, they worked for the, you know,

Acme security company, and that company had contracted with the US government to provide X service. And so there's just a relationship and understanding that I, as an American commander, can't go walk in and start telling people what to do. I have to have a conversation with their supervisor, with the contracting officer representative, with the government flight representative to figure out, hey, are we going to change the way we're going to do our operations? Or what are we going to focus on on next or where do I want their level of effort to be. But I absolutely foresee that way of just keeping a U.S. military uniform presence in the mission, which can't be replicated, but then having more of the labor and the manpower and expertise provided by defense contractors who, you know,

you can pull from around the world, have a much wider range and depth of expertise a lot of times than sometimes uniform military folks do who may have been the service for, you know, 8, 10, 12, 15 years. So I foresee that could be a model that we could exploit to help get after these countries, the fewer air advisors that we have and help service their needs. And what are the broader implications for policymakers, practitioners, and academics? Laura, that's a great question. And let me go back to the national security strategy and the national defense strategy. And some of the broader principles that our strategic leaders have told us is in our ultimate strategy as a nation.

The national security strategy says that allies and partners are a unique American advantage. The national defense strategy uses allies and partners dozens of times. It calls allies and partners our core to our strategy. It calls them a unique American advantage. Again, it talks about they are our center of gravity. And so if we are truly going to operationalize what our strategy makers say are our priorities and our ability to achieve our objectives and interests around the world, then we need to clearly invest in the right way and a sufficient way in this space or otherwise all of those words on those pieces of paper ring hollow. And so I go back to the scale of what we're talking about here, 400 foreign area officers, 300 exchange officers, and three squadrons of air advisors. That is a minute

portion of a 700,000 person force that is the United States Air Force. And so to me, that we are going to be unable to achieve our stated strategic desires if we don't properly invest in this space. And I think more needs to be written about and considered with respect to the small price and the large impact that is in an area that our strategic documents call out as the most important things that we can do in order to achieve our objectives. And so, the more people think about it with respect to scale and scope and how it maps to national defense and security strategy, I think will be more helpful in putting this in perspective as a vitally important element of us achieving those strategies. It's a very ripe and fertile area for really deep study. One of the books I

really appreciated was Air Power and Small Wars by Corman Johnson, but that left the story at kind of around 2001. I think there's another 20 years of engagements that academics could look at to help us draw the lessons of when this works, how it works, what their circumstances. Rand is doing some great work on this, but I think I would certainly invite other academics to come in and help us think through when can air advising and aviation security force assistance be helpful and under what circumstances or what constraints. For policymakers and strategists, what looks easy on paper of providing X airplanes or X helicopters to a partner, my implications, I think, over the last 20 years of doing this is we really have to lower our ambitions and increase our time horizons

if we really want to make this capability stick. If we weren't asking air advisors to come in and help operationalize this capability or unlock the potential, then we have to be humble about what we can think the partner can actually do. If we're talking to partners who are lower down on the aviation development and are facing internal challenges and don't have the resources that we do or our allies in Europe and Asia do, then we really need to, if we want to make it stick and make it work and have a real capability, then we need to increase that time horizon and really keep our ambitions in check. Tobias, I love the idea that we need to tell the story beyond 2001 about what international airmen and guardians or air advisors are doing. And I would love more academic

thought into what air advisors do, not just to counter violent extremist organizations, which has tended to be the focus or the assumption about what air advisor's role is, but shifting that to what do they do in strategic competition, specifically against our pacing challengers. And if we do that, then it creates a relevance to this capability

that some people may just see as a post 9-11 capability to something that is extremely relevant to strategic competition going forward. I think that's a great last little line right there. For your General Tire, John Teichert, Colonel Tobias Schweitzer, thank you so much for being with the Irregular Warfare podcast today. Jeff and I learned a lot, and I think our audience will have a broader understanding of what the aviation game is in security force assistance.

Laura and Jeff, thank you so much for hosting and having us today. I enjoyed myself and it was awesome to be able to share the microphone with my friend Tobias. Yes, Jeff, Laura, thank you again. It's an honor to be a part of the Irregular Warfare podcast and to get to share this moment with John Teichert is really special. So hats off to you and to the entire regular warfare community. Thank you again for joining us for episode 68 of the Irregular Warfare podcast. We release a new episode every two weeks. In the next episode, Ben and I will discuss great power competition in the Arctic with the Honorable Sherry Goodman and Brigadier General Sean Satterfield. Following that, Kyle and Ben will discuss the

NSS with Dr. Corey Shockey. Be sure to subscribe to the Regular Warfare podcast so you don't miss an episode. The podcast is a product of the Regular Warfare Initiative. We are a team of all volunteer practitioners and researchers dedicated to bridging the gap between scholars and practitioners to support the community of irregular warfare professionals. You can follow Thank you. episode, please leave a comment and positive rating on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to the Irregular Warfare podcast. It really helps expose the show to new listeners. And one last note, all that you hear in this episode are the views of the participants and do not represent those of Princeton, West Point, or any agency of the U.S. government. Thanks again and see you next time.