Brown Vows New Measures to Boost USAF Readiness

摘要

The Air Force Inspector General (IG) is conducting a sweeping review of the service's readiness assessments and reporting, a year after a Pentagon-wide order directed the armed forces to improve the state of key fighter fleets, according to the service's next Chief of Staff. Air Force department leadership told the inspector general in mid-March to begin the classified review, future Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. said to the Senate Armed Services Committee ahead of his May 7 confirmation hearing. The review's findings will shape the service's path forward as it looks for more comprehensive metrics for whether it can spring into action, In 2018, then-Defense Secretary Jim Mattis challenged the services to ensure that 80 percent of their F-16, F/A-18, F-22, and F-35 fleets could fly on any given day by the end of fiscal 2019. No Air Force fighter platforms hit the mark. "The F-16 mission-capable rate reached a high of 75 percent in June 2019, the F-22 mission-capable rate achieved a high of 68 percent in April 2019, and the F-35 mission capability rate climbed to a high of 74 percent in September 2019," Brown wrote.