Earlier at present, the general public affairs workplace on the Air Force’s 378th Air Expeditionary Wing, the service’s essential unit presently at Prince Sultan Air Base, launched photos of the brand new E-11A arriving there on December 16, 2022. Plane trackers utilizing on-line software program had already observed the jet, which carries the serial quantity 21-9045, flying into Saudi airspace that day.
The Air Force’s latest E-11A is a closely modified Bombardier Global 6500 enterprise jet. The service’s three different E-11As are primarily based on BD-700 and Global 6000 varieties.
All of the E-11As are fitted with the BACN bundle, which is a extremely specialised communications gateway node designed to create an ‘lively web’ over the battlespace and rapidly switch information despatched utilizing quite a lot of distinct waveforms between totally different aerial platforms and forces on the bottom/floor. With these capabilities, the plane may also function useful communications relay nodes. You can discover out extra about BACN and its historical past on this previous War Zone function.
Canadian agency Bombardier Defense delivered 21-9045 to the Air Force in September of this 12 months, bringing the whole dimension of the E-11A fleet to 4. The service had introduced its plans to accumulate six new E-11As in February 2021.
Until 2020, the 430th Expeditionary Electronic Combat Squadron, the Air Force’s solely operational E-11A unit, had been ahead deployed at Kandahar Airfield in Afghanistan. As a part of the withdrawal of U.S. forces from that nation, it was relocated first to Al Dhafra Air Base within the United Arab Emirates (UAE) after which, not less than partially, to Prince Sultan Air Base.
Bringing the scale of the E-11A fleet again to 4 can solely assist increase the Air Force’s means to make use of these jets – the very definition of a high-demand, low-density functionality – throughout the Middle East and in adjoining areas, such because the Mediterranean Sea. These plane need to be repeatedly rotated again to the United States for upkeep and different work, and with so few of them, coaching new pilots to fly them largely happens on the job in theater.
With the tip of lively U.S. navy operations in Afghanistan, not less than which can be publicly acknowledged, the E-11As have been very actively employed for varied different operational and coaching duties whereas flying from the Arabian Peninsula. This has included supporting quite a few workout routines off the coast of Israel, amongst different actions, together with one only in the near past, in addition to ongoing U.S.-led coalition operations in Iraq, as you possibly can learn extra about right here. BACN jets could be particularly useful in any future multi-national coalition operations within the area given their means to ‘translate’ between varied platforms that won’t in any other case have the ability to straight talk with one another and assist with making a extra full networking scenario in a specific area. This can embrace serving to low-flying and ground-based personnel keep related even in steep terrain.
In addition, 2021, not less than one E-11A was concerned in a mixed U.S.-UAE train centered on using “multiple platforms… together to execute and refine tactics, techniques and procedures to counter Unmanned Aerial System threats,” in line with the Air Force. Exactly what function the BACN jet performed on this case is unclear. However, the train does underscore the very actual and nonetheless evolving risk that drones, particularly these employed by Iran and its regional proxies, pose to U.S. forces, in addition to their allies and companions, within the area. As The War Zone repeatedly reviews on, uncrewed methods solely more and more current important risks to American forces overseas and at house, in addition to to civilian targets outdoors of typical battlefields.
The capabilities that BACN and the E-11A fleet present imply that the plane might very helpful for supporting operations elsewhere on the earth. This contains the huge expanses of the Pacific, the place the U.S. navy is more and more centered on making ready for a possible future high-end battle with China. The United States, along with its NATO allies, has additionally been increasing its pressure posture in Europe in recent times to assist deter Russian aggression, a broad effort that has taken on new significance and has expanded in gentle of Russia’s ongoing struggle on Ukraine.
With this in thoughts, it isn’t shocking that the Air Force is now planning to determine a brand new base for the E-11As within the United States at Robins Air Force Base in Georgia, which shall be overseen by the 319th Reconnaissance Wing headquartered at Grand Forks Air Base in North Dakota. The resolution to determine a U.S.-based E-11A squadron additionally comes because the E-8C Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System (JSTARS) battle administration plane fleet is being retired. Robins is presently the Air Force’s essential E-8C base.
For the second, although, the Air Force’s E-11A fleet stays centered totally on operations within the Middle East, as evidenced by the arrival of 21-9045 within the area.
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