Arlington, VA | July 23, 2024

On July 16–18 The Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies hosted the third in its series of wargames and exercises on uncrewed Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA). This tabletop exercise (TTX) drew together over 60 participants from Air Mobility Command, Air Combat Command, USAFE, AFCENT, the Air Force Research Laboratory, industry partners, and observers including from the Royal Air Force and the Royal Australian Air Force.

Led by Mitchell Institute’s Mark Gunzinger and Heather Penney, this research series explores how CCA could be used to execute a range of Air Force combat operations during a peer conflict. In particular, this year’s TTX asked the participating operators, planners, technologists, and logistics experts to assess how the logistics needed to support distributed CCA operations at scale in the Indo-Pacific could impact CCA force designs, operational concepts, and requirements. As a force development planner, retired Col Gunzinger explained, “One of the key objectives of this exercise, which I believe truly bore out across the three days, was the importance and value of creating a CCA force design that is informed by the realities of logistics. This is especially true in the challenging combat environment of the Pacific’s first island chain.”

Gen Mike Minihan, Commander of Air Mobility Command, and Lt Gen (Ret.) Dave Deptula, Dean of the Mitchell Institute, kicked off the TTX proceedings. Gen Deptula shared, “Participants and their USAF leaders shared with me the value they find in Mitchell running this research series, one that brings ‘all the right people’ in the room to have difficult conversations about tradeoffs, as well as the art of the possible. It also gives us strong indications of critical considerations as we move forward integrating CCA into the force—to include areas where we need to assess continuously.”

The findings and analysis from this TTX will be shared in subsequent months in a Mitchell Institute research report, executive summary briefings, and a public event. The previous CCA wargame reports on CCA for penetrating strike and CCA for disruptive warfare are available on our website.