Arlington, VA | January 23, 2025 — The Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies is pleased to announce a new entry in its Research Studies series, Want Combat Airpower? Then Fix the Air Force Pilot Crisis by Heather R. Penney, Senior Resident Fellow at the Mitchell Institute.
The Air Force’s pilot corps is now too small and poorly structured to sustain a healthy combat force that can prevail in a peer conflict and meet the nation’s other national security requirements. Fighter aircraft are foundational to establishing air superiority, suppressing and destroying surface-to-air missile defenses, interdicting time-sensitive and mobile targets, and supporting troops in contact—all missions that are essential to effective joint force operations. But combat pilot experience is equally critical to success in peace and war. Experienced pilots have better survivability rates and mission outcomes in combat and confer those benefits to their less experienced wingmen.
The Air Force must now increase its aircraft inventory, grow its pilot corps, and experience its combat pilots across its Active and Reserve Components—its Total Force—simultaneously. Leveraging the depth of pilot experience in the Reserve Component (RC) should be a major part of this solution. The RC represents the bulk of the nation’s experienced combat pilot corps, as many of the seasoned pilots who exit the Active Component continue to serve in the Air National Guard or Air Force Reserve. This assessment recommends that the U.S. Air Force:
• Recapitalize nearly its entire inventory of combat aircraft;
• Increase its combat capacity by growing force structure; and
• Grow and preserve its Active and Reserve combat pilot corps commensurate with the size of its combat aircraft inventory and create enough strategic depth to replace aircraft and airmen lost in combat
The Mitchell Institute’s Research Studies serve as an authoritative avenue for innovative, in-depth, insightful, and effective ideas and solutions for strengthening America’s aerospace power.
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