COL. DAVID LAPAN (deputy assistant secretary of defense for media operations): Good evening in Afghanistan. I'd like to welcome to the Pentagon Briefing Room Air Force Brigadier General David Allvin -- or I'm sorry, Allvin -- (changes pronunciation) -- the commanding general for NATO Air Training Command - Afghanistan and the 438th Air Expeditionary Wing.
General Allvin oversees the training and development of the Afghan Air Force, and he assumed his post in September of this year. This is the first time he has spoken to us in this format, and he joins us today from the NTM-A headquarters in Kabul. The general will make some opening remarks and then will take your questions.
With that, sir, I'll turn it over to you.
GEN. ALLVIN: Well, thanks very much, Dave, for that introduction. And for the folks at the Pentagon Press Corps, thank you very much, and good evening from Kabul. I'm glad to have this opportunity this evening to speak to you about NATO Air Training Command - Afghanistan, and specifically about the Afghan Air Force.
My command consists of the United States plus nine other partnering nations, and our mission is very simply to set the conditions for a professional, fully independent and self-sustaining, operationally capable Afghan Air Force that can meet the security needs of the Afghan national security forces, the Afghan government, today and tomorrow.
The Afghan Air Force is currently a work in process, currently have 4,000 strong in the Afghan Air Force, and we're building to 8,000. We have 400 -- I'm sorry, we have 40 -- sorry -- 56 aircraft in the Afghan Air Force inventory, building to 146. The Afghan Air Force inventory primarily consists of rotary wing assets, including the Mi-17, which is a medium-lift helicopter, and the Mi-35, which is a close air support asset.
In addition, the C-27 is a medium-lift twin engine turboprop fixed-wing aircraft, and that makes up the bulk of the inventory, along with the Mi-17 and the Mi-35. As I mentioned, we have gone from 56 now, moving to 146 at the end state.
We're also located primarily in three wings advising the Afghan Air Force. The first wing is the Kabul air wing, and that is the most mature of the Afghan Air Force's wings, and it's also the largest. The second is Kandahar air wing, and that is growing, but it is starting to become mission capable. They have five Mi-17s down there now, and we're going to move some more down there in the spring. In the summer, we'll also move some C-27s down there as more come off the production line. The third wing is Shindand air base, and it's unique for a couple of reasons. First of all, Shindand is going to be the only base that is a runway belonging to the Afghan National Security Forces alone. As you may know, Kabul and Kandahar share the runway with the international airport.
The other reason why Shindand is unique is because it is going to be the home to the Afghan Air Force training center. This is where all the rotary wing and fixed-wing training of the air crews will take place. And this is very important because this offers the capacity and capability for the Afghans to sustain their air force by having organic pilot training capability.
Now, building an air force does take time. It takes longer than ground forces, in many cases, because of the increased technical requirements, meaning increased educational requirements, and if you're in the flying business, it also means having some English comprehension level, because English is the global common language of airmen. So this is an enduring commitment we have with our Afghan partners to build an Afghan Air Force in this mission.
But just because it's a long road doesn't mean that they aren't actually delivering and significant progress isn't being made. As a matter of fact, one of the more elite units, the Presidential Airlift Squadron, has made some tremendous progress. In fact, they've come so far that, at the current pace, they're on track to take over the lead for all of the core capabilities for that squadron by this spring.
And that is -- considering that this is a high visibility, as you can imagine, complex, and a no-fail mission, that speaks volumes for how the Presidential Airlift Squadron has advanced.
Just a quick anecdote: Last week, General Petraeus and President Karzai were up north doing a battlefield circulation, and that entire operation was run by the Afghan Air Force and the Presidential Airlift Squadron. It was a seven-ship formation, very complex, and all the trappings of a complicated mission, including low visibility, high winds, very fluid changes. But through it all, the Afghan Air Force performed in a professional and precise manner and executed the mission very well. So this is the sort of progress that we see in that area and we look to expand throughout the rest of the Afghan Air Force as we progress.
Before I take your questions, I just want to offer one final thought. The Afghan Air Force is -- as I just related to you, is still relatively small. And of course, as you compare it to the awesome air power that the coalition brings to Afghanistan, it really pales in comparison numbers-wise. But I would offer that the Afghan Air Force is doing something today that no other air force in the world can do, and that is directly enhancing the legitimacy of the Afghan government. Whether that be through saving lives in flood- relief operations, delivering backpacks to school children, or delivering and retrieving ballots in support of the parliamentary elections, when that aircraft has an Afghan tail flash on it and it's operated by Afghans, that has a positive impact on the public's perception of their government. Now, the coalition does these sort of operations all the time, and we do them very, very well. But I've got to believe it's got a little more impact when the Afghan people see it's one of their own doing those missions.
So with that, I'd be happy to take any questions you have.
COL. LAPAN: Lalit.
Q: Yes, this is Lalit Jha, from Pajhwok Afghan -- this is Lalit Jha, from Pajhwok Afghan News.
Can you give us a sense of what the air force would look like in 2014, when the transition would be complete?
GEN. ALLVIN: Yes, sir. If I understood the question correctly: What will the air force look like in 2014 when the transition is complete? As you probably noticed from your slide deck -- I believe it's the third one; the second or third one -- it shows the actual Afghan Air Force build. And it does continue on beyond 2014, but the vast majority of the aircraft will be delivered by 2014.
And what the air force will look like at that point -- will still be largely an airlift force, with 56 Mi-17 rotary-wing assets. We will still have the nine Mi-35 assets that we have for the Afghan Air Force. The Afghan Air Force will also have 20 of the C-27s. By that time, there will also be six rotary-wing trainers at Shindand, six fixed-wing trainers at Shindand; as well as various locations that will have the light-lift capability, which is a small passenger sort of aircraft that can also carry some ISR [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance] capability. There will also be other close air support assets, enabled to support the counterinsurgency fight in support of the Afghan National Army. So the vast majority of the roughly 146 that's envisioned will have been delivered by the 2014-2015 timeline.
Q: General, this is Joe Tabet, with Al Hurra.
As you might know, that the nature of Afghanistan is making the counterinsurgency operations kind of difficult. Are you considering providing the Afghan Air Force in the future, like, combat helicopters, for example?
GEN. ALLVIN: Well, as a matter of fact, the Mi-35 is a fairly capable combat helicopter with close air support. We're also considering having some armament capability on our Mi-17s. We believe that with this close air support capability of a fixed-wing close air support aircraft, along with the rotary-wing close air support aircraft, this is very good in supporting the Afghan National Army in the counterinsurgency fight. So that is the vision, yes.
Q: Yeah, again, just to follow up, President Karzai expressed lately that Afghanistan might need fighter jets.
So, what's your -- what do you think about it?
GEN. ALLVIN: Well, with respect to the fighter jets or those sort of things into the future, those are strategic decisions that will be -- have to be made by the Afghans in the long term. What we have envisioned in our plan, we have envisioned an air force that can support the counterinsurgency fight, and that's why this is a phased approach that has the capability to airlift, battlefield mobility, in addition to close air support which can support the counterinsurgency fight.
Now, as we look at investing in the Afghan Air Force, there are several things we look at. Obviously we look at, we have to have a capable weapons system. And we certainly do have that with the -- with what we've envisioned for the Afghan Air Force. But we also have to look at sustainability and affordability, because, you know, we're also stewards of the American taxpayers' dollars, and we have to be very responsible with the way that we invest those dollars. And so this allows us to have a capable, sustainable, and affordable capability that will support the Afghan ground forces. Any decisions beyond that are certainly strategic decisions for the Afghans, but our vision is absolutely to support the counterinsurgency fight.
Q: General, Otto Kreisher with National Journal. Your chart shows 16 fixed-wing CAS [close air support] aircraft out in the future. Are you looking at something like the Tucano or, you know, a turbo jet or turboprop airplane, rather, to fill that mission?
GEN. ALLVIN: Currently the request for proposals is out. So I wouldn't -- I certainly wouldn't want to venture to say one type -- one particular model or make or another, because that's still an open source selection. But we are looking toward a fixed-wing, primarily a turboprop capability for that CAS, because that offers you obviously, as you know, loiter time, et cetera; it allows you to service different targets. So it -- we are envisioning a fixed-wing turboprop capability. Yes, sir.
Q: Hey, General; it's Carlo Munoz with Inside the Air Force. Wanted to follow up, sir, regarding your comments about the Presidential Airlift Squadron. Aside from that unit, can you give us an idea of what may be the next capability coming down the pipe, what other groups are sort of on the cusp of taking over that mission, and specifically -- well, follow up after that.
GEN. ALLVIN: Absolutely. The Presidential Airlift Squadron obviously is the one we see as perhaps transitioning the soonest. This is, as I mentioned, a very long process. But as we look at operational capabilities that we believe the Afghans will be able to take the lead in, obviously the battlefield mobility is a relatively general support sort of capability, and they're doing very well progressing on that. So we believe that's another capability that they will be able to take the lead in.
Also, very important, we're working hard on a medevac capability. To date this year, we've really started that in earnest, starting in the June/July time frame. And to date, we've transported 349 medevac patients over 48 missions that have been flown, and that's in the fixed-wing and the rotary-wing area. So we envision that the medevac capability -- we're trying to regularize that to ensure that it's something dependable for the Afghans, and we believe that's one of the ones that may be able to be moved along next.
Q: General, and to follow up on that, what about the capability in terms of the Joint Terminal Attack Controllers, the JTACS? Where's that program at now? I know it was sort of in flux earlier on.
GEN. ALLVIN: Yes. Currently we have one Afghan undergoing the JTAC training in the United Kingdom. We are currently working with forward observers, which, as you know very well, is not the -- does not have the capability or the expertise that a JTAC or Joint Terminal Attack Controller would have. However, we envision that individual graduating from the school in the U.K., coming back and being initial cadre to be able to teach the others. So that is a capacity that we're -- or capability we're looking for down the line, but we're going to grow that capability with an experienced or a certified instructor first.
Q: Hi, General. This is Courtney Kube from NBC News. Can you talk -- it may be in this packet and I just am not familiar with all these air assets that you have written on your slides -- but is there any intent to give the Afghan Air Force any ISR capability, any unmanned drones? Is there any training going on or any planning to train them to use any unmanned drones?
GEN. ALLVIN: Currently, in the area of ISR, we certainly are looking at different options in which we can give an ISR capability and train the Afghans on that.
However, our currently -- current thoughts are, those would be sort of ISR packages in the back of the light-lift, fixed-wing aircraft, which are destined to come into the fleet in approximately 2013 through 2015 time frame.
With respect to unmanned aerial vehicles, we currently do not have plans in the Afghan Air Force to train them on the UAVs. We're currently looking to the ISR capability in the back of manned fixed-wing aircraft at this point.
Q: Those are important, too, for the -- after 2014. Thank you.
Q: I'll ask on behalf of my colleague Lalit, who just asked you if there's any plan, why not any unmanned drones, when those are an important capability?
GEN. ALLVIN: Well, I believe that this falls into the previous question about the capability and along the sustainability and affordability. Right now we need to look at the needs of the Afghan National Security Forces, and within the Afghan Air Force, the ability to supply ISR is definitely a capability that we see a need for in the future. But if we can supply that capability for ISR to support the ground forces, that is something that we believe is capable, sustainable and affordable. And any sort of more expensive and more advanced beyond that, those would be strategic decisions in the future. But we believe that having an ISR capacity within these fixed-wing assets will meet the needs of the Afghan National Security Forces.
Q: Hi. This is Kevin Baron from Stars and Stripes. I was wondering if the -- I know that it's a 10-year plan to build the air force there to 2016. Have the -- all the talk in Washington and NATO about 2011 and 2014, has any of that come down to your level? Are you being asked to accelerate anything in any way to meet any of those kind of -- in that transition period?
GEN. ALLVIN: Actually, no, we have not, because I believe our plan is still consistent with the vision of the president and all the way down the chain of command. I believe the president on November 21st, in association with the Lisbon summit, had spoken about the goal of, by the end of 2014, having the Afghan National Security Forces take the lead for security operations throughout Afghanistan. And accompanying that, I believe the secretary of defense had mentioned that there will still be a fraction of the forces here, primarily for training and advising. So all those are consistent statements. And really, we are -- we're still on track with that plan.
However, that doesn't mean that we aren't certainly looking for ways to perhaps move that to the left whenever possible. I'll give you an example. When we develop pilots, one of the traditional long-lead items coming out of Afghanistan is the English language training. Because, as I said, English is a global common language of airmen, and so it's required to have some level of English comprehension in order to enter pilot training.
In the past, it was taking up to 400 days of training at the Defense Language Institute back in the United States before the Afghans could reach that English comprehension level to enter pilot training. So because of this, we in NATO Air Training Command-Afghanistan this last spring developed an English immersion program right out at the Kabul air wing. And we called it Thunder Lab.
And essentially, this gives the opportunities for Afghan pilot candidates to be living with -- "shana ba shana" as we say here -- shoulder to shoulder with their advisers, sunup to sundown. They actually stay in the same facility, and they speak English all the time. They do physical training together. The Afghans have English language courses. But throughout the day that immersion really accelerates their comprehension of English, and also, it enhances their professionalism, because they're speaking English, but they're speaking English on a variety of subjects, whether that be building integrity or fundamentals of ethics or some things about aviation. So you -- when you couple that with the English language training that they get, we found that that was a recipe for success.
Now, having said that, we currently have 23 graduates of the Thunder Lab. So the program is still fairly nascent. And we have had five graduates from the Defense Language Institute -- now, I hesitate to even give these numbers, because they are so -- there are so few of them, the statistical significance has yet to be determined. But I can speak with a fair amount of confidence that we will have reduced the amount of days to get through the Defense Language Institute from 400 to somewhere between 60 and 90. Now, that is incredible. And if we can sustain that, then that knocks several months off of that training pipeline and will allow us to get the pilot back to Afghanistan sooner, allow them to man those cockpits and accelerate the progress.
So any time that we can find areas in which we can accelerate, we certainly are looking for ways to do that.
Q: General, Scott Fontaine from Air Force Times. I've got a question about the current fleet of aircraft the Afghans have now. What's the average age and what's the -- well, what's the shape of these things? And going forward, are you guys looking to purchase new aircraft or maybe get, like, some sort of, you know, second-hand aircraft for lack of a better term? Thanks.
GEN. ALLVIN: Well, currently, the Afghan Air Force has a mix of old and new aircraft. There are some that are very old. The An-32 -- we have a couple of An-32 -- three to be exact -- and an An-26, which are old Soviet-style fixed-wing air assets. And those are all going to reach the end of their useful life by this summer or by the next summer, so summer of '11.
The C-27s are brand-new -- not brand-new; they are refurbished in Italy. And so they will be -- they have a service-life expectancy of approximately 10 years. Those are the twin-engine turboprop fixed-wing medium-lift assets.
The Mi-17s that we're getting -- that we have to date, the 35, are a mix of some older and some fairly new that are refurbished, and the V-5s that we call them, that are the most modern of the Mi-17s, where currently the Mi-17s we're going to get in the future are going to come directly off the line. So they'll be fairly new.
The Mi-35s currently have a life expectancy into 2016. So we have an option of doing the SLEP, or the Service Life Extension Program, on the Mi-35s.
So that -- as you can see, we have a wide range of ages.
You asked about the future and potential Westernization. We do have a look into the future as we approach the 2014-2015 time, to evaluate how these aircraft are holding up and perhaps evaluate a -- some Westernization program. But it's really too early to really speculate on what that might be, but we're going to do evaluations up to -- probably 2013, we're going to have an idea of if we're going to need to invest soon after that, and if so, what type of Western type of asset we'd be looking towards. This is a step-by-step progress.
Q: General, it's Luis Martinez with ABC. Two quick questions, if I could. You mentioned the medevac training. I think I've heard that there's a shortfall of trainers for next spring, about 750. And one of the specialized trainers I kept hearing about is medevac. How is that going to impact your mission, or am I mistaken in that?
And number two, I think on the sheet that we have here it shows FY '16, a need for 16 fixed-wing combat air support. What kind of aircrafts are you looking at for down that time frame? Are you talking prop or you talking maybe even jet?
GEN. ALLVIN: Okay, well, I'll go ahead and answer the second one first. With respect to that fixed-wing close air-support aircraft, this is the fixed-wing turboprop aircraft that we're looking at to fill that particular capability. So that is the current one that has a request for proposal out now, and it's an open-source selection, so I won't sort of, you know, lean one way or another, because there are -- I'm sure there are several companies perhaps out there looking at this. But it is a fixed-wing turboprop close air support capability is what's envisioned with that particular aircraft.
With respect to the trainers, I believe, sir, that it's not necessarily the medevac trainers but medical trainers in general. And I have to be very careful because that's slightly outside of my lane, but I do know that throughout NTM-A, we are short trainers. And I can speak for myself for NATO Air Training Command-Afghanistan, we are -- for through the summer period, we are currently short 64 trainers, but those are limited to the Mi-17 and the C-27 program.
I do need to caution, though, that this is really a snapshot in time. This is as of today, those are the trainers that we are short in this command. However, the force generation process for this combined joint statement of requirements, which is sort of the NATO and SHAPE [Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers, Europe (NATO)] work in progress for sourcing the needs that we have, it's being worked very hard through NATO and SHAPE, and all governments are talking and working these issues. So I would caution that, even though I say 64 today, we may have pledges in the next few days, and those numbers may change. But those are specifically medical trainers, sir, I believe you're referring to.
With respect to the medevac mission, we're actually doing the training of our own -- taking our own advisers and training Afghans in being flight medics.
So we do not see any specific shortfalls with respect to developing the medic -- the medevac capability.
Q: General, Otto Kreisher, at National Journal again.
Since most of your aircraft that you're training in are Soviet Bloc airplanes -- which, you know, the U.S. Air Force, you know, doesn't traditionally fly -- are you using, you know, our allies in those trainings, or have you trained, you know, U.S. airmen to fly those Soviet airbirds?
GEN. ALLVIN: Yes, sir, actually, a little bit of both. We actually have our [U.S.] Air Force airmen who trained -- we take experienced helicopter pilots and we have them train on the Mi-17. However, especially more recently, we've been able to welcome partners from NATO nations who have those Mi-17 aircraft and the Mi-35 aircraft in their countries. And I have to tell you, they have just been tremendous.
There's a difference, as you know, sir, between being a professional aviator and learning on a new aircraft -- the more experience you have, the easier it is to transition and be able to do teaching in different aircraft. But there's something to be said for having that -- a lot of experience in that particular aircraft. So in that capacity, the Czech Republic, the Hungarians, the Croatians and several others have really helped us out, because they fly these aircraft and they have a lot of experience in that weapons system.
So it's kind of interesting when you -- when you'll see some of the NATO trainers talking to the Afghans. You may actually see an American listening in, too, because there's always something that we can pick up as well.
Q: Hey, General. It's Carlo Munoz of Inside the Air Force again.
I wanted to follow up. I understand that some U.S. and NATO air advisers had recently coordinated with folks in the Afghan MOD [Ministry of Defense] to look at command-and-control issues -- kind of give them sort of some assistance to sort of change some of the tactics that the Afghan Air Force folks were using. One, can you give me an update on how that sort of -- how that's sort of working out at sort of the lower levels within the Afghan Air Force? And also, two, where -- what else are some of the issues that there could be this similar types of cooperation on in the future?
GEN. ALLVIN: Well, the command and control -- as was mentioned at the opening, I took over this command in September, and that was one of the things I really wanted to focus on, just because as the number of airframes increases, the capabilities increase, it becomes more and more important that we gain efficiencies in the way that we utilize those aircraft and when we train the Afghans in the command and control, that will enable them to take over an efficient process and be able to execute that.
Specifically, within the area of command and control, we are making some good headway. We are working on having a centralized scheduling process that works through the MOD, down through the Afghan Air Force, to what we call the air command and control center, in which the scheduling functions for all of the aircraft and all of the wings takes place; and simultaneously cooperating with the ground forces in the different corps, to have those requests funnel up. It's a bit complex to discuss, but when you see it on paper it makes perfect sense. And we're moving forward on that because, as we see the air assets move out further around the country, that becomes critical to utilize them to their best ability.
Some of the other issues that we're working through are the equipment. Obviously, command and control has to have associated equipment to be able to not only make the requests, but transmit the information and transmit the reports. So we're working on getting the equipment, the command and control equipment, out to all of the locations, and having a disciplined process, and just really setting in play behavioral patterns that will help to have a more efficient utilization of these really scarce resources.
I'll just -- to put things in perspective, you know, I think when Western militaries -- the United States, in particular -- when we think of rotary-wing assets, I think lots of times we think of them as a maneuver element for our ground force. But when you're in Afghanistan, those helicopters are really like, I guess, our C-130s. They're really critical inter-theater assets. And so they're not just localized in what they can provide, but they also can be moved around throughout the country. And they're very critical, given the limited number and the unique capability that they bring. So that's why command and control has been a very big focus.
And I think you mentioned other areas. The other areas that -- obviously, that our NATO partners are helping us out with are just doing the training in the out-bases, doing the training up in the detachments. And so as we expand our advising of the Afghan Air Force, we certain need additional NATO help to be able to do that.
And so our NATO partners are not only helping us within Kabul and Kandahar, but they're also going to be spreading out to all the detachments to do the air advising there, as well.
COL. LAPAN: Okay, General. Thank you for the time you gave this morning. I'll send it back to you for any closing remarks you'd like to make.
GEN. ALLVIN: Well, thank you very much, Dave. And again, thank you very much for those questions.
I'm happy to talk about something that I'm fairly passionate about. This is a mission that we're all very proud of. We have a ways to go, but we've gone a ways, as well. We have progress, continued progress. And our mission is to continue that progress moving forward, because it's not irreversible yet. But making progress, moving towards that time when we can transition, that's key. That's what we're focusing on.
But I would like to reiterate that even though this is a long process, building an air force is a long process, the Afghan Air Force is really delivering something for the Afghans every day. And the people see that, and I think that's very, very important.
And so I want to also thank everyone back at home for all the support that they give to the folks over here. Everyone's doing a great job. And I believe that we would make you all proud, and I want to wish everyone back there a very happy holiday season.
Thank you.
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