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"I've included some local press coverage of our NVG capability as well," notes Capt. Mike Stohler, as he hands over the binder. Stohler is an instructor pilot for NVG flying at Indiana's 163rd Fighter Squadron at Fort Wayne. The 163rd Blacksnakes, part of the 122nd Fighter Wing, are leading the charge into night multirole operations for the Air National Guard. Those living in the Fort Wayne area know about the unit's transition to night operations because they've read about it on the front page of the Fort Wayne News-Sentinel. The transition, though, may be news to other F-16 operators.

"The Guard has been using NVGs in its F-16 air defense units for several years," Stohler says. "But we are the first Guard unit to employ NVGs in both air-to-air and air-to-ground operations. We are also the first ANG F-16 unit to receive the Night Vision Imaging System, or NVIS, modification."

At about $60,000 per aircraft for the cockpit and external lighting modifications associated with NVIS and another $7,000 for a set of NVGs, the ANG is paying a relatively small fee for admission into the big league of night fighter operations. Col. Dave Brubaker, who oversees F-16 upgrades for the ANG (a former Blacksnake himself), is on record as saying that low cost is a basic requirement for upgrading the ANG's F-16 fleet to a level of capability that matches active-duty USAF fighters. Night capability is one of several fundamental improvements underlying the efforts of the Guard and the Air Force Reserve to remain viable warfighters into the next century.

"We're going to be flying these Block 25 F-16s for a long time," says Capt. J.D. Brown, the project leader for NVGs at Fort Wayne. "In the past, we upgraded our capabilities through airframes. With the F-4, for example, we could anticipate the capabilities of the F-16. It may be a long time before the Guard ever sees a Joint Strike Fighter. So, we have to work with what we have. Fortunately for us, the F-16 provides a lot of potential to work with."

NVIS and NVGs have opened up the night for Indiana's F-16s. "We are still a general-purpose Block 25 airplane," Stohler acknowledges, "but now we can operate effectively twenty-four hours a day. We still have to place the pipper on the target. And we still drop dumb bombs, which are not as accurate as laser-guided munitions. But we can drop them at night." A software upgrade will soon allow ANG aircraft to carry targeting pods and drop laser-guided munitions. For now, the Maverick missile is Fort Wayne's only precision-guided munition.

Stohler and Brown are two of five pilots at Fort Wayne who are fully qualified to fly with NVGs. Five other pilots are in various stages of training as of December 1997. The unit, which has been flying with NVGs since July 1997, expects to have all of its pilots qualified by the end of 1998.

"It takes a year to eighteen months for a unit to get checked out with NVGs," Stohler says. "In six months, we have checked out a third of our unit. We may or may not qualify every pilot. The necessity of qualifying every pilot in a unit to fly with NVGs is one of the many issues we address in the next year. Although we are not a test squadron, we are investigating transition issues for the ANG."

The qualification process begins with some familiarization training on the ground. Pilots practice inserting the NVGs into the helmet bracket and replacing the batteries while sitting in the unit's ejection procedures trainer in the dark. "The ground-based training gets them comfortable with how the NVGs feel," Stohler explains. "We want to get them used to the forty-degree field of view before going out to fly. We do a lot of focusing work. The best visual acuity we can get with the goggles is 20/30 or, for some, 20/25. Not focusing them correctly can cause eyestrain or, at worst, pilots won't be able to see what they should be seeing."

Fort Wayne's NVG training syllabus takes five rides to be qualified to fly as a wingman. The five missions begin with an introduction to formation maneuvering at night and build to one-vs-one intercepts, to two-vs-two intercepts (at beyond visual range and at visual identification ranges), to surface attacks, and finally to the employment of Maverick missiles at medium altitudes. Two more flights are needed to become a flight lead. To qualify as a four-ship wingman takes another two training flights. Flight leads and instructor pilots require four more flights to lead four-ships. Pilots who have not flown with NVGs for 120 days have to go through refamiliarization training.

Brown had a chance recently to compare his NVG training syllabus with syllabi from other commands. "The PACAF syllabus requires only five NVG rides to lead a four-ship," Brown notes. "We require seven to lead a two-ship and eleven for a four-ship. The ACC syllabus, on which we base our training, has no low-altitude events even though we can fly with NVGs at low altitude. We are beginning to address inconsistencies in the training. The Navy has standardized its NVG training. At some point, I think the Air Force will do the same. For now, though, the Guard is taking a conservative route. For example, we will not be flying four-ships until this summer."

Training pilots to fly and fight with NVGs is an obvious step in the shifting to night operations. A less obvious step is the transition of the system that supports these late-night F-16 flights. "I get two recurrent questions when I go to conferences to discuss NVGs," says Brown. "How long will it take to make the transition to night flying? And how do traditional part-timers handle the transition?"

"Night flying is a relatively new concept to most ANG units," Stohler adds. "The Guard not only relies on part-time pilots but also on part-time personnel in maintenance, weapons, operations, and scheduling. Shifting to night operations can, therefore, be a big cultural change for a Guard unit. We can't accomplish the transition without getting everyone on board."

Stohler suggests that units going through the change get the word out as soon as possible and discuss the transition with everyone affected by it. "We start by explaining our own perspectives," he says. "We're not just flying at night for the fun of it. We don't enjoy doing debriefs at two-thirty in the morning. For half a year or so, a unit will be flying two weeks of nights a month, launching more than four jets a night. The schedule may be determined by the phases of the moon. Getting through the upgrade may be painful. But once through it, a unit can go back to one week a month of nights with six or eight flights a night."

The transitional pain results in a capability gain that Stohler and Brown describe eagerly. "In some ways, flying with NVGs is like adding a sensor to the airplane," Brown explains. "At times it is easier to get tallies at night than it is during the day. The effectiveness depends a lot on the background lighting at night. In the midwest, we have lights everywhere. Chicago puts out an unimaginable skyglow. And we can lose people in the lights. Desert operations are a different story. Other aircraft cannot hide from us in the desert. We can see their cockpit lights from miles away."

All F-16 pilots are required to fly four or five night sorties per year. And these sorties, without NVGs, are always a chore. "We always had to modify our tactics at night," says Brown. "We would fly in a trail formation maybe three to five miles back, depending on the mission. The distance is needed because the wingman uses radar to keep to his station on the flight lead. In these flights, ninety percent of a wingman's time is spent station-keeping on his lead. Without NVGs, LANTIRN pilots fly a seven- or eight-mile trail. A twenty ship package would represent a 40-mile-long parade of jets."

NVGs essentially allow pilots to fly daytime tactics at night. "We deploy as a two-ship with AMRAAMs and Sidewinders and fly line abreast formation," Stohler says. "We are doing as much of our daytime tactics as we can. Right now we are limited to two-ships, but we will be checked out soon as four-ship instructor pilots. After that, we will be able to fly fluid-four formations at night. If we tried that at night without goggles, we would probably have a mid-air collision. At night, without NVGs, a pilot can't tell if his wingman is turning. Flying at night is very difficult. With the NVIS modification and NVGs, we can go out there full-up, turning and burning."

The NVIS covert mode adds a dose of stealthiness to these night tactics. "Potential adversaries may be able to hear us," says Stohler, "but they will have a hard time seeing us because the bottom of the jet is blacked out. We can sneak onto a target and not be detected visually. We never had that capability at night.

"If we had goggles in the Gulf War," adds Brown, who flew F-16s from Torrejon Air Base, Spain, in the war, "all of the F-16s in theater could have attacked targets at night."

The 163rd is coordinating its night missions with Army ground units from nearby Fort Campbell and Fort Knox in Kentucky. The Army units use NVGs and lasers to designate ground targets and communicate with the pilots on UHF and VHF radios.

"We have also flown some escort missions with B-1 bombers from McConnell AFB, Kansas," Stohler adds. "The B-1 crew was on goggles as well and we escorted them through simulated red air forces. We also plan to work with A-10s from the 110th Fighter Wing in Michigan to practice night close air support missions. We will be on NVGs and so will they. We are flying close air support, defensive counter-air sweeps, offensive counter airÑall at night."

NVGs transform Maverick air-to-ground missile tactics at night. "We flew ten-mile trails with the Maverick at night, preparing for a deployment to Kuwait last year," notes Brown. "Now we can use the covert NVIS lights and fly more of a fighting formation, a tactical line abreast. Both airplanes in a formation can fire their missiles and get out fast." The 163rd plans to fire live Mavericks at night in Arizona in February. A-10 pilots and ground-based forward air controllers will participate in the live shots.

The goggles complement the infrared Maverick, which senses frequencies farther into the red end of the spectrum. "Without the goggles, the only vision enhancer we have at night is the infrared sensor on the Maverick," Stohler explains. "We can slew the sensor to a limited degree, but our view is restricted to a little window in the multifunction display. With the goggles, we can peer out of the cockpit and visually identify ground targets much easier. We can spot muzzle flashes on the ground. If you are smoking a cigarette, we can see you at five miles. If you are smoking a cigar, we can spot you at ten miles. If your truck or tank is warm, we can see you with the Maverick."

NVGs are also opening up new methods of identifying potential adversaries. Russian and American munitions have identifiable characteristics in the goggles. "We are just now learning some of these finer aspects of flying with NVGs," Stohler says. "If we are flying close air support, for example, and we know who is shooting with tracers and who is not, it is easy to distinguish the bad guys on the ground at night. That's something we can't do during the day. External lighting schemes have become a hot topic for our intel folks. Aircraft have distinctive lighting patterns."

When asked why NVG capability, which has been around for a decade, is just now reaching F-16 multirole units, Brown suggests informed conservatism as a possible answer. "The F-16 community wanted to do NVGs right the first time, with compatible cockpit and external lighting." With lessons learned from Fort Wayne, other Guard units will be able to say that they, too, aren't afraid of the dark.

Eric Hehs