The 10th Air Force at NAS Fort Worth Joint Reserve Base in Texas directs the activities of 11,400 reservists located at more than twenty military installations throughout the United States. As commander of the 10th, Maj. Gen. John Bradley manages and supervises six fighter wings, three geographically dispersed rescue units, one bomber unit, one airborne warning and control unit, one special operations wing, one space group, one regional support group, and more than 120 nonflying units in logistics and support roles. The 10th Air Force supplements the nation’s active Air Force with operationally ready units on a moment’s notice. If mobilized, Air Combat Command and Special Operations Command gain these flying units and their support elements. Recently acquired missions of the 10th Air Force support Space Command and Air Education and Training Command as well. Units of the 10th Air Force fly satellites for both the US Space Command and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The flying organizations within 10th Air Force include fighter units equipped with F-16 Fighting Falcons and A-10 Thunderbolts, air rescue units equipped with HC-130 Hercules tankers and HH-60 Blackhawk helicopters, a bomber unit equipped with B-52H Stratofortresses, and a special operations unit equipped with the C-130 Combat Talon and Combat Shadow aircraft.

Beginning in October 2001, the 10th Air Force played a significant role in air operations against Taliban and Al Qaeda forces in Afghanistan. These Enduring Freedom operations included precision air strikes by F-16s from three Air Force Reserve Units that were on a scheduled deployment to Southwest Asia for Operation Southern Watch. Code One editor Eric Hehs met with Gen. Bradley in February to discuss the contribution of these F-16 units and the 10th Air Force to Operation Enduring Freedom.

How did F-16s of the 10th Air Force become involved in operations over Afghanistan?

Timing was everything. We had ten Air Force Reserve F-16s in the region for Operation Southern Watch. Beginning in mid-September, we were flying OSW missions over Iraq as part of a scheduled Aerospace Expeditionary Force. So when the war kicked off over Afghanistan, we were in Southwest Asia. We rainbowed F-16s from all three of our Block 30 units. The 482nd Fighter Wing from Homestead sent four aircraft. The 301st Fighter Wing from NAS Fort Worth and the 419th Fighter Wing from Hill AFB sent three airplanes each. Pilots and maintenance personnel were sent from the 944th Fighter Wing at Luke AFB, Arizona, as well.

The 482nd Fighter Wing from Homestead Air Reserve Base in Florida was the first F-16 unit deployed to OSW. But they returned to the US before Enduring Freedom operations began. Still, Reserve pilots from Homestead knocked out some surface-to-air missile sites and some anti-aircraft artillery sites during their missions over Iraq. Reserve F-16 units flew missions over Afghanistan from mid-October to the end of December 2001. We continued to support Southern Watch the entire time we were in Southwest Asia.

What other assets did the 10th Air Force have in theater for Enduring Freedom?

The 10th Air Force is a very diverse fighting force. Most numbered air forces are focused in one area. The 10th happens to have a variety of missions because it falls under the Air Force Reserve Command. We have fighters, bombers, rescue, special operations, space command, pilot training, and airborne warning and control, or AWACs.

Overall, we have more than 2,000 people activated who are still activated since 11 September. Many of these personnel were called up specifically for Enduring Freedom. We have more than 200 AWACs personnel involved at Tinker. They were in the region for Operation Northern Watch. Our B-52 bomber squadron at Barksdale, the 93rd Bomb Squadron, was called up for Enduring Freedom. We had close to 100 B-52 crew, maintenance, and weapons people involved. Some happened to be in the AEF rotation at the same time. But they activated more of our B-52 personnel specifically for Enduring Freedom. A third of the B-52 missions over Afghanistan from mid-September to late January were flown by reservists of the 10th Air Force. Our B-52s were used for close air support over there, a mission normally associated with fighter aircraft.

More than 500 of our special operations personnel were called up for Enduring Freedom. They were from Duke Field, which is part of the Eglin AFB complex in Florida. They flew MC-130P Combat Talon and MC-130E Combat Shadow missions. Our special operations forces dropped about half of the 15,000-pound daisy cutters from their C-130s. They performed other special ops missions with the active-duty folks, including infiltration, exfiltration, air drop, and helicopter re-fueling for combat search and rescue missions.

We’ve been in the AWACs business for about five years. Our AWACs units are covering Northern Watch missions right now from Incirlik, Turkey. We have seven space squadrons that control GPS and weather satellites. Some of these units were activated for Enduring Freedom as well.

Interestingly, none of our F-16 personnel were activated for Southern Watch. They volunteered for it.

What capabilities did your F-16s bring to the theater?

The Litening targeting pod and our datalink give our Block 30 F-16s some capabilities unmatched by any other fighter. The targeting pod allows us to find things Block 40 F-16s and F-15Es can’t find with their LANTIRN pods. Don’t get me wrong; LANTIRN is a great system. But our pod is twenty years newer. So you would expect it to be more capable. It has a third-generation forward-looking infrared sensor. This FLIR can pick up targets at a longer range and at higher altitudes. The pod also has an electro-optical camera that provides a visual picture as opposed to an infrared picture. The camera is a great capability, especially during daylight hours. With it, Homestead F-16 pilots were able to find and destroy some anti-aircraft artillery in Iraq that no one had seen before. They also destroyed some mobile surface-to-air missile sites.

Our situational awareness datalink, or SADL, is the neatest capability we’ve employed in years. The system is based on an enhanced position location reporting system, which was developed after the Gulf War to reduce fratricide. The radio designates its carrier as a friendly force. The system is perfect for operating in a close air support environment.

How did the Reserve and Guard F-16s end up with a situational datalink before the active Air Force?

The active Air Force is pursuing Link 16 as its advanced datalink system. We received SADL because funding limitations precluded us from acquiring Link 16. Like ACC, we view a datalink as an important capability. We looked for a system that was less expensive and more immediately available. When Link 16 is fielded, the two systems will be able to work together because we are developing a gateway that allows Link 16 and SADL to talk to each other.

Guard and Reserve F-16s have recently incorporated GPS into their navigation systems. Did the F-16s flown in Operation Enduring Freedom have this upgrade?

They didn’t when they first arrived in theater. They had to rely on their original inertial navigation system, or INS, which uses gyroscopes to keep track of position. F-16s flown in the initial days of the Afghanistan operations did not have the hardware modification for GPS called EGI, short for embedded GPS INS. EGI [pronounced iggy] replaces the INS with a navigation system that derives aircraft position from global positioning satellites. The modification takes many hours and involves more than plugging in a black box or two. The associated software upgrade is called SCU 4 [software capability upgrade].

When our airplanes went through a recent modification at the depot at Hill AFB, they were wired for EGI. However, some of the pieces and parts needed for the complete upgrade were not available. We were hoping to get those items installed before we went to Southern Watch, but the kits did not arrive in time.

In October, we began flying Enduring Freedom missions into Afghanistan without SCU 4 and EGI. INS is great for navigation, but it is less useful for precision targeting because it drifts over time. The longer the mission, the more the drift. With an inertial system, pilots have to update the targeting pod constantly. That is, they must continually designate some spot with known coordinates on their way to the actual target. If they are flying in weather, they can’t update the pod. Meanwhile, the INS can drift by several hundred feet in a matter of minutes.

The commander of our Southern Watch base called me the first week in November and asked for the EGI and SCU 4 to be installed. The installation involves some risks. We can break airplanes when we install new equipment and lose a few combat missions because the airplanes are not available. Besides, the pilots had not trained on the new capability. They had some academics on EGI back in the States but not actual flight time. Going from the old software to SCU 4 changes the functions of several hands-on switches in the cockpit. So pilots must learn a lot of switch changes. The flying schedule did not allow for training missions in theater. Still, the increased capability outweighed the risk of installing hardware and software.

Was the modification successful and, if so, what was the payoff?

The OSW commander called on a Wednesday. By the following Friday, we had gathered everything we needed to modify those ten F-16s. The short turnaround was phenomenal considering what we brought together. In a matter of days, we had ten huge crates of hardware in a hangar at Hill AFB to send to the base in Southwest Asia. Five days after the commander’s call, the crates arrived in Southwest Asia. The same day the hardware arrived, our deployed maintenance personnel began installing EGI on the airplanes. Seven days after the commander called, we were flying missions with the new software. Ten days after he called, all ten jets were modified. During the upgrades, no sorties were missed.

The payoff was incredible. The EGI upgrade makes the targeting pod extremely stable. It doesn’t drift at all. The datalink is just as stable. GPS allowed us to perform our laser-guided bombing much smarter, more effectively, and without error. Aircraft position in SADL was also extremely stable and accurate. The system performs marvelously.

What is the status of GPS modification with other Reserve F-16s?

As our jets were being modified last November, the CINC for Enduring Freedom was still considering moving fighters into countries bordering Afghanistan. We were told that some F-16s with targeting pods might be wanted at those bases. So once we got those first ten jets completed, our next job was to make sure that every other 10th Air Force F-16 was modified as well. By the end of November, we had all of our F-16s modified with EGI and SCU 4. That’s more than sixty combat-coded F-16s. The war progressed faster than expected, so the airplanes didn’t have to deploy to the region.

Describe a typical mission for an F-16 over Afghanistan.

Most missions were flown at night. A four-ship would depart from the base at dusk and arrive in the target area four to five hours later. The initial targets were defined in the daily air tasking orders telling everyone what to do and when to do it. The situation was dynamic. Controlling agencies often redirected aircraft once the aircraft arrived in the combat area. Special operations would often provide targeting coordinates through the command and control system. Descriptions of terrain, buildings, vehicles, and the like were passed to our pilots. The information came from a variety of sources, including airborne forward air controllers, ground forward air controllers, AWACs, and even from operators flying unmanned Predator aircraft. Forward air controllers often designated targets with hand-held lasers. The average mission lasted over ten hours. Some lasted more than twelve hours. I’m not aware of fighter missions of this length at any time in our history. Even P-51 Mustang missions that flew escort during World War II were only nine or ten hours long.

Our F-16s flew with F-15Es from Mountain Home in many of the missions. Every bomb dropped was a laser-guided bomb; most were 500-pound GBU-12s. Each pilot flew two to three missions per week in the two to three weeks he was in theater. Pilots typically accumulated three to four Enduring Freedom missions during their rotations. They also flew Southern Watch missions, including alert missions.

How was the Predator used by F-16s in Afghanistan?

Predators were used to locate and identify targets. The Predator controller, who can work with special operations forces equipped with night vision goggles, a GPS, and a radio, flew the aircraft from a desk somewhere usually far away from the theater. Directed by the special ops guy to a target area, the Predator located the target with a visual or infrared sensor. The Predator controller then verbally described the target to the special ops guys on the ground; some controllers can designate the target with a laser. That target information was then passed to our F-16s.

How did air operations for Enduring Freedom differ from those flown during Operation Desert Storm?

In Desert Storm, the services did not communicate as effectively. The Navy did not have systems that were compatible with the Air Force. For example, we couldn’t transmit air tasking orders directly to the Navy. We had to physically fly the orders to the carriers. We’ve made a lot of improvements in the last ten years. We work much better now in a joint environment. We have fixed the communication problems between the services and removed all the seams. Now information is transmitted to everyone in the same way. At the tactical level, I think we have progressed as well. Special operations personnel equipped with GPS and radios worked with Afghan soldiers on horseback. That didn’t happen in Desert Storm.

We have several new technologies that help us find and share target information from airplanes. We have a lot more laser-guided precision munitions than we had during Desert Storm. We have better methods of delivering weapons. We have forward air controllers on the ground designating targets with lasers for our bombs. We use unmanned aerial vehicles to designate targets as well. We significantly shorten the time between locating a target and dropping weapons on it.

How did the aircraft hold up?

When we sent these airplanes overseas for Southern Watch, we were originally going to fly only two- to three-hour missions. We ended up putting in four times the flying time we had planned. Every Enduring Freedom combat mission was like an overseas deployment. The longest leg of the return flight, back to the United States from Southwest Asia, was shorter than any mission flown over Afghanistan. We flew Southern Watch missions every day the missions were scheduled. The F-16s performed phenomenally. The ten airplanes came back to the United States in code one condition. I was so proud of how our airplanes performed that I sat down and wrote Dain Hancock a letter of appreciation.

How will these unexpectedly long Enduring Freedom missions affect maintenance schedules?

Since we sent ten airplanes from three units, the load was spread across the Reserve’s F-16 fleet. Noble Eagle missions, however, could have a much larger impact. The first two weeks after 11 September, we supported Noble Eagle in Fort Worth with alert jets. We may have to do that again. The 27th Fighter Wing from Cannon AFB, New Mexico, an active Air Force unit, is performing the alert missions in Fort Worth now.

Performing combat air patrols with two airplanes twenty-four hours a day results in some significant flying time. That’s forty-eight hours a day minimum, plus the overlap as one two-ship replaces another. Performing that mission for a three-month period accumulates more hours than the allocated flying time for one fighter squadron for one year. In other words, we are putting 1.25 fighter squadron’s worth of annual flying time on our F-16s in three months. That’s a fleet problem we are addressing. The increased activity throws airplanes into phase inspections sooner. Plus we’ll see some service life problems. We have to manage our fleet so we don’t burn up our airplanes too fast.

What comes to your mind first when you reflect on the performance of the 10th Air Force in Enduring Freedom?

I think about the people who made it work. The maintenance people who kept the airplanes running. We didn’t lose one sortie due to maintenance. The munitions people who loaded the weapons. We dropped a lot of laser-guided bombs. The pilots who flew incredibly long and difficult missions. We never missed a sortie. Never lost one pilot. I’m also proud of the airplane. The F-16 is the greatest fighter America has ever built. I know we have some great ones coming down the line —the Joint Strike Fighter and the F-22. Still, I love flying the F-16. And I’m very proud of the capabilities we have put on the airplane.