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1
Introduction
BACKGROUND
This study was mandated by Congress in the Na-
tional Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2002
(P.L. 107-107), Section 253: Study and Report on Ef-
fectiveness of Air Force Science and Technology Pro-
gram Changes (see Appendix A). Section 253 re-
quested that the National Research Council (NRC)
conduct a study to determine how changes that the Air
Force had implemented to its science and technology
(S&T) program during the previous 2 years responded
to concerns about the program that had been raised by
Congress, the Defense Science Board (DSB), the Air
Force Scientific Advisory Board (SAB), and the Air
Force Association (AFA). Section 253 also requested
that the NRC determine how those changes affected
the future capabilities of the Air Force (U.S. Congress,
2001~.
In recent years, there have been numerous concerns
expressed, studies conducted, and recommendations
made pertinent to the Air Force S&T program. Con-
gress has expressed its concerns in a series of national
defense authorization acts. The DSB, SAB, AFA, NRC,
and Naval Research Advisory Committee (NRAC)
have conducted studies and issued reports. (These are
summarized in Appendix E.) A synthesis of the con-
cerns and recommendations from these studies and re-
ports yields a list of five overarching issues with re-
spect to the Air Force S&T program. (See Table 1-1.)
The five areas in Table 1-1 correspond to the main
concerns or issues identified in Section 253 of P.L. 107-
107 and in the statement of task for this study (see the
section "Statement of Task," below). The areas are
these:
TABLE 1-1 Synthesis of Concerns and
Recommendations
Issue
Concern Raised by:
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· S&T investment levels and balance (Statement of
Task Part 1.C);
· The S&E workforce (within Statement of Task
Part 1.A);
· S&T and development planning (Statement of
Task Parts 2.D, 2.E, and within Part 1.A);
· S&T advocacy and visibility (Statement of Task
Parts 1.D through 2.C); and
· Technology availability, or content of the Air
Force S&T program (Statement of Task Part 1.A).
7
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8
AIR FORCE RESPONSE TO CONCERNS
During the initial meeting for this study, the Air
Force presented its view of the background for the
study and described actions that the Air Force had taken
to respond to the concerns raised by Congress and oth-
ers (Schneider, 2002a,b). The Air Force identified 16
reports that had been published from January 1999
through January 2002 that expressed concerns and pro-
vided recommendations about the Air Force S&T pro-
gram. In these reports, the Air Force found numerous
comments and 202 recommendations, ranging from
"quick and easy" to implement, to "difficult and time
consuming." Within the group of 202 recommenda-
tions, the Air Force found some to be seemingly con-
tradictory.
Of the 202 recommendations, the Air Force found
28 that it felt did not apply to this study. Of the remain-
ing 174, the Air Force believed that the Secretary of
Defense was the primary action party for 52 of them
and that the Secretary of the Air Force was the primary
action party for 122. The Air Force concluded its back-
ground presentation to the study committee by stating
that "the Air Force has heard the concerns and is ad-
dressing those concerns" (Schneider, 2002a).
In describing the actions that it had taken to address
concerns, the Air Force used five overarching areas (not
exactly the same as, but similar to the list described
above): the S&E workforce, visibility and advocacy of
S&T, technology availability, S&T planning, and bal-
anced investment. For each of these five areas, the Air
Force then described specific actions that it had taken
and changes that it had made to address these concerns.
These actions and changes included holding "S&T
Summits," creating applied technology councils
(ATCs), designating the Air Force Materiel Command
commander (AFMC/CC) to be the Air Force's S&T
advocate, reinstituting development planning, and con-
ducting the S&T planning review required by Section
252 of the FY 2001 National Defense Authorization
Act (P.L. 106-398) (see Appendix B).
STATEMENT OF TASK
The Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for
Science, Technology, and Engineering sponsored this
study. The statement of task for the study is as follows
(see Appendix A):
The NRC is requested to conduct a study to determine how changes
to the Air Force science and technology program implemented
EFFECTIVENESS OF AIR FORCE SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY PROGRAM CHANGES
during the past two years affect the future capabilities of the Air
Force. The NRC will:
1. Independently review and assess whether such changes as a whole
are sufficient to ensure the following:
A. That concerns about the management of the science and tech-
nology program that have been raised by the Congress, the De-
fense Science Board, the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board,
and the Air Force Association have been adequately addressed.
B. That appropriate and sufficient technology is available to en-
sure the military superiority of the United States and counter fu-
ture high-risk threats.
C. That the science and technology investments are balanced to
meet near-, mid-, and long-term needs of the Air Force.
D. That the Air Force organizational structure provides for a suf-
ficiently senior level advocate of science and technology to en-
sure an ongoing, effective presence of the science and technology
community during the budget and planning process.
2. In addition, the study shall independently assess the specific
changes to the Air Force science and technology program as fol-
lows:
A. Whether the biannual science and technology summits provide
sufficient visibility into, and understanding and appreciation of,
the value of the science and technology program to the senior
level of Air Force budget and policy decisionmakers.
B. Whether the applied technology councils are effective in con-
tributing the input of all levels beneath the senior leadership into
coordination, focus, and content of the science and technology
program.
C. Whether the designation of the commander of the Air Force
Materiel Command as the science and technology budget advo-
cate is effective to assure that an adequate budget top line is set.
D. Whether the revised development planning process is effective
to aid in the coordination of the needs of the Air Force warfighters
with decisions on science and technology investments and the
establishment of priorities among different science and technol-
ogy programs.
E. Whether the implementation of section 252 of the Floyd D.
Spence National Defense Authorization Act of Fiscal Year 2001
(as enacted into law by Public Law 106-398; 114 Stat. 1654A-46)
is effective to identify the basis for the appropriate science and
technology program top line and investment portfolio.
The NRC Committee on Review of the Effective-
ness of Air Force Science and Technology Program
Changes recognized that the tasks listed above encour-
age unequivocal "yes" or "no" answers; however, the
committee judged that unequivocal answers would lack
consideration of a number of factors. First, they would
imply unequivocal forecasts about what is required for
military superiority, the nature of future high-risk
threats, how to counter those high-risk threats, and how
technology could, given certain changes by the Air
Force, unfold to ensure all of those outcomes. Second,
military superiority does not depend on S&T alone, as
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INTRODUCTION
unequivocal answers to the statement of task questions
might imply, but instead on successfully balancing,
within the reality of constrained resources, the risks
among (1) today's readiness and ongoing operations,
(2) modernizing to meet tomorrow, and (3) investment
in S&T as the basis for modernizing the "day after to-
morrow." Such forecasts and balances are at least im-
plicit in the funding requests contained in the
President's budget request (PBR) each year, but they
can never be unequivocal.
The committee found Statement of Task Question
1.B to be particularly troublesome in this regard. En-
suring that the Air Force has appropriate and sufficient
technology to counter future threats in the post-
September 11, 2001, era is perhaps more difficult than
at any time in the past. The reasons are multifaceted.
First, terrorism, the possible development and use of
weapons of mass destruction (WMD) by rogue nations,
and more widespread availability of means to deliver
WMD all increase the diversity of the threats our
country faces and make the nature of such threats more
uncertain. Second, as stated above, the funds available
to support the development of countering technologies
are constrained by limited total Air Force funding in
the context of a high operational tempo, the necessity
of renewing stockpiles of expended weapons (readi-
ness), replacing or upgrading aging weapons systems
and infrastructure (modernization), and adapting to the
changing nature of 21st-century warfare (transforma-
tion). Third, both threats and countering technologies
are more numerous and more complex as are all as-
pects of modern living as the result of the inexorable
advances of scientific discovery and engineering appli-
cations.
Even without the totality of these complexities, at-
tempts to evaluate the effectiveness and adequacy of
programs of long-term research have always met with
substantial difficulty. The results of long-term research
will not be available in time to be useful for currently
approved projects, and those projects for which the re-
sults of long-term research could be helpful have not
yet been approved or fully defined. Moreover, since
S&T funding amounts to less than 2 percent of the over-
all Air Force program but is made up of perhaps a thou-
sand or more individual tasks and programs, it is not
conducive to regular, comprehensive, in-depth reviews
by senior Air Force leadership.
9
.
The committee believed that it could not definitively
answer the question posed by Statement of l ask Ques-
tion 1.B ("That appropriate and sufficient technology
is available to ensure the military superiority of the
United States and counter future high-risk threats".
However, the availability of appropriate, sufficient, and
flexible technology is significantly affected by several
factors that the committee could address. Those factors
include the following:
~
.
The level and stability of overall S&T funding;
2. The S&T investment balance to meet near-, mid-,
and long-term needs;
3. The flexibility of the S&T program to aggres-
sively pursue new and evolving challenges and
opportunities without disrupting ongoing, pro-
ductive programs;
4. The organization for advocacy of S&T;
5. The quality and quantity of the S&E workforce;
6. The effectiveness of the link between the S&T
programs and the programmed and anticipated ac-
quisition programs provided by development
planning and other means; and
7. The methodology for S&T planning and the vis-
ibility into the planning both by those who advo-
cate the other major elements of the Air Force
program (the Major Commands) and by those
who integrate the overall Air Force program (the
Air Force Corporate Structure).
These factors are addressed in the chapters that follow.
In summary, the committee did not attempt to pro-
vide unequivocal answers. Instead, it attempted to as-
sess the changes that the Air Force had made to its
S&T program and to judge whether those changes ad-
dressed past concerns about the Air Force S&T pro-
gram and whether those changes were for the better or
the worse. In other words, had the Air Force moved its
S&T program in the right direction?
STUDY APPROACH
To conduct this study, the NRC formed an indepen-
dent committee of persons with knowledge and exper-
Within the resources available to it, the committee tise relevant to the study issues. Concise biographical
faced the same challenge in conducting a comprehen- sketches of the committee members are provided in
sive, in-depth review of the Air Force S&T program. Appendix C. Over a 7-month period, the committee
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10
EFFECTIVENESS OF AIR FORCE SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY PROGRAM CHANGES
gathered data and information through meetings with
persons involved in Air Force and Department of De-
fense (DoD) S&T planning, budgeting, and execution
and through review of relevant reports and other docu-
ments. Appendix D contains a list of the presentations
made to the committee by guest speakers.
ORGANIZATION OF THE REPORT
Chapter 2 addresses the level of the Air Force' s total
S&T investment (top line) and the balance of that
investment. It responds to statement of task Parts 1.A
and 1.C and addresses factors 1 through 3 listed above.
Chapter 3 addresses the areas of the S&E workforce,
S&T planning, development planning, and S&T pro-
gram advocacy and visibility. Included in its discus-
sion, Chapter 3 addresses specific changes that the Air
Force has made in these areas. It responds to statement
of task Parts 1.A and 1.D, and 2.A through 2.E and
addresses factors 4 through 7, listed above.
The appendixes provide supplementary information,
as described in the report.
Representative terms from entire chapter:
program changes
