Page 44 - Williams Foundation Future of Electronic Warfare Seminar

A New Approach and Attitude to Electronic Warfare in Australia

Figure 11 A Royal Australian Air Force E-7A Wedgetail taxies past a U.S. Air Force 90th Fighter Squadron F-22 Raptor at RAAF Base Tindal, Australia, Feb.
24, 2017. Twelve F-22 Raptors and approximately 200 U.S. Air Force Airmen are in Australia as part of the Enhanced Air Cooperation, an initiative under
the Force Posture Agreement between the U.S. and Australia. (U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Alexander Martinez)

We are working really hard at the moment in collaboration with our allies to get a team approach to
accelerate our learning.
We are looking to build from the achievements we've done so far and build on that cooperatively with our
allies.

We're working to get to the next level, and we're looking at the next generation of E-7, based on our
operational experience and leveraging the collaborative networks we have established with allies moving
into the fifth generation enabled air combat force.

Question: A final thought suggests itself.

Without the global engagement of Wedgetail in operations and exercises, the entire development process
you described would not be possible.

And the Wedgetail would not be showing up if not for the presence of your KC-30A, a point that could
be missed.

How important has the new tanker been to enabling Wedgetail to deploy and to shape its combat
learning process?

Group Captain Bellingham: You have raised a very good point.

The two came into the force at about the same time.
Without the tanker, we don't get the endurance and the ability to stay on task.

We would not have the reach and persistence.

And our part of the world we have vast distances and lots of open water, we need the expeditionary
capability that a tanker brings, and a good tanker that can offload a good amount of gas and has great
reliability.

The KC-30A, what it's demonstrated on operations over the last two and a half years has again been
phenomenal.

Second Line of Defense

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