Oklahoma City Air Logistics Center, Tinker AFB, Okla., has won a $10.1 billion contract to conduct engine work now carried out at San Antonio Air Logistics Center, Kelly AFB, Texas. It is the biggest such repair and overhaul contract competitively awarded by the Air Force, according to officials.

The award will save the service about $1.8 billion over 15 years, said Darleen A. Druyun, principal deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force for acquisition and management, at a Feb. 12 announcement. She said the savings would provide badly needed cash for modernization efforts.

The last round of base closings put the work up for grabs. The 1995 Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission reported that San Antonio ALC and Kelly AFB, Texas, should be realigned. The commission further urged that ALC workloads be consolidated at other military depots or with similar private sector commercial activities.

Following up on the commission's recommendations, USAF conducted a competition for the propulsion business work of San Antonio. It received bids from Oklahoma City ALC and from Pratt & Whitney, which proposed to leave the work in San Antonio.

Though much of the propulsion work will now move to the north, some will stay in Texas. Lockheed Martin's Kelly Aircraft Co., a major Oklahoma City ALC subcontractor, plans to do its share of the work at the Greater Kelly Development Corp. facilities in San Antonio.

The propulsion business area workload consists of repair and overhaul of TF39, T56, and F100 non-core engines, modules, and associated fuel accessories, together with two-level maintenance of the TF39 and TF56 engines.

Senate Boosts Pay, Retirement

US military personnel are well on their way to getting their biggest raise in pay since the early Reagan­era increases.

On Feb. 24 the full Senate passed a sweeping pay and pension bill that would increase military salaries by 4.8 percent, starting next January. It would allot selected bonuses of up to 10.3 percent and increase pensions of retirees to 50 percent of basic pay, up from 40 percent. In addition, the bill would permit a career service member, if he or she so desired, to stay with the 40 percent retired pay formula and, at 15 years of service, take a $30,000 lump sum payment, which he or she could invest.

Passage of the bill marked a bit of one-upmanship on the part of the GOP­led Senate. The Clinton Administration proposed a somewhat less generous package consisting of a 4.4 percent raise and bonuses up to 9.9 percent.

The Administration had not proposed a full pension inflation adjustment-as the Senate approved.

"There is one thing that takes higher priority than budgets, and that's the defense of our country," said Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott of Mississippi after the legislation passed.

The White House is not happy about the Senate raising its bet, but officials indicated that it would be difficult for the President to veto the stand-alone pay and pension bill over its relatively narrow differences with Clinton's own proposal.

AEFs Seen to be on Track

Air Force officials said that the first two Air Expeditionary Forces will be ready for action in October-90 days before the comprehensive Expeditionary Aerospace Force concept becomes fully operational in January 2000.

Home bases for the lead AEFs will likely be Seymour Johnson AFB, N.C., and Mountain Home AFB, Idaho, Maj. Gen. Donald G. Cook, director of AEF implementation, said Feb. 16.

AEFs will consist of people and equipment from multiple wings and bases. The home base will provide a common ground for training and a command structure.

The Air Force is four to five years away from 10 complete AEFs, mainly because it does not have the equipment to ensure they are all equal in capability. The service leadership is not interested in some AEFs being more capable than others, said Cook.

At any given time, two AEFs will likely be deployed on 90-day rotations, and two other AEFs will be on call. Not all the aircraft and personnel of a particular AEF will be necessarily involved in a deployment. Different percentages of assets will be called upon, depending on need.

DoD to Tricare: Heal Thyself

Military medicine provides an excellent level of care, but the Tricare system still has much room for improvement.

Rudy de Leon, defense undersecretary for personnel and readiness, gave that assessment to attendees at the annual Tricare conference held in Washington in early February.

The system needs to do better about how and when patients receive care, how they learn about their health care options, and how and when bills are paid.

"As I talk with our beneficiaries at home and on deployment, a common theme emerges," said de Leon. "Active duty members and their families are pleased with the quality of health care they receive. The problems exist in the level of service."

To learn more about specific problems, de Leon has been holding town hall Tricare meetings across the country. He said most complaints fall into two categories: how long it takes to get through on the telephone to make an appointment and the number of times patients have to deal with their whole bill because the doctor hasn't been paid.

"We must resolve that the system will not allow young military families to be hounded by bill collectors or surprised by out-of-pocket costs," said de Leon. "And we must do all we can to pay our health care providers on time so that the best civilian doctors and other health care professionals will want to participate in the Tricare system."

Defense health officials hope to re-engineer the way the 27 million Tricare claims are processed each year.

By the end of 1999, Tricare will move to Medicare­like standards for its claims processing. This means that 95 percent of error-free claims filed by health care providers will be processed within 14 days, and 95 percent of "clean" claims submitted on paper will be processed within 30 days.

The current Tricare standard-that 75 percent of all claims be processed within 21 days-has been criticized as insufficient by providers, beneficiaries, and such officials as Army Chief of Staff Gen. Dennis J. Reimer.

The Army is creating light strike forces in an effort to improve its ability to deploy swiftly to world trouble spots, Army Secretary Louis Caldera announced at a Feb. 16 session of the Defense Writers Group in Washington.

The first experimental strike force, consisting of 3,000 to 5,000 soldiers, will be formed within the year at Ft. Polk, La., where it will be tested in wargames.

The force will eventually include lighter, but technically sophisticated, tanks and artillery, said Army officials. Current Army divisions are designed for conventional warfare, have heavy weapons, and up to 18,000 soldiers.

The goal is to provide units that combine deployability with a heavy unit punch. "We want to get to the fight quickly," said Caldera.

Air Force Nominee Emerges

A former acting head of the Department of Energy emerged in early March as President Clinton's likely nominee for the long-vacant post of Secretary of the Air Force.

Charles B. Curtis, 58, would be the second name put forward by the Administration to fill the job left empty when Sheila E. Widnall stepped down in October 1997. The first, Florida state Sen. Daryl L. Jones, was rejected by the Senate Armed Services Committee when lawmakers decided he had misled them about some aspects of his Air Force Reserve career.

Curtis is a Washington lawyer and former Army Reservist. Government service included a stint as head of DoE's defense and national security programs. He was chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission during the Carter Administration.

He and Defense Secretary William S. Cohen are former law school classmates. Both graduated from Boston University School of Law in 1965.

DoD Pushes Base Closure Again

Defense officials are again pushing Congress to allow more base closings. They think their chances of winning are better this year than last year, when lawmakers voted against a new Base Realignment and Closure round.

If they get a green light, no installation will be immune to possible closure.

"We in the Air Force need a BRAC very badly," Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Michael E. Ryan said in January. "We have too many forces spread out over too many installations."

Pentagon chiefs have been making their arguments for base closings in some unusual settings. Secretary of Defense William S. Cohen made a pitch for the move during a Jan. 28 speech before the Illinois House of Representatives.

"It should offend every one of us that serious needs for our troops remain unmet while we squander money on facilities we no longer need," he said.

One reason officials believe they may prevail in 1999: a possible change of heart by a key base closure opponent of recent years. Sen. John Warner (R­Va.), who cast a deciding committee vote against BRAC last summer, has been discussing a closure bill with the Pentagon. As the new chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Warner will have considerable influence over the fate of such legislation.

"There isn't a person up here who doesn't recognize that there are ... [more] bases than we need," said Warner at a Jan. 27 Capitol Hill briefing.

Last year, Congressional opponents said there was little evidence that previous closures had actually saved money and that the effect on surrounding communities was unpredictable. Since then, a General Accounting Office report backed up Pentagon claims that recent closing rounds have saved money-$2 billion to $3 billion a year-and that most lost jobs were replaced in two years.

Lawmakers remain suspicious that the Clinton Administration may play politics with base closings by favoring one state over another. However, proponents say Clinton is now likely to be out of office before another BRAC round is completed. This, they say, could help alleviate political concerns.

Air Force Buys Ad Time

For the first time in its history, the Air Force will pay for national television advertising to support its recruitment efforts.

Plans called for an initial $17 million purchase of ads to air during NCAA basketball games that led up to the Final Four Tournament in March. Plans call for another $37 million network ad campaign to take place in the fall.

Air Force leaders are taking this step in response to harsh recruiting difficulties. In the first quarter of Fiscal 1999, the service fell short of its goal by 6 percent-or a total of 696 airmen. Officials do not want to fall short for the entire year, a problem that has not been experienced since 1979.

"It's too early for us to say with certainty that the Air Force will not meet its recruiting mission, but our indicators are not encouraging," said Brig. Gen. Peter U. Sutton, commander of Air Force Recruiting Service. "We need the awareness that television can generate right now, so it can begin to have an impact this year."

In past years, the Air Force has relied on non-paid TV public service announcements to augment national and local print advertising. But such spots are shown irregularly and have an uncertain recruiting effect, said officials.

USAF General To Head Spy Agency

President Clinton has nominated Air Force Maj. Gen. Michael V. Hayden to be the director of the National Security Agency.

Hayden has had years of experience in intelligence gathering and information warfare, making him a natural to lead the nation's secret code-breaking and eavesdropping organization. Currently deputy chief of staff for the United Nations Command in Korea, he has also commanded Air Intelligence Agency and run the Joint Command and Control Warfare Center at Kelly AFB, Texas.

If confirmed by the Senate, he would take the helm of an agency that is still adjusting to its new duties in the post­Cold War world.

The NSA's job has been made more difficult in recent years by the rise in fiber-optic cables, digital cellular telephones, and proliferating encryption technology, say experts. All these developments make it harder than ever to clandestinely glean communications data useful to US national interests.

Titans Cleared for Launch

After a six-month stand-down, the Air Force's Titan rocket fleet is ready to start counting down toward its next launch.

Air Force officials suspended Titan flights after the loss of a Titan IVA last Aug. 12. Range safety officers at Cape Canaveral AS, Fla., were forced to destroy the launch vehicle about 40 seconds after liftoff, due to indications it was breaking up.

An accident investigation board has determined that electrical shorts in the vehicle power supply wiring harness were the most likely reason for the catastrophic failure. The board found evidence that a wire with damaged insulation-undetected during prelaunch inspections and tests-intermittently shorted as vibration increased after liftoff.

Shorting caused intermittent loss of power to the missile guidance computer, resulting in eventual loss of control.

Armed with this information the Air Force has developed a list of necessary corrective actions. It includes reinspection of all wire harnesses on current Titans, redesign or modification of systems related to power and guidance, and inspection improvements.

A Titan IVB carrying a Defense Support Program satellite is scheduled for launch from Cape Canaveral by early April. A Titan II launch from Vandenberg AFB, Calif., is set for late April.

DarkStar Dead?

The Pentagon moved to kill the DarkStar Unmanned Aerial Vehicle program in mid­January and divert remaining funds in its budget to a rival long-range UAV program, Global Hawk.

DarkStar was intended as a stealthy eye in the sky that could sneak past enemy defenses and provide commanders with real-time intelligence. Acquisition officials decided, however, that stealthiness was not a major virtue for a small, unmanned aircraft intended to fly at high altitudes. They opted instead for range, payload, and cost advantages provided by the larger, less-expensive Global Hawk.

Global Hawk, built by Teledyne Ryan Aeronautical, has completed at least 12 test sorties at Edwards AFB, Calif., as it looks toward a spring military utility assessment that will determine how it might be used in joint battlespace operations.

Two January test flights were cut short due to a faulty reading on the engine's oil sensor and a crack in the vehicle's hydraulic pump casing. However, during a Jan. 22 test, the UAV took in images from synthetic aperture radar, electro-optical, and infrared sensors, and sent them to ground controllers in real time.

"For the first time, all four of Global Hawk's command and control and imagery transmission data links were operational," said Lt. Col. Pat Bolibrzuch, program manager of the Joint High Altitude Endurance UAV Office.

DarkStar could yet be revived, as a number of members of the House and Senate have asked DoD to reconsider the move.

Anthrax Vaccine Safe, Says DoD Doctor

There is no truth to recent reports that contaminated anthrax vaccine has recently been shipped to military units, said the Pentagon's top doctor on Feb. 3.

Neither the Department of Defense nor the Food and Drug Administration has found any evidence of microbial contamination in vaccine vials, insisted Dr. Sue Bailey, assistant secretary of defense for health affairs. The manufacturing process for the vaccine has met all FDA requirements, she said.

"There have been no vials shipped or any immunizations given any of our service members with lots or vials that were contaminated in any way," she said.

Last February, the manufacturer found some vials with bits of stopper or other foreign matter floating in them. They were pulled from shipment.

"That is part of the usual quality assurance practices," said Bailey.

Some 166,000 US service personnel have already received the first of the series of six shots needed to protect against anthrax, according to Pentagon officials. About 76 people have refused the shots, saying they doubted the immunization's effectiveness, safety, or necessity.

At Travis AFB, Calif., A1C Jeffrey Bettendorf refused several orders to take the shots last year. After a special court-martial on the matter was scheduled for March 16, Bettendorf requested discharge in lieu of facing court-martial. The airman was discharged "under other than honorable conditions."

He was a member of the 815th Air Mobility Squadron, a unit that deploys quickly into high-threat areas and thus needs protection against biological warfare, according to commanders.

C-5 To Get Much-Needed Upgrades

The Pentagon is pushing forward with much-needed upgrades to improve reliability and maintainability of its C-5 airlifters.

On Jan. 22, DoD officials awarded a Lockheed Martin­Honeywell team a contract to add digital avionics to the C-5 transport. This C-5 Avionics Modernization Program will lead to replacement of the aircraft's automatic flight control system (autopilot) with a modern digital version. In addition, the effort will install a new communication/navigation system to meet global air traffic management standards and six new liquid crystal displays for flight and engine instruments.

Flight testing of the new avionics is scheduled to begin in October 2001.

Phase 2 of the overall modernization plan calls for re-engining the C-5 fleet. The current TF39 power plant has been rendered obsolete by today's big commercial turbofan engines.

Replacement of TF39s with new GE CF6-80C2 engines would boost the C-5 mission capable rate back into the mid-80s percent range, about equal with other Air Mobility Command aircraft, according to Lockheed Martin officials. The engines would also increase the mission capable hours by nearly one-half and takeoff thrust by nearly 22 percent.

An additional 40 subsystem and structure improvements, such as new pylons and thrust reversers, will yield like-new departure reliability, according to Lockheed Martin. Flying hour cost will be cut 34 percent. All these benefits come at a cost of less than 20 percent that required for comparable new airplanes.

F-22 1999 Milestones

Lockheed Martin delivered the mid-fuselage for the fourth flying F-22 to its Marietta, Ga., assembly plant late last year-and right on schedule.

Raptor 04 will be the first F-22 with a full complement of avionics. Its mid-fuselage, the most complex part of the plane, has about 40 percent more wires, by length, and the first fiber optics of any F-22 yet.

"In terms of internal changes, this represents our final evolutionary step towards a production configuration," said Mary Ann Horter, F-22 airframe manager at Lockheed Martin Tactical Aircraft Systems in Fort Worth, Texas.

Block 1 avionics flight testing in a 757 flying test bed was scheduled to begin in February or March and be completed by summer.

In other planned program milestones, a non-flying static test F-22 was to begin formal testing in the spring to verify the structural capability of the F-22 design. Raptor 03, the third flyable F-22, is expected to be flown for the first time in the fall.

The year's end should see the first flight readiness review for Raptor 04, as well as the contract award for Lot 1 aircraft and engines, and a long-lead funding contract for a Lot 2 of 10 aircraft and 25 engines.

Joint Experimentation Program To Begin

The Pentagon plans to begin a new program designed to fund exercises and experiments aimed at building forces as foreseen in Joint Vision 2010.

The Congressionally mandated Joint Experimentation Program is penciled in for $30 million in 1999 and $350 million over the next six years, according to budget documents.

Last year, US Atlantic Command was named executive agent for the effort. In December, USACOM issued a Joint Experimentation Campaign Plan that called for a "totally new" force development method.

News Notes

• The crash of a 27th Fighter Wing F-16D at Cannon AFB, N.M., last December was caused by engine failure due to a problem with a blade in the first stage compressor section, according to an Air Combat Command accident report released Feb. 16. Both the pilot and a passenger ejected safely from the aircraft.
• Two US fighter aircraft in Japan--an Air Force F-16 and a Marine F/A-18--crashed within days of each other in late January. Neither pilot was badly hurt, but the incidents caused a Japanese Foreign Ministry official to call the US Embassy, express concern about the spate of accidents, and ask that they be thoroughly investigated.
• An F-15E crew from Elmendorf AFB, Alaska, safely flew their aircraft several hundred miles back to base after an explosion tore off four feet of the left wing's leading edge, plus the left wing pylon and external fuel tank. No word yet on the cause of the fireball.
• The Raytheon-built AGM-154A Joint Standoff Weapon was used in combat for the first time Jan. 24. A Navy F/A-18 on patrol over the skies of Iraq launched the weapon at an Iraqi air defense site, effectively taking it out of operation.
• On Feb. 9, US and Slovakian military officials signed a Memorandum of Understanding that will give US fighters access to the Republic of Slovakia's Kuchyna Bombing Range and nearby Malacky AB, located about 25 kilometers east of the Austrian border. The successful completion of the MOU, after two years of work, means that US F-15s and F-16s will soon be loosing live munitions in what was once part of communist Czechoslovakia.
• The Air Force ended 1998 with 34 active duty deaths attributed to suicide-the lowest such number on record.
• The daughter of a Holloman AFB, N.M., NCO won the Miss USA pageant. Kimberly A. Pressler, daughter of 9th Fighter Squadron MSgt. Stan Pressler, was crowned Feb. 5 in Branson, Mo., and will represent the US in the Miss Universe pageant.
• The Air Force Personnel Center changed its phone numbers March 14. AFPC's commercial telephone prefix will change to 565 and the new DSN prefix will be 665.
• Jan Ferguson, cultural resources program manager in Aeronautical Systems Center's 88th Air Base Wing Office of Environmental Management, has won the servicewide 1998 Thomas D. White Award for individual excellence in cultural resources management. Ferguson played the lead role in the successful integration of the 84-acre Huffman Prairie Flying Field, a national historic landmark, into the Dayton Aviation Heritage National Historical Park, one of the newest parks in the US national park system.
• On Feb. 10 the National Aeronautic Association announced that the U-2S/ER-2 spy plane has won the NAA's Collier Trophy for 1998. The trophy recognizes the top aeronautical achievement in the US for the year. The U-2S, first delivered to the Air Force in 1994, can carry four times the payload of its predecessor and has claimed a number of altitude and payload records.
• Brig. Gen. Richard S. "Steve" Ritchie (AFRES), the Air Force's only pilot ace in the last 45 years, has flown his last fighter. Ritchie became an ace by downing five MiG-21s during the Vietnam War. He retired Jan. 29 after more than 34 years in the Air Force, Air Force Reserve, and Colorado Air National Guard.
• A C-17 crew from Charleston AFB, S.C., recently saved the life of a citizen of Christmas Island, a remote South Pacific atoll. While deployed in Hawaii the crew flew an emergency mission to the tiny island and evacuated an individual seriously ill with complications from diabetes.
• Hurlburt Field, Fla., 20th Special Operations Squadron and 4th SOS aircrews got a little more realistic action than they had planned during routine training Jan. 28. An AC-130U Spooky gunship located and two MH-53J Pave Low helicopters retrieved two F-15 pilots who ejected after their fighters collided over the ocean, 75 miles from the Florida coast. The pilots had only minor injuries.
• An Air Force Reservist with the 756th Airlift Squadron at Andrews AFB, Md., has won the 1998 Koren Kolligian Jr. Trophy, the Air Force's top aircrew safety award. Capt. Mark S. Barker garnered the honor for successfully landing his crippled C-141 Starlifter under adverse weather conditions.
• Air Force officials have chosen Sept. 18 as the date for the third annual US Air Force Marathon at Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio.
• An MH-53 Pave Low helicopter from the 352d Special Operations Group's 21st Special Operations Squadron performed an emergency medical evacuation from USS Monongahela in the Mediterranean on Feb. 4. The aircraft plucked a seaman suffering with appendicitis from the ship and transferred him to a hospital in Italy.
• Two F-16 fighter squadrons at Aviano AB, Italy, have temporarily merged. With most of the 510th FS deployed for training in the US, remaining aircraft and people teamed up with the 555th FS on Jan. 25 to ensure that USAF can meet mission requirements for patrols over the former Yugoslavia.

Obituary

Fred D. Orazio Sr., an Air Force aerospace design pioneer who helped break the sound barrier, died Jan. 17 in Centerville, Ohio, at the age of 86. A Pennsylvania native, Orazio arrived at Wright Field, Ohio, in 1939 to work in the design branch of the Army Air Corps Aircraft Laboratory. Teamed with George Bailey, he did preliminary design work for what, shortly after the war, became the first airplane to surpass Mach 1, the X-1. During the remainder of his long Wright Field career, Orazio contributed to technical efforts such as the X-20 Dyna-Soar and the Air Force's man-in-space effort. In 1971, he received the Air Force Association's Theodore von Karman Award.