In the black and white TV schedule of the late 1950s and early 1960s, the Western drama series reigned supreme. One of the most popular was ‘Have Gun, Will Travel’, starring Richard Boone as a mercenary in the late 1800s. It helped to popularise the role of the lone gunman and boost the US gun rights culture. Indeed, the term, “have gun, will travel” entered the popular lexicon and has been often quoted since.
A recent example was in the latest issue of the US military monthly, ‘Air Force’, the magazine of the Air Force Association, with the title ‘Have Bombs, Will Travel’, which is grimly indicative of a specific trend in US military thinking after two decades of the failed ‘war on terror’.
It concerns a newly developed way of moving planes and bombs rapidly to sudden hot spots if the US Air Force doesn’t have sufficient bombs in place to do what is thought necessary. It is known as agile combat employment and uses what are normally very sophisticated and powerful aircraft in a secondary role as weapons transporters.
In a recent mission, six F-15E Strike Eagle aircraft of the 494th Expeditionary Fighter Squadron flew from the RAF base at Lakenheath in England to Al Dhafra, 30 kilometres south of Abu Dhabi in the UAE. Ferrying operations are pretty standard if a squadron is on the move but usually the planes would be unarmed, with the weapons sent out separately in large military transport aircrafts such as the C-17.
Loaded to the gills
However, on this occasion the six aircraft were not only armed but loaded to the gills with twice the amount of ‘smart’ bombs usually sent in such situations. This required extra crew skills and logistical support, not least with additional air-to-air refuelling, but it meant that the six planes could, between them, move 72 of the powerful, GPS-guided Joint Direct Attack Munitions in a single rapid operation.
This immediately raises the question, why go to that trouble and expense when the US Air Force already has access to bases from Europe to the Middle East, sub-Saharan Africa, Central Asia and the Western Pacific?
For the official answer, an article in the defence publication, ‘Defense News’, put it this way: “China and Russia can increasingly hold overseas US bases at risk. To adapt, the Air Force must evolve from its dependence on well-established airfields, or risk yielding an operational edge. Beijing’s asymmetric arsenal includes thousands of ballistic and cruise missiles capable of striking the first and second island chains of the Western Pacific. Moscow also boasts an immense quantity of ballistic and cruise missiles that easily range all of Europe.
“The Air Force is especially vulnerable to these threats because of its reliance on prepared airfields. While the service can overcome some disadvantages with long-range bombers, a war in which missiles knock out American air bases and prevent the ability to launch and recover short-range fighter jets is unlikely to end well.”
The reasoning above contextualises the development of the agile combat employment concept within the US’s long-standing rivalry with China and Russia, but that is too simple a reading. The US has plenty of more reasons to increase its weapon load in the Middle East, when you consider that its wars with Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya have all gone badly wrong, and it is withdrawing from Afghanistan as the Taliban sets its sights on taking over the country.
