Garrison Davis

The Air Force only has 16 of these, and only about half are mission-capable at any given time.

The Army also maintains a fleet of E-3s.

I found an article in Air and Space Forces Magazine by Chris Gordon and Stephen Lossie, who interviewed Heather Penny.

She's a former F-16 pilot and current director of the Air Force Academy's Institute for Aerospace Studies.

Penny said, "...the loss of this E-3 is incredibly problematic, given how crucial these battle managers are to everything from airspace deconfliction, aircraft deconfliction, targeting, and providing other lethal effects that the entire force needs for the battle space."

E3s provide an irreplaceable service on the battlefield.

They act as both airborne radar stations and air traffic control towers, spotting threats up to 250 miles away and providing crucial early warning to forces in combat about incoming threats, particularly missiles and drones.

Drones really above anything else.

In other words, the E3 is really, really useful if you're, say, planning to have troops land on islands in a narrow strait surrounded by hostile forces who can shoot at you from the mainland.

Now, the AWACS themselves aren't technically irreplaceable, but they aren't easy to replace, especially on short notice.

Each one costs between $700 million and $1 billion, and we don't like make them anymore.

AWACS are old.

The average age of our remaining fleet is 45.

Per a relevant article in Task and Purpose magazine, nobody makes spare parts for the E-3's TF-33 engines anymore, which takes a toll on maintenance.

In 2022, General Mark Kelly, then the head of Air Combat Command, told reporters, "...we basically have 31 airplanes in hospice care, the most expensive care there is, and we need to get into the maternity business and out of hospices."

That's a weird metaphor for a plane designed to help you fight wars, but we'll move past that and into some ads.

And we're back.

So when we left off, I'd mentioned how in 2022, Mark Kelly, then the head of air combat command was like, we've only got about 31 of these AWACS and they're in hospice care.

And we need to like make some new AWACS that are modern and aren't falling apart and have engines being produced.

Unfortunately for our military, but fortunately for us,