Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) Fighter Enters Critical Phase

The United States Air Force’s secretive and highly classified Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) fighter program has entered its crucial, engineering and manufacturing development (EMD) phase, states USAF Secretary Frank Kendall.

In a discussion at the Heritage Foundation, Kendall said the Air Force began early experimental prototyping on NGAD in 2015. This early testing was designed to assess and reduce program risks while developing key technologies essential to the inchoate aircraft. 

Kendall asserts the prerequisite technologies have continued to progress, and the NGAD effort is now envisioned as a family of systems incorporating several elements—to include a handful of autonomous drone aircraft that will accompany the manned aircraft in formation.

Typically, it takes the Air Force’s acquisition programs around seven years to reach initial operating capability (IOC) from the beginning of the EMD phase, Kendall added. Ergo, despite the new fighter’s already considerable developmental period, IOC remains several years downrange. 

“The clock really didn’t start in 2015,” Kendall explained, “it’s starting roughly now.” 

In addition to the years thus-far invested in its development, NGAD stands to be the most expensive aircraft program in history. In April 2022, Kendall advised lawmakers that each piloted aircraft under the program would likely cost several hundred-million dollars.

To fund NGAD, the Air Force has petitioned Congress for almost $1.7-billion in its fiscal 2023 budget, including $133-million in research, development, testing and evaluation funding.

Kendall also indicated in his remarks that he wants the Air Force’s acquisition programs to move quickly toward production, thereby affording pilots meaningful capabilities in short order.

“I’m not interested in demos and experiments unless they are a necessary step … ” Kendall said. “If we don’t need it [a developmental measure] to reduce risk, we should go right to development for production and get there as quickly as we can.”

Kendall maintains the need to field cutting-edge capabilities justifies increased risk. 

Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) is a program with the goal of producing a sixth-generation fighter that would eventually replace the Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor currently in service with the USAF.

FMI: www.af.mil