Every discussion of the future of American airpower seems to revolve around how best to use drones to support manned combat aircraft. Few are willing to grant, at this point, that UAVs are taking over air warfare, but even fewer deny that drones will play an essential role in how air combat missions are performed. Both the Air Force’s NGAD program and the Navy’s F/A-XX program prominently feature “wingman” drones, which play supporting roles for manned fighters. For the Air Force, this wingman is known as the Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA), and may itself represent the real next generation combat aircraft.
Collaborative Combat Aircraft, Explained
The CCA is a medium-sized unmanned drone designed to support the operations of manned stealth fighters and other advanced aircraft. It is a key component of the “system of systems” designed to maintain air dominance for the United States military. The Air Force expects to build at least a thousand first-generation CCAs, with more potential as industry, doctrine, and technology come into coherence. The performance characteristics of the CCA are not yet available, and there is considerable uncertainty concerning its price. Despite the large number on order, the aircraft are sophisticated and expensive enough that they are not considered expendable by the Air Force
Two companies, Anduril, and General Atomics, have reached the final stage of the contract competition, although many subcontractors also have their fingers in the pie. General Atomics (GA), based out of San Diego, has substantial long-term experience in the manufacturing of UAVs for military purposes. The MQ-1 Predator and MQ-9 Reaper, prominent during the Wars on Terror, are only two of the best-known GA products. General Atomics is basing its entry on those two platforms and the XQ-67A, a UAV developed through a separate Air Force contract.
The other major firm pursuing the contract is Anduril (a Lord of the Rings reference of the sort ubiquitous in the tech world), a Costa Mesa firm founded in 2017 to pursue Department of Defense contracts. Anduril has, since its founding, pursued several interesting and innovative drone projects, sparking interest from the US and others across the globe. Anduril is working on the Fury, originally an unmanned aggressor squadron jet developed by the firm Blue Force, which Anduril has acquired.
The Air Force is expected to offer the first contracts by early September, possibly to both contractors in a move reminiscent of the Littoral Combat Ship project. It hopes to have the first operational examples in the air by 2026.
CCA: The Purpose
Press releases about the CCA can be absurdly vague, concentrating on the paradigm-shifting nature of the aircraft and its ability to collect data and transform the battlespace to create dilemmas for an adversary and increase situational awareness and a variety of other words that seem drawn directly from a corporate handbook on how to speak the language of Bureaucracy. Nevertheless, the emerging picture of the CCA is as a vehicle designed to support manned fighters, with an architecture that will eventually allow it to pursue more ambitious missions.
In its initial operational vision, the CCA is intended to act as a “loyal wingman” to the pilot of a manned fighter of Generation 4.5, 5, or 6. Pilots of those aircraft would share information with the Collaborative Combat Aircraft, creating a more complete vision of the battlespace and of the best way to bring weapons together with targets. At the most concrete level the CCA is supposed to increase the lethality of manned fighters by giving them access to more missiles to fire. If a fighter pilot identifies a target and decides to engage, she no longer need fire her own missiles, reducing her stockpile and possibly giving away her position. With support from a CCA carrying several missiles of its own, the pilot can direct the Loyal Wingman to engage the target directly. The CCA would thus act as a literal force multiplier, restoring a quantitative US advantage in a large scale air-sea-land operation.
In the long-term, the CCA is expected to have some degree of autonomy. Autonomous air combat is a holy grail of design, tying together an array of different technical problems associated with sensors and communications. Autonomy also brings certain complications with international law, although this seems to be a problem that the Air Force is happy to push into the future.
Loyal Wingman Coming Soon: What’s Next for CCA?
More than the F-35 or even the NGAD, the CCA represents a new frontier in air combat. The progress of the program will be watched closely by the Navy (working on its own fighter and drone programs), by US allies, and by potential US adversaries.
Indeed, perhaps more than with the NGAD the success or failure of the CCA will characterize how competitive the US Air Force remains over the next century.
About the Author: Dr. Robert Farley
Dr. Robert Farley has taught security and diplomacy courses at the Patterson School since 2005. He received his BS from the University of Oregon in 1997, and his Ph. D. from the University of Washington in 2004. Dr. Farley is the author of Grounded: The Case for Abolishing the United States Air Force (University Press of Kentucky, 2014), the Battleship Book (Wildside, 2016), Patents for Power: Intellectual Property Law and the Diffusion of Military Technology (University of Chicago, 2020), and most recently Waging War with Gold: National Security and the Finance Domain Across the Ages (Lynne Rienner, 2023). He has contributed extensively to a number of journals and magazines, including the National Interest, the Diplomat: APAC, World Politics Review, and the American Prospect. Dr. Farley is also a founder and senior editor of Lawyers, Guns and Money.
