Talk:Collaborative combat aircraft

International scope

This article has been totally biased towards US work. I have begun to broaden it out, but sections on more nations, such as China, Japan and Russia, are still needed. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 13:21, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

Proposed name change

Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) is an official USAF designation for aircraft more widely known as loyal wingmen.

— (Valius Venckunas; "USAF lays out plans for NGAD, loyal wingmen numbers", Aerotime Hub, 2023-03-08.)

Web searches seem to bear this out. The capitalised "Loyal Wingman" is used a fair bit as a proper name, especially in the UK, but appears to break Wikipedia's naming conventions. Loyal wingman (sentence case) redirects here already.

There appear to be two alternatives to sorting this out:

1. Move this article to Loyal wingman over the current redirect.
2. Copy this article to Loyal wingman over the current redirect, and revert the present page back to its focus on the US.

My view is that there is not enough US-specific content (at least, as yet) to sustain a separate article. Therefore I would prefer option 1. Does anybody have any concerns with that?

— Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 13:43, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

The name change would be a shift in tactics. I think it's pretty clear CCAs will be able to perform strikes, at a far distance from the mission commander, and forward of the commander. A wingman wouldn't be the 'tip of the spear'. That would be an argument for option 2, which would allow you to internationalize 'loyal wingman'.

-- Ancheta Wis   (talk | contribs) 14:48, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

Can you cite a reliable source for that? You appear to have different definitions of the "CCA" vs. "loyal wingman" roles in mind, and I can find none. Indeed, many of the cited sources in the article use the terms as synonyms. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 15:32, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

And this:

"The U.S. Air Force has laid out an initial operating plan for Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA), the uncrewed loyal wingman systems it plans to fly alongside fighters"

— Aviation week: USAF Plans To Initially Field 1,000 CCAs, Kendall Says

The more I check out, the more sources treat the CCA as a US loyal wingman implementation. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 16:33, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

See Heather Penney's initial definition.

See also the NGAD mission.

Consider that the F-35s on the eastern flank of NATO can see far beyond their flight paths.

Tactics are going to be classified, but CCA swarms are clearly envisioned. We just won't see those refs.

Again, I prefer option 2.-- Ancheta Wis   (talk | contribs) 17:11, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

Which document contains Penney's initial definition? Could you provide a link to it? The article on Next Generation Air Dominance currently refers to "uncrewed Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA), or "Loyal Wingman" platforms". What sources contradict NGAD's use of these terms as synonyms? Your other ideas are just unsupported editorial opinion, and hence not admissible here. This decision needs to be evidence-based, and you are just not offering any. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 17:31, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

She has written policy papers (Mitchell Institute). Here is a link to a podcast interviewing her. -- Ancheta Wis   (talk | contribs) 23:02, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

See reference #7 for the policy paper. You may need to revisit your edits which did not credit her. --Ancheta Wis   (talk | contribs) 23:16, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

Rather than 'my editorializing' see the efn 'a' for the priorities of Secretary Kendall stated to CSAF Brown in a previous version of this article. --Ancheta Wis   (talk | contribs) 01:37, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for identifying these links. So, Penney's "early" definition is an advisory paper pumped out by a think tank in 2022. She sees the loyal wingman as a tethered CCA, while CCAs may also operate in untethered modes. But those sources in the Note (that I moved, I did not delete) do not bear you out. Two do not mention the wingman by name, and the third, reporting an interview with Air Force Secretary Frank Kendal, remarks on "creation of a “Collaborative Combat Aircraft” program, under which the Air Force would develop a drone wingman for the NGAD fighter." In other words, Kendal supports Venckunas and contradicts Penney.

I can see where you are coming from, but the available source material is contradictory and the article too short to be worth splitting at this time. Outside of the USA, "loyal wingman" is the umbrella term (try googling untethered loyal wingman), so that is what this article should reflect. Or, to put it another way, if I did create a parallel article for the loyal wingman, I would simply clone what is currently here and then revert my generalzations in this article. If someone were then to put up a formal merge request to revert that fork, I reckon it would succeed - but that's just my opinion. So I'm kind of trying to virualize that process in this discussion, to see if there is any consensus one way or the other. I think we need more voices here. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 08:59, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for acknowledging her role: Kendall and CQ Brown are going with her CCA nomenclature, which, for the USAF is going to get institutionalized in the US DOD as "Program Executive Officer for Collaborative combat aircraft". What matters is the duration of the money being offered to the developing institutions (vendor, airframe manufacturer, thinktank, startup, etc.), to move the USAF to overmatch before any other competitor.

Consider that Kendall (and the Force) is determined to get to overmatch, first. The time frames appear to be: 2023 for National Defense Space Architecture and JADC2, mid-2020s for B-21, late 2020s for CCA, 2030 for NGAD, etc. The funding sources can be tracked in Military budget of the United States and List of countries by military expenditures.

-- Ancheta Wis   (talk | contribs) 12:45, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

None of which demonstrates any established mainstream distinction between the "CCA" and the "loyal wingman". Not that I accept your assertion that "Kendall ... [is] going with her CCA nomenclature" when I have just cited an example of Kendal's contradictory usage. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 17:11, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

[Update] With all the detailed stuff you are adding, it is becoming clear that separate articles are already appropriate. I'll get on with that. Thank you for your patience. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 12:48, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

I have pulled all my loyal wingman stuff now, hope that's OK. I shall leave you to it from here on it. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 13:15, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

FARP image

The FARP image was removed on the ground it was not a CCA. However, the image was of a FARP for a UAV, which is an allowed concept in Heather Penney's formulation. That particular FARP had never been accomplished before, and required the use of a refuelling team which had flown to a distant combatant command just to accomplish the FARP, and to demonstrate the principle. Since CCAs do not currently operate at large distances from their ground crews, the principle of a FARP was readily illustrated by the groundbreaking image of the MQ-9 being refuelled. I believe that FARPs will be just as important for CCAs in use in combat in a distant combatant command in wartime. They will need ground crews as well. -- Ancheta Wis   (talk | contribs) 22:54, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

Forward refuelling points have been routine for the last century and are not a concept-related capability by any stretch of the imagination. If somebody sets up special facilities for loyal wingmen that piloted jets won't use, then fine, but otherwise they are off-topic. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 17:06, 6 April 2023 (UTC)