Posted: March 8, 2017 4:45 PM
Navy, Air Force Begin Airborne Command Post Replacement Concept
By RICHARD R. BURGESS, Managing Editor
WASHINGTON — The Navy and the Air Force have begun to look at a replacement for the current strategic deterrent airborne command post and communication aircraft, service officials said.
The airborne command post (ABNCP) role of commanding the strategic deterrent forces and the Navy’s airborne TACAMO (“Take Charge and Move Out”) strategic Very-Low Frequency communications platform serving ballistic-missile submarines are both vested in the Navy’s fleet of 16 Boeing-built E-6B Mercury aircraft.
During the 1990s, when the Air Force retired its EC-135 ABNCP aircraft, the mission systems were installed in the Navy’s E-6 aircraft to combine the two missions. The mission systems have been upgraded but the airframes, based on the Boeing 707 airliner, are aging.
http://seapowermagazine.org/stories/20170309-airborne.html
