‘Peace Through Strength’ Starts with Rebuilding the US Air Force
March 13, 2025 | By Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula USAF (Ret.) and Douglas A. Birkey
“Airpower, anytime” is, as Chief of Staff of the Air Force Gen. David Allvin recently declared, a promise the Air Force must uphold for the nation. “We have to sustain and maintain the ability to go anytime, anywhere in the densest threat environment and put ‘warheads on foreheads’ anywhere the President might want.” He is right.
The roles and missions executed by Air Force warriors are essential to the nation’s security. Yet after three decades of constant demand and minimal replenishment, our Air Force is too small and too old. It needs to be rebuilt. The Trump administration and Congress must fund that modernization to ensure that the Air Force is sufficiently equipped, sized, and ready to fight and win when necessary. The nation’s security depends on it.
Air Force Underfunded for Decades
The challenges facing the Air Force stem from executing non-stop combat operations since 1990—longer than any other service. Operations Desert Storm, Northern and Southern Watch, Deliberate Force, Allied Force, Noble Eagle, Enduring Freedom, Iraqi Freedom, Unified Protector, Inherent Resolve, and additional engagements demanded much from the Air Force. Other services participated in some of these, but only the Air Force engaged in all of them. Post-Cold War budgets failed to keep pace with the demands on the Service. In the wake of the Berlin Wall falling, Department of the Air Force procurement funding plunged 52 percent, deeper than cuts to the Navy, at 32 percent or the Army at 40 percent.
https://www.airandspaceforces.com/peace-through-strength-rebuilding-us-air-force/
