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Senator calls Raptor request unrealistic

A member of the Senate panel that funds the Air Force’s budget told the service’s top leaders Wednesday that their desire for 381 F-22 Raptors is “unrealistic,” and he blasted them for not coming up with a Plan B.

Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. T. Michael Moseley and Secretary Michael W. Wynne were testifying about their fiscal 2009 budget proposal before the defense subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee when Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., ripped them on their F-22 stance.

“I know the figure of 381 F-22s is based on your required force model, and I also know that’s what Air Force’s Plan A is,” Bond said. “However, Plan A is unrealistic. We don’t need F-22s to hunt terrorists or perform air defense over the homeland, and it’s unsustainable in the current fiscal environment.”

Bond said lawmakers and the Pentagon’s civilian leadership have said that to Wynne and Moseley repeatedly, but they have failed to come up with an alternate option.

“It does not appear … that you have a Plan B,” he said. “Such a Plan B looks something like a mixture of F-22 and modernized legacy platforms like the F-`15 and the F-16.”

Bond did not give Wynne and Moseley a chance to respond.

Both leaders have been careful recently to say they support President Bush’s 2009 budget proposal, which appears to cap the F-22 buy at 183 aircraft. Another four are expected to be approved in the 2009 war funding bill.

But Wynne and Moseley have continued to say they believe the Air Force’s requirement is 381 Raptors, and they have not addressed how they will handle the situation if more planes are not approved.

The requirement of 381 F-22s is based on the need for 10 squadrons of 24 planes each — one squadron for each Air and Space Expeditionary Force — plus a suitable number of training aircraft and spares.

Proponents of a larger Raptor fleet say any less than 381 would require the Air Force to take the F-22 out of the AEF rotation and turn it into a special-use aircraft.