Air Force to place cyber operations under Space Command

The Air Force says it will back off its ambitious plan to set up a separate command for cyber space and has opted to place those operations within an existing organization.

Comment on this article in The Forum.That decision, made by the service's top leadership at a meeting last week, is part of a major restructuring of the Air Force, which includes forming a new command for its nuclear mission, a backwater since the Cold War, that will operate much like the Strategic Air Command, which managed that mission in the Cold War.

The Air Force originally planned to form a separate Cyber Command, but the service recently decided to put the mission under control of the existing Air Force Space Command, which is headquartered at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs, Colo. That move will give the Space Command added clout in the cyber and space arenas, an Air Force insider said.

"I am confident that the move of the cyberspace mission to Air Force Space Command allows us to take advantage of cross-domain synergies by combining the cyber and space missions under one command," said General Robert Kehler, commander the Space Command. "With this move we'll be able to take advantage of a common technical expertise while facilitating career development for our space and cyberwarriors."

In August, the Air Force suspended the development of the Cyber Command, which it had intended as a means to make the Air Force the dominant service in cyberspace. Weeks later, sources said the Pentagon planned to place cyber operations under the U.S. Strategic Command in Omaha, Neb. The Air Force renewed its plan last week to develop plans to conduct operations in cyberspace.

The Air Force said the cyber mission will no longer be managed by a separate command, but by the "numbered Air Force," much like the 8th Air Force at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana, which serves as the provisional headquarters of the Cyber Command. As such, the cyber unit will not have the four-star clout that comes with a major command, said an Air Force source who declined to be identified.

Placing cyber operations under Space Command will "mean a diminution in its marquee value from Broadway to Off-Broadway," the source said. "But the command will still have warfighting capabilities."

The Air Force will announce details of its planned restructuring later this month, but a source said the plan to have Space Command run the cyber mission will mean an end to the search for a new headquarters for the Cyber Command, which attracted interest from at least 18 states.

Colorado Springs appears to be the winner in the sweepstakes based on the decision to have Space Command run the cyber mission, Air Force sources said. Brian Binn, president of military affairs for the Colorado Springs Chamber of Commerce, told the Colorado Springs Gazette that he viewed Space Command taking over the cyber mission as a boon to the area's economy.

"I think this opens up avenues for more aerospace defense work and cyberspace work coming to the Springs," Binn said. "It will spur some new economic activities in the cyberspace world."

The change in the Cyber Command organizational structure will not halt efforts to transform Air Force communications and information technology career fields into cyberspace career fields, Maj. Gen. William Lord, head of the provisional Cyber Command said this month.

The Air Force has spent the past year working on how to organize, train and equip its cyber forces. "We've figured all that out," Lord said. "We've outlined how to organize cyber forces, what capabilities fall into, or not into, a cyber organization."

That work, Lord added, has fostered better integration of air, cyber and space assets for the service and whatever new organization takes over the cyber mission.

The Cyber Command was a victim of the Air Force's neglect of its nuclear mission, Defense sources said. In a September report on nuclear weapons management, former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger said Air Force interest and oversight of its nuclear mission had atrophied since the Cold War.

The report was commissioned by Defense Secretary William Gates in the wake of two incidents in which nuclear material went astray. The report recommended a new command structure much like the old Strategic Air Command. The report also said the Air Force's grand vision to use technology to dominate air, space and cyberspace resulted in neglect of the nuclear mission.

Besides establishing the Cyber Command, the 8th Air Force also has responsibility for global nuclear bomber operations, global conventional strategic missions and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions, a potpourri that "weighed heavily" on the 8th Air Force commander and his staff as they sought to devote proper attention and oversight to all the diverse missions.

"Improving nuclear command and control, especially control, is essential," said Philip Coyle, senior adviser with the Center for Defense Information, a security policy research organization in Washington. "Considering the various snafus that have occurred in recent years involving nuclear weapons and nuclear weapons related subassemblies, the Air Force must give priority to nuclear weapons matters, unless the Air Force is willing to give up its role managing and operating ICBMs to a more dependable military department."

Coyle, who served as assistant secretary of Defense and director of its operational test and evaluation office from 1994 to 2001, said compared to the nuclear mission, standing up a Cyber Command in the Air Force "has no comparable urgency."