AFSOC Redefines Itself for Great Power Competition.

• Author: Easley, Mikayla

ORLANDO, Fla.--After providing support to ground operations in the Middle East for two decades, Air Force Special Operations Command is reinventing how it does business in new contested environments.

The rise of threats such as China and Russia have forced the Defense Department to shift its focus to potential great power competition--putting counterinsurgency in the rear-view mirror. For AFSOC Commander Lt. Gen. James Slife, that means innovating how to use the tools and platforms already in the command's arsenal while going after next-generation technology.

AFSOC's fleet includes a range of 21st century aircraft mostly acquired by the service after the 9/11 terrorism attacks.

"We've got capable platforms. We have the best airmen that I could ask for. We just need to think about the recipes we make with them differently," Slife said during a panel at the Air Force Association's annual Air Warfare Symposium in Orlando, Florida.

Slife pointed to AFSOC's work with the Air Force Research Lab on the Rapid Dragon Program as a way the command can use old platforms in new ways. The program is exploring the feasibility and operational advantages of airdropping longrange palletized munitions from cargo planes the Pentagon already owns, such as the C-130 and C-17.

In December, Rapid Dragon successfully dropped a pallet of Joint Airto-Surface Standoff Missile Extended Range, or JASSM-ER, cruise missiles out the back of an MC-130J flown by AFSOC. The missiles targeted and destroyed an oil barge.

Slife said this is an example of deterrence.

"If our adversaries have to look at every C-130 and every C-17 and won der what's in the back and whether that C-17 is in fact a long-range fire squadron, it changes their calculus," he said.

The next few years will be key for SOCOM's pivot away from counterterrorism operations as it takes on more diverse missions, said Lt. Gen. Tony Bauernfeind/, vice commander of SOCOM.

"In [fiscal year] 2022, over 30 percent of our operations will be against great power competitors to assure allies, to make sure we're out preparing for the environment, to make sure we are forward and where we need to be to have the effects to provide the options that the nation needs," Bauernfeind said.

That percentage is going to grow through at least 2024, he added.

At the same time, SOCOM is ramping up modernization "because we real ize that there are capabilities that we have to invest in now to make sure the [special operators] ... are going...