National Guard chief frets about aging aircraft.

• Author: Jean, Grace V.
• Position: Air Power

When terrorists attacked the nation on 9/11, F-16 fighters from Joint Base Andrews, Md., scrambled to defend the skies over Washington. Since then, the District of Columbia Air National Guard's 113lh Wing has dispatched its jet fighters more than 3,000 times to intercept aircraft that have strayed into the national capital region's restricted airspace.

The wing also has routinely deployed squadrons and personnel to fight overseas in Afghanistan and Iraq. The high tempo is taking a toll on the "Fighting Falcon," an aircraft that was produced in the 1980s. Air Force leaders in recent years have been warning that the aging fleet needs to be recapitalized. The F-16 is slated to be replaced by the F-35 Lightning II, but delays in the program and high costs could keep the F-16 flying much longer than planned.

"We want to make sure that we have a plan to have continuous and potent defense of the National Capital Region," said Brig. Gen. Jeffrey R. Johnson, commander of the 113th Wing, District of Columbia Air National Guard.

The Air National Guard is flying some of the oldest equipment that is in the inventory, said Gen. Craig R. McKinley, chief of the National Guard Bureau.

"When you deem something 'legacy' in this fiscally challenged environment, it means it's at risk," McKinley told National Defense in an interview at the Pentagon. From 2001 to 2011, the Air Guard lost more than 245 planes in its inventory including 153 F-16s due to retirement, transfers or combat losses, he said.

The Guard potentially could lose many more F-16s because of the "legacy" status of the aircraft, McKinley added. "There's really nothing in quantity on the books to replace that equipment," he said.

The Air Force has decided to fund a "service life extension" program for the aging F-16 fleet. The plan, however, covers mostly Block 40 and Block 50 fighters, the bulk of which are not flown by the Guard, but by active-duty units.

"If those trickle down to us, or if F-35s come to us early in the F-35 production, we're okay," said Johnson. "But if they don't trickle down and we don't get in on the F-35 program early on, now we have concern over our force structure."

Air National Guard units with air sovereignty missions, like the 113lh Wing, will need to see that trickle down in the next four to five years, and perhaps even earlier for some units, depending on the status of their aircraft, he said.

"Three or four years is tomorrow, so we need to start planning right now,"...