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in july, it was confirmed that the us sixth-generation fighter ngad project was "suspended" from retirement, and the us air force said it would "start from scratch" to review the needs of the sixth-generation aircraft. the us "war zone" website (twz) reported on september 5 that us air force deputy chief of staff james slife said at a defense press conference held on september 4 local time that because the us air force did not know how to gain air superiority in a contested environment, and in the initial analysis of ngad alternatives, it was found that the technical basis was faster than expected, and it hoped to add existing capabilities to ngad, so it was necessary to review the needs of ngad from scratch.

sliff also said that the current problems facing the us air force include "whether the ngad fighter is the best fighter" and the ngad project's contract operations with the air force's "future collaborative combat aircraft" (cca) drone.

an imaginary picture of a ngad without a vertical tail

u.s. air force vice chief of staff james sliff and assistant secretary of the air force for acquisition, technology and logistics andrew hunter talked about the ngad fighter and related issues during a live broadcast of the 2024 defense news conference held on the 4th.

sliffe put it this way: “…so from a requirements perspective, i would say we’re going back to square one and thinking from the ground up about what is it that we’re trying to do. if you frame the problem as, ‘how do we achieve air superiority in a contested environment?’ that’s one way to frame the question. another way to frame it is, how do we build a sixth-generation manned fighter platform? i mean, those are not necessarily the same questions, right…so we’re back to the question of what are we trying to do?i don't know how exactly we achieve air superiority in a contested environment, which would probably involve a manned sixth-generation fighter platform, but we’re looking back at, you know, starting from scratch.”

sliffe also said that during the initial analysis of ngad alternatives, it was found that the technical basis was faster than expected. these capabilities were not taken into account when the u.s. air force began to design the ngad system. this also led to the u.s. air force needing to think about ngad from scratch. sliffe also said that the current problems facing the u.s. air force include "whether the ngad fighter is the best fighter" and the ngad project and the air force's "future collaborative combat aircraft" (cca) drone contract operations.

ngad was originally scheduled to award the final design contract this year and enter the engineering and manufacturing development (emd) phase. however, due to the delay in determining various indicators and requirements, on july 30 this year, us air force secretary frank kendall said that the process of deploying the next-generation fighter would be "paused" to confirm whether the design and program route were correct.

at present, the u.s. air force is facing "some major budget changes", such as the cost inflation of the next-generation intercontinental ballistic missile, the lgm-35a sentinel, which has been reported many times before. earlier in late june, kendall also said that the u.s. air force may be willing to "give up certain capabilities of the ngad fighter" to reduce costs because the price of the next-generation fighter is expected to be "quite substantial", although he said that "there is reason to believe that it will be a manned aircraft". the report cited public data and said that the unit price of the next-generation fighter is expected to be about 250 to 300 million us dollars, which is about three times that of the f-35.

however, kendall emphasized that this "pause" currently only involves the fighter part, while other components of the ngad project are still "moving forward as much as possible", such as "advanced unmanned aerial vehicles with highly autonomous capabilities", a new generation of jet engines, related supporting weapons, electronic warfare equipment, sensors, combat management and other subsystems.

it is worth noting that at the global aerospace chiefs of staff meeting held in london in july this year, us air force chief of staff general david alvin also stated that the ngad project was only the sixth-generation fighter project "responsible for penetrating air defense platforms" that was suspended, but the entire "ngad system" was not stopped.

“i want to clarify that just because the details and the wording is important. it’s the pause on ngad penetrating counter-air platform,” he said. “ngad stands for next generation air dominance. it’s not one thing. ngad is a family of systems. within the ngad family of systems is the collaborative aircraft, it’s the open systems and government reference architecture, it’s some of the sensors and other technologies that we’re developing. so all of those families of systems are still moving forward.”

gen. alvin spoke about the importance of iterative development and how the air force wants to acquire aircraft in the future, saying the focus is on “building to adapt” rather than “building for the long term.”

admiral alvin's presentation included an aircraft created using generative ai, showing a conceptual lightweight stealth fighter. the war zone website commented that while this use of generative ai was for illustrative purposes only, it was still a very interesting visual in the discussion surrounding the future of the ngad fighter.

u.s. air force chief of staff uses artificial intelligence to create an ngad concept

in this regard, the "war zone" column stated that although the future of the ngad fighter remains very uncertain, there are more and more signs that the air force may take action to supplement or even replace its previous plans to obtain new aircraft with one or more other platforms.