Air to Ground Integration Planning

GARMISCH-PARTENKIRCHEN, RHEINLAND-PFALZ, GERMANY

03.20.2023

Courtesy Story

U.S. Air Forces in Europe and Air Forces Africa   

U.S. Air Forces in Europe Air Forces Africa hosted the first planning conference of the Air to Ground Integration (AGI) program, on Mar. 20, 2023 in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany.

The intent of the AGI program is to become the umbrella under which USAFE-AFAFRICA will build partner capacity and capability development to conduct close air support, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR), casualty evacuation, personnel recovery, civilian casualty mitigation, and command and control.

“Welcome to the first annual Air to Ground Integration conference,” said Col. Beth Lane, Chief of International Affairs Division, Headquarters USAFE-AFAFRICA. “The focus of this conference is important now more than ever as our African partners’ requirements for close air support increase, as violent extremist organizations’ threats increase; we must ensure the tools of conflict are used properly to mitigate harm to civilians.”

The AGI program is designed to work by, with, and through partner nations to create institutionalized doctrine, training capability, and capacity to defeat violent extremist organizations, secure national borders, and respond to existing and emerging threats.

“We are looking for partner perspective and field service representative feedback on how we run the Air to Ground Integration program,” said Jason Messina, Plans, Programs and Analyses Branch Chief, International Affairs Division, Headquarters USAFE-AFAFRICA.

This four-phased, multi-year program has measurable milestones and outcomes. Creating codified AGI doctrine with advisors in country is a crucial first step and must have partner nation buy in from their top military leadership.

The program uses the “crawl, walk, run” model, phase I, or initial capability and doctrine phase aims to initiate an AGI training pipeline and identify specific units within the partner nation that will be trained throughout the life cycle of the program.

Phase II, or capability and capacity development phase, focuses on AGI Specialist capability training, sustainment planning, and integration with close air support aircrew.

During Phase III, or sustainment and operational phase, the air to ground trained personnel have a self-sustaining or organic training pipeline.

Phase IV, or advanced training and interoperability phase, seeks to validate the partner nation Close Air Support (CAS) capability through air, ground, and Command and Control (C2) interoperability with the U.S. and other international partners.

At the conclusion of the program, partner nations can be a security exporter and participate in joint multi-national exercises to evaluate these capabilities.

• Date Taken: 03.20.2023
• Date Posted: 03.29.2023 09:20
• Story ID: 441426
• Location: GARMISCH-PARTENKIRCHEN, RHEINLAND-PFALZ, DE