Dear Fellow Medium-Term Futurists,
My previous letter, my final Teal letter, looked back on three decades. For my first AeroDynamic letter, I’m looking forward. At the end of this decade, when I again look back, here are the questions I’d like answered, and here are my answers in advance. Think of this as a time capsule. Hold me accountable for this in 2030:
Q: What’s with NGAD? There’s a USAF Sixth Gen fighter flying out there. We don’t know what it looks like, as with ATF when I began my career. While it’s probably just a demonstrator, the word is that it will mature into a real production program. Given the challenge posed by near-peer and peer adversaries, the requirement is certainly there too. NGAD, therefore, will have a big impact on fighter markets, in the US and abroad. Also, if it isn’t a Lockheed Martin design (it might not be) the industry consequences are enormous. A: It’s built, and perhaps even deployed in small numbers, just after 2030. It then becomes a full production program, and not just a Digital Century Series. I can’t predict the prime.
Q: What will the USN do for air power? Over the past 45 years, Hornets and Super Hornets have taken over carrier decks. Meanwhile, the USMC has divorced the blue water USN, refusing to take any Super Hornets. The USN has returned the favor by so far only taking around 20 F-35Cs. A navalized NGAD is possible, but the history of jointness isn’t great. Will the big carrier folks be able to create their own new fighter? A: It isn’t looking good. The result will be modernized Super Hornets, drones, and, eventually, more F-35Cs.
Q: Will Boeing build a new jetliner? The company is losing market share fast thanks to the A321neo. It’s been 18 years since they’ve launched a new clean-sheet design. Their engineering workforce has shrunken, and also faces demographic issues. Do they do the right thing and launch a new mid-market single aisle jet, or just copy McDonnell Douglas and return the cash to investors? A: This is the biggest question in aviation. It could go either way, but there’s no middle ground. All we can do is hope that Boeing does what’s right – for their suppliers, for airlines and lessors, and, in the long run, for themselves.
Q: Is the Loyal Wingman concept deployable? That UCAV craze from a few decades ago didn’t work out – there are no remotely piloted surrogate fighters, just targeted assassination vehicles and the MQ-25, a refueling drone that may shift to strike missions one day. But the craze is attritables operating in conjunction with crewed aircraft – Skyborg, Loyal Wingman, Air Power Teaming, etc. Will these successfully mature, and will they impact the market? A: Yes, but like all other ambitious new technologies, it will take longer than expected. Small batches may arrive by 2030, but the AI needed for jets to operate with more than one or two drones won’t be ready until closer to 2040. Thus, in 2030, the market impact will be modest.
Q: Will Future Vertical Lift reinvent rotorcraft? US military rotorcraft have looked the same since the 1960s/70s, excepting the V-22. For Central Europe or the Mideast or most other places, a CH-47, UH-60, or AH-64, with modern engines and avionics, does the job fine. The Pacific is another story. But reinventing rotorcraft with greater speeds and ranges is expensive, and paying for them jeopardizes the Army’s ability to sustain its core capabilities. A: I’ve long doubted FVL’s viability, but I now think the FLRAA part will be built (starting around 2030). Even with FLRAA the Army will need to field a hybrid conventional/FVL medium lift fleet for decades.
Q: Can Europe get its act together with Tempest and FCAS? For 60 years, there’s been one pan-European fighter, and one French fighter (oh, and a Swedish one, too). But largely due to Brexit, there is now a UK fighter and a Franco-German fighter. That’s fine, except that a Franco-German fighter is arguably the worst idea in aviation since the Franco-German A380. A: History will resume its normal course. Germany will join Tempest, or just buy off-the-shelf. FCAS will survive as a Franco-French JV. Also, is Vladimir Putin the best F-35 salesman ever, or what?
Q: Will New Aero create anything new? Advanced Air Mobility looks like a very messy $10 billion bubble. Aerion, the one sensible New Aero idea, is dead. Other concepts, like Boom or Hermeus, look like a great source of collectible desktop models. But given all the cash going to these folks, particularly AAM, will something survive, if only after bankruptcy? A: As the joke goes, there must be a pony in there somewhere. But I don’t see it now.
Q: Will Old Aero create anything new? If Boeing doesn’t reassert itself in the duopoly, maybe someone else will take advantage of the situation. It won’t be China, except for their domestic market. A defense prime? Tesla? Embraer? And perhaps, as I’ve theorized, maybe one of the big mega-suppliers morphs into a prime. A: I can’t predict this. My favorite new concept: GE working with Embraer on a large single aisle powered by the RISE propfan.
Q: Does China create its own aviation ecosystem? China’s emerging producer ambitions, retreat from a market economy, and regional bellicosity threaten an outcome that looks like the old relationship between the USSR and the West, in aviation and everything else. A: As I’ve said before, China and the West are in a bad marriage, with no possibility of divorce. The relationship may be changing, but the aviation part of it won’t be radically different from today. But China will stagnate, as a country and as an aviation market.
Q: Are Hypersonics finally real? Like Cold Fusion, hypersonics have been 5-10 years away, for a very long time. But the money and requirement (and competitive threat) are all in place, and the technology is coming together too, even for ones that aren’t just boost-glide vehicles. A: We’ll see something deployable this decade (again, other than boost glide types). But as USAF leaders recently pointed out, the expense of these weapons isn’t always justified.
Q: Can aviation decarbonize? Much going on – electric, hybrid, hydrogen – motivated by ESG pressure and, perhaps, fuel prices, if they stay high. A: Not this decade, except in Caravan-sized platforms, at best. I’ve not met any independent experts who think scaled-up alternative propulsion concepts are credible for the next few decades. Aviation will be the last fossil fuel-burning industry. SAF offers some hope, though.
That’s what I want to learn from our wonderful industry by 2030, and that’s my thinking about it all now. But then there’s the big picture stuff – everything from interest rates and inflation to fuel prices and geopolitics. And the biggest question of all – will democracy, and for that matter, society, survive? Our industry moves people and defends countries. We can only hope that global mobility and a world dominated by united, stable countries remain intact.
Yours, ‘Til I Hear Ominous Laughter And See Dark Clouds,
Richard Aboulafia