Released 18 April 2022.

In this podcast, COL Maximillian K. Bremer and Dr. Kelly A. Grieco apply concepts from their 2021 article “Air Littoral: Another Look” to current events in Russia and Ukraine.

Click here to read the original article.

Episode Transcript

 Stephanie Crider (Host)

Welcome to Decisive Point, a US Army War College Press production featuring distinguished authors and contributors who get to the heart of the matter in national security affairs.

The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the authors and are not necessarily those of the Department of the Army, the US Army War College, or any other agency of the US government.

Decisive Point welcomes Colonel Maximilian K. Bremer and Dr. Kelly A. Grieco, authors of “The Air Littoral: Another Look,” featured in the winter 2021–22 issue of Parameters. Bremer is the director of the Special Programs Division at Air Mobility Command. He’s a 1997 distinguished graduate of the US Air Force Academy. He has an (master of public policy or) MPP from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and an (master of applied arts and sciences or) MAAS from the School of Advanced Air and Space Studies. Grieco is a resident senior fellow with the New American Engagement Initiative in the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security, which focuses on challenging the prevailing assumptions governing US foreign policy and seeks to develop effective solutions that preserve US security and prosperity. She received her PhD in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The guests in speaking order on this episode are:

(Guest 1: Maximilian K. Bremer)

(Guest 2: Kelly A. Grieco)

(Host)

Welcome back, Max and Kelly. The last time you were here, we talked about your 2021 article “The Air Littoral: Another Look.” For our listeners who maybe haven’t heard that episode or read the article, please just give us a brief recap on that piece.

(Bremer)

OK, Stephanie, thanks. And thanks for having us back for this follow-up. We're both very excited to have this chat and really appreciate you and Parameters reaching out to us.

Our original Parameters article talked about the area between the ground and the blue skies, and we refer to that as the air littoral—this region of transition that could be accessed from, and give access to, both the ground and the blue skies. It discussed what we saw as a progressively contested zone of transition, with this contestation coming from the increasingly democratized technology which allows improved access, persistence, and lethality in and through the air littoral.

We then went on to ask what that meant for the future Joint Force.

(Grieco)

I think the important thing here is that this article was really about the changing character of conflict and identifying that this convergence of threats, new threats to air superiority in the air littoral, meant that we need to update doctrinal concepts.

So, in the past, air superiority was either won or lost in what we're calling “the blue skies.” And the blue skies are really where high-end fighters and bombers typically operate. And if you won air control—you won that battle for the blue skies—it typically conferred control at all altitudes. But what we're seeing increasingly is that even if you win in the blue skies, it doesn't mean that you're going to actually have control of lower-altitude airspace.

And as a result, we really need to update doctrinal concepts around air control and not just think of it in terms of being localized in time and lateral space,