Introduction
During Exercise Predators Run 2024, the 1st Brigade tested its ability to move and fight in the littoral environment across a dispersed 1,000 km frontage. The dispersion of forces hindered the ability to position sufficient artillery to support the ground force with adjacent units also being too far removed to be effectively employed. Further compounding the issue was the heightened risk of sea-based loitering munitions, which increased the risk of Naval Surface Fire Support (NSFS) and the use of naval assets.
The only reliable form of fire support came from fixed and rotary-wing assets, which were flexible enough to manage the growing frontage of the battlegroups. Once in the area of operations, the air-based assets were coordinated through Tactical Air Control Parties (TACP) down to Joint Fires Observers (JFO) and Joint Terminal Attack Controllers (JTAC) to integrate into the ground commander’s plan and be used to engage targets.
The challenges presented by the littoral environment revealed a harsh reality for offensive support and highlighted shortcomings that can be addressed through enhanced support for the JFO and JTAC capabilities. Ensuring we retain the close air support role in the RAAF while also adapting for the future through the employment of UAS will allow the Army to maintain the initiative and be ready to fight tonight.
This article highlights the history of Close Air Support (CAS), details how the capabilities of JFO and JTAC have evolved, and argues why CAS will remain essential in future conflicts. It also proposes actions and outcomes to ensure that JFO/JTAC capabilities are suitable and relevant for the future.
A Short History
CAS is defined (in JPUB 3-09.3 – Close Air Support) as: "Air action by aircraft against hostile targets that are in close proximity to friendly forces and require detailed integration of each air mission with the fire and movement of those forces".
Since the advent of aircraft as a weapon in World War I, militaries have sought ways for aerial assets to support ground combat, requiring trained personnel to integrate aircraft into ground manoeuvres. Although rudimentary in its early stages, the latest iteration of these trained personnel includes the qualifications of JFO and JTAC. These highly trained individuals have made CAS the predominant form of offensive support over artillery in non-permissive environments. Examples from the Global War on Terror (GWOT) demonstrated its flexible employment within restrictions such as rules of engagement (ROE) and collateral damage estimates (CDE) that limited the latter’s involvement.
In every major war since World War I, aircraft used in the CAS role have been critical to the success of ground operations. Lessons from these wars indicated that ground personnel needed to be thoroughly current in procedures to prevent friendly fire and strike targets swiftly. A prevalent theme throughout each of these conflicts is the risk of fratricide, with significant instances of friendly fire arising due to inadequate training of pilots and ground personnel in both the procedures and application of CAS (Cooling, 1990).
Furthermore, integrating CAS proved challenging outside of static situations and could only be effectively carried out by skilled ground personnel. However, as these conflicts progressed, CAS procedures became more established, and these ground personnel gained experience, enabling a high level of air-ground integration (Cooling, 1990).
The introduction of the JFO and JTAC qualifications represents the latest iteration in a long line of qualifications aimed at training ground forces to expedite strikes from aircraft. This capability reduces fratricide, quickly achieves the intent of the ground commander, and emphasises maintaining a high level of currency for personnel. The current JTAC/JFO program began in 2000 when US TACP members struggled to maintain their skills due to insufficient support from the USAF. The program was timely, arriving just before the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, and received support across the services.
Shortly after, in 2004, the US Army adopted the JFO curriculum, and in 2006, Australia joined the program. Essentially, both qualifications are designed to train JFOs and JTACs to safely and swiftly strike targets using air assets, all within the ground commander’s intent. The JTAC holds authority on behalf of the ground commander for the strike but collaborates with a JFO to engage targets and support ground operations. Operationally, while a JTAC can be qualified to coordinate indirect fire (IDF), it is primarily the JFO who requests, controls, and adjusts surface-to-surface fires, provides targeting information in support of CAS, and is more likely to perform terminal guidance operations.
Although history demonstrates the effectiveness of this qualification, air forces worldwide de-prioritised CAS after each war, only to relearn it for the next. Before the Korean War, the USAF focused solely on air superiority and sea control, losing the experience and knowledge necessary to conduct CAS. Consequently, the USAF found itself woefully unprepared to support ground forces in the Busan Pocket, while the United States Marine Corps (USMC), which maintained the skill set, was heavily relied upon by ground forces to conduct CAS to fend off the North Korean armies (Cooling, 1990).
The USMC ensured that they had both ground and air personnel who were trained and experienced in conducting CAS with members spread throughout the Area of Operations. This approach proved very successful during the Battle of Chosin Reservoir against the Chinese Army, where CAS was credited with causing 50% of enemy casualties (Cooling, 1990). Unfortunately, the USAF did not learn the lessons of the Korean War regarding the importance of trained personnel in CAS. As a result, the USAF entered the Vietnam War without aircrew or ground personnel trained to safely coordinate strikes, while the USMC and US Navy provided the majority of CAS until the USAF relearned this essential knowledge (Phillips-Levine & Tenbusch, 2023; Corell, 2019).
While the Air Combat Wing and Army have important roles to focus on, it is essential to preserve the experience and knowledge of CAS. If the RAAF or Army lose the ability to conduct CAS, the orchestration and coordination between the domains will become a distant memory.
The ADF cannot afford to underestimate the importance of maintaining the CAS capability for the future.
In future conflicts against a peer enemy in the littoral environment, we must utilise all the joint effects we can wield to achieve multi-domain offensive and defensive actions. The removal of the land domain’s ability to coordinate with RAAF assets is likely to result in limited success against a numerically and technologically superior enemy.
Recent wars, such as the one in Ukraine, have highlighted the vulnerability of aircraft to sophisticated, layered integrated air and missile defence (IAMD), leading to the absence of CAS on the battlefield during these conflicts (Goodwin, 2024). This situation is not new; CAS can only occur within a bubble of air superiority. For example, during the 1973 Yom Kippur War, the Israeli Air Force lost 63 airframes on CAS missions because they did not establish air superiority. Only after they neutralised Egyptian and Syrian air defences could they return to the CAS role, which in turn enabled the Israelis to regain the initiative against the more numerous Arab states (Cooling, 1990).
In the first Gulf War, the ground campaign was not initiated until the Coalition forces established conditions for ground troops to advance through the Iraqi deserts unopposed. Most importantly, it neutralised the air defence systems and thus allowed ground attack aircraft to conduct CAS. Ultimately, A-10s conducted about 30% of the USAF sorties performing CAS/Interdiction, credited with over 50% of the Iraqi ground targets destroyed by aerial attacks (Pustam, 2020).
As current world events – such as the war in Ukraine – highlight, a European war bears very little similarity to one in the southwest Pacific. The distances involved in the amphibious environment rarely allow IAMD zones to be as dense, enabling platforms to slip into areas of air superiority to support ground forces (Savage, 2022). Furthermore, these distances restrict the employment of traditional land and sea-based offensive support assets. Drawing from experiences during Exercise Predator Run 24, air assets were able to navigate this terrain with relative ease compared to their ground-based offensive support counterparts.
While I acknowledge the risk of losing an airframe due to IAMD, this may be a risk acceptable to a commander as priorities change throughout the course of the war. If a ground force faces a higher risk of losing the land battle, a commander will be more willing to accept the risks of deploying aircraft to support CAS. This has been demonstrated in both the Italian and Vietnam Campaigns, where land objectives outweighed the risk to aircraft (Cooling, 1990).
Current CAS doctrine also recognises this operational conundrum: “in isolation, CAS rarely achieves campaign-level objectives, at times it may be the more critical mission due to its contributions to a specific operation or battle”. Although the risk of losing an airframe to IAMD is high during the opening stages of a land battle, the coverage of IAMD decreases as the war progresses. Air defence systems are often the first to be degraded due to kinetic and non-kinetic operations within the battlespace; even the Russian Air Force is on the cusp of returning to a more active role with the reduction of Ukrainian air missile stocks (Watling & Reynolds, 2025).
As many JFOs and JTACs know, CAS requires the establishment of air superiority, rather than air supremacy, and these conditions can exist briefly, though just enough for aircraft to conduct a strike and egress. By utilising indirect fire assets and electronic warfare to suppress enemy air defences, the JFO and JTAC can create a favourable environment for CAS to take place (Bartels, Tormey & Hendrickson, 2017). This contrasts with the Ukrainian and Russian militaries, which lack trained personnel like JFOs and JTACs to integrate other weapon systems that would facilitate a permissive environment for CAS (Watling & Reynolds 2025).
To assume, then, that CAS is a dying role, and along with it, the roles of JFO and JTAC, is naïve. Just as the USAF learned during the Korean War and the Vietnam War, losing expertise in CAS fails to recognise the critical importance of this role in supporting ground operations fight.
CAS is a mission; it is not platform-specific.
CAS is not limited to a fighter jet operating within visual range while conducting a strike. CAS refers to a mission that is in close proximity to friendly forces and requires detailed integration of each air mission with the fire and movement of those forces. CAS can be performed by C-130s armed with pods of AGM-179 Griffins launched from outside the Weapon Effective Zone (WEZ) of an enemy air defence system. Alternatively, as we are learning from Ukraine, the necessary effects could be delivered by UAVs, such as loitering munitions and FPV drones (Aksu, 2022; Matsumura, Gordon & Steeb, 2017; Olivieri, 2018).
An example of where standoff munitions support the close fight is the UMPK Glide bomb used by the Russian Air Force. Although these bombs are effective against section-sized positions, they are not integrated with fire and manoeuvre; instead, they are treated as another tool to degrade Ukrainian forces (Watling & Reynolds, 2025).
Browsing through FPV or loitering drone footage reveals that they are used almost exclusively against targets in the deep or for harassing static forces at the Forward Edge of the Battle Area (FEBA), rather than supporting forces in direct contact. Despite being paired with someone who acts as an observer for the drone operator, they lack the situational awareness on the ground needed to provide intimate support without the risk of hitting friendly forces (Molloy, 2024).
No one is adequately trained to safely and efficiently integrate these assets into the Ukrainian or Russian Army for operations at the company and battlegroup levels (Watling & Reynolds, 2025). This is where we, as an Army, have an advantage with our JFO and JTAC capabilities to evolve and utilise these assets.
This is also why JFOs and JTACs remain relevant but must evolve their skill sets to meet future demands. They are the best-suited capability for integrating both new and old assets into the multi-domain fight. They are the only capability we possess that truly integrates these assets at the battlegroup level and below, thanks to training that expedites the Kill Chain and reduces the risk of fratricide (Vessey, 2021). This capability will allow companies and battlegroups to become more lethal through the integration of all these assets.
How JFO and JTAC must evolve
For these capabilities to remain relevant, the Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs) must evolve. This evolution should involve increased usage of Digitally Aided CAS (DACAS), which reduces the signature of both aircraft and the observer while expediting the kill chain. A DACAS-enabled JFO and JTAC can send a digital message with a minimal electronic signature to an approaching aircraft, providing all the necessary information for a strike, thereby reducing time within the WEZ.
Joint Fires Teams currently have limited exposure to using DACAS with the existing DTCS Next Generation due to limited opportunities for simulated or live practice. Regiments must ensure that their members receive DACAS training and remediate it where possible, as JFOs are under-prepared to use DACAS.
JFOs and JTACs need approval to utilise a wider variety of munitions, such as standoff munitions, loitering munitions, and other unmanned aerial systems, to achieve a synchronised form of strike that can support companies and battlegroups (Aksu, 2022). These systems will enable JFOs and JTACs to provide support for ground operations but require exposure and practice, which is currently lacking. This limitation arises from the restricted number of drones available to the gun regiments and the limited uptake of loitering munitions within the Australian Army. To address this issue, while policies and platforms for loitering munitions are being acquired, the Army should consider introducing a non-lethal loitering munition to help our forces develop essential knowledge.
With the introduction of the US-made Parrot UAS into regiments and potentially expanding capabilities, regiments should now seek to incorporate UAS systems into JFTs and have JFOs practice integrating them to achieve company-level objectives. Consider the future concept of drone swarms. If that is managed at a battlegroup level, who would decide where to use them and how to ensure that the drone swarm strikes the right target at the right time? Given the resources and training provided to JFOs and JTACs, they are in the best position to ensure correct drone swarm usage.
FOs and JTACs also need to feel more confident using aircraft through tactics that minimise their exposure to threats like Man-Portable Air Defences (MANPADS). Generally, this involves employing low-altitude tactics so that aircraft can utilise terrain shielding while conducting SEAD missions from IDF or other systems (Horan, 2022). This profile is taught early in both curricula but is often overlooked as a skill to maintain due to the coordination required to integrate RAAF assets with mortars or artillery; furthermore, it is rarely practiced live and integrated with JFOS and JTACs working together.
Furthermore, the Army and RAAF need to be more flexible and comfortable with how we deconflict aircraft from active IDF missions, as we commonly treat gun and mortar target lines as a ‘hot wall’ that aircraft cannot cross. There are procedures that allow us to route aircraft under these target lines, but stakeholders need to trust that this can be conducted to enable IDF and CAS to work more seamlessly (Armfield, 2023). All of these issues will be resolved through the Army and RAAF working together more regularly to build confidence in sharing airspace between aircraft and IDF.
Training the Future JFO
The Army needs to train more JFOs so the capability proliferates as broadly as possible. Currently, there are only enough JFOs to support companies, but not enough to support platoons. Proliferation of this capability down to platoons aligns with how the Army intends to operate in the littoral environment and enables platoons to effectively integrate air-based assets into their plans, such as loitering munitions and UAS (Kempt, 2020; Houston, 2023).
Additionally, the JFO program needs greater support among the regiments. There are varying levels of accountability for JFOs maintaining their currency, which is dangerous, as history shows that CAS is only successful when members are competent and proficient. However, this is not solely the fault of JFOs; commanders and supervisors must recognise the qualifications and the associated currency, providing the necessary time to maintain it. Often perceived as 'avoiding' gunnery within the regiments, it is overlooked that JFO currency and events involve integrating ground-based assets while utilising aircraft to strike a target, and this should be encouraged more frequently.
There are very few qualifications in the Army that require currency events, and in those fields, commanders must take it seriously to ensure their members maintain both their qualifications and currency. The loss of the currency tracking program ‘JFACTS’ has also made it harder for commanders to keep members accountable. Units are not applying the necessary pressure to ensure their members complete the currency events and meet high standards, with Army Individual Readiness often being treated as a higher priority.
Although the regiments require JFTs to achieve common accreditation for artillery only, they should also incorporate CAS into this standard; it does not need to be live, as it can be simulated. A limiting factor for JFTs practising CAS is how regiments prioritise their simulator allocation, with most battery commanders focusing on surface-to-surface training and not allocating time to practice CAS serials. In 2024, the 8th/12th Regiment addressed this issue effectively by dedicating a simulator every fortnight for the JFOs and JTAC to practice CAS together, conducting scenarios that emulated Large Scale Conflict Operations (LSCO). This training culminated in a live exercise that tested JFTs' ability to integrate live guns and live rotary-wing assets, providing excellent training for JFOs and JTACs.
Future of TACP and JTAC
The RAAF should maintain the Tactical Air Control Party (TACP), as they play a crucial role in integrating aircraft into LSCO, expediting the kill chain through permissive airspace planning, and allowing fires and air-based assets to strike targets without interfering with one another. TACP members enhance the existing Brigade Air Liaison Officer (BALO) for exercises and operations, fulfilling a command and control (C2) and planning function for coordinating aircraft. As of this year, this capability has been reduced in scale and now can only support a divisional TACP, leading to a shortfall in the brigade's ability to integrate air-based systems in support of their manoeuvre.
As the TACP qualification is withdrawn from the brigade level, the School of Artillery should explore the possibility of offering an abridged version of the TACP course to empower JTACs with a higher level of airspace planning and battlespace control. While it may not completely bridge the capability gap that TACPs provide for brigades, it will help alleviate the planning challenges they face in successfully integrating RAAF assets. This approach aligns more closely with how the UK and the US employ their JTACs, and an abridged version of the TACP course could be as brief as four weeks, utilising the current model while adapting it to meet Army needs. A divisional TACP will not be able to deliver the level of fidelity required for a brigade that is engaged in dispersed operations in the littoral environment hundreds of kilometres away from the division, which was emphasised during Exercise Predators Run 24.
JTACs need to improve their skills in airspace control measures so they can, if necessary, support battlegroup and brigade headquarters with airspace planning. This means JTACs can play a central role in coordinating the support of air-based systems from various headquarters with senior JTACs prioritised for brigade headquarters. However, this will only succeed if the number of JFOs increases to enable them to be the eyes of the battlefield.
Conclusion
The JFO and JTAC capabilities are the most recent additions to a long line of qualifications learnt from operational failures in past conflicts. Therefore, it would be a mistake to assume that the war in Ukraine indicates that CAS, along with the JFO and JTAC capabilities, are no longer relevant. History has demonstrated that CAS will always be necessary; however, services must ensure we are prepared by training our members to remain current and proficient. While CAS has traditionally been conducted by manned fixed-wing aircraft, we need to adapt and embrace alternative solutions such as loitering munitions and UAS, while integrating them with assets like artillery and mortars. We must invest more in the JFO program and ensure that they are provided the time to practice and stay current through enabling training to enhance their skills, and by pushing toward exercises that include live or simulated air-based assets.
Special thanks to Declan, Craig, Rohan, Eric and Harry for their help with this article.
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