The Air Force says the super secret communications system aboard the two new VC-25B aircraft that will be designated Air Force One will be a security threat before any president rides on it and it will cost tens of millions of dollars to remove it and replace it. “The current Mission Communication System (MCS) baseline is not viable past CY 2028 due to cybersecurity and obsolescence issues,” the Air Force said in an update issued in April and declassified last week. “Unmitigated risk will drive an inability for Authority to Connect and Operate on vital National Security Systems required for Presidential communications.” Removing and replacing the system will cost $73.3 million and half of that has been approved in the current Air Force appropriation. The report also says replacing the main contractor for the interior renovations to the former Transaero Boeing 747-8i airliners has led to numerous delays adding up to the delivery date slipping to 2028, four years behind schedule.
The Air Force says it’s committed to keeping the two 30-year-old VC-25A aircraft that now fill the role “available and mission-ready until the VC-25B can support full mission requirements.” The report does not appear to mention any official use of a 10-year-old 747 Boeing Business Jet gifted to the Air Force by the Qatari Royal Family. The Qatari plane is now in Texas addressing apparent security gaps that came to light when it was supposed to take President Donald Trump from Turkey to Washington in mid-July. The Secret Service insisted Trump use one of the old airplanes as far as the U.K. because of a heightened security threat in Turkey. The nature of the additional renovations has not been made public.
Among other issues dogging the program is supply chain issues with cabin and flight deck windows for the aircraft. The report indicates the current window contractor is having trouble making the windows to the Air Force’s standards. “Challenging defect criteria has been established which require defect-free sub-components clean room facilities, and detailed processes to reduce and eliminate particles in the assembly of the windows,” the report says. There are also issues with the windshields. The original contractor went out of business, and PPG has been contracted to take over but does not have its design certified yet. We’ve added the full report below and recommend creating a separate window for the list of acronyms for easy reference while trying to absorb its contents. Those better versed in reading these kinds of documents are welcome to add their comments.
For this one we might not be able to lay all the blame at the contractors’ feet: it’s been a tough year or so in cybersec, with systems looking a lot less secure these days than they did not too long ago. In particular, the horizon for when quantum computers can crack some widely-used encryption schemes has recently been estimated to be several years sooner than they previously thought it would happen in the quantum computing field. My bet is that some of the obsolescence in play here has to do with fitting newer “post-quantum” secure communications capability.
Add on top of this the fact that AI systems are proving surprisingly adept at hacking, and you have two factors that most sober-eyed system designers and experts were not really factoring into their security planning even fairly recently.
All that said, I didn’t read the pdf 😛
Agreed. Soon virtually anything can be hackable. Perhaps this and future presidents will just have to keep radio silent when traveling. What a concept!
Everything is already hackable. The new tools are merely labor-saving devices….
“The Air Force says the super secret communications system aboard the two new VC-25B aircraft that will be designated Air Force One will be a security threat before any president rides on it and it will cost tens of millions of dollars to remove it and replace it. “The current Mission Communication System (MCS) baseline is not viable past CY 2028 due to cybersecurity and obsolescence issues,” the Air Force said in an update issued in April and declassified last week. “Unmitigated risk will drive an inability for Authority to Connect and Operate on vital National Security Systems required for Presidential communications.”
I did my best to read the PDF. The reason provided by the Air Force for buying two, already built aircraft was because Boeing’s inability to build fresh aircraft due to several reasons, one being lack of qualified staff, and two, ongoing supply chain issues with no end in sight for improvement. Both of these 747-8’s were completed, test flown, and then ferried to Victorville, CA for long term, desert storage in March and April of 2015. They were sold to a Russian cargo company called Transaero. Transaero went BK late 2014 before taking delivery. This procurement process was started September 2016, approved for development in March of 2017, with both eventually purchased in August 2017. Then in spring of 2019, they were ferried to San Antonio for conversion to VC-25B’s. These two were in desert storage for over four years before ferried to San Antonio in 2019, and have been at San Antonio ever since, being flown only twice since 2015. There are no spare windshields for any 747-8 aircraft according to PDF. PPG was contracted to be the new supplier of windshields. However, they have to go through the entire FAA certification process to essentially get a legal PMA to have certified windshields. So, PPG has decided to do that certification for all 747-8’s civilian or otherwise rather than just for these two airplanes. Secondly, the manufacturer of the remaining side windows have so far, not been able to meet quality control standards that already exist for 747-8’s let alone, these two VC-25B’s which seem to me by what I read, might be more stringent than original certification standards required by the FAA. Add to this fiasco, the interior contractor has had one setback after another with supply chain issues including constantly changing specifications. On top of all of this, POTUS and the CEO had an INFORMAL AGREEMENT’ not an official contract to limit this total expenditure for these two airplanes to $3.9 billion dollars. Nothing more than a handshake deal between, if even that, between POTUS and the CEO at the time, Boeing would absorb any cost overruns.
Seriously??????
Thanks for the write-up 101. What a mess government bureaucracy is nowadays. Or was and will be.
Bordello One was built in 2011/12 delivered to Qatar Amri Flight April 2012 which was owned by the Qatar Prime Minister Thania. Official Qatar records show it was in official government service from 2015 till 2023. Then it was sold to a yet to be disclosed buyer in 2023, put up for sale with no takers for over 2 years, and eventually “gifted” to the US taxpayer. It did not fly for those two years. It was flown to Palm Beach for POTUS and Mrs POTUS inspection and approval (I wonder who signed off that annual or gained the ferry permit), flown back to Qatar, “gifted” and then ferried to L3 Harris in San Antonio for security upgrades designed to be Bordello One, POTUS choice of flying command center AKA Air Force One. Part of the “gifting” agreement is that Bordello One will end up in Trump’s ownership BEFORE the end of his official term, so as to present no future liability to the Qatar government, as per former DOJ Bondi’s research, legal advice, and subsequent explanation to the US Congress before she was axed. All that work without even so much as a ride.
One billion dollars later, new livery, posh accommodations, but unfortunately, less than adequate security for our Commander in Chief when flying out of country with him aboard. It has fine security for everybody else including the crew, press corps, and Secret Service flying on Bordello One aka Air Force One, Two, Three, Bridge???? without him aboard.
So far we have $4.1 billion dollars invested in two other slightly used 2015 model VC-25B’s aka Air Force One’s with inadequate security with another $3.9 billion dollars in cost over runs Boeing is going to cover via an INFORMAL handshake between POTUS February 2018 (same POTUS today)with Boeing’s CEO then Muilenburg(February 2018), and a wink wink, nod nod from Kelly Ortberg, Boeing’s CEO today. Can’t verify the handshake.
The math is now 3 Air Force One’s at a current cost of $9 billion dollars, three outta three with inadequate security, continuing cost over runs with no end cost yet in sight…and reliance on the old Air Force One’s for POTUS through at least 2028 and Bordello One as the fanciest press corps barge, Secret Service hack, and promo airplane on what not to do with a used 747-8.
Maybe they should just forget all the big fancy hackable airplanes and technology and just go back to a King Air 90 like LBJ had. VC-6A (serial number 66-7943)
A 747 just has way too many nooks and crannies where somebody could hide something nefarious.
Snoop Dogg had some ideas about Air Force 1.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIb4Sf7IzFI
BTW Russ, I think participation is better when arguments have to be answered with logic and reason instead of up and down votes that have no stated logic or reason.