Military Camp Observation | Joint Flight Training Regimes Pose New Challenges for Air Base Support

Editor's Note: As combat-realistic training advances in depth, systematic support for joint training, mixed multi-type aircraft operations, and high-tempo cross-base deployments have become the norm. Air base support is now facing the severe test of "sharply increased task volumes and diverse, ever-changing requirements." Under the rigid constraints of no personnel increases and no organizational restructuring, how to break through the structural dilemma of traditional support's "large units doing everything, small units doing everything" has become an unavoidable mandatory question. In recent years, a Naval Aviation air base has continuously refined its "zero-accompaniment (零伴随)" and "modular (模块化)" support models at the institutional level, linking information chains and optimizing coordination mechanisms to leverage a leap in support effectiveness within a fixed organizational structure. "Zero-accompaniment" reduces accompanying personnel while increasing mobility speed; it saves support costs while building confidence in winning. From single-type aircraft support to multi-type mixed-formation coordination, modular support units on "standby at all times" are accelerating their integration into the training chain, injecting an unceasing source of war-winning momentum for combat aircraft to take flight.

Joint flight training regimes pose new challenges for air base support——

When the "Old Landlord" Meets the "New Tenants"

■ Dong Man, Shi Yichu, PLA Daily Special Correspondent Wang Ningchuan

On the shore of the East China Sea, the morning mist had yet to lift. The roar of engines tore through the silence. On the runway of a Naval Aviation air base, multiple types of naval and army aircraft taxied out in sequence, and a cross-service joint flight training exercise got underway.

Inside the control tower, Air Traffic Control Room Director Su Yunfei fixed his gaze on the screen, issuing terse, forceful commands: "Next batch of aircraft cross-deploying in 10 minutes — fuel trucks and power carts move immediately to Apron 2 and stand by!" Every station responded to the order at once, and the support team quickly converged — refueling, charging, and inspection proceeded in seamless succession. Before long, the aircraft surged back into the sky with afterburners lit.

At dusk, the last aircraft landed. Su Yunfei removed his headset. The Army Aviation tower commander walked over and said with genuine admiration: "In the past, a cross-base deployment meant bringing a support detachment of at least several dozen people. Now it's land and fly — no more worries about support during training deployments."

That remark was high praise from the flight unit for the air base — its "old landlord" — and behind it lay a profound transformation in support philosophy and capability. A year earlier, units on temporary assignment still habitually brought their own support forces, while the air base served as the "full guarantor" handling everything else. This appeared efficient but in reality involved redundant resource investment and rigid force allocation. As the intensity of cross-service joint training climbed year after year, support pressure surged. The air base Party committee recognized clearly: support resources have a ceiling, and only by innovating models and optimizing mechanisms could the effectiveness of "zero-accompaniment" support be truly unleashed. When "modular" support allows support units to be flexibly recombined like building blocks, and when an "integrated platform" moves airspace scheduling from experience-based judgment to data-driven management, the effectiveness of model innovation is continuously being released at the support front line. Today, relying on scientifically managed equipment systems, an all-capable support personnel force, and a refined scheduling mechanism, the air base has built a complete joint support system capable of hosting multiple units in simultaneous temporary assignment, powerfully advancing the normalization of cross-service combat-realistic training.

[Photo captions: Naval helicopters conduct training. Photo by Wang Ningchuan. / Maintenance personnel inspect aircraft. Photo by Wang Ningchuan. / A marshaller guides an aircraft during sling-load training. Photo by Wang Ningchuan.]

Breaking Mental Barriers: From "Grinding Through Attrition (拼消耗)" to "Accounting for the Full Picture (算总账)"

During a night flight exercise last year, multiple aircraft returned to base in rapid succession. Fuel Section Leader Sergeant Zhang Junlin kept his eyes fixed on the monitoring screen. The primary refueling truck had been in continuous operation for several hours and was approaching its safety time limit. The mission sheet showed three aircraft types — unmanned aerial vehicles, transport aircraft, and helicopters — with six batches of closely spaced takeoffs and landings, each with different refueling interfaces. Zhang Junlin had no choice but to activate an older refueling truck for emergency support.

The first several support batches were completed smoothly. Then the weather suddenly changed, and a certain type of transport aircraft returned ahead of schedule. The refueling truck that should have supported it was already occupied. Zhang Junlin urgently coordinated another vehicle. He had barely finished when the intercom crackled with the helicopter support team pressing for service.

"Section Leader, the temperature warning light just came on!" Operator Li Ming cried out. Zhang Junlin rushed to the vehicle and saw the temperature gauge on the refueling truck creeping toward the red line, with the smell of something burning drifting from the gaps in the hood. "Shut it down immediately! Switch to the backup truck!"

At the very moment the backup refueling truck moved into position, the primary refueling truck suddenly broke down and stopped. Afterward, technicians drew a sharp breath: "A few more minutes and the fuel line could have burst."

A similar near-incident occurred in the motor transport company. Driver Min Shaoxin was executing a towing task for a new-type aircraft. The operating procedures explicitly required "pulling the safety pin after connection to confirm it is locked." Relying on old experience, he felt that "a 'click' sound means it's engaged" and skipped the confirmation step. When the tow vehicle started and turned, the coupling made an abnormal sound. He stopped to check and found the adapter had come loose, causing a cross-base deployment delay of more than ten minutes.

Afterward, Min Shaoxin said with regret: "I've driven tow vehicles for over ten years and never made a mistake. The new equipment procedures added one confirmation step, and I skipped it because I thought it was a hassle — and nearly caused a serious accident."

Both near-incidents pointed to the same underlying problem: the support mindset was still stuck in the old logic of "grinding through attrition."

Air base leadership assembled the personnel at the scene of the failures and analyzed them one by one: "The scheduling broke down when the transport aircraft returned early because the interface parameters for each aircraft type are not standardized and vehicles cannot be flexibly substituted." "The refueling truck broke down shortly after starting because we were used to 'pushing through,' with no equipment rotation plan." "Steps were skipped in the procedures because thinking was still anchored in old experience."

"Support must protect the mission, but it must also protect safety and protect the long term," the leadership said, pointing to the bulging fuel line. "Equipment has limits; there are no small matters in safety. Every additional skill mastered adds one more line of defense for safety. Making new equipment come alive — truly leveraging the functions of new support platforms — is what builds genuine capability for winning."

This after-action review completed the transition from "assigning blame" to "finding solutions."

The shift permeated daily training: in the past, personnel competed over "who supported the most consecutive sorties"; now they compete over "who spots hazards earliest and who rotates most promptly." In the past, each type of equipment was assigned to only one group of personnel, and operating techniques for older equipment were not widely distributed; now, everyone studies maintenance and upkeep and masters operating techniques for two or more vehicle types, breathing new life into older equipment.

Not long ago, during a large-scale flight exercise, more than 40 sorties were flown throughout the day, with takeoff and landing intervals for UAVs, transport aircraft, and helicopters significantly shortened. Air traffic management staff officer Kong Zhou pointed at the monitoring screen and said: "When a primary vehicle exceeds three and a half hours, the system automatically alerts, and backup vehicle support seamlessly takes over. Everyone can operate two or more vehicle types — whatever aircraft comes in, someone can handle it."

From "grinding through attrition" to "accounting for the full picture," the shift in support thinking has made the rational use of equipment a matter of conscious action for every service member.

Personnel Reorganization: From "Sole Specialist per Post (岗位独苗)" to "Composite Modules (模块复合)"

On the eve of a night flight exercise in late autumn last year, a sudden strong wind hit the island, and the number of birds in the airfield area spiked sharply.

When the bird-dispersal team arrived on scene, they found their equipment had malfunctioned due to the harsh weather and could only drive birds away manually — but they were shorthanded. The dispatch center sought help in all directions, only to find that overly fine-grained division of job responsibilities had left support personnel with skill gaps: "Bird-dispersal specialists only know how to use bird-dispersal equipment; fuel specialists can only perform refueling support."

With aircraft about to land and seabirds still circling at low altitude, special vehicle driver Staff Sergeant Second Class Liu Xin volunteered, retrieved backup equipment from the warehouse, rushed to the airfield, and used techniques learned during cross-training to help adjust the sound wave frequency. Before long the flock dispersed, and the night flight proceeded on schedule.

This near-incident exposed not just a shortage of personnel but a structural shortcoming of "single-skill support." The air base Party committee made a decisive decision: support forces must shift from "fixed groupings by specialty" to "task-based modular groupings" — organizing backbone personnel from different specialties into multiple support modules by task type, with everyone in a module possessing two to three cross-specialty skills, capable of independently fulfilling multiple-post support duties and of being flexibly broken apart and recombined according to mission requirements.

The air base rolled out "one specialty, multiple capabilities (一专多能)" cross-specialty training, compiled a Cross-Specialty Knowledge and Skills Handbook, and organized paired team teaching, on-the-job work, and practical examinations. The air base's entire support force was integrated into standardized multi-type modules — trained by module in peacetime, deployed by module in wartime.

Staff Sergeant Second Class Yang Yihu is a fuel specialist backbone. Through cross-training he learned to operate power carts and calibrate communications equipment, and can also operate bird-dispersal equipment. He was assigned to the "fuel-power module," which also includes one power specialist and one communications specialist. During one large-scale support operation, the communications duty soldier was urgently pulled away due to equipment failure. The dispatcher immediately activated the contingency plan and called for Yang Yihu. He rushed into the communications duty room and, drawing on what he had learned, accurately relayed tower instructions, achieving zero interruption of the communications link for several hours. The power specialist in the module seamlessly filled in at the refueling post.

"Before, I thought 'multiple capabilities' was something for others to learn. Now I understand that one more skill means one more safeguard in the support chain," Yang Yihu said. From "sole specialist per post" to "composite modules," modular grouping forges support "all-rounders."

Staff Sergeant First Class Bai Kangxi proactively applied for "all-aircraft-type, cross-service" practical training. After the air base adopted the proposal, it invited Army Aviation maintenance backbone personnel to give instruction and compiled a Multi-Type Aircraft Support Handbook. After systematic training, his team went on to complete more than ten consecutive helicopter support sorties during subsequent joint training exercises with zero errors throughout.

Today, modular grouping covers all support specialties. From "one peg for one hole" to "one person, multiple capabilities, with backup for every post," and then to "composite modules, flexible deployment," the talent pool has undergone a complete transformation. Modular grouping has multiplied support effectiveness and adapted to diverse mission requirements.

Capability Enhancement: From "Competing for Airspace (抢空域)" to "Stratified Allocation (分层级)"

As support models multiplied, a new bottleneck emerged — the contradiction between "rough-cut planning" and "refined support."

In cross-service joint training, units submitted plans stating only "what time they arrive, what time they leave, and how many sorties they fly." The air base received these passively, and airspace conflicts and time-slot competition were commonplace. Air traffic management staff officer Kong Zhou once spent an hour coordinating overlapping airspace between Army Aviation and Naval Aviation, forcing a training delay.

Air base leadership resolved to break through the impasse at the institutional level. They established a weekly coordination and consultation mechanism, convening support backbone personnel from all services and branches stationed for training in "face-to-face meetings" to confirm on the spot the mission aircraft types, training subjects, time windows, and special requirements, and to precisely calculate the "airspace account" and "support account."

The control room, together with meteorological and air traffic management departments, introduced an "airspace stratification, time-slot staggering (空域分层、时段错峰)" plan: airspace was divided into low, medium, and high layers by altitude, training time was finely divided in thirty-minute increments, and "clear separation intervals (净空间隔)" were reserved between layers.

At the outset of the adjustment, an Army Aviation flight staff officer questioned: "With airspace divided in such detail, what happens when training subjects need to be changed on the fly?" Air base leadership replied: "Try it first; adjust as we train."

They integrated the previously dispersed systems for airspace management, intelligent equipment monitoring, and tower command into a unified scheduling platform. The platform aggregates data on flight time slots, airspace zones, and support resources for real-time sharing among all parties; the screen simultaneously displays aircraft movements and the operational status of each support point, automatically checks for airspace and time-slot conflicts, and rapidly accommodates ad hoc additional training tasks.

In early summer this year, a high-intensity 36-hour around-the-clock joint exercise and training event was conducted, involving three services and branches, four aircraft types, and more than ten training subjects. The tower's airspace situational display resembled a precise "mission web," with every time slot, altitude layer, and airspace window clearly marked.

During the exercise, an Army Aviation detachment temporarily requested the addition of a low-altitude penetration subject. The control room used the integrated scheduling platform to quickly coordinate a "dedicated window," satisfying the requirement without affecting the training of other units.

When the exercise concluded, aircraft returned to base on schedule — no airspace conflicts, no training delays. The Army Aviation flight staff officer who had raised doubts sought out the air base leadership and reflected: "In the past, what I feared most in the air was competing for airspace. Now everyone flies at their own altitude without interfering with each other. More participating units, more complex aircraft types — and training effectiveness has actually improved."

Refined airspace management brought a leap in the quality and efficiency of ground support. Reporters observing on site found: three aircraft of different types landed in succession, and the moment the tower issued its instructions, the "fuel-power module" support team deployed simultaneously — instructions translated directly into action, and support time was reduced by nearly one-third compared with the past.

From "competing for airspace" to "stratified allocation," from "rough-cut planning" to "refined overall coordination," the air base has completed a leap in its scheduling philosophy. Today, multi-unit simultaneous on-site training and multi-service synchronized training have become the norm. The duty room dispatches in good order; on the runway, fighters and helicopters each follow their own lanes; no one argues anymore over "competing for airspace" or "fighting over time slots."

What has changed in support is the system, the capability, and the process. What has not changed are those figures moving through the mist, the eyes reddened from long hours in the tower, the footsteps hurrying across the runway. Through repeated self-renewal, they have secured every safe takeoff and landing of the combat aircraft.

What this air base has been exploring is no longer merely how to "support well," but how to "sustain support and sustain it for the long haul" under high-intensity confrontation. This is precisely the core connotation of new-quality support capability (新质保障力) — not passive underwriting, but proactive design; not piling up resources, but system-level enablement.

Firsthand Account

"That Dispatch Was Really Sharp"

■ Air Traffic Management Staff Officer Kong Zhou

[Photo captions: A fuel specialist refuels an aircraft. / A bird-dispersal specialist conducts target-aiming training.]

Early last year, the air base invited Army Aviation and Naval Aviation flight staff officers together for a coordination and consultation meeting for the first time. After the meeting adjourned, I wrote several large characters in the duty log: "Multi-service joint scheduling." After two years in the air traffic control post, it was the first time I felt uncertain.

Single-type aircraft scheduling — parameters, flight routes, altitude layers — I had long since committed to memory. But multi-service joint operations on the same field pushed me into a completely unfamiliar domain. At the first coordination meeting, Army Aviation demanded priority use of altitude layers for "low-altitude penetration," while Naval Aviation insisted that "medium-to-high altitude formation" must be cleared first. Both sides held their ground and neither would yield. I stood there with my planning notebook, at a loss, and in the end it took a senior staff officer to step in and barely manage to stagger the time slots.

That evening after the meeting, I wrote in my notebook: "Parameters are fixed; scheduling is fluid. If all you can do is stare at a screen, you'll never be a good dispatcher."

Facing one's shortcomings is the first step toward closing them. I went through a borrowed Army Aviation flight syllabus from cover to cover — performance limits, airspace ranges, and training durations for different aircraft types, extracted one by one and taped to the edge of my screen. The minimum maneuvering radius for Army Aviation helicopter low-altitude penetration, the upper altitude limit for Naval Aviation fixed-wing formation pull-ups — I drilled them until I could recite them on demand.

Memorizing parameters alone was not enough; I also had to understand the requirements. Before each joint training exercise, I called each unit in advance to clarify subjects and special requirements, then came back and annotated the airspace map in layers using different colored pens. Over time, the airspace map transformed from a tangled mess into a clearly stratified planning chart.

Not long ago, during a joint training exercise, an Army Aviation detachment temporarily requested the addition of a low-altitude penetration subject. I pulled up the contingency plan and saw that a reserved clear separation interval was available. After a quick calculation, I submitted the adjustment plan. When training ended, the Army Aviation flight staff officer gave me a nod: "That dispatch was really sharp."

Thinking back on the awkwardness of being caught in the middle with nothing to contribute, compared to now being able to resolve conflicts in advance at the consultation table, my greatest takeaway is this: joint scheduling cannot mean sitting in the tower waiting for conflicts to arrive. You have to thoroughly understand the requirements of each service and branch in advance, lay them on the table, and eliminate hidden problems at the planning stage. That entry on the weekly training schedule marked "multi-service coordination" is a constant reminder — on the battlefield of joint support, my charge has only just begun.

Editor's Connection

The Military Camp Observation section editor in conversation with the political commissar of a Naval Aviation air base——

Let Units on Temporary Assignment Focus Entirely on Training

The accelerating generation of new-quality combat capabilities (新质战斗力) cannot be separated from the solid underpinning of new-quality support capability (新质保障力). As new equipment is fielded in complete systems and combat-realistic training advances in depth, innovation in support models has become a key lever for driving a leap in combat capability. Around this topic, this section's editor held a conversation with the political commissar of a Naval Aviation air base.

Reporter: What was the original motivation for advancing "modular" innovation under the "zero-accompaniment" model?

Political Commissar: The motivation came from a clear-eyed recognition of the bottleneck. "Zero-accompaniment" relieved the burden on units on temporary assignment but concentrated support pressure and the risk of resource overextension onto the air base itself. As joint training intensity increased, problems of equipment overload, single-skill personnel, and rough-cut planning were exposed all at once, and the traditional support model was approaching the limits of its capability. We chose to proactively break through — by scientifically allocating resources to make equipment active and cycling; by modular grouping to make personnel stronger and ready; by refined coordination to make planning synchronized and precise.

Reporter: Where does the core innovation of "modular" support lie?

Political Commissar: The core lies in reconstruction, not patching. In the past, when facing multi-service, multi-type aircraft missions, we were accustomed to pushing through by grinding equipment to its limits and grinding personnel to physical exhaustion — essentially shallow resource consumption. "Modular" support is not minor tinkering at the operational level; it is a scientific reorganization of support tasks, support personnel, and support equipment from the top-level design — replacing passive consumption with deep coordination between personnel and equipment, offsetting mission rigidity with institutional flexibility, and giving the support system the capacity for self-sustaining cycles and dynamic resilience under high-intensity stress.

Reporter: For cross-service joint training support, where does the new support system focus its efforts?

Political Commissar: Our positioning is clear — not to "take everything off the hands" of units on temporary assignment, but to break down inter-service barriers and build a support environment that integrates all elements and is standardized and universal. Concretely, this means solving the problem of "failing to adapt to new conditions (水土不服)." Aircraft types across the Army, Navy, and Air Force differ, and professional operating standards vary. The primary task is to convert differentiated requirements into unified support interfaces and eliminate the break-in period to the maximum extent. Our goal is to let units on temporary assignment focus entirely on completing their training tasks without being distracted by any support matter, truly achieving efficient coordination among multiple services and branches on the same runway and in the same airspace.

Reporter: Looking toward the future battlefield, how can support innovation further adapt to joint operations requirements?

Political Commissar: Future joint operations will move at a faster tempo and consume more resources. The focus of support should not be on "stockpiling more and assigning more people," but on forging the system's own rapid response and regenerative capacity. We are working to drive three transitions: first, from "labor-intensive (人力密集型)" to "intelligently predictive (智能预判型)" — using equipment health monitoring and data-driven scheduling so that support "runs ahead of" the mission rather than chasing after emergencies to "fight fires"; second, from "fixed groupings" to "building-block recombination (积木式重组)" — rapidly completing the breakup and reconstitution of support forces in response to combat losses and unforeseen requirements, always maintaining system flexibility; third, from "type-specific, type-dedicated support (专型专保)" to "universal compatibility (通用兼容)" — linking the physical interfaces and information chains of equipment across different services and branches to achieve ready-on-arrival, plug-and-play support for multiple types of aircraft. All three pathways point to the same core: giving the support system the resilience to "hold the bottom line (兜底)" under complex conditions. This is both an urgent requirement of current combat-realistic training and a mandatory question that future joint operations have set before us.