Consider This Air Force Replicator Concept for All the Right Reasons

Ted Harshberger

Expert InsightsPublished Jul 22, 2024

Although the United States faces potential adversaries on multiple fronts, the challenge presented by the People's Republic of China is at the forefront of U.S. security concerns. To counter the rapid spread of China's advanced military presence across the Indo-Pacific region, the U.S. Department of Defense is pursuing multiple approaches to rapidly transform its own forces through the accelerated application of emerging technologies, such as the Replicator Initiative. This paper—which is aimed at decisionmaking audiences in the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Department of the Air Force—identifies key U.S. Air Force Replicator attributes and lays out a potentially viable and valuable Replicator option for the Air Force.

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Harshberger, Ted, Consider This Air Force Replicator Concept for All the Right Reasons, RAND Corporation, PE-A3120-1, July 2024. As of April 8, 2025: https://www.rand.org/pubs/perspectives/PEA3120-1.html

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Harshberger, Ted, Consider This Air Force Replicator Concept for All the Right Reasons. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2024. https://www.rand.org/pubs/perspectives/PEA3120-1.html.
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This research was prepared for the Department of the Air Force and conducted within the Force Modernization and Employment Program of RAND Project AIR FORCE.

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