A maintainer with the Air Force's 90th Missile Maintenance Squadron removes the screws holding the nose point of a Minuteman III ICBM at F.E. Warren Air Force Base, Wyoming, in 2016. U.S. Air Force / Senior Airman Brandon Valle
Air Force merges ICBM program management offices
The new Intercontinental Ballistic Missile Systems Directorate will handle work on the decades-old Minuteman III and the wildly over-budget Sentinel.
The Air Force is making several changes as part of its effort to replace the aging Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile program after the service branch cancelled a large contract related to it.
The service has twice awarded the $12-billion Integration Support Contract 2.0—once to BAE Systems, which is currently doing work under !SE 1.0, and once to Guidehouse. Each time, the loser filed a protest that was upheld by the Government Accountability Office. In August, the service decided to cancel the ISC 2.0 contract and start over.
An Air Force spokesperson said the solicitation no longer met the requirements of the program. A new request for proposals is in the works.
The ISC 2.0 contract was to provide sustainment services for the Minuteman III ICBM and support for the deployment of its planned replacement, dubbed Sentinel. The 18-year contract would have covered services such cybersecurity, digital engineering, model-based systems engineering and change management.
However, bigger changes were in the works: the Air Force has announced it will merge the separate directorates that were overseeing Minuteman III and Sentinel into a single Intercontinental Ballistic Missile Systems Directorate.
Brig. Gen. William Rogers will lead the new group. “Placing our ICBM programs under one directorate will help streamline processes, improving how we coordinate with our partners in the nuclear enterprise,” Rogers said in an Aug. 27 release.
The new organization is also intended to fix leadership problems in the Sentinel program. In June, the branch fired Sentinel Systems Director Charles Clegg for not following “organizational procedures”.
As the Air Force develops its replacement for ISC 2.0, BAE is continuing its work under the current ISC 1.0 contract.
There is no public timetable for a new contract, an Air Force spokesperson said.