NATO Strategic Airlift

A growing strategic airlift capabilities gap within the NATO alliance drove members toward capabilities improvement goals to strengthen the alliance by increasing strategic airlift capacity. Although NATO has made progress in addressing deficiencies in strategic airlift capacity, NATO must further refine a strategic airlift capability to meet current and future alliance needs. Analyzing requirements against the potential solutions, this study evaluates the ability of existing organic and lease solutions along with the new C-17 Strategic Airlift Consortium to meet current and future NATO strategic airlift needs. The study further evaluates the feasibility of applying these solutions to European Union airlift needs.