AIR SUPERIORITY

 Counterair operations are designed to gain control of the air and wrest such control away from an adversary. Air superiority is a condition on the spectrum of air control, which ranges from adversary air supremacy, to air parity, to friendly air supremacy. The air superiority condition is achieved when friendly operations are able to proceed without prohibitive interference from opposing forces. In modern military operations, achieving this level of control of the air is a critical precondition for success. Air superiority provides freedom from attack, freedom to attack, freedom of action, freedom of access, and freedom of awareness. Importantly, it also precludes adversaries from exploiting similar advantages. As such, air superiority underwrites the full spectrum of joint military operations and provides an asymmetric advantage to friendly forces. A lack of air superiority significantly increases the risk of joint force mission failure as well as the cost to achieve victory both in terms of resources and loss of life. In common discourse, air superiority is often envisioned as a theater-wide condition. In highly contested environments, such a conception may be unrealistic and unnecessary. Air superiority is only needed for the time and over the geographic area required to enable joint operations. The specific amount of time and space required varies significantly across scenarios, mission objectives, and phases of conflict. Accordingly, capability development for air superiority must provide options for commanders to array their forces across a range of durations and geographies.