helped set the level of professionalism
and expectation, especially for some of
the newer ‘Tomcats’ pilots.
Interoperability
In relation to interoperability, Hudock
said, ‘I have worked with the navy a
lot, but to see us all come together —
the e ectiveness — it’s been pretty
awesome. I walked away with even more
appreciation of what the F-35s, the F-22s
and the Growlers bring to the ght. They
haven’t let any of my team-mates die,
and only one of my team-mates was shot
down and that was from a surface-to-air
threat. Just learning more about what the
fourth- and fth-generation systems can
do and their capabilities has been great.
As a Harrier guy, my job is to y down low
and attack. I know they have our back, so
we can do our mission, go in there and
drop the bombs on target.’
As in 2017, air force operational test
units attended ‘Northern Lightning’.
They conducted tactics validation and
tested software and hardware upgrades
in the Link 16-intensive, contested,
49