Luke Cropsey, Air Force’s C3BM exec, tapped for promotion to top acquisition job
Maj. Gen. Luke Cropsey, the overseer of the modernization of the Air Force’s command, control, communications and battle management (C3BM) enterprise, has been nominated for promotion to three-star and to serve as military deputy for the service’s acquisition, technology and logistics directorate at the Pentagon.
The nomination by President Donald Trump was submitted to the Senate last week and officially announced by Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on Thursday.
As program executive officer for C3BM over the past three-plus years, Cropsey has played a leading role in the development of the Department of the Air Force’s contributions to the U.S. military’s Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control (CJADC2) initiative, including the DAF Battle Network. Those efforts are aimed at better connecting the services’ sensors, shooters and data streams to enhance commanders’ situational awareness and boost the efficiency and effectiveness of operations.
The DAF Battle Network integrates about 50 programs of record across the department, according to the Air Force, to promote “resilient decision and information advantage needed by the Air Force, Space Force, Joint, and Coalition forces to win against the pacing challenge.”
China has been identified as the Pentagon’s so-called pacing challenge.
Cropsey, an Air Force Academy grad, has held a variety of engineering and acquisition roles during his military career, according to his official bio. As head of the C3BM portfolio, he recently helped stand up an integrated program office for the Joint Fires Network — which seeks to develop a battle management platform able to display real-time, actionable threat information from across domains to joint and partner forces operating in high-end conflicts, particularly within the Indo-Pacific region.
If confirmed as military deputy for the Air Force’s AT&L directorate, he would help oversee the service’s research, development, acquisition and sustainment portfolios — with an annual budget of more than $60 billion and upwards of 550 acquisition programs.
The job was previously held by Lt. Gen. Dale White, who was confirmed last week by the Senate for promotion to four-star and to serve as direct reporting portfolio manager for critical major weapon systems programs.
