1946 infördes en ny befattning i flygvapnet – Fältflygare. Dessa korttidsanställda piloter utbildades fram till och med 1982, året innan den Nya Befälsordningen infördes i försvarsmakten vilken innefattade alla officerare i en och samma kategori – yrkesofficerare. År 2008 reviderades dock befälsordningen, och sedan dess delas försvarsmaktens officerare in i två kategorier: specialistofficer respektive officer. Blivande stridspiloter rekryteras idag till den senare kategorin och anställs som officerare. Denna uppsats syftar till att belysa de argument som var bidragande till införandet av fältflygare och testa dessas validitet som argument för en applicering av tvåbefälssystemet på flygvapnets piloter idag. Uppsatsen utreder fältflygarsystemets framväxt, utformning, genomförande och avslutande samt jämför förutsättningarna mellan 1946 och 2010 inom områdena säkerhetspolitik, uppgifter samt ekonomi. Dessutom jämförs det svenska flygvapnets personalfördelning med ett antal andra länder. Genom att sätta de funna argumenten i dagens kontext, försöker validiteten av dessa avgöras. Uppsatsen avslutas med en diskussion rörande resultatet samt behovet av framtida forskning inom området. Resultatet i uppsatsen pekar på ett antal huvudsakliga argument för införandet av fältflygarsystemet, vilka samtliga kan härledas till flygvapnets expansiva fas under 30- och 40-talet. Uppsatsen visar att inget av dem är giltigt som ett argument för ett införande av ett tvåbefälssystem för flygvapnets piloter idag. Detta är främst på grund av skillnader mellan 1946 och idag rörande den säkerhetspolitiska situationen samt flygvapnets uppgifter. Det huvudsakliga syftet med fältflygarsystemet, att rekrytera en stor mängd individer till ett flygvapen under uppbyggnad, speglar inte dagens situation. Vidare är försvarsmaktens uppgifter idag betydligt fler än de som fältflygarna utbildades för att lösa: försvar av landet i händelse av krig. / In 1946, the Swedish Air Force (SwAF) introduced a new position open for pilot applicants. These pilots were trained and hired as non-commissioned officers and served in during a limited period of time. Influenced by the British RAF system with short service personnel, this system was in use until 1982. That year, it was decided that the Swedish Armed Forces would consist only of commissioned officers. However, in 2008, the non-commissioned officers were re-introduced into service. Today, the officers of the Armed Forces serve either as non-commissioned officers (“specialistofficerare) or commissioned officers (“officerare”). Aspirants who are applying to figher pilot training within the SwAF go through a three-year-long academic education in order to become commissioned officers. This essay aims to elucidate the key arguments used to introduce the system of non-commissioned fighter pilot officers and to test the validity of these arguments for applying the “new” system of officer ranks/other. The essay investigates the evolution, shaping, implementation and termination of the Fältflygare-system. It also compares 1946 and 2010 on three different aspects: the air force’s economic situation and tasks as well as the security policy-situation of the country. Also, a comparison of how officers are organised is made, between the SwAF and the air force of five other countries. The end of the essay consists of a discussion of the results. The result of the essay shows that none of the previous arguments are valid for implementing a system of non-commissioned fighter pilot officers for the SwAF pilots today. The main reasons for this are major differences in the tasks given to the armed forces and the differences of the security policy-situation. The main purpose of the Fältflygare-system, to recruit and train a large quantity of pilots for an air force that was being developed, does not reflect the situation today. Furthermore, the armed forces and air force today must be ready to solve a wider range of tasks today than before, particularly when it comes to peace keeping and peace enforcement missions. The older system trained for a more specific task - defending the Swedish country’s borders in case of a war between NATO and the Warsaw Pact.

The very nature of the fire fighting environment makes thermal degradation of turnout gear inevitable. Standards that are currently in place to ensure that new gear performs adequately for the protection of the fire fighter do not provide a quantitative measure for assessing this gear once it is in service. When the performance of the gear is compromised due to degradation, it could put the fire fighter wearing the gear at unnecessary risk. A non-destructive test that indicates the end of the useable service of the garment would be a benefit to the fire service. Full scale fire tests were conducted to suggest a range of heat fluxes that turnout gear specimens should be subjected to in order to simulate degradation caused by in-field use of the gear. A series of destructive tests were conducted on exposed specimens. A number of non-destructive tests were performed on the same specimens. The results of destructive and non-destructive tests were compared. This research explored some options for non-destructive tests of turnout gear. Digital image analysis and colorimetry were both offered as possibilities for a diagnostic test of this gear. Correlations between destructive performance tests and the colour changes of the outer shell fabric could be used to develop non-destructive tests to evaluate every garment owned by a department. More work is required to improve these test methods, but the door has been opened to better testing for in-use gear, and ultimately to provide better protection for the fire fighters who use this clothing.

This thesis presents an adaptive model reference controller for a highly maneuverable high performance aircraft, in particular, a modified F18. An adaptive controller is developed to maneuver an aircraft at a high angle of attack. Thus, the aircraft is required to fly over a highly nonlinear flight regime. The adaptive controller presented in this thesis can be viewed as a combination of a linear and a nonlinear controller. Around a fixed flight condition the adaptive controller converges to a linear controller; however, the controller remains a nonlinear controller during maneuvers. The contributions of this thesis lie in two areas. The first area is in control. A successful application of linear adaptive control is presented for a highly nonlinear system. A new method is used to generate the reference trajectory. The reference model uses output feedback to improve the reference trajectory. It is shown that this improvement is necessary because of the control limitations. This work is also important to the control of highly maneuverable high performance aircraft. A successful adaptive controller has been developed to rapidly maneuver an aircraft to a high angle of attack. The main focus of this thesis is adaptive control. / Graduation date: 1993

The very nature of the fire fighting environment makes thermal degradation of turnout gear inevitable. Standards that are currently in place to ensure that new gear performs adequately for the protection of the fire fighter do not provide a quantitative measure for assessing this gear once it is in service. When the performance of the gear is compromised due to degradation, it could put the fire fighter wearing the gear at unnecessary risk. A non-destructive test that indicates the end of the useable service of the garment would be a benefit to the fire service. Full scale fire tests were conducted to suggest a range of heat fluxes that turnout gear specimens should be subjected to in order to simulate degradation caused by in-field use of the gear. A series of destructive tests were conducted on exposed specimens. A number of non-destructive tests were performed on the same specimens. The results of destructive and non-destructive tests were compared. This research explored some options for non-destructive tests of turnout gear. Digital image analysis and colorimetry were both offered as possibilities for a diagnostic test of this gear. Correlations between destructive performance tests and the colour changes of the outer shell fabric could be used to develop non-destructive tests to evaluate every garment owned by a department. More work is required to improve these test methods, but the door has been opened to better testing for in-use gear, and ultimately to provide better protection for the fire fighters who use this clothing.

High performance twin-tail aircraft, like the F-15 and F/A-18, encounter a condition known as tail buffet. At high angles of attack, vortices are generated at the wing fuselage interface (shoulder) or other leading edge extensions. These vortices are directed toward the twin vertical tails. When the flow interacts with the vertical tail it creates pressure variations that can oscillate the vertical tail assembly. This results in fatigue cracks in the vertical tail assembly that can decrease the fatigue life and increase maintenance costs. For many years, research has been conducted to understand this phenomenon of buffet and to reduce its adverse effects on the fatigue life of aerospace structures. Many proposed solutions to this tail buffet problem have had limited success. These include strengthening the tail, modifying the vortex flow, using an active rudder control, and leading edge extensions. Some of the proposed active controls include piezoelectric actuators. Recently, an offset piezoceramic stack actuator was used on an F-15 wind tunnel model to control buffet induced vibrations at high angles of attack. The controller was based on acceleration feedback control methods. In this thesis a procedure for designing the offset piezoceramic stack actuators is developed. This design procedure includes determining the quantity and type of piezoceramic stacks used in these actuators. The changes of stresses, in the vertical tail caused by these actuators during an active control, are investigated. In many cases, linear controllers are very effective in reducing vibrations. However, during flight, the natural frequencies of the vertical tail structural system changes as the airspeed increases. This in turn, reduces the effectiveness of a linear controller. Other causes such as the unmodeled dynamics and nonlinear effects due to debonds also reduce the effectiveness of linear controllers. In this thesis, an adaptive neural network is used to augment the linear controller to correct these effects.

<p>This thesis describes the evaluation of a prototype (Illustrator) for future simulator training of Within Visual Range - combat in the Swedish Air Force. The main focus was to collect and transform user acceptance data (expert opinions) to useful guidelines for continued development. Thirteen active fighter pilots participated in the study. The aim was to use expert opinion to study a) the psychological user acceptance, and b) the technical user acceptance, of the Illustrator together with c) gathering opinions for future improvement. Three psychological aspects were rated before and after the sessions to measure psychological user acceptance. For technical user acceptance, seven fidelity levels of the Illustrator were evaluated regarding realism, limitation of performance and importance of realism after the sessions. The sessions consisted of WVR-scenarios. Four different questionnaires were used for data collection. Two fidelity levels showed to diverge from the others in many ways, and were identified as major problems by the participants. No change of the psychological aspects was found between measurements. According to the results of the evaluation, suggestions and guidelines for future development are presented. Finally, issues of interest for future research are proposed.</p>

The preoccupation in the past decades with theorizing radicalization in order to prevent violent extremism has left deradicalization undertheorized. As the number of returning Foreign Terrorist Fighters (FTFs) is expected to increase as a result of the anticipated military and intelligence advancement on terrorism, the reintegration imperative stresses the urgency to develop comprehensive reintegration and deradicalization strategies. This study seeks to contribute to filling the research deficit begging for empirical data informed by FTFs’ experiences of, and challenges in, reintegration, through qualitative interviews with returning FTFs in Kwale County, Kenya; a county producing a relative majority of Kenyan recruits to Al Shabaab who are now offered amnesty on return to their county of origin. The Life Psychology framework, which assumes an inherent human strive to obtain a good life, i.e. life embeddedness, is adopted for the analysis. The study finds that returnees commit to reintegration in the absence of other alternatives, due to economic incentives and longing for acceptance. It confirms that the process requires the societal motivation in facilitation, but will fail without the sustained commitment of the returning FTF. The study further establishes that returning FTFs are not able to obtain a flow in life embeddedness, which would indicate inability to reintegrate. Yet, many of the interviewed returning FTFs express the contrary, which challenges the concept of life embeddedness as an indicator for reintegration. The study further challenges the general assumption that deradicalization is a precondition for reintegration, as it finds that radicalized individuals are able to reintegrate into communities of origin without deserting held radical beliefs, if those communities share radical sentiments. This study contributes to filling the deficit in empirical data, which when advanced will work to avert security threats posed by returning FTFs and enable utilizing the potential of the phenomenon to counter violent extremism.

The main topic of this thesis is model predictive control (MPC) of an unstable fighter aircraft. When flying it is important to be able to reach, but not exceed the aircraft limitations and to consider the physical boundaries on the control signals. MPC is a method for controlling a system while considering constraints on states and control signals by formulating it as an optimization problem. The drawback with MPC is the computational time needed and because of that, it is primarily developed for systems with a slowly varying dynamics. Two different methods are chosen to speed up the process by making simplifications, approximations and exploiting the structure of the problem. The first method is an explicit method, performing most of the calculations offline. By solving the optimization problem for a number of data sets and thereafter training a neural network, it can be treated as a simpler function solved online. The second method is called fast MPC, in this case the entire optimization is done online. It uses Cholesky decomposition, backward-forward substitution and warm start to decrease the complexity and calculation time of the program. Both methods perform reference tracking by solving an underdetermined system by minimizing the weighted norm of the control signals. Integral control is also implemented by using a Kalman filter to observe constant disturbances. An implementation was made in MATLAB for a discrete time linear model and in ARES, a simulation tool used at Saab Aeronautics, with a more accurate nonlinear model. The result is a neural network function computed in tenth of a millisecond, a time independent of the size of the prediction horizon. The size of the fast MPC problem is however directly affected by the horizon and the computational time will never be as small, but it can be reduced to a couple of milliseconds at the cost of optimality.

This thesis describes the evaluation of a prototype (Illustrator) for future simulator training of Within Visual Range - combat in the Swedish Air Force. The main focus was to collect and transform user acceptance data (expert opinions) to useful guidelines for continued development. Thirteen active fighter pilots participated in the study. The aim was to use expert opinion to study a) the psychological user acceptance, and b) the technical user acceptance, of the Illustrator together with c) gathering opinions for future improvement. Three psychological aspects were rated before and after the sessions to measure psychological user acceptance. For technical user acceptance, seven fidelity levels of the Illustrator were evaluated regarding realism, limitation of performance and importance of realism after the sessions. The sessions consisted of WVR-scenarios. Four different questionnaires were used for data collection. Two fidelity levels showed to diverge from the others in many ways, and were identified as major problems by the participants. No change of the psychological aspects was found between measurements. According to the results of the evaluation, suggestions and guidelines for future development are presented. Finally, issues of interest for future research are proposed.

The reality of modern military training is the rapprochement of nations and the construction of military alliances to enhance nations defense cooperation and expand capabilities. Preparing for this scenario of cultural diversity is the challenge in designing military training programs for different groups. While training has a basic structure, different cultural environments require different approaches. Using a quantitative method, collected through a survey study, this thesis examines Brazilian and Swedish fighter pilots' perceptions of organizational culture and its impact on training. The flight simulator training environment was used for operationalization due to its characteristics of accessibility, fidelity to real operations, and flexibility in the training program.  The results showed that organizational culture was identified with a statistically significant difference in the indexes of individualism, masculinity, uncertainty avoidance, and indulgence between the two populations studied. This has implications for both training planning and capability management in the Air Force.