United States
Australia
United Kingdom
Europe
New Zealand
Canada
Senior leaders from the Air Force Reserve used two of the world’s largest airpower gatherings to formalize new avenues of cooperation with allied forces, signing Terms of Reference with counterparts from the United Kingdom, the Philippines and the Netherlands on July 16-17.
Lt. Gen. John P. Healy, Chief of the Air Force Reserve and Commander of Air Force Reserve Command, and Chief Master Sgt. Israel Nuñez, the senior enlisted advisor to the chief of the Air Force Reserve, met with allied air chiefs during the 2026 Global Air & Space Chiefs’ Conference and the Royal International Air Tattoo 2026. The bilateral engagements centered on strengthening interoperability and expanding international partnerships through the Reserve Allies & Partners Program, an initiative aimed at enhancing collective readiness.
“I get the opportunity to network and have a dialogue with every one of these air chiefs,” Healy said. “It’s a wonderful opportunity to build rapport and coalition, then from there discuss how we can help each other in the future.”
The agreements are designed to institutionalize long-term collaboration through recurring engagements and shared professional development. They also align with the Department of the Air Force’s emphasis on Total Force Integration, creating opportunities to share expertise and improve participating nations’ ability to operate together during future operations and contingencies.
“The sum of the parts are better than the individuals every time,” Healy said. “Whenever we’re able to build that interoperability, we’re able to leverage what we know and what they know in order to make both of our units stronger and more effective in the future.”
Allied leaders used the forums to exchange lessons learned and best practices and to build on one another’s operational experience. “We want them to learn from our successes and our failures,” Nuñez said. “We’re not saying what is correct but sharing how we employ in our capacity.”
“This solidifies a way forward for us to ensure that each year we’re doing exercises and mil-to-mil engagements together,” Healy said. “That same interoperability and those same interconnections we’re trying to solidify to make them deliberate, not accidental.”
