NATIONAL HARBOR: Boeing’s proposed Block III upgrade to the Super Hornet would be a “fairly high-end” complement to the F-35C Joint Strike Fighter, acting Navy Secretary Sean Stackley believes. Instead of seeing Super Hornets as a potential replacement for the F-35 — as President Trump proposed — Stackley and other naval leaders at the Sea-Air-Space conference…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.Why cloud modernization is critical to multi-domain operations
JADC2 is a forcing function, driving digital transformation of network infrastructure.
AFA HQ: William Roper, the man who’s helping shape that future at the well-named Strategic Capabilities Office, told a packed room here that “stealth won’t last forever;” that adapting to the new version of war he’s helping the country ready for “is going to be harder for the Air Force than the other services;” that…
By Colin Clark
WASHINGTON: “You get whacked a lot.” Those are the words of someone who should know, the leader of the aggressor squadron at Red Flag, the man who tries to kill U.S. forces. Lt. Col. Tyler Lewis, commander of the 57th Adversary Tactics Support Squadron at Nellis Air Force Base, echoed comments we’ve heard before, that…
By Colin Clark
On January 19, the Air Force struck Libya to halt terrorist activity using B-2 stealth bombers. This was not the first strike against Libya. A mix of U.S. Air Force and U.S. Navy fighters conducted strikes 30 years ago against Libya in response to terrorist acts in Europe. A comparison of the two raids illustrates the…
By David Deptula
President-Elect Trump’s recent announcement that he is considering acquiring the F/A-18 Super Hornet in place of the F-35 Lightning II does not add up for a leader who seeks “to make America great again.” Too much is at stake for the United States to rely on a fighter aircraft design whose roots extend back to…
By Doug Birkey
WASHINGTON: Just hours after the President-Elect tweeted F-35 costs were “out of control,” sending manufacturer Lockheed Martin‘s stock price into a nosedive, the first two F-35s to be based abroad landed in their new home country, Israel. Is the famously hard-nosed Israeli Defense Force deceived about what they’re getting for their money? Or is the…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
B-21, hypersonics and more: How digital development is driving industry innovation
Technological advancements are key to keeping pace with customer demands and evolving threat landscapes.
CAPITOL HILL: How smart is too smart? When F-35 Joint Strike Fighters flew simulated combat missions around Eglin Air Force Base in Florida, their pilots couldn’t see the “enemy” radars on their screens. Why? The F-35s’ on-board computers analyzed data from the airplanes’ various sensors, compared the readings to known threats, and figured out the…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
WASHINGTON: If you were hoping, after a bitterly contentious presidential campaign, that at least we’d have consensus on national defense spending…tough luck. Instead, teams from five leading thinktanks — spanning the political spectrum but all using the same budget simulator — came up with a more than $2 trillion spread of options. They debated their plans…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
PENTAGON: I thought I could hear Air Force and allied F-35 pilots around the world smiling when the new Air Force Chief of Staff said today that comparing the F-35 to the Chinese J-20 “is almost an irrelevant comparison.” The F-35, said Gen. David Goldfein, is “about a family of systems and it’s about a network — that’s what…
By Colin Clark
UPDATED: Adds ACC Carlisle, CSAF Goldfein, SecAF James JPO Bogdan Comments PENTAGON: Critics of the F-35 warned it was too heavy. They warned its stealth wasn’t good enough. They warned stealth, however good, wasn’t enough against advanced detection methods. They warned its range was too short and its weapons load too light. They warned it was…
By Colin Clark
Critics of US nuclear modernization claim the Long-Range Stand-Off (LRSO) weapon — an aircraft-launched nuclear cruise missile — can be eliminated without harming America’s security interests. But the LRSO provides America with a unique capability to deter adversaries from using nuclear force and projects credible power while keeping US forces safe. Updated standoff weapons ensure…
By Constance Baroudos and Peter Huessy
CORRECTED: Navy says new drone will have “limited strike” capability PENTAGON: After more than a year of intense debate over whether the Navy’s future UCLASS drone should be a long-range stealth bomber or a lightly armed scout, the Defense Department has chosen — neither. Instead, the 2017 budget proposes a program that is less ambitious…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
Dave Deptula was arguably the key player in air power during the world’s first precision guided war, Desert Storm. He offers the principal lessons learned during that war on its quarter-century anniversary. He takes those lessons and applies them to the current fight against the terrorists, murderers, thugs and rapists who comprise ISIL, which we call…
By David Deptula
Today’s United States Air Force faces a stark challenge: securing the sky in the face of ever increasing threats. Decades of deferred investment and an increasingly unstable world make this a critical issue facing the new Trump administration. Over 3/4 of the current Air Force fighter fleet is comprised of 1960s and 1970s designs that average…
By David Deptula