Fightersweep

Michele Rigby Assad is a former undercover officer in the National Clandestine Service of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. Trained as a counterterrorism specialist, Michele served her country for ten years, working in Iraq and other secret Middle Eastern locations. Upon retirement from active service, Michele and her husband (also a former agent) began leading […]

The United States employs the largest and most powerful fleet of aircraft carriers in the world, composed largely of the 100,000-plus-ton Nimitz-class and soon adding advanced Ford-class vessels to the operational mix. These ships provide the nation with its most potent force projection capabilities, and along with their accompanying strike groups, each represent more firepower […]

While tensions between the United States and Russia have increased in recent years thanks to Russian disinformation and espionage operations the world over, these two nations still maintain a number of security-centric treaties meant to diffuse the possibility of open war. While some of these treaties have been very publicly tossed aside in recent months, […]

Two Marine aviators were killed on Saturday when their AH-1Z Viper went down over Yuma, Arizona. They have now been identified as Maj. Matthew M. Wiegand, 34, of Ambler, Pennsylvania, and Capt. Travis W. Brannon, 30, of Nashville, Tennessee. The two Marine pilots we lost this weekend in an AH-1Z Viper accident have been identified […]

The United States’ Ground-based Midcourse Defense System has had its ups and downs over the years, but finally just showed it has what it takes to defend the country from an inbound nuclear missile launched from a nation like North Korea or Iran. In a first for the system, a salvo of two ground-based interceptors […]

The entire U.S. fleet of B-1B Lancer bombers has been grounded by the U.S. Air Force (USAF) after inspectors discovered a possible defect in the aircraft’s drogue parachute, which, according to a report from The Drive, is a component of the aircraft’s ejection seat. The drogue suit ensures the ejection seat remains level and oriented […]

The United States’ Ground-based Midcourse Defense System has had its ups and downs over the years, but finally just showed it has what it takes to defend the country from an inbound nuclear missile launched from a nation like North Korea or Iran. In a first for the system, a salvo of two ground-based interceptors […]

Ever since the first military drone took to the sky, pilots have wondered if their days in the fight were numbered. Drones, first relied on for reconnaissance, were soon armed and carrying out combat operations that used to fall solely to manned aircraft. Drones have grown to encompass more and more of the U.S. military’s […]

In July of 1947, something fell from the sky and crash landed in Mack Brazel’s ranch, just northwest of Roswell, New Mexico. According to the official story, it was an experimental weather balloon. If you listen to the long list of conspiracy theories surrounding the event, it was a spaceship from another world, crewed by […]

Although the secretive government facility in Nevada’s dry Groom Lake bed, known colloquially as Area 51, is most commonly associated with stories about flying saucers and little green men, the government has acknowledged in recent decades that it was actually the site responsible for testing some of the most advanced aircraft to ever take to […]

For a time, it seemed Russia was steaming toward fielding real fifth-generation stealth fighters, a development with serious security implications, based on the nation’s aggressive posture toward NATO and America’s reliance on air power in its style of warfare. As time wore on, however, cracks in Russia’s advanced fighter program began to show, culminating in […]

The use of drones has changed the way the U.S. and its competitors conduct combat operations. Yet despite the broad capabilities touted by America’s varied drone aircraft, some combat operations remain too complex for the pilotless planes. For years, air-to-air engagements were among those operations best left to manned aircraft–but that doesn’t mean drones won’t […]