The Pic of the Day: F-35 takes off from Nellis Air Force Base

An F-35A Lightning II takes off at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev. Feb. 1, 2019. Pilots and maintainers from the 388th Fighter Wing’s 4th Fighter Squadron and 4th Aircraft Maintenance Unit are participating in exercise Red Flag 19-1. This is the wing’s second Red Flag with the F-35A, America’s most advanced multi-role fighter, which brings […]

Why one planning decision could be responsible for so many of the F-35’s woes

It can be tough to find stories about the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter that don’t go out of their way to paint the platform as either an incredibly overpriced boondoggle or the best thing to happen to military air power since the invention of nose-mounted radar. From an editorial standpoint, these “absolute good” and “absolute […]

On This Day in 1942, Gen. Douglas MacArthur Gives the “I Shall Return” Speech

In the early, dark days of World War II, the United States military in the Pacific theater was reeling. After the disastrous sneak attack on Pearl Harbor in December of 1941, the Japanese forces began a series of invasions across the Pacific and extended their empire nearly to the edges of Hawaii. American and Filipino […]

Could America’s secretive B-21 Raider already be flying?

Back in 1975, Lockheed’s legendary Skunk Works started tooling around with the Experimental Survivable Testbed (XST) program, also known as Project Harvey. Harvey soon led to the Hopeless Diamond, a shape developed using computers that experts agreed would offer the smallest radar return possible under their current computational restrictions. The Hopeless Diamond led to Have […]

Dunford Shoots Down WSJ Report of US Troops Remaining in Syria

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Joseph Dunford is denying an earlier Wall St. Journal report that the United States is planning on leaving 1000 U.S. troops in Syria, which is more than double what was initially reported. “A claim reported this evening by a major U.S. newspaper that the U.S. military is developing plans […]

End of an era: Pentagon to stop purchasing CH-47F Chinooks

In a small corner of the humongous 2020 U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) budget, among numerous procurement and upgrade projects, there’s notification that the DOD decided to halt the acquisition of the CH-47F Block II—the newest model of the venerable Chinook heavy-lift helicopter. The decision indicates the end of an era for the Chinook, as […]

The Pic of the Day: Giants in the mist

An Airman walks past multiple C-17 Globemaster IIIs at Joint Base Charleston, S.C., Feb. 21, 2019. Exercise Patriot Sands was a joint-service exercise coordinated by the Air Force Reserve, designed to integrate first responders from federal, state, local agencies and the military by providing quick response training in the event of a regional emergency or […]

The Pic of the Day: American Bone flying with a Qatari Mirage 2000

A U.S. Air Force B-1B Lancer bomber and a Qatari Mirage 2000 fly in formation, Feb. 19, 2019. The aircraft participated with regional partners to test objective-based command and control actions during Joint Air Defense Exercise 19-01.   U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Clayton Cupit

The Skyborg Program: The Air Force’s new plan to give fighter pilots drone sidekicks

The Australian government and Boeing recently unveiled their plans for a “Loyal Wingman” drone system that would provide multiple support drones for fighters, bombers, and even unarmed aircraft during combat operations. Now, the U.S. Air Force has begun touting a new endeavor, dubbed “Skyborg,” that could take the Loyal Wingman concept to the next level. […]