Missouri Congressman Ike Skelton, ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, paid a visit recently to the Norfolk, Va., headquarters of US Joint Forces Command to see just what the command leading the Pentagon’s transformation effort is doing. Skelton got the complete dog and pony round of briefings and demonstrations. He marveled at the “new age in warfare,” saying “futurist information-type thinking” must receive “additional attention and additional resources.” The veteran lawmaker said, “We don’t get much of this advanced jointness in our hearings back in Washington.”
The Air Force said May 4 it has approved the T-7A Red Hawk trainer aircraft to move into low-rate production and awarded Boeing a $219 million contract to start building the first 14 production jets.