The Air Force’s Active Duty component, the Air National Guard, and Air Force Reserve met their fiscal-year-to-date recruiting accession goals through March, the halfway point for Fiscal 2012, according to the Pentagon’s latest recruiting statistics, issued on April 23. In fact, after getting off to a slow start this fiscal year, the Air Guard is tracking slightly ahead at the midway point, having accepted 4,206 accessions, 14 more than its goal of 4,192, according to the Defense Department’s numbers. USAF’s Active Duty component attracted 14,353 recruits through March, exactly matching its goal. Similarly, the Reserve brought in 4,255 accessions, meeting its target. Among the other services, each Active Duty component at least met, if not slightly exceeded, its accession goals through March. Across their reserve components, only the Army National Guard fell short of its goal. (See also our coverage of February’s recruiting numbers.)
Army Gen. Christopher G. Cavoli, head of U.S. European Command, told lawmakers that F-16s fly every day in Ukraine, conducting bombing attacks and countering cruise missiles from Russia. The F-16s currently operating in Ukraine are “mainly from Netherlands and Denmark,” but more F-16s "prepared to be deployed" to Ukraine, Cavoli…