The House Appropriations Committee in its report on the 2008 defense spending bill has noted “technical maturity problems” with the new active electronically scanned array radar antenna destined for the B-2 bomber. The AESA radar is just one part of a larger modernization program begun on the stealth bomber in 2004, but it has taken on new significance of late because the Air Force must move the B-2 from its current spectrum to a new spectrum. Why? As the committee explains in its report (the radar portion here), the Defense Department doesn’t “own” the current spectrum in which the B-2 operates, and the Commerce Department plans to expand the number of primary users, edging out secondary users like the B-2. To move the B-2 off that spectrum, the Air Force must modify the aircraft’s radar. The service expected the new AESA to take care of that issue, in addition to improving the aircraft’s targeting capability; however, now, it appears the AESA “maturity” problems will overreach the date upon which the service planned to change the B-2 spectrum. That date is classified, and the committee simply noted it as “near-term.”

The spectrum problem surfaced earlier this year during a House Armed Services Committee’s AirLand panel hearing at which Lt. Gen. Donald Hoffman, USAF military acquisition deputy, explained that DOD doesn’t have enough spectrum for its needs, and, in the case...

Air Force B-1B bomber units send aircrews into action in Southwest Asia ahead of their unit rotation to fly missions with the current bomber crews—forming “rainbow crews”—to gain experience on current theater operations, reports SrA. Clark Staehle. In the latest...

Airmen flying out of Forward Operating Location Manta in Ecuador plan to shift their FOL but not reduce their efforts toward US counterdrug operations, reports Louis Arana-Barradas. The President of Ecuador has told the US that he wants to end...

The Air Force on Aug. 1 dissolved its segrated space operations function—the Directorate of Strategic Security or A3S—within the Air Staff. Now, SSgt. Monique Randolph reports that space matters will be handled within operations (A3O), requirements (A5R), operational planning, policy,...

There may still be some friction between the Air Force and the ground forces, particularly the Army, over USAF’s bid to become executive agent for higher-flying unmanned aerial vehicles, but the air and sea services have come together as “strategic...

The contractor working under privatized housing agreements at four bases—Hanscom AFB, Mass., Little Rock AFB, Ark., Moody AFB, Ga., and Patrick AFB, Fla., has run into serious trouble at all four projects. American Eagle Communities is one of several companies...

US Air Force Security Forces airmen at Kunsan AB, South Korea, recently conducted training exercises to sort out tactics and techniques with South Korean anti-aircraft artillery forces that now form part of Kunsan’s defense plan should hostilities erupt on the...

The Defense Department has identified the remains of two airmen—Lt. Col. James H. Ayres of Pampa, Tex., and Lt. Col. Charles W. Stratton of Dallas—missing in action from the Vietnam War. On Jan. 3, 1971, Ayres and Stratton flew their...

Aug. 1-2, 2007 Sortie Type OIF OEF OIF/OEF Total ISR 26 21 47 CAS/Armed Recon 96 74 170 Airlift 269 269 Air refueling 90 90 Total 122 95 359 576 OIF=Operation Iraqi Freedom OEF=Operation Enduring Freedom ISR=Intelligence-surveillance-reconnaissance Airlift includes Horn...