Daily Report

An Air Force F-15E crashed Wednesday approximately 15 miles outside of a base in Southwest Asia, killing one crew member and injuring the second, announced Air Forces Central officials. Emergency response personnel brought the injured crew member to a military medical facility for treatment of minor injuries, they said. The Air Force has not released the name of the deceased airman, pending notification of kin. What is known is that the aircrew was deployed to the region from Mountain Home AFB, Idaho. "This is obviously a very sad day for the Gunfighters, as we mourn the loss of one of our warriors," said Col. Ron Buckley, commander of Mountain Home's 366th Fighter Wing, in a release. "Our thoughts and prayers are with his family and friends during this time." The cause of the incident is under investigation. More details will be released as they become available, said the AFCENT officials.

While the regime of Kim Jong Un is consolidating power, North Korea has given every indication it will proceed with a planned mid April launch of a long-range ballistic missile with a satellite aboard, said Peter Lavoy, acting assistant secretary of defense for Asia and Pacific security affairs. Lavoy told the House Armed Services Committee Wednesday that the launch would be "highly provocative" because it would reflect Pyongyang's desire to expand its long-range ballistic missile capabilities and is in defiance of United Nations resolutions prohibiting its from launching ballistic missiles. Already the United States has voided a recent bilateral agreement with Pyongyang on food aid, said Lavoy. The United States has very little confidence in the stability of the launch and where the missile's actual impact would be, he added. Several countries could be affected with debris, such as Japan and South Korea, and the intended impact area is likely close to Indonesia and the Philippines, he said. "I can assure you that we're consulting with all of the countries affected about measures to be taken," he said. (Lavoy's written testimony)

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) praised the Defense Department for its "clear commitment" to modernizing the nuclear triad despite tough economic times during Wednesday's hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee's strategic forces panel. However, he noted that sustaining and modernizing the triad will not be cheap, citing an estimated $120 billion cost just over the next decade. A modernized tried must be affordable, said Sessions, the panel's ranking member. "Uncontrollable cost, perhaps more than anything else, could be a threat to our ensuring it in the future," he asserted. He expressed his support "to do whatever is possible to modernize our nuclear weapons," but he also acknowledged that he's "been taken aback" by the estimated cost of $8 billion or more to build a new uranium-processing facility and a plutonium-handling facility for the nuclear weapons complex. Madelyn Creedon, assistant secretary of defense for global strategic affairs, said the Pentagon's Fiscal 2013 budget request generally protects the nuclear modernization initiatives despite "some adjustments in some of the schedules of programs," like the two-year slip to the fielding of the Ohio-class replacement submarine. "Where we are all concerned, and where we have work to do, is in the outyears," she said. (Creedon-Weber joint statement)

The Senate approved the President’s nomination of Lt. Gen. Janet Wolfenbarger to receive a fourth star for her new assignment as commander of Air Force Materiel Command at Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio. She becomes the Air Force’s first female four-star general....

The Air Force sharply reduced the scope of its planned military construction activities in Fiscal 2013 compared to this fiscal year, but anticipates that it will ramp up construction work again starting in Fiscal 2014, said Terry Yonkers, the service’s...

Senior US and Japanese military leaders gathered at Yokota AB, Japan, to celebrate the beginning of Air Defense Command operations at the base, located west of Tokyo. The Japan Air Self Defense Force relocated its ADC headquarters to Yokota from...

The Air Force’s Vietnam War-era UH-1N helicopter does not meet the requirements for protecting the nation’s ICBM fields and there are not enough of them to support the continuity-of-government mission in the nation’s capital, two headquarters-level generals told lawmakers. Yet,...

Air Force Global Strike Command has declared 2012 the “Year of the B-52” in honor of the 50th anniversary of the last delivery of a Stratofortress to Minot AFB, N.D., and the 60th anniversary of the first test flight of...

More than 40 members of the Virginia Air National Guard’s 192nd Medical Group earlier this month completed a 12-day deployment to Kauai, Hawaii, where they participated in the first Tropic Care innovative readiness training operation. Tropic Care brought together nearly...

The Air Force accepted its 184th F-22 production fighter, leaving just three more F-22s to go to complete the service’s program of record. Raptor 4192 was delivered to JB Langley-Eustis, Va., its beddown location, after its acceptance on March 23...