F-15Es struck enemy combatants and a weapons cache with 500-pound joint direct attack munitions and a 2,000-pound JDAM near Worzhanah Kalay, Afghanistan, on July 11, Air Forces Central said in a release. These strikes were part of the 65 close air support missions flown by coalition aircraft in the Near East nation on that day, An F-15E also dropped a 500-pound JDAM on enemy forces in the vicinity of Gereshk and A-10s fired cannon rounds at enemy units near Nangalam and hit them with general-purpose 500-pound bombs, AFCENT said. In Iraq there were 51 CAS missions, including a B-1B bomber attacking enemy bunkers in the vicinity of Baqubah with 2,000-pound JDAMs.
While U.S. defense officials have spent much of the past decade warning that China is the nation’s pacing threat and its People’s Liberation Army represents an urgent threat in the Indo-Pacific, several defense researchers are skeptical that the PLA has the human capital, the structural ability, or the political appetite…