An Aircraft Investment Plan through 2040 reportedly submitted to Congress along with the Fiscal 2011 budget is not meant to be a definitive schedule, according to Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz. In an interview with the Daily Report Wednesday, Schwartz explained: “I think it is a plan for the department. It is not a contract. But I think it gives the Hill a sense of what the general themes are.” Schwartz specifically corrected one aspect of the plan, which asserts that an F-22 air superiority replacement would be required around 2025, versus a new bomber that Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Tuesday will be along in “the late 2020s.” Schwartz said, “I think the Long Range Strike platform will certainly precede an F-22 replacement, in my view.” (Aircraft Investment Plan)
A provision in the fiscal 2025 defense policy bill will require the Defense Department to include the military occupational specialty of service members who die by suicide in its annual report on suicide deaths, though it remains to be seen how much data the department will actually disclose.