The second version of the Collaborative Combat Aircraft should have more capability than the first but mustn't be an "exquisite" and expensive platform that would defeat the notion of "affordable mass," outgoing Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said.
Operational Imperatives
The appearance of new Chinese combat aircraft in recent weeks—potentially a new bomber and medium bomber, a smaller, fighter-size aircraft, and a new AWACS platform, among others—didn’t influence current Air Force leadership’s recent decisions on the Next-Generation Air Dominance program or the service’s broader strategic ...
Over its 20 years of service, the MQ-9 Reaper drone has typically landed on paved runways, where it is rearmed and refueled by a large group of maintainers and support staff. But a recent Agile Combat Employment exercise saw Air Force Special Operations Command land an ...
The Air Force is collecting data from flight tests of a subscale version of its Blended-Wing Body demonstrator, and using that data to revise the full-scale aircraft’s control software and final configuration—the first flight of which remains on track for 2027. Full-scale test parts, including ...
Outgoing Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall thinks accelerating the Collaborative Combat Aircraft program will be his biggest legacy, as they will be "transformative" of how the service fights.
There’s a clear consensus within the Pentagon that the Space Force needs more money to tackle its growing mission and support the joint force—but don’t go raiding the Air Force’s budget to provide it, Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall said Dec. 19.
Small drones were spotted flying over Air Force bases in Utah, Ohio, and Germany this month, Air & Space Forces Magazine has confirmed—in addition to the arrest of a Chinese citizen who allegedly used a drone to snap photos of a Space Force base—as a ...
The Air Force has a word of caution for those who are urging that autonomous systems supplant crewed platforms: we still need a human in the loop.
The first iteration of the Pentagon’s Replicator initiative should achieve its goals of providing thousands of cheap, autonomous platforms in all combat domains by July 2025, the deputy director of the Defense Innovation Unit said Dec. 12.