For years, Rep. Rob Wittman, R-Va,. was known as a leading voice on naval matters in Congress. But with the 118th Congress, Wittman has left his ship committee behind and taken on the role of chairman on the House Armed Services Committee’s tactical air and land forces subcommittee. Following a subcommittee hearing on March 29, Breaking Defense sat down with Wittman to discuss his key priorities for the Air Force.
More military families could soon be eligible to apply for a new monthly cash allowance meant to alleviate food insecurity as the Pentagon plans to expand the pool of those who qualify in July, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said late last month. The Basic Needs Allowance, or BNA, began this year and is currently only for service members who have dependents and whose gross household income fell below 130% of the federal poverty level for their family size and location. To qualify, their income must have fallen below the threshold in both the previous calendar year and annualized for the current year.
Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall has defined seven Operational Imperatives for the Department of the Air Force to work on, warning that “if we don't get them right, we will have unacceptable operational risk.” From a resilient space order of battle to the development of next-generation tactical air dominance and global strike platforms, these imperatives will define the Air Force for decades to come—Dive deeper into each one with our new “Operational Imperatives” pages highlighting all the latest news and developments on these critical efforts.
Air Force recruiters have made gains in new enlistments over the past few months, but the service still projects it will fall thousands of Airmen short in critical units next year. “We’re currently down 900 maintainers that will not show up for shift change tonight on the flight line,” Chief Master Sgt. W. Frank Rawls, the Recruiting Service’s operations superintendent, wrote in an organization-wide email on Wednesday. “Unless we stop the bleeding, 700 defenders, who are badly needed to keep watch over our missile fields and checkpoints, won’t be there come [Sept. 30].”
The vast landmass of Australia, possessed of clear skies free of city lights or pollution, is the perfect spot to place the most acute space situational awareness systems. Which is why Brig. Gen. Anthony Mastalir, the head of Space Forces Indo-Pacific says it’s “absolutely critical” to get a new radar system there as quickly as can be.
It might not be as well-known as some of the Pentagon’s more high-profile teams working to enable new civil-military technology collaboration—but the National Security Innovation Network is generating connections and resources to help convert some of the most nascent concepts with big potential for the military into minimum viable products or prototypes.
Northrop Grumman is developing a geostationary communications satellite that will compete against a Boeing design in a military procurement estimated to be worth $2.4 billion. Boeing and Northrop Grumman were selected in 2020 by the U.S. Space Force to develop Protected Tactical Satcom prototype payloads, known as PTS. Both payloads passed government design reviews and were cleared for on-orbit demonstrations planned in 2025.
Dozens of leaked Defense Department classified documents posted online reveal details of U.S. spying on Russia’s war machine in Ukraine and secret assessments of Ukraine’s combat power, as well as intelligence gathering on America’s allies, including South Korea and Israel. NBC News obtained more than 50 of the leaked documents, many of them labeled “Top Secret,” the highest level of classification.
For more than a year, Ukrainian air defenses, reinforced by Western weaponry, have kept Russian planes at bay. But without a huge influx of munitions, Ukraine’s entire air defense network, weakened by repeated barrages from Russian drones and missiles, could fracture, according to U.S. officials and newly leaked Pentagon documents, potentially allowing President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia to unleash his lethal fighter jets in ways that could change the course of the war.
In Episode 123 of the Aerospace Advantage podcast, John Baum chats with drone experts Sam Bendett of the Center for Naval Analysis and Mitchell Institute’s own Dr. Caitlin Lee. The war in Ukraine has turned the world’s attention to the game-changing potential of networked, autonomous drone technologies. But to what extent are the lessons learned from Ukraine relevant to the Indo-Pacific theater? In this episode, Baum, Bendett, and Lee discuss the range of drone technologies and concepts that have been employed by both Russia and Ukraine and share some thoughts on how these observations should shape thinking about the capabilities, forces, and postures necessary for drones to make a difference in a U.S.-China conflict.
The Kirtland Air Force Base Trestle Facility is arguably one of the largest all-wood structures in the world, an engineering marvel and a landmark of the Cold War. The reason for the Trestle and its all-wood design was to test the effects of electromagnetic pulse, generated during a nuclear explosion, on operational aircraft.