The Air Force awarded Boeing a $500 million contract to transition from production of the C-17 transport to post-production support, announced the Pentagon. “The contract allows the US Air Force to purchase critical spare assemblies and also allows for post-production planning of the C-17 program,” Bob Ceisla, Boeing’s airlift vice president, told the Daily Report on July 11. “This is the beginning of a 10-year process . . . to leverage cost-effective purchases of critical parts to support the C-17 during its operational lifetime,” he added. Boeing builds the C-17 at its plant in Long Beach, Calif. The company plans to deliver the Air Force’s 224th and likely final C-17 next May, but it is still courting international customers, said Ceisla. “We are actively pursuing international sales and see strong customer interest in the capabilities only the C-17 can deliver,” he noted. Boeing delivered the 27th international C-17 to the United Arab Emirates in May.
The defense intelligence community has tried three times in the past decade to build a “common intelligence picture”—a single data stream providing the information that commanders need to make decisions about the battlefield. The first two attempts failed. But officials say things are different today.