The Pentagon’s point man for the Congressionally directed conversion of civilian employees from the National Security Personnel System said last week he expected the task to be done a year ahead of schedule for the majority of civilians. The Defense Department announced last month the appointment of John James Jr. to lead the effort to move more than 200,000 employees from NSPS back to the old General Schedule system by January 2012 as Congress directed in the 2010 defense authorization act. James said he is “committed to ensure … that employees experience no loss of, or decrease in, pay upon conversion.”
Due to the prolonged delay in deliveries of the Tech Refresh 3 version of the F-35 fighter, Denmark is pulling six of its TR-2-configured F-35 jets stationed in the U.S. back to home base in order to consolidate aircraft and get better training for its pilots and maintainers, the Danish…