Leaked images of Russia's new F-35-class single-engine jet fighter suggest the aircraft borrows from U.S. Joint Strike Fighter designs, resembling both Boeing's X-32 and McDonnell Douglas' JSF in some key aspects. The fighter, to be formally unveiled July 20, joins a crowding field of F-35 ...
The Air Force has awarded a $2 billion contract to Raytheon Missiles and Defense to engineer and develop the Long Range Standoff weapon system, the service’s next-generation air-launched nuclear missile. The deal, announced July 1, is for the engineering and manufacturing development phase and is ...
The State Department has approved the potential sale of a dozen F-16 jets, plus AGM-84 Harpoon missiles and AIM-9X Sidewinder missiles, to the Philippines, the Defense Security Cooperation Agency announced June 24. All told, the sales would total up to nearly $2.9 billion, with the ...
The Space Force plans to try out a used rocket booster—a first under the National Security Space Launch program—when it launches the fifth GPS III satellite on June 17. The new satellite likely will amount to a modest improvement in GPS location accuracy but with ...
The Air Force's fiscal 2022 budget request for munitions cuts deeply into production of staples like the Joint Direct Attack Munition bomb and Hellfire missile. The service, however, promises its stockpiles are adequate and that it needs to invest in new munitions that are better ...
The F-16, in service since the 1970s, could be flying with the Air Force into the late 2030s and with foreign air services into the 2070s, based on recently revealed USAF plans and Lockheed Martin's backorder of jets.
The F-35 has problems, but its operational success and critical role in future conflicts outweigh them, said Rep. Anthony Brown during the McAleese FY2022 Defense Programs Conference on May 12. He urged that the services' 2022 F-35 request—as well as any congressional adds—be supported by ...
Lockheed Martin is withdrawing personnel who support Iraq’s F-16 fleet from a major operating base because of threats from militias in the region, a step that will likely limit the fleet’s operations. The move comes after contractors temporarily left the base in recent months because ...
Iranian-backed militias have focused attacks on key bases in Iraq, prompting U.S. contractors to leave the Iraqi Air Force’s major F-16 base as the country’s Fighting Falcons are working to increase their capacity to train and conduct airstrikes, according to a new report. The militias ...
Raytheon Intelligence and Space on April 30 received a $228 million contract for the Global Positioning System Next-Generation Operational Control System Follow-On from Space Force’s Space and Missile Systems Center. Known as OCX 3F, the program builds on ground control station improvements made in Blocks ...
The F-35's program director promised Congress an F-35 sustainment strategy this summer, but said it's unlikely he'll achieve the elusive goal of $25,000 cost per flying hour by 2025. Negotiating three one-year sustainment deals is a "carrot" to get a better deal from Lockheed Martin ...
House Armed Services leaders say they'll move to block adding more F-35s than requested in the fiscal 2022 budget, in hopes of letting the overtaxed sustainment system for the fighter “catch up” to the fleet already in place. Without action on sustainment costs, the Air ...