The U.S. has been flying MQ-9 drones over Gaza as Washington is trying to gather information about American and other hostages held by Hamas and other militants there. The flights, which the Pentagon acknowledged Nov. 3, began after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel that ...
The 55th Operations Group flies RC-135 jets on intelligence-gathering missions all over the world with a small fleet of just 28 aircraft.
The Air Force’s 55th Operations Group is standing up a small detachment at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska to help launch and recover jets from the RC-135 family of intelligence and reconnaissance platforms as they conduct operations and exercises over the Indo-Pacific.
A Chinese fighter jet conducted an “unnecessarily aggressive” maneuver in front of a U.S. Air Force RC-135 last week, U.S. Indo-Pacific Command announced May 30, releasing footage of the incident. The intercept, which took place May 26, happened over the South China Sea in international airspace.
U.S. officials expressed growing concern April 18 about the lack of communication between the Chinese and American militaries in light of increasingly aggressive actions by Beijing. It has now been nearly five months since Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III last spoke to his ...
The Air Force has ordered safety inspections for its entire fleets of KC-135 tankers, RC-135 reconnaissance planes, and WC-135 “nuke sniffers” over poorly-made tail pins, preventing aircraft from flying until they are cleared. The Time Compliance Technical Order (TCTO), issued Feb. 14, affects hundreds of aircraft. ...
The Pentagon is tracking what it says is a Chinese surveillance balloon over the continental United States, it said Feb. 2. The U.S. military scrambled two Air Force F-22 Raptors from Nellis Air Force Base, Nev. on Feb. 1 in response to the incident, Air ...
Despite a public plea by Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III to open up lines of communications following a dangerous near-miss between American and Chinese jets last month, the U.S. and China have not held top-level military conversations recently, and there are no set ...
The American and Chinese militaries are trading blame after a close call between two warplanes over the South China Sea on Dec. 21, as a Chinese fighter jet came within a few yards of a U.S. Air Force RC-135 Rivet Joint over the South China ...
Legacy aircraft such as the KC-10, KC-135, E-8C JSTARS, RC-135, and RQ-4 all flew over eastern NATO allies including Poland and Romania in response to Russian aggression. But these platforms still need to be retired so the Air Force can modernize, Chief of Staff Gen. ...
As the United States closes out its participation in the 1992 Open Skies Treaty, some in government are starting to consider what might come next for the Air Force unit that has handled those foreign surveillance flights for decades. Lawmakers earlier this month released a ...
Every year, Congress and the military debate which combat assets should head to the boneyard and which have more life left in them. Lawmakers often opt to keep Air Force systems that bring jobs to their districts, which complicates matters as the service looks to ...