The Pentagon has directed USAF to speed up work toward a new long-range strike aircraft, advancing the “to be fielded” date from 2037 to 2018. Ken Kreig, for one, sees no problem with advancing the program by nearly 20 years. The Pentagon acquisition chief told reporters on Feb. 10, “I think there’s a lot of time.” He prefaced that by saying the Air Force needs to conduct an analysis of alternatives to focus on the different ways to create a desired “set of effects” and then he said, “One … tries to figure out what the acquisition strategy is.” Where is H.G. Wells when you need him?
The Air Force is targeting August 2027 for its new T-7A Red Hawk trainer jet to reach its initial operational capability. To get there, the head of Air and Education Training has three milestones he needs to see the program hit.
