The two competitors left out in the cold on the Combat Search and Rescue aircraft replacement program have decided to protest the Air Force decision to award the CSAR-X contract—potentially worth up to $15 billion—to Boeing. Sikorsky hoped to sell the Air Force an advanced version of its Hawk helicopter—the H-92 Superhawk—to replace the service’s fleet of Sikorsky HH-60 Pave Hawks. It filed its protest with the Government 
Accountability Office on Nov. 17. The Lockheed Martin-Agusta Westland team, which had high hopes for its new US101 aircraft since the Marine Corps tapped it to replace the Presidential helicopters, filed a CSAR-X protest on Nov. 20. Air Force leaders already have defended their selection, saying that Boeing could deliver its product sooner than the other two competitors. The GAO has until late February to render a decision in both cases.
The United Kingdom’s Royal Air Force has unveiled a new electronic warfare drone designed to fly with fighter jets into contested airspace, including alongside its fleet of F-35s. RAF says it plans to develop models that draw on the U.S. Air Force’s approach of mating unmanned systems with crewed platforms.