House Armed Services Chairman Duncan Hunter maintains that the Pentagon has a penchant for “increasingly expensive” platforms and ultimately does not “deploy these more expensive systems in sufficient numbers to sustain operational needs.” He wants to change that. In presenting his committee’s version of the 2007 defense authorization bill, Hunter declared, “This committee will insure that we are making the right tradeoffs between cost, new technology, and deployable numbers.” Hunter has been a chief critic of what he calls “budget-driven” Pentagon assessments of operational needs.
Members of the Air Force Reserve’s 920th Rescue Wing helped save 11 airplane crash survivors off the coast of Florida on May 12. The Reserve Airmen were flying an HC-130J Combat King II and an HH-60W Jolly Green II on a routine training flight when a Coast Guard call diverted…