The 11th Air Force met last week with civil aviation officials in Alaska to chart a new airspace use standard now that Pacific Air Forces has expanded training exercises being run out of Eielson and Elmendorf Air Force Bases to include Red Flag-Alaska, a larger venue than the Cope Thunder exercise it replaced. (The first Red Flag-Alaska for 2007 has just gotten underway.) “We’re now trying to execute a large, Air Force-level exercise in an area that’s not ideally designed to execute that,” explains Col. Jack Gregory, 11th AF vice commander. An Eielson release notes that USAF officials in Alaska routinely meet with civil aviation authorities twice a year and have frequent operational contact.
A new report from the Government Accountability Office calls for the Pentagon’s Chief Technology Officer to have budget certification authority over the military services’ research and development accounts—a move the services say would add a burdensome and unnecessary layer of bureaucracy.
