What are the chances of “Building a Multinational Global Navigation Satellite System”? It may not have the answer, but RAND analysts, in a new paper, note some possible benefits, such as “increased performance in accuracy.” For decades, the US Air Force’s Global Position System has been the preeminent navigation and timing system, used by military and civilian customers around the world. Free to customers. In advancing its own GPS-type system—Galileo—Europe is about to upset the apple cart. RAND says that the coexistence of the two poses “technical, geopolitical, regulatory, national security, and economic issues.”
The Collaborative Combat Aircraft will be operational in the late 2020s, several years before the Next-Generation Air Dominance family of systems, Air Force officials told the House Armed Services tactical aviation panel. The CCAs will first be “shooters,” then electronic warfare platforms, then sensors, in that order, they added.