The Air Force had made air refueling certification training part of its regular mission planning in Southwest Asia to ensure it has C-17 airlift crews who can transport wounded troops more quickly to medical help outside SWA, sometimes directly to the US. Maintaining air refueling skills requires practice, and having to land to refuel carves a huge chunk of time out of critical medical evacuation flights. Initially, air expeditionary force rotations tried to conduct the training on an ad hoc basis, reports SSgt. Jasmine Reif, but that proved too haphazard, producing only one in 25 opportunities to train. The scheduled practice sessions enable the C-17 crews to have the necessary sustained contact with a tanker to provide refueling certification, and no fuel has to flow between aircraft, keeping the tankers full to fulfill operational needs.
The Pentagon fulfilled Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's promise to slash the number of Religious Affiliation Codes used by the military to track the volume of members adhering to different religions and to shape the chaplain corps to support them. The change reduces the number of religions counted for such purposes…