Operation Noble Eagle—the long-running homeland air defense mission that has consumed some 43,000 sorties since the 9/11 terrorist attacks—is a stateside endeavor but that doesn’t mean it can sustain itself without deployments. NORAD reports that several thousand airmen deploy each year to support ONE.
When Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Air Force Gen. Dan Caine described the 150 aircraft used in Operation Absolute Resolve, the mission to capture Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, he referenced many by name, including the F-35 and F-22 fighters and B-1 bomber. Not specified, however, were “remotely piloted drones,” among them a secretive aircraft spotted and photographed returning to Puerto…
