T-7 Making Progress on New Ejection Seat, on Track for November 2027 IOC

May 7, 2025 | By Unshin Lee Harpley

The Air Force announced a successful ejection seat test for its T-7A trainer, and an official told lawmakers the service expects the jet to achieve initial operating capability by November 2027—two signs of progress for the program after many setbacks.

“We worked with our training community to make sure we are meeting AETC IOC requirement of November 2027,” Darlene Costello, the service’s principal deputy assistant secretary for acquisition, technology, and logistics told the House Armed Services Committee hearing on May. 7.

Costello’s remarks offer more clarity after the Air Force announced in January it was changing its acquisition plan for the T-7 in a bid to reach IOC sometime in 2027.

The announcement also follows a recent test at Holloman Air Force Base, N.M., to evaluate the newly installed canopy and ejection system of the T-7 aircraft. Boeing recently redesigned the canopy to safely break apart, preventing injuries from shattered glass, and added a new seat sequencer that deploys the parachute for a longer duration, reducing the risk of neck and spine injuries during descent. Last month, the 846th Test Squadron tested the T-7’s revamped escape mechanism with both light and heavy mannequins during a 450-knot (518 mph) ejection. The egress system is scheduled for another test in August.

The Air Force Life Cycle Management Center’s T-7A Red Hawk program achieved a major milestone as the 846th Test Squadron at Holloman Air Force Base, N.M., executed a high-speed test of its new escape system on April 16. (Courtesy photo)

The new trainer aircraft, developed to replace the 60-year-old T-38 Talon, boasts a single engine, twin fins, and stadium seating, providing unobstructed views for both the instructor and student pilots—something the T-38 lacks—while aiming to significantly reduce the time required to train fighter and bomber pilots.

But the production has faced safety-related setbacks during testing, pushed key milestones back time and time again.

In 2021, the Air Force revealed that the T-7 suffered from “aircraft wing rock” at high angles of attack, making it unstable in the roll axis. In late 2022, the Air Force and Boeing announced problems with the flight control software and escape system, stemming in part from the need for the seat to accommodate a wider range of body sizes. Faulty instruments also led to inaccurate testing data. And in early 2024, Boeing identified quality problems with some T-7 parts.

“We’ve now resolved the known ground-based training system requirements,” Costello added. “We’ve resolved the stability concerns; we did that in March of this year. Now, we’re working towards delivery to Randolph by October of this year. A recent qualification sled test on the egress system demonstrated optimal performance, so it’s showing good progress.”

In March, Boeing revealed that initial T-7A trainer production units are expected to be delivered in early 2026. Joint Base San Antonio-Randolph will receive the ground-based simulator this year ahead of its first T-7 deliveries scheduled for next year.

“The T-7A Red Hawk beddown is currently projected for [fiscal 2026], and the 99th Flying Training Squadron is set to be the first unit in the Air Force to receive the aircraft,” a spokesperson for the 12th Flying Training Wing at JBSA previously told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

Boeing teamed up with Swedish aerospace firm Saab in 2018 to build the T-7, and since Saab opened its Indiana facility in 2021, the companies have been working on the aircraft’s aft fuselage there. Costello added that Boeing’s subcontractor will resume work, with assembly of additional key aircraft components set to begin in August.

What the Supreme Court’s Transgender Ban Really Means

May 7, 2025 | By David Roza

The Supreme Court’s May 6 decision to grant the Trump administration’s request to block a lower court’s injunction means the Defense Department can resume separating transgender service members under a directive issued in February.

The military services are cleared to again place transgender troops on administrative leave, recall or cancel deployments, cancel transition-related medical care, and require transgender troops to adhere to the dress, grooming, and physical fitness standards of their sex at birth. DOD can also reinstate a hold on transgender recruits shipping to basic military training.

That is the apparent intent, according to an official DOD social media post: “Under Secretary [Pete] Hegseth’s leadership, we have changed our focus from wokeness to LETHALITY: No more pronouns. No more dudes in dresses. No more climate change obsessions. No more emergency vaccine mandates. NO MORE TRANS AT THE DOD.”

However, Pentagon spokespeople deferred questions to the Justice Department, and two lawsuits could stand in the way.

The administration appealed to the Supreme Court after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit denied its requests to stay an injunction imposed March 27 by federal district court judge Benjamin Settle. The Ninth Circuit must still rule on the government’s appeal of the injunction itself, legal experts said, a process that could take weeks or months and which can also be appealed to the Supreme Court.

Transgender advocates said removing the injunction allows the administration to act before the legality of its policy is determined.

“The whole purpose of a preliminary injunction is to preserve the status quo while the case proceeds,” said Shannon Minter, the legal director at the National Center for Lesbian Rights and one of the lead attorneys representing transgender troops and recruits in a similar case in Washington D.C. “The court just turned that upside down.”

But what happens next remains unclear.

In granting the preliminary injunction in the Ninth Circuit case, Shilling v. Trump, Settle—who was appointed to the bench by President George W. Bush—wrote that “none of the government’s data supports its conclusion that banning transgender persons from serving is substantially related to achieving military readiness.”

A second case, Talbott vs. USA, is playing out in parallel. In that case, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals granted an administrative stay on an injunction ordered by a lower court, but only on condition that DOD not start discharging transgender service members while the court continues to review the government’s request for an emergency stay. The decision is still pending.

It is difficult to predict how the circuit court will rule. Supreme Court can set precedent that lower courts follow, but that usually comes in full opinions. The order, like most from the court, was brief. Multiple lawyers, including Sasha Buchert, a senior attorney representing transgender recruits and service members in the case, said it is difficult to speculate on the outcome.

B-52 Bombers Join B-2s on Diego Garcia

May 7, 2025 | By Greg Hadley

B-52 bombers flew to the remote Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia, where multiple B-2 bombers have been stationed for weeks, Air & Space Forces Magazine has confirmed.

During a congressional hearing May 7, Air Force deputy chief of staff for strategic deterrence and nuclear integration Lt. Gen. Andrew J. Gebara told lawmakers that “there’s a Bomber Task Force of B-52s going on as we speak.”

Flight tracking data and radio transmissions posted on social media showed B-52s headed to Diego Garcia a few days ago, and satellite imagery posted by plane spotters appeared to show the bombers on the ramp near the B-2s, which arrived there in late March.

Air Force Global Strike Command would not comment on locations of aircraft. A statement responding to questions said the command “routinely conducts global operations in coordination with other combatant commands, services, and participating U.S. government agencies to deter, detect and, if necessary, defeat strategic attacks against the United States and its allies. To preserve operational security, we do not discuss details about exercises or operations.”

A B-52s BTF rotated through Diego Garcia last year, marking the first time the BUFF had landed there since 2020.

The B-2s already at Diego Garcia participated in airstrikes against Houthi rebels in Yemen, Air & Space Forces Magazine previously reported. That operation appeared to end May 6, however, as President Donald Trump announced the U.S. would stop its stepped-up bombing campaign against the Houthis after they agreed to stop attacking commercial shipping off the coast of Yemen.

Observers are skeptical that the Houthis will stop their attacks, and the U.S. may retain forces capable of striking the region to ensure compliance.

Bomber task force deployments do not necessarily herald offensive operations. More often, participating Airmen and aircraft take part in exercises, cooperative training with allies, and demonstrate the capability of American airpower. The last BTF was last month, when B-1 bombers flew to Misawa Air Base in Japan.

Industry Head: $150B Reconciliation Bill is ‘Sugar High,’ We Need Budget Stability

May 7, 2025 | By John A. Tirpak

Despite a proposed $150 billion reconciliation package that could lead to $1 trillion in defense spending in 2026, what industry needs more is stability in the budget to build a surge capacity, the head of the top aerospace trade group said May 7.

The $150 billion through reconciliation is “a sugar high,” Aerospace Industries Association CEO Eric Fanning told a Mitre Corporation conference on defense acquisition.

“It’s not in the topline,” Fanning said, noting that the reconciliation bill isn’t part of regular budgeting process. It’s a point lawmakers in Congress have made in arguing that President Donald Trump’s 2026 defense budget proposal is not as big as it appears.

From an industry perspective, Fanning also said the proposed package doesn’t set a trend in defense spending which would justify company investments in greater production capacity. It’s also not a sure thing, he said—a nod to the contentious debate over the broader reconciliation bill in Congress.

“Reconciliation hasn’t happened yet. I’m a perpetually disappointed optimist, but I’m not optimistic about this reconciliation process,” Fanning said.

The chairmen of the House and Senate Armed Services Committees—Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) and Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), respectively—have called for a substantial increase to the regular budget. Fanning said such a move would mean “it becomes baseline for next year,” which would “send that clear signal to industry.”

Production capacity has become especially important given Russia’s war on Ukraine and the massive amount of weapons the U.S. has surged to the Ukrainians—and industry and Pentagon officials say that have learned lessons when it comes to signaling demand for that capacity.

“Everyone said, ‘Why can’t you surge overnight?’” Fanning said. “You can surge by, if you’ve got two shifts, [adding] a third shift, if you can line up your supply chain, but you’re not going to start building a new line, knowing historically what we do, which is, ‘OK, the war is over. Never mind. We don’t need that anymore.’ And industry is left with all this excess capacity.”

Rather, “the single most important thing you can do for the private sector, not just the defense side … is some stability and consistency they can plan around. There are always variables that come at you, of course, but the way that we invest as a government in our defense and our national security is erratic in a good year.”

While the Pentagon has labored to break down barriers to new industry entrants and has had some success in recent years, “It’s still very difficult for new entrants, particularly that are coming from outside the defense industrial base, to get access,” Fanning said, noting that the private sector “needs to see some reward on the other end.”

Even with prime contractors, he said, “all these companies are investing a lot up front; they’re making bets, and if none of these bets pay off that, they’ll stop making those investments. There are other places that that that money can go.”

Fanning served on the Planning, Programming, Budget, and Execution reform commission that wrapped up last year, and he said true reform needs to break down the “artificial” boundaries between procurement and requirements. Unless the requirements process is greatly accelerated, “you’re already behind the curve by the time you get to the acquisition process,” he warned.

To improve acquisition and increase capacity, Fanning said the Pentagon should “really make sure that you have as much competition and as … many parts of the ecosystem involved in what you’re trying to do.”

Next, he said it is important to “clear the brush” of acquisition rules that have popped up in response to rare but glaring problems.

“Something bad happens, and you add a process to prevent it happening again, and it layers and it layers and it layers and layers,” Fanning said. There’s no “normal process” to clear away those layers, even when they’re no longer relevant, he noted.

“All those [rules and oversight] were put in for good reasons, but the cumulative risk mitigation over years” becomes a greater impediment to speed and action “than all of the little risks that you were trying to mitigate,” Fanning said.

Though, when “you start taking away everything that’s not spelled out in law … you realize there’s a lot in there that we kind of like because it was put in there for a reason.”

The third major element of what the Pentagon needs to do is “really changing the incentive of the government workforce: empowering them, rewarding them for risk,” Fanning said.

“We talk about ‘rewarding failure’ or ‘failing early.’ I think we should change that to ‘learning early,’ because we’re not really good at rewarding, but if you look at really innovative companies, they learn something quickly” from mistakes “but that’s not how we incentivize the government.”

Air Force Eyes More Uses for AI—with Guardrails

May 7, 2025 | By Shaun Waterman

The Air Force and other military services are deploying artificial intelligence tools in their IT networks and Security Operations Centers where personnel monitor cyber threats, officials said May 6—but they are leveraging the emerging technology cautiously even as some say it is ready to transform the very nature of warfare.

Col John W. Picklesimer, commander of the 67th Cyberspace Wing, said AI is more than just a buzzword. Airmen are using it to counter data overload in the SOC, a pervasive problem in defensive cyber operations across both the government and the private sector. Small SOC teams can easily be overwhelmed by the volume of alerts, most of which are false positives or routine attacks defeated by automated defenses.

“We’ve engaged with a couple of our industry partners to bring AI … into a SOC location, pull the data feeds, and then let the AI actually analyze and provide some of those quick insights,” Picklesimer said during a panel discussion at AFCEA International’s TechNet Cyber conference. Personnel could then more easily triage reports and “go and dig deep” on the significant ones, he explained.

Picklesimer said the wing had also been using NIPRGPT, an experimental generative AI chatbot developed by the Air Force Research Laboratory and cleared to run on the military’s unclassified global network—Non-secure Internet Protocol Router Network, or NIPRNet.

But he said Airmen shouldn’t use commercial tools that NIPRGPT was designed to mimic, like ChatGPT and other Large Language Models: “For day-to-day use, NIPRGPT is what we’re allowed to use,” he said.

The chatbot has proved useful for summarizing large volumes of information, he said, and pulling together multitudinous data sources. For example, it can monitor who has signed up for various commander’s programs, and what level of training they have.

“Are they signed up for the right programs? The right activities? How do you automate the tracking of all those different things across disparate systems?” Picklesimer said.

He told Air & Space Forces Magazine after the panel that he had not personally noticed NIPRGPT hallucinating—making up untrue but convincing-sounding answers—which is something commercial generative AI chatbots are known to do.

Nonetheless, he said he was more comfortable with use cases that involved summarizing or pulling together a defined data set, rather than asking more open-ended questions.

Last week, Lt. Col. Jose Almanzar, commander of the Space Force’s 19th Space Defense Squadron, said NIPRGPT had “helped tremendously in mission planning and reducing administrative actions and helping to standardize a lot of the appraisal writing and award writing and whatnot.”

Col. Heath Giesecke, director of the Army’s Enterprise Cloud Management Agency, also emphasized AI’s utility for back-office tasks.

“On the business side, the Army has adopted a large language model, [and] across the force we’re looking at specific use cases,” he said.

The Army’s AI is called CamoGPT, although the service says it is not strictly a generative AI chatbot. ”CamoGPT is a machine learning platform that optimizes equipment maintenance, logistics, and supply chain management using data analytics and algorithms,” the service said in March.

Giesecke gave one example of a successful use case: “In the HR domain, we took a bunch of [position descriptions] and enabled our contractor, the hiring agency, to use an LLM to reassess and reclassify hundreds or thousands … in a single day,” he said.

He added that an Army priority right now is that “we’re really trying to centralize the use of generative AI and make sure things aren’t being done on personal devices or personal accounts.”

Col. Dennis Katolin, the assistant chief of staff for operations for Marine Corps Forces Cyberspace Command, said he wants to use AI for three primary tasks:

First, as “something that’s able to discover new information.”

Second for the ability “infer from that data. What is going to happen, something that’s anticipatory.”

Third is “Synthesis: Generating a proposed solution to that problem set.”

Yet he also noted the danger of hallucinations.

“When it comes to AI, I have a bias that I think most of us up here do when it comes to artificial intelligence,” he said. “This group thinks it’s going to be great, that it’s going to accelerate everything. But I think it does introduce certain liabilities as well. There are times when ChatGPT has been incorrect. There’s times when AIs have been wrong.”

He compared the process of getting to know the limitations of an AI to that of getting to know a colleague: “Do you trust that individual making a recommendation? ‘Sir, we’ve got to do this!’ Does Col. Katolin have a really good track record? Then you’d be like, ‘Hey, I didn’t check his homework. But he’s been on the money before.’”

It is a very different calculus if the colleague—or the AI—has been wrong 75 percent of the time, he said.

“I think it does offer some risk, but I think that risk is mitigated by training with it, learning it … so we can build that trust and build that comfort level.”

Katolin went on to say that the rise of cyber and information operations had had an impact on warfare unmatched since the introduction of military aviation. “From our perspective, there are five sort of truths [about information operations,] that information is inherently global, persistent, instantaneous. It compresses the levels of war and requires maneuver in all domains,” he said.

USAF Gets New Autonomous Gliders to Resupply Troops in High-Risk Environments

May 7, 2025 | By Unshin Lee Harpley

The Air Force has added new self-guided gliders to deliver cargo to “high-risk environments” without putting a manned aircraft in danger.

Contractor DZYNE and the Air Force Research Laboratory unveiled the new “Grasshopper” gliders May 2, and an AFRL spokesperson told Air & Space Forces Magazine that “several dozen” units have been delivered.

Grasshopper can carry up to 500 pounds of supplies and be launched from cargo aircraft like the C-17 and C-130 using rear ramp airdrops. It can reach speeds of 109 miles per hour and glide “tens of miles” based on drop altitude, the spokesperson said.

The glider is also autonomous and capable of navigating in GPS-denied environments, allowing it to pilot itself and land with a built-in parachute.

In a release, DZYNE said it has delivered “multiple” units to the Air Force and is “currently planning for future deliveries.”

Grasshopper by DZYNE initiates landing to target with opened parachute

Grasshopper’s unveiling coincided with the start of SOF Week, an annual conference for special operations forces; AFRL first sought to develop the capability based on real-time feedback and rapid flight testing from Air Force Special Operations Command.

The small payload and disposable nature of the glider make it ideal for AFSOC’s mission of rapidly deploying units for precision strikes, infiltration, rescuing personnel, and intelligence gathering, often in restrictive or contested environments where nonstealthy cargo aircraft would be at high risk of being shot down.

The glider could also prove useful for the Air Force’s concept of Agile Combat Employment, enabling quick resupply of forces spread across remote islands or austere airfields under attack, without needing to send a full cargo aircraft.

“Its ability to deliver critical payloads from standoff distances while keeping our aircraft and crews out of harm’s way is a major advantage in modern operational environments,” Dr. Thomas Howell, portfolio lead at AFRL, said in a release.

DZYNE said it uses “low-cost manufacturing techniques” for the Grasshopper, keeping production costs around $40,000 per vehicle.

The Air Force has been interested in smaller-scale gliders for years now—AFRL initially tasked Silent Arrow in 2021 with scaling down its one-ton cargo glider GD-2000. The following year, U.S. Indo-Pacific Command and U.S. Special Operations Command joined up with the Joint Staff to award the company a yearlong contract to conduct operational demonstrations and refine the concepts of operation for these autonomous gliders.

DZYNE, meanwhile, has worked with the Air Force Research Laboratory before on its Unmanned Long-endurance Tactical Reconnaissance Aircraft, or ULTRA. It first test flew the Grasshopper in October 2022.

“The delivery of Grasshopper is a testament to the success of our collaboration with the Air Force in developing an autonomous resupply solution that meets the demands of contested environments,” said Matthew McCue, CEO of DZYNE Technologies. “By working closely, we were able to design and refine the Grasshopper product line into a cost-effective, high-performance aerial logistics platform.

McCue added that these self-navigating vehicles could also play a role in humanitarian aid and disaster relief efforts.

The company is currently developing a longer-range variant of Grasshopper, capable of traveling “hundreds of miles,” with plans for its debut in early 2026.

The Air Force and the Pentagon have long had the ability to airdrop supplies. For heavy-lift items weighing more than a ton, DOD introduced the Joint Precision Airdrop System in 2006. Utilizing GPS navigation, it autonomously guides steerable parachutes to one or more landing zones with precision, delivering cargo, fuel, and other supplies from altitudes as high as 25,000 feet.

The Air Force also employs Low-Cost Low Altitude (LCLA) drops for humanitarian missions, where aircraft get as low as 300 feet above ground to safely release parachuted medical kits.

These options, however, are less suitable for low-profile operations that demand swift, high-accuracy drops in remote, denied areas.

Air Force Set to ‘Significantly’ Change Launch Facilities for Sentinel ICBM

May 6, 2025 | By Chris Gordon

The design of the launch facilities for the Air Force’s new Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile are likely to undergo major revision, posing yet another challenge for the much-delayed and over-budget program to modernize the land-based component of America’s nuclear triad, officials said May 6.

“I imagine we’re significantly going to change it,” Acting Secretary of the Air Force Gary Ashworth told the House Appropriations Committee, referring to the strategy for the construction of the silos that will house the missile and the launch control facilities to operate it.

Ashworth’s comments come on the heels of the Air Force’s determination that it will need to build new silos for Sentinel instead of relying on a previous plan to refurbish the roughly 450 existing Minuteman III silos.

The Sentinel program is being restructured—officials reviewed the effort after critical cost and schedule overruns triggered an inquiry under the Nunn-McCurdy Act. Then-Pentagon acquisition czar William LaPlante certified the program to continue, but rescinded its Milestone B approval and ordered a restructure.

Officials say Sentinel’s ballooning costs are not driven not by the missile itself, but by the massive work needed for the ground infrastructure. The latest revelations continue that trend.

“The missile itself will continue going through its design and development phase as we move forward,” Ashworth said. “The main contributors to the cost breach itself were the command and launch segment … it’s the construction costs associated with those elements that really drove up the cost.”

When Northrop Grumman won the Sentinel contract in 2020, the ground infrastructure was expected to be a significant civil engineering effort. But it is now proving more complex than anticipated, an Air Force spokesperson told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

“As the program continues to undergo restructuring activities, the Air Force analysis continues to confirm unacceptable risks to cost, schedule, and weapon system performance stemming from the original baseline strategy of converting Minuteman III (MMIII) silos,” the spokesperson said. “To mitigate this and other risks, the Air Force plans to build new missile silos on predominantly Air Force-owned real estate, which means reusing the existing missile sites but not the 55-year-old silos.”

An ICBM launch control facility at Malmstrom Air Force Base, Mont., June 22, 2023. U.S. Air Force photo by John Turner

Air Force officials are now looking at altering the acquisition strategy for the program. In February, the service suspended work Northrop’s work on the command and launch segment including the design of the launch facilities.

“The program right now is reaching out to industry to understand how we might better construct a program on how to get after that particular [command and launch] segment,” Ashworth said. “By the end of the summer, they should have collected enough information, analyzed it, and put it back together to see if we’re going to stay with the current acquisition strategy or significantly change it. I imagine we’re significantly going to change it based upon that strategy.”

The Air Force plans to field Sentinel as a one-for-one replacement for the 400 currently deployed Minuteman III missiles, which represent one of three legs of the U.S. nuclear triad.

The Air Force has ICBM wings at F.E. Warren Air Force Base, Wyo.; Malmstrom Air Force Base, Mont.; and Minot Air Force Base, N.D. Missile fields are spread out over five states—Colorado, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, and Wyoming.

“Part of the requirements, initially—10 years ago when this program was started—was to reuse the holes, the missile holes at the launch facilities. That was believed to be more efficient, more cost effective, and quicker,” Air Force Global Strike Command boss Gen. Thomas A. Bussiere said during remarks at ANWA Deterrence Center Forum on April 30. “Shockingly enough … that may not be the answer.”

An Air Force spokesperson confirmed reusing Minuteman III silos was no longer considered to be a viable option.

“While no decision has been made, we expect Sentinel to use predominantly AF-owned real estate to build new missile silos instead of re-using MMIII silos,” the spokesperson said.

The Air Force has “data based on a test launch facility conversion project at Vandenberg Space Force Base that validated the implications of unknown site conditions with significant cost and schedule growth,” they added.

Breaking Defense first reported the Air Force’s change on building missile silos.

Air Force officials have recently said Minuteman III could be in service until 2050. The missile was originally expected to be decommissioned in the 2030s.

Pentagon officials have argued the U.S. needs to embark on a costly but overdue modernization of all three legs of its nuclear triad, which also includes fielding the B-21 Raider bomber, upgrades to B-52 bomber, the Columbia-class submarine, and the Sentinel. The Air Force is also developing the Long Range Standoff Weapon (LRSO) and the E-4C Survivable Airborne Operations Center (SAOC) nuclear command and control aircraft.

Lawmakers are seeking to add $1.5 billion to Sentinel in a 2025 budget resolution and roughly half a billion dollars to keep Minuteman viable.

“These would be our priorities: this is going to be Sentinel, once it’s restructured, making sure that comes through,” Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David W. Allvin told lawmakers. “… B-21, B-52, LRSO—those keep the nuclear deterrence.”

New KC-46 Remote Vision System Slips Another 18 Months, to Summer 2027

May 6, 2025 | By John A. Tirpak and Chris Gordon

The Air Force and Boeing are now projecting that they will field the Remote Vision System 2.0 on the KC-46 tanker by summer 2027. The new date is nearly two years longer than previously anticipated, and four years later than originally expected.

Chief of Staff Gen. David Allvin first reported the schedule slip during a House Appropriations Committee hearing, saying RVS 2.0 remains the “pacing item” among the KC-46’s half-dozen or so deficiencies, and “we’re probably looking at another 18 months” before it is corrected. He suggested that the other major problems with the aircraft—a “stiff” refueling boom, issues with the environmental control system, and others—will be fixed sooner.

“The current projection for fielding RVS 2.0 is summer 2027,” an Air Force spokesperson later told Air & Space Forces Magazine. “The Air Force and Boeing are exploring opportunities to prevent or mitigate the slip in schedule.”

A year ago, then-Air Force acquisition executive Andrew Hunter told lawmakers that RVS 2.0 would be ready in early 2026. The estimate before that, Hunter acknowledged at the time, was that RVS 2.0 would start fielding in October 2025, and the original timeline, under Hunter’s predecessor, Will Roper, was to field the system in 2023.

The original RVS, first developed in 2011, allows the KC-46 boom operator, who is seated behind the cockpit, to manipulate the refueling boom at the back end of the tanker using multiple screens instead of looking out the back of the aircraft like on the KC-135.

However, the advance of optical technology quickly outstripped it, and problems arouse—under certain lighting conditions, the boomer’s depth of field was compromised by glare and shadows, increasing the risk of the boom bumping or scraping receiving aircraft.

Airmen have developed workarounds and the Air Force has cleared the KC-46 for operations worldwide. But the issue persists and has become the poster child for the tanker’s many woes. Boeing has absorbed more than $7 billion in losses on the KC-46, which was developed and built under a fixed-price contract.

RVS 2.0 is supposed to fix that, with color screens, new camera tech, and advanced displays. But time and time again, the Air Force and Boeing has pushed back its schedule.

That’s on top of the other deficiencies and problems that have plagued the KC-46, sometimes even halting aircraft deliveries. Most recently, cracked control surface components caused the Air Force to halt KC-46 deliveries in February, but Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg said in April that problems on the KC-46 and other troubled Boeing problems—such as the T-7 trainer and Navy’s MQ-25 drone refueler—are “well contained.”

Ortberg told reporters on an earning call that the cracks were found quickly and aren’t “a safety-of-flight issue.”

“The population that they had to [repair] was small. The rework, they could get to that very quickly. So it really wasn’t a big deal.”

Allvin assured the committee that the head of Air Mobility Command and the head of Boeing Defense are working together to resolve all remaining KC-46 issues.

“It is producing. It can refuel all receivers” except the A-10 and the developmental E-7 Wedgetail, Allvin said. And while the RVS as now configured “is operating, it’s just not operating as we would expect it to.”

He also said the “Next-Generation Air refueling System study will tell us whether we need a new tanker altogether, or tankers that have better survivability.”

Previous civilian Air Force leadership had been pursuing a plan to develop new, stealthy tankers by the mid-2030s—necessary because of China’s ability to target key airborne assets from great range—while pursuing an interim “bridge tanker” buy of perhaps 75 airplanes to keep aerial refueling airplanes in production while NGAS takes shape. An upgraded version of the KC-46 is considered one of the contenders for such a bridge tanker.

Space Force Wants More Rapid, Flexible Launch

May 6, 2025 | By Greg Hadley

The Space Force launch enterprise is slashing the time it takes to get a payload into space. Over the past year, USSF’s Assured Access to Space office integrated a GPS satellite with a new rocket and prepped it for launch in under five months, less than a quarter of the typical two-year timeline.

What began as a series of proof-of-concept experiments, beginning with Victus Nox—Latin for “conquer the night”—and a follow-on coming soon called Victus Haze, is evolving into a new way of doing business.

“In the Space Force, we hear a lot about Tactically Responsive Space, and that’s done more on the small launch side, like the Victus series,” said AATS director Brig. Gen. Kristin L. Panzenhagen in a Schriever Spacepower Series event with AFA’s Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies. “So we took a look in the Assured Access to Space portfolio, and said, ‘Well, you know, I think we can do this with the larger lift.'”

Dubbed Rapid Response Trailblazer, it is the first rapid launch of that scale, with a follow-on GPS satellite launch planned for this month. Panzenhagen said the aim is to make this more routine.

“That doesn’t work for every mission,” she said. The satellite program offices have to adjust too. But the question being asked now, she added, is “Can we build in that flexibility?”

In terms of launch, “We’ve built in on our side the ability to accelerate launches,” Panzenhagen said. “So there are already pre-priced options on our contract to accelerate launches.”

More rapid launch would enable the Space Force to respond more quickly to changing situations, such as the need to counter an adversary’s actions or to replace a damaged satellite. But it can also help to deconflict an increasingly crowded and complex launch schedule.

In the case of the most recent GPS launches, a delay certifying the originally intended launch platform demanded the switch. It was possible because the satellites could be easily integrated with the rocket, a delicate process called “encapsulation.”

“Integration standards are a huge piece of this,” Panzenhagen said. “If a satellite has a lot of unique interface requirements, whether due to its geometry or due to power requirements, that increases the amount of time that you need to design the interface between the satellite and the booster. … But if you can integrate to standards, that makes it a lot easier.”

Space Systems Command boss Lt. Gen. Philip A. Garrant said at last month’s Space Symposium that Rapid Response Trailblazer proves the Space Force “can be responsive in very traditional programs and prioritize legacy programs like GPS when we need to.”

Now the AATS directorate is working on yet another responsive launch effort. Col. Richard Kniseley, then-head of the Commercial Space Office, said at the Space Symposium that the office wants to add launch to its Commercial Augmentation Space Reserve program, which aims to establish pre-negotiated pricing for commercial capabilities. Initially, the idea was to focus on commercial satellite products, but Kniseley said launch is also in the mix.

Kniseley said the focus is on small launch vehicles, an application that Panzenhagen’s team is familiar with through its Orbital Services Program-4, as well as the Rocket Systems Launch Program. Both are smaller than National Security Space Launch, and both include more providers.

“[In] the Rocket Systems Launch Program, our suborbital contract, we’ve got five providers, and then in our smaller orbital contract OSP-4, we’ve got 12,” Panzenhagen said. “So there’s a pretty wide range to give us assured access to space.”

Garrant has said he sees “a lot of synergy” between the programs, and that the shared goal of assured access to space in as little time as possible is essential.

Panzenhagen agreed: “That’s the key,” she said. “Making sure, as our launch tempo and launch cadence is increasing, that we’re using our resources to mitigate the most important risks, and we’re using our resources smartly.”