If Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), chair of the Senate Armed Services AirLand panel, has his way the 2007 defense budget will be $1.2 billion lighter in the Joint Strike Fighter account. In its markup of the 2007 defense authorization bill, the panel cited “a program delay” as its rationale for the cut. According to the Congressional newspaper The Hill, McCain proposes striking $870 million in 2007 procurement for the first five of USAF’s version of the F-35, which is slated to start rolling off the production line first, and another $85 million from 2008. The panel would also take $245 million in 2008 slated for the Marine Corps JSF. The House Armed Services Committee markup did not make similar cuts.
The Air Force awarded a $13.08 billion contract to the Sierra Nevada Corporation on April 26 for its Survivable Airborne Operations Center aircraft, the successor to the service’s E-4B “Doomsday” plane. Like the E-4B, officially called the National Airborne Operations Center, the SAOC will be meant to withstand a nuclear attack and keep…