Lawmakers on the Senate Armed Services air-land panel want to put all funds for the Joint Cargo Aircraft—the Army-Air Force program to purchase a new small intratheater transport—into the Air Force budget line, reports Roxana Tiron of The Hill. There’s no indication yet whether the full committee agrees with this move, however it would seem in line with the House Armed Services Committee push for a roles and missions review to eliminate duplication and put capabilities with their core competency owner. However, House authorizers want to hold off on JCA funding until DOD completes an intratheater analysis.
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…