The House Armed Services Committee voted 43 to 14 to strike down a resolution disapproving the recommendations of the Base Realignment and Closure commission. Rep. Curt Weldon (R-Pa.) ran the panel’s BRAC mark-up. After a bit of confusion over the “double negative” vote, the lawmakers swallowed hard and axed the resolution. The BRAC haters have one last chance to derail the politically painful closing of the bases. By law, the resolution must be approved by the full House, and that debate and vote could take place late next week or just after the Columbus Day break, said Weldon. In the now highly unlikely event the House overturns the BRAC decisions, a similar resolution would have to pass in the Senate, too. Otherwise, the measure automatically becomes law.
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…