2024 USAF & USSF Almanac: Air Force Wings

Two F-15EX Eagle II fighters arrived for training at Kadena Air Base, Japan, July 12 as the base gears up to receive a permanent fleet of the jets.

Expanded production of the B-21 bomber can be accomplished at Northrop Grumman's existing Palmdale, Calif., facilities, the Air Force said. The service also stated that test aircraft will be so similar to the production version that early examples could be used in combat if necessary.

Lawmakers from the House and Senate laid out competing versions of the annual defense policy bill on July 11, with vastly different potential outcomes for some of the Air Force’s most embattled programs. 

The Air Force kicked off a bomber task force deployment to Guam coinciding with a large-scale USAF exercise in the region that is intended to reinforce deterrence against China.

The Air Force permanently transferred F-16 fighter jets from Misawa Air Base in Japan to Osan Air Base in South Korea late last month, the next step in its transition to base F-35s in Japan. The move continues a modernization...

Air Force senior statesmen explained the reasons they jointly sent a letter to Congress urging restoration of the E-7 Wedgetail and more F-35s to the fiscal 2026 defense budget.

U.S. Special Operations Command is once again slowing its purchases of the new OA-1K Skyraider II multipurpose counterinsurgency plane, as the Pentagon pivots its budget to prepare for a high-end conflict following two decades of wars in the Middle East.

Bell Textron has won DARPA's contest for a no-runway, high-speed drone that will prove out technologies useful for special operations forces and possibly the Air Force's Agile Combat Employment concept. Bell's design converts a tiltrotor to a jet-powered aircraft able to fly at up to 450 knots.

Air Force B-52 program officials are gunning for a budget boost for new simulators that can adequately replicate challenging tasks crew members must perform on real-world bombing missions.