Seventy-Five Years of AFA

Thanks to reconciliation, the fiscal 2026 Air Force budget would get a surge of munitions procurement, but it's not yet clear if the production increase will be sustained. The Air Force revealed the secret AIM-260 air-to-air missile's funding for the first time.

A new survey found that military and veteran spouses experience depression and anxiety at two to three times the rate of the general population, with many also reporting difficulty finding community, peer support, and suitable employment.

The Air Force diverted what it says was excess funding from its delayed new nuclear missile program to modify a former Qatari royal jet for use as President Donald Trump’s Air Force One, the service’s top civilian said June 26.

An instructor pilot didn’t fully insert a safety pin into his T-6 ejection seat when taxiing after a flight last spring, then inadvertently pulled the handle while not fully buckled into his seat—leading to his death when the ejection system sent him 100 feet into the air at Sheppard Air Force…

The Air Force plans to cancel its program to purchase a fleet of E-7 Wedgetail airborne target-tracking jets as part of the fiscal 2026 budget, a senior defense official confirmed June 26.

The 36-hour operation by the U.S. military to fly deep into Iranian airspace and use Air Force B-2s to drop massive bunker buster bombs on a heavily fortified Iranian nuclear complex traces its roots to the work of intelligence analysts over 15 years ago.

The Air Force's fiscal 2026 combat aircraft budget request goes big on the new F-47 and B-21, but only buys 45 new fighters, less than half its traditional goal. The service said it can only buy what industry can make, and the desired 72 fighters is "not...achievable."

Buoyed mostly by extra funds earmarked for Golden Dome in the reconciliation bill being considered by Congress, the Space Force says its 2026 budget request is roughly $40 billion—an increase of more than 30 percent over 2025. Among the services, the Space Force is getting the largest proportion of its 2026…

The stealth technology that gave the U.S. its airpower edge over the last 30 years is being overcome by new sensors that will make it hard for anything to hide, putting a premium again on speed and maneuverability, the deputy director of DARPA told AFA's Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies.