The Air Force awarded teams led by Boeing and Lockheed Martin contract modifications up to $75 million to conduct additional risk-reduction work on their respective transformational communications satellite concepts, the Department of Defense announced June 6. Further, the new awards task each team to perform an industrial base impact study that assumes that USAF picks one of them to finish development and build the TSAT system anytime between July 1 and “six months thereafter through a total delay of 24 months.” The contractors will also develop concepts for two alternative requirements sets called “TSAT digital core” and “TSAT lite,” DOD said.
The Air Force could conduct an operation like Israel's successful air campaign against Iran's nuclear sites, military leadership and air defenses, but readiness issues would make it risky, airpower experts said. Limited spare parts and training, low mission capable rates and few flying hours would put a drag on USAF's…