Military flight operations at Kabul’s airport resumed Aug. 16 after a period of chaos halted flights. Images and videos circulating online showed desperate Afghans mobbing U.S. Air Force C-17s as they took off to evacuate Americans and others, as the Taliban reclaimed control of the ...
National Security
The first airplanes were powered by piston engines turning propellers, and when gas turbine engines emerged decades later, they quickly proved able to propel aircraft higher, further, and faster. The cycle repeated itself with the turbofan in the 1960s and ’70s. Yet as dazzling as ...
U.S. and coalition air crews rushed to evacuate personnel from Kabul as the Taliban entered the Afghan capital Aug. 15, completing the group's rapid takeover of the country and forcing the now former president into exile. USAF airlifters, along with those of other NATO nations, ...
The Air Force will deploy enough aircraft to ferry out “thousands per day” from Kabul as the American diplomatic presence draws down and more Afghan interpreters are brought out of the country, the Pentagon said Aug. 13. The first of approximately 3,000 troops deploying to ...
With Afghan provincial capitals falling like dominoes in recent days, the Pentagon is still resisting pressure to promise air support to Afghanistan after the Aug. 31 withdrawal deadline. Countries in the region, however, may be key to providing the over-the-horizon support needed to turn the ...
The Pentagon on Aug. 12 detailed a massive plan to protect American diplomats and Afghan special immigrant visa applicants in Kabul, ordering 3,000 Marines and Soldiers to Kabul within days, with an additional 1,000 Soldiers and Airmen deploying to Qatar to facilitate visa processing and ...
Air Force Global Strike Command launched an unarmed intercontinental ballistic missile from Vandenberg Space Force Base, Calif., in the early morning hours of Aug. 11, sending the ICBM some 4,200 miles before detonating it with non-nuclear explosives near the Marshall Islands in the Pacific, AFGSC ...
A visit to China as a one-star solidified 20th Air Force Commander Maj. Gen. Michael J. Lutton’s belief that waiting to modernize America’s nuclear arsenal won’t work. That’s because, in his view, the Chinese see treaties as a sign of weakness, Lutton said during a ...
At least five provincial Afghan capitals had fallen to the Taliban within three days, and U.S. airstrikes had failed to turn the tide for retreating Afghan forces, leading the Pentagon on Aug. 9 to preemptively blame a lack of political and combat “leadership” if the ...
