The Air Force has taken over weapons intelligence duties for Army and Marine Corps ground forces in Iraq. USAF has created a weapons intelligence flight within the 732nd Expeditionary Civil Engineering Squadron at Balad AB, Iraq, to provide teams for...

Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne told defense reporters in Washington Tuesday that new budget cuts probably mean the average age of USAF aircraft, now at 24 years, will continue to climb. Wynne said, “I wanted it to be 20, 21”...

Air Mobility Command C-17 maintainers deployed to Manas AB, Kyrgyzstan, have seen their C-17s through 1,000 combat sorties during a single Air and Space Expeditionary Force rotation. That is more than any C-17 operation to date, reports the Ganci Gazette. The Manas airmen, from various AMC bases, maintained the C-17s through a variety of missions, comprising almost 50 percent of all airlift support for operations in Afghanistan. Work to set up the aerial delivery system and logistics rails for the first combat airdrop by the Manas-based C-17s took crew chief SrA. Chris Johnston 18 hours to complete. He says, “I’ve worked on many airdrop missions before, but I can’t remember a mission where so many people banded together.”

In a new diatribe on Pentagon foibles, the Lexington Institute’s Loren Thompson hammers the decision to stop producing C-17 airlifters. He calls it the “dumbest weapons decision of the decade.” (He may be right.) In describing how the Pentagon could...

The Daily Report got a rare opportunity to see the RC-135 Rivet Joint electronic reconnaissance aircraft Wednesday at Andrews AFB, Md., taking a tour of the first upgraded Block 8 aircraft. The Block 8 improvements for the highly secretive RC-135...

The Air Force’s top civilian leader, Michael Wynne, expressed admiration for Singapore’s defense budgeting system at a Washington media breakfast Tuesday. He said that Singapore’s military forces get a percentage of the country’s gross domestic product, meaning when the GDP...

Air Force Space Command’s 4th Space Operations Squadron at Schriever AFB, Colo., has been envisioning for almost two years a method to get a mobile Milstar communications satellite command and control vehicle downsized so it would fit into a C-17...

No matter if you help govern a state, when the Air Force calls you go. Air Force Reserve officer Brian Dubie, who also happens to be the lieutenant governor of Vermont, has been deployed to Iraq for about two weeks...

The Air Force has employed 19 Lockheed Martin technicians in Southwest Asia for nearly two years to perform the extensive inspections the U-2 Dragon Lady aircraft need every 400 flying hours. The high-flying reconnaissance aircraft are in demand, so the...

Air Force officials have appointed Brig. Gen. Stanley Clarke to lead the investigation into the A-10 strafing accident that killed one Canadian soldier and wounded several others during Operation Medusa in Afghanistan last week. An Air Force spokesperson told Stars...

The Air Force wants all commanders to know where their people are 24/7 to facilitate operations and recovery during and after disasters or emergencies. It sounds like a reasonable request in light of the confusion surrounding last year’s Hurricane Katrina,...

An infomercial inspired William Durham, with the Oklahoma City Air Logistics Center, Tinker AFB, Okla., to try a steamer and detergent, instead of the current hazardous chemicals, to clean the carbonized fuel, called coking, off of F-15 engine parts. The...

After a 15-month startup process, the Air Force Band now has a “streaming” presence on the Internet. Utilizing the Army’s Soldiers Radio for the Internet service, the Air Force Bandstand operates 24 hours a day, offering music ranging from jazz...

Sept. 12, 2006 Sortie Type OIF OEF OIF/OEF Total ISR 18 6 24 CAS/Armed Recon 42 42 84 Airlift 180 180 Air refueling 40 40 Total 60 48 220 328 OIF=Operation Iraqi Freedom OEF=Operation Enduring Freedom ISR=Intelligence-surveillance-reconnaissance