Seven C-27Js for SOCOM

US Special Operations Command is taking on seven of the 21 C-27J transports that the Air Force is divesting, according to service spokeswoman Ann Stefanek. Deputy Defense Secretary Ash Carter made the decision on Oct. 28, Stefanek told the Daily...

Cold War Relic

It wouldn’t serve US nuclear deterrence—or nonproliferation—goals to modernize the B83 nuclear gravity bomb in place of the B61, said senior Defense Department and Energy Department officials last week. The megaton-class B83 is a “relic of the Cold War,” Madelyn...

More C-130J Deliveries

Lockheed Martin delivered two factory-fresh C-130J transports to the Air Force in October, along with one new-build MC-130J special-mission aircraft, announced the company. On Oct. 29, Maj. Gen. Michael Keltz, Air Education and Training Command’s director of intelligence, operations, and...

Transparency is Key

National Intelligence Director James Clapper said the US intelligence community continues to seek more ways to be open, to the extent possible, about what it does to show the American public that intelligence operations respect US citizens’ civil liberties and...

Misunderstandings

Foreign journalists’ claims that the National Security Agency collected tens of millions of phone conversations of their respective nations’ citizens are “completely false,” said Army Gen. Keith Alexander, NSA director. “They cite as evidence screen shots of the results of...

Lockheed Martin Discloses Work on SR-72 Mach 6 Aircraft

Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works is developing an unmanned hypersonic strike aircraft called the SR-72 that’s designed to travel at six times the speed of sound—twice the speed of the company’s famed SR-71 Blackbird surveillance airplane, announced the company. The SR-72...

C-17s Transport Hawaii-based Stryker Vehicles for First Time

Airmen from the 15th Wing at JB Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii, worked with soldiers from the 25th Infantry Division at nearby Schofield Barracks to load Army Stryker combat vehicles onto four C-17 transports during an emergency deployment-readiness exercise, according to a...

SDB II Scores Hits in Flight Tests

Raytheon and the Air Force completed a series of flight tests for the Small Diameter Bomb II that culminated in hitting ground targets moving at operationally representative speeds, announced the company. “These tests showcase the game-changing capability of Raytheon’s tri-mode...

South Korea Moving to Acquire Four Global Hawks

South Korea intends to procure four Northrop Grumman-supplied RQ-4 Global Hawks in 2014 through a foreign military sale with the United States worth an estimated $848 million, reported Reuters on Sunday. South Korea “has plans to sign a contract next...