The Recovery Budget

The Air Force released a $167.3 billion budget proposal to Congress on Monday, of which $122.2 billion is for “blue” or service-specific programs. The rest is divided in two areas: $34.5 billion for joint initiatives that receive funding from Air...

Pentagon Budget Goes to Congress

The Defense Department on Monday forwarded a $585.3 billion budget for Fiscal 2016 to Congress, of which $50.9 billion is funding for overseas contingency operations. At a Pentagon press briefing, Deputy Defense Secretary Robert Work said the budget leaves “no...

A Personnel Boost

The Air Force’s Fiscal 2016 budget proposal funds an endstrength of 491,700 military personnel across the service’s three components, an increase of 6,620 from Fiscal 2015, according to budget documents released on Monday. Active Duty endstrength would increase by 4,020...

Air Force Procurement Up More than 25 Percent

The Air Force is seeking a large overall increase in procurement in its Fiscal 2016 budget, most of which supports production of new fighters and tankers, but also would fund a spike in munitions buying, particularly the small weapons carried...

Budget Reaffirms Commitment to Nuclear Enterprise

The Pentagon’s Fiscal 2016 budget request, released on Monday, reaffirms the Air Force’s commitment to sustaining and modernizing the nuclear enterprise. The budget invests in the ICBM fuze replacement and Ground Based Strategic Deterrent flight system development. It continues incentive...

Please, Please, Mr. Congressman

The Air Force has a long laundry lists of items that would fall out of its Fiscal 2016 budget request if the Budget Control Act-mandated sequester is not repealed. Among bulleted items in its budget explanations, the Air Force said...

R&D Boosts for Demos

Spending on research, development, test, and evaluation activities gets about a 10 percent increase in the Air Force’s Fiscal 2016 budget request compared to Fiscal 2015 levels. Most categories, such as basic and applied research, would remain flat versus the...

The ISR Commitment

The Air Force’s Fiscal 2016 budget request delays the planned retirement of the U-2 high-altitude reconnaissance fleet to 2019, three years later than the service had proposed in its Fiscal 2015 request. The decision comes in “response to current operational...

Punxsutawney Phil, the Warthog Version

The Air Force’s Fiscal 2016 budget proposal once again attempts to divest the A-10 fleet, even though Congress has thus far adamantly refused to allow the service to do so. “During Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom, the A-10 aircraft...

Pentagon’s Fiscal 2016 Budget Plan Meets QDR Demands

The Pentagon’s $585.3 billion budget request for Fiscal 2016 is a “strategy-driven, resource-informed” plan to balance readiness, capabilities, and capacity in line with the demands of the 2014 Quadrennial Defense Review, Deputy Defense Secretary Bob Work told reporters Monday. “Like...

Defense Department Priorities Fully Funded

The Pentagon’s Fiscal 2016 budget proposal seeks to “address challenges to US technological superiority,” by protecting planned funding of big-ticket priorities. The Pentagon wants to buy 57 F-35s for $10.6 billion (of which 44 would be F-35As for the Air...

Toward Full-Spectrum Readiness

The Pentagon’s Fiscal 2016 budget request to Congress puts the US military back on a path, albeit measured, to rebuilding its “full-spectrum readiness,” said Lt. Gen. Mark Ramsay, the Joint Staff’s director of force structure, resources, and assessment, on Monday....

Getting Back to the Base

The Pentagon’s $585.3 billion budget proposal for Fiscal 2016 includes $50.9 billion to support overseas contingency operations. This funding would cover activities ranging from training and assisting Afghan security forces ($3.8 billion) to counter-ISIS operations ($5.3 billion), bolstering the US...

Military Intelligence Request Way Up

The topline budget request for intelligence operations across all military services and Defense Department agencies in Fiscal 2016 i s $17.9 billion, announced the Pentagon on Monday. That includes funds sought in the Defense Department’s base budget and overseas contingency...

ISIS: Allied Airpower Decisive in Kobani Defeat

ISIS fighters credited US-led coalition airstrikes for breaking their four-month hold on the Syrian town of Kobani in late January, according to press reports. “I swear by God, their planes did not leave the air, day and night; they did...

New POW/MIA Accounting Agency Launched

The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency commenced operations with the merger of the Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office and the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command, announced the Pentagon. “Today marks an important step in establishing the new agency and the continued commitment to...

World War II Airman’s Remains Recovered

Defense Department forensic scientists identified the remains of Army Air Forces 1st Lt. James F. Gatlin, 25, of Jacksonville, Fla., an airman missing in action since 1944, announced the Pentagon. He was interred on Jan. 30 in Bushnell, Fla., in...

Note to Readers

The Air Force informed us that, on page A37 of the service’s Fiscal 2016 Budget Overview document, the correct number of A-10s in the Active Duty force in Fiscal 2015 is 143 (not 54 as listed). Also, on that same...