The Air Force's fiscal 2022 budget request for munitions cuts deeply into production of staples like the Joint Direct Attack Munition bomb and Hellfire missile. The service, however, promises its stockpiles are adequate and that it needs to invest in new munitions that are better ...
The F-16, in service since the 1970s, could be flying with the Air Force into the late 2030s and with foreign air services into the 2070s, based on recently revealed USAF plans and Lockheed Martin's backorder of jets.
The F-35 has problems, but its operational success and critical role in future conflicts outweigh them, said Rep. Anthony Brown during the McAleese FY2022 Defense Programs Conference on May 12. He urged that the services' 2022 F-35 request—as well as any congressional adds—be supported by ...
Lockheed Martin is withdrawing personnel who support Iraq’s F-16 fleet from a major operating base because of threats from militias in the region, a step that will likely limit the fleet’s operations. The move comes after contractors temporarily left the base in recent months because ...
Iranian-backed militias have focused attacks on key bases in Iraq, prompting U.S. contractors to leave the Iraqi Air Force’s major F-16 base as the country’s Fighting Falcons are working to increase their capacity to train and conduct airstrikes, according to a new report. The militias ...
Raytheon Intelligence and Space on April 30 received a $228 million contract for the Global Positioning System Next-Generation Operational Control System Follow-On from Space Force’s Space and Missile Systems Center. Known as OCX 3F, the program builds on ground control station improvements made in Blocks ...
The F-35's program director promised Congress an F-35 sustainment strategy this summer, but said it's unlikely he'll achieve the elusive goal of $25,000 cost per flying hour by 2025. Negotiating three one-year sustainment deals is a "carrot" to get a better deal from Lockheed Martin ...
House Armed Services leaders say they'll move to block adding more F-35s than requested in the fiscal 2022 budget, in hopes of letting the overtaxed sustainment system for the fighter “catch up” to the fleet already in place. Without action on sustainment costs, the Air ...
Sustainment of the F-35 is rapidly becoming the most profitable part of the program, as growing numbers of jets, bases and depots drive a greater demand for parts and services, top Lockheed Martin officials said in an April 20 corporate earnings call. The comments come ...
The Defense Department's Space Development Agency wants to blanket Earth with a constellation of low-cost, open-architecture data-relay and missile-tracking satellites whose sheer numbers, along with their 1,000-kilometer-high orbits, would theoretically thwart some modes of interference—but not all. With all going according to plan so far, ...
The United States is on a crash course to field prototype hypersonic weapons within three years, with more elaborate and mature systems to follow soon after. Flight tests will ramp up quickly this year, with follow-on tests as frequently as every six weeks over the ...
The Missile Defense Agency on March 23 awarded Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin contracts worth a total of $7.6 billion to develop technology for the Next Generation Interceptor, which will replace aging ground-based interceptors and serve as the first layer of defense against intercontinental ballistic ...
