Kathleen H. Hicks, who will oversee decisions related to nuclear modernization if confirmed to be the No. 2 official at the Pentagon, assured lawmakers during her confirmation hearing on Feb. 2 that she is committed to all three legs of the nuclear triad. Since Defense ...
Raytheon
The Air Force's highly classified Long-Range Standoff nuclear cruise missile program is running ahead of schedule and could enter the engineering and manufacturing development phase in May—as much as nine months ahead of schedule, the Air Force's deputy chief of staff for strategic deterrence and ...
SpaceX will carry data-transport and missile-tracking satellites to orbit for the Space Development Agency, the Pentagon said Dec. 31. SpaceX won a $150.5 million contract for two launches from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., starting in September 2022. The entire constellation of up to 28 ...
President-elect Joe Biden will nominate retired Army Gen. Lloyd J. Austin III to be his Defense Secretary, the transition team announced Dec. 8. Austin, who left the military in 2016 as the four-star head of U.S. Central Command, would be the first-ever Black man to ...
F-15 Eagle drivers will get upgraded ejection seats under a new $700 million contract to Collins Aerospace, a Raytheon Technologies subsidiary, awarded on Oct. 29. The new ACES 5 ejection seat will replace the F-15’s older ACES II ejection seat, found in most of the ...
The Air Force said Oct. 13 it plans to choose a long-range radar in early 2021 to replace the aging AN/TPS-75, an effort that has been underway for several years. Late last month, the service held live-fly demonstrations to vet radars offered by Lockheed Martin, ...
The Air Force Research Laboratory wants to make its budding swarm of semi-autonomous weapons smarter. “Golden Horde” aims to connect munitions like Boeing’s Small Diameter Bomb I in a swarm that can work through a list of targets on its own, and that could redirect ...
Northrop Grumman will officially move ahead as the sole company in the Air Force’s competition to design a new intercontinental ballistic missile, under a $13.3 billion contract, the service said Sept. 8. Northrop’s design for the Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent will replace the 400 nuclear-tipped Minuteman ...
The Air Force is pursuing a speedy program for a new air-breathing hypersonic missile, equipped with a modular payload bay that apparently will be used for something other than submunitions, according to a service solicitation. USAF solicited Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Raytheon for the work, ...
A bipartisan group of four senators are demanding that the Pentagon explain why Turkey's expulsion from the F-35 program—to have been completed in March—now isn't expected until 2022. The senators said the sense of Congress on the matter is clear, and they want no further ...
The Air Force awarded contracts to 18 additional companies this week to develop and connect a plethora of technologies as part of the Advanced Battle Management System, after the first round of 28 contracts went out May 29. The ABMS network looks to connect the ...
U.S. forces in the Middle East are not prepared enough to defend against swarms of small drones, and the Pentagon needs to work harder to get ahead of the enduring threat, the head of U.S. Central Command warned. Small unmanned aerial systems, which can be ...
