The Viking 1 mission to Mars is launched from Cape Canaveral AFS, Fla., on a Titan III booster. The spacecraft enters Mars orbit on June 19, 1976, and the lander, which takes soil samples and performs rudimentary analysis on them, soft-lands on July 20, 1976.
When Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Air Force Gen. Dan Caine described the 150 aircraft used in Operation Absolute Resolve, the mission to capture Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, he referenced many by name, including the F-35 and F-22 fighters and B-1 bomber. Not specified, however, were “remotely piloted drones,” among them a secretive aircraft spotted and photographed returning to Puerto…

