The release of the 2020 defense budget is still over a month away, and it’s already been a wild ride. A look at what has happened, and what might happen next.

As commanders and contractors gather for the Air Force Association’s massive annual conference, our favorite iconoclastic officer, the White House-endorsed Lt. Col. Dan Ward, offers this merciless dissection of the Pentagon’s biggest program and how to avoid its mistakes. — the Editors In February of 2014, Lt. Gen. Charles Davis, the Air Force’s top uniformed acquisition official,… Keep reading →

Flash: email fm GeoEye CEO says “we are proposing acquisition of DigitalGlobe.” ALSO, EnhancedView “fully funded” thru 2012 contract year @Colinclarkaol

WASHINGTON: Congress needs to take a larger role in deciding how to get unmanned technologies into the hands of American allies while keeping them out of hands of U.S. adversaries, according to a new congressional study. The use of unmanned systems on the modern-day battlefield has increased significantly over the past decade. Unmanned aircraft have… Keep reading →

WHITE SANDS, NM: After weeks of testing at the Army’s vast facility here a private summed up the service’s newest iteration of the so-called Nett Warrior communication system in one phrase: “It ain’t ready.” Soldiers with the 2nd Heavy Combat Brigade, 1st Armored Division (2/1 Armored) spent several weeks at the Army’s latest network integration… Keep reading →

Washington: Defense giant Boeing is wasting no time pushing its newest attack helicopter onto the international market. Boeing is already fielding informal solicitations from a number of foreign militaries about the newest version of the Army’s AH-64 Apache. Representatives from several foreign militaries visited Boeing’s facility in Mesa, Arizona to commemorate the delivery of the… Keep reading →

UPDATED Washington: The list of jobs being piled onto the Navy’s newest do-it-all ship might get a little bit longer in the near future. The Marine Corps and U.S. Special Operations Command have held informal talks with the Navy about the possibility of developing new mission module packages for the Littoral Combat Ship, to support… Keep reading →

F-35 AF-1 and AF-2 Ferry Flight to Edwards AFB showing 2 F-35s in flight and aerial refueling Depending on what figures you use, the United States is either going to spend as much as $1 trillion — with a T — on the F-35 program over its life or something closer to $379 billion to… Keep reading →