Pentagon: If you ever wanted to be left nonplussed, you would have been well advised to attend the press conference about Air-Sea Battle. We were told yesterday afternoon by three clearly intelligent defense officials that their new office — staffed by 15 people — would be a “focusing lens” for the services. Exactly what they… Keep reading →

Washington: The Pentagon is offering field commanders control of counterintelligence operations to cope with the never-ceasing efforts by countries such as China, Iran and Israel to gain access to classified information and technology. Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence Mike Vickers approved the plan in an Oct. 5 memorandum. Groups such as Central Command and Special… Keep reading →

Until Tuesday Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta had been describing Pentagon budget cuts beyond the $450 billion over 10 years he and President Obama have already committed to in apocalyptic terms: “doomsday,” “catastrophic,” and “shooting ourselves in the head” to describe any cuts in the Pentagon’s budget. But on Tuesday, a new Leon Panetta was… Keep reading →

Washington: Air Force officials are struggling to wipe out a computer virus that has infected the ground control systems that guide Predator unmanned aerial vehicles and their successors. The control systems are based at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada. The famous Predators used by the CIA to kill terrorists are controlled from a different… Keep reading →

Washington: The Pentagon is hoping that a newly-revised price estimate will be the key to locking in a deal to sell the Global Hawk to the South Korean military. DoD plans to ship over that new estimate to Seoul within weeks, according to industry officials familiar with the program. Recent estimates by DoD have put… Keep reading →

National Harbor: The Air Force has cleared the nation’s highest performance fighter, the F-22, for return to flight but the service, unable to pinpoint the reasons for at least one worrying incident of what clearly appeared to be hypoxia, has decided to increase medical monitoring of pilots. “We now have enough insight from recent studies… Keep reading →

Washington: What began as a plan to get the Air Force and Navy versions of the Global Hawk unmanned aerial system under a single control station is now going worldwide, a top industry official said today. The new common ground station being designed by Northrop Grumman for the Navy’s Broad Area Maritime Surveillance UAS and… Keep reading →

National Harbor: Air Force Secretary Mike Donley pledged today to keep all three legs of America’s nuclear triad, arguing that the rise of new nuclear powers makes the air, sea and land legs even more important. “We must maintain the nuclear triad,” he said, drawing a tiny smattering of applause — the only spontaneous applause… Keep reading →

UPDATED Washington: DARPA, the Pentagon’s advanced weapons division, lost contact with a test version of a new weapon designed to hit any target around the world in less than an hour. For more news and information on the swiftly-changing defense industry, please sign up for the Breaking Defense newsletter. You can also catch us on… Keep reading →

A screwed-up control valve caused the grounding of the F-35 fleet and the program office has cleared the plane for ground operations while it tests the errant valve. Meanwhile, the F-22 fleet remains grounded until early fall when the results of an investigation into possible problems with the plane’s oxygen system are completed. For more… Keep reading →