“To be honest, we feel betrayed.” That’s what one National Guard gunship pilot told me when I asked him about the Army’s plan to strip the Guard of all its AH-64 Apache attack helicopters. That plan — still awaiting approval by President Obama before he includes it in his budget request for fiscal year 2015… Keep reading →

UPDATED: Latest Theory Is The Helo Is From Chinese Museum. No Proof. A photo of a helicopter that looks quite a bit like an American Apache AH-64 attack helicopter on a truck has surfaced in China. The experts agree on one thing: they aren’t sure what the aircraft is or what it portends. What do… Keep reading →

COMDEF: After decades without a significant new rotocraft technology, the head of Pentagon buying says he’s going to try and fund a new initiative to move helicopters and their brethren like the V-22 ahead. It won’t be easy. “Anything is going to be very hard to squeeze into the budget,” Kendall told reporters during a… Keep reading →

The story of what two Marine aviators did to be the first V-22 Osprey pilots awarded Distinguished Flying Crosses is simple, elegant, and and tactically telling. The double-DFC incident underscores how the Marines are using the unique tilt-rotor aircraft — which can take off and land like a helicopter, then fly long distances at high… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON:  Fewer F-35B Joint Strike Fighters, MV-22 Ospreys, AH-1 Cobras, and UH-1 Hueys. No Marine Personnel Carrier. Maybe no Joint Light Tactical Vehicle to replace the Humvee. 8,000 fewer Marines on active duty. The Marine Commandant has put all that on the table as part of his proposal to the Defense Secretary’s Strategic Choices and… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: The Secretary of the Army defended today what he admitted was “an unconventional approach” to fielding the service’s cutting-edge AH-64E Apache Guardian attack helicopter, saying the only alternative to the current complex workaround would have been to “shut the line down” for a time. “I will grant the unconventionality of it,” John McHugh said.… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: The Army’s problem with its new Apache helicopters isn’t as bad as we thought when we first wrote about it last week. It’s worse. We knew that Northstar Aerospace, the subcontractor making the transmissions for lead contractor Boeing, had fallen behind on building that crucial component. We knew at least seven of the latest… Keep reading →

The Army’s newest attack helicopter is on track, the colonel in charge said in response to congressional concerns: Delays in manufacturing transmissions for the Boeing-built AH-64E Guardian have neither driven up the price nor slowed its fielding to combat units. [But there are still unflyable AH-64Es on the Army’s hands: click here to read the… Keep reading →

CAPITOL HILL: Congress has asked the Army to explain why it has officially taken delivery of at least seven AH-64E Apache Guardian helicopters that don’t have transmissions installed yet, Breaking Defense has learned. An unidentified subcontractor to Boeing which makes the helicopter, fell behind on building the transmissions and is now trying to catch up,… Keep reading →

Bell Helicopter has unveiled what may become what everyone hoped the V-22 Osprey would be, a tiltrotor able to operate at high altitudes for long ranges and with easily managed downwash. The new aircraft, to be known as the V-280 Valor, is the company’s offering for the Army’s Future Vertical Lift technology demonstration program. FVL… Keep reading →