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Historic Moment: U.S. Air Force F-35 Stealth Fighters Just Went Off to War

U.S. Air Force F-35 stealth fighters for the first time have deployed for combat. At least six F-35s from the 388th and 419th Fighter Wings on April 12, 2019 traveled from their home station at Hill Air Force Base in Utah to Al Dhafra airbase in the United Arab Emirates to participate in coalition air

The U.S. Navy Has Unveiled A New Hydrofoil, Its First In Decades

The U.S. Navy has tested a small hydrofoil boat based on the VT Halter Marine Mk Mod 2 High Speed Assault Craft, a predecessor to the service”s stealthy Combatant Craft Assault special operations watercraft, or CCA. The revelation comes more than 25 years after the service retired its six Pegasus-class missile boats, the last of

Marines Qualifying 3D Printed Replacement Impellers for Battle Tanks

3D printing is proving to be an important manufacturing technology within the defense sector. In the U.S. especially, resources are being allocated to explore the use of the technology for producing replacement parts on the fly, so that military equipment can be kept up and running. Recently, the Marine Corps Systems Command teamed up with

New Changes Will See Marine Grunts Humping Farther Distances While Testing Combat Effectiveness

In September 2018, the Commandant of the Marine Corps Gen. Robert B. Neller directed that various Marine Corps units incorporate forced marches into combat readiness evaluations. That directive has resulted in new changes to training and readiness manuals that will see grunts moving farther distances while also testing combat effectiveness after a long hike carrying

Falcon Heavy Launch Paves the Way for Starlink and Air Force Satellites

Falcon Heavy has flown its first commercial mission, and there’s plenty more where that came from. The world’s most powerful operational rocket sent up the Arabsat-6A communications satellite from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida Thursday, demonstrating its commercial viability following its test launch in February 2018. SpaceX successfully landed all three cores, paving the

Lasers: Beyond The Power Problem

WASHINGTON: Integration of lasers on ships and other weapons is the biggest challenge today— not power. Officers and officials say there are lots of devilish details to deal with before the US military can employ laser weapons on the battlefield, from beam control to targeting to controls you can operate without a PhD. “I’m not

AI May Read Soldiers” Intents, Anticipate Their Needs

Scientists at the Army Research Lab are studying how brain activity could be harnessed to optimize a performance of a human-machine team. By feeding artificial intelligence systems information about a soldier”s intent, advanced systems “could dynamically respond and adapt to assist the soldier in completing the task,” said Jean Vettel, a senior neuroscientist at ARL”s

Meet the Future Unmanned Force: Skybord and Valkyrie

Two new autonomous aircraft concepts that promise to redefine the Air Force’s unmanned fleet are moving forward. The latest, Skyborg, is an autonomous drone prototyping program underway at the Air Force Research Laboratory. Researchers hope to get the aircraft—expected to be cheaper than other platforms and easily replaceable—combat-ready by the end of 2023. Air Force

Space Force Plan Seen as Optimistic

The Pentagon is making optimistic assumptions, especially regarding congressional support, in its five-year plan for a U.S. Space Force (USSF), according to sources on Capitol Hill and in industry. The Space Force planning task force initial work plan is the first deliverable as directed by the Air Force secretary. The document was created in 30

Why Some Counties Are Powerhouses for Innovation

By the time the application window closed, Amazon had received 238 proposals from cities and regions throughout North America looking to become the second headquarters of the behemoth tech company. Amazon invited proposals especially from places that looked a lot like its native Seattle: metro areas with more than a million people; a stable and

Army Debuts Missile Defense Framework in Move to Counter Drones, Hypersonic Threats

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. — The U.S. Army released its new air and missile defense framework March 27 that aims to pursue multimission units and counter emerging threats like drones and hypersonic missiles, the Army’s Space and Missile Defense Command chief told Defense News in an interview just ahead of the Association of the U.S. Army’s Global

DoD Is Rethinking What Defines a Major Aviation Accident

The Pentagon is considering revisions to the dollar amounts and damage levels that qualify an aircraft accident as a major mishap to better reflect the expense of repairing advanced jets. But such changes could lead to less visibility into the actual state of aviation safety, government watchdogs cautioned. Major aviation accidents are currently classified as