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In comments given to the National Interest, former Trump National Security Advisor Robert C. O'Brien explained that the U.S. Air Force needs 300-400 B-21 Raider stealth bombers considering the growing threat from China's rising military might.

The U.S. Air Force has formally launched a competition to build its new fighter jet, the Pentagon’s first in two decades, with the winner to be selected next year. The acquisition strategy for the Next Generation Air Dominance, or NGAD, aircraft “incorporates lessons learned from recent Air Force acquisition programs and will leverage open architecture standards,” the Air Force said in a statement released Thursday. “This approach will enable the government to maximize competition throughout the life cycle, provide a larger, more responsive industry base, and drastically reduce maintenance and sustainment costs.” This solicitation release “formally begins the source selection...

The U.S. Air Force is cutting the list of jobs that qualify for its special bonus pay and has so far released few details about which jobs will fall victim. An Air Force board, formed to review Special Duty Assignment Pay, reduced the number of jobs that qualify for the bonus money last month, slashing the number of jobs that qualify for the pay from 103 to 70 ahead of fiscal year 2024, and has refused to disclose which jobs will no longer qualify for the bonus, according to a report from Military.com. Special Duty Assignment Pay can range anywhere...

We have extensively discussed China’s fifth-generation fighter – the J-20 Mighty Dragon, which is now based at all regional theater commands in China to deploy in times of war quickly. It has radar-evading characteristics allowing it to join the exclusive club of stealth fighters to challenge F-22s and F-35s. China seems to be pumping out more J-20 models each month. Now Beijing’s air force is raising the stakes with its sixth-generation fighter on display at the Zhuhai Airshow. This is again to match the planned American Next-Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) fighter. When it looks like the United States Air Force...

In July 2020 ,the United States Air Force contracted with Boeing for the delivery of new F-15 fighters, to be dubbed the F-15EX. The idea behind the F-15EX is remarkable in its simplicity: We have a great fighter plane, but our existing fleet is old, so why not just buy some new ones?

Does it really have the radar signature of a bumble bee? The U.S. Air Force thinks so. I am talking, of course, about the F-22, a $108 billion program that at the time of its development was the most advanced fighter in the world. The F-22, though, is expensive to fly and maintain. It sets the Air Force back $68,000 per hour of flight – more than the F-15E Strike Eagle and the F-16C Fighting Falcon. Why did the U.S. military insist on buying it despite the cost? The main reasons are its stealthiness; its supercruise, or ability to fly...

Because of the prohibitive cost of designing, developing, and fielding a strategic bomber force, only three countries field strategic bombers, able to hit continents thousands of miles away; China, Russia, and the United States. And the B-21 Raider stealth bomber is set to provide the U.S. Air Force with 100 bombers for at least the next 30 years. The B-21 Raider gets its name honoring the Doolittle Raiders, U.S. Army Air Force men during World War II. Just months after the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor and the U.S. suffering defeat after defeat in the Pacific theater, President Roosevelt ordered...

Pity the poor F-111, the veritable “redheaded stepchild” of the Western jet fighter-bomber world. “What’s in a name?” quoth young Ms. Capulet to young Mr. Montague in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, but in the case of this warplane, the choice of name seemed to create some bad juju from the get-go. Instead of a regal bird-of-prey moniker like “Eagle” or “Fighting Falcon,” the warbird was instead officially dubbed “Aardvark,” after one of the more ungainly-looking mammals out there; accordingly, the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) nicknamed her “The Pig,” which shouldn’t automatically be viewed as an insult (“Pride-Integrity-Guts,” to quote...

How Many B-21 Raider Bombers Are Needed? At some point in the future, officials from the Department of the Air Force will likely be seated in a House subcommittee in our nation’s capital and asked a blunt question from United States lawmakers: How many B-21 Raider bombers do you actually need? Some U.S. Air Force officials are already pondering that query. Current plans call for the service to operate at least 100 long-range strategic bombers, but there have been calls for the Air Force to acquire upwards of 179 or more.

The United States Air Force has authorized the use of gender pronouns in electronic signature boxes for communications within the department."This guidance provides approval for the use of pronouns in electronic signature blocks and expands on written communication by providing official templates posted on e-publishing website available for download," the Air Force correspondence dated December 9 states."The use of pronouns (he/him, she/her, or they/them) in an email signature block is authorized but not required," the memo adds.The Air Force did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox News.

A federal judge has ruled that the U.S. Air Force is mostly responsible for a former serviceman killing more than two dozen people at a Texas church in 2017 because it failed to submit his criminal history into a database, which should have prevented him from purchasing firearms. U.S. District Judge Xavier Rodriguez in San Antonio wrote in a ruling signed Wednesday that the Air Force was “60% responsible” for the deaths and injuries at First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs. The attack remains the worst mass shooting in Texas history. Devin Kelley had served nearly five years in the...

A United States Air Force Academy Professor has argued Critical Race Theory should be taught to all cadets so that they can understand how the United States was 'shaped by racism.' Political scientist Lynne Chandler García said the Constitution brought about 'inequality' and that George Washington was a racist. She argued that the history of the U.S. proved that 'racism has shaped both foreign and domestic policy.' Garcia, who teaches the Marxist theory at the USAF Academy in Colorado Springs, said she agreed with the Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Mark Milley who recently told Congress that Critical Race...

Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) launched an effort to prevent forced vaccinations in the military after a massive outreach by troops. In a tweet on Monday, Massie said Democrats have attacked his recent proposal to ban forced vaccinations of U.S. troops. The congressman added he introduced HR 3860 to outlaw vaccine mandates in the military, which has been already back by 24 lawmakers. This came after reports claimed Joe Biden’s Pentagon might require vaccination for U.S. troops by September. “They want everybody to get vaccinated, even those who don’t need vaccinated,” he asserted. “If you followed the science, the Moderna trial...

On Monday, U.S. Air Force Lt. Gen. Brian T. Kelly, the deputy chief of staff for manpower, personnel, and services, previewed some of the changes to the service’s official physical fitness test, including allowing for service members to choose from a “menu” of different test items, with options walking instead of running and letting service members do a form of modified push-ups instead of traditional ones.While Air Force Chief MSgt. of the Air Force JoAnne Bass said the service will officially announce the changes to the fitness test “soon,” Kelly did provide some previews of the new test features during...

As far back as 2013, discussions of the SR-72 Darkstar’s various capabilities have made the rounds in the media, while the fact that supposedly using off-the-shelf materials has kept it affordable in this era of tight budget constraints. In 2017, Lockheed Martin had announced that the SR-72 would be in development by the early 2020s and could be in service by the early 2030s, but a year later it was announced that progress had been slow going based on the technological demands of the project. “Without the digital transformation the aircraft you see there could not have been made. In...

The Air Force Mongrels dropped their Pit Bull patch recently after they realized it too closely resembled a symbol associated with a white supremacist group in Pennsylvania with a couple of dozen members. The morale patch of the 51st Civil Engineer Squadron resembles the pit bull patch of the Keystone State Skinheads. Military.com reported: The civil engineer squadron at Osan has replaced its pit bull morale patch because it too closely resembled a symbol associated with a white supremacist group, according to a wing statement Tuesday Col. John Gonzales, commander of the 51st Fighter Wing, ordered the change after an...

The U.S. military carried out an airstrike against an Iranian-backed militia stronghold in Syria Thursday, a senior U.S. official told Fox News. Multiple facilities were struck in the air attack, which was sanctioned by President Biden. The senior official said the strike was a defensive strategy, intended to halt and deter future rocket attacks by the militia group that recently hit Baghdad and Erbil.

The Lockheed SR-71 spy plane was – and still is – the fastest plane on the planet. The Goal Known unofficially as the “Blackbird” for its black paint job, which was developed to dissipate heat, the jet featured sleek lines that certainly were “futuristic” when it was flying top secret missions years before American astronauts headed to the moon. It was developed in secret in the late 1950s to cruise to 80,000 feet above the earth, near the edge of space, and out fly any missile that was launched at it.

This Independence Day, read the unexpected history of the songs that have led our nation's soldiers, sailors, Marines, and airmen into battle. Armies have used music to rally troops in battle since biblical days. During the American War for Independence, boys too young and men too old to fight often played the fife and drum for the Continental Army, using music to signal commands as well as to boost soldiers’ morale.A particular tune might direct troops to cease fire, or to reload their rifles. While music rarely has such a practical use on the battlefield today, each branch of the...