May, 2015 Military Aviation News
05/31/2015
U.S.-led forces targeted Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) militants in Iraq with 16 air strikes from Friday morning through Saturday morning and conducted another six strikes against the group in Syria, the U.S. military said on Saturday. The strikes in Iraq were spread throughout the country, hitting targets near Baghdad, Bayji, Fallujah, Hit, Kirkuk, Mosul, Ramadi, Sinjar and Tal Afar, according to a military statement.
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05/31/2015
The 82nd Aerial Target Squadron, a subordinate unit of the 53rd Weapons Evaluation Group, flew its final QF-4 Phantom mission May 27 marking the end of almost 20 years at Tyndall.Two QF-4 full-scale aerial targets took off around 10:15 a.m. and were successfully destroyed about 30 minutes later by pilots completing their mission exactly as it was supposed to go.
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05/31/2015
Russian military aircraft were scrambled to head off a U.S. warship that was acting "aggressively" in the Black Sea, state news agency RIA reported on Saturday, citing an anonymous source in Russia's armed forces in Crimea. The source was quoted as saying that the U.S. destroyer Ross was moving along the edge of Russia's territorial waters and heading in their direction.
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05/31/2015
Rushing through the Welsh valleys at 250 feet and almost 500 miles per hour the ground slides rapidly past the cockpit of the Hawk jet. Military flyers in training quickly become accustomed to the sensations of speed. They also learn about the need to look far ahead of the aircraft for upcoming obstacles and other potential hazards.
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05/31/2015
Times have changed. Russia, China’s exclusive arms supplier for more than twenty years, is now rumored to be interested in Chinese arms. The visitation of a Chinese naval task force to the Black Sea, including a modern Type 054A frigate, has sparked rumors Russia may buy a batch of the frigates to stave off a ship shortfall.
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05/31/2015
US Defence Secretary Ash Carter has publicly criticised China for expanding a chain of artificial islands in the South China Sea, and declared that the US wouldn’t shy away from confronting Beijing over its determination to flex its military muscles in the region.
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05/31/2015
The US State Department approved the sale of 1,600 guided bomb units to the United Arab Emirates (UAE), as part of a package that is worth more than $100 million, the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) announced in a press release.
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05/31/2015
The Russian Navy will get an advanced aircraft carrier by 2026-2027, the Navy Ship Building Directorate head, Captain ? Rank Vladimir Tryapichnikov, said on Saturday. "At present, we plan to replace the current Admiral Kuznetsov aircraft carrier with the ship of this class by 2026-2027," Tryapichnikov said in an interview with Ekho Moskvy radio station. The official added work on the ship's design is currently underway.
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05/30/2015
The United States has spotted a pair of mobile artillery vehicles on an artificial island that China is building in the South China Sea, a resource-rich stretch of ocean crossed by vital shipping lanes, American officials said. China’s construction program on previously uninhabited atolls and reefs in the Spratly Islands has already raised alarm and drawn protests from other countries in the region, whose claims to parts of the South China Sea overlap with China’s.
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05/30/2015
From June 8 military aircraft will conduct low-level flights outside their usual trianing areas for the first time, a move that is "necessary in order to maintain the qualification of pilots and relevant abilities required for combat," a statement said. "The first low-level flights in Latvian airspace will be performed by US A-10 "Thunderbolt II aircraft which in February this year were sent to Europe under the Operations Atlantic Resolve program," the information adds.
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05/30/2015
Since its standup in 2009, Air Force Global Strike Command has worked to build and maintain a strong relationship with its allies in the French air forces. A regular series of exchange visits between leadership, participation in joint exercises, and attendance at major events, have served to develop mutual understanding and partnering opportunities between the two nations' strategic air forces.
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05/30/2015
It has been 32 years in the making but it will be least another five years before the indigenously-built fighter jet Tejas (Mark -II) can be deployed in a combat role, a top Indian Air Force official told NDTV. This is bad news for India which was hoping to induct the Tejas in large numbers to make-up for its ageing fighter fleet. India will have to decommission about 14 Squadrons of MiG-21 and MiG-27 fighters by 2022.
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05/30/2015
China has unveiled a new twin-fuselage drone that analysts say will give the People’s Liberation Army long-range surveillance and strike capabilities. The Shen Diao, or Divine Eagle, remotely piloted aircraft is being developed by China’s Shenyang Aircraft Corporation and appears from Chinese Internet photos made public recently to be larger than the U.S Air Force’s Global Hawk long-range surveillance drone.
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05/30/2015
The Marine Corps is finishing up its first round of operational testing for its F-35B short-take-off-and-landing Joint Strike Fighter on board the USS WASP, an amphibious assault ship in the Atlantic Ocean, service officials said. The tests -- seen as a key final step before the aircraft becomes operational later this year -- included night-time take-off and landings as well as a wide range of assessments placing the aircraft is various operational circumstances.
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05/30/2015
The U.S. Defense Department is considering ordering as many as 450 F-35 aircraft from Lockheed Martin Corp., sending warplane output to the fastest in three decades as it gains confidence in the advanced fighter’s performance. While the plan would require U.S. lawmakers’ approval, the so-called block buy wouldn’t face the same congressional scrutiny as a multi-year procurement.
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05/30/2015
Since the last decade, India has been on a spree of buying modern weapon systems through its ever increasing defence budget. In particular the Indian Air Force is going through a total revamp. India is the only country which has categorised its fighters as heavy, medium and light combat aircrafts. It has assigned specific roles to its fighters however most are multi-role in nature.
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05/30/2015
Russia will considerably increase its arsenal of Tupolev Tu-160 ("White Swan") heavy strategic bombers, unique machines, able to attack its targets at high speeds, US journalist Zachary Keck pointed out. Citing Col. Gen. Viktor Bondarev, the commander-in-chief of Russia's Air Force, American journalist Zachary Keck pointed out that Moscow is planning to dramatically boost its arsenal of Tupolev Tu-160 ("White Swan") heavy strategic bombers.
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05/29/2015
U.S. and Canadian fighter jets are to practise intercepting foreign aircraft high over the Arctic in the coming days as Russian military flights up to the edge of North American airspace increase. “This is probably the most active they’ve been since the end of the Cold War,” said Maj.-Gen. David Wheeler, commander of 1 Canadian Air Division and the officer overseeing his country’s role in exercise Amalgam Dart.
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05/29/2015
The U.S. watched Islamic State fighters, vehicles and heavy equipment gather on the outskirts of Ramadi before the group retook the city in mid-May. But the U.S. did not order airstrikes against the convoys before the battle started. It left the fighting to Iraqi troops, who ultimately abandoned their positions.
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05/29/2015
The Senate Armed Services Committee, as promised, is pushing to keep the A-10 flying, and wants to direct the Air Force to find maintainers for the F-35 in other ways, including grounding F-16s and cutting back on headquarters staff. The committee in the last week of May released its report on its version of the fiscal 2016 National Defense Authorization Act, which blocks any A-10 retirement and calls for the Air Force to maintain a minimum of 171 combat-coded A-10s.
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05/29/2015
Lightning II is a STOVL aircraft: Short Take Off Vertical Landing. It will place the UK at the forefront of fighter technology, giving the RAF a true multi-role all weather, day and night capability, able to operate from well-established land bases, deployed locations or the Royal Navy’s Queen Elizabeth Class Aircraft Carriers.
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05/29/2015
I had not given much thought to the flight plan of the airline I recently booked to go back to the U.S. from Vietnam, but recent events in the airspace over the South China Sea prompted an online search. As I discovered, my commercial flight would fly not far from where a U.S. surveillance plane was warned to leave on May 20 by a Chinese radar operator.
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05/29/2015
The Indian Air Force, facing a severe shortage of fighter aircraft, will have the opportunity to boost its combat strength with an unusual asset - fitting guns and rockets on Hawk trainer aircraft, bought for training IAF pilots before they entered the cockpits of high performance fighters like the MiG-21. On Tuesday, Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd and UK-headquartered BAE Systems (BAE), agreed to explore the development of a "Combat Hawk" which could even be exported to friendly foreign countries.
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05/29/2015
Boeing [NYSE: BA] today formally opened a new avionics maintenance and repair center in the Yeongcheon Industry District of Daegu-Gyeongbuk Free Economic Zone. The 10,000 square-foot facility will test and repair aircraft electrical systems, reducing repair times and yielding significant inventory cost savings for the ROKAF. The new facility underlines both Boeing’s growing role as a global enterprise and its participation in the growth of the domestic Korean aerosp sector.
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05/29/2015
The purchase volume of Russia's fifth-generation T-50 PAK-FA fighter jets, to be produced in 2017, will be limited only by on the manufacturer's production capability, Russian Air Force Commander Col.Gen. Viktor Bondarev said Thursday. Russian Deputy Defense Minister Yuri Borisov said in March that the ministry could reduce the purchases of PAK-FA fighters, due to "new economic circumstances."
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05/29/2015
A Russian MiG-31 (Foxhound) interceptor successfully downed a cruise missile that was fired by a Tu-95MS (Bear) strategic bomber over the Pemboi Range in Russia’s northwestern region, the Russian Defense Ministry’s Central Military District’s press service said Thursday.
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05/29/2015
The Russian Defense Ministry will purchase no less than 50 new Tu-160 (Blackjack) heavy strategic bombers when production is renewed, Russian Air Force Commander Col.Gen. Viktor Bondarev said Thursday. “No less than 50 aircraft over time will be purchased in order to cover the costs that will go into production,” Col.Gen. Bondarev said without specifying when production would begin.
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05/29/2015
It's the modern era's military strategy of choice: overwhelming air power delivering precision-guided punishment backed by intelligence on the ground, with minimal exposure for soldiers of the striking side. Seductive though it is to risk-averse governments with war-weary publics, the approach has its limits — and these are on display in Syria and Iraq, where a U.S.-led coalition has carried out over 4,100 airstrikes against Islamic State radicals yet failed to stop the extremists.
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05/28/2015
The selection of a foreign contractor to supply the South Korean Air Force with four aerial refueling tankers is just around the corner. The Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) said April 14 that it started price bidding for the 1.48 trillion won (US $1.36 billion) program. Competitors are Boeing, Airbus Defence and Space, and Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI).
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05/28/2015
Photos posted on military websites in China show the nation's new domestic J-16 twin-seat fighter repainted in a light grey which suggests the aircraft is almost ready to enter service with the People's Liberation Army Air Force, according to People's Daily Online.
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05/28/2015
At the invitation of the government of Sweden, More than 150 Airmen and 12 F-16 Fighting Falcons from the 31st Fighter Wing at Aviano Air Base, Italy, arrived at Norbotten Wing here in support of Arctic Challenge Exercise 2015. This year, the multinational flying exercise will include approximately 115 combat aircraft from nine different countries including the U.S., Finland, Sweden and Norway. The Arctic Challenge exercise will focus on improving interoperability with fellow air forces.
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05/28/2015
China's steady acquisition of advanced weaponry has driven ambitious Taiwanese requirements, including plans to procure stealth fighters, advanced jet trainers, long-range unmanned reconnaissance aircraft and main battle tanks.
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05/28/2015
The RAAF’s Wedgetail battlespace control aircraft and Hornet fighter bombers may be called on to support Iraqi troops assigned to recapture the key city of Ramadi from Islamic State. The terror group’s fighters swept into Ramadi more than a week ago under the cover of a sandstorm that “blinded” the unmanned patrol aircraft, armed with missiles which had provided a key part of the defences.
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05/28/2015
China’s political and aerospace leadership is painfully aware that its airpower ambitions are severely impeded by the lack of what it calls a “Chinese heart” – modern, indigenous aircraft engines. The Pentagon’s latest assessment on Chinese military capabilities, released on 8 May, is even more blunt, saying: “the Chinese aircraft industry remains reliant on foreign sourcing for dependable, proven high-performance aircraft engines.”
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05/28/2015
The 2013 spending cuts, or sequestration, imposed on the US government forced the US Air Force to scrap or reduce most of its planned training exercise that year, a new Government Accountability Office report, released on Wednesday, said.
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05/28/2015
The secretary general noted that NATO is “intercepting more Russian flights now than just a few years ago.” In early May 2015, Poland, the United Kingdom, Denmark, and France began enhanced air policing duties over the Baltic states and Central Europe. According to a NATO press report, the allies involved in the rotational air policing contributed 22 aircraft for the exercises.
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05/28/2015
The CDR is a key review point in a three-year, $102 million contract awarded to Northrop Grumman in August 2014 for the engineering and manufacturing development portion of the program. “The company successfully completed the critical design review (CDR) of the service's Flexible Strike Phase 1 program on February 3,” Northrop Grumman said on Wednesday.
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05/27/2015
Russia will deliver S-300 missile defence systems to Iran at quote ‘the earliest opportunity'.
That's according the Iranian Deputy Defence Minister, after talks with his counterpart from Moscow, German media reports, quoting news agency AFP. No exact date has been outlined – although previous statements suggest the long-range missile systems, which like this one are designed to combat aircraft and ballistic missiles, would be dispatched before the end of the year.
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05/27/2015
I had not given much thought to the flight plan of the airline I recently booked to go back to the U.S. from Vietnam, but recent events in the airspace over the South China Sea prompted an online search. As I discovered, my commercial flight will be flying not far from where a U.S. surveillance plane was warned on Wednesday to leave by a Chinese radar operator.
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05/27/2015
Islamic State, also known as ISIS, has seized control of Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province just 70 highway miles from Baghdad. Fallujah, located between, is already a terror stronghold.
There is little doubt that ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi plans to capture the city whose name he bears. A man who declared himself a caliph, Baghdadi knows his home was the seat of the Abbasid caliphate, founded in the eighth century to which ISIS would like to return.
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05/27/2015
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told CBS News he does not see any immediate threat against any of the 28 nations that make up the largest peacetime alliance in the world, despite Russian aggression in Eastern Ukraine and unannounced military exercises near member states' airspace.
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05/27/2015
In the air and on the ground, Sailors and Marines dazzled a crowd of nearly 6,000 visitors with a variety of troop insertions and flyovers during an aviation demonstration at Eisenhower Park as part of Fleet Week New York (FWNY), May 23.
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05/27/2015
Russia’s fifth-generation Sukhoi PAK FA fighter jet, which is also known as the T-50, is like a flying robot with greater stealth capabilities than its American counterparts, according to Russian state media. On Tuesday, Sputnik outlined some of the specifications of the PAK FA, which is currently undergoing the testing phase and will enter into production next year.
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05/27/2015
The Russian air force on Tuesday mobilised more than 100 aircraft from their bases to operational airfields as part of a surprise combat readiness inspection, according to the Russian defence ministry. "The flight personnel have received their flight tasks and started navigational calculations," a statement by the ministry stated, adding that the air units would manoeuvre in the Central Military District reinforced with units from other regions of the country.
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05/27/2015
China’s armed forces are to extend their operations and the air force will become an offensive as well as defensive force for the first time, in a major shift in policy that will strengthen fears of accidental conflict. The People’s Liberation Army, including its navy and air force, will be allowed to “project power” further beyond its borders at sea and more assertively in the air in order to safeguard its maritime possessions, according to a new policy document.
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05/27/2015
During a recent three-day visit to Langley Air Force Base in Virginia, General Mark Welsh said that China and Russia are primary examples of countries who will have highly capable fighter aircraft in the next three to five years. Welsh also said dozens of countries around the world would use Russian and Chinese top-end fighters in the future.
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05/26/2015
Just over a week ago, the remarks of US Assistant Defence Secretary David Shear to a Senate committee in Washington triggered strenuous denials in Canberra that the government had any intention of allowing the Pentagon to base nuclear-capable B1 strategic bombers in Australia.
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05/26/2015
The US military is exploring whether eLoran, a navigation technology that was pioneered in Britain, could protect against GPS jamming attacks The US military is testing a new type of navigation technology that was developed in Britain, in the hope that it that could prevent criminals from hijacking its vessels with GPS jamming attacks.
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05/26/2015
Sweden, Norway and Finland are to host one of Europe's largest fighter jet drills, dubbed the Arctic Challenge Exercise 2015 (ACE 2015), due to start on Monday. The Royal Norwegian Air Force (RNoAF) National Air Operations Center (NAOC) chief Brigadier General Jan Ove Rygg is in charge of this year's drills, which will run through June 2. This is the second such multinational training exercise held by the Scandinavian neighbors since 2013, with plans to continue them every second year.
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05/26/2015
The People's Liberation Army has rapidly developed into one of the world's most powerful militaries and could have up to 10,000 nuclear warheads in its arsenal, reports Huanqiu, the Chinese-language website of the nationalistic tabloid Global Times. Citing a detailed report into the PLA's military might by Russian media, the Global Times notes the speed of which China's military technology has been developing since the turn of the century.
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05/26/2015
During her two-day India visit (May 26-27), German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen is expected to hold talks with top Indian officials, including her counterpart Manohar Parrikar, and push for a stronger bilateral defense cooperation and being part of the "Make in India" initiative designed to boost foreign investment.
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05/26/2015
Russia and Egypt have agreed on a contract to supply 46 Mikoyan MiG-29 fighter aircraft, the Vedomosti newspaper reported, citing sources in the Russian aviation industry. The contract could be signed in the very near future, the paper says. A Rosoboronexport spokesman declined to comment. Efforts by the newspaper to reach a spokesperson for the Russian aircraft manufacturing corporation MiG have failed.
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05/26/2015
Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered four days of air combat readiness testing on Monday, the third major military exercise staged by the Kremlin in as many months. The drills will involve 12,000 troops, 250 aircraft and nearly 700 artillery pieces and other heavy weaponry and include cruise missile strikes at an imaginary enemy target at a Siberian firing range, the Tass news agency reported.
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05/26/2015
Russia's new fifth-generation T-50 fighter jet, currently in the testing phase, incorporates elements of automation which make it more like a robot than a fighter plane, explains a representative from the Rostech corporation. Russia, China Sign Deal to Boost Sukhoi Jet Sales in Asian Markets. The Sukhoi PAK FA fighter jet, also known as T-50, is ready to go into production next year, and boasts innovative technology which renders the pilot one part of the plane's whole control system.
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05/26/2015
Syrian government aircraft carried out intense strikes Monday against the Islamic State group in and around the ancient city of Palmyra after its fall to the jihadists, a military source said. "The air force struck more than 160 Daesh targets, killing and wounding terrorists and destroying weapons and vehicles equipped with machineguns" on Palmyra's outskirts and elsewhere in the east of Homs province, the source said.
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05/25/2015
Coalition military forces continued to attack ISIL terrorists in Syria and Iraq between 8 a.m., May 23, and 8 a.m., May 24, local time. In Syria, coalition military forces conducted 11 airstrikes using attack, bomber and fighter aircraft. Separately in Iraq, coalition military forces conducted 17 airstrikes approved by the Iraqi Ministry of Defense using attack, bomber, fighter and remotely piloted aircraft against ISIL terrorists.
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05/25/2015
Experts on Sunday warned of a potential military conflict over heightened US surveillance in the South China Sea and cautioned that both sides should try their best to avoid miscalculation in the world's most important bilateral relations. Analysts believe that recent US military activity is another example of how the US is struggling to maintain the status quo while coping with the rise of China as a global power.
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05/25/2015
Daesh’s seizure of Ramadi has revived a debate in the Obama administration about whether to send a limited number of US military specialists to Iraqi battlefields to target air strikes on the extremists. The group’s advances in the capital of Anbar province have called attention to the limits of using US air power to support Iraqi government and Kurdish forces and local militias.
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05/25/2015
Yemeni rebels claim to have shot down a Saudi F-16 fighter jet during a fresh wave of airstrikes. The Iran-backed rebels were pictured celebrating with the wreckage of the downed aircraft which crashed in the district of Bani Harith in the northern part of Sana’a today.
The fighter jet had reportedly conducted a number of airstrikes against Yemen’s al-Dailami air base before it came down.
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05/25/2015
New Delhi: The Indian Air Force (IAF) doesn`t intend to ground its fleet of Sukhoi SU-30MKI combat jets despite a sixth plane crashing in six years, says Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar even as concerns over the frontline fighter continue. The SU-30 fleet has in the past been grounded thrice after accidents but this would not happen again despite Tuesday`s crash of a fighter in Assam.
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05/25/2015
Israeli exports of weapons to African countries rose by 40 percent in 2014 compared with the previous year, according to Defense Ministry data published last week. But overall foreign arms exports to foreign countries were down compared to 2013 by nearly $1 billion in 2014, the data published in Haaretz showed.
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05/25/2015
In 2001, “60 Minutes” bashed it as a boondoggle. Six years later, Time magazine called it “A Flying Shame.” But quietly, the helicopter-airplane hybrid V-22 Osprey has become an indispensable part of the United States military, playing triumphant roles in both war and peace.
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05/25/2015
Saudi sources have dismissed claims that Al Houthi militiamen have shot down a Saudi fighter in Yemen and recovered two missiles. “The claims lack credibility and are not at all true,” the sources said. “What the Yemenis saw was merely a disposable external fuel tank that the plane released by the plane on its way back to the base. It is a routine action that the pilot did on the way back,” the sources told local news site Sabq on Sunday.
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05/25/2015
The United States and Norway will conduct a joint observation flight over the territory of Russia under the Treaty on Open Skies, head of Russia's National Nuclear Risk Reduction Center Sergei Ryzhkov has announced. The flight will be carried out on May 25-29, using the CN-235 medium-range transport plane, according to Ryzhkov, who explained that the aircraft is not equipped with any weapons.
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05/23/2015
The company said in a statement it had sent out an alert to its clients urging them to carry out “specific checks of the Electronic Control Units (ECU) on each of the aircraft’s engines”. The ECU controls how the aircraft’s engine operates. The potential flaw was uncovered during internal checks separate from an official investigation into the crash of an A400M cargo plane near Seville in which four people were killed 10 days ago.
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05/23/2015
The flight on Thursday, the first for Chinese military aircraft on that flight path, comprised bomber planes which flew in accordance with international norms and without affecting commercial flights, Chinese military spokesperson Col. Shen Jinke told the media. On a military website, Shen claimed the exercise was not aimed against any country.
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05/23/2015
On May 20, a P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft belonging to Patrol Squadron (VP) 45 conducted a routing surveillance flight over the South China Sea, where has started building an airstrip on the disputed Spratly Islands in the waters claimed by the Philippines.
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05/23/2015
As the war in Yemen escalates after a short humanitarian truce, the stakes are getting higher for Saudi Arabia's princes, the region and Washington. The United Nations-hosted talks in Geneva next week are unlikely to get much traction. The Royal Saudi Air Force (RSAF) and its Arab allies resumed their bombing campaign this week after a five-day cease-fire to allow humanitarian supplies into Yemen.
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05/23/2015
The Sikorsky S-97 Raider hit an important milestone Friday with the successful first flight of its experimental rotorcraft. The S-97, with two pilots, took off at the company's West Palm Beach, Fla., facility about 7 a.m. and performed all of its proscribed movements over roughly an hour. The flight test took on the basics — three take-offs and landings, and all cardinal movements at 10 knots — before more advanced tests over the year.
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05/23/2015
Each time a quick reaction alert sortie is launched from any of the nations operating the Eurofighter Typhoon combat aircraft, it is dependent on the availability of the type’s twin Eurojet EJ200 turbofan engines. Flown by partner nations Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK, plus export users Austria and Saudi Arabia – and also to be delivered to Oman from later this decade – the Eurofighter provides the backbone for their air defence capabilities.
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05/23/2015
India’s first indigenous aircraft carrier, INS Vikrant, will be re-launched next week according to local media reports. The vessel was officially launched in August 2013 with the completion of phase I of construction. The re-launch on May 28 at Cochin Shipyard Limited in Kochi will mark the successful completion of the most critical stage of phase II.
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05/23/2015
The United States and China on Friday escalated their dispute over contested territory in the South China Sea, after the Chinese repeatedly ordered an American military surveillance plane to abandon flights over areas where China has been building artificial islands. The continued American surveillance flights in areas where China is creating new islands in the South China Sea are intended to challenge the Chinese government’s claims of expanded territorial sovereignty.
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05/23/2015
Global Hawk long-range surveillance drones were targeted by jamming in at least one incident near the Spratly Islands, where China is building military facilities on Fiery Cross Reef, the Washington Free Beacon reported. That statement follows Thursday reports that the Chinese navy warned a US surveillance plane to leave the same area eight times in an apparent effort to establish and enforce a no-fly zone, a demand Washington rejected.
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05/22/2015
China yesterday said its air force planes flew over the Miyako Strait — a body of water between Japan’s islands of Miyako and Okinawa — to the western Pacific Ocean for training for the first time. China’s Defence Ministry said the training was conducted in line with international law and norms, and did not target any specific country, but the move is likely to raise tensions at a time when ties with Japan remain testy.
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05/22/2015
A few defense analysts including former military officers called for as many as 20,000 U.S. ground troops to be deployed to Iraq to combat Islamic militants gaining ground in the country. Frederick Kagan, one of the architects of the Bush-era troop surge in Iraq and a former professor of military history at West Point, was among those who cited the figure on Thursday during a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee on U.S. policy in Iraq and Syria.
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05/22/2015
Bulgaria will kickstart an acquisition process for a new multipurpose combat aircraft by the end of next month, Defence Minister Nikolay Nenchev has said. The Defence Ministry will submit the respective proposal to the government by 30 June, BGNES news outlet quoted Nenchev as saying on Thursday following a meeting of the parliament's defence committee.
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05/22/2015
The U.S. took punitive measures against an Iraqi airline and a Syrian businessman on Thursday over the sale of aircraft to a blacklisted Iranian airline, in a case that has sparked concerns that U.S. sanctions are beginning to fray as foreigners anticipate a nuclear deal with Tehran next month. Iran’s Mahan Air took delivery of the nine Airbus aircraft earlier this month, U.S. officials said.
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05/22/2015
Sweden's latest Gripen fighter jet has what it takes to shoot down the competition to defend Malaysia's skies. Its manufacturer, Swedish-based defence and security company Saab Group believes the reasons lie in the Gripen NG's cost-efficiency and multi-role operational performances.
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05/22/2015
The Air Force plans to be able to incinerate targets such as incoming missiles with laser weapons mounted on C-17s by 2023 as part of a directed energy developmental effort, service official said. The High Energy Laser, or HEL, is being tested by the Air Force Directed Energy Directorate, Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M. Ground tests are slated for later this year as part of a plan to precede air-launched laser weapons firing evaluations, Air Force Chief Scientist, told Military.com in an interview
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05/22/2015
In the years since the 9-11 attacks, unmanned aircraft — “drones” — have become the signature combat system of America’s global war against terrorists. According to the Air Force, its fleet of Predator and Reaper unmanned aircraft flew an average of 1000 hours per day last year over places like Iraq and Afghanistan, generating full-motion video and other reconnaissance that has become crucial to coalition military operations.
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05/22/2015
The Chinese navy repeatedly warned a U.S. surveillance plane to leave airspace around disputed islands in the South China Sea, a sign that Beijing may seek to create a military exclusion zone in a move that could heighten regional tensions. The warnings, delivered eight times to a P-8A Poseidon over the Spratly Islands on Wednesday, were reported by a CNN team aboard the plane.
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05/22/2015
The White House also said it is seeking to provide an additional $30 million in Foreign Military Financing to Tunis in 2015, a 50 percent increase compared to 2014. Tunisia’s newly elected president in Beji Caid Essebsi is currently in Washington, DC. On Thursday, he met with US President Barack Obama in the Oval office, becoming the first democratically elected Tunisian president to visit the White House.
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05/21/2015
A Russian military aeroplane has been spotted in British airspace near a Nato monitoring base earlier today. The Antonov An-30 military surveillance aircraft was spotted flying roughly 30 miles from Menwith Hill, a high-tech Nato monitoring station based in north Yorkshire, by 41-year-old semi-professional photographer Steve Bradley.
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05/21/2015
Islamic State extremists Wednesday captured the Syrian desert town of Palmyra, famed for its ancient ruins and a notorious political prison, in their second major victory in just four days after ousting the Iraqi army from the city of Ramadi. Syrian state news media reported that the government had withdrawn local militias protecting the town after evacuating their families, and local activists said other regime forces had retreated 30 miles to the east to a local phosphate mine.
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05/21/2015
Boeing has floated the idea of selling refurbished A-10 Warthogs to other nations as the US Air Force seeks to retire the venerable attack airplane. The company is currently extending the service life of the air force’s A-10 fleet through a re-winging programme, and it recently delivered its 100th modification with more than 70 modifications left on contract.
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05/21/2015
The U.S. Defense Department approved a deal selling Israel $1.8 billion worth of precision guided munitions and bombs, the Pentagon announced on Wednesday. The deal includes 14,500 Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAM), an arms system attached to bombs that enables precision targeting with GPS, intended for Air Force fighter jets.
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05/21/2015
The Russian army plans to integrate more than 250 aircraft into its armed forces by the end of the year, a top defense official said Wednesday. The influx will be the latest in a series of apparent upgrades to Russia’s military capability as part of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s vow to modernize the nation’s armed forces by the end of the decade.
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05/21/2015
Lt. General Jon Davis, Head of Marine Corps aviation, told Reuters that they might declare a squadron of 10 Lockheed Martin Corporation F-35 military aircraft ready for combat by July 15 this year. Earlier this week, Lockheed Martin also delivered six F-35B aircraft to the USS Wasp amphibious warship for operational testing.
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05/21/2015
The Chinese navy issued warnings eight times as a U.S. surveillance plane on Wednesday swooped over islands that Beijing is using to extend its zone of influence. The series of man-made islands and the massive Chinese military build-up on them have alarmed the Pentagon, which is carrying out the surveillance flights in order to make clear the U.S. does not recognize China's territorial claims. The militarized islands have also alarmed America's regional allies.
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05/21/2015
Boeing recently completed maintenance on a U.S. Air Force E-4B advanced airborne command post earlier than planned, enabling the Air Force to quickly return the vital aircraft to operational service. It was the first E-4B serviced at Boeing’s San Antonio site. Boeing also performs maintenance on Air Force C-17 Globemaster III airlifters, KC-135 aerial refueling tankers and on commercial aircraft at that site.
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05/21/2015
Initial operating capability (IOC) of the modernized French Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) fleet has been achieved with Boeing’s delivery of the second of four upgraded aircraft and completion of the operational tests and evaluations. The upgrade is part of a Foreign Military Sale between the French Defense Procurement and Technology Agency (Direction générale de l'armement – DGA) and the U.S. government.
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05/21/2015
The US State Department has approved a $1.9 billion proposed sale of 10 advanced multi-mission helicopters, equipment and weaponry to Saudi Arabia, the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) said in a statement. Produced by US defense contractors Lockheed Martin and Sikorsky, the MH-60R is the US Navy’s premier anti-submarine and anti-surface warfare helicopter.
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05/20/2015
The Air Force says it's going to implement a plan increasing a cap on the number of flights by aircraft visiting Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson. The plan increases the annual total of flights by visiting aircraft to 2,326 — up from the current cap of 1,408 based on flights in 2009. However, the Air Force also says that the actual number of flights could be smaller than allowed under the newly raised cap.
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05/20/2015
"Today, patrol aircraft over the neutral waters of the Baltic Sea near the outer sea border of Latvia identified an Il-72 plane of the Russian Air Force," the report reads. According to the Ministry of Defense of Latvia, in 2014, Russian military aircraft and ships approached the borders of the Republic more than 250 times.
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05/20/2015
The company said in a statement that it had sent out an alert to its clients urging them to carry out "specific checks of the Electronic Control Units (ECU) on each of the aircraft's engines". The ECU controls how the aircraft's engine operates. The potential flaw was uncovered during internal checks separate from an official investigation into the crash of an A400M cargo plane near Seville in which four people were killed 10 days ago.
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05/20/2015
The impending nuclear deal coupled with Russia’s supplying Iran with the S-300 anti-air missile system has made a military solution to a potential crisis in Iran more difficult for Israel to implement. In order to prepare for such an eventuality, the IAF recently ran a joint training exercise with the Greek military.
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05/20/2015
For United Technologies Corp., merging its Sikorsky helicopter unit with Textron Inc. could be a good alternative to a traditional spinoff. The $106 billion maker of aircraft engines and elevators announced in March that it would divest Sikorsky, either by selling it or spinning it off. A final decision by United Technologies will come in about a month.
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05/20/2015
A frontline Sukhoi SU-30 MKI combat jet of the Indian Air Force (IAF) crashed in Assam's Nagaon district on Tuesday, but both pilots ejected safely, officials said. Sources from the IAF said a technical snag was responsible for the crash that took place at 12.30 p.m. "Preliminary investigation shows a technical snag caused the crash," an official said. Officials said no decision has been taken yet for grounding the Sukhoi-30 fleet.
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05/20/2015
An F-35 Joint Strike Fighter pilot will one day control a small fleet of nearby drones from the cockpit while in flight - according to a new Air Force report on autonomous systems, Air Force Chief Scientist Mica Endsley said. The Air Force is poised to unveil a new strategy for unmanned aircraft systems next month. The report will discuss more teaming with manned aircraft such as the F-35, greater levels of automation and a wider scope of missions for UAS - such as transporting cargo.
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05/20/2015
The United States and Israel have begun preliminary, unofficial contacts regarding special American military aid for Israel due to developments in the Middle East. Although neither side has said so explicitly, the Obama administration plans to provide Israel substantial defense compensation if an agreement is signed between Tehran and the world powers to limit Iran’s nuclear program.
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05/20/2015
A demo version of the system is expected to be unveiled at a joint training meeting involving high ranking officials from the flight safety services. The meeting will take place on May 19-21.
"After testing and debugging, the unified flight safety system will be introduced on all air force units of Russia's Armed Forces. Other entities of the state aviation will be incorporated into the system," said Major-General Alexander Berzan, the chief of Aviation Safety in the Russian Armed Forces.
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05/20/2015
One US Marine was killed and 21 were injured when an MV-22 Osprey crash-landed at Bellows Air Force Station on Oahu on Sunday during a training session. The incident came just days after the Pentagon announced it would deploy a squadron of CV-22 Ospreys to Yokota base starting in 2017.
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05/19/2015
China's domestic J-16 multirole fighter/bomber is the key in the People's Liberation Army Air Force's transformation from a from a defense-oriented unit into an offensive power, says the Beijing-based Sina Military Network. Typically speaking, fighters are fighters and bombers and bombers, but improving technology, automation of avionics, more precise weapons and lighter weights have led to the development of multi-role aircraft.
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05/19/2015
Always Investigating has been digging deeper to find out more about the MV-22 Osprey. The Osprey that crashed at Bellows was based in San Diego, but the Kaneohe Marine Corps Base also received Ospreys back in 2012. The base was scheduled to get 24 of them. This Osprey is billed as having the speed of a turbo-prop airplane and the ability to move and tilt like a helicopter.
It’s currently being used in overseas military missions as well.
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05/19/2015
Dassault Aviation will double production of its Rafale combat jet within two to three years of the completion of a planned sale to India, its chief executive said on Monday. The maker of combat and business jets is also in talks on potential fighter sales with several other countries including Malaysia, after recently winning its first export contracts for the Rafale with Egypt and Qatar, CEO Eric Trappier added.
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05/19/2015
After spending much of the past decade racing to build up a cadre of drone pilots and aircraft, the Air Force is temporarily reducing the number of unmanned aircraft missions it flies. It’s not because demand is slacking off — UAVs remain in high demand in Iraq, where they search for Islamic State hideouts — but because the intense pace has pushed airmen to the breaking point.
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05/19/2015
President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry meet with GCC delegation at Camp David. When the United States sells billions of dollars in sophisticated arms to Arab nations, they are conditioned on two key factors: no weapons with a qualitative military edge over Israel will ever be sold to the Arabs, nor will they receive any weapons that are not an integral part of the U.S. arsenal.
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05/19/2015
There will be no tax on jet fighter aircraft Rafale when it flies into India. “Since, it is government-to-government (G2G) deal, it will not attract any duty (basic custom duty, special additional duty SAD or counter veiling duty CVD)” a senior Finance Ministry official told BusinessLine. India and France are expected to sign an Inter Government Agreement soon for this deal, which is estimated to be worth over $6 billion.
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05/19/2015
Russian troops are taking part in military training on Monday in Tajikistan alongside other members of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), the Russian Defense Ministry said. The CSTO is a military alliance comprising Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. As part of a snap inspection of the alliance’s Collective Rapid Reaction Force, troops are simulating combat with armed groups in mountainous terrain.
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05/19/2015
Another seven 24 Russian MIL-171SH military transport helicopters will be delivered to Peru later this month, the deputy head of Russia’s main arms exporter said on Monday. Rosoboronexport deputy director Sergei Ladygin made the announcement at the close of an international arms exhibition held in the Latin American country. The $400 million-plus contract for the delivery of 24 MIL-171SH helicopters was inked in December 2013.
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05/19/2015
Raytheon said in a statement that the US Air Force and defense contractor Raytheon have passed a final review of the Small Diameter Bomb II, an advanced bomb that can change direction and target in midflight.
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05/19/2015
If you were beginning to lose hope that futuristic laser weapons would ever become a reality – it’s 2015, people! – then you may be in luck. The US Air Force is working on it, and could be attaching laser artillery to fighter jets as early as 2022. Last September, the US Navy spent $40 million installing a 30-kilowatt Laser Weapons System (LaWS) onboard the USS Ponce. The first of its kind, the laser has yet to be used in a true combat situation, but it has been test-fired on practice drones.
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05/18/2015
A Papua New Guinea report says two Indonesian military jets were scrambled to confront an Australian Defence Force aircraft near the border over West Sepik on Friday. The Post Courier reports the information was in a PNG intelligence report which said in the process, the Indonesian aircraft violated PNG air space although the presence of the Australian aircraft was also a surprise. Neither the Australians nor the Indonesians have confirmed the incident.
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05/18/2015
In World War II, U.S. admirals often referred to the string of islands and atolls they were capturing as "unsinkable aircraft carriers" to be used in the war against Japan. In World War III, will islands be used this way again?
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05/18/2015
The rapid response capabilities of U.S. forces in Japan are now set to be strengthened, which will almost assuredly enhance the deterrence of the Japan-U.S. alliance. The U.S. Defense Department has announced that CV-22 Osprey transport aircraft will be stationed at Yokota Air Base, western Tokyo, starting in 2017. Their number is scheduled to be increased to 10 by 2021, according to the statement.
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05/18/2015
Singapore's quest for a new maritime patrol aircraft, a mid-life upgrade for F-16s and possible purchase of the F-35 are among the expected areas of interest at this year's Maritime Defence Exhibition and Conference (IMDEX), experts say. The 10th biennial IMDEX will be held at Singapore's Changi Exhibition Centre from May 19-20.
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05/18/2015
The U.S. Navy’s X-47B UCAS (unmanned combat air system) continues to break or make records. Thus in 2015 this included the world's first fully autonomous aerial refueling in April, performed with a KC-707 tanker. During the last few years this unmanned combat aircraft has successfully carried out numerous operations aboard aircraft carriers. These tests were often firsts for UCAS. Thus an X-47B made its first catapult launch from an aircraft carrier on May 14th 2013.
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05/18/2015
Days after the government auditor questioned the delay in producing the indigenous Tejas light combat aircraft (LCA), a defence ministry official said the first squadron of 18 aircraft will be delivered by 2017-18 — a good 17 years after it first took to the skies. “The initial operational clearance was obtained in December 2013 and the production of Tejas has commenced.
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05/18/2015
The U.S. special-operations force that carried out a first-of-its-kind mission in Syria to capture the Islamic State finance chief and his wife over the weekend came away with a treasure trove of materials that could help in the attempt to pressure the extremist group.
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05/18/2015
The 34-nation Treaty on Open Skies was signed in 1992 in Finland and currently applies most NATO member states, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Georgia, and Sweden. The treaty establishes a regime of unarmed aerial observation flights over the territory of its participants with the aim of boosting transparency of military activities.
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05/18/2015
A downed aircraft at Bellows Air Force Station in Windward Oahu suffered a “hard landing” to which firefighters and emergency crews were called to respond. An MV-22 Osprey from the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit experienced a "hard landing" while conducting training at the Marine Corps Training Area at Bellows, the military announced.
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05/17/2015
Coalition military forces continued to attack ISIL terrorists in Syria and Iraq between 8 a.m., May 15, and 8 a.m., May 16, local time. In Syria, coalition military forces conducted six airstrikes using bomber and fighter aircraft. Separately in Iraq, coalition military forces conducted 15 airstrikes approved by the Iraqi Ministry of Defense using attack, fighter and remotely piloted aircraft against ISIL terrorists.
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05/17/2015
After decades of maintaining a minimal nuclear force, China has re-engineered many of its long-range ballistic missiles to carry multiple warheads, a step that federal officials and policy analysts say appears designed to give pause to the United States as it prepares to deploy more robust missile defenses in the Pacific.
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05/17/2015
Some interesting international intrigue has been playing out in Europe. Russia’s the bad guy; the hero, improbably, is France. Early last year, as you may remember, Russia invaded and annexed Crimea, and ginned up a separatist movement in Ukraine’s east. Ever since, it has supported those separatists financially, with arms, and, sometimes, in battle.
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05/17/2015
U.S. and Nepalese teams found eight sets of remains as they resumed recovery efforts Saturday of the UH-1Y Huey helicopter that crashed in Nepal on Tuesday, presumably killing the six Marines and two Nepalese soldiers aboard. Eight separate sets of remains have been discovered since the recovery effort began, according to a Joint Task Force 505 statement May 16. They have yet to be positively identified. Additionally, the cause of the mishap has not been determined.
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05/17/2015
When Capt. Lisa Becker deployed to Afghanistan, she didn't expect to fly Mi-17 helicopters alongside Afghan pilots. "It's an opportunity that I didn't know I'd have," said Becker. "It's very fulfilling to be able to have that mentorship role." Becker is believed to be the first American female soldier to be rated to fly the Russian-made helicopter. She also is the first female Aviation Foreign Internal Defense/Special Operations Forces aviator to serve with the Special Mission Wing in Afghanista
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05/17/2015
A committee headed by Air Marshal S.B.P. Sinha is all set to begin government-to-government negotiations with France for procurement of Rafale fighter jets for the Indian Air Force, and the multi-billion dollar deal will be finalised as early as possible, Union Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar said on Saturday.
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05/17/2015
U.S. special operations forces carried out a raid into eastern Syria early Saturday, killing a senior leader of the Islamic State and about a dozen militant fighters, capturing the leader’s wife and freeing an 18-year-old woman apparently being held as a slave, Pentagon officials said. Two dozen Delta Force commandos entered Syria aboard Black Hawk helicopters and V-22 Ospreys and killed the militant leader, known as Abu Sayyaf.
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05/17/2015
Greek Defense Minister Panos Kammenos and US Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter will discuss Athens' proposal to construct a NATO air base in the Aegean Sea during a meeting next week, the Greek Defense Ministry said.
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05/16/2015
Turkish military jets shot down a Syrian aircraft after it violated Turkey's airspace on Saturday, media reported. It was not immediately clear what kind of aircraft was shot down. Turkey's NTV news channel said it came down in Syrian territory. A Turkish military official confirmed that two F-16 fighters flying out of the Incirlik base in southern Turkey had opened fire, but was unable to give any details about the target.
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05/16/2015
A number of RAF jets have been scrambled to intercept two Russian long-range bombers off northern Scotland, the latest in a series of provocative operations by the country's air force.
As tensions between Nato and Russia have worsened over the Ukraine crisis, Moscow has significantly increased the number of military flights probing Nato airspace. The number of interceptions over the Baltic States trebled last year and Nato members including Britain have stepped up air policing support.
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05/16/2015
Speaking to reporters after a two-day summit of foreign ministers of NATO countries in the southern city of Antalya on Thursday, Stoltenberg said he welcomed Turkey's decision to take part in forming a spearhead unit as part of the high readiness force. Allies decided to enhance the NATO Response Force (NRF) in 2014 by creating a “spearhead force” within it, known as the Very High Readiness Joint Task Force (VJTF).
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05/16/2015
Take the new F-22 fighter. It’s the most expensive fighter in the air today, but as a recent story in The National Interest by long-time United States Naval Institute writer Dave Majumdar points out, even its missiles will have a hard time getting past the ability of Russia’s truly fearsome Su-35S Flanker E to jam radars and other sensors.
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05/16/2015
A top military analyst believes Australia and the US may be holding discussions about hosting the supersonic B1 bomber in northern Australia, where it could threaten Chinese ships menacing US allies in the South China Sea. The Pentagon on Friday was forced to contradict one of its own top officials who said the US would be "placing additional Air Force assets in Australia … including B-1 bombers and surveillance aircraft".
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05/16/2015
When the U.S. navy sent a littoral combat ship on its first patrol of the disputed Spratly islands in the South China Sea during the past week, it was watching the skies as well. The USS Fort Worth, one of the most modern ships in the U.S. navy, dispatched a reconnaissance drone and a Seahawk helicopter to patrol the airspace, according to a little-noticed statement on the navy's website.
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05/16/2015
The U.S. is "expediting" weapons shipments to Iraq in light of the ISIS advances in Ramadi, Vice President Joe Biden told Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi in a telephone call on Friday. The announcement from the White House comes on the heels of a flurry of new airstrikes against ISIS, also known as ISIL, as Iraqi forces desperately try to hold the key city, the capital of the key Anbar province.
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05/16/2015
The wreckage of a Marine helicopter from Camp Pendleton missing in Nepal since Tuesday has been found and there are no apparent survivors, the U.S. military said Friday. Six Marines and two Nepalese soldiers were aboard the UH-1Y Huey when it disappeared while on a relief mission after a pair of earthquakes in the mountainous nation.
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05/16/2015
According to deputy director from the Russian Federal Service for Military-Technical Cooperation, Russia plans to sign a number of contracts with countries in Latin America this year on the purchases of arms and military equipment.
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05/16/2015
The US-led Coalition comprises some 60 nations that began carrying out airstrikes against Islamic State targets in Iraq in August 2014, and expanded the air campaign to Syria in September 2014, albeit without the approval of the Syrian government. In Syria, the Coalition struck the militants’ fighting positions, light vehicles, tanks and tactical units.
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05/14/2015
Raytheon has successfully completed the flight test of its APG-79(V) X AESA radar system, demonstrating the functions required to extend the combat relevance of F/A-18C/D Hornet aircraft for 15 to 20 years. The Hornet fleets, upgraded with new APG-79V(X) radar, will benefit from extended detection ranges, simultaneous air-to-air and air-to-ground capabilities, production of high-resolution synthetic aperture radar (SAR) mapping and better reliability.
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05/14/2015
A senior Department of Defense official signed a key acquisition memo May 7 that will allow the Joint STARS Recapitalization program office here to begin awarding contracts. Frank Kendall, Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics, signed a Materiel Development Decision Acquisition Decision Memo officially ushering the program into the Materiel Solution Analysis phase.
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05/14/2015
The Indonesian air force wants to replace its outdated American built F-5 fighters with the brand new Russian Su-35 Super Flanker, but the country’s political leadership is unable to act quickly because the U.S. is pitching in with its F-16 and F-18 jets. The Indonesians operate both American F-16s and Russian made Flankers – five Su-27s and 11 Su-30s. How Russian aircraft ended up in the air force of an American ally is interesting.
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05/14/2015
I was never told where I would be taken to. The only instructions I received was to arrive on time in the morning in front of the McDonald’s in Subang Airport. And so I was there on time.
Several Americans were there, a few in military garb and the rest in civilian clothes. They greeted me and said that we will be boarding a United States Navy C-2 Greyhound aircraft.
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05/14/2015
The defense authorization bill the House will debate this week includes a provision from a congressman and retired Navy SEAL that prevents the Navy from disestablishing Helicopter Sea Combat Squadrons 84 and 85. These U.S. Navy Reserve squadrons use the HH-60H Rescue Hawk helicopter and are responsible for training SEALs. HSC-84 is based at Chambers Field at Naval Station Norfolk, Va., and HSC-85 is based at Naval Air Station North Island, Calif.
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05/14/2015
Among the trainee fighter pilots of the Royal Australian Air Force's (RAAF) Introductory Fighter School is a Qantas captain who has taken leave without pay and a former Australian Army soldier. Another is from Melbourne and a fourth from country Western Australia. "It's a dream they've been chasing for quite a while," Squadron Leader Grant Taylor said, standing on the tarmac at RAAF Base Darwin as the trainees prepared their jets for takeoff. "A lot of the pressure is self-induced," he said.
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05/14/2015
Seeking to boost its maritime firepower, Beijing has announced that it is developing a new naval fighter that will be able to operate from amphibious warships and would be able to land vertically, similar to the F 35 B fifth generation aircraft. This is the third, new generation fighter program being under taken by China in the last five years, with the J 20 and J 31 being the others.
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05/14/2015
The Iraqi Ministry of Defense announced on its website on Wednesday that, according to critical intelligence information, the second-ranking ISIL leader Abu Alaa al-Afri was killed during an airstrike led by the international coalition forces. The Ministry claimed that the killing occurred during a gathering at a mosque.
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05/14/2015
The contract is worth around $467 million, the newspaper said. The project, alongside other major long-pending contracts, has been cleared by the defense acquisitions council chaired by Indian Defense Minister Manohar Parrikar. The helicopters will reportedly be assembled in India.
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05/13/2015
Air forces across Europe suspended flights of the Airbus Group NV A400M and shares of the planemaker slumped after one of the military transport aircraft crashed near Seville, Spain, killing four people. Britain’s Royal Air Force and Germany’s Luftwaffe both said they’d pause operations until more information is available on the cause of the crash, which a German media report suggested may have been engine failure.
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05/13/2015
In a recent act of heroism, the Turkish military headquarters proudly announced that its howitzers (with 40 km firing range) shelled a Syrian missile battery. Even more heroically than that, at the weekend, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu’s military convoy, protected by helicopters and armored vehicles, stepped foot deep into the Syrian soil: 253 meters from the Turkish side. They were paying a visit to the tomb of Süleyman Sah, the grandfather of the founder of the Ottoman Empire.
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05/13/2015
The nation's governors on Tuesday urged Congress to reject any personnel or equipment cuts from the Army National Guard, as lawmakers craft the defense bill that authorizes spending and activities in 2016. "The nation’s governors call on Congress to maintain Army National Guard (ARNG) aircraft, personnel and force structure," said a statement by the National Governors Association (NGA), which represents all governors.
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05/13/2015
The Nigerian Air Force has said the acquisition of new aircrafts has helped the military in the fight against Boko Haram terrorists in the Northeastern part of Nigeria. Speaking in Abuja at the 51st anniversary of the Nigerian Air Force, the Chief of Air Staff, Adesola Amosun, said the force has recorded giant strides in the past one year which has led to the successful onslaught against terrorists in the Northeast.
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05/13/2015
The Estonian reservist usually works in a car showroom, but Raido Reinsalu has spent the past week manning a battery of howitzers in his country’s pine forests. The 24-year-old sergeant is one of 13,000 soldiers mobilised by Estonia for the biggest military exercise in the nation’s history, joined by another 1,000 Nato troops from the US and Europe, including Britain.
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05/13/2015
The United States needs to decide how it's going to protect Syrian rebels it is training before they head back into battle, Air Force Gen. Mark Welsh III said Tuesday. "We’ve done a lot of support in the past for forces from the air, we do a lot of support from the ground and the policy decisions are going to have to be finalized before these guys go back and do their work," Welsh said on Fox News' "Shepard Smith Reporting."
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05/13/2015
In an average year, the global fighter jet industry does well to ink two or three blockbuster deals, the kind in which military groups decide to upgrade their fleet by ordering a couple of high-powered aircraft. By these standards, 2015 looks like it will be an above-average year after a surge in jet orders in March and April.
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05/13/2015
The U.S. military is considering using aircraft and Navy ships to directly contest Chinese territorial claims to a chain of rapidly expanding artificial islands, U.S. officials said, in a move that would raise the stakes in a regional showdown over who controls disputed waters in the South China Sea.
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05/13/2015
The weak Czech crown is complicating the sale of the Czech L-159 combat aircraft to Iraq as the state wants Penta, the owner of the mediating firm, to pay it 100 million crowns more than originally, daily Hospodarske noviny (HN) writes yesterday. The ministry agreed on the sale of 15 L-159 planes to Iraq with the Aero Vodochody aircraft maker for 750 million crowns last August.
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05/13/2015
The exercise, codenamed Lion Effort, marks a decade that Gripen fighter jets have been used to guard Czech airspace, Radio Prague said in a broadcast. In 2009 and 2011, similar exercises were held in Hungary and Sweden. The Czech air force sent L-159 light combat planes, Mi-24 assault helicopters, Mi-171 multipurpose helicopters and C-295 CASA transport aircraft to take part in live flying training.
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05/12/2015
British aircraft and unmanned drones have attacked Islamic State targets in Iraq with more than 200 bombs and missiles in military operations that have been largely ignored, a Guardian analysis has shown. The air strikes, which began in the autumn, have been undertaken by the RAF’s oldest bombers – Tornado GR4s and its newest weapon – the remotely piloted Reaper.
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05/12/2015
A Moroccan F-16 aircraft participating in the “Operation Decisive Storm” of the Arab coalition was shot down on Sunday by Houthi rebels in Yemen, the Moroccan Royal Armed Forces (FAR) report said Monday. According to a statement issued by the press service of the Inspectorate General of the RAF, a F16 warplane which is part of the Royal Armed Forces squadron put at the disposal of the Saudi-led coalition to restore legitimacy in Yemen, has been reported missing since Sunday.
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05/12/2015
Last week, the U.S. State Department approved the potential sale of components and logistical support for Singapore’s F-16 Block 52 upgrade program in a deal worth around $130 million. The approval was part of several deals that the State Department cleared for U.S. allies and partners in the Middle East and the Asia Pacific.
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05/12/2015
The United Kingdom’s former defense chief is using some colorful language to criticize the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. Nick Harvey, who served as armed forces minister from 2010 to 2012, recently said of the fifth-generation stealth fighter jet, “You could argue it was already one of the biggest white elephants in history a long time ago,” according to an article by The Independent, a national newspaper based in London.
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05/12/2015
All the Navy recovered after Lt. Nathan Poloski’s fighter jet collided in midair with another Navy jet on a training mission in the western Pacific in September were his flight helmet and a few bits of debris. The 26-year-old pilot, who was deployed aboard the aircraft carrier Carl Vinson, died one month before the ship steamed into the Persian Gulf and began launching combat missions against the Islamic State.
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05/12/2015
The following clip was aired by Zevda, the Russian TV network owned by the Russian Ministry of Defence. Filmed with GoPro cameras inside and/or outside Russian Air Force Yak-130s, Mi-28s, Ka-52s, Su-27s, Su-34s, Su-25s and Mig-29s the footage shows the biggest ever Victory Day parade over Red Square, on May 9, from a privileged point of view.
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05/12/2015
The Romanian Air Force (RoAF) and Royal Thai Air Force (RTAF) recently selected Lockheed Martin’s (NYSE: LMT) Sniper Advanced Targeting Pod (ATP) for their F-16 fleets, becoming the 18th and 19th international customers to receive this advanced sensor capability. Lockheed Martin will integrate and field Sniper ATPs on existing RoAF and RTAF aircraft and provide initial sustainment support. Pod deliveries began in early 2015 to meet operational need requirements.
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05/12/2015
The exercise allowed both Malaysian and US naval forces to track a live target that was threat representative, the release explained, adding that the United States was impressed with the capabilities of the Royal Malaysian Navy.
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05/12/2015
The Defense Department also said these aircraft will maximize interoperability, enhance operational cooperation, and promote stronger defense relations with the Japan Self-Defense Forces. The CV-22 Osprey is a tilt-rotor aircraft combing vertical takeoff, hover and vertical landing qualities of a helicopter with the long-range, fuel efficiency and speed characteristics of a turboprop aircraft.
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05/11/2015
Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan on Sunday released a video of its militants holding a Shoulder Launch Missile, which the militant group claimed to have used in downing a Pakistan military helicopter killing ambassadors of the Philippines and Norway and five others in the PoK. A video released by a jihadist media forum shows at least four masked militants with the surface-to-air missile (SAM-7 B) allegedly used in hitting the Mi-17 that crashed in Naltar valley of Gilgit-Baltisitan in PoK.
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05/11/2015
In the span of just a few weeks, a flurry of orders has reset the global fighter market. First came the Feb. 13 announcement that Egypt would become the first foreign customer for the Dassault Rafale. Then on April 10, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi placed an order for 36 Rafales for his nation. A week later, the United Arab Emirates said it was restarting talks with Dassault about the Rafale, and by the end of April, Qatar has declared its intention to buy the French fighter.
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05/11/2015
On June 22, 2012, a Turkish RF-4E military reconnaissance aircraft took off from an air base in eastern Turkey. It flew at low altitude, as most spy planes do, and violated Syrian airspace before it was hit - most likely - by a missile fired from a Syrian- or Russian-operated air defense system. Two Turkish pilots were killed. Their bodies were later recovered from the Mediterranean Sea with help from a US ship.
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05/11/2015
Spain said on Sunday it had found the two black boxes from the crashed Airbus A400M military aircraft that plowed into a field north of Seville airport in its maiden test flight on Saturday, killing four of the six test crew. The black boxes had been handed over to investigators, the government said in a statement. Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy late on Saturday asked for maximum transparency from Airbus during the investigation into the cause of the crash.
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05/11/2015
The largest mobilisation exercise Siil/Steadfast Javelin is currently underway in Estonia after the country restored its armed forces two decades ago. Siil/Steadfast Javelin involving over 7, 000 of reserve forces and in total 13, 000 troops from Estonia and Allied countries kicked off in locations all over Estonia this week and runs from May 4 to 15. "I was pleased to see the enthusiasm among the reservists, service members, Home Guard and Allied forces when inspecting the troops.
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05/11/2015
The Defense Ministry yesterday stated that recent media reports reporting that Chinese military forces paralyzed the capital Taipei within two days during simulations during the annual Han Kuang series of military exercises were inaccurate. In a noon press release, the Defense Ministry reported that the “Han Kuang Number 31” exercises which ran for five days and four nights between May 4 and 8 concluded with all training exercises completed as planned.
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05/11/2015
The Textron Scorpion costs $20 million, still not exactly a bargain by most people's standards, but a fifth of the cost of the F-35. It suggests that not every advanced defence project has to necessarily come in years late and billions over budget – and points to a new twist in not only the future of fighter-jet design, but also in more humanitarian roles that a budget jet could carry out.
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05/11/2015
A Moroccan F-16 warplane taking part in the Saudi Arabian-led coalition fighting in Yemen went missing on Sunday, the Moroccan Royal Armed Forces said in a statement. Backed by the United States, a Saudi-led coalition has been conducting air strikes against the Houthis and army units loyal to ex-president Ali Abdullah Saleh since March 26 with the aim of restoring the government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi.
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05/11/2015
Russian Aerospace Defense Forces (VKO) plan to cut the number of radar units produced for the air defense of Moscow and the Central region four times, however VKO will boost the production of new generation air defense systems, VKO spokesperson Alexei Zototukhin told RIA Novosti.
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05/10/2015
An Airbus Group NV military transport plane crashed near Seville, southern Spain, killing four of the people on board, the Spanish government said Saturday. A government official in Seville said the aircraft was carrying six people and crashed in a field about a mile north of Seville’s airport, catching fire upon impact. Two people were sent to the hospital with very serious injuries, she said.
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05/10/2015
The official signing ceremony for the acquisition of 24 Rafale aircraft was held today in Doha, in the presence of the Emir of the State of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, the President of the French Republic, François Hollande, Dassault Aviation Chairman and CEO, Eric Trappier and Thales charirman and CEO, Patrice Caine.
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05/10/2015
The United States transferred weapons to Pakistan that were used by American forces in Afghanistan and Iraq, including 14 combat aircrafts, 59 military trainer jets, and 374 armored personnel carriers, according to the Congressional Research Service (CRS).
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05/10/2015
Brazil will send an official inquiry about the potential purchase of the Russian Pantsir-S1 missile system, Brazilian Minister of Defense Jaques Wagner told Sputnik. On Saturday, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said that the waiting list for the purchase of the Pantsir-S1 system is formed until 2019.
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05/10/2015
The Ka-52 Alligator (Hokum B) is a Russian all-weather attack helicopter, which can be used both in reconnaissance and combat missions. The helicopter was designed to be capable of destroying tanks, armored and non-armored ground targets, as well as enemy troops and helicopters.
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05/09/2015
Yesterday, Boeing Co announced that it is in talks with Kuwait to get new orders of its F/A-18 super hornets, which will keep the production running till fiscal year 2019. Boeing was of the opinion that after getting the order, the future of its military aircraft will be safe.
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05/09/2015
North Korea has successfully test-fired a newly developed underwater ballistic missile which it describes as a "world-level strategic weapon", the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported early Saturday. Leader Kim Jong-Un gave the order to test-fire the missile and watched as it was launched from an attack submarine, the news agency said.
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05/09/2015
The Australian Defence Minister Kevin Andrews has announced the start of construction of the new air combat capability facilities at the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) Base Williamtown.
Marked by turning of the first sod, construction of the new facilities is being carried out as part of a $1.5bn project that will provide facilities for the F-35A Lightning II - Joint Strike Fighter at ten bases across the country.
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05/09/2015
Today marks the nine month anniversary since the start of the U.S.-led air campaign, later named Operation Inherent Resolve, against the self-declared Islamic State (IS) in Iraq and Syria. The air war, which Secretary of State John Kerry then described as definitively not a war, but rather “a heightened level of counterterrorism operation,” shows no sign of ending.
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05/09/2015
China has started building artificial islands in the South China Sea at a greater rate than ever to boost its territorial claims in the area, a U.S. Defense Department senior official said Friday.
The official said China had reclaimed 800 hectares (2,000 acres) at five different sites, three-quarters of it since the beginning of 2015, indicating that the speed of reclamation has picked up dramatically.
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05/09/2015
Drones-like sharks and William Shatner-are often misunderstood by the public. Many associate the autonomous fliers with warfare and creepy government spies. But drones can be heroic, dropping life-saving supplies to civilians in combat zones. That's what U.S. Air Force member/Stanford PhD student Mark Jacobsen wants to do with his crowdfunding effort, the Syria Airlift Project.
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05/09/2015
The U.S. Congressional Research Service reports that Pakistan has signed $5.4 billion in Foreign Military Sales contracts from fiscal 2001 to fiscal 2014. Procurement of F-16 aircraft and related equipment account for more than half of the sum. "Major U.S. arms sales and grants to Pakistan since 2001 have included numerous items useful for counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency operations, along with a number of "big ticket" platforms more suited to conventional warfare."
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05/09/2015
A MiG-27 aircraft of the Indian Air Force (IAF) crashed near Alipurdwar in West Bengal on Friday evening killing two civilians on the ground even as the pilot ejected safely. The aircraft had taken off from the Hasimara air base in Jalpaiguri district. The crash happened at 8.30pm about 10 minutes after it went airborne, an IAF official in New Delhi said.
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05/09/2015
India's Tejas Light Combat Aircraft project, in the works for over three decades, came under severe criticism from the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) on Friday, which said the Mark-I version has several shortcomings and does not meet IAF specifications. Not only that, Indian Air Force (IAF) would be "constrained" to induct the fighter LCA without availability of a trainer model, thereby "adversely impacting pilot training", the audit body said in a report tabled in Parliament.
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05/08/2015
It crashed during an emergency landing in the Gilgit-Baltistan territory. The wives of the Indonesian and Malaysian envoys and two Pakistani pilots also died. They were to attend the opening of a tourism project. The Pakistani Taliban (TTP) said they were behind the attack, but there is no confirmation of the claim.
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05/08/2015
The Indian Navy will present a report on the configuration options for the second indigenous Indian Aircraft Carrier (IAC-2) to the Ministry of Defense next month. At a recent seminar on the country’s naval aviation, it became clear that the vessel will likely be in the 65,000 ton class. It could be equipped with American aircraft – or a combination that might include the naval version of the French Rafale fighter.
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05/08/2015
The old EA-6B Prowler taxied slowly down the main runway at the Monroe County Airport on Tuesday afternoon beneath two arcing plumes of water shooting out from firetrucks stationed on each side. Then a rainbow appeared. Naval Flight Officer Matthew Wickersham had just landed the aircraft for the final time. It had served since 1991 in combat, and in training missions at Whidbey Island in Washington state. The EA-6B received an official military water salute at the end of its last flight.
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05/08/2015
In 1990, the air forces of the Soviet Union consisted of over ten thousand aircraft, excluding those operated by the Soviet Army (mostly helicopters). This included not only the Soviet Air Force proper, divided between Frontal Aviation, Long Range Aviation, and Military Transport, but also the Soviet Air Defense Command, and Soviet Naval Aviation.
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05/08/2015
France is offering India 36 Rafale fighter jets in fly-away condition at the same price which it pays to French defence major Dassault Aviation to equip its own air force, defence sources said. They added that this means that the cost per aircraft will be much lower than the price that was being worked out under the Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) tender, which also involved transfer of technology.
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05/08/2015
Angola is set to be become the third operator of the Sukhoi Su-30 series twin-seat fighter jets in Africa, following Algeria and Uganda. Six former Indian air force Su-30K (mod) aircraft are due for delivery in the second half of this year. Originally destined for the Belarus air force, they have undergone a major overhaul and repair program at the Aircraft Repair Plant no. 558 in Baranovichi, Belarus, arranged by Sukhoi.
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05/08/2015
Boeing will provide the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) with a complete training system for the P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft under a contract that also includes the sale of four P-8A training systems for the U.S. Navy. This combined domestic and foreign military sale further strengthens the growing partnership between the U.S. Navy and the RAAF on the P-8 program.
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05/08/2015
The US State Department approved a $130 million deal for an upgrade of Singapore’s F-16 fighter jet fleet, the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) said in a statement on Thursday. "The proposed upgrade improves both the capabilities and reliability of the Republic of Singapore Air Force’s (RSAF) aging fleet of F-16s," DSCA said.
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05/08/2015
China has warned Philippine military planes six times to leave disputed areas of the South China Sea and may be “testing the waters” to see if it can establish a no-fly zone in the region, senior Philippine military officials said.
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05/08/2015
Finnish Air Force F-18 Hornet fighters are set to participate in an exercise known as Arctic Challenge, a twelve day, nine country exercise involving nearly 100 planes, set to begin May 25, the Finnish Broadcasting Company (YLE) reported.
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05/07/2015
The Pentagon considered, and then rejected, the idea of stopping routine intercepts of Russian military aircraft flying off the coast of Alaska, because the U.S. intercept flights appeared to have limited deterrent or intelligence value, according to two U.S. defense officials. While the Russian military flights, usually bomber aircraft, were entering a U.S. "air defense identification zone," they were not entering U.S. airspace.
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05/07/2015
irbus aims to strike a new sales deal for its A400M military aircraft this year and hopes it will bolster interest in the delay-plagued transporter, a senior executive from its defence division said. Several buyers, including Turkey and Germany, have expressed frustration at repeated delays in deliveries of the heavy cargo and troop carrier, Europe's largest defence project.
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05/07/2015
Foreign warplanes struck a number of targets in the Khartoum area in central Sudan overnight Tuesday, the London-based news outlet al-Araby al-Jadeed reported. Several Arab media outlets attributed the airstrikes to Israel, which did not comment on the reports.
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05/07/2015
Hungry for defence deals, France has cosied up to the Gulf monarchies, winning several billion-euro contracts in the process, but its strategy of backing one side in the region's Sunni-Shia power struggle is risky, say experts.
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05/07/2015
Ever since the Budget Control Act of 2011 placed caps on the Pentagon's base budget, Congress and the Obama administration have been using creative accounting to evade them. But this year's House Armed Services Committee (HASC) version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) set a new standard for budget gimmickry.
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05/07/2015
The Air Force announced Wednesday it has crossed a new milestone for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter this week — its first female pilot. Lt. Col. Christine Mau, deputy commander of the 33rd Fighter Wing Operations, completed her first training flight in the fifth-generation fighter jet Tuesday, according to an official Air Force report.
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05/07/2015
An article in Sina's Chinese-language military news web portal compared the abilities of India's HAL Tejas Light Combat Aircraft and the FC-1 Xiaolong/JF-17 Thunder developed jointly by China and Pakistan. Overview of the Aircraft
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05/07/2015
The Parliamentary Committee on Defence has noted with concern that the frontline combat aircraft of the Indian Air Force (IAF), Sukhoi-30MKI, do not have protection of hardened shelters in air bases which would save them from direct hits of bombs in the event of a war.
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05/07/2015
The US has handed over to Pakistan 14 combat aircraft, 59 military trainer jets and 374 armoured personnel carriers, which were earlier used by American forces in Afghanistan and Iraq. As the US withdraws its forces from neighbouring Afghanistan, the major defence articles have been transferred to Pakistan under its 'Excessive Defence Article' category, an internal Congressional report has said.
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05/06/2015
France agreed to a 25% discount on its earlier offer to clinch the deal for an off the-shelf purchase of 36 Rafale aircraft during Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Paris last month. This will be the base on which further negotiations will take place on Wednesday. The ballpark cost per aircraft as per Dassault's winning bid for the 126 MMRCA programme — the old, nowscrapped, Rafale deal — came to about $300 million, taking into account the estimates of Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL).
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05/06/2015
Saudi Arabia has twice as many British-made warplanes at its disposal for its bombing campaign in Yemen than those that are available for the entire Royal Air Force, The Telegraph can disclose. British-made Tornado GR4 ground attack fighters and Eurofighter Typhoons are playing a central role in the Royal Saudi Air Force’s bombing campaign against Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen.
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05/06/2015
As the US withdraws its forces from neighbouring Afghanistan, the Obama administration has armed Pakistan with 14 combat aircraft, 59 military trainer jets and 374 armoured personnel carriers, an internal Congressional report has said. The major defence articles have been transferred to Pakistan under its 'Excessive Defence Article' category, which are mostly from its war combat zones of Afghanistan and Iraq.
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05/06/2015
At a ceremony yesterday at Royal Australian Air Force Base Townsville in northern Queensland, Australia commissioned their first two Boeing CH-47F Chinook advanced configuration aircraft. It’s a major milestone in the updating of the Australian Army’s cargo helicopter fleet.
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05/06/2015
The United States has approved a proposed $47 million sale of air-to-air Sidewinder missiles and associated parts to Indonesia, the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) said in a statement. DSCA explained that the sale will reduce Indonesia’s reliance on the United States to intervene in Southeast Asia to maintain stability, while improving Indonesia’s interoperability with the United States.
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05/06/2015
The United States has approved a possible military sale of 17 Osprey aircraft and associated parts and equipment to Japan in a $3 billion defense deal with the island country, the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) said on Tuesday.
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05/06/2015
UK Royal Air Force pilots and four Eurofighter Typhoon aircraft took over the NATO Baltic Air Policing mission from their Spanish colleagues at an airbase near Tallinn on Tuesday, the Estonian Defense Forces reported. Their Spanish partners had been patrolling the skies there since January 2.
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05/06/2015
China will have to purchase Sukhoi Su-35 (Flanker-E) supermaneuverable multirole fighter jets despite the fact that Beijing is developing its own fourth generation aircraft, according to the Want China Times website.
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05/06/2015
Russian-Turkish technological cooperation will continue in joint projects to include short-range missile defense systems, tactical digital communications, orbital space systems, as well as various military and marine equipment.
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05/05/2015
Much like the husky A-10 Warthog, the Air Force's combat-chiseled AC-130 gunships can claim legendary status among soldiers, aviators, historians and politicians. Steady-flying turboprop aircraft like the Spectre, Spooky, and Stinger II gunships are continually on patrol around the globe, ready to rain down fiery spit and fury at a moment's notice in support of American and coalition ground troops.
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05/05/2015
The Army’s OH-58 helicopter is retiring from service this year. As the Joint Readiness Training Center and Fort Polk used this classic war bird a final time for rotational unit support in April, a big fan of the aircraft was invited to observe one of its final missions. That fan is retired Lt. Col. Hugh L. Mills, also known as “Darkhorse 1-6,” whose legacy was born over the muddy deltas and thick jungles of Vietnam in 1969.
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05/05/2015
The Navy has no immediate plans to explore using its planned fleet of V-22 Ospreys carrier onboard delivery aircraft to refuel its carrier aircraft, while the Marines are actively looking to include a tanking capability in its own tilt-rotor V-22s by 2017, service officials told USNI News on Monday.
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05/05/2015
Sweden's Saab AB on Monday ruled out facilitating the sale of Gripen fighter aircraft to Argentina as the result of a deal to build and export combat jets from Brazil. Argentina has expressed interest in buying 24 Gripen fighter jets from its Latin American neighbour once Brazil is able to export them, early next decade. Such a deal would face an almost certain veto from Britain, which provides some 30 percent of the Gripen's content, including the radar on its next-generation Gripen E/F.
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05/05/2015
A daily game of Cold War cat-and-mouse is ratcheting up tensions in the Baltic and drawing the biggest military presence into the region for over 20 years, Swedish military officials say.
Eye-to-eye encounters with Russian combat jets and reports of suspected submarines in Swedish and Finnish waters are fuelling regional concerns about Russian assertiveness in the wake of the Ukraine crisis and reversing years of defense cuts.
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05/05/2015
Boeing will update two maintenance trainers for the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) so they better support the RAAF’s F/A-18F and EA-18G aircraft. Australia is the only nation other than the United States flying F/A-18 Super Hornet fighters and EA-18G Growler airborne electronic attack aircraft. While it operates the two-seat F variant of the Super Hornet, its current trainer configuration is for the single-seat variant.
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05/05/2015
The Saudi-led coalition's airstrikes against Houthi positions in Yemen will not yield any significant results without a ground operation, Sudan's Defense Ministry adviser told Sputnik Monday. Mahmoud also stated that in the last two days several troops from a Saudi-led Arab coalition landed in Yemen's southern city of Aden to create a military base that will deal with distribution of humanitarian aid for the city's residents.
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05/05/2015
Within the framework of the Open Skies Treaty, American and Danish inspectors will perform an observation flight over the territory of Russia May 4-8. According to sources a joint mission of the United States and Denmark will fly over the Russian territory on board an American observation aircraft OC-135B. The aircraft will take off from an airfield in Khabarovsk.
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05/05/2015
US warships have begun accompanying British merchant vessels in the Strait of Hormuz, a Pentagon spokesman said Monday. The US Department of Defense announced that US warships would accompany all US-flagged commercial vessels passing through the Strait of Hormuz. It also did not rule out that assistance could be extended to other countries as well.
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05/05/2015
The 6.3-billion-euro agreement includes an order for 24 jets manufactured by French defense group Dassault with an option on a further 12 planes, AFP reported from Doha. Another contract will involve the training of 36 Qatari pilots and around one hundred mechanics. Hollande met Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani to discuss the crises rocking the region, including Saudi-led coalition airstrikes on anti-government rebels in Yemen.
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05/04/2015
Qatar's planned signing of €6.3 billion (US $7.1 billion) of contracts for the Rafale fighter jet and missiles boosts French arms exports to more than €15 billion, the highest value France has ever reached in a single year, defense officials said. President François Hollande is due to attend the May 4 signing for 24 fighters by Dassault Aviation and missile maker MBDA in Doha, signaling high-level ties.
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05/04/2015
Pilots and passengers using Djibouti International Airport, site of the only U.S. air base in Africa, take their lives into their hands thanks to a dangerously incompetent air traffic control system there. Documents obtained by The Washington Post show that the air traffic controllers, civilians who work for the Djibouti government, regularly nap, listen to music, play video games and text on their mobile phones while directing military traffic from several nations.
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05/04/2015
The crew of Pelican One keeps a watchful eye as the U.S. Navy patrol plane swoops low to identify a ship operating near waters off southwestern Japan that China now claims as its territory. After a radio check and a close look confirms the ship is a harmless Panama-flagged commercial tanker, Pelican One veers off and resumes a patrol that can last up to 12 hours and takes the plane thousands of miles from its base in Okinawa, Japan.
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05/04/2015
Several large transport aircraft and four tilt-rotor MV-22 Ospreys landed at Kathmandu’s international airport Sunday as U.S. forces arrived to assist in the Nepal earthquake relief effort. People’s Liberation Army soldiers, whose own massive transport jet was parked next to the first American C-17 to land on the tarmac, were clearly impressed when a group of Marines unloaded a UH-1 Huey helicopter.
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05/04/2015
A new agreement between the US and Japan sets up the island nation to take a larger role in the politics of the Pacific while opening new opportunities for military research and development. The updated guidelines for the US-Japan military relationship reflect the changes in the Pacific that have occurred since the last version in 1997.
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05/04/2015
India is running out of patience with Russia and its shoddy military equipment. The most irritating issue, one that lasted more than five years, has been the low reliability of the Su-30MKI jet fighters. Fifty of these Russian designed aircraft were built in Russia and the rest of the 272 aircraft order are being assembled locally. Deliveries should be complete by 2019 and at the moment India is not keen on ordering any more.
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05/04/2015
Afghan security forces are suffering record casualties in their first battles against the Taliban since the US combat mission in Afghanistan ended in December after more than 13 years. The number of killed and wounded so far this year was about 70 per cent higher than during the same period last year, said Colonel Brian Tribus, director of public affairs for NATO's Afghanistan mission.
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05/04/2015
Saab's Gripen jet, for years often seen as an also-ran in international fighter competitions, is turning that reputation around. The trajectory began to change in October by the finalization of a deal to sell 36 Gripen NG aircraft to Brazil and a 2015 Swedish government commitment to buy 60 JAS 39 Gripen Es and Fs.
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05/04/2015
The multi-billion deal for 36 Rafale fighter jets could see French defence major Dassault Aviation entering into a joint venture with state-run HAL or any private player to set up a base here for augmenting its existing production line. Defence sources said such a step, if taken will not only allow the French firm to ramp up its production rate but will help it to meet offset obligations in India, likely to be 30-50 per cent of the sales value.
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05/03/2015
The military will conduct five days of computer-assisted war games May 4-8, with the focus this year on emergency response, as part of the country's annual Han Kuang exercises. In a bid to test the military's combat readiness in the face of a military threat from China, the drill will focus on swiftly preparing troops for battle and the mobilization of supplies and reservists.
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05/03/2015
Pakistan's military says airstrikes have killed 44 suspected militants in the tribal region near the Afghan border. A statement Saturday said 28 suspected militants were killed when jets struck hideouts in the Tirah Valley of the Khyber tribal region. It said separate strikes in the Datta Khel area of North Waziristan killed 16 suspected militants, most of them foreigners.
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05/03/2015
Two Russian military bombers, which are capable of delivering nuclear warheads, flew into a U.S. air defense zone near Alaska last week, a Washington news website reported Friday. A pair of Tu-95 Bear H bombers reportedly flew into the airspace on April 22 -- perhaps a sign, officials said, that Russia has begun its long-range aviation spring training cycle.
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05/03/2015
The U.S. is sending more aircraft to Nepal to fly relief supplies from Kathmandu to refugees in need, defense officials said on Saturday. The Marine Corps is sending four MV-22 Ospreys and two KC-130 cargo aircraft to Nepal, said Maj. Christopher Logan, a spokesman for Marine Forces, Pacific. Three UH-1Y Huey helicopters are being flown to Nepal in Air Force C-17s, he said.
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05/03/2015
Fourteenth ( 14th ) edition of Indo-French naval exercise (VARUNA) concluded today off Goa. The ten day long exercise commenced on 23 April 2015 and included both a harbour and sea phase. Mr Laxmikant Parsekar, Chief Minister of Goa, French ambassador Mr. Fran?ois Richier along with Vice Admiral SPS Cheema, Flag Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Western Naval Command and other senior naval officers embarked the French Navy's Aircraft Carrier.
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05/02/2015
Saudi Arabia’s decision to intervene militarily in Yemen against Iranian-backed Houthi rebels has raised regional tensions to a boiling point. In a cold war between Iran and Saudi Arabia that is growing increasingly hot, the move by Russian President Vladimir Putin to lift the ban on the sale of S-300 missiles to Iran has come at just the wrong moment.
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05/02/2015
With the conflict there now in its second month the UN estimates more than 1,200 people have been killed and thousands more displaced, amid a growing humanitarian crisis. But according to the official, who asked not to be named, Gulf Arab governments decided they had to intervene to stop the Houthi takeover of Yemen after new intelligence emerged in January this year.
(Read More...)
05/02/2015
Qatar has agreed to buy 24 Dassault Aviation-built Rafale fighter jets in a 6.3-billion-euro ($7 billion) deal, the French government said on Thursday, as the Gulf Arab state looks to boost its military firepower in an increasingly unstable region. Tensions in the Middle East with conflicts in Yemen, Syria and Libya, as well as concerns over Shi'ite Muslim power Iran's growing influence in the area, have fuelled a desire across Sunni Gulf Arab states to modernise their military hardware.
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05/02/2015
The roll rate, expressed in degrees per second, is the rate at which an aircraft can change its roll attitude. Modern jet fighters can achieve quite high maximum roll rates: the faster they can rotate around longitudinal axis the faster they can transit from one maneuver to another one.
However, the roll rate is just one of the parameters (not all equally important) that influence the aircraft’s maneuvering performance.
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05/02/2015
When analysing a subject like India's air force, it is important to rely only on facts. Thus an air force, which is one of the top five forces in the world, today has an ageing asset, with "some 500 fixed-wing operational aircraft, significantly down from the total of 850 in 2006". Printed open source information like that of the (latest) Jane's All the World's Aircraft shows that India has nine types of combat aircraft, the breakup of which gives a rather dismal scenario as on date.
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05/02/2015
The Kazakh Air Force has taken delivery of four Sukhoi Su-30 Flanker C 4++ fighter aircraft from Irkut Corporation, part of the Sukhoi Group from Irkutsk, Russia. The fighters were transferred at Taldykorgan air base in southern Kazakhstan and will participate in the aviation show during the city’s Armed Forces Day and 70th anniversary Victory Day parade on May 7, reported the Kazakh Ministry of Defence press office.
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05/02/2015
At the dawn of aerial combat 100 years ago, World War I flying aces frequently closed to within 15 meters before firing at enemy aircraft with their machine guns. Such intimate encounters helped create a perception of pilots as skilled “knights of the air” who climbed into the cockpits of nimble aircraft to duel their opponents.
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05/02/2015
Crews will participate in tactical war games and maneuvers alongside combined armed forces from the same military district. "A total of more than 25 exercises of various scale, involving assault aircraft crews from the Southern Military District's airbase in the country's south, will be held in 2015," the statement said.
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05/01/2015
NATO has decided to modernize two more air bases in Romania and related construction has already started at the 90th Airlift Base in Otopeni, northern Bucharest, local media reported on Thursday. The Alliance will also consolidate the runway at Air Base in Campia Turzii, northwestern Romania, to ensure military maneuvers without any problems, according to local Digi24 television.
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05/01/2015
The U.S. State Department has approved Australia’s request for U.S. sustainment packages for Australian fighter aircraft and warships through the Foreign Military Sales program. The U.S. Defense Security Cooperation Agency, in charge of the FMS program, has informed Congress of the approval.
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05/01/2015
Vasily Kashin, a military commentator from the Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies based in Moscow has said that the S-400 air defense system will give the People's Liberation Army the ability to control the entire airspace of Taiwan, in an article he wrote for Sputnik News in response to an article by J. Michael Cole, the Canadian chief editor of Thinking Taiwan, a media platform sponsored by Tsai Ing-wen, the chair of Taiwan's opposition Democratic Progressive Party.
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05/01/2015
The legislation rejects Pentagon proposals to close excess military bases and infrastructure and plans to trim support for military grocery stores and housing allowances for troops. The legislation backs pay raises for troops at 2.3 percent, versus a Pentagon call for 1.3 percent.
The bill also adds additional funding for fighter aircraft for the Navy and Marine Corps, including six more F-35 Joint Strike Fighters than requested and 12 extra F/A-18 Super Hornets.
(Read More...)
05/01/2015
A House panel early Thursday approved a defense bill that would again bar the Pentagon from scrapping the Air Force’s A-10 fleet. There are 18 A-10 airplanes stationed at Selfridge Air National Guard Base in Harrison Township that support about 650 full- and part-time jobs.
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05/01/2015
Earlier this year, Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Jonathan Greenert said that he believed that the F/A-XX, the Navy’s planned eventual follow-on to the F-35C, would be "optionally manned". On April 15 at the Sea-Air-Space conference, Navy Secretary Ray Mabus leaned further forward, noting how he believed that "the F-35 should be, and almost certainly will be, the last manned strike fighter aircraft the Department of the Navy will ever buy or fly.”
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05/01/2015
ockheed Martin marked the 1,000th Sniper Advanced Targeting Pod (ATP) delivery during a ceremony held yesterday at its Missiles and Fire Control facility in Orlando, Florida. The 1,000th pod, which was delivered to the U.S. Air Force, is a sensor-enhanced Sniper ATP that provides fighter and bomber aircraft with advanced modes for non-traditional intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (NTISR); enhanced target identification; maritime tracking; and two-way datalink communication.
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05/01/2015
The Boeing B-1B Lancer celebrates its soon to be 30th anniversary with the U.S. Air Force at Dyess Air Force Base this week – marking one of many milestones in a legacy that will continue long into the future as Boeing’s B-1 team ushers the supersonic bomber into the digital age with new upgrades.
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05/01/2015
Just as the 37th rotation of NATO's air policing mission is coming to an end and Spanish and Polish jets are returning to their home bases, Spanish media has released some images of what it claims to be “Spanish Air Force Typhoons escorting some Russian Air Force planes”.
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05/01/2015
China's high-end J-11D fighter aircraft, a copy of the Russian Sukhoi Su-27 jet, has made a maiden flight, local media reported Thursday. Photos uploaded to the Internet on Wednesday show the latest modification of China's domestically-constructed J-11B aircraft, initially designed as a copy of the Soviet-made Su-27, the Sina.com news portal said.
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