Naftaly Mwaniki

CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand — The last U.S. Air Force transport aircraft journeyed home on March 7 after a busy summer in Christchurch. From this New Zealand city, the Air Force made frequent flights to Antarctica in support of the National Science Foundation program there.
This year’s summer program was notable for two reasons.
Firstly, the Air Force utilized a new aircraft platform – in addition to usual Lockheed Martin LC-130H Hercules “skibirds” and Boeing C-17A Globemaster IIIs – to fly to one of the world’s most remote spots.
Lt. Col. Jack Smith, Commander of the 304th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron, Antarctic Operations, explained to Defense News why these C-130Hs of the Nevada Air National Guard put in an appearance, performing around ten missions to the frozen continent.
“There’s a C-17 gap season, from about the 5th of December through the third week of January, where we don’t operate because the runway gets too soft,&..

The Pentagon has awarded the long-awaited contract for the Air Force’s Next Generation Air Dominance future fighter jet, known as NGAD, to Boeing, President Donald Trump announced Friday.
The sixth-generation fighter, which will replace the F-22 Raptor, will be designated the F-47, Trump said. It will have “state-of-the-art stealth technologies [making it] virtually unseeable,” and will fly alongside multiple autonomous drone wingmen, known as collaborative combat aircraft.
“It’s something the likes of which nobody has ever seen before,” Trump said in an Oval Office announcement with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Allvin and Lt. Gen. Dale White, the Air Force’s military deputy for acquisition, technology and logistics. “In terms of all the attributes of a fighter jet, there’s never been anything even close to it, from speed to maneuverability to what it can have [as] payload. And this has been in the w..

PARIS — Denmark indicated plans to join a European pool of air-to-air refueling tankers, including the potential purchase of two Airbus A330 MRTT refueling aircraft, with Danish participation in the joint capacity estimated to cost about 7.4 billion Danish kroner ($1.1 billion) over the 2025-2033 period.
Danish Chief of Defence Gen. Michael Hyldgaard has recommended Denmark become a partner in the six-nation Multinational Multi-Role Tanker Transport Fleet, initially through the purchase of flight hours for air refueling, followed by negotiations to buy a share in the pool equivalent to two refueling aircraft, the Ministry of Defence said on March 25.
Aerial refueling is one of several critical defense enablers where Europe partly relies on U.S. capacities, a dependency that appears increasingly risky as the American government disengages from Europe. The stakes may be even higher for Denmark, as U.S. President Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to annex Greenland, an autonomo..

VICTORIA, British Columbia — The Canadian military hopes to start working with industry this summer on the acquisition of a new helicopter fleet that will deal with existing rotary aircraft gaps in firepower and mobility.
The Next Tactical Aviation Capability Set or nTACS project will provide a joint capability to be fielded by the Royal Canadian Air Force, the Canadian Army, and Canadian special forces.
In addition, Canada is also planning an upgrade of its existing fleet of Chinook heavy lift helicopters, according to a Feb. 25, 2025, briefing on Canada’s vertical lift capabilities.
The document noted that Canada will spend $12.9 billion (CA $18.4 billion) on new tactical helicopters. The briefing was prepared by RCAF Brig. Gen. Brendan Cook, director general of air and space force development, and provided to Defense News by the Department of National Defence.
The briefing pointed out that the nTACS project is in the options analysis phase but that discussions with indus..

The nominee to be the Department of the Air Force’s next secretary pledged on Thursday to focus on its nuclear modernization efforts and continue work to get its troubled intercontinental ballistic missile program back on track.
In his testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Troy Meink, who previously served as the deputy director of the National Reconnaissance Office, also told lawmakers the department needs to act faster to innovate its weapon systems and streamline its acquisition systems.
The Air Force is working on replacing its arsenal of about 450 50-year-old Minuteman III nuclear missiles — the land-based portion of the nation’s nuclear triad — with a new Northrop Grumman-made ICBM called the LGM-35A Sentinel.
But Sentinel’s projected future costs increased dramatically from what Northrop and the Air Force originally expected, triggering a cost overrun process called a critical Nunn-McCurdy breach. The Air Force launched a review of the pro..

ROME — Italy is considering buying the Japanese Kawasaki P-1 maritime patrol aircraft to tackle hostile submarines in the Mediterranean, a move which would break an Italian tradition of U.S. aircraft purchases and strengthen ties with Tokyo.
“The P-1 is is one of the possible options available,” Italian Air Force chief Luca Goretti told reporters on Friday when asked how Italy aimed to fill gaps in its maritime patrol capability.
“We have a great relationship with Japan,” he added.
A four engine platform designed from scratch as a maritime patrol aircraft, the P-1 has been in service in Japan since 2013. While export efforts to date have not been successful, the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force now operates 33 aircraft.
As Italy retired the last of its long serving Atlantique maritime patrol planes in 2017 it acquired ATR 72′s jointly built by Airbus and local firm Leonardo to fill the role, operated by mixed Air Force and Navy crews.
But while offe..

MANILA, Philippines — The U.S. State Department has approved a prospective sale of 20 F-16 aircraft to the Philippines, part of a larger package that includes hundreds of medium-range, air-to-air missiles, bombs, anti-aircraft guns and ammunition, worth $5.58 billion.
The official notice of the sale follows U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s trip to the Philippines last week, and it comes ahead of the annual Balikatan exercises, a joint military drill between the long-time treaty allies.
Hegseth’s visit came amid the U.S.’s growing tension with China and as part of what experts and geopolitical watchers describe as Washington’s pivot to Asia. During the visit, Hegseth said Washington plans to “re-establish deterrence” and strengthen its allies in the region.
The proposed aircraft sale to the Philippines will be “helping to improve the security of a strategic partner that continues to be an important force for political stability, peace, and ..

The U.S. military has deployed more of its most advanced fighter jets to the Middle East as it continues to strike Yemen’s Houthi rebels, an Iran-backed terrorist group attacking commercial ships in the Red Sea, according to multiple congressional aides.
The fifth-generation F-35A is the Air Force’s premier fighter, which includes stealth capabilities and advanced sensors and can carry a variety of air-to-air and air-to-ground guided weaponry.
The Pentagon previously surged the fighters to the Middle East amid the conflict in Gaza, while trying to contain a full regional war. While there, the fighters conducted airstrikes against the Houthis during the Biden administration’s campaign to reopen shipping lanes.
How Trump’s team flipped on bombing the Houthis
More than two weeks into the Trump administration’s intensified airstrike campaign in Yemen, Hegseth has rushed further military assets to U.S. Central Command. He’s extended the deployment of the Harry S. Truman Ca..

The Navy has awarded defense and aviation technology company Shift5 a contract to test predictive maintenance technology on the V-22 Osprey, which the company hopes might prevent gearbox catastrophes that have proven fatal in recent years.
Under Shift5’s contract with Naval Air Systems Command, or NAVAIR, the Marine Corps will run the company’s manifold technology on Osprey’s flown by its operational test squadron. This will allow the V-22 Joint Program Office to test how well continuous operational data monitoring works on the tilt-rotor aircraft, and how to develop rules for detecting maintenance problems that need to be quickly addressed, the company said in a release Wednesday.
“Given the criticality of solving some of these life-threatening issues that are happening on the V-22, it really is all about providing real-time insights to the crew for situational awareness so they can make better decisions,” said Shift5 chief executive and co-founder Josh L..

Marine F-35 and Air Force F-22 pilots operated for the first time last month as a joint fighting force in a digital training simulation that is soon expected to become standard for Marine, Navy and Air Force fighters, according to a release from the Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division.
As part of the exercise, F-35 aviators assigned to Marine Fighter Attack Squadrons 122, 225 and 311 partnered with four F-22 Raptor crews at the division’s Joint Simulation Environment, or JSE, in Patuxent River, Maryland.
The March 24-27 exercise saw aviators practice fifth generation fighting in 17 simulated combat missions comprising advanced warfighting scenarios, according to division commander Rear Adm. John Dougherty IV. Lessons learned after each mission were assessed via post-training evaluations of cockpit video and audio recordings reviewed by the pilots.
“This milestone is a game-changer that ushers in a new era of interoperability for aviation’s combat community and..