Military

The U.S. Air Force and commercial airline SkyWest Airlines are trying to learn more about a July 18 incident in which a North Dakota-based B-52 Stratofortress may have had a near miss with a passenger plane.
SkyWest said in a statement to Air Force Times that its flight 3788 was flying from Minneapolis to Minot, North Dakota, on Friday evening. Air traffic controllers cleared flight 3788 to approach Minot International Airport for a landing when “another aircraft became visible in their flight path,” SkyWest said.
The commercial plane aborted the landing and circled above the airport, before landing safely at the airport, the airline’s statement said. SkyWest said the company is now investigating the incident.
An Air Force spokesperson confirmed a B-52 from Minot Air Force Base held a flyover of the North Dakota State Fair that evening, but stopped short of confirming the near miss happened or saying an investigation was underway.
“We are aware of the recent rep..

The White House has nominated Gen. Thomas Bussiere, head of Air Force Global Strike Command, to be the service’s next vice chief of staff.
The Pentagon announced Bussiere’s nomination Friday, and said Lt. Gen. Stephen Davis — now the Air Force’s inspector general — has been nominated to receive his fourth star and succeed Bussiere as head of Global Strike.
The White House has also nominated the Space Force’s Lt. Gen. Shawn Bratton to be vice chief of space operations. Bratton is now deputy chief of space operations for strategy, plans, programs and requirements.
If confirmed by the Senate, Bratton would succeed Gen. Michael Guetlein as vice chief of space operations. The Senate on Thursday evening confirmed Guetlein to head the Pentagon’s massive Golden Dome missile defense project.
Bussiere would succeed former Air Force Vice Chief Gen. Jim Slife. President Donald Trump fired Slife without explanation in February, alongside former Chairman of the Jo..

WIESBADEN, Germany − As the U.S. and its allies in Europe pledge to ramp up defense spending amid mounting global threats, the supreme allied commander of Europe is calling on industry to deliver real capabilities to the field in record time.
“We can tell industry exactly what it is that we need for all the leaders that are out there. It’s our job, I think, to hold industry accountable to deliver quickly and to hold ourselves accountable for giving industry the ability to deliver quickly through our acquisition processes,” U.S. Air Force Gen. Alexus Grynkewich said July 17 during his first public speech since taking command at the Association of the U.S. Army’s inaugural LandEuro conference in Wiesbaden, Germany.
“We’ve got to do this fast. We need real capabilities and we need them delivered as soon as possible. We can’t afford to wait, future pledges are no longer enough,” he said. “To do this, the defense industrial base on..

The U.S. Navy is planning for its next-generation destroyer, currently known as the DDG(X), to feature directed-energy weapons and more capacity to carry and launch missiles.
According to a report this month from the Congressional Research Service, the service is requesting $133.5 million in research and development in its proposed fiscal 2026 budget to manufacture the DDG(X), which it hopes to procure in the early 2030s.
The design for the DDG(X) is larger than previous proposals, with the report noting that it now calls for the ship to have a displacement of 14,500 tons, representing a boost of 1,000 tons from the design put forth in the Navy’s shipbuilding plan for fiscal 2024.
The report questions how an enlarged design would be consistent with the Navy’s stated aim of transitioning to a modernized fleet featuring smaller vessels.
To modernize the fleet and cut costs, the Pentagon has been turning to autonomous vessels, and the Navy recently integrated small unmanned ..

WIESBADEN, Germany − NATO’s top commander said he is under guidance to move as quickly as possible in transferring more Patriot air and missile defense systems to Ukraine.
“I won’t go into a ton of details on any of that, I’m not going to tell the Russians or anyone else the exact numbers of weapons that we’re transferring or when those will happen,” U.S. Air Force Gen. Alexus Grynkewich, Supreme Allied Commander Europe, said at the Association of the U.S. Army’s inaugural LandEuro conference in Wiesbaden, Germany, July 17.
“We’re also looking at other capabilities and what those needs are and working on proposals for our political leadership,” Grynkewich said.
President Trump said publicly earlier this week that he intends to ship more Patriot systems to Ukraine.
The commander will soon bring European nations together to work on delivering Patriot and other capabilities, he said, to “look at what’s the art ..

WIESBADEN, Germany — The U.S. Army and its NATO allies are embarking on the execution of a new “Eastern Flank Deterrence Line” plan that aims to enhance ground-based capabilities and drive military-industrial interoperability across the alliance, the U.S. Army Europe and Africa commander said Wednesday at the Association of the U.S. Army’s inaugural LandEuro conference in Wiesbaden, Germany.
As part of the plan to counter Russian threats and enable scalable, global deterrence, the Army and its NATO allies are urgently developing standardized, data-driven systems, common launchers and cloud-based coordination, according to Gen. Christopher Donahue.
Regional plans have been coming together for some time, but the Army, along with NATO, is first focusing on the Baltic states “to try to get to how do you actually make it so that industry and the nations know exactly what the requirements are — ultimately that is now known as the Eastern Flank Deterrence Line,” Donahu..

In a seeming bid to counter increasingly aggressive Chinese activities in the South China Sea, the U.S. plans to finance and construct a fast boat facility on the western coast of Palawan in the Philippines.
The facility will be built to launch at least five fast boats, which will be constructed by U.S.-based company ReconCraft. The manufacturer specializes in producing vessels used by law enforcement and the military for rapid interdiction.
According to documents, the vessels will include both “assault boats” and rigid-hulled inflatable boats, USNI News has reported.
The facility, which will also include on-site storage and conference rooms, will provide the Armed Forces of the Philippines with an effective launch point for patrols into the South China Sea.
Chinese and Philippine vessels have clashed in increasingly hostile interactions in the region, especially as China has used aggressive tactics to assert its claims over a variety of uninhabitable reefs and shoals.
..

In a seeming bid to counter increasingly aggressive Chinese activities in the South China Sea, the U.S. plans to finance and construct a fast boat facility on the western coast of Palawan in the Philippines.
The facility will be built to launch at least five fast boats, which will be constructed by U.S.-based company ReconCraft. The manufacturer specializes in producing vessels used by law enforcement and the military for rapid interdiction.
According to documents, the vessels will include both “assault boats” and rigid-hulled inflatable boats, USNI News has reported.
The facility, which will also include on-site storage and conference rooms, will provide the Armed Forces of the Philippines with an effective launch point for patrols into the South China Sea.
Chinese and Philippine vessels have clashed in increasingly hostile interactions in the region, especially as China has used aggressive tactics to assert its claims over a variety of uninhabitable reefs and shoals.
..

MILAN — GM Defense has partnered with British company NP Aerospace to offer American platforms in a bid for the United Kingdom’s Light Mobility Vehicle (LMV) tender.
The program requirements are part of the UK’s wider Land Mobility Program that intends to replace three different types of aging vehicles and consolidate the British Army’s fleet.
The two companies have teamed up to offer GM’s flagship Infantry Squad Vehicle and its utility variant for the LMV segment, both based on the rugged Chevrolet Colorado ZR2.
In an interview with Defense News, Bradley Watters, vice-president of international government solutions and strategy at GM Defense, said the company views the competition as a strategic race.
GM Defense eyes $1 billion European market for tactical vehicles
“It’s all about getting that first win, with a major military force, and having these vehicles back in Europe – GM is getting back into Europe, if you have not heard of it, in..