2014-02-28 Second Line of Defense is currently visiting the Pacific and soon will visit the Wedgetail squadron, which currently operates from RAAF Base Williamtown, near Newcastle, New South Wales. During the exercise AWACS and Wedgetail played the core command and control role and F-22s in Alaska (which includes one flown by…
2014-02-02 By Ed Timperlake and Robbin Laird When President Obama announced a “Pivot to the Pacific,” the focus was really upon the United States and what it was going to do in the period ahead. But the US is simply part of a very dynamic and fluid defense and security…
2014-02-13 An F-35C aircraft flies a high angle of attack intentional departure test flight in November 2013. The video includes comments from the pilots and engineers testing the F-35C carrier variant's high angle of attack capabilities at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Md. Earlier we wrote about our visit to…
2014-01-16 It took a while for the KC-130J to work out its wrinkles. But by 2002, the new plane entered into USMC operations. This preceded the Osprey by five years, but the maturing of the Osprey and its pairing with the KC-130J is shaping a new long range force insertion capability.…
2014-01-15 Lockheed Martin commemorated the 100th F-35 Lightning II today with a ceremony for employees, elected officials and customers. The 100th F-35, known as AF-41, will be the first F-35 delivered to Luke Air Force Base (AFB) in Glendale, Ariz. Fleet Status Of the first 100 F-35s produced, 44 are…
2014-01-09 By Robbin Laird Japanese national security strategy is in evolution. In the most recent national security strategy, the Japanese government highlighted its latest iteration of what they called earlier “dynamic defense.” In an earlier piece, I wrote about the Japanese defense white paper of 2012 and highlighted the following:…
01/06/2014: Video shows Dutch pilot flying the F-35 at Eglin AFB. Credit: 33rd Fighter Wing:12/18/13 Maj. Laurens J.W. Vijge, Royal Netherlands Air Force F-35 Integrated Training Center training lead, completed his first flight after 210 hours of classroom training and 13 flights in the simulators. "The jet handles great and is very…
2014-01-07 By Robbin Laird and Ed Timperlake We visited the 33rd Fighter Wing during early September 2013 in the presence of Mike Wynne the 21ST Secretary of USAF. We collectively were given a professional briefing on the roll out of the F-35 to the three services, including visiting the Navy…
