2014-09-16 The arrival of the USS America in San Diego marks the completion of a two-month transit around South America from Ingalls Shipbuilding in Pascagoula, Miss. America is the first ship of its class, replacing the Tarawa-class of amphibious assault ships. As the next generation "big-deck" amphibious assault ship, America…
2014-08-28 Earlier, in our discussion with Major Summa, the executive officer of VFMA-121, the first operational U.S. Marine Corps (USMC) F-35 Squadron, the aviator emphasized the impact commonality was already having. Working with the other service pilots provides an important window on where we want to go with the concepts…
2014-08-07 By Robbin Laird An insertion force is characterized by strike, defense, lift, tanking and air battle management that can be effectively integrated to get to an objective area, and then to operate over and within until mission success. Sustainable reach is a fundamental operational objective. This means that lift…
2014-08-08 By Ed Timperlake and Robbin Laird We have focused from the outset on the maintainability of the F-35 and the roll out of real world experience in shaping the maintenance regime. We argued earlier that letting the operators shape the operational path for the F-35 makes a lot of…
[maxgallery id="67887"] 2014-08-07 By Robbin Laird During my visit to 2nd Marine Air Wing in June 2014, I had a chance to meet with several of the members of the VMGR-252 squadron. In this interview, Sgt. Paul Millis, a Crew Chief, and Sgt. Thomas Chevalier, a power train maintainer. Both…
2014-07-31 By Robbin Laird During my latest visit to Second Marine Air Wing, I focused upon the USMC evolution of its use of the KC-130J. I spent a morning in the KC-130J simulator watching Marine pilots hone their skills and did so from the tanker seat in the aircraft. [caption…
2014-07-23 By Robbin Laird During my latest visit to Second Marine Air Wing, I focused upon the USMC evolution of its use of the KC-130J. The Osprey has been a dramatic addition to the USMC and has made it the only tiltrotar assault enabled force in the world. What can…
2014-07-23 It is clear from much of the policy discussion surrounding the F-35 that it is difficult for folks to wrap their minds around what a global support structure might look like. What also makes the discussion difficult is to understand what a F-35 fleet deployed on national territories, on…
