Italian Built F-35 Makes First Flight

09/21/2015
09/21/2015: The F-35 is being built on three final assembly lines. The main one is in Fort Worth Texas. The second one is located at Cameri Air Force Base in Italy. This facility will transition to a full up maintenance facility after its run of planes have been built. Planes…

Osprey as Combat Connector: Landing on JMSFD Hyuga during Dawn Blitz 2015

09/21/2015
09/21/2015: The Osprey operates as a combat connector among ships in an operation and links with land forces as well. In this video, an MV-22 lands on the Japanese JMSFT ship Hyuga during Dawn Blitz 2015. Credit: Defense Media Activity - Navy:9/4/15 Marines and sailors with 1st Marine Expeditionary Brigade…

Looking Back and Looking Forward in 21st Century Warfare: Air Marshal (Retired) Geoff Brown Looks at the Evolution of Airpower

09/19/2015
2015-09-18 By Robbin Laird Air Marshal Geoff Brown retired on July 3, 2015 when Leo Davies became the new Air Marshal for the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF). Although retired, no one would consider Geoff Brown retiring in any sense of the word. After having interviewed the current Air Marshal…

New British Carriers: Working with the USN-USMC Team to Redefine the Air-Enabled Insertion Force

09/19/2015
2015-09-19 By Robbin Laird © 2015 FrontLine Defence (Vol 12, No 4) The British invented carrier warfare – and now, with their new Queen Elizabeth Class of carriers, they are working their own version of the 21st century strike carrier. Using global lessons learned, they are reinventing the large deck…

A Double 7 for the A400M: French and UK Air Forces Ramp Up

09/19/2015
2015-09-19  In June, the French Air Force received its 7th A400M. The aircraft delivered to France was the 13th production aircraft of 174 currently on order Then this month, the Royal Air Force received its 7th A400M. [caption id="attachment_80698" align="alignnone" width="300"] MSN 24, the 7th RAF A400M. Credit: Airbus Defence…

The Challenge for Independent Defense Journalism

09/18/2015
2015/09/18 By Chris MacLean In a thought-provoking commentary in this edition of Front Line Defence, retired Major-General Doug Dempster talks about the importance of “quality” as an equal, if not the most important, piece of the defence procurement puzzle. His comments bring to mind the challenges faced by media publishers. Defence…