By Mike Gruss
November 1, 2024
Hypersonic glide vehicles and air-breathing versions of these weapons have prompted two U.S. administrations to pump billions of dollars into better radars and space instruments for tracking them so they can be targeted effectively. Mike Gruss sorts the myth from the reality of the threat.
By Keith Button
October 1, 2024
Hypersonic weapons and experimental versions share something in common: They must be boosted up to high speeds so that tests can begin or hypersonic weapons can be released. Keith Button spoke to aerospace engineers who think they have a better motor for these jobs.
By Mike Gruss
July 1, 2024
The United States believes Russia is developing a nuclear weapon that could be put into orbit and detonated to knock out satellites. If that happened, what would you and I experience, and what would happen at a granular level to the satellites that are so central to modern life? Mike Gruss set out to find out.
By Keith Button
April 1, 2024
There was a time when “drone war” conjured images of Cessna-sized aircraft flying over enemy lands while their controllers monitored them from half a world away in a trailer. Ukraine has shown U.S. planners that a more visceral, fast-paced, innovate-or-die drone scenario could lie ahead. Keith Button spoke to researchers who want the U.S. to be ready.
By Cat Hofacker
March 1, 2024
Ken Plaks, director of DARPA’s Tactical Technology Office
By Hope Hodge Seck
January 1, 2024
By Debra Werner
April 1, 2023
David Voss, director of the U.S. Space Force's Spectrum Warfare Center of Excellence
July 1, 2022
Leaders in the U.S. national security enterprise are intrigued by artificial intelligence. Capitalizing on this groundbreaking computing technology will require firsthand knowledge of needs and discipline in deciding which of those AI can meet. MITRE Corp.’s Eliahu “Eli” H. Niewood explains.
June 1, 2021
Military strategists need to be sure they are sending pilots to battle with electronic warfare equipment that can spoof and evade enemy radars in a host of scenarios. Assessing EW performance once required many hours of costly and time-consuming flights, but today much of the work can be done on a laboratory bench or in a test chamber. Brad Frieden of Keysight Technologies describes how his company achieves this.
June 1, 2021
Today’s U.S. Space Force does little if anything beyond what the Air Force did when it led the country’s military space operations. Humanity’s terrestrial history and the increasingly bold plans of entrepreneurs to settle and economically exploit space suggest that change is coming. Don’t be afraid. Peter Garretson explains.
By Debra Werner
April 1, 2020
Debris tends to stick around in space, and this fact poses a unique challenge for military strategists who are used to keeping the peace elsewhere partly by threatening destruction. This reality complicates the U.S. military’s efforts to define how the newly established U.S. Space Force should go about its work and how far that reach should extend as entrepreneurs seek to open up the moon, asteroids and free space to commerce.
By Christine Fisher
March 1, 2020
By Debra Werner
April 1, 2019
U.S. strategists once bragged about their school-bus-sized, multibillion-dollar military satellites, but now they’re worried these behemoths are a glaring vulnerability in their contingency planning for a war against China or Russia. When it comes to defending them, fresh thinking is needed. Debra Werner looks at whether creation of a Space Development Agency is the best solution.
By Ben Iannotta
August 31, 2018
Jeff A. Babione
By Debra Werner
July 1, 2018
The U.S. Air Force is in the midst of upending its decades-old approach of gathering life-and-death weather data for commanders and troops with limousine-sized satellites. Smaller is in for this next generation, and privately operated constellations could play a prominent role too. Debra Werner went looking for what could come after the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program.
By Jan Tegler
July 1, 2018
Rotorcraft advocates in the U.S. military have been laying the research groundwork to replace many of today’s helicopters with versions that would employ a revolutionary propulsion concept to-be-decided. Jan Tegler looks at the battle to elevate the Future Vertical Lift initiative into an acquisition program and speed up its schedule.
By Keith Button
May 31, 2018
Even before Russian President Vladimir Putin’s saber rattling this year about high-speed weapons, the U.S. was laying plans to sharpen its focus on hypersonic weapons, motivated mainly by China’s ambitious research and weapons tests. The Trump Pentagon wants to put this new focus in place in the 2019 budget.
By Ben Iannotta
April 30, 2018
By Keith Button
April 30, 2018
BRIG. GEN. THOMAS TODD III
By Jan Tegler
April 30, 2018
Is the U.S. Navy's proposed refueling drone the best strategy for empowering pilots to penetrate enemy airspace?
March 30, 2018
Detonating a nuclear bomb is unlikely to protect Earth from a far-off asteroid or comet headed our way
By Debra Werner
February 28, 2018
Vanessa Reyna, 32, mechanical engineer, Raytheon Missile Systems
By Keith Button
February 28, 2018
The U.S. Air Force Research Lab will spend much of 2018 taking a fresh look at its approach to science and technology
By Jan Tegler
February 1, 2018
U.S. Air Force is preparing to outsource much of its demand for "aggressor" aircraft to private companies
February 1, 2018
Nuclear might be the best option against a meteoroid, engineer says
May 31, 2017
DARPA’s plans for a demonstrator UAS for the Navy
May 17, 2017
2 leading aerospace journalists analyze the most important decisions facing President Donald Trump's administration
By Tom Risen
April 17, 2017
The concept of spreading technology across many small satellites has proved hard to sell
By Joe Stumpe
April 17, 2017
The U.S. Air Force is having a hard time letting go of the A-10
By Debra Werner
March 6, 2017
Designing a jet-fast plane that can stop on a dime in midair, hover and speed off
By Tom Jones
March 6, 2017
Examining the effectiveness of the new U.S. preparedness strategy
By Michael Peck
February 9, 2017
Should the military have a greater role against wayward asteroids and comets?
By Michael Peck
January 27, 2017
Ground-based Midcourse Defense system faces turning point
