The California Air National Guard is trying to get ahead of the impending retirement of the 144th Fighter Wing’s F-16s, once the unit’s fighters “age out,” according to a wing official who spoke with the Associated Press news service. Although DOD did not propose cutting the Fresno-based F-16s during BRAC 2005, the BRAC commission decided to reduce the number from 24 to 18—and those 18 are older model F-16s. California lawmakers also have begun to query the Pentagon about how it will maintain the southwest air defense mission once the Vipers are gone, probably around 2012, according to AP.
No sooner had the Defense Intelligence Agency issued its North Korean Military Power report, in which it predicted Pyongyang would resume ballistic missile tests, than North Korea did exactly that, lofting a submarine-launched ballistic missile Oct. 19. The test, in which an SLBM launched from the port of Sinpo into…