According to a report in Flight International, Boeing has been soliciting the Army as a potential buyer for a C-17 revamped with short-takeoff-and-landing characteristics, the C-17B. Boeing has offered USAF the B model, which the company says would be able to land and takeoff on even shorter and more austere strips than the current A model, but the service doesn’t believe there is sufficient need to justify buying a small number of special variants that would require unique support equipment. Boeing reportedly has pitched the B model to the Army as a possible transport for its Future Combat System. And that’s interesting because the Air Force has been trying to get data from the Army on the FCS to work long-term mobility needs. Having the Army fly C-17s would be even more ludicrous than the Army’s insistence on maintaining its own fixed wing tactical transports. Bring on the roles and missions scrub.
The Senate Armed Services subcommittee on strategic forces heard testimony from the Defense Department’s top missile defense leaders and demanded to know why the Missile Defense Agency's proposed $9.6 billion fiscal 2023 budget will not yield more reliable defense against hypersonic weapons already being fielded by adversaries, including Russia on…