The Air National Guardsman who heads up the Air Expeditionary Group for Cooperative Cope Thunder (to become a Red Flag-Alaska exercise), Col. Greg Nelson, took the opportunity to meet with senior airmen from Japan and South Korea, who are participating in this multinational exercise. The visiting airmen extolled the wide-open training space offered by Alaska and the chance to train with allies.
Every year, Congress and the military debate which combat assets should head to the boneyard and which have more life left in them. Lawmakers often opt to keep Air Force systems that bring jobs to their districts, which complicates matters as the service looks to modernize and ditch certain platforms.…