The Pentagon’s POW/Missing Personnel Office has identified an Air Force officer missing in action from the Vietnam War. Maj. John F. Conlon III of Wilkes-Barre, Pa., and another crewmember took off from Qui Nhon Air Field in South Vietnam on March 4, 1966, in an O-1E Bird Dog light observation aircraft on a reconnaissance mission. The last contact with Bird Dog came 30 minutes after takeoff when the crew reported their position. A six-day search, initiated when the aircraft did not arrive at its destination, failed to find the aircraft or crew. Leads developed from May 1993 to August 2005, led investigators to a site that a joint JPAC-Vietnamese team excavated in February 2006. Conlon’s dental records confirmed his identity from remains found at the site.
The first flight of the secretive B-21 bomber has slipped to mid-2022, but the program is moving along well, Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office director Randall Walden said in an exclusive interview. The second copy of the B-21, which will be used for structural testing, is now on the production…