Airmen at Misawa AB, Japan, tripled their normal sortie rate during a two-day surge exercise earlier this week. The 35th Fighter Wing rapidly launched its F-16s in a simulated combat environment April 4 and 5, according to a release. Each squadron’s mission rate increased from 20 to 70 sorties a day as the personnel worked 12-hour shifts and launched aircraft from 8 a.m. to midnight. In March, the 35th Fighter Wing practiced a rapid deployment to nearby Kadena Air Base as part of exercise Beverly Sunrise 16-03.
The U.S. military needs to wake up to the fact that global dominance is no longer a viable strategy for national defense, because pursuing that unrealizable goal is making the country less safe, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee said April 22. Emerging defense technologies like swarms of…