Operation Noble Eagle, combat air patrols above American cities, marks the end of its first year, with 25,100 total sorties flown. Of these, 17,600 were fighter sorties. Most of the missions were flown by the Air National Guard: 74 percent of the fighter sorties, 62 percent of the tanker sorties, and 37 percent of the airlift sorties.
In the final few hours before the Senate adjourned for its Memorial Day recess on May 26, lawmakers approved a raft of some 3,400 pending military nominations, including a number of high-profile Air Force and Space Force generals to assignments that will significantly reshape some of the upper echelons of…