Aircraft & Propulsion

Are unmanned air vehicles worth their impact on the Air Force budget? We don’t really know.

Remember when the F-35 was going to be the only Western fighter in production after 2020? That’s not how it looks today.

This week’s Check 6 marks the start of a series of special features running before Aviation Week & Space Technology’s 100th anniversary in 2016 with a discussion of stealth and counter-stealth technology.

Much of the history of stealth has taken place under a shroud of secrecy that often hid important events from insiders as well as the public. It’s been a vast and often chaotic development, driven by technology, economics and geopolitics—and even the goals set 30 years ago have yet to be met.

You can assume that the T-50 is a Russian F-22, or that jammers on trucks can’t affect an air campaign. But if you’re wrong, you’re in trouble.

Some people conjecture that the next bomber will be supersonic or B-2-sized. It probably won’t be either.

Lasers, microwave weapons and railguns have flopped before. Here are some ways to stop that from happening again.

Some Australian politicians say they know the best answer for the country’s submarine needs. They don’t.

Think that range, payload and stealth will be the deciding factors in the Air Force’s bomber choice? Think again.

Service leaders are right to say that the F-35 is better than the aircraft they have today. But that’s not the whole story.

The Air Force expects a multi-player competition over TX. But has it thought its brilliant plan all the way through?

The Pentagon has many ideas about running the F-35’s upgrade program. It needs to pick one and stick with it.

The U.S. Air Force wants to keep its bomber program under wraps. There are at least six reasons why that’s a bad idea.

Two Western fighter houses are in the best position to challenge the F-35 in the 2020s. Can their rivals hang in there too?

As the wheels come off India’s plans to build Rafales, Brazil’s Gripen program moves carefully forward.

Star Wars lasers were intended to hit things that missiles could not touch. The new generation exploits different characteristics.

The U.S. likes to talk about international defense partnerships, but the reality is that the home industry’s interests always come first.

Marine leaders believe that their JSF will be a war-winner. They should be given a chance to show how their plans will work.

The story of the Navy’s stealth unmanned air vehicle has taken some new turns. Is a secret project behind the changes?

Don’t look at what new Pentagon projects look like this year. Worry about how to pay for them in the 2020s.

The Navy wants to fix the Littoral Combat Ship, but the changes are so extensive that it might make more sense to start over.

It looks as if the F-35 could meet its key performance parameter requirements, but that is a narrow definition of success.

Selling military airplanes is not just about hardware. It is the start of a decades-long relationship.

USAF is taking a serious look at reengining the Boeing B-52. The question is not whether it makes sense, but why it hasn’t been done.

This expanded issue of Aviation Week’s Defense Technology International edition is the first of a series planned to coincide with major defense shows worldwide. This week, the Association of the U.S. Army convention and show opens in Washington—an event that grew rapidly during the 2000s as the U.S. committed soldiers and weapons to the longest land conflict in its history.