Defense

Lockheed Martin starts building a 60-kW fiber-laser weapon for the U.S. Army, considers growth to 120 kW and sets its sights on Air Force and Navy high-energy laser opportunities.

French officials have confirmed that both France and the U.K. will likely pursue the joint development of a next-generation cruise and anti-ship missile.

“The tea leaves are saying it’s most likely next week,” a Northrop Grumman source tells Aviation Week.

“The tea leaves are saying it’s most likely next week,” a Northrop Grumman source tells Aviation Week.

With assembly complete, NASA’s Osiris-Rex spacecraft, the centerpiece for an asteroid sample return mission, will undergo five months of environmental testing.

The Finnish defense ministry has received the green light from the country’s government to begin the HX F/A-18 Hornet replacement program.

World View, the startup with plans for luxurious high-altitude passenger balloon excursions, has claimed a spot in the 2015 Neiman Marcus Christmas Book.

Huntington Ingalls Industries laid down the keel for the future DDG 117 USS Paul Ignatius earlier this month, formally beginning construction of the ship.

Naval forces and liaisons from India, Japan and the U.S. began Exercise Malabar 2015 earlier this month, emphasizing air defense collaboration.

Canada’s Liberals didn’t have to go on the record against the F-35. Nobody expected them to win an outright majority. Guess what just happened.

New Pentagon report shows subcontractors vastly outpacing prime contractors’ profit margins.

If Canada’s next prime minister follows through on his party’s campaign pledge to reject the F-35, it will increase the cost to other buyers by about $1 million per aircraft.

The SM-3’s North Atlantic missile grab; Boeing, India discuss making helicopters in India; new counter-UAV technology on display in South Korea; proposed $11 billion deal for U.S.-made combat ships.

Announcement of the Pentagon’s choice of a contractor to build the Long-Range Strike Bomber is “really, really close,” a U.S. Air Force official says.

The wave of counter-UAS systems hitting the market is a visible sign of growing concerns over the threat that consumer drones could become airborne IEDs.

South Korea will probably decide in early 2016 whether the proposed KF-X fighter will be equipped with the Eurojet EJ200 or General Electric F414 engine.

The first of 40 F-35 Lightnings ordered by South Korea should be delivered in the first quarter of 2018, Lockheed Martin says.

The guided-missile destroyer DDG 71 USS Ross intercepted a ballistic missile in the Atlantic during the Maritime Theater Missile Defense Forum’s At Sea Demonstration.

A U.S. Marine Corps McDonnell Douglas F/A-18C Hornet crashed shortly after takeoff from an airbase in the U.K. on Oct. 21, killing the pilot.

The U.S. Navy is scheduled to accept the first MH-60 Romeo helicopter slated for Denmark on Oct. 22.

Who better to turn to than the creative side of almost everyone for ideas on how to find and protect the Earth from asteroids on potential collision courses.

India is preparing to launch six satellites for Singaporean customers in December, including the TeLEOS-1 Earth observation satellite.

Military policy leaders in Congress took steps to reform the acquisition system this year, including allowing service chiefs to sign off on purchasing decisions.

Airbus is predicting the production of around 900 civil and military helicopters in a joint program with Korea Aerospace Industries.

The Deep Space Climate Observatory spacecraft mission has debuted images of the sunlit Blue Marble Earth on a new NASA website, http://epic.gsfc.nasa.gov/.