Missile Defense & Weapons

By Steve Trimble
Lockheed Martin has confirmed a secret customer has ordered the Speed Racer flight vehicle that the Skunk Works unveiled a year ago as a technology demonstrator.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Jen DiMascio
The U.S. Army’s next installment of Project Convergence—an experiment that seeks to link disparate military platforms—will involve all three services and focus on maximizing the use of data and sharing it across the joint force, according to the deputy commander of Army Futures Command.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Tony Osborne
Italy is committing funding to the Tempest Future Combat Air System as part of an uptick in the country’s national defense spending.
Missile Defense & Weapons

The Japanese Defense Ministry has reported to the ruling Liberal Democratic Party that the F-15J upgrade program will proceed without the Lockheed Martin AGM-158C Long-Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM), according to state broadcaster NHK.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Tony Osborne
The recoverable exercise-variant torpedo, which lacks a warhead or propulsion system, was released by the aircraft near the UK’s main Poseidon operating base at RAF Lossiemouth, Scotland.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Chen Chuanren
The U.S. State Department has approved the sale of 44 Raytheon RIM-116C Rolling Airframe Missiles Block 2 to Japan. The missiles are destined for Japan Maritime Self Defense Force ships.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Steve Trimble
U.S. Air Force officials will not know how the latest test failure of a hypersonic missile prototype will impact the schedule until an ongoing root cause investigation is completed, Brig. Gen. Heath Collins said on Aug. 4.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Steve Trimble
An extended-range version of a U.S. Navy anti-radiation missile completed a successful first air-launched, live-fire test on July 19 over the Point Mugu Missile Range off the California coast, the Navy said on Aug. 3.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Tony Osborne
The German Air Force is undertaking operational testing of MBDA’s Meteor beyond-visual-range air-to-air missile as it prepares to field the weapon on the Eurofighter before year’s end.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Steve Trimble
Hypersonic flight testing for the U.S. Air Force is off to a rough start.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Steve Trimble
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Aug. 1 that an Iranian unmanned air vehicle (UAV) attacked an Israeli-managed oil tanker in the Arabian
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Steve Trimble
The single-stage booster separated from the Boeing B-52 on the second test but failed to ignite over the Point Mugu Sea Range off the California coast.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Steve Trimble
An exchange during a think-tank event in Washington on July 29 may offer an explanation for the absence of a promised U.S. Air Force hypersonic flight test in July.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Steve Trimble
The U.S. Air Force has retired the first Kratos XQ-58A to become a new exhibit at the National Museum of the Air Force after the pioneering unmanned aircraft system logged a total of four flight hours on three flights in 2019.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Jen DiMascio
Lawmakers will consider draft legislation that would give the Pentagon a way to allow the Missile Defense Agency to develop laser technology to counter ballistic and hypersonic missiles.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Steve Trimble
A new think-tank formally introduced on July 26 by the National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA) will seek to bring industry’s voice to help
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Steve Trimble
“Based on initial observations, one target was successfully intercepted. At this time, we cannot confirm the second target was destroyed,” MDA said.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Tony Osborne
France and the UK will continue to collaborate on research and development for future missile technology through a renewed agreement with missile manufacturer MBDA.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Chen Chuanren
Korean Air and Seoul National University have been commissioned by the Republic of Korea Air Force to explore using the Boeing 747-400 passenger aircraft for an air launch system, similar to Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne.
Space

By Steve Trimble
U.S. Army and Navy officials are planning the first round of upgrades for a joint hypersonic missile program.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Steve Trimble
A Lockheed Martin F-35 has teamed up a second time with the same company’s PAC-3 missile to shoot down a surrogate cruise missile during a mid-July
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Steve Trimble
Details of the U.S. Air Force’s first hypersonic weapon show a concept not unlike the AGM-158B cruise missile, albeit 12.5 times faster.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Jen DiMascio
The newly formed U.S. Space Force has not done enough to realize the space force vision, which was founded in large part to fix lasting issues with acquisition, according to draft legislation passed by the House Appropriations Committee.
Space

By Jen DiMascio
U.S. lawmakers plan to consider whether to block funding for development of a missile defense system for Guam, they say in a report on a fiscal 2022 defense spending bill.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Steve Trimble
U.S. and Russian diplomats have pledged to open discussions to create “a mechanism that can lead to control of new and dangerous and sophisticated weapons that are coming on the scene now that reduce the times of response, that raise the prospects of accidental war."
Missile Defense & Weapons