Word: aires
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...Take the fight over the F-22. The Pentagon has declared it wants to cap procurement at 183 planes, for $65 billion. But the Air Force wants 380 of them. "We think that [183] is the wrong number," General Bruce Carlson, the Air Force's top weapons buyer, told reporters at a Feb. 13 industry gathering. "We're committed to funding 380," he added. "We're building a program right now to do that." Defense Secretary Robert Gates called Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne after reading Carlson's comments in Aerospace Daily, a trade paper, and told him to remind...
...Days earlier, Carlson said that today's U.S. Air Force "simply cannot fight and win against the fleet of airplanes that have been developed and are flying in India, China, and so forth," a claim questioned by many experts. But his view has been reinforced by the companies employing 25,000 workers in 44 states building the F-22 - the prime contractor is aerospace giant Lockheed Martin - and their allies in Congress. That is what is so insidious about these lists: once Congress gets a hold of them, they're used as pile drivers to pound extra billions into...
...addition to more F-22 fighters, the Air Force's wish list also seeks more F-35 fighters (needed for "the Required Force"), more C-130 and C-17 cargo planes ("Part of Required Force"), and more unmanned Global Hawk drones (these would merely "Support Required Force"). Unmanned aircraft are supposed to be cheaper, but the price tag on these runs more than $120 million apiece. More than $1 billion is being sought for 11 passenger planes, seven of them Gulfstream Vs favored by Apple's Steve Jobs and Sir Elton John (no mention of any Required Force justification here...
...Then there's the line item seeking 100,600 handguns (there are 330,000 people in the Air Force) featuring "improved ergonomic design and higher caliber effectiveness" at $1,157 a pop. The service also wants 210,000 M-4 carbines at $1,747 a clip. For years, the Air Force has complained about the Army having its own air force. Now, at long last, the Army may be able to complain about the Air Force having its own army...
...outlets were vandalized. A local Slovenian supermaket chain was targeted as were Albanian sweet shops and bakeries. (Slovenia currently holds the rotating EU presidency while Albania has consistently supported the secession struggle of Kosovo's ethnic Albanian majority.) Serbian state television pulled American movies and sitcoms off the air and replaced them with Russian and Spanish dramas. (Spain and Russia have refused to recognize Kosovo...