Flames on Zante: A Greek F-16 Belly-Lands
Share this story The holidaymakers on Zakynthos came for the beaches. On the afternoon of Jul. 9, 2026, they got something else entirely: a single-seat fighter jet sliding down the runway on its belly, trailing sparks, then wrapped in flame as fire crews rushed to...
China’s J-36 Can Reach Taiwan — the F-47 Can’t
Share this story A fighter is only as dangerous as the distance it can cross. On paper, America’s new F-47 is the longest-legged fighter the United States has ever built — and over the one map that matters most, the Western Pacific, it still comes up short. China’s...
The Air Force Goes Shopping for New Ways to Kill Drones
Share this story The aircraft that worries American air base commanders most in 2026 is not a Chinese stealth fighter or a Russian bomber. It is a battery-powered quadcopter that costs less than a used laptop, and there is nothing to stop a hostile one from buzzing...
Can Europe Hold the Sky if America Steps Back?
Share this story For three-quarters of a century, European security rested on a single quiet assumption: if the sky over the continent ever caught fire, American airpower would arrive to put it out. At this month’s NATO summit, the alliance’s top commander made clear...
A Tired B-52 Is Slowing America’s Next Nuclear Missile
Share this story The United States plans to rely on the AGM-181 to keep its airborne nuclear deterrent credible deep into the 2050s. To get there, it has exactly one aircraft cleared to test the missile: the B-52, a bomber whose last airframe rolled off the line in...
Trump Ditches the New Air Force One, Flies the Old Jet Home
Share this story The most expensive gift in the history of aviation sat gleaming on the ramp in Turkey — and the President of the United States walked straight past it. On 8 July, barely a day after American bombs fell on Iran, Donald Trump boarded the old Air Force...
Ford’s Super Hornets Wear Their War Paint
Share this story Fighter jets keep diaries. They keep them in stencilled paint, just below the cockpit rail, and if you know how to read them they will tell you exactly what kind of year the crews have had. On the Fourth of July, as the Super Hornets of Carrier Air...
T-7A Full-Rate Production Slips to 2029
Share this story Last week we walked you through the sustainment data fight simmering between Boeing and the Air Force over the T-7A Red Hawk. Seven days later, the Government Accountability Office showed up with receipts. GAO’s Weapon Systems Annual Assessment,...
Rectangle Silos Rise at China’s Jilantai Test Base
Share this story Commercial satellite imagery has revealed two hardened structures of an unfamiliar type at China’s most important missile test and training complex, and their geometry does not match anything previously catalogued there. The structures, at the...
Ten GlobalEyes, Five Tritons, One Shared Airlift
Share this story When we wrote last week that NATO’s next radar jet would be Swedish, the news still wore the modest clothing of a Reuters exclusive. On Tuesday in Ankara, it acquired numbers, signatures and a price tag. Secretary General Mark Rutte confirmed...
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