Brian Everstine is the Pentagon Editor for Aviation Week, based in Washington, D.C. Before joining Aviation Week in August 2021, Brian covered the Pentagon for Air Force Magazine. Brian began covering defense aviation in 2011 as a reporter for Military Times. Over a decade as a defense journalist, he has reported from dozens of bases at home and abroad, including austere airstrips in Afghanistan, the cockpit of a B-52 over the South Pacific and the boom operator station of a KC-46. Before the military beat, Brian covered the Washington state legislature for the Associated Press.
U.S. Army soldiers controlled all phases of an MQ-1C’s flight using a laptop for the first time during the massive Project Convergence 21 experiment earlier this month, part of a special operations-led effort to reduce the logistics footprint needed for Gray Eagle operations.
China’s test of a fractional orbital bombardment system and a hypersonic glide vehicle over the summer should have created more of a sense of urgency within the Pentagon, but that has not happened, the No. 2 military officer says.
Russia’s Nov. 15 test of a direct ascent anti-satellite missile, which destroyed a satellite and created a new field of debris, shows the U.S. needs to change its approach to space situational awareness away from simply tracking what debris is already in orbit to actively looking for what might be trying to evade detection and new threats, top U.S. space officials said.
