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.
The U.S. Air Force’s troubled KC-46 will be freed up for operational refueling of F-15s and F-16s “very soon” as part of the rollout of limited operations for the aircraft as permanent fixes to the tanker’s remote vision system continue to be developed.
A U.S. Air Force overhaul of its infrastructure across the Pacific is overdue so that it will be ready for a possible conflict with China, a service official says.
