Aviation Now has an interesting article on the USAF special projects, such as followups to the F-117A in the form of stealth cruise missles that also do recce.
Particularly interesting is the range of hacking projects the USAF has, such as Suter, which in the first guise can ‘see’ what targetted radars are seeing, and has grown to hack into the enemy computer networks and take control of them to manipulate the sensors. The latest version can

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Shear Thickening Fluid has the property that when struck with force it turns into a rigid barrier. A while after impact it reverts to gel. As it’s light, it can be incorporated into clothing and make bullet proof vests lighter.

The US is going from biggest to even bigger and commissioning a new class of aircraft carrier, the CVN-21. This will displace around 102,000 tons – compared to the British Invincible (22,000t) and the future French carrier (75,000t), this is indeed massive.
The current US aircraft carriers are built around a basic design developed 50 years ago, and allthough there are to be no radical departures in hull design (unlike the new British designs which are a radical departure featuring trimaran hulls and hexagonal flight decks), the CVN-21 will feature quite a few innovations, such as an electromagnetic launch rail, allowing for much more free space and electricity, a repositioned island and plug and play electronics, as well as better armour around the munitions bays and a better protected and more modern command centre.
The plan is to have the first one off the line in 2014.
This site has a comprehensive run down of the new features and is kept updated.

Some seriously imaginative weaponry that doesn’t exist, such as the cock-rocket, galaxy bazooka, laser guided polar bear, squirrel exploder, squirrel imploder, squirrel unsploder, squirrel desploder, the ADD Gun, Whoop-ass of mass destruction, Atomic bong and sheep air strike.

This video is a collection of loads of small military pilot movies and pasted into a half hour movie with a sound track. Nicely edited, very well done that bloke.

Google Video has a very cool 12 minute promotional video of the Su-35 with computer graphics in it and everything!

The entire inventory of the US nuclear arsenal is spreat over 18 military facilities in the states and Europe and available for download into Google Earth.

Defensetech is running an article about a lt. colonel in Iraq running around his province using lightly armoured small patrols, refusing to use much in the way of technology and booking remarkable success doing the job much more cheaply and effectively than other units in Iraq.

The US Army has a cool new simulation system, which I guess will be integrated with RL maneuver, showing units up to squad level on a map, updated continuously and allowing commanders control of the units. There’s a link in here to the maneuver control system which is well worth following.

or how to track stealth aircraft using your GSM network. This is the clearest explanation I’ve found over the past few years.

Canadian troops fighting in Afghanistan are unable to track Afghans through 10m high marijuana plants. The plants themselves are wet through and through, so they can’t be burned down using phosphorus. They tried putting fire to dryer outlying parts of the forest, but the wind turned and caused unexpected consequences on a troop concentration.

Ground based lasers from China hit lenses on US spy satellites with enough force to blind them temporarily but not enough to destroy them, the US has finally confirmed after a week or so of rumors floating around.

Well, the world’s media is in a buzzfuzz about North Korea’s upcoming Nuclear test ([sarcasm]who knew?![/sarcasm]), but let’s have a quick look at other nuclear states.

The USA is the only country to have ever used a nuclear weapon (ok, two of them) in anger on another nation.
France, Russia, Great Britain and China (with the US the five permanent members of the UN Security Council) are all nuclear, but have never used them.
There are several countries with access to nukes but don’t technically own them (such as the Netherlands).
Then there was the recent spat about India and Pakistan who both tested nukes, were embargoed for them, but because of their help on the war on terror, we’ve seem to have decided to forget that they have them.
Israel is a friend of the US so we don’t get too upset about them having nukes.

BUT, there’s more we’re not hearing about:
Brazil and Argentina.
Both have a track record of lying about their weaponry programmes to appease the international community, and have the technology needed to enrich uranium. Especially Brazil is a viable candidate for nuclear weaponry.

This article is interesting not only because the USAF is looking at cutting the training budget for pilots, but has a look at a whole load of the technologies they are investing in and keeping or losing.

Also the USAF is developing space radar.

It’s like the draft, but only for people who have enlisted and are now out of service. The US armed forces are huge, but now it looks like they’re fighting too many fights and can’t sustain it with their regular forces. How long before they institute the draft?

A good list of them here

A 1990 Gulf War I home video made by RAF fighter boys flying Tornadoes. Tres inspirational.

Apparently the full version is around 15 minutes long. On pprune a guy is offering that version for sale on E-Bay with the proceeds going towards the RAF Benevolent Fund.

Not only that, they’re encouraging the practice. They perform PRK instead of Lasik, because they worry that the flap cut during lasik could come loose during high G combat.

From bombs that made soldiers go mad with gay love, to halitosis and making an area an attraction point for wasps and rats, the US Military has pondered non lethal weaponry quite deeply.

After being dropped from the aircraft, using this system paratroopers can zoom about the skies for 200KM. Apparently ze Germans have been using this since 2003 – is this what the air raid warnings are about?

Sensational / Impressive video of a Russian helicopter crashing whilst on excercises with the Chinese. Hope the crew and passengers are OK.

Somewhat like the Army Rumor Network (link somewhere in here) but for pilots. In the military Aircrew forum there’s quite a few RAF types.

Some Royal Marine has a page of video’s flying the SHAR from carriers.

This lucky guy got to fly in the back seat of an F/A-18 and videoed it.

Spending 5 hours in an F-22 Raptor sounds like a good idea. Unless you’re on the ground. And the cockpit won’t open.
Eventually you cut it open with a chainsaw. Yay U.S. technology!