Defense

PARIS — French defense-technology firm Thales is “quite advanced” in discussions with a number of NATO countries about using its artificial intelligence-powered command-and-control system HexaForce, said the company’s vice president for multi-domain operations, Patrick Moreau. Thales announced the availability of HexaForce last week, after testing it during NATO’s Coalition Warrior…

Despite U.S. President Donald Trump’s nostalgia for old-fashioned steam catapults, the U.S. Navy appears to be sticking with electromagnetics for its newest class of aircraft carriers. The Navy recently awarded contracts for the Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System, or EMALS, which uses electrically generated magnetic fields to launch aircraft from Ford-class carriers. Kato Engineering…

On Oct. 1, the Air Force will eliminate all 10 civilian positions at the China Aerospace Studies Institute, the Air University center that publishes unclassified research on the People’s Liberation Army’s air, space and missile forces. Its director said the move will effectively end the institute, even as the service says CASI’s mission will continue. “As a part of the ongoing civilian…

ROME — The F-35B fighter can take off on a very short runway, hover in the air and land vertically, but the Italian navy is about to find out whether it can also outrace a Ferrari. In an unusual race planned next month at the Navy’s air base at Grottaglie in southern Italy, one of its F-35Bs will go head-to-head with a Ferrari SF90 to see which has the punchier acceleration. “We are used to…