Author: Tom Roeder, The Gazette

Colorado Springs would cash in with $325 million for military construction under a U.S. House version of a Defense Department policy bill that includes a slimmed-down Space Force. The bill, to be finalized this week by the House Armed Services Committee, would offer the Trump administration a Space Force that’s a miniaturized version of the…

COLORADO SPRINGS ? If nothing else, President Donald Trump broke the mold on Thursday. With a mix a humor and saber-rattling, accompanied by a Trumpian dash of adjectives and a bit of bravado, Trump saw off the U.S. Air Force Academy’s class of 2019, with a speech that was decidedly conventional for the famously off-the-cuff…

The Air Force is well underway in building a new headquarters for satellite troops, and U.S. Space Command will be ready to launch this year, the service said. Details on the headquarters and new plans to prepare for battle in orbit were unveiled by Air Force Space Command during a conference at Vandenberg Air Force…

The Air Force will choose the home for U.S. Space Command this summer, and Colorado remains in the lead, lawmakers were told Tuesday. The Air Force announcement confirmed documents obtained by The Gazette last month, showing that four Colorado bases – three of them in the Pikes Peak region – were competing with locations in…

The first openly gay general at the Air Force Academy has been removed as commandant of cadets, but leaders there were mum Monday on the exact cause of the apparent firing. Brig. Gen. Kristin Goodwin, who led military training at the academy since 2017, was removed from her role as commandant amid an investigation, the…

A Pentagon task force announced last week will examine sexual assault in the ranks – and it will do it quickly. Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan wants a report from the new Sexual Assault Accountability and Investigation Task Force by Wednesday. Shanahan ordered the task force into existence last month after congressional committees grilled him on…

?President Donald Trump will deliver the Air Force Academy’s graduation speech on May 30, the White House confirmed Thursday. Trump bumped expected speaker Vice President Mike Pence from the podium for the ceremony in Falcon Stadium, where about 1,000 seniors will pin on the rank of 2nd lieutenant. It will be Trump’s first stop in…

More than 4,000 cadets at the Air Force Academy will have a first-of-its-kind uniform of the day April 24 as part of a wider effort at the school to raise awareness of sexual assault. Jeans, long forbidden for cadets on duty, will be allowed by Lt. Gen Jay Silveria, who wants cadets to consider the…