Congress is backtracking on earlier language that would have blocked the Air Force from retiring Lockheed Martin's U-2 Dragon Lady and Northrop Grumman's RQ-4 Global Hawk before 2024. In the conference version of the fiscal year 2018 defense policy bill, passed by the House and Senate this week, lawmakers said the Air Force must keep both intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft unless the Pentagon acquisition chief decides the capabilities developed to replace either platform would cost less per flight hour...
