Based in Washington, Jen manages Aviation Week’s worldwide defense, space and security coverage.
Prior to taking on her current role, Jen was Aviation Week's Congressional Editor. Jen came to Aviation Week in March 2011 from Politico, where she covered the intersection of defense and politics. She also worked as a reporter and editor for Defense Daily, Inside the Army, The Other Paper and The Columbus Dispatch.
Jen received a Master’s degree in journalism as a Kiplinger Fellow at the Ohio State University. She graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in history and journalism from the University of Michigan.
The government may talk about conducting “full and open” competitions for military goods and services, but from 2007-10, the Pentagon sole-sourced contracts 41% of the time, spending $606.3 billion on such contracts. A Government Accountability Office report explains that the practice of ditching competitions happens most often because only “one responsible source” exists to meet the agency's requirements.
If the Pentagon's top tester gave letter grades for the reliability of weapons, only the Navy would receive a passing grade—a D-minus. Only 63% of Navy programs and 55% of Army programs cleared military reliability standards. At the bottom of the class is the Air Force. Just 27% of its programs met the service's goals. Michael Gilmore, the director of operational test and evaluation, found that programs including the Small Diameter Bomb, MQ-9 Reaper, Global Hawk and C-27J Joint Cargo Aircraft all fell short in his annual report on the progress of weapon programs.
Obama administration officials are pleasing no one with their space diplomacy efforts. Basically, the government still wants an “international code of conduct” for outer space, likes many parts of a proposed EU conduct code over a Russian-China effort, but will not sign either proposal and will try again from scratch. That was the tortuous conclusion after several recent official and unofficial statements in Washington.
