President Trump made a visit to Luke Air Force Base, Ariz., on Friday to talk with officials about U.S. military technology and weapons, as well as the 56th Fighter Wing’s training activities with the F-35 aircraft.

Discussions revolved around the topics of cybersecurity, F-35 development, stealth technology, foreign military sales and other defense matters, the U.S. Air Force said Saturday.

The president noted Arizona’s significant presence in the U.S. military community.

“This incredible state is home to six major military installations, more than 30K military personnel and thousands of defense companies,” Trump said. “Arizona’s military defense industries support 76,000 jobs and create $11.5B in economic output.”

Luke AFB represents approximately 95 percent of USAF’s pilot training activities, according to Brig. Gen. Todd Canterbury, who leads F-35 training as the 56th Fighter Wing commander.

An official from the Department of Health and Human Services has announced that a blockchain technology-based platform designed to facilitate a streamlined acquisition process will be operational this Thanksgiving, Bloomberg Government reported Friday.

HHS Associate Deputy Assistant Secretary Jose Arrieta said at a government technology conference, spearheaded by the General Services Administration‘s Emerging Citizen Technology Office, that Accelerate could become the first operational blockchain initiative launched by a federal agency.

Arrieta added that the department is optimistic that it will gain a return on investment of more than 800 percent over four years on its initial $3M capital spent.

A recent IDC study describes how the Department of Health and Human Services has deployed blockchain technology to monitor acquisitions across the agency, Nextgov reported Friday.

The study was written by IDC Government Insights Research Director Shawn McCarthy and was released in September.

In the study, McCarthy talks about how, under the HHS Accelerate program, the government agency keeps track of procurement activity across the entire organization using a distributed ledger.

McCarthy explains how blockchain technology allows the HHS to maintain a detailed transaction record in real-time, and how it facilitates collaboration, allowing the agency’s different departments to compare transaction information.

McCarthy describes blockchain as “a very powerful tool” but notes that “as with any tool, it must be used in the correct way.”

Unless the technology is properly integrated into an agency’s processes, “the promise of blockchain will not be realized,” McCarthy says.

The House Armed Services Committee has asked the Defense Department to provide more data on how it would establish and fund the new “space force,” SpaceNews reported Friday.

HASC Chairman Mac Thornberry (R-Texas) has called on DoD to submit the data by Nov. 16 before the House panel endorses an approach to form the new space-focused service, according to a copy of the Oct. 4 letter obtained by the publication.

The committee looks at four options to establish the new military branch: a space corps model; an enhanced version of the model; independent military department; and a model based on Space Operations Command.

Thornberry asked DoD to categorize the information into four categories, including existing and future resources to back each option and possible changes to current DoD authorities.

The letter was addressed to Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan and Gen. Paul Selva, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
 

The U.S. Library of Congress will introduce a crowdsourcing program on Wednesday, Oct. 24, in an effort to facilitate access to its physical and digital collections through tagging and transcription.

A blog post published Wednesday says the program is part of its new Digital Strategy and strategic plan, which seeks to facilitate connections with citizens through a digitally enabled, data-driven and user-centered approach.

The Digital Strategy aims to leverage technology to build up the library’s services, address geographical divide, expand reach and access and optimize resources through investment and connections.

The institution also announced the appointment of three new staff members who will form a group of community managers to oversee the crowdsourcing practice.

Lauren Algee, formerly digital curation librarian at DC Public Library, will join the Library of Congress Labs team that is now part of the digital strategy office led by Kate Zwaard, head of digital strategy.

Elaine Kamlley, who came from the General Services Administration’s 18F unit, will serve as technical project manager and oversee the open-source development of the transcription and tagging application Concordia.

Victoria Van Hyning, who oversaw the development of research and humanities projects at crowdsourcing platform Zooniverse.org, will help establish a process to determine collections that would benefit from transcription with the institution’s library services directorate.
 

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the U.S. Navy’s 2019 shipbuilding proposal would, on average, cost $28.9B in 2018 dollars per year throughout the plan’s three-decade duration.

The CBO detailed in a recently-published report a financial analysis of the Navy’s battle force build-up plan, which involves the construction of 301 combat and support vessels from fiscal year 2019 to 2048.

According to the CBO, the shipbuilding program’s projected average annual cost would be 80 percent higher than the average annual funding that the Navy has received for the past 30 years.

The Defense Department submitted the 2019 naval shipbuilding plan to Congress in February 2018. The plan seeks to establish a 355-ship fleet, or 70 vessels more than its total size as of September last year.

Based on CBO’s computations, the plan would cost $801B in 2018 dollars in total.