The Defense Logistics Agency has teamed up with the U.S. Army to equip the first of six security force assistance brigades tasked to perform advise-and-assist operations around the world.

The equipment list for the 1st SFAB unit covers approximately 6,300 items including the latest version of the Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle, updated communications systems and other materials currently deployed with other units, DLA said Wednesday.

DLA currently helps the Army repair approximately 1,500 line items at Fort Stewart, Georgia as part of efforts to help the 1st SFAB achieve mission readiness.

Phil Greene, customer support representative of the Army Forces Command, said part of the 1st SFAB equipment will come from surplus stock which will be turned over to the DLA Disposition Services as part of the All Army Excess program.

Greene noted DLA’s troop support unit has created and procured 1,000 berets for members of the 1st SFAB along with an additional 600 units for members of the next established SFAB.

Lisa Smitherman, customer support representative for DLA Land and Maritime, added agency representatives have reached out to Army Materiel Command, Red River Army Depot and Army Tank Automotive and Armaments Command representatives to acquire various parts such as optical lenses and wire rope assemblies.

Thomas Dee, acting U.S. Navy undersecretary, has said the service will take until 2050s to execute its plan to increase its combat fleet to 355 ships, Breaking Defense reported Thursday.

“We may want it very, very soon, and perhaps we’ll be able to get there, but we’re going to have to work with our partners over on the Hill,” Dee said of the 355-ship goal.

“We can get on mark by mid-century to be approaching 350 ships, with significant additional dollars in our shipbuilding accounts,” he said Wednesday at the Expeditionary Warfare conference in Annapolis, Maryland.

Dee said the Navy might have to complement its large combat ships with small fleets of unmanned vessels and leverage multi-domain concepts of operation and cyber space to facilitate services coordination in order to help achieve the 355-ship capability by 2050s, the report added.

U.S. Navy Rear Adm. Cathal O’Connor, commander of the Expeditionary Strike Group Three in San Diego, has been assigned as chief of staff at the Joint Staff’s strategic plans and policy directorate/J5 in Washington, D.C.

Navy Secretary Richard Spencer and John Richardson, chief of naval operations, announced O’Connor’s new assignment in a Defense Department release published Tuesday.

O’Connor will oversee the J5 organization that recommends strategies, plans and policy intended to help the Joint Staff chairman provide military advice to the U.S. president and other national leaders on national security matters.

He previously commanded Amphibious Squadron 11/Task Group 76.4 in Sasebo, Japan as well as the USS Rushmore Whidbey Island-class dock landing ship in San Diego, California.

His at-sea assignments have included officer roles onboard USS Farragut, USS Kitty Hawk, USS Pharris, USS Tortuga and USS Truett as well as the Carrier Strike Group 5/Commander Task Force and the Expeditionary Strike Group 7/CTF 76.

O’Connor also held positions within the Fleet Anti-Submarine Warfare Training Center, Surface Warfare Officers School, Joint Task Force Southwest Asia, Joint Staff J-8, Navy Staff, Office of the Secretary of Defense for Policy and U.S. Naval Forces Europe-Africa.

The U.S. Navy‘s first F-35 Joint Striker Fighter variant underwent a flight exercise Oct. 18 aboard an aircraft carrier off the Southern California coast as the aircraft prepares to reach initial operating capability.

F-35C Lightning II from the Strike Fighter Squadron 125 performed launch and recovery operations on the USS Carl Vinson as part of day and night carrier qualifications, the service branch said Friday.

“We’re supporting efforts to flight test the current helmet-mounted display system,” added VFA-125 Operations Officer Lt. Cmdr. Josh Reynolds.

Reynolds added that the F-35C works to add airborne stealth and deep-strike capacities to the carrier fleet in efforts to penetrate enemy air defenses.

The aircraft is set to reach IOC status for the Navy toward the end of 2018.

F-35C is a fifth-generation strike fighter for long-range stealth operations in support of aircraft carriers and is meant to enhance awareness, lethality and survivability in the battlespace.

The Navy said the Nimitz-class USS Carl Vinson is anticipated to be the first carrier in the West Coast to go on deployment with an F-35C squadron after the ship undergoes a scheduled maintenance in 2019.

Members of the Defense Innovation Board have called on the Defense Department to consider developing new career options to help address department-wide personnel management issues, DoD Buzz reported Tuesday.

Eight DIB members met Tuesday to discuss DoD’s talent management challenges and potential ways to overcome them.

Jennifer Pahlka, DIB member and founder of Code for America, said DoD’s “up or out” personnel system poses a talent management challenge because it can be “very limiting.”

The system gives DoD personnel two years to develop ideas then move to another position, which compels employees to abandon their ideas instead of pursuing them, Pahlka noted.

DIB members believe a parallel career track will help keep talented individuals from being stuck in the up-or-out system, the report stated.

Marne Levine, chief operating officer of Instagram, said DoD should also look into a new career field that is focused on innovation; rapid capability development and acquisition; and science, technology, engineering and mathematics skills.

Levine added that DoD faces recruitment and retention challenges due to the lack of a specialized STEM career field.

Shay Assad, director of defense pricing at the Defense Department, has said DoD has started a comprehensive cost review of the Lockheed Martin-built F-35 aircraft to help officials find ways on how to further reduce the cost of the fighter jet, Defense News reported Tuesday.

Assad told the publication Monday a DoD assessment team will collaborate with F-35 contractors Lockheed, Northrop Grumman and BAE Systems to discuss the parameters of the review that would take a year to conclude.

“Many of the things we’re talking about are just practices that have occurred in the past, this will just be much more rigorous,” Assad said.

“So we’ll lay it out with the companies… Here’s our plan in terms of your subcontractor base, and this is what we want to do, and then get off and get the work done,” he added.

Assad said he believes Lockheed can still further reduce the per unit price of an F-35A variant than the current goal of $80 million per aircraft by 2020, the report added.