Military Watch: YF-12 Interceptor Program Cancelled, SR-71 Sustainment Troubles, and Defense Procurement Scrutiny

The US Air Force once planned to buy 93 Mach 3 YF-12 interceptors, but only three were ever built. The program was cancelled in 1968, and its radar and missile went on to arm the US Navy's F-14 Tomcat, serving for roughly 40 years. The YF-12 was derived from the CIA's A-12, designed to fly above 80,000 feet at three times the speed of sound, carrying three AIM-47 missiles internally and fitted with the Hughes AN/ASG-18 radar, which could spot targets far below it. ^[1]

The SR-71 Blackbird's titanium tooling had been destroyed, so a new SR-71 could never be built. At Edwards Air Force Base, 16 test flights chased a phantom four-degree yaw until a yaw string proved the pitot boom was mounted crooked. ^[2]

In 1955, under Operation Question Mark, the US Army proposed the 25-ton TV-8 nuclear-powered tank, whose sealed turret could float across rivers. The tank's reactor would have forced constant crew rotation to limit radiation exposure. ^[3]

The US Army's 95-ton T28 tank needed four tracks and still topped out at just 8 mph. It was designed to crack Germany's Siegfried Line, but it wasn't ready until August 1945 — three months after Germany surrendered. One prototype was scrapped; the other survives at Fort Benning. ^[5]

On the procurement front, Congress is turning directly to Oracle for answers about the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) raising the ceiling on its electronic health record contract by $17 billion. ^[4]

Separately, a Texas man defrauded Tricare of $26 million, spending the money on luxuries including casino-themed parties and a gold-plated Tesla Cybertruck. ^[6]