WASHINGTON – Defense Secretary Robert Gates recommended on halting production of the F-22 Raptor fighter jet and scrapping a new helicopter for the president as he outlined deep cuts to many of the US military’s biggest weapons programs.

Gates said his $534 billion budget proposal represents a “fundamental overhaul” in defense acquisition and reflects in priorities from fighting controversial wars to the newer threats US forces face from insurgents in places such as Afghanistan.

The department must ensure it has the right programs and money to “fight the wars we are in today and the scenarios we are most likely to face in the years to come, while at the same time providing a hedge against other risks,” Gates said as he revealed details of his budget for the next fiscal year.

The promised emphasis on budget pairing is a reversal from the Bush years, which included a doubling of the Pentagon’s spending since 2001. spending on the tanks, fighter planes, ships, missiles and other weapons accounted for about a third of all defense-spending last year. But Gates noted more money will be needed in areas such as personnel to the Army and Marines expand the size of their forces.

Production of the F-22 fighter jet, which cost $140 million apiece, would be halted at 187. Plans to build a new helicopter for the president and a helicopter to rescue downed pilots would be canceled. A new communications satellite would be scrapped and the program for a new Air Force transport plane would be ended.

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Two unmanned NASA spacecraft reached the moon’s orbit and started the process of mapping its surface for future missions Tuesday morning.

The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), a satellite whose instruments will help scientists compile high resolution, three-dimensional maps of the moon’s surface, entered lunar orbit at 6:27 a.m. ET.

About two hours later, the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Spacecraft (LCROSS) swung past the moon on its way into an elongated Earth orbit. The spacecraft sent streaming video back to Earth, shown on a NASA Web site, for an hour as it passed the moon.

The two spacecraft lifted off June 18 atop the same Atlas V rocket. The mission is the first in NASA’s plan to return to the moon, then travel to Mars and beyond, the space agency said.

During the mission, the agency will collect all sorts of data, including day-night temperature maps, NASA said. There is particular emphasis on the polar areas of the moon, where sunlight is more plentiful and where water might exist.

The LCROSS is scheduled to crash land on the moon Oct. 9 to search for the presence of water ice in a permanently shadowed crater at the moon’s South Pole.

The data that the LRO collects and sends to Earth also will be used in planning an eventual lunar outpost, the agency said. During its mission, the orbiter also will spend at least a year looking for potential landing sites for astronauts.

A well-known sound, the high-pitched screech of the T-37B Tweet, was missing from the 80th Flying Training Wing’s aircraft parking ramp, one that has been prevalent in the Air Force’s pilot training mission for 50 years

The final student training mission, marking the last time an Air Force pilot will begin their career in the introductory jet.

Second Lt. Trevor Kernes, 89th Flying Training Squadron student pilot, said he was honored to be part of the historical event.

“Anyone of these guys deserves it,” the future Ohio National Guardsman said. “To be chosen out of some of the best in the world is an honor. I’m humbled.”

Lieutenant Kernes, a former forward air traffic controller who served in Afghanistan after 9/11 and was part of the initial push into Iraq in 2003, said the Tweet was fun to fly and a good training platform.

“I’m sorry for the T-6A (Texan II) student pilots because they didn’t get to fly the T-37“, he said.

Since 1959, more than 78,000 Air Force pilots have flown the venerable Tweet. The T-37 began its extraordinary flight into history in 1956 when it became an active aircraft in the U.S. Air Force inventory becoming operational in 1959.

“There is nothing new of that airplane,” Lt. Col. Doug Antcliff, 19th Air Force said of the aircraft’s technology. “But, I’m sad to see it go because it is a true workhorse.”

The Tweet officially retires from active service July 31. The 80th FTW began training student pilots Aug. 29, 2008, in the Tweet’s replacement the Texan II.

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At the request of Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, a House committee shifted money to continue to build F-22 fighters, a defeat for the Obama administration and a win for the workers at Hill Air Force Base.

Near the tail end of a marathon congressional hearing on the defense budget, Bishop pushed — and won by a single vote — an amendment that shifts $369 million to hold off on plans to shutter the F-22 production, and leaves open the potential of building 12 more fighter jets.

Bishop lost repeated attempts to restore a $1.2 billion cut to the missile defense system.

“We had a few losses on the missile defense side, but it was very good [night] for Hill,” Bishop said.

The defense-spending bill now heads to the full House for a vote and then to the Senate, a long process where language and funding may get changed.

“This is the first step,” Bishop said. “We have a long way to go.”

But Bishop said getting the House Armed Services Committee to agree to keep alive the F-22 program and deferring for a year a reduction in Air Force jets was a good initial success.

The Obama administration, led by Defense Secretary Robert Gates, has pushed a series of defense cuts, including ramping down the production of F-22s.

The Utah congressman, the state’s only member of the House Armed Services Committee, also added to the spending bill:

– $5.1 million

for modifying the taxiway apron of Hill’s main runway to make it safer and allow for more efficient flight operations;

– $3.4 million for research into converting fuel to fertilizer at Tooele Army Depot;

– $5.2 million for a program at Ogden Air Logistics Center to improve productivity of the 309th Maintenance Wing.

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