PHOENIX — A who’s-who panel of Washington insiders with the aerospace and defense sector sees a better-than-decent chance that lawmakers and the White House go through a series of mini-compromises for years over everything from defense spending to tax issues and the federal debt ceiling, now that the status quo power arrangement there has been re-cemented.
Democrats retained control of the U.S. Senate majority in a number of nail-bitingly close elections in states key to the defense industrial base. And the election sets up a potential shift at the top of the Senate Armed Services Committee, where Sen. John McCain, the top Republican, faces a party term limit. At least five seats on the committee, four of them Democratic, are now vacant due to retirements or losses.
NEW DELHI — India will expedite the procurement of the Swiss Pilatus PC-7 Mk. 2 trainer and the Indian air force (IAF) will begin training courses on the new turboprop aircraft starting in July 2013, the country’s defense minister says. The contract for 75 trainers, signed in May, is worth more than 500 million Swiss francs ($520 million). Deliveries will begin in February 2013 and last until August 2015.
Rep. Bill Young (R-Fla.), the leader of the House spending panel on defense, has hung on to his seat, leaving him in position to lead an effort to pass a full-year fiscal 2013 defense spending bill, potentially by late March. Young’s ongoing tenure adds some stability to the panel, where mass turnover otherwise will take place on the Democratic side. In addition to the retirement of Rep. Norm Dicks (Wash.), the panel’s top Democrat, Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-N.Y.) and Steve Rothman (D-N.J.) are also departing.
MUSICAL CHAIRS: Sen. Jim Inhofe (Okla.) is seeking to replace Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) as the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee. “Because of the term limits for Senate Republican Ranking Memberships, I am looking forward to stepping in as Ranking Member of the Senate Armed Services Committee,” Inhofe said in an emailed statement to Aviation Week, acknowledging that Republican committee members will have to vote for him. “I am deeply concerned about planned defense cuts and pending defense cuts through sequestration.
On the day after the election, President Barack Obama and Senate Democrats saw their victories as confirmation of the fact that the U.S. wants higher taxes on its richest citizens. And Republicans see the vote as a mandate for guarding against tax hikes and doubling down on spending reductions.
TEL AVIV — Tel Aviv’s defenses against missiles and artillery are quickly getting tougher. The Israeli Air Force is in the midst of deploying yet another upgrade to its Iron Dome system that should be completed by year’s end, say officials associated with the program.
Adm. John Richardson relieved Adm. Kirkland Donald as director of Naval Reactors earlier this month to take charge of the Naval Nuclear Propulsion Program, during a particularly vital moment for the Navy’s nuclear propulsion program. The nation’s Virginia-class SSN attack submarines are in block production as the country starts to design and plan for the replacement fleet for its SSBN ballistic missile submarine force. At the same time, the Navy is in the middle of honing and building its next-generation, Ford-class, nuclear-powered aircraft carriers.
JAKARTA, Indonesia — Russia’s defense industry plans to establish a service center in Indonesia to support Sukhoi fighters and Russian helicopters. “We know it is on the Indonesian agenda and we are now waiting for an invitation to have discussions on this,” Victor Komardin, deputy director general of Russian arms export agency Rosoboronexport, told Aviation Week Nov. 7 on the sidelines of the IndoDefense exhibition in Jakarta. “I think we will start talking about this next year,” he says.
Aviation Week Events - Defense Technology And Affordability Requirements March 5-6 2013 Hilton Arlington Arlington, VA Join senior defense officials and discover where priorities and opportunities exist beyond the FY 2014 budget and hear First-hand how programs are implementing affordable and effective designs! Register now at www.aviationweek.com/events/dtar
JAKARTA, Indonesia — Indonesia has enshrined in law its offset policy for the purchase of foreign defense equipment, setting the level of offset investment at 35%, Defense Minister Purnomo Yusgiantoro tells Aviation Week.
The U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) is researching the possibility of using Rotating Detonation Engines (RDEs) to reduce fuel consumption in gas-turbine engines, says Kazhikathra Kailasanath, who heads NRL’s Laboratory for Computational Physics and Fluid Dynamics. There are now about 430 gas turbine engines on 129 U.S. Navy ships. These engines burn about $2 billion worth of fuel each year. By retrofitting these engines with rotating detonation technology, researchers estimate that the Navy could save about $300 million to $400 million annually.
JAKARTA, Indonesia — Indonesia still needs to reach a final agreement with Australia on the purchase of ex-Royal Australian Air Force C-130Hs. The Southeast Asian nation has agreed to buy six additional C-130Hs from Australia, “but the two national teams have to sit down and work out a budget price and price per unit,” Indonesia’s defense minister, Purnomo Yusgiantoro, told Aviation Week Nov. 6 on the eve of the IndoDefense exhibition.
Aviation Week Events - Defense Technology And Affordability Requirements March 5-6 2013 Hilton Arlington Arlington, VA Join senior defense officials and discover where priorities and opportunities exist beyond the FY 2014 budget and hear first-hand how programs are implementing affordable and effective designs! Register now at www.aviationweek.com/events/dtar
LOS ANGELES — Boeing and NASA are preparing to start a new, potentially riskier phase of flight tests of the X-48C blended wing body (BWB) research aircraft at Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards AFB in California. The unmanned aircraft, which notched up its 100th flight on Oct. 30, is a rebuilt, twin-engine derivative of the three-engine X-48B tested between 2007 and 2011.
MAPLE LEAF VEHICLES: Rheinmetall and Textron’s Canada subsidiary have signed a €160 million ($207 million) contract for the Canadian Forces Tactical Armored Patrol Vehicle (TAPV) project. The work will be performed by Rheinmetall Canada in Quebec. The deal, which runs from July 2014 to March 2016, also fulfills a portion of Textron’s participation in Canada’s Industrial and Regional Benefits Policy — i.e., local offsets — after the government’s purchase of 500 Textron TAPVs.
RIDLEY PARK, Pa. — As testing of modified CH-47F Chinook heavy-lift helicopters for Canada gathers pace, Boeing is adapting the design to provide the basis for the first new-build MH-47Gs to be produced for U.S. Army special operations forces. Canada’s CH-147F is a new-production F model with the larger, long-range sponson fuel tanks of the G, plus a new electrical system and other changes. Ottawa ordered 15 Chinooks in June 2009, with deliveries to begin in June 2013.
Researchers in three projects will split grants from the Center for the Advancement of Science in Space (Casis) totaling $1.2 million to take advantage of the microgravity environment on the International Space Station for pharmaceutical research. Casis, set up to run the public portion of the U.S. National Laboratory on the ISS, awarded its first research grants to scientists at the University of Alabama-Birmingham, California Institute of Technology and iXpressGenes Inc.
Four student pilots participating in an operational utility evaluation of the F-35A at Eglin AFB, Fla., have each begun the flying portion of their training, and officials there say they are on track for completion of the OUE in the next few weeks. “If we have good weather, we will be done in the next two weeks,” says Lt. Col. Lee Kloos, 58th Fighter Squadron commander at Eglin, where pilot training is taking place.
