Congressional Democrats continue to raise the prospect of curbing requested funds for national missile defense in light of the Bush administration's fiscal 2007 request and long-term military planning for reduced Guard troop levels. Rep. Ike Skelton (Mo.), ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, told Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Marine Corps Gen. Peter Pace on Feb. 8 that he questioned plans to go "skinny" on Guard levels while going "robust" on missile funding.
NASA Administrator Michael Griffin has ordered agency public affairs officers not to spin public statements by scientists working with agency funds. "It is not the job of public affairs officers to alter, filter or adjust engineering or scientific material produced by NASA's technical staff," Griffin says in an e-mail sent to all NASA employees. He was responding to complaints from the agency's top climate expert that headquarters public affairs officials had tried to stifle his contention that more needs to be done to mitigate global warming.
The U.S. military is projecting that there will be 4,000 robotic systems in Iraq and Afghanistan before the end of fiscal 2006, as compared to 2,400 systems in theater today. There will be 22 different robots, ranging from iRobot's PackBot and the Rapid Equipping Force's MarcBot, to larger systems such as the Panther -- a modified Abrams tank equipped with a countermine flail. U.S. military forces are using robots for improvised explosive device (IED) disposal, force protection, countermine, and urban operations missions.
The U.S. Navy's new long-term shipbuilding and fleet structure plan, sent to Congress Feb. 7, notes that with early retirement of the aircraft carrier USS John F. Kennedy and funding of the CVN-21 in fiscal 2008, the Navy could fall below its own 11-carrier requirement in FY '13 or FY '14. The plan cited "past delays in beginning the CVN-21 program." Meanwhile, Navy officials have said they will immediately ask Congress to pass new legislation for mothballing the JFK -- which Congress recently rejected (DAILY, Feb. 7).
The Defense Department's Small Business Innovation Research and technology transfer and the Marine Corps' Expeditionary Warfare efforts have been designated as "programs that are not performing" under the White House's new blacklist of federal programs. The list, available at ExpectMore.gov, is part of the Bush administration's attempt to cull federal programs, 28 percent of which the White House asserts are not performing.
NEW YORK -- Top defense industry executives are giving a thumbs up to President Bush's fiscal 2007 budget request, but caution that it will be a long road before a final appropriation clears Capitol Hill. The $439.3 billion budget that Bush submitted on Feb. 6 would boost top line military spending by 7 percent over the budget approved by Congress last year and is missing some of the draconian program cuts that investors and defense executives have worried about for more than a year.
NET LOSSES: SPACEHAB Inc. said Feb. 7 that it suffered net losses for both its second quarter of FY '06 and the six-month period ending Dec. 31. The company's second quarter net loss was $8.9 million on revenue of $11.8 million. In the second quarter of FY '05, the company had a net loss of $1.2 million on revenue of $13.1 million. SPACEHAB's six-month net loss was $10.8 million on revenue of $23.8 million, compared to a net income of $5.7 million on revenue of $26.2 million for the first six months of the previous fiscal year.
Bath Iron Works has been awarded a $30.9 million contract modification to do upgrade, repair, and maintenance work on two Arleigh Burke-class Aegis destroyers, the company said Feb. 7. The work will be done on the USS Bainbridge (DDG 96) and USS Forrest Sherman (DDG 98), which are homeported in Norfolk, Va.
As the U.S. government reworks its plans to build the next generation of its own high-resolution imaging satellites, it has begun discussing stopgap measures to acquire more imagery from commercial providers, a key vendor says. "We have been asked by a number of people in Washington if we can fill gaps," GeoEye President and CEO Matthew M. O'Connell said at the Satellite 2006 conference and exhibition being held in Washington this week.
The U.S. Air Force is taking the first formal step to kicking off a program to upgrade the engines on its A-10s, to meet performance goals the current standard powerplant can't meet. The service is checking whether there are any contractors who would be interested in developing the kit-upgrade for the General Electric TF34 engines. The Air Force says it has $189.4 million budgeted for the effort, which should commence this fiscal year. The service wants the first engine upgrade kits delivered by late fiscal 2009 or early 2010.
The Defense Department is exploring alternatives to space-based communications as the gap between operational demands and military satellite communications capacity grows, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff told senators Feb. 7. "Space-based platforms should focus on surveillance capabilities that we cannot readily replicate elsewhere," Marine Corps Gen. Peter Pace testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee. Meantime, the DOD will continue to rely upon commercial vendors for the foreseeable future.
The U.S. Navy this year will take a hard look at its aviation investments to "balance" them with shipbuilding and other naval costs, according to the chief of naval operations (CNO). "As anybody in a senior position, we've got to balance all of this," Adm. Mike Mullen told reporters at the Pentagon on Feb. 7.
Weather permitting, adventurer Steve Fossett was to try again at dawn Feb. 8 to take off from the Kennedy Space Center, Fla., in the Scaled Composites/GlobalFlyer for a record around-the-world flight. Takeoffs with the 22,000-pound aircraft loaded with 18,000 pounds of JP-4 are always dangerous. A fuel leak in the modified vent system of the aircraft forced cancellation of a planned takeoff Feb. 7 for the 26,000-mile flight.
The Homeland Security Department's Information Technology Acquisition Center plans to establish $45 billion worth of department-wide contracts for IT support services under a program name Eagle, according to federal IT consultancy Federal Sources Inc. Contractors would support infrastructure engineering design, development, implementation and integration; operations and maintenance; independent test, validation, verification and evaluation; software development; and management support services.
A question of interest is how the U.S. Air Force will determine acquisition requirements for a fleet of tankers. George Muellner, Boeing's Air Force Systems vice president and general manager, says one factor in this decision may be whether the Air Force emphasizes employment or deployment in its specifications.
A surplus Russian spacesuit recycled as an amateur radio satellite continued to send weak signals, at least intermittently, through the weekend after the International Space Station (ISS) crew deployed it late Feb. 3 by pitching it over the side. Although NASA initially reported that "Suitsat" died after about two orbits, apparently because its standard-issue ISS batteries had gotten too cold, amateur radio operators later reported it continued to transmit a weak signal on Feb. 5.
CENTER RECOVERS: Northrop Grumman Corp.'s Sperry Marine North American Support Center in New Orleans is now operating at 100 percent capacity after damage was repaired from Hurricane Katrina, the company said Feb. 6. The center overhauls MK37 gyrocompasses, LCD monitors, radars, autopilots, and speed logs. It also holds new and refurbished spare parts and houses a worldwide service control center. The office suffered heavy exterior and interior damage from the hurricane.
