Submarines are among the most secretive and secure strategic assets any nation deploys. So it is good news for U.K. and NATO defense planners that London is not backing away from its commitment to develop new nuclear boats, despite ongoing budget pressures and a projected total cost of £15-20 billion ($24-32 billion) at 2006-07 prices. In late October, the U.K.
A significant part of Israel's Operation Pillar of Defense against Hamas in Gaza takes place overhead and well out of sight. Israel is doubtless using the observation capabilities of its satellites to detect and monitor activities by the terrorist group, which for years has fired rockets into southern Israel, lately increasing their range and potential lethality. During the hostilities last month, Hamas deployed Fajr 5 rockets with 45-mi. range, long enough to hit Tel Aviv.
Most in the District of Columbia and parts of Maryland and Virginia (DMV) appear to be employed to tell the government what to do. However, it's also important to identify, for a new or re-elected administration, strategies that have proven to be unworkable. The first of these is to wish for miracles. I will not belabor that, because it was discussed here last month (Oct. 15, p. DT2). Adding capability to a system or a force costs money, so you have to spend more, reduce numbers, or both.
Russia's legendary Kalashnikov assault rifle may get a new lease on life as its designers try to improve the weapon's operational parameters and attract orders from the country's defense ministry and paramilitary agencies.
There may be no better time to diagnose and reprogram an aircraft than during aerial refueling. Technicians have the full attention of a pilot or, in the case of a UAV, an operator. There is no waiting for results, and glitches can be fixed or mission changes made on the spot. This may have been part of the thinking behind development of the IconIC hose system for inflight refueling by Icon Polymer of Nottinghamshire, England, a specialist in engineered polymer products for military aviation and other industries.
Boeing used the Association of the United States Army (AUSA) convention in Washington last month to provide more details about its new Joint Air-Breathing Multi-Role Missile (Jabmm) concept originally intended for the U.S. Navy's Littoral Combat Ship (LCS). The new, small, modular missile payload was revealed in early 2012. Boeing is pitching the concept as a “turbine-air-breathing missile solution to countering proliferating anti-access threats.” At AUSA, Boeing revealed that Jabmm now consists of two yet-undesignated cruise missiles.
Rheinmetall and Textron's Canadian subsidiary last month signed a €160 million ($207 million) contract for the Canadian Forces Tactical Armored Patrol Vehicle (TAPV) project. 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.
Israeli defense companies are presenting several new tactical radars, with a combination of technology and weapons incorporated into a mobile system for infantry units. Israel Aerospace Industries subsidiary Elta is unveiling two multisensor systems designed to support battalion formations and provide timely alerts and warnings of imminent attacks with ballistic or direct weapons—mortars, rockets, missiles, or snipers and guns. Green Rock is a compact, mobile mortar and rocket detection, tracking and localization sensor.
Cumbersome and uncomfortable loads are ongoing problems for ground troops, especially as the amount of specialized equipment a soldier carries multiplies. To alleviate this, Rich Landry (see photo), an individual equipment designer in the Load Carriage Prototype Lab at the U.S. Army's Natick Soldier Systems Center, and colleague Murray Hamlet adapted the Molle (modular lightweight load-carrying equipment) medium rucksack to better accommodate packs of gear.
The U.S. Navy is among those employing an evolving process called additive manufacturing (AM), which uses 3-D printing to convert computer-aided-design files into functional objects of various materials that would otherwise be difficult or impossible to make. The Naval Undersea Warfare Center wanted two aluminum tail cones for Mk. 30 antisubmarine targets. Using conventional pattern-based sand-casting, the 22 X 22 X 22-in. parts would have taken 25 weeks to build and cost $20,000. A foundry using a machine from ExOne Co. of Irwin, Pa., made them in 10 weeks for $12,600.
Medical evacuation flights can put casualties in harm's way owing to the ambient noise of the aircraft. The noise overwhelms the acoustic properties of stethoscopes and prevents caregivers from detecting sounds of distress—or auscultation—from vital organs such as the heart and lungs. This is because when sound exceeds 95 dBA, the body conducts the external noise, which drowns out internal body sounds. A solution has been engineered by Active Signal Technologies of Linthicum Heights, Md., in the form of a noise-immune stethoscope with Doppler radar and advanced sensors.
The U.S. Navy has christened the first-in-class amphibious assault ship LHA 6 as the America. From the American Revolution through the first Persian Gulf war, only three warships have sailed with the name America, according to the Pentagon, the last being a Kitty Hawk-class aircraft carrier that supported operations from Vietnam through the first Gulf war. LHAs, which stand for landing helicopter assault, are sometimes called “big-deck” amphibious ships or even mini-carriers.
The Israeli robotics developer Roboteam is introducing a miniature robot designed for intelligence-gathering and to counter roadside bombs in dense urban combat. The ultra-light, 13-lb., highly maneuverable robot can be carried by a soldier, and is able to climb stairs and over-come 60-deg. obstacles. It operates indoors utilizing secure mobile ad hoc network data links. The Micro Tactical Ground Robot is designed to deliver video and acoustic intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.
The state-of-the-art in military energetics is HMX, a powerful material that is dense, thermodynamically stable and low in sensitivity—in other words, a devastating explosive that is safe to handle. Research by the University of Michigan and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) indicates that the explosiveness of HMX can be increased with no trade-off in sensitivity by combining it with an energetic known as CL-20, which while powerful, is by itself too sensitive for use.
