Tank: Rand Corp. Location: Santa Monica, Calif. Profile: Iconic, technocratic and an influential voice in the development of military and foreign policy.
The Indian army may soon be equipped with a non-lethal weapon it can use against terrorists and other combatants holed up in enclosed areas. The Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO) of New Delhi is working on a smoke grenade whose main component would be powdered seeds of the ultra-hot Bhut Jolokia red pepper, which is native to northeast India and Bangladesh. Bhut Jolokia is the second-hottest pepper in the world, registering 1,041,427 Scoville heat units.
The Israeli navy is expanding its unmanned surface vessels (USVs), which are used for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance. According to the IDF Journal, a publication of the Israel Defense Forces, the navy recently deployed the Protector USV, a 9-meter-long (30-ft.) craft developed by Rafael that is fast (50 kt.) and highly maneuverable, and is testing the Silver Marlin (see photo), a 10.6-meter-long boat from Elbit Systems with a top speed of 45 kt. and 24-hr. endurance.
Dismounted troops carry a load of gear that is heavy and cumbersome. In addition to weapons and body armor, they are weighed down with batteries that are essential to electronic devices such as radios, GPS and night-vision gear. The U.K. Defense Ministry reports that a British soldier carries 8.8 lb. of batteries on a 48-hr. mission, and more than 22 lb. for some operations. One way of reducing the load is wearable power systems, which involve webbing or other gear made from textiles with conductive yarn woven into them.
The Pentagon seeks a missile that can strike anywhere in the world within 60 min. of launch. It has considered such options as modifying submarine-based Trident missiles for what it calls the Prompt Global Strike mission. But potential weapons run up against political concerns that a launch could be confused with a nuclear strike. Boeing, however, is pitching a 1980s-era concept that could be ready in as little as 2.5 years.
Robust innovation in alternative and renewable energy technologies is on the verge of showing up in military applications. The results aren’t mature enough to call them a revolution, but they paint a picture of ever-more mobile units supported by lightweight, temporary structures and tools powered by a menu of power supplies.
A British company that for several years experimented with using honeybees to detect explosives, has perfected the technique and developed a prototype unit. Inscentinel Ltd. says the handheld Vasor136 (Volatile Analysis by Specific Olfactory Recognition) contains six cassettes, each with six bees that have been trained to respond to the scents of various compounds and mixtures, among them Semtex, C4, PE4, TNT, DMDNB and gunpowder. The U.K.
Lightweight polymer composites such as carbon fiber and epoxy resin are critical to the performance of aircraft, surface ships and other advanced vehicles. The ability to detect failure-inducing stress and strain, however, continues to be refined as engineers seek the best methods of assuring the integrity of composites. One promising way is by embedding optical fibers within a structure, transmitting laser pulses through them and tracking reflected signals to locate flaws. A method for doing this was reported in the April issue of NASA Tech Briefs.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) is undertaking a program to modernize its workhorse heavy engineering combat vehicle—also known as the Puma—based on lessons learned during Operation Cast Lead, the 2008‑09 war in Gaza. A prototype of the upgraded platform has been constructed at the military’s armored vehicle refurbishment center (see photo). The IDF plans to complete the project this year. The Puma, which is based on the aging Centurion tank chassis, will be equipped with a modified drive developed by Ashot Ashkelon.
Improvised explosive devices (IEDs) are an ongoing threat to U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq and Afghanistan (see related story on p. 22). Though a great deal of technology has been developed to defeat IEDs, many experts believe that one important way to counter them is by training soldiers in what to look for and expect when operating in different areas (DTI May 2009, p. 44). The U.S.
The 27,800-ton joint logistic support ship Karel Doorman, under construction for the Royal Netherlands Navy, will have an integrated mast developed by Thales Nederland. The I-Mast 400 will house radar, optronic and communication sensors, antennas and peripheral equipment. The navy signed a contract for it on March 30. The mast is installed on four of the navy’s patrol vessels, and consolidates the multiple antennas that are common to conventional ship designs while eliminating the electromagnetic interference they can cause.
There has been significant soul-searching over the past year in the U.S. Defense Department about the viability of the Marine Corps’ amphibious assault mission, tied to the controversy over the troubled General Dynamics Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle (EFV) program. No such doubts about amphibious operations exist in China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Since the early 1990s, the PLA has developed and deployed two generations of amphibious armored assault vehicles, and more recently developed a range of specialized amphibious assault and support systems.
Rolls-Royce’s Next Generation Nuclear Propulsion Plant (NGNPP) will deliver what the company calls “a step change in safety, capability and availability” for submarine propulsion. But its significance may go well beyond this application.
Every Israeli combat leader is indoctrinated from his first day in command training with the motto “Follow me.” Traditionally, Israel Defense Forces (IDF) combat leaders, whether infantry or armor, moved with the assault elements, from which they could not only get a precise battle picture, but “feel” the prevailing atmosphere among troops under combat conditions. The presence of the senior commander also enabled him to take critical decisions on the spot, rather than rely on long-range communication, which frequently proved erratic and unreliable.
Troops may someday have a new use for T-shirts—body armor. Work at the University of South Carolina, Zhejiang University of Technology in China and the Institute of Robotics and Intelligent Systems of Zurich demonstrates the potential to engineer a cotton T-shirt with boron and nanocomposites that would be lightweight and have ballistic-resistant properties. Boron, used in conventional body armor, is the third-hardest material at ambient temperature.
Heavily armored, supermen by the standards of the day, their mounts refined through generations of breeding, and trained in warfare from boyhood, France’s medieval cavalry could beat any similar force in the field. Unfortunately, you couldn’t armor a horse for battle, it was a big target for a plunging arrow, and Agincourt saw the flower of France dropped in its tracks by my ragged-arsed peasant ancestors.
Brig. Gen. H.R. McMaster Director of Concept Development and Experimentation, U.S. Army Capabilities Integration Center Age: 48 Birthplace: Philadelphia Education: B.S., United States Military Academy; Ph.D., University of North Carolina.
The Russian air force took delivery of the first Pantsyr-S short-range air-defense systems in March. The Pantsyrs will gradually replace the old Tunguska antiaircraft weapons. The first 10 systems were released from KBP Instrument Design Bureau’s assembly site in Tula and transported to Alabino, near Moscow, and will be part of the Victory Day parade in Red Square on May 9.
In March 2009, a senior Defense Department information technology official e-mailed employees in the Pentagon’s Office of the Secretary of Defense warning of a “cyber-exploration” threat. “There are currently targeted e-mail attacks toward Defense Department users,” the e-mail read.
Imagine trying to stage an entire U.S. Marine Corps expeditionary brigade from a country that does not want it there. Consider the logistical and security issues associated with operating, maintaining and protecting all the equipment and forces. Now imagine taking the whole operation offshore.
Paul McLeary (Washington), Neelam Mathews (New Delhi)
Just after dawn on March 23, as the Panamanian-flagged cargo vessel MV Almezaan was churning toward the port of Mogadishu, Somalia, the ship’s lookouts spotted three boats approaching at high speed. In the pirate-infested waters of the Gulf of Aden off the eastern coast of Africa, it was a scene that has played out all too often over the past several years, but this time things would be different. The plan of the two small skiffs manned by seven Somalis and the larger “mother ship,” one surmises, was to board the Almezaan and take its crew hostage.
As the U.S. military looks for ways to improve human intelligence in asymmetric conflicts, one organization is soliciting proposals for analytical equipment and software to meet this need. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa) has launched Guard Dog (Graph Understanding and Analysis for Rapid Detection-Deployed on the Ground), a program to develop handheld devices and software that automate the collection, analysis and prioritization of intelligence.
Telling your customer that he can’t do math is not a classic way to succeed in business, but it may have been the best argument that Lockheed Martin had by mid-April after a torrent of bad news about the Joint Strike Fighter program. There was one good news story in March: The first vertical landing, on March 18. The program notched up 50 flights in the first half of Fiscal 2010, bringing the total to 170, more than half of them logged by the now retired AA-1. Plans in 2008 called for 1,243 test sorties in Fiscal 2010.
A U.S. Marine Corps sergeant jumped from a Mine-Resistant Ambush-Protected vehicle last summer to inspect a suspicious clump in the dirt along the side of the highway linking his operating base and the combat outpost the convoy was headed to. He inched his way to the patch of ground with a metal detector. The marine had good reason for caution. Helmand Province is infested with improvised explosive devices (IEDs), found along roadways and footpaths that Marines and Afghan security forces use during dismounted patrols.
