Issues surrounding battery use are becoming critical as forces add more electronic gear to their loads. Chief among these are the amount of batteries needed for deployments, their service life and cost. Evgentech of Norcross, Ga., has developed a method of recharging batteries for personal electronics and other equipment that CEO Jackie Hutter says significantly reduces charge time and extends cycle life, thereby getting batteries back in use faster and potentially reducing the number needed.
British troops at forward operating bases and other outposts in Afghanistan now have fast access to fuel for generators and other equipment, due to the development of flexible air-transportable containers that resemble huge circular bladders. The Air Portable Fuel Container Mk 5 was designed and fabricated by GKN Aerospace of Portsmouth, England, in a five-year, £2 million ($3.1 million) deal with the U.K. Defense Ministry. The containers are made of rubber and DuPont's Kevlar aramid fiber—the latter for ballistic and impact protection.
Obviously, what you need to prevent your Otto fuel from freezing at altitude during a long patrol is a torpedo cozy. During the January travel break, Editor-in-Chief Bill Sweetman discovered this artwork by Philadelphia “yarn bomber” Ishknits in the Torpedo Factory Arts Center in Alexandria, Va.
Concerns over China's claims to the South China Sea are sparking an arms race among its Southeast Asian neighbors, some of which have maritime patrol, airborne early warning and anti-submarine warfare (ASW) aircraft high on their priority lists. China has laid claim to most of the South China Sea, a body of water that includes vital sea lanes and under which lie rich deposits of oil and gas.
The retreat of polar sea ice and increased shipping, oil and gas exploration and tourism could increase the need for a U.S. military and homeland security presence in the Arctic.
Portable radar that sees through walls is a growing area of development. A recent entrant is the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Lincoln Laboratory, which developed an ultra-wideband (UWB), multiple input/multiple output phased-array sensor with real-time acquisition and processing capabilities and video-like synthetic aperture radar imaging. The device is 8.5 ft. wide and 2 ft. high. When mounted on a mobile platform, it is 5 ft. tall. Importantly, the radar reduces through-wall data collection time to less than 100 millisec., an extremely fast rate.
A new hyperspectral sensor that could be used to detect drug labs or bomb-making facilities is set to deploy in early 2012 onboard the MQ-1 Predator, according to the U.S. Air Force. The Airborne Cueing and Exploitation System Hyperspectral (ACES HY) sensor works by collecting light reflected off objects on the ground from across the electromagnetic spectrum, which can help identify objects not visible to the human eye. By looking for specific spectral “fingerprints,” hyperspectral sensors can identify the composition of materials and even see through camouflage.
Countries are addressing budget shortfalls by slashing defense expenditures, the U.K. among them. Cutbacks will not affect all programs —sectors vital to countering evolving threats or achieving battlespace dominance will continue to receive funding, such as unmanned aerial systems (UAS). The Defense Ministry in late December awarded a four-year, £40 million ($62 million) research contract to BAE Systems for the Future Combat Air System. The results will “sustain and develop . . .
Over in China and Russia I'm sure that engineers at both Chengdu and Sukhoi will be raising their glasses in the New Year to the F-22 and the F-35 as doing more damage to the U.S. fighter world than all their fighter aircraft combined! —RSF in a comment about the F-35 on the Ares blog. Phabulous! I said it last time, but an F-4F-ICE full of Amraams and IRIS-Ts getting herded around by savvy Luftwaffe crew is very much a modern phormidable threat. —Frink-L in a comment about Phantoms
U.S. researchers are developing a program that will predict potential threats from employees of government agencies and defense contractors by detecting behavioral anomalies. Goals include detection before the fact of individuals planning workplace violence, espionage or other harmful activities. Researchers, supported by Darpa and the U.S. Army Research Lab, and led by Science Applications International Corp., are assembling the Anomaly Detection at Multiple Scales (Adams) system.
Israel is developing new ground systems after aerial experiences from Operation Cast Lead, the Gaza campaign of 2008-09. In that operation, each combat brigade had direct support of a dedicated attack helicopter squadron. Moving with the forward combat elements, joint terminal attack control teams included embedded attack helo pilots and in some cases even fighter pilots, having direct access to UAV real-time streaming imagery. Now Elbit Systems is demonstrating several systems to provide ground forces with safer air support.
As soon as the helicopter touched the ground on a dusty airfield in southern Afghanistan, the game had been forever changed. After a decade of sending vulnerable, manpower-intensive, fuel-guzzling ground convoys to resupply troops at far-flung combat outposts in Iraq and Afghanistan—and seeing those convoys consistently ambushed, blown up or just delayed—the U.S. Marine Corps had had enough. So, on Dec. 17, 2011, the Corps for the first time delivered supplies to troops using a remotely piloted helicopter.
Two stories that broke in the last few weeks of 2011 flag what is likely to become an ever-more dominant concern for militaries and defense contractors in the years ahead: the security, or vulnerability, of mobile communications. The two developments underline the challenges that have yet to be overcome as the defense establishment seeks to reap the technological and economic advantages of using cheap, proven, off-the-shelf communications technology. The first item did not, at first, appear to have much to do with defense.
Unmanned aircraft may have garnered the headlines since 9/11, but unmanned ground vehicles (UGV) are expected to become equally standard tools for most advanced armies around the world in coming decades. While obvious applications like route clearance and cargo transport spring to mind, nascent Italian technologies indicate that UGV roles and missions could become as diverse as the imagination allows when it comes to terrestrial crawlers.
Israeli air force air and missile defenses are to be combined and reorganized to better protect the entire nation. Under this doctrine, defense of Israel's skies will combine all forces designated to intercept enemy aircraft with all the assets allocated to intercept missiles, regardless of range. The multilayered, active defense will be run by a centralized interception-management center, which will also provide the common air picture that enables aircraft and interceptor missiles to safely coexist.
Japan's 2012 defense budget of ¥4.7 trillion ($60.8 billion) is essentially unchanged from last year. It is likely to remain flat in coming years or reflect a downward trend that began in 2003—especially as the country absorbs the huge financial burden from the devastating earthquake and tsunami that struck last March. Despite the shrinking budget, planners are working to enhance capabilities in surveillance and rapid deployment, and planning to strengthen the defense of its southwestern islands facing China, which has made territorial claims on them.
The Indian army conducted one of its largest war games ever in December, “Sudarshan Shakti,” in the western Thar Desert. The exercise involved 300 tanks, 250 artillery guns and 50,000 soldiers.
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa) wants proposals for a factory that builds a combat vehicle in record time by making rapid design changes. Darpa released the final solicitation for iFAB—Instant Foundry Adaptive through Bits—part of a program to build “adaptive vehicles” with drastically shorter development cycles. “Instead of building one factory, wrapping it around one product or even a family of products, the iFAB foundry is a manufacturing capability with no learning curve,” says Army Lt. Col. Nathan Weidenman, deputy program manager.
November 2011 was a month to remember in Iran. An International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) report challenged Tehran's claims that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes; two suspicious explosions killed individuals critical to ballistic missile and nuclear enrichment programs; and Basidji paramilitary “students” stormed the British embassy in Tehran, rupturing relations. Meanwhile, speculation continues as to whether Israel, the U.S., or both would attack Iran's uranium enrichment sites to prevent what many say is a march to nuclear armament.
Widely thought of as the U.K.'s next unmanned aerial system (UAS), Scavenger may be much more. The project is expected to deliver a deep and persistent airborne intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance (Istar) capability in the 2018 timeframe. Although the Defense Ministry is not anticipating a decision this year, 2012 will be pivotal in shaping a program important to the future force mix and the aerospace industry.
Want to predict the next Arab Spring, cyberattacks or a political revolution? A sophisticated computer program developed by Recorded Future of Cambridge, Mass., can help do that. Recorded Future analyzes 300,000 news sources per hour, looking for information about the future. Sources might come from social media, news reports or government filings. The idea is to mine this input for references to future events, thus the name Recorded Future.
Economic crises, budget cuts and shifting warfighting needs will have an impact on defense industries this year. Nevertheless, technology development continues. Products will be commercialized and business plans written with an eye toward weathering the storm and building for the future. Following are 10 companies that DTI's editors believe are worth watching for the innovation they will bring to the market this year.
