Four years after the Carter administration canceled the B-1 bomber, President Ronald Reagan revived the program amid the fervor of the Cold War. Between 1982 and 1986, no fewer than 100 Lancers rolled off the Palmdale, Calif., assembly line. Regardless of what one thinks of the much-maligned B-1B, the episode holds a valuable lesson for political leaders and military planners today.
There is nothing that concentrates the mind like the prospect of a hanging. This quip came to mind for U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense William Lynn when asked whether the Lockheed Martin F-35B was still on “probation.” Defense Secretary Robert Gates said in January that if performance of the short-takeoff-and-vertical-landing (Stovl) version of the F-35—the most expensive of the three variants—does not improve, he would propose terminating it in two years.
There still is a lot of uncertainty about the direction of the U.S. regional airline industry, given that higher fuel costs have led their mainline partners to cut back on regional flights and reduce the fixed-fee payments they make to the carriers. But here is one suggestion for how regional carriers should adapt their business model: become hybrid carriers.
The LightSquared GPS interference imbroglio has all the right elements to become a classic, intense Washington battle—billions of dollars at stake, technical arcana aplenty, multiple government agencies involved and potentially millions of users affected by the outcome. The basics are that LightSquared plans a satellite-plus-terrestrial system to offer fourth-generation (4G) wireless broadband services. The trouble is that GPS receivers listen for the faint signals from the navigation and timing satellites in parts of the radio spectrum that LightSquared owns.
In a move to bolster its military capability, Mongolia is set to modernize its air force and plans to invest in an Earth-observation satellite. The Mongolian defense budget accounts for 1.5% of gross domestic product, but “we're now debating making defense 4% of GDP,” Defense Minister Luvsanvandan Bold told Aviation Week on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue Asian security summit here. The economy is also growing at more than 10% per year, he adds.
Alain Durand has been promoted to group VP from head of the Advanced Sensors platform of Bellevue, Wash.-based Esterline Corp.'s Bourges, France, subsidiary. Michel Potvin has been named platform president of the company's four U.S.-based control systems operations. He was VP at L-3 MAS, where he led military maintenance, repair and overhaul, and special-mission aircraft activities.
Reader Jaro Franta's letter regarding the JAXA supersonic drop tests (AW&ST June 6, p. 8) as being a possible precursor for self-starting ramjets was intriguing. However, such a free-falling ramjet, once started, would then need to perform a 90-deg. high-g pull-up just to stop its descent. By that time it would be in the lower atmosphere and subject to high heating.
Marco Riccetti has been named technical director of Meads International, Orlando, Fla. He was chief engineer for the Medium Extended-Air Defense System (Meads) program at MBDA Italia in Rome and succeeds Claudio Ponzi, who will return to MBDA Italia as sector head for Air Defense and Ballistic Missile Defense.
The Israeli government is moving to expand a rocket protection shield across the entire country after months of heated discussion about how to proceed. “In two and a half years, the whole of Israel will be covered with an Iron Dome, protecting it from rocket attacks,” Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak declared during a visit to the Paris air show here.
Thailand's government is encouraging the launch of new airlines, but competition for aircraft and staff will make it hard for them to survive. The civil aviation department, which operates 28 of Thailand's smaller airports, wants more start-up airlines, says the director of its flight standards bureau, Sumpun Pongthai. In an effort to promote airport usage, the transport minister, Sophon Zarum, recently waived all landing and parking fees at 12 of these airports.
Iridium Communications Inc. will use ISC Kosmotras as a “supplemental” launch services provider to backstop Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX), which has the prime contract to launch the 66-satellite Iridium Next low Earth orbit communication satellite constellation. The McLean, Va.-based satellite operator has contracted with the Russian company to provide Dnepr launch services for its next-generation constellation, which also includes six spares on orbit and nine more on the ground.
A week of massive order intake has aircraft makers wondering how much further and faster they need to ramp up production to meet demand. But it also raises strategic product policy concerns for some, including Boeing, which is grappling with whether to re-engine the 737 or launch the New Small Airplane (NSA).
Indonesia will soon have to decide whether it wants a C-212 line. For more than a year, Airbus Military has been negotiating to transfer production of C-212 aircraft to Indonesian Aerospace in an effort to capitalize on the country's lower cost base. But the European company first wants to ensure that it garners sales from Indonesia before embarking on the move.
A startup space-tourism company based on the Isle of Man may begin using spacecraft originally built for the Soviet military to start flying humans to space in 2014, in the hope it will pave the way for commercial space stations. Excalibur Almaz says its acquisition of two old Almaz military space stations and four Reusable Re-entry Vehicles (RRVs) position it to be the first company to offer tourist flights to orbit.
While single-aisle engine news stole the limelight at the Paris air show, developments at the top end of the commercial thrust bracket gave the first hints of power battles to come over Boeing's planned successor to the 777.
U.S. Rep. John Mica (R-Fla.) makes no secret of the fact that he is out to reform the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). “My goal is to get them out of the passenger screening business and into the security business,” Mica says.
The White House and the Aerospace Industries Association (AIA) are alarmed over the fate of national security space programs under House appropriators' version of fiscal 2012 defense spending. According to a White House statement last week, Conventional Prompt Global Strike, the Deep Space Climate Observatory spacecraft and the Assured Satcom Services in Single Theater efforts could all see major delays or cost increases. And House language pushing for withdrawal by the U.S.
USAF Gen. (ret.) and former astronaut Kevin P. Chilton (see photo) has been elected to the board of The Aerospace Corp., El Segundo, Calif. He was a member of three space shuttle crews, including the 1996 flight of STS-76, which he commanded. Chilton also was commander of USAF Space Command, Peterson AFB, Colo.
Weapon systems have become a continual “work in progress,” rather than a finished product. Using the same testing criteria, no version of Windows from 3.11-7 would ever be declared operationally suitable.
As any graduate of the William D. O'Neil School of Reality can tell you, major defense contractors struggling to fulfill their contract requirements are usually not at fault for poor performance. . . . Anyway, what's a few more billion between friends and patriots?
The days when manufacturers can bank on a revenue stream through the life of an aircraft may be numbered. Budget pressure is focusing attention on the many proprietary system architectures the Pentagon must maintain, and the potential for competition to reduce the growing cost of upgrades to add capabilities and tackle obsolescence.
Long chartered to look far beyond the near-term needs of the Pentagon, the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa) is embracing the challenge of revitalizing and revolutionizing an industry that is becoming increasingly focused on the short term. The agency's goal is not only to reduce dramatically the time required to develop weapon systems, and the cost to produce them, but also overcome industry's struggles to enable innovation and attract the next generation of engineers.
