Kaminski tells same hearing that he sees agreements for three NATO nations participating in the Joint Strike Fighter program to be signed next month. "I expect to sign multilateral MOU agreements with The Netherlands, Norway and Denmark in April...," he says.
Loral's Globalstar expects to meet its end-of-1998 deadline for having its first 44 Big LEO communications satellites in orbit, despite the January grounding of the McDonnell Douglas Delta II that will carry its first satellites. Bob Berry, head of Space Systems/Loral, says he expects the Delta to return to service soon and to begin launching Globalstars in September.
Southcom is working on obtaining foliage penetrating synthetic aperture radar and hyperspectral imaging capability. Clark says such capabilities may be available within the next year or two.
Pioneer RocketPlane, a startup company that recently attracted former U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff Merrill A. McPeak as its chairman, expects to get financial backing soon to support detailed design work on a suborbital spaceplane that would use off-the-shelf engines and mid-air refueling to launch small satellites.
Forces in the U.S. Southern Command are structured and organized for the 21st Century, says Gen. Wesley Clark, commander-in- chief. Other theaters may be modeled in future after Southcom. "We hope we will be able to strengthen our capacity to acquire intelligence."
Halls says it's time for the Air Force to "walk the talk" on its commitment to making military space projects a priority. He says he "won't be bashful" in pushing service leaders to put the money in the military space programs they have been talking about. If confirmed, Hall will become assistant secretary of the Air Force for space in addition to NRO director.
FAA's life-cycle cost baseline for the Standard Terminal Automation Replacement System (STARS) could increase from the $2.23 billion level approved in January 1996 to as much as $2.76 billion, the General Accounting Office told a House panel. "This possible increase is attributable to the expected higher costs for operating and maintaining STARS equipment," the GAO said.
The ranking Democrat on the House National Security Committee, Ron Dellums (Calif.), says not to heed warnings from his Republican colleagues that the U.S. military is on the way to becoming a hollow force. Until the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) is completed, it will be impossible to say what is needed for the Pentagon's future years defense plan (FYDP), Dellums says. He made the remarks after Rep. Curt Weldon (R-Pa.) warned of huge shortfalls in the FYDP. Such statements do nothing but "make headlines for someone who is not thinking," says Dellums.
Ministers of the European Space Agency member states have adopted measures designed to increase competition among agency suppliers as part of industrial policy reform in the works since their last meeting in 1995.
The U.S. and Latin American countries may join forces in a Multilateral Counterdrug Center. Clark says such an outfit won't be dominated by the armed forces, even though it "would have some level of military support." Each country would maintain command and control over its military participation, he says. Clark says "we're not trying to create NATO in the Western Hemisphere."
The U.S. Air Force has told Congress that its top priority for a budget increase is protection from attacks like the one at Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia last year. Next are management of air traffic around the world and navigation safety, neither of which are in the fiscal year 1998 funding plan submitted to Congress last month.
The merger of Greenwich Air Services Inc. (GASI) and UNC Inc., the two largest independent aviation services companies (DAILY, Feb. 18), probably won't draw much attention from federal antitrust regulators, even though the combination creates a $2 billion company in a sector where at least one analyst cannot name a definitive number three.
After four months of delays, the Alliant Techsystems Outrider Tactical Unmanned Aerial Vehicle completed its first flight on Friday, an important milestone for the program that has come under increasing scrutiny during the last few weeks. A test variant flew for almost nine minutes at altitudes up to 1,000 feet from the Hondo, Tex., municipal airport, the UAV Joint Program Office reported yesterday. Outrider flew several figure-eights, reaching a top speed of 112 knots and completed climb, dive and bank maneuvers of up to 40 degrees.
The U.S. Army and the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization may try again in June on THAAD missile interception, a BMDO spokesman says. Last Thursday, the system failed for the fourth time to intercept a target. So far, there's nothing in the failure that indicates the June test can't take place on schedule. For that test, it will have a new seeker.
The National Reconnaissance Office intends to make a 20% cut in its system integration and technical analysis contractor workforce, says Keith Hall, now running the agency as deputy director, but nominated to be director. Meanwhile, he says, there are no plans to cut NRO employees for modernization dollars.
Paul G. Kaminski, Pentagon under secretary for acquisition, tells a joint hearing of the HNSC procurement and research and development subcommittees in a prepared statement that "...a new replacement interdiction aircraft will replace today's F-15E and F-117 aircraft respectively by 2030." Under questioning, he says there was a planned replacement interdiction aircraft six years ago, but it met the same fate "as the NATF and all the other planes that went by the wayside."
Russia's Mir orbital station has lost the primary and backup electrolysis units that produce crew oxygen from waste water, forcing the two Russians and one American aboard to rely on a supplemental system that is itself on backup because of a recent fire. A NASA spokesman at Johnson Space Center, Tex., said Friday the crew was in no immediate danger. After both electrolysis units malfunctioned and were shut down, the crew shifted to lithium perchlorate canisters designed to supplement crew oxygen when more than one three-person crew is aboard.
UND AEROSPACE, Grand Forks, N.D., named Thomas K. Kenville director, sales and marketing. Kenville has worked for UND for eight years in marketing positions and customer service.
The U.S. Ballistic Missile Defense Organization's Midcourse Space Experiment (MSX) satellite, launched last April to gather data for future space- and ground-based missile defense systems, has tracked two medium- range missiles, program officials reported. The two test missiles were launched from the NASA Wallops Flight Facility, Wallops Island, Va., each on a 135-degree azimuth. The first launch occurred Feb. 12 at 4 p.m. EST. The second launch occurred Feb. 23 at 5:06 a.m. EST.
House National Security Committee Chairman Floyd Spence (R-S.C.) yesterday acknowledged that the most he can expect to increase the Clinton Administration's $264.8 billion fiscal 1998 national security budget request is about $3 billion - and even that won't be easy. Spence told The DAILY that "it looks like the most we can get out" of the process with the House Budget Committee is $3 billion. "We're just worried about keeping that."
Loral Space&Communications still hasn't closed on its planned purchase of AT&T's Skynet Satellite Services, apparently because of difficulty negotiating down the original $712.5 million purchase price in the wake of Telstar 401's on-orbit failure. Loral CEO Bernard L. Schwartz told reporters in Arlington, Va., yesterday that the deal, originally set to close Feb. 28 (DAILY, Feb. 25), should conclude "certainly within two weeks, probably within days."
Douglas Aircraft said yesterday that it will convert at least 12 DC- 10s to freighters for Federal Express at an airport complex in Goodyear, Ariz., and that Alenia of Italy will convert at least 13 of the trijets to freighters under a $410 million contract. Douglas and FedEx signed a contract last fall under which Douglas will manage the modifications on up to 60 aircraft, which will be redesignated as MD-10s. The number and timing of conversions is up to FedEx.
TRACOR AEROSPACE INC., Austin, Tex., won a one-year, $7 million contract from the U.S. Army to make MJU-10 infrared flares for the U.S. Air Force's F-15 fighter, Tracor said yesterday. It said the company's Expendables Division will make more than 140,000 flares, which will be deployed from Tracor-developed electronic dispenser systems. Tracor said it will shift an additional 30-40 employees for its East Camden, Ark., facility to fulfill the production requirement. Deliveries are scheduled through April 1998.
