Defense contractors will remain largely unaffected by the downtown in the aerospace market, according to financial analysts with Deutsche Bank. Christopher Mecray, an aerospace analyst with Deutsche Banc Alex. Brown Inc., said in a report released Sept. 17 that defense sales should be largely unaffected by an economic downturn due to their focus on military work.
The two aerospace and defense companies vying for ownership of Newport News Shipbuilding Inc. have once again extended their tender offers to purchase all the company's outstanding shares of common stock. Last week, Northrop Grumman Corp. announced it was extending its offer from Sept. 13 to midnight Sept. 20. General Dynamics Corp. announced Sept. 17 it was extending its tender offer from Sept. 14 to midnight Sept. 21.
Deliveries of commercial aircraft could be dramatically affected by the Sept. 11 hijackings for months, if not years, to come, according to some financial analysts. Last week, Merrill Lynch Securities and Deutsche Bank issued reports predicting a sharp decline in The Boeing Co.'s commercial aircraft orders for 2002 and beyond. Christopher Mecray, aerospace analyst with Deutsche Banc Alex. Brown Inc., wrote that Boeing could lose as much as 25 percent of its projected delivery orders for 2002, dropping from a projected 515 to 390 or less.
Amid a growing realization among officials that India is vulnerable to terrorist attacks, the Indian ministry of civil aviation has redrafted its contingency plan for dealing with hijacked passenger aircraft. The proposed plan, which will be placed before the cabinet for its approval, suggests using Indian air force fighters, employing unusual tactics, against hijackers.
The U.S. has many options but no easy choices as it ponders how to retaliate for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Center, according to a report by the Congressional Research Service.
Michelle Van Cleave will be nominated to be assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low intensity conflict, the White House announced Sept. 17. Van Cleave is currently president of National Security Concepts, a firm specializing in strategic planning and senior level policy analysis for government customers. During the 105th Congress, she was the staff director and chief counsel of the Senate Judiciary Committee's subcommittee on technology, terrorism and government information.
Although unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have long been predicted to be a booming industry, the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington will likely accelerate their development and acceptance in a variety of missions, according to some analysts. "Even without this event, the prospects of the UAV industry getting more and more involved in military operations has been growing rapidly," Daryl Davidson, executive director of the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI), told The DAILY.
While air strikes will likely be a part of U.S. retaliation for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the Defense Department could face shortages of precision guided weapons, according to a recent DOD report and analysts who have examined the issue. One of the military's most popular conversion kits used for precision guided weapons, the Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM), will be unable to meet production surges, according to the report.
Northrop Grumman Corp. recently took delivery of the first engineering and manufacturing development (EMD) RQ-8A Fire Scout Vertical Takeoff and Landing Unmanned Aerial Vehicle from Schweizer Aircraft Corp., which produced the airframe.
TERRORISM LAWMAKER: House Intelligence terrorism and homeland security subcommittee Chairman Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) has been chosen by House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) to lead the chamber's efforts to examine "all facets" of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and recommend "new countermeasures," according to a statement from Chambliss' office.
Raytheon Co. has been awarded a $23.6 million option on a U.S. Navy contract to provide operation and maintenance of Relocatable-Over-the-Horizon-Radar (ROTHR) systems. Under this option, Raytheon Technical Services Co. will provide operation and maintenance, engineering and training services in Chesapeake and New Kent, Va.; King Ranch and Escondido Ranch, Texas; and Fort Allen and Vieques, Puerto Rico.
V-22 VERDICT: The U.S. Marine Corps have cleared five Marines accused of crimes related to falsified MV-22 Osprey maintenance records, and issued letters of reprimand to three officers. The Marines said investigators have found no link between the false records and two Osprey crashes last year that killed 23 Marines.
Once the focus of many policy studies but few applications, homeland defense may emerge as a central focus in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist incidents. What the outcome of this focus will be, however, is far from clear. "After seven years [of study], I am a little bit frustrated that things have not moved forward," said retired Air Force Col. Randall Larsen, now the director of the ANSER Institute for Homeland Security. The U.S. needs to act quickly to establish a cabinet level official in charge of homeland defense matters, he said.
Lockheed Martin Information Systems has been awarded the U.S. Air Force's Theater Aerospace Command and Control Facility operations and maintenance contract, which is worth about $25 million over the next five years. The contract could grow to cover 10 years, according to the company. It covers operations and maintenance, hardware, software and systems development, as well as studies and analyses for the Air Force training facility at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M.
LOW-TECH TERROR: "Over the last decade there has obviously been a tendency to focus on the exciting, high-end threats, and the expensive solutions to them," says John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org. "I have been of the view all along that it's the technologically less sophisticated threats that are far more likely to actually confront us. Terrorist organizations are extraordinarily risk averse.
Hopes for unanimity among the four countries in the Nordic Standard Helicopter Program were dashed Sept. 13, when Denmark decided not to select the NH-90, which had been picked by Finland, Norway and Sweden. Finland plans to buy 20 NH-90s, Norway plans to buy 14 and Sweden plans to buy 18 - 52 maritime, coast guard and troop transport versions in all, worth about 1.4 billion euros (nearly $1.3 billion).
SECOND-STRIKE ADVANTAGES: In addition to providing a critical level of deterrent to potential adversaries, maintaining survivable second-strike nuclear forces makes a nuclear exchange resulting from a false alarm less likely, according to Henry Cooper, former director of the Strategic Defense Initiative Organization. "False alarms will happen," says Cooper.
Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.) and ranking Republican John Warner (Va.) planned to work through the Sept. 15-16 weekend in hopes of resolving their differences over the missile defense provisions in the fiscal 2002 defense authorization bill, Warner told reporters Sept. 14. Warner also said that he was trying to add language to the bill to give Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld increased flexibility to transfer money between various accounts to respond to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Center.
BMD DETAILS: The Senate Armed Services Committee's newly released version of the fiscal 2002 defense authorization bill endorses the Bush Administration's proposal to reorganize the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization's activities into six main program elements: Boost, Midcourse and Terminal Defense segments, Ballistic Missile Defense system, Sensors and Technology.
SPECTRUM STANCE: Myers says he agrees with a recent Defense Department report that concluded it would take at least $4.3 billion and 17 years for DOD to vacate the 1755-1850 megahertz (MHz) band of the radio frequency spectrum, which the private sector wants to use for third-generation wireless communications devices. Comparable replacement spectrum would have to be found, and DOD would have to receive full and timely reimbursement to relocate its systems, Myers adds in written answers to questions from the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Even while the commercial satellite market remains flat, the Brazilian Congress is preparing to reject an agreement that would allow U.S. companies to launch satellites from the Alcantara launch center in Brazil. Alcantara's location on the coastline of northern Brazil in close proximity to the equator makes it a near ideal location for launching satellites into geostationary orbit, according to Marco Caceres, the director of Space Studies at the Teal Group in Fairfax, Va.
