Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and South Korean Defense Minister Kim Dong-shin agree that North Korea should accept nuclear inspectors and that the U.S. should maintain a "long-term" presence in the Korean peninsula to ensure peace. During a meeting between the two leaders in Washington, D.C. June 21, Rumsfeld said he "told the minister that the United States of America values [our] relationship, [our] alliance, and considers it important to peace and stability in that part of the world."
The joint CEOs of EADS, Phillippe Camus and Rainer Hertrich, have positioned their company as the world's No. 1 aerospace entity in terms of order book value. EADS currently has a six-year production backlog and an orderbook valued at 170 billion euros ($145 billion USD).
RAVEN INDUSTRIES' Engineered Films Division projects that international sales of its high-altitude research balloons will jump this year, spurred by a $1.3 million order from the Italian Space Agency. The scientific research balloons - which Raven also sells to Japan's Institute of Space and Astronautical Science and to NASA - can carry payloads weighing up to 4,000 pounds to altitudes of 120,000 feet. They are used for astronomy and physics experiments.
The European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. (EADS) will acquire the defense activities of Hawker Aerospace, a Saab Group Co., EADS announced June 21 from the Paris Air Show. EADS will acquire 100 percent of Hawker's Australian Aerospace Pty Ltd. The company's assets and operations include its Royal Australian Air Force P3 Orion maintenance work based at Richmond, northwest of Sydney, and its Royal Australian Army Caribou maintenance operations at Brisbane. The company employs 150 people.
A "heads of agreement" signed in May by Saab and Airbus U.K. is expected to lead to the Swedish group's becoming a risk-sharing partner in the 555-seat A380 superjumbo from contract finalization in the next few months. At Le Bourget, Saab senior VP and general manager commercial programs Pontus Kallen said that Saab would be responsible for the 31-meter-long, fixed mid- and outer-wing leading-edge sections of the A380, and is bidding for work on other parts of the aircraft.
NASA is satisfied it has fixed the major problems with the Canadian-built robotic arm on the International Space Station and will continue with plans to fly the station's airlock on Space Shuttle Atlantis next month. "We have formally decided that the 7A [Atlantis] mission is going to be the next shuttle mission that will arrive [at] the space station," flight director John Curry said June 21 at a NASA briefing at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. That mission is scheduled for no earlier than July 12, according to NASA.
Observations from instruments on NASA's Terra spacecraft will provide greater understanding of global climate change, the space agency announced June 21. The first observations of Terra's Clouds and the Earth's Radiant Energy System (CERES) instruments are the most accurate global energy measurements ever, and include the first complete year of such data since 1987. The CERES data, available to researchers at NASA Langley Research Center's Atmospheric Sciences Data Center, in Hampton, Va., capture incoming and outgoing energy over the whole planet.
Alcatel Space announced it has signed a contract with Russia's Babakin Space Center as part of the French Mars exploration program, Premier. The Babakin Space Center will be responsible for the development and production of the landing system on the four atmospheric descent modules in the Mars NetLander mission, work that is part of a European consortium effort. Babakin is proposing an atmospheric re-entry technology inherited from the NASA Mars Pathfinder mission, which used airbags to protect the spacecraft during landing.
The Senate Appropriations Committee June 21 approved a $5.5 billion fiscal 2001 supplemental defense spending bill that rejects the Bush Administration's $20 million request for the Small Diameter Bomb (SDB) and contains a bigger cut in V-22 production funding than the White House had sought. In a report accompanying the bill, the committee said the Defense Department already has $12 million in FY '01 money for the SDB program and that a contract award before the end of the fiscal year is unlikely.
Even though differences between U.S. and European governments appear at their most strained in recent times, Lockheed Martin chairman and CEO Vance Coffman is arguing for the two sides to start working together to enable more transatlantic industrial work. The executive was making the case for an "integrated transatlantic defense marketplace" in which governments work together on military requirements and companies on both sides of the ocean can compete equally.
The Defense Department plans to spend the next two months or so testing out a possible alternative approach to the current strategy that calls for the military to be able to fight and win two major theater wars nearly simultaneously, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told the Senate Armed Services Committee June 21.
Round-the-clock all-weather combat capabilities with Russian or western weapons are being offered by Russia's Rostvertol company at Le Bourget for the well-tried Mil Mi-24 and export Mi-35 "Hind" attack helicopter from various degrees of upgrade. Around half of the 3,000 or more rugged Mi-24 series built since 1969 for more than 20 countries worldwide are estimated to remain in service, and with new avionics and systems, can operate with improved effectiveness for another decade or more.
President Bush intends to nominate two government officials to Air Force posts, the White House announced June 20. Michael L. Dominguez will be nominated for assistant secretary of the Air Force for manpower and reserve affairs, and Nelson F. Gibbs will be nominated for assistant secretary of the Air Force for installations and environment.
Orbital Sciences Corp. will design, produce and launch a target missile for the Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) system under a $5 million Army Space and Missile Defense Command contract, the company announced June 20. Orbital will produce a two-stage, guided suborbital rocket. The company's Launch Systems Group will carry out the program activities at its engineering and manufacturing facility in Chandler, Ariz.
Israel Aircraft Industries and Aeronautics Unmanned Systems have announced the formation of a seven-year strategic cooperation agreement to market the Aerosky close-range UAV system. Under the agreement, IAI has an option to acquire 25 percent of Aeronautics Unmanned Systems. Aerosky is a lightweight tactical UAV (70 kg. take-off weight) capable of operating at a range of 100 km. (62 miles), sustaining a five-hour mission. Maximum operational altitude is 15,000 feet. It carries an 18-kg. (40 lb.) payload.
Alcatel Space, a major provider of broadband communications, is feeling the shock waves from last year's dot-com crash and other recent financial crises, but new and broader capabilities have positioned the company for substantial growth, a company official said June 20.
The U.S. Air Force has begun a 90-day evaluation of the Space-Based Infrared System (SBIRS) ground station slated to replace three control centers of the legacy Defense Support Program (DSP).
The House Rules Committee late June 19 decided to block House Armed Services Committee ranking Democrat Ike Skelton (Mo.) from offering an amendment on the House floor to add $2.74 billion in defense spending to the fiscal 2001 supplemental spending bill. House Republican leaders have insisted that the bill's total cost stay at $6.5 billion.
The deputy commander in chief for U.S. Space Command is advocating increased funding to protect U.S. military and commercial satellites, saying at a House hearing June 20 that American space assets are increasingly vulnerable to attack.
Lockheed Martin may be getting close to a payoff for some 15 years of work on closed loop infrared countermeasures technology, a method of rapidly determining the best way for an aircraft to respond to a heat-seeking missile. The company, with team leader Northrop Grumman, will propose its version of the technology in a competition for an Air Force program intended to protect transport aircraft from shoulder-fired infrared-guided missiles.
Pratt&Whitney successfully completed accelerated mission testing of its F119-PW-100 propulsion system, according to the East Hartford, Conn.-based company. The engine has been selected to power Lockheed Martin's F-22 Raptor. The AMT, performed at the Air Force's Arnold Engineering Development Center, simulated six to eight years of operational mission usage of the F-22 weapons system.
Taiwan's army destroyed a tactical ballistic missile target and a cruise missile target during the first live firings of its Patriot Air and Missile Defense system at the Chiu Peng Test Range, Raytheon Co. announced June 20. The tests of the Patriot Advanced Capability Phase 2 (PAC-2) missile were conducted by the Republic of China army in two missions under operationally realistic and stressing conditions from multiple launchers, according to Raytheon, which produces the PAC-2.
India is planning to send a person into space by the year 2008, according to a top scientist with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). S.S. Balakrishnan, the deputy director of ISRO's launch vehicle program office, said the ISRO is planning to build a launch vehicle with the capability of sending a human to space. He said the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle - GSLV Mark 3, which is scheduled for launch in 2007-08, has been earmarked for the task.
JOSEPH E. SCHMITZ will be nominated to be the Department of Defense inspector general, the White House announced. He is currently the deputy senior inspector for the Naval Reserve Intelligence Program, a partner with the law firm of Patton Boggs in Washington, D.C., and an adjunct professor of law at Georgetown University Law Center.
EDO Corp. will continue production of the Universal Exciter Upgrade receiver, the AN/ALQ-99 advanced jamming signal generator, under a $38.5 million contract it received from the U.S. Navy. The company also received a $3.2 million contract for the production of UEU subassembly spares. The UEU is carried under the wing pod of the Navy's EA-6B aircraft.
