Iran’s military ambitions mean that the U.S. is going to need more aircraft with stealth and more range, a new defense study argues, because access to nearby bases in the region can no longer be taken for granted. On Jan. 17, the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments (CSBA) released its study, “Outside In: Operating from Range to Defeat Iran’s Ant-Access and Area-Denial Threats,” which outlines an “operational concept” to deal with the time when Iran could advance what military strategists call “Anti-access/Area denial” (A2/AD) in the Persian Gulf.
Pentagon officials are working to improve the fuze on the Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP), the largest conventional munition in the U.S. Air Force arsenal. The MOP project began in response to an urgent need in 2003 for a capability to penetrate deeper than with any current U.S. munition; at the time, U.S. forces were early in their Iraq campaign.
While the Aegis Combat System is proving efficient for missile defense, efforts to further develop and improve the equipment are experiencing a bumpy ride. Recent program briefings and the just-released annual report from the Pentagon’s Director of Operational Test and Evaluation (DOT&E) highlight the mostly successful Aegis efforts. The DOT&E report in particular shows that while the Aegis system’s aim has been mostly true thus far, it’s not a bull’s-eye every time.
In the latest annual report from the Pentagon’s Director of Operational Test and Evaluation (DOT&E), the U.S. Air Force ranks last among the services in testing performance, with a mere 27% of programs reviewed meeting their reliabiliity thresholds. DOT&E chief J. Michael Gilmore writes that of the 311 Major Defense Acquisition Programs that his office scrutinized in fiscal 2011, 67 experienced either significant delays and/or Nunn-McCurdy breaches, with thirty-six actually breaching Nunn-McCurdy cost-growth caps.
John Young, who took over as the CEO of Alenia North America in June 2010, has left the company, and a new top officer is evidently waiting in the wings. A company official says an announcement on a new CEO is forthcoming as soon as next week.
AIR FORCE Lockheed Martin Corp., Space System Co., Newton, Pa., is being awarded a $238,489,236 cost-plus-incentive-fee with award fee contract for exercise option contract line item number 0016 to begin production of GPS III Space Vehicles three and four. The location of the performance is Newtown, Pa. Work is expected to be completed by Jan. 24, 2016. SMC/GPK, El Segundo, Calif., is the contracting activity (FA8807-08-C-0010).
While the Pentagon has made some progress in developing a procurement and operational plan for dealing with changes in the Arctic climate, more needs to be done, a recent U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) report says.
BORDER SURVEILLANCE: Thales, working with Spanish firm Aerovision, has demonstrated the Fulmar UAV system to Frontex, the European agency trying to coordinate border control. Fulmar weighs 19 kg (42 lb.), has an operating ceiling of 3,000 meters, and 8 hr. of endurance, the company says. The system was recently demonstrated during a Frontex trial at the Greek Aktio air base. Several other systems were also on hand.
AIR FORCE Boeing Satellite Systems Inc., El Segundo, Calif., is being awarded a $376,523,860 firm-fixed-price contract for the modification of the Wideband Global SATCOM (WGS) Block II follow-on contract. This contract exercises the option to produce, process, launch, and activate on-orbit Satellite Vehicle 9 as previously negotiated. The location of the performance is Fort Worth. The work is expected to be completed by May 2013. SMC/PKJW, El Segundo, Calif., is the contracting activity (FA8808-10-C-001/P00020).
LONDON — A key planning document the U.K. Defense Ministry has been working on to spell out its industrial strategy in the wake of the Strategic Defense and Security Review is now not expected to emerge until February. The document, which industry hopes will pinpoint areas the U.K. government will continue to support, was due last year. But release of the so-called White Paper encountered several delays, in part because of the change in the defense secretary position; Philip Hammond replaced Liam Fox in October.
In yet another show of force, amid the intensifying uprising against Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad's regime, the Syrian army held an extensive exercise last month. On display were two recent additions to its arsenal—the medium-range Buk-M2 self-propelled air defense system and the Bastion coastal defense system.
To retain and maintain its strength in the Pacific as China grows as a naval force, the U.S. needs to augment its naval fleet size, a noted think tank asserts. The current stated objective U.S. Navy fleet size is 313 and current budget cuts threaten to slice that number. The U.S. will need more ships, the Center for a New American Security says in its January report.
In an item about F-15 sales, Washington Outlook in the Jan. 2 edition (p. 23) erroneously referred to the “Royal Singapore Air Force.” Singapore is a republic and has no royalty.
With little publicity, South Korean engineers are working on the largest and most complicated aircraft their country has built independently, an unmanned surveillance aircraft called MUAV. From the scanty information available, they seem to have a technically successful program on their hands, one that augurs well for their ambitious national industry. The problem is that it might turn out to be a fiscal failure.
Kerry Lynch (Washington), Michael Bruno (Washington)
The U.S. Air Force might be turning away from Hawker Beechcraft's T-6 trainer, but Mexico is rolling out the red carpet and company representatives hope the move could lead to a long relationship for the embattled Wichita manufacturer south of the border.
Tired of cost and schedule overruns, the U.K. Defense Ministry is applying top-level oversight on troubled programs to force companies to cure persistent ills. Unfortunately, in one of the first test cases—the Watchkeeper unmanned aircraft program—that strategy has not panned out.
LEWIS DEPARTS: After 33 years in Congress, Rep. Jerry Lewis, the former chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, has announced he will not run for re-election. The Republican from Southern California is legendary in defense circles and in a sense represents a style of lawmaking that is being squeezed by an emphasis on government-wide belt-tightening. Lewis led the defense subcommittee dealing with Pentagon spending from 1999 to 2005, which included the early years of the Bush boom in military spending.
The next-generation battlefield—whether high- or low-intensity—may not appear less busy to the unaided eye, but the number of soldiers and airmen immediately involved and in danger will shrink significantly. Instead of troop-carrying helicopters, manned reconnaissance and close air support aircraft, the battlefield and the air over it are going to be thickly populated with a few heavily armored manned vehicles, a lot of robotic ground vehicles, airborne standoff weapons and both unmanned strike and reconnaissance aircraft, say Israeli and U.S. officials.
The U.S. Army and Air Force are in the final throes of hashing out a memorandum of agreement on the light cargo lift mission, the latest chapter in a years-long saga over this mission despite two wars and one fizzled buy of the C-27J. The agreement is being made by the chiefs of staff of both services. At issue is which service will manage the light cargo support mission; this includes the shuttling of small loads of supplies to forward Army units in the field.
