March 31, 2023 | International, Land
Army Materiel Command boss says logistics are key to future warfare
"Gone are the days when we had everything down to your favorite ice cream," warns Gen. Charles Hamilton.
November 29, 2018 | International, Aerospace
Bell pitches Viper attack helo to replace Japan’s Cobra copters
By: Mike Yeo
TOKYO — American company Bell is promoting its AH-1Z Viper attack helicopter at the Japan International Aerospace Exhibition in Tokyo as its entrant for Japan's attack helicopter replacement program.
The East Asian U.S. ally is seeking a new helicopter to replace the approximately 70 Bell AH-1S Cobra helos currently in use by the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force. The country had released a request for information in May seeking a new helicopter.
Speaking to Defense News at the show, retired Lt. Gen. George Trautman, a former U.S. Marine aviator and commander of all Marine Corps aviation who now works as an adviser for Bell, said the company responded to the RFI through the U.S. government with 50 AH-1Z helicopters.
John Woodbury, Bell's director of global military business development in the Asia-Pacific region, added that the RFI called for an attack helicopter with “marinization and shipboard compatibility,” with Trautman asserting that the AH-1Z can “operate onboard ships far better than the competition.”
The representatives from Bell said there's more to marinization than additional corrosion protection from saltwater. They said this also includes foldable rotor blades and other measures that reduce the stowage footprint onboard the limited space on ships, as well as a design that minimizes electromagnetic interference.
The requirement for the new attack helicopter to operate from ships suggests Japan plans to use them on Izumo-class helicopter destroyers or the smaller Hyuga-class of the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force, which are equipped with a long flight deck to operate multiple helicopters.
Japan will likely require at least a degree of technology transfer and local production for the new helicopters. Bell's relationship with Japan reaches across 65 years, including the company's partnership with Fuji Heavy Industries (now Subaru) for production of Japan's AH-1S helicopters.
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August 14, 2019 | International, Land, C4ISR
Can robots make an Army platoon 10 times as effective?
By: Kelsey D. Atherton Are humans with robots an order of magnitude better than humans without robots? It's the question the Army's Maneuver Center for Excellence is hoping to solve through trial and experimentation. The National Advanced Mobility Consortium posted a request for white papers Aug. 5 about technologies that might have a place in a robotic, artificial intelligence (AI) and autonomy technology demonstration at Fort Benning in September 2020. This project is long in the works, with an announcement of intent dating back to March 2019. The premise, as stated in the March announcement, is to “show a path towards an Army capability that will provide a robotically equipped dismounted infantry platoon that is 10 times more effective than the current dismounted infantry platoon.” In order to do this, the Maneuver Center for Excellence, together with Fort Benning's Maneuver Capabilities Development and Integration Directorate's Robotics Requirements Division, is exploring robotic systems for “ground, air, water,” as well as the virtual space — otherwise known as the four platonic elements of terrestrial war. These robots and systems should be able to improve “mobility, protection, situational awareness, endurance, persistence, and depth” as well as, and this is key, lethality. Taken together, the robots should lend an advantage to the platoon's OODA loop — its ability to observe, orient, decide and act — with the goal that a robot-enabled platoon completes OODA-loop cycles 10 times faster than it would without robots. That's a tremendous amount of promise to put in remote systems, especially since the present paradigm of controlled robotic battlefield tools involves a lot of human observers and controllers checking on, managing, and directing the robots. (The process by which humans are actively involved in robot control is “in the loop” or, with more passive robot monitoring termed “on the loop.”) If robots are going to improve soldier situational awareness by an order of magnitude, they will have to be autonomous. And not just autonomous in movement, but autonomous in sensing, data processing, and in providing that information back to the platoon. Part of this vision involves robots themselves producing intelligence products that are both immediate and ephemeral, useful in the tactical moment and then gone before they can become out of date. Another piece is machines autonomously moving through and responding to the environment on their own, as exercises undertaken by DARPA and the Marine Corps have already explored. If that same autonomy will extend to robot lethality, or if weapons will stay in the hands of humans, remains to be determined. In preparation for the September 2020 exercise, Georgia Tech Research Institute is designated to serve as the technology integrator for the assessment and demonstration parts of the task. As the industry proposals are vetted to meet Army needs, some will receive a Request for Prototype Proposal, and will also be evaluated in a simulation exercise to see if they will be part of the 2020 exercise. Interested parties should look to the National Advanced Mobility Consortium's posted request, and to the earlier proposal announcement, for more specific guidance. Interested observers, meanwhile, should keep an eye on September 2020 in Georgia, where the Army will see if the future of war is really 10 times as promising as expected. https://www.c4isrnet.com/unmanned/robotics/2019/08/08/can-robots-make-an-army-platoon-10-times-as-effective/
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July 6, 2020 | International, Aerospace, Land
MBDA’s MMP missile selected to fulfil the European Beyond-Line-Sight battlefield engagement capability
July 1, 2020 - LynkEUs, an MBDA coordinated project, has been selected by the European Commission as part of the new European Defence Industrial Development Programme (EDIDP), following consultation with Member States. LynkEUs is the first technological and industrial contribution to the objectives of the Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) Beyond Line Of Sight (BLOS) capability project. The BLOS capability project had been approved in November 2018 by the EU Defence Ministers. The LynkEUs project is managed in close partnership with the French, Belgian and Cypriot armed forces. The project seeks to define an initial operational concept for a European BLOS capability. It will also provide an opportunity to identify and test emerging solutions of potential value for future upgrades to the capability, and will be validated by a test campaign. The concepts and tests completed for the PESCO BLOS project will contribute to the development of a family of man-on-the loop BLOS missile systems with back image, based on the MMP medium range missile, and under full control of Europe's defence industry. Eric Béranger, MBDA CEO, said: “LynkEUs is the first cooperative project in the missile systems field leveraging on the new EU defence instruments, and the first EU defence R&D project to be coordinated by MBDA. It demonstrates our eagerness to cooperate to an ever-greater extent in Europe and to expand our circle of industrial and technological partnerships, particularly with innovative SMEs and European research centres. It also demonstrate our commitment to serve European strategic autonomy and technological sovereignty ambitions.” MBDA and its 10 partners – from Belgium: The Royal Military Academy, John Cockerill Defense, FN Herstal, Thales Belgium, and Xenics; from Cyprus: Aditess, Cyprus Institute, and SignalGenerix; from France: Novadem and Safran; along with the 3 subcontractors: MILREM (from Estonia), DELAIR (from France), and Carmenta (from Sweden) – are now entering the negotiation phase of the grant agreement with the Commission. This first success at the European level paves the way for further collaborative projects, that will consolidate a European BLOS capability by developing associated functions such as training systems and cooperative engagement. These new projects could be eligible for the future European Defence Fund as early as 2021. View source version on MBDA: https://www.mbda-systems.com/press-releases/mbdas-mmp-missile-selected-to-fulfill-the-european-beyond-line-of-sight-battlefield-engagement-capability/