Future Fighter Factory Technology Will Make Tempest Low-Cost

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  January 19, 2021 | International, Land

  French Army orders 364 Serval armored vehicles

  By: Christina Mackenzie   PARIS — The French Army is expected to receive 108 Serval armored vehicles in 2022 as part of an order from manufacturers Nexter and Texelis totaling 364. The contract was finalized through the DGA procurement agency on Dec. 23 but was not announced until Jan. 15. The two companies, which formed a temporary joint operation to build the light-armored, multirole Serval, will deliver the first 12 production vehicles in the first half of 2022, followed by a further 96 in the second half. The government previously allocated funding for the vehicle order, so the Army is expected to have a total of 978 Servals by 2030. The Serval is a four-wheel drive, 15-ton vehicle designed to replace the 40-year-old VAB, an armored personnel carrier and support vehicle. It complements the much bigger 24-ton Griffon armored vehicle, and these two, together with the Jaguar reconnaissance and combat vehicle, form the core of the French Army's Scorpion program to replace all French front-line fighting vehicles. They will be linked via a new communications and battlefield management system, the Scorpion Combat Information System. Three main versions of the Serval — patrol; intelligence and reconnaissance; and communications — will each have their own variants. Designed to operate in combat zones, the Serval combines flexibility, strategic mobility and payload-carrying capacity. The DGA said that despite difficulties caused by the coronavirus pandemic, testing of the vehicle, which began in September 2019, was sufficiently advanced to allow this first production phase to take place before the end of 2020, as planned in France's 2019-2025 Military Program Law. In addition, as part of a procedure undertaken by the gendarmerie (national police force) to renew its fleet of armored vehicles, the Nexter-Texelis team has proposed a vehicle based on the Serval capable of operating in mainland France and overseas. https://www.defensenews.com/land/2021/01/15/french-army-orders-364-serval-armored-vehicles/

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  December 4, 2017 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR, Security

  EU-Canada joint ministerial committee meeting

  The first meeting of the EU-Canada joint ministerial committee took place in Brussels on 4 December 2017. The committee adopted a joint statement: Joint statement: 'EU and Canada: A progressive and dynamic strategic partnership' "We are completely likeminded partners and since the signing of recent agreements our relations moved to an even deeper and stronger partnership. We are both committed and we are both supporting first of all multilateralism and rules-based international order. The importance of this could not be underestimated in these days. So our partnership is strong and beneficial not only for our citizens but also for serving a certain idea of multilateralism and of the world." Federica Mogherini, High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy "From Canada's perspective, we value very much our partnership with the European Union and today more than ever we value what the European Union stands for in the world. It stands for democracy, it stands for a strong voice in support of human rights, the European Union is a strong voice in favour of the international rules-based order. We appreciate that, we support you and we are very grateful. We look forward to working as allies in all of these issues in the days and months to come." Chrystia Freeland, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada EU-Canada bilateral relationship The committee agreed to strengthen bilateral cooperation between the EU and Canada. The cooperation has entered a new era with the provisional application of the strategic partnership agreement (SPA) since 1 April 2017 and of the comprehensive economic and trade agreement (CETA) since 21 September 2017. The committee discussed in particular how to step up security and defence cooperation in areas such as crisis management and security, cyber security and responding to hybrid threats. The EU and Canada also committed to working together on gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls. The Committee agreed that the EU and Canada will co-chair a Women Foreign Ministers meeting in 2018. The committee also reviewed how to strengthen EU-Canada cooperation in third countries in regions such as Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa. Foreign policy coordination A number of key issues on the international agenda were also discussed, including the situation in eastern Ukraine, Syria, Iraq, Iran, North Korea, Venezuela and Myanmar/Burma. Global issues The EU and Canada discussed global issues, including climate change, human rights and democracy, as well as migration and counter-terrorism. Signing ceremony In the margins of the meeting, the EU and Canada signed an agreement allowing for the exchange of classified information between them. This agreement enables greater cooperation, including in the framework of common security and defence policy (CSDP) missions and operations. http://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/meetings/international-ministerial-meetings/2017/12/04/

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  June 26, 2020 | International, C4ISR, Security

  Pandemic doesn’t slow cyber training for the Army

  Mark Pomerleau While much of the national security community has had to rethink or delay operations and business practices because of the global pandemic, the Army's cyber school has been able to carry on business as usual due to prior investments in online tools and virtual training environments. “Our virtual training environment had existed prior to COVID and that was really what our students logged into and that's where our training ranges are and where we do a lot of coding and where we ... conduct our courses,” Col. Paul Craft, the Fort Gordon-based school's commandant told Fifth Domain in an interview. “Because we had that environment, we were already prepared, we were already postured.” This environment is called the Virtual Training Area or VTA. It is a conglomeration of open-source technologies that Army users can login from around the world on the open internet, not the closed DoD network, to access course prep materials, courses, tests or even to note curriculum changes. Now, all the officer courses are conducted remotely in the unclassified environment. With the empty classroom space this creates, the enlisted student body can now meet in person and still follow Centers for Disease Control mandated social distancing standards. For some of the classified material, officers still need to come into classes, also adhering to social distancing mandates and wear masks. “We did not change. For us, it just occurred over a weekend where our students backed out and said ‘I'm going to log in [from home]' ... continue to train like we were logging into that virtual training environment and we're still going to conduct the classes,” Craft said. “We set up for a success that we didn't know we needed to have.” This change is especially important as the cyber school expanded to teach “operations in the information environment,” which incorporates how cyber operations, electronic warfare and information operations interact. Within the last two years, the Army merged the electronic warfare and cyber branches together. While much of the rest of the world has been forced to either halt operations or drastically change practices, many within the military cyber community have been able to lean on technical advancements to continue training. In addition to the Army Cyber School, U.S. Cyber Command is conducting its annual major training event in June almost entirely remote relying on a virtual training platform for the first time called the Persistent Cyber Training Environment. Craft explained that when PCTE comes fully online for all of the Defense Department, the plan is to migrate operations from the VTA to PCTE to conduct their training. Migrating to an almost entirely remote environment on the officer side has also allowed the school to open up more seats to more trainees since they aren't limited to physical space. It's also reduced travel costs for those who need training, Craft said. For example, personnel can take courses from their home stations without having to travel all the way to Fort Gordon. Moreover, senior leaders are able to audit courses or even conduct guest speaking sessions right from their desks without having to travel to the cyber school. https://www.fifthdomain.com/dod/army/2020/06/25/pandemic-doesnt-slow-cyber-training-for-the-army/