March 8, 2023 | International, Land
After Poland, Romania also wants to buy American Abrams tanks
A request to approve the acquisition is expected for consideration by the Romanian parliament shortly, a senior defense official said.
July 9, 2020 | International, Aerospace
House defense spending bill would give the MQ-9 Reaper drone a second life
By: Valerie Insinna
WASHINGTON —The House Appropriations Committee is aiming to resuscitate the MQ-9 Reaper program, which the Air Force wants to curtail in fiscal 2021.
The committee's version of the FY21 spending bill, which its defense subcommittee will deliberate Wednesday in a closed hearing, would allocate $344 million for 16 MQ-9 Reaper drones.
The language is a good sign for the aircraft's manufacturer, General Atomics, which stood to lose hundreds of millions of dollars in sales if the Air Force stopped buying the aircraft. The service in FY20 had planned to buy nine MQ-9s in FY21, 17 in FY22, two in FY23 and three in FY24, but zeroed out all plans to buy additional Reaper drones as part of its FY21 budget request.
However, the Reaper isn't home free just yet. The Senate Appropriations Committee has yet to unveil its own version of the legislation, leaving it unclear whether the Senate will concur with the House committee's spending bill.
The MQ-9 wasn't the only aircraft program to get a boost from House appropriators. The committee added 12 more F-35s to the budget, for a total of 91 jets and $9.3 billion.
The lawmakers are also planning to authorize $965 million for 11 C-130J aircraft — an increase of two planes — and they boosted the number of V-22 Ospreys tilt-rotor aircraft from nine to 11.
The bill also beefs up the investment for the UH-60 Black Hawk with an additional $141 million, funding a total of 42 helicopters.
The legislation funds three P-8A Poseidon submarine-hunting planes for the Navy Reserve force. Those aircraft were not originally included in the budget. The Navy would get an additional E-2D Advanced Hawkeye, for a total of five planes costing $791 million. The committee also approved $1 billion for nine CH-53K helicopters, two more than the request.
Additionally, the legislation would allow U.S. Special Operations Command to begin its Armed Overwatch Program, but the bill summary did not state how much funding would be allotted in FY21.
The House committee fully funded most other major military aircraft programs, including money for 50 AH-64 Apache attack helicopters, five CH-47 Chinook Block II cargo helicopters and long-lead funding for additional Chinooks for the Army.
The Air Force would get 12 F-15EX fighters, 15 KC-46 tankers and 19 HH-60W combat rescue helicopters.
Meanwhile, the Navy's request of 24 F/A-18E/F Super Hornets was also fully funded by the committee.
On the same subject
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October 1, 2023 | International, Naval
UK gives BAE 4 billion pound contract for AUKUS submarine programme | Reuters
Britain has awarded BAE Systems a 4 billion pound ($4.9 billion) contract as part of the AUKUS programme with Australia and the United States to build attack submarines, defence minister Grant Shapps and the company said on Sunday.
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May 1, 2020 | International, Aerospace
The US Air Force wants to develop a hypersonic cruise missile
By: Valerie Insinna WASHINGTON — The U.S. Air Force is seeking information from industry about hypersonic cruise missile technology, with the hopes of starting up a new prototyping program in the near future. The service issued a sources sought notification on April 27 asking companies to submit information about air-breathing conventional hypersonic cruise missiles that could be launched from fighter jets and bombers. The responses will help the Air Force determine whether to begin funding a new program of record and figure out how quickly it will be able to field the new weapon, said Air Force acquisition executive Will Roper. “In the case of how fast we could go with the scramjet technology getting into cruise missile and missionizing it, I think we can go fast,” he told reporters April 30. “I don't know how fast — that's why we're reaching out to the street. But given how far scramjet technology has matured, I'd expect that we'll be able to go pretty quickly on this.” According to the solicitation, the service would aim to conduct a preliminary design review in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2021. The technologies offered should feature ramjet, scramjet or dual-mode propulsion — a major difference from the hypersonic weapons currently under development by the Defense Department, which are all boost glide missiles. There are multiple advantages to fielding air-breathing and boost glide hypersonic weapons, Roper said. Boost glide missiles fly just below space, above the “thick atmosphere” where scramjet missiles would fly. That allows scramjet missiles to take on certain missions and targets that boost-glide systems cannot engage. “In the world of competing technology, we can't afford to have any blind spots or cede any ground. So we're preparing to make sure we don't cede ground on scramjet technology and hypersonic cruise missiles as a whole,” Roper said. “We will have greater flexibility with this as a whole. That's one reason we're interested in accelerating the technology. It's mature, it's ready. It will give our operators greater flexibility.” It will also allow the Defense Department to diversify the number of companies that can produce hypersonic weapons, he said. “In the case of boost glide technology, a lot of our major programs in the department go to the same suppliers,” in part because those companies have pioneered materials and components that have not been replicated throughout industry, Roper said. “One of the reasons I'm excited about starting a hypersonic cruise missile program is that we will have different suppliers. It's a very different technology.” Roper said the hypersonic cruise missile effort would involve inputs from the Air Force Research Laboratory and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. In particular, DARPA's Hypersonic Air-breathing Weapon Concept, or HAWC, effort could inform the new program. As part of the effort, a Raytheon-Northrop Grumman team and a Lockheed Martin-Aerojet Rocketdyne team are building scramjet-powered hypersonic vehicles. “Scramjet technology has come a long way. I have been exceptionally impressed by what new manufacturing techniques are enabling,” Roper said. “I entered this job thinking scramjet will probably be a step behind boost glide. I am delighted to say that I was wrong. Scramjet is much more mature and ready to go than I originally thought.” The Air Force may be embarking on a new hypersonic weapons program just months after canceling one of its two development efforts, the Hypersonic Conventional Strike Weapon, or HCSW. Although HCSW showed promise and was on track for flight tests, the service killed it the fiscal 2021 budget rollout this February in favor of the Air-Launched Rapid Response Weapon. Both ARRW and HCSW are boost-glide weapons made by Lockheed, but the Air Force decided to pursue ARRW because it was more affordable and could be carried in larger quantities by the B-52 and F-15 aircraft, Roper said. https://www.defensenews.com/industry/techwatch/2020/04/30/the-air-force-wants-to-develop-a-hypersonic-cruise-missile/