April 8, 2021 | International, Aerospace, C4ISR
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Airbus, Dassault Agreement on FCAS Project
July 30, 2018 | International, C4ISR
Pentagon Creates ‘Do Not Buy’ List of Russian, Chinese Software
Increasingly alarmed at foreign hacking, DOD and intelligence officials are racing to educate the military and defense contractors.
The Pentagon is warning the military and its contractors not to use software it deems to have Russian and Chinese connections, according to the U.S. Defense Department's acquisition chief.
Officials have begun circulating a “Do Not Buy” list of software that does not meet “national security standards,” Ellen Lord, defense undersecretary for acquisition and sustainment, said Friday.
“We had specific issues ... that caused us to focus on this,” Lord told reporters at the Pentagon.
“What we are doing is making sure that we do not buy software that's Russian or Chinese provenance,” she said. “Quite often that's difficult to tell at at first glance because of holding companies.”
The Pentagon started compiling the list about six months ago. Suspicious companies are put on a list that is circulated to the military's software buyers. Now the Pentagon is working with the three major defense industry trade associations — the Aerospace industries Association, National Defense Industrial Association and Professional Services Council — to alert contractors small and large.
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September 10, 2020 | International, Aerospace
GBSD, B-21 Spending Could Top $10B In 2027: Cowen Group
B-21 production costs, the Cowen analysis finds, will ramp up fast, from $202 million in 2022 to $4 billion in 2027. By THERESA HITCHENSon September 09, 2020 at 6:05 PM WASHINGTON: The Air Force's combined spending on the Ground Based Strategic Deterrent (GBSD) and the B-21 bomber is likely to triple by 2027 to some $10.2 billion annually, as production begins to ramp up under both programs, the Cowen Washington Research Group estimates. The $13.3 billion GBSD contract, announced yesterday by the Air Force, covers engineering, manufacturing and development (EMD) of the new ICBMs through 2029. The Cowen analysis, out today, notes that while the contract announcement does not explain whether LRIP is included, it can be assumed. This is because Air Force budget justification documents detail plans for “five option years” under the contract to include “early production and deployment,” author Roman Schweizer explains. GBSD, which will replace the aging LGM-30G Minuteman III missiles that first became operational in 1970, represents one third of DoD's top priority nuclear modernization effort. The third leg of the modernization program is the Navy's planned buy of 12 new Columbia-class nuke-launching submarines, which the Pentagon's 2021 budget documents estimate to cost $110 billion to buy. The Congressional Budget Office in 2019 estimated the price tag for the total DoD triad modernization effort at $234 billion through 2028. This ginormous price tag does not include spending by the Energy Department to build the nuclear warheads that would be carried by DoD's ICBMs, bombers and subs. Northrop Grumman was the sole bidder for the GBSD program following Boeing's decision last year to drop out over concerns about Northrop's acquisition of one of the two makers of solid rocket motors in the country, Orbital ATK. Cowen estimates that research and development spending for GBSD will jump from $1.5 billion in 2021, peaking at $3.07 billion in 2024, and decreasing to $1.9 billion in 2027. Production, the analysis says, will begin in 2027 with a budget of $2 billion. The Air Force's press release yesterday says that it expects to begin deploying GBSD in late 2020. For the B-21, the analysis estimates that R&D spending will steadily decline from the $2.8 billion in the Air Force's 2021 request to $1.2 billion in 2027. But production costs, the analysis finds, will ramp up: from $202 million in 2022 to $4 billion in 2027. The analysis is largely based on Air Force budget estimates through 2025, and Schweizer's own projections. Of course, this means the numbers are squishy. That's especially true for the B-21, whose program is highly classified. Indeed, the number of B-21 bombers the Air Force intends to buy, originally set at 100, remains unclear. As Breaking D readers know, senior service officials have been hinting loudly that they need more. In addition, unit costs for the stealth bomber's production are also classified. Way back in 2015, when the Air Force awarded Northrop Grumman the B-21 contract, it put a cap on the Average Production Unit Cost per aircraft of $550 million in 2010 dollars. “The APUC from the independent estimate supporting today's award is $511 million per aircraft, again in 2010 dollars,” the release added. No updated assessments have been released. Several high officials have said the program is on budget and on schedule, without providing any details. Finally, the production schedule and the count of how many are to be built each year, is classified, along with the planned annual procurement costs. That said, our colleagues at Bloomberg reported in February that internal Air Force budget documents show procurement starting in 2022 budgeted at $193 million. That jumps to $4.3 billion in 2025. Schweizer said in an email that his estimates are based on those numbers, and that the projections for 2026 and 2027 are his own. Cowen's analysis notes that Congress is by and large supportive of both efforts. While some have fretted that presidential candidate Joe Biden might reconsider building the GBSD, the document says that is not likely. After all, the Obama administration, during which Biden served as Veep, actually started the program. https://breakingdefense.com/2020/09/gbsd-b-21-spending-could-top-10b-in-2027-cowen-group
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July 9, 2020 | International, Aerospace
F-35 simulators can now team up with other fighter sims for virtual combat
By: Valerie Insinna WASHINGTON — U.S. Air Force F-35 pilots at Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada, will now be able to step into a simulator and train alongside virtual F-16s, F-15s and other aircraft, a Lockheed Martin executive said Wednesday. Air Combat Command formally accepted Lockheed's Distributed Mission Training system on June 22 after a final test on June 18. During that test, four F-35 simulators at Nellis carried out a virtual mission with pilots in F-22, F-16 and E-3 AWACs simulators at other bases, said Chauncey McIntosh, Lockheed's vice president for F-35 training and logistics. “We did originally intend to deliver this in the April time frame, but Nellis Air Force Base did shut down some operations due to the COVID crisis,” he told reporters in a July 1 briefing. “We worked very hard with both the [F-35 Joint Program Office] and the United States Air Force to ensure as soon as the facilities were re-stood up and open, that we were there to deliver this capability.” Although F-35 pilots in a simulator could previously train with up to three other F-35 sims at the same site, the DTS system allows for those pilots to fly digitally with a large number of varying types of aircraft, as long as the simulators can operate on the same network. Lockheed previously connected F-35 simulators to other aircraft sims in its test lab, but the June 18 test was the first time F-35 simulators linked to a mass of other simulators for a virtual mission in a highly contested environment, Lockheed said in a news release. F-15s will also be able to connect into the DMT system. The next step, McIntosh said, will be installing the DMT capability at Naval Air Station Lemoore this fall and to Marine Corps Air Station Miramar in spring 2021. Both bases are in California. However, some limitations will still exist, even as new DMT locations are spun up. The capability is “very scalable to other platforms,” McIntosh said, but currently only F-35, F-22, F-16, F-15 and E-3 simulators are supported by DMT. McIntosh also previously told Defense News that the U.S. Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps as well as the United Kingdom, which also plans to acquire the DMT system, won't be able to train together because they use different networks. https://www.defensenews.com/air/2020/07/01/f-35-simulators-can-now-team-up-with-other-fighter-sims-for-virtual-combat