November 16, 2022 | International, Naval
Spanish-British shipyard team wins bid for UK naval logistics fleet
The government vows to keep most of the work in Britain, following unions' fears that key skills could be outsourced to other countries.
November 9, 2018 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR, Security
US defense industry pushes back on White House’s proposed $33B budget cut
By: Joe Gould and Aaron Mehta
WASHINGTON — The American defense industry is warning that defense cuts proposed by the Trump administration could undermine the Pentagon's efforts to modernize the military and address threats from Russia, China, Iran, North Korea and transnational terrorism.
The Aerospace Industries Association, with the weight of the country's large and small defense firms behind it, issued a statement Thursday warning President Donald Trump and Congress “to provide steady and stable growth in defense spending in the fiscal year 2020 budget request and beyond” if they want to be able to meet those threats.
The message comes as Democrats — expected to prioritize domestic spending and question record defense increases — won the House this week, and after White House budget director Mick Mulvaney ordered the Pentagon to prepare for a $700 billion national defense budget proposal for fiscal 2020. (For comparison's sake, the Pentagon is also continuing to prep the $733 billion budget it was expecting.)
AIA argued in its statement that the last two years of budget growth have helped the Department of Defense and industry turn things around after years of war and budget instability, but not entirely.
“As a result, military readiness is improving, and our industry is responding with more innovation and advanced capabilities,” the statement reads. “But the shortfalls of the last decade cannot be erased in the space of two years, and now the Administration has announced potential reductions in defense investment that could undermine the improvements that are just now materializing.”
Last year, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis testified that the Pentagon needed 3 to 5 percent annual growth above inflation through 2023 to stay ahead of near-peer adversaries Russia and China. Congress responded with a $700 billion national defense budget for 2018 and $716 billion for 2019 — but also a $1 trillion tax cut that's grown the national deficit.
National security adviser John Bolton said publicly, days before Tuesday's election, that the national debt is “an existential threat to society” and that Pentagon spending will have to “flatten out” in the near term.
Deputy Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan had signaled in recent weeks that modernization programs like hypersonic weapons systems would take a hit if the budget falls. “It comes down to a judgment call, how fast do we modernize? And that's probably the biggest knob that we have to turn,” he said.
Along similar lines, AIA argued that to achieve the Pentagon's National Defense Strategy — which "requires armed forces that are large and capable enough to meet multiple threats in multiple environments” — “we must continue to invest in the most effective technology and weapons we can provide.”
“America's competitors and adversaries have made huge strides in their offensive and defensive capabilities, from submarines to cyberspace, and continue to develop advanced technology and sophisticated operational concepts,” the statement warns.
Though it's unclear how sensitive the administration will be to this call, it has been vocal about its focus on the defense-industrial base in concert with Trump's emphasis on the American economy. A Trump-ordered study found roughly 300 gaps and vulnerabilities across America's network of defense suppliers; Pentagon officials are hopeful a third of those issues will be addressed in the next year.
Whatever the administration does with its budget submission, it will be up to the new Congress to tweak it. Following the midterm elections, analysts have predictedlawmakers in next year's divided government will overcome gridlock to reach a budget deal that maintains flat defense spending.
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June 30, 2020 | International, Aerospace
Army selects eight counter-drone systems for the joint force
Nathan Strout Following an Army-led assessment, the Defense Department will be narrowing the number of different counter-small unmanned aircraft system solutions deployed by the joint force from about 40 to eight. In November, the defense secretary delegated the Army to lead an effort to reduce redundancy in the development and fielding of various C-sUAS solutions by the services. The Army subsequently set up the Joint C-sUAS Office to conduct that assessment, and over the last few months the office has worked to narrow down the dozens of counter-drone systems fielded by the services. “Our goal is to align existing and future Counter-UAS technology solutions to best address operational needs while applying resources more efficiently,” Maj. Gen. Sean Gainey, the JCO's first director, said during a media call June 26, one day after the assessment results were announced. “This is really why the organization was stood up — to eliminate the redundancy that was being fielded.” That assessment, which Defense Department leadership have approved, looked at approximately 40 systems, about 30 of which were primarily used for the C-sUAS mission, said the director. The assessment concluded that the joint force should move forward with fielding just eight different systems — a variety of fixed, mounted and dismounted solutions. “So essentially moving forward, we will focus our investments,” Gainey said. “The services have each been assigned sponsor of each one of those systems, so as we move this forward as a joint approach, it will coordinate the future upgrades to these systems and the contracting of these systems across the joint force.” C-sUAS systems that were not included in the final selection will be replaced by the approved systems, although JCO could not provide a timeline for how quickly this will take place, how much it will cost or how many units will need to be replaced across the services. Gainley noted that the services are currently conducting an analysis of how many systems will need to be replaced. Of the eight approved solutions, three are fixed, one is mounted and three are dismounted. The approved C-sUAS systems are as follows: 1) Fixed/Semi-Fixed Systems Fixed Site-Low, Slow, Small Unmanned Aircraft System Integrated Defeat System (FS-LIDS), sponsored by the Army Negation of Improvised Non-State Joint Aerial-Threats (NINJA), sponsored by the Air Force Counter-Remote Control Model Aircraft Integrated Air Defense Network (CORIAN), sponsored by the Navy 2) Mounted/Mobile System Light-Mobile Air Defense Integrated System (L-MADIS), sponsored by the Marine Corps 3) Dismounted/Handheld Systems Bal Chatri, sponsored by Special Operations Command Dronebuster, no sponsor, commercial off-the-shelf capability Smart Shooter, no sponsor, commercial off-the-shelf capability 4) Command and Control Forward Area Air Defense Command and Control (FAAD-C2), sponsored by the Army (includes FAAD-C2 interoperable systems like the Air Force's Air Defense System Integrator (ADSI) and the Marine Corps' Multi-Environmental Domain Unmanned Systems Application Command and Control (MEDUSA C2)) https://www.c4isrnet.com/unmanned/2020/06/26/army-selects-eight-counter-drone-systems-for-the-joint-force/
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November 18, 2019 | International, Aerospace
An entrepreneurial space race could benefit Space Command
By: Nathan Strout Officials at the newly re-established U.S. Space Command are structuring the organization to take better advantage of commercial space innovations, said Maj. Gen. Stephen Whiting, one of the command's leaders. The Combined Force Space Component Command, which plans space operations, has been working on creating so called “combat development divisions” to seek out and integrate new commercial technologies. Two weeks ago, U.S. Space Command dedicated a full-time position at its Combined Space Operations Center to foster greater cooperation between the military and commercial businesses on space operations. The move is necessary because the reality facing the Department of Defense is that funding for space ventures is increasingly taking place in the private sector, Whiting said. In response to this shift, military space leaders have been tasked with increasing information sharing and collaboration with commercial space operators. That effort started with the establishment of a commercial integration cell, a special group within the Combined Space Operations Center focused on maintaining strong interaction with commercial satellite owner/operators who provide services to the military. Inspired by the success of the cell, U.S. Space Command established a full-time position that will work with companies to make follow-on agreements, codify procedures and explore creating additional CIC-like groups to encompass other areas of space operations such as space situational awareness. Whiting serves as the head of the Combined Force Space Component Command and as the deputy commander of Air Force Space Command and spoke at the Mitchell Space Breakfast Series Nov. 15. U.S. Space Command has also had to adapt to new acquisition models designed to harness commercial innovation, Whiting said. The command is working to form small teams focused on scouting for new technologies, based on the Combat Development Divisions pioneered by Special Operations Command. Brig. Gen. Wolf Davidson, who is Whiting's No. 2 and the head of 14th Air Force, is leading the effort to adapt those models to space operations. These efforts are already bearing fruit. The Combat Development Divisions have helped stand up the DoD's first development platform for building and hosting cloud-native military software applications. The Combat Development Divisions have also been working with the Space and Missile Systems Center and the Air Force Research Laboratory to conduct the Air Force Space Pitch Days, an attempt to bring venture capital-style funding to space acquisitions. “I believe they will not only improve CFSCC's ability to innovate, they will also help our enterprise navigate through the uncertainty and technology disruption of the entrepreneurial space race, bringing down costs, schedule and performance risk to our enterprise along the way,” Whiting said. “We consider this to be a critical task and priority for U.S. Space Command and I think it will continue to be a strategic imperative for our future." These changes are fueled by a shift in space innovation from the government sector to the private sector, explained Whiting. “Since the launch of Sputnik up until the beginning of the last decade, research and development for space technology was almost exclusively funded by nation-states,” said Whiting. "This pattern was not only true for the United States, but for foreign nations as well. But in the past 10 years alone, the number of space companies receiving private, non-government funding has grown from 24 to more than 375.” That's an increase of 1,500 percent in privately funded space organizations, and Whiting said that trend would continue. That means that unlike in the past, innovation for space technologies will happen more in the commercial sector than within the government. “This explosion of innovation also means the calm, predictable environment we enjoyed after the Cold War is decisively over. We have entered a new space race ― an entrepreneurial space race ― and it will pull our enterprise out of its predictable and comfortable state into one that's ambiguous, complex and highly unpredictable," Whiting said. In order to harness that innovation, the military needs to be more open, responsive and collaborative with commercial companies. “It's not going to be enough for countries to outpace each other with exclusively state-sponsored campaigns anymore. Instead, nations will gain the upper hand by harvesting the emergent capabilities of their commercial industry, by unlocking the asymmetric advantage of commercial space operations seamlessly integrated with military space operations. Nations that do not do this run the risk of being left behind, of not being able to capitalize on their indigenous talent," said Whiting. https://www.c4isrnet.com/battlefield-tech/space/2019/11/15/an-entrepreneurial-space-race-could-benefit-space-command/