US Navy should view space, power margins as a 'warfighting capability' worth paying for

On the same subject

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  March 20, 2024 | International, Land

  First round of Replicator to heavily feature Army systems, Bush says

  Army acquisition chief Doug Bush said the service is the "biggest player" in the first tranche of the Pentagon's Replicator effort.

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  August 1, 2018 | International, Naval

  Navy Exercises Options For Additional Future Frigate Design Work

  By: Ben Werner The Navy has exercised options adding several million dollars to the future guided-missile frigate (FFG(X)) conceptual design work being performed by five shipbuilders in contention for the final hull design. The Navy expects bids from the following shipbuilders – Austal USA, Huntington Ingalls Industries, General Dynamics Bath Iron Works, Lockheed Martin and Fincantieri Marinette Marine. A final request for proposal is expected in 2019, with the Navy planning to award a single source design and construction contract in 2020, according to the Navy. Ultimately, the Navy plans to build a fleet of 20 frigates Each company was awarded initial contracts of $15 million in February to start design work. The latest contract modification, announced Monday, sends between $6.4 million and $8 million in additional funding to each company to be used fleshing out their designs. “Each company is maturing their proposed ship design to meet the FFG(X) System Specification. The Conceptual Design effort will inform the final specifications that will be used for the Detail Design and Construction Request for Proposal that will deliver the required capability for FFG(X),” Alan Baribeau, a Naval Sea Systems Command spokesman, said in an email to USNI News. Each design for the future frigate competition is based on existing designs the shipbuilders are already producing. The Navy expects to spend between $800 million and $950 million on each hull, which will follow the Littoral Combat Ship. In terms of combat and communications systems, the Navy plans to use what is already deployed on LCS platforms. USNI News understands the new frigates will use the COMBATSS-21 Combat Management System, which uses software from the same common source library as the Aegis Combat System on large surface combatants. Missile systems for the frigate include the canister-launched over-the-horizon missile; the surface-to-surface Longbow Hellfire missile; the Mk53 Nulka decoy launching system and the Surface Electron Warfare Improvement Program (SEWIP) Block 2 program with SLQ-32(V)6. The ships would also require an unspecified number of vertical launch cells. The frigate design also is expected to include the SeaRAM anti-ship missile defense system and several undersea warfare tools. The complete list of companies awarded contract options on their respective contracts include: Austal USA LLC (Austal), Mobile, Alabama – $6,399,053; initial contract award – $14,999,969 General Dynamics Bath Iron Works, Bath, Maine – $7,950,000; initial contract award – $14,950,000 Huntington Ingalls Inc., Pascagoula, Mississippi – $7,997,406; initial contract award – $14,999,924 Lockheed Martin Inc., Baltimore, Maryland – $6,972,741; initial contract award – $14,999,889 Marinette Marine Corp., doing business as Fincantieri Marinette Marine, Marinette, Wisconsin – $7,982,991 initial contract award – $14,994,626 https://news.usni.org/2018/07/31/35430

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  March 10, 2021 | International, Aerospace

  L’armée de l’Air et de l’Espace lance AsterX, son premier exercice militaire spatial

  La France mène cette semaine son premier exercice militaire spatial afin d'évaluer ses capacités à protéger ses satellites, dans un espace de plus en plus militarisé. « Notre but est de montrer que la stratégie spatiale de défense n'est pas qu'un document, mais qu'on passe de la parole aux actes », a expliqué, mardi 9 mars, lors d'une conférence de presse, le général Michel Friedling, en charge du Commandement de l'Espace. L'ensemble de l'exercice, qui a lieu au CNES à Toulouse, reste virtuel : aucune véritable modification de la trajectoire des satellites français ne sera opérée. 60 militaires du commandement de l'espace y participent. La « Space Force » américaine et le Centre de situation spatiale allemand ont été invités à s'y joindre. Le CNES, l'ONERA, Safran, ArianeGroup et CS Group sont aussi mobilisés. La stratégie spatiale de défense a prévu un investissement de 3,6 milliards pour le renouvellement des capacités satellitaires de l'armée française, avec les nouveaux satellites CSO de surveillance optique, Ceres de renseignement électromagnétique, et Syracuse de communications militaires, rappellent Les Echos. En juillet 2019, la ministre des Armées, Florence Parly, a aussi annoncé un nouveau programme d'armement nommé « Maîtrise de l'Espace », pour intégrer deux volets : la surveillance de l'espace et la défense active dans l'espace. Ensemble de la presse du 10 mars