US Navy upgrades more ships for the F-35 as the future of carriers remains in flux

On the same subject

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  May 27, 2020 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR, Security

  Opinion: Defense Is Unscathed By COVID-19? Think Again.

  John Dowdy May 22, 2020 The rapid onset of the novel coronavirus has wreaked havoc on markets around the world, hitting commercial aviation especially hard as load factors plummet, flights are canceled and suppliers cut production rates and furlough workers. Amid all this disruption, defense manufacturers appear to have been relatively unscathed. But defense has always been a long-cycle business, driven more by annual budgets than daily load factors. And as the bill for rebuilding the global economy mounts, defense budgets are sure to come under pressure. COVID-19 is first and foremost a human tragedy, and its continued spread is still a major concern. But we must solve for both the virus and the economy; the dual imperative of our time is the desire to preserve lives and livelihoods. Both will require substantial resources for public health and for economic rejuvenation. Countries around the world are making massive investments to rebuild battered economies, putting out more than $11 trillion in the last 2.5 months, with more sure to follow. In the U.S., Congress passed the $2.2 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act at the end of March, bringing the total stimulus thus far to $3 trillion, which could push the fiscal 2020 budget deficit to a record $3.8 trillion, an eye-watering 18.7% of the country's GDP. Other countries have passed similar aid packages, leading to soaring debt levels around the world. And more may well be necessary: The House has passed proposals for another $3 trillion in aid, although the bill's fate in the Senate is unclear. Government debt levels are already high, swelling as the global financial crisis of 2008 caused a drop in tax revenues and a rise in social-safety-net payments. And the wave of deleveraging many expected as the recession eased never materialized: From 2008 to mid-2017, global government debt more than doubled, reaching $60 trillion. According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), this year's increase in public-sector debt has reached 122.4% of gross domestic product (GDP) on average in developed countries. Increased deficits worldwide are likely to put pressure on all discretionary spend, including defense. In the U.S., military spending accounts for 15% of all federal and roughly half of discretionary spending, so defense may come under real pressure. Rep. Ken Calvert of California, the ranking Republican on the House Appropriations defense subcommittee, says defense budgets were strained even before this year's unplanned burst of deficit spending. “There's no question that budgetary pressure will only increase now for all segments of our federal budget, including defense,” Calvert said. Defense Secretary Mark Esper has said he is preparing for future defense budget cuts and that legacy systems may need to be scrapped to pay for more modern forces. South Korea shows early signs of this trend, with leaders recently announcing a shift in resources to disaster relief in response to the pandemic. Money came from education, agriculture, and environmental protection but mostly from defense. This example is particularly significant, given that South Korea is still technically at war, frozen in conflict with its immediate neighbor to the north. Furthermore, South Korea has been more effective than its peers in addressing the pandemic with a swift medical response and widespread testing that allowed the country to reopen its economy faster than other advanced countries. If South Korea is altering its budgetary priorities, others could follow. The coronavirus has already had a massive human cost, resulting in approximately 300,000 deaths, including more than 90,000 Americans, more than were killed in Vietnam, the Gulf War, Iraq and Afghanistan combined. But the financial cost has been even greater. The cost in the US has already exceeded that of all the wars the U.S. has fought over the last 50 years. And if an additional $3 trillion is approved by Congress, the cost will surpass that of World War II. At this point, it is too early to predict how much the defense budget will draw down how quickly. Indeed, the shift might not occur immediately. Broadly speaking, two factors have historically had the most influence on defense spending: threats and affordability. Governments will all calibrate the relative importance of the threats they face against their new economic realities. In keeping with past patterns, countries may give most weight to threats, real or perceived, over the near term. If there are anticipated or ongoing conflicts, their defense budgets will probably increase. Over the longer term, however, economic factors tend to prevail, and governments may set defense budgets in line with their diminished resources. Either way, we face some tough decisions ahead. https://aviationweek.com/aerospace/manufacturing-supply-chain/opinion-defense-unscathed-covid-19-think-again

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  October 10, 2022 | International, Aerospace

  Sierra Nevada buys drone maker Volansi after VC funding dries up

  Sierra Nevada said it bought Volansi for "considerably less" than other drone manufacturers have sold for recently.

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  December 18, 2019 | International, Aerospace

  Study: Counter-Drone Systems Proliferate, Challenges Endure

  Graham Warwick Counter-drone systems continue to proliferate on the market, but technical and operational challenges in countering small unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) have not yet been fully surmounted, says a new report by the Center for the Study of the Drone at Bard College, New York. The second edition of the Center's Counter-Drone Systems report lists 537 systems marketed by 227 companies in 38 countries, up from 235 in the first edition published in February 2018. This is despite removing 24 products from the database that no longer appear to be available. Citing a March 2019 solicitation by the Pentagon's Defense Innovation Unit which said “it has proven difficult to identify and mitigate threats using currently fielded technologies,” the report says “dozens of background interviews with military and law enforcement personnel have validated this assertion.” The challenges extend beyond the issue of effectiveness “and include complex questions around safety, practicality, policy and legality,” says the report's author, Arthur Holland Michel, founder and co-director of the Center. When it comes to detection effectiveness, radar may struggle to pick up small UAS flying close to the ground, while cameras might confuse a drone with a bird or aircraft and be degraded by poor weather, low visibility and strong sunlight. Electromagnetic interference may degrade the detection performance of radio-frequency sensors, with many potential sources of interference in urban areas. Radar, some RF systems and electro-optical/ infrared (EO/IR) sensors require line of sight to the drone, which can be problematic in urban areas. Acoustic sensors and RF detection systems rely on a library of sounds and signals emitted by known drones, but given the rapid rate at which drones are emerging on the market “even libraries that are updated often will never cover 100% of the drones that might be operating,” the report says. A major detection issue is the level of false negatives and false positives, the report said, noting that results of FAA testing of counter-drone systems showed distinguishing true positives from false positives in cluttered environments required a high level of manpower. Distinguishing between legitimate and illegitimate drone use is another issue. Remote identification technology and the FAA's pending Remote ID rulemaking, “may go a long way to addressing this issue once implemented, but it will not be a total fix,” the report says. There is a short time window available in which to respond to a drone threat and potential dangers posed to bystanders by some counter-drone interdiction techniques. Long-range systems such as lasers and high-power microwaves “could pose a serious threat to aircraft operated above the targeted drone.” In terms of interdiction effectiveness, the report points to results of a 2017 counter-UAS event staged by the U.S. Joint Improvised Threat Defeat Organization that showed the drones were resilient against damage. “More recent C-AUS exercises indicate this problem remains an enduring one,” it says. Jammers have no effect against drones operating autonomously without an active RF link; many signal jammers have an effective range of only a few hundred meters; spoofing systems may not be universally effective; and all kinetic systems may struggle against drones moving fast or in unpredictable patterns. Drone technology, meanwhile, is not standing still, the report says, noting research underway on UAS that can operate in GPS-denied environments, negating jamming, and are capable of actively defeating jamming or spoofing attacks. Consumer drones may soon be controllable via mobile LTE networks rather than an RF link, the report says. LTE drones could be operated at essentially unlimited range and “would be difficult or dangerous to interdict with jamming systems without interfering with ubiquitous cellular communications,” it says. The proliferation of counter-UAS systems will inevitably accelerate the development of technology to render them less effective, the report concludes, by programming drones to maneuver in patterns that make them hard to detect by automatic target algorithms. The report also highlights the challenges posed by drone swarms. “A swarm doesn't have to be dynamic or truly autonomous to achieve these effects: 10 individual drone operators flying 10 drones in unison may just be as difficult to defend against as a true autonomous swarm of 10 aircraft,” it says. https://aviationweek.com/defense-space/study-counter-drone-systems-proliferate-challenges-endure