Back to news

April 20, 2021 | International, Aerospace, Naval

V-22 Osprey conducts first landing on deck of a ship

The U.S. Navy announced it landed an Osprey V-22 aircraft for the first time on a flight deck aboard a Navy hospital ship, the USNS Mercy.

https://www.upi.com/Defense-News/2021/04/16/Navy-Osprey-V-22-Seahawk-landing-hospital-ship/8121618598760/

On the same subject

  • A consensus-driven joint concept for all-domain warfare will fall short

    September 23, 2020 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR, Security, Other Defence

    A consensus-driven joint concept for all-domain warfare will fall short

    Mark Gunzinger Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. John Hyten recently announced a new U.S. Department of Defense joint war-fighting concept will summarize capabilities needed for future all-domain operations and eliminate artificial lines on the battlefield used to deconflict U.S. operations in the past. Hyten also noted the concept will seamlessly integrate “fires from all domains, including space and cyber,” to overwhelm an enemy. While these aspirations are laudable, there are indications the concept could fall short of what is needed to inform cross-service trade-offs that must be made in an era of flat or declining defense budgets. The DoD creates operating concepts to define preferred approaches to perform specific missions or execute a campaign to defeat an enemy. They also provide a foundation for the services to assess new technologies, force alternatives and resource priorities. Said another way, they are the tissue that connects top-level National Defense Strategy guidance to actual plans and programs. While a joint all-domain war-fighting concept is urgently needed, Hyten has not made it clear the one in development will lead to trade-offs that maximize the DoD's war-fighting potential. For instance, Hyten has said it will call for every service to conduct long-range strikes: “A naval force can defend itself or strike deep. An air force can defend itself or strike deep. The Marines can defend itself or strike deep. ... Everybody.” This could mean the concept will support a degree of redundancy across the services that has never existed. Setting aside tough trade-offs that eliminate excessively redundant programs will waste defense dollars and reduce capabilities available to U.S. commanders. More specifically, the concept might endorse the Army's plan to buy 1,000-mile-plus, surface-to-surface missiles that cost millions of dollars each. Doing so would ignore analyses that have determined using large numbers of these weapons would be far more expensive than employing bombers that can strike any target on the planet for a fraction of the cost, then regenerate and fly more sorties. Furthermore, the Army's long-range missile investments could be at the expense of its ability to defend U.S. theater air bases against missile attacks. Not only has air base missile defense long been an Army mission — it has long neglected and underfunded the mission. Chinese or Russian strikes against under-defended air bases could cripple the United States' primary combat sortie-generation operations. If the concept does not consider these kinds of trade-offs, it could be due to the approach used to create it. The Joint Staff's doctrine development process is notorious for seeking consensus instead of making cross-service trade-offs necessary to maximize the DoD's war-fighting potential. Assuring bureaucratic service equities versus optimizing combat lethality can lead to operating concepts that fail to create clear priorities or — worse yet — declare everything a priority. If everything is a priority, then nothing is a priority. Moreover, each service was asked to develop a subordinate concept that will be integrated into the whole. This piece-part approach could result in the services ladening their subordinate concepts with their own equities instead of working together to develop the most effective, decisive options. In short, a bottom-up, consensus-driven concept for all-domain warfare would not be an effective baseline to compare the DoD's force structure and capability alternatives. Three things could help to avoid this mistake. First, the secretary of defense should approve a new all-domain war-fighting concept, and the secretary's staff should be deeply involved in its development. Some say the latter is inappropriate, believing the military, not DoD civilians, should create war-fighting concepts. However, it is entirely appropriate for the secretary's staff to be part of the concept's creation if its purpose is to shape the DoD's plans and programs. Second, DoD leaders should rigorously examine the services' existing roles and missions during the concept's development, and make changes to reduce excessively redundant responsibilities, forces and capabilities. This may need to be driven by congressional language. Finally, the DoD should jettison the word “joint” as part of the concept's title. This would stress the concept is focused on integrating operations across all domains, not on the services that provide forces to combatant commanders. The point is not for all to participate, but instead for all options to be considered, and those that provide best combat value be prioritized. Otherwise, it becomes a case analogous to all the kids chasing a soccer ball. The 2018 National Defense Strategy was the beginning of the effort to shift the DoD toward preparing for peer conflict. Given that dollars and time are short, the DoD must now get a concept for all-domain warfare right. Like the National Defense Strategy, the concept must be top-down driven, not a bottom-up, consensus-driven product that fails to make trade-offs across the services and provides a rationale that supports what each service desires to buy. Rather, its ultimate objective should be to seek best-value capabilities and expand theater commander options to defeat peer adversaries. https://www.defensenews.com/opinion/commentary/2020/09/22/a-consensus-driven-joint-concept-for-all-domain-warfare-will-fall-short/

  • The biggest CJADC2 opportunity isn’t AI, it’s true interoperability

    January 6, 2024 | International, Land

    The biggest CJADC2 opportunity isn’t AI, it’s true interoperability

    Opinion: The conflicts of the 21st century require unprecedented global coordination as threats operate across geographies, borders, and digital platforms.

  • Singapore wants the F-35 to replace its F-16s

    January 21, 2019 | International, Aerospace

    Singapore wants the F-35 to replace its F-16s

    By: Mike Yeo MELBOURNE, Australia — The Lockheed-Martin F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter appears to have secured another export success, with Singapore announcing that it has identified the type “as the most suitable replacement” for the Republic of Singapore Air Force's fleet of F-16s. In an announcement on Friday, Singapore's defense ministry said that it made the decision following the completion of a technical evaluation conducted together with the Southeast Asian island nation's Defence Science and Technology Agency. It added that “the technical evaluation also concluded that the RSAF should first purchase a small number of F-35 JSFs for a full evaluation of their capabilities and suitability before deciding on a full fleet.” According to the ministry, Singapore will next discuss details with relevant parties in the United States before confirming its decision to acquire the F-35. Singapore's defense minister Ng Eng Hen added that this process is expected to take “nine to 12 months.” The deal would almost certainly be through the United States Foreign Military Sales program. Ng had previously said that the F-16s will start to be retired around 2030, although neither he nor the ministry's announcement indicated how many F-35s will initially be acquired. Also not revealed was the variants that Singapore would buy. A ministry spokesperson declined to provide further details when asked by Defense News. Singapore has been a security cooperative partner in the F-35 program since 2003, and first disclosed its interest in the F-35 in 2013. Subsequent reports suggested it was keen on the short take-off and vertical landing F-35B variant. It is believed Singapore has a requirement of 40-60 aircraft, or enough to make up two or three squadrons. Singapore, which is a regional security partner of the United States, currently operates a fleet of 60 Lockheed Martin F-16C/D/D+ Fighting Falcon multirole fighters. These are a mix of 40 Block 52 C/D aircraft and a further 20 newer F-16D+ Advanced Block 52s acquired in four batches between 1994 and 2001. Deliveries started in 1998, which would make the oldest of these 32 years old by 2030. Twelve of the older Block 52s serve with a training detachment based at Luke Air Force Base in Arizona embedded within a mixed USAF-RSAF squadron conducting continuation training for RSAF pilots with the remainder distributed among three Singapore-based squadrons. Singapore's fleet of F-16s are currently being upgraded to F-16V standard, with the program expected to be completed in 2022 or 2023. https://www.defensenews.com/global/asia-pacific/2019/01/18/singapore-wants-the-f-35-to-replace-its-f-16s/

All news