ANALYSIS | As Europe's armies brace for war, allies call on Canada and others to catch up | CBC News

Sur le même sujet

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  13 septembre 2019 | International, Aérospatial

  UK Ministry of Defence orders Leonardo/Thales protection system for RAF Shadow ISTAR fleet

  London September 11, 2019 - The UK Ministry of Defence has contracted Leonardo and Thales, under a single source procurement, to deliver an integrated UK Defensive Aids System (DAS). The procurement will equip the RAF's fleet of eight Shadow R1 intelligence-gathering aircraft, providing an advanced DAS which will protect the aircraft against latest-generation of Infra-Red (heat seeking) missiles. Designed, developed and manufactured in the UK, the system provides a sovereign capability which will be able to evolve in anticipation of changing threats to air platforms. The contract will be delivered by a combined MOD/Leonardo/Thales team under a Leonardo prime systems integration contract, with the equipment being integrated onto the platform by Raytheon UK. Initial Operating Capability is targeted for early 2021. The system consists of the following subsystems: Thales “Elix-IR” Threat Warner Leonardo DAS Controller Leonardo “Miysis” Directed Infra-Red Counter Measure (DIRCM) Thales “Vicon” Countermeasures Dispensing System The single source selection by the MOD follows the recent SALT III international trials hosted by the Swedish Defence Materiel Administration in Sweden. There, the integrated Miysis/Elix-IR system, using a jamming waveform developed by the UK MOD's Defence Science and Technology Laboratory, proved its ability to defeat Infra-Red missiles in live fire exercises. How the system works: The integrated DAS brings together world-class capabilities in threat warning, self-protection co-ordination, countermeasures dispensing and in DIRCM. At the heart of the system, the DAS Controller is able to assess multiple threats to the aircraft and prioritise the appropriate response using the Countermeasure Dispensing System (CMDS) and Miysis DIRCM. Elix-IR is constantly on the lookout for missile and gunfire threats, providing long range, rapid and accurately-located alerts when they occur. The dual-head fit of the Miysis DIRCM provides 360 degree protection and the ability to defeat multiple threats simultaneously by accurately directing a jamming laser onto the missile's seeker, confusing its guidance system and steering the missile away from the aircraft. The integrated and optimised threat-warning/threat-defeat chain ensures that sequential incoming missiles are thwarted quickly and effectively. Shadow: The RAF's fleet of Shadow aircraft, which are based on the King Air 350CER, are operated by 14 Squadron out of RAF Waddington. Because of the ISR role of the aircraft, it may be required to fly through hostile airspace, necessitating protection from enemy forces. A particularly deadly and prevalent threat are heat-seeking, Man-Portable Air-Defence Systems (MANPADS), which are widely employed around the world. The Shadow's new defensive aids suite will effectively counter this threat, being able to rapidly defeat incoming missiles. About Leonardo Leonardo, a global high-technology company, is among the top ten world players in Aerospace, Defence and Security and Italy's main industrial company. Organized into five business divisions, Leonardo has a significant industrial presence in Italy, the United Kingdom, Poland and the USA, where it also operates through subsidiaries such as Leonardo DRS (defense electronics), and joint ventures and partnerships: ATR, MBDA, Telespazio, Thales Alenia Space and Avio. Leonardo competes in the most important international markets by leveraging its areas of technological and product leadership (Helicopters, Aircraft, Aerostructures, Electronics, Cyber Security and Space). Listed on the Milan Stock Exchange (LDO), in 2018 Leonardo recorded consolidated revenues of €12.2 billion and invested €1.4 billion in Research and Development. The Group has been part of the Dow Jones Sustainability Index since 2010.http://www.leonardocompany.com >For the RAF Shadow, Leonardo will draw on its experience providing protective systems for the UK's Eurofighter Typhoon and AW159 Wildcat, AW101 Merlin, Puma and Chinook helicopter fleets. The Company was also contracted in April to provide a UK sovereign defensive aids suite for the British Army's new fleet of Apache AH-64E helicopters. >While being smaller, lighter and drawing less power than other DIRCM systems on the market, the Miysis DIRCM still offers the full spherical coverage required to counter advanced threats. Its Laser Pointer Tracker offers sophisticated tracking to counter long range threats and exceptional response speed to counter short range threats. A multi-band IRCM can defeat even advanced threats. Miysis has been selected by customers in Canada and the Middle East. Contact: Leonardo Press Office pressoffice@leonardocompany.com +39 0632473313 About Thales Thales is a global technology leader for the Aerospace, Transport, Defence and Security markets. With 62,000 employees in 56 countries, Thales reported sales of €14 billion in 2016. With over 22,000 engineers and researchers, Thales has a unique capability to design and deploy equipment, systems and services to meet the most complex security requirements. Its exceptional international footprint allows it to work closely with its customers all over the world. https://www.thalesgroup.com > Elix-IRTM is a passive multi-function Threat Warning System that uses single wide spectrum colour Infra-Red sensing technology to deliver simultaneous and unimpeded Missile Approach Warning, Hostile Fire Indication and Situational Awareness from a single sensor system to increase overall platform survivability and help to mitigate the ‘Risk to Life'. Elix-IRTM is an ITAR free UK sovereign capability, developed in collaboration with the UK MOD that ensures Freedom of Action that assures a rapid and timely response to countering evolving threats and supporting new theatres of operation. Designed from the outset to provide the capabilities required to support a DIRCM and output data in support of off-board countermeasures, such as Smart Stores, it enables greater exploitation and utilisation of platform capabilities that support broader operational employment and increased mission success rates. Contact Thales Media Relations – Justine Degez, Media Relations – Land and Naval Defence justine.degez@thalesgroup.com +33 6 89 34 53 09 https://www.epicos.com/article/481146/uk-ministry-defence-orders-leonardothales-protection-system-raf-shadow-istar-fleet

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  28 mai 2020 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité

  Post-pandemic world presents real opportunity to change U.S.-Canada relationship, experts say

  By AIDAN CHAMANDY MAY 27, 2020 As the COVID-19 pandemic rages and the American election gets closer, Canadian foreign policy experts weigh in on how the pandemic has affected bilateral relations, and where we go from here. As the November U.S. presidential election approaches, with the prospect of a second-Trump term a real possibility, and the COVID-19 pandemic upending life on both sides of the border, some Canadian foreign policy experts say they expect the fallout from the pandemic will have a lasting effect on the bilateral relationship and the post-pandemic period presents a good opportunity for Canadian foreign policy practitioners to take novel approaches to the age-old problem of over reliance on trade with the United States, regardless of who sits behind the Resolute desk on Jan. 20, 2021. One of the most high-profile issues currently facing the relationship is managing the nearly 6,500-kilometre border, especially as both countries begin to gradually reopen and COVID-19 cases continue to spike in certain locales. Both countries have agreed to keep the border closed to non-essential travellers until at least June 21. Certain cross-border health-care workers are permitted entry to either country, and trade and commerce continue to flow. Refugee claimants who cross into Canada at official points of entry and meet certain eligibility criteria under the Safe Third Country Agreement are also allowed to enter. The decision on when and how to open the border will likely become a much more difficult issue to manage as time passes, given the divergent political incentives of U.S. President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (Papineau, Que.), said Christopher Sands, director of the D.C.-based Wilson Center's Canada Institute. The two leaders' differing political incentives are based “on the election cycle and the economy,” Mr. Sands said. “Trudeau was hit in the last election, but his election is behind him and he has a huge advantage because of the official opposition leader's weakness.” On the economic front, however, Mr. Sands said, is where Mr. Trudeau's job gets trickier. “Canada's economy was almost in recession in the fourth quarter of 2019. Canada is going into a recession and has been performing bad, economically, for some time. Mr. Trudeau is not in a strong position,” Mr. Sands said. Canadian gross domestic product (GDP) growth was largely flat from the third quarter to the fourth quarter of 2019, and that trend continued into early 2020 with factors such as rail disruptions contributing to the slow growth, according to data from Statistics Canada. In March, GDP dropped nine per cent and the most recent Labour Force Survey data showed more than three million Canadians have lost their jobs due to the pandemic. Because Canada's economy was already a poor performer prior to the pandemic, Mr. Sands said it behooves Mr. Trudeau to take an extremely cautious approach to reopening the border and to continue to emphasize the centrality of public health in the decision. “It's in his interest to say ‘safety first,'” Mr. Sands said. “As long as COVID is on everyone's mind, he has a perfect thing to blame for hard economic times.” The incentives for President Trump are almost exactly the opposite. “The U.S. has an election in November and Trump was going into it with a much stronger economy. He was planning to run on good times, but then COVID throws everything into question. He's got a political and economic interest in moving forward, but Trudeau doesn't,” Mr. Sands said. With the border closed until at least June 21, many would-be travellers on both sides have found their vacation plans interrupted. As the world adjusts to the new and yet-unforeseen norms of international travel post-pandemic, the U.S. will become an even more attractive target for Canadians looking to get away, said Sarah Goldfeder, principal at Earnscliffe Strategy Group and a fellow with the Canadian Global Affairs Institute. “The reason a lot of people go from Canada to the U.S. isn't because they want to see things, it's because they want to see people,” Ms. Goldfeder said. As the pandemic has and continues to prevent families with members on either side of the border from travelling to see each other, Ms. Goldfeder said she expects vacations to be “centred around seeing family, and the reality for many Canadians is their family is on the other side of the border.” However, Ms. Goldfeder also said security will be tightened. “It's going to be a long time before we take for granted crossing the border like we used to,” she said. “There will be more pressure to account for where and why you're going. There will be longer conversations about who you're going to see and how long you're staying.” Time to diversify trade options, say experts While the border and all the downstream implications are a more pressing problem, for some experts the pandemic and four years of the Trump administration—with four more potentially on the horizon—have highlighted the need for a renewed push for rethinking trade diversification and the broader relationship with the Americans. Fear of over-reliance on the United States for economic prosperity and external security has long pervaded Canadian foreign policy thinking. In 1972, foreign minister Mitchell Sharp articulated the “Third Option” doctrine in an article published in International Perspectives. Mr. Sharp tried to answer the question of how to live “distinct from, but in harmony with” the United States, as rising nationalist tides hit the shores of both countries. He argued against increased integration with the U.S. in favour of a trade diversification and a national industrial strategy emphasizing Canadian ownership. The proceeding years saw the creation of institutions such as the Foreign Investment Review Agency and Petro-Canada that addressed Canadian ownership issues. Trade diversification, however, did not bear the same fruit. The 1982 Macdonald Commission recommended taking a “leap of faith” and signing a free trade agreement with the U.S. In the late-1980s, the U.S.-Canada Free Trade Agreement, which later became NAFTA, made Canada and the U.S. two most of the most integrated economies, and countries, in the world. Then came Mr. Trump's claim that NAFTA was “perhaps the worst trade deal ever made” and his administration's subsequent efforts to renegotiate the deal, ending with the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA), which comes into effect on July 1. “One of the fundamental damaging things Trump has done to the relationship is shaken Canadians' trust in the U.S. in ways that have been profound and radical. Threatening the destruction of the Canadian economy resonated deeply in Canada,” said Eric Miller, president of Rideau-Potomac Strategy Group and fellow at the Canadian Global Affairs Institute. Canadians have mistrusted U.S. presidents before, Mr. Miller said, but where unpopular leaders like George W. Bush were perceived as “cowboys that would do bad things that harm the world,” Mr. Trump is entirely different. “There was no sense under [Ronald] Reagan or George W. Bush that the U.S. was deliberately going to use its power to injure Canada. Canada might be excluded from certain things, but there was no sense that we [the U.S] are going to destroy your economy,” Mr. Miller said. “Canada now has to make choices about co-operation on bigger picture issues, on economic issues that it hasn't had to contemplate much in the past.” The Liberals' 2018 fall economic statement announced the federal government's intention to increase non-U.S. exports by 50 per cent by 2025. Attached to the announcement was a $1.1-billion investment over six years to beef up trade resources and infrastructure for exporters. Mr. Miller said that is a welcome investment, but new ideas in addition to new money will be required for diversification to be successful. “When Canada looks for models it tends to look at the Anglosphere. Neither the U.S. or U.K. are good models because Canada needs a mid-sized country that trades a lot,” he said. Mr. Miller said countries like Japan have successfully grown their respective trade volumes by reducing the risk of exporting, something Canada has not done well. Japan deploys a model dubbed “Consortium for a New Export Nation,” wherein the Japanese government essentially approaches a partner country and fronts it money for an infrastructure project to be built by Japanese companies, ensuring future servicing of the infrastructure will also be done by Japanese companies. The model incorporates small, medium, and large companies, which Mr. Miller said would be essential to replicate in Canada's SME-driven economy. Just as Mr. Miller said Canadian trade policy needs to take advantage of the geopolitical environment, James L. Anderson, an external fellow at the Centre for International and Defence Policy at Queen's University, said he believes Canadian foreign policy is in a similar position. Mr. Anderson said the Trump administration's focus on the domestic challenges of the pandemic creates space for global leadership on infectious disease co-operation, especially as the World Health Organization comes under heavy criticism from multiple countries, which he said Canada is well-positioned to fill. Whereas the WHO is made up of all 193 United Nations countries save for Liechtenstein, Mr. Anderson sees value in a smaller body tasked with handling infectious diseases, what he calls “an infectious disease analogue to the G7.” Pursuing such a policy could be a boon to Canada's campaign for a UN Security Council seat, too, Mr. Anderson said. https://www.hilltimes.com/2020/05/27/post-pandemic-world-presents-real-opportunity-to-change-u-s-canada-relationship-experts-say/249721

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  25 août 2024 | International, Aérospatial

  When it comes to military AI, there is no second place

  Opinion: Our guest opinion writer argues that AI must be prioritized across military programs and platforms, or else America risks losing the AI race to China.