Contract Awards by US Department of Defense - May 04, 2020

Sur le même sujet

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  27 janvier 2024 | International, Aérospatial

  Milrem Robotics to Supply World’s Largest Combat UGV Order to the UAE Ministry of Defence

  The agreement, which represents the world’s largest combat robotics programme, was announced at the UMEX 2024 being held at the Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre until 24 January

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  11 juin 2019 | International, Terrestre, Sécurité

  Active protection systems demo hits dead end for Stryker, Army evaluating next steps

  By: Jen Judson WASHINGTON — After evaluating two active protection systems in a demonstration late last fall and determining neither were the right fit for the Stryker, the Army is now evaluating how to protect one of its critical combat vehicle. “Unfortunately for Stryker, we have not found a system that is suitable for the platform,” Col. Glenn Dean, Stryker project manager told Defense News in a June 7 interview. The Army has found interim APS for both its Abrams tank and Bradley infantry fighting vehicle but has struggled to find one for Stryker. The service has moved quickly to field combat vehicle protection against rocket-propelled grenades and anti-tank guided missiles while it develops a future system. The service originally considered Herndon,Virginia-based Artis Corporation's Iron Curtain APS for Stryker, but decided in August 2018not to move forward in fielding it to Stryker units. In an effort to expand its search for an appropriate system, the Army then decided to host a demonstration in late fall last year of two additional systems: Rafael's Trophy VPS and Rheinmetall's Active Defense Systems. Signs the demonstration wasn't proving fruitful cropped up in March, when the service said they'd need extra time — an entire year — to evaluate options for Stryker. Dean said the Army was hoping they'd see promise in one of the systems at the end of the demonstration and be able to carry it through more complex characterization for better evaluation in order to make a decision. But as the demonstration wrapped up, the Army decided neither would work. “Both Rheinmetall and the medium-weight Trophy, both have maturity challenges, but the bottom line is that they turned out to not be a suitable fit for Stryker,” Dean said. “We did see some potential in systems,” Dean said, adding, “it is our desire to continue to evaluate them further so we can understand them at a greater level of detail.” Neither system received the same level of testing as Rafael's Trophy on Abrams, IMI's Iron Fist on Bradley or Iron Curtain, Dean said, and the systems could end up being the right fit for some future effort to outfit other vehicles such as the Next-Generation Combat Vehicle program's Optionally Manned Fighting Vehicle, Mobile Protected Firepower and the Armored Multipurpose Vehicle, “none of which we have identified APS solutions for yet,” Dean said. Through continued evaluation “maybe we will eventually learn something that brings us back to Stryker,” he added. Unlike Bradley and Abrams, Stryker is a relatively light-weight platform, Dean said. “It has challenges in its space, weight and power integration. It has proven difficult for us to find a system that is entirely suitable for integration.” And while no operational APS system evaluated so far seems to work for Stryker, the Army is still looking into ways to protect it as its value on the battlefield only increases with the addition of bigger guns and more expensive weapon systems. Under the Vehicle Protection System (VPS) program office, the Army is working on reactive armor improvements focused on Bradley and AMPV, but that could be of particular value for Stryker, Dean said. The Army's laser warning program that is tied to the Modular Active Protection System (MAPS) program could also contribute to Stryker protection. MAPS is a system under development with the Army featuring a common controller into which hard-kill and soft-kill protection can be plugged. And the Army will be conducting a demonstration with layered hard-kill and soft-kill protection capability later this year as part of culminating exercise for its MAPS program, according to Dean. “The soft-kill may ultimately prove to be particularly well suited for Stryker,” Dean said. Those soft-kill systems are jammers and smoke systems that help obscure and tend to take up relatively little space and are less expensive then hard-kill APS that require the reloading of countermeasures. The service is also studying what it may need for a future APS and plans to initiate a program in the late part of the next fiscal year, which could also be an opportunity to develop something more suitable for Stryker, according to Dean. While the Army does have plans to protect its combat vehicles from rockets and missiles, in a June 6 letter sent to Army Secretary Mark Esper, a group of 13 House lawmakers expressed concern the service isn't doing enough to outfit its current fleet with APS and asked the Army to explain why it hadn't requested any further funding for APS upgrades in the budget According to Dean, for Abrams and Bradley, “we are resourced to meet the requirements that we have on an urgent basis to outfit a limited number of brigades. We are doing analysis right now to support development programs of record in active protection.” He added, “What we are buying is not the end of APS activity, but it is the urgent requirements we have been given.” https://www.defensenews.com/land/2019/06/10/active-protection-systems-demo-hits-dead-end-for-stryker-army-evaluating-next-steps/

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  16 avril 2020 | International, C4ISR

  Technology alliances will help shape our post-pandemic future

  Martijn Rasser There's no question the post-corona world will be very different. How it will look depends on actions the world's leaders take. Decisions made in coming months will determine whether we see a renewed commitment to a rules-based international order, or a fragmented world increasingly dominated by authoritarianism. Whomever steps up to lead will drive the outcome. China seeks the mantle of global leadership. Beijing is exploiting the global leadership vacuum, the fissures between the United States and its allies, and the growing strain on European unity. The Chinese Communist Party has aggressively pushed a narrative of acting swiftly and decisively to contain the virus, building goodwill through ‘mask diplomacy', and sowing doubts about the virus' origin to deflect blame for the magnitude of the crisis and to rewrite history. Even though the results so far are mixed, the absence of the United States on the global stage provides Beijing with good momentum. Before the pandemic, the world's democracies already faced their gravest challenge in decades: the shift of economic power to illiberal states. By late 2019, autocratic regimes accounted for a larger share of global GDP than democracies for the first time since 1900. As former U.K. foreign secretary David Miliband recently observed, “liberal democracy is in retreat.” How the United States and like-minded partners respond post-pandemic will determine if that trend holds. There is urgency to act — the problem is now even more acute. The countries that figure out how to quickly restart and rebuild their economies post-pandemic will set the course for the 21st century. It is not only economic heft that is of concern: political power and military might go hand in hand with economic dominance. At the center of this geostrategic and economic competition are technologies — artificial intelligence, quantum computing, biotechnology, and 5G — that will be the backbone of the 21st century economy. Leadership and ongoing innovation in these areas will confer critical economic, political, and military power, and the opportunity to shape global norms and values. The pre-crisis trajectory of waning clout in technology development, standards-setting, and proliferation posed an unacceptable and avoidable challenge to the interests of the world's leading liberal-democratic states. The current crisis accentuates this even more: it lays bare the need to rethink and restructure global supply chains; the imperative of ensuring telecommunication networks are secure, robust, and resilient; the ability to surge production of critical materiel, and the need to deter and counteract destructive disinformation. This is difficult and costly — and it is best done in concert. Bold action is needed to set a new course that enhances the ability of the world's democracies to out-compete increasingly capable illiberal states. The growing clout of authoritarian regimes is not rooted in better strategy or more effective statecraft. Rather, it lies in the fractious and complacent nature of the world's democracies and leading technology powers. In response, a new multilateral effort — an alliance framework — is needed to reverse these trends. The world's technology and democracy leaders — the G7 members and countries like Australia, the Netherlands, and South Korea — should join forces to tackle matters of technology policy. The purpose of this initiative is three-fold: one, regain the initiative in the global technology competition through strengthened cooperation between like-minded countries; two, protect and preserve key areas of competitive technological advantage; and three, promote collective norms and values around the use of emerging technologies. Such cooperation is vital to effectively deal with the hardest geopolitical issues that increasingly center on technology, from competing economically to building deterrence to combating disinformation. This group should not be an exclusive club: it should also work with countries like Finland and Sweden to align policies on telecommunications; Estonia, Israel, and New Zealand for cyber issues; and states around the world to craft efforts to counter the proliferation of Chinese surveillance technology and offer sound alternatives to infrastructure development, raw material extraction, and loans from China that erode their sovereignty. The spectrum of scale and ambition this alliance can tackle is broad. Better information sharing would yield benefits on matters like investment screening, counterespionage, and fighting disinformation. Investments in new semiconductor fabs could create more secure and diverse supply chains. A concerted effort to promote open architecture in 5G could usher in a paradigm shift for an entire industry. Collaboration will also be essential to avoiding another pandemic calamity. Similar ideas are percolating among current and former government leaders in capitals such as Tokyo, Berlin, London, and Washington, with thought leaders like Jared Cohen and Anja Manuel, and in think tanks around the world. The task at hand is to collate these ideas, find the common ground, and devise an executable plan. This requires tackling issues like organizational structure, governance, and institutionalization. It also requires making sure that stakeholders from government, industry, and civil society from around the world provide input to make the alliance framework realistic and successful. No one country can expect to achieve its full potential by going it alone, not even the United States. An alliance framework for technology policy is the best way to ensure that the world's democracies can effectively compete economically, politically, and militarily in the 21st century. The links between the world's leading democracies remain strong despite the challenges of the current crisis. These relationships are an enduring and critical advantage that no autocratic country can match. It is time to capitalize on these strengths, retake the initiative, and shape the post-corona world. Martijn Rasser is a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security. https://www.c4isrnet.com/opinion/2020/04/14/technology-alliances-will-help-shape-our-post-pandemic-future/