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  30 juillet 2019 | International, Aérospatial

  RAF Retiring Reaper In 2024, Paving Way For Protector

  By Tony Osborne LONDON—Britain is planning to retire its General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper unmanned aircraft systems in 2024 as the Royal Air Force transitions to its new Protector platform. Although Royal Air Force (RAF) officers have not detailed when the first of the new Protector aircraft will arrive, there will be a transition as crews retrain from Reaper onto Protector, with the Reaper complementing the Protector on operations, Wing Commander Judith Graham, the RAF's Protector Program Manager, told Aerospace DAILY at the Royal International Air Tattoo earlier this month. “Reaper is an extraordinarily valuable capability for the UK government, so we don't want there to be a capability gap,” Graham said. The plan for avoiding a capability gap between Reaper and Protector suggests that a significant number of Protectors will have entered service by the time the Reaper is retired. The UK currently has 10 MQ-9 Reapers that it purchased as an urgent operational requirement for operations in Afghanistan. Today, they operate over Iraq and Syria, but none are destined for use in UK airspace. Work also is underway to select the site for a new facility at RAF Waddington, UK, from which the Protector fleet and the UK's new E-7 Wedgetail airborne early warning aircraft will be operated. Graham said the facility needs “to be ready for Protector by the end of 2021,” suggesting that first Protector deliveries could take place in 2022. Britain plans to centralize its Protector operations from Waddington, resulting in the UK presence at Creech AFB, Nevada being scaled down. Because of the Protector's ability to self-deploy and perform autonomous landing and take-off, there also is a significantly reduced need for forward-based personnel to land the aircraft at forward-operating locations, further reducing the personnel burden. The UK currently is planning to buy 16 Protectors, a derivative of General Atomics' self-developed, certifiable SkyGuardian platform, which has been redesigned to pave the way for it to meet military airworthiness requirements. As a result, the aircraft now features an all-weather capability with an electro-expulsive de-icing system that blows the ice off the leading edges of the wings and Y-stabilizers. General Atomics also has increased the fatigue life and damage tolerance of the aircraft and produced flight-critical software certifiable to the DO-178 standard. British Protectors will be armed with the Raytheon Paveway IV laser-guided-bomb and MBDA Brimstone air-to-ground missile. There also are plans to fit it with Leonardo's Sage Electronic Support Measures system. The aircraft will also be equipped with General Atomics' Lynx synthetic aperture radar, but there are studies to look at installing a larger radar, such as Leonardo's Seaspray surface-search radar. Work on the integration of such a radar, which could allow the Protector to support the UK's new P-8 Poseidon in the maritime patrol role, is being scoped but is not yet funded. RAF officers are working alongside General Atomics at its San Diego, California, facility as part of a combined test team to pave the way for the platform's certification by the UK Military Aviation Authority, which the RAF hopes will allow the aircraft to fly in non-segregated airspace for training and support to national authorities. They are hoping to do this even without the immediate installation of General Atomics internally developed sense-and-avoid radar. The RAF's Protectors will be compatible, but not immediately equipped, with the active electronically scanned array radar, but Graham said work was underway with the UK's newly renamed Strategic Command (formerly Joint Forces Command) to understand the requirement for the radar, and test and evaluation work was underway. Officials state that the radar likely will be introduced as part of the full operational capability for the platform. The UK also will use the General Atomics Advanced Cockpit ground control station, which uses a similar flight management system to the Beechcraft King Air 350. Under current plans, the British Protectors will be flown by a crew of three—a pilot, a sensor operator and a mission intelligence coordinator. Rather than flying the aircraft from inside transportable containers, the seven ground control stations will occupy a permanent building with room for expansion. There also will be scope to add an additional mission specialist, should a particular mission require it, officials say. https://aviationweek.com/defense/raf-retiring-reaper-2024-paving-way-protector

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  5 novembre 2020 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité

  Armed Services committees and the election: Here’s what we know

  By: Joe Gould WASHINGTON — As results for key congressional races and the presidency continue to roll in, several Senate Armed Services Committee leaders are still battling tough races. But here is what we do know, as of mid-morning Thursday. This story will be updated as results come in: • Georgia Republican Sen. David Perdue, the chairman of the Seapower Subcommittee, is leading in his race against Democrat John Ossoff, potentially denying Democrats what would have been a vital pickup for seizing control of the Senate. It's also too soon to call the race between Vice President Joe Biden and President Donald Trump for the state's 16 electoral votes. Democratic hopes of controlling the Senate for the first since 2015 appear to be slipping. To win the Senate, Democrats would have to gain three seats if Biden prevails against Trump, or four seats if Trump wins the election. • Senate Military Personnel Subcommittee Chairman Thom Tillis, R-N.C., led challenger Cal Cunningham by 96,000 votes and declared victory Wednesday, but Cunningham refused to concede while more than 117,000 absentee ballots were outstanding. • Senate Readiness and Management Support Subcommittee Chairman Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, on Thursday morning appeared to have a 60,000-vote lead on Independent challenger Al Gross, with only half the votes counted. However, Alaska's tally is expected to take days as officials count mail-in ballots. • Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, had a similarly tough race but denied Democrats what would have been a key pickup for seizing control of the Senate. Ernst, the Emerging Threats and Capabilities Subcommittee chair and a member of Senate Republican leadership, is the first female combat veteran elected to Congress. • Michigan Democrat Sen. Gary Peters, the ranking member on the Emerging Threats and Capabilities Subcommittee, prevailed Wednesday night in a razor-tight race against businessman and Iraq war veteran John James. Hours after Biden defeated Trump in the state, Peters was roughly 60,000 votes ahead. • Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., and ranking member Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., both won reelection handily, and if the Senate stays in Republican hands, they will almost certainly stay in their leadership roles. Senate Airland Subcommittee Chairman Tom Cotton, R-Ark., had no Democratic challenger and won reelection. Senate Cybersecurity Subcommittee Chairman Mike Rounds, R-S.D., also won. New Hampshire Democrat Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, another senior member of SASC, easily won a third term. All three were projected wins. • SASC Republican Sen. Martha McSally, the Air Force's first female fighter pilot to fly in combat, lost to Mark Kelly, an astronaut and retired Navy captain, in Arizona. She has yet to concede, however. • SASC Democrat Sen. Doug Jones, D-Ala., lost decisively to Republican opponent Tommy Tuberville. • House Armed Services Committee Chairman Adam Smith, D-Wash., soundly defeated his Republican challenger, while two lead Republican contenders to replace Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, as ranking member ― Reps. Mike Turner of Ohio and Mike Rogers of Alabama ― also won reelection. • Two Democratic freshmen on HASC ― Reps. Kendra Horn of Oklahoma and Xochitl Torres Small of New Mexico ― lost seats that Democrats flipped in 2018. As of Wednesday afternoon, Rep. Anthony Brindisi, D-N.Y., was trailing his Republican challenger but refused to concede until absentee ballots are counted. • Nebraska Republican Rep. Don Bacon, a former Air Force one-star general whose policy positions sometimes clashed with Trump, carved out a reelection win. Because Nebraska awards its electoral votes by congressional district, NE-02 was also a crucial win for Biden. • Rep. Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., won reelection. Slotkin, a former CIA analyst and Pentagon official, is at the top of an influential class of Democratic freshmen who have hands-on national security experience. Addressing supporters Wednesday, she reportedly said Biden will win in Michigan, but there may be a tumultuous transfer of power. https://www.defensenews.com/congress/2020/11/04/armed-services-committees-and-the-election-heres-what-we-know/

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  5 mai 2021 | International, Aérospatial

  Le délégué général pour l’armement, Joël Barre, favorable à une convergence entre le Système de Combat Aérien du Futur (SCAF) et le programme Tempest

  Rappelant que « les systèmes de combat (et) les systèmes d'armes sont de plus en plus complexes, de plus en plus chers, de plus en plus lourds et difficiles à développer », et la nécessité de construire l'Europe de la défense, le délégué général pour l'armement, Joël Barre, s'est exprimé en faveur d'une convergence des programmes SCAF (Espagne, France, Allemagne) et Tempest (Italie, Royaume-Uni, Suède). « Nous sommes (pour) l'un et l'autre en phase de conception. Je pense dans les années qui viennent que les choses pourront évoluer (...) De notre côté, la porte est ouverte. C'est-à-dire que si nous pouvons un jour rapprocher les deux projets d'avions de combat qui existent à l'échelle européenne, ce serait quand même une bonne chose pour tous", a indiqué Joël Barre qui s'exprimait le 3 mai sur le plateau de BFM Business. En outre, il espère une conclusion de l'accord étatique concernant le SCAF « dans les jours qui viennent ». L'Usine Nouvelle et BFM Business, 3 mai