14 août 2020 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité

India announces ban on 101 imported arms. Who benefits, and who loses out?

NEW DELHI — To bolster self-reliance for its defense industrial base, India on Sunday released a list of 101 weapons and platforms that will be banned from import over the next seven years.

The list incorporates major armaments such as artillery guns, assault rifles, corvettes, sonar systems, transport aircraft, ammunition, radars, conventional diesel-electric submarines, communication satellites and shipborne cruise missiles.

In announcing the move, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh called it “a big step toward self-reliance in defense production in accordance with Prime Minister Narendra Modi's ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat,' ” or “Self-Reliant India.”

Singh added the decision will bring with it a great opportunity for the local defense industry to manufacture the items on the negative list by using domestic design and development capabilities.

“The embargo on imports is planned to be progressively implemented between 2020 to 2024,” the Ministry of Defense said in a statement. “The aim behind the promulgation of the list is to appraise the Indian defense industry about the anticipated requirements of the [Indian] armed forces so that they are better prepared to realize the goal of indigenization.”

The items on the list, worth a total of $53.4 billion, are to be manufactured in India, with local companies as prime contractors. Of these, about $17.3 billion will be either Army or Air Force programs, and defense contracts worth $18.6 billion will be meant for naval programs. The MoD said these orders will be placed with domestic companies within the next five to seven years.

The domestic industry will now stand a better chance to compete among itself and cater to local demand, an MoD official told Defense News.

“Foreign-origin technology transfer will be key. However, the Indian companies will be in the driver's seat,” the official said.

Domestic private companies have welcomed the government's move, but some defense experts doubt change will come.

Baba Kalyani, chairman of Bharat Forge Limited, said this decision is a strategic step that will “propel the Self-Reliant India narrative and bolster the Indian defense equipment-manufacturing industry.”

He added that the growth of the domestic sector will lead to self-reliance, reduced expenditure on imports, the saving of foreign currency, job creation and the revival of consumption, and that it will get India closer to its goal of a $5 trillion economy.

Jayant Patil, senior executive vice president of India's largest private defense company Larsen & Toubro, said the defense policy reforms will provide long-term visibility, which he said is needed to drive investment.

In contract, Vivek Rae, a former MoD chief of acquisitions, said the “gradual ban on imports of 101 weapons and platforms signals the strong intent of government to boost domestic defense production. However, some of these items are already made or assembled in India, and import content is also high. Therefore, business as usual will continue unless more orders are given to the private sector and import content reduced.”

Rae also noted the cost of items manufactured or assembled locally tends to be higher than the cost of imported items. The quality of locally produced materiel is also a concern for Rae.

The embargo may not adversely affect foreign original equipment manufacturers, as they can continue involvement in MoD acquisition programs, either by way of direct product orders or through technology transfer or collaboration with the Indian companies, in respect to items not covered by the list, according to Amit Cowshish, a former financial adviser for acquisition at the MoD.

It doesn't matter whether an embargoed item is made by a joint venture or any other entity, so long as it is designed and developed in India, Cowshish added.

Indeed, an MoD official confirmed that foreign original equipment manufacturers now can set up joint ventures with a majority control up to 74 percent. The ventures would be considered Indian companies and thus be eligible for manufacturing the embargoed items, the official explained.

https://www.defensenews.com/global/asia-pacific/2020/08/13/india-announces-ban-on-101-imported-arms-who-benefits-and-who-loses-out/

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27 juin 2019 | International, Aérospatial

USMC gets final RQ-21A Blackjack unmanned aircraft system
The US Marine Corps (USMC) has received the final RQ-21A Blackjack unmanned aircraft system (UAS) under a programme to procure 21 of these platforms. The final unit was delivered by the US Navy and Marine Corps Small Tactical UAS Program Office (PMA-263) at Marine Corps Air Station (MCAS) Cherry Point, North Carolina. In a release, Naval Air Systems Command stated that the fleet readiness detachment (FRD) at MCAS Cherry Point will use the RQ-21A for training purposes. Marine Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Squadron 2 (VMU-2) is also located at MCAS Cherry Point and will be responsible for maintaining the UAS. This delivery comes after VMU-3 received its fourth and final system in March this year to complete the squadron deliveries. VMU-3 is stationed in Hawaii. PMA-263 Program Manager colonel John Neville said: “As we wrap up the production phase of the RQ-21A programme for the Marine Corps and Navy, we have also been transitioning to continued sustainment for the fleet to include platform and payload capability improvements. “While it's a normal shift in the life of any programme, we maintain our focus on system readiness, affordability and capability improvements to ensure Blackjack remains a critical intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capability that's relevant for the warfighter.” Medium UAS lead lieutenant colonel Russell Strange noted that the programme also intends to enhance the capability of the RQ-21A system. In addition, the focus will be on growing the customer base for foreign military sales. Strange said: “Increased capability will include work on command and control, communication systems, avionics, optics, laser designation, and payloads.” RQ-21A Blackjack UAS was developed by Boeing Insitu in collaboration with the US Navy to meet requirements for a small tactical UAS that can operate from land and sea. With a flight endurance of up to 16 hours and an altitude ceiling of 19,500ft, RQ-21A can carry loads up to 39lb. The runway-independent system can be used to support tactical missions on land and at sea. The Marine Corps' RQ-21A Blackjack UAS achieved initial operational capability in 2016. https://www.naval-technology.com/news/usmc-gets-final-rq-21a-blackjack-unmanned-aircraft-system/
22 juillet 2020 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité

Le Fonds européen de défense doté de 7 milliards d'euros
Le Fonds européen de défense sera doté de 7 milliards d'euros pour la période 2021-2027, une somme nettement inférieure aux 13 milliards appelés par la France. Le Fonds vise à «favoriser la compétitivité, l'efficacité et la capacité d'innovation de la base industrielle et technologique de défense européenne, en soutenant des actions de collaboration et de coopération transfrontalière dans toute l'Union, à chaque étape du cycle industriel des produits et technologies de défense», indique le Conseil Européen. Le budget dévolu à l'espace sera quant à lui de 13,3 milliards d'euros (constants 2018) pour la période 2021-2027. Le projet initial était de 16 milliards d'euros courants, soit environ 14 milliards d'euros constants 2018. Ensemble de la presse du 22 juillet
21 janvier 2020 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité

U.S. Military Given Authority To Defend Against Climate Change
Lee Hudson The U.S. Congress is providing the military with direct responses to the threat of climate change. The passage of defense policy legislation provides the military with new tools to address the effects of the warming globe on strategic security interests, installations and readiness. Congress addresses climate change in defense legislation Climate change negatively affects military training That climate change is a threat to national security has been acknowledged by the military for nearly 30 years. In 1990, the U.S. Naval War College issued a report on “Global Climate Change Implications for the United States.” But in recent years, the issue has become politically charged, with the Republican-controlled House of Representatives voting in 2016 on an amendment to block Pentagon action on climate change. Now legislative support for addressing the security effects of a warming planet is growing. The 2018 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) characterized climate change as a direct threat to national security. Two years later, lawmakers are uniting around potential solutions. Last month, President Donald Trump signed into law the 2020 NDAA, which includes 10 provisions related to climate security. The bill made it through the Democrat-controlled House and the Senate, past Armed Services Committee Chairman Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), who wrote a book in 2012 calling global warming The Greatest Hoax. The 2020 NDAA mandates creation of a Climate Security Advisory Council within the intelligence community to ensure analysis is informed by the best possible science. Intelligence experts must incorporate the foresight scientists have in projecting stress on various regions to predict potential crises. Establishing a Climate and Security Council is a positive step, John Conger, director of the Center for Climate and Security, tells Aviation Week. “If you know there is going to be a water shortage in some portion of the world, that would inform, for example, the assessment of whether that region is going to go unstable,” Conger says. Another provision in the bill related to climate-security strategic interests for the U.S. revolves around the Arctic. Section 1752 of the 2020 NDAA directs the Pentagon to consider sites for a strategic port in the Arctic and submit a report to Congress no later than June 2020. The document should include a cost estimate for construction and sustained operations at the site. For years, experts have rallied for the U.S. to have a more permanent presence in the Arctic as melting ice caps begin to open sea lanes to vessels from Russia and other nations. As the Arctic continues to warm, extreme weather has hit hard at existing bases in the continental U.S. In 2018, Hurricane Michael decimated Tyndall AFB in Florida. Tyndall was home to the Air Force's fleet of Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptors. The Air Force is still coping with the aftermath. While Tyndall is undergoing repairs, F-22s assigned to the 43rd and 95th Fighter Sqdns. have moved to other installations. The jets assigned to the 43rd relocated to Eglin AFB in Florida, while the 95th's aircraft are being spread out across F-22 units at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Alaska, Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii, and Joint Base Langley-Eustis in Virginia. The military is not just concerned about its coastal bases. A few months after Hurricane Michael floodwaters reached 7ft. (2.1 m), damaging Offutt AFB in Nebraska and causing personnel to move aircraft and munitions to higher ground. The flooding damaged one-third of the Midwestern base, home to the headquarters of the nation's nuclear arsenal, U.S. Strategic Command (Stratcom) and the 55th Wing. The 55th Wing is Air Combat Command's largest wing, with an annual budget of more than $477 million, 45 aircraft, 31 squadrons and 7,000 employees. In total, the damage at Tyndall and Offutt will cost the American taxpayer an estimated $5 billion to rebuild. Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Goldfein and former Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson had to beg Congress for $5 billion in emergency funding to begin rebuilding the installations damaged by natural disasters. Section 328 of the 2020 NDAA creates a dedicated budget line item for adaptation to and mitigation of extreme weather on military networks, installations, facilities and other assets. These include loss or obstructed access to training ranges. The bill defines extreme weather as recurrent flooding, drought, desertification, wildfires and thawing permafrost. In 2019, the Air Force submitted to Congress a “Top 10” list of installations at risk of extreme damage from chaging weather. Six of the bases are in Florida—Eglin, Hurlburt Field, Patrick AFB, Homestead Air Reserve Base, MacDill AFB and Tyndall. The base taking the top spot is Vandenberg AFB in California, home to the Space Force's Space Operations Command. The remaining installations at risk are Dover AFB in Delaware and Langley-Eustis in Virginia. “As developed, the above list reflects installations susceptible to the consequences of severe weather events: coastal and inland flooding, wildfires, and/or drought; not necessarily 50-100-year climatic changes,” the submission states. “This list does not look at any specific critical mission implications (i.e., even if the base is subject to flooding because a portion is within a 100-year flood plain, a mission-critical facility may not be impacted because of its location on the base or it is on high ground; e.g. the Stratcom Headquarters Building on Offutt AFB).” The Army assessed six climate vulnerabilities on its military bases in the U.S. The service is most concerned about desertification, or land degradation caused by dry conditions, affecting its installations especially at Yuma Proving Ground and Fort Huachuca in Arizona, Fort Irwin and Camp Roberts in California, Fort Bliss in Texas, White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico, Hawthorne Army Depot in Nevada, Tooele Army Depot in Utah and Pueblo Chemical Depot in Colorado. “The analysis is based on climate science only and is not influenced by strategic or mission considerations,” the Army report says. The majority of the measures to defend the military against climate change to date are reactionary, but Section 2801a of the 2020 NDAA is more preventative, directing the Pentagon to incorporate military installation resilience into master plans; it authorizes funding for climate resilience projects. These installation master plans will specifically assess vulnerabilities to the bases and surrounding communities, identify missions affected by those susceptibilities and propose projects to address those weaknesses. “Until you start incorporating these risks into your master planning process, you aren't going to fully appreciate what you have to do at a particular location,” Conger says. “You can't just throw money at a problem not knowing what you're supposed to do.” The Navy paid attention to climate change early on because the service has the most coastal bases and infrastructures in its inventory. Separate from climate change, a few years ago Congress directed the Navy to study the infrastructure requirements of its shipyards. That assessment found that the dry docks at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Virginia were not high enough to deal with sea level rise, Conger says. The 2020 NDAA authorizes $49 million for a project at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard to increase the height of the floodwalls around its dry docks. The shipyard's primary mission is the overhaul, repair and modernization of Los Angeles-class fast-attack nuclear-powered submarines. Climate change is also affecting the U.S. military's readiness levels because of an increasing number of Black Flag days, when the temperature rises to 90F or higher, and training is suspended. This affects units being able to complete a training syllabus on time, Conger says. “It's not like we've never done workarounds in training, but these are things where the training experts in all of the services will have to look at trends and figure out how to adjust what they have to do,” he says. “It is not something they're immune from; it's something they're going to have to accommodate and deal with.” https://aviationweek.com/defense-space/us-military-given-authority-defend-against-climate-change

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