7 novembre 2023 | International, Aérospatial
US Air Force may remove 105mm cannon from AC-130 gunship
Other changes under consideration to prepare the Ghostrider for a high-end fight include adding small cruise missiles.
11 octobre 2018 | International, Terrestre
Inflection point: Army wrestles to strike balance between current and future capability
WASHINGTON — The Army is at an inflection point. It's a statement its top leaders have acknowledged countless times in recent months as they have made the case to begin major investment in future capability.
But to bring online state-of-the-art technology and weapons and equipment that will maintain overmatch against peer adversaries like Russia and China, the Army will need money. Lots of money.
And that means, at some point soon, the Army will have to make difficult decisions on how long legacy weapon systems and planned upgrades for those capabilities can — or should — carry the service into the future.
It is Army Secretary Mark Esper and Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley's goal and mandate to have a fully modernized Army that aligns with the service's multidomain operations doctrine by 2028.
It logically follows that to get there, much has to happen in the 10 years between now and then.
The Army wants longer-range fires, new combat vehicles and tanks, two new helicopters, highly capable autonomous vehicles and aircraft, a robust and resilient network tying together everything on the battlefield, a layered and more advanced air-and-missile defense capability and more lethal systems for warfighters.
These capabilities all fall under the Army's top six modernization priorities, which the service laid out a year ago in an overarching modernization strategy.
The Army then stood up Army Futures Command — a new four-star command — that will focus on rapidly bringing online modernized equipment and weapons that fit under the top six priorities. And it put a general officer in charge of a cross-functional team for each priority to advance prototypes and technology development.
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31 décembre 2018 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité
Budget Busters: What to Look For in 2019 and Beyond
By PAUL MCLEARY The release of the 2020 defense budget is still over a month away, and it's already been a wild ride. A look at what has happened, and what might happen next. WASHINGTON: If there's one complaint that has sounded a consistent across the Joint Chiefs and Pentagon leadership in recent years, it has been the lack of predictability in year-to-year funding. If there's one thing we have learned about President Trump, it's that nothing is certain until the very end. And even when there's a decision, it can be flipped, rehashed, tinkered with or forgotten about in the time it take to knock out a Tweet on phone. After two years of budget certainty in 2018-19, the 2020 submission was humming along at $733 billion — until it wasn't. In late October, the number plummeted (relatively speaking) to $700 billion, until the president was convinced by Defense Secretary Jim Mattis — not yet on his way out at the time — to rocket it up to $750 billion. But even that number isn't certain. Most analysts see the 2020 submission settling around the $733 billion level. Visiting US troops at the Al Asad air base on Dec. 26, the president gave the latest vague update. “I mean, I want to see costs come down, too. But not when it comes to our military. You have to have the finest equipment anywhere in the world, and you have that — $716 billion. And this year, again, we're going to be — don't tell anybody because nobody else knows — even a little bit higher.” Whatever the number is, it appears likely that incoming acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan will be the one to deliver and defend it on Capitol Hill in February, as Mattis has been told to leave by Jan. 1. It's unclear what effect the firing of Mattis will have on the process, or if there will be any significant strategic shifts for the department given the change in leadership. As budget guru Todd Harrison of the Center for Strategic and International Studies told me this week — specifically in reference to the Space Force, but it really applies across the entire budget — “the thing to keep in mind is that this is, so far, just the Pentagon's proposal to the White House. It's not clear if the White House is going to agree to this. The president has a way of sticking to his ideas even if his own administration recommends otherwise.” Here are a few of the stories we've done over the past months breaking down what is happening, and what might — might — happen next. Full article: https://breakingdefense.com/2018/12/budget-busters-what-to-look-for-in-2019-and-beyond
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24 avril 2022 | International, Aérospatial
UK, India promise partnership on new fighter jet technology
Johnson said the two countries would seek closer defense procurement 'to meet threats across land, sea and air, space and cyber, including partnering on new fighter jet technology [and] maritime technologies to detect and respond to threats in the oceans.'