13 juillet 2021 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité
DoD budget faces multiple obstacles | Actionable Intelligence
Defense News' Joe Gould speaks to retired Major General Arnold Punaro about the defense budget.
20 août 2020 | International, Aérospatial
Missile Defense Agency director lays out hurdles in path to layered homeland missile defense
By: Jen Judson
WASHINGTON — The Missile Defense Agency is planning to develop a layered homeland intercontinental ballistic missile defense architecture, but it must clear a range of hurdles to get after an approach that addresses emerging threats and fills a gap while a next-generation interceptor is developed, according to the agency's director.
The agency unveiled plans in its fiscal 2021 budget request in February to create a more layered homeland defense system that would include regional missile defense capability already resident with the Navy and Army to bolster homeland defense against ICBMs.
The plan would include establishing layers of defensive capability relying on the Aegis Weapon System, particularly the SM-3 Block IIA missiles used in the system, and a possible Aegis Ashore system in Hawaii. The underlay would also include the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system. The Army is already operating a THAAD battery in South Korea and Guam.
The layered approach would buy time while the Pentagon scrambles to field a new interceptor to replace older ground-based interceptors — after canceling its effort to redesign the kill vehicle for the GBIs — in its Ground-based Midcourse Defense system located primarily at Fort Greely, Alaska.
With little detail conveyed in MDA's budget request for a layered homeland missile defense plan, Congress is pressuring the agency to come up with a strategy and approach to putting the architecture in place in both the House and Senate passed FY21 defense authorization bills.
Much is riding on the success of an upcoming test of the SM-3 Block IIA missile, Vice Adm. Jon Hill said during a Heritage Foundation virtual event on Aug. 18. The missile has seen several test failures in the recent past.
“We're going to really stress the SM-3 Block IIA outside its design space,” Hill said. “It was designed for medium and intermediate range. Now we're going against long-range intercontinental ballistic missiles. The analysis says we'll be successful, but nothing is real to any of us until we actually get the empirical data from being out in the flight range.”
The test will involve several time zones on several different ranges and the same ICBM target used in the most recent GMD test, Hill said.
And while the test is still on track to happen by the end of the year, Hill said, challenges in coordination and travel due to the coronavirus pandemic could possibly have an impact on schedule.
When the pandemic hit, “we were ready and postured to go to the Pacific to execute” Flight Test Maritime-44, Hill said, “so we did get the target on station. So the target's out there in the Pacific and it's ready to roll.”
Following FTM-44, the agency would like to execute another test against a very complex ICBM target unlike the “simple” one being used in the upcoming test. That target will have “a lot of separation debris and that has a lot of countermeasures,” Hill said.
“We want to make sure that the system in total, from the space assets to the radar to the engage-on-remote capability that passes that information to the ship, that ship can actually sift through all that and say, ‘That's the [reentry vehicle] and that's the where the missile's going to go,‘” he added.
Success in the upcoming test doesn't mean the agency's work is done, Hill said. Upgrades will be required based on threats, combat system certifications will need to be conducted and work with the Navy to determine where Aegis ships would deploy will have to occur.
The agency will also have to determine how quickly it can ramp up its production line for SM-3 Block IIA missiles.
Then “if we succeed with Aegis, then we'll go right down the path with THAAD,” Hill said.
The second big challenge, after ensuring all the parts work to provide layered coverage, is developing engagement coordination between the different layers, according to Hill.
“Let's just say that step one is a ship off the coast as a complement to GMD. Those systems today talk already, but they're not talking in terms of being layered defenders,” Hill said. “So if GMD, for example, decides he's going to wait this first shot out and let the ship take it, we have to have the communication network to go do that. We have to have the technical architecture with the Command and Control Battle Management system, but in that context of layered defense and engagement coordination.”
Aegis ships are already able to do engagement coordination among each other and the work the Pentagon is doing to get THAAD and the Patriot air-and-missile defense system to coordinate are “extensible to that problem,” Hill said, “but we still need to do that kind of engineering and that sort of architecture work.”
And while a layered missile defense architecture for the homeland is an intricate one, “you don't have to solve the whole problem” at once, Rebecca Heinrichs, a missile defense analyst at the Hudson Institute, said during the Heritage Foundation event. But she cautioned that she did foresee challenges in establishing such an architecture on the political front rather than on the technical side.
“Congress always wants to vet these kinds of things, so even though it is Congress that wanted the SM-3 Block IIA test, whenever you start talking about which district it is going to be in, where it's going to go and that kind of thing, that is a political challenge that takes a lot of debate and conversation.”
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3 février 2020 | International, Aérospatial
Lockheed Martin receives $2.3B deal for helicopter parts maintenance
ByChristen McCurdy Jan. 31 (UPI) -- Lockheed Martin has received a $2.3 billion contract for parts maintenance for MH-60R and MH-60S helicopters for the U.S. Navy, the Department of Defense announced. The MH-60R -- also called the 'Romeo' aircraft -- has been operational since 2006. The helicopters are jointly built by Lockheed and Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. According to Lockheed, MH-60R replaces the SH-60B Bravo and SH-60F Foxtrot, and is equipped for combat duty as well as high-risk rescues. Itcan fly at speeds of up to 180 knots while carrying extra fuel tanks or torpedoes and Hellfire missiles. The MH-60S, also called the Knighthawk, replaced the CH-46 Sea Knight helicopters in 2001 and is used seek out and destroy naval mines from the air. Both models have a digital cockpit with four flat-panel color display screens that provide the crew access to advanced surveillance and information on weather conditions. The contract funds approximately 1,049 weapon replaceable assemblies and shop replaceable assemblies associated with both helicopter models. Forty-eight percent of work on the contract will be performed at various contractor supplier locations throughout the U.S., with 38 percent of work taking place in Stratford, Conn., and Owego, N.Y. Work should be completed by January 2025, but the contract does include an option that would extend the work through January 2027. https://www.upi.com/Defense-News/2020/01/31/Lockheed-Martin-receives-23B-deal-for-helicopter-parts-maintenance/3901580519254/
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16 octobre 2018 | International, Aérospatial
Most F-35s return to flight operations after fuel tube problem
By: Valerie Insinna WASHINGTON — After a fuel tube problem sidelined all operational F-35 aircraft last week, more than 80 percent of jets have been cleared to return to flight, the F-35 joint program office stated Monday. In a Oct. 15 statement, the JPO confirmed that the U.S. services and international partners have completed inspections of their F-35 inventories for faulty fuel tubes. The aircraft that are not impacted by the bad tubes — which are a component in Pratt & Whitney's F135 engine — are back in flying status. “The F-35 Joint Program Office continues to work closely with the military services to prioritize fuel tube replacements using the current spares inventory,” the JPO said. “Pratt & Whitney is rapidly procuring more parts to minimize the overall repair timeline for the remaining jets. Current inventory will restore about half of the impacted jets to flight operations, and the remaining aircraft are expected to be cleared for flight over the coming weeks.” Last week, all U.S. and international F-35s were momentarily grounded to allow for an enterprise-wide fuel tube inspection. The review began as a result of an investigation into a Sept. 28 Marine Corps' F-35B crash near Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort in South Carolina — the first F-35 crash in the jet's history. It is still unclear exactly how the defective fuel tubes impact the jet's performance or how serious a safety threat they pose during flight operations. Joe DellaVedova, a spokesman for the JPO, declined to discuss the specific problems that led the program office to call for a fleetwide inspection, saying that details could not be released until the Marine Corps completes its accident investigation. Also still up in the air is whether the Pentagon or Pratt & Whitney will be stuck paying the tab for retrofitting the fleet. Spokesmen from the U.S. Air Force, Marine Corps and Navy declined to lay out exactly how many of their aircraft had been impacted by the faulty fuel tubes. However, as Lockheed Martin delivered its 300th F-35 in June, 20 percent of the operational F-35 fleet can be estimated to be about 60 aircraft across the U.S. and international operators. The JPO called the fuel tube problem an “isolated incident” that would not impact F-35 deliveries. A total of 91 F-35s are planned to be delivered to the U.S. military and foreign customers this year. “The primary goal following any mishap is the prevention of future incidents,” the office said. “We will take every measure to ensure safe operations while we deliver, sustain and modernize the F-35 for the warfighter and our defense partners.” The problem with the defective fuel tubes is the latest in a string of recent supply chain issues that have plagued F-35 prime contractor Lockheed Martin and engine manufacturer Pratt & Whitney, and comes as Defense Secretary Jim Mattis sent a memo directing the Air Force, Marine Corps and Navy to boost the F-35′s mission capable rate to 80 percent. The Pentagon halted F-35 deliveries in March amid disagreements over whether the department or Lockheed should foot the bill for retrofitting part of the fleet that had not received corrosion-preventing primer in certain fastener holes. Deliveries resumed in May once the parties hammered out an agreement — although it was never revealed to the public exactly how the expenses would be paid off. In 2016, certain F-35As were grounded after it was found that coolant lines inside the jets' fuel tanks were rimmed with faulty insulation, which was prone to disintegrating. https://www.defensenews.com/air/2018/10/15/most-f-35s-return-to-flight-operations-after-fuel-tube-problem