US Air Force sees 5G as one of many connectors on future battlefields

Sur le même sujet

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  1 octobre 2018 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité

  Trump signs defense spending plan, with one more swipe at Democrats

  By: Leo Shane III WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump finalized an $854 billion spending bill on Friday that fully funds the military for fiscal 2019 and prevents a government shutdown next week, accomplishments that congressional leaders have called important and laudable. But Trump's signature came with one final attack on Democrats over the spending measure, lamenting lawmakers' decision not to include extra money in the appropriations package for his planned wall along the southern U.S. border. “Unfortunately, the radical Democrats refuse to support border security and want drugs and crime to pour into our country,” he said in a statement after signing the bill. The comments came just a week after Trump took to social media to blast “this ridiculous Spending Bill,” raising fears of a presidential veto on Capitol Hill. Instead, Trump largely praised the measure on Friday, calling it “important legislation to rebuild our military” and promote other domestic priorities. The appropriations measure includes $674 billion in defense funding for fiscal 2019, and marks the first time in a decade Congress has finalized the spending measure before the start of the new fiscal year. The measure funds a 2.6 percent pay raise for troops starting next January and a boost in military end strength of 16,400 spread across the active-duty and reserve forces. Trump, in his statement, praised the measure for including “93 new F-35 Lightning Joint Strike Fighters, 142 Apache and Black Hawk helicopters, and 13 Navy battle force ships — made right here in the USA.” In a statement after the signing, House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, praised the president for pushing for the funding increases in his budget request and past public statements. “By funding our military in full and on time, we can begin to restore its strength, agility, and effectiveness,” he said. “As I have said before, the task before us now is to make full, on time funding of our military the rule in Washington, and not the exception.” The spending bill also includes full-year funding for the departments of Health and Human Services, Education and Labor, as well as bridge funding for a handful of other government agencies to keep them operational through Dec. 7. Last week, Trump signed into law a separate package that included full-year funding for the Department of Veterans Affairs and for military construction projects. https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2018/09/28/trump-signs-spending-plan-avoiding-shutdown

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  20 novembre 2019 | International, Aérospatial

  B-21 Program Hits Schedule Pressure Even On ‘Conventional Trajectory’

  Steve Trimble As the first B-21 enters final assembly in Palmdale, California, the Northrop Grumman-led program is on track to hit a first-flight target in two years, although the first signs of schedule pressure have appeared. Most of the details of the U.S. Air Force's newest stealth bomber remain a tightly guarded secret, but those facts released show the program is following a conventional trajectory despite being managed by an organization with the word “rapid” in its title. The Air Force announced completion of the critical design review in December 2018 in the standard three years after Northrop Grumman won the engineering and manufacturing development contract. The target for the first flight milestone stayed secret until July , when Gen. Stephen Wilson, the Air Force's vice chief of staff, stated publicly—and with remarkable specificity—that the milestone was 863 days away. Wilson offered that timetable on July 25, suggesting the targeted date is around Dec. 3, 2021. SCO leader says earliest flight would be in December 2021 Public rollout event expected in Palmdale, California The final piece of the publicly acknowledged schedule is that the first B-21 entered the early stages of final assembly around September in Palmdale, presumably within Northrop's Site 4 manufacturing complex and perhaps inside Building 401 in the same assembly bay that once housed the B-2. To hit Wilson's first-flight target, Northrop's staff must complete assembly of the first aircraft, stage a public rollout event and perform necessary ground testing within about two years. But Wilson's first-flight target may already be under pressure. His description made the December 2021 date seem like a fixed schedule milestone typical of most major defense acquisition programs. Randall Walden, who leads the Rapid Capabilities Office assigned to lead the B-21 program, describes Wilson's timing as closer to a schedule goal than a deadline. Walden recast the target as the “earliest possible” date for first flight, which he has little confidence the program will achieve. “I would not bet on that date,” Walden told an audience at a Capitol Hill Club breakfast on Oct. 24 organized by the Air Force Association. The comment is a rare cautionary note among otherwise glowing descriptions of the B-21 program by officials cleared to know the status of the development program. In March 2018, Rep. Rob Wittman (R-Va.) reported concerns about the design of the engine inlet, citing an internal dispute between Northrop and engine supplier Pratt & Whitney's engineers. Twelve months later, Wittman confirmed that the inlet design problem had been resolved. The program has since received only glowing assessments by Air Force leaders, including a statement in October by Chief of Staff Gen. David Goldfein that the B-21 ranks at the top of his list of successful acquisition projects. Despite those assurances, transitioning a new aircraft from a paper design into manufactured hardware is a challenging phase for any program. Large pieces of the first aircraft are now in assembly. “We're working a production line, literally, today,” Walden says. An official artist's rendering shows the B-21 shares the all-wing profile of the B-2, minus the latter's distinctive sawtooth trailing edge. The Air Force's acquisition strategy also focused on minimizing risk by relying as much as possible on available technology. But a modern bomber with the B-21's mission to penetrate into highly contested airspace is still anything but a simple project. “It is a complex airplane. I'll leave it at that,” Walden says. Walden expects the Air Force to stage a public rollout event in Palmdale when the aircraft is ready. For the B-2, the rollout was staged seven months before the first flight. If the B-21 stays to the same schedule, the unveiling could come as early as May 2020. But Walden adds that includes several big “ifs.” “Like anything, building a complex system could add those schedule pressures,” Walden says. “We've got to bring parts together, got to assemble it and get it stuffed with the right avionics, get the landing gear on it, all the things that go along with an airplane.” Any schedule pressure facing the B-21 would not surprise Frank Kendall, the former undersecretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics. Kendall led the shaping of the acquisition strategy for the B-21. In a recent interview, he recalled pushing back against attempts by the Air Force to award a firm, fixed-price contract instead of a more flexible cost-plus arrangement, which is generally applied to acquisition projects with a higher risk. “When I looked at . . . the actual content of the program, I [was] so glad I told [the Air Force to use cost-plus],” Kendall says. “It's not risk-free. I'll be amazed if they get this thing in on schedule and on cost. But it was designed to have a reasonable chance of success.” An independent estimate by the Defense Department assessed the cost of the engineering and manufacturing development phase at $21.4 billion, with follow-on production of at least 80-100 bombers worth up to $60 billion more. The Air Force has budgeted $5.9 billion over the next five years to pay for the first operational aircraft, with low-rate initial production possibly beginning in fiscal 2023. “There are a lot of things that have to happen between now and a couple of years,” Walden says. https://aviationweek.com/defense/b-21-program-hits-schedule-pressure-even-conventional-trajectory

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  26 avril 2018 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité

  New Pentagon research chief is working on lasers, AI, hypersonic munitions and more

  By: Todd South The new chief for research in the Pentagon is building an artificial intelligence center, pushing for self-driving vehicles in combat zones and more powerful lasers, and says solving the hypersonic gap means updating testing facilities. Defense Undersecretary for Research and Engineering Michael Griffin testified before the House Armed Services Committee last week, answering questions on a range of gear and procurement questions. But those most relevant to service members included weapons systems on the horizon that troops could see in combat with near peer adversaries. More rapid development will include the use of unmanned ground vehicles in formations. The Army recently announced the 10th Mountain Division and the 101st Airborne Division will have a robotic combat vehicle called the Squad Multipurpose Equipment Transport in the ranks this year for testing, which will develop the likely full-fielding gear mule-type robot. Simple tasks, such as delivering food, mail, water and fuel, could be automated sooner than some think, Griffin said. “I think, frankly, we're going to have self-driving vehicles in theater for the Army before we'll have self-driving cars on the streets,” Griffin said. “If that can be done by an automated unmanned vehicle with a relatively simple AI driving algorithm where I don't have to worry about pedestrians and road signs and all of that, why wouldn't I do that?” Griffin pointed to Chinese systems that have been fielded or can be soon fielded that can launch a strike and reach out “thousands of kilometers” from the Chinese shore and “hold our carrier battle groups or forward deployed forces on land” at risk. “We, today, do not have systems which can hold them at risk in a corresponding manner, and we don't have defenses against those systems,” Griffin told the House Armed Services Committee members on April 18. Another Chinese technology threat includes the nation's development of swarm drone technologies to counter U.S. airpower and other strengths. That means getting powerful laser systems up to snuff. But it won't happen tomorrow. “We need to have 100-kilowatt-class weapons on Army theater vehicles. We need to have 300-kilowatt-class weapons on Air Force tankers,” Griffin said. “We need to have megawatt-class directed energy weapons in space for space defense. These are things we can do over the next decade if we can maintain our focus.” Scientists he's been talking with have told him that level of laser power is five to six years away and a “megawatt laser” is within a decade with persistent investment. ‘An unacceptable situation' Sen. Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., pointed out that the testing facilities, such as White Sands Missile Range in his state, have scarcely seen any upgrades or improvements in the past two decades, despite leaps in technology for missiles, lasers and other items. Griffin agreed, saying at a low estimate at least 20 such testing facilities across the nation are in the same situation. He said the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency does most of the leading-edge work on hypersonic missile systems and they have exactly one testing facility, a NASA wind tunnel near Langley, Virginia. “This is an unacceptable situation,” Griffin said. He promised to return with budget requests to renovate those facilities to improve testing. Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., asked about a new area of focus that has broad-reaching effects: artificial intelligence. Griffin oversees the creation of a Joint Artificial Intelligence Center that would create AI solutions for all the service branches. He deferred on the details but told members that he expected to return with a plan within two months. “We owe the Congress a report, I think, about two months from now on what our A.I. strategy will be. And the JAIC, the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center, will be a part of that overall strategy,” Griffin said. The plan must consider the 592 projects across the Defense Department that have AI as part of their development. https://www.defensenews.com/news/your-military/2018/04/24/new-pentagon-research-chief-is-working-on-lasers-ai-hypersonic-munitions-and-more/