7 avril 2023 | International, C4ISR
US Navy needs seamless ‘virtual cloud,’ cyber leaders say
Navy vessels dot waters the world over and are expected to play a critical role in a conflict with China or Russia.
19 novembre 2018 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR
Why the U.S. could lose the next big war - and what that means for Canada
Murray Brewster · CBC News
It was more than the usual sky-is-falling rhetoric we're used to seeing in national security reports out of Washington.
It came from some pretty sober, respected voices in the defence community.
A special commission report, presented to the U.S. Congress this week, delivered one of the most stark — even startling — assessments in the last two decades of the limits of American military power.
The independent, nonpartisan review of the Trump administration's 2018 National Defence Strategy said the U.S. could lose future wars with Russia or China.
"This Commission believes that America has reached the point of a full-blown national security crisis," reads the 116-page document written by 12 leading defence and security experts and released Wednesday.
"If the United States had to fight Russia in a Baltic contingency, or China in a war over Taiwan, Americans could face a decisive military defeat."
Those are sobering words for Canada, in light of this country's contribution of over 450 troops to the NATO-led deterrence mission in Latvia.
Time for a defence policy rewrite?
And it has prompted a call from at least one Canadian defence expert for a re-assessment — perhaps even a full-blown rewrite — of the Liberal government's own defence policy.
More than simply another rote, boilerplate plea for fatter U.S. defence budgets, the commission's report lays out in precise detail the kind of geopolitical threats Washington — and, by extension, other Western capitals — are facing from rivals and enemies at many levels and in multiple spheres.
"The security and well-being of the United States are at greater risk than at any time in decades. America's military superiority — the hard-power backbone of its global influence and national security — has eroded to a dangerous degree," says the report.
"America's ability to defend its allies, its partners, and its own vital interests is increasingly in doubt. If the nation does not act promptly to remedy these circumstances, the consequences will be grave and lasting."
The report acknowledges that the U.S. and its allies may be forced to fight a localized nuclear war in the future, given how Russia has restored the once-unthinkable concept to its military planning and training exercises.
The commission also paints various grim scenarios that could confront Western allies between now and 2022, including an invasion of the Baltics under the guise of a "peacekeeping" mission to protect Russian minorities:
"As U.S. and NATO forces prepare to respond, Russia declares that strikes against Russian forces in those states will be treated as attacks on Russia itself — implying a potential nuclear response.
"Meanwhile, to keep America off balance, Russia escalates in disruptive ways. Russian submarines attack transatlantic fibre optic cables. Russian hackers shut down power grids and compromise the security of U.S. banks."
The consequences, said the report, would be severe: "Major cities are paralyzed; use of the internet and smartphones is disrupted. Financial markets plummet as commerce seizes up and online financial transactions slow to a crawl. The banking system is thrown into chaos."
While the report doesn't mention U.S. President Donald Trump by name, it notes the effect of his bruising rhetorical fights with world leaders and criticism of international institutions, such as NATO.
"Doubts about America's ability to deter and, if necessary, defeat opponents and honour its global commitments have proliferated," said the report.
Cautious optimism
At this weekend's Halifax International Security Forum, Canada's marquee defence conference, some leading experts struck a less pessimistic note and suggested that the West still has a major technological lead on Moscow.
"Russia is a great country. It is a great country, historically. But Russia is also a failing country," said Peter Van Praagh, president of the Halifax Security Forum, at the opening of the event on Friday.
"Russia does not have the same advanced tools that NATO has, that Canada and NATO and the American alliance [have]."
Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan also expressed cautious optimism about the threat.
"In NATO we're taking this extremely seriously. We're learning from the various missions that are ongoing," he said.
A former military adviser to one of Sajjan's predecessors said Canada could learn from the commission exercise, which was meant to challenge the Trump administration's defence plans.
"It's certainly something we don't have," said Richard Cohen, an ex-army officer who served as former defence minister Peter MacKay's adviser. "Our government would never dream of inviting anyone to come and criticize its defence policy."
The current government sought extensive input before the new Canadian policy was presented 18 months ago.
The U.S. commission report calls on NATO and its allies to "rebuild" substantial military forces in Europe, among things.
Cohen said that, if anything, should trigger a fresh look at the Liberal government's own defence policy.
"Our defence policy is predicated on the kind of asymmetric warfare we have faced since the end of the Cold War and it really ignores the looming strategic threats that Russia, China and maybe some others pose as well," he said.
"At least the United States realizes this growing strategic threat," Cohen added, noting that the current Liberal defence policy makes only passing mention of China "in very gentle terms" and limited references to Russia.
"If the United States is in a national security crisis, then we're in a national security crisis."
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/defence-policy-trump-china-russia-1.4910038
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15 juin 2018 | International, C4ISR
The Army wants a better way to update software, buy smarter
By: Mark Pomerleau The Army is holding what it calls software solariums as a way to improve the business side of the service's multi-billion software efforts during the life of programs. “Software has become both a critically important element to readiness and a critically under-managed element of our capability portfolio,” Maj. Gen. Randy Taylor, commander of Communications and Electronics Command, said at the event held May 22-23. “Cohesive software management is a necessary enabler to maintaining overmatch in the multi-domain battle.” Providing software updates to units in austere field locations can be challenging. Prolonging such updates can make the systems they run on vulnerable. The Army has sought to develop new and innovative ways for automated software updates to these units. As the Army is also undergoing major IT modernization, both to its tactical and enterprise networks, software becomes a critical enabler in that future end state. “I believe that we are literally in the midst of the largest modernization of our networks,” Lt. Gen. Bruce Crawford, the Army CIO who began the software solariums as commander of CECOM, said at the recent event. “And that's all of our networks, from the tactical to the enterprise, to the business to the intelligence systems in the last 30 years.” With these modernization efforts, the Army realizes it must be better stewards of overall software costs. “We've got to be more holistic on how we approach this, especially when you consider that we, the U.S. taxpayer, spend 55 to 70 percent of a program's lifecycle on that post-acquisition and post-operations sustainment. That's a pretty big bill,” Taylor said. During a March conference, Crawford noted the service spends about $3 billion over a five year period on enterprise software sustainment. The previous solariums, officials said, have included new patching solutions and a goal to have no more than two fielded software baselines at any one time for all programs of record. Army leaders said CECOM will coordinate with stakeholders to finalize recommendations in the coming months. Those goals then will be submitted to the Army level Information Technology Oversight Council for approval and implementation. https://www.c4isrnet.com/it-networks/2018/06/14/the-army-wants-a-better-way-to-update-software-buy-smarter/
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14 janvier 2020 | International, C4ISR
Four Nations To Be Protected With Lockheed Martin's Next Generation Radar
MOORESTOWN, N.J., January 14, 2020 – Through partnerships with the U.S. Government, Spain, Japan, and Canada, Lockheed Martin's (NYSE: LMT) solid state radar (SSR) technology will provide front-line defense to nations around the world with cutting-edge air and missile defense capabilities. These nations are part of a growing SSR family of 24 platforms, ushering in the next generation of maritime and ground-based advanced radar technology. The basis of SSR is the Long Range Discrimination Radar (LRDR), which the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) selected Lockheed Martin to develop in 2015 with an on-track delivery set for 2020. In 2019 Lockheed Martin's SSR for Aegis Ashore Japan was designated by the United States Government as AN/SPY-7(V)1. What is SSR Technology? SPY-7's core technology is derived from the LRDR program, which has been declared Technical Readiness Level 7 by the U.S. Government. The technology consists of a scalable and modular gallium nitride (GaN) based “subarray” radar building block, providing advanced performance and increased efficiency and reliability to pace ever-evolving threats. As part of its investment into the advancement of SSR, Lockheed Martin built a Solid State Radar Integration Site to conduct detailed testing to prove the maturity of the system and reduce fielding risk. Scaled versions of the LRDR site will be utilized for future radar programs including Aegis Ashore Japan, Canadian Surface Combatant and MDA's Homeland Defense Radar in Hawaii. Solid state offers powerful capabilities to detect, track and engage sophisticated air and missile threats, including the very complicated task of discriminating – or picking out – and countering lethal objects present in enemy ballistic missiles. The Lockheed Martin SSR uses state-of-the art hardware and an innovative software-defined radar architecture to meet current requirements while providing extensibility features to pace evolving threats for decades to come. Its unique maintain-while-operate capability provides very high operational availability and enables continuous 24-hour/7-day week operation. Solid state radar is a multi-mission system providing a wide range of capabilities, from passive situational awareness to integrated air and missile defense solutions. The combined capability and mission flexibility of Lockheed Martin's SSR has gained the attention of new and current users of the Aegis Weapon System, the world's premier air and missile defense combat suite. Meeting the World's Most Demanding Missions While LRDR is the first program to utilize Lockheed Martin's new SSR building blocks, over the past three years Lockheed Martin has consistently been selected in open competitions to equip an additional 24 platforms in four nations. SPY-7 provides several times the performance of traditional SPY-1 radars and the ability to engage multiple targets simultaneously with the latest proven interceptors. Spain's Ministry of Defense stated its preference for Lockheed Martin's technology for its five F-110 class frigates in 2017 and awarded the ship construction order to Navantia in 2019. These ships will host the first-ever S-band variants of the SPY-7 radar for the Spanish Navy. Production will be a collaboration between Lockheed Martin and Spanish company, Indra. When the frigates deploy in 2026 our SPY-7 variant will be integrated as part of the Aegis Weapon System. The frigates will also incorporate the International Aegis Fire Control Loop (IAFCL) integrated with SCOMBA, the national combat system developed by Navantia. Canada's Department of National Defence also selected Lockheed Martin as the naval radar provider for its 15 Canadian Surface Combatant (CSC) ships. Lockheed Martin's IAFCL is integrated with Canada's combat management system, CMS 330, developed by Lockheed Martin Canada for the Royal Canadian Navy's HALIFAX Class ships. The program will make Canada the owner of the world's second largest Aegis fleet, and our SPY-7 radar variant will enable CSC to conduct highly advanced maritime missions for decades to come. Mature, Cost-Effective Systems Ready Now Including LRDR, the 24 Lockheed Martin SSR platforms selected to date represent a total of 91 antennas of varying sizes, collectively composed of over 15,000 subarrays. On LRDR alone, Lockheed Martin has produced an equivalent of eight Aegis shipsets to-date. The U.S. Government's LRDR has a planned service life for decades to come and will be supported and maintained throughout that period. This ensures the U.S. and its allies will have a large and stable base of cost-effective logistics and support for many years in the future. About Lockheed Martin Headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, Lockheed Martin is a global security and aerospace company that employs approximately 105,000 people worldwide and is principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture, integration and sustainment of advanced technology systems, products and services. https://news.lockheedmartin.com/2020-01-14-Four-Nations-to-Be-Protected-with-Lockheed-Martins-Next-Generation-Radar