18 août 2023 | International, Naval
Turkey to arm 11 naval platforms with Atmaca missiles
The Atmaca will replace Turkey’s aging inventory of more than 350 American-made Harpoon missiles.
27 octobre 2020 | International, C4ISR
With its new space centre, NATO seeks the ultimate high ground
It's not the Space Force you may have heard about. Still, NATO's newly announced space centre boldly takes the seven-decade-old institution where no international military alliance has gone before.
Most of its leading members and adversaries have sought individual advantage in the final frontier over the decades. And while the European Space Agency is a collective body, its civilian mission and its politics are inarguably different from those of NATO.
That difference was on display this week as NATO defence ministers, meeting online, put the final pieces in place for the new centre, which has been in the works for a couple of years.
"The space environment has fundamentally changed in the last decade," said NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg.
"Some nations, including Russia and China, are developing anti-satellite systems that could blind, disable or shoot down satellites and create dangerous debris in orbit."
NATO "must increase our understanding of the challenges in space," he said.
Unlike U.S. President Donald Trump's much-hyped plan to make the Space Force a separate branch of the U.S. military, the North Atlantic alliance has been careful to present its space centre not as a "war fighting" arm but as something purely defensive.
A 1967 international treaty commits 110 countries, including the United States and Canada, to limiting their use of space to "peaceful purposes" alone and prohibits the basing of weapons of mass destruction (nuclear bombs, for instance) in orbit. It further prohibits the militarization of the moon and other celestial bodies.
Stoltenberg has insisted that alliance activities will be in line with international law.
The rising threat of war in space
That's an important point for Paul Meyer, adjunct professor of international studies in international security at Simon Fraser University in B.C. He warned in a recent policy paper for the Canadian Global Affairs Institute that the "prospects for armed conflict in space appear more likely than they have been since the days of the Cold War."
Meyer said world leaders should think hard about what role — if any — arms control could play in avoiding a war in space.
"Diplomatic solutions are not being pursued, despite the fact that irresponsible state conduct in space can ruin it for everyone," he said Friday.
NATO has no satellites or space infrastructure of its own — but many member nations do and Stoltenberg said the alliance will draw on their expertise in setting up the new centre.
Almost all modern militaries rely on satellites. In any major conflict between NATO and either Russia or China, the orbital communication and navigation grid would be the first piece of infrastructure to be hit.
Not only does NATO need satellites for surveillance, reconnaissance and communications, an increasing number of military operations are being targeted from space.
A good example is the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, during which 68 per cent of airstrikes employed smart bombs guided by lasers and satellites.
Those "eyes in the sky" are also important for defence against ballistic missiles and (naturally) weather forecasting.
Diplomacy and deterrence
Dan Coats, the former U.S. director of national intelligence, warned Congress almost two years ago that China and Russia have trained and equipped their military space forces with new anti-satellite weapons.
Those warnings have not been limited to the Trump administration. In the spring of 2019, Norway accused Russia of "harassing" communications systems and jamming Norwegian Armed Forces GPS signals.
Last spring, the NATO space centre reported that Moscow had test-fired a satellite-killing missile.
Frank Rose, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, said in a recent online policy analysis that outer space will need to be "mainstreamed" within NATO when it comes to planning and operations.
He also argued that the alliance will need to find a way to "incorporate diplomacy into any eventual strategy."
Meyer agreed and noted in his October 2020 policy paper that Canada is largely absent from any meaningful debate on the militarization of space.
The Global Affairs website, he said, contains outdated material, is full of banal, non-specific references and is largely devoid of Canadian content.
"Pity the Canadian citizen who wishes to understand where our country stands on this troubling issue of outer space security," Meyer wrote.
It's not clear what sort of contribution Canada might make to the new NATO space centre.
In a statement, Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan said it's important for Canada's allies to develop a strategy that "ensures a peaceful use of space while protecting ourselves.
"Canada has been a leading voice in NATO about the importance of space for the Alliance and we remain committed to working with our Allies and partners to prevent space from becoming an arena of conflict."
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/nato-space-command-space-militarization-stoltenberg-1.5775269
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3 avril 2020 | International, Naval
Marine Raiders adjust training, add online courses to weather COVID-19
Shawn Snow Even Marine Raiders are feeling the impact of COVID-19 as the elite special operations unit headquartered in state under a stay-at-home order is being forced to adjust training to comply with state, defense and federal health guidelines. The Marine Raider Training Center aboard Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, is home to the seven-month Marine commando special operator school known as the Individual Training Course, which creates Critical Skill Operators who earn the 0372 military occupational specialty. While COVID-19 continues to rampage across the U.S., North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper issued a stay-at-home order to stem the spread of the virus. According to the New York Times, there are 1,582 reported cases of COVID-19 across North Carolina. To comply with the governor's order, Marine Forces Special Operations Command says it has made adjustments to training to include restructuring the ITC course and adding online training where possible. “The ITC schedule has been restructured to ensure the safety and health of the two classes currently undergoing training. Some of the in-class material has been shifted to online learning, to include parts of the Basic Language Course,” Gunnery Sgt. Lynn Kinney, told Marine Corps Times in an emailed statement. The ITC course is a seven-month training evolution broken down into several phases that includes land navigation, patrolling, small unit tactics, irregular warfare and close quarters battle. MARSOC did not provide any other details regarding the restructuring of the ITC course. “Other parts of the training have been shifted to ensure COVID-19 response requirements,” Kinney said. https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/coronavirus/2020/04/02/marine-raiders-adjust-training-add-online-courses-to-weather-covid-19/
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28 août 2018 | International, C4ISR
Army expects to spend up to $50 billion a year on Futures Command
By ROSE L. THAYER AUSTIN, Texas – It could cost between $30 and $50 billion annually for the Army's Futures Command to work towards modernizing the service, Gen. Mark Milley, the Army's chief of staff, said Friday. In Milley's formal remarks during an activation ceremony for the command at its new headquarters in downtown Austin, he said most of the Army is involved in today's military operations. Futures Command instead will think about tomorrow's fight. “The only thing that is more expensive than preventing war is fighting a war,” Milley said. “The only thing more expensive than fighting a war, is fighting and losing a war. This command is all about setting the United States Army up to not only win on the battlefield, but to be decisive and absolutely dominate on the battlefield so that we inflict punishment and destroy the enemy at the least cost to ourselves.” Futures Command hopes to help do that by working with technology companies, startups, academia and businesses of all sizes with ideas on how to modernize the Army and be prepared to fight forces of similar strength. The mission is to provide soldiers with the weapons and equipment they need, when they need them and ensure success on future battlefields – all at a much faster rate than the Defense Department's acquisitions process allows now. Milley said Futures Command would not have been formed if not for Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who announced Friday that he is discontinuing treatment for his brain cancer. The general said he and McCain discussed the challenges of procurement about three years ago as Milley awaited confirmation as chief of staff. “[McCain] said, ‘I want you to think about how you're going to reform the Army',” Milley recalled. “He planted that seed that we had significant challenges.” They continued the dialogue for several months and slowly their talks developed into Futures Command. On Friday, Gen. John “Mike” Murray took the helm of the new command with the support of its highest ranking noncommissioned officer Command Sgt. Maj. Michael Crosby. Together, the men unveiled the command's flag on the 17th floor of an University of Texas System office building. It is the first time that the Army has established a command in the middle of an urban center. The space's still unfinished walls and ceilings showed the work ahead to get the Futures Command operational. With the expectation of employing about 100 soldiers and about 400 civilians, the cost of managing just the headquarters is expected to be about $80 to $100 million, or on par with the other four-star commands. The new command is included in the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act. Milley said Murray has six months to get settled, and another six to start showing results. https://www.stripes.com/news/army-expects-to-spend-up-to-50-billion-a-year-on-futures-command-1.544234