Nouvelles

7/28/2020 By Jon Harper The Air Force plans to conduct operational experiments in 2021 with new unmanned aerial system prototypes for the Skyborg program, according to officials. Skyborg is one of the service's top three “Vanguard” science-and-technology initiatives aimed at delivering game-changing capabilities for the future force. The aim of the effort is to integrate attritable drone technologies with open missions systems to enable manned-unmanned teaming. The project is expected to lay the foundation for building a family of UAS that can adapt and make decisions at machine speeds. The autonomous platforms are expected to operate as robotic wingmen for manned aircraft, perform dangerous tasks and serve as low-cost force multipliers on the battlefield. The Air Force announced July 23 that it had awarded indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contracts to Boeing, General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Kratos Unmanned Aerial Systems and Northrop Grumman Systems that will enable the four companies to compete for up to $400 million in subsequent delivery orders in support of the Skyborg program. The contractors were down-selected after a competition with 18 participants. However, no funds were obligated at the time of the award; they will come with each individual order. The four companies are about to square off again as the Air Force prepares to make an order for the initial tranche of prototype aircraft. “Basically we'll look at the four options, what the pricing is, and so forth. There will be a lot that goes into deciding ... how many different vehicles we choose, how many we buy from each vendor,” Brig. Gen. Dale White, program executive officer for fighters and advanced aircraft at the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center, told reporters July 28 during a teleconference. “There's a lot of variables that are unknown in terms of what we get back from industry on that.” The service wants to buy as many different types of prototypes in the highest quantities it can afford with the pool of money that has been allotted, he added. It plans to place a delivery order in the next 60 to 90 days and "get the prototypes hopefully in the field by next year for some operational experimentation” with warfighters, White said. Vendors who didn't survive the recent down-select won't be completely shut out of the Skyborg program. “We are actively looking at how we use those vendors to increase the vendor pool over time because there's still a significant amount of work to be done getting to a production [system] and an operational vehicle,” White said. “We're going to keep the aperture open and we're going to maintain flexibility throughout this process.” The government-mandated open architecture will allow different organizations to come in and add technology to the platforms, noted Brig. Gen. Heather Pringle, commander of the Air Force Research Laboratory. “We will have that ability technically to add as we need to, and to increase the operational relevance,” she told reporters. “As the warfighter develops new ideas that would make it more operationally relevant, we'll be able to pull those pieces in as we conduct the operational experimentation campaign." AFRL is partnering with the Life Cycle Management Center on the Skyborg initiative and is bringing its own technologies to the table. “If there are opportunities on the autonomy side or developing the sensors that need to plug and play, or anything else that will help us achieve the operational goals that we have with our partners who are the warfighters. We're open to anybody ... that would make that happen,” she added. White said the Air Force envisions about 15 different potential mission sets that the drones could perform. The results of next year's operational experiments will help shape decisions about production and moving to a program of record. “We do have some timelines that we're looking at out there for making decisions, which I don't really want to share right now, but we believe we're going to be in a great position probably by the end of next year to be able to really decide which way we want to go with this,” White said. White was asked when the service aims to equip units with a Skyborg system that has initial operational capability or final operational capability. “We have plans that we think we'll [eventually] be ready to go do those things. But I think in a larger sense we still have to figure out how we bring this program together, put it in the overall corporate system in the Air Force and make sure ... we put the Air Force in a position to make a good decision point with when we go into production, how we produce it, what are the other things we have out there that it might partner with or it might complement,” he said. “We're still too early” in the project to say when systems will fielded, he added. https://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/articles/2020/7/28/air-force-to-fly-new-skyborg-drones-next-year

Seventy-six years after higher-performing Tempest fighters joined the Royal Air Force's Hawker Typhoons in harrying Nazi air and ground forces during World War II, the United Kingdom is once again counting on a warplane called the Tempest to replace succeed its Typhoons. London has big ambitions for its Team Tempest program kicked off in 2018, which aims to develop a sixth-generation optionally-manned stealth fighter (ie. it can fly without an onboard pilot if necessary) to enter service around 2040 to replace its current fleet of Eurofighter Typhoon jet fighters. Unfortunately, those ambitions may simply not square with the money available for “Combat Air” programs in the British defense budget according to a new paper published by the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), the UK's premier defense think tank. The author of Combat Air Choices for the UK Government, defense analyst Justin Bronk, argues that putting U.K's strategic goals in line with its available financial means may require procuring more stealth jets in the short term, while in the long term reconceiving the optionally-manned Tempest as a more affordable unmanned (drone) combat systems. British Combat Air Power, circa 2020 Today's Royal Air Force draws its primary combat strength from a projected fleet of 145 Eurofighter Typhoon fighters deployed in seven operational squadrons concentrated in two lightly-defended airbases, as well as a testing and training squadron each. Developed by a British/German/Italian consortium (BAE/Airbus/Leonardo respectively), the Typhoon is an advanced 4.5-generation fighter originally focused on a high-speed and high-altitude air-to-air combat, but which has since integrated short- and long-range precision ground attack capabilities. The RAF plans to further upgrade its Typhoons with an advanced CAPTOR-E active electronically scanned array radar which will substantially improve the type's reconnaissance, air-to-air, air-to-ground and self-defense capabilities. But because the Typhoon isn't a stealth aircraft, it can't safely penetrate airspace interdicted by long-range surface-to-air missiles like Russia's S-400 system until those systems are suppressed or destroyed. That job is set aside for 48 Lockheed F-35B Lightning II stealth jump jets shared by the Royal Navy's Fleet Air Arm and the Royal Air Force, of which 35 have been delivered so far. Though less agile than the Typhoon, the Lightning's low radar cross-section allows it to penetrate hostile airspace in comparative safety, while its powerful networked sensors enable it to locate and destroy air defense batteries and other key targets—or shuffle targeting data to non-stealth platforms a safe distance away to execute a strike Unfortunately, as discussed in this article by David Axe, 48 F-35s may not be enough to perform the anti-air defense mission in a hypothetical high-intensity conflict with Russia, particularly when the Royal Navy will want a significant chunk of those jets deployed on its Queen Elizabeth-class carriers to support naval operations. Lastly, the UK is finishing procurement of sixteen MQ-9B Protector drones which can cost-efficiently perform long-endurance surveillance and on-call strike missions in a counter-insurgency context. However, the MQ-9B lacks the stealth or agility to survive in a high-intensity conflict. The Tempest, not by Shakespeare In July 2018, the UK launched Team Tempest, a project to develop an optionally-manned sixth-generation stealth fighter that could replace the Typhoons as they age out of service in 2040. A mockup of a sleek twin-tail stealth design was unveiled at the Farnborough Airshow in July 2018, as well as a presentation highlighting concepts including adaptive cycle turbofans built by Rolls-Royce, revolutionary electrical power generation capabilities, integration of directed-energy (ie. lasers or microwaves) and hypersonic weapons, AI that could assist the pilot or even fly the plane without one, and control of swarms of supporting drones. London has committed £2 billion ($2.6 billion) in initial funding to Tempest, and Italy and Sweden have joined in as partners via companies Leonardo and Saab. Involvement of the Netherlands has also been rumored. In 2020, the British government announced it had recruited seven more companies into the program, and that the number of persons working on Team Tempest would increase from 1,800 to 2,500 by 2021. Tempest is implicitly a rival to the French-German-led Airbus/Dassault Future Combat Air System project which also includes Spain, though there has been tentative suggestions that FCAS and Tempest could be merged. According to Bronk, because modern combat aircraft have grown so immensely expensive to develop, and retaining a core of specialized engineering expertise is so vital, the fate of the Tempest program may determine the future of the UK's military aviation sector, which currently counts 46,000 jobs. “Tempest is the only way that the UK can retain a national combat aircraft design and manufacturing capability, and is currently the assumed source of a replacement capability for Typhoon by 2040... A failure of Tempest to generate significant airframe production contracts would also all but guarantee the demise of UK defence industry combat aircraft design and manufacturing capacity.” In other words, a failed Tempest project could relegate British companies to building components for other jets like the F-35 instead of for domestic jet fighter designs. The Budgetary Crunch Unfortunately, based on other stealth fighter programs abroad, completing development of an optionally-manned Tempest fighter would likely cost at least £25 billion ($32.5 billion) according to Bronk. Already, he writes there is “no headroom” to develop Tempest in the £18 billion set aside in the defense budget for Combat Air over the next decade, nor even to acquire more than 48 F-35s. The paper outlines some ways the Ministry of Defense could reallocate funds, arguing the RAF should do a “large-scale culling” of capabilities that wouldn't be survivable in a conflict with Russia, namely slow-moving intelligence/surveillance aircraft (ISTARs) and transport planes and helicopters. Additional F-35 purchases could be of the cheaper land-based F-35A model, which besides has superior performance. And older, more limited-capability Typhoon Tranche 1 aircraft could be retired early in the late 2020s. Nevertheless, completing Tempest would still likely require a large injection of funds outside of the regular defense budget. Instead, the report argues Tempest would likely become much more affordable as a stealth unmanned combat air vehicle (UCAV). Indeed, analysts are debating whether even the United States should choose to go that route for its next generation fighter. Removing a pilot achieves major weight savings as cockpit, ejection and life support systems can be trimmed away. The UK has already developed the Taranis stealth UCAV prototype, showing it already has a knowledge base with such technology. Furthermore the paper argues that unlike manned aircraft, closer to 100% of drones can remain available for operational missions. This is because pilots can do all of their training in simulators and units don't need to be rotated out of the line to rest and recover. That would mean both that a smaller number of UCAVs would need to be procured than jet fighters, and fewer personnel would be required to maintain them. “Cost savings derive from the significantly reduced airframe complexity, fleet size, training, testing and certification requirements compared to a piloted aircraft development effort... Without the need to rotate squadrons, airframes and personnel for training, maintenance, deployment and rest cycles, UCAVs offer significantly more operationally ready airframes from a given fleet size.” Admittedly, a Tempest UCAV would be less profitable for British defense industry. “The lower production volumes and rates which make UCAVs attractive from a military capability standpoint also greatly reduce potential profits per customer for industry,” Bronk concedes. Making the leap from manned to unmanned combat aircraft comes with other challenges. One is the need to harden UCAVs against hostile cyber- and electronic-warfare that could disrupt the command link. That likely includes building in autonomous AI capability so that UCAV can complete missions without relying on human direction. Especially in lower-intensity conflicts, it may be preferable to have a human pilot who can judge better from context whether a target is civilian or military. And air forces led by fighter pilots may resist the idea of replacing manned aircraft with unmanned ones. Regardless of whether one agrees with the RUSI report's recommendations, it seems clear that London will need to make some difficult choices in the years ahead as it balances the desired to field an effective air force today with investing in new technologies for tomorrow. https://www.forbes.com/sites/sebastienroblin/2020/07/30/can-the-uk-afford-to-develop-its-tempest-optionally-manned-stealth-fighter/#4452a87249b9

Tony Osborne July 29, 2020 Aviation Week's July 16 webinar on the future of combat aircraft mentioned British, French-German and Japanese fifth- and sixth-generation developments. Are there any others on the radar, such as Turkey or South Korea? Will these quieter players be able to pull the rabbit from the hat as the Turks have done with UAVs in Libya and Syria? London Bureau Chief Tony Osborne responds: Had we had more time during the webinar, we would have talked more about developments from Turkey and South Korea—in particular, the Turkish Aerospace Industries TF-X and Korea Aerospace Industries' KF-X. Taiwan and Pakistan are also making investments in fighter technologies, although their progress is not as mature. Turkey benefits from having a capable partner in BAE Systems to support the design process, and I believe they could produce a combat aircraft in the next 5-10 years. The Turkish electronics industry is well advanced, and Turkish Aerospace is growing its capabilities fairly rapidly. The biggest question is around development of engine technologies: Turkey wants an indigenous 25,000-30,000-lb. engine to power the TF-X. Although Turkey is not starting from scratch—given its experience on General Electric engines for the F-16—it has a long way to go before it can produce a reliable, locally developed powerplant. Without that, Turkey will have difficulty exporting such an aircraft. Surety of supply for a foreign engine, especially from the U.S., is doubtful given the political strains between the two countries. In South Korea, it is a slightly different story. Its platform will use a U.S.-supplied engine, and given the close relationship between South Korea and the U.S., there is that surety of supply. Time will tell whether that will change when it comes to exporting the KF-X. With assembly of the first prototype well underway, South Korea appears to be making strong progress. We are still waiting for metal to be cut. https://aviationweek.com/defense-space/aircraft-propulsion/what-countries-lead-developing-next-gen-combat-aircraft

7/29/2020 By Connie Lee The Air Force wants to shake up the industrial base and is looking to move away from relying on large, traditional prime contractors and instead bring in new talent, the service's top weapons buyer said. The service needs “a new industrial base model that's not a defense industrial base model,” said Will Roper, the Air Force's assistant secretary for acquisition, technology and logistics. “We have to have a new model that encourages companies to come in and work with [the] military, but not necessarily put them on a path to become a defense prime.” Such an approach would help the United States counter adversaries such as China, which has a larger industrial base, Roper said during a webinar hosted by the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies. The 2018 National Defense Strategy listed China as a great power competitor. “Our defense primes are going to continue to be heavy movers and shakers for us, but we're not going to win against China long term” without bringing in additional industry players, he said. “If they've got a nationalized industrial base, they have access to their entire talent pool. They have access to every company that's within their border. And we are only working with a small subset” of industry. To encourage these changes, the service has been taking steps such as setting up AFVentures.The effort is a collaboration between the Air Force Small Business Innovation Research/Small Business Technology Transfer Program and AFWERX to invest in companies that may have technology useful to the military. Some of the funding is coming from private investors. Over the last year and a half, the service has added over 1,000 companies to its industrial roster, Roper said. Many of these firms are working on research-and-development prototypes, which may lead to contracts for steady work later down the road, he noted. Through AFWERX, the Air Force has been giving out awards and making different levels of “bets” on technology, with small bets totaling between $50,000 to $75,000; medium bets worth between $1 million to $3 million; and big bets from $5 million to $50 million, according to the service. “It begins with getting companies through that front door so that they can move on to steady-state contracts and programs of record supporting the warfighters,” Roper said. Until recently the push to move away from the standard defense industrial base model through AFWERX has only been experimental, he noted. The service must make it the standard practice for acquiring new weapons, he said. “This is the year that we have to make it codified, steady-state across the Air and Space Force,” he said. “It's imperative. It's the bread and butter of winning the competition long term.” https://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/articles/2020/7/29/air-force-eyes-new-industrial-base-model

Aircraft has been sent to the region but was designed for combat in Europe, which could affect its capabilities, according to Yang Wei China's answer to the Raptor has yet to be put to the test in a real combat situation, military expert notes Minnie Chan Published: 12:00am, 30 Jul, 2020 America's F-22 Raptor stealth fighter was designed for combat in Europe but is now being used in the Asia-Pacific, according to a top Chinese aircraft designer, who says the different conditions will limit its capabilities there. Yang Wei, general designer of China's first stealth fighter the J-20, said the twin-engine F-22s could face the same challenges in the region as the F-4 fighter-bombers the Pentagon sent to the Vietnam war between 1965 and 1973. “The complex environment and political constraints in Vietnam caused the F-4 to almost fail to show its high-speed performance and over-the-horizon combat capabilities,” Yang wrote in a paper published in Chinese aeronautics journal Acta Aeronautica et Astronautica Sinica last month. He said the F-22, a tactical fighter inspired by the Cold War between the United States and the former Soviet Union, was designed for battle in Europe and could face similar problems now that it had been deployed in the Asia-Pacific. Yang did not draw any comparisons between America's F-22 and China's J-20 both fifth-generation, twin-engine heavy fighter jets and of a similar size. But military experts said his remarks indicated that the J-20 Weilong, or Powerful Dragon, was clearly seen as China's answer to the F-22. Comparing the two, Song Zhongping, a military commentator in Hong Kong, said the J-20's biggest advantage was that it was developed later, meaning its designers could learn from the F-22 – including how to fix shortcomings, and what type of new technologies could be used to optimise the aircraft. “The F-22 was originally designed for combat with the former Soviet Union, or today's Russia, in Europe, but now the Raptor's main opponent is the [People's Liberation Army] in the Asia-Pacific,” Song said. “China's J-20 was inspired by the F-22's deployment. The Chinese aircraft designers used the Raptor as a rival and the F-35 [stealth multi-role fighter] as a tactical opponent to help them to come up with a more practical and capable fighter jet.” Both the F-22 and the J-20 have a ceiling of 20km (12.4 miles) and a maximum speed of over Mach 2 (2,470km per hour, or 1,535mph) – faster than the speed of sound. The F-22 has a comparatively shorter range – with a combat radius of 800km (497 miles), while the J-20's large internal fuel tank can sustain a longer combat radius of 1,100km (684 miles). But Beijing-based military expert Zhou Chenming noted that the J-20, which entered service in 2017, had yet to be put to the test in a real combat situation. Andrei Chang, founder of influential military magazine Kanwa Asian Defence, said that in contrast, the F-22's combat capabilities had been seen, most recently last year when the stealth fighters were sent to Qatar as tensions rose with Iran. “The operation of the F-22 has been perfected since it joined the US military in 2005. The Raptor has taken part in countless actual combat situations around the globe, including in the Middle East, Singapore and Okinawa in the Pacific,” Chang said. A military source close to the PLA believed the J-20 could counter the F-22 in a one-on-one combat situation, but said far fewer of the fighter jets had been made compared to America's Raptors. “At the moment China has about 60 J-20s – just one-third of the total number of F-22s,” said the source, who requested anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter. “Now the US has deployed hundreds of F-35s to the region, so it's an even bigger threat to China,” he added. With F-22s being deployed to the Asia-Pacific region – and as relations worsen with Washington, including over the disputed South China Sea – Beijing has stepped up development of its new stealth fighter. Mass production of the J-20B began earlier this month. https://www.scmp.com/news/china/military/article/3095219/americas-f-22-stealth-fighter-may-be-limited-asia-pacific

NAVY Advanced Technology Systems Co.,* McLean, Virginia (N00039-20-D-0060); Forward Slope Inc.,* San Diego, California (N00039-20-D-0061); ITC Defense,* Arlington, Virginia (N00039-20-D-0062); Solute Inc.,* San Diego, California (N00039-20-D-0063); and Veterans First Initiative,* Gainesville, Virginia (N00039-20-D-0064), are awarded a $75,000,000 not-to-exceed, hybrid (firm-fixed-price, cost-plus fixed-fee, cost-reimbursable, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity) multiple award contract (MAC) for command, control, communications, computers and intelligence integrated international support services in support of U.S. security assistance and security cooperation programs. No contract funds will be obligated on the basic MAC awards. Funds in the amount of $2,000 per awardee will be obligated at the time of award on the first task order under each contract utilizing fiscal 2020 Foreign Military Sales (FMS) administration funding. This contract utilizes FMS funding from various security cooperation partners that will be identified as individual task orders are issued. Work will be performed in various overseas locations based on the requirement for each task order placed. The ordering period for each contract is five years. Contract funds that are awarded using FMS administration funding will expire at the end of the current fiscal year; any funds awarded using FMS case funding will not expire at the end of the year. These contracts were competitively procured with small business proposals solicited and 10 offers were received via the beta.SAM.gov and Naval Information Warfare Systems Command e-Commerce websites. The Naval Information Warfare Systems Command, San Diego, California, is the contracting activity. Heffler Contracting Group,* El Cajon, California, is awarded an $25,000,000 maximum amount, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract for heavy and civil engineering construction at various locations within the metro San Diego, California area (Naval Bases San Diego, Coronado, Point Loma and Marine Corps Air Station Miramar). No task orders are being issued at this time. The work to be performed provides for the design, construction, supervision, equipment, material, labor and all means necessary for other heavy and civil engineering construction, repairs, renovations and new construction projects. The term of the contract is not to exceed 60 months and work is expected to be completed by July 2025. Fiscal 2020 operations and maintenance (Navy) (O&M, N) contract funds in the amount of $2,000 are obligated on this award and will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. Future task orders will be primarily funded by military construction (Navy); O&M, N; and O&M (Marine Corps). This contract was competitively procured via the beta.SAM.gov contract opportunities website and four proposals were received. The Naval Facilities Engineering Command Southwest, San Diego, California, is the contracting activity (N62473-20-D-1110). HDR Architecture Inc., Arlington, Virginia, is awarded a $13,781,605 firm-fixed-price contract to provide post-construction award services for the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center addition/alteration at Naval Support Activity Bethesda, Maryland. The contract is incrementally funded with the first increment of $3,000,000 being allocated at the time of award. Work will be performed in Bethesda, Maryland. The work to be performed provides architect and engineering post construction award services for construction consultation to the government and provides assistance with technical issues that may arise in connection with the project during the construction of the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center addition/alteration at Naval Support Activity Bethesda, Maryland. This work consists of responding to requests for information, review shop drawing submittals, prepare record drawings, field consultation during construction, partnering meetings and other post construction award services as needed. In addition, full time/on-site representation will be required for field consultations or participations in construction progress team reviews. Work is expected to be completed by March 2026. Fiscal 2016 military construction (Department of Defense-wide) contract funds are obligated on this award and will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. Pursuant to the Federal Acquisition Regulation 6.302-1(a)(2)(iii), which authorizes the use of other than full and open competition when there is only one available source, this contract was sole sourced to HDR Architecture Inc. because of their uniquely qualified position to perform the required work. The Naval Facilities Engineering Command Washington, Washington, D.C., is the contracting activity (N40080-20-C-0016). Curtiss-Wright Fleet Solutions, Chesapeake, Virginia, is awarded a $13,308,348 not to exceed, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity, firm-fixed-price contract for labor, parts, support to installations, troubleshooting, repair and maintenance of Navy equipment manufactured and serviced by Curtiss-Wright Fleet Solutions. Equipment includes low, medium and high pressure air compressors, single stage turbines, pumps, compressed air valves and manifolds for various ship classes in support of Naval Surface Warfare Center Philadelphia Division. Work will be performed in Chesapeake, Virginia (85%); the remaining (15%) will be performed in Newport News, Virginia, as determined by the individual task orders. Work is expected to be completed by July 2026. Fiscal 2017 shipbuilding and conversion (Navy) funding in the amount of $500 ($500 minimum guarantee for contract) will be obligated at time of award via an individual task order and will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was not competitively procured in accordance with 10 U.S. Code 2304(c)(1); only one responsible source and no other supplies or services will satisfy agency requirements. The Naval Surface Warfare Center Philadelphia Division, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is the contracting activity (N64498-20-D-4028). AIR FORCE L3 Technologies Inc., Bristol, Pennsylvania, has been awarded a $64,232,376 firm-fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract for Telemetry Security Products (TSP) and ancillary services. The contractor shall manufacture and deliver all TSP, National Security Agency (NSA) approved class one encryption products and NSA-approved encryption accessories, in accordance with individual delivery orders. The contractor shall perform the following services in accordance with individual delivery orders, telecommunications electronics materials protected from emanating spurious transmissions test, electromagnetic interference/radio frequency interference test, product upgrade/enhancement, repair and technical support as required. Work will be performed in Bristol, Pennsylvania, and is expected to be completed by July 28, 2025. This award is the result of a sole-source acquisition. Fiscal 2019 Department of Defense procurement funds in the amount of $549,200 are being obligated at the time of award. Directorate of Contracting, Edwards Air Force Base, California, is the contracting activity. Hardwood Products Co. L.P., Guilford, Maine, has been awarded a not-to-exceed $51,150,000 undefinitized contract action (UCA) for industrial base expansion for U.S. domestic production capacity for medical flock tip swabs. This contract award is part of the ongoing collaboration between the Department of Defense and Health and Human Services, led by the department's Joint Acquisition Task Force and funded through the CARES Act to enable and support domestic industrial base expansion for critical medical resources. Primary tasks under this contract action include procurement, assembly and installation of flock tip swab assembly and packaging machinery and buildout of a production facility. Work will be performed in Guilford, Maine, and is expected to be completed eight months after receipt of UCA. This award is the result of a sole-source acquisition. Air Force Life Cycle Management, Hanscom Air Force Base, Massachusetts, is the contracting activity (FA8730-20-C-0056). A-Tech Corp., Albuquerque, New Mexico has been awarded a $16,923,957 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract for a communication system with two-way time transfer operating within W/V-bands and incorporating Free Space Optical links. This system will model Heterogeneous Optical W/V-band Demonstration, evaluate and develop its components and demonstrate its potential at meeting these objectives. Work will be performed in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and is expected to be completed Oct. 31, 2025. This award is the result of a competitive acquisition with one offer received. Fiscal 2019 and 2020 research and development funds in the amount of $365,733 are being obligated at time of award. Air Force Research Laboratory, Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico, is the contracting activity (FA9453-20-C-0024). Perry Management Corp., Pearl City, Hawaii, has been awarded a $15,041,798 indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract for refuse services. The contractor shall provide all personnel, equipment, tools, materials, vehicles, supervision and other items and services necessary to perform installation-wide Municipal Solid Waste collection/disposal to include asbestos disposal service specific to Joint Base San Antonio (JBSA) Lackland, Texas. Municipal Solid Waste collection services at JBSA installations include Lackland, Randolph, Fort Sam Houston, Camp Bullis, Canyon Lake military recreation areas, and Seguin Airfield in Texas, in accordance with all local, state and federal laws, regulations, standards, instructions, commercial practices or international agreements. This award is the result of a competitive acquisition and five offers were received. Fiscal 2020 operations and maintenance funds in the amount of $18,288 are being obligated at the time of award. The contract is expected to be completed by Feb. 28, 2025. The 502nd Contracting Squadron, JBSA Lackland, Texas, is the contracting activity (FA3016-20-D-0024). SRC Inc., North Syracuse, New York, has been awarded a $7,627,257 task order for primarily platform electronic fit and supporting telecommunication parametric data support under the indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract FA7037-17-D-0001 for the sensor beam program. The contractor will research, analyze, technically document and perform reviews on electromagnetic systems, events and signatures required by all services and other U.S. agencies. Work will be performed at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland, Texas, and is expected to be completed July 30, 2021. Fiscal 2020 operations and maintenance funds in the full amount are being obligated at the time of award. Acquisition Management and Integration Center-Detachment 2, Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland, Texas, is the contracting activity. DEFENSE LOGISTICS AGENCY Draeger Inc., Telford, Pennsylvania, has been awarded a maximum $60,000,000 modification (P00029) exercising the sixth one-year option period of a one-year base contract (SPE2D1-14-D-0004) with nine one-year option periods for patient monitoring systems, subsystems, accessories, consumables and training. This is a fixed-price with economic-price-adjustment indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract. Location of performance is Pennsylvania, with an Aug. 5, 2021, ordering period end date. Using customers are Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and federal civilian agencies. Type of appropriation is fiscal 2020 through 2021 defense working capital funds. The contracting activity is the Defense Logistics Agency Troop Support, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. ARMY Raytheon/Lockheed Martin Javelin JV, Tucson, Arizona, was awarded a $47,239,843 modification (P00022) to contract W31P4Q-19-C-0076 for full rate production of the Javelin weapon system. Work will be performed in Tucson, Arizona, with an estimated completion date of Aug. 31, 2023. Fiscal 2010 and 2020 missile procurement (Army) funds in the amount of $47,239,843 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, is the contracting activity. Threat Tech-Yorktown Systems Group JV LLC,* Hampton, Virginia, was awarded a $31,362,444 hybrid (firm-fixed-price, time-and-materials) contract for core functions support services for U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command. Bids were solicited via the internet with five received. Work will be performed in Fort Eustis, Virginia, with an estimated completion date of Aug. 9, 2025. Fiscal 2020 operations and maintenance (Army) funds in the amount of $19,997,056 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Field Directorate Office, Fort Eustis, Virginia, is the contracting activity (W911S0-20-C-0007). River City Construction LLC, East Peoria, Illinois, was awarded a $30,100,000 firm-fixed-price contract for construction of a consolidated communications building at Scott Air Force Base, Illinois. Bids were solicited via the internet with three received. Work will be performed at Scott Air Force Base, with an estimated completion date of Jan. 9, 2023. Fiscal 2017 military construction (Air Force) funds in the amount of $30,100,000 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Louisville, Kentucky, is the contracting activity (W912QR-20-C-0028). The Boeing Co., Mesa, Arizona, was awarded an $11,250,000 modification (P00053) to contract W58RGZ-16-C-0023 to update critical safety items for the Apache attack helicopter (AH-64E). Work will be performed in Mesa, Arizona, with an estimated completion date of Dec. 31, 2024. Fiscal 2018 and 2019 aircraft procurement (Army) funds in the amount of $11,250,000 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, is the contracting activity. DEFENSE ADVANCED RESEARCH PROJECTS AGENCY Kitware Inc., Clifton, New York, was awarded an $11,947,912 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract for a research project under the Semantic Forensics (SemaFor) program. The SemaFor program will develop methods that exploit semantic inconsistencies in falsified media to perform tasks across media modalities and at scale. Work will be performed in Clifton Park, New York; Corvallis, Oregon; and at university laboratories in New York, New York; Albany, New York; Tempe, Arizona; Urbana, Illinois; and Ann Arbor, Michigan, with an expected completion date of July 2024. Fiscal 2020 research, development, test and evaluation funding in the amount of $1,733,340 is being obligated at time of award. This contract was a competitive acquisition under a full and open broad agency announcement and 37 proposals were received. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, Arlington, Virginia, is the contracting activity (HR0011-20-C-0123). *Small Business https://www.defense.gov/Newsroom/Contracts/Contract/Article/2293268/source/GovDelivery/

Andrew Eversden A critical piece of the U.S. Army's network modernization push is ensuring its systems work with allies. In future battles, the Army will not fight alone; it will be joined by coalition partners, as well as other U.S. services. As the Army moves to improve its integrated tactical network, it must ensure that its network tools work with coalition and service partners The Army recently completed a critical design review of Capability Set '21 a set of new network tools that will be delivered to soldiers next year. The service is in the first phase of procuring the new capabilities. A “key factor” involved in delivery to soldiers at the battalion level and below is a move to a 75 percent “secure but unclassified” network that provides improved communication between coalition partners, said Col. Garth Winterle, project manager for tactical radios at the Army's Program Executive Office Command, Control, Communications-Tactical. “We're moving off of an all-secret network to one that's a lot more flexible and actually encourages coalition interoperability,” Winterle said. One opportunity to test interoperability was Defender Europe 2020, which was meant to be one of the largest European exercises involving both the U.S. Army and NATO allies, but had to be scaled down due to the coronavirus pandemic. Still, the Army was able to test interoperability. There were a series of pre-Defender Europe exercises to assess capabilities “to inform future network design,” according to Justine Ruggio, director of communications for the Network Cross-Functional Team at Army Futures Command. These assessments included several pieces of Capability Set '21, including communications exercises and validation exercises with the Army's fielded Command Post Computing Environment software, Tactical Server Infrastructure and Commercial Coalition Equipment “to enable the use of the Mission Partner Environment, which allowed all participants to share classified information during the exercise, including the Polish and U.K.,” Ruggio said. During the pre-Defender Europe tests, “we were able to bridge the Polish and U.K. unit into an integrated command structure using our secret releasable network and create that common command-and-control picture,” Col. Lesley Kipling, the mission command lead and Army National Guard liaison officer to the Network CFT, said in an interview with C4ISRNET. Secret but releasable information is classified at the secret level and can be released to certain coalition partners who have sufficient clearance from their home country. An exercise scheduled for next year, called Warfighter 21-4, will allow for additional interoperability assessments with U.K. and French forces. According to Ruggio, one focus area will be on interoperability using the Network CFT's DevOps model to iterate the Command Post Computing Environment, continue to assess Commercial Coalition Equipment and evaluate the Mission Partner Environment. The event will be aligned with Capability Set '23, the next iteration of network tools. Kipling added that the cross-functional team and its partners are “continuing” to work on policies and training for properly connecting to a coalition network “so that it's not learning on the fly, but that these procedures and policies are codified in a way that they can be standardized and any user can execute whenever they're put in a situation,” she said. Brig. Gen. Joseph Papenfus, chief Information officer and deputy chief of staff of the G6 of U.S. Army Europe, said that the scaled-back nature of Defender Europe did affect network interoperability testing because soldiers were unable to come over from the United States. That means that U.S. Army Europe will focus heavily on European partners during the smaller exercises, Papenfus said, including validating network integration and establishing a secret but releasable network with NATO. “Every opportunity that we have to see how a piece of equipment works within the larger set of the network, we take advantage of that,” Ruggio said. https://www.c4isrnet.com/yahoo-syndication/2020/07/29/how-army-network-modernization-efforts-ensure-equipment-works-with-allies/

By: Sen. David Perdue Right now, the world is more dangerous than any time in my lifetime. The United States faces five major threats: China, Russia, Iran, North Korea and terrorism. We face those threats across five domains: air, land, sea, cyberspace and space. The U.S. Navy is one of the most effective tools we as a country have to maintain peace and stability around the world. Today, however, the Navy is in danger of being surpassed in capability by our near-peer competitors. On top of that, our competitors are becoming even more brazen in their attempts to challenge our Navy every day. To address this, the 2018 National Defense Authorization Act called for a 355-ship Navy to be built as soon as possible. This effort is extremely expensive: $31 billion per year for 30 years. This can't be funded by new debt. We must reallocate resources to fund this priority. It is unclear at this time whether we will be able to achieve this goal, however, because Washington politicians have failed to provide consistent funding to our shipbuilding enterprise over the years. The last two Democratic presidents reduced military spending by 25 percent. Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama did it. Also, since 1975, Congress has only funded the government on time on four occasions due to our broken budget process. As a result, Congress forces the military in most years to operate under continuing resolutions, which further restricts the Navy's efforts to rebuild. These shortsighted decisions by Washington have had draconian effects on our military readiness. They have decimated our industrial supplier base and severely damaged critical supply chains. According to a 2018 report from the Pentagon, the entire Department of Defense lost over 20,000 U.S.-based industrial suppliers from 2000 to 2018. This means that, today, many shipbuilding components have just one U.S.-based supplier, and others are entirely outsourced to other countries. This is one of the reasons why it is doubtful that we can reach 355 ships unless major changes are made immediately. If we don't strengthen our industrial supplier base, there is simply no way to scale up ship production and maintenance capabilities to meet the requirements of a 355-ship fleet. The Department of Defense has not yet released this year's 30-year shipbuilding plan as required by law, and time is running out to reach the Navy's most recent projection of a 355-ship fleet by 2034. However, even if the Department of Defense has a solid, achievable plan to only reach 355 ships, I am skeptical that it will be enough. I am skeptical because America's biggest long-term challenge, China, is already running laps around us on shipbuilding. The Chinese Navy has 350 ships today, compared to our 300. By 2034, China is projected to have more than 425 ships. Even if we reached 355 ships, we would still have a 70-ship disadvantage, at the least. On top of that, because of the range restrictions in the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, which just ended in 2019, China has surpassed, or “out-sticked,” us in some missile capabilities as well. There are several steps we can take to respond to these developments. For starters, we need to place greater emphasis on funding our shipbuilding enterprise. Also, we need to rebuild our industrial supply chains through consistent, robust funding and by eliminating continuing resolutions. This year's NDAA takes critical steps to ensure we can keep up with our near-peer competitors and keep our country safe. It authorizes an increase of more than $1 billion for the construction of new submarines, destroyers and amphibious dock ships. It invests hundreds of millions of dollars to support our industrial supplier base. However, more work remains to be done in the coming years. We need to dramatically build up our Navy beyond 355 ships to ensure that the American-led free world can continue. President Teddy Roosevelt once said that “a good Navy is not a provocation to war. It is the surest guarantee of peace.” If we don't continue ramping up our shipbuilding enterprise right now, the world that we will be passing on to our children and grandchildren will only continue to grow more dangerous. Sen. David Perdue, R-Ga., is the chairman of the Seapower Subcommittee of the Senate Armed Services Committee. https://www.defensenews.com/opinion/commentary/2020/07/29/to-keep-up-with-our-competitors-america-must-boost-shipbuilding/

By: Burak Ege Bekdil   ANKARA, Turkey — A Turkish private drone manufacturer has won a contract to sell a batch of 50 miniature tactical drones to the Greek Ministry of Defence, the company announced July 28. The company Assuva Savunma Sanayi said two Proton Elic RB-128 drones sent to Greece successfully passed acceptance tests. Remzi Basbug, president of Assuva, said this is the company's first export deal to a country that is both a NATO and a European Union member. “We have obtained all necessary export licenses for the export to Greece,” Basbug said, adding that the company has previously sold the same drone systems to Turkish, Chinese and Sri Lankan armed forces. The Assuva miniature tactical drone can be used for search and rescue missions. It can also detect underground bunkers, explosives, land mines and chemical material. Featuring a thermal camera, it can capture imagery from a distance of up to 1 kilometer, and 50 meters underground. The company says its drone is the product of domestic engineering and software. https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2020/07/29/greece-orders-50-turkish-drones/