Airmen work on an RQ-4 Global Hawk after it returned to Beale Air Force Base, Calif. The US Air Force has decided not to pursue an adapter that would improve the Block 30's sensor suite. (US Air Force)

Nov. 20, 2013 - By BRIAN EVERSTINE – Defense news

The US Air Force will not buy a “universal payload adapter” to attach sensors from the U-2 to a variant of the unmanned RQ-4 Global Hawk, another sign that the service is not interested in keeping the brand-new planes in the sky.

The Block 30 variant of the Global Hawk, a massive unmanned aircraft designed for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, has been repeatedly targeted for cuts by the Air Force. The service planned to move the aircraft straight from the production line to the boneyard in 2013, but that move was blocked by Congress.

The Block 30’s sensor suite is not as capable as the U-2, and Global Hawk builder Northrop Grumman has been designing an adapter to attach the superior system to the unmanned aircraft. The Air Force, however, does not intend to use the adapter, said Maj. Ryan Simms, the chief of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance and remotely pilot aircraft policy in the headquarters Air Force executive action group.

Northrop Grumman officials said earlier this year that they are working through internal research and development on the adapter. Tom Vice, head of Northrop’s Aerospace Systems sector, told reporters in August that it was a “mature technology.”

The Air Force called the adapter “feasible,” and said it would cost about $487 million. It would take three years to develop and test, followed by another two years of production, according to an April report sent to congressional defense committees.

The adapter would attach the Optical Bar Camera or Senior Year Electro-Optical Reconnaissance System-2b sensors, in addition to Airborne Signals Intelligence Payload.

Simms told Air Force Times on Tuesday that budget restrictions will prevent the service from moving forward with the adapter.

Despite their uncertain future, Block 30s are currently flying humanitarian aid and military missions, Simms said. One Global Hawk in the Philippines has flown 50 hours and taken 300 pictures, he said.

MOSCOU, 20 novembre - RIA Novosti

Plusieurs pays ayant refusé de détruire les arsenaux chimiques syriens sur leur sol, les Etats-Unis ont proposé de le faire dans les eaux internationales via un navire dévolu à cela, écrit le New York Times se référant à des officiels américains.

Selon un plan détaillé de l'Organisation pour l'interdiction des armes chimiques (OIAC), toutes les substances susceptibles d'être utilisées pour la fabrication d'armes chimiques, à l'exception de l'isopropanol, seront évacuées de Syrie au plus tard le 5 février 2014. Toutefois, plusieurs pays qui s'étaient vus invités à détruire ces arsenaux sur leur sol ont refusé de participer à cette opération. 

Les sources du New York Times affirment que ce refus a poussé la communauté internationale à rechercher une alternative. Les Etats-Unis examinent deux scénarios possibles susceptibles d'être mis en place dans 75 jours seulement.

Conformément au premier projet, les précurseurs des arsenaux chimiques seront détruits dans cinq incinérateurs installés à bord d'un navire flottant dans les eaux internationaux. L'opération en question prendra 60 jours au maximum. Les substances qui en résulteront ne représenteront aucun danger, indique l'interlocuteur de l'agence. 

La participation de compagnies, navires ou experts américains n'est pas prévue. Toutefois, les Etats-Unis se déclarent prêts à assurer la sécurité du navire et s'engagent à envoyer leurs bâtiments de guerre et chasseurs dans sa zone de localisation. 

Le second scénario prévoit le recours à un système mobile high-tech développé par le Pentagone afin de neutraliser les précurseurs d'armes chimiques. Par le biais de la combinaison entre de l'eau, d'autres substances et de la chaleur, l'équipement en question permet de transformer les précurseurs des armes chimiques en combinaisons ne pouvant plus servir à la fabrication des arsenaux en question. La durée de la mise en place de ce projet est estimée à 10 jours.

Toutefois, le New York Times souligne que Washington continue à chercher un pays qui accepterait de recevoir sur son sol les plus de 1.000 tonnes de substances chimiques et de précurseurs déclarés par Damas.

Nov. 19, 2013 – Defense News (AFP)

KABUL — Afghanistan and the United States have solved a key sticking point in a crucial security pact just two days before it was due to be voted on by Afghan tribal and political leaders, an Afghan official said Tuesday.

Aimal Faizi, President Hamid Karzai’s spokesman, told reporters in Kabul that the deal would allow US troops to enter Afghan homes once NATO forces withdraw in 2014 but only in “extraordinary circumstances” where there was an urgent risk to life. The compromise appeared to end an impasse which had threatened to derail the agreement.

Faizi said President Karzai and Secretary of State John Kerry spoke by phone Tuesday during final negotiations for the bilateral security treaty (BSA) which will shape Washington’s future military presence in the war-scarred nation.

However officials in Washington said there was still some way to go before reaching a final agreement on the pact.

“We’re not there yet. There are still some final issues we are working through,” said State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki.

She confirmed that Kerry had spoken with Karzai on Tuesday morning, adding “obviously, there has been some progress made to resolve outstanding issues.” But she refused to go into any details.

Even if a final agreement is reached, Afghanistan has insisted that the BSA must be approved by a mass gathering of tribal chieftains and politicians.

The four-day grand assembly, known as a “loya jirga” in Pashto, is set to begin on Thursday in Kabul.

Key obstacles to finalizing the pact have included the question of legal immunity for those US troops who remain and whether they will be able to search the homes of Afghan citizens.

Faizi said both sides had now agreed to the “extraordinary exception” clause on house searches.

He also said President Barack Obama would write to Karzai and the Afghan people assuring them that US troops would not “misuse” the searches and that “those extraordinary circumstances would be strictly defined.”

He added that Karzai would expect the letter to acknowledge the fact that Afghan people have suffered in the last decade.

“What is important for the Afghan government is the US is acknowledging the fact that there have been mistakes in the war on terror, that in the conduct of military operations in Afghanistan mistakes were made and that the people of Afghanistan have suffered in the last decade,” he said.

Officials at the White House Tuesday said they would not comment on any presidential correspondence.

And a senior State Department official said later Tuesday that the request for a letter had come from Karzai during the phone call with Kerry.

“Secretary Kerry indicated that we want to continue working together to find a path forward, and that we will consider his request for reassurances including the option of a letter from the administration stating our position,” the official said.

Karzai had also invited Kerry to attend the loya jirga, but the US top diplomat said it” would not be possible for him to attend this week,” the official said.

The BSA will determine how many US troops stay in Afghanistan when most of NATO’s troops deployed in the country since 2001 — currently numbering 75,000 — leave at the end of 2014.

The Taliban have branded the loya jirga meeting a US-designed plot, vowing to pursue and punish its delegates as traitors if they approve the BSA.

Highlighting the ongoing security challenges facing Afghanistan, a Taliban suicide bomber on Saturday struck close to the venue where the meeting is set to be held killing a dozen people, most of them civilians.

The issue of US-troop immunity sank a similar deal in Iraq in 2011, leading the Americans to pull out completely. The country is now in the grip of some of its worst sectarian violence since 2008.

Nov. 19, 2013 by FG

Dubai - Potential customers for the Bell Boeing V-22 tiltrotor are being urged to take advantage of spare delivery slots, which will be available during the US government’s next five-year contract for the type.

The Department of Defense’s recently signed second multiyear procurement deal (MYP II) covers the planned manufacture of 100 V-22s for the US Marine Corps and US Air Force through the 2014 to 2019 fiscal years.

“The production profile is declining [from MYP I], and there is spare capacity for FMS [Foreign Military Sales] customers,” says USMC Col Dan Robinson, V-22 joint programme manager.

US defense secretary Chuck Hagel recently announced that Washington is to “expedite” the delivery of six V-22s to the Israeli air force, but Robinson declines to comment on the programme’s current status. Potential additional buyers are not being named, but he confirms: “I think we’ve got 18 or 19 [slots] left on the contract, and the capacity to add for whichever customer comes forward.”

Interest in the Middle East region is being shown in both the Osprey’s core military transport role, and also through its potential to receive a VIP cabin fit, Robinson says. He also hailed the USMC’s performance in deploying 12 MV-22s from Iwakuni in Japan to participate in humanitarian relief efforts mounted in the wake of Typhoon Haiyan, which devastated parts of the Philippines.

Meanwhile, the four MV-22s visiting the show this week completed a roughly 1,500nm (2,770km) self-deployment from a Marine Expeditionary Unit vessel off the coast of east Africa, each being refuelled three times in-flight. “That really demonstrates the versatility of this aircraft,” says Robinson, adding: “Since 2007, it has seen the full spectrum of operations.”

Nov. 19, 2013 - by AARON MEHTA – Defense News

WASHINGTON — The US Air Force is unlikely to see a new combat search and rescue (CSAR) helicopter in the near future, but the service remains committed to the mission, according to its top civilian.

“It’s an important platform with a lot of support, but it will be very difficult because of how little money there is for new starts in the coming year,” Eric Fanning, acting Air Force secretary, told reporters at an Air Force Association breakfast Monday. “I’m hard-pressed to imagine we can afford to start that soon based on the sequestration numbers and mechanics.

“I think all of the services, if given more money, would be investing it in what they’ve got, in their readiness and training, rather than starting something new.”

Defense News reported this week that the Combat Rescue Helicopter (CRH) program is not funded under the sequestered budget assembled by the Air Force. The CRH program is the Defense Department’s second attempt in the past decade to replace its heavily used Sikorsky-built Pave Hawk helicopters, some of which have been performing military and civil rescue operations since 1982. The Air Force wants to buy 112 new helicopters.

However, Fanning insisted the Air Force is not going to abandon the CSAR mission.

“That is still a priority mission for the Air Force,” Fanning said. “I have not seen a more emotional debate among the Air Force four-stars than when it came to the search-and-rescue mission. It impressed upon me how important that mission is.”

The service will continue to weigh whether the mission could be handled by Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC) as a stopgap until a helicopter replacement program can move forward. AFSOC spent several months this summer pushing to take over the CSAR mission, under the belief that its Bell-Boeing CV-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft could perform the mission at a lower cost. That idea has met resistance, both on Capitol Hill and from Air Combat Command (ACC), which operates the mission.

“If we can’t fund that new helicopter in the near years, it doesn’t mean we’re walking away from the mission, it doesn’t mean we’re walking away from recapitalization,” Fanning said. “But there is also a debate about where the mission should be in the Air Force, and that was the real emotional part — ACC versus Air Force Special Operations. We asked them to come back to us in the [fiscal 2016 planning budget] decision.”

In 2006, the Air Force awarded Boeing a contract expected to be worth $15 billion under the Combat Search and Rescue Helicopter program (CSAR-X). But after the Government Accountability Office upheld a protest from competitors Sikorsky and Lockheed Martin, over how the contract was handled, the deal was canceled in 2009. It took nearly 3½ years to relaunch CRH following the CSAR-X cancellation.

Service officials planned to award the CRH contract this year, but the program has again seen delays. Despite public statements that the Air Force desired multiple bidders, only one team — United Technologies subsidiary Sikorsky, working with Lockheed Martin — submitted a bid. Three other competitors dropped out under the belief they would not be able to meet the program price cap of $6.8 billion.

HERNDON, Va., Nov. 19 (UPI)

Task orders worth nearly $24 million have been given to Northrop Grumman by the U.S. Air Force to help keep A-10 Thunderbolts flying until 2028 and beyond.

The two task orders to Northrop were issued under the A-10 Thunderbolt life cycle program support contract, which is an indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity vehicle.

Under the four-year aircraft structural integrity program Modernization V deal, Northrop Grumman will perform tasks such as damage tolerance analysis, materials testing, probabilistic and risk analysis, and stress and thermal analysis.

"Northrop Grumman is proud to continue to supporting the Air Force's premier ground-attack aircraft," said John Parker, director of Northrop Grumman's global logistics and modernization business unit. "Our focus is to always provide our customer with the highest level of engineering services possible to ensure superior program performance. We look forward to continuing our work with the Air Force and the A-10 Thunderbolt."

Northrop said its team for the task orders includes the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, the University of Dayton Research Institute in Dayton, Ohio, Borsight Inc. of Ogden, Utah, and Prime Machine Inc. of Salt Lake City.

19.11.2013 par P. Chapleau - Lignes de Défense

L'US Navy ne rigole pas avec les dessous-de-table, les escort girls gratuites et les petits cadeaux. Elle a décidé de dénoncer au moins neuf contrats avec le shipshandler Glenn Defense Marine Asia, des contrats d'une valeur d'environ 205 millions de dollars, selon le blog FCPA.

Du côté de la Navy, les têtes tombent: un officier supérieur chargé de la logistique auprès de la VIIe flotte, qui aurait accepté une enveloppe de 100 00$ pour favoriser Glenn Defense a été mis en examen et deux amiraux ont été mis en congés (le vice-amiral Ted Branch, directeur du Naval Intelligence, et le contre-amiral Bruce Loveless, directeur des opérations de ce service).

"Nous pensons que d'autres officiers et peut-être des civils employés par la Navy risquent d'être impliqués dans le scandale", a admis le porte-parole de l'US Navy, le contre-amiral John Kirby. Côté civils, c'est déjà le cas d'un agent du Naval Criminal Investigative Service, organisme chargé de l'enquête et qui aurait transmis au PDG de Glenn Defense un rapport sur les investigations en cours.

Glenn Defense Marine Asia sert d'avitailleur à de très nombreuses marines (cliquer ici pour en voir la liste), dont la France comme le montre une page (ci-dessous) du site de GDMA (l'entreprise avait même fait de la pub dans Cols Bleus, il y a quelques années):

Nov 18, 2013 ASDNews Source : Saab AB

Saab Defense and Security USA LLC, the US entity of global defence and security company Saab, has received an additional order from the U.S. Army for radio systems which are used in data communications for live training. The order has a total value of 20 million USD (approximately 135 MSEK).

The order comprises additional options of the Live Training Transformation Interim Range System (LT2-IRS). A contract awarded to Saab in April 2011 by the U.S. Army Program Executive Office for Simulation, Training and Instrumentation (PEO STRI). The new options are valued at 20 million USD. Development and production will take place in Sweden and the US.

Read more

November 19, 2013: Strategy Page

U.S. Army leaders recently admitted that budget cuts, continued costs for troops in Afghanistan (and removing $17 billion worth of equipment) as well as keeping many major procurement and development projects going has had some negative effects. One of these has been a decline in the combat readiness of most combat brigades. Training is expensive in terms of fuel and spare parts costs, not to mention wear and tear on equipment. Currently only two of 47 combat brigades are fully trained for combat. The army expects to change this as the need to keep troops in Afghanistan (and pay to withdraw equipment) and have the cash to resume training. This will require a reduction in the number of combat brigades over the next four years, from 47 to 33. Army personnel strength will also go down 14 percent (from 490,000 to 420,000) and some major procurement projects (like replacing the hummer with a more heavily armored vehicle) will be cancelled or delayed.

Growing costs (for equipment, supplies, and wages) makes these cuts even larger. For example, over the next decade defense spending will decline from 3.6 percent to 2.8 percent of GDP. These cuts are nothing new as army leaders have seen it coming for some time. Back in 2007, despite major combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, the U.S. Army went through a major reorganization. The end result was the increase in the number of combat brigades from 33 to 48 (soon reduced to 45 because of budget cuts). This required the transfer of over 40,000 people from combat-support jobs to the combat brigades. In doing this, the army got some experience in reducing personnel strength without losing capability. Most of this reset was completed, with all the new brigades ready for service by 2010. In 2007 Congress ordered the army to increase its strength by 65,000 troops, and the army planned to add five more combat brigades. The army completed that personnel expansion, to 574,000 troops by 2009, but budget cuts reduced the combat brigade expansion.

Another major expense has been the reset process, which includes repairing and rebuilding the weapons and equipment that were used in the combat zone. While there was a lot of combat damage most of the reset work went into restoring gear that was simply used much more in combat than it would be in peacetime operations. This caused some serious problems, as much of the equipment dated from the 1980s and 1990s, and was due for replacement after 20-30 years. The rigors of combat wore out a lot of that stuff way ahead of schedule. But the reset effort enabled the army to get a more accurate idea of how to design and build new equipment.

The army scrambled to develop the next generation of vehicles, equipment, and weapons during the last decade. A new generation of trucks is now showing up. New weapons and other gear had been introduced gradually, with the specs of this new stuff driven largely by combat experience. One problem area was the new generation of armored vehicles. The FCS (Future Combat System) program envisioned radically new designs for tanks and infantry vehicles. The original FCS concepts were reconsidered, and then largely dropped, because of how well the M-1 tank, M-2 infantry vehicle, and Stryker wheeled armored vehicle performed in combat.

The 2007 reforms made the brigades, not the divisions, the primary combat unit. The new brigades have more support units permanently attached and can be more easily sent off to fight by themselves. In the past, doing this involved quickly adding a lot of support units to the brigade. But the new organization makes small support units part of the brigades and, more importantly, the brigades train using these support units and learn to work well with them. The divisions still exist but operate more like the corps has for the last two centuries (coordinating the actions of a few divisions and only having a few support units under its command).

The reorganized divisions originally had four of the new brigades but can control more (or less) in action. The budget cuts and combat experience have resulted in a return to three brigades per division. Each of the new brigades (or BCTs, for Brigade Combat Teams) has 3,500-4,000 troops (depending on the type). There are three types of BCTs: light (infantry, including paratroopers), heavy (mechanized, including tanks), and Stryker (mechanized using wheeled armored vehicles). This larger number of combat brigades is achieved by reorganizing the combat units of each division into four brigades, instead of the current three. There are several independent brigades as well.

New weapons and equipment (especially satellite based communications and battlefield Internet software) enabled the army to get the same amount of combat power per brigade using fewer combat troops. The actual number of infantrymen and tanks won't change but the number of communications, maintenance, and intelligence support will. For example, increased use of robots, sensors, and computerized vidcam surveillance systems makes it possible to do the same amount of work in combat with fewer troops. A lot of these new ideas, and equipment, were tested in Iraq and Afghanistan, and most of these items have worked well in combat.

This "reform and reorganize on the run" approach enabled the U.S. Army to leap way ahead of its contemporaries in terms of combat effectiveness. This caused lots of unease in the military headquarters of the other major military powers. But the American methods also depend on lots of cash for training and new equipment required by many of the new techniques and organizational ideas. Now the money is running out and the army has to concentrate on doing more with less.

18 novembre 2013 Romandie.com (AFP)

WASHINGTON - La vice-présidente de la commission européenne Viviane Reding s'est félicitée d'une rencontre positive et constructive lundi avec le ministre américain de la Justice, sur l'interception de communications en Europe par les services d'espionnage américains.

Nous nous sommes engagés à avancer rapidement dans les négociations sur un accord de protection des données qui soit significatif et cohérent, a-t-elle déclaré à la presse, à l'issue de cette rencontre à Washington.

La commissaire européenne en charge des affaires judiciaires a parlé d'un signal très fort pour restaurer la confiance entre les deux continents, qui s'était évanouie au cours des derniers mois avec les révélations sur l'interception de communications de citoyens européens par l'Agence de sécurité nationale américaine(NSA).

Dans un communiqué commun, publié à l'issue de cette réunion bi-annuelle, les ministres américains de la Justice et de la Sécurité intérieure Eric Holder et Rand Beers ont reconnu que cette affaire avait conduit à des tensions regrettables dans la relation transatlantique que nous cherchons à apaiser.

Mme Reding a précisé que c'était la première fois que le ministre américain de la Justice Eric Holder avait admis qu'il y avait des problèmes en Europe à la suite de ces révélations.

Elle a précisé que M. Holder avait promis une solution satisfaisante (...) très rapidement s'agissant de protection des données personnelles des citoyens américains et européens. Mais cette bonne volonté doit être suivie d'actions concrètes, et rapidement, a-t-elle mis en garde.

Les négociations sur la protection des données doivent aboutir au printemps 2014, a-t-elle estimé. Elle a ajouté qu'un accord mutuel d'assistance légale devait permettre aux citoyens européens d'obtenir réparation devant les tribunaux américains.

C'est la première fois en trois ans que je vois du mouvement, s'est-elle encore félicitée, au sortir de cette réunion.

Participaient également à cette rencontre Cecilia Malmström, commissaire européenne en charge des affaires intérieures, les ministres lituaniens Juozas Bernatonis et Elvinas Jankevicius, dont le pays préside le Conseil de l'UE, et le ministre grec de la Justice Charalampos Athanasiou, représentant la future présidence grecque de l'Europe.

SEATTLE, Nov. 18 (UPI)

Boeing reports it has delivered the second of eight P-8I long-range maritime reconnaissance and anti-submarine warfare patrol aircraft ordered by India.

The aircraft, the Indian Navy variant of the P-8A Poseidon being developed for the U.S. Navy, will now undergo flight trials in India, the company said.

"With two aircraft at Naval Station Rajali now, the Indian Navy will get a good feel for the P-8I's interoperability with other aircraft," said Leland Wight, Boeing P-8I program manager. "Acceptance trials on the first aircraft are progressing well and its availability for testing has been excellent, in large part due to Boeing's worldwide 737 support capabilities."

The P-8 platform is based on Boeing's 737 commercial aircraft and is assembled using the 737 in-line production process. It features open system architecture, advanced sensor and display technologies. Boeing partners in its production include CFM International, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, Spirit AeroSystems, BAE Systems and GE Aviation.

Boeing said the first P-8I, delivered to the Indian Navy in May, recently completed testing of its weapons capabilities.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, (Nov. 18, 2013) Lockheed Martin

The Raytheon Company (NYSE: RTN) and Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT) Javelin Joint Venture received a $176 million contract for the production and delivery of 842 Block I Javelin missile rounds and 120 command launch units (CLUs). The contract was awarded to the Javelin Joint Venture in September.

The missiles will be provided through the U.S. government to the U.S. Army, U.S. Marine Corps and three international customers: Oman, Jordan and Indonesia. Funded with Special Defense Acquisition Funds, the CLUs will be delivered to the U.S. Army beginning October 2014.

“The Javelin Joint Venture is providing U.S. and allied warfighters with an affordable, versatile and lethal one-man-portable, anti-tank, guided missile and surveillance weapon,” said Jeff Miller, Raytheon Javelin program director and Javelin Joint Venture president. “This contract is important to the Javelin program because the CLU retrofit business keeps our production line warm through mid-2015.”

Javelin enhances direct-fire capability against armored vehicles, buildings and field fortifications. Using the Javelin missile system, a single infantryman can engage and defeat targets in close combat and at ranges up to two-and-a-half kilometers.

“This contract allows us to provide to our customers one of the most reliable and user-friendly systems in the world,” said Barry James, Lockheed Martin Javelin program director and Javelin Joint Venture vice president. “Javelin has proven and continues to prove itself time and time again in combat.”

About Javelin

Javelin is a compact, lightweight missile designed for one-soldier operations in all environments. It is made by the Javelin Joint Venture, a partnership between Raytheon Company and Lockheed Martin. Javelin has been adopted by international armed forces around the world. It is currently fielded with the U.S. Army and U.S. Marine Corps, and has also been approved for foreign military sales to 13 nations.

About Lockheed Martin Corporation

Headquartered in Bethesda, Md., Lockheed Martin is a global security and aerospace company that employs about 116,000 people worldwide and is principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture, integration and sustainment of advanced technology systems, products and services. The Corporation’s net sales for 2012 were $47.2 billion. For additional information, visit our website: www.lockheedmartin.com.

About Raytheon

Raytheon Company, with 2012 sales of $24 billion and 68,000 employees worldwide, is a technology and innovation leader specializing in defense, security and civil markets throughout the world. With a history of innovation spanning 91 years, Raytheon provides state-of-the-art electronics, mission systems integration and other capabilities in the areas of sensing; effects; and command, control, communications and intelligence systems; as well as a broad range of mission support services. Raytheon is headquartered in Waltham, Mass. For more about Raytheon, visit us at www.raytheon.com and follow us on Twitter @Raytheon.