Report to congress on Constellation-class frigate program (FFG-62). ” Congress funded the procurement of the first FFG-62 class ship in FY2020 at a cost of $1,281.2 million (i.e., about $1.3 billion). The Navy’s proposed FY2021 budget requests $1,053.1 million (i.e., about $1.1 billion) for the procurement of the second FFG-62 class ship.”
AFWERX announces record response, $38 million for ‘flying car’ topic. “more than 250 proposals as part of its X20D Small Business Technology Transfer, or STTR, Open Topic solicitation, a record in the program’s nearly three-decade history.”
Senate democrats want hearing on Pentagon vaccine effort. Other Transaction backlash? “Warren and Hirono are concerned that OWS’s distribution of $6 billion in awards “bypasses regulatory requirements and limits transparency, raising numerous questions and ethical concerns,” the two wrote.”
Three ways procurement is being redesigned post Covid. “Prior to the pandemic, the MoD had a ‘prime contracting model’ where its prime suppliers would be expected to manage the supply chain and manage supply chain risks, Forzani explained.”
GM Defense delivers 1st infantry military vehicles to US Army. “… it will support the production of up to 2,065 vehicles as it gets additional authorization over the eight-year contract. “
Does Palantir see too much? “… federal contracts, Karp said, were largely apolitical, and a change in the White House was unlikely to affect Palantir.”
BAE systems working on skyborg technology for USAF drone concept. “… including an airframe design and subsystem proposals… “We are still in the early stages of development and have not yet determined the design of our attritable air vehicle system.””
The big controversy: Path to install hypersonic weapons on Arleigh Burke destroyers unclear. “The size of the weapons would prevent them from being fired off a deck launcher, similar to the 18-inch-diameter Harpoon anti-ship missiles on the Flight I Burkes. Installing the current weapons, in their current configuration, would mean removing some number of Mk-41 cells to accommodate the larger missiles. The cost of such an engineering effort is unclear.”
John Kuehn on it all: Force Structure Perspectives. “I concluded to the CNO that I would take a smaller, more ready fleet than a larger, unready one.”
The drone war over Ukraine’s tranches foretells the future of air combat. “The Russians can jam it, no problem,” Chernetskyi said of the Raven. “It was made for Afghanistan, and the Taliban didn’t have jamming.”
The excellent Bill Greenwalt: Buy American eramarks slip in: defense committees must act. “Thus, the House’s combined approach… is to give one U.S. company a 100% monopoly now and into the future to keep selling the Navy older and obsolete technology.”
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