Kelly worries F-35 flying costs won’t hit target, and that China may get NGAD first. (Air Force Magazine) ““I’m not brimming with confidence” that the $25K by ’25 goal will be met, Kelly said of the F-35… Kelly also said he’s concerned the nation won’t have the “courage” to field a new fighter based on NGAD technologies before America’s “pacing threat” adversary, China, starts deploying one. “I for one am confident … that the [NGAD] technology will get fielded.””
Lockheed Martin has a new F-35 sustainment proposal for the Pentagon that may improve readiness. (Defense News) “Company officials said they expect to be able to get costs per flight hour for the F-35A conventional takeoff and landing model below $25,000 (using fiscal 2012 dollars) by 2025 under the “skinny” PBL, Merchant said. Currently, it costs about $36,000 per hour to operate the aircraft.” — Note that last year we heard the $44K per flying hour for F-35A.
USAF will not sacrifice F-35 to buy NGAD, Brown Says. (Aviation Week) “The U.S. Air Force will not sacrifice its F-35 buy to pay for Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD), but other fighter programs may take a hit instead, according to the service’s chief of staff.”
US Air Force quietly admits the F-35 is a failure. (Extreme Tech) “The Air Force has announced a new study into the tactical aviation requirements of future aircraft, dubbed TacAir…. “I want to moderate how much we’re using those aircraft,” the general said. “You don’t drive your Ferrari to work every day, you only drive it on Sundays. This is our high end, we want to make sure we don’t use it all for the low-end fight.”
… Mixed signals much on the F-35? …
Space Force chief sees larger role for commercial industry in its missions. (C4ISRNET) “In fact, 350 of those 430 members of the consortium are really nontraditional contractors or academic organizations.” The Space Force has since expanded that consortium with a new contract that will see it dole out up to $12 billion in awards over the next 10 years. The Space Force has also taken over the Air Force’s Space Pitch Day concept, which invites companies to present their ideas and technologies in a “Shark Tank”-inspired competition. Acquisition officers are authorized to hand out contracts on the spot.”
Away from Silicon Valley, the military is the ideal customer. (NY Times) ““Most engineers want to engineer. They want to get stuff done,” the outspoken entrepreneur said as artillery fire echoed from a nearby range. “Most people have a pretty practical view.””
Stinger SAM-armed Marines riding in rubber rafts were featured in recent Pacific exercise. (Warzone) “… these rubber rafts could still provide a valuable way to quickly deploy at least some level of point air defense capability along with even very small Marine units during distributed operations…. The FIM-92 is a shoulder-fired, heat-seeking, surface-to-air missile, also known as a Man-Portable Air Defense System (MANPADS), that is designed primarily to engage low-flying targets, including fixed-wing aircraft, helicopters, and drones. “
Chinese assessment of new US naval strategy. (USNI News) “This strategy strives to unify thinking for all of America’s maritime forces, namely, that the U.S. no longer has command of the global commons and that the strategic guidance that forward presence can shape regional security and prevent conflict is now obsolete. All of America’s maritime forces must now shift to great power competition with China and Russia, fight for command of the sea, and gain the advantage.”
Commission calls for doubling AI R&D spending, billions more to bolster microelectronics manufacturing. (Defense Daily) “The National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence (NSCAI) wants to see the U.S. double AI research and development funding annually to reach $32 billion per year by fiscal year 2026, according to the draft of the group’s report to Congress”
Experts tell Congress how to turn innovation into reality. (Breaking Defense) ““We have wonderful examples like Kessel Run,” Coleman told the subcommittee. “What we don’t have today however is this concept of product management.” That, she explained, is the private-sector best practice in which coders get together every few weeks with the acquisition executives who can give them guidance and resources to help turn their software into a usable product.”
B-21 completes redesign with no cost, schedule impact: USAF. (Aviation Week) “Walden told Air Force magazine that a “major redesign” was required to fix problems with airflow and thrust on the B-21, which were related to the design of the bomber’s inlets, serpentine air ducts and exhausts. The USAF awarded Northrop a $21.4 billion contract, which was calculated in 2010 dollars, in October 2015 to begin developing the B-21. A second aircraft has now entered the production system five months after the Air Force confirmed the first, although neither has reached the final assembly stage.”
CNO Gilday updates professional reading program. (US Navy) “This CNO-Professional Reading Program includes 53 titles organized into four key lines of effort: Readiness, Capabilities, Capacity, and Sailors. Additionally, they are subdivided into tiers of foundational, advanced and capstone, indicating which books are appropriate during various stages of a Sailor’s career.”
Israel’s autonomous ‘robo-snipers’ and suicide drones raise ethical dilemma. (TRT World) “Israel has established itself as a pioneer of autonomous weapons, specifically with the Harop ‘Suicide Drone’, Robattle wheeled battlefield robot, and Sentry-Tech automated border control machine gun… With demand, comes opportunity. On February 11, more than Israelis including several former defence officials came under investigation for illegally designing, producing and selling ‘suicide drones’ to an unnamed Asian nation. “The Israelis are suspected of national security offenses, breaching arms exports laws, money laundering and other financial offenses,” the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported.”
Israel chooses to buy Lockheed’s CH-53K over Boeing’s CH-47. (Defense News) “ In 2017, when Israel was weighing the purchase of a heavy-lift helicopter, the cost of the CH-53K was given as $87 million, compared to $38 million for the Chinook. In 2018, reports indicated Israel was leaning toward the Chinook. A final decision was expected when a new government formed in the spring of 2020…. “The decision [to go with the CH-53K] was made following a professional assessment that included test flights in all the proposed aircraft, as well as a thorough examination of the various alternatives in terms of engineering, technology, maintenance and other considerations.” — I am a little surprised by Israel’s vote of confidence on CH-53K and F-35.
Air Force Research Laboratory wants to add more Vanguard programs. (C4ISRNET) “In 2021, Pringle said her focus is on matching investments to these transformational technologies as part of the 2030 strategy, accelerating funding by fiscal 2023.”
New Hicks memo sets acquisition, force posture 2022 budget priorities. (Breaking Defense) “Those plans called for a $27 billion shipbuilding budget in 2022, a huge increase from the $19 billion requested in 2021, and to build 82 new ships by 2026 — a significant increase from the Navy’s plan to build 44 new ships during that time. Likewise, both officials signaled support for nuclear modernization, but stopped short of pledging to uphold all aspects of the current nuclear modernization program.”
Pentagon budget must prioritize Navy, Air Force and cyber, lawmakers say. (Defense News) “When you talk about now 500 ships, sometimes some members of Congress kind of get turned off by that,” Wittman said. “I think we need to be talking clearly about the plan, [which] will have 405 manned ships, and what does that do for us to counter the Chinese. The communication needs to be simple and straightforward.”
Space Force awards engineering contract for certification of ULA’s Vulcan rocket. (Space News) “In addition to the engineering reviews, Vulcan has to complete two successful flights to get certified for national security launches. The first planned launch is a lunar lander for Astrobotic, a NASA contractor that will deliver payloads to the moon.”
DoD innovation arm delivers much-needed secure drones to the federal government. (C4ISRNET) “The Blue sUAS program provides the DoD and Federal government with trusted sUAS capabilities at commercially comparable unit costs on the General Services Administration (GSA) Schedule to ensure ease of procurement and signals aggregate government demand to strengthen the domestic sUAS industrial base,” the report said.
Defense budget: opportunities exist to improve DoD’s management of defense spending. (GAO) “GAO made recommendations that DOD take steps to better estimate its annual budget requirements and future fiscal needs for OCO, reduce improper payments, and refine and formalize its departmental reform efforts. DOD generally concurred with these recommendations and is working toward implementing them.”
DoD must improve budgeting, reevaluate systems for using funds, experts say. (MeriTalk) ““Each year, DoD allows billions of dollars appropriated by Congress to expire and a lot of this funding ends up being cancelled,” said Field. “Between fiscal year 2013 and 2018, DoD canceled more than $81 billion – returning those funds to the general treasury.”” — My view is that the obligation flurry at FY end is due to inflexibility in project tradeoffs and contracting more than a problem of expiring funds it self… The Blue sUAS is one of 11 projects that DIU transitioned to the department in 2020, up from nine last year.”
Northrop Grumman wins as Chinese and Russian hypersonic threat increases. (Seeking Alpha) “The BACN contract really was the big thing in the January contract awards, but what I also liked was the HBTSS contract. That is still a program that’s going into the prototype phase with Northrop Grumman being one of the participants, but given the objective of this program, tracking of hypersonic ballistic missiles, I think this is an important platform going forward given that Russia and China have been making moves arming themselves with hypersonic missiles.”
DARPA orders six satellites from Blue Canyon Technologies for Blackjack. (Space News) ” The spacecraft are for DARPA’s Blackjack program, a project to demonstrate a mesh network of small satellites in low Earth orbit. DARPA plans to start deploying a constellation by late 2022. Blue Canyon, based in Boulder, Colorado, is owned by Raytheon Technologies. The company is developing a custom bus design for DARPA based on its 150-kilogram X-SAT commercial bus.”
Vought 1600: The plan to put the F-16 on America’s carriers. (Sandboxx) Recommended. “The Vought 1600’s low-lying intake located just above the nose-wheel was considered a real risk on the flight deck of a Navy carrier, as it could literally suck unsuspecting sailors straight into it. This wasn’t the first time Vought faced this sort of criticism, as the pilot-favorite Vought F-8 Crusader’s large, low intake had already earned it the nickname “the Gator,” because of its tenacity for gobbling up sailors.”
Convergence within SOCOM – A bottom-up approach to multi domain operations. (OTH) “The solution will be twofold. First, the vision behind mission-type orders must be brought to life by pairing maximally delegated authority with earned trust between commanders of units at all levels. Second, those units must be embedded within joint-service clusters that can operate effectively in a C2-denied environment due to their pre-established lateral relationships.”
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