$32.3M for Test & Eval of Affordable Weapon Missiles

We prefer the term
“family value priced”

International Systems, LLC in San Diego, CA received a $32.3 million modification to a previously awarded cost-plus award-fee/ cost-plus fixed-fee contract for the FY 2005 demonstration, test and evaluation phase of the Affordable Weapon System. Work will be performed in San Diego, CA, and is expected to be complete by September 2006. The Naval Sea Systems Command, Wash. DC issued the contract (N00024-04-C-6301).

The Office of Naval Research (ONR) has a program to use commercially-based equipment to build a “cruise-like” missile with good performance at a price ten times less than the norm. The new missile is called, appropriately, the Affordable Weapon. Launched from its shipping container by a small rocket booster and powered in flight by a small turbojet engine, the Affordable Weapon is designed to carry a significant payload to a target several hundred miles away. Equipped with both line-of-sight and satellite data links, the Affordable Weapon can fly directly to its target guided by the Global Positioning System (GPS). Alternatively, it can fly to an area and loiter until a forward observer directs it to a target. It can also be retargeted in flight – an observer can direct it to switch to a target different from the one the weapon was originally sent to attack.