The latest Defense AT&L [PDF] from the US Defense Acquisition University covers how to manage operations & support costs and ways to make more accurate life cycle cost estimates.
The presentations from last month’s 9th Acquisition Research Symposium organized by the Naval Postgraduate School are available here [PDFs], including Defense Affordability; NPS Defense Affordability Panel, and some overkill contracting policies. Other panels covered systems engineering, risk management, contracting as a science, small businesses, how to assess the health of the defense industry and more.
Warren King, the chief of Australia’s Defence Materiel Organisation, told a panel of senators:
“There was a time when marketeers from industry had more sway than they should have and we should have used the maxim ‘trust and verify’.”
The US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations issued a report [PDF] on the state and challenges of security partnerships in the Gulf. It reveals that the US currently has about 15,000 troops in Kuwait.
The MV Alaed ship that was reportedly carrying Russian attack helicopters to Syria is apparently going back home. As of this writing this is not showing yet on the MarineTraffic tracker which was last updated on June 18. [June 25 update: she’s back in Russia.]
Italy is working on a modular approach to take care of IEDs with complementary vehicles to be developed by Iveco and MBDA.
France’s MinDef posted a EuroSatory recap video [in French] showing a variety of fielded equipment and future tech.