Frank Kendall has been confirmed by the US Senate Armed Services Committee as the Pentagon acquisition chief, alongside 6 other nominees including Heidi Shyu at Army acquisition. Back in March SASC Ranking Member Senator McCain had held up their confirmation. A full Senate vote is still needed to finalize the process. The chief and principal deputy acquisition jobs in the Air Force are vacant since David Van Buren’s departure for L-3 Communications.

In other news:

Boeing Delta IV Heavy

The EELV program was designed to reduce the cost of government space launches through greater contractor competition, and modifiable rocket families whose system requirements emphasized simplicity, commonality, standardization, new applications of existing technology, streamlined manufacturing capabilities, and more efficient launch-site processing. Result: the Delta IV (Boeing) and Atlas V (Lockheed Martin) heavy rockets.

Paradoxically, that very program may have forced the October 2006 merger of Boeing & Lockheed Martin’s rocket divisions. Crosslink Magazine’s Winter 2004 article “EELV: The Next Stage of Space Launch” offers an excellent briefing that covers EELV’s program innovations and results, while a detailed National Taxpayer’s Union letter to Congress takes a much less positive view. This DID Spotlight article looks at the Delta IV and Atlas V rockets, as well as the contracts placed since the merger that formed the United Launch Alliance:

• The EELV Systems
  • Delta IV
  • Atlas V
  • Military Satellite Payloads
• Competition Again? The New “Open” Launch Framework [NEW]
• Contracts & Key Events [updated]
• Additional Readings
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Adm. Gorshkov: Before.

This free-to-view DID Spotlight article offers an in-depth look at India’s troubled attempt to convert and field a full-size aircraft carrier, before time and wear force it to retire its existing naval aviation and ships.

India faced 2 major challenges. One was slipping timelines, which risked leaving them with no aircraft carriers at all. The other challenge involved Vikramaditya’s 3-fold cost increase, as Russia demanded a re-negotiated contract once India was deeper into the commitment trap. The carrier purchase has now become the subject of high level diplomacy, involving a shipyard that can’t even execute on commercial contracts. A revised deal was finally signed in March 2010e, even as deliveries of India’s new MiG-29K naval fighters got underway – but now Russia still has to make good. This article tracks the changes India is making to its new aircraft carrier, key characteristics, and a full history of contracts and events affecting this carrier and its planned aircraft contingent.

• Waiting for Gorshkov – A History
• Gorshkov-Vikramaditya: Aerial Complement
• INS Vikramaditya: Updates & Contracts [updated]
• Appendix A: Additional Readings – Equipment Profiles
• Appendix B: Additional Readings – Related Developments
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The US military needs a bigger data firehose. In an era of streaming data from proliferating UAVs and other persistent surveillance platforms, and the need for control of those systems anywhere in the world, bandwidth is almost as important as fuel. Commercial satellite communications (SATCOM) can fill some of the gaps, but it’s expensive, and may not be available when needed. The Wideband Gapfiller SATCOM (now Wideband Global SATCOM) program began as a way to ease these problems in the near term, but went on to become one of the twin pillars of US military communications, alongside the hardened AEHF constellation. Both satellite types expanded their roles after the super-high bandwidth T-SAT program was canceled. instead, the USA is adding WGS and AEHF satellites in space, even as it makes both programs multi-national efforts here on earth.

WGS is a set of 13-kilowatt spacecraft based upon Boeing’s model 702 commercial satellite. These satellites will handle a significant portion of the USA’s warfighting bandwidth requirements, supporting tactical C4ISR (command, control, communications, and computers; intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance); battle management; and combat support needs. Upon its 2007 launch into geosynchronous orbit, WGS Flight 1 became the U.S. Department of Defense’s highest capacity communication satellite. WGS F4, launched in January 2012, offers further improvements, and the constellation is set to grow to 10.

This is DID’s FOCUS Article covering the WGS program’s specifications, budgets, travails, international partnerships, and contracts, with links to additional research materials.

• WGS: Capabilities & Role
• The WGS Program & Schedule
• WGS Program: Contracts & Key Events [updated]
• Additional Readings
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AEHF concept

The USA’s new Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) satellites will support twice as many tactical networks as the current Milstar II satellites, while providing 10-12 times the bandwidth capacity and 6 times the data rate transfer speed. With the cancellation of the higher-capacity TSAT program, AEHF will form the secure, hardened backbone of the Pentagon’s future Military Satellite Communications (MILSATCOM) architecture, with a mission set that includes nuclear command and control. Its companion Family of Advanced Beyond-line-of-sight Terminals (FAB-T) program will give the US military more modern, higher-bandwidth receiving capabilities, and add more flexibility on the front lines. The program has international components, and partners currently include Britain, Canada, and the Netherlands.

This article offers a look at the AEHF system’s rationale and capabilities, while offering insight into some of the program’s problems, and an updated timeline covering over $5 billion worth of contracts since the program’s inception.

• The AEHF Program [updated]
• The AEHF Satellites
• The AEHF Satellites: Contracts & Key Events, full history [updated]
• FAB-T Terminals and Ground Control
• FAB-T & Ground Control: Contracts and Key Events, full history
• Additional Readings
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• The USA is reportedly resuming some weapon sales to Bahrain, which were suspended in October 2011 after Bahrain and Saudi Arabia crushed civil unrest in that country. The weapons reportedly include air-to-air missile and ammunition, but not HMMWVs or anti-tank missiles. Bahrain is the home base for the US Navy’s 5th Fleet.

• The Long War journal says that 2 of the 17 documents released following the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden indicate that “al Qaeda has a much larger footprint in Pakistan than US officials have claimed.”

• Indonesia is purchasing 37 BMP-3F Series 2 amphibious tanks from Russia for $114M, to be delivered next year.
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SM-2 Launch, DDG-77
(click to view larger)

Variants of the SM-2 Standard missile are the USA’s primary fleet defense anti-air weapon, and serve with 13 navies worldwide. The most common variant is the RIM-66K-L/ SM-2 Standard Block IIIB, which entered service in 1998. The Standard family extends far beyond the SM-2 missile, however; several nations still use the SM-1, the SM-3 is rising to international prominence as a missile defense weapon, and the SM-6 program is on track to supplement the SM-2. These missiles are designed to be paired with the AEGIS radar and combat system, but can be employed independently by ships with older or newer radar systems.

DID’s FOCUS articles offer in-depth, updated looks at significant military programs of record. This article covers each variant in the Standard missile family, plus several years worth of American and Foreign Military Sales requests and contracts and key events; and offers the budgetary, technical, and geopolitical background that can help put all that in context.

• The Standard Missile Naval Defense Family: Missiles and Plans (SM-1 to SM-6)
• The Standard Missile Naval Defense Family: Budgets
• The Standard Missile Naval Defense Family: US Contracts & Events, FY 2006 – Present [updated]
• The Standard Missile Naval Defense Family: Exports & Related Key Events, CY 2005 – Present
• Additional Readings
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P-8A Poseidon

Maritime surveillance and patrol is becoming more and more important, but the USA’s P-3 Orion fleet is falling apart. The P-8A emerged from the ashes of the P-7 Long Range Air ASW (Anti-Submarine Warfare) Capable Aircraft program that was begun in 1988. That program originally envisaged an improved P-3, but cost overruns, slow progress, and interest in opening the competition to commercial designs, led to the P-7’s cancellation for default in 1990. The successor MMA program was begun in March 2000, and Boeing beat Lockheed’s “Orion 21” with a design based on their ubiquitous 737 passenger jet.

Filling the P-3 Orion’s shoes is certainly no easy task. What missions will the new P-8A Poseidon face? What do we know about the platform, the project team, and ongoing developments? Will the P-3’s level of global customer coverage give its successor a comparable level of export opportunities? Australia and India have already signed on, but has the larger market shifted in the interim?

• P-8A Poseidon: Platform & Capabilities
  • The P-8’s BAMS Companion: Kicking It Up a Notch
• P-8A Poseidon: History & Program
  • US Program Budgets [updated]
  • Numbers & Basing
  • P-8A Industrial Partners
• P-8A Poseidon: Contracts & Events [updated]
• News & Analysis: India’s Interest, and Broader Export Potential
• Additional Readings & Sources
• Additional Readings & Sources: News & Updates
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B-2 drops JDAM

Precision bombing has been a significant military goal since the invention of the Norden bomb sight in the 1920s, but its application remained elusive. Over 30 years later, in Vietnam, the destruction of a single target could require 300 bombs, which meant sending an appropriate number of fighters or bombers into harm’s way to deliver them. Even the 1991 Desert Storm war with Iraq featured unguided munitions for the most part; the US Air Force did use some laser and TV-guided weapons like Paveway bombs and Maverick missiles, but they were very expensive and only effective in good weather. If precision bombing was finally to become a reality throughout the Air Force, a new approach would be needed. The Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) became that alternative, an engine of military transformation that was also a model of procurement transformation.

DID’s FOCUS articles offer in-depth, updated looks at significant military programs of record. This DID FOCUS Article looks at the transformational history of the JDAM GPS-guided bomb program, the ongoing efforts to bring its capabilities up to and beyond the level of dual-mode guidance kits like Israel’s Spice and Raytheon’s Enhanced Paveway, and the contracts issued under the JDAM program since its inception:

• JDAM: A Timely History of Transformation
• JDAM: Program & Variants [updated]
• JDAM: Contracts and Key Events, 1996 – Present [updated]
• Additional Readings & Sources
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RAAF F/A-18F rollout

Australia’s Super Hornet purchase began life in a storm. Australia’s involvement in the F-35 Lightning II program have been mired in controversy, amid criticisms that the F-35A will (1) be unable to compete with proliferating SU-30 family fighters in the region, (2) lack the range or response time that Australia requires, and (3) be both late and very expensive during early production years. The accelerated retirement of Australia’s 22 long-range F-111s in 2010 sharpened the timing debate, by creating a serious gap between the F-111’s retirement and the F-35’s likely arrival.

In December 2006, therefore, The Australian reported that Defence Minister Brendan Nelson was discussing an A$ 3 billion (about $2.36 billion) purchase of 24 F/A-18F Block II Super Hornet aircraft to fill the fighter gap. The move came as “a surprise to senior defence officials on Russell Hill”; but quickly became an official purchase as requests and contracts were hurriedly submitted. Australia’s new Labor government’s later decided to keep the Super Hornet purchase, rather than pay cancellation fees, but added an interesting option to convert 12 into electronic warfare planes. Ministerial statements place the program’s final figure at A$ 6.6 – 7.0 billion, which includes basing, training, and other ancillary costs.

This DID Spotlight article describes the model chosen, links to coverage of the key controversies, and offers a history of contracts and key event’s from the program’s first official DSCA requests to the present day.

• RAAF Super Hornets: Variants and Variances
• Contracts & Key Events [updated]
• Additional Readings
• Appendix A: RAAF Super Hornet Controversies
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