F100 visits Sydney
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DID’s FOCUS articles offer in-depth, updated looks at significant military programs of record. The Royal Australian Navy took a pair of giant steps in June 2007, when it selected winning designs for its keystone naval programs: Canberra Class LHD amphibious operations vessels, and Hobart Class “air warfare destroyers.” This DID’s FOCUS article offers in-depth research and coverage of the Hobart Class competition and program organization, along with the new “air warfare destroyer’s” capabilities, and associated contracts, and related developments.

Under the SEA 4000 Air Warfare Destroyer program, Australia plans to replace its retired air defense destroyers with a modern system that can provide significantly better protection from air attack, integrate with the US Navy and other Coalition partners, offer long-range air warfare defense for Royal Australian Navy task groups, and help provide a coordinated air picture for fighter and surveillance aircraft. Despite their name and focus, the ships are multi-role designs with a “sea control” mission that also includes advanced anti-submarine and surface warfare capabilities.

Spain’s Navantia made an A$ 11 billion clean sweep, winning both the A$ 3 billion Canberra Class LHD and the A$ 8 billion Hobart Class Air Warfare “Destroyer” contracts. The new AWD ships were scheduled to begin entering service with the Royal Australian Navy in 2013, but that date has now slipped to 2014-2015. Recent events include Australia’s Defence White Paper, decisions about the ship’s missiles, turbine orders, and system tests and support for the F100 derivative’s AEGIS radar and combat systems…

• SEA 4000: The Design Competition
• SEA 4000: The Program
• SEA 4000: Contracts & Key Events [updated]
• Appendix A: SEA 4000 Program Phase Organization
• Appendix B: Additional Readings & Sources
  
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HMCS Montreal & sub:
HMCS Windsor
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Launched between 1988-1995, and commissioned between 1992-1996, Canada’s 12 City Class (now Halifax Class) frigates currently form the high end of its naval capabilities. The Canadian Navy has declined drastically from its post-WWII status as the world’s 4th largest navy, and the Halifax Class itself is finding that its open-ocean design is not suited to cope with modern littoral threats and improving anti-ship missiles. Replacement vessels are still many years away, which means that the 4,750t frigates will need to be modernized within the limits of their design if they are to remain effective.

Canada’s government has decided to fund that modernization, much as Australia and New Zealand are modernizing the Halifax Class’ ANZAC Frigate contemporaries. Refits are scheduled to begin with HMCS Halifax in 2010, and that ship is scheduled to re-enter service about 18 months later in 2012. By 2017, all 12 frigates are scheduled to be upgraded as part of a C$ 3.1 billion (about $2.9 billion) program.

This DID article explains the scope of the upgrades, notes the current systems, and covers the contracts and developments involved. The latest addition this Canada Day is a contract to maintain and upgrade their Phalanx gatling guns…

• Upgrading The Halifax Class
• Contracts and Key Events [updated]
• Additional Readings
  
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Up-armored M3A3s in Iraq
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The USA’s M2/M3 Bradley Fighting Vehicles have played a central role in armed operations in Iraq. Many of them are now doing it with special reactive applique armor tiles that significantly improve their protection against anti-tank rockets. General Dynamics Armament and Technical Products Inc. in Burlington, VT is the main supplier, in conjunction with Israel’s RAFAEL who pioneered the design.

The add-on armor kit for the M2/M3 Bradleys, for instance, includes 105 tiles that look like small boxes and attach to the sides, the turret and the front of each vehicle. The armor is some of the most advanced in the world, and includes both passive protection of strong material that diverts the rocket, plus reactive protection. That reactive protection uses a very special, insensitive explosive that is detonated only when hit by a missile or rocket; it will not react to other heat sources, or lesser impacts from small arms or shell fragments. The resulting explosion disrupts the incoming armor-penetrating blast jet produced by an RPG-7’s shaped-charge warhead, for example.

That’s the theory, anyway. What have the results been like? Have improvements been made? What purchases have taken place, and when? DID has answers, including a recent order, more complete order tables, and program history…

• The Birth and Refinement of Reactive Armor
• Reactive Armor and Future Threats
• US Contract Awards: Bradley Reactive Armor [updated]
• Other Contract Awards & Key Events [updated]
• Additional Readings & Sources
  
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In “Hydra-70 Rockets: From Cutbacks to the Future of Warfare,” Sen. Leahy’s [D-VT] work to keep the Hydra 70mm rocket family alive through special appropriations was discussed, just in time for the Hydras’ potential on the battlefield to rise again. The key was the addition of low-cost precision guidance, which would expand the number of precision weapons carried by helicopters, aircraft, and even UAVs. “APKWS II… Hydra Rockets Enter SDD Phase,” discussed a laser-guided version from BAE, General Dynamics, and Northrop Grumman that appeared to have the inside track as a precision weapon of choice for helicopters, UAVs, and aircraft. This proved true, and the team won that contract in April 2006.

A lot can change in a couple of years. A lot has. This second attempt at APKWS has seen its program status change, before righting the program with Navy funding. Meanwhile, private development efforts from Lockheed Martin, Thales TDA, and a raft of international partnerships between major defense firms and partners in Korea, the UAE, Canada and Norway, and Israel are introducing new competitors into the precision-guided 70mm rocket space. The latest updates include successful tests of Elbit/ATK’s 70mm GATR system, and of a USMC program to retrofit its larger Zuni rockets…

• APKWS II: To be, or not to be…
• Lockheed Martin: Is this a DAGR I see before me…?
• LOGIR: ”...the heavenly-harnessed team/ Begins his golden progress in the east…”
• Raytheon and the UAE: “Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie…”
• Other Entries: “Come unto these yellow sands….” [updated]
  
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JASSM test, White Sands
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The U.S. Army Contracting Agency Information Technology, e-Commerce and Commercial Contracting Center awarded to NextiraOne Federal (dba Black Box Network Services) in Herndon, VA a $9.8 million task order to upgrade and expand the voice switching environment at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico. The task order was awarded under a 5-year indefinite delivery/ indefinite quantity infrastructure modernization (IMOD) contract awarded in 2006 under the Installation Infrastructure Modernization Program (I3MP).

DID has more on the NextiraOne Federal contract as well as information on other recipients of the IMOD contracts…

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Austal MRV/JHSV concept
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“UAVs, Blimps, and HSV-2, Oh My!” covered the USA’s leased Incat TSV/HSV wave-piercing catamaran ship designs, while other articles covered the Marines’ very successful use of Austal’s Westpac Express high-speed catamaran. These Australian-designed ships give commanders the ability to roll on a company with full gear and equipment (or roll on a full infantry battalion if used only as a troop transport), haul it intra-theater distances at 38 knots, then move their shallow draft safely into austere ports to roll them off. Unsurprisingly, their use has attracted favorable comment and notice from the US Navy, Marines, and Army alike.

So favorable that the experiments have resulted in a $1.6 billion program called the Joint High Speed Vessel, which could involve up to 10 ships. These designs may even have uses beyond simple ferrying and transport. DID’s FOCUS articles offer in-depth, updated looks at significant military programs of record, and this article covers JHSV from its inception onward. The program has picked a winner, and early contracts for ships 2 & 3 are beginning…

• The US Military’s HSV/TSV Experience
• The JHSV Program
• Contracts & Key Events
• Additional Readings & Sources
  
  Continue Reading… »

The entire fleet
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DID’s FOCUS articles offer in-depth, updated looks at significant military programs of record. The prime missions of the new DDG-1000 Zumwalt Class destroyer are to provide naval gunfire support and next-generation air defense in near-shore areas where other large ships hesitate to tread, possibly even as the anchor for an action group of stealthy Littoral Combat Ships and submarines. The estimated 14,500t (cruiser sized) Zumwalt Class will be fully multi-role, however, with undersea warfare, anti-ship, and long-range surface attack roles. That makes the DDG-1000 suitable or another role – as a “hidden ace card,” using its overall stealth to create uncertainty for enemy forces.

At over $3 billion per ship for construction alone, and just 2-8 ships to be built in the class, the program faces significant obstacles as it tries to avoid either “technology demonstrator” status, or the fulfillment of Secretary of the Navy Donald Winter’s fears for the fleet. A follow-on CG (X) cruiser is currently contemplated, and the issues faced by the DDG-1000 Program are having a significant influence on whether and how it comes to fruition.

True, or False?
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DID’s FOCUS Article for the DDG-1000 program covers the new ships’ capabilities and technologies, key controversies, associated contracts and costs, and related background resources. From the outset, DID has noted that the Zumwalt Class might face the same fate as the ultra-sophisticated, ultra-expensive SSN-21 Seawolf Class submarines. That appears to have come true, with news of the program’s cancellation at 2 ships. Or will it be 3?

The latest news involves the ship’s all-electric systems for ship power and propulsion, whose associated systems need to be tested rigorously…

• Zumwalt Class: Program and Participants (i.e. “Continue reading…”)
• DDG-1000 Key Technologies and Features
• DDG-1000 Issues and Controversies
• Zumwalt Class: Contracts and Key Events
  • FY 2009 [updated]
  • FY 2008
  • FY 2007
  • FY 2006
  • FY 2005
  • FY 1998 through 2004
• Additional Readings & Sources
  
  Continue Reading… »

General Dynamics Information Technology, a business unit of General Dynamics, received a $51 million indefinite delivery/ indefinite quantity contract from the Space and Naval Warfare (SPAWAR) Systems Center to provide technical support for the Defense Red Switch Network (DRSN), which provides global, secure voice and voice-conferencing services to senior decision makers within the Department of Defense (DOD). The single award contract (N66001-09-D-0037) covers a 5-year base period with 8 potential 6-month option periods and has a total potential value of $98 million if all options are exercised.

Through the contract, General Dynamics will perform a variety of duties including program management, engineering support, testing and evaluation, integrated logistics support, on-site technical assistance, network security, and implementation and integration of the DRSN, as well as the U.S. military’s secure voice, command and control (C2), and information systems networks. DID has more on the DRSN…

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General Dynamics Advanced Information Systems in Suffolk, VA won an $18.2 million indefinite-quantity contract with cost reimbursement and fixed-price ordering provisions for analysis and assessment of command and control (C2) interoperability in support of the U.S. Joint Forces Command’s (USJFCOM) Joint Systems Integration Center (JSIC). This contract includes a base year and 4 one-year option periods, which if exercised, bring the total estimated value of the contract to $101.9 million. General Dynamics will perform the work in Suffolk, VA and expects to complete it by June 2010. This contract was competitively procured, with 4 offers received by the Fleet and Industrial Supply Center Norfolk, Contracting Department, Philadelphia Division (N00189-09-D-Z050).

DID has more on the C2 interoperability work being done at the JSIC…

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Digital Range Training System
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Saab received a $12.4 million contract from lead integrator General Dynamics Information Technology to produce field simulators and moving and fixed targets for five gunnery ranges for the U.S. Army. The ranges are part of the Army’s Digital Range Training System (DRTS) program that provides live fire gunnery training facilities for soldiers in a training environment using live simulation and after action review capability with position location, video imagery and digital vehicle information. DID has more on the futuristic DRTS program…

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