• The RAND Corporation researched ways to reduce attrition in US Air Force training programs, which they believe could produce significant savings.

• The GAO finds DOD’s reporting of the costs involved in operating and supporting major programs to be lacking with a number of inconsistencies and under-reported amounts.

• DARPA is organizing a Proposers’ Day on Feb. 21 in Arlington, VA, to present its High-Assurance Cyber Military Systems (HACMS) whose goal is to secure embedded computer system software.

• A&P and Thales Australia are partnered to bid on long-term support of HMAS Choules, the RAN’s newest amphibious ship.

• 1st French Army NH90 TTH “Caiman” unveiled [in French].

• Fighting base realignment is guaranteed work for lobbyists. What’s less guaranteed are the chances that a bill introduced by Senate Republicans to partially undo sequestration gets traction with Democrats.

• CACI International’s revenue grew by 12% to $973M for its second FY12 quarter. Funded backlog at the end of 2011 was stable at $2.19B out of an $8B total. Meanwhile Harris Corporation had a flat second quarter at $1.45B in sales, with an increase in exports to compensate for lower US sales.

Hawaii Superferry

Cost actually $70M; Handover to Navy; Financial details. (Jan 29/12)

In his April 6/09 discussion of the FY 2010 budget, Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates said that the US military wanted to charter another 2 “JHSV-like” fast catamaran ships from 2009-2011, until the JHSV ships begin arriving. That meant JHSV-winner Austal would find its products competing once more with Incat, which has had 4 of its wave-piercing catamarans chartered by various American services. Their Swift wave-piercing catamaran is currently chartered by the Navy as HSV-2, just as the Austal-built Westpac Express is chartered by US Military Sealift Command for the Marines.

One obvious stopgap option is the Hawaiian Superferry catamarans, a larger pair of Austal-built ships that resemble the Westpac Express. They were even pressed into service when Haiti’s disaster struck, but the actual sale of the ships by US MARAD has been a much slower process.

• Latest from the Center for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS): Controlling Costs and Demanding Effective Program Execution [PDF, chart galore]; and a short memo [PDF] on evolving US-India relations. The author reckons India will want to get closer to Iran. The Washington Quarterly preemptively disagreed [PDF].

• Dassault Aviation released the most terse and self-restrained press release ever in the wake of the Rafale’s final selection for India’s MMRCA. The French business press and stock market were less subdued, but it is not a signed contract just yet. More details to come.

• Northrop Grumman reported sales of $26.4B in 2011, a $1.7B or 6% drop from 2010. Its aerospace, electronic and information systems all shrunk by a few percentage points while revenue from the smaller Technical Services dropped by 16%. Among other programs, lower-than-anticipated F-35 deliveries weighted on the aerospace division. The company has revisited the criteria it uses to state its total backlog. This change contributes $3B out of a $7.3B backlog decrease from the previous year, and brings the total down by 15.6% to $39.5B with a 59% funding ratio. NG excludes unexercised contract options and unfunded Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) orders from its backlog numbers.

• L-3 Communications’ sales for 2011 decreased by $511M (3%) to $15.2B. Growth in the C3ISR segment was not enough to compensate for lower sales elsewhere in the conglomerate. The funded backlog lost $396M (3.6%) to $10.7B.

• The US DoD announced [PDF] $18M in funds to 6 recipients for operational energy capability improvement.

• Catherine Ashton, head of the European Defence Agency (EDA), urged EU members to pool and share defense resources more aggressively but such calls have not been heeded much so far. Alignment of the British, French and Germans in the same project has proven elusive.

• The British MoD published its latest procurement and technology whitepaper [PDF], stating the intent to maintain science and technology spending at 1.2% or more of the defense budget. The report does mention in passing the EDA as well as NATO’s “Smart Defence” initiative, but its framework for cooperation with other countries will “generally favour bilateral collaboration on technology, equipment, and support issues, as we believe this offers the best balance of advantages and disadvantages. We will, however, continue to work multilaterally, for example through NATO or the EU, where this offers a clear benefit to the UK.” Coming later this year, a 10-year equipment plan.

• Defense Undersecretary for Policy Michelle Flournoy spoke at the Reserve Officers Association Symposium in the 1st video below. She toed the now familiar line from Panetta’s DoD. Flournoy will leave DOD at the end of the week.

• In the 2nd video below, CSBA’s Todd Harrison on the impact of projected FY13 cuts on the US Navy’s equipment and personnel:
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Top Pentagon officials gave a briefing yesterday on major budget decisions ahead of the FY13 President Budget request coming on Feb. 13. Highlights among the outlined priorities [PDF]:

• A relatively stable topline at $613.4B, made of a $525B baseline plus $88.4B overseas contingency operations (OCO). The former is a couple billion dollars below the FY10 actual budget and reflects a 5% decrease from the FY12 request, but in reality is just $6B below what DoD ended up getting last year. The OCO funds are 25% lower than last year’s $117.8B request but they remain at a pretty sizable level now that troops have left Iraq. Again, a significant part of the cuts Panetta and House Republicans have most vocally objected to are actually found in a) reductions vs. baseline growth previously projected by DoD – as opposed to net cuts – and b) a drop in war funding which arguably makes sense when you’re withdrawing troops from combat.

• Force and infrastructure adjustments, starting with a new base realignment and closure (BRAC) process. The last one dates from 2005 and wrapped up only very recently. Well, almost. Also, the start of a 5-year process that aims to lower active troops to 490,000 for the Army and 182,000 for the Marines; and a 10% reduction in the number of Air Force tactical air squadrons from today’s 60. A new BRAC is sure to open a whole new can of worms in Congress.

• Slowing down JSF procurement – again – to allow for more testing and address the laundry list of issues outlined in the latest DOT&E report [PDF]. This decision reflects the conclusions of the Concurrency Quick Look Review [PDF] that talked of a “lack of confidence in the design stability” and of the “concurrency driven consequences of the required fixes.”

• Retirement or divesting of 27 C-5As, 65 C-130s and 38 C-27s. Cancellation of Global Hawk Block 30 (not the whole program). Early retirement of 7 cruisers; delayed or reduced production of 14 ships, spread between LHA, LCS, JHSV, Virginia-class sub. Termination of the Defense Weather Satellite System (DWSS). Reduction in JAGM funding. Focus on JLTV rather than HMMWV Recap.
• Adjustments to pay raises shouldn’t start until 2015. Health care fees, co-pays and deductibles for retirees on the other hand will start to rise earlier. Beyond that, DoD is asking Congress to establish a commission to review military retirement. What could go wrong with that?

DID will obviously follow budget developments closely as they unfold and further details are made available. For reference, the FY12 DoD budget documents are found here. In other news:

• Full 2011 financial results: Textron saw growth at Bell, revenue decrease at Textron Systems. At $7.3B, Bell’s backlog has recovered from a reporting error announced by the company last quarter.

• Meanwhile General Dynamics generated $32.7B of revenue last year. It has potentially almost 3 years worth of revenue in backlog depending on how its indefinite quantity contracts pan out. Aerospace revenue grew but combat, marine and IT systems lost ground, translating into an almost flat topline for the prime contractor.

• Raytheon wrapped up 2011 with slightly lower revenue ($24.9B) but higher bookings ($25.2B) than the previous year. Its backlog rose by $700M to $35.3B though most of that growth is not appropriated yet.

• The RAND Arroyo Center is rather bullish on the potential for UAV logistics applications such as convoy overwatch and other surveillance tasks, but reminds decision makers that bandwidth is going to be critical. Note: the study doesn’t cover the use of UAS for Army resupply, separate research that General Dynamics was tasked with.

• According to the Guardian the British government is considering selling its RAF Norholt to possibly be converted into a satellite of the nearby Heathrow airport. Philip Hammond was Secretary of State for Transport before he replaced Liam Fox last October.

• The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) notes that defense budgets in Latin America have been growing faster than institutional transparency on policy, let alone on spending.

• BAE Systems and Caterpillar Inc. have signed a 20-year supply agreement to integrate the Cat CX family of transmissions into its HybriDrive parallel propulsion system, and use it to outfit and retrofit heavy trucks. It’s a civilian deal – but the same technologies can be used on military armored vehicles, and the civilian sector is pioneering this technology.

• The German Bundeswehr has a video covering the Boxer MRAV wheeled 8×8 APC’s 1st combat deployment to Afghanistan.

• The US Army is concerned about Facebook use. Yes, it can endanger lives, they say. People in the security community need to use it responsibly, and they have some tips.

• Frank Kendall has been confirmed as US undersecretary for defense for acquisition, technology and logistics, pending Senate confirmation. He’s been holding the job in an acting capacity since Ashton Carter was promoted to be Deputy SecDef back in September.

• Contradictory rumors are floating on a couple specific programs being cut in the FY13 federal budget request. For lack of material to corroborate or invalidate, we’ll just sit this out until the official Pentagon preview expected tomorrow.

• The House Armed Services Committee released its findings and recommendations [PDF] on the state of DOD’s progress towards auditability: “although the strategy needs more detail and refinement, the DOD has a reasonable strategy and methodology.” Video of yesterday’s related hearing can be found at the bottom of this entry.

• The U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency completed the destruction of chemical weapons stockpile at Deseret Chemical Depot in Utah, in application of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC). Similar work was done to completion at UMCD in Oregon last November.

• Its molecular structure makes this material resilient, fire-resistant, durable, easy to dye, plus it handles moisture well. All interesting properties for combat clothing. And researchers are making the astounding claim that it may grow on sheep. the Natick Soldier Research, Development, and Engineering Center (NSRDEC) is investigating the tentatively-named WOOL fabric.

• Divers and medical staff went through 4 days of exercise with the NATO Submarine Rescue System (NSRS), equipment jointly owned by Britain, France and Norway that never had to be used so far.

• The DGA French procurement agency received [in French] its 2nd EDA-R landing catamaran (L-CAT) to be carried on Mistral LHDs. The 1st one was delivered last November and 2 others are scheduled by mid-2012. Each Mistral ship can carry 2 L-CATs.

• EADS subsidiary Eurocopter grew its revenue by 12.5% to 5.4 billion euros (about $7B) in 2011 with the delivery of 503 helicopters and 457 net bookings. 32% of its sales came from the military segment.
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Pierce pumper, USAF

Oshkosh subsidiary Pierce Manufacturing, Inc. in Appleton, WI won a maximum $7.1 million firm-fixed-price contract for fire fighting vehicle pumpers, for use by the US Army. The contract will run until Nov 28/12. There were 3 solicitations made, with 3 responses to the The Defense Logistics Agency Troop Support in Philadelphia, PA (SPM8EC-11-D-0062-0009).

Fire fighting specialist Pierce was acquired by Oshkosh in 1996, and in 2001, their fire trucks introduced Oshkosh’s TAK-4 independent suspensions. The firm makes a range of fire pumpers, including their own foam systems that can spray multiple foam viscosities at the same time, in order to handle Class A and Class B fires. The Army order, though not large, will be very welcome at Oshkosh…

FMTV Family

Better air conditioning on the way; Heat still on in corporate battle. (Jan 17/12)

The 14 variants in the Family of Medium Tactical Vehicles (FMTV) form the core of the USA’s new state-of-the-art medium military transport truck fleet. Which in turn forms the core of the “mature logistics capability” seen in the Iraqi theater and elsewhere. FMTV trucks are all automatic transmission, and range from 2.5-ton cargo and van models to 5-ton cargo, tractor, van, wrecker, tanker, specialty, and dump-truck models in various 4×4 and 6×6 configurations. Some models also have attached trailers that increase their carrying capacity. Even so, the use of common engines, transmissions, drivelines, power trains, tires, cabs, etc. create over 80% parts commonality between FMTV models. Where possible, commercial components are used for added savings.

There have been 3 main phases of the FMTV program, including the last “SO23” open competition in 2003. All told, more than 50,000 FMTV trucks in various models have been delivered to the US Army. A bridging order to BAE continued production in Sealy, TX from 2008 through 2010, but the 4th phase re-compete saw a new firm begin FMTV production – alongside heavy truck production for the Army (FHTV) and Marines (LVSR), and medium trucks for the US Marine Corps (MTVR).

• FMTV Program & Production
• Contracts and Key Events [updated]
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• The US Navy takes delivery of the 25,000t LPD 22 San Diego. Commissioning is set for Spring 2012, in her homeport of… San Diego.

• The Pentagon hopes supply routes in Pakistan will be reopened soon. Driving through Russia and other countries surrounding Afghanistan is more expensive and takes more time.

• 5 Polish soldiers died from a roadside bomb explosion earlier today in Afghanistan. It appears they were driving one of the Cougars leased to Poland by the US.

• Navistar finished its FY11 strongly with $13.96B in revenue and a $320M pre-tax income. Earlier this year billionaire investor Carl Icahn disclosed he had built positions of almost 10% in both Navistar and Oshkosh.

• Boeing has signed Memoranda of Understanding (MOUs) with 2 Brazilian companies to strengthen its Super Hornet bid in the F-X2 competition. Brazil has made it clear that offsets would bear a lot of weight in its decision, while Boeing is not giving up on the fighter market.

• France takes delivery of the 1st of 8 more Airbus CN-235 light transports, 2 months ahead of schedule. They were bought as an immediate stopgap, due to A400M delays and a C160 fleet that’s aging out.

• Eurocopter delivered the first 2 Ecureuil AS350 B2s of a total 9 helicopters ordered by the Ecuadorian Armed Forces in July 2010.

• Will we see unmanned surface vessels (USVs) built and used to fight piracy?

• Germany’s military is facing retention issues after it transitioned away from compulsory military conscription earlier this year.

• In the latest issue of Joint Aircraft Survivability Program Office (JASPO)’s Aircraft Survivability: a threat model development for Man-Portable Air Defense Systems (MANPADS), a study of how much of a threat their are to the large engines of transport aircraft, and notes on the USAF’s efforts to improve its combat damage data collection and analysis. PDF.

• USN tests its new APKWS laser-guided 70mm rockets with the new Mk152 warhead, as part of low-rate production.

• Britain about to confirm it will sell its 74 Harrier jets to the US. The initial reporting on this deal that first surfaced back in June was denied by the UK MOD at the time.

• Is the huge 2010 Saudi arms request stalled?

• Northrop Grumman sees sustained demand for UAVs says Jim Zortman, site manager for Northrop’s unmanned systems business in San Diego County.

• More Q3 ‘11 results: Huntington Ingalls Industries: $1.59B revenue (-4.3% vs. same period last year), $248M loss because of a $300M noncash goodwill charge | CSC: $3.97B revenue (+1%), $2.69B goodwill impairment charge.

• After watching Italy’s AMX light attack planes vs. its expensive Eurofighters over Libya, and tallying up their own bills, NATO Countries are beginning to realize the need for low-cost light attack aircraft. Hate to say we told you so, but…

• Russia’s Prime Minister Vladimir Putin committed to significant naval spending last week.

• US Army soldiers are starting to use the Carl Gustav M3 Multi-role Anti-armor Anti-tank Weapon System (MAAWS) in Afghanistan. So far this Swede 84mm recoilless weapon introduced in 1948 was mostly used by Special Forces, as far as the US military goes. Video below:
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