EL/M-2032

In February 2012, IAI revealed that it has secured a $150 million contract for its EL/M-2032 fighter radar, from an unnamed customer. A Globes report places the customer within Asia.

The EL/M-2032 can be delivered in different sizes, and equips a number of different aircraft. It has been fitted to F-16s, including Israel’s own fleet. It has also been used to upgrade V/STOL Sea Harriers, F-5E/F Tiger light fighters, and F-4 Phantom, Kfir C10s, and Jaguar strike fighters around the world; and was recently picked for South Korea’s TA-50 and India Tejas lightweight fighters. So the question is, who’s the customer?

RAFO F-16Cs w. CFTs

Oman is location on the eastern Arabian peninsula next to the UAE and Saudi Arabia, and across from Persia. It remains a very strategic country, controlling the Strait of Hormuz’s western bank, and providing an overwatch position for both the entrance to the Persian Gulf and the Indian Ocean near Africa. The Royal Air Force of Oman (al-Quwwat al-Jawwiya al-Sultanat Oman) currently flies 12 F-16 Block 50 fighters: 8 F-16Cs and 4 F-16Ds, whose delivery began in 2005. They complement the RAFO’s 18 Jaguar strike aircraft, and 11 single-seat subsonic Hawk 203 light fighters. Sultan Qaboos’ air force is looking to replace its aging Jaguars, and has made inquiries about buying 4+ generation fighters like Eurofighters or even JAS-39 Gripens for this purpose.

A formal DSCA request for 18 more F-16s raised the possibility of a different approach, and that has now become a firm contract. But BAE just received an RFP for its Eurofighter…

• The Sultanate of Oman’s History, and its Fighter Fleet
• Contracts & Key Events [updated]
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Latest update (Feb 6/12)

LHA-R/NAAS Concept

Modern U.S. Navy Amphibious Assault Ships project power and maintain presence by serving as the cornerstone of the Amphibious Readiness Group (ARG) / Expeditionary Strike Group (ESG). LHA/LHD are a key element of the Seapower 21 doctrine pillars of Sea Strike and Sea Basing, transporting, launching, and landing elements of the Marine Expeditionary Brigade (MEB) via a combination of LCAC hovercraft, amphibious transports and vehicles, helicopters, and aircraft.

Designed to project power and maintain presence, LHA-Replacement (LHA-R, aka. LH-X and now the America Class) large deck amphibious assault ships will replace the LHA-1 Tarawa Class. They are based on the more modern LHD Wasp Class design, but initial ships will remove the LHD’s landing craft and well deck. While its LHA/LHD predecessors were amphibious assault ships with a secondary aviation element, it’s fair to describe the LHA-R (now New Amphibious Assault Ship) as escort carriers with a secondary amphibious assault role.

• America Class Ships: 21st Century Escort Carriers [updated]
• The LHA-R Program [updated]
• America Class: Contracts & Key Events [updated]
• Additional Readings
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EA-6B Prowler

Electronic Attack kits clarified; DOT&E Testing report. (Feb 6/12)

The USA’s electronic attack fighters are a unique, overworked, and nearly obsolete capability. With the retirement of the US Air Force’s long-range EF-111 Raven “Spark ‘Vark,” the aging 4-seat EA-6B Prowlers became the USA’s only remaining fighter for radar jamming, communications jamming and information operations like signals interception [1]. Despite their age and performance limits, they’ve been predictably busy on the front lines, used for everything from escorting strike aircraft against heavily defended targets, to disrupting enemy IED land mine attacks by jamming all radio signals in an area.

EA-18G at Pax

All airframes have lifespan limits, however, and the EA-6B is no exception. The USA’s new electronic warfare aircraft will be based on Boeing’s 2-seat F/A-18F Super Hornet multi-role fighter, and has 90% commonality with its counterpart. That will give it decent self-defense capabilities, as well as electronic attack potential. At present, however, the EA-18G is slated to be the only dedicated electronic warfare aircraft in the USA’s future force. Since the USA is currently the only western country with such aircraft, the US Navy’s EA-18G fleet would become the sole source of tactical jamming support for NATO and allied air forces as well.

DID’s FOCUS articles offer in-depth, updated looks at significant military programs of record. This article describes the EA-18G aircraft and its key systems, outlining the program, and keeping track of ongoing developments, contracts, etc. that affect the program.

• EA-18G: The Platform [updated]
• EA-18G: Industrial Program
• EA-18G: Numbers & Budgets
• EA-18G: Contracts & Other Key Developments [updated]
• Appendix A: The EA-18G and the Future Force Mix
• Appendix B: Additional Readings and Sources [updated]
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P-8A Poseidon

1st full sim & WTT delivered; $227M for certification. (Feb 1/2)

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
  • Numbers & Basing
  • P-8A Industrial Partners [updated]
• 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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Just 5 in 2013? (Feb 1/12)

Northrop Grumman’s E-2C Hawkeye is a carrier-capable “mini-AWACS” aircraft, designed to give long-range warning of incoming aerial threats. Secondary roles include strike command and control, land and maritime surveillance, search and rescue, communications relay, and even civil air traffic control during emergencies. E-2C Hawkeyes began replacing previous Hawkeye versions in 1973; they fly from USN and French carriers, from land bases in the militaries of Egypt, Japan, Mexico, Singapore, and Taiwan; and in a drug interdiction role for the US Naval Reserve. Over 200 Hawkeyes have been produced.

The $17.5 billion E-2D Advanced Hawkeye program aims to build 75 new aircraft with significant radar, engine, and electronics upgrades in order to deal with a world of stealthier cruise missiles, saturation attacks, and a growing need for ground surveillance as well as aerial scans. It looks a lot like the last generation E-2C Hawkeye 2000 upgrade on the outside – but inside, and even outside to some extent, it’s a whole new aircraft.

• From E-2A Hawkeye to the E-2D
• E-2D Advanced Hawkeye: Program
  • American Budgets
  • Industrial Partners
• E-2D Advanced Hawkeye: Contracts & Key Events, Full History [updated]
• Additional Readings
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Networking the Navy

Northrop Grumman wins CANES. (Feb 1/12)

The US Navy’s Consolidated Afloat Networks and Enterprise Services (CANES) program is designed to streamline and update shipboard networks to improve interoperability across the fleet. It will replace 5 shipboard legacy network programs to provide the common computing environment on board for command, control, intelligence and logistics. The primary goal of the CANES program is to build a secure shipboard network required for naval and joint operations, which is much easier when you consolidate and reduce the number of shipboard networks. That consolidation can also lower costs and maintenance requirements and reduce training needs, if good choices are made.

In 2010, the US Navy awarded 2 contracts, with a potential value of $1.7 billion, for the design and development of the CANES common computing environment. Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin are competing, and a single prime contractor was expected to be picked in 2011. It took until early 2012, but Northrop Grumman won.

Used to be ours…

Final assembly of 1st CH-147F begins; Hangar construction begins; 1st ISS support sub-contracts. (Oct 21/11)

Back in 1991, Canada’s Mulroney government sold the country’s CH-47 Chinook medium-lift helicopter fleet to the Dutch. They cost a lot to maintain and operate, and Canada didn’t need them anyway. Or so they thought. Fast forward to 2002, then 2006. Canada has had boots on the ground in Afghanistan for several years now, but doesn’t have any helicopters capable of operating in the hot and/or high-altitude environment of southern Afghanistan. To support its 2,000 or so troops in Afghanistan, Canada had to rely on favors from US, British, Australian, Polish, and – irony of ironies – Dutch pilots flying CH-47 Chinooks.

Even so, Canada’s “emergency” purchases for Operation Archer never included helicopters. It should have come as a relief, therefore, to learn in June 2006 that the Canadian government had announced a CDN$ 4.7 billion program to purchase 16 “medium-heavy” helicopters for military and “disaster response” roles. It should have, but it didn’t. It took 21 months after this helicopter program was announced before a sole-source RFP was even issued. DID explains the Afghan situation on the ground for Canadian forces, the RFP, the options, the problems, the ultimatum issued by Canada’s Parliament, and the contract(s) for new CH-47F/ CH-147 helicopters.

• Cemetary Sideroad: On the Ground in Afghanistan
• Bring It All Back: The New Helicopter Competition
• We’ll Go Too: Contracts and Key Events [updated]
• Appendix A: Looking for a Place to Happen – The Problem, and the Options
• Escape Is at Hand for the Travellin’ Man: Additional Readings & Sources
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• 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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Ultra APV demonstrator

DOTE testing reveals vehicle & requirements flaws; Budget commitment to JLTVs; JLTV EMD RFP. (Jan 30/12)

In an age of non-linear warfare, where front lines are nebulous at best and non-existent at worst, one of the biggest casualties is… the concept of unprotected rear echelon vehicles, designed with the idea that they’d never see serious combat. That imperative is being driven home on 2 fronts. One front is operational. The other front is buying trends.

These trends, and their design imperatives, found their way into the USA’s Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV) program, which aims to replace many of the US military’s 120,000 or so Humvees. The US military’s goal is a 7-10 ton vehicle that’s lighter than its MRAPs and easier to transport aboard ship, while offering substantially better protection ad durability than existing up-armored Humvees. They’d also like a vehicle that can address front-line issues like power generation, in order to recharge all of the batteries troops require for electronic gadgets like night sights, GPS devices, etc.

DID’s FOCUS articles offer in-depth, updated looks at significant military programs of record. JLTV certainly qualifies, though its future remains cloudy. That’s partly due to expected spending cutbacks, and partly due to the possible presence of “good enough” substitutes…

• JLTV: Program & Risks
  • The JLTV Family of Vehicles
  • JLTV: Goals and Constraints
  • JLTV: To Be, or Not to Be?
• JLTV: Participants and Platforms [updated]
• JLTV: Contracts and Key Events [updated]
• Additional Readings
• Appendix A: Phase 1 Technology Development’s Losing Teams
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