Rapid Fire 2011-05-24: AFOTEC Services

• US Supreme Court throws out lower court ruling that would have required Boeing and General Dynamics to repay $3 billion to the federal government for the cancelled A-12 Avenger fighter program.

• Does SpaceX have lessons to teach NASA? After it spends under $400 million to do what would have taken NASA around $4 billion, Congressional testimony says “yes!”, and SpaceX underscores its cost positions. Next step? Falcon 9 Heavy, which aims to challenge the current Boeing/Lockheed EELV heavy lift platforms on cost and payload.

• FLIR Systems, a supplier of thermal imaging and threat detection systems, agrees to pay $39 million to two former executives to settle litigation related to its 2004 acquisition of Indigo Systems.

• L-3′s Systems Field Support division gets contract worth up to $300 million to provide C-12 aircraft logistics support and maintenance to the US Navy and USAF.

• SAIC snags contract worth up to $85 million to provide fighter operational test and evaluation services at the Air Force Operational Test and Evaluation Center.

• US Army honors the MQ-5B Hunter UAV as “the little program that could,” with a history going back to 1989. Hunters still serve on the front lines, and some are now armed with GBU-44 Viper Strike mini-weapons.

• Smiths Detection receives $30 million order to provide battlefield chemical agent detectors for the US DoD’s Joint Chemical Agent Detector program.

• China’s submarine buildup is creating pressure on Asian countries to improve their anti-submarine capabilities – and add subs of their own. Given the volume of Chinese shipping that must pass through narrow chokepoints in and around Indonesia, it’s not a good strategic trade for China.

• Crews for India’s ordered Scorpene diesel-electric submarines are due to begin training in France, soon. The goal is now delivery by 2015, with all 6 delivered by the end of 2018.

• Loose or broken bolts caused South Korea to suspend operations for its 3 type U214 subs through much of 2010, and into 2011. The problem was fixed, and contracts to build its next set of 6 more U214s continue.

Rapid Fire 2011-05-23: Open Source Military Software

• Die Welt reports that Iran & Venezuela are collaborating on a hardened underground silo complex for Shebab-3 medium range ballistic missiles, on the Paraguana peninsula above Coro, Venezuela.

• A leaked UN report says Iran and North Korea are exchanging ballistic missile technology, with help from China. Al-Jazeera Inside Story (incl. video).

• GAO faults DoD’s efforts to include combatant commands in weapons system development.

• Chile has reportedly picked Elbit Systems’ Hermes 900 as its next high-end UAV. While the Hermes 450 has been a popular export, this would be the larger Hermes 900 MALE (Medium Altitude, Long Endurance) UAV’s 1st export order.

• India conducts 2 successful tests of its indigenously developed Astra medium range air-to-air missile.

• Spain fails to reach NATO target of spending 2% of GDP on defense in 2010. Just like most other NATO countries.

• DoD publishes open-source technology guide for military software, in an effort to encourage contractors to implement open technology development, rather than proprietary technology, for defense systems.

• Russia wants assurance from NATO that a European missile defense system is not be directed at their country. As long as they don’t launch missiles against NATO members, it won’t be.

• These are not you parents’ sea mines.

• US Defense Secretary Robert Gates warns against sharp cuts in the size and reach of US forces.

Focused Lethality: The Mk82 QRC Program

Mark 82 bombs
(click for full sequence)

The “Focused Lethality Munition” is a variant of the 250 pound Small Diameter Bomb I that changes its casing and internal fill, in order to produce more devastating effects within a smaller area. A carbon-fiber bomb body disintegrates instead of fragmenting, which adds explosive force nearby, but largely removes sharpnel issues farther away. Inside, metal particles turn the bomb’s explosive material into short-range projectiles. The result is especially useful in urban areas, in situations where friendly elements are close to the impact zone, and in campaigns fought using contemporary American counter-insurgency doctrine.

Now the USA wants a bigger, but still confined, bang. Enter the Precision Lethality MK82 Quick Reaction Capability Program, designed to turn 500 pound bombs into similar but larger weapons.

US Military Contracts for Private Aerial Refueling Services

K-707, F/A-18, EA-6B

Crash, and burn. (May 19/11)

Aerial tankers are essential when moving large quantities of men and materials long distances, or stretching the range and length of fighter combat air patrols. Most are government-owned, but a segment of semi-privatized services may be set to grow alongside existing military fleets. Could DID readers find themselves flying to an Azores vacation on a chartered aerial tanker during its “spare hours”? As Britain’s FSTA public-private aerial tanker partnership comes to fruition, that’s exactly what could happen.

The USA’s KC-45 competition was set to buy up to 179 aircraft for the USAF’s fleet instead. Even here, however, some outsourcing is going on. Enter Omega Refueling Services, Inc.

• Using Omega’s Air Force
  
• Contracts [updated]
  

Czechs Choose, Cancel, Then Come Back to Pandur II APCs

Pandur II w. RCWS-30

In January 2006, the Czech Republic selected General Dynamics’ European Land Combat Systems subsidiary Steyr-Daimler-Puch Spezialfahrzeug GmbH of Austria to supply its army with 199 new eight-wheeled Pandur II armored personnel carriers (APCs) between 2007-2012. The KBVP vehicles would replace Soviet-era OT-64 SKOT APCs, and would be produced in Austria and the Czech Republic.

In 2005 the contract included an option for 35 additional vehicles for a total of 234, and had a potential value of Koruna 23.6 billion ($1-1.4 billion). Steyr’s Pandur II was a finalist, and eventually won the competition. But questions arose, the deal became a political football, and delivery issues jeopardized the deal into oblivion. Or so it seemed. Despite the economic crisis gripping Eastern Europe, the Czechs reinstated a scaled-down version of the deal in late February 2009.

Rapid Fire 2011-05-20: Sizing the Global Defense Market

• Global defense budget is expected to reach $1.1 trillion in 2012, according to ASDReports.com

• Lockheed Martin gets $45.3 million order to upgrade 22 Finnish Army M270 multiple launch rocket systems, enabling them to fire GPS-guided munitions.

• BAE Systems gets GBP 39 million in MOD contracts to improve the intelligence processing capability of the RAF’s Typhoon fighter.

• General Dynamics Electric Boat receives a $33.5 million contract modification to develop advanced submarine technologies for US Navy undersea platforms.

• Northrop Grumman and Georgia Institute of Technology to develop MEMS gyroscope technology for DARPA’s Microscale Rate Integrating Gyroscope program.

• UK uses Roll Over Drills Egress Trainers (RODETs) – armored hulls outfitted like a real vehicle that can be completely rotated – to teach troops at Camp Bastion in Afghanistan how to survive if their vehicle hits an IED.

Iraq Orders a Long-Range Radar

AN/TPS-77 Radar

May 9/11: Lockheed Martin Corp., Lockheed Martin MS2 Tactical Systems in Eagan, MN receives $26 million firm-fixed-price/cost-plus-fixed-fee contract to provide a turn-key “Long Range Radar 2″ site for the Iraqi Air Force, as a Foreign Military Sales contract. At this point, $13 million has been committed by the Electronic Systems Center/HSGK at Hanscom AFB, MA (FA8707-11-C-0007). See also: FedBizOpps.

The question is, what radar are they referring to? After some back-and-forth, Lockheed Martin consulted the USAF and replied that “We can’t provide any more details about this in theater project. Sorry.”

Having said that, the likely options fall within a specific family of Lockheed Martin radars.

Rapid Fire 2011-05-19: KC-767A Tankers for Italy

• US Army Corp of Engineers unveils $5 billion Civil Works plan for FY 2011.

• Nearly 1,000 workers at 3 defense contractors in the Washington, DC area – General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman – are being laid off this year, the Washington Examiner reports.

• A number of projects are working to free science from the bottlenecks of copyright-bound paper articles, even for research produced on the public dime. Open source science is impractical for much defense R&D, except as a potential input. On the other hand, new Open Science approaches have shown great promise for areas like disease cures – which do have a military dimension.

• India continues working on creating a nuclear triad with the deployment of its 1st Arihant class nuclear submarine expected in 2012. It also has inspection teams doing assurance checks in advance of an expected buy of M777 ultra-light howitzers.

• UK announces plans for a new nuclear-powered submarine to replace its existing Vanguard class submarine. Advance design contracts for the missile section started a while ago, and the main build decision is expected in 2016.

• Italy accepts 2 of its 4 ordered KC-767A aerial tankers into service, after a long set of technical delays and certifications.

• Israel is setting up a taskforce to develop defense capabilities against cyber attacks on critical infrastructure. Rumor has it that they set up a task force to handle the other end a while back. You’d have to ask the Iranians.

ITT Wins Upgrades to Swedish Coastal Radars

LCR2020

Coastal surveillance and “maritime domain awareness” are growing priorities for nations who wish to secure control of their borders against threats ranging from drug smuggling, to illegal immigration, to terrorist infiltration. Recent contracts in Yemen and Malaysia offer good examples. This task has always been a priority for neutral Sweden as part of its basic defense, and ITT Corporation recently signed a $44.9 million contract with the Swedish Defence Material Administration (FMV) for the Reliability and Modification (REMO 870) upgrade of their PS-870 coastal/gapfiller radar systems and their integrated, turnkey coastal surveillance system, the SABER-2020.

The REMO 870 program will upgrade the radars to the LCR2020 model standard by adding state-of-the-art processing, transmitter, antenna and display technologies, while following the current trend of using commercial off-the-shelf equipment rather than dedicated military-only circuits. The goal is improved reliability and autonomous operation, for detection of land and sea threats.

Rapid Fire 2011-05-18: UCAV Attack Jets?

• The US Army may have to spend at least $441 million to replenish prepositioned equipment to meet combatant command planning requirements, part of the $4.5 billion needed to fully reconstitute the Army’s prepositioned stocks, the GAO says.

• Russian President Dmitry Medvedev fires weapons plant officials and defense ministry officials over delays in deliveries of new weapon systems, after musing about the good old days when they would have enjoyed “hard physical labor in the fresh air.” Getting Russia’s defense industry back on its feet won’t be easy – but the money is there. It will happen. Eventually.

• White House unveils [PDF] an international cyberspace strategy that includes a call for tightening global defenses against cyber attack and using “all necessary means” to defend networks. Until the US can go on offense, it doesn’t matter much since there’s no cost to attacks.