* The Center for a New American Security (CNAS) think tank published a report [PDF] on the South China Sea, a potential hot zone because of its sea lanes and China’s increasingly assertive territorial claims driven by natural resources such as deepwater oil and gas. Just surveying these resources has been a source of tension between China and neighbors including Vietnam and the Philippines.
* IAI says: Our President is retiring. Oh, and by the way, we just made a $1.1 billion sale to an unnamed Asian country (Globes first reported it was India but later retracted). It reportedly includes aircraft (UAVs? G550 ISR? KC-767 MMTT?), missiles (ground strike, anti-ship or naval air defense), and intelligence technologies (very wide range).
* Fellow Israeli UAV firm Aeronautics DS now has 8 long-range Dominator XP UAVs in different stages of work, as the DA42-based UAV ramps up production in the wake of export clearances.
* Little Rock AFB, AR accepts the 4th of 5 C-130H Avionics Modernization Program test & evaluation transport aircraft, and the 1st modified by the USAF’s Warner Robins ALC.
* Christmas came for the Swiss, with delayed delivery of their initial AEV-3 Geniepanzer heavy armored engineering vehicles. The Dutch and Swedes will be glad that problems were ironed out over there.
* Airdrops by US troops over Afghanistan reached a record last year at almost 16M pounds (about 7,250 tonnes). They like their JPADS. The airdrop ramp-up started a few years ago.
* THE US Air Force has a quick review on the state of eye injury protection and post-injury care. See also from the Army: Combat eye protection | Vision conservation and readiness program [PDF].
* US Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Jacob Lew will wrap-up the FY13 President Budget then replace William Daley as President Obama’s Chief of Staff.