April 19, 2024
X-62 VISTA Flew 1st AI Dogfight Against Manned F-16s | CyberTech Conference Took Place In Israel | China Bolsters Space Capabilities
Americas D-J Engineering Inc. won a $30 million deal for machine shop requirements for supplies related to EA-18G and P-8A aircraft components and related platforms/requirements for Naval Surface Warfare Center Crane. Each awardee will be awarded $10,000 obligated at time of award. These contracts include options which, if exercised, would bring the total value to […]
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April 19, 2024
P-8 Poseidon MMA: Long-Range Maritime Patrol, and More
P-8A Poseidon (click to view full) Maritime surveillance and patrol is becoming more and more important, but the USA’s P-3 Orion turboprop fleet is falling apart. The P-7 Long Range Air ASW (Anti-Submarine Warfare) Capable Aircraft program to create an improved P-3 began in 1988, but cost overruns, slow progress, and interest in opening the […]
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April 18, 2024
Denmark Sells F-16s To Argentina | Finnish Air Force To Conduct AAR With MMU | Mid-Range Capability Missile Landed In The Philippines
Americas Thales Defense & Security Inc. won a $16 million deal for the repair of three items that are part of the H-1 Optimized Top Owl system. All work will be performed in Valbonne, France, and work is expected to be completed by October 2024. Annual working capital funds (Navy) in the amount of $11,933,292 […]
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April 18, 2024
Snakes and Rotors: The H-1 Helicopter Program
UH-1Y and AH-1Z by Neville Dawson The US Marines’ helicopter force is aging at all levels, from banana-shaped CH-46 Sea Knight transports that are far older than their pilots, to the 1980s-era UH-1N Hueys and AH-1W Cobra attack helicopters that make up the Corps’ helicopter assault force. While the tilt-rotor V-22 Osprey program has staggered […]
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April 17, 2024
Australia's MH-60R Maritime Helicopters
MH-60Rs fire Hellfire (click to view full) Australia’s AIR 9000, Phase 8 project aimed to buy 24 modern naval helicopters to 16 existing S-70B-2 Seahawks, along with the disastrous A$1.1 billion, 11-helicopter SH-2G “Super Seasprite” acquisition attempt. With a total sales and support value of over A$ 3 billion, it was a highly coveted award. […]
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April 17, 2024
Lockheed Tapped For C2BMC Development | DoS Approved FMS To Iraq | Netherlands Ordered More Ground Master
Americas Lockheed Martin won a $46 million order by the US Navy, which provides non-recurring engineering for the development, integration, testing, and deployment of the MH-60 aircraft product line system configuration 26 fleet release for all MH-60 air platform variants, to include baseline management integrated management planning, integrated development environment support, support equipment baseline management, […]
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April 15, 2024
GD Tapped For Abrams | Hungary Welcomed 1st Millenium | Germany sends Additional Patriots To Ukraine
Americas General Dynamics Land Systems was awarded a $21,998,374 modification for Abrams systems technical support. Work will be performed in Sterling Heights, Michigan, with an estimated completion date of Jan. 15, 2025. Fiscal 2024 research, development, test, and evaluation, Army funds in the amount of $21,998,374 were obligated at the time of the award. Army […]
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April 15, 2024
Digital Abrams: The M1A2 SEP Program
M1A2 SEP (click to view full) America’s M1 Abrams tanks come in a number of versions. In addition to the M1A1 that is now standard, the US Army is beginning to field its M1 TUSK for urban warfare. It also operates the M1A2 System Enhancement Program (SEP), currently the most advanced standard variant. This Spotlight […]
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April 15, 2024
Aging Aircraft: USAF F-15 Fleet Sees Renewed Interest
F-15C over DC (click to view full) “Array of Aging American Aircraft Attracting Attention” discusses the issues that accompany an air force whose fighters have an average age of over 23.5 years – vs. an average of 8.5 years in 1967. One of the most obvious consequences is the potential for fleet groundings due to […]
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April 15, 2024
BAE Tapped For More ACV-P For The Marines | Most Of Iranian Drones Headed Towards Israel Intercepted | Saab Contracted By British Army For ILT-D
Americas BAE Systems has been awarded $25 million to provide the US Marine Corps with more Amphibious Combat Vehicle-Personnel units (ACV-P) under its fourth order for full-rate production. The deal is a follow-on order to a previously-awarded $181-million contract for the vehicles. The agreement also covers the vehicles’ fielding and sustainment costs, as well as support […]
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April 12, 2024
From Dolphins to Destroyers: The ScanEagle UAV
ScanEagle launch (click to view full) ScanEagle’s base Insight UAV platform was originally developed by Washington state’s Insitu, Inc. to track dolphins and tuna from fishing boats, in order to ensure that the fish you buy in supermarkets is “dolphin-safe”. It turns out that the same characteristics needed by fishing boats (able to handle salt […]
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April 12, 2024
US Army Wants More Commercial Tech | DoS Approved FMS To Saudi Arabia | JCG Orders Additional Airbus H225 Helicopters
Americas Insitu Inc. won a $84 million modification, which increases the contract ceiling to procure six RQ-21A and 20 ScanEagle unmanned air vehicles (UAS) including payloads and turrets; support equipment; spares and special tooling. Additionally, this modification procures services to include training, site surveys, engineering and technical and repair of repairable in support of the […]
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April 11, 2024
F-35 Lightning: The Joint Strike Fighter Program
F-35B: off probation (click to view full) The $382 billion F-35 Joint Strike fighter program may well be the largest single global defense program in history. This major multinational program is intended to produce an “affordably stealthy” multi-role fighter that will have 3 variants: the F-35A conventional version for the US Air Force et. al.; […]
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April 11, 2024
KC-46A Pegasus Aerial Tanker Completes Firsts
KC-135: Old as the hills… (click to view full) DID’s FOCUS articles cover major weapons acquisition programs – and no program is more important to the USAF than its aerial tanker fleet renewal. In January 2007, the big question was whether there would be a competition for the USA’s KC-X proposal, covering 175 production aircraft […]
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April 11, 2024
FlightSafety Tapped For KC-36 Training System | DoS OKs Hawk Missile Systems Support For Ukraine | Serbia Plans To Procure 12 Rafales
Americas FlightSafety International Defense Corp. won a $7.9 million modification for the exercise of the KC-46 Aircrew Training System. The contract modification will provide an additional weapon system trainer, additional learning management workstations, systems engineering and program management, as well as new refresher training scenarios. Work will be performed at Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, and is […]
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April 10, 2024
V-22 Osprey: The Multi-Year Buys, 2008-2021
(click to view full) In March 2008, the Bell Boeing Joint Project Office in Amarillo, TX received a $10.4 billion modification that converted the previous N00019-07-C-0001 advance acquisition contract to a fixed-price-incentive-fee, multi-year contract. The new contract rose to $10.92 billion, and was used to buy 143 MV-22 (for USMC) and 31 CV-22 (Air Force […]
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April 10, 2024
1st Naval CMV-22B Arrived For East Coast | Norinco Started VN22 6×6 Production | Taiwan Plans To Deploy Hsiung Sheng Missiles
Americas The US Navy’s transition to the CMV-22B Osprey for its long-range and medium-lift aerial logistics missions took a significant step forward on April 5, with the arrival of the first tiltrotor aircraft assigned to the East Coast at Naval Station Norfolk, Virginia. Fleet Logistics Multi-Mission Squadron (VRM) 40, nicknamed “Mighty Bison,” received the first […]
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April 9, 2024
Cochin Shipyard Inked Repair Agreement With USN | UK Delivered Land Rover Parts To Lebanon | South Korea Sent 2nd Spy Satellite To Space
Americas India’s Cochin Shipyard Limited has signed a maintenance and repair agreement with the US Navy. The third Master Shipyard Repair Agreement with an Indian company follows agreements with Larsen & Toubro in 2023 for Mazagon Dock and Kattupalli Port. The US Navy’s effort to expand maintenance and repair centers in the Indo-Pacific stems from the […]
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April 8, 2024
Eurofighter's Future: Tranche 3, and Beyond
Italian Eurofighters (click to view full) The multi-national Eurofighter Typhoon has been described as the aerodynamic apotheosis of lessons learned from the twin engine “teen series” fighters that began with the F-14 and F-15, continued with the emergence of the F/A-18 Hornet, and extended through to the most recent F/A-18 Super Hornet variants. Aerodynamically, it’s […]
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April 8, 2024
Delivery of 1st CE-145C Vigilance to RCAF | Austal Started LCU Construction in Mobile | RAF Eurofighters Arrived in Romania
Americas The US Army Security Assistance Command (USASAC) has a news article on the delivery of the first Beechcraft King Air 350ER, designated CE-145C Vigilance in Canada, to the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) on February 22nd. This marks the initial phase of a program that will see a total of three CE-145C Vigilance aircraft […]
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