Confronted by a waffling buyer, most vendors don’t immediately think of hostile acts a preferred sales tactic to close the deal. Putin’s Russia, on the other hand, seems to be taking exactly that approach as India remains locked in price negotiations over the former Admiral Gorshkov carrier and SU-30MKI fighters, and considers non-Russian aircraft in its MMRCA medium fighter competition.
Plans called for rotating Indo-Russian joint operation of the Ayni air base, located just 15km from Tajikstan’s capital. Its location above Afghanistan and Pakistan, and next to Uzbekistan et. al., makes it an important forward base for India to project special forces into the region, and send aid to Afghanistan over land routes. In July 2007, however…
Sept 13/07: Raytheon Company of McKinney, Texas received a firm-fixed-price contract for $86.1 million, in exchange for 27 AN/AAS-52 Multi-Spectral Targeting Systems Model A (MTS-A) and 54 MTS-A Retrofits to support the MQ-1 Predator UAV; 19 Multi-Spectral Targeting Systems (MTS-B), 3 MTS-B Pre-Production Retrofits to support the MQ-9 Reaper UAV program; and associated Shop Replaceable Unit (SRU) Spares. These systems provide the UAVs with electro-optical viewing, infrared viewing, laser designation, and laser targeting illumination.
Wright Patterson AFB, OH is the contracting activity (FA8620-06-G-4041, Delivery Order 0004), and at this time $10.1 million has been obligated.
Hydroid, LLC at the has carved out a very strong position in the global market for unmanned anti-mine underwater vehicles. Its modular Remote Environmental Measuring Unit (REMUS) systems were developed at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, and are already serving with Australia, Belgium, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Singapore, the US Navy, and the UK’s Royal Navy.
BAE Systems has been racing to catch up, rapidly developing their Talisman UUV using fast, iterative prototyping. The UK MoD continues to purchase Hydroid systems thus far, however, including a recent GBP 5.5 million (about $11.1 million) purchase of 2 complete Remus 600 systems for mine countermeasures work.
The REMUS 600 vehicles will provide a detailed maritime survey and mine detection and classification capability in the 30m to 200m depth range, although the vehicle can operate down to 600m. It is fitted with a range of sensors and runs on re-chargeable batteries giving it an endurance of over 70 hours. The Remus 600 can be deployed from any vessel equipped with a one tonne crane or davit, and is intended to enter service in 2009. UK MoD release.
Back in September 2006, there was a bit of a kerfuffle in some quarters over an Iranian news agency (IRNA) announcement that quoted the commander of the Iranian army General Attollah Salehi as saying their new indigeous Saegheh/ Saeqeh [DID: “thunder” or “lightning”, reports vary] aircraft is “similar to the F-18 fighter jet, but it is more capable and has been manufactured domestically… designed, remodeled, optimized and made more capable by our engineers… no country has aided us in its production.” Reports are also repeating Iran’s claim that it is developing a 5th generation “Shafagh” stealth fighter, without appropriate laughter or ridicule.
Readers may recall past Iranian claims re: “stealth” flying boats that obviously used stealth-killing propellers, and other such nonsense. At the time, DID offered a more sober and reasoned light on this new development. Now that IRNA news reports are resurfacing, including pictures, the issues seem worth revisiting.
