Dubai Airshow: Brimming with Commercial Orders

Do Buy… Airliners

• Day 1 of the Dubai airshow broke records yesterday in the airliner world, but on the military side the UAE still hasn’t decided which jets to acquire, despite hands-on business development help from UK Prime Minister David Cameron.

Defense Employment Trends

• Data compiled by consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas puts job losses in the defense sector at 30,000 jobs so far this year, and 160,000 jobs over the past 5 years.

Woe Is Me: FYDP FUD

• The services seem to be leaking preliminary FY15 budget data to either try and protect their share of the budget, and/or test whether they might get away with cutting programs they’re less interested in keeping. First we hear that LCS numbers are going to be cut, then the Air Force is allegedly not going to get funding for CRH and will de facto have to give up on Combat Search And Rescue (CSAR)? Whatever the motivation, we call PPBE shenanigans on such stories which tend to surface up in the November/December timeframe.

LWPS: Water, Water, Anywhere for the USMC

LWPS

You can live for weeks without food. A week without water will leave you dead, especially if you’re exerting yourself in unfriendly conditions. More bad news: water is heavy to carry, which means it takes a lot of resources to transport. There are all kinds of very clever single-soldier solutions for purifying water, but bases and outposts will need options that can scale and produce a steady supply. The US Marines are looking for expeditionary solutions, and TerraGroup’s TECWAR will be selling them some.