Xi Goes Cyber

• China’s state media announced that both President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang are members of a new “Internet security and informatization” executive group whose purpose seems to be a mix of maintaining internal control and countering external threats. That is quite the high profile display of interest. Xinhua [in Chinese] | WaPo.

Long Range Strike-Bomber RFP Coming Next Fall

• US Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James announced that an RFP for the USA’s next strategic bomber will be released “probably in the fall.” Lockheed Martin and Boeing have publicly announced their team twice, in January 2008 then with an October 2013 remarriage, while Northrop Grumman made its interest known in a more subdued way. Not much else is known, apart from the fact it’s one of the service’s top acquisition priorities, with fielding tentatively starting in about a decade.

Airbus Reports Solid 2013 Results with Backlog Nearing Trillion Dollar Mark

• Airbus announced sales up 5% to 59.3 billion euros ($81.5B) and orders worth 218.7 billion euros (about $300B) for 2013. Defense sales grew by 4% to 12.1 billion euros ($16.6B) thanks to initial A400M deliveries. Their defense backlog is down 4.6% to 47.3 billion euros ($65B), but Airbus Defence and Space’s order intake is rebounding thanks to orders in civilian space. Total backlog is up 21% to more than $940B or 8+ years of production and about twice what it was 5 years ago.

• This performance raises the question of delivering, then renewing products to sustain the same volumes a few years from now. Other even bigger industrial companies such as General Electrics don’t have such huge backlogs because of shorter average lead times. Too much of a good thing might turn into a liability, and it is at least a risk they will have to manage.

DARPA Aims at Counterfeit Electronics, Pursues Autonomous Cargo Transport

• DARPA wants to make DoD procurement more secure with its Supply Chain Hardware Integrity for Electronics Defense (SHIELD) program. This would be done through small, very cheap components dedicated to authenticating the origin of their host electronic parts. The agency will host a workshop [PDF] on March 14 in Arlington, VA.

What’s Going On in Ukraine? Don’t Blink!

• Last Friday DID pondered who would stand up to Vladimir Putin’s meddling in Ukraine, and the answer came quickly: Ukrainians. Since then, events moved at warp speed as the opposition stepped up the pressure with its newfound parliamentary majority. President Yanukovich left Kiev on Saturday, while former prime minister Tymoshenko was released. Yanukovich, who unsuccessfully tried to leave the country, said parliament’s vote to remove him and set elections to May 25 amounts to a coup (video with English subtitles). Olexander Turchynov, a close ally of Tymoshenko, was appointed interim president. This is not necessarily the change protesters are looking for.

• The Ukrainian parliament didn’t stop at that, with constitutional rollbacks and executive appointments to boot. Anders Aslund at the Peterson Institute for International Economics explains that Yanukovich’s support collapsed. On Monday the Ministry of Internal Affairs issued a warrant to arrest Yanukovich on murder charges. For now the Russian government is not recognizing Ukraine’s new de facto government as legitimate, unlike the US, EU and UN. Russia’s envoy didn’t co-sign Friday’s agreement, and Russia has withdrawn its ambassador.

• With Ukraine close to default, the EU is saying they’re ready to provide financial assistance once a new government is in place, and Russia is pointing to the IMF, implying they won’t proceed with the bailout they had agreed to with Yanukovich. Ukraine’s Ministry of Finance has restricted government payments to wages and is seeking $35B of assistance. Any help the IMF and EU will offer will come with reform strings attached.

• What now? The Financial Times weighs in on why Ukraine and its future matter so much. Zbigniew Brzezinski, a Polish American who was President Carter’s national security adviser, thinks Russia should be offered a ‘Finland option.’ Mikheil Saakashvili, until recently the president of Georgia, thinks Western help can not only lead to a democratic Ukraine, but also open minds in Russia.
  

Next-Gen Naval Gunfire Support: The USA’s AGS & LRLAP

AGS fires LRLAP

It’s easy to forget that the original rationale for the DDG-1000 Zumwalt Class centered around naval gunfire support for troops ashore, as the ship’s estimated costs have risen and its missions have proliferated. Heavily armored US battleships with massive 16-inch (406 mm) guns once performed extremely well in this role, as their volkswagen-weight shells gave enemies pause. USS Iowa was brought back into service during the Reagan era, but she was decommissioned again in 1990. That left America with a floating museum in Los Angeles, and a gap in its options.

While European manufacturers are fielding guided, long range adaptations of existing 127mm/54 and 76mm shells, the Zumwalt Class will be getting an entirely new Advanced Gun System that fires the same 155mm shells used by field artillery ashore. The goal was to combine the wide range of available 155mm shell options with extra-long range, GPS precision guidance, and rapid fire.

Of Ukraine and Wishful Thinking

• The Economist and the Telegraph urge Western leaders to confront not just Ukraine’s government but also Vladimir Putin. After 3 months of unrest the country is now expected to have early elections (the official presidential statement in Ukrainian doesn’t say when) at best, under a weak deal just signed between the government and opposition leaders. That alone may not do much to solve deep-seated problems, a decade after the Orange revolution.

• As to Mr. Putin, German Chancellor Angela Merkel has started in her third term to take a (slightly) firmer stance, but she’s constrained by a need for Russian gas to hedge dubious energy policies. President Obama’s talk of a “line” that shouldn’t be crossed has no credibility after his about-face on Syria. Ukrainian Defense Minister Pavlo Lebedev is not even picking up the phone when Secretary Hagel tries to reach him. Putin will continue to push against an impotent EU (fear our travel bans!) and a lame duck US administration, as much as he can get away with. It is difficult to see where the fortitude to tell him to back off is going to come from. Yet in the words of former Ukrainian president Viktor Yushchenko:

“Those who underestimated Moscow’s readiness to use whatever means to maintain a sphere of influence must draw lessons from this development and help overcome Russia’s imperialistic claims.”

• Update: What’s Going On in Ukraine? Don’t Blink!

CNA Recommends Afghan Force Structure Changes to Confront Continued Taliban Threat

• CNA’s Center for Strategic Studies assessed [PDF] for the US Congress the state of the Afghan National Security Forces and recommends that the ANSF change their composition to provide more support, relative to over-abundant infantry units. The research organization expects the Taliban threat to continue for years before a political solution to end the war is likely to emerge.

China to Ramp Up L-15 Trainer Production?

• An announcement [in Chinese] from the PRC’s ministry of defense seems to indicate that production of Hongdu’s L-15 Falcon light attack trainers may soon pick up. So far they haven’t delivered more than a few prototypes and early units. According to the ministry, Hongdu has improved its recruitment and training. The L-15 is intended for domestic use and export to Zambia and possibly other countries close to China such as Pakistan.

F-35 Gets Another Round of (Confined) Mainstream Scrutiny

• CBS’ 60 Minutes did a decent job outlining challenges and hot issues in its F-35 report, within the significant constraints of limiting their sourcing to DoD, the program office, the services, and Lockheed Martin. A broader perspective that includes allied countries, subcontractors, competitors and detractors would have been appreciated. The official posture, as seen in this show and apparent for the past year or so, has been focused on acknowledging problems relatively candidly. This beats denial or stonewalling, but reminds of the “prepare 3 envelopes” joke. Question for CBS: are the constant Viagra ads a subliminal way to convey that the JSF program needs outside help to perform?