GPS IIR: Lockheed Martin has completed the last satellite in the U.S. Air Force’s Global Positioning System Block IIR modernization program (GPS IIR-M), including a demonstration payload to transmit the new L5 civil signal. The last spacecraft is scheduled for shipment from King of Prussia, Pa., to Cape Canaveral, Fla., in time for a June launch. IIR-M work was completed a month ahead of schedule and less than a year after the Air Force added a $6 million contract for the L5 frequency (1176.45MHz).
The Bush administration will not seek further export licensing treaties similar to pending deals before the Senate regarding the United Kingdom and Australia, according to a State Department official.
The U.S. Army Reserve and National Guard will need an additional $6.8 billion from fiscal 2013 to FY ’19, above current projections to achieve full equipment and modernization levels, according to three-star generals commanding the traditionally supportive segments.
The Bush administration is pushing Congress to fund a study of a space-based missile defense test bed because the military wants to inform debate within Washington over what is and isn’t possible, according to the director of the Missile Defense Agency (MDA).
While a $27 million reprogramming request from the U.S. Army makes its way through defense subcommittees on the Hill for approval, a second unspecified request is being proposed to keep the Future Combat Systems’ (FCS) first spin-out on track. Lt. Gen. Stephen Speakes, Army deputy chief of staff, and Lt. Gen. Ross Thompson, acquisition deputy, spoke April 3 before the Senate Armed Services Airland Subcommittee about the challenges facing FCS, which are primarily budget-related.
The fourth and final Boeing C-17 has been officially delivered to the Canadian armed forces from the company’s Long Beach, Calif. production line. Dubbed the CC-177 by the Canadian Forces, the aircraft will be fitted with Northrop Grumman’s large aircraft infrared countermeasures system at Boeing’s San Antonio, Texas, modification site. Following installation, the aircraft will join the three other Canadian C-17s at the 429 Transport Squadron, based in Trenton, Ontario.
The Pentagon cannot be certain that body armor bought by the U.S. Army and Marine Corps meets Defense Department standards, a recent department Inspector General (IG) report says. In its March 31 report, the IG recommends the Pentagon make sure some of the armor items bought so far are up to standard before purchasing more.
NASA has nearly finished a study on the feasibility of accelerating the crew transport portion of its Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program, which for now remains focused exclusively on cargo. During testimony April 3 to the House Science subcommittee on space and aeronautics, Richard Gilbrech, NASA’s associate administrator for exploration, said the agency would be happy to share the results of the study with lawmakers as soon as it is completed. “We’re in the final stages of vetting that,” he said.
The first flight of the Kawasaki C-X military transport for Japan’s Self-Defense Forces has been delayed again, this time until summer, because of newly found defects. The C-X, which was supposed to fly in September 2007, failed static structural tests last July. Officials have since decided that strengthening is needed for the frames of the mid and aft fuselage where the landing gear is attached and for the rear cargo ramp, the Japanese Defense Ministry said.
The Bush administration and European allies hope that a missile defense agreement reached inside NATO will help spur Russia to strike a larger “framework” deal and perhaps pull in the former Soviet country to a joint European missile defense network based around proposed U.S. ground-based midcourse interceptors there.
The U.S. is in danger of assuming strategic risk if it neglects national defense as it did after World War II and the Korean and Vietnam wars, warned Gen. Richard Cody, departing U.S. Army vice chief of staff. Cody said that the U.S.’s historical neglect of national defense after major conflicts is a mistake. “We’ve been down that road before, as a nation and as an Army, and we know where it leads,” he said April 3. “Unexpected conflict happens, and it is the soldier who pays in blood when we as a nation are unprepared.”
Members of the U.S. Air Force’s source selection group raised concerns about the performance of the EADS refueling boom design during the KC-X tanker competition, according to Mark McGraw, Boeing’s tanker executive. The Air Force officials were “speaking loudly” behind closed doors in meetings about their worries, and this information found during the discovery phase of Boeing’s protest of the award to Northrop Grumman/EADS is “very encouraging” support for the company’s protest, McGraw told reporters during an April 3 teleconference.
Japan will consider the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning along with three other nonstealthy types as its next-generation fighter to replace McDonnell Douglas Phantoms, suggesting a softening of its hard-line requirement for F-22s.
FCS SUPPORT: The movement and distribution of supplies will happen “further back in the [Future Combat Systems] requirements than they would have you believe,” an Army transportation official said April 2. Brig. Gen. James E. Chambers, commander of the Army’s Transportation School at Ft. Eustis, Va., said it will be a legacy force that supports and sustains the Future Combat Systems (FCS) fleet.
Boeing has demonstrated that sustained, level flight in a manned aircraft can be achieved using nothing but a fuel cell for power, and is eyeing the technology for possible incorporation into unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Francisco Escarti, managing director of Boeing Research & Technology Europe (BR&TE), thinks UAVs that tap a fuel cell’s inherent silence and lack of heat signature – no hot gas engine – are a natural for the surveillance UAV world. The fact that such aircraft would contribute no pollutants or CO2 emissions is a bonus.
NASA engineers are in the early stages of designing a mechanical countermeasure to the thrust oscillation problem identified last year in the first stage of the Ares I crew launch vehicle, a modified space shuttle solid-fuel booster. The fix, which involves mounting the stage’s 14,000-pound recovery-parachute package on springs to dampen vibrations generated as its solid propellant burns out, should knock them down to a level that can be handled with shock absorbers or other devices on the seats of the Orion crew exploration vehicle on top.
ATV DOCKS: Astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) welcomed Europe’s first Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) April 3. The 20-metric ton freighter, which will complement the space shuttle, Russian Progress and Japan’s H-II Transfer Vehicle while filling a vital cargo role after the retirement of the shuttle in 2010, maneuvered from a holding position 39 kilometers beyond the ISS and docked with the Zvezda service module at 10:45 a.m.
Boeing Integrated Defense Systems is reporting fewer helicopter deliveries in the first quarter of 2008 than the comparable period last year and a slight decline in overall aircraft and spacecraft activity. No Apache new-builds were delivered so far this year, compared to four last year; and only two Chinooks new-builds were delivered versus five in early 2007. Boeing also delivered three C-17s (versus four), four F-15s (against none), 10 F/A-18EF and EA-18Gs (compared with 11), one T-45TS (versus two) and two 767 tankers (against none).
PROTEST UPDATE: The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has agreed to review a “streamlined” version of Boeing’s protest of the U.S. Air Force’s tanker decision. Boeing filed a truncated version of its original March 11 protest after the U.S. Air Force and the winner, a Northrop Grumman/EADS North America team, filed motions to dismiss many of its claims. Northrop Grumman says the move by GAO supports the company’s view that many of Boeing’s complaints should have been raised last year, prior to the downselect. GAO will rule on the issue by late June.
Lockheed Martin announced April 2 that the third VH-71 helicopter built for the Presidential Helicopter program, Test Vehicle 3 (TV-3), has arrived in the U.S. and will be the first VH-71 to undergo final assembly at Lockheed Martin Systems Integration in Owego, N.Y. The Navy-owned TV-3 was transported aboard a U.S. Air Force C-17 cargo plane from AgustaWestland’s facility in Yeovil, England, to Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Md., before flying to Owego.
The British Defense Ministry is finally going ahead with a considerably delayed – but sorely needed – overhaul of its air transport tasking computer software infrastructure. The Royal Air Force’s (RAF) Air Movements Operation (AMO) project is due to enter full service in September 2009, replacing the Air Movements Information System presently in use. The system selected to meet the AMO requirement, dubbed “Swift2Move,” is being developed for the ministry by a Thales-led team.
The provisional commander of the U.S. Air Force’s nascent cyber command suggests the U.S. military may need to rethink — and essentially loosen — its definition of uniformed personnel, as well as streamline and quicken its acquisition processes to meet growing cyberwarfare needs. “Perhaps we need a different kind of warrior in this domain,” Maj. Gen. William Lord told a Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) audience. “Today, all of our armed forces have a physical fitness test that requires us to ... meet some physical fitness standards.
RADIO DAYS: Lockheed Martin announced April 1 that it was awarded a $766 million System Development and Demonstration (SDD) contract to provide the Airborne and Maritime/Fixed (AMF) element of the Joint Tactical Radio System (JTRS). The AMF JTRS network component will provide interoperable communication for more than 160 platform types including fixed and rotary wing aircraft, submarines and surface ships, and fixed stations worldwide. The Lockheed Martin AMF JTRS team includes BAE Systems, General Dynamics, Northrop Grumman and Raytheon.
