On the heels of criticism over the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF), Australian defense officials have defended the massive aircraft program and said they have "full confidence that the stealthy, fifth-generation, multi-role JSF will mature on time to provide Australia's future air combat capability in the most effective way."
Sens. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine), both members of the Senate Armed Services committee, led 14 other senators on June 23 in urging Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to boost the Navy's shipbuilding budget to $14 billion in fiscal 2008. "While the top-line budget of the Department of Defense has increased over 50 percent since the terrorist attacks of September 11th, the ship procurement budget has been reduced by 17 percent, shrinking our naval fleet from 341 ships in 2001 to 280 ships today," the senators wrote the secretary.
AIR FORCE McDonnell Douglas Corp., Long Beach, Calif., is being awarded a $235,508,095 firm-fixed-price and cost-plus-incentive-fee contract modification. This action funds the FY06 fourth quarter option for the C-17 sustainment, labor/engine, contract logistic support and materials. At this time, total funds have been obligated. Headquarters Aeronautical Systems Center, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, is the contracting activity (FA8614-04-C-2004/P00106).
POWERFUL APPROPRIATIONS: Neah Power Systems Inc. announced June 26 that $3 million for the Porous Silicon-based Direct Methanol Fuel Cell research and development project has been earmarked in the House's fiscal 2007 defense appropriations bill. The company said the funds would support continued development of silicon-based fuel cell technology for portable military applications and devices, such as man-pack radio systems carried by soldiers.
Congress is on its way, before the final fiscal quarter, toward approving a congressional compromise over the Coast Guard authorization for fiscal 2006 now that lawmakers have hammered out an agreement over a controversial wind energy project.
RQ-11A WORK: The U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Command tacked on $9.6 million to AeroVironment Corp.'s contract for depot level maintenance and repair for the RQ-11A small unmanned aircraft system, the Defense Department said June 23. The contract modification, issued June 21, runs through Sept. 30, 2007.
Defense officials finally confirmed June 26 that they have decided to continue with Bell Helicopter Textron Inc. and its embattled H-1 helicopter upgrades program, although they also said more scrutiny was ahead. Pentagon acquisition chief Ken Krieg signed an acquisition decision memorandum June 22 requiring the Navy to go ahead with the existing program but schedule another in-process review for October. At the same time, the Navy is to "develop a way forward to resolve various program issues," as well as "potential alternatives" to the existing program.
Congress is on its way to tightening award and incentive fees to aerospace and defense contractors when their programs fall short or run into problems, although any final requirement still has to be worked out. The Senate's fiscal 2007 defense authorization bill, passed June 22, calls for the Defense Department to issue new guidance on the "appropriate" use of award and incentive fees in DOD acquisition programs.
JERRVs: All 122 Joint Explosive Ordnance Disposal Rapid Response Vehicles (JERRVs) originally ordered last year will be delivered to the U.S. military by the end of month, Marine Maj. Gen. William Catto told the House Armed Services Committee during a June 15 hearing. The v-bottom-shaped JERRVs, awarded May 2005, were expected by last month (DAILY, June 24, 2005). Still, Force Protection Industries Inc.
NORAD C2: SI International Inc. said June 23 that it received a 2.5-year, $14 million Air Force Space Command (AFSPC) contract to provide life-cycle planning, management and engineering and technical assistance to the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) and AFSPC. The company said it will help define, develop, field, test and sustain their command and control capabilities, including space, air missile, and command and control elements.
CHINESE OBSERVERS: The Defense Department hopes that inviting Chinese military observers to attend the Valiant Shield exercise in the Pacific Ocean will encourage a reciprocal invitation for the U.S. to observe the next Chinese-Russian military exercise. Ten Chinese officials were among the foreign observers watching Valiant Shield, a joint U.S. military exercise last week that included 30 warships, 290 aircraft and 22,000 service personnel. Three carrier strike groups - the Kitty Hawk, Abraham Lincoln and Ronald Reagan - participated in the weeklong exercise near Guam.
The U.S. Treasury Dept. has frozen the U.S. financial assets of China's Great Wall Industry, along with another Chinese space exporter, in response to charges that they and the Chinese government are aiding Iranian ballistic missile development. "The companies targeted have supplied Iran's military and Iranian proliferators with missile-related and dual-use components," said Stuart Levey, under secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence at the Treasury Dept.
SPACE, UAVs: The Department of Defense will have to conduct an independent review of its management of military space and deliver the results to Congress, according to language added to the fiscal 2007 Senate defense authorization bill by Sen. Wayne Allard (R-Colo.). Meanwhile, Sen. Pete Domenici (R-N.M.) has amended the same bill to require DOD to deliver annual reports on the expanded use of unmanned aerial vehicles in the national airspace.
SHUTTLE COSTS: NASA's latest published estimate sets the cost of making the space shuttle fleet safe to fly after the Feb. 1, 2003, Columbia accident at $1.267 billion. That number includes expenses only through January, and not the cost of upcoming wind tunnel tests and other work on modifications to the external tank's ice/frost ramps.
With the possibility of a long-range missile test by North Korea looming, the director of the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) said June 23 that he is "confident" of the current missile defense system's ability to defend the U.S. "Based on the testing that we have done to date, I'm confident that we could hit a long-range missile that would be fired at the United States," U.S. Air Force Lt. Gen. Trey Obering said. "Obviously, in my mind, it's much higher confidence than has been described by some of our critics in the press."
NASA managers will wait until October to decide whether to launch a final space shuttle mission to service the Hubble Space Telescope, gaining time to analyze data from the upcoming STS-121 flight to the International Space Station. The previous NASA administrator, Sean O'Keefe, cancelled the Hubble servicing mission after the Columbia accident because the crew of another debris-damaged orbiter would not be able to use the ISS as a "safe haven" while awaiting rescue.
DARPA AWARD: The Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has signed KLA-Tencor Corp. of San Jose, Calif., to a $5.44 million cost-share and technology-investment agreement to investigate the feasibility of various key requirements needed to develop reflective electron-beam lithography technology. The contract, announced June 21 by the Defense Department, runs through December. DARPA solicited bids online in January and multiple proposals were received, DOD said.
JULY MARKUP: Senate appropriators are not scheduled to mark up their fiscal 2007 defense spending bill as a whole committee until July 20. The defense subcommittee could meet any time before then, according to a Senate Appropriations Committee spokeswoman. The House has passed both its defense appropriations and authorization bills, and the Senate just passed its authorization (DAILY, June 23). Senate appropriators traditionally like to have the last word.
June 27 - 28 -- 2006 U.S. Coast Guard Innovation Expo, "Domain Awareness & Integration," Tampa Convention Center, Tampa, Fla. For more information go to www.ndia.org. June 29 -- Homeland Defense Training Conference, "Emergency Alert Notification Solutions for Government and Business," Omni Shoreham Hotel, Washington, D.C. For more information call (703) 807-2758 or go to www.homelanddefensejournal.com.
