The U.S. is pressing Persian Gulf allies to adopt a regional missile defense architecture, including the acquisition of U.S. systems, the State Department’s No. 2 official reiterated Feb. 19.
UAV AUDIT: U.S. congressional auditors are due to deliver a report to lawmakers recommending changes to how the U.S. Air Force manages and promotes UAV pilots. The report was spurred in 2012 by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), whose state is home to major Air Force UAV operations, and Armed Services Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.). It was triggered by congressional concerns that unmanned aircraft pilots were experiencing second-class status compared with the armed services’ traditional manned aircraft pilots.
Small vessels that represent a crime or piracy threat in global waters also present a potential means to smuggle weapons of mass destruction (WMD) into the U.S., according to a National Research Council (NRC) report.
LONDON — U.S. heavy-lift helicopter operator Columbia Helicopters is buying three ex-U.S. Army Boeing CH-47D Chinooks to bolster its fleet of the tandem-rotor helicopter. The purchase represents the first time a commercial operator has purchased former Army Chinooks for commercial use. The aircraft will be refurbished at the company’s maintenance facility at Portland, Ore., before beginning operations, although Columbia says no specific projects or contracts have been identified for the new Chinooks.
Anticipating the long-awaited release of the U.S. Navy’s draft request for proposals for a new carrier-borne unmanned air system (UAS), one influential congressman is going on record to support a set of demanding requirements. This could, perhaps, counter a push by some Pentagon leaders, including Adm. James Winnefeld, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He is said to be supporting requirements that are less rigorous in the area of survivability than those backed by officials in the Navy’s aviation community.
TEL AVIV — Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) a is expanding its cyber activities internationally, with the establishment of a cybersecurity research and development center in Singapore.
India’s military procurement plans are likely to be hampered by a minimal raise in budget allocation for acquisition in the next financial year. Though India has proposed increasing its defense spending by 10% to 2.24 trillion rupees ($36.2 billion) in its 2014-15 fiscal year, which begins April 1, the capital allocation earmarked to buy new arms and weapons systems has been increased by only a paltry 3.2%, or 28.47 billion rupees, to 895.87 billion rupees. The remaining 1.34 trillion rupees will go toward payment of salaries and other expenses.
LONDON — The French defense ministry has taken delivery of its first upgraded E-3F Sentry airborne early warning aircraft to be modified by Boeing and Air France Industries. The aircraft was handed over to the French defense procurement agency DGA, which will carry out ground and flight tests at Avord air base before handing the aircraft back to the French air force later this year, Boeing announced Feb. 17.
U.S. Army contracting officers made questionable contract changes for work involving the Ground Combat Vehicle (GCV), a recent Pentagon Inspector General (IG) report says.
Satellite observations of unique, finger-like dark features on steep slopes of the mid-southern latitudes of Mars hint at dense briny water flows during the summer season, according to findings from 11 researchers associated with NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) and Mars Odyssey missions.
HOUSTON — Orbital Sciences Corp. successfully completed its first NASA-contracted resupply mission to the International Space Station early Feb. 18, as the Dulles, Va.-based company’s “Orb-1” Cygnus capsule was unberthed from the U.S. segment Harmony module and released with Canada’s robot arm at 6:41 a.m. EST. The resupply craft is scheduled for a destructive re-entry through the Earth’s atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean at 1:20 p.m. EST on Feb. 19.
The U.S. Navy has further bolstered its Asia-Pacific profile by moving another submarine — the SSN-754 USS Topeka Los Angeles-class fast-attack submarine — to the region. The Navy detailed its plans this month to change the homeport for the submarine, now completing its Engineered Overhaul at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard (PNSY) in Portsmouth, N.H., to Naval Base Guam. Topeka will move to Guam as part of the U.S. Navy’s long-range plan to put the most advanced and capable units forward in the region, the Navy says.
Three prominent Republican congressmen are imploring Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel to continue funding the U.S. Air Force’s U-2 spy aircraft as he puts the finishing touches on a fiscal 2015-19 budget plan likely to gut the program. Hagel’s staff is considering abandoning support for the Lockheed Martin aircraft and capitulating to pressure from other lawmakers to funnel its money toward continued operation of the Northrop Grumman RQ-4B Global Hawk unmanned aerial system (UAS).
NEW DELHI — India’s first manned space flight program has received a major boost with a higher budgetary allocation and development of a crew module structural assembly. The federal interim budget, announced on Feb. 17, increased the allocation for the human space flight program from 92 million rupees ($1.5 million) to 170 million rupees. The increase comes days after state-run Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. (HAL) handed over the crew module to the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO).
Despite a need for ship modifications and other programmatic hiccups, the U.S. Marine Corps still plans to be operating Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) F-35B models off amphibious ships within about three years, says Marine Maj. Gen. Robert Walsh, director of Navy expeditionary warfare. Marines will be at the forefront of operating JSFs off Navy vessels, Walsh said at a recent U.S. Navy Amphibious Warship Forum sponsored by the Amphibious Warship Industrial Base Coalition. “We will be flying F-35s on a big-deck amphib,” he said Feb. 11.
TEST BAN: The Obama administration still wants the U.S. Senate to ratify the long-standing Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), but officials are sounding increasingly sober in their expectations. “We are going to be patient, but we will also be persistent,” said Rose Gottemoeller, acting undersecretary of state for arms control and international security.
The U.S. Navy needs to better equip a self-defense test ship (SDTS) to more accurately gauge Aegis combat system abilities for its proposed Flight III DDG-51 destroyers, the recent report from the Pentagon’s Director of Operational Tests and Evaluation (DOT&E) says.
