The joint venture of Shorts Missile Systems and Thomson Shorts Systemes has concluded integration of the laser-guided Starburst short range air defense missile with the Aspic fire control platform with a series of firings at a U.K. Ministry of Defence range. The joint venture said yesterday that the firings ran from July 23 to July 29, and were successful.
August 31, 1995 Honeywell Corporation Honeywell Corporation, Minneapolis, Minnesota, is being awarded a $8,499,439 Firm Fixed Price contract for 225 Pitch Augmentation Computers applicable to the C-5 aircraft. Contract is expected to be completed. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. There was one proposal received. Solicitation began May 1995 and negotiations were complete August 1995. San Antonio Air Logistics Center, Kelly Air Force Base, Texas is the contracting activity (F41608-95/D-1251). Sept. 1, 1995
Air Mobility Command officials have cleared airlift crews to transport the heavier M1A2 version of the Abrams main battle tank on McDonnell Douglas C-17s, concluding that the tank's extra weight is no problem for the plane or its ramp.
Israel's Rada Electronic Industries yesterday won a $14 million contract to supply operational training and maintenance systems to F-16 fighters of the Royal Netherlands Air Force.
UNC AVIATION SERVICES, Annapolis, Md., won an $8.5 million contract from the U.S. Air Force's Air Education and Training Command, Randolph AFB, Tex., for simulator and academic instructors for Undergraduate Pilot Training and Pilot Instructor Training in T-37 and T-38 aircraft, and academic instructors for Specialized Undergraduate Navigator Training. The Dept. of Defense announced the contract Aug. 29.
HUGHES TRAINING INC., Link Div., Binghamton, N.Y., has been chosen by the U.S. Navy to develop a block upgrade to the Cobra Helicopter Advanced Operations System (CHAOS) of the AH-1W Supercobra weapons system trainer. The Dept. of Defense, announcing the $8.5 million contract Aug. 29, said the upgrade "will improve the visual and computer systems of the AH-1W trainer. The contract was awarded by the U.S. Naval Air Warfare Training Center's Systems Div., Orlando, Fla.
Republicans on the Senate Armed Services Committee can live with the non-binding language of the Missile Defense Act compromise because it isn't the final version, the chairman of the SASC strategic forces subcommittee said yesterday. The panel chaired by Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) drafted the original Missile Defense Act of 1995 as part of the SASC-approved fiscal 1996 defense authorization. It mandated development and deployment by 2003 of a multiple site National Missile Defense (NMD) system.
Here's one way to cope with a too-high FS-X price tag-buy extra fighters for the aerobatic team to bring the unit price down. Of the 141 F-16 derivatives planned by the Japan Air Self-Defense Force, 74 will go to front-line combat units. The rest go for training, attrition-and the Blue Impulse aerobatic team, which gets nine planes. The Blue Impulse is already in the process of cashing in its Mitsubishi T-2 trainers for T-4s, so why do it again? And why return to a supersonic aircraft, after just converting to a subsonic plane?
Whittaker Electronic Systems, Simi Valley, Calif., said yesterday it has been awarded a $1.6 million contract for secure communications equipment for the United Arab Emirates' AH-64 Apache helicopters.
Thomas B. Ross, the senior public affairs director at the White House National Security Council, is leaving his position to take a job with Globalstar L.P., the Loral-led consortium that is developing a 48-satellite low-Earth orbit communications network. Ross will be responsible for Globalstar's public relations, investor relations and government relations, the consortium announced yesterday. He will be based in New York. Ross had served as assistant secretary of defense for public affairs from 1977 to 1981.
The Marine Corps, working with other U.S. services, still has a handful of avionics-related issues to agree on before a joint specification for the CV-22 tiltrotor for Special Operations Forces can be released. Most, if not all, of the outstanding issues are related to avionics, particularly electronic combat. "That's probably more because of the availability of the equipment than anything else," says Dar Lundberg, head of customer requirements for V-22 contractor Bell-Boeing.
VISICOM LABORATORIES INC., San Diego, beat three other competitors to win a $6.1 million U.S. Navy contract for system engineering and implementation services to support the Joint Maritime Command Information System (JMCIS). The Dept. of Defense said Aug. 31 that the contract, from the U.S. Naval Command, Control and Ocean Surveillance Center, RDT&E Div., San Diego, would have a value of $15.8 million if all options are exercised.
The pace of congressional decision-making on defense issues will accelerate sharply when the Senate returns from its August recess today and the House tomorrow. Within about 30 calendar days, Congress will make the major decisions it has been unable to make so far this year on about half a dozen major defense programs.
LT. GEN. JAMES R. CLAPPER, former director of the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, has been named executive vice president of Vredenburg, a professional and technical services firm based in Reston, Va. Clapper retired from the U.S. Air Force Sept. 1 after serving as director of the DIA since November 1991. Vredenburg said Friday that Clapper will work with President and CEO K.M. Baboyian to continue the growth of the company's business base.
Despite the many ongoing studies to reshape U.S. intelligence, the classified House bill is "fairly straightforward," a source says. That's because Intelligence Committee Chairman Larry Combest (R-Tex.) doesn't want to use an authorization bill as a vehicle for large- scale structural changes. Instead, he planning to propose intelligence reforms in a separate bill that should be introduced early next year.
The Air Force is considering upgrades to the High Speed Anti- Radiation Missile (HARM) and the HARM Targeting System (HTS) for F-16s assigned to Suppression of Enemy Air Defense (SEAD) missions, the official says. "We're making software improvements to the HTS and we're looking also at what's called a level improvement," he says. The service is already considering HARM software upgrades beyond the Block V modifications it contracted in June. Hardware changes are also being eyed, but the official wouldn't say what they would entail.
A top U.S. Marine Corps officer warned that the information and technology- based U.S. military could have a difficult time facing a technically less sophisticated opponent whom the U.S. couldn't confront on its own terms.
MAJ. GEN. WILLIAM NAVAS has been named as the next director of the U.S. Army National Guard. Navas, now deputy assistant secretary of defense for reserve affairs, succeeds Maj. Gen. John D'Araujo Jr., who has been director since 1992.
What's the top priority on the House Intelligence Committee's agenda today? Getting its fiscal 1996 intelligence authorization bill to the House floor. The committee approved the bill several months ago, but the crush of legislation in the new Republican- controlled Congress has left it sitting in waiting. The panel is hoping its bill can go before the House Rules Committee this week, which is needed before it can go to a floor vote.
NAVSTAR GLOBAL POSITIONING SYSTEM Joint Program Office plans to release a request for proposals around Sept. 12 for the GPS Block IIF acquisition, according to an announcement in the Sept. 5 Commerce Business Daily. The office plans to award a firm fixed price contract valued at $3.6 billion, including options, in February 1996.
