US Military News, Reports, Data, etc.

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Sea Waves said:

Herndon VA Jan 21, 2014 - Airbus Group, Inc. has delivered the 16th HC-144A Ocean Sentry maritime patrol aircraft to the U.S. Coast Guard. The Ocean Sentry is based on the Airbus CN235 tactical airlifter, more than 235 of which are currently in operation by 29 countries. This is the first of three HC-144A's planned for delivery this year.

The latest aircraft will join a fleet of 15 Ocean Sentries performing roles from Coast Guard Air Stations in Cape Cod, Mass., Mobile, Ala., and Miami, Fla. The Coast Guard is planning in 2014 to stand up the fourth HC-144A air station in Corpus Christi, Texas.

"The Coast Guard competitively selected and is buying the HC-144A because it has proven to effectively and efficiently perform the broad range of demanding maritime patrol missions, including search and rescue, homeland security, disaster response and national defense," said Sean O'Keefe, Chairman and CEO of Airbus Group, Inc.

"The Department of Homeland Security recently recognized the Coast Guard's HC-144A maritime patrol aircraft program as the DHS Project of the Year, and we're proud to have worked with them to deliver this capability consistently on schedule and on cost. We are pleased to be members of the Coast Guard aviation community and to support the dedicated men and women who protect our nation's coasts and waterways," said O'Keefe.

The HC-144A achieved initial operational capability with the Coast Guard in 2008.

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so I'm curious what's the reason, weather conditions? construction works somewhere on the way? (I've never been to Maryland) or sequestration?

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bd popeye said:

Bad weather.. they received about 5 inches(13cm) of snow yesterday...They were expecting more.

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Army's GCV program downgraded to study project
Jan. 19, 2014 - 06:00AM |

Congress has severely reduced funding for the Ground Combat Vehicle program, which is replacing the Bradley fighting vehicle for the US Army.
Congress has severely reduced funding for the Ground Combat Vehicle program, which is replacing the Bradley fighting vehicle for the US Army. (US Army)

By Paul McLeary
Staff writer army times

Odierno: Ground Combat Vehicle is dead (for now)
Ground combat vehicle budget slashed, cancellation more likely
WASHINGTON — Congress has cut $492 million from the White House’s request for the Army’s Ground Combat Vehicle (GCV) program for fiscal 2014, effectively ending the program as a major acquisition initiative for the ground service.

The White’s House’s original request was $592 million, which was winnowed to $100 million in the omnibus appropriations bill the Senate passed last week and sent to the White House for the president’s signature.

While the Army has made noises about canceling the program for several months, the final Senate bill was an unforeseen dramatic turn in a program that Army leaders have long said was critical to its modernization efforts.

An industry source told sister publication Defense News on Jan. 17 that the two competing GCV contractors — BAE Systems and General Dynamics — will run out of funds to keep working on the program by June unless the Army can find a way to fund the rest of the current six-month technology development phase of the program, which it extended by six months last year.

In April, General Dynamics was awarded a six-month, $180 million extension to complete work on the technology development phase of the program, while BAE was awarded $160 million. The funding began in December.

Sources have said the Army has received guidance from the Pentagon to keep the GCV program alive — though not to actually produce vehicles — just enough so the government could continue to work on technology development.

One industry official who asked to remain anonymous said the technologies that the service might be most interested in are advanced fire control systems or “maybe a hybrid engine” concept, based on industry’s talks with Army officials.

The official said that not canceling the GCV outright makes sense, as “the worst thing you can do is cancel the contract, because then you owe the contractor all kinds of money.”

The engineering and manufacturing development portion of the competition — slated to result in the selection of one vendor — was scheduled to kick off this coming June.

“When you’re this close to a milestone decision, the best thing to do is conduct the milestone, then say you’re not going to move on to the next phase of the program,” the official said.

“The Army can’t afford anything new,” said Loren Thompson of the Lexington Institute, Arlington, Va. “It can afford mods, it can afford upgrades, but clean sheet designs have fallen out of the modernization plan. There’s no GCV, no Armed Aerial Scout — it’s all a continuation of the Army’s ‘Big 5’ during the Reagan years.”

In the 1980s, the Army invested heavily in Apache and Black Hawk helicopters, the Abrams tank, the Bradley fighting vehicle and the Patriot missile defense system. All of those systems are expected to remain in the Army inventory for years, or decades, to come.

The technology development phase of the GCV program kicked off in August 2011 with the awarding of contracts to BAE Systems for $449 million and General Dynamics Land Systems for $439 million for continued work on the program.

Plans have called for the Army to buy 1,894 vehicles, with the service claiming the average unit production cost for the GCV would fall into the $9 million to $10.5 million range. The Pentagon’s Office of Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation disputed those figures, estimating the average unit cost could actually be as high as $17 million.

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Odierno: Ground Combat Vehicle is dead (for now)
Jan. 23, 2014 - 03:38PM |

Army Chief Of Staff Ray Odierno Gives Address On T
Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ray Odierno said Jan. 23 that he hopes the service can get back to building a new infantry fighting vehicle in a few years. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)

By Paul McLeary
Staff writer Army times
Army's GCV program downgraded to study project
WASHINGTON — If the omnibus budget bill that President Obama signed earlier this month didn’t already make it clear, the Army’s Ground Combat Vehicle program is all but dead.

After Congress slashed $492 million from the Army’s $592 million fiscal 2014 request for continued development of the program, it appeared that the next-generation infantry carrier was being relegated to little more than a technology development and study program.

In a breakfast speech Thursday, Chief of Staff of the Army Gen. Ray Odierno drew a thick black line under that assumption when he asked, “Do we need a new infantry fighting vehicle? Yes. Can we afford a new infantry fighting vehicle now? No.”

Odierno said he hopes that the remaining funding will allow the Army to continue to develop technology so that “three to four years from now” the service can get back to building a new infantry fighting vehicle to replace the aging Bradley.

“I was very pleased with the progress of the Ground Combat Vehicle,” he insisted. “I think we have the requirements right. We’re starting to see really good development by the contractors involved with this so it’s important that we carry that forward, so we’re trying to figure out how to carry that forward.”

BAE Systems and General Dynamics have been given hundreds of millions of dollars by the Army since 2011 to develop technologies for the GCV program, even though the Congressional Budget Office has argued against building the platform due to its ballooning weight, armor and projected sustainment requirements. In an April report, the agency estimated that the Army would have to spend $29 billion between 2014 and 2030 to purchase 1,748 GCVs.

Repeating a mantra that other service leaders have espoused over the past two years, the chief said that the service is looking for “leap-ahead technologies” that would allow it to build ground vehicles that are light and mobile, while still providing the protection against rockets and roadside bombs needed on today’s battlefield.

Over the past decade “we’ve traded mobility for survivability,” he said, adding, “I need tactical mobility for the future.”

According to the results of recent Army war games and comments the chief and his top advisrs have made over the past several years, the service projects that it will have to deploy rapidly and in small formations in future conflicts.

Leadership has been vague as to why it is convinced that future conflicts will hinge so critically on the Army’s ability to get to the fight faster, but it’s easy to see the lessons that Army brass have taken from recent conflicts such as the 2006 Israel thrust into Lebanon, the French intervention in Mali, and the emerging role of ground forces in places like South Sudan and the Central African Republic.

In the future, “we have to be expeditionary” Odierno added. “We have to be prepared to deploy very quickly. We have to get there in small packages. We have to get there with the least amount of support necessary. We have to be able to go to remote areas.”

Given these requirements, it might be hard to square Odierno’s claims that the Army had GCV requirements “right” as the vehicle was estimated to weigh as much as 70 tons, and as such, would not be easily deployable.

But the service is pressing on with other ground vehicle programs.

“We’re going to build new when its absolutely essential,” Odierno said, calling out the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle and Armored Multi-Purpose Vehicle as programs that will live on. “We have to have these systems” to replace the ancient M113 infantry carrier and the Humvee.

As far as the service’s helicopter fleets, Odierno said the Army will continue to invest in Black Hawks, CH-47F Chinooks and Apache Block III attack helicopters for the foreseeable future. ■

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SecDef Hagel ordering full review of nuclear force
Jan. 23, 2014 - 06:08PM |

By Robert Burns
The Associated Press
FILED UNDER
News
Congress & DOD
AP findings on troubles in nation’s nuclear force
A string of nuclear missteps, many uncovered by The Associated Press, have beset the nation’s nuclear force in the last year:
■ Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel orders on Thursday an independent review of the nuclear force and summons the most senior Pentagon leaders to discuss its serious missteps, leadership lapses and personnel problems.
■ On Jan. 16, the Air Force said at least 34 nuclear missile launch officers have been implicated in a cheating scandal and have been stripped of their certification in what the Air Force believes is the largest such breach of integrity in the nuclear force. The cheating involves the monthly test on their knowledge of how to operate the missiles.
■ As part of the Jan. 16 announcement of the alleged cheating, the Air Force said three ICBM launch officers — two at Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana and one at F.E. Warren Air Force Base in Wyoming — were among 11 officers at six bases implicated in an illegal-narcotics investigation.
■ In April, 17 missile crew members in the 91st Missile Wing at Minot, N.D., were deemed temporarily unfit for duty and given weeks of remedial training. The wing’s deputy commander of operations complained of “rot” in the force. Later, the officer in charge of the 91st’s missile crew training and proficiency was relieved of duty.
■ In August, the 341st Missile Wing at Malmstrom failed a safety and security inspection. Nine days later the officer in charge of security forces there was relieved of duty. In October the unit passed a do-over test.
■ On Oct. 11, the Air Force fired Maj. Gen. Michael Carey, commander of the 20th Air Force, which is responsible for the entire Minuteman 3 missile force, amid an investigation of an alcohol-related complaint. This happened two days after a Navy admiral who was second-in-command at U.S. Strategic Command, the military’s main nuclear war-fighting command, was relieved of duty amid a gambling-related investigation.
■ The AP reported that twice last year the Air Force punished officers involved in separate incidents of opening the blast door of their launch control center while one of the two launch officers was asleep, in violation of Air Force rules.
■ In November, the Air Force chief of staff, Gen. Mark Welsh, disclosed that as a result of the Carey firing, the Air Force would take a closer look at the background of candidates for general officer-level nuclear command jobs.
■ Also in November, the AP reported that key members of the Air Force’s nuclear missile force are feeling “burnout” from what they see as exhausting, unrewarding and stressful work. The finding, in an unpublished RAND Corp. study provided to the AP in draft form, also cited heightened levels of misconduct such as spousal abuse and said court-martial rates in the nuclear missile force in 2011 and 2012 were more than twice as high as in the overall Air Force. The courts martial rate in 2013 declined but was still higher than the overall Air Force. — AP
Related Links
Air Force secretary has 'picked up on morale issues'
Amid cheating investigation, raises considered for missileers
WASHINGTON — With public trust and safety at stake, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel ordered immediate actions Thursday to define the depth of trouble inside the nation’s nuclear force, which has been rocked by disclosures about security lapses, poor discipline, weak morale and other problems that raise questions about nuclear security.

It amounted to the most significant expression of high-level Pentagon concern about the nuclear force since 2008, when then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates fired the top uniformed and civilian officials in the Air Force following a series of mistakes that included an unauthorized flight of nuclear-armed cruise missiles across the country.

Hagel had recently said he was considering what may lay behind problems in the nuclear Air Force — many revealed by The Associated Press— but his chief spokesman said Thursday that the defense secretary concluded urgent remedies were needed.

“To the degree there are systemic problems in the training and professional standards of the nuclear career field, the secretary wants them solved,” the spokesman, Navy Rear Adm. John Kirby said. “To the degree there are gaps in our understanding or implementation of those standards, he wants them closed. And to the degree leaders have failed in their duties, he wants them held to account.”

Hagel summoned top military officials to a Pentagon conference, to be held within two weeks, to “raise and address” any personnel problems infesting the nuclear force, and he ordered an “action plan” be written within 60 days to explore nuclear force personnel issues, identify remedies, and put those fixes into place quickly. Hagel said he and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, will host the nuclear summit.

The Pentagon chief also said he would assemble a small group of outsiders with expertise in the nuclear field to conduct a broader review of the U.S. nuclear force, with a focus on personnel issues, and to recommend changes “that would help ensure the continued safety, security and effectiveness of our nuclear forces.”

Personnel failures within this force threaten to jeopardize the trust the American people have placed in us to keep our nuclear weapons safe and secure,” Hagel wrote in a memo to top military officials, including heads of the Air Force and Navy.

Sen. Mark Udall, D-Colo., chairman of the Senate subcommittee that oversees the nation’s strategic nuclear forces, welcomed Hagel’s move.

“I remain concerned by the lapses in judgment and discipline displayed by some nuclear missile launch officers in recent months, and I applaud Defense Secretary Hagel’s swift and appropriate actions to identify the root causes of those issues,” Udall said. “Our nation demands a great deal of the men and women in our nuclear enterprise for good reason.”

Since May, the AP has reported that nuclear force officers, from the commanding officer on down, had engaged in numerous misbehaviors. Some of those included failing security tests, violating security rules like leaving the blast door open while one of two officers napped, morale so low an officer complained of “rot” in his force and a report citing high levels of burnout.

Personnel issues are important because ICBMs are kept on alert every hour of every day, and the potential for human error is ever-present. Some argue that the men and women who hold the keys to the nuclear missiles have lost some of their focus on the mission, while others say their commanders are more to blame.

Not at issue, at least in the short term, is the Obama administration’s commitment to keeping the bulk of the current nuclear force, which is comprised of ballistic missile submarines, nuclear-capable bombers and the Air Force’s fleet of 450 Minuteman 3 intercontinental ballistic missiles based in silos in five states. Hagel recently reiterated his support for the nuclear force and said he is not questioning its safety.

Hagel directed his concern mainly at the Air Force and its Minuteman 3 missiles, which have been the source of many of the problems the AP reported.

And just last week, in a disclosure that apparently startled Hagel, the Air Force said a drug investigation that began at Malmstrom Air Force Base, Mont., which operates one-third of the ICBM force, led to a separate investigation of alleged cheating on proficiency tests by 34 officers who operate the missiles there.

Those 34 officers had their security clearances suspended in a scandal that the commander at Malmstrom, Col. Robert W. Stanley II, told the AP in an interview last Friday had left his force “brokenhearted.”

Last month an Air Force investigation revealed that Maj. Gen. Michael Carey, who was commander of the nuclear missile force, had engaged in embarrassing behavior while leading a U.S. government delegation to a nuclear security exercise in Russia, including heavy drinking and cavorting with suspicious women. He had been fired in October, just days after another senior nuclear officer, Navy Vice Adm. Tim Giardina, was relieved of command at U.S. Strategic Command amid allegations linked to counterfeit gambling chips.

Kirby said no single event had prompted Hagel to take action. Rather, Hagel had taken notice of a string of news reports about problems in the ICBM force, including AP reporting that “made an impact on his thinking,” Kirby said.

With an eye toward avoiding further surprises, Hagel’s planned Pentagon summit meeting with top officers, as well as other actions announced Thursday, include participation by Navy officials responsible for their portion of the nuclear arsenal. The Navy has not suffered any recent reported lapses or failures within its nuclear submarine force, but Kirby said Hagel believed it would be imprudent for him not to examine the entirety of the arsenal.

“What the secretary wants to know is, what else don’t I know” about problems inside the force, Kirby said.

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dSea Waves said:

San Diego January 23, 2014 – The Northrop Grumman Corporation built unmanned demonstrator aircraft used for maritime surveillance missions by the U.S. Navy surpassed 10,000 combat flying hours supporting intelligence-gathering missions in the Middle East.

The Broad Area Maritime Surveillance Demonstration (BAMS-D) aircraft are currently flying 15 missions a month and allow fleet commanders to identify and track potential targets of interest using a specialized suite of surveillance sensors.

"BAMS-D has been extremely successful in providing a strategic picture to carrier and amphibious battle groups as they move through areas where we need more awareness," said Capt. James Hoke, Triton program manager with Naval Air Systems Command. "The BAMS-D aircraft started a six-month deployment in 2009 to demonstrate a maritime surveillance capability. Since then, they have continued to be used and have truly found their role in helping secure the safety of the fleet."

Based on the Global Hawk unmanned air system (UAS) designed for land surveillance, the BAMS-D systems were modified to work in a maritime environment. The aircraft regularly fly missions more than 24 hourslong at high altitudes.
The Navy is also using BAMS-D to understand how to best use the new surveillance capabilities for the MQ-4C Triton UAS. Currently under development, Triton uses an entirely new sensor suite optimized for a maritime environment.

"We've designed Triton to carry sensors that can monitor large ocean and coastal areas with a 360-degree field of view," said Mike Mackey, Triton program director with Northrop Grumman. "Coupled with anti-ice/de-ice capabilities and some structural strength improvements, the system will operate in a variety of weather conditions while providing a greatly improved surveillance picture to fleet commanders."

The Navy's program of record calls for 68 Triton UAS to be built. Northrop Grumman is the prime contractor for the program and is using two test aircraft to develop Triton's capabilities through 2016.

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The Navy Is Dropping Down to Just Two Deployed Carriers

Fifty-percent reduction is mostly budget-driven

The U.S. Navy is about to cut in half the number of aircraft carriers it keeps ready for combat. Starting in 2015, just two American flattops will be on station at any given time, down from three or four today.

The change is spelled out in a presentation by Adm. Bill Gortney, head of Fleet Forces Command. The U.S. Naval Institute published the presentation on its Website on Jan. 24.

The new “Optimized Fleet Response Plan” represents an effort to standardize training, maintenance and overseas cruise schedules for the Navy’s 283 front-line warships, in particular the 10 nuclear-powered carriers.

The OFRP is also meant to save money and keep the Navy functioning under budget cuts mandated by the sequestration law. But to be clear, even after the change the Navy will still deploy more, bigger and better ships than any other maritime force in the world..................

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thunderchief said:

More budget cuts it seems :

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The following is a detailed outline of U.S. Fleet Forces new Optimized Fleet Response Plan (O-FRP). Beginning with the USS Harry S. Truman (CVN-75), the navy will schedule maintenance and deployments in a new scheme centred around the carrier strike group.

The Optimized Fleet Response Plan (O-FRP) has been developed to enhance the stability and predictability for our Sailors and families by aligning carrier strike group assets to a new 36 month training and deployment cycle.

Beginning in fiscal year ’15, all required maintenance, training, evaluations and a single eight-month deployment will be efficiently scheduled throughout the cycle in such a manner to drive down costs and increase overall fleet readiness.

Under this plan, we will streamline the inspection and evaluation process and ensure that we are able to maintain a level of surge capacity.

O-FRP reduces time at sea and increases home port tempo from 49% to 68% for our Sailors over the 36 month period. Initially focused on Carrier Strike Groups, O-FRP will ultimately be designed for all U.S Navy assets from the ARG/MEU to submarines and expeditionary forces.

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bd popeye said:

David Axe??!! I mean ..really..

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