US Military News, Reports, Data, etc.

Jeff Head said:

Ouch!

Amazing testament to the construction of the vesel and training of the crew. Looks like the sail was almost ripped off...which would have been catastophic and led to the loss of the vessel.

Looks like major, major refit time...long time out of service.

Click to expand...

bd popeye said:

85 degrees! Yikes and gadzooks! Here's some photos of the damage to the Hartford. Note how the sail (tower) is bent.

Click to expand...

Armytimes said:

Gates calls for huge cuts in weapons programs

By William H. McMichael - Staff writer
Posted : Monday Apr 6, 2009 17:29:07 EDT

Calling it a plan “crafted to reshape the priorities of America’s defense establishment,” Defense Secretary Robert Gates on Monday unveiled a controversial defense budget blueprint for fiscal 2010 that would cut spending on several high-profile weapons systems, maintain planned end-strength increases and boost spending for wounded warriors, medical research and family program improvements.

“This is a reform budget, reflecting lessons learned in Iraq and Afghanistan, yet also addressing the range of other potential threats around the world, now and in the future,” Gates told a packed press briefing room at the Pentagon.

In what Gates admitted was an “unorthodox approach” — announcing his recommendations in advance of the formal annual White House budget submission to Congress — Gates proposed ending program funding for the Air Force’s F-22 fighter, C-17 transport aircraft, and the combat search-and-rescue and presidential helicopter programs.

He also called for killing the Army’s Future Combat Systems (FCS) armored vehicles program and launch a competition to supply new vehicles.

He wants to complete the nascent Navy DDG-1000 destroyer program in fiscal 2010 and “smoothly restart” the DDG-51 Aegis destroyer program.

The decision on the F-22, whose builders have lobbied hard in recent months in light of Gates’ criticisms of the jet’s high program cost and lack of use in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, “was not a close call,” Gates said. He said the Air Force itself advised him to halt the program at 187 jets.

Gates also proposed increasing spending on Navy Littoral Combat Ships and the joint-service Joint Strike Fighter.

On the personnel side, Gates did not address the 2010 pay raise, as the administration is already on record as favoring a 2.9 percent bump to take effect Jan. 1, 2010 — a figure that key lawmakers have indicated they will increase by 0.5 percentage points, as it has frequently done in recent years.

The Obama administration’s overall defense budget request, announced in February, totals $533.7 billion, which would be a 4 percent increase over this year’s figure of $513.3 billion.

Gates did address the size and capability of the Defense Department’s military and civilian workforces, and said he wants to maintain or build capability in those areas.

He said that completing the growth of the Army and Marine Corps — slated to rise to 547,400 and 202,000, respectively — and also halting personnel reductions in the Navy and Air Force will cost $11 billion more than was approved during the current fiscal year.

At the same time, Gates wants to reduce the number of Army brigade combat teams from a planned-for 48 to 45.

“This will ensure that we have better-manned units ready to employ and help put an end to the routine use of stop-loss,” he said, referring to the widely unpopular practice that forces soldiers on deployment orders who are close to their end-of-service dates to stay on duty.

“This step will also lower the risk of hollowing the force,” he said, adding that he does not think the change would delay the Army’s plan to increase “dwell time,” as time back home between deployments is known.

Gates also wants to increase the size of special operations forces by 2,800, or 5 percent, and increase by 2011 the number of cyber warfare experts the Pentagon is training annually from 80 to 250.

More government civilian jobs also could be on the way. Gates called for wide-ranging reform of acquisition and contracting and said he wants to convert 11,000 contractor jobs in those areas to civil service positions and to add an additional 9,000 government acquisition professionals by 2015 — 4,100 in fiscal 2010 alone.

He also hopes to reduce support service contractors who now make up 39 percent of the Defense Department work force. That figure would shrink to the pre-2001 level of 26 percent under Gates’ recommendations, with the lost positions replaced with full-time government employees.

Gates proposed hiring 13,000 new civil servants next fiscal year, and up to 30,000 new government employees in place of contractors over the next five years.

Gates also would boost spending on medical research and development by $400 million; on programs for the treatment of war wounded by $300 million; and on improvements in child care, spouse support, lodging and education by $200 million.

In other weapons systems changes, Gates said he wants to “significantly restructure” the Army’s digitally connected FCS, accelerating the early phase of research to get technological enhancements being developed to troops in the field.

But he wants to kill the FCS vehicle family and re-launch it after the Pentagon re-evaluates the requirements, technology and approach. He said the FCS vehicles, which are being designed to avoid attacks instead of withstand them, were not geared to address combat of the sort taking place in Iraq and Afghanistan.

At least $87 billion had been planned for the FCS vehicles, which were a centerpiece of the $160 billion effort run by Boeing and SAIC.

Gates proposed increasing spending in the next fiscal year on the Navy’s Littoral Combat Ship, calling it “a key capability for presence, stability and counterinsurgency operations in coastal regions.”

Gates also wants to buy 30 more F-35 Joint Strike Fighters, and buy 31 more Navy F/A-18 fighter jets but retire 250 of the Air Force’s oldest tactical fighter jets, all during the upcoming fiscal year.

He wants to spend $2 billion more on intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assets, $500 million on the recruitment and training of helicopter pilots and maintenance crews, and $500 million on “global partnership capacity efforts.”

Gates also wants to double the annual charter of two Joint High Speed Vessels until the U.S. production program begins deliveries in 2011, and maintain the KC-X aerial tanker schedule and funding, “with the intent to solicit bids this summer.”

The Pentagon’s missile-defense program would take a $1.4 billion hit, however; Gates wants to restructure the program “to focus on the rogue state and theater missile threat.” He wants to cancel construction of a second airborne laser prototype aircraft, end the Multiple Kill Vehicle program and end expanding the number of ground-based interceptors in Alaska.

A bipartisan group of senators led by Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., immediately criticized the missile defense proposal.

“Cooperation on missile defense is now a critical component of many of our closest security partnerships around the world,” the letter stated. “We fear that cuts to the budget for missile defense could inadvertently undermine these relationships and foster the impression that the United States is an unreliable ally. Moreover, sharp cuts would leave us and our friends around the world less capable of responding to the growing ballistic missile threat.”

But the overall plan drew praise from Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, who said Gates “has set out major changes to the defense budget based on changed assumptions about the wars our military must be prepared to fight.”

Skelton, who was briefed earlier Monday along with other congressional leaders, called the proposal “a good faith effort” and said he appreciates “the hard work and thoughtful consideration” Gates and his staff put into the proposals.

Gates said he knows he’ll be roundly criticized in some circles. “In the coming weeks, we will hear a great deal about threats and risks and danger to our country and to our men and women in uniform associated with different budget choices,” he said. “Some will say I am too focused on the wars we are in and not enough on future threats. The allocation of dollars in this budget definitively belies that claim.

“But it is important to remember that every defense dollar spent to over-insure against a remote or diminishing risk, or in effect to run up the score in a capability where the United States is already dominant, is a dollar not available to take care of our people, reset the force, win the wars we are in, and improve capabilities in areas where we are under-invested and potentially vulnerable,” Gates said. “That is a risk I will not take.”

“We are at a crossroads,” added Marine Corps Gen. James Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs who sat in at the briefing for the chairman, Adm. Mike Mullen, who is on travel.

“We have under our belt the experiences of 9/11, the war in Iraq, the war in Afghanistan, the emergence of things like cyber, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction,” Cartwright said. “This submission represents the best balance of the most likely conflicts and the most dangerous conflicts we will face. It has been informed by the war fighters and the challenges they face today and are likely to face as we move to the future.”

Gates said his decisions were not guided by “finding a way to balance the books” or to fit everything within the budget top line.

“Let me be clear: I would have made virtually all of the decisions and recommendations announced today regardless of the department’s top-line budget number,” he said.

He said he consulted with the Pentagon’s military and civilian leadership and “consulted closely” with President Barack Obama, but added: “I received no direction or guidance from outside this department on individual program decisions.”

Click to expand...

TerraN_EmpirE said:

defense Sec Gates has dropped the Axe for Obama,

this Of course is not entirely a Death blow congress makes the final call, but with the Dems in office....

Click to expand...

Scratch said:

That looks not so nice and sleek any more. Popeye, do you also have something about the New Orleans? How is she doing?

Click to expand...

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Navy to keep carrier fleet, other programs

By Philip Ewing - Staff writer
Posted : Tuesday Apr 7, 2009 11:33:29 EDT

The Navy will maintain its current fleet of 11 aircraft carriers until 2040, when it will drop to a fleet of 10, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Monday.

Despite apprehension from some defense analysts that the Navy could lose at least one carrier, the Zumwalt-class destroyer program or other major weapons in Gates' budget this year, the service's plans escaped relatively unscathed. Although it will begin building carriers every five years — instead of a combination of four and five year intervals — and drop down to a permanent force of 10 flattops in 31 years, the Navy's major programs are essentially unchanged.

Navy officials didn't know whether the revised carrier plan would delay procuring the as-yet unnamed CVN 79 from fiscal 12 to fiscal 13.

It's also possible that technical problems with the aircraft-launching system aboard the Navy's next carrier, the Gerald R. Ford, could delay its entering service as scheduled in 2015, denying that ship to the fleet as planned. Service officials said last week they think they can get the new equipment to work, but they're also investigating the possibility of retrofitting the Ford with the steam catapults carried on the current fleet of Nimitz-class ships.

The Navy has asked, and plans to ask again, for permission from Congress to drop below the legally mandated force of 11 carriers from 2012, when the Enterprise will be decommissioned, until 2015, when the Ford is scheduled to join the fleet.

Gates unveiled changes and cuts in this year's defense budget Monday in an unusual appearance at the Pentagon, to preview the overall spending plan before the details are sent to Congress. The appearance was billed as a fundamental change to the way the Pentagon does business, and included deep cuts to Army and Air Force programs, plus the addition of thousands of full-time DoD acquisitions professionals, to take the place of contractors.

Gates did not have an overall number for the amount of money the Pentagon would save as part of the changes he was making

He said the Navy would re-negotiate its deal for its advanced Zumwalt-class ships, with the idea that it could save money by building all three at General Dynamics' Bath Iron Works shipyard in Bath, Maine. That's if the first ship is built on cost and schedule, Gates said; if not, the second and third ships would be cancelled. The other yard that was to build a Zumwalt, Northrop Grumman's shipyard in Pascagoula, Miss., would get first dibs on the Navy's new series of Arleigh Burke-class destroyers. Then, after the first few copies, further DDG 51s would be built at both Northrop and Bath.

Gates conceded he was not intimately familiar with the details of the Zumwalt program, also known as DDG 1000; that he has not been involved with the details or talked with the contractors. But "people here in the building" — meaning Navy officials in the Pentagon — believe the Navy can save money by having Bath build all three ships, Gates said. That would save the Navy from building two simultaneous first-of-class ships, one by Bath and one by Northrop, and create efficiencies for all three by having them come from the same yard.

Maine Sen. Susan Collins, a Republican for whom Bath Iron Works is the largest private employer in her state, issued a statement praising Gates' proposal to build all three DDG 1000s at Bath.

"My goal has always been to help ensure a steady work flow at BIW and a strong industrial base for shipbuilding, " Collins said. "That is why I worked hard to convince the president and the Navy to include full funding for a third DDG-1000 in the budget, and I am delighted that they have agreed. The Pentagon's preference to have BIW build all three of the DDG-1000s demonstrates confidence in BIW and should also stabilize production costs for the Navy."

Gates' budget proposals could be radically different by the time Congress gets through with them. He acknowledged his ideas would be controversial, especially where they would cut back on jobs in lawmakers' districts, but he said he hoped members of Congress would "rise above parochial interests and best serve the United States."

Before he had even finished his remarks Monday, Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, released a statement saying that Congress would have its own take on the changes Gates wanted to make.

"The buck stops with Congress, which has the critical constitutional responsibility to decide whether to support these proposals," Skelton wrote. "In the weeks ahead, my colleagues and I will carefully consider these proposals and look forward to working with Secretary Gates and [Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Michael] Mullen as we prepare the fiscal year 2010 defense authorization act."

In addition to the shipbuilding changes, Gates' proposal calls for the Navy to get money to add ballistic missile defense capability to six Aegis ships next year, and the Defense Department will spend an additional $700 million on the SM-3 missiles they fire at incoming ballistic missiles, as well as other missile defense systems.

On the aviation side, Gates said the Navy would buy 31 F/A-18 Super Hornets in fiscal 2010. Previous planning called for the Navy to purchase 18 Super Hornets. The additional aircraft will help reduce the so-called "fighter gap" — the shortage of aircraft the Navy faces as the older Hornets retire faster than the new F-35 Joint Strike Fighter arrives to replace them.

The Navy will also lease four joint high speed vessels next year, instead of two, until DoD takes delivery of its own ships in 2011, Gates said. The Navy leases high-speed catamarans, such as the Swift, now on a humanitarian deployment in the Caribbean, but has ordered its own purpose-built JHSVs from the Austal shipyard in Mobile, Ala.

That yard also builds General Dynamics' version of the ships competing in the Navy's Littoral Combat Ship program, along with a Lockheed Martin design built in Marinette, Wis. LCS came in for no changes in Gates' presentation; the Navy will still built a fleet of 55 ships and award contracts for three in fiscal `10.

The biggest cut to a Navy program was the VH-71 presidential helicopter, which has become a lighting rod for critics of bungled Pentagon acquisitions. The program is to be eliminated altogether and then restarted next year, Gates said, reaffirming the need for a new presidential helicopter.

Gates also said the Navy would again delay work on the CG(X) cruiser, a large, next-generation surface warship that was to take many of its design and technological cues from the Zumwalts.

Also delayed will be amphibious ships, including an 11th San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock; the Mobile Landing Platform ship; and other "sea-basing programs," Gates said.

Click to expand...