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The Army has a new weapon that can stop enemy tanks in their tracks without firing a shot

Business Insider UK 3 hours ago

U.S. Army / Sgt. Zachary A. Gardner

US Army personnel have successfully used advanced electronic warfare technology to completely disable enemy armor during a simulated tank assault at the Army National Training Center, Defense Systems

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.

Developed by the Army Rapid Capabilities Office (RCO), the combination of wireless communications-jamming and hacker exploits of vehicle systems forces enemy tanks to “stop, dismount, get out of their protection, [and] reduce their mobility,” as one Army observer

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the ANTC training exercise at Fort Irwin, California.

This is only the second major Army test of tactical electronic warfare in recent history. In April, the RCO

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nearly 20 soldiers from the

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at US Army Garrison Bavaria in Vilseck, Germany, with advanced electronic warfare equipment for field-testing, the

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an Army electronic warfare system had been deployed in a tactical environment.

Barely the size of “

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,” the vehicle- and -infantry portable kits come with two primary capabilities: VROD (Versatile Radio Observation & Direction) to “detect and understand” enemy electromagnetic signals, and the so-called VMAX to “search and attack” with “electronic attack effects” that the Army RCO

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as “more effective than the existing jammers used by anti-missile systems in aircraft.”

The two tests signal critical milestones in the Department of Defense’s mission to

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“cyber soldiers” from DARPA pipe-dream to tactical tool, a stark contrast to then-Pentagon research and engineering chief Alan Shaffer’s harsh

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in 2014 that the US “[had] lost the electromagnetic spectrum.”

As Breaking Defense

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, the Army

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its electronic warfare branch at the end of the Cold War. And while the Pentagon has put a

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on cybersecurity and operations over the last several years, the

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of battlefield-level electronic warfare, “tactical cyber” — “the art of detecting, disrupting, and deceiving” radio and electromagnetic signals — taking a backseat to warding off Russian and Chinese hackers and securing essential systems and infrastructure.

Since the Army’s official electronic warfare program

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won’t field an operational offensive jammer until 2023, then-Army Secretary Eric Fanning and Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley in 2015

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the RCO with

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to develop and test various electronic warfare prototypes as quickly as possible within the next five years. And in 2016, the Army began

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the development of a brand new electronic warfare unit to see battle alongside their fellow rifleman.

DOD

“The mission analysis just starts today,” Army cyber chief Brig. Gen. Patricia Frost

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reporters in December 2016, emphasizing the rapid development of electronic warfare specialists to start reclaiming the virtual battlefield ceded over the last several decades. “With the analysis that we’re doing over the next three to six months, we’ll rack and stack what are the capabilities that exist today that can allow us to experiment.”

In light of Russia’s territorial aspirations in the Ukraine and Eastern Europe, field-testing the new electronic warfare kits out of Vilseck,

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like Poland, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic. According to RCO

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Doug Wiltsie, the latest versions will see operational testing as part of the multinational US European Command exercise

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with 20 partner nations in October.

But don’t expect to see the new electronic warfare kits floating around your barracks anytime soon. According to Wiltsie, the Army plans on incorporating soldier feedback and concerns into addition testing from July through Saber Guardian in October before eventually fielding the new EW kits to soldiers downrange by the end of 2017.

“This is not the enduring program,” Wiltse

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during the C4ISRNET annual conference in Washington D.C. in May. “We’re looking at electronic warfare for one theater, [and] the requirement that I will meet when we field this stuff by the end of this year will be nowhere near the full capability.”

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bd popeye said:

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America’s top uniformed official said lines of communication remain open with Russia following the shootdown of a Syrian regime jet by an American aircraft.

The situation in Syria escalated Sunday when a U.S. Navy F/A-18 Super Hornet shot down a Syrian regime Su-22 fighter — the first time a U.S. plane shot down a manned aircraft since 1991. The Russian Ministry of Defense claimed in a statement that the pilot ejected over territory controlled by ISIS and that his “fate is unknown.”

In response, Russia announced Monday that any aircraft that fly west of the Euphrates River will be “tracked” by anti-aircraft systems and that it was halting the use of a military deconfliction line, set up to make sure U.S. and Russian forces did not target each other during the conflict. That includes both manned and unmanned aircraft used by the anti-Assad coalition, including American jets, raising the fear that U.S. forces could be shot down by Russian systems.

Gen. Joe Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, did not address the reports from Moscow that Russian weapons may track allied planes, instead calling for calm by saying, “The worst thing any of us could do now is address this thing with hyperbole.”

As to the deconfliction line being shut down, Dunford told an audience at the National Press Club, “That link is still ongoing here this morning. We’ve still been communicating over the last few hours,” but added, “I would just tell you we’ll work diplomatically and militarily in the coming hours to reestablish deconfliction” between Russia and the U.S.

A clarification about whether the deconfliction line remains specifically open was not immediately available, but last week, Dunford said there are three ways the Pentagon can contact their Russian counterparts.

“We have a direct communication between our air operations center and the Russians on the ground in Syria. We have a three-star channel, it's on the joint staff, it's my J5 that communicates with his counterpart in the Russian general staff. And then I speak routinely to the chief of Defense, General Gerasimov,” Dunford told the Senate Armed Services Committee June 13.

However, Dunford said Monday that he had not talked to his Russian counterpart since Sunday’s incident.

Asked about the legal justification for the U.S. to shoot down a Syrian government jet, Dunford said the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) covers American forces, because they are targeting ISIS on the ground in Syria.

The general added that he would welcome a new AUMF from Congress, which he said would be “very positive” for American troops.

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• Kremlin+Tehran forces in Syria (shown in green below, in an older map which I intentionally took (credit goes to
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  ) to make the point here) on one side, and
• pro-US Kurdish forces in Syria (shown in orange below) on the other side;

1. in the south: stretching to the Iraq border (by the way very attractive for Iran, more to the east, in its push towards the Med to directly join with
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   in Lebanon etc.), and
2. in the middle: in Raqqah area

Navy’s New Frigate Expected at Sea in 2024

The Navy expects to field its new frigate in 2024 while it sustains the small combatant industrial base with an additional littoral combat ship (LCS) order in 2018.

Sean Stackley, acting secretary of the Navy, testifying June 15 before the Senate Armed Services Committee, said that for the 2018 budget the Navy is requesting “two littoral combat ships, one of which is to follow in an amended budget proposal.

“We are seeking your support as we transition from the littoral combat ship to a frigate design that will provide multimission capability and increased survivability for our small surface combatant program,” he said. “The three littoral combat ships appropriated in 2017 with the additional ships we are requesting this year help fill our gap with small surface combatants and ensure a healthy industrial base for a competitive frigate down-select in 2020.”

“We’re committed to moving toward a more capable, more lethal and survivable frigate program,” Adm. John Richardson, chief of naval operations, told the committee. “The threat has changed. It’s become more challenging. The way we operate has changed. We’re operating the fleet under new concepts and want that frigate to be relevant in a distributed maritime operational concept. The combination of those two, with any changes in the fiscal environment, has caused us to re-address the requirements for the frigate.

“By the time that we define the requirements — which we’re just about done with — we’ll work with industry to find what I call the knees and the curves as to what’s possible technologically on a cost, schedule and risk that’s definable,” he said. “I think 2020 is an aggressive target. If we can go faster, we will.”

“We’ll put a request for proposals out in 2018 to get the proposals in 2019 with an award in 2020,” Stackley said. “We would expect industry to complete their detailed design; it will take them a year to a year and a half to complete their detailed design while they order material, about a three-year build span. So, we would expect the frigate to be in the water ready for delivery in the 2024 time frame. If we can accelerate that, we will, but what we don’t want to do is incur additional risk. We don’t want to take on the risk they took on in the LCS program where they established non-realistic schedule, and proceeded when a design was not mature.”

Stackley said the frigate competition will be full and open.

“Both of our LCS builders are strong competitors for that future frigate,” he said. “We want to ensure that they are healthy competitors and they maintain their viability in the interim.

“The [2018] budget reflects one ship in 2018. Congress added one ship in 2017, so our strategy at the time was we would take the three ships in 2017, combined with one in ’18 to ensure that each of the builders has a ship in ’17 and ’18 while we continue to look at 2019 and what unfolds in the industrial base in the interim. That is being revisited with regard to minimum sustaining rate — one per year — and then there is economic order quantity, which is three ships every two years per builder. We’re straddling those numbers and the decision was to add another ship in 2018, and that amended budget submission is pending.”

“We’re completely united with you to work with industry to accelerate this acquisition process as fast as we can,” Richardson said. “Moving into construction before you have a mature design is just a recipe for cost overruns and schedule delays.”

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YOKOSUKA, Japan (NNS) -- The remains of seven Sailors previously reported missing were located in flooded berthing compartments, after divers gained access to the spaces, June 18, that were damaged when USS Fitzgerald (DDG 62) was involved in a collision with the Philippine-flagged merchant vessel ACX Crystal.

The deceased are:

- Gunner's Mate Seaman Dakota Kyle Rigsby, 19, from Palmyra, Virginia

- Yeoman 3rd Class Shingo Alexander Douglass, 25, from San Diego, California

- Sonar Technician 3rd Class Ngoc T Truong Huynh, 25, from Oakville, Connecticut

- Gunner's Mate 2nd Class Noe Hernandez, 26, from Weslaco, Texas

- Fire Controlman 2nd Class Carlos Victor Ganzon Sibayan, 23, from Chula Vista, California

- Personnel Specialist 1st Class Xavier Alec Martin, 24, from Halethorpe, Maryland

- Fire Controlman 1st Class Gary Leo Rehm Jr., 37, from Elyria, Ohio

The incident is currently under investigation.

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bd popeye said:

The US Navy has identified the seven sailors killed aboard Fitzgerald. All are enlisted. I was mistaken. I thought they would be officers trapped in staterooms.

May they rest in peace.

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Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said last week that additional spending on missile defense against the North Korean threat awaits a strategy review.

“It’s a prioritization,” Mattis said. “Right now, I think we can first do the study to make sure what is the requirement, what are we lacking.”

The goal is to “define the problem well enough that we are targeted like a laser beam on exactly what we need,” he said in testimony June 12 to the House Armed Services Committee.

Mattis was responding to questions from Rep. Doug Lamborn, R-Colo., who said, “I know President Trump wants to have a state-of-the-art missile defense. I’m just concerned we’re cutting the budget for missile defense research and development. Why are we not putting our money where our mouth is?”

The SecDef replied, “I want to get this right before we come to you and spend a lot of money. “You’re going to count on us that we did our homework, and we’ve not yet done it.”

He stressed that he was not disagreeing that the U.S. must spend more on missile defense.

The Trump administration has proposed an overall $7.9 billion budget for the Missile Defense Agency in fiscal 2018, a relatively modest increase that essentially flat-lines the hit-to-kill anti-missile program.

In his June 7 testimony to the HASC strategic forces subcommittee, Vice Adm. J.D. Syring, head of the Missile Defense Agency, said the proposed $7.9 billion would meet current and future needs for the “development, testing, deployment, and integration of interceptors, sensors, and the command, control, battle management and communications (C2BMC) system for the Ballistic Missile Defense System.”

At the hearing, and at an earlier Pentagon briefing, Syring said the

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of a Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) interceptor missile launched from

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in California against an Intercontinental Ballistic Missile-class target launched from the Reagan Test Site on Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands showed the U.S. can defend against the North Korean threat at least through 2020.

“The intercept of a complex, threat-representative ICBM target is an incredible accomplishment for the GMD system and a critical milestone for this program,” Syring said. “This system is vitally important to the defense of our homeland, and this test demonstrates that we have a capable, credible deterrent against a very real threat.”

The interceptor system currently consists of 36 ground-based interceptors at Fort Greely, Alaska, and Vandenberg. The Missile Defense Agency is expected to finish fielding all 44 interceptors by the end of 2017.

At an earlier Pentagon briefing May 23, Gary Pennett, the Missile Defense Agency’s director for agency operations, said the review of missile defense ordered by Mattis will be completed by the end of this year but will not “preclude moving forward” with improvements for the system.

Pennett said the agency plans to move ahead with a $5 million study to look at the possibility of establishing an Atlantic radar. The study will assess “the feasibility of appropriate tracking and discrimination sensor capabilities to support the defense of the United States against emerging, long-range, ballistic missile threats from Iran,” he said.

One potential drawback is the enormous cost of testing the system. Syring noted that the May 30 successful intercept of the ICBM-type target cost $244 million.

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Jeff Head said:

Popeye...it is horrible that this happened.

I was talking to my son in law and he indicated that during the Obama years, overall, readiness and discipline have fallen off...a lot. And given his own attitude and actions, I do not dount that the people he put into positions passed on such attitudes.

These things lead to these mistakes.

That warship had the absolute best sensors available. it is inexcusable that they ran in front of a cargo/container ship (which is what my sources are telling me).

Even without the sensors, which should have been telling them of this large vessels (and every other one around) and would have warned them of a collision course...where were they personnel on watch...with eyes on...standing watch?

You know the commander and probably the XO are done...but I bet that the officer of the deck and several others are going to go down over this.

And if my hunch is correct...they should. They should go down hard. seven of their shipmates are dead because of what may amount to inescusable mistakes, lack of discipline, and simply not doing their job. Wheich means the command team was not doing its job instilling such quatlies into their crew.

These are war ships by gosh! There is no room for lackadaisical attitudes or action...EVERY on such ships.

Anyhow.../end rant.

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Jura said:

now Dunford: Communication with Russia still open after Syria shootdown

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and I'll tell you something what you won't believe:

the situation is pretty dangerous also strategically because people who are cheering about recent ISIL territorial loses are actually fooled by the recent ISIL strategy to increase (in a controlled way) the lines of contact between

• Kremlin+Tehran forces in Syria (shown in green below, in an older map which I intentionally took (credit goes to
  Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
  ) to make the point here) on one side, and
• pro-US Kurdish forces in Syria (shown in orange below) on the other side;

I marked those new lines of contact in thick black lines:

1. in the south: stretching to the Iraq border (by the way very attractive for Iran, more to the east, in its push towards the Med to directly join with
   Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
   in Lebanon etc.), and
2. in the middle: in Raqqah area

the point is if the two sides I named above started to fight each other, it would be the best chance for ISIL to still hold (while completely outnumbered, without airpower, etc.):

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