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according to BreakingDefense:
The National Defense Strategy rightly prioritizes great power competition as the biggest threat to U.S. security. This is perhaps its most significant contribution; waking us up from the collective security mindset that has captured the thinking of policy-makers following every major conflict going back to World War I.

Collective security assumes that all the great powers have bought in to the existing international system, that none seek to overturn it, and that all will defend against any challenge to it. Hence we witnessed the formation of the League of Nations after World War I and the signing of the Kellogg-Briand Pact to assure the eternal “renunciation of war”; the establishment of the United Nations after World War II along with the “Four Policemen” (an unlikely concert of the U.S., the U.S.S.R., what was still the British Empire, and not-yet-Communist China), and the protracted efforts after the Cold War to achieve some form of cooperative security.

In each case U.S. leaders misread the situation. Following World War I, Germany, Japan, and Italy rejected the international order and sought to impose a “New Order” of their liking. Following World War II the United States and the Free World were quickly confronted with the threat of Soviet and Communist expansionism. With the United States enjoying a dominant position following the Cold War, it was enticing to believe that the “end of history” was at hand and that the liberal democratic order had finally triumphed. But this only lasted until China amassed enough power and Russia recovered sufficient strength to challenge this order. Simply put, the United States has always been in an international system characterized by power politics, not collective security.

Between the two major revisionist powers, China is clearly the most formidable. China’s economy is roughly six times that of Russia’s, and is growing at a faster rate. Its military buildup dwarfs that of Russia. Relative to our own economy, China’s is far greater than the Soviet Union’s was at any point in the Cold War—and growing at a faster rate. Simply put, China’s potential power—hard and soft—is greater than that of Russia. Yes, Beijing has relatively few nuclear weapons compared to Moscow. That said, given time, there is nothing that prevents the Chinese from matching Russia’s arsenal.

From Strategy To Operations

So what do we do? Strategy is about setting priorities. What capabilities do we invest in, given our limited resources? Using a medical analogy, this means you must get the diagnosis right. Otherwise you risk investing increasingly scarce defense dollars in the wrong prescription—a suboptimal defense program—for dealing with the threat. Having come up with an accurate diagnosis, the National Defense Strategy must put the Pentagon on a path to make the appropriate adjustments to the defense program to employ our limited resources as efficiently and effectively as possible.

The link between the diagnosis and prescription is informed by operational concepts: how the military intends to deter and, if necessary, fight wars to defend our vital interests. During the Cold War, for example, our military developed detailed operational concepts to defend NATO’s European frontiers from a Soviet attack. The Army worked with the Air Force to develop its AirLand Battle concept to disrupt and defeat the successive echelons of a much larger Soviet force marching across Central Europe. The Navy pursued its Maritime Strategy and Outer Air Battle concepts to keep the Soviet fleet bottled up north of the Greenland-Iceland-UK gap and enable reinforcements to move by sea from America to Europe. The Marine Corps leveraged its maneuver warfare concepts with an eye toward rapidly reinforcing Norway to protect NATO’s northern flank. Informed by this detailed effort by our military services, senior civilian leaders in the Pentagon and in Congress were able to establish clear priorities for the defense program.

Today, unfortunately, these kinds of operational concepts for conflict with China and Russia simply do not exist. They are badly needed.

One proposed operational concept is Archipelagic Defense — which I have worked on with extensive input from colleagues and defense officials both here in the US and among our allies — for several years. Archipelagic Defense addresses the strategic question of how the United States, in concert with its allies and partners, can preserve a stable military balance in the Western Pacific. The objective is to help Japan, the Philippines, and Taiwan resist ongoing Chinese efforts to coerce and subvert them; to deter China from believing it can accomplish its aims through aggression; and, in the last resort, to defeat China should it choose the path of war.

Three countries—Japan, the Philippines, and Taiwan—comprise most of what China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) refers to as the First Island Chain. What should be the U.S. military’s operational concept for defending the chain?

Archipelagic Defense

The overall concept of Archipelagic Defense calls for a forward defense of the archipelago that comprises the Chain (hence the name). U.S. forces need to be deployed forward, on and around the islands before the conflict begins. It will likely be too difficult to bring reinforcements through airspace and waters which are within easy striking distance of PLA forces based in China and, increasingly, on South China Sea islands illegally seized by Beijing.

As the PLA believes it must seize control of the air and seas, as well as establish information dominance, in order to wage a major offensive campaign, deterring the Chinese requires U.S. and allied forces be clearly capable of preventing the PLA from creating these conditions.

To dominate the air and sea, the PLA will have to concentrate combat power at some point or points along the archipelago. American and allied forces must therefore also be capable of counter-concentrating sufficient forces to preclude this from occurring. To quote Confederate Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, we must “get there first with the most”— — troops, ships, planes and precision-guided weapons. This “concentration/counter-concentration” competition is a key feature of Archipelagic Defense, as it was of AirLand Battle during the Cold War and, indeed, Napoleon’s famous victories at places like Austerlitz.

Winning this competition is essential. To do so, much like the concepts for defending Western Europe during the Cold War, Archipelagic Defense makes full use of each armed service in an important role. Ground forces, dug in and camouflaged on the islands, provide the backbone of the defense, enabling far more mobile air and maritime forces to serve as the principal operational reserve—the “counter-concentration” force. Finally, and crucially, U.S. long-range precision-strike forces, to include its bomber force, cruise-missile armed submarines, and Cyber Command function as a strategic reserve, able to concentrate capability over great distances with relative speed.

The most difficult adaptation Archipelagic Defense requires of the U.S. military is that ground forces positioned along the First Island Chain must emphasize cross-domain missions. Land-based air and missile defense forces — Patriot, THAAD, and future laser or railgun weapons – focus on preventing the PLA from establishing air superiority. Coastal defense — Army and Marine Corps shore-based anti-ship cruise missiles and anti-ship mine laying forces – work on denying the PLA Navy command of the seas, while electronic warfare systems emphasize hobbling Chinese efforts to achieve information dominance. U.S. Special Forces can also work with Philippine ground troops to create an irregular warfare force — a higher-tech and far more lethal version of the U.S.-backed Northern Alliance forces in Afghanistan after 9/11. Combined, these forces constitute a line of Anti-Access/Area Denial defenses, much like the A2/AD systems China is deploying against us.

...
... goes on below due to size limit
 
the rest of the above article:
The Path Forward

All this is just the tip of the iceberg. A fully formed Archipelagic Defense concept would have to address other major planning issues, among them:
  • the dynamics of a mobilization race during a crisis;
  • how the concept would be adapted in the event of a war that becomes protracted;
  • and how the concept would be adjusted in response to shifts in the PLA’s posture and capabilities, as well as those of our allies and partners.
Make no mistake: Implementing Archipelagic Defense will require an increased investment by the U.S. and its allies and partners. There are encouraging signs from several allies, but they and other like-minded states are looking to Americans for leadership and for an understanding of what their role might be and how the U.S. armed forces can provide both the muscle and glue to enable their success. The recent budget agreement, with its significant increase in defense spending, is a good start.

While an effective Archipelagic Defense force cannot be done on the cheap, we can mitigate the cost. To start with, the new concept will take considerable time to put into effect. Just as NATO in 1962 was a far more capable alliance than it was when formed in 1949, Archipelagic Defense will not be realized overnight. This means the funding for it will necessarily be spread over time.

The Bottom Line: The National Defense Strategy does a service by getting the diagnosis right. But that is only the first step. To get the right prescription—the defense program—we will have to develop the operational concepts that link the ends sought with the means we can procure to achieve them.
it's
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Feb 13, 2018
"... the Air Force has formally announced it will be retiring the B-1 and B-2 bomber fleets once the B-21 — which will be dual-capable for both conventional and nuclear missions — starts to come online in the mid-2020s."
US Air Force requests $156.3 billion in FY19, plans to retire B-1, B-2 fleets
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and For B-1s and B-2s, Fending Off Retirement in Reserves Would Be Pricey
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Recent news of
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as the B-21 Long Range Strike Bomber comes online has sparked speculation in aviation communities about whether the bombers can keep flying beyond their prospective retirement dates.

But some experts say it may be a drag to keep them around, even for the next decade.

"The
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can't get the 'Bones' to the boneyard fast enough because the maintenance costs of just keeping them flying are ruinous," one defense analyst in Washington, D.C, said.

"The [Air Force] plans to spend as much money on
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s as on
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s and
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s over the next five years, but while that is for improvements on the B-2 and B-52, it's just to fix the
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," the source told Military.com on background.

That may not stop some officials from exploring if they can stave off the
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by pushing the Bone, Spirit or both into the Reserve.

During a House Armed Services Committee on Air Force readiness last week, Rep Madeleine Bordallo (D-Guam) asked Air Force officials, if they could comment on any plans by the Air Force Reserve to absorb legacy bombers.

Maj. Gen. Derek Rydholm, deputy to the chief of Air Force Reserve, replied that the program has been successful with
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s under 307th Bomb Wing at
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, Louisiana. The 131st Bomb Wing of the Missouri Air
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also operates the only nuclear-capable Guard bomb wing with B-2 missions.

"As far as the B-1 is concerned, our association there at Dyess [Air Force Base] is fairly small," he said.

The Air Force
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the 489th Bomb Group as an Air Force Reserve unit -- the only one of its kind to operate B-1s at the Texas base.

"The footprint is working well for us, and there's talk of expansion there," Rydholm said.

The general quickly noted, however, that if every base that currently has B-1s or B-2s is expected to get B-21s, he hoped the Reserve would also benefit in that transition.

"Our expectation would be that if we are currently associating in the B-1 at Dyess and the choice is made to divest that aircraft in order to invest in the B-21, that we would invest with our active-duty partners in that same airframe," he said.

It's an expensive proposition.

"Planes cost money to fly, whether they are in the reserves or in the mainline force," Richard Aboulafia, vice president and analyst at the Teal Group, told Military.com.

"The differential isn't all that great," he added.

Redesignating B-1s or B-2s, "would cost no less in the reserve component" than it would on the active side in terms of maintenance and flight hours, the defense analyst added.

The numbers
Flying the non-nuclear B-1 costs $82,777 per flight hour, according to published 2016 operational costs for Air Force aircraft. The B-2 costs $121,866 per flight hour, while the B-52 is the least expensive, at $68,186 per flight hour.

Meanwhile, readiness in the bomber fleet has
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.

According to Fiscal 2016 numbers, the mission-capable rate for the B-1B is 51.62 percent, and the B-2 mission-capable rate is 51.11 percent. The mission-capable rate measures how aircraft platforms can fly or perform their range of capabilities.

The B-52 long-range bomber, by contrast, does marginally better with a mission-capable rate of 73.92 percent. But there's also more of the B-52 to go around.

Even though the average age of the Cold War-era bomber is roughly 54 years for the total aircraft inventory, there are 76
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es as opposed to 62 B-1s or just 20 B-2s, according to the Air Force Association's
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.

On average, "B-52s have high [mission capable] rates because they're not being used very much," the first defense analyst said. This is despite the nuclear-capable B-52's operations in the Middle East over the last two years in the fight against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria and its increasing
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against the Taliban in Afghanistan.

High operational tempo, the effects of sequestration and general maintenance needs have worn all the bombers in some way.

"A lot of B-2s are unavailable because they're undergoing modernization. With a fleet of 20, it only takes one or two in depot to make a significant hit on MC rates," the defense analyst said.

Could pilots be absorbed?
There could be one strategic advantage to having Reserve bomber units: pilot and aircrew absorption.

"We fly at the same rate as the active-duty, so our combat mission readiness requirements are the same," said Col. Michael Brian McClanahan, commander of the 489th Bomb Group at Dyess, the sole B-1 Reserve unit in the Air Force.

McClanahan pointed out the investment the Air Force makes in a person, not just an airframe.

In order to get someone fully mission qualified in a bomber, it takes years, he said. And while he and his airmen will be long gone by the time the B-21 begins its initial missions, the idea of a Reserve unit to offset other bomber operations with part-time airmen makes sense.

"We spent lots of time training them, they've had multiple
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s; it takes a long time and a lot of money to get someone up to that speed," McClanahan said during an interview..

Military.com sat down
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from Air Force Global Strike Command's 7th Bomb Wing on Dec. 18 during a trip to the base,
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over training ranges in New Mexico.

Retaining bomber pilots is a challenge for the Air Force. And while the Reserve airmen stay busy, they only deploy half the time as their active-duty counterparts.

"The 9th Bomb Squadron has 12 crews and we have an additional 6 crews, so when a deployment comes ... normally four of my crews will go," McClanahan said, adding it would be two crews for the first part of the deployment, two in the second leg.

Sixty percent of the unit is made up of traditional, part-time Reserve members, working "90 percent of the time" as civilians, McClanahan said. In all, the 489th has 16 pilots and 15 weapons system operators, he said.

Echoing officials such as Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Goldfein, McClanahan said the Air Force is steadily growing, but remains smallest it has been
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. But what that means for the future is a mystery.

If the Air Force finds a need for a Reserve bomber unit, it will stand toe-to-toe with its active-duty counterparts doing the same missions in hopes of trying to relieve some of the operational pressure, McClanahan said.

Pilot retention "would be better if there were more Reserve units out there" in the bomber community, he said.

"If we can just keep that investment, that's a cost-saving measure," McClanahan added.
 

timepass

Brigadier
HII awarded $1.4B for new amphibious transport dock for U.S. Navy...

HII-awarded-14B-for-new-amphibious-transport-dock-for-US-Navy.jpg


"Shipbuilding company Huntington Ingalls Industries has been awarded a $1.43 billion contract to design and build the U.S. Navy's newest amphibious transport dock, LPD 29.

LPD 29 is a San Antonio-class warship designed to transport and land combat vehicles. The ship will be the 13th LPD constructed by Huntington Ingalls -- the company has already delivered 11 of the ships to the Navy, and the 12th is currently under construction."

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timepass

Brigadier
Army to Spend $1.6 Billion Improving Cold War Air Defense Missile...

patriot-up-close-1800.jpg


"The U.S. Army continues to invest in upgrades to its Cold-War era Patriot missile system in the proposed fiscal 2019 budget, requesting about $1.6 billion in upgrades to increase its range and lethality.

Since it was fielded in the mid-1980s, the Phased Array Tracking to Intercept of Target, or Patriot, system has been the Army's air-defense workhorse, designed to counter tactical ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and advanced aircraft."

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Feb 14, 2018
LCSs enthusiast PACOM Harris: U.S. Needs to Develop Hypersonic Weapons, Criticizes ‘Self-Limiting’ Missile Treaties
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now
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Last week, President Trump signed into law the Bipartisan Budget Act, which empowers the military to address critical national defense needs. Our military has been operating under harmful stop-gap spending bills (continuing resolutions) for over 1,000 days. However, there is finally a light at the end of the tunnel – providing a clear path forward for stable funding. This two-year budget agreement ensures our Armed Forces will have the resources they need to carry out their missions. This legislation lifts the outdated budget caps, ends dangerous sequestration through 2019, and finally puts us back on a path to fixing our current readiness crisis.

One capability that demands our attention in this new budget environment is hypersonic weapons. A hypersonic weapon is one that travels faster than Mach 5 — 5,000-25,000 km/hr, or about one mile to five miles per second. These new types of weapons are classified as either hypersonic glide vehicles or hypersonic cruise missiles. Both types have great speed and maneuverability, enabling these weapons to penetrate most missile defenses, compress timelines, and complicate the decision-making process of a nation under attack.

On January 30th, I received a classified brief on
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from the Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics’ office. This briefing highlighted recent progress in hypersonic weapon development and provided lawmakers an opportunity to further understand and ask questions regarding progress and future plans. It is apparent that the need to keep persistent focus on development and steady investment in this area is vital.

Since the conclusion of the Cold War, the United States has held an uncontested long-range strike advantage through Tomahawk cruise missiles, long-range bombers, and carrier-based aircraft. Having these capabilities has allowed the United States to confidently enter contested regions, prepare the battle-space for further military action, and accomplish strategic goals without having to put boots on the ground. Reinforcing our traditional diplomatic tools, our long-range strike capability permitted negotiating from a position of strength.

However, in recent years both Russia and China have developed long-range standoff weapons which create large denied environments which reduces our strategic advantage. China flighted tested their hypersonic glide vehicle, the DF-17, in November and expects to reach Initial Operating Capability in 2020. Russia has developed the 3M22 Zircon hypersonic cruise missile which could be tested this year. Both weapons are designed to travel great distances at blistering speeds to defeat all military defense systems and could conceivably be fitted with a nuclear warhead. These missiles could be used to strike mobile targets like ships and land-based launchers.

Due to the high costs for development and the daunting technical challenges, few nations can afford to conduct significant hypersonic research and development.

In order to regain the upper hand, the U.S. must pursue a two-tiered approach – stress existing international agreements that help prevent proliferation and boost our own robust technological investment.

The United States military has been developing hypersonic technology since 2003. The Department of Defense is currently testing a system that could deliver a conventional warhead anywhere in the world in a little as an hour. In November 2017, the Navy tested a submarine launched variant and if successful, this would serve as an ideal launch platform because of its stealth and survivability. The Secretary of Defense, James Mattis, highlighted in the 2018 National Defense Strategy that rapid technological advancement is changing the character of war. These and other hypersonic developments like the Navy’s railgun and hypervelocity projectile, currently being developed within my congressional district at Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC) Dahlgren, are technologies that will enable us to fight and win the wars of the future. I look forward to hearing about further developments and how the Pentagon will meet the National Defense Authorization Act-mandated capability deadline of 2022.

We must do more. While Russia, China, and the United States are known to be developing hypersonic capabilities, countries like France and India may not be far behind. There are several pacts that address development and proliferation of missile technologies throughout the world, including the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty and the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR). These and other agreements are essential and need to be constantly reexamined and enforced appropriately.

Congress plays a vital role in ensuring that our Nation has the resources it needs to operate effectively and to fulfill critical missions. We cannot be complacent. Through effective development and acquisition of hypersonics, we can give our decision makers what they need to meet the challenges of today and prepare for the threats of tomorrow.
source is BreakingDefense
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TerraN_EmpirE

Tyrant King
Army to Spend $1.6 Billion Improving Cold War Air Defense Missile...

patriot-up-close-1800.jpg


"The U.S. Army continues to invest in upgrades to its Cold-War era Patriot missile system in the proposed fiscal 2019 budget, requesting about $1.6 billion in upgrades to increase its range and lethality.

Since it was fielded in the mid-1980s, the Phased Array Tracking to Intercept of Target, or Patriot, system has been the Army's air-defense workhorse, designed to counter tactical ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and advanced aircraft."

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A bit miss leading The Patriot missile system has gone through about 3 or 4 major systems upgrades The Stock Pac system was first upgraded with PAC 1 a major Software upgrade soon after introduction.
Then came Pac 2 had entered service by 1990 including farther upgrades to the software as well as changes to missile guidance and warhead to allow it in theory to attack ballistic missile threats. then came the Pac2 Gem a series of 4 modifications made in the late 90's to early 2000s

But here is the point of almost misleading in my opinion.
The PAC3 missile introduced in 2015 with IOC 2017 is a totally new missile well retaining the same launcher but every part of the system was changed..Each launch cell that used to carry 1 PAC 1 or PAC 2 missile now carried 4 Pac 3
The PAC3 MSE is an upgrade to the PAC3 system.
 
Feb 15, 2018
Yesterday at 9:08 PM
related (actually quite interesting read):
Air Force Kills JSTARS Upgrade
it's
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and Here’s what we know about the Air Force’s alternative to the JSTARS recap
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In its recently unveiled fiscal 2019 budget proposal, the Air Force
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in favor of a disaggregated battle management approach that will rely on unmanned aircraft and seven revitalized E-3 Airborne Warning and Control System planes, at least in the near term.

“Buying a new version of something that was revolutionary 30 years ago doesn’t take us to a more competitive future,”
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said Thursday in a speech at the Air Force Association’s Air Warfare Symposium here.

“That’s why the chief and I decided to change gears and convince the Joint Staff, and the [Office of the Secretary of Defense] staff and the secretary to change gears, too. We will not recapitalize a system that is
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.”

Much of the service’s way forward still needs to be set in stone, said Wilson and Gen. Mike Holmes, head of Air Combat Command, during a roundtable with reporters later the same day.

However, the service has laid out a preliminary plan to bridge the gap between the
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and the yet-to-be-determined system-of-systems approach that would be fielded further down the road.

Here’s what we know so far:

Northrop Grumman could still see its JSTARS recap investment pay off.

Although three prime contractors — Boeing,
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and Northrop — saw their hopes of a $6.9 billion contract dashed when the JSTARS recap was killed, Northrop was, by and large, considered the biggest loser. The company is the maker of the legacy system and
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to manufacture a new ground moving target indicator (GMTI) radar for the JSTARS recap, regardless of which company ultimately won the prime contracting gig.

However, Holmes indicated that the Air Force could go forward with a purchase of the Northrop radar at some point.

“That radar is kind of a modular radar. It’s built on taking modules and adding them together. So I think there may be uses for that radar,” he said, adding that the service could know more about that once it completes the advanced battle management system analysis of alternatives that will kick off this summer.

Some MQ-9 Reapers could be getting a new radar.

To help replace the capability that will be lost when JSTARS retires in the mid 2020s, the Air Force plans to outfit some of its MQ-9 Reaper drones with a new ground surveillance radar that would allow them to close the kill chain all on their own, Holmes said.

The service wants “to spend some money to develop a GMTI radar,” he said, but he left it unclear whether the service will be able to repurpose an existing design and how many MQ-9s could get the upgrade.

Budget documents show the Air Force plans to spend an additional $10 million this year on an MQ-9 Reaper modification called the “dismount radar,” which will add a moving target indicator (MDI) capability.

That radar, in concert with the aircraft’s existing electro-optical sensor and weapons, would allow it to detect, find and shoot down adversaries without having to depend on another asset.

“Instead of having one airplane flying something with GMTI and cue another sensor to go look at it visually and then cue something to go strike it as necessary, we’ll look at providing the capability to do all that from one airplane and see if we can speed that up,” Holmes said.

The Air Force will upgrade seven AWACS.

The service had planned to retire seven AWACS this year, but instead those aircraft will be made over with new, advanced communications gear and sensors.

“We’ll upgrade those airplanes and then, with some already planned things, [put in] a little bit more effort with it to adjust the comms systems on those airplanes,” Holmes said.

“We’ll be able to bring more data to them and allow them, kind of in extremis, to also do air-to-ground battle management, which frankly, they do now,” he said. “But can we provide them more information?”

Some of that money is already in the FY19 budget. Justification documents show that the service intends to request $120.6 million in FY19 for AWACS modifications, with that funding increasing to $203 million over the next five years. Although that will pay for multiple upgrades, $5.7 million of the FY19 sum will go toward “advanced management and surveillance bridge capabilities” such as advanced communications, networking and sensor systems.

“First, it will probably be more of an ad hoc kind of laptop system, but we’d have to build it into their systems later as we went forward,” Holmes said.

The Global Hawk unmanned surveillance aircraft could see more investment, too.

“The Global Hawk Block 40 is certainly not the same thing as JSTARS, but it does provide useful GMTI information,” Holmes said. “We’ll spend some money to bring that information and make it more useful in real time.”

General Atomics and Northrop could win big if additional orders pile in.

Unmanned aircraft manufacturers could be among the biggest beneficiaries of the service’s decision to cancel the JSTARS program.

As the mission set for the Reaper and Global Hawk grows, the Air Force may need to buy more of them “and [put] different kinds of capabilities on them, and communication links on them,” Wilson said.

That would be a boon to Northrop, which makes the Global Hawk, and General Atomics, the creator of the MQ-9.

Three legacy JSTARS will retire in FY19.

The Air Force has handpicked three of its 17 legacy JSTARS for divestment in 2019. The reason, according to Wilson, is that these particular aircraft have become “hangar queens” and were no longer flying missions due to longstanding problems. The service opted not to continue to fund their continued sustainment, but the rest of the fleet will operate into the mid-2020s.

As for what will happen to the JSTARS crews, the Air Force is still working on how best to reabsorb that expertise as it conducts the battle management command and control mission in different ways.

“It may change our training. It may change our force structure. We’re still committed to the mission, but we’re going to do the mission in a different way,” Wilson said.
 
I didn't get how many missiles in total they launched in tests, then LOL got distraught in Russian Military thread
Problems with Army’s future air-to-ground missile fixed ahead of production decision
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Problems discovered in tests of the
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— including a cyber vulnerability — have been ironed out ahead of a production decision expected in May, the service’s Joint Attack Munition Systems project manager told Defense News.

The Lockheed Martin-developed
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is ultimately slated to replace the Hellfire missile — also a Lockheed product — on all platforms that fire them. It features a new dual-mode seeker and guidance system mated to a Hellfire missile.

A recently released Director of Operational Test and Evaluation (DOT&E) report found some issues with JAGM.

For one, the report said the guidance section of the missile could be hacked, noting that a cyber analyst successfully gained access to missile guidance software in cyber security testing in April 2017.

The engineering and manufacturing development version of the missile also missed two targets early in testing, one hitting the ground “well outside the burst radius of the warhead” and another hitting “near the bottom of the vehicle track and road wheels,” the report states.

And while 18 missiles were launched from an AH-64E Apache attack helicopter during tests, one of the four launches with a live warhead failed to detonate, according to the report.

The Apache’s targeting site and fire control radar also passed “erroneous target velocities” to the missile, the report stated.

Ironing out the kinks

While the DOT&E reports were released last month, much of the testing evaluated happened much earlier; programs have often rectified problems found during earlier tests by the time the test reports make their public debut. Such is the case with the JAGM program.

For one, the cyber vulnerability identified in April tests has been fixed, according to Col. David Warnick, the Army’s JAMS PM, said in a recent interview.

“We obviously have a cyber requirement and so we had a couple of test events laid into the program to ensure that we are complying with all of the hardening and capabilities that we are supposed to have,” Warnick said.

Prior to the cooperative vulnerability penetration assessment in April, the Army performed its own cyber assessment and had identified a vulnerability, he said. The Army subsequently informed the external evaluators of the issue, which was confirmed during the test.

The program had already been working on a solution by the time the test occurred and it implemented corrective actions following, according to Warnick.

A test that occurred on Jan. 26 verified the Army had “corrected the deficiency and no other vulnerabilities were identified,” Warnick said. “So we are comfortable with the hardware and we’ve successfully addressed that capability requirement.”

Warnick added the problem with the Apache’s systems passing incorrect information to the JAGM missile is also being addressed by the Apache program office, but said “they identified something there that wasn’t exactly right and I think they’ve already identified a fix for that as well.”

And while the Army had two misses out of 20 firings of the JAGM missile early on, the program office is confident in the missile’s ability to hit and destroy targets.

“We have since conducted an additional 19 tests and although the external agency is the scorer, I can say that all of our missiles left the rail, guided correctly to the target and impacted the target and performed nominally how we expected them to and so we are very encouraged by those results,” Warnick said.

The two misses during the EMD phase of the program happened when the Army was checking “the edge of the envelope” in terms of the missile’s capability, he said.

“I think our findings are going to be the missile performed how we want it to, we don’t want to change any of the algorithms,” Warnick said. “What we would do is we would more likely offer to use a different mode for those specific engagements.”

The JAGM has multiple modes that can be selected to go up against a variety of targets. If the missile had used a different mode during the test, it would have had a higher probability of hitting the target, Warnick explained.

When the Army fields the systems, it will provide guidance for the correct mode to use when employing JAGM against certain target sets, he added.

Full-speed ahead

The Army completed its limited user test in January, which included firing JAGM 10 times successfully off the rail of an Apache.

The service will conduct nine more test events in the EMD phase prior to reaching a production decision in May.

Warnick said JAGM will reach an initial operational capability in March 2019, which equates to providing 96 munitions for the stockpile. Then the Army will move to a full-rate production decision in September 2019.

The Army plans to spend a total of $1.6 billion to procure roughly 6,741 JAGM missiles across a five-year period from fiscal 2019 and 2023, according to FY19 Army budget request justification documents.

The Army’s total acquisition objective is to buy 20,303 missiles over the course of the program.

The Army will first field JAGM to Apaches and the Marine Corps’ AH-1 Zulu helicopters.

The service will expand to future platforms to include the Gray Eagle unmanned aircraft system from which it has
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in a proof-of-concept test in the summer of 2016.

More integration work on the Gray Eagle will begin in earnest this year, Warnick said.

The Army will continue to upgrade software against emerging threats starting in FY20 running through FY39, the budget request notes.

The program was originally restructured several years ago from integrating a tri-mode seeker into the system to a dual-mode due to affordability challenges.

“As the threat and the requirements change, we will look at that next increment that would bring a tri-mode seeker and figure out the best acquisition strategy for going after that capability,” Warnick said. JAGM has an open architecture system, he added, “so there is growth capability in it and if the requirements and resources are available we will go after it.”
 
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