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WASHINGTON: Army and Air Force officials announced March 17 that a new Joint Cargo Aircraft, designed to enhance the combat readiness of both services, will be developed by a combined team. Fielding of the new aircraft is expected within two years.

The Request for Proposals was released March 17 after the Acquisition Strategy Report was signed that morning, according to Pentagon officials. A Joint Program Office, comprised of personnel from both branches of service, will open Oct. 1 in Huntsville, Ala., with the Army taking the lead.

“This is a big day for both of us in terms of joint cooperation and capability,” said Brig. Gen. Stephen D. Mundt, Army Aviation director. “This aviation program is going to bring tremendous capability to both of our services and, more importantly, to the Department of Defense.”

Air Force Brig. Gen. Andrew Dichter, deputy director of Operational Capability Requirements, underscored Mundt’s enthusiasm for the new program and added that the program is an important example of the value of the joint capability and integration system (JCIDS).

“The Army and the Air Force have not always agreed, particularly at the beginning of this program,” he said. “But joint doctrine has always provided the ability for each service to have organic lift capability: the Army’s Sherpas, the Marine Corps’ KC-130 and the Navy’s COD are good examples of this. And the Air Force and the Army are committed to taking the new Joint Cargo Aircraft program, develop this important capability and deliver it to the joint warfighter.”

He said that the Air Force has accepted the Army’s need to recapitalize its aging fleet, and that the Air Force also identified a need for a light cargo aircraft – not only to transform itself because of mutual interdependencies, but also to be used for Homeland Defense missions and to support civil authorities in disasters or crises.

“The aircraft we field will provide a key capability to the joint force commander,” said Dichter. “For 59 years, the Air Force has been the service provider of intra-theater airlift, and for approximately 40 years, we’ve done that with essentially one airplane – the C-130.”

While the C-17 does perform a limited intra-theater role, Dichter added, the Air Force was long overdue in diversifying its intra-theater airlift fleet. The challenge, he said, is to transform the air fleet with the limited dollars available, to meet the transformational needs of not only the Army but of all the services and combatant commanders.

“The Air Force is prepared to meet that challenge,” said Dichter, “and fielding this Joint Cargo Aircraft capability along with the Army is a significant step toward that goal.”

On the Army side, Mundt said that the new aircraft would replace what he called a “very, very old and tired airframe in terms of the C-23 Sherpa, C-12 and C-26. Our Soldiers deserve better than that – we can also get them off the roads so they don’t have to be exposed to improvised explosive devices.”

The Air Force leads the world in the ability to perform operational and strategic intra-theater lift, he said. But because of the changing battlefield, the brigade combat teams modularity and the logistics concept of support changing to a push system, the Army needs additional intra-theater lift capability to fill the last tactical mile.

“Historically,” Mundt said, “the Air Force does not perform missions in the tactical spectrum, down to that point. Tactical wheeled vehicles and helicopters have performed that role.” Combining the two aircraft was a natural step because of the similarities in the capability gaps of each service, he added.

The Air Force and the Army have agreed that the aircraft each needs will have the same basic platform, with some intra-service requirements. The services are developing a memorandum of agreement (MOA) which outlines missions, roles, command and control, service responsibilities and the way ahead for doctrine, organizations, training, maintenance, logistics, leadership, personnel and facilities, according to Mundt.

He anticipates that an MOA will be approved by each service’s vice chief of staff by May 1.

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For four decades, relations among the major nuclear powers have been shaped by their common vulnerability, a condition known as mutual assured destruction. But with the U.S. arsenal growing rapidly while Russia's decays and China's stays small, the era of MAD is ending -- and the era of U.S. nuclear primacy has begun.

PRESENT AT THE DESTRUCTION

For almost half a century, the world's most powerful nuclear states have been locked in a military stalemate known as mutual assured destruction (MAD). By the early 1960s, the nuclear arsenals of the United States and the Soviet Union had grown so large and sophisticated that neither country could entirely destroy the other's retaliatory force by launching first, even with a surprise attack. Starting a nuclear war was therefore tantamount to committing suicide.

During the Cold War, many scholars and policy analysts believed that MAD made the world relatively stable and peaceful because it induced great caution in international politics, discouraged the use of nuclear threats to resolve disputes, and generally restrained the superpowers' behavior. (Revealingly, the last intense nuclear standoff, the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, occurred at the dawn of the era of MAD.) Because of the nuclear stalemate, the optimists argued, the era of intentional great-power wars had ended. Critics of MAD, however, argued that it prevented not great-power war but the rolling back of the power and influence of a dangerously expansionist and totalitarian Soviet Union. From that perspective, MAD prolonged the life of an evil empire.

This debate may now seem like ancient history, but it is actually more relevant than ever -- because the age of MAD is nearing an end. Today, for the first time in almost 50 years, the United States stands on the verge of attaining nuclear primacy. It will probably soon be possible for the United States to destroy the long-range nuclear arsenals of Russia or China with a first strike. This dramatic shift in the nuclear balance of power stems from a series of improvements in the United States' nuclear systems, the precipitous decline of Russia's arsenal, and the glacial pace of modernization of China's nuclear forces. Unless Washington's policies change or Moscow and Beijing take steps to increase the size and readiness of their forces, Russia and China -- and the rest of the world -- will live in the shadow of U.S. nuclear primacy for many years to come.

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tphuang said:

......... it's the Russian one that still poses a threat and probably always will pose a mutual destruction threat to the Americans.

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tphuang said:

man, can't I create a thread without it turning into a nuke thread? Anymore posts on this and I'm deleting it.

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The Ohio and its sister ships “will be ideal for playing an enhanced scout role,” he said. “They can put a contingency force ashore behind enemy lines without anybody knowing they are there.”

That could be useful not only in enemy territory, such as portions of Iraq, but also in countries, such as the Philippines, Indonesia or Pakistan, where the presence of U.S. troops might be politically embarrassing to the government in power. “Sometimes, we want to be basically invisible, not only to the bad guys, but to everybody,” said Capt. David DiOrio, director for SSGN readiness at Submarine Forces Headquarters in Norfolk, Va. SSGN is the Navy’s hull classification for a cruise missile submarine.

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Meanwhile, the Ohio and her sister ships are serving as platforms to develop and test new weapons systems, sensors and operational concepts that could further transform naval warfare. In particular, the Navy is experimenting with unmanned underwater and aerial vehicles on SSGNs and other subs to conduct reconnaissance, surveillance and other missions.

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NATO member Turkey plans to buy 100 new-generation combat aircraft under a $10 billion (8.3 billion euro) project over the next 20 years, Anatolia news agency quoted a senior official as saying March 28.

By the end of the year, Ankara will make a choice between the U.S. F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, whose construction is led by Lockheed Martin, and the Eurofighter, being built by a European consortium, the head of the defense industries undersecretariat, Murad Bayar, said in Washington.

The new warplanes would replace F-16 and F-4 aircraft currently used by the Turkish Air Force, Bayar said.

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The Navy will send an aircraft carrier strike group, with four ships, a 60-plane air wing and 6,500 sailors, to Caribbean and South American waters for a major training exercise, it was announced Monday.

Some defense analysts suggested that the unusual two-month-long deployment, set to begin in early April, could be interpreted as a show of force by anti-American governments in Venezuela and Cuba.

The mission was sought by the U.S. Southern Command, which has its headquarters in Miami and is responsible for all military activities in Latin America south of Mexico.

The Navy was last in the region in force in January 2003, when it used the bombing ranges at the Puerto Rican island of Vieques for the final time.

Led by the aircraft carrier George Washington, the deployment also will include the guided missile cruiser Monterey, guided missile destroyer Stout – all from Norfolk – and the guided missile frigate Underwood, based in Mayport, Fla.

“The presence of a U.S. carrier task force in the Caribbean will definitely be interpreted as some sort of signal by the governments of Cuba and Venezuela,” said Loren Thompson of the Lexington Institute, a pro-defense think tank in Washington.

“If I was sitting in the Venezuela capital looking at this American task force, the message I would be getting is America still is not so distracted by Iraq that it is unable to enforce its interests in the Caribbean,” Thompson said.

The objective of the deployment is to support the Southern Command’s maritime security in its area of responsibility, the Navy said, which includes 32 countries: 19 in Central and South America and 13 in the Caribbean.

The Navy, citing security requirements, declined to say which nations the carrier group would work with or which ports it might visit.

“Each ship will make two or three port visits in the region throughout their two-month deployment, but at this time no announcements are being made,” said Lt. Cmdr. Chris Loundermon, a spokesman for the U.S. Southern Command.

Called Partnership of the Americas, the exercise will focus on “unconventional threats, such as narco-terrorism and human trafficking, and improving training levels in a variety of mission areas,” the Navy said in a news release.

Stephen Johnson, a former State Department and senior policy analyst for Latin America at The Heritage Foundation, said such training exercises are relatively common in the region for the United States , albeit smaller ones.

“It’s a chance to show the flag and let our friends know we care,” he said.

As far as the exercise also sending a message to Latin American countries opposed to U.S. policies, particularly to Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, “there is a challenge for us not to be threatening and reignite hostilities in the region,” Johnson said.

However, there also is increasing concern Venezuela has begun to amass new weapons – from rifles to helicopters – possibly including Russian Su-27 or Chinese J-10 aircraft .

Tom Baranauskas, a Latin American defence analyst with Forecast International, said Venezuela has plans to procure 138 naval vessels, from small patrol craft to larger ones capable of carrying surface-to-air missiles.

It also wants to buy 30 transports and gunship helicopters for the army, he said.

Venezuela has always announced plans for acquiring new military hardware, even before Chavez came to power in 1998, but couldn’t afford it , he said.

“That was before the oil prices went up,” Baranauskas said. “Now the money is available, and there is a pretty nice pool to buy this stuff from.”

Thompson, with the Lexington Institute, said that although the Caribbean is a natural training area for the United States , “we don’t have a task force there very often because of the political sensitivities.

“So the fact we are doing it now will be interpreted by Castro and Chavez as indicative of some sort of U.S. plan, or initiative, or whatever you want to call it ,” said Thompson, referring to the Venezuelan leader and Cuban President Fidel Castro.

He said U.S. military interests in the region “waxes and wanes” depending on the political rhythms.

“ Right now, in addition to the persistent irritation of Castro, we have a very anti-American government in Venezuela, and we have a chronic guerrilla insurgency and narcotics problem in Colombia.

“Needless to say, the Venezuela issues intersect rather powerfully with our energy dependence.”

Norfolk-based Navy officials said the last time an aircraft carrier was in that region was summer 2004, when the Ronald Reagan sailed around South America after it left Norfolk to join the Pacific Fleet. However, that was a relatively quick trip to get the ship to its new home in San Diego.

The Navy drastically cut back sending its carrier groups, as well as all other warships, to the Caribbean for training when it agreed to abandon the island of Vieques near Puerto Rico in May 2003. Such training activities have since moved to the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic.

Likewise, a yearly exercise in the area, called UNITAS, has been scaled back in recent years. UNITAS is a multinational naval deployment exercise. Every year since 1960, U.S. Navy ships have circumnavigated the South American continent, participating in maneuvers with local navies.

L ately, however, fewer than four U.S. ships have participated. Instead of an exercise that once lasted as long as six months, it now is relegated to a month or two and is conducted in phases.

Reach Jack Dorsey at (757) 446-2284 or [email protected].

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By sharply upgrading ship sensor processing, it integrates and improves the boat's towed array, hull array and sphere array sonars, running more advanced algorithms and providing a fuller "picture" of the surrounding environment. Sometimes, it really is all about what you can do with it.

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Sea Dog said:

"Lockheed Upgrades U.S. Submarine Acoustics"

More improvements added to the sonar systems onboard U.S. submarines. I would surmise that some of these improvements are probably from the "Gotland experiences" and include improvements to filtering frequencies used by diesel-electric subs.

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Sea Dog said:

"Lockheed Upgrades U.S. Submarine Acoustics"

More improvements added to the sonar systems onboard U.S. submarines. I would surmise that some of these improvements are probably from the "Gotland experiences" and include improvements to filtering frequencies used by diesel-electric subs.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

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