US Military News, Reports, Data, etc.

TerraN_EmpirE

Tyrant King
thought you might want to comment on Army to Begin Fielding Thousands of Squad Marksman Rifles by Oct. 1
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well it's pretty much dead on. It'd interesting that the Army chose the Schmidt and Bender optic for there Sniper Rifle presuminly that means HK offered it as a Package deal. But the Marines have used those and seem pretty happy. There are three options I see for the DMR optic the S&B short dot, the Leupold Mk6 1-6x24 or the US Optics SVR 1-6. Leupold tends to do better in selections by the big army, but if HK is making the DMR Package deal then they would probably favor the Short dot it's a bit pricey but good German engineering and has been used by US Socom. The Navy and Air force will probably order some for there needs in both full sniper and DMR but the Marines would only grab the full sniper version as there moving back to a 5.56x45mm DMR in the form of the M38 configuration of HK M27.
 
Yesterday at 8:40 AM
Yesterday at 7:28 AM
tonight I noticed the story had ended while After veto threat, Trump signs full-year federal budget deal
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related:
Defense Hawks Soak Up Defense Spending Win. Now What?
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The backs of the men and women in uniform — which defense hawks say have so long borne the weight of Congress’s fiscal stumbles — helped carry the $1.3-trillion 2018 spending bill over a key hurdle on Thursday.

Defense hawks championed the passage of a $1.3 trillion spending bill in the House that would dramatically increase funding for the military, nearly seven years after federal spending caps were put in place. Members of Congress on Thursday approved an
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that includes than $650 billion for the U.S. Defense Department, and used the bill’s robust defense spending point as a top selling point.

Republican leaders, like House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisc. — who doesn’t often delve into defense issues — said passing the bill came down to a “fundamental question” of “whether we’re going to preserve the primacy of the American military in the 21st century. That’s really what’s going on right here.”

“Yes, this bill is critical for many, many other reasons,” Ryan said, noting it includes funding to address the national opioid epidemic and build fencing along the southern U.S. border. But, he said, “what this bill is ultimately about — what we fought for, for so long — is finally giving our military the tools and the resources it needs to do the job.”

Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, praised Ryan and the budget deal.

“Throughout this process fixing our military has been the most important thing, the most important priority the speaker has worked for,” Thornberry said while standing beside Ryan in a joint press appearance.

The House’s federal spending bill includes $589.5 billion for the Pentagon’s base budget and $65.2 billion forthe off-books “overseas contingency operations”, or OCO fund, which is used to pay for operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Africa. It also boosts spending for
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. With
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in total defense-related spending coming, the military’s service branch leaders are getting all they asked for and more. They’ll also get something else
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and
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requested:
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to spend money in the operations and maintenance accounts to compensate for the late-arriving fiscal 2018 funds.

“This bill provides the largest increase in defense spending in 15 years,” Ryan said on the House floor. “Why? Frankly because our military has been hollowed out for many years.” The phrase ‘hollowed out’ carries heavy meaning in military circles. It is most notably used to describe one of military’s darkest times, the late 1970s post-Vietnam era when the armed forces’ equipment and post-draft troop quality was at perhaps its lowest since World War II. Former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta warned Congress in 2011 after they adopted budget caps that if sequestration’s across-the-board cuts were permitted, they would “hollow out” the force.

Pentagon leaders routinely
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budget uncertainty, lower toplines and the Budget Control Act have done more damage to the armed forces than any enemy. Lawmakers have spent the last year saying the military is in the middle of a “readiness crisis.” Enlisted leaders have offered
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.

Ryan joined the chorus of legislators calling for more defense spending after receiving classified briefings on the state of the military, he
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.

“We have the greatest fighting force in the world, but we have asked them to do so much more with so much less for so long. Under the last administration, keeping a modern military force was simply not a priority, and the result has been a staggering readiness crisis that has cost us American lives,” Ryan said Thursday.

Ryan has echoed Thornberry’s talking points from the Armed Services Committee when selling a spending measure before. In January, he appeared at the Center for Strategic and International Studies one day before government funding was due to expire. “We have simply pushed our military past the breaking point,”
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, urging lawmakers to reach a deal.

The speaker journeyed down Pennsylvania Ave. earlier in the day to discuss the omnibus to President Donald Trump, after the commander in chief reportedly began to have doubts about the spending package. Shortly after, Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney told reporters the president would sign the budget because it “funds his priorities.”

But first it had to clear the whole Congress. The House pushed the deal through, less than one day after the bill text was released, by a vote of 256 to 167. Staring down an 11:59 p.m. Friday deadline for the expiration of government funding, the Senate began considering it Thursday afternoon. Only after
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did the upper chamber pass the bill, 65-32, at 12:39 a.m. Friday.

A two-year spending deal agreed to earlier this year gives the Pentagon a slight spending increase in fiscal 2019. The Trump administration requested $716 billion for defense next year. The Budget Control Act’s spending levels would return in fiscal years 2020 and 2021, when the Trump administration’s long-term Pentagon
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.

“The odds are, this is the largest the defense budget is going to be for, probably, about the next decade,” Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, said at a March 20 hearing. “We have to make sure that we spend this money wisely and we also spend it in a way that doesn’t lock us into long-term obligations that can’t be met given the fiscal constraints that are coming.”
 
Today at 12:59 PM
Yesterday at 8:40 AM
related:
Defense Hawks Soak Up Defense Spending Win. Now What?
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now
Trump defends $1.3T spending plan, points to military gains
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President Donald Trump on Sunday
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despite his misgivings, pointing to
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and national security.

Trump said on Twitter from his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida that because of the military funding, “many jobs are created and our Military is again rich.” He said building his signature border wall “is all about National Defense.”

Since grudgingly signing the bill on Friday after threatening a veto, Trump has faced fierce criticism from conservatives who have accused him of caving to congressional Democrats. The president said Friday at the White House he was “very disappointed” in the package, in part because it didn’t fully pay for his border wall. But Trump said he had “no choice” because the nation needed to fund the military.

Trump sought $25 billion for his border wall, but the plan included much less — $1.6 billion for building new sections of wall and replacing older sections. Trump tweeted Sunday that much can be done with the money and it’s “just a down payment.”

He said the “rest of the money will come” and again reiterated that Democrats “abandoned” young immigrants seeking protections. Trump on Friday noted that the bill failed to extend protection from deportation to some 700,000 “Dreamer” immigrants due to lose coverage under a program the president himself has tried to eliminate.

Trump’s veto threat had put him at odds with top members of his administration and Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan, who urged him to sign the bill. But prominent conservatives have criticized the massive spending plan, warning that it could add to the nation’s debt.

The president on Friday warned Congress that he would “never sign another bill like this again.” He called for the Senate to overhaul its rules to allow for simple-majority votes on all bills and urged Congress to provide him with a line-item veto power to kill specific spending items he disagrees with. The Supreme Court ruled in 1998 that a congressionally passed line-item veto was unconstitutional.
 
Dec 11, 2017
Interesting read.o_O


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and now comes a beautiful spin:
Did the Saudis Shoot Down a Houthi Missile on Nov. 4? It Doesn’t Much Matter LOL!
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while
Videos Show Malfunctioning Saudi Patriot Missile Fired To Intercept Houthi SRBM Hitting Capital City Riyadh Instead
Read more at
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and here's the sales talk:
Nov 15, 2017
now Raytheon: Saudi-based Patriots intercepted over 100 tactical ballistic missiles since 2015
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very interesting claim (middle, right):
9a3342dbf0d513e2746830cd7271f3a2.jpg
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TerraN_EmpirE

Tyrant King
US Navy completes fleet carrier qualifications for F-35C


  • 26 MARCH, 2018
  • SOURCE: FLIGHTGLOBAL.COM
  • BY: GARRETT REIM
  • LOS ANGELES


The US has completed carrier qualifications for the Lockheed Martin F-35C Lightning II aboard the Nimitz-class USS Abraham Lincoln on the Atlantic Ocean from 17 March to 21 March.

Two squadrons -- VFA-125 and VFA-101 -- accomplished day and night qualifications with 140 "traps", each denoting a successful landing on the carrier deck. The milestone clears the F-35C to begin operational testing on the carrier later this year, which will determine if the US Navy can obtain their initial operational capability target for the aircraft in fiscal year 2019.

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F-35C performs touch and go during fleet carrier qualifications: Image courtesy US Navy

The F-35C was qualified alongside other carrier-borne aircraft, said Rear Adm Dale Horan, director of the navy's F-35C Fleet Integration Office.

"It's personally interesting for me, but also professionally, it's really neat to see this aircraft out there with other aircraft; we haven't done that before,” he said. “Previously, all the (carrier qualification) evolutions have just been F-35s."

The qualification event tested the operation of the F-35C's folding-wing feature, as the aircraft manoeuvred on the deck and in the hangar with Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornets and EA-18G Growlers.

The navy's F-35C has a longer wingspan than the US Air Force’s F-35A and the US Marine Corps’ F-35B because it needs the additional lift to fly at slower speeds without stalling as it approaches an aircraft carrier to land.
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USAF researches bidders to deliver 22 AC-208 armed Caravans

  • 26 MARCH, 2018
  • SOURCE: FLIGHTGLOBAL.COM
  • BY: STEPHEN TRIMBLE
  • WASHINGTON DC
The US Air Force plans to acquire 22 more Cessna AC-208s to provide to allied governments to use for lightly armed surveillance missions.

An acquisition notice published on 23 March suggests the USAF is open to receive bids from companies interested in modifying aircraft to carry weapons and sensors.

AC-208s ordered by Iraqi, Lebanese and Afghan militaries received modifications by Orbital ATK, but AC-208s planned to be delivered to several other countries – including Chad, Cameroon, Niger and the Philippines – are modified by L-3 Communications.

A portion of the Iraqi AC-208 fleet is equipped to carry Lockheed Martin AGM-114 Hellfire missiles, but that 55kg-class missile is not among the weapons included in the USAF’s “sources sought” document for the next batch of 22 AC-208s.

Instead, the USAF plans to enable the AC-208s to carry the 70mm (2.75in) guided rockets – BAE Systems’ advanced precision kill weapon system.

Any interested contractors also must be able to integrate an L-3 Wescam MX-15 electro-optical and infrared sensor with a laser designator.

Responses by contractors to the USAF’s market survey are due by 16 April.
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The A in this case is a bit misleading it's more of a Scout.

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and looking at there MQ25 you can see a family resemblance.
 

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TerraN_EmpirE

Tyrant King
BAE Systems demos 40mm cannon as option for US Army combat vehicles


By:
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  16 hours ago

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— particularly to its Stryker combat vehicle.



“Everything went perfectly,” Rory Chamberlain, a business development manager at BAE Systems, told a small group of reporters following the March 21 live-fire event.



The Army is in the market to up-gun its Stryker vehicles and boost lethality across its fleet of tracked and wheeled vehicles. The service recently fielded a Stryker with a 30mm cannon — the Infantry Carrier Vehicle—Dragoon — to Europe to be tested by the 2nd Cavalry Regiment ahead of a decision on whether to add similar lethality across the Stryker fleet.



During a recent House Appropriations Committee hearing on the Army’s budget request, Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley said it was the intent of the Army to continue Stryker upgrades. He also said the service is waiting for feedback from the unit evaluating the up-gunned Stryker in Europe before making a decision on how it will proceed in providing increased lethality across the Stryker brigades.



Milley said he expected to get feedback in roughly the summer time frame to allow the Army to reassess the path and determine the best way forward.





BAE Systems has spent years developing the 40mm cannon and is fielding it to both the British and French armies. The system is at a technology readiness level of nine.



The company had the cannon on display at the DSEI conference in London last fall, and representatives from the U.S. military saw it and asked to have the system brought to Fort Benning for a demonstration, according to Chamberlain.




The cannon comes with a suite of ammunition, including a point-detonating round, an airburst capability and an armor-piercing round.



The ammunition-handling system can accommodate roughly 70 to 100 rounds in an unmanned turret configuration. A manned turret’s ammunition load can go inside a vehicle, Chamberlain explained, and there are a number of system designs.



The feeder system is like a soda vending machine, able to spit out a variety of ammunition that is pre-loaded, and the system can recognize where certain rounds are in the loader throughout an operation.



The cannon is also able to fire roughly 12 rounds before an enemy can return fire, Chamberlain added.



But one of the most attractive features for the U.S. Army is the cannon’s ability to fire at a very high angle, which would allow it to fight in urban terrain.



Showing off for the service



During the demonstration, BAE fired two rounds of point-detonating ammunition against a brick wall, two rounds of point-detonating ammunition against a concrete wall and three rounds of airburst ammunition at a trench, Chamberlain said.



BAE tried to simulate some scenarios that would be relevant to operations involving Strykers and Bradley Fighting Vehicles, according to Chamberlain. For example, a Stryker might perform a wall breech, so the demonstration included the firing of a point-detonating round into a wall to create a hole followed by two airburst rounds through the hole into what would be a room behind.



For Bradley, the company simulated what would happen if the vehicle unexpectedly came across a main battle tank, firing one airburst round above the tank to blind its scope and then firing a round that simulated armor-piecing ammunition to neutralize the target and quickly escape. The range was not large enough to accommodate a powerful, armor-piercing round, according to Chamberlain.



U.S. officials were then able to twice fire five rounds of airburst ammunition, and others were able to fire the cannon using a variety of ammunition to show its versatility, Chamberlain said.



Overall the cannon fired 80 rounds and “worked swimmingly and perfectly,” according to Chamberlain.



He noted that many U.S. officials commented on the high elevation of the cannon as well as its power and accuracy.



What’s next?



BAE’s next step is to work with the Army Armament Research, Development and Engineering Center to help it understand the weapon and the details of the technology.



The company also pitched a shoot-off against any competition, Chamberlain said.



“I think there is going to be interest to let ARDEC look at the weapon in some more detail,” he said. And in parallel, the company would conduct a transfer of technology to help inform the Army. The service has already been given qualification data from the British and French armies.



“It’s a mature cannon,” Chamberlain said, noting the company fired 80 rounds in the space of a couple of hours and had no issues.



The company is setting its sites most immediately on the opportunity that might crop up later this year as the Army decides how it might increase Stryker lethality beyond the 30mm cannon.



“From my point of view,” Chamberlain said, “Stryker lethality is open, as much as they got the Dragoon, that is a fat turret and it’s doing its job and it’s what they wanted.”



Bu “the lethality and requirements for the upgrade are still to be decided,” he added.



The same could be true for the Bradley, he acknowledged, but said it’s less certain what the U.S. Army has in mind for a future lethality upgrade on that vehicle.



Maj. Gen. David Bassett, the then-program executive officer for ground combat systems, told Defense News at the Association of the U.S. Army conference last fall, that a 30mm cannon was being considered for the Bradley.



“There is a lot of talk about the [Next-Generation Combat Vehicle] and where that goes; we are looking at that as well. So in an unmanned configuration on a Stryker, manned configuration on a Bradley and NGCV, who knows what that is going to be,” Chamberlain said. “We are looking at that.”
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Based on this "BAE Systems has spent years developing the 40mm cannon and is fielding it to both the British and French armies. The system is at a technology readiness level of nine." It sounds like a variant of the 40mm CTA cannon aimed for the VBCI 2 and the British Warrior upgrades
View attachment 45946
The 40mm CTA used Cased Teliscoping ammo so it squeezes a 40mm full power shell into the space of a 30mm length wise any way. meaning that the Shell saves about a third of the space needed for a conventional 40mm HV cannon shell meaning that you can go full power and have more ammo, to put it in pespective the Swedish CV9040 has about 24 rounds of ready to go 40mm L70 Bofors ammo in the turret. Where the CV9035 has 70 rounds of ammo in the turret and a CV9030 has 160 rounds in the turret. So you can see the advantage but there is also the detraction which is no matter what it changes the way the gun is used.
Both the USMC and US ARMY have had opportunities to up gun there LAV25 and Bradley before. What they concuded then was that the 25mm Bushmaster common to both vehicles could be used more liberally like a Machine gun The Bradley has 300 rounds in the Turret ready to salvo at a target where a heavier gun like this will only have 100.
 

TerraN_EmpirE

Tyrant King
US To produce PKT MG
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Hypersonic M777?
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Army 2 channel Radio.
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Darpa Swarm
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Abrams: Army units will be tasked to work on each of Futures Command’s priorities
By:
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  3 hours ago
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tasked with tackling the Army’s modernization needs, and this time around, leaders are taking care to get
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from the get-go.

So before they’ve reached even initial operational capability, scheduled for this summer, the
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has begun aligning CFTs with the Army’s numbered corps to test new devices and equipment.

“This is where we get immediate soldier feedback to help refine requirements,” Gen. Robert Abrams told Army Times on Tuesday at the AUSA Global Force Symposium. “One of our challenges all along has been, in the current acquisition process, we bring soldiers in kind of late, we bring commanders in late.”

XW75NJOSZZESZC7SBNNNJSB3LM.jpg

Gen. Robert B. Abrams, commanding general of Army Forces Command, speaks during the MG Robert G. Moorhead National Guard/Army Reserve Breakfast at the AUSA annual meeting. (Mike Morones for Army Times)
Now, CFTs will be able to call up their assigned commander to coordinate a research session.



“Hey, we want to try something out three weeks from now – I need 10 soldiers to come down to Benning, 10 soldiers to go up to Vermont, 10 soldiers to go here, 10 soldiers to go there,” Abrams said, explaining the plan. “Hey I need a platoon to go, and we’re going to put stuff in their hands and try it out.”

The teams are aligned according to a few factors, Abrams said, based not only on what the corps itself does, but where divisions are in operational tempo and how innovative their leaders are.

For example, most of the Army’s infantry brigade combat teams are under XVIII Airborne Corps, so they have taken on the soldier lethality portfolio, Abrams said.

They also have the network, where 82nd Airborne Division soldiers began testing new communications equipment last summer.

Meanwhile, III Corps has the next-generation combat vehicle — because they’re home to eight of the service’s nine armored brigade combat teams — as well as synthetic training, because the Fort Leavenworth, Kansas-based CFT is only a couple hours from Fort Riley.

“They probably have our best, what we call a mission command training center, where we do our exercises,” Abrams said of Riley.

And long-range precision fires landed at I Corps, because they are already involved in a multi-domain task force prototype that is launching next year under U.S. Army Pacific.

Those Army Futures Command is still standing up, the CFTs are off and running with a handful of projects, based on programs the Army has already been working, and commercially available products the Army is scouting for its own.

One of these is the enhanced night vision goggles, at the top of the list for the soldier lethality CFT.

“Putting that into the conventional force with the speed – [Joint Special Operations Command] was testing these about three years ago – if you look at historically, it would take a decade to get something like that,” Army Undersecretary Ryan McCarthy told Army Times.

Meanwhile, the network CFT is looking at commercial products, he said, because the research and development is already done.

“The applications move so quickly in the communications space, that we need to think very hard about, how do you keep pace?” he said. “The development work just takes too long.”

And though it might be years before all of these things are in every unit, McCarthy said he’s encouraged by the progress they’ve already made.

“We mentioned yesterday, we have a big discussion on future vertical lift this cycle, as well as next-gen combat vehicle and long-range precision fires,” he said.

Not every soldier will have a hand in this modernization overhaul, Abrams said, but initial response from selected units has been positive.

“When we put this stuff in the hands of soldiers, they’re providing the feedback … ‘Hey, thank goodness you’re asking us this now, because we can solve a lot of these things right now.’ “
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More from Abrams
Juggling two jobs? Army Futures Command leaders won’t have to worry about that
By:
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  11 hours ago
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in charge of transforming modernization priorities into capabilities won’t have to wear two hats when the
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, Army Forces Command head Gen. Robert Abrams said at the Association of the U.S. Army’s Global Force Symposium on Monday.

It was speculated that the cross-functional team — or CFT — leads would become dedicated positions, but Abrams said it’s “certainly been confirmed now” that the one-star generals would be 100 percent dedicated to their job within the newly created four-star-led command.

There are eight CFTs to address the Army’s top six modernization priorities: Long-Range Precision Fires, Next-Generation Combat Vehicle, Future Vertical Lift, the network, air and missile defense, and soldier lethality. The remaining two CFTs are designed to tackle efforts important across all six priorities: position, navigation and timing as well as the synthetic training environment.

Currently, the Army’s CFT leaders have had to keep their day jobs while working on the CFTs, and it’s become clear that managing the teams is a heavy lift that must be prioritized in order to modernize at a pace that maintains overmatch against near-peer adversaries.



What is required in daily work for a CFT “means that the CFT director needs to be a separate person,” Abrams said.

This summer, when the command reaches initial operational capability, each CFT will get a dedicated brigadier general, except for the soldier lethality CFT, according to Abrams. That CFT director will have other responsibilities.

“The other ones will become stand-alone because of the importance of that integration between the CFT lead and all the members of the CFT as well as staying linked in with the head of the respective [program executive office],” he explained.
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The
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is slated to become the next official Program Executive Office — or PEO — according to the service’s new acquisition chief Bruce Jette.
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timepass

Brigadier
Lockheed Martin Unveils MQ-25 'Stingray' Tanker Drone Design for the Navy...

refueling-sec-2-2-4-fig2b-jpg-1522094814.jpg


"Lockheed Martin's Advanced Development Programs, better known as Skunk Works, has released concept images of its MQ-25 'Stingray' design, an unmanned carrier-launched tanker plane. The refueling drone will compete against designs from Boeing and General Atomics for a Navy contract to build a fleet of the aircraft.

The Navy's MQ-25 program seeks a refueling drone that can perform catapult-launched takeoffs and arrested landings on aircraft carriers. The tanker should be capable of passing 14,000 lbs. of fuel to other planes at a range of 500 nautical miles from the carrier.

Such a tanker could significantly extend the operating range of carrier-based fighter jets like the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet and F-35C Joint Strike Fighter. A Super Hornet, for example, has a strike range of about 450 nautical miles. The Stingray could extend that range to more than 700 nmi."

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timepass

Brigadier
Raytheon to begin modernizing missile defense...

Raytheon-to-begin-modernizing-missile-defense.jpg


"Raytheon announced this week that the company has begun work on a contract from the U.S. Army to sustain and modernize missile defense for both military commands and government agencies.

Raytheon said on Monday it would start work on the three-year service contract for system upgrades valued at $600 million that was first announced in June 2017. The work was held up by a protest bid, the company said."

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