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US Military News, Reports, Data, etc.
- Thread starter tphuang
- Start date
Jura The idiot
General
now I read
Raytheon: SM -6 Passes Rigorous Graduation Tests
Raytheon: SM -6 Passes Rigorous Graduation Tests
source:After a complex series of U.S. Navy flight tests, the (SM-6) is ready for its final stage of the acquisition process: full operational capability, the missile’s builder, Raytheon Co., said in an April 27 release.
Reaching full operational capability is a kind of graduation exercise that signifies the weapon’s sea worthiness, with no more testing required. SM-6 is the only missile in the world that can perform anti-air warfare, anti-surface warfare and terminal ballistic missile defense, the company said.
“The U.S. Navy began deploying SM-6s four years ago, but we’ve continued to give it software upgrades and test it in every possible scenario to learn more about what it could do,” Mike Campisi, Raytheon’s SM-6 senior program director, said in the release. “We’ve continued to raise the bar, and the missile has exceeded it every time.”
Four SM-6 missiles were fired throughout the testing, each against a single shore-launched, sub- or supersonic target. All four test missions were successful.
“The missile is fully ready for deployment in all three modes at sea,” said Campisi. “That kind of flexibility is exactly what our sailors need, and that's exactly what they're going to get.”
Final assembly of SM-6 takes place at Raytheon’s state-of-the-art production facility at Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Ala. Raytheon has delivered more than 330 SM-6 missiles with continuing production. The U.S. Department of Defense approved the release of SM-6 to several international customers in early 2017.
Jura The idiot
General
Today at 9:26 AM
US lawmakers reach 2017 budget deal through September
now DefenseNewsSaturday at 12:25 PM
now I noticed (Updated 12:13 AM ET, Mon May 1, 2017)
Congressional negotiators reach deal on government funding through September
"... The plan would add billions for the Pentagon and border security but would not provide any money for President Donald Trump's promised border wall with Mexico,
Votes in both chambers are expected by the end of the week. ..."
US lawmakers reach 2017 budget deal through September
Bipartisan congressional negotiators have agreed to a sweeping $1.16 trillion omnibus spending bill for 2017, with $593 billion for the military. The deal, if passed, would fund the government through Sept. 30.
After funding the government at 2016 levels for more than half the fiscal year, Congress is expected to vote on a 2017 appropriations omnibus this week. The deal dos not contain the border wall funding sought by President Donald Trump and opposed by Democrats, but it does contain $1.5 billion in border security funding.
Republicans, who control Congress and the White House, sought to avoid a government shutdown that could reflect poorly on them, which provided leverage to Democrats, whose votes will likely be needed. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., released a statement Sunday evening saying that the deal "is a good agreement for the American people, and takes the threat of a government shutdown off the table."
The deal contains less than half the $30 billion defense supplemental Trump sought, but $19.9 billion more than in the last year of the Obama administration.
Adding in emergency funds, the Pentagon’s budget would total $598.5 billion for 2017, according to a House Appropriations Committee fact sheet.
Defense sector analyst Roman Schweitzer, of Cowen and Co., called the deal “a walk-off home run in the 11th inning for defense,” but predicted the 2018 budget cycle is likely to be “mired in gridlock until the very end."
For defense, the bill contains $223 billion in operations and maintenance funding, $73.7 billion for research and development and $123.3 billion for equipment procurement.
The bill rejects end-strength cuts sought by the Obama administration and funds an added 3,000 Army soldiers and 1,000 active-duty Marines. There’s also a 2.1 percent pay raise, a half-percent higher than Obama requested.
The bill contains $21.2 billion 13 Navy ships, including three DDG-51 guided missile destroyers, three littoral combat ships, one LPD-17 amphibious transport dock, and a down payment on future polar icebreaker procurement.
The bill funds 74 F-35 fighter jets at $8.2 billion, with $1.1 billion for 14 F/A-18E/F Super Hornets—a dozen more than requested. There’s also $2.6 billion for 15 KC-46 tanker aircraft and $1.3 billion for 17 C-130J aircraft variants.
For the Army, it funds 62 UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters, 52 remanufactured and seven new AH-64 Apaches; 20 MQ-1 Gray Eagle unmanned aerial vehicles; 28 Lakota light utility helicopters, with $210 million for Humvee modernization.
The deal means a partial government shutdown is unlikely. Government funding still expires on May 5, when a stopgap continuing resolution runs out, and lead appropriators are urging passage of the deal.
“It is time that we complete this essential work,” House Appropriations Chairman Rodney Frelinghuysen, R-N.J., said in a statement. “It is a solid bill that reflects our common values and that will help move our nation forward, and I urge its quick approval by the Congress and the White House.”
Jura The idiot
General
Yesterday at 5:58 PM
Omnibus Spending Bill Gives Navy $21B for Shipbuilding, $16B for Aircraft; Additional Aviation Maintenance Spending
and here's USNI News
Omnibus Spending Bill Gives Navy $21B for Shipbuilding, $16B for Aircraft; Additional Aviation Maintenance Spending
source:House and Senate appropriators reached an agreement to fund the government for the rest of the fiscal year that includes a $593-billion defense spending package to allow the Navy and Marine Corps to continue with planned ship and aircraft procurement and readiness increases.
This bill represents a compromise between the House and the Senate appropriations committees’ Fiscal Year 2017 spending bills, plus some additional money from the Trump Administration’s March 2017 request for supplemental funding to address near- and mid-term readiness shortfalls – about $15 billion in supplemental spending, compared to the $30 billion the administration requested.
This spending bill would give the Navy a $21.2-billion shipbuilding account, well above the recent average, as well as an $16.1-billion aircraft procurement account.
With that money, the Navy would be able to buy 13 ships and craft: three Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers, three Littoral Combat Ships, two Virginia-class attack submarines, the Bougainville (LHA-8) amphibious assault ship, a 13th San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock (LPD-29), two ship-to-shore connectors and a moored training ship, according to summaries released by both the House and Senate committees and the bill’s explanatory document. This is three ships more than the Navy had originally requested, with the third destroyer, third LCS and LPD-29 funding being added in by lawmakers.
The bill also provides $150 million for a joint Navy and Coast Guard effort to define the requirements and acquisition strategy for the Coast Guard’s heavy polar icebreaker. The Coast Guard will buy the lead ship in 2019, but this first sum will allow advance procurement of long lead time materials.
The Navy would be able to buy Boeing 12 F/A-18E-F Super Hornets and two additional Lockheed Martin F-35C Joint Strike Fighters to help deal with its fighter shortfall, as well as 11 Boeing P-8A Poseidon multi-mission maritime aircraft. The Marine Corps would receive funding for four additional Joint Strike Fighters – two F-35B short-takeoff and vertical-landing variants and two F-35C carrier variants – to help accelerate the retirement of its aging fixed-wing inventory.
In all, this compromise bill gives the Navy $48.8 billion for procurement, compared to the $44 billion it requested for this year.
With both the Navy and Marine Corps experiencing serious aviation readiness challenges, the appropriations compromise bill adds funding to several key areas to support pilots and maintainers. The operations and maintenance budget includes a $5.3 million addition for H-1 helicopter readiness and a $1.2 million addition for MV-22 tilt-rotor readiness in the air systems support line item, as well as a $10.7 million increase for MV-22 readiness and a $6.8 million increase for KC-130J readiness in the aviation logistics line item, compared to the services’ budget requests. Additionally, the Marine Corps saw modest plus-ups in some aircraft procurement line items to boost H-1 and CH-53E readiness. A Senate Appropriations Committee summary of the bill notes the spending measure includes a total of $205.5 million to increase spare parts purchases to help raise aviation readiness.
Similarly, for ship readiness, the O&M budget includes $14.5 million in additional ship depot maintenance funds and $2.5 million in additional ship depot operations support funding, compared to the Navy’s budget request.
The Senate Appropriations Committee summary notes the bill adds $1 billion in research and development funds for the Defense Department overall as a result of the supplemental funding. That increase in R&D funding can be seen throughout the Navy’s research and development funding section, which includes a $20 million increase for power projection applied research, $20 million increase for Marine Corps landing force technology, $40 million for autonomous surface unmanned vehicle research, $17 million for Future Naval Capabilities advanced technology development, $20 million to research aircraft carrier construction cost reduction initiatives, and $19 million to accelerate research and development for the LX(R) amphibious dock landing ship replacement design.
In all, the Navy and Marine Corps received $16.1 billion for aircraft compared to their requested $14.1 billion, or two billion more; $21.2 billion for ships compared to the requested $18.4 billion, or $2.8 billion more than requested; $3.27 billion for weapons compared to the requested $3.21 billion, or $58 million more; $634 million for ammunition compared to the requested $664 million, or $30 million less than requested; and $1.31 billion for Marine Corps-specific gear – ground vehicles and communications gear, for example – compared to the $1.36 billion request, or $55 million less than requested.
When Fiscal Year 2017 began on Oct. 1, 2016, lawmakers started the year with a continuing resolution that lasted through mid-December, funding the government at last year’s spending levels. When the December deadline came, Congress extended the CR through April 28, 2017. Last Friday, on the last day for which the government was funded, Congress passed a one-week extension.
The government is now funded to run through Friday, May 5. This compromise bill was announced on Sunday, April 30, and due to the short timeline for passing the omnibus spending measure – which includes spending packages for defense and all other federal departments and agencies, all within a single bill – it is unlikely that any additional changes will be made. Both the House and Senate will have to pass the bill and send it to the president to sign before the end of the day on Friday to avert a government shutdown.
Jura The idiot
General
now I read
source:Less than two hours after President Trump tweeted that a government shutdown might be a good thing, the of the said, no.
“It would be better for the country if the Pentagon and the military do not shut down at any point, because the do not shut down,” Rep. Mac Thornberry told reporters this morning. “My impression is the president is frustrated with the legislative process, especially in the other body (i.e. the Senate), and I share that frustration… but when men and women volunteer to risk their lives to defend us, we have a moral obligation to support them in every way possible — and I have no doubt in my mind the President shares that view, because I’ve heard him say it.”
Thornberry has critiqued Trump in the past, albeit more politely than his Senate counterpart John McCain. repeatedly and argued for for fiscal 2018, not the president’s proposed $603. “I do not think $603 (billion) is enough to accomplish what the president promised,” Thornberry repeated today.
The 50% Solution For 2017
Also, Thornberry isn’t thrilled that the 2017 spending deal heading for a vote tomorrow increases defense by half as much as Trump requested. But, the HASC chairman said, he’s going to vote for it as a first step.
The omnibus bill “is not enough to fix our military, but there is some money to begin to fix readiness,” Thornberry said, “(and) the consequences of a CR are just so for the military it’s essential to avoid that.” The “disastrous” CR refers to the prospect of a year-long that sets federal spending on autopilot at last year’s levels with little leeway to start, stop, or modify programs.
A year-long CR looked likely because of the legislative deadlock over a proper spending bill. Democrats had insisted that any increase in defense spending above the caps must be matched with a dollar-for-dollar increase in domestic programs. had insisted any defense increase be paid for dollar-for-dollar with domestic cuts. Yet congressional leadership sailed between this Scylla and Charybdis to produce an omnibus spending bill that increased defense by $15 billion while largely leaving domestic spending alone. In quality, if not quantity, that’s the kind of agreement Republican defense hawks like Thornberry wanted.
“Despite the fact this is only about half of what the president asked for… it is a significant achievement that the bonds are broken with other political agendas,” Thornberry said. “It’s really important to have defense stand on its own merits (without) holding our military hostage to some other political agenda.”
“I’m sure it’ll pass, I’ll support it, and then we’ll move to ’18,” Thornberry said.
The chairman wants to move fast on next year’s bill:
Of course, even if the House meets these deadlines for intramural progress, it will almost certainly have to wait for the far slower Senate, not to mention cope with the triangular dysfunction of Republicans, Democrats, and Trump.
- Assuming the administration’s budget request is released the week of May 22nd, Thornberry said,
- he wants his subcommittee chairman to submit their mark-ups (revisions) by “mid to late June,”
- get the full committee mark-up done before Congress goes home for 4th of July,
- and then get the bill on the House floor in July, before the August recess.
Acquisition Reform, Round 2
In parallel to the budget process, Thornberry will propose a raft of reforms to . (The plan is to get feedback on the reform proposals as a stand-alone bill before rolling them into the main National Defense Authorization Act). Building on last year’s reform package, Thornberry said, he and McCain will work to refine the ongoing .
“The essential nature of it, I think it is clear, and that was to have a responsible for ,” Thornberry said. At a detailed level, however, “there is some question about where some of the other pieces that were under AT&L fit in this new organization….It’s amazing how many people and organizations reported ultimately up through ATL, and part of what that concern was it got so big it could not be managed.”
Thornberry also wants to “empower” the Defense Department acquisition workforce, for example with new training on negotiations. He also wants to make the Pentagon run “more like a business” — not easy when no business has a board of directors as huge, as activist or as conflicted as Congress. To get the Hill at least partially out of the way, Thornberry plans on “streamlining some of the legislative requirements that have built up over the years that tie the department’s hands.” The trick is whether Thornberry and McCain can roll back restrictions faster than the rest of Congress adds them.
Jura The idiot
General
Yesterday at 3:42 PM
Raytheon to build first three Air and Missile Defense Radars for US Navy
andnow I read
Raytheon: SM -6 Passes Rigorous Graduation Tests
source:
Raytheon to build first three Air and Missile Defense Radars for US Navy
Following a successful ballistic missile defense test of the U.S. Navy’s next-generation Air and Missile Defense Radar in March this year, the Navy now awarded Raytheon a contract for the construction of the first three units.
Under a $327.1 million contract, Raytheon is to build three low-rate initial production units to be fitted on the DDG 51 Flight III destroyers.
Designated as AN/SPY-6(V), the AMDR provides greater detection ranges, increased discrimination accuracy, higher reliability and sustainability compared to the current AN/SPY-1D(V) radar onboard today’s destroyers, according to Raytheon.
The system is built with individual ‘building blocks’ called Radar Modular Assemblies. Each RMA is a self-contained radar in a 2’x2’x2’ box. These individual radar RMAs can stack together to form any size array to fit the mission requirements of any ship.
Raytheon says the inherent scalability could allow for new instantiations, such as back-fit on existing DDG 51 destroyers and installation on aircraft carriers, amphibious warfare ships, frigates, Littoral Combat Ship and DDG 1000 classes, without significant new radar development costs.
Work on the first three units will be performed in Marlborough, Massachusetts, and is expected to be completed by October 2020.
"With that money, the Navy would be able to buy 13 ships and craft: three Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers, three Littoral Combat Ships, two Virginia-class attack submarines, the Bougainville (LHA-8) amphibious assault ship, a 13th San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock (LPD-29), two ship-to-shore connectors and a moored training ship, according to summaries released by both the House and Senate committees and the bill’s explanatory document. This is three ships more than the Navy had originally requested, with the third destroyer, third LCS and LPD-29 funding being added in by lawmakers."Yesterday at 5:58 PM
and here's USNI News
Omnibus Spending Bill Gives Navy $21B for Shipbuilding, $16B for Aircraft; Additional Aviation Maintenance Spending
source:
Good to see here.
The Burke class line is gearing up and will soon enough be producing the Flight III vessels.
The 13th San Antonio is actually the first of the new LSD vessels based on the San Antonio Hull of I am not mistaken.
Three DDGs, 3 of what will ultimately be fairly decent FFG tye vessels with the uparming.
Another LHA America class...this one with the well deck. and two more Virginia class SSNs.
That's a decent years spending all right.
At the same time, the building on the 2nd and 3rd Zummwalt continues, as does the building of the 2nd Ford class, the JFK., and the second America class LHA.
Jura The idiot
General
now I read TRANSCOM May Increase KC-46 Requirement
US Transportation Command may revise its requirement for KC-46s in light of a recent war game that demonstrated the impact of attrition in contested environments, TRANSCOM chief Gen. Darren McDew told Congress Tuesday. “We have never in [our] history, that I can remember, planned for attrition of our logistics,” McDew told the Senate Armed Services Committee. But given the results of the recent exercise, he now he feels that “we owe the Congress, possibly, better numbers.” McDew said he helped to produce the current requirement, providing “numbers of tankers that are needed to provide help around the globe.” Then, earlier this year, TRANSCOM held its first ever war game that included anti-access, area denial scenarios. That experience “tells us that those numbers may not be sufficient,” McDew told the committee. While simply meeting the current requirement, given budget restraints “will be nearly impossible,” McDew admitted, meeting tanker requirements in a contested battlespace adds new complexities. “We don’t plan for losing tankers,” he said. “And if we don’t recap them, any loss is more catastrophic.”
Well done yeah very decent !"With that money, the Navy would be able to buy 13 ships and craft: three Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers, three Littoral Combat Ships, two Virginia-class attack submarines, the Bougainville (LHA-8) amphibious assault ship, a 13th San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock (LPD-29), two ship-to-shore connectors and a moored training ship, according to summaries released by both the House and Senate committees and the bill’s explanatory document. This is three ships more than the Navy had originally requested, with the third destroyer, third LCS and LPD-29 funding being added in by lawmakers."
Good to see here.
The Burke class line is gearing up and will soon enough be producing the Flight III vessels.
The 13th San Antonio is actually the first of the new LSD vessels based on the San Antonio Hull of I am not mistaken.
Three DDGs, 3 of what will ultimately be fairly decent FFG tye vessels with the uparming.
Another LHA America class...this one with the well deck. and two more Virginia class SSNs.
That's a decent years spending all right.
At the same time, the building on the 2nd and 3rd Zummwalt continues, as does the building of the 2nd Ford class, the JFK., and the second America class LHA.
Half of the demand but French proverb " un tiens vaut mieux que deux tu l'auras "
here-you-go is worth more than two you-can-have-it-laters
Or more commonly according usual expression put money at the problem
and Bougainville is a French hehe
Last edited:
But real world a bit laborious
Boeing now has six aircraft in its KC-46 Pegasus tanker test program, expanding its ability to complete ground and flight-test activities as it moves toward first deliveries to the US Air Force. Deliveries however have been delayed over various development issues.
The newest KC-46 aerial refueling aircraft, the second low-rate initial production plane, completed its first flight April 29. Its test activities will help ensure the KC-46 can safely operate through electromagnetic fields produced by radars, radio towers and other systems.
“Adding another tanker will help us to become even more efficient and significantly improve our ability to complete test points going forward,” said Jeanette Croppi, Boeing KC-46A tanker test team director. “We are also re-configuring one of our 767-2C aircraft into a tanker, which means we soon will have four KC-46 tankers in test.”
“This first flight is another important step for the KC-46 program toward verifying the aircraft’s operational capabilities,” said Col. John Newberry, Air Force KC-46 System program manager. “Adding this aircraft brings key capabilities to the test fleet and helps move us closer to delivering operational aircraft to the warfighter.”
Boeing expects to build 179 tankers in its Everett factory. To date, the program’s test aircraft have completed 1,600 flight hours and more than 1,200 contacts during refueling flights with F-16, F/A-18, AV-8B, C-17, A-10 and KC-10 aircraft.
Various issues have plagued test flights though, causing delays and forcing Boeing to pay many millions of USD in penalties.