US Military News, Reports, Data, etc.

Jura said:

recently my "favorite": the USAF puts forward "awesome" ideas how to get the funds, common! would you put ads on the aircraft maybe?!
Yesterday at 8:38 AM

Air Force Wants, But Can’t Afford, New B-52 Engines

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The

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has set aside $10 million in its fiscal 2018 budget request for risk-reduction efforts in support of a potential future B-52 bomber re-engining program.

If approved, the move could be a crucial first step to boost the service life of the

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long-range bomber — already pushing more than 60 years in its lifespan.

The budget also includes $227 million for B-52 modifications, Air Force spokeswoman Laura McAndrews said in an email to Military.com.

In total, the request allocates $1.34 billion across fiscal 2018 to 2022 to support efforts including a radar modernization program; Combat Network Communications Technology; the 1760 internal weapons bay upgrade; and tactical data link integration, McAndrews said.

For example, the internal weapons bay upgrade, or IWBU, “nearly doubles the number of [GPS-guided

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] a single plane can carry,” said Capt. Kenny, a 96th Bomb Squadron instructor weapon systems officer whose last name was withheld for security reasons.

“This new capability also extends our range by reducing the amount of drag that external weapons produce,” he said in a

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.

Lawmakers have prioritized the need to modernize, given that the Air Force anticipates flying the B-52 into the 2040s. The aircraft, known throughout the force as the BUFF, or “Big Ugly Fat Fellow,”

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if the engines are replaced, officials have said.

“Air Force leadership has … acknowledged that new engines would provide a 95 percent reduction in engine maintenance, virtually eliminating engine overhauls and reducing fuel consumption by 30 percent,” Rep. Madeleine Z. Bordallo of Guam said May 25 during a House Armed Services Committee’s Seapower and Projection Forces Subcommittee hearing.

“Does the Air Force have a plan to re-engine the B-52 to take advantage of benefits that would afford in terms of future cost avoidance and operational benefits?” she asked.

Testifying at the hearing about the Air Force’s

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were Lt. Gen. Arnold W. Bunch, the military deputy at the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition; Lt. Gen. Jerry D. Harris, deputy chief of staff for strategic plans and requirements; and Maj. Gen. Scott A. Vander Hamm, assistant deputy chief of staff for Air Force operations.

“So we … do realize that the engines we have on the B-52 are not going to last through the life of the program. We’re either going to have to do a service-life extension program or we’ll have to procure new engines,” Bunch said.

“We’re looking at all of those options right now. We have some money in the ’18 budget to do some of those initial analyses and look at all those alternatives,” he said, referring to the $10 million in risk-reduction efforts.

Bunch added that the re-engining effort would not be simply for fuel savings, but would extend to tanker savings, operational implications, and manpower savings “by not having to use as many maintainers on the flight line to be able to maintain those older engines, as well as what you talked about with the time it stays on the wing and the operational viability.”

The B-52, under Air Force Global Strike Command, has been invaluable in efforts such as Operation Desert Storm and Operation Iraqi Freedom, and most recently in the

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in Iraq and Syria.

After a decade in the Pacific, the aircraft was

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by the

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as part of the military’s continuous bomber presence mission in the theater.

Most recently, B-52s deployed to

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, England, last week to take part in a series of upcoming war games across Europe,

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.

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Jura said:

yeah

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source:

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In her first Washington event, Heather Wilson says the service needs new planes, faster.

The U.S. Air Force needs to buy more planes, and faster, to meet worldwide demands, the service’s new secretary said Monday.

In her first public appearance since she was sworn in on May 16, Heather Wilson

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Deborah Lee James.

“We are too small for what the nation expects of us,” Wilson said at an Air Force Association event. “It is unlikely that the need for air and space power will diminish significantly over the next decade.”

The former congresswoman also called for the repeal of the Budget Control Act, which caps defense spending through 2021. The Trump administration’s 2018 Pentagon budget request

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by $52 billion. Wilson, like numerous service secretaries and defense secretaries before her, said the Air Force needs predictability.

“If we don’t provide relief from the Budget Control Act, we will further hollow out the force and set ourselves back years,” she said.

After her speech to an audience largely made up of defense contractors, Wilson told reporters the Air Force must learn how to buy weapons more quickly.

“We need to be able to modernize and get things from concept to the warfighter faster,” she said. “We can’t do everything that way. Big programs are still going to be big programs, but if we can do some innovation faster, we can turn inside the adversary.”

As for aircraft, there are three priorities: the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, the B-21 stealth bomber, and the KC-46 refueling tanker, Wilson said.

“It’s also true — and critics will also point out — that the air frames that we’re buying are more capable, but we also have global responsibilities,” she said. “Sometimes quantity has a quality all of its own.”

The Air Force’s 2018 budget plan, sent to Congress last month, includes 46 F-35s. Last week the service said it had an unfunded requirement for 14 more F-35s, which would bring annual purchases to the service’s goal of 60.

“I’m not sure whether we’ll be able to get there,” Wilson said. “I also really want to see what the new national security strategy says and then how do we array our forces to be able to meet the need.”

Why didn’t the Air Force include 60 F-35s in its formal budget proposal?

“We only have so much money and so many priorities and so much mission,” Lt. Gen. Arnold Bunch, the military deputy for acquisition, said Monday morning after Wilson’s press conference.

“We do want to get to 60 [F-35s per year] as quickly as we can,” he added.

Wilson also stressed the need to restore readiness. “That means we’ve got to have people, pilots, maintainers and so forth,” she said.

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Two Naval Aviation Squadrons Deactivated

The Navy and Marine Corps each closed down a long-serving aviation squadron last week, in line with planning to reduce a carrier air wing and to retire the EA-6B Prowler electronic attack aircraft.

Strike Fighter Squadron 15 (VFA-15) was deactivated at Naval Air Station Oceana, Va., on May 31, after almost 49 years of service. The squadron was one of a dwindling number of Navy squadrons flying the legacy F/A-18C “Classic” Hornet strike fighter. It was cut as part of the Navy’s move to reduce the number of carrier air wings to nine.

Marine Tactical Electronic Warfare Squadron Four (VMAQ-4) was deactivated at Marine Corps Cherry Point, N.C., on June 2. The squadron originally was activated on May 21, 1981, as a Reserve squadron, but in October 1992 was activated as an active-duty component squadron. It was the second of the Corps’ four Prowler squadrons to be closed down.

The remaining two squadrons will be retired by 2019 — one each year — as the Corps retires the last EA-6Bs. The Corps is shifting to a distributed electronic warfare architecture that will include the F-35 Lightning II joint strike fighter.

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The administration’s Fiscal 2018 budget plan, which includes a three percent jump in overall funding, is a “good start” to the climb back to readiness, but overall more funding and stable budget plans will be needed, Air Force leaders told lawmakers Tuesday.

Testifying in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Goldfein said the small increase is a start to “arresting the decline that we’ve seen over the years. It’s a only a start to where we need to get with stable budgets that we can plan for.”

Eight years of stable funding, including the purchase of more aircraft such as F-35As and KC-46s, will be needed to get back to full-spectrum readiness. The requirements come as the service is facing a dramatic shortfall in pilots and tightened funding for other acquisition programs such as the UH-1N Huey replacement and Combat Rescue Helicopter, and maintaining the current fleet.

“We’re going to keep fourth generation aircraft into the 2040s,” Goldfein said. “And so what you’ll see in this budget, in addition to buying fifth generation aircraft, is actually modernizing our fourth gen. And here’s what we’ve found when we talk about the fighter inventory; what we found and continue to develop is the ability to fly these aircraft together in a complementary fashion so that fourth gen actually makes fifth gen better and fifth gen makes fourth gen better.”

The budget is moving forward on the B-21 next generation bomber program, including $2 billion in research and development funding. That number faced criticism from committee chairman Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), for being under the “veil of secrecy.”

“We are very open with the appropriate committees and the Congress about exactly what we’re doing and what we’re spending it on,” Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson said.

“That’s not true, Madame Secretary,” McCain quickly responded. “That is simply not true. The American people need to know if we’re going to spend $2 billion on what, R&D? Does the Air Force plan on releasing any further details on the program?”

Wilson said there “is a balance” between informing Congress and telling enemies about the program. The Air Force has determined that it requires a

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, including at least 100 B-21s, Goldfein said. However, the Pentagon is reviewing its national security strategy and that could impact future Air Force bomber force structure, he said.

Wilson also warned lawmakers that another schedule slip with the KC-46 tanker program is likely. There was a meeting at the Pentagon on Tuesday morning to assess risk in the testing schedule, with an independent assessment on timing expected. “We may see a couple of month slip is what I’m hearing informally,” she said.

The Air Force is looking at two major helicopter acquisition programs, two of which are also seeing issues in the current budget process. The UH-1 replacement program had to be adjusted after contractors said they could not meet requirements with current aircraft. The service now expects its formal request for proposals in July, Wilson said Tuesday.

The Combat Rescue Helicopter program, which will replace the Air Force’s HH-60G Pave Hawk fleet, saw a budget cut of $100 million in the Fiscal 2018 request. Goldfein said this is a “disconnect that we continue to watch.” Asking about this shortfall, Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) said it is a “disservice” to those in uniform “who need that helicopter.”

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’s U-2 spy plane made its debut at the Northern Edge joint training exercise last month, demonstrating a new capability nicknamed the “Einstein Box” that, among other things, enables crucial battlefield communications between new stealth fighters and legacy aircraft.

For its first appearance at Alaska’s premier joint training exercise, the Dragon Lady was configured as a communications relay, according to a quote tucked away at the bottom of a

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press release. What DOD didn’t say was what enabled that configuration of the U-2: a little-known system, developed by Lockheed’s secretive Skunk Works arm, called Enterprise Mission Computer 2.0, or EMC2—thus the nickname “Einstein Box.”

In simple terms, the Einstein Box is a “plug and play” system that bolts on to the U-2’s avionics processor and enables various capabilities, said Kyle Franklin, Lockheed’s U-2 program manager, in a June 1 interview. One of its applications is to enable communications between aircraft that operate on different tactical data links: Link 16, the data link used by most legacy U.S. Air Force aircraft; the

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’s multifunction advanced data link (MADL) waveform; and the

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’s intraflight data link (IFDL), Franklin said.

In this way, the Einstein Box could help solve one of the Air Force’s major challenges: getting aircraft from different generations to talk to each other and share a common picture quickly and efficiently. The F-35 and F-22 are flying data hubs, designed to vacuum in critical threat information and transmit it all over the world. The problem is that the Air Force does not currently have the network architecture necessary to quickly and efficiently distribute that data to the legacy fleet, most of which operates on Commodore 64-era computer systems.

The F-22, for instance, was designed to communicate covertly only with other F-22s, using the low-probability-of-detection, low-probability-of-interception (LPD/LPI) IFDL. By contrast, fourth-generation fighters use the nonstealthy Link 16, which gives off a radio frequency signature that potential adversaries can detect and track. The F-35, which communicates clandestinely with other F-35s over

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’s MADL, has the ability to transmit and receive Link 16 signals, but doing so will compromise its position if it is operating in stealth mode.

But the Einstein Box is not just a communications gateway. Renee Pasman, director of mission systems road maps for the Skunk Works, compared the Einstein Box to a smartphone that can run many different applications. The system, basically a computer, can also enable dynamic mission replanning, as well as various intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance and electronic warfare capabilities, she said.

“One of the things Lockheed has been [working on] is really how to put together a truly open architecture that allows us to integrate software services, third-party applications, [and] new capabilities quickly without impacting the system architecture of the platform that we are flying on,” said Pasman in a June 5 interview. “The Einstein box is the latest step in terms of the hardware implementation along that investment plan.”

The internally funded Einstein Box builds on Enterprise Mission Computer 1.0 (EMC1), Lockheed’s first iteration of the capability, Pasman said. Lockheed has demonstrated EMC1 in previous events such as Project Missouri, a series of flight tests that took place at Nellis AFB, Nevada, in 2014. Lockheed used a different hardware configuration during Project Missouri: testers outfitted an F-22 with a

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tactical radio for Link 16 transmit and receive capability, and two

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(now L3 Technologies) devices to support encrypted, secure operations. This enabled secure information sharing between stealth and legacy platforms, according to a Lockheed press release issued at the time.

The most recent demonstration, in Northern Edge, was the first time Lockheed flew “that particular configuration” of the upgraded EMC2 capability on any platform, Pasman said. She declined to give specifics on the configuration of EMC2 on the U-2 during Northern Edge.

The Einstein Box could be hosted on a different airborne platform other than the U-2, Pasman said. Lockheed likes using the U-2 to demonstrate cutting-edge technology because it has sufficient size, weight, power and cooling to carry many payloads, as well as an open systems architecture that makes the rapid integration of new capabilities very easy, she said. But the U-2 could be an idea platform to host a communications gateway between stealth fighters and legacy aircraft: its high altitude not only makes it hard to detect, but also allows line-of-sight—necessary for directional communications data links like IFDL and MADL—from greater distances.

The Air Force is working to build an active network, sometimes called a “combat cloud,” over the battlefield that enables the transmission of information from the tactical edge of the fight to command and control centers. But it is slow going—industry has been anticipating a request for proposals from the Air Force for a so-called “5th-to-4th” program of record for several years, but so far no such solicitation has emerged.

Lockheed could certainly offer the Einstein Box for the Air Force’s potential 5th-to-4th program, Pasman said. But the open systems architecture offers much more.

“Going back to the imperfect but sometimes useful cell phone analogy: your phone can do a lot more than just make calls,” Pasman said. “This technology is no different—it can do a lot more than just establish communication.”

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bd popeye said:

Instead of cutting back the airwings to nine the USN should at a minimum keep ten Air-wings.

Hopefully..things must change!

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It was a compelling image in 1982: The president of the United States standing in the shadow of the battleship New Jersey's enormous 16-inch guns, recommissioning the World War II behemoth for a final run in the fleet — the centerpiece of Ronald Reagan's famed goal of a 600-ship Navy.

Navy leaders say there probably won't be a similar ceremony for President Trump on the decks of the now-mothballed cruisers and destroyers sitting on the banks of the Delaware River in Philadelphia. In a recent interview, the admiral in charge of building and maintaining the Navy's fleet

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that the mothballed fleet at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard was probably not going to be a vital factor in getting the Navy to its goal of 355 ships — up from its current 275.

Vice Adm. Thomas Moore, head of Naval Sea Systems Command, told Defense & Aerospace Report's Vago Muradian that most of the ships in the inactive fleet are too far gone to make a major revival worth it. Some analysts have floated the idea of revitalizing the CG-47-class cruisers Ticonderoga, Yorktown and Thomas S. Gates, easing the burden on the Navy's strained and fast-wearing cruiser force.

But Moore said the cruisers are not easy to bring back and have been picked over in recent years.

"Most of those ships, from a combat systems perspective, are pretty obsolete," Moore said. "We probably wouldn’t bring them back and they’ve kind of been spare-parts lockers the last couple of years."

Moore said the frigates, which had largely been used for low-end counter-drug and partner-support missions, might be OK to bring back. The carrier Kitty Hawk remains a possibility as well.

"We’ll go look at the FFGs, see if there is utility there," Moore said. "We’ll look at the combat logistics force, see if there’s utility there. Of the carriers that are in inactive force, probably Kitty Hawk is the one that you could think about. But we studied that when we decommissioned Enterprise, and the carriers are pretty old. So, there is limited opportunity in the inactive fleet but we’ll look at it ship-by-ship."

Bringing back inactive ships is an incredibly expensive process and wouldn't give the Navy a lot of utility in return, said Bryan Clark, a retired Navy officer and analyst with the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.

"You could do that but what you'd get is essentially a frigate, capable of low-end missions. What you're not getting is a lot of capability — it's not going to be a ballistic missile defense shooter on patrol in the eastern Mediterranean."

The Navy announced in December that it had raised its ship-count goal from 308 to 355, five more than President Trump targeted while on the campaign trail. It's unclear, however, how the Navy plans to get there, with a number of programs like the littoral combat ship and DDG-2000 being truncated over the past decade.

The Navy is looking to transition from the littoral combat ship to a more heavily armed frigate, but it has not announced what such a ship would look like or how soon it could get to the fleet.

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The White House advanced its nominee for Navy secretary and two other Defense Department officials to the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday.

The

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— Richard Spencer for Navy secretary, Owen West for assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low-intensity conflict, and Charles “Cully” Stimson for Navy general counsel — have been formally referred to the SASC. They are expected to receive a committee hearing and approval vote in committee before the full Senate votes on their nominations.

Charles “Cully” Stimson has been senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation since 2007, when he resigned as deputy assistant secretary of defense for detainee affairs over controversial remarks in which he criticized lawyers who represent terrorism suspects.

Stimson said at the time he was leaving because of the controversy over a radio interview in which he said he found it shocking that lawyers at many of the nation's top law firms represent detainees held at the U.S. military prison in Cuba, The Washington Post had

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. The comments drew outrage from the legal community and a disavowal from the Defense Department.

Stimson is the commander of the Navy appellate government unit and serves as a captain in the Navy Judge Advocate General's Corps. He previously served as an assistant U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia and as a private equity mergers and acquisitions executive at Marsh & McLennan, a professional services firm.

He would replace the acting general counsel of the Navy, Anne M. Brennan.

On Wednesday, retired Lt. Gen. Thomas Spoehr, director of the Center for National Defense at The Heritage Foundation, told Defense News he hoped the past controversy would not impede Stimson's confirmation.

"He is such a great American and a servant to his country," Spoehr said. "I've never seen a man with more integrity than him and more respect for the system of legal jurisprudence."

Richard Spencer is a former financial industry executive and former Marine Corps captain.

The White House says Spencer most recently was a managing partner of Fall Creek Management, a privately held management consulting company in Wyoming. Spencer also was vice chairman and chief financial officer for Intercontinental Exchange, Inc., a financial market company, and president of Crossroads Group, a venture capital firm that was bought by Lehman Brothers in 2003.

President Donald Trump's first choice for Navy secretary, businessman Philip Bilden, withdrew from consideration in February. Bilden cited privacy concerns and the difficulty of separating from his business interests.

Spencer would replace Sean Stackley, the acting Navy secretary.

Owen West served as an infantry platoon commander, reconnaissance platoon leader and combat adviser in the Marine Corps, where he served two tours in Iraq. He is also a director of the Marine Corps Scholarship Foundation and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

The White House says West "most recently served as Partner, Head of Global Natural Gas Trading and Co-Head of Global Power Trading at Goldman Sachs & Co., where he designed and managed this international risk business."

He graduated Harvard University and the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

West, a third-generation Marine who joined the military after 9/11, took three leaves of absence during his time at Goldman Sachs, according to a

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in The Telegraph newspaper in London. Business Insider called him a "badass" in a

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of his third book, "Snake Eaters,” a nonfiction account of the role of military advisers for foreign armies.

West would replace Mark Mitchell as the acting assistant secretary of defense for special operations/low-intensity conflict.

Trump nominated former Army Ranger Ryan McCarthy as undersecretary of the Army on Tuesday, putting him in line for the service’s second-ranking post and a possible temporary promotion to the top job, according to a Military Times

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. McCarthy was a staffer for former Secretary of Defense Bob Gates and now works as a vice president at the defense contractor Lockheed Martin.

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