Current Events in the Americas

The Pentagon unveiled names of 4 new LCS-class ships: LCS-5 USS Milwaukee, LCS-6 USS Jakcson, LCS-7 USS Detroit and LCS-8 USS Montgomery. LCS-5 and LCS-7 will be trimarans, LCS-6 and LCS-8 will be monohulls.

Lots of great pics of modern aircraft and a few warbirds too, at this Ares link.

From Defense Aerospace [excerpt]

From Armed Forces Journal, April 2011 issue

MSNBC blog Basically, the US hasn't passed its FY 2011 budget yet and has been operating on "continuing resolutions" since 1 October. The current resolution ends on 4 March. This is having a military impact, as the latest issue of AIR International points out; some procurement stuff can't be started.

From DefenseNews [excerpt]

From Aviation Week CV32: Unfortunate, because it indirectly puts greater pressure on the already strained F-22 and F-35 [excerpt]

RADM Horton Relieved Other punishments (Both links Information Dissemination).

(Source: Ares and BBC) So, attempt number three at this has gone to Boeing...

From Aviation Week [excerpt]

From DefenseNews, 15 February 2011 US-Argentine tensions simmer with verbal jabs

Randomly happened upon this when looking through the Navy Laser Testing blog post. http://www.dote.osd.mil/pub/reports/FY2008...vy/2008arci.pdf Is that not a frank and earnest evaluation or what! Insufficient testing before sending submarines to sea. How does it feel when you are tailing an Akula II and the sonar computers crash? Even more telling may be some of the conclusions reached about the program not improving performance even beyond the goals established in 1998.

Unless you've been living under a rock, the never ending saga of fanbois versus hater continues in the world of JSF. Here, Aviation Week's Bill Sweetman takes a crack at tearing (yet) another new one in JSF. A Tale of Two Tales

From Defense Aerospace

CV32: Interesting take on a perceived shift in priorities in the US DoD/budget ... From Defense Program Begins to Swing Back Towards "High-End" Conflicts

What Russia's Stealth Fighter Developments Mean for America

How US strategic antimissile defense could be made to work An interesting piece. Contains a criticism of SM-3 testing methodologies and instead advocates airborne missile defense via stealthy drones.

CV32: Being the good neighbours we are, Canada has dived head first into a commitment to buy 65 F-35A JSF ... first, the "touchy feely" news releases ... From Defense Aerospace Government of Canada Strengthens Sovereignty While Generating Significant Economic Benefits (Source: Canadian Department of National Defence; issued July 16, 2010) (All monetary amounts are in Canadian dollars unless otherwise stated) OTTAWA --– The Government of Canada today announced it is acquiring the fifth generation Joint Strike Fighter F-35 aircraft to contribute to the modernization of the Canadian Forces, while bringing significant economic benefits and opportunities to re…

If you don't love the F-22 Raptor, here are all of Dr Kopp's reasons why you should ... Why America Needs More F-22 Raptors (I do not necessarily endorse all of the conclusions, but post it for your information just the same).

As if the F-35B program wasn't in enough trouble already ... Major F-35B Component Cracks in Fatigue Test