Raw Intel

Once again we are faced with two options: 1) the CNO is fighting as best he can to slow roll the forces of hate and division that are trying to turn his service in to an organization beset by strife, division, and sectarianism by saying the right words to keep the worst at bay while waiting for the tides to shift or; 2) the CNO is a true believer, more woke than woke – and he is going to drag everyone down with him. I am open to either option – or perhaps a 3rd “useful idiot” – but the CNO is not an idiot. He is a smart, hardworking, and talented man. As such, we must default to 1 or 2. Things are leaning towards 2. “My goal is to put the Navy in a place over the next 2…

Americas General Electric won a $483.1 million contract, which procures spare F414 engines and various spare engine modules in support of the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet and EA-18G Growler production aircraft. Boeing announced the delivery of the first two operational F/A-18E/F Super Hornet fighter jets in the Block III configuration to the US Navy on September 27. The service will use these aircraft to help complete an ongoing test and evaluation program for these updates, as well as support the development of new tactics, techniques, and procedures to go with them. Work will take place in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, Kentucky, Canada, Germany and North Carolina. Es…

Have you been less than pleased by the squishy use of words the last few months by our senior leadership when it comes to what we all saw transpire in Afghanistan? Well, it has been a burr in my saddle for months. At today's House Armed Services Committee meeting on Afghanistan, I just had about enough. Come on over to USNIBlog where I whip out the dictionary and a little family history on the topic. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?d=yIl2AUoC8zA http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?d=qj6IDK7rITs http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?i=ReWD3xSmy04:wMR9x5_xam8:gIN9vFwOqvQ http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?i=ReWD3xSmy04:wMR9x5_xam8…

Americas Boeing won a $17.3 million contract modification for the US and United Kingdom to provide Strategic Weapon System Trident II (D5) Inertial Navigation equipment technical engineering support services. The Trident II D5 fleet ballistic missile (FBM) is a three-stage, solid-propellant, inertial-guided ballistic missile. In September 2021 the US Navy test-fired two unarmed Trident II missiles off the coast of Cape Canaveral, dubbing the launches a successful test of the operational readiness of the weapons system. Work will take place in California, Ohio, Washington, New York, Virginia, Georgia, Florida and Scotland. Estimated completion date is September 30, 2022. …

Americas Boeing won a $3.5 billion deal for the C-17 Globemaster III Sustainment Program. The contract will provide support and sustainment services to the government product support manager/product support integrator for the C-17 weapon system. The contract involves Foreign Military Sales (FMS) to the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, NATO Airlift Management Program Office, India, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates and Qatar. Support includes: program management; sustaining logistics; material and equipment management; sustaining engineering; quality assurance; depot level aircraft maintenance and modifications; F117 propulsion system management; long-term sustainment plannin…

Will someone please save us from our experts? Question everyone. Defer to no one. If you have learned nothing the last two decades, at least know this; our elite aren’t. Our best institutions do not produce the best product. Credentialism is the last refuge of the incompetent. You have to assume these are well meaning people, but building off of yesterday’s post – let this week be a lesson to everyone that our self-selecting elites are like the Bourbons, “They had learned nothing and forgotten nothing.” I’m not sure I can do more but quote from the latest article in FP by By Charli Carpenter, a professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and director of Huma…

Americas Boeing won a $16 million deal for spare parts in support of the AH-64 Apache weapon system. The Apache is a twin-engined army attack helicopter. The Apache attack helicopter can be equipped with air-to-air missiles (Stinger, AIM-9 Sidewinder, Mistral and Sidearm) and the advanced precision kill weapon system (APKWS), formerly known as Hydra, family of guided and unguided 70mm rockets. Boeing won a $158.3 million contract modification for VC-25B Spares Phase 1 – Long Lead Parts. This contract modification is for the VC-25B initial spares with a production lead time of greater than 12 months that are required for the initial support period, which is the first 18 m…

Air Force One (click to view full) The USA’s fleet of 2 “VC-25” 747-200 derivatives is unique in several respects. It’s more popularly known as the latest incarnation of the “Air Force One” fleet that transports the President of the United States around the world, though the planes themselves only acquire the “Air Force One” call sign when the President is on board. The VC-25 can also serve as a secondary command post, thanks to a suite of advanced communications and electronics gear that’s both highly encrypted, and protected from the Electro-Magnetic Pulse effects of nuclear detonations. The 89th Airlift Wing operates them from Andrews AFB, MD. During the Cold War, i…

We’ve all seen it; those who promote, protect, and mentor the “deep select” Golden Boy become personally – and professionally – invested in their success. Not content to give them opportunities to succeed or fail on their own, when things do not turn out a perfect as the CV and as those mentors promised they would, the wounded instead make excuses, defend, and deflect any criticism of The Chosen One. Though years and decades pass, they still treat grown men on the edge of middle age as if they are still that promising young staffer they once were – poised for greatness at some point in the future. They never really achieve regular success, but give you the appearance tha…

Americas Lockheed Martin won a $14.8 million contract modification, which is adding scope to provide depot level repair capabilities for the F-35 gun system in support of F-35 Lightning II low-rate initial production Lot 11 aircraft for the Air Force, Marine Corps, Navy, and non-US Department of Defense (DOD) participants. F-35 Lightning II joint strike fighter (JSF) is a stealthy, supersonic multirole fighter developed by Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company for the US Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps and programme partners from the NATO and US allies. Work will take place in Varmint, Texas and Maine. Expected completion will be in November 2024. AAR Services won a $14.2…

BZ to VFA-154, the Black Knights, on their Cruise 2021 video. Everyone else is going to have to up their game. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?d=yIl2AUoC8zA http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?d=qj6IDK7rITs http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?i=ixh5f2XItWY:z-gZNVyqt8A:gIN9vFwOqvQ http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?i=ixh5f2XItWY:z-gZNVyqt8A:-BTjWOF_DHI http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?i=ixh5f2XItWY:z-gZNVyqt8A:V_sGLiPBpWU http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?i=ixh5f2XItWY:z-gZNVyqt8A:F7zBnMyn0Lo http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/blogspot/FAFV/~4/ixh5f2XItWYView the full article

So, you think you've had some memorable cruises, eh? What do you think about this record?DATEVESSEL SUNKAPR 26, 1944T29 Torpedo BoatAPR 29, 1944T27 Torpedo BoatJUN 9, 1944ZH1 DestroyerJUN 9, 1944Z32 DestroyerJUN 24, 1944U971 U-BoatJUN 15, 1944UJ1420/UJ1421 TrawlerJUN 6, 1944M486 MinesweeperAUG 6, 1944SG-3CSEPT 6, 1944VEDETTE Patrol BoatI give to you MHCS Haida, a Tribal Class destroyer who sank all those ships within 13-months of her commissioning. As Jerry Proc so simply put;HAIDA distinguished herself as Canada's most active warship by sinking no less than nine German ships in the period from April to September 1944. She was also involved in numerous other actions resul…

I joke now and then about “Make Auxiliary Cruisers Great Again” – but I am only partially joking. What were Auxiliary Cruisers? On the surface, they were somewhere between pirates and commerce raiders, but they were also a way to get more armed ships with your flag on them in the mind of your enemy's planners, disrupting their Sea Lines of Communication (SLOC) (aka supply chains), and complicating their attempts to secure their seas. Turning merchant ships in to warships is an imperfect act, but until your enemy achieves complete sea control, they have a good to acceptable track record of bringing more capability to the fight from the South Pacific to the Indian Ocean and…

Americas Oshkosh Defense won a $10 million contract modification for the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle Family of Vehicles. The JLTV Family of Vehicles (FoV) is the Marine Corps and Army partial replacement for the High Mobility Multi-purpose Wheeled Vehicle (HMMWV) fleet. Work will take place in Wisconsin. Estimated completion date is November 30, 2022. Raytheon Intelligence & Space has introduced a lightweight, affordable AESA radar in its lightest form factor ever. In addition to being a third of the weight of most modern AESA radars, the new compact radar also costs about half as much as typical fire control radars. Gallium Nitride technology is combined with an in…

Americas Vertex Aerospace won a $96.5 million contract modification, which increases the contract ceiling to extend organizational, intermediate, and depot level maintenance, logistics, and engineering support, to include support of equipment, tools, direct and indirect material for the T-45 aircraft, associated systems, and related support equipment to maintain all flight and test and evaluation operations for the Navy. Work will take place in Texas, Mississippi, Florida and Maryland. Estimated completion will be in December 2021. Northrop Grumman won a $30.9 million deal to procure 25 Link 16 B kits; three Link 16 B kit spares; and two Link 16 flight training device B …

If you think there is a good news story around the Navy's portion of the defense budget over the next few years, you haven't been paying attention. Pondering over at USNIBlog. Grab a drink and give it a read. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?d=yIl2AUoC8zA http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?d=qj6IDK7rITs http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?i=PQiHzpMMBx4:4cceqdxyaV0:gIN9vFwOqvQ http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?i=PQiHzpMMBx4:4cceqdxyaV0:-BTjWOF_DHI http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?i=PQiHzpMMBx4:4cceqdxyaV0:V_sGLiPBpWU http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?i=PQiHzpMMBx4:4cceqdxyaV0:F7zBnMyn0Lo http://feeds.f…

Americas Lockheed Martin won a $49.3 million deal. The contract provides for overhaul of the B-52 Counter Measure Receiver. The B-52H is the US Air Force’s long-range, large-payload multirole bomber. The B-52H Stratofortress is equipped with a range of electronic warfare equipment. The ITT AN/ALQ-172(V)2 electronic countermeasures system features multi-band threat recognition and multiple threat jamming. Work will take place ein New York. Estimated completion date is September 19, 2026. The US Air Force has started flying operational missions with the Collins Aerospace’s MS-177 multi-spectral imaging (MSI) sensor on the RQ-4B Block 30 aircraft. The MS-177 is derived from…

Ah, yes, The Terrible 20s. What if you had the leadership and malaise of the Carter Administration mixed in with the budgetary pressures of the Clinton Administration ... with a little bit of Biden Administration special sauce mixed in? We're not even a year in to the Biden Admin still at the start of the 20s...so you know this was coming. Via Joe Gould at DefenseNews; House progressives will have a few chances to hold down the defense budget this week, but it’s going to be an uphill fight. The House is set to vote this week on two Democratic amendments to cut the fiscal 2022 National Defense Authorization Act’s $740 billion top line. One would reduce it by roughly 10 …

Most readers here are aware of the fleets parked off major ports on both coasts; The number of container ships at anchor or drifting in San Pedro Bay off the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach has now blown through all previous records and is rising by the day. There were an all-time-high 65 container ships in the queue in San Pedro Bay on Thursday, according to the Marine Exchange of Southern California. Of those, a record 23 were forced to drift because anchorages were full. Theoretically, the numbers — already surreally high — could go a lot higher than this. While designated anchorages are limited, the space for ships to safely drift offshore is not. “There’s lots of…

Americas Ball Aerospace won a $9.7 million contract of the B-2 Antenna Electronics Unit. The B-2 is a low-observable, strategic, long-range, heavy bomber capable of penetrating sophisticated and dense air-defense shields. Work will take place in Colorado. Expected completion date September 16, 2026. Lockheed Martin has announced that the LMXT is being built in response to the US Air Force’s KC-Y Program. The new tanker builds on the design of the Airbus A330 Multi Role Tanker Transport (MRTT). Lockheed Martin is the prime contractor and works directly to implement US Air Force-specific requirements within the LMXT. The plane will be equipped with a fully automatic boom a…