Raw Intel

Americas The KC-46A has gotten its first Interim Capability Release (ICR) mission set, the approval to use its Centerline Drogue System. Air Mobility Command commander Gen. Jacqueline Van Ovost gave the greenlight on July 9. The decision provides more daily “taskable” operational capabilities to the various services. “This decision reflects a risk-informed, data-driven, constraint-analyzed approach to releasing KC-46A operational capabilities to the joint force,” Van Ovost was quoted as saying. The US Army awarded Raytheon approximately $321 million for Stinger missile production. The FIM-92 Stinger is a man-portable air-defense system (MANPADS) that operates as an infra…

The historical reckoning of the Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) that members of the Front Porch knew was coming since we started ringing the bell in 2004 is finally being written. New scholarship continues to come forward with a fresh look in investigating the causes of and lessons from the LCS program. There are firm lessons not just on how to run or not run a program, but also how perverse incentives hard wired in to our politics, acquisitions programs, and … yes … culture enabled abuse and wholesale institutional failure. Over at War on the Rocks, Emma Salisbury is doing exactly that. For those new to the LCS story – and there are many – Emma’s article is a great startin…

Americas Raytheon won a $34.3 million contract, which provides engineering and test support services for the ALQ-249 Next Generation Jammer (NGJ) currently in development for the Navy EA-18G aircraft. The scope includes H16/H18/H20/H22 software support for NGJ pod and integration including requirements analysis, design, development, integration, testing, training and tools related to and in support of ALQ-249 and advanced electronic warfare initiatives for Navy and Foreign Military Sales customers. The NGJ is an external jamming pod. The AN/ALQ-249 utilizes the latest digital, software-based, and Active Electronically Scanned Array technologies in order to address advance…

If you are only reading commentary about Russian President Putin's speech of 21 Feb 2022 or watching short clips, you are doing yourself a disservice. While some reporting is good, there is a lot of spin, narrative shaping, and just plain lazy reporting. If you want to try to understand if not what is in Putin's head, but what he wants the Russian people to think is in his head, you need to read and watch the speech yourself. When someone tells you what they're thinking, listen to them. Putin isn't trying to bring back the Soviet Union, he's focused on something much deeper and meaningful, the Russian Empire...build back better, as it were. You can clearly see that he i…

USN MH-60S test (click to view full) Hellfire I/II missiles are the USA’s preferred aerial anti-armor missile, and are widely deployed with America’s allies. They equip America’s helicopter fleets (AH-64, AH-1, OH-58D, MH-60S/R), AH-64 and S-70 helicopters flown by its allies, and even Australia and France’s Eurocopter Tiger attack helicopters. Range is officially listed as 9 km/ 5.6 miles. While Hellfires lack the fast-jet launch capabilities – and correspondingly extended maximum range – of the UK’s MBDA Brimstone missiles, Lockheed Martin’s missile has made big inroads as the world’s high-end helicopter-launched missile. It has also carved out unique niches as tripo…

After the events of this weekend, I'm not really up to writing something to kick Monday off. It isn't that I did not have time, it is just that I wanted to invest it in something else. While there are a lot of entities who need some self-reflection, I think for today we need to look back at the senior in-theater leadership of the military effort in Afghanistan. We'll talk in more detail later. This works best on full screen, and you only have 10 seconds a slide, so don't dilly-dally. Ponder. 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=WkAN3tHqTP4:K…

Americas Lockheed Martin won a $9.4 million contract modification for HELLFIRE and Joint-Air-to-Ground Missile engineering services. The AGM-114 Hellfire II is an air-to-ground missile developed primarily for the anti-armor role. It is a combat-proven tactical missile system using multiple launch platforms based on air, sea and ground. Joint Air-to-Ground Missile (JAGM) is an Army led program managed by PEO Missiles and Space, Joint Attack Munitions Systems (JAMS) Project Office. JAGM is a multi-sensor air-to-ground missile that is the successor to the combat proven HELLFIRE Romeo and HELLFIRE Longbow missiles. Work will take place in Florida. Estimated completion date i…

Zeebrugge. If you have been there or to its inner city Brugges you know what a beautiful and peaceful place it is - as most all of Belgium is today. In 1918 though, Belgium was a nightmarish slaughterhouse where the bodies of millions were blended into the beaten earth - where like Okinawa and Iwo Jima over a quarter century later - the living earth would move with a blanketed mass of maggots. In one of history's subtle hints she will give you early if you wish to listen, Britain found herself on the edge of starvation due to a threat few understood or even knew of at the beginning of the war - the submarine. Something new, unexpected and decisive needed to be done.…

This is kind of strange and different ... so of course, it is kind of growing on me. Via Megan Eckstein at Defense News; The U.S. Navy has promised a first deployment for its new aircraft carrier Gerald R. Ford by this fall — but that deployment won’t be a typical one, the head of Naval Air Force Atlantic told Defense News. Ford won’t fall under the operational command of a regional combatant commander. Rather, it will conduct a “service-retained early employment” period where the Navy keeps full control over the ship’s activities and schedule, Rear Adm. John Meier said. The Navy keeping COCOM hands off their ships for awhile ... good. Nice habit. We should do this more…

Bofors Archer system (click to view full) BAE Systems Bofors’ Archer is a light, air-portable, and highly automated 155/52 light mobile artillery system. Archer began as a Swedish project, administered by their FMV procurement agency. Funding was provided for system development and some initial production, but the project’s future had been shadowed by anemic Swedish defense budgets. In May 2007, however, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed with Norway’s FLO procurement agency, which evolved into a joint production venture. Just as initial production moved the Archer system from concept to imminent reality, however, Norway left the program. Why? The Archer Syste…

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…

Americas Lockheed Martin won a $37 million contract modification, which adds scope to procure special tooling and test equipment for the F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter production line in support of second source canopy tooling and other known capacity gaps for the Navy, Marines, Air Force and non-Department of Defense (DOD) participants. Work will take place in California, Texas, Australia and New Jersey. Estimated completion will be in August 2023. BAE Systems won a $117 million contract from Lockheed Martin to produce next-generation missile seekers for the Long Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM). The seeker technology enables LRASM to detect and engage specific m…

No, not your liberty stories ... but the front line nations facing China that aren't all that concerned, directly, about the crisis in Kabul. Taiwan and Japan ... tiny step by tiny step ... are getting closer. A few updates over at USNIBlog. Come by 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=lUHZfGepKDA:qOcc32tVzFc:gIN9vFwOqvQ http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?i=lUHZfGepKDA:qOcc32tVzFc:-BTjWOF_DHI http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?i=lUHZfGepKDA:qOcc32tVzFc:V_sGLiPBpWU http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogs…

I like well hidden history, especially those with good shoes. There are many stories out there that we are only now hearing about ... and this is one. From DailyMail, If the story sounds interesting, click the link above for an extended summary, or you can get the details in Operation Kronstadt: The True Story of Honor, Espionage, and the Rescue of Britain's Greatest Spy The Man with a Hundred Faces by Harry Ferguson.Wouldn't it make a great movie ... if Hollywood still made movies of this type? Wrong heroes, I guess.Originally posted JUL10.If you want to hear more, and I know you do, historian Justin Reay has almost an hour for you on a man who two world wars later wou…

Americas The US Air Force announced that two F-35A Lightning II aircraft recently released B61-12 Joint Test Assemblies, or JTAs, during the F-35A’s first Full Weapon System Demonstration, completing the final flight test exercise of the nuclear design certification process. The 422nd and 59th Test and Evaluation Squadrons led Air Combat Command’s portion of the test effort, with Airmen from the 57th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron, 926th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron and Bolt Aircraft Maintenance Unit leading all maintenance efforts. Thales has unveiled a new ground-based multi-mission radar with simultaneous ground and low-level air surveillance, providing early UAV dete…

Americas L-3 Communications won a $38 million contract modification for contractor logistics support of the Air Force C-12 fleet. Originally developed by Beechcraft, the Raytheon C-12 is a short-range personnel and cargo lift aircraft for the US military. Powered by two Pratt & Whitney turboprop engines, the low-wing, all-metal aircraft is the military version of the civilian Super King Air 200 aircraft. The pressurized cabin is capable of an altitude of 35,000 feet and can be reconfigured to accommodate a mix of passengers, and cargo. The first C-12s were fielded to the US Army in 1974 and the aircraft has undergone a series of upgrades since then. Work will take pla…

Americas American firm AeroVironment received two firm-fixed-price orders totaling nearly $16 million from the United States Air Force to deliver Puma 3 AE unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) and spares packages and Raven UAS spares packages. The hand-launched Puma 3 AE has a wingspan of 9.2 feet, weighs 15 pounds and can operate for up to 2.5 hours. The aircraft also has a range of 12.4 miles (20 kilometers) with a standard antenna, and up to 37.2 miles (60 kilometers) with AeroVironment’s Long-Range Tracking Antenna (LRTA). It also features reduced system packaging with a flyable configuration and GCS in one case. A US Air Force plan to transfer all A-10 Thunderbolt planes…

Barely six-weeks old, our retreat and national humiliation in Afghanistan for many of us has been I wrote the below almost exactly six years ago when we left a base that in my professional swan song, I had a lot invested in. Yep, that's my picture to here put as a reference point in time in late '08/early '09. Intersting to read how my feelings were in 2014 almost a warm-up for the feelings I continue to have about what we did to the effort as a whole in AFG. I'm still not fully settled on the issue. Anyway, if you are so inclined, join me in a quick return to OCT 2014. http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ErLLFCOOnLU/VFNtzLmfaCI/AAAAAAAAI0k/dH0yHFqt6Vk/s320/IMGP1114.JPGI will be,…

It is 1944 near Cagny in northern France. You are leading a section of two 33-ton M4 Sherman tanks when, all of a sudden, you find yourself facing a Panther, a Tiger I, an old Mark IV — and one70-ton King Tiger. What does an army lieutenant do? Become a naval officer. From the excellent War History Online; Gorman found himself at the top of a ridge, looking down at a field in which the German tanks were gathered. Only 900 feet (274 meters) of open ground stood between him and the feared Königstiger. He knew that if he didn’t act immediately, his two Sherman tanks would likely be taken out. This was when he decided to put a naval tactic to good use. By then, the Germ…

If it is early summer in the Black Sea, it is time for the annual Ukrainian hosted international exercise Sea Breeze. Why is this exercise important, who came along, and what does it tell us about the state of the Ukrainian Navy, maritime security in the contested eastern Black Sea, and some interesting responses from the Russians? Recently returning from the exercise and joining us for the full hour this Sunday from 5-6pm Eastern will be returning guest, Captain Chris Rawley, USNR CAPT Rawley is the Reserve Chief of Staff for US. Naval Forces Europe and Africa. Over his 29 year career, he has deployed to the Persian Gulf, Western Pacific, Iraq, Afghanistan, and across…