Raw Intel

Americas Boeing won a $2 billion contract modification for Lot 7 production KC-46 aircraft, subscriptions and licenses and G081 flat file. The modification provides for the exercise of an option for an additional quantity of 15 KC-46 aircraft, data, subscriptions and licenses, and G081 flat file being produced under the basic contract. The company delivered the first KC-46A to the Air Force in January 2019. Since then, Boeing has delivered 42 tankers to four different bases. The next-generation KC-46 brings new capabilities and operational flexibility to the US Air Force and international customers. Boeing says the KC-46 is a multirole tanker designed to refuel allied and…

http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/Sea-Giraffe-1X_slideshowpic1-300x169.jpg Sea Giraffe 1X 3D (click to view full) Swedish defense giant Saab is to offer its Sea Giraffe 1X 3D, active electronically scanned array (AESA) naval radar to the US market, showcasing it at the Maritime Security East Conference in Norfolk, Virginia this week. At 650 pounds, the radar is suitable for small patrol boats, giving them the ability to detect unmanned aerial vehicles for the first time. With no forced cooling requirements, and a minimal number of line-replaceable units (LRUs), it requires little power or upkeep. All maintenance, including LRU repair, can b…

BZ to our Coast Guard friends. There is a lot of good here in this message. The master message is, "tell our story." Simple but powerful. Having Chiefs - every Chief - helping bring in new people sounds like it should be happening already, but it isn't. Telling "our" story should be a given, but it isn't. All the services are having trouble recruiting, and no small measure of the problem is that our senior leadership from CJCS on down spent a bit too much time the last few years playing socio-political games and telling the public the military is full of racists, sexists, and rapists to a degree that we don't have time to spend telling the great story that represents 99.…

At least on the Navy side, it seems that many have learned the hard lessons of the Rumsfeld Era Transformationalism mistakes that still hobble our Navy. Sadly, it seems the head of the USMC and USAF have not learned that lesson. Head on over to USNIBlog to see the return of the snakeoil. 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=3p1oFyDYCWU:2CHqSe84a_E:gIN9vFwOqvQ http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?i=3p1oFyDYCWU:2CHqSe84a_E:-BTjWOF_DHI http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/blogspot/FAFV?i=3p1oFyDYCWU:2CHqSe84a_E:V_sGLiPBpWU http://feeds.f…

“Divest to Invest” is the lie a declining power tells itself when temporary leaders decide to shrug the hard work today to enable a more secure tomorrow, in order to have a comfortable and pleasant tour for themselves today – forcing others to have to play catch up later. It is that, or it is just plain wrong. We’ve seen this play before in the late 1990s and early 2000s, and it failed so well last time, it is back again. The Terrible 20s does not have to happen, but it is. Decline is a choice, and one we seem to be making … but it is reversible if a nation and its leaders have the will to stand athwart the declinist drive and yell, “Stop!”. While it is easy to become fr…

Americas Kampi Components won a maximum $9.7 million deal for hose assemblies supporting the Army AH-64 D & E Longbow helicopter. The AH-64 Apache is a twin-engined army attack helicopter. The AH-64D Longbow is fitted with the Longbow millimetre wave fire control radar and the Longbow Hellfire missile. Work will take place in Pennsylvania. Estimated completion date is November 9, 2024. Lockheed Martin and Keysight Technologies announced a collaboration to advance 5G in support of mission-critical communications for aerospace and defense applications. The companies are actively collaborating on a 5G.MIL testbed that Lockheed Martin teams will use to advance 5G capabi…

Americas General Dynamics Land won a $29 million deal for Abrams Systems technical support. The M1 Abrams is a third generation main battle tank. Work will take place in Sterling Heights, Michigan, with an estimated completion date of June 30, 2023. The first C-130H with eight-bladed propellors assigned to the 133rd Airlift Wing has returned home after modifications. The aircraft arrived home on May 11 at Minneapolis St. Paul International Airport. Another seven C-130Hs are undergoing the modifications with a completion date by the end of September 2023. After which the cargo planes will get new T56 3.5 turboprop engines. Middle East & Africa SpearUAV, an Israeli co…

One of the most compartmentalized areas, rightfully, in the national security apparatus involve the electromagnetic spectrum. Has been true for most of the last century. Radar, radio, and now IP based systems - they all can either be used to find or reveal your side or the other's location. "War winning technology" is perhaps an overused phrase, but some of these capabilities seem to be close to that. Some are hidden in plain sight, others with elaborate cover stories, some hidden in riddles and spin. One thing I keep telling myself as I type out my thoughts almost every day, is to remember that what I once knew is with each passing year very dated, and even when in the…

Americas Lockheed Martin won a $4 billion contract modification, which consists of all work associated with the manufacturing, assembly, integration, test, and delivery of three Next Generation Geosynchronous (NGG) Earth orbiting space vehicles (SV), and delivery of ground mission unique software and ground sensor processing software. Additionally, this modification includes engineering support for launch vehicle integration and launch and early on-orbit checkout for all three NGG SVs. The Space Force is acquiring five Next-Gen OPIR (Overhead Persistent Infrared) satellites — the three geosynchronous orbit satellites made by Lockheed Martin and two polar orbit satellites …

Americas Raytheon Missiles Won a $239.1 million contract modification for StormBreaker (SDBII, GBU-53/B) production Lot 6. Designed to address critical troop needs, the StormBreaker can detect, track, and destroy stationary or moving targets with high-precision and stand-off range during the day and at night in all-weather conditions. The GBU-53/B, originally known as the Small Diameter Bomb II (SDB II), has a tri-mode guidance system able to find targets using imaging infrared or millimeter-wave radar, or using semi-active laser homing to hit a designated aimpoint. Depending on the altitude of the launching aircraft, the weapon can also glide up to 69 miles on its own us…

As the U.S. decides who will be president for the next four years a review of procurement spending indicates that the Trump Administration has shown little difference in appropriations versus previous administrations, despite claims to have radically increased spending. The upshot is that the last four years saw about $2.9 in spending appropriated in inflation-adjusted dollars, which was larger than Barak Obama’s second term, but less than the Obama Administration’s first term. President Trump’s campaign speech claims of spending during his term relative to previous terms are incorrect. President Trump claimed this year that military spending in the 90s “used to be ‘mi…

Americas Honeywell International won a contract worth $476.1 million for the procurement of CH-47 aircraft T55 engines, CH-47 aircraft T55 engine electronic control units, and CH-47 aircraft T55 engine installation kits. The Honeywell T55 is a Family of military turboshaft engines. The most prominent aircraft application is the Boeing CH-47 Chinook and MH-47 helicopters. The new CH-47F uses more powerful Honeywell T55-GA-714A engines that improve fuel efficiency and enhance lift performance. The higher powerful Honeywell T55-GA-714A engines are fitted with full authority digital engine control (FADEC) and have a thrust of 3,529kW (4,733shp). The operating range was increa…

Does this guy look badass enough for you? You have no idea. In the summer of 1897 tribesmen of the North-western frontier of India (now a part of Pakistan) began attacking and intimidating British forces in the area. The Indian Government decided that the unprovoked attacks by the Afridis and the Orakzais tribesmen could not go unpunished and decided that a show of force in Tirah, the tribe’s summer home, was appropriate. Accordingly, Sir William Lockhart was ordered out from Britain and appointed to command a force of 32,882 officers and soldiers. The intention was to advance into the Chagru valley on 20 October but the Alikhel tribesmen had seen the preparation of …

Another chapter in Islam's slow war on France. You need to take time today to read a critically important article by John Lichfield. Below I will pull extensively from it, but you need to read the whole thing. On October 6, Mr Paty, 47, a much-liked history and geography teacher in a dull Paris suburb, produced for his middle school civics class a pair of the cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed which provoked the attack on Charlie Hebdo magazine five years ago. Cartoons. History. A significance moment in their nation’s history. That is the job of a teacher. A secular teacher in a secular republic. What happens when that republic allows, and indeed encourages, the grow…

Today we return to the subject of the addition to the CNO's reading list of a book that openly calls for the most sectarian view of race. Worse, it calls for the official application of racism in to official policy. For those who have not read his book, let me pull out how Ibram X. Kendi defines things in his book, "How to be an Antiracist," the book in question. Words mean things, and when people redefine words, you need to pay special attention; Now operationalize that concept in your mind every time in our Navy you hear, "equity." From Flight Surgeons to Nuke Power School - operationalize the above concept and how, once people read this CNO recommended book,…

Americas Bell Boeing won a maximum $36.5 million contract modification to extend the period of performance for delivery of V-22 spare consumable and depot-level repairable parts. The V-22 Osprey is a joint-service, medium-lift, multimission tilt-rotor aircraft developed by Boeing and Bell Helicopters. Boeing is responsible for the fuselage, landing gear, avionics, electrical and hydraulic systems, performance and flying qualities. The aircraft operates as a helicopter when taking off and landing vertically. The nacelles rotate 90° forward once airborne, converting the aircraft into a turboprop aircraft. Work will take place in Maryland, Texas and Pennsylvania. Estimated c…

Americas General Electric won a $101.5 million contract modification, which procures 21 T408-GE-400 turboshaft engines and associated engine, programmatic and logistics services in support of CH-53K King Stallion Lot Five low rate initial production aircraft. The King Stallion is the premier heavy-lift helicopter ever built by the United States government. It is an all-new heavy-lift helicopter that will expand the fleet’s ability to move more material more rapidly. That power comes from three new General Electric T-408 engines, which are more powerful and more fuel efficient than the T-64 engines currently outfitted on the CH-53E. The T408 gives the CH-53K helicopter the…

No, it is not.Today, no nation can find lasting security without addressing the climate crisis. We face all kinds of threats in our line of work, but few of them truly deserve to be called existential. The climate crisis does…climate change is making the world more unsafe, and we need to act. - Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, at the Leaders Summit on Climate, April 22, 2021 As a species, humans have thrived under drastically higher and lower sea levels; colder and warmer climates. The slow changes we are seeing now are not existential. Not even close. It is a challenge - maybe in some areas a mounting crisis, but not existential. It is something that, even if a mounti…

Americas Sikorsky won a $48 million deal, which procures eight spare part and management and delivery of parts in support of the CH-53K low rate initial production configuration aircraft. The CH-53K can be fielded from amphibious assault ships for the transportation of personnel and equipment. Work will take place in Connecticut, Massachusetts, Washington, UK, Canada, California and North Carolina. Estimated completion will be in December, 2026. Rockwell Collins Simulation and Training Solution won a $17.6 million modification, which procures initial spare parts and aircraft common equipment to support the E-2D Hawkeye Integrated Training Systems flight, tactics, and mai…

Americas Lockheed Martin Missiles won a $101.3 million contract modification for procurement of Hellfire missiles and containers. Hellfire is an air-to-ground, laser guided, subsonic missile with significant anti-tank capacity. It can also be used as an air-to-air weapon against helicopters or slow-moving fixed-wing aircraft. It has also been fielded on surface platforms in the surface-to-surface and surface-to-air roles. Work will take place in Florida. Estimated completion date is September 30, 2024. Northrop Grumman won a $28.7 million contract modification, which provides for the procurement of one additional G/ATOR system for the Air Force. The G/ATOR program is man…