CV32

Ask and ye shall receive ... J-10 Fighter Man Rtng: 4.0/2.0 Damage Value: 21 Size/Signature: Small/Small Bombsight: Advanced Counterm: 3rd Gen D Inflight Refuel: Y Sensors: Possible Helmet-Mounted Sight. Radar unknown. Throttle Setting (Speed in knots) Altitude Cruise Full Mil Reheat Low: 490 650 792 Med: 490 690 1020 High: 490 740 1220 Ceiling: 18000 m Engine Type: TF Cruise Range: 600 nm Int Fuel: 4500 kg Drop Tank Desc. Fuel Wt. Range Add. 1500 L Drop Tank 1190 kg 155 nm 1100 L Drop Tank 873 kg 110 nm Ordnance Loadouts: Payload: 4500 kg Off Guns: 23mm (xxx) • Blue Sky FLIR/Laser targeting pod can be carried on inlet HP. • Six underwing and five underfuselage HP. Inner pair and C/L are wet. • Cleared for PL-8 (Python 3), PL-9, PL-10 radar AAM, and PL-12. • Cleared for rockets and unguided bombs only. • May receive laser-guided bombs, YJ-8K/C801 antiship msl Remarks: In Service: 2005 Multirole fighter in Mirage 2000 or F-16C/D class. Development started in 1988. Uses technology and design elements of Israeli Lavi fighter, also Russian engine and design assistance. Aerodynamically unstable, quad FBW control system. Two-seat J-10AS version will also be developed. • Aug 02: Six prototypes and ten preproduction examples in limited service in Nanjing Military Command, in eastern China, for operational test. • IOC is 13 Jul 04 with 131st Regiment of 44th Air Division. {added 4 Nov 03, rev 6 May 04 fm HNR '03, rev 18 Nov 07 w/info fm IAPR 22, rev 2 Dec 08, two a/c shown w/inflight reuel probe fitted}

From Flight International DATE: 29/01/09 SOURCE: Flight International Russia to purchase Algeria's unwanted MiG-29s The Russian air force is to take delivery of "about 10" of the 28 RSK MiG-29SMT fighters built for, but never delivered to, Algeria, and is also acquiring nine upgraded Sukhoi Su-25 attack aircraft. The MiG-29s will join the air force's tactical training centre in Lipetsk. The Russian ministry of defence reportedly signed a Rb20 billion ($645 million) contract for all 28 MiG-29SMTs, but the air force will not take all of them immediately. MiG says the "great majority" of the ex-Algerian MiGs are "100% ready for service", although several airframes are missing "easy-to-install" vendor items.

From BBC News Russian move would reduce tensions By Paul Reynolds World affairs correspondent, BBC News website The reported Russian decision not to deploy short-range missiles to Kaliningrad could, if confirmed, represent a significant move towards de-escalating tensions between Russia and the United States. A Russian official, quoted by the Russian news agency Interfax, said that Russia was responding to "the fact that the new US administration is not rushing through plans" to deploy its missile defence system in Poland and the Czech Republic. In November, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev announced that Iskander missiles, with a range of up to 400 km (248 miles), would be moved to the Kaliningrad enclave to counter the anti-missile system. The US has said that the system is designed to stop missiles from Iran and other "rogue states" and would not affect Russian security. 'Remarkable gesture' "If confirmed, this is a pretty remarkable gesture," said Dr Paul Cornish, head of the international security programme at the Chatham House think tank in London. "It could be very important, not only regionally, where it will make a difference in the perception of Russia, but also in broader terms of US-Russian relations. It looks like a major concession and, if so, is a pretty major development and quite a big step." The Russians appear to have concluded that President Barack Obama is in no hurry to put into practice the plans developed by President George W Bush to place 10 missile interceptors in Poland and a mid-course correction radar in the Czech Republic. The Bush administration reached agreements with both governments on such a deployment. In particular, the Russians will have noted comments made by then President-elect Obama's transition team after Mr Obama spoke to Polish President Lech Kaczynski in November. After Mr Kaczynski indicated that Mr Obama had said the project would continue, the Obama team issued a statement saying that the president-elect had "made no commitment on it". His position continued to be, the statement said, that he would support deployment if the technology proved workable. Questions Two key questions coming up are these: will Mr Obama deploy the system and, if he did, would the Russians change their minds and take an active part in it, rather than seeing it as a threat? "It's too early to say what President Obama will do," said Dr Paul Cornish. "I think it is very unlikely that he will cancel it as a bad Bush idea. The effect in central and eastern Europe in that case would be severe. They are already rattled there by Russian actions in Georgia and over Ukraine. "But there has always been a question about whether the Russians would be in on this. They have said no in the past. Maybe they will revise their views." If the Russian move is confirmed, it could also herald a new period of progress in wider strategic arms talks with the US. Of particular importance is the 1991 Start 1 Treaty, which is due to expire in December this year. Its verification measures provide the basis of mutual monitoring measures, which are used to control other treaties, and these measures will have to be renewed. In the meantime, plans to develop the anti-missile system continue to progress. The US Missile Defence Agency carried out what it called a "successful intercept" in December. It reported that a "threat-representative target missile" had been launched from Alaska and that an interceptor missile fired from California "intercepted the threat warhead".

From Defense Industry Daily Wired for War, by P.W. Singer, The Brookings Institution Something big is going on in the history of war, and maybe even humanity itself. The US military went into Iraq with just a handful of drones in the air and zero unmanned systems on the ground, none of them armed. Today, there are over 5,300 drones in the US inventory and another roughly 12,000 on the ground. And these are just the first generation, the Model T Fords compared to what is already in the prototype stage. This is what is happening now. Peering forward, one Air Force lieutenant general forecast that “given the growth trends, it is not unreasonable to postulate future conflicts involving tens of thousands.” For my book Wired for War, I spent the last several years trying to capture this historic moment, as robots begin to move into the fighting of our human wars. The book features stories and anecdotes of everyone from robotic scientists and the science fiction writers who inspire them to 19 year old drone pilots and the Iraqi insurgents they are fighting. The hope wasn’t just to take the reader on a journey to meet this new generation of warriors—both human and machine, but also to explore the fascinating, and sometimes frightening, political, economic, legal and ethical questions that our society had better start facing in how our wars will be fought and who will fight them. In other words, “What happens when science fiction becomes battlefield reality?” Despite all the enthusiasm in military circles for the next generation of unmanned vehicles, ships, and planes, there is one question, however, that people are generally reluctant to talk about. It is the equivalent of Lord Voldemort in Harry Potter, the issue That-Must-Not-Be-Discussed. What happens to the human role in war as we arm ever more intelligent, more capable, and increasingly more autonomous robots? When this issue comes up, both specialists and military folks tend to either change the subject or speak in absolutes. “People will always want humans in the loop,” says Eliot Cohen, a noted military expert who served in the State Department under President George W. Bush. An Air Force captain similarly writes in his service’s professional journal, “In some cases, the potential exists to remove the man from harm’s way. Does this mean there will no longer be a man in the loop? No. Does this mean that brave men and women will no longer face death in combat? No. There will always be a need for the intrepid souls to fling their bodies across the sky.” As Noah Shachtman, editor of Wired magazine’s military reporting, explains, people speak in such absolute terms and use the phrase that “man will always stay in the loop” so often that it sounds like more like brainwashing than actual analysis. “Their mantra is a bit like the line they repeat again and again in the movie The Manchurian Candidate. “Sergeant Shaw is the kindest, bravest, warmest most wonderful human being.”” But he laughs that the constant repetition of these claims is pretty understandable. “It helps keep people calm that this isn’t the Terminators.” More seriously, he explains, “The core competency in the military is essentially shooting and blowing up things. So, no one is eager to say outsource that to a bunch of machines.” So how are we to weigh this issue if we were to treat it seriously? First, all the rhetoric ignores the reality that humans started moving out of “the loop” of war a long time before robots made their way onto battlefields. As far back as World War II, the Norden bombsight made calculations of height, speed, and trajectory too complex for a human to automatically decide when to drop a bomb on a B-17. By the time of the first Gulf War, Captain Doug Fries, a radar navigator, could write this description of what it was like to bomb Iraq in his B-52: “The navigation computer opened the bomb bay doors and dropped the weapons into the dark.” The trend toward growing computer autonomy has also been in place at sea since the Aegis computer system was introduced in the 1980s. Designed to defend U.S. Navy ships against missile and plane attacks, the system operates in four modes: 1. Semi-Automatic, in which humans work with the system to judge when and at what to shoot; 2. Automatic Special, in which human controllers set the priorities, such as telling the system to destroy bombers before fighter jets, but the computer decides how to do it; 3. Automatic, in which data goes to human operators in command but the system works without them; and 4. Casualty, in which the system just does what it calculates is best to keep the ship from being hit. Humans can override the Aegis system in any of its modes, but experience shows this is often beside the point, sometimes with tragic consequences. The most notable of these was in July 3, 1988, when the U.S.S. Vincennes was patrolling in the Persian Gulf. The ship had been nicknamed “Robo-cruiser,” both because of the new Aegis radar system it was carrying and because its captain had a reputation for being overly aggressive. That day, the Vincennes’s radars spotted Iran Air Flight 655, an Airbus passenger jet. The jet was on a consistent course and speed and was broadcasting a radar and radio signal that showed it to be civilian. The automated Aegis system, though, had been designed for managing battles against attacking Soviet bombers in the open North Atlantic, not for dealing with skies crowded with civilian aircraft like those over the Gulf. The computer system registered the plane with an icon on the screen that made it seem to be an Iranian F-14 fighter (a plane half the size), and hence an “Assumed Enemy.” Even though the hard data were telling the human crew that the plane wasn’t a fighter jet, they trusted what the computer was telling them more. Aegis was Semi-Automatic mode, giving it the least amount of autonomy. But not one of the 18 sailors and officers on the command crew was willing to challenge the computer’s wisdom. They authorized it to fire. (That they even had the authority to do so without seeking permission from more senior officers in the fleet, which any other ship would have had to, was again only because the Navy had greater confidence in Aegis than in a human-manned ship without it) Only after the fact did the crew members realize that they had accidentally shot down an airliner, killing all 290 passengers and crew, including 66 children. The tragedy of Flight 655 was no isolated incident. Indeed, much the same scenario was repeated just a few years ago, when U.S. Patriot missile batteries accidentally shot down two allied planes during the Iraq invasion of 2003. The Patriot systems classified the craft as Iraqi rockets and there were only a few seconds to make a decision. So, machine judgment trumped any human decisions. In both of these cases, the human power “in the loop” was actually only veto power, and even that was a power that military personnel were unwilling to use against the quicker (and what they viewed as superior) judgment of a computer. The point is not that the Matrix or Cylons are taking over, but rather that a redefinition of what it means to have humans “in the loop” of decision-making in war has long been under way, with the authority and autonomy of machines ever expanding. As we move towards more unmanned systems, there are myriad pressures to give war-bots greater and greater autonomy. The first is simply the push to make more capable and more intelligent robots. But as psychologist and artificial intelligence expert Robert Epstein notes, this comes with a built-in paradox. “The irony is that the military will want it [a robot] to be able learn, react, etc., in order for it to do its mission well. But they won’t want it to be too creative, just like with soldiers. But once you reach a space where it is really capable, how do you limit them? To be honest, I don’t think we can.” Simple military expediency also widens the loop. To achieve any sort of personnel savings from using unmanned systems, one human operator has to be able to “supervise” (as opposed to control) a larger number of robots. For example, the Army’s long-term FCS plan calls for having two humans jointly supervise a team of 10 land robots. In this scenario, the humans would delegate tasks to increasingly autonomous robots, but the robots would still need human permission to fire weapons. Researchers are finding, however, that humans have a hard time controlling multiple units at once (imagine playing 5 different video games at the same time). Even having human operators control two UAVs at a time rather than one reduces performance levels by an average of 50%. As a NATO study concluded, the goal of having one operator control multiple vehicles is “currently, at best, very ambitious, and, at worst, improbable to achieve.” And this is with systems that aren’t shooting or being shot at. As one Pentagon-funded report noted, “Even if the tactical commander is aware of the location of all his units, the combat is so fluid and fast-paced that it is very difficult to control them.” So, a push is made to given even more autonomy to the machine. Then there is the fact that an enemy is involved. If the robots aren’t going to fire unless a remote operator authorizes them to, then any foe need only disrupt that communication. The loop is the vulnerability to cut. Military officers respond to this problem by saying that, while they don’t like the idea of taking humans out of the loop, there has to be an exception, a backup plan for when communications are cut and the robot is “fighting blind.” So another exception is then made to the once absolute concept of the loop. Even if the communications link is not broken, there are combat situations in which there is not enough time for the human operator to react, even if the enemy is not operating at digital speed. The C-RAM system deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan already shoots down rockets and mortar fire without human command, while a number of robot makers have added “counter-sniper” capabilities to their machines, enabling them to automatically track down and target with a laser beam any enemy that shoots. But those precious seconds while the human decides whether to fire back or not could let the enemy get away. So, as one U.S military officer observes, there is nothing technical to prevent one from rigging the machine to shoot something more lethal than light. “If you can automatically hit it with a laser range finder, you can hit it with a bullet.” This creates a powerful argument for another exception to the rule that humans must always be “in the loop,” giving robots the ability to fire back on their own. This kind of autonomy is generally seen as more palatable than other types. “People tend to feel a little bit differently about the counterpunch than the punch,” notes Noah Shachtman. As Gordon Johnson of the Army’s Joint Forces Command explains, such autonomy soon comes to be viewed as not only logical but quite attractive. “Anyone who would shoot at our forces would die. Before he can drop that weapon and run, he’s probably already dead. Well now, these cowards in Baghdad would have to pay with blood and guts every time they shoot at one of our folks. The costs of poker went up significantly. The enemy, are they going to give up blood and guts to kill machines? I’m guessing not.” Each exception, however, pushes one further and further from an absolute and instead down a slippery slope. And at each step, once robots “establish a track record of reliability in finding the right targets and employing weapons properly,” says John Tirpak, editor of Air Force Magazine, the “machines will be trusted.” The reality is that the human location “in the loop” is already becoming, as retired Army colonel Thomas Adams notes, that of “a supervisor who serves in a fail-safe capacity in the event of a system malfunction.” Even then, he thinks the speed, confusion, and information overload of modern-day war will soon move the whole process outside of “human space.” He describes how the coming weapons “will be too fast, too small, too numerous, and will create an environment too complex for humans to direct.” As Adams concludes, the various new technologies “are rapidly taking us to a place where we may not want to go, but probably are unable to avoid.” The final irony is that for all the claims by military, political, and science leaders that “humans will always be in the loop,” as far back as 2004 the U.S. Army was carrying out research on armed ground robots which found that “instituting a ‘quickdraw’ response made them much more effective than an unarmed variation that had to call for fires from other assets.” Similarly, a 2006 study by the Defense Safety Working Group, a body in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, discussed how the concerns over potential killer robots could be allayed by giving “armed autonomous systems” permission to “shoot to destroy hostile weapons systems but not suspected combatants.” That is, they could shoot at tanks and jeeps, just not the people in them. By 2007, the U.S. Army had solicited proposals for a system that could carry out ”[f]ully autonomous engagement without human intervention.” The next year, the U.S. Navy circulated research on a “Concept for the Operation of Armed Autonomous Systems on the Battlefield.” Perhaps most telling is a report that the Joint Forces Command drew up in 2005, which suggested autonomous robots on the battlefield will be the norm within 20 years. Its title was somewhat amusing, given the official line one usually hears on the issue of ensuring absolute human control of armed robots: “Unmanned Effects: Taking the Human Out of the Loop.” So, despite what one article called “all the lip service paid to keeping a human in the loop,” the cold, hard, metallic reality is that autonomous armed robots are coming to war. They simply make too much sense to the people that matter. A Special Operations Forces officer put it this way: “That’s exactly the kind of thing that scares the sh*t out of me. . . . But we are on the pathway already. It’s inevitable.” P.W. Singer is a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution; at 34 years old, he’s the youngest person ever to hold that position. He has worked for the Pentagon and Harvard University, and in his personal capacity, served as the coordinator of the defense policy advisory task force for the Obama campaign. In Corporate Warriors and Children at War, Singer foretold the rise of private military contractors and the advent of child soldiers – predictions which proved to be all too accurate. His latest book, from which this article is derived, is: Wired for War: The Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the 21st Century (Penguin, 2009).

From Aviation Week Split-Buy USAF Tanker Concept Gaining Favor Jan 29, 2009 By Amy Butler As the Pentagon attempts to craft a way forward to replace the KC-135 aerial refueling fleet, the option of a split buy of two models is back and gaining attention on Capitol Hill, according to officials close to the tanker program. The idea is sure to be a topic of discussion as the chairman of the House Appropriations defense subcommittee, Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa. ), travels this week to Alabama, where Northrop Grumman and EADS were proposing to assemble their tanker design. Murtha is expected to visit Boeing’s Washington state facility in the coming weeks as well. After multiple failed attempts at competing the $35 billion KC-135 replacement program, some officials close to the program are convinced dual-sourcing is the only realistic option to get beyond repeated award protests and delays. But the split-buy concept still lacks support in the Pentagon. “It will incredibly complicate the Air Force’s life because they will have two new tankers and the old tankers and the maintenance, the training, and the logistics just becomes a nightmare,” Defense Secretary Robert Gates said during an interview last month with Aviation Week. Still, officials close to the KC-X program, which was designed to begin replacing more than 500 aging KC-135 tankers with 179 new aircraft, say dual-sourcing may be the only politically palatable way to move forward. Plans from the middle of the decade called for a later buy of KC-Y aircraft and replacing the KC-135s with these two new models in succession. KC-Y was to be a new round of competition after the KC-X buy ended. Now, officials are looking at an option to bring KC-Y forward and conduct simultaneous replacement purchases of KC-X and KC-Y. “This would put a wrapper of legitimacy around it,” one industry official says. Earlier talk of a split-buy involved halving the KC-X buy, which would have amounted to doling out funds for two simultaneous developments that would yield, at most, production of 90 aircraft for each contractor. Yet by guaranteeing each team a number of units, the benefits of competitive dual-sourcing would be lost, says Jacques Gansler, the Pentagon’s acquisition chief from 1997-2001. Gansler, who directs the University of Maryland’s Center for Public Policy and Private Enterprise, says that conducting periodic competitions between sources can produce significant savings and favorable contracting terms for the government, although he is not necessarily advocating this approach. During last year’s competition, the Northrop/EADS team’s development program was judged to be less expensive, but the team would incur cost by establishing its first stateside widebody final assembly facility. By bringing KC-Y forward, industry sources say, the Air Force would forgo some of the pricing benefits of competition in the development phase as both contractors would receive funding to design their models. However, the service could conduct merit-based pricing wars annually between the two models for production, awarding only a base amount if one of the teams is underperforming. Two earlier attempts at a competition between the rival teams – led by Boeing, with a 767-200-based option, and Northrop/EADS North America, with an A330-based aircraft – were botched. While options for a split buy are under review, the Air Force also is assessing ways for the new Obama administration to attempt a third competition. Pentagon officials are adamantly against a split buy because of high up-front cost. But some acquisition experts say competitive dual-sourcing may be the only way to avoid a new round of lengthy bid protests. “There’s no way that the Air Force or anyone else can write a operational requirement for existing aircraft with known capabilities that results in a level playing field,” says retired USAF Gen. Mike Loh, once head of Air Combat Command. “Whatever you write will tilt the decision and end up in another protest.”

HCDB-090128 Aircraft: F-15E RMP - USA JAS.39C Gripen - South Africa P-3AEW Dome - USA Soar Dragon - China Ships/MLUs: Al Jawf (Sandown) MCMV - Saudi Arabia Arleigh Burke IIA (CM) DDG - USA Bunker Hill (CM) CG - USA Cowan (Sandown) MCMV - Estonia Durban (Ton) MCMV - South Africa Gumdoksuri PTM - South Korea SAM SA-3a Goa Bty - Intl SAM SA-5a Btn - Intl SAM SA-5b Btn - Intl Tafelberg AOR - South Africa Submarines: Manthatisi (T209/1400) SS - South Africa Spear (Daphne) SS - South Africa Virginia Block III SSN - USA

A new version of the official Harpoon Commander's Edition (HCE) Database (HCDB-090128) is now available. Get the new DB in the Download section. New additions (or overhauls of existing entries) include: Aircraft: F-15E RMP - USA JAS.39C Gripen - South Africa P-3AEW Dome - USA Soar Dragon - China Ships/MLUs: Al Jawf (Sandown) MCMV - Saudi Arabia Arleigh Burke IIA (CM) DDG - USA Bunker Hill (CM) CG - USA Cowan (Sandown) MCMV - Estonia Durban (Ton) MCMV - South Africa Gumdoksuri PTM - South Korea SAM SA-3a Goa Bty - Intl SAM SA-5a Btn - Intl SAM SA-5b Btn - Intl Tafelberg AOR - South Africa Submarines: Manthatisi (T209/1400) SS - South Africa Spear (Daphne) SS - South Africa Virginia Block III SSN - USA Enjoy.

From Defence Talk China to begin projecting military around the world: analysts Agence France-Presse | Jan 28, 2009 London: China is likely to begin deploying its military increasingly further from its borders, analysts at a top thinktank said on Tuesday. The Asian power was also unlikely to constrain its defence budget because of an economic downturn that has left the World Bank forecasting the slowest pace of growth in China since 1990, the analysts at the International Institute for Strategic Studies said. Noting that China began using a naval convoy in the Gulf of Aden to protect the country's shipping from Somali pirates, IISS director of transnational threats and political risk Nigel Inkster said he expected "to see further such international contributions". "We are probably close to the end if not already at the end of what one now calls the Deng Xiaoping doctrine of lying low," he told reporters at a press conference, referring to the man who led China from 1978 to 1997. The naval task force, deploying two destroyers and a supply ship, marks China's first potential combat mission beyond its territorial waters in centuries. Tim Huxley, the thinktank's senior fellow for Asia-Pacific security, dismissed suggestions, meanwhile, that China would temper the growth in its military funding as its economic growth slowed. "China is clearly a country which takes building up its defence capability seriously," Huxley said. "There's been a long-term trend of substantial increase in China's defence spending over the last 10-15 years. "All indications are, given China's strategic interests and its sense of entitlement as a nascent major power that it will go on, attempting to increase its defence capability, probably with considerable success." Last March, China announced its defence spending would rise 17.6 percent in the coming year, reaching 57.2 billion dollars, using end-2007 exchange rates. Huxley, though, said concerns over the transparency of those figures led him to believe military spending in China may be as much as 50 percent higher than publicly-available data.

From IISS Introduction: Statement by IISS Director-General (Source: International Institute of Strategic Studies; issued Jan. 27, 2009) Welcome to the launch of the 2009 The Military Balance. Joining me to answer your questions today are: James Hackett, Editor of The Military Balance, Alex Nicoll, Director of Editorial, Nigel Inkster, Director for Transnational Threats and Political Risk; Tim Huxley, Executive Director IISS-Asia; Oksana Antonenko, Senior Fellow for Russia and Eurasia; Christopher Langton, Senior Fellow for Armed Conflict and Defence Diplomacy; Dana Allin, Editor of Survival and Senior Fellow for US Foreign Policy and Transatlantic Affairs; Mark Fitzpatrick, Senior Fellow for Non-Proliferation; Rahul Roy Chaudhury, Senior Fellow for South Asia; and Bastian Giegerich, Research Associate for European Security. An Executive Summary of the main points in this year’s The Military Balance, as well as this brief statement will be available right after this press conference and also on our web page. The Executive summary gives a brief region-by-region assessment of the key defence and military developments of the past year. The Military Balance 2009 is published in the wake of the inauguration of President Barack Obama in the US and the interest his election has inspired worldwide as a force for reconciliation. The challenges his administration faces in the security domain are as awesome as those he confronts in the economic and financial realms. The recently well established threats from international terrorism networks and from nuclear proliferation risks persist, but they do so in an environment plagued by poor relations between Western powers and Russia, diminishing will-power and capacity among European states for sustained projection of combat military power and growing instability in the Middle East and South West Asia. African conflicts remain very intense, with violence in the Congo recently leading to the displacement of 250,000 people, the Zimbabwe crisis unresolved and the challenges of Darfur addressd by a force too small for the task. Piracy has become a greater international challenge, and another unfortunate by-product of the failing-states phenomenon. The global economic crisis means additionally that financial resources for conflict prevention and reconstruction will not be abundant. This means that creative diplomacy must be an ever greater component of good strategy. The foreign policy and security team being assembled by President Obama will, it appears, engage in heavy diplomacy. His use of the Special Envoy instrument and his appointment of figures such as Richard Holbrooke and George Mitchell to such positions is confirmation that diplomatic and conflict-resolution efforts especially in South West Asia and the Middle East will intensify. Certainly the Mumbai terror attacks dangerously upset the India-Pakistan relationship. The Western intervention in Afghanistan is faltering and a robust diplomatic strategy involving tribal outreach and a more co-ordinated international approach is vital to success. The Gaza war has not eliminated the threat to Israel. While Hamas suffered serious blows, the diplomacy surrounding the efforts to end the crisis, and the anxiety that the level of civilian casualties created in the Arab world, has served to legitimise Hamas in the eyes of part of Arab public opinion and even amongst some regional leaders, weakening the position of the co-called moderates. A priority for US and international diplomacy must be dealing with the multiple crises in South and South East Asia, and the Near East and the Gulf. Whatever new impulse is given to these efforts by the US administration, however, involving Europeans and regional actors effectively will require unprecedented levels of consultation in order to establish a relatively common strategic approach. MUMBAI TERROR ATTACKS The Mumbai terror attacks on 26–28 November 2008 sharply raised tensions between India and Pakistan, and disrupted their fledgling peace process. While India initially blamed ‘elements in Pakistan’ for the attack, it raised the ante earlier this month by asserting the involvement of ‘official agencies’ in Pakistan, which Islamabad denied. Calling Pakistan the ‘epicentre of terrorism’, India demanded that it act against those responsible for the attacks. Pakistan subsequently closed down training camps and offices of the banned Islamist militant group Lashkar-e-Toyiba and its front organisation Jamaat-ud-Daawa, held responsible for the Mumbai attacks. There, no doubt, remains an extensive element of the network that has not been rolled up. Amidst increasing rhetoric and the armed forces of both countries being placed on high alert, the US and the UK tried to ease tensions by seeking restraint from India and urging Pakistan to do more to shut down terror groups operating from its territory. Although India has said that ‘all its options are open’, it has focused on mounting an international diplomatic campaign to put pressure on Pakistan while overhauling its own legal, administrative and operational measures to enhance security. However, amidst looming general elections in India, there remains concern that the Indian government could ratchet up the pressure on Pakistan. Although there is no sign of India’s massing troops on the border with Pakistan as happened after the December 2001 attacks on the Indian parliament, there remains a risk of misunderstanding and miscalculation between the two nuclear-armed nations, especially at a time when mutual trust is in such short supply. Another worry is that the Pakistan army would use the concern about a threat from India to move troops to the border and away from the counter-terrorism effort that has proved so costly to it. In general, these trends are discouraging, because of the growing appreciation that the conflict in Afghanistan is intimately linked to the situation in Pakistan, and the awareness that a decline in Pakistan’s stability has a direct outcome on the prospects of any measure of success in Afghanistan. GAZA WAR The Israeli war in Gaza that produced so many civilian casualties and that is now subject to a tenuous ceasefire has both given greater urgency to the need for a Middle East peace process and made it more difficult. The impending Israeli elections and the time needed to establish a new government will create delays. The rise, if temporary, in the position of Hamas and the proportionate decline in the reputation among Palestinians of Fatah, also means that the division in the Palestinian leadership is more acute. As after the Lebanon war in August 2006, there is already an intense debate in Israel as to whether Israel’s long-term strategic aims were fulfilled. If, at high cost, Israel’s ‘deterrence’ was somehow reinforced by the intensity of its onslaught in Gaza, the strategic threat posed by Hamas to Israel remains. Moderate Arab states that see Hamas as a threat and as an Iranian proxy are placed in a difficult position Israel’s strategic goal should be to find a way by which it can develop greater legitimacy for itself among moderate Arab states, which could then offer fuller support to Israel in whatever ongoing battles it may have with non-state actors such as Hamas and Hizbullah. The existence of a credible process to establish the two-state territorial settlement is the only route to strengthening that legitimacy. Re-establishing that process after the Israeli elections will be an important US and international priority. But a variety of specific security challenges in Gaza remain, not least balancing efforts to close the tunnels with commensurate work towards opening border crossings with Israel. THE FINANCIAL CRISIS AND MILITARY SPENDING Over time the financial and economic developments of the recent past and immediate future are likely to have an impact on the world’s strategic shape, potentially affecting the balance between the United States and Asian states, especially China. But it is too early to assess the precise effects. One immediate consequence of the financial situation is a dramatic increase in public borrowing in Western countries, as governments deliberately boost spending to try to breathe life into economic activity. In time there are bound to be consequences for defence spending. In the short term, there may not be too much change, because governments will be reluctant to do anything that could increase job losses. In the United States, which has by far the world’s largest defence budget, President Obama will be anxious to demonstrate that he is strong on issues of security, and indeed he plans to carry through with increases to the size of the Army and Marine Corps. Therefore, existing budget plans may not be subject to much immediate change, although we can expect much more discipline to be applied in drawing up supplementary budget demands to finance current deployments, and there will also be serious efforts to get better value for money in defence acquisition. In the longer term, and as economic recovery gets under way, governments will be faced by the need to reduce very large budget deficits, and defence spending seems bound to come under close scrutiny. It would be surprising not to see a levelling off in defence expenditure in the United States, and the long-term trend of lower spending in Europe could be reinforced. CONCLUDING THOUGHTS In Europe, 2009 will be the 60th anniversary of the Nato Alliance. Given the challenges NATO has confronted in Afghanistan, and the awkward consequences for its enlargement policy of the Russia–Georgia war, it would be wise if the opportunity were seized for Nato to do more work on two fronts. First, reinvigorating Nato’s strategic concept and placing the emphasis on the stabilisation missions that are at the core of its current activities. Second, developing a Russia strategy that allows for more effective consultation and where possible, co-operation, with Russia. In the aftermath of the Russia–Georgia conflict, the Russians announced plans for the most radical reform of the armed forces since the end of the Soviet Union. The army will be fully professionalised. The structure of the Armed Forces will change radically from divisions to more flexible brigades. This restructuring, if implemented jointly with the previously announced ambitious modernisation plans, could make Russian armed forces more capable to operate against modern threats and potentially better interoperable with western forces. Given its continuing challenges in Afghanistan, the Nato leadership would do well to develop more cordial ways to interact with the Russian national security establishment in the region, engaging co-operatively other Central Asian states in the task to bring political stability to the country. In Afghanistan, we are entering what is probably the most critical period since 2001. The Afghanistan Compact of 2006 is in its final two years and presidential elections are due to take place this year amid rising violence and with a government that is unable to exert its authority in the provinces. Against this background there is a risk that it will not be possible to hold elections; or voter turnout may be below the minimum necessary for the ballot to be valid. The integrity of the whole international mission in Afghanistan is therefore very substantially at stake. The Military Balance 2009 lays out in immense detail the military holdings, economic expenditure and defence modernisation plans of some 170 states. Over the year the IISS will analyse the strategic trends that may or may not give rise to the actual use of organised military force. We will also devote considerable efforts to understand the factors that may foreclose the use of military force, and discreetly assist conflict-resolution efforts where we can. We welcome your questions on current defence and strategic trends.

From Aviation Week Boeing Only Contender for New Air Force One Jan 28, 2009 By Amy Butler The European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. and its Airbus commercial aircraft manufacturing subsidiary is not planning to compete against Boeing for the prestigious contract to supply three planes to transport future U.S. presidents, according to company officials. "EADS North America's strategy for growth in the U.S. is based on bringing value to the U.S. warfighter; making industrial investments in the U.S. and in-sourcing high-technology defense and aerospace jobs," says Guy Hicks, the company's spokesman in Washington. "After careful review, we've determined that participation in the Air Force One program will not help us meet these business objectives." Responses to a request for information from the U.S. Air Force are due today. This leaves Boeing as the only provider for an Air Force One platform. Boeing is exploring the 747-8 and 787 as candidates, according to a company official. Known as Air Force One, the VIP aircraft officially takes on the name only when the current U.S. president is aboard. The Air Force has been assessing its options for a replacement Air Force One platform since 2007. EADS looked at A380, A350, A340 and A330 options. But due to the tight security that will surround the systems integration tasks of the Air Force One program, EADS would be required to turn over a so-called green aircraft to a U.S. company for modification. While that model is lucrative for the 179-aircraft Air Force refueling tanker program because it was linked to the opening of a final assembly facility in Alabama, the company didn't find value in selling only three aircraft for presidential transport. Some industry officials suggest EADS may have opted not to compete to avoid another high-profile fight with Boeing on Capitol Hill. Buy American advocates hammered the Air Force last year after it awarded the KC-135 replacement deal to a team of Northrop Grumman and EADS North America, which proposed an Airbus A330 variant. That deal was scrapped after Boeing protested and congressional auditors determined that the Air Force broke procurement guidelines. A new competition is expected. It is possible the Air Force could select a Boeing platform and conduct a competition for the systems integration task, a complex set of work to outfit the presidential transport with secure communications and other specialized equipment. The Air Force says it wants three aircraft, one each delivered in fiscal 2017, 2019 and 2021. The new aircraft will replace two VC-25As built on Boeing's 747-200 airframe and delivered in 1990. Maintenance of the system is growing because commercial airlines have retired their fleets. EADS officials say they plan to focus on working with Northrop Grumman to win the second competition against Boeing for tanker work. The company also will continue delivering UH-72A Lakota helicopters to the U.S. military.

The Alvand class light frigates ... ... and, more recently, the "destroyer" Jamaran (more accurately called a corvette or light frigate): YouTube video of Jamaran etc

Absolutely they do have their own radar absorbent materials. The Su-30MK Flanker, certain anti-ship missiles, even the Kirov class battlecruisers are reportedly fitted with RAM. Whether it can perform as well as American technology, I have no idea, of course. But I would think the Russians have yet to perfect the application and maintenance of RAM (not that its much easier in the West, since even US aircraft require plenty of regular maintenance to keep up the integrity of their RAM coatings).

From ARES Malaysia Takes Delivery of Its First Ever Submarine Posted by Christina Mackenzie at 1/27/2009 9:39 AM CST Malaysia took delivery today of its first ever submarine: a Scorpene built by French military shipyard DCNS in partnership with Spanish shipyard Navantia. The submarine, named the Tunku Abdul Rahman (after Malaysia's first Prime Minister following independence in 1957), completed its sea tests at the end of December and was handed over to Admiral Dato'Sri Aziz Hj Jaafar, chief of staff of the Royal Malaysian Navy at a ceremony in the Mediterranean port of Toulon. The vessel will sail to Malaysia in the summer and meantime the crew will complete their training on-board. A second submarine, the Tun Razak, is scheduled for delivery by the end of this year. Each submarine, 67.5 metres long for 1,550 tons, is crewed by 31 people. Although conventionally powered, these submarines have an autonomy of 45 days “making it one of the only conventional vessels able to undertake very long ocean patrols,” DCNS says in a statement. DCNS has sold 10 Scorpene submarines : 2 to Chili, 2 to Malaysia and 6 to India.

From Jane's A new line of defence: Iran's naval capabilities By Hossein Aryan 27 January 2009 Iran has signalled its intention to increase its naval presence along the coast of the Gulf of Oman and up to the Strait of Hormuz, the world's most important oil conduit, at the mouth of the Persian Gulf. The commander of the navy of the Islamic Republic of Iran Military (IRIM), Rear Admiral Habibollah Sayyari, said: "A new line of defence has been established to the east of the Strait of Hormuz ... and if necessary we can prevent any enemy ship from entering the Persian Gulf." Adm Sayyari was speaking at the October 2008 opening ceremony of a new naval base at Jask, a small fishing port about 300 km to the east of the port city of Bandar Abbas. The high-profile deputy commander of the IRIM's navy, Brigadier General Abdolrahim Musavi, echoed these sentiments at the naval base's inauguration. "The mastery of the Islamic republic is reaching the Indian Ocean. ... Today, the enemy is watching how a country, subjected to 30 years of sanctions, is making headway in all domains. ... The time of bullying and unilateralism, encirclement and invasion has come to an end. ... The sooner they understand this the better, otherwise they will have to pay a heavy price," he said. Gen Musavi told reporters that, at one time, aircraft carriers "terrorised" countries along their route, but today they are, as with "the elements of computer games", under the gaze of Iran's armed forces. The following day, while inspecting Iran's main naval bases in Bandar Abbas, Adm Sayyari said that, in line with the new mission of the navy, which is to build an "impenetrable line" of defence along the coast of the Gulf of Oman, new naval bases will be rapidly constructed from Bandar Abbas, which occupies a strategic position on the Strait of Hormuz, to Pasa Bandar, near the Pakistani border.

From Defense Aerospace Largest Deployment of F-22s Under Way (Source: US Air Force; issued Jan. 23, 2009) HICKAM AIR FORCE BASE, Hawaii --- Twenty-four F-22 Raptors and hundreds of Airmen deployed to the Pacific region for a three-month deployment in support of the Pacific global deterrence mission. Twelve F-22s deployed from Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska, arrived Jan. 18 to Andersen AFB, Guam, and the week prior 12 F-22s from Langley AFB, Va., began arriving at Kadena Air Base, Japan. The F-22s and Airmen are part of ongoing rotations of forces to ensure security and stability throughout the region. Members of both squadrons will conduct air combat training with Air Force and other U.S. military assets in the region. F-22s are the Air Force's newest and most advanced fighter, combining stealth, maneuverability, supercruise capability and superior avionics to provide the U.S. with unmatched air dominance. (EDITOR’S NOTE: This unprecedentedly large deployment of F-22s to Asia is being widely interpreted as an attempt by the US Air Force to raise the F-22’s profile, and to demonstrate its capability of deploying to Asia, before the Obama Administration decides whether to procure additional aircraft.)

From Aviation Week 24 F-22s Deployed To Guam and Okinawa Jan 26, 2009 By David A. Fulghum In the fourth and largest F-22 deployment so far, a squadron of the U.S. stealth fighters has shifted from Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska, to Andersen AFB, Guam. Another 12 fighters from Langley AFB, Va., flew to Kadena AFB in Okinawa, Japan, earlier this month. The first F-22 deployment was from Langley to Elmendorf, the second was from Langley to Okinawa and the third was from Elmendorf to Guam. All were temporary single squadron moves to test the new aircraft’s logistics and reliability and — in the last two moves — to participate in the rotation of units to the western Pacific Ocean. Moving the F-22s to non-U.S. bases, like Kadena, which belongs to Japan, is considered risky because intelligence gathering can be conducted from both the island and from ships in the area. Of particular concern are electronic and signals intelligence (sigint) that might be gathered by the extensive Chinese merchant fleet, according to senior U.S. intelligence officers. Russian Tu-95s with sigint capabilities recently flew close enough to Guam to create an operational stir. U.S. officials say the two units are part of an ongoing rotation of forces to ensure security and stability throughout the Asia-Pacific region. In case of a military emergency in Asia, U.S. fighters from Hawaii, Guam, Alaska and Kadena would shift to forward bases in Japan, South Korea or Singapore. Then additional aircraft from the continental United States would shift to the intermediate bases, ready for further deployment. A key mission for the F-22 in the western Pacific is cruise missile defense because of the fighter’s advanced, active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar, which can detect small objects at long range, as well as fielding new versions of the AIM-120C and D-model ARMRAAM air-to-air missile.The F-22 also has a very sophisticated electronic surveillance system that would help monitor electronic snooping by the Chinese, Russians and others.

Not something that could be modeled in the current HCE mode, and I haven't seen it mentioned in terms of the H4 paper rules, but certainly the latter are generally easily able to accommodate such things, as long as you can come up with or agree to a set of performance criteria.

If it makes you feel any better (probably not), its not specific to the USMC. In fact, for example, JSF is in breach of Nunn-McCurdy as well. For background, here's the Wikipedia blurb: "The Nunn–McCurdy Amendment or Nunn–McCurdy Provision, introduced in the United States 1982 Defense Authorization Act and made permanent in 1983, is designed to curtail cost growth in American weapons procurement programs. It requires cost growth of more than 15% to be notified to the United States Congress, and calls for the termination of programs whose total cost grew by more than 25% over the original estimate, unless the Secretary of Defense submits a detailed explanation certifying that the program is essential to the national security, that no suitable alternative of lesser cost is available, that new estimates of total program costs are reasonable, and that the management structure is (or has been made) adequate to control costs. Very rarely is a program actually cancelled under this provision—Congress normally regards the explanations from the Secretary of Defense as acceptable—but it has led to many changes to project management."

Correct.

Hey, I just report the news ... I'm just a private enterprise operation.

Of course. So, the question arises: What does $187 billion worth of "Made in China" get you?

Yes, its hard to guage just how much certain of the more secretive countries are spending on defense. (Of course, one never quite knows the true accuracy of the others either, but we plod along in ignorance). The same issue of DTI, for example, mentions China's 2009 spending could be "officially" some $69 billion. But the Pentagon apparently thinks it could be on the order of $187 billion. The way they appear to be furiously building weaponry, I suppose its not altogether improbable.

How long is a piece of string? Dependent totally on the mission and the conditions, both tactical and environmental.

Oh, I'm not saying they would not have been mildly interested (and there are a few reports of the Serbs inviting the Russians to examine the wreckage, and the Russians taking samples for testing, etc, etc), but by 1999 the stealth technology (yes, even the RAM) used in the F-117 was quite dated. The Russians would not have been spending much time and effort trying to replicate it.

From the January 2009 issue of Defense Technology International USA Estimated 2009 budget: $608 billion Percent of GDP: 4.25 Personnel under arms: 2.28 million (includes reserves) United Kingdom Estimated 2009 budget: GBP 37 billion ($56.6 billion) Percent of GDP: 2.5 Personnel under arms: 173,370 (as of 1 July 2008) India Estimated 2009 budget: $26.5 billion (for FY 08, ending 31 March; 2009-10 budget not available) Percent of GDP: 1.9 Personnel under arms: 1.15 million Russia Estimated 2009 budget: 1.34 trillion rubles ($49 billion) Percent of GDP: 2.6 Personnel under arms: 1.134 million Germany Estimated 2009 budget: Euro 31.1 billion ($38.8 billion) Percent of GDP: 1.3 Personnel under arms: 250,831 Israel Estimated 2009 budget: No data 2008 budget: NIS 51.3 billion ($13.4 billion) Percent of GDP: 7.0 (2008) Personnel under arms: 631,500 France Estimated 2009 budget: Euro 32.02 billion ($43.86 billion) Percent of GDP: 2.0 Personnel under arms: 242,977 Japan Estimated 2009 budget: Yen 4.84 trillion ($50 billion) Percent of GDP: 0.8 Personnel under arms: 247,536