Wednesday, March 19, 2025
Jason Sherman is a reporter for Inside Defense. For more than two decades -- including stints with Defense News and Armed Forces Journal -- he has covered the Pentagon, defense industry, the military budget, weapon system acquisition and defense policy formulation as well as reporting on technology, business, and global arms trade. Jason has traveled to more than 40 countries, studied medieval history at the State University of New York at Buffalo, and lives in Brooklyn.
The Defense Department depended on foreign companies in nearly 40 countries to provide $1.9 billion worth of components for U.S. military weapon systems ranging from airframes to ammunition, according to a recent report detailing the Pentagon's reliance on non-U.S. suppliers in fiscal year 2006.
The Army has selected BAE Systems to build its fleet of Medium Mine Protected Vehicles in a deal potentially worth $2.2 billion to produce more than 2,000 armored trucks, handing the builder of the RG33 blast-proof truck a chance at grabbing an even larger portion of the vast sums the Pentagon is spending to protect troops from roadside bombs.
The $70 billion "bridge" appropriation that will cover some fiscal year 2008 war costs for Iraq and Afghanistan sets aside $40.4 billion for the Army, including $4.4 billion for procurement.
The Pentagon's No. 2 official has issued draft guidance -- provided once every two years -- setting the foundation for the Defense Department's new six-year investment blueprint, a project to identify which weapons systems to buy and which to shed between fiscal years 2010 and 2015 that will begin in earnest next month and conclude next fall.
The Pentagon's $2.6 billion order for nearly 3,200 bomb-proof trucks may highlight the Army's preference for variants built by BAE Systems and International Military and Government, raising questions about whether Force Protection Industries -- whose vehicles in part inspired the Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle program -- will receive any additional large orders.
The Pentagon's top acquisition executive has approved a plan that could expand the number of armored truck builders producing Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles even as senior military officials are poised to reduce the total size of the MRAP acquisition objective, according to sources familiar with internal Defense Department deliberations.
The Pentagon today notified Congress of a potential sale to the United Kingdom of blast-proof trucks worth $147 million, marking the first deal to sell trucks manufactured through the Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle program to a foreign nation.
The White House Office of Management and Budget has directed the Pentagon to add money to the Air Force's fiscal year 2009 budget request to shut down the C-17 aircraft production line in August 2009, dialing up the pressure on program supporters in Congress to keep Boeing's Globemaster III production facility humming by financing additional C-17s in an emergency supplemental bill next year.
House and Senate lawmakers have agreed to legislation that would bar the Pentagon from naming private-sector "lead systems integrators" to lead the development of major weapon systems, a contracting practice the Defense Department has favored in complex programs including the Army's marquee modernization effort -- the Future Combat System.
The Joint Light Tactical Vehicle program is poised to proceed with a new acquisition strategy presented by the Army and Marine Corps last week to the Office of the Secretary of Defense, according to Pentagon and industry sources.
The Army and Marine Corps will run out of money to pay for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan early in the new calendar year, according to a new report by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service that effectively endorses recent assertions by Defense Department leaders.
The White House's Office of Management and Budget, concerned that the Pentagon's multibillion-dollar procurement plans for a raft of new tactical wheeled vehicles may be laden with excessive redundancy, has directed the Army and Marine Corps to present by March a strategy that justifies planned vehicle acquisitions.
NEW YORK -- The Marine Corps is pushing ahead with a proposal to withdraw from Iraq and shift its forces to Afghanistan despite a lukewarm reaction from Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who last month said such a move -- which would leave Iraq largely to the Army -- would not take place on his watch, according to a senior Marine.
The Defense Department is planning cuts worth nearly $3 billion from Air Force and Navy aircraft and ship procurement programs in fiscal year 2009, directing the Army to restructure a key helicopter program and deferring until next summer a decision on whether to make an organization set up to counter roadside bombs a permanent shop, according to sources and documents on the developing defense budget.
NEW YORK -- The Air Force hopes to use funds designated in its fiscal year 2009 spending proposal to shut down the F-22A fighter aircraft line instead as a down payment toward an additional 20 aircraft, part of a new strategy to keep the high-tech aircraft assembly line warm until the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter moves into production in 2013.
NEW YORK -- The Air Force plans to design two variants of its new bomber, a manned version to carry strategic weapons and an unmanned version for conventional missions, according to the service secretary.
The troubled, high-profile Pentagon effort to build a new fleet of presidential helicopters is facing a five-year delay, a previously unreported slip that promises to set back production of the most sophisticated and largest portion of the VH-71 executive rotorcraft fleet until fiscal year 2014.
The Senate on Friday confirmed John Young to be the under secretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics, a post he has held in an "acting" capacity since June.
Engineering difficulties have raised program costs for two key aircraft efforts by a total of more than $7 billion, the Pentagon confirmed today.
The Army last week placed a $22 million order with armored truck builder Force Protection for more than two dozen of its largest mine-protected vehicles -- called Buffalos -- to address a request from commanders in Iraq for additional route clearance capability and to replace vehicles lost in combat, according to a service official.