Saturday, August 13, 2022
Key Issues AETP China-Taiwan scenarios E-7 Wedgetail
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 Army is eyeing new options to limit further entanglement with an Israeli-made air defense system, specifically being released from a statutory requirement to buy and operationally deploy additional Iron Dome batteries.
The Missile Defense Agency formally launched the second of two new industry competitions for the so-called Ground-based Midcourse Defense system future acquisition: Systems Integration, Test and Readiness (SITR).
Northrop Grumman and Raytheon Technologies -- teamed to design a new intercontinental ballistic missile killer -- completed their Next Generation Interceptor System Requirements Review with the Missile Defense Agency, clearing the companies to proceed with product development of their new missile design.
The Missile Defense Agency has approved the second of two competing design proposals for a Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor, clearing L3Harris to proceed with Northrop Grumman in beginning to fabricate space vehicles critical to U.S. military plans to counter a new class of ultra-fast maneuvering weapons.
Lawmakers have set a 2025 target for fielding an improved air- and missile defense capability on Guam to give the island 360-degree protection against advanced Chinese threats, a statutory provision -- once the fiscal year 2022 defense authorization bill is signed by the president -- that would set a new marker in the debate over whether, what and when to deploy on the Western Pacific U.S. territory.
SIMI VALLEY, CA -- The Defense Department is eyeing increased Army deployments across the Indo-Pacific in a gambit to put boots on the ground -- rotating in and out of different countries -- for as many as six months a year to demonstrate a commitment to the region and create conditions for increased access in the event of a crisis with China.
SIMI VALLEY, CA -- Pentagon leaders are vetting combatant command high-priority, 2021 capability shortfalls as part of an annual plea for new -- and sometimes novel -- technology to address gaps in the current weapons inventory that put at risk their respective war plans.
SIMI VALLEY, CA -- Political dysfunction in Congress is driving Pentagon leaders to contemplate a major internal budget drill to craft a second, parallel plan for fiscal year 2022 that would wring nearly $40 billion from expected spending plans and prepare for major setbacks across the weapon system modernization portfolio.
SIMI VALLEY, CA -- Pentagon leaders are concerned about the health of the Army's Patriot force, particularly the stress that high operational tempo and limited deployment predictability is having on readiness, driving soldiers to leave units that provide the cornerstone of air and missile defense for deployed forces and allies.
SIMI VALLEY, CA -- The Marine Corps needs more money in fiscal years 2023 and 2024 to buy Light Amphibious Warships, critical to service plans to establish new littoral units that can nimbly move shore-to-shore inside China's striking range, while contemplating a radical new use for its big-deck combatants: "Motherships" to unleash unmanned air and undersea systems.
SIMI VALLEY, CA -- The Marine Corps is open to one day adopting a hypersonic strike weapon if its size is not too cumbersome for new front-line units being designed to operate in contested areas, said the service's top general, who allowed the service "could be" interested in a Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency effort called OpFires.
The U.S. military today took a key step toward operationalizing a major new component of its national missile defense system, declaring the Long Range Discrimination Radar -- a hulking pair of sensors in the heart of Alaska, each six stories tall and equally wide -- fielded and ready for testing to improve defense against North Korean intercontinental ballistic missiles.
SIMI VALLEY, CA -- The Defense Department is considering a request from Poland to buy as many as 250 Abrams tanks, a deal likely worth more than $3 billion that would provide stability for the heavy armor production line and deliver an important capability to a European ally near Russia -- a package a senior DOD official involved in the process views very favorably.
SIMI VALLEY, CA -- The Defense Department is awaiting "passback" guidance from the White House, a topline allocation that will allow Pentagon leaders to lock in the fiscal year 2023 budget proposal and account for inflation forecasts that could significantly diminish weapon system buying power.
SIMI VALLEY, CO -- The Army's maiden deployment of its Israeli-built Iron Dome air and missile defense system is wrapping up, capping a deployment to Guam -- billed as an experiment -- that began in early October to exercise transporting the system and setting up for operation but not conducting any live firings.
SIMI VALLEY, CA -- The gambit to deliver Guam a new air and missile defense system by 2026 -- U.S. Indo-Pacific Command's No. 1 unfunded priority which the Pentagon is still working to define and Congress has not fully funded -- appears no longer achievable, with a new target date set to be identified in the fiscal year 2023 budget request.
SIMI VALLEY, CA -- Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin issued "a call" to U.S. industry -- particularly information and technology innovation firms -- to help "bring the American way of war to the 21st century," directly appealing to national interest in the contest against China, previewing what he said is a pillar of the forthcoming National Defense Strategy.
The Marine Corps last month executed a key test -- previously delayed by software glitches that last year tripped up plans for a full-rate production decision of the $8.2 billion Joint Air-to-Ground Missile program -- firing the next-generation, airborne launched weapon from an AH-1Z Viper helicopter as part of an effort to integrate the weapon on the maritime aircraft fleet.
Earlier this year, the Defense Department turned to a relative newcomer in the missile defense business to prototype novel technologies the U.S. military is counting on to counter Chinese and Russian hypersonic threats, awarding L3Harris one of two competitive contracts for a Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor.
The Defense Department is laying plans to upgrade its future fleet of long-range hypersonic glide vehicles as frequently as every two years, creating windows for new technology insertion as experimental capabilities prove ready for production in a bid to catch up -- and overtake -- China’s current dominance of the near-space domain.