The Insider

If the news out of Toyota and Honda has you looking for a new ride, Car and Driver has nothing but good things to say about one you might not have considered: the Mine Resistant Ambush Protected All-Terrain Vehicle.

The mag even offers up a new name: The B'Gosh.

While the price is high -- $1.4 million, according to the magazine -- and it might not fit in your garage, the January 2010 article reports that the truck is easy to drive and “rides far better than you’d expect.”

“From the driver’s seat, it feels as if the M-ATV will take you home over any route you choose,” the author adds.

He notes that the truck offered “more than acceptable levels of jounce” over most drops and only “required minor steering inputs to stay the course.”

The truck’s “light steering, chassis stiffness, and lack of bump steer are impressive," he adds. "The thing just chugs over the mess.”

The whole thing's worth a read, but here's a bit more of the bottom line:

On-road, it’ll do a maximum of 65 mph. You wouldn’t call it nimble, but there’s little steering slop and the sense that if you hit something it’s not going to matter so much anyway. Acceleration is tank-like (although 0 to 60 in 32.8 seconds is quicker than an actual tank), and it’s noisy, with a little throttle lag.

Big brake drums require significant pedal pressure, but panic stops are drama-free. The nose dives, and you can actually see the anti-lock brakes pulse the M-ATV to a halt. An ATC test driver managed 0.46 g on our improvised 200-foot-diameter skidpad (an airfield helicopter ordnance-loading pad), the M-ATV tilting obscenely and actually lifting the unloaded front wheel. But really, your mom could drive this thing.

And that’s the point. The M-ATV is for fighting as well as driving. Ease of operation means experienced MRAP drivers need only about 14 hours of instruction, complete novices just 40 hours. The M-ATV has no formal name yet, but we’re tempted for obvious reasons to call it the “B’Gosh.” In Afghanistan, the M-ATV will endure months and perhaps years of the most arduous duty, where it must bring as many soldiers home as possible. Maybe they should call it the RTB.

Inclement weather has postponed Vice President Biden's upcoming speech on nuclear defense matters. The speech had been slated for tomorrow at National Defense University, but a blizzard bearing down on the nation's capital has prompted the White House to reschedule the speech for Feb. 18.

In addition to discussing U.S. nuclear deterrent capabilities and plans to implement President Obama's nonproliferation and nuclear security agenda, Biden is expected to address how the administration's fiscal year 2011 budget request and other efforts will support the president’s vision of reducing the nuclear dangers and working toward a world without nuclear weapons.

Just released by his office:

Congressman John Murtha Passes Away at Age 77

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Congressman John P. Murtha (PA-12) passed away peacefully this afternoon at 1:18 p.m. at Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington, VA. At his bedside was his family.

Murtha, 77, was Chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense.

First elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in February of 1974, Murtha dedicated his life to serving his country both in the military and in the halls of Congress. A former Marine, he became the first Vietnam War combat Veteran elected to the U.S. Congress.

This past Saturday, February 6, 2010, Murtha became Pennsylvania’s longest serving Member of Congress.

More than one debt-ratings agency is pleasantly surprised by the effects of the Pentagon's fiscal year 2011 budget request on the defense industry's credit quality.

According to a Fitch Ratings statement released today:

The Department of Defense's (DOD) budget request for fiscal 2011 released Feb. 1, 2010, was more favorable than Fitch Ratings' expectations and contained no major surprises. The request and DOD spending levels continue to support the solid credit quality in the defense industry, which will likely remain the most stable industrial sector from a credit perspective for the next two years given the revenue visibility provided by both the fiscal 2010 budget and the fiscal 2011 request. Potential risks in fiscal 2011 from the Obama Administration's first full budget exercise and the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) did not materialize. The budget request contains modest top-line growth, but the growth rates have clearly slowed from the rates seen in the past nine years.

While the Office of Management and Budget's "forecasts for base defense spending beyond fiscal 2011 also show continued modest growth . . . Fitch believes these forecasts could be pressured by high federal budget deficits, which is the key risk for the defense sector," the statement continues.

Standard & Poor's thinks the defense industry's credit ratings should be fine, as well:

The aftermath of the global recession and the financial crisis have created a difficult operating environment for the commercial aerospace and business jet sectors, although industry conditions are beginning to stabilize with the improving economy, according to an industry economic and ratings outlook published today on RatingsDirect. The report, titled "U.S. Aerospace Continues To Feel The Pinch, But The Defense Sector Remains Steady," says Standard & Poor's Ratings Services believes the defense sector outlook appears stable, in contrast to commercial aerospace, as the former still benefits from high, fairly steady government spending.

The Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity wants to push the envelope of biometrics technologies. In short, the intelligence community's counterpart to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is looking for technologies capable of identifying people from afar, and without them noticing.

"The IARPA Smart Collection Office is seeking innovative ideas and concepts for the advancement of standoff biometrics technologies," reads a Feb. 2 notice posted on the Federal Business Opportunities Web site. "IARPA's objective is to maintain a high degree of recognition accuracy (i.e. level of confidence associated with the match/non-match of biometric signatures derived from two distinct observations), while pushing the range of acquisition as far as possible and requiring minimal cooperation from the subject," it adds.

IARPA officials want to capture and recognize people's "unique human phenomenology," including anatomical, physiological, and behavioral characteristics, the notice reads.

Almost one year ago, the fate of Manas Air Base -- a key air traffic hub for U.S. military flights into Afghanistan -- became uncertain after the Kyrgyz government threatened to cancel the agreement allowing the Pentagon access to the installation. But officials in Washington and Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan's capital, resolved their issues over the summer, and Manas Transit Center, as it is now called, is still humming.

So much so, in fact, that the base needs an upgrade.

Tucked away in the fiscal year 2011 defense budget request are $6 million to build a "hot cargo pad" at the installation. In military lingo, hot cargo is code for ammunition, explosives and other hazardous material. Because the loading and unloading is so dangerous, hot cargo pads must be built at a safe distance away from flight operations, according to the Army Corps of Engineers.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates today cautioned lawmakers against thinking the military's aircraft recapitalization plans should be based on the simple equation of replacing one plane with another. With the advent of unmanned aerial vehicles as a major form or air power, the one-to-one formula no longer applies, Gates told members of the House Armed Services Committee.

As a notional -- and arguably simplistic -- example, he said it takes eight Reaper drones to perform missions that once required 16 F-16s, while carrying the same amount of weaponry as the manned planes.