The Insider

Capitol Hill proponents of directed-energy weapons have some new ammunition. In an op-ed piece published in this morning's Wall Street Journal, Andrew Krepinevich and Mark Gunzinger from the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments write:

Recent dramatic advances in solid-state laser technology (meaning lasers that create a lethal beam of light using solids or fibers, not liquids or gases) have yielded impressive power levels at a very low cost-per-shot, especially when compared to traditional missile interceptors that can cost over $10 million each. Experts in the U.S. Navy state that within six years, using technologies already developed and demonstrated in test firings, they could field solid-state lasers on warships with sufficient power to counter anti-ship cruise missiles, unmanned aircraft, and fast-attack "swarm" craft like those of Iran. These lasers could reduce the need for warships to carry bulky -- and expensive -- defensive munitions, while freeing space for other weaponry.

Like solid-state lasers, new chemical lasers can generate much greater power outputs than their predecessors, enabling them to engage a wide range of air and missile threats, including long-range ballistic missiles. Also within six years, and using technologies developed for the Airborne Laser, the Air Force and the Army could field ground-based, megawatt-class chemical lasers to help protect key bases in the Persian Gulf and Western Pacific.

To be sure, laser weapons have limitations. Bad weather reduces their effectiveness (as it does many other weapons), and killing very hard targets such as ballistic missile warheads will require multiple megawatts of laser power. But combined with suppression attacks and traditional defenses, high-power lasers could provide a major boost to our military's defenses and at a reduced cost, while also complicating an enemy's planning.

Other states -- especially Russia and China -- see the game-changing potential of these weapons and are investing aggressively in them. Yet the Pentagon plans to cut research funding in this area, even though it currently invests a little over $500 million in it annually, compared to well over $10 billion in traditional air and missile defenses. This imbalance is particularly worrisome considering the need to impose costs on our competitors while reducing our own costs.

The Defense Department has said that it is serious about retaining its technological edge, declaring in its new strategic guidance the "imperative to sustain key streams of innovation that may provide significant long-term payoffs." Unfortunately, absent a push from Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta or from Congress, it appears unlikely that high-power lasers will make the jump from the laboratory to the field anytime soon. If not, as in Afghanistan and Iraq, American forces will find themselves again reacting to a threat rather than anticipating it.

The Defense Security Cooperation Agency notified Congress April 30 of a possible foreign military sale to Japan of an initial four F-35 Joint Strike Fighter conventional-takeoff-and-landing aircraft, with an option to buy 38 more of the same variant, according to a May 1 agency statement. The estimated cost is $10 billion, the agency announced.

"Japan is one of the major political and economic powers in East Asia and the Western Pacific and a key ally of the United States in ensuring the peace and stability of this region," the agency statement notes. "The proposed sale of aircraft and support will augment Japan’s operational aircraft inventory and enhance its air-to-air and air-to-ground self-defense capability. The Japan Air Self-Defense Force’s F-4 aircraft will be decommissioned as F-35’s are added to the inventory. Japan will have no difficulty absorbing these aircraft into its armed forces."

InsideDefense.com reported on March 23 that in February, Japan signed a $6 million contract for studies led by the Defense Department and two JSF contractors that would outline options for how Japanese companies could manufacture components and play a role in assembling the 42 F-35s that Tokyo plans to buy.

The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program was on the agenda today when Defense Secretary Leon Panetta met with Italian Defense Minister Giampaolo Di Paola at the Pentagon to discuss mutual defense interests.

“Secretary Panetta reiterated the United States commitment to developing the Joint Strike Fighter and the technology advancements both nations will receive as a result of fielding this 5th generation fighter,” Pentagon Press Secretary George Little said in a statement. Panetta also noted the F-35C short-takeoff-and-vertical-landing variant recently came off probation “after catching up to the other variants' testing milestones,” Little said.

Also on the agenda of today’s session was the upcoming NATO Summit, Afghanistan and the Arab spring, Little said, adding that Panetta “reaffirmed the strong U.S.-Italian bilateral defense relationship and lauded Italy as a trusted partner and ally.” Panetta thanked Italy for its contributions to the NATO mission in Afghanistan, noting the causalities Italy has suffered to defeat al Qaeda and prevent Afghanistan from becoming a safe haven for terrorists.

The heads of two state governors' groups are calling a revised force-structure proposal issued by the Defense Department this week a failure "to address state concerns," citing remaining issues with manpower cuts and other reductions.

In a letter released today, the Council of Governors and National Governors Association declare that their attempt to find common ground with the Air Force regarding what is in the best interest of the states' Air National Guard units has not been fruitful, yielding only a small margin of improvement over the previous proposal, which included the elimination of more than 60 A-10 aircraft and the retirement of 65 C-130s.

The letter is addressed to the leaders of the House and Senate defense committees.

The Pentagon's new offer recommends keeping 24 of those 65 C-130s in operation and retaining 2,200 personnel positions that the Air Force had proposed cutting.

"The proposal outlined by [Defense] Secretary [Leon] Panetta this week is essentially the same as an Air Force proposal rejected by governors more than five weeks ago," the letter states, adding:

While we greatly appreciate the willingness of the [defense] secretary to adjust the Air Force's budget request to restore some organic ANG airlift capacity, the package still fails to address state concerns regarding remaining ANG manpower cuts and fighter aircraft and other ANG unit reductions.

The force-structure cut that lowers the number of aircraft and manpower available to the Guard is a part of the service's fiscal year 2013 budget request.

Council of Governors co-Chairs Terry Branstad (R-IA) and Chris Gregoire (D-WA), as well as National Governors Association Chairman David Heineman (R-NE) and Vice Chairman Jack Markell (D-DE) signed the letter.

The Council of Governors is a 10-person bipartisan organization with a rotating membership. The National Governors Association is an organization that includes all the states' governors.

The governors' letter states that Panetta's offer to work with governors early in the budget process is a "critical step" toward incorporating the domestic duties and operational capabilities of the Guard into the overall budget of the Air Force. But that offer to negotiate the force-structure balance appears to have limits, according to the letter, which adds:

Governors, through our Adjutants General and the Council of Governors (CoG), have worked diligently with the Air Force and the U.S. Department of Defense to rectify the surprising and disproportionate cuts facing the ANG as part of the U.S. Air Force's Fiscal Year (FY) 2013 budget request. Unfortunately those negotiations have not produced an agreement; it is therefore critical that Congress address the deficiencies in the Air Force's budget request.

Looks like the Airborne Laser isn't the only diminished program House authorizers want the Missile Defense Agency to revive.

In their mark of the fiscal year 2013 defense authorization bill approved this afternoon, House Armed Services strategic forces subcommittee members are striving to upgrade the Sea-based X-band radar's deployment capability. The subcommittee's portion of the bill includes the following brief language:

This section would require the Director, Missile Defense Agency to ensure that the sea-based X-band radar is maintained in a status such that the radar may be deployed in less than 14 days and for at least 60 days each year.

In February, Inside Missile Defense reported that the Pentagon had announced plans to downgrade SBX's operational status beginning in the third quarter of fiscal year 2013.  Further:

According to the Missile Defense Agency's FY-13 research, development, test and evaluation budget justification document, SBX "will be placed in a limited test support status, recallable to active operational status when indications and warnings indicate [a] need for enhanced discrimination."

Acting Pentagon acquisition chief Frank Kendall called SBX "a large X-band research development radar, primarily." He told reporters during a Feb. 13 press briefing that the radar system is "very expensive to keep and operate," and officials thought other systems could get similar results for less money. "It's largely an affordability issue where we have other sensors that can fill in the gap," he added.

Accordingly, MDA has recommended subtracting nearly $163 million from the program for FY-13, budgeting instead $9.7 million, according to the agency's justification document. That reduction "reflects a realignment of Department of Defense priorities," the document reads. Additionally, the agency has renamed the SBX project number from "MD46" to "MX46."

According to the White House Office of Management and Budget, "by maintaining the SBX radar as a test asset rather than terminating it, the administration saves at least $500 million over five years while also retaining the ability to recall it to an active, operational status if and when it is needed."

When the Obama administration sent its fiscal year 2010 defense budget request to Congress three years ago, it did not include money to continue development of the Airborne Laser program, citing costs, technological problems and a concern for the system's long-term operational role.

The Defense Department shipped the ABL -- a Boeing 747-400 cargo aircraft that carried a chemical laser and a production price tag of $1 billion to $1.5 billion per copy -- from the Missile Defense Agency to the office of the director of defense research and engineering.

Now the House Armed Services strategic forces subcommittee, led by Chairman Rep. Michael Turner (R-OH), wants DOD to take another look at ABL and its possible use in a real-world event. In the subcommittee's mark of the FY-13 defense authorization bill, released today, the panel states:

The committee directs the Director, Missile Defense Agency to provide a report to the congressional defense committee by July 31, 2012, on the costs involved with returning the Airborne Laser aircraft to an operational readiness status to continue technology development and testing, and to be ready to deploy in an operational contingency, if needed, to respond to rapidly developing threats from the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

When he went to Capitol Hill to defend the president's budget, then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates explained why he didn't think the ABL would work. In testimony before the strategic forces subcommittee -- chaired at the time by then-Rep. Ellen Tauscher (D-CA) -- on May 13, 2009, Gates said:

For example, the operational concept of the Airborne Laser would have required that the aircraft orbit, let's say the target was Iran, would have required an orbit almost entirely within the borders of Iran. This is probably a little problematic.

At the same hearing, then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen said he felt the ABL "has been a flawed concept for years."

As for a possible North Korean scenario involving the ABL, the intelligence community told Congress earlier this year that's not very likely. Testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Feb. 16, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said:

The Intelligence Community assesses Pyongyang views its nuclear capabilities as intended for deterrence, international prestige, and coercive diplomacy. We judge that North Korea would consider using nuclear weapons only under narrow circumstances. We also assess, albeit with low confidence, Pyongyang probably would not attempt to use nuclear weapons against U.S. forces or territory, unless it perceived its regime to be on the verge of military defeat and risked an irretrievable loss of control.

In the House Armed Services seapower and projection forces subcommittee's mark of the FY-13 defense budget, released today, panel members raise the issue of cracks in Navy ships -- and cite our own Inside the Navy for its reporting on the issue:

Items of Special Interest

Shipbuilding material comparison

In a recent article published in "Inside the Navy", it was reported that, “superstructure cracking in several classes of surface combatants is being addressed, but in some cases is proving costly”. The committee is aware that three materials have been used in the deckhouses of surface combatants: steel, aluminum, and most recently for the deckhouse of the DDG-1000 Zumwalt class, composite material.

The committee is also aware that there is a cost differential in both up-front procurement and production and in lifecycle maintenance cost for these materials.

The next opportunity that the Navy will have to influence a design will be with Flight III of the DDG-51 Arleigh Burke destroyers. The committee directs the Secretary of the Navy to provide a report to the congressional defense committees with delivery of the fiscal year 2014 budget request, comparing the estimated construction costs for a deckhouse made of each of the three materials, or even a possible hybrid of two or all three, and then compares the estimated lifecycle costs for the designed life of the ship.

Here's the top of the story the subcommittee is citing, published in the April 16 issue:

Naval Sea Systems Command is telling Congress that superstructure cracking in several classes of surface combatants is being addressed, but is in some cases proving costly.

Cracking problems on the CG-47 Ticonderoga-class cruisers "appears to be the most pervasive as it extends to all ships of the class," according to the March 5 document, "Report to Congress: Surface Combatant Topside Superstructure Cracking," which was recently reviewed by Inside the Navy.

In addition to facing fatigue cracks, "stress corrosion cracking is also pervasive and affects widespread areas of the superstructure." Four of the last five ships in the class also saw higher sensitization -- a process that changes the aluminum and makes it more susceptible to corrosion -- in a shorter period of time.

"Costly repairs resulting in extended maintenance availabilities have been executed or are planned, subject to availability of funding," the report continues, noting that a CG-47 Superstructure Cracking Task Force has developed a repair plan that requires $4 million in spending from the Navy's research and development budget and another $270 million from the operations and maintenance budget to fix cracks and develop mitigation techniques and tools. Of that amount, $152 million would be spent between fiscal years 2013 and 2017.