The Insider

The Senate Armed Services Committee is scheduled to convene on Sept. 11 to hold a nomination hearing for Marine Corps Gen. Christopher Mahoney, who has been tapped to serve as vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

If confirmed, Mahoney, who currently serves as assistant Marine Corps commandant, would succeed Adm. Christopher Grady.

As vice chairman, Mahoney would co-chair the Joint Requirements Oversight Council, which -- for now -- governs the process for validating and prioritizing what the military needs.

The job is set to be transformed, however, as the Pentagon recently announced the disestablishment of the Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System.

If confirmed, Mahoney would co-chair a new Requirements and Resourcing Alignment Board (RRAB) that is slated to be stood up over the next 120 days and is intended to link military requirements to the Pentagon budget process, choose “Key Operational Problems” (KOPs), and decide which will be resourced. The RRAB will also have the power to recommend canceling or redirecting service-specific programs.

Meanwhile, under the new regime the JROC will no longer validate service-level requirements, except when required by law. Instead, the JROC will focus on ranking the new KOPs representing the biggest warfighting gaps tied to the National Defense Strategy and the Joint Warfighting Concept.

Last week, Grady, noting the dissolution of JCIDS, said DOD is moving with haste toward its latest round of acquisition reforms.

“There is good momentum in the building to get after that,” he said. “JCIDS was in significant need of reform. The answer was: Let’s just get rid of it and think of different ways to do the business.”

Austal USA has entered into a strategic outsourcing agreement with fellow Alabama-based shipbuilder Master Boat Builders that will see the two companies collaborate on current programs in Austal’s portfolio as well as undisclosed future efforts, Austal announced today.

Under the agreement, Master Boat Builders will support Austal on “select programs” including the Landing Craft Utility 1700 series (LCU-1700) for the Navy, an Austal spokesperson told Inside Defense. Austal is on contract for five LCUs -- designed to carry vehicles and heavy cargo from ship to shore -- with options for up to seven additional vessels.

According to the announcement, “pilot projects” will be identified in the coming months, followed by a phased implementation approach. The partnership is intended to expand shipbuilding capacity by enabling regional shipyards to take on complex government programs.

“By distributing work across complementary facilities, Austal USA and Master Boat aim to reduce bottlenecks, shorten production schedules and create surge capacity for future demand. The companies also intend to co-invest in workforce development initiatives,” the announcement states.

Strategic outsourcing is one approach shipbuilders are pursuing to accelerate production across the Navy’s portfolio. Shipbuilding giant HII has made the practice a key piece of its plan to expand production capacity, and Austal itself is building Virginia- and Columbia-class submarine modules in an outsourcing arrangement with General Dynamics Electric Boat.

Austal is building a new, $450 million fabrication facility to expand submarine module work and is a limited partner in the United Submarine Alliance (USA) Qualified Opportunity Fund -- a shipbuilding venture managed by private equity that may eventually provide additional space and infrastructure to further expand Austal’s module work.

Austal also builds a range of naval surface ships, launching a steel production line in 2022 and taking on several new programs in recent years as serial production of its aluminum Independence-class Littoral Combat Ships reached its conclusion.

The company’s current portfolio includes Navajo-class Towing, Salvage and Rescue ships (T-ATS), Bethesda-class Expeditionary Medical Ships (EMS), TAGOS-25 Ocean Surveillance Ships and the Coast Guard’s Heritage-class Offshore Patrol Cutter.

Master Boat Builders, located in coastal Alabama relatively near to Austal’s Mobile yard, builds commercial ships including offshore supply vessels, tugboats, fishing boats and dive support vessels for domestic and international customers. The family-owned company was established in 1979 and currently has about 300 employees.

The Survivable Airborne Operations Center began flight testing last month, prime contractor SNC announced today.

The company, also called Sierra Nevada Corp., conducted its first flight of the aircraft Aug. 7 and will continue testing as part of its engineering and manufacturing development contract, according to a news release.

The Air Force awarded SNC a $13 billion contract for the aircraft in April 2024.

SNC currently has four Boeing 747-8I jets at its Dayton, OH facility which will be modified to become the E-4C, according to the company.

“Flight and ground testing will continue into 2026 to establish the technical design baseline,” the news release states. “Activities will primarily occur in Dayton, Ohio and Wichita, Kansas. Accomplishing these test activities early in the developmental program was a distinguishing aspect of SNC’s innovative approach to manage risk and avoid problems from arising later in the schedule.”

SAOC is set to replace the E-4B National Airborne Operations Center as part of the Nuclear Command, Control and Communications modernization effort in the Air Force. NAOC was built in the 1970s and is reaching the end of its life, the service has said.

According to SNC, the program has so far met all milestones on schedule.

This Wednesday INSIDER Daily Digest has news on the Government Accountability Office's latest report on the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, plus the Pentagon's Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification program and more.

A new Government Accountability Office report on the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program recommends the Defense Department "evaluates Lockheed Martin's capacity to meet planned deliveries on time; reevaluates the use of incentive fees to better achieve the desired schedule; and expands and formalizes the use of leading practices for product development":

GAO: F-35 remains years behind schedule, billions over budget

A new government watchdog report has found the F-35 aircraft is still years behind schedule and over budget, even as the Defense Department prepares to establish a subprogram to aid in meeting cost, schedule and performance goals. Total program costs are now pegged at over $2 trillion.

Document: GAO report on the F-35 program

The latest cyber defense news from our colleagues at Inside Cybersecurity:

DOD issues class deviation to postpone CMMC requirement from 2020, as final rulemaking clears interagency review

The Defense Department has clarified its plans for the rollout of the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification program through the release of a class deviation postponing an Oct. 1 compliance requirement for contractors in a 2020 interim final rule put on hold by the Biden administration.

Former ONCD official urges defense industrial base to integrate formal methods to ensure software cyber resilience

Former Office of the National Cyber Director official Anjana Rajan said the defense industrial base should move toward integrating formal methods to prove software is secure from cyber vulnerabilities, as the Defense Department and other agencies look to prioritize efficiencies.

The tug-of-war between two states vying to be the headquarters of U.S. Space Command seems to have been resolved:

Trump: SPACECOM HQ will move to Alabama

U.S. Space Command will move to Huntsville, AL, President Trump announced today, restoring the original plan for the young organization's headquarters.

The Missile Defense Agency issued a solicitation last week seeking "innovative approaches to rapidly demonstrate very low cost (<$750K per missile), modular interceptor designs to counter ballistic and hypersonic threats":

MDA seeks sub-$1M interceptor white papers to flip cost paradigm, deal with mass raids

The Missile Defense Agency is seeking industry proposals for a new class of low-cost interceptors to blunt the threat of massed missile attacks in a new project that aims to develop modular weapons that cost less than $750,000 apiece and can be produced on a compressed schedule to counter ballistic, cruise and hypersonic threats.

Document: MDA's low-cost interceptor solicitation

The Army has handed Lockheed Martin $26 million to lead a team to scale the service's next-generation network to the division level.

The Army announced yesterday that Lockheed Martin Rotary and Mission Systems won an other transaction agreement under a commercial solutions opening from the command, control, communications and network (C3N) program office, which first published the CSO in May.

The OTA will last 16 months and should yield an integrated data layer for the 25th Infantry Division in support of the Army’s Next Generation Command and Control program, according to a Sept. 2 service release.

Lockheed plans to harness its own command-and-control, engineering and project management work as well as taking advantage of technology from other, nontraditional companies like Raft and Hypergiant Industries to help scale, according to the company’s own release.

“By encouraging companies to self-organize and team with each other and enabling them to integrate and solve these problems directly with the operational force, we will be able to rapidly and continuously improve the command-and-control capabilities we deliver to soldiers,” Joseph Welch, deputy to the commanding general at Army Futures Command, said in a statement.

That comes after the service awarded Anduril a $100 million OTA in July to lead its own team designed to scale up the NGC2 architecture for the 4th Infantry Division in time for next year’s Project Convergence Capstone 6 test event, Inside Defense previously reported.

“The pace at which we are moving with NGC2, both in terms of contracting and getting the equipment into the hands of soldiers, is exceptional and laser-focused on making our formations faster and more lethal,” Brig. Gen. Shane Taylor, the program officer for C3N, said in a statement. “The NGC2 CSO is one way we are transforming our acquisition approaches to drive continuous competition and equip Soldiers with technologies that will win in the future fight.”

Anduril’s team has a focus on delivering its prototype architecture within a “technology stack,” while Lockheed homes in on the integrated data layer, according to the Army’s release.

The CSO that PEO C3N released in May announced the Army could end up selecting three winners for OTAs to kick off prototyping projects. The service plans to use the lessons learned from prototyping with the two infantry divisions to inform how to apply NGC2 to heavy and light units.

“This isn’t the end of competition, this is the beginning,” Welch said. “Through these two industry team lead agreements, we’ll evaluate different models for shared responsibility and aligned incentives during the NGC2 prototyping phase.”

This post-Labor Day INSIDER Daily Digest has news on the Navy's F/A-XX fighter aircraft program, the Pentagon's critical technology areas list, the Army's Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense Sensor and more.

We start off with a deep dive into the future of the Navy's F/A-XX fighter aircraft program:

Congress presses Navy on F/A-XX's cloudy future; White House questions industry's capacity

Rep. Jen Kiggans (R-VA) -- whose congressional district encompasses the Navy's East Coast Master Jet Base -- says a next-generation fighter will be essential to counter China, but she is questioning the service's current commitment to F/A-XX.

Just because the Pentagon's critical technology areas list has been shortened doesn't mean it's lost any importance:

Pentagon S&T chief: Critical tech list trimmed, but importance remains

The Pentagon's plan to shorten its list of critical technology areas reflects a shift in terminology -- not a downgrading of priorities -- according to Michael Holthe, who is performing the duties of deputy assistant defense secretary for science and technology.

The potential contract ceiling on the LTAMDS program has been raised to $3.8 billion -- which includes $436 million appropriated in fiscal year 2025 for the Army and $397 million for Poland under the Foreign Military Sales program:

Pentagon approves potential $1.7 billion for LTAMDS initial production pivot

The Defense Department has awarded a $1.7 billion modification to Raytheon for production of the Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense Sensor, allowing the Army -- and Poland -- to execute new orders for the next-generation, ground-forces radar.

The U.S. Navy and the NATO Sea Sparrow Project Office will hold an industry day on Oct. 14 in Washington to brief industry on efforts to design and develop a new ESSM variant:

NATO Sea Sparrow consortium hosts industry day for new missile variant

The U.S. Navy and international partners are considering developing a new missile variant to serve as a successor to the Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile Block II, which is currently used by 12 North Atlantic Alliance nations to defend warships from ballistic and cruise missiles.

In a recent memo, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth directs the Army secretary to dissolve the service's five-year-old Joint Counter-small Unmanned Aircraft Systems Office (JCO) and to stand up what's coined as the Joint Interagency Task Force 401 (JIATF 401) to "better align authorities and resources to rapidly deliver Joint C-sUAS capabilities to America's warfighters":

Hegseth orders Army to form counter-drone task force, scrap current office

The Army will get rid of its current joint counter-drone office to stand up an interagency task force with more authority to go fast, according to a new memo from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

Document: DOD memo on JTIAF 401