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17 Aug 18. Failure to launch? Trump’s Space Force faces Senate skeptics. If President Donald Trump wants his proposed Space Force to have a life beyond a campaign rally applause line, his administration will have to win over skeptics in both parties, especially in the U.S. Senate. When Vice President Mike Pence laid out plans last week for a new space-focused military branch to be created by 2020, the White House had not obtained buy-in ahead of time from two key constituencies: the Senate’s Republican leaders and members of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
“Traditionally, this has been a role played by the Air Force, and I’ve not yet heard a compelling case why we need a separate force,” Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn, R-Texas, told reporters Aug. 16. “Maybe there is a case to be made, I just haven’t heard it yet.”
At Trump’s behest, Pence proposed a new branch be created from existing space-focused elements in the military as part of the 2020 budget cycle and announced the Pentagon will get the ball rolling with or without Congress to build a new space operations force and fast-track space acquisitions organization. The White House contends it is working with lawmakers on the relevant committees, and at least one of them, House Armed Services Strategic Forces Subcommittee Chairman Rep. Mike Rogers said he has spoken by phone with Trump. Rogers, R-Ala., led the effort in Congress last year create a space corps, subordinate to the Air Force. Two House Republican leaders — Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California and GOP Whip Rep. Steve Scalise of Louisiana — are backing Trump’s proposed Space Force, the Associated Press reported Aug. 16. The two are lead contenders to become House speaker when Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., retires at the end of his term in January. The argument for a Space Force is that Russia and China have anti-satellite technologies that endanger the space-based assets America depends upon for indispensable intelligence, surveillance communications and navigation capabilities. For decades, the United States treated space as a peaceful domain and seeded it with unprotected assets — and now it needs to go big, with a dedicated organization to establish American military dominance in space, the argument goes.
“President Trump has pulled the lever to do this, DoD has built the plans to do this, and the thing for us to do is not throw rocks but say this is leadership taking us in a new direction,” said Senior Research Fellow for Defense Policy John Venable, of the conservative Heritage Foundation. “It won’t hurt us, it will only help us. It may cost us a little more in the process.”
Space Force has generated plenty of headlines in recent weeks, but whether the administration has effectively communicated its arguments to lawmakers and the public yet is a separate question. According to two recent polls, space fever isn’t yet an epidemic. Per one CNN poll, a majority of Americans (55 percent) say they don’t support the new plans to establish a Space Force; only 37 percent said they do. A separate Economist/YouGov poll found only 29 percent of Americans thought the Space Force was a good idea; 42 percent thought it was a bad idea, and 29 percent were on the fence or expressed some other opinion. The powerful Senate Appropriations Committee chairman, Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., said that while space is important and he’s open to persuasion, the administration has not adequately made its case.
“My concern might be satisfied with, you know, information, but do we need to create another Air Force, Army, Navy, Space Force, and will that be another bureaucracy? Will that help us do things that we can’t do within the Air Force?” Shelby said. “I don’t know those answers.”
Members of Senate Armed Services Committee — whose jurisdiction over military policy makes it a key gatekeeper for a new service — this week expressed varying degrees of skepticism.
SASC Ranking Member Sen. Jack Reed said he favors bringing military space assets together but held fast to his opposition to a new service. That could make him a major obstacle to any effort to make the proposal part of the 2020 defense authorization bill.
“I think the concept itself is not the right direction,” said Reed, of Rhode Island. “We have models that work very well in terms of joint and unified commands. We don’t need a specialized force with all of the bureaucracy, all of the trappings.
SASC Strategic Forces Subcommittee chairwoman Sen. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., last year openly opposed the House’s effort to create a space corps. She appeared to soften her language somewhat this week, but it seemed clear the White House had not sought her out.
“I’m looking forward to hearing more details,” Fischer said. “I need to hear from the [Defense] Department about how they plan to implement this and if we have personnel available in order to fill those positions.”
Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, and a member of the Airland and Strategic Forces subpanels, votes in favor of the president’s positions 93 percent of the time. But he saw this effort as out of step with the push from Congress and the Pentagon to boost military readiness.
“Readiness has plummeted of the five services—plummeted,” said Sullivan, a Marine Reserve officer. “Where I’ve been focused is let’s get the five services we currently have back to the readiness levels the American people think we should have … Once we get there, then we can talk about a space force.”
SASC Emerging Threats and Capabilities Chairwoman Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, was convinced threats in space needed to be taken seriously, but she was concerned a reorganization would be the wrong answer.
“There is a need for this. We just need to figure out the most efficient way to deliver on this project, whether its part of the Air Force,” said Ernst, a former Iowa National Guard officer. “How do we protect tax payer dollars and make sure they’re most efficiently used to achieve the objective.”
High-profile South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham said he was, “open-minded” to a Space Force. Still, the administration’s announcement left him with questions.
“I mean do we really need another branch of the [military]? What would be the benefits of having a separate branch?” said Graham, a SASC member. “Can you do it within the existing military structure? I’d be curious to see what the military says about this.”
Democrats, who have less to lose by alienating the White House, voiced sharper criticism and highlighted a weakness in the messaging: Pentagon leaders for the idea lately appeared to be against it earlier. (Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, who last year opposed moves in Congress to create a separate space service, defended the reversal this week.)
“I don’t believe that they have changed their minds about it,” New Hampshire Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, a SASC member and lead appropriator, said of military leaders. “I think there are people in the White House who have pushed them to change their minds, but I think the facts on the ground have not changed in the last year to suggest to me we should take a different action.”
Democrats said the White House’s roll-out last week without widespread engagement on Capitol Hill was typical of this administration. Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine, dubious of the idea and that it was achievable by 2020, called Pence’s announcement light on details, “like a brochure.”
“It seems a little fantastical to me, and especially that they hadn’t come and briefed us, ‘Here’s why this is a good idea,’” said Kaine, the top Democrat on SASC’s readiness subpanel. “They’re not taking cyber seriously enough and now they’re going to do a space force. It seemed odd.”
At least one Democrat on the panel who was open to hearing more, Seapower Ranking Member Maizie Hirono, of Hawaii, said she’d been turned off by the administration’s unilateral policy pronouncement.
“I think this is an example of the White House just announcing something without going through what I would call an appropriate discussion about whether or not we should create another force,” Hirono said.
“What I object to more is just the way the president tends to make all these big announcements. And whether or not it will happen, he moves on to the next crisis—which he generally creates himself.”
(Source: Defense News)
14 Aug 18. Here are the companies that could profit from Trump’s Space Force. The cosmic rhetoric of a Space Force seeking “American dominance in space,” as President Trump puts it, conjures images of stormtroopers, laser guns and X-wing fighters – technology straight out of science fiction. But the Pentagon is already working on technology designed to fight a war in space: rockets that could launch daily; missiles that would fly at five miles per second; satellites the size of shoe boxes; and robots that could repair them in orbit. Such efforts already amount to billions of dollars in government spending each year, much of it shrouded under classified military programs. And as the White House pledges to push for a Space Force as a sixth military branch and the first new service since the Air Force was created in 1947, a group of government contractors sees a chance to profit. Byron Callan, a prominent defense stock analyst with Capital Alpha Partners, said Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and Harris Corporation may be particularly well-positioned to benefit from Trump’s Space Force. The new service could line their pockets for years to come, assuming Congress embraces the idea.
“Because [the Space Force] will be a smaller service with fewer resources, it may be more dependent on industry for technical advice and policy input,” said Loren Thompson, a consultant with the nonprofit Lexington Institute, which receives funding from defense contractors. It “would likely be more of a creature of industry than if the Air Force were kept intact.”
Throughout the history of human space travel, NASA has tended to get most of the glory. But the Defense Department has been focused on the stars since before Sputnik caused a national panic in 1957 — and led to what is now known as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, the Pentagon’s research arm. Today, DARPA is working on a few programs that could ultimately fit under the mantle of a Space Force. Last year, it selected Boeing for its “Experimental Spaceplane,” or XS-1, program, which is meant to develop a spaceplane capable of flying 10 times in 10 days.
Boeing’s vehicle, known as the Phantom Express, would be designed to fuel up and go, taking off quickly, like a commercial airliner. That is particularly appealing to the Pentagon, which wants to be able to put satellites into orbit quickly if, for example, officials learn that an adversary is preparing to launch a missile or deploy a fleet of ships to sea. And with information-age technologies penetrating further into military operations, even the Army’s ground forces rely on support from beyond Earth’s atmosphere. The Global Positioning System (GPS) that numerous military systems rely on for geolocation is made possible by bus-sized satellites built primarily by Lockheed Martin and Boeing. Those satellites are hurled into space by firms like Elon Musk’s SpaceX and the United Launch Alliance (ULA), a joint venture of Lockheed Martin and Boeing.
Concerned that adversaries could jam or interfere with those satellites, the U.S. military has worked to make them more resilient. On Tuesday afternoon, the Air Force announced that it awarded Lockheed Martin a $2.9bn contract for just three satellites designed to be survivable against counter-space weaponry, handing the company an initial $80m to cover development costs. Alongside such large and expensive systems, defense officials are planning to launch swarms of smaller satellites into orbit, which they think will be harder to destroy or disable. DARPA is developing robots that could fly from satellite to satellite in space, refueling, repairing damage or updating the satellites with new capabilities as we do with our smartphones’ operating systems. The prospect that GPS communications could be knocked out through an attack on U.S. satellites has become so worrisome that the U.S. Navy recently added celestial navigation back into its required coursework for officers. Boeing is working on autonomous drones that can navigate without the help of GPS.
“The U.S. military is dependent on space across the full spectrum of conflict, from counterterrorism operations in Yemen to a major war with a near-peer adversary like Russia or China,” said Todd Harrison, a military analyst with the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “Other countries have taken note of the advantages space provides to the U.S. military and are developing and proliferating counter-space weapons to negate our advantage in space.”
Another top Pentagon priority is developing a hypersonic missile, one capable of traveling at five times the speed of sound, or more. In his speech at the Pentagon on his need for a Space Force, Vice President Pence said that both Russia and China are “investing heavily’ in the technology and that “China claimed to have made its first successful test of a hypersonic vehicle just last week.”
On Monday the Air Force announced it is awarding a $480m contract to Lockheed Martin to develop a hypersonic strike weapon, a project that builds on a similar contract worth almost $1bn awarded in April. Boeing also said it was investing in a British company that is working on hypersonic propulsion systems. For the time being, the federal space market is considered a niche business with tremendous overhead costs, available only to a handful of gigantic companies with the scale to compete. An analysis by Bloomberg Government found that the Defense Department spends about $4bn a year on space vehicles, launches, services and associated support. Most of that money is spent through contracts with three large companies: Boeing and Lockheed’s United Launch Alliance; Lockheed Martin individually; and a California-based nonprofit research center called the Aerospace Corporation. Elon Musk’s SpaceX was the fourth-largest recipient of Defense Department space funding, Bloomberg Government found. Independent analysts were skeptical that the Space Force would give companies such as Lockheed and Boeing much of a bump in business, however, unless its creation comes with a significant increase in defense spending. The Pentagon is expected to outline its plans in greater detail next year as part of its 2020 budget request, Deputy Defense Secretary Pat Shanahan told the Associated Press. The force could actually become a liability for contractors if the Pentagon’s other activities are defunded to make room for more bureaucratic overhead, they said, or if a future Congress decides to cut defense spending.
“From a business perspective I don’t think [the Space Force] changes a whole lot,” said Rob Levinson, senior defense analyst with Bloomberg Government. “It’s a different office they have to go to, but these companies are basically going to be doing the same thing.”
Capital Alpha partners analyst Byron Callan described the Space force as “far from an automatic win” for space companies. “They’re all diversified enough that you don’t know what else is going to get curtailed — that they’re counting on — to pay for this,” he said. And the prospect of resources being diverted from the Army, Navy and Air Force has military contractors spooked.
“Space should be prioritized…but at what cost?” said Wes Hallman, senior vice president for policy at the National Defense Industrial Association. “The challenge with the Space Force is that you worry about creating a few more bureaucratic layers. That won’t be good for the warfighter or for industry.”
President Trump’s comments at a recent news conference suggests Lockheed and Boeing’s United Launch Alliance could be in trouble if the White House gets its way: “I don’t like when Boeing and Lockheed get together because the pricing only goes up,” Trump said, later adding “we’re going to have to talk about that, your joining those two companies.”
Trump’s public admonishments to those companies have seldom translated to policy, however. When he tweeted a month before his inauguration that Boeing’s contract to build the Air Force One presidential plane should be canceled, it wasn’t. Months later, when he criticized the price of Lockheed’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter and suggested it should be replaced with a competing plane, the government ended up awarding a contract that was roughly in line with what it had already planned.
Geopolitical tensions are also creating new risk for space companies. Russian lawmakers are reportedly weighing whether to cut off sales of the RD-180 rocket engine — which NASA and the Defense Department use on the Atlas V rocket — in response to U.S. sanctions. A United Launch Alliance spokesman said the company has enough inventory in the U.S. to meet its current mission needs. Space companies contacted by The Washington Post mainly said they would continue to support the government’s work in space regardless of how the new service was structured. In other words, if a new Space Force were to supplant the space-based activities of another service like the Air Force, as some officials fear, the Lockheeds and Boeings of the world would simply follow the money.
“Lockheed Martin has played a central role in both commercial and national security space for decades, and we look forward to contributing to this critical effort through the National Space Council and other means,” said Lockheed Martin spokeswoman Maureen Schumann.
Boeing concurred: “We will continue to deliver for our partners in government as they stand up a Space Command and consider the path forward for implementing the Space Force,” spokesman Dan Curran said in an email.
Northrop Grumman offered something closer to a full-throated endorsement: “We are encouraged by the increased focus on the Space domain and its importance to our national security,” spokesman Tim Paynter said in an email. “Given our deep expertise, legacy and capabilities related to Space, we look forward to supporting the nation’s future needs in this critical area.”
Northrop took an aggressive step into the space business last year when it bought a Virginia-based company called Orbital ATK, giving it a broad suite of space-based capabilities including bus-sized communications satellites and experimental robotic spacecraft. Florida-based government contractor Harris Corporation edged further into the industry this year through an unspecified classified contract win, chief executive Bill Brown said in a recent earnings call. Others have pointed out that more than just military might is at stake. With commercial industries like trucking and shipping increasingly reliant on GPS for navigation, securing space could have broader implications for the U.S. economy.
“We’re pleased that the White House is focusing on America’s reliance on space, and on the growing threats from Russia and China,” Aerospace Industries Association president and chief executive Eric Fanning said in an email. “As Congress reacts to the Pentagon’s report, we need to be careful not to create increased bureaucracy and complexity that might actually slow us down. We also need to recognize that it’s not just our military, but every aspect of our economy that relies on security in space.” (Source: glstrade.com/Washington Post)
14 Aug 18. To win future conflicts, combatant commands must be integrated. The head of Strategic Command has outlined a vision for the future to better integrate war-fighting functions and capabilities to keep pace with adversaries in an increasingly dynamic environment. Responsible for a diverse set of missions, STRATCOM has been structured in stovepipes: the nuclear triad (itself three stovepipes), space, conventional global strike and missile defense. Yet Gen. John Hyten, speaking Aug. 13 at the annual DoDIIS conference in Omaha, Nebraska (STRATCOM’s home), envisions a future in which the command is one innovative war-fighting team that deters conflict and delivers decisive capabilities from, in and through all domains, wherever and whenever needed. Adversaries such as China have begun to integrate their disparate, yet related capabilities. With the Strategic Support Force, established in 2015, China has organized space, counter space, cyber, offensive, cyber, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance in the same command, Hyten said, because they understand the need to integrate information. The U.S. now has Cyber Command, a fully unified combatant command for generating cyber effects around the world, as well as STRATCOM, Specials Operations Command and Transportation Command. Soon there will be also be a unified command for space, and all of these operate separately. Hyten noted that success in the future — not just for STRATCOM, but also for the other similar commands that coordinate capabilities for other combatant commanders — will be achieved when capabilities are applied through whatever domain necessary with whatever means available.
“We don’t care where it comes from, where it goes to, as long as it dominates the adversary,” he said.
“Our challenge is how do we integrate that effectively so that we seamlessly share information in real-time across the board,” he said of these combatant commands — currently called functional, rather than geographic combatant commands, as they are not restricted to a region.
“And, oh, by the way, it’s not necessarily a bad thing to have those separate commands focused on those areas. The key is how do we integrate them?”
SOCOM and STRATCOM in July underwent the first war-fighter exercise between functional combatant commands as a means of figuring out how to eliminate redundancies, gain greater efficiencies and establish better integrated command relations.
Change to unified command plan
Both Hyten and Gen. Raymond Thomas, commander of SOCOM, outlined potential changes to the unified command plan, which defines scopes and authorities of the geographic and functional combatant commands and investments in manpower. The commanders would like to change first the perception and then the applications of their “functional” commands, because “that’s not the way I talk about my command and that’s not the way Gen. Thomas talks about his command,” Hyten said.
“We are global war-fighting commands. We have global capabilities that deliver lethal capabilities around this planet,” Hyten added.
Thomas said during the same conference that there is a change pending to list these commands as global combatant commands, “and it matters.”
“We are really keen and excited you might say on offering blended global solutions to the Department of Defense as we go forward,” Thomas added. (Source: C4ISR & Networks)
13 Aug 18. Trump Blocks Fighter Jet Transfer Amid Deepening U.S.-Turkey Rift. The decision is a blow to Ankara but could also complicate matters for Washington. U.S. U.S. President Donald Trump has signed into law a defense policy bill that will hold up the transfer to Turkey of 100 F-35 fighter jets, deepening a rift between the two countries over the ongoing imprisonment of an American pastor in Turkey. The move amounts to a sharp blow to Ankara, which is already reeling from Trump’s decision last week to double down on tariffs on Turkish aluminum and steel. Turkey planned to take possession of the jets over the next decade, which would make it the third-largest operator of F-35s in the world. But its cancellation will also complicate matters for the United States. Several key components of the jet are manufactured by Turkish companies, and the U.S. Defense Department estimates it will take two years to find and qualify new suppliers to replace any Turkish firms that are kicked out of the program. Meanwhile, the main European hub for the F-35’s engine repair and overhaul is in Eskisehir, in northwestern Turkey. Turkey jailed the American pastor, Andrew Brunson, almost two years ago in a widespread crackdown that followed a military coup attempt. Ankara maintains that Brunson, who has lived in Turkey for more than 20 years, had ties to the plotters. For a time, it seemed the Trump administration would reach a deal to defuse tensions and secure Brunson’s release. But the talks are said to have fallen apart in the past month. Now Trump, who has been personally engaged in cultivating the U.S.-Turkey relationship, feels betrayed and wants retribution, analysts said.
“Trump … did want to make things nice with Turkey, and he by all accounts invested personally in the relationship,” said Aaron Stein, an expert on Turkey with the Atlantic Council. “Now that he feels like the Turks have reneged on an agreement that they reached with him, the U.S. position is now an ultimatum.”
The Turkish Embassy in Washington did not respond to questions about the decision. But Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, writing in the New York Times over the weekend, warned that Trump’s punitive measures against Turkey would ultimately backfire on the United States.
“At a time when evil continues to lurk around the world, unilateral actions against Turkey by the United States, our ally of decades, will only serve to undermine American interests and security,” Erdogan wrote in an opinion piece.
“Failure to reverse this trend of unilateralism and disrespect will require us to start looking for new friends and allies.”
So far, the spat has mainly harmed Ankara. Trump’s tariff increases on aluminum and steel, which he announced via Twitter and which effectively priced Turkey out of the U.S. market, sent Turkish liratumbling to a new low on Friday.
“I hate [that] it came to this point, but President Donald Trump really had no other choice,” Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham wrote in a Friday tweet.
But senior U.S. officials, including Defense Secretary James Mattis, have warned against removing Turkey from the F-35 program. Ankara is a critical geopolitical partner and cornerstone of the NATO alliance, and the Incirlik Air Base in southern Turkey is a key launching pad for operations in the Middle East, particularly the campaign against the Islamic State. It is also home to a U.S. stockpile of B61 nuclear bombs, a linchpin of nuclear deterrence in Europe. Ankara is also a crucial partner in rebuilding Syria as the West, Russia, and Iran jockey for power in the war-torn nation. The sale of the F-35 to Turkey is particularly controversial, because Ankara also plans to purchase the sophisticated Russian-built S-400 missile system. Officials say integration of the S-400 with the F-35 and NATO air defenses could compromise closely guarded U.S. and allied military secrets.
“Unfortunately, we now have the egos of both leaders engaged, and that makes it difficult to finesse the situation,” said Loren Thompson, an analyst with the Lexington Institute, a think tank that receives funding from Lockheed Martin, among other defense contractors.
The language Trump signed into law on Monday, included in a $717bn bill that sets defense policy for the year, is watered down from its original form and mostly symbolic regarding Turkey. But it sets the stage for congressional appropriators to take more decisive action.
The legislation blocks the transfer of F-35s to Turkey until the Pentagon submits an impact assessment, particularly regarding U.S. military operations from Incirlik Air Base but also focusing on overall U.S.-Turkish relations. Lawmakers also want the Pentagon to assess the ramifications of Ankara’s planned purchase of the S-400 system. A provision in a draft version of the defense appropriations bill, which is expected to move forward in the next few weeks, would expressly prohibit funding for the transfer. (Source: Defense News Early Bird/FP)
13 Aug 18. It’s time to update US defense export policies. I recently stumbled upon an interesting article dated Oct. 1, 1999, by Loren Thompson with the Lexington Institute titled “Military Supremacy and How We Keep It.” In this article we are reminded of the February 1776 publication by British historian Edward Gibbon titled “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.” We are told George Washington read this work and its subsequent volumes, and in his first annual message to Congress as president he made reference stating: “To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace.” Or to quote Gibbon: “They preserved the peace by a constant preparation for war.”
America’s defense and aerospace industry is the second-largest gross exporter and retains the largest positive trade balance of any manufactured goods sector. The sector employs approximately 2.8 million individuals within the United States. America’s largest defense companies secure on average 70 percent of their annual revenue from domestic defense spending, with the remaining 30 percent accomplished through international sales to allies and friends. With defense appropriations at historic highs, our defense and aerospace industries are well-positioned to equip our military, but headwinds are gathering. In the face of growing budget deficits, robust annual U.S. defense appropriations may turn out to be unsustainable. Additionally, trade disputes are causing the cost of raw materials to rise by at least 40 percent, which ultimately increases the cost of our military hardware and could potentially undermine the ability for U.S. manufacturers to compete in the global market. Taken one step further, it’s possible that trade disputes could result in our allies slowing or ending acquisitions of U.S. capability as a way to protest tariffs. Faced with these challenges, the U.S. defense industry is focused on increasing international sales. Companies seek 5 percent to 30 percent growth within five years, while a select few are seeking growth greater than 50 percent. The benefits of increased global market share include reduced need for domestic investment, reduced cost to the U.S. military, increased allied capability globally and greater innovation investments by U.S. industries, minimizing the ability of emerging competitors in the defense and aerospace sector to capture market share at American industries’ expense. The U.S. defense-industrial sector is primed for rapid and significant growth, but conventional export policies and lengthy determination processes may be undermining the future health of the companies that support America’s safety, security and economic vitality. To do so is to ultimately enable our enemies and their industries to grow, and with that growth to develop products that will, if not checked, defeat U.S. military capability.
From aviation platforms to ammo, most allied and friendly nations around the world are unable to fully support their military forces with their own indigenous industries. Why? Because they are unable to financially sustain the breadth of industries needed to ensure military readiness, and because their industries were unable to compete effectively internationally to offset the limited domestic investment by their government. Is this where the United States intends to be tomorrow — a place where we are unable to equip our military without relying on friends, allies and not-so-friendly nations for capability and components?
For a moment, let us consider our most worrisome competitors. They are nations that have their own military-industrial complexes, which are largely self-reliant. Some are well-established while others are rapidly emerging as credible innovators and suppliers. Their military industries are run as state-owned enterprises. U.S. industries are publicly held companies that — although receiving considerable U.S. government funding through the annual defense appropriations — are accountable to shareholders, investors and corporate boards, meaning they must be profitable or perish. Our enemies control and preserve their military-industrial complex with an iron fist, while ours must function like any other publicly traded business in the United States.
In order to ensure our continued security and state of readiness, we must pursue ways for the U.S. government and our defense industries to partner more closely with a goal of achieving the following: a commitment through legislation, policy and procedures to reduce the regulatory burdens that adversely impact product costs and innovation investments; and a commitment by our government to reduce and remove barriers to successful competition in the global markets.
For both domestic performance and global competition success, timeliness and cost are critical success factors often disrupted by excessive U.S. government control and intervention. Revisiting Cold War-era policies and procedures can help create a contemporary model for advancing global sales, which can ensure U.S. readiness, contribute to military-industrial independence and limit the reach of our adversaries’ influence. We must ensure through innovation and domestic production that we can regularly prepare for war to help preserve the peace without being reliant upon others. (Source: Defense News Early Bird/Defense News)
13 Aug 18. President Signs Fiscal 2019 Defense Authorization Act at Fort Drum Ceremony. President Donald J. Trump today signed the $717bn Fiscal 2019 National Defense Authorization Act at a ceremony at Fort Drum, New York. The act – named for Arizona Sen. John S. McCain – authorizes a 2.6 percent military pay raise and increases the active duty forces by 15,600 service members.
“With this new authorization, we will increase the size and strength of our military by adding thousands of new recruits to active duty, Reserve and National Guard units, including 4,000 new active duty soldiers,” Trump told members of the Army’s 10th Mountain Division and their families. “And we will replace aging tanks, aging planes and ships with the most advanced and lethal technology ever developed. And hopefully, we’ll be so strong, we’ll never have to use it, but if we ever did, nobody has a chance.”
Services’ End Strength Set
The act sets active duty end strength for the Army at 487,500 in fiscal 2019, which begins Oct. 1, 2018. The Navy’s end strength is set at 335,400, the Marine Corps’ at 186,100 and the Air Force’s at 329,100. On the acquisition side, the act funds 77 F-35 joint strike fighters at $7.6bn. It also funds F-35 spares, modifications and depot repair capability. The budget also fully funds development of the B-21 bomber. The act authorizes $24.1bn for shipbuilding to fully fund 13 new battle force ships and accelerate funding for several future ships. This includes three Arleigh Burke-class destroyers and two Virginia-class submarines. There is also $1.6bn for three littoral combat ships. In addition, the act authorizes 24 F/A-18 Super Hornets, 10 P-8A Poseidons, two KC-130J Hercules, 25 AH-1Z Cobras, seven MV-22/CMV-22B Ospreys and three MQ-4 Tritons.
Afghanistan, Iraq
There is $5.2bn in the budget for the Afghanistan Security Forces Fund, and another $850m to train and equip Iraqi security forces to counter Islamic State of Iraq and Syria terrorists. The budget accelerates research on hyperspace technology and defense against hyperspace missiles. It also funds development of artificial intelligence capabilities.
“In order to maintain America’s military supremacy, we must always be on the cutting edge,” the president said. “That is why we are also proudly reasserting America’s legacy of leadership in space. Our foreign competitors and adversaries have already begun weaponizing space.”
The president said adversaries seek to negate America’s advantage in space, and they have made progress. “We’ll be catching them very shortly,” he added. “They want to jam transmissions, which threaten our battlefield operations and so many other things. We will be so far ahead of them in a very short period of time, your head will spin.”
He said the Chinese military has launched a new military division to oversee its warfighting programs in space. “Just like the air, the land, the sea, space has become a warfighting domain,” Trump said. “It is not enough to merely have an American presence in space; we must have American dominance in space, and that is why just a few days ago, the vice president outlined my administration’s plan to create a sixth branch of the United States military called the United States Space Force.”
The 2019 Authorization Act does not fund the military. Rather, it authorizes the policies under which funding will be set by the appropriations committees and then voted on by Congress. That bill is still under consideration. (Follow Jim Garamone on Twitter: @GaramoneDoDNews)
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About Lincad
Lincad is a leading expert in the design and manufacture of batteries, chargers and associated products for a range of applications across a number of different sectors. With a heritage spanning more than three decades in the defence and security sectors, Lincad has particular expertise in the development of reliable, ruggedised products with high environmental, thermal and electromagnetic performance. With a dedicated team of engineers and production staff, all product is designed and manufactured in-house at Lincad’s facility in Ash Vale, Surrey. Lincad is ISO 9001 and TickITplus accredited and works closely with its customers to satisfy their power management requirements.
Lincad is also a member of the Joint Supply Chain Accreditation Register (JOSCAR), the accreditation system for the aerospace, defence and security sectors, and is certified with Cyber Essentials, the government-backed, industry supported scheme to help organisations protect themselves against common cyber attacks. The majority of Lincad’s products contain high energy density lithium-ion technology, but the most suitable technology for each customer requirement is employed, based on Lincad’s extensive knowledge of available electrochemistries. Lincad offers full life cycle product support services that include repairs and upgrades from point of introduction into service, through to disposal at the end of a product’s life. From product inception, through to delivery and in-service product support, Lincad offers the high quality service that customers expect from a recognised British supplier.
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