Armée Américaine [USA]

[Dragunov]

Pentagon Orders 15 More KC-46A Tankers

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Boeing has been awarded USD2.6 billion to build a further 15 KC-46A Pegasus tanker-transport aircraft for the US Air Force (USAF).

The contract, announced by the Department of Defense (DoD) on 27 September, brings the number of aircraft that are under contract to 67. As noted by the DoD, the Lot 5 production award includes spares and support and will be complete by March 2023.

https://www.realcleardefense.com/2019/0 ... 10116.html

[Dragunov]

Trump regarde alors que le général Mark Milley devient président des Joint Chiefs

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Le nouveau chef d'état-major interarmées, le général d'armée Mark Milley, parle devant le président américain, Donald Trump, avec le vice-président Mike Pence et le secrétaire général de la défense, Mark Esper, lors d'une cérémonie de bienvenue pour Milley à la base commune Myer-Henderson Hall, Virginie, le 30 septembre 2019.

WASHINGTON – Le président Donald Trump a supervisé l'assermentation de l'officier militaire le plus haut gradé du pays lundi.

En juillet, le Sénat a confirmé que le général Mark Milley était le prochain président de l'état-major interarmées. Le président est le principal conseiller militaire du président.

Le général Joseph Dunford, du Corps des marines sortant, qui a assumé le rôle de président en 2015, a assermenté à Milley lors d'une cérémonie qui s'est déroulée à la base commune Myer-Henderson Hall en Virginie. Trump, le vice-président Mike Pence, le secrétaire à la Défense Mark Esper et le secrétaire d'État Mike Pompeo étaient présents.

"Nous resterons la première force de combat du monde, respectés par nos amis et redoutés par nos adversaires", a déclaré Milley lors de son allocution, remerciant Trump pour son leadership.

"Je sais que j'ai de grandes chaussures à remplir. J'ai connu Joe Dunford tout au long de ma carrière, j'ai servi avec lui au combat et je le considère comme un ami personnel, une amitié forgée avec les liens indéfectibles du combat que seul un sacrifice partagé peut produire, "Milley a dit de son prédécesseur.

L'ascension de Milley intervient à un moment particulièrement tumultueux, alors que le gouvernement Trump cherchait à contrer l'agression iranienne au Moyen-Orient et la dénucléarisation de la péninsule coréenne et à contrer des concurrents émergents tels que la Russie et la Chine.

"Aucun ennemi sur Terre ne peut rivaliser avec la puissance impressionnante de l'armée américaine, de la marine, de l'armée de l'air, des garde-côtes et des marines américains", a déclaré Trump lors de son allocution, saluant les budgets de dépenses favorables à la défense que son administration a adoptés.

"Nous avons dépensé 2 500 milliards de dollars, bien plus que ce que le pays a pensé à faire. Mais nous devions avoir une armée moderne et formidable dotée des machines les plus magnifiques et les plus sophistiquées, des avions, des bateaux, des navires, des armes de toutes sortes", a déclaré Trump. m'a dit.

En mars, le Pentagone avait demandé une somme colossale de 718 milliards de dollars dans son budget pour l'exercice 2020, soit une augmentation de 33 milliards de dollars – ou environ 5% – par rapport à ce que le Congrès avait promulgué pour l'exercice 2019.

La mesure actuelle, si elle est adoptée par le Sénat et promulguée par Trump, donnerait au Pentagone un budget de 738 milliards de dollars pour l'exercice financier 2020. Le Congrès a jusqu'au 1er octobre pour se mettre d'accord sur un accord ou en négocier un nouveau avec la Maison Blanche. .

"Sept heures trente-huit est un bon chiffre", a déclaré Esper en juillet à propos de la mesure. "Et je pense que dans la mesure où nous avons la prévisibilité, dans la mesure où nous pouvons éviter [résolutions continues], ces choses nous permettent de planifier et d'utiliser plus efficacement nos dollars. Donc je suis bon avec ces dollars."

"Aucune plainte", a ajouté Esper.

https://news-24.fr/trump-regarde-alors- ... nt-chiefs/

[bologhineziri1518]

Dans une interview accordée, il y a 7 ans, au magazine d'investigation "The Fifth Estate" de CBC/Radio-Canada, Pierre Sprey, ingénieur aéronautique et analyste en système d'armes américain qui influença la politique du Département de la Défense des États-Unis dans les années 1970-1980, explique pourquoi le F35 ne pourra être utilisé efficacement comme un moyen d’appui aérien rapproché, ni comme un chasseur-bombardier, non plus dans un combat aérien et moins comme un avion réellement furtif.
Pour cet expert le F35 est un gouffre et un moyen de dépenser l'argent des contribuables des pays ayant pris part au projet, au profit, surtout, de l'un des piliers du complexe militaro-industriel américain, en l'occurrence Lockheed Martin.



,

[bologhineziri1518]

Le magazine "The Fifth Estate" integral de CBC/Radio-Canada, qui a été consacré, en 2012, au F35

[Dragunov]

U.S. Army tests new Enhanced Night Vision Goggle-Binoculars

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Soldiers assigned to the 2nd Armored Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division testing and giving feedback on a new Enhanced Night Vision Goggle-Binoculars, according to a recent U.S. Army news release.

The Enhanced Night Vision Goggle-Binocular (ENVG-B) provides the U.S. Army’s close combat forces with the capability to observe and maneuver in all weather conditions, through obscurants, during limited visibility, and under all lighting conditions.

Providing Soldiers with enhanced situational awareness and lethality are essential in enabling combat overmatch. Soldier feedback being incorporated into the ENVG-B product helps the Army integrate the current needs of Soldiers with the Army’s future multi-domain battlefield.

The ENVG-B uses white phosphorous tubes that offer significant improvements over the current night-vision goggles. Soldiers will no longer see the green tint of the current night vision goggles, which uses green phosphorous tubes.

The binocular system also provides more depth perception than the traditional monocular sight. Also, higher resolution, white phosphor tubes instead of the traditional green providing better contrast.

The ENVG-B increases the Warfighter’s lethality, mobility, and situational awareness through augmented reality aspects from the Nett Warrior display.

Furthermore, wireless interconnectivity with the Family of Weapon Sight-Individual, (FWS-I) displaying the weapon site reticule in the ENVG-B allowing Soldiers to accurately engage without shouldering the weapon.

This system signifies an evolution in technology that stems from innovative and collaborative efforts between Program Executive Office Soldier (PEO Soldier), Soldier Lethality Cross Functional Team (SL-CFT), and Army Futures Command (AFC). Additionally, it successfully demonstrates the rapid prototyping process to meet the Army’s modernization priorities and is the first program to deliver an Army Futures Command capability set.

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https://defence-blog.com/army/u-s-army- ... ulars.html

[bologhineziri1518]

L'USS Gabrielle Giffords (LCS 10), navire de combat littoral, une variante de l’indépendance class, a effectué un tir du Naval Strike Missile, ou NSM (missile d'attaque naval) lors de l'exercice Pacific Griffin. Le NSM est un missile anti-navire et d'attaque terrestre, conçu et produit par la compagnie norvégienne Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace (KDA)

[Dragunov]

[Dragunov]

[barracuda]

B2 largant une bombe GBU-57A/B

Bombe de 30000 livres (14000 kg)

[sadral]

Northrop Grumman unveils 50mm chain gun for Army’s Next Generation Combat Vehicle

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Family portrait of the 30x113, 30x173, 40mm, & 50mm systems


U.S. weapons maker Northrop Grumman has displayed fo the first time the XM913 50mm Bushmaster chain gun at the annual Association of the United States Army (AUSA) conference in Washington, D.C.

The new 50mm Bushmaster chain gun being developed by Northrop Grumman is designed for the U.S. Army’s Next Generation Combat Vehicle.

The Northrop-built 50mm Bushmaster Chain Gun can hit ranges more than twice as far as the roughly 2-kilometer range of the Bradley Fighting Vehicle’s existing M242 25mm cannon. The 50mm is being engineered to address this potential disparity, by hitting ranges well over 4km.

“Dozens of countries have either parity or overmatch to the Bradley Fighting Vehicle’s M242,” a Northrop statement says.

The 50mm cannon can blend a variety of emerging, high-tech armored vehicle attack technologies into a single system — to include advanced fire-control, automated targeting sensors, next-gen ammunition, new computer processing speed and longer-range medium caliber attack options.

Currently, the 50mm Bushmaster is one of the most powerful medium-caliber weapon systems ever created for an armored vehicle.

Firepower from Next Generation Combat Vehicle’s 50-millimeter cannon will bring a longer-range, more-lethal measure of firepower to medium caliber armored vehicle attack.

The Next Generation of Combat Vehicles, or NGCV, allows the Army to achieve combat vehicle overmatch in close combat against the pacing threat. It delivers decisive lethality with manned and unmanned teaming as part of a combined arms team in the future operating environment.

https://defence-blog.com/army/northrop- ... hicle.html

[Dragunov]

Deploy the Ford and Shock Test a Later Ship in the Class

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The U.S. Navy’s newest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78) is now in the fleet, restoring the number of active carriers to the legally mandated 11 for the first time since 2015. But now the Gerald R. Ford is not scheduled to deploy until 2024, six years later than its original deployment date, because of problems with some new technologies as well as a testing program that includes a shock trial.

The 2017 National Defense Authorization Act permitted the Secretary of Defense to waive the requirement to shock test the ship, a decision that could move the ship’s first deployment up by a year. But leaders of the Senate Armed Services Committee urged the Secretary not to delay shock testing the Gerald R. Ford, and the Department of Defense still has the test scheduled before the ship’s maiden deployment. This is a mistake.

A better decision would be to delay the Gerald R. Ford-class shock trial until the next ship in the class is ready, thereby freeing her to deploy when other issues are resolved. Not only would this not be unprecedented, it would be far more consistent with the shock-testing pattern of previous ship classes. As the chart below makes clear, shocking the 3rd or later ship of a class has been the norm in recent decades.

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Navy shock trials for the 12 most recent ship classes.

In 1987, Congress passed a law that requires all weapon systems be subjected to a live-fire test. The Navy proposed to substitute shock tests for live-fire tests because ships must be manned to operate at sea, while aircraft, tanks, trucks, and armored vehicles can be controlled remotely. Furthermore, to obtain realistic shock performance data, the Navy developed methods to test critical ship components at “heavy shock levels” on floating unmanned barges—methods that test to much higher levels of shock than could be administered to a manned ship or vehicle. Congress accepted this solution and allowed Navy ship shock tests instead of live-fire tests.

The history of shipbuilding shows that the first ship of a class goes through many changes during construction to decrease construction costs and fix design flaws. Since follow-on ships of many classes are built at a second yard, the design does not stabilize until after construction of the second ship. To shock test a stable ship design, the Navy therefore has ended up shock testing the 3rd or later ship of the class.

After shock testing the USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-71), the fourth ship of the Nimitz class, an antenna structural support on the island failed and the deck at the base of ship’s mast buckled. That required a new structural support for the antenna and mast for the last two Nimitz-class carriers and replacements for the rest of the class during the midlife refueling overhauls. Furthermore, in terms of class in-service time, shock testing the USS John F. Kennedy (CVN-79) in 2025 or 2026 will be 1 to 2 years after its scheduled 2024 commissioning and 8 to 9 years after the Gerald R. Ford's 2017 commissioning. That will be 3 to 4 years earlier than for the Nimitz class when shock testing of the Theodore Roosevelt was done in 1987, one year after its 1986 commissioning and 12 years after the USS Nimitz (CVN-68) was commissioned in 1975. So for the Gerald R. Ford class, lessons learned from the John F. Kennedy’s shock trials will be incorporated 3 to 4 years earlier than they were with the Nimitz class.

The Gerald R. Ford has a one-of-a-kind dual-band radar (DBR). Originally selected because of its synergies with the DDG-1000 program (that was to be a 30-ship class), the DBR was later scaled back because of cost, leaving the Gerald R. Ford with the only one for its class. The DBR required the carrier to have a unique, pagoda-like island design that will have to be changed to accommodate the new radar for the rest of the class. With a new radar and a new island designed to accommodate it, that design will be stable for subsequent ships. For this reason alone, it makes more sense to shock test the second in the class, the USS John F. Kennedy (CVN-79).

Finally, shock trials are difficult to schedule because of environmental concerns. They are very expensive, and to protect marine life are conducted off Florida in late summer or early fall when the marine animal migratory traffic is at its lowest. But that puts shock trials in hurricane-prone waters where a storm can delay them, even forcing rescheduling to the following year in the next low-risk season. Waiting to shock test the John F. Kennedy will ensure an environmentally-driven delay has less effect on the class as a whole, as testing the Gerald R. Ford might require another ship in the class be tested as well anyway.

The best way forward for the Navy is to get the Gerald R. Ford on deployment as quickly as possible and start planning shock trials for the John F. Kennedy.

https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedi ... ship-class

[Dragunov]

[Dragunov]

U.S. Army selects General Dynamics to produce 624 robotic mules

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The U.S. Army announced that it has selected General Dynamics Land Systems (GDLS) to produce robotic mules under Small Multipurpose Equipment Transports (SMET) program.

The long-awaited Army contract worth $162.4 million for up to 624 robotic mules was awarded in October to GDLS, a business unit of General Dynamics. Delivery to Soldiers begins in the second quarter of Fiscal Year 2021.

The robotic mule is designed to reduce soldiers’ load by carrying their weapons and supplies in the field. According to Army’s officials, new SMET’s basic operational capabilities will include unmanned and optionally manned system, also the new system will Carry 1,000 lbs., reducing Soldier weight burden by 100-plus pounds each when in support of a rifle squad.

The GDLS website said the robotic mule is a rugged, reliable small-unit force multiplier providing increased persistence, protection and projection. As a controllerless small-unit robotic follower, it lightens the load throughout the full gamut of combat operations. As a remote-controlled or teleoperated teammate, it provides stand-off from threats or increased projection of combat power.

With the SMET (pronounced “Ess-Met”) program, a phased, quicker acquisition plan allowed the Army to make informed program decisions based on direct Soldier feedback on commercially available technology — fielding equipment faster than typical processes allow.

The Army issued a directed requirement in April 2017 for a rapid materiel acquisition aimed at unburdening infantry brigade combat teams with a robotic capability. To fast-track the acquisition process, the Army’s Program Executive Office for Combat Support & Combat Service Support, awarded S-MET Phase I Other Transaction Authority (OTA) agreements (vs. traditional Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR)-based contracting methods) in June 2017 for eight platforms.

The SMET program marks one of the Army’s first Middle Tier Acquisitions (MTA) for Rapid Fielding. This acquisition approach foregoes the traditional Department of Defense 5000.02 acquisition process, streamlining the delivery and fielding of capabilities within a period of five years. Use of the MTA approach was granted by Congress in the Fiscal Year 2016 National Defense Authorization Act Section 804.

“The SMET program has focused on meeting the Army’s emphasis on enhancing Soldier lethality and rapidly fielding modernized capabilities. Our product management team for Applique and Large Unmanned Ground Systems undertook a great challenge to develop a strategy using experimentation and technical demonstrations to streamline the SMET acquisition process,” said Timothy G. Goddette, the Army’s program executive officer for Combat Support and Combat Service Support.

“Using an innovative contracting approach through an Other Transaction Authority, a flexible, collaborative tool designed to speed acquisition and modernization, the SMET team awarded this capability within two and a half years. Using normal acquisition processes, it could have taken as much as five years,” he explained.

The initial candidate platforms participated in the SMET Phase I Assessment held in September 2017 at Fort Benning, Georgia. The evaluation enabled the Army to learn about each of the candidate platforms’ capabilities and obtain operational feedback based on Soldiers’ interactions with the candidate SMET systems. Based on the results in November 2017, the Army narrowed to four contractors to evaluate their respective platforms during a 12-month (later reduced to seven-month) S-MET Phase II Technology Demonstration.

Phase II called for each of the four selected contractors to produce 20 platforms. Four of the produced SMETs supported safety testing, Commercial-Off-the-Shelf operator manual verification, Instructor and Key Personnel Training, and Tactics, Techniques and Procedures (TTPs) development. Upon completion of safety testing, the Product Management Office for Applique and Large Unmanned Systems issued eight of each respective prototype S-METs to IBCTs within the 10th Mountain and the 101st Airborne Divisions in the first quarter of Fiscal Year 2019 for the seven-month Phase II Technology Demonstration. Results from the Technology Demonstration informed program decisions and further solidified SMET TTPs.

Dismounted Infantry carry water, extra ammunition, and other equipment and gear imposing physical burden. When fielded, S-MET will unburden Soldiers and enable IBCTs to travel greater distances and carry more. Soldier experimentation, touch points, and evaluation has been key in obtaining direct warfighter feedback.

“Thanks to tremendous teamwork across the acquisition, requirements, operational, and resource communities, this is a great modernization success story,” said Don Sando, director for the Maneuver Capabilities Development and Integration Directorate, Fort Benning. “Key to this success was involving Soldiers early in the process to get their input and feedback during experiments and assessments.

“Direct Soldier feedback drove the requirements for the SMET, and certainly helped determine what systems would work best for IBCTs to fill a capability gap,” Sando added.

This enhanced, modernized capability will unburden Soldiers of some of their physical load, thereby also improving Soldiers’ physical and cognitive capabilities. Future capability will feature modular mission payloads tailoring the SMET to specific mission needs, such as dismounted engineer mobility systems; remote weapon stations; casualty evacuation; and unmanned aerial systems and reconnaissance.

“Getting a modernized capability into the hands of IBCT Soldiers has been the team’s driving focus throughout this program,” said Lt. Col. Jon Bodenhamer, the Army’s product manager for Applique and Large Unmanned Ground Systems within the Program Executive Office for Combat Support & Combat Service Support. “Soldiers are why we do what we do, and I’m incredibly proud of the hard-working team that brought us to this point.”

https://defence-blog.com/army/u-s-army- ... mules.html

[bologhineziri1518]

projet "Future Vertical Lift"
Le Sikorsky–Boeing SB-1 Defiant termine son vol d'essai en tant qu'avion entièrement configuré


"Future Vertical Lift" est un projet visant à développer une famille d'hélicoptères militaires pour les forces armées des États-Unis. Cinq tailles d'aéronefs doivent être développées, partageant le matériel commun tel que les capteurs, l'avionique, les moteurs et les contre-mesures.

[geronimo]

U.S. Air Force F-16 Aircraft Intercepts Cruise Missile Target with APKWS Rocket

A U.S. Air Force F-16 fighter aircraft has successfully intercepted a cruise missile target with an APKWS rocket, the service announced.

During the test conducted on December 19, a subscale drone, imitating a cruise missile, was shot down using an AGR-20A Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System (APKWS) laser-guided rocket. The test provided a proof of concept for using rockets queued from an F-16 targeting pod as viable munitions to perform cruise missile defense.

The F-16 that conducted the interception was assigned to the USAF’s 85th Test and Evaluation Squadron (85 TES) based at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida. The 85th TES is part of the 53d Wing, which is the primary operational test and evaluation wing for the U.S. Air Force.

https://defpost.com/u-s-air-force-f-16- ... ws-rocket/