– USNI News – A design flaw in the system the Navy plans to help safely recover aircraft onboard its next generation Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78) aircraft carrier has set testing for the program back two years and risks extending the delivery of the ship past its March 31, 2016 deadline.
Author Archives: Naval Open Source Intelligence (NOSI)
Navy Officials: Current BMD Strategy ‘Unsustainable’; Greenert Asked Hagel for Review
– USNI News – As demand for regional ballistic missile defense (BMD) capabilities sharply increases, the BMD forces’ operational tempo is trying to keep pace while funding is not – leading defense officials to question if a new BMD strategy is needed.
Russian Navy Chief: Submarine Patrols Up 50 Percent Over Last Year
– USNI News – The military leader of the Russian Navy has acknowledged an increase in submarine patrols to “prevent threats to national security” in the last year, according to Russian state media.
Royal Navy unveils ‘modern’ uniform
– BBC – The Royal Navy’s first new uniform in 70 years has been unveiled.
Battle Over How to Count Navy Ships is Confusing, But Not New
– USNI News – Lawmakers and Navy leadership spent the past year going back and forth over how to count the number of ships in the Battle Force fleet. The Navy made some changes last spring that immediately increased the size of the fleet and complicated the ship-counting effort: certain ships would count only if they were forward deployed but not if they returned home to the United States. Congress pushed back, passing into law what was essentially a compromise counting rule – and the third methodology to be used in a one-year span. As a result of the back-and-forth, the Navy’s most recent ship-count projection it submitted to Congress contains two sets of figures: one with the Navy’s preferred method, and one following Congress’s rule. The dueling methods have led to confusing charts and tables earlier this year, but the conflict over how to count Navy ships is not new – the Carter and Reagan administrations both created their own sets of rules for counting ships.
PEO Carriers: CVN-79 Will Have a New Radar, Save $180M Compared to Dual Band Radar
– USNI News – The aircraft carrier USS John F. Kennedy (CVN-79) will have a different radar than the USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78), bringing the new Enterprise Air Surveillance Radar (EASR) into the carrier fleet one ship earlier than planned and saving the program about $180 million, according to the Navy.
Look How Quickly China is Building Its Island Bases Out Of Nothing
– Foxtrot Alpha – China isn’t just expanding its military reach into the South China Sea, it’s rapidly building completely new islands, and as you’d expect, that’s generating plenty of anxiety from the other nations in the neighborhood.
CNO Greenert Warns Congress of Fighter Shortfall, Boeing Super Hornet Line to Close in 2017 Absent New Orders
– USNI News – The Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) warned Congress of an upcoming Navy fighter shortfall just as Boeing is trying to determine whether to keep its Super Hornet and Growler production line open, setting the stage for intense talks between the service and company in the coming months about whether the Navy should and can afford to invest in additional legacy fighters.
Drones and the rise of the high-tech assassins
– Boing Boing – How twenty-three innocent Afghani civilians were wiped out by self-deceiving drone operators seven and a half thousand miles away. An excerpt from Andrew Cockburn’s new book, Kill Chain.
Marines May Merge ACV Increments as Industry Chases Higher Requirements
– USNI News – On Tuesday, Marine Corps Commandant Gen. Joseph Dunford told the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) that, because the Marines couldn’t achieve a vehicle that performed adequately on land, could self-deploy from the well deck of an amphibious ship and met budget constraints, the Marine Corps instead agreed on a three-phase approach. Increment 1.1 was meant to have the ground protection Marines needed and would go ashore via surface connectors. Increment 1.2 would have a self-deploying capability at least equal to the 40-year-old Amphibious Assault Vehicles (AAVs) used today. And the third increment, if ever exercised, would add the high water speed capability that would allow it to plane over the top of the water instead of swimming through it.
U.S. Should Consider Establishing a South China Sea International Operations Center in Indonesia
– USNI News – The incoming U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM) commander, Adm. Harry B. Harris, testified before Congress late last year that “China’s rise as a regional military and global economic power, and in particular, its rapid military modernization and assertive behavior toward regional neighbors present opportunities and challenges that must be managed effectively. This is our most enduring challenge.” To meet that challenge, the U.S. Navy should explore establishing an International Maritime Operations Center (IMOC) headquartered in Indonesia to showcase the Navy’s commitment to the Asia-Pacific, monitor maritime developments in the South China Sea and Indian Ocean and serve as a new mechanism to meet China’s rise.
Navy Wants To Shutter Its Only Two Special Operations Chopper Squadrons
– Foxtrot Alpha – Even some military aficionados would be surprised to know that the Navy has dedicated special operations helicopters squadrons. The Air Force’s Pave Hawk and Osprey communities and the Army’s notorious Night Stalkers take up much of the limelight. But now, the Navy’s two reclusive squadrons are set to stand down due to a budget crunch.
China’s maritime rise offers risks, rewards for U.S. sailors
– Navy Times – As part of the U.S. military’s shift to the Asia-Pacific region, the Navy is dispatching more ships and sailors for exercises with partner nations. There are also opportunities to work alongside the Chinese military in training and humanitarian operations. But make no mistake — China is at the heart of the new strategy, and the Middle Kingdom is pushing back. There have been high-level run-ins between the U.S. Navy and the Chinese military in recent years and experts believe these are likely to continue as the 1.3-billion strong nation builds its maritime might.
Running With the Pac
– Aviation Week – The general feeling among many of China’s naval neighbors and in U.S. military circles is that China has been turning into a bit of a bully in (re)staking territorial claims in the seas off its coasts, and there’s been an onslaught recently of material on how to deal with the Asian giant on that front.
What the U.S. Navy Could Learn from Danish Frigate Design
– USNI News – As the U.S. Navy’s requirements and engineering communities look at upcoming ship classes and attempt to build in flexibility, they first need to decide what it means to be a “flexible ship” and how much to prioritize that flexibility.
Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group to Depart for Middle East on Monday in First NIFC-CA Deployment
USNI News – The Navy’s most technologically capable carrier, cruiser and destroyer are shipping out for a Middle East deployment.
China’s Naval Modernization: The Implications of Seapower
– World Politics Review – After years of invitations that Beijing did not accept, coupled with last year’s cancellation of the event due to sequestration, the head of China’s navy, Adm. Wu Shengli, led a nine-officer delegation to this year’s International Seapower Symposium. Participants in the plenary and regional breakout sessions no doubt wondered who exactly Wu is, what mandate he has, what sort of navy he leads, where it is heading and how it will be interacting with the U.S. Navy. This article addresses these timely questions.
Marines Considering New Platforms to Extend Africa Reach, Including the Gulf of Guinea
– USNI News – The Marines are looking to employ new types of ships to extend the reach of special crisis response units into Africa. Shortly after becoming commandant late last year, Gen. Joseph Dunford directed his staff to study putting forward deployed Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force Crisis Response (SPMAGTF-CR) forces — currently land based — on platforms other than the traditional amphibious warships that comprise the Navy and the Marine Corps Amphibious Ready Group and Marine Expeditionary Units (ARG/MEU).
What Crunching the Data Tells Us About China’s Naval Port Visits
– War is Boring – Crunch the numbers on the location and number of PLAN visits and it becomes apparent that a desire for prestige and expertise outpaces the alternative explanations.
Navy Again Reduces Scope of Destroyer Modernization, 5 Ships Won’t Receive Any Ballistic Missile Defense Upgrades
– USNI News – Five Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyers (DDG-51) will forgo a combat system upgrade that would allow the ships to fight ballistic missile threats as part of a reduction in modernization funding included in the Navy’s Fiscal Year (FY) 2016 budget that will save the service $500 million over the next five years.
A Half Century of Half Aircraft Carriers
– War is Boring – Starting in the 1960s, the world’s leading navies experimented with a new kind of warship. Heavily-armed and sporting huge flight decks for helicopters, the vessels were hybrids—not quite cruisers, not quite aircraft carriers. Ungainly and in many cases conceptually flawed, the helicopter cruisers nevertheless represented an important leap forward for naval technology. Today’s assault ships—arguably the most useful warships afloat—owe much to the helicopter cruisers that preceded them.
Ten Reasons Why China Will Have Trouble Fighting A Modern War
– War on the Rocks – The introduction of new weapons and platforms into the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has captured the attention of much of the world for well over a decade. However, new equipment is only one element of the PLA’s long-term, multi-dimensional modernization process. There is much to be done and no one understands this better than the Chinese themselves. Based on what PLA commanders and staff officers write in their internal newspapers and journals, the force faces a multitude of challenges in order to close the perceived gaps between its capabilities and those of advanced militaries.
LCS Versus the Danish Strawman
– CIMSEC – Many critics have assailed the Littoral Combatant Ship (LCS) program for its high cost in comparison with foreign, supposedly better armed and equipped equivalents. The Danish Iver Huitfeldt and Absalon class frigates are often cited as examples of cheaper, more capable small combatants in comparison with LCS. These claims are not well researched and are based on isolated points of data rather than any systemic analysis.
The US Navy’s Cruise Missile Nightmare
– Real Clear Defense – The U.S. Navy has a problem…Not since the early 1990s, for instance, has the surface navy procured a new anti-ship cruise missile (ASCM), its chief weapon for fleet-on-fleet engagements.
This is Japan’s Best Strategy to Defeat China at Sea
– The Diplomat – In order to win, Japan should give China a dose of its own medicine.
You must be logged in to post a comment.