– BBC – The Conservatives and Lib Dems are at odds over the future of Trident after a government report set out options for the UK’s nuclear weapons system.
US Navy – Mystery Weapon Terrifies America’s Admirals
– Medium – Somewhere out there, someone has built something that has the Navy absolutely freaked.
US Navy – Deja Vu All Over Again
– Aviation Week – By now the recent U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) findings on a certain U.S. Navy small-ship program are pretty well known. Costs and concerns about survivability keep rising and confidence keeps waning in the ship’s capability to fill national defense needs. Oh, lord, you may be thinking – not another piece about the GAO and the Littoral Combat Ship. But not so fast. The GAO report in question is the Jan. 3, 1979, statement to Congress on “The Navy’s FFG-7 Class Frigate Shipbuilding Program, and Other Ship Program Issues.” That’s right – we’re talking about the FFG-7s here, the now-noble Oliver Hazard Perry guided missile frigate-class ships slated to become the backbone of the Navy’s sea control in the mid-1980s and whose missions, or some of them, the LCS vessels are supposed to assume.
US Marines – US Marine Force in Darwin, Australia Boosts To 1,000 Next Year; Rise To MEU
– Breaking Defense – The US presence in the remote northern Australian port of Darwin will soar from its current 250 troops to 1,000 next year and ultimately to 2,200, granting a full Marine Expeditionary Unit an effective base of operations.
Chinese Navy – China missile fear: U.S. vulnerable to nuclear-tipped submarine-launched missiles, Pentagon warns
– Washington Times – China maintains the fastest-growing fleet of ballistic and cruise missiles on the planet, and soon will deploy a nuclear-tipped, submarine-launched ballistic missile capable of hitting the United States from Chinese waters, according to a new Pentagon report.
US Navy – U.S. Navy Follows U.K. Lead On Infrared Systems
– Aviation Week – The U.S. Navy expects to award contracts soon for a longer-range version of the AIM-9X Sidewinder, known as Block III. Not only will it be a major change to the AIM-9X—retaining only the seeker, optical target detector (laser fuze) and data link of the Block II weapon—but its development is starting before the Block II has finished operational tests…With these developments, the U.S. Navy is following the lead of other air arms—notably, the Royal Air Force—in investing in non-RF sensors and weapons that work far outside the within-visual-range envelope. One key technology is better processing that has greatly improved the performance of IRST.
Royal Navy – Scottish Trident base claims 'preposterous threat'
– Daily Telegraph – The British Government denies reports it is examining plans to designate Faslane as sovereign UK territory in case Scots back independence next year.
Royal Navy – MoD fears for Trident base if Scotland says yes to independence
– Guardian – Whitehall looking at plan to designate home of nuclear fleet as sovereign United Kingdom territory
US Navy – Glimpse Inside Air-Sea Battle: Nukes, Cyber At Its Heart
– Breaking Defense – In intellectual terms, Air-Sea Battle is the biggest of the military’s big ideas for its post-Afghanistan future. But what is it, really? It’s a constantly evolving concept for high-tech, high-intensity conflict that touches on everything from cyberwar to nuclear escalation to the rise of China. In practical terms, however, the beating heart of AirSea Battle is eleven overworked officers working in windowless Pentagon meeting rooms, and the issues they can’t get to are at least as important as the ones they can.
Russian Navy – Russian Navy to Receive 36 Warships in 2013
– RIA Novosti – The Russian Navy will receive 36 warships in 2013, an unprecedented number in Russia’s history
Indian Navy – Russia Hands Over New Stealth Frigate to India
– RIA Novosti – Russia has delivered the last in a series of three modified Krivak-III frigates built for the Indian Navy.
US Navy – LCS Luv’n
– Aviation Week – If the U.S. Navy can untangle some of the rather significant acquisition, operational, logistical and programmatic knots still tying up its Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) efforts there are plenty ready to court the vessel for missions – providing the LCS works as advertised.
Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force – Flattops or Not: Japan’s Dilemma
– Medium – Tokyo’s aircraft carriers once ruled the waves; could they make a comeback?
Chinese Navy – China Employs Ships As Weapon Test Platforms
– Signal – The People’s Republic of China has been introducing diverse new classes of ships into its navy for decades, but it also has employed some as vessels for weapons trials. Three ships distinctly have served as test platforms for many of the new technologies that entered service with the People’s Liberation Army Navy, or PLAN. An examination of these trial ships can illustrate the next generation of technologies about to be incorporated in the navy.
US Navy – UCAS Anomaly Resolved On Deck After Historic Landing
– Aviation Week – There is no doubt that today’s first-ever arrested landing of the Northrop Grumman X-47B air vehicle 2 on the deck of the USS George H.W. Bush will go down in history books as a major milestone in aerospace history. But, what could be a footnote in the historical record is an anomaly that took place shortly after the first-ever landing of a stealthy, tailless unmanned aircraft on a carrier deck. It could have dampened the historical day had the system not been preprogrammed to handle a host of issues that could crop up. But, it didn’t. That came later when a third landing attempt sent the aircraft ashore
US Navy – X-47B makes first carrier trap
– Flight Global – The US Navy made aviation history on 10 July when a Northrop Grumman X-47B unmanned combat air system-demonstrator aircraft made a first-ever arrested landing onboard the aircraft carrier USS George H W Bush, which was sailing some 70 miles (113km) of the Virginia coast.
US Navy – Navy Should Delay Next Carrier Amid Troubles, GAO Audit Says
– Business Week – The U.S. Navy should delay the award of a multibillion-dollar contract to Huntington Ingalls Industries Inc. (HII) to build the second aircraft carrier in a new class as the first one faces failings from its radar to the gear that launches planes, congressional investigators said.
US Navy – Here’s How the Navy Plans to Shoot Down High-Tech Chinese Jets
– Medium – By homing in on their heat with a new missile.
US Navy – LCS — The Battle Within
– Aviation Week – The biggest impediment to the potential success of the U.S. Navy’s Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) may very well be some of the top-level brass who continue to view the ship through the “old-think” prism used to scrutinize traditional Navy warships.
US Navy – Inside the World’s Deadliest Warship
– Medium – Just below the surface with the submarine USS Toledo.
US Navy – Return Of LCS Past
– Aviation Week – The ghosts of the U.S. Navy’s Littoral Combat Ship’s (LCS) past still haunt the program – with the specter of LCS-yet-to-come striking fear among some in Congress about what may be in store for the fleet in terms of costs and operational relevance.
Chinese Navy – China's naval aspirations: A 'blue-water' force
– Stars and Stripes – A century before Columbus discovered America, Chinese naval vessels many times bigger than the Santa Maria sailed the high seas, reaching as far as Africa. But, unlike European voyages of discovery, the Chinese efforts did not forge a global empire. Beset by internal strife, China abandoned its naval efforts, and by 1500, it was a capital offense to build a seagoing junk with more than two masts. Today, fueled by a booming economy, Chinese naval power is on the rise again.
Chinese Navy – China and Russia conduct joint naval drill
– BBC – China and Russia are beginning joint naval drills which Beijing has described as the country’s largest with a foreign partner.
Piracy – Deadly Bandits of the Western Sea
– Medium – Peter Dörrie explains escalating piracy in Africa’s Gulf of Guinea.
Chinese Navy – China’s Overhyped Sub Threat
– Medium – Beijing’s submarine fleet is not as big or powerful as U.S. military planners once feared. Have its blue-water ambitions been overstated?
NOSI - Naval Open Source Intelligence™ 
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