Category Archives: tech

Coalition/Allies, Defense Department, Policy, weapons systems

U.S. to shift ABM base focus from E. Europe to Turkey, Israel

A Polish newpaper has reported that the Obama administration will scrap plans for “missile shield” bases in Poland and the Czech Republic in favor of a sea-based approach and potential bases in Turkey and Israel.

The move comes on the heels of Obama’s recent meeting with Russian leaders, and recent revelations that Iran’s latest ballistic missile could strike targets in Europe.  It may also have been bolstered by the progress of the Aegis ABM program, which has a much better track record thus far than the land-based ABM program.

Today, Army Lt. Gen. Patrick J. O’Reilly, the director for the Missile Defense Agency, pointed to the successes of the program as a whole, in an interview at the Pentagon. “A few years ago the question was, ‘Could you even hit a missile with a missile?’ We have proven we could do that well over 35 times.”

O’Reilly said that 39 of the last 45 tries at stopping a test missile were successful. All but one miss were early in the program, and he said that one was because of a manufacturing problem, which was fixed as demonstrated by a successful test three weeks ago.

The Defense Department recently committed an additional $900 million toward fielding the Army’s Theater High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) mobile missile defense system.

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Army, Contractors & Vendors, Policy, tech

Roadmap for Army's future combat vehicles coming

Jane’s reports that the US Army will release its new direction for ground combat vehicles in September. After canceling the majority of the Future Combat Systems program’s vehicles, the Army is taking a new look at what new vehicles should be built, and how current vehicles should be incorporated across the Army’s Brigade Combat Teams (BCTs).

The Army’s Vice Chief of Staff, Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli, hosted a workshop on June 15 at the National Defense University to bring together the Army’s ground vehicle thought leaders to hammer out the way ahead for a new ground combat vehicle. “We will work to include both lessons from the current fight and what we’ve learned from technology and build a better vehicle,” said Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey.

While FCS was cancelled, it is expected that the FCS Network and the System of Systems Common Operating Environment (SoSCOE) Boeing developed for the vehicles will likely be incorporated into both the new ground combat vehicle and existing vehicles, according to people familiar with the program.

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