Orbital ATK - GDLS LAV Kongsberg MCT-30 Turret 30mm/40mm MK44 Autocannon Firing Tests

Trumps National Security Adviser

Guess who might be spreading rumours about Gen. Flynn ?
-CNN

His straight talk is what --O-Banana and K-illary did not like

Inside Blackwater: Iraq's Most Controversial Private Military Contractor

US sheds 21 excess military facilities in Europe

Reuters       

The US military is shedding European real estate including a golf course, skeet range and hotel, as well as facilities like a munitions storage facility, as it looks to save cash during a US budget crunch, officials said on Friday.Rear Admiral John Kirby stressed the decisions to return the sites to host nations in Germany, Italy and elsewhere would not affect the US military's ability field personnel in Europe — a sensitive subject as the Ukraine crisis causes the worst stand-off between Russia and the West since the Cold War.

"I think it's pretty self-evident that it doesn't at all change our military capability on the continent or degrade in any way our readiness to meet our security commitments there in Europe," Kirby told reporters.He said the decision to turn the 21 sites to Germany, Italy, Denmark, Greece, the United Kingdom and Belgium would save about $60 million a year. Still, it is only the first step in reductions that will be ordered through an ongoing look at America's military footprint in Europe, called the European Infrastructure Consolidation review.

The Pentagon is struggling to implement nearly $1 trillion in cuts to projected spending over a decade, as required by law, and had been under pressure from Congress to cut non-essential facilities abroad prior to scaling back bases and other infrastructure in the United States. 

Pentagon and DARPA plans to seed ocean floor with payloads waiting to be activated

By Joey Cheng:

Sensors, drones and other devices can be a great help to U.S. forces at sea, but not if forces get caught in a situation without them. That’s why the military is planning to plant them in potential trouble spots ahead of time, and have them wait on the ocean floor to be called into action.

The program is called the Upward Falling Payloads (UFP) and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is preparing for Phase 2 and Phase 3, according to a pre-solicitation notice. The distributed systems would be remotely activated when needed and recalled to the surface by “falling upward.”

The project is a part of an effort to develop low-cost, unmanned and distributed systems in response to the limits imposed by costs and complexity in working in forward operating areas.

“The UFP approach averts solutions to deploy technology from legacy platforms or to grow the complexity and reach of unmanned systems,” DARPA said in its announcement. “Instead, the approach centers on pre-deploying deep-ocean nodes years in advance in forward areas which can be commanded from standoff to deliver a wide range of unmanned and distributed systems to the sub-surface, surface and air.”

http://defensesystems.com/articles/2014/03/27/upward-falling-payloads-darpa.aspx

DARPA’s Selects Four contender companies for new X-Plane Program

Aurora Flight Sciences Corporation, The Boeing Company, Karem Aircraft, Inc. and Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation selected for the new X-Plane Program.

DARPA has tasked four companies with designing new aircraft to revolutionise vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) flight capabilities. The four are Aurora Flight Sciences Corporation, The Boeing Company, Karem Aircraft, Inc. and Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation. The next major milestone for VTOL X-Plane is scheduled for late 2015, when the four performers are required to submit preliminary designs.

All four winning companies proposed designs for unmanned vehicles, but the technologies that VTOL X-Plane intends to develop could apply equally well to manned aircraft. Another common element among the designs is that they all incorporate multipurpose technologies to varying degrees. Multipurpose technologies decrease the number of systems in a vehicle and its overall mechanical complexity. Multipurpose technologies also use space and weight more efficiently to improve performance and enable new and improved capabilities.

ARES Aims to Provide More Front-line Units with Mission-tailored VTOL Capabilities

U.S. military experience has shown that rugged terrain and threats such as ambushes and Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) can make ground-based transportation to and from the front lines a dangerous challenge. Combat outposts require on average 100,000 pounds of material a week, and high elevation and impassable mountain roads often restrict access. Helicopters are one solution, but the supply of available helicopters can’t meet the demand for their services, which cover diverse operational needs including resupply, tactical insertion and extraction, and casualty evacuation.

To help overcome these challenges, DARPA unveiled the Transformer (TX) program in 2009. Transformer aimed to develop and demonstrate a prototype system that would provide flexible, terrain-independent transportation for logistics, personnel transport and tactical support missions for small ground units. In 2013, DARPA selected the Aerial Reconfigurable Embedded System (ARES) design concept to move forward.

“Many missions require dedicated vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) assets, but most ground units don’t have their own helicopters,” said Ashish Bagai, DARPA program manager. “ARES would make organic and versatile VTOL capability available to many more individual units. Our goal is to provide flexible, terrain-independent transportation that avoids ground-based threats, in turn supporting expedited, cost-effective operations and improving the likelihood of mission success.”

ARES would center on a VTOL flight module designed to operate as an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) capable of transporting a variety of payloads. The flight module would have its own power system, fuel, digital flight controls and remote command-and-control interfaces. Twin tilting ducted fans would provide efficient hovering and landing capabilities in a compact configuration, with rapid conversion to high-speed cruise flight similar to small aircraft. The system could use landing zones half the size typically needed by similarly sized helicopters, enabling it to land in rugged terrain and aboard ships.

It is envisioned that the flight module would travel between its home base and field operations to deliver and retrieve several different types of detachable mission modules, each designed for a specific purpose—cargo pickup and delivery, casualty extraction or airborne intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities, for instance. The flight module would have a useful load capability of up to 3,000 pounds, more than 40 percent the takeoff gross weight of the aircraft.

Units could direct the flight modules using apps on their mobile phones or ruggedized tablets. Initially, the system would be unmanned, with a future path towards semi-autonomous flight systems and user interfaces for optionally manned/controlled flight.

ARES is currently in its third and final phase. Lockheed Martin Skunk Works ® is the lead vehicle design and system integration performer for Phase 3 of the program.