“I get really irritated when I’m in the audience and I hear ‘startup, startup, startup,’” Army Futures Command’s chief innovation officer said this morning at the National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA). “Startups are not the only source of ideas.”
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.How to ensure readiness of next-generation defense technology: Solving the issue of massive heat.
High-performance systems generate tremendous amounts of heat that can compromise missions and make high-tech systems less effective in tactical environments. But there is a solution to this modern-age challenge.
We explore the possibilities, from cutting-edge hypersonics and 1,000-mile cannon to repackaged Tomahawk cruise missiles and updated Pershing ballstic missiles.
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
AUSA: The Army is investing more and more money in lasers to defeat incoming rockets and enemy drones. Across the Air & Missile Defense (AMD) portfolio, “we put over 50 percent of our S&T (Science and Technology) money going towards directed energy projects,” up from about a third previously, said the AMD modernization director, Brig. Gen.…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
BAE System’s CV90 Mark IV is the latest upgrade of a 25-year-old vehicle widely used in Europe; the Rheinmetall-Raytheon Lynx is an all-new design, although individual components have a good track record; but the General Dynamics Griffin III is in the middle, combining a new gun and new electronics with the time-tested chassis from the European ASCOD family.
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
While the Strategic Long-Range Cannon will hit targets at ranges comparable to bleeding-edge hypersonics missiles, Army officials emphasized the cannon is built on proven principles, just bigger.
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
“It’s much more like a fighter aircraft than a helicopter,” Sikorsky’s test pilot tells me in the video as he maneuvers gleefully.
“Whoa, warn me next time!” I say after a particularly nifty/nauseating roll.
Gray Eagle is the low-cost, low-risk answer to Army modernization
Gray Eagle STOL and Gray Eagle 25M are the best options for Army aviation as it assesses where to move from its current inflection point.
Just as AirLand Battle was aimed straight at the former Soviet Union, with its massed mechanized armies, Multi-Domain Operations is aimed straight at Vladimir Putin’s Russia, with its long-range missiles, electronic/cyber warfare expertise, and Little Green Men.
By Colin Clark
M1 tank at the National Training Center in Fort Irwin, California. AUSA: How will the US fight the next war? Today, the Army’s top general declared that the military means “to shift from battles of attrition to battles of cognition, where we think, direct, and act at speeds the enemy cannot match in order to…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
AUSA: In a promising sign for the US Army’s Big Six modernization plan, not one but three different companies have invested their own money in full-up working vehicles for the Army’s Next Generation Combat Vehicle (NGCV) project: BAE Systems, which makes the current M2 Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicle, a heavily armed and armored troop carrier…
By Colin Clark
After the Army’s director armored vehicle modernization raises concerns about weight, the companies respond with new details.
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
AMPV is a well-armored, all-terrain workhorse that will replace geriatric M113s in a host of roles from battlefield transport to armored ambulance to mobile command post.
By Colin Clark
With a proven hull and a cutting-edge gun, General Dynamics’ Griffin III might just hit the Army’s sweet spot between innovative and proven.
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
The Army plans to move at least $25 billion over the next five years from low-priority programs to preparing for major war. That includes developing a wide variety of new weapons, from high-speed aircraft, to partially-robotic armored vehicles, to a long-ranged 6.8 millimeter rifle to replace the venerable M16/M4 family and its controversial 5.56 mm round.
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
