NATIONAL DEFENSE UNIVERSITY: It just might be iPhone time for the world’s most powerful army,. As defense budgets shrink and commercial networks grow, top brass from Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ray Odierno on down are questioning the service’s current plan to keep developing custom-built, military-specific, and extremely expensive communications networks. If groups like al-Qaeda,…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.WASHINGTON: How much will it really cost to shut down the Army’s ill-fated Future Combat Systems program? Up to $1.5 billion, potentially three times the “special termination cost” reported by Inside Defense on Friday. Three years after then-Secretary of Defense Robert Gates cancelled the sprawling FCS program — the Army’s ambitious attempt to build a…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.In the difficult years since the 9-11 attacks, the U.S. Army has become proficient at quickly fielding equipment needed by troops at war. From improved night-vision devices to digital radios to up-armored vehicles, the Army’s acquisition community has proven it can be responsive when soldiers’ lives are on the line. But a very different story…
By Loren Thompson
As the Department of Defense continues to wrestle with the high costs and often slow pace of military technology and acquisition programs, it would do well to take a closer look at that other bastion of high-tech government programs: the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. NASA’s low-cost missions from yesteryear just might hold the secret…
By Dan Ward