ARMY WAR COLLEGE: If you want to know what the Army Chief of Staff is thinking, don’t just ask around the Pentagon. Drive a couple hours north through rural Pennsylvania — passing the Gettysburg battlefield on the way — to the Army War College here in quiet Carlisle. An institution whose influence has waxed and…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.A major overhaul is coming in software for missile warning
Space Systems Command’s FORGE program is the first, major missile-warning software modernization effort in 20 years.
WASHINGTON: That the Navy should get more money to build up its surface and submarine fleets may be the message Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson sends in an upcoming article which he promises would be a “strong Navy voice” on budget issues. Richardson told an audience at the Brookings Institution Thursday that he would be…
By Colin Clark
While North Korea threatens to shoot and sink American aircraft carriers and launch nuclear weapons, Pacific Command is running short of precision-guided munitions. And Pacific Command does not have enough surface ships, submarines and antimissile radars to keep up with current and emerging threats, its commander Adm. Harry Harris told the House Armed Services Committee…
By Sandra Erwin
WASHINGTON: If the Navy would buy one squadron of new F-18s (known as the XT, Block 3 or Advanced Super Hornet) instead of the carrier version of the F-35 it “actually improves overall mission capability, while substantially reducing cost.” But the Navy could go even one better and buy two squadrons of the new F-18, which…
By Colin Clark
American THAAD missile defense vehicles landed at Osan, South Korea today after almost eight months of waiting. Now the question is how the North and China react. Increasingly threatened by North Korean missiles — most recently test-launched just yesterday — the South agreed last July to host the US Army’s Terminal High Altitude Area Defense…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
SAN DIEGO: The Army and Navy must link their missile defense systems into a single network so Navy weapons can hit targets spotted by Army radars and vice versa, the chief of Pacific Command said today. That’s a daunting technical task but, if surmounted, it could dramatically improve defense against North Korean, Chinese, or Russian…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
New Army mounted system won’t play favorites when it comes to C5ISR, EW and A-PNT
The CMOSS Mounted Form Factor will facilitate tech insertion for new capabilities while co-existing with the Mounted Family of Computer Systems.
CLARIFIED: What MG Harris Really Meant CAPITOL HILL: The Air Force’s first operational squadron of F-35s will head to the Pacific, in addition to the European deployment recently departed Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James discussed in December. The news came in the form of one sentence today in the written testimony today of Maj. Gen. Jerry Harris, deputy…
By Colin Clark
WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump killed the Trans-Pacific Partnership just two days ago, but this morning, multiple experts and one four-star general agreed that America’s Pacific alliances — except perhaps the Philippines — would survive and even thrive. A few hours later, aptly enough, the Pentagon announced that Defense Secretary James Mattis, the new administration’s most outspoken…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
SYDNEY: While it will be a short deployment, Australia and the United States have agreed to deploy America’s most advanced fighter next year as part of the Enhanced Air Cooperation (EAC) Initiative that has seen B-2 bombers and other advanced American aircraft deployed to the lucky country. Adm. Harry Harris, head of Pacific Command, disclosed…
By Colin Clark
WASHINGTON: Neither President Trump’s transition in DC nor President Duterte’s eruptions in Manila will derail America’s 70-year military commitment to the Pacific, Adm. Harry Harris said today. US-Philippine cooperation continues unabated despite Duterte’s denunciation of the alliance, the head of Pacific Command said. (The senior State Department official for the Pacific, Daniel Russel, recently dismissed…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
ARLINGTON: Harry Harris has to be the Army’s favorite admiral. The chief of Pacific Command has called for Army-owned anti-ship missiles. He has enthused over the Army’s new warfare concept, and now he is planning a major inter-service exercise to work out what that Multi-Domain Battle concept means in practice. “We are starting to put…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
SINGAPORE: In his speech to the Shangri-La Dialogue here, Defense Secretary Ashton Carter laid out a cautious and carefully crafted vision for security in Asia. Carter called for an “inclusive (and) principled security network,” one that would try to include China and encourage it to abide by international law, rather than seeking to confront and…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
Concerned over increasingly reckless Chinese and Russian intercepts of US aircraft, Pacific Command says it urgently needs cameras on its planes to provide irrefutable proof of their misbehavior. The problem: reconnaissance planes like the propeller-driven P-3 Orion and the new jet-powered P-8 Poseidon are designed to take photos of the land and sea far below, not of…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.
American Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is paying his first visit to Asia this week. Just before he left, Acting Assistant Secretary of State Susan Thornton told reporters the Trump Administration “will have its own formulation” of the Pacific pivot, or the rebalance to Asia declared by the Obama Administration. “Pivot, rebalance, etcetera — that was a word that was…
By Maj. Paul Smith