The Navy is set to release plans to buy an extra fast-attack sub, another destroyer, and a handful of unmanned boats. Next step: Congress.
By Paul McLearyAre big, expensive vessels like amphibious ships and carriers too vulnerable in a long-range missile war with Russia or China?
By Paul McLearyCAPITOL HILL The head of the Navy’s Columbia-class nuclear submarine program says that the program, despite earlier concerns over cost, schedule, and industrial base issues, is set to meet its goal of a first deployment in 2031, putting the service’s most expensive and consequential program on track. The boats will come just in time to…
By Paul McLearyMost of the system that allows the president to launch nuclear weapons and to know what the enemy is doing with theirs is ancient. No one yet agrees what it must replaced with. And no one knows how much it will cost, although late last month the Congressional Budget Office issued an estimate of $77 billion.
By Colin Clark“We’ve spent a lot of time over the past years playing defense,” Rear Adm. Ronald Boxall, director of surface warfare, said at the West 2019 conference here. “The best defense is a good offense, and the idea that we will go after the threat — at range — is something that we have to be able to do.”
By Paul McLearyBoeing, Lockheed, Dassault Aviation of France, the European Eurofighter consortium, Sweden’s Saab, and United Aircraft Corporation of Russia are all jockeying for position for an Indian fighter contract worth $15 billion for 110 planes, and an $8 billion navy program of around 60 aircraft.
By Paul McLearyTEL AVIV: With over 80 percent of Israeli’s commerce carried by sea and its offshore gas fields crucial to the economy, the country is boosting spending on protecting its shipping lanes, littorals and ports with an array of weapons including underwater capabilities, heavily armed patrol boats and new submarines. Hezbollah sees the large natural gas…
By Arie EgoziPENTAGON: In his first day on the job, acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan gathered civilian leaders of the military services to deliver a simple message: “China, China, China.”
By Paul McLearyIt’s a major shift after decades in which submarines focused on projecting power ashore, with their only anti-ship weapons being their rarely-used torpedoes. Driving the change: increasing anxiety about China.
By Paul McLearyCAPITOL HILL: Navy readiness is “heading in the wrong direction,” the Government Accountability Office told the Senate this morning, with only 15 percent of Navy F-35Cs rated “fully mission capable.” At the same hearing, a four-star admiral acknowledged three nuclear-powered attack submarines were still stuck awaiting overhaul, with the USS Boise expected to be out of action…
By Paul McLearyThe Arctic will become increasingly crowded in the coming years, and the US Navy’s Second Fleet is making it a priority to get up there more often.
By Paul McLearyWASHINGTON: The once-revolutionary prospects of the Navy’s Zumwalt-class destroyer continue to be whittled away. Having lost some of its touted stealth capabilities and suffered a series of engine and electrical problems, now it’s likely to ditch its long-troubled gun. The Advanced Gun System on the Zumwalt never lived up to its billing. When the Navy…
By Paul McLearyThe Russians played around at the edges of this month’s Trident Juncture exercise in Norway, but that was to be expected. New moves in the Baltic Sea, however, have some concerned.
By Paul McLeary
In the coming clash between President Trump’s $750 billion defense budget and House Democrats’ desire to cut Pentagon spending, especially on nuclear weapons, there will be tremendous fiscal pressure to shortchange the almost $30 billion annual cost to modernize America’s strategic deterrent. The ideological cover for such penny-wise, pound-foolish cuts is the so-called Global Zero…
By Peter Huessy