Lockheed Fined, Ordered To Fix National Security Cutter Radios; Whistleblower Suit

Lockheed Fined, Ordered To Fix National Security Cutter Radios; Whistleblower Suit
Lockheed Fined, Ordered To Fix National Security Cutter Radios; Whistleblower Suit

WASHINGTON: A Lockheed Martin engineer risked much claiming his company knew the radio system it was building for the Coast Guard didn’t work as advertised. The company settled the suit, agreeing to pay $2.2 million in fines and to fix the radios on the National Security Cutters, which should cost another $2.2 million. The whistleblower,…

Beyond LCS: Navy Looks To Foreign Frigates, National Security Cutter

Beyond LCS: Navy Looks To Foreign Frigates, National Security Cutter
Beyond LCS: Navy Looks To Foreign Frigates, National Security Cutter

[UPDATED with Sec. Stackley comments] WASHINGTON: The Navy is seriously considering derivatives of foreign designs and the Coast Guard’s National Security Cutter for its new frigate, after three years pursuing an upgraded version of its current Littoral Combat Ship. The shift has shaken up the industry, panicking some players, while others quietly reposition: Wisconsin’s Marinette Marine,…

Coast Guard Dodges Big Trump Budget Bullet; But Coasties Fix Roofs

Coast Guard Dodges Big Trump Budget Bullet; But Coasties Fix Roofs
Coast Guard Dodges Big Trump Budget Bullet; But Coasties Fix Roofs

WASHINGTON: The White House has dropped plans for a 14 percent cut to the Coast Guard, instead promising a budget that “sustains current funding levels.” The bad news is that “current funding levels” are already too low. The Coast Guard has to give almost 600 drug shipments a pass each year because they don’t have the ships or planes to catch…

Navy League Denounces Trump’s Coast Guard Cuts

Navy League Denounces Trump’s Coast Guard Cuts
Navy League Denounces Trump’s Coast Guard Cuts

WASHINGTON: The Navy League of the United States just issued a withering denunciation of President Trump‘s proposed $1.3 billion cut to the Coast Guard. Trump’s 2018 budget plan has already come under fire from both sides. Democrats reject it for cutting domestic spending too much. Pro-military Republicans reject it for raising defense too little. The Republican…

2018 Budget Battle Between Defense, Budget Hawks Begins; Nukes Top Priority

2018 Budget Battle Between Defense, Budget Hawks Begins; Nukes Top Priority
2018 Budget Battle Between Defense, Budget Hawks Begins; Nukes Top Priority

CAPITOL HILL: The Republican chairman of the House Armed Services Committee thinks President Trump’s 2018 spending plan is dead on arrival and has already gone to the Budget Committee to get a much bigger defense budget. Mac Thornberry also doesn’t want defense increases offset by steep cuts to the Coast Guard or State Department, as Trump proposed. Thornberry…

Trump, Kelly, & The Coast Guard: Exclusive Interview With Adm. Zukunft

Trump, Kelly, & The Coast Guard: Exclusive Interview With Adm. Zukunft
Trump, Kelly, & The Coast Guard: Exclusive Interview With Adm. Zukunft

With the election of Donald Trump as the next President of the United States and with Trump’s nomination of Gen. John Kelly for Secretary of Homeland Security, life is going to change for the US Coast Guard. Trump’s campaign focused intently on border security, asking a fundamental question: Why do we send thousands of troops…

Coast Guard To Navy: Arctic’s Covered; White House OKs Arctic Icebreaker

Coast Guard To Navy: Arctic’s Covered; White House OKs Arctic Icebreaker
Coast Guard To Navy: Arctic’s Covered; White House OKs Arctic Icebreaker

[updated with Adm. Greenert comment] WASHINGTON: While the Navy pivots to the Pacific, the Coast Guard has got their northern flank: the once icebound but now rapidly opening waters of the Arctic Ocean, with its new opportunities for oil, gas, and trade through the fabled Northwest Passage. For the chronically underfunded and “oversubscribed” service, however, the…

Defending the Littorals: A Key Challenge For U.S. Pacific Strategy

This is the second in a series of commentaries defense consultant and author Robbin Laird, a member of the Breaking Defense Board of Contributors, is penning about how the U.S. can and should shape its forces to perform the Asia strategy pivot. As a key part of that, he’ll be looking closely at what he…

Shrinking Coast Guard Must Cut Drug War To Boost Cyber, Arctic

NATIONAL HARBOR, MD: The Coast Guard is shrinking and may have to cut back on traditional missions like fisheries protection and drug interdiction to free up resources for new issues like cybersecurity and the thawing of the Arctic, warned the service’s commandant, Admiral Robert J. Papp, this morning at the Navy League’s annual Sea-Air-Space convention.…

Shaping the Coasties’s Strategic Decline: One Platform Cut at a Time

When Congress considers funding a ship or a plane or a helicopter, the focus is often narrow: what does it cost this year? The Hill often ignores the impact of moving money for critical platforms to future budgets. Also, the strategic and tactical costs to the country of delaying a platform acquisition costs the country…