UAVs are finally entering aerial combat. How did we miss this?

Dave wrote an article about the Navy's UAV that will be Tomcat sized.  But in doing so he buried the lead.  Read the article here, but this is what we all missed.  Air Power purist should be afraid.  They should be very afraid...

But Manazir cautioned that the UCLASS will not be nearly as stealthy as the F-35C.
“We’re not going have JSF-like stealth,” Manazir said. “You’re not going to have somebody that can go right over the top—you know—of the threat capital city, but you’re going to have something that can stand in somewhat.”
Alternatively, the UCLASS might be useful as a flying missile magazine to supplement the firepower of the F/A-18 and F-35C in air-to-air combat as a robotic wingman of sorts.
“Maybe we put a whole bunch of AMRAAMs (Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile) on it and that thing is the truck,” Manazir said. “So this unmanned truck goes downtown with—as far as it can go—with a decision-maker.”
In those situations, Manazir said, a Northrop Grumman E-2D Hawkeye or a F-35C flight leader might command the UCLASS.
But the concepts for what missions the Navy might offload from manned aircraft to the UCLASS are still evolving.

So you're sitting there asking...Why should air power purist be afraid.  Its not only because someone is taking the idea of arming a UAV with AMRAAMs to potentially fire them at manned fighters.  Its because the guy who is making these statements is Rear Adm. Mike Manazir, the Navy's Director of Air Warfare.

He was diplomatic.

He deferred to the F-35C whenever he could.  But its obvious that the US Navy is definitely thinking beyond the F-35C when it comes to their air systems. One other tidbit caught my attention and I might be reading more into it than it deserves but check this out...

The Navy hopes to use the UCLASS as an aerial refueling tanker to extend the range of the tactical fighter fleet—particularly the Lockheed Martin F-35C Joint Strike Fighter. “We’re going to put a refueling capability into them and they’ll have an endurance package in them,” Manazir said. “They’ll be able to give away something like 20,000 lbs. of gas and still stay up for seven-and-a-half hours.”

By combining two tasks.  ISR and aerial refueling, the Navy is playing the game the right way.  They'll get the UAVs they want, at the size they want without threatening the F-35C program...at first anyway.  Its slick, as some would say its "strategic marketing" and it should get the plane past the bean counters.

This is gonna get good. 

The Brits still doing good work in the Philippines.

We made a huge splash and highlighted the Marine Expeditionary Brigade and the MV-22.

The Brits, Australians, Japanese and Chinese quietly got to work and continue on task.

We pulled out.

Now tell me.  Who's playing chess in the Pacific and who is just playing for the cameras.  The Brits don't even want bases in the Philippines but they're stacking up huge points with the local populace.  Whats worse is that we had the Chinese back peddling...they were embarrassed by the lack of aid they sent and we could have easily exploited the opening that gave us.  Instead we let them back in the game and now they're coming out of this better than we are.  We need new leadership if this Pacific tilt is serious.

There has to be more to this story...

More outrageous treatment of our military. Army 1LT Clint Lorance from Celeste Texas, a 28 year old ground combat platoon leader in the 82d Airborne Division was just sentenced to 20 years in Ft. Leavenworth on two counts of murder. In July 2012, 1LT Lorance ordered the engagement of two Taliban scouts who were tracking his platoon's movements while on a patrol in Kandahar province, a platoon that had recently experienced losses, including the previous Platoon Leader. According to our ridiculous Rules of Engagement, soldiers in a combat zone are told to hold their fire unless there is evidence of hostile action or direct hostile intent. I spent two and a half years in southern Afghanistan, and we all knew the Taliban utilized fighters on motorcycles and cell phones as scout/trackers. If there are enemy combatants reporting your patrol movements in order to facilitate an attack, how is that not hostile intent? CPT William Miller, the government prosecutor, said1LT Lorance "used his rank and position to harass, intimidate, threaten, and murder Afghans." What an incredible dilemma for our men and women in combat: fight and kill the enemy and be sent to prison. Or be killed by the enemy and be denied your death gratuity benefits. This is utter BS and I implore true Americans, and veterans, to melt down the White House, DoD, and Department of the Army phone lines and email.

The above is from US Palm Facebook Page.

This is an issue that I THOUGHT had been taken care of.  This isn't the first time (if it was a mistake) or the last time that Afghans tracking our troops will be engaged.  If the ROE are this tight then we're expecting perfection in the sloppiest of human endeavours.

There has to be more to this story.

Must read article by Captain Brett Friedman, USMC

No spoilers.  Read it here.  Thanks for the tip Don!!!

Crowds are dangerous and people are insane.

The proper application of firepower can solve numerous problems...

Crowds are dangerous and people are insane.  Fact.

I avoid large gatherings of people like the plague.  Maybe I'm secretly anti-social, maybe because they make me nervous...maybe because I keep reading stuff like this.  Read the it all here (with videos) but the juicy parts....

On Christmas Night over 600 kids and teenagers swarmed a movie theater in Jacksonville, Florida violently attacking moviegoers, an off duty police officer, and each other in one of the largest flash mobs to date.
Somewhere around 600 crazed teens swarmed the theater attacking people and stealing everything in sight. 62 police officers were dispatched to the theater, where they had to fire pepper spray into the crowd to get them to disperse.

And then this...

At the same time, another flash mob swarmed a mall in Brooklyn, New York. In this case, over 400 teens stormed a Brooklyn mall violently attacking security guards, shoppers and each other. Local reports say that while part of the flash mob was violently raiding stores around the mall, another large group of teens strategically targeted innocent shoppers as part of the now infamous knockout game.  According to police, the teens in both areas used social media sites like Facebook and Twitter to plan the violent attacks and mass looting events. Even while events unfolded, teens were still taking to the internet to brag about beating up innocent people and looting stores.

We talked about the appropriate firearms and the rounds carried.  In my opinion if you aren't planning on facing off against multiple attackers then you're fooling yourself.

And if you're still a movie goer or mall shopper you're in denial.  Hangouts for the younger set are just breeding grounds for stupidity and criminality. 

F-35B/C and the case for Marine Corps A-10's.

Thanks for the article Conrad.

via Aviation Week

Since the summer, the case for buying 340 F-35Bs for the Marines has been weakened by the service's admission that only 10% of operations will use the heavy, expensive short-takeoff-and-vertical-landing kit. What that implies is that the F-35B will only do Stovl when it is part of small detachments on amphibious-warfare ships; 100 F-35Bs would be more than enough for that.
So what replaces the majority, expeditionary land-based piece of Marine air, now equipped with aging Hornets? The Marines are all about close air support (CAS). They want to operate from runways that are shorter and rougher than most fighters need. Wouldn't it be great if someone had a force of around 200 dedicated CAS aircraft they were trying to divest?
They do and they are. They're called A-10s (AW&ST Dec. 9, p. 15) and transferring them to the Marines would do more than create a durable, focused force to provide CAS, not just for the Marines but for the Army and special operations forces. It would give the Navy's army's air force a mission.

Read it here, but despite the "dig" about the Navy's Army's Air Force, I'm leaning in Sweetman's direction.

Why?

Because the F-35 is doing more than simply wrecking the Marine Corps budget.  Its also taking Marine Air further away from its primary mission of supporting the grunt on the ground.  The F-35 could actually become a game changer, just not in the way intended.  That airplane could actually be the end of close air support in the manner in which Marines have enjoyed it for over 100 years.  Instead of prompt and enthusiastic support from the "wing" we could instead be stuck with brand new aircraft that perform at a lower level than the airplanes they replace.

The A-10C (which the USAF just refurbished) could be a safeguard against that.  That's why I like Sweetman's idea (shared by many...he just "formalized" it).

Sidenote:  One additional thing.  The mess that is the F-35B has caused not only financial problems for the USMC but has had a knock on effect of throwing procurement into a tailspin.  When the EFV was canned it was with the idea that a new vehicle would quickly be procured.  That effort has waned.  The only thing that has been on track is the MV-22 buy (which has been accelerated) but other important decisions have been shelved...the MPC, ACV, JLTV...and others are all taking a backseat to the F-35.

USMC Propaganda Playbook. Current as of 12Dec2013.

Uh Wow.  Once I dismissed the talk of the Marine Corps propaganda machine as being a fiction put forward by people of other services that didn't have the 'elan of the Marine Machine.  How naive was I?  Seems very.  Check this out...

  Playbook_20121212

Talking points on everything from the F-35 to the female PFT.  Want to know whats even more insidious about this?  I would bet valuable body parts that its aimed at Marines first, retirees and vets, law makers and finally the general public.  I had thought the indoctrination stopped at boot camp.  I was wrong....

F-35. The Pentagon and Lockheed conspired to make it cancel proof.

via The National Interest.

But the problem in this case is that the death spiral won’t lead to the actual death of the F-35. The fighter has, effectively, become unkillable. In the wake of negative experiences with the B-2 Spirit, the F-22 Raptor, and several other programs, Lockheed Martin and the Pentagon worked very hard to ensure that no one could kill the F-35. Three US services committed to acquiring substantial numbers of Joint Strike Fighters, with only minimal hedging with respect to alternatives. International partners bought in, often at considerable political cost. The result is an aircraft that perhaps should undergo a “death spiral,” but cannot; no matter how expensive the cheap alternative to the F-22 becomes, it cannot be killed. It is what it is, and we’re stuck with it.

& 

The battle against the F-35, at least in the domestic context, was lost before anyone beyond Lockheed Martin thought about fighting it. We’ll build it, and for better or worse we’ll have to live with it. This is a lesson that Congress and the Pentagon should take to heart when considering the Next-Generation Bomber, the Flight III Arleigh Burke destroyer, and a variety of other major procurement programs. In retrospect, the United States should have hedged by devoting more attention to the F-22 (a position that this author, to his discredit, opposed at the time) or to legacy platforms. But the future of air warfare is hard to predict, and the F-35 may yet do extraordinary things.

This article is written by Robert Farley and can be read here.

I take issue with the writer on a couple of points.  We can and should kill this program now.  To say that it is unkillable is to put ourselves at the mercy of the Pentagon and Lockheed Martin.  They aren't infallible and they should be held accountable. Will there be a price to pay?  Yes.  Should we pay it?  Most definitely.  Like an injury, this will only get worse the longer we let it go untreated.  The penicillin for the disease that is this program is to kill it poste haste.

One thing I do agree with the writer on is the fact that this is a warning sign.  This is the military industrial complex at its worse and the monster that we were warned about.  It would take an extremely strong President and SecDef to do what must be done.  We have neither.  It would also take men and women of character in Congress.  Again we're lacking.

The men and women of the military might be worthy of continued respect by the population.  Military leadership...along with the leadership of Lockheed is not.  They have literally committed a crime against the public. Tell me again why we don't have an FBI investigation into this program?

Note:  After reading this article one thing has become clear.  The driver behind the F-35 program is always said to be the USMC.  I wonder if that is true now.  The author cites USAF experience with the B-2 and the F-22 as being the primary reason for the structure of this program.  It now appears to me that the Air Force sat back and watched the Marine Corps doing the blocking and tackling for the F-35 while they were the architects of the program.  Deceitful and brilliant.

1st Walker Bulldog Tank - 1951 via ELP Blog.

Which would be worse. Economic collapse or long lasting malaise?

via The Washington Examiner.

A top financial advisor, worried that Obamacare, the NSA spying scandal and spiraling national debt is increasing the chances for a fiscal and social disaster, is recommending that Americans prepare a “bug-out bag” that includes food, a gun and ammo to help them stay alive.
David John Marotta, a Wall Street expert and financial advisor andForbes contributor, said in a note to investors, “Firearms are the last item on the list, but they are on the list. There are some terrible people in this world. And you are safer when your trusted neighbors have firearms.”
His memo is part of a series addressing the potential for a “financial apocalypse.” His view, however, is that the problems plaguing the country won't result in armageddon. “There is the possibility of a precipitous decline, although a long and drawn out malaise is much more likely,” said the Charlottesville, Va.-based president of Marotta Wealth Management.

This story is burning up parts of the social media.

I think everyone is missing the real scary (at least to me) part of this story.  An economic meltdown would be harsh.  It would catch many by surprise and it would jolt the Federal government to deal with many issues they're unwilling to face up to today.

Entitlements (all of them, even to the elderly and poor).  Budget deficits.  A jacked up trade policy etc...

A meltdown of the economy would focus everyone on real problems instead of the nonsense that we see today.  But what if we got hit with a long lasting malaise instead?  How would our population and politicians react to that?

I don't know and quite honestly that is the scarier proposition. 

5th Gen Club via War Machine.

The 5th Gen Club is bigger than I thought.  What will using AESA Arrays as electronic weapons, aerial lasers, extended range/hyper velocity missiles and other things being worked on affect Gen 6?  Could we return to a day when "the need for speed" from the '50's is in vogue again?   Seems a portion of the USAF thinks so.  Prompt Global Strike anyone?

National Guard stabs Regular Army in the back.

via USAToday.

WASHINGTON -- The National Guard hopes to gain from pending cuts to the regular Army's ranks, arguing that part-time soldiers are more cost-effective than their active-duty peers and could save $13 billion annually.
The Guard's gambit, revealed in interviews and documents obtained by USA TODAY, exposes a widening rift among and between the services as the fight over funding intensifies in the era of Pentagon austerity. Guard leaders maintain that the Army could be cut to as few as 420,000 soldiers if the Guard is allowed to expand. Army leaders say a force that small cannot defend the nation. The Army has about 540,000 soldiers now and is scheduled to reduce its ranks to 490,000 by 2017. Dipping below 450,000 soldiers could prevent the Army from winning a war, according to documents.

Read it all here.

This is heartbreaking.  My naive view of the Army and Guard was that they were siblings.  Close, and with an unbreakable bond.

The Guard is seeking to destroy the Army while inflating itself.

That is skullduggery of the worst kind.

Glock 42. Wrong caliber. Wrong capacity. Wrong gun.

Photo and article via Moderno.

In the past few weeks the forums and gun blogs have been buzzing with talk of two new Glock pistols to be announced next month (January), presumably at SHOT Show: the Glock 41 and 42. It looks like we now know what the Glock 42 is thanks to leaked images – a single-stack .380.
Honestly I’m shocked it took this long to leak – Glock really did a good job keeping this under wraps so long. The photos look to be the cover and article insert from a gun magazine (I’m guessing Guns & Ammo) and appear to be the real deal.

Read it all here.

This is the wrong gun on so many levels.  First the caliber.  380?  Are you kidding me?  That has no stopping power and would depend on bullet placement alone to take down an attacker.  Most experts recommend 9mm at a minimum and I believe them.  That was Glocks first mistake.

The next is the capacity of the gun.  6 shots?  Pathetic.  The reason why 9mm is so popular is because it allows the carriage of a large (relatively) number of rounds to be carried.  This defeats that.  The same can be said of the S&W Shield.  It might be popular (single stacks) but that don't make it right.

My last point is simply this.  Does anyone that takes self defense seriously really buy into these baby weapons?  If you're even partially paying attention to the news and to crime then its obvious that in this day and age the threat of multiple attackers is a concern.  The knock out game.  Home invasions.  You're lucky if you're only facing two bad guys.

This is the wrong gun.

I have no hope for the Glock 41 either. 

China's B-2. They copy and modify again.

Thanks for the pics Nico!

Above you see China's New Years gift to the Pentagon. The hits keep coming.

Z-20 flies. We're going to be fighting our doppelganger.

Thanks for the article Jonathan!

via Aviation Week.

A Chinese military utility helicopter roughly equivalent to the Sikorsky H-60 made its first flight on Dec. 23, state media report.
The helicopter, with the unconfirmed designation Z-20, is a 10-metric-ton (22,000 lb.) aircraft suitable for operation from high-altitude fields, China Central Television says. For almost three decades, China has relied on 24 UH-60 Black Hawks bought in the 1980s for such operations.
The Z-20 is externally similar to the Sikorsky helicopter. The body is low relative to its height, and the undercarriage has a tailwheel arrangement.
It can be taken for granted that Chinese engineers, tasked with building an aircraft similar to the H-60 and having samples available, will have referred closely to the U.S. design as they drew up their own. Further, the Chinese military may simply regard the H-60 configuration as highly suitable for the military utility mission.
A notable difference is the five-blade rotor; the H-60’s rotor has four blades.
The first flight took place at in northeastern China, the television network says. That strongly suggests that the aircraft is a product of Harbin Aircraft, part of Avic rotary wing division Avicopter.
A 10-ton military helicopter should have much the same potential applications as the H-60 and NH Industries NH90 offer to Western users, including battlefield transport and antisubmarine warfare. Depending on how far the design is compromised by its primarily military functions, it may also be useful for Chinese civil operators, but cannot have airworthiness certification recognized by Western aviation authorities, limiting its salability abroad.
The 10-ton category has been a notable gap in Avicopter’s increasingly complete range of helicopters, which runs from 1 to 13 tons gross weight, including several types in development.

When war comes between the US and China...and it will come...we're going to be fighting our doppelganger.  They're going to look very, very much like us.

Except they're going to have newer gear and in some cases gear that we wanted but got canned because another concept won the politics of the Pentagon.

It is interesting that we're so focused on small wars, tribal conflicts, piracy and terrorism that we're going to be poorly equipped to handle a peer competitor.

Oh and dump the near peer stuff already.  Between a manpower advantage, and a closing tech gap, I think we can say that China definitely is able to achieve local superiority across the board in certain regions of the Pacific.  Today.  Not in 10 or 20 years. 

Merry Christmas!

I don't understand the Israelis.

via DefenseTech.

Secret U.S. missile and electro-optics technology was transferred to China recently by Israel, prompting anger from the U.S. and causing a senior Israeli defense official to resign.
The head of defense exports for the Israeli Defense Ministry resigned after a U.S. investigation concluded that technology, including a miniature refrigeration system manufactured by Ricor and used for missiles and in electro-optic equipment, was sent to China, according to the Israeli newspaper Maariv.
Another Israeli news site, Aretz Sheva, reports the U.S. is concerned the technology could ultimately find its way to Iran, which last year sought to buy military equipment from China for its nuclear program.

Read it all here.

This is a continuing problem.  Quite frankly, after the LAVI issue I thought that the Israelis would get a better handle on things.  They haven't though.  Additionally Chinese Special Ops personnel train in Israel and they have a famed international security academy that is pumping out Chinese security pros like a pez dispenser.

I'm a friend of Israel but this is disturbing, makes me wonder if our interests actually align and make selling them any high tech gear questionable.

CRH-60. ParaRescue gets their bird.

Thanks for the article Jonathan.

via Fool.com

December 24, 2013
The Department of Defense announced 24 new defense contracts Monday, with a combined value of $1.66 billion. The biggest of these awards, by a large margin, was the $724 million contract modification that United Technologies subsidiary Sikorsky Aircraft Corp just landed.
Accounting for nearly 44% of all funds on offer Monday, Sikorsky's contract hires the company to supply the DoD with 33 UH-60M Black Hawk transport helicopters and 24 HH-60M combat search-and-rescue helicopters, plus associated program management, systems engineering, provisioning, and logistics services. These funds cover planned purchases of third lot-year helicopters under the underlying contract, and also contribute funds in advance for lot-years four and five (which may be applied to termination fees if those outlying years' helicopters are ultimately not bought).
Delivery of this year's lot of helos is due by June 30, 2015.

That was a real short campaign by the PJ's and Sikorsky.  They got their helicopters.

Was all the fuss they raised really necessary?

Royal Marines in for a tough year via UK Armed Forces Commentary

via UKAFC.

From the outside, the picture for the Royal Marines is unpleasant to say the least: all their main projects appear to have been killed; one Bay LSD has been sold off; one LPD is in mothball and HMS Ocean is to be withdrawn from service in 2019 without a replacement.
848 NAS will disband at the end of the year, having concluded the last training course for Sea King HC4 crews on December 19. 846 NAS has been disbanded already in March, leaving the sole 845 with just 11 Sea Kings. 846 NAS will reform on Merlin HC3/3A in September 2014, with 845 NAS following in August 2015.
It is not expected to reform 848 NAS: 845 will instead include an Operational Conversion Flight. The whole force will include 37 crews and 25 helicopters, unless there are further reductions.
Actually adapting the Merlin for shipboard operations will be a slow affair. The first navalised Merlin is not expected before 2017, and the last won't be around before 2022. For several years, the amphibious force will be extraordinarily poor in dedicate helicopter support.

Read it all here.

Gabrielle does a good job of covering the entire UK military, but the look at the Royal Marines was particularly interesting.  A commando force in nature, things look bleak for those boys.  I look forward to further details. 

Ultra Hornet. Does it deserve a new designation?

Thanks to Joe for the tantalizing question.

The USN when developing the Super Hornet, decided against giving it a new aircraft designation because they believed that Congress was more likely to approve it if they "stressed" that it was an upgrade instead of an entirely new airplane (which it was).

Now we're facing the potential of another major upgrade of the Super Hornet to Ultra Hornet status and the question becomes...does the Ultra Hornet deserve a new designation?

My answer?  Yes.  F/A-36 sings to me.  I know there is a X-36, but this is F/A so maybe it can work, and besides the "36" indicates its twice as good as the previous model (maybe not but I'm marketing here).  Yeah.  F/A-36 is how they should be pushing this thing!