Defense Watch

Defense Daily, Nov 13, 2006

The Latest Word On Trends And Developments In Aerospace And Defense

Open the Gates. The Senate plans to soon take up the nomination of former CIA Director Robert Gates as a replacement for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, whose resignation was announced by President Bush last week. The Senate intends to return after the Thanksgiving holiday to start confirmation hearings during the week of Dec. 4. Dec. 22 is the last feasible day the Senate could be in session, a Senate aide said Nov. 9, but "we would hope in wouldn't go to the bitter end."

Lame Duck Dealing. The U.S.-India civil nuclear agreement is likely to pass during the lame duck session according to Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and according to a Republican Senate official, who spoke to reporters on background yesterday. Before leaving for recess, the Senate did not reach a unanimous consent agreement. But Sen. Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), the Senate Majority Leader, will ask Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) and Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.), the chairman of the International Relations Committees to work on a common text that would normally be a conference agreement. "That'll happen," the aide says. "That is the cornerstone of next week."

Awaiting Answers. Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) told reporters last week that he was still waiting for answers to questions and at least 50 documents from Douglas Feith, the former Pentagon under secretary of defense for policy, who is being investigated for distorting pre-war intelligence on Iraq. The case has been assigned to the Defense Department's Inspector General, but Feith has "ducked" providing answers for years, Levin said Nov. 8.

Growing Precision. The Air Force plans to launch its next Global Positioning System (GPS) navigation satellite into orbit on Wednesday of this week from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla., aboard a Boeing Delta II rocket. The new satellite, which is designated GPS Block IIR-16 (M), is the third modernized Block IIR spacecraft to go into orbit. Once it is in place, the service will enjoy a constellation of 30 GPS satellites. The Air Force says the constellation may grow to 32 spacecraft based on the longevity of the on-orbit assets and the schedule of their replenishment. The GPS Block IIR-M model features two new signals and enhanced encryption and anti-jamming capabilities for military users as well as a second civil signal.

Osprey Rising. Air Force Special Operations Command plans to take delivery of its first operational CV-22 Osprey tiltrotor aircraft on Thursday at Hurlburt Field, Fla. Army Gen. Doug Brown, commander of U.S. Special Operation Command, will pilot the aircraft and lead a ceremony upon landing to commemorate the event. The Air Force intends to field 50 CV-22s by 2017. They will be used to conduct long-range infiltration and exfiltration as well as resupply missions during nighttime operations.

Defining the Threat. Air defenses in the hands of potential U.S. adversaries today are approaching the level of technological sophistication to make them able to dramatically impact how the United States and its coalition partners conduct air warfare, says Brig. Gen. Andrew Dichter, deputy director for Joint Integration on the Air Staff. While modern surface-to-air missile systems are usually considered "conventional" threats in Pentagon parlance, their formidable attributes, such as keep-out ranges up to 200 nautical miles and increasingly networked, redundant and automated command-and-control infrastructures, make them more game-changing or "disruptive" capabilities and a cause for concern, he contends.

Space Jammer. The idea of jamming an adversary's air defenses from space is feasible today, says Air Force Maj. Tim Sands, who is currently pursuing a doctorate degree at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, Calif. Speaking only for himself and not as a representative of the Air Force, Sands says his analysis shows that jammers placed in low Earth orbit could effectively interfere with air defense systems. There are some limitations to space-based jammers, he acknowledges, such as the large size that they would need to be to be effective at distances of thousands of kilometers, and the short intervals-- between four and 10 minutes--that they would have over the target on a single orbit. Sands says the radar used by NASA during its Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) in February 2000 aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour to map the globe operated at the same frequency as the Serbian SA-2 air defenses that frustrated NATO combat aircraft during Operation Allied Force in 1999. The SRTM system could have effectively jammed the Serbian air defenses, he claims.

Helping Out. Come Jan. 26, Air Force electronic warfare (EW) personnel will deploy with Army units most likely in Afghanistan to assist the land service as its builds up its own EW expertise. "They are going through training right now," says Col. Richard Rankin, chief of the Air Staff's electronic warfare and cyber warfare requirements division, of the airmen. "This is something that we have never done before." Presently the Army has no organic EW assets and must rely instead on the other services. However, it is in the midst of making EW a core competency and establishing its own cadre of specialists, says Lt. Col. Chip Bircher, deputy director of the Army's EW proponent office. Today 295 Navy EW personnel support the Army in Iraq, he says.