Some unrelated recent military procurment storiess since I am getting bored of Ukraine

[Nevins]

Does anyone know of source on the gun pod for the FS-35 I always see talked about individually (and typically disparagingly vs the A-10 in capacity) I curious if flying in a permissive environment could the USMC strap on more or rockets. I guess I am sort of curious as to how much the Pentagon will pay attention to one of the actual benefits of being the Patron of Israel. The software layer could be really important it seems to me...

The US already uses IAI stuff when it makes sense, the current Whiskey Cobra helmet sight was purchased from the Israeli program for their own (now retired) AH-1s.


And that is exactly what the USMC intends. People about the low ordnance capacity when the aircraft is run slick to be stealthy but you can still attach a shitton of munitions to it if you are utilizing attachable pylons below the wings

As far a the gun issue- jets just don't really strafe anymore. We have tons of AH flavor aircraft that can deliver 20mm if thats what the grunts really want but doctrinally we are shifting more and more towards PGMs because you get a lot more bang for your buck. Those clips of A-10s lighting stuff up always get the blood pumping but a few lobbed APKWS would get much the same effect done and you don't have to set up in that predictable strafing geometry.

[Adar]

Another Eurofighter have crashed, this time a Spanish Eurofighter returning from a display

The accident record for the Eurofighter is getting quite bad. It is however telling that none of the major accidents have happened to the Royal Air Force which are the ones who seem to invest the most time and effort into the aircraft. Flying fighter jets less often is actually often more dangerous than doing it often so I think it is best to only judge the Eurofighter based on its performance in the RAF.

Edit: Now it is confirmed that the pilot unfortunately did not make it out alive.

[Knight_Of_Ne]

That and the RAF are the only airforce who seem serious about the Eurofighter. The others are abandoned projects almost.

[Condottiere 40K]

It's an expensive toy in a shrinking niche market.

[Adar]

Anyone who wish to guess what the string is for?


Sweden is doing weapons testing for its new Self-Propelled Mortar-System named Mjolnir mounted on the CV90 chassis.

On one hand I am very impressed by the project as it has been carried out much faster than any other development project in the last 20 years. Preliminary testing is very promising and as soon as safety testing is finished I've heard that they will drop the string and fire the mortar from inside the platform . It does however hurt to think of the fact that the cost for shutting down the AMOS development project and then restart this project will have been costing more than the far more capable AMOS concept that was cancelled less than 10 years ago as our political leaders underestimated how quickly security conditions can change.

It's an expensive toy in a shrinking niche market.

It will be an amazingly expensive failure for everyone but Britain. It would however be very interesting to see how much the failure of other partners have hurt Britain in the long run. For Sweden this have been very fortunate as the issues for Austrian and German Eurofighters have reduced competition while Gripen now benefits from sharing weapons and certain avionics development with the British Eurofighter.

[Ziltoid]

Anyone who wish to guess what the string is for?

Safest way to "pull the trigger" of artillery is to use rope like that. We did the same plenty in army as i was serving in artillery in FDF.

Sweden is doing weapons testing for its new Self-Propelled Mortar-System named Mjolnir mounted on the CV90 chassis.

On one hand I am very impressed by the project as it has been carried out much faster than any other development project in the last 20 years. Preliminary testing is very promising and as soon as safety testing is finished and they can fire the mortar while inside the vehicle it will be both capable and cost efficient. It does however hurt to think of the fact that the cost for shutting down the AMOS development project and then restart this project will have been costing more than the far more capable AMOS concept that was cancelled less than 10 years ago as our political leaders underestimated how quickly security conditions can change.

It's a shame AMOS got dumped, Finland only got 18 of em, could have easily done double or triple of that. Even more silly as AMOS fits also on CV90, to now go through all the trouble coming up with another similar system when there is already one good working one like AMOS for same purpose.

While were on topic of artillery. Finland bought this year 48 K9 Thunder SPGs from South Korea.



FDF really likes their artillery. We got more than Germany or GB or any other european country, only Russians got more.

WWII experiences certainly play big part of it, as in 1944 massed artillery of 200+ guns aiming 200m x 200m staging areas of Soviet incoming assault halted them before they could even start attacking and played vital part in saving Finland from being invaded.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

The ensuing Finnish concentration of artillery fire was the heaviest in the country's military history.^[31] It was based on the famed fire correction method of Finnish Artillery General Vilho Petter Nenonen, which enabled easy fire correction and quick changes of targets.^[5] At the critical Ihantala sector of the battle, the Finnish defenders managed to concentrate their fire to the extent of smashing the advancing Soviet spearhead.^[31] The clever fire control system enabled as many as 21 batteries, totaling some 250 guns, to fire at the same target simultaneously in the battle; the fire controller did not need to be aware of the location of individual batteries to guide their fire, which made quick fire concentration and target switching possible. The Finnish artillery fired altogether over 122,000 rounds of ordnance. This concentration was considered a world record at the time.^[5] These fire missions managed to halt and destroy Soviet forces that were assembling at their jumping off points. On thirty occasions the Soviet forces destroyed were larger than battalion size.^[10]

Recently it was also found out that we have used some statistical tricks to hide lots of extra artillery pieces, that weren't counted in the official amount of artillery we have. That can be easily pulled out of storage incase war comes.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

First reported by Iltalehti (Finnish newspaper) http://www.iltalehti.fi/uutiset/2016...29469_uu.shtml
Finland quietly doubled the number of artillery pieces from the previous years in the report to OSCE.
In year 2014 Finnish Defense Forces (FDF) reported 647 artillery pieces, this year it reported 1566 artillery pieces.
FDF has been using loophole in the Vienna-agreement. Navy equipment is excluded from the reporting. Apparently Finnish Navy had more field artillery (heavy mortars, howitzers, 155 mm guns) than Army. This year the equipment has been moved under FDF logistics.
According to the article Finnish field artillery is now largest in the Western Europe, seven times larger than what Germany is reporting (223).
FDF refuses to comment why they made the change.

source: https://www.reddit.com/r/geopolitics...n_size_in_the/

[Hmmm]

Anyone who wish to guess what the string is for?


Sweden is doing weapons testing for its new Self-Propelled Mortar-System named Mjolnir mounted on the CV90 chassis.

On one hand I am very impressed by the project as it has been carried out much faster than any other development project in the last 20 years. Preliminary testing is very promising and as soon as safety testing is finished and they can fire the mortar while inside the vehicle it will be both capable and cost efficient. It does however hurt to think of the fact that the cost for shutting down the AMOS development project and then restart this project will have been costing more than the far more capable AMOS concept that was cancelled less than 10 years ago as our political leaders underestimated how quickly security conditions can change.

Hold on, isn't AMOS operational with the Finnish army? Why are we bothering with Mjolnir instead of just picking up AMOS again?

[Ziltoid]

Hold on, isn't AMOS operational with the Finnish army? Why are we bothering with Mjolnir instead of just picking up AMOS again?

Yes we got 18 of em. One shooting in this vid at 1min40s. And driving around 1min05s.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsKuvY6hUDU&t=97

I guess there were plans to make lot more of em and perhaps even export, but since Sweden backed out, only 18 got made for Finland. Sweden even had 40 CV90 hulls ready to fit AMOS, which are apparently the ones now being fitted with this cheaper and likely bit more compromised Mjölner system. Manually loaded instead of autoloader and looks like shorter barrel.

Anyways my guess is that the manufacturing lines and machinery for making AMOS has been ditched at this point. NEMO container is still being made which is 1 mortar instead of 2 for Middle Eastern markets. So perhaps AMOS could have been revived too? Who knows...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLns_5xadtA



ps. Those concept images of Mjölner look like straight outta 90s 3dsmax to the point of being comical.
http://defence-blog.com/army/bae-sys...dish-army.html


It seems Finland is nowdays more interested in buying used equipment to maximise gains from our relatively small budget, as there occasionally comes along cheap offers on used gear. Like the 100 Leopard 2A6s we got fairly cheaply from Netherlands for 200mil euros. K9 Thunders were bought also used.
http://defense-update.com/20140119_f..._leopards.html

[Love Mountain]

It seems Finland is nowdays more interested in buying used equipment to maximise gains from our relatively small budget, as there occasionally comes along cheap offers on used gear. Like the 100 Leopard 2A6s we got fairly cheaply from Netherlands for 200mil euros. K9 Thunders were bought also used.
http://defense-update.com/20140119_f..._leopards.html

Smart way to do things. That's how Asians buy cars and we get a lot of mileage out of our dollar.

[Condottiere 40K]

Not by choice, as the new car smell is gone.

Computer components ...

[Love Mountain]

Ive actually bought a lot of my PC parts used. Just a matter of finding the right seller.

[Hmmm]

Yes we got 18 of em. One shooting in this vid at 1min40s. And driving around 1min05s.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsKuvY6hUDU&t=97

I guess there were plans to make lot more of em and perhaps even export, but since Sweden backed out, only 18 got made for Finland. Sweden even had 40 CV90 hulls ready to fit AMOS, which are apparently the ones now being fitted with this cheaper and likely bit more compromised Mjölner system. Manually loaded instead of autoloader and looks like shorter barrel.

Anyways my guess is that the manufacturing lines and machinery for making AMOS has been ditched at this point. NEMO container is still being made which is 1 mortar instead of 2 for Middle Eastern markets. So perhaps AMOS could have been revived too? Who knows...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLns_5xadtA

Ah, I thought production lines were open in Finland, but it makes sense if they were closed. What a damn shame. Another awesome performance by our shortsighted political leadership.

It seems Finland is nowdays more interested in buying used equipment to maximise gains from our relatively small budget, as there occasionally comes along cheap offers on used gear. Like the 100 Leopard 2A6s we got fairly cheaply from Netherlands for 200mil euros. K9 Thunders were bought also used.
http://defense-update.com/20140119_f..._leopards.html

I read we were looking for long range SAM systems (Patriot or Aster were being considered). Wonder if anything will come off it.

[conon394]

So the US military industrial complex gets another fire sale asset - although not as humiliating as the UK sale of Harriers.

http://www.denel.co.za/press-article...In-America/179

Looks to me like Draken International is primarily a private supplier of red force teams for training the US (and possibly US approved allies?). I think had post here way back on how SA seems not even care to run its Air Force much. These would match solid 80's era soviet gear (maybe even 90's) and look to have relatively low flight times. So safe and they come with spares and a support contract. Draken has other contracts but its hard not to think the Pentagon green lighted this one. They frankly looks like a private arm of the US military.

http://www.drakenintl.com/

So question does anyone in the EU have private air force for red on blue games and sorry for implied cynicism (but not complete paranoia) but stuff the CIA (or equivalent agency) needs

[conon394]

Poor Dönitz he must be rolling in his grave...

Germany has no active subs:

http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the...ubmarine-23688


But than again he can join Nelson since the RN has no CVs (at lest the Russians still have a rusting hulk to tow around for show).

[Love Mountain]

Happy New Years TWC. Haven't been on in a while, not really been busy but I have been working on a fairly massive post for the Academy for the last few weeks. That said, there have been a couple things that caught my eye recently. I can't believe I missed it, butt here is an on-going effort to modernize Taiwan's F-16 fleet to the F-16V Viper standard. Complete with an AESA radar. Now whether Taiwan will get all of the toys like the data links, munitions, and other systems for imaging and so on is something I don't know. I didn't read too much into it. Other customers are Bahrain and Greece apparently, which is surprising but interesting.

Other F16 news I missed is the USAF's potential to upgrade 300+ of their F16 frames to extend their lives an additional 4,000 service hours keeping these planes through 2048. Additionally I've read headlines that the USN is following suit and thinking of ordering more Super Hornets and upgrading their existing fleet.

It's becoming increasingly clear that existing air frames will be kept in service through to 2050 and more of them will be built, albeit heavily modified. This is all pointing to the fact that the F35 project is continuing to be a colossal failure and will not be able to deliver either the quantity or the quality of aircraft it originally promised. Not even close.

[conon394]

This is all pointing to the fact that the F35 project is continuing to be a colossal failure and will not be able to deliver either the quantity or the quality of aircraft it originally promised. Not even close.

I would disagree with that absolutism. The US is certainly paying the price for concurrent production and a better option in two aircraft, colossal is a large overstatement. The title rather should be applied to the literal (non) combat ship. A true disaster that is sorta hiding behind the over hyped negative news for the F-35, so much so the USN tried (and thankfully seems to giving up) using it as the basis for a Frigate.

That said the F-35 is just sucking too much life out of the Defense budget.

So the F-35, it is realistically likely time to pull the plug. It was always a bad ideal too serve 3 masters with one plane. Sunk cost are sunk costs. F-22 is working well, and the The China and Russian Stealth planes look over hyped and stalled. The USMC patched Harrier fleet with the Brit buy, The supper Hornet is available and even the F-15SE Silent Eagle could be had and used on the cheap as patches (I am sure the US F-15 fleet is dire need of new planes). However the need for a STOVL is real to allow small CVs that the US and western allies have so many be available for disbursed fleet air power, but they don't need stealth. They need to good at ground support and available to serve as CAP aircraft. I'm not sure what the navy and air force need but one plane might fit their needs... the USN should pull all of its just refitted and retired A-6s out of mothballs give them a new refurbish and use them the Forever war. Sure they won't be the first in against China, but last time I checked they be great bombing places that have no AA and Air force like say A-stan. Oh and finish the dam already allocated A-10 refurbish and don't retire them. Add ski Jumps to the America class ships to improve capability of whatever STOVL plane they carry.

The real problem for the F-35 is reality vs imagined BVR reality. The F-35 is basically a super BVR platform. And great if you are in a real hot war and have nice fine declared massive exclusion zone and can fire at any thing you see and then stealth is worth the lose of close air maneuverability. But problem is outside of that ideal situation most forces flinch at want confirmation that leads to making engagements close - than the stealth for maneuverability trade is a bad one.

Give Lockheed a single block of funding to - no open purse string to fix and fish the existing F-35s and tie them off. That might focus Lockheed a little better on solving problems a little faster.

Some more signs the Army is facing the fact there will be no Future Land combat system and recalling it still might need armor...

Upgrades to the BFV:

https://warisboring.com/finally-the-...igh-tech-gear/
https://breakingdefense.com/2016/10/...he-m2-bradley/
https://www.defenseindustrydaily.com...updated-02835/

M1A1 Upgrades:

Looks like an immediate upgrade now and second round to done by 2020.

https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-...re-on-the-way/

[Condottiere 40K]

The issue with the Lightninged Too has been and is political: too many influential parties have invested capital and sunken costs.

[conon394]

The issue with the Lightninged Too has been and is political: too many influential parties have invested capital and sunken costs.

Yes I don't think there won't be a cost and if we had a real president - not a toddler in chief. I would think it is a problem that can be solved. The US defense budget is so vast we can certainly afford to coddle our allies with cash vs a bad aircraft and new plans for more specific craft that avoid the issues of the F-35. As I noted its not like Russia or China are not having teething problems a many on their 5th gen aircraft, and so its not like the US and company do not have time to reset.

That said I refine my previous post I would cut the A and C versions and dump everything into the B. It is the one that is flying the best and the one the USN and USA allies need to work to leverage small CVs. The USN and US (air farce) need to simply step back and buy two new aircraft designed for their needs and not some idiotic concurrent production of some all in one wonder weapon.

Sure the Russians and China will mock us but man up - their 5th generation planes look to be hype, simply be honest say we made a mistake and will do better next time with the experience of a failure.

[Love Mountain]

I would disagree with that absolutism. The US is certainly paying the price for concurrent production and a better option in two aircraft, colossal is a large overstatement. The title rather should be applied to the literal (non) combat ship. A true disaster that is sorta hiding behind the over hyped negative news for the F-35, so much so the USN tried (and thankfully seems to giving up) using it as the basis for a Frigate.

I really don't think I am. The plane has fallen far short of its original promise and performance. People make fun of Tesla and how they've missed every production goal they've ever made, but even Tesla is not quite on the level of Lockheed. Pretty sure everyone in the GAO understands the concept of sunk costs. There is a lot of good technology and engineering we've learned from the JSF. Scaling the program back and having a new 15-year development wouldn't be a bad idea. If the budget office is worried about international sales, simply say you are going to deliver the aircraft to international customers first and then reduce the number of planes to be produced for our own military. The F-35 is not a bad plane judging by the recent reports, but it's obviously not the "concept" that the military was sold on almost two decades ago. There is nothing wrong with scaling back the JSF program and aiming for a 2030-2035 time frame instead.

Problematic development is nothing new in the history of American military aviation. The original F-18 hornet was no princess either. It did however develop into an excellent combat platform from the F-18A to the F-18E Super Hornet. Then there's the TFX program and the F-111. It's hard to know what will happen when the next President is in office, but I am hoping that cooler heads will prevail and push a solution to the current problems in military procurement. There is a very serious problem of aging equipment in the military and it's only going to get worse every year. How we handle the JSF program will be a valuable insight into the next several decades as we replace a massive amount of old equipment. Everything from tanks to ships to subs. This is also in light of next generation Russian and Chinese radar systems proliferating other countries. The emphasis on aviation stealth has been a significant mistake by the U.S. military, at least as far as we can tell at this moment. New radar systems, like those developed in the 70s and mass produced in 80s-90s, employ a broad range of frequencies to detect aircraft, while that's been true for the years even before the F-117, the fact of the matter is that these systems have rapidly grown in sophistication and interoperability. The stealth is component is rapidly becoming a non-factor.

[Aanker]

The new transport helicopter project for the army looks so unbelievably cool: http://nordic.businessinsider.com/v2...18-1?r=US&IR=T

The V-280 is intended to replace the black hawk (that's right! The new standard helicopter of the army will be a tiltrotor platform!), but this time it appears the army is going for diversity, and multiple projects are being considered for simultaneous use. Somewhat interesting, considering the aforementioned F-35 project, which was supposed to do everything on it's own. I must admit that the new sci-fi-like helicopters almost make me regret my academic choices, military aeronautical engineering is pretty sweet