July 10, 2013 Military Aviation News
07/10/2013
Military installations and defense contractors are taking the brunt of the automatic budgets cuts mandated by sequestration. Why should we care? Washington has major bases and military suppliers such as Boeing. They contribute more than $13 billion to our economy, or about 4 percent of total gross domestic product. A July 2012 study by George Mason University projected that sequestration could cost our state 41,000 military-related jobs.
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07/10/2013
The first F-35B Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter ever to land at Cherry Point taxied up to Fleet Readiness Center East Tuesday morning. The stealth jet, Navy Bureau Number 168059, is only the second production model of the F-35B to be completed by manufacturer Lockheed Martin. It arrived at the FRC East maintenance and repair facility as the first F-35B to enter a modification program that officials have said would be vital to the maintenance of the entire fleet of fifth-generation aircraft.
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07/10/2013
At the Paris Air Show the Gripen folks, SaaB Group. very deliberately floated an interesting idea. Since the Gripen uses fly-by-wire technology and advanced avionics which virtually eliminate the need for a pilot during normal flight, why not take the software to the next step and turn the fighters into optionally manned aircraft that can be controlled by a pilot in another Gripen.
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07/10/2013
Israel Military Industries, one of the Jewish state's leading defense companies, has completed development of its long-range MARS precision air-launched rocket, which appears to have capabilities similar to the missiles the air force reportedly used to hit targets in Syria in May.
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07/10/2013
According to Channel 10, all of the squadrons employed aging planes and were scheduled to be cut in several years’ time anyway, due to high operation costs. “This is just the beginning,” a senior Defense Ministry official warned Tuesday. “We must stop burying our heads in the sand. The public does not understand that we are facing an earthquake,” he said, adding that the 2013 and 2014 defense budgets face a combined cut of nearly 8 billion shekels ($2.2 billion).
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07/10/2013
Prominent US senators on Tuesday called for the Obama administration to suspend all aid to Egypt — including military assistance — unless the interim government meets certain standards. The Egyptian military is heavily dependent on nearly $1.5 billion in annual aid it receives from the United States. But the military has come under increasing pressure after forcing from power former President Mohamed Morsi, then days later reportedly opening fire on some of his supporters.
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07/10/2013
The steady progress of smart rockets continues as area-fire 70-mm unguided rockets are upgraded into precision, laser-guided weapons that are a fraction of the cost and weight of existing missiles such as the Hellfire.
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07/10/2013
The future of electronic combat came into focus on Monday, and it looks like Raytheon will be leading the way. The Massachusetts-based technology company won a very tough competition to develop the defense department’s next airborne jamming system, defeating two other world-class teams. If Raytheon performs as expected, it will dominate the arcane world of electronic warfare for decades to come, generating many billions of dollars in revenues.
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07/10/2013
Without a lot of opposition from the U.S. Air Force, the ground support mission is being replaced by GPS guided rockets and artillery shells, as well as a growing assortment of guided missiles controlled by ground forces. The air force was never comfortable with the ground support (of ground combat troops) mission.
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07/10/2013
Russia’s new aerospace defense system will ensure guaranteed detection of enemy ballistic and long-range cruise missiles at blastoff, a top military official said Tuesday. General Staff chief Valery Gerasimov said the system would feature advanced information-gathering, data-processing and attack capabilities with an early-warning radar system to be deployed along the entire Russian border.
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