Dornier DO 31..

Imagine if this airplane used the engines from the X-32!  It would be able to hover without the need for additional podded lift jets.

It really does seem like nothing is new under the sun and the US Army and Air Forces future lift vehicle has already been solved...all we need to do is to add current tech to it.

SM-72 Tactical Transport.

Stavatti Military Aerospace has come up with another unusual airplane. I have absolutely no idea why a wing in that configuration is considered optimal and their website doesn't give details...but for pure fantasy its hard to beat.

Merry Christmas to you and yours....

F-35A AF-3 In Acceptance Test Facility

F-35A AF-3 is the first flyable F-35 to go through the Acceptance Test Facility. The facility is used to measure radar cross section to ensure that the aircraft meets low observable requirements. The facility was used to test the full-scale pole model of the F-35 in 2009. AF-3 was tested in late October 2010.

Quote of the week...

"Energo - I stand corrected. LockMart has indeed predicted an F-35 unit recurring flyaway cost of $60 million, current dollars, in full production, complete with engine and upholstery protection..."
...Bill Sweetman's response to a post on the "F-35 Target Price Revealed"

ARH...I mean OH-58F moves forward.

via Defense News...

The U.S. Army has decided to move ahead with its F-model upgrade program for the OH-58 Kiowa Warrior, while completing analysis on a future scout helicopter...

...The OH-58F will feature a cockpit and sensor upgrade, including digital flight controls and cockpit displays, nose-mounted sensors and aircraft survivability equipment.
The Army's Armed Reconnaissance Helicopter (ARH) program was supposed to replace the OH-58 Kiowa Warriors, which have seen heavy use in Iraq and Afghanistan. When ARH was canceled in October 2008, the Army began redirecting the program's money toward the effort to keep the Kiowa Warrior flying until 2025...

Is combat making Ranger school unnecessary?

via Stars and Stripes...

After a decade of extended war deployments and with little time back home for training, there is now a “critical” shortage of Rangers needed to fill hundreds of crucial combat leadership positions intended for them across the Army, school officials say.
The dearth is particularly noticeable among noncommissioned officers — the sergeants, staff sergeants and sergeants first class who lead small units of enlisted soldiers through combat — and among all ranks of combat maneuver operators — the infantry, armor, field artillery and cavalry units fighting at the front lines.
Because of the shortage, soldiers without Ranger training increasingly are filling those leadership positions. Officials at the Army’s exclusive Ranger School at Fort Benning, Ga., and elsewhere said lives may be at risk because soldiers are going into battle without the best possible leaders.
“The best life insurance policy that a person can have ... is his leader being Ranger qualified,” said Command Sgt. Maj. Dennis Smith, who heads Fort Benning’s Ranger Training Brigade.
But others, including some who are Ranger qualified, believe that combat trumps training, that the hard-earned Ranger tab worn on the left shoulder after completing a brutal 61-day regimen through mountains, woods and swamps, on minimal food and sleep, is no substitute for years spent fighting real-life enemies in Afghanistan or Iraq.
NCOs with extensive combat experience are good enough for some.
“They’re as qualified as anybody else,” said Sgt. Maj. Thomas Dartez, who earned his tab in 1985, served with the 2nd Ranger Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, and taught at the school twice, most recently in 2004.

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Combat is ultimately the best teacher “because you learn from experience,” Dartez said, using roadside bombs as an example. “Having a tab doesn’t prepare you for that.”

Read the whole thing...fascinating.  It makes the massive push by the former SecDef to get the Marines into the Special Ops arena make more sense.

Misery...

Lance Cpl. Andrew S. Puckett, a rifleman and Aitkin, Minn., native with Fox Company, Battalion Landing Team, 2nd Battalion, 2nd Marine Regiment, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, sits in his fighting hole watching a nearby tree line during a defensive training exercise aboard Fort Pickett, Va., Dec. 10, 2010. The BLT defended a small village against enemy sniper teams and by locating weapons caches. The 22nd MEU is a multi-mission capable force of 2,200 Marines and sailors and comprised of Aviation Combat Element, Marine Tilt Rotor Squadron 263 (Reinforced); Logistics Combat Element, Combat Logistics Battalion 22; Ground Combat Element, Battalion Landing Team, 2nd Battalion, 2nd Marine Regiment; and its command element.

EMALS works!

Outstanding!  via NAVAIR!

Navy launches first aircraft using EMALS

NAVAL AIR SYSTEMS COMMAND PATUXENT RIVER, Md. – The Navy made history Saturday when it launched the first aircraft from the Naval Air Systems Command, Lakehurst, N.J., test site using the Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System, or EMALS, technology.

The Navy has been using steam for more than 50 years to launch aircraft from carriers. Saturday, the Aircraft Launch and Recovery Equipment (ALRE) program launched an F/A-18E Super Hornet using the EMALS technology that will replace steam catapults on future aircraft carriers.

“This is a tremendous achievement not just for the ALRE team, but for the entire Navy,” said Capt. James Donnelly, ALRE program manager. “Saturday’s EMALS launch demonstrates an evolution in carrier flight deck operations using advanced computer control, system monitoring and automation for tomorrow’s carrier air wings.”

EMALS is a complete carrier-based launch system designed for Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78) and future Ford-class carriers.

“I thought the launch went great,” said Lt. Daniel Radocaj, the test pilot from Air Test and Evaluation Squadron 23 (VX-23) who made the first EMALS manned launch. “I got excited once I was on the catapult but I went through the same procedures as on a steam catapult. The catapult stroke felt similar to a steam catapult and EMALS met all of the expectations I had.”

The current aircraft launch system for Navy aircraft carriers is the steam catapult. Newer, heavier and faster aircraft will result in launch energy requirements approaching the limits of the steam catapult system.

The mission and function of EMALS remain the same as the steam catapult; however, EMALS employs entirely different technologies. EMALS will deliver the necessary higher launch energy capacity as well as substantial improvements in system weight, maintenance, increased efficiency, and more accurate end-speed control.

“I felt honored to be chosen as the Shooter to help launch the first live aircraft tested on the new EMALS track at Lakehurst,” said Chief Petty Officer Brandon Barr, Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division Test Department, Lakehurst. “It was very exciting to knowingly be a part of naval aviation history. Petty Officers 1st Class Hunsaker and Robinson, Petty Officers 2nd Class Williams, Wong, and Simmons, were the sailors on my team who worked together to help make this test a success. We all look forward to seeing this cutting edge technology deployed on the Gerald R. Ford."

“I’m excited about the improvement EMALS will bring to the fleet from a capability and reliability perspective,” said Cmdr. Russ McCormack, ALRE, PMA-251, deputy program manager for future systems. “EMALS was designed for just that purpose, and the team is delivering that requirement.”

The system’s technology allows for a smooth acceleration at both high and low speeds, increasing the carrier’s ability to launch aircraft in support of the warfighter.

The system will provide the capability for launching all current and future carrier air wing platforms – lightweight unmanned to heavy strike fighters.

Engineers will continue system functional demonstration testing at NAVAIR Lakehurst. The team will expand aircraft launches with the addition of T-45 and C-2 aircraft next year.

You have the watches. We have the time...

Digital Art from Cool Vibe...Afghanistan 2025?  I really hope not...

A proposal to share the UK's 2nd carrier with NATO or France or the US?

I wonder what THINK DEFENCE, GvG, Marcase and other European readers think about this...via the Financial Times...This is a snippet...read the whole thing here...

The first is to offer the second carrier to Nato, designating it a Nato asset with the modifications and operational costs underwritten jointly by all Nato countries, in the way that the Alliance’s Awacs fleet is operated today. The Royal Navy could supply the crew, or the carrier could be manned by a multinational Nato crew. Cost-sharing, the crewing arrangements and deployment patterns would present challenges, but not insuperable ones. A month after the alliance reaffirmed its commitment to common defence at the Lisbon summit, this may be an idea whose time has come. Sharing a carrier’s costs would project Nato’s power in defence of the sea lanes and would be striking affirmation of its purpose. It would be a way of challenging Nato members whose defence spending falls short of the target of 2 per cent of GDP to take a fairer share of the strain. This option is one that Nato defence ministers could discuss at their meeting next March.A second option would be to share the carrier with France. The UK/France summit in November at which David Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy signed might make this viable. The carrier would need to be configured to take French naval planes as well as JSFs; and both countries would need to agree that when either had its exclusively national carrier in refit the second carrier would be immediately available as a replacement.A third option is sharing the carrier with America. The huge budget deficit confronting the Obama administrationmakes cuts to the US defence budget all but inevitable. The US navy’s carrier fleet is a likely target. One way of easing the strain on both US and UK naval budgets would be to share the second carrier, perhaps for a year at a time; perhaps with a UK starboard crew and a US port one. This would be a bi-national variation of the two-crew system currently used by each nation when deploying Trident submarines.

Modest proposal...revamp the Marine Personnel Carrier scheme.

The Marine Corps wanted a vehicle that was amphibious across streams and lakes...could transport around 7 to  9 Marines and had a remotely operated weapons station.  It began settling on wheeled transports (out of a desire to reduce logistics costs I assume).

But what happens when we marry the idea of a Marine Personnel Carrier with the idea of distributed operations.

We come up with a whole different set of requirements...

1.  A vehicle that is air transportable by CH-53 or even the MV-22.
2.  A vehicle that is amphibious ... across rivers and lakes is awesome but in sea state 1 or 2 from a ship would be fantastic (even if its in an adhoc situation).
3.  A RWS is still desirable.

So where does that lead us?  It leads to the BVS-10 or a modified Marine Corps version of it anyway.  Why the BVS-10?  Because its in production....because it has already been tested with numerous weapons/mounts...because its amphibious and lastly because BAE has production facilities rolling in the US which would mean that we could get the vehicle to our forces now, not 10 years from now.

Pic is courtesy of THINK DEFENCE.