Force Recon practices VBSS.

Turkey's FNSS wins huge arms deal.

Thanks Jonathan for the article!

via Today Zaman.com

Turkish and Malaysian defense companies have signed a $600 million deal, making it Turkey's largest single sale in defense industry exports. Turkish defense industry firm FNSS signed a deal in Ankara on Tuesday with Malaysia's DEFTECH to sell armored combat vehicle frames to the Malaysian armed forces. Under the deal FNSS will sell 257 armored carrier frames for the Pars 8x8 to Malaysia. The 8x8 Pars armored vehicle will be redesigned by Turkish and Malaysian engineers, and the vehicles will be produced locally in Malaysia. The deal is important for the Turkish defense industry since it is the largest single sale in defense industry exports.

I knew the PARS 8x8 looked familiar and the full article points to the US corporation GPV.  

Cartwright cleared?

I didn't even know that the Vice Chairman was under investigation.  This smells...via CNN.

Marine Corps Gen. James Cartwright, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has been cleared of any wrongdoing after an investigation by the Pentagon inspector general in connection with an incident involving a female officer on his staff.

Zipper control...or the appearance of a lack of zipper control.  How did they keep this quiet?

GvG on the European Response.

GvG of Information Dissemination fame has an excellent article on the European response to the crisis in Libya.  Bear in mind that the US response has been a (as in 1) ferry and the generosity of Turkey to allow our citizens aboard their ships....read the whole thing here but to sum it up...he writes...

So how many naval vessels are we counting?
HMS Cumberland (F 85)
HNLMS Tromp (F 803)
INS Francesco Mimbelli (D 561)
INS San Marco (L 9893)
INS San Georgio (L 9892)

So, that's 1 destroyer, 2 frigates and 2 LPD's.

This doesn't include Turkey...remember our response, the response of the most powerful military/Navy in the world ...One freaking ferry...and hitchhiking on Turkish ships.

America in distress.

America appears to be under distress.


While militarily our power is unrivaled, it seems (at least to my eyes) that there is a disconnect between the application of that power, the diplomatic element and finally respect from enemies / fear from despots.

Why do I say this?

In the past month what have we witnessed.

1.  The fall of Mubarak and a middling response that satisfied neither conservative or liberal.  Mubarak was pushed out but it is now clear that events spiraled out of control in part because of the tepid and weak stance taken by the current administration.

2.  The most powerful Navy in the world...with an Aircraft Carrier-the most powerful ship afloat...and a Burke Class Destroyer-perhaps the modern equivalent of a WW2 Battleship...along with possibly the finest of our Special Forces--Navy SEALS...all forced to standby while American Missionaries are gunned down.

3.  Libya melts down with reports of mercenaries committing atrocities and foreign snipers murdering people in the street.  European Powers are acting forcefully to recover their citizens while the US dithers.

One thing is clear.

It doesn't matter if you haven't the finest, best equipped, most highly trained forces in the world if you have no strategic vision.

If you have no plan.

If you vacillate when decisive- considered action is required.

Then you have a nation under distress. 

More info on the Merkava than even I wanted.

I found this site and many of you have probably already been there but its new to me.  If you want information on the latest and greatest in regards to the Merkava Main Battle Tank then this is your spot.

Quote of the week...

The media and the think tank community is made up of chicken shit cowards who refuse to ask why the US Navy sails circles around the Gulf of Aden while piracy gets worse, and under no circumstances will anyone criticize the Obama administration for an aimless, endless perpetual violence policy in the Indian Ocean. What is the point of continuous military operations without objectives? 

Galrahn at Information Dissemination on an "after action" report on the latest atrocity committed by Somali pirates.

UAE to convert its BlackHawks to BattleHawks.

via DefenseNews.

ABU DHABI - The United Arab Emirates is set to turn a number of its Sikorsky Black Hawks into gunships in a deal with the U.S. helicopter maker worth nearly 1 billion Arab Emirate dirhams ($272 million).

The announcement of a plan to buy weaponization kits for 23 of its Black Hawk UH-60M helicopters was the pick of a 4 billion Arab Emirate dirham order bonanza unveiled by the UAE armed forces at the IDEX show Feb. 21 in Abu Dhabi.

 An attack copter that does double duty as a transport?  It took several years but it seems that the US has finally achieved what the Russians did many years ago.  We have our own Mi-24...Columbia has been using a version of this for quite some time too...the only remaining question is whether the US Navy or Army will acquire a few kits.  It would seem a natural for the Navy.  With the focus on littoral combat, these would seem an ideal addition to the fleet.


S70-054_ABH_BR_hi

The British people will go ape if the RN buys P-8's.

via the News.

Navy to buy new aircraft

Published on Tue Feb 22 13:07:21 GMT 2011

THE Royal Navy is looking to buy a fleet of maritime patrol aircraft for up to £1 billion just weeks after the Ministry of Defence scrapped the new Nimrod aircraft at a cost of £3.6 billion.
The MoD confirmed last week that the navy wanted to buy its own maritime patrol aircraft to track enemy submarines to replace the Nimrods, which are being broken up for scrap.
The new RAF Nimrod MRA4s had not even come into service when the prime minister announced last October that as part of the strategic defence review he was scrapping Nimrod.
The navy, which was furious that RAF bosses had agreed to get rid of Nimrod at a time of increased submarine activity, has already set up a team to buy a replacement and ensure that it is flown by the Fleet Air Arm. The programme is being run by Commodore Simon Kings with a team made up of naval officers.

If this is true and the plan is actually carried out then the British public will go ape!  This will be the ultimate boondoggle.

Another blast from the past...the XP-87.

via the National Museum of the Air Force...

The XF-87 was the last aircraft built by Curtiss Aircraft. The specification originally called for a twin-engine, single-place fighter, which evolved into an attack aircraft (XA-43) and finally to a quad-jet, twin-place, all-weather, high-altitude fighter. Two prototype XF-87s were built (S/N 45-59600 and 46-522), the second of which was modified to the sole XF-87A.

The XF-87 was designed for an innovative nose turret capable of swiveling in a wide arc around the axis of flight; however, the turret was never actually installed on the XF-87.

The very large fighter was severely underpowered by four J34 turbojets and was redesigned for two J47 turbojets (XF-87A). A production order for 58 XF-87As and 30 RF-87s was canceled before any aircraft were constructed.

Type	Number built/ converted	Remarks
XF-87	2	Last Curtiss aircraft
XF-87A	1 (cv)	Modified XF-87
F-87A	0	58 canceled
RF-87A	0	30 canceled

TECHNICAL NOTES:
Engines: Four Westinghouse J34-WE-7 turbojets of 3,000 lbs. thrust each
Armament: Four 20mm cannon and two .50-cal. machine guns
Maximum speed: 520 mph
Cruising speed: 450 mph
Range: 1,000 miles
Service ceiling: 41,000 ft.
Span: 60 ft. 0 in.
Length: 62 ft. 0 in.
Height: 20 ft. 4 in.
Weight: 37,350 lbs. loaded
Crew: Two

Sadly, this beautiful airplane lost out to the F-89...