Super Hornet Praised, But Boeing Has No Orders
Morning Coffee is a robust blend of links to news around the internet concerning the Naval Air Station Patuxent River economic community. The opinions expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of the Leader’s owners or staff.
Breaking Defense, reporting from Pax River, quotes RADM Donald Gaddis who oversees all Navy fighter programs, “Until JSF does arrive in the fleet,” Gaddis said, “the Super Hornet is Navy aviation.” And there’s no truth to rumors that JSF champions in DoD yanked an F-18 pre-solicitation earlier this year.
Without any orders on the table, Boeing has until March to decide whether to building more Super Hornets on its own dime or let the last one roll off the production line in 2016. The supply chain has a two-year cycle, reports Aviation Week.
Software remains the top issue with the Marine Corps F-35s due for combat use in July 2015, says Aviation Week.
Israel considers itself the most cyber-attacked country in the world and as such the best place to train other nations and agencies how to fight back, reports Defence Talk. At “Cyber Gym” IT and infrastructure company employees train to defend against cyber attacks.
Amazon founder Jeff Bezo might need that training as he pursues use of drones to deliver products in an hour. Defense Tech reports it was barely an hour after Mr. Bezo’s announced his plan that hacker Samy Kamkar released his interceptor drone, “SkyJack … creating an army of zombie drones under your control,” says the website.
It isn’t pretty but it is possible that a compromise $607 billion defense funding bill could still be passed this year, reports Defense News. No one is completely happy with the final product which was hammered out by a bipartisan group of members of both chambers and includes 79 amendments. The $607 billion for defense includes $527 billion in base funding and $80 billion for the war in Afghanistan. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand’s (D-N.Y.) amendment to take military sexual assault cases outside the chain of command is not included, says DEFCON Hill.
Still the biggest and most favored in the world, the US arms market is facing new economies and growing international offsets that will force them to change some of their business practices to hold on to the international market, says National Defense Magazine.
As the US continues to grapple with ways to sell arms to the Gulf region nations, SecDef Chuck Hagel encouraged the Gulf Cooperation Council members to form a military alliance and operate as a block for weapon acquisition rather than as individual nations, reports Defense News.
