Text Fwd: Global Hawk purchase in trouble as U.S. price tag jumps twofold

http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/475725.html
Hankyoreh
Global Hawk purchase in trouble as U.S. price tag jumps twofold
: A decline in demand due to U.S. defense budget cuts has been cited for the price hike
Posted on : Apr.30,2011 13:20 KST

By Lee Soon-hyuk

Following the South Korean government’s announcement of plans to hasten the introduction of the Global Hawk unmanned high-altitude surveillance aircraft in the wake of the Cheonan sinking and artillery attack on Yeonpyeong Island, the United States has reportedly raised its quote for the aircraft more than twofold.

While Seoul announced plans in March to move up the introduction of the Global Hawk in order to improve its North Korean intelligence gathering capabilities, the large increase in the price may generate controversy.

Military web journal Defense 21 reported Friday that the United States recently quoted a purchase price of $450 million for four Global Hawks and demanded an additional $350 million in development costs. Taking into account demands for the settlement of additional expenses at the time of delivery reflecting the rate of increase in consumer prices, the report added that the total purchase amount would be over one trillion won, more than twice the initially predicted amount, and that operation expenses are predicted to increase by 25 percent each year.

Defense 21 also reported the United States announced its intention to install an operation station at its military base in Guam with terrestrial reception station facilities in order to operate a surveillance and reconnaissance network linking unmanned surveillance aircraft and satellites.

The Global Hawk is an unmanned high-altitude aircraft capable of observing and photographing terrestrial facilities and movements even in the presence of clouds using state-of-the-art radar and optical and infrared sensors from an altitude of 20 kilometers. The top-level strategic spy satellite weapon, which over a 24-hour period is capable of generating thousands of detailed photographs in which a single point represents 30 square centimeters, has an operational radius of some 3,000 kilometers.

The reason cited for the sharp rise in the price of the Global Hawk was a decline in demand stemming from reductions in the U.S. defense budget.

According to a Bloomberg report, U.S. Secretary of the Air Force Michael Donley stated in a letter submitted to Congress on April 12 that the per-unit price for the Global Hawk would increase by more than 25 percent owing to a 14 percent drop in the number of orders. Northrop Grumman, the manufacturer of the aircraft, also said that a decision by Air Force authorities to reduce the number of new and improved Block 40 models scheduled for production through 2015 from 22 to 11 also had a major impact. Amid this situation, the effects of U.S. defense budget cuts spilled over onto the South Korean government’s plan to introduce the Global Hawk.

The South Korean government currently has concerns over the matting. It is awaiting a response to a letter of offer and acceptance (LOA) request submitted to the United States following its decision in the second half of 2010 to introduce the Global Hawk, citing the transfer of wartime operational control (OPCON) and strengthening its North Korea monitoring system.

It also made official its plans to hasten the introduction of next-generation stealth fighters and the Global Hawk with last month’s announcement of “National Defense Reform Plan 307.”

Regarding the controversy, an official of South Korea’s Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) said, “It has not been verified that the U.S. made such a proposal.”

“There should be an official response to the LOA request very soon, and we will handle the matter through transparent discussions at that time,” the official added.


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Text Fwd: Northrop Grumman profiting from the Diaoyu/Senkaku row

* Text thankfully informed from M.S. and S. N. on Oct.5, 2010

breitbart.com

Northrop Grumman profiting from the Diaoyu/Senkaku row

TOKYO, Oct. 4 (AP) - (Kyodo)?Japan's Defense Ministry is considering acquiring three Global Hawk unmanned high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft from the United States to deal with China's military rise and North Korea's nuclear and ballistic missile programs, sources in the ministry and the Self-Defense Forces said Sunday.

The ministry hopes to write the plan into its new Mid-Term Defense Program for fiscal 2011-2015, which will be based on a new National Defense Program Outline the government is poised to adopt at the end of this year.

The recent rise in tensions between Japan and China triggered by the collisions last month between a Chinese trawler and Japan Coast Guard patrol boats near disputed territories in the East China Sea is expected to help push the acquisition plan, the sources said.

The current midterm defense buildup plan says that from the standpoint of strengthening Japan's intelligence-gathering capabilities, the ministry will take "necessary measures after considering" acquiring unmanned reconnaissance aircraft.

Although the ministry has been conducting basic research on unmanned surveillance aircraft since fiscal 2003 with the possibility of producing it domestically, it has now tilted toward first importing the Global Hawk given the aircraft's advantages in performance and costs, the sources said.

The U.S. government has also sounded out the Japanese government over acquisition possibilities through multiple channels, they added.

The Global Hawk would cost about $50 million (roughly 4.15 billion yen), including equipment, bringing the sum for three aircraft to more than 12 billion yen. The ministry estimates it would need tens of billions of yen additionally to build ground facilities with command functions, according to the sources.

Equipped with sophisticated cameras and highly sensitive communications-receiving abilities, the Global Hawk can fly at 60,000 feet (roughly 18,000 meters) in altitude -- about twice as high as commercial passenger aircraft can -- for just more than 30 hours on autopilot.

Data gathered on board the reconnaissance plane can be almost simultaneously sent to command facilities on the ground. Its ability to fly at high altitudes also enables the aircraft to survey countries such as North Korea and China much more deeply into their territories.

Together with its ability to fly longer than manned counterparts, the Global Hawk is likely to boost Japan's ability to gather intelligence and monitor its neighbors' activities.

The ministry hopes to use the aircraft, which does not have attack capability, to defend remote Japanese islands and counter suspicious ships in and near Japanese waters, while at the same time looking at the possibility of operating them as part of the country's shield against ballistic missiles, according to the sources.

The ministry has yet to decide which section within its organization should be in charge of unmanned reconnaissance aircraft, partly because officials are concerned that money will be cut from existing programs if the new program comes under their authority, they said.

If the ministry has trouble sorting out which section will be in charge, there is a possibility that plans about unmanned reconnaissance aircraft would remain unclear in the new midterm defense buildup plan, the sources said.

Text Fwd: Pentagon Star Wars Satellite Achieves Milestone 미 국방부 우주 전쟁 위성 이정표를 이룩하다

* Image source: cryptome.org
( Original source: New York Times, May 3, 2006
'An aerial view of Starfire, a government observatory in New Mexico where laser work is being done.'

* Image source: cryptome.org
(Original source: http://www.de.afrl.af.mil/Gallery/Images/Full/Domes.jpg
(50% reduction below)
'This sodium laser—being fired from the Starfire Optical Range on Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico—is used with deformable optics to help eliminate atmospheric distortions when gathering images of objects in space. '

* Image source: New York Times, May 3, 2006
'Graphic: Sharpening a Laser Beam to Create a weapon'
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Stop NATO

United Press International
Security Industry
Defense satellite achieves milestone
Published: Sept. 20, 2010 at 11:55 AM


REDONDO BEACH, Calif. - A demonstration U.S. missile defense satellite in orbit autonomously transferred target track data from its acquisition sensor to its tracking sensor.

Northrop Grumman and Raytheon, which built the Space Tracking and Surveillance System satellite for the U.S. Missile Defense Agency, said the successful transfer was the first time the capability had been executed in space as part of the STSS program.

"This is a major success for the STSS program," Gabe Watson, vice president of missile defense and missile warning programs for Northrop Grumman's Aerospace Systems sector said. "We proved that the STSS satellites can autonomously transition from target acquisition and track mode using the acquisition sensor to target precision track mode using the multiple band track sensor,

"All of these operations occurred as intended, with no operator intervention. This is the same type and sequence of functions that will be performed on-board during subsequent MDA missile tests."

The data hand-off occurred when the MDA satellite acquired a ground laser operated and pointed by the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory from the Starfire Optical Range at Kirtland Air Force Base near Albuquerque.

Once the acquisition sensor acquired the ground laser, it formed a confirmed track, which was passed to the track sensor. The track sensor slewed and pointed to the coordinates reported by the acquisition sensor, detected the ground laser and formed an on-board track of the ground laser.

Data were transmitted to the STSS ground systems located at Schriever Air Force Base in Colorado Springs.
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Stop NATO
Blog site

Text Fwd: US Defense Firms Considers Transparency Pledge

Korea Times
02-19-2010 18:08
[Exclusive] US Defense Firms Considers Transparency Pledge
By Jung Sung-ki
Staff Reporter

Representatives from U.S. defense firms doing business here have discussed the idea of submitting a declaration of transparency to Cheong Wa Dae, amid Seoul's crackdown on irregular weapons acquisition deals, an industry source said Friday.

During a meeting at the American Chamber of Commerce (AMCHAM) in Korea in Seoul, Tuesday, some of the executive officers complained that the proposed policy to fight corruption in arms deals was too rigid and not realistic, the source said, requesting anonymity.

Participants included representatives from Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon, Northrop Grumman and General Electric, he said.

"The representatives were engaged in a debate over arms acquisition policy that has been proposed by the government," the source told The Korea Times.

"They put forward the idea of presenting a pledge of transparency to the presidential office as part of anti-corruption efforts but failed to reach an agreement."

In recent months, President Lee Myung-bak and other government officials have called for a new arms-buying mechanism, citing rampant corruption in arms contracts such as overblown commissions for purchasing arms overseas, inflated unit costs and the leakage of classified military information.

Against this backdrop, Defense Minister Kim Tae-young said late last year in a report to President Lee that the government would reduce the amount of arms bought through the roughly 600 arms agents who do business in the country.

Instead of such commercial sales, which currently account for 65 percent of procurement, the ministry will encourage more government-to-government foreign military acquisition programs, the minister said.

Officially, the arms agents receive about 3-5 percent in commissions from procurement spending, but industry officials said their actual take is much higher, particularly in large deals. So the government wants to introduce a standard price cap on the payments.

"Most of the participants at the AMCHAM meeting discussed ways of meeting the new standards, but some of them complained of the Korean government's rigid approach to the issue," said the source.

A Lockheed Martin executive officer said the current commission payments rate is quite low, so agents sometimes engage in behind-the-scenes deals.

He argued that reducing the number of agents would not be a fundamental solution in that context.

gallantjung@koreatimes.co.kr