Defense War News Updates

DTN News - DEFENSE NEWS: U.S. Budget Proposal Aims to Support Troops, Families

2012-02-13T23:29:00.003-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News - DEFENSE NEWS: U.S. Budget Proposal Aims to Support Troops, Families
Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources American Forces Press Service
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 13, 2012: President Barack Obama’s fiscal 2013 budget proposal has several provisions for service members, veterans and their families.

According to an Office of Management and Budget fact sheet released today, the budget request includes:

-- $8.5 billion in Defense Department base funding to support military families, from child care and education for military children to counseling and employment programs for the entire family.

-- More than $1 billion through the Education Department’s Impact Aid program to local school districts where a military base may increase the number of students and decrease the property tax base that funds the local schools. Districts educating more than 368,000 children from military families receive these funds.

-- Funding for a 1.7 percent pay raise for service members -- the full amount authorized by law -- as well as a variety of monthly special skill-based payments, enlistment and re-enlistment bonuses, and other benefits.

-- About $2.4 billion for programs serving wounded, ill and injured service members, with $747 million of that total to address traumatic brain injury and psychological health needs, such as support for recovery care coordinators and enhanced access to care.

-- $465 million for medical research specifically focused on psychological health, TBI and post-traumatic stress disorder.

-- $259 million for the Labor Department’s Veterans Employment and Training Service, and $8 million for the department’s transition assistance program and grants for employment services to veterans. The budget request ends the Veterans Workforce Investment Program, supporting service delivery innovations through the Workforce Innovation Fund instead. The expanded transition assistance program makes employment workshops more accessible to retiring Reserve and National Guard members, as well as spouses of separating service members.

-- Continuing grants under the Homeless Veterans’ Reintegration Program at a level of $38 million.

-- Expanding entrepreneurship training for veterans and military families through the Small Business Administration’s National Veterans Entrepreneurship Training, a new $7 million program that will train up to 260,000 veterans annually.

-- $278 million for implementation of the Caregivers and Veterans Omnibus Health Services Act. New caregiver benefits and services include training adapted to the veterans' individual care needs, a direct stipend payment and health care and mental health services.

-- Almost $1.4 billion to provide services through the Veterans Affairs Department for homeless and at-risk veterans. These funds will combat veteran homelessness through collaborative partnerships with local governments, nonprofit organizations, and the Housing and Urban Development, Justice and Labor departments.

Earlier today, officials said defense leaders are fully committed to assisting service members and their families.

The DOD budget request provides $1.3 billion in funding for child care space for more than 200,000 children, as well as $1.4 billion for family support centers and morale, welfare and recreation programs. It also commits $2.7 billion for the education of more than 61,000 students at DOD Education Activity schools in 12 countries and more than 33,000 students in seven states, Puerto Rico and Guam.

The request includes more than $50 million to improve public school facilities on military installations.

Military construction funding is set at $9.1 billion, and family housing at $1.7 billion.

*Link for This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources American Forces Press Service
*Speaking Image - Creation of DTN News ~ Defense Technology News
*This article is being posted from Toronto, Canada By DTN News ~ Defense-Technology News Contact:dtnnews@ymail.com
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DTN News - INTELLIGENCE REPORT/NEWS: Bombers Target Israeli Diplomats In India, Georgia

2012-02-13T19:18:00.002-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News - INTELLIGENCE REPORT/NEWS: Bombers Target Israeli Diplomats In India, Georgia
Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources CBS News
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 13, 2012: Israel blamed Iran on Monday for bomb attacks on its diplomats' cars in India and Georgia, heightening concerns that the Jewish state was moving closer to striking its archenemy.

Iran denied responsibility for the attacks that appeared to mirror the recent killings of Iranian nuclear scientists that Tehran blamed on Israel.

The blast in New Delhi set a car ablaze and injured four people, including an Israeli Embassy driver and a diplomat's wife; the device in Georgia was discovered and safely defused.

"Iran is behind these attacks and it is the largest terror exporter in the world," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told lawmakers from his Likud Party.

The violence added further tension to one of the globe's most contentious standoffs. Iran has been accused of developing a nuclear weapons program that Israel says threatens the existence of the Jewish state. Tehran says its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only.

Comments by Israeli officials in recent weeks have raised fears Israel might be preparing to strike Iranian nuclear facilities. While Israel says it hopes that international sanctions can curb Iran's nuclear program, leaders pointedly note that "all options are on the table" and have warned that as Iran moves closer to weapons capability, time is running out for action. Fearing an Israeli attack could set off a conflict across the region and send oil prices skyrocketing, U.S. and other Western countries have been pressing Israel to give sanctions more time.

Israeli military analyst Reuven Pedatzur said Monday's action was unlikely to have any bearing on whether Israel attacks Iran, calling it an "isolated incident" with rather low impact.

The attackers in India and Georgia appeared to have used "sticky bombs" attached to cars by magnets, similar to weapons used against Iran's nuclear officials. Netanyahu said Israel had thwarted attacks in recent months in Azerbaijan and Thailand and unspecified other countries.

"In all those cases, the elements behind these attacks were Iran and its protege, Hezbollah," Netanyahu said, referring to Iran's Lebanese proxy. He vowed to "act with a strong hand against international terror."

Israeli media reported that the government blamed Iran based on prior intelligence and that security officials feared this could be the start of a wave of attacks against Israeli targets overseas.

Iranian officials rejected Netanyahu's accusation.

"This accusation is within the Zionist regime's psychological war against Iran," the official IRNA news agency quoted Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast as saying.

"The Zionist regime, due to repeated crimes against humanity, is the main party accused of terrorist activities," he said, according to IRNA.

The New Delhi attack took place just after 3 p.m. a few hundred yards (meters) from the prime minister's residence as the diplomat's wife headed to the American Embassy School to pick up her children, said Delhi Police Commissioner B.K. Gupta.

When the minivan approached a crossing, she noticed a motorcyclist ride up and stick something on it that appeared to be a magnetic device, he said. The car drove a short distance, there was a loud sound and then an explosion, and the car caught fire, he said.

"It was a loud explosion. We realized it's not a firecracker, but an explosion, and rushed toward the car," said Ravi Singh, owner of a nearby gas station.

The blast left the vehicle charred and appeared to blow out its rear door.

"The blast was so powerful, the car behind got damaged as well," said Monu, a high school student who uses only one name.

The Israeli Defense Ministry said the woman, Tal Yehoshua-Koren, the wife of a Defense Ministry official based in New Delhi, suffered moderate shrapnel wounds and was treated at a hospital by Israeli doctors.

Her driver, Manoj Sharma, 42, and two people in a nearby car had minor injuries, Gupta said.

Israeli diplomats in India have been on constant alert since Pakistan-based militants rampaged across the Indian city of Mumbai in 2008, targeting luxury hotels, a train station and the Chabad Jewish community center.

India's foreign minister, S.M. Krishna, said India would cooperate closely with Israel in the investigation and promised to bring the assailants to justice.

"I have just spoken to the Israeli foreign minister," he said. "I assured him that the law of the land will take its course."

Authorities in the former Soviet republic of Georgia said an explosive device was planted on the car of a driver for the Israeli Embassy in the capital of Tbilisi.

Shota Utiashvili, spokesman for the Georgian Interior Ministry, said the driver noticed a package on his car's undercarriage and called police, who found and defused a grenade.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton condemned the attacks.

"The United States places a high priority on the safety and security of diplomatic personnel around the world and we stand ready to assist with any investigation of these cowardly actions," she said.

Iranian lawmaker Javad Jahangirzadeh was quoted by the semiofficial Mehr news agency as saying the Israeli charges were meant to provoke the world against Iran and to undermine upcoming nuclear talks between Tehran and the world powers.

Another lawmaker, Avaz Heidarpour, was quoted by Mehr as saying Netanyahu's allegations were an attempt by Israel to justify future operations against Iran.

"It's very likely that the Zionist regime is paving the way to carry out an assassination abroad or hit inside Iran. So, they are making preparations for that," Mehr quoted him as saying.

Hezbollah and Iran have deep grievances against Israel.

Hezbollah battled Israel in a monthlong war in 2006. On Sunday, the Lebanese guerrilla group marked the anniversary of the 2008 assassination of one of its commanders, Imad Mughniyeh, in a bombing widely believed to have been carried out by Israel. Iran has been widely suspected of looking for payback for the covert plots against its nuclear program it has blamed on Israel's spy agency Mossad and Western allies.

"There have been all kinds of mysterious things happening in Iran, and it could be an Iranian counterattack," said Mike Herzog, a retired Israeli general and former top aide to Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak. "It's no secret that Iran uses Hezbollah globally, and Hezbollah has the capacity to carry out attacks around the globe."

Iran and Hezbollah also could be trying to divert attention away from ally Syria's crackdown on protesters.

Were Iran found to be behind the New Delhi attack, it would be a stunning action against one of its more reliable allies.

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has resisted U.S. and European Union pressure to curtail trade with Iran over the nuclear issue. Energy-starved India relies heavily on Iranian oil imports, and the two countries are working to find creative ways for India to circumvent banking restrictions to pay for the oil by using rupees and investing in Iranian infrastructure projects.

Israel has urged the international community to consider all means, including military action, to stop Tehran.

Last month, a director of Iran's main uranium enrichment site was killed in a blast from a magnetic bomb placed on his car, at least the fifth member of Iran's scientific community killed in apparent targeted attacks in two years.

In a signal Iran could retaliate, Gen. Masoud Jazayeri, the spokesman for Iran's Joint Armed Forces Staff, was quoted by the semiofficial news agency ISNA last month as saying that Tehran was "reviewing the punishment" of "behind-the-scene elements" involved in the assassination.

"Iran's response will be a tormenting one for supporters of state terrorism," he said. "The enemies of the Iranian nation, especially the United States, Britain and the Zionist regime, or Israel, have to be held responsible for their activities."

Clinton categorically denied any U.S. link to an "act of violence inside Iran." Israel has made no direct comments about Iran's accusations of covert operations, but some officials have made provocative hints that Tehran's many foes could have an interest in efforts to destabilize its nuclear program.

Iran also has blamed the U.S. and allies for a sophisticated computer virus, known as Stuxnet, that was programmed to disrupt the centrifuges used in uranium enrichment. Iran said the virus was detected in its systems, but added there were no serious setbacks.

In January, a foreign suspect with alleged links to Hezbollah militants led Thai police to a warehouse filled with materials commonly used to make bombs.

In 1992, a bombing at the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires killed 29 people. Two years later, a bombing at a Jewish community center there killed 85 people. Argentines have long suspected high-level Iranian diplomats were involved in the 1994 bombing.

___

Federman reported from Jerusalem. Associated Press writer Misha Dzhindzhikhashvili in Tbilisi and Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report. Follow Nessman at http://www.twitter.com/ravinessman and Federman at www.twitter.com/joseffederman

*Link for This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources CBS News
*Speaking Image - Creation of DTN News ~ Defense Technology News
*This article is being posted from Toronto, Canada By DTN News ~ Defense-Technology News Contact:dtnnews@ymail.com
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DTN News: U.S. Department of Defense Contracts Dated February 13, 2012

2012-02-13T19:16:00.000-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News: U.S. Department of Defense Contracts Dated February 13, 2012

Source: U.S. DoD issued No. 100-12 February 13, 2012

(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 13, 2012: U.S. Department of Defense, Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Public Affairs) Contracts issued February 13, 2012 are undermentioned;

CONTRACTS

ARMY

GAP Solutions, Inc., Reston, Va. (W9124J-12-D-0006), and Advancia Corp., Oklahoma City, Okla. (W9124J-12-D-04), were awarded a $983,000,000 indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity multiple-award-task-order contract between seven contractors. The award will provide for the support base services at various Army installations. Work location will be determined with each task order, with an estimated completion date of Dec. 31, 2016. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with 31 bids received. The Mission and Installation Contracting Office, Fort Sam Houston, Texas, is the contracting activity.

The Boeing Co., Ridley Park, Pa., was awarded a $676,000,000 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the modification of an existing contract to procure 32 CH-47F new build cargo helicopters. Work will be performed in Ridley Park, Pa., with an estimated completion date of Dec. 31, 2015. One bid was solicited, with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Ala., is the contracting activity (W58RGZ-08-C-0098).

Mission Essential Personnel, Columbus, Ohio, was awarded a $330,000,000 cost-plus-award-fee contract. The award will provide for the modification of an existing contract for linguist and interpretation services in support of operations in Afghanistan. Work will be performed in Columbus, Ohio, and Afghanistan, with an estimated completion date of Sept. 6, 2012. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with six bids received. The U.S. Army Intelligence and Security Command, Fort Belvoir, Va., is the contracting activity (W911W4-07-D-0010).

Triple Canopy, Reston, Va., was awarded a $159,972,048 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the security services in Afghanistan. Work will be performed in Afghanistan, with an estimated completion date of Jan. 26, 2017. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with eight bids received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Rock Island, Ill., is the contracting activity (W560MY-12-C-0002).

ITT Systems Corp., Colorado Springs, Colo., was awarded a $159,538,880 cost-plus-fixed-fee and firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the information technology support services to U.S. Army Europe, U.S. European Command, and U.S. Africa Command. Work will be performed in Germany, Italy, and Balkans, with an estimated completion date of Sept. 30, 2016. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with three bids received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Fort Huachuca, Ariz., is the contracting activity (W91RUS-12-C-0005).

Jacobs Technology, Inc., Fort Walton Beach, Fla., was awarded a $157,209,880 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract. The award will provide for the systems engineering and technical assistance support services. Work will be performed in Fort Belvoir, Va.; Natick, Mass.; Eatontown, N.J.; Aberdeen Proving Ground, Md.; Springfield, Va.; Fort Lewis, Wash.; Fort Knox, Ky.; and Fort Benning, Ga., with an estimated completion date of Jan. 31, 2015. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with two bids received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Aberdeen Proving Ground, Md., is the contracting activity (W91CRB-12-C-0013).

Raytheon Integrated Defense Systems, Andover, Mass., was awarded a $138,698,837 firm-fixed-price, level-of-effort, cost-plus-fixed-fee contract. The award will provide for the modification of an existing contract for engineering services in support of the Phased Array Tracking Radar Intercept On Target. Work will be performed in Andover, Mass.; Billerica, Mass.; Burlington, Mass.; El Segundo, Calif.; El Paso, Texas; Huntsville, Ala.; Norfolk, Va.; and Tewksbury, Mass., with an estimated completion date of Jan. 31, 2013. One bid was solicited, with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Ala., is the contracting activity (W31P4Q-09-C-0057).

Tennessee Apparel Corp., Tullahoma, Tenn. (W911QY-12-D-0004); Creative Apparel Associates, L.L.C., Belmont, Maine (W911QY-12-D-0005); and Paul Boye Technologies, Le Vernet, France (W911QY-12-D-0008), were awarded a $129,000,000 firm-fixed-price contract between three contractors. The award will provide for the procurement of uniform integrated protection ensemble chemical and biological protective garments. Work will be performed in Tullahoma, Tenn.; Belmont, Maine; and Belfast, Maine, with an estimated completion date of Jan. 31, 2017. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with eight bids received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Natick, Mass., is the contracting activity.

Johns Hopkins University, Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, Md., was awarded an $85,499,999 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract. The award will provide for the modification of an existing contract to supply engineering, research, development and test and evaluation services. Work will be performed in Laurel, Md., with an estimated completion date of Feb. 14, 2014. One bid was solicited, with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Ala., is the contracting activity (W9113M-09-D-0001).

Watermark - ECC, L.L.C., Lowell, Mass. (W912DR-12-D-0001); H&S - Zapata, J.V., Westborough, Mass. (W912DR-12-D-0002); Chimera - ERRG, Martinez, Calif. (W912DR-12-D-0003); TPMC/ARM Environmental Solutions, Irving, Texas (W912DR-12-D-0004); and Coastal Environmental Group, Inc., Central Islip, N.Y. (W912DR-12-D-0005), were awarded a $49,700,000 firm-fixed-price contract between five contractors. The award will provide for the environmental services to various federal, state, and local agencies. Work location will be determined with each task order, with an estimated completion date of Jan. 31, 2017. Twelve bids were solicited, with 12 bids received. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Baltimore, Md., is the contracting activity.

Blackhawk Constructors, L.L.C., San Antonio, Texas (W912DQ-12-D-4004); Zieson Construction Co., L.L.C., Topeka, Kan. (W912DQ-12-D-4003); Hanke Constructors, Wentzville, Mo. (W912DQ-12-D-4002); K&P Construction, Dunkirk, Md. (W912DQ-12-D-4005); and Robinson Mechanical Contractors, Inc., Perryville, Mo. (W912DQ-12-D-4006), were awarded a $49,000,000 firm-fixed-price contract between five contractors. The award will provide the sustainability, renovation, and modernization construction services. Work location will be determined with each task order, with an estimated completion date of Jan. 26, 2017. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with 29 bids received. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Kansas City, Mo., is the contracting activity.

Choctaw Transportation Co., Dyersburg, Tenn. (W912EQ-12-D-0001); Luhr Bros., Inc., Columbia, Ill. (W912EQ-12-D-0002); Patton-Tully Marine, L.L.C., Marine Construction, Memphis, Tenn. (W912EQ-12-D-0003); and Pine Bluff Sand Gravel Co., Pine Bluff, Ark., (W912EQ-12-0004), were awarded a $45,000,000 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the construction of stone navigation structures in the Mississippi River. Work location will be determined with each task order, with an estimated completion date of Jan. 31, 2013. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with five bids received. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Memphis, Tenn., is the contracting activity.

Georgia Tech Applied Research Corp., Atlanta, Ga., was awarded a $45,000,000 firm-fixed-price and cost-plus-fixed-fee contract. The award will provide for the services in support of the Army Threat Simulator Program Support. Work will be performed in Atlanta, Ga., with an estimated completion date of Jan. 31, 2015. One bid was solicited, with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Aberdeen Proving Ground, Md., is the contracting activity (W91CRB-12-D-0002).

AM General, L.L.C., Mishawaka, Ind., was awarded a $41,913,084 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the procurement of HMMWV power packs. Work will be performed in Mishawaka, Ind., with an estimated completion date of Jan. 31, 2013. One bid was solicited, with one bid received. The Letterkenny Army Depot, Chambersburg, Pa., is the contracting activity (W911N2-12-D-0014)

Longbow, L.L.C., Orlando, Fla., was awarded a $40,810,212 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the services in support of the Apache helicopter. Work will be performed in Orlando, Fla., with an estimated completion date of May 31, 2015. One bid was solicited, with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Ala., is the contracting activity (W58RGZ-06-C-0134).

BAE Systems - Information and Electronic Systems Integration, Nashua, N.H., was awarded a $38,010,103 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract. The award will provide for the services in support of furthering the technology development phase of the Common Infrared Countermeasure Program. Work will be performed in Nashua, N.H., with an estimated completion date of Oct. 30, 2013. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with five bids received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Ala., is the contracting activity (W58RGZ-12-C-0045).

Jacobs Technology, Fort Walton Beach, Fla., was awarded a $36,097,935 firm-fixed-price and level-of-effort contract. The award will provide for the technical and administrative services in support of the Mine Resistant Ambush Protection vehicle. Work will be performed in Kuwait; Warren, Mich.; Stafford, Va.; Aberdeen, Md.; Fort Sam Houston, Texas; Fort Benning, Ga.; Afghanistan; Camp Atterbury, Ind.; and Red River Army Depot, Texas, with an estimated completion date of Feb. 6, 2013. Ten bids were solicited, with two bids received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Warren, Mich., is the contracting activity (W56HZV-09-A-A904).

Northrop Grumman Systems Corp., Rolling Meadows, Ill., was awarded a $31,359,202 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract. The award will provide for the services in support of furthering the technology development phase of the Common Infrared Countermeasure Program. Work will be performed in Rolling Meadows, Ill., with an estimated completion date of Oct. 30, 2012. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with five bids received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Ala., is the contracting activity (W58RGZ-12-C-0046).

AM General, L.L.C., South Bend, Ind., was awarded a $29,034,664 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the modification of an existing contract to procure various models of HMMWVs. Work will be performed in Mishawaka, Ind., with an estimated completion date of Sept. 30, 2012. One bid was solicited, with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Warren, Mich., is the contracting activity (W56HZV-10-C-0405).

Watts Construction, L.L.C., Honolulu, Hawaii, was awarded a $28,300,000 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the construction services at Schofield Barracks, Hawaii. Work will be performed in Oahu, Hawaii, with an estimated completion date of Dec. 19, 2013. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with 14 bids received. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Honolulu, Hawaii, is the contracting activity (W9128A-12-C-0001).

DRS Test & Energy Management, L.L.C., Huntsville, Ala., was awarded a $23,500,000 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the information technology services. Work will be performed in Huntsville, Ala., with an estimated completion date of Feb. 7, 2017. One bid was solicited, with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Picatinny Arsenal, N.J., is the contracting activity (W15QKN-12-D-0004).

The Boeing Co., Ridley Park, Pa., was awarded a $21,852,317 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract. The award will provide for the procurement of initial production fielding support for each new equipment training site equipped with the CH-47 cargo helicopter. Work will be performed in Ridley Park, Pa., with an estimated completion date of April 30, 2013. One bid was solicited, with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Ala., is the contracting activity (W58RGZ-11-C-0093).

Agentase, L.L.C., Pittsburgh, Pa., was awarded a $15,850,000 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract. The award will provide for the modification of an existing contract to develop, test, produce, integrate, field and support technologies for detecting and detoxifying highly toxic hazards. Work will be performed in Pittsburgh, Pa.; Elkridge, Md.; and West Lafayette, Ind., with an estimated completion date of Feb. 10, 2014. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with 3,009 bids received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Durham, N.C., is the contracting activity (W911NF-08-D-0002).

Raytheon Integrated Defense Systems, Andover, Mass., was awarded a $15,705,172 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract. The award will provide for the services in support of the Patriot Missile Support Center. Work will be performed in Chambersburg, Pa.; Andover, Mass.; Burlington, Mass.; and Germany, with an estimated completion date of Jan. 31, 2014. One bid was solicited, with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Ala., is the contracting activity (W31P4Q-11-C-0156).

Avon Protection Systems, Inc., Cadillac, Mich., was awarded a $15,204,905 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the procurement of the Joint Services General Purpose Mask spares for sustainment. Work will be performed in Cadillac, Mich., with an estimated completion date of Jan. 31, 2015. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Warren, Mich., is the contracting activity (W56HZV-12-D-0001).

Affigent, L.L.C., Herndon, Va., was awarded a $15,048,915 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the modification of an existing project to supply net and migrated services for the Military Entrance Processing Station. Work will be performed in North Chicago, Ill., with an estimated completion date of Jan. 30, 2013. Four bids were solicited, with three bids received. The U.S. Army Mission & Installation Contracting Center, Fort Knox, Ky., is the contracting activity (W91QUZ-09-A-0001).

Signal Ship Repair, L.L.C., Mobile, Ala., was awarded a $14,484,630 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the services in support of engine replacements, engine auxiliary systems modification and repair of dredge wheeler. Work will be performed in Mobile, Ala., with an estimated completion date of Jan. 15, 2013. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with three bids received. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Philadelphia, Pa., is the contracting activity (W912BU-12-C-0006).

ReconRobotics, Inc., Minneapolis, Minn., was awarded a $13,975,038 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the procurement of micro unmanned ground vehicle robots in support of video reconnaissance. Work will be performed in Minneapolis, Minn., with an estimated completion date of May 31, 2012. One bid was solicited, with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Aberdeen Proving Ground, Md., is the contracting activity (W91CRB-12-C-0026).

The Boeing Company, Ridley Park, Pa., was awarded a $13,317,149 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract. The award will provide for the modification of an existing contract to manufacture and test five Cargo On-and-Off Loading System prototypes. Work will be performed in Ridley Park, Pa., with an estimated completion date of Feb. 28, 2014. One bid was solicited, with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Ala., is the contracting activity (W58RGZ-04-G-0023).

Raytheon - Lockheed Martin Javelin, J.V., Tucson, Ariz., was awarded a $12,195,926 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the modification of an existing contract to procure 2001BH tactical round and 3001AM command launch unit cost reduction initiative retrofits. Work will be performed in Tucson, Ariz., with an estimated completion date of Dec. 31, 2014. One bid was solicited, with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Ala., is the contracting activity (W31P4Q-09-C-0376).

General Dynamics Land Systems, Sterling Heights, Mich., was awarded an $11,832,671 cost-type contract. The award will provide for the modification of an existing contract to procure material items. Work will be performed in Lima, Ohio, with an estimated completion date of Nov. 30, 2012. One bid was solicited, with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Warren, Mich., is the contracting activity (W56HZV-11-C-0350).

A-B Computer Solutions, Inc., Mandeville, La., was awarded an $11,388,816 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the computer software and hardware maintenance service and support. Work location will be determined with each task order, with an estimated completion date of Jan. 31, 2017. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with three bids received. The Directorate for Contracting, Red River Army Depot, Texarkana, Texas, is the contracting activity (W911RQ-12-D-0001).

Garco Construction, Spokane, Wash., was awarded a $10,217,000 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the construction of fuel storage and distribution facilities at Joint Base Lewis-MChord, Wash. Work will be performed in Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Wash., with an estimated completion date of March 30, 2013. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with three bids received. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Seattle, Wash., is the contracting activity (W912DW-12-C-0016).

Atlantic Electric, L.L.C., Charleston, S.C., was awarded a $9,793,111 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the renovation of the Richard B. Russell Dam powerhouse. Work will be performed in Elbert County, Ga., with an estimated completion date of July 30, 2013. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with three bids received. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Savannah, Ga., is the contracting activity (W912HN-12-C-0004).

International Business Machines Corp., Yorktown Heights, N.Y., was awarded an $8,987,156 cost-type contract. The award will provide for the research and development services. Work will be performed in Yorktown Heights, N.Y., with an estimated completion date of May 1, 2015. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with 12 bids received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Durham, N.C., is the contracting activity (W911NF-12-C-0028).

Manson Construction Co., Seattle, Wash., was awarded an $8,045,456 firm-fixed-price contract. The award will provide for the maintenance dredging services. Work will be performed in Anchorage Harbor, Anchorage, Alaska, with an estimated completion date of May 15, 2015. The bid was solicited through the Internet, with five bids received. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Anchorage, Alaska, is the contracting activity (W911KB-12-C-0004).

U.S. TRANSPORTATION COMMAND

U.S. Transportation Command is modifying contracts with Maersk Line, Ltd., Norfolk, Va. (for a face value of $197,000,000; modification to modification to HTC711-09- D-0040); American President Lines, Ltd., Inc., Scottsdale, Ariz. (for a face value of $147,000,000; modification to HTC711-09-D-0028); Farrell Lines, Inc., Norfolk, Va. (for a face value of $44,000,000; modification to modification to HTC711-09- D-0034); American Roll-on, American Roll-off Carrier, L.L.C., Park Ridge, N.J. (for a face value of $40,000,000; modification to modification to HTC711-09-D-0029); Liberty Global Logistics, L.L.C., Lake Success, N.Y. (for a face value of $28,000,000; modification to modification to HTC711-09- D-0039); Hapag-Lloyd USA, L.L.C., Tampa, Fla. (for a face value of $25,000,000; modification to modification to HTC711-09- D-0036); and Central Gulf Lines, Inc., Mobile, Ala. (for a face value of $9,000,000; modification to modification to HTC711-09-D-0031). These modifications will extend the period of performance under the Universal Services Contract-6 Program for an additional three months, March 31 to June 30, 2012. These contracts provide ocean and intermodal distribution services worldwide. Funds are only obligated upon cargo bookings and the amounts above are only an estimate to cover the three-month extension, as needed. U.S. Transportation Command, Directorate of Acquisition, Scott Air Force Base, Ill., is the contracting activity.

NAVY

Bell Helicopter Textron, Inc., Fort Worth, Texas, is being awarded a $56,750,000 advance acquisition contract to provide long lead parts and components required for the manufacture of Lot 10 UH-1Y (15) and AH-1Z (13) helicopters for the Marine Corps in support of the H-1 upgrade program. Work will be performed in Fort Worth, Texas (60 percent), and Amarillo, Texas (40 percent), and is expected to be completed in September 2013. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was not competitively procured pursuant to FAR 6.302-1. The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Md., is the contracting activity (N00019-12-C-0009).

General Electric Aviation, Lynn, Mass., is being awarded an $8,831,994 order against a previously issued basic ordering agreement (N00019-09-G-0009) for the F404 Component Improvement Program to include engineering and engine system improvement support. Work will be performed in Lynn, Mass., and is expected to be completed in December 2012. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Md., is the contracting activity.

General Dynamics Armament and Technical Products, Burlington, Vt., is being awarded a $6,875,640 modification to previously awarded contract (N00024-10-C-5141) for the production of Aegis gun and guided missile directors, MK82 Mod 0; and Aegis director controllers, MK 200 Mod 0 in support of DDG 116. The MK 82 director serves to position the fire control system antenna to a position in space for the purpose of illuminating the target. The director controller MK 200 houses the solid-state servo-amplifiers providing the servo drive signals, which then position the director to the desired target position. Work will be performed in Burlington, Vt., and is expected to be completed by January 2014. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington, D.C., is the contracting activity.

AIR FORCE

The Boeing Co., Huntington Beach, Calif., is being awarded a $20,693,458 a firm-fixed-price for procurement of 17,873-507 very high frequency/ultra high frequency modules for the Combat Survivor Evader Locator hand held radio and installation of the new module into 3,273 hand held radios. The location of the performance is Huntington Beach, Calif. Work is expected to be completed by April 30, 2013. Space and Nuclear Networks Division, Hanscom Air Force Base, Mass., is the contracting activity (FA8807-05-C-0004 P00084).

DEFENSE LOGISTICS AGENCY

AmeriQual Group, L.L.C., Evansville, Ind., was awarded a firm-fixed-price contract with a maximum $15,864,815 for various polymeric entree ration items. There are no other locations of performance. Using services are Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps. There were two responses to the Web solicitation. Type of appropriation is fiscal 2012 Defense Working Capital Funds. The date of performance completion is Feb. 28, 2013. The Defense Logistics Agency Troop Support, Philadelphia, Pa., is the contracting activity (SPM3S1-12-D-Z197).

The Wornick Co., Cincinnati, Ohio, was awarded a firm-fixed-price contract with a maximum $15,553,079 for various polymeric entree ration items. Other location of performance is Hamilton, Ohio. Using services are Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps. There were two responses to the Web solicitation. Type of appropriation is fiscal 2012 Defense Working Capital Funds. The date of performance completion is Feb. 28, 2013. The Defense Logistics Agency Troop Support, Philadelphia, Pa., is the contracting activity (SPM3S1-12-D-Z196).

*Link for This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources U.S. DoD issued No. 100-12 February 13, 2012
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*This article is being posted from Toronto, Canada By DTN News ~ Defense-Technology News Contact:dtnnews@ymail.com
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DTN News: Al-Qaeda Top Stories / Headlines News Dated February 13, 2012

2012-02-13T10:44:00.003-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News: Al-Qaeda Top Stories / Headlines News Dated February 13, 2012
Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable media

(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 13, 2012: Comprehensive daily news related to Al-Qaeda Top Stories / Headlines News for the world of TODAY.

*Comprehensive daily news related on Al-Qaeda Top Stories / Headlines News for the world of TODAY

Suspected Bali bomber said to be key link to Al-Qaeda
Channel News Asia
He is a suspected key member of Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), a Southeast Asian terror network linked toAl-Qaeda. Indonesian Defence Minister Purnomo Yusgiantoro has cited intelligence that Patek tried to meet Osama bin Laden in the Pakistani town of ...
See all stories on this topic »

Pakistani Taliban decry attacks against military
Pakistan Daily Times
PESHAWAR: Terrorists have called on fighters to honour an agreement not to attack the Pakistanimilitary in the most important sanctuary for the Taliban and al Qaeda along the Afghan border.Terrorists have long used North Waziristan as a base to ...
See all stories on this topic »

Implications of an Al Qaeda Syria
ABC Online
Claims by US sources that Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama Bin Laden's heir in thePakistani/Afghani-based Al Qaeda prime, personally oversaw the operation against Aleppo also seem out of character for AQI's previous track record. Following the 2001 invasion ...
See all stories on this topic »

ABC Online

Osama Bin Laden told children to move to the West
Daily Mail
Zakaria al-Sadah, whose sister is the fifth wife of the Al-Qaeda leader, said Bin Laden did not want his children and grandchildren following in the same path of terrorism like him. 'He told his own children and grandchildren, go to Europe and America ...
See all stories on this topic »

Daily Mail

Al-Qaeda has no direct terror role in India: Intelligence agencies
The Asian Age
An elaborate security review by the top intelligence and security establishment conducted over the last one week has not found any credible evidence of the Al Qaeda's direct involvement in sponsoring terror activities in the country.
See all stories on this topic »

Radical cleric Anwar Awlaki said to have directed underwear bomber terror plot
Examiner.com
Supplemental Factual Appendix documentation in the Justice Department's memo details Abdulmutallab's interactions with Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninusla (AQAP) terrorists in the months leading up to his attack on Northwest Flight 253.
See all stories on this topic »

Qaeda-linked Patek to stand trial in Indonesia
Emirates 24/7
He was extradited to Indonesia after being arrested in January 2011 in the Pakistani town of Abbottabad, where US commandos later killed Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden in a raid. Counter-terrorism officials would not confirm whether Patek had met bin ...
See all stories on this topic »

Al Qaeda terrorist dad sent to jail for 4 1/2 years
New York Daily News
BY JOHN MARZULLI THE FATHER of Al Qaeda terrorist Najibullah Zazi was sentenced Friday to 4 1/2 years in prison for obstructing the probe of his son's plan to detonate bombs in Manhattan subway trains. Mohammed Wali Zazi was convicted last summer by a ...
See all stories on this topic »

New York Daily News

BOOK REVIEW: 'The Al Qaeda Factor'
Washington Times
By Joshua Sinai - Special to The Washington Times By Mitchell D. Silber In “The Al Qaeda Factor,” Mitchell D. Silber investigates the extent to which al Qaeda's “core” in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region has been involved in organizing terrorist plots ...
See all stories on this topic »

Washington Times

Al-Shabab, Al Qaeda: Linkup of groups in decline?
Fox News
NAIROBI, Kenya -- Al Qaeda's decision to formally extend its terror franchise to what once was a nationalist movement in Somalia may only be a desperate joining of hands to prop up two militant groups that are both losing popular support and facing ...
See all stories on this topic »

Drones will not rid Pakistan of the terrorists
The Voice of Russia
Within al-Qaeda Badr Mansoor as well as Ilyas Kashmiri before him was responsible for the military training of extremists in Pakistan, who were later transferred to Afghanistan for terrorist attacks against the NATO forces. Among the terrorists killed...
See all stories on this topic »

The Voice of Russia

Britons jailed over terrorist plots
Sydney Morning Herald
A BRITISH judge has sent nine men to prison for al-Qaeda-inspired plots to bomb the London Stock Exchange and to set up a terrorist training camp. The Britons all pleaded guilty last week as their trial was due to begin at London's Woolwich Crown Court ...
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Sydney Morning Herald

Abu Qatada: the evil let loose on our streets
Telegraph.co.uk
In reality, Qatada is listed on the consolidated United Nations list of internationalterrorists under “Al-Qaeda Associates”. Although British judges decided he could be deported to Jordan, they were overruled by their counterparts in Strasbourg.
See all stories on this topic »

Telegraph.co.uk

Umar Patek Bali bombings accused on trial Monday
Channel News Asia
Umar was captured only in January last year in Abbotabad, Pakistan - the same city where Al Qaeda leader, Osama bin Laden, was killed by US soldiers. But terrorism experts following Umar Pateks' trial are looking beyond what took place in Bali more ...
See all stories on this topic »

The LWOT: Chicago cab driver pleads guilty to material support charge - by ...
Foreign Policy (blog)
BY JENNIFER ROWLAND | FEBRUARY 10, 2012 A Pakistani-American Chicago cab driver, Raja Lahrasib Khan, pleaded guilty on February 6 to one count of attempting to provide material support toterrorism for attempting to send money to Pakistan-based ...
See all stories on this topic »

Feds release new details on 'underwear bomber' and top Al Qaeda figure ...
Fox News
DETROIT – A Nigerian who pleaded guilty to trying to blow up a Detroit-bound plane began his path to terrorism with a text message from a top Al Qaeda figure in Yemen, the US government said Friday in a court filing that discloses new details about ...
See all stories on this topic »

U.S. Officials: Al Qaeda in Iraq Behind Deadly Bombings in Damascus and Aleppo ...
RedState
However, the expansion of al Qaeda in Iraq beyond that state's borders – evidently for the first time – demonstrates AQI's strength in Iraq's post-America phase. Despite years of hunting terror cells and individuals within AQI, the US was not only ...
See all stories on this topic »

*Link for This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable media sources

*Speaking Image - Creation of DTN News ~ Defense Technology News

*This article is being posted from Toronto, Canada By DTN News ~ Defense-Technology News Contact:dtnnews@ymail.com

©COPYRIGHT (C) DTN NEWS DEFENSE-TECHNOLOGY NEWS

DTN News - DEFENSE NEWS: Israel's President Shimon Peres Sends Message Of Peace To Iranians

2012-02-08T19:18:00.000-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News - DEFENSE NEWS: Israel's President Shimon Peres Sends Message Of Peace To Iranians

Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources AFP
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 8, 2012: President Shimon Peres sent a message of peace to Iranians from the podium of Israel's parliament on Wednesday, saying there was no need for the two peoples to be foes.

"We were not born enemies and there is no need for us to live as enemies," Peres said in a speech marking the 63rd anniversary of the Knesset's founding.

"Do not allow the flags of hostility to cast a dark shadow on your historic heritage," he said. "Your people are a sensitive people who aspire for friendship and peace, and not for conflict and wars."

In a televised address on Friday, Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei described Israel as "a cancerous tumour that must be cut out, and God willing it will be."

"From now on we will support any group that will fight the Zionist regime," said the all-powerful Iranian leader.

Speculation has risen in recent weeks, driven in part by comments made by officials in the Jewish state, about the possibility of an Israeli military strike on Iran.

Israel and much of the international community believe that Iran's nuclear programme masks a covert weapons drive, a charge Tehran denies.

Widely believed to be the Middle East's only albeit undeclared nuclear power, Israel has supported tough sanctions against Iran but also insists on retaining the military option to halt its nuclear activities.

Before the 1979 Islamic revolution which brought the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to power, Israel and the shah's Iran had warm relations.

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ABC News - ‎1 hour ago‎
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NPR (blog) - ‎2 hours ago‎
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Washington Post (blog) - ‎2 hours ago‎
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Wall Street Journal (blog) - ‎3 hours ago‎
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Reuters - ‎3 hours ago‎
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*Link for This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources AFP
*Speaking Image - Creation of DTN News ~ Defense Technology News
*This article is being posted from Toronto, Canada By DTN News ~ Defense-Technology News Contact:dtnnews@ymail.com
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DTN News - DEFENSE NEWS: BAE May Cut Typhoon Price To Win India Order

2012-02-07T21:42:00.000-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News - DEFENSE NEWS: BAE May Cut Typhoon Price To Win India Order
Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources The Telegraph - UK
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 7, 2012: BAE Systems is considering lowering the price of its Eurofighter Typhoon to win back an $11bn (£7bn) Indian contract from France’s Dassault.

Ian King, BAE’s chief executive, said the company was considering a range of options to secure the deal to supply fighter jets, which could help prevent a major industrial setback for Britain.

A source close to the company said BAE was consulting with its partners in Germany, Italy and Spain to see what was feasible in the coming days and weeks.

India had previously changed its mind on defence contracts, the source said, adding there was “still some way to go” before any decisions by the country had been made.

The insider insisted the contract was still up for grabs, with Dassault’s Rafale only having been named as the lowest-priced compliant bidder rather than being awarded the contract.

The Government’s drive to kickstart growth and rebalance the economy towards advanced manufacturing suffered a blow last month when the Indian government named the French manufacturer as its preferred partner for the deal.

Trade union Unite warned the selection of the Rafale could have "serious implications" for BAE Systems and the UK aerospace industry. It is estimated that 40,000 UK jobs are supported by the project.

Winning the Indian contract would help sustain tens of thousands of jobs, although production is expected to gradually move to India if Britain won the deal.

BAE currently has enough orders for the Typhoon to maintain work until 2017.

The Typhoon is made by Britain's BAE, European giant EADS, and Italy's Finmeccanica. The UK accounts for 37.5pc of production with the aircraft assembled at BAE's aerospace facilities in Lancashire and suppliers including GKN, Ultra Electronics and Rolls-Royce.

Last year, BAE cut 3,000 jobs in the UK, partly because it had won fewer export orders for the Typhoon than planned.

*Link for This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources The Telegraph - UK
*Speaking Image - Creation of DTN News ~ Defense Technology News
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DTN News - LOCKHEED MARTIN DEFENSE NEWS: Eleventh C-5B Inducted To Become Super Galaxy

2012-02-07T17:39:00.003-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News - LOCKHEED MARTIN DEFENSE NEWS: Eleventh C-5B Inducted To Become Super Galaxy
Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources Lockheed Martin
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 7, 2012: Lockheed Martin inducted the 11th aircraft to the C-5M Super Galaxy production line on Feb. 1, 2012.

Based at Dover Air Force Base, Del., this aircraft has supported the warfighter’s operations across the globe. It has delivered cargo in locations such as Iraq, Italy, Germany, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Qatar, Spain and Turkey.

Aircraft 86-0017 has accumulated more than 18,000 flight hours and more than 4,300 full-stop landings

Mission The C-5 Galaxy is one of the largest aircraft in the world and the largest airlifter in the Air Force inventory. The aircraft can carry a fully equipped combat-ready military unit to any point in the world on short notice and then provide the supplies required to help sustain the fighting force.

Features
The C-5 has a greater capacity than any other airlifter. It has the ability to carry 36 standard pallets and 81 troops simultaneously. The Galaxy is also capable of carrying any of the Army's air-transportable combat equipment, including such bulky items as the 74-ton mobile scissors bridge. It can also carry outsize and oversize cargo over intercontinental ranges and can take off or land in relatively short distances. Ground crews are able to load and off-load the C-5 simultaneously at the front and rear cargo openings, reducing cargo transfer times. Other features of the C-5 are:
   · Able to operate on runways 6,000 feet long (1,829 meters).
   · Five landing gear totaling 28 wheels to distribute the weight.
   · Nose and aft doors that open the full width and height of the cargo
     compartment to permit faster and easier loading.
   · A "kneeling" landing gear system that permits lowering the parked
     aircraft to facilitate drive-on/drive-off vehicle loading and adjusts the
     cargo floor to standard truck-bed height.
   · Full width drive-on ramps at each end for loading double rows of
     vehicles.
   · A system that records and analyzes information and detects
     malfunctions in more than 800 test points.

The C-5 has the distinctive high T-tail, 25-degree wing sweep, and four TF39 turbofan engines (C-5A and B) mounted on pylons beneath the wings. These engines are each rated at 43,000 pounds of thrust and weigh 7,900 pounds (3,555 kilograms) a piece. They have an air intake diameter of more than 8.5 feet (2.6 meters). Each engine pod is nearly 27 feet long (8.2 meters).

The Galaxy has 12 internal wing tanks with a total capacity of 51,150 gallons (194,370 liters) of fuel -- enough to fill 6 1/2 regular size railroad tank cars. A full fuel load weighs 332,500 pounds (150,820 kilograms). A C-5 with a cargo load of 270,000 pounds (122,472 kilograms) can fly 2,150 nautical miles, offload, and fly to a second base 500 nautical miles away from the original destination -- all without aerial refueling. With aerial refueling, the aircraft's range is limited only by crew endurance.

BackgroundLockheed-Georgia Co. delivered the first operational Galaxy to the 437th Airlift Wing, Charleston Air Force Base, now known as Joint Base Charleston, S.C., in June l970. C-5s are operated by active-duty, Reserve, and Air National Guard crews. They are currently stationed at Dover AFB, Del.; Travis AFB, Calif.; Lackland AFB, Texas; Martinsburg ANGB, W.V.; Memphis ANGB, Tenn. and Westover Air Reserve Base, Mass.

In March 1989, the last of 50 C-5Bs was added to the 76 C-5As in the Air Force's airlift force structure. The C-5B includes all C-5A improvements as well as more than 100 additional system modifications to improve reliability and maintainability.

Based on a study showing 80 percent of the C-5 airframe service life remaining, AMC began an aggressive program to modernize the C-5 in 1998. The C-5 Avionics Modernization Program included upgrading the avionics to improve communications, navigation and surveillance/air traffic management compliance. The upgrade also added new safety equipment and installed a new autopilot system.

Another part of the C-5 modernization plan is a comprehensive Reliability Enhancement and Re-engining Program. The centerpiece of this program is the General Electric CF6-80C2 (F-138) commercial engine. This engine delivers a 22 percent increase in thrust, a 30 percent shorter take-off roll, has a 58 percent faster climb rate and will allow significantly more cargo to be carried over longer distances. With its new engine and upgrades, the C-5 becomes the C-5M Super Galaxy. This modernization program will enhance aircraft reliability and maintainability, maintain structural and system integrity, reduce cost of ownership and increase operational capability well into the 21st century.

Media Contact:

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DTN News - AFGHANISTAN NEWS: Afghanistan - Moving Toward A Distant Endgame

2012-02-07T17:36:00.002-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News - AFGHANISTAN NEWS: Afghanistan - Moving Toward A Distant Endgame
Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources By George Friedman - Stratfor
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 7, 2012: U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta suggested last week that the United States could wrap up combat operations in Afghanistan by the end of 2013, well before the longstanding 2014 deadline when full control is to be ceded to Kabul. Troops would remain in Afghanistan until 2014, as agreed upon at the 2010 Lisbon Summit, and would be engaged in two roles until at least 2014 and perhaps even later. One role would be continuing the training of Afghan security forces. The other would involve special operations troops carrying out capture or kill operations against high-value targets.

Along with this announcement, the White House gave The New York Times some details on negotiations that have been under way with the Taliban. According to the Times, Mullah Mohammad Omar, the senior-most leader of the Afghan Taliban, last summer made overtures to the White House offering negotiations. An intermediary claiming to speak for Mullah Omar delivered the proposal, an unsigned document purportedly from Mullah Omar that could not be established as authentic. The letter demanded the release of some Taliban prisoners before any talks. In spite of the ambiguities, which included a recent public denial by the Taliban that the offer came from Mullah Omar, U.S. officials, obviously acting on other intelligence, regarded the proposal as both authentic and representative of the views of the Taliban leadership and, in all likelihood, those of Mullah Omar, too.

The idea of negotiating with the Taliban is not new. Talks, as distinct from negotiations, in which specific terms are hammered out, have gone on for some time now. Several previous attempts have ended in failure, including one instance when the supposed representative proved to be a fraud. However, according to the Times report, the negotiations took on a degree of specificity last summer. They began in November 2010, initiated by a man named Tayyab Agha, who claimed to speak for Mullah Omar. The administration of U.S. President Barack Obama regards authenticating the present offer as unimportant and the intermediary as having authority; the question on the table is the release of Taliban captives as a token of American seriousness.

The Taliban see themselves as already having made a major concession. Their original demand was the complete withdrawal of Western forces from Afghanistan as a precondition for negotiations. The talks have continued in spite of the U.S. refusal to comply. The Taliban shifted their position to a very specific timetable for withdrawal, something Panetta may have been hinting at last week, though not on a timetable to the Taliban's liking. Two more years of combat operations -- not to mention an unspecified time in which U.S. special operations forces will continue working in Afghanistan -- is a long time. In addition, the United States has not delivered on the release of the Taliban, an issue that has not emerged as a campaign issue in the U.S. presidential election.

Still, U.S. operations have become less aggressive. This is in part due to the season: It is winter in Afghanistan, a time of year when large-scale operations are not practical in many areas. At the same time, we are not seeing the level of operations we have seen in previous winters after Obama increased the number of U.S. forces in Afghanistan. This in part reflects a realization of the limits of U.S. military power in Afghanistan. Regardless of the motive, the Taliban interpret it as a signal -- and it is understood in Washington as a signal, too.

The Pakistani-Taliban Channel

To get negotiations going, the United States had to reach two conclusions. The first was that negotiations could not happen without Pakistani involvement. U.S. accusations that current and former military figures in Pakistan maintained close ties with the Taliban undoubtedly were true. Conversely, this meant Pakistan represented a clear channel the United States could use to reach the Taliban. That channel permitted the Obama administration to conclude that it had no hope of meaningfully dividing the Taliban.

Certainly, the Taliban are an operationally diffuse group. Even so, Mullah Omar is at their center, with the political operatives surrounding him representing the political office of the Taliban. The line of communications with the Taliban runs through Pakistan and terminates with Mullah Omar. This means that U.S. hopes of splitting the Taliban politically and conducting factional negotiations are not realistic. Particularly after a series of attacks and suicide bombings in Kabul last fall, it also became apparent that the United States would not be able to manage negotiations at arm's length using Afghan President Hamid Karzai and his advisers as the primary channel.

The Pakistanis and the Taliban also had to face certain realities. The Taliban had claimed that the United States and its allies in Afghanistan had lost. This underpinned their demand for an immediate U.S. withdrawal; their offer to permit this without harassment was made under the assumption that the United States had a defeated military force at risk.

The reality was that, while the United States had not won the war in Afghanistan and in all likelihood could not defeat the Taliban militarily, it was far from defeated. The United States remained, and remains, able to conduct operations in Afghanistan as and where it wishes. The Taliban have not reached the point where they can operationally defeat the forces arrayed against them. Where large Western forces exist, the Taliban must decline combat and disengage or be annihilated. As important, there is no overwhelming pressure from the American public to withdraw -- something not true of some U.S. allies. However, in this election, Obama is likely to be challenged by candidates supporting his position in Afghanistan or wanting a more aggressive stance. Mitt Romney, for example, not only rejected the idea of releasing Taliban fighters, but also said in response to a question that his strategy in Afghanistan was to "beat them."

The United States could hypothetically remain in Afghanistan indefinitely given the current cost and force structure. But we would argue that defeating a guerrilla force with sanctuary and support across the border in Pakistan, an excellent intelligence capability and units able to operate independently is unlikely. But neither, for that matter, can the Taliban defeat the coalition forces.

Stalemate in Afghanistan

This makes for a stalemate, one the Americans hope to solve by creating an Afghan state under Karzai and a security and military force able and willing to engage the Taliban. As I have argued in the past, the core problem with this plan is the same problem that existed during the Vietnamization phase of the Vietnam War. The Afghan military must recruit troops, and some of the most eager volunteers will be Taliban operatives. These operatives will be indistinguishable from anti-Taliban soldiers, and their presence will have two consequences. First, the intelligence they will provide the Taliban will cause the Afghan army offensive to fail. Second, shrewd use of these operatives will undermine the cohesion and morale of the Afghan forces. Surprise is crucial in locating, engaging and destroying a guerrilla force. Afghan security forces will face the same problem the South Vietnamese army did; namely, they will lack the element of surprise and at least some of their units will be unreliable.

Accordingly, the U.S. strategy of using the stalemate to construct a capable military force accordingly looks unlikely to succeed even leaving aside the issue of the fragmentation of the Afghan nation and the Karzai government's internal problems. The Taliban are intimately familiar with the U.S. dilemma and are positioned to choose from two strategies. One is to increase their tempo of operations and so increase American casualties prior to the November elections. But this strategy would see Taliban casualties increase even more dramatically, and its impact on the elections would be unclear to say the least. The Taliban are more likely to pursue the second strategy, which involves accepting the stalemate and permitting the United States to try to build an Afghan military.

Like the Taliban, the United States is aware of the difficulty of building an Afghan army. It also understands that deploying troops in Afghanistan is unlikely to lead anywhere. It does not have to flee defeat in Afghanistan, but there are strategic reasons for leaving, beginning with the fact that the military situation is about as satisfactory as it likely ever will be. Improving the situation would incur costs without yielding anything like victory. With the United States reducing its military budget, serious issues emerging in Iran and throughout the Arab World, and a new emphasis by the U.S. Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force on the Pacific, the world is moving on. A violent yet frozen conflict in Afghanistan simply does not benefit the United States.

This, of course, leaves a crucial question: Will Afghanistan become a base for al Qaeda or follow-on transnational jihadist groups in the event of a U.S. withdrawal? It is true that these groups can form anywhere, but the fact is that they did form in Afghanistan while Mullah Omar was in charge. The negotiators undoubtedly have promised that, in exchange for withdrawal, they will take responsibility for suppressing jihadist elements. But trusting the Taliban, or trusting those in Pakistan who took violent offense at the killing of Osama bin Laden, poses obvious risks for the United States. In truth, it does not increase the risk much: Afghanistan is not necessary for the jihadists, but it is naturally fragmented and the threat of its re-emergence as a sanctuary is always there. Even so, the issue will remain a sticking point in the negotiations. The United States will want a residual force to deal with the jihadist threat, something the Taliban and Pakistan will oppose.

The Pakistani Role

In this sense, the negotiations really come down to Pakistan and the burden it is willing to undertake in the event of a U.S. withdrawal.

The United States does not trust the Taliban or many of those Pakistani officials speaking to and for the Taliban. But the United States also knows two things. First, that the future of Afghanistan is of fundamental interest to Pakistan. Instability or Indian or Iranian influence in Pakistan is not in Pakistan's interest. Therefore, the Pakistanis will play a leading role in Afghanistan as they did after the end of the Soviet occupation. Second, the United States knows that India remains Pakistan's major adversary. The Pakistanis have tried to play the China card to make the United States nervous about Pakistan. But the fact is that the Chinese People's Liberation Army does not have the training and logistics to support Pakistan against India, and the last thing Pakistan wants is a large Chinese military deployment in Pakistan. Indeed, that is the last thing China wants.

The issue over time will boil down to this: The United States will want a coalition government in which Taliban elements take Cabinet positions in the current structure of the Karzai regime. The Taliban will want an entirely new government in which elements of the existing power structure (Karzai has promised not to seek a third term when his current one ends in 2014) might have a position but that would be an altogether new regime. In either case, the Taliban assume, as the North Vietnamese assumed a generation ago, that a political settlement followed by a U.S. withdrawal would, after a "decent interval," result in a Taliban-dominated regime.

Ultimately, the United States could remain in Afghanistan indefinitely and there is nothing the Taliban could do about it. But the United States cannot defeat the Taliban. The Taliban have nowhere to go and no desire to leave. The United States has other issues to attend to and no overriding strategic interest in Afghanistan. From the American point of view, its presence in Afghanistan does not reduce Islamist threats to the homeland but it does absorb military resources.

What the United States is engaged in now, as it was in 1971, is the complex process of crafting a political path from the current situation to the inevitable end. This isn't easy, since the manner in which the United States withdraws will influence its position in the region as much as its indefinite presence would. This is why the administration is so eager to pursue the current initiative and prepared to release prisoners as a gesture. It is also why the Taliban will accept a coalition government for a while, and why Pakistan will make and likely honor guarantees.

However this war is brought to an end will be a complex and time-consuming process, during which the fighting will continue. But then the how is never trivial in ending a war.

*Link for This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources By George Friedman - Stratfor
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DTN News - IRAN NUCLEAR FACTOR: Obama Says Risky To Attack Iran, Wants Diplomatic Fix

2012-02-06T05:52:00.001-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News - IRAN NUCLEAR FACTOR: Obama Says Risky To Attack Iran, Wants Diplomatic Fix
Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources By Laura MacInnis and Parisa Hafezi - Reuters
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 6, 2012: In a television interview, Obama also said he did not believe Tehran had the "intentions or capabilities" to attack the United States, playing down the threats from Tehran and saying he wanted a diplomatic end to the nuclear standoff.

"Any kind of additional military activity inside the Gulf is disruptive and has a big effect on us. It could have a big effect on oil prices. We've still got troops in Afghanistan, which borders Iran. And so our preferred solution here is diplomatic," Obama said.

His comments echoed concerns expressed by earlier by Iran's neighbor Turkey that an attack on Iran would be disastrous.

Obama, who is up for re-election in November, has ended the U.S. war in Iraq and is winding down combat in Afghanistan amid growing public discontent about American war spending at a time when the economy remains shaky.

He said Israel had not yet decided what to do in response to the escalating tension but was "rightly" concerned about Tehran's plans.

"My number one priority continues to be the security of the United States, but also the security of Israel, and we are going to make sure that we work in lockstep as we proceed to try to solve this, hopefully diplomatically," he told NBC.

Iranian leaders have responded sharply to speculation that Israel could bomb Iran within months to stop it from assembling nuclear weapons, threatening to retaliate against any country that launches an attack against the Islamic Republic.

Iran says its nuclear program is meant to produce energy, not weapons.

But its recent shift of uranium enrichment to a mountain bunker - possibly impervious to conventional bombing - and refusal to negotiate peaceful guarantees for the program or open up to U.N. inspectors have raised fears about Iran's ambitions as well as concerns about Gulf oil supplies.

'DISASTER'

Although tough sanctions from the United States and Europe have begun to inflict economic pain in Iran, its oil minister asserted on Saturday it would make no nuclear retreat even if its energy exports ground to a halt.

Betraying nervousness about the possibility of a military strike on Iran, two of its neighbors - Qatar and Turkey - urged Western powers on Sunday to make greater efforts to negotiate a solution to the nuclear dispute.

Speaking at a security conference in Munich, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said an attack would be a disaster and suggested the dispute over Iran's nuclear program could be ended very rapidly.

"If there is strong political will and mutual confidence being established, this issue could be resolved in a few days," he said. "The technical disputes are not so big. The problem is mutual confidence and strong political will."

He added: "A military option will create a disaster in our region. So before that disaster, everybody must be serious in negotiations. We hope soon both sides will meet again but this time there will be a complete result."

Qatari Deputy Foreign Minister Khalid Mohamed al-Attiyah said an attack "is not a solution."

"I believe that with our allies and friends in the West we should open a serious dialogue with the Iranians to get out of this dilemma. This is what we feel in our region," he said.

Turkey hosted talks between Western powers and Iran a year ago that ended in stalemate because the participants could not agree on an agenda.

VOLATILE REGION

Despite Obama's stated preference for a diplomatic solution, he said from the White House on Sunday he would not take options off the table to stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons.

"We're going to do everything we can to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon and creating an arms race - a nuclear arms race - in a volatile region," he said in the interview.

Any military strike on Iran, which might include an attack on the oilfields of No. 1 exporter Saudi Arabia, could send oil prices soaring, which could seriously harm the global economy.

Tehran has warned its response to any such strike would be "painful," threatening to target Israel and U.S. bases in the Gulf, and warning it may close the Strait of Hormuz used by one third of the world's seaborne oil traffic.

The elite Revolutionary Guards began two days of military maneuvers in southern Iran on Saturday in a show of force for Iran's adversaries. On Sunday, the deputy of that unit said Iran was ready to attack any country whose territory is used by "enemies" to launch a military strike against it.

"Any spot used by the enemy for hostile operations against Iran will be subjected to retaliatory aggression by our armed forces," Hossein Salami told the semi-official Fars news agency. The Gulf states that host U.S. military facilities are Qatar, Bahrain and Kuwait.

Experts currently estimate the longest range of an Iranian missile to be 1,500 miles, capable of reaching Israel and Europe. Las week, Israeli Vice Prime Minister Moshe Yaalon said Iran had been working on a missile that could strike the United States, with a range of 6,000 miles.

Asked about that risk, Obama said there was little sign of a pending Iranian attack on U.S. soil. "We don't see any evidence they have those intentions or capabilities right now," he said.

(Additional reporting by William Maclean in Munich, Michael Holden in London and Aruna Viswanatha in Washington; Writing by Laura MacInnis; Editing by Doina Chiacu)

*Link for This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources By Laura MacInnis and Parisa Hafezi - Reuters
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DTN News - INDIA DEFENSE NEWS: Why India Chose Rafale

2012-02-06T04:17:00.002-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News - INDIA DEFENSE NEWS: Why India Chose Rafale
Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources By K. P. Nayar - The Telergraph Calcutta India

(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 6, 2012: When Pratibha Patil travelled to Europe last October, she and others in her entourage had a pleasant surprise in the sky. At one point along the air space that the President’s flight was using, half a squadron of Eurofighters appeared on both sides of her Air India plane.

In the graceful style of these sleek war machines, they escorted the presidential aircraft to its safe landing at Patil’s next destination. Even so, those manning the Eurofighters could not resist showing off.

When the Eurofighters displayed the prowess of this advanced new-generation, multi-role combat aircraft to the President, members of Parliament and senior officials accompanying her, New Delhi’s quest for 126 planes of its kind could not have been far from the minds of their pilots.

The competition for the biggest military aviation deal in history, which began 11 years ago when the defence ministry initiated its “request for information” or RFI, had just entered its final and decisive phase.

But the impromptu decision to send the Eurofighters across European skies to impress the President was typical of what cost some rivals of Dassault Aviation — last week’s winners — the lucrative Indian Air Force contract.

It was somewhat reminiscent of Henry Kissinger’s disastrous invitation to defence minister Jagjivan Ram to visit Washington in 1971 as the sub-continent was heading into war, as recounted by Rukmini Menon, who was then joint secretary for the US in South Block.

“Why should I visit Washington?” Ram asked a non-plussed Kissinger and proceeded to tell him how American arms supplies had emboldened Pakistan to ruthlessly suppress East Pakistanis.

Partly, it was a similar approach that resulted in Boeing’s F-18E and Lockheed Martin’s F-16E being turfed out of the competition for the IAF deal earlier in the race. Not solely with the multi-role combat aircraft deal in mind, the Obama administration had made too much noise bereft of substance about the first state visit of his administration and Barack Obama’s first state dinner in honour of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

There was a time when India’s rulers could solely be influenced by gimmicks. But theatrics and atmospherics can no longer substitute hard policy options. This is one lesson New Delhi has hopefully absorbed firsthand from intense, albeit under the radar interaction with Israelis — especially in defence matters — in the last 20 years.

Then there was A.K. Antony, whom the losers in the bid for the IAF deal had not reckoned with. Antony, by nature, is averse to being the public face of decision-making. This has been the case throughout his tenure as defence minister, especially during scandals such as the Adarsh housing scam that rocked the army. Each time it was clear that the defence minister had made up his mind, but the decisions were put out as if they were taken elsewhere, along the proper channel.

Such an approach came through clearly in his most detailed statement on January 31 on the controversy about the army chief’s age. Ending months of virtual silence in the matter, Antony blamed the army for sitting on the problem for 36 years and then dealing with it in its own wisdom. So much so the army chief Gen. V.K. Singh had to agree with the minister.

Antony has maintained in public throughout that the multi-role combat aircraft acquisition process is a technical matter that would be decided by professionals in uniform. But such a public position overlooks the reality that Antony’s core support team in his ministry is much more ideological than in any other wing of the present government. Like civil servants, men in uniform are not immune from ministerial winds blowing in a particular direction.

Ideological considerations have prevented Antony from visiting Israel and from signing at least three defence agreements with the Americans which his core team views as compromising India’s strategic autonomy.

If the Russian plane on offer, MiG-35, had not clearly failed the tests, it was conceivable that it would very much have been in the reckoning. With the Russians out of the way, it did weigh with the political leadership in the defence ministry that France favours a multi-polar world and that India is a beneficiary of such an approach.

France won the bid for the entire order because it supplemented the requirements of the global tender with sweeteners that in the real world of strategic engagement, only three countries can offer India: Russia and Israel, in addition to France itself.

The collaborations that France has offered India in recent years in the field of intelligence sharing and upgrade are without parallel. Naturally, this is an area where co-operation cannot be publicised by the very nature of such engagement.

India and France face somewhat similar threats of domestic terrorism, vastly different from the threats faced by the US, Russia or even Israel. The assistance that Paris has offered New Delhi in preparing the country against such threats and the constant upgrading of their assistance went a long way towards creating an environment that favoured the French on the aircraft deal.

It was in direct contrast to Washington’s approach: the bulk of India’s intelligence community and key bureaucrats at decision-making levels believe that the Americans two-timed New Delhi on David Coleman Headley, their double agent in Chicago who played a major role in the Pakistan-supported terrorist attack on Mumbai in 2008.

In addition, spread across India’s entire political spectrum that includes much of the Opposition, is a firm conviction that India would not have come out unscathed from the decision to conduct the 1998 nuclear tests if it were not for the steadfast backing that President Jacques Chirac — and Nicolas Sarkozy after him — offered India in an hour of great need.

It is not widely known that during the Kargil war in 1999, the French approved with lightning speed the adaptation of Indian Air Force Mirages in tandem with equally speedy Israeli supplies of laser-guided bombs which they delivered in Srinagar: without such French and Israeli support, India could have lost Kargil to Pervez Musharraf’s perfidy.

No honourable Indian in uniform can forget that in such a situation, the US or Britain would have probably suspended all military supplies to the combatants to prove their bona fides as honest brokers for peace.

Policies may be the result of collective decision-making in governments, but within that framework, individuals do matter. One such individual who has left a mark on Franco-Indian relations is Jean-David Levitte, whose critical role in securing the Rafale deal for his country will never become a matter of public record because of the nature of his job.

Levitte is diplomatic adviser and “Sherpa” to Sarkozy, who made amends for the temperamental mistakes during his President’s first visit to India as chief guest during Republic Day celebrations in New Delhi and organised a second trip that turned out to be one of most productive and substantive visits by any head of state to India.

Levitte was senior diplomatic adviser to Chirac too when Brajesh Mishra, the then principal secretary to Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, flew to Paris as his first stop abroad seeking diplomatic support after the Pokhran II nuclear tests. Mishra found such support in Paris before he extracted reluctant support from Moscow.

Soon afterwards, Levitte became French permanent representative to the UN in New York where he led, along with Russia, a split among the five permanent members of the Security Council on the issue of punishing India through sanctions on the nuclear issue. Later he was ambassador in Washington.

Two of the countries which have been after the multi-role combat aircraft deal, the US and Britain, were at that time in the forefront of efforts in the Security Council to choke India into submission and roll back its nuclear programme.

Within the political and civilian leadership of India’s defence establishment, there has been no doubt that other things being equal, India should reward a friend in need, in this case, France.

*Link for This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources By K. P. Nayar - The Telergraph Calcutta India
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DTN News - DEFENSE & INTELLIGENCE NEWS: China's Cyber Thievery Is National Policy—And Must Be Challenged

2012-02-05T12:17:00.002-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News - DEFENSE & INTELLIGENCE NEWS: China's Cyber Thievery Is National Policy—And Must Be Challenged
*It is more efficient for the Chinese to steal innovations and intellectual property than to incur the cost and time of creating their own.
Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources WSJ – Mike McConnell, Michael Chertoff, William Lynn
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 5, 2012:Only three months ago, we would have violated U.S. secrecy laws by sharing what we write here—even though, as a former director of national intelligence, secretary of homeland security, and deputy secretary of defense, we have long known it to be true. The Chinese government has a national policy of economic espionage in cyberspace. In fact, the Chinese are the world's most active and persistent practitioners of cyber espionage today.

Evidence of China's economically devastating theft of proprietary technologies and other intellectual property from U.S. companies is growing. Only in October 2011 were details declassified in a report to Congress by the Office of the National Counterintelligence Executive. Each of us has been speaking publicly for years about the ability of cyber terrorists to cripple our critical infrastructure, including financial networks and the power grid. Now this report finally reveals what we couldn't say before: The threat of economic cyber espionage looms even more ominously.

The report is a summation of the catastrophic impact cyber espionage could have on the U.S. economy and global competitiveness over the next decade. Evidence indicates that China intends to help build its economy by intellectual-property theft rather than by innovation and investment in research and development (two strong suits of the U.S. economy). The nature of the Chinese economy offers a powerful motive to do so.

According to 2009 estimates by the United Nations, China has a population of 1.3 billion, with 468 million (about 36% of the population) living on less than $2 a day. While Chinese poverty has declined dramatically in the last 30 years, income inequality has increased, with much greater benefits going to the relatively small portion of educated people in urban areas, where about 25% of the population lives.

The bottom line is this: China has a massive, inexpensive work force ravenous for economic growth. It is much more efficient for the Chinese to steal innovations and intellectual property—the source code of advanced economies—than to incur the cost and time of creating their own. They turn those stolen ideas directly into production, creating products faster and cheaper than the U.S. and others.

Cyberspace is an ideal medium for stealing intellectual capital. Hackers can easily penetrate systems that transfer large amounts of data, while corporations and governments have a very hard time identifying specific perpetrators.

Unfortunately, it is also difficult to estimate the economic cost of these thefts to the U.S. economy. The report to Congress calls the cost "large" and notes that this includes corporate revenues, jobs, innovation and impacts to national security. Although a rigorous assessment has not been done, we think it is safe to say that "large" easily means billions of dollars and millions of jobs.

So how to protect ourselves from this economic threat? First, we must acknowledge its severity and understand that its impacts are more long-term than immediate. And we need to respond with all of the diplomatic, trade, economic and technological tools at our disposal.

The report to Congress notes that the U.S. intelligence community has improved its collaboration to better address cyber espionage in the military and national-security areas. Yet today's legislative framework severely restricts us from fully addressing domestic economic espionage. The intelligence community must gain a stronger role in collecting and analyzing this economic data and making it available to appropriate government and commercial entities.

Congress and the administration must also create the means to actively force more information-sharing. While organizations (both in government and in the private sector) claim to share information, the opposite is usually the case, and this must be actively fixed.

The U.S. also must make broader investments in education to produce many more workers with science, technology, engineering and math skills. Our country reacted to the Soviet Union's 1957 launch of Sputnik with investments in math and science education that launched the age of digital communications. Now is the time for a similar approach to build the skills our nation will need to compete in a global economy vastly different from 50 years ago.

Corporate America must do its part, too. If we are to ever understand the extent of cyber espionage, companies must be more open and aggressive about identifying, acknowledging and reporting incidents of cyber theft. Congress is considering legislation to require this, and the idea deserves support. Companies must also invest more in enhancing their employees' cyber skills; it is shocking how many cyber-security breaches result from simple human error such as coding mistakes or lost discs and laptops.

In this election year, our economy will take center stage, as will China and its role in issues such as monetary policy. If we are to protect ourselves against irreversible long-term damage, the economic issues behind cyber espionage must share some of that spotlight.

Mr. McConnell, a retired Navy vice admiral and former director of the National Security Agency (1992-96) and director of national intelligence (2007-09), is vice chairman of Booz Allen Hamilton. Mr. Chertoff, a former secretary of homeland security (2005-09), is senior counsel at Covington & Burling. Mr. Lynn has served as deputy secretary of defense (2009-11) and undersecretary of defense (1997-2001).

*LINK FOR THIS ARTICLE COMPILED BY ROGER SMITH FROM RELIABLE SOURCES WSJ – MIKE MCCONNELL, MICHAEL CHERTOFF, WILLIAM LYNN

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DTN News - INSIGHT BIHAR STATE ~ INDIA NEWS: From Darkest India, An Enlightened Leader

2012-02-05T06:21:00.003-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News - INSIGHT BIHAR STATE ~ INDIA NEWS: From Darkest India, An Enlightened Leader
Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources Reuters
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 5, 2012: There's an apocryphal story about Bihar, a sprawling state on the Gangetic plains of eastern India that for decades held the dubious honor of being the most violent, poverty-stricken and corrupt in the land.

A Japanese minister visiting in the 1990s, shocked at the decrepit buildings, the darkness at night even in the centre of town and the crumbling roads, declared that it was all solvable.

"Give me three years," he told a state leader, "and I can turn Bihar into Japan."

"That's nothing," came the laconic reply from his host. "Give me three days and I will turn Japan into Bihar."

Bihar is no longer the butt of jokes, however, not since Nitish Kumar took charge of the ruined state in 2005 and began to turn it around -- winning such respect that he stands a decent chance of one day becoming prime minister of India.

"My first priority was governance, my second priority was governance and my third priority was governance," Chief Minister Kumar told Reuters at his office in the state capital, Patna, a dusty city where property prices have soared to levels paid in far away New Delhi, even as its streets teem with the desperately poor.

"Bihar suffered not because of bad governance but because of a lack of governance."

When India launched reforms to open up its state-stifled economy 20 years ago, many states surged ahead, leaving behind the 3.5 percent "Hindu rate of growth" that had plagued the decades after the country's independence from Britain in 1947, and with it Bihar.

Bihar is still India's most impoverished state: landlocked, not blessed with resources and prone to catastrophic flooding, its annual per-capita income of about $400 is just a third of the national average. Its 104 million overwhelmingly farm-dependent people have India's worst literacy rate and the lowest proportion of households with electricity, and the state scores miserably on the U.N.'s Human Development Index.

It's hard to imagine that in ancient times Bihar was the centre of the flourishing Magadha empires and the region where the Buddha lived and attained enlightenment.

And yet the state's dismally low income level has grown 250 percent since Kumar took the helm, more than double the national average. The growth of its economy has surged into double figures to become India's second-fastest growing state, driven by hefty public spending on roads and buildings and rapid expansion in services such as hotels and restaurants.

RESTORING FAITH

Kumar has done much more than bring growth. Working until midnight most days for the past six years, he has declared war on crime and corruption, introduced an act that gives citizens the right to efficient public services, launched a frenzy of road-building, empowered women and promoted education, offering a free bicycle to every girl that registers in a Grade 9 class.

"Everything had gone to the dogs," said Prakash Jha, one of Bihar's favorite sons, a Bollywood film-maker who has chronicled many of the state's ills, including the once-thriving industry of kidnapping businessmen.

"What Nitish Kumar has been able to do is restore faith in the society of Bihar. We had almost given up, but now you feel you can do things in Bihar," said Jha, who has put his money where his mouth is, spending $12 million on a shopping mall and cinema multiplex in Patna, the state's first.

Kumar is not without detractors: critics say he is poor at delegating, causes bottlenecks by amassing all decision-making in his office and accomplishes far less than he claims.

"This is a government of denting, painting and decorating," said state opposition leader Abdul Bari Siddiqui. "It's all on the surface. Nitish Kumar will hold a ceremony to inaugurate the ditch and then another for the bridge built over it."

Still, the contrast between the hyper-active chief minister of Bihar and the central government in New Delhi could hardly be more stark after months of drift and policy paralysis under Prime Minister Manmohan Singh that have contributed to a slowdown in the country's stellar economic growth.

AN IDEOLOGY OF HUMANISM

A vegetable garden borders the path that leads to the simple Patna bungalow where the chief minister has his office. On a shelf inside his sparsely furnished room, there are several trophies awarded by media groups for "Indian of the Year." There is just one picture on the wall, an image of Mahatma Gandhi, father of independent India.

Kumar's father was a freedom-fighter during British rule, but the son has always been implacably opposed to the Congress party that led the struggle for independence and its Nehru-Gandhi dynasty of leaders, defining himself more by his vision of social justice than any political group.

"His is not an ideology of a political party, it's an ideology of humanism," said M.J. Akbar, one of India's best-known newspaper editors and a former member of parliament for a Bihar constituency.

Meticulously turned out in a creaseless cream tunic, sleeveless Nehru jacket and a grey scarf, 60-year-old Kumar smiles gently as he explains his style of governance: "pro-poor and pro-people."

An engineering graduate, Kumar first got a toehold in state politics and then in New Delhi, where he was a member of parliament and the country's railways minister in a coalition led by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

He won elections in Bihar for his Janata Dal (United) party six years ago and, in a ringing endorsement of his policies, he was voted back to power in 2010.

Kumar's party is still aligned with the BJP, and popular wisdom has is that if their coalition wins the general election in 2014 he could be a strong contender to become prime minister.

Does he dream of leading the country one day?

"Not really," he says diffidently. "Serving my own people gives me satisfaction. I don't have any ambition. I don't have that kind of desire."

Not content to sit in Patna for long, Kumar gets around Bihar's 38 districts, talking to people on streets and in village squares to find out what they want fixed. These audiences are followed by meetings with district officials at which he prods the state's bureaucracy to respond.

"Why is there darkness around the lamp?" he asked at one such meeting in Patna recently, when he was informed that a scheme to provide free meals for schoolchildren was least effective in and around the city. "This is the capital, you all live here, we have to improve this."

Later, when told of plans to hire more land records staff, he instructed officials to make sure there were desks and offices ready for them. "We don't want them loitering in the corridors," he said, his voice restrained but still dominating the room filled with more than 100 bureaucrats.

This direct and no-nonsense delivery belies his apparent bonhomie.

"He is a very confident person who disguises his confidence with a great amount of modesty," said Akbar.

VOTES ARE 'CASTE'

It is sometimes said that in Bihar people "don't cast their votes, they vote for their caste."

That is because, besides being blighted by poverty, its people have long been sharply divided by Hinduism's social hierarchy. In the fairly recent past, upper and lower caste groups kept private armies, and pitched battles between them or massacres by one side or another were common.

Fanning the caste-based politics of Bihar in the 1990s was Lalu Prasad Yadav, now a lawmaker in New Delhi. A charismatic leader from a "backward" caste whose trademark humor can make a budget speech sound like a stand-up routine, Yadav's reign was dubbed the "Jungle Raj" as the rule of law broke down.

Kumar also belongs to a minority "backward" caste and was aligned with Yadav for years before they parted ways. One factor behind his rise has been his resolve to woo voters not by social blocs but on the basis of his government's performance.

"Caste is the reality in the Indian system, but I have proved that caste does not decide the outcome of an election," he said.

Corruption is still endemic despite Kumar's crackdown. He has confiscated the houses of two corrupt officials to turn them into schools, and many others face the same fate, but critics say he is actually too tolerant of the graft around him.

Law and order remains a serious problem, too. In 2010, Bihar ranked second among the country's states for the number of people killed in violent crimes, and police seize tens of thousands of illegal firearms every year.

Still, many feel that Bihar is a safer place since Kumar launched an anti-crime drive. Residents now feel less frightened to drive at night in rural areas, where roadside hold-ups and kidnappings were once routine.

"Five years ago, if we had to travel from Gaya to Patna, we would leave by 3 in the afternoon so we could get to the city before dark," said Navendu Kumar Thakur, who runs a construction company in the state. Gaya is about 100 km (60 miles) south of the state capital. "Now, it doesn't matter if we leave at 9 at night, there's no problem on the road."

Kumar says restoring faith in the police and judiciary was a top priority.

"A reign of terror used to prevail in the society, Bihar used to be in the news for all the wrong reasons," he said. "My first task was to ensure rule of law and trust in the system."

WEAK ECONOMIC BASE

With the improvement in law and order, there has been tentative interest in setting up industries in Bihar, which is 90 percent dependent on agriculture after the mineral-rich region of Jharkhand was hived off into a separate state in 2000.

New industries in Bihar can receive up to 300 percent of capital invested in VAT refunds over 10 years, in addition to a host of other incentives.

"He (Kumar) has shown that grass can grow in a desert," said Prem Kumar Agrawal, part-owner of a biscuit-making plant in the Hajipur industrial park near Patna, where half a dozen factories have opened in the past six months. With 300 workers, his enterprise produces 70-75 tonnes of biscuits per day.

"I give Nitish 9 out of 10 in terms of industrial policy," Agrawal said. "Bihar is now on the map."

But the new factories are only part of the story: abandoned buildings litter the rest of the industrial park, the metal fences on road dividers are rusty and the link to the nearby highway is a potholed and narrow road.

Manufacturing has in fact contributed very little to the surge in the economy's growth: with power cuts common, highways often jammed and graft still thriving, few investors are willing to brave Bihar yet. No surprise, then, that Bihar was ranked bottom last year in a state-by-state survey of economic freedom.

Official figures show that even agriculture, the mainstay of the economy, has contracted for the past six years, suggesting that the Bihar boom has been far from inclusive. Much of the growth has instead been generated by hefty public spending on construction, which means the Bihar boom may not have a solid enough base to be sustainable.

Indeed, Bihar is Exhibit A for the case that India is a two-track economy, with industry-friendly seaboard states rushing ahead as others grow from extremely low bases.

Shaibal Gupta, secretary of the Asian Development Research Institute in Patna, reckons that even if Bihar's growth continues at its current double-digit clip it would take 18 years to catch up with the present-day wealth of Maharashtra, home to the financial capital, Mumbai.

"We can't call it a miracle," Gupta said. "It's some change at an initial level that should have happened 60 years ago."

(Editing by Alex Richardson)

*Link for This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources Reuters
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DTN News - DEFENSE NEWS: U.S. DoD Awarded Contract To Oshkosh Defense For Navy LVSR

2012-02-04T10:36:00.003-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News - DEFENSE NEWS: U.S. DoD Awarded Contract To Oshkosh Defense For Navy LVSR
Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources DTN News & U.S. DoD February 3, 2012
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 4, 2012: Oshkosh Defense, Oshkosh, Wis., is being awarded $94,352,041 for fixed-price delivery order 0151 under a previously awarded indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract (M67854-06-D-5028) for the purchase of 143 Logistics Vehicle System Replacement (LVSR) production cargo vehicles, federal retail excise tax for 113 cargo vehicles; 69 LVSR tractor (fifth wheel) vehicles; and federal retail excise tax for 20 tractor vehicles.

Work will be performed in Oshkosh, Wis., and is expected to be completed by Sept. 30, 2013.

Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Marine Corps System Command, Quantico, Va., is the contracting activity.

*Link for This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources DTN News & U.S. DoD February 3, 2012
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*This article is being posted from Toronto, Canada By DTN News ~ Defense-Technology News Contact:dtnnews@ymail.com
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DTN News - DEFENSE NEWS: MDA Awarded Contract To Lockheed Martin In Conjunction To Upgrades For THAAD System

2012-02-04T10:32:00.003-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News - DEFENSE NEWS: MDA Awarded Contract To Lockheed Martin In Conjunction To Upgrades For THAAD System
Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources DTN News & U.S. DoD February 3, 2012
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 4, 2012: The Missile Defense Agency is announcing the award of a sole-source indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract to Lockheed Martin Corp., Sunnyvale, Calif. The total ceiling award value is $515,400,000. Under this follow-on contract, the contractor will be responsible for development, integration, and testing of any upgrades to the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system.

Task orders issued under this contract will address the continued development, enhancement, and testing of the THAAD components/system. The THAAD element is comprised of the following components: interceptor, THAAD fire control and communication, launcher, peculiar support equipment, and AN/TPY-2 radar integrated into a weapon system.

Examples of task orders include, but are not limited to, communications upgrades, obsolescence mitigation, flight and ground testing, and spiral development to further integrate THAAD in the BMDS architecture through development of unifying missile defense functions.

The work will be performed in Sunnyvale, Calif., and Huntsville, Ala. The ordering period is from Feb. 1, 2012 through Jan. 31, 2017. Fiscal 2012 research, development, test and evaluation funds will be used to incrementally fund the initial orders.

Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This is not a Foreign Military Sales acquisition. The MDA, Redstone Arsenal, Ala., is the buying activity (HQ0147-12-D-0001).

*Link for This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources DTN News & U.S. DoD February 3, 2012
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DTN News - AUSTRALIA DEFENSE NEWS: Australia Acceptance Of Two CH-47D Chinook Helicopters

2012-02-04T04:53:00.004-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News - AUSTRALIA DEFENSE NEWS: Australia Acceptance Of Two CH-47D Chinook Helicopters
Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources Australian Government Department of Defence
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 3, 2012: Minister for Defence Stephen Smith announced on Wednesday ~ February 1, 2012 that the Australian Defence Force (ADF) fleet of Chinooks has increased to seven following the arrival of two additional CH-47D Chinook helicopters in Townsville.

In November last year, the Government approved the purchase of the two ex-United States Army Chinooks following the loss of one ADF Chinook on operations in Afghanistan in May 2011.

The Minister said the new Chinooks would enter a period of deep maintenance and modification to bring them up to the same configuration as the existing ADF Chinook fleet.

Both Chinooks are scheduled to be delivered to the Australian Army to support operations by the middle of 2012.

The CH-47D Chinook is a highly capable medium-lift utility helicopter. Its roles include troop movement, battlefield equipment transport, search and rescue and disaster relief.

Chinooks have been highly capable workhorses since they entered ADF service in 1995 in operations both in Australia and overseas.

Chinooks have been deployed on Operation Slipper in Afghanistan since 2006.

They have performed an outstanding service for both ADF and International Security Assistance Forces and are in high demand across Afghanistan due to their superior performance in hot and high altitude conditions.

The ADF CH-47D fleet will be replaced with seven new CH-47F Chinooks from around 2016.

Media Contacts:

Mr Smith’s Office: Andrew Porter (02) 6277 7800 or 0419 474 392
Department of Defence: (02) 6127 1999

*Link for This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources Australian Government Department of Defence
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DTN News - BRAZIL DEFENSE NEWS: Brazil Minister Heads To India To Improve Defense Ties

2012-02-03T18:20:00.002-05:00

Defense War News Updates: DTN News - BRAZIL DEFENSE NEWS: Brazil Minister Heads To India To Improve Defense Ties
Source: DTN News - - This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources Defense News - AFP
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - February 3, 2012: Brazilian Defense Minister Celso Amorim is to travel to India this week for talks on boosting bilateral military cooperation, his office announced.

Brazil and India are members of the BRICS group of emerging powers (along with China, Russia and South Africa) and Brasilia views its multi-faceted partnership with New Delhi, including in the defense field, as a “strategic priority.”

Amorim was due in New Delhi on Feb. 7 at the start of a five-day visit that will include talks with Prime Minister Manmoham Singh and Defense Minister A.K. Antony as well as visits of military installations, his ministry said in a statement released Feb. 1.

India “has one of the world’s biggest armed forces” and like Brazil “seeks to reduce its technological dependence on other countries,” the statement added. “There is a great potential for scientific, technological cooperation (with India), to develop projects of mutual interest.”

Brazil is keen on expanding its own defense industry and its military purchases to upgrade its air and naval forces are conditioned on technology transfer and construction in this country.

Amorim was expected to discuss naval cooperation with his Indian counterparts, particularly plans to build aircraft carriers and Scorpene-class submarines, in addition to expand exchanges between military academies of the two countries.

India announced Feb. 1 that it has selected the Rafale, a modern multi-role jet built by French firm Dassault Aviation, as its preferred next-generation interceptor, but details of the $12 billion (9.1 billion euros) contract remain to be ironed out.

Last December, French Prime Minister Francois Fillon said during a visit to Brazil that he was confident that Brasilia would buy the Rafale because the aircraft’s technology cannot be matched.

The Rafale is competing against U.S. aviation giant Boeing’s F/A-18 Super Hornet and Swedish manufacturer Saab’s Gripen jet to supply Brazil with 36 multi-role combat aircraft.

India has also purchased Legacy 600 business jets from Brazilian aircraft manufacturer Embraer.

Meanwhile, Amorim was to stop in the southern Italian city of Palermo on Feb. 6 for talks with his Italian counterpart Giampaolo Di Paola And on Feb. 10, the Brazilian minister will be in Rabat for talks with Moroccan Defense Minister Abdellatif Loudiyi and Foreign Minister Saad Eddine Othmani.

*Link for This article compiled by Roger Smith from reliable sources Defense News - AFP
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*This article is being posted from Toronto, Canada By DTN News ~ Defense-Technology News Contact:dtnnews@ymail.com
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