SEALs train at Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek-Fort Story in 2012. US Navy Photo
A SEAL from the Naval Special Warfare Group Two at Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek-Fort Story was killed Wednesday in a training accident at Army installation Ft. Knox, according to several press reports. Five other sailors were injured in the accident. Read More
Former under secretary of the Navy Bob Work. US Navy Photo
Bob Work — the chief executive officer of Center for a New American Security and former under secretary of the Navy— gave Pentagon leaders advice on how the services should innovate in a time of austerity in Thursday remarks at the EAST: Joint Warfighting 2013 symposium in Virginia Beach, Va.
Work said the greatest threat to U.S. security would be not taking advantage of the current drawdown in resources to create a force structure that makes sense for security threats. The second greatest threat was the current climate of political indecision in Washington. Read More
The following is an excert from the executive summary of a May Government Accountability Office report on support personnel to the Department of Defense’s Unified Combatant Commands:
GAO’s analysis of resources devoted to the Department of Defense’s (DOD) geographic combatant commands shows that authorized military and civilian positions and mission and headquarters-support costs have grown considerably over the last decade due to the addition of two new commands and increases in authorized positions at theater special operations commands. Data provided by the commands shows that authorized military and civilian positions increased by about 50 percent from fiscal years 2001 through 2012, to about 10,100 authorized positions. In addition, mission and headquarters support-costs at the combatant commands more than doubled from fiscal years 2007 through 2012, to about $1.1 billion. Read More
USS Lake Erie fires a SM-3 interceptor in February. MDA Photo
The Missile Defense Agency and the U.S. Navy intercepted a simulated ballistic missile in the third successful test of the Navy’s next generation Aegis ballistic missile defense system, MDA officials told USNI News on Thursday.
The target missile – fired from a test range in Hawaii at 5:25 p.m. local time on Wednesday – was detected by the SPY-1 radar aboard USS Lake Erie (CG-70). The ship launched a SM-3 Block IB equipped with a BMD kill vehicle that successfully destroyed the simulated threat missile in low Earth orbit. Read More
Rear Adm. Ted Branch, commander of Naval Air Force, Atlantic, speaks to Sailors aboard the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN-69) in 2012. US Navy Photo
A previous version of this story cited an incorrect figure for the number of lost aircrew in the Navy and Marine Corps from 1949 to 1988. That actual number of was not 5,000, but 8,500. USNI News regrets the error.
It will take less time for China to learn how to effectively operate aircraft carriers than it took the U.S., the commander of the U.S. Navy’s Atlantic air arm, Rear Adm. Ted Branch said Wednesday. Read More
Gen. Robert Cone, TRADOC commander in 2011. US Army Photo
The hard learned lesson of how important the human dimension and human domain is in warfare could be lost when budgets gets tight, the Army’s top training officer told attendees at the EAST: Joint Warfighting 2013 symposium in Virginia Beach, Va. on Wednesday.
“We need to prepare the land force [Army, Special Operating Force and Marine Corps] for a sophisticated understanding of the human dimension and human domain,” and invest in it, Gen. Robert Cone, commanding general of U.S. Army’s Training and Doctrine Command, said. Read More
rank Kendall, the under secretary of defense, Acquisition, Technology and Logistics in 2012.
The Pentagon’s top acquisition official apologized he “didn’t have better news” in discussing the Department of Defense’s fiscal outlook during his keynote address on Tuesday at the EAST: Joint Warfighting 2013 symposium in Virginia Beach, Va.
Frank Kendall, Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics warned the Department of Defense might have to again operate under a Continuing Resolution rather than a budget for Fiscal Year 2014.
“It’s starting to make me nervous,” he said. Read More
The U.S. Navy ushered in a new era in aviation with Tuesday’s launch of the first autonomous jet from an aircraft carrier.
The angular X-47B flew from deck of USS George H.W. Bush (CVN-77) launched from the same steam catapult that’s pushed manned fighters into the sky for decades — but without a cockpit or a pilot. Read More
U.S. made parts in this Virginia-class submarine could be replaced by foreign components.
Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Jonathan Greenert has long warned of a decline in U.S. companies that provide critical components to the nation’s most technologically sophisticated hardware: nuclear submarines and aircraft carriers.
“I worry about the industrial base,” Greenert said at the Credit Suisse/McAllese Defense Programs Conference in Washington, D.C., on March 12. “Ninety percent of the industry that builds our nuclear components is single source. . . . It’s the second or third tier. It’s ‘Bob’s Nuclear Valve Shop.’” Read More
Army Gen. James D. Thurman, commander, United Nations Command, Republic of Korea – United States Combined Forces command, and United States Forces Korea onboard the USS Nimitz (CVN-68) on May, 11 2013. US Navy Photo
Aircraft carrier USS Nimitz (CVN-68) has left Busan, Korea for joint exercises between the U.S. and the Republic of Korea, according to a Monday statement from U.S. 7th Fleet.
“The operations are taking place beyond the territorial seas of any coastal nations and are intended to reinforce regional security and stability, enhance interoperability with our allies, and increase operational proficiency and readiness,” read the statement. Read More
