DT's good friend and SpouseBUZZ founder Andi forwarded an "opportunity" currently posted at DoD Tech Match with the following objective:
"To develop a highly interactive PC or web-based application to allow family members to verbally interact with virtual renditions of deployed Service Members."
The opportunity frames the challenge to killer app designers with the notion that "the stresses of deployment might be softened if spouses and especially children could conduct simple conversations with their loved ones in immediate times of stress or prolonged absence." It goes on to suggest that traditionally "families have derived comfort and support from photographs or mementos, but current technology should allow for more personal interactive messages of support" and that "computer-based applications would resonate with children and capture their interest and imagination."
Cool idea, no doubt. But . . . and maybe this is the novelist in me coming out . . . right away I start thinking about the unintended consequences of this technology. What happens, for instance, during the reintegration process (the period immediately following the servicemember's return from deployment) when the child realizes that the vitual servicemember was a lot nicer that the real deal?
I spent part of the day yesterday at the Association of the US Army's Aviation Symposium here in the DC area and among other interesting things, got my first exposure to an experimental Sikorsky helicopter that could change the paradigm of rotor wing aviation.
I remember way back in the day when Sikorsky purchased Schweitzer helicopter company (the forebears of the MQ-8B Firescout helo-drone) and planned to turn that shop into the rotor wing equivalent of Lockheed's Skunk Works.
Well, it looks like they've turned out a very interesting product in the new X2 Technology Demonstrator.
According to Doug Shidler, VP for Sikorsky's Army Programs office, it was only recently -- and with the help of new technology flight tested on the Army's Rascal (rotorcraft aircrew systems concept airborne laboratory) UH-60 tech demonstrator -- was the company able to incorporate mature systems that didn't make the X2 so unstable it couldn't fly for very long.
"There's a lot of technology that we're applying that we learned on the Comanche program and that we're learning on the [Blackhawk] upgrade program that we're applying right now," Shidler said. "It will demonstrate a lot of different things that we had difficulties with in the '70s and '80s. ... What we've done is apply a lot of the technologies that we've learned developing and embodied in our platforms today and to go ahead and develop this new platform."
The X2 features a set of two counter-rotating blades and a rear-mounted propulsion blade. The goal is to get the aircraft to speeds in the 250 kt range -- which puts it in close competition with the Osprey's specs, but of course the V-22 is operational and can carry a load of troops.
Sikorsky claims this technology can be applied for light attack, light transport, SAR and intermediate commercial applications, and Shidler hinted that it could be used for heavy lift.
Their literature on the X2 claims the configuration will allow for increased payload, improved range, low downwash and cheaper price.
Shidler showed a slide that said Sikorsky had conducted a successful test flight in August.
IDF tanks and soldiers guard the Gaza border. Photo Courtesy of Popular Mechanics
--John Noonan
Peeking into Private Data
Cyber espionage is a relatively new type of intelligence gathering capability with various strategies, tactics and tools.Cyber espionage is defined as the intentional use of computers or digital communications activities in an effort to gain access to sensitive information about an adversary or competitor for the purpose of gaining an advantage or selling the sensitive information for monetary reward. This widely accepted definition was originally crafted by Spy-Ops in their cyber warfare analysis program back in 2004.
Cyber espionage blasted on the scene in the mid 90s and has grown at a steady pace along side the adoption and use of the internet by business, government and industry. Even though cyber espionage is relatively new, countries like China have already invested a lot into building large and well trained cyber-espionage forces. By the first of 2009, Spy-Ops estimates about 140 countries and over 50 terrorist and criminal/extremist groups will be developing cyber weapons and espionage capabilities.
In conventional espionage you rely on deep cover covert operatives to conduct espionage and gain intelligence. In cyber espionage you use computer systems and data coupled with conventional techniques to gain intelligence and sensitive information. Events like the ones at ClearanceJobs and the Oakridge National Labs seem to indicate that the U.S. science and engineering community is being targeted. Let's look at these two incidents a bit closer.
Incident #1 ClearanceJobs.com
ClearanceJobs.com is an online jobs board that specifically addresses the needs of individuals with security clearances and those who hire them. They only focus on active or current security clearances. As such those who apply to job postings on the ClearanceJobs site are ready to work on sensitive /classified projects.
ClearanceJobs.com sent out an email to all those who registered at the web site on Monday, November 19th disclosing a security and systems breach. The hackers did not obtain resume information; however, they did gain access to names, emails and contact information according to the company. The company currently has approximately 3,700 job postings that attract a significant number of candidates seeking a new positions. To illustrate the sensitive nature of many of these posted opportunities, a search on Top Secret SCI resulted in a return of 2,660 listings with that as a requirement. Top Secret is applied to information or materials that the unauthorized disclosure of which would be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security. SCI is the abbreviation for Sensitive Compartmented Information, the term given to a method for handling specific types of classified information that relates to national security topics or programs whose existence is not publicly acknowledged.
Modern warfare -- where the battlefield is a mix of actors, motivations and weapons -- is in part defined by its rapidly changing threat scenarios and multiple layers of high- and low-tech on-the-fly innovations, all of which demand real-time responses.
In Iraq and Afghanistan, this has been especially true of armor protection for ground vehicles, which have been battered by all manner of increasingly powerful pressure plate and remotely controlled improvised explosive devices and explosively formed penetrators; weapons which morph as U.S. armor technology learns how to counter each successive generation of explosive.
This catch-as-catch can approach has produced fleets of hulking Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAPs), intriguing designs for Joint Light Tactical Vehicles (JLTVs) -- currently hung up in industry protests -- and calls for the Multipurpose All-Terrain Vehicle (MATV), or "MRAP Lite" as some are calling it. But what's next for the armor field? Militaries want lighter vehicles, and despite the hulking size of the original MRAPs, successive generations of the vehicle will by necessity be lighter, and more maneuverable.
Damon Walsh, executive vice president of customer operation at armor and vehicle maker Force Protection, says his company, while always working on new armor solutions, is also focusing on ways to defeat and detect the threat before the vehicles encounter it. "One of the things that we're keen on," he says, "is not just passive armor systems to stop threats, but also more sophisticated active protection systems. The idea is "don't just rely on armor, try and defeat the threat earlier before you get hit."
In reflecting on the last several years, it's not surprising that Walsh says that "we've had one of the largest demands that I've ever seen in the industry...for increased protection levels in real time. The threat changed in the past three years so many times that we were in the labs over the weekends trying to create solutions based on intel given by the customer for real-time changes."
Tony Russell, vice president of vehicle armor BAE, which has supplied over 5,000 MRAPs to the U.S. Army and Marine Corps in recent years, sees one of the challenges of the future being the sustainment of the relatively expensive MRAP fleet, now that new orders have waned. But he's also got his eye on the prize that other armor makers like Force Protection are gunning for -- you've got to find "ways to defeat and detect the threat before you even get to it," he says.
There were a number of clips of Merkava tanks and Achizart APC's parked and moving.
There was an inspection of a blown up Hamas tunnel.
IDF Sayret special forces with Tavor rifles and IDF paratroopers with M4 carbines engaged in operations.
At about 3:54 to 4:40 There was a long urban fire fight sequence. The noise from their small arms includes a couple of rifle clips or half machine gun's a belt's worth of "rock and roll" followed by shorter controlled bursts. There is also some sort of very rapid burst automatic weapon barking. This may be Travor rifles in "burst mode." These sounds are in sharp contrast to the sound of American Army troopers and American Marines in Iraq. American infantry machine guns are almost always used in shorter burts and the singular pops of semi-automatic aimed rifle shots distinguishes the presence of American infantry. Also heard in the back ground is sharp controlled bursts of machine gun fire from armored vehicles, judging from the amount of it used. There are also many impacts of Tank, 40mm grenades or heavy machine guns on a Hamas position.
There was an overhead view of an IDF/Hamas fire fight ended by what looked like and tank round or a missile.
There were extensive overhead strike videos showing Hamas fighters firing rockets and mortars from civilian areas.
There were extensive strike videos of large improvised explosive devices being destroyed by air dropped ordinance.
There were extensive overhead views of strikes on Hamas munitions stores and tunnels with many secondary explosions.
-- The Military Curmudgeon
State Counterterror Chief Says UBL/Zawahiri 'in a Hole.'
The head of counterterrorism operations for the U.S. Department of State said the al-Qaeda network is largely broken and has lost the ability to conduct large-scale terrorist operations.
While the U.S. has still been unable to kill or capture the organization's top leaders, they have nevertheless been "beaten back into a hole" by relentless pressure from special operations, law enforcement and drone attacks.
"They are scratching their heads, realizing they took on a pretty savvy opponent who went after them kinetically very fast, pulled out the rug from underneath them, put them on the run, put them in a area where they didn't have the assets they had before," said former Army special operations commander, Amb. Dell Dailey, who now heads the State Department's counterterrorism office. "Bin Laden can't get an operational effort off the ground without it being detected ahead of time and being thwarted."
Dailey cited the foiled terror plot to bring down as many as 10 U.S.-bound commercial jets in 2006 as an example of al-Qaeda's diminished capability to launch dramatic attacks.
"Their ability to reach is non-existent," Dailey told military reporters during a Jan. 6 breakfast meeting in Washington, D.C.
But that doesn't mean the U.S. can sit back and relax, he added.
Though he's a political appointee who may not keep his job in an Obama administration, Dailey had high praise for the incoming team's counterterrorism strategy and for the people who've been tabbed to wage it.
Over the five meetings he's had with Obama officials since the election, Dailey sees a willingness to abandon presidential campaign promises to unilaterally move into Pakistan if there's solid intel on bin Laden's whereabouts and the local government cannot or will not act. The incoming administration's focus on strengthening multilateralism over unilateralism seems to mesh with the State Department's current counter-terror plan.
"It's not 'go out and kill people right now' to the detriment of our relationships with sovereign countries," Dailey said. "Their twist is going to be more aggressive engagement with our partner nations."
Yesterday, I saw that InsideDefense.com had reported a letter sent by Def Sec Gates to Hill armed services committees asking for $69 billion through summer for the GWOT/Iraq/Afghanistan fight -- not including any Afghan "surge."
We were forwarded the full report by DT friend Ned Conger, and we're trying to track down the letter and charts from our Hill sources.
Here's part of what they wrote:
Funded in Gates' estimate are $10.8 billion for “force protection” to buy body armor, armored vehicles, and lighter Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles; $1.5 billion for efforts to counter roadside bombs; and $3.6 billion to fund intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance initiatives -- efforts the defense secretary has designated as high priorities.
As expected, the estimate includes $600 million to buy four F-22 fighters for the Air Force to replace one F-15 and three F-16s, according to a Pentagon chart accompanying Gates' letter to lawmakers. Congress in the past has been unwilling to fund new fighter aircraft purchases using supplemental appropriation bills.
In addition, the spending proposal includes $2.3 billion to train the Afghan national security forces; $1.3 billion to buy equipment -- including aircraft, vehicles, and engineering equipment -- and fund training for the Afghan army; $400 million to bolster Pakistan's counterinsurgency capability; and $1.4 billion to reimburse Pakistan, Jordan and “other key nations for their support to U.S. military operations,” according to the Pentagon chart. The request also includes $400 million for the Commander's Emergency Response Program and $1.3 billion for military construction projects, including those “to support realignment of U.S. forces into and within Afghanistan.”
The estimate includes $7.5 billion to modify AH-64 attack helicopters and CH-47 cargo helos as well as mine protection vehicles. Also in the mix is funding to recapitalize High Mobility Multi-purpose Wheeled Vehicles, trainers, tractors and explosive ordnance disposal equipment, according to the chart.
For the last two years, the Israeli Army has been developing new tactics and equipment for fighting Hamas and Hezbollah-type gunmen in urban areas. The Israelis have built training areas, with dense urban construction, and run many of its ground troops through special exercises. How well the new tactics and training are will be seen in the next week or so. The new tactics are meant to minimize civilian casualties, while enabling Israeli troops to quickly move through the area and kill or capture enemy personnel and equipment. Reservist units that have not gone through the special training are being sent to the new training centers for at least a few days of instruction on the new tactics. These new methods, while officially secret, apparently involve some new fighting tactics, and lots of electronic warfare. Hamas has had to operate with both cell phones and landline communications down. In addition, their walkie-talkies are sometimes jammed, and apparently listened to carefully by Israeli electronic warfare troops. This is causing command and coordination problems for Hamas fighters.
What we are seeing here is an IDF version of the British Army urban tactics used in the 2003 Iraqi invasion at Basra, with IDF special forces reprising the role of the SAS.
This article first appeared in AviationWeek.com.
