The Air Force released the request for proposals for the next phase of the Space Fence radar program: engineering and manufacturing development and production and deployment. Service acquisition officials want bids in by Nov. 14, according to the solicitation documents, which they posted on the Federal Business Opportunities website on Oct 4. Lockheed Martin and Raytheon have been maturing their respective Space Fence designs under Air Force sponsorship. The RFP’s release comes about a week after the Air Force announced plans to base the first Space Fence site on Kwajalein Island in the Marshall Islands, with initial operations commencing in Fiscal 2017. A subsequent second site is notionally planned for western Australia. The Space Fence will be part of the Air Force’s overall space surveillance network and will feature an S-band radar system that the service wants to be capable of detecting, tracking, identifying, and characterizing space objects in low and medium Earth orbits.
The Pentagon needs a Digital Command and a Digital Warfare Corps, along with other changes, to take advantage of critical new technologies, according to a think tank founded by former Google CEO and Chairman Eric Schmidt.
