Task and Purpose
One Sailor was killed and two were injured after a Navy E-2D Hawkeye crashed the evening of March 30 near Wallops Island and Chinconteague, Va. “Two crew members were rescued by Maryland State Police and transported to Wallops Island for follow-on medical treatment for non life-threatening injuries,” read a statement from the Navy.
Military.com
The Army released the name March 30 of an officer who died at Fort Stewart, Ga., on March 29 in an incident involving two HH-60 helicopters. Capt. James Bellew, 26, was found dead at the site of the incident at Wright Army Airfield. A spokesperson for the base declined to comment on whether other Soldiers were injured, what the condition of the two helicopters were, or what led to Bellew’s death.
Lawfire
“Recently the President warned business leaders that Russia has ‘a very sophisticated cyber capability’ and ‘may be planning a cyberattack against us.’ I agree, but I also think any such cyber-attack may not necessarily be conducted via the hacking/malware weaponry with which many people have become familiar. So let’s take a look at what these new threats to cyber operations might be, and how they could be effectively employed to wage cyberwar in what might today be considered an ‘unconventional’ way,” writes retired Maj. Gen. Charles J. Dunlap Jr. of Duke Law and a former Air Force deputy judge advocate general.
Air Force Magazine
Recent Russian and Chinese missile launches raised the stakes in space. Find out the latest news on sensing, tracking, and defending against enemy missile strikes.
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Forbes
“Speaking to a joint session of Congress on March 16, Ukrainian President Zelensky issued an emotional plea: ‘I have a need—I need to protect our sky.’ Shocking images of wounded children, homes, apartments, and refuges under attack further amplified the dire nature of his pronouncement. On the very same day, news leaked regarding Department of Defense plans to slash F-35 procurement by a third in the Biden administration’s FY 2023 budget request. The incongruity of the two episodes is obvious,” writes retired Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, dean of the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies.
Defense One
The National Defense Industrial Association has appointed David Norquist, a former Trump administration deputy defense secretary, as its new CEO following a clash between the trade organization's previous leader and its board chairman. Norquist will take over May 1. The organization’s announcement of Norquist’s appointment did not make any reference to outgoing CEO Herbert “Hawk” Carlisle, a retired Air Force general who had led NDIA since June 2017.
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Stars and Stripes
The proposed defense budget unveiled March 28 by the White House puts nearly $1 billion, full funding, toward a comprehensive missile defense system for Guam. Adm. John Aquilino, commander of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, has several times emphasized the importance of a missile defense system for the U.S. territory that is home to key Navy and Air Force installations. Aquilino called it his “No. 1 unfunded request” during a House Armed Services Committee meeting earlier this month.
Defense One
Space is a fast-moving and constantly changing domain where threats can arrive before troops even see them, so the Space Force is buying new technology for a real-time picture of space to train in. The service awarded Slingshot Aerospace a $25-million, 39-month contract to provide a digital twin of orbital space.
Defense Daily
The Department of the Air Force is to complete a force design for future ground moving target indication (GMTI) using a possible mix of space and air assets this year in advance of the fiscal 2024 budget submission. The department’s fiscal 2023 budget indicates plans to retire its 12 remaining Northrop Grumman E-8C JSTARS GMTI planes–eight in fiscal 2023 and four in fiscal 2024–and to use other intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance assets to fill in for the loss of JSTARS.
NextGov
A division of the Air Force and the General Services Administration’s Technology Transformation Services announced a partnership March 30 to help the cloud.gov platform support more users on its network. The Kessel Run division of the Air Force entered the partnership with the TTS to help improve customer service on cloud.gov, as agencies turn to it as a modernization solution for them to build new applications and digital services. As the software-focused branch of the Air Force, Kessel Run supported the TTS to help scale cloud.gov’s bandwidth to support 100 million users per hour.
Northwest Florida Daily News
The beginnings of the planned move of the formal training unit (FTU) for the AC-130J "Ghostrider" gunship from Hurlburt Field to New Mexico's Kirtland Air Force Base was confirmed March 25 by U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.). The move, expected to begin this summer and to take several years to complete, will eventually see seven of the four-engine turboprop aircraft transferred from Air Force Special Operations Command at Hurlburt to Air Education and Training Command at Kirtland.
Breaking Defense
In an Israeli desert, autonomous drones will creep around corners and float through doorways, generate 3D layouts of interiors, and automatically classify humans, animals, and other objects—perhaps while a human places a device on one wall that allows them to “see” threats on the other side. At least that’s the hope for the upcoming MoSAIC competition, put on by the Israeli military’s research directorate and the Pentagon’s Irregular Warfare Technical Support Directorate. The idea is to put the latest urban warfare technology to the test and to see which systems might work in concert with one another in one of the military’s most fraught combat scenarios.
Air Force release
The last HH-60W Jolly Green II departed Duke Field, Fla., signaling the end of initial developmental test with the 413th Flight Test Squadron and the beginning of sustainment operational test led by the 88th Test and Evaluation Squadron at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev. The 88th TES has been engaged with the Air Force’s newest combat rescue helicopter since the inception of the program, supporting developmental testing and enabling early operational evaluations to take place while the HH-60Ws were stationed at Duke Field.
One More Thing
Military Times
Members of the military community are renowned for giving their time and money to help others, and many, like their civilian counterparts, are searching for ways to help the Ukrainian people. If you’re interested in helping, there are plenty of charities doing humanitarian work for the people of Ukraine, so do some research to find one that does the work you think is worthwhile and that will put your donation where you want it to go.
