Raytheon Gets Service Contract for Patriot

Aerospace and defense operator Raytheon Company received a $109 million contract from the U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Command, Redstone Arsenal, AL. Per this Engineering Service contract, Raytheon will keep the Patriot Air and Missile Defense System battle ready for the U.S. Army and foreign military customers.

The Patriot missile defense system has continuously been upgraded to keep pace with the changing dynamics of modern warfare. Through this new contract, Raytheon will aim to maintain as well as upgrade the existing Patriot Air and Missile Defense System. The sustainment and modernization of the Patriot Air and Missile defense system will help to keep it in service till 2048 and beyond. 

Raytheon to produce Antimissile Warheads

Five Warheads are being assembled and work on four others will begin soon.

This group of warheads will be followed by eight assembled in 2015 and nine in 2016, according to Missile Defense Agency data.

It’s the first tangible step in expanding the array of interceptors in Alaska and California intended to protect the U.S. if North Korea or Iran deploy intercontinental ballistic missiles.

Spears and Shields: A brief look

America’s National Intelligence Council said in 1999 that China and Russia had devised numerous countermeasures to protect offensive missiles and were probably willing to sell the technology.

A statement in May by the office of the assistant secretary of defence for research and engineering noted that the proliferation of such advanced countermeasures was rendering America’s missile defences “no longer practical or cost-effective”.

Among nuclear powers, neither North Korea nor Pakistan is presently capable of building a ballistic-missile triggering system that is able to detonate a nuclear payload if an interceptor was drawing near. But with time and enough effort, this could change: At least one type of nuclear device detonated by North Korea “is not inconsistent” with efforts to build a bomb designed for an Electro Magnetic Pulse (EMP) attack. Effects of a EMP depend on factors including the altitude of the detonation, energy yield, gamma ray output, interactions with the Earth's magnetic field and electromagnetic shielding of targets, but in any case rapidly changing electric fields and magnetic fields may couple with electrical/electronic systems to produce damaging current and voltage surges. The threat grows as potential attackers continue to acquire “more complex, survivable, reliable and accurate” ICBMs equipped with countermeasures

Land- and Sea-Based Spears: ICBMs

The trajectory of an ICBM runs in three consecutive phases: Atmosphere-Space-Atmosphere. The first phase is the "easyest" one in order to incercept the ICBM, so it is neccesary to place interceptors close enough to reach the missile before it leaves the atmosphere... But it is not easy, indeed. Ronald Reagan hoped to put interception satellites into low orbit, but the “Star Wars” scheme, as it was known, presented three main handicaps:

1. It would have required a lot satellites costing billions of dollars.
2. Satellites could be shot up with missiles
3. Satellites could be blinded with lasers

Space-Based Spears: Satellites

• In December 2012 North Korea launched a satellite on a southerly track. The launch reveals a vulnerability in missile defences which could be exploited for an EMP attack.
• A nuclear device fitted into a subsequent southerly launched satellite would circumvent America’s defences against long-range weapons because these are positioned to hit warheads flying from over the North Pole, not those coming from the south.
• A nuke concealed in a satellite in an orbit used by many civilian satellites could be detonated on a flyover above America. There is no point in having a missile-defence system that cannot prevent such an attack.

Air-Based Shields: Lasers and interceptors

• MDA believes that aircraft-mounted anti-missile Solid-state lasers may “play a crucial role” in defeating ICBMs during the boost phase. Experiments have begun with General Atomics’ Reaper and Boeing’s Phantom Eye drones.
• Dale Tietz, a former senior Star Wars official, says that North Korean missiles could be prevented from reaching space by just three interceptor-armed Global Hawk UAVs.

Sea-Based Shields: Aegis

• 30 of America’s warships carry Aegis anti-missile systems, but these were designed to strike shorter-range missiles.
• With recent upgrades, Aegis is thought to be capable of intercepting warheads in space, in limited circumstances.
• With additional radar near America’s east coast, Aegis destroyers in the Atlantic could theoretically intercept ICBMs coming from Europe and Asia.

Ground-Based Shields: GMD

• The GMD system consists of an “exoatmospheric kill vehicle” with steering rockets and its own X-Band Radar system.
• There are 30 GMD interceptors at Vandenberg AFB and Fort Greely in Alaska.
• The MDA has begun work at Fort Greely to prepare for a field of silos that will contain an extra 14 interceptors by 2017.

Russia says dissatisfied

Russian Deputy Defence Minister Anatoly Antonov said Russia had voiced concerns over planned U.S. ground-launched arms tests next year in Romania and in 2018 in Poland, which he said the U.S. side assured him would only use anti-rocket defences and would not fall foul of the treaty.

Relations between the two countries are at their lowest since the Cold War because of Russia's role in the crisis in Ukraine, and both Moscow and Washington question the other's commitment to the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty.

Russia argues that Washington's use of drones and other intermediate-range arms amounts to a violation of the treaty and has said that planned U.S. weapons tests in Romania and Poland may also breach the agreement. Also, Russia said on Thursday it was dissatisfied with talks held with U.S. officials to address concerns that Moscow had violated a Cold War-era arms control agreement by testing a ground-launched cruise missile.

About the treaty, Anatoly Antonov said last month Moscow was committed to the treaty but President Vladimir Putin has questioned whether it meets Russia's interests, bearing on mind the INF treaty eliminated nuclear and conventional ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with a range of 500-5.500 km (300-3.400 miles).

Russia Fires Nuclear Missile

Russia successfully tested its latest Bulava intercontinental nuclear missile Wednesday amid rising tensions with NATO over the conflict in Ukraine.

The nearly 37-ton missile was launched from Russia’s new submarine, the Vladimir Monomakh, as part of its sea trials. Deputy Defense Minister Yuriy Borisov said a total of five test launches are planned.

The Borei-class Vladimir Monomakh can carry up to 16 Bulava missiles, which can each carry up to 10 nuclear warheads. The Bulava missiles have a range of 5,000 miles and can reportedly cause a blast 100 times larger than the atomic bombs the U.S. dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.

Russia: ¿Getting Ready For Nuclear War?

A Russian general has called for Russia to revamp its military doctrine, last updated in 2010, to clearly identify the U.S. and its NATO allies as Moscow’s enemy number one and spell out the conditions under which Russia would launch a preemptive nuclear strike against the 28-member military alliance, Interfax reported Wednesday.

And Russia is spending money as if a nuclear confrontation with the U.S. is a very real possibility.  In fact, Russian President Vladimir Putin has committed to a “weapons modernization program” that is going to cost the equivalent of 540 billion dollars. In line with this program, it is said Russia would be building submarines so quiet that the U.S. military would not detect them. These “black hole” submarines could freely approach the coastlines of the United States almost without fear of being detected. The U.S. Navy openly acknowledges that they cannot track these subs when they are submerged, so it would mean that the Russians would be able to sail right up to U.S. coastlines and launch nukes whenever they want.

Meanwhile...

• U.S. nuclear officers are actually still using floppy disks and other computer technology from the 1960s
• The size of the U.S. nuclear arsenal has been reduced by about 95 percent from the peak of the Cold War
• Most Americans still believe that “the Cold War is over” and that Russia presents absolutely no threat to U.S.
• The Obama administration has discussed reducing the size of their already neutered strategic nuclear arsenal down to just 300 warheads

But...

• Russian media is reporting that 60 percent of all Russian nuclear missiles will have radar-evading capability by 2016.
• Just this week, Russia conducted a successful test of the new submarine-launched Bulava intercontinental nuclear missile.

Most Americans don’t want to think on this, but ¿What if Russian subs could come cruising right up to U.S. coasts while americans are sleeping..., and launch missiles towards the main cities? Of course nobody on either side actually hopes that such a war will happen, but most wars are won before a single shot is fired, and right now Russia is working very hard to make sure that it will have the best chance possible of coming out on top in any future conflict.

Let us hope and pray that we never see a nuclear war between the United States and Russia.

Minuteman III rocket motor aging surveillance test completed at AEDC

Arnold Engineering Development Complex (AEDC) personnel completed testing of a Minuteman III Stage II motor in the Complex's J-6 Large Rocket Test Facility for aging surveillance of the 48-year-old defense program. 

"Motors such as this Stage II, are pulled from the field and sent to us to test," said Brandon Dorman, a J-6 test engineer. "The motor's age and storage conditions are tracked and documented for the test. It is fired at the J-6 facility and various performance parameters are collected and analyzed to determine the motor's overall performance. This information is then compared to build specifications, as well as previous firings, to assist in early detection of trends that could threaten the readiness of our nation's ICBM  fleet."

Since these motors are located in different operational locations for varying lengths of time, aging surveillance testing may uncover critical information that is valuable to the Department of Defense. "The Stage II motor is part of the Minuteman III Aging and Surveillance test program to obtain motor performance data that is used to identify and quantify age-related degradation," said Richard Kirkpatrick, an AEDC test manager and engineer in the Space and Missile Test Branch. "In addition, the motor is inspected post-test for any emerging critical failure modes."

Two Fort Greeley Soldiers win Best Warrior Competition

Alaska Army National Guardsmen Sgt. Gerardo Lopez and Spc. Yamil Ramirez, both military policemen from the 49th Missile Defense Battalion, won the competition in the noncommissioned officer and junior enlisted categories.

Among the competition’s events were an Army Physical Fitness Test, day and night land navigation, close-quarter battle drills, casualty evacuation, a written exam, and live-fire weapons ranges. For Lopez, this win marks his second time winning the title of Best Warrior. In 2012, he won in the junior enlisted category when he competed as a specialist.

“It’s a really tough competition,” Nelson said. “Starting from day one, they’re pushed physically in the first event, and it doesn’t let up for the next 72 hours. Anybody who comes out of this competition and wins it, they deserve to hold that title.”

“My favorite part of this competition is getting together with the other Soldiers and competing against them head to head,” Lopez said. “The events aren’t what makes the competition hard, what makes the competition hard are the Soldiers to the left and right of you.”

“We take candidates from every unit and test them to figure out who the best Soldier and noncommissioned officer is in the entire Alaska Army National Guard,” said Sgt. 1st Class Mike Nelson, branch chief of the 207th Multi-Functional Training Regiment, Alaska Army National Guard.

38 North: NK in deep

North Korea is not a hermit kingdom, but rather a country that has been in the throes of change, good and bad, for over a decade.

Those changes have important implications for the Korean peninsula, the East Asian region and the international community. Too often analysis of the North is permeated by inexperience, littered with inaccurate information or grounded in poorly deducted reasoning.

38 North covers not only North Korea’s weapons of mass destruction, but digs beneath the surface of political, economic, social and other developments. 38 North is a program of the U.S.-Korea Institute at SAIS (USKI), managed by Joel S. Wit, former U.S. State Department official and current USKI Visiting Scholar, and Jenny Town, USKI Assistant Director.