By Pierre Tran Paris - Two European arms companies, KNDS France and MBDA, recently pointed up their hefty investment to boost production of cannon shells, artillery, and missiles, indicating a willingness to anticipate orders, and their access to extensive funds. The willingness of those two privately held companies to invest…
By Robbin Laird and Ed Timperlake Journalist Kate Woodsome has been laser-focused on a key challenge facing democracy in the United States and, frankly, within liberal democracies more generally: the growing inability of social and political tribes to talk with one another. In fact, the impacts of the pandemic on…
By George Galdorisi The U. S. Navy stands at the precipice of a new era of technology advancement. In an address at a military-industry conference, then-U.S. Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Michael Gilday, revealed the Navy’s goal to grow to 500 ships, to include 350 crewed ships and 150 uncrewed…
By Pierre Tran Paris - MBDA was beating its own targets in building missiles in larger numbers and greater speed, at a time when the ties between Western allies were shifting, the chief executive of the European missile company said March 17. Eric Béranger said last year he had forecast there…
By Pierre Tran Paris - KNDS has been much in the news, with the chief executive of the French unit floating the idea of a public-private partnership to boost arms production, and media reports of a possible stock market flotation of the Franco-German builder of land weapons. The chief executive…
By Robbin Laird When I interviewed the Commanding General of 2nd Marine Air Wing last summer, he underscored the importance for the Marines to craft a way ahead with regard to distributed air operations. This is how we discussed the issue at that time: We then discussed distributed air operations…
2017-12-18 By Brian Morra The Department of Defense’s acquisition system is a major cause of the erosion of the defense capabilities of the United States. This erosion is visible in high profile, fatal accidents like those the US Navy has experienced in the Western Pacific over the past two years.…
2016-03-02 Our colleague Air Vice Marshal (Retired) John Blackburn has focused attention on the energy security shortfall for Australia for some time. As an island continent at the bottom of the Asia Pacific region, Australia is heavily dependent upon liquid energy imports and with a rapidly disappearing domestic refinery production capacity,…
