A Whole New Twist on “Buy America”

07/16/2012
2012-07-16 by Robbin Laird This past weekend in a fine piece in The New York Times, C.J. Chivers focused on  the airpower dimension in Afghan operations.  The title was tellingly: “Afghan Conflict Losing Air Power as U.S. pulls out.” In its way, this strike was a model of what air power can…

Misleading Headlines and Progress: Does the One Hinder the Other?

07/09/2012
7/9/12: by Robbin Laird Building new platforms in the 21st century is challenging. caroThe challenge in part is that it has been so long since new air platforms have been built that an entire generation has grown up as the recipients of the work of the 50s and 60s and…

The Farnbourgh Airshow 2012: Glimpses of the Future

07/06/2012
By Robbin Laird and Ed Timperlake This year’s Farnbourgh Airshow is occurring at an interesting juncture in history. On the financial side, there is the Euro crisis, and various dynamics such as the fate of the Chinese and American economies. On the defense side, there is the end of a…

The Norwegian F-35 Decision: Understanding the Impact of Weapons Integration

06/21/2012
6/21/12: by Robbin Laird A key element of the F-35 decision by Norway was the acceptance of the integration of a new Kongsberg missile onto the F-35 itself. Through the development of the Naval Strike Missile (NSM), the Norwegian Armed Forces has established KONGSBERG and other Norwegian industry in the…

A400M: The Fleet

06/08/2012
6/8/12: The A400M is being built with the 21st century approach to fleet management in mind.  Ranging from Unique Identification Tags built in, to multinational training, to providing for global support, the A400M has the advantages inherent in advanced manufacturing. As we argued earlier: It was clear notably with the…

Moving Forward to Strengthen the U.S. Military Manufacturing Base

06/07/2012
06/7/12: by Bill Anderson The National Network for Manufacturing Innovation Take a drive through any industrial city across the United States.  Take a good look at the shuttered factories behind locked gates that not so long ago manufactured quality televisions, clothing, shoes, automobiles and, quite importantly, critical military equipment to…