Author: Michael

The U.S. Navy’s Orca XLUUV — Extra Large Uncrewed Undersea Vehicle — is an 84-foot autonomous submarine drone with a 6,500 nautical mile range, built by Boeing under a 2019 Navy contract that began with DARPA’s Manta Ray program and Northrop Grumman’s prototype before Boeing inherited the production line.

The Orca Could Change Naval Warfare and Submarines Forever 

If you are of a certain age and perhaps a member of the Baby Boom or “X” generation, you may remember a 1977 movie by the name of Orca: the Killer Whale.

On December 29, 2011, a Russian Delta IV submarine called the Yekaterinburg caught fire in the PD-50 dry dock at Roslyakovo, near Severomorsk in the Murmansk region. Sparks from welding on the hull ignited wooden scaffolding around the submarine, which spread to the rubber acoustic coating on the boat itself. Russian firefighters fought the blaze for nearly 24 hours using helicopters and tugboats; eventually the Russian Navy had to partially submerge the entire submarine to extinguish the fire. Russian officials told the public there were no missiles aboard the Yekaterinburg during the fire.

Three months into the Iran War, Gulf states are pushing the United States and Israel toward a lasting peace settlement with Tehran. The talks are stalling on two points neither side will abandon: Iran’s nuclear materials and Iranian control over the Strait of Hormuz. Tehran has created a new government bureaucracy to collect tolls from ships passing through the Strait. Iran cites the 1936 Montreux Convention covering the Turkish Straits as legal justification. Washington counters that Turkey charges service fees for navigation aids and rescue services, not tolls.

The U.S. Air Force concluded Exercise Checkered Flag 26-2 at Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida on May 14, integrating F-22 Raptors, F-35A Lightning II stealth fighters, F-16 Fighting Falcons, Navy F/A-18 Super Hornets, EA-18G Growlers, and E-2D Advanced Hawkeyes into a single combat network. The 325th Fighter Wing ran the exercise in partnership with the 53rd Wing’s Weapons System Evaluation Program East. Aircrews conducted live-fire missile engagements against maneuvering aerial drone targets across the Gulf Range Complex.

The U.S. Navy was supposed to have its own stealth bomber. The A-12 Avenger II — nicknamed the “Flying Dorito” for its triangular flying-wing shape — was designed to replace the A-6 Intruder, fly off carrier decks, and deliver precision strikes against the most heavily defended Soviet targets on Earth. The Navy planned to buy 620 of them. Not a single one ever flew. Dick Cheney canceled the program in January 1991 — the largest defense contract termination in Pentagon history. The lawsuit that followed lasted 23 years.

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Could Ukraine’s new domestically-produced

In the coming weeks, the Army will introduce an online marketplace where the United States’ allies and partners can quickly purchase American-made defense systems.
The Foreign Military Sales Marketplace will be open to 25 foreign nations “in a couple of weeks or a month-ish” and will initially feature unmanned aerial systems and counter-drone technology, Secretary of the Army Dan Driscoll told reporters Wednesday. The goal is to simplify the service’s current FMS process, thereby speeding up weapons sales to other countries and bringing more business to the U.S.

More than a dozen agencies gathered at Fort Bragg last week to game-out a worst-case scenario for the North Carolina installation.
All at once, drones attacked; a nearby water treatment plant was hacked, launching a wave of E. Coli across post that sickened countless soldiers readying to deploy; and a municipal worker accidentally severed a fiber optic line critical for crisis communication while clearing debris.

The President’s Cup heads back to the Net