Month: August 2008

Put a Fork in Pervez Musharraf He is Done

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With a 2/3 vote of Parliament necessary to impeach Musharraf, Siddique-ul-Farooq, a leader of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz party says the count is above 300 parliamentarians out of 440.

What’s more members of the PML-Q, Musharraf’s principal allies in the parliament are publicly calling for his resignation.

Given that the head of the military, has privately ruled out a coup, he’s done.

He has allowed the Taliban and al Qaeda to run roughshod over the tribal areas and Afghanistan, because like many in the Pakistani military establishment, he cannot see past a war with India, so I think that his exit will be a good thing for the US too.

The Sad, Twisted Tale NASA’s Ares rockets

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Well, it appears that, much like the shuttle, NASA’s Ares rockets are proving difficult to develop.

Originally intended to rely heavily on existing equipment, largely based on the Shuttle, nothing is going that way:

Beyond the much publicised CLV solid-rocket motor oscillation problem, other issues for Ares I include pocket buckling in its upper-stage liquid hydrogen (LH2) tank, an immature first-stage forward skirt avionics box design, protection for parachutes against the interstage’s shaped linear charge separation system and first-stage thrust vector control (TVC) changes.

I expect this to be both behind schedule and over budget, again.

Air Force Working on Dyan-Soar Successor

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The USAF is conducting drop tests of an unmanned space plane (Paid Subscription Required) as a prelude to launching a full up variant on an Atlas missile.

Aerodynamically, it’s very similar to the shuttle, in fact, they are hoping to reuse the control laws for reentry.

The issues of handling reentry and landing of an unmanned system have been solved before, albeit by the Soviets, when they did this on an unmanned test flight, actually the only flight, of their Buran shuttle.


Flight after helicopter drop.


Automated landing.


A better view of its configuration, showing its Shuttle-style double delta wings.


Concept of craft in orbit


Dyna-Soar Concept, Circa 1962

IAF Adds Electro-Optical Target ID to Patriot SAM

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The Israelis Air Force is integrating a sytstem that they call Sniper to their Patriot SAM batteries.*

The rules of engagement that the IDF uses requires positive visual engagement, something, no doubt, that the RAF Tornado crew shot down during the invasion of Iraq would have appreciated, and this system allows for a positive ID out to the maximum range of the missile.

*Unlike most other services where SAMS are assigned to the army, typically a part of artillery, the Israelis give their air force ownership of their SAMs, on the theory that they have a better idea of who are the good guys and who are the bad guys flying around.

JSF Office Looking to Make Special Sale Price Available to Partners

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Basically, they are trying to make a fixed price fly-away offer to these nations in the $58-63 million range if they order right now. (Note: total acquisition cost is generally around double fly-away cost)

The JSF office is concerned, with no small justification, that in competition against aircraft in service (or a modification of an aircraft in service in the case of the SAAB Gripen NG) which can guarantee prices, that they will lose too many sales, and so lose economies of scale, which leads to procurement costs, which leads to unit cost increases, and so on, and so on, and so on.

NASA to Test Vasimr On Space Station

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NASA will test the Variable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket (VASIMR) plasma engine on their space station

It promises something in excess of 40 times the specific impulse (fuel efficiency) of chemical rockets, and its thrust is a lot higher than alternate technologies, something on the order of about 10N (around 2 lbs) as opposed to the millinewton thrust levels of ion engines.

It should be interesting.

Previous posts here.

The Navy has been Delivering a Lunchbag of Bulls#@$ to Congress Regarding Surface Combatants for Three Years

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That is the money quote on the cancellation of the DDG-1000 at 2 ships. It appears that while it could technically carry Standard missiles in its vertical launchers, it could not guide the missiles, and would have had to rely on another ship to do so:

However, in the current program of record, the DDG-1000 cannot perform area air defense; specifically, it cannot successfully employ the Standard Missile-2 (SM-2), SM-3 or SM-6, and is incapable of conducting Ballistic Missile Defense.

(emphasis mine)

No Standard missile capability, so it’s just point defense (Sea Sparrow), and ground attack. As Galrahn notes, that makes it a more expensive variant of the Arsenal Ship canceled in the late 1990s, despite the fact that the navy very strongly implied, through the DDG designation (the “G” standing for guided missile air defense), and through its expansive descriptions of the sensor suite, that the ship could provide air defense.

It appears that the threats from new generations of anti-ship missiles will have the navy buying more Burke class DDGs, though some DDG-1000 tech would make into the new build destroyers, primarily electric drives and the new gun, along with systems to allow for a reduced crew size.

And the Award for Best Use of Monty Python in the Context of a Complex Financial Instrument Goes To…

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Mark Gilbert:

CDO Market Is Dead, Not Just Pining for Fjords: Mark Gilbert

Commentary by Mark Gilbert (with apologies to Monty Python)

Aug. 7 (Bloomberg) — Hedge-Fund Guy enters an investment bank. “I wish to complain about this derivative security what I purchased not two years ago from this very boutique,” he says.

“Ah yes, the Collateralized-Debt Obligation,” says the Wall Street Banker. “What’s wrong with him?”

“I’ll tell you what’s wrong with him, my lad. He’s dead, that’s what’s wrong with him!”

Wall Street Banker: “No, no, he’s … restin’.” Hedge-Fund Guy: “Look, matey, I know a dead derivative when I see one, and I’m looking at one right now.”

“No, no, he’s not dead, he’s restin’! Remarkable investment, the CDO, isn’t it? Beautiful plumage!”

“The plumage don’t enter into it. He’s stone dead.”

…

Go read the rest, and don’t try to drink anything at the same time.

Anthrax Update

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My position remains the same as always, that until I see evidence of how Bruce Ivins might have been able to acquire the equipment, which was not at Fort Detrick, and know how, which was not at Fort Detrick, to weaponize the anthrax, I am dubious of the FBI’s case.

Had the case really been strong enough to go to court, they would have arrested him, instead of harassing him.

Meryl Nass, M.D., who has more background in this area than I do, runs down her concerns with the case, and notes that over 100 people had access to the flask.

Additionally, experts in the field are requesting a peer review of the FBI’s genetic test, which, considering the record of problems at the FBI crime lab, is not at all unreasonable.

Finally, Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) and Rep. Rush D. Holt (D-N.J.) are calling for an investigation of the investigation, which would be a good thing.

Navy Ignoring Riverine Warfare

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So the US Army is forced to up their own “Swift Boat” corps, and members of the 101st Airborn are now on boats.

I’m sure that they will do a good job, and it appears that these guys are gung ho about this, but the Navy should handling things like patrolling the Euphrates river.

As Galrahn notes, “Imagine a world where the Navy’s leadership was excited about doing the Navy’s job as those Army guys reportedly are.”

AAAV on Chopping Block?

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It’s now called the EFV, Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle, but when I worked on it,* it was called the AAAV, the Advanced Amphibious Assault Vehicle.

In any case, this program is yet another long term defense development program that is seriously screwed up.

The Marines just signed a, “$766.8 million cost-plus-incentive-fee contract,” for two prototypes under the, “system development and demonstration-2 phase”, which means that the original SDD did not work out so well.

The program has been delayed IOC in 2015 and full operational capability in 2025, which is a 35 year development track, and while the Senate is moving toward accelerating production, the House is looking at cutting funding.

Every single service has a jewel of acquisition programs, and they are all in trouble, with the EFV for the Marines, the DDG-1000 for the Navy, the FCS-MGV for the Army, and the F-22 (and to a lesser degree the F-35 and tanker) for the USAF.

Our defense procurement system is broken.

*Yes, I have worked everywhere. Maybe I can’t hold down a job, but more likely this has been my role as “technical hit man”, where you are parachuted in to take care of a specific need.

Boeing Looks to Apache Upgrade

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Basically, the modifications are to the engines, structure, and avionics:

  • Composite rotor blades.
  • A composite after body.
  • Upgraded transmission, capable of handling 3,400shp, up from 2,860shp.
  • A new 3000 shp engine.
  • Active defense systems.
  • Synthetic vision for the crew helmets.

Not clear on the need for the engine upgrade, as the two existing 1,900shp T701D engines already put out more horsepower than the upgraded transmission could handle.

Falcon Launch Fails, Scotty Misses Orbit

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This makes SpaceX 0 for 3 on its Falcon-1 rockets.

This time they lost three small satellites and the ashes of 208 people, including Star Trek alum Jimmy Doohan and astronaut Gordon Cooper.

It appears to have been a problem with stage separation:

“Four methods of analysis, vehicle inertial measurement, chamber pressure, on-board video and a simple physics free body calculation, all give the same answer. [Residual thrust caused] the first stage to recontact the second stage,” says SpaceX chief executive Elon Musk.

According to SpaceX, unburned fuel in the engine’s cooling channels and manifold combined with residual oxygen to produce enough thrust to overcome the separation impulse. The solution is to increase the time between commanding main engine shutdown and stage separation.

Bummer for the families involved.

Indian BVR Missile

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India is developing a beyond visual range air to air missile called the Astra (Paid Subscription Required).

Considering the record of the Defense Research Development Organization (DRDO), my daughter, now 11, will be out of college before they get to final testing.

The missile looks rather similar to the French Super 530 missile, which the Indian Air Force operates, or at least did operate, though at 160kg, it’s about 60% of the weight of the Super 530, which clocks in at 275 kilos.