Year: 2009

U.S. Looking at Israeli Iron Fist APS

No Comments
Click for full size

From Wiki

It looks like the US military is far less sanguine over Raytheon’s Active Protection System (APS), Quick Kill, because the military folks at the AUSA convention were all over the Israeli Iron Fist APS, made by Rafael.

It is similar to, but appears to be a somewhat more capable system than the other Israeli APS, IMI’s Trophy system, in that it can engage KE rounds as well as ATGMs and RPGs.

The concept is somewhat different than both Raytheon’s and IMI’s, with the blast intended to take out incoming missiles and sabot darts, as opposed to shot, which means that the sabot is not actually destroyed, but made to yaw prior to impact, which would reduce penetration.

When one considers that the Israeli standard infantry fighting vehicle is the Namer, which is based on the Merkava chassis, and weighs in at 60T, as versus 40T for the Bradley, the 20T Stryker, and the 20-30T FCS replacement, it may be of somewhat more limited utility.

A sabot yawing 15° or so off the normal may not prevent penetration of the thinner armor, but on the plus side, using of a non-fragmenting charge means that the potential to injure troops operating closely to the vehicle is significantly reduced.

Background here, here, and here.

When Policy Creates Stupidity

No Comments

David Stevens, HUD’s Assistant Secretary of Housing and Federal Housing Commissioner, basically the head of the Federal Housing Administration, has drawn a line in the sand against legislation increasing the minimum downpayment for an FHA loan from 3.5% to 5%.

This is the same FHA, that has had its reserves sucked dry by increasing defaults on its mortgage (here and here), and now they are fighting against making their loans less likely to default.

The reason given? That, “limiting the pool of eligible home buyers could dampen a fragile housing recovery.”

This is an extension of two largely bipartisan policies:

  • The federal government has been pushing home-ownership aggressively for decades.
  • A desperate attempt to re-inflate the housing bubble.

Both policies have proven disastrous, but decisions are still being made on this basis.

It should be noted that this is the same FHA was spitting in the face of sanity for some time by allowing “seller funded downpayment assistance loans”, where the seller raised the price of the home in order to lend the buyer the money for the downpayment (!). It was called the Down-payment Assistance Program (DAP).

This procedure is one of the reasons that they are in a pickle now, because it made it too easy for people who could not afford house payments to buy a house.

Thankfully, Congress made this illegal, and they are now looking at a further tightening of lending standards, but just as in the case the DAP, they are fighting the change tooth and nail.

Well, Here’s a Shocker

No Comments

It turns out that most of Timothy “I am not a Banker” Geitner’s friends that he has brought into the Treasury department have made millions working for the banks that wrecked out economy:

Some of Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner’s closest aides, none of whom faced Senate confirmation, earned millions of dollars a year working for Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Citigroup Inc. and other Wall Street firms, according to financial disclosure forms.

When you have people overseeing the current system who personally profit from it, fundamental change is not in the offing.

Economics Update (a Day Late)

No Comments
Click for full size

H/T Calculated Risk for the Graph Pr0n


Yeah, CR again, this time LA Port Traffic

Notwithstanding green shoots, it still appears that consumers, who account for 70% of GDP,* remain pessimistic, with the Consumer Sentiment Index falling to 69.4, down from August’s 73.5, and well below the forecast that the number would be flat.

On the other hand, industrial production rose 0.7% in September, and capacity utilization (see top graph) rose to 70.5%.

You also have a secondary indicator of the economy, port traffic for the LA/Long Beach ports continues to fall.

Additionally, the banks who actually do make loans to real people, as opposed to the Wall Street parasites, are not doing well, with Bank of America posting a loss, and credit card delinquencies are rising.

Wall Street may be doing fine, but main street is still being hammered.

Meanwhile, in energy, the industrial production numbers drove oil to a 12-month high, and the US dollar recovered a bit, though it is still down for the week

*Or maybe not, see here.

Thrust-Vectoring EJ200 for Typhoon

No Comments

So it looks like Eurojet is looking at getting into the thrust vectoring game.

It also looks like they will be selling it on improved economics, based on the use of lower thrust settings for takeoff and landing, and improved straight-line performance through reduced trim drag, rather than any massive increase in agility.

This is not surprising: At the speeds at which combat generally occurs, aerodynamic surfaces just work better.

For all the play over airshow maneuvers like the Cobra, etc., you have to be out of energy and very slow for them to work, which mirrors Colonel Fornof’s talks on dealing with the thrust vectoring F-22 and Su-30MKI, where he says that using thrust vectoring creates opportunities for the opposing aircraft to shoot you down.

Sounds like the old truism of air combat, “Speed is life,” remains true.

Video:

Signs of the Apocalypse: EADS Edition

No Comments
Click for full size


Dr. Peter Venkman: This aircraft is headed for a disaster of biblical proportions.

Mayor: What do you mean, “biblical”?
Dr Ray Stantz: What he means is Old Testament, Mr. Mayor, real wrath of God type stuff.
Dr. Peter Venkman: Exactly.
Dr Ray Stantz: Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies! Rivers and seas boiling!
Dr. Egon Spengler: Forty years of darkness! Earthquakes, volcanoes…
Winston Zeddemore: The dead rising from the grave!
Dr. Peter Venkman: Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together… mass hysteria!

So there you have it, actual photographic evidence of the EADS A400M military transport with actual flight worthy engines on the wing, and they are now claiming that we should expect a first flight in December.

Personally, I expect that when the aircraft hits the runway for its first flight, we will see rains of frogs, burning pitch, daffodils, and Amway salesmen.

GD Pitches Stryker for FCS Replacement

No Comments

I think that the idea of an upgraded an uparmored Stryker to replace the now-canceled FCS is a very bad idea.

The problem is that Strykers, which now tip the scales at less than 25 tons when extra armor is added on, but it looks like an upgraded Stryker would weigh somewhere between 30 and 35 tons, and when considering that the original vehicle, the LAV, weighed about 15 tons, I think that it would be just too heavy.

Simply replacing the manned turret on the Bradley IFV with an unmanned one, and using the space that is opened up for more troops gets you there, and there is probably some space left over for the communications gear that was developed along with the FCS.

Bank of America/Merrill Lynch Smoking gun

No Comments

So, Bank of America has agreed to turn over email records to NY AG Andrew Cuomo, because there is no court in the world that will allow them to use the “I was following my lawyer’s advice” defense without them actually turning over that advice, and we find a smoking gun:

“Unfortunately it’s screw the shareholders!!” Charles K. Gifford wrote to a fellow director in an e-mail exchange that took place during the call.

“No trail,” Thomas May, that director, reminded him, an apparent reference to the inadvisability of leaving an e-mail thread of their conversation.

(emphasis mine)

It’s called “putting lipstick on a pig,” and it is illegal.

Unfortunately for the senior management at BoA, while it was pretty tough to document, today, in the age of casual and conversational email, you can get caught pretty easily, as Mr. May remembered, but Mr. Gifford forgot, and so, in the words of everyone’s favorite robot, “We’re boned!”

Even without the whole, “going to jail” thing, there is a shareholder suit, and this will be used, so it’s not a pretty picture.

About the only defense that they have left is the “Hank Paulson and Ben Bernanke made me do it defense,” and I rather expect to be hearing that soon.