“We’ve got to wrestle with ship mix and their capacity; there’s a balancing act.” 

The Electronic Warfare Tactical Vehicle is by no means the solution to the Army’s EW shortfalls. But there are enough vehicles with enough capability to train electronic warfare troops, test out new tactics, and, if worst comes to worst, deploy “to both Korea and Europe.”

SOUTH BEND, IND.: The US military replaced its Humvees in Afghanistan and Iraq, with heavier, better armored vehicles because of the threat from roadside bombs. But that approach may not work In a high-tech conflict, argues manufacturer AM General. You might want to go back to the Humvee. Why? Because it’s simpler. There are no… Keep reading →

  The Air Force already has a big hole in its capabilities for the future: it needs what it is calling Penetrating Counter Air, a very fast, long-range, sensor-loaded and furiously lethal aircraft. But that effort is designed to fill a need in 2030. Dave Deptula, head of the Air Force Association’s Mitchell Institute and… Keep reading →

PENTAGON: You wouldn’t have known it from the way the Army announced it, but the service awarded arguably its most important contract in a decade this evening to build the first 17,000 Joint Light Tactical Vehicles (JLTV) to Oshkosh. “The JLTV production contract is a historic win for Oshkosh Corporation and more than 300 suppliers in 31… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: The most surprising thing about a Central Command list of 3,222 ISIL targets struck during the air campaign is the number of tanks, Humvees, MRAPs and Armored Personnel Carriers.   Yes, the MRAPs and Humvees are American-made military equipment seized by ISIL as it swept the Iraqi Army aside on its way from Syria… Keep reading →

The future of military robotics may not look much like a robot. It may just be a truck that drives itself. That’s the simple, pragmatic approach pursued by Oshkosh — a company better known for trucks than Terminators — with its TerraMax Unmanned Ground Vehicle. But after eight years of experiments for three different military… Keep reading →

Massive government documents typically hide some gold nuggets of information. In today’s report from the Pentagon’s independent Director of Operational Test & Evaluation, a famously tough grader known as DOT&E, there’s one detail that is going to make defense contractor BAE Systems very happy: “Results from the third underbody blast test also demonstrate that the… Keep reading →

The bomb exploded like a dusty thunderclap directly underneath the front left tire of the U.S. Army MaxxPro truck, sending the tall, roughly 20-ton vehicle lurching at least 10 feet forward and scattering chunks of the outer hull like amputated body parts. It was March 19, 2011, in the Pakhab-e-Shana in eastern Afghanistan’s breadbasket Logar… Keep reading →

Mt. Airy, N.C. – Some have questioned the Army’s decision to pump millions into the aging Humvee, especially with defense spending expected to take a tumble over the next few years. Opponents argue the Humvee is simply an old warhorse that needs to be put down, replaced by more advanced systems already in the field,… Keep reading →