MOBILE, Ala. — Austal USA delivered its 10th
Independence-variant littoral combat ship to the U.S. Navy, the company
announced in a release, as the future USS Cincinnati(LCS 20) will be
the 18th LCS to enter the fleet.

“It’s so exciting to deliver another great warship to the
U.S. Navy,” Austal USA President Craig Perciavalle said. “I’m so proud of our
incredible team here at Austal USA, our industry and Navy partners for achieving
this major milestone for the future USS Cincinnati.”

Five small surface combatants are presently under various
stages of construction at Austal’s Alabama shipyard. The future USS Kansas City
(LCS 22) is preparing for sea trials. Assembly is underway on the future USS
Oakland (LCS 24) and the future USS Mobile (LCS 26), and modules are under
construction for the future USS Savannah (LCS 28) and the future USS Canberra
(LCS 30) with four more under contract through LCS 38.

“The shipbuilding momentum here is second to none, led by
the most talented shipbuilding professionals I’ve ever worked with,”
Perciavalle said. “This momentum and efficiency continue to result in
incredible cost savings ship over ship, enabling us to provide highly capable
but very cost-effective solutions to our Navy.”

More than 700 suppliers in 40 states contribute to the
Independence-variant LCS program. This supplier base supports tens of thousands
of small business to large business jobs.

LCS is a highly maneuverable, lethal and adaptable ship
designed to support focused mine countermeasures, anti-submarine warfare and
surface warfare missions. The Independence-variant LCS integrates new
technology and capability to support current and future mission capability from
deep water to the littorals.

Austal is also under contract to build 14 Expeditionary
Fast Transport vessels (EPF) for the Navy. The company has delivered 10 EPFs
while an additional two are in various stages of construction.

STAFFORD, Va. — BAE Systems along with teammate Iveco Defence Vehicles has been awarded a $67
million contract modification by the U.S. Marine Corps to develop new variants
for the Amphibious Combat Vehicle (ACV) Family of Vehicles, BAE announced in a release.

“The ACV has proven to be a versatile platform capable of numerous
configurations to meet current and future mission requirements,” said John
Swift, director of amphibious programs at BAE. “With this award, BAE Systems
will be able to develop a family of vehicles that will deliver the technology
and capability the Marines require to accomplish their mission in support of
our national security.”

The contract calls for the design and development of command
(ACV-C) and 30 mm medium caliber cannon (ACV-30) variants. The ACV-C variant incorporates
seven workstations to provide situational awareness and control of the battle
space. The ACV-30 integrates a 30 mm cannon to provide the lethality and
protection Marines need while leaving ample room for troop capacity and
payload.

BAE Systems was previously awarded a low-rate initial production
contract last June 2018 for the personnel variant (ACV-P). The Marine Corps
announced the ACV had successfully completed anticipated requirements testing
and would no longer be pursuing an envisioned incremental ACV 1.1 and ACV 1.2
development approach. The program is now known as the ACV Family of Vehicles,
which encompasses the breadth and depth of the vehicle’s capabilities and
multiple variants.

ARLINGTON,
Va. — The Marine Corps’ first operational squadron to fly the F-35C
carrier-capable version of the Lightning II joint strike fighter has retired
its last F/A-18 Hornet strike fighter.

In ceremonies
held June 21 at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, California, Marine Fighter
Attack Squadron 314 (VMFA-314) retired its last Hornet, an F/A-18A++ version.
The Black Knights, as the squadron is known, are now in transition to the F-35C
at Naval Air Station Lemoore, California, under the tutelage of the Navy’s
F-35C replacement training squadron, VFA-125.

The Marine
Corps flies both the short-takeoff/vertical landing F-35B version and the F-35C
aircraft carrier version. The Corps currently fields three operational F-35B
squadrons, VMFA-121, -211, and -122.

The Corps is
procuring 67 F-35Cs to equip squadrons that will deploy with Navy carrier air
wings. In recent years the Corps has assigned two VMFA F/A-18 squadrons to
deploy with carrier air wings.

KEY WEST,
Fla. — The crew of the Coast Guard Cutter Mohawk (WMEC-913) returned to their
homeport in Key West following a 90-day counter-smuggling patrol in support of
Joint Interagency Task Force-South and operations in the Eastern Pacific Ocean,
the Coast Guard 7th District said in a release.

The Mohawk
crew, along with Coast Guard crews from Tactical Law Enforcement Team-South,
Coast Guard Helicopter Interdiction Tactical Squadron and multiple partner
agencies, interdicted more than 16,500 pounds of cocaine and more than 1,500
pounds of marijuana to counter and disrupt the illegal smuggling operations of
transnational criminal organizations.

The cutter
crew also conducted joint operations with crews from the Costa Rica Servicio
Nacional de Guardacostas, in which they assisted in the rescue of four Costa
Rican mariners. The Mohawk crew also rescued four sea turtles entangled in
fishing gear.

The Coast
Guard increased U.S. and allied presence in the Eastern Pacific Ocean and
Caribbean Basin, which are known drug transit zones off Central and South
America. During at-sea interdictions in international waters, a suspect vessel
is initially located and tracked by allied, military or law-enforcement
personnel coordinated by JIAFT-S. The interdictions, including the actual
boarding, are led and conducted by U.S. Coast Guardsmen. The law-enforcement
phase of counter-smuggling operations in the Eastern Pacific is conducted under
the authority of the Coast Guard 11th District headquartered in Alameda,
California.

The cutter Mohawk is a
270-foot medium-endurance cutter, whose missions include search and rescue,
maritime safety and security, and maritime law enforcement operations, such as
illegal migrant and drug interdiction operations.

WASHINGTON
— Navy Secretary Richard V. Spencer has announced the newest towing, salvage
and rescue ship will be named Cherokee Nation in honor of the service and
contributions the Cherokee people have made to the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps,
the secretary’s public affairs office said in a June 21 release.

“It is my
privilege to announce that the many Cherokee Nation citizens who’ve served
throughout the years will be remembered with the highest honor a secretary of
the Navy can bestow, the naming of a ship,” Spencer said.

This is
the fifth U.S. ship to be named in honor of the Cherokee people.

“The Cherokee Nation is extremely honored that the U.S. Navy is recognizing our tribal nation and the generations of Cherokee men and women who have bravely and humbly sacrificed for our freedom today,” Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Bill John Baker said.

“Our
Cherokee people have contributed in every major battle and war ever fought in
this country and continue to serve in the armed forces in some of the highest
rates per ethnicity. Cherokees are a strong, resilient people, and we are
privileged to have a U.S. ship at sea that reflects both our country and
tribe’s history and values.”

Gulf
Island Shipyards was awarded a $64.8 million contract option for the detail
design and construction of the new Ship, which will be based on existing
commercial towing offshore vessel designs and will replace the current T-ATF
166 and T-ARS 50 class ships in service with the U.S. Military Sealift Command.
The Cherokee Nation is the second ship in the new class of towing, salvage and rescue
ships and will be designated T-ATS 7.

The contract
includes options for potentially six additional vessels, and each additional
ship will be named in honor of prominent Native Americans or Native American
tribes.

The T-ATS
will serve as open ocean towing vessels and will additionally support salvage operations and submarine rescue missions. The ship will be
built at the company’s shipyard in Houma, Louisiana, and is expected to be
completed in July 2021.

ARLINGTON,
Va. — The U.S. Marine Corps has awarded BAE Systems a contract to develop two
variants of the Amphibious Combat Vehicle (ACV) and manufacture one of them.

Marine Corps
Systems Command has awarded “a not-to-exceed [$67 million] modification for
firm-fixed-price, cost-plus-fixed-fee contract for the development of
engineering drawings, manufacture and test support for three [ACV] command-and-control
Mission Role Variants (MRVs) and the development of engineering drawings for
the ACV medium-caliber-cannon MRV,” according to a Defense Department release.

BAE Systems
is building the ACV for the Marine Corps as an amphibious troop carrier to
replace the four-decade-old Assault Amphibious Vehicle. The AAV7 is fielded in
several variants, and the Corps plans to field the ACV in variants as well.

The
command-and-control (C2) MRV will be the first variant of the ACV. The C2
variant will be designed for a commander and staff and equipped with computer
displays and communications systems to enable the commander to maintain
situational awareness of the battlefield.

A variant
with a medium-caliber gun atop the ACV will follow.

Work is
expected to be completed by Sept. 30, 2022.

WASHINGTON
— Bruce Jette, assistant secretary of the U.S. Army for acquisition, logistics
and technology, on June 20 approved the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV)
program’s transition into full-rate production, the Army Program Executive
Office for Combat Support and Combat Service Support announced in a release.

The
approval follows an Army decision in December to begin fielding the new
platform with the Army’s 1st Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division, Fort Stewart,
Georgia, in April. The 1-3 ID became the Army’s first unit equipped with JLTVs
in April after receiving more than 300 vehicles.

Fieldings
to the Ordnance School, Fort Lee, Virginia, the 84th Training Command, Fort
McCoy, Wisconsin, the Marine Corps’ School of Infantry-West at Camp Pendleton,
California, as well as the Marine School of Infantry-East, Camp Lejeune, North
Carolina, have also been completed.

“Thanks
to tremendous teamwork across two services on requirements, resources, program
management, testing and other areas, this is a great modernization success story.
JLTV shows how teams focused on stable requirements, mature technologies and
the right incentives can deliver meaningful capability advancements in a
cost-conscious way,” said Jeffrey White, Jette’s principal deputy.

The JLTV
family of vehicles is designed to restore payload and performance that were
traded from light tactical vehicles to add protection in recent conflict,
giving commanders an improved protected mobility solution and the first vehicle
purpose-built for modern battlefield networks.

“Getting
an improved capability into the hands of Soldiers and Marines has been our
team’s driving focus throughout this program,” said Michael Sprang, project
manager, Joint Program Office, Joint Light Tactical Vehicles.

“We
are also grateful for Soldier feedback on new features and enhancements,” Sprang
continued. “The Soldiers of the 1st ABCT, 3rd Infantry Division provided
valuable input on enhancements such as increased situational awareness,
reduction of system noise, a troop seat kit, and a companion JLTV trailer.
Their assessments helped bring us all to a successful Full-Rate Production
decision.”

The JLTV
program remains on schedule and on budget to replace a significant portion of
the Army’s High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle fleet. The JLTV comes in
two variants and four mission package configurations: general purpose, close combat
weapons carrier, heavy guns carrier and a utility vehicle. The U.S. Navy and
Air Force also plan to field JLTVs in much smaller quantities.

“The full-rate production decision is a key
milestone for the JLTV program, closing out the low-rate initial production
(LRIP) phase, which began in 2015, George
Mansfield, vice president and general manager of joint programs for Oshkosh
Defense, said in a June 21 statement. “Important insights from
manufacturing and rigorous developmental and operational test during LRIP
contributed to shaping the vehicle’s current configuration. The program remains
on schedule and on budget and ensures our troops have the protection,
connection and extreme off-road mobility they need today for current and future
battlefields. The JLTV is the only light tactical vehicle being fielded today
that can maneuver within combat formations.”

ARLINGTON, Va. — The U.S. Navy RQ-4A Block 10 Global Hawk
unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) shot down June 19 by Iranian forces was destroyed
by a surface-to-air missile of indigenous Iranian design and manufacture.

The Global Hawk was downed by a missile system the
Iranians call the Third of Khordad, which was
first unveiled in Iran in 2014. The system’s missile has a range of 75
kilometers and can intercept targets at an altitude of up to 81,000 feet,
higher than the 60,000-foot ceiling of the Global Hawk.

One
former Navy electronic countermeasures officer described the Third of Khordad
as a knock-off of the Russian-designed BUK-M1 (NATO code name SA-11 Gadfly) missile
system.

In a June 20 release, U.S. Central Command spokesman
Cmdr. Bill Urban said the RQ-4A was shot down “while operating in international airspace over the Strait of
Hormuz at approximately 11:35 p.m. GMT on June 19, 2019. Iranian reports that
the aircraft was over Iran are false. This was an unprovoked attack on a U.S.
surveillance asset in international airspace.”

Iran claimed the UAV had violated Iranian airspace.

The incident occurred a few days after Iranian forces
fired a missile at a U.S. MQ-9 Reaper UAV near the Strait of Hormuz and damaged
two oil tankers with limpet mines. Last month, four tankers were damaged by
explosives believed to be limpet mines.

The Northrop Grumman RQ-4A Block 10 Global Hawk
high-altitude long-endurance (HALE) UAV also is known as the BAMS-D (Broad-Area
Maritime Surveillance-Demonstration) system. Urban said the RQ-4A “provides
real-time intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions over vast
ocean and coastal regions.”

The Navy has deployed the RQ-4A to Southwest Asia since 2009 as a
component of the Broad-Area Maritime Surveillance-Demonstration (BAMS-D)
program. Five RQ-4As were acquired from the U.S. Air Force and were based at
Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland, and operated by a detachment of
Patrol Reconnaissance Wing 11. The detachment keeps at least one RQ-4A in the
rotation to a base in the Persian Gulf region. One was lost in a mishap in
Maryland in June 2012.

The Navy and Northrop Grumman have been developing a
Global Hawk derivative, the MQ-4C Triton, to meet the Navy’s HALE requirements.
Unmanned Patrol Squadron 19 is scheduled to send a two-aircraft detachment to
Guam this year for the Triton’s Early Operational Capability deployment. The
deployment had been delayed a year following the gear-up landing of one of the
squadron’s MQ-4Cs in September 2018.

According to news reports, one MQ-4C recently had been
deployed to Southwest Asia as part of the U.S. buildup of forces in response to
Iranian hostile acts. The deployment initially led to some erroneous reports
that the downed UAV was an MQ-4C.

NORFOLK, Va. — The U.S. Navy, Marine Corps and Coast Guard
panelists that participated in the Sea Service Update panel June 20 at the Navy
League National Convention prepared remarks focused on a multitude of recent
document releases such as the National Defense Strategy, the National Military
Strategy and the Coast Guard Arctic Strategic Outlook.

Remarks also focused on readiness; the importance of
remaining forward-deployed; and many other probable talking points, but it was
a host of questions fielded by longtime local defense reporter Mike Gooding
that elicited perhaps the most interesting insights into how the services are
preparing for the future.

Gooding touched on the government shutdown early this year,
which saw the unprecedented scenario of the Coast Guard working without pay. He
also asked panelists their thoughts on the Budget Control Act of 2011 that many
expected would be short-lived but instead has brought with it sequestration
threats for nearly a decade. Gooding wondered how the services were preparing
to weather the upcoming storm of another likely continuing resolution in
September — a process where the services would remain funded at their current
levels regardless of shifting program needs.

Coast Guard Adm. Scott Buschman, the Atlantic Area commander,
conveyed how many organizations, including the Navy League, stepped up to
ensure the Coast Guard had extra support during the shutdown, but panelists
made clear how untenable that situation would be in the future.

“I hope that doesn’t happen again because it was a very
stressful time for our women and men,” Buschman said, a sentiment echoed by Navy
Vice Adm. Bruce Lindsey, deputy commander of U.S. Fleet Forces Command. “We
should never, ever do that again,” Lindsey added.

As for dealing with continuing resolutions, Lindsey said he wanted
to see more flexibility.

U.S. Fleet Forces manages a $12 billion annual budget. “It
would be really nice if [Fleet Forces Commander] Adm. Grady had the authority
to move less than 5% of the total operating budget without having to approach
Congress,” he said. That would amount to $480 million — a substantial amount to
make a difference. Grady “needs that authority,” Lindsey said.

Marine Corps Lt. Gen. Mark Brilakis, commander of Forces
Command, said stability in resources is critical to managing programs in the
pipeline.

“A budget’s a budget. Congress appropriates money and … you
have a problem trying to push dollars around. I’ve had to cancel exercises this
year because we don’t have the funds to complete the schedule,” Brilakis said.

He predicted there would be a continuing resolution this
fall based on his years of experience.

“The sequester was a bad law, and everyone thought it’d get
fixed,” Brilakis said.

Gooding also brought up a recent Government Accountability
Office report that came out this week, identifying that 46 of 79 Defense Department
installations are at risk to a rise in sea levels.

Brilakis said there’s a reason so much DoD land is under
threat — the Pentagon bought marginal land on purpose because it was
inexpensive. When Hurricane Florence hit Camp Lejeune, North Carolina last
summer, it dumped 36 inches of rain, and many buildings there still have tarps
on them and no air conditioning.

“We’re not going to replace buildings where we had them
before,” he said.

Brilakis also said that Parris Island, South Carolina, is
“no longer tenable” — despite the generations that have trained there. “We have
to start making historic decisions.”

Buschman’s forces are on the front lines of climate issues,
with two historic hurricane seasons in recent memory. He said the Coast Guard must
make tough decisions recapitalizing ships and instead use that money to repair critical
infrastructure issues after storms. When the Coast Guard is rebuilding, the
service is factoring in resilience so when the next big one hits, infrastructure
can take the punch.

Lindsey concurred with the infrastructure challenges climate
change could bring, stating he didn’t want the United States to have to face
scenarios like the recent widespread power
outages in South America, which could affect banking and other critical
services.

“A lot of people think this is an issue with global warming.
It’s a critical infrastructure issue,” he said.

ARLINGTON,
Va. — The U.S Navy will christen its newest Arleigh Burke-class guided missile
destroyer, the future USS Daniel Inouye (DDG 118), during a 10 a.m. ceremony June
22, in Bath, Maine, the Defense Department announced.

The future
USS Daniel Inouye is named in honor of Daniel Inouye, who served as a United
States senator for Hawaii from 1963 until his death in 2012.

Inouye
received the Medal of Honor June 21, 2000, for his extraordinary heroism in
action while serving with the 442nd Infantry Regiment Combat Team in Italy
during World War II. During an assault on April 21, 1945, an exploding grenade
shattered his right arm; despite the intense pain, he refused evacuation. He
remained at the head of his platoon until they broke the enemy resistance and
his men deployed in defensive positions, continuing to fight until the
regiment’s position was secured.

U.S. Sen.
Mazie Hirono of Hawaii will deliver the christening ceremony’s principal
address. Irene Hirano Inouye, the late senator’s wife, will serve as the ship’s
sponsor. In a time-honored Navy tradition, Irene Inouye will christen the ship
by breaking a bottle of sparkling wine across her bow.

“The
future USS Daniel Inouye will serve for decades as a reminder of Senator
Inouye’s service to our nation and his unwavering support of a strong Navy and
Marine Corps team,” Navy Secretary Richard V. Spencer said. “This
ship honors not only his service but the service of our shipbuilders who help
make ours the greatest Navy and Marine Corps team in the world.”

The future
USS Daniel Inouye will be the 68th Arleigh Burke-class destroyer and is one of
21 ships under contract for the DDG 51 program. The ship is configured as a
Flight IIA destroyer, which enables power projection and delivers quick
reaction time, high firepower, and increased electronic countermeasures
capability for anti-air warfare. The USS Daniel Inouye will be 509.5 feet long
and 59 feet wide, with a displacement of 9,496 tons. She will be homeported in
Pearl Harbor.