Lockheed Martin [LMT] continues its work on ballistic missile defense programs even as program uncertainties and budget cuts loom, company officials said.
“There’s an increased concern about the (ballistic missile) threat, so I think the demand will continue,” John Osborn, director of Missile Defense for Lockheed Martin Information Systems and Global Solutions-Defense, said yesterday during a media briefing.
Lockheed Martin must focus on program performance, delivering the product and ensuring the required capabilities are there, he said.
With sequestration cuts in the offing, Osborne said, “We’ve done our planning…prepared options…and now we’re waiting to see what the U.S. government and DoD implement whatever their sequestration plans are. We are prepared to respond.”
Company missile defense officials detailed program activities, to include missile defense subject matter experts like Doug Graham, vice president of advanced programs for Strategic and Missile Defense Systems for Lockheed Martin Space Systems.
The company is waiting to hear the specifics on how the Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) IIB program will be restructured, as Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said March 15.
SM-3 IIB was to have been deployed as part of the Phased Adaptive Approach (PAA), adding to the protection of the U.S. homeland from Middle East missile threats.
“The timeline for deploying this program had been delayed to at least 2022 due to cuts in congressional funding,” Hagel said last week in unveiling missile defense changes at the Pentagon. “Meanwhile, the threat matures.”
Shifting resources to fund additional ground-based interceptors as well as advance-kill vehicle technology that will improve performance of the GBI and other SM-3 versions will add protection against Iranian missiles sooner while providing additional protection against the North Korean threat, Hagel said.
The refocus is from developing the entire interceptor to kill vehicle technology that can be applied to the next generation kill vehicle for the GBI, Graham said. “It’s pretty clear, the kill vehicles are essentially 1980s technology….We’ve felt for some time that the current state of kill vehicle technology we can come up with a much lower cost, more capable kill vehicle.”
In 2011 Lockheed Martin was awarded $43.3 million contract for concept definition and program planning for the SM-3 IIB.
Other company missile defense officials detailed program activities.
Nick Bucci, director of Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense Programs for Lockheed Martin Mission Systems and Training, said said the USS John Paul Jones (DDG 53) in January received the second half of the multi-mission signal processor (MMSP), part of modernization that allows an integrated air defense and ballistic missile capability. Pulling the Aegis SPY-1 radar and MMSP into one signal processing combat system will improve Navy integrated air missile defense capabilities. More testing comes this spring.
Lockheed Martin is the prime contractor for the Aegis system, earlier this month winning the Navy competition to modernize the system (Defense Daily, March 5).
Work on the Aegis Ashore development program is proceeding well, he said. The Aegis ashore deck house is built in Moorestown, N.J., and once integration tests are complete everything will be shipped out to the Aegis Ashore Missile Defense Test Complex (AAMDTC) at the Pacific Missile Range Facility in Kauai, Hawaii. Moorestown’s work will be mated with a second deck house, built with lessons learned from building the Moorestown deck house, leaving it about five months behind, he said. After final integration, next year will see the first land-based SM-3 Block IB missiles fired.
The AAMDTC will use the same components used on the Navy’s new construction Aegis BMD destroyers, and will be part of the Phased Adaptive Approach for European ballistic missile defense.
Late yesterday, the Missile Defense Agency was issued a contract modification to Lockheed Martin as the Aegis Ashore Engineering Agent that increases the total contract value to $331.8 million to provide installation, integration and test of the Aegis Ashore Missile Defense System at the PMRF in Kauai, and at Deveselu, Romania.
Orville Prins, vice president of international air and missile defense business development for Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control, said there is strong near-term interest in missile defense capabilities around the world, noting that Turkey recently requested NATO Patriot Weapon systems, which includes the Lockheed Martin the Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) missile for protection along its border.
The Patriot team is set for four intercept tests this year for the PAC-3 missile, and three intercept tests for its follow on, the Missile Segment Enhancement (MSE) missile, he said. The company hopes for a fiscal year 2014 production buy decision.
To date, the Army has activated two Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) systems, which has a 100 percent success rate over its last 11 flight engagements, Prins said. A third battery is expected to be activated soon. The Army plans for six batteries overall, and Prins said five are on contract.
In 2011, the United Arab Emirates became the first international THAAD customer. The Middle East and the Asia-Pacific area have shown particular interest in the system, he said.