BREAKING: TEXTRON’S BELL V-280 VALOR CHOSEN AS NEW U.S. ARMY LONG-RANGE ASSAULT AIRCRAFT

(c) Steve Douglass 

TEXTRON’S BELL V-280 VALOR CHOSEN AS NEW U.S. ARMY LONG-RANGE ASSAULT AIRCRAFT

The V-280’s unmatched combination of proven tiltrotor technology coupled with innovative digital engineering and an open architecture offers the Army outstanding operational versatility for its vertical lift fleet

PROVIDENCE, R.I.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Textron Inc (NYSE: TXT) announced today that Bell Textron Inc., a Textron company,has been awarded the development contract for the U.S. Army’s Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA) program. The award is based on Bell’s V-280 Valor tiltrotor that was developed and tested as part of the Joint Multi-Role Technology Demonstrator (JMR TD) program that began in 2013. The V-280 progressed through design, manufacturing, and more than three years of rigorous flight testing that provided extensive data validating the technical and operational advantages of the aircraft for the long-range assault mission.

"We are honored that the U.S. Army has selected the Bell V-280 Valor as its next-generation assault aircraft," said Scott C. Donnelly, Textron’s chairman and chief executive officer. "We intend to honor that trust by building a truly remarkable and transformational weapon system to meet the Army’s mission requirements. We are excited to play an important role in the future of Army Aviation."

“This is an exciting time for the U.S. Army, Bell, and Team Valor as we modernize the Army’s aviation capabilities for decades to come,” said Mitch Snyder, president and CEO of Bell. “Bell has a long history supporting Army Aviation and we are ready to equip Soldiers with the speed and range they need to compete and win using the most mature, reliable, and affordable high-performance long-range assault weapon system in the world.”

This award builds on a decade of the V-280 Valor’s progress through design, manufacturing, and thorough testing to demonstrate that this aircraft will deliver on the FLRAA program requirements. Bell and its industry partners have systematically validated the V-280 aircraft and their modular open systems approach in collaboration with the Army.

“For the past several years the Bell team demonstrated the exceptional operational capabilities, digital thread synergies, and platform affordability enhancements the V-280 provides,” said Keith Flail, executive vice president, Advanced Vertical Lift Systems at Bell. “Bell stands ready with our world-class manufacturing facilities to apply our nearly seven decades of tiltrotor expertise to deliver a modern FLRAA fleet to the Army.”

The initial contract refines the weapon system design, sustainment, digital enterprise, manufacturing, systems integration, flight-testing, and airworthiness qualification.

This award builds on Bell’s history of more than 85 years delivering over 30,000 trusted vertical lift products to military and commercial customers in the U.S. and around the world. To learn more about the V-280 Valor, Team Valor, and the FLRAA program, please visit https://www.bellflight.com/products/bell-v-280 and textron.com and follow us on YouTube, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

                                          VIDEO (C) STEVE DOUGLASS

Behold - the B-21 Bomber

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PALMDALE, Calif. – Dec. 2, 2022 – Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE: NOC) and the U.S. Air Force unveiled the B-21 Raider to the world today. The B-21 joins the nuclear triad as a visible and flexible deterrent designed for the U.S. Air Force to meet its most complex missions.

“The Northrop Grumman team develops and delivers technology that advances science, looks into the future and brings it to the here and now,” said Kathy Warden, chair, chief executive officer and president, Northrop Grumman. “The B-21 Raider defines a new era in technology and strengthens America’s role of delivering peace through deterrence.”

The B-21 Raider forms the backbone of the future for U.S. air power, leading a powerful family of systems that deliver a new era of capability and flexibility through advanced integration of data, sensors and weapons. Its sixth-generation capabilities include stealth, information advantage and open architecture.

“The B-21 Raider is a testament to America’s enduring advantages in ingenuity and innovation. And it’s proof of the Department’s long-term commitment to building advanced capabilities that will fortify America’s ability to deter aggression, today and into the future. Now, strengthening and sustaining U.S. deterrence is at the heart of our National Defense Strategy,” said Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III. “This bomber was built on a foundation of strong, bipartisan support in Congress. And because of that support, we will soon fly this aircraft, test it and then move into production.”

The B-21 is capable of networking across the battlespace to multiple systems, and into all domains. Supported by a digital ecosystem throughout its lifecycle, the B-21 can quickly evolve through rapid technology upgrades that provide new capabilities to outpace future threats.

“With the B-21, the U.S. Air Force will be able to deter or defeat threats anywhere in the world,” said Tom Jones, corporate vice president and president, Northrop Grumman Aeronautics Systems. “The B-21 exemplifies how Northrop Grumman is leading the industry in digital transformation and digital engineering, ultimately delivering more value to our customers.”

The B-21 Raider is named in honor of the Doolittle Raids of World War II when 80 men, led by Lt. Col. James “Jimmy” Doolittle, and 16 B-25 Mitchell medium bombers set off on a mission that changed the course of World War II. The designation B-21 recognizes the Raider as the first bomber of the 21st century.

Northrop Grumman is a technology company, focused on global security and human discovery. Our pioneering solutions equip our customers with capabilities they need to connect, advance and protect the U.S. and its allies. Driven by a shared purpose to solve our customers’ toughest problems, our 90,000 employees define possible every day.

B-21 Debut tonight - here's the latest and live stream link.

WASHINGTON (AP) — America’s newest nuclear stealth bomber is making its public debut after years of secret development and as part of the Pentagon’s answer to rising concerns over a future conflict with China.

The B-21 Raider is the first new American bomber aircraft in more than 30 years. Almost every aspect of the program is classified. Ahead of its unveiling Friday at an Air Force facility in Palmdale, California, only artists’ renderings of the warplane have been released. Those few images reveal that the Raider resembles the black nuclear stealth bomber it will eventually replace, the B-2 Spirit.

The bomber is part of the Pentagon’s efforts to modernize all three legs of its nuclear triad, which includes silo-launched nuclear ballistic missiles and submarine-launched warheads, as it shifts from the counterterrorism campaigns of recent decades to meet China’s rapid military modernization.

China is on track to have 1,500 nuclear weapons by 2035, and its gains in hypersonics, cyber warfare, space capabilities and other areas present “the most consequential and systemic challenge to U.S. national security and the free and open international system,” the Pentagon said this week in its annual China report.

CLICK HERE FOR THE LIVESTREAM THAT BEGINS AT 5:00 PM PSDT

 

Northrop's B-21 RAIDER stealth bomber to be unveiled on Friday DEC 2nd.

 

click here to connect to streaming event on 12-2-22

BREAKING: Poland hit by missiles, two dead.

Missiles crossed into NATO member Poland, killing two people, a senior US intelligence official said on Tuesday in what could mark a serious escalation.

The weapon hit a farm in Przewodów, Lublin, near the border with Ukraine, according to Polish media reports.

Senior U.S. intelligence officials say that although not all details are clear at this time it appears a grain elevator was hit and at last two people are dead.

A Polish government spokesman did not immediately confirm the information, but said  leaders were meeting on "crisis situation."

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UPDATE: SKY NEWS

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki has called an urgent meeting to discuss national security, a government spokesman said on Twitter.State news agency PAP said the meeting was to be held at 8pm GMT.

Latvia's deputy prime minister, Artis Pabriks, said Moscow had fired missiles that landed in Poland and sent Warsaw his condolences.

Polish media said missiles hit an area where grain was drying in Przewodow, a village in eastern Poland near the border with Ukraine.

"Firefighters are on the spot - it's not clear what has happened," said firefighter Lukasz Kucy.

Moscow launched a large number of missiles at Ukraine on Wednesday, knocking out power for seven million households.

It is unclear whether the two missiles that apparently landed in Poland were part of the same wave, but it is the first time Russian rockets are said to have reached Poland.

Poland has not been involved in the conflict, but has welcomed millions of Ukrainian refugees and has widely condemned the war.

UPDATE: 

There is no evidence a missile that slammed into a Polish border town near Ukraine was an intentional attack on his country, Poland President Andrzej Duda said Wednesday.

The missile, which killed two people in a rural area, appeared to be Russian-made, Duda said. Ukraine's weaponry includes Russian-made missiles.

“Ukraine’s defense was launching their missiles in various directions and it is highly probable that one of these missiles unfortunately fell on Polish territory,” Duda said. “There is nothing, absolutely nothing to suggest that it was an intentional attack on Poland.”

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, at a meeting of the military alliance in Brussels, said a preliminary analysis suggests that the incident was likely caused by a Ukrainian air defense missile fired to defend Ukrainian territory against Russian cruise missile attacks.