By David Crane defrev (at) gmail (dot) com March 11, 2011 DefenseReview (DR) readers may remember a story we published back in February 2010 on the Russian PAK FA Sukhoi T-50 low-observable stealth fighter aircraft that’s essentially Russia’s developmental version of the Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor. Well, the program has developed since then into the more fleshed-out Sukhoi/HAL FGFA (Fifth …

By David Crane defrev (at) gmail (dot) com December 28, 2010 Looks like the “D” version of the Chinese DF-21 medium-range anti-ship ballistic missile (ASBM) is moving into the deployment phase, although an “over the water” flight test has reportedly not yet been conducted. If the DF-21D ASBM ends up working as advertised, however, it may (potentially) effectively obsolete U.S. …

By David Crane defrev (at) gmail (dot) com July 20, 2010 On October 15, 2009, DefenseReview (DR) published an article on the U.S. Air Force’s successful testing of a Lockheed Martin Martin NC-130H-mounted Boeing Advanced Tactical Laser (ATL) weapon system. As impressive as that may have been, Raytheon Company just picked up the gauntlet by shooting down four unmanned aerial …

By David Crane defrev (at) gmail (dot) com July 12, 2010 Anyone remember the movie Stealth (2005)? It was a huge bomb at the box office, but it did feature some interesting fictional future aircraft tech, including the “Extreme Deep Invader (EDI)” an autonomous high-speed, low-observable jet-powered unmanned combat air vehicle (UCAV) with artificial intelligence (via a quantum computer pilot …

By David Crane defrev (at) gmail (dot) com May 3, 2010 Updated on 5/03/2010 Within the last couple weeks, British newspapers have published stories on two Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) programs under the Prompt Global Strike (PGS) initiative, who’s purpose is to enable the United States to launch precision conventional weapon strikes anywhere in the world within one …

By David Crane defrev (at) gmail (dot) com April 7, 2010 Updated 4/09/10 Looks like nuclear weapons aren’t the only thing the Iranian government is after. Apparently, they’ve also got a penchant for speedboats, specifically high-tech, very expensive speedboats. Multiple news sources are reporting that the Iranians have surreptitiously acquired a “James Bond-style” fast mover called the Bladerunner 51 / Bradstone …

By David Crane defrev (at) gmail (dot) com October 15, 2009 There’s a scene at the beginning of the 1985 film Real Genius showing a fictional “Crossbow Project” demonstration video of some unlucky bastard (perhaps a third-world dictator or politician?) getting instantly vaporized by a space-based laser weapon fired from a satellite. The video is being shown to a bunch …

By David Crane defrev at gmail dot com April 6, 2009 I’ve been writing about the vulnerability of U.S. Navy surface ships, particularly large expensive aircraft carriers, against other countries’ anti-ship cruise missiles and torpedoes for awhile, now. Specifically, I’ve focused on the latest crop of supersonic anti-ship cruise missiles and supercavitating torpedoes, even though some argue that long-range wake-homing …

By David Crane defrev at gmail dot com September 7, 2008 Laser warfare may be closer than we think. Danger Room and Gizmodo both report that Northrop Grumman is promising the U.S. military that it will have working, deployable weapons-grade solid-state, electric lasers (tactical lasers) ready to go by the end of 2008. Solid-state electric lasers have been making progress …

by David Crane defrev at gmail.com May 30, 2008 DefenseReview has been hearing some pretty great things about the Eurofighter Typhoon multi-role combat fighter aircraft’s performance, from its excellent flight characteristics to its pilot-friendly cockpit, to its helmet-mounted display and targeting system. What’s interesting is that it can perform so well acrobatically, even without thrust vectoring. Advanced electronic fly-by-wire flight …