usa technology

Part 5: The Current Liberal Government            By  Chuck Black This series of posts is attempting to answer some of the questions surrounding the appropriate Canadian response to the recently announced US plan to create an expanded  United States Space Force .   Part one (" The Axworthy Doctrine ") focused on how the dissolution of the Soviet Union in the early 1990's led to a new Canadian focus on aggressive, international peacekeeping missions requiring space focused communication and surveillance capabilities of a type which Canada didn't then possess. Part two (" The Changing Political Landscape ") discussed why Canada never had a military space policy prior to 1998 by going back to the 1960's and the federal liberal party under  Lester Pearson  and  Pierre Trudeau .   Part three (" Towards Northern Sovereignty ") dealt with the changing focus of Canadian foreign policy from international peacekeeping towards northe...

           By  Brian Orlotti The US Air Force (USAF) has awarded a total $2.3Bln US ($3.0Bln CDN) in contracts to three firms to develop launch systems for national security payloads. The announcement is a watershed moment, highlighting the entry of a new player as well as new technology into the US national security launch apparatus. The military contracts were awarded to: Kent WA based Blue Origin , which received $500Mln US ($650Mln CDN) to build its reusable  New Glenn rocket . Centennial, CO based United Launch Services (ULS), a part of the larger United Launch Alliance (ULA), which received $967Mln USD ($1.25Bln CDN) to develop its " partially " reusable  Vulcan rocket . ULA is the incumbent in this market and currently provides launch services to the US military using two expendable launch systems , the Delta IV and Atlas V .  Dulles VA based " non-reusable "  Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems , which received $791.6...

           By  Brian Orlotti Seattle WA based Stratolaunch Systems Corporation , the aerospace firm founded by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, has announced that it is exploring the development of a series of rocket planes that would serve as a testbed for hypersonic flight. As outlined in the September 20th, 2018 Geek Wire post, " Paul Allen’s Stratolaunch Systems lays out a roadmap for hypersonic rocket planes ," Stratolaunch senior technical fellow for hypersonics Stephen Corda presented a concept study detailing a delta-wing uncrewed testbed aircraft called Hyper-Z at the 22nd American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics’ (AIAA)  International Space Planes and Hypersonic Systems and Technologies conference, which was held on September 19th - 22nd in Orlando FL. Called the Hyper-Z, the proposed rocket plane would feature a hydrogen-fueled rocket engine as its main propulsion system, but could also be equipped with an air-breathing engin...