BRAC Work Continues At Fort Sam Houston For Eaton
Filed under: BRAC, Business Line, Companies, Congress, Contract Additions, Contract Awards, Department of Defense, Events, Services, States, Texas, U.S. Air Force, U.S. Army, logistics, medicine
The last round of the Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) act in the United States moved to consolidate development and training centers. One base that is gaining from this policy is Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, TX. Because it was decided to move most of the military’s medical training to this location much work is being done to expand the facilities there. Eaton Corporation received a further contract addition worth $8 million.
The contract is for electrical services and parts to support the construction of the required facilities. One key component of this is a 425 bed hospital that Eaton Corp. has been working on.
Army Awards DCGS Support Contract
Filed under: Business Line, Companies, Contract Awards, Events, IT, Raytheon, Services, States, Texas, Textron, U.S. Army, development program, logistics, production program
Overwatch an operating unit of Textron Inc. (TXT) was awarded a contract by the U.S. Army to support the Distributed Common Ground System (DCGS)-Army system. DCGS is a product of Raytheon (RTN) that allows the distribution of a variety of intelligence material. The DCGS-Army as it sounds is the system in use by the Army at their ground facilities to support their operations.
Overwatch received a contract that will be worth over $48 million if all options are exercised to provide software development and training. The software is used to develop and support applications on the DCGS. Overwatch has been doing this kind of work for U.S. and other countries military since the early 1990. It was acquired by Textron in 2006.
BRAC Contracts For Fort Sam Houston Keep Adding Up
Filed under: Business Line, Companies, Congress, Contract Awards, Department of Defense, Events, IT, Lockheed Martin, Restructuring, Services, States, Texas, U.S. Air Force, U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, logistics, training
As part of the last round of Base Realignment And Closure (BRAC) the U.S. Department of Defense decided to consolidate service wide training at various locations. One of these plans is to move all medical training to Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, TX. Much of the Air Force and Army training was already located there so the move is primarily of the Navy centers. Part of the consolidation will require construction of new barracks and facilities.
It was announced yesterday that Lockheed Martin was awarded a $200 million contract to provide logistics support for the movement of the Air Force and Navy’s training centers. The contract calls for the company to do purchasing, warehousing and training on new and moved equipment. Lockheed Martin will also actively manage the movement and transfer of the schools.
The goal of this consolidation is to save money in the long run through economies of scale. This is being done for a variety of specialized training such as moving electronics and missile maintenance to FT Lee, Virginia. Many of the facilities losing the training commands are not closing but gaining other organizations and commands.
This round of BRAC began a whole sale shuffle of training and testing and development organizations that should allow some synergy across the three services.
Army To Upgrade And Refurbish M2 Bradleys
Filed under: BAE Systems, Business Line, Companies, Contract Awards, Events, Pennsylvia, Services, States, Texas, U.S. Army, logistics, production program
In the 1980’s the U.S. Army upgraded their heavy units with the M1 Abrams tank and M2/M3 Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicles (IFV). These vehicles have been upgraded over the last twenty-five years and saw service in Desert Storm as well as the invasion and stabilization operations in Iraq. There has been no new production of them for several years and since 2001 the Army has spent a great deal of money to keep the vehicles up and running.
BAE Systems was awarded a contract to repair and upgrade another 600 M2 vehicles. This contract is worth about $600 million over its full life. This is enough to equip about twelve battalions. Normally when the vehicles go through this process they are completely rebuilt and also receive any current upgrades available. At the end of the process basically a brand new vehicle is delivered back to the Army.
Work on this contract will be done in Texas and Pennsylvania. BAE Systems has been doing the bulk of this kind of work on the M2 for the last several years. The vehicles were originally made by FMC a company that has long since been merged and bought out of existence.
Earmark Proposed For Elbit To Upgrade CH-53D Aircraft
Filed under: Business Line, Companies, Congress, Editorial, Elbit, Events, Federal Budget Process, Military Aviation, Services, States, Texas, U.S. Marine Corps, production program
The U.S. Marines like the Army have been heavily stressing their helicopter fleet in Iraq and Afghanistan. That service has begun to upgrade their lift capability with the procurement of CH-53K and V-22 aircraft. At the same time they have refurbished their older CH-53D aircraft to maximize their use.
Elbit makes a display that has been fitted into many Army and Marine helicopters already called the ANVIS-HUD. The Marine Corps did not have the money available in their budget to add this to the CH-53D as part of their refurbishment. Now the local Congressional Representative, Kay Granger (R-TX), has proposed a $22 million earmark to do this.
This illustrates one of the issues with earmarks. Sometimes they can be used for good things that the services may not have available funds for. Not all earmarks are for blatant waste or fraud like those that make the headlines. There are also cases where the company or the Service have lobbied Congress to include these kind of marks.
Ideally the budget would be planned by the Services, OSD and the President and Congress would do little to change it. That is not possible as the Constitution gives the House the authority to start all funding bills. What is in the bill is what is given to the Executive Branch at the end. Earmarks are a part of this process. As this example shows though not all earmarks are bad and they can buy useful capability for the military that might not be able to fit in the regular budget.
CH-53 photo by Flickr user Obskurantist.
BRAC Moves Air Force Unit to Aberdeen Proving Ground
Filed under: Battelle Memorial Institute, Business Line, Companies, Contract Awards, Department of Defense, Events, Maryland, S&T, Services, States, Texas, U.S. Air Force, development program
The U.S. Air Force under the last round of BRAC is moving its chemical, nuclear and biological defense development unit to the Aberdeen Proving Ground (APG) in Maryland. Battelle was given a $32 million contract to aid in moving the 649th Aeronautical Systems Squadron from Texas. This round focused on concentrating the various parts of the services that carry on like roles. The Army has used APG for most of their chemical and biological research and the Air Force unit will move there to gain benefits from co-location. The Air Force bases in Texas though are gaining Army and Navy units related to medical research and training so that state will not suffer with this move.
Unlike a lot of contracts related to BRAC this is not for construction of facilities. Battelle will provide analysis and support so that not only with the Squadron be able to continue their programs and research without interruption; but also so that the unit can receive improved equipment and processes as part of the move. This is also a benefit of the BRAC process. By moving an organization or unit it is possible to upgrade and modernize their capability through improving facilities. The combining of like abilities from various services and organizations will also aid in sharing and exchanging experience and knowledge.
Killeen Texas tries to understand the effect of defense contracting
Killeen, TX is the largest city near Fort Hood in Texas. Two local defense contractors attempted to gain a handle on how much work was being done at the Fort and its effect on the local economy. See the story here. It proved to be hard to learn who and what were getting contracts that supported the base and the units there.



