The Air Force is scheduled to select an industry lead systems integrator for its B-52 Stand-Off Jammer program, moving the B-52H into the arena of radar-jamming. The Air Force will award $236 million for a 25-month contract to develop the pre-system and demonstration portion of the program. Northrop Grumman and Boeing/BAE are lined up as leading candidates for the work. Air Force plans to modify 16 of the venerable bombers with two outboard radar-jamming pods designed to disrupt air defense networks from long range. USAF expects the Electric BUFFs to reach initial operational capability by 2014. Read our article “The New Way of Electron War,” which describes this new mission for an old bomber.
With a new policy in hand, the Air Force’s Foreign Military Sales enterprise is looking to go beyond selling USAF systems to allies and partner nations—and instead help them develop their own capabilities. Such an approach, deemed “non-program of record acquisitions,” is part of a larger shift in FMS toward…