Douglas A. Macgregor's Blog, page 7

The defense industry ‘conned the American people and the Pentagon’: Army Secretary

WASHINGTON — Army Secretary Dan Driscoll doubled down on his stance this week that the Army is looking to do less business with traditional prime defense contractors and more deals with smaller, Silicon Valley-like vendors. This comes on the heels of the Army’s decision to launch a complete rework of its acquisition structure, which Breaking Defense first reported earlier this week.

“It used to be 90 percent of things we bought were purpose-built for the military or the Army, and 10 percent were off the shelf,” Driscoll said Wednesday at a media roundtable. “The defense industrial base broadly, and the primes in particular, conned the American people and the Pentagon and the Army into thinking that it needed military specific solutions, when in reality, a lot of these commercial solutions are equal to or better, and we’ve actually harmed ourselves with that mentality.” 

But this way of doing things is no longer, especially if the big primes don’t start operating more efficiently, he said, as the goal is to get weapons systems and platforms delivered to soldiers much faster.

“So what we are trying to do is flip it to 90 percent being commercially available and 10 percent being specific in the worst of cases, because when you actually start to think about what large-scale conflict looks like, you cannot scale one-off solutions as quickly and easily as you can scale commercially available things.” 

But Driscoll also acknowledged that the primes are not always to blame, as the Army has a history of being a less-than-perfect customer. 

“When I meet with [primes], I highlight how bad of a customer we have been and the characteristics that they have today, we created and incentivized over a long period of time. I appreciate that it’s so difficult to build against our demand signal, and it requires such a balance sheet to outlast all of our insane processes, that I can appreciate that from their perspective,” Driscoll said.

“But when I sit with them, and when [Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George] sits with them, and when we talk to them very openly, and they’re almost all honorable, patriotic people, we stress to them that their system has changed, and you will no longer be able to do that in the United States Army.” 

Doing more business with nontraditional vendors is part of the Army’s plans to make sprawling changes to its acquisition structure, which mark the biggest buying shakeup the service has seen in years. The revamp will see a host of consolidations, including a reduction in the number of general officers at the top rank; the contraction of the 12 Program Executive Offices (PEOs) in charge of acquisition; an entirely new reporting structure up the chain; and a larger emphasis on doing business with commercial and private enquiry companies. 

Related: EXCLUSIVE: The Army is changing its acquisition structure. Here are the details.

These changes also echo remarks made by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth last week. Hegseth on Nov. 7 spoke to a group of defense CEOs and military program officials to highlight the switch to doing more business with commercial companies — even if their solutions are not completely compliant with the Army’s requirements.

“It means that we will be open to buying the 85 percent solution and iterate together over time to achieve the 100 percent solution. It also means there will be no non compliant bids,” Hegseth said, repeating twice that the department wants to “increase acquisition risk in order to decrease operational risk.” 

Also at Wednesday’s roundtable, George said that the Army has already started incorporating commercial products into its systems, specifically General Motor’s engines for the service’s infantry squad vehicles (ISVs), adding that it is looking at Caterpillar engines for the M1E3, the Army’s next-generation Abrams tank. 

“There are companies out there that do this that we can definitely take advantage of, and that’s what we’re doing,” George said. “I think that we have a lot of opportunities on the commercial side, and we’re working with the other companies that we’ve been working with [the primes], and what’s been refreshing to me is they’re all working together as well, and they know that we got to get after speed.”

Anduril, Hyundai Heavy Industries set sights on US Navy’s unmanned surface vessel program

WASHINGTON — American defense tech firm Anduril and South Korean shipbuilder Hyundai Heavy Industries announced today they will partner to design a new class of maritime drones with hopes of securing a spot in the US Navy’s latest unmanned surface vessel program.

“Anduril and HD Hyundai’s ASV [autonomous surface vessel] is built for modularity, speed of production, and mission flexibility. Its open-architecture design supports interchangeable payloads, allowing the same vessel to perform intelligence, surveillance, strike, electronic warfare, and other missions through rapid reconfiguration,” according to a statement from the American firm. “The vessel’s distinctive central superstructure provides an unobstructed 360-degree field of view, enabling continuous situational awareness and optimal payload performance.”

The release pitched a version of the ship as a potential entrant for the Modular Attack Surface Craft, the Navy’s latest vision for a family of unmanned surface vessels, envisioned to carry a variety of payloads and be easily built and repaired in large quantities. As Breaking Defense exclusively reported, the service is intentionally taking a different approach in soliciting the vessel from industry, foregoing the standard process of laying out a bevy of strict requirements process and instead employing a Defense Innovation Unit-style competition.

“The first dual-use ASV prototype is currently being fabricated in Korea, utilizing [HHI’s] industrial capacity to validate designs, integrate propulsion and power systems, automate ship functions with autonomy, and prepare for U.S. production ahead of its maiden voyage,” according to Anduril’s statement. “Future vessels, including the MASC variant, will be completely built in the United States. Anduril has invested tens of millions of dollars to revamp a previously retired shipyard in the Pacific Northwest region at the historic former Foss Shipyard in Seattle, Washington.”

Foss Maritime is a transportation and logistics services company handling towing, construction support, barge mooring and other marine services. Foss announced the closure of its Seattle shipyard in October 2021, citing the company’s “regular evaluation of business lines and follows the company’s diligent effort to improve the viability of the Seattle shipyard over many years.”

The closure of numerous commercial and defense-oriented shipyards in recent decades has become an increasingly prolific concern for Pentagon brass who frequently cite China’s exponentially larger shipbuilding output compared to the United States. Anduril said it believes the Pacific Northwest is a prime market for its new maritime drone production.

“The Pacific Northwest, home to the wartime legacy of Kaiser Shipyards and the original Freedom’s Forge, offers the infrastructure, supply chain depth, and skilled labor to expand U.S. shipbuilding capacity,” according to a company statement. “The region provides the ideal conditions to re-energize American shipbuilding and grow the maritime workforce.”

The defense tech firm, based in California and started by Palmer Luckey in 2017, has aggressively staked out positions in numerous technology sectors prized by the Pentagon in recent years — to include challenging some of the best-known primes in the country for a chance at both Navy and Air Force unmanned aviation programs.

Hyundai Heavy Industries is one of South Korea’s three major shipbuilders and, alongside its contemporaries such as Hanwha, has been making a sustained push in recent months to establish itself in the American defense industrial base. Those efforts have largely taken the form of industry-to-industry partnerships with American firms, such as the broader partnership HHI announced with Anduril last year focused on developing autonomous systems.

The South Korean company has also recently struck agreements with Germany’s Siemens and American shipbuilder HII with eyes on furthering its position in the United States’ maritime industrial base.

Boeing workers in St. Louis end strike

WASHINGTON — Boeing defense workers in St. Louis reached an agreement with the company today, ending a three-month long strike.

Members of International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers District 837 will return to work on Nov. 17, according to an announcement from the union. Terms of the agreement were not immediately made public.

“IAM District 837 members stood strong and united for over three months,” the union said. “We’re proud of what our members have fought for together and are ready to get back to building the world’s most advanced military aircraft.”

In a statement, a Boeing spokesperson said “We’re pleased with the results and look forward to bringing our full team back together on Nov. 17 to support our customers.”

The strike started on Aug. 4, with the roughly 3,200 machinists putting down their tools on production lines such as the F-15EX and F/A-18. The two sides passed proposals back and forth in the ensuing time, both attempting to put pressure on the other.

During an October earnings call, a Boeing executive said there had been “immaterial impacts associated with the IAM work stoppage.” Amid the strike, the company also took the unusual step to look into hiring non-union workers.

NATO allies cancel E-7A Wedgetail order, eye replacement, says Netherlands

BELFAST — The Netherlands Ministry of Defence said today that together with “several [NATO] partner countries” they have jointly ended the acquisition of six Boeing E-7 Wedgetail Airborne Warning & Control System (AWACS) aircraft, due to the loss of “strategic and financial foundations.”

The Hague noted that a collection of eight NATO allies, including the US, were all involved in the program to replace E-3A Sentry planes with the E-7. Nations “united in the Support Partnership Committee, halted the acquisition of the E-7. The members are now exploring alternatives for fleet replacement and seeking new partners,” said a translated Netherlands MoD statement.

Confirming the Dutch stance, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte told reporters today at the alliance’s AWACS main operating base in Geilenkirchen, Germany, that an E-3A Sentry replacement process is “ongoing.” He added, “I will do everything to make sure that we speed up that process. It is important that we speed it up.”

The NATO Support and Procurement Agency (NSPA) had not responded to a request for comment at press time. A Boeing spokesperson said in a statement to Breaking Defense that it “remains fully committed to NATO and allied nations’ airborne early warning and control needs. The E-7A is the most capable and mature AEW&C platform fielded today, with combat-proven capabilities, interoperability with alliance systems, and a ready industrial and sustainment framework to meet operational timelines.”

Based on the approval of allies, the NSPA initially decided to buy Wedgetail in 2023, targeting “operational duty by 2031” as part of the alliance’s initial Allied Future Surveillance and Control (iAFSC) project.

That program “is now undergoing significant changes,” the Dutch statement noted, after the US Air Force’s “withdrawal” from the Wedgetail effort. The USAF cancelled the troubled program in June 2024 due to soaring costs and survivability concerns, Breaking Defense previously reported.

On Wednesday, under a continuing appropriations and extensions for fiscal year 2026 bill, Congress proposed nearly $200 million for Wedgetail rapid prototyping activities, despite the Trump administration’s efforts to axe the program. That push is aligned to an alternative plan to rely on space-based capabilities to assist warplanes find and track enemy aircraft, more commonly known as the air moving target indicator (AMTI) mission.

“The US [Wedgetail] withdrawal also demonstrates the importance of investing as much as possible in European industry,” said Netherlands state secretary Gijs Tuinman, per the Dutch statement. “The goal remains to have other, quieter aircraft [succeeding the E-3A] operational by 2035.”

Although the Netherlands did not share which specific aircraft allies are assessing as candidates to replace Wedgetail, iAFSC was previously contested by Saab’s GlobalEye, Northrop Grumman’s E-2D, and L3Harris’s pitch for the Bombardier Global 6500 business jet “cross decked” with a Conformal Airborne Early Warning (CAEW) mission system, previously fitted on Gulfstream G550 platforms.

“We are prepared to participate in any NSPA-led competitive process with a rapidly available solution optimized for survivability and integrated with a communications suite that will provide interoperability with NATO and coalition partners,” said an L3Harris spokesperson in a statement to Breaking Defense. “Building upon our recent selection by the Republic of Korea for a next-generation AEW&C capability based on the Bombardier Global 6500, our solution will create a networked battlespace with fifth-generation aircraft and beyond.”

Stressing that the company is “tracking” reports from today regarding the E-7A procurement, the spokesperson added that “should NSPA issue a call for competition, we are ready to respond.”

Similarly, a Saab spokesperson said it is “aware of media reports related to NATO’s AWACS programme.” They noted a “significant increase in global interest for GlobalEye and we believe GlobalEye makes an excellent solution for many countries which need long-range detection and identification capabilities of objects in the air, at sea and over land. We are open to discuss and explore how our technology can support the needs of our potential customers.” 

Northrop Grumman declined to comment.

NATO currently operates a fleet of 14 E-3A units, but the prior decision to acquire six Wedgetails was justified at the time by an alliance official, on the basis that the limited buy was “recognized as the minimum number of aircraft that the strategic commands state is required to deliver the minimum operational capability for SACEUR’s [Supreme Allied Commander Europe] day-zero airborne air battle management capability.”

Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the E-3 has been consistently used by NATO for surveillance missions across the eastern flank.

The latest Wedgetail setback also adds to technical and financial problems linked to the UK’s estimated £1.89 billion ($2.57 billion) program. Despite an original plan to field the aircraft in the “early” 2020s, an initial operational capability milestone has since been pushed to next year.

The UK originally signed a $1.98 billion contract with Boeing for the procurement of five aircraft to replace a fleet of E-3 planes, before committing to a reduced buy of three airframes on cost grounds.

Updated 11/14/2025 at 7:12 am ET with comment from Boeing.  

Govini removes founder from board following arrest

WASHINGTON — Defense tech firm Govini said it has removed founder Eric Gillespie from its board of directors, following his arrest for allegedly soliciting sexual contact with a minor.

Gillespie was arrested earlier this week, after purportedly being caught in a sting operation in the Pittsburgh area. He is facing four felony counts, according to the Pennsylvania Attorney General. Gillespie doesn’t appear to have made public comments about the allegations, and court documents don’t yet show a plea.

“On November 12, 2025, the Govini Board of Directors terminated Eric Gillespie from the organization, including as a member of the Board, effective immediately,” a company statement reads. “Mr. Gillespie stepped down from the role of CEO almost a decade ago and had no access to classified information.

“Govini is an organization that has been built by over 250 people who share a profound commitment to America’s national security, including veterans, reservists, and people who have dedicated their lives to causes greater than themselves. The actions of one depraved individual should not in any way diminish the hard work of the broader team and their commitment to the security of the United States of America.”

Govini has emerged as a steady member of the new defense tech sector over the last decade, first by focusing on the use of public data and, more recently, with its AI-powered Ark system. The company has offices in both Arlington, Va. and Pittsburgh, Pa.

Congress voted to reopen the government. What does that mean for defense?

The longest shutdown in history is officially over, with Congress voting to fund the government at previous fiscal year levels until Jan. 30. How does this impact defense spending?

Breaking Defense Editor-in-Chief Aaron Mehta briefs you on what the Pentagon could try to get done in the next 11 weeks before Congress tries again to pass a FY26 budget. And make sure to read our story, which has more details on the impact on specific defense programs.

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France announces almost $5B in new military space funding

WASHINGTON — French President Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday announced a planned increase of €4.2 billion ($4.9 billion) in military space spending between 2026 and 2030.

“We must fight to preserve this precious asset; indeed, space is no longer a sanctuary, it has become a battlefield,” he said, according to a translation by Google. “Today’s war is already being fought in space, and tomorrow’s war will begin in space. Let us be ready. This will be a condition for the success of military operations on land, in the air, and at sea.”

Speaking at a ceremony in Toulouse to celebrate the achievement of operational capability by France’s Space Command, Macron said that the funds would support the 2027 launch of the Ministry of Defense’s long-planned counter-space satellites.

“In addition to what was already planned for active defense, we will deploy our first patrol satellites … starting in 2027 to monitor, inspect, and, if necessary, counter threats in orbit. These will be complemented by our first space-based action capabilities based on lasers and jammers,” he said.

Since 2024, the French military has been working on two maneuverable microsatellites to spot, and potentially take action against, threatening satellites in low Earth orbit under its TOUTATIS (In-Orbit Test of Action Techniques against Attempted Spatial Interference) program. TOUTATIS is a companion to the YODA (Yeux en Orbite pour un Démonstrateur Agile) experimental “patrol” nanosatellite in geosynchronous orbit effort, initiated in 2019, as well as a project known as FLAMHE to develop on-board lasers to blind threatening satellites. The projects are part of the French MoD’s overarching ARES (Action et Résilience Spatiale) program.

Macron said that the funds also will support “accelerating the development of our early warning capabilities in cooperation with Germany.”

The two countries in October announced the Joint Early Warning for European Lookout (JEWEL) initiative to develop, detect and track missiles, which is designed to contribute to NATO’s Integrated Air and Missile Defence effort. Germany, for its part, pledged in September to invest $41 billion in military space systems over the next five years.

Finally, Macron said, the spending would support the French military’s AURORE ground-based space surveillance radar.

French defense firm Thales (now set to create a joint space-focused entity with Airbus and Leonardo) on Oct. 25 announced a contract for an undisclosed amount from the French Defense Procurement Agency to develop the new UHF radar to monitor low Earth orbit. “AURORE will be the largest surveillance radar deployed in Europe,” the release said.

The additional funds are in support of France’s new national space strategy, which sets “Strategic and Defense” capabilities as the third of with five key “pillars,” Macron explained. The other four are:

Access to space: “Having autonomous access to space is a collective responsibility for France and for Europe. Depending on a major third-party power or any kind of space magnate is out of the question,” he said, in what could be read as a nod to concerns about America’s reliability as a security partner. “[T]his means we must guarantee the maintenance and development of our launch base, the Guiana Space Centre, and the control of our launchers, with Ariane today and our future launchers tomorrow, which are the main levers for our independent access.”

Industry and Skills: “The French space sector can only be credible, and even sovereign, with a competitive industry. The industrial and commercial model must be rethought from the ground up,” Macron said. “The battle for skills is also a decisive battle.

Science and Exploration. “Climate change is a framework for many programs undertaken by CNES [the French space agency] in conjunction with others, especially at a time when some are withdrawing to understand the origin of the universe and so many other key elements,” he said. “Therefore, continuing to defend science and exploration in space is also an element of sovereignty and independence.”

Cooperation. While citing a wide range of partner countries for France’s space programs, Macron stressed the need for Europe to create a strong, unified regional presence in the heavens. “Our European space program is fragile. It is under attack by those who would like to fragment it to prevent us from being stronger together,” he said.

This includes supporting the development of “European champions so that they are competitive on the global market,” Macron said. “To achieve this, we need to move beyond the mechanism of geographical return to competitive markets.”

Further, he said, it involves each nation setting a policy of “European preference” when granting space-related government contracts, saying it would be “naive” to think that China and America don’t do the same.

“This European preference is not a dirty word and it is not protectionism,” Macron asserted.

Joby notches first flight for hybrid VTOL aircraft

PARIS — Joby Aviation flew a demonstrator of a new hybrid-electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft for the first time, which it plans to pitch to military customers through an agreement with L3Harris, the company announced today.

Conducted at Joby’s Marina, Calif., facility on Nov. 7, the flight is a step toward operational demonstrations with prospective customers like the US government planned for next year. The autonomous aircraft will be produced by Joby for commercial applications but missionized for military users by L3Harris. The aircraft will include Joby’s autonomy stack dubbed SuperPilot.

“It’s imperative that we find ways to deliver new technology into the hands of American troops more quickly and cost-efficiently than we have in the past,” founder and CEO of Joby JoeBen Bevirt, said in the company’s release, touting a quick pace for the aircraft’s development. 

The aircraft is based on Joby’s all-electric S4 platform, but is modified to include a gas turbine hybrid powertrain. That change, the companies say, provides the necessary range for military missions. The team intends to market the autonomous system to the DoD for roles like contested logistics, drone wingmen roles and more. 

The US military is on the hunt for platforms that can operate in austere environments like the Indo-Pacific, where runways are sparse and potential threats from adversaries like China are severe. The underlying S4 platform can takeoff and land vertically like a helicopter but rotate its propellers to fly like an airplane. 

The US Air Force experimented with electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft under its Agility Prime program, where Joby in 2023 delivered its S4 to the service for testing missions like moving cargo. However, the Air Force has acknowledged that all-electric vehicles lack the range necessary for military missions and have expressed interest instead in hybrid platforms. The service is also transitioning the efforts for eVTOL experimentation from the existing Agility Prime effort to a new program.

“The magic of dual-use technology is that it creates value in both directions,” Bevirt said in the release. “By building on our proven technology stack, our partners can rapidly deliver new capabilities for” the Pentagon “while we benefit from advancing the maturity of our hybrid and autonomous systems. In turn, this will help pave the way for commercial applications, from longer-range hybrid VTOL missions to autonomous air operations in commercial airspace.”

The announcement comes ahead of the Dubai Airshow, a key hub for the display of electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft, where both Joby and L3Harris are expected to have a presence. L3Harris and other defense players like Anduril have recently expanded into eVTOL partnerships, as industry bets that investments will be mutually beneficial for defense and commercial applications.

Army looking to field CCA-like capability potentially in ‘next couple of years’

WASHINGTON — The Army is looking to acquire a Collaborative Combat Aircraft-like capability that could be delivered to the service in as soon as a “couple of years,” according to a top Army aviation leader. 

“That has been a focus for the last … really year,” Brig. Gen. Cain Baker, director of the Future Vertical Lift Cross Functional Team, told reporters Wednesday at the annual AUSA conference here in Washington, DC. “As we go forward, we’re watching closely in our experimentation to develop a full requirement, potentially to deliver our capability over the next couple of years.” 

The fleet of the drone wingman is currently being pursued by other services — the Air Force is in an active CCA competition and the Navy recently tapped four companies to produce “conceptual designs” — but before this week, it had not been reported that the Army was looking for its own CCA.

The Army has other autonomous air tech in the works, such as launched effects and drones. Launched effects can be a broad term but often refer to smaller drones that shoot out of something else mid-flight and can be used to collect information or strike targets. Now, the service plans to expand its autonomous air capability portfolio with a CCA-like option, and is working with the other services to find out what the right option may look like. 

“We’re following the other services very closely as they’re looking at this, this concept capability. I think for the Army, especially launched effects, it comes down to a discussion of mass. How do we provide mass to the commander, to sense with launch effects,” Baker said. 

“A platform you know, a loyal wingman, a CCA concept, allows you to increase mass while also reducing the amount of aviators you got to have in the air. So we’re working with both the INDOPACOM [Indo-Pacific Command], we’re working with Europe to look at the capabilities that they need in order to deliver that mass and really survivability.” 

Regarding options of what this would look like for the Army, Gen. David Phillips, the Program Executive Officer of Aviation, told reporters that the service was exploring options last fall for a Group 4 vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) CCA-like capability. He said he teamed with industry to find out what such a capability could look like, but didn’t share what vendors were involved.

While no vendors have been announced for an Army CCA, Boeing unveiled on Monday its version of the tiltrotor CCA capability to pair with the Army’s helicopter fleet, including the company’s Chinook and Apache aircraft. The new model is called the Collaborative Transformational Rotorcraft, or the CxR, and is in the “conceptual stages,” a company exec told reporters ahead of the unveiling.

“It’ll be a tiltrotor with two proprotors” and a gas turbine engine, Chris Speights, chief engineer of Boeing’s vertical lift portfolio for its defense division, said in a briefing with reporters on Oct. 7 ahead of the AUSA conference. “We believe that that’s going to provide the most mature, rapid ability to field.”

He added that CxR will be either a Group 4 or Group 5 drone.

Though Phillips did not call out Boeing specifically, he said “we received a very robust response from industry,” regarding the responses from last fall, adding that the capability “might not look like some of the things we’ve seen on the floor today” or it could be a “combination of maybe some of the things you’d seen on the floor, but we’re excited to start thinking about that space.” 

Further, Baker said that the service plans to conduct testing for the CCA-like capability during its annaul aviation experiment in the second quarter of this fiscal year.

“We’re looking at vendors potentially to come out and market with us,” Baker said. “That is what we’re really looking at, is what is the state of technology right now to develop a requirement that we can deliver?”

Army ‘hitting stride’ with 155mm production, but general worries over what’s needed next

AUSA 2025 — After decades of stagnation, America’s ammunition industry is beginning to boom again, according to a senior Army official.

New production sites are popping up around the country as $5.5 billion in funding — appropriated over the last three years in response to Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine — finally percolates through the contracting process, said the two-star general in charge of inter-service ammunition production.

“I’ve had the privilege of doing nine ribbon-cutting ceremonies here in the last year,” Maj. Gen. John Reim, the Joint Program Executive Officer for Armaments and Ammunition (JPEO-A&A), told the Association of the US Army conference here on Wednesday. “We’re bringing new capabilities online. We’re replacing legacy production methods. … Most of our facilities, they date back to World War II.”

The bad news? The new, more flexible facilities are just starting to ramp up — and the ones that exist are overwhelmingly focused on one type of ammunition: the 155 mm howitzer rounds that proved crucial in the early phases of the Ukrainian war. Production of these artillery shells has surged from 14,000 rounds per month in early 2022, which was just enough to cover what the Army and Marine Corps typically expended in training, to 40,000 a month by late 2024. That’s still well short of the Army’s objective of 100,000 a month.

“Those facilities are just now coming online. We’re just hitting stride with first article tests and transitioning to full rate production,” Reim said during the panel discussion at AUSA. “[And] probably 95 percent of the money that’s come into us has been targeted for 155. … We’re laser focused on artillery.”

RELATED: Joint Fires Network will complete transition from R&D to acquisition program Oct. 1

Meanwhile, other types of ammunition, from mortar shells to tank rounds, aren’t getting anywhere near the same investment. One partial exception is a pair of new facilities to make 6.8 mm rifle rounds for the Army’s new M-7 Next Generation Squad Weapon and M250 light machinegun: “We’re going to be in a good spot with 6.8 ammunition going forward with both Lake City and Sig Sauer doing production,” Reim said.

Beyond 155: Flexible Production

But while the US is ramping up 155 mm ammo production, Reim warned that the nature of war is continuously changing, pointing to the new ubiquity of small attack drones on the frontlines in Ukraine.

When it comes to predicting the needs of future conflicts, Reim said, “the Army’s gotten it wrong 100 percent of the time.”

That’s why the nation needs not just more ammunition production capacity, but more flexible facilities, Reim emphasized to Breaking Defense in a sidebar conversation after the panel.

The majority of the infrastructure still dates to World War II, when efficiency meant building factories that specialized in cranking out one specific product in staggering quantities. Modern conflict changes too fast for that approach, Reim argued. Fortunately, modern manufacturing technology can adapt fast enough to keep up with it.

“Right, now we’ve got one-trick ponies in existing facilities that are optimized to produce at scale, and so when we’re not producing at scale, they’re very inefficient,” Reim told Breaking Defense. “We need this modular, flexible production capability that can support a surge.”

At a cutting-edge ammunition plant, Reim continued, “I’ve got the flexibility to pivot between a 60 mm mortar and 81 [mm mortar], 120 [mm tank rounds], 105 [mm], 155 [mm]. I’ve got that with a simple software change and minor tooling changes.”

The showpiece for this new approach is the Universal Artillery Project Lines (UAPL) facility formally opened in Mesquite, Texas last year, which is initially focused on making the metal parts for 155 mm shells, but in theory can switch to 60 mm mortars or any caliber in between.

Unfortunately, UAPL’s technology has proved as ambitious as its name, and contractor General Dynamics has struggled to get all three lines running properly. The problem became so acute that in June, the Army sent an official “show cause” letter warning the company the service would “consider terminating” GD’s contract to run UAPL unless it shaped up ASAP. (At the time, a spokesperson for General Dynamic declined to comment on the letter, deferring to the Army.)

“In Mesquite … we’re working through some challenges [and a] stop-work,” Reim acknowledged when he spoke to Breaking Defense this week. “But we’ve got a tiger team [working to] baseline where we’re at today [and] what do you need to do to get this operational.”

One recurring difficulty at the new facilities, Reim said, is the need to import crucial equipment from specialized manufacturers with limited capacity and large backlogs.

“At Mesquite, there’s a lot of Turkish equipment, [specifically] free flow forming technology — say that three times fast,” Reim said. “We just don’t make a lot of stuff in the US anymore. When we look at the equipment that goes in these facilities that’s not sitting in a shelf at Costco, right? They’re long-lead items.”

RELATED: Startup Union eyes share of 155mm shell production at new Texas facility

Some of the new facilities are themselves located abroad, albeit close by in Canada. Reim told Breaking Defense that, recently, “we went through first article testing at IMT up in Ingersoll, Canada.” The ribbon-cutting for Ingersoll happened a year ago, but the complexity of the industrial process, especially the need for rigorous safety and performance testing, means it’s still working up to mass production.

Ingersoll is focused on 155 mm shells, currently the older M795 model, but with the capacity to shift to the longer-ranged M1128 that the Army wants to make its new standard.

Even as it tries to modernize its artillery, the Army has also revived production of at least one older type of ammunition, because it faced delays in ramping up production of the newer version, Reim said. Again, the problem was the need to import key supplies, in this case high-grade nitrocellulose to contain the gunpowder “propellant charge” that launches the 155 mm artillery shell out of the howitzer.

“As we try to ramp to 100,000 all-up rounds [per month], the LIMFAC [limiting factor] quickly became propelling charges,” Reim told Breaking Defense. “Today, we don’t have the capability to produce the grade of nitrocellulose that we need, and so we’re importing that from the French, from the Czech Republic, from the Koreans, [and] GD Valleyfield, up in Canada. … So we brought back the old M119 red bag that uses a different grade of nitrocellulose, so it doesn’t compete with for the same supply chain, [and] we opened two new production facilities, one in Marion, Illinois, one in Perry, Florida.”

“We’ve got a lot going on,” Reim said. “It’s historic, and we haven’t seen this level of investment since World War Two.”