FOG HORN

Readers it’s been a great week but I’m glad it’s coming to an end because I’m looking forward to a dry weekend. It looks like it may stop raining so that’s a good thing. I also picked up a stash of some great cigars, so there’s much to look forward to. But, what I’m really looking forward to is a good shoot the shit. For readers new to this site, a shoot the shit is a social interaction during which participants don’t need to know anything about the subject, they can make completely unsupported comments, use uncensored profanity, insult anyone they wish or change the subject altogether. The alternative to a shoot the shit is a trip to a therapist, who is someone that studied psychology so they could understand themselves. So, let’s get started.

If you’re sitting there with your head about to explode with all of the crap you’re being fed on a daily basis by mainstream media, take an hour out of your day and visit France 24 Live. The programming is in English; I’ll guarantee you’ll learn something new each and every day.

I have to tell you that I’m tapped out with the Muller Report and Impeachment. Readers, you are paying these bozos $177K + a year and they’ve done nothing in two years! If you want to see how much Congress is costing you, read my piece “I Want a Raise”

If the Muller Report and subsequent Congressional hearings aren’t enough for you, we also have the Squad. Who’s the Squad?

From left to right Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts. What do these women have in common? Certainly not skin color as you can readily see, they all come from very cold parts of the country; as such, their brains have atrophied, if not shrunk, due to the harsh ambient temperatures and wearing a turban too tight. If random selection were at play, the aggregate I.Q. of the group would be higher. Take for example Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez who wants to do away with DHS, she also wants solar panels on all buildings in N.Y.C. She clearly does not have an inkling about how power generation integrates with the existing grid and she also wants to straighten out Speaker Pelosi. Continuing, Rashida Tlaib who I affectionately nicknamed “thunder thighs ” and “potty mouth” says ‘We Didn’t Have ICE Years Ago Before 9/11 … We Were Fine’. She’s also suffering from delusions of grandeur when she says she won’t leave Washington until she impeaches the President. No kidding Rashida! I don’t know why but for some reason or another, I’ve associated Congresswoman Tlaib with Jabba the hutt. Next we have Ilhan Omar of Minnesota or Jabba’s pet the Kowakian monkey-lizard. She wants to alert America’s people of color to white persons in America. She may not know who Abraham Lincoln was, the white guy who freed the slaves and who wisely said “Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and to remove all doubt…”

Any criticism directed their way is racism and misogyny because they are women of color, no shit! And these individuals are going to tell the Democrat Congress how to conduct business. Unbelievable folks!

Moving to something more interesting. National Defense ran a piece written by Yasmin Tadjdeh; “Army Investing in New Positioning, Navigation, Timing Technology,” which is worth your reading.

A soldier utilizes a defense advanced GPS receiver. Photo: Defense Dept.

Army Futures Command is funding and testing new systems that will help troops maintain critical positioning, navigation and timing capabilities against adversaries that employ area-denial weapons.

“Soldiers are finding themselves operating in contested environments with degraded or no GPS signal at all,” said Jeri Manley, deputy director of the command’s assured PNT cross-functional team. “It’s our job … to explore new technologies, to be able to give those soldiers enhanced GPS signals, to be able to operate through those denied and contested environments.”

Col. Nick Kioutas, program manager for position, navigation and timing, said such technology is critical across the Army’s portfolio.

In a “contested environment, we can’t shoot, move or communicate without some sort of PNT capability,” he told reporters July 16 during an Army Futures Command media day at Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall in Arlington, Virginia. The service’s multi-domain operations concept “talks about penetration, disintegration and exploitation — and PNT is needed for all of those,” he noted.

The cross-functional team is one of eight such groups spearheading the development of new technologies as Army Futures Command embarks on an ambitious modernization strategy focused on long-range precision fires, next-generation combat vehicles, future vertical lift, the network, air-and-missile defense and soldier lethality.

Manley’s team is currently overseeing a PNT Assessment Exercise, or PNTAX, at White Sands Missile Range, Nevada. The event kicked off July 22. It is scheduled to run through mid-August, Manley said.

“We’re bringing 34 soldiers to operate and test the equipment because the equipment is … [in] different phases of development,” she said. “We’re getting that test data and that soldier feedback early and often.”

Kioutas added that exercises such as PNTAX can be useful opportunities for industry to demonstrate their products.

“We’re trying to ask them to go develop things for the government and come show us what they got,” he said. “But it’s really hard to do it if they don’t have a place to test it.”

Often, industry will have to test their products inside buildings or in special chambers due to U.S. laws regarding electronic jamming, but that can be very limiting, he noted.

The Army is currently working on replacing its defense advanced GPS receiver, or DAGR, Kioutas said. The device is outfitted with a military code known as the selective availability/anti-spoofing module chip. However, the Defense Department is moving to the next code level known as the M-Code, he said.

“We’re going to be getting rid of these [DAGR systems] over time,” he said. “We have 300,000 of them, so it’s going to take us a little bit of time. We’re upgrading the software in these to be more spoof-resistant because it’s going to take a while” to fully replace the devices, he added.

The cross-functional team has multiple lines of effort including a mounted and dismounted assured PNT system, Kioutas said. The dismounted version will be integrated with the Army’s Nett Warrior situational awareness system and replace the DAGR, he added.

The mounted version will include jamming and spoofing protection that can be used on military vehicles, according to the Army. It will be able scalable, modular and have an open standard interface.

The cross-functional team also has a space line of effort, Manley said. Last year, it completed a military utility assessment of a Kestrel Eye satellite which was operated by soldiers from Indo-Pacific Command. The system weighs 110 pounds and flies in low-Earth orbit, she noted.

“The soldiers operated that satellite with a telescope … to take an image of a particular area on the Earth, and we’re able to get that signal down within just a matter of minutes,” she said. That is an important capability because U.S. warfighters on the battlefield could task such satellites to gather and transmit critical intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance information, she added.

They could see “formations, tanks, weaponry and have really an unprecedented level of situational awareness,” Kioutas said.

I for one am happy to see the Army, or for that matter the DoD, leverage technology to enhance individual performance and effectiveness, but technology often has the unintended consequence of creating single points of failure. Our military’s mission is rapidly changing and although I don’t suspect asymmetric skirmishes will disappear any time soon, the greatest threats to our national security comes from nation state aggression. These players have the capacity to incapacitate most, if not all, of our space assets; incapacitating navigation, communication and targeting. It’s therefore necessary for our soldiers and sailors to revisit and master the basic skills, land navigation being only one. We have servicemen and women that don’t know how to orient a map let alone use a lensantic compass to navigate or fix their position.

Give Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and Twitter a rest and have a shoot the shit with your buds, coworkers and family. Be safe and have a great weekend but as always remember to keep sweat pumps in low speed!