Posted on 05/08/2020 3:39:47 PM PDT by daniel1212
U.S. reliance on China is one of many areas discussed in a 146-page report about the health of the defense industrial base...
The report says China is the only producer of various chemicals needed in missiles and bombs, Japan and European nations are the only suppliers of certain carbon fibers used in missiles, satellites, and space rockets; Germany is the prime supplier of special vacuum tubes for night vision goggles, it says...
China is mentioned 232 times in the report, which has been been in the works for more than a year by a handful of government agencies. Much of the document’s findings and recommendations are classified because they describe areas of vulnerability in America’s supply chain...
“Reliance on single producers within the supply chain, dependence on unstable or unfriendly foreign suppliers for critical components, and misplaced presumption of continued preeminence of American military superiority are examples of findings that should be immediately addressed,” Carlisle, a retired Air Force general, said in a statement.
The US is running out of bombs — and it may soon struggle to make more The annual Industrial Capabilities report, put out by the Pentagon’s Office of Manufacturing and Industrial Base Policy, has concluded that the industrial base of the munitions sector is particularly strained...
Some suppliers have dropped out entirely, leaving no option for replacing vital materials. Other key suppliers are foreign-owned, with no indigenous capability to produce vital parts and materials ― setting up the risk that a conflict with China could rely on Chinese-made parts...
As to diversity in the industrial base, well ― there isn’t any, with the authors concluding that Raytheon and Lockheed Martin account for about 97 percent of the DoD’s munitions and missile procurement funding. Four industrial areas stand out as “high risk” areas of concern: Solid rocket motors. A military-only technology, SRMs are basically split between Orbital ATK and AerojetRocketdyne. However, Orbital is set to take on a broader section of this production, essentially leaving the U.S. with only one producer of this vital equipment...
Thermal batteries. Used in all DoD missiles and guided munitions, there is one (unnamed) manufacturer of these technologies who controls about 80 percent of the market... - https://www.defensenews.com/pentagon/2018/05/22/the-us-is-running-out-of-bombs-and-it-may-soon-struggle-to-make-more
The Pentagon’s Seek-and-Destroy Mission for Counterfeit Electronics. ..
The military estimates that up to 15 percent of all spare and replacement parts for its weapons, vehicles and other equipment are counterfeit, making them vulnerable to dangerous malfunctions...
In December 2015 federal agents arrested three Chinese nationals for, among other things, selling 45 counterfeit Intel microchips to an undercover agent with the understanding the chips would be headed to the U.S. Navy for a project involving submarines. One of the men arrested—Jiang Guanghou Yan—had also asked the undercover agent to get him 22 military-grade Xilinx Corp. microchips—worth $37,00 apiece—for illegal export to China. “Military grade” means the electrical components are designed specifically to withstand prolonged exposure to extreme temperatures and radiation. When the agent advised Yan they would have to be stolen from a U.S. Navy base, Yan offered to cover up the crime by providing fakes to replace the stolen chips.
“If [those counterfeit chips had been] installed in a missile’s guidance system, such missile would either not function at all or would likely not proceed to its intended target, and would likely strike a completely unintended destination,” Keith Avery, a senior engineer at the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory, testified..
Integrated circuits are especially difficult to protect from counterfeiting because they might come from an overseas manufacturer and be resold by several subcontractors before a large military supplier like Lockheed Martin or Boeing embeds them in technology that it sells to the U.S. government. The global growth of the supply chain that lets electronics manufacturers tap less-expensive suppliers in China, Japan, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan has proved very difficult to police. Electronic waste from the U.S. is another key contributor to counterfeit integrated circuits, as trashed circuit boards from computers discarded in some countries are often taken apart, refurbished, relabeled, repackaged and resold as new to electronics manufacturers. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-pentagon-rsquo-s-seek-and-destroy-mission-for-counterfeit-electronics/
More relevant excerpts: How ridiculous was American production in World War 2? [images at link]
This is Willow Run...At peak, it produced 100 bombers in just two days.
America had 18 dry docks building Liberty Ships during WW2...the Liberty Ships went from nothing to ready to launch in an average of 42 days in those dry docks....The fastest built ship took less than five days. We built 2,710 of these ships during the war.
Here we have the M4 Sherman Tank...Between the nine plants, 49,234 Sherman tanks were built during the war, accounting for about half of the tanks the US produced during the war. Yeah, half again.
The Essex Class Carriers...The Navy built 24 of these babies during WW2....The United States built and launched 141 Aircraft Carriers of all classes during the war. To protect them we built 498 escort ships (Corvettes and Frigates)..As well as 349 destroyers
On its present spiritual, moral and political trajectory, the time will come when it is lamented of the US,
How are the mighty fallen, and the weapons of war perished! (2 Samuel 1:27)
.
“Reliance on single producers within the supply chain, dependence on unstable or unfriendly foreign suppliers for critical components, and misplaced presumption of continued preeminence of American military superiority are examples of findings that should be immediately addressed,”
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Good lord, this needs to be ended ASAP. Actually FASTER than ASAP...do it in TRUMP TIME!
This is all great as long as the GOPe doesn’t just use it as an excuse to sell us out to somebody else.
It’s crazy that we have any military supplies made off of US soil. So many things can go wrong.
We need to remove from office every one responsible for getting us in this situation.
Then we have the governor of California giving a virtually defunct Chinese electric automobile maker a $1 billion dollar contract for N95 masks and surgical masks. He paid a good portion of the money up front. The Chinese auto maker has never made masks before. No information is being given out by the state of California on the details.
No politician has ever addressed these vulnerabilities. This has been going on for 3 DECADES. The first person to seriously address these obvious vulnerabilities is Donald Trump.
He has ordered the mapping of certain areas of the 50 states for likely deposits of rare earth minerals, as one example. Right now China and Russia are the primary sources worldwide for rare earth minerals.
Get China materials and products out of all sectors.
ATM Trump has National powers to direct our industry. Can’t he start demanding local producers make some of these weapons to combat wartime actions of China?
Well, there is this:
California Just Revealed A $54.3 Billion Deficit — Signaling Deep Cuts Ahead 5/8/2020, 12:32:38 AM · by fluorescence · 37 replies Southern California Public Radio ^ | May 7, 2020 California finance officials just revealed a $54.3 billion deficit in the first economic assessment of the coronavirus pandemic's devastating blow to the fifth-largest economy in the world. That figure is higher than the deficit during the Great Recession and obliterates the state's once-healthy reserve
Most no longer are, or are dead. G.B. Sr. for one.
There plenty of Bush League Republicans still in office.
Flimsey Grahamnesty and Micro Rubio are two prime examples.
He has ordered the mapping of certain areas of the 50 states for likely deposits of rare earth minerals, as one example
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Just open all the US rare earth mines Bill Clinton closed as a favor to his Indonesian and Chinese buddies, now national parks and the like.
I said this years ago. It is ludicrous to incorporate parts made by your enemy into your own weapons! Who signed off on this idiocy?
Absolutely.
Why should our enemies be making parts for our weapons??????
Absolutely.
If I was to guess, I would say Bill Clinton, followed by G.W. Bush.
Open borders are a direct result of the poison desire for cheap labor.
GHW Bush, Clinton, GW Bush, Kenyanesian Usurper all sold us out to China.
We will be lucky to survive as a nation.
This article is about high tech stuff. 25 years ago I went to a sports store to buy some hiking boots. ALL the boots from ALL the manufacturers were made in China.
You cannot put an army in the field without boots.
So this chain of supply problem is not just high tech.
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