U.K. Eyes Improved Counter-IED Capabilities   By Robert Wall London   The U.K.’s effort to upgrade the Astor ground-surveillance aircraft to enhance detection of improvised explosive devices (IED) is one in a series of equipment upgrades European militaries plan to bolster their military presence in Afghanistan.   The effort comes as the debate over the course ahead in Afghanistan continues in many European countries, signaled most starkly by the formal end of the D

MiG-35 stalls in Indian fighter tender contract   10/08/2010 © RIA Novosti. Ilya Pitalev   Russia's MiG-35 multirole fighter aircraft has failed to make the short-list in a $10 billion international tender for 126 combat aircraft for the Indian air force, according to Indian media reports quoted by Kommersant daily.   The favorites to win the tender are the French Dassault Rafale and the Eurofighter Typhoon, Indian media say.   Russia's United Aircraft Corporation (UAC), the holding

Lockheed Martin Hypersonic ATACMS Motor Boosts Experimental Scramjet in First Flight   DALLAS, TX and SACRAMENTO, CA, August 10th, 2010 -- Lockheed Martin [NYSE: LMT] announced today that its Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) rocket motor successfully boosted the experimental X-51A WaveRider beyond Mach 4.5, the speed at which a scramjet will start and begin to provide thrust. The successful boost helped the X-51 hypersonic scramjet engine to accelerate to a historic Mach 5, a first fo

Chinese fighter jets train over Tibet   (TibetanReview.net, Aug08, 2010) J-11 planes, the most modern Chinese jet fighters said to be pirated copies of Russia’s Su-27, have for the first time been shown in training over the Tibetan Plateau recently. While the Chinese media only showed a picture of some of these planes in the air, with a caption referring to the training flight, Strategy Page online Aug 6 said, reporting on it, that China had no combat aircraft stationed in Tibet, saying

The Topol-M mobile ballistic missile system   Russia's missile forces chief to inspect Teikovo division   01:37 10/08/2010 RIA Novosti By: Ilia Pytalev   New commander of the Russian Strategic Missile Forces (SMF) will inspect on August 10-12 the rearmament of a missile division in central Russia with new mobile missile systems.   During his first inspection as Russia's missile forces chief, Lt. Gen. Sergei Karakayev will visit the 54th Strategic Missile Division in the town of Te

Stephen Hawking: Abandon the Earth   (CANVAS STAFF REPORTS) - Theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking has some advice for the people of Earth - it's time to get off. "I believe that the long-term future of the human race must be in space," Hawking said to Big Think , a global forum that includes interviews with experts.   "It will be difficult enough to avoid disaster on planet Earth in the next hundred years, let alone the next thousand, or million. The human race shouldn't have all its