WASHINGTON (NNS) — The Navy will christen its newest Freedom-variant littoral combat ship, USS St. Louis (LCS 19), during a 10 a.m. CST ceremony Saturday, Dec. 15, in Marinette, Wisconsin.

The future USS St. Louis, designated LCS 19, honors Missouri’s major port city along the Mississippi river. She will be the seventh ship to bear the name St. Louis. The first was a sloop of war, the second a Civil War gunboat, followed by a Spanish-American War-era steamer troop ship, a World War I cruiser, a World War II light cruiser, and a Cold War era attack cargo ship.

The principal speaker will be U.S. Sen. Roy Blunt from Missouri. Barbara Taylor, wife of Andy Taylor, chairman of Enterprise Holdings, the largest privately held company in St. Louis, will serve as the ship’s sponsor. In a time-honored Navy tradition, she will christen the ship by breaking a bottle of sparkling wine across the bow.

“The future USS St. Louis honors not just the great city of St. Louis, Missouri, but also the skilled industrial workforce who built this ship,” said Secretary of the Navy Richard V. Spencer. “This christening marks the transition of USS St. Louis being a mere hull number to a ship with a name and a spirit, and is a testament to the increased lethality and readiness made possible by the combined effort between our industrial partners and the Navy and Marine Corps team.”

The future USS St. Louis is a fast, agile, focused-mission platform designed for operation in near-shore environments as well as the open-ocean. It is designed to defeat asymmetric “anti-access” threats such as mines, quiet diesel submarines and fast surface craft.

Media may direct queries to the Navy Office of Information at (703) 697-5342. For more information about the Littoral Combat Ship class: http://www.navy.mil/navydata/fact_display.asp?cid=4200&tid=1650&ct=4

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WASHINGTON — The Defense Department is looking to step up its development of hypersonic weapons — missiles that travel more than five times faster than the speed of sound — DOD leaders said at the National Defense Industrial Association-sponsored “Hypersonics Senior Executive Series” here today.

“In the last year, China has tested more hypersonics weapons than we have in a decade,” said Michael Griffin, undersecretary of defense for research and engineering. “We’ve got to fix that.”

Russia also is involved in hypersonics, Griffin said. “Hypersonics is a game changer,” he added.

If Russia were to invade Estonia or China were to attack Taiwan tomorrow, Griffin said, it would be difficult to defend against their strike assets. “It’s not a space we want to stay in,” he told the audience.

DOD is looking at air-breathing boost-glide hypersonics systems, the latter being used by China, Griffin said. The United States has the boost-glide system competency to get these developed today, he noted.

On the flip side, he said, the U.S. needs to develop systems to counter adversary hypersonics. The place to take them out is in their relatively long cruise phase, in which they don’t change course suddenly. It’s not a particularly hard intercept, he said, but it requires knowing they’re coming. Current radars can’t see far enough. “They need to see thousands of kilometers out, not hundreds,” Griffin said.

The Western Pacific is a particularly difficult area, he noted, because “it’s not littered with a lot

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WASHINGTON — Two Defense Department artificial-intelligence experts testified on Capitol Hill yesterday on DOD’s efforts to transform delivery of capabilities enabled by artificial intelligence to the nation’s warfighters.

Lisa Porter, deputy undersecretary of defense for research and engineering, and Dana Deasy, DOD’s chief information officer, testified at a hearing of the House Armed Services Committee’s subcommittee on emerging threats and capabilities.

The John S. McCain National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2019 directed the defense secretary to conduct a comprehensive national review of advances in AI relevant to the needs of the military services. Section 238 directed the secretary to craft a strategic plan to develop, mature, adopt and transition AI technologies into operational use.

“Today we are experiencing an explosion of interest in a subfield of AI called machine learning, where algorithms have become remarkably good at classification and prediction tasks when they can be trained on very large amounts of data,” Porter told the House panel. Today’s AI capabilities offer potential solutions to many defense-specific problems, such as object identification in drone video or satellite imagery and detection of cyber threats on networks, she said.

However, she added, several issues must be addressed to effectively apply AI to national security mission problems.

“First, objective evaluation of performance requires the use of quantitative metrics that are relevant to the specific use case,” she said. “In other words, AI systems that have been optimized for commercial applications may not yield effective outcomes in military applications.”

Challenges, Vulnerabilities

DOD is working to address such challenges and vulnerabilities in multiple ways, she said, most of which will leverage the complementary roles of the new Joint Artificial Intelligence Center and the department’s research and engineering enterprise.

Second, Porter said, existing AI systems need enormous amounts of training data, and the preparation of

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CAMP ZAMA, Japan — A line of cadets have their sights fixed on their targets, each squaring their aim and breathing out before pulling the trigger. The distinct “Pop! Pop! Pop!” of a volley of air rifle rounds pierces the quiet of the scene.

The Zama American Middle High School Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps battalion placed second in the annual Pacific East District Three-Position Air Rifle Marksmanship Match, which they hosted Dec. 7 and 8.

Thirty-six cadets from three schools, also including Nile C. Kinnick High School from U.S. Fleet Activities Yokosuka, and Yokota High School, participated in the competition at both the varsity and junior varsity level. ZAMHS finished with a score of 1728, coming in just short of the winning Kinnick battalion’s 1810.4. Yokota finished third with a score of 1698.4.

The varsity match was a 3×20 format, meaning the competitors fired 20 shots from three positions: prone, standing and kneeling. The junior varsity match was 3×10 format.

In addition to ZAMHS placing second, one of the school’s varsity competitors, Cadet Maj. Ian Tan, a senior, had an impressive individual performance, taking second place in the overall shooter category with a score of 492.9.

Cadet Lt. Col. Daisy Dalat, a ZAMHS senior and battalion commander, lauded her team of six varsity and five junior varsity shooters, saying all the practicing they did translated to a great result when it came time for the match.

“Our team has been making improvements little by little all year,” said Daisy. “Being in this competition provided our team with a good opportunity to observe how other teams are doing, and to get advice from them.”

Cadet Toni Ludwig, a junior at Kinnick High School, was the top overall shooter with a score of 552. Toni said she has aspirations to compete

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JOINT BASE SAN ANTONIO–LACKLAND, Texas (AFNS) — The Air Force Installation and Mission Support Center Innovation Office will launch a program in the new year to help Airmen implement their innovative ideas. The campaign, open Jan. 1-31, 2019, gives military and civilian members of mission support groups worldwide a chance to fund their ideas and partner with innovation experts.

“Our office focuses on an idea, and our goal is to collaborate across the enterprise and help lead the idea towards implementation” said Marc Vandeveer, AFIMSC chief innovation officer. “If we don’t implement, we’re not adding value to the organization.”

Ideas can be submitted though the online collaboration tool Ideascale at https://usaf.ideascalegov.com/a/campaign-home/39.

“Let’s get those brilliant ideas submitted from our civil engineer, security forces, logistics readiness, communications, force support and contracting squadrons,” Vandeveer said.

Full-time innovation specialists with the innovation office will collaborate with Airmen to refine their ideas. AFIMSC will fund some directly; compete others through the $600-million Small Business Innovation and Research Program; and take the three best ideas to compete in an official AFWERX Challenge in 2019, each funded with $200,000 to connect with global experts, start-ups and venture capitalists to prototype and implement.

“When the field submits an idea or challenge, it just doesn’t sit on someone’s desk,” Vandeveer said. “We put money against it and solve problems.”

The AFIMSC enterprise is at the forefront of innovation, said Brig. Gen. Brian Bruckbauer, expeditionary support director.

“We definitely feel the momentum building, and we’re finally making a name for ourselves,” Bruckbauer said. “Operations understands that installation and mission support is a big deal.”

The AFWERX program encourages partnerships with academic institutions, science and technology communities, and private industries with a vested interest in solving complex security issues.

“The goal is to enable Airmen to accomplish their mission

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VAERNES, Norway (NNS) — Under Secretary of the Navy, Thomas Modly, completed a three-day partnership-building visit to Norway, Dec. 12.

Modly met with senior military and civilian officials to discuss security and stability issues and efforts along with touring some of the Norwegian assets and facilities.

Meetings were held with the U.S. ambassador, State Secretary of Defence, Chief of Royal Norwegian Navy, Commander of Norwegian Defence Liaison Office, members from the Royal Norwegian Air Force, Army and Navy, and U.S. Marines on rotation to Norway.

“The U.S. and Norway share a very close military relationship and collaborate on many global, regional and bilateral issues,” said Modly. “Being able to see it first hand was impressive and helped underscore the enduring value of investing in cooperative security relationships.”

During his visit, Modly toured a Royal Norwegian Navy Skjold class Corvette and Fridtjof Nansen class frigate and the facilities at the Marine Corps Pre-Positioning Program-Norway (MCPP-N).

“By working together with one of our closest allies, we create force multipliers that enhance our capabilities and build a better understanding of each other,” said Modly. “I look forward to fostering this relationship through our Navy and Marine Corps team.”

On his final day, Modly had the opportunity to have lunch and a discussion with some of the U.S. Marines from the Marine Rotational Force – Europe.

“Marine training in Norway improves cold weather and mountain readiness in Artic conditions,” said Modly. “It also enhances interoperability between U.S. And Norwegian forces.  Our marines are getting great training and building enduring relationships with their Norwegian partners.”

Modly is on a multination visit to the European region focused on strengthening partnerships and cooperation in support of the second line of effort of the National Defense Strategy: Strengthening Partnerships and Alliances.

Welcome to Navy Live blog coverage of Recruit Training Command’s graduation, Pass-In-Review. It is a formal military ceremony that honors a Sailor’s hard work and dedication to a new way of life. Pass-In-Review also ties together the future of the Navy with our long-held naval traditions and customs.

Read how Recruit Training Command transforms civilians into Sailors – 38,000 of them each year.

The live video from the Navy’s only boot camp at Great Lakes, Illinois, is scheduled to begin 8:45 a.m. CST Dec. 14.

Congratulations Sailors and welcome aboard to the newest members of our Navy family!

Join in the story of four recruits as they make their way into the Navy through the training pipeline, never before so intimately profiled, of the Navy’s Recruit Training Command in All Hands Magazine’s documentary “Making a Sailor.”

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ROSEMOUNT, Minn. — The perpetual rotor is arguably the most vital component of a watch. Without this stable, consistent power reserve, the second hand would tick forward irregularly, or worse, come to a halt entirely.

In the same way that a perpetual rotor is the driving force behind a watch’s precision, efficiency, and power, the Soldier remains the impetus of the U.S. Army’s capabilities and achievements. In the Middle East, each Soldier assigned to Task Force Spartan — successfully completing individual duties for one of a variety of units synchronized throughout the region — is contributing to the goals and output of a larger operation.

“Our Soldiers are competent in their craft and

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