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<p>FORT WAYNE, Ind. (AP) — A contractor with the U.S. military says it's getting rid of 360 jobs in its Fort Wayne facility as it moves radio manufacturing to an existing plant in Rochester, New York.</p> <p>Harris Corporation announced Wednesday that job cuts will begin this fall and finish by the middle of next summer. WANE-TV reports that about 900 people currently work for Harris in Fort Wayne, and that the cuts only affect the division that makes radios.</p>

Brandon Webb, a former U.S. Navy SEAL and now Editor-in-Chief of SOFREP.com, posted a sobering article today on the failures of the State Department in regards to our former military contractors working overseas. Brandon tells us the story of a CIA paramilitary and former Navy SEAL, Matthew Wojciechowski, who, while on TDY (temporary duty assignment) in ‎the Middle East, endured severe chest pains while on a mission. Instead of the medical professionals at the U.S. Embassy assisting him, they performed a stress test on him, took his vitals and sent him back to work. They denied him further treatment, leaving...

An Idaho man accused of uttering a racial slur and slapping a crying 19-month-old boy on a Delta Air Lines flight is now out of a job. Joe Rickey Hundley of Hayden, Idaho, was charged with assaulting a minor in the February 8 incident. His company, which initially suspended him, said Sunday that Hundley no longer has his job. "Reports of the recent behavior of one of our business unit executives while on personal travel are offensive and disturbing," said a statement from AGC Aerospace & Defense. "We have taken this matter very seriously and worked diligently to examine it...

SNIP Hagel, however, has friends in Democratic lobbying circles. The powerful Washington D.C. organization known as the Podesta Group is reportedly asking defense contractors for financial support to run ads defending the Hagel nomination. Fox News White House Chief White House Correspondent Ed Henry reported on Friday: (2:15 in) "Sources confirm to Fox [that] Democratic super lobbyist Tony Podesta has been hired by a firm known as the Bipartisan Group to help mobilize support for Hagel. And defense contractors received calls this week urging them to be ready for a Hagel pick as soon as Monday, and asking them for...

The military contractor said cuts by the government necessitated the reductions. More than 200 hourly employees at the ITT Exelis facility in Roanoke County were laid off with about two weeks' notice Thursday, according to a company spokesman. It was not an entirely unexpected move by the company, which manufactures night vision goggles, monoculars and related gear and is a major supplier for the U.S. armed forces. "Due to anticipated U.S. defense government procurement reductions, we have experienced an impact on the size and frequency of night vision contracts," communications director Jared Adams said in a news release last week....

The White House has initiated an effort, possibly extra-legal, to head off required layoff notices to employees of defense contractors on the cusp of Election Day. Worse, without congressional approval, it has offered to pay firms' penalties and court costs, potentially $500 million or more, out of the Pentagon budget. This puts defense contractors in an untenable position, creating additional economic uncertainty. They can break the law and keep the White House happy, or follow the law and annoy their major customer. If this were Venezuela, no one would think twice. But in America, if we're not shocked, something is...

In case you missed it over the weekend, the Obama administration’s Friday afternoon document drop was a memo from the Department of Labor telling defense contractors not to provide legally-required notice to thousands of employees that they are about to be laid off, if automatic spending cuts agreed to by the President and the Congress take effect. Translation: President Obama wants to prevent thousands of employees, especially in swing-state Virginia, from being told that they are going to be laid off due to Department of Defense funding cuts. Because of the timing of the cuts, those notices would have been...

The top brass at the Pentagon is signaling in no uncertain terms that the defense industry needs to clean up its act and accept that the government can no longer throw away money on ill-conceived military projects. Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz on Wednesday had some tough talk for defense contractors, saying firms must stop “blowing smoke” and over-promising about what they can deliver. “Don’t blow smoke up my ass” about what a military platform can do and when it will be ready, Schwartz told a tense and silent ballroom filled with defense industry executives. “There’s no...

UPDATE: THE Federal Government has ordered the defence department to look at ways of removing biblical references on gunsights used by special forces troops in Afghanistan. The American maker of the Advanced Combat Optical Gunsight, a Michigan based company called Trijicon, stamps Biblical references next to the serial number of all of its military gunsights. The references include "2COR4:6,'' a reference to Second Corinthians 4:6 of the New Testament. The passage in part reads: "For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory...

A Michigan defense contractor will voluntarily stop stamping references to Bible verses on combat rifle sights made for the U.S. military, a major buyer of the company's gear. In a statement released Thursday, Trijicon of Wixom, Mich., says it is also providing to the armed forces free of charge modification kits to remove the Scripture citations from the telescoping sights already in use. The Marine Corps has purchased more than 200,000 Trijicon sights and the Army has bought about 100,000.

WASHINGTON – Combat rifle sights used by U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan carry references to Bible verses, stoking concerns about whether the inscriptions break a government rule that bars proselytizing by American troops. Military officials said the citations don't violate the ban and they won't stop using the telescoping sights, which allow troops to pinpoint the enemy day or night. The contractor that makes the equipment, Trijicon of Wixom, Mich., said the U.S. military has been a customer since 1995 and the company has never received any complaints about the Scripture citations. "We don't publicize this," Tom Munson, Trijicon's...

GOOSE CREEK -- A former military defense contractor faked a police badge so he could walk into an office with a gun and demand to know why he was fired last week, according to a Navy investigator who sent him to jail. Naval Criminal Investigative Service Special Agent Troy Williams spelled out the story in an Aug. 13 affidavit filed in U.S. District Court. Harry Edgar Lewis III of Ladson was a contractor for the ICS Corporation working at the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center until he was fired.

Here is a video report on a new prototype military vehicle made by Lockheed Martin that flipped over while carrying a news crew. The crew was on board as Lockheed was showcasing the safety and maneuverability of the new JLTV, which they believe surpasses the Humvee used for so long by the military. Just prior to the test drive that went wrong, Lockheed officials had been bragging that in 50,000 miles of test driving, the JLTV had never flipped over. But, inexplicably, it flipped over shortly thereafter with the news crew on board. No word yet from Lockheed Martin as...

Major Cook has been fired from his civilian defense contractor job. See details at link.

Congressman John Murtha reminds me of Big Julie in play Guys and Dolls, who boasts: “I got a poifect record: thoity-three arrests, no convictions.” Months ago, the FBI raided the offices of the PMA group. What they found suggested that Murtha and his buddies at the PMA Group operated their own little Earmark Factory. But that was just the tip of the iceberg, another one of John Murtha's most favorite contractors was charged for taking $200,000 in kickbacks, the FBI is Investigating Multi-Billion-Dollar Murtha favored Defense Contractor With Tax-Exempt Status, Murtha has even gotten family into the earmark business, and...

Scandalous $10 Million Bat Mitzvah David Brooks of DHB Industries Arrested for Embezzling Company Funds Oct. 27, 2007 — The headliners read like a who's who of music: Aerosmith, 50 Cent and Don Henley of the Eagles. No, it wasn't the Grammys, it was 13-year-old Elizabeth Brooks' birthday party -- a $10 million mega bat mitzvah. Aerosmith alone was paid a $1 million to perform -- flown in on her father's company jet. Her father is David Brooks, who was then the CEO of DHB Industries, the leading body armor provider to U.S. soliders in Iraq. And he had his...

SAN DIEGO - Attorneys for the House of Representatives asked a federal judge Wednesday to quash subpoenas for former House Speaker Dennis Hastert, House Republican Whip Roy Blunt and 10 other members of Congress in the trial of a defense contractor charged with bribing jailed former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham. The subpoenas were sent by attorneys for Brent Wilkes, whose trial begins Tuesday on charges that he paid Cunningham $700,000 in exchange for government contracts. The contractor has pleaded not guilty to 25 counts of bribery, fraud, money laundering and conspiracy. Cunningham, an eight-term Republican from San Diego, is serving...

'America's private army' under fire for Illinois facility Anti-war activists, locals are wary about military contractor's new training site By E.A. Torriero Tribune staff reporter 6:11 AM CDT, July 23, 2007 MT. CARROLL, Ill. Strangers rarely venture onto the twisting gravel roads in this corner of the state, and those who do sometimes get lost amid the rolling hills. So it came as a surprise to many locals when the expert marksmen of Blackwater USA -- a controversial military contractor that provides armed security guards in the Iraq war -- took over an 80-acre rifle range and opened up a...

A defense company engineer accused of conspiring to send technical military information to China was never given permission to share sensitive documents on a future Navy warship with his brother, a security official for the company testified Thursday. Fred Witham, who oversees security for Power Paragon Inc., was questioned about defendant Chi Mak's access to a so-called DDX document. The government claims the document was found on a computer belonging to Mak's brother, who is also charged in the case. Mak, a Chinese-born naturalized U.S. citizen, went on trial this week in U.S. District Court. Prosecutors also asked Witham whether...

(AFX UK Focus) 2006-03-21 10:10 GMT: France's Thales worker arrested for stealing SKorean military secrets - UPDATE Article layout: raw (Updates with Thales statement, quotes, details) SEOUL (AFX) - A Frenchman working for defense company Thales has been arrested for obtaining South Korean military secrets, prosecutors said. The French businessman and two South Koreans were held for obtaining confidential documents concerning radar equipment for the South Korean Navy, a prosecution official told Agence France-Presse. The prosecutors' office in the central city of Daejeon refused to identify the Frenchman. He was described as an executive with the South Korean branch of...