Atk

U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar has vowed to co-sponsor a bill that would restrict the United States’ use of cluster bombs, rendering as many as half a billion stockpiled weapons off-limits. That’s according to activists who say the announcement — made at a meeting with her Wednesday, after months of pressure by Minnesota citizens and peace groups — came as a surprise.

Last year was abysmal for American workers, right? Not if you’re a CEO. Reuters reports that more CEOs saw pay increases last year than saw pay cuts. On top of that, “the median salary for CEOs of 200 large corporations increased by 4.5 percent to $1.08 million,” according to a new survey released Tuesday by [...]

Defense contractors, one group left out of discussions about an economic stimulus package, are worried about how the Democratic majority will cut military spending. One local company, the largest provider of munitions to the U.S. military and “allied nations around the world,” seems to be feeling the pinch. ATK (formerly Alliant Techsystems), the Edina-based manufacturer [...]

Edina-based Alliant Techsystems — maker of everything from bullets to cluster bombs to satellite equipment — has had its bid to buy Canada’s top aerospace firm shot down. The Canadian government rejected the $1.325 billion sale of MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates’ satellite and space systems because it deemed it did not offer a “net benefit” [...]

Edina-based Alliant Techsystems (ATK), the largest supplier of small-caliber ammunition to the United States military, has announced that it delivered 1.4 billion rounds to the military for FY 2008 and projects another 1.4 billion military rounds for FY 2009. The latest delivery numbers were accompanied by the announcement of a $415.6 million contract for additional [...]

Though Sen. Hillary Clinton has balked so far at releasing a full list of her requested earmarks, the Seattle Times has published a partial list of the ones she secured in the 2007 Defense Authorization Bill, and they include $3.5 million for Minnesota-based ATK (formerly Alliant Tech Systems) for development of the X-51 robust scramjet. [...]

Ireland is the latest addition on a growing list of countries that refuse to invest government funds in manufacturers of “cluster munitions” — and Edina’s Alliant Tech Systems (now rebranded as ATK) is among the six targeted companies. On Wednesday, the country’s National Pensions Reserve Fund (NPRF) announced it will withdraw 27 million euros [...]

Part Two: ATK’s Cluster Bombs Kill Civilians, Rights Groups Charge
The widening controversy over an Edina-based munitions firm extends from the suburbs of Minneapolis to the capital of Canada to battlefields of Lebanon and Iraq.
ATK, formerly known as Alliant Technology Systems, won unwelcome headlines following its January acquisition of two divisions of the Canadian defense firm [...]

Edina-based ATK, formerly Alliant Tech Systems, has been building its space systems operations for years in an effort to diversify its business as one of the nation’s largest munitions manufacturers. But its expansion efforts aren’t appreciated in Canada, where objections to ATK’s production of land mines, cluster bombs and depleted uranium artillery shells are [...]