[House Hearing, 109 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.A.S.C. No. 109-79]
THE STATUS OF TACTICAL WHEELED VEHICLE ARMORING INITIATIVES, AND
IMPROVISED EXPLOSIVE DEVICE (IED) JAMMER INITIATIVES IN OPERATION IRAQI
FREEDOM
__________
HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
HEARING HELD
MAY 5, 2005
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] TONGRESS.#13
HOUSE COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
32-996 PDF WASHINGTON DC: 2008
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One Hundred Ninth Congress
DUNCAN HUNTER, California, Chairman
CURT WELDON, Pennsylvania IKE SKELTON, Missouri
JOEL HEFLEY, Colorado JOHN SPRATT, South Carolina
JIM SAXTON, New Jersey SOLOMON P. ORTIZ, Texas
JOHN M. McHUGH, New York LANE EVANS, Illinois
TERRY EVERETT, Alabama GENE TAYLOR, Mississippi
ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland NEIL ABERCROMBIE, Hawaii
HOWARD P. ``BUCK'' McKEON, MARTY MEEHAN, Massachusetts
California SILVESTRE REYES, Texas
MAC THORNBERRY, Texas VIC SNYDER, Arkansas
JOHN N. HOSTETTLER, Indiana ADAM SMITH, Washington
WALTER B. JONES, North Carolina LORETTA SANCHEZ, California
JIM RYUN, Kansas MIKE McINTYRE, North Carolina
JIM GIBBONS, Nevada ELLEN O. TAUSCHER, California
ROBIN HAYES, North Carolina ROBERT A. BRADY, Pennsylvania
KEN CALVERT, California ROBERT ANDREWS, New Jersey
ROB SIMMONS, Connecticut SUSAN A. DAVIS, California
JO ANN DAVIS, Virginia JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island
W. TODD AKIN, Missouri STEVE ISRAEL, New York
J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia RICK LARSEN, Washington
JEFF MILLER, Florida JIM COOPER, Tennessee
JOE WILSON, South Carolina JIM MARSHALL, Georgia
FRANK A. LoBIONDO, New Jersey KENDRICK B. MEEK, Florida
JEB BRADLEY, New Hampshire MADELEINE Z. BORDALLO, Guam
MICHAEL TURNER, Ohio TIM RYAN, Ohio
JOHN KLINE, Minnesota MARK UDALL, Colorado
CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan G.K. BUTTERFIELD, North Carolina
MIKE ROGERS, Alabama CYNTHIA McKINNEY, Georgia
TRENT FRANKS, Arizona DAN BOREN, Oklahoma
BILL SHUSTER, Pennsylvania
THELMA DRAKE, Virginia
JOE SCHWARZ, Michigan
CATHY McMORRIS, Washington
MICHAEL CONAWAY, Texas
GEOFF DAVIS, Kentucky
Robert S. Rangel, Staff Director
Jesse Tolleson, Program Analyst
Andrew Hunter, Professional Staff Member
Paul Arcangeli, Professional Staff Member
Curtis Flood, Staff Assistant
C O N T E N T S
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CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF HEARINGS
2005
Page
Hearing:
Thursday, May 5, 2005, The Status of Tactical Wheeled Vehicle
Armoring Initiatives, and Improvised Explosive Device (IED)
Jammer Initiatives in Operation Iraqi Freedom.................. 1
Appendix:
Thursday, May 5, 2005............................................ 73
----------
THURSDAY, MAY 5, 2005
THE STATUS OF TACTICAL WHEELED VEHICLE ARMORING INITIATIVES, AND
IMPROVISED EXPLOSIVE DEVICE (IED) JAMMER INITIATIVES IN OPERATION IRAQI
FREEDOM
STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS
Hunter, Hon. Duncan, a Representative from California, Chairman,
Committee on Armed Services.................................... 1
Skelton, Hon. Ike, a Representative from Missouri, Ranking
Member, Committee on Armed Services............................ 5
Weldon, Hon. Curt, a Representative from Pennsylvania............ 4
WITNESSES
Catto, Maj. Gen. (Sel) William D., Commanding General, Marine
Corps Systems Command, U.S. Marine Corps....................... 12
DeTeresa, Dr. Steven, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory..... 6
Kennedy, Lt. Col. Paul J., Former Battalion Commander, 2nd
Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment, First Marine Division,
Headquarters Battalion, First Marine Division, U.S. Marine
Corps.......................................................... 65
Mattis, Lt. Gen. James N., Former Commander, First Marine
Division, Commanding General, Marine Corps Combat Development
Command, U.S. Marine Corps..................................... 65
Sorenson, Brig. Gen. (Promotable) Jeffrey A., Deputy for
Acquisition and Systems Management, Office of the Assistant
Secretary of the Army (Acquisition, Logistics and Technology).. 12
Votel, Brig. Gen. Joseph L., Director, Joint Improvised Explosive
Device Defeat Task Force, Headquarters, Department of the Army,
Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff, G3........................ 14
APPENDIX
Prepared Statements:
Catto, Maj. (Sel) Gen. William D............................. 90
Hunter, Hon. Duncan.......................................... 77
Sorenson, Brig. Gen. Jeffrey A., joint with Brig. Gen. Joseph
L. Votel................................................... 82
Documents Submitted for the Record:
Actions Needed to Improve the Availability of Critical Items
During Current and Future Operations [The information
referred to is retained in the committee files and can be
viewed upon request.]
Armor & Countermeasure Timeline Key Points with chart on Army
HMMWV Ad-on Armor Production vs. Operational Requirements.. 137
Article of April 25, 2005 from New York Times on the Marines
From Iraq Sound Off About Want of Armor and Men by Michael
Moss....................................................... 142
Guns Trucks and Transparent Armor for Force Protection
presented by Dr. Steven DeTeresa........................... 105
House Report 108-491--Section 801--Rapid Acquisition
Authority to Respond to Combat Emergencies................. 147
OEF AoA Requirements......................................... 153
Response to the New York Times Article and the Issue of Armor
Available to the Battalion From its Arrival in Kuwait
Through the Redeployment to OIF............................ 135
The ``Iron Horse'' in El Taqaddum, Iraq...................... 148
UAH Requirements............................................. 154
Questions and Answers Submitted for the Record:
Mr. Andrews.................................................. 158
Mr. Langevin................................................. 157
Mr. Reyes.................................................... 157
Mr. Shuster.................................................. 158
THE STATUS OF TACTICAL WHEELED VEHICLE ARMORING INITIATIVES, AND
IMPROVISED EXPLOSIVE DEVICE (IED) JAMMER INITIATIVES IN OPERATION IRAQI
FREEDOM
----------
House of Representatives,
Committee on Armed Services,
Washington, DC, Thursday, May 5, 2005.
The committee met, pursuant to call, at 9:05 a.m., in room
2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Duncan Hunter
(chairman of the committee) presiding.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. DUNCAN HUNTER, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM
CALIFORNIA, CHAIRMAN, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
The Chairman. The committee will come to order.
This morning the committee continues its review of the
status of the armoring program for Army and Marine Corps
tactical vehicles in Iraq, as well as the status of deployment
of electronic jamming devices to counter the threat of
improvised explosive devices, better known to all of us as
IEDs.
Our leadoff witness is Dr. Steven J. Teresa of the Lawrence
Livermore National Laboratory. And on our second panel,
Brigadier General Joseph Votel, Director of the Joint IED
Defeat Task Force, Office of the Secretary of Defense;
Brigadier General Jeffrey Sorenson, Deputy for Acquisition and
Systems Management, Office of the Assistant Secretary of the
Army; and Brigadier General William Catto, Commanding General,
Marine Corps Systems Command.
And on our third panel, Lieutenant General James N. Mattis,
Former Commander, First Marine Division, and Commanding
General, Marine Corps Combat Development Command; and
Lieutenant Colonel Paul J. Kennedy, Former Battalion Commander,
2nd Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment, First Marine Division.
The jurisdiction of this committee is such that we cover a
very wide range of issues, but the significance of other issues
pales relative to the importance of providing the best
protection possible to our men and women serving in Operation
Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom.
No other issue in the past two years has taken a higher
priority for this committee. We have done a lot of work on this
specific issue of armor, and I wanted to let my colleagues know
where we stand with respect to committee action that has been
taken and the task force that we have put together to work the
armor issue, because there has been no element of this conflict
that has been more deadly to our people than the IED blowing
these things remotely, sometimes hardwired, on our troops who
are either in operation or in convoy. And we put together a
task force headed up by Mr. Bob Simmons. I want to run down
some of the things that we have done so we can take a look at
the present state of affairs, and when we get our updates from
the services and from Dr. DeTeresa, the committee can decide
where we want to go from here.
We began oversight of the Army on these programs in 2003.
The Army at that point approved $129 million for add-on armor
kits; $300 million remains, however, at this time unfunded.
In January of 2004, we reviewed the Army production plan
that was originally scheduled to complete 7,000 kits by
December of 2004. We determined that the best production effort
could actually finish those kits much earlier, in fact by April
2004; and we submitted a memo to the Army noting that we had
enough in terms of arsenals, industry and steel mills, if they
operated at max capacity, to move this production of armor to
the left, that is, to move it up to April.
We visited the steel mills that churn this stuff out. We
reached agreement with steel mill management and union
officials to voluntarily set aside the commercial work they
were doing and dedicate a hundred percent of their capacity to
armor plate production.
The delivery schedule for steel was compressed at that
point by four months; that is, we moved the production from
December 2004 to April 2004. Now, at this point, we found
something else, and that was that when we built Strykers, we
utilized high hard steel;that is three-eighths-inch high-
performance steel, and we had a lot of it left over from
Stryker production. So we discovered that at the steel mills
while we were making the visits, and we started to move that
into the system.
We determined at that point that we needed additional
manufacturing capacity, and the Army, working with Les
Brownley, the Army committed nine depots and arsenals to armor
kit production.
We also suggested to the Army that 11 sites be opened in
Iraq to install Humvee armor, because by doing that we could
put that armor on--when the Humvees arrived in country, we
could marry it up with armor and move it out to its location in
theater.
On March 2nd of 2004, the Secretary directed the
compression of the schedule to what we recommended in terms of
production rates, to the House recommended production rates.
The Army notified us at that time of delinquent deliveries of
steel from Canadian steel mills, and they requested our
assistance. And we sent our team out to Canada to resolve the
delivery issues. At that point, we started to look also at the
tactical truck fleet because these 5-ton trucks with the Army,
particularly 7-ton trucks with the Marines, with the capability
that they have in terms of a load carrying capacity, lends
itself to the heavy weight that is involved in armoring up.
We delivered, on June of 2004, Stryker steel gun boxes;
these were gun boxes made out of excess Stryker steel that we
had found that were delivered to Iraq. In November of 2004,
aluminum mill shipments threatened to break production of armor
kits for trucks. Our team met with the aluminum company
executives and arranged for a shift in priorities back to the
armor programs.
Our oversight team also discovered that the IED
countermeasure supplier was running out of Army funding and
laying off production personnel, and at that point, we went
into a negotiation with the Secretary of Defense, and we agreed
on a very substantial reprogramming to put the IED
countermeasure production at full speed.
In January of 2005, we shipped our first--the Army shipped
its first 5-ton truck kit, three months later than the original
commitment. And our HASC team at the same time was working on
oversight of IED production, and we started to move into that
area.
CENTCOM then reported this policy--that we are all familiar
with now--that no unarmored vehicles, that is, vehicles without
level one, two or three armor, would go out on operation after
February 15 in theater in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Since then, we have been working the IED countermeasure
problem, and what we have done is the committee passed last
year--I think everybody's familiar with this provision that we
passed that said that the Secretary of Defense, if he is taking
casualties on the battlefield, can wave every existing American
law with respect to acquisition and simply buy what the troops
need as quickly as possible.
We have developed some new jamming capability, and we have
a product that we think we can flood into the field very
quickly. And a couple of days ago the Secretary of Defense
(SECDEF) signed out the directive that is utilizing this new
license that HASC developed and that we passed into law last
year for the first time, and that is that with a goal of
arriving at contract within 15 days after certification. The
certification was signed just a couple of days ago. We hope to
be able to get this new capability flooded into the field, not
ramped up on a classic industrial schedule, but flooded into
the field within the next 45 to 60 days.
So SECDEF is moving out that. He signed the certification
that we provided for him, certifying that there was an urgent
combat need for this system, and this will be will be the first
system moved out under this new structure that we have. Now
this is going to require lots of personal accountability
because what we are doing is replacing miles of paperwork and
lots of bureaucracy with individual accountability, but we
think that this is an area that is so critical that we are
going to have to move very quickly, like we have managed to
move in the past, and so we are going to exercise this new
instrument that we have put together.
Now, we have a big bureaucracy; we in Congress have helped
to build up bureaucracy in lots of agencies and for good--in
many cases, for good reasons, you need to have lots of checks
and balances in a system where taxpayer monies are spent in
large numbers. On the other hand, when you are in a combat
situation, sometimes that bureaucracy gets in the way. We have
moved out on our armor situation sometimes fitfully, sometimes
in a robust manner. We have had a number of good news stories.
We have gotten companies that have developed things, and we
have gotten depots that have moved out quickly, and we have
been able to move capability into the field. On the other hand,
we have also been plagued with all the glitches and foul-ups
and delays that attend large bureaucracies.
What we are here to do today is to take a picture of where
we are, of our present status, what we have got in country, how
well it is protecting our troops, and where we need to go from
here. And so we are not going to be--we are not here to
congratulate ourselves on accomplishments. We are not here to
continue to berate and criticize this system which we built,
which moves products and capability rather slowly to our people
in uniform. But we are here to speed it up, to see what else we
can do to move this process along and to provide better
protection for our folks in uniform.
And we have got some warfighters here today. And I am glad
we have got them here because we also have some of our experts
in developing systems. And I have already asked a couple of
questions about some new things; perhaps we could put our
Humvee and trucks in theaters. So I am glad we have our
warfighters here, and they will be able to comment and perhaps
have some interchange with some of our designers on some of the
requirements that we could get into theater fairly quickly.
So gentlemen, thank you for being with us today.
And let me comment, also, that my good colleague, Mr.
Weldon, who is the chairman of the Tactical Air and Land Forces
Subcommittee and whose subcommittee has moved large amounts of
money into the armor program and has been aggressively pursuing
this program, he has also been very concerned. And he and I are
partnering on this hearing.
And Curt, did you have anything you wanted to say.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Hunter can be found in the
Appendix on page 77.]
STATEMENT OF HON. CURT WELDON, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM
PENNSYLVANIA
Mr. Weldon. If the gentleman would yield.
Just briefly, Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you for your
tireless work, along with the ranking member. Chairman Hunter
has taken a personal interest in this issue to the extent that
I have never seen in my 19 years in Congress, to the point of
going out into the field, on his own and with key staffers
assigning teams, to get the real story.
Now we should not have to do that. Now I want to tell you
that as a strong supporter of the military, I am not too happy
today. Now maybe this hearing will make me happy.
Now I am the Chairman of the Tactical Air and Land Forces
Subcommittee that oversees the funding for these programs. Over
the past year, while Chairman Hunter and staff have been out
doing yeomen's efforts--it goes well beyond what a committee
chairman should ever have to do--and basically looking over the
shoulders of those men who are responsible for making sure that
our soldiers are protected, we have been assured repeatedly
that we have equipment in the field that in fact is meeting the
needs. And I want to hear today that that is, in fact, the
case.
I want to applaud both you, Chairman Hunter, and especially
the staff that you have assigned, most particularly the
incoming staff director who has done a fantastic job on this
issue on your behalf. And I want to ask one question. I am a
strong supporter of the Marines. I am going back to Iraq on
Memorial Day with a delegation to see the troops again for a
short trip. But I want to ask the Marines to answer me a
question today, because this offends me, as perhaps one of the
most loyal supporters of the Marines. I want to ask if the
commander of E company, Captain Kelly Royer--which was the
company that suffered the most casualties and deaths during
their six-month tour in Iraq, 185--who on May 31st of 2004's
fitness report, and I quote, He has single handedly reshaped a
company in sore need of a leader, succeeded in forming a
cohesive fighting force that is battle-tested and worthy--but
after he confronted the brass about the shortages threatening
his men, it was changed, and the superiors found him to be
quote, dictatorial, with no morale or motivation in his
Marines.
I want the Marines to answer the question about Kelly
Royer. Is that what we do to an officer who reports that there
are problems within his unit? And what is the status of him
today? Is, in fact, he being railroaded out of the Marine
Corps?
So, Mr. Chairman, I would ask, when the Marines come to the
table, that I expect answers on that question about this
specific--if they want to go into a classified session when we
talk about the personnel issues, then so be it, but I am
quoting from Marine documents.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
And I want to thank my colleague, Mr. Skelton, who has been
a great partner in this bipartisan effort to accelerate armor
of our folks in theater.
And Mr. Skelton, thank you for everything you have done,
and the gentleman is recognized.
STATEMENT OF HON. IKE SKELTON, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM MISSOURI,
RANKING MEMBER, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
Mr. Skelton. Mr. Chairman, thank you. And let me join you
in welcoming our witnesses and our panels this morning.
Mr. Chairman, let me commend you for holding this hearing.
This is good. This is very important. And I, too, would like to
join my friend from Pennsylvania on seeking the answers
regarding that company commander. That goes to the very heart
of the credibility of the United States Marine Corps.
We are dealing with the process of writing our bill, Mr.
Chairman, as you know, and our paramount responsibility is
still the oversight of our forces here deployed in Iraq.
Today's hearing is very, very helpful. Men and women in our
armed forces have exceeded what we, as their leaders, have the
right to expect. This is most especially true of the soldiers
and the Marines involved in the daily fight, to be given the
responsibility to lead, to equip these men and women is to be
given a very, very important job, and I consider that
responsibility to belong to the members of this committee, to
the Congress of the United States and the Constitution and as
well, of course, as the witnesses today.
The Army and the Marine Corps, with help from Congress, are
making progress with armoring vehicles, and they have
dramatically upgraded their force protection capabilities. Mr.
Chairman, I believe if we had to grade our efforts to date we
would have to give ourselves a C at best. As the recent article
from the New York Times brought home again, we started our
occupation in Iraq without a plan, without the right equipment
for the fight, and we were too slow to react when it became
clear that post-combat operations were just as dangerous, if
not more so, as the combat originally was. A heavy price has
sadly been paid for mistakes.
Now, it is neither helpful or fair to even try to single
out a person or an organization as being to blame. Instead, I
believe we must make sure that at least something good comes
out of this mistake and something good comes out of this
hearing. I, again, Mr. Chairman, congratulate you for this
hearing. I ask that the remainder of my statement be placed in
the record.
The Chairman. Without objection. I thank the gentleman.
And our lead-off witness is Dr. Steve DeTeresa of Lawrence
Livermore National Laboratory, a laboratory that heretofore has
been engaged in the design of our strategic weapons systems
that has lots of talented folks.
And Dr. DeTeresa, you folks have put a team together and
have put together some pretty substantial armor that you have
moved into theater. Tell us about this.
STATEMENT OF DR. STEVEN DETERESA, LAWRENCE LIVERMORE NATIONAL
LABORATORY
Dr. DeTeresa. Mr. Chairman, and members of the committee,
thank you for inviting me to report on one of several force
protection efforts that we at the Lawrence Livermore National
Lab have been conducting under the joint sponsorship of the
Defense Advance Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, and the
Lawrence Livermore Lab.
DARPA and Lawrence Livermore Lab have a history of
responding quickly to urgent matters of national security, and
we are privileged to have the recent opportunity to support our
service men and women engaged in the Global War on Terror.
This morning, I will describe our work to develop and field
armor kits to convert cargo trucks to gun trucks for convoy
escort and other missions requiring a mobile weapons platform.
We have been engaged in this work at the request of this
committee since December of 2003. I am happy to report that our
efforts have already helped to save lives.
This project has truly been a joint effort, and the work I
am about to describe is that of many dedicated and hardworking
Livermore Lab employees and consultants, DARPA program
managers, Vietnam veterans, Army personnel and civilians, and
U.S. Industrial partners.
The concept of the gun truck was developed over more than
five years of wartime experience in Vietnam. We saw many
parallels between the need for these mobile weapons platforms
in that conflict and in the current conflicts. Our work to
develop a modern version of the gun truck began where Vietnam
left off. And we were fortunate that much of the knowledge
gained in this former war is preserved in the Fort Eustis
Transportation Museum and in the memories of the close
brotherhood of Vietnam gun truck veterans.
Allow me to describe the details of this project using the
presentation slides that you have before you.
In your first slide, and in the poster over to my left, you
will see an example of a gun truck, and I will take the time to
describe what that is. As I mentioned, it is a cargo truck that
is converted with add-on armor into a mobile weapons platform.
It involves armor for the cab and an armored box that is on the
back of the cargo truck with multiple weapons. The reason we
use a cargo truck is that it can handle the excess weight which
is within the capacity of the truck, and the primary purpose is
for convoy escort and other defensive missions.
On your second slide, you see a summary of where we are to
date. Although small, we have made an impact. There are 31 5-
ton gun trucks in Iraq, and they are saving lives. And we
believe more are needed.
The Chairman. Now, Dr. DeTeresa, if you can put the picture
of that gun truck back up there for one second. And we have got
a picture of one of those trucks that was hit by an IED, is
that your--that is, the Ironhorse effort took a heavy IED. And
I saw the report from the driver who said that all seven
personnel walked away with no injuries. That box is double
hold, is it not?
Dr. DeTeresa. That is correct.
The Chairman. So you have got two layers of three-eighths-
inch-high hard steel, separated by about eight inches?
Dr. DeTeresa. There are two layers of steel, and then there
is also ballistic fiberglass.
The Chairman. And explain why you have the steel and the
ballistic fiberglass on the inside of that box.
Dr. DeTeresa. Well, it provides additional protection, both
from IED threats and small-arm threats. And the inside
fiberglass is a small shield, so it is a very effective
combination of materials.
The Chairman. So you have got two layers of steel,
approximately three-eighths-inch, eight inches apart, and then
you have got an inch and a quarter of E glass inside that
interior wall. Is that right?
Dr. DeTeresa. Yes.
The Chairman. Now, explain the ballistic glass along the
top. I think this is instructive, as we go into the future
here, in putting these armored systems together.
Dr. DeTeresa. Well, this is one of the things we have added
to this design since the Vietnam era. We were most interested
in providing protection for the gun crew from the IED threat,
and so what we have added is the transparent armored windows
that you see on the sides of the box, allows the gun crew to
have watch and have high situational awareness and yet be
protected.
The Chairman. Now, you will notice that my colleagues, most
folks in this committee, have been to Bethesda and Walter Reed;
we have looked at the casualty reports fairly extensively. A
lot of the casualties are the gunners. In the case of the
Humvee, it is usually the gunner who catches--who is in the
blast plane and catches that fragmentation in the face, head
and neck. And it is similarly, if you are in a truck, if you
are standing up, even though you are actually a little below
some of the blast planes, if that IED is close to the roadbed
itself, the ballistic glass allows you to look out, to have the
situational awareness without catching that fragment when that
IED blows. And that is an area where I think you folks can do
some real--give some real help to the Marines and the Army with
respect to their Humvees because the Humvee troop carrier has a
4-foot high or so steel high-hard or RHA steel sides to it, and
if we had a slotted 12-inch high ballistic glass plane that we
could slide over the rim, just like those ballistic glass panes
on the rim of a gun truck, that would allow your folks that are
riding in the troop carrier version of the Humvee to look out,
to have what they call situational awareness and not catch the
fragment from that initial IED blast.
So is that--and I want to--when General Mattis comes up, we
have talked about that a little bit because he has been head of
the first division in a hot area, and I want to talk to you a
little bit about that, General Mattis, to see if there is not--
you have at least initially expressed support for that type of
a ballistic glass apparatus to put on the Humvees. In fact, I
will tell you what, why don't you come up right now while Steve
DeTeresa is here. Come on up, we are an informal bunch here.
General Mattis, you have been the commander of the First
Marine Division during some very severe fighting and in a very
severe IED environment in the Fallujah AO. What do you think
about the--first, about the adequacy of the Humvee troop
carrier, but also the prospects of having a glass rim, a
ballistic glass windshield along the top of that troop carrier?
General Mattis. Sir, the glass can only help. What we
cannot do with these armor solutions is encase the Marines and
soldiers so well that they cannot see what is going on outside.
Much of their survival depends on identifying the threat before
they ever get to it. At this time, we are finding anywhere from
40 to 60 percent of the IEDs before they are detonated. That
has a significant impact on the reduction of casualties.
Glass like this can assist greatly because the armor, while
it is best--if something goes off, you have armor between you
and the blast--but, eventually, you get to the point where the
lack of observation actually has the opposite effect behind the
armor, actually increasing your vulnerability.
The Chairman. So anyway, Steve, if that is the case,
General, if you had a rim, a 1-foot high glass rim around the
troop-carrying Humvees in the back, that obviously would give
you that ability to look out it, yet not catch the full--that
blast in the initial IED explosion.
Mr. DeTeresa, is that something that you folks at Livermore
could fabricate fairly quickly for testing at Aberdeen?
Dr. DeTeresa. Yes. We have actually thought about that
design, so we could work on that quickly.
The Chairman. Could you have a prototype in a week or so?
Dr. DeTeresa. I would give it a little more time than that.
The Chairman. Okay. Well, please proceed, Mr. DeTeresa.
And General, hang tough right where you are at; you may
want to comment on some of his testimony here, if you could.
General Mattis. Yes, sir.
Dr. DeTeresa. We will go back to the truck that we see on
our left that we have in front of you, which was the 5-ton gun
truck called the Ironhorse, which took a hard hit from an IED.
As we heard, all the crew members survived with relatively
minor injury. And then the other feature of the truck--the
truck was damaged beyond repair, but all the armor was
recovered and has been moved to a new truck. And it is back out
on the road. That is part of the design of the kit that we
have.
The next poster we would like to show is an example of what
we heard before, the troop-carrier version of the box made from
the Stryker steel. It is a lighter version, so that you can
take the weight with troops in the back of the cargo truck.
This vehicle was also, at least in one case, subjected to an
attack by a car bomb, a vehicle-borne IED. And we have another
poster that shows the damage to the truck. And again, all crew
members survived.
I think that this points out that with relatively simple
armor kits, especially with these heavier 5-ton gun trucks,
that we can save lives pretty simply.
Mr. Spratt. Mr. Chairman, one question, were all of these
adaptations made in the field?
Dr. DeTeresa. The kits were sent to the field and were
assembled in the field, but the kits were designed here and
tested thoroughly at the Aberdeen Test Center.
The Chairman. What is the thickness of that Stryker steel
that you have got in the back there, Mr. DeTeresa?
Dr. DeTeresa. Actually, that is something I do not recall
exactly. I believe it is a little bit over a quarter-inch
thick, as I remember; but it has got additional armor with it.
The Chairman. Okay.
Dr. DeTeresa. We have jumped around a bit, and if we are
going to follow my package of----
The Chairman. Go right ahead, Mr. DeTeresa. Reassemble and
continue to present.
Dr. DeTeresa. Let me point out on slide number five, which
you have in front of you, what we have is a comparison between
an up-armored Humvee and the 5-ton gun trucks. And let me tell
you up front that we have always believed--and we still
believe--that the best convoy escort is provided by the
combination of these vehicles, not one or the other. And that
is based on the experience in Vietnam, and it is based on
things that we are seeing today.
The up-armored Humvee obviously gives you the nimble
vehicle that is able to move around as a commander vehicle and
a scout vehicle. But the 5-ton gun truck, by virtue of the fact
that it can handle the additional armor and have multiple
weapons, provides a much more serious convoy protection
platform. And there are many things we have compared here, but
in the end, I will save some time and say that both will make
the effective convoy escort as we have seen in Vietnam.
We have one last poster which is an example of 5-ton gun
trucks that were being made--we call them homemade gun trucks--
that were being made in the field. Pointing out that the troops
recognized the benefit of using a 5-ton truck for armoring and
providing escort to convoys.
This was one of our motivations. When we saw this, we said,
we can do better; we can provide them with a very good kit that
is easy to assemble and provide substantial armor protection,
knowing what we know from the history of Vietnam. So that is
where we got to in our efforts was to improve that situation,
recognizing that this was something that was needed and was
actually being developed by the troops in the field.
The Chairman. Mr. DeTeresa, was that one of the ones
assembled at the Mad Max shop--what they called the Mad Max
truck in Balad?
Dr. DeTeresa. Stunt Works is the other name. I am not sure
where this one came from, but actually, I believe there are
several kinds of those facilities around the country where
people are doing this.
I would like to skip all the way to our various view graph,
which is our timeline for the project. I just want to go over a
few points.
I mentioned that we started this work at the request of
this committee. That was back in December of 2003. In the first
phase of this, in the matter of the time period from January--
end of January to April 2004, we had designed, built and tested
at Aberdeen Test Center the first prototype, so we were ready
to go. Over the next few months, there were lots of discussions
about requirements and features that were needed to send the
kit into field, and the committee helped to expedite that.
And finally, in July, we were able to send the first
prototype, which was well received by the unit, and soon after,
we received an operational needs statement requesting 28 more
kits. To meet that, we pursued funding, and again, the
committee helped and introduced us to some of the DARPA
efforts. And jointly with DARPA, we got the funding to build
the 30 kits actually that we sent, and that was done over the
time period from October to December; we built and fielded
those 30 kits. They were built over a period of time from the
end of December to January, and now, all 31 are on the road,
including the ones you have seen in some of the posters here.
The Chairman. Mr. DeTeresa, what type of weaponry will the
gun truck accommodate?
Dr. DeTeresa. Typically, a gun truck handles crew served
weapons, machine guns. And that is the purpose of this. As a
mobile weapons platform, you want substantial firepower on the
back of these trucks, meaning multiple weapons. And I actually
have a slide, but I will just describe that now. The reason for
multiple weapons--and for reference, it is number nine--besides
the greater firepower, you have got redundancy in case of
weapon malfunctions, which does happen, and you are able to
repel simultaneous attacks in different directions. So to make
a true gun truck, you really need multiple weapons. And
actually, that has been a little bit of an issue with the folks
who have our gun trucks over there. They have a hard time
getting the multiple weapons.
The Chairman. But it takes 50's.
Dr. DeTeresa. Fifty calibers are preferred, but smaller-
gauge weapons are also useful.
The Chairman. Okay.
Dr. DeTeresa. If we skip to ten, one of the things I wanted
to highlight is the fact that we have tested this thoroughly at
the Aberdeen Test Center. You will see examples of the
prototype box, which was subjected to a live IED test. And you
will see holes in the side of the armor. You will see damaged
ballistics windows. The result of all that was nothing got
through the box. This is substantial. And any of the typical
IEDs that we see out there will not penetrate this armor. So it
is a very simple design and a very effective one.
And in addition, they have also tested the armor against
RPGs and minimized the impact of an RPG by stripping all the
attending frags and minimizing any of the blastings effects.
So, again, by virtue of the fact that this is a cargo truck
that can handle a substantial weight, there is nothing magical
about the armor system. It provides very substantial
protection.
I would like to skip to number 12, in the interest of time,
again, to again point out that there are 31 of these gun trucks
in the field and to point out also that the feedback on these
has been very positive. We have had comments from the gun crews
that they feel much safer and they feel well protected and that
these are clearly superior to anything they have used before.
One of the other satisfying things about this is that the
crews and the troops that are engaged in this, providing
feedback and suggestions for improvement, and we strive to
continue to improve the design and make this a better weapons
platform for the troops.
And 13, I think it is important to acknowledge many of the
DOD organizations that have made this possible, provided a lot
of critical support. First of all, the U.S. Army Developmental
Test Command and their sub-organization Aberdeen Test Center
was instrumental in all the ballistic and road testing and
actually helped with some aspects of the design. And those
folks were hardworking folks who did a lot of work to get our
kits up to speed and sent out.
The Army Research Lab has always been our partners in
looking at armor materials and performance, and they have
provided a lot of valuable input. We have not talked about it,
but the cab kit that we designed was actually based on an
initial design by the U.S. Marine Corps. And this is at the
Albany, Georgia, Logistics Base for the 923 truck. They shared
that design with us. We improved it and provided that for the
field.
And then the Tank and Automotive Command of the U.S. Army
was helpful in expediting these kits to the field when we got
to the point where we could ship.
So what I would like to do is summarize with 14 and say, we
have produced a kit which is relatively inexpensive. I did not
mention the number, but $40,000 will provide a full gun truck
kit, which includes the cab armor. It is a highly effective and
highly survivable mobile weapons platform. And we believe that
the combinations of these gun trucks and up-armored Humvees are
the right vehicles and the right combination for convoy escort.
I will also mention that these trucks are also valuable for
troop transport and perimeter and checkpoint security.
If I may, I would just like to make a closing statement. I
would like to thank you for the opportunity to discuss this
element of force protection and also to thank you for your
continued support and concern for the safety of our men and
women in the military. Thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you, Mr. DeTeresa. And thanks for
laying that out. I thought that was a good context to bring up
our next panel. And so we are going to move, without further
ado, to--we will bring our next panel up. And we will have--and
we are going to get, for the committee, the state of armor in
the theater, where we are at, what the production rate is, and
how far away we are from completion.
And General Mattis, if you want to stick around right
there, I think we have got enough chairs, or you can move back
to an observation post, whichever you want. Why don't you hang
around there as we bring up General Joe Votel, who is director
of the IED Defeat Task Force; General Jeff Sorenson, United
States Army Deputy for Acquisition and Systems management; and
Brigadier General William D. Catto, United States Marine Corps
Commanding General, Marine Corps Systems Command?
Come on up, gentlemen.
General Sorenson, you are going to lead off here.
STATEMENT OF BRIG. GEN. (PROMOTABLE) JEFFREY A. SORENSON,
DEPUTY FOR ACQUISITION AND SYSTEMS MANAGEMENT, OFFICE OF THE
ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF THE ARMY (ACQUISITION, LOGISTICS AND
TECHNOLOGY)
General Sorenson. Yes, Chairman Hunter, Congressman
Skelton, and distinguished members of the committee, thank you
for this opportunity to provide you an update to the status of
current force protection programs.
Since our journey began in August 2003, we have increased
the number of armored vehicles deployed to theater by a factor
of over a hundred fold in 18 months. This serves as testament
to the tremendous support of our industrial partners, our
government program management offices and their supporting
engineer and logistics centers, and our test community.
We have also increased delivery of body armor, IED
countermeasure systems and changes in tactics and training to
provide a holistic approach to enhancing the force protection
capability of our deployed forces.
Your support to provide resources to fund our efforts is
greatly appreciated, and with your continued support, including
quick passage of the FY 2005 supplemental, we will continue our
efforts to satisfy theater force protection requirements in an
expeditious manner.
Following my other colleagues' introductory remarks, I will
discuss in detail our current armor status with the charts that
have been provided to you and will be ready to answer any
questions that you have. Thank you.
[The joint prepared statement of General Sorenson and
General Votel can be found in the Appendix on page 82.]
The Chairman. Okay, thank you very much.
General Catto.
STATEMENT OF MAJ. GEN. (SEL) WILLIAM D. CATTO, COMMANDING
GENERAL, MARINE CORPS SYSTEMS COMMAND, U.S. MARINE CORPS
General Catto. Chairman Hunter, Congressman Skelton,
honorable members of the committee, thank you for the
opportunity to appear before you to discuss the state of
vehicle armoring in the Marine Corps today. I am accompanied
this morning by my Deputy Commander, Mr. Barry Dillon.
As you may remember, the Marine Corps forces departed Iraq
for the first time in October of 2003. At that time, none of
our tactical wheeled vehicles were equipped with armor. A month
later, in November, we received confirmation that as part of
Operation Iraqi Freedom II, we would return to Al Anbar
province, which includes Fallujah and Ramadi.
When one of our forces took responsibility for this
province in March of 2004, 92 percent of their 3,049 vehicles
had armor installed. Armor was available in Kuwait for the
remainder of the vehicles, but operational timeline did not
allow for installation prior to crossing the line of departure.
As operation tempo allowed, the remaining vehicles were
armored.
I am pleased to be able to report to you today that 100
percent of our wheeled vehicles involved in combat operations
in Iraq, Afghanistan or the Horn of Africa are equipped at a
minimum with zonal two, level two armor.
The current wartime environment is ever changing as we face
a thinking, adaptive enemy. Therefore, we continue to address
the immediate and anticipated needs of our warfighters in
theater in multiple ways, ensuring that we design, fully test
and manufacture armor solutions that perform well while at the
same time ensuring that it does not severely degrade the
operational capabilities of existing vehicles.
Each successive armor enhancement has been designed and
vetted with the operational forces in the fight. Our vehicle
armoring program has evolved over the last 17 months through
now three generations of armor.
The first generation consisted of level three protection,
comprised of commercial, off-the-shelf components or three-
sixteenths-inch high hard-armored steel doors and flanks. At
that time, they were the best available material solutions.
Our second generation, offering level two protection,
consisted of three-eighths-inch rolled homogenous armored zonal
kits. By August 2004, 100 percent of our vehicles had this type
of armor.
Our current or third generation marine armor kit consists
of integrated components offering enhanced level two protection
as can be seen in your handouts and the display boards. By
addressing the details of our armoring strategy in my written
statement for the record, I would like to specifically
highlight the most recent measures we are taking in theater.
Since mines are a growing threat, we are expediting the
delivery of Marine armor kit underbodies for organizational or
battalion level installation into 400 Humvee A2s. Production of
these underbodies will be completed in the next 30 days. Within
the next 60 days, we expect to complete production of
underbodies to upgrade the armor of our 5-ton medium trucks and
logistic support vehicles.
Additionally, with the assistance of the Chairman and his
staff, the Defense Logistics Agency in Kuwait has made
available up to 450 sheets of 6-by-6-foot rolled homogenous
armor for use in theater. The Marine Corps Logistics Command,
which is our depot, has completed its assessment of this
material to determine the best and most expeditious and
effective means for in-theater cutting and installation of this
steel for use as rocker panels of our base Humvees and
sustainment for 5-ton truck underbodies.
The operational tempo determines the rate at which we can
pull our tactical vehicles out of service to install upgraded
protective solutions, therefore, we are continuing looking to
identify production and installation capabilities and
opportunities to enhance the speed and production and
installation without degrading operational force capabilities.
A perfect example is our armor installation facility
established at Camp Al Taqaddum in Iraq.
Finally, with your continued support, enabled by speedy
passage of the fiscal year 2005 supplemental, we can continue
our efforts to quickly meet emerging vehicle armor protection
requirements to stay ahead of an adaptive enemy. I will be
happy to answer any questions that committee members may have.
[The prepared statement of General Catto can be found in
the Appendix on page 90.]
The Chairman. Thank you.
General Votel.
STATEMENT OF BRIG. GEN. JOSEPH L. VOTEL, DIRECTOR, JOINT
IMPROVISED EXPLOSIVE DEVICE DEFEAT TASK FORCE, HEADQUARTERS,
DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY, OFFICE OF THE DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF, G3
General Votel. Yes. Mr. Chairman and Congressman Skelton,
thank you very much for the invitation to be here today, and
members of the committee. Sir, we would also like to express
our thanks to Mr. Bob Simmons and Mr. Norm Morris on your
committee who have been so instrumental in helping us breakdown
obstacles in fielding these devices that we are going to
discuss this morning. Thank you very much for that.
You are aware, from our previous classified discussions,
the sensitivity of the area in which we are talking this
morning. I am going to do my best to answer all of your
inquiries as part of my presentation----
The Chairman. You can keep it as general as you want to,
General.
General Votel. Thank you, sir.
We are continuing to make progress in a number of areas,
but as you noted and as we agree, obviously, there still is
much to be done. There are still many soldiers, Marines, airmen
and sailors who are being injured by these devices, so we
continue to focus in on this area.
I look forward to updating you and members of the committee
here on this particular area of our holistic approach,
electronic countermeasure devices, following my counterparts.
Thank you, sir.
[The joint prepared statement of General Votel and General
Sorenson can be found in the Appendix on page 82.]
The Chairman. Okay. Thanks. And we will move--and I
apologize to other members for taking so long to move through
our first two panels to get to questions, but I think it is
important to set the stage and understand what we have.
General Catto, one question on this. The underbody steel
that we are going to put on the Humvees operating in the
western AO there where we are taking some triple stack mines,
at this point, they were going to--they had the armor, the RHA,
available in Kuwait. Do the Marines have possession of that
right now, that steel?
General Catto. Chairman Hunter, I just talked with the
folks at DLA. They have given us 450 pieces of the armor. We
are looking now at how are we going to cut it and get it there.
The plan is to do it as rapidly as we possibly can. In fact, I
talked to General Payne this morning at our depot about how we
are going to do that.
The Chairman. Are you going to cut it with the equipment
that they have got in Kuwait? They have got that heavy
machinery that is available to cut it in Kuwait. Are you going
to move it up in already cut pieces?
General Catto. We will cut it to size there, prepare it and
then move it up so we can install it at the battalion level in
western Iraq, so they do not have to do the work, other than
installation.
The Chairman. How are you fixed for plasma cutters and the
requisite attachment stuff, your bolts, your nuts, the
accessories? Do you have plenty of those?
General Catto. I think, at this time, we are fine; if we
are not, I will let you know and ask for help.
The Chairman. Okay. Gentlemen, if you could just give us
very quickly--and then I want to move to Mr. Skelton--the
percentage of Humvees that are level one, and that is
obviously, that is the 1114, that is the manufactured Humvee,
the percentage of those that are in theater and the percentage
that are level one, as opposed to level two and three. Have you
got that basic info, General Sorenson?
General Sorenson. Yes, sir. If I can refer you to the
spreadsheet charts that are in your packet there, the first one
entitled, Armor Summary. If you go to the top line, identified
as UAH, meaning up-armored Humvee, this is the 1114 series you
speak of. And today, as of the 28th of April, the latest report
out of the area of responsibility (AOR) is that they are at
almost 80 percent full of level one requirements for the up-
armor Humvee.
With respect to add-on armor kits for the Humvees----
The Chairman. Now when you say, ``of the requirement,''
what does that mean in hard numbers?
General Sorenson. Sir, if you, again, go across here--if I
can refer you to the spreadsheet that we passed out. You have
the AOR requirement, which at this point in time is 10,079. Now
that was an increase just identified here at the end of March.
The previous requirement was 8,105, which was in August 2004,
and to date, as we have predicted before, we were going to
complete that requirement here in the May timeframe. However,
because of the fact that the requirement has increased, we are
now projecting July 2005 that all up-armor Humvees and 1114s--
--
The Chairman. So you will have how many in theater at that
time?
General Sorenson. At that time, it will be over 10,000.
Mr. Reyes. Mr. Chairman, I have a question. When you refer
to the area of operations, you are referring to the areas of
both Iraq and Afghanistan?
General Sorenson. That is correct.
The Chairman. General Catto, same question.
General Catto. The up-armor Humvees?
The Chairman. Yes.
General Catto. We have 37 of the foreign variants that we
bought very early when we went into Iraq back in March. We also
have over 475 M-1114s that we have received through
Multinational Corps Iraq that have come through the joint
community for our use. Additionally, we have 498 that are on
order today, and as the production capability ramps up, we will
be receiving them.
I would like to stress one thing, also. As we work through
the M-1114 shortages, the joint community and the Army have
been very helpful with trading assets for us in terms of, the
guys who need it the most got the assets.
The Chairman. So in theater, you have received up-armored
Humvees from Army units and other parts of Iraq?
General Catto. 475 that have come from Multinational Corps
Iraq and the joint community that have been parceled out to us
through the Army productions.
The Chairman. Okay. General Mattis, do you have any take on
how many Humvees you have got in our AO in Iraq? How many were
in the Fallujah AO?
General Mattis. Mr. Chairman, you are aware that I departed
Iraq about six months ago, but it is around 2,675 is our latest
reporting, sir.
The Chairman. That is a total Humvee pool.
General Mattis. Yes, sir.
The Chairman. And how many of those are fully up-armored?
Maybe General Catto has got that.
General Catto. Well, we have 100 percent of our A2s and
baseline Humvees are armored at level two with the zonal kits,
and they have been that way since August of 2004.
The Chairman. Okay. But how many of those are at level one,
which is the up-armor?
General Catto. 475 that we have had loaned to us through
the Multinational Corps Iraq, and the 37 foreign that we bought
very early in the campaign when we went back.
The Chairman. Okay. Thank you.
Gentleman from Missouri, Mr. Skelton.
Mr. Skelton. I will ask just one question--any of you can
answer this. I am privileged to represent Jefferson City, Cole
County, Missouri. A National Guard unit was activated and given
orders to go to Iraq. Through local funding and local steel,
that was cut to specification and later approved by Aberdeen,
their vehicles were later armored. What other examples have
you--and I notice you have not mentioned any such situations--
how many other examples of local self-help have you experienced
in helping soldiers, Marines, National Guard, Reserves up-armor
the vehicles for the young folks who are being deployed? Any of
you.
General Sorenson. Sir, I will try to answer that question
first.
I think there have been a number of examples where people
have gone to the local communities and tried to acquire some
steel to put on their vehicles. We have been aggressive in
pointing out to them that if the right steel, right composition
of steel, whether it is RHA, the rolled homogenous armor or the
high hard steel is not applied, then, in an IED incident, they
may be causing more problems than solving.
We have, I think at this point in time, gotten ahead of the
byway with respect to putting armor on vehicles. As you will
note here in the data that was provided, in many cases, we are
over requirements in terms of being able to satisfy what is
necessary. In fact, we have at this point in time with respect
to a total of armored vehicles, we have at this time 36,000
vehicles that basically have the armor. Now we are in the
process of changing out the level three, which essentially was
the headquarter's, Department of Army approved, steel provided
to units, provided to theater to put on vehicles and replacing
that with level two, which is a more hardened with ballistics
glass capability for the units and for the vehicles.
Mr. Skelton. I merely say I am proud of the citizens of
Jefferson City that took it upon themselves when the military
was not up-armoring the vehicles at that time.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
The gentleman from Colorado, Mr. Hefley.
Mr. Hefley. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Well, you know, it seems obvious that the IEDs are the big
threat, and that is what we are talking about armoring against.
And we have made huge investments in defeating the radio
frequency detonator IEDs with the use of jammers. So the enemy
adjusts to our technology it appears and are now beginning to
use more and more hardwired--or at least that is my
information, you can correct me if I am wrong on that. And I
would like to know what we are doing to defeat the high
hardwired threats. And also, have we explored the use of
spectral contrast or terrain analysis to find these hardwired
devices before they can be employed?
General Votel. Sir, I think I can address that one for you.
Certainly, we can characterize the enemy by being very
adaptive, very smart, very learning, very innovative in what he
is doing. And it is very clear to us from watching him and
studying him that he watches how we base our operations,
attempts to learn from those and then attempts to exploit what
he thinks are vulnerabilities. In theater, the radio control
device, initiated device, does remain the primary threat that
we are seeing. We have seen him do some other things and move
to, as you have suggested, some of the hardwired capabilities.
In general, some of the things that we are trying to do,
working with the services in helping us, is use some of our
aerial platforms, be they from an aero stat or from a UAV or
from some other type of fixed wing aircraft, to help us with
change detection technology that will allow us to identify
anomalies on the ground that will help us identify where these
devices are in place.
We are also pursuing a strategy for persistent
surveillance, things like NS microwave, the JLENS Raid Aero
stats and towers that we are moving in theater that provide us
long-term persistent surveillance over the high likelihood
areas where IEDs are placed so we can provide the long-term
persistent stare, if you will, that allows us to see what is
happening there.
And then I will tell you that I think the third thing that
we are doing is really helping focus on training for our
soldiers and Marines. A key piece of this, of identifying any
anomalies on the ground, really exists in the eyes of our
soldiers and Marines who are on patrol, be they from vehicles
or on their feet. They clearly are our best sensor. So what we
are attempting to do is make sure that we have provided the
best information and provided the most relevant current
training and situational awareness so they understand the
environment that they are going into and, more importantly,
they understand the enemy that they are fighting and how he
operates.
Mr. Hefley. I see the light is still green, and let me ask
one other quick question.
How did we get ourselves in this position? Did we have no
idea going in there that we would need armored vehicles? Are we
surprised that the IEDs became such a big deal?
General Catto. If I may, Congressman Hefley, remember this
has been an evolving theater. When the Marine Corps went back
in Iraq in early March, the threats were 60-millimeter, 81-
millimeter mortar kinds of rounds. That has evolved from the
lower kinds of munitions, 122- to 155-millimeter artillery
shells to 500-pound bombs, to double-stacked anti-tank mines,
et cetera.
As we have added armor, they have added greater explosives,
so as General Votel discussed, it is not just one solution, it
is a combination of good tactics, training and procedure with
our soldiers and Marines on the ground. It is using aerial
assets such as UAVs, fixed-wing assets, EA6s for our electronic
countermeasures in the air; and it is using IEDs and things
like explosive-sniffing dogs.
It is a game of improvements, changes, counter
improvements, changes. So there is no one solution.
General Mattis. Sir, if I could take a stab at that, as
well, if I were to sum up what I learned after 30 years in this
business, all combat is one improvisation after another. That
is all it is. The enemy has not made all of its adaptations
because they wanted to; they have been forced into positions.
For example, when we found their hard wires, the initial
way they set off IEDs, they went into direct attacks with small
arms. That didn't work out well for them, so they had to adapt
again. They went for the radio frequency. You are aware from
closed sessions what we have done to check and checkmate those,
and we forced them into other indirect fire modes.
But this is combat, and this is a thinking enemy up against
us. We are out-thinking them and we will continue to out-think
them.
I will tell you that something as small as a rifle scope
that we are putting on every Marine's rifle, thanks to the
money provided by the Congress, has turned out to be very
helpful in spotting those little antennas and the red wires
going off into the ditches and that sort of thing.
It is a very complex issue. We improvise better than the
enemy improvises; but it is a bloody issue, and we have to keep
improvising to stay ahead of it.
The Chairman. Thank you.
The gentleman from Massachusetts, Mr. Meehan.
Mr. Meehan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you very much,
Generals, for appearing.
General Sorenson, a recent GAO study found that the Army
has been consistently unable to meet reoccurring spikes in
demand for up-armored Humvees and add-on kits, which obviously
is a surprise to members of the committee who have worked hard
on this, including the chairman.
The GAO faulted the Pentagon for the shortfall, because it
didn't ramp up armor production to the maximum level. It also
pointed out that the Pentagon didn't release funds in a timely
and predictable manner, even though money had been appropriated
and was available.
The GAO recommended several actions for the Army to take.
They recommended that the Army update its war reserve
requirements at least every year to account for change in
operational tempo; and second, develop computer models that can
estimate supply requirements to deploying units as part of
prewar planning.
Can you comment on what the Army is doing to follow up on
those GAO recommendations?
General Sorenson. Yes, Congressman. Let me give you some
insight into what we are trying to do as we go forward here in
planning for future contingency operations and future
operations.
To date, what you have found in many cases as we tried to
ramp up, as previous Congressmen asked the question, Did we not
know what was going on, after the March to Baghdad, there was
clearly a need and an interest in the theater commanders to
move to a more motorized force. As the motorized force was
becoming more apparent on the streets, the enemy began to take
advantage of it and began to attack us with IEDs.
Subsequent to that, we began to try to do what we could do
with the vehicles we had, such as the M-1114, such as putting
armor on trucks, trucks that were never designed to carry armor
in some cases, and so we had to go through a lengthy process to
do that.
What we have learned from all this activity is that in the
future, we are going to be fighting as an expeditionary Army,
we are going to be fighting as a modular force, and we are
going to be fighting an asymmetric enemy. In order to contest
that, we have to be more flexible. So as a consequence of what
we are doing right now with our trucks and vehicles is
developing an armor strategy by which we will put armoring into
the chassis--armoring into the ballistic glass, armoring into
latches, armoring into the frame, increasing the engine
capability such that a vehicle would be almost like a
chameleon.
In an operation in terms of the move to Baghdad, where
speed was more of the essence, maybe you don't need the armor,
but as you go into stability operations, because that chassis,
because the engine, because the latches, because the glass are
there, we then hang the armor package on it; and it now
becomes, as opposed to an unarmored vehicle that was needed to,
if you will, proceed quickly, an armored vehicle that now
conducts stability operations.
That is what you are going to see in terms of the future.
And we are working at that right now with the consortium of
vehicle contractors and working through at this point in time
through fiscal year 2006, beginning to let contracts for these
kits that can be added on to the vehicles in the future.
Mr. Meehan. General, how much of the fiscal 2005
supplemental does the Army intend to use to purchase these M-
1114 Humvees?
And it was my understanding that the Army is planning a
transition from the M-1114, the fully armored, to the M-1151
version. What is the Army's plan for purchasing fully armored
1151 Humvees with both the underbody and the perimeter and
overhead kits? And how many and when?
General Sorenson. Sir, as we talked, as I was just
mentioning, we are going to buy the 1114s. We are going to buy
about a thousand 1114s through this next year. As we transition
to what we call the 1151-1152 vehicle, we will be procuring
those that will essentially have the frame, have the engine
armored with an underbody protection capability such that we
can add these packages on. And the intent is to move from the
1114, which is basically a standard armored vehicle that at
this point can only conduct stability operations to the point
where we can get a vehicle both to do combat operations and
then stability operations.
Mr. Meehan. General Votel, I am concerned the Army has not
fielded the best jammer technologies for the troops in Iraq.
The Army has spent $140 million sole-source contract to procure
the older Warlock jammer systems which have limited
effectiveness. At the same time, you are investing $500 million
in a competitive program for rapidly developing, proving and
fielding the next generation of jammer technologies.
How do you balance the immediate needs of our troops with
investing in what I think will be a more proven technology for
the future?
General Votel. Thank you, Congressman.
That is a difficult balance, and it is one that we are
constantly looking at. What is the overriding factor for us is
trying to provide protection to our soldiers and Marines and
forces deployed right now and trying to address the immediate
requirement; and that is what is taking priority for us.
So we are at the same time developing a next-generation
system, if you will, which is in testing as we speak here. We
are also continuing to procure some of our legacy systems that
are currently fielded. We are looking at ways to take systems
that we have in the field and give them additional capability,
and then we are doing things, as the chairman identified here,
of putting out rapidly developed, low-cost systems that can
address a portion of the threat.
Mr. Meehan. Mr. Chairman, I just want to compliment the
General, you and the task force's use of the Backscatter x-ray
imaging for force protection in Iraq. I am familiar with that;
there is a company in Massachusetts that I have visited, and it
is a source of pride to us, and I am just happy to see that
Backscatter x-ray imaging.
General Votel. We have had two reports in the last two
weeks where the Backscatter, the van model, has actually helped
us identify vehicle borne IEDs (VBID), giving indication to a
soldier and/or a Marine in each situation, and allowed us to
deal with that in another manner.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
The gentleman from Pennsylvania, Mr. Weldon.
Mr. Weldon. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I thank you for
appearing here. I apologize for having had to go out and back,
but I had a number of other things going on, like our
colleagues do. But this is an extremely important hearing to
all of us, and to me personally as the chairman of the Tactical
Air and Land Forces Subcommittee.
As you heard me say in my opening statement, I am not a
happy camper right now. I am embarrassed and I feel let down. I
feel let down because the responsibility of this committee is
to oversee the safety and services of our military personnel
when they enter harm's way, and they have done that. It was
this committee that stepped out ahead of this Administration a
year ago, saying we could not stand for the budget that was
being requested which called for a cut in the Army's net
funding for this year. And we requested a $25 billion
supplemental when the White House didn't want it.
It was this committee who saw the need to provide
additional support for our troops, and we fought that battle
even though we knew that it would cause us problems personally
in the case of the members on this side of the aisle with our
Administration, but we did the right thing.
It was this committee back in 1996 when the Pentagon said
they didn't want to arm the Predator. It was this committee
that put language into the defense bill that called for the
armoring of the Predator when the services did not request it,
and we had the vision to see. And three, four years later
everyone took credit for what this committee had done, even
though the first year we did it in a bill that was blocked by
the Pentagon.
And so I come to this hearing with a sense of outrage. I
can't tell you the number of homes I have sat in with families
whose soldiers have come home in body bags. I know you take the
loss of any life seriously. I sat in the home of a young Marine
in Bridgeport, Pennsylvania, who had just married before he
went in; and I tried to console his wife and his parents.
Last week, I was at another event for a soldier that fell
in January, and I was with his brother, who is still serving in
Iraq, and his parents. And like our colleagues here, we have to
live with this, and we take it very seriously.
When we think and have been told that a problem has been
resolved, or is being resolved, then we believe that. This
staff director should not have to go out to companies to
double-check whether or not they are doing what they said they
would do, but we did it.
And I would thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the
documentation--and I would urge all of our colleagues to look
at that to give you the complete assessment of what this
committee has done on this issue of armoring and providing
personal protection for the troops. We will take a back seat to
no one in that support.
But what really offends me, and I have to say this to my
Marine Corps friends--and you remember very well my first term
in Congress; I fought the Administration and I fought the
current Vice President and led the effort to restore the V-22
program, which took us 12 years. You know I was in the
forefront of that, and it was tough; but we won the day because
it was what the Marines deserved to have to provide the over-
the-horizon medium lift capability they needed.
I am absolutely overwhelmingly offended when I read reports
that a Marine captain, Kelly Royer, commander of E Company, a
company that suffered the largest casualties of any company in
the theater the six months they were there, is perhaps being
railroaded out of the Corps because he simply spoke up about
the troops that he was leading.
Now I am not going to perceive to know who Royer is. I have
no idea who the guy is. I never met him; I never talked to him.
But I do know he came out and publicly spoke out about his
frustration with his company not being properly protected.
Instead of what I think should have been the proper
response, which was to have everybody join in and fight the
system and demand that the work be done to protect those
troops, it appears as though--it appears as though he is being
singled out now, even though past reports of his career, which
I read into the record and I am going to read into the record
again, were positive.
``On May 31, 2004,'' his fitness report and I quote, ``he
has single-handedly reshaped the company in sore need of a
leader, succeeded in forming a cohesive fighting force that is
battle tested and worthy,'' unquote. Those are pretty strong
words. And then I have other quotes that I assume came from his
personnel file.
Now he is being found to be dictatorial with no morale or
motivation in his Marines. Perhaps it is just coincidental that
the one report was before he spoke out and the second was after
he spoke out. But I am going to tell you, as one Member of
Congress, I am not going to sit still until we find out. If it
can't be done in open session, then we want a closed session.
Will you tell us why the reports about Captain Royer have
been changed?
And so, General, I would ask you and the public to tell me,
do you have any indication that there is any attempt to punish
directly, or indirectly, Captain Royer for having spoken out
about the problems of E Company?
General Mattis. Congressman Weldon, I can assure you, I can
unequivocally state that this has nothing to do with him
speaking out. I used to speak to Captain Royer probably on a
several-times-a-month basis. My headquarters was in Ramadi. I
didn't focus on it any more than the other places.
But you know, sir, have you ever been disappointed when you
found out something that you didn't know what was going on?
When NCOs come forward, when sergeants come forward with a
concern, I have always found it very well advised for an
officer to dismiss the NCOs' concerns. The pressures, as some
of you who have served, the pressures you understand on company
and battalion commanders in the midst of a tough fight are
beyond my ability to explain them.
Take one of our most articulate associate justices of the
Supreme Court, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., who was an infantry
officer in the Civil War; and he said--speaking to his fellow
veterans many years after the war, he said, ``We have shared
the uncommunicable experience of war.''
So I am probably not going to articulate it well, sir, but
I would tell you the last thing that any commander, any
battalion commander, ever wanted to do--and the battalion
commander joins us here today--is to relieve one of his company
commanders. The pressures on a company commander in combat,
especially one in an intense fight, to hold the key terrain of
Ramadi--and that was the key terrain; for all you have heard of
Fallujah, Ramadi was the key terrain. That battalion was given
more up-armored Humvees than any other, by a factor of two,
because of the nature of the fight there.
The fight there, that was written about in that New York
Times article, was over a year ago.
[The information referred to can be found in the Appendix
on page 142.]
General Mattis. We had 17 different forms of armor on the
1st Marine Division vehicles at that time. And to set the
tactical context for when that article starts out, the supply
lines out of Kuwait had virtually been cut in the northern
Babil area. Army troops, already completing a 12-month tour,
were being turned around in Kuwait to return to Iraq and
relieve us, so it could bring more assault battalions into the
fight in Fallujah that had been blown up at the same time.
Out on the Syrian border, Husaiba was under severe attack.
We lost the company commander and four NCOs in the first hour
of fighting. Ramadi was an open fight. The enemy got their back
broken, and from that time until June, there was no fight left
in the enemy in Ramadi.
They have recovered since that time. They are an adaptive
enemy.
My point to you is that in the midst of what was going on,
this company was standing strongly against the enemy. But when
NCOs, months later, come in with concerns, the battalion
commander took the last step he ever wanted to take; and I
support him in what he decided to do. It had nothing to do
with, since that time, his concerns. We addressed his concerns
every day, as we did with every company commander, but that was
war and the enemy surged against us.
And you are aware of what happened in Fallujah. We went in,
we stopped, we came back out at this time; and we had to ship
troops hundreds of miles while a robust enemy assassination
campaign killed the people in many places that had been working
with us. It was not a good time and we eventually restored the
situation, but there are costs not just in lives lost and
wounded, but also costs in terms of people's identities and the
challenges to our character.
And I can explain more in private session.
Mr. Weldon. I would appreciate a private session. I am not
trying to second-guess what our military officers do. That is
not my job, and I never want that to be my job. I have total
confidence in our leadership.
And maybe this report is wrong, that the leadership
overseeing Captain Royer on May 31 of a year ago--which wasn't
even a year ago, was about 11 months ago--made such very, very
strong, positive comments about the leadership qualities of
this Marine. I didn't write those comments. I don't know who
did. You know who did. But somebody wrote--they weren't
mediocre comments, but extremely strong comments about the work
of this leader 11 months ago.
And I understand the New York Times article was about
issues that happened months ago, but the point is, something
changed. Maybe it was the officer himself that changed, which
is what you are saying, but you can understand why perhaps we
would be somewhat suspect if that officer had also come out and
publicly spoken out about the concerns of the troops under him,
especially when that unit was the most heavily hit unit in
terms of suffering casualties in theater.
I look forward to a private session with you, and I would
thank again the chairman and the deputy staff director for
their outstanding work on this issue.
The Chairman. And let me suggest, Mr. Weldon, that we will
accommodate a private session, General, if we could. Anything
else would disserve the officer in the process. We will do
that.
The gentleman from Arkansas, Dr. Snyder.
Dr. Snyder. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, gentlemen for being here. I hope you all know
how glad we are that you are here. I hope you also are feeling
very, very uncomfortable about being here because there is a
lot of dissatisfaction on this committee, the Congress and the
American people. If it makes you feel any better, most of us
are very uncomfortable with our position here.
I have a different take on this than Mr. Weldon. I think we
have also dropped the ball, that we have thought that, well, if
we just have a funding level when someone says they are short
of money and we pump money into it, that is good enough.
That is not good enough. That is not the kind of oversight
that Congress needs to be providing, the kind of attention. It
should not take a young man standing up in Iraq at a town
meeting that Secretary Rumsfeld is holding on December 8,
making the comments that he does. That generates another focus
on this kind of issue.
So I think this is a very painful day for all of us, but
the goal is the same, I think, to get better. I assume this is
the report that Mr. Meehan was referring to, the GAO report
that came out in April of this year.
I ask unanimous consent that this could be inserted in the
record in its entirety.
The Chairman. Without objection.
Dr. Snyder. And the title of it is, Actions Needed to
Improve the Availability of Critical Items During Current and
Future Operations. In just one of--their very brief, one-page
summary, they say, ``While U.S. troops develop short-term
solutions to manage item shortage during OIF, DOD and its
services have begun to undertake systemic long-term changes to
fix some supply problems identified. While GAO did not evaluate
their potential for success, the majority of the changes are
focused on distribution and not on the full gambit of systemic
deficiencies that GAO identified.''
[The information referred to is retained in the committee
files and can be viewed upon request.]
Dr. Snyder. I think you have some pretty knowledgeable
people saying you are not there yet; you are going to have
other problems down the line. It not just the distribution
system. I look at it as a pyramid. In Congress, I think we
think the top of this pyramid is funding, that if we are giving
you proper funding and have our laws stay out of your way for
procurement, we are doing our job.
But that is not accurate. If the problem down below is
distribution systems and proper planning, information, all
those kinds of things, if the stones in the pyramid below are
inadequate, the pyramid crumbles and it doesn't matter what is
on top.
One of the problems that we have had on this committee on
this issue--and in my view, a lot of issues--is getting
information. We have been told multiple times, I don't know how
many times, that the industrial capacity was at full capacity,
maximum capacity, that everything was being done to produce
armor that could be; and it turned out not to be accurate.
I was really struck in the last week when the information
in one of the newspapers came out about the death of Pat
Tillman, and they make very strong statements that information
was withheld from the American public that this was a
fratricide incident until after this brave man's funeral. I
don't think that does his family or the American people any
favors.
It is a problem that this Congress and the American people
have had about getting information about these kinds of
problems, and it is very, very frustrating. And we are now two
years into this war and still having problems getting the
information.
I commend you for being here today. I hope and I know you
are working very, very hard to solve this, but we all are not
doing the kind of job--we are not having the kind of success
that we would like to have; and in my view, that includes this
committee also.
One specific, detailed question, General Catto: You
mentioned March. What March are you talking about?
General Catto. March of 2004.
Dr. Snyder. March of 2004, so a year ago. And would you
repeat again what you said about the changing threat? Did I
understand you to say at that time that IEDs were not
considered the kind of threat you were dealing with?
General Catto. That is correct. In a low level, we did not
have a lot of incidents of IEDs at that time frame, and they
have increasingly become a bigger threat with more incidents,
greater explosives, et cetera.
Dr. Snyder. Are you saying they had been a threat and
dropped off, or they have continued to escalate since that
time?
General Catto. They have continued to escalate since the
time the Marine Corps went back into Iraq until the present
time.
Dr. Snyder. Mr. Reyes has made a lot of trips to Iraq, and
Mr. Weldon and the chairman and others. I have made several
trips, and prior to March, I was in Iraq; and in my office I
have a picture of me sitting in a mess hall, talking to some
troops. And there is a poster right behind us--this is a mess
hall photo that says, ``Beware of IEDs.'' That was six months
before. I am confused on this time frame.
General Mattis. If I could take a stab at this, what we are
getting here: The Marines came out of Iraq for a period. The
first IEDs that hit us the summer before, we went through 5-1/2
months of stability operation. We didn't lose one sailor or
Marine killed. The IEDs were small, ineffective, and relatively
easy to hunt down the people who were laying them.
They adapted. Basically they made bigger IEDs and went to
RF stuff.
We came out of Iraq in October. The IED threat matured. We
got the word we are going back in November. General Kelly, my
assistant division commander, and I flew back into Iraq in
November and December. General Catto joined us in December with
modifications to armored kits, and we began the armoring.
In March, when we came in, we were hit by a limited number
of IEDs, you are right, but the Marine Corps was out of the
theater, and the 82nd Airborne was turned over to us in March.
We have a little gap.
Just like politics, every war is local. They are all local.
We didn't see the maturation. We picked up from 82nd Airborne's
great turnover to us, what we were coming back for; that is
what we were armoring our vehicles for.
Dr. Snyder. My time is up, but one of the issues that has
been talked about, we have this turnover. I guess you are
saying there was not adequate communication between the units
that you were replacing, that somehow our sharing of
intelligence when we have that kind of transition on these
rotations----
General Mattis. Quite the opposite. The 82nd Airborne
warned us about what we were going into.
We got the word in November we were going back in. The
ships were still at sea bringing our gear home. They arrived in
December. General Catto was at my headquarters with armored
solutions that we began producing in January. We were going as
fast as we could, and it was thanks to the 82nd Airborne's very
keen attention and getting us that information, we knew what we
were getting back into over there, sir.
Dr. Snyder. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman. I would direct the
gentlemen to look at the time line and the actions taken by the
staff team that the committee has put into action. I don't know
if he has taken a look at that, but they have worked steadily.
We have compressed schedules. We have driven reprogramming.
We have met with union leadership and business leadership to
reopen mills and to keep them operating at full capacity. So
our team--I want our members to know that our team has been out
there. And if they look at the key points where we compressed
the schedules on the 7,000 kits in April of 2004, how we have
driven the reprogramming on IEDs, I want our members to know
that our staff team, that has been dedicated to this, has been
active.
Look at the road map that we have provided there for you.
Dr. Snyder. Mr. Chairman, may I respond?
The Chairman. I certainly would like to have the gentleman
respond, but I heard the gentleman say that there is more to
this than just simply funding money. And the committee has been
doing more than providing money.
Dr. Snyder. It is also a bigger issue than just this armor.
The GAO report talks about problems with batteries, tires,
vehicles, body armor, meals ready-to-eat, vehicle generators.
I appreciate what you all have done and what the committee
staff has done on this specific issue and what members do in
terms of bringing this to the attention of the American people,
but there are problems out there that we will continue to have
problems addressing; and it is going to bite us again. I mean,
that is what GAO is predicting.
Well, thank you.
The Chairman. That is why we are having this hearing and
that is why we had four classified hearings on the force
protection situation, to see what we can do from this point,
how we can move forward and how we can accelerate the programs
we have initiated.
The gentleman from Nevada, Mr. Gibbons.
Mr. Gibbons. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I would
like to ask General Votel about the training our soldiers
receive in improvised explosive devices before they are
deployed over there.
As I understand it today, our soldiers are not receiving a
lot of training here in the United States, but more likely
receive their training in IEDs when they deploy, immediately
before they deploy to overseas.
In your opinion, General, how great is the need to
establish a training center, an IED training center, for our
soldiers to experience IED environments before they are
deployed overseas?
General Votel. Thank you, sir. I think it is very important
that we provide a high-quality experience for our soldiers and
our Marines and everyone who is deploying, so they have the
opportunity to practice and train in the environment in which
they are going to fight.
My observation is, I think we are well on our way to doing
that with the resources that we already have at the National
Training Center out in California, at the Joint Readiness
Training Center in Louisiana and, on the Army side, the
Combined Arms Training Center in Hunfeld, Germany. All of those
locations for Army forces are being used to train units to be
there. And we talk directly with the commanders and the
operations officers that run those training areas to ensure
that they have the latest information and that we are
replicating the environment as closely as we can.
Mr. Gibbons. What kind of physical environment is best
suited for an IED training center? What do you need? Is it an
area where you can utilize technology for defeat of IEDs as
well as the experience of detecting and disarming IEDs? What
kind of environment do you need and do we have that environment
in these centers that you are talking about?
General Votel. Yes, sir, I do. At the training center in
California, it is an environment that is uniquely suited to
what we are doing. I know that historically has been a place
where we have trained a lot of our large, armored mobile forces
on the Army side, but they have undergone a fairly remarkable
transformation to build up villages and to replicate some of
the urban environment that exists in Iraq. And so what we have
tried to do is provide this combination of open terrain and
urban terrain that we do see in Iraq.
One of the things we are seeing is, we have made very good
use of Yuma Proving Ground, Yuma, of course, being an Army
facility. Also it is home to the Joint Experimentation range
complex that has been put together with OSD money, and we made
an additional investment to more closely replicate not just the
physical environment--that is, roads, buildings--but also some
of the background signatures, cell phone nets, other
atmospherics that are necessary for us to go in and test the
equipment, or the particular solutions we are looking at, and
test it against an environment that we can closely replicate to
what we see in Iraq.
There is a combination of training areas, like we have at
the NTC, that are very suitable; and there are test facilities
out in Yuma, Arizona, that are very suitable to what we are
doing. And there are things going on in other places.
In Louisiana, at the Joint Readiness Training Center, the
terrain is a little bit different than it might be Iraq or
Afghanistan. Nonetheless, we are able to replicate many of the
situations very successfully there.
Both of the training centers have made huge investments in
trying to provide HUMINT roles who actually replicate the
people on the ground. So we are doing a good job of trying to
replicate that and close the gap between what units experience
in training and what they are going to experience when they get
into theater.
Mr. Gibbons. Are there any restrictions that you are
running into, or obstructions that you are running into, with
regard to the utilization of electronic countermeasures for
IEDs that influence the training in any of these areas?
General Votel. Yes, sir, there are some FCC regulations. We
are working through the Spectrum Management office in the
Pentagon to help us with that. We have been successful in
working through some of those to get some access to frequencies
that we can use to prove to soldiers. Of course, confidence in
these systems is paramount in making sure that they are used
properly and we have soldiers set up. So we have had some
success in doing that and we are continuing to do that.
One of the other things we are doing is, we are working in
conjunction with the rapid equipping force. We have gone out
and purchased a number of training boxes, if you will, that
replicate the current family of Warlock systems, and we have
bought a fairly large number of those, about 500 of each of
those. Those are in the process of being produced. We think we
will have the first deliveries here in about three weeks, and
we will be sending these out to the training sites so they will
have, in numbers, these training devices that can be used and
can replicate the capabilities in a training environment.
Mr. Gibbons. Thank you, General. And I hope during the
course of all this that you will let us know what we can do to
assist you in providing the training needs that will help our
soldiers, sailors and airmen deal with these IEDs in a very
forward-looking, forward-leaning fashion.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
The gentleman from New Jersey, Mr. Andrews.
Mr. Andrews. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to thank
the witnesses for their testimony this morning and acknowledge
the fact that no one has cared more or worked harder about
protecting these young men and women than you have and the
people you represent. We appreciate your efforts.
I also want to say that it is clear to me that the efforts
of Chairman Hunter and Mr. Taylor and Mr. Skelton and Mr.
Simmons, a lot of members of this committee, have made a
difference, and I express my appreciation to them as well.
I am hearing really two stories or two parts of one story
here. The first is the story as to what happened after about
November of 2003, when we heard that it was going to become a
top priority to get more armor into the field. And that story
has had fits and starts and it has told us a lot about the
labyrinth of the military bureaucracy in dealing with the
private sector. There have been successes and failures, and I
think the hearing properly focuses on how to make the successes
greater.
I am interested in the first part of the story, which is
how we got to a point, before November of 2003, where we were
so poorly prepared. It is my understanding, General Sorenson,
in your written testimony, that we deployed 235 up-armored
Humvees during the initial phase of combat; and our present
goal, if I am not mistaken, is 10,345.
That is a colossal difference, one for which you are not
responsible. It is your job to fill the order. But I am
heartsick about the inaccuracy and inadequacy of the orders
that were placed with you.
You were quoted in an article in the Philadelphia Enquirer
talking about the beginning of the insurgencies and saying that
no one, no one, predicted in the insurgency a potential to use
these IEDs so widely. When did you first get asked to ramp up
production of the up-armored vehicles and by whom?
General Sorenson. Sir, thank you for the question.
I arrived at the Pentagon about October of 2003, shortly
after the AUSA convention. And at that time, I was beginning to
get briefings with respect to what was going on in theater and
the fact that we were beginning to see incidents of IEDs and we
were looking at what were potential ways to respond to that.
At the same point in time, we went back and began to look
at what was in the laboratories, testing communities, at the
time ARL was putting together some door kits that you could add
on to a Humvee.
But going back to your other question about the 1114, this
vehicle in terms of what the basis of issue was only for
reconnaissance soldiers and MPs who were going to be conducting
military operations: Subsequent to that, we have found, because
of the IEDs and the stability operations and the fact that we
had never anticipated, if you will, this type of a threat, we
had to go back and go ahead to begin to armor.
I will go back and make one point. When we put together a
kit in response to Bosnia, we built the kit for the Humvee that
essentially had a lot of body armor underneath, but not so much
to the side. As we began to look at the threat in terms of what
we were encountering in Iraq, we found that the threat wasn't
to the bottom, but was to the side because the IED explosives
were coming from the side.
Mr. Andrews. At some point there is a sea change. We go
from having 200 and some of these armored vehicles to rushing
to get ourselves over 10,000. Frankly, the track record in the
months at the end of calendar 2003 is not bad. You have ramped
up 8,000-and-something right now. But I am less interested in
the industrial production than I am the paradigm shift in
people's thinking. Who was it that came to you and said, you
know, we need a lot more of these things in a hurry; and when
did that happen?
General Sorenson. Sir, I would have to go back and create--
we have some time lines and time charts, and I can respond to
that for the record.
[The information referred to can be found in the Appendix
beginning on page 158.]
Mr. Andrews. I would appreciate your doing that.
Let me ask you a related question. I know you cannot and
should not disclose sensitive intelligence. I am not asking you
to do that, but who is advising you how many of these things we
are going to need a year from now and what is the basis of
their advice?
General Sorenson. Sir, I think, again, if you look at the
data we have provided here, we have begun to fund for in excess
of the requirement. And right now, we are postured to do that
with the kits we currently have in production as well as the
up-armored Humvee.
At this point, Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC) has
been working this particular issue, looking at lessons learned,
looking at what the future operations of the Army would be,
looking at what the future armored requirements are going to
be. In the June time frame, they are to report back to
headquarters with respect to what they think the potential
armored solutions.
Mr. Andrews. I know the committee would be interested in
hearing what that recommendation is.
I just close with this point: One of the reasons that I
think our military is so successful is that it is your training
and your orientation to anticipate the worst and prepare for
it, and then if anything short of that happens, we are home
free. And I am just dismayed, dismayed, that planners above
your pay grade did not follow that practice in this case and
seemingly assumed the best, received the worst, and we are here
in this predicament as a result of it today.
Thank you.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
The gentleman from North Carolina, Mr. Hayes.
Mr. Hayes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I think this has been a
very valuable hearing in a long series of hearings in this
particular subject. Let me first start by making a comment.
General Mattis, I think you have an extremely clear and
accurate view, so stated somewhere on the West Coast not long
ago about our objective in this whole process, and that is to
destroy the enemy. And I want to compliment you on your clear
and concise view and also your willingness to articulate that.
Along the same line, you also made a comment--I think it is
valuable for the committee to seize on the day you spoke about
taking over for the 82nd. And I suspect that was General
Swannack that you replaced. The sequence of events that
occurred and the rate at which, or the nature by which, the
battle reshaped itself with the passage of time, I think is
very important.
There have been statements made that we all care about--
Weldon, Andrews, acquisition of armor, installation, very
important. But there are a lot of facts, and you really touched
on something in there that I don't think we really grasped
before, the evolution of what has happened here; and I think we
need to think about that before going forward.
And my good friend, Dr. Snyder, I appreciate his
participation, and he is a faithful member, but I take
exception to his characterization, as the chairman did, about
our awareness and the aggressive way that the committee and the
military have pursued the issue of armor and IED jammers--the
four classified hearings, very important, and we continue to do
that.
I remember Mr. Simmons on my right and others have visited
sites and encouraged numerous, various manufacturers and others
to get on the ball and get this material. The Philadelphia
Enquirer article, I was shocked and disappointed.
There is a long history here of what happened. We could
have done a lot better job. We don't need to dwell on that.
What we do need to dwell on is the acquisition process. We
would love to measure responses with a stopwatch. Typically,
when the Pentagon gets involved, it becomes a calendar. But an
acquisition, you are talking about carbon dating to find out
what is going on.
I think part of what we talk about coming out of here today
is the acquisition process. This committee has very, very
strongly supported our industrial defense base in this country.
We have not received similar support from some folks in the
Pentagon and some folks in the other body--I guess we can call
them the Senate here.
Our industrial defense base is vitally important. When we
call on them, and if you look at the reports here today, you
find training of people in Pennsylvania and Ohio, having them
and the personnel ready to go 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
I hope, General Votel and General Sorenson, that is a part
of our lessons learned as we go forward today, because there
are some vital lessons that we can carry forward that will put
us in a position to respond in the future to the always- and
ever-changing battlefield.
Now for a question, General Votel and General Sorenson. As
we look at the whole issue of armoring, whether we begin with
an armored vehicle or add on later, a part of our forward-
looking consists of new materials that can be used that are
lighter and even more effective. My understanding is that there
are some ceramic and glass materials, laminating structures,
that could improve and strengthen efficiency.
Are we using that as a part to respond to all the issues we
have talked about with armor?
General Sorenson. Let me answer that question, and the
answer is absolutely ``yes.'' to date, even in our armoring
strategy and armoring efforts to date, we have had about 60
vendors provide technical solutions for armoring, everything
from steel to composites and more elaborate capabilities. Of
those, we have tested over 300 solutions. As we go into the
future, as I was describing before, the intent is to get to
some composites, to some steel, basically a standard common
application that we can put on many of our vehicles in order to
reduce the logistics requirements, as well as provide a better
surge capability.
If we can get the same ballistic glass, or the same latch
or the same door to go on more of our vehicles, we could better
respond with respect to more vendors with improved solutions.
And the intent at this point in time is to look at--in many
cases, to look at our science and technology base.
Mr. Hayes. One more question, if I may. Are you looking at
glass ceramics and glass laminates as future armor decisions?
Are you familiar with those?
General Sorenson. I am familiar with those, and as I
mentioned before, I think we are looking at those in our
science and technology base at the present time, yes.
Mr. Hayes. Thank you, gentlemen, for your service.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. The gentleman from Mississippi, Mr. Taylor.
Mr. Taylor. Let me begin by thanking you generals for being
here. I believe each of you is a combat veteran from this war,
and I thank you for your service in doing that.
I would like to echo the remarks that my friend from
Arkansas said. I am not particularly pleased, and I am
certainly displeased with what has happened. I don't think our
Nation has anywhere near shown the commitment that our young
men and women in the field deserve.
I think it started with sending troops off to war and
saying only the front line troops need the best body armor. If
you recall, the Guardsmen and Reservists did not have it and
people needlessly died. And I would remind this committee that
despite all of the money we have thrown at the problem--we have
thrown a lot of money at the problem.
The day after that Tennessee Guardsman questioned Secretary
Rumsfeld, I went to Rock Island and there were a dozen people
in white coats telling me why they couldn't get the job done,
while three blue collar workers were working on a Friday
afternoon. Now, tell me that is the national commitment to
solve the problem.
With the jammers, I mean, let us face it, the game that
keeps getting played is, we are fulfilling the requirement.
Requirement is artificially low; requirement isn't every
vehicle. Everybody in this room knows the only reason that the
number of jammers is classified is because they don't want the
American people to know how few are protected.
I appreciate General Votel's efforts, and I appreciate what
the guys are doing at Indian Head. People are working on it.
But we, as a Nation, have been so incredibly inconsistent on
this war.
George Bush says he is a wartime President. Well, doggone
it, if he can find the time to go out and pitch Social
Security, he can find the time to make these programs happen
because kids are needlessly dying. And I suspect that half the
kids in Iraq needlessly died because of lack of armor, body
armor, and lack of jammers.
I think the next thing we need to address--and we do all
get ready to serve on programs and--I know I do; we are not
addressing the need to change the shape of the vehicles.
Pressure detonated mines are now causing a lot of injuries over
there.
Bottom line is, almost all the vehicles we have over there
have flat bottoms. I am a boater. I understand boats probably
better than a lot of folks. A flat-bottom boat hits a wave, it
bounces up. A V-bottom boat hits the same wave, it slices
through it. That explosion going off underneath the vehicle is
a wave. And until we start changing the shape of our vehicles,
we can have all the armor, but if that vehicle gets thrown 10,
20 yards, the people in it get severely injured.
I don't hear much talk about changing that. And, again,
does that have to be the fourth mistake we make? Why don't we
start addressing it today? And the last thing, why is it that a
Nation that is at war can't turn to these factories and say,
make it, because the truth of the matter is, this body is
afraid to declare war on the insurgents in Iraq. If we had
declared war as a body, then our Nation would be in a position
to call the steel mills, to call the ballistic glass folks and
call American manufacturing, what is left of it, and say, Make
the things our troops need.
Gentlemen, I realize you have been the pinatas de jour. I
appreciate your service, but before we start pointing the
finger at them, every member of this committee ought to look in
the mirror as to whether or not we are making the commitment as
a Nation. We can find the time to cut taxes for Paris Hilton.
We can find the time to pass a $1.5 trillion prescription drug
benefit, but somehow we haven't found the time to take care of
the troops.
Getting to the question of V-bottom vehicles, gentlemen,
what kind of progress is being made toward that? And again do
we have to wait until we field 20,000 flat-bottom Humvees with
armor before we finally decide it is time to move on to
something. Again, I don't care who makes it as long as it is
made in this country, but do a better job of protecting the
kids in the field.
General Votel. I will address a couple of things that we
are doing with respect to the shape of vehicles.
One of the areas which we deal with on the IED task force
is the functional capability for our engineering units and
others to go out and perform route clearance. Clearly, keeping
the lines of communication, the roads, the systems that we rely
on for operations, for our logistics is vitally important.
What we have done is, we have gone out and brought into the
theater vehicles like the Buffalo, which comes with a specific
V-shaped hull design and provides the type of protection that
is afforded by that design. So that is in service with our
engineering units, who are primarily doing route clearance
operations for us right now. And the response we are getting
from them is overwhelmingly positive.
One of the things we have recently done, really taking a
cue from the Marine Corps, is procuring a vehicle we call the
Cougar. This is designed as a joint EOD, explosive ordinance
disposal, force vehicle, and it does have a V-shaped hull. It
is produced in South Carolina. The Marine Corps moved out on
that, and we watched that closely and saw the advantage of that
right away in making sure our forces--most of those who are
responding to these types of situations with IEDs and have, in
combination with Army supplemental money and money that we have
taken out of the Iraqi Freedom Fund, fully funded the expedited
production of those. We will see some coming into theater as
early as August.
Mr. Taylor. What is your goal on that?
General Votel. We are working on 122--our focus is on EOD
teams that are in the theater of operations, Iraq, Afghanistan,
the Horn of Africa, and that is how we have addressed it
through the IED task force because that is what our focus is.
We clearly recognize there are ramifications for the long-term
force, and so we are working with the institutional part of the
Army to make sure that we are programming for these in the long
term.
General Sorenson. If I may add to that, right now I believe
you are aware of the fact in the data that was provided here,
we have 395 armored security vehicles which essentially have a
V-shaped hull. In the supplemental, we have put a requirement
in there to buy an additional 824, bringing it up to almost
over 1,100.
To date, the amount we are trying to satisfy is about 872,
and we will intend to do that by the fiscal year 2006 time
frame.
Mr. Taylor. Gentlemen, what is the target date that you can
assure this committee that before troops rotate to Iraq, they
will have trained with jammers here in the States? And the
reason I say this, right now I have got close to 4,000
Mississippians over there. They never saw a jammer until they
arrived in Iraq, never trained with one in the States and were
told they were trained with them in Kuwait. That never
happened; the first time they saw it was in Iraq. And many of
the jammers they received did not have the software in it.
That is water under the bridge. I regret that happened, but
there will be other units rotating into theater. What is the
game plan so that there are enough jammers that they can train
in the United States, since we are losing half of our
casualties to IEDs, and that they will be proficient at this
before they get to the theater?
General Votel. Sir, I will address that. As we last talked
here, three, four weeks, we have gone back to the rapid
equipment force and we have made an immediate purchase here of
500 of each of the types of jammers, training devices, if you
will, of each of the major Warlock systems that we have fielded
in the theater. That is under contract and we think we will
have the first systems here in about three, four weeks. We
think production will be completed in about 16 weeks.
Our goal is to basically take those devices and equally
break them between the major training sites where forces are
undergoing training so that, as they go to the mobilization
sites and as they go through their rehearsal exercises at the
combat training centers, they will have systems in number to
train with.
We are moving training sets down into Kuwait so that as
they go through some of the training that takes place there,
the refinement training, others will be able to reinforce that
and do so with real devices.
Mr. Taylor. The troops that are rotating in now are trained
with jammers prior to going into theater? The rotations in
January and May?
General Votel. I can't speak necessarily for the Marine
Corps rotation. For the Army rotation, for the most part, I
think that is pretty much complete now. They have got in some
amount of training back here and they get training from the
Explosives Hazards Awareness team and from folks off of our
task force. They come through Kuwait. That is what this
rotation has got.
General Mattis. For the Marines and sailors going in, part
of them, whether they be aviation Marines or combat service
supporter infantry, all of them go through training at March
Air Force Base where we train them in urban terrain. We are
building a center at Twenty-nine Palms.
Right now we have to split the training between March Air
Force Base and Twenty-nine Palms. Twenty-nine Palms is the only
place we have the waiver in order to actually use the improved
counter-IED equipment. And so they all get it and have been
getting it for several months. I would have to check on when it
started, but all of them in country now have training on the
gear they use.
Mr. Taylor. Thank you, gentlemen, for your service to our
country.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
And I want to remind the gentleman and the rest of the
committee that we will vote momentarily on this supplemental,
which has in it the dollars that we are going to use to
proliferate some new technology into theater. And we are not
going to proliferate it in the old way, that is, we are going
to surge production, using lots of companies; it is not going
to be a long, slow acquisition trail. And we are going to move
it in very, very quickly; and it is being done under our new
license that directs getting the contract under way within 15
days.
But we look forward to working with you, General Votel, on
that program.
The gentleman from Minnesota, Mr. Kline.
Mr. Kline. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, gentlemen, for being here. You can sense a
certain frustration among the members of the committee.
My colleague, the gentleman from Mississippi, expressed his
concern that we couldn't find the time and the money to defend
our troops. I disagree with that. I think this committee has
shown that it is willing to spend the time in briefings and
hearings, in visits to bases and stations and plants around the
country and, of course, to our troops in theater. And certainly
we have shown a willingness to spend money, and we are going to
spend some more today to protect our troops.
There has been some discussion today about what went wrong,
what failed. Well, clearly when we do acquisition for the
Pentagon, we have a system that is, as my colleague said,
sometimes carbon dated in identifying requirements and planning
and programming and budgeting to make sure that we are buying
the best equipment, the right equipment for our troops, and
getting it fielded on time; and I think we would have to agree
that somehow that system let us down here. We didn't properly
plan, program, budget, execute to get our troops the equipment
that they needed in the form of armored vehicles, which were
never designed to be armored in the first place. But we didn't
foresee that need and we didn't get that equipment and
appropriate devices to counter the IED threat. So that is where
we are today.
We have been scrambling on this committee, and I know you
have, to make up for what is clearly a failure in that system,
to get the equipment that our Marines and soldiers need on the
ground. And this committee, under this chairman, has taken
extraordinary steps to give you the latitude, to give the
Secretary the latitude to get things done quickly, to bypass
the carbon-dating process and get at least to a count of the
process, if not the stopwatch, which we would like to see. And
yet we continue to be frustrated.
And we are counting the numbers and the percentages, and is
it the right requirement? And what we want to do is make sure
that our soldiers and Marines have got what it takes to keep
them as safe as we can keep soldiers and Marines engaged in
combat.
So the question is, what more can we do to get either
regulations out of the way, to get you money faster? What more
can we do to kick this thing where it needs to be kicked and
move us down the road faster?
Now, we are always going to be chasing--General Mattis very
eloquently described the situation we have in combat. We are
dealing with an adaptive enemy, so our requirements are
changing right now in real time while we are sitting here. And
that archaic, decades-long, established system of identifying
those requirements and validating them and then programming
them is not responsive enough.
I guess I will give up on my speech and just ask the
question again. Would anybody like to step up to it? What more
can we do to move this thing so that we can acquire things in
the same responsive way that you insist that your solders and
Marines do in the field?
General Catto. Congressman Kline, one thing that would be
very helpful to us: As we talk about looking at what can we do
for the future, let's take a second and talk about
survivability in vehicles. We are at about the 98 percent point
in what we can do to make vehicles better. You can't put any
more armor on these things. We are breaking the springs; the
suspensions can't--the enemy continues to put bigger
explosives, et cetera. We are just at the peak of what we can
do.
We need to look at vehicle design from the tires up. It has
to be for survivability where you have a combination of
deployability in terms of--if you look at the Cougar, that
thing weighs 36,000 pounds; it is tough to hurt, but let me
tell you fellows, it is very hard to get it off the ship. So
there is a trade there.
We have to look at things like ceramics, which you talked
about. The problem with the ceramics is, if you hit a ceramic
today, it will work for the first blast and then it shatters.
Well, if you are in a daisy-chain IED, you are fine the first
time; the second one kills you. Metal doesn't do that, but
metal is heavy and--you understand the problem, it is physics.
We need help in the science and technology regime to get us
materials that are light and very, very strong so when General
Sorenson's guys and my guys put A-kits on vehicles, we don't
weigh them down so they can't move. I mean, there is a balance
between what can we do for the weight, what can we do for
mobility, and how are we going to deploy them.
In this case, in my opinion, it is a science and technology
issue to help us with the kinds of composites and blast-
protective material that will allow us--to give us this kind of
protection on vehicles and still be able to move. I mean, that
goes all the way to things like our SAPI plates. You put a
small arms protective insert in an outer tactical vest that
weighs 4.5 pounds, one in the front, one in the back, well,
pretty soon our Marines and soldiers are wearing 60 pounds of
gear between Kevlar helmets, their SAPI plates, et cetera. How
do we make that helmet more protective? We can't make it any
heavier.
We are really at the point now where it is a science and
technology effort, where we have to get the materials that give
us the same form and function, but that are lighter.
And so I think, to answer your question, you need to put
moneys in the science and technology regime that are pointed
exactly to those kinds of things, and they have to be funded
long enough for us to make the research and get the
breakthrough.
General Sorenson. Sir, if I may just add on, not to spend
time talking about the science and technology, I agree with
General Catto, those particular efforts would certainly help us
to do what we need to do for force protection and
survivability.
But to address your question about the process, just a
couple thoughts: As an acquisition officer for a number of
years here, this particular dilemma we have encountered, now we
have, in the department, had to go back through and recalibrate
the way we go through our process. Our vice chief's staff, as
we began this particular conflict, began having weekly meetings
which were basically what he called the Army Strategic Planning
Board, where requirements would be vetted, we would look
forward in terms of what was necessary for planning purposes,
and begin to make changes immediately to what we were procuring
or how we had to make changes so we could get that through the
acquisition process.
The dilemma becomes, in many cases, just like what we
talked about; and I think the chairman has spoken about what
the committee has done.
I will go back to October 2003, where we began to identify
a need to have armor packages, we had to go through a lengthy
process in order to get the reprogrammings done, and you take
money from one pot and you put it in another one. I will tell
you, that process is very laborious; it takes an enormous
amount of time in trying to work through all the records as we
go through the Army staff to 0SD staff, to OMB, to Congress,
and back down the chain.
If there could be some flexibility put in with respect to
providing, if you will, an amount of money to do what was
necessary--you know, By the way, you go do that, spend it on
what you need and report back on what you spent--that would
give an enormous amount of flexibility to the acquisition
process, as opposed to what it is right now where we have our
budgets and we have our lines, and any time we want to change
things we have to go through this entire pyramid up here, and
down the pyramid down the right-hand side.
So, again, providing some flexibility to accounts, line
accounts, that basically say, You have $100 million, you have
$200 million, you use this as you see necessary; and by the
way, report back to us how that money is being spent. I think
that would go a long way to improving our ability to react to
necessary changes on an immediate basis.
Mr. Kline. Thank you, General. That is precisely the
direction I was looking at.
I hope, Mr. Chairman, we can follow up on that as a
committee.
The Chairman. If the gentleman will yield----
Mr. Kline. I yield back.
The Chairman. If the gentleman will yield on that.
General, I would ask you to look at the new law that this
committee did just write for you, and it says that if you are
taking casualties in combat, the Secretary can waive every law
on the books of the United States of America up to $100
million, the figure you just suggested.
This first--this jammer is going to be the first model
under this particular provision. Secretary Rumsfeld has signed
that; he has certified it as an urgent need. We are going to
knock that thing out, and we are going to surge it into
production, and we are going to surge it into the field. We got
back an 8-month profile from the Navy on the production. We
said, That doesn't work, we want to do it really within 30 to
60 days.
So my recommendation is, if we can get that to you while
you are here today, that is a license that you need to use. And
you need to get one guy to sign off on that, and that is
SECDEF. You go to SECDEF and tell him you have a combat
requirement, and I don't think he is going to turn you down.
So I think you have got precisely the instrument that you
need. So why don't you take a look at that and get back with
us, let us know what you think about it.
General Sorenson. Will do, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. The gentlelady from San Diego, Ms. Davis.
Ms. Davis of California. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you to all of you for your service and for being
here.
I want to follow up for a second the comments just made
about science and technology. As I recall, looking at budgets a
while ago, we saw that those accounts actually have been cut;
and I wonder, have you had a chance to look at those? Do you
think that we are doing what is required and necessary in order
to bring about the results that you just mentioned?
General Catto. I was the Vice Chief of Naval Research at
ONR in a former life, before I became an acquisition guy. And
what I would tell you is the S&T budgets have declined to some
extent. I think there is a reason for that, because the S&T
community in many respects hasn't been responsive to what the
guys need.
It is very hard to get DARPA and ONR to give you help on
specific technologies and transition into the operational
forces. And I think that is the frustration that I personally
have, having worked as the Commanding General of the
warfighting lab and the Vice Chief of Naval Research, and then
moved into acquisition. To get the science and technology guys
to work on the kinds of technologies that soldiers and Marines
need so that we field them during our lifetimes is very
difficult.
Ms. Davis of California. Well, Mr. Chairman, I would
suggest that perhaps that is something that we need to push on.
And I think that we have tried to change those numbers from
time to time, at least in the relatively short time I have been
on the committee, and I don't know that we have all had that
support. So I would take that under advisement, and I think
that is something that we need to take a look at.
I wanted to follow up with my colleague, Congressman
Snyder, for a second on the GAO report. Have you all read that?
Have you had a chance to review that?
General Sorenson. Ma'am, I have just gotten a copy of that.
I have not completely reviewed it. I looked it over very
briefly last night. I believe in some cases some of the
information, obviously, just like any other report, is dated.
However, there are some particular nuggets there which probably
are worthwhile to go off and pursue, but I couldn't give you a
complete answer at this point in time.
Ms. Davis of California. I wonder if you just want to
comment on the systemic problems that were identified. And do
you think that the problems are systemic? If you had had an
opportunity to look at the issues, how--perhaps if you haven't
read it, it would be difficult--but how would you have written
that differently? What particularly would you have identified
as the problems?
And we have had a chance to discuss them here, but I am
just wondering if you could respond to the report itself.
General Sorenson. Again, I would have to come back to you
with a better response because, like I said, I have just
received a copy of the report and I have not gone through it in
detail.
I guess if you are asking for a personal opinion on what we
saw prior to this with respect to our efforts to armor our
vehicles and things like that, clearly there were some systemic
issues with respect to working with industry, defining exactly
what the requirement was going to be, how we can begin to move
it, accelerate it and so forth.
I think in many cases, too, as we begin to work on these
kits, you will find that the kits were designed by a host of
different manufacturers--we had Stewart and Stevenson, we had
Radian, we had Armor Holdings--and in many cases they went off
and did the system engineering work to build that kit.
But I will tell you in many cases what we would get back
from industry, specifically the steel industry, is that the
plates were cut. But in one case they were cut 1 foot--or
excuse me, 3 feet; next one was 3.2 feet, next one was 3.3. So
in many cases we were really not working well together to
accommodate and put out packages that, quite frankly, could be
used on all of the vehicles.
It goes back to what I said earlier. We are having all the
consortiums get together, identify some common parts such that
we can pursue an aggressive strategy to accelerate, as well as
have a surge capability, to accommodate need for armoring
different vehicles, but armoring and giving it force protection
with common components, as opposed to everybody has got their
unique little thing.
Ms. Davis of California. I appreciate that. I mean, it
seems like common sense that you would be working to coordinate
in that regard, and yet sometimes it is difficult to walk in
one another's shoes and try and get that out there. I
appreciate that.
I know, in having met with a number of Marines who have
come back from the field, they certainty speak highly of the
plates; they know that those definitely saved their lives. But
they also responded that they were being asked to wear so much
armor that they couldn't even move any longer. I think that
that is a real problem, and when you speak of the technology
and the materials that we use, that is also one to address.
Mr. Chairman, I see that my time is up. I wanted to just
ask one question, which is a really more sensitive question. I
certainly wouldn't want it to be taken that any of the deaths
are any different from one another; these are all men and women
who have given their lives, who are very courageous. But I
wonder whether the families are notified whether--in fact, how,
the way in which they were killed--whether it was necessarily
in combat in an up-armored vehicle, IEDs, and whether you think
that the public as a whole should have more information.
Should the Congress have more information? Should we be
told? Should we have some way of knowing the numbers and how
those deaths correspond to the way in which individuals were
killed? Would that spur on any more activity than we already
have seen?
I know everyone is working at full capacity here, but I am
just wondering, is that something that we should know more
about?
General Mattis. Ma'am, if I could address that. The family
needs to know everything that we know; that is the bottom line.
Now, in the chaos of the battlefield, there are sometimes
legitimate reasons why we don't know the specific thing that
happened at that moment, there is always going to be
information gaps, especially to a family that is getting the
worst possible news.
With that said, at the time we release information in Iraq,
you will notice it is very cursory, and the reason is to keep
from reporting back to the enemy, at least in the Al Anbar
Province--I am speaking for the Marines here--what we call
battle damage assessment. We don't want them to know that the
mortar rounds that they fired into Ramadi last night killed a
soldier, sailor or Marine. We will simply say we lost one of
our lads in the Al Anbar Province.We don't want to give the
enemy the feedback.
But once it comes down to the family, nothing is kept back.
There are times when there is just legitimate friction and fog
of war that causes problems, but no other restraints
whatsoever, ma'am.
Ms. Davis of California. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. I thank the gentlelady and her--I think her
point is an extremely good one with respect to the analysis of
what is happening, for example, to platforms with the IED
threat and with the other threats that affect them. Because
right now we are in the stages of developing a new generation
of systems, and there is nothing more instructive, probably, to
that process than this real war that is going on right now.
So we have talked--intelligent lady, we have talked about
that with the service leadership and operational leadership,
and my understanding is that there is fulsome reporting or
analysis going on with respect to the actual attacks and the
damage resulting from that. That is something that we need to
concentrate on.
And also, to the gentlelady, one thing we have done: I
think there is probably nothing more meaningful to a family
than to have the commander of the people--of a soldier, sailor,
airman, Marine who is killed--talking to the parents. And we
have managed to get that done in several places where they
don't have much information, at least initially.
But I think General Mattis makes a good point about not
announcing to the world what happened in these recent
activities.
The gentleman from Pennsylvania, Mr. Shuster.
Mr. Shuster. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
First, I want to thank all of you for your service to this
Nation, especially in the times we are living in and what is
going on in the world. And I also appreciate what General
Mattis said to us early on, reminding us that combat is an
ever-changing environment; and I think some of us, some of the
people across this country and here in this committee forget
that fact.
And it is not a new phenomenon, it is something that has
been going on for thousands and thousands of years, as long as
wars have been fought, the enemy figures out a way to overcome
your defenses; and we have got to change, so what is likely
today to defend our troops tomorrow may be ineffective.
Could you please, any one of you--I am not sure who to
direct it to--clarify for me the problems with up-armor. Was it
a bigger problem in supplying of steel; or was the problem the
capacity to get the vehicles up-armored the workforce, the
number of people we had out there?
And the second part of that question is, were there any
problems with the weight of the steel on the vehicles, whether
it is a Humvee or it is the Iron Horse? Could you comment on
that?
General Sorenson. Yes, Congressman, thank you.
Initially we did have some issues, as was addressed
earlier, at the beginning here, with respect to acquiring the
amount of steel that was necessary. I believe most of those
particular issues have now been overcome, and we are now to the
point where at the beginning we had maybe one steel
manufacturer that was essentially providing capability, we are
now up to three. Where we had one, if you will, government
organizations more or less working on armoring, we are now
eight and nine depots with arsenals. And where we had but a
handful of contractors, three or four, there are now clearly a
dozen-and-a-half, essentially providing capability here to our
forces.
When we first began to embark upon the add-on armor kits
specifically for the Humvees, it was a very difficult issue
because many of the vehicles that we have that were committed
to the war are of the variety that we call the A0, the initial
deliveries of, if you will, Humvees that were delivered to the
Army and the Marine Corps years and years ago. And we are
talking about the 1980's.
We had to go through a very deliberate process whereby we
analyzed how much armor could we put on this vehicle, and what
was the optimum amount in order to give force protection, but
yet not basically load down the vehicle so that it couldn't
move. And I will tell you, in some of the first instances when
we put one of the kits on a vehicle and ran it up there at the
Aberdeen Test Proving Grounds, the vehicle came to a basic stop
and it shattered the front shaft.
So we had some difficult challenges we had to go through,
the interim process trying to find out how much weight could we
put on this vehicle, and essentially what will that armor
package look at--and oh, by the way, where would we optimize
that armor?
We went back to theater, the 8,400 that the chairman spoke
of before, when that first requirement came in, and went
through a detailed analysis of what does that 8,400 break down
to in types of vehicle, so we could begin to identify what
armor package could go on what particular vehicle.
Subsequent to that, as we have talked about now in terms of
the 1151 that we are about to go produce, that will be able to
accommodate the armor package that essentially is the same as
an 1114.
So we have learned a lot by going through this, but
initially, you are right, we had some significant issues with
respect to how much armor can we put on some of those, if you
will, Humvees, the older Humvees that we had in theater.
Mr. Shuster. In light of your answer, then, my next
question is, because we had trouble getting the steel and the
fact that we don't have a significant steelmaking capacity in
this country anymore, and that the weight was a problem, why
aren't we aggressively pursuing the use of composites?
And I know you mentioned earlier that we are looking at it,
but from what I can find out and gather, we are not putting a
whole lot of money into it. And it just seems to me that
composites--again, from what I understand, you may have
different information--composites work. I mean, Boeing is
building a new airplane, jetliner, that is going to fly 35,000
feet up in the air and deliver a couple hundred passengers
around the world. And from what I understand, it is in testing
composites work.
Why aren't we aggressively--and when I say
``aggressively,'' why aren't we spending money getting
composites into the field and lightening the load on the truck?
And not having to depend on foreign countries to get the
composites, we can manufacture them here.
General Sorenson. Sir, we are actually working through
that. In fact, there are several companies, several composite
armor makers that are basically providing that capability. We
have talked a lot with respect to the soldiers giving us
feedback in terms of how the vehicles are being weighed down,
the issues respective to the frame; and as a result of that, we
have gone back and really pursued many of the composite makers.
Specifically, as I mentioned before, we have had about--
over 300 solutions shot up at Aberdeen. A lot of those were
composites, and in some cases, the composites didn't give
enough protection, so we had to take the composite and
essentially put in, if you will, a small piece of armor or
aluminum or something else to give it the capability of force
protection that we are looking for.
Mr. Shuster. Decreasing the load on the truck, though, by
using a combination----
General Sorenson. Yes, but in some cases, there were
tradeoffs. From our test results, our initial test results--
again, I go back to early 2004, late 2003; the results at that
point in time with respect to composites were not to the
standard that we needed in terms of force protection.
I think subsequent to that they have increased
substantially, and I believe the Marines have used some of the
composites in their latter designs that have shown us that, as
we go forward, even in our 1151 forecast, we are going to have
some potential composite makers for armor protection.
Mr. Shuster. I haven't heard you talk much about it today,
the composites. We are spending a lot of money on steel. So are
we going to aggressively go after composites to be put on the
ones that are successful?
General Sorenson. Yes.
Mr. Shuster. I would like to--I see my time is up. If you
could give me some kind of report on what you are doing,
because as I said, what I understand is that it is--the money
is not being spent to go after the composites, and they have a
great benefit us to.
And I don't know the cost, but I--can you just quickly
comment on the cost?
General Sorenson. The costs in some cases have been a
little bit more expensive than, obviously, the steel, but there
are some tradeoffs there. And I can certainly give you some
more feedback in terms of the composite companies that we have
worked with, and what we are doing in that regard.
[The information referred to can be found in the Appendix
beginning on page 158.]
Mr. Shuster. I would appreciate if you would give me that.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman for an excellent line
of questioning.
The gentleman from South Carolina, Mr. Spratt.
Mr. Spratt. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you all for
your testimony and for your service to our country.
About a month before the war began, General Shinseki was in
my office for a briefing on another subject. When we finished,
I took the opportunity to ask him his assessment of the postwar
planning, because I had great concerns about what could happen;
and he gave me a surprising answer. He said, Sir, I haven't
been briefed.
Now here is the Chief of Staff for the Army whose main
responsibility is to take and hold real estate, who had a
major--had a primary role in this invasion, this war; and also
had experience--he did--running a multilateral force dealing
with a partially Muslim population, trying to pacify and
stabilize Bosnia and Kosovo. This is a week before he testified
that several hundred thousand troops would be necessary.
He told me, I haven't been briefed yet, a month before the
war was to begin.
Were there deficiencies, blind spots? I won't ask you to
pass on General Shinseki's situation, but were there
deficiencies and blind spots in our planning process that
caused us not to foresee what could have been foreseen in this
situation?
I will put that question to anyone.
General Mattis. Sir, certainly with hindsight we can spot
blind spots. We adapt quickly--probably the U.S. Military
adapts more quickly than any other on earth. But we are
certainly subject to a certain degree of criticism about the
post--what you would call the decisive combat, defeating the
enemy's main forces.
Mr. Spratt. Would it be accurate to say we were unprepared,
surprised, by what has developed with respect to this
insurgency, in particular, the way that they have been able to
deploy these improvised weapons?
General Mattis. Sir, I wouldn't go that far. The U.S. Navy
went triumphant. It crossed the Pacific coast in World War II
and got to Okinawa, found vehicle-borne IEDs in the form of
Kamikazes. I think we need to be--I need to be slow to
characterize as failure an enemy adaptation.
Our Army, our Marines, our Navy, our Air Force are
employable worldwide. There are numerous situations where these
heavily armed vehicles would have bogged us down and we would
not have made the speed we might have needed; or in certain
areas, the enemy simply wouldn't have responded this way.
I think in hindsight you can always find areas you could
have planned better because all planning is anticipatory
decision-making. And thanks to our professional military
education, which must remain strong, I think we have adapted
well.
But there were certain aspects to this fight that were
probably missed. I can tell you that, as a division commander,
I have clear guidance from my MEF commander, then General
Hagee, now our commandant, which anticipated the need to get
the electricity turned on to work with Iraqi security forces;
and as I was pulled out of Baghdad and Tikrit, I had a very
clear plan from actually a year before that General Hagee had
given to me--now General Conway commanding me--that I knew what
to do.
Mr. Spratt. Let me ask you this: I was there, I think it
was October of 2003, and the units were beginning to experience
the problems that we are having with IEDs, and also with a lack
of the latest version of Kevlar vests, body armor, particularly
for the units that had been rear echelon units that were now in
places like Baghdad.
And one young MP from an MP--a National Guard MP company in
the Carolinas, told me, Sir, I can account for at least three
people who have been killed in my unit, my company, because
they didn't have the latest version with the ceramic plates of
the Kevlar vest.
I came back, and I knew some folks at DuPont, so I called
them into my office to see what we could do to facilitate the
production of these things; and I found out that they weren't
the prime, that somebody else was the prime contractor for us,
and that they then had to let out subcontracts to at least two
or three subcontractors and vendors, and the process was all
very onerous and time consuming. And there were through FIT
rates that each one of them--each supplier in the chain was
subject to.
I didn't get the sense then that there was any Herculean
effort to override all of these onerous military procurement
processes and get the deal done, get the Kevlar vests out in
the field.
Looking back, would you think that we should have taken
more extraordinary efforts to break through these bottlenecks
and speed up the process to deliver these things that the
troops clearly needed?
General Mattis. Sir, I will defer to the acquisition folks
on that, but let me make one point.
I personally did not wear one in OIF-1, and the reason I
didn't wear it was the speed. They are very heavy, as you know,
and anything you can do to lighten one of your Marines, they
can move faster, more agile.
Going back to OIF-2, once I made certain that every sailor
and Marine I had had one--or had two, one in front, one in
back, then I took one, too. The situation had changed.
Mr. Spratt. This applied before we got that level of
supply, did it not?
General Mattis. I think we were okay. When we actually
decided we needed them, sir, I was able to give one to every
sailor and Marine in my division.
I can only defer to the acquisition people as far as the
time line. I don't know how they did it, but they did it.
General Catto. Congressman Spratt, I think some of your
criticisms are valid in terms of the process in some of the
convoluted contracting, et cetera, that went on earlier in the
conflict.
But the principal problem with SAPI plates in particular,
though, is the raw material for them. There just hasn't been
enough of the raw material available worldwide for that
particular technology.
I have been to Brazil looking for raw material for those
particular things. It is just an issue of there just wasn't
enough around for the demand, and I think that my counterparts
in the Army had the same problems.
General Sorenson. That is correct. We had the same issue
with respect to--it was essentially the raw material. We had
several producers that could take the raw material and produce
the plates, but it was getting that flow, getting that pipeline
to the point that we could actually develop enough plates to
get to theater.
Mr. Spratt. Thank you for your testimony. My time is up. I
appreciate it.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
The gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Schwarz.
Dr. Schwarz. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Am I correct in assuming that the Humvees that are being
manufactured now by AM General are Level one, the ones that are
coming off the line are Level one Humvees that have the armor
protection, the integrated armor against small arms; is that
correct?
General Sorenson. No, sir, not exactly.
What AM General----
Dr. Schwarz. Okay.
General Sorenson. Let me just clarify. AM General produces
the frame. They send that frame to Armor Holdings. Armor
Holdings then puts on, if you will, the armor package that we
now call the 1114.
So it is a joint--what AM General does, though, is make
sure that that frame can accommodate that armor package.
Dr. Schwarz. What I am getting at here is capacity. UAW
Local 5 at AM General indicates that they are working 4 days a
week a 10-hour shift, one day a week an 8-hour shift, one
Saturday a month, 28 chassis a week, and they could double that
production if asked to do so.
Is there some comment that you would like to make on that?
Is there a reason why if the upgraded Humvees aren't out
there--either the armor maybe doesn't have the capacity, so it
wouldn't make any sense to have AM General make any more--or,
in fact, could we go up, as UAW Local 5 says--good folks out in
the Midwest, who would be very happy to work the extra hours
and produce twice as many of these chassis a week.
Do any of you gentlemen have a comment on that?
General Sorenson. Sir, I will take that question. Thank
you.
As we just talked about with respect to SAPI plates, the
flow of material to make it an armor essentially comes out of
AM General. At this point in time they are not the critical
hurdle to get through. It is to get the armor package put on,
which essentially is Armor Holdings.
Now, as we go into our 1151 production, the intent at some
point in time is to take advantage of the surge capability that
AM General has, that have more than one producer, if you will,
of the B kit, the armor package that we can put on these
vehicles such that we can surge the capability, use the
additional excess assets that are there at AM General, and
begin to, if you will, deliver systems much quicker than we are
today.
Dr. Schwarz. So at the conclusion--I will go very rapidly,
Mr. Chairman.
I can come to the conclusion that, if you could, you would
use the extra capacity AM General quite candidly says they
have, and the holdup is with the armorer?
General Sorenson. That is correct, yes, sir.
Dr. Schwarz. Thank you.
I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
The gentleman from Rhode Island, Mr. Langevin.
Mr. Langevin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And thank you, gentlemen, for your testimony today and for
your service to the country.
I would like to follow up on two things: One, IEDs; and the
second will focus on composite materials that one of my
colleagues was actually talking about earlier.
But since we are talking so much about IEDs this morning, I
wanted to also ask if you can give us an update on tracking
down how the insurgents, our enemies, are being resupplied,
whether this material is hidden in country and they are just
obtaining it that way and building IEDs; or if they are being
resupplied from outside the country.
Obviously, we didn't have much success finding weapons of
mass destruction, so I am not exactly optimistic that we are
going to also be able to track down the source of where the
IEDs are coming from. But if you can give us an update on how
robust that effort is and what the status is, I think that
would be helpful.
The other thing that I would like to ask about this
morning, with respect to composite material, clearly our focus
has to be protecting the soldier. It is our concern, it is your
primary concern; and I understand that, I hear that from you
today.
The other thing that we need to be focused on as a
secondary concern is extending and protecting the service life
of the equipment, as well. And I am very disturbed about
reports I have heard about how quickly you are running material
into the ground and not doing enough to resupply. We need
obviously to be concerned about the next battle, the next
conflict that could arise anywhere in the world, whether it is
the Middle East or other areas; and our equipment is being
severely degraded far faster than what we had originally
intended.
So I would like an update, first of all, on how our
equipment is doing. And then, as a follow-up to that, I have
been--I have been concerned about more rapidly developing
composite material.
We have--I have two requests in right now, the defense
authorization bill, for lightweight armor for vehicles, $5
million would go for the armored composite cab program, working
with a company in Rhode Island called TPI. And as we know,
composites can provide both alternative and standard armor for
tactical vehicles while extending service life.
The other request is $5 million for lightweight materials
for armored vehicles for Brown University, which has worked
with the Army's Cardek program to research materials that could
be the basis for the next-generation armor.
So my question is--and I do agree we touched on this this
morning, so I want to give you an opportunity to expand on it,
but what effect the add-on armor, either a Level two or Level
three, is having on the service life of the vehicles? And can
you expand upon the efforts that you are taking to decrease the
weight of the armor, or the vehicles, to ensure sufficient
protection without further degradation.
If you can expand on those, I know the committee would
consider it helpful.
General Votel. Mr. Congressman, if I could, I will address
your first question that dealt with the enemy and how we are
working with that.
I think a full and complete answer really needs to be done
outside the confines of this current setting here, and we would
be more than happy to bring somebody off the IED task force to
come to your office and share that information with you, if you
would like to have them, and give you a full laydown.
In general, however, I think what we see is, IEDs are not a
tactic that is limited to insurgents in Iraq or Afghanistan;
they are clearly one of the preferred methods which worldwide
insurgents use to make contact with the people whom they are
trying to inflict.
And so we do see movement of techniques, of technology, of
people and, certainly, materials that cross international
borders. And we see some of that in Iraq and Afghanistan.
I would be more than happy to bring a team member across
and talk with you in specific detail about that.
I am very happy to report, however, that one of the things
that we have done is really starting to take efforts to get
after bomb-makers and those that would try to plant bombs
against our forces or others. And we have a very robust system
in place in theater now, that has been in place now for several
months, and we are seeing some progress.
Again, I would offer to you that at the same time, we could
come across and update you on that particular effort. We are
very proud of it, we think we are making some progress in that
particular area.
Mr. Langevin. I would welcome that update on both of those,
that would be helpful.
General Sorenson. Sir, with respect to your other question
about the impact on the vehicles, I can certainly assure you
that we are doing everything we can to take care of the
vehicles that have these armor packages. We, in some cases,
modified the springs that we have deployed to theater and so
forth.
But clearly the vehicles that we have put these armor
packages on are the older vehicles, and we have had a number of
problems; we have seen how they react to having that armor, how
the soldiers are having to react to driving them, in some cases
we have seen some pictures where they almost looks like a low
rider, if you will, by the time you took the armor and put the
package on.
But I can give you--if you will, take a question for the
record and give you a more robust response with respect to our
recap and reset efforts in terms of what we are doing to take
these vehicles and put them back into a condition that they can
be reused in the future.
[The information referred to can be found in the Appendix
beginning on page 157.]
General Catto. As a side statement, we are using our
vehicles at seven to eight times the normal rate right now. It
is going to be very helpful in the supplemental, with the
support that we have gotten from this body, to replace those
vehicles. So I think that you will find, in the upcoming years
we are going to be okay, but it is not inexpensive. And we are
grateful for the help that you have given us in terms of
replacing the equipment that the Marine Corps has lost.
But if you go back to your composite question for a minute,
it is going to be a great technology when it is mature. The
problem we have is that it is just not ready for prime time.
And that is why I say we need to have greater emphasis placed
upon producing a composite that can take the place of armor,
that is durable, that is lightweight, that is effective, and
that becomes a very, very valuable commodity.
Mr. Langevin. Well, gentlemen, thank you. And this
committee, I know, looks forward to working with you to make
sure that we are replacing equipment at the rate at which we
need to; and at the same time, developing the next generation
of composite materials to make the vehicles safer and the life
of the vehicles last longer.
So thank you for your testimony.
And thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman.
I think we have just enough time for Mr. Simmons to slip in
before we both have one minute left for this vote. We have got
about six minutes right now, I think we may be able to make it.
So Rob, if you want to give it a shot.
Mr. Simmons. I thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I thank the
gentlemen.
Almost 30 years ago in Vietnam I was called out to witness
a scene in Fujian Province where I was stationed, which was a
quarter-ton Jeep that had gone over a mine placed in the
highway. And the Jeep was totally destroyed, the four soldiers
in it were all killed; and in fact, the largest piece of the
Jeep that I could find was a piece of the engine block, which
you could virtually lift with your hand.
And the message from that experience, to me at least, was
that a determined enemy, if they want to blow you up, they are
going to blow you up, and no amount of armor, sandbags,
protective vests, bottom plates--whether flat or V-based--are
going to save your life. You are just in the wrong place at the
wrong time, you are going to die.
And I understand that. But what I don't understand is what
has happened in this situation over the last several years. I
went to Iraq in October of 2003. I returned back and submitted
a four-page trip report to the Secretary of Defense. He gave it
to the Secretary of the Army. And on 12 November of 2003 I
received a four-page letter back from the Secretary of the Army
saying that the movement of up-armor Humvees into the Central
Command area of operations is a top priority, quote, ``a top
priority.''
In January of 2004, I wrote him again after three of my
constituents had been seriously injured, one nearly fatally, in
an unarmored Humvee. And I said, What can I do as a member of
the House Armed Services Committee to work with you to solve
this problem of getting armor plate and up-armored Humvees into
the theater ASAP, solve the problem ASAP, as soon as possible.
I referred back to his reference that this was a top priority.
It was a full 13 months later that the Secretary of the
Army established the Armor Task Force, and we still don't have
coverage on all our vehicles.
As I read your armor summary, there are almost--there are
over 5,000 that are not armored because they are not leaving
the FOBs. Well, we hope they are not, but you know, in a
battlefield situation, who knows? Whether you have to hop in
that baby and hum out of there, you just don't know.
So there are 5,000 still in theater. We have heard it is a
problem of the manufacturers, but when I went out to visit
O'Gara-Hess, we discovered they had tremendous capacity. We
hear it is a problem with, I don't know, the manufacturer and
the UAW, but they have capacity.
And what I see in here, what I see is the statement that
the priority of fielding UAHs to units in Iraq is determined by
the commander of the U.S. Forces. And what I see in your
testimony is installation of the kits shall commence should
commanders request that these vehicles be equipped with this
capability based on their own individual threat analysis.
So I think that the truth of the matter lies in the
commander's setting of priorities, and the truth of the matter
lies in what my colleague referred to as the glacial process of
deploying equipment into the field. And that bothers me, and I
suspect it bothers you.
It bothers me that this rolled homogenous alloy is
produced, I believe, by only one company in America, Coleville,
Pennsylvania. It bothers me that our industrial base is so thin
that we can't produce this ourselves, we have to buy from the
Canadians and the Swedes. And I wonder if this committee needs
to legislate or have oversight hearings on our industrial base
when it comes to these issues, and maybe on our capacity to
produce new materials that are lightweight.
The Chairman. Let me tell my good colleague, who has worked
this issue with a lot of effort, that we are going to work on
that issue, but right now you and I had better work on the
issue of getting to the floor. We have got about a minute and a
half left, and they may give us an extra minute or so. We will
come back.
And gentlemen, we have got some sandwiches and the best
Diet Coke you can buy available, if you want to grab a bite
before we come back.
We will come back to finish the hearing. But, Rob, we had
better take off right now and come on back; and you will get
the rest of your question.
Mr. Simmons. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[Recess.]
The Chairman. Mr. Simmons gets to finish his questioning.
But we will go to the gentleman from El Paso who has taken 11
trips now to Afghanistan and Iraq. Is it 11, Mr. Reyes?
Mr. Reyes. Five to Iraq and ten to Afghanistan, but we are
overdue and we need to go again.
The Chairman. He is very concerned about these issues and I
thank the gentleman and thank him for being with us on our last
tour in Fallujah. Gentleman from El Paso, Mr. Reyes.
Mr. Reyes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And as always, thank
you, gentlemen, for being here. I know this morning you have, I
guess, endured some of the frustration by members of this
committee; but you know, just to put it in context, when we
were going--when we were in the build-up going into Iraq, we
had hearing after hearing here, and a number of us would ask
the questions that we were being asked for reassurance by the
parents and spouses of our men and women in uniform. And we
were always assured there won't be a single military person in
theater that doesn't have all the equipment and hasn't been
properly trained. And that is why you are hearing a lot of the
frustration here, and we know that there are unexpected
challenges that we face in combat. And we know, at least those
of us who have had that kind of experience know, that you have
got to improvise; and sometimes it is a situation that is so
fluid that it evolves so fast that you are just not able to
respond any other way except under emergency situations. And I
think that has to be one of the lessons learned.
And before I ask you a question, I wanted to see, Mr.
Chairman, is it--and on the way to vote, I asked you if we were
possibly going to have a hearing on this GAO report that we
have referenced here this morning that I don't think any of the
witnesses have read completely yet. But the reason I think it
is a good idea, Mr. Chairman, for instance, on page 53, it
states: To improve visibility over the adequacy of the Army's
war reserve, something we have been very concerned about,
Congress may wish to consider requiring the Secretary of
Defense to provide information that discloses the risks
associated with not fully funding the Army war reserve. And
there have been a number of concerns about that.
One bigger concern that I personally have is a statement in
here by GAO that says while DOD agreed with the intent of three
recommendations, it did not commit to any specific actions to
address them. And therein lies the concerns that I have and I
know a lot of my colleagues have about the things we have
identified. So if we can have a hearing specifically relevant
to the GAO report, I know I would be very appreciative.
The Chairman. We are going to have another hearing on force
protection. And what I recommend is why don't we make the GAO
report and the issues that it raises a part of that, and we
will give that to our witnesses to prepare responses and we
will make it a part of our next hearing. And if the gentleman
wants to put it into the record, we will be happy to do that.
Mr. Reyes. I appreciate that, Mr. Chairman, because I know
you have been--in fact, I have seen firsthand, on the many
trips that we have taken, the concern that you have for giving
the troops anything and everything that they need; whether we
here officially, or as one individual, who gave us a list of
things that they needed that you championed right away. I think
that is our legitimate role as members of this committee.
I was going to ask for whoever wants to take this,
specifically in Afghanistan, all our vehicles are armored?
General Sorenson. To address the question with respect to
Afghanistan, the answer is in fact no, that is not exactly the
case. There again----
Mr. Reyes. Can you tell me the percentage? And the reason I
am asking you this, General--and I know the Chairman has been
there as well--in a recent trip to San Antonio, some of the
soldiers that were recovering there made mention that their
armored vehicles are way less--and this is something they get
frustrated about, that they are kind of the forgotten war or
forgotten front in this issue, because they complained about
having to go out on these missions with vehicles that are not
armored.
And when I said well, from your viewpoint--and this may not
be accurate, but I want to ask you this--but from your
viewpoint--I am asking the soldiers--what is the percentage
that you think is armored? And they were giving me guesses of
20 to 30 percent. Is that in the ball park that we have 60, 70
percent of the vehicles not armored in Afghanistan right now?
General Sorenson. I am not sure that is exactly the right
number. And rather than give you a number that I am not
confident of, I would rather give it--if I could take that for
the record and respond back to you.
I will tell you that we have on a weekly basis, in fact
every Saturday morning, we have discussions with theater,
theater being both Iraq, Afghanistan. And we conduct a recount,
if you will, of vehicles, exactly what is armored, what is not
armored, any changes. We can provide that information to you,
if you will.
[The information referred to can be found in the Appendix
beginning on page 157.]
Mr. Reyes. I would appreciate that, because I am concerned
that those that are fighting in Afghanistan somehow feel like
they have been neglected by--certainly by us and in terms of
the supplies as well.
General Sorenson. I am not sure I would say that.
Mr. Reyes. I am just telling what we are hearing, and that
word was used.
General Sorenson. I think in many cases, there are
different conditions and different environments. And as a
result, the commander on the ground there has defined a
different requirement than if you were the commander in Iraq.
Mr. Reyes. I appreciate that. Well, my time is out, can
you----
The Chairman. Mr. Reyes, you have been to theater over to
11 times, you have earned more questions. I don't believe there
are any votes for awhile.
Mr. Reyes. I thank you, Mr. Chairman.
One other concern that we have heard is that the
predeployment training, before they deployed specifically to
Iraq, the training that they get on Humvees that are designed
to simulate what they would be driving in theater with all the
armor and all, that is dramatically different. They are telling
us they are much more sluggish, they react differently. They
control way different than anything that they are training on
here.
My question is, first of all, you have got to be aware of
that, number one. And number two, what are we doing to address
that? And one of my colleagues was talking about perhaps there
may be some way to modify the training vehicles to respond that
way, whether it is loading them up with the equivalent in
weight--I don't know how you would do that--but that certainly
is something that the soldiers are concerned about because,
regrettably, sometimes when they get in country, they don't
have this ramp-up of time to get familiarized with the
vehicles. They jump in, go out on a mission, and they get hit.
And they don't have that time to get familiar with them. So
that is very critical in terms of what we are hearing on that.
General Sorenson. You are absolutely correct. I think to
date, clearly the effort has been to try to move, as much as we
can, the armored packages into theater. This has become an
issue as late. It has been identified by a number of soldiers
either returning, as well as soldiers deploying, and we are now
identifying armored packages to be put on vehicles that can be
used clearly here at home station. But even before they deploy,
there is a training range there at a facility in Kuwait that
they get some training on the vehicle to understand what the
environment is, because the roads are different than what we
have here, et cetera. So that actually is occurring.
But we are trying to get more of that training here back at
CONUS so the soldiers will get more familiar with having this
extra armor on and what does that mean with respect to
responding to turns, curves, speed, et cetera. And we are
working that right now.
General Mattis. Congressman, that is also the same for the
Marines. We have numerous troops on their second and third tour
in Iraq now. For example, we have 300 men in 3rd Battalion on
their third tour in Iraq, so we are not losing the skills
either for all of our prioritizing the gear going to Iraq first
rather than to the training establishment.
Mr. Reyes. The only follow-up question I would ask is, it
is my understanding, because of limitations in Kuwait, not
everyone is able to do that; is that correct?
General Sorenson. I was going to say, sir, it is not to my
understanding. That is correct.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman and thank him for his
attention to this issue.
And, Mr. Simmons, you were part-way through when we had to
make that vote. Go right ahead.
Mr. Simmons. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. Before we broke for the
vote, I expressed my frustration and concerns about the use of
the words ``top priority'' by the Secretary of the Army in
response to my concerns back in October of 2003 on this issue.
Top priority seems to me to be just what it says, top priority;
and yet the schedule of implementation puzzles me, because it
has been so slow and the reasons given for it has been so
diverse.
But let me go to my questions. First and foremost on the
armor summary, it appears over 5,000 vehicles are currently
unarmored. My question is when can we expect these vehicles to
be up-armored; or, alternatively, are we being told that the
commander in the field is saying that it is not important to
up-armor these Humvees, these vehicles? That is point one.
Point two, the issue of IEDs. Have we talked to the
Israelis about IEDs? I have been to Israel and have seen what
they do in their border areas. I have seen some of the
equipment they deploy and use on a regular basis. They have
been dealing with IEDs for dozens of years. They have been
dealing with the kind of threat that we are facing in Iraq for
many years. How productive have we been in learning from others
who might be willing to cooperate with us on developing and
deploying and getting equipment into the field as soon as
possible?
And then the final question is again, RHA, rolled
homogenous alloy, one company I am aware of in this Continental
United States that produces this in Coatesville, Pennsylvania.
We have had to go to Canada and to Sweden. To what extent is
the failure of our industrial base to provide material
inhibiting our ability to protect our men and women in uniform
in the field?
General Catto. I would like to talk directly to your
question about what we have done with the Israelis. We are
exchanging technology with them. One of our key technology
things is called OPAL. I won't address it anymore in an open
forum, but it has been very successful in helping us identify
suicide bombers or folks who are carrying concealed weapons.
We have also done a program with them for specialized
search dogs that sniff out explosives off leash. And they are
trained to go hundreds of meters forward and they will point
out an IED or unattended munition and alert the handlers. We
had two instances in theater with those dogs, and successes for
us. And they were trained with the Israeli help and we have
instituted that into our search dogs. We are talking to the
Israelis constantly, and there is an exchange of information.
General Votel. Sir, I would just add with respect to the
Israelis, through the offices of the IED Task Force, we have a
well-established relationship with them and we have gone--they
have been very open and forthcoming with us. We have brought
groups of officers and NCOs, Americans and Israelis to exchange
information. We have gone as far as to ask them for some help
in areas which we may now think we may have some capability
gaps, and they have been forthcoming in identifying things to
us and offering things for us to test and look at. And we are
doing some of that in the next couple of weeks here.
General Mattis. When we took the First Marine Division back
into Iraq, an Israeli-trained detective on the Los Angeles
department was on my staff. The LAPD was helpful to the Marine
division going back in as we got ready. This Israeli-trained
IED expert on the LAPD staff conducted training for all of my
men going back in as they rotated through their predeployment
training. And he was with us for the first 45 or 60 days we
were in country.
General Sorenson. Just referring back to the armor summary,
I draw your attention to the fact that right now in theater, we
have close to 42,000 vehicles in theater. The requirement has
been identified in terms of armoring vehicles somewhere in the
neighborhood of 36,000. So in some cases, the basic difference
there, the 5,000 are vehicles that the theater has identified
to only occupy missions on a forward operating base. They are
not to deploy outside the gate without an armored package. And
in some cases, they are doing mail runs. But the determination
has been not to put an armored package on these particular
vehicles. So consequently, we probably won't.
You see here in terms of funding, we are funded right now
to basically armor over 37,000 vehicles. So we are going to be
well in advance of what we are planning for with respect to
theater requirements.
Mr. Simmons. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And if I could make a quick comment. I am concerned that
5,000 vehicles have not been designated for some form of armor
packaging, and my concern is very simple. It is all very fine
for the commander in the field to say these vehicles will be
operating within a base and a zone that does not create a
current threat, but we do not know what tomorrow is going to
bring. We do not know what tomorrow's requirements are going to
be and 5,000 vehicles multiplied by three or four soldiers, any
one of those could be an emergency situation out there in
harm's way. And I would feel far more comfortable if I knew if
they had some equipment on them.
But I guess this is the commander's decision. I am not sure
it is a decision I would make, but I guess what you are
testifying is this is the commander's decision to keep 5,000
vehicles in theater unarmored.
General Sorenson. I am coming back to the fact that we have
received from CFLCC a requirement document to basically armor
36,000 vehicles. And we do know there are additional vehicles
there, but at this point in time we do not have any plans to
armor them, although we are adding additional armored packages
that could be used, if required to armor some of those
vehicles.
The Chairman. General Sorenson, let me ask you a question
on this. We are trading out level one for level two. And level
three is being, as I understand, virtually traded out in a lot
of areas. So you have got these--a door on a Humvee is simply a
steel that is three feet by four feet and it can have a piano
hinge where you pull the standard screws out of the hinges and
put a piece of piano hinge on it in about 20 to 30 minutes, and
put a three by four piece of high hard steel with 8-bolt holes
cut in it, and you have got a new door. And in fact, retired
Marine General Terry Paul did it in a record of about two
hours, armored up a Humvee simply by lifting the hinges off the
soft Humvee and putting the old ones on.
The point being that you are getting rid of--as I take it,
when these kits come in, they have everything including the
doors. And the two solid doors on a Humvee, they are each three
feet by four feet. So that is the big package of protection
across the side of the Humvee.
If you are taking the steel doors off--and I presume they
are good steel, high hard steel--you could put those on, and
those could be put on in theater on the soft Humvees, the 5,000
or so that Mr. Simmons referred to, could they not? It seemed
like it would be a pretty fast changeover because you can
change the doors out in a few minutes?
General Sorenson. Yes, Mr. Chairman. That probably could be
done. There are only 3,000 of these Humvees that aren't
armored. The Department is working with theater to try to bring
some of these vehicles out of theater, the ones that are not
armored, and bring them back to a reset, recap program so we
can get the entire force reset with respect to what we are
going to need in terms vehicles.
The Chairman. I understand all that. If you have a Humvee
sitting there in a forward base--and even a base like Balad
where they take a few rounds of mortar or were taking a few
mortar rounds every couple of days, and now again taking some
casualties there, right. And if they are close to a building,
they herd everybody inside, and if you're not, I presume you
get in your vehicle. If you have got these doors, which
represent a large part of the armor profile in some numbers
now, because we have taken them off and you simply lift those
hinges up and pull them out pretty easily, wouldn't that be
something that commanders could do at these forward bases if
they were so inclined, without prejudice to any program or any
time schedule or anything else?
General Sorenson. Mr. Chairman, you are absolutely right.
And certainly we will convey that back as we work with theater,
the possibility of doing that. But again, I think we are all
working to get, like I said, some of these vehicles that are
not armored out of Iraq, because in many cases the older
vehicles have to come back to be reset. That is why we are
trying to get back out of theater right now.
The Chairman. This wouldn't delay for one split second any
retrievable vehicles. It would be a matter of using something
that you had that is available when people need it. So why
don't we scrub that with our operational people and talk to the
chiefs about that and see what they think about it? Looks like
to me you are going to have stuff laying around as these kits
come in and you discharge some of the old stuff.
Let me see, the gentleman from Ohio, Mr. Ryan, has been
waiting patiently.
Mr. Ryan of Ohio. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I appreciate everything you gentlemen have done for our
country. This is a difficult endeavor for all of us and I
appreciate everything all you guys do. One of the issues that
struck me throughout the hearing is the research and
development. I think it was--General, you had mentioned that as
being an issue. And some of the numbers I have, I think we are
spending between 26 and $30 million on research on armor R&D.
And to me it seems like a pretty low number, given the other
side of what happens when we don't do the research and don't
get the kind of products that we need. So I think it is
important for, obviously, this panel to state the importance of
that and communicate the importance of that to us.
I hope, Mr. Chairman, we can work in the future to try to
get that budget up not only for the military research, but I
think overall into the universities. And at Youngstown State
where I represent, we have an advanced material science program
that is just getting off the ground. One of the products they
are developing is steel foam that maintains the same strength
and character of steel, but made out of foam which is much
lighter, which I think would achieve some of the goals that you
would need in the military.
So I think it is important for us to be committed. And the
military research, quite frankly, is in many ways more
effective than research we do at NIH or somewhere else, because
it has this practical application in the field. So I want to
work with you and share with you some information that I have,
but I would love to participate in trying to help you increase
the budget for that purpose.
My main concern prior to the war, and which continues to be
reaffirmed throughout these hearings, is that we weren't
prepared for this kind of long-term struggle; and it is mind-
boggling to me to think that is the case. Given our
relationship with the Israeli Government and our cooperative
ventures that we have between their military and our military,
was anyone asked before? Because it seems like these IEDs have
been common in what has been going on in the Middle East for a
long time. Were we not using that as some kind of model to
prepare ourselves, not necessarily to the extent it was used in
the Middle East, but it would obviously be used more in Iraq.
Was that used as a model for us to say hey, here is what is
happening with IEDs in this particular region, in this
particular struggle in the West Bank and the Gaza strip, and we
know that will be used here and we need to prepare for it
accordingly? And maybe if that was used as a model, wouldn't
the response be we need the armor and we need to be prepared
for these IEDs, and we are not going off in the war until we
find ourselves ready?
General Votel. I am not sure I can answer your question as
to whether we had studied that prior to the war. But what I can
tell you is that since October of 2003 when I became involved
with the Army IED task force, and now in my role with the joint
IED task force, we have reached out to our international
partners, the Israelis and others who have had experience in
dealing with insurgencies where IEDs were either a major part
of the enemy's tactic or one of the contributing techniques he
has employed. I think we have done a good job of looking at
what others are doing and how they have approached the problem
from training, from an organization, from intelligence and from
a technology standpoint in trying to bring some of those things
forth.
General Catto gave you the example of the use of off-leash
search dogs. That is not anything peculiar to the Israelis.
Other countries use it as well. I think that is one small
example of how we have reached out. To the point, quite
honestly, within the IED task force, right now one of my
deputies is a U.K. Officer, and he is there to help bring the
experience of their army in dealing with insurgent-type
operations into our consideration and make sure that we are
cooperating and coordinating as closely as we can in this
particular fight.
Mr. Ryan of Ohio. I guess my question isn't whether or not
you are working with the U.K. Or working with the Israelis, but
it was prior to the war. It seems like we were surprised that
they would sit back and fight a guerilla war and use the IEDs
the way they have. I would just think that there would have to
be some preparation in the war-gaming, that one of the
scenarios is they sit back and wait and fight a guerilla war.
And I remember we were talking about it here, using IEDs in an
urban setting.
My time is up, but the point being is that I hope in future
conflicts like this, we scrub this, as the Chairman would like
to say, and make sure that we cover all the different angles
here, because I think a lot of this could have been prevented.
I don't think we necessarily needed to rush in as quickly as we
did without covering all of our bases.
Thank you very much. And I look forward to helping with the
research and development aspect of it and look forward to
working with all of you. So thank you for your contribution in
coming before us today. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. The gentleman from North Carolina, Mr. Jones.
Mr. Jones of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, thank you very
much. And first I would like to submit and ask unanimous
consent to enter four written questions I submit and get
written answers back, please.
The Chairman. Without objection, any written questions you
submit for the record here will request an answer.
Mr. Jones of North Carolina. I am still waiting for those
questions from Secretary Rumsfeld, sir, but I don't want to
bring that up.
The Chairman. We will try to deliver these in the same
batch.
Mr. Jones of North Carolina. Probably will get the same
response, but I hope not.
The written questions are for the United States Army and it
does deal with Army issues. But I want to say to my friends,
the Marine Corps, that I am not going to ask you a question,
but I might when I finish this. But for three months, I have
been watching an outstanding Marine who was charged with
murder. His name is Lieutenant Ilario Pantano. I have had the
opportunity to go down and meet with him. I have met with his
lovely wife and have seen his beautiful boys. And I never met a
person in my life that loves the Marine Corps--let me rephrase
that. This man loves the Corps. No matter what has happened to
him, he loves the Corps.
Today I am pleased to report that a Marine corporal who was
videotaped shooting and apparently injured an unarmed Iraqi in
a Fallujah mosque last year will not face court martial, the
Marine Corps announced. And if I mispronounce his name, I do
apologize to him, Major General Richard Natonski. And I want to
read what he said:
``Consistent with the established rules of engagement and
the law of armed conflict, he will not be charged and move
forward to a court martial.''
Last week there was article 32 hearings down in Camp
Lejeune. This was a witness for the prosecution, those who are
prosecuting Lieutenant Pantano who has been being charged with
two counts of premeditated murder. This is Navy medical
corpsman George Gobles. And he was a witness to the
prosecution, and his comments about Pantano, ``a damn good
leader,'' he testified. ``I felt the safest with, you know,
this platoon, because more than anything, because of Lieutenant
Pantano and his leadership.''
Also Major Brian Neal, the operations officer for Pantano's
battalion, testified that Lieutenant Pantano was one of the
finest second lieutenants he had ever known during his 17 years
in the Corps. To me, that is one heck of a compliment. He
recalled--Major Neal recalled the day of the shooting and I
quote him: ``to me, it was a good day. We killed two obvious
insurgents.''
I don't know how in the world this thing has gotten where a
man who loves the Corps, so talented, would probably--maybe not
now--had made a career of the Marine Corps. A valuable person.
The charges, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member, came two-and-a-
half months after the shooting, when this marine did his job.
He thought he was doing his job as he was trained. Two-and-a-
half months later, a sergeant that he had demoted from a
leadership position to be the radio man, two-and-a-half months
later, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member, he decides this might
have been a murder. So he tells a fellow marine, and then it
works its way up.
I truthfully do not know, and I pray to God that the
hearing officer will recommend to General Huck that this not
move forward, just like this corporal who was doing his job in
the battlefield. And I agree with many of my colleagues on both
sides of the aisle. I regret that we are in Iraq. I regret what
is happening to our men and women in uniform. But God bless
them, they are doing a great job.
Many of you at that table, probably all of you have been in
a battle. I haven't. But some of this stuff is common sense.
You don't have to be in a battle to understand what is
happening.
Let me tell you one other thing. I hope that the base
commander or whomever is in charge, I don't know if the
prosecutor for the Marine Corps was one man or two, but in the
courtroom when this man's life is at stake for doing his job
for this Nation, they were joking and laughing to the point
that they were told to apologize to Lieutenant Pantano's
mother. And I know you gentlemen at the table are not
responsible for any of this. And my frustration and my
preaching is not at you, I promise you, but I don't know how we
can ask our men and women, Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines,
to go into this type of situation with an unconventional-type
enemy and no eye-witness to what Pantano did.
Sergeant Coburn, the Corpsman, they said we didn't see it.
This corporal, and I thank God he is not going to be court-
martialed, they videotaped it. And I hope and pray, Mr.
Chairman and Ranking Member, that this Lieutenant Pantano is
exonerated. And I have said it on the floor of the House, I
pray to the good Lord that he and his family will be cleared.
And this might be my question, and I will close, that I
hope if he is exonerated and he chooses to stay in the Corps,
which he loves so much, that he would have a future, just like
I hope this corporal, if he decides to stay in--I just don't
think, Mr. Chairman, we should be second-guessing any of our
men and women in uniform when they are in the battlefield. They
have an enemy in front of them, whether armed or unarmed. I
don't think any of us sitting behind a desk, unless we have
been in their shoes, need to be making decisions of such.
I don't think it is fair for me to ask you, but I will ask
if you have any comments, not so much about Pantano, but maybe
tell me what does happen to a person like the corporal or like
Lieutenant Pantano if they decide to stay in the Marine Corps?
Do they have a future? Give me a yes or no. And I know I have
taken Mr. Davis's time but I would like to know do they still
have a future in the Corps?
General Mattis. Congressman Jones, I respect everything you
have said. The lieutenant, the corporal, they absolutely have a
future. If they are found to be innocent, they are innocent and
they will be treated as such. But what sets the U.S. military
apart often from other militaries in the world is when we send
them around the world, they represent what President Lincoln
called the ``better angels of our country.'' we investigate
every allegation against our troops. And as you can see from
what you read this morning coming off the West Coast, what
General Natonski has decided, there is no rush to judgment.
In the case on the other coast, in the 2nd Division area,
we have a case that was reported up through the chain. Now I
realize the NCO, there may be issues I can't address, I don't
know the specifics. But we are always reluctant to ignore the
comments of an NCO in the Marine Corps, of a petty officer in
the Navy. By conducting an investigation and conducting a
thorough one--and an article 32, as you know, is like a
civilian grand jury. He is not in front of a court martial yet.
I am not saying he is in an enviable position, and I respect
again what you are saying, but we owe it in the Naval service
where we hold people accountable who are leaders, whether they
are lieutenants, corporal or generals, that we look at the
circumstances surrounding something like that. Right now, that
is what is going on, and I have to defer to the investigation
itself, sir.
Mr. Jones of North Carolina. Chairman, if I could make one
statement and then I will close. I appreciate your answer, and
that I think is very encouraging, that if they are exonerated
both with will have a future. That will not be held against
them.
I would like to talk about Sergeant Coburn. He was demoted
from his leadership position. Everything I have read from the
Jacksonville paper, the Wilmington Star--the Wilmington News--
and one thing that I do want to make clear for the record,
Sergeant Coburn, being cross-examined by lawyer Gittins for
Pantano and Marine Stackhouse, also attorney, he responded 50
times by saying ``I don't know or I can't remember.''
Again, I hope and pray that we give all the support that we
talked about today as it relates to armor, and we remember that
these men and women are human beings. And maybe if sometimes
you don't have the luxury of a full second--you have been
there, I haven't--it is a split-second decision. Let us give
them the benefit of the doubt. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. I thank the gentleman and I thank him for his
attention to this very important area.
Gentleman from Kentucky, Mr. Davis.
Mr. Davis of Kentucky. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Returning
back to the original focus of the hearing, I would like to make
some comments and then ask a specific technical question. I
think if one views military history--and I will speak as a
student of military history--our current military, Army Marine
Corps, Navy and Air Force, especially our forces on the ground
in Iraq, are the best trained, best armored and best protected
force in the military history of the world. That is very clear
to anybody who I think would really open the books and get
beyond politically motivated comments.
And I would like to take exception with a couple of my
colleagues in the minority and some of the comments that they
made earlier this morning from what I believe is a
mischaracterization of the current situation by constantly
resurrecting the events of past--of nearly two years ago, and
now overcome by other events. And my suggestion would be all of
us should be careful in our rhetoric, because the comments by
some in this body, indeed though may seem well-intentioned to
those members, do indeed have a contradictory effect in the
culture to encourage and potentially embolden enemies who would
not otherwise engage in destructive activities, and sends the
wrong message, and thus potentially putting our service members
in unnecessary danger and harm.
More correctly, I think what we need to focus on and where
we are focusing is to assure that the material management life
cycle is collapsed, very similar to the competitive models of
competitive American manufacturing in the automotive industry
and high-technology industry, which can field a brand-new
vehicle in a year in an environment that contains continuous
improvement and adaptation to a fluid and changing marketplace,
not unlike the fluid situations you have so well adapted to.
And I make my comment from this perspective, as one who had
delivered a technical paper at the Annual Mine Warfare
Conference at the Naval Postgraduate School in 1996. I have to
tell you, with nine years of perspective, I stand absolutely
amazed at the great strides in adaptability of the Marine Corps
and the Army on the ground.
I was in Israel with Chairman Saxton comparing tools and
techniques, procedures, tactics that were being used both by
Israeli defense forces in dealing with similar tools. They did
some things that were interesting and adaptive based on their
unique situations.
I have to say in the context of some of the remarks made by
two minority members this morning, we in many areas are far in
advance of where they are. And I think it is a commendation to
the efforts of folks that have reacted well to this situation.
That being said, I would like to move into the future and
think strategically as we are moving into a more network-
centric and more adaptive expeditionary-type environment.
General Sorenson, you made a comment that the future vision is
to have vehicles that can be rapidly reconfigured for changing
situations. For example, when we move from the conventional
ground combat, the first phase of Operation Iraqi Freedom and
then versus the second phase, where it became more
unconventional, dealing with a counterinsurgency situation, we
have taken immediate steps. But looking from a standpoint in
the long term, does this vision include the ability to rapidly
reconfigure--an area of personal interest to me--the heavy
combat service support vehicles that tend to be the most
vulnerable when they go into countries, the ``Red Ball
Express'' they were called in World War II. If you comment what
you are doing in that area, particularly looking down the road
5, 10, 15 years.
General Sorenson. Thank you for the question. And that is
exactly what we are doing. Much similar to what we are doing
with the Humvees, we are doing the same thing with the heavy
trucks. As I mentioned, there is a consortium right now with
all the heavy truck manufacturers, Freightliner, Oshkosh,
International. They are getting together to assemble with
respect to their particular vehicles where can we make some
common applications of force protection capability, i.e.,
latches, doors, glass, et cetera, such that we can begin to
find other vendors that can produce these and put these on
different vehicles and make them all fit, so when we will have
a surge capability, as opposed to every particular vehicle
having their own unique solution, which is exactly what we have
right now.
So the intent is just like what we have done with the
Humvees in terms of getting the chassis and getting a B kit, if
you will, that we can hang onto that vehicle to make it an
armored capability. We are going to do the same thing with our
medium vehicles and also heavy fleet to identify how we can do
the same thing.
Mr. Davis of Kentucky. Do you see this type of technology--
I wouldn't call them add-ons correctly, but other parts of
their deployment package? Would that be resident with the units
or would that be kept at a logistical location and adapted
based on contingencies?
General Sorenson. I would say both. TRADOC is working to
define what the future armor strategy ought to be, what that
composition of armor capability ought to be. As we produce
these kits, some of them will be in a warehouse, but in other
cases as they deploy forward, a number of these kits will go
forward, such that as they go from combat operations to
sustainment operations, they can make that adjustment rather
rapidly and not require a bunch of mechanics and welders and so
forth to begin to put these kits on. In many cases, the basic
maintenance capability can be put on immediately.
Mr. Davis of Kentucky. I yield back the balance of my time,
Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Did the Ranking Member have a few comments?
Mr. Skelton. I know the Chairman and other members of the
committee heard me make reference to this before, but I--and I
would like to address a question to General Mattis, if I may.
It appears that the insurgency guerilla warfare was not
anticipated or not anticipated fully. General, I am not a
clairvoyant nor am I a graduate of any of the war colleges, but
my studying of things military over the years as a member of
this committee caused me in September of 2002 to send a letter
to the President with copies to the Pentagon. I have reason to
believe they were widely distributed. The letter which, of
course, is before the war, which began in March of 2003,
anticipated potential and extensive conflict against American
forces and/or among the Iraqi ethnic and religious groups; in
other words, the potential for insurgency.
I did the same a few days before the invasion in March,
2003. As a result of my first letter, Steven Hadley and Elliot
Abrams came to my office to allay my concerns. Sadly, I was
right. Now, if I can come up with a potential problem, why
can't those of you who study and live the military anticipate
this? I realize at that time you were just a two-star general
and you may say, Congressman, it was above my pay grade. But
you are the only one here to ask that question of. Why was it
not anticipated that there would be an insurgency? And I am not
talking about the type of insurgency, but just an insurgency.
General.
General Mattis. Congressman Skelton, it is not above my pay
grade. It is a very valid question.
Mr. Skelton. Not above the pay grade now, but as a two-
star, it may have been.
General Mattis. That is what we are paid to do. Much of the
professional PME, professional military education that we offer
to our military leaders today is thanks, in no small part, to
your sustained tenacious drive toward this sort of preparation
of our leadership.
I will tell you that General Hagee, when he was the
commanding general of 1 MEF, I was flown out of Afghanistan, if
I remember right, in March of 2002, back to 1 MEF as his
deputy. And in April we went through a war game. He pulled out
all of our best planners, earning the ire of some of our gray
beards, and said the day we step across that border, we will be
in phase four behind us, so start putting together the plan. I
was not so brilliant. I went to him and said, can't we
concentrate on winning the war first? He said no, this is
important.
They put together a plan that was so good that when I was
sent down to command First Marine Division for the attack in
Iraq, I took the plan with me. In November of that year, former
Commander in Chief of Central Command was the guest of honor at
the First Marine Division birthday ball--and this is November.
We deployed, as you know, in January and February. And he said,
``Young men,'' he said, ``you will destroy the enemy's army in
six weeks or us old guys are going to disown you.'' but he
said, ``Then the work begins.'' I had two generals and a former
retired marine commander of Central Command who warned us that
the hard work would start not when we were fighting the main
force of the enemy.
We had a plan, we executed the plan. I am speaking now as
tactical commander, as a division commander. Perhaps it was not
on the national level thoroughly thought through. Certainly
with hindsight, we can see things. Perhaps because of the
clarity of your views and the reading that you have done--I
have seen your reading list, as you recall--you were able to
identify it. We went five and a half months, Congressman
Skelton, five and a half months after we pulled out of Tikrit
and Baghdad in the southern area, and I didn't lose one sailor
or marine. We lost about 55 or 60 wounded, some grievously
wounded. And the insurgency was growing during this period.
You know, sir, I can't give you a sufficient answer. I
think if instead of 2005 it was 1805 in this room, we would not
anticipate that in 10 years the British Navy would sail up the
Chesapeake and they would burn this building. I think in 1905,
we would not anticipate that in 12 years our Indian fighting
armies spread across the western frontier and would be fighting
with machine guns and barbed wire in the trenches in Europe.
Sir, life is one darn thing after another. It is not a good
answer for you. We anticipated a lot. We had a plan. We knew
how to get the lights turned back on, get the water treatment
plants working so there would be no cholera, to make common
cause with the Iraqis. And in many, many places, it has worked.
And when you look at an election in Iraq where a purple finger
could have gotten your family destroyed, killed, and they had a
voter turnout that rivaled what we had in some of our
elections, I think we have accomplished a lot.
And it is always easy in hindsight to see where perhaps we
fell short, and I acknowledge and take responsibility for it.
But we have done a lot of things right, sir and that was thanks
to the PME in the anticipation and a lot of work that we have
done to try and get it right. The victories we have had--and
they have been significant--have not come by happenstance. And
the challenges, yes, and the losses as heartbreaking as they
are, well, it could have been a lot worse, sir.
Mr. Skelton. General, I thank you.
The Chairman. I thank the gentlemen.
Gentlemen, thank you very much for your testimony, and we
still have a panel to go. So this is a good marathon session,
but I think it is worthwhile.
You know, one thing that I think is--one realization I
think most folks have from looking at the operation in the
warfighting theaters, the asymmetric threats that have been
carried out fairly effectively by an enemy that is adaptive
have reflected, I think, to all of us that the Humvee is
basically a big Jeep. It was a successor to the Jeep. It was
never intended to be a tank or even an armored vehicle, and yet
it has gone--we have used them in tactical situations. We have
used them in combat situations. And we have loaded them up and
tried to load them up with enough armor to the point where it
is a little bit like the cartoon where you have the little boy
that is ready to go out and play in the snow, and his mommy is
asking why he is not moving, and he says, you have got so much
stuff on me, you have bundled me up so much against the cold
that I can't move.
You can only do so much with a Humvee. Even if you have the
beefed-up suspension and the increased engine power that we
had--put into the 1114, you still have basically a big Jeep
that has to carry a lot of steel. Since--although we are
talking about the armor situation and force protection in
theater, what do you think, General Catto? Where do you think
we are going to be going with the next vehicle? Do you think
the Humvee has, in light of this asymmetric warfare, seen its
day and is going to be relegated to garrison-type situations?
Do you think we need to go with another vehicle that has more
suspension, more horses, more protection?
General Catto. Mr. Chairman, I think we have got a lot of
Humvees for the near term that we are going to use until we
die. Your question really means are we going to develop a
vehicle from the ground up for survivability that we can put
armor packages on or off of, depending upon the requirement.
And I think the answer is that is where we have to go. And it
is going to be an issue of what is the mission you want and
what do you want the vehicle to do and how do we build that? My
opinion is we are going to have to start with a new class
vehicle and build it from the tires up.
The Chairman. General Sorenson, what do you think?
General Sorenson. I think in some cases you are correct. In
fact, right now we have been conducting, if you will, with
industry partners, tactical rodeos, just like we did with the
Stryker competition. We are doing a utility vehicle and a
medium utility vehicle, and we are having industry show up and
kind of give some ideas in terms of what we can do; as well as
we are trying to leverage other lessons learned from this
environment to figure out how we can plan for improvements in
what the soldiers are requiring for utility vehicles and medium
utility vehicles in the future.
The Chairman. Well, gentlemen, thank you. And let me just
leave you with this. We have a schedule to finish out the armor
program. We want to look at this schedule with you and we would
like you to take it back and take a look at it to see if there
is any way we can accelerate the program, and let us know what
the long poles and the tent are. And the committee will work
with you to try to shorten those poles and try to compress the
schedule.
We are going to vote in a little bit on this bill, the big
supplemental that will have--incidentally, along with the other
things and the jammer funding that is in this and armor
funding, we also have money to try to handle for the first time
these mortar rounds coming into theater. And we have had some
tests out at Yuma and El Paso that have proven fruitful. And we
are going to be moving systems into theater fairly quickly and
we would like to have your feedback on that, and I think we
have got some candidate locations for those first couple of
systems. But we do need to scrub with you this schedule and see
if we can't compress it, accelerate it, and do whatever it
takes to get the program finished.
Thank you very much. We will move to our third panel. And
General Mattis, you have the pleasure of being with us in your
first panel for a long time, so stay where you are at. And you
are going to be joined with Lieutenant Colonel Paul J. Kennedy
United States Marine Corps, former battalion commander, 2nd
Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment, First Marine Division, who is
now with Headquarters Battalion, First Marine Division.
General Mattis, if you want to lead in and introduce. And
also, General Kelly, come up to the table. You are welcome,
too.
STATEMENT OF LT. GEN. JAMES N. MATTIS, FORMER COMMANDER, FIRST
MARINE DIVISION, COMMANDING GENERAL, MARINE CORPS COMBAT
DEVELOPMENT COMMAND, U.S. MARINE CORPS
General Mattis. Thank you Mr. Chairman, Lieutenant Paul
Kennedy served as the lead First Marine Division planner for
OIF 1. Going back into OIF 2, his name had come up on the
command list and he took command of 2nd Battalion, 4th Marines.
This battalion was given the task of holding Ramadi. Ramadi in
Al-Anbar Province is the center of gravity. It is the
administrative and legal center of Al-Anbar Province, which is
the heart of the Sunni triangle and it was the critical key
terrain that must be held. While Fallujah received a lot of
attention, the place that we could not lose control of was this
town.
Colonel Kennedy served under an Army brigade commander who
served under my command. In other words, we have a Marine
division with an Army brigade, and inside the Army brigade was
the 2nd Battalion, 4th Marines. And that is the command
structure he operated under.
I observed Colonel Kennedy on probably a daily basis in
terms of his troops, because that is where my headquarters, was
and I would depart every day through his lines. And I would go
down and see him probably as often as I saw any other battalion
commander, every week to ten days or so, maybe two weeks if I
was caught elsewhere.
Colonel Kennedy proved to be one of our more effective
combat leaders in one of our toughest fights that the Marine
Corps has fought since Vietnam. I think that is a sufficient
introduction, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, General.
Colonel, the floor is yours, sir.
STATEMENT OF LT. COL. PAUL J. KENNEDY, FORMER BATTALION
COMMANDER, 2ND BATTALION, 4TH MARINE REGIMENT, FIRST MARINE
DIVISION, HEADQUARTERS BATTALION, FIRST MARINE DIVISION, U.S.
MARINE CORPS
Colonel Kennedy. Mr. Chairman, distinguished members of the
committee----
The Chairman. Have you got that mike on there? And bring in
pretty close if you can.
Colonel Kennedy. Yes, sir.
Mr. Chairman, distinguished members of the committee, thank
you for this opportunity to address the issues that surround
the force protection of the marines and sailors of 2nd
Battalion, 4th Marines.
It is my distinct privilege to represent the nearly 1,100
marines and sailors of 2-4 during these proceedings, for after
only a short seven months home, they are forward-deployed as a
force in readiness. For this opportunity I am exceptionally
thankful.
Over the course of seven months within the City of Ar
Ramadi, Iraq, 2-4 battled a relentless and adaptive enemy for
control of this provincial capital, the heart of the Sunni
Triangle. During this period we bore witness to an ever-
increasing lethality of attacks that ranged from simple
improvised explosive devices to suicide bombers to full-blown
urban combat. This wrought a terrible price for our service.
This is war, and we are committed to winning.
In April, May, and July, we fought full-scale combat on the
city streets of our assigned area, accounted for nearly 1,000
enemy dead combatants, while maintaining control over the
population of 450,000 Iraqi citizens. This success did not come
cheaply. In the almost daily fight that defined our lives, 34
young men gave their lives with the several times that number
wounded.
In spite of the sacrifice, their spirit readied them for
each successive challenge, eager to deny the enemy the chance
of victory. They stood ready to defend the lives of the
innocent, but, most importantly, they stood ready to defend the
lives of their fellow countrymen, and in this they exceeded all
expectations.
In response to Representative Weldon's earlier questions, I
am also the officer responsible for writing the fitness report
concerning Captain Royer. I would tell you that Kelly Royer is
a good and decent man and initially a strong combat leader. In
over 90 days of intense combat, my confidence in his ability to
lead eroded to the point of necessitating his relief. This was
my decision and my decision alone. And, sir, I will tell you
that it was not an easy one to take.
The relief was not based upon any complaints that he had
forwarded or suggestion of falling out of disfavor. It was
strictly a matter of leadership shortfalls brought about by
long-term exposure to combat. I have spoken to the captain in
recent months in his current and demanding assignment as the
operations officer for Headquarters Battalion of the 1st Marine
Division.
Sir, beyond these comments and out of respect for Captain
Royer's personal reputation and that of his family, I would
await a closed hearing to further discuss this particular
matter.
I thank the Members of Congress for their support in
providing my marines the best equipment possible to continue
this war on terrorism, and I am grateful for your inquiry as to
the welfare and well-being of the Magnificent Bastards of 2-4.
At this time I would be happy to answer your questions.
The Chairman. Colonel Kennedy, thank you for your very
succinct statement, and, in light of your leadership position
as the commanding officer of the battalion, that we should give
a lot of credibility to what you have just said.
You know, one thing in reading the story about E Company,
one thing that it refers to is the--to a lack of equipment, to
a delay in armoring. And that is a thread that is woven
throughout this story, along with the aspect of Captain Royer.
And there has been--it appeared to me, and I think this has
probably been the case throughout the history of this country,
that there is always a disconnect between those of us who are
the shopkeepers back in the States, or in the system, whether
it is wearing the uniform or the congressional system or in the
civil service or in industry, that supplies your equipment and
the warfighter who needs it.
And, in fact, I can remember when we were with you, General
Mattis, I was there with Congressman Calvert and Congressman
Reyes last time, and I asked you what you needed, and you said,
I would like to get scopes for my guys and for all the marines,
ACOGs. That makes sense because even though it is a little
magnification, it gives them added capability, and they are
all--marines are good shots above all, and that leverages that
capability.
And I came back and I met with the head of SOCOM, and I
called him up and I said, do you have any ACOGs? And he said, I
have a hundred that I can ship tomorrow. And he had a guy in
there at 7 a.m. in the morning in my office, and he rolled out
a blanket--I don't know how he got through security--and he had
every device known to man that Special Operations had. And he
said, I could send a hundred overnight.
I saw the e-mails after we sent those coming from the
marines about the old Congressmen getting involved in the
acquisition system, and all we were doing was sending you what
you asked for, right? No strings attached. So my point is that
it appears to me that there is, and always has been, and
probably always will be to some degree, a disconnect between
the guys that need stuff, the guys in the battlefield, and the
system that supplies that stuff. And what we are trying to do
is shorten up that connection and make that connection one that
is more responsive.
So, Colonel Kennedy, if you look at the statements that are
in this, have you read this article that is the subject of a
lot of Members' understanding of the situation?
Colonel Kennedy. Yes, sir, I have.
The Chairman. Okay. You have read where they talk about
having unarmored Humvees and Humvees that were partly armored
and some that were there that appeared to be almost totally
soft. But as I recall when you folks went in, one pledge that
the Marines gave me when you came over, left out of Kuwait, was
that all the Humvees coming in--this is when you came back to
Fallujah--came into Fallujah--that everything that was going to
be in operations would have some kind of armor on it, either
steel doors, or that plus something else; so maybe not 1114s
and maybe not kitted, but would have some level of armor.
But from your estimation, your personal estimation, was
there more that could have been done in terms of moving armor
to the guys who were doing the fighting, which was largely this
company and your battalion in particular?
Colonel Kennedy. Sir, there was a progression of armor
protection that started when we got to Kuwait. We had
originally embarked about 80 Humvees from Camp Pendleton, none
of which were armored per se. Before we departed in the two-
week bloc of preparation, before we departed, 75 percent of the
vehicles that went forward--I gained some vehicles in that
process--75 percent of those vehicles were armored to some
Level three protection.
None of the troops' carrier Humvees that went forward had
anything less than the armored doors, and if they did not have
armor in the back in the actual troop compartments, they went
empty. Echo Company did not make that transit. They flew into
Al Assad and met with us in Ramadi. Every vehicle that went
forward either had the LOGCOM-provided Level three armor or
armor that we procured in Camp Victory from Army units that
were departing the theater.
The Chairman. So you had--the stuff that you brought in
from Kuwait typically would have the two--have the doors
armored, have steel doors?
Colonel Kennedy. Yes, sir. The original doors, I believe,
were called the Simula doors. They were half doors. We had not
seen the L-shaped armor at that point. We received a number of
side armor panels from the division logistics system and from
the Army units that were depositing that same armor that they
had locally fabricated in Kuwait.
The Chairman. Okay. The marines that were killed in that
firefight, which I think you had one Humvee that took heavy
fire, the one that is referred to in the article? I think you
had, what, seven or eight marines killed in that particular
vehicle? What did that have on it?
Colonel Kennedy. Sir, I cannot attest 100 percent. As we--
any armor that would have been on that vehicle was totally
destroyed was pulled off soon thereafter. During that period on
the 6th of April when it was ambushed, that fight continued for
three days, and there was a varying state of breakage of the
equipment.
I have pictures from--taken right after those marines were
pulled from those vehicles. They were shot through the
windshield by a 12.7-millimeter heavy machine gun. Armor really
was not an issue in protecting or failing to protect those
marines. Even if they had had the 4-inch-thick ballistic glass,
from the 100 meters away, a heavier machine gun is going to
defeat any armor.
Six marines died right out. One was manning his machine
gun, so he was standing above the armor that would have
afforded him any protection. And the last marine to have been
killed in that ambush, in fact it was a sailor, a corpsman that
was treating the marine on the ground. So he was outside of the
vehicle. I do not believe that armor in that case would have
made a difference, sir.
The Chairman. That machine gun is approximately what
caliber? Is that the equivalent of a .50?
Colonel Kennedy. It is exactly a .50-caliber.
The Chairman. .50 cal is going to tear up a Humvee fairly
quickly.
What about the second vehicle that they speak about in the
article that was following that particular Humvee? I think it
states that it had armor. What degree of armor did that have,
if you can recall?
Colonel Kennedy. Yes, sir. On the 29th of May, Echo Company
was tasked with investigating a parked station wagon that was
on the side of the road. We had not seen vehicle-borne IEDs at
that stage in our time in Iraq, but it seemed suspicious
because the Iraqis do not just leave a vehicle unattended. It
would be quickly stripped.
A convoy of four vehicles was passing that station wagon,
passed within six feet of the vehicle, when it detonated on the
last Humvee. That Humvee was transporting not only the Marines
that were assigned to the Quick Reaction Force, but it was, in
fact, carrying additional marines that had been picked up along
the road that had been conducting a patrol. So it was a fairly
full vehicle.
The armor had again, sir, LOGCOM-provided flank protection.
It had the Foster Miller panels on the backside, and it had L-
shaped doors and the ballistic glass for the windshield.
I was the on scene of that explosion within about five to
ten minutes. We surveyed the entire vehicle. There were no
perforations or failures of the armor systems themselves. It
was where marines were exposed above the protection of the
armor or through the void where the L-shaped door is that they
were killed by the overpressure.
Ultimately, sir, it appeared to have been four to five
.155-millimeter artillery projectiles, plastic explosives and
ball bearings that killed those marines.
The Chairman. So in that incident, a fully up-armored 1114,
with all of the--with the full suit of armor would not have
prevented the deaths? Is that basically your opinion?
Colonel Kennedy. Sir, we experienced just over 200 IEDs
over the course of the time we were there. Sir, there were
times where I had no rational explanation for why marines
survived detonation of an IED right at their feet. Other times
they were as much as 50 meters away and were injured
grievously. I do not know if an up-armored Humvee would have or
would not have survived that level of explosion. It was a big
bomb, sir. The station wagon itself was completely
disintegrated. There was a small portion of the engine block
left.
The Chairman. Okay. And the first incident you described,
the ambush where you had heavy machine gun fire coming through
the front of the vehicle, that, in your opinion--is there any
type of armor suit that we make for the Humvee today that would
have survived that or would have prevented that or repelled
that attack?
Colonel Kennedy. I don't believe so, sir. I know that a
.50-caliber machine gun at that range striking any armor, it is
going to penetrate anything short of a Bradley fighting vehicle
or a tank. It is going to kill it.
The Chairman. I don't think the ballistic glass, any of the
species of the ballistic glass that we make is heavy duty
enough to take a hit, much less multiple hits with a .50.
Mr. Skelton.
Mr. Skelton. Colonel, thank you for your testimony.
Regarding the marine in question of which you spoke, did you
write the earlier OER on him?
Colonel Kennedy. Yes, sir, I did.
Mr. Skelton. And the subsequent comments that Congressman
Weldon read, did you write those as well?
Colonel Kennedy. Sir, actually those were--those were
comments provided for this report. There was comments provided
up the chain of command. There are procedures to safeguard that
officer's career, reputation, checks and balances. So I believe
that is where those comments were taken from, sir.
Mr. Skelton. Thank you.
The Chairman. General Mattis, let me ask you while we have
got you here--we are going to have a vote very quickly on this
supplemental--what is your take on the western AOR right now,
the Fallujah to Syria border? And in particular, if you look at
the standup of the Iraqi forces and the mentoring that we are
undertaking now, the embedding of American advisers, if you
will, the ongoing training, we have got a lot of Iraqi forces
being stood up for almost every AOR except that AOR. They are a
very small, dedicated Iraqi group. The implication is that is
pretty heavy lifting.
I would like to have your personal opinion as to whether
you think that the Iraqis are going to be able to hold that
tough piece of territory and manage it not to an extremely high
level, but to a basic level of stability?
General Mattis. Sir, Mr. Chairman, I would like to caveat
what I say, that I have been out of there for a while. With
Fallujah no longer providing a sanctuary due to the victory
that we had in November, last November, the border is, as you
know, almost impossible to fully control. We have our own
challenges on our own southwest border. This is a very remote
and long border, and there is always going to be some people
coming across which impacts on the security situation there.
The election, however, has changed this dynamic. I think it
is why the enemy is trying to kill so many Iraqis now.
The Iraqi security forces that were out there were
penetrated by the enemy, heavily penetrated by the enemy. Plus
they had intense tribal loyalties. And the current situation
that the leadership, Iraqi and American, has taken charge of
shows they have got to bring in nationally recruited Iraqi
security forces. Young guys from the hometown walking down the
street in uniform are too vulnerable. They know where their
families are. They have tribal loyalties. Troops that are a
nationally recruited force living in barracks, operating more
on military or paramilitary lines will give us a better
opportunity to allow them to, with American support, American
stiffening, American training, American reaction forces for
quite some time yet--will permit them to do what perhaps the
disappointing performance of the previous force could not
provide.
The Chairman. But do you think they are going to be able to
do it? And I agree with you totally that this is going to have
to be a national force. Do you think they are going to be tough
enough or the Iraq situation may evolve to where we can move
out of some of the more lightly traveled areas and some of the
less difficult areas in Iraq? But I can see in my mind's eye a
continuing call from the Iraq Government for American forces to
stabilize that western AOR, that piece of the triangle.
General Mattis. Sir, since I am no longer over there, I
always look a little askance at Washington, D.C., generals
talking authoritatively about things a long ways away, or New
York reporters writing about Ramadi when they have never been
there. But it is trending in that way, sir.
The Chairman. I would be interested in your take on that.
And thank you for your service. You have a great reputation as
a warfighter, and you did a great job handling our people. And,
Colonel, thank you for your description of this tough area,
this difficult area. You know, it is--the Marines have a very
disciplined process, which is quite a personal process. And I
know when my son was going through TBS, I remember him, he was
writing his reports one day, because they get all the young--
all the new officers end up--are placed in leadership
positions, and they have to rate sometimes their best friend;
right? The rest of their peers. And their peers in turn rate
them, and that means you have to sit down, look somebody in the
eye, and tell them that they failed. And that is a difficult
thing, but it is one that is necessary for the development of
marines. And I don't think there is any substitute.
And so I think the committee has got to take your statement
as one that is--one that is made with honor, with insight and
obviously an understanding of the situation that we do not
have.
So you certainly--I think you have served the committee
well in giving us your take, straightforward, on this
situation. And beyond that, I think it has been good, General
Mattis, to have you here with us also listening to the armor
discussion, because you are a consumer. And we are going to
have to change this system. We are going to have to get a
system developed. We are going to have to develop more
response. This system is largely a product of Washington, D.C.,
to some degree, a product of Congress. It is a product of $600
hammers that nobody ever wanted to see again.
So we have a system that can say no 35 times before it says
yes to anything. Even the new Jammer, this license that the
Secretary signed out to use, a license we have given them to
buy equipment for the combat theater, waiving all laws, there
was enormous resistance, I can tell you, to utilizing that for
something as basic as a Jammer. So hopefully we have trotted
this one out, and we will use that as a model to follow.
So let's work together and try to get this--try to work out
this disconnect that has always existed to some degree between
the field and the suppliers and serve our people well. So
thanks a lot to your endurance, all parties involved. And thank
you, General Kelly, for your helping to escort this august
body, and thanks for your service to the country as well.
This hearing is concluded. Let's get back together in three
or four weeks, and let's sit down and see where we are.
[Whereupon, at 1:34 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]
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A P P E N D I X
May 5, 2005
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PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
May 5, 2005
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DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
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QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
May 5, 2005
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QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. REYES
Mr. Reyes. What is the percentage that you think is armored? Is
that in the ball park that we have 60, 70 percent of the vehicles not
armored in Afghanistan right now?
General Sorenson. [The information referred to can be found in the
Appendix on page 153.]
______
QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. LANGEVIN
Mr. Langevin. I would like an update, first of all, on how our
equipment is doing. And then, as a follow-up to that, I have been
concerned about more rapidly developing composite material.
What effect the add-on armor, either a Level two or Level three, is
having on the service life of the vehicles? And can you expand upon the
efforts that you are taking to decrease the weight of the armor, or the
vehicles, to ensure sufficient protection without further degradation.
If you can expand on those, I know the committee would consider it
helpful.
General Sorenson.
PURPOSE: To provide Congress with an update of the HMMWV
Recapitalization Program.
FACTS:
a. Recapitalization is an important on-going element of the TWV
strategy that has proven effective. It is adding new capabilities such
as engines, chassis, and transmissions, which enhances a program where
existing equipment is aging.
b. The Light Tactical Vehicle Fleet (HMMWVs) represents 50% of the
total tactical truck fleet, approximately 115,000 systems. The major
portion approximately 86,000 vehicles are AO models. The fleet average
age is 13.9 years against a EUL of 15-years. The HMMWV program is a
Tri-service program, supporting Army, Marine Corps and Air Force
requirements. Approximately 12,600 HMMWVs (12% of Fleet) are supporting
OIF and are experiencing a 6:1 OPTEMPO [putting 6,000 miles in a war
time one year period vs. 1,000 miles under a normal peace time
OPTEMPO]. The M998 HMMWV variants are unable to accept add-on armor to
achieve a 360-degree protection. These operational gaps necessitated
the procurement of additional Up-Armored HMMWVs (UAHs) and 13,000 Add-
on Armor kits to provide force protection for soldiers. Production
lines have now been changed and we are currently producing only M1114's
(UAHs), M1151 and M1152 platforms to accommodate the force protection
requirements.
c. The VCSA approved and revised the HMMWV Recapitalization
Program, which is essential to the aging fleet. A selected number of
the M998A0 vehicles from the HMMWV fleet will be modified to meet the
M1097R1 vehicle standard. The M1097R1 vehicle is more capable,
reliable, and maintainable and can accept Add-on Armor for force
protection. The result of this Recapitalization effort is a vehicle
with an extended service life that is ``like new'' in appearance,
1900lbs increase payload, improved suspension components, increased
electrical capacity, and is force protection compliant.
d. To meet Army demands, a third Recap production source, Maine
Military Authority, has been added to the program to augment Red River
Army Depot (RRAD) and Letterkenny Army Depot (LEAD) production
capacity. The Army budget currently has programmed 697 vehicles in FY06
and 800 vehicles in FY07. However, the TWV Strategy and OSD Stress
Study support quantities of 4000 in each of the program years. Funding
strategy is to fund through supplementals. Additionally, a Re-power
Program is underway to increase the horsepower and introduce an EPA
compliant power train for both the HMMWV Recap and new production
lines.
______
QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. ANDREWS
Mr. Andrews. At some point there is a sea change. We go from having
200 and some of these armored vehicles to rushing to get ourselves over
10,000. Frankly, the track record in the months at the end of calendar
2003 is not bad. You have ramped up 8,000-and-something right now. But
I am less interested in the industrial production than I am the
paradigm shift in people's thinking. Who was it that came to you and
said, you know, we need a lot more of these things in a hurry; and when
did that happen?
General Sorenson.
THE ARMY POSITION:
The Army is meeting the CENTCOM Combatant Commander's
increased requirements for Up-Armored HMMWVs with increased production,
diverting current production, and redirecting assets in support of
Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF) and Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF).
The current requirement for Up-Armored HMMWVs is 10,079.
There are approximately 7,991 Up-Armored vehicles
currently available to, or directed to, the theater Area of
Responsibility (AOR). This number includes approximately 2,725 Up-
Armored vehicles obtained from units deployed and those diverted from
production or redistributed from other units not currently identified
for deployment.
All Up-Armored HMMWVs deployed to theater will remain in
theater, whether organic to units or in fulfillment to CENTCOM
requirement to protect Soldiers' lives and to ensure we have enough
armored vehicles required to perform the military mission.
TALKING POINTS
The initial theater request for Up-Armored vehicle
requirement was received in May 2003 for 235 vehicles. This requirement
was fulfilled with vehicles coming directly from the production line
(originally scheduled for other units) and a redistribution of vehicles
assigned to Forces Command and U.S. Army Europe.
In Aug. 2003, CFLCC requested an increase in Up-Armored
vehicles from 235 to 1,233.
By Aug. 2003, CFLCC further refined the requirement to
1,407 vehicles.
On 3 Oct. 2003, the request increased to 2,957 to include
Military Police requirements for OIF.
Additional requirements for OEF were approved in Oct.
2003, bringing the total to 3,142.
From Dec. 2003 to Jan. 2004 Up-Armored vehicle
requirements increased by more than 1,000 vehicles bringing the total
to 4,149.
On 15 Mar. 2004, the Vice Chief of Staff, Army, approved
additional increases bringing the requirement to 4,388.
By Apr. 2004 additional Up-Armored vehicle requirements
for OIF/OEF were approved by the VCSA increasing the requirement to
4,454.
On 29 June 2004, the VCSA approved further requirements,
bringing the total requirement to 6,223.
On 14 Aug. 2004, the VCSA approved additional
requirements to bring the total required to 8,105.
On 23 Dec. 04, the VCSA approved additional Up-Armored
vehicles requirement for OEF increasing the requirement to 8,275.
On 11 Mar. 05, the VCSA approved additional Up-Armored
vehicles requirement for OEF increasing the requirement to 10,079.
[A chart of the UAH Requirements can be found in the Appendix on
page 154.]
______
QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. SHUSTER
Mr. Shuster. If you could give me some kind of report on what you
are doing, because as I said, what I understand is that it is--the
money is not being spent to go after the composites, and they have a
great benefit to us.
General Sorenson.
PURPOSE: To provide information on S&T efforts for composite armor
FACTS:
a. The Army's S&T program continues to focus on developing lighter
weight, improved protective armor technology for both vehicles and
personnel to include advanced composite concepts/designs, active
protection systems, and enhanced predictive models.
b. U.S. Army Research and Development and Engineering Command
(RDECOM) has developed key advances in fibers and materials that have
contributed to the success of the Interceptor Body Armor. Additional
efforts have focused on systems for increased extremity protection,
such as the Deltoid Axillary Protection system.
c. RDECOM is researching high-strength fibers such as M5 and Zylon,
along with post-processing treatments, which could improve the
fragmentation protection of soft armor systems. In addition, new
methods of production and innovative architectures for protective
materials (e.g., non-woven, unidirectional layers; backing materials;
flexible resin impregnated fabrics) are being assessed.
d. RDECOM has been working toward lighter and more affordable
solutions for the entire spectrum of Army vehicles. Combat System and
Tactical Wheeled Vehicle armors have had considerable success in using
ballistic-grade composites such as the family of Kevlar and ``S2-
glass'' composite materials. The fiber reinforced composite materials
are often combined with various metals or ceramics to form ``hybrid''
composite armors.
e. Hybrid armors come in three basic variants.
a. Metal-composite designs are approximately 30% lighter than
monolithic steel. In general, the purpose of composites in these
various hybrid constructions is to provide backing stiffness to the
structure that is critical to the function of the armor design.
i. Metal-Composite armor: Used in the Low Signature Armor
Cab, the M1114, and other vehicles in development
b. Hybrid ceramic-composite laminate designs are approximately
66% lighter than monolithic steel. In these designs the composite
materials support the ceramic tiles and catch residual projectile
debris resulting from an impact. These designs have a higher cost and
maintenance burden, but they are significantly lighter than metal-
composite armor systems.
i. Ceramic-Composite Monocoque armor: Demonstrated in a
mobile platform, the Composite Armored Vehicle technology
demonstration, including maintenance and repair technologies.
ii. Advanced Ceramic-Composite Structural armor: Higher
efficiency armor technologies evolved for the Future Combat Systems
Program.
c. Composite hybrid armor panels can be constructed from a
variety of composite materials and metals. The relationship governing
the performance of composite hybrid armors is governed by interactions
between the layers of material used. As there are multiple layers of
materials, changing constituent materials will affect total system
performance. Numerical models have been coupled to ballistic
experiments to provide an assessment process and a limited predictive
capability to understand the influence of armor recipe changes.
i. Ceramic-Metal-Composite applique armors: Used in the M1117
Armored Security Vehicle, the STRYKER, and can be applied to the fleet
of tactical wheeled vehicles.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
FY05 FY06 FY07 FY08 FY09 Total
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Soldier Ballistic Protection 3.0 2.5 1.5 2.6 2.7 12.3
Adv Lighteweight Armor for Vehicles 4.5 10.3 10.9 13.5 13.9 53.1
------------------------------------------------------------------------