    [House Hearing, 114 Congress]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

                             [H.A.S.C. No. 114-129]

                               AVIATION READINESS

                                   __________

                                    HEARING

                                   BEFORE THE

                           SUBCOMMITTEE ON READINESS

                                     OF THE

                          COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES

                            HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                        ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS

                                 SECOND SESSION

                                   __________

                                  HEARING HELD

                                  JULY 6, 2016

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                                   __________

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                           SUBCOMMITTEE ON READINESS

                     ROBERT J. WITTMAN, Virginia, Chairman

    ROB BISHOP, Utah                     MADELEINE Z. BORDALLO, Guam
    VICKY HARTZLER, Missouri             SUSAN A. DAVIS, California
    AUSTIN SCOTT, Georgia                JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut
    ELISE M. STEFANIK, New York          TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois
    FRANK A. LoBIONDO, New Jersey        SCOTT H. PETERS, California
    MIKE ROGERS, Alabama                 TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii
    CHRISTOPHER P. GIBSON, New York      BETO O'ROURKE, Texas
    RICHARD B. NUGENT, Florida           RUBEN GALLEGO, Arizona
    BRAD R. WENSTRUP, Ohio               (Vacancy)
    SAM GRAVES, Missouri
    STEVE RUSSELL, Oklahoma
                    Margaret Dean, Professional Staff Member
                   Vickie Plunkett, Professional Staff Member
                              Jodi Brignola, Clerk

                               C O N T E N T S

                                  ----------
                                                                       Page

                  STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS

    Bordallo, Hon. Madeleine Z., a Delegate from Guam, Ranking
      Member, Subcommittee on Readiness..............................     2
    Wittman, Hon. Robert J., a Representative from Virginia,
      Chairman, Subcommittee on Readiness............................     1

                                   WITNESSES

    Davis, LtGen Jon M., USMC, Deputy Commandant for Aviation, U.S.
      Marine Corps...................................................     3
    Manazir, RADM Michael C., USN, Deputy Chief of Naval Operations
      for Warfare Systems, U.S. Navy.................................     8
    Mangum, LTG Kevin W., USA, Deputy Commanding General, U.S. Army
      Training and Doctrine Command, U.S. Army.......................     5
    West, Maj Gen Scott D., USAF, Director of Current Operations,
      U.S. Air Force.................................................     6

                                    APPENDIX

    Prepared Statements:

        Davis, LtGen Jon M...........................................    45
        Manazir, RADM Michael C......................................    75
        Mangum, LTG Kevin W..........................................    56
        West, Maj Gen Scott D........................................    65
        Wittman, Hon. Robert J.......................................    43

    Documents Submitted for the Record:

        [There were no Documents submitted.]

    Witness Responses to Questions Asked During the Hearing:

        Mrs. Hartzler................................................    85

    Questions Submitted by Members Post Hearing:

        Mr. Peters...................................................    89
        Ms. Tsongas..................................................    89

                               AVIATION READINESS

          House of Representatives,
            Committee on Armed Services,
              Subcommittee on Readiness,
                Washington, DC, Wednesday, July 6, 2016.
    The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:03 a.m., in room
      2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Robert J. Wittman
      (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.......................
                    OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. ROBERT J. WITTMAN, A
                      REPRESENTATIVE FROM VIRGINIA, CHAIRMAN,
                      SUBCOMMITTEE ON READINESS
    Mr. Wittman. I am going to call to order the House Armed Services
      Committee, Subcommittee on Readiness...........................
    I wish everybody a good morning, and thank you for being here
      today to discuss a topic that is instrumental to the success of
      our military operations, and that is aviation readiness........
    Over the last several months, we have heard testimony from each
      of the service branches about what needs to be done to overcome
      our significant readiness challenges. A critical part of that
      testimony has dealt with the negative impacts that aircraft
      shortages, maintenance, and lack of adequate hangar space
      continue to have, not only on our overall readiness levels, but
      also on our military aviators..................................
    In separate hearings about naval infrastructure readiness, both
      Admiral Mary Jackson and General Azzano testified about
      aircraft hangar fire suppression systems that were unusable and
      inadvertently activated........................................
    At the Air Force hangar at Eglin Air Force Base, the instability
      of these systems ultimately rendered the entire hangar unusable
      for nearly 3 months. The impacted portion of the hangar, 17
      percent of that hangar's airspace, remains today unusable......
    The Marine Corps and the Army face similar facility challenges.
      The service branches also face real obstacles when it comes to
      the retention and training of flight and maintenance crews.
      Aging aircraft and prolonged maintenance times, not to mention
      the operational demands associated with the fight against
      terrorism, means that aviators and other personnel are dealing
      with more danger and fewer training opportunities..............
    Regrettably, the rash of recent military aircraft crashes have
      highlighted the human and other cost of dwindling aviation
      readiness. We owe our warfighters every protection and
      precaution available and I look forward today to hearing from
      each of our service branches about aviation readiness,
      readiness recovery, impacts to safety, and where we can
      continue to take risks and what risks are acceptable and those
      which are not..................................................
    With that, I welcome all of you, our members of our distinguished
      panel and senior aviators before us today. We have with us
      Lieutenant General Jon M. Davis, United States Marine Corps,
      Deputy Commandant for Aviation; Lieutenant General Kevin
      Mangum, U.S. Army, Deputy Commanding General, U.S. Army
      Training and Doctrine Command [TRADOC]; Major General Scott D.
      West, United States Air Force, Director of Current Operations;
      and Rear Admiral Michael C. Manazir, United States Navy, Deputy
      Chief of Naval Operations for Warfare Systems..................
    Gentlemen, thank you for your presence and your testimony today.
      I look forward to hearing your insights about the readiness
      challenges to military aviation................................
    I would now like to turn to our ranking member, Madeleine
      Bordallo, for any remarks that she may have....................
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Wittman can be found in the
      Appendix on page 43.]..........................................

                    STATEMENT OF HON. MADELEINE Z. BORDALLO, A
                      DELEGATE FROM GUAM, RANKING MEMBER,
                      SUBCOMMITTEE ON READINESS

    Ms. Bordallo. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and good morning
      to all our witnesses. I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding
      this hearing about some of the challenges and the solutions
      that we are facing with regard to aviation readiness across the
      services. We know that readiness shortfalls exist, from
      degraded maintenance capabilities to reduced training hours,
      and we need to address them....................................
    Just as it will take time to build back readiness, these issues,
      of course, did not arise overnight. What the services are
      experiencing now and what we are working to remedy in the
      fiscal year 2017 NDAA [National Defense Authorization Act] are
      the consequences of years' worth of high operational tempo
      experienced by fewer aircraft with fewer experienced operators
      and skilled military and civilian personnel to sustain them....
    The services have responded to falling material readiness
      conditions by identifying deficits and prioritizing training
      and maintenance needs, but these efforts are hampered by the
      continuing impacts of sequestration and unstable and
      unpredictable funding. When coupled with reductions in skilled
      personnel at aviation depots, severe challenges in obtaining
      spare parts for legacy systems, late and unpredictable funding
      due to multiple continuing resolutions [CRs] and the
      unrelenting operational tempo required by today's complex
      security environment, it is not surprising that we are dealing
      with what some are calling a readiness crisis..................
    Just as these readiness issues did not arise overnight, they
      cannot be resolved in a single fiscal year's defense bill. More
      aircraft would bring some relief to the stress of high
      operational tempo, but these aircraft need more trained, more
      ready personnel to operate and sustain them and improved base
      infrastructure to support them.................................
    So, we also cannot just throw money at the problem though, and it
      has become clear that consistency in funding are more helpful
      than increased budgets.........................................
    I welcome this opportunity today to hear from our witnesses about
      the challenges they are facing in their services to achieve and
      sustain aviation readiness. And I also encourage my colleagues
      to listen to some of the underlying causes of our current
      situation and also to think about the long-term financial
      commitments we are making in the fiscal year 2017 NDAA.........
    And I thank you, Mr. Chairman, and yield back....................
    Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Ms. Bordallo.............................
    Gentlemen, I have been told that each of you will make an opening
      statement. And please proceed. And as a reminder, your written
      testimony has already been made available to the members and
      will be part of the official record............................
    So, General Davis, we will begin with you........................

                    STATEMENT OF LTGEN JON M. DAVIS, USMC, DEPUTY
                      COMMANDANT FOR AVIATION, U.S. MARINE CORPS

    General Davis. Chairman Wittman, Chairman Thornberry, Ranking
      Member Bordallo, distinguished members of the House Armed
      Services Committee, Subcommittee on Readiness, and other
      distinguished members, thank you for your continued support. We
      appreciate the opportunity to testify on the current state of
      Marine aviation readiness......................................
    The Marine Corps' title 10 responsibilities are to be the
      Nation's force in readiness. We are charged and expected to
      always be the most ready when the Nation is least ready. This
      responsibility is the very core of our identity as Marines,
      your ``fight tonight'' force...................................
    The last time I testified, we were only able to fly on any given
      day about one-third of our aircraft. Today, we have improved
      and can launch 42 percent, 443 aircraft, of our required 1,065
      flight-line inventory, a 9 percent improvement. We could not
      make this progress without your support. Thank you very much.
      However, we are still far short of what we need to be the force
      of readiness. Forty-two percent is not good enough; it is not
      good at all....................................................
    We are constantly transferring aircraft to fill out our deploying
      squadrons. Deployment success is at the cost of our non-
      deploying squadrons. We balance F-18, Harrier, E-6, and CH-53
      squadrons by reducing the number of aircraft per squadron
      because of a lack of aircraft inventory........................
    So, yes, while I can tell you we are improving, I would
      characterize our current state of recovery as fragile. We are
      in a deep hole and have a ways to go to climb out. Continued
      progress in our race to recovery depends on consistent,
      reliable, and targeted readiness and procurement funding. Our
      risk is bought down through fixing old and procuring new.......
    The CH-53K recently lifted more than any helicopter in history.
      It is doing great in tests and is on track for replacing our
      CH-53 Echo. Just last week, we stood up our second operational
      F-35B squadron, VMFA-211 in Arizona............................
    Today, we have five lieutenants, brand new guys, training to fly
      the F-35B in South Carolina. The F-35B procurement ramp is
      approaching 20 per year, enabling the transition from our
      legacy strike force to an aircraft that can protect marines and
      any threat as a fifth generation strike fighter, and then, at a
      time and place of our choosing, transition to a fourth
      generation bomb truck..........................................
    We need the F-35s and 53Ks as quick as we can get them to replace
      our proven but worn-out and wearing out F-18s, Harriers, EA-
      6Bs, and CH-53 Echos. The combination of fixing aircraft while
      recapitalizing with new gear are both critical to Marine
      aviation and the Marine air-ground task force [MAGTF]..........
    I measure our recovery not only in terms of ready basic aircraft,
      but also on how many hours our crew fly. The ultimate readiness
      metric is aircrew flying hours per month per crew. The last
      time I testified, Marine pilots averaged between 6 and 9 hours
      per month. That is not good, either. Today, our non-deployed
      aircrews average between 7 to 11 hours per month. This is an
      improvement, but still 6 hours per month shy of what a trained
      and ready force requires.......................................
    The lack of ready aircraft in flight line is a reason for the
      shortfall, but more concerning is the loss of experience this
      generation of Marine aviators has preparing for the future.
      Marine aviation has a history replete with being exceptional in
      the air and able to provide unmatched aviation fire support to
      our ground forces. Every hour not flown today by our forces
      today means that they will have less of an experience base for
      our future.....................................................
    Our enlisted marines are the highest quality ever. They work hard
      to sustain our aircraft and maximize every flight opportunity.
      They do get frustrated at the lack of parts available for
      fixing aircraft. They do work hours--long hours and weekends
      just before deploying to get that last aircraft up to make that
      on deployment or to complete a transfer to make sure their
      deployment numbers are whole...................................
    Our deployment-to-dwell is not an ideal 1:3. It is a sustained
      1:2; technically a state of surge. We are answering the
      combatant commanders' demand for incredible capabilities our
      MAGTFs offer, but doing it with aging aircraft, not enough of
      those aircraft, and our marines are stretched thin. They are
      doing their level-best to make themselves ready to be that
      potent and formidable combat-capable force, ready to take on
      any threat, any place, any time across a range of military
      operations.....................................................
    In summary, Marine aviation readiness remains in jeopardy in this
      fiscally constrained environment. We have a plan to recover.
      The plan includes aircraft recapitalization, legacy aircraft
      recovery and reset, and that plan is showing positive results.
      But success requires continued funding stability, our
      production ramps in new aircraft to stay whole and the
      resources for our marines, sailors, civilians, and industry
      partners to recover the readiness of our aging legacy aircraft.
    Thank you for your time today. I look forward to answering your
      questions......................................................
    [The prepared statement of General Davis can be found in the
      Appendix on page 45.]..........................................
    Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Lieutenant General Davis.................
    We will now go to Lieutenant General Mangum......................

                    STATEMENT OF LTG KEVIN W. MANGUM, USA, DEPUTY
                      COMMANDING GENERAL, U.S. ARMY TRAINING AND
                      DOCTRINE COMMAND, U.S. ARMY

    General Mangum. Chairman Wittman, Chairman Thornberry, Ranking
      Member Bordallo, distinguished members of the Readiness
      Subcommittee and other distinguished members, thanks for the
      opportunity to appear before you today to address Army aviation
      readiness......................................................
    As a career Army aviator, I am proud to represent all the
      terrific soldiers of our total Army aviation force who serve
      our Nation faithfully every day. I can also definitively say
      that the total Army aviation units across all our formations
      and components have performed magnificently over the last 15
      years of sustained combat and operations in various threat
      environments...................................................
    I say this knowing full well that Army aviation faces the same
      and similar challenges and concerns as the rest of our Army in
      this budget-constrained environment............................
    Our aviation modernization and procurement accounts have slowed
      to a snail's pace in order to build readiness for the current
      fight. We have had seven serious manned mishaps, or Class A
      accidents, and eight unmanned accidents thus far this fiscal
      year. Flight training hours are our only resource to achieve
      platoon-level readiness, proficiency...........................
    And our aviation maintenance soldiers and our combat aviation
      brigades are not deploying with their aircraft and aircrews,
      which is causing an atrophy of critical skills that will be
      needed for expeditionary operations in combat zones that do not
      allow for contract maintenance.................................
    While we have resourced our deploying aviation units to a level
      of proficiency sufficient for the current and recent fights in
      Iraq and Afghanistan, we see peer and near-peer competitors and
      know that we will require resourcing our units to higher levels
      of proficiency in order to train for combined arms maneuver
      fights that will likely come...................................
    We also know that with the prospect of sequestration in fiscal
      year 2018 and continued unpredictable budgets, these areas of
      concern may get worse before they get better as we prepare for
      the future threat environment..................................
    As a result of these operational, strategic, and budgetary
      challenges, General Milley, our Army Chief of Staff, asked me
      to lead a holistic assessment of Army aviation with the mission
      to conduct a comprehensive assessment of all things Army
      aviation. I was supported by a superstar team of Army aviation
      subject matter experts who I would like to thank publicly today
      for their incredible effort to complete our initial work.......
    I have briefed General Milley on our initial findings and have
      received his guidance to finalize our report, which we will do
      very soon. And I am confident that those recommendations will
      set us on a path to get after some of the readiness challenges
      and opportunities that lay in front of us......................
    I often describe aviation as a fragile ecosystem. In order to
      keep this ecosystem healthy and thriving all the requisite
      parts must be nourished routinely. If any get out of balance
      for long, the whole system can begin to fray and collapse,
      putting soldiers at risk.......................................
    For army aviation and our readiness, this includes our personnel,
      pilots, crews, maintainers and all those who work the numerous
      support roles, our manned and unmanned aircraft systems, our
      installations and training ranges and facilities, and the
      resources and time necessary to meet battalion-level collective
      proficiency with modernized equipment..........................
    While we can and have continued to assume risk in some areas of
      the ecosystem, in order to build the readiness needed to meet
      global aviation commitments, we do risk getting out of balance,
      which of course has consequences...............................
    In order to meet the challenges of emerging and future threats,
      we must provide realistic training, resource with time and
      dollars and couple this with exceptional leader development. In
      doing so, we set the best possible conditions for success to
      provide a trained and ready aviation force whenever needed in
      support of combatant commanders to meet any threat or
      contingency....................................................
    That said, what we cannot do is resource our aviation units to
      platoon- or company-level readiness, yet expect that these same
      units--these same units to operate in environments that require
      battalion-level proficiency and flight skills. If there is
      something that keeps me awake at night, this is it.
      Additionally, if we do not address the issue of time and
      dollars and the demand signal for aviation forces continues to
      increase, we will consume readiness faster than we can rebuild
      it.............................................................
    In a nutshell, we need to resource Army aviation units to train
      to battalion-level proficiency to keep the ecosystem in
      balance. This will allow our units to become proficient in
      those collective tasks required to operate at higher threat
      levels against peer or near-peer adversaries. This also means
      that our pilots and crews will get more repetitions to master
      their craft, and more is better................................
    The same is true for our soldiers who maintain our aircraft. They
      will get more opportunities to fix, repair, and maintain, which
      is critical to skill proficiency...............................
    Last, and certainly not least, is that training to battalion-
      level collective proficiency allows for more robust leader
      development to ensure our leaders can operate against complex
      hybrid threats in the future...................................
    Notwithstanding the challenges and concerns, the United States
      Army retains the largest, most modern, and best trained
      aviation force of its kind in the world. One that has been
      tested in a variety of operational environments and whose
      soldiers met and are meeting today, the tasks at hand no matter
      how difficult the danger.......................................
    Thank you again for the opportunity to testify today, we
      appreciate your support and I look forward to answering your
      questions......................................................
    [The prepared statement of General Mangum can be found in the
      Appendix on page 56.]..........................................
    Mr. Wittman. Lieutenant General Mangum, thank you. Major General
      West, we will now go to you....................................

                    STATEMENT OF MAJ GEN SCOTT D. WEST, USAF,
                      DIRECTOR OF CURRENT OPERATIONS, U.S. AIR FORCE

    General West. Chairman Wittman, Chairman Thornberry, Ranking
      Member Bordallo, distinguished members of the House Armed
      Service Subcommittee on Readiness, thank you for conducting
      this hearing today and allowing me to join Army, Navy, and
      Marine counterparts in testimony on our service readiness......
    Today's national security challenges come from a combination of
      strong states that are challenging world order, weak states
      that cannot preserve order, and poorly governed spaces that
      provide sanctuary to terrorists................................
    The Nation needs a strong joint force and that force depends upon
      Air Force capabilities at the beginning, middle, and end of
      every operation. The Air Force must be able to disrupt,
      degrade, or destroy any target in the world quickly and
      precisely with conventional or nuclear weapons to deter and win
      our Nation's wars. Whether in support of counterterrorism
      operations or near-peer deterrence, your Air Force remains
      constantly committed, as we have for 25 years..................
    However two and a half decades of continuous combat operations
      and reductions to our total force, coupled with budget
      instability and lower-than-planned funding levels, have
      contributed to the creation of one of the smallest, oldest, and
      least ready forces in our history. While the Bipartisan Budget
      Act of 2015 provides some space to recover readiness and
      continue modernization efforts, the Air Force needs permanent
      relief from the Budget Control Act, flexible funding, increased
      manpower, and time to recover..................................
    Today less than 50 percent of the conventional Air Force is ready
      to conduct the full spectrum of combat operations. While we are
      able to conduct nuclear deterrent operations and support
      counterterrorism efforts, operations against a near-peer
      competitor would require a significant amount of training. If
      called upon to fight state-to-state, an associated training
      delay would pose a significant risk to mission. Conversely,
      deploying airmen in their current readiness state to fight
      along soldiers, sailors, and marines, would significantly
      increase the risk to success of the joint fight................
    Accordingly, we will address readiness shortfalls in five areas:
      critical personnel skills, weapons systems sustainment,
      training resources, flying hours, and operations tempo. All
      five must be synchronized and balanced. Since development of
      human capital takes the longest to complete, we must first
      address personnel shortfalls in critical skills................
    We will also need to stabilize weapon system sustainment and
      improve our training infrastructure............................
    Finally, we need to increase our training hours and reduce
      operations tempo to provide the time our airmen need to prepare
      for full-spectrum operations...................................
    Mr. Chairman Wittman, Ranking Member Bordallo, distinguished
      members of the subcommittee, I look forward to answering your
      questions as we work to resolve our readiness challenges.......
    [The prepared statement of General West can be found in the
      Appendix on page 65.]..........................................
    Mr. Wittman. General West thank you so much. We will now go to
      Rear Admiral Manazir...........................................

                    STATEMENT OF RADM MICHAEL C. MANAZIR, USN, DEPUTY
                      CHIEF OF NAVAL OPERATIONS FOR WARFARE SYSTEMS,
                      U.S. NAVY

    Admiral Manazir. Chairman Thornberry, Chairman Wittman, Ranking
      Member Bordallo, distinguished members, I am proud to be here
      with my brothers in arms. Thank you for the opportunity to
      testify on the state of aviation readiness in the Navy.........
    For the first time in 25 years, the Nation and your Navy are
      facing the challenges of a return to great power competition at
      sea. Provocations from state and non-state actors continue to
      cause instability in almost every region of the world and pose
      a significant threat to U.S. interests, our allies, and the
      homeland.......................................................
    But our Nation continues to answer the call. Today the Navy has
      four carrier strike groups forward deployed: John C. Stennis,
      Ronald Reagan in the Pacific; Dwight D. Eisenhower, Harry S.
      Truman in the Mediterranean and Arabian Gulf. We also remain
      vigilant with rotational presence of land-based aviation forces
      such as EA-18G Growler, P-8 Poseidon, and the P-3 [Orion] in
      the Middle East and the Western Pacific. These missions not
      only demonstrate our Navy's responsiveness and warfighting
      power, but also maintain our sailor combat proficiency,
      readiness bought only with time at sea.........................
    This required level of readiness is fragile and can be
      squandered. As we reset in stride following 15 years of combat
      stress to the force, we continue to face challenges associated
      with balancing readiness for today and modernization for
      tomorrow's fight. More of our force is being demanded, deployed
      longer than planned; intended replacements are not keeping pace
      with attrition. Fiscal constraints continue to force difficult
      trades in capacity and readiness for long-term capability
      improvements...................................................
    Achieving full-spectrum aviation readiness requires us to restore
      capacity and throughput at our aviation depots primarily
      through workforce development changes and process improvement.
      Through a concerted hiring effort with the support of
      congressional budgetary increases, the recovery and maintenance
      capacity is underway and continues to progress.................
    Fleet Readiness Center hiring is on pace, and training continues
      so that we may ensure the depots can meet the looming workload
      demand. We have increased capacity at field sites, and are
      swarming repairs of aircraft on the flight line................
    So far in fiscal year 2016, we have completed 50 percent more
      depot-level repairs on the flight line than we did in fiscal
      year 2015. We have also partnered with industry to incorporate
      additional engineering, maintenance, and depot capacity to
      accomplish inspections and repairs outside of government depot
      facilities. As a result of process improvement implemented in
      2014, we saw a 44 percent increase in fiscal year 2015 F/A-18 A
      through D depot production when compared to the prior year.....
    We are recovering from a readiness deficit that started to accrue
      in 2009, and was exacerbated by sequestration effects. With the
      submission of the fiscal year 2016 omnibus request yesterday,
      and with a fiscal year 2017 President's budget request, we have
      invested to provide the maximum predictable and sustainable
      presence under the Optimized Fleet Response Plan...............
    The budget request harmonizes our readiness accounts to improve
      aircraft availability, the leading factor in our readiness
      challenge. Harmonization means that with the 2017 President's
      budget request, we realigned funds from the flight hour
      program, which is constrained by aircraft availability, to
      readiness enabler accounts such as depot maintenance, aviation
      support, aircraft spares, and aviation logistics. Each of these
      vital programs underpins the flying hour account, but has been
      critically underfunded in previous years.......................
    Specifically, programs like the Aviation Support Program funds
      engineers and logisticians, who help diagnose and develop
      repairs for failed components discovered by fleet maintainers.
      In this approach to readiness harmonization, the budget for
      aviation support is broken into individual program elements
      tied to specific platforms.....................................
    In this manner we can track platform targeted investments, which
      over time will yield improved aircraft availability. While we
      are seeing signs of recovery, and our processes need time to
      mature, we need funding stability to support our plan. The
      bipartisan budget agreement of 2015 gave us the stability to
      make target investments in the near term, but the threat of
      continuing resolutions and the prospect of return to
      sequestration would undo this progress, and further hamper our
      fragile recovery plan..........................................
    Ladies and gentlemen, your Navy aviation arm is the world's
      premier sea-based airpower. That advantage could be lost if we
      do not achieve stable budgets and make deliberate investments
      in future readiness, while ensuring the force can fight
      tonight. Mr. Chairman, distinguished committee members, we
      welcome your continued support as we work together to overcome
      these challenges, build and sustain the preeminent force of the
      future. Thank you for your commitment to naval aviation, I look
      forward to your questions......................................
    [The prepared statement of Admiral Manazir can be found in the
      Appendix on page 75.]..........................................
    Mr. Wittman. Admiral Manazir, thank you..........................
    I wanted to thank our other panelists here, and now I want to go
      to the chairman of our committee, Chairman Thornberry, for his
      comments and questions.........................................
    The Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would just like to take
      a moment to thank you and Ms. Bordallo for holding this
      hearing, and for all the members of the subcommittee and your
      staff for your deep dive into this important issue. I think it
      is very important that we and the American people understand
      what is happening, and I really admire the witnesses today and
      their efforts to make the best of a difficult situation........
    So first and foremost, I want to thank you, and as well as our
      witnesses, for dealing with this. I want to take just a moment
      and clarify one issue with General Mangum, if I may. You
      testified sir, that starting in fiscal year 2015, a combat
      aviation brigade was deployed to Afghanistan--it was supposed
      to have 2,800 soldiers, it only sent 800, right?...............
    General Mangum. Yes, sir.........................................
    The Chairman. And one of the ways you got from 2,800 to 800 was
      to leave most of the maintainers behind, right?................
    General Mangum. Yes, sir.........................................
    The Chairman. And so what do those maintainers do when they are
      left here in the states, when their aircraft and their pilots
      are in Afghanistan?............................................
    General Mangum. Sir, they are not doing a whole lot of aviation
      maintenance....................................................
    The Chairman. Well, and I think that your point, as I understand
      it, is that does not help readiness when you have important
      maintainers without aircraft to work on........................
    General Mangum. No sir, we are building a deficit of experience
      and expertise in our formations as a result....................
    The Chairman. And then my second question was, as I understand
      it, what is happening in Afghanistan is that we have
      contractors who are taking care of those helicopters, right?...
    General Mangum. That is correct, yes, sir........................
    The Chairman. And does that cost more or less than if the
      maintainers had been there with them?..........................
    General Mangum. It costs more....................................
    The Chairman. To have contractors?...............................
    General Mangum. To have contractors there, we are paying around
      $100 million this year for contractors in Afghanistan..........
    The Chairman. And that practice that started in fiscal year 2015
      continues today?...............................................
    General Mangum. Yes, sir.........................................
    The Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I just think it is important for
      members to understand this point. I understand that there may
      shortly be an announcement on troop caps for Afghanistan, and
      one of the ways the troop caps are reached is like this........
    And it costs more, and yet where does that money come from? It
      comes out of the readiness of all these folks, and what they
      are trying to do. It is only a subset of the issues you are
      looking at today, but I think it is important for us to
      understand it..................................................
    Thank you for letting me take a moment to clarify that. I yield
      back...........................................................
    Mr. Wittman. Well, thank you Mr. Chairman, I appreciate you
      bringing that up...............................................
    I know Lieutenant General Mangum and I had a chance to talk about
      that the other day, and that does get down truly to the element
      of only platoon-level readiness, and if you don't have the
      maintainers there and the ability to operate at those higher
      levels of training at the battalion and brigade level, then it
      creates a whole new set of circumstances.......................
    I would like to ask a question collectively of all of our
      witnesses. In looking at the scenario we had today, each of you
      spoke about where we are today with the President's budget for
      2017, and then the NDAA that was passed both by the House and
      the Senate, and the appropriations bills for national defense,
      one here in the House, one soon to be taken up there in the
      Senate. Those all have us at higher overall spending levels....
    We can debate back and forth about how many of those dollars are
      OCO [overseas contingency operations] but how many dollars are
      in the base budget, but overall an increase. And each you all
      spoke to that and how that increase is helpful to you in
      regenerating readiness. And where we are today is just
      preparing the conditions to reestablish that readiness, so it
      is not even getting on that steep glide slope of rebuilding, it
      is just setting the conditions.................................
    Give me your perspective in that element of setting the
      conditions, of what a CR this year would do to you in getting
      where we need to be, in reestablishing that aviation readiness,
      and Lieutenant General Davis, I will begin with you............
    General Davis. Thank you, sir, for the question..................
    We talked about stable funding, and I think the hard work the
      Marines put forth this last year, to recover from what I
      consider to be the lowest ebb of Marine aviation readiness in a
      long time. F-18 pilots on average 8.8 hours a month last year.
      That is about half what they should be flying..................
    Now we are about 9.8 for those that aren't deployed. That is
      still way below where we should be. So we are eking out inch by
      inch a progressive recovery out there. So the recovery, and the
      budgets, while good, we need to make sure they stay whole, sir.
      Why is that? We need to procure the new airplanes that are--a
      lot of our old F-18s and 53 Echos are really old and we are
      running out of service life and it is really hard for those
      marines to keep them going.....................................
    So, buying the new--putting the readiness recovery money into the
      platforms, we have like 53 reset, allows us to extract maximum
      value out of any risk to those funding profiles puts that
      recovery at risk. And I would say we are in a period of risk
      right now in Marine aviation to recover to get back to full
      warfighting formations to be the force in readiness that this
      body told us we have to be.....................................
    Mr. Wittman. Very good...........................................
    Lieutenant General Mangum........................................
    General Mangum. Mr. Chairman, the greatest risk for CR to Army
      and Army aviation is in training. We have programmed to
      kickstart our readiness recovery with increased flight hours to
      get us from--to start the journey from platoon-level collective
      readiness to company-level collective readiness................
    We would remain at platoon-level readiness funding under the CR,
      as well as putting further constraints on our modernization
      programs that are already at the floors for multiyear
      procurement. So, it would definitely constrain our ability to
      start our journey to readiness recovery........................
    Mr. Wittman. Very good...........................................
    Major General West...............................................
    General West. Yes, sir. I would echo the same comments, that if
      we are faced with a continuing resolution this year, as has
      happened in the past, we will be capped at previous spending
      levels, which prevents us from realizing the benefit of having
      increased funding levels in fiscal year 2017 to address
      readiness......................................................
    When we are capped at previous year's funding levels, we
      prioritize. Our first priority is to support troops in combat.
      Second, those that are forward deployed to assure our allies,
      which means the bill-payer for training are those that are here
      in the United States. So, it exacerbates the issue not only
      that we not be able to begin to slow the rate of decline, it
      delays the start of us being able to stop the rate of decline
      of our readiness...............................................
    Mr. Wittman. All right. Thank you................................
    Rear Admiral Manazir.............................................
    Admiral Manazir. Thank you, sir. The neat thing about being last
      is I get to capture all the comments, and agree and summarize..
    You spoke of that increase, and I would like to complement the
      teamwork that we have had in all the services and especially
      your committee on building this case for readiness. You spoke
      of that increase, so the President's budget was an increase.
      The various bills are increases. If we go with a CR, all of
      that increase gets wiped out...................................
    Additionally, each year, as was spoken by Scott West, we program
      to a set of operations in a year. So, more deployments for
      Navy, different deployments, different length of deployments,
      different employment of the force. Our request reflected that
      operations, maintenance, and training for fiscal year 2017.....
    It is a deeper request because we have to recover the readiness
      and support those maintenance and support. So therefore, if we
      stay with a CR, it will not reflect the request that we sent
      over from our budget...........................................
    Mr. Wittman. Very good. Thank you................................
    We will now go to Ms. Bordallo...................................
    Ms. Bordallo. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman..................
    General Davis, could you explain the consequences for current
      Marine Corps aviation readiness of not executing a reset
      program to bring all equipment to readiness standards, as the
      Army did for nearly two dozen major units during OIF [Operation
      Iraqi Freedom] and OEF [Operation Enduring Freedom] instead of
      waiting until now, as the Marine Corps has done?...............
    General Davis. Well, I think the community that was particularly
      impacted was the CH-53 Echo. And we have--had low numbers of
      CH-53 Echo.....................................................
    The reset is not the only reason for the low readiness. We have
      a--I would say a very debilitating ``not mission capable-
      supply'' problem in CH-53. But the reset will allow us to
      basically get our aircraft back up to speed, while, you know,
      in the timeline--an ability to order the parts we need to get
      our supply bins full so we can get maximum value out of the
      airplane.......................................................
    But the CH-53 was about one-third of the CH-53s we have in the
      inventory we are able to fly, maybe even a little bit less.
      Recovering that now, the flight time was very low. A lot of
      those units now, the flight time has about doubled what it was
      last summer. So, we are recovering in CH-53, but the reset is
      essential to do that now.......................................
    So we copied a playbook out of the Army. We had an independent
      readiness review that looked at what was wrong with the CH-53
      and why we couldn't get our readiness out of that aircraft. We
      also did it with Harrier. The Harrier has recovered its
      readiness. We are generating the numbers we need to out of that
      airplane. It is serving, again, really great in combat and we
      are able to track the training missions we need to out of that.
    CH-53 is going to take a longer time to recover. It will take us
      until about 2019 to 2020 to get all of our CH-53s back up in
      the battery that they should be and the numbers they should and
      a highly reliable airplane. It is a good airplane now, but it
      will be highly reliable. So, we should have done that before,
      we didn't, and we are doing it now.............................
    And also, too, we have to address the not mission capable-supply
      problem, which the low inventory masked how bad that really
      was............................................................
    Ms. Bordallo. Thank you. Thank you, General. I have another
      question for you and General Mangum. In your opening
      statements, both of you discussed trends in Class A mishaps,
      which result in loss of property and/or life. Could you discuss
      your findings and whether you believe there is currently a
      correlation between degraded readiness, whether due to
      maintenance failures or inadequate training?...................
    And the other witnesses, I welcome your remarks as well. So,
      begin with you, General........................................
    General Davis. Ma'am, I will tell you that we don't fly any
      aircraft that is unsafe. I will say that my pilots across the
      Marine Corps are not getting the flight time they need. With
      the exception of the F-35; we are generating our hours in that
      new airplane. They are not getting the hours they need to be as
      proficient as they should be...................................
    So, while historically, our Class A mishap rate is higher--is
      high--it is high, but it is actually kind of on par where it
      has been in the past. But I--smaller number of flight hours,
      every mishap makes that bump up a lot..........................
    What I will tell you is we are seeing a spike, almost double the
      number of Class C mishaps than we had last year and we are
      trying to look at why the reason for that is...................
    What I will tell you is kind of hard to take a look at from
      today's standpoint, but we are flying less, getting less
      experience. So my flight leads 2, 3, 4 years from now are not
      going to be guys with 1,000 hours or 1,500 hours, like I had.
      And you have got a youngster on your wing that is having a
      problem, you go, do this or do that. The flight leads coming
      back now, because they are not getting the flight time they
      need, will have 500 or 600 hours...............................
    They don't have that looks at the ball like my compadres talked
      about that will say, this is what you should do. So, I think we
      could see future mishap spikes in the Class A realm because of
      the low flight time and the low experience our guys are getting
      right now......................................................
    So, while the numbers are steady, they are unacceptable. We
      should be driving those numbers down. And it is something we
      need to work on and I--it is hard to tie the low flight time to
      a Class A mishap rate right now, but we are seeing the high
      OPTEMPO [operations tempo]. The deployment-to-dwell I think has
      an impact for sure on our Class C mishap rate, which impacts
      our readiness to a great degree. If--again, 100 percent
      increase from last year in the Marine Corps in Class C mishap
      rate...........................................................
    Ms. Bordallo. General............................................
    General Mangum. Ma'am, this year, our Class A accident rate for
      manned systems is down, and not to historically low levels, but
      we continue to trend down. So, correlation between the hours
      and our accident rate is a bit tenuous.........................
    However, more repetitions is better. Practice makes perfect, and
      as we increase our flying hour program to achieve higher levels
      of collective readiness, that gives our flight crews more
      repetitions, it gives our maintainers more repetitions.........
    However, as we start to go to higher levels of collective
      training, say at the National Training Center or Joint
      Readiness Training Center, as we ask those crews to do some
      things they had not been doing to the same level, we will face
      increased risk as we increase the flight hours.................
    That is a bit counterintuitive but I guess to specifically answer
      your question, ma'am, we don't see necessarily a correlation
      based on them being isolated events. This year, we have had
      1.16 accidents per 100,000 hours which is the military and
      industry standard to measure those against which is down from
      last year......................................................
    We are seeing a spike in our unmanned systems and those are still
      under investigation to try to determine what the root cause of
      those are......................................................
    Ms. Bordallo. General West.......................................
    General West. Yes, ma'am. We have not--we analyzed our mishap
      rates over the last 10 years, which we keep the data for. We
      can't find that there is a correlation between our trend in
      mishap rates and our readiness levels..........................
    Our mishap rates still are at the same rate that they have been
      over the past 10 years. I would expect, because of our
      readiness concerns and deployment-to-dwell issues that we might
      see some trends related to human factors.......................
    Either operators that are complacent when they are back in the
      United States or maintainers that may fail to follow tech order
      guidance in the maintenance of aircraft. But we haven't seen
      that and I think that is emphasis on professionalism that we
      don't sacrifice airworthiness or safety standards to recover
      readiness......................................................
    Same thing in our depots; the workforce that sustains systems,
      some over 50 years old require more time to be able to complete
      the work in the depots and they take the time necessary to
      provide airworthy and safe systems to be able to operate.......
    I think that has contributed to the fact that we have not seen an
      increase in material failures in older systems. However,
      separating mishaps and the fact that right now we are having
      the same decreasing trend in mishap rates does not mean that we
      don't have a readiness issue...................................
    We still have a readiness issue, it is just not manifesting
      itself in our mishap rates.....................................
    Ms. Bordallo. Admiral............................................
    Admiral Manazir. Ma'am, thank you. We do not see our mishap rates
      manifesting themselves from a lack of readiness. Our Class B
      aviation mishaps are down this year over the last 2 years and
      our Class As are consistent....................................
    We looked at the Class A mishaps and they were a very small-
      number to see if they were proficiency-based. In other words,
      not enough flight time or aircrew executing operations that
      they were not proficient for. And in fact, that was not the
      case...........................................................
    The aircrew involved--and I won't go into the causal factors
      because they are privileged--were well-experienced and they
      were proficient at their trade. The Class C mishaps, we have
      seen an increase to nearly double what it was since 2008, so
      similar to General Davis' testimony............................
    We are diving hard with the safety center to see what the causal
      factors would be for an increase in Class C mishaps, ground
      mishaps, were the mistakes made because of inexperience, were
      there procedures that were not followed........................
    This might be an indicator at the lower level of our mishap
      classes of potentially some effects from readiness. But when we
      asked to look at the way that we put causal factors against
      mishaps there were none that stood out as low readiness, low
      currency, lack of familiarity with procedures for our aircrew
      or our maintainers.............................................
    But we continue to look at that Class C mishap rate to see if
      there might be a problem. I will endorse the comment made by
      several of my compadres here that we probably won't see the
      effects of a critical underfunding of readiness, critical
      underflying, critical lack of experience, for several years....
    As people are now put in leadership positions and they are
      leading larger flight operations or they are leading squadrons
      and with a lack of experience, that lack of exposure, you might
      start to see some effects on the units that they lead because
      of the lack of flying several years ago in different positions.
    So it could have a lagging effect in the future. We are worried
      about that.....................................................
    Ms. Bordallo. Thank you..........................................
    I have one further question, Mr. Chairman........................
    To any of you, though both situations would be ideal, which
      fiscal remedy would help build back readiness most effectively
      over the long term? Increased funding or stable predictable
      budgets?.......................................................
    General..........................................................
    General Davis. Can I say both, ma'am.............................
    [Laughter.]......................................................
    Obviously, stable budgets are key. As you know, we are in
      recovery so we have a little bit more requirement for that. We
      have kind of held off, we are right now in the heyday of our
      procurement, our recapitalization in the Marine Corps..........
    We are only about--we are just starting now our TACAIR [tactical
      air] recapitalization so all the Harriers and Hornets have to
      be replaced and our 53s have to be replaced. Stable funding is
      best...........................................................
    But also, too, it is if you are funding below the minimum
      required then--if you are funding below the requirement--you
      have got a requirement--you are going to end up with something
      that is--I am no math major, but that is a recipe for disaster
      and kind of where we are right now.............................
    Ms. Bordallo. General............................................
    General Mangum. Ma'am, the answer is both. Stable predictable
      funding; we have brought down our modernization counts to the
      floors of our multiyear contract. So we have slowed our
      modernization to a snail's pace................................
    And if our predictable funding keeps at platoon- or company-level
      collective readiness, we are not on the recovery path that we
      need to be.....................................................
    Ms. Bordallo. General West.......................................
    General West. Yes, ma'am the answer is both here, as well. Given
      an--I will give a response for the need for stable predictive
      funding based on the effects on industry.......................
    If you operate a fleet that is decades old, you have to be able
      to give the business case--make the business case--of why
      should you stay in this business to make a reasonable profit,
      given that we don't know if we are going to have a predictable
      level of funding to be able to warrant you being in this
      business. That has an impact on older systems..................
    As to the top line for increased funding, that is also important
      because we have to balance the discussion topic here today,
      which I define a little bit separately from modernization,
      because we will have a bow wave of issues of modernized
      projects to come up in the next decade that we will have to
      address........................................................
    Otherwise, the things that we are readying today will be
      irrelevant in combat given the gaps that our near-peer
      competitors are closing technologically........................
    Ms. Bordallo. And finally, Admiral, do you agree with your
      compadres?.....................................................
    Admiral Manazir. Ma'am, I say it is stable and predictable
      budgets but only after you have increased the budget to buy
      back the readiness deficit that we have built. So we have to
      get back at--buying that whole back and then you can probably
      decline that level and get to stable and predictable so that we
      can stay with the readiness capability of our force............
    Ms. Bordallo. Thank you..........................................
    And I yield back, Mr. Chair......................................
    Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Ms. Bordallo.............................
    And now I will go to Mr. Scott...................................
    Mr. Scott. Thank you, Mr. Chairman...............................
    Gentlemen, thanks for being here and I want to go back to what
      Chairman Thornberry said that is one of my great frustrations
      is that, you know, some political strategist somewhere
      determines that it is going to be popular to say that we have
      drawn down a certain number of troops..........................
    And so we are sending the pilots and not the maintainers and in
      fact, we are actually paying more for the equipment to be
      maintained by contractors. And all over something that reaches
      a political target and has absolutely nothing to do with
      winning the war................................................
    With that said, I hear your comments about the continuing
      resolutions and the other issues. I want to encourage you, as I
      have in private meetings, and I want to do it publicly, to meet
      with members that are not on the Armed Services Committee......
    The term ``readiness'' is not something that, if you are not on
      this committee, that you would normally hear. And I think the
      majority of the members of this committee will vote to support
      you in the things that you need. In order for us to win that
      vote, we have to have votes from members that are not on that
      committee--on this committee and I would encourage you to meet
      with them as well..............................................
    But General Scott, under the Budget Control Act, the funding
      levels--what are the hardest readiness choices you will have to
      make in the Air Force fleet? And what impact do these have on
      your ability to meet mission requirements, national defense
      strategy, both today and in the future? And I would appreciate
      it if you could be specific on that............................
    General West. Today your Air Force is able to support nuclear
      deterrent operations. We are growing our cyber capability. We
      are able to conduct space operations. We will have to continue
      to modernize in space. And we have grown and will continue to
      grow our ISR [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance]
      capability.....................................................
    To get to those four areas of operations, we had to make trades
      in people and our conventional air forces. We downsized 252
      aircraft, 10 squadrons' worth of fighter squadrons to--and made
      people trades that today has resulted in our first readiness
      issue and that is to address critical skills...................
    That is mainly in maintenance. We need an increase of 4,000--up
      to 4,000 to be at end strength of 321,000 for the Air Force.
      And that is the first readiness hurdle that we need to be able
      to have support, and I think we do have that to get after our
      readiness recovery.............................................
    Because that takes up to 7 years to build the maintainer of the
      future we want, which is not just freshly out of high school
      and trained, but has experience on how to trouble-shoot the
      aircraft, particularly those that are older. That timespan
      means we can start later on increasing weapon systems
      sustainment, improving our range infrastructure, adding to the
      flying hour program, and last, working within the Department of
      Defense to reduce our operations tempo. So our first--the first
      criteria--first thing we would ask for is for a modest increase
      in end strength................................................
    I didn't quite answer your question, sir. Let me go back to where
      our concern is. What our concern is not that we can't conduct
      counterterrorism operations today, nuclear operations, space,
      cyber, and ISR. We do that. We rotate through the Middle East
      and we support our joint partners. Where we have concern is to
      have the time and the resources available to train when not
      deployed, for full-spectrum combat. That is the concern........
    Mr. Scott. Is it accurate to say that the fleet--the Air Force
      fleet is older today on average than it has ever been?.........
    General West. Yes, sir, it is. I had an anecdote that a B-17 that
      flew in World War II, which they were made shortly therefore.
      If it had flown in Desert Storm, the aircraft bombers we are
      using today are older than those B-17s would have been. It is
      an aged fleet..................................................
    Mr. Scott. And how many fewer men and women do you have today
      than you had in the first Gulf War?............................
    General West. It is on the order of thousands. I will get you
      that. I will get you the data, but if I could put it in terms
      of fighter squadrons, we had 134 fighter squadrons at the
      beginning of the Gulf War. Today we have 55....................
    Mr. Scott. One hundred and thirty four at the beginning of the
      Gulf War and today we have 55..................................
    General West. Fifty-five. Yes, sir...............................
    Mr. Scott. Could you touch briefly--I am down to about 30
      seconds--on the status of the Air Force depots and how they
      contribute to the increased readiness of the Air Force?........
    General West. It is critical. They find--they weigh--they sustain
      the older systems that are decades old that we use and operate
      today. Our KC-135 mishap--reliability rate is outstanding to
      me, and I think it is on the backs of professionals that work
      in our depots..................................................
    Mr. Scott. Gentlemen, thank you for your service and I look
      forward to working with you to resolve these issues............
    Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Mr. Scott................................
    We will now go to Mr. Peters.....................................
    Mr. Peters. Thank you, Mr. Chairman..............................
    Thank you, gentlemen, for being here.............................
    General Davis, you may have answered this question in response to
      Ms. Bordallo, but I wanted to sort of explore the mitigation
      strategies that the Marine Corps might have in the event that
      the F-35 squadron transitions take longer than the expected 2
      years, or if the F-35s continue to experience technical delays.
    General Davis. What we are seeing right now, sir, the F-35 is
      exceptional capability. Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 121
      [VMFA-121] ran their, you know, their kind of an operational
      readiness inspection; knocked it out of the park. We just
      finished the Weapons and Instructor Course [WTI], VMFA-211
      stood up. And we actually have three airplanes over in the
      United Kingdom [U.K.] right now getting ready to do the
      Farnborough and Riyadh Air Show................................
    A lot of excitement over in the U.K. We are very excited about
      the airplane. I can tell you we just ran a transition board for
      F-35 and everybody that can put in to fly the F-35 is--to
      include my oldest son who is getting ready to fly that
      airplane; youngest one would like to do it, too................
    We are not seeing a problem right now. The production line is
      ramping up to full-rate production. What we have to do is keep
      our F-18s and our Harriers going, sustain them properly to make
      our F-35 bridge. Right now, we are seeing no problems with that
      airplane. What we are seeing is high readiness rates and
      incredible capability..........................................
    We just ran a WTI drill where normal scenario that we would have
      with our legacy aircraft out there. I was a CO [commanding
      officer] at the weapons school. Generally about half the
      airplanes that go into the across the--ROMO [range of military
      operations], the high-end threat, Prowlers, Hornets, Harriers,
      and generally about half to a third of the airplanes don't make
      it through.....................................................
    The F-35s, 24 to zero kill ratio. It killed all the targets. It
      is--it was like Jurassic Park, watching a Velociraptor. It
      kills everything. It does really well, so we can't get that
      airplane fast enough into the fleet, sir.......................
    Mr. Peters. Okay, I know we are putting some hangars up at
      Miramar. Hangars are the least of your worries, I think, so....
    General Davis. Actually, hangars are essential. A lot of our
      infrastructure in our bases is World War II-vintage. And so
      Miramar--what we are building is a two-squadron hangar out
      there at Miramar. So we are really happy to get the support on
      that...........................................................
    We are very tightly aligned with the United States Navy on the F-
      35 program. We are going to procure four squadrons of F-35C,
      the tailhook variant of the airplane. And when the first
      tailhook-capable carrier for F-35C moved from the east coast to
      the west coast, we had planned on standing that squadron up on
      the east coast. Now we have moved it to the west coast.........
    A lot of help from you guys; worked inside the Marine Corps on
      green dollar budgets to build a hangar out there at Miramar and
      got that done so we can actually be ready to take that airplane
      when it comes. It is not just the hangar. It is the training
      facilities and everything else that goes with it. So a lot of
      excitement at Miramar to get that airplane out there...........
    Mr. Peters. Okay, terrific.......................................
    One other question about training. You have discussed the hours
      and in terms of experience, and it has been reported in the
      press, General West, that the Air Force Research Laboratory's
      secure live virtual constructed advance technology environment,
      advanced technology demonstration--that is a simulator. Does
      that help address the gap? And tell me kind of what advantages
      that offers? And where it leaves you short.....................
    General West. Well, sir, in general there is a right balance
      between what training we can conduct in simulators versus what
      training we need to conduct and do conduct on live ranges. And
      the balance is this. In simulation, you can train operator or a
      maintainer to do certain tasks very well. You can integrate
      operations between different operators.........................
    But what you don't do in a simulator is assess the entire
      performance of the system: do the sensors work, because--for
      example, because the sensors are replicated in simulation......
    So you have to have a balance between stressing and training the
      entire system, maintaining, generating the sortie, loading the
      weapons and actually performing against threat replicators in a
      live range to see how the sensors work--do they work as they
      are supposed to do--and crews make decisions on what to do,
      versus what you can replicate in simulation which doesn't
      stress the entire system but gives you great capacity to train
      the human being................................................
    Mr. Peters. In terms of the simulator part of the budget, do you
      think that we have adequate resources to stay on track and keep
      the program goals?.............................................
    General West. Yes, sir...........................................
    Mr. Peters. So that it is after the simulation that you are
      concerned about the training primarily?........................
    General West. Yes, sir. It is getting the right mix between
      simulation and supporting the funds necessary to upgrade our
      ranges to replicate what threats airmen are going to face in
      the future, which are closing the gap, if you will, on our
      technological advantage that we have right now and also
      sustaining our ability to employ and train and test weapons,
      and you need live ranges to be able to do that.................
    Mr. Peters. Okay.................................................
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for having the hearing. And I yield
      back...........................................................
    Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Mr. Peters...............................
    We will now to go Ms. Stefanik...................................
    Ms. Stefanik. Thank you, Mr. Chairman............................
    My first question is for General Mangum. As you mentioned in your
      testimony, the Army aviation community is blessed with agile
      and adaptive leaders. I have seen this firsthand with the 10th
      Combat Aviation Brigade at Fort Drum in my district............
    My question is, how will certain force structure reductions
      combined with such a heavy demand for aviation assets impact
      overall readiness? We know the Army prioritizes operational
      readiness, but where does it assume risk for the future?.......
    General Mangum. Ma'am, currently, we have 11 combat aviation
      brigades in the Active Component and 12 aviation brigades in
      the Reserve Component for a total of 23. Twelve of those
      twenty-three brigades have elements deployed overseas today. So
      the--that fine balance between consuming readiness and our
      ability to rebuild it, we are on the edge......................
    And again, I think we have all used the word fragile, there is
      some fragility into this system. So we are, again, about at the
      tipping point. Several years ago, we did a study that
      determined that we needed 15 or 16--between 15 and 16 combat
      aviation brigades in the Active Component. We are on glide
      slope to go to 10, the National Commission for the Future of
      the Army recommended maintaining an eleventh...................
    So we are--again, we are at the tipping point. The National
      Commission for the Future of the Army recommendations are--
      Secretary Fanning and General Milley will consult with
      Secretary Carter here soon, but all of those recommendations
      come with no resources.........................................
    Ms. Stefanik. My next question is for Admiral Manazir............
    Earlier this year, I had the opportunity to embark on the USS
      Harry Truman with my colleague Mr. Peters. How will the recent
      30-day extension of the USS Harry Truman's deployment impact
      future carrier deployments? And is there a concern that future
      deployments could be extended? And what is the impact on the
      carrier air wing?..............................................
    Admiral Manazir. Yes, ma'am. First of all, thank you for going
      out to Harry S. Truman and seeing what our great Americans do
      on that flight deck and around the carrier strike group........
    The Harry S. Truman, as you read from the press and saw the
      reports--maybe on a classified level--had a superb deployment,
      both in the Arabian Gulf and the Mediterranean Sea and
      demonstrated the power of mobile sea-based aviation............
    We build into our Optimized Fleet Response Plan the capability to
      continue to deploy or to extend the deployments of our carriers
      once they go on deployment. The model is 7 months for the
      deployment, but we build in some surge capability on the
      carrier when the Nation calls, as in this case, they did.......
    The particular impact is--required more readiness dollars to keep
      the carrier strike group out there for an additional month. So
      we had to pay for that. That caused some impacts to the
      training--the forces in training down the road. But it didn't
      impact the Truman strike group, particularly because we had
      already planned for that, both the air wing, the ship, and the
      accompanying ships.............................................
    Ms. Stefanik. Thank you very much................................
    I yield back.....................................................
    Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Ms. Stefanik.............................
    We will now go to Mr. Ashford....................................
    Mr. Ashford. Thank you...........................................
    Just a comment--a question to General West. First of all,
      General, thank you for and thank the Air Force for moving
      forward on the restoration of the runway at Offutt. I think it
      is a great improvement for the 55th and I appreciate that......
    I have a couple questions related to the ISR mission,
      specifically the 55th, that is the mission that I am most
      familiar with. I have visited in Qatar and just recently at
      Mildenhall and several visits at Offutt. The nature of that
      mission is obviously an ISR mission, a highly--high-tech
      mission. The vast majority of the military personnel on those
      airplanes are not pilots, they are actually back in the back
      working on the computers and intercepting the information that
      they are getting...............................................
    The concern that I always get from them, and you have really
      talked to it, not specifically on this issue, but is the
      training. And I know during the time prior to 2015, there was a
      great deal of concern about training in language proficiency
      and--which is a major part of the mission. How do you see that
      improving? And I know there are some languages where there--we
      need more proficiency..........................................
    At Mildenhall, I was able to visit the training center there
      where they are doing great work and getting people up to
      proficiency and continuing to move forward into their testing
      regimens and so forth. But how do you see that evolving? And
      what impact would it have if we were to go back prior to 2015,
      specifically on the language issue as it relates to the 55th
      and other related missions?....................................
    General West. Thank you, sir. I am not familiar with the language
      issue to which you refer.......................................
    Mr. Ashford. Just the proficiency in the various languages, which
      is the--you know, the central core of that 55th mission........
    General West. Yes, sir...........................................
    Well, I would say this. The 55th has capabilities that are
      absolutely necessary if we had to go to combat versus a near-
      peer, state-to-state combat. The training that the 55th and
      operations that the 55th conducts now down range, as they did
      for me in Afghanistan and others in other places, doesn't place
      the demand signal on proficiency that training would for other
      scenarios......................................................
    So providing not only just the maintainers that we need, which is
      mainly for--not for the big wing ISR at Offutt but other
      platforms, but providing the weapons system sustainment, these
      are older platforms............................................
    Mr. Ashford. Right...............................................
    General West. The training range infrastructure that includes
      simulation that we can upgrade to replicate what is now not
      only possessed, but being exported by near-peer competitors,
      and working with our Joint Staff partners on deploy-to-dwell
      issues so we have got more time to be able to train with the
      flying hour program............................................
    All of those have to be synchronized in order to start to recover
      readiness. It is not just one individually can work it.........
    Mr. Ashford. Right...............................................
    And I--my point, I guess, is to--is that I was--it is very
      impressive to see what has been achieved in the last year and a
      half in upgrading the training and getting more people trained
      in specific line language, and obviously, the maintainer issue
      is always--is also a big issue.................................
    But the gaps that existed prior to 2015, to a great extent, have
      started to be extinguished on the training side on language
      specifically. But I just--the comments that you have made
      regarding readiness generally and training generally and
      maintainers generally applies, I think, to the language sector
      as well. And I just applaud the Air Force for moving quickly to
      fill those gaps................................................
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back............................
    Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Mr. Ashford..............................
    We will now go to Mr. Cook.......................................
    Mr. Cook. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman......................
    A couple of my questions--a little bit different. I want to talk
      about the--maybe the F-35. And airspace, particularly on the
      west coast and particularly in California and--training time, I
      think, is essential. And we have some issues that I think
      everybody, all four services, are impacted by the FAA [Federal
      Aviation Administration], and I am talking about the corridor
      that goes into the Los Angeles area............................
    I am a ground guy, so I can't even spell air. But the problems
      that we are going to have with the F-35 in the envelope and
      they even effect ground weapons, such as the HIMARS [High
      Mobility Artillery Rocket] system at Fort Irwin. And some of
      the paths that they have to take affects Mugu, it affects the
      Air Force base that--all the ranges are basically in my
      district, and most of them in San Bernardino. China Lake, I
      don't have the headquarters, but I got all the ranges..........
    I have got obviously Fort Irwin, and the--some of the
      restrictions that are coming out would have a major impact on
      the training of all four services. And if you could address
      that or how concerned you are about this because I just think
      it is going to get worse and worse and worse. This is not the
      old aircraft, and that is--but the F-35 is--operates in a
      different area and some of these newer weapon systems..........
    So if you could comment on that, please..........................
    General Davis. Sir, I will take that question to start. We are
      very concerned about it. And as you know, I am a guy who joined
      the Marine Corps not knowing they had airplanes. So, rifleman
      first, aviator second always. Hoorah...........................
    Mr. Cook. Thank you..............................................
    General Davis. That should probably scare you a little bit, that
      I am running Marine aviation right now.........................
    But bottom line is the F-35 is a qualitatively different
      airplane, both in capabilities and also watching the way the
      Marines are flying it. They fly Twentynine Palms, Yuma, out
      there. They are using a lot more airspace to extract maximum
      value out of that airplane. And I can't talk about all the
      numbers because they are classified, but it is more and it is
      different. I think those ranges are national assets and we have
      to do our level best to protect them...........................
    The Marine Corps, like the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force, are
      all trained to fight not today's fight, but also tomorrow's
      fight. And it is a very high-end fight and at the end of the
      day, we cannot be caught short because we didn't have this much
      altitude or this much range space to bring these qualitative
      advantages that you are providing for us and our marines,
      soldiers, sailors, and airmen are fighting and flying with.....
    We need airspace. You need to spread out, train against the near-
      peer competitor. It is not what we have been doing for the last
      15 years in the aggregate. It is very different. And all of us
      need to train and be able to do that, and we need the space to
      move out and train.............................................
    We are seeing that with the Air Force out there at Nellis and the
      Navy up at Fallon and even at the National Training Center and
      our ground forces. Long-range rockets that--we need the ability
      to fight at range, see at range and dominate at range and kick
      anybody's butt that is out there at range. And we need the
      airspace and the ground space to do that, sir..................
    Mr. Cook. Thank you..............................................
    Anyone else?.....................................................
    Admiral Manazir. Sir, OPNAV [Office of the Chief of Naval
      Operations] has an office inside of the Director of Air Warfare
      that works directly with the FAA on encroachment issues. I
      would echo what General Davis said. Our ranges are crown jewels
      in our ability to train........................................
    We have worked with the FAA on airspace corridors. There are
      limited places to go supersonic, especially in the West. There
      are small corridors. It is--the airspace is very dear.
      Connecting the ranges between Nellis and Fallon, Point Mugu,
      the sea ranges over to China Lake is something that we already
      do.............................................................
    But encroachment is a gigantic issue. So, not only the airspace,
      but encroachment on the ground towards our training ranges for
      peaceful issues like wind farms and the partnership with wind
      farms all the way to nefarious threat countries who would try
      to buy property in close so they can monitor what we are doing.
    The F-35 is different. I would offer to you that our networked
      way of warfare, the way we are going to do warfare with fifth
      generation would take up about three quarters of the United
      States if we could have it. And so that goes to the value of
      what General West talked about, which is this live virtual
      constructive training..........................................
    So, when we have to go to the high-end fight using fifth
      generation and full, full capabilities, it is not just the
      geography of the airspace which is getting limiting for F-35,
      but also our ability to practice how we are going to really
      fight. And so we have to tailor what we do in the air..........
    Mr. Cook. I appreciate that comment. I am not always sure that
      the FAA is on the mindset of a lot people in this room here in
      terms of readiness, readiness, readiness, combat readiness. And
      they might have other priorities that are not the same. And
      obviously, I think this is a battle that is going to be a
      bureaucratic battle just like you fight about the budget and
      everything else................................................
    Just one last question I have, and that is on tempo of ops, and
      it has always been my concern that we overload that box. The
      planners, we are going do this, this, this, this, this. You can
      only do so much. And I think, yes, but the big wars and
      everything like that, but you are going to see more and more
      come-as-you-are parties. And maybe that is a bad phrase. But
      you never know what is going to--and you have got to be ready
      to go when the balloon goes up.................................
    And any comments on being overloaded with tempo of ops, which I
      think are always going to be there?............................
    General Davis. If I could, sir. The demand from the combatant
      commanders is strong. Again, we go back, I think the demand is
      reasonable and if you got the assets that you need to go do the
      job right. Right now, we are shy on the number of platforms we
      have. So, the Marines are working really hard to make ends
      meet...........................................................
    So, I think the dep [deployment] tempo of 1:2 is manifested or
      made more deep, and the fact that they just don't have enough
      of the assets to go around so they are working harder to make
      ends meet......................................................
    Right now, the world is a pretty dangerous place and we have got
      marines forward deployed at sea and at shore, and all of them
      are very gainfully employed. So we are doing our level best to
      try to pull some of that--try to do a little bit better with a
      little less to reduce the number of assets we have forward
      deployed, but it has met with not a lot of positive effects
      from our combatant commanders right now........................
    Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Mr. Cook.................................
    We will now go to Mr. Veasey.....................................
    Mr. Veasey. Thank you............................................
    I wanted to ask Admiral Manazir a question about training and
      transitioning from F-18s to F-35s, including the training and
      re-training of pilots and the maintenance personnel. How will
      this transition affect the availability of units for
      deployments?...................................................
    Admiral Manazir. Sir, we are going to initial operational
      capability the F-35C in August of 2018. There is some risk to
      that date, but we are planning to that date and on path working
      with the Joint Program Office to do that.......................
    The first squadron will be ready for deployment shortly after
      that initial operational capability. We will then go through a
      heel-to-toe transition of units from generally the F-18C, but
      some F-18Es and F units will transition through a process that
      we have mapped out already. And they will do that at Naval Air
      Station Lemoore in California..................................
    The transition takes about a year to do it. We have that planned
      into our master aviation plan, which is laid out to support all
      the deployments necessary to support the combatant commander.
      So, the simple answer to your question, sir, is that the
      transition to the F-35C will not affect our ability to provide
      the combatant commander with the forces that he needs as we go
      forward to source the global force management plan.............
    Mr. Veasey. Thank you very much..................................
    And wanted to ask Lieutenant General Davis a question also about
      the F-35. I was just curious, what is the plan to follow on
      development of modernization for F-35s to ensure that the
      aircraft continues to have the upgrades necessary to maintain a
      capability advantage over threats through the life of the
      aircraft?......................................................
    And--the same thing, I wanted to also--if you could just touch on
      just the transitioning, as well, as you move from the F-18s and
      the AV-8s and how that is going?...............................
    General Davis. It is F-18s, AV-8s, and EA-6Bs; we have two
      Prowler pilots flying the airplane very successfully right now.
      One, in fact, is an instructor in VMFAT-501 [Marine Fighter
      Attack Training Squadron 501] and we picked four EA-6B pilots
      this last board to transition out of the 16s. So, a quarter of
      the guys we picked are Prowler pilots to basically make maximum
      use of the electronic warfare capability of that airplane......
    The transition is going well. Again, we just stood up our second
      operational squadron. We will stand--the next one will be an F-
      18 squadron that will shut down VMFA-122, will move to Yuma,
      Arizona, and stand up as an F-35B squadron; then VMFA-314,
      which will be the first Charlie squadron, in Miramar in 2019...
    So, the transition is going well. What we are doing is we are
      managing the inventory of our AV-8s and our F-18s. The good
      news, on our readiness recovery, we solved some of the problems
      we had with Harriers. We have actually burned some--built some
      margin in Harrier that can keep the Harrier going a little bit
      longer if we need it to, so we can balance between F-18 and
      Harrier, which, you know, we sundown next to make those--to
      make our transition............................................
    Right now, VMFAT-501 in Beaufort, South Carolina, is scheduled to
      get bigger to handle more students. And so, that is growing.
      And the production line, really sir, and the spare parts that
      flows with that, is getting ready to go up to 20 aircraft a
      year, which we need, just on Bs alone, which we need very
      desperately....................................................
    So, the transition is going well. We are managing that inside the
      Marine Corps. We are making a little bit of our own luck with
      better readiness in Harrier, which is good, and then working
      very closely with the Navy to extract maximum value out of the
      legacy F-18....................................................
    And on Block four--I am sorry--Block four, I think is was you are
      talking about the capability modernization development. I
      worked that very closely with Admiral Manazir and my Air Force
      counterparts to make sure we are getting the very best combat
      capability for the country.....................................
    I think we are close to slapping the table and all that we have
      put into that modernization program out there but it is
      actually very exciting. We compete and push to see what we want
      to put in there in the timeline we get it. We broke it up into
      four chunks, which is smart to go do...........................
    And bottom line is bring in the great capabilities that the Block
      4 upgrades to the airplane as quickly as we can................
    Mr. Veasey. Over the last several years, the numbers of the
      squadrons that you have, have dropped from about 70 to 55, or
      so.............................................................
    General Davis. Yes, sir..........................................
    Mr. Veasey. Is that hampering the transition at all, or----......
    General Davis. Well, what we are--sir, we--right now, we are at
      20 TACAIR squadrons and we, like the Air Force, came down after
      Desert Storm. I think we are about 28 TACAIR squadrons during
      Desert Storm. And over time we are down to 20..................
    And right now I am 19 because one of my Reserve squadrons is
      cadred. So making our own luck with F-18 and the Harrier,
      keeping them robust will allow us to make that transition......
    But right now, we are executing a transition in stride and we
      will shut down--you know, we have basically worked out a long-
      term training and deployment plan for the Marine Corps so that
      we can sundown our squadrons and stand up in stride............
    And we just did that with VMFA-211, so VMFA-211 came back from
      combat deployment. There is--the VMFA-121 was a F-35 squadron
      in Yuma. It grew to be larger than a normal F-35 squadron and
      then what we did is when 211 stood up, they split off their
      airplanes they were supposed to have and the maintainers and
      the pilots so they can be a going concern from the beginning...
    We will do that for the rest of the squadrons itself. I will say
      that the ramp for F-35 in the Marine Corps has been very slow.
      We are looking very much forward to getting a faster ramp and
      be able to stand squadrons up faster and still making all of
      our operational commitments....................................
    Mr. Veasey. Thank you............................................
    General Davis. Thank you, sir....................................
    Mr. Veasey. Chairman, thank you..................................
    Mr. Wittman. Very good, thank you Mr. Veasey.....................
    We will now go to Mr. LoBiondo...................................
    Mr. LoBiondo. Thank you, Mr. Chairman............................
    General West, I know that you know this but some of the others in
      the room may not, that the 177th Fighter Wing that I represent
      has a state-of-the-art infrastructure including state-of-the-
      art alert hangars that can accommodate the F-35 and we hope
      will, someday..................................................
    Admiral, if you have or having challenges with the FAA, I would
      appreciate knowing a little more about it. I chair the Aviation
      Subcommittee which has oversight with the FAA. I certainly
      would be happy to weigh in and get their attention on this if
      there is something we can do...................................
    And General Davis, a short while back maybe 4, 6 weeks ago, there
      was a report on one of the cable channels about the
      cannibalization. Are you familiar with that?...................
    General Davis. Are they talking about the F-18, sir?.............
    Mr. LoBiondo. Yes................................................
    General Davis. I am, sir.........................................
    Mr. LoBiondo. They had to go into a museum and get parts and so
      on and so forth. So is--are we going to see more of that?......
    What is the status of that? Is it more than just in the Marine
      Corps? Anybody else or--was pretty disturbing report...........
    General Davis. What I will tell you, sir, is on that--we were
      looking for a hinge for a nose gear of an old model, A model F-
      18, no longer in production. And a lot of those airplanes were
      built in lots and they are all different.......................
    So we do, we have done that in the past, go out and look at a--
      for a part. And it just so happened that one of the squadron
      members was out there looking; said hey, that is as close to
      the bureau number..............................................
    It didn't match up but the good news to it in that is there was
      no part to be had so we 3D-printed the part and then
      manufactured the part, Okay? And so they--so the company was
      able to make that part for us..................................
    You also heard on the news that the Marines are also going into
      the boneyard to get F-18s. We are doing that, sir. We took I
      think 23 out of Davis-Monthan. But those are 23 airplanes we
      had put in in 2007 to kind of preserve the life................
    We--they are low flight hour F-18s now we will basically--we are
      bringing them back into service now to go fly them, to go make
      our operational commitments and it goes back to how we manage
      the F-18 life to the end of its service life, extract maximum
      value..........................................................
    We would like to recapitalize faster, that is what we need to do,
      that is what we want to do. By the--until that time, we are
      going to do what we have to do to make our operational
      commitments with our F-18s and our Harriers....................
    Right now, my two communities at greatest risk for making their
      flight hour goals and making their readiness goals is CH-53
      Echo and the legacy F-18.......................................
    Again, 53 Kilo will replace the Echo and is doing great in tests
      and the F-35 is going great in its production and its tests and
      its initial operating capability development out there.........
    So replacing our F-18s with F-35s as quickly as we can is our
      strategy.......................................................
    Mr. LoBiondo. Mr. Chairman, I yield back.........................
    Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Mr. LoBiondo.............................
    We will now go to Mrs. Hartzler..................................
    Mrs. Hartzler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman...........................
    Thank you, gentlemen, for being here today on this very important
      hearing dealing with aviation readiness........................
    Rear Admiral Manazir, I would like to start the question with
      you. So the committee has heard testimony in prior hearings
      about a strike fighter shortfall and some of the issues you
      have to manage as a result.....................................
    So how have training hours for Navy and Marine Corps pilots been
      impacted and do you see an impact to pilot readiness due to the
      shortfall now or in the future?................................
    Admiral Manazir. Ma'am, I will let General Davis answer the
      Marine Corps question because the impacts to both services
      while founded in the same challenge are different in how we
      train..........................................................
    Strike fighter shortfall we now term as inventory management, so
      if you have a shortfall that means your supply doesn't equal
      your demand and so you have to manage that force...............
    The proximate cause of the strike fighter inventory challenges
      particularly in the F-18 and the JSF [Joint Strike Fighter] is
      the JSF sliding to the right. General Davis testified that he
      wants to see a faster ramp to F-35, to the new, fifth
      generation fighter.............................................
    We want to make sure that there is no delay to the F-35C
      arriving. But it has slid several years. That has caused two
      problems. The first one is that we have had to induct more of
      our F-18 A through D legacy force into the depot...............
    We didn't plan to do that maintenance and when we opened those
      airplanes up they had significant corrosion that we did not
      plan for. And so that created a depot load that we had to
      change the process and how we manage that. That created
      shortfalls on the flight line..................................
    The second effect it had was we were over-flying our F-18s, Super
      Hornets, Es and Fs. We didn't plan to fly them this much nor
      this early in their life. So it is accelerating the life use on
      the F-18 Es and Fs.............................................
    And in fact, our unfunded priority list--the number one priority
      from the Chief of Naval Operations is 14 Es and Fs to help
      cover the gap that we never foresaw between the F-18 C and the
      F-35...........................................................
    We are taking--as you know, we do what is called tiered
      readiness, it is phase-based tiered readiness, I explained it a
      little bit in my written statement, where the deployers are
      full up ready to go for any high-end mission. And then the next
      to go are also trained at the intermediate, advanced level.....
    Where we see the effects on training, ma'am, are in the early
      training phases leading up to advanced training and then it is
      sustainment when they come home from extended deployment. You
      will see some of the resources having to be moved to the next
      deployer.......................................................
    So on either end of that deployed cycle, that is where we see
      those hits. That aircraft availability, just exactly what
      General Davis says, that limited aircraft availability--
      especially early in the phase--doesn't allow us to train those
      aviators that are in that phase. And we have to steepen the
      training ramp to get them up to speed before they deploy. Those
      are the effects................................................
    Mrs. Hartzler. How many hours short are you, would you say, for a
      normal training? If you have optimal training for all tiers to
      be fully trained, how many hours more are--you need?...........
    Admiral Manazir. So it is a--that is a difficult calculation
      because we--it is almost area under the curve. There is a
      certain number of hours at the very low maintenance level, its
      currency hours is just 11 hours per pilot per month............
    And then it goes up to the fully deployed to about 27 hours per
      pilot per month in each type model series. The fiscal year 2017
      President's budget request does give us a readiness level that
      is executable because of the numbers of airplanes..............
    Sometimes people will say, hey, you need to fly more hours and so
      we are going to give you more flying hour money. One of the
      causes of why we are where we are today is money went into
      flying hours but the underlying accounts, the enabling
      accounts, were underfunded.....................................
    So the airplanes weren't available to fly. So I would rather not
      tell you that I need more hours. What I need is the fiscal year
      2017 submission and the bills that the chairman talked about to
      get that readiness level up so that we can increase the flying
      in those lower stages of training..............................
    Mrs. Hartzler. As you know, we have got the 14 extra F-18s in the
      NDAA and we are going to try and bring that across the finish
      line. Is that enough? Would you like more if you could?........
    Admiral Manazir. In the 2017 budget, that 14 remains the request.
      CNO Greenert testified earlier in 2015 that we need two to
      three squadrons to fill the gap in our total force with a
      tiered-readiness model.........................................
    We haven't quite got to that point of having all of those
      squadrons and all of those numbers. As we continue to use the
      airplanes that we are using, I think you are going to see
      repeat requests for Super Hornets as we go forward in future
      year budgets...................................................
    Mrs. Hartzler. Sure..............................................
    Nineteen seconds General Davis--has pilot readiness been
      impacted?......................................................
    General Davis. I will tell you exactly, we are 6 hours--about 6
      hours per month per pilot short on the TACAIR fleet,
      specifically F-18. We fixed the Harriers; they are doing better
      right now......................................................
    We have got one squadron that is in Bahrain that is flying a lot,
      about 800 hour a month for a 10-plane squadron, so those guys
      are doing well. But on average, low. We have asked for two F-
      35Cs and two F-35Bs to help fill our coffers out there.........
    Our plan is to put our guys in an 8,000-hour airplane, the F-35B
      and C, and basically take advantage of that full ramp. We have
      been having a lot of help from Boeing Corporation to help fix
      our legacy airplane............................................
    So four things that F-18s--legacy F-18s are down for. They are in
      the depot. They are--need an in-service repair, which is too
      much maintenance for my marines to fix. They need the special
      permissions to go do that. Not mission capable-supply or -
      maintenance. A large number of our legacy F-18s were on the
      flight line, needed a minor repair that my marines aren't able
      to do it, same thing with the sailors..........................
    So we didn't have enough depot artisans to do that work so we
      took some depot artisans and put them up at Miramar and that
      has had a palpable and positive impact on my flight line
      readiness for F-18 in Miramar. We basically hired Boeing--Navy
      blessed Boeing Corporation folks to go do that ISR [in-service
      repair] work. It makes sense, they built the airplane, and
      bottom line is we are getting much better readiness out of the
      Beaufort effort, as well.......................................
    That just started................................................
    So taking those in-service repair airplanes, a large slug of our
      airplanes, if we could get at that would actually help on my F-
      18 readiness as they are doing that now. So hats off to Boeing
      and using the OEMs [original equipment manufacturers], not just
      for the F-18 but across the spectrum to help increase our
      readiness wherever we can......................................
    Mrs. Hartzler. Hats off to all of you for taking a difficult
      situation and making the best of it............................
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman..........................................
    Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Mrs. Hartzler............................
    We will now go to Mr. Gallego....................................
    Mr. Gallego. Thank you, Mr. Chair................................
    This question is for the Navy-Marine Corps team. Recently, the
      Marine Corps announced plans to rotate another amphibious
      readiness group [ARG] or Marine expeditionary unit [MEU] in the
      Pacific by 2019................................................
    However, when the announcement was made it was acknowledged that
      sourcing plans had yet not been worked out. While the Navy-
      Marine Corps continued to maintain a forward presence through
      aircraft carriers and MEUs for example additional requirements
      such as two special purpose MAGTFs and this proposed ARG-MEU
      continued to place additional requirements on the force during
      a time of constrained resources................................
    So my question, very simple: How much more operational stress can
      the Navy and Marine Corps aviation enterprise take within what
      I described? And also, can we continue to extend our presence
      under the current readiness projections?.......................
    General Davis. I can answer part of that. The special purpose
      MAGTFs--we have one in Spain and one in the Central Command
      area of responsibility. The reason we did that, 12 V-22s and 4
      C-130s, is because we didn't have the amphibious shipping we
      needed to put out there........................................
    So I could cover down on the requirement with four V-22s if I had
      an amphibious ship to embark those marines on, but they have
      got to fly, a lot of times 2,000 miles. So the beauty of sea-
      based assets, whether it is on a carrier or an amphibious
      carrier, is you can move that ship around and put it to close
      proximity of the action and get out there without a tanker. It
      could fly there without a tanker...............................
    So the fact that we don't have the ships does add to wear and
      tear on airplanes like the V-22 and C-130s. So I would have
      more amphibious ships. I know this is an aviation hearing. I
      would have a--my guys go off the ships and off the
      expeditionary bases ashore. But that helps us get closer to the
      objective area, so more of that would be certainly helpful,
      sir............................................................
    Admiral Manazir. Okay, Mr. Gallego, the Navy works closely with
      the Joint Staff to source a global force management plan. We
      currently are resourced to deploy two amphibious readiness
      groups and two carrier strike groups. It will take us to about
      the end of this Future Year Defense Plan, 2020 to 2022, to be
      able to resource a third deployed amphibious readiness group.
      So our current capacity is two amphibious readiness groups.....
    Mr. Gallego. Excellent, thank you................................
    General Davis, we spoke a little bit earlier under--from
      questions from another Member of Congress regarding parts. But
      you have advocated for resizing the spare parts account to
      increase readiness. Such a change would ensure more parts are
      on hand instead of waiting on the supply chain. Can you
      describe how much additional funding you think it will require
      in future years, and whether this would demand a policy change
      in how spare parts programs are maintained?....................
    General Davis. I can get you the exact number, sir, but that is
      something we are looking at. This year, you can see from our
      unfunded priorities list that we ask for help on spare parts,
      specifically F-35. They have been underfunded and that has an
      impact not just in the year of execution, but it is 3 years
      later when those parts are supposed to be there to make sure we
      get maximum value out of that..................................
    But I think in the aggregate, we could look at how we spare our
      programs in the Department of Defense. I don't know any airline
      out there that has got a not mission capable-supply target
      anything other than zero percent. So we have these great
      airplanes, but we put a marine out there or a sailor, soldier,
      airman, and they don't have enough parts.......................
    If your target is 10 percent non mission capable-supply, I am
      worried about that 10 percent. Where do they get that part? It
      has usually got a bureau number written on it..................
    And then airplanes like the CH-53, we had marines for a number of
      years who would go to an airplane that couldn't fly and take
      the part off the airplane. These are great maintainers. I worry
      about the pilots and retaining pilots. I worry about my
      enlisted marines, my enlisted maintainers. Those are the guys
      if I have got to focus on retaining anybody, I am going to
      retain them; give them the tools, not just the tools in the
      shop, but the pubs, but also the parts they need to be--to
      extract maximum readiness out of the platforms we have.........
    I will come back to you, sir, and tell you exactly what I think
      they would cost, but it is the cost of low readiness is, I
      think, something our Nation can't afford. And if having that
      airplane, as great as the airplanes we are all procuring out
      here, to not have a part for it is kind of crazy...............
    Mr. Gallego. Thank you...........................................
    Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Mr. Gallego..............................
    We now go to Mr. Lamborn.........................................
    Mr. Lamborn. Thank you...........................................
    We have all known for some time that readiness is a big problem
      and including a recent focus by this committee, under the
      leadership of Chairman Thornberry and Chairman Wittman.........
    So from an Air Force perspective in particular, recently the
      Thunderbird crash in my district, along with the tragic loss of
      life in the Blue Angel crash the very same day, really got
      people's attention.............................................
    These tragic events, along with other recent crashes, have caused
      the American people to ask a lot of questions including: Why
      did these crashes happen? And what can we do to prevent this in
      the future?....................................................
    The answers to these questions are undoubtedly complex. But
      getting the right answers and taking the right action is
      vitally important. The very lives of our aviators depend on it.
      And also how well prepared we are to fight a war if necessary..
    So I know it is your job in the military to make the most of what
      you have and to carry on with the mission regardless, but I
      really ask for the maximum frankness and being candid on your
      part...........................................................
    So, General West, what are the trends in Air Force mishaps over
      the past 8 to 10 years?........................................
    General West. Thank you, sir. We haven't seen a correlation
      between mishap rates and our readiness concerns now over the
      last 10 years..................................................
    Mr. Lamborn. We have or haven't?.................................
    General West. Have not. Our mishap rate is about the same,
      trending down, as it has been over 10 years. That doesn't mean
      that the goal for mishaps is not zero. We don't want to lose a
      single airman or lose equipment. But we don't have a
      correlation because of our readiness issues that would seem to
      indicate that either human factors, largely driven by
      complacency, operations or maintenance, or material failures of
      operating systems that are decades old, are having--they have
      an affect on readiness.........................................
    But we haven't seen that the trend data shows that they have had
      an affect on safety. That doesn't mean we don't pay attention
      to safety. In every case, we do conduct two investigations
      afterward--one safety for the safety privilege reasons; the
      other for legal purposes. And those--the legal one is public
      knowledge. The safety one under privilege is meant to uncover
      things with privilege so that we can take action quickly, if
      necessary......................................................
    Mr. Lamborn. Okay, well let's focus then on readiness in
      particular now. How many hours did the average pilot fly 10
      years ago versus today, as far as you know? And is there a
      difference in either flight hours or maintenance or the age of
      aircraft 10 years ago versus today? How would you summarize
      that?..........................................................
    General West. Yes, sir. Well the--I don't mean to be flippant at
      all, sir. They are 10 years older, the aircraft, obviously. And
      that comes with the challenges of when you perform depot work,
      you are going to discover things that weren't anticipated
      because the original service life wasn't intended to be this
      many decades old. And we make choices of sustaining legacy
      systems within a certain amount of budget, with modernizing for
      the future.....................................................
    So the longer we sustain systems that are older, then the closer
      we get to where they will no longer be relevant in combat
      because of other systems that are fielded by potential
      adversaries. So we have to make choices........................
    Mr. Lamborn. Now if the replacement rate is equal to the rate at
      which they are being mothballed, there would not be--the
      average would not be 8 or 10 years older. It would be constant.
    General West. Yes, sir...........................................
    Mr. Lamborn. But you are saying that that is not the case; that
      the average rate is now 10 years older versus 10 years ago, of
      the aircraft?..................................................
    General West. That is the way it is going to be outside of the
      ISR [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance] community,
      which MQ-1s and MQ-9s are a brand new weapon system. But we
      continue to operate A-10s, F-16s, B-52s, B-1s, B-2s, KC-135s,
      KC-10s. It is the same fleet that we have operated successfully
      for years......................................................
    We will have a large modernization effort that will come forward
      in the 2020s, B-21, KC-46, the bulk of the F-35s, et cetera,
      for a long period to come. But right now the fleet is aging....
    Mr. Lamborn. Now as aircraft reach their expected life, or exceed
      their expected life, what happens in terms of maintenance or
      flying hours and things like that?.............................
    General West. We conduct a service life extension program to
      extend the life of the aircraft. It varies by aircraft what
      that entails technically. But we extend it by some number of
      thousands of hours, and we work at how long we want to extend
      the service life based on when we expect a replacement to come
      into play......................................................
    If I could go back to your question about hours. The hours are a
      concern for training, but more important than just the hours
      that crews get, are the intensity of training during those
      hours. Our crews get excellent training to be able to go down
      range and conduct ISR, strike, airlift, close air support,
      electronic warfare.............................................
    What we are not able to do with the training hours we get in the
      United States is sufficiently prepare them for combat with that
      near-peer competitor. That is a different level of intensity
      that requires investments along five different fronts, first
      starting with the maintainers to be able to do it..............
    And that is a different dynamic from events when you are training
      versus just hours. Our crews get a lot of hours down range. But
      that is not the same level of intensity........................
    Mr. Lamborn. Thank you very much.................................
    Mr. Wittman. Lieutenant General Davis, I wanted to follow up on
      some of the comments that you have made concerning training
      hours. You have talked about making sure that you had
      maintainers that were capable and that you were short in the
      amount of seat time that pilots had, real flying time, not
      simulator time, and talked about needing to have that ready
      bench, and that when you lack aircraft to train pilots and
      train maintainers that ready bench gets pretty thin, and in
      some instances non-existent....................................
    I wanted to, and you spoke earlier about Class A mishaps. I do
      want to try to drill a little bit deeper. We know about a year
      or so ago, there was a tragic CH-53 accident off the coast of
      Hawaii; challenging conditions. But that being said, in talking
      about those shortfalls that you have there in making sure
      maintainers have what they need, making sure pilots have that
      seat time. And I know that the investigation for that accident
      is coming to its completion....................................
    Can you maybe talk a little bit specifically about that? Do you
      believe that the elements that you spoke about in the training
      side, both maintainers and pilots, could have had any impact in
      that particular accident?......................................
    And I know we can look at rates, but I want to be able to look at
      specific recent instances, because I think that is what Mr.
      Lamborn had spoken about, what we are hearing from folks about
      the concern about that particular situation....................
    And whether it is the tragic accident with the Blue Angels pilot,
      the Thunderbirds pilot, whatever it may be, the question
      becomes as we highlight these shortfalls, what association
      might that have with this? And I want to ask you specifically
      about that incident because I know there are a lot of different
      conditions there that were at question.........................
    General Davis. Yes, sir, thank you for the question. As you know
      that investigation is still underway and I don't want to do
      anything to get out in front of what they might tell us........
    I am highly confident that that crew was flying good airplanes,
      that both crews were flying good airplanes, they were properly
      maintained, and it is a tragedy................................
    I mean this is a real tragedy, all of our losses to include the
      Blue Angels, tragedy. Here is what I worry about the most, if I
      had to kind of step back from this. That crew was safe but that
      crew could have been a lot more proficient at the combat
      mission that it is on task to go execute. So I don't know how
      well trained they would be to go fight the high-end fight......
    They were doing what was a pretty straightforward mission that
      night. Tragedy though. I worry about my young aviators that
      aren't getting the number of hours they need to. And so it is
      the mishap that looms on our bow that we don't see coming just
      now............................................................
    I remember that as a young guy I had a couple close calls; as I
      young guy I had some close calls. I do not know how I would do
      having the amount of flight time that my youngsters get. And I
      have got two sons that fly Marine airplanes....................
    They're not complainers, but as a dad I worry about it. They're
      just not getting the looks at the ball that I got. So when that
      bad thing happens to them, or when they're a flight lead, and
      they're trying to take somebody out there and a bad thing is
      happening to the youngster that they're leading, man or woman,
      will they have the experience to keep that bad thing from
      happening?.....................................................
    Saying I see this, I know this, I feel this--I know the science
      of aviation but you have me up here, General Neller has me, to
      understand the intuition and the sense of aviation as well. We
      are not where we need to be. So we are proficient but we are
      not as good as we need to be because we don't get the number of
      hours that we need to get because there is just not enough
      inventory there................................................
    You know, the old days when I was a lieutenant, it was 75 percent
      mission capable rates, those were all the numbers we knew. I
      will tell you that in order to get to 75 percent mission
      capable, I would need about another 366 airplanes in the Marine
      Corps that, they are there, they don't exist, they don't have
      parts, they are stuck in a depot, or they are on a production
      line someplace coming to us. I think I can--I can't make a
      direct line to the Class A, but there is risk there by not
      flying and not building the experience out there...............
    It has not been borne out in an investigation. It doesn't mean
      that a mishap investigation 3 years from now isn't going to say
      that this person here did not have the experience they needed
      to get as a young captain and now he is a major or she is a
      lieutenant colonel, squadron commander, and she just didn't see
      this before because she didn't have the experience. So I would
      worry about the stuff that looms in our bow sir................
    Mr. Wittman. Thank you General Davis, and I want to kind of tie a
      string between each of these instances that you all have
      highlighted today. And we will start there in the Marine Corps.
      You have spoken about the shortfalls that are there with
      maintainers, aircraft to maintain, the ability for that
      experience with our maintainers and with our pilots all
      manifesting themselves in different ways.......................
    General Mangum, you spoke about the same thing. Situation where
      if a helicopter is deployed in Afghanistan, maintainer is back
      home. That creates an atrophy there in that force in that
      capability that not only will we see today, but as you spoke
      of, we will probably see in years to come. General West you
      spoke of the same thing there..................................
    A shortage of maintainers in the Air Force. Making sure too, that
      we have the senior NCOs [noncommissioned officers] there in the
      Air Force that are the backbone of training, the new airmen
      that come in to be able to maintain those aircraft. Making
      sure, too, we are transitioning from maintainers that are on an
      A-10 aircraft to the new F-35 aircraft. You know all of that,
      creating a challenge, a deficiency I would say within the realm
      of what we need to have........................................
    Admiral Manazir, you spoke of, too, the element there of what you
      are dealing with today, going from a backlog of 12 F-18s to now
      nearly 200, with legacy aircraft and Super Hornets, getting
      them to that depot.............................................
    We have flown those aircraft more than we expected, therefore
      when they get to the depot we are having to do much deeper
      maintenance, maintenance that really wasn't originally designed
      to be done at the depot level, but you all are managing to get
      that done......................................................
    There is a common theme here we see across the realm here, we are
      pushing harder, we have fewer resources, we have fewer of the
      skilled people in the necessary positions to do all the things
      that we need to do to make sure that we are not just rebuilding
      that readiness, but maintaining the current level of readiness.
    To me, that is a very, very deeply concerning issue. I know the
      chairman and myself, as well as members of the committee and
      the ranking member all have a deep level of concern............
    And while it may not show itself directly today in the rate of
      mishaps, I do believe it exhibits itself in additional risk for
      the brave men and women that serve in our Air Force, our Navy,
      our Army, and our Marine Corps. And to me, that is deeply,
      deeply disturbing..............................................
    And as you know, that bow wave that happens with that many times
      doesn't manifest itself until months or sometimes years into
      the future. I think our obligation on this subcommittee, as
      well as the full committee, is to make sure we understand the
      full scope of that, understand the challenges that you all face
      which you have very eloquently stated to us today, but then
      make sure that we get from you what do we need to do?..........
    Now, we talk about preparing the conditions to restore readiness.
      I mean, that is just building the foundation so you can
      actually begin to build the house, as I put it. You know, this
      is about building that two-story house. We are just right now
      building the foundation. We can't even talk about the materials
      that we need to actually build the structure of the house......
    That is my concern and we need to understand not only what we
      need to do to continue that effort, but where do we go and
      where do we make sure we get there in the shortest amount of
      time possible..................................................
    This is also an issue not only of resources, but also of
      capacity. You know, even if we were tomorrow able to write the
      check, which we at this time can't, but if we were, the issue
      is of pipeline capacity. Even if we wanted to, there is only so
      much that you can do to get to that particular point. So you
      know, our thrust from this hearing is to make sure we get from
      you not only where those shortfalls are, but what do we need to
      do to continue on that path of creating the conditions to
      rebuild readiness and then how we expect to get there as
      quickly as possible because the shorter time it takes for us to
      get there, the less reverberation of effects that we will see
      years down the road............................................
    And we absolutely want to be able to prevent that with everything
      that we have and we have to be able to, as Mr. Scott spoke
      about--we have to be able to communicate this with folks that
      are not on the Armed Services Committee. I think most of the
      folks on the Armed Services Committee get it, they understand
      the concept of readiness.......................................
    But other members don't, so we have to be able to take from you
      the headlines that they read about mishaps or shortfalls in
      aviation across the spectrum and say okay, what are the things
      that we need to do to be committed as a Congress to get those
      things done? Maintainers, pilots, air time, experience in
      maintaining, all those elements, and I think people intuitively
      get that as long as we can provide them the specifics of that..
    So our challenge is to make sure that we get from you, as an
      outcome of today's hearing, in order to be able to do that. And
      I know Mrs. Hartzler has another question that she wants to ask
      that I think is within that realm and I want to make sure that
      we give her that opportunity...................................
    Mrs. Hartzler....................................................
    Mrs. Hartzler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman for the additional time.
      Well said. The purpose of this hearing and the importance of
      this hearing, not only for our current readiness but also as we
      look to the future and future platforms that are being
      developed, maybe lessons learned and that is where my question
      is focused.....................................................
    The excellent airmen at Whiteman Air Force Base know a little bit
      about readiness, and certainly, they have done an amazing job
      in keeping the B-2 aircraft viable and mission-capable even
      though there are only 20 aircrafts and they have had issues
      with parts, sustainment and now, they are doing the DMS
      [Defensive Management System] modernization all at the same
      time. But yet, they are doing a great job......................
    And I just wonder, as we look to the B-21, this question is for
      General--Major General West--as we look to the B-21 being
      developed, what lessons learned are you gleaning from the B-2
      that can be a part of the sustainment plan for the B-21 going
      forward?.......................................................
    General West. I would say--I am not that closely connected to the
      B-21 program. But we want the systems that we procure in the
      future to the max extent possible to use proven technologies
      that reduce the amount of time it takes to field and reduce the
      cost as efficiently as possible, while at the same time,
      fielding systems that are going to be relevant in combat for
      years..........................................................
    And there is risk with both to be able to do that. We want to
      make them as maintainable as possible. We have made great
      strides in maintaining stealth from the original platforms to
      F-117 to F-22. Now, F-35 is much more maintainable; it will be
      in the future. We are going to have to be able to share and
      fuse information for B-21 crews just the same as we are going
      to be able to do with the F-35.................................
    And long-term lifecycle costs have to fit within our requirement
      to have to modernize many other systems, KC-46, F-35s, weapons
      associated with platforms to go with it. It all has to fit
      within a certain top line......................................
    So the lessons--not necessarily from B-2, but just in general
      is--it is the entire life cycle and it has got to be able to
      perform in combat for decades because it is likely we will
      operate the B-21 just like we have other platforms and they
      have to be relevant for a long time............................
    Mrs. Hartzler. Certainly, having an increased number of airplanes
      manufactured will be a big help. At this point, we are
      projecting 100, from what I have read. But yet, I have also
      read that that is a little bit short, that other people are
      saying that we need about 174 to 205 B-21s.....................
    Do you have any insights into that issue?........................
    General West. No, ma'am. I don't. I will have to take that for
      the record.....................................................
    [The information referred to can be found in the Appendix on page
      85.]...........................................................
    Mrs. Hartzler. Okay. Well, thank you for what you do.............
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back............................
    Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Mrs. Hartzler............................
    I want to thank all of our witnesses today, General Davis,
      General Mangum, General West, Admiral Manazir. Thank you so
      much...........................................................
    I also want to thank, too, the officers from your staff that are
      here. I know they are extraordinarily valuable in things that
      they do to provide the information collectively to us today. So
      I want to thank each and every one of you......................
    I assume we have some junior officers here today, too, so they
      are certainly seeing and hearing things that they will be
      dealing with in the years to come..............................
    So we appreciate everyone here. Thanks--thank you so much for
      your leadership and providing us a perspective that we need to
      make sure that we are making the right decisions to support the
      great job that you do..........................................
    Please thank all of your great airmen, marines, soldiers, and
      sailors for the job they do in maintaining our aircraft and the
      job that they do in keeping those aircraft in the air and the
      job they do in piloting those aircraft. We have absolutely the
      best in the world and please thank them on our behalf for that.
    And with that, our subcommittee is adjourned.....................
    [Whereupon, at 11:51 a.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]......

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                               A P P E N D I X

                                  July 6, 2016

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                  PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD

                                  July 6, 2016

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        [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

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                  WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING

                                  THE HEARING

                                  July 6, 2016

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                RESPONSE TO QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MRS. HARTZLER

        General West. The Air Force is currently conducting a
    congressionally-mandated study to determine the appropriate B-21 fleet
    size. We expect to submit the results of this study to Congress in late
    2016/early 2017.   [See page 36.]

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                  QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING

                                  July 6, 2016

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                       QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MS. TSONGAS

        Ms. Tsongas. Rear Admiral Manazir, during the February 2nd, 2016
    Tactical Airland Subcommittee hearing on Naval Aviation, you noted that
    you were focused on driving down the rate of physiological incidents
    experienced by F/A-18 pilots. Has that occurred? Has the rate of
    incidents decreased since we last spoke?
        Admiral Manazir. The Department has not yet seen a decline in the
    rate of reported F/A-18 physiological incidents. We are continuing
    efforts to educate our aviators about the risks of physiological
    events, and encouraging them to report even minor events which will aid
    in more accurate tracking of the incident rate and diagnosing the
    problem.
        Ms. Tsongas. Rear Admiral Manazir, during the same February 2nd,
    2016 Airland Subcommittee hearing, Rear Admiral Moran noted that
    addressing the physiological incident rate in the F-A/18 fleet was not
    a question of resources. Do you still feel like that is the case?
        Admiral Manazir. The F/A-18 Physiological Episode Team does not
    have any efforts or mitigations that have not been pursued or that have
    been put on hold due to a lack of funding. All reasonable efforts to
    reduce Physiological incidents are being pursued and are currently
    funded.
        Ms. Tsongas. Rear Admiral Manazir, during the same February 2nd,
    2016 Airland Subcommittee hearing, Rear Admiral Moran also indicated
    that the Navy was looking into extending the capacity of the backup
    oxygen system in order for pilots to have longer access to pure oxygen
    in the event of an emergency or if they felt the onset of a
    physiological event. Can you tell me where the Navy is in those
    efforts?
        Admiral Manazir. The Navy is in the process of awarding a contract
    in the fourth quarter of Fiscal Year 2016 for the developmental
    engineering design to increase the NACES seat kit emergency oxygen
    capacity by adding an additional oxygen bottle to the seat pan. The
    Navy will field the solution immediately following successful
    development and testing of the system.
                                     ______

                       QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. PETERS
        Mr. Peters. The Secure LVC Advanced Training Environment ATD will
    provide a technology framework for LVC integration into 4th and 5th
    generation aircraft for a 2022 Program of Record. This program is
    intended to help meet increasing demand for higher fidelity, contested
    environment combat training and maintain a critical technology and
    training advantage. Given the significant cost savings and higher
    fidelity training SLATE ATD will help deliver, please provide an
    estimate of additional program resources to achieve all identified
    program goals including physical cockpit integration and testing,
    encryption, and 4th and 5th generation interoperability.
        General Davis. At this time, information regarding additional
    resource requirements has not been determined due to the immaturity of
    SLATE ATD. USAF-led efforts to test and field SLATE ATD will continue
    to be monitored with interest and no financial burden to the USMC. If
    the program matures over time and is determined to meet USMC LVC
    training capability requirements, then efforts to join the program may
    begin. In the meantime, the USMC will continue to research this and
    other LVC training options.
        Mr. Peters. The Secure LVC Advanced Training Environment ATD will
    provide a technology framework for LVC integration into 4th and 5th
    generation aircraft for a 2022 Program of Record. This program is
    intended to help meet increasing demand for higher fidelity, contested
    environment combat training and maintain a critical technology and
    training advantage. Given the significant cost savings and higher
    fidelity training SLATE ATD will help deliver, please provide an
    estimate of additional program resources to achieve all identified
    program goals including physical cockpit integration and testing,
    encryption, and 4th and 5th generation interoperability.
        General Mangum. The Secure Live, Virtual, Constructive (LVC)
    Advanced Training Environment (SLATE) Advanced Technology Demonstration
    (ATD) system is not an Army program of record for our aviation assets
    nor, is it on any transition path for any Army training aids, devices,
    simulations or simulators.
        Mr. Peters. The Secure LVC Advanced Training Environment ATD will
    provide a technology framework for LVC integration into 4th and 5th
    generation aircraft for a 2022 Program of Record. This program is
    intended to help meet increasing demand for higher fidelity, contested
    environment combat training and maintain a critical technology and
    training advantage. Given the significant cost savings and higher
    fidelity training SLATE ATD will help deliver, please provide an
    estimate of additional program resources to achieve all identified
    program goals including physical cockpit integration and testing,
    encryption, and 4th and 5th generation interoperability.
        General West. The SLATE program team has developed and coordinated
    a set of priorities, focus, and a revised timeline for an extension to
    the SLATE ATD to align with the availability of an F-35 aircraft for
    flight testing. The extension timeline would cost $48M and would add
    2.5 years to the schedule. In addition to testing SLATE components and
    models on the F-35, the extension expands the capabilities of the
    baseline demonstration with a larger number of sensor models, cyber
    vulnerability assessments of the SLATE infrastructure, and additional
    trades on range infrastructure, form factor processors, radios, MILS
    devices and 4th and 5th gen integration.
        The Air Force considers it essential that the potential for a
    timely training capability remain the practical imperative of the SLATE
    ATD program.
        Mr. Peters. The Secure LVC Advanced Training Environment ATD will
    provide a technology framework for LVC integration into 4th and 5th
    generation aircraft for a 2022 Program of Record. This program is
    intended to help meet increasing demand for higher fidelity, contested
    environment combat training and maintain a critical technology and
    training advantage. Given the significant cost savings and higher
    fidelity training SLATE ATD will help deliver, please provide an
    estimate of additional program resources to achieve all identified
    program goals including physical cockpit integration and testing,
    encryption, and 4th and 5th generation interoperability.
        Admiral Manazir. The Department of the Navy (DON) is collaborating
    with Department of the Air Force as a supplemental contributor to Air
    Force led Secure LVC Advanced Training Environment (SLATE) ATD efforts.
    DON hopes to gain a better understanding, through advanced or
    experimental waveforms, of how to improve data transfer capabilities
    driven by future aircraft training requirements. However, as a
    supplemental contributor DON defers specifics of SLATE ATD program
    goals and resourcing to the lead service.

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