[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
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
__________
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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
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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.]......
=======================================================================
A P P E N D I X
July 6, 2016
=======================================================================
PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
July 6, 2016
=======================================================================
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
=======================================================================
WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING
THE HEARING
July 6, 2016
=======================================================================
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.]
=======================================================================
QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING
July 6, 2016
=======================================================================
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.
[all]