The U.S. Navy is taking some new initiatives
to sustain the ships of its busy fleet, including additional oversight, new
contracting strategies, shipyard workload stability and capital investment in
shipyard infrastructure.

The initiatives are focused on getting ships and submarines through their maintenance periods on time and back to the fleet to meet the requirements of combatant commanders. As the fleet — run hard by decades of war or crisis — grows in numbers, the challenge becomes greater.

Check out the digital edition of November’s Seapower magazine here. 

In an Aug. 23 release, James
Geurts, assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition,
announced that the Department of the Navy was establishing a new deputy
assistant secretary of the Navy for sustainment (DASN-S) to develop, monitor
and, implement policy and guidance throughout the Navy who “will enable us to
better plan, program, budget and execute the Navy’s sustainment mission.” 

“Sustainment
is as critical as new construction to ensure the Navy is ready to deploy,”
Geurts added. “This position will allow us to improve and align the complex
drivers of maintenance and modernization completion — that in turn will
increase our output to the fleet. We have to get better, and this will help.” 

“We have grown the size of the naval shipyards from 33,850 [workers] to over 36,100 in the past three years. The goal was to get to 36,100 by the start of [fiscal 2020]; we actually got there a year early. That is good news, and that capacity is starting to yield some results to deliver the last eight of the last nine carriers [from maintenance] on time.”

Vice Adm. Thomas Moore, Naval Sea Systems Command

The
new DASN-S will have funding oversight and will “manage Navy and Marine Corps
sustainment and life-cycle management policies,” the release said. The new
position was authorized by Congress in the 2018 National Defense Authorization
Act. 

The new deputy “will help facilitate and
ensure we are putting the same level of aggressiveness into new tools, new ways
of doing business, new ways to contract for that effort, making sure that
they’ve got the full horsepower of the secretariat as [Naval Sea Systems
Command Vice] Adm. [Thomas] Moore’s teams execute that effort,” Geurts said in
an Aug. 23 media roundtable at the Pentagon, which Moore also attended.  

Moore said at the event that the Navy had been
focusing on building the workforce at its shipyards — necessary because the
backlog of ship maintenance occurred in part due to a shortage of skilled
workers.

“We have grown the size of the naval shipyards
from 33,850 [workers] to over 36,100 in the past three years,” he said. “The
goal was to get to 36,100 by the start of [fiscal 2020]; we actually got there a year early. That is good news,
and that capacity is starting to yield some results to deliver the last eight
of the last nine carriers [from maintenance] on time.” 

Moore said the Navy also is focused on getting
workers qualified more quickly by establishing learning centers. 

“Right now, what we are seeing is that [for]
the average worker — from the time we bring them in the door to the time they
are a productive person — we have cut the time in about half. … Even though
half my workforce has less than five years of experience, that trend is also
starting to turn in the right direction.” 

Moore also said the 20-year Shipyard
Infrastructure Optimization Plan (SIOP), implemented in March 2018 for aircraft
carriers and submarines in Navy-owned shipyards, has already “resulted in
significant investments in capital expenditures, great support from the Navy
and the budgets in ’18, ’19 and ’20 and great support from [Congress]. That is
a key enabler.” 

He pointed out that many shipyards are
hundreds of years old and the SIOP is engaged in building them into 21^st
century naval facilities by modernizing dry docks, replacing outmoded equipment
and improving workflow. In the 2021 budget proposal, the Navy plans to include an initiative
like SIOP to come up with creative ways to make capital investments in private shipyards.   

“We will look at dry-dock capacity, capital
expenditures, etc.,” Moore said. “It’s a little bit different to execute the
plan because, unlike in the public sector where we own everything and we can
budget for this, this [involves] individual private companies, and so, we’re
working with [Geurts] to come up with some creative ways as to how we could go
execute this. For instance, we could do like we do with small business
innovative research. The Navy would have a pool of money and, if industry came
to us with a good idea in their yard, maybe we could self-fund some of
it.”  

Geurts said that the Navy is looking at other
shipyards that could be certified for Navy work, even though they have no
current Navy contracts.  

The
Navy is also executing a Perform to Plan initiative that identifies performance
gaps and barriers to execution so they can be addressed to improve performance,
according to the Aug. 23 release. 

USS Boise Illustrates Submarine Upkeep Challenges

Moore spoke of submarine maintenance being the
toughest challenge, noting that the extensive delay in returning the Los
Angeles-class attack submarine USS Boise to service was “the poster child” of
that challenge. The Boise completed its last deployment in 2015 and lost its
dive certification in 2017. He said the Boise delay caused the Navy to
recognize that the sea service did not have enough shipyard capacity for its submarines.  

There are only two private shipyards capable
of handling work on nuclear-powered submarines: Huntington Ingalls Industries’ Newport
News Shipbuilding in Virginia and General Dynamics Electric Boat in
Connecticut. These companies are occupied with construction of new submarines.  

“We were kidding ourselves that we could get
the work done,” Moore said. “In many ways, Boise caused us to really take a
hard look at what we needed to do in the naval shipyards and, also, caused us
to recognize that we would like to have some surge capacity in the private
sector, working with both Newport News and [Electric Boat] to give them work
when it makes sense. We have had some challenges with them the first time for
them to do submarine maintenance work in a long time. It is different than
building submarines. And so, they have had some proficiency challenges, which
we are working our way through.  

“We have to be careful that we’re not stepping
into the new construction lane with everything going on with Columbia [ballistic-missile
submarine] and [Virginia-class attack submarine] Block V, etc.,” he said.
“Newport News has expressed a very strong interest in developing a capacity to
do submarine sustainment over the long haul similar to what they do with carrier
maintenance today.” 

“In many ways, Boise caused us to really take a hard look at what we needed to do in the naval shipyards and, also, caused us to recognize that we would like to have some surge capacity in the private sector.”

VICE ADM. THOMAS MOORE

Moore said the Boise “will actually start at
Newport News probably in April 2020.” 

He explained that delays can be described in
terms of maintenance delay and idle time, the latter being the time a submarine
is idle awaiting the beginning of maintenance. Some idle time results when the
Navy squeezes more operational time out of a sub deployment, causing a boat to
miss its slot in the maintenance schedule. 

“What the data told us is that, if you
consider the variables to be idle time and maintenance delays, 80% of that was
due to the maintenance delays, and only about 20 percent of it was idle time,”
Moore said. “What we have focused on first from a systems standpoint is to fix
the maintenance delays and that is by growing the capacity of the shipyard.
We’re starting to see those maintenance delays [were cut] in half between ’18
and ’19 [and] the amount of workload carryover between what we saw at its peak
in ’16 to today has been reduced by 75%.” 

The idle time is coming down as well because
of the Navy’s initiatives — “down to about 1,800 total days of idle time, of
which 1,200 is Boise,” Moore said. “When you take Boise off the table, it’s
really relatively small and my expectation is that, by the end of fiscal ’20,
we will have no more idle time.”  

For the Surface Fleet, Enticing Private Yards to
Build Capacity 

In the private shipyards, where much surface
ship maintenance takes place, the Navy is working to entice growth in capacity.
Results so far are positive. 

“The data is getting better,” Moore said.
“Last year, we delivered 16% of our DDGs [guided-missile destroyers] on time.
“This year, it was up to about 40%, and we are forecasting that the next eight
DDGs will be on time.”

“Currently, 75% of the DDGs are on plan to
their life-cycle health assessment and, by 2023, we will have gotten the other
25% back on plan,” he added. “The [nuclear power community] have always been
very meticulous about staying onto the class maintenance plan. We’ve been a
little bit less rigorous on the surface side of the house probably over the
last 10 to 15 years, and we’ve paid the price for that.”  

Moore said that part of the success is
attributed to a new contracting strategy: “bundling [shipyard] availabilities
together so that they have an opportunity to project workload out,” enabling
shipyards to see the stability of enough work to cut costs and maintain the  workforce.

He said the Navy was not happy with the cost
and schedule performance of cost-plus contracts with a single company for five
years at a time. The service then switched to fixed-price contracts for one ship at a time, but
this made the private shipyards reluctant to hire additional workers when they
did not know if they would win the next contract. With the shipyard reluctant, hiring lagged behind the workload, resulting in delays in
delivery back to the fleet. Bundling fixed-price contracts is the new plan. 

Moore has been working with Geurts on bundling
availabilities together so that if a shipyard wins, it is “going to win
availabilities over a two-, three-, four-year period head-to-toe, then you’ve
got a stable plan and you can then go make capital investments in your plan,
and you can hire to have that workforce trained.”  

“My priority for the fleet is, ships come in on time, ships go out on time and they go out with all the work done.”

James Geurts, assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition

Another factor in delayed delivery is having maintenance
plans that aren’t executable. Moore said that working with the fleets to
provide an executable, level-loaded plan for the shipyards, staying away from
overloading them, is yielding progress in tackling the workload.  

Moore
said that NAVSEA’s “partnership with the fleets has been as good as it has ever been in
the 25 years [that] I’ve been a maintenance provider.” 

The Navy also is reducing quality assurance
checkpoints by 50%, which will cut shipyards’ costs. Moore cited the example of
a DDG hull being painted at a Vigor shipyard adjacent to a commercial ferry also getting fresh
paint. Vigor’s president pointed out to Moore that painting the DDG cost four
times more and took twice as long as the ferry work — and the difference was the
Navy’s onerous checkpoints. The ferry’s painter also provided a warranty. Moore
said the Navy will conduct a pilot project this year with two ships under a
contract with a warranty. 

“In return, we’ll reduce the checkpoints, and
let’s see if we can get the cost and the schedule down,” Moore said. “There are
a number of things out there like that that, over years, we have just added
bureaucracy into the system that really doesn’t add any value to get the work
done.” 

Geurts, referring to the Navy’s 30-year
maintenance and modernization plan that supplements the 30-year shipbuilding
plan, said: “We’ve got to get those balanced up right so that we cannot only
deliver the capabilities needed but sustain them to provide the operational
commanders the capabilities they need.  

“My priority for the fleet is, ships come in
on time, ships go out on time and they go out with all the work done,” he said.
“The fleet uses the term ‘on time in full.’ So, my priority is getting
credibility in the system so that a fleet commander is confident when they turn
a ship over to us to go do the maintenance work that it comes out on time and
in full. 

“Part of the rigging for speed is not just
delivering in peacetime, it’s really getting prepared for wartime,” he said.
“Ready to me means ready tonight to fight and then ready for the fights that
are coming in the future. It’s not just about meeting a schedule or a budget
target. If we can’t do the peacetime stuff well with credibility, we’re really
going to struggle in wartime mode.” 

Geurts said that sustaining the lethality of the
fleet is a matter of maximizing availability, capacity and capacity, and “the
trick is getting those synchronized and mutually supporting, not competing. To
some degree, if you spend too much time worrying about new construction but you
don’t worry about maintenance, then you’re not maximizing that investment. If
all you are doing is worrying about maintenance and not tracking the costs and
trying to drive that cost down, you won’t have money to modernize and build new
things.”

ARLINGTON, Va. — The U.S. Navy’s top acquisitions official said all advanced weapons elevators (AWE) on the new aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford will be operational by 18 months after post-delivery trials and testing begins and that a team of experts will be formed to carry over lessons learned as the AWEs are installed in each new carrier of the Ford class. 

James F. Geurts, assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition, told media at an Oct. 28 Pentagon roundtable that Huntington Ingalls’ Newport News Shipbuilding will form a team of experts on the installation and repair of the AWEs that will carry over as the next three carriers (CVNs 79, 80 and 81) follow the Gerald R. Ford in construction. The Navy will form a team of AWE experts to certify the installation. 

The AWEs are one of five major technologies introduced on the Ford and have proven to be the most troublesome. The ship’s dual band radar, electromagnetic aircraft launch system and advanced arresting gear and new-design nuclear reactor are all doing well in trials, but the 11 AWEs — crucial to bringing ordnance up to the flight deck rapidly enough to provide the carrier’s design sortie generation rate — have proven difficult to install and operate. 

Geurts, who visited the Gerald R. Ford at sea on Oct. 27, said the Navy has certified the three upper AWEs (plus one utility or medevac elevator). Newport News Shipbuilding is working on the seven elevators that operate from the ship’s two weapons magazines.

He said that seven remaining AWEs will be installed and certified in sequence to allow access to both the fore and aft magazines to ensure that both are accessible as early as possible as redundancy develops. Three of the lower AWEs were exercised during the carrier’s first at-sea period this year while Geurts was visiting the ship in preparation for certification. 

The goal for the Navy is to have all 11 AWEs operational by the time the 18-month post-delivery trials and testing is completed in mid-2021. 

During the testing, the carrier will be put through several trials, including re-certification of its flight deck, the arresting gear, the catapults, fuel system and many other systems. 

During the recent trials attended by Geurts, the Ford’s propulsion plant was tested at full throttle. “The propulsion plant activities are looking pretty solid,” he said. 

Geurts said the Navy is building a full digital twin of the AWE and is building a land-based test site for it at Naval Surface Warfare Center Philadelphia to troubleshoot any AWE issues. He said that adjusting the AWEs for the next carrier, John F. Kennedy, will not require a huge amount of work.

WASHINGTON — The secretary of the U.S. Navy said the sea service is looking ahead to determine what the follow-on aircraft carrier design will look like, even as work continues to get the new USS Gerald R. Ford out to regular operations at sea. 

“With the [recent] two-carrier buy, what will the next carrier look like? We’re having discussions on that as we speak, and we will see what happens,” Navy Secretary Richard V. Spencer said, speaking Oct. 23 at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank. “I think we actually whiteboard this thing. What will it look like in 10 to 15 years? Is it a floating platform for electrically charged unmanned aircraft? I don’t know.”  

Spencer said the Navy is looking at the “lightning carrier” concept, deploying 20 F-35B Lightning II strike fighters on an amphibious assault ship. Recently the USS America operated in the eastern Pacific Ocean with 13 F-35Bs of Marine Fighter Attack Squadron (VMFA) 122, the Corps’ most recently equipped F-35B squadron. Earlier this year, USS Wasp operated for a short period with 10 F-35Bs of VMFA-121 on board.  

“My cost performance there is tremendous,” Spencer said. “Does it have the same punch? No, it doesn’t. But it has a very interesting sting to it.” 

Such lightning carriers would lack airborne early warning aircraft unless the Navy developed a capability for these smaller decks. The sea service is developing an aerial refueling tanker capability to be installed in the MV-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft to refuel the F-35Bs. 

“With the [recent] two-carrier buy, what will the next carrier look like? We’re having discussions on that as we speak, and we will see what happens.”

Navy Secretary Richard V. Spencer

During the opening phase of Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003, the amphibious assault ship USS Bataan operated as a “Harrier carrier,” equipped with two full squadrons of AV-8B Harrier II attack aircraft, which the F-35B is replacing, rather than the usual six aircraft. 

The concept might get a serious workout in a couple of years.   

“In 2021, you will see a Marine Corps F-35B squadron on the Queen Elizabeth, which we are very excited about,” Spencer said, speaking of the plan to operate a Marine Corps F-35B squadron alongside a British F-35B squadron on the new Royal Navy aircraft carrier.

WASHINGTON — The secretary of the Navy said that the U.S. Air Force, not the Navy, will manage the program for the next generation of the Mobile User Objective System (MUOS). 

The MUOS, built by Lockheed Martin, is a communications satellite equipped with a wideband code division multiple-access payload that enables a 10-fold increase in capability over the previous UHF Follow-On satellite. 

The MUOS provides secure channels for voice and data at high speeds with streaming capability. The five-satellite system includes an in-orbit spare. Four are operational. The fifth — the spare — was launched in 2016 and turned over to Navy control in October 2017. General Dynamics has built MUOS ground stations in Hawaii, Virginia and Australia. In August 2018, the system was approved for expanded use by U.S. Strategic Command.  

The MUOS is unusual in that it is a Navy-developed and owned space satellite system. The Air Force is the primary operator of defense space satellites for the armed services. 

Spencer, speaking Oct. 23 to an audience at the Bookings Institution, a Washington, D.C., think tank, replying to a question about the Navy Department’s involvement in space, said the Navy should subscribe to space services rather than purchase more satellite systems itself. 

“My fundamental position, and I believe the CNO [chief of naval operations] and commandant [of the Marine Corps] agree with me, is we’ve moved to a thought process where I just want the service and/or the resource provided to me,” Spencer said.  

“I just signed a memorandum of agreement with the Air Force,” Spencer said. “They will take over MUOS Next Generation. If that’s your expertise, I want you on it and [the Navy Department] will just buy the service from it.”

ARLINGTON, Va. — The Navy’s last active-duty patrol squadron to operate the Lockheed P-3 Orion maritime patrol aircraft has returned from deployment and soon will begin transition to the Boeing P-8A Poseidon.  

Patrol Squadron 40 (VP-40) completed its return to Naval Air Station (NAS) Whidbey Island, Washington, on Oct. 10 from its deployment to the U.S. 7th Fleet and U.S. 5th Fleet areas of operations. 

VP-40 is the last of the existing 12 VP fleet squadrons to operate the P-3C. It will join those squadrons in flying the P-8A as it begins its transition with the fleet replacement squadron, VP-30 at NAS Jacksonville, Florida. 

VP-40 had the distinction of retiring the Navy’s last flying boats, the SP-5B Marlins, in 1967 following a deployment to the Philippines and South Vietnam. 

Although it is no longer in the regular fleet deployment cycles, the P-3 will continue for several more years to be operated by several units, including two reserve VP squadrons, VP-62 and VP-69, as well as VP-30, Special Projects Patrol Squadron Two, Scientific Development Squadron One, and Air Test and Evaluation Squadron 30. 

The EP-3E electronic reconnaissance version will continue to deploy from NAS Whidbey Island with detachments of Fleet Air Reconnaissance Squadron One until the MQ-4C Triton unmanned aerial vehicle is deployed in sufficient numbers with signals intelligence capability.       

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Navy’s program for its next-generation ballistic-missile submarine (SSBN), the Columbia class, is on track to start construction on time, but the program has a tight schedule with little margin for delay, the program manager said. 

“Our biggest risk today is the supplier base,” said Capt. Jon Rucker, program manager for the Columbia SSBN, speaking Oct. 8 at the eighth annual TRIAD Conference in the Washington, D.C., area.  

Rucker pointed out that when construction of the current Ohio class began, a supplier base of 17,000 companies contributed to the materiel and systems for the boat. Today, the Columbia program is pressing forward with only 3,000 suppliers. 

The supply of skilled shipyard workers also is a concern to Rucker. He noted that General Dynamics Electric Boat, the prime contractor for the Columbia, is increasing its workforce to 20,000 from 17,000 workers. But the hiring is drawing skilled workers from naval shipyards that routinely maintain subs and carriers. 

Rucker said that robots have been used in building the Common Missile Compartment for the Columbia class and the U.K. Royal Navy’s Dreadnought-class SSBN. Robots used in welding the missile tubes to the bottom of the hull section took 44 minutes and 8 seconds, compared with 4 days for a human worker. 

Electric Boat has invested $1.8 billion in facilities to build the Columbia class and Huntington Ingalls Industries’ Newport News Shipbuilding division is spending $800 million to $900 million to support the construction, Rucker said.  

About 10 percent of the construction of the lead boat, Columbia, already has begun but its formal start is scheduled for Oct. 1, 2020. The first Columbia SSBN needs to be on patrol by the beginning of fiscal 2031, on Oct. 1, 2030. The program goal is to build each of the following boats of the class in 84 months.  

“We will deliver at least 12 Columbia-class SSBNs by 2042,” Rucker said, with emphasis on “at least.” 

The Navy operates 14 Ohio-class missile submarines, which are scheduled for an extended service life of 42.5 years. The last Ohio-class boat built, USS Louisiana, recently entered its final refueling period to extend its life. The Ohio class is scheduled to begin retirement in 2027. 

“We can’t extend them anymore,” Rucker said. 

Rucker noted that the Columbia program has a high design maturity, with a design that will be 83% at construction start. By contrast, the Ohio design was only 2% complete at construction start.  

“We make sure we keep stable requirements,” he said. 

“We own this platform cradle to grave,” Rucker said, noting that the program office will be responsible for sustainment in addition to construction. 

ARLINGTON, Va. — The Navy’s submarine base in Kings Bay, Georgia, will be the first base to be readied for the Navy’s new Columbia-class ballistic-missile submarine (SSBN), a Navy admiral said. 

“Kings Bay will come first, so that [construction] will be in [the] 2023 to 2025 period,” Rear Adm. John W. Korka, commander of Naval Facilities Engineering Command, said in an interview with Seapower. “About a year later, we will see similar efforts at Bangor [Washington].

See More Coverage of the Columbia Class

“In Kings Bay today, the critical SSBN dry dock facility requires upgrades,” Korka said. “In support of that requirement, next year we will award a project to recapitalize the dry dock. That work is part of a $400 million-plus project.” 

The 12 planned Columbia-class SSBNs will replace the 14 Ohio-class SSBNs in service on ballistic-missile patrols beginning in 2031. The program is on a tight timeline to deliver the new SSBNs in time to assume the patrols, and the Naval Facilities Engineering Command has program officials embedded with Program Executive Office-Submarines to coordinate the infrastructure requirements of the Columbia sub program. 

“Each new class brings a new capability, so that translates to unique training and refitting associated with supporting any new platform,” Korka added. 

“I tell people to keep in mind, though, that as we are bringing the Ohio class offline, we still need to maintain the facilities to support that program and that submarine and, at the same time, we are transitioning to bringing on the Columbia class. Training and maintenance spaces are critical in that arena. I will add that there is an opportunity to use the existing spaces, but there is a requirement for a certain amount of expansion.” 

Korka added: “It’s important to note that we are introducing a new platform while there is still an operational requirement for an existing platform. As such, we need to make sure our team has the requirements right and possesses the agility of being able to change direction without losing the pace of construction. That is going to be critical element to our success — being able to adjust to meet the emerging requirements while keeping the timeline on track. That is where agility plays a key role.”   

“In Kings Bay today, the critical SSBN dry dock facility requires upgrades. In support of that requirement, next year we will award a project to recapitalize the dry dock.”

Rear Adm. John Korka, NAVFAC commander

Korka’s command also has been heavily engaged in upgrading the infrastructure in Philadelphia to support the Columbia construction. 

“What many people may not know is that the Navy produces the propulsor components and propellers at the Naval Foundry and Propeller Center in Philadelphia,” he said.

“The facilities at the Naval Surface Warfare Center portion of the annex that were part of supporting the Columbia class needed power upgrades. They additionally required construction of the power propulsion facilities primarily designed to do all the testing of components associated with the electrical drive system of the Columbia class. We awarded that project in 2015 and will complete it in the coming months. It has a full-tilt testing cell to characterize and certify the acoustic signature performance. The propulsion system then is barged up to Groton [Connecticut] to Electric Boat, where it will be installed into the submarines. This project is active and progressing along. There are other projects in Philadelphia supporting the manufacturing elements and testing labs as well, and work associated with those projects will continue.” 

“There also is a submarine propulsor manufacturing support facility that is tracking to be awarded this year as well as planning and design efforts for the training and refit facilities in support of the Columbia class,” he said.

WASHINGTON — The admiral in charge of Naval Air Systems Command said that aircraft readiness hinges on reliability of the systems and the maintenance that keeps them mission-capable. 

“Reliability is just as critical as lethality,” said NAVAIR’s commander, Vice Adm. Dean Peters, speaking Oct. 1 at a luncheon of the Greater Washington Council of the U.S. Naval Academy Alumni Association in Washington, noting that the Navy had to take a different view of how to achieve more reliability as it endeavors to improve aircraft readiness. 

Peters said he would like to turn all 10,000 engineers in the Naval Aviation Enterprise into reliability engineers. 

One challenge to achieving high readiness is the lagging provision of things like vital spare parts, technical manuals and ground support equipment. Peters cited the 2003 introduction of the Marine Corps’ UH-1Y Venom helicopter to replace the UH-1N in Afghanistan and Iraq. He said the UH-1Y deployed with inadequate spare parts, manuals and ground support equipment as the Navy continued to buy the aircraft while shorting the necessary support. 

“We are mesmerized by quantities,” Peters said, explaining that Congress often is focused more on the aircraft — the “above-line costs” — rather than the supporting items — the “below-line” costs.   

“This is just not the way to align our fleet,” he said.  

The admiral said the Navy is establishing a new program executive office for common parts, such as radios and other systems used in multiple platforms, with a civilian program executive officer, to raise the procurement of such systems to a higher visibility. 

He pointed out that throwing money and spare parts at the Navy is not going to solve the readiness problem, but that the sea service needed to change its way of fostering reliability and maintenance, balancing sustainment with new capability. 

Peters praised fleet readiness centers for their progress in improving the readiness of Navy and Marine Corps aircraft. The Navy consulted with airlines to see what they did to sustain high aircraft availability. He said that every supporting function had to own the outcome. 

“It’s really about bringing accountability to everyone involved,” the admiral said.  

One factor in improvement was bringing the management, planning, logistics and maintenance all at the same site.  

Peters said the Navy established a reliability control board to identify the factors that degrade aircraft readiness. 

For one example, the Navy found that a component of the E-2D’s APY-9 radar was lasting only 600 hours rather than 6,000 hours. 

In another example, an F/A-18 that had been inducted into a fleet readiness center had not flown a single hour since it emerged from its last induction six years prior. 

Peters said the fleet readiness centers at Naval Air Station (NAS) Lemoore, California, and NAS Oceana, Virginia, delivered 36 F/A-18 strike fighters in fiscal 2019, each of which was completed in 60 days and flown within seven days after delivery. 

The 80% readiness goal for the F/A-18 fleet that then-Defense Secretary Jim Mattis set was met and exceeded by the Navy. The goal of 341 of 550 aircraft to be mission-capable was exceeded, reaching 379 aircraft on Oct. 1. 

“People are starting to believe we can do it,” Peters said. “It’s not all about efficiency.”

ARLINGTON, Va. — The commander of U.S. forces in Latin America and the Caribbean Sea said that the U.S. strategy in the region is designed to secure a prosperous hemisphere and to counter threats that would undermine the security of the region, including the issues brought about by the increasing great power competition.   

“The best way to counter threats is partnership,” said Adm. Craig S. Faller, commander of U.S. Southern Command, speaking Sept. 30 at the Gen. Bernard W. Rogers Strategic Issues Forum, an event sponsored by the Association of the United States Army and the Navy League of the United States. 

Strengthening partnerships “wins in life, wins in war,” Faller said. 

Strengthening partnerships is Faller’s top priority as he works with the nations of the region and their militaries. He said that partnership is the best way to achieve his second priority, countering threats to the region. His third priority is to “build our team,” strengthening the forces available to secure the peace in the region. 

“The best way to counter threats is partnership.”

Adm. Craig S. Faller, U.S. Southern Command

Faller pointed out as good news that 27 of the nations in his area of responsibility are democracies. He also noted that some nations, such as Colombia, are now not only providing their own defense but are providing security assistance to other nations in the region. 

The admiral stressed the importance of promoting shared values — professionalism, respect for law, respect for human rights — as a means to address the regional problems of weak democracies and institutional corruption and of countering transnational criminal organizations engaged in activities such as drug running, human trafficking, weapons running and illegal fishing and mining. He said that combatting international terrorism, such as that sponsored by Iran, comes under the purview of U.S. Special Operations Command.  

Faller said he considered Russia and China to be “malign actors” in the region that have “moved in a way that all of us should find alarming.” 

China is working on 60 seaport access deals across the hemisphere, 56 in the Southern Command region, he said.  

Faller said that 67% of the goods that pass through the Panama Canal are U.S. goods, but he noted that China has signed 45 agreements with Panama during the last U.S. administration “and locked up port deals at either end of the canal.” 

“I do consider China a threat to the democracy, to the stability of this neighborhood,” Faller said, noting the support of China and Russia for Venezuela’s Maduro regime. He also said that Maduro’s presidential guard is provided by Cuba.   

He said that the Panama Canal is vulnerable to terrorist and cyber threats. 

Faller praised the partnership between the United States and Brazil during World War II, when the U.S. 4th Fleet was based in Brazil, and the two countries operated together to counter the German submarine threat in the Atlantic. 

“Brazil would say they should be part of NATO, and I don’t disagree with them,” he said. “There is a lot of opportunity there.” 

The admiral also stressed the importance of the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, which is the southernmost U.S. facility in the region. The U.S. stages aircraft at Soto Cano in Honduras and has some pier space in Curacao, an island owned by The Netherlands.  

The 4th Fleet has no ships permanently assigned to the Southern Command, but Faller is looking forward to one ship being assigned there. Typically, five Coast Guard cutters are in the region on drug and migrant interdiction missions.

ARLINGTON, Va. — The Navy has ordered nine E-2D Advanced Hawkeye from Northrop Grumman Systems Corp. for the government of Japan.  

According to a Sept. 26 Defense Department contract announcement, Naval Air Systems Command awarded to Northrop Grumman Systems Corp. a $1.36 billion firm fixed-price contract modification for the production and delivery of the nine E-2Ds. The contract was awarded under Foreign Military Sales. 

Earlier, in May 2019, Northrop Grumman delivered the first of four E-2Ds ordered under a 2014 contract.  

The E-2Ds will equip the Japanese Air Self-Defense Force, which currently operates the older E-2C version.  

The E-2D features the Lockheed Martin APY-9 radar with a two-generation leap in capability and upgraded aircraft systems that improve supportability and increase readiness. Another notable upgrade is the glass cockpit. The three 17-inch liquid crystal display panels enable either the pilot or co-pilot to become a fourth tactical operator — when not actively engaged in flying the aircraft — to give the crew more flexibility in performing its diverse missions.