At well north of $100 billion for 12 vessels, the Columbia-class ballistic-missile submarine will be the most expensive new undertaking for the U.S Navy since the Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carrier program. And everyone is hoping development and production goes a lot smoother for the new sub than the Ford class of carriers.

The Navy is trying to replace its aging fleet of 14 Ohio-class ballistic-missile subs, which carry nuclear-tipped Trident missiles and serve as the nation’s sea-based strategic deterrent. The sheer per-vessel cost of the Columbia class prompts one to draw comparisons to the $13-billion-per-ship Ford program — and that’s reason for concern considering the struggles throughout the carrier’s development.

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

Cost increases and schedule delays were a hallmark of the program during design, development and production, and the class still has its share of challenges. USNI reported earlier this year that the Ford had to spend months in dry dock to deal with problems with the ship’s nuclear power plant, and another report indicated that most of the carrier’s Advanced Weapons Elevators (AWEs) were not operational.

However, Columbia and Ford are certainly two very different programs, and the Navy believes it has a handle on the new sub.

Naval Sea Systems Command spokesman Bill Couch told Seapower in an e-mail that the Columbia-class program is working hard to tackle challenges early and make sure the sub stays on schedule.

“The Columbia Class Submarine Program is executing schedule risk and cost-reduction activities (e.g., advance construction, continuous production of missile tubes) and closely manages technology development and engineering/integration efforts,” he said. “Additionally, the shipbuilder [General Dynamics Electric Boat] is executing a plan to meet the highest design maturity target for any shipbuilding program [83%] at construction start.”

The program has run into some issues early. Officials discovered a problem last year with the submarine missile tube welds that reportedly cost $27 million and a year of work to fix.

However, the Navy says that issue isn’t affecting the schedule.

“General Dynamics Electric Boat [GDEB] and the Navy continue to work together to manage schedule impacts caused by the missile tube welding defects, with currently no impact to lead ship delivery schedule,” Couch said. “Margin remaining to the missile compartment due to the missile tube deliveries is under review.”

He added that Columbia-class deliveries are still aligned with the retirements of Ohio-class submarines to ensure the nation’s strategic deterrence requirements are met.

Additionally, he said a potential fiscal 2020 continuing resolution is unlikely to affect the program.

The program hit a big milestone earlier this year, with Huntington Ingalls Industries hosting a ceremony at its Newport News Shipbuilding division — which is working with GDEB on the program — on May 23 to celebrate cutting the first steel for the program.

“The first cut of steel is a major construction milestone that signifies our shipyard and submarine industrial base are ready to move forward with production,” Jason Ward, Newport News’ vice president for Columbia-class construction, said in a statement.

“We have worked to engage the submarine industrial base and leveraged lessons learned from the successful Virginia-class program to building the Columbia-class submarines in the most efficient and affordable manner to provide the best value to the Navy.”

On March 6, the Navy announced that it had established Program Executive Office Columbia (PEO CLB) to focus entirely on the “Navy’s No. 1 acquisition priority,” according to a Navy statement.

“This is the Navy’s most important program and establishing a new PEO today will meet tomorrow’s challenges head-on,” James Geurts, assistant secretary of the Navy for acquisition, research and development, said in the statement. “The evolution from initial funding to construction, development and testing to serial production of 12 SSBNs will be crucial to meeting the National Defense Strategy and building the Navy the nation needs. PEO Columbia will work directly with resource sponsors, stakeholders, foreign partners, shipbuilders and suppliers to meet national priorities and deliver and sustain lethal capacity our warfighters need.”

Bryan Clark, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, said that there are reasons to be optimistic about the Columbia-class program despite the challenges of the Ford class.

For one thing, the Ford-class program had a lot more new technologies creating compounding risk, as opposed to the Columbia program, he said. He noted that there were some new technologies to watch, such as an all-electric propulsion plant and a new kind of propulsor assembly.

However, the Navy has done some advance work on that technology to reduce risk, Clark said.

“On the propulsion plant, the Navy built a land-based prototype to get the technical risk burned down,” he said. “The Navy spent quite a bit of time trying to tackle [the technical risk] by prototyping and demonstrating. But you can never completely eliminate the risk. They lost some time and margin because of technical challenges not fully tackled.”

And while the program has margin built in, the recent problems — particularly with the missile tubes — risk eliminating that margin early and creating no room for error with still many years left until the first sub is scheduled for delivery in 2028.

The good news is that the Navy may be through the hard part, Clark said.

“On the manufacturing side, I think there’s just having to do some rework and some more effort to test and inspect things before they get pushed out to the construction yard, which will introduce a little bit of schedule delay — but it is somewhat bounded,” he said. “I think compared to the Ford, the risks with Columbia are smaller in number, more bounded, and relatively understood.”

A delegation from U.S.
Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) embarked on a three-nation, 10-day tour in South
America at the end of August, traveling along Brazil’s coast for multi-nation
military exercises, then cutting across the continent to observe military
training in Paraguay followed by a diplomatic mission to Lima, Peru.

On its second multination trip this year to South America, the Miami-based SOUTHCOM staff, headed by its commander of 11 months, Adm. Craig Faller, has under Faller’s concerted guidance virtually landed running since his swearing-in in last November, overseeing a tireless travel itinerary to visit every nation and dependency in the central and southern reaches of the Western hemisphere while seeing to the implementation of programs, attending events and monitoring the well-being of the command’s extended embassy and military staffs.

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

Even as Faller and his team
are focused on commitments set forth in its May 2019 strategic plan, “Enduring
Promise for the Americas,” SOUTHCOM’s achievements to date include a remarkable
checklist of already-cemented programs, including medical and rescue
operations, military training and civic and community development.

With an area of
responsibility that includes 31 countries and 16 dependencies in Central
America, South America and the Caribbean, the command’s impact is playing out in
Panama, Guatemala, Honduras and Columbia. In addition, SOUTHCOM governs the
ongoing medical assistance mission of the USNS Comfort and operates in Brazil’s
Amazon rainforest, where a joint U.S. and Brazilian military medical team recently
completed a 26-day riverine humanitarian mission to provide medical care to isolated
communities along the Amazon.

Meanwhile, Faller kicked off
the SOUTHCOM tour on Aug. 19 at Base Naval do Rio de Janeiro, where he and Adm.
Leonardo Puntel, commander of the Brazilian Operational Navy, presided over
opening ceremonies of UNITAS LX (60), an annual multinational maritime exercise
of more than 3,100 naval forces from 13 countries.

“I think you all should just savor the moment. Look around the room,
look at the group of like-minded professionals that you are with,” said Faller,
underscoring a key theme of the SOUTHCOM’s Enduring Promise, while sending a
clear message to the South American military teams whom he addressed throughout
his tour.

“We all have so much to learn from each other. Take every advantage of the
opportunity to teach, to make new friends, to build trust. This is how we are
going to fight. We are going to fight together. As like-minded democracies, as friends,”
he added. 

In addition to the U.S. and
Brazil, UNITAS LX participants included naval forces, representatives and
observers from Argentina, Chile, Columbia, Ecuador, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay,
Peru, Portugal, Great Britain and Japan. Unique to UNITAS LX this year, the
Brazilian navy, as host of the event, demonstrated regional maritime
cooperation in a humanitarian assistance and disaster relief (HADR) scenario.

“This is the 60th [year] of UNITAS, and today we have more of an emphasis on disaster relief and humanitarian relief,” said Puntel, who reflected on Brazil’s longstanding maritime ties to the U.S. and Royal Navy dating back to World War I when, during the events of 1917, British Admiralty requested naval assistance from distant allies, including Japan. “The relationship between the Brazilian navy and the U.S. Navy is very important and started back in the first World War when the Brazilian navy sent a task force to Gibraltar to fight against the German navy, and we fought side-by-side with the U.S. Navy, the Royal Navy and the Japanese navy in the mouth of the Mediterranean.”

In Rio later that day, Faller
addressed students and faculty at the Brazilian Armed Forces’ Escola Superior
de Guerra (War College), where he discussed the significance of the U.S.-Brazil
military alliance and the urgency to elevate the importance of Central and
South American regional partners, which has led to Brazil’s designation as a
non-NATO major ally, as outlined in the Defense Department’s National Defense
Strategy. To that end, Faller explained how he views the region as a “shared
neighborhood” — a notion that also illustrates the close partnership between
the U.S. and its South American allies.

“I say this neighborhood of
the Western Hemisphere because we are neighbors, and we are close neighbors.
And, we’re partners. And, we’re friends,” Faller told students and instructors
at Brazil’s war college. “We share all the domains that we study — and we’re
fighting air, land, sea, space, cyber — but most importantly, we share values.
We share a belief in freedom. We share a belief in sovereignty, respect for
human rights and for democracies. The hemisphere is blessed with democracies.”

In his remarks, Faller explained
how the United States and SOUTHCOM view regional security in terms of the
pervasive and ever-present threats that touch every South American nation,
among them anti-government political factions, counter-drug trafficking, illicit
mining, money laundering, the influence of violent extremist organizations, Russia’s
anti-U.S. crusade and criminal ties, China’s economic offensive, and to discuss
the reality of corruption across governments, militaries and communities in the
region.

“You look at what we share, and the opportunity that is presented — it
is also being challenged by the threats we share. The threats we share … are
chacterized by a vicious circle that includes corruption,” Faller explained.
“Yes, I do include that as a military threat. Because with corruption thrives criminal
networks, transnational criminal networks … that respect no laws, no boundaries
and that are aiming at our way of life. And there are violent extremists — a
fancy name that we made up in the United States for terrorists. They are
operating here in this neighborhood and they thrive on those same conditions.”

At the South American
Defense Conference (SOUTHDEC) in Natal, Brazil, SOUTHCOM met with members of
the Brazilian Armed Forces for a forum that included defense leaders from
Argentina, Chile, Columbia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname and Uruguay as
well as representatives from Canada, Portugal, Spain and the United Kingdom.
With its theme of “regional defense cooperation in response to hemispheric
challenges,” militaries attending the conference took part in two days of
dialog, briefings, roundtables and meetings that focused on humanitarian
assistance missions, disaster relief operations and international cooperation
targeting transnational threats.

At the conference, Fernando
Azevedo e Silva, Brazil’s minister of defense, noted the climate of present-day
security challenges compared to a decade ago, and, like Faller, emphasized the
need for South American countries and their allies to join forces.

“The world is undergoing
transitions with a diversity of threats, demanding joint efforts to neutralize
them for regional stability and lasting peace,” Azevedo said.

SOUTHCOM staff and
delegations from other countries included senior enlisted leaders who met
concurrently for the third consecutive year to discuss the meeting’s top line
themes, while also dedicating time to the important role of the region’s
professional enlisted corps, and examining more closely fitness, talent
management, professional development, and the growing contributions of women to
peace and security missions.

In a first visit to the
region, Faller and the SOUTHCOM delegation traveled to Asuncion, Paraguay,
where they met with Lee McClenny, U.S. ambassador to Paraguay, as well as U.S. Embassy
and host nation officials. Together, they observed a Joint Combined Exchange
Training (JCET) at Vista Alegre Infantry Training School in which a team of trainees
from a Paraguayan Joint Special Forces Battalion demonstrated an ambush. The
exercise was as part of a 30-day bilateral training engagement between instructors
from the 20th Special Forces Group of the Massachusetts Army National Guard and
about 40 soldiers in Paraguay’s special forces battalion.

Faller said Paraguay’s
challenges mirror the threats seen in other South and Central American
countries. A landlocked country in the center of the continent, Paraguay, with
its tri-border area where Argentina, Paraguay and Brazil meet, is lodged right
in the middle of a critical area in South America that has served as a hub for narcotics trafficking, illegal mining, money laundering and that serves
globally and transnationally in the flow illicit materials overseas, Faller
said.

“When you look at
transnational criminal organizations and the threats, there is a nexus in
Paraguay,” Faller explained. “A lot of the challenges that Paraguay faces are
principally, for them, law enforcement-type challenges — police challenges,
border challenges. As in all our countries, their military is very capable and
there is a role for the military in support of those police efforts. So, we are
focused on education and training and on these J-CETs. [Paraguay] is a small
country with a small force. I think we saw how eager they were, how motivated
they were, and how important this was to them.”

SOUTHCOM’s final stop
included meetings in Lima, Peru, at Peruvian army headquarters in Lima, where Faller
met with Peru’s minister of defense, Peruvian navy Adm. Jorge Moscoso, and Krishna
R. Urs, U.S. ambassador to Peru.

At Peru’s Centro Naval,
Faller and his staff met with Gen. Cesar Astudillo Salcedo, head of the
Peruvian Armed Forces Joint Command. Following the meeting, Faller received, on
behalf of the country of Peru, the Medalla Gran Cruz (“Great Cross”), the
highest award given to leaders as a show of gratitude and thanks and to honor
the SOUTHCOM’s support in natural disasters, humanitarian aid and in
multinational operations and training between both countries, while also
honoring the commander’s military service.

At several meetings with
South American leaders and military personnel, Faller discussed the importance
of professionalism as a key concept for achieving unified, effective and
enlightened partnerships among allies in Latin America and the Caribbean. A
common theme in SOUTHCOM’s Enduring Promise, Faller returned time and again to
the topic of professionalism as a means for remaining strong across the
hemisphere.

“Building our team, it is about
professionalism. No one here is going to argue about the concept of professionalism.
But what goes into it for a military force, for a security force?” Faller said.
“Whether you are a police force, whether you are foreign service, with professionalism, it is doing the
right thing. It is integrity, it is legitimacy, it is human rights, it is
forces that respect talent, and gender integration. We can’t fight the future
without accepting the talent into our teams that makes us better and stronger.
We’ve all got to figure that out as we move forward.”

To report this story, Daisy R. Khalifa traveled with the U.S. Southern Command delegation on its three-nation, 10-day tour of South America and the visits with their militaries. This is the first in a series of stories on her trip.

The U.S. Navy and Marine Corps are aggressively changing course
and refocusing their resources and training to prepare the fleet and
expeditionary forces for a “Great Power Competition” with China and Russia. But
a growing number of Navy officers and defense analysts are warning that current
and planned maritime logistics capabilities are seriously inadequate to sustain
forward-deployed combat forces in an extended fight against such peer
competitors.

This deficiency would be particularly severe in a high-intensity
conflict against China, which is rapidly developing military capabilities
specifically aimed at keeping U.S. forces far from their shores and able to
threaten Pacific Ocean-based logistical support facilities, the critics warned.
A fight against a resurgent Russia could be a repeat of the 1940s “battle of
the Atlantic” with a small Military Sealift Command (MSC) force and an American
merchant marine fleet — a fraction of the size of the World War II armada — trying
to evade scores of sophisticated Russian submarines in a desperate effort to
reinforce and supply U.S. forces in Europe.

“Failing to remedy
this situation, when adversaries have U.S. logistics networks in their
crosshairs, could cause the United States to lose a war and fail its allies and
partners in their hour of need. An unsupported force may quickly become a
defeated one,” said a comprehensive report released this spring by the Center
for Strategic and Budgetary Assessment (CSBA).

A
similar warning was issued by retired Navy Capt. Pete Pagano, who wrote in the
May edition of the journal Proceedings: “The combat logistics force must be
able to sail in harm’s way and defend itself, with enough ships in inventory to
absorb losses and still sustain Navy forces at sea. The Navy will not possess
sufficient surface combatants to meet this demand signal, even if it reaches
its goal of 355 ships.”

Last
October, the U.S. Maritime administrator, retired Rear Adm. Mark Buzby, said
the Navy told his agency that it would not be able to escort sealift and supply
ships during a major war. For those ships to survive, crews have been told to
“go fast and stay quiet,” with the latter referring to reduced electronic
signaling. But MSC ships, with sustained speeds of 15 to 20 knots, can’t go as fast
as 30-knot Navy warships.

Also, in
May, defense analyst Loren Thompson,wrote in Forbes that the well-trained and
equipped U.S. military is facing “a big operational challenge that few
policymakers or politicians are even aware of — its ability to get to the fight
is wasting away. So even with the most capable fighting force in history, the
United States might find itself unable to respond effectively to future
military contingencies. … Until recently, military planners could at least
assume the safety of commercial sea lanes outside war zones. But now even that
assumption is being called into question.”

‘Unchallenged Sea to Contested Waters’

MSC Commander Rear Adm. Dee L. Mewbourne in 2017 told Seapower, “The operating environment is changing,” going from “unchallenged sea to contest waters. … I would maintain that the debate over whether we’re sailing in contested waters is over.” Looking at the situation today, “there is a persistent threat to the ships that are going through those areas,” Mewbourne added, citing missile attacks on U.S. and other ships sailing near Yemen and China’s growing sea-denial capabilities.

“The question
might be, ‘Will it be like it is, or could it get worse?’ I would suggest it’s
the latter,” Mewbourne said, showing a graph depicting a rising curve of the
threats from China and Russian and a nearly flat line of likely U.S. sealift
capability to meet that threat. To adjust, Mewbourne said he is working on ways
to harden his fleet of tankers and ammunition and cargo ships and to train his
crews of primarily civilian mariners to survive in contested environments.

The most comprehensive analysis of the threats to maritime
logistics was the 124-page CSBA report, “Sustaining the Fight, Resilient
Maritime Logistics for a New Era,” which Navy Secretary Richard V. Spencer
praised, saying “this is a critical issue for the [Department of the Navy]. We
have not funded it, and we
really have to get after it.

“It is key that we focus on this now,” Spencer said at
the report’s rollout. “Over the past two decades, our naval logistic
enterprises have performed admirably, in an environment of truly expanded
responsibility and resources that were constrained. But the world has changed. …
And we have to start addressing this in earnest” and not as “business as usual.”

Spencer noted that the National Defense Strategy recognized the logistical problem,
“and we have to stay ahead of it.” He saw the report as “a forcing function.”

‘Brittle’ Maritime Logistics Forces

The CSBA report said that although the defense strategy listed “resilient and agile logistics” as one of the eight capabilities that had to be strengthened for the great power competition, the Navy’s latest 30-year shipbuilding plan reduced the funding for maritime logistical forces and “further reduces the logistical forces as a proportion of the fleet.” It also noted that “decades of downsizing and consolidation” have left U.S. maritime logistics forces “brittle” and contributed to the decline of the U.S. shipbuilding industry and the Merchant Marine, which is expected to carry the bulk of military material and equipment for an overseas contingency.

To create a logistical force able to prevail in a major conflict with a peer competitor, CSBA recommended increasing that force from the current 299 ships to at least 364 by 2048. Most of those ships are not included in the Navy’s target of a 355-ship battle fleet.

The largest
increases CSBA proposed would go to refueling capabilities, from the current 21
tankers and fleet oilers to 69; the towing and salvage fleets, from five to 25;
and maintenance and repair, from two tenders to 17.

The report also
recommended growing cargo and munitions support from 12 ships to 25 and
creating a combat search and rescue (CSR) and increasing medical care capability
from the current two large and aging hospital ships to seven. That would
include platforms for CSR helicopters and MV-22 tilt-rotor aircraft and small
“expeditionary medical ships,” based on the expeditionary fast transports
currently being built.

This larger
logistical support force would include several new ship types — including a
variety of tankers and smaller oilers able to refuel combatants and commercial
tankers to move fuel forward to replenish fleet refuelers. The CSBA report also
urged that munitions ships be able to reload vertical launching system (VLS)
tubes at sea and that new tenders be able to repair surface combatants and even
unmanned surface vessels.

The greater
numbers and new types of support ships are needed, the report argues, to allow
logistical support to continue despite the high attrition expected in a great
power conflict, to provide support in contested waters, and to make up for the
likely damage to forward support facilities such as Guam, the Marianas and
Diego Garcia.

Still in Need of an ‘Expeditionary Navy’

Much of the CSBA recommendations were supported in a July 24 opinion article in Real Clear Defense by surface warfare Capt. Anthony Cowden, who wrote: “A navy that cannot rearm itself at sea, that cannot conduct ship systems repairs organically” without use of a friendly port “is not an ‘expeditionary’ navy. … The United States needs an expeditionary navy, and that’s not what it has.”

The CSBA report echoed
the call from the congressional sea power subcommittees to expand and modernize
the sealift fleet, much of which is old and still powered by ancient,
inefficient steam power plants. The report endorsed the congressional plan to
have U.S. shipyards build a variety of new ships using a common hull under the Common
Hull Auxiliary Multi-Mission Platform concept and buy used cargo vessels off
the international market.

Spencer supported
that two-track plan, but said, “I can’t afford a lot of $400 million new ships,”
when he could buy a lot of surplus ships for much less. He said he has been “up
on the Hill asking for some money” to update the sealift fleet.

CSBA estimated the
cost of buying the additional ships and different capabilities at $47.8 billion
over 30 years, which the report said would be $1.6 billion a year above what
the Navy plans to spend on its maritime logistics capabilities.

The need for that spending was illustrated by the CSBA report’s co-author, Harrison Schramm, who said the Chinese are focusing on counter-logistics in their campaign plans because “they know that forward-deployed naval forces are limited by magazine size.” Once the onboard munitions are expended, the U.S. fleet’s capabilities are drastically diminished, Schramm said. That problem is aggravated, he added, by the Navy’s inability to reload VLS tubes without use of a functioning port.

The report also stressed a point that Buzby also made: The U.S. flagged merchant marine has shrunk to a degree that it would be of limited help in providing logistical support in a major conflict. And, CSBA noted, leasing cargo ships or tankers from larger international fleets is complicated by the fact that China owns or controls a substantial portion of those ships. And Buzby also warned that if the U.S. tried to expand its civilian merchant marine for a crisis, it would have trouble manning those ships — because of an estimated shortage of more than 1,000 qualified mariners.

Ever since the V-22 Osprey entered service for the first
time in 2007 — nearly two decades after its first flight — the tilt-rotor aircraft
has been in heavy use by the U.S. Marine Corps and has seen action in Iraq,
Afghanistan, Libya and Kuwait. But there is one stubborn problem that continues
to plague the program: readiness.

The aircraft was long delayed in reaching the field due
in no small part to deadly accidents during its development and a hefty price
tag, but when it finally did arrive, the V-22 gave the Marines the versatility
the service craved — an aircraft that could land on the deck of an amphibious
assault ship like a helicopter but speed off like a fixed-wing aircraft when
necessary. While the battles over development and procurement are long over,
the Pentagon continues to struggle with a stubbornly low availability rate for
an aircraft that serves not just the Marines but also the U.S. Navy and the U.S
Air Force.

Currently, four out of 10 of its Ospreys are unavailable
for combat, according to the Marine Corps, which means the program is a long
way from the goal of 80% overall readiness set by former Defense Secretary Jim
Mattis. Several media outlets reported earlier this year that the overall
readiness rate of the aircraft was even more dismal — 52%.

The question of why readiness is so low is complicated,
but the uniqueness of the aircraft may be a large factor.

Richard Aboulafia, vice president of analysis at the Teal
Group, said that the limited number of users of the V-22 makes it tough to have
an adequate stock of V-22 spares available.

“Normally, a pool of users — services and countries — can
share costs and inventories, but the Marines are the only sizeable user, and
the [Air Force] CV-22 community probably focuses on its own systems and
missions,” Aboulafia said. Even when the Navy gets [Carrier Onboard Delivery]
V-22s, the Marines will still oversee budgeting. Adequate provisioning is
further complicated by the shipborne nature of the platform.”

But the Marine Corps says that while the overall availability rate may be low, training and deployed squadrons have higher overall readiness levels. The service also says it’s taking significant steps to improve the aircraft’s overall readiness.

Better Readiness With Block C

Capt. Christopher Harrison, a Marine Corps spokesman,
said that while the availability of the Marine MV-22 fleet is currently at
around 60%, he also noted that training squadrons and deployed aircraft, which
have a common Block C configuration, regularly report an 80% mission-capable
rate.

The Marine Corps is trying to improve availability with
the V-22 Readiness Program (VRP), which Harrison described as a “top
priority” of the service, Harrison said.

“VRP takes a holistic approach to readiness recovery by
providing contract maintenance support, increased engineering support and
improved training for our maintainers and increased component supply depth and
breadth,” he said in an email response to questions from Seapower.
“VRP also consists of two major aircraft modification plans: The Common
Configuration-Readiness and Modernization [CC-RAM] initiative and nacelle improvements.”

CC-RAM aims to improve on availability rates by
modernizing older Block B aircraft with upgraded avionics and components to
produce the Block C, which are in production now. In addition to having “readiness
enhancements,” making more of the fleet in the Block C configuration
streamlines maintenance and sustainment, Harrison said.

Meanwhile, the nacelle improvement initiative includes
improving wiring harnesses and making the nacelle easier to maintain, he said. “We
believe we’ll see an additive positive effect on readiness by introducing more
reliable systems, streamlined procedures and improved maintainability.”

Analytics in Use to Improve MCR

In addition to those two initiatives, the Marines are using analytics to reduce scheduled maintenance and spot emerging trouble areas, which could improve mission-capable rates by as much as 15%, he claimed.

CC-RAM started in January 2018 and four aircraft are
currently undergoing modifications.

“The Osprey is our most in-demand and deployed aircraft,”
Harrison said. “At any given moment, five to seven VMMs are forward-deployed.
The MV-22 transformed the way the Marine Corps conducts assault support.
Capable of self-deploying, the Osprey’s speed, range and lift allows it to
sustain and move the MAGTF [Marine Air-Ground Task Force] anywhere in the world,
and it is routinely at center stage for humanitarian assistance operations.”

Boeing — which produces the aircraft jointly with Bell —
said in a statement that fleet enhancements and upgrades that are funded
through the Defense Department budget outyears include an improved engine inlet
separation system; a cockpit engine health indicator; component reliability and
safety improvements for swashplate, rudder, conversion actuators, O2N2
concentrator and shaft-driven compressor; and rotor blade time-on-wing
improvements.

Bell Boeing received a performance-based logistics and
engineering (PBL&E) contract in January that includes other initiatives
meant to boost the reliability of the aircraft. “Bell Boeing have the
flexibility to incorporate data analytics into maintenance efforts, yielding
innovative approaches such as predictive and condition-based maintenance to
improve aircraft availability and readiness,” their statement reads.

The company supports three customers: the MV-22 for the
Marine Corps, the CV-22 for Air Force Special Operations Command, and the
CMV-22 for the Navy. In all, more than 350 aircraft are scheduled to be built,
Boeing said.

“Bell Boeing is also executing a supply chain contract,
which includes the purchase, repair, stocking and delivery for more than 200
part numbers,” the statement notes.

A total of 129 Block B Ospreys will get the CC-RAM
upgrade, Boeing said. The last of those aircraft was built in 2011. “Boeing
expects to see a marked improvement in the mission-capable rate of Ospreys that
go through CC-RAM,” according to the company.

The company also expects to see “marked improvement” in
availability rates through the nacelle improvement initiative.

Other investments are being
made to address the problem of the mission-capable rate. Boeing reportedly
spent $115 million and two years transforming a 350,000-square-foot facility
near Philadelphia into a fuselage factory for V-22s. The facility will be home
to the CC-RAM program, making it a key part of the push to improve readiness.

The
focus of the U.S. Navy’s efforts in mine warfare over the last two decades has
been mine countermeasures (MCM) — locating and neutralizing hostile mines. New
airborne systems such as the Airborne Laser Mine-Detection System and the
Airborne Mine Neutralization System were developed, and the MCM Mission Package
for the littoral combat ships includes new systems, some unmanned, to “take the
man out of the minefield,” as proponents call the overall focus of the effort.
The efforts are well-needed: Since World War II, mines have sunk more U.S. Navy
ships than any other weapon.

Check out the full digital edition of Seapower magazine here.

With
MCM modernization efforts well underway, the changing world geopolitical
situation is bringing new emphasis of the other aspect of mine warfare —
offensive mining — that has not seen such attention since the end of the Cold
War. The rise of Russia and China and the modernization of their navies has
marked the return of an era of “Great Power Competition” has brought offensive
mining from a dormancy to renewed emphasis and development of new sea mines.

Sea
mines — sometimes called “weapons that wait” — have a strong deterrent effect
on shipping. With sensitive magnetic, acoustic or contact fuses and hiding in
waters where they are difficult to detect, their covertness and lethality have
a strong effect on the morale and effectiveness of ship crews and can shut down
harbors and transit lanes from shipping more effectively than other methods,
effecting a blockade.

Sea
mines are an ancient technology, but came into widespread use in World War I,
when 235,000 sea mines were laid by the belligerents’ ships and submarines. During
World War II, between 600,000 and a million sea mines were laid by the
belligerents. During World War II, aircraft, finally powerful enough to carry a
payload of mines, became the dominant mine-laying platform.

The
United States’ use of aircraft to conduct offensive mining achieved some
extraordinary successes during World War II. U.S., British and Australian
aircraft mined the Yangon River in Burma, inflicting severe losses on Japanese
merchant shipping in February 1943. Navy TBF torpedo bombers mined the harbor
of Palau in March 1944, closing the harbor for 20 days and bottling up 32 ships,
which were sunk or damaged by airstrikes.

The
most successful aerial mining offensive was Operation Starvation, the campaign
to cut off the Japanese homeland from food and other supplies brought by
shipping. Beginning in March 1945, 160 U.S. Army Air Force B-29 bombers were
used to lay 12,000 mines in and near Japanese waters. At a cost of 15 B-29s
lost in the operation, 293 Japanese merchant ships were sunk by the mines.
According to the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey, one in 21 air-laid mines struck
a ship, compared with one in 12 submarine-laid mines. Even though the
submarine-laid mines were more effective, the aerial mining proved to be 10
times less expensive per tonnage sunk.

The
U.S. Navy used offensive mining to good effect during the latter stages of the
Vietnam War. During Operation Pocket Money in May 1972, President Richard Nixon
ordered the mining of Haiphong Harbor to cut off the seaborne flow of supplies
to North Vietnam. Four Navy A-7E and three Marine Corps A-6A aircraft laid
mines that bottled up 32 ships in the harbor for more than 10 months. The
mining operations continued through the rest of 1972, resulting in the laying
of more than 8,000 mines in the coastal waters of North Vietnam and 3,000 in
rivers and inland waterways.

The
only U.S. use of mine-laying since was during Operation Desert Storm in January
1991. According an email from Sean P. Henseler, a professor and deputy dean of
the College of Maritime Operational Warfare at the Naval War College and former
intelligence officer of one of the two participating squadrons, four A-6E
aircraft conducted mine-laying, each armed with 12 500-pound Destructor mines
(general-purpose bombs fitted with Snakeye retarding fins and mine fuzes), of
the Iraqi port of Umm Qasr. One A-6E was shot down and its two-man crew was
killed.

Renewed
Interest

The
capability for offensive mining has remained intact — though low-key — in
subsequent years. But over the last two years, the Navy has shown more interest
in offensive mining and has accelerated improvements in its mining weaponry.

“Mines provide an
effective means of achieving sea control and sea denial,” a Navy official said
in an email provided by Navy spokesman Lt. Cmdr. Kevin Chambers. “Mining
creates an additional factor that must be taken into account by our
adversaries’ decision-making.”

According to the Navy
official, “munitions requirements are determined based upon COCOM [combatant
commander] requirements and input, coupled with fiscal considerations. War-gaming
is a useful tool to determine numbers.”

Today, naval mines can
be deployed from a variety of aerial and subsurface platforms, including attack
submarines, Navy F/A-18 strike fighters and P-3 maritime patrol aircraft, and
Air Force B-52, B-1 and B-2 bombers.

Until
recently, the Navy’s mine inventory was limited to the Mk62, 63 and 65
Quickstrike air-delivered mines and the Submarine-Launched Mobile Mine. The
Mk62 and Mk63 Quickstrike mines are blast/fragmentation 500-pound Mk82 and
1,000-pound Mk83 bombs, respectively, equipped with influence target-detection
devices for use in shallow water. The Mk65 is a thin-walled casing with a
2,000-pound warhead equipped with a target-detection device for magnetic,
seismic and pressure detonation.

For
these air-delivered mines, the Navy ordered new target-detection devices and
adapters from Sechan Electronics Inc. during the last quarter of fiscal 2018.
The Navy also has adapted the Joint Direct-Attack Munition (JDAM) guidance kit
for the Quickstrike weapons, allowing for more precise seeding of the mines.
This capability was demonstrated in Exercise Valiant Shield in 2018. In
addition, an extended-range version of the JDAM Quickstrike — through installation
of a wing kit — will be tested during the third quarter of fiscal 2019.

One
indication of the growing importance of naval mines is that one of the items on
the Navy’s 2020 unfunded priorities list was $71 million for the Quickstrike JDAM-ER,
which a Navy spokesman said “provides a means to deliver increased capability
to the COCOMs.”

The Submarine-Launched Mobile Mine is a modified Mk37 torpedo armed with
a target detection device. This shallow-water mine can be covertly launched into
a harbor, anchorage, shipping lane or other area to interdict ship and
submarine traffic.

The
Navy now is developing the Clandestine Delivered Mine (CDM), Capt. Danielle
George, the Navy’s mine warfare program manager, said Jan. 17 at the Surface
Navy Association convention in Arlington, Virginia. The Navy is conducting
testing of the new cylindrical-shaped mine, including end-to-end testing during
the second quarter of fiscal 2019. Initial deliveries are scheduled for 2020.
George said she was not at liberty to reveal the delivery platform(s) for the
CDM.

Another
new mine program, started in 2018, is the Hammerhead, an encapsulated torpedo
designed to lie in wait for submarines. The capsule for the torpedo would be
anchored to the ocean floor, much like the Mk60 CAPTOR mine of Cold War vintage
that housed a Mk46 antisubmarine torpedo. (The CAPTOR was withdrawn from the
Navy’s inventory in 2001.) The Hammerhead will be designed to have modular
architecture to allow for technology insertion. The Navy expects to issue a classified
request for information for the Hammerhead this year, George said.

“The
initial payload for Hammerhead is planned to be the Mk54 torpedo,” a Navy
official said. “The vision for the program is to use existing technologies,
where possible, while seeking opportunities to upgrade and expand the
capability as new technology becomes available.”

One
thing that has changed offensive mining in recent years is the GPS.

“GPS technology has
opened up additional possibilities for increased precision and longer-range
delivery,” a Navy official said.

GPS
also will aid in the post-war mine clearance, in that “the location of minefields must
be carefully recorded to ensure accurate notification and facilitate subsequent
removal and/or deactivation,” the official said.

The Navy’s chief of naval
operations has a mine warfare plan under development.

Less ice in the Arctic is inviting more human activity. While
the environmental changes in the far north have opened the previously fully
frozen ocean and its coastline to opportunity, the Arctic is naturally a cold
and inhospitable place that is unforgiving for the unprepared.

As the access, interest and presence in the Arctic has grown,
new icebreakers and ice-capable ships are being built, and policies and
strategies have been updated. International research efforts are studying the
changing environment, and military exercise programs are learning and
practicing how to operate there.

Check out the full digital edition of Seapower magazine here.

Speaking at the Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space exposition in May,
Commandant of the Coast Guard Adm. Karl Schultz announced that the service had just
contracted for its new Polar Security Cutter (PSC), calling it the “first
recapitalization of the heavy icebreaker capability in the nation in more than
40 years.” Simultaneously, and what Schultz said was no coincidence, the Coast
Guard issued its new “Arctic Strategic Outlook.”

The U.S. Navy released “Strategic Outlook for the Arctic” in
January, which outlines the objectives of defending U.S. sovereignty and the
homeland from attack, ensuring that the Arctic remains a stable and
conflict-free region, preserving freedom of the seas, and promoting
partnerships within the U.S. Government and with allies and partners to achieve
these objectives.

According to the Danish “Defence Agreement 2018-2023,”
“Climate change brings not only better accessibility, but also an increased
attention to the extraction of natural resources as well as intensified
commercial and scientific activity. There is also increased military activity
in the area.”

According to the document, the Danish Defence presence and tasks are based on close relationships with the populations and local authorities of both Greenland and the Faroe Islands. “Although climate change and increased activity in the region necessitate increased presence and monitoring, Denmark continues to strengthen surveillance, command, control and communication, and operational efforts in the Arctic.”

All of these documents and action underscore concerns about
presence, sovereignty, safety and security, environmental, economic, and world
power competition in the Arctic. Russia has been open about its massive
military buildup in the Arctic, but Russia has a vested interest in extracting
resources and building access to markets. In fact, Russia gets 20 percent of
its gross domestic product from the north — not the situation in North America.
In 2018, China announced in its official Arctic strategy a $1 trillion program
to develop polar regions economically, declaring itself a “Near-Arctic State.” Russia’s
military expansion and China’s attempts to invest in a ports on Baffin Island
and airports in Greenland have alarmed the West. However, all the nations have
a goal to maintain the Arctic as a low-tension area, stressing cooperation and
collaboration.

Prepared for the High
Latitudes

The Coast Guard conducts annual the Arctic Shield exercise
to familiarize themselves with Arctic operations and evaluate new equipment. In
addition to the Navy’s long-running series of undersea Ice Exercises, the Navy
and Marine Corps also conducted major exercises in the high latitudes like NATO’s
Trident Juncture in and around Norway last fall, and is demonstrating
expeditionary maneuvers up in Alaska during the Arctic Expeditionary
Capabilities Exercise in September.

There are many challenges in conducting military exercises
in the Arctic, but they help warfighters to better understand and deal with the
lack of infrastructure, communications, logistics, medical response capability
and vastness of the region. For starters, they require ships designed and
equipped for high latitudes.

The Royal Danish Navy has operated in the waters off
Greenland for many years, and currently has Thetis-class frigates and Knud
Rasmussen-class arctic offshore patrol vessels that are optimized for the icy
waters.

The Royal Canadian Navy has commissioned the first of six Harry
DeWolf Arctic and offshore patrol vessels, and two more are planned for the
Canadian Coast Guard. The CCG is also modifying three icebreakers procured from
Sweden for use in Canadian waters and is building at least two new icebreakers
as part of the National Shipbuilding Strategy. And the Canadian Armed Forces
continue to exercise and operate in the extreme north, and even conducting
diving operations with partner nations beneath the Arctic Ocean, as part of its
continuing Operation NANOOK series of training exercises.

There has been an increase in traffic in Canada’s Northwest
Passage, including transits by the Crystal Serenity cruise ship in 2016 and
2017. But the ice is unpredictable and prevented ships from getting through
last year. The 27 rural communities in Canada’s Nunavut territory are not
connect by roads, but must be resupplied once a year by ship or barge, and are
dependent on the capability to operate in the Arctic in the summer. Both the Royal
Canadian Navy and Coast Guard hope their new ships will allow them to work
farther north, and upgrading a former mining pier at Nanasivik to be used as a
refueling port will let them stay longer.

Cooperation

Also speaking at Sea-Air-Space, U.S. Coast Guard Deputy
Commandant for Operations Vice Adm. Daniel B. Abel talked about profound
partnerships and native knowledge. He served previously in command of the 17th
Coast Guard District in Juneau, Alaska, where he learned to “Listen to those
who live there, who are impacted by the Arctic.”

The Alaskan coastline is more than 6,600 miles long, Abel
said — more than the entire coastline for the lower 48 states. So cooperation
is an absolute necessity.

“We work closely with our partners in the Arctic, including
our neighbors in Canada, who are the best partners we could ever have,” Abel
said.

But that includes all the players in the Arctic. “The
distance across the Bering Strait is 44 miles, the same distance as Washington
is to Baltimore. That’s how close the United States is to Russia,” Abel said.
“Clearly, we have to cooperate.”

Commissioner of the Canadian Coast Guard Jeffery Hutchinson,
speaking at the Sea-Air-Space, said the Arctic is “not as frozen as it once
was, but from where we sit, there’s still lots of ice.”

The U.S. and Canada work closely with the other Arctic
nations, as members of the Arctic Coast Guard Forum. “We all understand the
vastness in the Arctic, in the ice, on the seas and on the land. It requires
everyone to pull together,” Hutchinson said. “There isn’t an Arctic nation that
hasn’t had to rely on another Arctic nation, at some point — and I say that
with pride and humility.

One important way nations cooperate in through scientific
research and environmental data collection. This fall the German research
icebreaker Polarstern will get stuck in the Arctic ice on purpose, and drift
for a year as teams of 600 scientists and researchers from 17 countries rotate
on and off the ship to collect data that would otherwise be impractical or
impossible. The Multidisciplinary drifting Observatory for the Study of Arctic
Climate (MOSAiC) will study the Arctic climate system and how it relates to
global climate models. The U.S., Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, New
Zealand, Norway and Sweden are participating in the International Cooperative
Engagement Program for Polar Research (ICE-PPR), which shares in the
development and use of polar sensors and remote sensing techniques, data
collection, environmental modeling and prediction, and associated human factors
involved in operating in the extreme latitudes. The Canadian Armed Forces are
leading the multinational Joint Arctic Experiment.

Survival Gets Personal

While the places of the far north — like Alaska, Greenland,
or Nunavut — are enormous, and major the research efforts being conducted there
require many people working together, the bottom line for any military
operation or scientific project there comes down to personal survival.

The real enemy is the Arctic itself. In 2015, two
experienced polar explorers, Marc Cornelissen and Philip de Roo, fell through
the ice while on an expedition to measure sea ice thickness.

Maj. Gary Johnson from the Canadian Army Doctrine and
Training Mobility command runs the Canadian Arctic Training Center in Resolute,
which served as a base for Operation NANOOK-NUNALIVUT 2019 and the Joint Arctic
Experiment. As a logistician, he said any military activity in the far north
must address mobility, sustainability and survivability. “Whatever we do, it
has to be deliberate; it has to be planned. It’s an environment that can take
your life if you don’t respect it.”

Johnson looks at it as a crawl-walk-run situation. “Up here,
crawl means survive. The next phase is to operate, and the end goal is to thrive.

During NANOOK-NUNALIVUT, platoons traveled by snowmobile to
secure a landing zone while other soldiers built ice shelters and igloos. As
part of the Joint Arctic Experiment, researchers monitored the soldiers for
frostbite, which in the -60 degree Celsius temperatures can affect exposed skin
in two minutes.

Eyes, ears and voice
of the North

The vast majority of the people in the Canadian North are
indigenous, which has implications for Canadian Armed Forces operations in the
North. In fact, the face of the Canadian Armed Forces in the north is
indigenous.

Canada has 1,800 Canadian Rangers, a component of the
Reserve, most of whom are indigenous.

The Canadian Armed Forces are represented in every community through
the Ranger program. They are not only Canadian Armed Forces Reservists, but
they’re also selected by their communities. So within their communities,
they’re seen as leaders and examples to the young people, respected by their
peers and the people in their villages. “That level of connection is invaluable,
because they’re the eyes and ears and voice of the North,” said Brig. Gen. Patrick
Carpentier, commander, Joint Task Force North. “They connect to us on a
constant basis. So it’s a sensor that we wouldn’t otherwise have for what is
going on in different communities in the north. Our expectations are
that they will be masters of the terrain around their own communities and they
will be able to spot anything that changes, and pass word back to the 1^st
Canadian Rangers Patrol Group headquarters, and on to Joint Task Force North
headquarters in Yellowknife.

“We are on the land of the Inuit,” said Carpentier. “We look
to them to bring their traditional knowledge to us as we conduct operations in
the North. Nothing we do here would be possible without the Rangers.”

“It’s not a matter of they need our support,” said Hutchinson. “Rather we need their support, their knowledge and understanding.”

Edward Lundquist traveled to Yellowknife and Tukyoyaktuk, Northwest Territories, and Resolute, Nunavut, to report this story.

Sporting spectacles such as the Pro Bowl and Boston Marathon
draw big crowds. Now they are also drawing swarms of U.S. Navy recruiters.

Recruiters have always gravitated to where the potential
applicants may be, to talk about Navy opportunities. Navy Recruiting Command
initiated “swarming” in December 2018, to bring extra recruiters and resources
together for high-profile events.

“This concept will give us the ability to support bigger
events with heightened visibility while bolstering prospecting, increasing Navy
awareness and closing leads,” said Rear Adm. Brendan McLane, commander of Navy
Recruiting Command.

“We focus on big events and bring in our top recruiters from
around the country to take advantage of the increased attention which those events
have. We ran a pilot right before Christmas in Miami for two back-to-back Miami
Heat NBA games,” McLane said.

The Miami swarm included 55 recruiting personnel who visited
12 high schools, three community outreach events and attended two Miami Heat-Houston
Rockets basketball games Dec. 17-22.

“It was very successful, and we followed that with the Pro
Bowl in January, which also coincided with a military expo focused on high
school kids in Orlando. We did the Mobile Navy Week in Alabama at the end of
February. And then in March, we were at the Minnesota Ice Hockey State
Championship in Minneapolis and the Boston Marathon in April,” McLane said. “We
bring in our best instructors from the Recruiting Academy, and the recruiters of
the year from the other districts, as a way of recognizing them, and we swarm.
We visit the high schools in much larger groups than we usually do.”

McLane said groups of recruiters visit a number of high
schools to make presentations in the classrooms, particularly about STEM
subjects, to drive recruitment for the nuclear field and other advanced career
fields. “We also invest in local media about 14 days before the event.”

According to Interior Communications Electrician 1st Class
Hilary A. Martin, assigned to Navy Recruiting District, Raleigh, and a
participant in the Miami swarm, the Navy can offer young people an education,
health care and travel, a chance to serve their country and a career.  “I’m a communications electrician, and I work
with some of the most advanced systems and equipment, which not only is
exciting but helps prepare me for other jobs when I eventually get out of the
Navy.”

The swarm includes one of CNRC’s two virtual reality trucks,
which offers young people the chance to put on a 360-degree virtual reality
headset with amazing graphics and become immersed in a tactical scenario. “You
get a dog tag that has your info on it and then you become a special boat
driver who has to go into a hot extraction point to get the SEALs out, and
drive them back down the river,” McLane said. “After your mission, you get your
debrief, and you can see if you performed as well as your friends.”

“The centennial generation have grown up with the internet
and technology, so we appeal to them with things like virtual reality goggles
where they get to see a 360-degree view on a carrier flight deck and more,”
said Capt. Matthew Boren, Navy Recruiting Command’s chief marketing officer.
“They want to see it, and we have the virtual reality truck where they can go
on a virtual mission to extract a SEAL team. We are a technical Navy with some
of the most high-tech combat systems in the world, so we need really
well-trained and smart operators that have the skills to run those systems.”

“All these things combined drive the number of contacts up,
which leads to higher numbers of interviews, which leads to greater numbers of contracts,”
McLane said.  “That leads to recruits
graduating and going on to [initial job training] “A” schools so they can fill;
vital billets in the fleet.”

McLane said the plan is ensure that there are an equal
number of swarms in both the east and west recruiting regions.  “You can count on swarming events occurring
every month throughout the nation.”

Edward Lundquist traveled to Navy Recruiting Command’s headquarters in Millington, Tennessee, to report this story.

After years
and years of waiting, the last variant of the Joint Strike Fighter — the F-35C Lightning
II — is officially operational. But it’s still a couple of years away from
making an impact on the high seas — and some questions about the plane remain.

The U.S. Navy
on Feb. 28 declared that the F-35C, the aircraft carrier-capable variant of the
fifth-generation stealth fighter, had reached initial operational capability
(IOC). The Marine Corps vertical-lift F-35B and the Air Force conventional F-35A
variants already have been declared operational.

The first
F-35C squadron, Strike Fighter Squadron 147, completed carrier qualifications
aboard the USS Carl Vinson (CVN-70) as a precursor to IOC. All that remains is
a couple of years of preparations until the first squadron deploys aboard the
Carl Vinson.

However,
issues still surround the aircraft, which was plagued by development and
production delays over its history.

A report
issued in March by nonprofit watchdog Project on Government Oversight declared
that the F-35 was “far from ready to face current or future threats,” citing
data that allegedly shows “unacceptably low” mission-capable rates. The
watchdog group also stated that the F-35 was initially promised at $38 million
per plane but that they now average $158.4 million apiece.

Despite all
the questions that surrounded the program for years, the plane is here. And the
Navy is preparing to introduce its variant into the fleet.

The IOC was a
joint declaration between the Navy and Marine Corps, because the aircraft will
be flown by both services. In the six months before that, the “last couple of
pieces” began coming together for the program — training, crews and the like,
Brian Neunaber, one of two national deputies for the Navy’s F-35 program, said in
an interview with Seapower.

“So we have
airplanes,” Neunaber said. “VFA-147 immediately reported to Carrier Air Wing
Two. It’s involved with unit-level training, and they will commence air-wing
workups, probably in the middle of next year.”

That said,
the F-35C is still a couple years away from actual deployment. Their first ship
— the Carl Vinson — is in drydock at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard for repairs and
modernization after concluding a busy deployment cycle.

“She’ll come
out of the shipyard in the middle of 2020, and shortly thereafter the entire
air wing will start working up with Carl Vinson, and sometime in the middle of
2021,” the first deployment is expected, Neunaber said, noting that the
deployment after that would probably take place six months later, and
eventually all carriers would be flying the F-35C.

The Vinson’s F-35C
squadron will consist of 10 planes. Every air wing in the fleet eventually each
will have a squadron of 10 aircraft before the Navy goes to two squadrons per
carrier, he said. The program of record stands at 340 F-35Cs, Neunaber added.

Doubts, Praise for F-35C

Of the three JSF
variants, the F-35C is the one that is “not in a particularly good place,” said
Richard Aboulafia, Teal Group’s vice president of analysis.

Aboulafia said
he believes that, though the Navy is going ahead with purchasing the aircraft,
the sea service isn’t enthusiastic about the F-35C. He noted that the Navy
wants to keep buying the F-35C’s predecessor, the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet, and
that appetite hasn’t seemed to diminish as the F-35C finally reaches IOC.

The Navy has
a lot of reasons to hedge its bets, he argued.

“Why pay the
up-front price at all — rather than wait for someone else to drive down the
cost?” he said, also noting that the Navy “is less convinced themselves that [the
F-35C] has much value at sea. There’s also an institutional preference for
twin-engine fighters.”

Aboulafia also
claimed the F-35C could diminish the Navy’s case for large-deck carriers. “If
the [F35B] works, and Marines deploy Bs and Cs together and the difference isn’t
all that great, then you have a situation where the case for large carriers is
a little undercut,” he said.

In a worst-case
scenario — at least for a sea service that wants to keep operating a fleet of
large aircraft carriers — the Navy could lose support for even a carrier fleet
of 10 ships and see an argument for smaller carriers supplemented by amphibious
ships gain a lot of steam, Aboulafia argued.

Though many
have expressed doubts about the Navy’s enthusiasm about the F-35C, the service
has continued to publicly and emphatically support the fighter. The Navy argues
that the F-35C offers the latest in technology and is perfectly suited to fight
a modern war.

“The F-35C is
ready for operations, ready for combat and ready to win,” the commander of Naval
Air Forces, Vice Adm. DeWolfe Miller, said in a statement following the
declaration of the fighter’s IOC. “We are adding an incredible weapon system
into the arsenal of our carrier strike groups that significantly enhances the
capability of the joint force.”

Capt. Max
McCoy, commodore of the Navy’s Joint Strike Fighter Wing, predicted that the
F-35C would make us “more combat effective than ever before.”

“We will
continue to learn and improve ways to maintain and sustain F-35C as we prepare
for first deployment,” McCoy added in a statement. “The addition of
F-35C to existing carrier air wing capability ensures that we can fight and win
in contested battlespace now and well into the future.”

Some 10,000 Marines and Sailors stretched their
logistical muscles to support and supply sea-based operations during a major
exercise to prepare naval expeditionary forces for enemy threats and a
potential future fight across an island-dotted battlespace.

During Pacific Blitz 2019, they built expeditionary
bases, cleared and repaired an airfield and seaport, resupplied units on land
and warships at sea, and created medical care, refueling and rearming
positions. The exercise, held March 12 through March 31 in Southern California,
combined two regular training events — maritime prepositioning exercise Pacific
Horizon and amphibious integration exercise Dawn Blitz.

The force-level training event for I Marine Expeditionary
Force and the Navy’s 3rd Fleet, supported by Naval Expeditionary Combatant
Command (NECC), focused on distributed maritime operations with emphasis on
expeditionary logistics and sea control. That includes operational capabilities
to refuel, resupply, repair, and rearm expeditionary forces dispersed at sea
and ashore — and likely against capable, peer-like enemy forces. Those missions
are critical to the Marine Corps and Navy concepts of Distributed Maritime
Operations (DMO), Littoral Operations in a Contested Environment (LOCE) and
Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations (EABO).

The campaign-level exercise required fleet and force
battle staffs to integrate and “action officers work through the pains of: how
do you actually do this, how do you coordinate, do our systems talk well to
each other and how do we get better at those pieces,” said Lt. Cmdr. John
Ruggiero, a lead planner at NECC headquarters in Virginia Beach, Virginia,
exercise liaison to 3rd Fleet and I MEF. Both sides want “to ensure that we
continue to build on what we’ve learned, to make sure we document what we’ve
learned and keep that going.” Lessons learned will wrap into follow-on
exercises such as Large-Scale Exercise 2020, Ruggiero said.

NECC provided something of a bridge supporting fleet and
force missions in the battlespace, where expeditionary advanced bases, advanced
naval bases, sea bases, airfields and ports provided logistical hubs to support
and sustain operational forces.

“We are constantly looking for opportunities like Pacific
Blitz where we can demonstrate this capability,” said Cmdr. Brian Cummings,
NECC explosive ordnance disposal planner and exercise liaison to 3rd Fleet and
I MEF. “When people think Navy, they think airplanes, they think carriers, they
think DDGs and they think submarines — but they’re not necessarily thinking
expeditionary teams of four to 10 people that are thinking of putting missiles
back on DDGs in disassociated locations.”

Sailors worked with 1st Marine Logistics Group to
construct advanced naval bases and facilities at simulated “islands” in the
scenario-based exercise. In a first, they removed and unpacked an Expeditionary
Medical Facility from the roll-on/roll-off cargo ship USNS Sgt. William R.
Button (T-AK-3012), set it up at an expeditionary base at Camp Pendleton,
California, and later broke it down, packed it up and reloaded it onto Button.

Navy Seabees at five sites built several berthing areas,
did concrete slab and masonry work, repaired a damaged airfield, repaired and
rebuilt a 3.5-mile gravel road and, in a proof-of-concept, built a
90,000-square-foot heavy equipment storage area with a 24-foot wide, 8-foot
tall berm.

“The best part of this exercise was all these projects were
real-world projects, with the exception of the berm … being utilized by their
customers,” said Builder 1st Class Jacob Kusay of Naval Mobile Construction
Battalion 5.

But it wasn’t just about construction. The road and berm
projects were part of the realistic battle scenarios, Kusay said, so “we set up
our own 360-degree security, maintained their own security watch 24/7 until the
project was completed.”

More than 100 Marines with Marine Aviation Logistics
Squadron 16 packed their mobile facilities onto aviation logistics ship SS
Curtiss (T-AVB-4) at Port Hueneme, California, and got underway to do aircraft
maintenance at sea, a new experience for maintainers accustomed to working in
hangars and airfields.

“That’s kind of why we do this, to operate outside our
comfort zone to expand our capabilities,” said Capt. Mark Stone, supply officer
with 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing’s aviation logistics department. Stone helped
coordinate movements by boats and MV-22 Osprey tilt-rotors and CH-53E Super
Stallion heavy-lift helicopters to and from the Curtiss.

The Marine Corps relies on Curtiss and SS Wright (T-AVB-3)
on the East Coast to provide at-sea intermediate-level maintenance of rotary
and fixed-wing aircraft. Marines repaired, tested or maintained aircraft parts
brought to the ship. Those they couldn’t fix were sent to the depot for
overhaul. Marines “repaired a significant amount of components for us to get
back to MALS-16 to support the flight line,” Stone said. By the end of the
exercise, Marines on the ship had fixed or repaired 134 components, Maj. James
Moore, MALS-16 operations officer, said in an email.

Pacific Blitz provided a rare, hands-on training in an
expeditionary ordnance reload operation typically handled by Navy Munitions
Command teams. It was the first time Navy Cargo Handling Battalion 1 did the
rapid resupply mission, a new capability the Navy is weighing expanding since
the future distributed battlespace may require other units to rapidly resupply
and reload warships.

Sailors used a forklift and crane to load an SM-2 missile
into a vertical launch system tube on guided-missile destroyer USS Michael
Murphy (DDG-112) March 13 at Seal Beach Naval Weapons Station, California.

“It gave us a great overview, start to finish, of how
would we do this down range as far as transportation, getting equipment
supplies and ordnance from point A to point B,” said Chief Aviation Ordnanceman
Raymond Gibree, senior adviser with the reload team.

“We garnered a tremendous amount of experience with the reps
and sets we got, under the oversight of NMC,” Gibree said. “We are expected to
do this mission in many different locations, under many different circumstances
and under permissive, hostile and uncertain areas.”

The scenario
included transporting the team on two Navy ships and utility landing craft to
reach Michael Murphy. It helped “make sure we can provide that capability to
the fleet in more locations, more responsive to their requirements,” Ruggiero
said, “wherever they happen to be.”

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — Sea services leaders expressed unwavering support during a May 6 panel discussion for the nation’s future ventures in space — no matter whether the effort is split among the nation’s existing military branches or a new United States Space Force is created.

The panelists at Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space 2019 reiterated
the need to increase the nation’s space initiatives as rival nations such as
China, Russia, India and Japan build their push toward the stars.

“Space is no longer an uncontested environment,” said
Rear Adm. Christian Becker, commander, Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command.

As other countries stake their spots in space, the U.S.
needs to hold its “ground,” like when the maritime forces were first formed, Becker
explained.

“Space is very much akin to the maritime,” Becker said.
“We first went to sea to trade, and then we went to sea when we realized other
people could stop our trade. … Made sure we can maintain freedom at sea.”

Don’t expect the U.S. Space Force to appear overnight,
however. Services like the Navy, Marine Corps and Coast Guard are still evaluating
the personnel needed to staff an agency dedicated to the Final Frontier.

“We are assessing as part of the [Navy Department]
how we can meet the mission needs of the Space Force,” Becker said. “We’re not
there yet at our level of understanding, but that’s what we have to pursue.”

Finding and retaining the talent necessary to develop a
fully operational Space Force is a significant challenge, said Brig. Gen. Lorna
Mahlock, the Marine Corps’ chief information officer.

“It’s exciting to think about space … but we have to make
sure we develop the skill [to maintain a Space Force] and do it right,” Mahlock
said.

However, she emphasized that, no matter the
obstacles, the Marine Corps “embraces building the Space Force” and will offer its
full support.