[House Hearing, 116 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.A.S.C. No. 116-77]
HEARING
ON
NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT
FOR FISCAL YEAR 2021
AND
OVERSIGHT OF PREVIOUSLY AUTHORIZED PROGRAMS
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
SUBCOMMITTEE ON TACTICAL AIR AND LAND FORCES HEARING
ON
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE TACTICAL
AND ROTARY AIRCRAFT ACQUISITION
AND MODERNIZATION PROGRAMS IN
THE FISCAL YEAR 2021 PRESIDENT'S
BUDGET REQUEST
__________
HEARING HELD
MARCH 10, 2020
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
41-501 WASHINGTON : 2021
SUBCOMMITTEE ON TACTICAL AIR AND LAND FORCES
DONALD NORCROSS, New Jersey, Chairman
JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island VICKY HARTZLER, Missouri
JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut PAUL COOK, California
RUBEN GALLEGO, Arizona MATT GAETZ, Florida
SALUD O. CARBAJAL, California DON BACON, Nebraska
ANTHONY G. BROWN, Maryland JIM BANKS, Indiana
FILEMON VELA, Texas PAUL MITCHELL, Michigan
XOCHITL TORRES SMALL, New Mexico, MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio
Vice Chair DOUG LAMBORN, Colorado
MIKIE SHERRILL, New Jersey ROBERT J. WITTMAN, Virginia
JARED F. GOLDEN, Maine
ANTHONY BRINDISI, New York
Carla Zeppieri, Professional Staff Member
Jesse Tolleson, Professional Staff Member
Caroline Kehrli, Clerk
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS
Hartzler, Hon. Vicky, a Representative from Missouri, Ranking
Member, Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces........... 2
Norcross, Hon. Donald, a Representative from New Jersey,
Chairman, Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces......... 1
WITNESSES
Geurts, Hon. James F., Assistant Secretary of the Navy for
Research, Development, and Acquisition, Department of the Navy;
LtGen Steven Rudder, USMC, Deputy Commandant for Aviation,
Headquarters U.S. Marine Corps; and RADM Gregory Harris, USN,
Director, Air Warfare, Office of the Chief of Naval Operations. 5
Jette, Hon. Bruce D., Assistant Secretary of the Army for
Acquisition, Logistics and Technology, Department of the Army;
and BG Walter T. Rugen, USA, Director, Future Vertical Lift
Cross-Functional Team, Army Futures Command.................... 4
Roper, Hon. William B., Jr., Assistant Secretary of the Air Force
for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics, Department of the
Air Force; Gen James M. Holmes, USAF, Commander, Air Combat
Command, Headquarters U.S. Air Force; and Lt Gen David S.
Nahom, USAF, Director of Programs, Office of the Deputy Chief
of Staff for Plans and Requirements, Headquarters U.S. Air
Force.......................................................... 6
APPENDIX
Prepared Statements:
Geurts, Hon. James F., joint with LtGen Steven Rudder and
RADM Gregory Harris........................................ 51
Jette, Hon. Bruce D., joint with BG Walter T. Rugen.......... 41
Norcross, Hon. Donald........................................ 37
Roper, Hon. William B., Jr., joint with Gen James M. Holmes
and Lt Gen David S. Nahom.................................. 79
Documents Submitted for the Record:
[There were no Documents submitted.]
Witness Responses to Questions Asked During the Hearing:
[There were no Questions submitted during the hearing.]
Questions Submitted by Members Post Hearing:
Mr. Bacon.................................................... 111
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE TACTICAL AND ROTARY
AIRCRAFT ACQUISITION AND MODERNIZATION
PROGRAMS IN THE FISCAL YEAR 2021
PRESIDENT'S BUDGET REQUEST
----------
House of Representatives,
Committee on Armed Services,
Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces,
Washington, DC, Tuesday, March 10, 2020.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 2:01 p.m., in
room 2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Donald Norcross
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. DONALD NORCROSS, A REPRESENTATIVE
FROM NEW JERSEY, CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON TACTICAL AIR AND
LAND FORCES
Mr. Norcross. Calling the hearing to order. And just
discussing the awkwardness whether we shake hands, fist bump,
but obviously it is on the minds of many, and certainly for you
and the men and women you command, it is obviously a very big
issue. Together, we will get through these as we have many
others.
Today, the subcommittee will review the Army, Navy, Air
Force, and Marine Corps tactical and rotary-wing aviation
programs in fiscal year 2021 budget request. We have an
extensive portfolio of aviation programs to cover today. As a
reminder, that the subcommittee is holding a separate hearing
for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program. Reminder, so the F-
35, if you have to, we can do it here today, but we are having
a separate hearing certainly which is going to demand a lot of
our time.
I would like to welcome our distinguished panel of
witnesses, all eight of you: Dr. Bruce Jette, Assistant
Secretary of the Army for Acquisition, Logistics and
Technology; Brigadier General Walter Rugen, Director of Future
Vertical Lift Cross-Functional Team; Mr. James Geurts,
Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Research, Development and
Acquisition. Is this seven out of eight times? Wonderful. Good
to see you again. Lieutenant General Steven Rudder, Deputy
Commandant of the Marine Corps for Aviation; Rear Admiral
Gregory Harris, Director of Air Warfare, Chief of Naval
Operations; Dr. Will Roper, Assistant Secretary of the Air
Force for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics; General Mike
Holmes, Commander, Air Combat Command for the Air Force; and
Lieutenant General David Nahom, Deputy Chief of Staff for Plans
and Programs at Headquarters Air Force at the Pentagon.
Thank you all for your service and especially being here
today.
I will be submitting my full statement for the record, but
want to take a few minutes, just some areas that we are going
to have particular focus on today.
Fiscal year 2021 budget request underlines tough choices
ahead of us and highlights even within the contexts of the
largest defense budget in the history resources that need to be
allocated wisely. The request before us trades current aviation
capability and capacity for future capability, calculating the
need to lessen our high-end next-gen [generation] systems that
will come at the expense of existing aircraft, certainly flying
those current steady state and lesser contingency missions.
The Navy's budget proposal removes 36 Super Hornet strike
fighter aircraft planned after the 2021 budget and begins to
shut down the F/A-18 production line beginning in 2023,
increasing the Navy's strike fighter shortfall next year.
Further, we need to understand what gives Navy leadership and
acquisition officials confidence in terminating Super Hornet's
production 10 years before the next-gen F/A-XX strike fighter,
and currently exists in briefing slides, is as prudent.
Turning to the Army, Future Vertical Lift initiatives will
approach $1 billion in year 2021, with most of the funding
accelerating development of the two new aircrafts. Army
witnesses should be prepared to explain what measures they are
taking to manage cost and risk as aircraft developed in
parallel.
With respect to ongoing Army programs, in fiscal year 2020,
the NDAA [National Defense Authorization Act] and the
appropriations both included $28.0 million in advance
procurement for the Chinook Block II long-lead items. Now we
have learned that despite congressional direction, the Army has
put these funds on hold pending a decision from Army
leadership.
I am interested to hear details on the Army's strategy, how
to preserve the heavy-lift industrial base. Management of the
CH-53K, the heavy lift, certainly is one of great interest. And
we are glad to see some of the openness and the feedback that
we are getting, so we will get into that. And as the
subcommittee continues to work on the 2021 NDAA, we will take a
close look at these issues to make sure taxpayer dollars are
wisely spent.
Now I want to turn it over to my friend and ranking member
of the TAL [Tactical Air and Land Forces] Committee, Ms.
Hartzler, for her opening remarks.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Norcross can be found in the
Appendix on page 37.]
STATEMENT OF HON. VICKY HARTZLER, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM
MISSOURI, RANKING MEMBER, SUBCOMMITTEE ON TACTICAL AIR AND LAND
FORCES
Mrs. Hartzler. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I have a lot to cover in a relatively short amount of time,
so I will try to keep my comments brief. But first of all,
thank you. Thank you all for your service to our Nation. We
really appreciate your leadership and being here to provide
testimony on the budget request for tactical and rotary-wing
aircraft modernization programs.
With flat budgets likely to be the norm, I appreciate all
of your efforts in conducting exhaustive program reviews to
better align your military service with the National Defense
Strategy and the great power competition. I look forward to
working together to determine what is the right balance to fund
both current tactical readiness and needed modernization
required for future readiness. It is within this context that I
will highlight a few issues to discuss during this hearing.
Regarding Navy strike fighter management, the chairman
alluded to this, it is something I am interested in as well.
This budget request, as he said, as you know, removed 36 new
production
F/A-18 Super Hornets in the outyears that were originally
planned for production in last year's budget. Given the Navy's
current shortfall of 49 aircraft, I am concerned that this
decision is creating too much operational risk in the near
term.
Regarding the F-15EX program and Air Force fighter force
structure. Last year, during a similar hearing, we heard from
you, Dr. Roper and General Holmes, that two-thirds of the F-15C
fleet were past their service lives and these planes needed to
be replaced now, which is why the Air Force made the F-15EX a
top priority. I shared those concerns and agreed with you. And
I am concerned that this budget request appears to have removed
six F-15EX aircraft from what was originally projected in the
fiscal year 2020 budget for fiscal year 2021.
I understand these planes were removed due to higher Air
Force priorities. I would like to know what these higher
priorities are, since we obviously have a major readiness
challenge with our F-15C fleet. I would appreciate the
witnesses to update us on the current status of the F-15EX
program.
Regarding Army rotorcraft modernization, both the Future
Armed Reconnaissance Aircraft and the Future Long-Range Assault
Aircraft appear to be making considerable progress and
significant down-selections scheduled for this month. That is
good news. And I am encouraged by their success to date. I
would appreciate an update on both of these programs from our
witnesses today.
I do however have some concerns regarding the reduced
request for UH-60 Mike Black Hawks, and specifically what
impacts this could have on accelerating the fielding of these
helicopters for the Army National Guard.
In closing, during our hearing last week on ground system
modernization programs, General Murray stated that, quote, no
service is able to go it alone. And as history has shown, joint
teams win, and modernization is no exception. I would say
winning matters, but winning together matters most, end quote.
I couldn't agree more. So I would appreciate it if the
witnesses could describe how they are coordinating with one
another, and look forward to working with all of you and my
colleagues in a collaborative manner as we review the fiscal
year 2021 budget request.
So thank you, Chairman, for organizing this important
hearing. I yield back.
Mr. Norcross. Thank you.
And I would ask that each of you keep your opening remarks
to 5 minutes per service. We have a full discussion and we have
many of you.
So, with that, Dr. Jette, great to have you back. Look
forward to your statement.
STATEMENT OF HON. BRUCE D. JETTE, ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF THE
ARMY FOR ACQUISITION, LOGISTICS AND TECHNOLOGY, DEPARTMENT OF
THE ARMY; AND BG WALTER T. RUGEN, USA, DIRECTOR, FUTURE
VERTICAL LIFT CROSS-FUNCTIONAL TEAM, ARMY FUTURES COMMAND
Secretary Jette. Chairman Norcross, Ranking Member
Hartzler, and distinguished members of the Subcommittee on
Tactical Air and Land Forces, thank you for the invitation to
discuss the Army's tactical rotary aircraft acquisition and
modernization programs for fiscal year 2021, and for this
opportunity to appear with our service counterparts.
With me today is Brigadier General Wally Rugen, Director of
the Future Vertical Lift Cross-Functional Team. I appreciate,
Mr. Chairman, your making our written statement a part of the
record for today's hearing.
Aviation is one of Army's largest portfolio in terms of
budget and an important element of the joint and organizational
and multinational team. Our focus on aviation modernization
comprises two parallel lanes of execution: modernization
through new platforms and targeted modernization efforts for
the current platforms.
My office and my Program Executive Office Aviation, work
closely with the Army Futures Command and Brigadier General
Rugen's Future Vertical Lift Cross-Functional Team to rapidly
develop capabilities to support multidomain operations. Key
efforts include the Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft,
FARA, which is designed to fill a critical armed reconnaissance
capability that currently exists in our formation; and the
Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft, FLRAA, which is projected
to replace the UH-60 Black Hawk with increased speed, range,
payload, and endurance.
At the same time, the fiscal year 2021 President's budget
request also invests in the readiness and modernization of our
current Black Hawk, Apache, and Chinook fleets needed for the
foreseeable future.
I would like to take a moment to address our reform
efforts. The Army continues to implement initiatives granted by
Congress in order to streamline and gain efficiencies in our
acquisition process.
Specifically, aviation has been playing a key role in
implementing the Army's intellectual property policy, which
stresses identifying and planning IP needs early in the life
cycles of any system. And PEO [Program Executive Office]
Aviation is participating in Program Management Resource Tool,
PMRT, a pilot program which captures and manages our program
data across the enterprise to enable real-time analysis and
data-driven decisions. This will further ensure Army senior
leaders have the information necessary to make well-informed
decisions on Army programs.
Mr. Chairman and distinguished members of the subcommittee,
we are grateful for your strong and steadfast support for our
soldiers and our soldier aviators, as well as our Army
civilians and their families. Thank you for the opportunity to
appear before this committee, Mr. Chairman. We look forward to
your questions.
[The joint prepared statement of Secretary Jette and
General Rugen can be found in the Appendix on page 41.]
Mr. Norcross. Thank you.
Mr. Geurts.
STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES F. GEURTS, ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF THE
NAVY FOR RESEARCH, DEVELOPMENT AND ACQUISITION, DEPARTMENT OF
THE NAVY; LTGEN STEVEN RUDDER, USMC, DEPUTY COMMANDANT FOR
AVIATION, HEADQUARTERS U.S. MARINE CORPS; AND RADM GREGORY
HARRIS, USN, DIRECTOR, AIR WARFARE, OFFICE OF THE CHIEF OF
NAVAL OPERATIONS
Secretary Geurts. Chairman Norcross, Ranking Member
Hartzler, and distinguished subcommittee members, thanks for
the opportunity to appear before you today to address the
Department of the Navy's fiscal 2021 budget request. Joining me
today from the Department of the Navy are Lieutenant General
Steve Rudder, Deputy Commandant for Aviation, and Rear Admiral
Greg Harris, Director of Air Warfare. With your permission, I
intend to provide a few brief remarks and submit a statement
for the record.
We thank the subcommittee and all of Congress for your
leadership and steadfast support. Your efforts to fully fund
the fiscal 2020 budget provides the stability and
predictability and funding that enable us to build and sustain
the naval aviation force that the Nation needs so we can
execute the maritime component of the National Defense
Strategy.
In 2019, the Department delivered 125 new manned aircraft
and 15 unmanned air systems to the Navy and Marine Corps, with
a plan of delivering an additional 125 aircraft this fiscal
year. As we continue to modernize the fleet, we have also
focused on aviation maintenance, delivering higher aircraft
mission-capable rates, reducing maintenance backlogs, and
enabling our maintainers to do a better job of supporting our
fleet.
The Department achieved our goal of an 80 percent mission-
capable rate for the F/A-18E/Fs and EA-18Gs in October 2019,
and periodically throughout 2019 for the Marine tactical
aircraft. We are committed to maintaining and expanding these
systematic improvements.
Our 2021 investments build upon these initiatives in order
to lever a ready, capable, and global sea-based and
expeditionary force. Our vision is to provide the right
capability in the hands of the warfighter on schedule and in
the most affordable manner possible. The fiscal year 2021
budget procures 121 aircraft with 537 aircraft across the FYDP
[Future Years Defense Program], increases depot maintenance and
logistics funding, increases our flying-hour program, and
continues to make investments in many key Navy and Marine Corps
development programs to ensure readiness for the future fight.
Additionally, our 2021 budget makes focused investments in
our fleet readiness centers, enabling the procurement of more
modern equipment and implementation to process and workflow
improvements, similar to what the Navy is doing in the public
shipyards.
Minimizing the risk of physiological episodes [PEs]
continue to be the naval aviation's top safety priority and
will remain so until we understand and mitigate all causal
factors. We have reduced PE for legacy Hornets by over 80
percent and seen similar improvements in the T-45 aircraft. In
January, we had zero F/A-18 PE incidents, the first month with
zero since the summer of 2011. The Department will continue to
work to drive PEs to the lowest possible level.
Naval aviation operates forward near our potential
adversaries' home shores. We thank you for the strong support
this subcommittee has always provided our sailors, our Marines,
and our families. And we thank you for the opportunity to
appear before you today. We look forward to answering your
questions.
[The joint prepared statement of Secretary Geurts, General
Rudder, and Admiral Harris can be found in the Appendix on page
51.]
Mr. Norcross. Thank you.
Dr. Roper.
STATEMENT OF HON. WILLIAM B. ROPER, JR., ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF
THE AIR FORCE FOR ACQUISITION, TECHNOLOGY AND LOGISTICS,
DEPARTMENT OF THE AIR FORCE; GEN JAMES M. HOLMES, USAF,
COMMANDER, AIR COMBAT COMMAND, HEADQUARTERS U.S. AIR FORCE; AND
LT GEN DAVID S. NAHOM, USAF, DIRECTOR OF PROGRAMS, OFFICE OF
THE DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF FOR PLANS AND REQUIREMENTS,
HEADQUARTERS U.S. AIR FORCE
Secretary Roper. Chairman Norcross, Ranking Member
Hartzler, distinguished members of the subcommittee, thank you
for the opportunity to be here today to testify on this
important topic. Aviation is the key to winning on the
battlefield. Air superiority is the hallmark of our military,
and we are committed in the Department of the Air Force to keep
it that way. I am delighted to be here with our distinguished
colleagues from the services and to share this hearing with
General Holmes and General Nahom, who are great wingmen in
trying to modernize our future Air Force.
The National Defense Strategy makes it very clear that time
matters. We have a capable adversary, capable adversaries,
China and Russia, who can match us technologically, and in the
case of China, economically. So the need to modernize the force
while we have a window of opportunity and divest legacy assets
that are draining our resources that could go into advanced
warfighting capabilities could not be a more important nor
timely topic.
We know that we have to provide 2,100 fighters to meet the
needs of our combatant commanders, along with all the support
equipment, training, and other systems, such as combat rescue,
that enable those fighters to be a fighting force at the future
edge of battlefield. We are focused on doing that in the Air
Force. We are focused on training pilots better using
technologies like AI, artificial intelligence, tailored
training so that pilots get through the training pipeline
faster and are able to take on combat duties.
But we are focused on far more that just what we buy and
how we modernize. We care about the speed at which we do it. We
are very thankful for authorities that you have granted and
championed, things like section 804 that allow us to get on
contract faster with industry, do more prototyping, which is
just flying before you buy so that we can remove time from our
programs and deliver faster for the warfighter. To date, we
have removed approximately 125 years from traditional programs,
and we look forward to continuing to drive speed and delivery.
Modern practices in software development are also helping
us bring greater lethality to the edge. Practices like
DevSecOps or agile software development are fundamentally
changing how fast we can modernize systems and keep them
relevant. Even though we may talk about the airplane, the
software on it is an increasingly important part of its
lethality. We have to modernize it at the speed of need.
We are excited about new technologies like digital
engineering that will change the way in which we build and
design systems and modernize future systems that we don't have
today. We look forward to sharing those with you both in this
open hearing and in a closed setting.
We thank you for the focus that you put on supporting the
Department of the Air Force, our airmen, and their families. We
thank you for your time today for this hearing. Our time
matters when we have a capable adversary. In the Department of
the Air Force we try to make every year, every budget count. We
look forward to sharing with you the highlights of this budget
today.
[The joint prepared statement of Secretary Roper, General
Holmes, and General Nahom can be found in the Appendix on page
79.]
Mr. Norcross. Thank you for your statement.
So, Dr. Roper, let me just start with a couple of comments,
because it is indicative across all the services. Window of
opportunity, why is now that window and it wasn't 2 years ago
or 2 years from now? And the second question, in your
statement--or in your testimony, you talk about being embraced
by the Secretary of Defense goal of irreversible moment. Why is
it, A, irreversible at this moment and--hasn't happened before,
because obviously we have made changes. And why is now that
window of opportunity?
Secretary Roper. Chairman Norcross, if we had our druthers,
I think we should have started this pivot a couple of years
ago. And I think many of you I have worked with in past jobs
focusing on peer competition high-end warfighting. It is a
significant challenge today. If you go back to the Cold War, we
were generating most of the technology that found its way to
the battlefield. We were the major generator of technology in
the world. And now we live in a world where the Defense
Department is only 20 percent of the R&D [research and
development] that happens in this country. We live in a world
that is technology rich. And so that should give us both
concern, but also, you know, a lot of appeal, because we live
in a time where we can pull things into future warfighting
systems.
China has been modernizing, looking at how our military
operates in the Middle East. It has been on display, our
playbook has been understood. The counters have been done. And
if we continue to build the same kinds of systems and fight the
same kind of way, we are playing into their hands. Playing into
a fight that they understand and know how to counter. So the
reason that now is the time is that if we simply wait until the
fight happens, we won't have the time to build new systems, new
training, new techniques so that we retain the overmatch that
we have enjoyed.
Mr. Norcross. So you are suggesting the risk is less now is
why that window is open?
Secretary Roper. The risk will always be less now than
waiting. We have to start now to create options for the future.
Secretary Esper's comment of making the National Defense
Strategy irreversible I think is simply moving the portfolios
of the services to focus on high-end warfighting. The
capabilities that we can build to take on a peer, the training
that is needed to take on a peer can be taken into the
uncontested environment and to low-intensity conflict, but you
can't take low-intensity conflict into the peer fight. And so
this pivot towards irreversibility is getting our portfolios
properly modernized so if the Nation calls upon us to project
power in a contested environment, we will have options for the
commanders to do that.
Mr. Norcross. Thank you.
So, Admiral Harris, let me shift things over to the Navy
here. And in my opening remarks, we talked about the 44 strike
fighters change per air wing, does not include attrition of the
aircraft. Obviously, every time something goes into the
maintenance depot, we find things out that help educate us,
whether it is corrosion or otherwise. So can you explain to the
committee why the Navy does not plan for attrition of the
reserved aircraft in the carrier wings? And what risk is
involved in that?
Admiral Harris. Sir, there is risk--thank you for that
question--in the attrition aircraft, but it is a balanced mix
for the Navy as we looked across the number of combat-coded
aircraft that we need to be able to meet that high-end fight
for those nine carrier air wings. That balance comes in the
result of ensuring that you have enough in depot maintenance
that are coming out ready to be forward deployed with the
forces while we bring the others back into the service life
modification program. So it is a balanced risk that we are
taking right now based on the current budgets.
Mr. Norcross. So I know my ranking member is going to have
a lot of questions on the F-18, but I want to talk about what
has happened recently with the first two Super Hornets coming
into service life maintenance found a tremendous amount of
corrosion. I can't say areas it was not expected, because the
maintenance schedule suggests that we should do things to
protect those. And here we are blowing the budget out, the time
out.
A, what are we doing to prevent further problems? And are
those first two aircraft the most difficult ones or are we
going to fall into this? And what are we doing to change it so
we don't face this sort of thing?
Secretary Geurts. Yes, sir. I think it is a combination of
factors. One of the factors is we are finding more corrosion on
the airplanes. And I will ask Admiral Harris to talk about what
are we doing on the operational fleet to get after that so that
we can not get the corrosion and have to pull it out to the
extent we are.
The other thing we changed a little bit in the SLM [service
life modification] program is we have added a bit to it so we
deliver a fully mission-capable airplane out of SLM. In other
words, we bring in all the phase maintenance checks. So when we
hand it back to the wing and the squadron, it is ready to go.
Previous service life extension programs have just, you know,
done things for the airplane but not taken advantage of the
fact we had the airplane all pulled apart.
The third piece is working closely with Boeing to
productionize this service life extension. In other words, not
get every airplane being its own custom, artisan activity. We
need get that into production flow. So some of the risk of
shutting the F-18 down, line down, after 2021 will be taking
advantage of that line to productionize, to get to our goal of
40 airplanes a year through that SLEP [service life extension
program] line.
Mr. Norcross. So let me ask you while you are on that, the
first two picked out and we found the corrosion much worse. Are
we anticipating that to continue or are you expecting that to
drop? And what have you done to rectify the budget and the time
schedule?
Secretary Geurts. Yes, sir. Twofold, we are working on our
maintenance on the flight line and our procedures on the flight
line using best practice out of commercial aviation to reduce
exposure to corrosion, only open it up once, button it up, as
opposed to open it up many times. And then I expect over time
as that gets into the fleet, that component of uncertainty will
drop down.
Mr. Norcross. Admiral Harris, did you have anything to add?
[Audio malfunction in hearing room.]
Admiral Harris. Just to add, maintenance reset right now
looking at a line all of our inspections to try to prevent, to
the Secretary's point, opening a patient more than we need to.
So we don't have to perform an inspection, we don't have to
open an area and expose it to the elements and perhaps not put
the corrosion [inaudible] back in as we are putting it back
together. We are going to cut down on that.
The second thing we are doing for all the aircraft as they
are coming in the SLM line 6 months [inaudible] what areas we
need to work on so the fleet can work on those areas prior to
the aircraft entering SLM.
Mr. Norcross. So maybe you can explain. As we understand
it, from the manufacturer there are certain processes that were
supposed to take place. And what they suggested, the way of
fixing it, were the ones that were suggested, they weren't
followed. So, A, not so much why wasn't it followed, but have
we corrected those actions? And why haven't they followed the
manufacturers' suggestions?
Admiral Harris. Sir, I think what we will find, Chairman,
is that as we perform maintenance on the aircraft, frequently
we are adding inspections as we see things that we think we
need to do. So it is oil-changing your car more frequently than
the manufacturer recommends. So you are opening panels more
frequently. As we can align all of those inspection cycles and
prevent that, the idea will be to open it less frequently, more
along the lines of what we should be doing. And then the other
piece gets down to using the precise material when you are
putting corrosion prevention on the surfaces prior to putting
them back together. We need to get back to the correct
material.
Mr. Norcross. We don't want to get too deep in the weeds,
but closing up the proper way. It is not the opening, it is the
resealing that is the problem.
Admiral Harris. Yes, sir.
Mr. Norcross. Thank you.
Dr. Jette, our Chinook, we put in there last year the idea
of the advanced procurement. As we understand it, that is still
is in the same position as we put it a year ago. That is the
first question. The second one is minimum sustaining rates,
whether it is 24, 18. The answer a year ago was we needed a
robust program that--more speed for the future, more weight.
When we look at the program, the way that we are hearing
you say it, that foreign military sales is going to bring up
that minimum sustaining rate. Right now, I think there is only
one that has been signed and one potentially. First, give us an
update on foreign military sales that can feed the beast, shall
we say, of keeping that line running. And then I have a
followup.
Secretary Jette. Yes, sir. So I will start with the foreign
military sales. On the foreign military sales, we are able to
maintain the minimum sustaining rate. So we worked with Boeing
on minimum sustaining rate and the one defined that we both
agreed to----
Mr. Norcross. Is how many?
Secretary Jette. Eighteen.
Mr. Norcross. Okay.
Secretary Jette. And 18 is one shift a day, 8-hour day, 5
days a week, throughout the year. The minimum sustaining rate
is 18. We have orders in place for out to 25, we believe, were
at those minimum sustaining rates.
Mr. Norcross. Really?
Secretary Jette. We have moved some of our ORF [operational
readiness float] deliveries just to the right, which lets us
make sure that we fill in some of the gaps. We have an LOA
[letter of offer and acceptance] waiting signature with the
U.K. [United Kingdom]. We are pretty confident that that will
follow through. They are going through their current budget
works as well. We expect that by October. That is very
promising.
We also have visibility on direct commercial sales, so that
sometimes what happens is we make our counts based purely on
the number that are being produced for foreign military sales,
which is separate from direct commercial sales. Some countries
do direct commercial sales. Some countries want to go through
the foreign military sales and leverage some of the training
and things you can get, sustainment that you get through the
FMS.
So the Netherlands has on contract through direct
commercial sales six new builds for Block Is; delivery in 2021.
We have Singapore is on contract for direct commercial sales
for eight new builds as well. And we have laid these out with
respect to the profiles.
Mr. Norcross. In the interest of time, we will get the
actual numbers, but they are going to meet the minimum
sustaining rate?
Secretary Jette. Yes, sir. Out to 2025 is where we think we
are good.
Mr. Norcross. Okay. In the second round we will get back to
it.
Mrs. Hartzler.
Mrs. Hartzler. Thank you.
Just to pick up on the F-18 questions that my colleague
started with there. So first of all, would you affirm that we
have a 49 airplane shortfall right now?
Admiral Harris. Yes, ma'am. That is correct.
Mrs. Hartzler. Okay. And that is one carrier wing. And you
confirm that we are having--you are suggesting this budget to
cut another 36 Super Hornets out that were projected to be
built, but now you don't have them?
Admiral Harris. That is correct, ma'am.
Mrs. Hartzler. Okay. I know you said that it was a balance
risk. I feel like this is too much operational risk. And I want
to get some clarity on as you talk about the service life
extension and maintenance. So how are you addressing this
shortfall? It sounds like you are just going to maintain and
rehabilitate the current ones, is your plan?
Secretary Geurts. Yes, ma'am. And again, the transition
risk between fleets is always where we are at most risk. And so
our 2021 budget fully funds the F-18 production at 24.
Mrs. Hartzler. Future life.
Secretary Geurts. That gives us some time--we, again, made
some hard decisions on F-18. As the SLM line comes up towards
our goal of being able to take 40 airplanes into that line a
year, we can understand the balance of that risk. And as we
brought the mission-capable rate of aircraft up across the
Department of the Navy, that gives us additional up aircraft to
help balance that shortfall. So it was an affordability
balance. We are trying to work the balancing act again fully
funding the 2021 that 3-year multiyear so that we can continue
to watch that this year and ensure the decisions we made in
2021 reflected in 2022 out budget balance that risk
appropriately.
Mrs. Hartzler. So you are cutting into the outyears 36
aircraft, then you are going to pull in 40 that are currently
flying, into maintenance. How long does it take to go through
the service life extension?
Secretary Geurts. Right now, we are at about 18 months.
When we get at full rate, our goal is to do that in 12 months.
Mrs. Hartzler. So if you add all those up, this is a severe
shortage that we are experiencing. And then if you don't count
for the attrition rate actually in combat, we would have a very
large gap there, potentially?
Secretary Geurts. Yes, ma'am. We are taking this risk until
the end kind of late 2020s. I think 2029 is when we will get to
the full fighter inventory. So we have had to take some risk as
we balance that.
Mrs. Hartzler. Sure. General Rudder, as you heard that the
Navy has this shortfall of 49 aircraft, but it doesn't account
for attrition potentially, does the Marine Corps have a similar
shortfall in strike fighter fleet? And if so, can you describe
the shortfall and how it is being mitigated by the Marine
Corps?
General Rudder. Thank you, Congresswoman. Since the Navy
divested of their legacy Hornets, we actually have a lot of
Hornets that we are kind of sorting through to configure with
the best of breed, the higher lot numbers, if you will. So, you
know, for Hornets, we have 275; we need about 100, 143 on the
flight line. So we have enough Hornets. We have enough
carriers, even though they are down around 123.
What the challenge for us is is the transition. When I say
we have 18 squadrons amid the ongoing deployments that we have,
we have squadrons coming and going from Asia right now, coming
back from the Middle East, and F-35s and AV-8Bs in the ship as
we speak.
The challenge would be to maintain a 20 F-35 buy a year at
least so we can stand up at least two squadrons a year as we go
forward. So as we stand down a squadron, there is going to be a
dip. Out of our 18 squadrons, we will have 16 available, if you
will. But this transition will be probably the most challenging
for us. Not that we will have less jets; it is just
transitioning out of our old jets into the new ones to make
sure that procurement cycle stays at 20 a year.
Mrs. Hartzler. And there will be training that needs to go
along with that too since you are switching aircraft and all of
that. So it is not just an easy transition.
General Rudder. It is not. That is why, you know, at every
given year, you have two squadrons in a transition. It is
training the maintainers, training the pilots to be ready to
deploy, because much like anything else, as the ship mods come
to being with our amphibious shipping capability, we are
putting F-35s out there, to include the [HMS] Queen Elizabeth
[British aircraft carrier]. So we are training people on multi-
fronts to not only deploy on the carrier with the Navy, but
also deploy our amphibs and other commitments around the world.
So it is an ongoing in stride transition for the F-35.
Mrs. Hartzler. Great. Thank you very much. I have some
others, but we will come back a second round.
Thank you, Chairman.
Mr. Norcross. Mr. Gallego.
Mr. Gallego. Thank you, Chairman.
General Holmes, on February 27, we received word that the
Air Force was changing its retirement plan for 44 A-10
Warthogs. Unfortunately, that change plan didn't reach Chief of
Staff of the Air Force in time for him to add this to his
testimony on March 4. Can you comment on what the new new plan
is now?
General Holmes. Yes, thank you, Congressman. Between
General Nahom and I, we will work the numbers, and I will kind
of talk about the impact, if that is okay. So as we brought our
budget forward, we are trying to balance the need to go forward
with fifth-gen aircraft, keep a fourth-gen balance, and conduct
all the roles that the Nation expects us to do. All around the
world, then, as we balance that force and we look at rebuilding
it, we wanted to come through and maintain seven squadrons of
A-10s, which is enough for us to have one overseas in PACAF
[Pacific Air Forces] that is stationed there, and then have six
that can be rotationally available. We keep about one squadron
of A-10s deployed in the CENTCOM [U.S. Central Command] area of
operations to meet the requirements there. And with those
numbers, we can still meet those requirements. We can do the
wing upgrades that are required to keep the A-10 useful. And we
can bring all of the A-10 fleet up to the same configuration so
that they are all just as capable. And General Nahom will talk
about the numbers.
General Nahom. Congressman, so for the A-10, as we work
ourselves through the F-35/A-10 comparison testing, we know the
restrictions on the retiring. We are watching----
Mr. Gallego. Just to interrupt you there, General.
Actually, I want to bring that up. So we have the requirements.
The report is supposed to come out when?
General Nahom. We are expecting a report in the early fall,
sir.
Mr. Gallego. Okay. So the Air Force has decided to retire
A-10s, over our own objections here. What is the point of the
report? You guys kind of made decisions before the report came
out and came back to us.
General Nahom. Sir, that is our plan. We fully intend to
comply with the law about when we can retire the A-10s, but
right now, we are planning for the next phase of the A-10.
Because when we get past the comparison testing, when we start
using F-35 for many of the high-end missions that we are
planning on----
Mr. Gallego. I guess the point I am trying to make is that
it seems prejudicial that you guys already made decisions or
planned the future of the A-10 without showing us the report so
we can have our input, you know, about the comparison between
the F-35 and the A-10. Do you see how that will look on our
behalf, how we see things?
General Nahom. Yes, sir. And we are working very closely
with DOT&E [Director, Operational Test and Evaluation] on the
report, not only that, but the IOT&E [initial operational test
and evaluation] for the F-35, because it is very important
before we go forward with next phase of the A-10. But what we
need from the A-10 moving forward is we still need that
airplane in service. We just have to make sure that the A-10s
we keep we upgrade, not only with new wings, with a new digital
backbone in the avionics to make sure this can be an aircraft
that we can use very effectively in low-end conflict for the
next 20 years. And we think that is actually a pretty good news
story for the A-10. We intend to make sure we get those numbers
right.
Mr. Gallego. Back to you, General Holmes. I guess the
bigger question is--we could argue back and forth whether we
are doing this report correctly, in the right manner--but how
did this plan basically evolve to the point where, you know, in
my opinion, it seems to be predetermined, without any input
from Congress? Specifically, if you look at the history of the
A-10 in Congress, it has had consistent bipartisan support. So
for many of us here, it was quite surprising that some of the
Air Force showed up with this plan. That was the first time we
had heard about it. There wasn't any other type of input,
especially from the authorizers on this side.
Admiral Harris. Sir, I am going to again defer that
question to the Headquarters Air Force. I think our goal in our
combat command, as General Nahom said, was to make sure that
all the A-10s we kept for another 20 years were useful and it
could continue to do what they do on the battlefield well. As
far as the decisions at the Headquarters Air Force, I will
defer that to General Nahom.
General Nahom. And, sir, as we looked at the A-10 numbers,
as we look at all our fleets, we are very keen on making sure
we balance the risk across all our portfolios. We want to make
sure we have enough of the modernized fighters, the F-35s, for
the high-end fight, as Dr. Roper alluded to in his opening
comments. And having that balance----
Mr. Gallego. I mean, I understand that, but, you know, most
of our fights still right now are not high-end fights. We find
ourselves more doing close air combat support more than
anything else.
And thank you for your time, gentlemen.
Mr. Chairman, just want to note, as I said to General
Goldfein last week, for me, the fact that I think the process
was just tossed aside from the 2017 NDAA, it is just--you know,
for me, it is quite galling. And I really would hope that the
committee would work with me to ensure that, you know, we don't
allow Congress' voice to be not heard again.
Thank you.
Mr. Norcross. Comments are noted. Thank you.
Mr. Banks.
Mr. Banks. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I want to ask the panel about the Future Long-Range Assault
Aircraft. Last year, you requested and Congress appropriated
funds to accelerate the program based on significant testing
progress. Secretary Jette and General Rugen, could you give us
a picture of where testing currently stands for the program?
Secretary Jette. Yes, sir. Thank you for the question. I
think what we saw with the request that was made and supported
by Congress last year really set the conditions for a 4-year
acceleration from where we are currently in tech demonstration
to a program of record and a full weapon system. So what
happened last year was a great year of successes as we made it
through our analysis, as we made it through CAPE [Cost
Assessment and Program Evaluation] sufficiency. And we saw both
tech demonstrators fly. We wanted to double down on that
success, and we needed that help to basically in this budget
you see a 4-year acceleration.
Mr. Banks. Mr. Secretary.
Secretary Jette. What we are doing, sir, is we are taking--
we have looked at the successes of the FLRAA. We are looking at
the flight capability of both aircraft at this point, and we
have begun putting together the final formal plan to move to a
flight--full program of record. The conceptual design and
requirements for a full acquisition strategy will be completed
by next year. We will then determine contract award in fiscal
year 2022 and with FUE [first unit equipped] in 2030. It looks
so far since we have seen six promising, and you can go down
and watch the aircraft fly both of the versions right now.
Mr. Banks. So it sounds like both of you can reassure this
committee that the program will meet the accelerated timeline.
Secretary Jette. At this point, we believe so. Yes, sir.
Mr. Banks. Are there any particular performance metrics
that you consider to be indicative of future success in the
program?
General Rugen. I think we had an independent tech readiness
assessment by OSD [Office of the Secretary of Defense] last
year where they named nine technologies that were risk areas
that we needed to burn down. We fully understand those risk
areas. Some of the most prominent are the full authority fly-
by-wire flight controls, the drivetrain, the powertrain and the
like. And again, because we got that report early, probably
years earlier than we normally would have, we are already in
our next phase driving that risk down.
Secretary Jette. Yes, sir. And I would like to add, so
elements of overmatch that we see on the aircraft is reach--one
of them is reach. It has got three subcomponents: speed, range,
and endurance. Both aircraft have significant improvement over
what it's fundamentally replacing, which is OH-58. It does have
a lethality component, which was very limited on the OH-58, but
it will be much more flexible on this version, and the
survivability of the aircraft. Because of the integrated
ecosystem, in other words, these aircraft are intending
specifically to be able to work together and understand the air
picture, it will give them an increased survivability by
knowing where air defenses are, where radars are, how to use
the NOE, nap-of-the-earth, flights and mask from different
systems. So we are bringing all of these things to bear in
trying to make all of these actually, the FLRAA, FARA, and see
how much of that we can push into our existing systems.
Mr. Banks. Let me finish by just asking, do you anticipate
anything that might alter the current timeline or provide an
opportunity even to accelerate the testing in this budget cycle
or future cycles?
Secretary Jette. Sir, I think that being an acquisition
person who has actually had to build stuff and put on the
field, I think we are about as aggressive as I am prepared to
go at this point, but I think it is still well within reason
that we can get there by 2030.
Mr. Banks. Thank you very much.
I yield back.
Mr. Norcross. Mr. Courtney.
Mr. Courtney. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you to all
the witnesses that are here today.
Lieutenant General Rudder, I just want to spend a minute
just to catch up on the CH-53K heavy-lift replacement program.
Last year, I know we went back and forth with some
reprogramming issues regarding the exhaust gas reingestion
problem, which is one of the most unpleasant sounding terms I
think we have ever heard here. But it does seem like that issue
has been sort of worked through. And I was just wondering if
you can sort of give us an update as far as how that stands
right now. And then I just have another question after that.
General Rudder. I will begin, but I have to thank Secretary
Geurts sitting next to me that they really did a great job of
putting the package together. We had 126 deficiencies. One was
the gas reingestion. They fixed that. I know there is some
concern about where the budget is this year. We put seven in
there because it wasn't fixed yet and he had not signed off on
it yet, so we just put seven in. But we plan on ramping up from
there. But the testing is going well. We've got 1,700 hours on
the airframe itself. By this fall, we will have our first
operational airplane flying in New River. And by next year, we
will have our first four operational airplanes flying in New
River, and we have got our first squadron on contract. So,
right now, it is on track and going very well. I have got to
thank the acquisition community for putting it on track.
Mr. Courtney. Well, I think you are right. Actually, Mr.
Geurts was deeply involved in terms of trying to work that
through with the Appropriations Committee. And I am glad, you
know, we had a good ending to that.
Again, you sort of alluded to the fact that, you know, now
we are pretty close to going to a higher production rate than
low rate. I mean, can you give us kind of a horizon in terms of
how you see that moving forward?
General Rudder. Yeah. We put in seven. I mean, you see 11
the following year. We are hoping, you know, we can stay at
that. We are hoping the budget stays, you know, where it is and
it is acceptable. But obviously we would like to get higher.
The higher the numbers, the greater the learning curve from
production. And as we saw with the F-35, the greater the cost
curve, as we saw the F-35, as you ramp production, cost curve
came down. We can already see a cost curve beginning to take a
turn with the 53K. So I think increased production will bring
that cost curve down more efficiently.
Mr. Courtney. Mr. Geurts, did you want to add anything?
Secretary Geurts. No, sir. I would agree with ``Stick.'' I
mean, a couple of good things. We negotiated that production
contract, so any of these fixes will go into the production
aircraft so we are not handing the field an aircraft that
doesn't have the fixes in, which I think is important. That
also means we can accelerate production. And so with the fixes
already in, we will accelerate that production ramp to get it
as most efficient as possible.
Mr. Norcross. Thank you.
Mr. Lamborn.
Mr. Lamborn. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for having this
hearing. Thank you all for being here and what you do for our
country.
General Holmes, could you provide the subcommittee with an
update that is appropriate for an open setting like this on
where we believe Russia and China are with their fifth-
generation aircraft production?
General Holmes. Yes, sir. Thank you. I will do my best. We
believe that China is in front of Russia in their ability to
build an airplane that matches the capabilities that we can. So
the J-20 is the airplane that we talk about. In China, they
have shown they can build it. They haven't shown yet how many
they can build and whether they can build it in numbers, but
you wouldn't want to bet against China being able to do that.
So they have a small number of airplanes that are close to par
with our capability to build.
The Russian airplane that compares is not as far along on
the fifth-generation ladder as what China is building. It is a
capable airplane, we believe, but they haven't shown the
ability to build it in numbers yet. They continue to run into
production problems and cost problems, we believe. And so I am
more concerned with China's ability to build a peer aircraft
and to produce it in mass numbers than I am with Russia at this
time.
Mr. Lamborn. Okay. Thank you. And then also, General
Goldfein testified last week that the Air Force is short about
2,000 pilots. Can you discuss any efforts by the Air Force to
accelerate pilot production and experience, and especially in
the area of fifth-generation pilots?
General Holmes. Yes, sir. Again, thank you. We have several
efforts going on. It starts with trying to make sure that we
offer a place where our young aircrew and all our operators can
find meaning and purpose enough to stay in this career for the
long term in the face of, you know, competing economic
opportunity somewhere else. So it starts with trying to build
an Air Force that they want to stay in for the long term and
talking about the importance of what they do.
The next place is production. We know that to make up that
2,000 pilot gap, we are going to have to produce more pilots
every year. So my colleagues in Air Education and Training
Command have been ramping up production every year, both
maximizing the use they have with the legacy equipment, the T-
6, the T-38, and the T-1, and then looking for new ways to
produce pilots better and faster, like Dr. Roper talked about,
through Pilot Training Next, now kind of pilot training 2.0,
and to see if we can produce a better pilot faster using new
techniques. And we believe that we can. Right now, most of our
pilots are still trained very close to the way we trained them
in 1947, and certainly very close to the way we trained them in
1981 when I went to pilot training; same number of hours, same
number of syllabus requirements, doing it the same way. And we
believe that we have the ability to speed it up and make better
pilots.
Mr. Lamborn. Thank you. Thank you for all being here and
for the answers to those questions.
And, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Mr. Norcross. Thank you.
Mr. Golden.
Mr. Golden. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you to the panel
for being with us today.
Good to see you again, Secretary Geurts. It has been a
couple of days.
General Rudder, I just want to give you an opportunity to
talk a little bit about the Commandant's future design for the
Marine force and how that is going to impact your plans for
aviation force structure, comp [component] and total aircraft
inventory requirements. You know, just looking ahead a little
bit, what can you tell the subcommittee about what to watch
for?
General Rudder. Yeah. I don't have an exact number. He is
actually walking the hallways as we speak briefing up different
leaders in the building. I will offer that, you know, one of
the challenges we have with force design to switch to a major
competitor is to pull ourselves out of most of the operations
we are doing around the world. I think it is the same for all
my partners at the table here. So that will be the challenge on
what we do, because in some cases, we have aircraft there in
places that we kind of like to use them somewhere else. So
being able to focus on the Pacific with what the Commandant
wants to do and his force design will be based a lot in part
upon that and how much risk we assume.
I would offer that in all the aviation you heard them talk
about 200 53Ks. He has openly said that in these particular
forums. And all the different force design elements, aviation
plays a key role. I guess I will stop at that.
Mr. Golden. That is all I have. The next thing I was going
to ask was about how the CH-53K figured into that new force
structure. So you got right on it. Thank you very much. I
appreciate it.
Mr. Norcross. Thank you.
Mr. Bacon.
Mr. Bacon. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you all for
being here today.
And I just want to point out it is a pleasure to see
General Holmes, who I worked with 7 or 8 years ago on the sale
and the integration of the RC-135 to the RAF [Royal Air Force]
and the F-35. So it is great to see you back.
My first question is to Dr. Roper and General Holmes. A few
years back, we cut the Joint STARS [Surveillance Target Attack
Radar System] and we moved that money to help fund the future
of the ABMS [Advanced Battle Management System]. I see in this
budget we are also making major cuts to the Global Hawk, to the
Reaper, I think again to move funds to the ABMS. We also heard
this past week and last week how important to the Army and the
Marines the long-range fires are and integrating that. And they
rely on ISR [intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance],
the Air Force ISR to do that.
So really my question is to Dr. Roper and General Holmes,
what is the timeline to get ABMS operational? When is the
combatant commander going to start getting data off this ABMS?
What is the future of MTI [moving target indicator] or the
moving target--the capability, the ISR capability that is in
high demand, what are those timelines? Thank you.
Secretary Roper. Thank you, sir. I will talk to how we are
going to do it, and I will turn it over to General Holmes for
what the operational impact will be.
So the Advanced Battle Management System is going to
challenge everything about how we bring capability to bear for
the warfighter. It is really--it is a stark contrast when you
leave your personal life and then you go work in a military
organization. You leave a personal life where you are connected
to almost everything, analytics push data to you that you don't
have to request. You interact with it, it allows those
analytics to improve. So decision at machine speed is something
we really need to fear, because if we face it on the
battlefield, it is one technology that might negate the human
advantage that we currently enjoy. So what we have to do in
Advanced Battle Management System is build the Internet of
Things but where the things are military systems--so fighters,
ships, soldiers--that are pushing data to that centralized
infrastructure but that are also getting data pushed to it.
Mr. Bacon. [Off mic.] From what I understand, the timelines
is what scares us.
Secretary Roper. It is. If we do this as a traditional
acquisition program, I will already tell you it has already
failed, right. It is too big, it touches too much. So the way
we are doing it is pushing out capability in 4-month cycles. If
we let it go further than that, we are not moving in internet
speeds and we are injecting too much risk. So the idea is
having multiple activities that have to come to bear and live
fly. The first one happened in December. We connected the F-22
and the F-35 for the first time. That is great. That is not the
capability we want to have a year from now, but it is the first
step, and it allowed us to retire the risk, learn, and give
better data to our engineers to iterate.
We are going to do another activity in April, bigger,
better, with the way we connected the F-22 and the F-35, rather
than being something that is on the ground, we are going to fly
it on an attritable drone. So we take that next evolution.
The best advice we got from people that built the internet
is do it in rapid iterative spirals, fail very frequently, and
ensure that risk is retired and given back to engineers so that
you can deliver capability in 15 percent slices. And the 15
percent slices got my attention, because we typically talk
about 80 or 90 percent solutions at the end. Their point was
design it so the slices stack towards greater capability, but
don't wait on delivering to the end. And so we are going to
continue that through the program, sir.
[Audio malfunction in hearing room.]
Mr. Bacon. [Off mic, inaudible.]
Secretary Roper. Sir, the biggest risk is if we don't
succeed on ABMS, if we cannot bring internet-type connectivity
to the military, we have already failed. We will face
adversaries who can fight at machine speed and we won't. We
have to have those things like cloud and software to find
networking and mesh ad hoc networking to move data the way the
internet does. So we cannot fail on ABMS.
To your question about divesting legacy assets, a lot of
things we will need to plug into ABMS initially will be
existing systems, but we are going to have to move a lot of how
we do business into the classified domain. I know a lot of
members of the committee have taken us up on classified
briefings. We appreciate that. We know it is hard that we can't
discuss it here, but if we are going to take on a peer like
China, we are going to have to have some tricks up our sleeves,
and how we do ABMS needs to be where some of our best tricks
are.
Mr. Bacon. [Inaudible.] --state of the warfighter or do you
think we are there? Are we going to be able to meet it?
General Holmes. Thank you, Congressman Bacon. I would start
with I think we already face gaps in our systems that we
possess now ability to gather the information we would need in
a fight with Russia or China. They are still useful to us in
what we call the preparation of the battlefield stage of
finding information of indications and warning, but if it comes
to a fight, we already have a gap in things like those older
RQ-4s, the RC-135, the E-8. They are useful to us in peacetime,
but we can't use them during that conflict. So we are trying to
address that gap as we go forward.
I think we already have more data than we can sort through
to analyze and get to warfighters. And I believe that the work
that our AQ [Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for
Acquisition, Technology and Logistics] is doing, along with
General Hyten and the rest of our service partners, is going to
deliver that information as we need.
Mr. Bacon. Mr. Chairman, I have some follow-on questions,
but I hope I can get a second round. Thank you.
Mr. Norcross. Thank you.
Mr. Vela.
Mr. Vela. Dr. Jette, the Army currently plans to upgrade
over 750 UH-60s to the Victor model. Most of that work, if not
all, is being done at Corpus Christi Army Depot. Can you
provide the committee an update on this modernization program?
Give us some insight and your thoughts on how things are going
at Corpus Christi Army Depot and what you think the benefits of
this entire approach are?
Secretary Jette. Sir, in summary, I would say that things
are going well. In 2018, we had 6 Victors converted; 2019 is 18
converted; 25 in 2020; and we are planning to do 24 in 2021. We
will continue moving through the rest of the fleet out until
about 2034. The conversion process is going well. Corpus
Christi is doing a fine job with the conversion process.
Mr. Vela. Do you see anything about Corpus Christi Army
Depot to suggest the process is being impeded?
Secretary Jette. At this point, we are not competing the
process. We are incorporating some commercial vendors into the
process, and we are actually looking to see whether or not
there is some added advantage to recompeting some of the
subcomponents.
Depots are very strong, very capable. They have a great
deal of resources. It is good sometimes to see if we can inject
some of the commercial perspective into the depot environment
and facilitate a little bit more aggressive view of things.
Mr. Vela. Thank you.
Secretary Roper, I was recently at Creech and saw the
important work you all do with the Reapers. In the fiscal year
2021 budget, the Air Force cut its MQ-9 production to zero. Why
the major change in plans, and how will the Air Force address
its ISR gap?
Secretary Roper. Thank you, sir. I will speak to my side of
it and then turn it over to General Nahom for the requirements
side.
The Reaper has been a great platform for us. I mean, 4
million flight hours, just undeniable overmatch in a low-end,
uncontested fight and has certainly saved many lives. But as we
look to the high-end fight, we just can't take them into the
battlefield. You know, they are easily shot down.
And so what we are preparing to do on the acquisition side
as we take down the production line is build the next
generation of systems. A lot of industry have come into the
drone business, right? It is a big market right now, many
commercial applications. And so we will look at a mixture of
options for the future. There are things that are more high-end
military unique, things that are meant to be able to survive
even in a contested environment. Obviously, a lot of technology
will have to go in, and they will be likely expensive systems.
But we also see a lot of opportunity to bring in commercial
technology, push the price point down, have systems that can be
more attritable, we can take more loss with because we can
field the quantities needed. And so we are doing studies right
now looking at both ends, and I expect that is going to be one
of our major decisions in the fiscal year 2022 budget for the
Air Force.
General Nahom. And, sir, yes, what Dr. Roper said is how we
are balancing that measured risk with our ISR portfolio on the
low end. As you noticed, in the budget, we are taking down the
10 lines this year. And we are working very closely with the
intel community and the combatant commands for a measured
reduction in the coming years that matches some of the future
initiatives that we have in the ISR force, especially in the
low-end fight, because we do have to balance the risk with what
we are doing current day with where we need to go in the
future.
Mr. Vela. So, General Rudder, how will the Air Force's cuts
impact the Marine Corps development of a variant, of a Reaper
variant?
General Rudder. Well, I have to first thank General Holmes
because we have been able to enter into this world through his
network and his training, and we have just had our first two
Reaper-certified Marine captains show up in Yuma with four
sensor operators because of the Air Force training.
So what we will do is I think, within our MUX system
[Marine Air-Ground Task Force Unmanned Aerial System
Expeditionary], we are going to have a family of systems, and
one of those will be a land-based, long-endurance type of
capability. The next generation MQ-9 could be part of that, or
there could be something else out there. As Dr. Roper said,
this unmanned systems enterprise, if you will, with industry is
kind of wide open. There are a lot of opportunities out there.
But I think the Air Force will continue to operate. We hope
to be able to continue to operate with the Air Force as we have
been looking at our next-generation unmanned system. But I
think what we have learned from the Air Force has been
invaluable. So we are ready to step out on our own system.
Secretary Roper. Sir, one quick followup. Although right
now we are talking about divesting systems, taking risk in the
near term so we can modernize, one of the things we are very
focused on for the next budget is not having to simply divest
of current missions, but finding a way to do them cheaper.
So a lot of commercial technology can help us in the low-
end fight, and we need to do a better job of leveraging it.
This will be one of our first challenges, to find a very
different price point for continuing to operate and provide
invaluable ISR to the warfighter.
Mr. Vela. Thank you for your perspectives.
Mr. Norcross. So, 2 years ago, it was all about fifth gen.
A year ago, we were reeducated to say we want fourth gen, and
that mixture that go hand in glove. And when we look at the F-
15EX, that has changed from 18 originally; now we are down to
12. It was explained to us back then that there was a certain
mix going into a high-end fight that we would want to have.
So, on one hand, we are increasing the buy for the F-35,
and on this hand, we are decreasing the F-15. That mixture
ratio was something that was told to us was very important, yet
here we are this year looking at a different configuration.
For my friends from the Air Force, can you explain how that
has changed?
General Nahom. And, sir, I will start off that, then I will
turn it over to General Holmes for more of the specifics on the
fighter. I want to get through some of the programmatics.
As we balanced the President's budget this year, we
definitely had to take some--we definitely had to make some
tough choices in the endgame. We were very cognizant not to
touch the F-35 investment. We wanted to make sure we kept that
steady across the FYDP. On the F-15EX----
Mr. Norcross. At the requested level or the unfunded level
when you say that?
General Nahom. I would say right now at the requested
level, but we know--at our requested level we kept that. We
kept that steady across the FYDP. We wanted to make sure we had
no reduction in our ability to bring on fifth generation into
the Air Force.
The F-15EX is very important because we have added capacity
that it brings. It allows us to retire the F-15Cs in the
timeline we think we need to retire them, by 2026. We did
reduce from 18 down to 12 in this President's budget, but we
are going keep the total number in the initial buy of the F-
15EX steady across the FYDP, and our intention is to replace
the F-15Cs on time as well.
As we were balancing the budget at the very end, the
choices, the problem is, as we modernize as an Air Force, and
there are some things we are doing day in and day out right now
with the combatant commands, and there is certain friction as
we modernize that we have to make sure that we are still
attending to the current day fight.
And that is where a lot of the balancing was at the end, to
make sure we weren't retiring things too quickly, some of the
older technologies, while we brought on the new technologies.
And it offered some challenges as we close the books on the
2021 PB [President's budget].
Mr. Norcross. General Holmes.
General Holmes. Mr. Chairman, General Nahom and his team
worked with the Secretary and the chief to balance the Air
Force's submission and to balance a whole lot of activities and
all the things that you expect the Air Force to do.
From the Air Combat Command perspective, you know, we
continue to believe that we need 72 fighter aircraft a year to
keep up with the age of our airplanes and to keep them
relevant. What you will hear me say over and over is that I am
grateful for the additional money that we have been able to use
to get ready over the last 2 or 3 years.
Starting with that 2018 budget, we have had increased
funding, which has helped us make all our fighter force ready.
And we are grateful for the additional aircraft that the
committee provided last year on top of our request. But what I
don't want to do is go backwards. I don't want to go back to
have aircraft and crews that aren't fully ready for the fight.
And so, as we balance, I don't want to buy more airplanes
at the expense of the weapons and the things they need to be
effective or the training environment that they need to train
in that represents a Chinese or a Russian threat. I will always
be arguing within the process that whatever force I have, it
needs to be ready so that the aircrew members we send into
harm's way are ready to do their job on behalf of the joint
force. And so that is part of the tradeoff that we make when we
put the budget together. Thank you.
Mr. Norcross. But the configuration, and maybe Dr. Roper,
from the 15 assisting the 35s, there was a mix that you brought
to us, a ratio. But here we are increasing the 35, and you are
reducing the 15.
So it is not a budget consideration. It is a choice that
you are making because the dollar for dollar, the fact, if
anything, the F-35 sustainment rate, as General Goldfein talked
about, is way too high. So talk to that.
General Holmes. I would take a hack at that. You know, when
we made the decision several years ago in 2008 or 2009 to
cancel the F-22, we based that on accelerating the F-35
program. And if we had executed that program, the Air Force
would have a thousand F-35s right now, which would put us at
about a 50-50 ratio of fourth- and fifth-gen fighters.
We just delivered the 500th F-35 to all customers
worldwide, not to the Air Force. And so we are behind on
reaching that ratio. Right now, we have 3 F-35 squadrons that
are operational in the Air Force and 5 F-22 squadrons, 10 out
of 55 or so. So we are at about a 20 percent fifth-to-fourth
ratio. The study that OSD CAPE did and the different works have
said something like a 50-50 ratio. We think maybe 60-40. So we
think we are buying toward that ratio that we need in the 2,000
or so fighters that we have, and we have to keep buying F-35s
to get to that ratio.
Mr. Norcross. So, just to follow up, Pratt and Whitney has
a protest in on the engine for the F-15. Can you bring us up to
speed with that?
Secretary Roper. Yes, sir. So there is a protest by Pratt
and Whitney on the engine. So like we do with any protest, we
will work with the GAO [Government Accountability Office] to
resolve the----
Mr. Norcross. But are you preparing? If the protest is
upheld, it is going to drive that timeline.
Secretary Roper. Yes, sir. So just, you know, for context,
there is--so when the Saudis and Qataris started modernizing
the F-15, they have put over $5 billion into modernization,
which we want to leverage, especially given how much it costs
us to operate the F-15Cs and Ds. So it is just a good business
deal to retire the Cs and Ds, trade up to the EX.
Well, part of those modernizations was integrating a new
engine by GE on, so the F110. The F100 is on the current F-15E.
And so our acquisition strategy was to be able to buy off of
the line that the Qataris and the Saudis have stood up. If we
have to do an engine competition, it will add time, 2 to 3
years.
And so we will work with the GAO. We will obviously follow
their recommendations. But until we have had time to sit down
with them, I won't have more that I can say.
Mr. Norcross. Right. Just quickly, and this is for all our
witnesses. Coronavirus. We see what it is doing to the Italians
right now. Turkey, although not the virus problem, threw some
additional weight on us. What contingency plans, because I can
imagine after being down in Texas through the F-35 plant that,
if it hits there, it is going to have a severe effect on that
production.
If you could just briefly from each of the services, how
are you planning for this?
General Holmes. Well, sir, I will go. I attended a meeting
today with our chief of staff and Secretary after a meeting
yesterday with the Secretary of Defense and the chairman to
talk about an overall OSD approach to it.
And we have done the things you would expect us to do. We
have gone through the checklists that we have for a potential
pandemic, not that we are to pandemic status, but we have
planned ahead to look at how it affects us. Right now, we are
concerned with the movement of our people back and forth to
overseas assignments and the temporary duty that we go back and
forth to do exercises, we are working through that policy.
In our industry base, those are certainly challenges that
are a larger challenge, I think an American challenge, a
national challenge beyond our scope to be able to handle. But
we are working to try to safeguard our military members and the
communities where they live, and then also safeguard the
readiness that we fought hard to gain through this process by
thinking ahead and trying to prepare for the next steps.
Secretary Geurts. Yes, sir. I think for Navy and Marine
Corps, the same, all the services working together there. And
then we are watching supply chains. Where do we have parts
either being repaired or produced overseas. Do we understand
supply chains. And for those foreign military sales programs
where we have folks going overseas, watching that closely and
controlling the movements and taking very measured response,
sir.
Mr. Norcross. Thank you. Are you in the same boat, no pun
intended, for you Army guys?
Secretary Jette. Close to the same boat, sir, although we
are really trying to not do much cruise ship work together. It
seems that is not a good thing for coronavirus. We surveyed all
the PMs [project managers] and through the POs [program
offices], to try and determine which programs are at risk in
which areas.
We have both some risk in the supply chain issues that we
have got to take a look at, but we have also got to take a look
at the delivery of systems because I have got to move people
there, deliver the systems, train people. And for the Army in
particular, it is a people relationship issue. So we do have an
extensive effort right now, trying to make sure we have a good
handle on that. The Army senior leaders are working very
closely on trying to make sure that we have got all the things
we can in place for our military, military families,
particularly overseas.
And we do have two benefits that we kind of think we
contribute to the Nation. One of them is Joint Chemical,
Biological, Radiological, Nuclear Program Office, where we are
working with the different health agencies within the
government on transferring capabilities that we have and trying
to look at biodefense and our bio labs up at in NATICK--or not
in NATICK, in Maryland, to see how we can bring some of the
technologies that we know there to bear on these problems. We
think, within a month, we will have a fieldable local test you
can quickly do and determine if someone has the effect.
Mr. Norcross. Thank you.
And I apologize, Mrs. Hartzler, for running over.
Mrs. Hartzler. That is all right, very important questions
for sure.
Dr. Jette, to continue with you, the Army has requested to
procure 36 UH-60M helicopters for fiscal year 2021, and that is
significantly less than 73 requested for in fiscal year 2020.
And I understand that, out of the 36, 13 are for the Active
Duty, 23 are for the Army National Guard. So why is the number
requested significantly lower than the number last year, and
how will this impact units that are in the pipeline to receive
UH-60M helicopters?
Secretary Jette. Yes, ma'am. So what we did was, in our
procurement last year, our specific effort is to try and retire
the alpha models. So we want to get the alpha models out of the
National Guard first, and we want to do that by 2022, and then
we want to get the alpha models out of the Active forces by
2024. So, to do that, we plussed up on our buy last year, and
we are working to buy out more this year.
So you are right. We put 66 of the buys last year for the M
models into the National Guard, and we were planning to put 23
out of the fiscal year 2021 buys into the National Guard. This
is all leading to our scheme of getting the alpha models out.
Mrs. Hartzler. So how is this going to impact those that
are in the pipeline to receive UH-60M helicopters?
Secretary Jette. I am----
Mrs. Hartzler. Is it going to slow down their ability to be
able to receive the Mike models, as you have cut the number
that you are going to procure this year of the updated
versions?
Secretary Jette. Well, I don't think that--our view of it
is that we are not trying to slow down. Sort of, we were lower.
For example, we were 62, 58, popped up to 74, and we are back
down to 36. And what we just have is affordability of trying to
keep the Mike model procurements over a period of time that is
affordable. So our intent is not to stop or slow down. It is to
get to a level.
Mrs. Hartzler. So, if a unit was expected and told you were
going to get a Mike model, say, within 2 years, then they can
expect they will get it?
Secretary Jette. Yes, ma'am.
Mrs. Hartzler. That is good. Okay.
General Rudder and Admiral Harris, the Marine Corps has
identified and established a requirement for a modernized
aviation body armor vest for all HMLA [Marine Light Attack
Helicopter Squadron] airframes within the Marine Corps.
In fiscal year 2020, the Marine Corps requested $2.2
million to purchase 1,000 commercial off-the-shelf units that
are immediately available. However, the funds provided would
not even cover half of the aviation body armor vests needed to
outfit all the airframes, and there is no money requested for
fiscal year 2021. What is the Marine Corps plan to outfit the
rest of the airframes with modernized aviation body armor
vests?
General Rudder. I think this was the initial buy from a
request, urgent UNS [universal need statement] request for
these additional body armors, and we put that in there. We
think we may have to buy some more, but we will see with the
deliveries, see if they like them when we put them with our
forward element. So, if you look at the training commands and
some of the squadrons that are back, they don't necessarily
need, you know, outfit for every single airframe. But those
that go forward, we will have enough to outfit those that are
actually going into harm's way with these new vests and still
have some in the rear to be able to train with.
Mrs. Hartzler. Okay. We will watch that.
Dr. Roper, during last week's Air Force posture hearing,
General Goldfein highlighted the benefits and savings of the T-
7 program's digital design and manufacturing techniques as a
game-changer for bringing down sustainment and modernization
costs in the long term. And I know this is your baby, your
initiative that is so exciting.
So are there lessons learned from the T-7 program that the
Air Force can apply to drive down costs of other platforms as
you go forward?
Secretary Roper. Yes, ma'am. I mean, the technologies that
let you design and build things differently are the most
exciting to me. And you know I have worked with you in the past
on warfighting technologies. I still love those. But we are
going to have to speed up how we build things and be able to
work with a broader industry base, or we can be right this year
and next year in our budgets and still lose to China simply
because we are not working with the entire innovation base that
this country has.
Digital engineering has been used in many industries that
are commercial. The automotive industry has been fundamentally
transformed because of it. And T-7, we have seen the first
crossover in the military systems.
I think the lesson to be learned is that when you have that
level of design and your design and assembly are digitally
rendered--think of it as like a simulator for designing and
assembling that allows you to de-risk things before you do them
in the real world. It is actually the next evolution past
flying before you buy because you can kind of digitally design
and fly before you decide to do it in the physical world.
So, ma'am, what it should do is it should transform how we
do every acquisition. We should get rid of paper. We should
transition to full digital tools. And in the Air Force, for
every new program, they have to do this. So for Ground-Based
Strategic Deterrent, they have to use these digital tools. And
I think what we will learn is that we can de-risk things
digitally that we used to have to do in the physical world
after we built the system.
Mrs. Hartzler. I know my time is up, but I certainly hope
100 percent of the services are adopting the same technology.
Secretary Geurts. Yes, ma'am. And in shipbuilding, nuclear
shipbuilding, all of our submarines and aircraft carriers are
100 percent digital design from the start, which also goes all
the way through sustainment.
Mrs. Hartzler. That is great. Thank you very much.
I yield back.
Mr. Norcross. Mr. Bacon.
Mr. Bacon. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have a couple questions
on electronic warfare. So my first is for Dr. Jette and Mr.
Geurts. I applaud the efforts made on your rotor-wing aircraft
and all the emphasis you put on infrared kind of
countermeasures. We are seeing an increased capability that the
opposition or our enemy, potential adversaries would have with
radar-guided missiles for helicopters even at those lowest of
altitudes.
Do we have the appropriate priority for countermeasures for
RF [radio frequency] being put on our new helicopters or
current ones we use?
Secretary Jette. Sir, our current helicopters have--we have
got two new programs that we are working with on the
helicopters. One of them is LIMWS, Limited Interim Missile
Warning System, that gives us an ability to detect these
missiles coming in faster and then use various methods, chaff
and flares to decoy them away. We have some other things that
we----
Mr. Bacon. Is there a jamming pod associated?
Secretary Jette. We need to talk in a different forum.
Mr. Bacon. Fair enough. Mr. Geurts.
Secretary Geurts. Again, across the board, between all of
our, you know, F-18Gs and all of our next generation pods----
Mr. Bacon. You could go with the rotor wing.
Secretary Geurts. But even on the rotor wing, we are
switching over kind of our decoys and techniques there, taking
advantage, again, of the rip-off and deploy R&D. So if the Air
Force or the Army has done something, we will work on getting
it into our fleet as quickly as possible.
Mr. Bacon. Typically, for helicopters, we worry about IR
[infrared] threats. Now the RF, increasingly, that envelope is
going into the rotor wing.
Secretary Geurts. Yes, sir.
Mr. Bacon. Even at 100 feet, right? So it is important we
have a thought or plan for it.
For the Air Force side, I wanted to ask--or maybe it would
be better for the record and come back and talk one-on-one. I
am concerned about the EC-37 program. We have 5 aircraft out of
10 purchased to replace the EC-130s. A sixth one is in this
budget. But now the Gulfstream production line is going to
stop. We are talking about buying used ones that we don't know
how many hours they will have, what kind of configurations they
have been in. And in the meantime, our squadron is going to
have partial EC-130s, partial EC-37s. It is very hard for crew
management. I am worried about where we are going with this.
Can we not buy new aircraft, put them on hold and then modify
them later in later budgets?
Secretary Roper. So I will speak to the acquisition,
certainly open it to my colleagues for the operational impacts.
But yes, we are working many options to try to accelerate how
quickly we can deliver the capability.
We are in discussions, you know, with vendors, and so those
aren't things that I can share publicly. But yes, we understand
that having a line shut down means we need to think creatively
about how we can bring aircraft to bear.
And, sir, I will take as an action to come by and chat with
you about what we are thinking.
Mr. Bacon. Anything else? I just welcome the office time if
we need to do that.
I think, from a squadron commander, which I was a two-time
squadron commander, having a squadron with half 130s, half EC-
137s, it is pretty hard to manage that crew, especially--you
can do it for a short time, but if we are going to do one
aircraft a year, I just think it is a risk to that squadron and
our capability if we need to deploy them.
Secretary Roper. Yes, sir. We are aware that putting that
burden on the operational community is not a bill that we want
to pass. And so, between options to try to extend the line,
used aircraft, and alternative aircraft, we are pursuing
options for all three. And I can let you know which ones appear
to be trending, but I will need to do that in a closed setting,
sir.
Mr. Bacon. Thank you.
One followup with you, Dr. Roper, if I may. Going to our
ICBM [intercontinental ballistic missile] wings, as you know,
we are starting to deliver the MH-139A Gray Wolf helicopters.
And they have to have the capability to go to an ICBM site in
case there is a force protection issue, so you have a door
gunner. Typically all right in the summer, but in the winter up
there, as you know, it is like minus 30. And what I am hearing
is it is so cold that they can't operate the guns.
Do we have a plan, whether it is the right gear, you know,
with warmers and the gloves or the mittens? It seems to me we
have to have a capability for these door gunners to be
effective at what they are doing. Do you have any updates or
any thoughts on how we can help out that community?
Secretary Roper. Yes, sir. We are working closely with
Global Strike Command currently. We are aware of the weather
conditions in Minot. I went up a year ago right before winter
started, and I was there on one of the warmest days on record.
So I did not get to experience the full Minot experience. Part
of doing UH-1 replacement, the Gray Wolf, is having
capabilities that operators can use and to let them do their
missions more flexibly.
So cold weather, a primary challenge that has to be
overcome. The defenders always tell me to make sure that I say
publicly when I am testifying before you that they are some of
the toughest airmen in the Air Force, and I think I agree with
them.
So we are working a variety of options, environmental
options, clothing options, to try to mitigate that risk, sir.
And that is part of why we are excited to start getting those
aircraft and start doing testing.
Mr. Bacon. I will just close by saying I have my ear to the
ground with that community, and I know they would be pleased to
hear what the plan is because, at minus 30, it is hard to
operate a machine gun with an open door. Thank you.
Mr. Norcross. Thank you. We have roughly 10 minutes, we
expect. So you are good?
So let me, the future strike fighter, the F/A-X. So, if we
go back a few years and we look at what happened when we
thought we were going to up-ramp the F-35s, we let the F-18s
slide down. That was a risk we imagined that didn't come to
fruition, and we had to stand up the F-18 to a different
number. Yet, here we are getting ready to curtail 36 Super
Hornets because we are expecting, you know, the F/A-XX to come
online. Now, we always look to history to kind of teach us in
the future. What do you see differently here that historically
trying to get that next generation in the original timeframe
hasn't been the greatest history that gets delayed? So if you
could talk to that.
Admiral Harris. Absolutely. So, in PB-21, we did look at
the mix of fourth- and fifth-gen aircraft and then started
funding the next-gen air dominance family of systems. The F/A-
XX is the manned aircraft portion of that.
We believe in the way we have the program designed--it is
classified. We are happy to come over and talk to you at the
classified level about it. But at the UNCLASS [unclassified]
level here, we are working closely with the Air Force to ensure
that the systems that we put on that have the TRL [technology
readiness level] that gives us confidence that we can achieve
that aircraft on time in the early thirties to replace the F-
18E/F as it reaches the end of its service life.
Mr. Norcross. What is it that we are not seeing this time?
Because you made the same--not you. We made that determination
years ago, and so it cost you a lot more to stand up a line
that was dwindling. Dr. Roper.
Secretary Roper. Yes, Chairman. I appreciate you and
Ranking Member Hartzler taking that classified briefing on
next-generation air dominance.
So we are pushing ahead on the Air Force component of the
program. If you are asking why do we have hopes that things can
be different, it is exactly what Mrs. Hartzler referenced. It
is digital engineering tools coming fully into a program,
allowing us to be more agile.
So I view it as a must do. It is just as important to get
the way we build the future systems right as it is to build
those systems.
Mr. Norcross. That is the question I wanted. Thank you.
Mrs. Hartzler.
Mrs. Hartzler. Sure. My last topic here--and thank you for
being so patient and covering a lot of important areas. So this
is about the Future Vertical Lift. Let me start with you,
General Rugen. Last year, Congress provided you with an
additional $75 million to help accelerate the Future Long-Range
Assault Aircraft program.
Could you update us on how you are using these additional
funds to accelerate the program?
General Rugen. Yes, ma'am. Really, we are leveraging fully
the Joint Multi-Role Tech Demonstrator [JMRTD]. We have two
demonstrators flying now. And we are taking that demonstrator
program into a phase where we are looking at the weapon system.
So that is a higher bar, and, honestly, it is driving down the
risk of those, you know, making it more of a weapon system.
It also set the conditions for a 4-year acceleration on the
program from 2034 first unit equip to 2030. And then it is also
informing our trades analysis on our requirements, so getting
requirements that are achievable.
Secretary Jette. If I can just add.
Mrs. Hartzler. Sure.
Secretary Jette. So this is one of the things that
sometimes isn't understood. So I will just make sure it is
clear. When we did the JMRTD, you get an aircraft that has the
fundamental capability to fly to demonstrate some of the major
components of the system. But this issue of it not being a
weapon system, for example, it doesn't have--these were never
designed to be able to withstand rough landings. They weren't
designed to have the data busses that we need for combat
operations in them.
All of these things have to be built out for the aircraft.
You can either wait until you get through a very formal
development program, or you can begin funding some of those
efforts. It is the application of those funds to those type of
efforts which are actually allowing us to accelerate, because
now what we know is we are going to begin transitioning this
from simply a demonstrator to a weapon system. And we are
pursuing it on both platforms.
Mrs. Hartzler. Makes sense.
General Rudder, how is the Marine Corps participating in
the Future Vertical Lift initiative, and have you requested
funding in fiscal year 2021 budget request for this effort?
General Rudder. Yes. You know, our FVL replacement CAPSET
[capability set] 3, we are tied in with the Army. We have
actually an officer down in Huntsville participating with all
their meetings. So the Army is going a lot faster than we are.
Our replacement for the H-1 doesn't really come into play until
about 2035, but we are tracking everything that the Army is
doing and watching that.
We are also using the limited funds that we put in there. I
think you added some funds for us last year. We put about $10
million in for 2021, just to look at operating concepts,
mission survivability, and really digital operability. Much
like we are doing with our unmanned systems, we want to make
sure that we have got, within the industry model we have got
the digital and operability right. But we are tied in with the
Army in tracking this very closely as they down-select to their
next two air vehicles.
Mrs. Hartzler. Good. It looks like you want to say
something, and I was going to go back to you anyway just on the
last question regarding affordability of this platform. There
have been two studies over the last year analyzing the Future
Vertical Lift affordability. So can you walk us through the
results of the studies, explain to us what measures the Army is
taking to ensure affordability for both the Future Vertical
Lift as well as the Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft?
General Rugen. Yes, ma'am. Those two studies, one from the
Congressional Budget Office and then one from CSIS [Center for
Strategic and International Studies], really analyzed our past
20 years of historical procurement dollars. And what came out
was, with two aircraft going forward, we trended towards, from
2019 to 2050, on the procurement of our new aircraft, the lower
end of those budgets. So a lean program, a lower end of those
budgets and not a higher end.
So we also were cautioned by those two reports to maintain,
you know, vigilance over our operations and sustainment costs,
and we are doing that now. So we have five pillars of cost in
our cost-conscious culture requirements. We are picking it and
sticking it. We are not going to have the requirements creep
you have maybe seen from past aviation programs.
We also have competition. There is robust competition from
industry to win these aircraft. IP and data rights strategy, we
are part of a pathfinder program with Dr. Jette on what is
going to be our IP and data rights strategy. We have also gone
to school with external experts on past programs that maybe had
cost overruns. And then the O&S [operation and sustainment]
cost and technology that, you know, I echo Dr. Roper. We are in
the digital design environment, and that is going to impact in
a positive way our ops and sustainment cost.
Mrs. Hartzler. That is encouraging. Hopefully, you can be
an example for other application programs. Thank you.
Mr. Norcross. First of all, I want to thank you all of you
for coming, all eight of you, and certainly our staff for
prepping us for all eight.
Just a quick reminder. Our ISR is April 1st. Mr. Bacon I
know particularly, so we can do the ABMS and some more
questions along that line.
With that, we are adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 3:34 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
=======================================================================
A P P E N D I X
March 10, 2020
=======================================================================
=======================================================================
PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
March 10, 2020
=======================================================================
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
=======================================================================
QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING
March 10, 2020
=======================================================================
QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MR. BACON
Mr. Bacon. In the hearing we heard a lot about the process that the
USAF is using to pursue ABMS, but we did not hear much about specific
timelines for capability delivery. Can you provide a specific timeline
for when GMTI sensors are going to be available through ABMS to meet
these growing needs and begin replacing legacy GMTI feeds?
Secretary Roper and General Holmes. The Air Force has completed the
Advanced Battle Management System (ABMS) Moving Target Indicator (MTI)
and Battle Management Command and Control (BMC2) Analysis of
Alternatives (AOA) and released the Final Report to OSD CAPE for
sufficiency review on 3 February 2020. The ABMS MTI and BMC2 AOA
describes potential MTI capabilities, including GMTI, which is needed
for operations in highly contested environments. The DAF will use the
ABMS MTI and BMC2 AOA to develop plans for future MTI capability
development which includes timelines and impacts to legacy MTI
capabilities. The ABMS MTI and BMC2 AOA is scheduled for delivery to
Congress in June 2020. We can provide a classified briefing with the
details to Rep Bacon in the proper setting.