Building the LPD-17

Posted on | by Caroline Teames
04/27/2011

04/27/2011 – In late March 2011, prior to the christening of the LPD-24 at the Ingalls Shipyards in Pascagoula, Mississippi, Second Line of Defense interviewed the LPD 17 program manager, Doug Lounsberry.  Lounsberry provided an overview to the challenges of building this class of ship and the advantages, which the ship brings to the USN-USMC team.

SLD: Could you give us some background on the LPD 17 and the Ingalls Shipbuilding?

Lounsberry: It’s the first LPD that we built; we built other big deck Amphibs, the LHAs, the LHDs, but we never built an LPD class before.  We actually didn’t win the contract; Avondale with Bath Iron Works won the contract.  And then, in the Northrop Grumman consolidation, the intent at the time was Avondale was going to continue on with the LPDs, we were going to continue on over here with our platforms.

At the time Avondale was also finishing the Sea Lift contract and Polar tanker contracts so the decision was made based on facilities and resource availability to build some of the LPDs at Avondale and some in Pascagoula. Another driving decision was the complexity of the ship. Because of the highly automated systems on the ship, we felt we could utilize some of the Electronics expertise we had developed over the years on our surface combatant programs to help sort out some of the issues in this new class of ship we were seeing. As a result, LPD’s are being constructed at two sites. As you know, now we’re going through another big roll down in the shipbuilding industry.  It appears that we will wind down our ship construction activities at Avondale by 2013, so we will then be building all the LPDs in Pascagoula. We have two in construction in Avondale right now, LPD 23 and 25.  We just launched 23.  25 was just moved to position two; we’ll finish construction there and launch her in about 12 months or so, then about a year after that she will deliver in Avondale.



Lounsberry During the SLD Interview, March 2011

Photo Credit: SLD

SLD:   What is the current planning for the number of ships for the LPDs?

Lounsberry:  The original class was planned to be at least 12 ships. Right now we have been awarded 10 LPD’s, with LPD-26 just recently awarded to us to build.

SLD: How long does it take to go from keel to launch on a ship like this?

Lounsberry: It’s about four years right now.

SLD: And the supply chain for the ship is national?  It’s international?

Lounsberry: Actually, there are some international aspects to it.  As the Navy has sized down to significantly fewer ships  from the 600-ship fleet pursued during the Reagan era, the industrial base has shrunk along with it. Also, a lot of our suppliers, like Caterpillar have gone overseas to find more business, Caterpillar particularly is doing a lot of business over in China. So now, where the American shipbuilder used to be one of the prime customers for some of these big manufacturers, now, with fewer orders, we have to get in the manufacturing line like everyone else, and wait our turn.

We’re seeing things now that we never saw before.  For instance, on the diesel engines, we have always had a pretty long lead-time on the diesel engines, but you could get a typical long lead contract and get your engines in ahead of construction of the ship. Now, we’ve had to restructure some of that a little bit, and the Navy’s had to become a little bit more flexible.  When we went to buy the engines on LPD-25, and again on 26, we had to have advanced long lead-time material to give our engine suppliers, because they had to buy their bearings and rods from suppliers that are also serving some markets overseas, which meant longer lead time for parts for our engine suppliers and consequently longer time for the engines. So, it stretched out the length of some of these big procurements a little bit longer.  And I perhaps that’s the way business is going to be, as long as the procurement volumes are significantly reduced.

SLD: As DOD significantly reduces the platforms it buys; it is going to be a less significant buyer shaping supply chain realities.

Lounsberry: It’s very interesting if you go back and look, even 15 years ago.  When we were building a lot more ships, the availability for suppliers for components, the base was a lot bigger, that meant a lot more competition and a lot more innovation in my opinion.  In some areas, we’re down to one or two vendors now. This limits our ability to go do some things with our suppliers to get the prices down, and again, I think stifles innovation.

When we were building a lot of ships, the suppliers had to build a lot of their components to military standards. As that customer’s orders decreased, they were servicing more commercial contracts; their production lines were set up for more commercial grade products. Doing a one off mill spec item becomes a lot more expensive; and they’re not as interested.

SLD:   Have you had any single points of failure where somebody goes away right in the middle of a construction effort?

Lounsberry: Yes. When a vendor will or cannot continue to supply a product or service we have to work with another vendor to supply or take over another vendor’s business, which puts additional stresses on some of the schedules for major ship components.

SLD: And that slowed everything down?

Lounsberry: Yes, and that drove quite a bit of “work arounds” to do things out of sequence which is more expensive for us and more time consuming in delivering completed ships.

SLD:   So your folks, your workers, your engineers were going into the supply chain, in this case, and trying to shape the products that you wanted to accept.

Lounsberry: More importantly we were helping them get some of these production lines stabilized again by reviewing component schedules and working with them to incrementally accept pieces of equipment a little at a time to minimize overall impacts.

SLD: Let us focus on the ship itself.

Lounsberry: As I said earlier, this was the first LPD class that I had been involved with at this shipyard.  We built LHDs, LHAs, and at the other end of the spectrum, Destroyers and Cruisers.  It’s a well deck ship, kind of like the LHDs were, but it has different capabilities, the ship’s a lot faster and stealthier. When you look at some of the previous LSD class ships that the Navy has procured, it has a lot more warfare capability as far as command and control is concerned. I was very impressed with the first ship when I went on sea trials. I spent most of my time on Destroyers and Cruisers.  So I was expecting a very slow dull ride on sea trials. When we got LPD-17 up to speed, and did the turns, I was on the bridge, and I tell you what, you could’ve been on a cruise ship.  That’s how smooth that ship ran. And speed was not an issue for this ship. I was very pleasantly surprised.

SLD: Why?  Does it have new features or a new hull design?

Lounsberry: You can look at the ship and see that it has the RCS design on the outer hull.



The USS San Antonio Transiting the Suez Canal

Credit: US Naval Forces, 5th Fleet Public Affairs, 9/23/08

SLD:   What’s an RCS?

Lounsberry: The reduced radar cross-section, which is a design, that helps keep it less detectable by radars.

SLD:   Trying to make it less of a target.

Lounsberry: It’s harder to pick up on radar.  And I’m not a naval architect, but I can tell you that the time they spent on the hull form to make it a stable platform was well worth the time. And the ballast capability of it really impressed me too, how quickly we could ballast down and ballast back up.

SLD:   What’s the tonnage of this ship?

Lounsberry: Roughly twenty-eight thousand tons.

SLD: The yard has built destroyers and there seems to be synergy between some of your destroyer work and the LPD-17.

Lounsberry: It has a lot of the same capabilities that our Destroyer does, as far as command and control goes.  Its capabilities could be useful as a Navy command and control ship. As far as the rest of the command and control systems, the ship has very good modern state-of-the-art surveillance, navigation, and communication.



SLD’s Ed Timperlake in Front of the LPD 24 Prior to the Ship’s Christening

Photo Credit SLD 2011


SLD:   Well, let’s just focus on that for a moment, because the older ships, it was always kind of an add-on.  But here, you’ve built into the structure of the ship, the modern command and control capability.  Is that true in terms of the architecture itself?

Lounsberry: Yes. It’s part of the base ship itself.  It’s not your grandfather’s Amphibious Ship.  It could be considered, in my view, as a candidate for the lead ship of an ARG, because it has significant command and control capability.

Lounsberry: The flexibility for carrying, retaining, launching, recovering aircraft, just like you said, Ospreys, the big Hueys, the smaller helos.  As far as the Marine Corps equipment goes, the ability to carry two LCACs (Landing Craft Air Cushion class) and all their landing equipment.

SLD:  Could you service LCSs off this thing or other ships?

Lounsberry: Absolutely. It has significant fuel capability onboard. One of the concepts is the clustering of ships that can usually support each other on the logistical side also.

SLD: Let us go back to the question of the challenge of manufacturing this ship.

Lounsberry: Initially, the design was not mature, and we started construction without a final design, and as design changes were made, it would slow down construction to accommodate the changes. As I said this is a very complex warship with a lot of interfaces. We had to finish the design on the ship while we were trying to build the first two, with a third already starting construction. Because of the complexity of the ship, particularly on the electronics side, the decision was made to pull the first ship over to Pascagoula once it was seaworthy, because we had the DDG class electronic experts here from our DDG class ship. We believe we know how to do that part of the combat system electronic integration as well or better than anyone in the country.

SLD: When you inherited the ship, you had the opportunity basically to link to your destroyer experience on combat systems integration.

Lounsberry: Right.



http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/lpd17-san-antonio-class-the-usas-new-amphibious-ships-updated-02322/

SLD: You also had an opportunity to say okay, the program really needs to be recast, you need to simplify the ship, and you need to mature the design.  But maturing the design, it obviously must mean in part making some decisions that some things are just too complex for this ship, from a necessity perspective, to deliver the capability the USN wanted.

Lounsberry: Sure, a good example was eliminating signals that notified the command center that someone had activated an eyewash, not really a necessary feature and it complicates control systems by adding unnecessary signals. And also, a product like this takes a relatively long time to go through the manufacturing process. It’s critical to hit that sweet spot where the overlay from one ship to the next, so you can roll those crews from ship to ship at the appropriate phases of construction and maximize learning.  The added dimensions of increased technology meant more integration and a different approach to the construction process and how we moved those crews.

SLD: I have a sense that the drive to reduce manpower by technology also has created problems.

Lounsberry: We were talking earlier about how complex it was.  I believe early in the design with a tremendous focus on overall life cycle costs, there were decisions made to automate everything possible in order to reduce crew size. I think they may have gone a little overboard in that area as was demonstrated by the eye wash alarms. Just because technologically you can engineer something and build, doesn’t necessarily mean you should. But that’s the level of complexity driven into this design.  And we started weeding some of that out as we descoped, while not eliminating essential improvements in mission capability.

SLD: The LPD-17 seems a kind of mini-Destroyer.

Lounsberry:  I like to think of it as a Destroyer with larger muscles.

SLD: Could you describe the advantages accrued from the learning curve in building this ship.  We seem to have an approach that highlights getting the building process to the sweet spot and then stop buying the platform.

Lounsberry:  One measure of the learning curve can be seen in this way.  We have delivered five of these ships; we have four in construction right now.  Between the first ship LPD 17 end cost and the LPD-25 right now, we’ve taken 2.5 million man-hours out of the construction; we only have potentially one, maybe two more of the class to build unless something changes.

SLD: Folks also seem to forget the challenge of dealing with hurricanes and the impact on your work force and the construction challenges that has posed.

Lounsberry:  Because of the hurricanes, our workforce that remained with us was stressed and we also lost a lot of our workforce both here and at Avondale.  We ended up having to outsource units to subcontractors to do the steelwork on 22 and 23.  And that was not a very efficient way to do it, until we could build our workforce back up. We’re back up to speed now; our workforce has the experience with these ships now to really crank them out. If we could build more of these, there’s no telling where the price on this could go. We are now on a very good learning curve, which has allowed us to get the cost of these ships down.  Material costs are the material costs, the overhead costs, you can control somewhat, but vessel labor is where we can really make the biggest difference.

SLD: And the size and flexibility of these ships argues for building more.  It is also a platform, which can evolve with transformation of robotic technology. You could carry tons of robotic vehicles on these ships and deploy them.  The autonomous mine vehicle, which we discussed earlier.

Lounsberry:     There are tremendous possibilities with this platform based on its designed-in flexibility and capability.

SLD: And what about the logs and sustainment approach of the ship?

Lounsberry:  There’s a lot going on in those particular areas on this class of ship right now, the first of these ships is out in the fleet now. They have some new components that had never been deployed before and as they use some of those certain reliability problems have arisen. Typically on the first of a class of ship, you’ll build the ship completely, you’ll test it, you’ll send it out there, run it through its motions, get feedback and then use lesson learned to flow, back into the design. Because of the nature of this particular contract, there were limited opportunities to get detailed feedback early to apply to the follow ships.  So, it was four or five ships down the line, before they shook out the maintenance issues.  We are working closely with our Navy customers to get these issues ironed out and drive those improvements into the ships now under construction. We have a tremendous focus on first time quality at the shipyard and we are seeing the benefits of that also.

Right now, there’s a lot of work going on, our lead engineer right now used to be the Program Manager on this program, and is working directly with the Navy.  They’ve developed a very robust reliability model.  They’re putting in all of the components down through the piece part level for the propulsion system where they’ve had some issues.The Navy and the shipbuilder are spending a lot of time on reliability, sustainability.  The Navy is finally getting up to speed on looking at failure data and stocking up their supply system.  So that’s starting to really get momentum now.

SLD: What about the future opportunities for this ship?

Lounsberry:  As I said earlier, we seem to only have one more of these potentially in the queue, LPD-27. Unfortunately, we’re getting into that sweet spot now with these ships where we’ve ironed out a lot of the issues.  We’re on a good learning curve.  If we could keep going on these things, there’s no telling where we could take these ships relative to reductions in vessel labor, and overall improvements in operational excellence.


The ARG: A Core National Capability

Posted on | by Caroline Teames
04/20/2011

The Amphibious Ready Group: A Core National Capability

An Interview With Colonel “Ozzie” Osborn, Former 15th MEU Commander

04/20/2011 – Second Line of Defense during its interview with Colonel “Ozzie” Osborn discussed the flexibility of the Amphibious Ready Group and Marine Expeditionary Unit team. Colonel Osborn provided an overview of capabilities now in play with a disaggregate/distributed Ops ARG/MEU  and the potential expansion of those capabilities with the addition of new enablers.  These enablers are the F-35B Lighting II, the MV-22 Osprey, the CH-53K Super Stallion, the LPD-17 and robotics.  Colonel Osborn was the 15th MEU commander during its last operational deployment.


Harrier Landing on USS Kearsarge During Operation Odyssey Dawn After Night Operation

Credit: USN Visual News Service, March 20, 2011

 

Colonel Osborn: Basically, I’m a CH-46 helicopter pilot in terms of background. I’ve deployed both on the west coast and east coasts.  And I started off with everything from the Alaska oil cleanup to Desert Shield/Desert Storm to Operation Iraqi Freedom.  I flew missions during the race riots in LA back in the early 90s.I was in Somalia in 93/94; we got there 14 days after Black Hawk Down and spent four and a half months in Mogadishu.

SLD:   That’s a lot of time.

Colonel Osborn: It was a very long time.  I have flown missions in support of the liberation of Kosovo and in OIF I.  In OIF II, I was an ACE commander for 24th MEU in Iraq and then came back to the fleet as a MEU commander. I’ve done just about everything you can do, amphibious operations wise, and a term that we’ve kind of coined now- which is Sea-based Expeditionary Operations. The concept now is that you take the seabase, and whether the sea base is a big deck carrier, or whether it’s an LHA, or an LHD, or it could be something as small as an LCS.  It’s a sea base and you conduct expeditionary ops from that base.

SLD:   You are therefore operating in modular terms and you’re tailoring to the mission.

Colonel Osborn: We focus upon multi-mission capabilities.  Every platform out there has to be multi-mission.  It cannot be single-mission. That doesn’t mean that you have to be able to do every mission 100-percent.  But you need to be able to do a significant percentage of every mission that’s out there. With the last deployment of the 15th MEU, I went out completely old school.  I had CH-46s, which is the core for the ACE, I had AV8B Harriers, a mix of Night Attack and Radar Birds.  I had Whiskey Cobras, I had November Hueys, and I had three of them.  I had CH-53 Echoes. The only new piece of gear in the ACE that we had, really two new pieces of gear, we were the first ones to go out with an ACE COC, a CapSet for the ACE.  I could actually send the ACE to a separate environment, and they’ve got their own command and control capability.  And I had KC-130Js, I had two of those assigned to the MEU. Every one of my major subordinate elements, my MSEs, the BLT, the CLB and the ACE, had the ability to operate as an independent command and control headquarters, separate from the MEU and independent from the ships.

We focus upon multi-mission capabilities.  Every platform out there has to be multi-mission.  It cannot be single-mission. That doesn’t mean that you have to be able to do every mission 100-percent.  But you need to be able to do a significant percentage of every mission that’s out there. With the last deployment of the 15th MEU, I went out completely old school.  I had CH-46s, which is the core for the ACE, I had AV8B Harriers, a mix of Night Attack and Radar Birds.  I had Whiskey Cobras, I had November Hueys, and I had three of them.  I had CH-53 Echoes. The only new piece of gear in the ACE that we had, really two new pieces of gear, we were the first ones to go out with an ACE COC, a CapSet for the ACE.  I could actually send the ACE to a separate environment, and they’ve got their own command and control capability.  And I had KC-130Js, I had two of those assigned to the MEU. Every one of my major subordinate elements, my MSEs, the BLT, the CLB and the ACE, had the ability to operate as an independent command and control headquarters, separate from the MEU and independent from the ships.

We brought extra SWAN-Ds, which are our new satellite link systems.  We also had a small suitcase portable type satellite communication systems – BGANs.  And we brought extra generators. We really went out with a distributed ops mentality. As 24th MEU ACE in OIF II, I had half of my command at Camp Kalsu 55 miles away from the main ACE command at Al Taqaddum in a stand alone position.  I had another chunk of my command at Al Assad.  So distributed Ops was not new for me. But it was distributed ops the hard way; the separate chunks of the commands had no Combat Operations Center (COC) capability.

All we had were laptop computers that we normally had in Garrison.  But we had no radios and no telephones.  I didn’t even have an Iridium phone as an ACE commander.  I had no way to hook up any of the nets or anything like that.  And so, we had to beg, borrow, steal and tag in on other assets – not the way you want to operate . I would never again want to go out with a unit that could be distributed and not have the ability to link.  So, when we started really looking hard at 15th MEU, that was one of the core items we focused on.  I wanted to be able to do distributed ops across as much of the battle space as I could.

SLD:   So, you visualized the technology necessary to accomplish that.  Now, with the evolution of the V-22 and maybe the K, and the ability to drop in further, farther, faster, that just comes together?

Colonel Osborn: It absolutely comes together, and it’s even bigger than that.  We’ve classically defined the littorals as about 200 miles but the littorals are as deep as you can go.  The ARG/MEU had assets that were operating in Northern Pakistan with the operational airbase 650 nautical miles feet dry.

SLD:   And we kick around the term enduring littoral operations. Increasingly, you’re going to have to get engaged for counter-piracy and you might move to something else.  And you may need to assemble assets that are going to be there for 60-90 days. So now, the question is how do you manage such a situation?

Colonel Osborn: One of the questions that keeps getting asked to me was how do you do C2?  And how do you manage this?  Well, you don’t.  And that’s the fundamental thing.  Get away from the idea that you have to manage everything. You’ve got to get to the point where you operate with trust tactics. But you’ve also got to get to the point where you can shift assets to the greatest need, and you can balance the risk versus the gain.  If I pull an asset off from here, can I shift it to there?  And can I get it there quickly.  That’s where the range, speed, and payload of the V-22 and the KC-130J come into play — and in my case, it was KC-130J.  That’s how I really expanded my battle space. If I’d had V-22s, I would’ve been able to do the mission easier, faster and with less risk.  That’s just a fundamental bottom line.  You can draw the charts and you can actually show that.  Speed, range, and payload become overwhelming factors when you are operating well over 200 nautical miles from the seabase.

(…) how do you do C2?  And how do you manage this?  Well, you don’t.  And that’s the fundamental thing.  Get away from the idea that you have to manage everything. You’ve got to get to the point where you operate with trust tactics. But you’ve also got to get to the point where you can shift assets to the greatest need, and you can balance the risk versus the gain.  If I pull an asset off from here, can I shift it to there?  And can I get it there quickly.  (…) You can draw the charts and you can actually show that.  Speed, range, and payload become overwhelming factors when you are operating well over 200 nautical miles from the seabase.

SLD:   Well now, if we just hover on this point, when you have the Osprey and the F-35B, it’s going to affect the decision-making choices you’re going to be able to make.

Colonel Osborn: Absolutely, especially in how intelligence impacts your decisions. The capabilities of the Osprey and F35 dramatically expand the real and potential battlespace for the ARG/MEU. We have for years, gone with the idea that we do intelligence operations where we collect and process intelligence.  Mission and intel drive the operation based upon the capability of the platforms you are using.  We need to do operational intelligence, which is I need to know everything’s that going on. But what I need to know from an operator’s point of view is I need to know the intelligence that impacts this mission.  And so, I need to be able to take that intelligence and not turn it into some PowerPoint brief that sits up at the head shed.  That intel has to be  given to the shooter.

SLD:   That’s very Marine, Colonel.

Colonel Osborn: As an example, I wanted live video feed during the counter-piracy mission where we took the MV Magellan Star back from the Somali pirates.  I wanted live video feed for overall command and control, but more importantly to the Assault Force Team Leads in the boats.  When they are about 500 meters out, heading in to take that ship down, they need control of the ISR asset and the ability to see the target.

SLD: It’s basically a flying telescope.

Colonel Osborn: That’s exactly what it is.  And it’s a flying telescope that has three-dimensional view.

SLD:   So essentially, what you’re describing is trying to have modular C2, appropriate to the command level.  We’re trying to evolve ISR that’s also appropriate to the command level or operationally.  And if we can get to this point where we’re delivering to the tip of the spear.  Because we don’t care about the guys hundreds of miles back or somewhere in Nevada, are really smart about overall situational awareness.  It’s irrelevant.

Colonel Osborn: That’s right. In higher-level command, I got it.  You’ve got to have the big battle picture. But when you’re looking at where it really gets down to the success of the mission, especially in the modern battlefield environment where one single sailor, soldier, airman or Marine shoots the wrong dog or the wrong water buffalo, and it makes international news, it changes the entire strategic picture. So what you’ve got now is you need to make sure that down to that fire team level, down to that individual saying “you and you shoot that building, or hey, F-18, F-35, F-16 take out that building”.

 

An MH-60S Sea Hawk helicopter takes off from the amphibious assault ship USS Peleliu with a pallet of ammunition. Peleliu is underway off the coast of Southern California conducting an ammunition offload and transfer with the amphibious assault ship USS Makin Island.

Credit: USN Visual Service, March 16, 2011

SLD:   Where should the D on that be, Colonel?

Colonel Osborn: I’m a much bigger fan of pushing decisions down as far as you can.  You provide the guidance, you provide the mission, you provide the parameters, and you provide the support from higher command levels. But let the guy on the ground execute.

SLD:   Right.  And that’s why from my point of view, the F-35B fits the Marine Corps perfectly…

Colonel Osborn: Well, they’re living it in the F-22 right now.  The F-22 is kicking butt as a Fifth generation fighter when it comes to capability.  The F-35B will give the amphibious forces that Fifth generation capability to include stealth and a host of other capabilities.  Command and control across the battlespace becomes even more sophisticated and at times challenging.

SLD: How then would you use the AWACS?

Colonel Osborn: Here’s what I like about AWACS type capability from the view of our recent deployment, having lived this in Pakistan… So many of the places that we operate in the world do not have a radar capable ATC system.  Pakistan has a very good one, down to about 2,000 feet AGL.  So anything below 2,000 feet is flying without radar support.  That’s what an AWACS type system can do especially in a Joint/Combined operation.  If the AWACS did nothing more than tell you Dragon 01, you got a flight of six, at your one o’clock at 5 miles.  It’s a safety of flight thing. But it’s a very expensive safety of flight.  It is a different picture and challenge when operating with stealth and UAV aircraft at higher altitudes.

SLD: So you took a typical MEU with old equipment.

Colonel Osborn: Right now, it’s the current pattern for the west coast MEUs, and it’s what we called an old school MEU.  Plus we fit aboard those three amphibs, and strangely enough, that’s the smallest square footage of embark space you can get with any three amphibs.  When you take the LHA with the model of LPD and LSD that we had.  We had the smallest embarkable footprint. So we left a lot of equipment at home. We had to prioritize the multi-mission capable assets. If it wasn’t multi-mission, I didn’t take it.  So, I left things like the armored seven-ton, the Armadillo.  I left those at home; because it has one mission.  It’s an armored bus.  I didn’t want an armored bus, I needed a truck.  So you follow that mentality. We also trained as an aggregate force during our normal workup.  We trained as a three-ship operating together within relative distance of each other, line of sight most of the time.  We trained where our deepest operations were about 140 miles, 150 miles deep.  That was our training package.  That’s a standard MEU workup-training package. We were tasked to be the Proof of Concept for the re-introduction of the visit, board, search and seizure (VBSS) mission.  So we coined a new phrase, the Maritime Raid Force.  And we shaped a Maritime Raid Force Capability.

We were tasked to be the Proof of Concept for the re-introduction of the visit, board, search and seizure (VBSS) mission.  So we coined a new phrase, the Maritime Raid Force.  And we shaped a Maritime Raid Force Capability.

 

The Navy does VBSS, level 1 and level 2 they call it, which is unopposed, basically, they’re Coast Guard type actions.  They pull up alongside a ship that they want to talk to.  Ask them hey, can we come aboard?  They say yes, you can board, you snoop around, and you collect information. But the Navy does this with all of their smaller ships, they do it with all of their destroyers, they also do it with all of the small deck amphibs. The mission that we picked up is between that level and the true special operations mission. It’s an integrated Navy/Marine Corps package, the assault boats that we use to go take the ships down are Naval Special Warfare boats.  They are SEAL RHIBs.And the Navy runs those.  The shadowing ship, the ship that we launch from is a Navy ship.  We also put a Marine sniper team on the bridge wing of that ship.  And he provides fixed fire coverage.  We also put aircraft on that ship; I put Hueys and Cobras on that ship.  They provided my heavy firepower with the Cobra.  Command and control, ISR and also some offset firepower with a sniper was provided by the Huey.

So, you take a target ship, which is what we did with the MV Magellan Star, the ship that we recovered from the pirates. When we pulled in, the USS PRINCETON was on the station, and was watching the ship.  The USS DUBUQUE got into position, which was our Maritime Raid Force launch platform that we had set up.  We had four assault RHIBs on the USS DUBUQUE. I had a team from the MEU command element embedded with these guys.  And we had ships personnel that were trained in all the follow on actions.  The question is always what will you do when you capture the ship and all that? So that’s the ship control team.


A sailor aboard the amphibious dock landing ship USS Tortuga guides a Japan Ground Self-Defense Force truck carrying humanitarian supplies into the well deck of the ship. Tortuga is transporting the equipment to support Operation Tomodachi, a humanitarian assistance mission in the aftermath of a 9.0 magnitude earthquake and subsequent tsunami.

Credit: USN Visual Service, March 16, 2011

 

SLD: What impact would the new capabilities have had if they were deployed with the MEU?

Colonel Osborn: Modern piracy is more about holding the ship hostage for ransom, whereas in days of old, it was to ransack the ship, take whatever you could off that you could do for booty, and cut the throats of the people onboard, throw them over the side and keep going.  That’s not the way they do it now.  Nowadays, it is a pure business. Piracy in Malaysia, back in the 90’s, was more capturing boats and then turning them into illegal trafficking platforms.  They’d capture large yachts; they would capture small freighters and all that.  The stuff that’s going on now off the coast of Somalia — and to some extent off the coast of Nigeria with oil platforms as well, and there’s a couple other places around the world where it happens. They’re capturing ships, because they know that the insurance money that the ship has on it is huge. When we were over there, there were about 14 ships that were being held by Somalia pirates, with about 150 people.  So this is a growth industry; a very lucrative growth industry. And the trick is that the pirates are getting more aggressive and they’re getting more dangerous.  So what the Navy and the Marine Corps really came up with was a potential operational solution.  We needed the ability to do an opposed boarding.

We look at this as two stages of opposition to the boarding.  You have active opposition and passive opposition.  Passive is the guys are just not letting you get onboard but they’re not really doing anything to stop you.The active opposition can take the form of truly offensive, or it can just be denial.  And the truly offensive is what we train to.  The guy’s standing there with a weapon, and he’s just got the weapon in his hand, that’s an opposed boarding.  If he raises the weapon to his shoulder, that’s offensive and he dies, instantly.  And that’s the way our ROE was written.

ROE became our guidance when you pull the trigger on a guy. Finding that target ties directly to future capabilities.  The F-35B and other platforms with a robust ISR/C2 capability could be used to cue the assault force well before reaching the target.  We tried this with our Harriers and the Navy MH-60s.  It worked very well in training.  But at the time of the MV Magellan Star takedown, those assets were a thousand miles away conducting other missions.  We used the Hueys and Cobras to provide that lethal C2 and ISR coverage, but not as integrated with the Assault Force as we would have liked it to be. The counter piracy mission is very law enforcement oriented, and the rules of evidence fully apply.  We actually have a law enforcement guy that would go aboard the ships as well.  So you actually follow all the rules of evidence, you actually collect fingerprints and other materials. This is the world we operate in.The Maritime Raid Force that we trained up for this had that same tasking as if that was not a ship, but was a shore facility.  It could be a take down on an oil refinery that’s on the coastline. We could do it.  That’s what the Maritime Raid Force was built around.

The F-35B and other platforms with a robust ISR/C2 capability could be used to cue the assault force well before reaching the target.  We tried this with our Harriers and the Navy MH-60s.  It worked very well in training.  But at the time of the MV Magellan Star takedown, those assets were a thousand miles away conducting other missions.  We used the Hueys and Cobras to provide that lethal C2 and ISR coverage, but not as integrated with the Assault Force as we would have liked it to be. The counter piracy mission is very law enforcement oriented, and the rules of evidence fully apply.

SLD: And this is also a useful tool for embassy rescue and embassy support and that sort of thing?

Colonel Osborn: Absolutely. The way you look embassy reinforcement is it’s a raid.  It has limited objectives and limited duration.

SLD:   So, you took one of your three ships, which was the mother ship for offloading the raiding force.

Colonel Osborn: It was also  a fire support platform- the ship that they were taking out was dead in the water – the USS DUBUQUE was parked about 300 meters away and had a Marine sniper team on the bridge wing, looking at the target ship. And you also had all the gun mounts on the USS DUBUQUE manned as well, with marines and sailors.  So you have 50 cal and 25 millimeter guns.  Plus the fact that you’ve got a Cobra loaded to the teeth that’s sitting there right off the shoulder pointing at you.  And you’ve got a Huey overhead, and you can see a Marine hanging out overhead with the sniper rifle.

SLD:   Well, let’s look at just this mission for a moment, and fast-forward, you have Bs and Ospreys.  How would they contribute in this particular mission?

Colonel Osborn: I wanted to use the sensors on my Harriers, my Hueys, and my Cobras.  I could not do it, because we haven’t bought the capability.  The Harrier and the Huey have a tremendous sensor on them.  But I can’t get that imagery live that the pilot is seeing on his display to the shooter in the assault boat.And I want the guy in the boat to be able to tell the shooter up high, the Harrier, hey, I got it.  I can see the guy behind the bridge wing right there.  And I’m telling you, we’re looking at the target through the same binoculars, and that’s not an RPG.  That’s an SA14.  Okay change in mission and change in risk. Now our threat factor’s gone up.  And so, what you do is you tie the shooter on the ground — sensor on the ground — to the sensor shooter in the air.  And your ROE switches over from “is this a viable target to take out with a surface force?  Or do I need to do some prep fires or do I need some precision fire?”

We haven’t bought the amphibious and aviation communications needed to do this.  That’s the biggest limitation we’ve got right now.  Overall amphibious comms is one of the biggest limiting factors.  Compared with what I have aboard the big deck, if I go ashore with my command element, I have more connectivity and capability with my command element ashore.  I actually have more with my organic ground based assets, than all three ships added together. And we’re not taking this aircraft and back channeling it back into the amphibs.  This aircraft (F-35B) is going to bring a huge capability for C4ISR delivered to the raiding party.  It’s going to sit inside the cockpit, rather than work it from the (Amphib) ship.

SLD:   This is potentially a breakthrough platform for the Navy/Marine Corps for the 21st century. I want to go back to your Harrier point.  And one of the things I’m struck with is that you take this 360-degree operational aircraft with flying situational awareness. The tip of spear guy is using a 360-degree telescope.  And the jamming capability of the F-35B is important as well.

Colonel Osborn: You want to shut them down, but you don’t want to shut them down the whole Middle East, you want to shut down that one ship. I need a platform out there that not only can see, and not only can talk, but that whenever the guy on the assault boat says okay, we’re about to unmask behind the mother ship that could take these guys down, turn off their stuff via electronic jamming.

SLD:   Can you talk about the ability to inject force and the options this gives the National Command Authority.

Colonel Osborn: The seabased raiding party concept can allow significant flexibility.  You can go where the enemy is not. You’ve got the raid; escalate the mission into something where it’s some kind of power projection or something like that. As you elevate the presence of a Marine into a combat zone, as you say, the scope of operation just goes wide and deep.

SLD: Right.  And parked where the enemy can’t get at you for the first round.  In other words, everybody’s arguing the Marine Corps is irrelevant, because they haven’t had opposed landings.  My argument is they have been too smart to have opposed landings and go where they’re not opposed so they can prevail.

Colonel Osborn: And I lived the greatest example of that all around.  Desert Storm.  I was part of the amphibious taskforce that was sitting off the coast of Kuwait that was causing Saddam to put a layered defense all up and down the Kuwaiti coast.  The LZ that we were going to land in on D-Day in Kuwait was high risk.  For the LZ, our projected losses were going to be a quarter of the helicopters across the beach would not come back out.

That was the projected loss rate.  I mean, we had all the mine countermeasure stuff, we looked at everything we could do to get in, and try to insert forces in the backside, the breakout and all that.  Thankfully, it was a ruse, and it was a very successfully played on, because what we really did was we loaded up the Marines on the beach down in Saudi Arabia, and then we punched him in the nose and ran over him from a completely different direction.That is a great example of what we will probably do in any future conflict.  It is stupid to go against the bad guy’s strength.  That’s why in a huge debate that goes on between the Navy and the rest of the world about going against the Chinese, it’s always about strength versus strength.  You never go against strength.  You find the weakness.  Every situation has a weak point.  And you insert the flexible force, which is the ARG.

SLD: In effect the ARG can become the hub of operations across the spectrum of warfare and capabilities in support of both hard and soft power.  In fact, the modern MEU can perhaps even redefine the vortex between soft and hard power.

Colonel Osborn: The MEU is based on a mobile sea-base.  As such, the seabase can provide the hospitals, the command control, the R&R place, etc.  It’s a city with an airport on top of it and more.But the real key for me is that we can go from high-end time sensitive targeting type stuff, which is one of our core missions to missions like flood relief – all on the same day.  It is the flexibility of the ARG to support the national command authority, which is central to understanding why modernizing the ARG is so important to the nation.

 

F35B in Flight

Credit: Lockheed Martin

 

SLD: Let us speak the modernization piece.

Colonel Osborn: When we were parked off of Pakistan, I was launching the Harriers 450 nautical miles inland into Afghanistan, providing CAS  (close air support) over Afghanistan and then bring them back out.  They were plugged in fully and they’d execute operations and then come out.This is from an amphib.  We did 525 flight hours in just under 60 days on 6 jets.  The first use of the GBU-54 by Naval air was the Harriers from the big deck amphib.  Could I have done more with an F-35B?  Oh absolutely.  Not only could I have carried more ordinance, I could’ve got there faster and with less risk. F-35B would’ve kicked in the door. We would be able to plug in completely to the other services and provide the warfighter with the best support available. Asset allocation is also a big discussion, but for the rifleman on point – who cares whether it’s owned by the Air Force, the Army or the Navy. We don’t care. Higher headquarters has  to facilitate operations in that battle space.  And they cannot be an impediment to operations.

And that’s one of the reasons why in our mind, the F-35, the V-22 and some of these others, expand our battle space dramatically. But what it also does is, is it now forces the other services, both in the Air Force and in the Navy and in the Army, and also forces international partners to realize that the battle space is no longer what you can see from the ship.  It is no longer that 100 miles out, it’s no longer that 200 miles out.  It’s truly as far as you want to fly. Six hundred and fifty miles inland and it’s supportable.  Logistics and sustainment –  doing it old school – which was we’d fly stuff via helo from ship to shore.  Put it on a KC-130J and fly up to Northern Pakistan to conduct operations. That’s how we did sustainment and its very hard to do.  If I had V-22s, I would have been flying straight to the operations area from the ship.I f I would’ve had the F-35B, instead of having to take the ship off station and push it 90 miles offshore so they could get into the box where they’d launch at the boulevard for the Harriers, I could’ve launched them right off the coast of Pakistan, where we were off of Karachi.  Because of the range, speed and performance of the F-35B. The emerging capabilities of the MV-22 and the future capabilities of the F-35B reduce the commander’s risk and you make his mission simpler by expanding his capabilities from the platform’s he’s got.  And that’s the win-win moneymaker.

That’s one of the reasons why in our mind, the F-35, the V-22 and some of these others, expand our battle space dramatically. But what it also does is, is it now forces the other services, both in the Air Force and in the Navy and in the Army, and also forces international partners to realize that the battle space is no longer what you can see from the ship.  It is no longer that 100 miles out, it’s no longer that 200 miles out.  It’s truly as far as you want to fly. Six hundred and fifty miles inland and it’s supportable.  Logistics and sustainment –  doing it old school – which was we’d fly stuff via helo from ship to shore.  Put it on a KC-130J and fly up to Northern Pakistan to conduct operations. That’s how we did sustainment and its very hard to do.  If I had V-22s, I would have been flying straight to the operations area from the ship.I f I would’ve had the F-35B, instead of having to take the ship off station and push it 90 miles offshore so they could get into the box where they’d launch at the boulevard for the Harriers, I could’ve launched them right off the coast of Pakistan, where we were off of Karachi.  Because of the range, speed and performance of the F-35B. The emerging capabilities of the MV-22 and the future capabilities of the F-35B reduce the commander’s risk and you make his mission simpler by expanding his capabilities from the platform’s he’s got.  And that’s the win-win moneymaker.

Exercise Iron Fist Amphibious Training

Posted on | by Caroline Teames
04/02/2011

04/02/2011 – Marines with 1st Reconnaissance Battalion, Alpha Company participate in amphibious training as part of Exercise Iron Fist aboard Camp Pendleton, Calif., Feb. 16. Marines are participating in the bilateral training to advance their amphibious knowledge.

Credit: 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit, 2/17/11

Remembering 9/11: Christening the USS Arlington

Posted on | by Caroline Teames
03/27/2011

By Robbin Laird and Ed Timperlake

 

03/27/2011 – At a somber ceremony remembering the attack on the Pentagon, the World Trade Center and the fatal crash in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, officials gathered to christen the USS Arlington on March 26, 2011.  The event included Arlington County officials, members of families who had lost kin in the Pentagon attack, and USN, USMC and shipyard officials and workers.  The LPD-17 class will include ships named for the three sites where terrorists brought home to the United States the global conflagration, which has been called the war on terror.

The SLD team had a chance to meet a man and his wife who symbolized the American experience.  He was a Vietnam combat veteran, with eight close friends whose names are forever on The Vietnam Veterans Memorial. Tragically he and his wife were present to honor lost family members including two very young children when they were aboard the fatal American Airlines jet.  Seeing such a man brought home the loss, which Americans had that day. Indeed, this man symbolized for us the need and importance of American global engagement to reduce threats to the American homeland and to the continued American engagement to work with friends and allies to contain the terrorist challenge.

A key presentation was by Major General James Kessler, Commander USMC Logistics Command. The General provided a hard-hitting reminder of the commitment of the USN and USMC team to engage globally and to provide security for Americans. The General emphasized that for the USMC, after many years engaged in land wars, the Corps was returning to the sea.  He emphasized the growing significance of the littoral mission as global population and economic activity shifted to the littorals. And he underscored that the new LPD-17 would be at the heart of an expanded capability for the USN and USMC team.  He underscored the flexibility of this ship in supporting the spectrum of engagements, ranging from humanitarian to combat operations.

It was fitting on a day in which the USN-USMC Amphibious Ready Groups are in action worldwide from the Shores of Tripoli, with our Fleet in the Indian Ocean, to the Sea of Japan, the USS Arlington was christened. Those global commitments are the backdrop to the importance of giving the fleet new capabilities. With a complement of over 800 Marines, the USS Arlington and the sister ships in the class will stand ready off any coast.  It has the ability to take aboard or launch two MV-22 Ospreys at the same time and can carry five. The MV-22 is a revolutionary aircraft that can project forces quickly inland to establish combat presence. Four Medium lift Ch-46s can operate and soon heavy lift CH-53Ks and Zulu Cobras can complement an airborne strike package.

Two Landing Craft Air Cushion vehicles can leave the USS Arlington with a range of 200 miles at 40 KTs. It is far to say this ship will project Marines firepower ashore on the beach, over the beach or inland.  USMC Infantry riflemen will have significant supporting organic firepower and continuous logistical resupply to seize any objective. The USS Arlington has state-of-the art communication capabilities to reach out to both all ships in an Amphibious Readiness Groups and also reach back to Carrier Battle Groups supporting littoral combat engagements. In fact, there is currently a potential evolving tactical synergy between these new LSDs to work in concert with the new Littoral Combat Ship class. No one at the ceremony can predict today the full range of future capabilities.

But it has design features to embrace the entire spectrum of emerging technology, from linking to the USMC F-35B, to being a platform for the robotic revolution to launching UAS systems. The USS Arlington has the deck space and hull capacity to become a really integrated and effective ship for the “Gator Navy. The investment in this ship will be repaid many times over in the decades of service, which it and its crew will provide.  And the capabilities deployed in two years when it enters service will bear little relation to what will be placed on it decks in 30 years.  This is why investments in a multi-purpose ship makes such great sense, for the USN-USMC team and for the nation.

 

Lybia: The Need To Be “Ready Now”

Posted on | by Caroline Teames
03/23/2011
||||||

USN-USMC “Ready Now” Capabilities

By Ed Timperlake

03/23/2011 – An old saying comes to mind when looking at the UN action against Quaddafi  and Libya—“Act in Haste, Repent at Leisure.” Regardless of the outcome, some very important 21st Century military lessons learned are already being seen. The USMC for over two decades kept the visionary flame of the need for unique capabilities of the MV-22 Osprey burning. In Afghanistan, it has been a potential war tipping technology and in today’s headlines in the Libyan “adventure” a life savor.



As a fellow Marine Fighter Pilot said to me about rescuing pilots who go down- “I can remember a brief to my squadron (VMFA-451) two days before the start of Desert Storm by a SEAL who had to be all of 21-22 years old, telling us how HE was gonna get US out if we got bagged. This is why US pilots walk confidently to their planes and their competitors may decline to launch; US Marines, USAF PJs, and US Navy SEALs.” With the success of the USMC “TRAP” (Tactical recovery of Aircraft and Personnel) operation to rescue an Air Force pilot on the ground, the 26th MEU time line and distance flown by the MV-22 and AV-8 Harriers is impressive.  Let us review the operational timeline of this effort.


With the success of the USMC “TRAP” (Tactical recovery of Aircraft and Personnel) operation to rescue an Air Force pilot on the ground, the 26th MEU time line and distance flown by the MV-22 and AV-8 Harriers is impressive.

Timeline

Ø 2333B 21 Mar:  USAF F-15E goes down, pilot and WSO eject safely

Ø 0050B: 22 Mar: 2xAV-8Bs launch USS Kearsarge (KSG)

Ø 0055B: JFACC approvesTRAP

Ø 0120B: MEU KC-130J launch Sigonella IOT refuel TRAP aircraft

Ø 0120B: AV-8Bs overhead downed pilots with F-16 in comm with F-15 pilot.

Ø 0130B: (quick reaction force) QRF 2xCH53E ready for launch with 46 Marines

Ø 0133B: AV-8Bs drop 2xGBU-12 ISO F-15 pilot

Ø 0133B: 2xMV-22s launch KSG

Ø 0151B: QRF (CH-53E) launch KSG

Ø 0219B: MV-22s overhead F-15 Pilot

Ø 0238B: MV-22 lands LZ recovers F-15 Pilot

Ø 0300B: MV-22s recover KSG with F-15 Pilot

Ø WSO reported in-hands of opposition forces at safe house.


Recently, senior policymakers have called into question the need for Marine Amphibious Ready Groups (ARGs) and also put the USMC F-35B “on probation”. But reality has a quality all of its own, even within inside the Beltway considerations.

Current combat has just demonstrated that not only did the USN/USMC capabilities in the Libyan fight save a pilot but they also are ready to live up to a famous  US Navy World War I quote.  When a US Navy Destroyer Squadron crossed the Atlantic and joined with the Royal Navy the US Commander was asked when his Destroyer Squadron would be ready–

“Vice Admiral Sir Lewis Bayly, asked Squadron Commander Taussig that question and he replied, ” We are ready now, Sir.”

Currently, from the deck of the USS Kearsarge and other ships off Libya, the America Navy battle cry of “ready now” is being heard. The importance of that battle cry cannot be overstated.  Because of recent political squabbling, and independent of the fact that forces are already engaged in combat, current air operations against Libya from Italian Bases might be aborted.

“The squabbling continued as Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini again threatened to take back complete control of Italian airbases if NATO did not take the reins of the mission.” [1]

So in addition to keeping faith in the Osprey, the USMC should pause to give an additional thanks to the UK for V/STOL Harrier– which the Brits unfortunately just retired –  and now on to take the  F-35B V/STOL off probation. The MV-22, with the coming F-35B and Marine helo modernization, “Zulu Cobras” and CH-53K, along with Marine Infantry and their combined arms will put a true 21st Century  US “sovereign territory” force off any coast in the world.

Currently, today’s 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit might prove to be an invaluable military capability to shape American capabilities to get out of the Libyan mess.


———

Footnote

[1] http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/europe/03/22/libya.nato.squabbling/

New U.S. National Security Space Strategy

Posted on | by Caroline Teames
03/22/2011

New U.S. National Security Space Strategy Proposes New Partnerships

By Dr. Richard Weitz

03/22/2011 – The new approach expounded in the National Security Space Strategy released by the Obama administration in early February could, if implemented, affect a number of SLD readers, including the military logistics community, industrial players, and civilian contractors, as well as anyone interested in how U.S. military space public-private partnerships are evolving. It could affect evolving allied relationships as well.

 

The 2009 National Defense Authorization Act directed the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) and the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) to conduct a joint and comprehensive Space Posture Review (SPR). The Review was conducted in close consultation with other agencies and partners. OSD and ODNI waited until after the release of the more comprehensive U.S. National Space Policy (NSP) in June 2010, which reversed several positions advocated in the 2006 version, before finalizing and releasing the new National Security Space Strategy (NSSS), which provides the overarching guidance requested by Congress.

In addition to the NSP, the NSSS draws guidance from the White House National Security Strategy (NSS), the Department of Defense’s Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR), and the Intelligence Community’s National Intelligence Strategy. Only an unclassified summary was released on February 4. The classified version, which was sent to Congress the day before, is four pages longer. According to the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space Policy Gregory Schulte, who briefed the media on the day of the public release, “there are no surprises in the classified version.” The NSSS produced in the George W. Bush administration was never publicly released.The NSSS stresses how outer space is becoming ever more important for U.S. national interests, and is crucial for U.S. military operations and intelligence collection.

The Pentagon uses space-based assets for communications, reconnaissance, navigation, targeting, and other core military activities, while satellites provide vital information to the U.S. intelligence community. These assets are essential for important U.S. national security missions including conducting combat operations, verifying arms control agreements, analyzing foreign defense developments, and monitoring long-term environmental conditions. The Pentagon’s commercial, civil, and foreign partners also rely on unfettered access to space for economic, scientific, and international missions that benefit the United States. The Pentagon relies on commercial satellites for much of its communications and imagery, especially in Afghanistan.

Photo Credit: Growth in Global Space Sat Traffic, NSSS, page 1

The NSSS directs major changes in how the U.S. government approaches several space issues. “The National Security Space Strategy represents a significant departure from past practice,” Robert Gates announced in the public release. “It is a pragmatic approach to maintain the advantages we derive from space while confronting the new challenges we face.” SLD readers will be most interested in how the NSSS aims to transform U.S. space-related acquisition and export policies as well as renewed the U.S space industrial base.In terms of space acquisition reform, the NSSS envisages a robust, competitive, flexible, and healthy space industrial base that delivers reliable space capabilities on time and on budget. In various briefings around Washington, U.S. officials have agreed with various SLD critiques that the current practice of pursuing inconsistent acquisition and production rates and long development cycles have weakened the U.S. space industrial base.

The decrease in specialized suppliers could deny the U.S. access to critical technologies, make the U.S. dependent on foreign sources, and weak U.S. innovative potential. DoD and IC satellites that have been developed in the past decade have cost billions more and been delayed years in terms of delivery.Frequent changes in government requirements, such as to introduce new technologies or to decrease volume of purchases, frequently increase costs and delay schedules.  These problems were epitomized by the high-profile cancellation in 2009 of the Air Force’s planned Transformational Satellites (TSAT), which was designed to revolutionize satellite communications, due to their high costs and technical delays.The NSS proposes various solutions to stabilize acquisition and requirements-generation processes. The Defense Department will increase its own space acquisition workforce by hiring 9,000 new employees and converting 11,000 contractors to federal service in the next five years. The intent is to strengthen in-house expertise in cost estimation, systems engineering, and program management.

The NSS will also employ a more holistic view of the space industrial base by expanding reliance on commercial and foreign suppliers. For example, U.S.-based DigitalGlobe and GeoEye each have contracts under the EnhancedView program to provide remote-sensing data to the U.S. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency.In addition, the U.S. government is considering paying commercial satellite operators to host government payloads. Using private launchers gives the government flexibility to deploy a payload on a satellite close to launch. DoD leaders also seek to increase transparency between government and industry through more dialogue and meetings. This can open up a whole new approach to dealing with entities such as Space X or Arianespace.

The NSS also states that the Defense Department will improve the way its sets requirements by adding configuration steering boards to help stabilize requirements early on in the acquisition cycle, relying more on independent cost estimates for developing programs and fixed-price contracts for programs in execution phase, and imposing discipline by canceling programs that are no longer needed, will cost too much, or are not working technically.Other space acquisition reforms will include better managing investments across portfolios to ensure the industrial base can sustain critical technologies and skills.

In addition, the Defense Department will shorten development cycles to minimize delays, cut cost growth, and enable more rapid technology maturation, innovation, and exploitation. Furthermore, DoD will synchronize the planning, programming, and execution of major space acquisition programs with other DoD and IC processes. One major change will be that the Defense Department will pursue transformational capabilities only when necessary. The U.S. government will complement the development of satellites with revolutionary technology with smaller, less expensive satellites that can be developed and launched more rapidly. They will only provide incremental capability improvements, but they will avoid the high expense and high risks of revolutionary systems that can often fail (e.g., TSAT).

This new approach is reflected in the administration’s new Evolutionary Acquisition for Space Efficiency (EASE) Initiative. This initiative will rely on block rather than unique buys, fixed-price rather than cost-plus contracts (which require the government to pay for any overruns), and technology infusions only at regularly scheduled intervals.The resulting more predicable demand, with multiple purchases of the same satellites, should produce more stable and sustained production lines and product workforce that generates economic efficiencies. EASE will likely first apply to the Advanced Extremely High Frequency satellites. DoD will continue to rely mostly on cost-plus contracts for immature and innovative programs where the costs are less predictable. The Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicles (EELV) program is becoming another early test of the new approach. DoD is increasing spending on the EELV program to ensure a stable block buy.

The Obama administration export reform program aims to move in two directions designed to enhance the U.S. industrial base while protecting unique U.S. advantages. The problem is that current approach toward space exports is harming U.S. space exporters while not greatly impeding states of concern from acquiring sensitive technologies. The administration wants to guard state-of-the-art as opposed to state-of-the-world technologies.The reforms aims to construct higher fences around most sensitive technologies, but allow easier export of items outside the fences. In making export control decisions, the administration will consider whether commercial articles are the product of unique capabilities that cannot be obtained in other ways, the actual risk of U.S. exported equipment being someday used against the United States or its allies, the greater control the United States gains from selling the technology itself, how improving allies’ capabilities helps them contribute to coalition operations, and the damage to U.S. industrial base if sub-tier suppliers go out of business by not being able to export their products.

Another change is to restore the health of the U.S. “space cadre” as well as U.S. space-related science and technology. This will entail enhancing recruiting, retention, and training policies designed to develop current and future national security space professionals in the military, intelligence, civilian, and contractor components of the work force.In addition, the administration proposes to support science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education initiatives designed to produce skills and capabilities need by future space professionals. The government will also encourage the space community to improve how it incorporates new space-related research and technology, including those developed outside the United States, into U.S. space systems.

OSD and ODNI will now apply this new general strategic guidance, which seeks to guide U.S. space polices for the next decade, to specific planning, programming, acquisition, doctrinal, and operational decisions. The Deputy Secretary of Defense revalidated the role of the DoD Executive Agent (EA), currently Secretary of the Air Force Michael B. Donley, for Space to integrate and assess the overall DoD space program and facilitate increased cooperation with the Intelligence Community The Deputy Secretary of Defense established a Defense Space Council, chaired by the EA, to serve as the principal advisory forum overseeing NSSS implementation. He also serves to coordinate DoD policies toward agency, industrial, and foreign partners. The NSSS has some 30 action items for all agencies, and DoD has a leadership or major stake in many of them.

The Council will align requirements, acquisition, and budget planning and execution with strategy and policy. The Council’s initial priority has been to streamline the many DoD and national security space committees, boards, and councils.The FY 2012 DoD budget (which also funds IC space programs) contains only initial steps toward implementing the new strategy. DoD and ODNI will use this year to make more comprehensive changes in FY 2013 and beyond. In the words of the Secretary of Defense, “The strategy provides a basis to update defense plans and programs and make the hard choices that will be required to implement the strategy. We look forward to working closely with Congress, industry, and allies to implement this new strategy for space.”

The ARG At The Vortex of Change

Posted on | by Caroline Teames
03/06/2011

How Amphibious Forces Create Strategic Options

By Vince Martinez

03/06/2011 – The world is changing.  For many who have studied the subject over the last decade, the Arc of Instability is coming to fruition.  Old powers are beginning to falter under the pressures of collapsing economies, the lack of resources, civil unrest and natural disaster. As we collectively watch the latest Libyan conflict as it moves from weeks into months, the international community–and the United States in particular — will most certainly begin to buckle under international pressure with calls to assist in the containment and resolution of the latest Middle-Eastern strife. Questions will arise on how to best influence and contain the scenario given the international role of outside players, and the military will once again find itself intertwined with a series of solutions to do exactly that.

The amphibs are among the busiest of USN ships in support of US global operations The flexibility of the ships are an important reason why they are so important to day-to-day operations. The military often plays a significant role in implementation of political will in circumstances just like these. The choices the decision makers have to make relative to the forces used, however, can also have significant impacts in other international and political arenas.

Credit : The USS Peleliu, www.public.navy.mil

Reeling from the protracted land war in the Middle East that has ushered in a reluctance for using occupational forces, what has often been glossed over by decision makers recently is the power and influence that an Amphibious Readiness Group (ARG) brings to bear in response to these delicate operational conditions. Whether the ARG is conducting Non-Combatant Evacuation Operations (NEO), dropping supplies to those in need, protecting land and sea-based lines of communication, establishing presence, providing security, or facilitating containment through martial action, it is clear that the ability of the ARG to take action in both land or sea is what makes the ARG a resource that is impossible to replace with other doctrinal solutions.

Reeling from the protracted land war in the Middle East that has ushered in a reluctance for using occupational forces, what has often been glossed over by decision makers recently is the power and influence that an Amphibious Readiness Group (ARG) brings to bear in response to these delicate operational conditions. Whether the ARG is conducting Non-Combatant Evacuation Operations (NEO), dropping supplies to those in need, protecting land and sea-based lines of communication, establishing presence, providing security, or facilitating containment through martial action, it is clear that the ability of the ARG to take action in both land or sea is what makes the ARG a resource that is impossible to replace with other doctrinal solutions.

Lessons Learned From Operation El Dorado Canyon
During Operation El Dorado Canyon in Libya in the late 1980s, the United States conducted a strike against the Libyan government in response to the state-sponsored bombing of a disco in Berlin that resulted in the injury of over 200 people, and cost the lives of two individuals. Much of the accolades that followed the successful raids on Libya revolved around the long-range, EF-111 and FB-111 bombers, along with the KC-135 and KC-10 aircraft that conducted long-range refueling operations while originating operations out of the United Kingdom.

Less talked about was the role of the Naval Forces off the coast of Libya that also participated in the raids.  Well over 30 Naval strike aircraft participated in the raids as well, and the Naval Force was also on stand-by to conduct search and rescue operations as needed with helo-borne forces.  The Naval Fleet provided command and Control as well, and the security of the airspace was guaranteed through the use of carrier-based F-14 Tomcats that were in position to react should something arise.

What is more important is what did not take place. Had there been an unforeseen emergent air threat that resulted in significant delays, the bomber force that had transited the Atlantic would have been unable adjust to the extended operations, and would likely have had to turn back toward England without dropping their ordnance. In an equivalent scenario in today’s day and age, that would most certainly be viewed as a strategic failure and then subsequently be plastered all over the mass media as exactly that.

What is more important is what did not take place. Had there been an unforeseen emergent air threat that resulted in significant delays, the bomber force that had transited the Atlantic would have been unable adjust to the extended operations, and would likely have had to turn back toward England without dropping their ordnance.

What the Naval Services provided operational commanders during Operation El Dorado Canyon is exactly the same thing the ARG provides today– the ability to react to change and absorb operational friction across a spectrum of operational conditions.  That is something that typically doesn’t make the history books. Instead of a single-focus, long-range strike capability, the USN-USMC team provides operational commanders with a series of strategic, operational and tactical options that a one-dimensional bomber force cannot provide.

“From Friend To Foe In A Matter Of Minutes”
Fast forward to today.  With the introduction of transformational platforms like the MV-22, the UH-1Y, the AH-1Z, and the KC-130J–along with emerging platforms like the JSF and the CH-53K–the ability for the ARG to influence a spectrum of operations has grown exponentially. With forces now operating comfortably under the “3-Block War” construct that the U.S. Marine Corps had forecasted well over a decade ago, the ability to go from friend to foe in a matter of seconds is an accepted lifestyle [1].  Forces today have evolved to do exactly that under the challenging operational conditions across the Middle East over the last 10 years.

The ARG brings the ability to provide sustained operational presence across the spectrum of operations while also maintaining safe haven off shore — with no loss of operational impact.  The technological innovation of the Marine Air Ground Task Force (MAGTF) enables the ability to control and influence an environment through peacetime, civil unrest and combat.  It is the operational flexibility of the MAGTF and the ARG that brings a wide range of military options to the table.

In the dynamic operational conditions of today, a “force in readiness” means more than just being capable of slinging lead down-range — and the ARG is the best-postured strategic capability to be able to adjust quickly to dynamic environments. Aside from the challenging humanitarian aspects of the civil strife in Libya, this conflict also gives us yet another reason to pause and reflect our overall operational posture.

In the dynamic operational conditions of today, a “force in readiness” means more than just being capable of slinging lead down-range — and the ARG is the best-postured strategic capability to be able to adjust quickly to dynamic environments.

The Arc of Instability demands the use of innovative and tailored methods for engagement and influence, and must be implemented successfully without the impacts of pre-conceived notions that come with a bomber-force or a land army.The ARG is built for this exact environment, and has established operational relevancy over many years behind the scenes.  It is time for the decision makers to acknowledge that fact, and a definitive push should be made to ensure that the operational capabilities of the ARG and the Naval Force as a whole to ensure our strategic relevance for many years to come.

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Footnote:

[1] The Three Block War concept has been described that way by Former Commandant of the Marines Corps (1995-1999), General Charles C. Krulak, to illustrate the post Cold War battelfield: he argued that in the distance of three city blocks one could be faced with full military combat, peacekeeping or humanitarian missions, hence testing the ability of a good leader to adapt to a dynamic situation (see for instance: http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/usmc/strategic_corporal.htm).

 

The Libyan Crisis: Beyond “Bosnia ’96”

Posted on | by Caroline Teames
03/05/2011

How the New Amphibious Ready Group Expands the President’s Options

By Robbin Laird

03/05/2011 – The Libyan crisis is occurring in a period of challenges to the USAF and USN’s ability to deliver capabilities useful to the President. Part of the problem is the significant commitment of dwindling assets for use in the region. Even though there are elements of this crisis which look like 1996, President Obama has not nearly the assets President Clinton had. Part of the problem is the relatively inflexible quality of those assets. The USAF can line up its AWACS and air fleet to do “Bosnia 1996”, but given the constrained geography of the Middle East, this is a major operation. The USN can move a carrier battle group to engage Libya and support a no fly zone. And then there is the desire to move US and allied airlift into the area to support humanitarian missions, although that requires securing an airfield to execute the mission, something only Special Forces or the USMC can do, either by seabasing or air drop. But this requires air defense assets as well.

Credit: F-35B in Flight, LMC

None of these are great options and each will be executed with a deliberate Presidential decision, which will indicate to the Libyan leadership a virtual act of war.

Fast forward to the newly configured USMC Amphibious Ready Group (ARG).

  • The new ARG built around the LPD 17 has a larger deck to operate from, with modern C2 capabilities.
  • The F-35B can be launched as the picket fence operating on the border of Libya able to do electronic warfare, C4ISR and preparation for kinetic or non-kinetic strike.
  • The CH-53K can take off from the amphibious ships and carry three times the cargo of a CH-53E, to include 463L pallets (normally used in KC-130s).
  • The USMC Ospreys can support insertion operations with speed and range.

The force can of course secure an airfield for humanitarian airlift; the picket fence of the F-35s replace the AWACs and can guide coalition airpower into Libyan airspace to support agreed upon missions.  The USAF does not need to move a large air operation into place to send combat air; the USN does not need to move a large aircraft carrier battle group into place to prepare to strike Libya.

What the newly equipped ARG does is provide a significant shaping function for the President.  And this shaping function allows significant flexibility and, is in fact, a redefinition of the dichotomy between hard and soft power.

The USN-USMC amphibious team can provide for a wide-range of options for the President simply by being offshore, with 5th generation aircraft capability on board which provides 360 situational awareness, deep visibility over the air and ground space, and carrying significant capability on board to empower a full spectrum force as needed.

And if you add the LCS to the USN-USMC amphibious team you have even more capability and more options.  As a senior USMC MEU commander has put it:

You’re sitting off the coast, pick your country, doesn’t matter, you’re told okay, we’ve got to do some shaping operations, we want to take and put some assets into shore, their going to do some shaping work over here.  LCS comes in, very low profile platform.  Operating off the shore, inserts these guys in small boats that night.  They infill, they go in, their doing their mission.The LCS now sets up — it’s a gun platform.  It’s a resupply, refuel point for my Hueys and Cobras.
Now, these guys get in here, okay.  High value targets been picked out, there is an F-35 that’s doing some other operations.  These guys only came with him and said hey, we have got a high value target, but if we take him out, we will compromise our position. The F-35 goes roger, got it painted, got it seen.  This is what you’re seeing, this is what I’m seeing.  Okay.  Kill the target.  The guys on the ground never even know what hit them.

In short, simply by completing the procurement of what the USN and USMC are in the course of doing in a very short period, the nation gains significant flexibility to deal with ambiguous strategic situations. US Army Special Forces or USAF special operations Ospreys can be deployed on the decks of the amphib force ready to do insertion operations.  UAVs can be launched off of the decks of the amphib force as well.

Simply by completing the procurement of what the USN and USMC are in the course of doing in a very short period, the nation gains significant flexibility to deal with ambiguous strategic situations.