Ships Moored at Pearl Harbor and Ford Island during RIMPAC 2024

09/11/2024

An aerial view of ships moored at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam and Ford Island during Rim of the Pacific 2024, July 3. Twenty nine nations, 40 surface ships, three submarines, 14 national land forces, more than 150 aircraft and 25,000 personnel are participating in RIMPAC in and around the Hawaiian Islands, June 27 to Aug. 1.

The world’s largest international maritime exercise, RIMPAC provides a unique training opportunity while fostering and sustaining cooperative relationships among participants critical to ensuring the safety of sea lanes and security on the world’s oceans. RIMPAC 2024 is the 29th exercise in the series that began in 1971.

07.03.2024
Video by Petty Officer 1st Class Hannah Mohr
Commander, U.S. 3rd Fleet

204th Airlift Squadron

09/09/2024

The 204th Airlift Squadron from the 154th Wing, Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, conducts LUU 2 Flare training from a C-17 Globemaster III during training with the Alaska Air National Guard held July 7, 2022, Kenai Peninsula Borough, Alaska.

The addition of high-intensity illuminating flares comes from the Hawaii Air National Guard’s continued support of NASA’s SpaceX Human Space Flight program. It enhances the airlift squadron’s ability to conduct contingency astronaut rescue operations in various lighting conditions.

07.07.2023
Video by Master Sgt. Mysti Bicoy
154th Wing, Hawaii Air National Guard

The Changing Communications Demand Side for Mobile Forces: Packaging Considerations

09/08/2024

By Robbin Laird

As the U.S. and allied militaries face the realities of the evolving threat based environment, shaping ways for enhanced force mobility, lower signature operating forces, and more rapid insertion capabilities are shaping the demand side of the military communications market.

To operate at the tactical edge or to manage forces operating at the tactical edge from a mobile strategic command post requires smaller footprint communications capability and ways to move that capability and to package that capability for more rapid set up and use.

Recently, I talked with Dominique Schinabeck, the CEO of DESAPRO, a firm which specializes in packaging for military force, notably in terms of customizable and scalable aluminum casing, about how the demand side is changing for her firm in terms of the communications shift.

She underscored that the “basic shift is upon the need to be able to set up secure 5G communications networks anywhere as needed.

“This can be done within our aluminum casing products in a way that an adversary does not even know what is inside of the casing.

“And we can build the product to allow rapid setup using the casing as well as part of the established system.”

A notable area of change is with regard to the overall trend line for transporting and setting up of satellite terminals.

With the evolution of microelectronics, smaller satellite terminals are being built which can be transported in smaller form factor packaging as well.

This also affects the question of how many soldiers are needed to set up and operate such a terminal.

Reducing the form factor and the manpower required is part of the shift in demand.

The other part of the mobility operational equation is the question of time to set up upon deployment.

As Schinabeck notes: “There is a desire among military customers to reduce the setup time from hours to minutes.

“And to be able to be moved throughout the battlespace by being able to disassemble and reassemble rapidly. They want to lower their signature and reduce their ability to be targeted.

“We are focused on ways to be able to package a smaller satellite terminal which can be set up rapidly, repackaged and moved reliably and securely as possible.

“We believe aluminum casing crafted with an ability to assist through its design in rapid setup and re-packaging and movement is a key part of the solution militaries are increasingly looking for.”

See also, the following:

The Paradigm Shift to Deployable Communications: Ripple Effects

An Inside View of the CH-53K

By Robbin Laird

In this video produced by Lockheed Martin, CH-53K test pilots provide a tour of the CH-53K.

In a recent visit to 2nd Marine Air Wing, the current squadron where the CH-53K is operating talked about the aircraft.

In the article published on August 5, 2024, I discussed the visit.

During my recent visit to 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing, I visited Marine Corps Air Station New River and had a chance to meet with two members involved from the outset in HMH-461 standing up the CH-53K.

I first visited New River in 2010, where the focus was on the coming of the Osprey and its initial engagement in Iraq and later that year in Afghanistan. The Osprey is obviously a very different aircraft than the CH-46 it replaced, as is the CH-53K with regard to the CH-53E. It just doesn’t look that way in terms of a quick glance.

That is why I wrote a piece in 2020 where I suggested it should have been called something different, such as the CH-55. This is what I wrote:

To the casual observer, the Super Stallion and the King Stallion look like the same aircraft.

One of the challenges in understanding how different the CH-53K is from the CH-53E is the numbering part.

If it were called CH-55 perhaps one would get the point that these are very different air platforms, with very different capabilities.

What they have in common, by deliberate design, is a similar logistical footprint, so that they could operate similarly off of amphibious ships or other ships in the fleet for that matter.

But the CH-53E is a mechanical aircraft, which most assuredly the CH-55 (aka as the CH-53K) is not.

In blunt terms, the CH-55 (aka as the CH-53K) is faster, carries more kit, can distribute its load to multiple locations without landing, is built as a digital aircraft from the ground up and can leverage its digitality for significant advancements in how it is maintained, how it operates in a task force, how it can be updated, and how it could work with unmanned systems or remotes.

These capabilities taken together create a very different lift platform than is the legacy CH-53E. In a strategic environment where force mobility is informing capabilities across the combat spectrum, it is hard to understate the value of a lift platform, notably one which can talk and operate digitally, in carving out new tactical capabilities with strategic impacts.

During my July 2024 visit, I met with Capt. Jeffrey Stanton, assistant operations officer, and with Capt. Philip Wood, CH-53K pilot and pilot training officer.

In fact, at the beginning of the discussion, the officers noted my chapter in my CH-53K book which made the CH-55 point, and they fully underscored the core argument about the differences of the King Stallion from its predecessor.

Both officers were legacy heavy lift operators and came to the squadron at the same time and have been on the ground floor with the squadron as it has begun its CH-53K operations.

As Capt. Wood put it: “The CH-53K is a completely different aircraft from the CH-53E. The way you physically fly it, the way you plan for operations, and the way you maintain it are completely different.”

He went on to note that when he came to the CH-53K he was told not to treat it as an Echo but to change his mindset. And he noted that helped him to shape a different muscle memory capability to fly and operate the aircraft, again, completely different from the Echo.

Capt. Wood described the shift as follows: “It is more of mental than physical game in operating the aircraft.

“You are focused on manipulating everything the aircraft can do. You are focused outside of the aircraft on what the pilots can do to support operations. The pilots have much more situational awareness and can operate the aircraft to support the changing operations environments more rapidly.”

We then discussed an interesting case of the difference which I learned about when I visited MAWTS-1. This was the case of a downed Navy helo which had to be lifted out of a very difficult location, namely at the bottom of a ravine.

This is how 2nd MAW described the operation:

U.S. Marines with Marine Heavy Helicopter Squadron (HMH) 461 and 2nd Distribution Support Battalion (DSB), U.S. Navy Sailors with Naval Mobile Construction Battalion Four, and animal packers with the U.S. National Forest Service hike to the site of a downed U.S. Navy MH-60S Seahawk to prepare it for recovery at Inyo National Forest, California, Oct. 19, 2023.

The combined efforts of U.S. Marines, Sailors, and Forest Service personnel allowed HMH-461 to successfully recover the MH-60S Seahawk with a CH-53K King Stallion.

HMH-461 is a subordinate unit of the 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing, and 2nd DSB is a subordinate unit of the 2nd Marine Logistics Group, the aviation and logistics combat elements of the II Marine Expeditionary Force.

What I learned at MAWTS-1 was that the hover capability of the King Stallion was critical to being able to lift the downed Seahawk out of the ravine. During a visit to VMX-1 in 2020 with Lt. Col. Frank, he underscored the importance of precision hover as follows:

“We’re not used to anything like this. It’s very intuitive. It can be as hands off as you know, a brand-new Tesla, you can close your eyes, set the autopilot and fly across country. Obviously, you wouldn’t do that in a tactical environment, but it does reduce your workload, reduces your stress.

“And in precision hover areas, whether it’s night under low light conditions, under NVGs, in the confines of a tight landing zone, we have the ability to hit position hold in the 53K and have the aircraft maintain pretty much within one foot of its intended hover point, one foot forward, lateral and AFT, and then one foot of vertical elevation change. It will maintain that hover until the end of the time if required. That’s very, very stress relieving for us when landing in degraded visual environments.”

Capt. Stanton was part of the ground crew during the Seahawk recovery operation and underscored how the King Stallion facilitated the lift operation. He noted: “I was on the advance party we sent out to plan the operation. It was clear that using the CH-53K would reduce significantly the risk factors involved in such an operation. It was around a 2 minute precision hover to come in and allow the helicopter support team to rig the Seahawk and to have the CH-53K to lift the Seahawk. And we did some non-traditional hooking of the aircraft to the CH-53K as well.”

The two officers noted that the aircraft is going through its developmental progression so that new capabilities are being released as the aircraft tests out each of these capabilities. That means that the King Stallion has been largely limited operationally to what the Marines do with the CH-53E but as capabilities are certified and then available, they fully expect the squadron to drive significant new innovations with a fully operational CH-53K squadron.

And while doing the path to transition, they are doing even CH-53E tasks more efficiently and in a more effective manner. Notably when moving equipment off an amphibious ship, the CH-53K can carry what a CH-53E either cannot or not do as easily or efficiently. A case in point is the ability of a CH-53K to carry a JLTV ashore in one sweep.

Col. Fleeger in my recent interview with her underscored how she saw the innovation process associated with the aircraft as follows:

“The operating crews will drive the out of the box thinking about how we can use our heavy lift assets to do new things and work new thinking about what payloads we can and should carry. In the Marine Corps, there is not simply out of the box thinking, it is really about operational innovations, and such innovations will drive new ways to use the CH-53K forward and suggest innovations we can work with the remaining legacy heavy lift aircraft.”

Both officers underscored their agreement with this perspective.

As Capt. Wood put it: “There are a lot of things we could do now with the CH-53K that have yet to explore.

“And there are certainly things the aircraft can do that we have not even thought of.

“The fleet pilots will come up with new ways of doing things and employing its new capabilities.

“And it has capabilities were are not even realizing now.”

 

Michigan National Guard’s 127th Maintenance Group

09/04/2024

Maintainers with the Michigan National Guard’s 127th Maintenance Group, agile combat employment team, referred to as the, “ACE Team,” paired with tactical air control party personnel assigned to the Kansas National Guard’s 284th Air Support Operations Squadron, creating a unique training dynamic in Alpena, Michigan, May 18-25, 2024.

The TACP Airmen communicate directly with fighter aircraft during close air support missions in joint combat environments, making them ideal trainers for the A-10 Thunderbolt II maintainers tasked with the new ACE mission set.

05.23.2024
Video by Master Sgt. Chelsea FitzPatrick
127th Wing

MRF-D 24.3

09/02/2024

U.S. Marines with India Battery, 2nd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment (Reinforced), Marine Rotational Force – Darwin 24.3, and Australian Army Soldiers with 102 Battery, 8th/12th Regiment, Royal Australian Artillery, participate in Exercise Thunder Walk 24 at Mount Bundey Training Area, NT, Australia, May 26 to June 6, 2024.

U.S. Marines and their Australian Allies rehearsed delivering precision artillery fire, integrating the fire direction center, and enhancing the joint combat space.

This video contains music from USMC enterprise licensed assets from Adobe Stock: Corporate Cinematic Trailer Inspiring composed by Colorofmusic/Jamendo/stock.adobe.com and Horror Trailer Action Tension Hero composed by Chillsound/Musicrevolution/stock.adobe.com

MOUNT BUNDEY TRAINING AREA, NORTHERN TERRITORY, AUSTRALIA
06.15.2024
Video by Cpl. Migel Reynosa
Marine Rotational Force – Darwin

CH-53K Comes to VMX-1 in Yuma

08/30/2024

Marine Operational Test and Evaluation Squadron (VMX) 1 receives a CH-53K King Stallion at Marine Corps Air Station (MCAS) Yuma, Arizona, June 7, 2024.

VMX-1 received this CH-53 from their detachment at MCAS New River, North Carolina, this will allow the unit to further enhance their weapon and aviation capabilities in order to complete VMX-1’s mission of being the Marine Corps’ test and evaluation squadron. (U.S. Marine Corps video by Lance Cpl. Christian Raodsti)

YUMA, ARIZONA
06.07.2024
Video by Lance Cpl. Christian Radosti
Marine Corps Air Station Yuma