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Who Is To Blame?

Victory has a thousand fathers; defeat has deadbeat dads. No one wants to take responsibility for the slowdowns in the appointments process, but there are plenty of candidates. Even within the administration,

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, as we’ve documented. Some veteran insiders blame the bureaucratic process of vetting. Some blame Trump loyalists for excluding anyone who has had

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about the president or picking

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with

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of or interest in governing. And, of course, there’s the president’s favorite target: Democrats.

DeMartino, interestingly, declined to comment on this accusation. “Honestly, I haven’t done this before,” he told me, so he can’t say whether Senate Democrats are a bottleneck or not, just that “it’s part of the process and planned for.”

One prominent advisor to Trump’s nomination team, however, was unequivocal. “This certainly is not John McCain’s fault, but the Senate basically sits on them,” said

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, a retired Marine Reserve two-star who served as staff director of the Senate Armed Services Committee — what McCain chairs now — and has advised countless nominees in the two decades since. Today’s senators may complain about not getting nominees from the White House, Punaro said, but when they got a slate of six just before Memorial Day, Armed Services approved all six, but the full Senate only acted on three.

“They’re not letting through the qualified people (sent over),” Punaro told me. “The signal that the minority is sending to the nomination engine room is ‘all ahead slow.'” (Update: A

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out this morning confirmed the Senate is moving slower than ever).

Senate Democrats didn’t comment by deadline, but Rep. Smith was more than happy to defend them. “All we ever hear from Trump is blaming Democrats for blocking his nominees,” said Smith. “I realize the president lies like most people breathe… but it’s completely untrue. (It’s) shameless that the president blames the Democrats for this when he won’t send the names.”

Once again, Smith was not the only skeptic.

“There’s a multitude of factors at work… but the initial delays are occurring because the administration has been very slow at transmitting their nominations to the Senate,” said AIA’s Stohr. “We encourage the administration to move forward with a little greater speed and persistence.”

“The process is completely broken in comparison to past administrations,” said one former DoD official. “I don’t know if the bureaucracy over at FBI or OGE is slow-rolling them compared to past administrations, but they should look at how long the vetting process is taking. This is ridiculous.”

The Federal Bureau of Investigation does laborious criminal and espionage checks on potential appointees, talking to former neighbors and old acquaintances. OGE is the more obscure Office of Government Ethics, which enforces an array of often arcane conflict-of-interest rules and requirements to divest assets.

For its part, the Senate Armed Services Committee enforces even more stringent standards for Pentagon appointees than OGE, requiring total divestiture of any stock in any company that does business with the Defense Department. “They’ve always been stricter,” said Punaro, going back to the Nixon administration. “The problem with the conflict of interest stuff (is) it was put in place in the 1970s… Compensation then was totally different; it was mainly cash.”

Nowadays, people with experience running large businesses almost always have a complex mix of stock, stock options, and other deferred compensation, which the rules don’t allow. Punaro and other former staff directors have put together a package of reforms, he said, but until then billionaire nominees like Philip Bilden and Vincent Viola will continue to get hung up.

DeMartino told me the FBI/OGE vetting process has indeed been laborious, but the nominations team has learned their lessons and those processes are no different for this administration than for past ones. “Viola and Bilden we announced, obviously, before they were all the way through the vetting process — and they were both early on,” he told me. Since then, “we as a team have learned, let’s wait until they are all the way through the vetting process.”

The exception that proves the rule is Shanahan, he said. Eager to show progress on the No. 2 position in the Pentagon, they announced his name as soon as President Trump approved it. Since then, they’ve faced criticism for taking so long to forward his nomination to the Senate, but it’s only because of FBI and OGE doing what they have to do. “It’s too important to rush,” he said.

Does an ever-more-burdensome vetting process explain the slowdown? “It explains a piece of it,” said Rep. Smith, “but…Obama had to vet people, Bush had to vet people, (and) none of them has come anywhere near taking the pathetically long amount of time the Trump White House has in getting people put into positions. There’s no excuse for that. That’s part of what the

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should have done.”

Well, I said, there are stories that the campaign honestly didn’t expect to win and focused on campaigning rather than vetting candidates, in contrast to the Clinton campaign, which had almost an entire government in waiting. “In February I could have gone, ‘yeah, I kind of get that.’ It’s June,” Smith said. “While they may not have expected to win… they won seven months ago.”

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U.S. Navy’s amphibious assault ship USS Wasp (LHD 1) is nearly ready to head to her new homeport in Japan after works on her maintenance availability were completed in Norfolk.

The Mid-Atlantic Regional Maintenance Center (MARMC) completed the Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) Planned Maintenance Availability on June 9.

MARMC was tasked with overseeing repairs and maintenance to Wasp last December, and given a six-month window to complete her availability and return her to service where she will replace USS Bonhomme Richard (LHD 6) in support of the new generation of Joint Strike Fighters (JSF) in the Pacific.

Once USS Wasp becomes part of the U.S. 7th Fleet, it is scheduled to deploy as part of a new, improved, Expeditionary Strike Group that will combine a three-ship Amphibious Ready Group (ARG) with a three ship guided-missile destroyer surface action group (SAG).

“Completing Wasp’s avail in such a timely manner – we owe a lot of our success to the planning during her basic phase,” said MARMC Commanding Officer Capt. Daniel Lannamann. “In the areas where we used lessons learned and had a solid plan in place to tackle repairs and maintenance on day one, we saw those jobs performed flawlessly and in a timely fashion.”

Wasp’s work package called for major overhauls, and was no small task while moored at BAE Systems Norfolk Ship Repair, who was the contractor tasked with performing the ship’s repairs and maintenance. Work items included repairs to the vent plenum, extensive work to the Number 4 Ship Service Turbine Generator (SSTG), modifications for Joint Strike Fighters (JSF), and replacement of all the non-skid on the flight deck. Repairs to Wasp’s flight deck nets were also on the long list of items to tackle during the avail.

With Wasp’s new focus on carrying the Navy’s new F-35B Lightning II JSF, it was imperative that the ship’s flight deck be resurfaced, which proved to be an exceptional undertaking.

“Generally, we would have more time to resurface the flight deck, so we would only use one containment tent, going zone to zone,” said MARMC Project Manager Bobby Pridgen. “Due to our condensed schedule, we had two 16,500 square foot containment tents on the flight deck at the same time, which is rare. Typically, to complete an entire flight deck, it takes 134 days. We completed Wasp’s entire flight deck in 89 days.”

Zone four of the flight deck is designated as the launch and recovery area for the F-35B, and this area was enclosed by a 12,000 square foot tent. Zone four is unique in that it contains Thermion, a coating system designed for landing and takeoff operations of the JSF. Without this heat resistant coating protecting the deck of the ship, when the thrusters of the JSF turned down, they could potentially cause severe damage to the deck.

“The JSF modification makes this availability unusual,” said Spence. “Six F-35B JSFs are already on site in Japan, and this vessel will be capable of supporting their operations in the Pacific. Although USS America (LHA 6) is configured for JSF, Wasp is the first Amphibious Assault Ship going overseas.”

Another area the Wasp saw success was with upgrades and replacement of insulation in several spaces around the ship. MARMC Production Department removed and installed over 21,000 square feet of insulation covering a large portion of Wasps structure.

Wasp will be forward deployed to Sasebo, Japan this fall as part of the U.S. 7th Fleet Forward Deployed Naval Forces.

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U.S. Air Force C-5M Super Galaxy transports two retired Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force MH-53E Sea Dragon helicopters, purchased by the U.S. Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) and H-53 Heavy Lift Helicopter Program Office (PMA-261) at Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni, Japan, June 9, 2017.

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How to fast-track to an improved Navy

U.S. Marines based out of Norway, another Marine expeditionary unit operating from Sicily. U.S. submarines forward-deployed to Scotland, littoral combat ships in the Mediterranean. Supply ships, fleet oilers and amphibious ships armed with cruise missiles. A third aviation-centered assault ship. More networked connectivity.

Those are just some of the changes and enhancements proposed by the new iNavy concept – i for Improved Navy -- a set of force enhancements that, according to its proponents, can be implemented over the next five years to make the existing fleet more lethal and effective.

“It’s things we can do between 2017 and 2022 to improve our Navy, to improve our capabilities and to improve the size of the Navy in order to fill some of the gaps we have today. And to do so in a manner that doesn’t preclude us from doing things in the long term to ensure that we’ve got the Navy that we need in 2030, 2035,” said John Miller, a retired vice admiral who led the team that developed the concept.

The concept isn’t dependent on buying more ships, since it’s unlikely any new construction would enter service within five years. Rather, Miller said, the idea is to improve the overall readiness of the service as quickly and efficiently as possible.

“iNavy is a larger Navy. It’s a more lethal Navy. It’s a Navy that’s more forward-deployed and it’s a Navy that’s more ready. It’s those four attributes,” he said.

“We can’t just grow the Navy, that’s not the solution that’s going to meet all the demands we have,” Miller explained. “We really don’t have the money to do that and we don’t have the industrial capacity to just build a bigger Navy in a very short amount of time.

“Most of the Navy we’re going to have in 2022 is already with us. In fact, most of the Navy we’re going to have in 2030 is already with us, about seventy-five percent of it. So you have to look at other things we can do to get more out of the Navy we have.”

Working with the support of Tom Donnelly at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), Miller, a former commander of U.S. Naval Forces Central Command, proposes moving a number of U.S.-based forces to forward-deployed locations, with a particular emphasis on beefing up the U.S. presence in Europe. Among the proposals is to establish a Mediterranean base for one of the two aviation-centered assault ships, America or Tripoli. The Mediterranean base would also support cruisers, destroyers and logistics efforts. He advocates an amphibious ready group (ARG) and associated Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) based in Sicily, similar to the ARG and MEU now forward-deployed to Japan.

Another new Mediterranean base would support littoral combat ships, and a U.S. submarine base would be established at Faslane, Scotland, already home to a British Royal Navy sub base.

The emphasis on more units in Europe, Miller said, is a reflection of recent rebalancing efforts to move more forces to the Pacific where, he said, “I think we’ve moved sufficient numbers.”

And forces based in Europe, he added, could move easily to other theaters when needed.

“Where we really see gaps of concern is in the Mediterranean and in the North Atlantic and an area of the Baltics,” Miller said. “Moving forces into the Mediterranean helps you in a couple of different places -- in the Mediterranean, in the North Atlantic and also in West Asia, because you’re closer to that part of the world. You could swing those forces into the Central Command area as a possibility or into the Indian Ocean as well.”

Miller would move more submarines to Guam, shortening the transit time to the Western Pacific or Indian Ocean theaters. He also proposes forward-deploying the other aviation assault ship to the Pacific, and advocates building a third aviation ship, not in current shipbuilding plans. He would beef up purchases of Marine Corps F-35B joint strike fighters to fill out the assault ship decks.

Miller’s iNavy also embraces distributed lethality concepts to get more firepower out of the fleet. All 22 Ticonderoga-class cruisers would be retained and fully modernized, and the combat systems of all destroyers would be upgraded to Aegis Baseline 9, the current top-of-the-line standard. A key element would be to arm at least six San Antonio-class landing ship docks and six T-AKE dry cargo ammunition ships with vertical launch systems (VLS) able to launch cruise missiles. The ships also would receive cooperative engagement capabilities to allow more sophisticated warships to control the weapons. Miller’s concept also envisions returning all four Supply-class fast supply ships to Military Sealift Command service and providing them with VLS, and considers similar modifications to Kaiser-class fleet oilers.

Miller and his team conducted a series of four war games, running scenarios with and without iNavy concepts. In every scenario, the iNavy dramatically improved U.S. responses to regional threats.

“The more forward-deployed we are the more ready we are and the more capable we are of responding to crisis,” Miller said. “We need to be more forward-deployed than we are today. You have to have the numbers of ships and aircraft and you have to have sufficient lethality and be properly networked.”

Greater emphasis would be placed, he said, on expanding the Navy Integrated Fire Control-Counter Air (NIFC-CA) network, which links together weapons and sensors on a variety of different ships, aircraft and shore units.

“A NIFC-CA-configured strike group is one that’s easier to disaggregate and operate in different geographic areas while staying connected,” Miller said. “You have more synergy than if you don’t have a NIFC-CA-configured strike group. That’s mature technology and we’ve deployed it so we understand how it works. It’s just a matter of buying the kit and installing it.”

Miller is beginning to brief Navy brass on the concept, and an AEI report is forthcoming.

“All four of the concepts attributes are required,” Miller said. “It’s not just a bigger Navy or a more ready Navy or a more lethal Navy or more forward-deployed Navy. It’s all four of those attributes together.”

One analyst familiar with the iNavy concept is impressed.

“This was a very focused excursion into how we could do better with what we already have with modest adjustments in the next few years,” said Bryan McGrath, one of the co-authors of a recent fleet architecture study conducted by the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. “I was grateful to see that group of smart people had looked very hard at the near-term horizon. There are a world of things we can do in the next few years that are interesting and can have impact.”

But McGrath noted that “there’s a considerable amount of diplomacy to be done to make those things happen,” referring to the multiple forward-basing proposals. He also brought up another issue.

“There has to be a reason why, a sense of urgency, compelling reasons to force the Navy and Congress to make these adjustments,” McGrath observed. “But that compelling narrative has not been created, and no one is out preaching it. I know in my heart there is one.

“I think Admiral MIller’s team makes a very useful contribution that when a compelling narrative arrives that makes these things important, they will be useful first steps, and relatively straightforward to implement. But without that narrative it’s going to be difficult to pull off.”

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Army is looking for a new 7.62mm rifle
By:

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June 12, 2017
The Army is scouting out an off-the-shelf, interim rifle in 7.62mm.

A May 31 request for information set June 6 as the deadline for industry submissions to provide five systems to Picatinny Arsenal in New Jersey with the potential to manufacture 10,000 rifles for the Army.

The Interim Combat Service Rifle must be commercially available, chambered in 7.62mm, a round already used by the U.S. military and its NATO allies and fired in the M240 machine gun and some sniper rifle systems.

The ICSR would include both 16- and 20-inch barrel options and be adaptable for flash and sound suppression with a detachable magazine holding at least 20 rounds.

Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley told Congress that the 5.56mm round used in the M4 and one of the squad machine guns was not sufficient to penetrate newer enemy body armor.

A 7.62mm round was sufficient, he said.

On May 31 the Army also requested industry demonstrations, scheduled for July, for a weapon to replace the M249 Squad Automatic Weapon, the squad-level machine gun which fires 5.5 mm. The replacement machine gun did not have a caliber listed.

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The Army's Maneuver Center of Excellence is currently developing intermediate caliber ammunition and rifles both for Infantry Automatic Rifle and for a light machine gun. The round would fall between 5.56mm and 7.62mm. Some experts say a round in that range would extend range and increase both accuracy and lethality.

In May, Army Times had a story tracing the history of intermediate caliber development and long-standing criticisms of the M16/M4 platform and the 5.56mm round.

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Since that time, advocates for the new round have testified before a congressional subcommittee about the need for a new round/rifle combination.

In recent years, the Marine Corps has adopted the M27, made by Heckler and Koch, chambered in 5.56mm but also available in 7.62mm.

Some Marine units now have more M27s than SAWs but still carry both. A typical rifle company carries 27 IARs and six SAWs, a Marine Corps official said.

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Army looks to replace the Squad Automatic Weapon
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June 10, 2017 (Photo Credit: Staff Sgt. Nicholas M. Byers/Air Force)
The Army is looking for a replacement for its Squad Automatic Weapon.

Army officials posted the

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on the Federal Business Opportunities website on May 31, seeking contractor submissions for a classified industry days event on July 25-27 at the Maneuver Center of Excellence at Fort Benning, Georgia.

Dubbed the "Next Generation Squad Automatic Rifle," the new rifle would replace the M249 SAW in brigade combat teams, according to the website.

"It will combine the firepower and range of a machine gun with the precision and ergonomics of a carbine, yielding capability improvements in accuracy, range and lethality," according to the website.

The aim is for soldiers to use the new rifle against both "close and extended range targets in all terrains and conditions."

The posting does not specify caliber, but the SAW fires 5.56 mm ammunition. The Army is currently developing an intermediate caliber round between 5.56 mm and 7.62 mm for both an M4 replacement and light machine guns.

The new rifle must be compatible with the current Small Arms Fire Control system and possess back-up sights, according to the special notice.

The weapon will "achieve overmatch by killing stationary, and suppressing moving, threats out to 500 meters and suppressing all threats to a range of 1,200 meters," according to the website.

The new rifle must weigh no more than 12 pounds with sling, bipod and suppressor. The SAW in that configuration weighs approximately 17 pounds. That figure does not include ammunition or magazine weight.

The Marines recently adopted a new Infantry Automatic Rifle called the M27. But Marine units continue to deploy both the new IAR and SAWs. Most rifle companies are issued 27 IARs and six SAWs, a Marine Corps official said.

The planned Army replacement is expected to occur over the next decade, according to the website.

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bd popeye said:

The main thing the USN can get out of USAF trainers is valuable flight hours. They can't make arrested landings.

This is an issue that must soon be fixed. Like perhaps yesterday.

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By the end of June, the number of student naval aviators to miss their planned end of training and transition to the next squadron will reach 75, the head of Naval Air Systems Command said Tuesday.

Addressing a panel of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Vice Adm. Paul Grosklags said flights on the

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trainer remain at a standstill, with students delayed in their transition to the fleet at the rate of 25 per month.

Meanwhile, he said, the nebulous problem that caused the

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to temporarily ground its entire T-45 fleet in the spring continues to puzzle investigators.

"We are not doing well on the diagnosis," Grosklags told Sen. Roger Wicker, chairman of the Senate Armed Services subcommittee on seapower.

As Fox News first reported in April, the Navy

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after 100 instructor pilots refused to fly, citing concerns about the safety of the aircraft after a spike in hypoxia-like cockpit incidents for the aircraft. Ultimately, the Navy would launch a 30-day review of both the T-45 and the

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, another platform for which "physiological episodes," as the service calls them, have been reported.

While the service announced in late April that flight operations for the T-45 had resumed with a 5,000-foot altitude limit and a requirement that pilots pull no more than 2 Gs, Grosklags said that, to date, only currency flights for trainers had taken place. Actual training, he testified, remains at a standstill.

"It would be far easier if we could find out what the root cause was, and then go after fixing that root cause," Grosklags said. "To date, we have been unable to find any smoking guns."

He described Navy efforts to address the problem as running on two parallel paths. One effort has involved taking several of the affected aircraft from Naval Air Training Command and bringing them to

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, Maryland, where engineers have torn them apart looking for problems with the breathing apparatus. Technicians have inspected every component in the "gas path" of the aircraft, looking for toxins or contaminants, but without success, he said.

"We've subjected each of those individual components to extremes of testing, extremes of environmental conditions, in excess of what we would ever expect to see in the aircraft," Grosklags said. "And we still have not been able to find what we would consider proximate cause of contamination or something being released into the gas path."

Simultaneously, the Navy has zeroed in on "10 to 12" different protective or prophylactic measures for T-45 aircrew that would allow pilots and trainees to identify a potential episode before it becomes a crisis in mid-air. It's this effort that will likely enable student pilots to return to the air, which is expected to happen in a matter of weeks, he said.

"Once ... we've got those individual items all in place for every single aircraft and aircrew down at [Naval Air Training Command, that is the point at which we will consider [resuming training]," Grosklags said.

If the effort is delayed, it could begin to affect air operations in the fleet. Lt. Gen. Jon Davis, deputy commandant of aviation for the

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, said Tuesday that if T-45 training does not start up again by September, it will cause operational problems for the service's aviation enterprise.

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VMA-311 conducts first APKWS live-fire training in Pacific

ABOARD USS BONHOMME RICHARD (LHD-6), Pacific Ocean – Marines with Marine Attack Squadron 311, currently attached to Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 265 (Reinforced), conducted training with the Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System (APKWS) for the first time in the Indo-Asia-Pacific region during live-fire training in the skies above the W-183 range training area, Okinawa, Japan, June 9, 2017.
VMA-311 pilots fly AV-8B Harrier jets – fixed-wing aircraft capable of operating from the flight decks of amphibious warfare vessels.

The Harriers launched from the USS Bonhomme Richard (LHD 6), the flagship of the Bonhomme Richard Expeditionary Strike Group. VMM-265 (Rein.) is the Aviation Combat Element of the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit, which is currently embarked aboard the ships of the BHR ESG for a routine patrol of the Indo-Asia-Pacific region.

The APKWS is a low-cost, laser-guided, modular system that attaches to unguided munitions. The APKWS gives Harrier pilots a lighter, precision air-to-ground attack option. Harrier pilots usually fire unguided rockets or drop unguided 500 pound bombs to destroy enemy threats, according to Capt. Paul M. Gucwa, a Harrier pilot with VMA-311.

“We took eight shots and hit the target with all eight, and every single one of them was perfect,” said Gucwa. “It worked completely as advertised. From bringing the system up from the bottom of the ship all the way to putting them on the target, it all went absolutely outstanding.”
Before mounting the weapons, VMA-311 aviation ordnance Marines pulled eight 2.75 inch rockets out of the BHR’s munitions magazines, where ordnance is stored when the ship is underway. They then affixed the APKWSs to a pair of Harriers before the pilots departed the BHR, said Chief Warrant Officer 3 Eric J. McCoy.

“It’s incredible to see the pilots come back with no ordnance after seeing my Marines out on the flight deck training and sweating under the sun,” said McCoy.

Throughout the training, aviation ordnance Marines worked alongside their Navy counterparts on the flight deck to prepare the AKPWS and to ensure safety for all involved. According to McCoy, refining the Navy-Marine Corps team was a supplementary goal of the exercise.
“Not only did we conduct this exercise to test VMA-311’s ability to tactically employ the weapon system, but also to test both VMA-311 and our Navy partners’ proficiency at supporting the ESG’s mission,” said McCoy.

The 31st MEU partners with the Navy’s Amphibious Squadron 11 to form the amphibious component of the BHR ESG. The 31st MEU and PHIBRON 11 combine to provide a cohesive blue-green team capable of accomplishing a variety of missions across the Indo-Asia-Pacific.

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