First CH-53K to fly soon.

via AINonline.

The first four flying versions of the U.S. Marine Corps’ next generation CH-53K helicopter wereadvancing through assembly at Sikorsky Aircraft’s West Palm Beach, Florida, facility earlier this year. “We’re well beyond the paper side of the aircraft. We’re building this thing,” Marine Col. Robert Pridgen, H-53 program manager, told reporters at the Navy League conference in April.

When I first read this I thought it was a non story but a closer look revealed that they're reporting from the Paris Air Show so I would imagine there is work going on behind the scenes to get Germany and Paris to consider buying the beast.

Son of a fucking BITCH!

via ELP Blog.

Marines Put Marine Personnel Carrier On Shelf Due To Budget Constraints
The Marine Corps is putting the Marine Personnel Carrier, the complement to the Amphibious Combat Vehicle, on ice, and it may not be resurrected for 10 years, according to service, industry and congressional sources.


Well of course. When you have money going into a gold-plated USMC tac-air (MV-22, F-35 and the 53K), those ground elements (the reason why we have a Marine Corps) will suffer.

CDR Salamander writes that you should never blog mad.

Internet etiquette experts say you should count to 10 before you press the publish button.

I've counted to 100 and I'm left with this.

THAT SON OF A BITCH AMOS HAS GOT TO GO.  The USMC is now the funding source for the Air Wing?  We have two aviation commandants and a logistics bubba.  No one is looking out for the Ground Combat Element.

The Marine Corps as we know it is no more.  It is aviation centric and Amos will go down in history as one of the most ineffective and misguided leaders the Marines have ever known.  He needs to be throat punched. 

Is the USAF combat ineffective? Are they still mission capable?

I was doing my afternoon round of web military stories and happened across an AOL story on the USAF and the no fly zone in Syria.  One line stopped me cold.

“It depends on the risk you’re willing to accept,” Gen. Welsh told reporters this morning, in response to a question from the incomparable Tony Capaccio of Bloomberg News. The Air Force has currently had to ground about 33 squadrons, Welsh had already told the audience at an Air Force Associationbreakfast, 12 of them “combat-coded” fighter and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) units. Another seven have been reduced to doing only basic “takeoff and landing” training, although Welsh was optimistic the funds freed up by sequestering federal workers would buy back their readiness – albeit not immediately.
“If we have aircraft that would be needed to conduct a no-fly zone, and they haven’t been flying, hopefully we would have time to get them up to speed before we use them,” Welsh told the clustering reporters.

Uh.  Wow.

33 squadrons gone whether through combat or financial consideration is still 33 squadrons gone.

If that isn't bad enough the good General goes on to say that he "hopes they would have time to get (the remaining squadrons) up to speed."

That means that even with those type of draconian cuts, the remaining squadrons are not combat capable and would need to build up to deployment. Make no mistake about it, this isn't like a certification for deployment.  This is an issue of USAF squadrons not being basically trained to perform their mission sets.

By the Generals own words, we have at least a portion of our active duty USAF that is combat ineffective and mission incapable...unless they have time to get ready.  This is probably the most honest, scariest, most worrying statement that I've heard from any of the Service Chiefs.

I've seen waste in the DoD and believe that weapons systems are being bought that aren't justified (see previous post about the MV-22 vs. MH-60) but this shows me that Sequestration has gone from being an abstraction to an actual threat to national security.  We have got to get it fixed.

Is one MV-22 worth 4.5 MH-60R/S?

I was going over the Marine Corps aviation budget and the question must be asked.  Is one MV-22 worth 4.5 MH-60R/S?  via AOL

“In 2010 we have had a 28 percent increase in readiness; at the same time we’ve had a 19 percent decrease in maintenance costs, as measured by cost per flight hour,” an obviously pleased program manager replied when I asked him for the latest numbers. “I’m unaware of any other program that has demonstrated an increase in readiness while lowering flight hour costs.”

This news come fresh on the heels of the V-22 program landing an impressive commitment from the Pentagon for a $6.5 billion, five-year mulityear contract for 99 Ospreys. The average unit price for the V-22s ordered across that deal is $70 million, he told reporters here during a briefing at the Boeing chalet. While that isn’t, strictly speaking news (the redoubtable Rick Whittle reported that for us in February), he buried the information and we want to make sure you know.)

Sorry but I'm not entirely convinced that the speed that the V-22 brings is worth 4.5 MH-60s.

Not for Marine Corps mission sets.  There is no justification for the Marine Corps to have an all V-22 fleet of aircraft.

None.

NOT ONE.

The Marine Corps is talking about a financial trainwreck affecting procurement.  That's bullshit and Sweetman (listen up buddy cause I won't ever admit this again) was right.  We could have afforded the EFV, the MPC and or the ACV if we weren't paying (now 70 mill but at the time) 100 mill a piece for the V-22.

This is borderline criminal and the Corps is out of balance because of it.

The Brits have a problem with their carriers.

British Naval Aviation should be sitting pretty right now.

They're about to get their F-35B's...The USMC is already looking at using the MV-22 as a refueling platform and you can bet that someone in the Commandant's office (or in the Assistant Commandant for Aviation) is already looking at the concepts for an early warning version.

So with the purchase of the F-35B and a few V-22's in the future, you can have a pretty impressive fighter force operating from those flat decks.

Sharkey Ward though is throwing cold water on the whole idea. via his news letter.

The Air Marshal does not appear to understand that the decks of U.S. Navy and US Marine Corps carriers are 4 inches thick - whereas our new carrier decks are no more than 1 inch thick. The Air Marshal’s comments are therefore misleading at best. Scientific/engineering judgement is that our thin new carrier decks will not be able to withstand the thermal effects of F35B STOVL vertical landing operations. There is therefore a massive latent/hidden cost waiting in the wings for the provision of a new and much thicker flight deck for our new carriers. Gray and Hillier should both be required to provide this cost estimate and place it in the equation for comparison with cat and trap costs.

How much it will cost to reinforce the Elizabeth classes flight decks is anyones guess but it won't be cheap.

This will be fun to watch.

A400 Paris Air Show Flight Demonstration Pics.

The 1st Armored Division is in Jordan...

If you're going to test a concept AND have troops in place to carry out directives from the President then the Chief of Staff of the Army either has a crystal ball or planning that is beyond perfect.

via Army.mil and Bob...

WASHINGTON (Army News Service, June 3, 2013) -- About 100 Soldiers from the 1st Armored Division are now in Jordan, within the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility, as part of an advance headquarters element that will pave the way for follow-on Soldiers in the June "Eager Lion" exercise there.
Maj. Gen. Sean B. MacFarland, the new commander of Fort Bliss, Texas, and the 1st Armored Division, or 1st AD, will himself go forward in a few weeks to meet up with his deputy, who is already in place, in order to participate in the exercise.
"It's an opportunity for us to develop mil-to-mil relationships with the Jordanian armed forces," MacFarland said. "The 1st Armored Division is regionally aligned with the U.S. Central Command, or CENTCOM, area of responsibility, or AOR, so building on our ability to operate and establish greater bonds of mutual trust with the Jordanians is a huge benefit for our troops who are going over there, and familiarizing ourselves with Jordan."
The exercise will involve about 8,000 personnel. About 5,000 of those will be U.S., and about 3,000 will be Jordanian.
The 1st AD is "regionally aligned" with CENTCOM, something the Army has recently started to push. A regional alignment flags Army units to prepare to go forward and support combatant commanders as they address mutual threats and interests with partners; build capabilities of partners so they can handle things themselves; and increase influence to have access if needed.
Regionally aligned forces can include Army capabilities in direct support of combatant commanders every day. They also include personnel and units assigned to a theater, U.S. Pacific Command and U.S. European Command have the bulk of these. Additionally, regionally aligned forces include those units in an "allocated" status, given to a combatant commander for a specific mission for a specific period of time and under his direct control.

The 1st Armored Division is in Jordan.

The 26th MEU is in Jordan.

The Kearsarge Amphibious Ready Group is off shore.

USAF assets in the form of F-16 squadrons are on the way.

Additionally allied forces are suppose to be participating in this exercise.

When you have this many forces in a region ready to go several things can happen.  Either it can be something that you want because of a plan, or it can be forced action because of enemy activity.

Two words for you.  If you're a commander then they're in all caps.  Force Protection.

Hezbollah and the Iranians are our adversaries?  This will not be good.  Not because they're better than us.  They're not.  But they've practiced fighting combined arms organizations like ours when they go up against the Israeli's.

If that's a guide then we can count on one more thing planners might not be considering.  Hezbollah likes to kidnap soldiers. 

This is going to be anything but simple.

Skunk Works® -- 70 Years of Mission Driven Innovation

Kearsarge ARG Photoex...photos by MC2 Corbin Shea.

I've been so focused on the 26th MEU on the ground in Syria that I've forgotten that we have our ARG floating off shore in an almost classic cold war Russia vs. USA stance. This will be interesting to watch.

Iran sends its Revolutionary Guard (Immortals) to Syria. Will Rangers and MARSOC put the name to the test?

MARSOC recently had an award ceremony where the awardees were running around in SPARTAN replica headgear.

Interesting considering the fact that the Spartans didn't create special units and simply raised their entire force to elite standards...something that was once the hallmark of the Marine Corps.  I digress.  Persia...I mean Iran is reportedly sending 4000 of its troops to help defend Syria.

Pentagon planning has it that SOCOM is ready to conduct strikes to seize weapons of mass destruction (read that to mean chemical and certain conventional weapons ... more than likely MANPADS).

Which means that we could see the first real deal meeting between Iranian and US Special Operations (and I'm not counting reports that I've heard that Iranian Revolutionary Guards were advising rebels in Afghanistan).

This mission set (if it gets green lighted) will fall to the Rangers and MARSOC.  Special Forces would turn down a raid of this type without second thought (Its not their thing--not their mission set...and they won't plus up a mission just to satisfy planners or Flag rank if history is a guide).  MARSOC and Rangers would jump at the chance (Rangers especially train to conduct Battalion sized operations---MARSOC started off doing Battalion sized ops in Afghanistan but switched to the SEAL model after the first deployment)...which leaves me wondering about SEALs.

For the fanboys, memory is short, but SEALs had a very spotty record in the Special Ops game until recently.  In previous years, they had been mauled on several occasions when conducting platoon sized missions.  Additionally when going up against conventional forces they suffered an alarming mission failure rate that was often chalked up to poor intel/greater resistance than expected.

Syria is starting off as the war that no one wanted except for the extreme left (humanitarian hawks) and extreme right (global interventionist all the time--McCain and his cronies).  I'll be interested to see how McRaven, MARSOC, Rangers, SEALs and the aviation assets of SOCOM (along with the obligatory MV-22 that Amos will demand on at least a few missions) perform.

This is the fuse that could light the whole thing off...and with a President needing a distraction, and an economy that needs revving...maybe a large scale regional war is exactly what the policy makers actually want.

UPDATE:  Required reading.  Bob (thanks!) provided a couple of links that makes me wonder if this isn't further along in planning than even I thought.  Take a few minutes, digest it and ponder exactly what it means...

http://killerapps.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/06/10/the_us_has_5000_troops_in_jordan_for_an_air_defense_and_disaster_relief_excercise

http://www.army.mil/article/104693/1st_Armored_Division_troops_aligned_with_CENTCOM__ready_for_Eager_Lion_kick_off/

http://www.defensenews.com/article/20121021/DEFREG02/310210010/U-S-Israel-Kick-Off-Austere-Challenge-Missile-Exercise

82nd Airborne IS making a move toward the Pacific! Can we get a Brigade forward deployed next?

An 82nd Airborne Division Paratrooper handles a snake during Jungle Survival Training with the Tentara Nasional Indonesia Angkatan Darat (Indonesian Army) 17th Airborne Brigade as part of Garuda Shield bilateral training, June 12, 2013, in 1st Kostrad Headquarters, West Java, Indonesia. Sponsored by United States Army Pacific, the training is in its seventh year.

About the caption to this photo...

1.  I'm calling bullshit on what they're trying to imply.  They're giving the idea that the 17th Airborne Brigade has been rotating troops through this training regularly.  I might have missed it but I've only seen the occasional frontline unit go through this training.  Lots of Marines but few Soldiers.

2.  He can try and put on his war face but I can tell he ain't happy.  Check out his death grip on dinner!  A few more minutes and that snake's head is gonna pop off!!!!:))

3.  Now how about we make room in the back of the base the Marines, Navy and Air Force is building in Australia (way in the back...closest to the swamp water) and stick a Reinforced Company of Paratroopers there permanently...we can rotate them in and out but eventually we can have the dream ticket (if they don't jack up the formations) of a MEU (full strength with armor) and Airborne Light Infantry along with C-130/C-17 detachment from Pope AFB to fly them around showing the flag (heck they can jump into Singapore, while we hit the beach to show what a combined Airborne, Amphibious Assault looks like...that should make the Dragon piss his pants).

Sidenote:  Australia is about to become the modern day Germany and Philippines/Japan rolled into one.  Military men go their single but come back with wives....Recommendation?  Don't do it boys.  Save your pennies and make weekend jaunts to Sydney.  Paradise awaits but hurry.  5 years in and it'll be filled with graby ya catch ya bars right off base.

We revived the concept and EADS will finish it...

A heavy lift airship.

Once sought by the US Army and now presumably abandoned is revived by EADS.

They'll probably make it work too.  Oh and check out EADS' fantastic Paris Airshow Video Page here.

Sunday Selfy..

Note:  Although we all lust after this body type is it biologically possible for it to be achieved naturally?  By that I mean without the use of silicon or water soluble based enhancements?  Body fat on women that is low enough to show abs is usually low enough to make "the good stuff" diminish proportionally.  Ok.  That's a sign of too many beers.  Why do I even care?  This pic is approved!

Happy Fathers Day...Marine style.

via Tactical News Magazine.

VBTP-MR 6x6 Guarani Torc.

via TechnoDefesa

The TORC-30 is a tower modern dual employment (antiaircraft and ground) that uses the cannon Rheinmetall MK 30-2 ABM (Air Burst Munitions) of 30x173mm (the same used in Puma IFV) and, according to Ricardo Azevedo, Director Marketing ARES, this station will be equipped with weapons shooting system already employed at REMAX, also developed by the partnership CTEx and ARES.
Although anti-aircraft capability, the TORC-30 does not have a radar, which significantly reduces the weight of the tower, eliminating the need for structural reinforcement pillars as Guarani equipped with the turret TU-30 BR-Elbit AEL. The TORC-30 also has a lower profile than the tower Israeli.
This program was secured with funds from FINEP. On 23/07/2012 the fund disbursed R $ 3,198,500.00 for the design and construction of the prototype, which Rheinmetall cannon should arrive in Brazil during the second half of this year. The design and manufacture of tower 30 TORC is scheduled for completion in 2015.

And now it begins.

I missed this news from LAAD, but the arms makers are rushing in to make sure that every possible variant is fielded, and that they're providing components for it.

But the bigger news is that Elbit is getting competition from all directions.  RAFAEL is making a new 30mm unmanned turret and now Rheinmetall is marketing their Puma setup.  This is nothing but good news for the USMC.  Especially if we had a REAL Marine Personnel Carrier program running. 

Help needed! A comprehensive history of the AAV-7/LVTP-7

Hey all!

I need your help.  I'm looking for a comprehensive history of the AAV-7/LVTP-7 from development to its current build.

Ideally it would cover all modifications, both sanctioned and "hillbilly" mods done in the field, along with costs.  Combat history of the platform isn't really what I'm after...that's already well documented and easily found.  Whats got me stumped is a history of the vehicle itself.

Recommendations would be appreciated...in or out of print is irrelevant.  A complete history would be ideal but even if a book covers from development to the '80's would work (for example).

Thanks!  Sol.

BAE's historic data dump.

I wondered what was going on when I got these in my mailbox and a little "google-foo" showed me that BAE uncovered these secret projects and ITV published a story on it that is only now making it over to the US.  Read it all here.

BAE Fighter Jet Take-Off Platform

Note:  They keep putting 'em out and as long as they're cool, I'll keep posting 'em!

S-300 is a beast. One system is altering US military options.

Have you been keeping up with the talk about a no fly zone in Syria?

If you have then whats been talked about is almost shocking.  I'm reading between the lines but it appears from my Command Chair in Camp SNAFU! that US military options are being shaped by the S-300 and fear of it.

Why do I say that?

I read earlier that they were discussing using F-16's from Jordanian airbases to enforce a zone that extended 25 miles into Syria.  F-16's would fire their missiles from inside Jordan to destroy any aircraft violating that zone.

That was quickly knocked down as only an option.  Later we heard that the Army would be sending Patriot Missile Batteries to join Marine units on the border.  I found this to be particularly interesting because the USMC doesn't have organic anti-air except in the form of the aircraft that accompany the MEU.  Hell it doesn't have organic anti-air even at the division level (I won't touch the MEB and MEF which I consider to be full scale warfare orgs).

But again, I'm off track.  One missile system...not even the Russians most advanced...is keeping the allies (US and Western European forces) from mounting a vigorous no fly zone like we saw over Libya.

What happens when we face a real deal, 100% fully integrated air defense establishment over a country doing bad things?

The S-300 is a beast.  The S-400/500 must be Monsters.

(VBTP-MR) 6x6 Guarani in full scale production in Brazil.

Impressive.

In the span of a few short years, the Brazilians have put forward a request to industry...selected a winning design...negotiated a favorable price & production schedule...and put it into production.

During the same time span, the US Marine Corps (once considered the finest fighting organization the world has ever known) has done basically nothing.

Is there a better example of a power in decline than this? If not then I can point to about 100 other things that point to the same conclusion.  We need to get our house in order from the top down.  We don't have a sexual assault, desecrating of enemy body, failure to treat our sick and wounded (although those are legit issues) problem...we have a leadership problem.  No more "stand downs" to address these issues with the troops...This is an 0-5 and above problem and the answer can only come from those ranks (not ignoring the SNCO's here but they implement policy, not make it).

First course of business?  Accept that change cannot come until there is change at the top.  AMOS MUST GO!

But back to the issue at hand.  Put on your Google translate and read about the VBTP-MR here.