each services inform congress that they are currently incurring the peak shortage of aircraft climbs to three hundred twelve in that same year what is more troubling is that it appears that there was a disconnect between the office of the secretary of defense in the department of navy officials from o s d have recently briefed this committee that there is no strike fighter shortfall but that the totality of strike fighter inventory is a matter of analysis in the quadrennial defense review in other words o s d has already pre determined the answer and now they'll use the q t r to build the equation i request that the witnesses explain today what the position of the department of navy is regarding the strike fighter shortfall and if they are aware of any new analysis by the joint staff or which would contradict what is apparently simple arithmetic because the last time i checked an aircraft carrier is only worth its weight in gold if it has embarked if it hasn't embarked you know wing another words ninety thousand tonnes of american sovereignty becomes ninety thousand tons of american helicopter transportation next there are a number of programs and i know we may not have time to discuss all of them today there are high interest to members of the subcommittee the first program is the f eighteen super hornet which ties directly with the strike fighter amatory discussion but i would like to understand what i would like to understand is why the navy reduced its program request by nine super hornets in fiscal year two thousand and ten over the predicted request in last year's budget it was our understanding that the program is executing very well cost target and on schedule with the super hornet line executing while the navy and marine corps have opted to increase their fiscal ten by joint strike fighter f thirty five aircraft by t and an estimated cost of two hundred thirty six million dollars each i know the department prefers the advantages of stealth but given the high risk and high concurrency regarding the development testing and production of the f thirty five we need to stand at what point putting combat proven rubber on the ramp super hornets is more advantageous than waiting for an experimental aircraft that is behind its original schedule by more than two years over its original program budget estimate by more than sixty five billion dollars and has already reduced its plan more than four hundred aircraft the g a o has noted in its most recent f thirty five report to congress that the program estimate estimates an additional two point four billion is needed to cover cost overruns on the air system in engine contracts and to incorporate the one year extension to the development schedule the prime contractor has already extended the manufacturing schedule three times and due to ongoing manufacturing inefficiencies in part supply problems with its subcontractors has only delivered three out of thirteen aircraft nine aircraft should have been delivered by now i would like to understand why the department wants to accelerate f thirty five procurement between twenty twenty ten and twenty fifteen by purchasing twenty eight additional aircraft above its current program of record it is my understanding that f thirty five contracts are planned as a class reimburse as cost reimbursable instead of fixed price and this magnifies the financial risk to the government has the department learned nothing from the fiascos of the f eight seventy one program the littoral combat ship program the f eighteen super hornet can be purchased for somewhere in the neighborhood of fifty million dollars on a fixed price contract for the f thirty five the cost growth frame alone is thirty eight point three million dollars i think we have a great airframe in the f a eighteen super hornet it is affordable it is multi mission and is flying off our carriers in combat today i would like our witnesses to explain why this committee should recommend removing funds from a proven program to increase procurement and a developmental program and briefly i would like to address to the seventy one program the navy invested over three point two billion dollars received one test pilot aircraft was only able to successfully execute this program that ultimately was canceled by secretary gates i would like to understand what the plan is for the current aircraft assets that have already been delivered and what is the plan going forward and how the mistakes of the original program will be prevented from happening in the next program i understand the need to deprogram may be on the verge of a significant mccurdy breach i would request the witnesses to comment on the health of that program finally i understand that although the twenty two is performed extremely well in combat operations in iraq the aircraft is having sustainment issues and unforeseen additional costs associated with maintenance their ongoing efforts at design changes to address some of these maintenance issues i realize i've outlined a number of issues facing naval aviation and i believe the these are fair concerns and deserve an open and public accounting of the costs and benefits of these programs when i am not willing to do is sit by as program after program breaks the bank i'm cos i have seen enough of that and shipbuilding programs we can no longer afford an affordable programs i believe it time to step back and build what we know works make it better if we can and get the capability to the sailor and marine who need it today not ten years from now again i think the witnesses for joining us today and now would like to recognize the gentleman from maryland mr bartlett thank you very much i will ranking members opening statement into the record as you will see from my line of questioning later if it were my opening statement it would be different thank you mr chairman and welcome to our witnesses we meet this afternoon to receive testimony  navy marine corps aviation programs which is an area with many challenges naval aviation has been a major component of our mighty military might since world war two our ability to project our great distances on to  core from any ocean in the world has been vital to u s national security our aircraft carriers have become a symbol of american diplomatic power and freedom and are the heart of our modern navy as the saying goes when a crisis arrives the first question everyone says where is the nearest carrier i'm forcing our navy faces a significant strike fighter shortfall in the near future and what good is an aircraft carrier without aircraft last year the scieno testified to a fighter shortfall or proxy hundred twenty five planes for the department of the navy by twenty seventeen this year based on an updated analysis of navy as told congress that a more realistic estimate is a shortfall over two hundred forty planes this is assumed that the joint strike fighter delivers on time and the navy will continue to resort to its carrier air wings with fewer aircraft than is called for in the national military strategy if the joint strike fighter program is like most of our programs it will not deliver on time and so the real shortage will be well over two hundred forty planes to the navy resorts to its full strike fighter requirement the shortfall would be greater than three hundred aircraft what does all this mean simple math shows that at least five of our eleven carriers will be without fighter aircraft or we would be forced to severely limit the number of aircraft carrier and a bailable for training in either case a solution or pose a significant strategic risk i'm deeply concerned that this budget actually makes the shortfall worse by cutting the number of super hornets the navy is buying facing a gap of at a future years defense program with the budget as required by section two twenty one of title ten united states code and has refused to brief congress on the apparently differing estimates on the size of the fighters shortfall is this a transparency that president obama promised there's a part of the defense consider itself above the law let us be clear the american system of a quadrennial defense review does not exempt the department from filling its legal obligations well i understand that the witnesses this afternoon are not responsible for these decisions to violate the law let me say at the outset that the department can expect to use a q t r as a get out of jail free card i witnesses should understand that this committee expects and deserves answers not invasive maneuvers before closing let me briefly mention few other concerns i hope the witnesses will address person development and testing of the joint strike fighter remains uncertain the fact that we are already spending billions of dollars to buy these planes we have only completed a fraction of the testing deeply concerns me i believe that we will continue to see cost and schedules left and i'm concerned that in a constrained fiscal environment we will continue to see growth in this expensive program the joint strike fighter may be a great weapon system but it seems to be the ninety nine percent solution that secretary gates said we should avoid i would also like the witnesses to comment on where we stand in terms of electronic warfare capabilities today are we meeting the needs of this combat or the combatant commanders what are the marines doing about electronic warfare or will the navy continue to provide expeditionary electronic warfare capability on behalf of the air force there's much work to be done in the area of naval aviation let me again thank the witnesses for being here today for the work they're doing for our nation thank you mr chairman for holding this important hearing i yield back thank you m we've been joined by mr cochran do you have an opening statement thank you buzzers are going off thursday the good news is these are the final votes of the day and there's only three why don't we have admiral why don't you submit your remarks and then we can take a brief recess for the members to go vote will come back and we should have the rest of the afternoon clear and up again you can have your statements entered for the record so this chair chairman corney and congressman acquisition lead we develop and test and acquire our country's naval aviation weapons systems by balancing performance and cost effectiveness the fiscal year two thousand and ten budget supports navy marine corps joint forces capable of meeting the wide spectrum of total of two hundred three aircraft with the fiscal year two thousand and ten funding the navy's acquisition professional workforce dedicated men and women of civilian and military career fields working to bring the most capable and affordable weapons systems to the fleet by developing new technologies testing and integration of systems and of experiment equipment and support for these weapon systems they get the funds and policies of this budget request i am proud to represent them this committee the navy is committed to finding and fielding the joint strike fighter as a highly capable fifth generation multimission strike fighter j s f is in the eighth year of design that is designed vellum and test program  aircraft are in ground in flight test all f thirty five variants are projected to meet their prospective key performance parameters for k p p s b f one thirty five engine has completed eleven hundred three eleven thousand three hundred plus test hours and sixteen engines to mid april two thousand and nine systems integration testing continues on plan b a test flight test flying a lab in over one hundred fifty thousand hours of ground laboratory testing before the integrated mission technologically advanced product in a short acquisition timeline this aircraft will be delivered only nine years after program initiation and will you both extremely capable and affordable in f y ten will procure six l ripple on one aircraft the program will commence flight tests later this year and i o c n f y thirteen another good news story in eighteen growler has completed its operational test and is preparing to go before the defense acquisition board for product product decision later this summer for reproduction we have delivered sixteen aircraft would be island and on track for i will see in september of this year in f y ten we will pick your twenty two production aircraft the two d advance talk i have completed over ninety two percent of its s t d program and operational assessment and currently has two aircraft in flight test that have flown more than one thousand flight hours the aircraft has already demonstrated that its advanced radar delivers three times the range of legacy of radar and provide the detection required against advanced threats of today and tomorrow the program we presented to defense acquisition board for milestones the decision by the end of this month we need to award a contract for two l replied one aircraft by june one two three four test test test  mention was made of the v twenty two and the joint strike fighter if i could i'll just read that part of my statement for you firstly m b twenty two osprey we've just finished three highly successful combat rotations to iraq and just last week a fourth osprey squadron sailed toward the fight with the marine expeditionary unit that will be deployed for the next six or seven months the osprey has transformed the way we are fighting in a manner akin to the introduction of the helicopter in the middle of the last century we can now project combat loaded marines soldiers and special operators from the sea base or any forward site deep into the battle space at the speed of a k c one thirty and we could do it at altitude above the ground threat that is claim so many helicopters in iraq afghanistan and elsewhere and then we can land the payload anywhere it is needed just like a helicopter with its speed range and survivability of the m b twenty two truly a game changer another game changer for us will be the f thirty five b short takeoff and vertical landing variant of the joint strike fighter in the fall of two thousand and twelve when the marine corps stands up its first operational squadron the m f a three three two this fifth generation stealth aircraft will begin replacing r f eighteen's eighty eight and e a six b with a single platform that far exceeds the operational capabilities of any of the tactical aircraft being flown today the joint strike fighter gives us the operational agility we need to support the joint force in the hybrid battles that loom on our nation's bow most importantly we intend to leverage the unprecedented sensor capability this machine offers for the benefit of the entire arena ground task force allowing us to accelerate the decision cycle and fight smarter than we ever have before just three short years from now so our operational commanders will be able to combine the effects of these two machines you have the twenty two osprey and  thirty five lightning two from a sea or land base to run lisa tempo agility and speed of action that has never been possible in the past regardless of the future fret threats we will face in varying mission remains to be the marine corps aviation force in readiness across the full spectrum of combat operations i pride in the accomplishments about marines past and present and the staying power of our military families is only exceeded by my confidence that we are proper force to meet  thank you for the opportunity to appear before you to discuss navy aviation i would like to submit my written statement for the record without objection so i'm delighted to share this time with my colleagues from the navy and marine corps to convey the contributions of navy aircraft in our armed forces our aviation community private aircraft ships and weapon systems has proved to be a stabilizing force with the capacity to span the globe if we can take a look to the days following nine eleven just three weeks after the attack to carry the enterprise and the carl vinson were in theater ready to provide continuous strikes and closer support in fact the air prize reversed course  provided the first tactical air strikes in country our response in support of nine eleven operation enduring freedom continues today in fact as recently as a few days ago our chief of naval operations that i would like to mention because i believe it bears repeating on the value of our carrier fleet he said that a single navy aircraft carrier provides forty six percent of the vicks aircraft sorties in afghanistan that one carrier provides close support airborne reconnaissance and airborne electronic attack to our troops in contact with the enemy by the way the response time for those troops in contact with the enemy is often less than ten minutes augmenting the carrier support our troops  that in a moment of crisis we hear the phrase where are the carriers in the first to arrive in response to a crisis syria strike group provides credible capability and assured access with the speed agility  including the horn of africa sea power is disrupting insurance on land as well as disrupting smuggling and piracy at sea arctics and rotary wing navy assets have been engaged in counter piracy operations around the horn of africa last month during the merced alabama incident the first u s military assets on scene was a navy p three and our helicopters have been integral in the apprehension of a number of pirates by providing necessary surveillance to locate track and intercept vessels on behalf of the visit board search and seizure teams are carriers and ships remain on station around the world providing presence in other places as well the caribbean the mediterranean the pacific this out china sea the indian ocean in the red sea our forces provide the effect the shore at sea and strengthening relationships and building regional stability throughout the area fiscal year two thousand and ten president's budget maintains our ability to meet our wartime needs today and contend with future security challenges it's the aircraft that are fighting today's war are being recapitalized or sustained to ensure relevancy across the spectrum of threats we are thankful to our predecessors for investing in programs that we are benefiting from today and those that will meet future security challenges tomorrow our budget continues the development of the f thirty five b two d unmanned systems as well as new strike weapons capability and the department of navy will produce ninety eight additional tax on fixed wing aircraft one hundred rotary wing aircraft and five for a total of two hundred three aircraft i would like to offer my appreciation to this committee without the committee's tireless devotion and significant contributions the great success of our force would not be possible we are truly grateful and thank you for the opportunity to appear before you and thank you for your support for what you do for us today and what we will do tomorrow and i look stressed so that resulted this year in the estimate of instead of one hundred twenty some aircraft shortfall on our carriers to two hundred forty something i guess my question is and everybody is saying and i guess really what they're saying is give us more time to figure this out but what they're saying is well we've got to do this quadrennial review well didn't like this is too complicated we say we're going to have eleven aircraft carriers for a certain brief window we're going to be down to ten you've got forty four aircraft on an aircraft carrier  two hundred forty some aircraft sure you've got five aircraft carriers and no planes on so my question is one first of all how does that affect the number of missions that you have to fly just to practice because i was watching night landings of these things it looked  me like i was pretty tricky business yes and i would think you want to have plenty of practice for your pilots and if you've got fewer planes then i would think it would affect your training schedule it's first question second question would be let's say that you can have forty four aircraft on aircraft carrier is an aircraft carrier just about as good if you've got twenty or crafts you could split the aircraft half and half if that's not the case let's just answer those two first questions  that was assuming that all our legacy f eighteen s a three d to get to ten thousand hours or so that was sort of a book and the other book and was if none of those aircraft got past eighty six hundred hours that it would be one hundred twenty five and two hundred forty three shortfall now that was last year and what i'd like to do is talk to you for a few minutes and outline what's changed it's got to be pretty short because just a minute or so i want to just get to the number of the you know i want to remind the ranking member that as the ranking member the analysis the service life extension has informed us that there are a number of areas that we want to be focused on when we open these aircraft up when they go to the depot  cut to the city and we're not sure exactly the number of the aircraft that we're going to be able to get through and the reason we're between about one twenty five to forty it's somewhere between there would be your  guess we're not sure right now represent vacant and the reason is because we're still discovering a lot by looking at these aircraft when they go through the depot we've had thirty nine aircraft that have gone through the depot to date we thought there are about one hundred fifty nine focus areas or areas of interest on the airplane we've got about nine that have come through the depot and what we found is there are fifty additional areas each airplane is going to be a little bit different but as we go through a three phase process to determine what the limits are on service life extension we're going to be able to revise refine the technical baseline and understand more now currently today the navy has  currently as the aircraft necessary to fulfill the missions that the cocoa have laid upon us so we have the aircraft that we need today so the focus is how do we get through the next summer what levers that we need to look at to understand not only what the strike fighter shortfall is but how to mitigate it and there's four ways to mitigate it one is to maintain our continued unwavering support for the joint strike fighter second is to maintain our buy of f eighteen s there is to maintain the funding in terms of logistics for our current legacy aircraft our strike fi  forty four is the requirement for the navy for strike fighters on our aircraft carriers forty four represents the number that the combatant commanders are expecting when those carriers show up overseas to provide th necessary facts for everything from contingency ops to major combat operations and also represents the most effective use of a nimitz class size flight deck so forty four is a number that's required for our craft carriers and that's what we intend to do so following up you're saying you would deploy a carrier that had significantly number less than forty four planes on it you'd want to keep that number pretty close if you have a  so if you had a shortfall and you're saying you would rather have some aircraft carrier left behind than to have one with half the planes on it or something you wouldn't consider that probably are you saying that that's used on no or that's a fleet commander decision on exactly how he loads out a carrier when we have we understand the requirement we understand the way that we're deploying ships and our aircraft air carriers and they're  today but how that would be done in the future would depend on the needs of the combatant commander and the fleet commander but currently the requirements for forty four and that's what we're doing right now what i heard you say though me a lot of detail but what i heard you say was still the shortfall is probably going to be between the one twenty five number and the two forty three number because two forty three was worst case that's assuming you can't get any more than eight thousand six hundred dollars and the one twenty five was assuming that you could get ten thousand hours and you're saying into the actually look at the play and you will know exactly how many of them fit into which category but it's going to fall in that number is that correct there is the possibility that some of them could fall outside that number and that's part of the analysis the second phase of the analysis it's ongoing right now that nab here is going and working with their depots to understand exactly the extent of whether or not it's going to be exactly in that in that bracket e v a s or you're not even sure that bracket is what you're saying bracket is is the best information that we have this moment but we're we've still got work to do congress now what would it cost let's say that you find some aircraft that are eight thousand six hundred dollars and and they're going to need some repairs do you really have any idea of what that would cost my understanding was it was prohibitive to do that but it would be cheaper just to get some new ones is that true or not necessarily or it would not necessarily true what we know is that a center barrel cost about five million and a center barrel is going to be required on the earlier lot aircraft meaning lot sixteen and earlier what we know entire wing could cost as much as four five million what we know is that the inner wing is a focus area of the aircraft that have gone through the depot in terms of the additional  hotspots or focus so but what we don't know is whether or not all of the aircraft that go through are going to need all of those repairs so it could be expensive and it might not and right now that's what the so we don't we don't have a current cost estimate of what it would take if we wanted to extend the service life we don't really know what that number is is what you're saying it depends on the individual plane is that what you're basically saying yes or it depends on the plane we have programmed some money because we do know about this integral replacement and the analysis that will go on through the summer and is expected to finish in the march two thousand and ten time frame is set to be a part of twelve issue and that's the way that we set up the analysis to feed into twelve and that would be give us enough time to eighteen what's the minimum number of aircraft required to be purchased over the contract period that would result in a savings of at least ten percent as required by laws or some particular number that you've got because we saved what a billion two hundred ten aircraft it resulted in about a seven hundred ten million dollars savings and with a five year program we followed that with a multi year two which just ended nine that was a that saved about one point one billion over the same five year period to make a multi year value we need economic order quantity which means we have to have volume we've also got to have a length of period of time that wouldn't do us any good to give volume and put it in one or two or three years we need to have some length of time to make that to get that return on investment here to answer your question if we look at multiyear one we had about a seven point five or six percent savings that equates to alter your two by eleven percent saving you have those kind of savings when you go five years and get economic or quantity by we want to have a say a significant savings which go in the order of ten percent or five million dollars would be the those kind of book and if you were using that term here that would seek to get in f is scheduled to be ready to go at twenty fifteen are we sure that that's going to happen on time that gives you five years right ten to fifteen years or so let's assume j s f actually is there twenty fifteen so you do have the five years so what would the number be to get to the ten percent of you figure that's right ten is a single year by hornets as you know the growler we put into the multi year for multi year to and we were able to take advantage of that with a single year by we don't have the economic or the quantity to do it so tense is is in the books we don't have that ability to incorporate that into a multi year now so a target eleven then eleven to fifteen and then you're sure that we're going to have  seven fifteen i know that i can speak to the i o c as we had today which is for the marine corps and the navy and say that plan we have today we will serve i mean we're developing those programs to go forward on those timelines but i time getting anything i feel like i'm trying to nail jello to a wall gentleman you know i'm asking about a time for both a year and you're saying no we really don't know what the requirements are of talk about the requirements i thought we're looking at one twenty five and then two forty three now you're saying yeah but it could be this other way somewhere along the line we've got to make a plan as to what we're going to do and we i mean j s s could be there twenty fifteen and that's obviously something that's very important i know the brain core has keen interest in the stovl version because you're kind of putting all your eggs in that basket with the harriers i guess are getting older and older but somewhere along the line we've got to be able to do some planning and seems like no matter how you look at the number that we should be referring to is sixty nine to one twenty nine for the u s navy and that's what i prefer last year that's those were the book ends of ten thousand hours for three hundred aircraft and eighty six hundred dollars no aircraft slapped so that gives you all about a seventy aircraft shortfall and the numbers are will let's start with seventy if you had seventy additional aircraft over a five year period would you get ten percent  minimum sustain rate for there is about twenty four aircraft to go through the economic climate is somewhere between thirty and thirty six depending on the numbers we have so if you could generate on the order of thirty per year for five years you would be able to enter a multi year that would produce ten and be able to produce them to allow economic growth and quantity buys over a five year period or some significant period of time and you will definitely get savings in a multiyear that's why that's the only reason we're allowed to enter multi years if we can assure significant savings so you're saying the minimum you'd have to buy would be about one hundred fifty over five years total in order to get that ten percent so in the scenario you presented yesterday i would be well we'd have to do i would say that but again we i don't set the requirements o nine data shortfall for us and it still about seventy aircraft best case right now but we still have some discovery to do this summer as we go through slapp and we still have some levers to pull the number was higher because you variables that are involved here first of all the p p o nine numbers are no longer relevant to this discussion in my opinion for example if if the if the program purchases more than one strike fighters then we didn't p b o nine which does the  strike by the shortfall would come down by a concern commensurate number of of f thirty five b and c models secondly this issue of the service life assessment program in the service life extension program is very much filled with variability at this point friday there are approximately three hundred thirty eight through which they identify as prime candidates to be extended and so we will extend by a number by pure number making wise business decisions associated with go impediments to expansion at this point so are you saying this that means you wouldn't have to put more money in him or they would be prime candidates to put more money into to get him to ten thousand rights or the second time candidate yes or put it put more money into them  on a case by case basis to decide how much would need to be extended but even that has variability for example the majority of the interest areas are in the senate barrel that's the majority interest area we already have one point one four billion in the budget to pay for four hundred seventeen general bales to be replaced second most are in the wings there are options with regard to the wings one is repair two is to remove and replace and gave you the cost of a new wing the third is to take wings out of a mark which we're doing right now and replace those wings with wings that are essentially free and then the third large area that we're concerned about as we go through the assessment program is in the ass and of the a three d s that's probably where most of the uncertainty lies right now with regard to the cost responses from the witnesses i think the last item was on the presidential helicopter reference the fact obviously that secretary gates on friday announced the cancellation of the program and i was just following on his  correct secretary gates did announce recommend cancellation and is basis for that was original six billion dollars program which had headed toward thirteen billion six years overdue and does not meet the requirements of the white house and in come on in fact is a long long way to meet that requirement so it's been a very extremely challenging climate in this program complicated and exacerbated by us trying to bring this program to me t earlier when we weren't really defined what we had to do there were mistakes were made we drove significant developmental efforts forward at a time when we weren't certain of what those impacts would be and we were grossly details that go with every facet of the program to understand but it is a high level if you will plan of action how we're going to go forward to meet the direction also to have a program developed so we can do the president replace and helicopter program so in this case i believe what we need to do now is we need to meet the requirements we need just understand what those requirements are going to be understand the impacts of those requirements begin with requirements take them through the impacts of that and and do airplanes are going to need to be replaced the v h three is forty years old by twenty seventeen even with the service life extension programs that we are assessing now there at the near the end of their life so i'm very anxious to get back into the requirements generation process with the white house military office to decide what requirements they will lay out and then help move those requirements up to the joint requirements oversight council into the acquisition prague  was wondering thinking that through the navy is not going to sort of walk away from the research and development investment that's already taken place i mean there's some ways to recoup some of the next what has already  mentioned to you was a high level comeback we will plan to go forward but we have to do and simultaneously with that we have another course of action at the fall which is we have to can following the cancellation program we have to bring about what we do with this program and how we contracting ops it takes actions on the terminations as if they so understanding what we want to do in the future obviously we will take advantage of anything we can from a technology standpoint that would go into future helicopter programs or other programs of similar nature again as we start back in this program we have to understand the requirements to begin with requirements understand what they mean and what we have to do to meet those mission that's that set and in front of us and that was  gentleman from maryland mr bartlett thank you very much you know you would think from the discussion we've been having that we hadn't spent three point two billion and a number of years building the seventy one and the original requirements document for the the eight seventy one program the navy gave a litany of reasons why the legacy fleet was in urgent need of replacement so urgent that we were working around some of the usual procedures to get a plane more quickly so the president could have it the planes the navy said was overweight they like all weather capability they have extremely limited range speed and payload and i quote from the document right that the aircraft is no longer capable of implementing upgrades for mission requirements and now we're told that the current fleet is ok they can indeed be upgraded and that the cost of doing so will likely might be enormous were already spent three point two billion to produce the nine increment one helicopters they m exceed their performance requirements they are always intended to fly the president's why isn't it reasonable that congress would expect the navy to field these aircraft to meet the highly urgent need we had been briefed on for years but instead congressman is given a list of reasons why flying the thirty five year old legacy late for another decade is preferable to fielding the modern v a seventy one helicopters we have already paid for dues princes were told that  only has a five year service life even though the committee knows that it was designed for a minimum of thirty years that the navy has not even performed a basic airframe for tea testing to make a sound determination we need real answers we consider the budget requests frankly congress has been ignored for too long on this critical program and i'm concerned that the in the stop work order we are now being ignored the navy said that we needed a new aircraft to fly the president we bought that we asked the navy to build that aircraft and now without coming back to congress for a consultation the navy is usually they stop work order the very limits our options because there will be cost involved in the stop work order if we decide that we really ought to continue to provide service life extension for the current slate and what kind of new improvements will be made in it what conficker previously told that we really couldn't make the necessary improvements which is why we needed a plane so urgently that we were bypassing some of the usual we know that the increment ron was designed to provide what we were told was essential transportation for the president well increment to is being developed we know that increment one is deficient in a little deficient paylo capability in speed and in how far it can go in range but the essential reason we were told for moving away from the current fleet was to have better communication shut down it's going to cost about half a billion in the industry to shut down it's going to cost about a tenth of a billion in the in the navy to shut down and for another one point three billion we could make ready five of the nine planes so the president could use them and i am told by the by the manufacturer that for roughly one hundred million dollars each which comes well under the original figure of six point eight billion that they will engineer firm fixed price contract to  president's best interest to go ahead and provide these extra planes will have essentially nothing if we simply terminate and shut down if you gentlemen would answer the question please grossly underestimated and top of that we went to a two income approach in an effort to deliver near term as well as long term solutions so we are not delivering on the capability with increment one the program does not meet the requirements and that was what the recommendation for cancellation was for a certified miner a project the moment it was going to be sufficiently superior to the present fleet that it was deemed desirable to spend the money to produce to use it for five years what we've produced increment to  the as a do with the aircraft itself would be a different aircraft on the one you're talking to when you talk of thirty years of our aircraft life that's another factor in the interim one in terms of us not being able to make more than approximate chairman i think that the original five year life was not what the plane was expected to do it was just that well they only needed it for five years until they had increment to but nobody doubts that this plane is built as well as other helicopters and it should have the usual thirty thirty five forty year life should it n my understanding is the systems command would have to inspect the airplane and go through a rigorous service life extension program seeking hotspots and areas of interest to some sort of discussion we had previously about the a expeditionary gap and i want to would like to have an understanding if if if you had a decision has been made to have it have the growler fill that gap or if with additional additional growlers or if if it doesn't decision hasn't been made what kind of timeline are we on to make a decision so we can get there sort of by the time the gap is there we've made decisions ahead of time to fill that gap would be the best one to answer th timeframe so right now there is an acknowledged gap in terms of expeditionary capability that could occur depending on what happens with the sundown of the marine e a sixes in terms of what are our opportunities to mitigate this gap we still have a hot production line with f eighteen s and that is a hot production line that goes through the next few years i know that there's dialogue and this is a discussion topic in the building but for the time being there is no plan to recapitalize the navy f eighteen growl what i can tell you is that it it is an item that i know that the department of navy has is discussing with the other services and i can answer the question about exactly when there's going to be the next step for when there's going to be a dialogue that would lead to a decision either to recapitalize or not currently there is no decision to recapitalize general will take over the airborne electronic attack is that they got that about right you're closer if i may our plan is to keep going for another decade and sun down the last of ours in  twenty nine we believe that's a prudent course to take as we bring f thirty five online and we won't stand up warfare version of the f thirty five but we'll do it will take advantage of the inherent capability of resident in all  thirty five variants across the board we've also taken steps to ensure that next generation jammer is not just a replacement pod for the l q one ninety nine on the prowler and growler but is also going to be a threat threshold capability on the f thirty five so by twenty nineteen you should be in a situation where you can fly f thirty five in a very low observable in a mode or if called for you can fly a thirty flies not very low observable with with  we want to keep flying until twenty nineteen any additional we have funded and we'll take some of the navy's improved capability sets three which will improve our ability to provide proper support to the joint force commander for the next decade so we're very confident that we'll be all right despite the fact that our prowlers are flying at a one to one two well right now they're the one of the most popular capabilities in the expedition environment that we have with regard to the next generation jammer timeline i think that remains to be seen how quickly that program can come to the fore but about a decade from now i think we should be able to do it the ideas are picking up more and more energy and steam in recent months and i'm surprised but gratified that they are at twelve aircraft out getting ready to actually go forward on first deployment i o c in the aircraft this year as you go forward and to the next generation jammer that's an analysis of alternatives it's funded and we'll go back and i don't think we should we can't imagine i mean we have done some very wise things with the c h forty six over the past decade and a half we've we've improved the engines for the engine reliability improvement program about a decade ago we changed out the cockpit we change out the drive train we have spent our dollars wisely in the c h forty six and it remains a workhorse today we have so much forty six is deployed on our marine expeditionary units around the globe we have them for deployed in three meth in japan and we have them operating in iraq today thank goodness the venerable frog is continuing to perform just as we i hope that it would as far as it sundown as long as we can keep the b twenty two osprey on track we hope to be out of the c h forty six business by the end of the next decade and  we're on track to do that what we've been able to do some of my answer on the six b previously we've been able to take best of breed as the v twenty two is arrived now at thirty per year we've been able to use best of breed on the forty six and some down and put the ones in the  six business but i just share with you when i was executive officer of the great ship back in the early ninety's and the bird rep evolution which i was up on the bridge in kind in the carriers we were doing that the first left of the day fifty three kilos what you're referring to this is an airplane it's a it's a heavy lifter that will replace our existing c h fifty three echoes the requirement that we laid out for this airplane was to carry twenty seven thousand pounds one hundred twenty ten miles roundtrip in a navy high hot day that's about three times what the c h fifty three echo can carry today the need for this is because unfortunately during our ground task force is getting heavier  jail t v and some other things that cause us a degree of concern but but this fifty three kilos will be the load load carrying machine that we need the program has as resolved to my knowledge all of the technical risks associated with bucking up and becoming this heavy lifter that i described we got off to a slow start about a year late on preliminary design review that's going to make them late for critical design review we're in the process now assessing with the program manager and the contractor what impact that may have on cost and schedule our desire is to have initial operational capability of the fifty three kilos in around two thousand and sixteen and we'll see if we can hold that as we get more fact based analysis on the program in the coming two or are undergoing an analysis of alternatives to determine whether or not a follow on e p i x would be a manned replacement platform or an unmanned or distributed platform or series of family a platform so that analysis is on colin and that's an issue for f y eleven and paul twelve to make sure that we understand and are focused on hand funded so that if it is a follow on platform then we can program for it and make sure that it's mature enough before we sunset the e p three and a decision is to remain and the e p three and keep it in the same man a platform then we need to make a decision by palm fourteen so that we can take advantage of some of the zone five kit s s i k and the outer wing work that we've been doing for the p three s this morning so if i up front part of what we have learned over the past year is understanding exactly what it is we want to pick your and what are the challenges before we go to any kind of the current program so this set the stage for what i'm a mindset about entering into an alternatives this is decision to go forward to that to set in place that motion so we're working closely on the acquisition side with three where men stand with often have entire lot of staff to go forward in the problems they go forwards from just from an acquisition standpoint a quite nine years ago those were tragic mishaps we learned a lot from those mishaps we dug into the airplane with the airplane through the most intensive engineering scrutiny i think of any airplane in the department's history and thank goodness we did because the proof has been in the way the airplane has performed since then fifty five thousand hours on the b twenty two's in the fleet to include the last twenty months of combat operations in iraq flying in the most austere hostile environments you can imagine b twenty two super former iraqi leslie last friday we launched flight squadron of the twenty two's out on a marine expedition unit sailing towards the fight from carolina and by the fall we'll have a squadron of the twenty two's in afghanistan since then thank goodness the safety record has been super we've had a couple of  minor challenges on the deck that we've resolved we know the causes of those but beyond that the safety record has been absolutely superb for the last nine years so if i could just add although not perhaps as current as you know but you went back and talked about the history of the program and i happen to have been the commander of opt for operational testing valuation force for the retesting of the twenty two as it came back into a top of that i can tell you that the rigor put in quotes from nav air on the tactical side we grow the force in afghanistan from its previous two thousand up above ten thousand we make quite sure that we have the right number of assault support platforms in theater to ensure that we can provide the support that we need for the marines we've met that standard now well i believe we will meet that standard inside the contiguous battle space that the marine corps has been given with the second marine expeditionary brigade i'm not sure and i'm not up to speed on the rest of afghanistan at this point but for r c so i'm just asking about the marine corps for the second marine expeditionary brigade my understanding is that we can and will meet that standard with the assets that we when we have the marine corps surge when the surge is complete when we finish this month's of the rotation that's right and  does that coincide with the between to get in there with the twenty two will arrive in the fall right now we have c h fifty three delta c h with echoes and u h one n s in the battle space and they will provide the capability that we need we are also as i said from the marine expeditionary unit no i don't in the fall in the fall absolutely i mean that's one of the great one of the main reasons that we lean forward and as soon as we have enough range in depth in the community we want to get to squa existing assault support platforms that we're putting into theater is my understanding in the fall now now now that's right so it is being met as we grow to ten thousand and more yes yes or i'm not trying to i'm right i believe it is met now we do not have all of the assault support forces there yet i think we have six more c h fifty three echos to deploy but but the fifty three deltas that are in that battle space are quite capable of supporting the golden hour inside the second marine expedition brigade battle space let me have a takeaway to go confirm that i'm right about that but i think i am ok along those lines are you happy with the way that the infrastructure is being built for air at camp bastion and kandahar is going to be able to support you because you aren't you aren't going the right the air force is building that you'll be using some of it right that's right is it going according to the plan to support you will be bedding down our aircraft a combination of we're working side by side in bastion with the air force to you are now we are we are we ship six million square feet of am to mattie to afghanistan that makes good border fence by the way that's not being used for that we need to lay it down to create the jobs parks and air fields and i think we are i know we are so we also provided the subject matter expertise from our own marine wing support squadrons that actually showed both the army and of air force how to expeditiously lay down that manning so the progress is being made as best it can be there have been times in the last two months that one of my principal concerns was the pace at which this was being done but as i sit here today i'm satisfied that we're on track  and as you can tell by some of the questions we are facing an affordability problem in the very near future for the record i'd like to ask each of your personal opinions as to how many aircraft around the world would you rate is superior to the f eighteen e n f if you would do if you would name them name the country of origin and whether they exist and have a ballpark figure of how many of them would exist in each of those countries myers who would you like to address that yes or no and i would say that of all of the aircraft that are in production from foreign nations that i would much rather be in the cockpit of an f eighteen you know f and he one of those other aircraft general would you like to make a difficult to parse among all of the fourth generation airplanes that exist in the world if a teeny an f is certainly tied with them doesn't stand a chance against f twenty two there are planes out there that are that are returned ratio would not be what we would want for our young men and women if we had to go against them hopefully we won't have to go against them was any of that you would care to mention at this point missouri mistake yeah i had just a couple more questions general drop and my understanding is that the marine corps currently has four f and eighteen fighter squadrons that are supposed to have forty aircraft allocated to them but actually have no aircraft allocated to them and the marine corps does not include those in the shortfall and if why did you not include them in the shortfall twenty two from our large medium lift population of c h forty six is it one thing you need to do when you have a large population changing as the as our tactical aircraft are going to change beginning in two thousand and twelve is to create a man powerful from which you can draw because particularly when you're changing from a forty six to a v twenty two or from a legacy hornet to joint strike fighter it's not a light switch it's a rheostat and you have to have time to train and prepare both aircrew and maintainers so we set aside those caught cod rate personnel and now thank goodness we did because over the last few months we picked the squadron commander for our first fleet riding a squadron of the m f a t five o one which will stand up beginning this summer we pick the first six aviators that will go into the squadron we're detailing th maintainer's that will go into that squadron and beginning in two thousand and twelve and twenty thirteen will bring back those two active qadri squadrons as joint strike fighter squadrons and that's been our plan with regard to the two reserve godrej squadrons will bring them back three or four or five years into the joint strike fighter transition about the time that reserve aviators and maintainers are looking for a place to go if they decide to remain engaged in the marine corps or the reserves so we think we've got this laid out right and  and that's why we did what we did so in a sense your strategic decision of three years ago was that while you started with four squadrons you're going to go down to two so in the transition you've  challenging and that's why we that's why we take the decision that we took to to set aside that manpower pool to make right in this long as the other plane comes online you're saying we could live with being at half strength for some a few years to make that transition if they're not online in time then that becomes increasingly problematic i suppose what it does the good news is that we are we're meeting our current obligations with the force structure that we have the challenges of course that marine tac air is at a higher up tempo than either the navy or the air force tac air and so in some ways we're playing out the risk on the backs of our marines and we don't like to do that but we think it's a proactive step that was worth taking in order to get to decided to have those squadrons up and we didn't want to take the man parts we could take the thirty lat ten eleven f eighteen c s that we are putting into preservation so we could have those round up those quadrants in the near term if we chose to do so i think that would not be very wise decision though i like for the decision we made or you're saying there are aircraft around but they're just old like ten eleven that's right ok and you also mentioned the idea of reworking some of the f eighteen you're saying that's a possibility depending on the analysis of what those look like the numbers we're seeing and that is you're looking at what about fifteen million dollars if you've got to put the with that rework in there that gets you whatever it is a thousand five hundred hours or something it seems like to me that's almost costing you twice the cost per hour and a lot less capability than you just gotta  that would you ever look at doing that i was advised that putting any kind of number on the cost of extending a hornet from eight thousand to ten thousand at this point would be premature as i said we're only halfway through phase b of a three phase process until we get through that process there are too many variables associated to put a number on it i haven't heard numbers high fifteen million that's a new one to me i've heard lower numbers i thought that was it with what's the engine about five five or ten what was the engine the central point it was africa center barrel yes yes sir we already have one point one billion dollars in the budget it's already paid for to do four hundred seventeen center barrels so the good news is that's a risk mitigator against the challenge that we face in order to do the service life extensions and as i said most of the areas of interest are in the center barrel area it still costs money the whether it's all right no doubts or you're exactly right and we'll have to make wise case by case bureau number by bureau number assessments and then decisions about how to expand if you had to do the center barrel and you had to do the wing sections what are you talking actual dollars to do that  well for example if we already have the center but i'll budget it if we want to a mark as we're doing this year to get twenty four wings out we could we could do both of those for for no additional dollars if we had to buy a center we'll wing i'm not sure what the current cost that is off  five five million for that for those now as general chapman says if you take wings off an existing aircraft with life and you still want to rework those wings so i mean you're going to have some cost involving absolute rights or if you want to look at where we go to get above to be a six hundred hours and you want to go past that to ten we have a high flying our inspection that inspection alone is running around four hundred seventy five million dollars that's you get to the point where you can open inspect and look at the airplanes to see which you have and i agree with exact cost of each aircraft you won't know till you open it up and find out what you have certain basically i think you made it clear to me today that you don't really know what the fighter aircraft shortfall is you're saying it's somewhere and i thought it was variable between two numbers you said you can't even count on that it's when when would you know for sure what your shortfall is where you actually have a number of the shortfall right now is it's it is about we're in the second phase of a three step process and we're refining the technical baseline and cost estimates to see exactly what we want to slap and what's in the realm of the possible what we knew last eighty six hundred and ten thousand numbers the sixty nine and one twenty nine was based on two hundred ninety five aircraft being able to be slabbed right now the number is about three hundred thirty aircraft that we think might be candidates or our target it to be slabbed but through the summer we're going to have a lot more information and the second phase is set to complete next march we've got lots of work to do  and i want to make sure that everybody understand that it's not just the slapping of the aircraft that is our focus on mitigating the shortfall it also means that we maintain our by the  f it means that we maintain the logistics support of the current fleet and it also means main means that we maintain the current buy of our f and eighteen ian f's i appreciate  store and these numbers are still the best we know for the moment those numbers have not been officially changed and updated we are currently doing analysis and looking at assumptions point we will know a lot more through this summer and through the summer we're also be able to better understand what the assumptions are that go into that model in terms of our productive ratio or the efficiencies that we use the air wings that are not deployed there's a lot of things that go into the model besides just the forty four and the marine corps requirement and that's one of the things that the marines and the u s navy are currently undergoing is some  an understanding of ways that we can more efficiently get aircraft out of the war fighter congressman if i could add excellent answer about the variability that chart that you held up last year is no longer relevant it is it is not an accurate depiction at this point and i can just give you the simplest example i can is if if we have decided to buy additional f thirty five b s and cs compared to last year which we have done that changes all of that all of those equations just for example well you could picture yourself in our shoes we got this information from you in march and i'm hearing you say that it's increasingly irrelevant right now it's hard for us to get a number of it i'm just saying when are we going to have something  can understand what we're planning we we know you better and who are current information and in march sir that was the best that we had and we we owe you the benefit of understanding what we think the future's going to hold in terms of f thirty five production and in terms of the ongoings slap and slap analysis so are you saying then the end of this summer you think we're going to have some pretty reliable numbers or is it going to be march of next year or i mean where are we going to be within plus or minus ten percent of the number both very fair questions i would remind both gentlemen that we tend to go through this is the beginning of every new administration that it is my memory that the bush administration did not submit a deal and a budget until july zero one and so although this is taking longer than anyone wished it had there's still a little bit of head of that market which was eight years ago right now but that's a chair record this is a gentleman from maryland mr chairman relative to your question about competitive aircraft around the world it's my understanding that the only aircraft we have that might be competitive with the latest russian  u fighter aircraft is the twenty two is that also your understanding i'm not an f twenty two pilot so and i'm not ready and on a lot of you have twenty two programs or so my perspective comes from the navy and what i know of the f eighteen and  meant for an open hearing but a more private discussion that's the aircraft i would prefer to be mr chairman it's not a certainty anymore that we will always have the best fighter aircraft in the world i think most people now feel that the latest su russian fighter is probably as good as or maybe better than our best planes and they are selling them india has bought them thank you very much sure that your thanks to jim and for the record since that is just a part was observation i would appreciate you gentlemen getting back to us within two weeks if possible with how many of those