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44–210 2009

[H.A.S.C. No. 110–17] 

U.S. MARINE CORPS AND U.S. NAVY 

RESET REQUIREMENTS 

JOINT HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SEAPOWER AND EXPEDITIONARY FORCES 

SUBCOMMITTEE 

MEETING JOINTLY WITH

READINESS SUBCOMMITTEE 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

HEARING HELD 

FEBRUARY 13, 2007 


Congress.#13
(II) 

SEAPOWER AND EXPEDITIONARY FORCES SUBCOMMITTEE 

GENE TAYLOR, Mississippi, Chairman 

NEIL ABERCROMBIE, Hawaii 

JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island 

RICK LARSEN, Washington 

MADELEINE Z. BORDALLO, Guam 

BRAD ELLSWORTH, Indiana 

JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut 

JOE SESTAK, Pennsylvania 

ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland 

KEN CALVERT, California 

TERRY EVERETT, Alabama 

JO ANN DAVIS, Virginia 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia 

JOE WILSON, South Carolina 

JESSE TOLLESON, Professional Staff Member 

JOHN WASON, Professional Staff Member 

JASON HAGADORN, Staff Assistant 

READINESS SUBCOMMITTEE 

SOLOMON P. ORTIZ, Texas, Chairman 

GENE TAYLOR, Mississippi 

SILVESTRE REYES, Texas 

LORETTA SANCHEZ, California 

ROBERT A. BRADY, Pennsylvania 

JIM MARSHALL, Georgia 

MADELEINE Z. BORDALLO, Guam 

MARK UDALL, Colorado 

DAN BOREN, Oklahoma 

NANCY BOYDA, Kansas 

CAROL SHEA-PORTER, New Hampshire 

JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut 

DAVID LOEBSACK, Iowa 

GABRIELLE GIFFORDS, Arizona 

KATHY CASTOR, Florida 

JO ANN DAVIS, Virginia 

WALTER B. JONES, North Carolina 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia 

MIKE ROGERS, Alabama 

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York 

HOWARD P. ‘‘BUCK’’ MCKEON, California 

ROBIN HAYES, North Carolina 

FRANK A. LOBIONDO, New Jersey 

TOM COLE, Oklahoma 

ROB BISHOP, Utah 

CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan 

TRENT FRANKS, Arizona 

CATHY MCMORRIS RODGERS, Washington 

PAUL ARCANGELI, Professional Staff Member 

LYNN WILLIAMS, Professional Staff Member 

(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF HEARINGS 

2007 

Page 

HEARING: 

Tuesday, February 13, 2007, U.S. Marine Corps and U.S. Navy Reset Requirements ............................................................................................................ 1 

APPENDIX: 

Tuesday, February 13, 2007 ................................................................................... 27 

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2007 

U.S. MARINE CORPS AND U.S. NAVY RESET REQUIREMENTS 

STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS 

Bartlett, Hon. Roscoe G., a Representative from Maryland, Ranking Member, 

Seapower and Expeditionary Forces Subcommittee .......................................... 3 

Forbes, Hon. J. Randy, a Representative from Virginia, Readiness Subcommittee .............................................................................................................. 3 

Ortiz, Hon. Solomon P., a Representative from Texas, Chairman, Readiness 

Subcommittee ....................................................................................................... 1 

Taylor, Hon. Gene, a Representative from Mississippi, Chairman, Seapower 

and Expeditionary Forces Subcommittee ........................................................... 2 

WITNESSES 

Gardner, Lt. Gen. Emerson N., Jr., USMC, Deputy Commandant for Programs and Resources, U.S. Marine Corps .......................................................... 4 

Greenert, Vice Adm. Jonathan W., USN, Deputy Chief of Naval Operations 

for Integration of Capabilities and Resources, U.S. Navy ................................ 6 

APPENDIX 

PREPARED STATEMENTS: 

Gardner, Lt. Gen. Emerson N., Jr. ................................................................. 34 

Greenert, Vice Adm. Jonathan W. .................................................................. 41 

Ortiz, Hon. Solomon P. ..................................................................................... 31 

Taylor, Hon. Gene ............................................................................................. 33 

DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD: 

[There were no Documents submitted.] 

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD: 

[There were no Questions submitted.] 

(1) 

U.S. MARINE CORPS AND U.S. NAVY RESET 

REQUIREMENTS 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON ARMED

SERVICES, SEAPOWER AND EXPEDITIONARY FORCES

SUBCOMMITTEE, MEETING JOINTLY WITH READINESS

SUBCOMMITTEE, Washington, DC, Tuesday, February 

13, 2007. 

The subcommittees met, pursuant to call, at 3:00 p.m., in room 

2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Solomon Ortiz (chairman of the Subcommittee on Readiness) presiding. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. SOLOMON P. ORTIZ, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM TEXAS, CHAIRMAN, READINESS SUBCOMMITTEE 

Mr. ORTIZ. This hearing will come to order. 

I thank our distinguished witnesses for appearing before these 

subcommittees today. We appreciate all the Marine Corps and 

Navy are doing to try to keep our Marines and sailors equipped for 

combat. 

Today the Readiness and Seapower subcommittees will hear 

about the reset programs of the Marine Corps and the Navy’s Seabees and Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) teams. 

Reset, for those that are civilians among us, means what it 

would take to fix and resupply the Marine Corps and Navy so they 

are ready to do their job and do their battles. Since November 

2001, operations in Afghanistan, then in Iraq, have taken a significant toll on the Marine Corps’ and Navy’s equipment. 

According to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), as 

much as 40 percent of the Marine Corps’ ground equipment is deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan or at depots waiting to be repaired 

and returned to the fight. Some Seabee units, which are Naval construction forces, are reporting equipment usage rates 43 times the 

peacetime usage rate. These factors, along with battle losses and 

industrial base constraints, are reducing the overall equipment 

readiness of the Marine Corps and the Navy’s Seabees and EOD 

teams. 

To fix this, the Department of the Navy has implemented the 

reset strategy to repair, recapitalize and replace damaged and destroyed equipment. The Marine Corps and Navy must accomplish 

this program efficiently in order to quickly restore the full equipment readiness of their forces. 

This committee understands the need for a successful reset. To 

that end, we authorized $6.6 billion for Marine Corps reset in fiscal 

year 2007, fully satisfying all reset requirements requested by the 

Marine Corps, including some carried over from the previous year. 

2 

It is vital that the Marine Corps and Navy move as quickly as 

possible to quickly re-equip units with new and repaired equipment 

for combat. I hope our witnesses will discuss how the troop escalation in Iraq will affect reset in both dollars and time and what 

measures are being taken to mitigate these effects. We also would 

like to understand how Reserve component equipment payback will 

be figured into the services’ reset strategies. 

We all understand how quickly you execute reset, actual repair 

and replacement, not just how quickly you pay for it, will determine how quickly the Marine Corps and Navy will be whole again 

and fully prepared for any challenge. 

I look forward to hearing your testimony, but before we hear our 

witnesses’ testimony, I would like to ask my good friend from Mississippi if he has any opening remarks he would like to make. 

And I yield to my good friend, Gene Taylor. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Ortiz can be found in the Appendix on page 31.] 

STATEMENT OF HON. GENE TAYLOR, A REPRESENTATIVE 

FROM MISSISSIPPI, CHAIRMAN, SEAPOWER AND EXPEDITIONARY FORCES SUBCOMMITTEE 

Mr. TAYLOR. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I want to thank our witnesses for being here. 

I have to confess that like a lot of other members of this committee, I am less than convinced that the Administration has shot 

straight with us as far as the true cost of this war. And the last 

people I want to suffer as a result of this would be the Marines and 

the sailors that require the proper equipment to be replaced as it 

is being used up or destroyed in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

So I am pleased that our witnesses are here today. 

Mr. Chairman, I thank you very much for calling this hearing. 

But above all, I would hope that what we are told today for those 

things that are foreseeable, for those things that have already occurred, will be actually what the Navy and Marine Corps need. 

And as advances are made in technologies, and I point more specifically to the mine resistant ambush protected (MRAP) vehicle to 

follow on to the High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle 

(HMMWV), a vehicle that will be less likely to sustain the injuries 

and less likely for the occupants to die in the event of an ambush, 

that to the greatest extent possible those programs be fielded in a 

timely manner. 

In this instance, timeliness does not have to equate with cost 

control. I think it is the most important thing we can do is get 

those vehicles into theater, set a precedent that the Army will follow in short order, get it done to the greatest extent that we can 

in a cost effective manner, but the most important thing is to get 

those vehicles fielded and get them quickly. 

So, General, I would hope that you would tell us what progress 

is being made toward that goal of having 4,000 vehicles in your inventory by the first of January. 

Again, thank you very much for calling this hearing, Mr. Chairman. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Taylor can be found in the Appendix on page 33.] 

3 

Mr. ORTIZ. Thank you so much. 

The ranking member is a little ill, under the weather, but we 

have Mr. Forbes who has a statement to read. 

Go ahead. 

STATEMENT OF HON. J. RANDY FORBES, A REPRESENTATIVE 

FROM VIRGINIA, READINESS SUBCOMMITTEE 

Mr. FORBES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased that the Readiness and 

Seapower subcommittees are coming together today to examine the 

very important issue of Marine Corps and Navy reset requirements. 

We often think of reset as a depot-level repair activity that is 

funded through operations and maintenance accounts. However, 

particularly with the Marine Corps’ approach, the reset of our 

forces are highly dependent on procurement funds as well. It is 

critical that our two committees continue to work together to ensure that we get a full understand of the issue, and so I am pleased 

that we are having this hearing today. 

Availability of equipment and its combat capabilities continue to 

be concerns as we examine the readiness trends of Marine Corps 

and Navy ground and aviation elements. 

As we all know, the high operational tempo and harsh conditions 

of Iraq and Afghanistan place a great deal of stress on equipment. 

The requirement to reset this equipment is critical to maintaining 

the ability to respond to challenges around the world. The effective 

and efficient reset of this equipment ensures that our Marines and 

sailors have the equipment they need when they need it. Despite over $10 billion in appropriations for reset activity, the Marine Corps has indicated that they require an additional $4.4 

billion for equipment reset in the coming year. It is also likely that 

depot maintenance requirements will continue for years beyond the 

operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

In addition to funding requirements, rest takes quite a balancing 

act and proper establishment of priorities. You can’t send a piece 

of equipment to the depot for repair if it is needed in the hands 

of a warfighter. 

With these unambiguous challenges before us, I am looking forward to hearing from General Gardner and Admiral Greenert on 

their plans to address the Navy and Marine Corps reset requirements and challenges. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back the balance of my time. 

Mr. ORTIZ. The chair now recognizes the distinguished gentleman from Maryland, Mr. Bartlett, the ranking member for the 

Seapower Subcommittee, for any opening remarks that he might 

have. 

STATEMENT OF HON. ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM MARYLAND, RANKING MEMBER, SEAPOWER AND 

EXPEDITIONARY FORCES SUBCOMMITTEE 

Mr. BARTLETT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will be brief so that 

we can proceed to today’s testimony. 

First, I would like to thank our witnesses for being here. We are 

very fortunate to have each of you serving our country. 

4 

Second, as many of you know, U.S. military equipment usage in 

Iraq and Afghanistan is estimated to be two to six times peacetime 

usage rate, depending on the type of equipment and operational 

conditions. We in Congress have a responsibility to provide the necessary funding to repair and/or replace this equipment. Our depots 

and private industry also play a key role in this effort. 

In some cases, legacy equipment is no longer in production, 

which necessitates superior supply chain management to obtain obsolescent parts or the flexibility to substitute alternative equipment 

that is in production. Full reset will require a long-term plan that 

includes effective and efficient partnership between our depots and 

industry. 

The ultimate metric of success is whether or not we are getting 

the proper equipment into the hands of our brave warfighters in 

time for them to train before they go into harm’s way. 

Again, I want thank all of you for your service to our country. 

Thank you for being here and I look forward to your testimony. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Today we have a panel of distinguished witnesses 

representing the Department of the Navy, who will address the 

Marine Corps and Navy reset program. 

Our witnesses are Lieutenant General Emerson Gardner, deputy 

commander for programs and resources in active Marine Corps, 

and Vice Admiral Jonathan Greenert, deputy chief of naval operations for integration of capabilities and resources. 

Without objection, both witnesses’ prepared testimony will be accepted for the record. 

General Gardner, welcome. It is so good to see you again—both 

of you. And I know you gave us a good briefing last week. But it 

is good to see you again, and thank you for the information that 

you gave us last week and the information that you are about to 

give us today. 

Please proceed with your opening remarks, General Gardner. 

STATEMENT OF LT. GEN. EMERSON N. GARDNER, JR., USMC, 

DEPUTY COMMANDANT FOR PROGRAMS AND RESOURCES, 

U.S. MARINE CORPS 

General GARDNER. Thank you, Chairman Ortiz, Chairman Taylor, Mr. Forbes, Ranking Member Bartlett, distinguished members. 

Thank you for the opportunity to discuss your Marine Corps’ readiness, resources and our efforts to reset the force. 

As a Marine of 34 years and as a father of a Marine who served 

in Iraq in 2006, I want to thank you for your steady and generous 

support for our Corps. It has made a great difference in the lives 

of many young Marines and we appreciate it. 

For over five years, the Marine Corps has been involved in combat and combat support operations around the globe. Your deployed 

Marines are better trained, better equipped and better protected 

than ever before. Their readiness in the four measurement categories of maintenance, supply, training and personnel remains 

very high. We are committed to keeping it there, no matter what 

the changing circumstances. We will not compromise in the training and equipping of any of our forces going forward. 

5 

Given our commitment to maintaining our deployed and deploying forces at the highest state of readiness possible, we have had 

to draw personnel and equipment from across the Corps to ensure 

that we have correctly weighted our main effort. This prioritization 

of personnel and equipment for forward-deployed units has caused 

the decline in readiness of our nondeployed units in those two 

areas. 

On the personnel side, an expansion of the Corps existing force 

structure is critical to meet the demands of today. But more importantly, it is vital for the Marine Corps of the future, if we are to 

remain the Nation’s 911 force. We intend to grow from our current 

temporary end-strength of 180,000 to 184,000 by the end of this fiscal year and add 5,000 Marines per year thereafter until we attain 

our goal of 202,000 by 2011. 

We are initially funding this effort through a mix of baseline and 

supplemental appropriations, but we are eager to get these costs 

into our baseline budget as soon as possible. Our efforts to reset 

the force address the readiness deficit in our maritime preposition 

stocks and home stations that occurred as we increased the equipment density of the forward-deployed forces. 

Our current total reset estimate is now $13.7 billion. The Congress has already provided $10.2 billion toward that cost in fiscal 

year 2006 and 2007 supplementals and we thank you for that. The 

remaining costs to reset the force are spread over the next couple 

of years and will be contained in future requests. 

While timely provision of resources is critical, it is deliveries to 

the warfighters that actually improves readiness. We have been 

hampered by the need to replace lost items that are no longer in 

production and by limited industrial capacities. For example, although we lost our first light armored vehicle in April of 2003, the 

actual replacement of that vehicle will not be delivered until December 2007, four and a half years from the date of loss. 

As vehicles continue to be lost without replacement, readiness 

declines, and the billpayer is a nondeployed unit. Fortunately, the 

bulk of this lag time is now behind us and we are beginning to see 

a turnaround in equipment readiness. 

Our focus is on the Marines that are currently in harm’s way. 

In 3 years, we have transformed from 100 percent soft-skinned 

HMMWVs to level 2 armor to our current fleet of level 1 up-armored HMMWVs. But now the enemy has adapted to our countermeasures and is attacking our best armored HMMWVs successfully 

with increasing regularity. 

Tactical vehicles with V-shaped hulls built from the ground up 

to counter improvised explosive devices are urgently needed. 

Known as mine resistant ambush protected vehicle, or MRAP, 

these vehicles are big, heavy and expensive. 

Because we have about 65 in Iraq now, we know that the payoff 

is great, however. Our experience is that the Marines in these vehicles have been four to five times safer than a Marine in an armored 

HMMWV. Based on this experience, we recently decided to replace 

our armored HMMWVs in theater on a one-for-one basis with 

MRAPs. Our total requirement is now 3,700 MRAPs. 

6 

The fiscal year 2007 bridge and supplemental funding request 

will procure just over 1,000 MRAPs for the Marine Corps. The additional 2,700 vehicles needed will cost $2.8 billion. 

The Marine Corps is leading an aggressive Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) joint acquisition strategy for MRAPs and 

we believe that we can deliver these vehicles in quantity by late 

summer and complete the entire joint requirement of nearly 6,800 

vehicles by the end of 2008. 

Thank you for your tremendous support, and I look forward to 

your questions. 

[The prepared statement of General Gardner can be found in the 

Appendix on page 34.] 

Mr. ORTIZ. Admiral, whenever you are ready, sir. 

STATEMENT OF VICE ADM. JONATHAN W. GREENERT, USN, 

DEPUTY CHIEF OF NAVAL OPERATIONS FOR INTEGRATION 

OF CAPABILITIES AND RESOURCES, U.S. NAVY 

Admiral GREENERT. Thank you very much, Chairman Ortiz, 

Chairman Taylor, Ranking Member Bartlett and Mr. Forbes, distinguished members of the Readiness and Seapower and Expeditionary Forces Subcommittees. 

It is my pleasure to appear before you to discuss the Navy’s reset 

request, and I am honored to be here with my teammate, General 

Gardner. 

We are a maritime nation entering our sixth year of a global war 

on terror (GWOT). Navy continues to play a vital role in this war 

by deterring our enemies and supporting our friends and partners 

and by providing direct and indirect support to combat forces on 

the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan, and by leading the joint combined counter improvised explosive device (IED) task force, by leading the joint task forces in the Horn of Africa, Guantanamo Bay 

and Southeast Asia, and through commanding provisional reconstruction teams in Afghanistan. 

There are currently over 42,000 sailors deployed worldwide and 

over 12,000 of them are serving on the ground in Iraq, Afghanistan 

and throughout the Central Command area of responsibility. Navy 

support of these operations results in a higher tempo of operations 

than experienced in peacetime. This has resulted in a high turnaround ratio for some expeditionary forces, particularly our Navy 

construction force, our Seabees, and our explosive ordnance disposal teams. 

Moreover, the Seabees and the explosive ordnance disposal units 

deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan require the right equipment to 

do their mission, including improved self-protection against IEDs. 

Ongoing operations in Iraq have required new vehicles to support 

our troops against an array of explosive devices that they encounter. MRAP vehicles have been developed to better withstand these 

threats and they are being outfitted and delivered to our Seabees. 

Additionally, traditional Seabee equipment deployed to the Central Command is wearing out on average 14 times faster than that 

experienced during peacetime usage. And some of the equipment, 

like generators, are wearing 40 times faster. 

Of particular concern is the effect combat operations is having on 

our tactical and expeditionary aircraft. Navy’s legacy aircraft are 

7 

showing significant wear from the increased combat-related operational tempo in Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF) and Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF). And this increased OPTEMPO decreases 

the years of our legacy tactical aircraft beyond that predicted. 

A third of the Navy’s legacy tactical air fleet is already operating 

over our design limits and the bulk of the fleet, the FA–18 CD Hornet, is consuming flight hours at a rate 30 percent greater than 

originally planned. This increase in flight hours is accelerating the 

expected service life of these aircraft, reducing anticipated years of 

service. 

Similarly, the EA–6B fleet is operating on average at a 120 percent design expected life with an average aircraft age of 24 years, 

although it was designed for 20-year life. Units of the P3 and EP3 

fleets have exceeded fatigue, life expended limits and some are now 

being very closely monitored for continued operation. The average 

age of our P3 fleet is 27.5 years and the average age of our EP3 

fleet is 33.5 years. Both are expected to last 30 years upon design. 

This all translates to greater operational costs, but for the longterm it translates to shorter life spans, and the potential for decreased future force structure. So Navy has worked to identify the 

cost to reset the force which result from this war on terror. Resetting the force replaces required capability for our sustained required operations with global reach and with persistent presence. 

These two unique attributes provide the influence, the dissuasion 

and the deterrence, both in our day-to-day operations and as a vital 

element of our Nation’s strategic reserve. 

Navy’s reset requests complies with the September 2006 Office of 

Secretary of Defense directive and we will leverage technology 

wherever it makes sense. Determining reset is a dynamic process 

which is influenced by multiple factors to include the operational 

tempo, the environment and the tactical employment of the equipment. 

To accommodate this, we take assessment of our reset every six 

months, the last one completed in October 2006. This assessment 

provides us a point of reference and incorporates a three-year horizon to accomplish the reset, taking into account the time to authorize, appropriate and then execute and deliver the equipment. 

This reset, contained without our fiscal year 2007 supplemental 

and 2008 GWOT requests, contains only those items that we can 

obligate in the year requested. 

Past supplemental funding has mitigated Navy’s operational 

costs but has been focused more on our costs of war than on resetting the force. Our reset requirements for our equipment will continue to grow more extensively than originally anticipated as long 

as our high operational tempo (OPTEMPO) continues. 

Replace equipment and aircraft are essential to preclude near- to 

mid-term capability and capacity gaps. Your timely attention to our 

request would be appreciated. We thank you very much for your 

past support to our Navy and on behalf of our sailors, I thank you 

for your consideration of our reset requests. I look forward to your 

questions. 

Thank you, sir. 

[The prepared statement of Admiral Greenert can be found in the 

Appendix on page 41.] 

8 

Mr. ORTIZ. Thank you so much for both of your opening statements. 

Now, let me yield to the chairman of the Seapower Subcommittee 

to see if he has any questions. 

Mr. Taylor. 

Mr. TAYLOR. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

General, with regard to the MRAP, I am just trying to get a handle on the dollars. A quick look would have me think that you have 

had money in hand to build about 1,200 of them roughly. So to get 

to the 4,000, how much more do you need? 

General GARDNER. Sir, we need an additional $2.8 billion for the 

2,700 more that we have asked for. Our original request was for 

1,022 vehicles. Congress appropriated $600 million toward that in 

the Title IX and we have asked for an additional approximately 

$500 million in the full supp. So we would need an additional $2.8 

billion above that number. If we receive that funding, then we will 

fill our requirement for 3,700. 

The Army has also requested as a requirement for 2,500 vehicles 

and the Navy has a requirement for 538. That adds up to about 

6,730 total vehicles. 

Mr. TAYLOR. You are in a competition now with nine different 

variants with down selects sometime in the early summer? 

General GARDNER. Sir, they have issued contracts to nine different vendors to provide four vehicles each. Two of the four would 

be for destructive testing, two for road testing. As each vendor produces these test vehicles, and they must do it within 60 days, and 

they prove to meet the requirements, as the companies say that 

they will, they will be issued production contracts to the extent 

that they are able to fill the requirements. 

So those nine contracts have been issued with regard to test contracts and we are already getting underway, as companies will be 

issued production contracts as they qualify. So some of these companies are more mature in their vehicles, they have already demonstrated capability to produce the vehicles. They will be issued 

production contracts earlier. 

Mr. TAYLOR. I guess what I am curious on, having seen the explosive growth of the Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) and some other 

things, you have nine vendors, you are going to down select this 

summer. 

What happens if a vehicle you like comes in at $1.1 million in- stead of $900,000? How do you react to that, given that the requirement, hopefully, will not change, that every vehicle that 

leaves the wire will be properly protected? So how do you come up 

with the difference in dollars? How do you get that message to 

Congress in a timely manner and get the dollars that you need? 

Because, again, the Marine Corps is on record saying January 1. 

I am pleased that you are sticking your neck out to set that date, 

but I don’t want to see anything happens that keeps that from becoming a reality, starting with lack of funding. 

So how would you react to that if the one you really want comes 

in a little bit more expensive than what you anticipated? 

General GARDNER. Sir, our requirement is firm and if we don’t 

have the resources to fill the requirement, we will seek more resources. We will take the immediate action required, reprogramVerDate Nov 24 2008 07:14 May 18, 2009 Jkt 044210 PO 00000 Frm 00012 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\110-17\44210.TXT HARM2 PsN: MARY
9 

ming funds as we are able to do that, and then seek resources to 

replace those funds. 

Mr. TAYLOR. I guess I am curious. The admiral made a point. 

Every trip to Iraq, I am absolutely overwhelmed by how many generators are buzzing in the background and looking at the tents, and 

everywhere you are seeing very expensive stuff taking place to give 

the troops the quality of life that they deserve. But it has all got 

a price tag, and all those things wear out, and all those things have 

to be replaced. 

So where do you find the funds for that reset, given that there 

are so many other needs going on simultaneously? 

General GARDNER. Well, the Congress appropriated already $600 

million for the first vehicles, almost about 800 vehicles-worth, probably, and our systems commander, General Brogan, is already 

working with that money. We have initiated a reprogramming action to provide him another $400 million so that he is not cash-flow 

limited in getting these production contracts on contract. 

We see this 3,700 requirement as firm and we are seeking resources for that and have asked for that additional $2.8 billion. We 

are able to cash flow, in this part of the year, for example, personnel costs that we know we are counting on the Congress to provide the 2007 supp here by this spring. And at that time, then we 

can replenish those funds. 

Mr. TAYLOR. General, well, Congress always seems to be a day 

late on this. I felt like we were a day late on up-armor. I felt like 

we were a day late on small arms protective inserts (SAPI) plates. 

I felt like we were a day late on jammers. And I have to confess, 

I personally felt a day late on the V-bottom vehicles when the retired colonel from the Army Liaison Office stopped by about a year 

ago and showed me a South African vehicle, explaining how that 

had evolved from the mine threat. And, you know, that was 10 

years ago, maybe 20 years ago, that the South Africans went to 

this, that the Russians went to this. 

What are we missing now? What should we be looking at in addition to this so that kids don’t die needlessly? 

General GARDNER. Sir, we need to move out aggressively with 

this short-term solution, which is the MRAP, and we are asking for 

that money. If we receive that money in 2007, we will be able to 

obligate and execute it in 2007 and deliver those vehicles during 

fiscal year 2008, we believe. 

We are also aggressively in the President’s budget for 2008, we 

have robustly funded the research and development for the joint 

light tactical vehicle (JLTV), which we see as the next iteration. 

Whereas the MRAP is more or less an off-the-shelf buy for an immediate requirement, the joint light tactical vehicle, we are working in conjunction with the Army. This is a vehicle which we will 

design from the ground up to deal with the threats of the future. 

So we need to keep that on track, aggressively fund that research 

and development (R&D), so we get a vehicle that will take advantage of the technologies of the future, have better fuel efficiency, 

have lighter armor and hopefully be less expensive. 

But we are buying the MRAP right now. It is not the ideal vehicle for the Marine Corps. We are not in any way constraining the 

buy of it so that it will fit on ships or any of that or our expediVerDate Nov 24 2008 07:14 May 18, 2009 Jkt 044210 PO 00000 Frm 00013 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\110-17\44210.TXT HARM2 PsN: MARY
10 

tionary aspects. We are buying it for the war in Iraq and this kind 

of a threat, but we want to fund the development of the JLTV, 

which is what we see will be able to deal with this kind of insurgency in the future and future threats and be more suited to our 

expeditionary nature. 

Mr. TAYLOR. What percentage of the funds for this program are 

coming from the Army? And to what extent have they shown up 

or not shown up with those funds in order for everything to work? 

General GARDNER. To date, we have put in $600 million of the 

Title IX funds. I believe the Army has a reprogramming action of 

$70 million to get theirs going. And I believe they have requested 

additional funds to finance their part of the requirement. 

Mr. TAYLOR. Is there any delay in the acquisition caused by the 

Army’s slowness in paying? 

General GARDNER. I am probably not the one to speak to that 

delay right now. I know that we are, like I said, he had $600 million to start out with. We are moving out on an additional $400 

million reprogramming so that he will not be delayed. I am not 

aware of any delays at this time. 

Mr. TAYLOR. Thank you, General. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Mr. Forbes. 

Mr. FORBES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you, Admiral, for being here, and General. 

General, I would like to just follow up a little bit on some of Mr. 

Taylor’s questions, if I could, regarding the MRAP. I was looking 

at your written testimony, and one of the statements that is in it 

is we were buying all of the small-production capacity currently 

available. And I know in any kind of reset policy, we are looking 

at, really, two major components: the procurement aspect of it and 

also the maintenance aspect of it down the road. 

When we look at the nine companies that we are trying to look 

to to produce the four MRAP test vehicles each, can you tell me 

what happens after those vehicles are produced? In other words, 

what are our requirements? 

Because I know it says here, it says, ‘‘To meet force protection 

and performance standards.’’ What will you then do? Will you pick 

two companies, three companies, to produce these? Will you pick 

one vehicle and then go back to each of the companies and say, 

‘‘Can you produce this for X number of dollars?’’ How will you make 

those selections? 

General GARDNER. Well, this is a large program. I believe it is 

going to be an Acquisition Category (ACAT) 1D programs will be 

managed at the OSD level. The assistant secretary of the Navy for 

research, development and acquisition, Dr. Etter, I believe, will be 

the acquisition executive over the executive agents responsible for 

that. And the joint program executive officer will be our systems 

command officer, General Brogan. 

What he has done is, he has nine candidates on a table and they 

have been asked to produce something that can demonstrate they 

have a vehicle that will do what they claim it will do. When they 

see the results of that, and they actually see what they have, I 

think they will put together a strategy of what they actually put 

into large production, if they are going to have multiple companies 

11 

producing the same vehicle or each company producing their own 

vehicle and they are common enough to be dealt with. 

The candidate vehicles that have been submitted so far appear 

to have a great deal of commonality among them. It is more along 

the lines of, we are buying contract logistic support—that is part 

of the anticipated contract for each of these vehicles—so that they 

would be maintained for about a two-year period, so that we are 

buying the vehicle. We are also buying the maintenance in terms 

of field representatives to keep them in an up status. That way we 

do not have to go through the time of having to train Marines and 

providing a supply chain. That supply chain comes with it. 

These are off-the-shelf vehicles, so these capabilities exist in 

these industries. We think there is sufficient commonality among 

these vehicles that this will be a viable program, but in the end it 

is up to Dr. Etter and her program executive officer (PEO), General 

Brogan, to decide exactly how many companies and exactly the 

strategy they are going to pursue. 

Mr. FORBES. So at this particular point in time, we basically 

have nine companies that will be competing. It has just been my 

practice that unless some of those companies are colluding or working with each other, you could get quite a bit of differentiation between those vehicles. 

And my big concern is that if you pick door number two, which 

you suggested, where we may have multiple companies producing 

different vehicles so that we can turn production out in a greater 

capacity, how are we going to ensure the interoperability? 

Because when you are in-theater and you are in a situation like 

that, despite the fact you may have the contract for the contracts 

for the maintenance, it is still sometimes, you know, our men and 

women in uniform who are going to have to do that maintenance 

out in the field. 

What concerns me is we have a million-dollar vehicle out there 

and for some reason we can’t do the maintenance on it. So just the 

two questions I would have is, one, how will we ensure the interoperability of those vehicles out there? 

And the second thing, even how do we ensure that the companies 

are going to be able to continue to perform their maintenance requirements and get the parts and all that we need to be out there 

to service them, if you have multiple companies that are doing it? 

General GARDNER. I think it is up to General Brogan to ensure 

that the production contracts ensure that the companies do what 

they say they are going to do and that we are going to get what 

we actually pay for. 

I think that the commonality of vehicles, the candidate vehicles, 

something like 15 different vehicles submitted by the 9 companies, 

there is a lot of commonality among them. I think it is more—some 

of these things are more the difference between a Ford and a Chevrolet than it is the difference between a bicycle and a dump truck, 

or something. So it is not that far apart. 

It is almost as if—and I think our vision is—you will have, like, 

a certified mechanic who comes into a garage, and he can change 

the air filter or deal with the basic maintenance on any of them. 

It might be a little bit different air filter, but there are plenty of 

12 

air filters available to be able to go ahead and do it and change 

it. 

Mr. FORBES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Mr. Bartlett. 

Mr. BARTLETT. Thank you very much. 

I want to thank you for the generous amount of time you spent 

with us in a briefing on this. We spent quite a long while with 

questions and discussion in quite some detail. So that will necessitate fewer questions at this open hearing, because we had the 

satisfaction of this long discussion with you then. 

What percent of the production base will have to be employed for 

the MRAP to meet your production schedule? Do you have that figure? 

General GARDNER. Sir, I don’t—— 

Mr. BARTLETT. Our anticipation was it was a pretty high percentage. 

General GARDNER. Of the number of that kind of vehicle that are 

produced in the country, what percentage of that would be dedicated to producing this number? 

Mr. BARTLETT. What percent of the production capability of these 

nine companies that you let a contract to will you have to use in 

order to meet your production schedule? From our briefing, my understanding was that your anticipation was, or your hope was, that 

most of them would qualify? 

General GARDNER. Yes, sir. We are hoping that most of these 

nine companies will qualify. I am very confident that we will have 

multiple companies qualify. 

As to the percentage of those particular companies, how much of 

this is their total capacity, I will have to come back to you with 

that. 

But we are looking for approximately 6,800 total vehicles 

through some number of the companies. Some subset of nine will 

be qualified. We believe that we will be able to generate hundreds 

of vehicles per month with that and that this will be well within 

the capacity of these companies to deliver. 

Mr. BARTLETT. Obviously, in a different world, we would like to 

have them all made if not by the same company, at least to exactly 

the same specifications—— 

General GARDNER. Yes, sir. 

Mr. BARTLETT [continuing]. So that their maintenance in the 

field would be easier. But we are now faced with a compromise between that and the reality that we need to get these to the troops 

as quickly as possible, because these are enormously more effective 

at protecting our troops than the flat-bottomed HMMWVs are. 

My understanding is that a couple of these companies have pretty much satisfied you that what they have proposed is workable 

and we are very shortly going to let contracts to those two companies to begin production. 

General GARDNER. It is my understanding that some of these 

companies, they are quickly identifying those and they are going to 

start issuing production contracts as early as this week. 

Mr. BARTLETT. My understanding is that, on their own dime, 

that a couple of them have produced these vehicles ahead of the 

13 

contract that would have paid them for producing them, so that 

they are ready for tests now? 

General GARDNER. That is correct, sir, and we want to go ahead 

and those that are ready and that have been invested in and are 

ready to go, we want to reward that good behavior and get them 

some money on production contracts to start generating vehicles, 

get that lead time behind us. 

Mr. BARTLETT. Well, I was very impressed that working within 

the system, that you had exercised every option that you had to 

move this along as quickly as possible. I hope that the future goes 

as well as the progress up to this point, because you will have established an enviable track record that I hope others can adopt in 

procuring this equipment more quickly. 

From the time you started this, the procurement process, till you 

have some of these over there for our troops will be how long? 

General GARDNER. There are 65 in country right now that we 

were buying some of the very larger variants, we are using for our 

explosive ordnance disposal teams, the category 3 MRAPs, about 65 

in country. The Army has another number, about another 140, in 

country. So there are already some out there. 

We had 1 vendor that was already producing about 25 of these 

a month, and that was what I was talking about. We are buying 

out their production until we get these larger capacity online. So 

we are cranking those out, continue to deliver those in theater, and 

hopefully we will get up to the point where we are starting to deliver hundreds a month. 

Mr. BARTLETT. Well, we want to compliment you for your willingness to push the envelope and run some risks to get these to our 

troops quicker. You have set a very enviable track record, I think, 

and I hope that it can be adopted by others who may be a whole 

lot longer in getting them out there if they don’t exploit the opportunities that you have found to push the envelope and you have 

flown pretty near the flame on some of these. Thank you very 

much for doing that. 

I yield back, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Mr. Wilson. 

Mr. WILSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And, General and Admiral, thank you for being here today. 

And in particular, General, the MRAP, I have had the opportunity to visit force protection and actually see the vehicles and the 

personnel who are constructing these are just so enthusiastic as to 

how they are helping our troops. They feel so good about it at every 

level. It is just an inspiration to see the people working to protect 

our country. 

General, how will the Marine Corps reset requirements change 

as a result of the additional personnel and equipment plus-up? 

General GARDNER. Not substantially. The reset, the force requirement as we know it, that is to pay for sort of the bathtub of 

readiness that is behind us. 

Future costs that we are generation, attrition costs, for example, 

if we lose an aircraft in theater now, those are cost of war costs 

and we are calculating those. Our cost of war costs are estimated 

to be around $6.5 billion this year. And so as we submitted the 

2008 supplemental request along with the 2008 budget, I think we 

14 

have about $6.3 billion in there for cost of war toward that kind 

of attrition. 

Mr. WILSON. And on another side, how and when will the Marine 

Corps Reserve units be reset? 

General GARDNER. Marine Corps Reserve units are treated exactly the same as the regular units. We procure, Reserve equipment, using Procurement Marine Corps, PMC. It is the same dollar 

account, it is the same value—those Reserve battalions, for example, would be exactly the same table of equipment and use the 

same funding. So there is no difference. 

Mr. WILSON. Thank you very much. 

Admiral, I am very grateful about the Naval squadrons that have 

been located at the Beaufort Marine Air Station and they are very 

much appreciated in the community. Great citizens. 

As we look at fiscal year 2008, the Department of Navy budget 

request contains a total of 54 F18s of various models. Can the 

prime contractor for F18s meet a production capacity rate per year 

of 54 aircraft in fiscal year 2008? Is this amount within the contractual bounds of the current multi-year procurement program? 

Admiral GREENERT. The short answer to your question is, yes, 

sir, Boeing can meet that production capacity of 54 aircraft. In fact, 

they are not limited in production line up to 72 aircraft per year. 

But additional tooling above 54 would be required and that cost 

would have to be accommodated. 

To answer your question, though, yes, sir, that production line 

capacity of 54 can be accommodated. 

Mr. WILSON. In our community we appreciate the sound of freedom. 

Thank you very much. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Mr. Courtney. 

Mr. COURTNEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Admiral, in your testimony, on page four, you made sort of a 

comment about past supplemental funding requests which I guess 

were more focused on costs of war versus resetting the force. 

Admiral GREENERT. Yes, sir. 

Mr. COURTNEY. And I don’t want to read too much into that, but, 

I mean, did that happen just because we were at a different point 

in the war and that the utilization of equipment hadn’t reached a 

certain level where reset was an issue? Or is it just because people 

chose not to ask for funding for resetting equipment? 

Admiral GREENERT. Sir, I think it was threefold. One, we didn’t 

understand as well the long-term implications. Two, the tempo of 

operations and the expanse of operations, particularly in our tactical aircraft, ramped up rather dramatically in the last three and 

a half years. But, third, it was Department policy to request only 

those costs of war needs directly associated with operations, per se, 

with aircraft ship operations, as opposed to looking to procure to 

reset. 

Mr. COURTNEY. So did something happen on that third point, 

where you said it was Department policy? There was a policy 

change? 

Admiral GREENERT. Yes, sir. 

Mr. COURTNEY. What caused that to happen? 

15 

Admiral GREENERT. I would have to get that answer to be specific, to find out exactly, you know, what the tipping point may 

have been for a Department policy change. But I would tell you, 

as we watched it, a realization, perhaps, the length of operations 

and the fact that the impact of operations on equipment, capturing 

and quantifying that in a tangible enough manner that we could 

come to the Congress and ask for help in the procurement aspect 

of that. 

Mr. COURTNEY. And your testimony sort of goes on to describe 

where a failure to reset equipment resulted in the British armed 

forces, I guess, equipment just being totally unusable. Can you just 

talk about that a little bit in terms of what the consequences would 

be if we didn’t do what you are requesting? 

Admiral GREENERT. Well, I speak to that, or I write to that, in 

terms of not recognizing the longer-term impact on force structure. 

We have other tasks to the Nation around the globe to be prepared 

to deal with and to dissuade and deter and, if necessary, to act. 

And we need to be ready as the strategic reserve for the Nation. 

And that is the context, sir, of which I refer, to be sure that we 

have the appropriate force structure for beyond the near-term operations in Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom. 

Mr. COURTNEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Mr. Ellsworth. 

Mr. ELLSWORTH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I have a two-part question, but I think I can separate it, for the 

admiral and the general. I noticed in one of the documents—you 

know, we get a whole lot of documents up here—that the research 

and development budget in this area has been cut, I believe it was 

eight or nine percent. It may not even be in today’s documents. 

But, Admiral, my question to you, the first part of that, is are 

you satisfied? I know we always want more dollars, but are you 

satisfied with the research and development, particularly in that 

the roadside bombs and IEDs that are killing our soldiers seem to 

be on the increase. I would like to address the research and development dollars for the technology, to set those off, before we are 

on top of them and hopefully when they are being planted on the 

road would be our goal. 

And then to you, General, the Marine Corps has a funding shortfall of $2.8 billion for the MRAP program, and I would like to know 

if this funding shortfall was provided to you in fiscal year 2007, 

could we obligate that funding this year yet? 

Admiral GREENERT. To answer your question, satisfaction on our 

research and development funding for defeat of IEDs, sir, I think 

I would have to defer to the joint IED defeat office on that. 

But from strictly a Navy perspective, we are satisfied with the 

response of our request for research and development. In this request, in the fiscal year 2008 GWOT request, we have $11 million 

for continued research for defeating IEDs via electronic warfare 

(E.W.), predominantly through the aerial means and also to help 

our explosive ordnance disposal people. 

So we would appreciate your support in that regard, but we have 

been satisfied so far from the Navy, strictly, sir. 

Mr. ELLSWORTH. Thank you. 

16 

And, General, before you continue on yours, I just wanted to let 

you know, Admiral, that Crane Naval Warfare Center is in my district, in Indiana, and those civilians are people who are working 

very hard to keep our troops safe, and I want to just publicly commend their work. 

Admiral GREENERT. Thank you, sir. 

General GARDNER. Sir, we are confident that if we were given the $2.8 billion in the 2007 supplemental, that we could in fact obligate 

it. That is procurement dollars. That is three-year dollars. We 

could obligate them and get them on contract this fiscal year. 

Mr. ELLSWORTH. Thank you. 

Mr. Chairman, I yield. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Mr. McKeon, do you have any questions? 

Ms. Gillibrand. 

Mrs. GILLIBRAND. Thank you. 

I want to continue with Mr. Ellsworth’s line of questioning, about 

research and development and production of the new equipment 

that we really need done to make sure we have the readiness that 

is required. 

Do you believe that the industrial base can meet the demand 

that the Marine Corps has for maintenance and new production 

right now? 

General GARDNER. I am sorry. For the production of MRAP, vehicles, ma’am? Is that what you mean? 

Yes, ma’am, we believe so, and that will be part of this qualifying 

process, that the vendors can in fact produce what they claim to 

produce that we are going to pay them for. 

Mrs. GILLIBRAND. And in terms of production of other supplies, 

do you believe that the depots are currently operating at full capacity? 

General GARDNER. Our depot operates—we have a full eight-hour 

shift. Our main depot at Albany, for example, a full 8-hour shift, 

and some areas are at 12-hour shifts. So the way that is estimated 

is 143 percent of a full 8-hour shift week. 

So we normally figure 2 shifts would be 100 percent, so you could 

say that another way of looking at it would be about 70 percent of 

capacity. 

We have no backlog at our depot. Our primary limitation on the 

through-put of our depot is the items available to put through 

there. We have not had the benefit of having enough vehicles to 

supply the deployed forces and have some in depot maintenance to 

do that. 

As we build up and as deliveries of these vehicles and other critical items takes place, we will have enough then to have a float to 

be able to do that. But, to date, we haven’t had that. We are striving to establish that. 

There is a lot of friction in getting this done. We have to get the 

vehicles from the frontline units. We have to give them something 

to replace what they have. And then you have to get all those units 

to Al Taqaddum, which is our primary logistics hub there, and you 

have to get them from Al Taqaddum down to Kuwait, onto a ship, 

back to the United States, and then reverse the process. That process takes about 260 days by the time you count all that transit and 

the choke points. 

17 

And remember that Al Taqaddum is in Al Anbar province, up 

there in the eastern portion where we are, and you have to—that 

is a difficult transit and you have to group the vehicles and the 

parts and everything to get them down to Kuwait. And that actually becomes one of the larger choke points, is the movement from 

there down to Kuwait. 

Mrs. GILLIBRAND. Thank you. 

Can I also move to a different area that I have concerns about. 

In your testimony that you submitted, you talked about an increase 

in end-strength and I agree wholeheartedly that our number one 

asset is our Marines. But I am concerned about being able to have 

sufficient recruitment to meet the end-strength needs that you 

have designated. 

Do you foresee any issues there or do you think that you are on 

target to have the end-strength that you have planned for? 

General GARDNER. Achieving the end-strength gains will be a 

challenge, but we can do that. We are going to do that through two 

means; by recruiting young Marines to come in, providing those incentives and doing that. Our recruit command has done well in 

that. But it is also retention. The Marine Corps brings in about 

39,000 Americans each year and turns them into Marines. We also 

release from active duty about 39,000 Marines. 

Of that 39,000 Marines a year, about 20,000 are issued a re-enlistment code. It means that we would like to re-enlist them if we 

had a place for them and if they desire to do so. That means since 

9/11 we have released from active duty about 100,000 Marines that 

we would love to have re-enlist if we had a place for them and if 

they had an opportunity. 

Now, some of those, they didn’t re-enlist because they didn’t 

want to at that time. Some of them didn’t re-enlist because we did 

not have what we call boat space for them. So our commandant has 

now issued a call to arms and is going back after them. 

You can see by those numbers, it doesn’t take a large percentage 

of those to come back on and that is a significant number of 

trained, experienced Marines. 

So it is an aggressive plan that we have to get to 202,000 by 

2011, but we think that we can do it. 

Mrs. GILLIBRAND. Thank you. 

My last question is special operations forces (SOF), for both of 

you. That is something that many of us believe is the key to being 

able to fight sufficiently the war on terror, so that we can find 

these terrorist cells and have the capacity to, you know, destroy 

them at their early stages. 

What is your plan for your special operations forces, in terms of 

growth, and what are your objectives over the next five years? 

General GARDNER. We are the newest component to the special 

operations command. We established our Marines special operations command component just last year and they are still standing up out of Camp Lejeune, commanded by Major General Hejlik. 

But two primary elements or aspects of this, they have a foreign 

military training unit, and they have teams out and actually executing Special Operations Command (SOCOM) missions now. 

The other aspect are Marines special operations companies, and 

the first Marines special operations company is already deployed 

18 

with its first Marine expeditionary unit and is already deployed 

and is now on its way to Afghanistan. 

So we are past our initial operating capability and moving toward full operational capability of our Marine special operations by 

the end of 2008. 

Admiral GREENERT. Our support for special operations is predominantly in the form of our SEALS, which we organize, train 

and equip and provide for the special operations command. 

I will tell you, ma’am, that our SEALS do a wonderful job. We 

are very proud of them. They are very difficult to retain, because 

they are high demand outside the service and they are a challenge 

to recruit, and it remains one of our predominant challenges in recruiting today. 

We are doing okay, but it is near the very top of our recruiting 

challenges. 

Our support for the SOF is also in the form of some of our core 

capabilities, which can reach out: explosive ordnance disposal units 

providing IED support and embedded with the Special Forces units 

and some of our construction folks as well, our Seabees, will on occasion embed with special operating forces. So those are our predominant support and challenges, ma’am. 

Mrs. GILLIBRAND. Thank you. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Chairman Abercrombie. 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Does anybody else need to be deferred to? 

Mr. ORTIZ. I think that everybody has asked a question. 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE. All right. 

Mr. ORTIZ. I think that that briefing we had the other day really 

helped us to understand. 

Chairman Taylor, he wants to make sure absolutely that you are 

the last one. 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE. I regret I wasn’t here earlier. 

Mr. Chairman, did you go through our activities over the last 

couple of days in this hearing yet? 

Mr. ORTIZ. Which? 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE. At the depots? 

Mr. ORTIZ. No, we haven’t yet. You might want to touch on that. 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Is it okay if I pursue that for a moment in 

this context? 

Mr. ORTIZ. Go right ahead. Yes. 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Thank you very much. 

Over the weekend, under the chairman’s leadership, several of us 

had the opportunity to go to Corpus Christi to the depot and to Anniston, to the depot there, and see the excellent work undertaken 

there. 

The difficulty I have with what has being presented here is trying to reconcile the various budgets that are now before us. We 

have the continuing resolution, which presumably will be voted favorably upon in the next two days. We have the presentation of the 

budget for the 2008 fiscal year. We have the supplementary budget 

for the present fiscal year. We have proposals, including that from 

the Army for further supplementary proposals, supplementary 

budgets. And then we have the projection of the Administration, of 

the Bush Administration, with respect to 2009 and further on. 

19 

In the context of those budgets that I have just mentioned that 

are actually before us in one form or another, and the projections 

of the Administration and the Pentagon for 2009 and beyond, in 

which the number which jumped out at me was that the expenditures in Iraq would be around $50 billion, I can’t reconcile what 

you are testifying to here today and the reset requirements in 

terms of the budgetary provisions that we are expected to make 

with regard to the supplementals, next year’s budget, et cetera. You are familiar with the $50 billion projection, General? 

General GARDNER. It was my understand, sir, that that $50 billion was a Title IX type appropriation. 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE. A so-called placeholder. 

General GARDNER. Yes, sir. 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Yes, I am under no illusion that that was the 

final number. But you see the dilemma we are then placed in. 

Because we have to recommend to the Appropriations Committee, among other things that we do in the Defense Authorization Bill, what it is that we think should be done in terms of policy. 

And Mr. Murtha has made it clear to us as subcommittee chairs 

as well as members of the overall committee that he is not only 

willing to listen to but anxious to hear from us as to what our recommendations are and what the rationale is. 

The difficulty I have right now is aside from certain specific dialogue that has taken place with regard to individual items, if you 

will, like up-armored HMMWVs and the MRAPs, et cetera, I still 

can’t quite figure out what it is that makes you whole or what it 

is that we need to do in order to get your people, the people to 

whom you feel direct responsibility, up into the highest level of 

readiness with regard to equipment and training. 

Is there something that you can do to enlighten me as to what 

those exact numbers are in terms of the budgets that are before us? 

General GARDNER. Sir, maybe I can help year by year. 

In fiscal year 2007, we have submitted our 2007 supplemental. We need that funding and we can execute the other $2.8 billion 

that we need for the rest of those MRAPs. The Congress gave us 

that in the spring. 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Out of the $17 billion? Is that what you are 

talking about? 

General GARDNER. Sir, we have identified a requirement of 3,700 

MRAPs. We have formally requested funding for about 1,022; a 

2,700 difference, which is a new requirement, which is not in those 

requests. That additional $2.8 billion is what we need added to 

fully fill any—— 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE [continuing]. The President’s budget of 2008 

and what was submitted in the 2008 GWOT will fill our requirements as we are able to execute them within 2008. In 2009, the 

baseline budget for the Marine Corps for the first time will fully 

fund our personnel cost within the baseline. It depends on what assumptions are made about the war in 2009. We have been averaging about $6.3 billion for cost of war. 

So if the tempo of the war is as it is this year, and we make that 

same assumption in 2008 and we make that same assumption in 

2009, it will be another $6.3 billion will be needed for the cost of 

war that is not in the baseline. 

20 

So the baseline budget with regard to the reset, there are some 

items in reset the force that we cannot yet obligate and we would 

not ask for money because we cannot execute it. For example, there 

are a number of helicopters that have been destroyed. For example, 

we cannot put them all on budget over and above the capacity of 

where it is. So we need to buy some of those in the out years. 

Some of the reset the force estimate by the definition given to us 

by the Office of the Secretary of Defense, is to 2 years worth of 

depot maintenance, so that is about $500 million for green dollar 

depot maintenance and about $400 million for blue. So depending 

on what assumptions you make on the reset, if you assume that 

the—it is about a billion dollars per year for depot maintenance for 

two years. 

Now, we believe that if the war were to end at some point in 

time and you were to make an assessment of all the gear over 

there and if you were to assume, for example, that you could only 

responsibly restore 50 percent of it, that that would cost and would 

take more work than we could accomplish in 2 years. So by that 

time, you would have to ask for an increase to your baseline budget 

to carryout that. 

So for example if there was, let us say there is about $4 billion 

worth of depot maintenance work that needs to be done on the 

equipment on Iraq. Once the war in Iraq is over, if we decide that 

we are going to actually do that $4 billion worth of work, then if 

you can do $800 million worth of work, that would take you 5 years 

worth of maintenance to do that. 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE. This is my final point. Is the present projection that you have taking into account what they are capable of 

doing, say, in Corpus Christi, with regard to helicopters right now? 

I grant you, you are not in the Army, but I presume you are working with them. 

General GARDNER. We are working with the Army to facilitate—— 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Is my question clear? Because I am a little— 

not confused, but concerned that there is a coordination going on 

between what the depots are capable of in the context of repair and 

refurbishing and being able to put the, say, helicopters back on the 

line. And the connection of that to the various budgets that are 

now before us. 

General GARDNER. Our reset request includes two years worth of 

depot maintenance. I personally believe—— 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE [continuing]. Does it take into account that the 

depot, say, at Corpus Christi, will be turning out X number of usable helicopters? Or that Anniston is turning out X number of fighting vehicles, et cetera? 

General GARDNER. The issue for us is—yes, sir. I believe that 

those numbers, wherever that work will be done, I believe that is 

accounted for in that dollar estimate. 

Our primary limitation is actually having the material to induct 

into it without—if we have 30 to 40 percent of our equipment in 

theater, we cannot—even if we had all the depot capacity that you 

could imagine, we wouldn’t want to put 40 percent of our equipment in a depot all at once. We would want to induct it over—— 

21 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Okay. Last thing. I neglected to ask, does this 

also take into account what you are able to do in theater? Because 

I for one was impressed with the capacity of these teams at the depots to deploy into theater to do—I am saying repair work. It is a 

lot more than that. But you get my point. 

General GARDNER. Yes, sir. We are taking full advantage of everything in theater because of the difficulty to move things out of 

theater, which I earlier described. 

Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Okay. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Thank you. 

I am glad that my good friend brought the point about Corpus 

Christi. One of the problems that we had, because we had to revert 

back to the continuing resolution (C.R.), we had something like $10 

million or $15 million to repair the rotor blades. Well, they cannot 

repair the rotor blades that they will need to repair because they 

don’t have the equipment. You know, we have lost six helicopters. 

Well, because of the C.R., we have to go back to the old budget. 

That was put up or down to 2011, 2012. We have two wars going 

on. You know, we need those helicopters. And if those helicopters 

don’t have those rotor blades, they can’t fly. 

I hope that you don’t have the same problem that happened in 

Corpus Christi, where instead of turning out, let me say, I think 

it was 100 blades, rotor blades, a month, they are down to 30 or 

40. And that causes a big problem. 

I just hope that you don’t have that same problem, that because 

the C.R., we have to go back, we have to go to the old budget, and 

money that was included is not available. We don’t want you to be 

in the same shape that they are in. You don’t have any problem 

like that? With not only the helicopters, but any other equipment 

that you might have? 

General GARDNER. Yes, sir. Sir, we are in the middle of a detailed assessment to try to estimate exactly what is the volume of 

work that is out there, to identify what are the constraints in the 

depot production process and what capital improvements need to 

be made to maximize the flow through it. So the example I had, where you had $4 billion worth of work, you can only do $500 million worth of work and that would take 

8 years to do, that is unsatisfactory. So what does it take to actually maximize the production? 

So we are doing that, looking for results on that, to maximize the 

production so that when we do have the material available we can 

get it through the production process as quickly as possible. 

Mr. ORTIZ. You don’t have that problem, Admiral? 

Admiral GREENERT. Sir, we have a similar problem with helicopters, but we work together with the Marine Corps, but with 

ships, when ships are on station longer, and what was an original 

depot plan, where the ships would be in the depot now has to be 

rescheduled and the workforce appropriately balanced, that is 

something that we work through. We have been doing these sorts 

of deployments for a number of years and so we are getting better 

at it. But that is our challenge, to be sure we can capture the additional work which will generally result from a longer time at sea 

and have the workforce in place at the right shipyard. 

22 

Mr. ORTIZ. This is my last question, and I am going to then yield 

to my good friend from Mississippi. 

Do we have enough capacity at the industrial base of the depot 

in case, you know, there is another conflict around the world? The 

reason I ask that, someone said one time that at any one given 

time, one-third of the world is asleep and the other two-thirds are 

planning to kill each other. 

We just want to be sure that we have the capacity at the industrial base, the depots, that is something escalates, that we have the 

surge capabilities, you know, to where we can expand the work 

that we have to do. 

General GARDNER. Sir, we believe we have the capacity to do 

what is required now. And we are undertaking this assessment to 

ensure that we are going to have to do what is required, that we 

are going to have the capacity to do what is going to be required 

as we get equipment back from Iraq, whenever that is. 

But right now, the limitation is the availability of the equipment 

to induct. We don’t have any spare up-armored HMMWVs to put 

in the process. What we have is over there. As quickly as they are 

delivered, we put them over there, and we are just keeping up with 

the attrition. Eventually we will get to the rate, hopefully with this 

strategy we are doing with MRAP, where we will actually have 

enough to create this float and we will put it through there. 

But we are just as concerned as the chairman is, that we have 

sufficient capacity, that we are doing the capital improvements to 

do that, and we are looking hard at that. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Thank you. 

Mr. Taylor. 

Mr. TAYLOR. Admiral, in December the Navy was getting ready 

to transfer four coastal mine hunters to some of our allies and the 

chairman and myself and others were able to get a hold of the chief 

of naval operations (CNO) and put that on hold. At that time, it 

was said that, well, they have old engines and they need better 

electronics and we are going to replace them with the LCS. 

As anyone who can pick up a newspaper in this town knows, we 

have problems with the LCS. It is probably not going to be delivered on time. It sure as heck doesn’t look like it is on budget. 

So given that the bad actors around the world, that their asymmetrical response to our smart weapons are things like IEDs, 

mines, and I would presume the logical extension of that would be 

mines at sea, be it someone in the Middle East, be it someone in 

the straits of Taiwan, off of Korea. It just strikes me as the next 

logical thing, particularly since we have suffered casualties with 

the Princeton and the Tripoli. 

Where in this budget request is it to fill that void of those four 

or to take the remaining coastal mine hunters that are in inventory 

and get them up to a readiness level that is acceptable to the 

Navy? 

Admiral GREENERT. You mean the MHCs, sir, to be clear? 

Mr. TAYLOR. Yes, sir. 

Admiral GREENERT. The capability of those particular mine hunters are best suited and were originally designed for searching 

mines predominantly a minefield, predominantly by perhaps submarines. So we are talking about a large minefield. 

23 

The capability that they bring is limited and we feel can be replicated using MH53 helicopters combined with our MCM1 mine 

class, which we worked to replace in the Middle East, which we 

moved to the Fifth Fleet just recently when we retired the four you 

discussed. 

So to answer your question, that is my short clip on the answer. 

We have funding in this budget to repair the mine ships to the extent that they are effected by the global war on terror and then, 

of course, in the base budget to sustain the mine capability we 

have. But those MHCs and the capability they bring are much less 

and different from what the LCS would bring. And I would tell you, 

sir, that in our view, the combination of the MH53 with the MCM1 

class far and away exceeds what those MHCs would bring. 

Mr. TAYLOR. What if it happened today? What if you had an 

event in the Straits of Hormuz followed up by an event off of North 

Korea and coincidentally something off of Taiwan? How do you respond to that given the fact that, you know, in the general’s testimony, it is taking us approximately 88 months to replace every helicopter that he loses in Iraq, that unfortunately we have lost several in the past couple of weeks. 

Is anyone thinking through these scenarios? We always seem to 

be playing catch-up. I happen to have been here when we played 

catch-up after the Princeton and the Tripoli. I am not convinced 

that could not happen again. 

Admiral GREENERT. I believe I understand your question, sir. 

If I could, addressing Korea, our force posture in we call that the 

forward-deployed naval forces, takes into account the requirements 

necessary to meet the capability needs for that scenario, and one 

of that scenario might be mines and mine lanes. So we need to be 

vigilant to the threat. 

We do have the forces in theater as requested by the combatant 

commander to meet that mine requirement and that threat. 

With regard to the Straits of Hormuz, we recently moved two 

minesweepers of a greater capability, the MCM1 class, and again, 

combined with our MH53 helicopters, to be able to detect, to sweep 

and then to neutralize the mine threat. Focusing on keeping the 

straits open as opposed to cleaning all mines from a minefield, as 

requested by the combatant commander. 

Mr. TAYLOR. General, going back to your projected time to replace your helicopters, are you allowed within your budget to anticipate losses and budget for that in anticipation? Or are you always playing catch-up? 

If it takes 88 months to replace a helicopter, and unfortunately 

the trend seems to be going the wrong way as far as helicopter 

losses, at what point does that become a vulnerability to the troops 

on the ground? 

At what point do you start flying the remaining helicopters more 

than you should, longer than you should, or create a vulnerability 

where you can’t respond to a situation, where you would need some 

helicopter support? 

General GARDNER. We have not been forecasting attrition in our 

supplemental request. In our supplemental request contains requests to replace things that have already attrited. So there is a 

built-in delay from the time an aircraft is lost to when we request 

24 

the funding to when we get the funding to when you actually 

produce the helicopter and then deliver it back out. That is the—— 

Mr. TAYLOR. General, if I may, and I am not blaming you, I think 

this Pollyanna rosy scenario comes from the guys wearing suits, 

not the guys wearing uniforms, but since there has been now a 

record of years where things have not gone as well as we would 

have liked them to, why aren’t you given the opportunity—and because some things take so long to replace—why aren’t you given 

the opportunity to budget for attrition? 

General GARDNER. Sir, actually there was a policy change in this 

year’s 2007 supplemental request that was alluded to by Admiral 

Greenert earlier, we were given guidance to include in our supplemental request a request to accelerate capabilities that we thought 

would be needed for the war on terrorism. 

So our total of $14.5 billion, I think, in the 2007 budget, $3 billion of that was to accelerate capabilities. In our 2008 request, 

there is an $11.3 billion total supplemental request. Three-pointthree billion dollars of that $11.3 billion is to accelerate capabilities 

and to grow the force, as we projected. 

So I think there was a policy change in the guidance and the 

supplementals that were submitted here. We are still not forecasting attrition, but what we are doing is we are keeping the production capacities, which have some attrition in there. 

What happened, like, for example, on our CH46, is we have lost 

a total of six CH46s since 9/11. We last bought a CH46 in 1970. 

When we bought them, we did have some Highpoint aircraft, some 

attrition aircraft in there. But in the years since we bought those 

400-some helicopters, we have attrited down to something on the 

order of 250 are left, which is well under the number of helicopters 

we need. So we have already used up that attrition. 

What needs to be done is to get our replacement aircraft, keep 

it on track and buy those attrition aircraft. So we have now 

stepped up the rate of buy of the MV22, which is replacing the 

CH46. We are buying 21 of those. And we have requested some 

more as part of this acceleration piece. And I mentioned for 2008, 

to get up the rate even more, to get those on tap. 

That is where we are. So as I mentioned earlier, I think that we 

have gotten the bulk of this lag time behind us, because now these 

items are now in production. So now all that we are dealing with 

is the actual production lag time and we are not waiting to actually 

start production. 

Mr. TAYLOR. How many operational MV22s are there in the Marine Corps? 

General GARDNER. There are three squadrons right now operating. One is training. We are looking for it to deploy in country 

this fall and there are two right behind them at about six months. 

Every six months we will be bringing a squadron online. 

So those squadrons right now have 10 aircraft each. So I think 

there are about 41 operation V22s out there, counting the training 

units, but there are 3 operational squadrons in the pipeline, and 

the first one deploys in theater this fall. 

Mr. TAYLOR. Just as a matter of curiosity, I know when times 

were less violent and we were only losing equipment to accidents, 

there was the mindset that we could transition from the 1970’s-era 

25 

platforms, the UH1, the 46s and 47s, to the 22, that we had some 

time to make that transition, that it was not necessary for the Marines to use something like a Blackhawk as in interim platform. 

I am curious, given the situation in Iraq, given the situation in 

Afghanistan, is that still the Marine Corps’ line of thinking? Or has 

there been any discussion of possibly going to a Blackhawk as a replacement for the 1970’s-era equipment that you are losing? 

General GARDNER. To replace the 46, the MV22 is the way to go. 

They are in production. They are coming off the line. Like I said, 

we are already at 21 in our baseline budget and we are heading 

toward 30 per year until we have completed that buy-out. 

The H1s would be probably the candidate to replace the 

Blackhawks. We have an H1 program, which is getting ready to go 

to a production decision. So now, whereas there might have been 

a time to do it differently, we are where we are with the H1 replacement right now. 

Mr. TAYLOR. How do you find an H1? Do you get an old frame 

and rebuild it? Do they start from scratch? I am curious as to how 

this occurs. 

General GARDNER. The replacement for the UH1N and the 

AH1W is the UH1Y, Yankee, and the AH1Z, Zulu. The Yankee 

Zulu program was originally supposed to be a rebuild program to 

take those old airframes, take what you could use off them, and 

put the new capabilities into them. 

We have since augmented that since the force is so heavily committed and we can’t pull those assets out of theater so we can put 

them in the remanufacturing pipeline. So we are actually buying 

new airframes, which are built from the bottom up. We have done 

that with the Yankees and now we are beginning to do that and 

we have that in our supplemental request to do that for the Cobra 

as a replacement. 

Mr. TAYLOR. I was just passed a note about the grounding of 

MV22s last week. Can you give us an update on that program? 

General GARDNER. The MV22 is one of the most heavily self-tested programs in our programs because of its history. In one of the 

tests evaluations, it was discovered that one of the chips in the 

flight control management system—I might not have that terminology correct—was susceptible to cold temperatures in certain 

kinds of scenarios. So a red stripe, a grounding, was temporarily 

issued. 

It was evaluated that a bad chip was used. They are now replacing those chips. We already have 15 aircraft returned to service 

and they have a plan to return basically full up by the end of the 

month. So that is well on the way, and that is actually a success 

story in that this was not discovered through some kind of flaw. 

This was sort of a self test program on there. It is a tribute to the 

labs and the work that is always done and the scrutiny that is 

going on in this aircraft to ensure there aren’t any issues. 

Mr. TAYLOR. Thank you, General. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Do we have any other questions? 

If not, thank you so much for your testimony. I think that the 

briefing we had was very helpful. Thank you for your testimony 

26 

and for what you do. I know there is a lot of sacrifices in our troops 

and the families as well. 

This hearing stands adjourned. Thank you, sirs. 

[Whereupon, at 4:30 p.m., the subcommittees were adjourned.] 

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FEBRUARY 13, 2007 

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