By Emelie Rutherford
Marine Gen. James Amos, President Barack Obama’s pick to be the service’s next commandant, spoke favorably about the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle (EFV) in comments to the congressional committee that weighed his nomination yesterday.
Amos faced no obvious opposition during his confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) and his approval to be the Marine Corps’ top officer by the Senate seems certain. Amos, the Marine Corps’ deputy commandant, would succeed the retiring Commandant Gen. James Conway.
In answers to written questions from the SASC, Amos said: “In an era of increasing challenges to access, the capabilities of a vehicle like the EFV afford our amphibious ships the maneuver space and stand-off distance to better counter anti-access weapons.”
Pentagon observers speculated Defense Secretary Robert Gates wanted a new commandant who would be receptive to canceling the EFV, General Dynamics‘ [GD] long-delayed amphibious tank development program. Conway has been an outspoken supporter of the tracked vehicle that can quickly carry troops to land from ships far offshore, while Gates has questioned if the military needs such a vehicle and will conduct future major amphibious landings on foreign shores.
The Marine Corps plans to start reliability-growth testing on new EFV prototypes in late October to early November. The program is expected to be canceled if the vehicles General Dynamics is currently turning over to the government don’t perform well.
The Pentagon delayed the due date for the Marine Corps’ ground-vehicle strategy, which will address the EFV, until after Conway is gone.
Amos told the SASC, in written responses to advance-policy questions, that that strategy plan will address the EFV “and the full impact of its affordability versus capability will be defined in that document once published.”
He said the Marine Corps “absolutely” has ” an enduring requirement for the capability to conduct opposed amphibious operations.”
In “simple terms, this gives the United States an assured access capability under any circumstances,” he said.
The EFV program, Amos said, ‘”will help to fill a current gap in littoral capabilities and supports a waterborne assault capability the United States cannot live without– assured access and forcible entry from the sea.”
“If the nation wants the ability to come from the sea, it needs an amphibious tractor that is also a fighting vehicle for use across the continuum of threats and at every scale in the littorals,” he added. “I am convinced of that. A modern amphibious tractor is required to maneuver the ground combat forces of the Marine Air Ground Task Force, a balanced air/ground team.”
Amos said the EFV is suitable for both opposed shore landings as well as “hybrid threats that accompany counter-insurgency environments.”
He argued, in writing, that the Marine Corps’ current amphibious vehicles are too old and not properly equipped with guns that could counter the varied threats troops could face during an opposed landing. Using the older vehicles requires Navy vessels to be close to shore and exposed to more mine and anti-ship missile threats, he said.