By Geoff Fein
The Coast Guard has requested more than $9 billion dollars for its FY ’09 budget that includes $1.2 billion for recapitalizing the service’s fleet of vessels as well as improving command and control and intelligence gathering.
Additionally, the Coast Guard will publish its first-ever posture statement along with the budget, a Coast Guard official told reporters.
The FY ’09 budget, which is the largest request in the Coast Guard’s history, focuses on four areas: recapitalizing the service’s fleet of aircraft and vessels; enhancing marine safety; improving command and control; and establishing comprehensive intelligence and awareness regimes, the official said.
The budget includes approximately $353.7 million for the fourth National Security Cutter (NSC), the official said. The ships are being built by Northrop Grumman [NOC] at its Ingalls operations in Pascagoula, Miss. The first NSC, CGC Bertholf (WMSL 750), completed machinery trials in December and will wrap up both builders trials and acceptance trials through the first half of 2008.
The Coast Guard budget also requests $86.6 million for two HC-144A Maritime Patrol Aircraft, a variant of the European Aeronautic Defense and Space Co. [EADS], CASA CN-235 military transport.
Additionally, the Coast Guard has requested $115 million to purchase the second, third and fourth Fast Response Cutters.
The service has also requested $100 million for cockpit integration work to improve command and control access and to enhance sensors on 22 EADS HH-65C and eight Sikorsky [UTX] HH-60s.
The Coast Guard is also buying an additional 14 response boat mediums to replace its fleet of 41-foot utility boats.
“They are aging and becoming obsolete,” the official said. “So there is a $64 million line for that.”
The Coast Guard also has requested $9 million to be used for emergency sustainment of its fleet of 31 inland river boats as well as efforts to begin looking at a replacement for the crafts, the official said.
“The vessels we have on the inland rivers are the only federal presence in many parts of those rivers. They are an important presence, a multi-mission presence,” he said. “Some of the vessels are over 40 years old.They have been around for quite some time, and [some are] probably significantly older than that.”
Besides being the only federal presence on inland waterways, the boats can also conduct search and rescue missions and law enforcement operations if needed, the official noted.
Of the $9 million funding line, $5 million will go toward developing alternatives for what a replacement vessel on the heartland waterways could be, he added. “We need to be thinking about what our recapitalization will look like in the future,” the official added.
There are no changes in Deepwater acquisition, the official noted. However, there is a $9 million request to add 65 new positions for consolidation of the Coast Guard’s consolidated acquisition directorate, he added.
“We stood up the consolidated acquisition directorate and it is assuming lead system integration in a number of areas,” the official said. “Those 65 new positions, given our small size as an agency, are significant and will help us ensure we meet our systems integration responsibilities and enhance contract oversight as well.”
The Coast Guard is seeking $87.6 million for Rescue 21, the General Dynamics [GD] command control and communications system. According to the Coast Guard official, the funding will get the service 97 new positions as well as improve coverage in the Great Lakes, Hawaii, Guam and Puerto Rico.
Rescue 21 is used for search and rescue, marine environmental protection and homeland security missions. The system is set to replace the Coast Guard’s aging National Distress and Response System.
The Coast Guard is also requesting $44.1 million for comprehensive intelligence and awareness regimes. Included in that is funding for the Maritime Awareness Global Network (MAGNET) 2.0.
“It will allow us to consolidate intelligence information from approximately 20 national sources and then push that intelligence information out to the field to act on it,” the official said. “We are also going to stand up a number of cryptological service groups, and we are initiating a counter intelligence service initiative and both of those are aimed at specific needs related to espionage and our force protection.”
The Coast Guard has also requested $25 million for the Nationwide Automatic Identification System (NAIS) and it will continue with Command 21. “We have some funding for that as well,” the official said.
Command 21 will enhance maritime domain awareness, in particular in the area of vessel tracking.
NAIS is a two-way maritime data communication system based on the Automatic Identification System, according to the Coast Guard. The $25 million request is primarily for infrastructure antennas, the official said. “It is increment II.”
The service has also requested $3 million to build on the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) research and development efforts the Coast Guard pursues in FY ’08, the official added.
According to the Coast Guard budget, “priority research will be conducted to determine the best unmanned aerial system to operate in conjunction with the NSC.”
“It is basically pre-acquisition activities, but no specific vehicle has been chosen or selected for [testing] yet,” he said.
The Coast Guard will also investigate technologies such as High Altitude Long Endurance UAV’s to extend maritime domain awareness and coordinate long range operations, according to the budget.