By Emelie Rutherford
The House’s top defense appropriator said he is committed “at this point” to continue funding the V-22 Osprey but will investigate its low readiness rates, which prompted another legislative leader to recommend halting the aircraft’s production.
House Appropriations Defense subcommittee (HAC-D) Chairman John Murtha (D-Pa.) detailed his views yesterday on the V-22 and other hot-button aircraft programs at a Defense Writers Group breakfast. His panel expects to mark up its fiscal year 2010 defense appropriations bill next month.
Murtha neither endorsed nor outright rejected House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Edolphus Towns’ (D-N.Y.) proposal from Tuesday for House appropriators to halt Osprey production; Towns during a hearing cited shortcomings with the tilt-rotor aircraft including availability and reliability challenges in Iraq and rising costs (Defense Daily, June 24).
Yet Murtha told reporters he will travel to Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, N.C., “in the next couple of weeks,” before his panel’s markup, to investigate V-22 maintenance problems.
“That’s where I’ll really find out what the hell happened,” he said.
Murtha said “until recently” the Marine Corps lead him to believe the nascent Osprey, a helicopter-airplane hybrid built by a Bell Helicopter Textron [TXT]-Boeing [BA] team, was performing well after a lengthy and controversial development. The Marine Corps took the lead in developing the multi-service aircraft and deployed three V-22 squadrons to Iraq.
“The impression was until recently that the V-22 was doing fine, that is was going faster in Iraq, it was getting there, they had less missions, it was capable, carry more people, all the things that were good about it,” Murtha said. “And then I find out we got some maintenance problems.”
The V-22’s readiness rate in Iraq was 62 percent, lower than the desired minimum of 82 percent, Marine Lt. Gen. George Trautman, deputy commandant for aviation, said in written testimony submitted to Towns’ panel. Unreliable parts and a nascent supply chain are at least partly to blame, Trautman and a government auditor said Tuesday.
Murtha said experts tell him that the V-22’s operationally readiness level is typical for aircraft programs at such early stages of their lifetimes.
“I think it’s just too early to know” what to do regarding the V-22, Murtha said. “At this point” before the Camp Lejeune trip, he added, “I think we’re committed. We’re going to have to go forward with the V-22.”
The Pentagon hopes to buy 282 more Ospreys.
On other matters, Murtha said he is still strongly encouraging the Pentagon to buy aerial-refueling tankers from both competitors vying for the stalled contract: Boeing and a Northrop Grumman [NOC]-European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. (EADS) team.
Murtha said he met with Defense Secretary Robert Gates Tuesday and Gates did not list a tanker dual buy as one of the weapon-system skirmishes on which he would not budge. Gates in the past has voiced strong opposition to a dual procurement.
“There are three or four points that the secretary made that he wasn’t able to negotiate on,” Murtha said. “The tankers is not one of them.”
The HAC-D chairman said he does not know if he will introduce a legislative mandate compelling a dual buy. But, he said Pentagon officials “are working with us now” and Pentagon acquisition chief Ashton Carter pledged to closely examine the concept.
The congressman held up a list of the defense issues he said Gates told him were non-negotiable. Murtha would not share the list with reporters.
Yet he said the White House remains “adamant” about not buying more F-22 stealth fighters for the Air Force beyond the 187 the Pentagon wants.
Murtha spoke favorably about buying more F-22s from Lockheed Martin [LMT], but said he does not know if and how Congress could add to the defense budget $3 billion for buying 20 more of them. He said the administration’s intelligence on the threat-based need for the F-22 also is a factor in the debate.
Congress may allow Japan to buy an export version of the F-22, a proposal pushed by Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii), Murtha said.
He will meet soon with House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey (D-Wis.) and HAC-D Ranking Member Bill Young (R-Fla.) about possibly allowing Lockheed Martin to sell Japan a simplified F-22. Obey crafted the provision in current law that prohibiting other nations from buying the fifth-generation fighter. Yet Obey is “willing to listen” about lifting the ban, Murtha said.
Murtha estimated it would cost $1 billion in research and development funds to create a demilitarized version for Japan to buy.
The HAC-D chairman said it would be a challenge to try to extend the F-22’s production for approximately three years until Japan could start buying the aircraft, assuming permission is granted and it can afford the F-22.
Murtha said he also has concerns about development problems the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter is experiencing, and may not support funding for the Lockheed Martin jet at the administration’s requested level in FY ’10 “if it’s not ready.”
Yet he said he is confident Congress will add funding for the F-35 second engine program to the administration’s defense budget request this year, as it did in recent years.
The congressman, meanwhile, voiced strong support for buying more Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet fighters to ameliorate an expected Navy fighter shortfall.
And he repeated his call for making use of the $3 billion-plus invested in the now-canceled VH-71 presidential helicopter program with Lockheed Martin.
“We’ve got to find someway to utilize some of that money,” Murtha said.
He at least wants to salvage some technology from the already developed VH-71 chopper–a move he said the Pentagon is eyeing. He said he is hesitant to add more money for VH-71 to the defense appropriations bill “until we have some assurances we get something out of it.” Carter is investigating this issue, he added.
The HAC-D plans to mark up its bill in July, soon after lawmakers return from the 4th of July recess, and the appropriations legislation will be the last bill that hit the House floor before the August recess, Murtha said.