NATIONAL HARBOR,
Md. — The meeting of Navy leaders with submarine shipbuilding industry
officials, planned for this month, will focus on integrating the production of
the Columbia-class ballistic missile sub and the future Virginia-class attack
boats, the Navy’s top acquisition executive said May 7.

The biggest issue is removing any conflict in the production of the two classes of submarines, which will be built by the same two shipyards — Newport News and Electric Boat, James Geurts, the assistant Navy secretary for research, development and acquisition, told reporters after his luncheon speech at the Navy League’s annual Sea-Air-Space exposition. The concern is the impact on Columbia if Virginia production “gets out the box,” Geurts said. That issue could become acute in five years when both submarines are in serial production.

The planned
meeting was announced by Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson, who
said it would seek to add back some of the schedule margin for Columbia that
has been eroded by production problems. Maintaining the schedule for Columbia
is crucial, because the first boat must be ready for its strategic deterrence
patrol in 2031 when the first of the Ohio-class ballistic missile subs is
forced to retire.

If any conflict in production emerges, Geurts said, the priority will be Columbia.

One another
current acquisition issue, Geurts minimized the impact from President Donald
Trump’s decision to reverse the Navy’s budget proposal to retire the aircraft
carrier Harry S. Truman rather than put it through the planned mid-life nuclear
refueling and overhaul, which would give it 25 years of additional service
life. Geurts said the change affected very little money in the fiscal 2020
budget, which is being processed in Congress. The cost of keeping Truman in service
and paying for the refueling and overhaul will be worked into the fiscal 2021
budget, and “we’ll do what needs to be done,” he said.

In his speech at
the Navy League luncheon, Geurts urged the industry and Navy officials in the
audience not to focus on sequestration and other budget problems but look at
what the Navy has accomplished in the last 18 months. “I’ve been incredibly
impressed with how fast this organization has changed,” he said.

He said the Navy
has saved about $30 billion through acquisition reform and has accelerated some
production systems by six to eight months, and industry is saving money through
innovation. He noted that the Navy would deliver 12 ships this year, more than
it has produced in decades. “We are getting tools out to the fleet,” he said.

NATIONAL
HARBOR, Md. — The first seven of Block II F/A-18E/F Super Hornet strike
fighters have been inducted into the service-life modernization (SLM) at
Boeing’s St. Louis, Missouri, facility, while next month the company’s San
Antonino facility will induct its first Super Hornet.

Bob Kornegay,
Boeing’s capture team lead for F/A-18, briefing
reporters May 7 at the Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space Expo in National Harbor,
Maryland, said the inducted jets will emerge as Block III Super Hornets with
their 6,000-hour life extended to 10,000 flight hours.

Boeing plans to process 40 Super Hornets
per year through the SLM sites, with production running through 2033.

Kornegay
described the Block III Super Hornet as having conformal over-wing fuel tanks,
freeing up two wing pylons for more weapons. The new version also will be
equipped with the Distributed Targeting Processor-Networked
(DTP-N), which incorporates the Tactical Targeting Network Technology
and produces a common operating picture. The Block II Infrared Search and Track
sensor will be installed in a centerline pod. With some additional coating
applied, the Block III will have a smaller radar cross-section and will feature
the Advanced Cockpit System.

This year the Navy issued a contract for
the fourth multiyear procurement for the Super Hornet, ordering 78 new Block
III Super Hornets over fiscal years 2019, 2020 and 2021. Production is planned
to continue through 2023, with 12 Super Hornets per year for three years.  

The two Super Hornets selected by Boeing
to be the test jets for the Block III program have been inducted into the
factory and will be ready to turn over the Navy at the end of the year, said Jennifer Tebo, director of Development
for the F/A-18 and EA-18G. This event had been accelerated by one year.

The conformal
fuel tanks were flown in February and March.

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — The new generation of Sailors, Marines and Coast Guardsmen who are entering the force and in the early stages of their careers is, well, different. Such is the consensus among the three senior enlisted leaders who spoke at Sea-Air-Space 2019 on May 7.

On one hand, these
young people come into military service with an unprecedented technological
savvy. On the other, they have a greater need to know why they are given the
tasks they must complete. And they must be placed in the right jobs — with the
understanding that they should know how to perform other tasks necessary to
support the warfighting mission. 

“From my
perspective, as I’m looking at the Sailor standing in front of me, is there are
too many choices and options in time management,” said Master Chief Petty
Officer of the Navy Russell Smith. 

Young Sailors
understandably are attracted to service by incentives like tuition assistance
and the ability to take college courses while deployed on ships. Still, Smith
said, those Sailors must know how to do their jobs. 

“What you’re
expected to do under high stress in the middle of the night, with things
exploding around you or the ship sinking,” is critical, Smith said. So too is
the “ability to continue the fight.” 

Leaders, Smith
said, need to convince their younger charges that goals like the achievement of
associate degrees are worthwhile.

“Stay with us. We’ll
help you get there — but focus on your job,” Smith said. 

Smith said he
spent too much time in the accession pipeline to believe that the next
generation of Navy leaders is not up to the task. 

“By any measure,
we have more capable Sailors today than any time in our nation’s history,”
Smith said, mentioning that performance and retention went up due to recent
efforts to bolster physical standards and boot camp requirements. 

Sgt. Maj. Robin Fortner
of the Quantico, Virginia-based Marine Corps Systems Command, discussed the
need to show new recruits what the service can offer them. 

“We have to make
sure we have the right incentives for those with the right skills to stay,”
said Fortner, who was standing in on the panel for Sergeant Major of the Marine
Corps Ronald Green. 

Master Chief of
the Coast Guard Jason Vanderhaden emphasized the need to allow the service’s
young men and women to specialize in fields that are compatible with individual
skill sets. 

“They want to get
really good at their jobs,” Vanderhaden said. 

But like his
fellow panelists, Vanderhaden stressed that these Coastguardsmen also must be
able to perform missions like damage control, law enforcement or helicopter
landings that may be outside of their ratings. As the smallest armed service,
the Coast Guard needs everyone possible to fulfill mission requirements, he
said. Moreover, as the service gains from technological advances associated
with the largest recapitalization in service history, young members’ skill sets
must grow accordingly to keep pace. 

NATIONAL HARBOR,
Md. — The Navy is investing $21 billion in a multiphase program to improve the
efficiency of its government shipyards, which have struggled to get ships and
submarines back into service on time. The program is called the Shipyard
Industrial Optimization Plan, said Steve Lagana, program manager for the plan
in the Naval Sea Systems Command Industrial Division.

Speaking at a NAVSEA
briefing at the Navy League’s annual Sea-Air-Space exposition May 7, Lagana
said the plan was developed in response to criticism from Congress, which has
complained about ships and submarines languishing in the yards or unable to get
in for required maintenance. A prime example of the problem is the three Los
Angeles-class attack boats that have lost their certification to sail due to
the overdue maintenance. The USS Boise has been waiting 18 months for its
required yard period.

The plan was
developed by a team of 40 engineers, Lagana said. The first two phases of the
plan were surveys of the yards and detailed analysis of the problems. Those
studies showed enormous inefficiencies created by the physical layout of the
yards, which had facilities providing parts or services to the dry docks in
some cases more than a mile apart.

Lagana showed
diagrams of the existing arrangements at the major yards and the planned
realignments, which would produce more compact and efficient facilities. At the
Puget Sound and Norfolk yards, the facilities serving submarines and
nuclear-power carriers would be separated and combined with their supporting
components.

“This is a whole
new way of thinking about the problem,” Lagana said. Ships in the yards do not
produce a lethal Navy, he said.

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — Citing recent high-profile comments
by Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John M. Richardson and Marine Corps
Commandant Gen. Robert B. Neller on cybersecurity’s importance, panelists at a
May 7 event at Sea-Air-Space agreed that it is a top issue for their services,
regardless of external perceptions.

Coast Guard Rear Adm. David Dermanelian, assistant
commandant for C4IT and commander of Coast Guard Cyber Command, said his branch
is known for its drug interdictions and waterway management missions, but often
perception does not equate that work with cybersecurity.

“All those missions are directly linked to the cyber domain,”
he said. “And I would posit that even within the Coast Guard, we’re in contact
with bad actors, or the enemy, every day. The Coast Guard’s role is to defend
our maritime transportation, our cyber domain.”

Detailing how maritime commerce coming through U.S.
waterways is valued at $5.4 trillion and supports 31 million Americans,
Dermanelian quantified the importance of cybersecurity for fellow panelist,
Maritime Administration Director of the Office of Maritime Security Cameron
Naron. 

Naron said it’s critical MARAD has cyber systems, as well as
resilient measures, in place should anything under their purview be
compromised. With MARAD sitting at the crux of defense, homeland security and
commerce, his office is focusing on working with all its stakeholders to
maintain security.

“Our role is really to make sure that industry’s needs,
industry’s equities, are represented in federal policy formulations,” Naron
said.

Naron said commercial network monitoring and vulnerability
remediation options are out there today, and there are also great government
solutions, and those resources need to be in the hands of industry, not only
because it’s good for business, but because it’s good for national security. MARAD
also must ensure the security of the Ready Reserve Fleet, and Naron stressed
that cyber concerns also extend to areas such as precision navigation and GPS
vulnerability.

Gregg Kendrick, Marine Corps Forces Cyberspace Command executive
director, addressed his service’s complex network of cybersecurity operations
and how that information is critical to the Marines’ return to its roots.

“Just like the Coast Guard, we have a little of a unique
mission as well. … The commandant and the chief of naval operations are
exceedingly … bringing us out of the ground force and bringing us back to our
naval heritage,” Kendrick said. That makes the fidelity of the information the
Marines and Navy share when they go from sea and ashore critical so the
services can make that gap as seamless as possible, he said.

Kendrick also addressed how the Marines are staffing up
their cybersecurity teams, when industry hiring is so competitive. He said 40%
of the Corps’ cyber mission force is civilian, stating that Neller wanted to
use best business practices from people that work for companies like Google or
other software developers to ensure the Marines had cutting-edge tactics.

The moderator, Navy Vice Adm. Matthew Kohler, deputy chief of naval operations for information warfare and director of naval intelligence, summed up the vastness of the challenge of keeping up with cybersecurity needs, and how it’s directly tied to the larger challenges the sea services face. “Technology is running at us at an unprecedented rate. … It’s not just the pace of the technology, it’s the race for how quickly we can adopt that technology … to how we fight and [it] gives us the ‘Great Power Competition’ that we find ourselves in today,” he said.

NATIONAL HARBOR,
Md. — The Navy is on track to award a contract for its new training helicopter by
the end of this calendar year, and Leonardo Helicopters believes it is in a
great position to win that competition, Andrew Gappy, director of the firm’s
Navy and Marine Corps programs, said May 7.

Leonardo is
offering the TH-119, a modified version of its widely used commercial
helicopter, which is serving as a trainer for the Portuguese Air Force and
Israel, Gappy said. A former Marine helicopter pilot, Gappy said the 119 has
the advantage of being the only one of the three competitors that is made in America,
at Leonardo’s full-service plant in Philadelphia. It also has a rugged, nearly
all metal airframe that can take the rough handling commonly endured by
training aircraft and has a single engine, which will reduce the long-term
maintenance and operating cost, he said.

Also competing to
replace the Navy’s current TH-57, which is used to train helicopter pilots for
the Navy, Marine Corps and Coast Guard, are Airbus, with its twin-engine
H-235P3, and Bell Helicopters, with the 407 GXi, an updated version of the Bell
206, which was the basis for the TH-57.

Gappy said all
three firms have submitted their proposals, which are being evaluated by the
Navy. The contract required an in-service helicopter, a ground training system
and a long-term sustainment proposal with projected cost. The winner will
produce 130 aircraft in five years, with the first five due by the end of the
fiscal 2020.

Gappy said the
TH-119 proposal was crafted with input from a team of former military
helicopter pilots. It is the highest power-rated single-engine helo in the
U.S., meets all of the Navy’s requirement and offers a low sustainment cost.
“It’s not just what the airplane can do; it’s the affordability of the
airplane,” he said.

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — The addition of a third Virginia-class submarine to the fiscal 2020 budget proposal won’t cause significant disruption to the industrial base because the program has given enough lead time before the sub needs to be built, the program’s manager said May 7 at Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space exposition.

Capt. Christopher Hanson, the U.S. Navy’s Virginia-class program manager, acknowledged that the decision years ago to increase procurement from one sub per year to two caused “some vendors [to] struggle,” but that the industry is able to handle a third sub because enough lead time has been built in. The addition won’t cause a shock in the production line, Hanson said.

By adding a third sub to the budget, the Navy sends a “very clear signal of what’s coming,” allowing vendors to adjust and prepare, he added.

“If they get a clear signal, they will invest,” Hanson said. “That clear signal is hard to measure, but you definitely see the results in the vendor base.”

This request will allow the Navy to immediately get orders out to the vendors so they can fill those orders. And it’s not anything they can’t handle, Hanson said, arguing that they are simply asking the industrial base to deliver 11 subs instead of 10 over the next five years.

The Navy is still striving to get construction time of Virginia-class subs down to 60 months, although it has recently stalled in the area of 66 to 68 months. Hanson said the goal is still 60 months, although he acknowledged it was not a guarantee. “Would I bet my life on 60 months? Probably not.”

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — The Zumwalt-class of destroyers is experiencing a series of milestones as its program continues to refine its role in the fleet, according to a May 7 briefing at Sea-Air-Space 2019. The third and final DDG-1000 Zumwalt-class destroyer was just christened in the last couple of weeks, setting it up for a 2020 delivery. The DDG-1002 was christened on April 27, Capt. Kevin Smith, DDG-1000 program manager, said. The program also conducted the first live missile firings using the Zumwalt Combat System on April 26.

The program is looking into implementing a maritime strike version of the Tomahawk missile, and they are also looking at the SM-6 Block 1A, the captain said.

The Navy expects the DDG-1000 to take on a different role in the fleet compared to how it was originally envisioned. It was slated as a ship that could operate in the littorals, but now the Navy is shifting it to a more blue-water focus, Smith said.

“We are now an offensive surface strike platform — more blue water,” he said. “The Navy made a decision to go that way.”

NATIONAL
HARBOR, Md. — The Navy’s admiral in charge of unmanned aviation said that the
Initial Operational Capability (IOC) of the MQ-25A aerial tanking unmanned
aerial vehicle is “as soon as possible.”

Speaking May
6 to an audience at the Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space exposition here, Rear Adm.
Brian Corey, program executive officer for unmanned aviation and strike
weapons, said that the MQ-25A program does not have a set IOC date but that it
was to be before 2026 “if we can.”

The
Boeing-owned MQ-25 prototype was trucked earlier this week from the factory in
St. Louis to Mid-America airport in Illinois for more ground testing and,
eventually, flight testing.

Corey said
the first flight of the prototype would take place later this year.

He also said that four
aircraft carriers initially will be equipped to operate the MQ-25A, but he
declined to speculate which carrier, citing the flexibility of schedules.

NATIONAL HARBOR,
Md. — As head of expeditionary warfare at the Naval Information Warfare Center
Atlantic, Kevin Charlow constantly is on the lookout for ways to share good
results with as many potential users as possible. 

“We’re focused on
trying to deliver capability to the fleet faster — by leveraging our exercise
and prototype efforts,” Charlow said during a May 7 interview at Sea-Air-Space
2019. 

To that end,
Charlow pointed to a recent case involving a precision navigation unit developed
for a U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) combat craft. It turned out that
the Marine Corps had a need for a similar unit, for use in its Amphibious
Assault Vehicles (AAV). 

“We were able to
take that integrated navigation and control capability — one of our SOCOM
projects – and leverage that with the Marine Corps AAV,” Charlow said.
“Basically, one sponsor funded a solution we’re now sharing with another, and
we have a potential win for the warfighters.”

The Marines are testing
the system now in Charleston, South Carolina, harbor. 

“Pressing forward,
we want to deliver C4ISR [command, control, communications, computer,
intelligence, reconnaissance and surveillance], and its system and engineering
services and solutions, to our major sponsors,” Charlow said.   

The Navy, Marine
Corps and SOCOM are primary benefactors, but the Naval Information Warfare center
has helped the U.S. Air Force and U.S. Army as well. 

Besides
advances in development of C4ISR prototypes, the center has awarded some $9
million in funding for 20 innovation projects for fiscal year 2019, which began
Oct. 1. Its engineers also built and installed a more robust firewall in the
Marine Corps’ SIPR (secret internet protocol router) network. The center was
able to fulfill an urgent need for the Marines within 10 months.