Center hails critical milestone for transformational ‘Osprey’

While the Marine Corps-Special Operations tiltrotor aircraft’s official title is the Osprey, its extraordinary developmental history is more reminiscent of the story of the legendary Phoenix. With critical decisions taken in recent days by the Defense Department and the Congress, the V-22 now seems poised to realize its potential as one of the truly transformational technologies that Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has been pursuing to equip the Pentagon for the 21st Century.

On 20 May, the Defense Acquisition Board (DAB) concluded one of the most exhaustive – and critical – phases in the development of any defense system in history with the certification that the V-22 "is satisfying the threshold levels for all of its key performance parameters and reliability and maintainability metrics."

In an Acquisition Decision Memorandum, Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics E.C. "Pete" Aldrich certified that the "technical progress of the flight testing" has satisfied safety, reliability, maneuverability, formation flying, shipboard compatibility and other issues that have, in the past, hindered the development and acquisition of this aircraft.

Even more important, Secretary Aldrich directed the Overarching Integrated Product Team to review the V-22 program and make recommendations to the DAB relative to revising the program and making it more success-oriented, consistent with the terms of the FY02 National Defense Authorization Act (Sec 123 Public Law 107-107). He also ordered the Joint Vertical Aircraft Road Map Task Force to assess the V-22 production profile alternatives against the department’s overall investment in the rotary wing industrial sector and the eventual needs to replace and or refurbish aging aircraft.

Mr. Aldrich took the further step of personally complimenting the V-22’s program manager, Colonel Dan Shultz USMC, and the military and Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey team for the "disciplined management of the restructured test program to date."

In addition, both houses of Congress this week authorized the expenditure of $1.1 billion for the purchase of 11 Boeing-Textron V-22 Osprey aircraft in FY 2004. Bipartisan congressional supporters of the V-22 program deserve – together with the U.S. Marine Corps — no small measure of the credit for keeping the program alive during its periodic difficulties and despite various administrations’ efforts to slow or terminate it.

The Center for Security Policy’s President Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. said today, "The Pentagon’s imprimatur on the V-22, coupled with the latest indication of strong congressional support for the program, is welcome news for those of us who have believed the tiltrotor technology being perfected in the Osprey will revolutionize both military operations and civilian aerospace."

This point was amply demonstrated in the High-Level Roundtable Discussion the Center organized last September, entitled "The V-22: Exemplar of Transformation or Its Next Casualty?" An extraordinary group of security policy professionals – including both past and present senior civilian officials and legislators and leaders of the armed forces — participated. Among them were: General James L. Jones, then-Commandant of the Marine Corps (now Supreme Allied Commander, Europe); General William L. Nyland, Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps; Lieutenant General Paul Hester, Commander, Air Force Special Operations Command; Major General David H. Huntoon, Director of Strategy, Plans & Policy, United States Army; Major General John J. Batbie Jr., Vice Commander, U.S. Air Force Reserve; Major General Michael Hough, Assistant Deputy Commandant for Aviation; Col. Dan Schultz USMC, V-22 Program Manager; Mr. Tom MacDonald, Chief Test Pilot, V-22 Program; and Major Generals (Ret.) Hugh Cox and Jack Fenimore, former Adjutants General, respectively, of Alaska and New York.

Top legislators also addressed the Roundtable, including: Rep. Bill Young (R-FL), Chairman, House Appropriations Committee; Rep. Martin Frost (D- TX), Democratic Caucus Chairman; Rep. Curt Weldon (R-PA), Chairman, House Armed Services Military Procurement Subcommittee; Rep. Robin Hayes (R-NC), Vice Chairman of the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Military Installations and Facilities; Rep. Robert Andrews (D-NJ) and Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC), members of the House Armed Services Committee; and Rep. Kay Granger (R-TX), a member of the House Appropriations Committee.

Gaffney added: "All of these individuals — and many others who never lost faith in the capacity of tiltrotor technology to transform the U.S. military and revolutionize America’s civilian aerospace capabilities – have earned, and fully deserve, our lasting gratitude."