Summary Of The Center For Security Policy’s High-Level Roundtable Discussion On Tiltrotor Technology And ‘Joint Vision 2010

In the fall of 1996, Chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff General John M.
Shalikashvili, released a document
entitled “Joint Vision 2010”
which was intended to provide “the
conceptual template for how America’s
armed forces will channel the vitality
and innovation of our people and leverage
technological opportunities to achieve
new levels of effectiveness in joint
warfighting.” The focus of the
Chairman’s vision was on the achievement
of dominance across the full spectrum of
military operations — specifically
maneuver, engagement, self-protection and
logistics.

On 9 April 1997, the Center for
Security Policy convened the latest in a
series of high-level Roundtable
Discussions addressing critical and
emerging security policy issues. The
focus of this event was the V-22 Osprey
and the enormous contribution tiltrotor
technology may make to the Nation’s
security and other interests provided
its full potential is allowed to be
realized. The Osprey has the
capability unique among transport
aircraft to take-off and land vertically
like a helicopter, but convert in-flight
so as to fly at speeds comparable to a
conventional turboprop airplane.

In attendance at the Roundtable,
entitled “Tiltrotor Technology and
‘Joint Vision 2010′: A New Way to Fly and
to Fight,” were more than seventy
current and former policy-makers in the
legislative and executive branches,
members of the armed services,
representatives of industry and the
media. (The full listing of participants
is attached.) The half-day conference
held at the ANA Hotel in Washington, D.C.
featured remarks on: “Tiltrotors and
the Marine Corps’ Vision of 21st Century
Warfare” by former Commandant of the
Marine Corps, General Carl E.
Mundy, Jr.; a discussion of
“Tiltrotor Capabilities for the
Special Operations Command” by Major
General Maxwell C. Bailey, USAF,
Director of Operations (J-3) for U.S.
Special Operations Command; and a survey
of “Tiltrotor Potential for Joint
Service Applications” by Brigadier
General Michael A. Hough, USMC,
Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Navy
for Expeditionary Warfare.

Particularly noteworthy were the
observations provided by several leading
Members of the U.S. Congress. Rep. Curt
Weldon (R-PA), Chairman of the
House National Security Committee’s
Military Research and Development
Subcommittee, offered his insights into
the Osprey’s prospects on Capitol Hill
and, in particular, the implications of
the Pentagon’s plan to build V-22s at a
relatively low rate for realizing the
tiltrotor’s full potential in both
military and civil applications.

These issues were subsequently
addressed from the perspective of the
Senate authorizing and appropriations
panels by Senator Bob Smith
(R-NH), Chairman of the Senate Armed
Services Committee’s Strategic Forces
Subcommittee, and Senate Appropriations
Committee and Defense Appropriations
Subcommittee Chairman Ted Stevens
(R-AK).

The following were among the themes
addressed in the course of this
high-level Roundtable Discussion. No
effort was made to formulate a consensus
position on the part of those
participating, but the conversation
suggested that these points were broadly
endorsed.

Maximizing the Leverage of
Defense Technology

The Center Roundtable emphasized an
objective that was stressed by General
Shalikashvili’s “Joint Vision
2010” and that has emerged from
various other top-level reviews of U.S.
national security requirements and future
capabilities (e.g., the Bottom-Up Review,
the Quadrennial Defense Review, etc.) —
namely, the need to get more
capability out of individual weapons
systems.

The discussion suggested that in the
post-Cold War world, as in earlier
periods, there will always be a
need for troops on the ground and that
their precise and safe insertion,
resupply and extraction will remain a
high priority. The tiltrotor was
consistently identified as a uniquely
powerful contributor to technology
leverage because it “leaps
ahead” of current helicopter
Vertical Take-Off and Landing (VTOL)
technology. The V-22 and its variants
will provide the Nation with what were
termed “dramatic” and
“revolutionary” improvements in
force projection, discrete and precise
engagement options, upgraded mobility and
survivability, and enhanced economy of
force and higher tempo operations.

The V-22 was designed as an assault
transport with the inherent capability to
meet a broad range of mission
requirements from all four services. It
has a unique ability to: self-deploy
worldwide; perform in any weather, day or
night; and operate in high-threat and
nuclear, biological or chemical (NBC)
environments, with high reliability, low
maintenance and a small logistics
foot-print. Such inherent flexibility
makes the V-22 an exemplar of the
technology standard being sought for 21st
Century weapon systems.

No less exemplary is the technology
used to manufacture the Osprey.
Congressional, service and industry
participants observed that industrial
breakthroughs pioneered in Boeing’s 777
program were utilized extensively over
the past seven years to design and
produce the V-22. Thanks to this
leveraging of the previous investment of
millions of dollars in state-of-the-art
commercial technology a 23%
decrease in unit price (to $32.3
million per MV-22) has already been
achieved — with the real promise of
further reductions to come.

21st Century Warfighting

Symposium participants discussed the
likely conditions in which military
operations are likely to occur in the
future. America’s armed forces will
surely be expected to deal with a variety
of sudden, fast-moving, rapidly changing
contingencies — many of which may
involve unconventional scenarios.

Such contingencies — whether on the
lower end of the spectrum of conflict
(e.g., Panama, Grenada, Somalia, Rwanda,
Bosnia, etc.) or higher end (e.g. Korea,
Iraq, Iran, etc.) — will require U.S.
forces to be rapidly deployed
from naval ships in theater, from
America’s few remaining forward bases or
(increasingly) from the continental
United States itself. With fewer
strategic lift assets available, aircraft
must be able to self-deploy and be
operationally ready on arrival. The V-22
meets this test: It is globally
self-deployable and designed to fight on
arrival in theater.

Discussants noted that the American
people and their leaders will want to
avoid “attrition warfare” in
future conflicts. In part, as a result,
warfare in the 21^st Century is
going to be characterized by operational
maneuver — placing a premium on speed,
range, precision engagement and a need
for high performance, survivable air
platforms. Some projections claim that by
2010, approximately 80% of the world’s
population will live within V-22 range of
the littorals, in cities. Future aircraft
capable of fighting in urban environments
must be highly survivable and have both
Vertical Take-Off and Landing (VTOL) and
fixed-wing performance — VTOL for
precision engagement of ground forces and
fixed-wing speed and maneuver
characteristics to arrive and return
safely.

21st Century missions are likely to be
volatile in nature, characterized by
rapid change and unpredictability in both
the intensity and type of threat. The
V-22 alone among VTOL aircraft has the
range, endurance and real-time threat
update systems to circumvent known
threats, the speed and electronic
countermeasures to evade unanticipated
threats that attempt to engage the
aircraft, the built-in survivability and
ballistic tolerance to take hits and fly
safely out of harm’s way, the capability
to operate repeatedly in NBC-contaminated
environments and the crashworthiness to
optimize aircrew survival if the aircraft
is shot down.

For the Marines this
concept of warfare has been come to be
known as “Ship-to-Objective
Maneuver.” Rather than storming
ashore in the face of hardened defensive
positions, the V-22’s speed, range and
survivability features will enable the
Marines to launch from over-the-horizon
and to maneuver directly to an objective,
bypassing enemy strongholds. This puts
the enemy commander on the defensive,
continually reorienting to U.S. moves and
inhibits his ability to reach decisions
and take effective countervailing action.
The V-22 will permit the Marine Corps to
maintain the initiative and achieve
mission objectives quickly with far fewer
casualties.

For U.S. Special Operations
Command (SOCOM), the V-22’s
ability covertly to penetrate and
maneuver in hostile air space at great
distances (500 nm radius) within a
single period of darkness translates
into increased responsiveness, greater
mission flexibility, enhanced operational
security and higher probability of
mission success.

Specifically, V-22 survivability and
the unique flexibility of tiltrotor
performance will result in fewer aircraft
being required for a given mission, and
more mission capability in a single
aircraft. Smaller, more efficient mission
packages mean fewer aircraft types
involved, fewer personnel exposed and
increased physical security — which, in
turn, translates into fewer casualties
and increased probability of mission
success.

In discussion of joint mission
potential for the tiltrotor, the
case was made that V-22 variants could
prove ideally suited for an unprecedented
array of tasks. Foremost among these is combat
search and rescue. Discussants
pointed out that this mission has
developed a level of strategic,
as well as humanitarian, significance
insofar as the failure to rescue downed
aircrew not only diminishes their chances
of survival but exposes them to
exploitation as propaganda tools by an
adversary. Helicopters were, relative to
the V-22, considered to be too slow, too
range-limited and too vulnerable to be
optimal for this critical mission area.

Other joint mission applications put
forward included use of the V-22 with a
tanking kit installed as an aerial
refueller for both high
performance aircraft and helicopters. In
its basic configuration the Osprey can
also function impressively as a medevac
and logistics support
aircraft, and as a general
purpose aircraft for humanitarian,
disaster relief and counter-drug
operations. The V-22 airframe
can also be readily configured as an airborne
early warning platform, a command
and control aircraft, an electronic
warfare platform, an
anti-submarine warfare platform and as an
airborne mine-countermeasures platform.
Smaller variants of the tiltrotor were
identified as attractive candidates for
gunship, coastal rescue and training
missions. In fact, the Department of
Defense has identified more than 30
joint service mission applications
for the V-22. No other aircraft
in history has offered the Nation as much
versatility in military operations.

Marine Corps, Special Operations
Command and congressional discussants
emphasized that, while the move to V-22
represented an evolutionary step in the
modernization of key U.S. combat
capabilities, the unique qualities of the
tiltrotor offer a revolution in
how the American military will do
business. One legislator observed that
the V-22 represents an advanced
technology that would “fundamentally
transform the nature of warfare.”

The Epitome of ‘Dual-Use’
Technology

As one participant observed: “The
V-22 tiltrotor, [is]…the best living
example of dual-use technology that money
could buy. Tiltrotor technology
gives us the potential to continue to
lead the world in aviation products to
advance the technology base and the
innovativeness of our industry for the
common good.”

Both the Europeans and Japanese have
expressed interest in developing and
acquiring tiltrotor technology. In light
of the fact that aviation exports
represent the single largest favorable
contributor to the U.S. balance of trade,
it is obvious that the
translation of tiltrotor technology into
civil applications will not only
revolutionize civil aviation; it will
also reap enormous benefits for the
Nation more generally.

Roundtable participants described the
growing and, in some cases acute,
global need for efficient inter-city
transportation forms that are responsive
to environmental considerations, noise
abatement concerns, land-use constraints
and that can reduce the time
unnecessarily consumed by those using
current, conventional commercial air
services. Construction of tiltrotor
“verti-ports” in center-city
transportation nodes would ease airline
congestion, open new and more efficient
routes and provide business and
recreational travelers with a wide range
of new travel options.

By some estimates, the first
decade of tiltrotor commercial operations
could generate more than 135,000
high-quality U.S. manufacturing jobs,
over $125 billion in economic activity,
$20 billion in exports and precipitate a
new era in commercial transportation.
It was noted that the promise of
dual-use tiltrotor technology has begun
to be realized with the
announcement of a Bell-Boeing joint
initiative to develop, with industry
funding, the Model 609 — a 6-to-9
passenger civil tiltrotor for the
executive transport, resource
development, emergency medical service
and utility markets. Domestic and
international potential for this aircraft
is assessed to be enormous; its
introduction would represent the first
step toward widespread availability of
future commercial variants, including
commuter-class tiltrotors.

The Challenge Ahead

The only real concern to come out of
the Roundtable Discussion involved the
pace at which the Pentagon currently
plans to introduce the MV-22 and replace
the existing inventory of thirty-year-old
CH-46 Sea Knights now approaching block
obsolescence.⁽¹⁾

It will be 2001 before the Marines are
able to achieve an initial operating
capability of a single 12-aircraft MV-22
squadron — 18 years after program
initiation. The buy for the Marines
and SOCOM as currently planned stretches
out over an uneconomical 25 years. Unless
that plan is accelerated, the Marines
will be obliged to prolonge the operation
of transport helicopters featuring
1960s-technology, with all the attendant
costs in terms of expensive maintenance
and service-life extension programs. When
combined with the unnecessarily high unit
costs imposed by relatively low-rates of
production of V-22s, the result of such a
procurement schedule could be to
jeopardize the entire Osprey program.
This would not only deny the advantages
of tiltrotor effectiveness and
survivability to those Marines and
Special Operators who must go in harm’s
way; it could impede, if not preclude,
the realization of the “peace
dividend” this technology promises
the Nation as a whole.

Conclusion

The Roundtable Discussion provided
convincing evidence that the national
security and other interests would be
very poorly served if the V-22 were —
for the second time in a decade — to be
the victim of
penny-pinching/pound-foolish budgeting by
the Pentagon.

Accordingly, congressional
participants issued a challenge to those
in attendance: To revitalize the
“Tiltrotor Coalition.” This
informal alliance of concerned citizens,
industry leaders and legislators that did
so much to foil repeated attempts by the
Bush Administration to cancel the Osprey
program. It is now needed to educating
members of the public and the many newer
legislators who now represent them on
Capitol Hill regarding the significance
of tiltrotor technology, and the
importance to the Nation of getting this
program properly structured — i.e.,
given authorization and resources to
achieve the higher rates of production
(32 V-22s per year) needed to bring the
tiltrotor capability on-line as quickly
as possible and minimize overall costs.
Doing so would save up to $6
billion and result in full Marine
capability eight years sooner
and full SOCOM capability two years
sooner.

The Center for Security Policy and
other participants in its Roundtable
Discussion on the Tiltrotor Technology
have accepted this challenge and will
work to educate policy-makers and the
public about the benefits that will
accrue from putting the Osprey production
program on a basis that is both
operationally and fiscally sound. Those
interested in contributing to the success
of this effort are encouraged to call the
Center’s Chief of Staff, Rinelda Bliss at
(202) 835-9077.

– End of
Summary –

SYMPOSIUM ON

TILTROTOR
TECHNOLOGY AND ‘JOINT VISION 2010’

9 April 1997,
8:30 a.m. – 2:00 p.m.

ANA Hotel,
Washington, D.C.

Participants’
List

Morris J. Amitay, Esq., Morris J.
Amitay, P.C.

Mr. Terry A. Arnold, Bell Helicopter
Textron, Inc.

Major General Maxwell Bailey, USAF,
U.S. Special Operations Command (J3)

Mr. Richard Ballard, Ballard
Associates, Ltd.

Mr. James Battle, Moog, Inc., Aircraft
Group

Ms. Rinelda Bliss, Center for Security
Policy

Mr. Thomas Bosco, Port Authority of
New York and New Jersey

Mr. Walter Bridgeman, Sunstrand
Aerospace

J. Stephen Britt, Esq., Krooth &
Altman

Mr. Barret F. Bryant, Center for
Security Policy

Mr. Tony Ceglia, Office of Senator
Graham

Ms. Caren Centorelli, Helicopter
Association International

Mr. Steven Cortese, Senate
Appropriations Committee

MGen. Hugh L. Cox III, USAF (Ret.),
Boeing North America, Inc.

Mr. Gary B. Crouse, Defense Daily

Mr. Robert Cummings, Douw Capital

Lt. Gen. Terrence Dake, USMC, U.S.
Marine Corps

Mr. Fred Elliott, Department of
Commerce

Mr. Bill Fallon, The Boeing Company

Ms. Gidget Fuentes, Navy Times

Mr. Frank J. Gaffney, Jr., Center for
Security Policy

Mr. Harley F. Garrett, SCI Systems,
Inc.

Dr. James L. George, Writer and
Analyst, National Security Affairs

Mr. Glenn W. Goodman, Armed Forces
Journal International

Mr. Joe Harty, Office of Rep. Adam
Smith

Mr. David S. Harvey, Rotor &
Wing

Mr. Marlin L. Hefti, AlliedSignal
Aerospace Co.

Brig.Gen. Michael A. Hough, USMC,
United States Marine Corps

Vice Admiral William D. Houser, USN
(Ret.), Fort Scott Corporation

Ms. Jenna Hughes, Office of
Congressman Cook

Maj. Mark Ingram, USMC, U.S. Marine
Corps

Mr. David Jensen, Phillips Business
Information, Inc.

Capt. T.V. Johnson, USMC, United
States Marine Corps

Mr. T.K. Jones, Boeing Defense &
Space Group

Mr. Norbert W. Josten, Boeing Defense
& Space Group

Mr. Sven F. Kraemer, Global Challenge
2000

Dr. Robert H. Krieble, Krieble
Associates

Lt.Col. Ray Kruelski, USAF, U.S.
Special Operations Command

Mr. Frank Lake, Jr., Boeing Defense
& Space Group

Mr. Bob Lange, Lockheed Martin
Corporation

Mr. Tom Lankford, Office of Senator
Bob Smith

Mr. Gerald E. Lethcoe, Textron, Inc.

Dr. John W. Leverton, Leverton
Associates, Inc.

Mr. Darren Logan, Center for Security
Policy

Mr. Ramon L. Lopez, Flight
International

Mr. Dar Lundberg, Bell Boeing V-22
Joint Program Office

Mr. Greg McAdams, Boeing Defense &
Space Group

Lt. Gen. Thomas H. Miller, USMC
(Ret.), Former Deputy Chief of Staff for
Aviation

Mr. Thomas G. Moore, Heritage
Foundation

Mr. Amir A. Morgan, Center for
Security Policy

Mr. Norm Mowbray, Textron, Inc.

General Carl E. Mundy, Jr., USMC
(Ret.), World USO

Ms. Sally L. Newman, System Planning
Corporation

Ms. Janice Nielson, Office of Senator
Craig

Mr. Austin O’Toole, McDonnell Douglas
Corporation

Mr. Chris Perkins, Office of Senator
Jeffords

Mr. Jim Pettit, Texas Office of
State-Federal Relations

Mr. Mike Prendergast, Office of
Senator Graham

Mr. Ron Reber, Bell Helicopter
Textron, Inc.

Hon. Roger W. Robinson, Jr., RWR, Inc.

Maj.Gen. Richard Scholtes, USA (Ret.),
ANSER

Dr. Wayne A. Schroeder, Logicon RDA

Mr. Atsushi ‘Peter’ Shiiba, Itochu
Aviation, Inc.

Mr. Gary Simpson, Bell Helicopter
Textron, Inc.

Hon. Bob Smith, U.S. Senate

Mr. Gordon Smith, McDonnell Douglas
Corporation

Lt. Gen. Keith A. Smith, USMC (Ret.),
Former Deputy Chief of Staff for Aviation

Mr. Dick Spivey, Bell Boeing

Mr. W. Dennis Stephens, Preston Gates
Ellis & Rouvelas Meeds

Hon. Ted Stevens, U.S. Senate

Mr. Jimmy Tai, Georgia Institute of
Technology

Lt.Col. James R. Teeple (USAF), HQ,
Air Force Special Operations Command

Ms. Alicia D. Therrien, Center for
Security Policy

Hon. Curt Weldon, U.S. House of
Representatives

Mr. Cal Whitehurst, Textron, Inc.

Ms. Paulina B. Wilson, McDonnell
Douglas Corporation

Mr. John Young, Senate Defense
Appropriations Subcommittee

Mr. John F. Zugschwert, Textron, Inc.

1. In the month since
this Symposium was convened, two more Sea
Knights have been involved in fatal
crashes.