American fighter aircraft are just that. On Dec. 20, 2011 Japan’s Ministry of Defense announced its selection of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter as the next generation fighter to meet the needs of the Japan Air Self-Defense Force (JASDF). The announcement was a shot in the arm for the beleaguered JSF program, but not a surprise.

Since World War II, the U.S. has exported technology of all kinds to Japan, and vice-versa. Toyota sold its first car in the U.S. – a Toyopet Crown – in 1958, beginning a tidal wave of sales. Often overlooked has been the large-scale purchase, license-production and employment of American fighters in Japan, which began two years before that first Toyopet left the dealership.

Though the terms of the Armistice Agreement signed aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay in September 1945 prohibited Japanese aerial activity, including aircraft manufacturing, the swiftly changing geostrategic climate resulted in the establishment of

The Japan Air Self Defense Force's (JASDF) flight demonstration team, Blue Impulse, taxi their F-86F Sabre aircraft out during the annual Japanese-American Friendship Festival at Yokota Air Base, Japan, Jan. 1, 1981. U.S. Air Force photo

the Japan Self Defense Force in 1952. The Japan Air Self Defense Force (JASDF) was formed on July 1, 1954, and under American tutelage a flight training school stood up at Hamamatsu Air Base with 25 Beech T-34 Mentors in December 1954.

Jet training began the following year in Lockheed T-33As. The initial advanced training classes graduated to jet fighter conversion both in Japan and in Nevada, taking the controls of the Japan’s first post-War fighter, the North American F-86F Sabre.

The first operational wing of JASDF F-86Fs was established at Hamamatsu in 1956, with 70 Sabres on the flightline. Two additional F-86F wings were formed in 1957 at Chitose and Matsushima Air Bases, with a fourth wing added in 1959. All-weather F-86Ds were adopted by the JASDF in the same period, with 60 having been delivered by the end of 1958.

Japan was actually the third Asian Sabre operator after Taiwan and South Korea, but acquired the aircraft in larger numbers than any other foreign air force. Japanese and Asian orders for the fighter convinced the USAF to reinstate Sabre production in 1955 with the new F-86F-40 which enjoyed extended wing tips and leading-edge slats. The first batch of this improved Sabre was shipped to Japan via Sacramento in 1956.

A Lockheed Martin F-104J Starfighter of the Japanese Air Self Defense Force (JASDF) in flight with a target sleeve during a training exercise in 1983. The Japanese F-104J were manufactured by Lockheed Martin but assembled by Mitsubishi. U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Steve McGill

Even before the first F-86s were delivered, plans were made for the resumption of indigenous aircraft production with the acquisition of manufacturing licenses from American aerospace firms. Mitsubishi, maker of the iconic A6M Zero, got the North American license for the Sabre, completing its first F-86 in 1956. By 1960 Mitsubishi would turn out some 300 Sabres, firmly establishing a tradition.

The JASDF operated the F-86 through the early 1970s, its “Blue Impulse” jet aerobatic team keeping the Sabre in business until 1982. In the early 1960s the Japanese Defense Ministry was already considering its next fighter option. At the time, Lockheed was looking for potential customers for its redesigned F-104. Europe was a likely target, but the JASDF’s interceptor needs matched well with the 104, which Lockheed realized would sell most readily under license arrangements.

The company built a Starfighter for Japan largely similar to the F-104G, optimized for air defense. The first three F-104Js were assembled in the spring of 1961 and flew in June. They were then disassembled, shipped to Japan and reassembled by Mitsubishi. The first units to get the Starfighter were the 201^st and 202^ndsquadrons at Chitose and Nyutabaru, commencing operations in 1962. Some 210 F-104s were manufactured by both Mitsubishi and Kawasaki as the single-seat 104J and two-seat F-104DJ. They remained in JASDF service through 1986.

A Japanese Air Self Defense Force (JASDF) F-4EJ Phantom II aircraft of the 301st Hikotai takes off during the joint U.S./Japan exercise Cope North 85-4. Below is a Japanese Lockheed T-33 aircraft. DoD photo by Staff Sgt. James R. Ferguson

Its air defense needs unabated, the JASDF continued to look to the U.S. for fighter aircraft in the mid-1960s. With its range, power and radar, the F-4 Phantom was a natural choice. Its selection was announced in 1968 and, as Lockheed had done, McDonnell Douglas built the first two prototype F-4EJs, disassembled them and shipped them for reassembly in Japan.

Following initial deliveries in 1971, Mitsubishi undertook production of the F-4EJ and the reconnaissance RF-4EJ. The 7^th Air Wing was the first to equip with the Phantom, standing up at Hyakuri Air Base in August 1972.  Ultimately, the JASDF would field 154 Phantoms (140 F-4EJs, 14 RF-4EJs) acquired in small batches through the 1980s. Updates kept the F-4 viable through the 1990s, and two squadrons of F-4EJs remain in service today with a few RF-4EJs still operational.

Involvement with the Sabre, Starfighter and Phantom gave the Japanese aerospace industry enough experience to embark on its own fighter, the Mitsubishi F-1, which debuted in 1971. While the F-1 proved successful, Japan continued to rely on U.S. designs for the backbone of its fleet. Next up was the McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle.

The F-15 was one of 13 candidates to replace the F-104/F-4, and despite initial technology transfer limitations, was selected by Japan’s Ministry of Defense in 1975. Dubbed the

A Japan Air Self Defense Force F-15DJ in flight, as viewed from the boom operator position of a U.S. Air Force KC-135 from the 909th Air Refueling Squadron, Kadena Air Base, after being refueled during air refueling training July 30, 2009. U.S. Air Force photo by Angelique Perez

“Peace Eagle” the F-15J/F-15DJ were essentially export versions of the F-15C/D. McDonnell built the first two F-15Js and 12 F-15DJs, with most of the early aircraft manufactured in large components and shipped to Japan. Mitsubishi would again handle assembly and go on to produce the remainder of the 203 Peace Eagles acquired.

The first F-15J/DJs joined the 23rd Flying Training Squadron at Nyutabaru in late 1982. Subsequently, Eagles began replacing F-104s at Chitose beginning in 1984. Engine and weapons systems upgrades have kept the F-15J/DJs effective, and they equip seven front line squadrons and other units including an aggressor squadron.

Finally, while not an American fighter design per se, the F-16-based F-2 was introduced into JASDF service in 2000. Having grown out of the “big-wing” F-16 Agile Falcon proposal, the F-2 has a higher proportion of Japanese weapons and other systems. Approximately 75 are in service and up to 94 may be acquired.

With its F-35 announcement, Japan becomes the second FMS buyer for the Lightning II following Israel. The acquisition proves the America’s fighters are still big in Japan, and it’s certainly a big deal for the JSF program.

Ours is largely an open society, but when it comes to secrecy Americans generally defer to their government. Information deemed potentially harmful to national security is, more often than not, just that. But a new study published by University of Missouri Associate Professor of Journalism Studies Charles Davis, finds that government secrecy claims based on “mosaic theory” are often too broad.

Mosaic theory is a rationale used to uphold the classification of information. The basic idea is individuals or states may be able to piece together bits of information from multiple unclassified but relevant documents to form an intelligence picture or “mosaic.” It is unknown when the mosaic idea was first employed but Professor Davis says that a range of government agencies are increasingly using it to keep select information from public view and from Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, a trend he finds disturbing.

A former director of the National Freedom of Information Coalition (a coalition of state Freedom of Information groups) and Director of the Freedom of Information Center at the University of Missouri, Professor Davis has studied secrecy and public information issues for 20 years.

Defense Media Network spoke with Professor Davis shortly after his work was published in Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies in November 2011.

Your basic contention is that mosaic theory is so ambiguous that it can be used by government to justify non-disclosure of material deemed dangerous to national security even if the risk may be questionable?

Yes. Federal fears have to be tempered by the public’s right to know. If FOIA’s provisions for exemption are narrowed, then the public will retain its right to know, and the government will still be able to act in accordance with national security interests.

The public’s interest in knowing should be given a degree of importance in clashes between government secrecy and calls for transparency. Right now the government says “just trust us.” That doesn’t cut it.

When did mosaic theory emerge as a secrecy rationale?

It started even before Sept. 11, 2001. There were arguments being made by various agencies that one could parcel together seemingly disparate piles of information from systematic releases of information in a shrewd way and cause harm. But that basic argument, that disparate information can be [fused] to create harm, has been around for decades. It was after Sept. 11 that it began to take shape in the imagination. The idea that the mosaic theory could truly come to life took wing.

Though you’ve directed a Freedom of Information NGO you say you’re not an absolutist regarding information secrecy?

Yes, I know that there is information at the federal, state and local level that is dangerous, frankly, and would do our adversaries good. I come at this from the perspective of someone who believes that there is justification for secrecy.

That having been said, I have real problems with this doctrine. It’s a doctrine without limits, a moat without end. You can put just about anything around the rubric of mosaic theory by cooking up a worst-case scenario. If terrorist X gets hold of records A, C and G something terrible is going to happen.

Do you worry that mosaic theory is being over-used for defense-related information?

From a defense perspective, I don’t think that’s an argument. It worries me more in other contexts. You can make a very plausible argument in the military industrial complex or national intelligence gathering areas that the mosaic theory is a real worry.

Once you do that and have given birth to this doctrine, however, what you see – and this is what our paper set out to establish – is [mosaic theory] beginning to leap over to agencies that have nothing to do with either defending the borders of the United States or gathering intelligence to keep us safe. The theory gets picked up by the EPA and Interior, places where I think it has absolutely no business.

So your concern with mosaic theory is the potential to use it to control information flow?

My unease with mosaic theory is not categorically the notion that there may be information that can be pieced together in a dangerous way. I do reject the notion that [the risk] is so commonplace that we need a categorical approach to it. When you accept mosaic theory doctrine you accept an unbelievable amount of deference to administrative agency positions for secrecy. That’s my fundamental problem with it. It doesn’t ask government to prove very much to keep information secret. It asks government to tell a good story. If government can produce a scary enough specter, then courts are swayed and the information is closed.

Could the defense establishment use mosaic theory as a sort of public relations management tool? Often the military has been accused of shaping the message.

That’s right. You’re already in a context – military and national intelligence gathering – where information access is incredibly deferential. When you’re talking about Exemption 1 under FOIA, information falls into an entirely different category of treatment. You have FOIA requesters arguing uphill against impressive guys in uniform who say “That information is dangerous and presents a risk to the United States.” That shuts down critical inquiry about whether or not there is a rationale for secrecy.

And yet a significant percentage of the people who make FOIA requests are military or former military people who are writing about or highlighting some aspect of national security.

That’s a very good point. There are also a lot of citizen-requesters. Some are working on personal histories. Some are working on books, some are simply curious. Under the mosaic rationale everyone is treated the same way. Any release [of information] is potentially disastrous regardless of the source requesting. That’s not so much a criticism as it is an observation.

You say there hasn’t been any formal challenge to mosaic theory in court. I suppose it would have to be carefully undertaken because the courts might uphold it, thereby establishing precedent.

You have to be really careful about the case you present if you’re the requester community. If the facts lined up well, say there are four documents that some guy in a cave in a country that wishes us harm could patch together information from, you would lose that case and there would be a rock-solid precedent in favor of the mosaic theory forever.

Bottom line, you believe that mosaic theory is too vague a standard to justify sequestration of information?

Yes, and I don’t think this is a dominant rationale for [information] denial, but I think it’s an increasingly popular one. It’s a rationale without limits.

I’m not saying there aren’t occasions where it’s perfectly justified. There are, but as a standard it’s too loose. It doesn’t require enough scrutiny of secrecy claims.

During the summer, the HEL TD team completed integrating a ruggedized beam control system (BCS) and other critical hardware on an Oshkosh Heavy Expanded Mobility Tactical Truck (HEMTT) which the Army uses to move fuel and material and for recovery missions. A low power laser was fitted in August after the system’s arrival at White Sands.

The BCS – which finds/tracks targets and points/focuses the laser beam on those targets – lies partly within the box-like structure atop the HEMTT, but its most obvious feature is the beam director, a rotating turret that extends above the roof of the vehicle when it engages targets.

And eventually, the Army expects the system to track and destroy small munitions such as rockets or mortar shells at close range on the battlefield. Such short-range projectiles are airborne for just seconds, providing little time to take cover. Using heavy gunfire to counter them can inadvertently hit friendly forces in the process. HEL TD’s laser beam, moving at the speed of light, has the potential to “hit targets with unprecedented precision and swiftness,” according to Boeing.

HEL TD is one of a number of directed energy weapons demonstrations currently running for all three services. Examples include the Joint High Power Solid State Laser (JHPSSL), funded by the Joint Technology Office and the Army to produce a lab-based 100 kilowatt technology demonstrator; and the High Energy Liquid Laser Area Defense System (HELLADS), a DARPA-funded program to demonstrate an actual 150 kilowatt laser weapon system.

JHPSSL is about midway through a three-year program, while HELLADS is approaching demonstration of a 50-kilowatt unit cell demonstration. That is expected to be followed by a two-year phase to build and demonstrate a full 150-kilowatt capability, then transitioning the technology to the Air Force to test on an airborne platform.

HEL TD began in 2007, with Boeing awarded a Phase 1 contract that included preliminary system design. Phase II, awarded in 2008, comprised the system build and initial test. The solid-state laser technology employed for HEL TD shares characteristics with those described above and with the Navy’s Free Electron Laser (FEL) program. However, Boeing spokesperson Elizabeth Merida points to the USAF’s Airborne Laser (ABL) program which placed a high-power laser aboard a 747 (YAL-1) and its Advanced Tactical Laser (ATL), which put a high-energy laser on an AC-130 gunship, as important predecessors to HEL TD’s tracking system. Some of the same engineers who worked on ATL are at work on HEL TD.

Completion of the integration of the low-power laser, BCS and other hardware on the HEMTT, “was significant for us in terms of the development and evolution of this system,” Boeing’s Merida says, “because it meant we were then ready to take the system from the laboratory out into the field as a coherent whole.”

Neither Boeing nor SMDC is prepared to discuss the results of the testing thus far, but we know that initial test objectives included tracking and possibly lasing small projectiles using HEL TD. The tracking system is a High Power Adaptive Optic system which uses an “edge track algorithm” to track targets.

In basic terms HEL TD’s BCS will acquire, track and select an aim point on a target during the same timeframe in which the system receives the laser beam from the laser device. It then reshapes, aligns it, and focuses it on the target via mirrors, high-speed processors and high-speed optical sensors.

Obviously the HEMTT is too cumbersome for the sort of tactical scenarios the Army envisions, but its choice as the HEL TD platform is based on the size of the laser system available at the beginning of the program. SMDC says the space available on the HEMTT also allows for the integration of a variety of future lasers as they become available. Over time, the packaging requirements should get smaller, Merida affirms.

“Over the last decade a lot of these directed energy systems have become much smaller and more lightweight. There are still challenges in making the technology compact enough to fit on a truck type platform or fly on a small unmanned aerial vehicle.”

Plans for 2012 center on the installation and testing of a commercial 10 kilowatt laser on the platform and, with system verification complete, for a demonstration at the end of the year.

Unfortunately, as Lewis Sorley – a former member of Westmoreland’s staff and author of the recently released biography Westmoreland: The General Who Lost Vietnam – explains, the confidence which Westmoreland’s looks inspired was ill-founded. Despite a career building upon his experience as an Eagle Scout at 15, First Captain of his West Point class, combat commander in World War II and Korea, command of the 101st Airborne Division, and a return to West Point as Superintendent, Westmoreland proved woefully inadequate as the man in charge of America’s war in Vietnam and, later, of the U.S. Army.

In his book, Sorley details Westmoreland’s career, his flaws and deceptions and his failure to understand the fundamental nature of the conflict in Vietnam. Westmoreland’s tenure as commander of U.S. forces, the author concludes, ultimately put America’s massive effort in Vietnam on a negative trajectory from which it never recovered. In this four-part interview with DMN writer Eric Tegler, Sorley discusses Westmoreland’s tenure as Army Chief of Staff, his conduct of the war in Vietnam, how he came to that position and why he stayed in command for so long. Parts one, two, and three can be found here, here, and here.

Eric Tegler: Do you think that Gen. David Petraeus drew any lessons from study of the Vietnam conflict and the ideas of Vietnamization and support for the South Vietnamese Army that were rejected by Westmoreland?

Lewis Sorley: I don’t know any more than the average newspaper reader about events in Iraq or Afghanistan, but I do know Gen. Petraeus well. David Petraeus had an assignment at Fort Leavenworth between his time in Iraq and when he went to Afghanistan. One of the tasks he was given then was to write a new counterinsurgency manual that would be used by both the Army and the Marine Corps.

Early in that process he convened a by-invitation meeting of about 40 people who would have some role in drafting that manual. He invited me and said we’d have two keynote speakers, ‘You and me. You’re going to talk about the past – things that might be gleaned from the Abrams years in Vietnam. I’m going to talk about how these lessons could be applied to current and prospective future conflicts.’

We spent three intensive days [at Fort Leavenworth] doing that. The counterinsurgency manual has a lot of history in it which I think is valuable. When [General Petraeus] went out again to command forces [in Afghanistan], I’m convinced that he applied lessons he derived from the Abrams years in Vietnam. I heard him say to an audience once, ‘You cannot commute to a counterinsurgency war. You can’t hole-up in your secure fire bases. You’ve got to be out there where the people are and with them both day and night.’

Could it be argued that Westmoreland’s conduct of the war, and the support of Gen. Wheeler, actually hurt the Army to which they were both committed in Vietnam and for years thereafter?

I don’t think there’s any question that that is the case. When Gen. Westmoreland returned to be the Chief of Staff he encountered many problems, some of which were certainly exacerbated by the long duration of the war and the inconclusive results achieved under his command.

He largely turned his back on those problems and went off on an incessant round of speaking engagements. In 1970 he commissioned a significant study, after being persuaded to do so by Gen. William DePuy, an officer of considerable brilliance and honesty. DePuy would look at things and assess how they turned out, and if they had not turned out well he’d be willing to say so, which Westmoreland never was.

The study came to be called the Army War College Study on Military Professionalism, and it showed that the junior officers thought the senior officers were self-serving in the extreme. It was a very hard-hitting document. It was briefed to Gen. Westmoreland. He put a ‘For Official Use Only’ stamp on it. The authors at the War College in Carlisle said they put about 200 copies in a bathroom somewhere and locked the door. It wasn’t until quite some time later that these devastating findings became widely known and studied.

Less than two years [after burying the study], when Westmoreland was about to retire, he said in several forums, including some op-ed pieces he wrote for the New York Times, that the officer corps of the Army had never been better than it was under his command and that the Army was in wonderful shape. At that time I believe there were 13 divisions, ten of which were considered not combat ready. Gen. Westmoreland always wished to paint a picture which was favorable to him and his stewardship. Very often it was a false picture.

Gen. Westmoreland was succeeded in Vietnam and as Chief of Staff by Gen. Creighton Abrams, who is credited both with stabilizing and improving the war effort in Vietnam and, during the two years before his death in office, enacting reforms which put the Army back on a path to cultural and combat success as seen in the first Gulf War. Comparisons of the two are inevitable, I suppose?

Because of their following one another in these two major positions, the comparisons are inescapable. They’re exact contemporaries, and I think that’s important for reasons that go well beyond individuals.

Some have suggested that Westmoreland’s disabilities, especially in Vietnam, were institutionally and culturally induced. Even with the same record of service in World War II and Korea [Abrams] had an entirely different outlook on the nature of the war and how it should be conducted. That shows that the institution [the Army] was not incapable of adaptation and change or appropriate analysis of the task at hand. It was just Westmoreland.

Why write this book about Westmoreland now?

After 20 years in the Army I went to the Central Intelligence Agency and spent a number of years there. I never thought I’d become an author, but I’d commanded a tank battalion in Germany from 1970-1972 that was descended from Abrams’ World War II battalion. The Army in Europe at the time was in terrible shape. The war in Vietnam had degraded just about every aspect of the Army in Europe and elsewhere, and I was trying desperately to motivate the soldiers I had.

I learned all I could about the battalion’s history in World War II, then wrote and issued a little mimeographed history, gave talks and so on. I don’t think I influenced the soldiers very much, partly because they were just passing through. They’d been drafted, got a little training, went to Vietnam and spent their tours there, and had only three or four months to serve before their two years of service were up. They were sent to Europe just to keep the NATO numbers up so we could claim we were meeting our responsibility there. They weren’t really interested in anything except going home, and I didn’t blame them. I didn’t influence them, but I influenced myself.

[Sorley then spent eight years on his book on Gen. Abrams, Thunderbolt: General Creighton Abrams and the Army of His Times, followed by books on Gen. Harold K. Johnson and on Abrams’ command in Vietnam].

The only hole left in the Vietnam story was the four years that Westmoreland commanded there. It was not to me a congenial task, but I felt an obligation to history, and I had a lot of material on Gen. Westmoreland that I’d never seen published anywhere else. So I decided to do a full-scale biography.

In the meantime the Army asked me to edit the papers of a general named Donn Starry, which resulted in a two-volume collection. Then West Point asked me to write a book on the history and origins of the Honor Code and Honor System. Then VMI asked me spend a semester there as their first Visiting Professor to of leadership and ethics. Those were opportunities I felt I could just not turn down. Finally I got back to Westmoreland. This book probably would have been more timely earlier, but I got to it when I could.

Unfortunately, as Lewis Sorley – a former member of Westmoreland’s staff and author of the recently released biography Westmoreland: The General Who Lost Vietnam – explains, the confidence which Westmoreland’s looks inspired was ill-founded. Despite a career building upon his experience as an Eagle Scout at 15, First Captain of his West Point class, combat commander in World War II and Korea, command of the 101st Airborne Division, and a return to West Point as Superintendent, Westmoreland proved woefully inadequate as the man in charge of America’s war in Vietnam and, later, of the U.S. Army.

In his book, Sorley details Westmoreland’s career, his flaws and deceptions and his failure to understand the fundamental nature of the conflict in Vietnam. Westmoreland’s tenure as commander of U.S. forces, the author concludes, ultimately put America’s massive effort in Vietnam on a negative trajectory from which it never recovered. In this four-part interview with DMN writer Eric Tegler, Sorley discusses Westmoreland’s tenure as Army Chief of Staff, his conduct of the war in Vietnam, how he came to that position and why he remained in command for so long. Part 1 and Part 2 of the interview can be found here and here.

Eric Tegler: Some people apparently had significant doubts about Westmoreland even before he was assigned command in Vietnam.

Lewis Sorley: Yes. Brig. Gen. Amos “Joe” Jordan went to see Cyrus Vance, who was then deputy secretary of defense. Jordan had known Vance well, and had been a permanent professor at West Point when Westmoreland was superintendent, so he knew the general well too.

He said to Vance that [Westmoreland’s selection] would be a disaster, that Vietnam would be a counter-insurgency war and that Westmoreland was a ‘two up and one back’ man [in standard Army tactics with three battalions a commander places two forward and one behind, a rote approach to military ops] and he’d have no idea how to go about it.

The irony of Vietnam is that there were any number of places where, had a different decision been made, it would have made a significant difference in the way the war was conducted and probably in the way it turned out.

And the decision to send Gen. Westmoreland to Vietnam had to be one of those?

When Westmoreland was proposed to go out and replace Gen. Paul Harkins [then Commander, U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam] in early 1964, there were four candidates offered to the president. I don’t think Lyndon Johnson knew any of these officers, because he’d only recently replaced Jack Kennedy, so Secretary McNamara was probably the key figure in making recommendations and helping the president decide. Gen. Maxwell Taylor, who from World War II days forward was a great supporter and patron of Westmoreland, may very well have influenced McNamara to make that choice.

The other three that were proposed included Gen. Harold K. Johnson, who became instead the Army Chief of Staff; Gen. Creighton Abrams, who became the Vice Chief of Staff; and Gen. Bruce Palmer Jr., who became the Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations – three top people in the Army staff.

We now know, though they couldn’t have known then, that those three officers saw the war very much the same way and understood it to be a war for the security of the people, not a war of body count and attrition. You could argue that we had three chances to start out on the winning track and we got the one which didn’t work that way. It’s rather tragic actually.

That’s one of the quirks of history, as was the death of John Kennedy, who might have altered that decision had he been in office.

That’s probably right. The recently published Jacqueline Kennedy interviews included a number of comments, the most striking I thought was that she said, ‘Anybody but Lyndon Johnson. We all thought he was the worst.’ How the [Kennedy campaign] got from there to choosing him I’m not quite sure. I suppose he was thought to be someone who could balance the ticket and influence the Senate.

In Westmoreland and President Johnson do you see a lesson for military leadership in advising a president in wartime? Johnson appeared to accept at face value the advice of Gen. Westmoreland and Gen. Wheeler without considering other input.

Inevitably my mind goes to Harry Truman and ‘the buck stops here.’ Even though his military service had only been at the level of captain, he understood that a commander in chief has to be commander in chief. It’s troubling to me that, after the 1968 Tet Offensive, Gen. Westmoreland and Gen. Wheeler apparently colluded to mislead the president and try to force his hand.

Johnson had never wanted to call up reserve forces. They asked for 206,000 more troops. Westmoreland maintained for years and years that he had not done so until [ABC News] reporter Sam Donaldson cornered him and Westmoreland admitted that Wheeler had persuaded him to ask for those soldiers.

Westmoreland also tried, and maybe succeeded, we don’t know for sure, in misleading the president about how they were doing in his war of attrition, how many of the enemy they were able to kill and whether that brought about a net reduction in the number of enemy [soldiers] you were fighting, which in Westmoreland’s terms would have meant some degree of success.

We now know, and a lot of people thought at the time, that it didn’t really matter how many of the enemy you killed, he would just keep replacing them. I think it was David Halberstam who said we were fighting the birth rate of a nation.

In the book you explain that one of Westmoreland’s command tenets was simply to go out and meet as many people as possible, not in a cordial or in-depth way, but to show himself, shake a hand and move on to the next person.

What makes it interesting is that in earlier days he was going out primarily to talk to people in units that he commanded. During his time as Chief of Staff he walked away from that and went out to talk to the American public more generally, and overwhelmingly to try to justify his service in Vietnam. But Westmoreland’s traipsing around the country to talk as he did was not a continuation of the way he [spoke to] people in his units earlier.

How did the Army function then with his lack of direction as Chief of Staff?

The person who really ran the Army in those days was the Vice Chief of Staff, Gen. Bruce Palmer, Jr., who was Westmoreland’s exact contemporary, his West Point classmate. Palmer had also served under Westmoreland in the latter stages of his command in Vietnam. He was desperately unhappy with the way Westmoreland fought the war. In the Pentagon, we younger staff members would always turn to Gen. Palmer if there was any problem.

When [Westmoreland] became its Chief of Staff, the Army had quite a number of problems, some of its own making, some societal in nature. There was indiscipline in the ranks, racial disharmony, pretty widespread drug abuse, budgetary problems and the necessity to prepare for an inevitable transformation to an all-volunteer force. With all those very serious problems on his plate, Gen. Westmoreland said, ‘I thought my primary role was to go out and talk to the American people.’ And he did.

Unfortunately, as Lewis Sorley – a former member of Westmoreland’s staff and author of the recently released biography Westmoreland: The General Who Lost Vietnam – explains, the confidence which Westmoreland’s looks inspired was ill-founded. Despite a career building upon his experience as an Eagle Scout at 15, First Captain of his West Point class, combat commander in World War II and Korea, command of the 101st Airborne Division, and a return to West Point as Superintendent, Westmoreland proved woefully inadequate as the man in charge of America’s war in Vietnam and, later, of the U.S. Army.

In his book, Sorley details Westmoreland’s career, his flaws and deceptions and his failure to understand the fundamental nature of the conflict in Vietnam. Westmoreland’s tenure as commander of U.S. forces, the author concludes, ultimately put America’s massive effort in Vietnam on a negative trajectory from which it never recovered. In this four-part interview with DMN writer Eric Tegler, Sorley discusses Westmoreland’s tenure as Army Chief of Staff, his conduct of the war in Vietnam, how he came to that position and why he stayed in command for so long. Part 1 of the interview can be found here.

Eric Tegler: Did Westmoreland ever really embrace the ideas of strengthening the Vietnamese army and “Vietnamization” (building/strengthening Vietnamese civil society and institutions) as the PROVN Study recommended?

Lewis Sorley: Westmoreland always claimed he was giving high priority to support for South Vietnamese forces. There was no substance to that claim. He did little or nothing for them. Many, many other officers then remarked that we wasted three or four years when we could have been developing them much earlier and they could have taken over far more responsibility for the security of their country much sooner.

Among the evidence of how thoroughly Westmoreland ignored the South Vietnamese is the weaponry they were given. They limped through his tenure with basically cast-off American World War II weapons. I saw a study which said the average Vietnamese soldier stood five feet tall and weighed 90 pounds. The M1 rifle weighs about 11 pounds loaded and would stand almost to the shoulder of a five foot Vietnamese. The enemy was meanwhile arming the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese Army with, among other things, the AK-47, one of the great infantry assault weapons of all time.

So the South Vietnamese are terribly outgunned. As a result they lose a lot of engagements, lose a lot of leaders, their reputation suffers and their morale suffers. Meanwhile, Westmoreland is giving every mechanic, cook, radio repairman, and everyone else in the U.S. forces M16s. It’s not until Gen. Abrams comes on the scene as deputy commander that this changes, and changes very dramatically. The claims made by Westmoreland that he cared about the South Vietnamese forces and did everything he could to improve them are simply without substance.

Up to the level of division commander, Westmoreland was well respected by the Army’s senior commanders and by his own troops. Thereafter he seems like a “Dudley Do-Right” who looked the part and had allies like JCS Chairman Gen. Earle Wheeler and others. How did he stay in command despite his obvious shortcomings?

The Army Chief of Staff, Gen. Harold K. Johnson, was fighting, fighting, fighting, trying to get Gen. Westmoreland to change the way he was running the war in accordance with the PROVN Study or to get him replaced. But Gen. Johnson was not in the chain of command. He was a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, but with Gen. Wheeler as the chairman it was hard to wield influence. Three people could have acted to change the situation – the Commander in Chief, Lyndon Johnson; the Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara; and Earle Wheeler, the Chairman of the JCS.

Johnson, I think it’s fair to say, had little or no military background. Same thing for Robert McNamara. And Wheeler was essentially a staff officer with very limited command experience and none in combat. His understanding of the nature of the war paralleled Westmoreland’s – the way to win was to go out and kill as many of the enemy as you could. I think those senior people lacked the experience and, I would say, the confidence to replace Westmoreland before it became so painfully obvious that it had to be done.

I’m also convinced that Westmoreland’s looks had considerable influence. It’s hard to say how much, but he was one of the most handsome, photogenic officers we’ve ever had. Robert McNamara once said that if you sent to central casting for a general, they’d send you William C. Westmoreland. I try not to speculate, but I think Lyndon Johnson, looking at the magnificence of Westmoreland, was unable to believe that this general didn’t know what he was doing.

You point out that one of the generals under Westmoreland’s command opined that American forces should have defended what was worth defending in Vietnam – the cities and natural resources – and let the enemy come to them rather than fighting him in the jungle at times and places of his choosing. Westmoreland never heeded such advice, despite hearing it and other doubts from a number of people, including McNamara and Johnson.

That was Gen. Stone up with the 4th Division in the Central Highlands. The interesting thing was that many, many senior people – military officers and others – critiqued Westmoreland’s approach, not after the fact but at the time. No one could persuade him to change, and those with authority over him who could have ordered him to change or replaced him didn’t do so.

When it comes to flight training, one of the most common cost-saving suggestions is the increased use of simulators, saving airframe hours, maintenance, and fuel. Seems logical, but following through is far from simple. Could increasing the use of simulators in undergraduate pilot training significantly reduce its cost? The answer appears to be a definite … maybe.

Flight simulators at Warrior Hall help U.S. Army Flight School XXI students learn flight techniques and instrument control without the aid of actual aircraft. Recently, flight students passed the 250,000-hour mark in TH-67 Creek simulator training. U.S. Army photo

For insight, Defense spoke to both the Air Force’s Air Education & Training Command (AETC) and the Navy’s Chief of Naval Air Training (CNATRA) but it should be pointed out that the U.S. Army has apparently decided that flight training simulation can lower its costs. The Army’s Flight School XXI program at Fort Rucker, Ala. is moving to make contractor-provided simulation the major part of initial flight training for its pilots.

A commercial team led by CSC has built a new 136,000-square-foot facility at Fort Rucker dubbed ‘Warrior Hall,’ which hosts 38 aviation training simulators. CSC is responsible for all aspects of the facility from building security to simulator and facility operations and maintenance. In a separate government facility, collective training consists of 18 reconfigurable training devices that can communicate with each other and be reconfigured into a specific aircraft with exchangeable panels and software.

The contractor team has worked with the Army to adapt its basic syllabus to allow the service to meet its long-term training objective – several months of 60 percent simulation and 40 percent live training. This balance of simulation and live flight represents a revolution in basic flight training.

The Navy and Air Force (USAF) have yet to make such a commitment to the use of simulation. Obviously, the scale and breadth of their respective training commands differ markedly from the Army, but both express degrees of inclination to head in the same direction.

John Gillis is the Undergraduate Flying Training Pipeline Manager, A3F Undergraduate Flying Training Standardization Division, Headquarters AETC. He makes the point that the current Air Force live flight/simulator training balance varies from pipeline to pipeline. Primary training that all USAF pilots go through in the T-6 Texan II demonstrates the current emphasis on live flight. The division between live flight and simulation events is 65 percent/35 percent. That equates to about 87 hours in the aircraft and 46 hours in the simulator.

T-38 Talon pilots prepare for takeoff Jan 26, 2011, at Whiteman Air Force Base, Mo. U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Kenny Holston

For the airlift/mobility pipeline where students fly the T-1 Jayhawk, the current balance is similar, 71 percent of events occurring in the aircraft and 29 percent in the simulator. This will shortly change, however. The USAF is working its way through a “tech refresh” of its T-1 simulation devices, which will grow significantly in capability. With T-1 flight training total time scheduled to drop to 130 hours, the pipeline will move toward a 60/40 percent live flight/simulator split by 2013. This represents 76.5 hours of aircraft time and 53.5 hours of simulator time.

As the Air Force’s upgrade to the TH-1H Iroquois helicopter with its new engine and glass cockpit progresses, the live flight/simulator balance for rotary-wing students will go from 77 percent/23 percent to 74 percent/26 percent. The fighter-bomber track sees students in the venerable T-38C Talon 71 percent of the time, comprising 96 hours, and in the simulator 29 percent of the time or 39 hours.

All of AETC’s flying training programs have seen reductions in flight time according to Gillis, particularly the advanced training tracks, in which flight time has dropped by 15 percent. Some of this is by design. The airlift/mobility track’s less dynamic, more procedures-oriented type of flying allows for a different live flight/simulator balance.

“We are adding some things to the syllabus that lend themselves particularly well to the simulator,” Gillis said. “For example, the T-1 currently flies simulated air-refueling in the air. They go out and fly the simulated rendezvous, take the airplane to a pre-contact position. In the simulator, we’ll be able to take that training a little farther. We’ll also be able to do more low-level training [in the simulator] with the new visual system which has a database down to a meter resolution. We can fly a lot more realistic low-level in the sim and there’s a complementary relationship between what you do in the simulator and what you do in the airplane.”

Postgraduate flight training is headed in the same direction Gillis added. Squadron level formal airlift/mobility training units at Altus Air Force Base (AFB) and Little Rock AFB are employing increasing amounts of simulation. For some airlift aircraft, most of the training is done via simulator. Only a couple of events, including the aircraft check ride, are done as live flight sorties.

However, the USAF remains biased toward live flight in undergraduate pilot training, particularly for beginners Gillis said.

T-45C Goshawk training aircraft are prepped for flight operations aboard the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69). Dwight D. Eisenhower was under way assisting Chief of Naval Air Training (CNATRA) in preparing naval aviators for future carrier-based operations. U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communications Specialist 3rd Class Erick Kogler

“The issue for us has always been how important it is for an ab initio student to get live flight experience. Only then can he really appreciate what goes on in the simulator.”

Simulation is viewed as complementary to flying, but the reverse is also true.

“There’s an opportunity with the T-1 pipeline, especially with the simulator tech-refresh, for a more complementary syllabus. We’ve tried to do that in the past. With a basic student you’d do a lot of procedures up front and then put him in the airplane, from which he comes back to the simulator occasionally. Today a T-1 training block may have ten aircraft sorties in it. We’re looking at maybe six in the airplane and four in the simulator, so as students go along, there will be a back and forth approach.”

On the Navy side, enthusiasm for the possibilities and cost efficiency of simulation may be a bit higher. Nonetheless, the current breakdown between live flight and simulation looks much like the balance at AETC. Simulator time accounts for between 26 and 29 percent of flight training events said CNATRA Simulator Requirements Officer Wilfred Merkel. Those averages hold across multiple tracks within and between the various pipelines. Like their USAF counterparts, naval aviators receive primary training in the T-6. Rotary-wing students move on to the TH-57 Sea Ranger, multi-engine students step into the T-44A Pegasus, and fighter/attack students progress to the T-45B Goshawk.

“We think we can eventually modify the syllabus to move to an overall goal of being somewhere in the high 40 percent range for [the] simulation proportion of flight training,” Merkel explained. “Going from the high 20s to high 40s is a challenge but it’s what we think we can accomplish in most of the syllabi.”

Of course that goal hinges on having the right training devices.

“At CNATRA, we have a vision of a training spectrum of devices and we’re applying that in our roadmap,” Merkel said.

Don’t get the wrong idea from the word “roadmap’” he stressed.

This screenshot shows flight simulation software created by Air Force researchers who leveraged existing commercial gaming software to demonstrate an alternative way to quickly deliver a low-cost, realistic simulation program with genuine training effectiveness. Researchers integrated the graphics-rich commercial package with high-fidelity real-world aircraft models. U.S. Air Force image

There is no formal, programmatic effort to bring a new array of training devices to the command. It’s more of a philosophy that CNATRA will try to realize where it can. Merkel said the desire is to see devices, ranging from laptop computers that allow students to practice using and accessing information provided by modern digital integrated avionics systems on multi-function displays (MFDs), to ground training devices with flat panel control presentations, interactive cockpit procedural trainers with basic controls, unit training devices (lower-end simulators with visual presentation), and finally to full-blown operational flight trainers with high-fidelity visuals and motion.

“We think there’s a place for each one of those, and we’re in the process of acquiring some of the laptop and basic devices for our T-6,” Merkel said. “The example I give is that in the days of round gauges, you could hand the student a flight manual of a couple hundred pages and they could flip through every option that every instrument could give them.

“Today, there are thousands of options that any MFD can present. The only way to have students learn glass cockpits is to give them something that functions like the actual cockpit device, laptops or desktops running software like or similar to the onboard version.”

AETC has desktop representations of cockpits for some its types as well. Just like the most complex and sophisticated operational flight trainers, these simpler devices offer a key cost advantage – availability.

“We’re training in different parts of the country where we may have a thunderstorm every afternoon, bad weather at night, hurricanes a couple times a year,” said Merkel, a former USAF flight instructor himself. “We can run a simulator 16, 18, or more hours a day and turn it back to back. So a single simulator is giving eight, perhaps 10 events a day. We can generate sorties all day.”

With weather not an obstacle, the follow-on advantages in scheduling and syllabus progression should further reduce costs. How much? No one really knows. Both the Navy and Air Force have done marginal cost comparisons of a sort, but not to the level of detail really necessary to divine whether real savings would accrue or not.

Gillis confirmed that AETC leaders are in discussion about the impact of likely budget cuts and that there are several working committees assessing various aspects of the command’s cost structure. Energy is chief among them, and Gillis sits on an AETC panel that takes a holistic view of energy usage, which would theoretically include simulation.

Merkel admitted that CNATRA isn’t sure whether increasing the use of simulation would absolutely lower the overall cost of flight training, at least in the short run. “The initial acquisition per singular device can very well exceed the cost of a single airplane,” he said.

High-fidelity full-motion simulators are expensive, $10 million to $12 million per copy, in fact. The lack of certainty underscores the fact that no one has yet defined the variables that go into calculating flight training simulation costs versus live flight costs.

Midshipman 3rd Class Juan Vielma, a student at the Illinois Institute of Technology, pilots a helicopter simulator while learning about the various job opportunities for prospective Navy and Marine Corps officers. Midshipmen in the Navy ROTC were touring the military installations in the San Diego-area for Career Orientation and Training for Midshipmen (CORTRAMID) to get an idea of what they want to do during their military careers. U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Alan Gragg

“We’ve got a lot more fidelity on cost per flying hour than for cost per simulator hour,” Gillis said. “It depends on how you do the calculation. When you buy a simulator you have an up-front investment, the cost of the facility it goes into, power, HVAC, all the things that go into it. You have to decide how to divide that up – can it be done per hour over the life of the simulator?”

Energy consumption, maintenance, and the cost of outsourcing are more variables. Both AETC and CNATRA use contractor-provided simulator instructors. Running the bid process and awarding the contracts are costs that could be factored in to any calculation. Curiously, AETC is moving to bring simulator instruction and academic instruction back into its fold, converting those contractor slots to government civilian positions.

CNATRA has toiled with the possible cost calculations as well. Merkel asserted that to have a proper comparison one would have to lay out exactly which variables would need to be included on both the simulation and aircraft sides. That would include various value-added simulator attributes such as being able to include training events too dangerous to train to in live flight (extreme spin recovery, rotary-wing vortex ring state). There have been suggestions that were such a calculus properly done, the aircraft would likely cost six to 10 times as much as the simulator.

“What if the [costs] were absolutely equal?” Merkel asked. “If flying an aircraft cost exactly the same amount as running a simulator, would you still want to do the simulation? You probably would, because of all those other things. Would you want to do it all? Probably not. There’s intrinsic value in just getting air under your wings and experiencing the stressors of actually being in the aircraft.”

Simulation is doubtless an effective teaching tool that presents opportunities that live flight does not. And the computing power necessary to render highly realistic visuals in concentrated spaces, Merkel pointed out, is accelerating at the same rapid rate as commercial technology, holding the promise of lower costs in the future. Nevertheless, integrating the right “spectrum of devices” to significantly alter the balance of simulation versus live flight in undergraduate pilot training isn’t free.

The irony is that even if significant reductions in flight training costs are achievable using a higher degree of simulation, the forces tightening the defense budget may prevent the services from making the initial investment in simulation devices necessary to get there.

This article was first published in Defense: Fall 2011 Edition.

Unfortunately, as Lewis Sorley – a former member of Westmoreland’s staff and author of the recently released biography Westmoreland: The General Who Lost Vietnam – explains, the confidence which Westmoreland’s looks inspired was ill-founded. Despite a career building upon his experience as an Eagle Scout at 15, First Captain of his West Point class, combat commander in World War II and Korea, command of the 101st Airborne Division, and a return to West Point as Superintendent, Westmoreland proved woefully inadequate as the man in charge of America’s war in Vietnam and, later, of the U.S. Army.

In his book, Sorley details Westmoreland’s career, his flaws and deceptions and his failure to understand the fundamental nature of the conflict in Vietnam. Westmoreland’s tenure as commander of U.S. forces, the author concludes, ultimately put America’s massive effort in Vietnam on a negative trajectory from which it never recovered. In this four-part interview with DMN writer Eric Tegler, Sorley discusses Westmoreland’s tenure as Army Chief of Staff, how he became commander of U.S. forces in Vietnam, his conduct of the war, and why he remained in command for so long.

Eric Tegler: You served with Gen. Westmoreland after he returned from Vietnam. How did you view Westmoreland at that time?

Lewis Sorley: I served 20 years as an armor officer and retired as a lieutenant colonel. I was a new lieutenant colonel at the time I served in Gen. Westmoreland’s office. Within the office of the chief of staff there was an element known as SGS [secretary of the general staff] and I was an assistant (of whom there were quite a few) to the SGS. Our role was to receive matters to be briefed to the chief of staff for his information or for a decision he would render. When it was time to brief we would be sent into his office following a very strict routine.

His desk was maybe 20 paces from the door to his office. In front of the desk there were two hard wooden chairs. When his executive officer sent us in, we were to walk directly to one of those chairs and sit down with no preliminaries. We weren’t allowed to say ‘Good morning, sir,’ or anything like that. You would launch immediately into your case and, as soon as it was finished, would stand up and, with no parting words, march back out the door. Meanwhile the Exec is looking through a peephole in the door and, when you stand up, he sends in the next man, who you’d pass on your way out. That detail is very illustrative of the relationship that most of us had with Gen. Westmoreland – very distant, very formal, no chitchat, no personal interest whatever.

How was Westmoreland viewed by the rest of the Army at that time?

I was there for the first two-and-a-half of the four years he was chief of staff, then I went to Europe to command a tank battalion. But it was almost a joke that [Westmoreland] was on the road so much of the time. He said himself that he was determined to speak in every one of the 50 states and that he considered that his primary duty. When he’d speak he would always speak of Vietnam, usually in an exculpatory manner, trying put his service there in the best possible light.

Given the era, place, culture and institutions with which Westmoreland grew up he seems, even by 1965, to be a man of the “old Army,” a figure of the past fighting a conflict for which he was not only intellectually unprepared but by experience not ready for.

It’s interesting in that not only did he have the background he had but, unaccountably, he missed out on all the great stops in the Army’s fantastic school system. The only formal schooling he received during his 36 years as an officer was a one-month course in mess management given by the Cooks and Bakers School in Hawaii when he was a lieutenant, and parachute school right after World War II.

He did not go to the Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth and he did not go to the Army War College at Carlisle Barracks. He was rather proud of that. He said, ‘I hadn’t read the book and so I wasn’t burdened by it.’

He was assigned to be Superintendent of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, an astounding assignment to me. Not only had he not had military schooling; he had no graduate schooling, had not had a prior tour as a junior officer on the faculty at West Point, was not known as an intellectual, and had not written anything scholarly for publication. It was quite a surprising choice.

He wrote a letter soon after the appointment was made telling others he didn’t really feel very well prepared for it and that he was apprehensive about it. He handled himself reasonably well because he concentrated on post administration rather than on the academic or military training of cadets.

Westmoreland was commissioned in 1936. He served initially in the horse artillery. His World War II service was in Europe and his Korean War service was in the last year of the war when it was basically a static conflict. So he has certain outlooks that he derived from that background.

But after his four years in command of U.S. forces in Vietnam he was succeeded by Gen. Creighton Abrams, his exact contemporary, his West Point classmate who also served in World War II in Europe and during the final stages of the Korean War, but who brought to his command of U.S. forces in Vietnam a radically different outlook on the nature of the war. His was without any question a far more availing approach then Westmoreland’s ‘head-down, bang, bang, bang’ approach against the enemy’s main forces out in the jungle.

Though Westmoreland’s view of American strategy in Vietnam doesn’t seem to have changed in the years following his command, others did reflect on its failure, didn’t they?

Westmoreland’s closest staff associate in Vietnam was Gen. William DePuy, who was then the J-3, the operations officer as it was called. DePuy was probably the actual originator of the search-and-destroy approach to conduct of a war of attrition. After Vietnam, DePuy said very clearly that their analysis was faulty, that their operational approach had no possibility of bringing a favorable outcome to the war.

During the war Gen. Harold K. Johnson, who was Chief of Staff of the Army for the same four years Westmoreland commanded in Vietnam, was terribly distressed with Westmoreland’s approach to the war. He created a major study known as PROVN [Program for the Pacification and Long-Term Development of Vietnam] which concluded that the Westmoreland approach was not working and could not work, and the reason it could not was that it was ignoring the war in the villages.

Thrashing around in the deep jungle did nothing to help people who were under the domination of a covert enemy infrastructure that was using terror and coercion to keep them under its foot. Gen. Palmer, Westmoreland’s classmate and deputy commanding general of U.S. Army, Vietnam, went to Westmoreland and said he had some real concerns about how the war was going. Westmoreland didn’t want to talk to him about it, as Palmer said later.

When Gen. Abrams came out to Vietnam in May of 1967 to be the deputy commander, thinking he was going to be taking over within weeks [which did not happen for about 13 months], Palmer went to this other West Point classmate and said, ‘What Westy’s doing isn’t working. Everything’s going to hell. You’ve got to do something about this.’

Gen. Fred Weyand, later Chief of Staff of the Army, was a corps-level commander with the II Field Force, Vietnam, when Westmoreland was in command. He told reporters that [the strategy] was not working at all. He said, ‘I’ve beat up on the same VC division three times in a row and they just go back across the border into their sanctuaries, refit, re-supply, fill up with new people and come back. We’re getting nowhere.’

Person after person, including civilian officials like our Ambassador to Vietnam, Ellsworth Bunker, and Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge said we could beat up on the enemy in the Central Highlands for the next 20 years and it wouldn’t change the course of the war. I could extend that list almost limitlessly. The infuriating as well as baffling thing is why those with the authority to do so didn’t step in and remove him.

During the two-hour seminar, four of naval aviation’s current senior leaders – Vice Adm. David Architzel, USN, commander, Naval Air Systems Command; Vice Adm. David J. Venlet, USN, program executive officer – F-35 Lightning II Program; Lt. Gen. Terry G. Robling, USMC, deputy commandant for aviation; and Vice Adm. John P. Currier, USCG chief of staff – reflected on the last century of naval aviation and articulated its future.

The P-8A Poseidon is expected to achieve IOC in 2013 on its way to replacing the veteran P-3 Orion. Photo courtesy of The Boeing Company.

While the next 100 years will present both obstacles we expect and those we cannot yet envision, all agreed the primary near-term challenge in naval aviation was the transition from late 20th century weapons systems and operational doctrine to true 21st century platforms and integrated warfare tactics. Complex in its own right, this transitional era will unfold in the context of flat or diminishing defense budgets and rapidly evolving threats.

Architzel succinctly summed up the panel’s view with his opening comment that “there are challenges that abound,  but the next 100 years of naval aviation will be even better than the first.”

His declaration should inspire anyone enamored with naval aviation, because its first century was pretty spectacular. In the beginning, it also needed “all hands,” the Coast Guard’s Currier said.

“Early in naval aviation’s history we were almost equal partners. As we started to fly from decks, there was a paucity of engineers. The Navy actually reached out to our class at the Coast Guard Academy, who joined with them to help with the early development of flight from the decks of ships.”

Currier, a 6,500-hour rotary- and fixed-wing pilot, reminded the audience of Cmdr. Elmer Stone, who became the first Coast Guard (USCG) aviator and Naval Aviator No. 38. Stone piloted the famous Curtiss seaplane NC-4, under the command of Navy Lt. Cmdr. A.C. Read, on its seminal 1919 trans-Atlantic flight. Currier also pointed to the Coast Guard’s pioneering rotary-wing efforts and individuals like Cmdr. Stewart R. Graham, the USCG’s second helicopter pilot. Graham received his pilot’s license from Dr. Igor Sikorsky, and made the first shipboard helicopter landing. He also was instrumental in the development of helicopter rescue hoists, pop-out floats, and medevac techniques.

A UH-1Y Venom helicopter from Marine Light Attack Helicopter Training Squadron 303 flies over the Picacho State Recreation Area, Calif., March 3, 2010. The Venom marks a huge jump in capability for the light attack community. U.S. Marine Corps photo by Lance Cpl. Aaron Diamant

“We grew to a certain size,” Currier explained. “Navy/Marine Corps aviation grew exponentially following World War I, but we stayed closely tied. Along with the development of the seaplane and search and rescue procedures, the Coast Guard was instrumental in law enforcement in the context of Prohibition. That was followed in the 1970s and ’80s by the interdiction of drugs from the Caribbean and later the cocaine anti-narco/terrorism operations that are still going on.”

Robling commented on the Marine Corps’ present by looking to its past and likely future.

“The [USMC] commandant has called us the ‘nation’s middleweight force’ and I agree. We’ve always been able to fight at that medium-threat spectrum, but we can also punch above our weight if we need to. Or we can go to a lower weight class and conduct point operations. We also do that in a frugal way. When I was a junior officer, I used to call us a ‘cheap service.’ Now that I’m more mature and wise I say [we have] a ‘tradition of fiscal austerity and responsibility.’”

Fiscal responsibility is a facet of naval aviation that has never been more under the microscope than today, but the assembled flag officers also emphasized that the pace of advancement in naval aviation has never before been so rapid.

The sustainment of legacy platforms and transition to technologies that will take naval aviation into the future was neatly encapsulated in 2010 and early 2011, Naval Air Systems Command’s (NAVAIR) commanding officer explained.

The new UH-1Y “Yankee” helicopter completed its second operational deployment in 2010 and started 2011 with its third deployment. The Yankee’s attack-oriented stablemate, the AH-1Z “Zulu,” was approved for full-rate production in November 2010 and achieved initial operational capability (IOC) in February 2011. The Zulu is expected to see its first deployment this year.

The vitally important EA-18G Growler was designated “safe-for-flight” in 2010 and quickly made its combat debut in the skies over Iraq, Afghanistan, and more recently, Libya. The F/A-18E/F Super Hornet continued its role as the backbone of naval strike fighters and one example, an F/A-18F dubbed the “Green Hornet” flew supersonic on a 50/50 blend of JP-5 and Camelina-based bio-fuel. In April, the 500th Super Hornet/Growler was delivered to the fleet.

CF-2, the second F-35C Lightning II carrier variant flight test jet, completes its first flight on April 29, 2011. Lockheed Martin photo by Liz Kaszynski

The MH-60R/S saw their first deployment aboard USS John C. Stennis and USS Abraham Lincoln, where they immediately began providing search and rescue service while adding FLIR and Hellfire weapon systems capability. The MV-22 Osprey “hit full stride” in 2010, Architzel declared, as deliveries continued and Ospreys deployed to Afghanistan and supported humanitarian relief operations in Haiti. An MV-22 was central in rescuing a downed Air Force (USAF) pilot in Libya in late March.

In July 2010, the CH-53K passed its critical design review and is on track for an early 2019 IOC. The Marine Corps is already reviewing opportunities for integrating its technology into existing CH-53Es.

The Navy’s P-8A Poseidon celebrated its milestone C decision in 2010 and the first LRIP, or low-rate initial production, contract for six aircraft was awarded in January 2011. The P-8 is expected to achieve IOC in 2013. The E-2D Hawkeye continued development and carrier suitability work in 2010 and made its first carrier landings and catapult takeoffs in early 2011.

Unmanned systems were rapidly developed and fielded in 2010, with the Tethered Aerostat (blimp) radar surveillance system supporting bases across Afghanistan after a rapid prototyping effort by NAVAIR in cooperation with the Army and other agencies in response to urgent warfighting requirements. The MQ-8 Fire Scout conducted counter-piracy missions and is deploying to Afghanistan as part of the ISR Task Force.

The Navy’s Small Tactical Unmanned Aircraft System (STUAS), which is to provide persistent maritime/land-based reconnaissance/surveillance, was awarded a Tier II contract in July 2010 while its BAMS-D (Broad Area Maritime Surveillance-Demonstrator) managed more than 110 sorties and 2,100 flight hours. Ninety percent of those sorties were combat missions, and 2011 will be BAMS-D’s third year deployed in support of operations in U.S. Central Command. The Unmanned Combat Aircraft System (UCAS) X-47 Demonstrator made three successful flights in 2010 and a second prototype will make its first flight in mid-2011.

The X-47B began flight testing in early 2011. Photo courtesy Northrop Grumman

Aircraft support systems advanced too, with Block 1A JPALS (Joint Precision Aircraft Landing System) testing continuing through the year. In December 2010, the Electromagnetic Aircraft Launching System (EMALS) catapulted its first aircraft, an F/A-18E, off the deck at Naval Air Station (NAS) Lakehurst, N.J., Functional demonstration testing continues and aircraft compatibility testing will go forward in 2011. The new Advanced Arresting Gear (AAG) system continued engineering development in 2010 and made its first dead-load wire pulls at NAS Lakehurst in late March 2011. AAG will join EMALS on the USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78).

With these new and recent systems come new capabilities but also a need to maintain current readiness, Architzel stated.

“Today we’re bringing out a myriad of products at a pace never seen in naval aviation, but with that comes a need to maintain our legacy assets. There are challenges like sustaining the P-3; challenges maintaining the legacy Hornet; challenges maintaining the H-46s until we fully bring the V-22 forward. Those are all being attacked through the work of people who don’t get much notoriety – the engineers, testers, and logisticians who work through NAVAIR and the Naval Aviation Enterprise.”

Robling cast the naval aviation transition in terms of necking-down platforms and type models, a process under way in the Marine Corps for the last 15 years. He pointed to the Marines’ air tanker fleet. The Corps’ active squadrons have almost fully completed the transition from the KC-130R/T to the KC-130J, and the service’s two Reserve squadrons flying the Hercules will be equipping with -130Js this year. On the East Coast, the Corps has completed transitioning its CH-46E squadrons to MV-22s. Three squadrons on the West Coast are under way with the transition and USMC vertical-lift squadrons on Okinawa and the Pacific are next up. The heavy-lift squadron in Hawaii will shift from CH-53Ds to CH-53Es in 2013, and by 2016 the Corps will begin receiving the first six CH-53Ks.

The arrival of the AH-1Z/UH-1Y Cobra/Huey helicopters exemplifies the jump in capability offered by new platforms, Robling said.

“I was in Iraq during Iraqi Freedom with a UH-1N on a 100-degree day with two machine guns and two aircrew and we couldn’t put any more people in that aircraft. I couldn’t take the division commander and put him out there on a recon in a helicopter that was built to do that. With the new Yankee, you’ll literally fill it before you out-weight it, even in the temperatures I’m talking about. It’s a generational change. Along with that, we get the Zulu, almost 30 knots faster than the Whiskey version, with increased targeting and better precision weapons.”

The second F-35B short takeoff/vertical landing jet, BF-2, descends to a vertical landing on Jan. 12, 2011, at NAS Patuxent River, Md. Lockheed Martin photo

Replacing the AV-8B Harrier, EA-6B Prowler, and legacy Hornets with the F-35B and C will, by itself, save the Marine Corps more than a billion dollars in operations and support costs, according to Robling. The F-35B’s short takeoff/vertical landing (STOVL) capability is pivotal to the Navy/Marine Corps’ operational concept, he added, citing the fact that available runways around the world’s littoral regions shorter than 3,000 feet outnumber runways suitable for fast jets by a ratio of 12-to-1. Furthermore, the F-35B’s STOVL qualities allow it to expand the number of decks from which naval airpower can be projected.

“Instead of 11 capital ships, it gives the nation 22 capital ships with TacAir [Tactical Aviation] capability in those littoral areas.”

Venlet agreed, and told the audience that “the A-team of test, acquisition, and logistics support is present on the F-35 program – from NAVAIR to [USMC] Aeronautical Systems Command to industry.”

Venlet explained that in 2010, the program was deeply assessed.

“It was important that we grounded our view of the future in realism and fundamentals in test, engineering, production, and sustainment. Yes, it’s probably as complex a program as has ever been developed. That manifests itself in concurrency; testing while you’re building – developing while you’re fielding. This is the first year in which concurrency [hits] as we deliver production aircraft to the fleet to train. Adding to that, we’re doing it with not just one but three models, and we’re doing it for 10 international partners at the same time.”

With the F-35’s development program extended and its production ramp adjusted, Venlet said his confidence in the new plan was based on the fact that it could absorb “the normal learning and discovery that occur in development without driving the program into the ditch.”

As of early April, the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program had logged 702 flights across all three models and a total of 1,045 flight hours. That very day Venlet said the program had seven aircraft in the air (four As, two Bs, one C) and stressed that “we’re not just logging flight hours and counting test flights. We’re counting progress to meaningful milestones.”

One of those, he revealed, would be getting the F-35B to initial sea trials by the fall of 2011, which was accomplished in October 2011. Beginning land-based carrier suitability testing of the F-35C is another year-end goal. All three models are on the assembly line at Fort Worth, Venlet confirmed, and major components are in production at Northrop Grumman’s Palmdale facility and at other supplier locations. The final F-35A test aircraft was delivered in January, and the last F-35B and two F-35C test aircraft were to be delivered by the end of spring. The possibility of delivering the first 16 production aircraft to the USAF and Marines by year’s end was at hand as well.

The development of a rotary-wing air intercept capability is among the newest missions Coast Guard air has undertaken,  and Currier stressed the cooperation that protecting the National Capital Region from small, low-flying threats required with NORAD and the Air Force.

Like his counterparts, Currier cited affordability as one of the biggest challenges for naval aviation. Though he said his biggest budgetary concerns lay in shipbuilding rather than aviation, he stressed that one of the keys to acquisitions affordability would be stable requirements.

“Our job is stable requirements, and I think you’ll see more of that. Requirements-creep is a cost driver. My read on Congress is that if they perceive [a weapons system] to be ‘gold plated’ or a moving target, it will likely not be funded.”

An EA-18G Growler assigned to Electronic Attack Squadron (VAQ) 141 lands during flight operations aboard the aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77). U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Eric Tretter

Likewise, risk management will be paramount in the future, both for government and industry. Despite the current appetite for fixed-price contracts, Currier does not believe they are a panacea.

Robling echoed Currier’s sentiments regarding requirements and systems capability. “We’re not going to ask for anything more than we need, even though there are a lot of things out there that would be nice to have.”

The challenge then becomes explaining the services’ “must-haves” to a new crop of lawmakers. “It’s an education for those new to Congress who haven’t been around the military as much,” Robling said. He also explained that the Marine Corps would likely deal with the budget crunch through a reduction in manpower (by approximately 15,000) and assets (striking 6,000 vehicles from its fleet).

Grappling with the largest defense acquisition in history, Venlet acknowledged  that getting production costs under control today would make or break the JSF program.

“Folks in the industry team know that they’ve got to have an inflection point on the cost curve to keep the airplane within a price range that those 10 nations can afford. If this is going to be a 3,000-plus production run, it’ll have to be at a price that aging inventories can be replaced at.”

Life cycle costs and acquisition cycle times need to be reduced and better understood, according to Architzel, who pointed out that while the nominal costs of acquisition make headlines, systems development and procurement represent only 10 to 15 percent and 25 percent respectively of overall life cycle cost. The rest is in sustainment, typically 60 to 65 percent. Given its share of overall cost, Architzel said sustainment costs must figure in the speed with which weapons systems are acquired.

“You can go fast, but you’d better know where you’re going. We need to understand not just the speed with which we deploy and field systems but their efficacy and suitability when deployed. That may cause you to take a little slower route at first to make sure you get it right at the end.”

For this transitional period, each of the flag officers was asked which single platform presented the greatest challenge. Robling answered quickly – the Corps’ fleet of F/A-18B-D Hornets is his biggest headache.

“We’ve got a shortfall of TacAir aircraft to get us to JSF. The legacy Hornet is a very capable airplane that’s getting to the end of its service life. It was built to be a 6,000-hour aircraft but we’ve done inspections and some things that may get it to 8,000 hours. With a lot of work and more money, we may be able to get it to 10,000 hours. Keeping these aircraft, relevant and keeping readiness high is my biggest challenge.”

Robling added that the AV-8B Harrier is also challenging to keep operational and that the Marine Corps is looking at sourcing appropriate parts and aircraft from the U.K. as it retires its Harrier fleet over the next year.

Interestingly, Currier said that his challenge is not legacy aircraft sustainment but mission employment.

A C-130H displaying an historic color scheme (foreground) to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the C-130 in Coast Guard Service flies in formation with a new HC-130J from Air Station Elizabeth City, N.C. Air Station Elizabeth City received the first operational J models. The Coast Guard has been using a version of the C130 since Air Station Elizabeth City took delivery of the first one in December 1959. Coast Guard photo by Dave Silva

“What I need are two classes of unmanned vehicle for maritime surveillance, because we’re inappropriately using C-130s and helicopters for all of our maritime domain awareness. We really have a need for an unmanned broad-area maritime surveillance aircraft. Our problem is not so much maintaining the aircraft as it is inappropriately tasking them in a vital mission.”

Finally, Architzel raised his concern about the intellectual energy and workforce that will propel naval aviation into the future.

“What’s the follow-on to the MH-60 Sierras and Romeos? Where is that technology today in our industry and government? I also look to the future of the NAVAIR workforce and I realize we have a mean age over 40. We have to look at the nation and ask, ‘Where is our STEM [science, technology, engineering, mathematics] education? Where is the base that’s going to produce engineers of the future?’ It’s not just in aviation. We design an aircraft carrier every 50 years and we have to have the engineering talent to do it. One of my main concerns is the workforce.”

But along with those concerns is a shared recognition of how far naval aviation has come. The distance has literally been on view as a replica of the Curtiss Pusher flown by naval aviator Eugene Ely in 1910 has toured the country. The replica’s presence at SAS reminded Architzel that “the greatness of naval aviation is the sum total of all the pioneers who came before us, all those serving today, and those who will stand where we are in the future.”

This article was first published in Air Power at Sea: A Century of U.S. Naval Aviation.

The 45,000 pound aircraft accelerated down the catapult and into the air propelled by a wave of electromagnetic energy, recording the 62^nd launch of a manned aircraft by the new Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS). EMALS will become operational in 2015 with the USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78) and will be the launch system for all future carriers. Because it is not planned to be retrofitted to Nimitz-class carriers, it will share the stage with steam catapults for at least another 50 years.

An EMALS launch looks and, according to flight crews, feels largely the same as a steam catapult launch, with one exception. There’s no steam rising from the shuttle track. Steam pressure and the large piston it drives to haul an aircraft down the catapult have been replaced by electric power. Electrical current is essentially converted into the electromagnetic forces to accelerate the aircraft along the launch stroke.

The basic concept has been researched since the 1980s. Capt. James Donnelly, PMA-251 Aircraft Launch and Recovery Equipment Program Manager, calls EMALS “a big wave generator for a surfer with an aircraft attached.” The idea of “surfing” down the deck on a catapult stroke is an appealing one, but EMALS offers more than just a novel way of launching aircraft.

Developed by a contractor team led by General Atomics, EMALS promises reduced manning requirements, a lower thermal signature, increased reliability, reduced topside weight, reduced installed volume and greater capability for launching unmanned aerial vehicles. It is also said to be more precise than steam systems, reducing the sudden shock to the airframe transmitted by conventional catapults, offering a smoother launch and up to 30 percent more launch energy potential to cope with heavier fighters.

Over an aircraft’s life cycle, the resulting potential reduction in airframe fatigue may prove to be significant. Just as importantly, EMALS’ combination of reduced manning and greater reliability frees deck crews from much of the drudgery of servicing the catapults after each launch cycle. Donnelly, a former catapult and arresting gear officer, explains that the fewer moving parts of the EMALS system mean less routine maintenance and quicker repair. In fact, EMALS average mean time to repair is projected to be one hour versus several hours for steam catapults. The reduced workload translates to better-rested, more alert, and thus safer deck crews.

General Atomics was awarded the System Development and Demonstration (SDD) contract (valued at $435.3 million) for EMALS in 2004. Since then it has constructed and begun extensively testing the EMALS system at Lakehurst. The new electromagnetic catapult resides next to a steam catapult at one end of Lakehurst’s 12,000 foot runway.

The equivalent of three deployments worth of activity has been conducted at the test site already. That activity has included 7,259 armature movements, 4,406 catapult maneuvers, 1,298 no-load strokes and 1,494 dead-load strokes. As of this writing the system had launched the F/A-18E 25 times, including the first aircraft launch, which took place in December 2010. EMALS has also accomplished 18 T-45 launches and 18 C-2A launches, along with the most recent E-2D launch.

EMALS consists of six major subsystems:

• Prime Power Interface
• Launch Motor
• Power Conversion Electronics
• Launch Control
• Energy Storage
• Energy Distribution System

The Prime Power Interface provides the connection with the ship’s electrical distribution system and delivers power to drive the energy storage generators.

The Launch Motor, a 100,000 horsepower linear induction motor, is a compact, modular, integrated flight-deck structure that converts electrical current into the electromagnetic forces to accelerate the aircraft along the launch stroke. The design tolerates the range of conditions experienced in the flight-deck environment and operating scenarios. A simple moving shuttle interfaces with the aircraft in the same manner as existing catapults. After the aircraft launches, the electric current in the motor will reverse to brake the shuttle to a complete halt without the use of a water brake.

The deletion of the water brake not only removes a layer of complexity but may contribute to the rest and quality of life of those sleeping a couple decks below in junior officers quarters.

“The water brake has been removed, so from that perspective, the [catapult] will get quieter,” Donnelly says. “You’ll continue to hear the shuttle noise, jet blast deflectors and hooks hitting the flight deck in the arresting gear area.”

Power Conversion Electronics derive power from the energy store and convert this power to a traveling wave of energy of the appropriate voltage and current to drive the shuttle along the launch stroke. Based on solid-state technology already in use by General Atomics, the conversion electronics are packaged as compact modules in cabinets located below deck.

For Launch Control, EMALS uses a state-of-the-art system to finitely deliver the current into the launch motor in real time. More precise end-speeds are achievable over a wider range of aircraft types and weights than those characteristic of steam catapults. System architecture with inherent redundancy is achieved by use of commercial off-the-shelf components where possible, and modularity is emphasized to ease installation and maintenance.

Energy Storage devices (potential energy is stored via a flywheel device that will fully power a cat stroke even if the electrical power supply is disrupted) provide the required energy for each two- to three-second launch. The energy storage devices are recharged from ship’s power between launches.

Finally, the Energy Distribution System delivers the energy from the power conversion system to the launch motor. The system is comprised of cables, disconnects, and terminations. Among other features, EMALS incorporates a closed loop control system with diagnostic health monitoring. The latter can detect launch anomalies within 500 microseconds and adjust to compensate for issues ranging from aircraft engine flameouts to blown tires.

General Atomics has already embarked on building the required gear for CVN 78’s EMALS at its Tupelo, Miss., facility including launch motors, inverter and block switch assemblies, and energy distribution cable assemblies. Both the delivery of EMALS hardware and SDD testing are on schedule, with the former actually ahead of schedule. General Atomics expects to deliver all remaining hardware due in 2011 and to begin warehousing hardware in Tupelo in 2012.

Back at the test site the E-2D from the Navy’s test and evaluation squadron, VX-20, taxied back to the catapult and shut down. When asked about the shot, which hurled the Hawkeye to an end speed of about 125 knots, the pilot, Lt. Cmdr. Brian Tollefson said, “It felt just like a steam catapult to me. Real smooth.”

From inside the E-2D’s glass cockpit, one catapult may indeed be indistinguishable from another, the pre-launch procedures being identical. Similarly, the E-2D looks much the same as the E-2C, though it is a significantly different airplane. But both EMALS and the Advanced Hawkeye are pushing the state-of-the-art, said Hawkeye and Greyhound Program Office (PMA-231) Program Manager Capt. Shane Gahagan following the launch.

“EMALS and E-2D are demonstrating great capability for the future battle group. Each system displays technology leaps, replacing legacy systems of approximately the same 50-year design age. Seeing the two testing together today is a significant milestone.”

There will be many more E-2D launches at Lakehurst. Each aircraft type, including the F-35C, is expected to undergo 63 to 65 launches before type certification. SDD testing is slated to continue at Lakehurst through late 2011, with a second phase of aircraft compatibility testing to begin next year. Reliability testing will reportedly continue through 2013, at which point the system should be installed on the Ford.

Curiously, Donnelly says he does not think that the EMALS system has been hardened against the electromagnetic pulse (EMP) threat from nuclear weapons, but asserts, “From an EMI perspective as far as what the system emits, we’ve taken care of that. The vulnerability of this system is no different from any other system that I know of.”

Naval Sea Systems Command will likely have a more definitive answer, but if the system has no direct or indirect EMP protection, it would be notable. Nonetheless, once in place, EMALS should offer operators the ability to accurately dial up the requisite energy to launch a fully loaded Growler on one stroke and a much lighter UAV or UCAV on the next. Each aircraft will be surfing the wave.