Re-Iterates Position No Credible Data Exists to Support DoD Contention That Aircraft Currently in Operation and On Order Are Sufficient to Meet Existent and Projected Strategic Airlift Needs; Echoes Department of Commerce Description of Globemaster III as a “National Asset”; Provides Copy of McCaffrey Report Asserting 600+ C-17 Fleet Complement to Meet 21st Century Force Projection Needs; Issues Statement Concerning Next Generation USAF Tanker Competition
Chicago, IL, September 28, 2009 — UPDATE TO MAY 28, 2009 RELEASE: Among several items discussed in the Administration’s 2010 Budget overview released yesterday was Boeing’s C-17 Globemaster III Strategic/Tactical airlifter, and yet again it has voiced a desire to shut down production of this critical aircraft citing “DoD analyses”.
In view of what can be perceived as a continuing — albeit of lesser intensity — threat to the existence of C-17, Myron D. Stokes, Managing Member of Global HeavyLift Holdings, LLC, a Florida incorporated, Bloomfield Hills, MI based DLA-listed firm (www.ccr.gov) is again re-iterating the view held by this entity and that of several colleagues in the academic and governmental sectors, of no substantive data to support the DoD’s assertions.
“As we noted in our May 28, 2009 release, C-17 is not only absolutely essential to current and anticipated force projection requirements in a world wherein conventional and asymmetric conflict potential exists concomitantly,” said Stokes, “but to our plans implementing a US/NATO controlled Heavy and Outsized (HOM) industry utilizing modestly modified variants of this superlative airlifter.
“I daresay that data from several and quite significant resources, inclusive of the limited availability 2005/2006 Department of Commerce C-17 Industrial Base Impacts Study, strongly, if not overwhelmingly, suggests the direction and viewpoints articulated by our Washington colleagues relative to C-17’s continued existence is at best flawed, and at worst, not reflective of the great responsibilities conferred upon them by the office in which they serve.
“It should be noted that while we have the greatest respect for the offices of the SECDEF, SECAF and those to whom they report, we feel it necessary to again invoke the wisdom, past and present, of DoD personnel such as the late VADM Arthur K. Cebrowski, whose vast experience and knowledge cannot be ignored. In this instance, we feel it appropriate to highlight the conclusions of decorated U.S. Army 4-Star General (Ret’d) Barry R. McCaffrey, Adjunct Professor of International Affairs, United States Military Academy (USMA) West Point, as outlined in an “After Action” Report following visits to Nellis and Scott Air Force Bases 14-17 August, 2007.”
The report was designed to summarize assessments of USAF capabilities and resources in the face of current, emergent and projected threats to national security. General McCaffrey’s comments on C-17 are as follows:
2nd — The C-17 Globemaster III.
• We must create the strategic national military airlift and air-to-air refuel capability (600+ C-17 aircraft) to project national military and humanitarian power in the global environment. We currently have an inadequate capability with 150 aircraft supported by an aging refueling fleet. The C-5 aircraft must be retired—these planes are shot. The Army must back off the dubious proposition that they will size their ground combat force around the volume and lift metrics of the C-130 — and instead use the C-17 as the sizing template.
• The Rumsfeld doctrine postulated bringing home deployed Army and Air Force capabilities from Europe, Okinawa, and Korea. This seismic strategic shift was unexamined and not debated by Congress or the American people. We are bringing home ground and air strike assets thousands of miles— from basing infrastructure paid for by allies— to unprepared US launch platforms. If we are to pose a serious deterrent capability in the dangerous world arena— then we must credibly be able to project power back into future combat areas to sustain allies at risk.
• The C-17 represents the capacity to carry out this strategic power projection mission —as well as providing intra-theater logistics and humanitarian lift for pin point distribution of thousands of truck load equivalents of supply per day.
• The C-17 is a global national transportation asset— not merely a military or Air Force system.
The whole of the report is accessible via the link
http://www.mccaffreyassociates.com/pages/documents…
and should be considered a “must read” by all concerned.
Knowledge is Power
“I will respond preemptively to those who are quick to dismiss the views and analytics crafted by retired DoD personnel as ‘irrelevant and inapplicable’, by saying that such assertions are sophomoric, unsustainable, without merit and wholly dismissive of the Dr. W. Edwards Deming advocated pursuit of profound knowledge,” says Stokes. “To be sure, we benefit from applying accumulated knowledge, as has been evident since humankind first saw the need to record and preserve what was learned. The Library of Alexandria is an ancient and extraordinary example of this premise.”
Tanker Procurement Process Observations
Further commenting on the recent re-release of USAF Tanker competitive requirements after Boeing’s successful protest to the GAO against EADS/Airbus, Stokes conveys the viewpoints of several academic, government and industrial associates that the need to preserve C-17 is as critically important as the necessity of having the tanker requirement fulfilled by a true US firm. “It must be designed, developed, engineered, manufactured and sustained in the United States. This is not jingoism, this is not nationalism, this is not representative of a disturbing naivete as concerns the so-called “new globality”, but rather, a recognition that the country’s industrial base must be maintained. Moreover, it must be OWNED and controlled by American firms with a strongly supportive role by the US government as is common practice by other industrialized nations.
“This is to say, even if the A330-based Tanker were indeed designed, engineered and manufactured here, the question at the end of the day is ‘Where does the money go?’ Answer: To overseas bank accounts. Also, ‘Would there be any guarantees that manufacturing and design would remain on these shores in the event of a global economic schism (again) thereby resulting in calls by company stakeholders to shrink the company’s global footprint in the interests of ‘fiduciary responsibility?’
Based on the recorded activities of international corporations, the answer is no.
“The idea that obvious illegalities in the form of WTO disallowed EU subsidies designed to give EADS/Airbus ( Northrop-Grumman, with its extraordinary history of aircraft development, is nothing more than, sadly, a front to give the illusion of “Americaness” to their overtures) a competitive advantage in price is dismissed by DoD procurement officers as irrelevant or “having no bearing in the ultimate decision” (paraphrased) is suggesting a departure from logic, reason, conventional wisdom and a complete lack of of understanding that the US defense and industrial bases are one and the same.”
Stokes suggests a much needed expansion of the DoD’s paraphrased assertion that “we are in pursuit of the best value for the warfighter” would include ‘…,the American worker and taxpayer.”
“To be sure,” Stokes further states, “No other country on earth, neither Germany, France, Italy, Belgium, Spain, Japan, South Korea, China… no one would give away a core element of its critical industrial base which this Tanker, as built by Boeing with its clearly superior aircraft build skillsets, represents.”
The content of the May 28 release follows:.
Following previous releases in February 2006 and March 2007, Global Heavylift Holdings, LLC, a Florida incorporated and Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) listed entity with principal offices in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, will continue its pursuit of an USD18.4B capital raise to implement a US/NATO-controlled Heavy and Outsized (H&O) air cargo industry utilizing new and used modestly modified variants of C-17 for commercial missions, while still meeting USAF operational standards as part of Civil Reserve Air Fleet (CRAF) organic airlift augmentation. (GOOGLE SEARCH: Global HeavyLift Holdings, LLC; also Commercial Application of Military Airlift Aircraft (CAMAA) )
” The current and real threat to C-17 line continuance concomitant with the core role this aircraft plays in our existent and long-term plans for wresting control of the H&O air cargo industry from our Russian and Ukrainian friends, whilst allowing them to maintain a symbiotic role with the heavylift market-proving Antonov AN-124 Ruslan, serves as a strong impetus to assist in the preservation of C-17, not for just the next 2 years, but for the next two decades”, says Myron D. Stokes, Managing Member. “A status, mind you, that C-17 richly deserves as an aircraft unparalleled in its tactical/strategic airlift capacity. And, given the fact there is no replacement on any horizon for an airlifter with capabilities anywhere near C-17, proposing its termination approaches the realm of the irresponsible.”
As for Secretary of the Air Force Donley’s comment to the extent if the AF needed more airlift, “They could always retrofit more [35-42 year old] C-5s”, Stokes observes that without complete control of the air in a battlespace -the intended role of F-22- very large, minimally maneuverable C5s (not to mention requiring significant air operations infrastructure) would be nothing more than fodder for the cannons and missiles of enemy fighter craft.
Stokes also stated his team will support Antonov’s late 2009 efforts to restart AN-124 production at Ulyanovsk, Ukraine, through as yet undisclosed means. The DoD continues to contract Russian/Ukrainian government controlled entities operating AN-124 to make up for in-theater airlift capacity shortfalls in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The company is right now in process of establishing aircraft operations offices (to anchor four global epicenters in the US, Europe. Middle East and Asia) with one of its strategic air partners in Oakland and Washtenaw counties, Michigan.
“Our strategy, as announced in February 2006, outlined a non-traditional business model involving a primary focus on acquisition of the necessary intellectual resources from within industry and government to craft a blueprint for a new global industry. It continues to evolve in content and depth, but has remained largely intact owing to built-in project execution flexibility architecture”, says Stokes.
“In light of the on-going fight, and it is a fight, if not out and out political war, for preservation of C-17, whose production constitutes so large an economic foot print as confirmed by the Department of Commerce (DOC) in its still quite viable C-17 Industrial Base Impacts Study of 2005/2006, our team is resolute in its support.”
(Note to editors: A copy of this quasi-public study is available upon request)
According to Stokes, the criticality of retaining an aircraft that effortlessly transitions between strategic and tactical airlift missions as demanded by 21st Century conventional (the military build-up of China; nuclearization of Iran and North Korea; re-emergence of Russia as a power broker, etc) and asymmetric war (Terrorist operations with global reach) threats/realities compells listing the following informational absolutes to clarify, if not neutralize, assertions being made by C-17 detractors:
1.Secretary of Defense Gates, with all due respect, has no truly substantive, credible data to support his intent to kill C-17. Although initially publicly supportive of ending C-17 production at 180 (now 205) as suggested by the never released to public Mobility Capabilities Study (MCS, 2005/2006) and 2006 Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR)gao which echoed MCS findings, former SECAF Michael Wynne and Chief of Staff Gen. Michael Mosely strongly recommended against line closure, and were fired last year as a result. It was this, not the “inadvertent” flight of a nuclear-armed B-52 across country, that played a significant role in their dismissal. The data the SECDEF refers to as “internal Pentagon analyses” is that developed by the Pentagon Office of Program Analysis and Evaluation (PA&E) in collaboration with RAND Corporation, and exists in the form of the Mobility Capabilities Study mentioned above, which was completed in late 2005 after several delays. This study was promptly debunked by the GAO (and to former SECDEF Rumsfeld in a strongly worded letter prior to its “release”) subsequently by Congress as being based on flawed analytics and inapplicable, outdated, conflict assumptions.
Comments to the effect that a new study ordered by Congress “Will reach the same conclusions as the first” should be suspect.
By all rational indications, the directives given to PA&E were designed to ensure an end of C-17 production in favor of C-5A and B retrofit, and inclusion of a much-delayed EADS/Airbus A400M (despite its inability to carry an Abrams Tank) in USAF inventory.
2.Before the MCS was completed, capable academics and researchers in industry and government were advised in advance of the “release” of its findings and promptly developed a countering study -co-sponsored by the USAF- as it pertained to industrial base impact. This was particularly important owing to an element of MCS concluding that industrial base impact would be negligible. As those lawmakers who were able to receive a copy of the DOC study before it was rendered inacessible ascertained, it reached a diametrically opposite conclusion.
3.The intent of the DoD to kill two critically important elements of national security, C-17 and F-22, comes on the heels of the confirmed (by Lockheed-Martin) theft by China of the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense System (BMD) through a front company posing as an LMCO supplier. The Aegis is core to US Naval offensive/defensive capabilities, while being systemically interlinked to the whole of network-centric US military operations. Moreover, there is every reason to believe that F-22 Raptor and C-17 technologies have been compromised as well, owing to the relative ease with which Aegis was acquired. The Chinese clone was initially introduced on Luyang II-class Destroyers in 2005/2006 (derived from Sovremenny-class Russian vessels) and in all likelihood incorporated, among other capitol ships, within the now operational 67,500 ton Adm. Kuznetsov-class aircraft carrier Shilang purchased from Ukraine.
4.Transformational Recapitalization, an acquisition process well articulated by national security strategist Dr. Sheila Ronis in a Defense AT&L (November 2004) analysis “Transformational Recapitalization: Rethinking USAF Aircraft Procurement Philosophies”, holds the key to virtual elimination of Congressional/Presidential budget wrangling, while simultaneously taking large steps towards achieving oft-stated goals of governmental expenditure equilibrium. GHH will initialize this process through acquisition -following Congressional resale approval to the USAF- of first generation “A” model C-17s, currently constituting approximately 54 aircraft at a price ranging between USD90M-140M. The money paid to the USAF, subsequent to a necessary change in scoring law, flows back into their coffers, thus recapitalizing it. Another modification of existing budgetary law would require that these funds are used to acquire new C-17s only, therefore keeping Long Beach and St. Louis assembly lines open, as well as maintaining the irreplaceable design, engineering and supplier base.
Utilization of A-model C-17s from AF inventory allows GHH H&O commercial operations to begin sooner, and profitability to be achieved in a shorter timeframe, while maintaining these aircraft at mandated AF operational standards and immediately available in times of national emergency. The aircraft will be available for peacetime organic airlift augmentation at all times. Notably, the used aircraft scenario does not require Boeing’s participation, other than contracted and mandated major maintenance, or approval.
5.Concurrent with required Congressional approval for USAF resale of first generation C-17s, FAA exemption to FAR Part 14 CFR 21.27 -a reg requiring that all aircraft declared “military surplus” are re-certified to operate in US airspace- must be obtained. GHH maintains, as did Boeing in a previous petition, they are not surplus, owing to mandated inclusion in the Civil Reserve Air Fleet and continuous Air Mobility Command mission undertakings. Also, thanks to an impeccable C-17 safety record since becoming operational in 1993 (Iraq War sustained missile strikes and unintentional wheels-up landings at Bagram Air Base, Afghanistan, notwithstanding) there should be no viable concerns in this arena.
“We will not only continue to pursue the necessary resale language from Congress, to be contained within the 2010 or 2011 budget, but FAA exemption from 14 CFR 21.27, perhaps with a little prodding from the DoD. Furthermore, this continued exemption quest will be undertaken separate from Boeing”, says Stokes.
“The 18.4B funding strategy that will permit acquisition of up to 60 C-17As and 40 new aircraft, and hopefully include the even more capable B variant proposed, remains as a quadruple and simultaneous raise in the US, Europe, Middle-East and Asia. This approach continues viable as it was designed with the understanding of a possible financial sector melt-down over a year before it occurred.
“As of now, and towards the above objective, we have identified accessible resources up to USD5B. Conversely, in the middle of an economic war and a much more dangerous world, it is our intent, through the heavylift initiative, to be part of the profound economic revitalization efforts ongoing; at least to the extent humans can shape the outcome they want.”
Recognizing the absolute necessity of international C-17 sales to its continued production, GHH, while working with foreign governments to establish the four global aircraft operations epicenters outlined within plan data, encouraged them to acquire -and if already in inventory, acquire more- C-17s for both military and commercial use as a condition of purchase. Such overtures were made to the UK, Belgium, Japan and The Sultanate of Oman governments, among others.
“Many dedicated people in industry and government have worked very hard, and made many sacrifices, over the past near decade to preserve C-17 and to create a US/NATO-controlled heavlift industry with the BC-17 variant,” says Stokes.
“For all of us intensely involved in this project; from New York to Washington; from Detroit to Chicago; from St. Louis to Los Angeles and Long Beach, failure… is not an option.”
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About Global HeavyLift Holdings, LLC
Founded in 2002, GHH is a strategic air transport solutions that was born of a multi-year public/private effort among forward thinkers in both the private sector and government to mitigate emerging and observable vulnerabilities in the U.S. industrial base global supply chain. Such vulnerabilities are represented by the fact that no ocean-borne shipping is in U.S. hands at present, thus potentially subjecting American corporations, especially automotive, and their global operations to the whims and perhaps economically hostile activities of and by foreign governments. Add to this the risk of terrorist activities, which have, according to the Department of Homeland Security, targeted maritime operations; i.e., ships, ports and ocean containers.
Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) listed, it is the goal of GHH and its strategic partners around the planet to work with key logistics personnel within these corporations and government agencies to conceptualize, craft and structure long-term global supply chain alternative transportation methodologies through continuous — not stop gap or emergency — air augmentation solutions. Its most important mission, however, has been in the co-development of global architecture for infrastructure of a new American controlled industry, Heavylift, utilizing the excellent airlift performance characteristics of the Boeing BC-17.
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Contact :
John T. Chuhran
Global HeavyLift Holdings, LLC
74 W. Long Lake Rd.
Suite 103
Bloomfield Hills, MI 48304
253-220-2566
[email protected]
