Budget Cuts leave Marine Corps Aircraft Grounded

www.foxnews.com...

Probably another symptom of pushing too far on too little as the US military Machine slowly falls apart....
You cant keep loosing wars for decades without wearing out the means to wage them.....
I think this is another example of how the politicians are burning up the military component of the MIC faster than it can be replentished in many branches....

EXCLUSIVE: Since 1775, the U.S. Marine Corps has prided itself on being “The Few" and "The Proud." But while the Corps takes pride in doing more with less, senior Marine officers are warning that the Corps' aviation service is being stretched to the breaking point.

Today, the vast majority of Marine Corps aircraft can’t fly. The reasons behind the grounding of these aircraft include the toll of long wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the fight against ISIS and budget cuts precluding the purchase of the parts needed to fix an aging fleet, according to dozens of Marines interviewed by Fox News at two air stations in the Carolinas this week.

Out of 276 F/A-18 Hornet strike fighters in the Marine Corps inventory, only about 30% are ready to fly, according to statistics provided by the Corps. Similarly, only 42 of 147 heavy-lift CH-53E Super Stallion helicopters are airworthy.

Visit the link for the low down....but these are the headlines for Marine air power.....
See the TV report at the link as well.....
In the interview...they state some of these units are about to deploy overseas ....


The thinning ranks of the US military and the access to small tac nukes seems to me to be a dangerous combo should the warfighting continue even on a low intensity level over several theaters....
If Americans really supported their boys theyd all be sending their checks payable to : Commandant Marine Airwing.....parts Dept...

edit on 21-4-2016 by bandersnatch because: (no reason given)

edit on 21-4-2016 by bandersnatch because: (no reason given)

edit on 21-4-2016 by bandersnatch because: (no reason given)

a reply to: bandersnatch

The Navy knew this was coming. They said over a year ago that it would take two to three years to get caught up on Hornet maintenance that had been pushed off.

The Air Force has similar issues. The B-1 fleet had a mission capable rate of under 50% because they were undergoing $3B in upgrades to the fleet. They were going through the Depot in record numbers.

A big part of the problem is that some of the aircraft are so old that parts are no longer built for them. Companies go out of business, parts are changed in newer versions, etc. Eventually you run out of spares and get hurt.

a reply to: Zaphod58
Im sure the most junior grade one striper could understand these simple facts....
This is what is egregious about these high muckey asshats...
They can pay for a new upgrade to the officers golf course but when it comes to covering a bunch of front line Marines with the airpower to complete their mission.....NAH....we need to gut those programs...
The units who were interviewed (im not an embedding type computer guy....go to link....)
Both were going to deploy soon......
Their pilots were getting 4 hours a month in the drivers seat....
I might not believe in attending some of these wars....but I damn sure believe in putting down all the ordinance called for by those who have to do the heavy lifting on the ground...
Somehow this reeks of negligence....even murder....

Their pilots were getting 4 hours a month in the drivers seat....

I have wondered this for a long time.

What do pilots and weapons guys actually do all day?

I actually used to think that they flew

But they don't seem to do a lot of that.

Do they just hang around the Officer's Mess?

P

a reply to: bandersnatch

They haven't had a choice. The operations tempo has been so high for so long they've had to push Depot level maintenance back. And then the aircraft were needed again and it becomes a vicious cycle.

They had the same problem with ships and it led to a carrier gap in the Gulf. At one point there was a single carrier group available to deploy because they were all months behind in maintenance and had reached the point they HAD to go into maintenance.

The choice is perform the mission, or go down for maintenance that takes months. The mission has been going on for so long that if they take aircraft offline for maintenance the Depot couldn't fit them all, so they rotate them through as fast as they can, but in the meantime the aircraft that haven't gotten there yet still have to fly the missions they would normally, and cover the gap left.

The pilots are getting so little time because their aircraft are undergoing that maintenance, which is a good thing, but it hurts proficiency badly. We're going to be hurting for the next couple of years, but they'll get caught up.

a reply to: pheonix358

They wear multiple hats around the Squadron. From planning, to weapons, to teaching classes on the latest Intel, or latest ACM tactics... They're always busy, even when not flying.

a reply to: pheonix358

I think these ones are probably elbows deep with their ground crews trying to wring one more flight out of their airplanes and choppers...

a reply to: bandersnatch

Pilots don't do maintenance, it's beneath them.

a reply to: Zaphod58

They would in my airwing.....and why not?
Surely twould make them better fliers when emergency situation arise....as well as adding extra hands to the task of getting better than ONE of every THREE weapons up....
I know id be wanting to get hands on with my ride....specially if it could be my coffin ....

a reply to: bandersnatch

Because they already have other duties to deal with when they aren't flying. They aren't sitting around doing nothing, they're constantly studying threat reports, learning about new weapons, performing various tasks around the Squadron, etc.

a reply to: Zaphod58

Isn't this evidence of some level of treason on the part of some higher levels of gumment?

It seems plenty outrageous, to me, at least.

a reply to: BO XIAN

If you were fighting a war, patrolling multiple areas of the world, training with allies, and had to keep up maintenance on aircraft, which would you prioritize?

That was the choice they had.

a reply to: Zaphod58

How about a few less trips in Air Force 1?

Maybe a few less $Billion on destroying American jobs and sending them overseas . . .

A few less $Billion inviting too many Jihadi's in and giving them welfare . . .

Would that have covered the needed funds at all?

a reply to: BO XIAN

What does Air Force One have to do with the Navy/Marine budget?

In fact what does any of that have to do with the military budget?

a reply to: Zaphod58

I sometimes get the impression that the Federal budge is a vast shell game with Monopoly money.

They seem to have little trouble shuffling funds around to do ugly unconstitutional things.

How about shuffling some around to do some patriotic things for a change?

Maybe they could find some of that missing $Trillion to fund such a high priority.

But then one of the upper level oligarchy puppet masters (Henry K) thinks that all military personnel are stupid idiots--merely to be used as serfs, slaves and canon fodder--a sentiment evidently in line with the current WH imposter's perspective and likely the gritchy one's as well.

I'm not pretending to know anything exhaustive or substantial about such budget issues.

I'm just sick and tired of the upper levels of puppets shredding our military every way they can get away with; putting our great service personnel in harm's way for questionable reasons and shackling them with inadequate funding; inadequate training; inadequate materiel; and stupid rules of engagement.

Obama hamstringing our defense to aid our enemies, nobody should be shocked.

Somewhere the Muslim Brotherhood is smiling. This is no different than trying to mothball the A-10's, one of the most feared weapons used against those who wear turbans.

originally posted by: bandersnatch
a reply to: Zaphod58

They would in my airwing.....and why not?

There's an even better reason that pilots, and air crew don't engage in maintenance...They're not qualified. Back in the Viet Nam days, I did maintenance on aircraft ECM systems. IF the Officer had touched my "radios", I would have grounded his plane!

a reply to: TinfoilTP

I'm not defending Obama, but I hate to break it to you, but it's taken many years to get to this point. The average aircraft requires Depot maintenance once every five to seven years.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: TinfoilTP

I'm not defending Obama, but I hate to break it to you, but it's taken many years to get to this point. The average aircraft requires Depot maintenance once every five to seven years.

And the requirements were known and not prioritized in oh lets say the last seven years.

a reply to: TinfoilTP

Longer than that. The CH-53 fleet has flown 95,000 combat hours in 13 years. They're the worst in the inventory in terms of readiness and flight time. They've been pushed back so long that they have to do a maintenance reset on the fleet. They've been pushing maintenance more like 10 years now.

The current administration hasn't helped any, but are far from the reason for this.