Modernization of the Organic Industrial Base

Peter, rounds per month. While I support this goal, as one five five's have proven their value in wartime, I worry about the sustainment of production capacity once the demand and requirements for this munition decreases. We've seen this happen time and time again in the past, where we've been on this rollercoaster ride where we rebuild weapons, stockpiles, our batteries, our then uh, able to fire at will and our our magazines are full, but then we find ourselves in the same predicament again. So the question is, is how do we sustain this production? It's imperative that the army responsibly invest in industry partners and production facilities looking at the long term. And I'm eager to hear from the witnesses on the progress of the many modernization projects across the OIB. Most army ammunition plants and arsenals have technology and processes from With supplemental dollars and a fifteen year modernization strategy with plans to invest roughly eighteen billion dollars across the organic industrial base I'm optimistic about the Army's efforts to update production technology and facilities with improved production lines boasting flexibility in advanced manufacturing the OIB will be better positioned for production surges we must ensure that the billions of dollars we have invested are appropriately spent across facilities. The modernization of energetics is another key issue within the organic industrial base. Novel energetics can and will increase lethality and range for ordnance, propulsion, and weapon systems, giving the warfighter a greater edge in future fights and ensuring that our technology remains bound uh in technology that puts us ahead of our adversaries. Through industry and academic institutions, we are currently developing improved energetic materials. the department is still primarily using the same energetic materials from World War Two. The historic lack of central management and strategy across the services has delayed the progress of novel energetic integration into weapons systems. I am pleased that finally, after last year's hearing, the joint energetic transition office has been established, two years after it was enabled in the National Defense Authorization Act. This office will be a key to creating central leadership in advancing energetic innovation and integration, allowing us to catch up with our adversaries, both in range and lethality. I'm looking forward to seeing the work they do across the organic industrial base. Today's hearing will explore the many challenges the organic industrial base encounters including access to a domestic supply chain, antiquated manufacturing processes, and fluctuating requirements. We will also explore the Army's efforts to scale munition production, capacity to ensure safety standards for service members, and civilians working in the production process are met. And we want to make sure we're investing too in emerging technologies and new facilities to modernize the organic industrial base. With that, I'd like to uh introduce our witnesses and then turn to our ranking member. Our witnesses today are the Honorable Brett Ingram, Assistant Secretary of the Army for Acquisition, Sustainment and Technology, Lieutenant General Chris Mohan, Commanding General, Army Material Command, Major General John Rehm, Joint Program Executive Officer, Armaments and Ammunition and Commanding General of Picatinny Arsenal. Gentlemen, thank you for joining us today, and I turn to my friend and ranking member, Mister Norcross, for his opening statements.

Thank you, Chairman. And I want to thank the witnesses uh for their time today. Look forward to this discussion. Chairman Whitman-Bergman, thank you for holding this joint hearing on such an important topic, the modernization of the Army's portion of our organic industrial base. Our ammunition plants, arsenals and depots play a critical role in providing capability and capacity to meet the requirements of the combatant commanders.

So, and uh,

These facilities develop and produce the

oh, and

ammunitions the musicians and weapons, therefore, for war fighters rely on. And they repair over-haul our combat systems. Our country could not sustain a large scale combat operations without the support of these facilities. So, very glad that we're spending today on this issue and certainly looking forward to your comment but over the last few years this committee, the Tactical Air and Land Forces, we paid particularly close attention to sustaining the modernization of the Army organic industrial base. Anyone who has visited any of these depots, which Rob and I had, it's a time machine.

Yeah.

For many of them it feels like uh we land in a different century so um some of their spaces are certainly need repair upgrades and safety improvements and we have a plan it's how quickly can we get it done so for those Americans who work in these facilities we need to provide the best equipment a safe a safe work environment because what we've seen improvements over the years we can send continue to see actions I acknowledge that some of this work is absolutely dangerous work, but we can and must do better. I know we will discuss the investments the Army has made to increase capacity and the capabilities of our facilities, but I'd like to hear about investments and procedural changes that the Army has made to improve safety at these facilities and drive down mishaps. I recognize the topic is squarely in the lane of our friends from the Readiness Committee, But it is a topic that I paid close attention to, and I cannot think of a better forum than this to discuss it. Second, the modernization and expansion. The war in Ukraine helped us identify shortfalls in our organic munition production facilities. In many ways, this is our own fault by historically using munition accounts as bill payers for other high priority accounts. But over the last few years, the department and Congress have worked collaboratively to reverse the course resulting billion dollars of investment to our ammunition and production facilities. In some cases these investments resulted in modernization to existing facilities. In others we've expanded the organic industrial base by creating entirely new facilities. In a perfect world these two types of investment would not compete with each other. However the army is now forecasting that we may not realize the full expanded capacity and that instead settle for a lower sustainment rate. This creates a problem, especially with the one five five artillery rounds. We're building a new facility in Mesquite, Texas, yet short of a large scale war, high demand from foreign partners and allies will likely never achieve the production rates that would utilize this capacity. So I asked the witnesses to address the problem in such a way that it doesn't pull work away from our existing facilities. I'll ask the witnesses today to address this concern for a coherent plan for those facilities and show that we will optimally utilize that we don't compete with each other lastly I remain concerned that ourselves into a boom bust cycle those sine waves that we've talked so many times before Billions of dollars of investments over last few years are helpful, but in added capacity, and then it would be wasted if the demand never materializes. There was sustained conflict or external demand through foreign material sales. I return to the one five five to talk about these shells, since we had such a good example, the department initially planned a hundred thousand rounds per month, now forecast a much lower rate. We modernized and expanded the base to achieve that high number. And some cases, our industry partners made internal investments to help. If we never realize this capacity, that all happens to our investments, both private and public. What happens to the facilities and the companies that hired additional workers to achieve these goals? We need to find out the staining rate, will be the production we're looking for. In closing, this hearing focuses on an extremely important topic. Very much look forward to discussion and like to again thank Chairman Whitman and Bergman for holding this committee hearing.

I thank the gentlemen from New Jersey, our ranking member, Mister Norcross, and now turn to the gentleman from Michigan, the Chairman of the Readiness Subcommittee, Chairman Bergman.

Thank you, Chairman Whitman. I appreciate you for recognizing me for this and particularly pleased to be working uh, Ranking Member Garimendi, Ranking Member Norcross, on discussing Army's organic industrial base. The organic industrial base is the heart of our Army's ability to generate combat power and any inadequacies in the industrial base directly impact the mission capable rates of our ground forces. Unfortunately, Army's readiness trends over the last decade are particularly troubling. Since two thousand and fifteen, almost all army vehicles experienced declines in mission capable rates. Additionally, army's maintenance costs are increasing with an average cost increase of over fifty percent. According to GAO, the lack of parts and challenges related to technical data negatively affected the availability and cost of the entire ground forces. These declining mission capability rates and increasing costs are directly related to an underperforming acquisition system. Our inability to adequately secure the parts and determine the technical data rights at the beginning of our acquisition process undermine the ability of our organic industrial base to adequately maintain our ground vehicle fleet. Additionally, I think that we are sitting on the precipice of a new dawn where advanced manufacturing revolutionizes our vehicle maintenance approach. I'm not confident that our military is pacing with the commercial sector in delivering timely and cost-efficient products. As to the Army's organic industrial base to generate munitions capacity, our Army arsenals stand at the epicenter. I think using our arsenal's ability to assemble and build munitions necessary for our combat forces and maintain excess capacity in times of need is a good model to maintain operational readiness. I also think that the organic industrial base needs to be utilized before additional commercial options are pursued. This is why I am particularly surprised that we continue to sustain foreign munition manufacturers when idle American capacity is available to support munitions production. We need to be more realistic as to our nation's munitions goals and build capacity to meet our needs in times of conflict. At the same time, it is important that our partners and allies also retain sufficient capacity to support their needs. It is hard for me to understand why the United States should size our industrial base to meet an apathetic international consortium that has the time but lacks the will to make strategic investments to support their own national security interests. There is much we need to do to better align our industrial base for the future, and I look forward to working with the administration and our esteemed witnesses to make this a reality. I appreciate uh Chairman Whitman's support, and with that I yield back.

I thank the gentleman from Michigan for his opening statement. Chairman Bergman, thank you. And now turn to the gentleman from California, the ranking member. Ranking Member Garimendi.

Uh, thank you, Chairman Whitman and Ranking Member uh Norcross, and of course, my colleague, Jack Bergman, for your partnership and leadership on issues affecting the organic industrial base and I want to thank our witnesses. Uh, I had a conversation earlier, my three letter question, why, will probably be repeated here. Uh, the war in Ukraine demonstrated both the stre- strength in the gaps and the ability of the organic industrial base to surge in response to a conflict. However, many of those gaps are not new. They're the result of decades of inconsistent and insufficient investment. Much of the uh organic industrial base infrastructure dates back to World War Two. The state of these facilities impacts the ability of the workforce to reset equipment, sustain combat systems, and ensure that the warfighter has what they need, when they need it. If we are serious about readiness and about supporting the soldiers in the field, we must be equally serious about modernizing the facilities that sustain them. To the Army's credit, it has developed a fifteen year plan to invest eighteen billion in modernizing the organic industrial base. I look forward to receiving more details about this plan, including how the fiscal year twenty-seven budget reflects this commitment. Modernization is not just about facilities, it's about people. There are over sixteen thousand skilled artisans working across the organic industrial base. Over the past year, this committee has heard concerns that resignation programs, hiring freezers, reductions in permanent positions have strained depot capacity to perform the critical ground vehicle maintenance and overhauls. The modernization plan must be driven by validated workload requirements and measurable - measurable readiness outcomes. not arbitrary workforce reductions. The Army needs a deliberate workforce strategy that recruits, trains, and retains the skilled employees required to sustain the force over the long term. Lastly, one of my favorite issues is the issue of technical rights. Across the services, limited access to technical data has restricted the ability to maintain taxpayer-funded weapons systems. For the Army, restricted access to technical data has been a significant contributor to declining mission capable rates of its ground vehicle fleet. This combined with supply chain's issue in getting the critical parts needed, is why maintenance costs have increased while mission capabilities have decreased over the decade. As we work towards the fiscal twenty-seven budget, I look forward to seeing how the Army's modernization plan will increase mission capable rates, sustain the workforce, incorporate the rights to technical data, and perform maintenance on our assets. I'm gonna end with just one short uh couple of sentences. And that is, over the last sixteen years as I've looked at this readiness issue, uh in all of the departments, it all comes back to getting worse rather than better. And I want to ask the question, why? Is there a a problem of the way in which we work our way through these issues? Uh, we could take one issue at a time and push it forward, uh, but ultimately we're not really making the progress we need. In your, um, eighteen billion dollar, fifteen year program, maybe you're asking the you're answering the question, why? If so, I'd like to hear it. With that, I yield back.

I think the gentleman from California, ranking member Girimendi, will now go to our witnesses. I understand that Assistant Secretary Ingram and Lieutenant General Mohan will do the opening statements. So, Assistant Secretary Ingram, we'll begin with you.

Chairman Whitman, Chairman Bergman, Ranking Member Norcross, Ranking Member Guilherme Mendy, distinguished members of the House Armed Services subcommittees on tactical air and land forces and readiness. Good afternoon. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today to discuss the Army's progress in modernizing the organic industrial base to ensure the highest state of readiness and sustain peace through strength. It is an honor to testify before you for the first time as the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Acquisition of Logistics and Technology. I'm pleased to be joined by Lieutenant General Mohan, Major General Rime, who are integral members of the Army team. We appreciate your inclusion of our written statement in today's record for the hearing. The Army's organic industrial base serves as the backstop, the last line of defense for our nation, providing surge capability and functioning as a critical national asset. These facilities play a vital role in depot level maintenance, munitions production, and strategic manufacturing. Congress's support has been instrumental in advancing the modernization of the organic industrial base, including provisions in the fiscal year twenty twenty-six National Defense Authorization Act. We look forward to continuing our collaboration with this committee to implement the NDA and achieve sustainable modernization across the department. Despite its critical role, the OIB faces significant challenges. First, fluctuating workloads, where unpredictable production cycles disrupt schedules, increase costs, and hinder workforce planning. High operating rates, where indirect costs drive up operating rates, reduce competitiveness with commercial industry. An aging infrastructure, where outdated facilities limit efficiency and the ability to support advanced technologies. And workforce skill gaps, where the need for specialized skills in advanced manufacturing and technology remains a pressing issue. We recognize these challenges and are actively addressing them. The Army is focused on increasing direct labor hours, fostering public-private partnerships, and reducing indirect costs to ensure long-term sustainabil- sustainability of the OIB. One of the ways we're tackling these challenges is by leveraging modern data and analytic tools. Those tools allow the Army to automate and synthesize readiness data across multiple weapons systems and units, enabling more informed resourcing decisions. I wanna highlight two examples. First is Weapons Three Sixty. It's a revolutionary tool that compi- that compiles live readiness data across the army. And then ASALT live, which is a platform that houses live acquisition data prov- providing visibility into risks and challenges at all echelons. These tools are transforming how the army sees itself, understands its data and communicates its needs. We invite you and your staff to explore these capabilities firsthand. The army has taken significant steps to modernize its manufacturing capabilities. Recently, we released a commercial solutions opening to accelerate advanced manufacturing initiatives at Red River Army Depot. This effort aims to modernize traditional manufacturing methods and produce new weapon system capabilities, such as unmanned aircraft systems and components, and robotic platforms. The response from industry has been robust, offering innovative proposals that include government-owned, contracted, operated, government-owned, government-operated, enhanced-use leases, private-public partnerships, number of efforts. These initiatives will upscale the workforce, reduce indirect costs, bring private capital and new jobs to the OIB sites. They target key areas such as traditional metal and plastic components, propellants, precursor chemicals, and ammunition to reduce supply chain vulnerabilities and ensure missing, mission success. In alignment with our modernization strategy, the Army recently announced the selection of an industry partner for an enhanced use lease at Pine Bluff Arsenal. The p- this partnership will utilize approximately a thousand acres of the installation to produce critical energetic materials, significantly strengthening the U. S. domestic defense industrial base. This initiative represents a one point three billion dollar industry investment in a new energetics facility, underscoring the Army's commitment to modernizing the OIB and leveraging public-private partnerships to achieve readiness goals and support key allies and partners. When I testified during my confirmation hearing, I committed to modernizing the OIB as a matter of national security. In just four months, we made significant process progress, including securing the Pine Bluff, uh, enhanced use lease, the advanced manufacturing, uh, efforts at Red River Army Depot. This is just the tip of the iceberg. The partnership between L- Lieutenant General Mohan, the Commander of the Army Material Command, and myself has never been stronger. Together, we are driving change and delivering results. Thank you for the opportunity to discuss the army's organic industrial base, and for your unwavering support to our soldiers, civilian and their families. Look forward to answering your questions today and continue continuing our collaboration to assure the army's can achieve readiness and modernization goals.

Assistant Secretary Ingram, thank you so much, we're now gathered to Lieutenant General Mohian.

Chairman Whitman, Chairman Bergman, Ranking Member Norcross, Ranking Member Garimendi, and distinguished members of the subcommittees, thank you for the opportunity to discuss the Army's organic industrial base. We appreciate the subcommittee's shared commitment to the OIB. The Army's OIB, twenty-three government-owned manufacturing arsenals, maintenance depots and ammunition ammunition plants are a critical sub-component of the defense industrial base. The OIB not only supports operational readiness for current operation, but it preserves the nation's ability to surge during conflict. As a government-controlled capability, the OIB provides strategic depth and fills production gaps while industry scales to meet wartime demand. Although many facilities have been modernized since their World War Two origins, too much of the OIB still relies upon aging infrastructure, legacy equipment, and outdated processes. Combined with fluctuating workload tied to operational tempo, these challenges now demand decisive action. In November of twenty twenty five, the Army Material Command delivered a report to Army senior leaders that among other things considered every policy, regulation, statute, and business process impacting the health and viability of the OIB. The comprehensive review assessed each OIB site and offered concrete recommendations to address OIB challenges. Among the key issues were the need to reform to balance steady-state and surge capacities, improve readiness, improve uh um efficiency, and expand industry partnerships to stabilize revenue, particularly during peacetime when workload traditionally declines. With strong senior leader support, we are moving quickly on near-term actions to strengthen the OIB. This includes the development of an OIB transformation implementation plan, which will incorporate the ongoing OIB modernization plan that has included five billion dollars in investments at OI OIB sites over the past three fiscal years alone. We appreciate Congress's continued support for the OIB uh modernization plan. The OIB transformation plan will carry that momentum, but it'll look broader than our own internal investments into the modernization facilities and lines. It will explore innovative opportunities to increase partnerships with industry through enhanced use leases such as the one at Pine Bluff Arsenal, innovation hubs, and nontraditional public-private partnerships, while still maximizing traditional P-three models. In conjunction with with the ASALT, we have established also established an OIB integration cell in the Pentagon to ensure our government-owned facilities are considered up front in acquisition decisions. The OIB integration cell will better synchronize OIB capabilities with the acquisition program executives and Army requirements, conduct long-term OIB planning, and accelerate OIB transformation and modernization efforts. Integrated in all of our efforts is our focus on Army readiness. We've all we've made great strides in expanding advanced manufacturing capabilities across our OIB sites. Rock Island Arsenal, the joint manufacturing and technology center, remains the center of excellence. home to our digital repository and the bulk of our advanced manufacturer capacity. But distributed capabilities, automation and machine learning across the OIB will enable the rapid, flexible production and repair required at the speed of war. Finally, our Operational Readiness Program, or ORP, brings depot maintenance capability directly to the warfighter in extending the reach and power of the OIB globally, connecting the OIB to the tactical edge. We have put three heavy armor BCTs through this OIP OR our ORP program, and we're having tangible effects with increased unit readiness, maintainer proficiency, and a reduction of repair parts required during operational deployments. As a former Depot Commander and now the Commander of Army Material Command who I am responsible for the operation of of the Army's OIB, I am personally committed to ensuring the Army OIB remains a viable, responsive, and essential component of the defense industrial base. Investment in the OIB is an investment in our national security and defense. Thank you so much for your continued support. I'll go over to your questions.

Lieutenant General Mohan, thanks so much. We'll go to our witnesses now with some questions. Uh, Assistant Secretary Ingram, Major General Rehm, I want to begin with the effort the Army undertook to uh reconfigure and reconstitute its capability and capacity to produce one five five howards a rounds. Uh, ranking member Norcross and I had a chance to visit Mesquite, Texas at a time where there was lots of excitement about the concept of a COCO, contractor owned, contractor operated entity, building a facility, producing large numbers of rounds very quickly. So we were uh impressed with the speed at which things were happening there. Uh, we are now two years later and the facility has yet to produce a single uh projectile for one five five or any other artillery for that matter or mortar round. Uh, that puts us in a situation today to ask, uh, where are we going with that facility? The army had put out there a one hundred thousand round annual production rate. Are we still at that particular point? Are we still going to be looking to add production capability to get to a hundred thousand rounds annually? And if we are, how do we sustain that rate? What's happened before is we fill our weapons magazines, we have no other room, and then we say, guess what, we're gonna reduced production, instead of looking at other ways to partner with allies to make sure that their weapons magazines are full, to look at more aggressive training where we're firing more rounds to make sure we continue to to have a demand cycle that sustains that. All those things are part of that. So if you could uh shed some light on us about where we are with the Mesquite the Mesquite facility the hundred thousand uh pr projection and where we are with continuing to build the industrial base.

Chairman, thank you for the question. Um, first let me start by saying uh I'm not happy with where we are in Mesquite either, right? So I'm in the same boat you are. Um, so uh I'll talk about Mesquite in a second. As far as the the hundred thousand uh capacity that we were trying to reach, uh I agree boom to bust is a real thing. We've seen it in every major conf following every major conflicts following World War Two, right? It doesn't matter where it is, we've gone boom to bust on every single munition. And so as we ensure that we've got enough capacity to support what the US army needs, uh, along with sort of the extended demand signal we continue to see from allies and partners, uh, we are still shooting for that hundred thousand goal. We're still trying to get there. Um, so now back to specifically what's happening at Mesquite. Absolutely. Uh, you know, if you go back to twenty twenty two with the Russian invasion on Ukraine, uh, and the use of one five five, you know, we're at fourteen thousand. a month. Uh we're now pushing north of fifty six thousand a month, so we've seen a significant increase.

Mm-hmm.

And uh that's important to highlight that it's that's more than just the metal parts that they make at Mesquite, right? That's been into everything that goes into building a one five five, right? So that's the metal parts, the load assembly, the pack, the charges, the fuses, everything that goes into that. So we've seen a significant scaling up of all of those capabilities over the last few years.

Right.

Mesquite uh was uh there was risk taken right when we uh loaded the did the Mesquite uh project.

Mm-hmm. Yep.

Risk from the technology of the assembly line, the the production line that that was installed. Uh but at that time it was agreed upon we would take both risk on the government and and contractor side to deliver on that sort of capability.

Mm-hmm.

And so um we are currently in the middle of so I guess to to put it earlier the stop work is still in place.

Mm-hmm.

We are currently in negotiation with General Dynamics about what the future of that looks like. Uh, you know, I anticipate you will see uh an investment from the company themselves, uh from the industry partner themselves, to ensure they can continue to to build out for that facility that would make rounds, that would primarily be supported by the FMS, the foreign materials demand that we currently have.

Mm-hmm.

But we are currently in negotiation what that looks like. Both from a from a line perspective, a quantity perspective,

Yeah.

um and and hopefully we'll have that wrapped up soon. But I'll pause there and turn over to General Ryan

Yeah, we

if he has anything else he'd like to add to that.

General Ryan?

Mister Chairman, I I I share your same concerns where we're at with Mesquite. But uh let me first just say, you know, thank you for your continued support and advocacy,

Mm-hmm.

you know the authorities and the resourcing. that enabled us to get after this hundred thousand, you know, per month mandate have been uh, you know, instrumental to the progress we've made.

Mm-hmm.

I mean it's a historic level of funding that we've received, you know, to the likes we haven't seen since World War Two.

Yep.

And uh the investments we've made uh, you know, both in terms of advanced manufacturing capability, adding resilience,

Yep.

um improving workforce safety with the modernization efforts is critically important. So when we kicked off this surge, it was with a lot of the nineteen forties aging infrastructure and it really forces a look at, you know, other forces to reach some of this capacity. And so when you think of a one five five, right? We've got a fuse, we've got, you know, a metal projectile. We've got an energetic fill, we've got a propelling charge and a primer. And so we made investments uh to to add you know second and third sources in some cases to get to this number.

Right.

Uh I think the beauty of that is is that those um investments you know are bringing advanced manufacturing,

Yeah.

automation, all the things that are gonna add resilience are gonna improve workforce safety with some of our facilities.

Yeah.

And so you look at line three A you know down in uh Iowa as an example, uh that's been in continuous operation since nineteen forty. We've just awarded a contract This past fall for future artillery center, that's gonna be uh you know probably the most advanced melt pore operation where we load uh our artillery projectiles. Um new six eight facility, no one could remember where the last time we built anything new at Lake City. The answer was twenty six December nineteen forty, they found it in Harry S. Truman's presidential library. It's the last time we built anything new and so um we certainly appreciate you know all the support uh, I'm going for and look forward to continue working with you cuz a lot of those

Sure.

investments were very targeted towards one five five and there's a lot more to the conventional munition space than just artillery.

Yeah, there's a, there's a lot more left to do and we appreciate uh the army being willing to take risks, and we've said this plain uh plainly and clearly, that is take risks, but if you're gonna fail, fail quickly. Make sure you take away lessons from that, make sure we recover as much of the resources that we've expended there, make sure too that we have partners that are willing to share in the risk. I think that's key with this uh mesquite facility and listen, I understand uh folks not wanting to say, oh that was a failure, but I but I wanna make sure that if i- if there's if there's not a clear and quick path to recovering there that we're not afraid to say, hey, sorry we're gonna move on, we learned something from that, we spent some money, but let's let's move on to the next stop in in that effort. Let me ask one other uh real quick question about uh about novel energetics. You know, we talk about being cast in the past, as far as our weapons production capability, we are still there when it comes to weapons chemistry. You know, we are using two weapons uh compounds both for explosives and propellants that go back to World War Two RDX and HMX, uh and we developed the more w- more uh modern novel energetics in CL twenty. And our adversaries use as their metric, CL twenty, we use as our metric the substances that are developed in nineteen forty. So when we ask the question, why are the Chinese uh having more success in range and lethality, and they're using the weapons chemistry that we developed, and we wonder why we're getting out-sticked, and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure that one out. And then it's taken us so long to actually ramp up and put in place an office on energetics so we can look at that and modernize these weapons platforms. I wanna get a perspective from you all about how you think the joint, uh, energetics uh office is going to operate. And what will it do to quickly modernize existing weapon systems and look at modern energetics for future weapon systems? We know initially there's been a lot of success there. That shouldn't be surprising since CL uh twenty, CL stands for China Lake, we actually developed this stuff. And then we we allow the Chinese to to steal it and use it against us. Just doesn't make sense. So give me a pathway forward where we're gonna be using novel energetics to get back in the business of range and lethality.

So Chairman, uh I don't disagree that uh we need to continue to figure out how to get uh better energetics in most of our weapons systems and so I I s agree with you the fact that the the general office will hopefully be the guiding light for that for the department as we continue to move forward why that is being stood up the army has not waited the army has continued to move we got three projects right now where we are integrating CL twenty into three different weapons to prove out how well or how the d- weapon design will have to change to successfully use those materials. And so those are gonna lead to a variety of tests that are occurring uh later this year, uh but but absolutely moving out. Uh we see other areas uh that we think uh we can uh CL twenty will bring uh uh better uh r- uh capabilities for us, whether that's longer range munitions where weight is becomes a becomes a challenge, think everything from one-way attack UAS to long-range munitions. We also see it in small UAS where you have small UAS that can't carry a lot of payload, and so to get a bigger bang for the for the buck with the payload. Um, and so, uh, absolutely as a as a prior, uh, naval weapons system, uh, engineer,

Mm-hmm.

uh, understand what we do at the labs and where that was created. And there's lots of capabilities like that that we have within our labs that we need to continue to bring to the forefront and we see the general office, is sort of leading that charge for us.

That's great. Thank you for doing that. There's a lot of capability out there that happens at our labs, that happens at uh a lot of places where some great research is done, like DARPA and others, unfortunately gets put on the shelf because they're not allowed to be uh, advocates for their products, and they can't go out and actively find customers. We have to find a way to close that gap too, cuz I think if a lot of people out there in the in the combat space knew these things were available they would be the biggest advocates to put them in their arsenal. So with that I'll turn to my colleague. Mr. Norcross for for his questions and with that, Mr. Norcross, the pleasure.

Thank you, Chairman. Um, we've heard repeatedly the SECDEF talk about sending the demand signals to the industry so that they can re- react appropriately in the relevance of time. So first question uh goes to you Assistant Secretary Ingram. We've talked about the hundred thousand round goal per month on the one five fives. I believe you said we are still looking to make that goal. So A, for what period of time? Because it goes directly to the question of sending the signals. Great, a hundred thousand we made it two months and we're backing off. How long do you anticipate, in rough numbers, that hundred thousand goal?

I'll make a plan for that. So I, so that number for a year for, from a US perspective,

Mm-hmm.

right, um, like I said, boom to bust is real, right. We are uh, we are getting closer and closer to coming up to our, to our tamers, to our sort of uh readiness numbers that we need back for, for one five five, for uh conventional shells, right. We have, but we're not there yet. Uh, we also know that there's still a demand uh from a number of our uh allies and partners that are out there, and so I, i do not see us backing off from that number for for a few years yet

ok good news you you mentioned the different parts for the one five fives and we talked about mesquite as being the metal where is the choke point right now on the uh building of each shell is it the metal the energetics where are we

i will let general rye cover that he's closer to the D to D operations as a shell.

E. Two areas um for the hundred thousand number, you know, early on metal parts was the limb fact, you know, who was driving um, you know, the focus of our efforts. And so, you know, we we had a uh kind of phased of approach. You know, we had the mission to produce as many as humanly possible on on day one at existing facilities. In parallel, we were making investments to bring other sources online. You know, we've been successful with IMT in Canada. You know, just uh right before the holidays we had successfully did first article tests and they're in in production. Um, you know, we all know about Mesquite and it's not uh, you know, where we want, but we've also invested heavily in Scranton. And and, you know, that that's a tough challenge to produce at max capacity while doing targeted modernization. And I would tell you that, you know, Scranton is unrecognizable from when you were out there, most recently, you know, visiting uh the the the facility um you know, all the old five inch, all the old M one O seven equipment's out. There's new floors, there's new lights, new parking lot, refurbished the crane, we've got our new go to war rounds, the eleven twenty eight, eleven thirteen lines going in. It is completely different. Um you know, later this summer we'll realize, you know, kind of phase two of the expansion at Scranton. It will be at thirty five thousand. The sister, you know, commercial operation right there on Wilkes Bar. You know, that's a twenty-one thousand. We'll be at fifty-six thousand. So, uh, I think we'll be in a good spot there. What - what - what concerns me now is energetics and some of the fragility with supply chain, in particular, and some of our dependencies on international sourcing, in some cases adversarial sourcing. And the team's worked really hard there, you know, one, um, to see ourselves. You know, we've got a - a - a really fantastic assured management's team. As we like to say, we can see ourselves from the ground to the round. And that's driven a lot of uh uh you know here near-term investments with other international partners while we look to leverage authorities like the Defense Production Act to onshore critical capabilities. Things like TNT, um, Antimony, or uh, you know, I think recent examples that are gonna make it make a difference.

OK, so the ski, we talked about it, and the equipment that was envisioned to be able to produce the one five fives and others apparently is not operating in as we expected are we at the point that we're gonna throw in the towel on the equipment and refit it to likes of Scranton

so we're in negotiations right now with general dynamics um you know

ok got that

uh we're

wouldn't Can you share with us when we expect that we'll be able to get the one five fives? Give me a quarter, the last quarter of this year, beginning. We're just trying to get an idea after two plus years, how close are we getting.

So in terms of delivery apart, I I don't think we're that close.

OK.

In terms of a plan of what a re-scoped mesquite would look like, I think we'll see that here very quickly.

OK. Um, I yield back.

OK, I guess it's uh I'm gonna recognize myself then. All right, um, first of all, uh, Ingraham or Ingram?

Ingraham.

Ingraham, Mohan or Mohan?

It's Mohan, sir.

Mohan, all right. You know, I'm kind of hooked on phonics here. Uh. General Mohan. inadequate supply resources at a misaligned organic industrial base continue, as I mentioned in my earlier remarks, a low emission capability rate. Can you better explain why this is occurring and describe for us your plan to rapidly increase our readiness to better meet program design standards?

Yes, sir, and thank you for the question. So I I would say to the why we are uh, where we are right now. Um, I can't speak, uh, particularly to the, the, uh, decisions that were made between are we gonna modernize and buy new stuff, or are we gonna sustain the, uh, the current fleet that we have. What I can tell you is, is the way that, that we are attacking the problem in, in Army Material Command of particularly, um, those units that are under the highest stress. And so our biggest consumers right now are our heavy BCTs, our armor brigade combat teams. They consume the most maintenance capability, they consume the most class nine. Um, and so what we've done is, with our operational readiness program, instead of taking a fleet-based view, because quite frankly some of our worst vehicles will wash out in at the size of our fleets, we've started looking at a unit-based view, synchronizing the capability that we have with uh with the timelines uh and the train up of a division commander and and doing several things. One, uh we uh apply a heavy depot maintenance teams, export them from Anniston and Red River down to the unit's motor pool to help the unit see themselves. Then, we harvest the worst of their vehicles, the ones that are consuming the most man hours, the ones that are consuming the most class nine or mainta- uh repair parts, and we give them new ones that are coming off the depot production line. Um, and then finally, we follow that unit through their deployment, um, with with depot maintenance capability, and we're seeing great results. And so, so for example, um, First Brigade, First Armored Division is, is um our latest ORP candidate. Um, they just loaded the boat to go to Europe and they loaded at, with one of the legacy, one of our oldest equipment fleets, they, they loaded the boat um at the highest readiness rate of any ABCT in the army. So we know it works. Um, the last rotation they went through during their, their nine month rotation in Europe consumed thirty million dollars less than class nine in repair parts. and and maintain a higher readiness rate. So in the future we look to double down on that and instead of doing a smaller subset of harvesting of vehicles we're gonna expand that by three-fold because the process is working. The second one is I would uh pull the thread on is advanced manufacturing. Um so so it's not only access to tech data, it's access to digitized tech data that we're after. So if you go to um uh one of our our academia partners, uh the National Institute for Avionics Research, you'll see a B-one bomber, you'll see, you know, all fixed wing fighter jets. You'll also see an M-eighty-eight that is over sitting in the corner, and they're taking a part and digitizing uh every part on that um so that we can digitize it and use it for advanced manufacturing and we are we're exploding that capability across the um uh across the army um across our organic industrial base and down at unit levels connecting it all in a uh digital repository and a connected network of capability that uh that is powered by by um data that says here are the parts that we need to produce, and then we produce those parts um in different places across to ch- to to solve the challenge that we're having with readiness rates. All while putting pressure on uh our industry partners who owe us right now over five hundred million dollars worth of delinquent back orders of repair parts. So that we are putting pressure on them to produce and to deliver the parts that we have we have ordered.