Copley News Service June 24, 2002
KC-130 crash fueling debate over military's procurement priorities
James W. Crawley and Jeanette Steele
Though the Marine Corps faults the cockpit crew for the January plane crash in Pakistan that killed seven Marines, some experts wonder whether the finger of blame also should point at military decisions and priorities made years ago in peacetime.
The overarching question is: Why can't a technologically sophisticated military that can drop a bomb through a window from four miles high prevent an airplane - in this case a KC-130 transport - from slamming into a mountain at night?
Experts say the military tends to spend money on new weapons systems and gear for combat forces rather than on equipment for support units, such as transport squadrons.
For example, some experts say, during the tight budgets years of the 1990s, the Corps devoted much of its modernization funds to the expensive - and problem-plagued - Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft designed to replace Vietnam-era helicopters. The U.S. military does have the radars, computers and satellites to avert accidents such as the KC-130 crash. However, the technology isn't available throughout the military or on every plane, including the one that crashed.
The accident investigators' conclusions, released Wednesday, said the KC-130 crew was flying the four-engine plane too low and off course when it crashed while approaching a desert airstrip Jan. 9. There were no survivors and few clues.
The report noted that the plane, known by its tail number, No. 21, was not equipped with night-vision equipment, terrain-avoidance radar or satellite-navigation computers - technology found on many military aircraft and commercial airliners.
The report said the Shamsi, Pakistan, airfield did not have a control tower, air traffic control radar or navigational beacons even though the military has such equipment in its inventory.
One or more of these technologies might have prevented the tragedy by alerting the crew to its dangerous situation, military and nonmilitary experts said.
Why didn't No. 21 have that navigational equipment and why didn't the Marines at Shamsi have modern air traffic control?
It's not for want.
"There isn't a single person in the military who wouldn't like to have night-vision capability on any combat aircraft," said Loren Thompson of the Virginia-based Lexington Institute, a think tank. "The problem is, you can't have everything you want without breaking the bank."
So the Pentagon sets priorities, usually buying the newest, best weapons and equipment for the forces most likely to face combat rather than support units.
That's why fighter jets are equipped with night-vision devices, and most transport planes, like the KC-130, are not.
Chris Hellman, who studies the military for the Center for Defense Information, said the Pentagon's priorities have missed the mark because too much money has been earmarked for high-cost future weapons systems.
"There's no amount of money that would solve all the problems," he said. "But the Pentagon has to choose things better."
Hellman said the military should have spent more money on technology to improve operational effectiveness, like night-vision goggles.
"It's not terribly sexy, but it's terribly important," he said.
When the accident report was released, the commanding officer of the KC-130 squadron, Lt. Col. C.T. Parker, said the public can help get better equipment for the armed forces.
"If the American public doesn't demand it, then Congress won't buy it and we won't get it," Parker said. "If that stuff showed up on my doorstep today, I would happily pick it up and use it."
Analyst Jack Spencer at the Heritage Foundation said Pentagon budget and personnel cuts during the 1990s still hurt the military.
For 10 years, the Marines have had limited funds for new equipment. Much of the budget has gone to the Osprey, an aircraft that flies like a plane but takes off and lands like a helicopter, and efforts to keep aging aircraft, armor and vehicles in working order.
The Marines' active-duty fleet of 51 KC-130s is old and needs to be replaced. Some of the aircraft date to the 1960s.
"It was a big mistake to go on a procurement holiday for a decade in the '90s," Spencer said.
Could night-vision goggles have saved the Miramar crew?
"What the investigation concluded is (they) may have helped. We just don't know," said Col. Randolph Alles, who oversees the fixed-wing squadrons at the Miramar Marine Corps Air Station.
In January, none of the Marine Corps' transports that support troops in Afghanistan and Pakistan by refueling helicopters and jet fighters, and hauling cargo and soldiers were equipped with night-vision goggles for pilots.
The goggles, which help the wearer see in the darkness, are routinely used by fighter pilots, special operations troops, tank drivers and truck drivers.
Marine Corps Reserve KC-130 pilots use the goggles, but the equipment has not been issued to active-duty KC-130 pilots.
The big expense in night-vision devices isn't the goggles, which can cost less than $10,000 each, but the needed aircraft modifications - such as low-intensity cockpit and exterior lighting - and training for pilots.
Since the crash, three KC-130s have been retrofitted with night-vision equipment. It will take years and millions of dollars to modify all of the Marine Corps' KC-130s. The newest version of the plane, the KC-130J, has night-vision and terrain-avoidance capabilities, and is being added to the fleet in the next two years.
Experts acknowledge the goggles aren't perfect and require regular pilot training to use them. But they point out this war has made night navigation more important.
"The reason why this issue arises now is because the way we wage war has changed. A lot of the assumptions that drove how these aircraft were equipped are no longer valid," Thompson said.
The threat of shoulder-launched missiles - inexpensive, portable and proliferous in the region - has forced transport planes that don't have anti-missile defenses, like the KC-130, to fly only at night.
The transport planes also are flying into primitive airfields, like Shamsi. However, the Marines do have air traffic control radars and equipment that can be airlifted to distant, unimproved airstrips. None was at Shamsi, the investigation report said.
"Why was this airfield so austere?" asked John Pike, founder of the GlobalSecurity think tank in Washington.
But no matter how much technology, how much training and how good the pilots, accidents happen.
"Flying (in a war) is not perfectable," Pike said. "It's difficult and dangerous. People can be very good at it and still get killed."
Copyright 2002 Copley News Service
