JOHN FERRARI and CHARLES RAHR
One of the most striking displays at the Association of the United States Army conference this year was the intimidating, full-sized, silver Abrams X, which greeted visitors coming down the stairs to the show floor. It’s also the tank that AEI’s John Ferrari, a 32-year Army veteran, and Charles Rahr argue in the following op-ed should be the focus of Army acquisition as the service casts about for its next main battle tank.
As the Army determines the future of the Abrams tank, it should remember that when it comes to purchasing new equipment, it’s often the easiest and cheapest to stick with what you know.
The Army is expected to make an initial determination on the Abrams’ successor next year. Rather than building an entirely new tank, like the Decisive Lethality Platform [PDF], the Army should continue along the Abrams’ iterative design route and purchase the Abrams X with the goal of the first production unit being in the hands of Army soldiers this decade.
This is a very important decision for the Army for two reasons. First, given the Russian war in the Ukraine and the need to stimulate the defense industrial base, the Army cannot afford another decade-long research program for a new build vehicle. Second, the Abrams tank remains the most formidable tank in the entire world, but current Army soldiers are in older version that need to be replaced as rapidly as possible. Fortunately, industry is ahead of the Army and has already produced a prototype of the most modern Abrams ever designed.
Unveiled earlier this month at the AUSA annual exhibition, the Abrams X will boast a number of improvements over the current M1A2 while being built around the tried and true Abrams chassis. Compared to the M1A2, the Abrams X is simply more mobile. Its lighter frame allows it to weigh in at 10 tons less and its new hybrid diesel electric engine makes the tank 50 percent more fuel efficient. That new engine also allows for “silent watch” functionality, letting soldiers operate weapons and sensors without the tank giving off its usual thermal or acoustic signatures. Along with hardware, the Abrams X will also feature upgraded software, including AI systems that can identify targets and compile them in a ranked list for human operators to eliminate.
Aside from its new capabilities, what makes the Abrams X a no brainer for the Army is that it’s already here. That means it can be manufactured in the same Army-owned and General Dynamics-operated Lima, Ohio plant that has turned out versions of the Abrams since 1980 and most importantly, it skips over the years of research and development needed to build an entirely new tank. Between the Defense Department’s complicated acquisition system and the inevitable unpredictability of unproven technologies, new weapons systems can take over a decade to go from inception to the hands of the warfighter. With a prototype already produced, the Abrams X has a head start, putting it much farther along in the acquisitions process than an entirely new platform.
But, instead of the Abrams X, the Army is currently considering the Decisive Lethality Platform as a follow-on to the Abrams. A notional, possibly unmanned platform contained within the Next Generation Combat Vehicle (NGCV) program, the DLP may cost significantly more than a manned tank because of the sophisticated control and communication systems required due to a lack of crew.
Besides the years, and possibly decades, needed to bring the DLP from R&D to production at scale, it would undoubtedly cost billions in R&D funding. Already, the estimated lifecycle costs [PDF] for two other vehicles within the NGCV program, Mobile Protected Firepower (MPF) and the planned replacement for the M-2 Bradley, the Optionally Manned Fighting Vehicle (OMFV), stand at $62 billion in fiscal 2019 dollars or nearly $72 billion today. For just the OMFV’s R&D cost [PDF] in the coming fiscal year, the Army requested over $589 million, with $3.5 billion planned between FY21 and FY27. In contrast, since the Abrams X is essentially an upgrade, it would only cost close to $650 million in R&D costs, the amount spent on the SEPv3.
The Army should purchase both the current SEPv3 Abrams and the Abrams X using five-year multiyear procurement contracts. By providing a guaranteed revenue stream, multiyear contracts allow suppliers to take advantage of economies of scale and invest up front in the equipment and personnel they need to produce a product. Because of these efficiencies, the Congressional Research Service estimated [PDF] that multiyear contracts can save the Pentagon between 5 and 15 percent of program costs.
Currently, the Army fields 16 armored brigade combat teams (ABCT), plus two or three in Army Prepositioned stocks. Each ABCT has 87 tanks. To replace half its Abrams in a single five-year contract, the Army would therefore have to purchase about 165 Abrams a year. This would start with the M1A2 SEPv3s, which are currently coming off the production line and then, by the end of the decade, the Abrams X. We should also be letting our allies, like Poland and Australia, get involved in the multiyear contract, as more countries buying the Abrams X means more tanks produced and, thus, lower costs.
For those who may be hesitant to think that the United States can build so many Abrams in such a short span of time, Abrams procurement between 1985 and 1992 offers a reassuring example. During that period, 4,800 Abrams were built, coming out to 50 tanks built per month for each of the eight years. It will take a significant amount of work to get our tank production up to the levels we need for the Abrams fleet, but production capacity can be gradually expanded through sustained funding, which is exactly the thing that multiyear procurement contracts provide.
Despite the calls of those sounding the death knell of the tank due to the war in Ukraine, the platform is far from dead. Tanks will remain relevant into the future as a way to rapidly punch through enemy lines while wielding large amounts of firepower to eliminate a host of obstacles, whether that be vehicles, infantry, or other tanks. Because of that, the Army should select the Abrams X for what comes beyond the SEPv3. It should scrap the plans for the successors to the SEPv3, the SEPv4 and the DLP, divert funds still intended for the OMFV’s research and development into the Abrams production, and instead ask industry to produce its own infantry fighting vehicle, just as General Dynamic Land Systems did with the Abrams X. The Army may also be forced down this path with its Future Vertical Lift program for which an autonomous Blackhawk is within reach now versus the continued multi-billion dollar development of an entirely new platform.
For the Army, it needs to buy more systems now and spend less on development in order to be prepared for the threats this decade. The future of the Army’s main battle tank doesn’t lie in untested, unproven and far-off platforms. It instead lies with the Abrams X and other existing platforms like it.
No comments:
Post a Comment