Pinnacles National Park Act

Madam Chair, I support the amendment being offered.

With that, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Tonko).

Madam Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. Becerra).

Madam Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt).

I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. Baca).

I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Cuellar).

I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Waters).

I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

I claim the time in opposition.

I do rise to oppose this amendment. I am very sympathetic to the direction that the sponsor is headed--the notion that we need to make sure that if people see something that is a threat to them, or the service, or to our national interests at all, they should feel free reporting it.

The problem I have with this amendment is current law protects that. We have current statute with whistleblower protection that very clearly says that if you have any reason to believe that something is going on that is counterproductive or detrimental to the United States' interests or security, you are free to report that to the appropriate superiors. That law is there and is protected.

Now I will agree with the sponsor that people nonetheless are reluctant to come forward and provide that information. But what we need to do is we need to educate people about that protection being there in the current law.

What this amendment does is broadens that to the point where it's going to sweep a lot of stuff up that we don't want to hear about. It isn't necessarily going to make it any more likely that what we want to hear about is going to be reported by saying ``ideologically based threats or actions.'' That is beyond broad, it almost is beyond definition. It is the freedom to say anything about anyone any time with this protection, which I don't think we want, which I think would undermine the broader mission.

So the current law makes it clear. If you are a servicemember who sees a threat or perceives a threat for any reason, ideologically based or otherwise, frankly I don't see why it makes any difference whether or not it's ideologically based; we want it reported.

So that is current law, it's protected. We need to make sure that everyone, not just servicemembers, but everyone in society feels free to report such threats to the appropriate authorities.

This amendment is overly broad and would cause more trouble than it would solve. So, therefore, I oppose the amendment and urge the body to do so.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Andrews).

(Mr. ANDREWS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Madam Chair, just to close, I agree with the gentleman's remarks.

Let me just say if I thought that there was the tiniest little bit possibility that this amendment would prevent the type of tragedy that happened at Fort Hood, I would support it unquestionably, but I don't believe it will. The concerns, the back and forth about whether or not to report something that is concerning, they exist, they need to be dealt with. They will exist whether or not this amendment is passed.

We need to work to educate people to report threats, but making it ideologically based, I think, opens up more problems and shifts the focus away from what we need. And what we need is whether the threat is ideological or whatever the cause, we need to encourage people to go to their superiors, report it, and make sure that they are better safe than sorry. I would encourage that, but I don't think this amendment does that. Again, I would urge a ``no'' vote.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I rise in opposition to this amendment for a couple of reasons. First of all, I'm curious about the ``we're not actually going to fund it out of DOD, we will fund the money somewhere else in conference'' argument because it's funded out of DOD right now. Unless this is now being offered as a sense of Congress with no money attached to it, in a minute I would be curious to hear exactly how that works.

But beyond that, this is not what is in the best interests of the children of our servicemembers. To give them a $7,500 voucher to go get special needs education is a license for them not to get the education they need. As everyone in this body knows, the costs of

special needs children can sometimes be as much as $100,000 a year to our public schools. There are some children out there who have some very, very strong needs.

Fortunately, because of the IDEA, the public schools in this country are 100 percent obligated to meet that need. Talk to any school superintendent who has to deal with this, it's an enormous cost, but it's also an enormous benefit to these children. They have to meet those needs, and if they don't, it is precisely the parent who has the law on his or her side to say the public school must meet that requirement.

If you give them a $7,500 voucher and send them off to whatever private school is out there, they are not subject to those same requirements. They do not have to meet that same dollar value. What you are doing is you are undermining the education for these special needs children in a way that could be very detrimental to our families.

Now, we had a very long debate on this in the Armed Services Committee. This amendment was defeated on a bipartisan basis in committee for a variety of different reasons. I want to make it clear, it was stated throughout, how can you not care about the children of our servicemembers, and more than one Member on our side said, we do. This is not what this is about. We absolutly care about the children of our servicemembers. We want them to get the best education possible. But taking special needs families, giving them a $7,500 voucher and sending them out into the public and private school world and saying, good luck, is not what is in the best interests of parents with special needs children. It simply isn't. They are not getting the type of protections that they have under the law if they go out in that situation.

I would strongly urge a ``no'' vote on this amendment.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I yield myself the remainder of my time.

I find that last argument interesting to say that they move around a lot. I think that is very true. I think they do, and that is a challenge. And they don't have time to make all of these decisions. But they do have time to take a $7,500 voucher and search across all the different schools to see which private schools are going to take it. Because keep in mind, that's another critical aspect of this. Private schools do not have to accept a single solitary student. They don't. You show up with a $7,500 voucher and they say, we're sorry, your child is going to cost more than that. They just say no and move on.

Public schools do have to accept these children and do have to fund it. I really do believe that this will be a step in the wrong direction. The cost is also going to be an issue. We are going to have to find the money for this somewhere. It's not going to improve the education or the lives of our servicemembers and their families, and it is going to wind up costing money.

Again, I would urge a ``no'' vote;

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield the remainder of my time to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Andrews).

Madam Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Chairman, I support the amendment.

I have no speakers at this time; so I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer).

I'm happy to yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. Chairman, this may not be the best way to get at this problem, but this is a problem. There is nothing wrong with competition, but what's happening right now with a lot of DOD contracts is not competition. The DOD has gone in, in a very arbitrary way, picked large contractors from a long ways away, and not even allowed, in many instances, local contractors to compete for that work.

This is a very real problem. It's a bipartisan problem. We had a Republican Member testify before the Armed Services Committee about his concerns about this. They are driving work away from local contractors and away from local workers, not allowing them to compete for that work by showing a bias in favor of a large, one-size-fits-all contractor. Not good for the Department of Defense.

Also, with all of our bases, the local community is a critical support structure for that base. Once you take that out, once you take local workers, local contractors out of the equation, it makes it that much more difficult to get the local community to give the base the support that it deserves. This is not competition as it's currently constructed. I applaud the gentleman for offering his amendment. I urge support, and I urge that this committee look more closely at this issue.

Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition.

I do oppose the gentleman from Connecticut's amendment on the grounds that it's really bad policy.

Having spent several years working with the acquisition system, that is relatively complicated throughout the Department of Defense, to add one more layer of considerations to that system is, in my view, wrongheaded.

While the amendment allows this information to be provided, it provides for some punitive teeth in the amendment that should a contractor, either in good faith or bad faith, overstate the number of jobs created or retained, then that contractor would be debarred from being able to participate in the acquisitions process.

At the end of the day, at the beginning of the day, whatever part of the day you want to talk about, acquisition by the Department of Defense should be about something this straightforward. It should be about buying the gear, the equipment, and the goods and services our warfighters need at the time they need it at a price that is appropriate for the taxpayer to pay. And while jobs get created under that circumstance, that should not be a consideration as to what the warfighter needs, how we get it, how it's acquired, and that process.

My colleague has said this is simply a suggestion. That's how you get to mandatory. He already said, if it were up to him, it would be mandatory. We put this in as a ``suggestion,'' and the next step will be for him to ask that it be made mandatory and that we drive higher costs into the systems, because then the criterion for deciding on a contract is not is this the goods and service that we need at a price we can afford, and, oh, by the way, which one of these guys uses the most number of people to do that. That's counter to getting the best deal for the American taxpayer.

I want the contractors to use whatever the appropriate number of people is to build a piece of equipment that we need, provide a good or service that we need at a cost that the American taxpayer can afford.

At a time when we're going to squeeze on the Department of Defense to force higher costs through this policy, in my view, is wrongheaded.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I would just simply respond that, again, the value for the taxpayer at the end of the day is what we need to do.

We're going to have to cut costs across this government, and that's going to mean that people are going to have to do something differently than they have done in the past. And to simply say that the American manufacturing jobs should have absolute preference over getting the best deal for the taxpayer, in my view, doesn't make sense.

We've got a very complicated acquisition process in place right now. And it reminds me of the headlines that were shown in the last couple of days of the number of folks who got money from the vaunted stimulus plan that was--in fact, whose sole purpose was to really create jobs, unlike acquisition for the military and Department of Defense whose sole purpose is to provide the goods and services and equipment needed for our warfighters at the point and time they need it at a cost that makes sense for the taxpayer. The job creation of the stimulus plan, that emphasis was flawed in the extreme. And I don't believe that adding that emphasis to defense acquisition will make for a better acquisition process or will make for a better piece of equipment that we get.

And the analogy that the country that goes out of business costs all of these other kinds of things, that's basically hyperbole. I don't think my good colleague has any of the facts to associate that with.

At the end of the day, it's the private sector that drives this economy. You cannot flourish an economy with growing government jobs. It must be in the private sector. The private sector does it best, and this would impede that.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I have to oppose the gentleman from California's amendment. While it is straightforward, it is bad policy, quite frankly.

At first blush, where is the 60 miles? It just says ``military installations.'' If you go to Fort Hood, there are a lot of places around that are way further than 60 miles away from the west edge on the east side of the State. The amendment doesn't even say from the flagpole or the central location. Where do you measure the 60 miles? It's kind of a straightforward problem there.

It also doesn't provide for historically underutilized businesses. So you've got an historically underutilized business, a HUB, that is 61 miles outside whatever the measurement might be. They would be excluded under this provision from competing for that 40 percent because they would be an arbitrary 61 miles, 60.5 miles, 60 miles and 1 foot--or whatever the criterion is--which is not stated in this amendment.

You can't fence out competition. I understand that folks don't like to compete. This morning at baseball practice for the Republicans, we had a bunch of new guys out of the 87, and the coach said, Folks, all nine positions are up for competition. Well, I'm No. 2 on the depth chart. I'm not real happy about that, but it spurred me to compete better for that position.

Competition works. It works for the big guys, and it works for the little guys. To arbitrarily and capriciously set a 60-mile perimeter around a military base and say 40 percent of everything has to be provided to the folks inside that is wrong-headed, so I oppose this amendment.

I reserve the balance of my time.

May I inquire as to how much time is remaining on both sides.

I yield 2 minutes to my colleague from Pennsylvania (Mr. Shuster).

Mr. Chair, if I thought there was a mileage issue that made sense, then the proponent's amendment might make sense. But I quite frankly don't believe that is the case. As my colleague from Pennsylvania said, if we need to streamline the processes within the Department of Defense acquisition to allow small businesses to compete regardless of where they are for some of this work, let's do that.

But quite frankly, there is no--and my colleague made the point by saying, well, is it 60? It could be 60, 70, I mean, went up to 60,000-- that would be a bit of a stretch--miles. You can't use a miles fence. And so I am going to oppose the amendment because that's not the way. All of us are for small businesses. There is not anybody in here who is remotely going to stand up and say they are not for small business.

We want small businesses to be able to compete. If there are systemic issues and barriers to them to be able to compete, then let's fix that as opposed to some sort of an artificial cone of protection around a particular set.

The other point I would like to make is what if the subcontracting work that needs to be done is greater than--that would eat into the 40 percent is not available within the 60 miles? And so we just have that work not be done because we couldn't find a contractor. The other thing this would promote is the artificial circumstances where they will set up a shop just inside the 60 miles with a post office box or whatever in order to comply with this artificial restraint of trade, restraint of competition. If we need to fix the way the Department of Defense goes at it, fine. This one is not the way to get at it.

I would urge opposition to this amendment.

Mr. President, I would like to announce for the information of the Senate and the public that a hearing has been scheduled before the Subcommittee on National Parks.

The hearing will be held on Wednesday, May 11, 2011, at 2:30 p.m. in room SD-366 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.

The purpose of the hearing is to receive testimony on the following bills:

S. 114, to authorize the Secretary of the Interior to enter into a cooperative agreement for a park headquarters at San Antonio Missions National Historical Park, to expand the boundary of the Park, to conduct a study of potential land acquisitions, and for other purposes;

S. 127, to establish the Buffalo Bayou National Heritage Area in the State of Texas, and for other purposes;

S. 140, to designate as wilderness certain land and inland water within the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore in the State of Michigan, and for other purposes;

S. 161, to establish Pinnacles National Park in the State of California as a unit of the National Park System, and for other purposes;

S. 177, to authorize the Secretary of the Interior to acquire the Gold Hill Ranch in Coloma, California;

S. 247, to establish the Harriet Tubman National Historical Park in Auburn, New York, and the Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad National Historical Park in Caroline, Dorchester, and Talbot Counties, Maryland, and for other purposes;

S. 279, to direct the Secretary of the Interior to carry out a study to determine the suitability and feasibility of establishing Camp Hale as a unit of the National Park System;

S. 302, to authorize the Secretary of the Interior to issue right-of- way permits for a natural gas transmission pipeline in nonwilderness areas within the boundary of Denali National Park, and for other purposes;

S. 313, to authorize the Secretary of the Interior to issue permits for a microhydro project in nonwilderness areas within the boundaries of Denali National Park and Preserve, to acquire land for Denali National Park and Preserve from Doyon Tourism, Inc., and for other purposes;

S. 323, to establish the First State National Historical Park in the State of Delaware, and for other purposes;

S. 403, to amend the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act to designate segments of the Molalla River in the State of Oregon, as components of the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System, and for other purposes;

S. 404, to modify a land grant patent issued by the Secretary of the Interior;

S. 508, to establish the Chimney Rock National Monument in the State of Colorado;

S. 535, to authorize the Secretary of the Interior to lease certain lands within Fort Pulaski National Monument, and for other purposes;

S. 564, to designate the Valles Caldera National Preserve as a unit of the National Park System, and for other purposes;

S. 599, to establish a commission to commemorate the sesquicentennial of the American Civil War;

S. 713, to modify the boundary of Petersburg National Battlefield in the Commonwealth of Virginia, and for other purposes;

S. 765, to modify the boundary of the Oregon Caves National Monument, and for other purposes;

S. 779, to authorize the acquisition and protection of nationally significant battlefields and associated sites of the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812 under the American Battlefield Protection Program;

S. 849, to establish the Waco Mammoth National Monument in the State of Texas, and for other purposes; and

S. 858, to authorize the Secretary of the Interior to conduct a special resource study to determine the suitability and feasibility of designating the Colonel Charles Young Home in Xenia, Ohio as a unit of the National Park System, and for other purposes.

Because of the limited time available for the hearing, witnesses may testify by invitation only. However, those wishing to submit written testimony for the hearing record should send it to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, United States Senate, Washington, DC 20510-6150, or by email to allison_seyferth@energy.senate.gov.

For further information, please contact Sara Tucker or Allison Seyferth.

committee on energy and natural resources

Mr. President, I would like to announce for the information of the Senate and the public that a hearing has been scheduled before the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. The hearing will be held on Thursday, May 12, 2011, at 9:30 a.m., in room SD-366 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.

The purpose of the hearing is to receive testimony on carbon capture and sequestration legislation, including S. 699 and S. 757.

Because of the limited time available for the hearing, witnesses may testify by invitation only. However, those wishing to submit written testimony for the hearing record may do so by sending it to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, United States Senate, Washington, D.C. 20510-6150, or by e-mail to Abigail_Campbell@energy.senate.gov.

For further information, please contact Allyson Anderson or Abigail Campbell.

committee on energy and natural resources

Mr. President, I would like to announce for the information of the Senate and the public that a hearing has been scheduled before the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. The hearing will be held on Thursday, June 16, 2011, at 10:30 a.m., in room SD-366 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.

The purpose of this hearing is to review S. 343, a bill to amend Title I of PL 99-658 regarding the Compact of Free Association between the Government of the United States of America and the Government of Palau, to approve the results of the 15-year review of the Compact, including the Agreement Between the Government of the United States of America and the Government of the Republic of Palau following the Compact of Free Association Section 432 Review, to appropriate funds for the purposes of the amended PL 99-658 for fiscal years ending on or before September 30, 2024, and to carry out the agreements resulting from that review.

Because of the limited time available for the hearing, witnesses may testify by invitation only. However, those wishing to submit written testimony for the hearing record may do so by sending it to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, United States Senate, Washington, DC 20510-6150, or by e-mail to Abigail_Campbell@energy.senate.gov.

For further information, please contact Al Stayman or Abigail Campbell.

Mr. Chair, on February 19, 2010, a constituent of mine, Marine Lance Corporal Joshua Birchfield of Westville, Indiana, was shot and killed while on patrol by a local Afghan security contractor who had been hired, with six other colleagues, to guard a nearby construction project and road. The construction project and the security contractor were funded by the U.S. Department of Defense. While the shooter was immediately apprehended and would later admit to the shooting and be sentenced to 15 years in prison by an Afghan court, I am deeply troubled by the fact that insufficient contract oversight by our government may have lead to this tragedy.

According to NCIS documents obtained by the Birchfield family through a Freedom of Information Act request, the seven Afghan guards taken into custody were found in possession of five ounces of opium and some of them were presenting symptoms of opium withdrawal. Several of the guards admitted that they had little to no training, and most of them stated they had none of the permits required for their jobs. Their employer, a subcontractor providing security for the project, admitted his employees were not properly licensed and that he did not know where he was supposed to obtain licenses.

Last month, the Department of Defense confirmed to me that the project these security guards were subcontracted under was funded by U.S. funds known as Commander's Emergency Response Program funds, or ``CERP.''

It appears clear that proper oversight of these security contractors paid by our government did not happen. These private security contractors were operating without the licenses that are required of private security contractors in Afghanistan, they were not properly trained, and several of them were drug users. I cannot say that had there been better oversight by our government this tragedy would have been avoided, but we owe it to our service men and women in harm's way to get this right. I believe DoD must significantly improve their oversight of private security contractors.

According to the Congressional Research Service, right now the DoD relies on 19,000 private security contractors in Afghanistan, a force equal to almost 20 percent of all U.S. military personnel in that country. Not only is the ratio of armed contractors to U.S. forces higher in Afghanistan than it ever was in Iraq where we had many more troops, 95 percent of the security contractors in Afghanistan are Afghans, a much, much higher reliance on local security contractors than Iraq. Meanwhile, the performance and reliability of Afghan security contractors is spotty and continues to be. If we are going to continue to rely on local security contractors in Afghanistan, we must make oversight a top priority. And that means ensuring that rigorous oversight on the ground is getting done.

The Congress and GAO have been critical of DoD's security contract oversight for years. In the 2008 NDAA, Congress directed DoD and the State Department to prescribe regulations for the use of private security contractors in an area of combat operations by May of 2008. In 2009, GAO recommended specific steps that DoD implement to satisfactorily comply with Congress' directive on security contractors, including the screening, training, equipping and oversight of contractors. Currently, the GAO considers all of these recommendations as either only partially implemented or not implemented at all.

Further, the DoD has acted to try to improve oversight, but the fact is, I don't think they are focusing enough properly trained personnel on oversight maintenance. Many contract officers are not even in the same country as the project they are responsible for managing. And often the responsibility for on the ground oversight falls to a service member designated as a Contracting Officer's Representative (COR) whose primary responsibility likely has nothing to do with contracting and who may have had only minimal contract oversight training before arriving in the field. DoD needs to do more than come up with plans and guidance, they need to ensure that sufficient personnel who are adequately trained are in place and actually doing their job, especially when the contracts involve paying and arming Afghan security personnel in a theatre of combat.

My amendment to H.R. 1540 does two things which I believe are crucially important but also should not be difficult for DoD to comply with.

First, my amendment directs the Secretary of Defense to establish a Quality Assurance Surveillance Plan which would set uniform standards for contract oversight plans for all private security contracts funded by DoD in Afghanistan and in any future contingency. Beyond just ensuring that paperwork is in order, all security contracts would require a plan clearly laying out an oversight strategy and designating sufficient personnel to exercise necessary oversight to ensure contract performance and reliability.

Second, my amendment directs the Secretary of Defense to designate a single official in the country of operations with the responsibility of reviewing private security contracts to ensure compliance with the Quality Assurance Surveillance Plan. Further, this official must certify that they have reviewed the oversight plan for a security contract, that the oversight plan is appropriate for that contract, that there is an appropriate number of appropriately trained personnel available to oversee that contract, and confirm that any and all licenses and permits required of a security contractor and its employees have been reviewed and verified as current and authentic.

The Congressional Budget Office has reviewed my amendment and has advised me that it does not affect direct spending or discretionary authorizations.

Mr. Chair, if we have the time, money and resources to bid and hire private security contractors, and if these private security contractors are essential to successfully executing military operations and reconstruction in Afghanistan, then we should make sure that we've clearly planned how we will maximize contract performance and ensure safety and reliability, and make sure someone is held accountable for seeing that this is actually carried out.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Just in fairness, none of the manufacturing of this great aircraft is in my district. So what I'm saying is based on my experience and what I know about the capabilities of this great aircraft.

First and foremost, if we had had the Osprey when we went into combat in Tora Bora, we wouldn't have had the casualties that we suffered there because it's got much better capabilities than even the upgraded CH-47s that we were using at the time.

Secondly, in February, along with the chairman and another member of our committee, we flew the MV-22 in Afghanistan. I also had an opportunity to talk to the pilots and talk to the crew chief, mainly because that's what I did when I was in the Army. I was in aviation. And I wanted to get a sense from them as to what they felt about the aircraft.

All of them said this was a great aircraft with great capabilities--a technological marvel.

The bottom line is that is it effective. It is not how much have we paid for it but, rather, how many lives have we saved with it, and how many lives will we save because of it.

In closing, Madam Chair, I submit for the Record a letter from the Commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps, and I want to read a paragraph from that letter.

It reads, ``This aircraft is safe and survivable, effective and efficient. The MV-22 has operated successfully in extreme environmental conditions--'' extreme environmental conditions like the ones we were in when we were in Afghanistan ``--during nine combined deployments to Iraq, Afghanistan and aboard amphibious shipping. It has the lowest Class A flight mishap rate of any United States Marine Corps rotorcraft in the past 10 years. In addition to being safe, our Osprey offers a very efficient use of resources. In 2010, the MV-22 had the lowest cost per seat mile of any Department of the Navy rotorcraft. Those figures will only improve as our cost per flight hour continues to decrease and our readiness rates continue to rise.''

Vote ``no.''

February 15, 2011.

Hon. C.W. Bill Young,

Chairman, Subcommittee on Defense, Committee on

Appropriations, Washington, DC.

Dear Mr. Chairman: In light of the current debate regarding

the MV-22, I appreciate this opportunity to expound upon this

important issue. The effectiveness and survivability of the

MV-22 Osprey have been demonstrated repeatedly in combat,

from land-based operations in Iraq and Afghanistan to sea-

based operations in Haiti and the Horn of Africa. The Osprey

is giving our Combatant Commanders unprecedented agility and

operational reach. As we remain actively engaged in combat

for the foreseeable future, the revolutionary capability of

the MV-22 will be a cornerstone of our Marine Air Ground Task

Force.

Without a doubt, this great country faces tough challenges

in the coming years. Continuous forward engagement, coupled

with growing fiscal pressures at home, presents a dilemma in

the face of public demands for dramatic action. The MV-22 is

the medium lift assault support aircraft for the Marine

Corps, and we must have it in sufficient quantities to

support our ground forces and ensure robust sustainment from

industry. The cost of introducing a second aircraft to make

up the difference in medium lift would be extreme. A prudent

evaluation of the facts makes it clear that the V-22 Program

of Record must be kept intact.

This aircraft is safe and survivable, effective and

efficient. The MV-22 has operated successfully in extreme

environmental conditions during nine combined deployments to

Iraq, Afghnistan, and aboard amphibious shipping. It has the

lowest Class A flight mishap rate of any USMC rotorcraft in

the past ten years. In addition to being safe, our Osprey

offers a very efficient use of resources. In 2010, the MV-22

had the lowest cost per seat mile of any Department of the

Navy rotorcraft. Those figures will only improve as our cost

per flight hour continues to decrease and our readiness rates

continue to rise.

As we consider the likely challenges of the next two

decades and how the Corps will meet them, one thing emains

clear: America needs an Expeditionary Force in Readiness that

is prepared to respond to any crisis. We are a maritime

Nation with global responsibilities requiring ready, agile

sea-based forces. These forces are organized, trained and

equipped to conduct operations in the littorals--from

humanitarian assistance to major combat--and ``such other

duties as the President may direct.'' This has been, and will

remain, the Marine Corps' primary role in providing for the

Nation's defense. The MV-22 serves as a critical linchpin

that will enable our Corps to deliver this capability across

the spectrum of operations.

Again, I appreciate the opportunity to provide these

details, and I stand ready to answer any additional questions

you or others on your Committee may have.

Sincerely,

James F. Amos,

General, U.S. Marine Corps,

Commandant of the Marine Corps.