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| Boeing C-17 Engaged in McMurdo Station, Antarctica, resupply Image: US Air Force |
Bloomfield Hills, MI 19 September 2013 (eMOTION! REPORTS) - Global HeavyLift Holdings, Inc. (Defense Logistics Agency DLA listed) Managing Director Myron D. Stokes, who with colleagues in the academic, industrial and governmental sectors has been involved with Commercial variant Boeing C-17 (BC-17) Globemaster III business development at the original direction of SECAF Dr. James G. Roche, is calling Boeing's announcement to end production of this superlative strategic/tactical airlifter with no operational peer or near term replacement claiming lack of DoD orders and FMS interest irresponsible. "Boeing management is fully aware of the not just strong interest being displayed by a multitude of foreign governments which now include Algeria and Israel, but continuing FMS orders or LOIs, not the least of which is India's 10 with an option for 6 more. And given the current, largely unpredictable security environment created by China's clearly aggressive stance to become the dominant hemispheric power, India, in re-assessing its ability to rapidly deploy division strength units to any point along common borders, can utilize up to 30 C-17s," he said.
Stokes says Boeing leadership is also acutely aware of extraordinarily positive potential of business deriving from USAF directed conjoined efforts between Boeing, Global HeavyLift and strategic partners in academia and industry to develop a US/NATO controlled Heavy and Outsized industry (currently dominated by Russia/Ukraine with AN-124) HOM described as the movement of goods too large and outsized to fit in any door of any 747 or similar sized freighter, utilizing the near magical capabilities of C-17 relative to max cargo, short field take-off, self unloading and the ability to back up a 2% grade. "No other aircraft in the world has these comprehensive capabilities, and the USAF has nothing to replace it short or mid term. And, considering Globemaster's hyper-utilization owing to a near 100% mission success rate and indispensability as a result of the Afghanistan, Iraq and an uptick in humanitarian missions globally, they are being worn out at levels approaching that of the venerable C-141 during the Viet Nam conflict."
Stokes further notes that asserting irresponsibility on the part of Boeing, and for that matter the US Air Force, is knowing with certainty that shutdown of the C-17 plant in Long Beach ends this country's ability to build wide body strategic airlifters critical to projection of power anywhere on the globe, in a world wherein asymmetric/conventional warfare exists concomitantly and the probability of new conflicts has risen exponentially.
"Boeing is effectively ceding provision of strategic/tactical airlift aircraft to AIRBUS with its vastly inferior A400M, a swept wing, turboprop aircraft whose design capacity has been reduced from 37tonnes to 25 due to overweight as it begins flight testing. It is unable to carry a main battle tank, and struggles to accommodate light attack vehicles such as Stryker," Stokes says. "Moreover, and without rancor, it can be rightly called a higher cost C-130J, and whose performance barely exceeds that of the over half century old Hercules. We are nevertheless aware of elements within Congress and within the USAF, who have actively pushed for the elimination of Boeing C-17 and accommodation of AIRBUS overtures to provide 200 A400Ms soonest. These individuals, which even include Boeing personnel, have been compromised by the European company's lobbying efforts, and have no regard for the damage to US national security and economic security they will invoke. The extreme damage to the US defense industrial and the industrial base, which are one and the same, is well articulated in the 2005 Department of Commerce study outlining the negative impact on this country's economy as a result of C-17 production line closure.
"Global HeavyLift Holdings and Boeing itself recognizes that extensive business case developmental data which includes case studies with Exxon-Mobil, Conoco-Philips, DuPont, Black and Veatch among other corporations, countries and agencies, support 100 plus BC-17s and a proposed aerial firefighting variant to replace an aging, increasingly dangerous fleet of firefighting aircraft with an average age of 42 years, adding a least another 50 C-17s to be deployed in emergency response duties worldwide.
"At the very least, Boeing senior management is being disingenuous, as are elements of the US Air Force, and at worst irresponsible, knowing that ceding strategic/tactical airlifter production to AIRBUS is the beginning of a short march to Boeing being relegated to the role of minor player in overall defense, and the USAF rapidly becoming unable to fulfill its Constitutionally mandated role of national security."
Stokes says that Global HeavyLift and others constituting an industrial base preservation team, have worked incessantly to maintain production of C-17 and the existence of Boeing itself. "We will continue to do this," he said, "And we are prepared now to provide another RFP, backed by up to USD 5BIL in bankable instruments, for up to 30 C-17s.
"Boeing", he says, "Needs to rethink its position regarding C-17, and do so now."
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Global HeavyLift Holdings, Inc., a Delaware incorporated, Michigan-based, Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) entity, was founded in 2002 with a directive to bring together the intellectual resources from within industry, government and academia to craft architecture for infrastructure of a new globe spanning industry: A blueprint, if you will, without which no infrastructural project of this magnitude in history, as applied to the Erie Canal, America's ( or any developed country) railroads, the Civilian Nuclear Program or the US Space Program, has come into being.
Implementation of this initiative will culminate years of unprecedented interaction and cooperation between industry and government; required owing to the need for the regulatory power and financial resources of governments, conjoined with expertise and capital from the private sector.
Ultimately, the project will be a factor in changing the face of global transportation infrastructure, inclusive of a strong logistics role in government and private space programs, while simultaneously providing much needed economic stimulus.
Current plans call for the 2014 initialization of support operations in the US and abroad.
Implementation of this initiative will culminate years of unprecedented interaction and cooperation between industry and government; required owing to the need for the regulatory power and financial resources of governments, conjoined with expertise and capital from the private sector.
Ultimately, the project will be a factor in changing the face of global transportation infrastructure, inclusive of a strong logistics role in government and private space programs, while simultaneously providing much needed economic stimulus.
Current plans call for the 2014 initialization of support operations in the US and abroad.
