(Source: U.S. Department of Defense; issued January 18, 2008) http://archive.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=48709
Charleston, SC: Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates vis- ited here to see progress made in speeding up delivery of
Integration and distribution 5/day: August 22, 2007 50/day: November 4, 2007 50/day for one month: January 2008 5S work cell Work cell standardization Material supply flow Production cell configuration December 2007 work sequencing/cell loading Enterprise VSM (value stream mapping) 2008
BeforeAfter Figure 4.6 How fast is “fast enough?”
DOD is expected to surpass MRAP goal on Thursday By Jeff Schogol
Stars and Stripes
Published: December 18, 2007
ARLINGTON, Va.—More than 1500 Mine Resistant Ambush Resistant vehicles are expected to be downrange as of Thursday, Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said.
The MRAPs have V-shaped hulls that deflect blasts from underneath, providing better protec- tion than up-armored Humvees. But MRAP vehicles also are often too large to go off-road, into confined spaces and cross bridges.
Defense officials had said the department’s goal was to deliver 1500 MRAP vehicles to the U.S.
Central Command theater of operations by the end of the year.
“Our hope is on or about Dec. 20, we will exceed that number,” Morrell told reporters Wednesday.
Defense officials have delivered 1330 MRAPs to theater as of December 17, with another 180 vehicles enroute by sea and 15 more vehicles being airlifted downrange, he said.
Morrell said not all of the vehicles delivered downrange will be fielded to troops by the end of the year, it would be close to 1500.
Morrell’s comments came one day after Defense officials placed their latest order for MRAP vehicles, asking for 3126 more of the heavily armored vehicles. Those would be in addition to the 8800 vehicles already under contract this year.
In October, a senior Defense official told reporters that the Defense Department planned to order 6500 of the vehicles in December.
Asked if the Defense Department had decided to curtail MRAP orders, Morrell said no and noted that commanders in Afghanistan have requested more.
The plan is still to get more than 15,000 MRAP vehicles to all branches of the service, and that number could increase, Morrell said.
However, the fervor surrounding MRAPs seems to have cooled since earlier this year.
In March, Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Conway told reporters it was a moral impera- tive to get all Marines and sailors going outside the wire in Iraq into MRAPs. In May, Defense Secretary Robert Gates wrote a memo calling the MRAP program “the highest priority of the Department of Defense acquisition program.”
But at the end of November, the Corps scaled back its request for MRAPs due to the vehicles’
limitations and the improved security situation in Iraq.
Last week, the head of Multi-National Corps – Iraq said the Army would need fewer MRAPs after U.S. troop strength in Iraq falls next year.
Still, Morrell said Wednesday that MRAPs are still needed downrange.
“Despite whatever the limitations there might be on these vehicles, they are proving to be extraordinarily valuable life-saving, and the commanders in Afghanistan seem to want more of them.”
Figure 4.7 MRAP: speed to service.
mine-resistant, ambush-protected vehicles to warfighters and to thank the people working behind the scenes to save military lives.
The secretary toured the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center, a massive warehouse where teams crawled in, on, and around nearly 60 of the massive MRAP vehicles on the factory floor, installing radios, sensors, jammers, and other equipment.
The crews, who work around the clock in two shifts equip- ping more than 50 MRAPs a day, crowded around a podium and took places on MRAPs flanking it as Gates compared them to their World War II–era predecessors.
He cited President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who called on the production lines to “raise their sights” and proved wrong any- one who said that what they were striving to achieve couldn’t be done.
“Those in the MRAP program have shown that it can be done. So keep raising your sights. Keep these vehicles rolling off the line,” Gates said. “Your efforts are saving lives.”
Gates called the MRAP “a proven lifesaver on the battle- field” that helps protect against cheap, deadly and difficult- to-detect improvised explosive devices, which have been the no. 1 troop killer in Iraq. He noted that in 12 of the Army’s deployed MRAPs that have come under attack every soldier aboard walked away.
The secretary shared a deployed sergeant major’s descrip- tion of the MRAP as “just lovely,” drawing laughter when he admitted that the soldier’s actual words were “considerably more colorful.”
Gates went on to share more of the sergeant major’s assess- ment: “Troops love them. Commanders sleep better knowing the troops have them.”
“There can be no better description of the difference you are making here. You are saving lives,” the secretary told the workers as he extended his thanks, along with those of “count- less moms and dads, husbands and wives, and sons and daughters of U.S. troops deployed abroad.”
Gates conceded that there is no fail-safe measure to prevent all loss of life and limb on the battlefield. “That is the brutal reality of war,” he said. “But vehicles like MRAP, combined with the right tactics, techniques, and pro- cedures, provide the best protection available against these attacks.”
Since the secretary made MRAPs the Defense Department’s top acquisition priority, the program has advanced at near- unprecedented speed. The department met its year-end goal of getting 1500 MRAPs to the theater, and by January 16 had delivered 2225 MRAPs.
“The last time American industry moved from concept to full-rate military production in less than a year was World War II,” Gates said.
He cited a monumental partnership between government and industry and the willingness of workers like those at the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center to work around the clock 6 days a week to meet requirements.
“I don’t think it will surprise you to hear me say you must keep pressing on,” Gates told the workers. “IEDs will be with us for some time to come in Iraq, Afghanistan, and battlefields of the future. The need for these vehicles will not soon go away.”
Gates walked through a static display of nine MRAP vari- ants for all four services and rode past a huge staging area where more than 300 vehicles were about to be loaded for ship- ment to the theater.
From there, Gates went to Charleston Air Force Base to watch an MRAP destined for Army Special Operations Command in Iraq being loaded aboard a C-17 Globemaster III cargo aircraft.
Air Force Maj. Chad Morris, 437th Aerial Port Squadron commander, described operations that have airlifted 1609 MRAPs to the theater to date. “Our target was 360 a month, but we’re pushing that out,” he said.
“Our folks are here, committed to the mission and doing the job,” Morris said he told Gates. “We haven’t missed a beat yet.”
On the factory floor and tarmac, workers and airmen alike said they were happy to show the secretary how they are con- tributing to the MRAP mission.
“It’s not every day we get a man of his integrity to come out and see us,” said Andrew Harkleroad, who has worked at the center for 15 months. As an Air Force Reserve staff sergeant, Harkleroad said he has a personal interest in knowing that the country is pulling out all stops to protect its deployed service members.
“It’s an honor for him to come down here and talk to us,”
agreed Andrew Fuentes, another center employee. Fuentes said he gets a lot of gratification knowing he’s supporting
the troops. “I feel I’m participating. I’m saving lives,” he said.
“That’s the objective.”
At the air force base, Air Force Tech. Sgt. Eugene Porter called Gates’ visit “awesome.”
“It shows our men and women in the military we’re doing what we can to support our comrades overseas,” said Porter, a shift supervisor for the air terminal operations center. “We’re getting our stuff to the fight, and we’re doing it all as quickly as we possibly can.”