First, as previously reported, Naval Aviation is doing just great. The preponderance of the effort is over Iraq and Afghanistan but our active duty colleagues are busy elsewhere as well. There’s a downside to that too, of course. Airframes, engines and other equipment are being used up far faster than was earlier programmed. People are being well-compensated and that’s good; but together with the soaring costs of health care it also means that personnel costs are skyrocketing. Couple that with ever-rising fuel costs and the sense that the ground forces need dollars more than aviation and a real budget crunch is coming. Unless our citizens appreciate the dangers of not supporting Naval Aviation and convince their Congressmen and women of the need, our forces will be in serious peril. This convincing fits exactly with the mission of the ANA and, as such, I hope you will keep this need and this urgency forefront in the minds of your members as they go about their daily routines.

Of late much has been in the media about criticism of the air force for not proceeding apace with UAVs. The Navy has benefited to a degree by not being in that particular spotlight but you should know that the Navy is, in fact, deeply involved in development of UAVs for a variety of missions. Foremost among them are for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance but other missions are under study as well. For those missions that can be operated from land bases or even sea bases with proper launch and recovery facilities, the problems are not insurmountable. In fact, Navy has been doing this for some years. What is a problem is maneuvering a UAV that requires catapulting and arrested recovery about a flight deck, a capability needed for a large seabased UAV. That’s being worked on but it will take a while. Meanwhile, if the air force had the UAVs some think they need, our P3s might not be wearing out their service life over Iraq and Afghanistan.

The USS George H.W. Bush, the last Nimitz-class carrier, is nearing the date when it will be delivered to the Navy with commissioning scheduled not long after that, probably early in 2009. Meanwhile, the USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78) is just being laid down at Newport News. Unfortunately, the Ford comes with some budgetary baggage. Our bean-counting friends are fond of declaring that the Ford will cost the taxpayers $10 billion and following with statements to the effect that the Nation can ill-afford many such ships. For your education, they are assigning the research and development costs for the entire class to the first ship, the Bush. A much more reasonable stratagem would be to apportion those R&D costs across the entire number of Ford class carriers to be built. The budgeters won’t change the way they do business but you can point that out in discussions of costs as they arise.

The One Hundredth Anniversary of Naval Aviation will be upon us before we know it: May 11, 2011. VADM Killer Kilcline, Commander Naval Air Forces, has taken charge of planning and has designated his deputy, RADM Pat McGrath as the executive agent. Admiral McGrath has assembled an advisory group of predominantly active duty people, Navy, Marine and Coast Guard, to begin. On the private side he has enlisted the aid of VADM Mike Bowman, USN (Ret), former ComNavAirPac, to chair an Executive Advisory Group. That latter group is now in the process of forming but it will encompass various Naval Aviation support organizations such as the ANA. There will be industry sponsors as well and to celebrate there will be celebrations and events around the country. More to follow; but do standby to help.

Finally, ANA news. The Olympic Squadron of Port Ludlow Washington, headed by CAPT John Payne, USN (Ret.), has won the Project 3-300recruiting contest and the promised check is in the mail. Congratulations to the winners and to all who tried.

Please keep those e-mails coming in, if you need help let us know, and remember our mission: “…to educate and encourage an interest among the general public as to the importance of Naval Aviation in the defense of the United States and its allies….”

Sky anchors aweigh…Bob Dunn.