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Navy Reserve logistics squadron at Fort Worth base may be cut
Posted Wednesday, Feb. 16, 2011
By Chris Vaughn
FORT WORTH -- Just two years after relocating to Naval Air Station Fort Worth, a Navy Reserve logistics squadron is threatened with shutdown by the Navy command and the president's budget.
Fleet Logistics Support Squadron 46, as well as at least two sister reserve squadrons in New Jersey and Maryland,
are slated for decommissioning in the Defense Department's fiscal 2012 budget that was sent to Congress on Monday.
Two squadrons fly the C-9 Skytrain, a 40-year-old version of the DC-9 airliner that is increasingly expensive to maintain and operate and has significant limitations.
The president's budget calls for removing 10 C-9, five C-12 and two C-20 aircraft from the Navy Reserve's operations budget about midway through the fiscal year.
"The Navy has led themselves down this road, where they think there is no alternative to decommissioning squadrons," said Ike Puzon, a retired Navy captain and the legislative director for the Association of the U.S. Navy in Virginia.
"They knew they needed to replace this airplane, but they had no roadmap to do it. We're now at a point where money is short, and the Navy has shortages in a lot of equipment."
With budget cuts looming across the entire federal government, the Defense Department is facing its own shrinking funding.
Numerous weapons programs are on the table for cancellation or reduction, including the Fort Worth-built F-35, and most of the services are trimming personnel from the ranks.
The Republican majority in the House, including U.S. Rep. Kay Granger of Fort Worth, may also find it hard to protect defense programs, given the pressure to cut spending and reduce the deficit.
Losing expertise
VR-46, as the squadron is known within the military, has about 150 full-time officers and sailors and 110 reservists who work part time.
The squadron moved to Fort Worth in 2009 after Naval Air Station Atlanta was shuttered in the last round of base closures.
If the Navy does shut down VR-46 next year, it will leave one Navy flying squadron at the Fort Worth base, which already has a significantly greater number of Air Force and Marine aircraft.
Puzon said the Navy's recent decisions regarding its reserve forces are a legitimate threat to the base during the next round of closings and realignments.
In 2007, the Navy decommissioned the Fort Worth-based Strike Fighter Squadron 201, an F/A-18 Hornet unit that was widely considered one of the jewels of the Navy Reserve.
"There is a lot of aviation and military experience in Dallas-Fort Worth, and instead of keeping that expertise, the Navy wants to decommission squadrons there," he said.
"Once you lose that manpower and equipment, you'll never get it back. Honestly, the Navy can't seem to decide whether it wants a reserve air force component or not."
The commander of VR-46, Cmdr. Joe Marinello, a Delta Air Lines pilot and longtime Navy reservist, said that he has informed his sailors and officers that it is a distinct possibility they will cease missions next spring.
"I continue to talk with them about continuing to focus on safely flying and operating our aircraft," Marinello said.
"We can't let this process affect the way we do business. We need to let the decision-makers do what they do, and we need to do what we do, which is fly critical manpower and materiel around the world."
Slow to change
A spokesman with the Navy Air Forces command in San Diego said the Navy "is committed to working more efficiently and cost-effectively in this resource-constrained environment."
The C-9 is being replaced by the Boeing C-40 Clipper, which is a military version of the Boeing 737. Fleet Logistics Support Squadron 59, also based in Fort Worth, flies C-40s.
But observers of the Navy have said that the service has been buying them so slowly -- one every year or two -- that it became the fastest and cheapest route to just shut down C-9 squadrons.
No C-40s are in the budget until 2014.
"It's always been an easy area to cut from the budget," said retired Capt. Richard Tedmon, who recently commanded the Navy's logistics squadrons.
Tedmon, who commanded the wing from Fort Worth, consistently pushed for the Navy to make VR-46 a C-130 Hercules squadron, which he said the Navy needs badly. The base has a Hercules simulator school, he said.
"It doesn't make a whole lot of sense to have a C-40 squadron and a C-9 squadron co-located," Tedmon said.
"It makes much more sense to have a C-130 squadron in Fort Worth. The Navy needs more 130s.
They need to keep VR-46 because if they shut it down, they'll never be able to re-establish the squadron, not in our lifetime anyway."
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