Defense Acquisitions--Status of the Expeditionary Fire Support System
http//www.gao.gov/new.items/d08331r.pdf

Report: Osprey's Assault Vehicles Can't Carry Ammo
Jeeplike Growler is said to tip over

By Joseph Neff, McClatchy-Tribune News Service
San Diego Union-Tribune
January 26, 2008

RALEIGH, N.C. - When the Marines shipped their V-22 Osprey aircraft to
Iraq last year, they had to leave behind the assault vehicles and
mobile mortar system that fit inside the planes.

It turns out that the new mortar system can't safely carry its
ammunition.

That conclusion, from a government audit, is the most recent bad news
for the Marines' attempt to ferry firepower inside the Osprey. The
Defense Department inspector general is investigating the program,
which is two years behind schedule and $15 million over budget.

The system consists of a jeeplike vehicle called the Growler that
pulls trailers carrying mortars and ammunition.

Each Growler costs $127,000 and is made in Robbins, N.C.

It can't safely pull its ammunition trailer, according to interviews
and the Government Accountability Office report. The trailer has a
tendency to bounce or tip over, which could crush a Marine riding in
the back of the Growler. A Growler without a trailer was reported to
have tipped over last summer when it swerved to avoid a turtle in the
road.

The Marines won't discuss the program, known as the Expeditionary Fire
Support System, because of the Defense Department's investigation.

The Osprey is a rotorcraft that takes off and lands like a helicopter
and tilts its huge rotors forward to fly like an airplane.

The aircraft, which costs $119 million, has suffered cost overruns, a
string of crashes that left 30 dead and repeated watering down of
specifications during its two decades of development. The Pentagon has
declared that most of the Osprey's problems have been fixed, and the
first squadron of 12 Ospreys went to Iraq in October.

In 1999, the Marines decided the Osprey program needed assault
vehicles to carry men and mortars to the battlefield.

Some Growlers will pull the mortar systems on trailers. Others will be
outfitted with a machine gun.

The Ospreys are designed to take off from ships and go inland faster
than helicopters. Once they land, the Growlers would provide assault
firepower or machine-gun cover for Marines on foot.

In November 2004, the Marines awarded the contract to General
Dynamics, which produced the mortar system. The defense giant uses a
company in Robbins, N.C., called Carolina Growler to build a modified
dune buggy whose design recalls Vietnam-era jeeps.

Gov. Mike Easley awarded Carolina Growler a $25,000 grant, and U.S.
Rep. Howard Coble, R-N.C., helped the company get a $300,000 grant and
a $112,000 loan from the U.S. Agriculture Department.

The contract award was disputed because the founder of Carolina
Growler, Terry Crews, is a retired Marine colonel with strong
connections at Marine headquarters in Quantico, Va.

A selection committee had recommended that Rae-Beck Automotive of
Michigan get the contract rather than Carolina Growler. But the
committee was overruled.

A complaint filed in the case says Rae-Beck built a cheaper and
technically superior vehicle that did not need to use a trailer to
transport the ammunition.

In September, as the Marines were poised to give final approval to the
full order of 66 mortar systems and 600 Growler assault vehicles, Sen.
Carl Levin, D-Mich. and chairman of the Senate Armed Services
Committee, asked the Marines to postpone the decision so the
Government Accountability Office could investigate. Levin wrote the
letter after complaints came from a Michigan company and after a
Detroit TV station reported that a Growler traveling at 22 mph,
without a trailer, had rolled over at Camp Lejeune, N.C., when it
swerved to avoid a turtle.

Carolina Growler President Bill Crisp wouldn't discuss the turtle
report, saying the accident report was classified: "That may or may
not have been true."