Marines within the service’s latest preventing formation will discipline a extra rugged and succesful cell command car on one in all its latest floor automobiles in January.
Below a contract with U.S protection agency Science Purposes Worldwide Company, an preliminary buy of 18 Cellular Command Autos, or MCVs, might be delivered to Marine littoral regiments’ medium-range missile firing items between January and July of subsequent yr, in keeping with a Marine Corps launch.
The Corps’ present program finances has one other 18 MCVs headed to the service in August via early 2026.
The MCV is platform-mounted to the Joint Gentle Tactical Car, or JLTV, which replaces the Humvee in some Military and Marine items.
As mounted positions on the battlefield grow to be more and more weak, the discharge states, cell programs just like the MCV and JLTV are important to sustaining an edge within the present risk atmosphere.
The MCV combines a shelter built-in on the JLTV platform with upgraded communication capabilities and expanded entry to fires command and management networks, in keeping with the discharge.
Lt. Col. Joshua Faucett, product supervisor for fireplace help programs, famous the MCV’s “strategic, operational benefit” in equipping Marines with capabilities important for a future battle.
“The MCV is a first-rate instance of how we’re adapting to fulfill the wants of the trendy battlefield and we’re receiving deliveries lower than six months after award — that’s a testomony to the laborious work of our acquisition group and business companions,” Faucett stated.
The Marines additionally use the MCV-equipped JLTV for the Marine Air Protection Built-in System and on its new ship-killing missile system, Navy-Marine Corps Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System.
The service requested $340 million in its most up-to-date finances to purchase 674 JLTVs, in keeping with a July Congressional Analysis Companies report. Marines acquired their first JLTVs in early 2019.
Elsewhere within the Corps, personnel on the Marine Depot Upkeep Command manufacturing plant at Marine Corps Logistics Base Albany, Georgia, performed the service’s first natural rebuild of a JLTV engine at a Protection Division depot, in keeping with a launch.
The modified Duramax 6.6-liter diesel engine has specialised parts and a proprietary engine management module particularly designed for fight circumstances.
Nevertheless, these options additionally make testing and repairing automobiles tougher.
Consultants observed earlier this yr that the car was burning via engines quicker than they’d deliberate. However the Military, as the primary purchaser of JLTVs, controls the brand new engine stock. And the Marines should pay about $61,000 for every.
“The toughest half wasn’t rebuilding the engine itself — it was speaking with the pc,” stated Jim Dupree, a heavy cell gear mechanic on the depot. “As soon as we cracked that, every part else fell into place.”
By rebuilding worn engines in-house, the depot may save as a lot as $40,000 per unit.
The brand new potential additionally lets the Corps stay ‘Semper Gumby,’ or All the time Versatile, by having one other provide line.
Todd South has written about crime, courts, authorities and the army for a number of publications since 2004 and was named a 2014 Pulitzer finalist for a co-written challenge on witness intimidation. Todd is a Marine veteran of the Iraq Battle.