Mark Ayton visited US Marine Corps’ weapons school to cover the latest evolution of its seven-week course known as WTI
US MARINE CORPS WEAPONS SCHOOL
Yuma, Arizona is a city with a history, which in part is territorial; the city is built on land which was once part of California, then New Mexico and, since 1863, the state of Arizona. Anyone familiar with the Yuma area will know it’s a hot dusty place; the highest recorded temperature is 124°F (51°C) and the average summer temperature is a touch above 106°F (41°C). Yuma’s dusty environmental credentials come from its location in the Sonoran Desert. It’s also located on the banks of the Colorado River, the water source for the extensive farmlands throughout the river valley. Yuma’s a tough place to live, not just because of the heat, but also because of its struggling economy. It is however a fascinating place to visit. By far the largest employer in the city is Marine Corps Air Station Yuma; the US Marine Corps’ largest aviation training base. Although AV-8B Harrier and F-35B Lightning II squadrons assigned to the resident Marine Aircraft Group 13 conduct plenty of flying from the massive base, one unit conducts more training than most aviation squadrons in the entire Marine Corps. And here’s the interesting point; that one squadron doesn’t have a single aircraft assigned. Equally, it’s not a standard squadron but one that’s a school house running two annual flying exercises. Each exercise can legitimately be considered as two giant combat experiments, both conducted under stringent flight safety procedures. The squadron is Marine Aviation Weapons and Tactics Squadron 1 (MAWTS-1). The flying exercise is WTI.
That said, it’s not classed as an exercise but the US Marine Corps’ Weapons and Tactics Instructor course; seven weeks of gruelling, stressful effort undertaken by Marine Corps officers selected to attend the course. You might be thinking WTI is just for pilots but that’s not the case. WTI is attended by students from all functions required to support and conduct Marine Corps flight operations.
Colonel James Wellons, an AV-8B Harrier pilot with combat experience who served with the squadron as an instructor between 2003 and 2006, took command of MAWTS-1 in May 2016. WTI 1-17 was his first course in command. That’s a lot of responsibility. WTI 1-17 involved 84 aircraft, just about every weapons system in the Marine Corps’ inventory, and 5,000 Marines operating at different stages of the course in California, Nevada and New Mexico.
Col Wellons said: “It takes time to digest because it’s important the CO and the staff have a clear understanding of what’s happening so we can manage risk with all of the marines and assets conducting highend training.”
MAWTS-1 is responsible for aviation weapons and tactics standardisation and employment which it delivers with each WTI course. But the squadron’s role-call also includes:
• Supporting Marine Air-Ground Task Force (MAGTF) training through the Integrated Training Exercise and Large Scale Exercise programmes.
• Conducting aviation training support (flight and academic) at other Marine Corps Air Stations with advanced instructor certification.
• Managing aviation tactics publications.
• Conducting tactical development and evaluation projects for Marine aviation.
Course One Tack Seventeen
Marine aviation requires many skillsets in addition to aviators. Of the 230 students at Yuma for WTI 1-17, many were aviators but some were pilots involved in command and control, those that work in a Tactical Air Operations Centre who are responsible for procedural, and sometimes positive control of aircraft; officers involved with air defence; infantry officers; air officers who specialise in the integration of the ground and air combat elements of a MAGTF; aviation ground support; intelligence; meteorologists to name a few. “People from pretty much every role the Marine Corps needs to conduct aviation operations,” said Col Wellons.
As the keeper of the doctrine for weapons and tactics in aviation, MAWTS-1 is manned by experienced instructors, all of whom graduated at the top of their WTI class and were hand-picked for the squadron. The instructors’ objective is to train each student to a level that allows the individual to return to their unit as the WTI instructor. Each WTI instructor is responsible for imparting tactics, techniques, procedures and standardisation required to safely and effectively employ a weapons system in combat.
Most students arrive at MAWTS-1 as an expert in their field and do so following preparation work undertaken by the Yumabased instructors who seek to ensure the student has all of the prerequisite qualifications required.
Col Wellons said in most cases, students are already seasoned flight leads with instructor and combat experience.
Student Preparation
The course has a specific set of aircrew prerequisites for each type-model-series of aircraft, helicopter, tiltrotor or unmanned aerial system flown by the Marine Corps. A couple of examples. For an F/A-18 pilot to attend the WTI, he or she must have graduated from either Top Gun (the US Navy’s fighter weapons school) or the Marine Division Tactics Course (MDTC), a one-month event run by MAWTS-1 twice a year at Miramar in the spring and Beaufort in the summer. Col Wellons explained: “Our Hornet instructors go to the venue one month prior, to ensure prospective Hornet pilots are prepared before they execute the MDTC course.”
For AV-8B Harrier, a pilot must be either a night systems instructor or an air combat tactics instructor.
As part of the student’s preparation, instructors from MAWTS-1 visit the pilot’s squadron, whatever the type, to evaluate not just the student, but the process used by that squadron to certify pilots at all levels of the US Marine Corps’ combat training programme. The visiting MAWTS-1 instructor is then able to recommend the pilot for WTI certification, which is ultimately signed off by the pilot’s commanding officer.
Col Wellons said the process is good for two reasons: “One, it gives us a chance to determine whether or not the student is ready for the gruelling demands of the course. The last thing we want is to have a student arrive who is not ready. It’s a tough course and historically we have a 3 to 5% rate of failure. Two, it gives the instructors an opportunity to fly, which is especially important because MAWTS-1 does not have aircraft assigned.
“The process takes 12 months in most cases because we still have to run the WTI course twice a year. Each one requires a month of dedicated preparation and two months to conduct. So for six months of each calendar year the instructors are unavailable to visit fleet squadrons to prepare students to attend WTI.”
Departments
Departments are the main organisational unit of MAWTS-1. Each department is responsible for a specific function; the rotary wing and tactical aircraft departments are further organised into divisions each of which is responsible for a specific mission set and aircraft type.
The air officer course is designed to produce officers who control all of the forward air controllers in a regiment and orchestrates the integration of aviation, fires, assault support with the ground scheme of manoeuvre in a combat scenario. The air officer course is usually taken by pilots with experience of working as a forward air controller with ground units some of whom have previously been through WTI as a pilot; there are usually 12 air officer graduates per course.
Air officers get posted to a variety of non-flying jobs classed as DIFDEN (duty involving flight operations denied) billets with Marine Expeditionary Units; either of the Expeditionary Warfare Training Groups; and in some cases to a rifle regimental headquarters or a division.
One of the largest departments is Aviation Command, Control and Communications (C3) which has nearly 25% of the course footprint with enlisted and officer students in a variety of command and control functions.
• Tactical Air Control Party (TACP) provides terminal attack control for close air support.
• Tactical Air Operations Centre (TAOC) provides air surveillance and control of aircraft and surface-to-air weapons for anti-air warfare in support of the MAGTF.
• Marine Air Traffic Control Mobile Team (MMT) provides air traffic control to aircraft in austere and/or improved landing environments.
• Direct Air Support Center (DASC), the principal Marine air control agency, provides procedural control and routing from the operating airfield to the objective area and back.
The C3 department also has a spectrum warfare division which provides a course on cyber, electronic warfare and MAGTF integration.
According to Col Wellons, command and control is arguably the most important function undertaken by the Marine Corps: “Striking targets, air refuelling aircraft and providing ISR is important but without a C3 entity that knits all of those functions together in support of the mission, then you have isolated actions taking place with no cohesive purpose.”
Lastly the aviation ground support department course is taken by Marines who among many roles build airfields, lay AM-2 matting, conduct bulk fuelling of aircraft and provide air base ground defence at forward bases. Aviation ground support Marines ensure the MAGTF has all the supplies and equipment required to sustain an operation.
DEPARTMENTS AND DIVISIONS IN MAWTS-1
Command
Safety
Administration
Intelligence
Ops and training
Academic
Rotary wing
Medium assault division MV-22
Heavy assault division CH-53
Utility division UH-1
Attack division AH-1
Tactical aircraft (TACAIR)
F-35B division
Fighter attack/Tactical Air Control Airborne/Forward Air Control Airborne/ Reconnaissance division F/A-18
Light attack division AV-8B
Electronic Warfare division EA-6B
Transport division KC-130J
Unmanned aerial systems division RQ-7 and RQ-21
Air officer
Ground combat
Aviation C3
Aviation logistics
Aviation ground support
Aviation tactics development and evaluation
Course Phases
The WTI courses run for about seven weeks with three specific phases: academics (generic, common and specific); flying (specific, common and generic) and the final exercise.
Academics
Students start the academics phase with generic lectures covering all of the topics every student needs to know. More specifically to gain an understanding of functions that are outside of their respective field; electronic warfare and intelligence preparation of the battlefield are two examples.
Academics also provides insight to all six functions of Marine aviation: assault support, anti-aircraft warfare, offensive air support, electronic warfare, control of aircraft and missiles, and aerial reconnaissance.
Day one involves an inventory examine about topics that all students are expected to know. This gives the instructors an initial snapshot of each student’s preparation for the course.
Three days of academics follows, finishing with another test.
Subjects include tactical risk management; teaching students to be risk managers and making them aware of the human factors that contribute to accidents. This crucial work involves the help of sports psychologists, physiologists and extreme athletes, all of whom address how to optimise performance and minimise distractions.
Fatigue is one of the subjects covered. In any combat environment, an individual will be fatigued and stressed. Both conditions contribute to degraded decision making.
During the course, students go through a lot of stress, so MAWTS-1 staff pay a lot of attention to the relationship between stress and performance.
Col Wellons said some degree of stress is important in order to perform at the highest level but underlined that lethargy does not necessarily lead to high quality performance: “An individual has to manage and departmentalise stress, so we lecture on the tools and techniques for doing that.”
The common component focuses on aspects of a mission that are common to all students in each respective field. By contrast the specifics component provides detailed instruction to all students from a respective type about the aircraft, including sensors and weapons, to gain more expertise. Specifics is the smallest component of the academic phase.
Flying
Prior to the start of the flying phase MAWTS-1 forms a maintenance department comprising around 1,000 Marines who arrive at Yuma from units based around the fleet.
Flight operations last for 21 days. In contrast to the academics phase, the same three components are conducted in reverse order.
Day one involves an orientation flight.
The specifics component lasts for three to four days and involves type-specific flying. For example, MV-22s conduct individual MV-22 tasks such as landing in a restricted visibility scenario or conducting air delivery of equipment.
In the second flying week, the course enters the common component which involves different types operating together. For example, MV-22s fly a long-range raid escorted by AH-1 attack helicopters, stop for fuel at a forward-arming and refuelling point and then go into the objective area, with air support from an unmanned aerial vehicle.
In the third and fourth flying weeks, the course enters the generic component which involves all types and fields operating together as a MAGTF. This includes an infantry battalion of about 1,000 Marines who provide the ground manoeuvre element. The battalion’s participation adds realism to the course. One example is an air assault involving the insertion of hundreds of Marines into an objective area.
Fully replicating a real combat mission is not always possible based on the amount of aircraft required which might exceed the number deployed to Yuma. To bridge any gap, MAWTS-1 can either use live virtual construct training to simulate additional assets or request additional participants from the air force, navy and army.
One example in WTI 1-17 was the participation by a US Army Patriot missile battalion comprising hundreds of soldiers. The battalion deployed to WTI to complete its own training objectives, but these were enhanced by the missions staged for the course. The Patriot battalion formed part of an integrated air defence structure to defend Yuma airfield from being attacked.
Explaining the extent of any ground-based threat array presented, Col Wellons said the pinnacle of the training is the force-onforce aspect, the ability to execute a plan against a living, breathing, thinking enemy. He explained: “If it’s a passive or simulated enemy we learn a few lessons, but with no man in the loop, it’s hard to test tactics and how they would work in the real world. TACAIR aircraft fly to the Nellis range to utilise the robust threat array available there, while the ground forces operate in objective areas in ranges closer to Yuma.
“When the infantry battalion was inserted by helicopter at Twentynine Palms [California], we used pop-up targets and ways to test their tactics, but there was no opposition manoeuvre force involved. Threats presented to the battalion included cyber, electronic warfare, air-to-air and surface-to-air. Air-to-air was provided by VMFT-401 and surface-to-air threats by Marines based at the training range. [Marine Fighter Training Squadron 401 (VMFT-401) ‘Snipers’ is a dedicated adversary unit based at Yuma, equipped with F-5N Tiger IIs].
“In some cases, the ground force uses live ammunition. An example is the air assault into Blue Mountain Airfield using MV-22s to airlift the Marines and CH-53s to lift artillery systems. AH-1 Cobras, UH-1Y Hueys, AV-8B Harriers, F-35B Lightning IIs and F/A-18 Hornets provided fire support to suppress the landing zone in advance of the troop insertion. Once in, the battalion faced a notional enemy ground force armed with artillery which moved toward the objective area to pose a direct threat to the Marine battalion. That drives a decision cycle. The battalion commanders must decide whether to defend their position or get back on the aircraft. If they opt to withdraw, the WTI students must decide how they execute that. It’s a very realistic mission and gives an idea of the complexity of the scenarios.”
Final Exercise
The final phase is known as the final exercise, dubbed FINEX, and comprises three events (FINEX 1, FINEX 2 and FINEX 3) each involving one day of flying.
On day one of the final week (Monday), all 230 students are presented with a scenario and a problem statement. Their task is to determine how to conduct the FINEX 1 mission the following day (Tuesday). For WTI 1-17, this involved striking targets in the Nellis range in Nevada. If the strike is deemed successful, it triggers a battalion air assault at Twentynine Palms in California.
An intelligence update is issued on day three (Wednesday) showing how the enemy has responded and what the new threat is. This requires the students to look at different objective areas for the FINEX 2 mission on day four (Thursday). All six functions of Marine aviation will be required to efficiently address the target set. FINEX 2 also includes a typical Marine special operations forces (MARSOC) mission; a simulated casualty evacuation and a scenario involving the rescue of a downed pilot shot down in the objective area.
Then on the final day of flying (Saturday) everything comes together in FINEX 3 which is the culmination of all previous phases. This so-called graduation event involves an air strike on targets located deep inside enemy territory and a follow-on air assault raid.
Describing FINEX 3, Col Wellons highlighted how surprises are input to the event so the students plan for a certain scenario but must be prepared to flex to an alternate. He said: “Pilots flying TACAIR jets might take off expecting to conduct close air support and in reality provide direct air support or support a downed pilot scenario. It’s one of the most challenging days of the course at a time when the students are very tired, so we have to consider the cumulative fatigue they are experiencing. That’s very similar to real combat, which impacts on their decision making ability on the last day.”
Graduation
Every aspect of the WTI course is geared to time and the graduation ceremony is no different. Col Wellons and his staff have less than 24 hours to tally up each student’s final course grade from the time the last aircraft lands on Saturday evening to the graduation ceremony held at 4pm on Sunday.
What’s more, before the graduation ceremony can get underway, on Sunday morning all students attend a debrief for FINEX 3 to capture the lessons learnt from the last day of flying.
The grading process is, however, very much in hand. When FINEX 3 starts, Col Wellons knows exactly how all of the students are doing, particularly those that are struggling. Student evaluation is updated every day of the course. In a few cases, students don’t succeed at WTI. Col Wellons said it’s hard to predict how well some students will do, but believed there is a direct correlation between each student’s level of preparation and good performance at WTI. He added: “My staff ensures they do that to the best of their ability.”
After the graduation ceremony, the clock continues to tick: the aircraft and WTIs are desperately needed at the units from which they came. Within days of graduation some students will be deployed on ships and others at locations where combat operations are ongoing.
Tactics, Technology and Innovation
MAWTS-1 is also tasked with developing tactics for Marine aviation, a role conducted by the squadron’s Aviation Development, Tactics and Evaluation (ADT&E) department. The ADT&E task resembles operational test but the department’s work is not part of the US Navy and US Marine Corps’ operational test community.
Technology and innovation form a big part of the ADT&E department’s work; each WTI course enables MAWTS-1 to conduct tactical demonstrations of new equipment. Two examples from WTI 1-17 included the use of APKWS laser-guided rockets and hot loading of an F-35B – two events that were both undertaken for the first time in a WTI course.
ADT&E subject matter experts from each Marine aviation specialised field use new technologies. There are generally two classifications of technologies that MAWTS-1 can evaluate during a course – those being considered by the Department of Defense and those that are already a Program of Record and will enter service with the fleet in the future. Digital interoperability is one example of the latter.
During WTI 1-17, US company IOMAX deployed two Archangel aircraft to Yuma to participate in missions under a self-funded company project. The IOMAX Archangel is not a Program of Record weapon system but a version of the Thrush S2R-660 crop duster highly-modified for the close air support role.
According to Col Wellons, systems used in WTI can be under development, in the acquisition process, under operational test, or already released to the fleet; whatever the status, the ADT&E department look at future applications. He said: “During my time as a Harrier instructor with MAWTS-1, the Litening pod was a Program of Record, but we were constantly looking at ways to improve the interface between the pod and the cockpit. Northrop Grumman visited MAWTS-1 to discuss the pod’s advancement with test pilots from China Lake and Patuxent River and the squadron’s instructors. Experiences [of using the Litening pod] were discussed and how we would like the display modified to enhance the pilot’s situational awareness. MAWTS-1 has the experience and agility to make such inputs and see them potentially incorporated into a mature programme.”
New Types, New Capabilities
Explaining how the course accommodates new capabilities provided by new types like the MV-22B and F-35B, Col Wellons said the collaboration between MAWTS-1 staff and the aviation department, Headquarters US Marine Corps, is key.
Each type has a small team that is responsible for managing the programme. That team, in conjunction with the Marine Corps Development Command based at Quantico, Virginia, develop concepts of employment for all aircraft. Each programme team provides MAWTS-1 with the Marine Corps’ concept of employment for a given aircraft. In addition, MAWTS-1 works with the test community based at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland and Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, California and VMX-1 at Yuma to get early insight of the aircraft and its capabilities. By understanding the aircraft, its capabilities and its concept of employment, the instructors with MAWTS-1 are able to create a syllabus to optimise the capability of the aircraft and when it’s integrated with the other types in the Air Combat Element.
One example involved the cruise speeds of the AH-1Z Cobra and MV-22B Osprey. One of the Cobra’s tasks is armed escort for Ospreys, but the MV-22’s 280kts (518km/h) cruise speed is much faster than the AH-1Z at 139kts (257km/h). On an armed escort mission, the Osprey outpaces its escort ship which could leave the less well-armed MV-22 vulnerable. A situation not acceptable to the Marine Corps, and one that the smart thinking Marines at MAWTS-1 were tasked to overcome by developing tactical employment methods to avoid vulnerability and achieve mission success. The solution has been successfully implemented.
And the work does not stop once a new type, like the MV-22, has entered service. Constant changes in operating environments, technology and weapons deem it necessary for instructors and staff working in all of the different aircraft divisions at MAWTS-1 to continuously re-write standard operating procedures. Col Wellons described the work as one of the exciting aspects of MAWTS-1: “We’re in a community within the Department of Defense that is on the leading edge of determining how the Marine Corps will fight with the new types. The WTI course is training designed to prepare WTI officers to lead their individual units, but it’s also a giant combat experiment. We perform a mission in the way we think makes sense, against a realistic threat array akin to the real world, and measure losses. If we notionally lose any aircraft to a manpad [man-portable airdefence system], during the mission debrief we try to determine what went wrong. Did we not execute our tactics correctly or are we using the wrong tactics? That process happens continuously throughout the course.”
“MAWTS-1 holds a hot wash after each course; one of the most important week’s worth of work in the year. The staff look at every single thing we did in the course and the critiques provided by the students from every class on the course. We scrub those things and are very hard on ourselves and address the tough questions. Why did we fall short in one area or not achieve mission success? What do we need to do to make it better next time?” Because of this exacting process, each subsequent course is subtly different to the previous edition, although the syllabus looks very similar.
The challenge for the squadron staff is striking a balance between implementing subtle differences to the course while still achieving all of the requirements.
Consideration is given to the impact of removing events, and whether that decision makes the course tactically unsound for a follow-on mission requirement. The staff must also avoid potential surprises faced by the WTI officers in a real world situation because something was missed on the course.
Similar processes are also undertaken for all new munitions and weapons. Col Wellons stressed that the W in WTI stands for weapons and it is a big aspect of the course. No kidding. During 21 days of flying for WTI 1-17, aircraft assigned to MAWTS-1 dropped nearly 500,000lb (227,000kg) of ordnance which included every weapon in the inventory. Statistics are recorded for the performance of every single weapon dropped including the effect on target. Was it a direct hit and if not how far was the miss?
“We assess the statistics, course by course, year by year, to see if we did better in the live course. Operations analysts track the data which is reported to the department responsible for ordnance.”
Each course yields a massive evaluation of the weapons dropped and each weapon type’s suitability for strike requirement by front line pilots. The data is used by MAGTF commanders to inform their decisions for which weapons are carried in combat.
Amphibious Warfare
To support the Marine Corps’ amphibious warfare capability during the desert-locked training undertaken for the WTI course, MAWTS-1 has a scenario that overlays the entire course. Mexico, which is a few miles south of Yuma, is considered to be an ocean, so that naval warfare is incorporated to the course in a scenariodriven manner.
Another event that brings the naval component into the course is MEUEX (Marine Expeditionary Unit exercise) which involves staging long-range raids using AV-8Bs, F-35Bs and MV-22s launched from simulated ships under the command of the C3 division. A US Navy TACRON (tactical air control squadron) based in San Diego deploys to Yuma to provide a quality assurance check on how a raid is launched from a landing strip which looks like a Landing Helicopter Dock amphibious assault ship, located out in the field.
Col Wellons expects future courses to include more simulated naval assets and foresees potential for deploying to the west coast to conduct missions that involve US Navy units including command and control.
