by Kris Osborn, Warrior

Air assault raids under hostile fire, forcible entry seizing enemy ground, life saving medical evacuation, island-hopping in the Pacific, logistical support and high-speed force transport .. are just a few of the many operations the U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne has planned for its newly arriving MV-75 Cheyenne tiltrotor aircraft.

In development for years as the service’s Future Long Range Assault Aircraft, the MV-75 was designed to meet a new series of Army requirements made to address an entirely new and different threat landscape. The MV-75 Cheyenne tiltrotor aircraft, now surging into production and integrating with the 101st Airborne at Fort Campbell, Ky, hits speeds greater than 300 mph and operates with an 800 nautical mile combat range. … twice as fast and twice as far as the Army’s existing Black Hawk helicopter.  The 101st Airborne Division’s Combat Aviation Brigade Commander says the new tiltrotor is bringing new tactics, maneuver formations and concepts of operation to the Army.

“The ability to move twice as far, twice as fast, enables us, particularly in geographically isolated or large square kilometers or mileage areas, to move out into the battle space much, much more quickly than we can with some of our current platforms. The biggest advantage for us is also reduction in logistics when it comes to the speed of fighting, you can't run without logistics,” Col. Tyler Partridge, 101st Combat Aviation Brigade Commander, told Warrior. “I think what this platform opens up with its arrival and integration is the ability to think about problem solving in ways we've not done before…the ability to jump in an aircraft or multiple aircraft and fly as a formation. The aircraft allows us to operate as  a self-deploying force traveling with weapons and equipment to a location from the place where we train, maintain and sustain those operations on a daily basis …this is relatively new.”

MV-75 Range & Pacific

The threat equation  addressed by the MV-75 is particularly relevant in the Pacific, given its well known geographical limitations, often referred to as a "tyranny of distance.” The maritime “expanse” that is the Pacific, from the coast of mainland China to the first island chain and beyond, requires platforms, sensors, weapons and aircraft able to operate and self-sustain at much greater ranges than were previously envisioned for other theaters of operation. The Army and Bell have crafted and refined the requirements and technologies for the MV-75 with this in mind.

Since the earliest days of conceptual development of the new aircraft, the Army understood that rotorcraft--like agility and hover capability ….and airplane speed…. needed to be combined into a single aircraft to operate at longer ranges, extend and enable attack missions, transit across dispersed, maritime,  land-sea coastal and island terrain.  and achieve unprecedented speeds needed for air assault, transport and multi-domain networking.

As the first MV-75s arrive, the 101st Airborne will be conducting extensive testing and training operations to include tactical exercises, live-fire drills, mission execution and wargaming with the new platform.

Partridge’s reference to sustainment and “self-deployment” seem particularly critical to the MV-75 arrival, as the increased range of the new aircraft changes tactical reality and enables the tiltrotor to self-sustain an operational deployment without having to rely upon as many Forward Arming and Refueling Point (FARP).  Deemed critical for Army air combat operations, FARPs are small, mobile high-risk outposts where helicopters can land, re-arm and refuel during an ongoing mission. While often effective and expeditionary, FARPs are also extremely high risk as they place potential targets on the ground in hostile areas.

“With Army aviation in particular, maintenance, sustainment, logistics is the name of the game, to keep our aircraft and platforms in the fight. The fact that this platform requires less logistics support to operate in similar geographic areas is incredibly advantageous to us when we look at new areas or geographic requirements,” Partridge said.

New Tiltrotor Technology

Many of the details of the MV-75 are not available for security reasons, yet Army and Bell developers believed a “clean-sheet” new-build design was necessary for future missions, as the combat-tested Black Hawk has “maxed out” on upgrades. Certainly the 80s-era Black Hawk has served admirably, and years have upgrades have massively improved its operational capacity; it was nearly 20 years ago that the Black Hawk “M” variant emerged, a modern helicopter with composite rotorblades, all digital cockpit, improved lift and stronger, more efficient 701D engine. However, the famous utility helicopter still hit a crucial tactical “wall” or barrier in the realm of range and speed. The Black Hawk has certainly increased its speed and range since its arrival in 1979, yet it still can’t fly faster than roughly 160knots and it operates with a combat radius of 320 miles.

“When you double that, (range and speed) if you just take a look at a map and some of the distances you do down there from some of the island chains or from, you know, places like the Philippines to some of the Spratlys, you can see that conventional helicopter just isn't going to get there. This tiltrotor gives the Army control of its own destiny as far as what missions would be possible in that theater.”Frank Lazzara, Director, Advanced Vertical Lift Systems Sales and Strategy, Bell, told Warrior.

The MV-75 tiltrotor, as contrasted with the Black Hawk, can hit speeds greater than 300 mph, according to the U.S. Army Western Hemisphere Command ; “The target speed or the requirements from the Army included a threshold and objective. We exceeded the thresholds by quite a bit. We'll see where the tactics, techniques and procedures fall out and how fast they choose to plan their missions at, but at the very least, it'll be twice that of what they can do now with their existing fleet,” Lazzara said.

 In terms of pure tactical reality, an 800-mile combat range completely changes the “reach” and “self-deployment” capabilities for Army aviation. The distance from the Southern Japanese Islands to the Northern Philippines is 400-to-600 miles depending on starting and ending points, and the distance from Southern Japan to Taiwan is also within the MV-75s range as it is several hundred miles. This means a formation of MV-75s could conduct missions across otherwise inaccessible regions of the Pacific, to include the collection of islands in the South China Sea. A Black Hawk operating with a combat range of roughly 320 miles simply cannot fly those crucial missions over water, so the MV-75 brings a transformative “self-deployment” capability.

“One of the things that we often don't do in the Army is self deployment. We typically require a level of dependency on our other services, particularly the Air Force and our Navy, particularly to help get us in and out of theaters. The Black Hawk, the Chinook, Apache, you know, almost all of them, we fly to a port and break them down or put them on the back of a C-17 or C-5 and fly them somewhere, whereas the self-deployment gives a certain level of autonomy that the Army has not had in the past. So a little bit less dependency there, which obviously enables creative problem solving in new ways,” Partridge said.

As a former U.S. Air Force Special Operations helicopter pilot, Lazzara offered a unique perspective on the operational margin of difference the MV-75 brings to combat.

“I learned this firsthand from my experience going from a regular assault helicopter  to a tiltrotor. It really opens up the aperture of the imagination, as there are things you can do now that you never really considered flying helicopters. If you’re thinking about the South China Sea or the South Pacific, well, one, how do you get there? Most helicopter forces, in fact, all helicopter forces are relying on other services or other assets to get their equipment to theater. There are now scenarios where the aircraft can self-deploy to the Pacific theater,” Lazzara said.

Partridge also explained that the Army continued refining new tactics and maneuvers during an exercise at Fort Polk, La., called Operation Lethal Eagle; this was a series of training and war preparation drills intended to prepare 101st Airborne soldiers for the kinds of new missions and capabilities the MV-75 introduces into the tactical equation.

“We used the total capability, the speed and the distance to put some early elements on the ground that we're doing reconnaissance ... .long distance reconnaissance. We leveraged the speed, the distance and the range capability there is to put soldiers on the ground in synchronization. Integrating this with the large plan proved to be pretty pivotal for the performance and the survivability of the ground forces that came in later on different platforms.” Partridge said.