combat aircraft

Rules are, there are no rules. I want you

to screw with the Russians, because

they’re going to be watching you real hard, and

so is the navy

Col (ret’d) Bill Spicer

Above right:

Stacked up with

Zuni 5in forward-

firing rockets and

Mk77 firebombs,

these VMA-513

AV-8As are ready

for action.

Below: An AV-8A

taxiing out of

its ‘hide’ at

Twentynine Palms

with live Mk82s

under its wings.

VMA‑231 also proved that the Harrier

could maintain a high sortie rate, with

shorter intervals between take‑ofs and

landings than its conventional shipmates

as well as being able to recover aboard

ship regardless of wind direction. This

meant the Roosevelt could remain

committed to its plan of intended

movement without having to change

course into wind for recovery operations.

‘Harrier carrier’

In the early 1980s, the US Navy was failing

to make good on a NATO obligation

to have two carriers on patrol in the

Mediterranean at all times. At an unrelated

event in Washington DC, the Secretary

of the Navy, chief of naval operations,

and commandant of the Marine Corps

discussed the matter. They agreed the

solution was to put two Harrier squadrons

aboard an LHA to make it look like a

big‑deck. It fell upon VMA‑231 and

VMA‑542 to provide the aircraft, pilots, and

maintainers to make it happen. Bill Spicer

was the commanding oicer of VMA‑231

at the time, and had just returned from

a shipboard deployment to the North

a V/STOL aircraft could operate from
ships much smaller than a conventional
big‑deck aircraft carrier. Though NAVAIR’s
opposition to the Harrier was well known,
the chief of naval operations (CNO) in the
early 1970s, ADM Elmo Zumwalt, quickly
found a use for the AV‑8A. Zumwalt’s
pet project during his tenure as CNO
was the sea control ship (SCS), intended
for convoy escort and anti‑submarine
warfare (ASW). While the program —
like UK‑based training for Marine Corps
Harrier pilots — was scrapped under
post‑Vietnam budget cuts, the concept
did get far enough to include an at‑sea
trial utilizing the USS Guam (LPH 9), a
short‑deck amphibious assault ship, from
January to July 1974. For this trial, Guam’s
air wing consisted of a mix of navy H‑3
Sea King helicopters and marine AV‑8As
from VMA‑513. With this being the irst
at‑sea deployment of USMC AV‑8As, it
helped that VMA‑513 was top‑heavy
with test pilots, as the work done prior to
and during this evaluation established
the foundation that future Harrier
maritime operational procedures would
be built on.
The second major at‑sea test for
the Harrier came in June 1976, when
VMA‑231 embarked upon the USS
Franklin D. Roosevelt (CV 42) as part of
Carrier Air Wing 19 (CVW‑19) for a six‑
month Mediterranean cruise, the intent
being to prove that V/STOL aircraft could
successfully integrate with a ixed‑wing
CVW. During this cruise, the Harrier
participated in a broad range of missions,
from training for close air support
(CAS) and surface attack to real‑world
intercepts of Soviet bombers.

http://www.combataircraft.net // December 2018 71