MR. REED: Madam President, I rise in support of the Lieberman-McCain amendment. I commend both of them for their efforts in this regard. This represents part of what I believe Secretary Gates is trying to do, which is to focus on immediate consequential threats and necessary equipment while we continue to maintain deterrents for the future.
This second engine has not been fully validated by the Secretary of Defense. This amendment requires such validation. In addition, one of the aspects of the underlying legislation is that the alternate engine for the Joint Strike Fighter would be paid for in part by taking away funds to purchase additional UH-1Y helicopters for the Marine Corps. This request was in the President's budget. These helicopters are absolutely critical to ongoing operations in Afghanistan and throughout the world. The wear and tear on equipment, particularly in Afghanistan and Iraq, has been considerable. If we don't upgrade or repair these pieces of equipment on a regular basis, we will not have the lift to combat our opponents across the globe.
By comparison, right now in Great Britain there is an argument about the sufficiency of helicopters their forces have. We don't want to get into such an argument down the road. We want to make sure our forces in the field have the equipment they need to carry the fight to our opponents.
I think this amendment is extremely well crafted. It puts the money where it should be to help our tactical airlift, marines particularly, helicopter airlift. It requires the Secretary to justify and validate that a second engine would reduce the whole life cycle cost and improve the operational readiness of the F-35. We should go forward with helicopters and let the Secretary make a judgment about the efficacy of the second engine.
I thank the Senator for yielding to me.
