The Navy’s timeframe for initially fielding the aircraft-carrier based Unmanned Carrier-Launched Surveillance and Strike (UCLASS) aircraft has been delayed by at least two years, the service said Monday as it rolled out its spending request for fiscal 2016.
Rear Adm. Rear Adm. William Lescher, the Navy’s top budget officer, told reporters that the new schedule for UCLASS has initial operational capability (IOC) now set for 2022-2023 range. The Navy had targeted IOC for 2020.
Lescher said the delay was associated with the Pentagon’s overall review of intelligence, reconnaissance and surveillance assets and future capability requirements. He described it as a “brief pause” to review UCLASS role in the area of ISR.
The Navy was expected to begin the industry competition to build UCLASS with the release of a request for proposals in September, but those plans appear to have been indefinitely put off as senior Pentagon officials wanted to take another look at UCLASS.
There has been debate, including within Congress, as to whether UCLASS should have a greater strike capability in addition to ISR than the Navy has planned, and a refueling capacity.
Earlier in 2014 the Navy released a draft RFP to the four industry teams competing on the program, and took the unusual step of keeping it from the public by classifying it as “for official use only.”
The four companies are currently under early design contracts with Naval Air Systems Command. They are Boeing [BA], General Atomics, Lockheed Martin [LMT] and Northrop Grumman [NOC].
Northrop Grumman has been the prime contractor for the X-47B unmanned aircraft that have been tested on carriers as a precursor to the UCLASS program.