Army aviation plays central role in Pacific
Chief Warrant Officer Wayne Griffin has spent 5-1/2 years of his decade-long career as an Army pilot based in Hawaii. The mountains, valleys and the long stretches of blue ocean between the islands serve up some of the most beautiful views a pilot can see — but they come with unique challenges, too.
“Flying here can be extremely varied,” he said. “You could start your day out with the sky being clear. And then, depending on the winds and weather, since we’re so far out in the middle of the ocean, things can dynamically change with the mountain structure that we have on the islands. So you could go from real nice weather to very heavy rain.”
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The military considers Hawaii an increasingly critical training ground and operational hub as tensions simmer in the Pacific. With its varied terrain and microclimates, the Army has been touting training ranges in the islands as ideal places to train soldiers in terrain similar to the areas they may be called to operate in.
As the Army looks to reorient its operations in the region, aviation is playing an increasingly central role — and the Army’s 25th Combat Aviation Brigade at Wheeler Army Airfield is leading the charge. Through the Army’s Operation Pathways — which sends U.S. troops to countries around the region and brings foreign troops to American bases to train — the brigade has helicopters deploying to multiple countries every year.
This year they participated in exercises Cobra Gold in Thailand and Balikatan in the Philippines nearly back to back, with more planned.
“A lot of this combat power that we’re building here on Oahu is so that the aircraft can go forward where there’s a very austere and immature footprint (where) we don’t have the hangars and all the parts and pieces that we have back here to sustain our fleet,” said Brigade commander Col. Rob Bryant. “They’re doing all of that forward in an austere environment over the Pathways rotation.”
During Balikatan, Army and Marine Corps helicopters ferried American and Philippine troops from U.S. Navy ships as they landed them on islands in the Luzon strait, just south of Taiwan.
The Marines have also been reorienting their operations in the region and are radically reshaping their force, including significant changes to its aircraft inventory in Hawaii as it seeks to return to its roots as a naval fighting force. But Bryant said he sees the future of Army aviation focusing on land operations in the Pacific supporting U.S. and allied troops that could find themselves operating anywhere from island chains to deep in the jungles, mountains and other environments around the region.
The 25th Aviation Brigade falls under the 25th Infantry Division at Schofield Barracks and primarily supports its operations in Hawaii, but portions of it are also in Alaska providing combat air support for the 11th Airborne Division. They all fall under U.S. Indo-Pacific Command’s large area of responsibility, which commanders describe as “spanning Bollywood to Hollywood and polar bears to penguins.”
“We also are integral in terms of advancing aviation and supporting the developments in the Arctic, and clearly, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that’s a very different operating environments,” Bryant said. He recalled that recently he flew to Alaska to check on operations during the frigid winter months and that “within 48 hours I was in 90-degree heat sitting in Thailand with our aviation task force … and that’s the scope and span of control of the aviation brigade, when it comes to how we operate and what we’re operating with.”
But the vast blue expanse of ocean that separates these places is an inescapable challenge for Army operations. Staff Sgt. Conner Horvath is an eight-year Army veteran who has been stationed in Hawaii twice and has spent his career as an aircraft “maintainer” keeping helicopters in shape to fly. For every pilot there are dozens of ground crew keeping their aircraft in working order.
Horvath said maintenance challenges in Hawaii include the salty air from the Pacific Ocean and the tropical humidity that can contribute to corrosion of helicopters and spare parts. He also notes that Hawaii’s geographic location as an island thousands of miles from North America introduces a “logistic aspect of getting parts out here in a timely manner.”
