The Marine Corps is facing “significant” challenges keeping some of its most important weapons in working order, because Marines too often must rely on contractors for equipment upkeep, the service’s second-ranking general recently wrote to a Senate panel.

Gen. Bradford Gering, the Marine Corps assistant commandant, described for the Armed Services Committee cases involving several high-profile military systems — including parts for communications terminals and for armored vehicles — that Marines sometimes wait months for contractors to fix, when Marines could complete the repair in days or even hours for a fraction of the price if they controlled the data.

“Sustaining Marines in contested environments is as critical as sensing the enemy or maintaining command and control,” Gering wrote in responses to questions from Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., a member of the Armed Services Committee, that were viewed by CQ Roll Call.

Warren, in an emailed statement, said Gering’s input underscores the need for changes in how the Defense Department and its contractors maintain military systems.

“Military leaders are continuing to sound the alarm that repair restrictions threaten our military readiness,” Warren said. “These new examples are more evidence that greedy contractors are scamming our military and wasting taxpayer dollars.”

Questions for the record

Warren had submitted the questions to Gering after a March hearing of the committee’s Readiness and Management Support Subcommittee. The general’s replies arrived late last month.

Warren and Sen. Tim Sheehy, R-Mont., have championed a so-called right-to-repair provision in the fiscal 2027 NDAA that would give the military services more control over the data they need to maintain their systems more rapidly than they do today and at lower cost. Their provision would expand the military’s access to repair materials, hold accountable companies that falsely assert restrictions and permit the military to contract with companies other than the original system manufacturers to perform repairs in wartime and contingency operations.

A similar provision by Reps. Maggie Goodlander, D-N.H., and Pat Harrigan, R-N.C., is part of the House’s fiscal 2027 NDAA.

The Senate plans to start debating its NDAA as soon as next week, starting with consideration of procedural motions. The Senate Armed Services Committee approved the measure last month.

The House would also like to move onto its own NDAA as soon as next week, but Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., has been unable to overcome internal GOP fissures to secure adoption of a rule governing floor debate.

Military support

Civilian and uniformed leaders from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on down have supported shifting control over data rights from industry to the government to increase competition, reduce prices and ensure troops can fix their equipment on the battlefield.

The department has begun to make some changes along those lines but many lawmakers believe a statutory change is required.

Warren and Sheehy wrote Armed Services leaders in May to summarize the armed forces’ support for their measure.

The White House, for its part, supported the changes in broad terms last year but has not signed off completely on any particular legislative approach.

But defense contractor lobbyists have so far blocked any statutory overhaul. They have been pushing back hard against the provisions, which they believe threaten industry’s intellectual property and its incentives to innovate.

Rep. Mike D. Rogers, R-Ala., the House Armed Services Committee chairman, has been sympathetic to the industry’s concerns.

Late last year, the defense contractors successfully killed a right-to-repair proposal in the final negotiations over the fiscal 2026 NDAA.

The issue is shaping up to be one of the big defense fights looming in the coming months, as lawmakers hope the NDAA can be enacted for the 66th consecutive year.

Bering’s description of the costs of the current system could influence that debate.

Top Marine Corps systems

Gering’s responses stand out for detailing the concrete impacts on particular weapons that are central to Marine Corps war plans.

When he was asked directly about the Warren-Sheehy right-to-repair provision, Gering said its approach would benefit the Marine Corps.

“Obtaining a license for Government Purpose Rights in the underlying technical data for Marine Corps systems would improve readiness, decrease life cycle costs, and enhance the Marine Corps’ ability to perform organic maintenance and repairs,” Gering wrote.

Because the Marine Corps is reliant on contractors to fix certain systems as a result of data restrictions, Marines have to wait too long and pay too much to fix several of their most important pieces of equipment, Gering said.

One such system, he said, is the Amphibious Combat Vehicle program, which fields armored vehicles that can operate on both the water and land.

Gering cited a panel in the driver’s compartment of the amphibious vehicle where key system controls are located.

The panel “costs $3,040.88 to replace and takes approximately eight months for the repair via support from a secondary repairables exchange contract,” he said. “With access to an original part, however, the repair cycle could be reduced to less than one month — a trained Marine could repair this component in approximately four hours.”

Deployed communications

Another key system affected are the masts that hold antennas for Mobile User Objective System terminals. These terminals link Marines who are on foot or in vehicles to communications satellites, providing the troops with smartphone-like voice and data connections to command posts that are beyond the line of sight.

Marines were able to develop their own replacement mast that can be built for $10 in 10 hours, whereas a replacement mast from the original manufacturer “could cost up to $5,644.37 and take more than seven months to deliver,” Gering said — adding that the Marine Corps’ mast is “more durable than the original version.”

Gering said the Marine Corps has also found “additional costs and delays associated with the maintenance challenges resulting from restrictions on maintaining” the service’s Ground/Air Task Oriented Radar, Medium Tactical Vehicle Replacement and certain communications systems.

Such restrictions have “significantly inflated sustainment costs,” Gering wrote. “By reducing our sole-source dependencies, we can ensure that our equipment is maintained on our timeline rather than being constrained by vendor availability. Ultimately, these authorities would allow us to be more agile in our sustainment and drive higher readiness rates across the Force.”