C-17 SkyCrane delivers Gavin's KIWI Pod BATTLEBOXes

Lieutenant General James M. Gavin in his 1947 book, Airborne Warfare:

http://www.combatreform.org/airbornewarfare.htm

explained that the most efficient way to be loaded and ready-to-fight is to already be in a KIWI POD; and the fastest way to get this stuff to the ground is not to pull it out break-bulk from inside a fuselage but to DROP THE ENTIRE KIWI POD. If you drop the pod, you don't have risks of getting caught up inside the fuselage.

We have Gavin's KIWI pods today--they are called ISO shipping containers. These containers can be made into "BATTLERBOXes" for specific Army missions like being bunkers for troops to live in as well as carry everything the Army needs to fight etc.

http://www.geocities.com/strategicmaneuver/battleboxes.htm

The early-model Sikorsky CH-54 SkyCrane VTOL helicopter was ahead of its time but required special expensive lightweight pods to conserve its limited 15-ton payload that the Army couldn't afford to buy. The Army today doesn't need costly single-application pods, there are millions of ISOs that can travel by land, sea or air available at less than $5, 000 each. What the Army needs is the USAF to do its damn job and supply a fixed-wing SkyCrane-type transport plane that can deliver 100 tons and drop its BATTLEBOXes with extreme STOL "cow pasture" landing capabilities.

This is a bugaboo because the fighter-bomber jock USAF wants to win wars by firepower bombing and doesn't give a damn about helping the Army to win wars by maneuver. The USAF has for over 6 decades refused to supply the Army with a plane that can land on any cow pasture by conveniently only creating runway dependant transports that could parachute airdrop things IF the Army takes the time to rig them with expensive and costly parachutes. This is fine to take a drop zone by assault but afterwards for RESUPPLY the USAF wants a secure and smooth, long 3, 000 foot minimum runway which places Army Paratroopers in a suicidal position of first having to take a heavily-defended airfield or build one from scratch. The latter is do-able but it takes TIME we may not have provided us by a lazy enemy.

All of this complication can be solved by creating a C-17 SkyCrane derivative that can carry and DROP 10 x 20-foot BATTLEBOXes from very low altitude as in ZERO---because the plane itself touches ground only by a small air cushion and as it flies forward, ISO containers are dropped in sequence from back-to-front without ANY special parachutes or platforms. The BATTLEBOXes might be lined with SKEDCO plastic on the bottom to slide easier along the ground---but that's it. The KIWI Pod C-17 doesn't need a smooth surface for landing gear wheels because its Air Cushion Landing System (ACLS)

http://www.combatreform.org/c130.htm

enables it to land on any roughly flat unprepared surface to then commence BATTLEBOX dropping from such a low actual height that no position-righting parachutes are needed nor any parachutes to pull them out from the fuselage BECAUSE THERE IS NO FUSELAGE FLOOR! There will not be any LAPES/Sicily Drop Zone type accidents; after the C-17 SkyCrane has dropped its BATTLEBOXes, it takes-off and leaves the assault zone even if its considered "secure" because we don't want the bottleneck of "MOG rate" that occurs when wheel landing gear planes need to after landing taxi back to an upwind take-off position, hogging up the runway. With C-17 SkyCranes there wouldn't be any runways---just an open area with lanes marked on it so multiple C-17s can essentially touch 'n go and drop their BATTLEBOXes.

After the C-17 SkyCrane takes-off from its designated lane, 10 x special M113 Gavins tracked armored fighting vehicles with forklift tines on their front bulldozer blades drive to the 10 x BATTLEBOXes and pick them up like the video game "Pac-Man" and drive them to the collection point, clearing that SkyCrane lane for another pod drop-off sortie.

The C-17 SkyCrane-BATTLEBOX would dramatically speed the delivery of supplies to Army forces because there'd be no parachute/shock absorber rigging cost/complication and at 5 tons+ per BATTLEBOX there'd be plenty of ammo, food, water to grab by simply opening the doors of the ISO containers and getting what you need. The Army just has to grab the entire BATTLEBOX and move it to where it wants it, to include arranging them as walls to create fortified forward operating bases. All that requires for this to occur is for Congress to order and fund Industry/USAF to create and field C-17 SkyCranes to provide the EFFICIENCY up-front to deliver containerized supplies without having to work around built-in cargo volume fuselages--current transport aircraft are like old fashioned cargo ships but need to become containerized to be maximally efficient like the container ships the entire world depends on.

Our book, "Air-Mech-Strike: Asymmetric Maneuver Warfare for the 21st Century":

http://books.google.com/books?id=RCWtHnYZ0LMC&pg

Category:

Autos & Vehicles

Tags:

• kiwi
• pods
• james
• gavin
• airborne
• c-17
• containers
• army
• usaf
• battlebox

[FoxTacticalResponse]

You'll never get the plane to do both STOL and use a hover skirt (the skirt itself will be quite an engineering feat.) The problem is the high angle of attack necessary for STOL work. You'd be hard pressed to land on a cushion at slow speeds (and high angles.) Flat-landing defeats STOL due to the inevitably high speed that results. Rotating the wings causes issues with center of balance and low mounted wings for increased WIG-effect reduces usability for "cow pasture" landing.

[dynmicpara]

@FoxTacticalResponse Already been done: flare for landing followed by hover skirt. Go to c130 dot htm web page in video description for details.

[hurdleman48]

The Air Force does its damn job, the biggest problem is that the Army can't share equipment and the Air Force spends 90% of it time moving in equipment and taking out exact smae equipment 'owned' by someone else. I lost count how many HMMWV's I've 'swapped out' cuz the Army can't share. If they would also prioritize also it would go smoother. Giving ammunition and chow hall 'To-Go' containers the same priority code sure does slow done the ability to get the vital supplies in a timely manner.

[wkrstf]

Words fail me.

[astrialkil]

This is a truly great vid.!..how i missed it till now is beyond me. Great graphics!

[dragon825]

brits use this system a lot for ground movement, placed on the back of drops vehicles, also use the marshall shelter which is same size but has folding floor and walls so it doubles in size when demounted and opened

[dynmicpara]

What would you ike to know?

[dynmicpara]

8 x 20 footers.

[dynmicpara]

We could just make the bottom open to facilitate the BATTLEBOXes being dropped out.

[ihateforigners]

Can you explain that further?

[ihateforigners]

Did you take out the fuselage ( like the CH-54 skycrane) or did you leave it on?

[ihateforigners]

How many ISO containers are carried? What size? 20ft or 40ft?