1 AIR FORCE ASSOCIATION ANNUAL AIR & SPACE CONFERENCE AND TECHNOLOGY ...

42 Pages·2014·0.15 MB·English

AIR FORCE ASSOCIATION

ANNUAL AIR & SPACE CONFERENCE AND TECHNOLOGY EXPOSITION
2014

FOUR STAR FORUM

Wednesday, September 17, 2014

National Harbor, Maryland

1
LIST OF PARTICIPANTS

LIEUTENANT GENERAL GEORGE K. MUELLNER
Chairman, Board of Directors
Air Force Association

GENERAL MARK A. WELSH III
Chief of Staff

LIEUTENANT GENERAL JAMES JACKSON
Chief, Air Force Reserve

GENERAL JANET C. WOLFENBARGER
Commander, Air Force Materiel Command

GENERAL HAWK CARLISLE
Commander, Pacific Air Forces

LIEUTENANT GENERAL STEPHEN WILSON
Commander, Air Force Global Strike Command

LIEUTENANT GENERAL STANLEY E. CLARKE III
Director, Air National Guard

GENERAL MICHAEL HOSTAGE
Commander, Air Combat Command

GENERAL ROBIN RAND
Commander, Air Education and Training Command

GENERAL DARREN W. McDEW
Commander, Air Mobility Command

GENERAL JOHN E. HYTEN
Commander, Air Force Space Command

CHIEF MASTER SERGEANT JAMES A CODY
Air Force

LIEUTENANT GENERAL BRAD HEITHOLD
Special Operations Command

2
FOUR STAR FORUM

GEN. MUELLNER: Well, folks, welcome to what has
become a tradition here at AFA and our kind of closing
event. We bring everybody together. This is the Four
Start Forum. This is where in this case the moderator
doesn't get only one step higher, I guess, that's it. The
Chief-of-staff is going to moderate this one. So all the
questions that are coming up here can get routed directly
to him. He throws the soft balls out and only passes down
the hard ones. So chief, over to you.

GEN. WELSH: Thank you, sir. And thank for
everything for the last few days, this has been fantastic.

GEN. MUELLNER: Thank you.

GEN. WELSH: And I think I speak for everybody at the
table when I say how much we've enjoyed the chance to
interface with our industry partners, how much we've
enjoyed the chance to see each other, to visit with the
command chiefs, 12 outstanding airmen, lot of our great
young ROTC cadets and the future leaders of our Air Force.
So thank you so much to everybody for being here.

And we always really enjoy the chance to come and get
counseled and mentored and corrected by the -- our
heritage leaders of our Air Force who are, so many of whom
are here today and taught us about the business from the
time we came in the door. It's always a huge thrill to
see you.

Questions should be flowing my way momentarily, or we
can start asking them from the audience, if you would
like, until we get the paper copies. But why don't I
start the action by just asking one myself. And I'll just
pick somebody at the end of the table and ask them. Yeah,
nobody is making eye contact, I'm noticing.

(Laughter)

GEN. WELSH: Why don't I ask JJ Jackson to tell you
what is the biggest move forward that he's seen in the Air
Force Reserve or in the Air Force's use of the Air Force
3
Reserve during his tenure?

GEN. JACKSON: Thank you, Chief. I appreciate the
opportunity.

Chief, the biggest move I've seen in my 2-year tenure
here, Chief, has been basically the ability to go ahead
and make the decision I believe to use the Air Force
Reserve, Air National Guard and active duty airmen in
support of combatant commander requirements. We slapped
the table on that about a year and a half ago, I think,
and I think that's what's going to happen, it's going to
improve the ability for our citizen airmen to go ahead and
be more predictive in what they're going to do in the
future. It's also going to allow us to provide, I
believe, more notification to our employers. But most of
all, it's going to take care of all of our airmen, active
duty guard and reserve to allow them to spend more time
obviously, focused on training and readiness because we'll
have a larger pool of manpower that we're going to use
against that requirement.

GEN. WELSH: Thanks JJ.

One for General Wolfenbarger. The fleet has been
dramatically reduced in the last eight years by hundreds
of aircraft. Is it time to think about consolidating some
of the depots, why or why not?

GEN. WOLFENBARGER: Hawk tells me that was a soft
ball. Did you want to answer that, Hawk?

(Laughter)

GEN. WOLFENBARGER: Okay.

Let me just say this, we have gone through down-
sizing over the years, over many years, relative to our
Air Force in a whole lot of different capacities and
certainly our depots was one of those prime areas in which
we have placed a spotlight in the past. I would tell you
that based on what I have seen as the Air Force material
command commander that we are just right right now. We
have three depots who are very active in the work that
4
they do. And as General Litchfield will say, they are
looking for more work as they become world class at the
depot maintenance and supply chain activities that execute
at those three locations. So if you were to ask my
opinion, my opinion is we don't want to downsize anymore,
we've got it right in the number of depots that we have in
our Air Force.

GEN. WELSH: Thank you, Janet.

Since Hawk thought that was an easy one, let's try
this one big guy. Back in the '90s the Pentagon thought
about having huge modular floating platforms big enough
that C-130s could operate them, specifically to use in
Pacific scenarios. Give the need to spread your forces
around the Pacific, beyond Kadena and Anderson which have
fixed coordinates, is that an idea whose time may be
coming again?

GEN. CARLISLE: Yeah, I didn't join the Navy, Chief,
I'm not -- that whole floating thing doesn't strike a
great idea. I think the biggest factor in the resiliency
of the pacific is our ability to move into different
places. We use the term places, not bases. But as we
work our relationships, our forward presence, our
engagements with all our friends and partners, if you go
from Northeast Asia and Japan and Korea through obviously
the Philippines, Australia, Indonesia and Malaysia,
Singapore, Thailand, we have expanded, even growing now
and potentially in India, so I think you get a vast number
of locations to upgrade air power, land-based air power in
the Pacific.

Those distances are a challenge and we know that, and
that's one of the things we're working on. But the answer
in resiliency in the Pacific is more places and more
places to operate out of, which is you get to that
position by engagement and relationships and being present
in the theater to be able to engage out of more areas. So
to me that's a whole lot better than floating around in
the Pacific.

GEN. WELSH: Thank you, sir.

5
Seve Wilson, the secretary just announced Monday that
your folks in Global Strike Command, some of them will
start receiving special duty pay for their work in the
nuclear business. How can the Air Force afford to pay
Special Duty Assignment Pay when we had to cut 16,000 plus
airmen from our ranks to maintain training and readiness?

GEN. WILSON: Well, chief, you know, our nuclear
forces take on some really special skill and
responsibility. I like to tell people that when you look
at the things that they work with, today an airmen may be
working on a Mark 21 warhead. Each one of those warheads
is the equivalent of a 150,000 MOPs. That's the enormous
power and responsibility that they have. And so we're
trying to recruit, retrain, and incentivize the nuclear
force with -- I think you and the secretary, we talked
about it's a consistent focused attention and resources.
And for lots of our airmen who do special skill and
responsibility, we provide special duty assignment pay and
so we're looking to do that same things for those nuclear
airmen who posses that same skill and responsibility.
They're doing a really vitally important mission for our
nation.

GEN. WELSH: Thanks, Seve.

One for our director of the Air National Guard, Sid
Clarke. Does it seem like the Air Force has been
successful in mending its relationships with governors and
the TAGs? If that's still a work in progress, what do
they want to see that they still haven't gotten from
Headquarters Air Force?

GEN. CLARKE: Thanks, Chief. Yes, I would say that
the relationship is outstanding. I like to tell people
that I have a great relationship with my wife, but that
doesn't keep me from having heated discussions with my
wife, but we're family and we work on the issues, we find
the best solution set. And I would tell you that
adjutants general are very proud to be a part of the Air
Force, they're very proud of their airmen, they continue
to support mobilization and encourage volunteerism, work
with the employers, have concerns about the families, and
we continue to support the United States Air Force the
6
best way we can. And I would tell you that the
relationship is outstanding. The thanks goes to Secretary
James and yourself.

GEN. WELSH: Give yourself some credit there, Sidney.
Lot of hard work by Sid Clarke to help keep us moving in
the right direction here, along with a whole herd of great
TAGs and (inaudible).

A quick question for Mike Hostage at Air Combat
Command. What can be done with the money that you've got
to keep the fourth generation fleet credible and capable
without doing major upgrades?

GEN. HOSTAGE: Well, our challenge, Chief, as you
well know is that with the zero-sum game and the reduction
in budget we had to choose either recapitalization or
refurbishment. And we're going down the path of
refurbishing or recapitalizing the fleet by pushing the F-
35 as our one of our key programs. And I've had to
sacrifice the refurbishment of the legacy fleet to get
there.

The problem is we need that legacy capacity out to
the end of the next decade in order to have the volume
required to meet the combatant commandeered requirements.
We will need that fifth generation in order for the fourth
generation to even be viable. So this is not a matter of
one or the other. You got to have them both to have the
volume. But without the fifth gen the fourth gen is going
to be pointless by the middle of the next decade.

So I viewed the recapitalization as existential. I
need the refurbishment to have the volume. But worse
comes to worst, we will still have the firth generation
fleet if the legacy fleet dies off. But sadly, you know,
given the budgets that we just turned in, we had to -- we
had to give up on most of the refurbishment of the legacy
fleet. There are certain key elements that we're trying
to hang on to but -- and they deal with the F-15C fleet
because air superiority, we have a very limited number of
assets to produce air superiority, and we need that F-15C
fleet. But unfortunately our F-16 fleet, the capability
extension program, the SLEP, the Service Life Extension
7
Programs, have taken some pretty heavy hits, but --

GEN. WELSH: Okay. For Robin Rand in Air Education
and Training Command. Robin, how are we evolving cyber
education and training to meet the rapid pace of
technology change?

GEN. RAND: Chief, I think we're coordinating as much
as we can. And I have the benefit of having Twenty-Fourth
Air Force right there at Lackland. And so we're working
with them, we're certainly support -- soliciting feedback
and inputs from Ed Wilson and his lawyers in Twenty-Fourth
Air Force and Cyber and we're pedaling fast, but it's a
fast-moving game, as you talked about yesterday. So I
know there is more work to do and we have a review going
on right now as we speak. They're at Keesler, that's
where most of the school house training is done, is at
Keesler. And so I'll give you an update when I -- when we
come back in February at Orlando on what we're doing.

GEN. WELSH: Okay. Thanks, Robin.

For Darren McDew. If sequester is repealed, do you
see a requirement for something like the C-27 returning,
especially in a homeland security role?

GEN. McDEW: Well, first of all, Chief, let me start
by saying that I'm actually taller than four-foot-five and
you can't tell it by --

(Laughter)

GEN. McDEW: The gave me the low chair again. I
thought that was over since last Corona.

(Laughter)

GEN. McDEW: This Corona we have John here. So
anyway.

If sequestration is repealed, we have many needs, we
have a lot of things in the budget that we need to take a
look at. We need to look at the resourcing of the tankers
obviously to see how many of them we'll have in the fleet
8
and what the composition will be going forward as we bring
on the KC-46. We have to look at some things in the out
years on what the C-130 fleet and our tactical airlift
fleet will look like. Could it involve something like a
C-27? Who knows? Everything is open. However, what
we've got to do is figure out what the Army is going to
need for lift going forward to determine what's the best
platform to use going forward. I rather not look too much
into the past than see what's in the future.

GEN. WELSH: Thanks, Darren. You probably know this,
I'm not trying to answer any questions. So let me answer
this one. Do you envision any new uniforms coming down
the line?

(Laughter)

GEN. WELSH: Yeah, just the ceremonial. We're still
working on that. No.

One for Robin Rand. Let me come back to this. Has
the Air Force decreased its uniformed and civilian
personnel? Do you think you will turn over more training
to contractors, and if so in what general areas?

GEN. RAND: I was asked a similar question. And if
with the force shaping we're going through how that will
affect, if it will affect AETC. And I can honestly say I
don't think it's going to affect these cuts that we're
going through now. I'm not envisioning any cuts.

But I would tell you, Chief, I think it is worth a
discussion. And I'm going to start that as if we could
augment into our undergraduate flying training what we
have done with simulators and academic instructors, if we
could augment a percentage of some of our great retired
aviators that have time and still desire to get if they
could come and augment into the instructor cadre. I think
it's a discussion that should occur.

I don't think -- yeah, General Hostage is a
volunteer. But it has to be done thoughtfully. So I
think that's a discussion that I actually am working at
right now with the staff. And we're going to run that up
9
the flagpole. But we'll be okay, I think, with what you
need us to do. We've got the right number of folks and
we'll be okay. We're going to work through.

We did take a bit of a hit with some of our mobility
air crews and pilots who took advantage of the VSP. We're
working through that and we'll get through that without
any loss of PFT through the spring in large measure
because JJ and Sid's guys are stepping up and going to
give us a little more of their traditional guardsmen and
reservists are going to put in some extra days for us as
we work through some of that at some of our T-1 in -- at
Otis with the C-17 folks.

GEN. WELSH: Okay. Thanks, Robin.

For John Hyten. Do you anticipate any problems with
procuring the new Space Fence and do you have adequate
coverage in the meantime?

GEN. HYTEN: So the new Space Fence thankfully was,
contract was awarded just this summer. So we're just
starting down that path. Any time you start down a path
where you're going to build probably the largest radar
that we've ever built to do space surveillance, you should
have concerns. Nonetheless, the program that was
structured, that was run by the PEO of Space and General
Polakowski really reduced the risk with the two
contractors as we went down through that. The risk was
reduced at a level where it not only reduced the risk, but
it put us into a certain price contract arrangement where
we believe we can deliver the capability for the price
we're talking about and we're confident we can deliver the
schedule.

Nonetheless, the environment in the Pacific is a
difficult environment to work in. There is lots of
humidity when you're right there on Kwajalein.
Nonetheless, I can be as confident as I can be because
we're off to as good a start as you can on a program like
that. Thanks, Chief.

GEN. WELSH: Thank you, John.

10