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i 

87–615 2014

[H.A.S.C. No. 113–83] 

HEARING 

ON

NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT 

FOR FISCAL YEAR 2015 

AND

OVERSIGHT OF PREVIOUSLY AUTHORIZED 

PROGRAMS 

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

FULL COMMITTEE HEARING 

ON

FISCAL YEAR 2015 NATIONAL DEFENSE 

AUTHORIZATION BUDGET REQUESTS 

FROM THE U.S. PACIFIC COMMAND, 

U.S. CENTRAL COMMAND, AND 

U.S. AFRICA COMMAND 

HEARING HELD 

MARCH 5, 2014 
(II) 

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 

ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS

HOWARD P. ‘‘BUCK’’ MCKEON, California, Chairman 

MAC THORNBERRY, Texas 

WALTER B. JONES, North Carolina 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia 

JEFF MILLER, Florida 

JOE WILSON, South Carolina 

FRANK A. LOBIONDO, New Jersey 

ROB BISHOP, Utah 

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio 

JOHN KLINE, Minnesota 

MIKE ROGERS, Alabama 

TRENT FRANKS, Arizona 

BILL SHUSTER, Pennsylvania 

K. MICHAEL CONAWAY, Texas 

DOUG LAMBORN, Colorado 

ROBERT J. WITTMAN, Virginia 

DUNCAN HUNTER, California 

JOHN FLEMING, Louisiana 

MIKE COFFMAN, Colorado 

E. SCOTT RIGELL, Virginia 

CHRISTOPHER P. GIBSON, New York 

VICKY HARTZLER, Missouri 

JOSEPH J. HECK, Nevada 

JON RUNYAN, New Jersey 

AUSTIN SCOTT, Georgia 

STEVEN M. PALAZZO, Mississippi 

MO BROOKS, Alabama 

RICHARD B. NUGENT, Florida 

KRISTI L. NOEM, South Dakota 

PAUL COOK, California 

JIM BRIDENSTINE, Oklahoma 

BRAD R. WENSTRUP, Ohio 

JACKIE WALORSKI, Indiana 

BRADLEY BYRNE, Alabama 

ADAM SMITH, Washington 

LORETTA SANCHEZ, California 

MIKE MCINTYRE, North Carolina 

ROBERT A. BRADY, Pennsylvania 

SUSAN A. DAVIS, California 

JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island 

RICK LARSEN, Washington 

JIM COOPER, Tennessee 

MADELEINE Z. BORDALLO, Guam 

JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut 

DAVID LOEBSACK, Iowa 

NIKI TSONGAS, Massachusetts 

JOHN GARAMENDI, California 

HENRY C. ‘‘HANK’’ JOHNSON, JR., Georgia 

COLLEEN W. HANABUSA, Hawaii 

JACKIE SPEIER, California 

RON BARBER, Arizona 

ANDRE ́ CARSON, Indiana 

CAROL SHEA-PORTER, New Hampshire 

DANIEL B. MAFFEI, New York 

DEREK KILMER, Washington 

JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas 

TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois 

SCOTT H. PETERS, California 

WILLIAM L. ENYART, Illinois 

PETE P. GALLEGO, Texas 

MARC A. VEASEY, Texas 

ROBERT L. SIMMONS II, Staff Director 

ALEX GALLO, Professional Staff Member 

MIKE CASEY, Professional Staff Member 

AARON FALK, Clerk 
(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF HEARINGS 

2014 

Page 

HEARING: 

Wednesday, March 5, 2014, Fiscal Year 2015 National Defense Authorization 

Budget Requests from the U.S. Pacific Command, U.S. Central Command, 

and U.S. Africa Command ................................................................................... 1 

APPENDIX: 

Wednesday, March 5, 2014 ..................................................................................... 47 

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 5, 2014 

FISCAL YEAR 2015 NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION BUDGET 

REQUESTS FROM THE U.S. PACIFIC COMMAND, U.S. CENTRAL COMMAND, AND U.S. AFRICA COMMAND 

STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS 

McKeon, Hon. Howard P. ‘‘Buck,’’ a Representative from California, Chairman, Committee on Armed Services .................................................................. 1 

Smith, Hon. Adam, a Representative from Washington, Ranking Member, 

Committee on Armed Services ............................................................................ 2 

WITNESSES 

Austin, GEN Lloyd J., III, USA, Commander, U.S. Central Command ............. 5 

Locklear, ADM Samuel J., USN, Commander, U.S. Pacific Command .............. 4 

Rodriguez, GEN David M., USA, Commander, U.S. Africa Command ............... 7 

APPENDIX 

PREPARED STATEMENTS: 

Austin, GEN Lloyd J., III ................................................................................ 82 

Locklear, ADM Samuel J. ................................................................................ 56 

McKeon, Hon. Howard P. ‘‘Buck’’ .................................................................... 51 

Rodriguez, GEN David M. ............................................................................... 129 

Smith, Hon. Adam ............................................................................................ 53 

DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD: 

[There were no Documents submitted.] 

WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING THE HEARING: 

Mrs. Davis ......................................................................................................... 147 

Mr. Turner ........................................................................................................ 147 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING: 

Ms. Duckworth .................................................................................................. 155 

Mr. Lamborn ..................................................................................................... 154 

Mr. LoBiondo .................................................................................................... 153 

Mr. McKeon ....................................................................................................... 151 

Mr. Shuster ....................................................................................................... 153 

Ms. Speier ......................................................................................................... 154 
Page

IV 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING—Continued 

Ms. Tsongas ...................................................................................................... 153 

Mrs. Walorski ................................................................................................... 155 
(1) 

FISCAL YEAR 2015 NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION BUDGET REQUESTS FROM THE U.S. PACIFIC 

COMMAND, U.S. CENTRAL COMMAND, AND U.S. AFRICA 

COMMAND 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES, Washington, DC, Wednesday, March 5, 2014. 

The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:03 a.m., in room 

2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Howard P. ‘‘Buck’’ 

McKeon (chairman of the committee) presiding. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. HOWARD P. ‘‘BUCK’’ MCKEON, 

A REPRESENTATIVE FROM CALIFORNIA, CHAIRMAN, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 

The CHAIRMAN. The committee will come to order. 

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. The committee meets today 

to receive testimony on the fiscal year 2015 National Defense Authorization budget request for the U.S. Pacific Command, U.S. Central Command, U.S. Africa Command. 

Joining us today are Admiral Samuel Locklear, General Lloyd 

Austin, and General David Rodriguez. Thank you for being with us. 

Admiral Locklear, thank you for adapting your schedule to accommodate the Mid-Atlantic snow and ice. 

He is not here, but one of my good friends that sits on this committee from Minnesota told me he was for global warming now. 

They have had 50 days below zero this winter. 

The scope of this hearing is immense and it is doubtful that we 

will address all of the important issues we have here today, so I 

encourage members to submit questions for the record. 

However, I do think the composite views of these three commanders provides an interesting and interactive opportunity to discuss the changing strategic environment, the global demand for 

forces, the implications of budget cuts and force reductions and risk 

among the commands. 

Today’s hearing is a study in contrast. The crisis unfolding in 

Ukraine is a sobering reminder that military strength, presence, 

and staying power in the world still matter. 

And just yesterday, we received a budget request and new defense strategy that continues to cut our military strength and reduces our ability to respond to crises around the world. 

The President’s assumption that the tide of war is receding and 

that we can safely reduce American hard power in favor of soft 

power to assure our national security lies in stark contrast to reality. The majority of our vexing security challenges emanate from 

your three regions of the world: deterring an increasingly assertive 
2 

China; preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons; denying Al 

Qaeda and its affiliates safe havens in Afghanistan and elsewhere 

to launch attacks against us and our allies; and stemming the violence and instability in the Middle East and North Africa within 

the context of the Arab Awakening. 

These actors and others are surely watching how the United 

States responds to Russian aggression and some might be 

emboldened to further test U.S. resolve. 

Our allies and partners are also closely watching. But in contrast, they worry about U.S. disengagement and the staying power 

of U.S. security agreements. 

The administration has committed to a rebalance to the AsiaPacific while also sustaining a heightened alert posture in the Middle East and North Africa. 

How well are we doing both? A declining defense budget, reduction in troop strength and force structure, and diminished readiness, suggests that we can’t do both; or if we do, we do so at an 

increased risk to our forces and their missions. 

Nevertheless, the Department’s new defense strategy and budget 

request take us down this path. I hope you can provide us with 

your best military judgment on the advisability of such an approach; how the strategy and budget reflect your mission requirements; and the implications for your command’s force structure and 

needed capabilities. 

This is a challenging time and we appreciate the leadership and 

counsel that you all provide us. 

Mr. Smith. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. McKeon can be found in the Appendix on page 51.] 

STATEMENT OF HON. ADAM SMITH, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM 

WASHINGTON, RANKING MEMBER, COMMITTEE ON ARMED 

SERVICES 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Welcome to our very distinguished panel. We very much appreciate your service and your terrific work for our country. 

As the President—President, sorry—you mentioned the President, I almost called you the President, Mr. McKeon. 

As the chairman said, you know, we could do a hearing entirely 

on, gosh, a dozen different issues from each of your regions. So, it 

is going to be an interesting challenge as we touch upon all of those 

topics and the challenges that are there. 

But the chairman does correctly point out that at the top of this 

is the budget. It is certainly what we are thinking about. 

You live with whatever budget you are given and then you go out 

and try to meet the challenges that each of your commands offers, 

you know; but the focus on the budget and where we go is an important part of what we do here. 

I will say that it is wrong to assume that the President’s budget 

reflects the President’s opinion about, you know, where we think 

defense spending should go. 

What the President’s budget reflects is the top-line number that 

was given to him by this Congress; that is the amount of money 

that we all collectively decided to spend on defense. 
3 

So, I hope we will not waste a lot of time here saying that, 

‘‘Gosh, I wish the Administration would spend more money on it.’’ 

If that is what we want to do, then we as Congress should get together and pass a budget that spends more money on it. 

I have yet to see a proposal to actually do that, because apparently, we both want to dramatically cut what government spends 

and then complain about the impacts of what happens when you 

dramatically cut what government spends. 

But the top-line number is the top-line number. That is what the 

President set the budget to. 

And all I have really heard from the committee thus far is complaints about the things that were cut. And if we don’t cut some 

of those things—if we don’t do a base closure, if we don’t make 

some savings in personnel, if we don’t retire the A–10s or mothball 

11 cruiser ships—then we have billions upon billions of dollars to 

make up somewhere else in the budget. 

And I hope as we go forward, we will have that discussion. We 

as a committee will honestly say, ‘‘Look, I don’t think we should 

mothball those 11 cruisers, so here is where I am going to make 

up that $5 billion from the cut.’’ 

Or alternatively, as the President has done, he sent us an addi- tional $26 billion in spending on defense with the offsets to pay for 

it. Now, they are all offsets that the majority of Congress doesn’t 

like—they are increases in taxes and a variety of different things. But if you want to spend $26 billion more on the defense budget 

and find the savings elsewhere, then that, too, is a conversation we 

should have. 

But to this point, since the budget has been released, all we have 

heard is an endless string of complaints about what is cut and an 

endless string of complaints about how the government is spending 

too much money. 

That sort of hypocrisy is not going to serve our national security 

well. We need to resolve that issue and figure it out. 

I will also point out that on the Ukraine, there are a whole lot 

of complex issues at work there, in terms of why Russia does what 

it does. I don’t think the United States defense budget is really one 

of them. Because back in 2008, when we had a defense budget well 

over $700 billion and George W. Bush was President, Putin felt no 

limitation whatsoever on going into Georgia and essentially taking 

over two separate provinces, which he hasn’t given up, to date. 

So there are a lot of complex issues at work here. I hope that we 

will understand them in their full context and work out in a nonpartisan way to try to find out what the best solutions are. 

Now, given your different areas, I will just touch on one I think 

is most important in each of yours. 

Afghanistan, we are very interested in, General Austin. As, you 

know, President Karzai continues to cause us problems by not signing the Bilateral Security Agreement [BSA]—how you think we 

should best handle that. 

I don’t believe that a zero option is the right way to go. We need 

a presence past the end of 2014 in order to continue to secure the 

transition that we have worked so hard to secure in Afghanistan; 

but how do we get there, given the fact that we can’t get the BSA 

signed? 
4 

General Rodriguez, particularly interested in Somalia and the 

Horn of Africa where AQAP [Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula] 

is most active, and the partnerships that we have built there. I 

think it is a real model for how we can have influence without having to spend as much money or commit as much troops. 

Our working relationships with Ethiopia, Kenya, and Uganda, as 

well as others in the region, have really been a huge force multiplier in a critical part of the world. Curious, how that is going forward. 

And then of course, in Asia, you know, our ongoing relationship 

with China. I was deeply encouraged that China and Taiwan not 

long ago had their first, I guess China would be reluctant to call 

it bilateral, let’s just say their first meeting in forever. And I think 

there is some promise there. On the other hand, there are still 

many, many challenges in terms of how China overreaches on a variety of different issues, so I would be curious, in your viewpoints, 

as to how we work that out. 

Again, thank you very much, we have a lot of ground to cover. 

I will yield back, and I thank the chairman for this hearing. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Smith can be found in the Appendix on page 53.] 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. Admiral, you want to lead off? 

STATEMENT OF ADM SAMUEL J. LOCKLEAR, USN, 

COMMANDER, U.S. PACIFIC COMMAND 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Thank you, sir. Mr. Chairman, Congressman 

Smith, and distinguished members of the committee, thank you for 

the opportunity to appear before you today. For 2 years, I have had 

the honor and the privilege of leading the exceptional men and 

women, both military and civilian, throughout the United States 

Pacific Command [PACOM]. They are not only skilled professionals 

who are dedicated to the defense of our great Nation, but within 

Pacific Command they serve as superb ambassadors and truly represent the values and strengths of our great Nation. We continue 

to work to ensure they are well-trained, that they are wellequipped, and that they are well-led to meet the challenges we are 

facing in the 21st century. So, I want to publicly thank them and 

their families for their sacrifices. 

So, when I spoke to you last year, one day ago last year, I highlighted my concern of several issues that could challenge the security environment across the Pacific Command area of responsibility 

[AOR], which, in my view, I look at it as the Indo-Asia-Pacific. 

Those challenges included the potential for significant humanitarian disasters; an increasingly dangerous and unpredictable 

North Korea; the continued escalation of complex territorial disputes; growing challenges to our freedom of action in the shared 

domains of the sea, the airspace, and cyberspace; growing regional 

transnational threats; and significant challenges associated with 

China’s emergence as a global economic power and a regional military power. 

And during the past year, we have been witness to all of these 

challenges, and our forces have been very busy attempting to secure the peace and defending U.S. interests throughout half of the 

globe. We have done our very best to remain ready to respond to 
5 

crisis and contingency, although that we have assumed greater 

risk. We have maintained focus on the key aspects of the rebalance 

to the Asia-Pacific, strengthening our alliances and partnerships 

and improving our posture and presence and developing the concepts and capabilities required by today’s and tomorrow’s security 

environment. And we have done all this against the backdrop of 

continued fiscal and resource uncertainty, and the resultant diminishing readiness and availability of our joint force. 

I would like to thank the committee for your continued interest 

and support and I look forward to your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Admiral Locklear can be found in the 

Appendix on page 56.] 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. General Austin. 

STATEMENT OF GEN LLOYD J. AUSTIN III, USA, COMMANDER, 

U.S. CENTRAL COMMAND 

General AUSTIN. Good morning. Chairman McKeon, Ranking 

Member Smith, distinguished members of the committee, I want to 

thank you for the opportunity to appear here today to discuss the 

current posture and state of readiness of United States Central 

Command [CENTCOM]. I appreciate your strong and continued 

support of our men and women in uniform and their families, and 

I look forward to talking about them and the exceptional contributions that they are making on behalf of this command and our 

Nation. 

I am pleased to be here alongside my colleagues, two very distinguished warriors, Admiral Sam Locklear and General Dave 

Rodriguez. I will join them in making a few brief opening comments, and then I am prepared to answer your questions. 

I have been in command of CENTCOM for about a year now, and 

it has been an incredibly busy and productive period. We have 

dealt with a number of significant challenges to include the revolution in Egypt; the civil war in Syria that is severely impacting 

neighboring countries; Iranian aggression and malign activity; the 

perennial fight against Al Qaeda and other violent extremist organizations; and of course, our top priority, which is the operation in 

Afghanistan. 

The central region is an area fraught with turmoil, political instability and social upheaval, and economic stagnation. And while 

some may view it as a perpetual trouble spot, I don’t believe that 

to be the case. When I look around the region, I see great potential 

for lasting improvement. But progress requires a clear understanding of the challenges and the particular circumstances. 

Much of what is occurring in the CENTCOM AOR is the manifestation of the underlying currents at play in that strategically important part of the world, and foremost among them are the growing ethno-sectarian divide, the struggle between moderates and extremists, the rejection of corruption of oppressive governments, and 

an expanding ‘‘youth bulge’’ comprised of young, educated, unemployed, and often disenfranchised individuals. 

And so, by understanding these currents, which are the root 

causes of the disruptive and destructive behaviors in the region, we 

and others are able to help mitigate the effects. We are also able 

to identify and pursue the many opportunities that are present 
6 

amidst the challenges. And that has been and will remain our focus 

at Central Command. What occurs in the central region has shown 

to have significant and lasting impacts on the global economy, on 

our vital interests, and those of our partner nations. Thus, it is 

critical that we continue to do what is necessary to maintain our 

influence and access and to contribute to strengthening regional security and stability. We are also focused on building the capacity 

and capability of our allies, while further improving our militaryto-military relationships. 

I have traveled extensively over the past year throughout the 

Middle East and South and Central Asia, and I have talked at 

great length with senior government and military officials about 

the challenges and the opportunities present in the region, and I 

can assure you that the opinion and support of the United States 

is still widely sought and highly valued. Our regional partners 

have seen what we are able to accomplish, and they respect and 

appreciate our leadership. Our military relationships are as strong 

as they have ever been, and they are indeed the foundation of 

America’s strategic partnerships with almost every country in our 

area of responsibility. 

The year ahead provides significant opportunities for the United 

States, together with our partners and our allies, both in the region 

and beyond. Opportunities to achieve diplomatic and military successes that will further contribute to improve security and stability 

in our area of responsibility. And certainly, while we remain pragmatic, we are also hopeful that the opportunity provided by the 

P5+1 [United States, Russia, China, United Kingdom, and France, 

plus Germany] and the Joint Plan of Action, for example, will have 

a positive outcome, and that could fundamentally change the region for the better. We are likewise encouraged by the tremendous 

progress made by the Afghans, and the opportunity that exists to 

establish a lasting partnership with the people of that country. It 

is a partnership that we want to have going forward, and the people of Afghanistan have made it clear that they want the same 

thing. And these are just two examples. 

The reality is that there are a number of opportunities present 

in the region, and the CENTCOM team stands postured and ready 

to do our part to pursue them, while also addressing the various 

challenges that exist in that complex and most important part of 

the world. 

Ours is a very challenging mission, and it is made even more difficult by the realities of the fiscal environment; but given the enormity of the stakes, we will do what is required, and we will continue to work closely with and support the efforts of our colleagues 

across the interagency, to ensure a whole-of-government approach 

that provides for lasting and positive outcomes. 

Ladies and gentlemen, our soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, and 

coastguardsmen, and their families, have worked exceptionally 

hard over the past 13 years. I have had the honor of serving beside 

them in combat. I have been privileged to lead them as they did 

difficult work, under some of the most difficult conditions in the 

world, and I have been humbled by their acts of absolute selflessness, as they have made enormous sacrifices on almost a daily 

basis in support of the mission and in support of one another. 
7 

I am incredibly proud of them, and I know that you are as well. 

Chairman McKeon, Ranking Member Smith, and members of the 

committee, thank you for continuing to provide the capabilities, authorities, and resources that we need to effectively execute our mission in the strategic environment that I have described. And most 

importantly, thank you again for the strong support that you consistently show to our service men and women and their families, 

particularly those associated with the United States Central Command. I look forward to your questions. 

[The prepared statement of General Austin can be found in the 

Appendix on page 82.] 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

General Rodriguez. 

STATEMENT OF GEN DAVID M. RODRIGUEZ, USA, 

COMMANDER, U.S. AFRICA COMMAND 

General RODRIGUEZ. [Off mic.] 

The CHAIRMAN. Is your mic on, General? 

General RODRIGUEZ. It is now, sir. 

Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Smith, members of the committee, thank you for this opportunity to update you on the efforts 

of the United States Africa Command [AFRICOM]. I am honored 

to be testifying with General Austin and Admiral Locklear today. 

In light of the expanding connections between Africa Command, 

Central Command, and Pacific Command, I think it is fitting that 

we are appearing before this committee together. 

Africa Command is adapting our strategy and approach to address growing opportunities and threats to U.S. national interests. 

In the past year, we have seen progress in regional and multinational cooperation in counterterrorism, peacekeeping, maritime 

security, and countering the Lord’s Resistance Army. The successes 

to date of the African Union mission in Somalia, French and 

United Nations activities in Mali, and the African Union’s regional 

task force against the Lord’s Resistance Army are examples of this 

progress. 

Along with this progress, Al Shabaab remains a persistent threat 

in East Africa, and is conducting more lethal and complex attacks, 

as demonstrated by the Westgate Mall attack in Nairobi last September, and the attack on the Somali presidential palace last 

month. 

Terrorist groups in North and West Africa are more actively 

sharing resources and planning attacks. And while piracy rates are 

stable after a steep decline in East Africa, they remain at concerning rates in West Africa. 

Our tailored contributions to building partner capacity and enabling partners are critical to mitigating immediate threats in countries like Somalia and Mali. By supporting the gradual development of effective and democratic African security institutions, and 

professional forces that respect civilian authority, our shaping activities also reduce the likelihood of U.S. involvement in future 

interventions in Africa. 

Our expanding security challenges in Africa make it vitally important that we align our resources with priorities across the globe, 
8 

strengthen and leverage all our partnerships, and increase our 

operational flexibility. 

Sharpening our prioritization and deepening partnerships will 

help to mitigate risks and increase our effectiveness in a dynamic 

security environment. 

Our Nation will face tough decisions about risks and tradeoffs in 

the future, and Africa Command will continue to work collaboratively with other combatant commands and the Joint Staff to 

provide our best military advice to inform decisionmakers about 

managing risk in our area of responsibility and beyond. 

Thank you for your continued support to our mission and the 

men and women of Africa Command, who, every day, do their absolute best to make a difference for the United States. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of General Rodriguez can be found in 

the Appendix on page 129.] 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

The ranking member was correct that the Secretary and the 

Joint Chiefs did not set the top line on the budget. The problem 

that we have, though, is—I think we cut too much out of Defense. 

I think probably most of the members of this committee agree. 

And the budget that they presented to us didn’t take into account 

sequestration. I know the media gave a lot of attention to the cuts 

in the Army, that would take the Army down to the lowest level 

since World War II. And the number was 440,000. But when they 

presented that budget in an earlier meeting to us, the Secretary 

and General Dempsey—they said that 440,000 would be if sequestration went away. 

If sequestration remains in effect and kicks back in at the end 

of this budget deal that they worked out for the next year, the 

troop level would actually have to go down to 420,000, which is 

even worse than the budget that they are presenting and talking 

to us about. 

What I would like to ask you gentlemen specifically—the reduction in troop strength and the force structure and the program terminations and delays—how will they affect your ability to meet 

your mission requirements and manage risks? 

The Secretary said this budget would cause increased risk. What 

are the most significant gaps and shortfalls that you will see in 

your commands as you move forward, given this budget? 

Admiral. 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Thank you, sir. 

The problem for the Pacific Command is severalfold. One, it is— 

about 52 percent of the world is in the Pacific Command. Much of 

what we do in the Pacific Command, because of vast size—the fact 

that there are five of our treaty allies that are there. A growing 

number of partners. A growing amount of our economy, growing 

number of national security—or U.S. security issues in that region. 

A rising China—those things all make a security environment that 

is more complex, not to mention, a very unpredictable and increasingly dangerous North Korea situation. 

So, what we have endured in the last couple of years with the 

changes in the fiscal environment through sequestration is a requirement to try to keep the forces that are forward, they have to— 
9 

what we would refer to as the crisis response forces—those that 

would have to be able to respond quickly on the Korean Peninsula, 

that have to be able to respond should one of our allies be threatened. 

The services, through our request, have had to move readiness 

from the rest of the global force, in particular, the force that is here 

in CONUS [continental United States]—and to push it in our direction so that we can keep those forces that have to do something 

quickly ready. And they have done that. 

But it was at significant expense of the follow-on force. And the 

follow-on force are really what provide the deterrent value of the 

joint force, in general, in the Pacific AOR. 

So, the forces that would have to follow immediately on any crisis or contingency that come from the United States—the readiness 

levels, in my view, are unacceptable to be able to support that in 

the timelines that we would need. This has created a number of 

years, based on the projections of the budget, for the services to recover that readiness in the force that we have today. 

So, how has it impacted me otherwise? It is also—I also rely not 

only on the forces that are forward, but I rely on rotational force, 

particularly in the air and maritime area. Of the 52 percent of the 

world, only 17 percent of my part of the world is landmass. It happens that 6 out of every 10 people in the world live in that 17 percent. But the other 83 percent would be what I refer to as ‘‘grand 

commons’’—‘‘global commons’’—that have to be protected from a 

cyber or space, maritime, air perspective. 

And so, we will, because of the readiness of the force today—the 

depressed readiness of that force—the ability for the services to 

provide the type of maritime coverage, the air coverage of some of 

the key elements that we have historically needed in this part of 

the world for a crisis response have not been available to the level 

that I would consider acceptable risk. 

The CHAIRMAN. General. 

General AUSTIN. Well, Mr. Chairman, as you know, Central Command is responsible for a smaller piece of the globe, but we own 

about 90 percent of the problems currently that our country is facing in terms of issues that have arisen. And my concern with a 

shrinking budget would be whether or not the services would have 

what they need to provide trained and ready forces in a timely 

fashion. 

I would be—I am further concerned about their ability to refurbish that critical equipment that we have used extensively over the 

past 13 years or so while we have been engaged in combat. And 

in addition to that, there are critical enablers, like ISR [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance], that—you know, as the 

top line decreases, we have less of an ability to provide those critical enablers that I think have been game changers in our fights 

in the past. 

So, overall, Mr. Chairman, the ability of the services to provide 

those trained and ready forces and the critical enablers are what 

cause me greatest concern. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

General. 
10 

General RODRIGUEZ. Sir, in the AFRICOM area of responsibility, 

the biggest risks that we see in the future are mainly in the intelligence area, as General Austin talked about. The intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance assets, as well as the intelligence 

personnel who support AFRICOM—many of them have been funded by OCO [Overseas Contingency Operations]. So, we are challenged in that area. 

We also have a significant amount of activity going on throughout the area of responsibility, and in very, very small elements. So, 

I worry about medical evacuation and personal recovery and mobility assets, some of which, you know, were challenged during the 

past year because of sequestration and because of the readiness 

levels that those mobility air and—both helicopter and fixed-wing 

aviation assets were allowed to maintain. 

Thank you. 

The CHAIRMAN. I can remember years ago when Duncan Hunter 

was chairman or ranking member. He used to carry a little card 

that showed all the different shortfalls that you have each pointed 

out in your specific commands. And I remember what we did at 

that time was we asked if you had an additional amount of money, 

what would you buy? And I remember some of the things were bullets, canteens, tents. 

Basically, we were well under-equipped. And I am hearing the 

same thing. It is just different things, but it is the same thing— 

that you have needs that are unmet through this budget, which 

puts us at greater risk as we go forward. 

I appreciate your frankness and your ability to relate to us what 

your needs are. 

Mr. Smith. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I will pick one of those regions of the world. 

General Rodriguez, can you tell us a little bit about—update us 

on the situation in Mali and sort of West and North Africa, where 

you see the threats? Exactly how they have evolved in Mali and 

Libya, in sort of the very unstable part of the world where Al 

Qaeda and various affiliates are active. What are the groups we are 

worried about? How are we progressing in terms of being able to 

contain those threats? 

General RODRIGUEZ. Yes, sir. Thank you. 

In northwest Africa, the threats that are there are from Libya, 

and really, only into CENTCOM area of responsibility in Egypt. 

And it stretches down through the Maghreb and Sahel regions 

down to northern Mali. 

The challenge in Mali was a very fragile situation with the government and the military leadership. And after Libya fell, there 

was a surge and a tremendous amount of fighters who flowed in 

and out of there, as well as arms, ammunition, explosives that 

have spread throughout the region. That is what caused the challenges in northern Mali, which both the French—initially, an African Union force, and now the U.N. [United Nations] forces have 

disrupted and moved a little bit north out of the challenging areas 

in northern Mali, where they had a new election, and have started 

on the road to rebuilding that country. 
11 

But between there and Libya, those support networks and movement of arms, ammunition, explosives, as well as personnel, continues to create security and stability challenges for those countries. 

And we are working with all of them, as well as working with 

our partners, mainly the French, but also the Italians, the Brits, 

the Moroccans—have all worked to support the efforts, as well as 

the Turks in Libya. 

So, what we are trying to do to help out the challenges in northwest Africa is work in a multinational effort, as I said down in 

Mali, 9 African nations going up to 16 are helping to participate 

there and regionalize the effort. 

And in Libya, four of our European partners and another African 

partner are going to help to build that security forces up there. 

They will continue to be challenged by borders and their inability 

to disrupt the movement and the flow of fighters and equipment, 

but we are going to continue to work to regionalize that problem 

and help all of them build the capacity to do it. 

Mr. SMITH. Are there particular groups in that region that you 

think pose a transnational threat, or is it, at this point, primarily 

local conflicts? 

General RODRIGUEZ. Most of them are local conflicts. Obviously, 

they have the will and the aspirations to do more than that. 

In the—from the European perspective, of course, they are much 

closer to the problem, so they are extremely concerned about the 

illegal movement of personnel and equipment and terrorists in 

their southern border. 

And it is—will depend, obviously, on how much pressure that we 

can continue to put on them with our—you know, in cooperation 

with our allies, whether they will be able to expand their capabilities outside the region. 

Mr. SMITH. Okay. 

General RODRIGUEZ. The ones—the most troubling areas are in 

eastern Libya and southwestern Libya right now. But they flow 

and move, again, where they, you know, have the weakest government and security infrastructure. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you. 

And gentlemen, I literally have dozens of questions, but I want 

to get my colleagues in there. We have had opportunity to speak 

before the hearing. So, I thank you for your service. 

I yield back. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Mr. Forbes. 

Mr. FORBES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Admiral, Generals—thank you for your service and for the service of all those who serve under your commands. 

You have heard two lines of questions really set forth before this 

committee—one is that we should be limiting ourselves to asking 

questions about how much do we have to spend and how do we 

best allocate those dollars. Many of us reject that limitation, as I 

believe does the chairman, and believe we should also be asking 

what do we need to do to defend the United States of America? 
12 

In asking that second set of questions, there are some who will 

characterize that as an endless chain of complaints about cuts. We 

reject that characterization. 

We believe that it is an endless chain of warnings, warnings that 

the most expensive acquisition the United States could have over 

the next 10 years would be cheap armies and cheap navies. 

And to that, Admiral Locklear, you have the distinct privilege 

and responsibility of having under your command a body of water 

that both the President and the Secretary of Defense have said it 

is absolutely crucial to the national defense strategy of this country 

over the next decade. 

Is it fair to say that almost all, if not all of the countries in that 

region, the Asia-Pacific area, are actually increasing their navies at 

this time? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. I would say as a general statement, that is 

true. You know, we have 7 of the—it is the most militarized region 

of the world; not only navies—we have 7 of the 10 largest armies 

in my AOR; we have all the largest navies. 

And many of our allies and our partners are growing maritime 

capabilities because for many decades, they relied solely on—primarily on the U.S. as an underwriter of maritime security—since 

World War II. And they focused internally on their militaries—on 

internal security. 

And as they have become more prosperous and more—in some 

cases, more democratic, they have become internally more secure, 

which is a good thing; it led the rise of Asia. 

But at the same time, now, they are looking at their commons 

and they are saying—into their economic zones—and they are saying, ‘‘How do I know what is going on and how do I protect it?’’ 

So, they are building an ever more aggressive navy; submarine 

forces, high-end military capabilities. 

Mr. FORBES. Admiral, would it be fair to say that virtually every 

major contingency plan we have for that region—that our aircraft 

carriers are at the point or the front of that contingency plan? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. I would say that in my AOR, that aircraft 

carriers play a significant role in any crisis or any contingency, 

whether it is a reaction to a humanitarian disaster like we just had 

in the Philippines, which was reacted to almost simultaneous at occurring by the aircraft carrier and the forces that were there and 

then the Marine forces that came in and helped the joint force 

buildup. 

But in any crisis or contingency, for this—for now and the foreseeable future, they play a significant role. 

Mr. FORBES. Do you see, based on current situations, any gaps 

in your carrier deployment that you either have now or see in the 

foreseeable future? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. From my assessment, the global demand on 

maritime forces in general, which include our aircraft carrier force, 

far exceed what the Navy is able to resource. 

So, it has implications that push risk in my direction when those 

forces that I would need—I believe that acceptable risks are not 

available because they are either not ready or they are somewhere 

else in the world. 
13 

Mr. FORBES. And we can argue over the number of ships that we 

should have in our Navy—some think 306, some 313, some 346. 

But let’s put that on the table for a minute. If our Navy were 

to go down to 250 plus or minus ships, could we remain a superpower, based on your analysis and professional military judgment? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, I don’t know that the size of a military 

is the only element of being a world power. But I do sense that 

world powers are globally dispersed in the maritime commons— 

probably in the air commons, as well as upcoming cyber and space 

commons. 

In my estimation, a navy that is—the Navy that we have today— 

can’t support the global requirements. I mean, when I was a young 

officer, I never considered that we would be contemplating operations in the Antarctic, but that will come—probably in the very 

near future. 

I couldn’t have found the Horn of Africa probably on a chart— 

or wasn’t familiar with it. But now, we operate routinely there. 

I would have never anticipated that there would be the kind of 

tensions in the vast South China Sea over territorial rights and 

fishing rights—or in the East China Sea. 

And so, I can’t tell you at what number we would no longer become a global maritime power, but we are getting close. 

Mr. FORBES. Okay, thank you, Admiral. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Ms. Sanchez. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you, gentlemen, again, for being before us. 

I have a question for PACOM commander. Admiral, before I pose 

the question, I understand that countries like Vietnam are asking 

for a closer military cooperation with the U.S. as a result of the 

East Sea maritime dispute. 

I know that it is—that you are the military guy, but you do sit 

in on the civilian side as policy is being made. 

And I would strongly urge you, along with the Department of Defense, to take Vietnam’s human rights issues into consideration before committing to any maritime security package—because I believe that this country has been really terrible in its human rights 

issues; they continue to say they are going to do something and 

then they just get worse. 

With that in mind, Admiral, can you provide this committee with 

your observations on the evolving security challenges presented by 

the ongoing maritime disputes in the East and South China Seas? 

And from a contingency standpoint, I mean, what would you consider would be our role if things begin to devolve and get out of 

hand, with respect to those disputes? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Thank you. And first, I would very much 

take your comments and counsel on the human rights. 

We track very closely with the State Department; we follow their 

lead to ensure that—and the Department of Justice to ensure that 

we are within the boundaries of what is legal to be able to do. And 

we are very sensitive to that because—for all the right reasons. 
14 

If you take a look at the territorial disputes, you ask yourself, 

‘‘How did this all happen in this generation?’’ Well, what—why has 

it—it has just now popped up. 

Well, reality—they have been around for a long time. But there 

hasn’t been much motivation to have to deal with them. 

There were plenty of fish resources; energy resources weren’t 

that important. China was not on the rise that it is today. 

And we didn’t have, until the 1980s, which we are not a signatory to—we didn’t have the U.N. Law of the Sea Convention, which 

defined how you would lay out what belongs to you and your EEZs 

[exclusive economic zones]—your economic zones. 

So, all that culminated in this century where now everybody— 

all these nations taking a look at, well, how do I ensure that for 

my sovereignty, that I have access to these in the way that I see 

them? 

So, in the East China Sea and in the north there, over the 

Senkaku Diaoyu Islands, there is the issue between China and 

Japan that you are all very familiar with. 

In that case, I think we made it clear—the role of the U.S. and 

the alliance with Japan and that those islands fall within what we 

consider a mutual defense treaty boundaries. And that has been 

stated widely by the Secretary of State; and so, we would—that is 

kind of the policy there. 

How that will play out in the long run between the Chinese and 

Japanese would be speculation. But at this stage, we are watching 

it very carefully. 

In the South China Sea, if you take a look at all the overlapping 

complaint—claims, it looks—it is like chicken soup. I mean, it is so 

complex—who would own what. 

And so, there is really—it might be the only way forward is for 

them to use the international law—international tribunals to be 

able to come to agreement. And we have seen successes of that 

throughout the AOR where countries come together—they get a tribunal to be able to look at it and then they accept that. 

What is complicated, though, I think is the perspective that the 

PRC [People’s Republic of China] or China has on their claims and 

the way that they are approaching those. 

First, they don’t—they take a historic view of the South China 

Sea and they have a—what I think is a loosely defined historic 

nine-dash line, which basically gives them the entire fishing rights 

and mineral rights and EEZ rights to the South China Sea. 

And this is in direct conflict with many of their neighbors who 

have similar claims and are looking to protect them. 

There is—PRC, or China, has also done things, I think, that exacerbated the situation by establishment of an air defense zone in 

the East China Sea. And you understand what the U.S. position is 

on that. 

So, the way ahead here is, first of all, I think that the role of an 

ASEAN [Association of Southeast Asian Nations] is important. 

That the 10 nations of ASEAN who have equities, particularly in 

this part of the world, have got to be supported. And they have— 

they need to come together and to have a voice on how these things 

are dealt with. In particular, as it relates to how they deal with 

China. 
15 

They very much need to go forward quickly on a code of conduct 

that China needs to agree with to prevent miscalculation in the 

South China Sea. 

Our role on it is—number one, is to be able to sense and understand what is going on. So, ISR assets are very important to me 

in that part of the world. 

And then for us to be able to share information where necessary 

with our allies and with our partners so that there is a common 

understanding of what is actually happening in there. 

But in the end, these things will need to be solved through arbitration, through legal means, through international forums, and 

not through coercion, which, we, as a U.S. policy, do not support 

coercive behavior to get to your claims by any claimant. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Mr. Wilson. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. I appreciate it. 

Mr. WILSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you all for 

being here today. 

I am very grateful. I have four sons currently serving in the military. At different times, they have been under your command. And 

I have always had faith in your leadership and your service, so 

thank you very, very much. 

General Rodriguez, in your opinion, if AFRICOM headquarters 

were relocated to the continental United States, would you be able 

to accomplish your mission effectively? 

General RODRIGUEZ. Sir, the Secretary of Defense—the former 

one looked at that, and the recommendation was to continue to 

leave it where it was. The strengths of keeping it in Europe is the 

close coordination with our international partners mainly, who are 

in Europe, as well as access to the continent. So, right now, for the 

foreseeable future, we are going to continue to leave it in that location. 

Mr. WILSON. And, well, if it ever relocates to the continental 

United States, Charleston, South Carolina, comes to mind. With 

military facilities and—we also have a shared culture with West 

Africa, so there is a relationship which is very positive. 

And, General Austin, what potential options and courses of actions have we considered if the situation in Iraq continues to deteriorate, allowing Al Qaeda’s increasing presence and influence, 

which is creating safe havens to attack America? 

General AUSTIN. Thank you, sir. 

This is an issue that the Iraqis have to solve for themselves. And 

I think we can and should do some things to help them, because 

we face a common enemy. 

As you know, we have spent a considerable amount of time battling Al Qaeda in Iraq in the past. And as that enemy resurfaces, 

I think it is prudent for us to do everything within our power to 

ensure that we help countries in the region, specifically Iraq, battle 

this enemy. And we are doing some things. 

As you know, sir, we have provided them some munitions and 

some weapons, based upon their request. You know, I have engaged Prime Minister Maliki personally. I have talked to their senior leaders about what they are doing, and revisited some lessons 
16 

learned from the past in terms of how you combat the type of 

enemy that they are currently faced with. 

But, again, it is in our best interest to make sure that they can 

address this problem and keep it from further spreading. 

Now, part of the solution—a major part of the solution is going 

to have to be a political solution. They are going to have to accommodate the Sunnis in a much greater way. And I think that counsel has been provided to the prime minister from a number of people. 

Mr. WILSON. And, general, thank you very much. I had two sons 

serve in Iraq, and so it was, indeed, painfully obvious the SunniShiite divide. And, as you say, it needs to be bridged. 

Admiral Locklear, the Joint POW/MIA [Prisoner of War/Missing 

in Action] Accounting Command’s POW/MIA mission can assist 

PACOM in building partnerships with countries in the region capitalizing on the humanitarian aspect of JPAC’s [Joint POW/MIA 

Accounting Command] mission. 

Do you feel this is a useful tool for the PACOM commander? Additionally, if JPAC were not part of PACOM, but a worldwide 

asset, would you be able to capitalize on the mission of building 

partnerships? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, first, let me say that the mission that 

JPAC does—already, they are a global outfit already. And the mission they do is essential, I think, for how we define ourselves as 

a military, as a nation—the fact that we show to the rest of the 

world that we go to great lengths to go bring our fallen MIAs home 

when we can find them is absolutely the right thing to do. 

I think that they do—in fact, I know they do play a significant 

role in our interaction with nations throughout my AOR. In particular, where we can encourage through this humanitarian mission, which—I would call it that—the access to places where we 

may not have access. 

So, we have very successful, ongoing operations as our host, for 

instance, in Vietnam. And we are looking for opportunities in Indonesia. Just last year, we were almost ready to move into North 

Korea, just before there was a provocation. And we were not—we 

were unable to do that, but that would have been—an almost unheard of thing is to have U.S. forces, U.S. scientists supported by 

JPAC in North Korea. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to survive. 

If they are aligned as a—as you put it, as a more global outfit, 

does it impact—I don’t think—not necessarily. I think any operation that JPAC would do—recovery—that was in my AOR would 

have to be coordinated, as it would be with any of these other 

COCOMs [combatant commands], should there be the requirement 

in their command. So, I don’t see that as a problem. 

Mr. WILSON. Thank you. And thank you for leaving no one behind. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Mrs. Davis. 

Mrs. DAVIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you to all of you 

for being here, and, of course, for your extraordinary service. 

Admiral Locklear, just to follow up a little bit—and I am sorry 

I ran in on the middle of that response, but when you look at the 

budget request of the $128 million for military infrastructure in the 
17 

AOR, what—what about that concerns you in some ways? Do you— 

what is it that you really believe is so critical to do? And is this 

going to cover it? 

And also, where else do you think we really need to be looking 

in terms of that infrastructure? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, thank you. 

In my AOR, there is historic infrastructure that we support 

through longstanding alliances with Japan, Korea. And so, that infrastructure is important as it relates to the success of that alliance 

as we go forward. And both of those alliances in Japan and Korea, 

I think, will continue for the long term. And that infrastructure 

needs to be in place to support the alliance properly. 

So, that is the kind of—that infrastructure. We also have the infrastructure that is in our territories and the infrastructure that is 

in Hawaii, for instance, that is important. As you look at the vastness of the Pacific—the forces that generate and the command and 

control from Hawaii as we look forward into Guam and we look forward into the theater—all that becomes important for us to be able 

to ensure that all the blood and sweat that the U.S. put into gaining access to those back in the 1940s, that we maintain that infrastructure in a way that we can access it when it is in our national 

interest to be able to do that. 

We are also, though, not going to build any more bases overseas 

in other countries. We have made that decision. We are going forward with our allies and our partners to look at opportunities for 

us to partner together, to look for access agreements. 

The ongoing operations that we have in the northern territories 

of Australia—where we are partnering with them to get to use 

ranges and to have some access on a mutually agreeable basis. 

We are looking for the opportunity to close an access agreement 

with the Philippines that allows us to provide support to their minimum credible defense. At the same time, to be able to position ourselves better for everything from humanitarian assistance to disaster relief. 

And with that, there are some infrastructure requirements that 

come. And I know that there is always a competition between, well, 

what you build at home and what you build overseas. I can assure 

you that when we look at this, we keep that in mind, and that we 

look for opportunities to leverage our allies and our partners as 

heavily as we can. Because they all have—most of them growing 

economies. Most of them have growing militaries. And we are figuring that into our long-term strategy. 

Mrs. DAVIS. Okay, thank you. I appreciate that. 

I was looking for a little more specifics in terms of where you 

might see a shortfall that really needs to be addressed. And if you 

could provide me with that later, that would be helpful. Thank you. 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Be happy to. 

[The information referred to can be found in the Appendix on 

page 147.] 

Mrs. DAVIS. General Austin, I think we are all concerned about 

what is going to happen in Afghanistan. Having traveled there on 

numerous occasions, and particularly, meeting with women in rural 

areas, as well as the parliamentarians—how do you—I mean, how 

do we really talk about, I think, ensuring that the strides that have 
18 

been made for women, particularly, and girls in education, are not 

going to be lost, as we move forward—as they move forward? 

I think this has always been about Afghans—securing Afghans. 

But at the same time, we know that it is going to take more than 

that. 

General AUSTIN. Well, thank you, ma’am. I think it is—I mean, 

there is not much question in anyone’s mind that, you know, the 

presence of the coalition here for, you know, some time in the future, will help to allow this wonderful thing that has begun to happen continue to evolve. 

And, as you know, since you have been there a number of times, 

you know, Afghanistan was one of the most repressive countries in 

the world with respect to women’s rights. And as we look at, you 

know, the impact that we have had some 13 years later, it really 

is remarkable. 

Having said that, there is a long way to go. We fully appreciate 

that. But, you know, back in 2003, when I first entered the country, to think that we would have one day a police chief in the city 

of Kabul, and perhaps one day soon, a police chief—a female police 

chief in the city of Herat—sergeants major in the Army—— 

Mrs. DAVIS. It—sir, I guess—if I could interrupt. Is there something specific that we can point to that signals that that is being 

done and I can—— 

The CHAIRMAN. The gentlelady’s time is expired. 

Mr. Turner. 

Mr. TURNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I know many members have interest in that question area, so 

perhaps you could expand your answers in writing. 

[The information referred to can be found in the Appendix on 

page 147.] 

Mr. TURNER. General Austin, General Rodriguez, I recognize, of 

course, General Austin, that you are the commander for Central 

Command; and General Rodriguez, the commander of Africa Command. 

But my question to you is actually going to be about Europe— 

but it is not going to be about the recent change of events that 

have occurred with Russia and Ukraine; but it is going to be of the 

importance of our forward basing troops in Europe to your command. 

Now, there are many in Congress—some people, even, on this 

committee—who question the forward basing of our troops in Europe. 

Many times, I think it is a result because Congress misses the 

nexus of the importance of having those troops forward deployed 

for even your jobs and your positions. 

So, I wanted to ask you if you could, please, help make that connection for us. Could you please describe what effect it would have 

upon you if we did not have our troops forward based in Europe? 

And also, how do they enable your ability to carry out missions 

in Africa and the Middle East, moving critical supplies and supporting the missions that you currently have—and also, in missions 

that you might foresee? 

And does it assist in, also, your ability to maintain international 

partnership? If you would, please, gentlemen, describe those re-
19 

sources that we have in Europe and how they are important to 

your commands. General Austin? 

General AUSTIN. Well, certainly all the forces that we could have 

forward deployed that they are within support distance—reasonable distance to be able to quickly support us—it is value added. 

And I would say further that if they are stationed in the Central 

Command region, that is even better. 

But, you know, we have seen a number of examples of us using 

those—some of those capabilities; most recently, I think as everyone watched the potential strike against Syria, you know that 

there were forces from both Central Command and European Command that were involved in that planning and potential execution. 

We have shared, you know, capabilities throughout; you know 

that we have made good use of the hospitals that are based in European area. We have used that region to transit, in terms of providing supplies to our soldiers. 

So, it has been of great benefit and—— 

Mr. TURNER. General Austin—and I appreciate your statements 

of how it assists. But, you know, my understanding would be that 

you wouldn’t be able to do the job you do if they were not there. 

Is that correct? 

If suddenly that asset was not there for you, wouldn’t that significantly impact your operations? 

General AUSTIN. It would have an impact, yes, sir. But—— 

Mr. TURNER. General Rodriguez—your view? 

General RODRIGUEZ. Yes, sir. Those—first of all, the relationships with our European partners are critical because they are also 

helping—working together in our multinational efforts. 

They also provide the majority of the forces that I employ on the 

African continent and we have now put together some great forcesharing agreements where they are much more flexible. 

So, every which way you can think of, whether it be supportive 

forces, supportive bases, or logistical support, the bases in Europe 

are critical to our mission in Africa. Thank you. 

Mr. TURNER. General, thank you. 

Admiral Locklear, as we now look to Russia having invaded the 

Ukraine, many are concerned that the adventurous environment 

might result in China taking action against either the Philippines 

or Japan. 

Do you have similar concerns that the current environment 

might encourage activities that we are all concerned about? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, my assessment today is that I don’t 

have a lot of concerns that what is happening in Ukraine with Russia would motivate a change in the current status in the East 

China Sea or the South China Sea. So, I don’t see that having a 

bearing. I am watching carefully what is coming out of the general 

press and what is being said by the diplomats in China about it; 

and my sense is that they are looking at this carefully to make 

sure that they—their perspective as a global leader—that they are 

having a measured perspective on this. That is my take of this—— 

Mr. TURNER. Admiral, quick question—are you more concerned 

about China’s perhaps involvement with the Philippines or Japan, 

with respect to territorial conflicts? 
20 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, I am concerned about them both. I 

would say that in the—probably if I were going to look at it from 

the Chinese perspective, I think they are very clear of the position 

in the East China Sea—the U.S. positions there. 

As it relates to the broader, undefined areas in the South China 

Sea and the U.S. role in that position is less clearly defined. But 

we have been pretty firm on ensuring that every—all the claimants 

understand the U.S. position on no coercion, no change to status 

quo. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Ms. Bordallo. 

Ms. BORDALLO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And Admiral and Generals—welcome to the hearing. 

And Admiral Locklear, I welcome you particularly because you 

have been able to brave the snowstorms and be here. 

Admiral, Guam has maintained a robust depot-level ship repair 

capability for several decades now. 

So, in 2005, the ship repair capability assisted in the emergent 

repair of the USS San Francisco, which ran into an underwater 

seamount. The repairs helped to keep the submarine operational 

until it could return to the West Coast for comprehensive repairs. 

How important, in your opinion, is the depot-level ship repair capability with a dry dock capability to your responsibilities in the 

Pacific AOR? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. So, very important. 

Ms. BORDALLO. Very important—thank you. 

Another question, Admiral, I have for you—this past December, 

the governor of Okinawa signed a landfill permit allowing for the 

initial construction of the runway of Henoko. 

Now, can you comment on the significance of this event and what 

that means for the realignment of Marines on Okinawa? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. The signing of the landfill permit and the beginning work on the facility at Camp Schwab is not directly connected to the realignment of Marines. So, the realignment of Marines will go forward based on other initiatives such as infrastructure that has to be built in Guam and things like that. 

That said, I would say that, first of all, we are very happy that 

the government of Japan got the landfill permit signed. 

I think it is an indication of the government of Japan’s commitment to the alliance and the changes necessary to make the alliance endure for the future. So, we are happy that it got signed. 

Ms. BORDALLO. Thank you. The final question is also for you, Admiral, and addresses a developing issue. I would like to address the 

issue of illegal, unregulated, and unreported fishing in the Pacific 

AOR. 

Several of our allies and partners in the region are complaining 

about illegal fishing in their respective EEZs. Now, in some cases, 

this overfishing is causing economic and security impacts. 

Can you comment on the significance of this issue and what 

more the U.S. can do to combat this destabilizing activity? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, I think the likelihood of illegal fishing 

in Oceania will only go up as the global fisheries and supplies of 

fish becomes under more pressure and fishermen move to places 
21 

where the fish actually are, which I think remains a reasonable 

amount of stocks in Oceania. 

Most of the nations, or most of the folks in Oceania—island nations do not have the capability to properly, adequately monitor 

and understand what is happening in their economic zones. So, the 

ability for them to be taken advantage of to their economic detriment is growing. 

The Coast Guard in the Pacific and the U.S. Navy in the Pacific 

work closely together to support, where we can, programs that 

allow us to help the nations monitor their economic zones for illegal 

fishing. 

It is not comprehensive. It is the best we can do with the resources that we have over a vast, vast area. 

Ms. BORDALLO. Thank you very much, Admiral. And I agree with 

you on the Coast Guard; I think we are undermanned and certainly 

could use more help in that area. Do you agree? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, I have to refer that to the commandant 

of the Coast Guard. But I have always been amazed of how much 

our Coast Guard does for how small it is. 

Ms. BORDALLO. And a vast area that they have to look after. 

Well, thank you very much. 

And I yield back. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Mr. Conaway. 

Mr. CONAWAY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Gentlemen, thank you all for your service; I appreciate that. 

General Austin, can you talk to us a little bit about the missions 

and risks associated with the residual force level less than 10,000 

in Afghanistan after this year? And also, what is your best professional military judgment on what would happen in Afghanistan in 

a zero option? 

General AUSTIN. Well, certainly I think a zero option would be 

very problematic for the country of Afghanistan. I think the military would fracture because of a lack of support, both fiscally and 

our inability to provide advice and counsel—further advice and 

counsel to the Afghan security forces. 

I think it would also be bad for the region. I think we would see 

significant hedging activity with the key countries in that region; 

and again, that would lead towards greater instability for some 

time to come. 

With respect to the size of the force, as you know, our leadership 

is currently undergoing a decisionmaking process to really determine what that size of the force is going to be going forward. 

I would just say that the size of the force is always based upon 

what missions you are trying to accomplish. Our principal missions, you know, going forward, will be to continue to advise the 

Afghan security forces, also to counter terrorism and you—as you 

know, sir, that is why we went there in the first place—to really 

push back on the folks that attacked us and take away their capability to do that in the future. 

And so—as we do those things, I think it is necessary, also, to 

be able to provide force protection for the force that is deployed. 

And as you evaluate what is required to accomplish those missions, you know, the smaller you get, the greater the risk is to the 
22 

mission, and the greater the risk to the force. So, those are the 

things that we have to balance out. 

Mr. CONAWAY. The—whatever cap is set, would personnel associated with the example of Bagram, the world-class trauma center 

there, would they count against that cap? In other words, the issue 

is, we currently have, for the last, all these years, enjoyed an opportunity to save lives—battlefield injuries—that—under the golden hour and those kind of things by having Bagram there, the 

trauma center there is an important issue. 

Will that go away under smaller forces? And we, in fact, begin 

to lose men and women—— 

General AUSTIN. Well, certainly—— 

Mr. CONAWAY [continuing]. To combat injuries that would otherwise not be lost? 

General AUSTIN. Yes. Pardon me, sir. 

Certainly, as, you know, we determine the size of the force, we 

will have to figure out what is required to support that force. And 

all of the forces there will be accounted for in that—whatever the 

number is. 

Mr. CONAWAY. Okay. 

Pivoting over to the Gulf region—we have two Air Force bases 

there, military bases there that are currently funded under OCO. 

If that is unable to pivot to the regular budget, what impact will 

losing the base at Qatar and UAE [United Arab Emirates] be to 

our ability to operate? 

General AUSTIN. Well, these are critical capabilities to us, sir, in 

terms of our ability to respond rapidly to contingencies, our ability 

to provide command and control. And I think, you know, going forward, it will be essential that we maintain those capabilities if at 

all possible. 

Mr. CONAWAY. All right. And just for this public forum, can you 

give us a quick couple of seconds on efforts with respect to getting 

Sergeant Bergdahl back? 

General AUSTIN. Well, I can tell you, sir, that, you know, I am 

committed—my entire command is committed to getting Sergeant 

Bergdahl back. I just met with his parents in December. They came 

down and spent 2 days in my headquarters, and we walked them 

through all the things that we were doing to get Bowe back. And 

that remains at the top of my list to get things done. And, you 

know, so we will—I give you my guarantee that we will remain focused on that. 

Mr. CONAWAY. All right, I appreciate that. 

Real quickly, Admiral, the—for years now, our boats transiting 

the Strait of Hormuz have been working against not having some 

sort of incident occur with the Iranian boats—those kind of things. 

As we work in the South China Sea, do your boat drivers have the 

same kind of focus on what are the rules of engagement there? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, as I said earlier, we have encouraged 

the ASEAN nations, who operate out there, too, to pursue a code 

of conduct, particularly over the territorial disputes. But when it 

comes to maritime forces that are operating there, in particular, I 

assume you are referring to our interactions with the PLA [People’s 

Liberation Army]—— 

Mr. CONAWAY. Right. 
23 

Admiral LOCKLEAR [continuing]. Navy, the Chinese Navy. We 

have mechanisms in place where we have dialogue. I mean, we 

have a—in general, our relationship with the Chinese today is cooperative, but competitive, and we know where there are areas 

where we have friction. And we do operate in close proximity to 

each other. And we have mechanisms that are run in my headquarters through—in Beijing, where we get together and talk about 

those issues so we can have a professional atmosphere. And so far, 

I would say that we are doing pretty well with each other, operating in those regions and respecting each other’s professionalism 

and operating together. 

Mr. CONAWAY. All right. Thank you, gentlemen. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Ms. Tsongas. 

Ms. TSONGAS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you all for 

being here and all that you do to defend our country in a very dynamic and challenging world. So, I thank you for that. 

And, as we have heard some comment sort of debating the impact of budget cuts on all that you do, I am very mindful of what 

Admiral Mullen said some years ago, that—he has said, quote, ‘‘I 

have said many times that I believe the single biggest threat to our 

national security is our debt.’’ So, I also believe we have every responsibility to help eliminate that threat. We must and will do our 

part. 

And all that we are doing today is really in response to a 

daunting Federal budget deficit. So, I appreciate the tough choices 

that you are having to make. 

I also remember another hearing in which a gentleman who—I 

wish I had his name before me—said that ‘‘a strategy without restraint—without fiscal restraint is not a strategy,’’ and that ‘‘fiscal 

restraint is really a forcing function.’’ It forces some very difficult 

choices, but some—perhaps in the end, better choices. Because we 

have to think very thoughtfully about where to put our efforts. 

So, if we want something different, what we really need is a 

more balanced approach, and we look—in which we look not just 

at cuts across the discretionary budget and elsewhere, but also 

ways to bring revenue into the equation. 

So, this hearing is really a very important part of our way forward. And I appreciate all that you are doing. 

I am currently the ranking member of Oversight and Investigations, that subcommittee on this broader committee. And it has 

conducted a series of hearings involving the Department of Defense’s response to the terrorist attack on the U.S. Embassy in 

Benghazi on September 11, 2012. And as a result of those hearings, 

the majority published a report of major findings last month. 

One of the report’s major findings was that the, quote, ‘‘U.S. military’s response to the Benghazi attack was severely degraded because of the location and readiness of U.S. forces,’’ unquote. 

However, another one of the report’s major findings was that, 

quote, ‘‘The Department of Defense is working to correct many 

weaknesses revealed by the Benghazi attack,’’ unquote. 

So, General Rodriguez, can you please talk about to the committee what changes the Defense Department has made to correct 

the issues that the Benghazi attack revealed? And in doing so, 
24 

could you please address changes to the posture of armed aircraft, 

ISR platforms, and quick response ground forces? 

General RODRIGUEZ. Yes, ma’am. 

First, the top of that list is the cooperation and coordination with 

the entire Intelligence Community as well as the State Department, so that we all have a common view of what is happening out 

there to ensure that the indication and the warnings are the best 

that we can possibly make them. 

The second thing is that we have moved forces and we have more 

capabilities ready to support challenges like that across the continent. We now have an East Africa Response Force stationed in 

Djibouti, an Army and Air Force combined—or joint force there to 

respond to situations at 15, or 15—excuse me—of the high-threat, 

high-risk embassies across Africa. We also have a Special Purpose 

MAGTF [Marine Air-Ground Task Force] Crisis Response stationed 

up in Moro ́n with—it has both air and ground assets. And we also 

have a Commander’s In-Extremis Force that is now stationed in 

Germany at the European bases, as I said, that are so important 

to us. 

We also have got the authority to access European forces faster 

to include the mobility assets, as well as the air assets that you 

mentioned. And we also have the capability to also access 

CENTCOM forces or SOCOM [U.S. Special Operations Command] 

forces if that is required. 

We had an experience just recently in South Sudan. And just to 

show you the difference—first of all, the intelligence and warning 

was there. Now, it was good that it is closer than West Africa, because that is a different situation—West Africa. And we had special operations forces, the East African Response Force, the 

CENTCOM Crisis Response element. The CENTCOM knew who 

was their reserve, as well as the Special Purpose MAGTF, all combined to support the efforts down in South Sudan. 

The other thing I think that is important to understand is that 

the State Department, as well as the Marine Security Guards that 

support the State Department, have reinforced many of our embassies. And right now, I have also reinforced those embassies, so I 

have three forces at Libya, Tunis, and South Sudan to support the 

efforts of the State Department to continue to provide the mission 

that they do. 

Ms. TSONGAS. What continues to—— 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

The gentleman—— 

Ms. TSONGAS [continuing]. I lost my time. Thank you. I yield 

back. 

The CHAIRMAN. The gentlelady’s time is expired. 

Mr. Wittman. 

Mr. WITTMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Admiral Locklear, General Austin, General Rodriguez, thank you 

so much each of you for your service to our Nation, and thank you 

for joining us today. 

Admiral Locklear, I wanted to begin with you. I have spent a significant amount of time in your AOR looking at the force structure 

laydown, looking at readiness components, understanding what is 

going on. Also, having the time to speak to partners in the region, 
25 

having conversations with them about our rebalance to the AsiaPacific, and how they look at things. And you can imagine, they are 

positive about us putting the rebalance into place, but somewhat 

skeptical about what they have seen to this point with that. 

Can you tell me this? In looking at where we are going with the 

budget proposals, essentially with 11 cruisers being essentially put 

in suspended animation, with us not having the dollars available 

for the USS George Washington refueling, and looking at cutting 

short our LCS [littoral combat ship] build? Can you tell me, in light 

of that, and with the tyranny of distance that we have to deal with 

in the Asia-Pacific, and with us rebalancing there—obviously, the 

naval presence there is going to be an important part of that. 

How are you going to be situated with accomplishing your mission in the face of a declining naval presence with fewer ships at 

your avail? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, thank you, Mr. Wittman. And thanks 

for coming out to the AOR. I am sorry I missed you in Hawaii, but 

I understand that your visit was very well received. 

Mr. WITTMAN. Yes, yes. 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. It will—first of all, this isn’t my—not just 

about maritime. There are similar types of issues that we are facing from a force availability in the Air Force, with ISR, with ‘‘fight 

tonight’’ forces ready for the Korean Peninsula—all those put pressure on the joint force to be able to provide it. 

So, if you extrapolate a smaller, more lethal military, when it 

comes to some aspects of our military, and those that have to be 

forward, that have to be providing presence, capacity is an aspect 

that has to be considered. I mean, it is great to talk about how capable everything has got to be, but, you know, one ship that is completely capable or one airplane that is completely capable—it can 

only be in really in one place at one time. 

Mr. WITTMAN. Exactly. 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. So, the natural extrapolation is, is that as 

the world—I mean, the world gets a vote in all this. And we are 

not out ginning this stuff up, I don’t think. I mean, it is kind of 

happening to us. 

Mr. WITTMAN. Right. 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. And we are giving our best military advice 

on how we position ourselves for a couple things. One, what is the 

most dangerous situations you might face as it relates to American 

interests. But we also are pragmatic, and we say, ‘‘What are the 

most likely things that might happen?’’ 

And then we put a demand signal on the joint force to produce 

resources for the most likely thing that will happen, kind of hedging our bets just in case it goes worse. 

So, on the maritime domain, you know, I think the Navy is going 

to have a hard time. With the numbers we have, we have a hard 

time today. Smaller numbers would be, for my AOR—assuming the 

rest of the world stays the way it is—would be difficult for me to 

maintain the type of maritime presence that I need. 

Mr. WITTMAN. Admiral, let me take it down another step to drill 

down a little bit further in asking you specifically about amphibious and logistic ships. 
26 

As you know, in the AOR you talked about and we visited with 

marines here about having that presence and being able to have 

that first-strike capability, that forcible entry capability. 

Obviously, having those amphibious ships and logistic ships are 

an important part of that. Can you tell me, in light of where we 

are going with our L-class ships, can you tell me, in the AOR, the 

role of amphibious and logistic ships? 

How important is that to your mission set there within that combatant command? And then where does that leave us as we are 

looking at a declining number of amphibious and logistic ships as 

it relates to force readiness in the region? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, the role of logistic ships for my AOR 

really can’t be understated—can be understated, but can’t be overstated. 

The reality is just because of the way we operate forward, even 

though we have reliable allies and partners who help us, we still 

have to move things around, like fuel. I mean, the PACOM AOR— 

I think I am the largest consumer of fuel, resources, maybe in all 

of DOD [Department of Defense] and maybe in the world. 

And you have to be able to move that stuff around—you got to 

be able to move it reliably. So, what you can move around in peacetime, day to day, is much different than what you might be able 

to have to move around during contingency. 

So, we have to have a logistics force that is not just about dayto-day operations—one that has some surge capabilities that can be 

able to support it. 

So, we have to—the Navy and TRANSCOM [U.S. Transportation 

Command], they have to keep putting that in their equation; not 

just on the surface of the water, but also in the air. 

As it relates to amphibious capability, first I think the amphibious capability of our Marine Corps will be most apparent—the 

need of it in my AOR. I mean, just because of the littoral nature 

of it, because of the history of the way the Marine Corps has operated, because of the forward forces we have that are there, and 

their ability for crisis response. 

So, you can see, just in this Operation Damayan they had in the 

Philippines how quickly the Marines were able to respond with amphibious capability; that really made a big difference in turning 

that around—and that is just a HA/DR [humanitarian assistance/ 

disaster relief] event. But—— 

Mr. WITTMAN. Thank you. 

Admiral LOCKLEAR [continuing]. They’ve got to be able to get 

them around. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Ms. Hanabusa. 

Ms. HANABUSA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member 

Smith. 

Generals, Admiral, thank you for being here. 

Admiral Locklear, aloha. Admiral, in your testimony, you referenced the rising China and you didn’t say whether it was—you 

didn’t use the adjective threat. 

So, I am—want to give you the opportunity—that when you said 

a rising China, what were you referring to? And I am, of course, 

looking at it in terms of from your military perspective. 
27 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, first, I mean the rise of China globally, 

economically, and the fact that they have the desire or the ability 

to be able to build a military that—what I think they believe is 

necessary to defend their interests, both regionally and globally; we 

shouldn’t be surprised by that. 

We should also be recognizing that as a rising China, there is 

benefit to the world for a peaceful, prosperous China that is transparent and that has—that participates in the international institutions and is a—I have said this before—is a net provider of security 

rather than a net user of security. And I think that the future— 

they have the potential to be able to do that. 

There are many areas where we cooperate. We have a growing 

relationship between China and the U.S.—mil-to-mil relationship— 

that is, I would say it is slow but steady and we are making 

progress in kind of breaking down the barriers we have to understand each other. And this is an essential part, I think, of having 

a peaceful, prosperous, stable China that has a military that helps. 

They can have a significant role in what the outcome of North 

Korea is. And so, we need to encourage that. 

What’s frustrated them, though, however, is what is kind of happening in their own backyard as it relates to their relations with 

some of our allies and our partners. As I said earlier, their kind 

of ambiguous claims on their—territorial claims in the South China 

Sea, establishment of air defense zones; these all complicate the security environment and make us wonder. 

Their military is on the rise. They reported today they are going 

to have a 12.2 percent increase in spending—just got reported this 

morning. And that is just what we can see; there is much more 

that might lie below that. 

So, whether the military rise—I think that is a given; it will. The 

question is, is it transparent? What is it used for? Is it in cooperation in the larger security environment that its neighbors and that 

we as a Pacific nation want them included? 

So, that remains the question; to see how they proceed. Some of 

the things that have happened in the last—since I talked to you 

last that have—in their own back—in their own local areas—have 

called into question how they are going to progress. 

Ms. HANABUSA. Now—— 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. But—— 

Ms. HANABUSA. And one of the frustrations that we have had is 

that we have had people come in and testify in the same seats that 

you are in and a lot of them feel—seem to feel that the administration doesn’t have a clear China strategy. 

In other words, are they a threat or are they somebody that we 

are going to deal with economically or try to develop some kind of 

a global relationship with? But how can you do that out of the context of the military threat? 

So, for example, we also do know—we hear words like the ADIZ 

[air defense identification zone], A2AD [anti-access, area denial]; 

and we also know that we have the Scarborough Shoals issues— 

plus you even mentioned Senkaku Diaoyu today; and we also have 

the issues with Taiwan Straits. 
28 

And in that context, we also know that they have very good 

short- and long-range ballistic missile capabilities; they have cruiser capabilities; and, of course, they have cyber capabilities. 

So, in that context, now, how prepared do you feel that you are 

now, in light of this budget, for the PACOM AOR, as the PACOM 

commander? Can you meet all of these threats if the threat size 

rises? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, I would say that the preeminence of 

the U.S. military power globally will remain in place for a long 

time; and that even a rising China won’t be able to, be able to globally threaten that. 

I think where we have the most concern are in the region where 

we happen to have four or five very important allies to us, where 

the PRC has introduced some of their military capabilities that, on 

the surface, would appear to want to deny access to the United 

States and limit our ability to defend our allies and to protect our 

interests in that region. 

So, they have focused much of their military spending on those 

things that—I mean, they understand what they think are our 

weaknesses and our—and they focus their—it appears that they 

focus their industrial capability on being able to go after those. 

So, what we have to do—we have to have—whether the Chinese 

ever use these or not, they will probably proliferate. And so, these 

are challenges that will go not just in the local AOR, but they are 

going to proliferate into other parts of the world over this century. 

So, we have to be aware of what they are; we have to have the 

right research and development in place and we have to fund the 

types of capabilities that allow us to maintain our dominance and 

our asymmetric capabilities for the—where we have significant 

ones—and we do have significant advantages. 

Mr. FORBES [presiding]. The gentlelady’s time—— 

Ms. HANABUSA. Thank you. 

Mr. FORBES. Time is expired. 

The gentleman from Nevada, Dr. Heck, is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Dr. HECK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you all for being here today. Thank you for your long and 

distinguished service to our Nation and your commitment to our 

men and women in uniform. 

General Rodriguez, when we look at some of the other commands 

around PACOM, there are roughly 330,000 military and civilian 

personnel assigned within its AOR—CENTCOM, about 90,000. 

And then we come to AFRICOM that has a lack of dedicated assigned forces, which seem to be perhaps constraining the command’s ability to conduct long-term and robust planning and execution of missions on the continent, as well as creating some risk to 

the command’s ability to respond to crises. 

What, if any, requests have you made to address these constraints and mitigate the risks, and what is the status of those requests? 

General RODRIGUEZ. Thank you, sir. We have requested an allocation of forces that go year by year by assignment and we have 

been given a Special Purpose MAGTF Marine force; we have also 

been allocated a regionally aligned brigade from the U.S. Army. 
29 

And then we have also got approved the force-sharing agreements with EUCOM [U.S. European Command] to also access some 

of their forces to be used on the African continent. 

As we look forward, we have asked for a regionally aligned division from the U.S. Army, as well as an intelligence brigade, minus 

from the Army, and a Theater Sustainment Organization, which is 

a tailored organization less than a brigade, as well as an engineer 

unit. 

So, those are the things that we are asking to be allocated to us 

in the future. 

Dr. HECK. And do you know the status of those requests? 

General RODRIGUEZ. It is working through the process. It will 

probably be another 3 or 4 months before that decisionmaking 

process gets completed, sir. 

Dr. HECK. And where is the Special Purpose MAGTF located? 

General RODRIGUEZ. The Special Purpose MAGTF is located at 

Moro ́n, Spain. 

Dr. HECK. And the regionally aligned brigade? 

General RODRIGUEZ. The regionally aligned brigade—the majority of the forces forward are at Djibouti. But they participate in exercises in theater security cooperation throughout the continent, 

sir. 

Dr. HECK. And the allocation by year—approximately how many 

forces are being requested in that yearly allocation? 

General RODRIGUEZ. I would have to get you the exact number. 

And I will get that to you afterwards, sir. 

Dr. HECK. All right. Thank you. 

[The information referred to is classified and retained in the committee files.] 

Dr. HECK. I mean, obviously we are very concerned about—especially in light of the situation in Benghazi—making sure that 

AFRICOM has the resources necessary to respond in a timely manner. So, please keep us apprised; keep me apprised of the request 

for those additional forces. We will—— 

General RODRIGUEZ. Will do, sir. 

Dr. HECK. Thank you. 

I yield back, Mr. Chair. 

Mr. CONAWAY [presiding]. Gentleman yields back. 

Ms. Duckworth, for 5 minutes. 

Ms. DUCKWORTH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you, gentlemen, for being here. I was disturbed to see that 

this year’s proposed cuts to the National Guard’s end strength and 

the seemingly escalation of words over the readiness threat levels 

for the National Guard and Reserve Forces. I would like to address 

that a little bit. 

General Rodriguez, you just talked about forces that are dedicated to AFRICOM. You didn’t mention the State Partnership Program at all. Can you touch on what role they play? 

General RODRIGUEZ. I can, ma’am. Thank you. 

We have eight states that are over in State Partnership Program. 

They perform a great role in building relationships, as well as 

building capacity of our partners. 

We have just expanded North Dakota from one country to three, 

and we are also putting more requests in to get a couple more 
30 

State Partnership Programs. So they have been a long-term benefit 

to us in Africa. 

Ms. DUCKWORTH. Thank you. General Austin, can you speak a 

little bit to the role of Guard and Reserve forces in CENTCOM for 

example, in the past year? Roughly how many flight hours were 

flown by Guard or Reserve pilots? The amount of work that is done 

by Guard and Reserve medical staff and hospital facilities in theater and the like? 

General AUSTIN. Well, ma’am, you know that the support that 

has been provided in Afghanistan has been a tremendous help 

throughout. I would have to take the question for the record to get 

you the exact amount of hours that have been flown by Guard 

forces, but it has been substantial throughout the AOR. And they 

have contributed in a meaningful way. 

[The information referred to can be found in the Appendix on 

page 155.] 

Ms. DUCKWORTH. Thank you. Admiral Locklear, can you speak a 

little bit in your AO [area of operations] as well? You just came 

back from Thailand, I believe, last month with Cobra Gold. Looking 

at Cobra Gold and Garuda Shield and all of the exercises that go 

on there, what role do Guard and Reserve forces play in your AO, 

in PACOM? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, they play an important role, even 

though sometimes not in large numbers. They bring some capabilities and capacities that are important to the AOR. So, very appreciative of them. We have seven State Partnership Programs in my 

AOR. There are areas that we would like to grow those in. 

Ms. DUCKWORTH. Okay. General Austin, I would like to touch a 

little bit on the line of questioning that Mrs. Davis, my colleague 

from—the gentlelady from California had started on Afghanistan, 

and what we are doing specifically to grow women leaders in both 

the Afghan military, but also their police forces. Can you speak a 

bit more to that? 

General AUSTIN. We continue to focus on recruiting more women 

into the force, and to train those women to assume greater roles 

of responsibility. Right now I think the ratio is about 1 percent of 

the total force is female. But having said that, I think we are working a number of lines of effort simultaneously. It is refreshing to 

see that we have our first fixed-wing pilot that has recently been 

trained and so there are more to follow in the pipeline. This is— 

as you know, ma’am, it is not an easy task. But I think where we 

are now, based upon where we started, is we are a long way away 

from a start point. And we will continue to emphasize—work with 

the Afghans to continue to emphasize this going forward. 

Ms. DUCKWORTH. What are we doing specifically with being able 

to put these women in, say the Afghan—the police forces out into 

places where they are needed? When I visited Afghanistan last 

year, one of the things that the women told us was that they didn’t 

trust that they could go to the local police or military to report 

abuse, or report issues because there were no women there. When 

I spoke with the women in the military, and also their police forces, 

they said that—well, there are not even barracks there with bathrooms that they are allowed to use. So they can’t be forward de-
31 

ployed to those areas. And if they can’t get out there, then they 

can’t do their jobs. 

General AUSTIN. Yes, ma’am. This is a challenge. And, you know, 

it is something that we are going to have to continue to work with 

the Afghan leadership on in moving forward. Again, I think there 

is a police chief that is going to take a position in Herat, which is 

out in the west as you know, in the near future. That is encouraging. But we are going to have to continue to emphasize to the 

Afghan leadership that, in order to get the women out to where 

they need to be and provide the right protections for them, there 

are things that they are going to need to continue to focus on. And 

we are just not there yet. So. 

Ms. DUCKWORTH. All right. Thank you. I yield back, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN [presiding]. Thank you. Mr. Scott. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you Mr. Chairman. Gentleman, thank you for 

being here today and General Dempsey testified that the world was 

going to continue to be unpredictable, complex, and dangerous and 

would continue to surprise us in many unpleasant ways, before the 

Senate. And Admiral, I know that while we can have a plane or 

a boat, it can only be in one place at one time. And that brings me 

to an issue that all three of you have talked about, which is the 

ISR platforms and how we can use that as force multipliers. Certainly something that we can provide that many countries can’t. 

And the JSTARS [Joint Surveillance and Target Attack Radar 

System] fly out of my district. It is a platform that we have hoped 

to recapitalize so that we can get more intelligence to you in a faster manner. But if you could each speak to theater-wide ISR capabilities, whether or not you feel like they are properly resourced 

and what roles the JSTARS have played in each of your areas of 

command? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, I would say from my PACOM perspective, our ISR requirements are underresourced. And that is including our ISR resources for the Korean peninsula, as well as the 

growing number of places that we have to keep track of throughout 

this AOR. And that is not just in air-breathing ISR, it is all the 

way from your national technical means down all the way through 

HUMINT [human intelligence]. And so each year I make those requirements known to the DNI, Director of National Intelligence, 

about what my priorities are. And we are seeing some improvement, but we are still underresourced. 

In the area of JSTARS, the JSTARS—I think every COCOM 

would tell you that they are—that JSTARS play and the capability 

that the JSTARS bring is just critical. The first, it provides—in my 

AOR, it provides a combat battle management capability that is 

important if I get into a comms [communications] or denied environment. So if my command and control from my central command 

nodes is cut off, which is highly likely in a conflict in my AOR, and 

this will—and that command and control capability is critical. It 

also provides unique capabilities with moving target capability, 

that—important for, like General Scaparrotti in Korea, as he tries 

to keep track of the fourth largest army in the world that is in position to be able to strike Seoul within minutes. And so those type 

of capabilities, I think for my AOR, are very important. 
32 

General AUSTIN. Well, sir, it is—likewise, ISR is a critical part 

of what we do in terms of warfighting. And even in those places 

where we are not engaged in kinetic activity on a daily basis, they 

help us remain aware of what is going on in the AOR. I have 

about—currently about—because of the fight in Afghanistan, about 

85 percent of the inventory focused on the CENTCOM AOR. That 

helps me with activities in Afghanistan, but also helps our efforts 

as we prosecute the fight against terrorists in ungoverned spaces 

like Yemen and in the FATA [Federally Administered Tribal Areas] 

and other places. 

That is about 62 percent of what I, you know, requested. Because 

you know, it is just not in the inventory to give us everything that 

we need. With respect to JSTARS, I can tell you that as a commander in the—a division commander in Afghanistan or a core 

commander in Iraq, the JSTARS platform was very, very helpful 

to us in prosecuting the fight. As Sam said, you know, moving target indicators—moving target indicator capability was really, really 

beneficial. And that command and control capability—that helped 

to augment was also very good. 

So an essential part of what we did in the past and certainly, you 

know, the more of that we can get, the better. 

General RODRIGUEZ. Yes, thank you. The JSTARS capability, as 

both my partners mentioned, is usually important in Africa. It is 

good because of the broad space that it covers, and also bridges the 

gap between the national technical means and the smaller, lighter 

aircraft to better focus their efforts on where to look. As far—far 

as the entire intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance efforts, 

everybody needs more, so we are working with our partners to help 

do the intelligence sharing, which is so important. Because the situational understanding we have to have in AFRICOM AOR to be 

able to respond quickly is usually important to all of us. So we 

work with all of our partners on that. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you gentlemen—do you have—— 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Mr. SCOTT [continuing]. The ISR that you need. 

Mr. GARAMENDI. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Several things here. 

Mr. Chairman, you started off the hearing talking about the budget. The President actually provides some $24 billion additional over 

and above what was originally in the—and my understanding is 

that at this moment, the Republican caucus is rejecting that $24 

billion additional dollars for the military. I know that is not where 

you are, but you might look more closely at the options and opportunities that the President has provided. 

Also the sequestration, which we constantly talk about here, 

came about as a direct result of the threat to default on the American debt. And that led to the sequestration and the compromise 

that was put together at that time. I know some members of this 

committee did not vote for that, but the option was to default on 

the American debt. That was brought to us by the Republican caucus. 

General Austin, your written testimony really focuses much more 

on the social, economic, and political issues in your command. I am 

delighted that you did that. At least in your written testimony. 

Here, we tend to focus more on the military side of it. But it seems 
33 

to me that you are correctly paying a great deal of attention to economic development, social development, education and political development in your region. 

Without that, we are not going to be successful. We have spent $1 trillion in Afghanistan, $1 trillion in Iraq. It is debatable whether it was a positive outcome or not. That is still in doubt. So I really urge you to continue to do that, and to continue to focus the attention of your command on those issues. And, I would appreciate 

hearing a comment on that, if you would, sir. 

General AUSTIN. Yes, sir. I certainly agree with you that in order 

to address the issues that exist in the region, and in order to work 

to push things in a direction that trends more towards security and 

stability, it is going to require a constant whole-of-government approach. And as you have pointed out, sir, the military is an instrument of power, but it is only one of many. 

And so, I think we are going to have to work more closely with 

our partners in the region, to use everything that is in the inventory to push things in the right direction, and take advantage of 

opportunities. 

Mr. GARAMENDI. I really appreciate you are heading in that direction, at least your testimony indicates that is where your mind 

is, and I think that all is to our benefit. 

I also want to push back on Mr. Wilson, who thinks you ought— 

thinks Mr. Rodriguez ought to be located in South Carolina. 

I think that would be a particularly unwise thing to do, General 

Rodriguez. You appropriately pointed out Africa and Europe have 

a long history together. And to be able to be in Europe, working 

with our allies, who have that history in Africa, is extremely important. 

South Carolina is a wonderful place, but it is a long way and significantly disconnected. 

I don’t need your comment on it. I am pushing back here, so that 

people are aware, if he tries on the NDAA [National Defense Authorization Act] to move you, I will push back. I hope others do 

also. 

With regard to the ISR, General Rodriguez, if you could comment 

briefly about what you, specifically, need. And I am concerned here 

about the U–2 and its longevity or whether it is short or long is 

not yet clear. 

General RODRIGUEZ. Yes, sir. Well, you know, again, based on 

the prioritization and decisionmaking in the Department of Defense, you know, we get the share that they think is best. 

It is a little bit less than both what CENTCOM and PACOM get, 

but that is, you know, a prioritization that they continue to, you 

know, are forced to make. 

And I think that what we are trying to do is creatively figure out 

how we can, you know, leverage all our allies, all our African partners, to both do that. European countries also have ISRs so we are 

trying to leverage all that. 

But we are going to continue to be a risk and a challenge because 

of the inability to source all the ISR that is needed. 

Mr. GARAMENDI. Yes, I would just—I am sure the committee is 

aware, but I will point out to those of us that are here and for the 

record, that the Air Force has flip-flopped three times on what to 
34 

do with the Global Hawk. It now apparently is in line to continue. 

It is an asset that—you need it in the central—in Mali and in that 

area. 

The U–2 is presumably scheduled to be—to go, and what is going 

to replace it? 

These are fundamental questions. All three of you spoke to the 

need of ISR. That is gonna be a major issue. 

So I thank you. 

And, with that, Mr. Chairman, my 1—2 seconds over. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. And, just to correct the record, the President actually put in $56 

billion in his budget over and above the budget deal that was 

worked out between the House and the Senate last fall and signed 

by the President. Twenty-six billion dollars to go to defense and $30 billion to go 

to social spending, which continues the trend that he had had in 

previous budgets where we tried to solve the budget on the backs 

of the military, taking half of the cuts out of the military, when 

they only account for about 17 percent, 18 percent, of the budget. 

Mr. Nugent. 

Mr. NUGENT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And I want to first of all thank the two generals, not snubbing 

the admiral, but both of you have commanded two of my sons, in 

both Afghanistan and Iraq, and now in AFRICOM, one of them 

who is currently deployed. So I want to thank you for your service 

and your leadership. It has been well received by their parents, 

that is for sure. 

Admiral, as it relates to CHAMP [Counter-Electronics High 

Power Microwave Advanced Missile Project], and for those that are 

unfamiliar with CHAMP in the committee, it is a microwave emitter that is utilized, can be flown to disable and knock out enemy 

electronics. 

Air Force has had a successful test with CHAMP. It was placed 

on a cruise missile. They expect deployment out in 2020, 2025, because they want to develop another platform, which I am not opposed to. 

But currently, we have an excess of cruise missiles. We have the 

ability to outfit some of those with CHAMP. That could help, I 

would think, in PACOM particularly, as a stand-off weapon, but 

one that doesn’t have any collateral damage, doesn’t injure or destroy anything, but does knock out the enemy’s ability to target. 

Do you have any comments as it would help in PACOM? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, to the degree that we use the entire 

electromagnetic spectrum to our advantage, and in any potential 

contingency or conflict you would try to deny the advantage of any 

potential adversary that—their capability to use it. 

Things such as the microwave emitters, those types of technologies, are of a growing importance in a more technically sophisticated world. Having the capabilities that something like that 

demonstrator would provide in my AOR would be an important aspect of any planning I would do. 

Mr. NUGENT. And I would think getting it in 18 months versus— 

like I said, I don’t disagree with the Air Force’s projection to do 

something reusable in 2025, but to have it available to you in 18 
35 

months, to your inventory, at least, to make decisions as to how 

you move forward, would that be helpful or not? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, I would say that of course the Air 

Force will have to speak for the decisions they make on that, but 

I understand the significant pressure that they are under to try to 

make good decisions. So we have a joint force, and want to ensure 

that we make near-term investments that, such as this, that they 

facilitate the longer-term investment. 

So if this particular platform was a proper stepping stone to a 

greater capability in the future, why wouldn’t I want it sooner than 

later? 

Yes, sir. 

Mr. NUGENT. I don’t disagree with you. 

Changing somewhat to General Austin, it was just reported in 

the news, reference to Israel interrupting a flow of weapons by the 

sea, coming from Iran, or at least manufactured in Syria, but 

through, you know, through the Sudan, that was going to go to 

Egypt and then over to the fight as it relates against Israel by 

Gaza. 

You know, all the discussion right now with Iran is referenced 

to their nuclear capabilities. But, you know, as we move forward, 

right now, we see them as it relates to, you know, conventional 

arms, supplying and, you know, they are terrorists, support of terrorist actions throughout the world, but, in particularly as it relates to Israel. 

Is the position that we are taking—I mean, we are so focused on 

the nuclear development. Are we losing sight of the fact that Iran 

poses other threats besides just nuclear? 

General AUSTIN. I don’t think we are, sir. I think, first of all, if 

we can—you know, we are very pragmatic about the P5+1 and our 

efforts there. 

But if we can get that done, I think it will make a significant 

difference in the region. 

Certainly, a nuclear Iran is something that no one wants to see. 

But above and beyond that, I agree with you that Iran presents 

a number of other threats to the region. Their ability to mine the 

straits; their ability to conduct cyber attacks; their ballistic missile 

capability; and, of course, the issue that you just spoke to, the activities of the Quds Force and their efforts to spread malign activity, not only around the region, but across the globe. 

And I think what the leaders in the region remain focused on are 

all those other things in addition to the nuclear capability. 

So, certainly the folks in the region haven’t lost sight of that. We 

have not lost sight of that. 

But, again, if we can get the P5+1 negotiations to the right place, 

I think it will make a significant difference for all of us going forward. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Mr. Barber. 

Mr. BARBER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I want to thank the witnesses not only for being here today, but, 

more importantly, for your long and distinguished service to our 

country and to the people in your command. 
36 

Like many of my colleagues, I was quite disturbed and very concerned when the Secretary rolled out his proposed budget cuts last 

week. And I know we will be hearing more about it tomorrow. 

In my view, this is absolutely not the time to hollow out our military or to eliminate critical air and sea assets. And I hope we can 

find a way forward that does not allow that to happen. 

I would like to discuss a particular proposal this morning with 

you, and that is one that I think you know has generated considerable debate. And that is the mission of the A–10. 

I am proud to represent many people in my district who are associated with Davis Monthan Air Force Base, many of the pilots who 

fly the A–10. At that base, we have the 355th Fighter Wing, which 

supports and operates 82 Warthog and trains the next generation 

of A–10 pilots. 

And I think you all know that this critical platform to our military arsenal has been updated with new electronic packages, new 

wings, which will extend the life of the A–10 for another 15 to 20 

years. It has already been flying for 30, but it has got a lot more 

life left, given the $1.1 billion we have invested in upgrades. 

This fighter plays a crucial role, in my view, in protecting our 

troops on the ground, a role that just cannot be suitably replicated 

by any other aircraft in our inventory. 

In fact, Major General Bill Hix, deputy director of TRADOC 

[Training and Doctrine Command], has said the A–10’s ‘‘complementary mix of precision, area fires, sustained coverage, persistence, responsiveness, and moral and physical’’ impact on the enemy 

provides a capability that should not be overlooked. 

And, as you know, the Warthog provides dynamic close air support at high altitudes, where attack helicopters can’t fly, such as 

the mountains of eastern Afghanistan, and it can fly low and slow, 

and in tight places, close spaces, something aircraft, other aircraft 

cannot perform with the same effect. 

General, the President’s—President Obama’s budget would divest 

the entire A–10 fleet to reduce costs. 

And with countless sorties flown by the A–10 in Iraq and Afghanistan, which have proven lethal to the enemy, in support of 

ground troops during firefights, I ask you, General, how would the 

loss of the A–10 mission affect CENTCOM’s close air support capabilities? 

General AUSTIN. Is that my question, sir? 

Mr. BARBER. Yes, sir, General Austin. 

General AUSTIN. All right, thank you, sir. 

Well, as you have indicated, the A–10 has provided a tremendous 

service to the forces on the ground over time. And I have seen it 

do wonderful things in both Iraq and Afghanistan. 

Having said that, you know, it is—actually the domain of the Air 

Force to really kind of figure out how to balance their requirements, you know, how to balance readiness and force modernization and end strength going forward. 

As a combatant commander, you know, what I care about is 

when I put forth a requirement to support our troops, that the 

services can provide that support—credible support and in a timely 

fashion. And if the Air Force determines that there are other platforms that can deliver that, I would have to defer to their judg-
37 

ment; but again, it has provided credible and sustained support to 

our troops in combat. 

Mr. BARBER. Absolutely agree with you. 

When I talk to the men and women of the Army down in Fort 

Huachuca, which is also down in my district, they have told me 

over and over again that when the Warthog shows up overhead 

they are going to have a much better day. And I think we need to 

make sure it is continuing. 

I would like to pose a similar question, Admiral, to you. It is my 

understanding that PACOM’s strategic approach relies on the A– 

10’s assured presence to meet the demands of the military contingency mission. Osan Air Force base in South Korea, which houses 

the 51st Fighter Wing, employs a premier close air support A–10 

fighter squadron, has more fire power to provide closer support 

than its counterparts and at a cheaper price. 

If the A–10s in this region, Admiral, are divested, what capability will fill the close air support gap that would result, and at 

what price? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, first let me say that I am very proud 

of the forces that—A–10 squadrons that operate in support of the 

Korean peninsula and in support of all of our operations in the 

PACOM AOR. 

I am in the same position that General Austin is in, that, you 

know, the—given where we are today with the budget, and given 

the way we’re in the future, the services are having to make hard 

decisions. And this is a decision that I have to defer to the Air 

Force on if they have to come back to me and be able to show us 

what will replace this. 

There are capabilities out there. Clearly they don’t exactly parallel what the A–10 can do. But, we will just have to—when this 

platform goes away, we will have to use what the services can resource and produce and we will have to readjust our plans to be 

able to minimize the amount of risk, assuming that we can do that. 

Mr. BARBER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Bridenstine. 

Mr. BRIDENSTINE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I would like to clarify, contrary to the comments by my colleague, 

Congressman Garamendi, the President is not serious about increasing defense spending. What he is very serious about is holding 

proper defense spending hostage to social spending. 

To start, I would like to quote the Assistant Secretary for Defense—Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Katrina McFarland. 

Her quote is, ‘‘Right now, the pivot is being looked at again, because, candidly, it can’t happen.’’ 

She says, ‘‘Candidly, it can’t happen.’’ 

Admiral Locklear, would you agree with that assessment or not? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, I wouldn’t completely agree with it. I 

mean, I think there are shades of how you have to answer that 

question. 

First, the pivot is not just about military. We have got a lot of 

different aspects. So there are trade agreements, there are activities with our allies—if you come to my headquarters we are moving 

forward with the aspects of rebalancing. We are working hard on 
38 

the alliances, on the exercises to underpin them. We are moving 

our force structure into places we need to. 

The real question is, is whether or not the force that Congress 

will eventually buy to give us, is it adequate for the security environment that is changing? And my AOR has changed significantly—in my lifetime it has changed dramatically in this area. 

So whether or not we can resource to meet the challenges and 

remain the preeminent guarantor of security in the Pacific area, I 

think that is the question. 

Mr. BRIDENSTINE. Thank you, Admiral. 

General Rodriguez, in your testimony you talked about some of 

the challenges you face with assets, including ISR, Medevac, crisis 

response, and my understanding is for some of those funding issues 

that you are having, you are actually turning to OCO funds, Overseas Contingency Operations funds, which should not technically 

be used for this. But can you share with us your testimony on ISR 

and other asset shortages that you might have? 

General RODRIGUEZ. Yes. 

As I mentioned in testimony, the ISR shortages that we have, 

you know, are less than half of our support—requests get supported. And on the personnel recovery and Medevac is about the 

long ranges that we are challenged with in AFRICOM that, you 

know, puts our people at risk at distances that we have challenges 

supporting. 

And, on the crisis response forces, the challenge that we have is 

really in Western Africa where we don’t have access agreements, 

overflight or expeditionary infrastructure to support ability to move 

closer when the indications and warnings are increased or there is 

an increased threat level to those high-risk, high-threat embassies 

in Western Africa. 

Mr. BRIDENSTINE. If you had your optimum order of battle, what 

kind of assets would you need and where would they be located? 

General RODRIGUEZ. I would have some improved expeditionary 

infrastructure across West Africa so that we could go in and out 

of there as required based on the situation and then some increased ISR assets to support the entire Intelligence Community’s 

ability to understand the situation as best as we possibly could on 

the ground so we couldn’t get surprised. 

Mr. BRIDENSTINE. As far as mobility assets, can you describe the 

situation there? 

General RODRIGUEZ. The mobility assets that we are talking 

about are multiple different types of platform, mostly air movement 

as well as helicopter movement and the long-range capability of the 

V–22s; it would be a combination of all those things. 

Mr. BRIDENSTINE. Thank you. 

And, General Austin, I just wanted to get your take on what 

looks more and more real would be the zero option. Obviously the 

President has had some phone calls with the President of Afghanistan—or Afghanistan, and those have not gone well. 

If we end up in a zero option in Afghanistan, can you describe 

to me, do you believe that would be stabilizing or destabilizing? 

General AUSTIN. Well, I certainly believe it would be problematic 

for the country of Afghanistan, because I think the military would 

struggle, or the security forces would struggle going forward, be-
39 

cause of the possibility of a lack of resources and also lack of 

mentorship. 

Now, to be fair, going forward, our goal is to transition responsibilities for the security of Afghanistan to the country of Afghanistan, and we have been working hard at that for 13 years now. And 

so, as they stand up capability, what we want to do is stand down 

and trend towards a more normal relationship going forward. 

And so, you know, we are hopeful that we can do that, and I 

think if we can do that, and we are there to help mentor them a 

bit more, then I think it will be extremely beneficial. 

But again, the goal is to have the Afghans do this for themselves 

at some point going forward. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Mr. Smith. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have some specific questions for Admiral Locklear about the number of carriers that we 

need. But, before I get into that, just revisiting the budget thing 

a little bit. The President is very, very serious about increasing the 

defense budget. 

You know, he put together his strategy 3, 4 years ago. At the 

time there was considerable concern that that strategy didn’t spend 

enough money, but it spent a heck of a lot more money than what 

we wound up spending in 3 years and what we project to spend 

going forward, as a result of the Budget Control Act, as a result 

of sequestration, as a result of a whole bunch of different issues. 

So make no mistake about it, the $26 billion that the President 

has asked for, he is very serious about, because that is, you know, 

what meets the strategy that they had put in place. 

But yes, it is fair to say that he understands that a country does 

not simply stand on how much money it spends on defense. He 

cares also about infrastructure, about transportation, about investments in research. And it is the entire discretionary budget, that 

defense is slightly over half of, that has been most devastated by 

the Budget Control Act and by sequestration. And we, on this committee, document with great detail the impacts that has on our 

defense. 

But, outside of this committee—and certainly in our districts— 

the impacts we have seen on transportation, you know, our infrastructure is just way behind. The impacts we have seen on investments in research, on education, on Head Start, on a whole lot of 

programs that are very important is just as real. 

The President is serious about both. 

Now, as Mr. Forbes and I had this epic battle about—you know, 

what to do about the budget, there is a clear disagreement about 

how to handle the larger budget. The President wants to get to 

that vision of the $56 billion by increasing taxes and making cuts 

to entitlements. 

You know, he put a proposal on the table a year ago for the 

Chained CPI [Consumer Price Index], you know, which was very 

controversial. He has not been at all unwilling to go after the entitlements. And the problem that we have collectively as a body, 

House, Senate, President is we can’t get to a point where we get 

an agreement on raising taxes or cutting entitlements, which then 
40 

forces us into a discretionary budget that is lower than most of us 

want. 

Some are very comfortable with it. You know, some, you know, 

very conservative folks want to cut everything including defense. I 

know the chairman battles that in his own caucus. There are some 

on our side who are more than comfortable cutting defense. But, 

overall, we cannot get an agreement to get to that larger number 

that the majority of us want, because we are unwilling to raise 

taxes and cut entitlements. 

Now, on the Republican side, they say we don’t need to raise 

taxes, and we have had that argument, but it is not President is, 

you know, interested in cutting defense. He put his plan in place 

3 years ago that had us spending a lot more money than we are 

currently talking about spending, but all of these other fights, over 

the overall budget, have shoved us down to a number that is very 

problematic—I will agree with you on that. 

It is a matter of how we get an agreement. 

Which brings us to the point that I started with, we are where 

we are. We have the top line that we have. And the worst thing 

that this committee and this Congress could do at this point is to 

fight every single cut that has been proposed to hit that top line, 

because where that leaves us, it leaves us with a hollow force. 

If we will not make the cuts in base infrastructure, in personnel 

costs, whether it is the—you know, the A–10 on that side, the 11 

cruisers that we want to mothball—if we don’t do that, what happens is readiness gets cut, because then you are down to the last 

thing and you cut down on training, you cut down on equipment, 

you cut down on maintenance. 

That is a hollow force. 

A hollow force is not about the size of the force. It is about 

whether or not the force you have is trained and equipped to do 

the missions that you are asking them to do. And if we don’t make 

some of these other cuts, that is where we are likely to be. 

Now, I am wide open to ideas, all right. If someone says, ‘‘Hey, 

can’t cut the A–10,’’ okay. Show me the $3.5 billion. All right. Can’t 

do the personnel cuts? Show the $700 million. Show me the $5 billion for the cruisers. But if we simply say no, no, no, no, no, at the 

end, we wind up with readiness in a very bad place. 

On the carrier issue, you know, I have heard everywhere, I think 

I heard Mr. Forbes say at a forum we were at last week that we 

are in a 15-carrier world, that ideally, to meet our requirements, 

we would hit 15 carriers. But I also happen to know that a lot of 

folks very high up in the Navy think that we could survive quite 

easily with 10, 9, or even 8 carriers. That the 11 carriers are primarily about presence more than they are about warfighting capability, and there are a lot cheaper ways to establish presence. 

Now, before my friends down in Norfolk freak out, I understand 

the industrial base argument. Okay. If you shrink down to 10 or 

9 or 8, do you lose the ability to build any in the future? And that 

is something we certainly will need to talk about. But Admiral 

Locklear, from a strategy standpoint, you know, could we not have 

a very effective national security strategy with fewer than 11 aircraft carriers? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. In my view, you could not. 
41 

Mr. SMITH. Are there folks high up in the Navy who disagree 

with that view, without naming names? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. I don’t know who they are, if they do. If they 

do, they haven’t been out and about very much or understand the 

utility of aircraft carriers as it relates to global security environment rather than just fighting wars. 

Mr. SMITH. Just listening to internal dynamics, and I don’t know 

if you are a part, but when we were talking, when folks were meeting to talk about how to hit this cap that we are all frustrated 

about for different reasons, were there not some in the Navy and 

some in the Pentagon who said that one of the ways to do that, 

they would support, would be reducing from 11 aircraft carriers? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. If they did, I don’t know who they are. I 

mean, I am sure you could find someone, but I am not—wasn’t 

privy to that argument, and I—to be honest with you, I can’t see 

a—I mean, unless the world changes and the role of aircraft carriers can be subsumed by something else, which they can’t, at least 

in the Navy and the military bill today—— 

Mr. SMITH. So spin that out for me a little. What is it, that if 

we had 10 instead of 11, that we couldn’t do that would place us 

at risk? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. If you look at your defenses only in the context of can you fight a war—— 

Mr. SMITH. No, I am not. 

Admiral LOCKLEAR [continuing]. Then the numbers of carriers 

that you—first of all, you have to get them there quickly. I mean, 

war is going to start more quickly than it did in the last century, 

so you have to be generally present with some things to be relevant 

in the early stages of any conflict. So, we made that investment in 

nuclear aircraft carriers for a lot of reasons, because they can just 

stay forward, as you know, they have significant strike capability, 

they also have a huge deterrent value, otherwise other countries, 

you know, like China, wouldn’t be building them. 

And they have the ability to be there in what we would call 

phase zero in day-to-day operations—— 

Mr. SMITH. Let me pause you on just one piece there. 

At the moment, China has built one, and that they got from Russia, and it is not exactly incredibly capable, so China has been at 

this for quite a while, and they haven’t built any, so I am not sure 

that is a good argument. 

On the other side of it, I mean, I am not—I accept some of your 

broader arguments, but I am not sure that is an effective one. 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, they have announced they are going to 

pursue a fleet of four just in this past year. 

But we don’t build carriers because of Chinese carriers. 

Mr. SMITH. Right. 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. So, if you think globally today, you effectively have a 10-carrier force with 11 that is coming. The demand 

signal day to day from Syria, to Iran, to Korea, to the South China 

Sea that demand this asset be there because of the sovereignty 

issues, you don’t have to have somebody’s permission, because of 

the strike capability, because of the command and control capability they bring—— 
42 

Mr. SMITH. And as security, any other ship that we could send 

out there? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Yes. Absolutely. 

Mr. SMITH. Yes, I take your point in that. We have other ships. 

We have cruisers, we have destroyers, we have submarines, we 

have other things we could send in for that same reason. What, 

and again, this is more of a thought experiment, because I think 

these are the type of thought experiments we are going to need to 

have in order to get to a budget that makes sense, what is it about 

an aircraft carrier that these other ships don’t bring to forward 

presence in deterrence? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, they bring about 40 strike aircraft that 

are going to have, from Super Hornets into the next generation of 

F–35, stealth capability. They are going to have MV–22 capability. 

So there is this, I mean, to try to put that on another platform, you 

would end up having basically—— 

Mr. SMITH. Well, no, you wouldn’t put it on another platform. 

The other platforms, what they bring, is they bring standoff weapon strike capability. They bring cruise missiles and a variety of 

other things; not implying that you have to fly in and shoot. So 

that is the tradeoff there. 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. That is true, but I would say that a lot of 

what you do with aircraft carriers is you use them before you actually start shooting. And so the ability to maintain air and space 

and maritime dominance if you—if you are only going to rely on 

missiles that you fire and it is when the shooting starts, then you 

limit, you know, you start to limit the space for decisions to be 

made. 

Mr. SMITH. Understood. Let me drill down a little bit on that. 

So, aircraft carriers give us dominance that has nothing to do 

with what they could shoot. What is that, exactly? What do aircraft—what do aircraft carriers do that give us that sort of dominance outside of actually having to shoot? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, first of all, they take with them—you 

know, generally go in an aircraft carrier strike group, which has 

other maritime assets with it, including cruisers and destroyers, 

that capability to interact with submarines, U.S. submarines that 

go with them. 

Mr. SMITH. Understood, but the aircraft carrier is not necessarily 

required for that. That is part of that strike group, but the strike 

group is, I mean, that is just the way that we have assembled it, 

so—— 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. The aircraft carrier is not required? I 

don’t—— 

Mr. SMITH. No, I am asking, to some degree. You know, if you 

have a strike group, why does an aircraft carrier have to be part 

of that? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, we have deployed strike groups in the 

past. Then, we had battleships that were the centerpiece of a strike 

group. And we didn’t like the options that those assets that became 

very expensive and kind of arcane provided for us. But we haven’t 

seen that same change in the value of having U.S. sovereign aircraft carriers that can produce credible strike capability forward in 

places where we want to manage the crisis in our favor, and if cri-
43 

sis occurs, be able to respond quickly. And that is the value of having a carrier forward in my AOR. 

Mr. SMITH. Okay. And you feel strongly that 11 is the number 

that we need at this point. 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, you have about 10 now. We can’t support the global demand. And so, I don’t know how you get to a better equation. We have tried—the Navy has tried very hard to kind 

of get into a resourcing rate that ables up the presence capability. 

But, one thing for sure, in my experience is that part of the U.S. 

global leadership is maritime dominance, where we choose to have 

it. And at the front of that maritime dominance, which starts to become very important, particularly in the world we are in today, are 

the capability that aircraft carriers bring. 

Mr. SMITH. Okay. Thank you very much. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Mr. Cook. 

Mr. COOK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have got a number of 

questions, and I will try and be quick. But, Admiral, I know it has 

been a long day with everything, but I just want to resurrect this 

question about the U–2s. 

And, I will stay away from the A–10s and full disclosure, I am 

a Marine officer asking an admiral with two Army officers an Air 

Force question, but my concern is about Korea and the U–2s and 

the situation there. The U–2 has had more than nine lives, you 

know, ever since 1960, going forward. And I always thought it was 

based on a cost-benefit analysis that what you got for that highaltitude platform in bad weather and everything else, it has been 

around, and I noticed that it is out of the budget. I am going to 

stay away from the A–10s and all the other stuff. 

But in your opinion, right now, doing that, because of Korea, do 

you weigh in on that at all? Would you prefer to still see if it has 

got a lot of miles? I was one of the ones in 1968 to want to get rid 

of the M–16, and it is still around, so sometimes improvements can 

be made, and if you could just quickly comment on that. 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, I think when General Scaparrotti 

comes to see you, he will be able to give you a detail of how he figures the U–2 into his plans, but in general, the U–2 today is central to the ISR plan for the Korea peninsula. It has capabilities 

that you just well articulated. I don’t, you know, need to go through 

those again. But, I think in the dialogue that the Air Force has had 

that said, ‘‘We just can’t afford everything.’’ So, we want to go, and 

we have to go in the direction of these unmanneds. They have 

other, broader capabilities, and we have to merge the capabilities 

that the U–2 bring and put it on these unmanned platforms, which, 

the unmanned piece is not a bad direction for the future. I mean, 

that is a good direction for us. 

So, to the degree that this decision motivates the ISR capabilities 

to be migrated onto those unmanned platforms in a way that services the warfighter demand, that is, I think, that is an opportunity, 

but it has to be realized. 

Mr. COOK. General Austin, real quick, we have had different 

briefs about the equipment coming out of Afghanistan. And one 

time I heard there was $21 billion to $22 billion worth of equip-
44 

ment, and the Marine Corps, last brief, said they had a lot of their 

equipment that came through Pakistan. Do you have any estimate 

on how much gear we still have left right now that is—we have got 

to get back and the clock is ticking. Could you address that, briefly? 

General AUSTIN. Yes sir. In terms of vehicles, there are probably 

about 17,000-plus vehicles in-country and there are about 3,000 or 

so, well, there are a number of containers there that we will have 

to redeploy as well. 

Mr. COOK. Coming through Pakistan, primarily, or is that the 

port of choice, or the country—— 

General AUSTIN. We use number of routes, sir. 

Mr. COOK. Depending upon how we—okay. 

General AUSTIN. Southern ground LOC [line of communication] 

in Pakistan, predominantly, is about 44 percent of our inventory 

goes down that route. We use multimodal, you know, flat out transfer at some point, and put it on a ship. Other means. 

Mr. COOK. Yes sir. The MRAPS [Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles]. You know, we had a brief, a couple months ago, 

about, and I don’t know, I think the thing has changed, the number 

was that they were going to chop up, or the old ones or what have 

you. And then I look at the situation in Iraq, unfortunately, 

Fallujah, where the Iraqis can’t—they have tried to come back and 

seize that. They ran into a number of IEDs [improvised explosive 

devices], and based upon that—the situation which really hasn’t 

changed in a couple of decades, almost, are we looking at the number of MRAPs that maybe we want to put in part of the pre-position forces or expand that? Has that been revisited at all because 

of—— 

General AUSTIN. The services have done extensive work, sir, to 

determine what their needs going forward are, both in pre-position 

stocks, in both to support their training efforts back at home and 

their rapid deployment efforts as well. 

Mr. COOK. Okay. The last question I have is about Egypt, and 

of course the situation with the buying Russian equipment and the 

helicopters in the Sinai. How do you feel about the Egyptians obviously want more helicopters to combat that terrorist threat in the 

Sinai. Do you have any comments on that? 

General AUSTIN. Well, certainly, I think that they have been 

clear about their need for more Apaches from us to, excuse me, to 

support their efforts. I think that certainly, you know, we should 

support them when we can support them, and again, once you 

know, if our leadership decides that that is the right thing to do, 

but clearly they have a need. They are in a fight in the Sinai. They 

are great partners from a military perspective, and I think we 

want to maintain that partnership. 

Mr. COOK. Thank you very much, I yield back. 

The CHAIRMAN. Yield back. 

[Laughter.] 

I enjoyed the discussion between the admiral and Mr. Smith 

about aircraft carriers. I would like to make a couple of comments 

about it, and I would like to ask some questions of the admiral 

about that, too. You know, I think one of the main things that we 

benefit from with our strong military is—goes back to the com-
45 

ments of General Eisenhower, President Eisenhower. We hear a lot 

about beware of the military industrial complex. But he also said, 

be so strong that nobody dares attack us for fear of annihilation. 

And I think, because we have had a strong military, continue to 

have a very strong military, it keeps us out of war. And that is— 

should be, hopefully, the ultimate goal. I know that is what you 

work on every day, to keep our young men and women out of 

harm’s way, and that is something that I think that the aircraft 

carrier goes a long way, as a deterrent, if we never had to use 

them. 

The fact that we have them keeps us out of probably many conflicts. By having 10, and this is what I would like to ask you, Admiral Locklear, we have 11. One of them needs to be refueled. So, 

that cuts us down to 10, and I know in the budget they are saying 

they want to hold off on refueling that one, so basically, we are 

going to just take it out of the service and then decide later, I 

guess, what, that is the plan with that, and with the 13 cruisers. 

But, if we have 11, or 10, what is their position? I mean, 10 aren’t 

all forward at all times, right? How do you position those? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Well, with the exception of the George Washington, which is forward-deployed in Japan in support of the alliance and in response to the Korean peninsula, the remaining 10 of 

them are distributed on the east and west coast of the United 

States. So, the cost-benefit of having a nuclear carrier that can stay 

deployed for a long time with the capabilities that it has is that it 

is also, the cost is that it is a nuclear carrier, and it requires care 

and feeding to be able to operate these things for 50 years, and 

with an industrial base that is generally pretty small to be able to 

support it. 

So, there is a requirement by the Navy to be able to get these 

things through their required maintenance to be able to send them 

back out. So, there is a turnaround ratio. Now, in the case of the 

kind of day-to-day world we are in, with the number of carriers 

today, the Navy struggles to meet the carrier demand signal from 

basically CENTCOM and PACOM. In fact, they can’t do it. I mean 

there is—they can’t meet it, and they will tell you that. 

In the case of—and so that is in your kind of normal, day-to-day 

managing of a very complex security environment and the role that 

those carriers plays in it. So, we have two or three to four carriers 

out at any one time, that is a lot in kind of steady state. Now, in 

the case of a larger conflict, where you had to go to a contingency, 

you may require three, four, five, six aircraft carriers, and then 

those would have to be surged; but in my case, it takes a while for 

things to get out and to get surged, and you may not have—the 

‘‘flash-to-bang’’ in Korea is about a day, and you are going to have 

potential for a million people dead in a day. And so, thinking that 

we are going to surge a large capacity for the United States to get 

on top of that particular problem will just put us—creates issues 

for us. 

So, I guess that was a long answer to your question. That the 

entire force has to be looked at as an enterprise that pushes out 

the carriers in peacetime on the ability to be able to manage, provide that forward presence that is critical, I think, to our security. 
46 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you all for your service. Thank you for 

being here today. Appreciate your patience, your indulgence, and 

thank you to the men and women that serve with you. Would you 

please convey that back to them, of how much we appreciate them 

and their families and the sacrifices that they make on a daily 

basis for us. Thank you very much, the committee stands adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:31 p.m., the committee was adjourned.] 
A P P E N D I X 

MARCH 5, 2014 

PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD 

MARCH 5, 2014 

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WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING 

THE HEARING 

MARCH 5, 2014 

(147) 

RESPONSE TO QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MRS. DAVIS 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. The FY15 budget request includes more than $775M of military construction (MILCON) supporting USPACOM and Service requirements in the 

Pacific theater. This budget request meets the USPACOM posture requirements. 

The $128M for military infrastructure referenced in your question refers to the 

Presidential Budget Request MILCON program specifically for Guam. Table 1 below 

provides a breakdown of those requirements. 

Table 1: FY15 President’s Budget submission for Guam MILCON program 

GDP Initiative PACOM 

Initiative Project Country Location Lead Agent 

MILCON 

ROM ($M) 

DPRI Basing and 

Resiliency 

Ground Support Element Shops at 

North Ramp (USMC) 

Guam Andersen 

AFB 

USN $21.88 

DPRI Basing and 

Resiliency 

Marine Wing Support Squadron 

Facilities at North Ramp (USMC) 

Guam Andersen 

AFB 

USN $28.77 

Access in South and 

Southeast Asia 

Basing and 

Resiliency 

Guam Strike Fuel Systems Maint 

Hanger Inc. 2 

Guam Andersen 

AFB 

USAF $64.00 

Access in South and 

Southeast Asia 

Basing and 

Resiliency 

PRTC RED HORSE Logistics Facility Guam Andersen 

AFB 

USAF $3.15 

Access in South and 

Southeast Asia 

Basing and 

Resiliency 

PRTC Combat Communications 

Infrastructure Facility 

Guam Andersen 

AFB 

USAF $3.75 

Access in South and 

Southeast Asia 

Basing and 

Resiliency 

PRTC Satellite Fire Station Guam Andersen 

AFB 

USAF $6.50 

Total $128.05 

[See page 17.] 

RESPONSE TO QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MR. TURNER 

General AUSTIN. We continue to focus on recruiting more women into the force. 

And to train those women to assume greater roles of responsibility. Right now I 

think the ratio is about one percent of the total force is female. But having said 

that, I think we’re working a number of lines of effort simultaneously. It’s refreshing 

to see that we have our first fixed wing pilot that’s recently been trained and so 

there are more to follow in the pipeline. This is, as you know, not an easy task. 

But I think where we are now, based upon where we started, we’re a long way away 

from a start point. And we’ll continue to emphasize and work with the Afghans to 

continue to emphasize this going forward. 

Ensuring these women get assigned where they are needed is a challenge. And, 

you know, it’s something that we’re going to have to continue to work with the Afghan leadership on in moving forward. Again, I think there’s a police chief that’s 

going to take a position in Herat, which is out in the west as you know, in the near 

future. That’s encouraging. But we’re going to have to continue to emphasize to the 

Afghan leadership that, in order to get the women out to where they need to be and 

provide the right protections for them, there are things that they’re going to need 

to continue to focus on. And we’re just not there yet. [See page 18.] 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING 

MARCH 5, 2014 

(151) 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. MCKEON 

Mr. MCKEON. We’ve had many lessons learned from contracting actions during 

contingency operations and there is no doubt we will rely on contract support in future contingencies, be it humanitarian relief or full-spectrum combat operations. 

What are you doing to not only plan for contract support during a contingency, but 

to educate and train your personnel so they are prepared to develop requirements, 

and execute and oversee contracting actions in order to properly respond in a contingency. Are you adequately resourced to plan, execute, and oversee the contract support you would need in the event of a major contingency in your area of responsibility? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. Although United States Pacific Command (USPACOM) has 

made great progress towards integrating contract planning, USPACOM currently 

has a shortfall of Operational Contract Support (OCS) integraton throughout the 

Theater. The establishments of Joint Contingency Acquisition Support Office 

(JCASO) planners at USPACOM, United States Forces Korea (USFK) and United 

States Forces Japan (USFJ) have increased OCS integration and readiness by adding planning capabilities. USPACOM has issued an updated OCS Instruction to 

components and Sub-Unified Commands, describing the OCS environment within 

the USPACOM AOR and providing planning and execution guidance for OCS. Current planning efforts include OCS direction and guidance as part of base plans and 

annexes. USPACOM is the first Combatant Command (CCMD) to implement an 

OCS Mission Integrator (OMI) cell through an Office of the Secretary of Defense 

(OSD) and Joint Staff (JS) initiative demonstrating the capability. This OMI Cell 

will provide the operational capacity to integrate OCS across the broader staff, and 

provide increased capability to support planning for contract support across all joint 

capability areas. 

The OMI concept will be implemented through this demonstration, developing and 

executing the first overseas Joint OCS Exercise next year to provide training 

throughout USPACOM and our Service Components while exercising command and 

control for contract planning and execution supporting a major operation. The OMI 

team will enable planning, integration and contract execution capability throughout 

the Theater, from the CCMD to Service Components; from contracting offices to requiring activities, while providing command and control to link contracting support 

to operations. OMI will demonstrate operational contract support effectiveness 

through participation in the existing USPACOM operationalized command and control construct, ensuring OCS is integrated throughout our plans at both the CCMD 

and Service Component level. 

Mr. MCKEON. We’ve had many lessons learned from contracting actions during 

contingency operations and there is no doubt we will rely on contract support in future contingencies, be it humanitarian relief or full-spectrum combat operations. 

What are you doing to not only plan for contract support during a contingency, but 

to educate and train your personnel so they are prepared to develop requirements, 

and execute and oversee contracting actions in order to properly respond in a contingency. Are you adequately resourced to plan, execute, and oversee the contract support you would need in the event of a major contingency in your area of responsibility? 

General AUSTIN. We recognize the importance of Operational Contract Support 

(OCS) as a critical enabler for a broad range of potential contingencies and have 

incorporated OCS into each of our major contingency plans. The development of requirements and the execution and oversight of contracting actions are primarily 

Service issues but we, in conjunction with the Joint Staff, are attempting to mitigate 

resourcing deficiencies by coordinating training geared specifically for OCS planning 

and activities. We continue to advocate for each Service component to have trained 

OCS planners and to have those planners integrated into the Service component 

plans. Additionally, we are working closely with the Joint Staff to refine and integrate OCS doctrine into our planning efforts. Implementation of OCS processes and 

procedures by the Services is improving our ability to define contract support requirements, award contracts that efficiently fulfill the requirement and ensure proper contract oversight in theater. We utilize resources provided by outside organiza-
152 

tions to support OCS efforts, but they are not sufficient. Neither the Combatant 

Commands nor the Service components are staffed with OCS planners which are 

required to ensure OCS is integrated in all planning efforts. 

Mr. MCKEON. We’ve had many lessons learned from contracting actions during 

contingency operations and there is no doubt we will rely on contract support in future contingencies, be it humanitarian relief or full-spectrum combat operations. 

What are you doing to not only plan for contract support during a contingency, but 

to educate and train your personnel so they are prepared to develop requirements, 

and execute and oversee contracting actions in order to properly respond in a contingency. Are you adequately resourced to plan, execute, and oversee the contract support you would need in the event of a major contingency in your area of responsibility? 

General RODRIGUEZ. USAFRICOM is prepared to plan, execute, and oversee operational contract support (OCS) in a contingency environment, but there are aspects 

of OCS in USAFRICOM that we can improve. Below are some of the actions and 

initiatives that we’ve taken to not only plan for contract support during a contingency, but also to educate and train our personnel to develop requirements and execute and oversee contracting actions during a contingency. 

1. We are doubling the size of our four-person OCS branch in order to centralize 

acquisition/contracting expertise to oversee, assist, and provide quality control 

for all USAFRICOM Directorate Operational and non-operational contracting 

activities—from requirements generation through contract execution, oversight/administration. 

2. In partnership with the Defense Logistics Agency, we have two embedded 

Joint Contingency Acquisition Support Office (JCASO) planners working 

closely with our staff to ensure we incorporate OCS considerations in operations planning. 

3. We are developing our OCS Common Operational Picture (COP) and leveraging the capabilities resident in the new Global Combat Support System–Joint 

(GCSS–J) to synchronize and optimize OCS efforts at various levels of organizational structure in our AOR. This effort represents an on-going initiative to 

establish a centralized repository of relevant OCS information available to 

key stakeholders. 

4. In order to improve OCS in our component commands, we conduct Staff Assistance Visits (SAV) to ensure current OCS processes, policies, tools, and procedures enhance mission execution. The end state of the scheduled SAVs is 

to gain better understanding of component OCS procedures, gaps, and issues, 

and streamlined OCS processes and standardized procedures. 

5. We have developed an OCS planning template as a guide that enables our 

subordinate commands to plan OCS with respect to operations, security cooperation activities, and exercises. 

6. We have taken advantage of available OCS training offered by Joint Staff/J4 

and Army Logistics University. In Nov 13, USAFRICOM hosted the first 2- 

week JOPEC course taught by Joint Staff/J4 in Stuttgart, Germany, for operational and logistics planners and other DOD entities with OCS equity. The 

course focuses on planning for contract support integration, contracting support, and contractor management. We have requested two JOPEC sessions for 

the next fiscal year. 

7. We have established validation boards for operational requirements and are 

currently in the process of streamlining our validation procedures to better 

consolidate contracting actions, reduce cost, and eliminate duplication of efforts. Additionally, in order to synchronize and optimize OCS and other logistics-related efforts in the AOR, we conduct monthly OCS Working Group and 

quarterly Combatant Commander Logistics Procurement Support Board meetings. 

8. We are in the process of gathering observations for submission into the Department of Defense’s Joint Lessons Learned Information Management System (JLLIS) related to Operational Contract Support. Lessons learned will be 

incorporated into training events and activities as we have done in the past. 

9. DLA JCASO has developed an OCS Readiness Scorecard management tool 

which provides an assessment of performance measures on 28 OCS-related assigned and implied tasks in policy, campaign plans, operations orders, and directives. We review this scorecard at OCS forums such as our quarterly 

CLPSB and our monthly OCS Working Groups to understand if required 

tasks are being executed and if not, why not, and what corrective actions can 

be taken. 

10. We continuously coordinate with the Office of the Secretary of Defense/Office 

of the Deputy Chief Management Officer (DCMO) to mature our Contract/ 
153 

Spend Performance Assessment capability. We are committed to improving 

end-to-end visibility over HQ AFRICOM requirements and contracts and to 

strengthening the positive control we have over externally sourced support. 

With OSD/DCMO’s support and assistance, we analyzed AFRICOM’s data for 

all FY13 HQ requirements, financials, and contracts to measure ability to 

match Requirements to Commitments and Obligations to Contracts in systems of record. 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. LOBIONDO 

Mr. LOBIONDO. When the U–2 goes out of service will we still be able to fulfill 

all of the high-altitude intelligence collection requirements we have in the Pacific? 

Will we be able to continue monitoring activities in North Korea without regard to 

weather conditions as we can now with the U–2? Will other assets provide the same 

sort of flexibility to react in a crisis and the same capabilities as the U–2? In a scenario where our space assets may be degraded will other platforms be able to provide the same critical intelligence support we now get from the U–2? Did you and 

the other combatant commanders have any input into the decision to retire the U– 

2s? If so, what was your recommendation? 

Admiral LOCKLEAR. [The information referred to is classified and is retained in 

the committee files.] 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MS. TSONGAS 

Ms. TSONGAS. The Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee has conducted a 

series of hearings involving the Department of Defense’s response to the terrorist 

attack on the U.S. Embassy in Benghazi on September 11, 2012. As a result of these 

hearings, the majority published a report of major findings last month. 

One of the report’s major findings was that the ‘‘U.S. military’s response to the 

Benghazi attack was severely degraded because of the location and readiness of U.S. 

forces.’’ However, another one of the report’s major findings was that ‘‘the Department of Defense is working to correct many weaknesses revealed by the Benghazi 

attack.’’ 

Can you please explain to the committee what changes the Department of Defense 

has made to correct the issues that the Benghazi attack revealed? Please specifically 

address changes to the posture of armed aircraft, ISR platforms, and quick-response 

ground forces. 

Additionally, can you please describe how these changes to DOD posture in your 

AOR helped during the situations in Somalia and South Sudan. 

General RODRIGUEZ. [The information referred to is classified and is retained in 

the committee files.] 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. SHUSTER 

Mr. SHUSTER. On the subject of effectors, the Congress has supported acceleration 

of the deployment of the PAC–3 missile to combatant commands but production and 

resources limit replacing the current missile inventory one-for-one with PAC–3s. 

This concerns several members of the House since, in multiple scenarios, U.S. forces 

would deplete the current inventory of PAC–3s before some hypothetical opposing 

forces deplete their inventories of threats. PAC–2/GEM–T is an upgrade to PAC– 

2 that, when combined with the PAC–3 inventory, can counter short and long-range 

threats and address evasive characteristics of enemy missiles. Do you currently believe you have the necessary inventory mix of PAC–2/GEM–Ts and PAC–3s to sufficiently address the full range of threat scenarios? 

General AUSTIN. [The information referred to is classified and is retained in the 

committee files.] 

Mr. SHUSTER. In his confirmation discussions, Secretary Hagel confirmed that 

CENTCOM has an outstanding requirement for persistent elevated surveillance and 

fire control. In a July 22, 2013, op-ed in ‘‘The Hill,’’ Commander Kirk S. Lippold 

(USN Ret.), former commander of the USS Cole, suggested that capability to address that requirement in the form of the Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense 

Elevated Netted Sensor System (JLENS) could have supported the type of force protection mission needed to defend against the attack on the Cole. Are you aware that 

a JLENS orbit stands in strategic reserve in New Mexico today? Would deployment 

of that asset to the Persian Gulf help CENTCOM provide the surveillance and fire 
154 

control required to provide missile defense and force protection to forward deployed 

troops? 

General AUSTIN. I am aware of the JLENS system orbiting in strategic reserve 

at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico; however, as I understand it, the 

Army was directed not to plan for procurement, but to employ one Engineering, 

Manufacturing and Development (EMD) orbit to support a 3-year exercise at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland. The decision to terminate planned procurement of 

JLENS was based on affordability and other competing priorities. My team has assessed that JLENS could be used to effectively counter swarming boats, UAVs, and 

cruise missiles. However, considering JLENS’ fielding requirements, which include 

host nation approval, airspace restrictions, site preparation requirements, and the 

need for trained soldiers, it is debatable whether or not the cost/benefit ration merits efforts to deploy the system. 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. LAMBORN 

Mr. LAMBORN. 1. What is the annualized cost of O&M for each of the following 

platforms: EMARSS, Project Liberty (MC–12) and Sable Spear? 2. What are the associated procurement costs (total annualized for each program) for each of the following platforms: EMARSS, Project Liberty (MC–12) and Sable Spear? 3. What is 

the capability and endurance comparison between the following platforms: 

EMARSS, Project Liberty (MC–12) and Sable Spear? 4. If OCO O&M for ISR was 

not funded, what capabilities would be lost? Would it have an effect on footprint 

size, or number, for the remaining ISR assets—assuming USAFRICOM were to 

maintain the same level of capability? 5. What geographic footprint is required for 

each of the following platforms: EMARSS, Project Liberty (MC–12) and Sable 

Spear? 

Note: Sable Spear is a project name known by AFRICOM and SOCOM 

General RODRIGUEZ. [The information referred to is classified and is retained in 

the committee files.] 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MS. SPEIER 

Ms. SPEIER. Throughout the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan we’ve been heavily reliant upon private security contractors. A few years ago the Afghans said that our 

aid programs and convoys couldn’t rely on contractors anymore and instead had to 

use the Afghan Public Protection Force (APPF). SIGAR and others pointed out that 

relying on APPF significantly increased security risks for our service men and 

women and aid workers there. The government of Afghanistan recently disbanded 

the APPF. General Austin, what does this mean for security in Afghanistan? Are 

we going to go back to using private security contractors instead, and how are you 

mitigating security concerns? 

General AUSTIN. The President of Afghanistan directed that the responsibility for 

the security mission of the APPF be transferred to the Ministry of the Interior. The 

exact date of implementation and the transition plan are still undefined at this 

point. We continue to monitor the situation; so far there have been no lapses in the 

security services provided by the APPF. We are also working with the Ministry of 

the Interior to help develop their implementation plan. We do not expect to revert 

back to using private security contractors. 

Ms. SPEIER. Last year I sent a letter to Secretary Hagel after SIGAR found that 

burn pits were being used at Forward Operating Base Salerno, in violation of DOD 

guidelines and CENTCOM regulations, and we had wasted $5.4 million on incinerators to protect our service men and women’s health that were never used. I was 

told that there weren’t any other bases that had received waivers to use burn pits, 

but in December SIGAR issued a report about the same thing—$5.4 million wasted 

on inoperable incinerators, and continued use of open air burn pits in violation of 

DOD policy. General Austin, are there any other bases in Afghanistan that are operating open air burn pits, in violation of policy, and have been issued a waiver? 

General AUSTIN. There is currently one burn pit operating at Forward Operating 

Base Sabit Qadam, where the base exceeds the population of 100 U.S. personnel. 

This burn pit is operating with a USCENTCOM approved waiver. The base was 

scheduled for closure, but USFOR–A requested a 90-day waiver extension to support 

operational requirements. There is no other viable alternative means for waste disposal under the current operational conditions and in anticipation of base closure. 
155 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MS. DUCKWORTH 

Ms. DUCKWORTH. This is a follow-up on Representative Duckworth’s question on 

the role of the Guard and Reserve within CENTCOM—she was looking for more 

specific details. 

What percentage of missions within the CENTCOM AOR are completed by the 

Guard and Reserve ground element and what is the nature of those operations? 

Please describe whether those are combat operations or support operations. Additionally, how many flight hours were flown by Guard and Reserve pilots and again, 

what were the nature of those operations: support, combat, humanitarian etc.? In 

which countries are they operating and can you please detail the percentage of readiness levels compared to their Active Duty counterparts? 

General AUSTIN. Guard and Reserve forces constitute approximately 15% of the 

total force operating in the USCENTCOM AOR. The average Guard and Reserve 

manning in support of Operation ENDURING FREEDOM in Fiscal Year 2013 was 

13,587 personnel. The total flight hours in Fiscal Year 2013 executed by Guard and 

Reserve pilots exceeded 125,000 flight hours and included mobility, air-refueling, 

combat (fighter, bomber, helicopter, and SOF), ISR and Search and Rescue mission 

sets. When Guard and Reserve forces deploy to the theater they are at 100% readiness, they are completely integrated with the active force. Questions regarding the 

exact breakdown of ground and air missions, along with specific details, would be 

best answered by the Services. 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MRS. WALORSKI 

Mrs. WALORSKI. Are you concerned about our long-term ability to project airpower 

in your area of responsibility, particularly given (1) the decreased carrier presence 

in the Arabian Gulf and (2) the fact that our bases in Al Udeid and Al Dhafra are 

supported by OCO funds? 

General AUSTIN. The combination of carrier presence and enduring bases at Al 

Udeid, Qatar and Al Dhafra, United Arab Emirates provides us with flexibility and 

a sustainable capability for projecting airpower in the Arabian Gulf. This critical capability has enabled us to manage current conflicts and prevent other situations and 

confrontations from escalating into conflicts. While we are facing significant budgetary constraints, we must remain present and engaged in the Central Region going 

forward, in order to reassure our allies and convey strength to our potential adversaries. This will require base lined funding, once OCO funds are no longer available. 

Mrs. WALORSKI. Given the short-term growth of the Iranian economy, do you 

think the current relaxed sanctions on Iran are sufficient to incentivize a comprehensive nuclear agreement? 

General AUSTIN. Thus far, the relaxed sanctions appear to be prompting Iranian 

compliance and willingness to negotiate a final comprehensive nuclear agreement. 

Ultimately, Iran seeks permanent sanctions relief, while securing terms regarding 

its nuclear program that are favorable to the regime. 

Iran recently complained it has not been able to access any of the foreign reserves 

released so far under the terms of the Joint Plan of Action (JPOA) interim agreement. As a result, Tehran is beginning to highlight P5+1 ‘‘noncompliance’’ with the 

agreement while touting its own continued compliance. Additionally, it is already 

courting international investment and building economic relationships beyond the 

JPOA framework, which potentially violate standing sanctions. 

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