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24–676 2017

[H.A.S.C. No. 115–4] 

THE STATE OF THE MILITARY 

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

HEARING HELD 

FEBRUARY 7, 2017 
(II) 

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 

ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS

WILLIAM M. ‘‘MAC’’ THORNBERRY, Texas, Chairman 

WALTER B. JONES, North Carolina 

JOE WILSON, South Carolina 

FRANK A. LOBIONDO, New Jersey 

ROB BISHOP, Utah 

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio 

MIKE ROGERS, Alabama 

TRENT FRANKS, Arizona 

BILL SHUSTER, Pennsylvania 

K. MICHAEL CONAWAY, Texas 

DOUG LAMBORN, Colorado 

ROBERT J. WITTMAN, Virginia 

DUNCAN HUNTER, California 

MIKE COFFMAN, Colorado 

VICKY HARTZLER, Missouri 

AUSTIN SCOTT, Georgia 

MO BROOKS, Alabama 

PAUL COOK, California 

JIM BRIDENSTINE, Oklahoma 

BRAD R. WENSTRUP, Ohio 

BRADLEY BYRNE, Alabama 

SAM GRAVES, Missouri 

ELISE M. STEFANIK, New York 

MARTHA MCSALLY, Arizona 

STEPHEN KNIGHT, California 

STEVE RUSSELL, Oklahoma 

SCOTT DESJARLAIS, Tennessee 

RALPH LEE ABRAHAM, Louisiana 

TRENT KELLY, Mississippi 

MIKE GALLAGHER, Wisconsin 

MATT GAETZ, Florida 

DON BACON, Nebraska 

JIM BANKS, Indiana 

LIZ CHENEY, Wyoming 

ADAM SMITH, Washington 

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 

NIKI TSONGAS, Massachusetts 

JOHN GARAMENDI, California 

JACKIE SPEIER, California 

MARC A. VEASEY, Texas 

TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii 

BETO O’ROURKE, Texas 

DONALD NORCROSS, New Jersey 

RUBEN GALLEGO, Arizona 

SETH MOULTON, Massachusetts 

COLLEEN HANABUSA, Hawaii 

CAROL SHEA–PORTER, New Hampshire 

JACKY ROSEN, Nevada 

A. DONALD MCEACHIN, Virginia 

SALUD O. CARBAJAL, California 

ANTHONY G. BROWN, Maryland 

STEPHANIE N. MURPHY, Florida 

RO KHANNA, California 

TOM O’HALLERAN, Arizona 

THOMAS R. SUOZZI, New York 

(Vacancy) 

ROBERT L. SIMMONS II, Staff Director 

KARI BINGEN, Professional Staff Member 

WILLIAM S. JOHNSON, Counsel 

BRITTON BURKETT, Clerk 
(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS 

Cooper, Hon. Jim, a Representative from Tennessee, Committee on Armed 

Services ................................................................................................................. 2 

Thornberry, Hon. William M. ‘‘Mac,’’ a Representative from Texas, Chairman, 

Committee on Armed Services ............................................................................ 1 

WITNESSES 

Allyn, GEN Daniel B., USA, Vice Chief of Staff of the Army .............................. 2 

Moran, ADM William F., USN, Vice Chief of Naval Operations ......................... 3 

Walters, Gen Glenn M., USMC, Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps . 6 

Wilson, Gen Stephen W., USAF, Vice Chief of Staff of the Air Force ................. 4 

APPENDIX 

PREPARED STATEMENTS: 

Allyn, GEN Daniel B. ....................................................................................... 59 

Moran, ADM William F. .................................................................................. 69 

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

Committee on Armed Services ..................................................................... 57 

Walters, Gen Glenn M. .................................................................................... 90 

Wilson, Gen Stephen W. .................................................................................. 75 

DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD: 

[There were no Documents submitted.] 

WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING THE HEARING: 

Mr. Kelly ........................................................................................................... 106 

Ms. McSally ....................................................................................................... 105 

Mr. Wittman ..................................................................................................... 105 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING: 

Mr. Brooks ......................................................................................................... 118 

Mr. Graves ........................................................................................................ 117 

Ms. Hanabusa ................................................................................................... 121 

Mr. Lamborn ..................................................................................................... 115 

Mr. Langevin ..................................................................................................... 109 

Mr. Scott ............................................................................................................ 116 

Mr. Shuster ....................................................................................................... 113 

Ms. Speier ......................................................................................................... 114 

Ms. Stefanik ...................................................................................................... 120 

Mr. Turner ........................................................................................................ 110 

(1) 

THE STATE OF THE MILITARY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES, Washington, DC, Tuesday, February 7, 2017. 

The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:02 a.m., in room 

2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. William M. ‘‘Mac’’ 

Thornberry (chairman of the committee) presiding. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. WILLIAM M. ‘‘MAC’’ THORNBERRY, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM TEXAS, CHAIRMAN, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 

The CHAIRMAN. The committee will come to order. 

Last week, the committee held classified and unclassified sessions on the state of the world or, more accurately, the state of the 

world environment in which the American military must operate 

and U.S. national security must be protected. I was struck by the 

essential point General Petraeus made that we face many threats, 

and can overcome any of them, except perhaps what we do to ourselves. 

Today, we turn to the state of the U.S. military. I continue to be 

concerned and sometimes even disturbed by evidence that is accumulating on the damage inflicted upon our military in recent years 

and the stresses our forces are under. That damage comes from a 

variety of factors, including budget cuts of 20 percent, continuing 

resolutions, the failure to recognize or at least admit and then address mounting readiness problems, as well as the shrinking size 

of the force, while keeping the tempo of operations high. 

There is certainly plenty of blame to go around between both 

parties and both the executive and legislative branches for this 

state of affairs. But now with a new administration and a new Congress, we have an opportunity to begin the repairs. To do that, we 

need a clear understanding of the state of our military and the immediate trends that challenge us. For that, we turn to the vice 

chiefs of each of our services, and we ask that each of you provide 

this committee your best professional military judgment in answering the questions we pose. 

As was emphasized last week, the world situation is dangerous 

and complex. This is no time to exaggerate or to underplay the 

challenges before us. Only by facing them squarely can we meet 

the obligations all of us have to the Constitution, to the men and 

women who serve, and to the American public. 

I will now yield to the distinguished acting ranking member, the 

gentleman from Tennessee, for any comments he would like to 

make. 
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STATEMENT OF HON. JIM COOPER, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM 

TENNESSEE, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 

Mr. COOPER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I would like to ask unanimous consent that the opening statement of the real ranking member, Mr. Smith, be inserted in the 

record. 

The CHAIRMAN. Without objection. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Smith can be found in the Appendix on page 57.] 

Mr. COOPER. And speaking on my own behalf, I think we all realize that few subjects are more important for the future of the Nation than the readiness of our military forces. I hope that we all 

know that few things are more detrimental to that readiness than 

sequestration. 

So I share the chairman’s hope, and I am not ready to be optimistic yet, but I hope that we can deal with sequestration this year 

and end it permanently. So it is going to be up to the folks on this 

committee, the largest committee in the House of Representatives, 

to make sure that our impact is felt in ending sequestration. 

So thank you, Mr. Chairman. I look forward to the testimony of 

the witnesses. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, sir. 

I am pleased to welcome each of our witnesses today and also to 

express, I know, the committee’s appreciation for your service in 

this job and for each of your service to the country. Without objection, your complete written statements will be made part of the 

record. 

And let me just briefly introduce General Daniel Allyn, Vice 

Chief of Staff of the Army; Admiral William Moran, Vice Chief of 

Naval Operations; General Stephen Wilson, Vice Chief of Staff of 

the Air Force; and General Glenn Walters, Assistant Commandant 

of the Marine Corps. Again, thank you all for being here. 

We would be interested in any opening comments each of you 

would like to make. 

We will start with you, General Allyn. 

STATEMENT OF GEN DANIEL B. ALLYN, USA, VICE CHIEF OF 

STAFF OF THE ARMY 

General ALLYN. Thank you, Chairman Thornberry and Congressman Cooper, distinguished members of the committee. Thank you 

for the opportunity to testify on the state of your United States 

Army. I appreciate your support and demonstrated commitment to 

our soldiers, Army civilians, families, and veterans, and look forward to discussing the strength of our Army with you today. 

This is a challenging time for our Nation and certainly for our 

Army. The unipolar moment is over and replacing it is a multipolar 

world characterized by competition and uncertainty. Today, the 

Army is globally engaged with more than 182,000 soldiers supporting combatant commanders in over 140 worldwide locations. 

My recent travel, I visited our soldiers in 15 countries since Veterans Day, reinforces that the Army is not about programs. It is 

all about people; our people executing security missions all around 

the globe. The strength of the All-Volunteer Force truly remains 

our soldiers. These young men and women are trained, ready, and 
3 

inspired. And we must be similarly inspired to provide for them 

commensurate with their extraordinary service and sacrifice. 

To meet the demands of today’s unstable global security environment and maintain the trust placed in us by the American people, 

the Army requires sustained, long-term, and predictable funding. 

Absent additional legislation, the caps set by the Budget Control 

Act [BCA] of 2011 will return in fiscal year 2018, forcing the Army 

to once again draw down our end strength, reduce funding for readiness, and increase the risk of sending undertrained and poorly 

equipped soldiers into harm’s way, a preventable risk our Nation 

must not accept. 

We thank all of you for recognizing that plans to reduce the 

Army to 980,000 soldiers would threaten our national security. And 

we appreciate all your work to stem the drawdown. Nevertheless, 

the most important actions you can take, steps that will have both 

positive and lasting impact, will be to immediately repeal the 2011 

Budget Control Act and ensure sufficient funding to train, man, 

and equip the fiscal year 2017 NDAA [National Defense Authorization Act] authorized force. Unless this is done, additional top-line 

and OCO [Overseas Contingency Operations] funding, though nice 

in the short term, will prove unsustainable, rendering all your hard 

work for naught. 

In this uncertain environment, readiness remains our numberone priority. Sufficient and consistent funding is essential to build 

and sustain current readiness, to progress towards a more modern, 

capable force sized to reduce risk for contingencies and to recruit 

and train the best talent within our ranks. Readiness remains 

paramount because the Army does not have the luxury of taking 

a day off. We must stand ready at a moment’s notice to defend the 

United States and its interests. 

With your assistance, the Army will continue to resource the 

best-trained, best-equipped, and best-led fighting force in the 

world. We thank you for the steadfast support of our outstanding 

men and women in uniform. And please accept my written testament for the record. And I look forward to your questions. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

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

Appendix on page 59.] 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Admiral. 

STATEMENT OF ADM WILLIAM F. MORAN, USN, VICE CHIEF OF 

NAVAL OPERATIONS 

Admiral MORAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And good morning to the members of the committee. It is a privilege to be here with my fellow vice chiefs to talk about the readiness of our military. 

It is easiest for me to talk to you in terms of simple supply and 

demand. As many of you know, the ongoing demand for naval 

forces far exceeds our long-term supply. And that need continues 

to grow with no end in sight. Supply is best summed up in one fact: 

Your Navy today is the smallest it has been in 99 years. 

That said, we are where we are, which makes it urgent to adequately fund, fix, and maintain the fleet that we do have. And by 
4 

the way, we have never been busier. A quick snapshot around the 

globe and you will see the Navy is the Nation’s primary deterrence 

policy in places like the Arabian, Mediterranean, and South China 

Seas. 

Over the past 5 or 6 years, this call for deterrence and to be 

ready to take action has grown, principally because of the aggressive growth from expanding naval competitors like Russia and 

China. And when you add threats from Iran, North Korea, ISIS [Islamic State of Iraq and Syria], and others, it is a very, very busy 

time for your Navy. 

Our sailors have always risen to the occasion, answering the call 

no matter the circumstances and no matter the resources. From 

providing food, water, and medical assistance in Haiti, to striking 

hostile sites in Yemen, to Navy SEALs [Sea, Air, Land teams] taking down terrorist leaders, we are getting it done, because that is 

who we are, that is what makes us the best navy in the world. But 

the unrelenting pace, inadequate resources, and small size are taking their toll. 

Our testimony today may seem like a broken record. Our Navy 

faces increased demand without the size and resources required to 

properly maintain and train for our future. And every year we have 

had to make tough choices, often choosing to sacrifice long-term 

readiness to make sure we could be ready to answer the call today. 

We are in fact putting our first team on the field, but we lack 

serious depth on the bench. This didn’t happen overnight; readiness declines tend to be insidious. From year to year we have all 

learned to live with less and less. We have certainly learned to execute our budget inefficiently with nine consecutive continuing resolutions, but this has forced us to repeatedly take money from cash 

accounts that are the lifeblood of building long-term readiness in 

our Navy. It is money for young lieutenants to fly high and fast, 

and who need air under their seats to perfect their skills in the future. It is money for spare parts so sailors can fix the gear that 

they have. It is money for sailors to operate at sea in all kinds of 

conditions to build instincts that create the best warfighters in the 

world. With your help we have the opportunity to change this. 

It starts by strengthening our foundation. Let’s ensure the ships 

and aircraft that we do have are maintained and modernized so 

they provide the full measure of combat power. Then let’s fill in the 

holes by eliminating inventory shortfalls in ships, submarines, and 

aircraft throughout the fleet. And together by taking these steps, 

we can achieve the ultimate goal of sizing the Navy to meet the 

strategic demands of this dynamic and changing world. 

Mr. Chairman, thank you for the opportunity to be here, and I 

look forward to your questions. 

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

Appendix on page 69.] 

The CHAIRMAN. General Wilson. 

STATEMENT OF GEN STEPHEN W. WILSON, USAF, VICE CHIEF 

OF STAFF OF THE AIR FORCE 

General WILSON. Thank you Chairman Thornberry, Congressman Cooper, distinguished members of the committee. 
5 

On behalf of the Secretary of the Air Force and our chief of staff, 

it is an honor to be with you today and to be with my fellow vice 

chiefs to talk to you about the state of our Air Force and readiness. 

Your American airmen are proud to be part of the most powerful 

joint force warfighting team in its history. Together we provide 

leaders with a broad range of options to protect our country and 

its interests both home and abroad. For the past 70 years, responsive, flexible, and agile American airpower has been our Nation’s 

first and most sustainable solution in both crisis and conflict 

underwriting every other instrument of power. We provide the Nation with unrelenting Global Vigilance, Global Reach, and Global 

Power. 

In short, your Air Force is always in demand and always there. 

Look no further than 2 weeks ago when your Air Force executed 

a precision strike in Sirte, Libya, killing over 100 violent extremists. This was a textbook transregional multidomain, multifunction 

mission. Air Force space, cyber, and ISR [intelligence, surveillance, 

and reconnaissance] warriors provided precision navigation and 

timing while monitoring enemy communication and movement. 

Simultaneously, two B–2 bombers took off from Missouri, flew 17 

hours one way, refueled with numerous tankers and teamed with 

two MQ–9s to employ precision munitions within 10 seconds of 

their designated time over target. They then flew another 17 hours 

home and landed safely back in the United States. 

Meanwhile, airmen operate 60 persistent remotely piloted aircraft patrols, 24/7/365. They are the blinking eye for combatant 

commanders. They remotely fly missions from the continental 

United States, teaming with nearly 20,000 forward deployed airmen to support operations like the recent events in Raqqa and 

Mosul where our RPA [remotely piloted aircraft] fighters and 

bombers have conducted 92 percent of the strikes against ISIS. 

We did this all while simultaneously ensuring two-thirds of our 

nuclear triad and 75 percent of our nuclear command and control 

remain robust, reliable, flexible, and survivable options for the nations. During the allotted time of this hearing, an average of 65 

mobility aircraft will take off; 430,000 cyber connections will be 

blocked; 5 homeland defense missions will fly; and 3 strikes against 

ISIS will occur. Each of these actions are enabled by airmen providing space-based position, navigation, and timing and communication for our military, while also providing GPS [Global Positioning System] capability to the world’s 3 billion users. 

The capabilities of our airmen provided to our Nation and our allies have never been more vital and the global demand for American airpower will only grow in the future. American airmen remain professional, innovative, and dedicated; quite frankly, the 

envy of the world. However, we are out of balance. The demand for 

our mission and our people exceed the supply. The 26 years of continuous combat has limited our ability to prepare for the future 

against advanced future threats, scenarios with the lowest margin 

of error and the highest risk to national security. 

This nonstop combat, paired with the budget instability and 

lower-than-planned top lines, has made the United States Air 

Force the smallest, oldest equipped, and least ready in our history. 

We have attempted to balance risk across the force to maintain 
6 

readiness. And we have been forced to make unacceptable trades 

between readiness, force structure, and modernization. 

Today’s global challenges require an Air Force ready not only to 

defeat violent extremism, but an Air Force prepared to modernize 

for any threat the Nation may face. 

Mr. Chairman, I will close by quoting General Douglas MacArthur. He sent the following cable as he escaped the Philippines 

in 1942. He said, ‘‘The history of failure in war can be summed up 

in two words: too late. Too late in comprehending the deadly purpose of a potential enemy, too late in realizing the moral danger, 

too late in preparedness.’’ 

Distinguished members of the committee, preparedness or readiness cannot be overlooked. Your Air Force needs congressional support to repeal the Budget Control Act and provide stable, predictable funding. It is critical to rebuilding our military’s full-spectrum 

readiness, which is the number-one priority for the Secretary of Defense. We need to act now, before it is too late. 

On behalf of the chief of staff and the Secretary of the Air Force 

and the 660,000 Active, Guard, Reserve, and civilian airmen who 

serve our Nation, thank you for your tireless support for us. 

I look forward to your questions. 

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

Appendix on page 75.] 

The CHAIRMAN. General Walters. 

STATEMENT OF GEN GLENN M. WALTERS, USMC, ASSISTANT 

COMMANDANT OF THE MARINE CORPS 

General WALTERS. Mr. Chairman and distinguished members of 

the House Armed Services Committee, thank you for the opportunity to appear today and report on the readiness of your Marine 

Corps. 

The Marine Corps remains dedicated to our central role as our 

Nation’s naval expeditionary force in readiness. During 15 years of 

conflict, we focused investment on ensuring marines were prepared 

for the fight, and they were. Today, our operational tempo remains 

as high as it was during the peak of our operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Our continued focus on deployed unit readiness combined with the fiscal uncertainty and funding reductions leave your 

Marine Corps facing substantial readiness challenges. 

Your Marine Corps is insufficiently manned, trained, and equipped across the depth of the force to operate in an ever-evolving 

operational environment. Due to years of fiscal constraints, the Marine Corps is fundamentally optimized for the past and has sacrificed modernization and infrastructure to sustain our current 

readiness posture. 

In addition to the increased resources for operations and maintenance needed to improve current readiness across the entirety of 

our Marine Corps, we require your support in three key areas to 

regain the readiness levels our Nation requires of us. Over the past 

18 months, we have identified various end strengths and associated 

capabilities and modernization required to operate in the threat environment characterized by complex terrain, information warfare, 

electromagnetic signatures, and contested maritime domain. 
7 

We need to increase our Active Component end strength. We are 

confident that an increase of 3,000 marines per year maintains a 

rate of growth consistent with effective recruiting and accession 

while maintaining our high standards. 

Our bases, stations, and installations are platforms where we 

train and generate our readiness. The continued underfunding of 

facility sustainment, restoration, and modernization, and military 

construction, continues to cause progressive degradation of our infrastructure and creates increased long-term cost. We have a backlog of over $9 billion in deferred maintenance for our infrastructure. We require up-to-date training systems, ranges, and facilities 

[to] support the fielding of new equipment, and simulations systems that facilitate improved training and standards of readiness. 

Supporting the joint force requirements of the past 15 years consumed much of the useful life of our legacy systems, and fiscal uncertainty and reduced defense spending forced significant delays in 

our modernization efforts. There is significant cost associated with 

maintaining and sustaining any legacy system without a proportional capability increase associated with that investment. 

As we continue to spend limited fiscal resources to sustain legacy 

systems, developed for threats of 20 years ago, we risk steadily losing our competitive advantage against potential adversaries. We 

need to modernize our ground tactical vehicle and aircraft fleets 

soonest, accelerating the investment in amphibious ships is necessary to reach our wartime requirement. If forced to continue to 

pursue a path of investing in legacy systems in lieu of modernizing 

our force, we will find our Marine Corps optimized for the past and 

increasingly at risk to deter and defeat our potential adversaries. 

On behalf of all of your marines, sailors, and their families and 

civilians that support their service, we thank the Congress and this 

committee for the opportunity to discuss the key challenges your 

Marine Corps faces. While much work needs to be done, the authorizations within coupled with the sufficient funding and the repeal of the Budget Control Act, will put us in a path to build and 

sustain our Marine Corps for the 21st century. 

Thank you, and I look forward to your questions. 

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

Appendix on page 90.] 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

I want to briefly touch on some of the facts, largely in you-all’s 

written testimony, but also some press reports. And I will just go 

down the line. 

General Allyn, in your written testimony, it says only about onethird of the brigade combat teams and one-fourth of our combat 

aviation brigades and half of our division headquarters are ready. 

And then you say only three brigade combat teams could be called 

upon to fight tonight in the event of a crisis. 

Now, I think we have 58, right, brigade combat teams, and your 

testimony is that only 3 of them could be called upon to fight tonight. Is that right? 

General ALLYN. That is accurate, Chairman, and it reflects the 

realities of both the OPTEMPO [operations tempo] and the recurring demand that our forces face. When we say fight tonight, that 
8 

means that unit needs no additional people, no additional training, 

and no additional equipment. 

And three is where we are at today. And those that we say are 

ready, the one-third, it is actually just higher than that, of our 

forces that are ready, require somewhere in the range of 30 days 

to ensure that they have everything they need to meet the demands of immediate combat. 

The CHAIRMAN. Well, you kind of hope an enemy will be accommodating and give us the 30 days, so that we can be ready. You 

then go on on the next page, in talking about equipment and say 

today we are out-ranged, outgunned, and outdated. And then in 

your testimony you also say, so if you put all this together, the 

Army can only accomplish defense planning guidance requirements 

at high military risk. 

Now, General Milley has kind of talked about this, but explain 

what that means to us. My layman’s ears seem to hear that we can 

only do what the country asks us to do with a pretty darn good 

chance that we won’t be successful. 

Am I right? 

General ALLYN. Chairman, basically what it comes down to is the 

term that you heard General Wilson use from General MacArthur. 

We will be too late to need. Our soldiers will arrive too late, our 

units will require too much time to close the equipping and manning and training gaps. And as you highlighted, hope is not a 

method and we cannot count on the enemy providing us that window of opportunity to close those gaps. 

The end result is excessive casualties, both to innocent civilians 

and to our forces that are already forward stationed to close the 

rest of the force required to accomplish the mission. 

The CHAIRMAN. Admiral, I had several things I wanted to ask 

you about. You mentioned the Navy is smaller than it has been in 

the last 99 years. But I want to ask you about a story that came 

out yesterday that you don’t mention in your testimony that says, 

according to the Navy, 53 percent of all Navy aircraft cannot fly. 

And that is about twice the historic norm. If you go to F–18s, 62 

percent are out of service, 27 percent in major depot work, and 35 

percent simply awaiting maintenance or parts. This is a press story 

from yesterday in Defense News. 

Are those statistics accurate? 

Admiral MORAN. Yes, sir, they are. 

The CHAIRMAN. It is a little hard for me to know what question 

to ask next. Fifty-three percent of all Navy aircraft can’t fly and 62 

percent of our strike F–18s can’t fly today? That is our status. 

Admiral MORAN. Yes, sir. When it comes to the strike fighter 

community, that is our legacy Hornets, A through Ds, and our 

Super Hornets, E and F versions. Our legacy Hornets, which we 

and the Marine Corps operate today, are well beyond their design 

life, let alone their service life. They were designed for 6,000 hours; 

we are extending the life on those Hornets into the 8,000 to 9,000 

hour range. 

They have been around as long as General Walters and I have 

been serving, for the most part, so they are pretty old. It takes 

about twice the amount of man-hours to fix one of those jets as it 

was designed to take, which gives you a pretty good indication how 
9 

old they are, and the capacity in our depots has been diminished 

since sequestration and furloughs back in 2013 and we are trying 

to rebuild that capacity today to try to get those jets turned 

around. 

So on a typical day in the Navy, about 25 to 30 percent of our 

jets and our airplanes are in some kind of depot maintenance or 

maintenance which does not allow them to fly. So your statistics 

of twice that amount, or two-thirds today, is a reflection of how 

hard we have flown these jets over the last 15 years. And the fact 

that we have not re-capped those jets, in other words, we haven’t 

built new or we have not bought enough new ones to replace them, 

and we have been waiting for quite some time for the F–35 to deliver, which we were counting on 7, 8 years ago to start filling in 

those holes, all of that adds up to the numbers you reflected. 

The CHAIRMAN. It is true, is it not, that a fair number of the 

strikes against Al Qaeda and ISIS over the years have been carried 

out by these Navy jets? 

Admiral MORAN. Yes, sir. We can and we do put—we put ready 

airplanes and ready crews forward on deployment. Yet, as I reflected in my opening statement, there is no depth on the bench to 

go behind them, though, if we had to surge forces. I think it is consistent with what General Allyn just described in the Army. 

The CHAIRMAN. Yes. 

Admiral MORAN. We will be late to get there if we want to have 

full up equipment to get to the fight in the future. 

The CHAIRMAN. And turning to the Air Force, General Wilson, 

you testified in your written statement, and I think you said this, 

‘‘The smallest and oldest Air Force we have ever had. Average aircraft age is 27 years old today.’’ But you go on and talk about the 

pilot shortage where, at the end of fiscal year 2016, we were 1,555 

total pilots short and 3,400 aircraft maintainers short. 

What I am struck by is we have—we are short 1,500 pilots, 3,400 

maintainers in the smallest Air Force we have ever had. Certainly 

that translates, does it not, into less military capability? 

General WILSON. Chairman, that is exactly right. As a context, 

in 1991 we went to Desert Storm, our Air Force was 500,000 people 

and 134 fighter squadrons. Today we find ourselves at 317,000 

total force—317,000 force—317,000 in our Active Force, with 55 

fighter squadrons. 

You mentioned the pilot shortage. Of those numbers, we have 

723 short in our fighter pilots. We don’t have a problem bringing 

people into the Air Force, we are doing our best to retain people. 

But when you are flying old equipment, 27 years old as an average, 

and you are short on maintainers to fix those airplanes and to talk 

to the vice chief, Vice CNO [Chief of Naval Operations], who talked 

about the depots, is they break into the depots and they find things 

that they have never found before and it takes real craftsmens and 

artisans to fix those airplanes, and it takes longer, we are flying 

less. 

Again, as a matter of context, at the very bottom in the late 

1970s of what we called the hollow force, fighter pilots were flying 

about 15 sorties a month and about 20 hours. Today, we are flying 

less hours and less sorties than we were in the late 1970s. 
10 

Now, we didn’t get there overnight in the 1970s and we found 

a way out of that. There is a way out of this. The way out of this 

starts first with manpower. We need more manpower to be able to 

plus-up our force. 

We need to get the right training. With the right training, we 

can bring in the right weapons system support. With the weapons 

system support we can increase the flying hours. With the flying 

hours, we reduce the OPSTEMPO. And we need time, and over 

time we will increase our readiness. We think it will take 6 to 8 

years to bring our readiness level back where it needs to be. But 

it starts first with people. 

The CHAIRMAN. Six to eight years under a favorable scenario, I 

assume? 

General WILSON. Yes, Chairman, yes. 

The CHAIRMAN. Well, I don’t want to toot our own horn, but 

thank goodness we tried to stop the shrinkage of end strength in 

last year’s NDAA. We hadn’t fixed anything, but hopefully we kept 

it from getting worse. 

Finally, Marine Corps General Walters, one of the things that 

just stuck out to me in your written testimony was the statement 

that flight-hour averages per crew per month are below the minimum standards required to achieve and maintain adequate flight 

time and training and readiness levels. So it is similar, I guess, to 

what General Wilson just said. 

We are flying less now than we have, even in the hollow force 

of the 1970s, that was what he said. You say below the minimum 

standards to achieve and maintain flight time training and readiness levels. My question to you, what are the consequences of that? 

What does it mean if you can’t even meet the minimum level of 

flight hours? 

General WALTERS. Thank you for the question, Chairman. 

And thank you to this committee for trying to get us back on our 

RBA [ready basic aircraft] recovery in the last 2 years. We have 

made some improvement. To your question about the flying hours 

and what it means, each type model series has a minimum requirement. It is important to understand what that minimum requirement is and it is somewhere between 16 and 18 hours per pilot per 

month. There is an outlier there on C–130s, which is about 23 

hours. And what that does is keeps them current in their current 

capabilities. It does not guarantee that they will be proficient or 

they will be the A-team to defeat an enemy in a near-peer fight. 

If you are looking for a number, the last time I saw us that good 

was when the pilots were getting about 25 hours per month. And 

that would make them current and proficient. 

What it really means in the end is that we are sending a lot of 

these—we will send, in a major combat operation, we will send a 

lot of pilots that don’t have the adequate training. And there is historical example after historical example when flight time required 

is not produced and the results in an air fight, both air to ground 

and air to air. 

The CHAIRMAN. Okay, so you said 16 to 18 hours per month is 

the minimum. 
11 

General WALTERS. That is the minimum. And what we are getting now is between 12 and 14. So that is the minimum to maintain your currency. But currency is not nirvana for a war fight. 

Proficient pilots is what we are aimed for. And that is across 

every capability we have. There are certain tasks that you have to 

do them once, but doing them multiple reps and sets is what makes 

a world-class military organization. 

The CHAIRMAN. You might say it is kind of like getting ready to 

play in the Super Bowl but not being able to practice. 

General WALTERS. That is a very good analogy, sir. 

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Cooper. 

Mr. COOPER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I thank each of the 

vice chiefs for their excellent testimony. Each one of you has revealed critical gaps in our readiness, and I hope all the members 

of this committee are listening closely. 

I want to focus particularly on what this committee and this 

Congress can do to solve some of these problems. Because I think 

you gentlemen have highlighted the problems very well. 

General Allyn said it in plain English, and let me foot-stomp his 

testimony. I am going to quote here, ‘‘The most important actions 

you can take, steps that will have both positive and lasting impact 

will be to immediately repeal the 2011 Budget Control Act and ensure sufficient funding to train, man, and equip fiscal year 2017 

NDAA authorized force.’’ 

Let me emphasize again, immediately repeal the 2011 Budget 

Control Act. The general goes on to say ‘‘unless this is done, additional top-line and OCO funding,’’ something that Congress has 

traditionally done, ‘‘though nice in the short term, will prove unsustainable, rendering all your hard work for naught.’’ Could there 

be a clearer, more dire warning to this committee? 

So I thank you, General, for offering that clear-cut, plain-English 

testimony. It is not your problem, it is our problem. Another of the 

witnesses emphasized that we have had nine consecutive continuing resolutions. How can anyone, even the ablest manager in 

the world, manage that? Nine consecutive ones. 

So my main message today is for the newer members of our committee, who perhaps haven’t learned all the bad habits that some 

of the older members of the committee have unfortunately gotten 

used to. This is the chance for a new day, a new approach, to have 

a stronger military that is more ready for all the threats we face. 

And this is one of the most bipartisan committees in Congress, 

it should be, these are issues we should all be able to agree on. 

Managing our affairs responsibly. Another way to put this is, the 

worst enemy we face is ourselves. Our BCA act of 2011 probably 

poses a greater threat to our military than any foreign adversary, 

so why do we hurt ourselves? There is no good reason for this. 

And General Allyn said it better than I could possibly say it. If 

you would like to elaborate, General Allyn, you are welcome to, but 

again, the problem is ours, it is not yours. We should solve this sequestration problem. 

General ALLYN. Well, I know, to reinforce your point. I was in 

the operational force when the BCA took effect and caused us to 

cancel seven combat training center rotations. And that is a generation of leaders that can never get that experience back and we 
12 

cannot go back there, we cannot do that to ourselves again. And 

it is for most of our services, we are still climbing out of that abyss 

of the BCA impact, when it was impacted mid-year. 

So my belief is, if we can do away with BCA, if we can fund our 

services to the authorized end strength in this budget year and the 

next, you will do more good for the sustained readiness build of our 

services than you can begin to imagine. 

Mr. COOPER. Thank you, General. Let me end by just saying, all 

members of this committee should be asking leadership and our respective parties why we can’t repeal BCA now as the general suggests. You will get all sorts of excuses, all sorts of half reasons, but 

none of them are good enough. Now is the time to take action on 

this, and any delay is inexcusable. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. At the end of last week’s hearing there were 

three members who sat through the hearing, but still did not get 

a chance to ask questions. So I promised them they could go first 

today and then we will go back to regular order as we usually do. 

First up is the gentleman from Mississippi, Mr. Kelly. 

Mr. KELLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And first of all, I just want to say to the panel, you guys are warriors and heroes, not only in our eyes, but in the eyes of all Americans. And I know that truly you put the interest of this Nation 

first, and I thank you for that. 

That being said, I read your testimony, and I noticed you used 

a lot of military jargon. And I understand all the Army stuff, I 

don’t necessarily—I know most of the Marine stuff, but I don’t understand the air and naval. 

So today, you know, a lot of people are watching this on Fox 

News and other places so I ask, as much as you can, speak like 

a civilian or speak like someone who is not in the military because 

acronyms have a tendency of them not understanding what it is. 

First, I want to start with the Air, something I am familiar with 

General Wilson, or as much as I should. But I have Columbus Air 

Force Base, the home of the 14th Flying Training Wing, and it is 

located in my district. And these men and women train on all of 

our platforms in the Air Force, or train right there in Columbus, 

Mississippi, flies more sorties than anywhere else in the world, to 

my knowledge, right out of Columbus Air Force Base. 

But I am concerned when they leave Columbus Air Force Base. 

If they aren’t getting the hours on the platform, not the trainer, 

but on the actual platform that they are going to be trying to fly, 

the adequate numbers of hours to be ready and to make sure that 

we save lives, because that is what it comes down to when they are 

not trained in saving lives, because an unprepared pilot can’t do 

the job. 

Tell me, how many hours we are getting today and how that impacts your readiness to do our mission on the battlefield? 

General WILSON. Congressman Kelly, thanks for the question 

and, as you know, as we talked before, I commanded the 14th Flying Training Wing at Columbus. It is the busiest Air Force Base 

in our Air Force, flies more sorties than anybody. It does a fantastic job producing pilots for our Air Force. And today’s pilots, we 

are not flying enough. We are not flying enough hours or sorties. 
13 

So as I mentioned earlier, today’s combat fighter pilots are flying 

less hours and less sorties than they were flying in the late 1970s. 

They are averaging about 10 sorties a month and about 14 hours 

a month and that is too few for the missions that we need to be 

able to fly. 

Today it is, we talk about high-spectrum or high-end readiness, 

we need to be prepared to fight any adversary. Our adversaries 

around the globe have been looking at how we fight and they are 

training and modernizing their forces. They have sufficient capability of fighter airplanes like ours and are also developing what we 

call fifth-generation stealth-type fighters, both in China and Russia. 

They, again, they have watched our fighting and they are preparing their forces. We need to be prepared to fight any adversary. 

We are extremely good today and are ready to fight in the Middle 

East, against violent extremists. But we need to be ready to fight 

against any adversary. 

So, we need more flying hours, but to get more flying hours we 

need more people. Today, our Air Force we bottomed out at 311,000 

people. Thanks to your help we are up to 317 at the end of this 

past fiscal year. We want to grow to 321,000 people here in the 

next coming year. 

If we do that, that brings us to about 90 percent manning. But 

as anybody knows, 90 percent manning, effective manning, because 

you always have people that are deployed or can’t do the job or are 

in training, leaves you about 75 percent effective manning. 

We think we need to grow the Air Force—— 

Mr. KELLY. Let me stop because I have another question that I 

really want to get to. Because when we talk about BCTs [brigade 

combat teams] or we talk about MEUs [Marine expeditionary 

units] or we talk about fighter wings, or the number of ships, or 

carrier groups, those things are important. 

And I think a lot of America doesn’t understand, we are rotating 

the fresh equipment out of units to make combat-ready units and 

that, by doing that, it decreases the readiness of the future deployments. And so, have you guys in writing, I would ask that each of 

you let me know how many BCTs you need and what the personnel 

end strength that the Army needs. 

And not only that, but the number of new M–1 systems so that 

we are not rotating equipment. They used to wouldn’t let us hotbed 

in the Army. When I was in there General Allyn, they wanted a 

crew on his tank because you get a familiarity with that piece of 

equipment. And we are having to hotbed everything that we have 

in the military today. 

A hotbed means, a crew uses another crew’s equipment because 

it is newer and up to date. So do you guys have an idea what end 

strength you think you need to be ready to meet today’s missions? 

And also, the number of equipment both in modernization and just 

replacing the old stuff. 

And if you could address that, and I will start with you, General 

Walters. 

General WALTERS. Yes, sir. 

The number of Marines we need in my written statement, I said 

I think we need a minimum of 194 [thousand]. But it is also inter-
14 

esting and you have hit on the point, so why are we hot racking 

the equipment, why are we moving equipment around? 

Because for 8 or 10 years, we had modernization programs in 

place to replace our old equipment but they are delivering over a 

30-year timeframe. And we are buying them at a minimum level. 

The example for us, the prime example, is we have a 40-year-old 

amphibious vehicle and we are putting a survivable upgrade on it, 

on a third of them, because we won’t deliver the other ones, the 

new ones yet. 

JLTV, I have all kinds of needs for light tactical vehicles, they 

have been around for 20 years, where we are buying the Joint 

Light Tactical Vehicle at a very shallow rate. It will take us 20 

years to get there. 

And probably the poster child for us is the light armored vehicle—that is 34 years old, and because of the fiscal stress we have 

been under, we never even thought about replacing it. So we have 

an obsolescence program on there. It is not the best use of our 

money, and the Marines deserve new equipment for the threat. 

Mr. KELLY. Chairman, I thank you, but just to mention, OCO 

does not allow them to modernize like top-line funding, and I yield 

back, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. Yes. And if others of you would like to respond 

in writing to Mr. Kelly’s question that is great. We have got to stay 

reasonably on time, as Mr. Cooper said. We have got lots of folks 

on this committee. 

Mr. Carbajal. 

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

page 106.] 

Mr. CARBAJAL. Thank you, Chairman Thornberry. 

And thank you to all our witnesses and in particular, thank you 

for your service to our country. As a former Marine, I am very honored to be able to be part of this committee and to address you 

today. 

It is quite clear, from your testimonies today and from our previous hearings, that our military faces incredibly diverse threats. 

Some of which are well prepared for and some of which remain to 

be a work in progress. 

There is no question we must continue to maintain a strong military force and Congress must do its part to provide the necessary 

resources to ensure readiness. However, as all of you will probably 

agree, sequestration is not the answer. 

It will neither balance our budgets, nor improve our military 

readiness. Many, if not all of you, have indicated that the numberone risk to readiness is sequestration. I believe the question we 

must ask ourselves is what are we trying to protect as we continue 

to impose arbitrary cuts to our country’s education and health systems and not take steps to protect our environment. 

I believe we will be left with a hollow Nation, with nothing more 

for the most superior Armed Forces to protect. I believe in order 

to develop an effective strategy, we must decide what our desired 

end state is for each of the threats and priorities our military leaders identify. 

And then look at what resources are needed to meet these desired goals. Better oversight and accountability systems must be 
15 

put in place to ensure not only an effective, but an efficient military. 

I believe it is a disservice to the American people for Congress 

to be funding cost overruns. To this end, my question to all of you 

is what steps has each service taken in order to increase oversight 

and accountability to its various programs and operations in order 

to eliminate wasteful spending. 

Can you provide us with some examples of savings, savings your 

service has identified? And I say this, because it’s no surprise to 

you that on occasion, there are many articles in the media that 

identify this wasteful spending, 

And yet we have so many priorities that we are being asked to 

consider. I would like to hear from each one of you, if possible. 

General ALLYN. Thank you, Congressman. And thank you for 

your service, semper fidelis. We love the United States Marine 

Corps, too, even in the United States Army, so we appreciate your 

service. 

I would first highlight the fact that you spoke of two significant 

challenges. First of all, the threats that we face in this uncertain 

environment that we operate and the savings that we must continue to be pursuing as good stewards of the resources that you, 

the Congress, provide to us. 

On the first piece, the other significant challenge to us in addition to sequestration is continuing resolutions. Continuing resolutions deny us the opportunity to implement new programs, like the 

ability to upgrade our opposing force capability at our combat 

training centers as we identify capabilities our adversaries are 

using, that we are likely to face. 

We must train against those. We must upgrade our capability to 

do that, we cannot do that under continuing resolution conditions. 

So we would also appreciate the passage of an appropriations bill 

obviously in the very near future. 

In terms of savings, a couple of critical initiatives the United 

States Army is underway with to continue to be good stewards of 

the resources that you provide. We have a strategic portfolio review 

process that looks at all of our acquisition programs across all domains and identifies the highest priority programs and ensures 

that we are moving money away from those that are less important 

and funding those that we must deliver as fast as possible, to ensure that we can equip our forces in the future. 

The second thing is to ensure we achieve audit ability, which is 

a critical requirement that we must deliver to the Nation. And that 

is well underway, we have made progress year over year. 

We estimate we will probably still have work to do at the end 

of this year to get to full audit ability. But we are progressing as 

rapidly as we can. 

One of the programs that allows us to do that is our GFEBS 

[General Fund Enterprise Business System] software program that 

enables us to see ourselves accurately across all our funding systems. We need to upgrade that program, based on the findings of 

prior-year audits. 

We cannot do that in a continuing resolution environment. So 

again, a couple of points to your very accurate questions. 
16 

The CHAIRMAN. And I hope the gentlemen will work with us on 

our acquisition reform efforts of the last 2 years and they will continue. 

Mr. Khanna. 

Mr. KHANNA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for your graciousness in allowing junior members a chance to participate and 

your offering of this opportunity. 

Thank you to the witnesses for your extraordinary service to our 

Nation and the extraordinary sacrifices you have each made. 

My question concerns cybersecurity. One of the things that I 

often hear from companies is the burden that they actually have 

to have cybersecurity. And you would never would expect our companies to have private defense forces against conventional attacks. 

But a large portion of their budgets are going to defend against 

cyber attacks. And we know that there are about 240,000 cybersecurity jobs that are unfilled because folks don’t have the skills. 

Many people in the private sector will say the best folks are those 

who have been trained either by the military or the government. 

And there are just not enough of them for them to come into the 

private sector. So my question for all the branches, and I don’t 

know, whichever one is most relevant, is, what can we in Congress 

do to help you better prepare in training folks equipped in cybersecurity? 

What do you need for the military, and what do you think you 

can do to help get more trained folks who can then go into the private sector? 

General ALLYN. I will start, Congressman, and thank you for 

that question. 

Incredibly important area for all of us operating in the cyber domain each and every day. I would offer that one very important authorization that you could provide to us is increased flexibility in 

cyber program funding. 

The adversary is moving at light speed in their attacks of our infrastructure and our capabilities. And we have to be able to develop 

counters and offensive capabilities at the speed of light. And our 

current systems are not designed that way. 

So authorizing some funding flexibility specifically for our cyber 

programs, so that we can be more agile, responsive, and capable, 

both on offense and defense, would be critical. 

Admiral MORAN. Sir, I would add to those very important points 

that flexibility is also needed in how we manage the people that 

we have. Your point about the number of vacancies in the civilian 

market for cyber professionals and the draw that it takes off of the 

services, who do produce incredible talented folks in this world, is 

there. 

And so we are looking at every opportunity to allow for our sailors who are trained and experienced in this to have opportunities 

to work inside and outside the Navy. And the flexibility to draw 

between the Active and the Reserve and the civilian and back. 

I think that is how the Nation can solve this problem, because 

we can’t keep throwing money at people to try to keep them in. 

That said, our training and the way we are organized has increased significantly. All of the services have invested a substantial 

amount of money in the last several years. But cyber is a warfare 
17 

area that is also, like everything else we do, subject to readiness 

cuts. And those cuts come in the form of being about to upgrade 

from Windows X to Windows Y. And we have to take some cuts to 

those readiness accounts as well as all the other ones as we see a 

reduced top line. 

Thanks for the question. 

General WILSON. I will just add this, we have shifted in the Air 

Force from a communication-centered focus to a cyberspace operations focus. And I would highlight exactly what was mentioned 

earlier; there are some acquisition reforms, I think, that can help 

us to keep up with that speed that the industry is going with. 

As well as, we have made great progress on our civilian hiring 

and how we can do that. But I think there is more work to be done 

there. We are in a competition for talent; we need to bring in the 

best and brightest. 

We have fantastic training programs, and then we can help our 

Nation moving forward. But there is still work to be done in how 

we bring on civilians into our workforce. 

General WALTERS. Sir, I am with all my colleagues here. We 

need to recruit, train, and maintain that workforce. And we are 

short, and I think we are short globally. I think this is a problem 

not just that it is replicated in the military, but it is really for the 

entire country. 

Mr. KHANNA. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. Mr. Wilson. 

Mr. WILSON OF SOUTH CAROLINA. Thank you, Chairman Thornberry. And thank you for your work, Mr. Chairman, with President 

Trump. 

Secretary Mattis, this issue has been raised and what a great 

team we have here with the vice chiefs, too, to work on the issue 

of readiness. 

It is very important to me. I am very grateful to be the chairman 

of the Readiness Subcommittee. It gives me the opportunity to 

work with Ranking Member Madeleine Bordallo. And we will be 

there to back you up in every way we can; to promote our troops, 

protect our country, protect military families. 

With that in mind, General Wilson, I appreciate that in South 

Carolina, we have Joint Base Charleston, Shaw Air Force Base, 

McEntire Joint National Guard Base, and North Auxiliary Field. 

Comments of concern have been raised by prior persons serving in 

the military. 

Secretary Deborah Lee James stated, quote, ‘‘Less than half of 

our combat force is ready for a high end fight,’’ end of quote. And 

also, Air Force Chief of Staff David Goldfein stated, ‘‘Combat operations and reductions in our total force, coupled with budgetary instability and lower than planned funding levels have resulted in 

the smallest, oldest, and least ready forces across the full spectrum 

of operations in our history.’’ 

These are deeply troubling comments for American families. Two 

questions: General, have these shortfalls affected the Air Force’s 

ability to generate the necessary forces to meet mission requirements? And secondly, do these shortages still exist and, if so, how 

does the Air Force plan to address them? 
18 

General WILSON. Thank you, Congressman Wilson. The short answer is yes, these still exist. Today we find ourselves less than 50 

percent ready across our Air Force and we have pockets that are 

below that. 

In particular, some of the bases that you have mentioned in 

South Carolina—between Shaw and McEntire and others, we find, 

again, not flying enough sorties with enough hours. We know how 

to fix this, and we did this in the late 1970s as we we dug out from 

there. We can do this again. 

It starts with, as we have talked before, stable, predictable funding that we can—in our case, we believe we need to increase our 

manpower to 350,000 airmen. That mans 100 percent of the positions on our books today, and we do that over the next 5 to 7 years. 

While we bring on the manpower, then we can make sure we 

have got all the training behind that for this manpower. Then we 

can increase our weapons systems support so all our supports and 

our depots and our parts and our supply. On top of that, then we 

can increase our flying hours and then we can bring down our 

OPSTEMPO and we can get our readiness back. 

But we also, at the same time, have to modernize the force. And 

we are doing so. As we are bringing on F–35s, as we are bringing 

on KC–46, as we are bringing on B–21s, we need to keep those programs on track. 

Today we have 75 less F–35s than we planned to have in 2012. 

We have 95 less MQ–9s than we planned because of sequestration. 

So today’s modernization has a readiness impact in the future. So 

today’s modernization is tomorrow’s readiness. 

We need to focus on that going forward in the future. With those 

steps, we can dig out of our readiness challenges we have today 

and bring it up to full-spectrum readiness of about 80 percent. 

Mr. WILSON OF SOUTH CAROLINA. Thank you for your commitment. And General Walters, I am really grateful, South Carolina 

has a Marine Corps Air Station in Beaufort, along with Parris Island. We are very grateful for such extraordinary facilities, giving 

young people extraordinary opportunity to serve our country and 

achieve to their highest ability. 

But I am concerned that it was reported last year that we have 

had only 141 flyable tactical aircraft that, additionally, we have 

had accidents that have just been unprecedented. And from that 

situation of danger to our pilots and communities, what is the current state of Marine aviation? 

Is there a correlation between aviation mishaps and the ability 

of a ready basic aircraft and how do you plan to address this? 

General WALTERS. Sir, we are addressing the ready basic aircraft 

issue. I have been doing it for 2 years. With the help of Congress, 

we have turned. We need to get up to 589 ready basic aircraft; that 

just gives us enough to train with. We are not there yet, we are 

at 439, so we are 100 and some short. 

But we are 50 more than we were 2 years ago, so that seems 

positive. Your last question about correlation to accidents and 

ready basic aircraft—there is no direct correlation because I have 

reviewed every action we have had in the last 2 years, those pilots 

have had the adequate time. 
19 

But I think it is an overall systemic shortfall in readiness in our 

aviation units. 

Mr. WILSON OF SOUTH CAROLINA. Thank you all for your service, 

we appreciate it so much. Thank you. 

The CHAIRMAN. Ms. Bordallo. 

Ms. BORDALLO. Thank you Mr. Chairman and thank you to all 

the witnesses for being here today. 

I appreciate the opportunity to continue to highlight the very serious challenges that we face. We have brought ourselves to this 

point largely by fighting two decade-long wars, paid for with a 

credit card, while deferring investments in our people, our equipment, and our facilities. 

This has been further strained by self-imposed fiscal constraints 

and our national security apparatus will continue to be hampered, 

without an end to across-the-board sequestration. In the meantime, 

we must continue to focus our resources on individual operations 

and maintenance accounts. 

I have a question for you, Admiral Moran, as we discussed yesterday in my office, there are significant readiness needs facing the 

Navy, and our ship maintenance infrastructure has limited capacity. 

Now the recent unfunded priorities list indicates as much with 

ship depot maintenance at the top. However, that conflicts with the 

administration that has indicated a desire to focus instead on construction. 

In an ideal world, the Navy would be able to modernize while 

shrinking the readiness deficit, but the reality is that we do not 

have a blank check. My question to you, Admiral, is, how does the 

Navy intend to prioritize these competing needs? 

In other words, with additional resources, will it focus on immediate action such as addressing deferred ship maintenance or aviation depot throughout, or instead on building new vessels? 

Admiral MORAN. Ma’am, thank you for the question. If additional 

resources become available in fiscal year 2017 we absolutely will 

put that money toward ship depot maintenance, aircraft maintenance, cybersecurity, the things, the readiness shortfalls we have 

talked about here this morning. 

As I stated in my opening, if we don’t take care of the foundation 

of the Navy, which is the 275 ships we have today, it doesn’t do 

us much good to continue to buy new. So we—it is somewhat of a 

false choice to choose between the future size of the Navy and the 

current condition of the Navy. But to your point, the resources are 

where they are and if additional funds become available in 2017 we 

will absolutely put them in the readiness accounts. 

Ms. BORDALLO. Thank you. Thank you very much, Admiral. 

And my second question is open for any of the witnesses. The Department of Defense has been asking for the authority to have another round of BRAC [base realignment and closure], for years, citing that manpower and excess infrastructure are a drain on operations and maintenance budgets and ultimately affecting readiness. 

So do you believe the Department needs another BRAC? And if 

a new round were authorized how would you reallocate the resources that are currently being used to maintain excess capacity? 

Any one of you? I just need one answer. 
20 

[Laughter.] 

General WILSON. Congresswoman Bordallo. We have—— 

Ms. BORDALLO. My time is running out so, please—— 

General WILSON [continuing]. Excess capacity in the Air Force. 

We think we have about 25 percent excess capacity at our bases. 

We think that we are, in today’s budget environment, it makes 

sense to invest wisely so BRAC would help us to do smart investment of the bases preparing for the future. 

And we could take the money we are spending on the excess infrastructure and put that back into solving some of our fiscal problems. 

Ms. BORDALLO. So, in other words, you are supporting BRAC closures? 

General WILSON. Yes ma’am. 

Ms. BORDALLO. Anybody else have a different—yes? 

General ALLYN. I will pile on. We are in a similar situation, depending on what size force you describe for 490,000 soldier Active 

Force, which is about 25,000 more than we are today. We have 21 

percent excess facilities to need. We save year over year, annually, 

$1 billion from the 2005 BRAC that took place. So it is real money, 

that we really need to reinvest into the deferred maintenance and 

infrastructure backlog that we have. For the Army it is $11 billion in deferred infrastructure sustainment, restoration, and modernization. 

Ms. BORDALLO. Thank you. 

General ALLYN. So it would be very helpful. 

General WILSON. I would say for the Air Force that number is $25 billion of money that we need to put back into our bases of deferred maintenance. 

Ms. BORDALLO. And General? 

General WALTERS. Ma’am, we think we are about right, but we 

will participate in any BRAC to see if there is any savings with our 

partners. 

Ms. BORDALLO. Thank you very much, and I submit the rest of 

my time to the Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. Chairman appreciates it. Thank you ma’am. 

Gentleman from Colorado, Mr. Coffman. 

Mr. COFFMAN. Thank you Mr. Chairman, and all of you have an 

aviation component to your branch of service. 

There is a growing concern about a pilot shortage in the United 

States military, and I think that is also reflected in the fact that 

we have a growing demand in civil aviation for pilots. 

And so, what is your approach if you could all reflect on your approaches in terms of how to deal with that issue, whether it is a 

retention bonus structure, an enhancement of some sort? 

But also the fact is that we have got experienced pilots in the 

United States military leaving for jobs in civilian airlines who 

would probably still like to affiliate in some way. And so then the 

question is, should we shift then, some of those flying billets from 

the Active Duty to the Guard and Reserve? 

So maybe we will start with the United States Army and work 

our way down or up maybe. 

[Laughter.] 

Okay. You have got helicopter pilots. 
21 

General ALLYN. We are not having a problem retaining our helicopter pilots, so I will defer to the other services. 

Mr. COFFMAN. Okay, fantastic. Okay. 

Admiral MORAN. We would like some of your helicopter pilots. 

[Laughter.] 

Sir, it is a great question and it is one we do focus on a lot as 

we manage our force. I would tell you that the thing that keeps pilots in our services, I speak for the Navy, but I am sure General 

Wilson would agree because we have both flown, is to fly. If you 

don’t have the adequate resources of airplanes and money to resource flying hours, that dissatisfaction will show up with people 

walking out the door. We are all facing that shortage today. 

Not enough airplanes, we are not fixing them fast enough, we 

don’t have the spare parts that we need. And young men and 

women are not flying nearly enough to keep the job satisfaction at 

a level that they would like. 

Mr. COFFMAN. So Admiral, your view is it is a morale issue based 

on the ability to give flying hours? 

Admiral MORAN. It absolutely is a morale issue. 

Mr. COFFMAN. General Wilson. 

General WILSON. Today, we find ourselves producing about 1,200 

pilots a year, and if I add the Navy and the Marines together, we 

produce about 2,000 pilots a year. The airlines are hiring 4,000 pilots a year. All right, so I think this is bigger than just a service 

problem, I think this is a national problem that we have to be able 

to get at and work with industry on how we do that. 

Certainly, the Guard and Reserves are a big part of this. Certainly, the whole team on how we go forward on this. We can recruit lots of people to fly, we don’t have a problem there. Retaining 

them is a problem. Today and for the last 5 years, our retention 

of pilots has declined. We need to keep about 65 percent after the 

10-year point. Today, we are doing less than half of that. 

So I would say it is a quality of life and quality of service. So 

as the admiral said, we are doing everything we can to improve, 

to reduce the additional duties, all the other burdens on our pilots 

and let them do their job and to build that culture that most military pilots, the warfighting culture ethos that you see in the squadrons, that will keep people in the service. But there is certainly a 

cultural aspect of this. 

But there is also, to improve the quality of life and reduce administrative burdens on our crews and let them fly. 

Mr. COFFMAN. Sure. 

General WILSON. But this is a national problem, it is not just a 

service problem. 

Mr. COFFMAN. The Guard and Reserve have pilots who have 

served on Active Duty that transfer into the Guard and Reserve 

and that are flying in civilian airlines. And so are you looking at 

all at restructuring? 

General WILSON. Absolutely. That is all part of how we are looking at it and we are engaging with all the corporate airline leaders 

on how do we do this together and how do we do this smarter. But 

right now we have a math problem that doesn’t close because we 

produce 2,000 and the Nation needs about 4,000. 

Mr. COFFMAN. General Walters. 
22 

General WALTERS. Sir, fortuitous, we have a meeting with the 

Commandant tomorrow to discuss this particular issue and all the 

levers you just described; the Reserves, how we keep them once we 

get them. And I will add one more, is how long do we sign them 

up for when we sign them up. 

All those will be part of it, and we might end up having to pay 

a bonus for those select people to keep them around and to make 

it so we can get them a draw. In the end, it is their willingness 

to serve and their value that they put on service that I think will 

be the biggest magnet. I don’t think we can dump enough money 

on them to keep them there just with the money. 

Mr. COFFMAN. Thank you. 

Mr. Chairman, I yield back. 

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Courtney. 

Mr. COURTNEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you to all the witnesses for your excellent testimony 

this morning. 

Admiral Moran, I would like to again, go back to your very frank 

advice that we really need to focus on maintenance and repair in 

terms of just getting to meet the operational demand, shipbuilding, 

which I think is going to be an exciting year with the FSA [Force 

Structure Assessment] that came out. 

But having said that, that is a long game, and we are not going 

to see the fruits of that for 2017 action, for years to come. So your, 

you know, description about the fact that there is this backlog 

building up of work that is not getting performed, I was wondering 

if you could be a little more descriptive about, you know, how that 

looks, in terms of whether it is carriers or surface ships or submarines. You know, what is happening out there in terms of that 

backlog that is building up? 

Admiral MORAN. Yes, sir, Congressman. Thanks for the question. 

First of all, in 2017 alone, if we do not see some kind of supplemental come for this fiscal year without a CR [continuing resolution], within a month we are going to have to shut down air wings, 

we are going to have to defer maintenance on several availabilities 

for our surface ships and submarine maintenance facilities. We are 

just flat out out of money to be able to do that. 

I think everyone here knows that in 2017, the Navy took a $5 

billion cut in its top line. And if that comes to fruition, that is $2 

billion of readiness cuts we had to take, which is immediately applied to the things like ship avails. So we have had cases in the 

past here, in the recent past, where we have had to decertify a submarine from being able to dive because we cannot get it into nuclear maintenance that is needed. 

The crew on the USS Albany, for example, went over 48 months 

before getting out of the yard because of several delays, at least 

four different delays, because of other priorities. And those other 

priorities start with our SSBN force, which is our nuclear strategic 

deterrence submarine force, carriers, and then we get to SSNs [attack submarines]. 

So if any of those get disrupted, a carrier goes long in one of our 

public yards, then we are going to bump things like our SSNs. So 

that crew of Albany, the CO [commanding officer] took over at the 

start of that maintenance avail, gave up command before the end 
23 

of that maintenance avail. And the crew, the entire crew, did not 

deploy. To someone’s point here earlier, you cannot buy back that 

experience. 

Mr. COURTNEY. Right. 

Admiral MORAN. And so those are the kinds of real impacts we 

are seeing in the yards because of the shortage of resources and the 

continuing raiding of the readiness accounts in order to keep the 

rest of the Navy whole. 

Mr. COURTNEY. Thank you. I mean, that story about the Albany 

really resonates I think because in this room, you know, we have 

heard from Admiral Harris at PACOM [Pacific Command], General 

Scaparrotti at EUCOM [European Command], that they need more 

submarines, I mean now, and to the extent that you know, we are 

not going to build a Virginia class now because it takes 5 years. 

But if we can get, you know, the Albany and the Boise and those 

others out and, you know, underway then, you know, we can respond to those combatant commanders. 

So let’s assume, you know, we fully fund, you know, we deal with 

the resource issue and we also deal with the funding certainty 

issue which your testimony pointed out as another, you know, big 

problem. I mean, there is still I think are issues though, in terms 

of allocation of work and in the shipyards. I mean, in your testimony, you said for a variety of reasons, our shipyards are struggling to get our ships through maintenance periods on time. 

So again, let’s assume, you know, that we take care of some of 

the resource questions. I mean, how can we, you know, deal with 

that? I mean, can we call on the private yards to help take on some 

of the work? And can Congress help with that process? 

Admiral MORAN. Yes, sir. You are absolutely correct. Obviously, 

we try to maximize our public yard workload, but we try to smooth 

out those god-awful sand charts that we are used to staring at to 

try to smooth out the work across those yards. 

And where we need that extra capacity, we do use the private 

yards to do it. Montpelier is a good example today that is in EB 

[Electric Boat] too, for example. So we will continue to look at 

those. The problem is, the very late determination that we would 

no longer have the capacity in the public yards. When we turn to 

the private yards at that moment, it becomes a very expensive 

proposition. 

So the degree to which we can take advantage of your support 

and working with our private yards to try to drive down the costs, 

it makes it easier for us to have to surge to those private yards 

when public yards become, the capacity or the work exceeds the capacity because of delays that are already there, if that makes 

sense. 

Mr. COURTNEY. Thank you. 

I think Admiral Kevin McCoy described it as one shipyard, that 

should be our philosophy. 

Admiral MORAN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. COURTNEY. Thank you. 

Yield back. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. The story about the Albany is amazing. 

Mr. Franks. 
24 

Mr. FRANKS. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank all of 

the witnesses for your noble service to America. Mr. Chairman, I 

have what is probably somewhat of a redundant question, but it 

seems important to emphasize. 

On March 22nd last year, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff 

General Joseph Dunford said, quote, ‘‘Absorbing significant cuts of 

the last 5 years has resulted in our under-investing in critical capabilities, and unless we reverse sequestration, we will be unable to 

execute the current defense strategy,’’ close quote. 

So, General Walters, and I might ask a follow-up by General 

Allyn, if you would maybe keep the responses fairly concise. In 

your professional military opinion, is your service able to execute 

our current defense strategy with our current force levels? 

General WALTERS. Sir, if your definition of the strategy is to do 

two things simultaneously, the answer is no. 

General ALLYN. And for the United States Army, as General 

Milley has testified before this committee and as have I in prior 

years, only at high risk. 

Mr. FRANKS. So, maybe to give you a real-world example, when 

you have talked about two scenarios. In your professional military 

opinion, at its current force level, would your service, and I will 

begin with [inaudible] again first, General Walters, would your 

service be capable of executing a Korea scenario while maintaining 

your current commitments around the world? 

General WALTERS. Sir, we would be able to execute a Korea scenario, but we would have to draw from other commitments in the 

world to make it on the timeline required. 

General ALLYN. And likewise, for the United States Army, we 

would both draw down committed forces elsewhere as well as have 

forces arriving late to need based on current readiness levels, as we 

talked about at the outset with the chairman. 

Mr. FRANKS. I will broaden it to the committee, whoever would 

like to take a shot at it. With your current planned end-strength 

levels, can you meet the current force planning construct outlined 

in the 2014 Quadrennial Defense Review to, quote, ‘‘defeat a regional adversary and deny another aggressor in another region?’’ 

And maybe, General or Admiral Moran, maybe take a shot at it. 

Admiral MORAN. Well, my answer would be very consistent with 

my brothers here. And that is, we will be able to employ our force, 

but at great risk to being there late and at higher casualties than 

we would expect. 

General WILSON. And I would second that. 

Mr. FRANKS. No disagreement on the panel? 

So final question, Mr. Chairman, and I address it to all of you. 

In your professional military opinions, are your respective services too small given current and emerging mission requirements? 

General ALLYN. Yes, we are for the current defense planning 

guidance. Now, the Secretary of Defense has directed a new strategic review that could result in a revised force construct requirement, but we will undergo that process and provide our recommendations on what the size of the Army must be. But today, 

it is too small. 

Admiral MORAN. I agree with General Allyn for the Navy as well. 

General WILSON. Same for the Air Force. 
25 

General WALTERS. Same for the Marine Corps, sir. 

Mr. FRANKS. Well, Mr. Chairman, they say that sometimes, you 

know, there is nothing more encouraging to hear than to hear your 

own convictions fall from another’s lips. But in this case, I think 

I am more alarmed by that than anything else, and yet, it does 

seem to be a consistent circumstance. And I just hope the committee and the country and the new administration is considering 

the responses of these gentlemen carefully. 

And with that, I would yield back. Thank you all. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Ms. Tsongas. 

Ms. TSONGAS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you all for being here today as we have this very important discussion. Last week—and this has been in the context of 

a number of hearings that we have had to sort of discuss this global situation that we have to deal with and deal with appropriately 

and successfully. And last week this committee had the opportunity 

to hear from General Petraeus and John McLaughlin about some 

of the pressing threats and challenges facing our Nation. And in 

their testimony, I was struck by the focus they both placed on the 

shifting global balance of power and the need for the United States 

to maintain its technological superiority in relation to both Russia 

and China. 

And just last week, The New York Times reported on Chinese 

advances in computer science and engineering in relation to declining U.S. investments in these areas. 

Historically, our Nation’s national labs and our FFRDCs [federally funded research and development centers] have led the way in 

advancing new technology for our Nation’s military. But today, private firms, many located overseas, are increasingly taking the lead, 

making investments in those technologies that have both consumer 

and military applications. So they see a dual benefit to it. And robotics and artificial intelligence [AI] are just two examples of where 

the private sector has been increasingly successful. 

So as we are talking today about the many challenges we face, 

and much of the emphasis is on end strength and the need for 

more people, it seems to me that as we are thinking about how we 

maintain our competitive advantage, that it is not just about end 

strength, but it is about how we use cutting-edge technologies to 

leverage fiscally thoughtful investments, whether they be in people 

or other areas. 

And so, to that end, General Wilson, and this certainly comes as 

I am a Representative from Massachusetts, we have great labs and 

FFRDCs in our State that have done such great work, what is the 

Air Force doing to modernize its labs and defense-focused FFRDCs 

to make sure that we are able to keep the Air Force at the cutting 

edge of technology? And how much of a priority is it for you, given 

the many competing demands for investment? 

General WILSON. Congresswoman, we have investments going 

into MIT [Massachusetts Institute of Technology] Lincoln Labs to 

help improve the infrastructure there. I have been out to visit 

them, and I can tell you they are absolutely world-class. And there 

are some technologies that they are working on, you mentioned AI 

and robotics. They are also working on directed energy, some 
26 

things that can truly change the game. So that is an important 

focus of our Air Force. 

As we modernize our force, we need to modernize smartly across 

the specific areas. And as you mentioned, industry in many areas 

is leading us in that way. So we are collaborating with industry, 

whether we work with folks like DARPA [Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency], our Air Force Research Lab, with the 

Strategic Capabilities Office, Dr. Roper and his team, all the 

FFRDCs and all the national labs that also are reaching out with 

all the private sector to make sure that we can stay up to date with 

them. 

I look at this as, almost like the FFRD, the FSRM, Facilities Restoration Modernization accounts, we have to invest so much today 

in our technology that is going to get us to tomorrow. Right now, 

our R&D [research and development] is about 2 percent. We need 

to keep it at that or even grow that because otherwise, our adversaries will outpace us. 

But we have a great collaboration with all the national labs, they 

are truly national treasures. We need to leverage those to help us 

stay ahead of all of our adversaries going forward. 

Ms. TSONGAS. Well, and those national treasures don’t remain 

national treasures without the significant investment that needs to 

be made in them, and I know given the constrained resources, I 

just want to be reassured that we aren’t shortsighted and that we, 

in making those tough choices, we are not putting what we need 

to because technology has a long time line and yet it also can move 

very quickly, and we don’t want to be behind the eight ball because 

we have just been too shortsighted in some of our near-term investments. 

And so to that end, also General Allyn, I wanted to ask you how 

you are prioritizing your investments. Again, Massachusetts has a 

great facility that really focuses on the soldier and how to best protect the soldier, to make them as ready as possible, but again, fully 

equipped and thinking thoughtfully what kind of investments the 

Army is making. 

General ALLYN. Well, thank you, Congresswoman, and I am 

sorry you are missing the championship parade in Boston this 

morning. 

Ms. TSONGAS. I am very sorry myself. 

General ALLYN. That is a great sacrifice on your part, but we 

likewise fully leverage not only Natick Labs, as you have highlighted, but also MIT Lincoln Labs. I have been there in the last 

2 months on several programs that are critical to us to be able to 

continue to dominate in the multidomain environment of the future. And we will continue to leverage both the great soldier enhancement initiatives that come from Natick as well as the technology that is critical. 

You highlighted the importance of technology to readiness. It is 

the right balance of capability and capacity that makes a ready 

force. And all of us are trying to ensure that we maintain that balance as we move forward, ma’am. 

Ms. TSONGAS. Thank you. 

I yield back. 

The CHAIRMAN. Mrs. Hartzler. 
27 

Mrs. HARTZLER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you gentlemen for being here today for this very important hearing and pretty sobering testimony, but I think we all need 

to hear it. 

And General Wilson I appreciate your highlighting the recent 

mission that went from Whiteman over to Libya, and we are so 

proud of them. And your testimony, it just goes right along with 

the question I wanted to ask, where you talked about how you feel 

like that our training makes us capable for Middle Eastern conflict 

but we need to have peer adversary training. 

And I know with your 35 years in the Air Force as a pilot and 

flying B–1 and your participation in Red Flag over the years, I 

wanted to ask you about the capability of that training exercise to 

meet our near-peer competitors that we are facing today. 

And so is the Air Force training with a fight tonight mentality 

against a high-end threat like China and Russia? And what I mean 

by this is, are you confident in the Air Force’s ability to accurately 

train against a near-peer adversary? Can you give our young men 

and women a glimpse of what night one in Kaliningrad would look 

like? Can you prepare them and put their families’ mind at ease, 

such that a flare-up in the South China Seas would look routine? 

General WILSON. Congressman Hartzler, we are putting significant investment into our ranges and infrastructure, places like 

Nellis Air Force Base. The Red Flag that I started flying with in 

the 1980s, we have changed it considerably in how we incorporate 

space and cyber into it, but the range infrastructure, the threats, 

the way we can replicate threats, hasn’t improved to a significant 

degree, until recently; we have changed that. 

We have put significant investment into the range infrastructure 

to give us the right threat emitters, the right ability to give us a 

Kaliningrad-like environment with high-end threats and allow our 

crews to be able to train in that. We are not there yet, though, we 

have just started that investment to improve our ranges and infrastructure. But that will be critical going forward. 

It is also critical that we invest in our what we call live, virtual, 

constructive training because in the future, I am not going to have, 

a, the flying hours or the money to be able to train an F–35 pilot 

and give them all the training outdoors in the live environment. I 

am going to have to do some of that in the virtual or constructive 

environment. 

So we are putting money into that live, virtual, constructive so 

that our folks can be at home station and we can replicate a Red 

Flag-like environment or a high-end training scenario to give them 

the most realistic training possible. But it is important that we 

continue that investment of our ranges, our infrastructure, and our 

live, virtual, constructive environments going forwards. 

Mrs. HARTZLER. So, if 100 was the number for feeling very, very 

confident that you would be able to go up against, that the training 

was adequate for fifth gen, zero, what would be the number where 

you feel like that we would be able to go up against fifth gen adversary? 

General WILSON. Well, again, if you go to one of our Red Flag 

exercises, it is absolutely fantastic training. The problem is, not 

enough people get to go to it and we don’t do those frequently 
28 

enough. So the average crew, I would say we would call ourselves 

50 percent ready against a high-end threat. In certain parts of our 

Air Force, that number is considerably below that. 

So again, it takes all those resources we talked about. I have got 

to have the people, the training, the weapon systems support, the 

training ranges, the flying hours, and I have got to be in time to 

do that, to build up to high-end readiness. So today, we are not 

near where we need to be, I would say 50 percent. 

Mrs. HARTZLER. All right. Look forward to working with you to 

help get that up to 100 so everyone can meet the threats that we 

are facing. 

Thank you. I yield back. 

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Garamendi. 

Mr. GARAMENDI. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And gentlemen, thank you so much for your service. I don’t know 

how many of these hearings we have gone to and it always comes 

down to more money and then somebody mentions sequestration 

and it seems to me that with the unified control of Congress and 

the administration that, if sequestration is a problem, then perhaps 

it could be solved quickly. Nonetheless, the money problem is likely 

to persist. 

A couple of questions, just to follow up on the question about the 

airmen and the pilots that are necessary. I understand that the Air 

Force is now moving to provide or to allow pilots that are not officers to fly certain missions. General Wilson, if you could comment 

on that briefly, and is it going to help solve this problem? 

General WILSON. Congressman, we think so. Let me tell you our 

efforts today. We have got the initial group of enlisted aviators into 

our RQ–4 Global Hawk program. We think over the next few years, 

we will be able to grow it so that a majority of the pilots in the 

Global Hawk will be enlisted. 

We will learn from that, we will see if we can take that example 

and do that in other areas like our MQ–9s and others, but that is 

to be determined. We think that will help alleviate some of the 

shortages right now, but it is in the first stages. We have got the 

second class in training, we only have a handful of enlisted operators going through that training program right now. 

Mr. GARAMENDI. I think the question really comes to this committee, and whether this committee and the Senate, whether we 

are going to force this faster, or not. It seems to me we ought to 

let this go in a way that is wise. Not necessarily slow, but at least 

thoughtfully done. 

The next question, if I might, General Wilson, has to do with, I 

guess we want to have everything, and we want to have everything 

now. A long discussion has ensued about the aircraft and about the 

personnel. Not much discussion about the ground based strategic 

deterrent and the multibillions that will be spent on that. 

The question arises in my mind, and I hope in this committee’s 

mind about the necessity of rebuilding the entire nuclear mission; 

all of the bombs, all of the delivery systems, from naval to Air 

Force. General, if you could comment on this issue. Can we afford 

all of it? 

General WILSON. Congressman, I think we can. Look at the investment across the nuclear enterprise going forward on all the 
29 

modernization programs. It will peak at about 5.5 percent of our 

defense budget, so it is a matter of priorities. 

Foundationally, what our Nation provides, the nuclear deterrent 

provides our Nation is incalculable. It has provided 70-plus years 

of no conflict between major powers. As I look across the globe and 

the landscape that you talk about changing, as we see what our adversaries are doing across their force, we have no option other than 

to modernize. 

Our forces were built, many of them, in the 1960s. Modernized 

early in the 1970s, that we are still maintaining today. There 

comes a time where we have to modernize, and we have reached 

that. 

We have delayed the modernization of these programs for far too 

long. Specifically the ground based strategic deterrent. If we look 

at today’s Minuteman IIIs which are put in the ground, actually 

have Minuteman I parts on them, designed in the 1950s, put in 

place in the early 1960s, Minuteman IIIs in the 1970s. 

We are now having 50-year life cycles of these missiles. The strategic stability that they afford our Nation, is well worth the cost 

and investment going forward. We welcome that discussion about 

the importance of a nuclear triad. 

Mr. GARAMENDI. I certainly think we need to have that discussion. We need to have that discussion in detail, and it is not just 

about the ICBMs [intercontinental ballistic missiles] that are in the 

ground, whether they need to be renewed. 

It is about the naval, and the new submarines, and the new 

bombs that go with the new missiles, as well as the new F–21 long 

range bomber and the cruise missiles. And the question for all of 

us is a trillion dollar question over the next 25 years or so. With 

the bow wave occurring within the next 5 to 7 years. 

And the Army needs more men and women, as does the Marine 

Corps, and you need more fighter pilots, and more aircraft, and the 

Navy needs new submarines. And another 55 ships on top of what 

you already have. 

And, where is the money? And the President is suggesting a tax 

cut of more than a trillion dollars, so we better have a big credit 

card. I think that is called the deficit. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back. 

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Scott. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

General Walters, Marine Corps Logistics [Command] based in Albany, Georgia, got hit pretty hard with those storms. I will be there 

this coming Friday; that is not technically my district, but I live 

about 30 minutes away from that base, and it is certainly important to us. 

Could you give me any estimate when that base will be back to 

fully operational status, if that has not already occurred? And, how 

and why is this particular base critical to the Marine Corps? 

General WALTERS. Congressman, thanks for the question, and we 

are tracking that daily. I know what damage has been done to the 

infrastructure. We think by the end of this week we will have all 

of that collapsed building and warehouses off, so we can take a look 

at it and analyze what damage was done to the equipment that 

was inside of it, so I can understand the full cost. 
30 

In our ongoing efforts in 2017, we have identified at least the 

first cost of that. Your second question is when are we going to get 

it back full-up round. I mean, they are operating at a minimal capacity now on areas that weren’t affected, but it is definitely critical. 

That is where our tanks, our amphibious vehicles, our light 

armor vehicles, and our artillery go through depot. I don’t have an 

estimate for you now when that is going to start up again; we do 

other components; we only have two depots, one on the east coast, 

one on the west coast in Barstow. 

It is good that we have two, because if it is going to be a long 

period of time, we are going to have to make a decision on what 

we do out at Barstow and what we don’t do at Barstow to take the 

critical things and move them out there. My preference would be 

to rapidly get Albany back up running at 100 percent. 

Mr. SCOTT. Would you agree that from a deployment standpoint 

it is important that we be able to deploy from both the east coast 

and the west coast. 

General WALTERS. Absolutely, sir. We are a global Nation. 

Mr. SCOTT. Yes, sir. 

General Wilson, David Goldfein in February, I will quote him, 

‘‘25 years of continuous combat operations and reductions to our 

total force, coupled with budget instability and lower than planned 

funding levels, have resulted in one of the smallest, oldest, and 

least ready forces across the full spectrum of our operations and 

our history.’’ 

Your testimony was pretty close to that. General Welsh, who I 

think is just a wonderful leader, prior to 1992 the Air Force procured an average of 200 fighter aircraft per year. In the two and 

a half decades since, curtailed modernization has resulted in the 

procurement of less than an average of 25 fighters yearly. In short, 

the technology and capability gaps between America and our adversaries are closing dangerously fast. 

General Wilson, it is clear that there are not enough fighter aircraft to sustain readiness, through both pilot flight hours and flying aircraft, yet the Air Force is contemplating reducing the workforce to include the depots. Can you explain how that squares up? 

General WILSON. Yes, I don’t believe we are planning on reducing depots; depots are critical to going forward in the future. Instead—General Welsh, Chief 20, I will also agree, is a remarkable 

airman. 

Mr. SCOTT. Yes, sir. 

General WILSON. A real visionary about what we need to do with 

our force. Chief 21, as you have talked about, outlined a problem 

we have at hand. We used to procure about 200 fighter airplanes 

a year; today, we are producing less than 20. That is why 21 of our 

39 fleets of airplane are older than 27 years old. 

To maintain those 27-year-old airplanes takes a lot of work. It 

takes heroic efforts by lots of maintainers and, of course, it takes 

our depots. We have to actually get more out of our depots because 

each time we bring in a new airplane or bring in an old airplane, 

today, they are finding things they have never found before. 

Whether it be a F–16, a B–1, or C–5, they are finding things that 

they have never seen. So these are, they are real artisans on how 
31 

they fix these airplanes. And our depots will be critical to success 

going forward. 

Mr. SCOTT. One last question. I represent Robins Air Force Base 

and a lot of those men and women work at Robins. And as you said 

they are very skilled and talented and without them our planes 

wouldn’t be able to fly today. When can we expect guidance issued 

down to the base level on the workforce? 

General WILSON. We hope that the guidance will come out this 

week of what is exempted and categories, to allow our workforce 

to continue. As you know, we are still just digging out of the sequestration and the effects that that had, the furlough of our civilians. 

Our civilian workforce is critical, whether it be maintaining our 

planes, sustaining them, operations across our Air Force. Any reductions of that skilled workforce and 96 percent of our civilians 

work outside of Washington, DC; they work in our depots and our 

flight lines. And so we have to be able to sustain those and grow 

our civilian workforce. 

Mr. SCOTT. Thank you, gentleman. Thank you for your service. 

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. O’Rourke. 

Mr. O’ROURKE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you to 

each of the vice chiefs for your service, your leadership, and your 

testimony today. And I also really appreciate the guidance that you 

have given to Congress so far, in repealing the Budget Control Act; 

ending this threat of sequestration; having budgets that are funded, and predictable, and consistent, instead of having continuing 

resolutions; and pointing out the real value in a base realignment 

and closure process, to be able to direct and focus resources where 

they are going to be most effective for our service members in our 

missions. 

And so on each of those, I would like to be part of working with 

my colleagues from both sides of the aisle, to get these things done. 

I think you made a very good case for why we need to do it, why 

we need to do it now. 

For General Allyn, the 3 of 58 brigade combat teams that are 

ready to fight tonight. I think one, it says something about our 

form of government that we would say that publicly, in a meeting 

like this, and advertise our state of preparedness or lack of preparedness to the rest of the world. But I understand, we say these 

kind of things to make sure that we are making fully informed decisions. And I hope that your comments spur us to take the necessary actions to reverse this trend and make sure that we are 

where we need to be. 

I am guessing that whatever analogous body to HASC [House 

Armed Services Committee] that exists in Russia, is not talking 

about these preparedness levels in Russia in a public way. But generally speaking, could you tell us how we compare, if you can in 

a setting like this one? Are they at 3 of 58? 

General ALLYN. I have got to be be honest with you, Congressman. I don’t have access to their unit status reporting. I do get 

ours every month; and so I have a fingertip feel for where we 

stand. The United States Army and obviously on behalf of the Congress, it is our responsibility to deliver the best readiness that we 
32 

can at the funding levels that we have. And every commander in 

the field is getting after that, as you know, from Fort Bliss, Texas. 

I will offer, it is not all doom and gloom, you know. One of the 

biggest impacts for us, in terms of elevating our readiness above 

what it is today, is our personnel shortages. It is the first thing we 

are doing with the increased authorization that you have given us 

in the NDAA this year, is to fill the holes in our current formations 

so that they can be manned at a level to deploy, ready to fight; despite some of the medically nondeployable numbers that we have 

in our force. So we are absolutely committed to getting after that 

as our top priority. 

Mr. O’ROURKE. Let me ask you another question. What do you 

need above what was authorized in fiscal year 2017 NDAA to meet 

the gaps that you highlighted today? What is a dollar amount that 

this committee should know about? 

General ALLYN. Well, that work is going to happen next week. 

We got some initial guidance mid-week this week from the Secretary of Defense on how to approach this. As you know, from the 

memo being published publicly, the first priority is that which can 

deliver readiness immediately in 2017 and 2018. 

Then it is achieving a better balanced force; i.e., fill in the holes 

in our current formation. And then it is building the joint force 

that we need for the future. And we are aggressively working with 

OSD [Office of the Secretary of Defense] staff to finalize exactly 

what that figure will look like. And we will be getting that to you 

as quickly as we can. 

Mr. O’ROURKE. Last question, and you may not have enough 

time to answer, and if not, we will take it for the record. But the 

tempo of the last 16 years of combat in Afghanistan and Iraq have 

really taken a toll, certainly on our service members, on their 

units, on their families. 

And I am really interested on where we are in moving to the 

Army Sustainable Readiness Model to replace the Army Force Generation model that probably was appropriate for some of our needs 

at the time, but long term, I think, is compromising readiness and 

unit cohesion. 

I know you only have 15 seconds left. If you want to answer for 

the record, I would be happy to take that. 

General ALLYN. You are absolutely correct. It is a top priority. 

Army Forces Command is running a pilot now with units across 

the total force using this new model. The goal is to be able to sustain readiness of our forces across time regardless of their deployment status. And the goal is two-thirds of our force ready to deploy 

at any moment in time. And we are absolutely getting after that. 

Mr. O’ROURKE. Thank you. 

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Byrne. 

Mr. BYRNE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And gentlemen, thank 

you for your service to our country and your time with us today. 

Admiral Moran, the preponderance of our current 274-ship Navy 

was constituted as a result of the Reagan era 600-ship Navy. 

These ships were built throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Many of 

them have reached, or are beyond, their original service life expectancy. In your best military judgment, are we building, and are we 

capable of building, given our shipyard capacity, enough ships to 
33 

not only maintain this already hazardly low 274-ship Navy in the 

battle force but to also increase it to the 355 ships that is called 

for in the latest Force Structure Assessment? 

Admiral MORAN. Congressman, thanks for the question. You are 

absolutely right that for the last couple decades, we have been living off the fat, if you will, of that Reagan era buildup. But it is 

coming home to roost now. Back then, we used to build up to five 

DDGs [guided missile destroyers] a year. 

Today, we are fortunate to get two to three a year. So, when you 

look at the math, it doesn’t add up over time as that Reagan era 

buildup starts to decommission because they have reached the end 

of their life. And we are not building at a rate to replace them. We 

have programmed in 2017 and 2018, as we are beginning that program look now, to arrest the decline in our total numbers. 

It is why we have come down since 9/11 from 316 ships to 275 

today. We just have not been replenishing them at the same rate 

as they have been going out. So, we have taken a hard look at 

whether there is industrial capacity to not only arrest the decline 

but to start to climb back out of it. 

And there is industrial capacity to do it. We have vendors and 

subvendors though that are in short supply that we have to begin 

to have that conversation with. 

So, to General Allyn’s point, once we get past this year and the 

immediate readiness needs, we are going to take a hard look along 

with the OSD to determine what the strategy calls for and the size 

and shape and function of the force, the joint force in the future. 

We are prepared and I think we can go to a higher ramp earlier 

than is currently planned, but the resourcing clearly is not there. 

Mr. BYRNE. What effect will this low level of ships have on our 

combatant commands to safeguard and secure our economic shipping lanes, execute current missions, and answer the call should a 

contingent operation arise? 

Admiral MORAN. Yes, sir. Today, we satisfy about 40 percent of 

the combatant commander requests for naval forces, 40 percent. 

And that is why the size of the Navy we have today is too small. 

It is also why that small Navy is being driven at a high 

OPTEMPO, a higher OPTEMPO year after year. 

And, that higher OPTEMPO is driving up maintenance requirements, delays in shipyards, and our ability to get that force back 

at sea. So our ability to satisfy growing combatant commander 

requirements is not going to be satisfying to anyone in the near future unless we have a larger Navy. 

Mr. BYRNE. Can you expand upon why the Navy is unique compared to the other services with regards to why the Navy should 

invest current readiness funds into shipbuilding and the impact 

that that has on the future readiness of the Navy? 

Admiral MORAN. Yes, sir. Clearly, it takes a long time to build 

a capital ship, or any ship of the line. So, when we invest money 

in current year dollars or near year dollars it takes several years 

for that capability to deliver. So we are unique from that standpoint. 

The number of years it takes to deliver an aircraft carrier or a 

ballistic submarine or just a high-end destroyer is well beyond the 
34 

FYDP [Future Years Defense Program] in many cases. So it has an 

impact over long-term readiness if we don’t invest now. 

Mr. BYRNE. Let me just say in closing, I was honored to be able 

to go to the RIMPAC [Rim of the Pacific] exercise in Hawaii this 

past summer. And not only to see our Navy at work but to see 

other navies at work. Because, there are 27, I think, other nations 

that were participating with us. And I was struck by the esprit de 

corps of the sailors that I was with. 

I was struck by their commitment to the mission. And I was 

struck by the fact that they are doing a lot more with a lot less. 

But I worry that there is a time coming when even the great sailors that we have got cannot continue to do more with whatever the 

dwindling number of resources that we are providing to them. 

And, I was struck by that quote that General Wilson gave from 

General MacArthur. That hit me very hard. I hope that we never, 

ever get to the point where we are there again. Where we literally 

have to say it is too late. I don’t think it is too late. But, the clock 

is ticking and it is ticking on all of us. 

And, I hope that we will work together to rebuild all of our 

Armed Forces, and I appreciate what each of you do. And, I yield 

back, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. Ms. Rosen. 

Ms. ROSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And, I want to thank all 

of you for being here today and your thoughtful and certainly enlightening testimony and for your service to our Nation. You know, 

I represent a district in Nevada about a dozen miles from Nellis 

Air Force Base, home to the U.S. Air Force Warfare Center, the 

largest advanced combat training mission in the world. 

And, our primary mission includes testing of the Nation’s most 

advanced aircraft and weapons systems, tactical air training, advanced training on the Nevada Test and Training Range. The Nevada Test and Training Range is the largest air and ground space 

available for peacetime military operations. And it looks very much 

like the Middle East. So in the summertime, we are not so lucky, 

happy about that, but it is good for the military. And even though 

we are a small State, we have the sixth most Active Duty Air Force 

personnel in the country. 

And one of out every 300 Nevadans is Active Duty Air Force. So 

it is very important in our community. We have touched on a lot 

of issues today, but your testimony really seems to have put into 

place and emphasized the importance of passing a budget, so that 

we can plan on your side and on the private side. 

So I would like to ask about uniform versus contractor. Are there 

responsibilities that contractors are doing now because you don’t 

have the money in your budgets and, conversely, what are service 

members doing that contractors used to do because we don’t have 

the funds on that side? 

General WILSON. Congresswoman, we have got contractors involved in all aspects of our organization. So today, for example, at 

Laughlin Air Force Base, one of our pilot training bases, all—it is 

contract maintenance. They are doing all of the flight-line maintenance. 

So we have contracted that out and our balancing of modernization, capacity, and readiness, we didn’t have the funds and that is 
35 

how parts of that—blue suit—used to be done by blue suit maintenance, now being done by contractors. 

That example would permeate across every unit in every part of 

our Air Force. It is contractors are involved in some aspects of how 

we do operations. Is it too much or too little? I guess I would say 

that that there, it is going to depend. There are areas that we 

think should be more and, in our case Air Force blue suit maintenance or blue suit operations. 

But we are having to rely on contractors because we don’t have 

the people that we once had to be able to do that. 

Ms. ROSEN. So what resources do you need for training to increase the people pipeline because that really, we have maintenance, we have equipment, but without the people and the training 

to do it. So what resources do you need to improve the people on 

both ends? 

General WILSON. Well, we have the infrastructure to be able to 

access and train the right people. We need the authorizations for 

the people and the funding that goes with it to be able to do that. 

Ms. ROSEN. Thank you. I yield back my time. 

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Wittman. 

Mr. WITTMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Gentlemen, thank you 

so much for joining us today, and thanks again for your service. 

Admiral Moran, I would like to begin with you and ask you to 

elaborate on the backlog of maintenance that we are seeing within 

the Navy. And I am going to go right to our aircraft carriers. As 

you know, the CNO has said he wants to stay on 7-month deployment schedules, there have been delays of CVNs [aircraft carriers] 

getting to the yard. 

When that happens, it also has an impact on maintenance availabilities and, therefore, deployment schedules, training schedules, 

and now we are seeing that reverberate down to our SSN, our attack submarines, because all of this work on our nuclear ships, as 

you know, has to be done at our public shipyards. 

Give me your perspective in several ways. First of all, we are 

now seeing the impact on SSNs, with the USS Boise now being tied 

up at the dock, one of our active attack submarines tied up at the 

dock for 2 years before maintenance will begin. 

And, again, that takes a while before she gets back to the fleet, 

and another five getting ready to be tied up at the dock, awaiting 

maintenance. Again, for that 2-year period before the first work 

gets done. 

You have that; you have carrier gaps now in the Persian Gulf. 

You are seeing that start to back up with carriers going to the 

yards and then, not just maintenance availability backups but 

then, that affects training schedules. 

I want to ask you this. Are you going to change deployment 

schedules? Lengthen them from 7 months? Will training times, predeployment workups, will they get shortened? How are you going 

to deal with this to make sure that all these ships get to the yard, 

get maintained, get back to the fleet? If we are going to get to 355 

ships, we have got to do all possible to maintain the ships that we 

have. 

Admiral MORAN. Congressman, thanks for your question. It is a 

very complex answer. I will try to keep it simple. 
36 

Mr. WITTMAN. Okay. Okay. 

Admiral MORAN. When we hit sequestration and furlough back 

in 2013, we saw several of our civilian sailors in our yards leave 

who were eligible for retirement, eligible to move on just because 

they were tired of dealing with this kind of uncertainty. In the 

years since then, when we have been able to hire back, we have 

hired back in numbers that are fairly substantial, but they are 

young, they are inexperienced. 

And so today, in our public shipyards, roughly 50 percent of our 

civilian workforce there has less than 5 years experience. We are 

talking operating or maintaining nuclear-capable ships. That is not 

necessarily a good place to be. What happens with something like 

that is take [USS George H.W.] Bush for example. Bush just came 

out late, 141 days from its availability—141 days which delayed its 

ability to get on deployment to relieve the Eisenhower. 

CNO has maintained and will try to maintain to the best of our 

ability the 7-month deployments and take risk by gapping in certain parts of the globe, in order to get Ike back here to get her 

started on her upkeep. Bush was late for a lot of reasons. One was 

the junior nature of the workforce. We had upwards of 70 percent 

of rework on Bush throughout that 13-month maintenance period. 

So until the workforce gains that experience, we are going to continue to see rework issues. There are training issues involved, but 

we are starting to see some nice turnaround in the public yards 

along those lines. 

But again, until we see that workforce mature, performance in 

the yards continues to improve. And then the timelines that we put 

our ships in maintenance begin to shrink back to what is planned 

and can be executed. We are going to continue to see these problems. 

So when a carrier gets delayed, to your point, when a carrier gets 

delayed like Bush for 141 days, that bumps an SSN. So that workforce cannot go over and work on a Boise, so the Boise is delayed 

and delayed. Now she is 2 years delayed. I used the example earlier of Albany that got delayed for 48 months before it came out. 

An entire crew lost proficiency and experience on that sub. We 

have the same concerns about Boise, we have the same concerns 

about Montpelier which we put in a public yard just to try to offload some of this workload. 

So there are huge impacts to the place we are at on the maintenance front. In the public yards, we are trying to spread it with the 

private as best we can but it is just going to take time and resources, as has been highlighted here. 

Mr. WITTMAN. Very quickly, what can you do to mitigate this 

backlog? Because the backlog is only going to grow. You can’t gain 

back time, you can’t gain back workforce experience to be able to 

accelerate that. I mean, you can hire up in the yards but you are 

still hiring new people so the proficiency there is not going to be 

there. How do you gain that back? 

Admiral MORAN. Yes sir. I can answer that for the record. Quickly, though, it is by sticking to the deployment lengths that we have 

so we don’t wear out the equipment so much that when it gets back 

in the yards, it has got to go for longer periods of time. 
37 

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

page 105.] 

Mr. WITTMAN. Very good. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, I yield 

back. 

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Larsen. 

Mr. LARSEN. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. Admiral Moran, you mentioned in your testimony about, discussed aviation readiness. I note 

that you are a CO [commanding officer] VP [Patrol Squadron] 46 

and then we moved on to P–8s. They are relatively new, the Growlers are Super Hornet derivatives, they are fairly new. So what 

class of aviation in the Navy is really a focus for readiness and 

maintenance? 

Admiral MORAN. The focus right now is clearly with our partners 

in Marine Corps on our legacy Hornet fleet and the beginning bow 

wave of Super Hornets who we are flying harder and more often 

than we would have because of the issues in the legacy fleet. So, 

it is a two-fer. The strike fighter community is definitely the focus 

of our energy right now. 

Mr. LARSEN. General Walters, do you want to comment on that? 

General WALTERS. Sir, it is our focus also, our biggest challenge, 

and I would throw in our 53Ks, our old heavy-lift helicopters, and 

our V–22s by capacity, those are all the three priorities for us, sir. 

Mr. LARSEN. Those were the focuses, great. 

Admiral Moran, back to you on an issue regarding the Growlers 

and the OBOGS [on-board oxygen generation systems] problem. 

Can you, so I understand that physiological event [PE] teams is investigating a variety of solutions for the OBOGS issue. Two things: 

Can you update us on that, where they are? And second, do you 

envision that if there is a supplemental that comes to us that 

money to further research or try to get to a solution faster will be 

part of that? 

Admiral MORAN. Yes, sir. First of all, on the Growler issue, that 

was a maintenance procedural issue. We have fixed that, we do not 

have a problem with the Growlers today. The physiological events 

you are referring to are both—and they are different. One for the 

legacy Hornet fleet and one the Super Hornet fleet, and I am happy 

to pass you where we are with that. 

We have not found the smoking gun to that. It is very complicated and we have taken a Hornet and torn it down to parade 

rest. In other words, we have taken it all the way down to as if 

we were going to build it from scratch to try to piece it together 

to see where these events are coming from so that we can more accurately put an engineering solution to it. 

In the meantime, we have put a lot of mitigators out there in 

terms of how we have provided our pilots watches and what we call 

slam sticks so we can verify and validate the events actually occurred and then give us a better indication of what we do about 

it. And we have also put decompression chambers, portable decompression chambers, on our deployed carriers so that if we do have 

an event, we don’t take any added risk for our pilots going through 

any kind of physiological event. 

Mr. LARSEN. Yes, I don’t want to get into the details or contradict 

you too much but my understanding is the PE rate on Growlers is 
38 

going down, but we did see an upturn again last year so maybe we 

can send some folks over, we can get that—— 

Admiral MORAN. Yes sir, absolutely. 

Mr. LARSEN [continuing]. Inconsistency settled? That would be 

great since Naval Air Station Whidbey Island, home to the Growlers there. I will just pick one of the services rather than have all 

of you discuss it, maybe the Air Force on building and rebuilding 

the force. 

This is really more on the building the force and the area of 

cybersecurity because we are really not rebuilding forces there, we 

are trying to build up the cadre. So how do you envision that balance between say an Active Duty, Reserve, or National Guard, and 

use of private sector? In the personnel side. 

General WILSON. Sure, we would use all of it. I will use an example, recently we had a guardsman in California who went to cyber 

training for the Air Force. He also happened to be CEO [chief executive officer] of a cyber company. So we need to be able to tailor 

the continuum of training for the people and we see across our both 

Guard and Reserves, they have got some really skilled people in 

the cyber area, that they don’t need to do a cookie-cutter type 

training for somebody newly accessing in. 

Mr. LARSEN. So do you have the flexibility in personnel systems 

in the Air Force to be able to do that? Or do you feel stuck at all? 

General WILSON. We are working through, I wouldn’t say it is 

perfect, but we are working through that to be able to provide that 

flexibility across, and specifically cybersecurity. And as General 

Allyn talked about today, as we look at what is happening in the 

world of software and how fast it is moving, we can’t do acquisition 

speed to be able to do current acquisition speed. 

So we are going to have to change that whole paradigm, as well 

as the people and how we train them. So actually next month, we 

are having a big huddle at the Corona session to talk through just 

this subject on this continuation of training and how we develop 

our corps across all the Active, Guard, and Reserve. 

Mr. LARSEN. And for all the services, I will follow up with all of 

you on that question about flexibility of personnel systems to address that. 

Thanks. 

Thanks, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. That is a good question. 

Dr. DesJarlais. 

Dr. DESJARLAIS. I thank the chairman. 

I thank all of you for being here today and answering our questions. 

This can be for whoever wants to take it, but how have readiness 

shortfalls impacted operations with allies? In other words, related 

to joint exercise, defense cooperation agreements, and what our allies expect from our military on an international stage? 

General ALLYN. Well, I will start, and give these guys a break. 

You have been wearing out the Navy and the Air Force here the 

last few minutes. 

But we have had incredible opportunities to assure our allies, 

strengthen the capability and capacity of our allies, as well as increase the deterrent posture both in Europe and in the Pacific, 
39 

with exercise series that have been invaluable at a time when the 

capacity of each of these nations to be both a stable force in their 

own countries, as well as contribute to regional solutions is part of 

how we deal with the extant threats that are there with a smaller 

military here in the United States. 

And I will just highlight some of the work underway in Eastern 

Europe to strengthen that deterrent posture. We recently deployed 

3rd Brigade, 4th Infantry Division that will start our heel-to-toe rotations of a constant armor brigade combat team presence in Eastern Europe. They began off-loading ships just about 30 days ago. 

Within 14 days, they were on gunnery ranges and beginning to 

work with their Polish counterparts in the Zagan region of Poland. 

And today, elements of that unit are already forward in Estonia 

as a clear signature of our commitment to our NATO [North Atlantic Treaty Organization] alliance and our ability to strengthen the 

capacity of the Baltic nations to deal with the instability that has 

been created with the aggression that Russia has exercised here in 

the last several years. 

So, those are critical commitments. We could not have done it 

without the increased ERI [European Reassurance Initiative] funding that you provided us. And that funding is going to be critical 

in 2018 as well. 

Dr. DESJARLAIS. Okay. 

I guess, I mean, that is good to hear, but are there any rumblings in terms of our allies having concerns? What we are hearing 

today about our lack of readiness, does that give them trepidation 

as far as our ability to step up and honor our agreements? 

General ALLYN. Well, I will first say for the Army, whenever we 

send a unit anywhere to meet a mission, they are trained and 

ready when they arrive. So, no, they are not seeing this. What we 

are trying to describe to you is the readiness impact for the forces 

on the bench that should be ready to go for the unforeseen contingency. 

Dr. DESJARLAIS. Okay. Let’s talk a little bit about what may be 

the most important topic of today, and that is our military men and 

women, and what impact this readiness shortfall has on the personnel emotionally. I think anyone who signs up for any of the 

branches of the military understand the sacrifices they are going 

to make. They know they are going to miss Christmases, birthdays, 

anniversaries, T-ball games, basketball games, things like that. I 

mean, I don’t think they go in there not knowing that. 

But with the high OPSTEMPO of our smaller force, what is the 

impact on our staff sergeants and the morale of our troops? 

General ALLYN. Well, I will start, then I will pass to my Marine 

brother, because it is something that we absolutely keep a pulsecheck on each and every day. The sergeant major of the Army travels across the Army every week to assess exactly the morale of our 

force and our ability to sustain this incredible All-Volunteer Force 

that we have built in the United States. 

And it is very inspiring to see the sustained commitment that 

our soldiers have. And I will just give you one current example. 

You know, as part of this building toward the authorized strength 

that you have given us in this year’s NDAA, we have to build 

about, you know, 28,000 additional soldiers in the total force. 
40 

You know, within the first month of that effort, we had 2,500 soldiers raise their hand and say, hey, I want to continue to serve. 

You know, because the best way we deliver this capability at best 

dollar is to retain those that have already been trained and keep 

them in the force. And they are stepping up and saying, hey, I 

want to stay on this team. 

And we find that to be very encouraging. 

General WALTERS. Sir, I just have a little bit of time. We are 

watching exactly what you are asking about. We see no issue with 

reenlistments after the first term of enlistment. I think we will 

make our goal. But for the first time in this year, our challenge 

from getting that staff sergeant to reenlist right now, we are going 

to have to reenlist 87 percent of our remaining cohort to make our 

goal. And that might be challenging. So we are looking at incentives to that. That might be a leading indicator of the phenomenon 

you were describing, is that we are starting to feel a little stressed. 

Dr. DESJARLAIS. I know I speak for all of us here, our gratitude 

and appreciation for all you do and all our service men and women 

do is immense, and we greatly appreciate it. So thank you. 

The CHAIRMAN. Mrs. Murphy. 

Mrs. MURPHY. Gentlemen, thank you for being here and for your 

testimony today. 

I have two questions that I will ask in succession, and then leave 

you with the remainder of my allotted time to answer it. 

Admiral Moran, in January of 2016, the Navy put out a document called ‘‘A Design for Maintaining Maritime Superiority’’ 

which intends to guide the Navy’s behavior in investments going 

forward. And it is built around four lines of effort: warfighting, 

learning faster, strengthening the Navy team, and building partnerships. 

And within the warfighting line of effort, the document notes the 

importance of developing concepts and capabilities to provide a 

range of options to national leaders. And then testing and refining 

those concepts through focused wargaming, modeling, and simulations. 

Also within the learning faster line of effort, there is a stated desire to expand the use of learning-centered technologies, simulation, and online gaming. 

I represent Florida’s Seventh District, which includes Naval Support Activity Orlando, which is home to a variety of government, 

private sector, and academic organizations, many of which specialize in high-tech R&D, modeling, and simulation, and are known 

collectively as Team Orlando. 

Could you describe what investments the Navy will be making 

in support of modeling and simulation in the fiscal year 2018 budget request, as well as in future budget requests? 

And to the other services, could you describe how modeling and 

simulation fits into your service training and readiness strategy? 

And then how do we ensure that the military services are acquiring state-of-the-art training equipment before that equipment becomes anything less than state of the art? Put another way, is 

there a mismatch between the time it takes to acquire this modeling and simulation technology, and the rapid pace at which the 

technology is evolving? 
41 

And then my second line of questioning involves a recent article 

I read about an Associated Press examination into the effectiveness 

of DOD’s [Department of Defense’s] program run out of CENTCOM 

[Central Command] to counter the online propaganda of ISIL [Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant]. 

The investigation raised questions about whether DOD employees and contractors are sufficiently skilled in Arabic and adequately knowledgeable about Islam to serve as an effective counterweight to online recruiters seeking to radicalize young men and 

women throughout the Arab and Muslim world. 

Given the importance of this effort, what can we do to improve 

this? 

Admiral MORAN. Congresswoman, I will start. I will tackle the 

training piece here. I think I can speak for most everybody at the 

table. All of us are incredibly interested in this technology. Team 

Orlando is Army team, Navy team, Disney team, and the colleges 

and universities of that area. And they are terrific. I have been 

down there probably a half-dozen times in the last 2 years. 

The technology maturation that is finally coming to meet its 

promise is there. And we are purposefully investing in that technology to try to take traditional paths of training out of schoolhouses, brick and mortar, and bring it to what we would call to the 

fleet, to the pier, to the flight line where sailors are working on 

their gear, learning new gear, and being able to turn around training faster on their schedule, when they learn at the right time. 

And that is what the technology really brings is an ability for 

this generation to learn on equipment that they are used to seeing 

as they are growing up. So, we are the ones that have to mature 

our own, our training programs, so that is actively going on. 

You heard earlier General Wilson talk about live, virtual, constructive. That is also a key component because all of our weapons 

systems, the ranges in which we operate this gear now is extended 

well beyond the reach of some of our ranges out there. So this technology can bring that in closer. 

So to give others time to talk, I would leave it with you there. 

Everybody, especially on our side, we are actively investing because 

it is going to save us money in the long haul. Thank you. 

General ALLYN. And I will just pile on, given that he highlighted 

the teamwork we have there in Orlando. Modeling and simulation, 

live, virtual, constructive, is basically the practice time that we 

spend hitting the sled before we ever take the field, right, for collective training. It is absolutely critical, particularly for our leaders 

so that they get repetitions before you put the blood, sweat, and 

tears of our soldiers at risk in a venue that they may not be fully 

rehearsed in. So it is absolutely critical. 

And I will cite one example. We are pursuing an upgrade to the 

Stryker vehicle, specifically to deal with a capability gap in Eastern 

Europe. And in stride with fielding that new hardware, the new 

weapons platform, we are also pursuing a simulation trainer to enable us to get the repetitions on that combat vehicle before we ever 

roll it to the field. 

So it is done in stride. You talked about our ability to keep up 

with the rapid pace of modernization in modeling and simulation. 
42 

Ours is less a problem with the capacity to do it than it is the funding. 

Like everything else, we have had to stretch out those program 

portfolios beyond what any of us are comfortable with, within the 

funding constraints that we have. 

The CHAIRMAN. Time of the gentlelady is expired. 

Dr. Abraham. 

Dr. ABRAHAM. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you gentlemen for being here and for the men and 

women behind you and all those that wear the uniform, thanks for 

letting us sleep soundly at night and raising our children and 

grandchildren in a safe environment. 

Mr. Chairman, this committee knows the value of the B–52 

bomber fleet. We in Louisiana are fortunate to have Barksdale, 

Fort Polk, the joint air base at Belle Chasse. The communities are 

very supportive. 

But this B–52 is 60 years old, expected to fly until 2050. And it 

has both nuclear and conventional missions that it is expected to 

fly. 

The Air Force, General Wilson, is considering a proposal to replace the engines on the B–52s and it is my understanding that if 

we re-engine these B–52s that it will increase their range by 30 

percent, will increase their loitering time by 150 percent. 

And Mr. Chairman, I do have some slides that I would ask to be 

presented in the record. But just for future. 

[The information referred to was not available at the time of 

printing.] 

The CHAIRMAN. Without objection. 

Dr. ABRAHAM. And these major re-engine re-toolings have what 

I have seen, wonderful cost benefits and increases longevity, lowers 

maintenance cost. What is your take on this, General Wilson? 

And in particular, would you describe the proposal to pay for 

these engines with the third party and what is your take on that? 

General WILSON. Thanks for the question, I am intimately familiar with this proposal. I think it makes great sense in a couple of 

different areas. Operationally, as you pointed out, it makes great 

sense in terms of it increases both the range and the loiter capability of the B–52. 

From a business case, it seems to make sense. We say today’s 

technology of engines will give you about a 30 percent efficiency 

than we had on the current TF33 engine. So it is more efficient in 

terms of it costs less, in terms to fly it. 

It costs less in terms of people because its current technology will 

put an engine on a wing and they won’t take it off for 10,000 hours. 

There is a lot of manpower savings and time savings in keeping 

those engines updated and upgraded and running on the wing. 

So to me, it makes great sense. The question is, how do we pay 

for it. If we had it in our budget, we would buy it. But we don’t 

have it so we looked at you know, there are creative ways we can 

do this through third-party financing and teams exploring just that 

and to see if it makes a business case through a third party to do 

it. 

But ultimately, I would say if we had the money, we would do 

it. 
43 

Dr. ABRAHAM. Does the Air Force support the third party—— 

General WILSON. I haven’t seen the specifics in the third party 

back on how we will do that. We have a team in the Pentagon who 

are working that right now, with the third-party finance folks to 

see how we would bring that forward. 

Dr. ABRAHAM. Okay, thank you and one other question for you, 

General Wilson. Let me switch lanes. I want to get your thoughts 

on the service life extension of the F–15. 

Where is that going, how is it being put out there? Is it going 

to work? 

General WILSON. We don’t know. We are going to do some modernization to our fourth generation fighters, we have to, whether 

it be new radars or new equipment on it. Our F–15s are going to 

reach a point in the future where structurally, it is going to cost 

too much to maintain them and we are looking for options to see 

how do we maintain or what are some other options to ensure we 

have the capacity of a fourth generation fighter fleet going forward. 

Dr. ABRAHAM. Yes, I am just afraid if we don’t do something, we 

have got this critical gap that we have all alluded to this morning. 

And as we all know, the Active, Guard, Reserve, everybody depends 

on this F–15 aircraft as a strike fighter. I thank you. 

Mr. Chairman, I yield back. 

The CHAIRMAN. Ms. Speier. 

Ms. SPEIER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you, for your extraordinary service to our country and to 

each and every one of you. General Petraeus was here last week 

and 6 months ago, in The Wall Street Journal, he penned an oped in which he said, there is no crisis in military readiness. 

In fact, he said, the current national defense budget of over $600 

billion a year far exceeds the Cold War average of about $525 billion adjusted for inflation. Assuming no return to sequestration has 

occurred in 2013, the Pentagon budgets to buy equipment now exceeds $100 billion a year, a healthy and sustainable level. The socalled procurement holiday of the 1990s and early 2000s is over. 

So on the one hand, you are making statements about readiness. 

I realize that General Petraeus is no longer in service. But he suggests that we have enough money. 

What would be your comment to that, General Allyn? 

General ALLYN. Thank you, Congresswoman Speier, for the opportunity to answer a great question. And I can only say the facts 

as they affect the United States Army. Our modernization budget, 

which is how we build future readiness against the forces we will 

face in the future, is 50 percent of what it was in 2009. 

In fiscal year 2017, it is $24.8 billion. It was $45.5 billion in 

2009. So what that means is, we have significantly attrited the 

building of future readiness against the likely threats that we will 

face. 

And in terms of near-term readiness, there is a significant challenge in meeting not only the current operational tempo with training ready forces, but having sufficient forces ready to deploy in the 

event of an unforeseen contingency. That is what we owe the country. 

Ms. SPEIER. So you dispute what General Petraeus says? 
44 

General ALLYN. They don’t match the facts, as I see them, affecting the United States Army’s readiness. 

Ms. SPEIER. All right. I think maybe more than one of you referenced the base inventory surplus of some 25 percent which is a 

mind-boggling number. For each of you, would you tell us what 

that means in costs we are putting out for surplus spaces? 

General WILSON. I will start with part of it. So today, we maintain our facilities at a rate of 1.5 percent of recapitalization. So 

said in another way, it takes 129 years to recapitalize our bases. 

We have a $25 billion backlog of modernization projects across 

our bases. We could smartly reduce the infrastructure, target 

where it would be needed going forward, and be able to invest that 

money into future facilities. 

Today, in terms of MILCON construction at our bases, we only 

fund a new mission or those that directly support the COCOM, 

combatant commanders’, needs. We have lots of places, whether it 

be dorms or childcare education centers, gymnasiums that are not 

where they need to be in terms of facilities. But yet, we maintain 

those facilities across too many bases. And we think we can reduce 

some of that. The largest BRAC in the past has reduced infrastructure about 5 percent. 

We think it is worth looking at, be able to target the investment 

to put elsewhere in these challenging budget conditions. 

Ms. SPEIER. So I would like to work with you on this. I mean, 

this is a hot potato for this committee. No one wants to see bases 

close. But we have a certain pot of money and we have got to use 

it smartly. 

And we are spending more money than China and Russia combined on our military. And I would suggest that there has got to 

be a smarter way that we spend it. So I would look forward to 

working with you on that. 

A question about women in combat positions. A 3-year study has 

opened up about 213,000 positions to women in combat if they 

meet the standards. It appears and we are hearing rumblings that 

the administration now, through Secretary Mattis and Chairman 

Dunford, are talking about reviewing, revising, or repealing this 

policy. 

I would like your comments on that. Do you know about any efforts to do that and doesn’t that kind of fly in the face of having 

the ready workforce we need, if you are excluding women who are 

capable to engage in combat? 

General ALLYN. There has been no conversation in the Pentagon 

about reviewing, revising the commitment that has been made to 

gender integration. And we are all achieving higher levels of readiness, now that we are opening it up to 100 percent of the population of America to be able to contribute. 

Ms. SPEIER. If the rest of you could just respond for the record, 

thank you. 

[The information referred to was not available at the time of 

printing.] 

The CHAIRMAN. If the gentlelady from Arizona will permit me, I 

wanted to give the other witnesses a chance to answer Ms. Speier’s 

first question. And that is, are we spending enough money? 
45 

General Allyn compared what we are doing now with what we 

were doing in 2009. But how would the other three of you respond 

to her question. 

Admiral. 

Admiral MORAN. Well, I completely agree with how General 

Allyn described his answer, which was the facts speak largely towards a Navy that is too small, and that size has caused us to be 

less ready because we are driving the small force harder than we 

ever have. 

And if that continues, we are eventually going to spiral down 

where we don’t have enough ships to operate in the parts of the 

world where the Nation expects us to be. So we are on a clear path 

to not having enough capacity to answer the call, anywhere in the 

world. 

General WILSON. Chairman, I would say the same thing for the 

Air Force. We are too small for what the Nation requires of our Air 

Force. We are fully ready and have shown repeatedly that we can 

fight today’s fight against a violent extremist organization. 

Against a high-end adversary, we lack the capacity and the numbers that are full-spectrum ready to be able to perform without significant risk against a high-end adversary. So I would disagree 

with General Petraeus and say that we are ready today. 

General WALTERS. And Congresswoman, General Petraeus is one 

of our best military minds. What I don’t know what was in the editorial, I haven’t read it, but you threw two numbers out, 525 with 

constant year dollars, $600 billion this year in a defense budget. 

I don’t know what year the Cold War was, but there were a few 

things that happened during the Cold War; one was that we went 

to an All-Volunteer Force. You know, so it is true that we spend 

more money on our enlisted and officers now, than we did in the 

Cold War. 

So I would have to dig through that. So I can’t make a comparison. If that is the gross level of comparison, a hundred billion in 

modernization, you know, we used to modernize at about $4 billion 

a year a decade ago. 

We just crested the $1.5 billion mark per year. That is all we 

spend out of a $24 billion budget. It is about 7 percent. It ought 

to be about 50 percent, I don’t know any large organization that 

does not recapitalize its capital infrastructure at less than a 15 percent annum rate. 

So there is an apples and apples here, somewhere. But I think 

the discussion is an apples and oranges right now, ma’am. 

The CHAIRMAN. Well, and fair point, we don’t know the context. 

But I just thought everybody ought to have a chance to answer the 

general question. I appreciate the gentlelady’s patience. 

Ms. McSally. 

Ms. MCSALLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

General Wilson, your testimony in the discussion today about 

pilot shortage and readiness, has been very important. I remember 

as a young officer, us making fun of our Soviet counterparts who 

didn’t have the money to get the training hours so that they were 

practicing their maneuvers on sticks. 

Now, it seems like we are in this situation where our guys and 

gals are not flying what they need in order to stay ready. So we 
46 

have heard a lot about that today, but can you compare with what 

we know about how that compares to Russia and China and what 

their pilots are getting? 

General WILSON. I can’t specifically speak on what Russia and 

China are doing. I would say that today, in our combat air forces, 

we are flying less hours and sorties than we were at the bottom 

of the hollow force in the late 1970s. And we need to turn that 

around. 

Ms. MCSALLY. Is it possible to hear back, for the record, what we 

know of the assessment or from appropriate agencies on the comparison? Because that is obviously of deep concern to us. 

General WILSON. We will do that. 

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

page 105.] 

Ms. MCSALLY. Additionally, the fighter pilot shortage we are 

very aware of, I have good friends that are moving out. There is 

push/pull factors, as you know, morale and mission focus and the 

ability to do their job in the military. Plus, the airlines are hiring. 

We have got the numbers on the record. 

Are there creative solutions being discussed, where it is not just 

a win-lose between us and the airlines, but a win-win to include 

leaves of absence or graybeard programs or those that—I know 

many who left for the airlines and they would love to come back 

for maybe 2 or 3 years and be a part of the mission again, but 

then, you know, be able to go back. What sort of creative solutions 

are you discussing? So this isn’t just a one, small pie being in a 

win-lose situation. 

General WILSON. Congresswoman, that is exactly what we are 

looking at. We are looking at any and all those options to make 

this a win-win. As we mentioned earlier, the airlines are hiring 

4,000 a year. We are producing amongst all three of us, about 2,000 

a year. So we have got to find creative ways to do it differently. 

Whether people can take leave of absences and come back, 

whether we can seamlessly transition between Active, Guard, Reserve, civilian airlines and be able to do that, we are looking at any 

and all options. 

Ms. MCSALLY. Great, thanks. And similarly, on the maintenance 

front, we have got 3,500 short maintenance. But while you were 

downsizing, you pushed thousands of maintenance guys out. Some 

of them didn’t want to leave. 

Are we reaching back to them, instead of having to train new 

people out of basic training, bring back those who left at 6 years, 

10 years, 12 years, give them the option to come back in so that 

we are bringing that experience back. 

General WILSON. Yes, ma’am and that is being looked at, also. 

Ms. MCSALLY. Great, thank you. 

General Allyn, Fort Huachuca is in my district. A lot of discussion today about readiness of the conventional force brigade combat 

teams which are important. But we also have asymmetrical capabilities, like electronic warfare [EW], intel, others. 

Can you talk about our readiness, specifically of EW, say, and 

some of these other asymmetrical areas that don’t get the same 

amount of attention? 
47 

General ALLYN. Well, thank you, ma’am, and they are getting 

significant amount of attention from us. We recognize the capability gap that we have, particularly in electronic warfare, in cyber, 

and across the electromagnetic spectrum. 

And we have a number of projects underway, both to address the 

high-technology gaps that exist for the long-term and fielding capabilities that enable us to operate more effectively, both offensively 

and defensively. As well as operations at the brigade level and 

below, which is the most pressing current gap we have, tactically. 

As you know, the Russians employ this capability in an integrated manner inside very tactical-sized units. We have historically 

kept that at echelons above division. And so we are looking at how 

to better integrate this capability to enable us to dominate, if necessary, against near-peer competitors, where we know that we will 

face a very congested cyberspace environment. 

Ms. MCSALLY. Great, thanks. 

General Wilson, back to you. In some of the discussions I have 

had with those that are still Active Duty, the squadron I commanded had 24 aircraft assigned, most of them are down to 18. But 

we are deploying 12, usually, is the model. 

Those that stay behind are having a hard time, you know, doing 

a two-turn-two, sorry to get so specific, here. But looking at it from 

my experience, it seems like that may be exacerbating some of the 

readiness challenges for the small package that is left behind. 

Are you looking at plussing up to 24 PAA [primary aircraft authorization] in order to have a better balance to address some of 

these readiness issues? 

General WILSON. We are looking at how we get the right force 

presentation construct to go forward, what the size of the squadrons are. Generally, the chief of staff has got three big efforts underway. 

One is reinvigorating the squadron to bring—that is where the 

warfighting happens, that is where the culture happens, that is 

how we build and maintain our Air Force. So across the Air Force, 

that is one of the main efforts. 

The next one is, how do we build joint leaders and teams going 

forward in the future. And the third one is on multidomain command and control. All three efforts are really important. As one of 

those, there will be a force sizing construct of what should a squadron look like in the future? 

Ms. MCSALLY. Great. And you know, if you need any retired Hog 

drivers to come back and fly a little bit on the weekends, I am 

happy to volunteer. 

All right, thank you Mr. Chairman. I yield back. 

The CHAIRMAN. Oh, we might have to put a stop to that. 

Gentleman from Rhode Island. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And I want to thank our witnesses for your testimony today, 

most especially for your service to our Nation and of course, the 

men and women under your command for their service, as well. 

So to all of our witnesses, over the past year or so, a persistent 

theme within the Armed Services Committee has been that of military readiness. And certainly, we have discussed many ways by 
48 

which to increase support and resources to the Department of Defense. 

Yet Congress has not taken any lasting steps to reverse sequestration in order to meet these goals. CNO Richardson stated to this 

committee last March, in fact, that the ability to do maintenance 

on our ships was severely affected by sequestration. 

It incurred a readiness debt. So I know that this topic has been 

covered several times already this morning, so I am going to move 

on to another question. But I would just like to echo my colleagues’ 

comments and note that sequestration really must be repealed. I 

am certainly looking for ways that we can do that. 

So let me move on to another topic, though, important to national security. And this is for all of our witnesses. Ensuring that 

the U.S. military can operate effectively across all domains, including cyberspace, one of my top priorities; this necessitates training 

and equipping our service men and women in cyberspace, which 

can be both costly and time-consuming, understandably. 

But once we have trained these operators in cyberspace, how are 

you ensuring that they continue on this career path within the 

military? And how is each of your services recruiting and retaining 

the superior cyber warriors? 

General ALLYN. Well, I will start and we will roll down the table 

here as quickly as we can, Congressman. Thanks for that question. 

It has absolutely been a focus for all of our services is how do 

you ensure you have the flexible retention policies in place to sustain these great professionals once we have them trained-up. I 

think you know it takes 18 to 24 months to train a fully trained, 

multidomain cyber warrior. And once we get them trained, we have 

to be able to sustain their presence in our force to be effective in 

a future battlefield. 

One insight I will offer to you, a vignette from a visit I had with 

some of our cyber warriors this past year. I asked exactly that 

question: What were we going to need to do to keep you in the 

force? And the response of one of our staff sergeants was, ‘‘Sir, if 

I tried to do this on the outside, I would get arrested.’’ And so, the 

mission that we provide them, the opportunity they have to contribute in this domain to national security is actually very, very attractive for them. But we must continue to watch to ensure that 

we both continue to access and retain them as we move forward. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. Thank you, General. 

Admiral MORAN. Yes, I would just add, Congressman, that the 

beauty of our services is that young men and women join because 

they want to serve. As long as we provide them that opportunity, 

whether it is at the high end of things that they wouldn’t be allowed to do outside the service, and continue to provide them with 

the right compensation, we are going to be able to keep those that 

we need to keep. 

But we are also looking at other ways to keep them interested 

by ensuring that they are having the most modern training, the 

most modern education and capability training that they can get. 

Some of that involves allowing them to take time to go work in industries where these new technologies are being advanced and 

bring them back into the Navy and other services. 
49 

And other ways are to be able to laterally bring people from industry and the commercial sector, who also want to serve, an opportunity to laterally move into the services and be able to go in 

and out. So some of the authorities we have asked for in legislation 

have been towards this end, the ability to move people freely between what the civilian market does and what we do for service. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. And on that point, Admiral, I will just mention 

that I authored the provision along with support of the chairman, 

that brought down a lot of those barriers that allowed us to bring 

in private sector talent for a period of time. And same thing allow 

our men and women in uniform to also for a period of time be in 

the private sector to learn best practices and up-to-date skills 

there. 

So, I agree with you on that. 

Admiral MORAN. Thank you for that, sir. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. Thank you. 

General WILSON. If I can make it real quick is to say, you know, 

we are blessed that we get the best and brightest young people 

America has to offer to join our services. So we start with good people. We get them the right education, training, and experience. We 

make sure they are competent and proud of what they do, and personally, professionally fulfilled. 

And we have got efforts in all those little boxes to make sure we 

are doing that smartly, rightly. And how do we partner with our 

civilian partners to make sure that they are personally and professionally fulfilled to retain them over time is important. 

General WALTERS. I am with them, sir. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. Thank you, General. 

I just hope that, in closing, that we are also maintaining the, you 

know, the career path for them to be able to advance in their careers to the next rank, while at the same time keeping them in this 

highly in-demand field, because cyber is not going away anytime 

soon. 

So thank you all, and I yield back. 

The CHAIRMAN. And just piggybacking on Mr. Langevin’s point 

and Ms. McSally’s point, about bringing in maintainers laterally or 

something. I mean, I trust you-all are all looking at these authorities for bringing in folks, and also for their promotion, their career 

track, what happens then. 

And certainly it is something that we are interested in assisting 

you with if some change in statute or some sort of authority, and 

I am going to trust you all as you look at it to let us know what 

you find, whether it is cyber or these other areas. 

I just want to touch on couple things right quick. Admiral Moran 

already answered the question what happens without a supplemental this year. He said they have got to decommission air wings, 

et cetera. Have the others of you looked at what you would have 

to do if there is no supplemental and funding is flat for the remainder of the fiscal year? 

General WILSON. I will start. Chairman, yes we have looked at 

this. A yearlong CR puts us into sequestration-type actions. To 

make up a $1.5 billion shortfall, right now the only place we can 

go is our readiness accounts, so we would have to go after flying 

hours, WSS [weapon system support], FRSM [facilities, sustain-
50 

ment, restoration and modernization]. It would have a dramatic 

impact on us, so that is why it is really important that we get an 

appropriations bill. 

General WALTERS. Sir, for us, the shining example is we would 

stop flying in about July. 

The CHAIRMAN. Completely? 

General WALTERS. Yes, sir. Caveated by the guys that are forward will still fly; all the flying back in the continental United 

States, all the training would cease without the supplemental, and 

that includes the parts money and the flying hour money. That is 

what would happen to us. 

General ALLYN. And Chairman, for the United States Army, the 

increased authorization to an Active force of 476,000, a total force 

of 1.018 million, without the funding for that increase, we would 

set the conditions for a hollow force, which is absolutely unacceptable. And it will be felt by those forces preparing to deploy because, 

as with the Marine Corps, we will continue to deliver trained and 

ready forces for the known demands that we have, but our bench 

will be repleted and our equipment, training, and personnel readiness will all begin to suffer. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Admiral, we made brief reference, but we really haven’t talked 

about carrier gap today. We have talked a lot about readiness, but 

it is, there is also the issue of whether we can be where we need 

to be when we need to be there, and I don’t know how much detail 

you can get into in this forum, but can you describe briefly the concern about not having a carrier in key theaters at some points? 

Admiral MORAN. Yes, sir, I will use what I believe is a great example. A couple years ago, when you will recall ISIS took a bunch 

of Yazidis hostage on a hilltop in northern Iraq, and national command authority wanted to be able to go push back that force. At 

the time, just based on agreements with partners in the region, the 

aircraft carrier and its component air wing and support ships was 

the only force really that was able to provide that top cover for 

about 54 consecutive days. 

The fact that we were there as part of a normal rotation allowed 

for that contingency. So every time you see a gap in areas where 

we have got troops on the ground, we have got combat ongoing and 

you don’t have that capability at sea in the Gulf, eastern Med, 

South China Sea, and something erupts, we are not going to get 

there in time, to go back to the original discussion. So the idea of 

our global presence is to be there when things do erupt and try to 

prevent things from happening in the first place. 

The CHAIRMAN. But it is true, is it not, that in recent years we 

have had what we call a carrier gap, where we have not had a carrier, for example in the Persian Gulf, or in other key places around 

the world? 

Admiral MORAN. Yes, sir, that is true, as recent as just the last 

few months, when Ike returned home and Bush was late, as we 

talked about earlier. Bush was late getting out of the yards. We 

chose to bring Ike back at our 7-month point so we can get her back 

in the maintenance lineup. That was all done jointly with the Joint 

Staff, but clearly for that period of time there was no carrier in the 

Gulf. 
51 

The CHAIRMAN. Well, I want to thank you all. I am struck, and 

I don’t remember which one of you made this comment, but one of 

the service chiefs in a meeting with the committee last year said 

the price for our lack of readiness is higher casualties. One of you 

mentioned that earlier today. 

I made some offhanded reference to the Super Bowl about if you 

don’t get to practice, and then you go play the Super Bowl; the difference in this Super Bowl is there are lives at stake, and I know 

you all are acutely aware of that. I think members of the committee are, but it just adds a sense of importance and urgency to 

our joint work to get these problems fixed that we have identified 

today. You all have been helpful. 

Thank you for being here, the hearing stands adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:45 p.m., the committee was adjourned.] 

A P P E N D I X 

FEBRUARY 7, 2017 

PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD 

FEBRUARY 7, 2017 

(57) 

Ranking Member Smith Statement for the Record 

Hearing on the State of the Military 

February 7, 2017 

I thank the Chairman for holding this important hearing. I am also 

grateful to our witnesses for appearing before the committee. Their 

institutional knowledge and up-to-date perspectives on military preparedness 

will be immensely helpful to our consideration of the National Defense 

Authorization Act tor Fiscal Year 2018. As we assess the state of the 

military, I wish to highlight a couple of issues. 

One salient issue is the budget. Sequestration wreaked havoc on the 

Federal budget in fiscal year 2013, and it threatens to do so again pursuant to 

the Budget Control Act of 20 II (the BCA). Unless the law is changed, the 

full measure of sequestration would be applied in fiscal year 2018 through 

fiscal year 2021 to a wide variety of discretionary spending programs, 

preventing meaningful investments in national security. 

We also need to remember that, in addition to the devastating harms 

inflicted by sequestration and the BCA caps, years of budgetary standoffs 

leading to several threatened government shutdowns, one actual government 

shutdown, and congressional overreliance on continuing resolutions have 

combined to produce debilitating fiscal uncertainty, which has undermined 

the ability of every Federal Department and Agency to plan confidently and 

to fund critical activities. Uncertainty specifically undermines the military's 

ability to fulfill the national defense strategy, and uncertainties regarding end 

strength totals, the number of serviceable Navy ships and aircraft, the 

numbers of Air Force bomber and tactical fighter aircraft, other major weapon 

system procurement programs, and combat unit readiness are just a few 

defense-related examples of the numerous unsettling effects that the 

congressional failure to enact a comprehensive, deficit-reduction plan has 

imparted on governmental operations. Moreover, short-term remedies, like 

the Bipartisan Budget Act of20 15, have only suspended the prospect of 

sequestration, perpetuated these uncertainties, and frustrated plans and 

priorities. 

For these reasons, I have long held that the Congress must eliminate 

sequestration in its entirety. Shielding defense alone would be insufficient. 

Other vital national investments in homeland security, law enforcement, 

emergency preparedness and response capacities, veterans services, and 

foreign assistance programs need attention, and we need to reinvest heavily 

in sound infrastructure, research and innovation, education, health care, public 

safety, housing, the workforce, small businesses and many other facets of 

enduring national strength. National security involves much more than 

defense. The Congress must, therefore, establish a manageable, long-term, 

discretionary spending plan that advances national interests on a broad front. 

I also wish to reiterate that deficit-reduction goals cannot be achieved through 
58 

cuts alone. Increased revenues and changes in mandatory spending are 

integral to the solution. 

My second point of emphasis involves striking the right balance with 

respect to providing resources and with respect to maintaining an effective 

joint force. The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2017 

authorized $611.2 billion for national defense. Assuming that appropriations 

supporting that top-line amount eventually follow; it is a considerable sum, 

which comprises more than one-half of the discretionary budget for this fiscal 

year. Given the complex diversity of the current security environment, one 

can make a strong argument for increasing funding for defense, but we clearly 

need to find new ways to realize savings within the defense budget to 

maximize effectiveness. l agree with former Secretary Gates' assertion that 

"not every defense dollar is sacred and well-spent, and that more of nearly 

everything is simply not sustainable." Merely throwing money at the defense 

budget is not a viable option. Rather, the legislative and the executive 

branches of government must work in concert to identifY efficiencies that can 

be justifiably reinvested to good effect. 

We must also guard against making force structure adjustments that 

could potentially compromise military effectiveness. The modern joint force 

is a sophisticated and carefully orchestrated body of specialized roles and 

capabilities. Too much attention to any one element or detail risks the 

cohesion and readiness of the whole. As we consider the state of the military 

and the preferences of the individual services for improving it, I ask that we 

do so with a mind to optimizing the effectiveness of the joint force construct. 

We must invest wisely when it comes to national security. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I look forward to reviewing our witnesses' 

testimony. 
59 

RECORD VERSION 

STATEMENT BY 

GENERAL DANIEL ALLYN 

VICE CHIEF OF STAFF UNITED STATES ARMY 

BEFORE THE 

HOUSE ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE 

FIRST SESSION, 115rH CONGRESS 

STATE OF THE MILITARY 

FEBRUARY 7TH, 2017 

NOT FOR PUBLICATION UNTIL RELEASED BY THE 

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 
60 

INTRODUCTION: 

Chairman Thornberry, Ranking Member Smith, distinguished Members of the 

Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify on the state of your United States 

Army. On behalf of our Acting Secretary, the Honorable Robert Speer, and our Chief of 

Staff, General Mark Milley, thank you for your support and demonstrated commitment to 

our Soldiers, Army Civilians, Families, and Veterans. 

To meet the demands of today's unstable global security environment and 

maintain the trust placed in us by the American people, our Army requires sustained, long 

term, and predictable funding. Absent additional legislation, the caps set by the Budget 

Control Act of 2011 will return in FY18, forcing the Army to once again draw down end 

strength, reduce funding for readiness, and increase the risk of sending under-trained 

and poorly equipped Soldiers into harm's way - a preventable risk our Nation must not 

accept. We all thank you for recognizing that plans to reduce the Army to 980,000 

Soldiers would threaten our national security, and we appreciate all your work to stem the 

drawdown. Nevertheless, the most important actions you can take- steps that will have 

both positive and lasting impact- will be to immediately repeal the 2011 Budget Control 

Act and ensure sufficient funding to train, man and equip the FY17 NOAA authorized 

force. Unless this is done, additional top-line and OCO funding, though nice in the shortterm, will prove unsustainable, rendering all your hard work for naught. 

This is a challenging time for our Nation and certainly for our Army. The unipolar 

moment is over, and replacing it is a multi-polar world characterized by competition and 

uncertainty. Today, the Army is globally engaged with more than 182,000 Soldiers 

supporting Combatant Commanders in over 140 worldwide locations. To break this down 

a bit: Over 5,000 Soldiers are in the Middle East supporting the fight against ISIL, a 

barbaric enemy intent on destabilizing the region and the globe. Nearly 8,000 more 

remain in Afghanistan, providing critical enabling support to Afghan National Security 

forces fighting a persistent insurgent threat. Over 33,000 are assigned or allocated to 

Europe to assure our Allies and deter a potentially grave threat to freedom. Nearly 80,000 

are assigned to PACOM, including nearly 20,000 Soldiers on the Korean peninsula, 

prepared to respond tonight with our ROK allies. At the same time thousands of Soldiers 

are operating across Africa and Central and South America, along with thousands more 

preparing right here in the United States. At home and around the world, your Army 

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61 

stands ready. 

My recent travel - I have visited our Soldiers in 15 countries since Veterans Day -

reinforces that all this is not about programs ... it is about people ... our people executing 

security missions for all of us around the globe. In fact, the strength of the All Volunteer 

Force truly remains our Soldiers. These young men and women are trained, ready and 

inspired. We must be similarly inspired to provide for them commensurate with their 

extraordinary service and sacrifice. 

Readiness: Manning, Training, Equipping/Sustaining and Leader Development 

Readiness remains our number one priority. Sufficient and consistent funding is 

essential to build and sustain current readiness, progress towards a more modern, 

capable force sized to reduce risk for contingencies, and recruit and retain the best 

talent within our ranks. A ready Army enables the Joint Force to protect our Nation and 

win decisively in combat. Unfortunately, fifteen years of sustained counter-insurgency 

operations have degraded the Army's ability to conduct operations across the spectrum 

of conflict and narrowed the experience base of our leaders. The current global security 

environment demands a shift in focus to support Joint operations against a broader 

range of threats. In this uncertain world, combined arms maneuver, which enables the 

Joint Force to deter, deny, compel, and defeat peer competitors and execute hybrid 

warfare, represents the benchmark by which we measure our future readiness. 

Manning: 

The Total Force remains globally engaged with the Army set to meet nearly half 

- 48% - of Combatant Command base demand and forecast to meet over two-thirds -

70% of emergent demand for forces in FY17. This trend, exacerbated by end strength 

reductions and increasing global requirements, has been consistent for the past three 

years and promises to continue. Looking ahead, any potential future manpower 

increases to reduce military risk related to Defense Planning Guidance and National 

Military Strategy requirements, must be coupled with commensurate funding to ensure 

the long-term strength of the force. 

At today's end-strength, the Army risks consuming readiness as fast as we build 

it. To alleviate some of the burden, we are reallocating and reorganizing existing force 

2 
62 

structure and leveraging the Total Force to meet operational demand. For example, 

recognizing the importance of assuring our Allies and deterring our adversaries, last 

month 3/4 Armor Brigade Combat Team (ABCT) began heel-to-toe rotations in Europe. 

This unit, representing a permanent armored presence, enables our forces to exercise 

deployment systems and processes while simultaneously demonstrating the United 

States' commitment to the region. This ABCT deployment will be followed shortly by a 

rotational heel-to-toe Combat Aviation Brigade to Europe to provide aviation capacity 

and capability in that important part of the world. We will also begin Heavy Aviation 

Reconnaissance Squadron rotations to Korea, reestablishing full Combat Aviation 

Brigade capacity and capability on the peninsula. 

In FY18 we will adjust our brigade combat team force mix by converting an 

Active Army Infantry Brigade Combat Team into an Armor Brigade Combat Team, 

marking the creation of our 151

h ABCT. This increased armor capacity will provide much 

needed flexibility to meet extant threats around the globe. We will also build two 

Security Force Assistance Brigades (SFABs), one in the Active Army and one in the 

Army National Guard in FY18 followed by another Active Component SFAB in FY19 to 

better support our partners and preserve BCT readiness. These SFABs will also serve 

as the backbone of new brigades if the Army is ever called to rapidly expand. 

To address mounting challenges in the cyber domain, the Army is building 41 

Cyber Mission Force teams. Currently, 30 of the Army's 41 teams are at full operating 

capability (FOC), and 11 more will achieve FOC by FY18. In addition, the Reserve 

Component is building 21 Cyber Protection Teams, with 11 teams in the Army National 

Guard and 10 teams in the Army Reserve. 

The Army has increased operational use of the Army National Guard and the 

Army Reserve to support Joint Force requirements around the globe, and this trend will 

continue. Today, three Army National Guard Division Headquarters, along with 

numerous other formations, are supporting geographic combatant commanders here at 

home and around the world. With the support of Congress, the Army can maintain the 

appropriate force mix and Total Force readiness to sustain these vital operations 

worldwide. 

Again, we appreciate the Congress' efforts to stem the continued decrease in 

force structure, and we are underway to regrow the Army in accordance with NOAA 

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63 

prescribed end strength. As we grow, however, we will focus first on filling the holes in 

our existing units as our top priority. 

Training: 

Training is the bedrock of readiness. The Army must continue to conduct realistic 

and rigorous training across multiple echelons to provide trained and ready forces, and 

this realistic training regimen is dependent upon predictable and sustained resources, 

both time and money. 

To maximize our resources, the Army has made significant progress implementing 

the Sustainable Readiness Model (SRM) and restoring core warfighting skills, and we 

remain focused on achieving full spectrum readiness for combined arms maneuver 

proficiency against peer competitors. SRM, the Army's solution to manage risk and fight 

and win when called, is a Total Force effort to define readiness objectives for current 

demand while mitigating risk for contingency requirements. Because readiness objectives 

inform programmatic decisions, a key SRM benefit is prevention of the "readiness cliff' as 

units redeploy from named operations. 

To ensure a trained and ready Army, the Army accepted considerable risk by 

reducing end- strength while deferring modernization programs and infrastructure 

investments. These trade-offs reflect constrained resources, not strategic insight. 

Again, we appreciate your support in helping stem the tide of force structure reductions, 

and our restored strength must be coupled with sufficient and sustained funding to 

avoid creating a hollow force. 

Today, only about 1/3 of our BCTs, 1/4 of our Combat Aviation Brigades and half 

of our Division Headquarters are ready. Of the BCTs that are ready, only three could be 

called upon to fight tonight in the event of a crisis. In total, only about 2/3 of the Army's 

initial critical formations- the formations we would need at the outset of a major conflict 

- are at acceptable levels of readiness to conduct sustained ground combat in a full 

spectrum environment against a highly lethal hybrid threat or near-peer adversary. 

Stated more strategically, based on current readiness levels, the Army can only 

accomplish Defense Planning Guidance Requirements at high military risk. To address 

this vital readiness issue, the Army continues to fully fund Combat Training Center 

(CTC) rotations, establish objective training standards, reduce non-essential training 

4 
64 

requirements, and protect home station training to increase training rigor and readiness 

in our formations. 

A ready Army requires highly trained units across all components. To build 

sufficient operational and strategic depth, the Army continues to explore ways to build 

increased readiness in our Reserve Component units. This includes increasing the 

number of annual training days for early deployers to provide sufficient repetition in core 

tasks; building multi-component and round-out units to enhance Total Force integration; 

and expanding Army National Guard BCT's CTC rotations from two to four in FY18. 

These initiatives, providing readiness for current operations and ensuring strategic 

depth required for future campaigns, will require sufficient resources. 

Looking to the future, the Army continues to work with our Joint Force partners to 

develop the multi-domain battle concept This emerging concept, though in the early 

stages of development, will enable the Joint force to create temporary windows of 

opportunity across multiple domains- air, land, sea, space and cyberspace- to seize, 

retain and exploit the initiative, defeat enemies and achieve military objectives. The Army 

is developing a Multi-Domain Task Force to evolve and refine the concept, based on 

operational lessons and experimentation that will ultimately inform future training. 

Equipping/Sustaining: 

Our Army requires modernized equipment to win decisively, but today we are 

outranged, outgunned and outdated. We have prioritized our near-term readiness to the 

detriment of equipment modernization and infrastructure upgrades, assuming risk and 

mortgaging our future readiness. Looking ahead, the Army will prioritize critical 

equipment modernization and infrastructure upgrades while proceeding with acquisition 

reform initiatives to deliver optimal readiness with apportioned resources. 

An unintended consequence of current fiscal constraints is that the Army can no 

longer afford the most modern equipment, and we risk falling behind near- peers in 

critical capabilities. Decreases to the Army budget over the past several years 

significantly impacted Army modernization. Given these trends, and to preserve 

readiness in the short term, the Army has been forced to selectively modernize 

equipment to counter our adversary's most pressing technological advances and 

capabilities. At the same time, we have not modernized for warfare against peer 

5 
65 

competitors, and today we risk losing overmatch in every domain. 

The Army developed the Army Equipment Modernization Strategy to preserve 

readiness in the short term and manage risk in the mid- to long-term. The strategy 

reflects those areas in which the Army will focus its limited investments for future Army 

readiness. We request the support of Congress to provide flexibility in current 

procurement methods and to fund five capability areas - Long Range Precision Fires, 

Cyber/Eiectronic Warfare, Integrated Air and Missile Defense, Active Protection 

Systems for combat vehicles and aircraft and Stryker Lethality Upgrades- to provide 

the equipment the Army requires to fight and win our Nation's wars. 

Prioritizing readiness, given current fiscal constraints the Army must assume risk 

in installation modernization and infrastructure improvement. Installations are the Army's 

power projection platforms and a key component in generating readiness. To build 

readiness, however, the Army has been forced to cancel or delay military construction, 

sustainment, restoration and modernization across our posts, camps and stations. Right 

now 22%, or 33,000 Army facilities require significant investment to address critical 

infrastructure deficiencies. Additionally, the Army reduced key installation services, 

individual training programs, and modernization to a level that impacts future readiness 

and quality of life. The deliberate decision to prioritize readiness over Army 

modernization and installation improvement, though necessary, is an unfavorable one. 

Leader Development: 

The single most important factor in delivering Army readiness, both now and in 

the future, is the development of decisive leaders of character at every echelon. Our 

deep bench of combat experienced leaders remain our asymmetric advantage. To that 

end, the Army will continue to develop leader competencies for the breadth of missions 

across the Total Force. 

In a complex and uncertain world, the Army will cultivate leaders who thrive in 

uncertainty and chaos. To ensure the Army retains this decisive advantage, we continue 

to prioritize leader development across the force ... from the individual and unit to the 

institution level. In FY16, the Army trained over 500,000 Soldiers and leaders from all 

three components in its Professional Military Education programs, along with nearly 

30,000 more from our Joint Force teammates. Despite budget constraints, we will 

6 
66 

continue to fund these priority programs, targeted to develop Soldiers and leaders who 

demonstrate the necessary competence, commitment and character to win in a complex 

world. 

Decisive leaders strengthen the bond between our Army and the Nation and 

preserve our All-Volunteer Force. As Army leaders, we continue to express our 

enduring commitment to those who serve, recognizing that attracting and retaining high 

quality individuals in all three components is critical to readiness. The Army is 

expanding our Soldier for Life-Transition Assistance Program (SFL-TAP) to drive 

cultural change. Our Soldiers will receive the tools, leveraging resources from their time 

in service, to succeed in the civilian sector. As they return to civilian life, Soldiers will 

continue to serve as ambassadors for the Army and, along with retired Soldiers and 

Veterans, remain the vital link with our Nation's communities. We owe it to our Soldiers 

and their Families to ensure our Veterans strengthen the prosperity of our Nation 

through rewarding and meaningful civilian careers and service to their communities. 

Committed and engaged leadership is the focal point of our Sexual 

Harassment/Assault Response and Prevention (SHARP) efforts. To that end, we 

recently fielded the Emergent Leader lmmersive Training Environment (ELITE) 

Command Team Trainer and the Prevention and Outreach Simulation Trainer to train 

Army SHARP professionals on how to support command teams and units. The Army is 

also helping shape the Department's Installation Prevention Project by sharing best 

practices on case management methodology, Community Health Promotion Councils 

and collaboration efforts. These holistic prevention and response efforts strengthen our 

Army culture, enrich Army readiness and support Department of Defense efforts. 

Army leaders remain committed to building diverse teams. We continue to fully 

integrate women into all combat roles throughout the operational force and remain 

committed to a standards-based process to maintain readiness. The Army's deliberate 

process validated standards, grounded in real-world operational requirements, and will 

provide our integrated professional force the highest level of readiness and potential for 

mission success. 

In this increasingly complex world, decisive leaders are essential to maintaining a 

ready Army, composed of resilient individuals and cohesive teams, capable of 

accomplishing a range of missions amidst uncertainty and persistent danger. 

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67 

Closing: 

Today, our Army stands ready to defend the United States and its interests. This 

requires sustained, predictable funding. To rebuild readiness today and prepare for 

tomorrow's challenges, the Army has prioritized combined arms maneuver readiness 

against a peer competitor as we prepare to respond to our Nation's security challenges. 

The difficult trade-offs in modernization and installation improvements reflect the hard 

realities of today's fiscal constraints. 

In the immediate future, the Army looks forward to providing input to the 

Department of Defense's 30-day Readiness Review, an important document that will 

inform a new National Defense Strategy. More long term and with your assistance, the 

Army will continue to resource the best-trained, best-equipped and best-led fighting 

force in the world. We thank Congress for the steadfast support of our outstanding men 

and women in uniform. The Army is all about people ... our Soldiers, Families, 

Civilians ... and they deserve our best effort. 

8 
68 

General Daniel B. Allyn 

35th Vice Chief of Staff of the Army 

United States Army 

General Daniel B. Allyn assumed duties as the 35th Vice Chief of Staff of the Army, August 15, 2014. 

General Allyn is a native of Berwick, Maine, and a graduate of the United States Military Academy at 

West Point, New York. He previously served as the Commander of the United States Army Forces 

Command, Fort Bragg, NC. 

He also served as the Commanding General, XVIII Airborne Corps and Commanding General, 1st 

Cavalry Division, "America's First Team," including duty as Commanding General, Combined Joint 

Task Force-! and Regional Command East in Afghanistan. General Allyn has also served as the Chief 

of Staff, and later, Deputy Commanding General of XVIII Airborne Corps, including duty as Chief of 

Staff, Multi-National Corps Iraq. His joint assignments include the Joint Improvised Explosive Device 

Defeat Organization and the Joint Operations Directorate, J-3. Prior to his Joint assignments, he served 

as Commander, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanized), culminating with 

service during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Prior to serving in the "Marne Division," General Allyn served 

two tours of duty with the 82nd Airborne Division, two years with the 2nd Infantry Division, and three 

tours of duty with the 75th Ranger Regiment. 

General Allyn's previous duties include command at the platoon through division level and staff 

assignments at the battalion through Joint Staff level. He served an overseas assignment in Korea and 

operational deployments for Operation Urgent Fury in Grenada, two peacekeeping deployments to the 

Sinai Peninsula in Egypt, Operation Just Cause in Panama, Operation Desert Storm in Saudi Arabia, and 

Operations Desert Spring and Enduring Freedom in Kuwait, two tours in support of Operation Iraqi 

Freedom, and most recently was deployed to Afghanistan in support of Operation Enduring Freedom 

XII. 

He is a graduate of the Naval War College at Newport, Rhode Island, where he earned a Master of Arts 

degree in Strategic and National Security Studies. 

General Allyn's awards and decorations include the Distinguished Service Medal, the Silver Star, three 

Defense Superior Service Medals, three Legions of Merit, the Bronze Star Medal, two Defense 

Meritorious Service Medals, six Meritorious Service Medals, the Joint Service Commendation Medal, 

four Army Commendation Medals, three Army Achievement Medals, the Combat Infantryman Badge 

(with Star), the Expert Infantryman Badge, Master Parachutist Badge (with Bronze Star), the Ranger 

Tab, the Pathfinder Badge, the Joint Chiefs of Staff Identification Badge. 
69 

NOT FOR PUBLICATION UNTIL 

RELEASED BY THE HOUSE ARMED 

SERVICES COMMITTEE 

STATEMENT OF 

ADMIRAL WILLIAM F. MORAN 

U.S. NAVY 

VICE CHIEF OF NAVAL OPERATIONS 

BEFORE THE 

HOUSE ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE 

ON 

STATE OF THE MILITARY 

FEBRUARY 7, 2017 

NOT FOR PUBLICATION UNTIL 

RELEASED BY THE HOUSE ARMED 

SERVICES COMMITTEE 
70 

Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Smith, and distinguished members of the SubCommittee, I appreciate the opportunity to testify on the current state of Navy readiness and 

the challenges we face today and in the future. 

Before we discuss Navy's readiness challenges and our plans to address them, it is 

important to understand our present situation. Globally present and modern, our Navy 

provides timely, agile, and effective options to national leaders as they seek to advance 

American security and prosperity. Today, however, the ongoing demand for naval forces 

continues to grow, which will require the Navy to continue to make tough choices. In the 

classic trade space for any service (readiness, modernization and force structure), 

readiness has become the bill payer in an increasingly complex and fast-paced security 

environment. To address these realities, the Navy has identified investments to restore the 

readiness of the fleet today to shore up what we have. At the same time, we cannot restore 

the fleet to full health without also updating our platforms and weapons to better address 

current and future threats, and evaluating the right size of the Navy so that it can sustain the 

tempo of operations that has become the norm. The Navy is actively working on plans for 

the future fleet with Secretary Mattis and his team, and we look forward to discussing those 

plans with you when they are approved. 

To characterize where we are today, I would say it's a tale of two navies. As I travel to 

see our sailors in the United States and overseas, it is clear to me that our deployed units 

are operationally ready to respond to any challenge. They understand their role in our 

nation's security and the security of our allies, and they have the training and resources they 

need to win any fight that might arise. Unfortunately, my visits to units and installations back 

home in the United States paint a different picture. As our Sailors and Navy civilians, who 

are just as committed as their colleagues afloat, prepare to ensure our next ships and 

aircraft squadrons deploy with all that they need, the strain is significant and growing. For a 

variety of reasons, our shipyards and aviation depots are struggling to get our ships and 

airplanes through maintenance periods on time. In turn, these delays directly impact the 

time Sailors have to train and hone their skills prior to deployment. These challenges are 

further exacerbated by low stocks of critical parts and fleet-wide shortfalls in ordnance, and 

an aging shore infrastructure. So while our first team on deployment is ready, our bench -

the depth of our forces at home - is thin. It has become clear to me that the Navy's overall 

readiness has reached its lowest level in many years. 
71 

There are three main drivers of our readiness problems: 1) persistent, high operational 

demand for naval forces; 2) funding reductions; and 3) consistent uncertainty about when 

those reduced budgets will be approved. 

The operational demand for our Navy continues to be high, while the fleet has gotten 

smaller. Between 2001 and 2015, the Navy was able to keep an average of 100 ships at 

sea each day, despite a 14 percent decrease in the size of the battle force. The Navy is 

smaller today than it has been in the last 99 years. Maintaining these deployment levels as 

ships have been retired has taken a significant toll on our Sailors and their families, as well 

as on our equipment. 

The second factor degrading Navy readiness is the result of several years of 

constrained funding levels for our major readiness accounts, largely due to fiscal pressures 

imposed by the Budget Control Act of 2011. Although the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015 

provided temporary relief, in FY 2017 the Navy budget was $5 billion lower than in FY 2016. 

This major reduction drove very hard choices, including the difficult decision to reduce 

readiness accounts by over $2 billion this year. 

The third primary driver of reduced readiness is the inefficiency imposed by the 

uncertainty around when budgets will actually be approved. The inability to adjust funding 

levels as planned, or to commit to longer-term contracts, creates additional work and drives 

up costs. This results in even less capability for any given dollar we invest, and represents 

yet another tax on our readiness. We are paying more money and spending more time to 

maintain a less capable Navy. 

We have testified before about the maintenance and training backlogs that result from 

high operational tempo, and how addressing those backlogs has been further set back by 

budget cuts and fiscal uncertainty. Our attempts to restore stability and predictability to our 

deployment cycles have been challenged both by constrained funding levels and by 

operational demands that remain unabated. 

Although we remain committed to return to a seven month deployment cycle as the 

norm, the need to support the fight against ISIS in 2016 led us to extend the deployments of 

the Harry S Truman and Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Groups to eight and eight and a 

half months, respectively. Similar extensions apply to the Amphibious Ready Groups which 

support Marine Expeditionary Units. This collective pace of operations has increased wear 

and tear on ships, aircraft and crews and, adding to the downward readiness spiral, has 

decreased the time available for maintenance and modernization. Deferred maintenance 

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72 

has led to equipment failures, and to larger-than-projected work packages for our shipyards 

and aviation depots. This has forced us to remove ships and aircraft from service for 

extended periods, which in turn increases the tempo for the rest of the fleet, which causes 

the fleets to utilize their ships and airframes at higher-than-projected rates, which increases 

the maintenance work, which adds to the backlogs, and so on. 

Reversing this vicious cycle and restoring the short-term readiness of the fleet will 

require sufficient and predictable funding. This funding would allow our pilots to fly the hours 

they need to remain proficient, and ensure that we can conduct the required maintenance 

on our ships. It would also enable the Navy to restore stocks of necessary parts, getting 

more ships to sea and better preparing them to stay deployed as required. 

Our readiness challenges go deeper than ship and aircraft maintenance, directly 

affecting our ability to care for the Navy Team. Our people are what make the U.S. Navy the 

best in the world, but our actions do not reflect that reality. To meet the constraints of the 

Balanced Budget Act, the Navy's FY 2017 budget request was forced to reduce funding for 

Permanent Change of Station (PCS) moves. These reductions have been compounded by 

the Continuing Resolution, which imposed even further reductions on that account. Without 

sufficient PCS funding, the Navy will be unable to move Sailors to replace ship and 

squadron crewmembers leaving service, increasing the strain on those who remain. This is 

an area in which timing also matters greatly. Even if the money comes eventually, if it is too 

late, necessary moves will be delayed until the beginning of the new fiscal year. That means 

our Sailors with children will be forced to relocate their children in the middle of a school 

year. And because we don't know if and when additional PCS funding may come, we 

cannot give our Sailors and their families much time to prepare, often leaving them with 

weeks, rather than months, to prepare for and conduct a move, often from one coast, or 

even one country, to another. 

Meanwhile, our shore infrastructure has become severely degraded and is getting 

worse because it has been a repeated bill payer for other readiness accounts in an effort to 

maintain afloat readiness. Consequently, we continue to carry a substantial backlog of 

facilities maintenance and replacement, approaching $8 billion. 

3 
73 

Summary 

Time is running out. Years of sustained deployments and constrained and uncertain 

funding have resulted in a readiness debt that will take years to pay down. If the slow pace 

of readiness recovery continues, unnecessary equipment damage, poorly trained operators 

at sea, and a force improperly trained and equipped to sustain itself will result. Absent 

sufficient funding for readiness, modernization and force structure, the Navy cannot return to 

full health, where it can continue to meet its mission on a sustainable basis. And even if 

additional resources are made available, if they continue to be provided in a way that cannot 

be counted on and planned for, some will be wasted. As we strive to improve efficiency in 

our own internal business practices, those efforts are being actively undermined by the 

absence of regular budgets. Although we face many readiness challenges, your Navy 

remains the finest Navy in the world. We are committed to maintaining that position. That 

commitment will require constant vigilance and a dedication to readiness recovery, in full 

partnership with the Congress. On behalf of our Sailors and civilians, thank you for your 

continued support. 

4 
74 

5/31/2016- Present 

ADMIRAL BILL MORAN 

Adm. Bill Moran is a native ofNew York and graduated with a Bachelor of Science from 

the United States Naval Academy in 1981 and a master's degree from the National War 

College in 2006. 

As a flag officer, he has served as commander, Patrol and Reconnaissance Group; director, 

Air Warfare (N98) on the staff of the Chief ofNaval Operations; and most recently as the 

57th chief of naval personnel. 

His operational tours spanned both coasts, commanding Patrol Squadron (VP) 46 and 

Patrol and Reconnaissance Wing 2. He served as an instructor pilot in two tours with VP30 and as a staff member for Commander, Carrier Group 6 aboard USS Forrestal (CV A 

59). 

Ashore, he served as executive assistant to the chief of naval operations; executive 

assistant to Commander, U.S. Pacific Command; deputy director, Navy staff; and assistant 

Washington placement officer and assistant flag officer detailer in the Bureau ofNaval 

Personnel. 

Moran assumed duties as the Navy's 39th vice chief of naval operations, May 31, 2016. He 

is a senior naval advisor to the secretary of the Navy and the chief of naval operations. 

He is entitled to wear the Distinguished Service Medal, Defense Superior Service Medal, 

Legion of Merit (five awards) and other various personal, unit and service awards. 
75 

DEPARTMENT OF THE AIR FORCE 

PRESENTATION TO THE COMMITTEE 

ON 

ARMED SERVICES 

UNITED STATES CONGRESS 

SUBJECT: STATE OF THE MILITARY 

STATEMENT OF: GENERAL STEPHEN W. WILSON 

VICE CHIEF OF STAFF OF THE AIR FORCE 

NOT FOR PUBLICATION UNTIL RELEASED 

BY THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON READINESS 

AND MANAGEMENT SUPPORT 

UNITED STATES SENATE 

Page I ofl3 

FEBRUARY 7, 2017 
76 

INTRODUCTION 

Since our establishment 70 years ago, the United States Air Force has secured 

peace throughout the full spectrum of hostilities with a decisive warfighting advantage 

in, through, and from air, space, and cyberspace. Without pause, we deliver global 

combat power by deterring and defeating our nation's enemies, while supporting joint 

and coalition forces at the beginning, the middle, and end of every operation. Though 

the intrinsic nature of warfare remains unchanged, the character of war-and the 

approach joint forces must take to address new and changing threats-must 

continually evolve. 

As the nation plans to counter the national security challenges posed by Russia, 

China, Iran, North Korea, and Violent Extremist Organizations, controlling and 

exploiting air, space, and cyberspace remains foundational to joint and coalition 

success. Today's 660,000 active duty, guard, reserve, and civilian Airmen meet these 

challenges by deterring threats to the U.S., assuring our allies, and defeating our 

adversaries 24/7/365. We provide unwavering homeland defense and operate a 

robust, reliable, flexible, and survivable nuclear enterprise, as the bedrock of our 

national security. 

This steadfast watch, however, comes at a price. Conducting continuous, 

worldwide combat operations since 1991 has taken a toll on our Airmen, equipment, 

and infrastructure. Sustained global commitments and funding reductions have 

eroded our Air Force to the point where we have become one of the smallest, oldestequipped, and least ready forces across the full-spectrum of operations, in our service 

history. The uncertainty and reduction in military funding resulting from the Budget 

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Control Act of 2011 (BCA) further degraded our readiness. Such fiscal uncertainty 

critically challenges our ability to sustain warfighting capacity, improve readiness, 

modernize our force, and invest in research and development to maintain our 

advantages over near-peer competitors. 

While the Bipartisan Budget Act (BBA) of 2015 provided some relief to improve 

readiness and continue modernization efforts, your Air Force needs continued 

Congressional support to ensure we strengthen America's military to win today's fight, 

while maintaining the Air Force our nation needs to meet tomorrow's challenges. 

ALWAYS THERE 

Your Air Force has been globally engaged for the last 26 years of combat 

operations. We relentlessly provide Global Vigilance, Global Reach, and Global 

Power for the nation ... we're always in demand ... and we're always there. Though our 

end strength has decreased by 38% since 1991, we have experienced significant 

growth across several mission areas. 

Our Airmen provide 24/7 Global Vigilance in real-time by integrating multidomain platforms and sensors across our global intelligence and command and 

control networks to find, fix, and eventually finish a wide range of hostile targets 

simultaneously across the globe. Without fail, the Air Force flies 60 combat lines of 

persistent attack remotely piloted aircraft (RPA) per day to support combatant 

commander requirements. Through our Intelligence, Surveillance and 

Reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities, we provided warfighters over 6,000 intelligence 

products per day used to identify enemy targets and trigger 70% of Special Operations 

Forces assaults on terrorists. 

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Additionally, the Air Force conducted 4,000 cyber missions against more than 

100,000 targets, disrupting adversaries and enabling over 200 High Value Individual 

kill/capture missions. In securing our networks and digital infrastructure, 2016 saw Air 

Force cyber operators block more than 1.3 billion malicious connections- an average 

of more than 40 per second. Meanwhile, our space operators provide relentless and 

reliable interconnectedness for our forces, global positional awareness, global missile 

warning, and battlefield situational awareness. 

Nearly every three minutes a mobility aircraft departs on a mission, providing 

Global Reach and access, projecting power through a network of airfields in 23 

countries and 77 locations, while providing critical aerial refueling capability. In 2016, 

our aeromedical professionals evacuated over 5,700 patients and provided 

emergency medical care resulting in a 98% survival rate. Your Air Force provides 

unrelenting ability to maneuver, sustain, and recover personnel and assets ... at home, 

abroad, and with our allies and partners. 

With American fighters, bombers, RPAs, and Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles 

(ICBMs ), the Air Force provides conventional and nuclear Global Power that can 

strike an enemy on short notice anywhere in the world. In Iraq and Syria, the Air 

Force has led 65% of the more than 17,000 coalition airstrikes since 2014, to 

delivering decisive firepower in partnership with joint, special operations, and coalition 

ground forces to defeat and degrade ISIS and regain critical territory. All while our 

Airmen continue to provide two legs of the nuclear triad, resource 75% of the Nuclear 

Command, Control, and Communications framework, deter our adversaries, and 

connect the President to strategic options. 

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Stitched together, the fabric of our Air Force weaves multi-domain effects and 

provides U.S. service men and women the strongest blanket of protection and the 

ability to power project American's full range of combat capabilities. Make no 

mistake, your Air Force is always there. 

STATE OF THE AIR FORCE 

However, being "always there" comes at a cost to our Airmen, equipment, and 

infrastructure, and we are now able to keep only half of our force at an acceptable 

level of readiness for full-spectrum combat. Sustained global commitments and recent 

funding cuts eroded Air Force readiness, capacity, and capability for a full-spectrum 

fight against a near-peer adversary. Although America's Air Force remains the finest in 

the world, it is the smallest it has ever been. In 2013, the impacts of sequestration 

abruptly delayed modernization and reduced both readiness and the size of the Total 

Force. We remain America's first and most agile responder to crisis and conflict, 

underwriting many joint operations ... however, the demand for your Air Force 

exceeds the supply. 

The combination of decreased funding and increased military operations 

required the Air Force to make tradeoffs that adversely affected readiness. Since 

1991, the Air Force also reduced its aircraft inventory from 8,600 to 5,500 aircraft, and 

today the average aircraft is 27 years old. In fact, 54% of our aircraft major weapons 

systems now qualify for antique vehicle license plates in the state of Virginia. The Air 

Force of 1991 possessed 134 fighter squadrons across the active duty, Air National 

Guard, and Air Force Reserve. As a result of budget reductions, our force has 

gradually declined to a total of 55 fighter squadrons. At the same time, we are 

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stressed by challenges complicated by Russia's annexing of Crimea, Chinese islandbuilding in the South China Seas, the rapid rise of ISIL, and ongoing operations in 

Iraq and Afghanistan. With your help, we will build the force up to about 321,000 

Airmen in 2017, but even at that size we will still be stretched to meet global mission 

requirements. 

We also face daunting challenges in balancing readiness and modernization in 

our nuclear, space, and cyber mission areas. Each leg of our nuclear triad requires 

modernization and our responsibility to complete the near-term sustainment efforts 

required to sustain our current ICBM and bomber fleets, as well as modernize these two 

legs of the triad and our nuclear command and control systems require significant 

national investment through the out years. 

At the same time, we are posturing our forces to fight and win a war should it 

extend into space, and Air Force space capabilities have never been more critical to our 

national ability to project power globally. The national security space enterprise, which 

evolved in an uncontested environment, is not resilient enough to deliver joint warfighting 

effects in and through today's contested space domain. As the nation's lead service for 

space, Airmen perform multiple space missions ranging from position, navigation, and 

timing and space situational awareness, to missile warning, and satellite 

communications. 

Lastly, our cyberspace capabilities are essential to every Airman, platform, and 

mission. All of our weapons systems are under attack through the cyberspace domain. 

Accordingly, we are posturing ourselves to fight and win in today's contested cyber 

environment with a disciplined, integrated approach to cybersecurity and cyber 

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resiliency. We are working to quickly close the cyber-needs gap by leveraging publicprivate partnerships, especially with small businesses, to deliver the most cutting edge 

cyber capabilities in the digital age with agility and speed. We are harvesting cyber talent 

across our nation to grow our world-class cyber workforce which requires tapping into 

businesses and talent not necessarily recognized as part of the Defense Industry. 

BALANCING RISK 

America's Airmen can fight and win today, and we are making sure that our active 

duty, guard, and reserve Airmen closest to the fight remain our most ready forces. 

However, our combat forces are heavily committed in our nation's current fights in the 

Middle East and Africa, limiting our preparation to deter and defeat skilled, near-peer 

competitors. We have balanced risk across the force to address our most critical 

shortfalls, focusing on sustaining end-strength while investing in readiness, 

infrastructure, nuclear deterrence operations, space, and combat air forces. Despite 

these efforts, current budget levels require the Air Force to continue making difficult 

tradeoffs between force structure, readiness, and modernization. 

Budget instability and decreased funding levels, coupled with 26 years of 

continuous combat operations and manpower reductions, has driven Air Force readiness 

to historically low levels. Currently, less than fifty percent of the Air Force's combat 

forces are sufficiently ready for a highly-contested fight against peer adversariescreating unacceptable risk for our Airmen, our joint partners, and our nation. Our 

readiness levels are currently handicapped in five key readiness elements: a shortage of 

trained and experienced Airmen in critical positions; capped weapon system sustainment 

funding; reliance on too few and obsolete training facilities and systems; insufficient flight 

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hours for full-spectrum training (due to operational demands); and a war-time operational 

tempo supported by a force sized for a peacetime environment. We must restore fullspectrum readiness to continue to provide unrelenting Airpower for the joint force. 

To ensure we remain ready to defeat violent extremism as well as sophisticated, 

advanced threats and near-peer adversaries, we must grow the force. The active duty 

force will grow to 321,000 in FY17, as authorized by the FY17 National Defense 

Authorization Act. This includes growth across all components as well as our officer, 

enlisted, and civilian workforces. 

Furthermore, we are targeting our efforts to address shortfalls in critical career 

fields to help improve readiness. We are stabilizing and bolstering our remotely piloted 

aircraft (RPA) community to meet combatant commander requirements. We are 

increasing pilot training capacity and pilot absorption, strengthening our squadrons 

with a host of initiatives, and adjusting our incentive pay structure to help address our 

growing pilot shortage. 

The most acute shortage is in our fighter pilot community. We expect fighter 

pilot retention to suffer, as it has over the last 4 years. We ended FY16 at 723 fighter 

pilots below requirement and 1 ,555 total pilots short across all mission areas. Pilot 

training and retention are priorities. The increased end-strength provided in the FY17 

NOAA will allow us to maximize the training pipeline and fill out under-manned units, 

which are vital to our recovery. We are grateful for your support to increase the pilot 

bonus, and we will continue to ensure our retention programs are appropriately sized 

and utilized. 

In the aircraft maintenance field, we are short approximately 3,400 aircraft 

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maintainers at the close of 2016. Because of this shortage, we cannot generate the 

training sorties needed for our aircrews. Our maintainers must keep our existing 

aircraft flying at home and in combat, while simultaneously fielding new platforms with 

highly complicated and technological systems. 

We are rapidly developing the B-21 Raider long-range strike bomber and 

modernizing the B-52 and B-2 bombers for strategic delivery of advanced munitions. We 

are bedding down our advanced F-35 multi-role fighter and enhancing our air refueling 

capability by entering initial production of the KC-46 Pegasus tanker. We are also 

modernizing the land-based nuclear leg with the Ground Based Strategic Deterrent 

(GBSD). 

We transformed our space training and we are developing tactics and enhancing 

our space situational awareness and command and control systems. We are building a 

more resilient space architecture and strengthening our partnerships to protect, defend 

and operate critical national security space systems to outpace adversaries and counter 

any intention to deny us the use of space. 

We are pivoting our communications and cyber efforts from a communications 

and information technology-centric force, to a cyberspace operations force of full 

warfighting partners who protect the mission and carry the fight to the enemy through 

integrated cyberspace operations. We are fortifying combat air forces by retaining, and 

beginning to modernize our fighter squadrons, while developing and buying required 

munitions for both high-end and low-end conflicts of the future. 

LOOKING FORWARD 

Despite these efforts, current budget levels and the threat of sequestration will 

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force the Air Force to continue making difficult tradeoffs between force structure, 

readiness, and modernization that will lead to a less ready and less capable Air Force 

than the joint force requires. Meanwhile, the capability gap is closing between us and our 

potential adversaries. Our nation must continue to support its investment in its Air Force 

with specific focus on readiness, manpower, nuclear deterrence operations, space, 

cyberspace, combat air forces, ISR, and infrastructure. 

READINESS AND MANPOWER 

To improve readiness and attain manning levels matching our mission 

requirements, the Air Force will assess what levels of end-strength are needed for our 

active duty, Guard and Reserve. We will develop plans to address shortfalls in key 

areas, including critical career fields such as aircraft maintenance, pilots, NC3, 

intelligence, cyber, and battlefield Airmen. The Air Force will consider end strength 

increases as it works with the Secretary of Defense to develop the FY18 President's 

Budget. 

As we drew down active duty manpower in recent years, we have relied more 

heavily on our civilian Airmen's contributions, and they remain critical to readiness. 

Our civilians make up 26% of our Total Force-of which, 94% are in the field, providing 

vital mission support through weapons system maintenance, sustainment, engineering, 

logistics, security, intelligence, and medical functions. Currently, our civilian workforce is 

96% manned. At the historical attrition rate, the civilian workforce will shrink to 93% 

manning level over the next four months. 

NUCLEAR DETERRENCE OPERATIONS 

We need to maintain our nuclear capabilities and infrastructure that are the 

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bedrock of our national security. While our nuclear forces remain safe, secure, and 

effective, we will eventually require significant investment to ensure robust, reliable, 

flexible, and survivable nuclear readiness and deterrence well into the future. 

Today, the nation must preserve our foundational capabilities (GBSD, LRSO, 

B-21, 861-12, UH-1 N recapitalization, and Nuclear Command, Control, and 

Communications (NC3)) and infrastructure that underpins nuclear deterrence 

capabilities vital to a credible deterrent against any future threat. 

SPACE 

We must recapitalize Air Force space systems for resilience, ensuring we can 

continue to operate in an increasingly contested environment. As we modernize space 

systems, they must be able to fight in a contested, degraded, and operationally limited 

environment. Additionally, we need to integrate our ground systems, modernize our 

space operations centers, and improve training for our space force. 

CYBERSPACE 

The Air Force is committed to fully exploiting the cyber domain to create effects 

against our adversaries while simultaneously denying the adversary's advantage against 

friendly forces. The Air Force will leverage industry best practices, such as cloud 

computing and network service partnerships, both to make our network more secure and 

to reallocate critical cyber manpower towards emerging warfighting missions. Further, we 

must take a comprehensive approach to cybersecurity to protect and defend our weapon 

systems and data-it is imperative we treat cybersecurity as an intrinsic part of Air Force 

readiness. These priorities will support Air Force and joint mission assurance-command 

and control, weapon system cyberspace defense, information dominance, and 

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integrating offensive cyberspace effects into multi-domain operations. 

COMBAT AIR FORCES 

To continue to provide unrelenting air superiority and global precision strike, we 

cannot accept a less than ready force. With current combat readiness falling below 

50% and an ever-growing demand signal, our Air Force requires an increase in 

combat air forces capacity. The more diminished our combat-coded fighter squadrons, 

the more degraded our ability to posture and project global power for America. At our 

current fighter procurement rate, it will take 45 years to recapitalize our full fighter 

force. 

We must also continue to procure the F-35 to counter rapidly advancing threat 

systems. Further, we must have enough munitions to counter current threats, while 

developing new advanced munitions to counter future threats. Finally, our forces must 

have access to realistic test and training ranges and investment in computer-aided 

live, virtual, and constructive (LVC) infrastructure. LVC capability provides 

opportunities to test and train against the world's most capable threats, reduces costs, 

and supports full-spectrum readiness. 

INTELLIGENCE, SURVEILLANCE, AND RECONNAISSANCE (ISR) 

To meet the needs of combatant commanders, the ISR enterprise requires a 

sufficient number of Airmen to achieve a healthy and sustainable force structure. We 

must continue to recapitalize our C21SR platforms, such our E-8C JSTARS aircraft, 

which provides a unique combination of airborne C2, communications, and highfidelity moving-target surveillance capability. These capabilities are essential to finding 

and tracking our adversaries, conducting non-kinetic targeting, and ensuring cyber 

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mission assurance for Air Force weapon systems. 

INFRASTRUCTURE 

We project airpower from a network of globally positioned bases, and we must 

maintain these bases as part of our strategic force posture. However, our 

infrastructure, particularly our installations in the continental U.S., is in excess of our 

operational needs. This is an inefficient arrangement with aging and underused 

facilities consuming funds that should be prioritized for readiness and modernization. 

Investments in aging critical infrastructure such as test and training ranges, 

airfields, facilities, and even basic infrastructure like power and drainage systems, 

have been repeatedly delayed. The problem has been significantly exacerbated by the 

funding caps imposed under the BCA. Every year that we delay these repairs affects 

operations and substantially increases improvement costs. It is time for another round 

of Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) to allow us to reinvest funds in higher 

priority areas across the Air Force. 

CONCLUSION 

Since 1947, the Air Force has relentlessly provided America with credible 

deterrence and decisive combat power in times of peace, crisis, contingency, and 

conflict. However, our relative advantage over potential adversaries is shrinking and 

we must be prepared to win decisively against any adversary. We owe this to our 

nation, our joint teammates, and our allies. The nation requires full-spectrum ready air, 

space, and cyber power, now more than ever. America expects it; combatant 

commanders require it; and with your support, Airmen will deliver it. 

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GENERAL STEPHEN W. "SEVE" WILSON 

Gen. Stephen W. "Seve" Wilson is Vice Chief of Staff of the U.S. Air Force, 

Washington, D.C. As Vice Chief, he presides over the Air Staff and serves as a member 

of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Requirements Oversight Council and Deputy Advisory 

Working Group. He assists the Chief of StafTwith organizing, training, and equipping 

of660,000 active-duty, Guard, Reserve and civilian forces serving in the United States 

and overseas. 

Gen. Wilson received his commission from Texas A&M University in 1981. He's had 

multiple flying tours, and led bomber; intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance; 

mobility; aeromedical evacuation; and airborne command and control operations 

supporting Iraqi Freedom, Enduring Freedom and Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of 

Africa. Gen. Wilson has also held numerous command positions, including the Joint 

Functional Component Commander for Global Strike and Air Force Global Strike 

Command. Gen. Wilson is a command pilot with more than 4,500 flying hours and 680 

combat hours. Prior to his current assignment, the general was Deputy Commander, 

U.S. Strategic Command, Offutt AFB, Nebraska. 

EDUCATION 

1981 Bachelor of Science, Aerospace Engineering. Texas A&M University, College Station 

1985 Squadron Officer SchooL Maxwell AFB, Ala. 

1989 Master of Science degree, Engineering Management, South Dakota School of Mines & 

Technology 

1993 Air Command and Staff College, Maxwell AFB, Ala. 

1997 U.S. Air Force Weapons School, Nellis AFB, Nev. 

2000 Master's degree in strategic studies, Air War College, Maxwell AFB, Ala. 

2005 Leadership for a Democratic Society, Federal Executive Institute, Charlottesville, Va. 

2007 Joint Force Air Component Commander Course, Maxwell AFB, Ala. 

2009 Joint Flag Officer Warfighting Course, Maxwell AFB, Ala. 

2010 Leadership Decision Making Program, John F. Kennedy School of Government, 

Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. 

2013 Pinnacle Course, National Defense University, Fort Lesley J. McNair, Washington, D.C. 

ASSIGNMENTS 

l. June 1981 -May 1982, student, undergraduate pilot training, Laughlin AFB, Texas 

2. May 1982- September 1986, T-38 Instructor Pilot, evaluator pilot and flight commander, 86th 

Flying Training Squadron, Laughlin AFB, Texas 

3. September 1986 -May I 987, B-1 Student, 338th Combat Training Squadron, Dyess AFB, 

Texas 

4. May 1987- July 1991, B-1 Instructor Pilot and Flight Commander, 77th Bomb Squadron, 

Ellsworth AFB, S.D. 

5. July 1991 -July 1992, Chief of Weapons and Tactics, 28th Operations Support Squadron, 

Ellsworth AFB, S.D. 

6. July 1992- July 1993, Student, Air Command and Staff College, Maxwell AFB, Ala. 

7. July 1993 -September 1995, Joint Staff Officer, Doctrine, Concepts and Initiatives Division, 

Plans and Policy (15), Headquarters U.S. European Command, Stuttgart, Germany 

8. September 1995 -June 1997, Chief of Safety, 28th Bomb Wing, later, operations officer, 

37th Bomb Squadron, Ellsworth AFB, S.D. 

9. June 1997 -June 1999, Commander, B-1 Division, and Instructor Pilot, Weapons Instructor 

Course, USAF Weapons School, Ellsworth AFB, S.D. 

10. August 1999- June 2000, Student, Air War College, Maxwell AFB, Ala. 

11. June 2000- June 2002, Deputy Commander, 366th Operations Group, Mountain Home AFB, 

Idaho 
89 

12. July 2002 ·March 2004, Commander, 608th Air Operations Group, Barksdale AFB, La. 

13. March 2004- June 2006, Commander, 14th Flying Training Wing, Columbus AFB, Miss. 

14. June 2006- July 2007, Deputy Director of Air, Space and Information Operations (A2/3), 

Headquarters Air Education and Training Command, Randolph AFB, Texas 

15. July 2007- July 2009, Deputy Commander, Canadian North American Aerospace 

Defense Region, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada 

16. July 2009- July 2010, Commander, 379th Air Expeditionary Wing, Southwest Asia 

17. July 2010- June 2011, Director for Joint Integration, Directorate of Operational Capability 

Requirements, Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations, Plans and Requirements, Headquarters U.S. 

Air Force, the Pentagon, Washington, D.C. 

18. June 2011 -October 2013, Commander, Eighth Air Force (Air Forces Strategic), Barksdale 

AFB, La., and Joint Functional Component Commander for Global Strike, U.S. Strategic 

Command, Offutt AFB, Neb. 

19. October 2013- July 2015, Commander, Air Force Global Strike Command, Barksdale AFB, 

La. 

20. July 2015 July 2016, Deputy Commander, U.S. Strategic Command, Offutt AFB, Neb. 

21. July 2016- present, Vice Chief of Staff of the U.S. Air Force, the Pentagon, Washington, D.C 

SUMMARY OF JOINT ASSIGNMENTS 

I. July 1993 -September 1995, Joint Staff officer, Doctrine, Concepts and Initiatives Division, 

Plans and Policy (J5), Headquarters U.S. European Command, Stuttgart, Germany, as a major 

2. July 2007- July 2009, Deputy Commander, Canadian North American Aerospace Defense 

Region, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, as a colonel and brigadier general 

3. June 2011 -October 2013, Joint Functional Component Commander for Global Strike, U.S. 

Strategic Command, Offutt AFB, Neb., as a brigadier general and major general 

4. July 2015- July 2016, Deputy Commander, U.S. Strategic Command, Offutt, AFB, Neb., as a 

lieutenant general 

FLIGHT INFORMATION 

Rating: Command pilot 

Flight hours: More than 4,600, and 680 combat hours 

Aircraft flown: T-37, T-38, B-1 and B-52 

MAJOR AWARDS AND DECORATIONS 

Distinguished Service Medal with oak leaf cluster 

Defense Superior Service Medal 

Legion of Merit with oak leaf cluster 

Bronze Star Medal with oak leaf cluster 

Defense Meritorious Service Medal 

Meritorious Service Medal with four oak leaf clusters 

Air Medal with oak leaf cluster 

Aerial Achievement Medal 

Air Force Commendation Medal with oak leaf cluster 

EFFECTIVE DATES OF PROMOTION 

Second Lieutenant June 2, 1981 

First Lieutenant June 2, 1983 

Captain June 2, 1985 

Major June l, 1993 

Lieutenant Colonel Jan. 1, 1997 

Colonel June 1, 2002 

Brigadier General Dec. 3, 2007 

Major General Sept. L 2011 

Lieutenant General Oct. 23, 2013 

General July 22,2016 
90 

STATEMENT 

or 

GENERAL GLENN WALTERS 

ASSISTANT COMMANDANT OF THE MARINE CORPS 

BEFORE THE 

HOUSE ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE 

ON 

MARINE CORPS READINESS 

7 FEBRUARY 2017 

RAYBURN HOUSE OFFICE BUILDING 

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91 

General Glenn M. Walters 

Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps 

General Walters was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant on 12 May 1979, after graduating 

from The Citadel with a degree in Electrical Engineering. Upon completion of the Officers Basic 

Course in November of 1979, he was assigned to 3rd Battalion, 2nd Marines at Camp Lejeune as 

a Platoon Commander in Weapons Company. He attended flight training in Pensacola, Florida 

and was designated a Naval Aviator in March of 1981. 

After receiving his wings, General Walters was assigned to Marine Aircraft Group-39 for 

training in the AH-1 T, subsequently transferring to HMA-169 as the Flight Line Officer, Flight 

Scheduler and Adjutant. He completed two WESTP AC cruises in 1983 and 1984 with IIMM265. 

During June of 1986, General Walters was assigned to 1st Reconnaissance Battalion, 1st Marine 

Division at Camp Pendleton for duty as Air Officer and Operations Officer. In July of 1987 he 

was assigned to HMT-303 for refresher training in the AH-IJ and subsequent transition to the 

Afl-1 W. In July 1987 he deployed on MAGTF 1-88 in support of Operation Earnest Will in the 

Arabian Gulf on the USS Okinawa. After returning to the United States he was assigned as the 

Assistant Operations Officer and S-4 in HMLA-169. 

Departing MAG-39 in September of 1989, General Walters attended Multi-Engine Transition 

Training at NAS Corpus Christi, Texas. He then attended the United States Naval Test Pilot 

School in 1990. After graduation from Test Pilot School, General Walters was assigned to the 

Attack/Assault Depmtment of the Rotm-y Wing Aircraft Test Directorate at Naval Air Station, 

Patuxent River. His duties included Flight Test lead for the AH-1 W Night Targeting System, 

Integrated Body and Head Restraint System and AH-1 W Maverick Missile feasibility testing. He 

was elected to the Society of Experimental Test Pilots in October of 1994. 

In April of 1994, after his tour in Flight Test, General Walters was assigned duties in the Fleet 

Introduction Team for the AH-1 W Night Targeting System at MAG-39, Camp Pendleton, CA. 

Upon completion of Fleet Introduction ofthe NTS system, General Walters assumed the duties 

as Operations Officer for HMLA-369, deploying to Okinawa in November of 1995. Returning 

from Okinawa in May of 1996, General Walters assumed the duties as XO ofiiMLA-369. 

General Walters took command ofHMT-303 on 4 June 1997, and relinquished command 21 

months later on 2 March 1999, where he was subsequently assigned the duties ofXO, MAG-39. 

During April of 1999, General Walters was transferred to the Aviation Branch, Headquarters 

Marine Corps, for service as the Head, APP-2 in the Aviation Plans and Programs Division. In 

March of2001 was transferred to the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense, Acquisition, 

Technology & Logistics, Defense System, Land Warfare, where he was an Aviation Staff 

Specialist. 

General Walters assumed command ofVMX-22 on 28 August 2003, becoming the first 

Commanding Officer of the Squadron. In August or2006 General Walters was assigned as head 

of the Aviation Requirements Branch (APW) in the Department of Aviation at HQMC. From 

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92 

January 2007 to April2008, he served as head of the Plans, Policy and Budget Branch (APP). In 

March of 2008 he assumed the duties of Assistant Deputy Commandant for Aviation. After his 

promotion to Brigadier General in August of2008, he was assigned to the Joint Staff as Deputy 

Director J-8, DORA. General Walters came to 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing in July of2010, and 

assumed command of 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing (Forward) in November of2010.lle was 

promoted to the rank of Major General while deployed in August of 20 II, and returned in March 

of2012. General Walters assumed command of 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing in May of2012 and 

relinquished command in May of2013. General Walters was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant 

General on 7 June 20 13 and was assigned as the Deputy Commandant of Programs and 

Resources. On August 2, 2016 General Walters was promoted to his current rank and began 

serving as the Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps. 

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93 

lntmduction 

Chairman Thornberry, Ranking Member Smith, and distinguished members of the House 

Armed Services Committee, I appreciate the opportunity to testify on the current state of Marine 

Corps readiness. The Marine Corps remains dedicated to our essential role as our Nation's 

expeditionary force in readiness, chartered by the 82"d Congress and reaffirmed by the 114'h 

Congress. During 15 years of conflict in Afghanistan and Iraq, we focused investment on 

ensuring Marines were prepared for the fight, and they were. This was our task and our focus. 

Those 15 years of conflict consumed much of the useful life of many of our legacy systems 

while delaying replacement with new equipment. A focus on those operations, the decrease in 

funding levels from Fiscal Year (FY) 2012, fiscal instability and the lack of an inter-war period 

have left your Marine Corps insufficiently manned, trained and equipped across the depth of the 

force to operate in an evolving operational environment. Under the current funding levels and 

those we stand to face in the near future -the current Continuing Resolution and the Budget 

Control Act (BCA)- your Marine Corps will experience increasingly significant challenges to 

the institutional readiness required to deter aggression and, when necessary, fight and win our 

Nation's battles. Rebuilding the Marine Corps will require near term actions that can be 

implemented in FY17 and FY 18 as well as longer term efforts in the Future Years Defense Plan 

(FYDP). I would like to take this opportunity to share with you the accomplishments of your 

Marine Corps, provide our vision for the Marine Corps of tomorrow, and to articulate the 

readiness challenges we face as we strive to reach that vision. With the support of the 115'h 

Congress, we can begin the deliberate journey to overcome these difficulties and rebuild your 

Marine Corps for the 21st century. 

Your Marine Corps Today 

In 2016, your Marine Corps remained in high demand, forward deployed, and at the same 

operational tempo as the past 15 years. With an increasingly challenging and complex global 

security environment, the Joint Force continues to require and actively employs our 

expeditionary capabilities. During the past year, your Marines executed approximately 185 

operations, 140 security cooperation events with our partners and allies and participated in 65 

major exercises. 

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94 

Nearly 23,000 Marines remain stationed or deployed west of the International Date Line to 

maintain regional stability and deterrence in the Indo-Asia-Pacific region. Our Marine 

Expeditionary Units (MEUs) continue their support of Joint Force requirements around the 

globe. Our ME Us have supported counterterrorism (CT) operations in Iraq and North Africa, 

humanitarian assistance and disaster relief (HA/DR) in Japan and Haiti, and remain forward 

deployed to respond to the next crisis. In partnership with the State Department, we employed 

Marine Security Guards at 176 embassies and consulates in 146 countries. Altogether, over 66% 

our operating forces have been deployed or stationed overseas during calendar year 2016. 

Since 2013, Marines have increasingly deployed to land-based locations due to the limited 

inventory of operationally available amphibious ships. Joint Force requirements remain high, 

and the number of available amphibious ships remains below the requirement. Despite the 

limitations in available amphibious shipping, your Marine Corps adapted to meet these 

requirements through land-based Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Forces 

(SPMAGTFs). In 2016, we sourced SPMAGTFs to Central Command, Africa Command and 

Southern Command. Our Black Sea Rotational Force remains forward deployed in Europe. 

Although SPMAGTFs have met a limited requirement tor the Joint Force, they lack the full 

capability, capacity and strategic and operational agility that results when Marine Air-Ground 

Task Forces (MAGTFs) are embarked aboard Navy amphibious ships. 

What Tomorrow's Marine Corps Requires 

Marine Corps institutional readiness is built upon five pillars: Unit Readiness; Capability and 

Capacity to Meet Joint Force Requirements; High Quality People; Installation Capability; and 

Equipment Modernization. First, unit readiness is always our most immediate concern. 

Cohesive unit teams are the instruments that accomplish national security objectives, and we 

must ensure our ability to successfully accomplish any mission when called. Second, when the 

Joint Force requires naval expeditionary capabilities, we must answer with both the capabilities 

and capacity necessary to meet their needs. The third, most important pillar of our readiness 

remains our Marines, the product of a time-tested yet evolving transformation process beginning 

with our Recruiting and Training Commands. The fourth, often understated, pillar of our 

readiness is our infrastructure. Our bases, stations, and installations, not only serve as locations 

where we train our Marines, but also where we sustain their equipment and support their 

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families. We have a backlog of$9 billion in deferred infrastructure sustainment requirements. 

We require up-to-date training systems, ranges and facilities. We need resources to sustain our 

installation capabilities at a higher level than we have been able to reach for the last five years. 

Fifth and finally, we must accelerate equipment modernization, as it is essential in our 

transf01mation to a 21st century, 5th generation Marine Corps. 

We require proper balance across these pillars to achieve a force capable not only of assuring 

allies and deterring threats, but able to rapidly respond to crises and contingencies, while 

remaining good stewards of the Nation's limited resources. Currently, readiness is not where it 

needs to be. Resources that would have otherwise been applied to installation capabilities and 

modernization were re-prioritized to support deployed and next-to-deploy units to safeguard 

near-term operational unit readiness. We are not only out of balance but are also short of the 

resources required to rebalance. 

We require a more stable and predictable fiscal planning horizon to support increased end 

strength, equipment recapitalization and modernization, amphibious ship capability and capacity, 

and the modern infrastructure required to rebuild and sustain balanced readiness across the depth 

of the force. Looming BCA implementation continues to disrupt our planning and directly 

threatens our current and future readiness. 

Unit Readiness 

Despite the existing fiscal constraints, we will continue to ensure deployed units possess 

mission critical resources to the greatest extent possible- trained personnel, operational 

equipment and vital spare parts- required to accomplish their mission. Deployed and next-todeploy units will remain our priority in the current fiscally-constrained environment while we 

increasingly experience risk to non-deployed unit readiness. 

The most acute readiness concerns are found in our aviation units. Approximately 80% of 

our aviation units lack the minimum number of ready basic aircraft (RBA) for training, and we 

are significantly short ready aircraft for wartime requirements. Recapitalization of attack 

helicopters and reset of heavy lift helicopters are two examples of ways we are addressing RBA 

shortfalls. Our tactical fighter and attack squadrons suffer from shortages in aircraft availability 

due to increased wear on aging airframes subjected to continuing modernization delays. The 

impact of reduced funding levels on our depot level maintenance capacity still resonates today. 

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We have temporarily reduced the number of aircraft assigned to our fighter-attack and heavy lift 

squadrons. We simply do not have the available aircraft to meet our squadrons' requirements. 

This means that t1ight hour averages per crew per month are below the minimum standards 

required to achieve and maintain adequate flight time and training and readiness levels. 

Although deployed squadrons remain trained for their assigned mission, next-to-deploy 

squadrons are often achieving the minimum readiness goals just prior to deployment. Reduced 

acquisition rates for the F-35 and the CH-53K require the Marine Corps to continue to operate 

legacy aircraft well beyond their planned lifespan. Every dollar decremented from our 

procurement of future systems increases both the cost and complexity of maintaining our aged 

legacy systems beyond their projected life. Every dollar spent on aviation modernization now 

has a direct positive effect on current and future aviation readiness. 

We currently maintain higher ground equipment readiness than what we experience within 

our aviation community, but that is small consolation given the age of most of this ground 

equipment. With Congress' sustained support of our reset effort, the Marine Corps has reset 

over 90 percent of its legacy ground equipment. Despite this effort, underlying readiness issues 

exist. Non-deployed forces experience supply degradation as they source low density equipment 

requirements in support of deployed, task organized units such as our SPMAGTFs. These 

equipment shmifalls create training gaps for non-deployed units preparing for their next 

deployment. Our most important ground legacy capabilities continue to age as modernization 

efforts are at minimum production rates due to limited available resources. Our Amphibious 

Assault Vehicles (AA V s) are a prime example. Our AA V s are now more than four decades old. 

Our AA V Survivability Upgrade (SU) Program will sustain and marginally enhance the 

capability of the legacy AAV, but will not replace any of these nearly obsolete legacy vehicles. 

The average age of our Light Armored Vehicle (LAY) fleet is 26 years; our oldest vehicle is 34 

years old. There is currently no program identified to replace this capable but outdated platform, 

and yet we continue to incur increased costs with the LA V Obsolescence Program to extend its 

life. Our AA Vs and LAYs are two of the four systems that consume 50 percent of the Marine 

Corps' annual depot maintenance budget. There is significant cost associated with maintaining 

and sustaining any legacy systems without a proportional capability increase associated with that 

investment. As we continue to spend limited fiscal resources to sustain legacy systems as a 

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result of deferred modernization, we risk steadily losing our capability advantage against 

potential adversaries. 

Current readiness shortfalls require additional operations and maintenance resources, and we 

have exhausted our internal options. Additional resources would facilitate exercises and training 

and correct repair parts shotifalls, while specifically addressing aviation specific operations and 

maintenance funding. In sum, the Marine Corps has a plan to regain and sustain unit readiness. 

With your support, we can execute our plan to achieve required organizational readiness. 

Joint Force Requirements and Capacity to Respond 

The 2014 Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) and fiscal constraints directed the Marine 

Corps to decrease its end strent,>ih from 202,000 to 182,000. 2014 QOR assessments and 

assumptions identified limited global security challenges compared to what we face today. We 

must continue to counter violent extremist organizations and deter both an emboldened China 

and a more aggressive Russia. As a result, the need for deployed and forward stationed Marines 

has not diminished while the size of the force has decreased. Our current end strength challenges 

our ability to suppoti Joint Force requirements while simultaneously maintaining the minimum 

adequate time at home stations and bases to reconstitute our units and train for the full range of 

militaty operations prior to next deployment. At our current end strength, the operational tempo 

is creating significant and unsustainable strain on the force. 

Increased support for both equipment readiness and force structure levels remain critical 

requirements to improve our readiness. Time is equally as vital as funding to generate required 

readiness levels. Our sustainable deployment to dwell (D20) ratio is I :3, which means a 

deployment of six months is followed by a period of 18 months at home station. Units require 

adequate home station time to conduct personnel turnover; equipment reset and maintenance; 

and complete a comprehensive individual, collective, and cohesive unit training program. Units 

need this period to ensure they are ready to meet all core and assigned Mission Essential Tasks 

(METs) prior to re-deploying. 

These challenges are compounded by the requirements on today's force. Those requirements 

place a I :2 020 ratio on many of our units and capabilities. The cmTent ratio equates to a home 

station training period one third less than what our best military judgment and experience tells us 

is necessary and sustainable. Some units and personnel that possess critical high demand, low 

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98 

density capabilities and skill sets currently operate below a I :2 D2D ratio. Portions of Marine 

aviation experience operational tempo below a 1 :2 D2D ratio. Our tiltrotor MV-22 Ospreys, 

deployed in conjunction with KC-130J aerial refueling aircraft, provide previously unthinkable 

reach and flexibility to the Joint Force. Deployment requirements have also brought both 

communities to unsustainable D2D ratios. We recently reduced the number of those aircraft 

assigned to our SPMAGTFs in order to move these communities closer to a sustainable path. 

The capabilities provided to the Joint Force will not change; however, capacity will decrease. 

With increasing demand, resource limitations will further reduce Joint Force capacity and/or 

incur risk for home station units required for major combat operations. Some of our formations 

lack the requisite days of supply to sustain a major conflict beyond the initial weeks. The Marine 

Corps continues to support existing operational requirements, but we may not have the required 

capacity the "ready bench" -to respond to larger crises at the readiness levels and timelines 

required. 

High Quality People 

The success of our Marine Corps relies upon the high quality, character, and capabilities of 

our individual Marines and civilians; they are the cornerstone of our readiness. Since the 

establishment of the All-Volunteer Force over 40 years ago through the millennia! generation of 

today, we have successfully recruited and retained the high caliber men and women we need to 

operate effectively in the global security environment. Nearly 70 percent of our Marines are 

serving in their first enlistment, and approximately 35,000 Marines leave the Marine Corps each 

year. They must be replaced with the same high quality men and women. Our recruiting efforts 

continue to succeed in providing highly talented, patriotic men and women to replace those 

Marines who loyally served before. 99.89% of our newest Marines and recruits are high school 

graduates. This speaks to the quality of the Marines that make up our force. Despite our 

continued successes, we must continue to seek ways to maintain the high quality people who will 

comprise tomorrow's Marine Corps. We must closely track our ability to recruit and retain our 

most highly qualified and skilled Marines. In order to retain Marines on our team, we require the 

resources to offer incentives to Marines with experience, critical skills and valuable specialties. 

Marine Corps Force 2025, a year-long, comprehensive, bottom-up review of the force 

identified various end-strengths and the associated capabilities and modernization required to 

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operate in the future security environment. Through this process, we determined that we need to 

increase active component end strength to at least 194,000, to build new capabilities that will 

deter, defeat and deny adversaries and meet future Joint Force requirements. An increase of 

3,000 Marines per year maintains a rate of growth consistent with effective recruiting and 

accession while maintaining our high standards and ensuring a balanced force. We thank you for 

passing the 2017 NOAA that authorizes 185,000 active component Marines. Your authorization, 

combined with the appropriations we still require, puts your Marine Corps on the right path to 

realize necessary growth that will enhance readiness. 

Installation Capability 

Marine Corps installations are the power projection platforms that generate our readiness; 

they build, train and launch combat-ready forces. Our installations provide the capability and 

capacity we need to support the force. This includes our two depot maintenance facilities, which 

provide responsive and scalable depot maintenance support. While prioritizing deployed 

readiness, we defer infrastructure and facility investments and modernization necessary to 

sustain and train our Marine Corps for the 21st century. The continued deferment of Facility 

Sustainment, Restoration and Modernization (FSRM) requires increased infrastructure 

investment now to ensure that future FSRM requirements costs do not increase. We ask for your 

continued suppmi to restore and modernize our facilities. 

In addition to facilities sustainment and recapitalization, we require investment in military 

construction (MILCON). Those investments will support the fielding of new equipment and 

simulation systems that facilitate improved training standards and operational readiness 

enhancements. Improvements in training areas, to include aerial and ground ranges, require your 

support for special use airspace and additional land to replace inadequate facilities. 

Modernization 

Modemization is the foundation of our future readiness to deter and counter growing threats. 

Investing in and accelerating our modemization programs directly correlate to improved overall 

readiness. Previous decrements to our modernization etTorts deferred and delayed our critical 

future programs and forced us to continue investment in aged legacy systems that lack the 

capabilities required for the 21st century. Over time, legacy systems continue to cost more to 

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repair and sustain. Simultaneously, we incur the opportunity costs associated with the delayed 

fielding of replacement systems and the increased capabilities they will provide. When we 

accelerate modernization, we reduce unit costs, achieve efficiencies and save taxpayer money. 

Our Aviation Modernization Plan requires acceleration after suffering recent delays, many 

attributed to funding deficiencies. This modernization plan has proven its worth. Our MV-22 

Ospreys expand the operational reach of Marines supporting Joint Force requirements. 

Increasing the procurement ofthe F-35 and CH-53K will result in similar and greater Marine 

aviation capability improvements. Our first operational F-35 squadron relocated to Iwakuni, 

Japan last month. The squadron will deploy the F-35B as part of a MEU for the first time in 

2018. We look forward to the stand-up of our first F-35C squadron, further enhancing the 5'11 

generation capabilities of our Navy-Marine Corps Team. The CH-53K Heavy Lift Replacement 

remains critical to maintaining the battlefield mobility our force requires. It will nearly triple the 

lift capacity ofthe aircraft it is replacing. The acceleration of these key modernization progran1s 

will directly improve our readiness and allow us to retire aircraft that have reached or exceeded 

their intended life. 

To modernize our ground combat element and ensure success against increasingly capable 

21st century threats, we need to accelerate investments in our ground systems. We need to 

replace our 40-year old AA V fleet soonest. The procurement of Joint Light Tactical Vehicles as 

planned will incrementally replace our High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles that we 

began operating over 30 years ago and that are still in use today. This needs to be accelerated. 

There is currently no replacement program for our legacy LA V fleet. We need to develop and 

invest in a next generation replacement for this system. Additionally, we need to establish 

programs that develop, procure and deliver active protection systems, counter-UAS and 

increased long-range precision fires capabilities. The Marine Corps will need your support to 

recapitalize and modernize these key ground capabilities required for the future operating 

environment. 

Amphibious platforms provide the sovereignty, strategic mobility, unmatched logistical 

support, operational reach, and forcible entry capability required to deter and, when necessary, 

defeat our Nation's adversaries. Our amphibious capability is a centerpiece to the operational 

success of the Navy-Marine Corps Team. Our amphibious concepts - our Naval character and 

expeditionary mindset- have been validated by history, and we will remain agents of change in 

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the future. As the operating environment changes, the Marine Corps will continue to innovate as 

we implement our new Marine Corps Operating Concept (MOC). The availability of 

amphibious shipping remains paramount to our readiness, responsiveness and the MOC. The 

Nation's amphibious warship requirement remains at 38. The current inventory of 31 vessels 

falls well short of this requirement. Recurrent maintenance challenges in the aging amphibious 

t1eet significantly exacerbate that shortfall. The current and enduring gap of amphibious 

warships to requirements inhibits our Navy-Marine Corps Team trom training to our full 

capabilities, impedes our shared ability to respond to an emergent crisis, and increases the strain 

on our current readiness. We will explore procurement strategies including the possibility of 

block buys and accelerating schedules that offer the best value for the taxpayer and allow us to 

retain skilled artisans in our shipyards. Along with increased amphibious ship capacity and 

modernization, we require the funding for the associated surface connectors that transport our 

Marines from ship-to-shore, including the programmed replacement of the Landing Craft Air 

Cushioned and Landing Craft Utility platforms. These investments will improve our overall 

amphibious capability and capacity. 

The 5'11 generation Marine Corps for the 21st century must dominate the information domain. 

We must both enable and protect our ability to command and control (C2) Marines distributed 

across an area of operations. This requires transforming MAGTF C2 capabilities through a 

unified network environment that is ready, responsive and resilient. Recently fielded C2 systems 

provide a significantly increased capability associated with maneuver across the battlespace. We 

require support from the Congress to fully field these capabilities to the tactical edge, both in our 

ground and aviation platforms. These are examples of modern capabilities that will facilitate 

improved battlefield awareness to and from small, dispersed tactical units. As warfare evolves 

into a battle of signatures and detection, improvements such as these are vital to maximize our 

Marines' protection and e!Tectiveness. 

For too long, we have balanced the cost of our modernization etTorts against our current 

readiness by extending and reti·eshing many of our legacy systems. While we judge these risks 

to be at manageable levels today, those risks are increasing and they are yet more examples of 

the trade-om; we are required to make due to fiscal reductions that accompany operational 

demand increases. The continued support of this Congress can mitigate and reverse these risks. 

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Conclusion 

On behalf of all of our Marines, Sailors - many deployed and in harm's way today - and their 

families and the civilians that support their service, we thank the Congress and this committee 

for this opportunity to discuss the key challenges your Marine Corps faces. I thank you for your 

support as articulated in the recent 2017 NOAA. While much work needs to be done, the 

authorizations within, coupled with sufficient funding and the repeal of the BCA, will begin to 

put us on a path to rebuild and sustain your Mm·ine Corps for the 21st century. Our FY 18 plm1 

will require adjustment for decisions in FY17 NDAA authorizations. We need to carry over 

decisions for FY 17 and FY 18 into our FYDP planning. Along with your authorization, we ask 

for the continued support of this Congress to appropriate the funds required to rebuild your 

Marine Corps. Additional end strength authorized by the Congress will help put us on the path 

to generate both the capabilities and capacity required in the complex operating environment our 

Nation faces. Additional funds will provide the "ready bench" our Nation requires and the 

infrastructure the force needs to train and sustain itself. Our future readiness relies upon 

increased procurement and modernization funding that will facilitate amphibious ship capacity 

and allow us to off ramp the continued funding for sustaining legacy systems. We have a plan to 

reset, recapitalize and modernize your Mm·ine Corps into a S'h generation force for the 21 '' 

century. With fiscal stability and predictability and increased resources, we will provide the 

Expeditionary Force in Readiness our Nation requires to protect its interests and security. With 

the support of the 115!1' Congress, we will move forward with our plan and vision to ensure your 

Marine Corps is organized, manned, trained and equipped to assure our allies, deter and, when 

necessary, defeat our adversaries. 

13 
WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING 

THE HEARING 

FEBRUARY 7, 2017 

(105) 

RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. WITTMAN 

Admiral MORAN. In addition to minimizing wear-and-tear on the fleet, disciplined 

schedule adherence, via the Optimized Fleet Response Plan (OFRP), is important 

to ensure that the limited public and private sector ship repair capacity is fully utilized. This has been, and will continue to be, challenging because of the high demand for Navy assets. In addition to schedule management, Navy is taking a number of steps to mitigate the combined impact of the backlog and workforce growth 

within the maintenance enterprise. First, availability schedules and workload projections in the Naval Shipyards have been adjusted based on the actual efficiency 

achieved by the new workforce brought on board over the last several years. Navy 

also routinely engages private/contracted shipyards to review and adjust availability 

schedules and workload projections based on hiring and execution capacity. This 

should help reduce unanticipated delays and cost overruns which have contributed 

to the backlog. Second, the Naval Shipyards are implementing new, innovative 

training processes to reduce the time to get new workers the skill sets to be initially 

useful and eventually become fully effective members of the team in comparison to 

the traditional on-the-job approach. Furthermore, open dialogue between Navy and 

private industry ensures contracted shipyards are aware of and responsive to the 

maintenance needs of the Fleet. Lastly, while the new shipyard workforce is being 

trained, Navy plans to more heavily leverage private sector capacity to increase 

throughput and address the backlog sooner. This includes continuing to contract out 

some submarine availabilities to the private shipbuilders, and bringing in more contractors to supplement the work performed within the Naval Shipyards. [See page 

37.] 

RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MS. McSALLY 

General WILSON. Current USAF flight hours approximate the NATO Standard 

and exceeds the flight hours of potential adversaries. [See graph.] [See page 46.] 
106 

RESPONSE TO QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MR. KELLY 

General ALLYN. The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) 2017 authorizes 

the Army to grow its end strength to 1.018M which allows the Army to sustain 58 

BCTs. At this end strength the Army is still at a significant risk level trending toward high. As CSA Mark Milley has previously testified, an Army of 1.2 million and 

66 BCTs designed around the existing defense strategy is required to reduce the 

risk to a moderate level. Any increase in end strength must be fully resourced.

[See page 14.] 

Admiral MORAN. The Navy currently operates under a ‘‘tiered readiness’’ construct. To mitigate shortfalls in available resources the Navy has moved/reprioritized aircraft, aircraft components and specific mission systems to ensure prescribed levels of readiness are met for those units advancing within their specific 

training cycle. The construct allows for the redistribution of finite assets according 

to resourcing requirements needed during each month of the Fleet Response Training Plan (FRTP). Fleet-wide requirements and risks to readiness are continually 

managed to ensure deployed units are fully capable for major combat operations. 

Typically, squadrons in a maintenance phase (not planned to deploy in the near future) or the Fleet Replacement Squadrons (FRS) are leveraged to support asset requirements. There are times a Carrier Air Wing (CVW) remains in a ‘‘sustainment’’ 

mode after a deployment. When this happens the CVW retains all of the necessary 

resource requirements to ensure they are able to deploy, if required. Generally, returning CVWs (not in sustainment) resource other unit requirements. Examples: 

Following the 2016 deployment, CVW–9 assets were re-prioritized to CVW–2 and 

CVW–11 for milestone training events. In March of 2017, three aircraft from Naval 

Air Station (NAS) Oceana, Virginia were moved to NAS Lemoore, California to support CVW–11 and CVW–17 milestone training events. The movement of assets (aircraft, aircraft components and specific mission systems) can be long-term such as 

a deployment or short-term to meet specific milestone training events. Ready Based 

Aircraft requirements are challenged by maintenance, repair, overhaul and parts 

shortages. In today’s fiscal environment with a reduced level of Ready Basic Aircraft, squadron proficiency is continually challenged. Second order impacts can be 

seen during later phases of a CVW training cycle (prior to deployment), due to aircrew and maintainer backlogs for training and maintenance requirements that have 

been postponed due to resource availability. These backlogs or cumulative training 

and readiness gaps risk established Navy readiness requirements to support major 

combat operations. [See page 14.] 

General WILSON. The Air Force’s goal is to reach 60 healthy fighter squadrons 

and above 350,000 personnel. [See page 14.] 

General WALTERS. [No answer was available at the time of printing.] [See page 

14.] 
QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING 

FEBRUARY 7, 2017 

(109) 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. LANGEVIN 

Mr. LANGEVIN. I am a firm believer that there is a place for matured, advanced 

technologies on the battlefield to complement the more traditional, kinetic weapons 

systems we already have in place. The laser weapons system onboard the USS 

Ponce is a great example, and in an austere budget environment under sequestration and multiple continuing resolutions, the cheap cost-per-shot with directed energy weapon systems is appealing to many. How are your services utilizing and 

adapting to advanced technologies such as these? Are your soldiers, sailors, airmen, 

and marines building confidence in their employment of these types of weapon systems? 

General ALLYN. The Army has an aggressive, but responsible, path to demonstrate a pre-prototype High Energy Laser Counter-Rocket Artillery & Mortar (C– 

RAM) and Counter-Unmanned Aerial System (C–UAS) capability in Fiscal Year 

2022 to support the Indirect Fires Protection Capability Increment 2-Intercept 

(IFPC Inc 2–I) Program of Record (POR). We continue to invest in advanced beam 

control and tracking technologies required for use in adverse environmental conditions, and investing in research to decrease size, weight, and power requirements 

that will dictate the platform size for the overall laser weapon system. 

In addition to some of the recent proof-of-concept demonstrations with the High 

Energy Laser Mobile Demonstrator, the Army has teamed with industry partners 

to integrate 2 kW and 5 kW lasers on to combat platforms for use in the annual 

Maneuver-Fires Integrated Experiment (MFIX) at Ft. Sill, Oklahoma. At this year’s 

MFIX, Soldiers and Marines will use the laser system in realistic scenarios against 

small unmanned aerial systems. These type of events help inform requirements, tactics, techniques and procedures, concept of operations, and provide feedback to the 

developers that will be used to improve the system design for a POR. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. I am a firm believer that there is a place for matured, advanced 

technologies on the battlefield to complement the more traditional, kinetic weapons 

systems we already have in place. The laser weapons system onboard the USS 

Ponce is a great example, and in an austere budget environment under sequestration and multiple continuing resolutions, the cheap cost-per-shot with directed energy weapon systems is appealing to many. How are your services utilizing and 

adapting to advanced technologies such as these? Are your soldiers, sailors, airmen, 

and marines building confidence in their employment of these types of weapon systems? 

Admiral MORAN. The U.S. Navy has a spiral, multi-pronged approach to fielding 

laser weapon capability to the warfighter. 

• Laser Weapon System (LaWS) on PONCE is a successful High Energy Laser 

(HEL) proof-of-concept that capitalized on advancements in COTS fiber laser 

technology. LaWS is the first-ever DOD laser weapon system deployed and approved for operational use, setting precedent for laser weapon safety and policy. 

• Building on LaWS, the Navy is working on a plan to deliver Surface Navy Laser 

Weapon System (SNLWS) Increment 1 to a DDG in 2020. SNLWS is intended 

to incorporate a more powerful HEL with integrated Counter-ISR dazzling capability, leveraging mature and proven technology. By focusing on ship integration, combat system integration, reliability, and operational employment on a 

surface combatant, SNLWS Increment 1 will permit learning to inform future 

laser weapon acquisition efforts. 

• SNLWS has been selected as the Navy’s first Rapid Prototyping, Experimentation, and Demonstration (RPED) project, which will develop and field a HEL 

prototype and accelerate the integration of directed energy weapons into the 

fleet. The RPED program is designed to rapidly develop technologies that have 

an urgent field need. 

• ONR’s Solid State Laser Technology Maturation (SSL–TM) program is a 150 

kW HEL demonstrator, scheduled for testing in 2018 against a variety of relevant target sets. SSL–TM is maturing technology to inform future SNLWS increments, which will permit increased capability and expanded mission sets. 

• In parallel with these efforts, the Navy is conducting Simulation Experiments 

(SIMEXs) to engage Warfighters early and permit operational feedback on employment of laser weapon systems. The most recent SIMEX was held in Oct 
110 

2016, and explored Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTP) and mission effectiveness of Solid State Laser (SSL) employment in a Carrier Strike Group. 

These combined efforts are building confidence in future employment of laser 

weapon systems, and enable an incremental approach to increased laser weapon capability as technology continues to mature. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. I am a firm believer that there is a place for matured, advanced 

technologies on the battlefield to complement the more traditional, kinetic weapons 

systems we already have in place. The laser weapons system onboard the USS 

Ponce is a great example, and in an austere budget environment under sequestration and multiple continuing resolutions, the cheap cost-per-shot with directed energy weapon systems is appealing to many. How are your services utilizing and 

adapting to advanced technologies such as these? Are your soldiers, sailors, airmen, 

and marines building confidence in their employment of these types of weapon systems? 

General WILSON. To date, there are no Air Force operationally fielded Directed 

Energy Weapons (DEWs). That being said, the Air Force believes we are at the pivotal point in history where DEWs are almost ready for transitioning out of the labs 

and into the hands of the warfighters. To support this transition, the Air Force has 

recently developed a DEW Flight Plan which is currently awaiting SecAF and CSAF 

approval. This flight plan directs multiple actions across the Air Force enterprise 

to enable the transition of Directed Energy capabilities to the warfighters by 2020, 

including experimentation, prototyping, and the establishment of a Joint Test Center to support the rapid transition of these capabilities while minimizing the cost 

to our taxpayers. We expect the current work being done will help Air Force Airmen 

adapt and use advanced DEWs technologies within the next 5 years. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. I am a firm believer that there is a place for matured, advanced 

technologies on the battlefield to complement the more traditional, kinetic weapons 

systems we already have in place. The laser weapons system onboard the USS 

Ponce is a great example, and in an austere budget environment under sequestration and multiple continuing resolutions, the cheap cost-per-shot with directed energy weapon systems is appealing to many. How are your services utilizing and 

adapting to advanced technologies such as these? Are your soldiers, sailors, airmen, 

and marines building confidence in their employment of these types of weapon systems? 

General WALTERS. [No answer was available at the time of printing.] 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. TURNER 

Mr. TURNER. The committee heard testimony from combatant commanders last 

year about the operational challenges they will face with the implementation of the 

policy restricting the use of cluster munitions, and the resulting shortfall in availability of critical weapon systems. We also understand that developing new compliant munitions is a costly and time-consuming process. In the interim, what resources do you need to acquire capabilities that: (a) meet commanders’ operational 

requirements; (b) keep unexploded ordnance to a minimum; and (c) do so in a rapid, 

cost-effective manner? 

What is the current status of the long range precision fires program, and in your 

opinion can we find reasonable ways to accelerate this program? 

General ALLYN. The U.S. Army has developed a bridging solution for both the 

Cannon-Delivered Area Effects Munitions (C–DAEM) 155mm projectile and the 

Long Range Precision Fires (LRPF). The C–DAEM bridging strategy is an interim 

solution to replace the existing cannon delivered Dual Purpose Improved Conventional Munitions (DPICM) to mitigate or eliminate gaps for engagement of area targets, imprecisely located targets, moving targets, counterfire, and suppression of 

enemy air-defense. There is a directed requirement for the bridging strategy to procure 3,000(+) Sensor Fuzed Munitions delivered over a three year period to address 

medium and heavy armor targets. The bridging strategy also authorizes U.S. Army 

test & evaluation efforts of allied nation munitions to address light armor and personnel targets. Research Development Test and Engineering (RDT&E) cost to determine cluster munition compliance is estimated to be $8M (FY17) and future funding 

is anticipated. The U.S. Army would procure ∼5,000 of these anti-personnel type 

munitions delivered over a three year period. In addition, the U.S. Army is accelerating the Lithograph Fragmentation Technology for the M1128 projectile at a 

RDT&E cost of $9.866M (FY17) with future funding anticipated. Although the bridging strategy will provide a near-term capability, it will not fully mitigate the impact 

created on 1 January 2019 when the use of our existing 155mm DPICM projectiles 

is prohibited. Furthermore, the C–DAEM program is not projected to begin deliv-
111 

eries of a DOD Policy compliant munition until 2026. The U.S. Army will conduct 

a Service Life Extension Program (SLEP) of the Army Tactical Missile System 

(ATACMS) as a bridging solution to meet the capability gap until the U.S. Army 

procures LRPF. The U.S. Army plans to SLEP a total of 1,500 ATACMS missiles. 

LRPF is currently in the Materiel Solution Analysis phase and is completing documentation necessary to support a decision to enter the Technology Maturation and 

Risk Reduction phase. Shortening the time it takes to deliver capability to the 

warfighter is one of the U.S. Army’s top priorities. The U.S. Army is considering 

acceleration options and decisions to execute those options will be based upon a risk 

informed evaluation as technology maturation provides opportunities. 

Mr. TURNER. General Dunford and key combatant commanders have all discussed 

shortfalls in precision-guided munitions and global munitions inventories. What is 

the magnitude of this shortfall and what steps are being taken by the military services to address it? 

General ALLYN. The Army has shortages of critical preferred munitions based on 

current and emerging requirements. Shortages include PATRIOT, THAAD, Hellfire, 

TOW, Precision Guidance Kits and Excalibur. These shortages impact the Army’s 

ability to execute Combatant Command OPLANs and to respond and surge rapidly 

when needed. We are currently updating analysis based on strategic guidance to determine the magnitude of gaps and priorities to address shortfalls. The results of 

our analysis which will inform resourcing strategies. The Army plans to begin addressing these shortfalls in our FY18 budget request and future budget submission. 

Additionally, to better support Combatant Commands, we are reviewing munitions 

positioning to prioritize locations for forward positioned stocks. 

Mr. TURNER. As you know, the Army is rebuilding capability and capacity in Europe through the European Reassurance Initiative or ERI. I am pleased to see the 

Army is returning armor back to Europe to provide for increased credible deterrence 

against ongoing Russian aggression on NATO’s eastern flank. Returning an Armored Brigade Combat Team on a rotational basis is a good first step, but I am 

concerned this may not be enough. Are you considering growing additional Armored 

Brigade Combat Teams that could be deployed to Europe either on a rotational or 

permanent basis, and will these Armored Brigade Teams be equipped with modernized equipment, for example, will they be equipped with the most modernized 

versions of Abrams Tanks and Bradley Fighting vehicles? 

General ALLYN. The Army is in the process of growing additional Armored Brigade Combat Teams that would be available for global commitment. In addition to 

the recently announced conversion of an Infantry Brigade Combat Team to an Armored Brigade Combat Team this calendar year (pending PB17 funding), we also 

plan to create a 16th Armored Brigade Combat Team by 2019. Significantly, the 

16th Armored Brigade Combat Team will be equipped with our most modern 

versions of Abrams Tank and Bradley Fighting Vehicle. The addition of these two 

armored formations better postures the Army to meet the defense strategic guidance 

by developing necessary capabilities to deter and defeat peer competitors. These decisions, however, must be informed by our available resources. If budget requests 

remain un-appropriated by Congress, we cannot modernize our armored formations. 

Mr. TURNER. Given the rapidly changing security environment and the proliferation of more advanced rocket propelled grenades and anti-tank guided missiles I am 

particularly interested in the Army’s vehicle active protection system initiative that 

will help mitigate these threats in the near term. Please provide the committee with 

an update on this initiative and are there ways that we can accelerate the fielding 

of this capability? 

General ALLYN. The Army’s Modular Active Protection System (MAPS) Program 

of Record strategy is based on commonality of components, integration tailored to 

the vehicle, and incremental capability building blocks. The MAPS program is anticipated to support fleet-wide capability. In the near term, an expedited Non-Developmental Item (NDI) risk reduction effort is in process. This risk reduction effort 

installs and characterizes three different NDI Active Protective System (APS) on 

Abrams, Bradley and Stryker platforms to assess the technical maturity, performance and suitability. The APS prototypes are the Trophy (Manufacturer—Rafael Advanced Defense Systems) on Abrams; Iron Fist Light Decoupled (Manufacturer— 

Israeli Military Industries) on Bradley; and Iron Curtain (Manufacturer—Artis Corporation) on Stryker. The Abrams/Trophy effort has completed the installation and 

calibration portion and is currently conducting characterization. Bradley/Iron Fist 

Light Decoupled and Stryker/Iron Curtain are completing the APS kit mounting 

bracket design and fabrication that occurs prior to the installation/calibration. The 

effort is fully funded and on schedule to support a decision in 1QFY18 on whether 

to pursue limited APS fielding on an accelerated timeline. 
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Mr. TURNER. General Dunford and key combatant commanders have all discussed 

shortfalls in precision-guided munitions and global munitions inventories. What is 

the magnitude of this shortfall and what steps are being taken by the military services to address it? 

Admiral MORAN. The DON has had to accept risk in certain mission areas due 

to BCA/BBA reductions. We have already begun to put into place steps that will 

help mitigate these risks which include but are not limited to: adjustments in loading plans and focusing future investments on procurement and sustainment funding. WPN procurement in PB–17 was $3.209B and with FY17 RAA we propose in- creasing procurement by $0.172B for a total of $3.38B Specific procurements include: • 96 additional Tomahawk missiles • 30 additional Rolling Airframe Missiles (RAM) • 224 Laser Maverick Kits PANMC OCO procurement in PB–17 was $0.066B and 

with FY17 RAA we propose increasing procurement by $0.058B for a total of 

$0.124B. The additional increase procures General Purpose bombs to replenish 

operational usage of JDAM and other munitions. 

Mr. TURNER. Two years ago, the CNO testified that he had a strike fighter shortfall of ‘‘2–3 squadrons.’’ How has that changed over the past two years? What are 

the Navy’s plans to address current and future shortfalls? Are the Navy’s current 

plans in the future years defense program for procurement of F/A–18E/Fs and F– 

35Cs sufficient to address the strike fighter shortfall? 

Admiral MORAN. We deploy our Carrier Strike Groups for strategic maritime control, for deterrence in places like the South China Sea or off the Korean Peninsula, 

and to project power where needed as in Syria and Iraq for the global fight on terror. The pace of deployed operations has not slowed, but the Strike Fighter inventory to conduct those operations continues to shrink as we expend approximately 2– 

3 Strike/Fighter squadrons a year. Navy tactical aircraft are designed for a limited 

service life. The F/A–18 variant was designed to fly 6,000 flight hours and to be in 

service 23 to 25 years. After 6,000 flight hours, the aircraft will need to be stricken 

from the inventory since it has expended the designed service life of the airframe, 

systems and components. The F/A–18 fleet is flying on average 180,000 flight hours 

per year which equates to the entire fleet expending 24–36 aircraft worth of service 

life per year, or approximately 2–3 squadrons. To complicate the situation, years of 

underfunded readiness accounts due to fiscal constraints of the Budget Control Act 

and Bipartisan Budget Acts have left our shelves short of parts, and many aircraft 

sit on the ramp in a non-mission capable status. This operational tempo and aircraft 

expenditure has caused an increasing strike fighter inventory management challenge. Our oldest F/A–18C aircraft are reaching the end of their service life, and 

the ones that are in the depot require extensive work due to corrosion and fatigue. 

To address this growing strike fighter shortfall, the Navy has three basic options 

or ‘‘levers’’: 

1) Manage and conserve hours on our aging fleet—unfortunately the world gets 

a vote and our operational tempo has not slowed; 

2) Extend aircraft service life from their originally planned 6,000 hours to 9,000 

hours (or more) using our aviation depots and commercial assistance; 

3) Procure new aircraft. The Navy expects the first F/A–18E/F to reach 6,000 

hours in CY 2018. By the mid-2020s, we expect to induct 60–70 aircraft per year 

into our depots. To solve our existing Strike Fighter gap, cover the surge in depot 

throughput, and increase capacity and readiness on the flight line, we must procure 

aircraft throughout the FYDP. The FY17 Request for Additional Appropriations begins to address these issues through increased funding of readiness accounts, depot 

maintenance and Super Hornet procurement, but sustained funding over time is 

necessary to solve the long-term Strike Fighter inventory problem. 

Mr. TURNER. The committee heard testimony from combatant commanders last 

year about the operational challenges they will face with the implementation of the 

policy restricting the use of cluster munitions, and the resulting shortfall in availability of critical weapon systems. We also understand that developing new compliant munitions is a costly and time-consuming process. In the interim, what resources do you need to acquire capabilities that: (a) meet commanders’ operational 

requirements; (b) keep unexploded ordnance to a minimum; and (c) do so in a rapid, 

cost-effective manner? 

General WILSON. The Air Force currently has plans for four development and procurement efforts to address different targeting aspects that were previous covered 

by cluster munitions. To address armored targets, both mobile and stationary, the 

Air Force is developing and procuring the Small Diameter Bomb increment II (SDB 

II). To address the smaller area softer targets, Air Force is developing and procuring 
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the 500-pound Cast Ductile Iron (CDI) bomb. To address the larger area soft targets, Air Force is planning to design and procure a high fragmenting 2,000 pound 

bomb (HF–2K). To enhance effectiveness and lethality, Air Force is designing a 

cockpit selectable height of burst sensor (C–HOBS) that will work with both legacy 

and new warheads. The combination of these technologies are expected to meet combatant commanders’ operation requirements and will keep unexploded ordnance to 

a minimum by using unitary warheads and avoiding use of cluster munitions. The 

plan will start providing capability in late FY18 with additional capabilities coming 

on line over the FYDP. The resources planned for these developments and production needs to be preserved to ensure these technologies are provided to the 

warfighter in a timely manner. 

Mr. TURNER. General Dunford and key combatant commanders have all discussed 

shortfalls in precision-guided munitions and global munitions inventories. What is 

the magnitude of this shortfall and what steps are being taken by the military services to address it? 

General WILSON. Ongoing operations against ISIS are expending many more 

weapons (>51K) than planned for in a contingency operation (Air Force has expended an OPLAN level of munitions). As a result, most direct attack munitions 

have current and forecasted inventory shortfalls. Munitions experiencing shortfalls 

due to OIR are Hellfire missiles, Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAM), Small Diameter Bomb I (SDB I) and Hellfire missiles. High expenditures are expected to continue in FY17. We were able to utilize Overseas Contingency Operations funding to 

replenish the munitions with high combat expenditures to date. However, this funding, while important, is only a means of replenishing what is used in contingencies 

and generally results in replenishment 2–4 years after the munitions are expended. 

Mr. TURNER. The Air Force currently has 55 fighter squadrons, but a recent 

‘‘State of the Air Force’’ paper described a need to grow to 60 fighter squadrons. 

What requirement is driving that increase of five fighter squadrons? 

General WILSON. The Air Force requires a fighter force structure to meet current 

Defense Planning Guidance (DPG) requirements and our current counterterrorism 

deployments. Our analysis has determined 55 fighter squadrons does not allow for 

rotational counterterrorism forces to remain on task during a major theater conflict 

as described in the DPG. Additionally, the rotational demand on the 55 fighter 

squadron force has proven to decay personnel and equipment readiness for full spectrum conflict. The gradual growth to 60 fighter squadrons will improve readiness 

and reduce our capability and capacity challenges associated with meeting both a 

DPG-tasked scenario and counter-terrorism operations. 

Mr. TURNER. The committee heard testimony from combatant commanders last 

year about the operational challenges they will face with the implementation of the 

policy restricting the use of cluster munitions, and the resulting shortfall in availability of critical weapon systems. We also understand that developing new compliant munitions is a costly and time-consuming process. In the interim, what resources do you need to acquire capabilities that: (a) meet commanders’ operational 

requirements; (b) keep unexploded ordnance to a minimum; and (c) do so in a rapid, 

cost-effective manner? 

General WALTERS. [No answer was available at the time of printing.] 

Mr. TURNER. General Dunford and key combatant commanders have all discussed 

shortfalls in precision-guided munitions and global munitions inventories. What is 

the magnitude of this shortfall and what steps are being taken by the military services to address it? 

General WALTERS. [No answer was available at the time of printing.] 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. SHUSTER 

Mr. SHUSTER. The House Appropriations Committee has made cuts to the Army 

Operations and Maintenance Budget due to allegations that the Army is holding too 

much carryover. Can you discuss the impact that cuts to Army O&M have on things 

like production orders, systems, unit costs and depots? Would you say that ultimately these cuts cost us more than they save? 

General ALLYN. I believe cuts to Army O&M impact our ability to conduct proper 

production planning, leading to inefficiencies and higher costs to the Army. Also, as 

workload declines, the reductions impact our ability to retain our skilled artisans 

and impact our ability to reconstitute capability requirements for wartime surge. 

This will make our ability to surge more expensive. Our goal is consistent and predictable funding that reduces this turbulence and enables our depots to create outputs that increase Army readiness at the lowest possible cost. 
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Mr. SHUSTER. Genera Allyn, given the heightened threat picture we see around 

the world and the readiness issues being reported, do you believe current Army Organic Industrial Base capability meets the demand? In other words, do we have 

enough capacity in our depots to deal with the array of dangers we face in the 

world? 

General ALLYN. Yes, the Army Organic Industrial Base (OIB), which is comprised 

primarily of manufacturing arsenals, maintenance depots, and ammunition plants, 

has the required capability and capacity to deal with the array of dangers we face 

in the world and to meet readiness demands. The Army continually assesses the capability and capacity of its OIB to ensure the Army maintains the required level 

of readiness to meet the needs of the Warfighter. 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MS. SPEIER 

Ms. SPEIER. General Allyn, Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work reported to 

Congress last year that more than 20 percent of the Department’s bases will be considered excess by 2019. How much will that excess capacity cost the Army per year? 

Could those savings instead be applied to meeting unfunded Army requirements? 

General ALLYN. The Office of the Secretary of Defense uses the Parametric Capability Analysis to estimate excess ‘‘base loading capability. Using this analysis, the 

Army’s estimated excess is 33 percent at a Total Army strength of 980,000 Soldiers. 

The Army has done additional internal analysis of excess capacity as measured in 

square footage of facilities, and concluded that the Army would have approximately 

21 percent or 161 million square feet of underutilized or excess capacity and our 

FY17 NDAA authorized strength of 1.018M Soldiers. The vast preponderance of excess capacity is not empty buildings, but partially occupied ones costing about the 

same to maintain as fully occupied buildings. Namely, it costs the Army about $3 

per square foot per year to maintain an occupied facility, even if it is underutilized. 

So a conservative estimate for the carrying costs of this excess capacity is about 

$500M per year. On top of the facility costs, excess capacity generates significant 

fixed annual recurring costs in the Army’s Base Operations Support (BOS) accounts. 

It costs between $30–50M per year to operate a medium-sized Army installation 

with municipal services like garbage/wastewater removal, security guards, IT support, landscaping, pest control management, child care, snow removal, commissaries 

etc. Most of these costs are the salaries of the garrison staff and support contractors, 

which are incurred regardless of whether the installation has 100 Soldiers, 1,000 

Soldiers or 10,000 Soldiers assigned. Estimating excess capacity BOS costs is difficult because BOS expenses are non-linear relative to population, and savings accrue mainly when an installation is inactivated. Historically, this BOS expenses provided the bulk of the Army’s $2B in annual recurring savings from the five previous 

BRAC rounds were realized. BRAC savings can be reinvested into higher priority 

areas and unfunded requirements, such as maintaining a higher force structure, increased readiness levels through higher-funded training events, expanded research, 

or additional procurement. BRAC also provides the Reserve Components an opportunity to re-look the demographic areas in which they operate, and recapitalize into 

a more efficient and mission effective footprint. 

Ms. SPEIER. Admiral Moran, Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work reported 

to Congress last year that more than 20 percent of the Department’s bases will be 

considered excess by 2019. How much will that excess capacity cost the Navy per 

year? Could those savings instead be applied to meeting unfunded Navy requirements? 

Admiral MORAN. Deputy Secretary of Defense Work’s report to Congress indicated 

that indicated that the DOD has 22% excess infrastructure capacity when compared 

to then-projected FY19 force levels, distributed as follows: Army—33%; Navy—7%; 

Air Force—32%; and the Defense Logistics Agency—12%. This analysis was completed at a macro-level and did not identify specific bases or individual facilities by 

name. Since then, the Navy has proposed growing from an FY19 projection of 311 

ships to 355 ships, and the Navy will need to reevaluate its excess capacity to determine if this amount still exists in light of potential force structure changes and/or 

increased requirements. The Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process is the 

only fair, objective, and proven process within which DOD can holistically review 

infrastructure to determine and reduce excess and configure its infrastructure so it 

is best positioned to meet strategic and mission requirements. 

Ms. SPEIER. General Wilson, Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work reported 

to Congress last year that more than 20 percent of the Department’s bases will be 

considered excess by 2019. How much will that excess capacity cost the Air Force 
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per year? Could those savings instead be applied to meeting unfunded Air Force requirements? 

General WILSON. To date, the Air Force has only executed high-level parametric 

analysis and has not analyzed excesses by specific categories whose costs could be 

estimated. Whole base closures are the most effective means to reduce infrastructure costs, and on average, the Air Force’s annual savings after a BRAC round implementation is roughly $600M every year (five rounds of BRAC totaling $2.9B in 

annual savings). 

Savings from a new round of BRAC would be applied against the Air Force’s next 

highest unfunded requirements. By consolidating missions onto fewer installations 

and closing whole installations it no longer needs, the Air Force would save every 

year in perpetuity, funding spent on keeping the gates open and lights on. This 

funding would be reallocated to bolster mission-critical readiness, modernization, 

and infrastructure spending at enduring installations. 

Ms. SPEIER. General Walters, Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work reported 

to Congress last year that more than 20 percent of the Department’s bases will be 

considered excess by 2019. How much will that excess capacity cost the Marine 

Corps per year? Could those savings instead be applied to meeting unfunded Marine 

Corps requirements? 

General WALTERS. [No answer was available at the time of printing.] 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. LAMBORN 

Mr. LAMBORN. General Allyn, your testimony today is nearly identical to General 

Milley’s testimony before this committee last year: the Army is not ready ‘‘to conduct sustained ground combat in a full spectrum environment against a highly lethal hybrid threat or near-peer adversary.’’ In your best military judgment, do we 

have enough Armor BCTs, especially when you look at current and potential future 

commitments in Europe, the Pacific, and the Middle East? 

General ALLYN. No. Based on extensive modeling and wargame analysis, any conflict in Europe would easily stretch the Army’s armor capacity to a point where we 

don’t have sufficient ready forces. What is often forgotten is the constant demand 

for armored formations in the ongoing operations in U.S. Army Central Command 

(USCENTCOM) area of responsibility, as well as the Korea rotation, and the requirement to support these missions indefinitely through the sustainable rotation of 

forces. Hence, if we were to confront two near simultaneous major conflicts, along 

with the current demand, we would barely have enough Armor BCTs, with every 

formation deployed regardless of readiness, and we would have no depth to rotate 

forces over the course of lengthy combat operations. This analysis is why an Army 

budget request for the FY17 Budget Supplemental and future budget requests will 

support the conversion of one IBCT to an ABCT in 2018 and 2019. 

Mr. LAMBORN. The Army’s recent Unfunded Priority List contained $1 billion for 

air defense, which General Milley also recently spoke about as a priority at AUSA. 

Is the Army sufficiently prepared to defend itself from air threats, whether ISIS 

drones, attack helicopters, high-end fighters, bombers, and cruise missiles, or rockets, artillery, and mortars, and what are you doing to better address this threat? 

General ALLYN. The Army currently has the capability to defend our Soldiers and 

assets from a variety of air threats, but we lack sufficient capacity and, in some 

cases, capability to counter advanced threats. To address this in the near-term, we 

are modernizing our Air and Missile Defense (AMD) forces with digital radar processors, improved interceptors, upgraded sensors, advanced software builds, and a 

command and control system to integrate all Army air and missile defense systems. 

The Army has a Counter-Rocket, Artillery, and Mortar system using the LandBased Phalanx Weapons System, deployed to multiple locations in Iraq and Afghanistan. We have also provided a variety of systems to USCENTCOM to defend 

against low, slow, small drones, and we are testing even more systems for employment in the near term. The Army is taking a phased approach to developing AMD 

capability; in the interim we are developing Stinger-based solutions, e.g. Stinger 

Proximity Fuse to increase lethality against these small drones. The objective solutions may include kinetic and non-kinetic defeat options. We will increase Maneuver-Short Range Air Defense (SHORAD) capacity over the next several years to field 

a mobile, survivable platform to protect our Soldiers from attack helicopters, drones, 

and other air threats. Additionally, the Army has programmed funding for the development and fielding of the Indirect Fire Protection Capability, Increment 2-Intercept (IFPC, Inc 2–I), with Initial Operational Capability (IOC) scheduled for 2020. 

Once fielded, the Army will protect static and semi-static assets from cruise missiles 

and unmanned aerial systems (UAS), and the Army will identify and engage fixed 
116 

and rotary-wing threats at greater ranges than is currently possible. Finally, the 

Army intends to update our Patriot radar system with the Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense Sensor (LTAMDS). The effort will provide 360 degree capability to 

counter air threats from UAS to tactical ballistic missiles (TBM), with increased 

electronic and cyber protection to the system. 

Mr. LAMBORN. What lessons did the Army learn from its recent movement of the 

4th Infantry Division’s 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team from Germany to Poland 

via commercial rail? 

General ALLYN. The Army utilized the deployment of 3/4 ID to validate current 

deployment processes and procedures. Multiple lessons learned from the tactical 

(unit load plans), operational (local port employee business practices) and strategic 

(sequencing of border crossings) will be incorporated into future operations. In addition, rail movement from ports in Europe to training areas in Poland provided us 

with an excellent opportunity to exercise our rail loading procedures and the command, control, coordination necessary to operate with both national and international partners. As we move forward and continue to conduct strategic mobilization and expeditionary operations, we will validate our rail and port operations during exercises in the continental United States and overseas. 

Mr. LAMBORN. How are space and cyber being integrated into COCOM OPLANS, 

especially when it comes to addressing ‘‘worst-case scenario’’ space and cyber 

threats? Do you have sufficient authorities, resources, and posture to respond to 

space threats? 

General WILSON. The DOD has multiple options when responding to ‘‘worst case 

scenarios’’ related to space and cyber threats. While U.S. Strategic Command has 

an overarching lead for addressing threat actors that cross multiple, Geographic 

Combatant Commands, the Air Force does have some thoughts for your consideration. 

First, there is a space annex integrated into each of the OPLANS that describes 

the actions and deployment of Air Force space systems. We have identified the necessary forces and are fully prepared to execute the actions contained within these 

OPLANS. Additionally, each combatant commander has the responsibility to protect 

critical warfighting assets in all five warfighting domains. Exercising specific 

OPLANS enables combatant commanders to identify vulnerabilities and prepare to 

fight in a contested environment. 

Air Force Space Command recognizes the growing space threat and continues to 

prepare forces for the contested space environment. The Space Enterprise Vision describes the future force and systems needed for mission assurance and the Space 

Mission Force construct permits Air Force Space Command personnel to conduct focused training for emerging threats. 

Second, consistent with its core responsibilities, the Department of Defense is prepared to support the Department of Homeland Security or a sector-specific agency 

to address threats to U.S. civilian critical infrastructure. Therefore, when directed, 

the U.S. military can conduct military operations, including cyberspace operations, 

to counter an imminent or on-going attack against critical infrastructure. Additionally, to facilitate multi-domain operations, the Air Force stood up non-kinetic effects 

cells within our Air Operations Centers that enable OPLAN execution to address 

the Joint Force Air Component Commanders objectives. 

To answer the second part of your question, CDR USSTRATCOM is responsible 

for posturing and employing space capabilities. We believe he is postured to employ 

his assets in a timely manner to respond to current and emerging space threats but 

doesn’t have timely authorities, in all cases necessary, to fully protect all space assets. As the Space Domain becomes increasingly contested, we must develop and 

subsequently delegate authorities to the appropriate level to ensure the ability to 

protect of assigned systems against real-time threats. 

The Air Force Space Enterprise Vision (SEV) identifies numerous capabilities to 

counter emerging space threats. We need your help in funding SEV identified capabilities. Additionally, the Space Mission Force is predicated on advanced training to 

prepare crews to operate in a contested environment with advanced adversaries. 

The current training infrastructure requires additional resources to sufficiently (1) 

upgrade our modeling and simulation, (2) provide advanced adversarial training (aggressors), and (3) upgraded training ranges. 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. SCOTT 

Mr. SCOTT. General Wilson related ‘‘it makes sense to invest wisely, so BRAC 

would help us make smart investments to prepare for the future.’’ Furthermore, 

‘‘the Air Force has 25 percent excess capacity.’’ 
117 

Please provide additional context for this statement and define the term ’excess 

capacity’? 

How was the figure 25 percent calculated and what is included? 

Is it 25 percent of aircraft support facilities such as runways, hangars, etc.? 

Is it 25 percent of overall base infrastructure to include work space facilities and 

housing? 

What installations have this excess? 

Given the Air Force’s stated shortfall of pilots, low aircraft inventory, and the ever 

increasing demand on the depot facilities, how does the 25 percent excess capacity 

statement square with demand for growth? 

General WILSON. The Air Force estimates its excess infrastructure capacity using 

a parametric capacity analysis (PCA) that compares force structure and infrastructure inventory from a benchmark year 1989, and compares it to a future year force 

structure and infrastructure inventory. Infrastructure inventory was evaluated 

across several subsets including: parking apron; depot capacity; classroom space; 

space operations facilities; and product centers, laboratories, test and evaluation 

centers. PCA does not evaluate housing excess capacity. 

PCA yielded 28% excess capacity when plugging in AF’s FY12 force structure 

(333K Active end strength and 5,587 Total Aircraft Inventory (TAI)). If we raise our 

force structure to 350K Active end strength with comparable increase in reserve 

component & TAI, PCA yields 24% excess capacity. VCSAF in testimony just rounded these figures to a rough ‘‘25% excess capacity.’’ 

PCA is deliberately designed to not determine specific excess at any one base, but 

rather be a leading indicator of excess capacity across the Air Force enterprise considering changes in inventory and force structure. We do not have an installationby-installation assessment of excess capacity as this would require a much more detailed, installation and weapon-system specific data collection and analysis effort. 

In summary, even at most aggressive force structure increases (350K Active end 

strength), AF still anticipates having sufficient excess capacity to allow divestiture 

of whole installations while maintaining enough swing space for contingencies. A 

BRAC will allow the AF to analyze future force structure and develop beddown scenarios which will allow us to grow in the right places. 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. GRAVES 

Mr. GRAVES. General Wilson, in your testimony, you state ‘‘we must restore fullspectrum readiness to continue to provide unrelenting Airpower for the joint force.’’ 

The Air National Guard, and the National Guard in general, has seen an increase 

in overseas involvement since 2001, not only to combat terrorism but to provide 

vital support for peacekeeping missions. 

Given that part of their Federal mission is to maintain a well-equipped force to 

be ready to defend the United States at a moment’s notice, how have our current 

budget constraints affected the Guard’s ability to fulfill their Federal commitment? 

Specifically how has our airlift capability been affected and how does that impact 

the overall goal of ‘‘full-spectrum readiness?’’ 

General WILSON. The Air National Guard has faced many challenges in fulfilling 

our federal commitment. We were engaged in the Air Expeditionary Force before 9/ 

11 and contributed essential forces to overseas contingencies as a key part of the 

U.S. Air Force. However, twenty-seven years of continuous combat combined with 

the negative incrementalism of force structure cuts to the active component and 

mission changes to the Guard have created a situation where our readiness has significantly degraded over the last eight years. Prior to BRAC 2005 our readiness concerns were focused on equipment. Today our most significant readiness concerns for 

both fighter and airlift capabilities has been personnel and training. The retirement 

of the baby boomers and significant and repeated unit mission changes along with 

the reduction of the active component training force (namely Air Education and 

Training Command) and more technical and demanding training has created a less 

experienced and younger force operating very old and aging aircraft and systems. 

Funding shortages have created parts and spares shortfalls and with an average 

fleet age of 31 years many parts are no longer available and must be specially manufactured. Many of our KC–135 aerial tankers were manufactured in the late 1950s 

but are at the heart of our ability to project power throughout the world. Budget 

cuts have reduced our C–5 and C–130 fleets to bare bones numbers and even with 

the lower numbers we struggle to train enough aircrews and maintenance personnel. Overall, our full-spectrum readiness is at historically low levels and not projected to level off or improve for several years. The good news is that Guardsmen 

continue to step up to their calling and have fulfilled their federal mission although 
118 

this has been done at a great cost to themselves, their families, and their employers 

as the operations tempo keeps Guardsmen deployed to support our Combatant Commanders throughout the world. 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. BROOKS 

Mr. BROOKS. Congress has demonstrated our desire for the Department of Defense (DOD) to use tubular LED (TLED) lights to replace fluorescent lights through 

many legislative means in the recent past. Congress has also encouraged the DOD 

to change the Unified Facilities Criteria (UFC) to allow greater usage of TLEDs on 

military bases. The Navy fleet already allows direct wire TLED technology for the 

fleet with great energy and manpower savings. Can you please explain to the committee why the DOD bans a safe and proven technology, used at major hospitals, 

schools, and other public building? Would you support changing the UFC to allow 

direct wire TLEDs on DOD bases? 

General ALLYN. The Army does not support changing the UFC to allow Type B 

(aka, direct wire) Tubular LED retrofits into fluorescent lighting fixtures. The Department of Defense currently prohibits this type of lamp to be used as a retrofit 

on the basis that retrofitting fixtures with the Type B tubular LED has the potential for adverse incidents including overheating, smoking, and catching fire. Furthermore, the Tri-Services Electrical Working Group has expressed concern regarding 

worker safety in bypassing the ballast. This action could allow someone merely 

changing the light tube to be potentially subjected to voltages higher than 120V, 

which could result in serious injury, death, and arc flash hazard. Manufacturers of 

the Type B lamp will argue that by properly removing or disabling the ballasts 

eliminates the possibility the ballasts can overheat and thus become a life/health/ 

safety risk. There is no easy way to ascertain that a retrofit project has correctly 

removed 100% of the ballasts without exception. Army sampling of projects retrofitted with Type B ballasts has found instances where the installer inadvertently 

left the ballast connected in multiple fixtures. It is important to note that when the 

fixtures are modified (or not) to accept the Type B lamps, there is no way to inspect 

without disassembling the lighting fixtures to ensure that the required modifications have been properly accomplished. This leaves open the possibility that the retrofit team may have inadvertently omitted fixtures from being properly retrofitted. 

Type B lamp retrofits require electrical (and possibly mechanical) fixture modification to bypass or remove the ballast, creating opportunities for unsafe alterations 

and associated electrical hazards. For these reasons, the Army does not intend to 

retrofit fluorescent lighting fixtures with direct wire TLEDs. The Department approves Type A lamps, which do not require any electrical or mechanical modifications, to be used during lighting efficiency retrofits. In fact, this is the most costeffective Energy Conservation Measure (ECM) commonly used in Energy Savings 

Performance Contracts. 

Mr. BROOKS. The tubular LED (TLED) lights used in today’s fleet are not just 

glass tubes filled with gas, they are sophisticated, high-tech pieces of electronic 

equipment. That sophistication is what allows TLEDs to produce the highest quality 

light and reduce energy consumption while meeting the rigorous requirements of 

the Navy lighting specification. The Navy must be certain of the supply chain for 

the electronic components used in TLEDs. The Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) recently approved a Canadian manufacturer whose components are unknown to sale 

TLEDs to the U.S. Navy fleet. What will you do to ensure that the domestic industrial base for high-tech TLEDs are protected and how will you ensure that the components brought on board Navy ships are safe and secure? 

Admiral MORAN. Under 10 U.S.C. 2500(1), Canada is considered part of the national technology and industrial base. The Navy defers inquiries regarding protections to the domestic industrial supply base to the Defense Logistics Agency. Tubular LED lighting is one of several LED lighting options available for shipboard use. 

Other available LED shipboard lighting options include LED lighting fixtures with 

an array of LED elements built into the fixture. LED lighting is widely available 

in the commercial, commercial marine and industrial lighting markets. By 

leveraging vendors and products that supply the commercial and industrial lighting 

markets, the Navy is utilizing an existing industrial base. These LED lighting vendors have demonstrated via a rigorous qualification process that they can produce 

LED lighting that meets the requirements for the shipboard environment. Navy 

technical and qualification requirements ensure components are safe for naval use. 

LED lighting products are tested per specification (MIL–DTL–16377) to ensure safety of personnel and equipment in a shipboard environment. From a security perspective, LED lighting is only connected to the shipboard electrical power and struc-
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tural systems. Additionally, the lights undergo electromagnetic interference testing 

to insure that signals or interference from the LED lights will not impact or interfere with surrounding equipment. 

Mr. BROOKS. Currently, the Navy has no commonality/standardization in regards 

to how you are updating your interior lighting for the fleet. You are using legacy 

fluorescent tubes, a LED bolt on array, a light guide, and replacing legacy florescent 

tubes with tubular LED (TLED) lights. Vice Admiral William Hilarides recommended a ‘‘Common Interface’’ for light sources across the fleet in all Type III 

shipboard luminaries. What steps are you and your office doing to implement this 

recommendation and achieve a ‘‘Common Interface?’’ It is my understanding that 

the Navy has converted roughly 34 percent of the fleets lighting from fluorescent 

tubes to TLEDs. Is simply keeping the current fixture and replacing fluorescent 

tubes with TLEDs the right answer? 

Admiral MORAN. It is the Navy’s intent to shift shipboard lighting away from fluorescent and incandescent lamps to LED lighting solutions to implement energy savings and to improve sailor shipboard quality of life. NAVSEA concluded that the 

most cost effective ‘‘common interface’’ is achieved through standardization of power, 

size, and mounting requirements. Updated requirements (MIL–DTL–16377) were 

signed out in June 2014 and allows for implementation of LED lighting in an affordable manner. The specification covers a broad range of shipboard applications, 

which allows users to select the proper configuration. This ‘‘common interface’’ accommodates the necessary commonality requirements to support both fixtures and 

tubes and allows for the use of TLEDs for new construction ships, and as replacements for fluorescent tubes as an economical ‘‘backfit’’ option for in-service ships. 

Mr. BROOKS. Congress has demonstrated our desire for the Department of Defense (DOD) to use tubular LED (TLED) lights to replace fluorescent lights through 

many legislative means in the recent past. Congress has also encouraged the DOD 

to change the Unified Facilities Criteria (UFC) to allow greater usage of TLEDs on 

military bases. The Navy fleet already allows direct wire TLED technology for the 

fleet with great energy and manpower savings. Can you please explain to the committee why the DOD bans a safe and proven technology, used at major hospitals, 

schools, and other public building? Would you support changing the UFC to allow 

direct wire TLEDs on DOD bases? 

Admiral MORAN. UFC 3–530–01 Interior Exterior Lighting and Controls allows 

the use of Type A TLEDs. This is supported across the Services and is recognized 

in criteria and contract solicitations. Type B (direct wire) TLEDs are not supported 

by UFC 3–530–01 Interior Exterior Lighting and Controls. The fluorescent light fixture ballasts serve to significantly limit incoming line current to the lamp holders. 

This limits the potential shock hazard and ARC flash (thermal) hazard to anyone 

changing a burned-out lamp while the fixture is energized. Type B LED retrofit installation requires removal or bypass of the light fixture’s ballast. With the ballast 

removed or bypassed, incoming line current at full voltage (120, 277, or 480 volts) 

directly reaches the lamp holders. This exposes maintenance personnel to significant 

safety risks including electrical shock, ARC flash hazard, and fall hazard when installing and routinely replacing a lamp. On the other hand, Type A TLEDs do not 

require fixture modifications and provide safe and cost effective implementation of 

TLED technology into DOD facilities. A further complication is the lack of an industry standard for Type B lamp holders. Each manufacturer has its own unique lamp 

holder which prevents use of lamps from other manufacturers. This differs from all 

other types of commercially-available lighting technology (e.g., incandescent, metal 

halide, high-pressure sodium, induction, and fluorescent), each of which follows a 

common industry standard. (Type A linear LED lamps also fall into this category, 

by accommodating the standard lamp holder for fluorescent fixtures.) Should one 

make and model of Type B lamp prove unsatisfactory or become unavailable, the 

user would be forced to perform yet another modification to the fixture to accommodate the lamp holder of a different model or manufacturer. 

Mr. BROOKS. Congress has demonstrated our desire for the Department of Defense (DOD) to use tubular LED (TLED) lights to replace fluorescent lights through 

many legislative means in the recent past. Congress has also encouraged the DOD 

to change the Unified Facilities Criteria (UFC) to allow greater usage of TLEDs on 

military bases. The Navy fleet already allows direct wire TLED technology for the 

fleet with great energy and manpower savings. Can you please explain to the committee why the DOD bans a safe and proven technology, used at major hospitals, 

schools, and other public building? Would you support changing the UFC to allow 

direct wire TLEDs on DOD bases? 

General WILSON. Unified Facilities Criteria (UFC) 3–530–01, Interior and Exterior Lighting Systems and Controls, was updated on 1 Jun 2016 to allow linear LED 

lamps (also referred to as TLED lights) for Air Force and Army projects. The up-
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dated UFC can be found at https://www.wbdg.org/ffc/dod/unified-facilities-criteriaufc/ufc-3-530-01. 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MS. STEFANIK 

Ms. STEFANIK. Like many of my colleagues, I want to focus on military readiness, 

but in the context of emerging threats, and how we maintain the edge on a 21st 

century battlefield. Other near-peer adversaries and terrorist organizations have 

both exercised an increased use of cyber capabilities to support their objectives. How 

confident are you in each of your services cyber capabilities and how well they are 

tied in to the interagency apparatus? 

General ALLYN. The Army is very confident in its progress and development of 

the Cyber Mission Force and its operational capabilities in a very complex and contested domain. Today, the Army is engaged in real world cyberspace operations 

against our adversaries, and we will need additional tools, platforms, architecture 

and force structure to meet some operational demands. The Army’s mission is to 

protect the Army’s portion of the DOD information environment, support the joint 

cyber mission force and Unified Combatant Command requirements, as directed. In 

order to maintain our technological edge and prevail in the cyber domain we require 

sustained investment in building out the right force structure and development of 

the right capabilities. Cybersecurity requires a collaborative approach with a range 

of interagency and industry partners. Through U.S. Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM), ARCYBER partners with the DOD and Intelligence Community and collaborates with federal agencies, industry, academia and international partners. The 

Army can no longer assume continuous superiority in any domain because potential 

adversaries have made significant strides to disrupt or deny the use of Army combat 

capabilities that rely on the electromagnetic spectrum. In addition, we must also 

recognize the close interrelationship and interdependencies between the electromagnetic spectrum and the cyber domain. Accordingly, it is critical that the Army 

modernize its Electronic Warfare (EW) capabilities in order to first counter and then 

overmatch potential adversaries in the Electromagnetic Spectrum with EW capability and capacity. 

Ms. STEFANIK. Like many of my colleagues, I want to focus on military readiness, 

but in the context of emerging threats, and how we maintain the edge on a 21st 

century battlefield. Other near-peer adversaries and terrorist organizations have 

both exercised an increased use of cyber capabilities to support their objectives. How 

confident are you in each of your services cyber capabilities and how well they are 

tied in to the interagency apparatus? 

Admiral MORAN. The Navy has taken aggressive steps to hire and retain the 

cyber talent needed to operate and win in this new threat environment. We are maturing cyber offensive and defensive capabilities in concert with the joint forces and 

the interagency in order to assure our network availability and integrity while holding adversaries at risk. There is more work to be done to fully assure maritime command and control in a contested cyber environment, as the nature of this threat continues to morph over time. No one service or agency can do it alone and much of 

this work is conducted through the U.S. Cyber Command Cyber Mission Force on 

behalf of Combatant Commanders, DISA, and the Services. For cyberspace operations, collaboration, integration and coordination is extremely important due to the 

global operational nature of the cyber domain. To that end, the Navy has established a close working relationship with U.S. Cyber Command, our sister-services, 

and our interagency partners to support a whole of nation response to cyber threats. 

As we continue to face this rapidly changing cyber threat environment, the Navy 

will remain vigilant in detecting and sharing cyber threat information with our joint 

and interagency partners to share best practices and ensure mission success across 

all warfighting domains. 

Ms. STEFANIK. Like many of my colleagues, I want to focus on military readiness, 

but in the context of emerging threats, and how we maintain the edge on a 21st 

century battlefield. Other near-peer adversaries and terrorist organizations have 

both exercised an increased use of cyber capabilities to support their objectives. How 

confident are you in each of your services cyber capabilities and how well they are 

tied in to the interagency apparatus? 

General WILSON. The USAF has strong ties with the interagency and engages regularly with DHS, the National Intelligence community, and other federal partners. 

Our robust relationship helps with the sharing of indications and warnings and aids 

in focusing our mutual employment of our defensive cyber capabilities. While we 

continually strive to improve our operations, I am confident that our offensive forces 
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can rise to the occasion when tasked to employ the required capabilities to achieve 

the desired effects. 

Ms. STEFANIK. Like many of my colleagues, I want to focus on military readiness, 

but in the context of emerging threats, and how we maintain the edge on a 21st 

century battlefield. Other near-peer adversaries and terrorist organizations have 

both exercised an increased use of cyber capabilities to support their objectives. How 

confident are you in each of your services cyber capabilities and how well they are 

tied in to the interagency apparatus? 

General WALTERS. [No answer was available at the time of printing.] 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MS. HANABUSA 

Ms. HANABUSA. Our 21st century Army is playing a critical role in the Asia-Pacific, and notably strengthening our regional ties through programs like Pacific 

Pathways. Pohakuloa Training Area, on the Big Island of Hawaii, is leased by the 

Army but is used extensively for training by all the services, as well as the Hawaii 

National Guard and our State and County emergency responders. The Army’s lease 

with the State is due to expire in 2029, and although there are several steps left 

in the Army’s internal process before it can enter into negotiations with the State, 

Army Garrison Hawaii has made it clear that without access to the great training 

facilities at PTA, it will likely have to relocate the majority of its forces from Hawaii 

to the mainland. General, can you speak to the Army’s commitment to maintaining 

its presence in Hawaii, and may I ask for your commitment to seek a long-term 

lease renewal with the State? 

General ALLYN. The Army Operating Concept envisions Pohakuloa Training Area 

(PTA) as a regional training center, within the Pacific Training Complex, capable 

of supporting the United States Army Hawaii (USARHAW) home station and joint/ 

multinational training requirements. The training environment is fully supported by 

Live-Virtual-Constructive integrated training systems that enable Army units to 

achieve full readiness potential. Achieving this vision will require infrastructure investments to support the air, maritime, space, and cyber domains, and assured future access to the State of Hawaii leased lands on terms that allow the Army to 

fully utilize PTA to train as we fight. To that end, Headquarters, Department of the 

Army is coordinating with USARHAW and United States Army Pacific (USARPAC) 

on a request to be forwarded through the chain of command for authority to acquire 

a long-term interest in the currently leased State of Hawaii lands. 

Ms. HANABUSA. Admiral Moran, as you know, the Pacific Missile Range Facility 

on Kauai is home to an Aegis Ashore test site. What are your thoughts on converting PMRF into a combat-ready facility for missile defense to rebuff North Korea, 

and to a lesser extent China as needed? 

Admiral MORAN. The Pacific Missile Range Facility (PMRF) and Aegis Ashore 

Missile Defense Test Complex (AAMDTC) are critical to Test and Evaluation (T&E) 

and training across a variety of warfare areas, directly benefiting programs from all 

the services and MDA. PMRF’s unique, strategic, mid-Pacific location, combined 

with extensive range space, specialized instrumentation, and unique testing-focused 

logistics support, provide important capabilities to Ballistic Missile Defense testing 

and help sustain Navy readiness. If the AAMDTC was operationalized, it would adversely impact the further development of Joint defenses to rebuff a wide range of 

threats from North Korea or China due to losing a T&E and training site for a combat-ready, missile defense facility. MDA has commenced siting studies for a Homeland Defense Radar–Hawaii, which will provide better defense of the Hawaiian Islands. The AAMDTC would provide better service as it was originally intended— 

as the test bed for future Aegis technologies. 

Ms. HANABUSA. Maintaining the shipyard at Pearl Harbor provides us a huge 

strategic and geographical advantage, as it is 14 days steam time from Honolulu 

to the South China Sea, as opposed to 21 from the west coast of the U.S. Currently, 

however, our dry docks and infrastructure are in need of some significant upgrades. 

For example, Dry Dock 3 is not large enough to service Virginia-class submarines. 

Will the proposed buildup and improvement of Navy ships correspond with similar 

investment in our shipyards and other facilities? 

Admiral MORAN. Once the Navy determines the timing of ships and makes homeporting decisions, infrastructure investment requirements will be identified and 

prioritized to ensure continued warfighter readiness. 

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