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i 

71–529 2012

[H.A.S.C. No. 112–90] 

A DAY WITHOUT SEAPOWER AND 

PROJECTION FORCES 

JOINT HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON SEAPOWER AND 

PROJECTION FORCES 

MEETING JOINTLY WITH THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON READINESS 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

HEARING HELD 

NOVEMBER 3, 2011 
(II) 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON SEAPOWER AND PROJECTION FORCES 

W. TODD AKIN, Missouri, Chairman 

DUNCAN HUNTER, California 

MIKE COFFMAN, Colorado 

SCOTT RIGELL, Virginia 

TIM GRIFFIN, Arkansas 

STEVEN PALAZZO, Mississippi 

TODD YOUNG, Indiana 

ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia 

ROB WITTMAN, Virginia 

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania 

MIKE MCINTYRE, North Carolina 

SUSAN A. DAVIS, California 

JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island 

RICK LARSEN, Washington 

JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut 

CHELLIE PINGREE, Maine 

MARK S. CRITZ, Pennsylvania 

HANK JOHNSON, Georgia 

BETTY SUTTON, Ohio 

TOM MACKENZIE, Professional Staff Member 

PHIL MACNAUGHTON, Professional Staff Member 

MARY KATE CUNNINGHAM, Staff Assistant 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON READINESS 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia, Chairman 

MIKE ROGERS, Alabama 

JOE HECK, Nevada 

AUSTIN SCOTT, Georgia 

FRANK A. LOBIONDO, New Jersey 

CHRIS GIBSON, New York 

VICKY HARTZLER, Missouri 

BOBBY SCHILLING, Illinois 

JON RUNYAN, New Jersey 

TIM GRIFFIN, Arkansas 

STEVEN PALAZZO, Mississippi 

MARTHA ROBY, Alabama 

MADELEINE Z. BORDALLO, Guam 

SILVESTRE REYES, Texas 

JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut 

DAVE LOEBSACK, Iowa 

GABRIELLE GIFFORDS, Arizona 

LARRY KISSELL, North Carolina 

BILL OWENS, New York 

TIM RYAN, Ohio 

COLLEEN HANABUSA, Hawaii 

JAMIE LYNCH, Professional Staff Member 

VICKIE PLUNKETT, Professional Staff Member 

NICHOLAS RODMAN, Staff Assistant 
(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF HEARINGS 

2011 

Page 

HEARING: 

Thursday, November 3, 2011, A Day Without Seapower and Projection Forces 1 

APPENDIX: 

Thursday, November 3, 2011 .................................................................................. 31 

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2011 

A DAY WITHOUT SEAPOWER AND PROJECTION FORCES 

STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS 

Akin, Hon. W. Todd, a Representative from Missouri, Chairman, Subcommittee on Seapower and Projection Forces .................................................. 3 

Bordallo, Hon. Madeleine Z., a Delegate from Guam, Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Readiness ...................................................................................... 5 

Forbes, Hon. J. Randy, a Representative from Virginia, Chairman, Subcommittee on Readiness ...................................................................................... 1 

McIntyre, Hon. Mike, a Representative from North Carolina, Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Seapower and Projection Forces .................................... 3 

WITNESSES 

Clingan, VADM Bruce W., USN, Deputy Chief of Naval Operations for Operations, Planning and Strategy (N3/5) ................................................................. 6 

Hesterman, Maj Gen John W., III, USAF, Assistant Deputy Chief of Staff 

for Operations, Plans, and Requirements (A3/5), U.S. Air Force ..................... 10 

Mills, LtGen Richard P., USMC, Deputy Commander for Combat Development and Integration, Marine Corps Combat Development Command .......... 7 

APPENDIX 

PREPARED STATEMENTS: 

Akin, Hon. W. Todd .......................................................................................... 35 

Clingan, VADM Bruce W. ................................................................................ 38 

Forbes, Hon. J. Randy ...................................................................................... 36 

Hesterman, Maj Gen John W., III .................................................................. 61 

Mills, LtGen Richard P. ................................................................................... 54 

DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD: 

[There were no Documents submitted.] 

WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING THE HEARING: 

Ms. Bordallo ...................................................................................................... 75 

Mr. Larsen ........................................................................................................ 75 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING: 

Mr. Coffman ...................................................................................................... 82 

Mr. Forbes ......................................................................................................... 81 

Mr. Palazzo ....................................................................................................... 86 
Page

IV 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING—Continued 

Mr. Schilling ..................................................................................................... 83 

Mr. Scott ............................................................................................................ 85 
(1) 

A DAY WITHOUT SEAPOWER AND PROJECTION FORCES 

House of Representatives, Committee on Armed Services, 

Subcommittee on Seapower and Projection Forces, Meeting 

Jointly with Subcommittee on Readiness, Washington, DC, 

Thursday, November 3, 2011. 

The subcommittees met, pursuant to call, at 11:42 a.m. in room 

2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. J. Randy Forbes (chairman of the Subcommittee on Readiness) presiding. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. J. RANDY FORBES, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM VIRGINIA, CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE 

ON READINESS 

Mr. FORBES. Good morning. We would like to call this joint hearing to order. 

Mr. Akin, we understand, is on his way, and he will take over 

the gavel as soon as he gets here. 

But I want to thank Chairman Akin for co-chairing this hearing 

and thank all of our members and the distinguished panel of experts and welcome them to today’s hearing focused on what the future of seapower and projection capabilities may portend in an era 

of austere budgets. 

I am sure that Chairman Akin will note his appreciation for all 

of our witnesses being here, and I want to just say how much we 

appreciate your service to our country and your taking time today 

to bring your expertise and experience to all the members of this 

subcommittee. 

I believe it is vital that you are all here today to continue to inform the members of these subcommittees and the public in advance of the ‘‘super committee’’ [Joint Select Committee on Deficit 

Reduction] delivering its ultimate recommendations to the Congress. 

I am going to keep my remarks short in order that we proceed 

to the heart of the discussion. The Readiness Subcommittee has 

convened numerous times in the past few months to hear from 

each of the services, and most recently the vice chiefs, regarding 

the current state of the force, the increased risk and the uncertainty of the future and potential impacts to military readiness if 

sequestration were enacted. 

While there seems to be a prevailing consensus that sequestration, under the Budget Control Act, would be devastating to the 

military, I remain severely concerned that we have already gone 

too far. 

Last year, when the DOD [Department of Defense] began closing 

Joint Forces Command without any predecisional analysis, I told 

members this would soon be coming to a theater near you. 
2 

Well, currently, we are dealing with the $465 billion DOD cuts 

that was arbitrarily made without analysis to underpin that number. Now another shoe has dropped with regard to civilian personnel. The Air Force announced just yesterday that they will 

eliminate 16,500 civilian positions in fiscal year 2012. That is just 

the Air Force and only one fiscal year. 

What happens when the other shoe drops or if it drops under sequestration? 

With all these individual decisions, the cumulative effect will be 

devastating. At this point, I would say get ready. The show is only 

just beginning. 

This leads me to reiterate my concern regarding additional shortterm decisions that could lead to the potential hollowing of the 

force under sequestration. That would be a situation that cannot be 

quickly reversed. 

General Dunford articulated this very point before the Readiness 

Subcommittee last week regarding concerns that we will make 

these cuts without any adequate appreciation of the strategic implications. 

The implications on our readiness are the implications of breaking faith; and also, that folks would think that, if we get it wrong, 

‘‘Well, we can just simply fix it in a year or two.’’ 

That is not possible, particularly in the latter category. And if we 

break the trust of our marines, sailors, soldiers and airmen today, 

it would be decades before we get it back. 

The question I continue to ask is what is the risk to the national 

defense of our country if we continue to make some of the cuts to 

defense we are hearing being discussed in Washington? 

There are never enough resources to eliminate all of our risk, but 

there must be a strategic assessment to underpin the decisions. Instead, I feel that, currently, the DOD is just responding to budgetary pressures the result of which could severely degrade the military’s ability to operate. 

In Vice Admiral Clingan’s written testimony for this hearing 

today, he indicates, without question, the fleet is operating now at 

an unsustainable level. 

To best meet the combatant commander’s need for deployed Navy 

forces since September 11, 2001, and to respond to emergent requirements, we have increased the frequency and average length of 

unit deployments. 

This has resulted in reduced training time, reduced maintenance 

availabilities, a narrowing of predeployment training for certain 

units to mission-specific tasks, and an accelerated aging of our 

ships and aircraft. 

Consistent with the testimony that Vice Admiral Burke provided 

before the Readiness Subcommittee, the Navy has been operating 

in a sustained surge, precluding the opportunity to do deep maintenance on fleet assets. How will that impact the future force? Looking forward, will our forces be ready for the mission they are called 

upon to do when the time comes? 

While there are many contributing factors that brought us to this 

point today, we are currently at a crossroads where we have time 

yet to prepare for the many tough decisions that lie ahead. 
3 

In doing so, we must not forget our obligation to ensure our men 

and women in uniform are given all the tools necessary for the job 

we ask them to do. 

I look forward to learning from each of our witnesses about how 

we cope with these challenging fiscal times while also maintaining 

a ready military. 

At this time, I would like to recognize my good friend, the representative from North Carolina, Mr. McIntyre, for any opening remarks he might have and pass the gavel to Chairman Akin. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Forbes can be found in the Appendix on page 36.] 

STATEMENT OF HON. MIKE MCINTYRE, A REPRESENTATIVE 

FROM NORTH CAROLINA, RANKING MEMBER, SUBCOMMITTEE ON SEAPOWER AND PROJECTION FORCES 

Mr. MCINTYRE. Thank you very much. 

I thank the chairman. Thank you, Mr. Forbes and to Mr. Akin, 

and thank them for their leadership. 

I also want to thank the witnesses for taking time out of your 

schedule to be with us today and to even come and meet with us 

yesterday and other days that you have met with us personally 

when we have had questions or had concerns and you have been 

proactive in raising the awareness of the concerns that our military 

has with regard to this budget. 

It is becoming clear that, as we draw down from Iraq and Afghanistan, the demand for maritime presence and force projection 

will increase. 

We must ensure that our troops are available to quickly respond 

to crises around the world. As we know also, there will be times 

that we are called upon to offer humanitarian assistance in disaster situations and to help protect and keep open economic trade 

lanes by maintaining peace operations. 

I am concerned, very concerned about the impact that large defense cuts will have on U.S. national security. DOD has given more 

than their fair share in budget cuts already. And if further cuts 

were implemented beyond those in the Budget Control Act, our 

great Nation possibly could be jeopardized in terms of its status as 

the global power that is preeminent. 

I look forward to hearing the witnesses discuss the current missions we are executing in our combat AORs [Areas of Responsibility] and elsewhere around the world. More importantly, I would 

like to hear which of these missions would be compromised if we 

faced the inevitable situation that we hope will not face by November 23rd or ultimately December 23rd. 

Thank you. Thank you to the witnesses for your service. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

STATEMENT OF HON. W. TODD AKIN, A REPRESENTATIVE 

FROM MISSOURI, CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

SEAPOWER AND PROJECTION FORCES 

Mr. AKIN. [Presiding.] Thank you very much. I appreciate it. 

And thank you, Randy, also for sitting in for me here. I was 

caught on the telephone. I think we ought to get rid of those gadgets. 
4 

So, if we could, I would like to back up a little bit, start the meeting with a prayer, if I could. Father, we thank you for the people 

who serve us in uniform, and we just ask please now for your wisdom as we take a look at the decisions that we need to be making 

in this Nation. And I ask your blessing on everybody here and help 

us to make good and wise decisions. I pray in Jesus’ name. Amen. 

Just to put things simply, and I want to try to get to the right altitude here, we have already taken $450 billion in cuts to military just in the last year or so. Now, $450 billion is more than normal paycheck that I know what to do with, so what does that 

amount to? I want to try and put that in perspective. 

First of all, we have a Marine general. I think you are talking about $100 billion maybe for a year to run the United States Marines. Is that roughly right? So $450 billion cut that we have already taken would be the equivalent of 41⁄2 years for the entire Marine Corps budget, right? 

Let us shift over now. Let us talk about aircraft carriers. We 

have, I believe, 11 aircraft carriers. We don’t lose them too often, 

they are considered important. How many would $450 billion buy; 

about what, maybe 45 aircraft carriers? That is a long string of aircraft carriers. 

That is how big the cuts we have already taken are, and now 

there is discussion about cutting more. 

And so the point of this hearing is to say, ‘‘When is enough already in terms of cuts?’’ 

Now, just to put some things onto some graphs, we have a couple 

of graphs that I think are very important for people to be aware 

of. The first is this one here, and it is on the chart. Basically it 

shows, as a percent of GDP [Gross Domestic Product] how much we 

have spent on defense through the years, and also as a percent of 

GDP what we are spending on various things that politicians call 

entitlements. 

The red line is the entitlements. The blue line is defense. What 

you see is we are spending a whole lot less of the American dollar 

on defense than we used to. That is the first one. 

The second chart that I think is somewhat—no, I don’t want to 

do that chart. I want to do that other one about the number of 

planes and men in uniform. Okay. 

If you make a comparison to where we were in 1990, the number 

of people in uniform, the number of aircraft and the number of 

ships, what you see is, is that we are running about 50 percent just 

in sheer numbers of where we were in 1990. 

So we are already at half strength from 1990, and now we are talking—that is before the $450 billion budget cut. And if we take 

more budget cuts, what is that going to mean? 

I am very uncomfortable with those numbers, but I am not the 

expert. We have the experts right here with us this morning. 

I would hope each of you gentlemen would first of all at least follow somewhere in your presentation, one, this is the purpose of 

what my branch of service is about; and then second of all, if you 

take this money away, how is that going to degrade our ability to 

do the mission that you have been assigned to do? 

With that, I am going to conclude my opening remarks and go 

to the wonderful lady from Guam, Madam Bordallo. 
5 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Akin can be found in the Appendix on page 35.] 

STATEMENT OF HON. MADELEINE Z. BORDALLO, A DELEGATE 

FROM GUAM, RANKING MEMBER, SUBCOMMITTEE ON READINESS 

Ms. BORDALLO. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and Chairman Forbes. Thank you for scheduling this hearing. And I am glad 

to join my colleague and my good friend Congressman McIntyre. 

I also want to welcome each of our witnesses this afternoon. 

And, General Hesterman, I congratulate you on your new appointment as the military deputy for readiness in the Office of the 

Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness. 

Today we continue our discussion on the implications of the defense spending reductions resulting from the passage of the Budget 

Control Act, as well as the possible implications if sequestering occurs. 

As I have stated in previous hearings, I do not believe sequestration needs to occur. In fact, I believe former Senator Simpson, Erskine Bowles, and others got it right when they indicated that the 

so-called super committee cannot fail. Everything must be on the 

table to achieve a balanced result that helps put American finances 

back on track. 

So that said, I believe our sea and air-power projection capabilities are vitally important as we understand the threats that we 

will be facing in future years. 

This is particularly important for my constituents in Guam. Our 

naval and Air Force long-range strike capabilities are what to a 

greater extent provide stability in the Western Pacific. The tyranny 

of distance in the Pacific makes these capabilities invaluable. 

Recently, Secretary Panetta visited our allies in Asia to discuss 

a range of issues, and I commend Secretary Panetta for his comments while he was in Asia. Time after time he reiterated the importance of Asia-Pacific to the U.S. military and our greater national security and economic interests. 

He further stated how important it is that no matter what happens with regards to current or future budget reductions, that we 

at least maintain, if not grow, our military presence in Asia-Pacific. 

Secretary Panetta stated, ‘‘Most importantly, we have the opportunity to strengthen our presence in the Pacific, and we will.’’ 

I believe that is the right approach for our country to be best postured to address current and emerging threats. I hope that each of 

our witnesses this afternoon will be able to comment on the importance of power projection or long-range strikes if we are to maintain a constant and significant presence in Asia-Pacific. 

Specifically, how important is the development of a next-generation bomber to our presence in the Pacific? What additional capabilities could this asset provide us in the Asia-Pacific region? Further, what strategies are being employed to manage the program 

in a cost-effective manner? 

For our friends in the Navy and the Marine Corps, I hope you 

can each comment on the impact that tyranny of distance has on 

power projection. What is needed to overcome the tyranny of distance? There has been some discussion, particularly by our friends 
6 

in the Senate, of pulling back most of our military forces from 

abroad to bases back home; or whether we even need a forwarddeployed presence. 

I hope our witnesses can discuss the strategic value of a forwarddeployed presence, particularly in the Asia-Pacific region. 

Finally, many of those in think tanks are suggesting that our 

next conflict will be a maritime and air battle concept. I remain 

concerned that budget cuts, because of the Budget Control Act, will 

unduly target the operation and maintenance accounts, and specifically the training accounts. 

How are the Navy and the Marine Corps going to approach this 

matter? The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were primarily land 

based, so what will we need to do to achieve a certain level of readiness for our Naval and Marine Corps forces? How important is 

amphibious landing capability to an expeditionary Marine Corps? 

I hope that each of these matters can be addressed at this hearing, and I thank each of our witness, and I look forward to your 

testimony. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. AKIN. Thank you very much for your opening statement as 

well. 

Now we are going to go to our witnesses. And first off is Vice Admiral Bruce Clingan. He is the Deputy Chief of Naval Operations 

for Planning and Strategy. 

And so, Bruce, fire away, sir. 

STATEMENT OF VADM BRUCE W. CLINGAN, USN, DEPUTY 

CHIEF OF NAVAL OPERATIONS FOR OPERATIONS, PLANNING AND STRATEGY (N3/5) 

Admiral CLINGAN. Thank you, Chairman Akin, Chairman Forbes, 

Ranking Member McIntyre and Ranking Member Bordallo and 

members of the subcommittee. We thank you for the opportunity 

to testify today. 

I am proud to represent 625,000 sailors and civilians that are 

serving on Active Duty in the Navy today, a testament to your support today, and which makes the topic of today’s hearing hypothetical, thankfully, as opposed to historical. 

I look forward to assisting you to ensure that our Navy remains 

fully capable of providing America offshore options to protect and 

advance our national interests in an era of uncertainty and fiscal 

challenges that must be addressed. 

As it has for more than 200 years, our Navy today delivers credible capability for deterrence, sea control, and power projection, to 

prevent crises, contain conflicts, and win our Nation’s wars. 

We remain forward at the maritime crossroads, protecting the 

interconnected systems of trade, information and security that underpin our Nation’s economic prosperity. 

This prosperity requires free access to the global commons, in 

particular the maritime air, space, and cyberspace commons where 

the Navy operates today, which are increasingly threatened by 

both state and non-state actors. 

Significant concerns have been voiced regarding the impact of the 

Budget Control Act on the Navy’s future ability to fulfill its fundamental responsibilities. There is no doubt that the evolving security 
7 

environment, characterized by systems designed to neutralize our 

advantages in both space and cyberspace; proliferation of sophisticated weapons intended to prevent freedom of action in those global commons; aggressive, coercive and assertive states, unfettered by 

international norms; and persistent attacks by violent extremists. 

All of these characteristics of the future security environment pose 

a growing challenge to our national interests. 

And all of these characteristics demand a ready Navy that can 

rapidly and effectively respond to diverse crises with efficient offshore options ranging from humanitarian assistance to high-end, 

high-intensity combat operations against a very capable adversary. 

The risk to successfully accomplishing such missions today is significant and the impact of the Budget Control Act before sequestration would push this risk to the manageable limit. Tough choices 

will have to be made as we balance this risk and distribute it 

across the Navy’s portfolio and as we endeavor to ensure that we 

are manned, trained, and equipped to fulfill our obligations to the 

Nation. 

While we anticipate being resourced at a level that will never result in a day without seapower, I am eager to answer your questions as we contemplate adjustments that move the Navy in this 

direction. 

Thank you. 

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

Appendix on page 38.] 

Mr. AKIN. Thank you, Admiral. 

Our next witness is going to be Lieutenant General Richard 

Mills, Deputy Commander for Combat Development and Integration at the Marine Corps, Combat Development Command. 

General Mills. 

STATEMENT OF LTGEN RICHARD P. MILLS, USMC, DEPUTY 

COMMANDER FOR COMBAT DEVELOPMENT AND INTEGRATION, MARINE CORPS COMBAT DEVELOPMENT COMMAND 

General MILLS. Thank you, sir. 

Chairman Akin, Chairman Forbes, Ranking Members McIntyre 

and Bordallo, members of the subcommittee, thank you very much 

for the opportunity to appear before you today to discuss the importance of seapower and projection forces. 

More importantly, thank you for the tremendous support you 

provide to your marines on a daily basis, both here at CONUS 

[Continental United States], while embarked aboard ship, and in 

combat overseas. 

As we plan for the years ahead, we see a world of increasing instability and conflict. It will be characterized by poverty, competition for resources, urbanization, overpopulation, and extremism. 

Failed states may indeed become safe havens for terrorists, insurgents, and criminal groups that directly threaten the United States 

and our allies. 

There is no doubt that these trends will exert a significant influence on future security environments. History tells us that we 

never know when crisis, conflict or security challenges will occur, 

but it also tells us we know they will occur. It also tells us the price 
8 

we will have to pay if we are unable to respond to them quickly, 

effectively, and reasonably. 

While the character of the future security environment continues 

to evolve and change, our Nation’s requirement to maintain a forward-based force in readiness has not changed and in fact has 

never been stronger. Forward-deployed forces are important for a 

myriad of reasons. 

First, physical presence matters. It demonstrates our economic 

and military commitment to a particular region. It deters our adversaries. It ensures our friends. Crisis response matters, and crisis 

response is frequently measured in hours, if not in minutes. Embassies are threatened. Americans are put in danger. Disasters 

occur. Time is critical. Flexible options are critical. 

When the marines rescued a downed American pilot shot down 

in Libya earlier this year, the marines did so from amphibious 

shipping in the Mediterranean, with the rescue completed within 

3 hours of notification. Without our forward presence, that situation would have turned out dramatically differently. Imagine how 

the situation might have changed had Gadhafi in fact captured a 

U.S. aircrew. 

Earlier in the year, within 20 hours of notification of the tsunami, forward-deployed marines arrived in Japan to conduct humanitarian assistance and disaster relief missions. Crisis response 

cannot be adequately accomplished in the United States. By its 

very nature, it requires a forward presence that our naval forces 

are uniquely positioned to provide. We are the Nation’s away-team 

ready to respond to any crisis. 

The Nation must have forward-deployed marines ready to respond to crisis. Indeed, I believe that the phrase, ‘‘The marines 

have landed and the situation is well in hand,’’ means more than 

just kinetic success. It means that people struck by disaster quickly 

see the United States flag helping them. It means that a stable, capable force under the United States flag is on hand to assist in any 

number of crisis situations. 

Ultimately, it means people overseas thankful to the United 

States for the help they receive. 

The demand for amphibious forces has never been greater. Flexibility has been the key. This year alone, your Marines partnered 

with the Navy have fought an aggressive, full-spectrum counterinsurgency operation in Afghanistan and we continue to fight there 

today. Partnered with allied forces engaged in missions at every geographic combatant commander’s area of responsibility, we train 

with our allies. 

We have conducted foreign humanitarian assistance and disaster 

relief missions in Pakistan, in Haiti, in the Philippines, and in 

Japan. We have executed maritime security operations to ensure 

freedom of navigation along sea lines of communication. That includes the recapture of the vessel Magellan Star and the rescue of 

its crew from Somali pirates. 

The Marines have rapidly reinforced U.S. embassies overseas, in 

Haiti, in Guinea, in Kazakhstan, and in Cairo, Egypt. We have protected diplomatic personnel. And finally, we have conducted air 

strikes against loyalist forces in Libya and, as I mentioned, rescued 

an American aviator shot down during Operation Odyssey Dawn. 
9 

Demand for amphibious forces has never been greater, as I said. 

While we cannot know when the next conflict will occur, we know 

in fact that it will occur. When that happens, America’s forwarddeployed Navy and Marine Corps team will be there, ready to plug 

the gaps during international crisis; ready to give our decisionmakers back here in Washington time and space in which to make 

those decisions; and ultimately, to provide those decisionmakers 

with responsible options to respond when the Nation is ready. 

The United States remains the world’s largest economy. We are 

critically dependent on the sea for exports and imports that ultimately sustain our livelihood. Disruptions in the sea have measurable economic impact on every family in the States. The Nation’s 

naval forces provide the ability to maneuver through the littorals, 

to deter, to defend, and to protect vital areas from any variety of 

threats without dependence on land bases. 

I would urge the members to remember that the Nation’s economic health is directly tied to our ability to maintain stability on 

the seas. Your Navy and Marine Corps team is forward-deployed 

and ready to meet the needs of our Nation. 

Over the past decade, our men and women in uniform have made 

extraordinary sacrifices. We must maintain faith with our marines. 

We must send them a clear message that their contributions are 

recognized and appreciated. For us the marines, keeping faith 

means that the institution, the people, the marines, the families 

that are out there in Twentynine Palms, Camp Pendleton, Camp 

Lejeune, Beaufort are ready. 

We need to maintain their best interests at heart. Even though 

they understand there will be changes, we must have their best interests at heart at all times as you look at the three main areas 

of manning, training, and equipping our forces that go forward. We 

cannot break faith with them. 

Cuts at the level anticipated with sequestration would in fact 

break faith with those marines. I would like to add that as the year 

continues, the challenge we face operating on a continuing resolution will only increase. We need a budget passed so that we have 

the predictability and flexibility to carry out our missions. 

In the months and years ahead, we will face difficult resource decisions. I urge Congress to consider how best to mitigate the risk 

of a reduced defense capability; and I tell you, like an affordable 

insurance policy, the Marine Corps and Navy’s amphibious forces 

are, in fact, the hedge against the Nation’s most likely risks. It is 

imperative that our Nation retain a credible means of mitigating 

risk as we draw down other capabilities and capacities. 

Thank you for the opportunity to be here. I look forward to your 

questions. 

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

Appendix on page 54.] 

Mr. AKIN. Thank you very much, General. 

Our last witness is Major General John Hesterman, United 

States Air Force, Assistant Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations, 

Plans and Requirements. 

And I also wanted to offer my congratulations, General 

Hesterman, at your nomination for Lieutenant General, I guess 

was just yesterday, was it? 
10 

Thank you very much. Please proceed. 

STATEMENT OF MAJ GEN JOHN W. HESTERMAN III, USAF, ASSISTANT DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF FOR OPERATIONS, 

PLANS, AND REQUIREMENTS (A3/5), U.S. AIR FORCE 

General HESTERMAN. I thank the chairman. My senior joint 

brothers have told me I will immediately become more intelligent 

and more eloquent if that confirmation process goes forward. 

Chairman Akin, Chairman Forbes, Ranking Member Bordallo 

and all the distinguished members of the committee, thanks for the 

opportunity to provide you an update on your power projection 

forces and your outstanding airmen around the world. 

Today, the Air Force is fully engaged in operations across the 

globe supporting our Nation’s and our combat commanders’ requirements. Today, our capability and reach are unparalleled 

among the world’s air forces, and the dedication of your airmen is 

truly exceptional, and they are busy. 

Each day, 24 hours a day, a mobility aircraft takes off every 90 

seconds. On an average day, your airmen and our airlift fleet transport 4,500 passengers and over 1,900 tons of cargo. Our tanker 

crews deliver 5 million pounds of fuel to U.S. and coalition aircraft 

and there has been no let-up in the pace. 

Since September 11th, 2001, our tankers have delivered 15 billion pounds of fuel. Our airlift fleet has delivered over 6.5 million 

tons of cargo. During a 2-week period last March, affectionately 

known inside the Air Force as ‘‘March madness,’’ the Air Force conducted humanitarian relief efforts in Japan simultaneously with 

combat operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya. 

In Japan, the Air Force opened Sendai Airfield in the heart of 

the disaster area within 5 days of the tsunami and started the flow 

of much-needed aid. Within 2 weeks, our airlift crews delivered 2.5 

million gallons of water and 167 tons of food to those most affected. 

Last year in Afghanistan, we air-dropped 60 million pounds of 

critical supplies in the most heavily contested areas to our soldiers 

and marines. Our air-drop for Operation Enduring Freedom has 

doubled each year since 2006, from 3.5 million pounds in 2006 to 

60.4 million pounds in 2010. And this year we have exceeded the 

2010 number already. 

This important capability minimizes the predictable overland delivery requirement which puts truck convoys and U.S. personnel at 

risk of insurgent attacks and the prolific IED [Improvised Explosive Device] threats. It saves soldiers’ and marines’ lives. At the 

same time, in the early days of the Libya conflict, as part of Operation Odyssey Dawn, our B–2 stealth bombers launched from 

Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri flew halfway around the 

world and destroyed precise targets in Libya before flying back 

home to Whiteman. En route, they were refueled several times by 

our tanker fleets and their crews. Yours is the only air force on the 

planet that can do that and right now, we can do it anywhere we 

need to. 

Our Nation cannot afford to compromise this long-range strike 

capability, particularly as we look at a future with anti-access/areadenial environments our adversaries are now creating. 
11 

Chairmen, Ranking Members, all the distinguished subcommittee members, I join our Secretary of Defense and my Air 

Force Chief of Staff in stating that any further cuts in addition to 

the $450-plus billion already identified in the Budget Control Act 

will at least reduce our capability to conduct these operations concurrently. And if the sequester provision goes into effect, it may 

risk our ability to protect the Nation. 

My sincere thanks to all of you for your continued support of 

your outstanding airmen and for all our Nation’s military, and I 

look forward to your questions. 

[The prepared statement of General Hesterman can be found in 

the Appendix on page 61.] 

Mr. AKIN. Thank you, all three, for your testimonies. 

We are going to now proceed to questions from both committees 

here. And as the chairman, I guess I get the first shot. So I am 

going to try and start with kind of simple things. 

There are a lot of people that would prefer America to be a nation that is at peace and where things are peaceful and there is not 

war going on all the time. 

So if you really want America to be a peaceful nation, would you 

think it would be better to have a strong military or a weak military? 

Admiral CLINGAN. Chairman Akin, I will start the answer. 

Of course, you might imagine that you will find unanimity of 

opinion at this table that a strong military certainly contributes to 

the peace that the American population and, frankly, our allies and 

partners desire. And in many cases we are the guarantor of their 

peace as well as our own. 

Mr. AKIN. Good, let us just stop right there. That is kind of what 

I was fishing for. 

It seems like to me if we are strong, one, it doesn’t encourage adventurism in other nations that are less stable. And it provides not 

only peace for our own people but around the world nations can 

trade and more or less live at peace just because of, in a sense, the 

umbrella that we provide. 

Is that a pretty safe assumption? And so if we allow our defense 

to degenerate, then we get into a situation where there is more 

wars and things, isn’t that right? The times that we have been at 

war, haven’t those times been many times when we are not as 

strong as we might have been? Anybody want to comment on that 

historically? 

General MILLS. Sir, I would echo your words. I think any student 

of history realizes this country has been most at threat and gone 

to war when it has been its weakest. Certainly, World War II 

would be certainly an outstanding example of that. 

But I concur with the admiral. The best way to ensure a just 

peace is to have a strong military that is out there to deter your 

enemy and to stand ready to defend your homeland if called upon. 

Mr. AKIN. Right. 

Now, sometimes people are critical and say, ‘‘Hey, we have got 

troops in Germany and we have got troops in Korea, all this stuff. 

Why do we need troops all the way over there? Why don’t we just 

bring them home, and save a lot of money—with having to resup-
12 

ply all of those different people living in different corners of the 

world?’’ 

And, yet, some of the missions that you have talked about today 

couldn’t happen if we didn’t have forward-deployed troops, isn’t 

that correct? 

Admiral CLINGAN. That is correct, Chairman. 

Mr. AKIN. So just kind of running through things, first of all, a 

navy, your mission in a way is to turn the oceans into area where 

we can project force in order to keep the peace but also be prepared 

for different contingencies, is that correct? 

Admiral CLINGAN. Chairman Akin, that is absolutely correct. 

Mr. AKIN. And in order to do that you have to have a certain 

number of ships because the globe is a pretty big place to put ships 

on, isn’t it? 

Admiral CLINGAN. Yes, it is. 

Mr. AKIN. So you don’t have enough ships you are not going to 

be present and then people start to become adventurous and do 

risky things, is that right? 

Admiral CLINGAN. That is certainly a risk as we look at the future security environment and the way it is evolving. 

Mr. AKIN. Okay. 

And then from the point of view of the Marine Corps, your job 

is to be the first ones in, but in a degree, doesn’t that also buy us 

time in terms of what our response needs to be when there is a 

problem, General? 

General MILLS. Absolutely, sir. The presence of amphibious 

forces near a crisis site, I believe, buy critical time for decisionmakers to sort out what needs to be done and come to a reasonable 

solution over that. 

Those forces don’t necessarily have to be ashore. Simply their 

presence in the area indicates the strength and power of the 

United States is there ready to take action if so called upon; I believe has a huge deterrent effect anyplace in the world where we 

have our forward-deployed forces. 

Mr. AKIN. Because essentially if you need to go into a particular 

location in the world in a fairly short period of time, you could hit 

with a pretty big hammer and land an awful lot of marines, is that 

correct? 

General MILLS. Sir, we advertise ourself as a middle weight force 

but we are in fact strong enough to be able to stabilize any situation and then allow for the entry of the joint force as it begins to 

close on that situation. 

But, yes, sir, we are there prepared to win once we get ashore, 

and then thoroughly ready to do so under our current capabilities. 

Mr. AKIN. Right. 

General MILLS. Should we suffer drastic cuts, those capabilities, 

in fact, could be reduced? 

Mr. AKIN. And when that is reduced then you have got to make 

decisions, right? You got to decide, ‘‘Am I going to cut training? Am 

I going to have fewer troops?’’—so that makes everything more 

risky. ‘‘Am I going to have cheaper, poorer quality equipment so 

people don’t have the type of protection they need?’’ 

All those are given you some kind of impossible decisions to 

make in a way, aren’t they, when you get down to a certain point? 
13 

General MILLS. Those are very difficult decisions to make, sir. I 

think the battlefield is a dynamic place. It is not stable. The enemy 

threat changes every day. I would point to Afghanistan where we 

look at an enemy who is adaptive, who is imaginative and who we 

have to adjust to. Those require changes in equipment, they require changes in training and adequate force structure to conduct 

the mission once ashore. 

Mr. AKIN. And then, John, from a Air Force point of view, in a 

way, you have a lot of service aspect to what you do because you 

are providing all that support essentially to all the other people, as 

well as that long-range punch to let people know that we have 

some teeth and those teeth can reach pretty far and bite pretty 

hard. And that is what you have to try to maintain that capability 

too, right? 

General HESTERMAN. Yes, sir, Mr. Chairman, that is true. 

And let me add, to pile on just a little bit, I spent the last year 

of my life in the Middle East as the Deputy Air Component Commander for Central Command. And there is a reason the combatant commanders spend most of their time working on relationships 

with foreign militaries and foreign leaders: so that we are able to 

execute, or we are told to go execute the things we need to do that 

we have those relationships in order to give us the access and the 

lily pads and the things that we need to prosecute our campaigns. 

Mr. AKIN. So there is an ongoing working with other nation partners and things, which facilitate that ability to provide that overall 

umbrella of peace, really—— 

General HESTERMAN. I am convinced it is essential, sir. 

Mr. AKIN. Yes. 

Well, if any of you want to jump on; I just want to talk at the 

highest level. What starts to degenerate if you don’t fund things 

enough? 

Because we have seen the charts, and we have been cutting defense, as a percent of GDP heavily. We see that we have reduced 

our force almost by half of where we were in 1990. 

And now we are talking after $450 billion, which again I am trying to figure out what 45 aircraft carriers look like in a row. Imagine, Admiral, you might think it is a pretty sight as a matter of 

fact. 

But, anyway, that is a lot of money we have already taken in 

cuts, and now we are talking about more cuts. 

And, really, I think what I am hearing you say is that if you really want a safe and well-defended America, you just can’t do this. 

I think that is what I am hearing you say. 

Admiral CLINGAN. Chairman Akin, as we contemplate how to 

solve the budget puzzle posed with the current cuts that are on the 

table, the Department of Defense appreciates the fact that those 

type of major adjustments must be driven by strategy. 

And that strategy review is ongoing. 

As the Navy looks to its maritime strategy as a supporting strategy for that defense strategy, we can see the persistence of some 

strategic imperatives that you have alluded to; for example, contain 

regional conflict, deter adversaries, win our Nation’s wars. And we 

do that with forward regionally postured forces. 
14 

We also see the imperative to contribute to the homeland defense 

in depth to foster and sustain the cooperative relationships that 

have been talked about and are of great value as we work together 

in an evolving security environment that is challenging and, of 

course, to prevent disruptions and crisis that disrupt the international system. That benefits all of us, as I mentioned earlier, not 

just America, but allies, partners and even adversaries. 

To that end, we use globally distributed naval forces. And the 

benefit of those forward forces is a commitment, this declaration of 

commitment to our allies with which we have common defense 

agreements. 

To our partners who look to us to protect their interests and 

their economic well-being in a world that relies on container ships 

moving 90 percent of the commerce, and we look at the rapid response that the General talked to where we can provide with the 

Navy offshore options that are very diverse in their capability and 

tailorable to achieve support of our national interests. 

So we look, as these budget adjustments must be contemplated, 

at the prospect of finding the forward presence that we know we 

need in this evolving security environment to be at risk. 

Mr. AKIN. Thank you very much. 

I didn’t mean to take too much time, but I think the next person 

I am going to isn’t here; McIntyre. 

So I will go ahead—— 

Ms. BORDALLO. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

My first question is for General Hesterman. 

Last week, while Secretary Panetta was meeting with allies in 

the Pacific, he reaffirmed the U.S. intent to remain a Pacific power. 

We applaud the Secretary’s focus on this key region, and we will 

do everything we can to support this imperative. 

However, in order to ensure that such words could be translated 

into actual military capability, we need to think about numbers. 

Given the tyranny of time and distance in the Pacific region, and 

I know I don’t have to remind you, but given that these areas are 

a part of the United States, and many thousands of U.S. citizens 

are living there, at what point do Air Force fleet numbers drop too 

low to sustain an extended air campaign in the region? 

We must have enough long-range strike assets in the fleet to 

project force over enemy territory in a concentrated fashion. The 

Air Force has done nothing but shrink the force over the past decade. At a certain point, you simply can’t do more with less. So my 

question is where is the red line regarding the size of the fleet as 

we look at the operations in the Pacific theater? 

General HESTERMAN. Ma’am, I don’t have a number for you, but 

what I will tell you is this is important to us. It is what we do. 

You know, my kid brother is a 46-year-old vice wing commander 

at a strategic bomber base in Louisiana. He spends a lot of time 

on Guam. Every airplane on the ramp is 4 years older than him, 

at least. 

So what we have to do is be able to have a budget that allows 

the modernization of that fleet, because we expect those youngsters 

to fly that thing until 2030. And in order to equip it and equip the 

weapons base with the kinds of standoff weapons they all need to 
15 

fight in the Pacific theater, we have to fund those things, because 

they will go if we ask them, needless to say. 

You know, we have to fund the long-range strike bombers, as you 

talked about because at some point, you know, we have to have a 

platform that will actually get and be able to operate inside of that 

fight. 

So it is similarly important to us to have the right number to be 

able to prosecute our campaigns in the theater there. 

Ms. BORDALLO [continuing]. But it must be the right number? 

General HESTERMAN. Yes, ma’am. 

Ms. BORDALLO. Thank you, General. 

And I have another question, Mr. Chairman, for Admiral Clingan 

and General Mills. 

Given China’s rapid development of an increasingly capable bluewater navy and their intent to be in broadened command of the 

Western Pacific operating area, how would a resource-constrained 

Navy and Marine Corps respond to calls for support from our allies 

in the region if contentious natural resource land or navigation 

issues arise? 

How important is it to have our forces strategically forward-deployed in the Pacific to overcome the massive challenge of tyranny 

of distance? 

And I will begin with you, Admiral. 

Admiral CLINGAN. Ranking Member Bordallo, thank you for the 

question. 

We respond to those types of crises which are unanticipated and 

at times come up in a fashion or a manner over a spark that wasn’t 

anticipated with having forward-deployed naval forces that are permanently stationed overseas, as well as having forward presence 

that we generate through the rotation of United States-based 

forces. 

It is that combination that allows us to respond immediately 

with the presence that are there in theater. 

And should the tension or crisis be of such a magnitude that 

those forces were insufficient, we would have the wherewithal to 

surge additional forces from the continental United States, should 

that be required. 

But your point is that we need those forward forces to be sufficient to deter that type of behavior in the first place. And that is 

an area that takes the leadership of the United States, both diplomatic and military, to keep a constant sense of the trends and the 

assertiveness of nations; not just China, but others; so that we understand how that environment is evolving and we can make adjustments in terms of those standard levels of presence that would 

be there. 

Ms. BORDALLO. Thank you, Admiral. 

And General Mills. 

General MILLS. I would just add to the Admiral’s comments on 

the value of the forward-deployed forces over there, that they assure our allies and our friends that the U.S. is interested and that 

we maintain a presence over there because of that vital interest 

and our vital interest in supporting them as they proceed to their 

day-to-day activities. 
16 

Secondly, it gives us the opportunity, forward-deployed, to interoperate with our allies, with the Australians, who are developing 

an amphibious capability because of some of the threat that they 

see on the horizon. 

Forward-deployed forces enable us to operate on a day-to-day 

basis with them to gain familiarity with them, interoperability, and 

develop those relationships that become very critical during times 

of crisis and, ultimately, perhaps in times of war. 

So the value of a constant presence out there, I think, cannot be 

overstated. 

Ms. BORDALLO. Thank you, General. And I yield back, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. AKIN. Congressman Forbes. 

Mr. FORBES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And, gentlemen, thank you so much for your service to our country and for being here today. Admiral, we talk a lot about these 

numbers, and they, kind of, go over everybody’s head sometimes, 

especially the general public; I know not over the three of your 

heads. 

But one thing that really just stuck out to me in your testimony 

was the fact that you said that, in fiscal year 2011, throughout 

2011, the Navy was only able to meet 59 percent of the combatant 

commanders’ requirements. 

And I am assuming I am reading that correctly. 

And that was, as I understand it, before the $465 billion of cuts 

that are going to be coming our way that we are already taking, 

and, obviously, before any $600 billion in sequestration. Is that a 

fair statement, Admiral? 

Admiral CLINGAN. Yes, sir, it is. 

Mr. FORBES. General Mills, have you been able to look at a similar analysis for the ability that you had to meet our combatant 

commanders’ requirements before all of these $465 billion of cuts, 

or the $600 billion cuts? 

And if you were, can you give us any ballpark of that percentage, 

like Admiral—— 

General MILLS. I can, Mr. Chairman. 

If you assume that the 20,000 marines deployed to Afghanistan 

will also meet a combatant commander’s requirement, then we are 

at about 60 percent of that requirement. 

If you subtract those 20,000 forces out, we drop into the 20s because of that large commitment on the ground that we have in Afghanistan. 

I think some of it reflects, for both of us, the rapid rise in those 

requirements over the past few years. Since 2007 we have seen 

somewhat of an 86 percent increase in the combatant commanders’ 

requests for amphibious forces. 

So it is a rising demand and there is a large commitment already 

made, and we are doing the best the we can. 

Mr. FORBES. And you are not seeing anything on the security 

front that suggest to you that that is going to reduce significantly 

over the next few years, have you? 

General MILLS. I do not. I do not. I would expect that demand 

only to increase. 

Mr. FORBES. General Hesterman. 
17 

General HESTERMAN. Sir, I don’t have a number to throw out at 

you. What I will tell you is the combatant commander requirement 

for several of our capabilities are at a 1–1 dwell. That means people are in combat for at least as much time as they are home. 

You know, so, pararescue men, ISR [Intelligence, Surveillance, 

and Reconnaissance] operators, combat controllers, special operations, weather guys, civil engineers, our EOD [Explosive Ordnance 

Disposal] guys that find those IEDs, there aren’t enough of them. 

And we send all that we can. And we have already cut well back 

in some of our training in order to meet combatant commander requirements. We will continue to do that. 

Our service leadership is committed to giving them everything 

that we have. 

Mr. FORBES. And, General, just for clarification, that is before—— 

General HESTERMAN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. FORBES [continuing]. The $465 billion of cuts that are coming 

down the pike we are already taking? 

General HESTERMAN. Yes, sir, that is true. 

Mr. FORBES. And obviously long before sequestration. 

General HESTERMAN. Yes, sir. 

Mr. FORBES. Admiral, just one last question for you; and this is 

no fault of the Navy’s. This is because we just haven’t given you 

the resources. But today, as I understand it, you are facing—let us 

forget Afghanistan and Iraq—and let us look at China and what 

we face there. 

The Chinese, for the first time in our lifetimes, have more ships 

in their Navy than we have in our Navy. And we can argue about 

capacity and those kind of things, but it is my understanding that, 

from just surface-to-surface missiles based on open-source documents, they can hit us from about 185 kilometers, and we are at 

about a 120-kilometer range to them. 

And at the end of this decade, they are going to have 78 subs 

to our 32 subs in the South China Sea, if we don’t do something 

different. 

You have a $367 million shortfall in your maintenance accounts 

because we haven’t given you the money to do them. 

My concern is this. If I look at your projections for shipbuilding, 

and even, at a minimum, a 313-ship Navy, about 70 percent of 

those ships that will make up that 313-ship Navy by 2020, we already own today. But we are not able to do the maintenance; and, 

again, not through your fault, because we haven’t given you the resources. 

What can the Navy do? Are we going to continue to just allow 

our resources to wear out so that we take them off earlier, or are 

we going to try to invest resources to try to maintain them and get 

a greater service life? And if so, how in the world can you do it if 

we are already at $367 million shortfall in the dollars we have 

given you to maintain the ships we have, and we are cutting another $450 billion, and we are talking about sequestration? 

How do you possibly get your arms around that? 

Admiral CLINGAN. Well, that is one of the daunting challenges 

that we are working with, not just today but as we look to make 

the cuts required. 
18 

First of all, one of the contributing factors to the material condition of the ships, which we are working to invest in through increasing the dollars that we allocate to our maintenance accounts, 

to your point, to get those ships to their expected service life, one 

of the challenges has been that, for at least the last 3 years, we 

have been operating above a sustainable operational tempo, at a 

level that we call surge, as we endeavor to meet that combatant 

commander’s demand that you alluded to. 

That is with our current force structure. It has come at a cost 

that represents missed maintenance opportunities or reduced 

maintenance opportunities. It has come at longer deployments that 

have caused that compression of the maintenance cycle. It has 

come at tailored mission training as opposed to fully robust major 

combat operations training, so that we can get those ships forward 

to do the missions that the combatant commanders need. 

As we have looked at the cost of that surge, we have come to the 

conclusion that you mentioned, which says it is an unsustainable 

rate and we must build time into our force generation model that 

allows the appropriate maintenance to be conducted and we must 

fund that maintenance appropriately. 

We have taken steps within our budget constraints, approximately 900 additional million dollars each year toward that end, 

but it will come at a cost of reduced forward presence as we keep 

those ships which have been operating at surge at home to get the 

maintenance required. 

Mr. FORBES. So, Admiral, it would be fair to say that that 59 percent that you were able to meet under the previous budgets, we 

may not even be able to meet that if we are having to keep more 

of the ships back home. Is that a fair statement? 

Admiral CLINGAN. That is a fair statement. It will depend on 

their demand signal, which, as the General alluded to, we expect, 

in the evolving security environment, will go up. 

Mr. FORBES. Thank you, Admiral. 

And, Mr. Chairman, I yield back. Thank you. 

Thank you, gentlemen. 

Mr. AKIN. And Congresswoman Davis. 

Mrs. DAVIS. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate 

the joint hearing and certainly appreciate the service of all of you 

gentlemen. Thank you very much for being here and for your leadership. 

I wanted to just clarify for a minute, as I am looking at the declining force structure chart, and are these numbers that you all, 

if we go over to the final, if the super committee fails, my understanding is this is really a worst-case scenario if, totally, across the 

board, everything is cut. 

Are these the Pentagon’s numbers? 

Admiral CLINGAN. Congresswoman, I can’t attribute the numbers 

to anybody beyond what the footnote says. But I can comment on 

the impact of sequestration. 

Backing up just a minute, as we look at how to work simply with the current bill that we have with the existing $450 million to $500 

million requirement, we are looking to balance risk as we take 

those cuts by, number one, making sure that we are ready to fight 

and win today; number two, to build the future force that we can 
19 

fight and win with tomorrow; and, three, to take care of our people, 

as we work through those priorities to avoid a hollow force. 

Mrs. DAVIS. I—— 

Admiral CLINGAN. I can’t get any more—— 

Mrs. DAVIS. I appreciate that, sir. 

I just wanted to understand for myself because I think that the 

attribution is for the quote and not for the numbers in the chart, 

if I am not mistaken. And I just wanted to, I hope that, you know, 

if you all can go back and take a look at those and see. Is that really what you would come up with, so the Department of Defense 

would provide those numbers. 

I think the other thing that is really critical and it is important, 

I think, for our constituents and certainly for the country to understand is, you know, as you are talking about the 59 percent of requirement, and certainly 87 percent, you know, for Marines, what 

does that really mean in specifics? 

I think you have tried to do that, but it would be helpful to even 

have that on paper as we were to draw down. Some of those requirements, we know, certainly in budgets there are things that, 

you know, under the best of circumstances it would be great to 

have, but, you know, it is not as critical as some other things. 

I think I am looking at the criticality here. You know, what is 

it that really does make a difference? I happen to believe that humanitarian missions actually can do more for the country sometimes than other commitments that we have and other kinetic activity. 

So I think that, you know, if we could look at that more, that 

would be very helpful because we are trying as hard as we can to 

communicate with the individuals that are serving on this super 

committee and that kind of specificity would be very, very important to have. I think that we talk about hollowing out of the force, 

but you know, getting down to the details is also important. 

And certainly on the personnel issues, I welcome your comments 

about that. You don’t have to make them now. But, you know, 

where is it? I mean, obviously none of us would like to touch any 

of that, but if we have to, and we want to make certain of the least 

harmful to our troops, that keep the faith, et cetera, what is it that 

you think, you know, in your many years of service, would actually 

be reasonable to look at; would be something worth, you know, 

worth doing. 

And the other thing, just very quickly, I just have a moment, in 

terms of the overseas presence. Our constituents ask those questions all the time. And I don’t know whether there are opportunities where if you drew down a sixth of the force that is overseas, 

what difference that would make. We are talking about more accompanied tours in South Korea, for example. You know, how critical is that? And is that worthwhile to put that effort into there? 

Or, you know, is that not as important in terms of how are troops 

are able to carry out their mission? 

I happen to know something about accompanied or unaccompanied tours, but on the other hand I think, you know, that is, 

today with our budget constraints, we may be looking at some different realities. So I wanted to be sure that I had a chance to get 

out that message. 
20 

And then I think just finally, we know that our Marines have 

certainly not been as much a part of amphibious ready groups as 

in the past and there are challenges there, and within budget constraints where do those lie as well? 

So I have given you very little time to respond. I am sorry. But 

I wanted to just lay out and understand; help us get to the specificity when you can. 

Would you like to comment? 

Admiral CLINGAN. Just quickly, Representative Davis. As we 

work through those priorities I outlined, these ship numbers are in 

the ballpark of what could result. So while I can’t credit the numbers exactly, this is the type of impact that you might expect. 

General MILLS. I would offer up my, I am not sure where those 

figures came from. We did a very, very thorough and rigorous force 

structure review over the past year, arrived at what we felt was 

a Marine Corps proper size, 186,800 marines that met our commitments and kept our capabilities where they were. But more importantly, perhaps, reduced stress on the force to give marines adequate time at home between training deployments and between actual deployments, to be able to spend some time decompressing, if 

you will, from their activities. 

That force is at great peril as we watch the budgets decline. 

Where the breaking point is, is probably difficult to say. We look 

at what our commitments are; what we are required to provide the 

Nation in the way of COM [Command] plans and things like that, 

but also what we need to be able to give our forces adequate time 

to train and adequate time at home in order, as I said, to recover. 

I would offer up that, as you talked about South Korea, the presence of forces in the Pacific offer up quite a, present our possible 

opponents over there with whom they have to think about. They 

can’t act as freely knowing that there are American forces both in 

Korea, close by Korea, and within the Pacific region that could respond quickly, and I think raise the stakes considerably when they 

decide what their strategy will be against us in the years to come. 

So I appreciate the opportunity to comment on that, but I think, 

again, the value of deterrence with forward-deployed forces cannot 

be overstated. It is absolutely critical to what we are trying to do 

all over the world. 

General HESTERMAN. Ma’am, just very briefly. Our thoughts on 

the numbers are the same as my compatriots here. The thing that 

we worry the most about is the stress on our airmen, needless to 

say. One thing I will tell you, in a lifetime in the Air Force, the 

thing that is the biggest morale booster is having the appropriate 

training and the appropriate equipment and the appropriately 

sized force to win when we send them into conflict. 

Mrs. DAVIS. Thank you. 

Mr. AKIN. Yes, I think you had a question on the numbers that 

we had in that one set of graphs? Could we throw the chart up on 

the screen again? The screen with the different various cuts. How 

much we are going to be, what the cuts were going to be? 

I guess we can’t put it on the screen. Anyway, my understanding 

was, let me get this right, the 1990 numbers are from where? 

Those are historical data. Oops, we are getting closer here. There 

we go. 
21 

So the 1990 number is historical data. The 2000 numbers are 

also historical data, right? And the today numbers are historical. 

The black and red columns were done by some of the staff on the 

Armed Services Committee, and my understanding is those are 

simply you take the size budget cut; it is a straight percentage, and 

take the percentage, and that is what you get. 

Obviously, it is an estimate, but it is kind of a ballpark if you 

figure using straight percentages. Okay. Our next question comes 

from Congressman Hunter. 

Mr. HUNTER. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. And I would like to recognize General Mills, too, first Marine Corps general to command 

NATO [North Atlantic Treaty Organization] forces in combat; just 

left Afghanistan. So he is not just a Quantico guy. He just left theater. And I am just happy to have you back and thanks for the job 

there. 

Think back 50 years ago to World War II, putting a Marine general in charge of anybody would have created an uproar; but we 

were able to do it, so hurrah for that. 

When I look at the three of you, what I see is kind of like the 

heavy compound list; like let me just phrase it this way: dead lifts, 

squats and bench press. I mean, you are what makes the American 

superpower the American superpower. You can do curls and you 

can do other fancy stuff to get beach muscles, but when it comes 

to heavy lifting and how powerful you are, and the ability to reach 

out and touch somebody, it is you. 

And when you think back to the Falklands in 1982 with the British as kind of the, Britain’s last gasp of trying to reach out and 

touch somebody, and succeeding, but also kind of that was their 

last gasp, and post-World War II Britain giving up all of their sea 

bases to us. 

I don’t even know where to start with what is happening. Chairman Akin and Chairman Forbes have laid this out. If we can’t 

reach out and touch people anymore and we pull back our sphere 

of influence, you have things like the LCS [Littoral Combat Ship], 

which I would argue is just a fast frigate. It is not Stealth. The 

Navy has some carbon-fiber ships that could evade radar. We are 

not building them. We are building fast frigates that can’t get next 

to Taiwan; that can’t go through the strait there. 

On one side, we are building ships that are going to be nice to 

have. They are nice modular ships, but they are not going to be 

able to get our men and women to where they need to go. And then 

on the Marine Corps side, I guess the big question is: Do we need 

to go anymore? 

So I have seen the Air Force’s plans for the next-generation tanker and the bombers, and they are looking good. They are looking 

on track and it looks like you have overcome a lot of the acquisition 

problems we have had in the past. But when it comes to the Navy 

and Marine Corps being able to reach out and touch and gain access to that anti-access/area-denial thing that we like to say, it 

seems like we are well behind that still. 

And there is not a chance in heck of getting there now with the 

way that the budget is. But even when we have to prioritize, we 

are still not buying the right stuff. We are buying stuff, but we are 

not buying the right stuff. 
22 

So if you can’t get next to Taiwan and you can’t get even close 

to North Korea, why do you need the ability to knock down doors 

and gain a beachhead, if you can’t get there in the first place? 

So my question is for General Mills, do we need to get there in 

the first place? Does the Marine Corps need that anymore? 

And to Admiral Clingan, how do we do it if we are not going to 

build the right ships for it, if we are going to build some modular 

fast frigates that are not stealthy and that are not as fast as some 

of the ships like the Stiletto in San Diego? It is a carbon fiber air 

entrapment whole ship that can go really fast and is undetectable 

by radar. If we aren’t going to do that, then how are we going to 

touch people anyway? 

General MILLS. Thank you for those comments, Congressman. 

And thank you for the comment on my service. 

Let me just start off, and I would just say that the Marine Corps 

and amphibious warfare go back, as you know, quite a while. The 

initial question we had to answer was: Was amphibious warfare 

even feasible, back in the 1930s, as we began to look at an expanding Japanese threat in the Pacific? There were many people back 

there who said no, it was not a feasible military strategy and was 

foolish for us to pursue and try to train and equip our forces to do 

so. 

I think the success, obviously, in World War II as it evolved and 

as our tactics changed and our equipment changed, proved, in fact, 

that was a very feasible strategy. 

In the years since World War II, time and time again, the feasibility of amphibious operations has been questioned, whether it be 

in 1949 when it was—General Bradley questioned the very idea 

that an amphibious attack would ever take place again, followed 

very shortly thereafter, of course, by the Inchon landing and then 

what many people would describe as the decisive stroke of the Korean War, and the other amphibious operations that have taken 

place since that time. 

Each time, things have changed. The threat has been more. People have questioned whether or not that was still a feasible military operation. Each time, I think that the Navy and Marine Corps 

team, backed by the entire joint community, has proven in fact not 

only is it feasible, but it is extraordinarily valuable as you pursue 

operations whether across the entire spectrum of military operations, everything from humanitarian relief to full combat ashore 

with Task Force 58, as we struck some 450 miles inland to begin 

the Afghan war back in the early 2000s. 

So I would say that those who question the ability of amphibious 

forces to conduct operations today just don’t understand the way 

that we constantly study, that we constantly adapt, that we constantly change. And we face a threat and we believe that we can 

overcome it. 

I would argue vehemently that amphibious operations play a 

critical role in the United States military spectrum of capabilities. 

We fit in very nicely to the joint effort. I think over the years we 

have begun to operate more and more with them. We operate very 

closely with our SOC [Special Operations Command] community, 

which is emerging as a very powerful force. 
23 

We also operate now with our cyber community, which, again, is 

adding another facet to amphibious operations. 

So I would argue, properly equipped, properly trained, properly 

manned, amphibious operations are indeed a valuable tool for the 

United States military to have in its toolbox in the years to come. 

Admiral CLINGAN. Congressman Hunter, thank you for the question, and you have well articulated one of the challenges that faces 

the Navy and the joint force today. 

Clearly, to bring the Marine Corps to bear in its amphibious assault role and in fact to flow the joint force to a theater of interest 

and to sustain it requires that we deal with the anti-access/areadenial environment that is not only evolving in the Asia-Pacific, 

but we expect proliferation of those weapons as well as its uniquely 

evolving in other parts of the world. 

So it is a global challenge that we must be able to address, 

against a very capable adversary that can bring ballistic missile capability, cruise missiles, submarines and the entire spectrum of 

highly technical and sophisticated weapon systems together to oppose our access. We need to bring the entire portfolio of the Navy 

and the Air Force and other elements of the joint force to bear as 

well. 

So when we look at what is required of the Navy to deal with 

this anti-access environment, it runs the gamut from aircraft carriers to cruisers with ballistic missile and integrated air missile defense capabilities, as well as our DDGs and the DDG–51. It takes 

P–8s to deal with the submarine threat, and even the Littoral 

Combat Ship, which is our future mine countermeasures platform, 

which is an aspect of area denial that we have got to deal with. 

So it is a challenge, and the budget constraints that we face are 

going to require us to balance risk across that entire portfolio necessary to deal with it. 

Mr. HUNTER. Thank you, gentlemen. 

And I would just end, Mr. Chairman, by saying he who controls 

the ocean controls the world, and he who controls space controls 

the ocean. And if we lose that ability we are going to lose our superpower status and be a regional power. And it is going to be a 

sad day if we in this committee and in these committees allow that 

to happen. 

Thank you. 

Mr. AKIN. Thank you, Congressman Hunter. 

And Mr. Larsen; Congressman Larsen. 

Mr. LARSEN. Either one works, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for recognition. I think what we are hearing is that deficits matter here 

on Capitol Hill, and the global recession that begin in 2007 exacerbated structural deficits, structural problems in the Federal budget 

overall that this Congress and Congresses before us and administration before us and this administration have all ignored. 

And now we are left with a period of having to make some serious choices, and serious choices sooner rather than later, because 

the tail on a lack of making decisions on this is pretty big. But the 

impact of making good decisions now is pretty big as well, in the 

future. 

And so that is kind of what we are left with. And I know on this 

committee we talk about a core constitutional function being com-
24 

mon defense, but there is also general welfare, ensuring the blessings of liberty. So it impacts the entire budget. 

And I just think it is important to make those points as we are 

putting this in context. We tend to focus on one set of issues here 

on this committee, but there are a lot of committees and a lot of 

people around the country who are looking at a lot of other parts 

of the budget, too, and trying to make sure that we are addressing 

a lot of needs. 

And so now we are faced with choices that, frankly, we are elected to make, but are trying to resist making sometimes. But, you 

know, we have to make them. That is a premise. 

Admiral, just a couple questions. So I just want to understand 

some of the details on some of the points. On the maintenance and 

Navy ships that have been at a high operational tempo over the 

last 10 years, would this, a couple questions here, would this maintenance cycle, we have to bring these home; would these have occurred regardless of sequestration, first off? In other words, isn’t 

the need for the maintenance of a lot of these ships going to occur 

anyway? So what does the impact of sequestration have on it, have 

on this maintenance, first? 

Second, the 59 percent of the requests that are being fulfilled; is 

that request of any and all requests, or are these 59 percent of the 

requests that have been validated by the Joint Chiefs of Staff that 

are being fulfilled? Or are 100 percent of the requests that have 

been validated being fulfilled? You know, what is that number? 

And I guess for the record, if I could have the Air Force and Marine Corps get back to me. 

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

page 75.] 

Mr. LARSEN. Give me the difference there between the percentage of requests being fulfilled versus the one that actually, the requests that have been validated have been fulfilled. So how do 

those differ? 

And I think those, if I had that kind of information it would help 

me understand a little bit better about this challenge. I know there 

are challenges, just trying to put some numbers on them that are 

from a similar standard so I can deal with some of these decisions 

and choices that we are going to have to make all over the budget, 

not just here in the defense budget, but all over the budget. 

So, Admiral, if you could, just take a whack at those. 

Then, for the other two, for the record, give me the Marine Corps 

and the Air Force numbers. 

Admiral CLINGAN. Congressman Larsen, thank you for the question. 

The impact of operating at surge levels over the last several 

years has resulted in challenges with regard to the material condition of our ships. And we have just recently finished work that has 

developed class maintenance plans for each type of ship. And that 

gives us a good baseline for us to understand what needs to be 

done to maintain these ships so they are ready to be operationally 

employed and will reach their expected service life. 

So we are endeavoring within budget constraints to put the right 

money against those maintenance plans and provide the time, the 
25 

access for the ship yards and ship company to the ships when they 

are not operating to actually do the required maintenance. 

Sequestration, as you well know, applies a level cut against all 

program and activity lines. And so very clearly that budget line 

would be cut and we would be forced to rescope some availabilities 

and cancel others. 

So, if you will, this recovery effort that is required to get our 

ships to the expected service lives would be delayed, if not precluded to some significant extent. 

With regard to the 59 percent of the COCOM [Combatant Command] demand, the COCOMs derive their requirements from their 

tasking, and they are pretty good at that. And so they will work 

hard at deciding what capabilities across the joint force they need 

to accomplish their requirements, their effects out in the real 

world, and they get validated. So we are talking about 59 percent 

of the validated requirements we are able to resource. 

That said, we are working with them under the circumstances 

and have been to explore new and creative ways to meet the requirements. For example, while we prefer an offshore option in 

many cases, perhaps we can send the training team by aircraft and 

have them train in situ on the partnership. Not the way we prefer, 

but an alternative that may help us not exacerbate the shortfall in 

meeting their demands through innovative and creative ways, as 

an example. 

Mr. LARSEN. And, Mr. Chairman, just before I yield back, I 

apologize for going over time. For the QFR [Question for the 

Record], can you break that down by COCOM as well, and maybe 

give me every 2 years, going back to 2000, the percentage every 2 

years that is being fulfilled and by COCOM, I guess. So I might 

get some perspective on this? 

Admiral CLINGAN. Yes, sir, we can. 

Mr. LARSEN. Good. Thank you. 

General MILLS. Representative Larsen, if I could comment—— 

Mr. LARSEN. It will be up to the chairman. I am over my time. 

Sorry, General Mills. It will be up to the chairman. 

Mr. AKIN. You can finish the question. 

Mr. LARSEN. Okay. Thank you, General. 

General MILLS. I would just add to the admiral’s statement, in 

addition to the maintenance, of course, which the Marine Corps 

also faces on its equipment, which is being used both for training 

and for operational purposes, sequestration also impacts our modernization programs, which are critical to us resetting the force as 

it begins to proceed ahead. 

Regarding the COCOM requirements, those are validated requirements. The joint system has a system in which they submit 

their requirements to a single point of entry, which are then 

prioritized and filled as best. 

The Navy, Marine Corps, and the Air Force have looked at ways 

of meeting those requirements in really extraordinary means. I will 

give you an example. The USS Kearsarge battle group that was out 

in the Pacific over the spring and summer of this year; three ships, 

at one point, separated literally by thousands of miles. As each 

ship conducted and met a COCOM’s requirement, everything from 

the Pakistani floods to the operations off Libya to the landing force 
26 

in support of my forces that were ashore in Afghanistan at the time 

when we saw an opportunity to deal a blow to the enemy. 

And so by spreading that force out literally over thousands of 

miles, those ships operating semi-independently, we were able to 

come to, with one asset, if you will, meet three requirements. 

So the Navy-Marine Corps team, and with the Air Force, and 

with the Army, are trying to meet those requirements as best we 

can using somewhat extraordinary procedures at times. 

Mr. LARSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. AKIN. And Congressman Mike. 

Mr. COFFMAN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you all for you dedicated years of service to this country. 

I certainly share the majority’s concern within this committee 

that the cuts from sequestration, should they occur, on the Department of Defense would be far too deep and would hurt this country’s capability. I disagree, probably, with the majority where they 

feel that no savings, further savings are available from the Department of Defense. 

And first I want to say that we have made progress in acquisition that have, I think, created efficiencies. We are going more to 

fixed-price contracting. And I think that that is a big help. 

I think there is a natural shift that is occurring from a counterinsurgency doctrine to a counterterrorism doctrine, and I think 

that that will bring about substantial savings to this country. 

And I certainly hope we never go down the path of nation-building again. 

And I think it will take a good decade for our military to reestablish the combined arms capabilities that have been lost in counterinsurgency warfare that are essential to the deterring our adversaries. 

I have a concern that on the personnel side, the personnel costs. 

And Secretary of Defense Gates warned us about this, that the trajectory of personnel costs are eating into acquisition costs. 

So even if we can deal with a problem external to the Department of Defense, which is essentially the rise of entitlement spending, mandatory spending eating into the discretionary budget, I 

think we have a problem internal to the Department of Defense to 

the military in terms of the trajectory of personnel costs eating into 

acquisition costs. And, again, Secretary of Defense Gates warned us 

about this. 

And I want to express, when I am looking at this chart, where 

we talk about 1990 to today and the decline of our military going 

from, say, Army maneuver battalions to 180 to 98; Navy ships, 546 

in 1990 to 288 today; U.S. Air Force fighters, 4,355 to 1,990, et 

cetera. 

My guess is, and I will be asking the Department of Defense this, 

that we have more flag officers today than we did in 1990 with a 

much larger force. I believe our military is just much too top-heavy 

today and there is an unnecessary cost associated to that. 

I think that we ought to be looking at, when we look at the force 

structure, what additional units could be placed in the Guard and 

Reserve for savings. I think, probably, we should look at, on the increasing-cost side, plussing up, I think, compensation for our de-
27 

ployed military, whether it is sea service or whether it is hazardous-duty or imminent-danger pay, to recognize the disparity between our deployed forces and our non-deployed forces. 

But I think that we are going to have to deal with the trajectory 

of personnel costs, and that is going to be very unpopular for this 

committee, and it is going to take a lot of courage. 

But we have got a two-front war going on against our capability: 

again, the external one that is coming upon us on November 23rd 

and an internal one on rising personnel costs. And I wonder if any 

of you would like to respond to any of the comments that I made. 

Admiral. 

Admiral CLINGAN. Sir, thank you for the question. 

The Department of Defense and the Navy appreciate that challenge of the rising personnel costs. And in almost every case senior 

leadership in the Departments have said all things are on the 

table. 

So many of the things that you have identified we are exploring 

with great detail, procurement program, process improvements, deficiencies, the rising costs of personnel. The top-heavy, I know we 

have looked at adjusting, and I believe have made adjustments, to 

the number of flag and general officers we have. 

And Active Component–Reserve Component balance, while not 

going back to the circumstance we found ourselves a decade ago 

where we didn’t quite have the combat support and combat service 

support allocations across Active and Reserve right. 

You know, this budget challenge has caused us to look at all 

those things. And I think when the dust settles that you will find 

appropriate thought has been applied in those directions. 

Mr. COFFMAN. Lieutenant General Mills, do you have any comment? 

General MILLS. I would agree with the admiral. I think that we 

have done, as I said, we did a force structure review last winter; 

took a look at the requirements for the Marine Corps and how they 

could be met with an appropriately sized force, looking at the drawdown in Afghanistan. 

I think that we designed a force that met our requirements and 

that was affordable under those budget conditions. Those conditions, we know now, are shifting and we are taking another look 

at being able to meet our commitments with a, perhaps, reduced 

force. 

I agree with you, sir, that we need to identify and to recognize 

our commitment of our people who are forward deployed and in 

harm’s way. We do a good job of it. Perhaps we could do a better 

of it. 

I do believe that Secretary Panetta’s guidance has been relatively 

consistent over the past couple of months, and it is critical that we 

do not break faith with our forces, both with our men and their 

families. I think that is important to our future. 

I think that we are going to have some tough choices to make. 

We basically got, I think, three ways to look at the cuts. We look 

at it through man, through train, or through equip. And those are 

the kind of hard selection processes that we are going to have to 

make and perhaps ask our question: ‘‘What is good enough?’’ 
28 

General HESTERMAN. Sir, Air Force leadership is very similar to 

what my brother described here. 

I will tell you, I was the no-taker this weekend when our Chief 

and Secretary sat down with our Guard and Reserve leadership. 

They are committed to an optimal mix. They are committed to 

doing this together and to making sure that we get this right. 

General MILLS. Sir, if I could add just one more thought, please? 

When you spoke about the 10 years you felt that would take for 

us to move back to a combined arms environment, I think that the, 

if one thing all of our services have shown over the past few years 

is our ability to turn, to adjust, and to adapt. I would argue that 

perhaps no other force in the world other than the United States 

force could have done what was done in Iraq and Afghanistan, 

which was move from a high-intensity conflict, a very traditional 

armor-against-armor force, to pivot on a dime, if you will, to moving to a very effective counterinsurgency campaign. 

I think that the flexibility of all of our forces was paramount to 

that. And very few people in the world could have done that. 

And I think we will show that same adaptability over the years 

to come if we move back to perhaps what you would think of as 

more traditional roles. 

I believe the combined arms force is still in effect. I believe an 

amphibiously capable force is still in effect. And I think that we are 

still able to accomplish a wide range of missions despite the fact 

that we have been focusing, perhaps, a bit on the Afghan fight over 

the past few years. 

Mr. COFFMAN. And, Mr. Chairman, I yield back. 

Mr. AKIN. Thank you. 

And we also have our Congressman Gibson here. 

Mr. GIBSON. Well, thanks very much, Chairman. And I appreciate you calling this joint meeting. 

I appreciate the panelists today, for your service and leadership. 

The question has to do for the Air Force, General Hesterman, 

about joint forcible-entry capabilities, particularly United States 

Army airborne, air assault, and then also United States Marine 

Corps supported by Navy, obviously. 

And looking at it both 12 months out and then also 5 years out, 

Air Force support in terms of simulations, but then also as building 

capabilities, the training exercises; the commitment in terms of 

platforms—C–17s, C–130s, joint arm airborne command-and-control, electronic warfare, fighters, bombers—the frequency that the 

Air Force will be able to support these exercises used to go on 

about six times a year at Fort Bragg, and the level of commitment 

you are going to be able to make. 

And then is there anything in the long-term planning to bring 

this all together, Air Force support to a truly joint exercise, whether that be simulated or at some point sort of like what Ocean Venture used to do years ago, bring in the whole joint team together? 

General HESTERMAN. Sir, first of all, let me say that our commitment to our joint brothers to be able to provide that capability you 

described is, that is why we are here. I mean, that is what we do. 

As far as being able to sustain these exercises or to grow them 

in, the reason we are here is to talk about the potential impact. 
29 

You can be sure that if we go much beyond the cuts that we have 

now or into sequester, that those kinds of things will be at risk. 

Mr. GIBSON. Well, then, based on, go with the assumption for the 

moment, no sequester. What is the Air Force’s commitment at this 

point in terms of platforms and really the diversity of platforms to 

continue to build that capability going forward? Do you have any 

sense or do you want to do that for the record? 

General HESTERMAN. The sense of it is, is there is a lot of discussion now about which platforms we’ll carry forward. The commitment, and my Service Chief articulated it yesterday, to provide this 

support to our land component is 100 percent. 

So what platform we will do that with will be decided in the next 

few months, I think. 

Mr. GIBSON. Yes. You know, my experience with this, I led the 

brigade task force that was part of the global response force, and 

clearly we had pressing priorities all over the globe. So, you know, 

this had to move down in the prioritization, but of course over time 

we are incurring more risk when we do that. 

I would assess our risk at very high risk at this point to be able 

to conduct a full-blown joint forcible entry. When you look at the 

fact that, as you know, it is a very complex operation, and we often 

had to pull platforms from all across the eastern United States and 

in some cases all throughout the continental United States to be 

able to support these exercises, understandably. 

And I know you are juggling a lot of things. And what I am trying to get a sense of is where we are today in terms of the Air 

Force’s ability to support. It may very well be that we are not able 

to afford doing this six times a year, but what is that right frequency, are we going to be able to pull this all together, the entire 

joint team? Because otherwise I don’t know that the American people and the people’s representatives fully understand the risk that 

we are incurring over time. 

General HESTERMAN. Sir, what I will tell you is whatever size we 

end up, our leadership is committed to it being exceptionally capable. So, you know, I think we do know how to do this. And I think 

the problem will be is in how many places we can do it, you know, 

and because obviously we don’t get to decide where it is needed. 

But, you know, our capability, I think, will be pure. How much 

of that capability exists, I think, is the subject of this hearing. 

Mr. GIBSON. Yes. And lastly, I think your pilots will tell you that, 

you know, the longer you go without doing these type of exercises, 

the more difficult it is to try to restart and to pull that capability 

together. 

General HESTERMAN. No argument, sir. 

Mr. GIBSON. Yes. 

Okay. Thanks very much, Chairman. 

Mr. AKIN. Thank you. Good questions. 

One last question to Congresswoman Bordallo. 

Ms. BORDALLO. Yes. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

I just want a clarification before we disperse this afternoon. And 

I think you made some comments, and others here, and I have 

heard them as well: Why don’t we bring our troops back from these 

foreign countries? This would save us millions and millions of dollars. 
30 

Well, I would, since we have three very important officers here 

before us, I am sure they will be able to answer these questions. 

And I will take these two countries: Korea and Japan. 

Now, aside from the need for forward presence to deter potential 

adversaries, how much host-nation support are Japan and Korea 

providing to station our troops in their countries? 

My understanding is that they are paying the bill. And it is a 

significant amount of money—billions of dollars—for MILCON 

[Military Construction], base operations, facilities sustainment. In 

fact, it would cost us a lot more to send all our troops back to the 

United States. We would have to build bases. We would have to 

build housing. 

Am I right in this? And I don’t think they charge us any kind 

of lease or lots of money for using their properties. Am I correct 

in this? Yes, in Japan and Korea, we don’t pay leasing fees and 

they are providing all the facilities and so forth. Is this correct? 

Admiral CLINGAN. Congresswoman, I cannot confirm for you exactly what costs the United States Navy, in our case, is paying and 

what costs Japan is carrying. But I do know that Japan, for example, does pay a significant amount of money to facilitate hosting us 

there. 

Ms. BORDALLO. General. 

General MILLS. I would agree with the admiral. I will have to get 

back to you on the exact split between what the host nation provides and what we provide. 

I would absolutely agree with you that if we brought all the marines back home, that it would be a MILCON bill back in the states 

as our facilities are designed and built and structured that a certain percentage of our force will be forward-deployed and therefore 

they don’t need barracks or office space or training grounds to operate on. 

So I absolutely concur with the second half of your comment. 

Ms. BORDALLO. And General. 

General HESTERMAN. Ma’am, we will get you the exact numbers, 

but I believe your premise is correct. 

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

page 75.] 

Ms. BORDALLO. Thank you. I just wanted to clarify that, Mr. 

Chairman, that it would cost us more to bring our troops back 

home than when they are stationed over in places like Japan and 

Korea, where they are picking up the tab. 

Mr. AKIN. I very much appreciate all of you sticking with us 

today on the committee and for your testimony. I think that the 

message is pretty straightforward that we have gone about as far 

as she can go on this thing. And I think you have developed that 

in terms of a fair amount of detail for us. 

So thank you all for coming out, Generals and Admiral, and I 

look forward to the next time. God bless you all. 

Thanks. 

[Whereupon, at 1:15 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 
A P P E N D I X 

NOVEMBER 3, 2011 

PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD 

NOVEMBER 3, 2011 

(35) 

Statement of Hon. W. Todd Akin 

Chairman, House Subcommittee on Seapower and 

Projection Forces 

Hearing on 

A Day Without Seapower and Projection Forces 

November 3, 2011 

Our witnesses represent those organizations within their respective services which are responsible for development of the strategy 

by which their departments can build a program by which to execute that strategy. Once the elements of the program have been defined, the necessary resources can be determined. Usually there 

will never be enough resources to execute the strategy with little 

or no risks in all of the elements, and a prioritization process is 

necessary. The less resources—the more risk. 

The thing about risk in the Armed Services of the United States 

usually means the higher the risk, the more casualties are taken 

should a conflict occur. 

We are about to enter a period of constrained resources, and I 

am sure our witnesses are well aware of the impacts in their respective services of the roughly $465 billion cut to the budget over 

the next 10 years from internal Department cuts and the enactment of the Budget Control Act. To further complicate things, if the 

Special Committee for Deficit Reduction fails to find an additional 

$1.2 trillion in cuts over the next 10 years, and a sequestration scenario ensues, the Defense Department will face the potential for 

additional cuts of roughly another $600 billion. 

This all happened so fast—and I do not envy our witnesses’ predicament of having to developing strategies that have been dictated 

by budgets—it should be the other way around. I am sure the subcommittees would be interested in hearing the witnesses’ thoughts 

on this, as well as on what prioritization processes you are using 

to comply with the $465 billion cut, and what would happen were 

sequestration to occur. I want to thank the witnesses for appearing 

today, and look forward to your testimony. 
36 

Statement of Hon. J. Randy Forbes 

Chairman, House Subcommittee on Readiness 

Hearing on 

A Day Without Seapower and Projection Forces 

November 3, 2011 

I want to thank Chairman Akin for co-chairing this hearing, and 

to thank all of our members and the distinguished panel of experts 

and welcome them to today’s hearing focused on what the future 

of seapower and projection capabilities may portend in an era of 

austere budgets. 

As Chairman Akin already offered, I want to add my thanks to 

our witnesses for being with us this morning to continue this very 

important dialogue regarding potential cuts to defense, potential 

impacts to the future force, and the readiness of our maritime and 

projection assets today and in the future. 

I believe it is vital that you are all here with us today to continue 

to inform the members of these subcommittees and the public in 

advance of the ‘‘super committee’’ delivering its ultimate recommendations to the Congress. I will keep my remarks short in 

order that we proceed to the heart of the discussion. 

The Readiness Subcommittee has convened numerous times in 

the past few months to hear from each of the Services, and most 

recently the Vice Chiefs regarding the current state of the force, 

the increased risk, and the uncertainty of the future and potential 

impacts to military readiness if sequestration were enacted. 

While there seems to be a prevailing consensus that sequestration under the Budget Control Act would be devastating to the 

military, I remain severely concerned that we have already gone 

too far. Last year, when the DOD began closing Joint Forces Command without analysis, I told members this would soon be coming 

to a theater near you. Currently we are dealing with the $465 billion DOD cut that was arbitrarily made without analysis to underpin that number. Now, another shoe has dropped with regard to civilian personnel. The Air Force announced just yesterday that they 

will eliminate 16,500 civilian positions in Fiscal Year 2012. That is 

just the Air Force and only one fiscal year. What happens if the 

other shoe drops under sequestration? With all of these individual 

decisions, the cumulative effect will be devastating. At this point 

I would say get ready, the show is only just beginning. 

This leads me to reiterate my concern regarding additional shortterm decisions that could lead to the potential ‘‘hollowing of the 

force’’ under sequestration. That would be a situation that cannot 

be quickly reversed. General Dunford articulated this very point 

before the Readiness Subcommittee last week, regarding concerns 

that ‘‘we will make these cuts without an adequate appreciation of 

the strategic implications, the implications on our readiness, or the 

implications of breaking faith. And also . . . that folks would think 

that if we get it wrong, well, we can just simply fix it in a year 

or two. That is not possible, particularly in the latter category. And 
37 

if we break the trust of our marines, sailors, soldiers and airmen 

today, it would be decades before we get it back.’’ 

The question I continue to ask is what is the risk to the national 

defense of our country if we continue making some of the cuts to 

defense we hear being discussed in Washington? There are never 

enough resources to eliminate all of our risks, but, there must be 

a strategic assessment to underpin the decisions. Instead, I feel that 

currently the DOD is just responding to budgetary pressures, the 

result of which could severely degrade the military’s ability to operate. 

In Vice Admiral Clingan’s written testimony for this hearing 

today, he indicates ‘‘Without question, the Fleet is operating now 

at an unsustainable level. To best meet the Combatant Commanders’ need for deployed Navy forces since September 11, 2001 

and to respond to emergent requirements, we have increased the 

frequency and average length of unit deployments. This has resulted in reduced training time; reduced maintenance availabilities; 

a narrowing of pre-deployment training for certain units to mission-specific tasks; and an accelerated aging of our ships and aircraft.’’ 

Consistent with the testimony that Vice Admiral Burke provided 

before the Readiness Subcommittee, the Navy has been operating 

in a sustained surge, precluding the opportunity to do deep maintenance on fleet assets. How will that impact the future force? Looking forward, will our forces be ‘‘ready’’ for the mission they are 

called upon to do when the time comes? 

While there are many contributing factors that brought us to this 

point today, we are currently at a crossroads where we have time 

yet to prepare for the many tough decisions that lie ahead. In doing 

so, we must not forget our obligation to ensure our men and women 

in uniform are given all the tools necessary for the job we ask them 

to do. 

I look forward to learning from each of our witnesses about how 

we cope with these challenging fiscal times while also maintaining 

a ready military. 
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WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING 

THE HEARING 

NOVEMBER 3, 2011 

(75) 

RESPONSES TO QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MR. LARSEN 

Admiral CLINGAN. From 1991 through 2004, naval forces were allocated by the 

Joint Staff through the Global Naval Force Presence Policy. This policy dictated the 

COCOM allocation via a long range schedule. The current Global Force Management (GFM) process, which started in 2005, allocates forces based on yearly 

COCOM demand. Accessible summary records are available going back to 2007, as 

follows: 

Percent of COCOM unit demand fulfilled: 

Year Global CENTCOM PACOM EUCOM/ 

AFRICOM SOUTHCOM 

2007 90 98 81 82 75 

2008 76 100 82 73 45 

2009 69 71 74 57 65 

2010 64 73 74 54 76 

2011 59 76 72 53 25 

2012 53 56 65 48 29 

[See page 24.] 

General MILLS. [The information referred to is classified and retained in the committee files.] [See page 24.] 

General HESTERMAN. The Air Force fulfills nearly 100% of the Joint Staff-validated requirements that are subsequently tasked by the Secretary of Defense. The 

Air Force also supports a significant number of requirements from in garrison—also 

referred to as ‘‘deployed in place.’’ Many space and cyber capabilities are provided 

from stateside locations, and the vast majority of our Remotely Piloted Aircraft are 

controlled from non-deployed units in the United States. While not physically deployed, these forces operate on the Combatant Commander’s battle rhythm in support of theater objectives. The Air Force remains fully committed to supporting overseas contingency operations and the high rotational demand from our Combatant 

Commanders. 

Within the Global Force Management process run by the Joint Staff, the Combatant Commanders submit their force requirements for needed capabilities to be filled 

from across the Services. Requests are not necessarily made for Air Force, Army or 

Navy forces—they are requests for capability such as close air support, combat engineering, etc. Unfortunately the COCOM’s needs in some areas far exceed the combined Services’ capacity to fill, so requests are prioritized, coordinated and then 

sourced from the available forces (this requires Secretary of Defense approval). 

Since the Services all have some measure of air capability, the Air Force does not 

fill all airpower requirements. Due to these factors the Air Force does not report 

the percentage of initial requests that enter the Global Force Management process 

and are ultimately not filled as a shortfall in AF capability. [See page 24.] 

RESPONSES TO QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MS. BORDALLO 

Admiral CLINGAN. The Republic of Korea (RoK) provides the U.S. Navy approximately 64% for logistics cost and 70% for salaries under a Special Measures Agreement. The RoK provided $19M in 2009 for the construction of a Fleet and Family 

Town Center, $5M in 2011 (68% of the annual Navy budget) for Logistics Cost sharing (acquisition of logistics equipment, supplies, and/or services), and $4.5M in 2011 

(71% of salaries) for Labor Cost Sharing. The U.S. Navy does not pay for the land 
76 

and facilities provided for its use under the Status of Forces Agreement; this currently totals 95 acres and 344 buildings in Korea. 

The Government of Japan (GoJ) provides approximately 75% of the Navy’s total 

utility bill which covers electricity, water, sewer, and gas for heating ($62M in 

2011). The GoJ voluntarily initiated the Japan Facilities Improvement Program 

which provides funding of approximately $200M per year for services. This program 

supports infrastructure capital investment similar to MILCON but it does not provide support to any base operations or facilities. 

The Republic of Korea (ROK) 

1.) Salaries: Navy Region Korea has received the following amounts for Labor. 

The ROK Government pays 71% of salaries for Korean Government Service (KGS) 

employees. 

• FY 09 $5.2M 

• FY 10 $4.1M 

• FY 11 $4.5M 

2.) Leases: U.S. Navy does not pay for the land and facilities provided for its use 

under Status of Forces Agreement grant. This currently totals 95 acres and 344 

buildings in Korea. 

3.) Construction: In recent years Navy Region Korea has received the following 

host nation funded construction funds, totaling $32.7M. 

• CY07 Bachelor Enlisted Quarters $5.7M—Completed 2011 

• Natural Gas Line $2.7M—Completed 2010 

• Vehicle Maintenance Facility $2.5M—Under construction 

• Fire Station $2.9M—Completed 2011 

• CY09 Fleet and Family Town Center $18.9M—Under construction 

4.) Sustainment: Navy Region Korea has received the following amounts for 

sustainment/equipment from the host nation, totaling $9.6M. 

• CY09 $2.1M 

• CY10 $2.6M 

• CY11 $4.9M 

5.) Utilities: Navy Region Korea does not receive utility funding for consumption, 

but are given the lowest industrial rates offered. However, over the past decade, the 

Korean government has paid for a completely new electrical system; water storage 

tank and pipeline system; and natural gas line installation; shore power mounds at 

Piers 11 and 22 for use by USN ships; and has funded a number of green energy 

projects via host nation construction and sustainment funds, greatly reducing Navy 

costs for utilities. 

6.) Other funding: Other in-kind support provided includes highway toll waivers 

and docking and security patrols at ROK Navy bases for visiting U.S. Navy ships. 

Government of Japan (GOJ) 

1.) Salaries: Labor Cost Sharing Program under Special Measures Agreement Article I. The Government of Japan has for over two decades funded 85–90 percent 

of the overall labor costs of DON’s largest foreign national workforce worldwide— 

13,703 personnel (9,423 with Navy and 4,280 with Marine Corps) who perform work 

supporting the United States Government’s (USG) forward deployment strategy in 

the western Pacific, including ship repair, supply, communications and infrastructure maintenance. Most recent financial information in existence is Japanese Fiscal 

Year (JFY) 10 (1 Apr 10–31 Mar 11). The weighted average actual exchange rate 

obtained by Defense Finance & Accounting Service for payment of the USG portion 

was 82.2 yen per U.S. dollar. Budget Execution Rates and other rates used often 

vary throughout the year or by activity. 

• Navy: 

• ¥38,936,621,525 was spent on Master Labor Contracts (MLC)s 

• ¥5,924,115,963 was covered by USG 

• ¥33,012,505,562 was covered by GOJ 

• Marines: 

• ¥14,645,746,145 was spent on MLCs 

• ¥859,315,904 was covered by USG 

• ¥13,786,430,241 was covered by GOJ 

2.) Leases: USN does not pay the GOJ for the use of land and facilities provided 

under the Status Of Forces Agreement (SOFA) grant. USN does have exclusive use 

of approximately 16,000 acres of land and 24,109 facilities with Plant Replacement 

Value of approximately $12,873M in Japan. The only type of ‘‘lease or rental’’ payment made is $209,894/year to a private Japanese company for 50 apartment units 
77 

that houses the ship repair workforce surge from Puget Sound Naval Shipyard during CVN maintenance. 

3.) Construction: Japanese Facilities Improvement Program (JFIP) provides infrastructure capital investment similar to MILCON, but project selection, programming, and award differs greatly from MILCON. Funding levels have been steadily 

declining since the mid 1990s from approximately $1.0B to less than $200M a year 

since FY08 through FY12 for all the services. Funding varies by year since JFIP 

vary depending on projects programmed in each year. Historically, Navy has received approximately 1⁄3 of the annual JFIP. 

4.) Sustainment: USN does not receive any funds from the GOJ for base operation 

support or facilities sustainment. 

5.) Utilities: Utilities Cost Share Program provides GOJ funds to help offset 

USN’s utility cost of electricity, water, sewer, and gas for heating. USN receives 

¥6.3 billion annually, approximately $68.0M a year depending yen/dollar exchange 

rate, which covers approximately 75% of USN’s total utility bill. For past three 

years, USN received JFY09 $68.0M, JFY10 $73.0M, and JFY11 $62.0M respectively. 

6.) Other funding: N/A [See page 30.] 

General MILLS. Government of Korea Logistics Cost Share support received for 

the past 3 fiscal years follows: 

FY09: 

• Labor—$1,202,767 

• Vehicles—$43,640 

• Aircraft In-service Repair—$163,583 

• Service Depot Level Maintenance (SDLM) for CH–53—$7,046,340 

• Supplies—$0 

• Facilities sustainment—$254,826 

FY10: 

• Labor—$1,011,896 

• Vehicles—$194,731 

• Aircraft In-service Repair—$148,152 

• SDLM for CH–53—$6,258,065 

• Supplies—$0 

• Facilities sustainment—$381,848 

FY11: 

• Labor—$1,061,339 

• Vehicles—$257,605 

• Aircraft In-service Repair—$104,374 

• SDLM for CH–53—$6,049,020 

• Supplies—$2,019,051 

• Facilities sustainment—$695,951 

Government of Japan provided Utility and Labor support: (Please note that the 

Japanese Fiscal Year begins on 1 April and ends on 31 March) 

FY09: 

• Labor Cost Sharing—$147,549,249 

• Utility Cost Sharing—$60,911,050 

FY10: 

• Labor Cost Sharing—$149,067,628 

• Utility Cost Sharing—$62,051,558 

FY11: 

• Labor Cost Sharing—$158,721,331 

• Utility Cost Sharing—$64,983,396 

Government of Japan provided support under the Japanese Facilities Improvement Program (JFIP) for various levels of effort including MCAS Iwakuni, MCB 

Butler and CATC Camp Fuji: 

FY09 MCAS Iwakuni—$86 Million 

FY09 MCB Butler—$2 Million 

FY09 Camp Fuji—$0 

FY10 MCAS Iwakuni—$29 Million 

FY10 MCB Butler—$800,000 

FY10 Camp Fuji—$300,000 

FY11 MCAS Iwakuni—$35 Million 

FY11 MCB Butler—$2.1 Million 

FY11 Camp Fuji—$200,000 
78 

Government of Japan lease payments made to land owners: There are 23,000 land 

owners on Okinawa who are paid by the Japanese Government. Land owners are 

paid two times per year in March and July. The following figures are payments 

made to land owners Okinawa wide to include the Marine Corps, Air Force, and 

Army. 

JFY08—78,375 mil Yen (conversion rate 114.7781) = $682,839,322 

JFY09—79,090 mil Yen (conversion rate 114.3007) = $691,946,768 

JFY10—79,295 mil Yen (conversion rate 108.9969) = $663,275,744 

The U.S. Government does not pay rent for land or facilities in Japan. 

The Government of Japan does not fund any facilities maintenance. 

Government of Japan (GOJ) has constructed family housing under the Special Action Committee on Okinawa (SACO) agreement. GOJ has only constructed four of 

eight phases of new family housing. The remaining four phases are on hold. The 

GOJ will construct the 56 housing units that will serve the new hospital. Construction is tentatively scheduled for FY15. [See page 30.] 

General HESTERMAN. Japan will provide $332 million and Korea will provide $125 

million to support the United States Air Force for FY12. [See page 30.] 
QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING 

NOVEMBER 3, 2011 

(81) 

QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MR. FORBES 

Mr. FORBES. Adoption of advanced predictive logistics technologies to enable 

major cost avoidance: Section 328 of the FY 2010 NDAA required DOD to develop 

a comprehensive plan for improving inventory management systems, including addressing weaknesses in demand forecasting procedures. GAO’s review of the Comprehensive Inventory Management Improvement Plan, submitted to Congress in 

January of this year, cited difficulties in predicting demand patterns as a key challenge in implementing improved forecasting. However, we are aware that several 

program offices have already effectively addressed this challenge by adopting advanced modeling and simulation tools, and the results have been billions of dollars 

in cost avoidance and savings. If some program offices have already dealt with this 

problem, what is preventing wider application of these tools in the immediate future 

across each of the services? 

Admiral CLINGAN. The objective of the Comprehensive Inventory Management Improvement Plan (CIMIP) is to ensure DOD buys only what we need and retains only 

what we use. This OSD-led effort involves considerable sharing of ideas and lessons 

learned on techniques to improve forecasting as well as vetting ideas and adopting 

proven techniques across DOD. 

As part of our Enterprise Resource Planning implementation, Navy is currently 

implementing a SAP1 business solution with an enhanced forecasting module which 

will improve our demand forecasting capabilities and allow for more efficient management of Navy wholesale inventories. Additionally Navy is utilizing a Multi-Indenture Multi-Echelon Readiness Based Sparing (RBS) capable model called Supply 

Planning and Optimization (SPO) to compute wholesale and retail stock levels for 

aviation programs. This model uses advanced RBS techniques to optimize inventory 

levels across the enterprise, delivering weapon systems readiness at least cost. 

While customer demands are often difficult to forecast due to operating tempo 

changes and low weapon system population density, Navy is currently working to 

expand SPO utilization to maritime retail products and is also researching further 

integration of wholesale and retail inventory computation. Navy continues to pursue 

opportunities to improve demand forecasting; as successful techniques are identified 

the challenge lies in understanding how to apply those techniques to what are often 

times widely different customer bases. Demand patterns for aviation platforms, 

where there are thousands of airframes, can be fundamentally different from those 

for surface ship or submarine platforms with very small populations. 

Furthermore, OSD (Supply Chain Integration) is beginning a study in which the 

Navy and Air Force will explore alternative demand forecasting methodologies for 

low-demand repairable items. 

Mr. FORBES. Adoption of advanced predictive logistics technologies to enable 

major cost avoidance: Section 328 of the FY 2010 NDAA required DOD to develop 

a comprehensive plan for improving inventory management systems, including addressing weaknesses in demand forecasting procedures. GAO’s review of the Comprehensive Inventory Management Improvement Plan, submitted to Congress in 

January of this year, cited difficulties in predicting demand patterns as a key challenge in implementing improved forecasting. However, we are aware that several 

program offices have already effectively addressed this challenge by adopting advanced modeling and simulation tools, and the results have been billions of dollars 

in cost avoidance and savings. If some program offices have already dealt with this 

problem, what is preventing wider application of these tools in the immediate future 

across each of the services? 

General MILLS. The Marine Corps cannot answer the question on behalf of the 

other services. However the Marine Corps is applying predictive tools to its inventories as follows: 

At this time, the Marine Corps is in the process of implementing Global Combat 

Support System-Marine Corps (GCSS–MC) and is currently using and exploring the 

full potential of the Advance Planning Suite (APS) of applications inherent in the 

system to implement total force demand planning. APS is comprised of Oracle Demand Planning (ODP), Inventory Optimization (IO) and Advance Supply Chain 

Planning (ASCP). Marine Corps Logistics Command administers the plans while the 
82 

Marine Forces (MARFORS) provide input and ultimately execute to their specific requirements and constraints. The Marine Corps is using 24 months of shipment history to produce a demand forecast one year in the future. As this process matures, 

the Marines will observe, measure, and modify our forecasts to best support our demand planning while minimizing the amount of inventory on hand. Additionally an 

enterprise forecast will enable better collaboration and communication of Marine 

Corps requirements with our suppliers. The GCSS–MC benefits realized are increased accountability, enhanced visibility, and a right-sized inventory to reduce inventory carrying costs. 

Mr. FORBES. Adoption of advanced predictive logistics technologies to enable 

major cost avoidance: Section 328 of the FY 2010 NDAA required DOD to develop 

a comprehensive plan for improving inventory management systems, including addressing weaknesses in demand forecasting procedures. GAO’s review of the Comprehensive Inventory Management Improvement Plan, submitted to Congress in 

January of this year, cited difficulties in predicting demand patterns as a key challenge in implementing improved forecasting. However, we are aware that several 

program offices have already effectively addressed this challenge by adopting advanced modeling and simulation tools, and the results have been billions of dollars 

in cost avoidance and savings. If some program offices have already dealt with this 

problem, what is preventing wider application of these tools in the immediate future 

across each of the services? 

General HESTERMAN. The Department of Defense Comprehensive Inventory Management Improvement Plan includes a Demand Forecasting sub-plan which lays out 

a course of action to improve the inventory level setting process, demand planning 

accuracy, and forecast accuracy. The Air Force is collaborating with other components to baseline current demand forecast methodologies, review best practices, and 

establish diagnostic metrics on forecast accuracy and forecast bias. In our review of 

best practices, we look across all levels in our supply chain. 

Contributing to improved forecasting, the Air Force has undertaken a Logistics 

Modeling and Simulation (M&S) effort which has identified and catalogued M&S 

tools in use or available across the Air Force. However, M&S tools used by our acquisition program offices are not sustainment inventory forecasting models and have 

limited application to Air Force Supply Chain Management. 

QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MR. COFFMAN 

Mr. COFFMAN. What is the number of Flag Officers in the Navy in 1990, 1995, 

2000, 2005, and 2010? What was the total number of personnel in your service in 

1990, 1995, 2000, 2005, and 2010? 

Admiral CLINGAN. 

Flag Officers: 

• 1990: 256 

• 1995: 218 

• 2000: 219 

• 2005: 213 

• 2010: 253 

Total Personnel: 

• 1990: 582,854 

• 1995: 434,617 

• 2000: 373,193 

• 2005: 362,941 

• 2010: 328,303 

The increase in Flag Officers between 2005 and 2010 primarily reflects the growth 

in Joint Flag/General Officer billet requirements. 
83 

Mr. COFFMAN. What is the number of General Officers in the Marine Corps in 

1990, 1995, 2000, 2005, and 2010? What was the total number of personnel in your 

service in 1990, 1995, 2000, 2005, and 2010? 

General MILLS. 

Year GOs Other Officers Enlisted Total 

1990 70 19,868 176,639 196,577 

1995 68 17,714 156,724 174,506 

2000 80 17,849 155,361 173,291 

2005 80 18,803 161,141 180,025 

2010 86 21,221 181,134 202,441 

Mr. COFFMAN. What is the number of General Officers in the Air Force in 1990, 

1995, 2000, 2005, and 2010? What was the total number of personnel in your service 

in 1990, 1995, 2000, 2005, and 2010? 

General HESTERMAN. In 1990, there were 333 general officers in the Air Force and 

the total number of personnel was 530,861. 

In 1995, there were 274 general officers in the Air Force and the total number 

of personnel was 396,376. 

In 2000, there were 271 general officers in the Air Force and the total number 

of personnel was 351,375. 

In 2005, there were 273 general officers in the Air Force and the total number 

of personnel was 349,369. 

In 2010, there were 315 general officers in the Air Force. 300 of these general officers were in authorizations contained in the 2009 National Defense Authorization 

Act. The additional officers were in positions that were exempted by title 10 of the 

U.S. Code and therefore did not count against Air Force authorizations. The total 

number of Air Force personnel was 329,638. 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. SCHILLING 

Mr. SCHILLING. What is the impact of reducing our forward power globally on our 

organic base here at home? Will there be reductions in the amount of work that is 

required to be done by the military organic base? Will the military be able to keep 

our capabilities warm here at home if we pull back our service members and ships? 

Admiral CLINGAN. The Navy has continued to operate globally even while providing significant forces to Commander, U.S. Central Command. Following the end 

of combat operations in Afghanistan, the Navy expects to continue to operate forward, employing a combination of Forward Deployed Naval Forces and rotational 

forces, at a sustainable level. While we continuously seek the most efficient and cost 

effective approach for ship and aviation depot maintenance, both organic Navy and 

private sector capabilities will remain in demand to support Navy maintenance requirements. As it has historically, this demand will largely reflect our force structure; the operational tempo of our forces; and available resources. 

Mr. SCHILLING. How can we maintain force projection in the current fiscal climate? Are there roadblocks impeding the defense industrial base that could be fixed 

to create a more efficient system and help project better forward strength at a lower 

cost? 

Admiral CLINGAN. Navy rotational forces have, and will continue to, reset-instride to execute our global responsibilities. While we continue to seek the most efficient and cost effective approach for ship and aviation depot maintenance, both organic Navy and private sector capabilities will remain in demand to support Navy 

maintenance requirements. The Fleet Response Plan remains the Navy’s force generation model, and is a proven means to provide ready forces to the Combatant 

Commanders globally, in addition to forces ready to surge in response to crises. 

Sustaining the defense industrial base is critical to our war fighting capability. 

To this end, potential efficiencies include: 

• Clearly defining core industrial requirements in the public and private sectors 

to sustain present capabilities and field new capabilities. 

• Establishing the roles of both public depots and private industry in meeting 

these core requirements. 

• Increased partnering between public and private sectors. Depot maintenance 

should not be thought of as a fixed activity or location, but as a level of main-
84 

tenance that must be performed by highly skilled artisans within a core 

competency. 

• Effective integration of product support. This would include sharing of technical data, public-private partnering in both technical and trade skills, and 

maximizing use of capabilities across our public and private industrial 

facilities. 

The new DOD Defense Strategy and supporting Fiscal Year 2013 budget both 

focus on balancing DOD force structure to address warfighting needs while sustaining the industrial base. Deliberations on Navy’s force structure are ongoing by 

the Secretary of the Navy and Office of the Secretary of Defense; results will be submitted in the President’s Fiscal Year 2013 budget request. Navy is confident our resulting force structure will be aligned with the new Defense Strategy. 

Mr. SCHILLING. What is the impact of reducing our forward power globally on our 

organic base here at home? Will there be reductions in the amount of work that is 

required to be done by the military organic base? Will the military be able to keep 

our capabilities warm here at home if we pull back our service members and ships? 

General MILLS. Reducing forward presence will have a number of impacts on the 

forces in the contiguous United States (CONUS). 

First, the number of un-planned deployments will increase. Instead of reacting to 

crisis with forces that are positioned forward—we will have to deploy CONUS forces 

to respond. We currently maintain forces that are ready to rapidly deploy—these 

forces will be required to deploy more frequently. In the past 20 years we would 

have had to deploy CONUS reaction forces more than 100 times—for periods of up 

to 6 months. 

Forces used to transport crisis response forces (air and sea lift) will be at even 

greater demand. Crises require a rapid response—and most require a force that is 

flexible and responsive to a rapidly changing situation. Marines on the ground have 

proven to be one of the best alternatives for these types of situations. If we reduce 

our forward presence we will have two options when crisis develop: use diplomacy 

and support from partner nations to meet our objectives, or rapidly deploy a force. 

If partner nations are willing to provide airfields and ports, we can respond to many 

crisis using maritime prepositioning forces and strategic airlift. 

Mr. SCHILLING. How can we maintain force projection in the current fiscal climate? Are there roadblocks impeding the defense industrial base that could be fixed 

to create a more efficient system and help project better forward strength at a lower 

cost? 

General MILLS. Although the world is continuing to change and budgets continue 

to fluctuate, America’s requirement to maintain a forward based force-in-readiness 

remains. Physical presence matters. It shows our economic and our military commitment to a particular region. It deters potential adversaries, assures our friends, and 

permits response in a timely manner to crises. Our current combination of amphibious, air borne and, prepositioned forces provide the minimal capacity to realistically 

address this challenge. During these times of constrained resources, we remain committed to refining operations, identifying efficiencies, and reinvesting savings to conserve scarce public funds. For 7.8% of the total DOD budget, our Nation gains the 

ability to respond to unexpected crises, from humanitarian disaster relief efforts, to 

non-combatant evacuation operations, to conduct counter-piracy operations, or full 

scale combat. 

The Marine Corps is not aware of roadblocks impeding the industrial base. That 

being said, we recognize that our operational capabilities are enabled by the diverse 

industrial base. The Marine Corps works aggressively to identify and mitigate activities or decisions that could unintentionally destabilize the base upon which we 

depend. 

Mr. SCHILLING. What is the impact of reducing our forward power globally on our 

organic base here at home? Will there be reductions in the amount of work that is 

required to be done by the military organic base? Will the military be able to keep 

our capabilities warm here at home if we pull back our service members and ships? 

General HESTERMAN. A forward presence reduction could impact the ability of 

CONUS bases to absorb additional force structure, including limitations of CONUS 

airspace and ranges to support training requirements. Also, increased airlift requirements would extend deployment timelines, affect joint force synchronization, 

and add risk to Combatant Commander’s Operational Plans. Further, reduced forward presence would degrade our interoperability and capability to building partnerships with friends and allies. Lastly, such reductions could jeopardize our ability 

to assure access to overseas locations as well as overcome anti-access or area-denial 

measures—all are considerations when determining our global force posture. 
85 

Mr. SCHILLING. How can we maintain force projection in the current fiscal climate? Are there roadblocks impeding the defense industrial base that could be fixed 

to create a more efficient system and help project better forward strength at a lower 

cost? 

General HESTERMAN. Ensuring our ability to project force in the current fiscal environment involves making difficult decisions about our force posture. Limited budget resources may compel a gradual shift away from our current posture to one that 

provides force projection capability more efficiently and allows us a quick reach to 

emerging areas of strategic interest. Equally important is the need to avoid a 

‘‘hollowing out’’ of the force. A smaller, highly capable and ready force is preferable 

to a large, less-ready force. Finally, there is no escaping the need to modernize our 

forces. The future operating environment will challenge us in ways that our current 

capabilities may not be able to overcome. Necessary modernization efforts include, 

but are not limited to, systems that ensure better interoperability and integration 

both within the services as well as with allied nations. 

As a general comment, the more technological breadth and production diversity 

that exists within the defense industry, the greater our chances of procuring and 

employing projection capability at an acceptable cost. The Defense Industrial Base 

(DIB) underpinning Force Projection capabilities, from an AF perspective (e.g., long 

range bombers, air lift and tankers), is not separate from the DIB supporting other 

AF capabilities and those of other Services. As the DIB has combined in the upper 

tier to fewer but more diversified primes, the DIB in the lower tiers has also realigned, but the effect is not transparent to the AF. Upcoming cuts in defense 

spending, up to the $1T level, will affect the health of the DIB at all levels; however, 

the extent is difficult to predict at this point in time. Lower tier fragility will emerge 

over time as the impacts of decreased spending manifest. 

QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MR. SCOTT 

Mr. SCOTT. Can you describe how a Day without the U.S. Coast Guard would impact the U.S. Navy? 

Admiral CLINGAN. The full strength and value of our Nation’s seapower cannot 

be fully appreciated without considering realized without the U.S. Coast Guard. 

This Service provides unique capabilities and authorities that enable it to prevent 

and respond to a broad array of maritime threats and to seamlessly integrate into 

naval operations in all maritime theaters. An invaluable partner and force multiplier, Coast Guard forces complement the U.S. Navy’s ability to employ the global 

reach, persistent presence and operational flexibility it needs to accomplish its strategic imperatives. 

As stated in the 2006 National Fleet Policy Statement, the Coast Guard and Navy 

mutually support and complement each Service’s roles and missions. To this end, 

Coast Guard cutters serve alongside U.S. Navy ships in the Northern Arabian Gulf 

and other areas of the world. In theater, Coast Guard forces protect seaports of debarkation, the combat logistics force, and maritime pre-positioning ships. Coast 

Guard ships deployed individually or with Navy task forces support U.S. Navy 

‘‘Partnership Stations.’’ Coast Guard Law Enforcement Detachments serve aboard 

Navy ships performing counter-piracy operations off the Horn of Africa and 

counterdrug operations in the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific. The 21st century maritime security environment requires these types of cooperative initiatives to effectively protect and promote our national maritime interests. 

Because a majority of the world’s navies and coastguards are not blue-water, 

power projection forces, many countries routinely accept, desire, and explicitly request interaction with the Coast Guard. Speaking the language of both civil and 

military organizations, the Coast Guard’s inter-agency expertise provides multiple 

access points into foreign nation governments that might otherwise be inaccessible 

through purely military channels. Coast Guard training teams and international 

port security liaisons also assist developing nations with building the maritime expertise, infrastructure, domain awareness and response capabilities needed to protect their maritime interests. This helps develop layered, integrated maritime regimes that promote regional security and ultimately contribute to U.S. homeland defense in depth. 

The Coast Guard also provides an exceptional first responder capability for foreign and domestic disruptions. Events such as Hurricane Katrina, Haiti Earthquake 

Response, and Deepwater Horizon demonstrate the Coast Guard’s ability to integrate across conjoined military (e.g. Navy, National Guard, Air Force, etc.) and nonmilitary agencies to provide a timely and highly effective unified response. 

A day without the U.S. Coast Guard would be a significantly more difficult day 

for the U.S. Navy and our Nation. 
86 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. PALAZZO 

Mr. PALAZZO. The Navy is short about 30 ships from the 313 goal set by Secretary 

Mabus as the minimum necessary to meet current operational needs. How does the 

Navy intend to reach its goal in the budgetary environment, especially when current 

shortfalls in maintenance funding have left one in five of existing vessels unfit for 

combat? 

Admiral CLINGAN. Although less that the 313 ship floor, the current Navy battle 

force of 284 ships provides a fleet capable of meeting Combatant Commander demands with manageable risk. Going forward, our current shipbuilding and aviation 

plans balance the anticipated future demand for naval forces with expected resources. With anticipated funding being flat or declining in the future, we will focus 

our investments to ensure the battle force has the capability for Navy’s core missions such as ensuring Joint operational access and the capacity to remain forward 

in the most critical regions. Our plans also take into account the importance of 

maintaining an adequate national shipbuilding design and industrial base. 

Our deployed ships are materially fit for combat. Ships that are in deep maintenance are not ready for combat operations and are a normal part of our ongoing 

Fleet Readiness and Training Process. As for operating ships, recent readiness reports by the fleet indicate that the trend of higher failure rates by surface ships on 

inspections by the Navy Board of Inspections and Survey is turning—and we will 

remain vigilant and proactive. We conducted a review of Surface Force readiness 

over the last year, which identified a number of root causes. These include reduced 

surface ship and intermediate maintenance center manning and the disestablishment (by BRAC 1995) of the surface ship life cycle engineering organization. These 

changes stopped updates to ship class maintenance plans, eliminated the technical 

support to plan maintenance periods, and reduced the ability of crews to complete 

required maintenance. 

To address these problems, we put executive-level oversight in place and initiated 

a multi-prong plan to improve surface ship readiness. This plan includes increases 

to surface ship manning, restoring organizations to plan and manage ship lifecycle 

maintenance, and reestablishing technical support for planning and conducting 

maintenance periods. These corrections are all in place or in progress. We also significantly increased the FY 2011 and FY 2012 baseline Ship Maintenance budget 

submissions (compared to FY 2010). Today, Navy’s maintenance account is fully 

funded. 

While our ability to plan and conduct maintenance is much more comprehensive, 

an additional factor affecting surface ship readiness is the high operational tempo 

of the last ten years. Since 2001, underway days per ship increased by 15 percent 

while fleet size decreased by 10 percent. This reduces the time a ship is available 

in port to conduct maintenance—even if it is pre-planned and fully funded. The 

Navy is investigating options to improve the balance between presence and pre-deployment training and maintenance requirements, in order to achieve a sustainable 

level of operations that is consistent with the size of the fleet. 

Mr. PALAZZO. Can we reach the 313 mark, or more as the need arises? What is 

the consequence if we do not reach this minimum number? 

Admiral CLINGAN. The Fiscal Year 2012 Long-Range Shipbuilding Tables submitted to Congress show the fleet reaching 313 ships by Fiscal Year 2019. The main 

assumptions behind this plan are that our ships reach their expected service lives 

and that we and our shipbuilders can continue to build and deliver ships on 

schedule. 

Today, these key assumptions are not being met. Since 2000, the fleet has about 

10% fewer ships, and on average each ship spends about 15% more days underway 

each year to meet Combatant Commander demands. The greater amount of underway time comes at the expense of training and maintenance. Today we are unable 

to complete all the maintenance needed on each ship and aircraft, reducing their 

service lives. Resources alone cannot alleviate this issue. We will need to establish 

a sustainable level of deployed forces through the DOD Global Force Management 

process. In conjunction with adjusting the GFM plan, we are adjusting our Fleet 

Readiness and Training Plan to establish a sustainable operational tempo and complete required maintenance and training between deployments. This will constrain 

the number of ships and aircraft we deliver to Combatant Commanders in the future, but will ensure ships and aircraft reach their expected service lives and help 

avoid a further decrease in fleet capacity. 

To reach our ship inventory goals, we also need to build and deliver ships on 

schedule. We continue to work to reduce costs and incentivize our industry partners 

to remain on schedule and maximize the Navy’s return on investment. To reduce 

costs in general, our shipbuilding strategy leverages existing designs and proven 
87 

technologies as much as possible. The Department has also refined its internal 2– 

Pass/6–Gate review process to ensure requirements are set early and balanced 

against cost, and that this balance is visible and managed throughout the acquisition process. The Navy has strengthened acquisition policy to improve program oversight, control cost growth, and more effectively monitor contractor performance. The 

ability to build and deliver our fleet on time and under cost continues to require 

the combined effort of and collaboration between the Navy, the Congress, and the 

shipbuilding industry. 

Mr. PALAZZO. Many people have questioned the relevancy of amphibious operations in this day and age. Could you please give us your opinion on the relevancy 

of amphibious operations in the modern era? 

General MILLS. Amphibious flexibility is the greatest strategic asset that a sea 

based power possesses. The inherent flexibility and utility of amphibious forces are 

not widely understood, as evidenced by the frequent and mistaken direct correlation 

between the term amphibious operations and mental images of World War II marines assaulting Tarawa or Iwo Jima. In fact, in the last 20 years the Navy-Marine 

Corps team has conducted well over 100 amphibious operations of various types. 

The majority of these involved humanitarian assistance/disaster response (HA/DR) 

or noncombatant evacuations and defense of U.S. diplomatic posts during periods 

of host nation unrest occurring in permissive or uncertain environments. A smaller 

number involved operations in openly hostile environments to project or withdraw 

U.S. or partner-nation forces. Not included in the last 20 year tally—because they 

were only recently codified as a type of amphibious operation within joint doctrine— 

are the numerous military engagement and security cooperation activities routinely 

conducted by amphibious forces. Given the National Security Strategy’s emphasis on 

engagement, these operations are becoming increasingly prominent. 

Regardless of the type of amphibious operation conducted, they generally involve 

overcoming diplomatic, geographic, and/or military challenges to access. Regular employment of amphibious forces in uncertain and austere environments where access 

is challenged is chronicled by over 50 amphibious operations conducted since Sept. 

11, 2001. 

Rapid action is the critical enabler in these operations requiring immediate response regardless of access afforded. Organic capabilities such as well decks and 

flight decks, billeting, communications, medical, dental, messing, and command and 

control all combine to increase the utility of amphibious forces. More importantly, 

an amphibious force can loiter off shore indefinitely providing valuable time for diplomatic efforts to unfold; complementing diplomacy with demonstrated resolve. Amphibious forces can be task organized to the mission and threat, and scaled to bring 

only those capabilities ashore necessary for mission accomplishment. In a security 

environment characterized by uncertainty, operating from the sea provides a degree 

of flexibility, force protection, and freedom of action not realized by traditional 

ground force lay-down. 

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