State of the Force: “Call for Change”, 2019 Air Space & Cyber Conference, Acting Secretary of the Air Force Matthew Donovan.
Transcript
[Announcer] Ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon! Please welcome back to the stage, AFA’s Chairman of the Board, the Honorable F. Whitten Peters. (dramatic music) (audience applauding)
Well, welcome back for the afternoon. I hope you enjoyed the tech session. I hope there was enough lunch, and we’re really happy to have you back. I’m excited to welcome, for the first time, apparently, Matt Donovan, the Acting Secretary of the Air Force. I was kidding him because I was once an Acting Secretary for the Air Force for 19 months, and then they made me the real deal, which is a lot more fun. Secretary Donovan has a long history with the Air Force, including his 26-year career in the Air Force, where he was a command pilot with more than 2,900 flight hours in an F-16 Eagle and F-5E Tiger 2. You don’t probably remember the F-5E, but it was an airplane, including combat sorties during Operation Southern Watch. Secretary Donovan retired from the Air Force as a colonel, and went on to serve in the defense industry before transitioning to civil service. His civil service includes serving as a professional staff member for the Senate Armed Services Committee. As a professional staff member, he managed all matters for the committee relating to the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps fixed wing aircraft, manned and unmanned tactical aviation programs and Air Force bomber mobility and special mission aircraft, as well as research and development, aircraft procurement and sustainment programs. Mr. Donovan is able to use his extensive experience on Capitol Hill to better serve our Air Force and our airmen as the current Acting Secretary of the Air Force. Before you stand up, let me say there’s a video. At the end of the video, Secretary Donovan will appear, and we’ll go from there, so roll the tape, please.
[Male] We’re in a competition. We’re leaving the period of the department’s history where we’ve been focusing solely on violent extremists.
[Male] Steep competition has returned.
[Male] They’re doing things.
[Female] China has had a strong presence in Africa for years.
[Male] Vladimir Putin testing a new intercontinental missile.
[Female] And this warning about Iran.
Locked in a bitter standoff over the now scrapped nuclear deal.
And so if conflict in the future is going to be trans-regional that’s gonna extend beyond the current combatant commander boundaries and maps.
[Male] How do we have the right policies and the right directives, leveraging the right acquisition authorities and unleash this talent that the hard problems that our Air Force and our nation faces today.
[Female] Over the past three decades our adversaries have studied how the United States and its allies.
[Man] Organized train and equip our forces.
[Male] It won’t be tanks, planes and ships that are the essential differentiators in tomorrow’s conflict, that conflict’s going to be data-centric.
[Male] They’ve learned how we fight and they’ve invested heavily in adaptive technologies
[Male] designed to exploit our vulnerabilities.
[Male] AI,
Yep
[Male] Is that, talk to me, is that, that’s scary.
[Man] Artificial intelligence has capability to significantly speed our tactical, operational and strategic.
[Man] And so we have to adapt to these commercial development tools.
[Male] forced us to change our approach to how we would then do acquisitions.
[Male] Drive a consistent demand signal to our industry team mates. Does what you’re offering connect across the network? Air, land, space, sea, and cyber operations occurring simultaneously to achieve objectives.
[Man] In the early days in the Cold War, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik and
[Woman] Space contributions continue to expand.
[Man] We must move fast and we must be bold in fielding space war fighting capabilities.
[Woman] We must prepare to protect our interests.
[Man] We’re the best in the world of space. With the establishment of U.S. Space Command we’re even better.
[Man] We’re gonna have to be able to keep building, keep upgrading, keep sustaining faster than any adversary we have.
[Man] An incredible choreography all coming together
[Man] Get back to our roots as being a rapid builder and fielder of things.
[Male] As members of the DoD, of the Department of the Air Force
[Female] We must be ready for the great power competition
[Male] As a fully networked force in a data-dense environment in a digital age
[Man] With the national defense strategy
[Male] And efforts of our airmen,
[Man] And I’m seeing that creativity across the ocean.
[Female] We will compete, deter
[Man] And win. (audience applauding)
Well thank you folks. Thank you, please sit down. Well thank you. Good afternoon. Thank you, Whitt, for that kind introduction. More importantly, your lengthy service to our nation in all your many positions, but especially as Chairman of AFA, really appreciate that. You know I became a life member of AFA back in 1981 when I was a staff sergeant. And I guess I should have looked at the fine print a little closer because I didn’t know they’d actually have me speak some day. (audience laughing) By the way I believe Whitt still holds the record for longest tenure as Acting Secretary of the Air Force what is it, 19 months? Well, I’ve been at it for almost four months now and I’m happy to report that Ambassador Barrett’s congressional hearing went very well and we’re just days away from her confirmation vote. So it looks like your record will stand. I’d also like to thank Sir Richard Branson for his attendance and his remarks this morning. What a great opportunity to hear from a modern-day aviation and space pioneer. When I found out he was speaking, I had only one request. Not to follow him. So thanks, thanks guys. And of course thank you to Chief Goldfein and Chief Wright. It’s an honor to share the stage with you this week. Okay, we’ve got a lot of ground to cover so let’s dive in. Before talking about where we’re going as an Air Force I’d like to talk about where we are today. Specifically in the context of what we’ve accomplished over the last year. The Air Force has spent the better part of the last three decades in a readiness decline, with a shrinking force. It wasn’t until 2017 when the Trump administration’s request for additional appropriations was passed by Congress, followed by the passing of the 2018 bipartisan Budget Act Agreement, that we stopped the bleeding from years of budget declines and uncertainty. And for the first time in over a decade, we actually started the year with an executable two-year plan that had steady top line increases. I can’t overemphasize the positive impact this kind of budget stability has on our planning, programming and acquisition efforts, and ultimately our ability to start digging out from this readiness hole. Because of this in 2019 we made real progress in readiness restoration and we’re finally able to start rebuilding the Force. More importantly we made significant steps in building the Air Force we need. But what does this real progress look like? What did we, or rather what did you, accomplish this last year? As the Chief likes to say, what does our receipt to Congress look like? Well it’s pretty impressive and worth a review. As we begin to pivot toward the future, some of this year’s most notable feats came from our scientists and research and development teams. The Department of the Air Force has been hard at work expanding our hypersonic capabilities. This year we discovered new ways to measure atmospheric conditions during testing at the home and high speed test track and made significant improvements in our ability to test the flight characteristics of hypersonic re-entry vehicles. Our advances in hypersonics weren’t just theoretical. We conducted flight tests with the carriage of a hypersonic missile from a B-52. That’s right, we used the oldest aircraft in the inventory to test our newest kinetic capability. And it’s all tied together with rapid prototyping as we increase the speed of our acquisition system. Faster, smarter. Speaking of bombers, I’m happy to announce the development of the B-21 Raider is on schedule and the first aircraft is being built at the same facility in Palmdale, California, as its predecessor, the B-2 Spirit. The first flight of the Raider will take it from Palmdale to Edwards Air Force Base where the legacy of excellence will continue with the reactivation of the 425th Flight Test Squadron. As we seek to develop these types of next-generation weapons, we’re implementing ways to streamline our procurement process such as with the XQ-58 Valkyrie. The Valkyrie is a low-cost, attritable aircraft that is a test bed for a cost effective and timely aircraft procurement process. It’s a stealthy, unmanned aircraft that can escort fourth and fifth generation aircraft in combat acting as a loyal wingman. Plus it’s a great platform to help develop and experiment with artificial intelligence for autonomous operations. And the most impressive thing about it was it only took two and a half years to go from contract award to first flight. The Air Force Research Lab did this by working with commercial partners during the initial development and it’s already paying dividends. We’re constantly developing creative ways to get after tough problems. For instance, this past March we held our first Pitch Day event. So far we’ve had more than 130 small businesses and nearly 100 industry groups participate. Holding a competition is one thing. Turning that competition into successful contracts is another. And we absolutely nailed it with our Pitch Days. We decided to focus each Pitch Day on a specific area, such as unmanned aircraft or special operations forces and this paid off. In the last six months we’ve awarded 72 contracts worth $41 million. As one company said, it was quicker to get an Air Force contract than it is to get a beer in New York City. That’s success. We’re only getting started with Air Force Pitch Days. Over the next three months we’ll host five more in cities like San Francisco and Orlando. This is just another way that we’re infusing innovation into our Air Force to make sure we’re lethal and ready, while being faster and smarter so we can get to the Air Force we need. As we bring on new capabilities quickly, it’s important that we protect the intellectual properties associated with these assets from countries that would like to steal our ideas. Last year we established a cross-functional team made up of airmen with acquisitions, legal, logistics and intellectual property professionals. The team brainstormed and developed recommendations for how we can better protect ourselves. Ultimately they recommended what we, they recommended we create what they call a smart IP cadre that will partner with industry and serve as the Air Force’s lead agency in a whole new government approach against the theft of our hard-won intellectual property. We continue to find new ways to streamline by utilizing the authorities Congress gave us to accelerate acquisitions and develop programs faster. One way we’ve done this is by aggressively using Section 804 of the fiscal year 2016 National Defense Authorization Act. The beauty of Section 804 is that you can scribe it on the back of a bar napkin. It establishes a series of common sense reforms, begin prototyping earlier, nearly a year and a half earlier than under the normal system, which gives engineers more time for testing and trouble shooting and keeps flawed concepts from entering production and operations. This alone represents a whopping 70% of any program’s total cost. In line with this, our acquisition folks created a program called the Century Challenge. Dr. Will Roper, our acquisition Chief, asked his community to shave 100 years off the total acquisition timelines. They attacked 55 programs and within a year they not only met this goal, they beat it. Now they’ve set a new goal. 150 years of time savings while ensuring that rapid and tailored programs are the new normal for Air Force acquisitions. Will is speaking next so stick around and you can hear more about it. This really is ground breaking and game changing. We’ve also been looking for ways to improve some of the processes you all face on a daily basis. Specifically for those who sacrifice as they support our airmen, our spouses. For years, whenever a family moved to a new state, they had to pay for professional licenses, credentials they already earned and paid for. Well, we’ve heard you and have worked to mitigate this hurdle to spouse employment. Now when family PCS’s to a new state, the Air Force will reimburse them up to $500 for exams, registration and other costs required by their new home state so they can continue their careers. This is a quality of life issue designed to help spouses get back to work quicker after a move while keeping money in our airmen’s pockets. As you can see, we’ve been pretty busy this year, and that’s just what we’ve been doing here on earth. We’ve been just as busy in space. If you were sitting outdoors on the east coast of Florida on August 8, you may have witnessed a powerful event as the engines of the Atlas Five rocket ignited, a deep rumble would have reverberated through your bones as you watched a 20-story rocket lift off. That morning the Atlas Five pushed a communications payload into space with the help of 1.6 million pounds of thrust. It was a beautiful sight as the smoke trail was highlighted against the perfectly blue Air Force sky. But the technical aspect wasn’t the most impressive part of the launch. Just hours earlier, SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket carrying an Israeli-owned space craft into orbit from Patrick Air Force Base. And just like that, the 45th Space Wing launched two rockets in 34 hours. This was the first time our space professionals at Cape Canaveral had done this since 1981, more than 38 years ago. Speaking of space, you might have heard a little something about a space force. And we might have had a part in ensuring the President’s vision is carried out. Our nation needs the United States Space Force to guarantee our preeminence in the space domain and it must be a new and separate service to unleash its full potential. We need Congress to finalize the necessary legislation to fully establish the United States Space Force as the sixth branch of the armed forces within the Department of Defense, and I know they’re working hard in Congress to do just that. Two and a half weeks ago the President formally stood up U.S. Space Command, the 11th unified combatant command. General Jay Raymond, our lead warfighter for the space domain took the helm as its commander. This is a critical step towards meeting the growing threats posed by our potential adversaries in space and will be crucial if future conflicts start in or extend into space. One of my favorite interlocutors, Yogi Berra, once said, it’s tough to make predictions. Especially about the future. But no challenge worth undertaking is easy, so our space professionals at Air Force Space Command took a hack at predicting what the space domain will look like in 2060, and how we can assure the United States will continue to be the leader in space. These space professionals, along with experts from across the DoD, NASA, NATO, industry and academia developed eight potential scenarios for the future of space. Each scenario examined the human presence, the economics and the leadership challenges in space. On one end of their predictive spectrum, people are back on the moon and exploring Mars but there is no permanent presence. On the other end of the gamut we have permanent outposts on both the moon and Mars. Regardless, estimates of the future economic impact of space range from one to two percent of the global economy to 10% of global GDP. Either way, we’re talking trillions of dollars in commerce. I encourage you to read Air Force Space Command’s recent report, The Future of Space 2060. I fully endorse the author’s number one recommendation, that the U.S. must develop a long-term national strategy to ensure continued leadership in space. A whole government effort is required to ensure we can defend our national interests, our commercial capabilities, and our people in space. The Department of the Air Force is leading this effort. Discuss and debate the future of space. Airmen have been thinking about this domain for decades and we have some of the smartest people in the world. The Department of the Air Force has got this. In the meantime, we’re still taking care of business both home and abroad, and last year was no exception. In October airmen responded to the devastation left behind by Hurricane Michael. In the true spirit of the Air Force you came together as a team to take care of our families. Within 36 hours of Hurricane Michael’s landfall, the Devil Raiders from the 621st Contingency Response Wing had 66 airmen airborne and headed towards Tyndall Air Force Base. These forces conducted an air field assessment, command and control and aerial port operations along with field management and air traffic control, all which helped the 325th Fighter Wing evacuate the remaining F-22s and then kicked off recovery operations. But the Devil Raiders didn’t stop there, they also tasked 22 people to take over some of the responsibilities of the devastated 601st Air Operation Center. These 22 airmen enabled airlift from multiple operations including humanitarian disaster relief missions along with FEMA’s life-saving efforts. At the same time, our headquarter staff was hard at work ensuring airmen and their families were taken care of financially. They linked up with Task Force HARP, a unit that concentrated on housing, assignments, relocation and posture for personnel affected by the hurricane to secure entitlements for 11,000 airmen and their families. This work ensured our people had money to pay for the increased housing costs and non-concurrent travel so the airmen who were focused on disaster recovery efforts didn’t have to worry about how they would support their families who had evacuated. They also found a way to cover family separation payments for those airmen. The staff then worked tirelessly with Congress to secure a $1.9 billion supplemental to pay for all this while also partial funding recovery efforts at Tyndall and at Offutt Air Force Base which received severe flooding earlier this year. And with hurricane season upon us once more, our airmen are again answering the call. Just last week a group of rescue airmen from Moody Air Force Base in Georgia forward deployed to provide disaster relief operations following the devastation of Hurricane Dorian. The team saved 54 lives while delivering critical medical attention and supplies to Bahamian citizens in need. It’s a testament to their dedication as airmen and the epitome of their creed, “These Things We Do That Others May Live.” I hope you’re starting to pick up on a theme, innovation, team work, progress. And by the way, we’re still in serious conflicts overseas. This year alone we’ve flown over 54,000 sorties, air-dropped over a million pounds of supplies, off-loaded 400 million pounds of fuel, and released over 8,500 weapons in support of joint coalition operations to seek out and destroy insurgent terrorist networks around the world. In other words, you all absolutely crushed it this year. Each of these examples shows the tenacity and the grit of our airmen. Whether it’s the Devil Raiders deploying at a moments notice and ensuring Americans AOC didn’t miss a beat, or airmen finding ways to save time and money so we can begin to focus on the future, our airmen are making a difference for our nation. This is just a small sample of what you airmen have accomplished all around the globe this past year, a subset of an amazing array of accomplishments. My hat is off to all of you. Before we start talking about what the future looks like, I’d like to take a moment to pause and pay tribute to some of the larger-than-life icons of aviation we lost this year. Ollie Crawford, a true advocate for air power, passed away at the age of 94. He enlisted in the Army Air Corps during World War II where he trained Chinese pilots on the P-40. After the war he was part of the Air Force Reserve for 13 years while he continued to be an advocate for the Air Force. He was the driving force behind the formal recognition of the Flying Tigers and worked to ensure the pilots were awarded Distinguished Flying Crosses while the ground crews were presented with Bronze Stars for their actions. He also led the effort to build the Air Force Memorial on the hill overlooking the Pentagon. Ollie also served as a president and then as the chairman of the board of the Air Force Association and was its Man of the Year in 1989. More impressive than his honors is the fact that he flew more than 100 different types of aircraft and racked up 13,000 hours of flying time during his lifetime. I first got to know Ollie at air shows when I was a demonstration pilot many moons ago, and he was just a larger-than-life hero to me. Lieutenant Colonel Dick Cole was the last of the Doolittle Raiders when he passed away at 103 years old. Dick was a lieutenant in 1942 when he served as Jimmy Doolittle’s co-pilot as 16 B-25s bombed the Japanese home islands just four months after Pearl Harbor. After the raid, thunderstorms forced the bombers off course and the crews bailed out over China where they evaded enemy forces until they could return to the war. Lieutenant Colonel Dick Cole retired from the U.S. Air Force after earning three Distinguished Flying Crosses and the Congressional Gold Medal. And a few years ago you may remember that he helped us dedicate the B-21 named of Raider in memory of that historic mission. Dr. Harold Brown was an absolute genius who passed away in January. By the age of 21 he had earned a Ph.D. in Physics from Columbia University and at 23 he was appointed the director of what’s now known as the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory. Dr. Brown’s penchant for service continued when at the age of just 38 he took the helm as the Secretary of the Air Force and then went on to become the first scientist to serve as the Secretary of Defense. Dr. Brown was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Carter, who called him one of his finest cabinet officers. Lieutenant Colonel Robert Friend, a Tuskegee airman, passed away this year at age 99. He flew 142 combat missions with the Army Air Corps during World War II, and continued to serve during the Korean War and Vietnam. While he earned a Distinguished Flying Cross and Congressional Gold Medal for the bravery he exhibited during his 28 year career, his lasting legacy will always be the distinctive red-tailed paint scheme that he created and painted on his World War II aircraft. In honor of Lieutenant Colonel Friend, I’d like to invite a special guest up on stage. Mr. Charles McGee, would you join me on stage? (audience applauding) Mr. McGee is actually Colonel McGee, a retired Air Force officer and fighter pilot who flew more than 400 combat missions in World War II, Korea and Vietnam. In fact, as a lieutenant during World War II, Colonel McGee was stationed with the 302nd Fighter Squadron as one of the original Tuskegee Airmen. Flying his P-51 Mustang named Kitten after his wife, Colonel McGee kept American bombers safe and engaged enemy fighters in the skies over Germany as part of a greatest generation. Colonel McGee is joined by other members of the East Coast Chapter of the Tuskegee Airmen seated in the audience today, and I though it fitting for these men to help us memorialize their brother-in-arms. Please join me in recognizing these genuine Air Force heroes. (audience applauding) (rousing music) In honor of Lieutenant Colonel Friend, and as a lasting tribute to the sacrifice and bravery of all the Tuskegee Airmen, please turn your attention to the screen as we introduce the Air Force’s newest Red Tail. (peaceful orchestral music) (jet engines roaring)
[Male] As America enters the war, these Tuskegee Airmen are ready to fly into combat with honor. (audience applauding)
Ladies and gentlemen I present to you the T-7A Red Hawk. (stirring orchestral music) (audience applauding) Thank you. Thank you Colonel McGee. The name Red Hawk honors the legacy of Tuskegee Airmen and pays homage to their signature red-tailed aircraft from World War II. The name is also a tribute to the Curtis P-40 War Hawk, an American fighter aircraft that first flew in 1938 and was flown by the 99th Fighter Squadron, the U.S. Army Air Force’s first African-American fighter squadron. The P-51 and P-40 are some of the most iconic fighters of their time. Likewise the T-7A will be the staple of a new generation of aircraft. The Red Hawk offers advanced capabilities for training tomorrow’s pilots on data links, simulated radar, smart weapons, defensive management systems as well as synthetic training capabilities. The first T-7A aircraft and simulators are scheduled to arrive at Joint Base Randolph Air Force Base Texas in 2023 as a replacement for the venerable T-38C. And the moniker Red Hawk is certainly fitting as that species of raptor, the red-tailed hawk, is often seen soaring over our pilot training bases. Thank again to Colonel McGee, let’s have one more round of applause to honor these true American heroes. (audience applauding) (stirring music) So folks, that literally brings us up to today, and today looks a lot different than it has over the last quarter century since the end of the Cold War. We are operating in the most competitive international security environment in generations. If this last year has taught us anything, it’s that long-term strategic competition between nations is back with a vengeance. This year we have seen our adversaries continue to modernize their armed forces to compete directly with the United States. These adversaries, unable to match us on air, land or sea, are looking for ways to exploit our American way of war with its increasing dependence on cyber and space. To put it bluntly, our adversaries are growing less fearful of how we would respond if they were to challenge the U.S., its partners or allies. They increasingly doubt we would choose to engage them in a conventional war. That would be a huge miscalculation on their part. In light of this and guided by the National Defense Strategy, the Air Force conducted an in-depth analysis on what it would take to achieve all the missions laid out in the NDS. The analysis confirmed what we already knew. The Air Force is too small for all it’s being asked to do. And so last year we laid out the growth required for the Air Force we need, but while we need to get bigger, we must also get better. We simply cannot ask for more stuff and continue to do things in the same old way. It’s time we truly harness the power of the information age and reclaim our significant competitive technological advantage. We have entered a new age of discovery and advancement. Big data and analytics are transforming societies and economies. These advances are fueling a revolution in how we fight and evolving the character of war. Victory in combat will depend less on discrete war fighting platforms and more on the networks, data and IT infrastructure that binds them all together. To address this challenge we’ve developed a war fighting concept that brings the full strength of the joint war fighting force to project power. It’s called multi-domain operations. And if this is the first time you’re hearing about it, don’t fret because you’re gonna hear a lot more about it during this week. In fact, the Chief is going to talk about multi-domain operations tomorrow so I won’t steal all of his thunder, but going first does have its privileges. So allow me to tee it up for him. It will take true team work across all forces and domains to meet the difficult challenges posed by future adversaries. That is the power of multi-domain operations. In effect, it integrates and synchronizes military activities instead of just seeking to de-conflict them. This creates simultaneous dilemmas for our adversaries overwhelming them with more challenges than they can deal with at one time. The Advanced Battle Management System, or ABMS, is our first real step in operationalizing this type of command and control required for multi-domain operations. Instead of relying on one specific platform for future command and control, we’re developing a robust open architecture family of systems that includes air, ground, remotely piloted and space assets, and synchronizing them onto a single network. The key though is not the individual platform, the key is connecting every sensor to every shooter. I’ll let the Chief take it from here tomorrow but needless to say, achieving multi-domain operations will not be easy and requires a shift in the way the Air Force and the U.S. military as a whole views lethality. To help get after this, we also introduced the Digital Air Force Initiative. The Digital Air Force is a transformation in the way we employ data, technology and infrastructure to remain dominant in the 21st century. The core of the Digital Air Force consists of the three inter-connected and mutually supporting reform efforts: IT architecture, data management and business operations reform. The Digital Air Force is really about orchestrating these capabilities, how do we develop the app that sits on the cloud that’s powered by AI, that’s connected to the warfighter. I’ll tell you up front, the military doesn’t hold all the answers. Gone are the days when the government would spin off technology to the private sector. Think NASA and innovations such as scratch-resistant lenses or space blankets. Today, the government must spin on technology advancement from industry and the private sector. The same technologies that are revolutionizing business and commerce such as smart phones, cloud computing and artificial intelligence are equally influencing the future of war. We’re heavily engaged with the commercial sector as we seek to find solutions to these challenges. Just this summer, as an example, we kicked off an initiative in the Air Force working with industry to install and sustain 5G networks at 10 Air Force bases in the southeast region. It’s a win-win for the military and industry, industry invests in infrastructure while we provide the facilities, land and customers. And in the end our airmen have some of the fastest most reliable network connectivity in the nation. And as we rebuild Tyndall Air Force Base after the devastation of Hurricane Michael, we plan to incorporate 5G into the design, literally from the ground up to create a 21st-century Air Force base. Artificial intelligence is another area of promising collaboration. We’ve already begun incorporating AI into day-to-day operations such as aircraft maintenance. It’s called condition-based maintenance, and it uses AI to help determine if a component is about to fail. We deployed this technology in our C-5 and KC-135 fleets to improve aircraft availability rates, decrease unscheduled maintenance, and ultimately save money. We’ll roll this technology out to our C-135 fleet next and eventually across the Air Force in the near future. To get a sense of how important a seemingly small change can be, we estimate that if the entire Department of Defense transitioned to this process, we could save as much as $15 billion a year, savings that could fund an entire additional International Guard squadron of F-35s or an additional active duty squadron of KC-46s. We’re also looking to the commercial sector to help us reform our business practices. Just like with networks and big data applications, industry is leading the way on digital business practices for large organizations in the information age. With high-speed networks and the power of big data, we should be able to wean off of static Power Point slides and hook into live data streams to show the latest information for a given system or program. And using digital sandbox environments we can start manipulating variables such as funding and manpower to see the outcomes in real time. Data, information, technology. These are the things that will ensure we compete, deter and win against our great power adversaries. As General Goldfein has maintained, victory is not a birthright, it has to be fought for. But America has never been satisfied with bringing a knife to a knife fight. We’re building a 21st century force for the information age and we can’t do it without you. Your ideas, your creativity and your tenacity are ultimately our greatest advantage. It’s also why we’re committed to making real and lasting reforms in talent management, developing the airmen we need for the Air Force we need. More to follow on that this week as well. I hope you’re as excited about this next year as I am. 72 is a pretty impressive year for the Department of the Air Force and you can imagine what sort of historic changes we’ll be talking about next year at this time. We may very well have a new branch of the military by then and some of you will be in on the ground floor of that historic event. In the meantime, we eagerly await the confirmation of Ambassador Barrett as our 25th Secretary of the Air Force. It truly has been an honor of a lifetime to serve with you these last few months as Acting Secretary, and I’d be remiss if I didn’t take this opportunity to thank you for that and all you do for our nation every day. Thank you again, thank you Whitt, thank you General Goldfein, and most importantly, thank you my fellow airmen. (audience applauding) (stirring music)
We gave Secretary Donovan the Will Whilper Award of a pair of AFA’s gaudy socks. We’re trying to have a new competition. One final administrative note before we break, we’ve had a switch in speech times for General Ray and General Raymond, this is gonna be hard folks, their speeches have swapped days, so General Ray will be today at 3:40 and General Raymond will be tomorrow at 3:55. So with that, enjoy some coffee and we’ll be back in about 10 minutes for the next speaker, thank you. (stirring music)