DOD launches new website on cyber strategy

The DOD recently launched a new website only weeks after they released their first comprehensive cybersecurity strategy to guide the department's efforts to fight cyber attacks going forward.

The website will act as a companion to the strategy as a resource for the DOD's execution of it. The site provides detailed content on the five pillars of the new cyberstrategy: to treat cyberspace as an operational domain; to employ new defense operating concepts; to partner with the public and private sector; to build international partnerships; and to leverage talent and innovation.

AFA commends the initiatives being taken by DOD to further explore the opportunities of asymmetric impacts in cyberspace, and how it can significantly affect U.S. defensive readiness, national security and the nation’s day-to-day functions.

We encourage you to explore the new site as it is a platform underscoring how important cybersecurity is to the department. DOD's efforts are not to exploit civilians' internet privacy nor do they have plans to use its power to control cyberspace, but to take proactive measures to fortify our national security.

2011 Air & Space Highlights: MISTY Pilots

AFA’sAir & Space Conference attracts the top echelon of USAF senior leadership, including the commanders of every USAF command, and military dignitaries from air forces worldwide. It brings together Air Force leadership, industry experts, academia and current aerospace specialists from around the world. 

But it also recognizes the airmen of the past who have significantly contributed to the nation, with their dedication, their sacrifice and their service.

In 1967, the primitive nature of Vietnam’s topography made it difficult for aircraft like the F-4 and F-105 to see targets of opportunity, posing a heavy problem for US forces in Vietnam. The Air Force tasked then-Major Bud Day to form a top-secret unit called Commando Sabre—radio call sign"Misty"—that flew risky missions over North Vietnam's Ho Chi Minh Trail in two-man F-100 jet fighters, scouring the terrain for targets. These Misty Pilots – all volunteer – went on to pioneer a new array of tactics to fly fast and low over enemy territory. Of the 157 pilots who flew Misty missions, 34 were shot down (two of them twice), three were captured, and seven declared MIA. Despite overwhelming loss rates and constant danger, Misty crews got into their cockpits and carried out their assigned missions day after day. 

At this year’s Air & Space Conference, a panel of Misty Pilots will speak on their experiences in this historical unit. The panel will include:

Medal of Honor Recipient Colonel George E. “Bud” Day, a veteran of World War II, the Korean War, and Vietnam War, who has received over 70 decorations with most being in combat, and is a former prisoner of war. On 26 August 1967, Col. Day was forced to eject from his aircraft over North Vietnam when it was hit by ground fire. His right arm was broken in 3 places, and his left knee was badly sprained. He was immediately captured by hostile forces and taken to a prison camp. Day was able to eventual escape into the jungle and began the trek toward South Vietnam. Though he successfully evaded enemy patrols and reached the Ben Hai River, where he encountered U.S. artillery barrages, he was eventually ambushed and recaptured by the Viet Cong, sustaining gunshot wounds to his left hand and thigh. He was returned to the prison. 

Paul. K. “P.K.” Robinson, who, while assigned as a "Misty FAST-FAG" at Phu Cat AB, completed over 250 combat missions, including 101 missions over North Vietnam. He participated in many of the key battles of the Vietnam War including the Dak To Offensive, the siege at Khe Sahn and the Tet Offensive.

General Ronald R. Fogleman, former chief of staff of the U.S. Air Force, Washington, where he served as the senior uniformed Air Force officer responsible for the organization, training and equipage of 750,000 active duty, Guard, Reserve and civilian forces serving in the United States and overseas. In early assignments he instructed student pilots, performed combat duty as a fighter pilot and high-speed forward air controller in Vietnam and Thailand, taught history at the Air Force Academy and conducted flight operations in Europe -- including duty as an F-15 aircraft demonstration pilot for international airshows.

General Merrill A. McPeak was the 14^th chief of staff of the U.S. Air Force. As chief, he served as the senior uniformed Air Force officer responsible for a combined force of over 850,000 people serving at approximately 1,300 locations in the United States and overseas. He is a command pilot, having flown more than 6,000 hours, principally in fighter aircraft. He flew two years as a solo pilot for the elite aerial demonstration team, the Thunderbirds, and flew as an attack pilot and high-speed forward air controller in Vietnam.

Major General Donald W. Shepperd (moderator) is a former director of Air National Guard. As director, he was responsible for formulating, developing, and coordinating all programs, policies, and plans affecting the Air Guard members in units throughout the United States, D.C., Puerto Rico, Guam and the Virgin Islands. After receiving his wings, he was assigned to duty in West Germany and South Vietnam. He is a command pilot, having flown more than 5,000 hours; and flew 247 fighter combat missions in Southeast Asia.

The MISTY Panel will take place Tuesday, September 20, from 10:00am - 10:45am.

Don't forget to check the blog for more highlights of the 2011 Air & Space Conference!

Budget deal, Military retirement, Factoid

AFA Members, Congressional Staff members, Civic leaders, DOCA members, this week the good news is we finally got a budget deal to offset increasing the borrowing limit with spending cuts. The bad news is Defense spending could be impacted in a way never seen in our country. First it’s important to review the facts as we know them. President Obama has tasked DOD (in April) to come up with $400B over 10 years, taken out of the base budget. The Air Force share of that is $49B over the Future Years Defense Plan (five years). To do so, the AF will have to get smaller, and, as stated by a senior AF official, “won’t be able to be in two places at once.” The budget deal may make these cuts much worse – perhaps twice as much or more. To our knowledge, never before has the United States cut defense spending to such an extent in a time of war.


We argue, in our briefings on the Hill, that we need to focus on what really counts. The US has many interests around the globe, but a select set are fundamentally existential in nature:

• Stemming nuclear proliferation

• Managing the rise of near-peer competitors

• Ensuring access to key resources

• Maintaining strategic alliances

• Protecting open access to the global commons

• Defending the homeland

The familiar missions of deterring … and defeating aggression through large-scale power-projection operations have not diminished in importance. These are not obsolete Cold War missions. States have had competing objectives throughout history, and nothing has changed to diminish such dynamics. The force of the future is one that is focused on fundamental objectives, is flexible, limits the loss of life (both adversaries and friendlies), does not project vulnerability, and is capable of operating throughout the threat spectrum. Occupation—based strategies are risky. They impose tremendous costs upon our nation—huge resources are required, both military personnel and civilians are thrust into tremendous points of vulnerability, and it takes a significant period of time to secure the strategic objective of a stable society. Any budget cuts must take into account a strategy which protects our interests, accomplishes the key missions above, and takes advantage of American strengths. Cuts should not be “salami-sliced” across the Services. They must be strategy driven. In a zero-sum budget environment, any funding directed against lower priority missions will come at the cost of addressing fundamental interests. We can no longer afford that approach.

Secondly, the Defense Business Board is reviewing major changes to the military retirement system. They have a draft briefing which transitions it from a defined benefit plan to a defined contribution plan (much like a 401k). The brief can be found here: http://www.afa.org/members/CommTools/APA/OpEds/2933_001.pdf.  One of our most thoughtful members and a former AFA leader has offered his comments to the brief. They are below my name.

Finally, I came across a piece of data on the C-17. The highest-time C-17 has over 18,000 hours on it … and is 22 years old. Compare that with the average Southwest Airlines aircraft of 11 years old and less time.

For your consideration.

Mike

Michael M. Dunn
President/CEO
Air Force Association
______________________________________

Comments on Modernizing the Military Retirement System

Defense Business Board Task Group

July 21, 2011

The problem with the DBB Task Group’s work on the military retirement system begins with the Terms of Reference for the study. No problem statement is given – the Task Group is to support the SECDEF’s “efficiency initiatives” (whatever they are) and to “Begin with a review of the current reform thinking on military retirement benefits.” What “reform thinking”? The Task Group is to “provide recommendations for optimizing…the…retirement system” – against what criteria? I have read the TOR several times, and I still do not know what problem the DBB is trying to solve.

Chart 4. The Task Force points out that military pay, healthcare benefits, and retirement benefits exceed that of the private sector today. No data was presented to back up that claim, but even if it is true, it is irrelevant. I know of no company in the private sector that asks its employees to sign a piece of paper saying that, if called upon to do so, they will give their lives in the defense of the parent corporation. Comparisons with the private sector are interesting, but they do not dictate what is appropriate for military members.

Charts 5-8. Interesting information in the Findings charts, but they do not lead to the conclusion in the Assessment chart that the current retirement plan is “Unfair.” Unfair to whom? By what definition of fairness? In over 45 years of my association with the military, I have never heard a member say that they thought the retirement system was unfair.

Charts 9-10. The Task Force may believe that the current retirement system is unaffordable, but that has nothing to do with the TOR for the study. What they may be saying is that the “volunteer force” concept for the defense of our country is not a viable concept. That may be true or untrue, but it is beyond the scope of this study. The cost curve in Chart 10 is useless, because the reader is not told whether the amounts are in constant-year or then-year dollars – big difference. Also, I could not find a payment line, although that is what is implied by the chart title.

Chart 11. The Task Force asserts that a modified retirement system would “create an effective force shaping tool” without any substantiating evidence that this would be the case. It is a conclusion without benefit of supporting data.

Charts 12-14. The Task Force presents its recommendations for a retirement system based on a defined contribution plan without demonstrating that the recommended plan would address the shortcomings it asserts exist with the current retirement system. It also touts the “good” features of such a plan without pointing out its negatives. It also fails to address the mitigation of the negatives or any unintended consequences of the recommended plan.

Concluding thought. There may be good reasons why the current retirement system should be scrapped and replaced with something else. If there are, they certainly are not presented in this study. The study also lacks a compelling argument for why its recommended solution would be an improvement over what exists now…it is not clear what has been “optimized.” This is a very shoddy piece of work, in my view.

2011 Air & Space Highlights: Author John Olsen's Global Air Power

Colonel John Andreas Olsen will present his critically acclaimed book Global Air Power at the 2011 Air & Space Conference and Technology Exposition!

Global Air Power provides insight into the evolution of air power theory and practice by examining the experience of six of the world’s largest air forces—those of the United Kingdom, the United States, Israel, Russia, India, and China—and of representative smaller air forces in Pacific Asia, Latin America, and continental Europe.

Olsen explores how various nations have integrated air power into their armed forces and how they have applied air power in both regular and irregular warfare and in peacetime operations. In his forum, he will cover the organizational, professional, and doctrinal issues that air forces confronted in the past, the lessons learned from victory and defeat, and emerging challenges and opportunities.

Olsen is both an author and an active-duty colonel in the Royal Norwegian Air Force. He is also the dean of the Norwegian Defence University College, head of its division for strategic studies, and visiting professor of operational art and tactics at the Swedish National Defense College.

He began his military career as a radar technician at the Air State Sørreisa in 1989. Olsen served as a project officer in Oslo between 1995 to 1997; as assistant principal teacher of air power by the Air Force Academy between 2000 and 2003; and then liaison officer at the Norwegian Embassy in Berlin between 2005 and 2006.

In 2010, Olsen was appointed deputy commander and chief of the NATO Advisory Team at headquarters in Sarajevo, where he heads the team assigned to prepare Bosnia-Herzegovina on the status of membership candidate in NATO.

His other works include:

• The Evolution of Operational Art: From Napoleon to the Present (2010)
• A History of Air Warfare (2009)
• John Warden and the Renaissance of American Air Power (2007)
• Strategic Air Power in Desert Storm (Studies in Air Power)  (2003)
• Asymmetric Warfare (2002)
• A Second Aerospace Century (2001)

In 2010, Olsen also received the Gill Robb Wilson Award (Civil Air Patrol’s (CAP) highest award for senior member professional development).

Olsen's session will be Monday, Sept 19, from 4 to 4:45pm (times subject to change.) Check out the Air & Space agenda for more details. Also, make sure you come down to the Expo floor and get your copy of Global Air Power signed!

2011 Air & Space Highlights: Continuous Learning Points (CLPs)

The Air & Space Conference is truly THE professional development event, granting a one-of-a-kind experience with a full agenda of speaker sessions, workshops and panels addressing today’s challenges in aerospace. The Conference brings together Air Force leadership, industry experts, academia and current aerospace specialists from around the world giving insight to past, present and future aerospace challenges.

After being in contact with the Air Force's Acquisitions Training Office, we found out that many of this year's Conference sessions qualify toward continuous learning points (CLPs) for acquisitions professionals. Air Force acquisitions professionals can earn 0.5 points per hour, maximum of four points per day and 20 points per year.

Specific sessions that count for CLPs are:

+ Keynote Address Secretary Ashton B. Carter, Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology & Logistics

+ Changing Tradewinds in the Global Economy and Its Impact on the Defense Sector Dr. Nayantara Hensel

+ Innovation of Large Organizations Mr. Bran Ferren

+ Industry Panel Dr. Alton Romig, Mr. Fred Downey and Mr. Chris Chadwick

+ Space Industrial Base Panel Dr. Michael Griffin, Mr. Gary Payton, Mr. Roger Krone, Mr. Mark Valerio and Mr. Jeff Grant

+ Resource Strained Environment Panel Dr. Richard P. Hallion, Dr. Mark J. Lewis, Dr. Werner Dahm and Maj. Gen. Curtis Bedke, USAF Ret.

In addition, the Technology Expo could potentially be included, from which contracting, purchasing or engineering personnel may benefit from the knowledge gained about new products or innovations being exhibited. 

[Please contact the Air Force Acquisition Training Office, saf.acqnowcl@us.af.mil, COMM (210) 565-5917, for further guidance. However, other Services must contact their acquisitions departments to see if attendance at AFA’s Air & Space Conference and Technology Exposition fulfills their qualifications.]

The full conference agenda can be found on the AFA's website. We hope to see you there!