Hearing of the Defense Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee - Fiscal Year 2010 Air Force Budget Request

Statement

Hearing of the Defense Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee - Fiscal Year 2010 Air Force Budget Request

Chaired By: Rep. John P. Murtha

Witnesses: Michael B. Donley, Secretary Of The Air Force; General Norton A. Schwartz, Chief Of Staff Of The Air Force

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REP. MURTHA: This morning the committee will hold an open hearing concerning the Air Force Fiscal Year 2010 budget requests. We are pleased to welcome two distinguished witnesses: Mr. Michael B. Donley, Secretary of the Air Force, General Norton A. Schwartz, Chief of Staff of the Air Force. They are very well qualified to discuss these areas and to answer the questions of the committee. Secretary Donley, General Schwartz, thank you all for being here this morning. This committee is very interested in hearing what you have to say about the Air Force's Fiscal Year 2010 budget.

Specifically, as you are well aware, some of us on the committee are anxious to hear the status of the KC-X competition and particularly how you will address the issues that led the General Accountability Office to overturn last year's competition. In addition, the Air Force budget includes the retirement of over 250 fighter aircraft, yet, to date, the Air Force has been unable to provide a schedule for retirement of the aircraft or a plan for reassignment of personnel. We look forward to your testimony and to a spirited and informative question and answer session.

Now, before we hear you, I would like to call on our ranking member this morning, Kay Granger of Texas for any comments you would like to make.

REP. KAY GRANGER (R-TX): Thank you, Mr. Chairman -- (inaudible).

REP. MURTHA: Okay, Secretary Donley, we understand that you and General Schwartz will each make an opening statement. You may proceed with your summarized statement, but your entire statement will be placed in the record and you may proceed as you wish.

SEC. DONLEY: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Congressman Dicks, Ms. Granger, members of the committee. We appreciate the opportunity to appear before you today to discuss the Air Force's FY'10 budget. It's been almost a year since General Schwartz and I took on these roles as Chief and Secretary, and I must tell you I could not have had a better partner in this work than General Schwartz.

In recent months Secretary Gates and Admiral Mullen led a constructive dialogue about necessary changes in our national defense priorities and areas of emphasis. Our discussions emphasized taking care of our most important asset, which is our people, rebalancing our capabilities to fight and win the current and most likely conflicts in front of us while also hedging against other risks and contingencies and reforming how and what we buy. We've contributed our analysis and judgment throughout this process.

With OSD, our sister services and interagency partners, we've undertaken several strategic reviews in the Air Force over the last year. Last fall we refined the Air Force's mission statement. We articulated our five strategic priorities and refined our core functions to more clearly articulate the Air Force's role in national security. We also made progress in areas that required some focused attention up front, such as strengthening the Air Force's nuclear enterprise, preparing to stand up our cyber numbered Air Force, articulating our strategy for irregular warfare and counterinsurgency operations, consolidating our approach in the Air Force for global partnerships, and advancing stewardship of the Air Force's energy program.

Our reviews were guided by the concept of strategic balance, which has several meanings for us. As Secretary Gates and Admiral Mullen have described, balance means prevailing in today's fight while also being able to respond across the spectrum of conflict to emerging hybrid threats. Balance also means allocating investment across our 12 diverse, but complimentary, core functions. Balance also means organizing, training and equipping ourselves as an Air Force across our active and reserve components.

Our budget proposal recognizes that people are the heart and soul of America's Air Force. Without them out organizations and equipment would grind to a halt. In FY '10 we are reversing the previously planned reductions in Air Force active duty in strength with commensurate adjustments in the reserve components. We will also grow our civilian cadre, especially the acquisition workforce. At the same time we'll continue to reshape our skill sets with particular emphasis on stress career fields and missions that need our attention now, such as intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, acquisition, maintenance, cyber operations and nuclear matters. In FY '10 we're also driving more balance into our fore-structure. In theater, the demand for ISR and special operations capabilities continues to increase, so we will increase unmanned aircraft system combat air patrols, CAPS from 34 today to 43 by the end of FY '10, as well as increase soft in strength by about 550 personnel.

We also took a broader strategic look at the total combat Air Force capabilities, and there is a general view in the Department's leadership that the United States has enough tactical air capability. With that in mind we judged this as a prudent opportunity to accelerate the planned retirement of older aircraft as we have done in this budget. As a result, we will reshape the portfolio of the fighter force by retiring about 250 of our oldest tactical fighters, completing production of the F-22 program at 187 aircraft, and committing to planned F-22 upgrades and readying the fifth generation F-35 joint Strike Fighter program to become the workhorse of our new fighter fleet going forward.

We'll also ensure balance for joint airlift needs by completing the C-17 production, continuing to modernize our C-5s, reinitiating the C-130J production line and transitioning the C-27J program from the Army to the Air Force. In particular, the Department made a judgment that about 316 strategic airlift tails in the program of record is adequate to meet our needs. We also conducted a business case analysis that identified alternatives to improve our current strategic airlift capability at less cost than simply buying more C- 17s.

We will enhance stability and remove risk in our military SAT COMM programs by extending our AEHF and WGS inventories and continuing partnerships with commercial providers. While AEHF does not give us all the capabilities of the projected TSAT program, adding additional AEHF and WGS satellites does provide additional MIL SAT COMM capability until we can gain confidence about the affordability and requirements for TSAT-like capabilities in the future.

We also placed additional emphasis on Air Force acquisition.

We recently published our acquisition improvement plan to focus our efforts on several key areas: first, to revitalize the Air Force's acquisition workforce; second, improving the requirements generation process; third, instilling budget and financial discipline into our programs; fourth, improving the Air Force's major systems source selection process; and, fifth, establishing clear lines of authority and accountability within acquisition organizations.

I look forward to working with this committee in the future and with our OSD leadership as we address defense acquisition improvements going forward. Over the coming months, the Air Force will, with the other services, participate in several major reviews including the quadrennial defense review, nuclear posture, and space posture reviews. And from these analyses we will better understand the needs, requirements and available technologies for long-range strike as well as our requirements and potential joint solutions for personnel recovery.

Stewardship of the United States Air Force, Mr. Chairman, is a responsibility that General Schwartz and I take very seriously and we look forward—first of all, we are grateful to the support that we get from this committee and we do look forward to working with you in the months ahead.

REP. MURTHA: Thank you, Mr. Secretary. General Schwartz.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Mr. Chairman, Congresswoman Granger and other members of the committee, I'm proud to be here with Secretary Donley representing your Air Force. The United States Air Force is fully committed to effective stewardship of the resources that the American people place in our trust, a commitment founded on our core values of integrity first, service before self, and excellence in all we do. Guided by these core values, American airmen are all in, working courageously every day with precision and reliability.

I recently had a chance to take a trip to visit with some of our airmen who are serving in various locations around the world and they are providing game-changing capabilities to the combatant commanders in the air and on the ground. Last year American airmen conducted 61,000 sorties in Operation Iraqi Freedom, some 37,000 sorties in Operation Enduring Freedom. That's roughly 265 sorties each and every day. Airmen also served on convoys and in coalition operation centers and delivered two million passengers and some 700,000 tons of cargo in the United States central command area of responsibility last year. And dedicated airmen directly support CENTCOM operations from right here in the United States by providing command and control of unmanned aerial vehicles while our nuclear operations professionals support the umbrella of deterrents for the nation and its allies across the globe. As well, our space professionals are providing truly amazing capabilities ranging from early warning to precise global positioning, navigation and timing.

Through Secretary Donley's guidance and leadership, we have set a course to provide even greater capabilities for the nation and to balance our priorities to meet a spectrum of challenges. The top priority is to reinvigorate our Air Force nuclear enterprise, as outlined in nuclear roadmap. We are also fielding capabilities that allow us to innovate partnerships with joint and coalition teammates to win today's fight by expanding intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance with the procurement of 24 MQ0 Reaper unmanned aerial systems.

At the same time we will continue support for our most precious asset, our people. We are focused on providing programs that develop and care for our airmen and their families with world class quality of service and honor the lasting commitments that we've made to our wounded warriors. Part of ensuring support for airmen means providing them with the tools they need to do their jobs effectively. Therefore, we are modernizing our air and space inventories, organizations and training with the right, if difficult, choices.

In addition to programs that Secretary Donley just mentioned, we are committed to providing robust air refueling capability. We also intend to increase efficiency by retiring aging aircraft, and we will complete the production of the F-22 at 187 aircraft and the C-17 at 205 aircraft subject to congressional approval.

In recent testimony Admiral Mullen stated we are what we buy. Following his lead, we intend to maintain stewardship of America's resources for our war fighters in the field as well as taxpayers at home by recapturing acquisition excellence in fielding the right capabilities for the nation on time and within budget.

Mr. Chairman, our core value guiding us, the Air Force will continue to provide our best military advice and stewardship, delivering global reach, vigilance and power for America. Thank you for your continuing support of the United States Air Force and particularly for our airmen and their families. Sir, I look forward to your questions.

REP. MURTHA: Thank you both for your statements. Secretary Donley, on May 4th you and General Schwartz signed a plan to improve Air Force acquisition. Included in the plan are five goals and 33 actions that ensure rigor, reliability, and transparency across the Air Force acquisition enterprise. Your first goal is to revitalize the Air Force acquisition workforce. Will you hire new personnel or re-task current employees, or both?

SEC. DONLEY: Our intent is to strengthen the acquisition workforce through both internal retraining and enhanced training in critical skill sets and also to bring in new personnel as well. As you are probably aware, the broader intent in the Department is to make changes in civilian personnel, which will bring more work now performed by contractors back into the government. That pendulum of contracting out some of our important functions is swinging back toward a definite bias among the current leadership to get more of this capability back into our organic workforce, so our—

REP. MURTHA: Were we using contractors to actually do the acquisition work?

SEC. DONLEY: Contractors were definitely supporting our acquisition work. I'm not sure that they were—they were not in charge of our acquisition decision process, but no question that contractors have been part of that. As we go forward, our target for contractor to civilian conversions is about 4,000 in FY '10, of which about half are focused on our acquisition workforce, so we anticipate beefing up our acquisition workforce by about 2,000.

REP. MURTHA: What was the number again, 10,000?

SEC. DONLEY: Two thousand, and this is across a number of skill sets: systems engineering contracts, cost estimators, all the different functions and supporting expertise that supports the acquisition process.

REP. MURTHA: Will they mainly be civilians or will they be civilians and military?

SEC. DONLEY: Mostly civilians.

REP. MURTHA: Mostly civilians. How will you improve the requirements generation process? I mean, one of the things we've talked about over the years is the fact that we have this requirements creep that drives up the cost. How are we going to try to get that under control?

SEC. DONLEY: Our focus in the Air Force on this subject is getting better visibility on requirements in the acquisition process and getting better understanding of the acquisition process in the requirements process up front, so we're undertaking procedures internally which require the requirements being developed by the war fighter to be reviewed by the acquisition process so we know those requirements can be translated into deliverables, contract deliverables that we know can be accomplished and to get acquisition professionals to sign off on those requirements so that they are written in such a way that they can be translated into contracts and then as the requirements move into the acquisition process, that, as we write the contracts and as we translate those requirements into acquisition activities, that the war fighter who set the requirements signs off on those so it's really cross-checking between requirements and acquisition.

REP. MURTHA: Secretary Donley, what is the status of the KC-X procurement program and when will you release the latest RFP?

SEC. DONLEY: Well, as you know, Mr. Chairman, I've been in dialogue with the new Undersecretary for Acquisition, Dr. Carter, and the deputy secretary of defense and our acquisition officials on a regular basis over the last couple of months.

We hope to take the work that we've developed thus far to the secretary very soon and to have him give us his direction on how to proceed. We're hopeful that that new Request For Proposal will be out on the street this summer.

REP. MURTHA: How much funding is requested for the KC-X in the 2010 budget?

SEC. DONLEY: I'd have to check, sir. I believe it's in the neighborhood of $600 to $800 million. I'd have to double-check.

REP. MURTHA: I think it's -- we have the number. We think it's $439 -- (million) -- .

SEC. DONLEY: Four thirty-nine. Right.

REP. MURTHA: But this year's going to be mainly the competition and we hope it'll be a fair and open, transparent competition, which Secretary Gates has promised and also I would—and I want to say this on the record, encourage dialogue between the two competing sides. I think that is very important and was one of the issues, by the way, in the GAO report was that there was an unfairness toward one side in the previous competition, so transparency, openness and, I would hope, trying to keep both sides on the political side to let you guys, let the professionals make this decision without political interference, which I'm afraid did mar this somewhat in the previous competition.

And we understand also that the KC-X requirement was briefed at the Joint Requirements Oversight Council and what was the outcome of that? Do you know?

SEC. DONLEY: The general work done earlier this year was to revalidate that the requirements for the KC-X are and remain as they had been approved previously so they were revalidated this year.

REP. MURTHA: We also understand that there's been a significant reduction in the 800 previous requests for proposals in the requirements in the previous requests. Is that accurate as well?

SEC. DONLEY: Well, we have been working to reduce, to streamline, to consolidate requirements, to write them as clearly as we can going forward so that that has been part of our process this winter.

REP. MURTHA: And one final question and then I'm going to yield to Ms. Granger. The last competition was based on the best value, yet we understand that the Air Force may be considering low cost in the next competition. How do you differentiate these two concepts, best value and low cost?

SEC. DONLEY: Performance and cost are always part of our trade space in source selections and I believe they will be part of our trade space going forward. I can't describe for you here yet exactly how that will be balanced out as we finalize the RFP, but I think in some cases there is a tendency to polarize these concepts, whereas they are always part of our mix.

REP. MURTHA: The source selection authority has not yet been decided, is that correct between the Air Force and DOD?

SEC. DONLEY: That's correct.

REP. MURTHA: Thank you. Ms. Granger.

REP. KAY GRANGER: Thank you both for being here and thank you for your service. I have a question for the general having to do with the Joint Strike Fighter, not surprisingly. I'd like to know what impact there would be on reducing the procurement of the Joint Strike Fighter on your modernization plans. We've heard, you know, year after year how important reform and modernization is, and so my first question would be: what effect would it have and given that, are there any plans to increase your buy from 80 to 110 per year since that was the original plan?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Ma'am, it clearly, and this is not just for the Air Force, certainly the United States Navy, the United States Marine Corps and a number of international partners are highly dependent on delivery of the F-35 and that is certainly true for your Air Force. We need to have very substantial rates of production for the F-35 to accomplish a couple of things for us. The most pressing has to do with the fact that much of our inventory is aging. I mean, all of it is, but many of the machines that were bought during the Reagan building-up in the '80s are approaching the end of their service life, some of which we are going to retire early in order to get us on the ramp that we need to be on for high rates of production for the F-35, and if we have those high rates of production not less than 80 a year and, hopefully, more, as you indicated. We will be able to manage the retirements of remaining aircraft in our fleet, upgrade those that will last a bit longer time and, again, provide the overall attack air capability that the Department requires of us, so in short, as I see it, 80 is the minimum. It's the floor; it's not the ceiling, and it is very important that this program deliver on time and on cost.

REP. GRANGER: Thank you. I want to follow up on that to both of you. Given the fact that your requirement for 1,763 Joint Strike Fighters was predicated on the F-22 force of 381 aircraft, will there be an effort on your part in the quadrennial defense review to make a case for the F-35 force structure to compensate for not having 381 F- 22s?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Ma'am, it depends, frankly, on what the analysis that is currently underway with the quadrennial defense review, what it comes up with. All of this is highly dependent on the scenarios we use to conduct the analysis, one war fight, two war fights, how close those war fights might be in terms of simultaneity. All of this affects both the size of the force and the mix of the force and, more broadly, it's the joint team, but in the fighter area, as you indicated for us, the F-35, F-22 and some number of legacy platforms. I think it is not yet clear what the top line will be for the Department. For us, it has been 2,250 fighter strike type aircraft for some number of years. It could end up being less, and, if that's the case, we will still have a predominantly F-35 populated force and we'll have the 187 F-22s, we'll have well over 1,500 F-35s and then some number of legacy airplanes. That'll be the mix. It remains to be seen what the top line is, however, based on the analysis.

REP. GRANGER: Mr. Secretary.

SEC. DONLEY: Ma'am, I would add one other item in addition to what the general has mentioned and that is, as the Department looks at its tactical fighter and its air-to-ground capabilities in particular, the Reaper and armed Predator capabilities that the Department has been building the past several years to support the war fight are coming into view as substantial assets for the Department in terms of air-to-ground capability, so as we think about total tactical fighter strike inventories, we're starting to include these armed UAS capabilities in that mix, as well. They don't have air-to-air fighter capability, but they're certainly providing air-to-ground strike, and it's making that Tactical Air Force more effective at the low end of the conflict spectrum.

REP. GRANGER: Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

REP. BOYD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Secretary Donley, General Schwartz, welcome and thank both of you for your time you've given me to work through some of the issues that we're have a common interest in. And also I look forward to your visit to Tyndall Air Force Base on June 22. And I thank you for that commitment to come.

Secretary Donley, General Schwartz, last year the Air Force briefed this committee.

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Have I got the wrong one on?

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You'll have to forgive me, I'm low tech, technologically challenged.

Last year the Air Force briefed this committee and other committees of Congress on combat Air Force structure. And basically that briefing concluded that we were in a real deficit in terms of air structure --- Air Force --- tactical Air Force structure.

On May the 9th of this year you briefed this committee staff on the combat Air Forces restructure that's proposed in the fiscal year 2010 budget and that includes retiring approximately 250 F-15s, F-16s, and A-10s in 2010. It is a very radical fast forwarding of what was in the BRAC documents that were put in place a couple years ago.

Can you explain to the committee what, in your mind, has changed in the last 12 months that's gotten us to this point?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Sir, I think it's a couple things. Clearly there are budgetary pressures that we are dealing with. That's one aspect. A significant aspect has to do with the demands that are being placed on us by our joint commanders, which is to expand, amplify certain aspects of the force, in other words, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, reinvestment in the nuclear mission. There are a number of areas where we had to expand or do more.

And the issue for us was how do we bridge ourselves from the current position that we are with the legacy fighter force to the one that we know we need to have which will be a predominantly generation five kind of force?

And it was our judgment, looking at this fresh this year, that it was not without risk but that it was an opportunity to retire some of the legacy force structure sooner, several years sooner, than they would otherwise have retired, take those resources, both dollars and manpower, in order to address some of those needs that we spoke to. Invest in the remaining fourth generation fighter fleet, radars, infrared search and track capability and so on. And then have the resources to leap to the high production rates of F-35 that we know we have to have.

It is a difficult choice but one we think is needed, sir.

REP. BOYD: Obviously this is a long though out process, action and one that, as you know, became public in the Tyndall Air Force area and around the Air Force community much before, or weeks before, you intended it to.

But the May 9th briefing was about four weeks ago and to this point there has been no plan for reassigning personnel, there's been no plan for the retirement, particular retirement dates for the aircraft. We can't really seem to get any meat on the bones here. And, obviously, from a operational standpoint and from a parochial standpoint for the communities that we represent that's a very, you know, that's a very serious subject.

So, can you help me a little bit here about the reassignment of 4,000 manpower positions, civilian and military, where will they be reassigned? What about all your 2500 Air National Guard folks?

You got two school houses for F-15s in the country, I understand. You got Klamath Falls and you got Tyndall. And you're going to transfer all of those to Klamath Falls under your plan. Why would you do that? What about the military construction requirements? I haven't been to Klamath Falls but I've spent a lot of time around Tyndall. You need to talk to us a little bit about those things.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Sir, this is an example of thinning out the fighter fleet. Whether we need to have two school houses in order to sustain the long term F-15 population ---

REP. BOYD: Granted you go to one school house. Talk to me about the choice.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: This is a mission which is well suited to the Air National Guard and one which performed not just in the F-15 community but the F-16 community in Tucson as well. The bottom line is those remaining F-15 units will be operational combat coded kinds of units and the training will occur by our partners who are full up rounds in the Air National Guard and have no reservations about that, sir, at all.

With regard to the reallocation of manpower some of these folks no doubt will be reassigned in their current disciplines. Perhaps an F-15 crew chief from Tyndall might become an F-16 crew chief at Mountain Home. I mean, the --- but fundamentally folks will be reassigned, to a great degree, in their current disciplines.

Some of these folks, however, will be retrained into these growth areas. One of which the secretary mentioned, which is unmanned aerial vehicles. We are putting roughly 4,000 spaces overall, not just out of the cap adjustment but also out of the growth of our head space, into intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance.

While we call them unmanned vehicles, sir, they are hardly unmanned. The truth is is that there are a lot of folks that operate them and also digest the data that comes from the platforms and turn it into actionable intelligence.

REP. BOYD: Mr. Chairman, I've got --- I want to --- I've got many other questions so I'd like to go maybe to the second round and hold those questions.

But I would ask one final point is that when can you give us a timetable of schedule for retirement of particular aircraft and reassignment and when will we have a little meat on the bones here with this?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Sir, you will have insight into that before the end of the month.

REP. BOYD: Okay. And I'd hold, Mr. Chairman, my other questions until the second round if that ---

REP. MURTHA: We appreciate your questions and we will have a second round.

REP. BOYD: Thank you.

REP. MURTHA: Mr. Bishop.

REP. BISHOP: Thank you very much.

I'd like to welcome you gentlemen but I want to focus on personnel tempo, if you will. The increasing deployments over the past few years for domestic disasters, contingency operations, military operations other than war has stressed the military personnel and their families.

What is the average time that airmen are away from home during your training exercises or deployments other than Iraq and Afghanistan?

And Secretary Donley, would you talk to us about how the Air Force manages the personnel tempo so that it doesn't have an adverse impact on individual unit readiness and training? What systems you have in place to track that personnel tempo information?

SEC. DONLEY: Sir, I can give you a partial answer, let the chief follow up a little bit. In the last year we have begun to bin our air expeditionary forces, our AEF deployments into various bands of activity. So personnel assigned to various functions and jobs understand what kind of a rotation they will be in depending on which band they are in.

The Air Force has a broad range of deployment lengths and tours for its personnel. And this is a way in which we have spread the load across our Air Force so if you are a --- you can be a medical professional in Yokota, Japan and know that you're going to deploy to Iraq or Afghanistan on a, sort of a regular basis.

But the medical community has its own --- for example, the medical community has its own deployment ---

REP. BISHOP: Search and Rescue for example.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Sir, the --- just to give you broad numbers about half of our deployments are 179 days, six months tours. About a third are less than that, up to 120 days. And maybe 10 percent or so are one year duration deployments.

In the case of Search and Rescue, those are typically 120 to 179 days. Case in point is we have 12 combat Search and Rescue helicopters serving in Afghanistan now doing both the search and rescue mission, combat search and rescue mission and the med-evac mission.

REP. BISHOP: Are there certain units or mission skills that are being continually stressed with either the normal deployments for training exercises or contingency operations? And if so, which of those skill sets units are being stretched thin?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Sir, there are several. Certainly the intelligence field is stressed. The security forces career feel distressed. Contracting is another high demand career field. They're essentially on a one to one deployment to at home ratio. And ---

REP. BISHOP: These are Air Force ---

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Air Force contracting personnel who are supporting the joint fight, who are in joint assignments in ---

REP. BISHOP: As I understand you have reduced your contracting significantly.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: We have --- that is another area, as the secretary mentioned, that we will robust over time.

In addition, as you are aware I'm sure, we have also included incentives for these personnel who are in high demand career fields in order to help compensate in some way for the demands on themselves and their families.

REP. BISHOP: Has that been effective? How much of the budget for 2010 is being allocated for these --- the retention in these high stressed skill sets? And has that been successful because I think there are some areas where you have met your goals but other area where you have not?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Yes, sir. I'm sure the secretary will want to lean into this. But in short I think the number overall for incentives and bonuses and so on is in the neighborhood of $700 million. It's substantial money which is largely targeted to the high stress career fields.

We have seen adequate results. We still, you know, we're on the bubble in a couple of the career fields like contracting, for example. But I -- and another one that's very interesting in the medical field. We have had some difficulty in meeting our goals both on recruiting and attention in the medical disciplines.

But interestingly this is not just an issue for the Air Force. It's an issue for the other services and in the civilian posture as well.

REP. BISHOP: One final question for Secretary Donley. According to the office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs, reservists contributed about a million man days per year to their respective services between fiscal years '86 and '89.

In fiscal year '07 reservists contributed 45.8 million days.

What is the number of Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve personnel that are currently on active duty in support of ongoing operations? And what is the Air Force's current mobilization cap?

SEC. DONLEY: Sir, I have to get back to you on the record for that to get those numbers.

REP. BISHOP: Alright.

REP. MURTHA (?): Do you have any idea?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Sir, the --- we have roughly 38,000 people deployed About 8,000 of which, if I recall correctly, are guard and reserve.

REP. MURTHA: Okay.

Ms. Kilpatrick.

REP. KILPATRICK: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

General, Secretary, I should say the other way around, Secretary and General thank you for your service.

Along that same lines kind of, first of all, congratulations on a successful graduation from the academy. I understand the numbers --- were they the highest ever? And what was that number?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: It was 1,046, Ma'am. It was a very large class and we shook quite a number of hands that day.

REP. KILPATRICK: Okay. Thank you very much for that.

And for the young men and women who serve in the Air Force and the service who are children who commit their lives. I believe we in this committee and certainly our chairman is totally committed to the force and the people who serve.

Along that same line, education is where I want to go. I know that your air reserves as well as your active duty air guard numbers are up. And in the retention of the Air Force the numbers are down just a bit. I read somewhere you expect with the economy you expect those may increase as well.

What kind of programs do you have, in K-12 particularly, and others that would help lead people, young people, into fields of the military? Are there currently those education programs? Do you partner with anyone? Are we looking for a certain type of student? I know you have recruiters all over the country. Can you talk a bit about it?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: There are a number of programs that help, I think, to grow good citizens. I think that's fundamentally what they are about. And they have the side benefit of perhaps increasing the propensity of the young to serve in the armed forces or elsewhere in public service. Civil Air Patrol is one. Junior ROTC at the high schools is another. Both of which are excellent programs, I think, that focus on citizenship but increase the propensity to serve.

Naturally it's a competitive arena out there and while the economy is suffering and it has improved our recruiting performance of late we know that we have to keep at it. This is a constant effort.

And one thing I would just say, Ma'am, is that it is very important that the influencers, like you, like the other members of this committee, certainly parents and other influential folks remind our youth that public service is a worthy undertaking. And that would certainly be helpful.

REP. KILPATRICK: Right. I do participate in our own Civil Air Patrol as well as ROTC. I think those are good feeders as we move to the military.

It's important to me that young people have that kind of discipline and responsibility, even as they move forward, whatever career that they choose.

SEC. DONLEY: Could I just add one other aspect that's important to our Air Force and that is continuing to encourage our partnerships with academia and various schools and organizations on science technology, engineering and math, what we can stem education, very important to the future of our nation, regardless of whether young people come in to the United States Air Force.

And we have partner --- just partnered with the Aerospace Industries Association a few weeks ago and the American Rocketry Club, which sponsors, you know, events for young people around the country to get them interested in this important work.

REP. KILPATRICK: Funny you should mention that. Former Congressman Lou Stokes, who brought together program partnering with NASA and stem related and we've put together one at Penn State University and they're phenomenal. Our team, and it's called SEMA, science, engineering, mathematics, aerospace academy. Our team from Michigan competed around the world, excuse me, around the country in the rocketry and came here to D.C. to compete and placed kind of high. So we know that stem is the future. I'd like to work with you on that because that's very important.

And finally, I'll wait for the second round, Afghanistan, Iraq, moving, I guess, 15 up in the other.

What are some of your concerns and are you ready for that challenge?

SEC. DONLEY: Well, the Air Force has been working with the joint community for many months on the shift of emphasis from Iraq to Afghanistan. I'll let the chief go in to some of the operational details but I've just mentioned a couple. One is that certainly our mobility community, led by the transportation command and the air mobility command, have been working very hard on logistical support to Afghanistan developing alternative routes for supplies and transportation to support this shift and to support a higher tempo of operations in that part of the world. That's been a great focus.

And also our construction and engineering units and organizations have been deeply involved. Congress has been very supportive in supporting our MILCON requirements down range. As you appreciate, Afghanistan has much less infrastructure in that country and needs much more development of air bases and other infrastructure as we build up our capabilities. So we've been working very hard on that for many months.

REP. KILPATRICK: Thank you, Mr. Secretary. Mr. Schwartz?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: I would only amplify by saying that we currently have about 5,000 Air Force personnel in Afghanistan supporting the joint team, part of the joint team. It'll increase probably to in the neighborhood of 6500 or so by the time all the additional troops that have been authorized by the president arrive there to assume their new missions.

REP. KILPATRICK: Thank you, General.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

REP. MURTHA: Mr. Secretary, General Schwartz, over the last couple of years many of us have been briefed on the next generation bomber. And one of Mr. Secretary Gates' decision was to terminate this program. You know, at some point, you know, we only have 20 stealthy B-2 bombers. We're going to have to --- and then that is '80s, '70s actually, technology --- '70 and 80's technology, which we have modernized.

Can you give us kind of the status of where we are on the next generation bomber? And, you know, I understand that there's a --- in your unfunded list there's a request for 140 million (dollars) to keep this --- to keep some level of effort going, which I personally would support. But can you fill us in on this?

SEC. DONLEY: Well sir, I think the short story on next generation bomber is that our plans in that area were probably running out ahead of the political consensus inside the Department of Defense on what was needed for that capability going forward. While we had significant resources put against this we had not yet worked through the, sort of the basic parameters of the program. I'll let the chief address those in a moment.

But in addition to the programmatic detail, I take your point that we do need to be attentive to the kinds of technology integration support in this very sensitive area where we are combining many different technologies. And we do think it's important as we go forward to look at this more closely in the QDR and develop a new way ahead that we do bridge this period of time where we do not have the next generation bomber, that program is being cancelled.

REP. MURTHA: General, before you start I want to read to you a statement that was made before a committee in the other body. Barry Watts of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessment replied to a question on next generation bomber requirements, we've studied the NGB issue to death. The need, the requirement, and the technology are in hand and reasonably well understood.

Would you address that as you address your answer?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Yes, sir. The bottom line was that I don't think that our secretary of Defense was comfortable with how the Air Force had defined the parameters of this platform. I do not believe that he has misgivings about the fundamental mission of long range strike. This was a question about whether we had this thing right. Did we have the right range? Did we have the right payload? Did we know whether this should be supersonic or subsonic? Should it be low observable or very low observable? Should it be nuclear or non- nuclear capable? Should it be manned or unmanned?

These were questions that he --- we did not have the secretary of Defense in his comfort zone. And this is what we will do over the next cycle, is to make sure that he, in fact, is comfortable.

REP. MURTHA: Wasn't that exactly what the next generation bomber program was doing, was analyzing all of those issues so the decision --- it sounds to me that we know what to --- know what the options are, it's just a failure of decision making here. We couldn't make a decision. We couldn't decide let's go do it and we're going to one way or the other.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Mr. Chairman, I think the bottom line was that what he wanted to make sure was that he did not get son of NGB as the answer to this near term process that we have underway. He wanted this to be a thorough, no holds barred review of parameters and that he would get a truly fresh look. That is what, I believe, was behind the programmatics, which came out and that we've discussed.

The key thing about this is that, in my view, Barry Watts certainly respect him. Numerous studies have been done but you have to get the decision maker comfortable with your proposal and your program. That is something we have not done effectively but we will do that.

SEC. DONLEY: If I could add one more item to that, Mr. Chairman.

REP. MURTHA: Yes, of course, Mr. Secretary.

SEC. DONLEY: This is a very significant program for the Air Force and potentially a very large and highly complex program. We needed to make sure that as we go forward we can make this a successful acquisition program for the Air Force.

And I will tell you that I'm concerned about how we do that. We do not have a good track record in our last two bombers in terms of developing program --- a program of record which we are able to sustain financially over time to get done what we say initially what we think needs to be done. We planned on buying a few hundred B-1 bombers. We ended up with --

REP. MURTHA: You mean B-2s.

SEC. DONLEY: B-1s, a few hundred.

REP. MURTHA: We got 100.

SEC. DONLEY: We got 100. For the B-2 program ---

REP. MURTHA: And B-2s were way up there too.

SEC. DONLEY: It was 175, I think.

REP. MURTHA: We got 20.

SEC. DONLEY: We got 20. That makes those airplanes very expensive. And I do not want to repeat that process going forward.

REP. MURTHA: I understand that. I can understand the budgetary implication but I still think, and I'm glad to see you've got some money in the unfunded, that we've got to have an office and keep this things going. I mean, the secretary isn't going to learn anything if we don't have any work being done on this issue anywhere in the government. So it seems to me that we have to correct this flaw.

Now the other thing, quickly. On the C-5A retirements, where do we stand on this? You know, as far as I'm concerned I've supported you every step of the way. I think we're trying to do something in the supplemental, I'm told, on this issue. I mean, can't we save a lot of money by retiring these older airplanes? And when we're so stressed for, you know, so short of money to do all these important things, isn't is imperative that we deal with this issue?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Sir, here's the bottom line; sometimes too much aluminum is as bad as not enough. And too many airplanes, excess capacity, if you will, as you suggest, competes with other needs. And our view is if it is the Congress's determination to continue to acquire C-17 platforms beyond the 205 that we've indicated we think is the proper force size, then we need to make adjustments elsewhere in the fleet mix and that means C-5A retirements.

Now, there is a debate about what the floor should be on that and from a former mobility capability study circa 2005 that floor was at 292. There's been more recent legislation over the years that established the floor at 299. We currently are at 316. That is slightly above what we believe is the minimum requirement that was certified during the Nunn-McCurdy action related to the C-5 re- engining, that was 33.95 million ton miles per day.

So there is some space to reduce and I --- my recommendation, my best military advice to the secretary is if there are X number of C- 17s, either in the supplemental or the authorization going forward, that we should retire C-5As in like number on a one for one basis. That would be my best military advice.

REP. MURTHA: Mr. Secretary do you have anything on that or do you just want to stand with that?

SEC. DONLEY: Well, I do think, as you know, Mr. Chairman, we do have a new military -- a mobility requirement study going on now delivers toward the end of this year. My hope is that we will get that in synch with the QDR conclusion, so that we can provide the Congress again sort of the next best -- the best benchmark for what the strategic airlift requirements are.

REP. MURTHA: Well, and I'm with you on that. Also says to me do we really want to shut down the C-17 line until we get the study? I mean, wouldn't it be a good idea to get the study in to see if, in fact, the assumptions we're making now are validated by the study?

SEC. DONLEY: We understand that perspective, but we think there is enough flex in the 316 that the general referred to to add some marginal capability within the existing fleet by making other changes. We still have opportunities to do more reengining and modernization of the C-5Bs. That program had been truncated during the Nunn-McCurdy decisions, but we can do that.

We have other CRAF (ph) options that have not been pursued and those -- we have two or three things that we can do that are cheaper than buying new C-17s, as good an airplane as that is.

REP. MURTHA: Ms. Granger.

REP. GRANGER (R-TX): Briefly, to the unmanned aerial systems, give us a little more details about your vision for the future in unmanned aerial systems and counterinsurgency, and, in particular, are we short of those in places like Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea, our hot spots?

SEC. DONLEY: Ma'am, we will grow to 50 orbits of unmanned systems by 2011. We're currently at 34, 31 of which are the smaller Predator, three of which are the larger Reaper, and then the yet larger, more strategic platform, the Global Hawk, one orbit. We have approximately 120 Predators in the inventory, about 30 Reapers and about 15 of the Global Hawks.

This is a trend which will continue, ma'am. It is clear that we will become, over time, a more unmanned force. These are very useful assets particularly in those cases where you need persistence, where 24-7 coverage is what is required to get the mission done, and they're very efficient ways to perform that kind of mission, particularly intelligence surveillance, reconnaissance, some quick-reaction strike and so on. This will be a significant portion of our portfolio going forward, and the 24 Reapers that are in this year's budget proposal are a manifestation of that.

I don't think that we will ever end up being a completely unmanned force. There are some missions, in my view, that require a man in the cockpit or a woman in the cockpit. For example, a nuclear bomber like the B-2, I'm not sure that I would be comfortable making that an unmanned platform.

Nonetheless the plan will be to expand the population of unmanned vehicles, certainly to the 50-orbit level. That's our current target, and we'll see what the demand signal looks like out of QDR and so on.

The last thing I'd like to mention to you, ma'am, is that it is important to recognize that UASs are not any-time, any-place machines. They have wonderful application, but they need to be utilized largely in benign airspace.

In other words, if it's denied airspace, they cannot protect themselves. They do not have the natural capacities to avoid attack, and they are vulnerable. In fact, as you may recall in the news we shot down an Iranian UAV in Iraq some months back.

So we need, again, to think about this in terms of the whole concept of operations, where do they apply, where are they less applicable. Maybe they don't go in right away, but they follow the F- 35s and the F-22s, that sort of thing. This is a package. And that's really the genius of this is being able to package this in a good way.

REP. MURTHA: (Inaudible.)

SEC. DONLEY: Mr. Chairman, yes, indeed. Those 34 orbits that we're currently performing I would say probably half of those are dedicated to special operations teams on the ground and half to more conventional forces.

REP. MURTHA: (Inaudible.)

REP. GRANGER: No, I don't. Thank you.

REP. BOYD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Secretary Donley, I want to go back to the proposed plan of the retirement of the 1516s and 810s. As you know, Mr. Secretary, the Air Force does not have a particularly good track record when it comes to proposed cost savings versus actual cost savings.

And I think many of us on this committee would be somewhat suspicious of proposed cost savings until we saw some thorough analysis of what those would be and how you would achieve that $3-1/2 billion over the next five years. Can you speak to that, when we might see that analysis and in what detail?

SEC. DONLEY: I'm open to briefing that to the committee. There are some sensitivities with it with respect to out-year funding. The department has not yet provided a five-year plan of detail to the Congress as is normally the case by this time of year, because the out-year work just hasn't been done.

But I think the main message, sir, is the one that the chief indicated earlier. This was not just a budgetary and a savings drill. We reinvested the resources elsewhere in the Air Force program, and we have a good briefing and a good track record of where we put the money back in fourth-generation MODs. We put it in air-to-ground munitions, air-to-air munitions and very specific movements of dollars from one account to another.

And we have a very specific track on what we did with the people, which the secretary mentioned is just as important. We needed additional personnel to be reinvested in higher-priority missionaries and to get that done as soon as possible. So these were the factors behind the decision. I think we have a good trail on the dollars and the people.

REP. BOYD: I think we understand the intent, of course, to reduce cost in one account and transfer it to another account, but before you can transfer it, you have to reduce the one account, and I think that's where the track record hasn't been very good. So we look forward to seeing that or getting those briefings and seeing that detailed analysis.

What would be the military MILCON requirements for Klamath Falls in this particular scenario?

SEC. DONLEY: Sir, I don't know the answer to that. I'd like to take that for the record get back to you.

REP. BOYD: Okay. I assume there would be some.

SEC. DONLEY: I am not certain that's the case. They currently have a schoolhouse operation, and, in the resized force, that may not be true. But I need to confirm that for you.

REP. BOYD: Okay. Thank you. Can you speak to the specific personnel and funding impact to Tyndall Air Force Base, General?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Sir, as you are aware, the intent is to draw down to an F-22-only -- at the moment, F-22-only scenario. And so you will end up losing the F-15s that are currently there and the folks that are associated with that mission. And, again, I'll be happy to give you the precise numbers, and we'll certainly have that for you on the 22nd.

REP. BOYD: Thank you, sir. Now, in your report or in your -- when you briefed the committee earlier, you said that this plan would free up, nationwide, some 266 full-time and 2,426 part-time Air National Guard personnel. Can you talk to us about where those personnel will be? Will they be reassigned?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: This is really an issue for the Air National Guard and the National Guard Bureau, and we'll certainly get that information to you as well.

As you know, that active duty, we can reassign to other missions in other locations. This is not as easy to do with regard to the National Guard, and we're working those adjustments with the Air National Guard and General McKinley at the bureau.

REP. BOYD: I think that was the point, what I wanted to hear you say is you've got 2,700 Air National Guard, many of them part time. It seems to me that -- How do you reassign a part-time Air National Guardsman from one community to another across the nation? I think that's a very difficult -- You probably can't do it.

So all of these questions that we've talked about in the two rounds that I've had, I know you've told me a lot that you will give us the reports, give us the briefings and we will have that before the end of the month. Okay.

Chairman, that -- thank you.

REP. MURTHA: Mr. Tiahrt.

REP. TIAHRT (R-KS): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Secretary Donley and General Schwartz, thanks for your service to the country and appreciate your time here. I just want to briefly go over the tanker replacement.

We had an RFP that was clearly to replace a medium-size tanker with a single platform, and there's no plan to change that concept of a single platform in the Air Force's revision of the RFP, is there?

SEC. DONLEY: Sir, our view is that we ought to go ahead with the source selection for a single airplane.

REP. TIAHRT: Okay. I thought the RFP was very clear last time about that, but we had some significant political influence where the RFP became modified so much that it resulted in a GAO study. It seemed like the joint-strike fighter had Euro (ph) participation, and so we tried to reciprocate by modifying the RFP to accommodate a mega medium-sized tanker.

And I hope that doesn't occur this time, that the political influence is excluded from the RFP. As you know, the results of the GAO study brought to light that some of these changes were just way beyond the pale and it resulted in a cancellation of the decision. So, as we move forward, I'm hoping that we can keep the political influence out of it, that we look at the actual cost, long-term cost, as well as the other significant requirements and come up with a good decision this time that's not influenced by politics.

And there's another program called Project Liberty. It's an ISR platform, and it seems to be held up right now. Can you tell me what the status of the HBC UC-12 Project Liberty, what's the --

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Sir, the first aircraft deployed for Iraq on the first and it will arrive Friday. And so you know that we have had a training operation going on in Meridian, Mississippi, the temporary location, so that we can train the crews and man these, that we are going to push the aircraft forward. There'll only be several training birds left in the States. Everything else will go forward.

And this, in a way, also addresses Congresswoman Granger's earlier question about ISR capacity that the MC-12s are an important part of that. They have much the same kind of capability, at least in the video area, that the Predators and the Reapers do, and they will provide support to the ground forces that are required both in Iraq and, ultimately, in Afghanistan.

So the program is slightly behind schedule based on efforts by the prime contractor, L-3. We originally anticipated deployments in April. We just got deployments this week and we'll continue to press on that.

REP. TIAHRT: Is it an integration problem or is it hardware problems, software problem?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Sir, I think this is just sort of underestimating some of the engineering demands that had been placed on this program. It was a very aggressive schedule to begin with. As you may recall, the plan was to buy the first eight aircraft from commercial sales and the used-aircraft market.

As we bought those airplanes, we ended up with seven or eight different configured airplanes. So the engineering integration had to be done differently seven times for those initial airplanes.

For the block two aircraft, we have -- working with the Office of the Secretary of Defense, with CENTCOM and others -- have been adding capabilities to these aircraft to ensure that they have the ISR capabilities that the combatant commander wants and needs in the theater. And as we have done that, we have added engineering time again into that process. So those, I think, are the reasons really for the delay. Contractor is on it, and they are working 24-7 to meet the contract schedule.

SEC. DONLEY: Congressman, I'll only add that the first delivery was seven months after contract award. So this was not sort of business as usual on anybody's part.

REP. TIAHRT: It was pretty short stroke. When we spoke last time, there was a problem with the AT-6C program. And --

REP. MURTHA: Mr. Tiahrt, would you pull your mike a little bit to you? It's hard to hear you.

REP. TIAHRT: All right. Sorry. There was a problem when we met last time with the AT-6C. It was an engine problem with a prop sleeve, and I think that's been resolved. But how are we doing to ensure that the Iraqis are fielding them properly and that they are working them as well as the trainers -- trainer version of it?

SEC. DONLEY: Well, sir, the trainers have not been delivered to the Iraqi Air Force as yet. That's still ahead of us. The prop- sleeve touchdown problem with the engine, we still have 64 airplanes that are grounded pending certification of the fix. Certainly, Pratt and Whitney believes they have the fix, and we're in the midst of phase-one tests to confirm that before we take the machines back airborne.

Assuming that comes through as advertised, we'll be okay with regard to the schedule for delivery to the Iraqi Air Force of the trainers.

REP. TIAHRT: Are you aware of the state of the Iraqi budget as far as the funding of this? Are they in good shape?

SEC. DONLEY: The Iraqis have had a couple of ups and downs in their budget planning and including national defense for them based on the price of oil. So their budgeting process is very dependent on the price of oil.

We understand the minister of defense is being briefed this week by their air chief, and they are working through the various programs and priorities that they have set for the new Iraqi Air Force.

And we have had advisors as part of that process continue to be directly involved with their leadership in watching the schedules and the performance of the programs that have been set in place to support the buildup of that. But they are definitely under resource constraints and remain heavily dependent on U.S. support.

REP. TIAHRT: Mr. Dicks was talking about the next generation bomber, which seems like it's some ways downstream, and we have a limited inventory of other bombers available today. Is there a program office for reengining the B-52s in existence today and would you consider that?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Congressman, we've looked at that a number of times over the years. The TF-33 engine is sustainable through the air-frame life of the platform. And so, at the moment, there's no consideration of reengining the B-52, sir.

REP. TIAHRT: Current fuel costs, it always varies, but it looks like it's going no place but up. Have you recalculated based on current fuel costs and how they are projected in the future? Because it seems like there's a significant fuel savings with the reengining program.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: We have looked at the business case and it has not risen to a level of priority which would suggest that we would preempt something else in order to reengine the B-52. For example, candidly, we wouldn't interfere with F-35 or KCX procurement to reengine the B-52. We think those two other items and others are higher priority.

REP. TIAHRT: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

REP. MURTHA: Mr. Bishop.

REP. BISHOP: Thank you very much. I'd like to turn my attention to general Air Force missions and requirements. Now, the Air Force is really embracing a collaborative and supportive role in the types of operations that are being conducted in Iraq and Afghanistan and, in general, attempting to change the service's culture to meet these new challenges.

Of course, the Air Force has always provided mission support in the struggle against extremism, which you designated as in lieu of, and, now, in lieu of, I think, is -- well, in lieu of has been defined as standard force and equipment that's -- to execute missions and tasks outside of your core competencies or co-responsibilities.

Now, the Air Force views these responsibilities and refers to them as joint expeditionary tasking, JTs. But to support that, there are some realities that you've got to deal with increased deployment tempo and requirements and they are done at the expense of your traditional missions.

General Schwartz, I think you've stated that you want to change the Air Force's culture. What types of changes can we expect to see in the Air Force? And, Secretary Donley, will there be any overall policy changes to reflect such a shift in the FY 2010?

GEN. SCHWARTZ : Congressman, I think the way to start this -- and I know the secretary will wrap -- the nation is at war, and their demands on the joint team writ large to be successful in Iraq and Afghanistan, and if there is a need, and if the Air Force can fill a need, it was our view -- the leadership's view -- that, in a time of war, we'll do whatever is necessary, wherever it's needed for however long it's needed.

Now, our commitment to our youngsters is that they'll be trained to do what we ask them to do, and I think we have been very rigorous in that regard. But, yes, we have some people who are doing non- traditional things, but I think we should celebrate that. It doesn't diminish us at all.

The truth is is that -- and I just met with 60 folks or so that are doing convoy work -- in Kuwait and sustaining our forces in Iraq, including Air Force youngsters. And these airmen will be better chief master sergeants when they grow up as a result of this experience.

So, in short, sir, I do not apologize for our folks filling legitimate combat requirements for the joint team. We just simply need to recognize their contribution, honor their contribution, make sure that they're properly trained and that they're rewarded for their work.

REP. BISHOP: Is that going to result in a shortfall of the traditional missions for training as well as execution, if you do that? And how many of those functions were performed by the Army and Marine Corps?

GENERAL DONLEY: Sir, it means that the folks that remain in those disciplines where we drew folks for non-traditional tasks will work harder. It means the entire team works harder, that that is the reality.

But, again, I would put this in context. This is not peacetime, and people are dying. And so we're not going to stand by and argue about it's not our job. That's not what we're about.

SEC. DONLEY: I would echo exactly what the chief has said. We are all in. Whatever we are asked to, we will do.

I think another aspect of our joint work together over the last year has been to broaden the appreciation with both outside and inside communities in our Air Force of the extent to which we are all participating in this fight whether we're deployed down range or not.

We have logisticians. We have mobility forces that are back and forth from the theater on a regular basis that are not necessarily deployed there. We have all the UAS support work, the intelligence work that backs up all that data collection that's done in other parts of the world, not just in CONUS. Some of it's done in Europe. Some of it's done elsewhere.

Our Air Force is committed to these fights geographically from -- basically from all around the world and in all of our different functions.

REP. BISHOP: How many of them in the central command area of responsibility?

SEC. DONLEY: About 26,000 at any given time of our 37,000 deployed abroad are in the CENTCOM AOR.

REP. BISHOP: Are you experiencing any difficulty filling those deployment missions?

SEC. DONLEY: It's interesting, sir. You know, we -- and I'll give you an example. We just lost two people on a provincial reconstruction team mission in Afghanistan last week, one officer, one young airman, both of whom were volunteers. And this is the reality. The people understand the value of the work and they have volunteered. Thus far, we are fulfilling the requirements that have been levied on us.

REP. BISHOP: As I understand it, the Air Force is currently playing a critical role in the mission that's expected to continue expanding to match 50 unmanned combat air patrols. Will this expanded role affect Air Force ISR manning requirements? And, if so, how does the 2010 budget request address those needs?

SEC. DONLEY: Sir, we have been very attentive to making sure that as we add ISR collection assets, as the unmanned aerial systems and other ISR assets increase that we also back it up with the necessary intelligence personnel to do that. So we have done that in the '10 budget. We can get you more detail as you would like.

REP. BISHOP: And, finally, what are the nuclear manning requirements? And how does your 010 budget address those needs? And are you able to source all your requirements in the nuclear field? And, if not, what shortfalls do you have and how can we help in that regard?

SEC. DONLEY: We are on a glide path, Congressman, with regard to reinvigorating the nuclear discipline in our Air Force.

And so in some areas we don't have the numbers or the depth of expertise we'd like. That is part of our plan for recapturing excellence in this area.

We are putting, for example, about 1,000 spaces back into the nuclear enterprise in order to serve that mission well. Some of that is in the new headquarters, the global strike command. Some of that's in the fourth B-52 squadron that'll be moving to Minot Air Force Base, North Dakota, and it is in the '10 program.

REP. BISHOP: Okay. It's in the 010 program. All right. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

REP. MURTHA: Mr. Rogers.

REP. ROGERS (R-KY): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good morning, gentlemen. Thanks for your service to our country, to all of you in the room.

Let me quickly ask about the two high-profile nuclear security incidents in the past few years, Minot and Taiwan. You've taken severe, I guess is the word, steps to try to correct those problems. Are you satisfied -- both of you -- are you satisfied with what you've done that our nuclear capability is kept secure at all times?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: I can speak from the operational side. I think we took the necessary actions, some of which included disciplining officers and NCOs, some of which entailed reorganizing the way we had responsibilities distributed around the Air Force in a number of commands and concentrating that operationally in one command, and on the sustaining side in one command, one accountable officer.

We, likewise, have given focus to the policy side of this, which is not trivial, as well, and that activity, of course, works for the secretary.

My view is we are on exactly the right path, the needed path. In fact, this Saturday, we will have what we call the Nuclear Oversight Board. We meet periodically to address progress along with our nuclear road map, those remedies that we've put in place and I'm persuaded that we are on the right path, sir.

MR. MICHAEL B. DONLEY: Likewise. I think we've put together a strong roadmap to get back the level of expertise and discipline that we need in this very important area. But, I would tell you this is a work in progress. It will not come back quickly and it needs continued attention in the next several years as we build back the necessary expertise. We have had since October, I believe, about 19 inspections across our nuclear enterprise, of which 17 were resulted in satisfactory or excellent, 2 were unsatisfactory and had to be retested at a later date, which they passed.

But, this continues to be a work in progress and chief mentioned the Nuclear Oversight Board that we have established. This will be our third meeting at the end of this week. Just this last weekend, we were back at Ogden Air Logistics Center reviewing the progress made there over the past year in the handling of nuclear related materials. They have made progress there, but there is more to do. We do not have in place all the automated systems and such that we should have that would help us with end-to-end accountability and get us out of the paper environment.

So, we have a lot of work to do to build back, but we have a good program and we're putting the resources in place to do it. So, I'm very pleased with the progress we've made over the last year.

REP. JOHN P. MURTHA (D-PA): Well, I need not remind us all that it just takes one simple mistake to do a lot of damage. Well, on February 4th, the Washington Times, and other agencies, reported that Air Force Nuclear Units have failed two surety inspections in the past three months. Are those the ones that you mentioned a moment ago?

SEC. DONLEY: I believe they are, sir.

REP. MURTHA: Well, again, are you positive that we've solved the problem given those lapses that we have just mentioned?

SEC. DONLEY: Sir, in the end, this is discipline, it's compliance with procedures, and there will be some human error, so that's why we do two-man or two-woman kind of processes to assure that we mitigate that risk, but with respect to the inspections, I don't think that 100 percent pass on inspections is necessarily the thing we want to see. We consciously turned the dial up on the inspection process to make sure that it was rigorous, to make sure that it was more invasive, to make sure that it actually told commanders where they had problems and that was one of the dilemmas we had. Frankly, I think the inspection process became too easy and so that has been part of the corrective action and if we see failures, I think that is a reflection of rigor and not necessarily a situation over which we should be too alarmed, in any event.

REP. MURTHA: Alright, thank you. Ms. Kilpatrick.

REP. CAROLYN C. KILPATRICK (D-MI): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Those were exactly where I was going with the nuclear, but one thing as it relates to the '10 budget, and thank you for all you said, and Secretary Gates coming in and changing the command and the two of you assuming your new positions and carrying out what we just discussed in the last questioning. Does the '10 budget fully source all your requirements for the field? Do you have what you need and I think I asked you that before. Are there any shortfalls that we must look at at this time?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Trust me, ma'am. We made sure that all the nuclear requirements were addressed at a hundred percent.

REP. KILPATRICK: So, as this committee goes through its due diligence after you all have gone back to base and all that, you want to leave us with that point.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Yes, Ma'am. The key thing is you won't see any nuclear items on the unfunded list.

REP. KILPATRICK: Okay. Thank you very much. Then, let's go to health care. We didn't talk much about that this morning. General, you did mention that that is one of the assured staffing falls or, I don't know if you have the people that would require the needs that we have as we go forth to, again, Afghanistan, and certainly in it's own domestic, and around-the-world needs. What kind of assistance do you need? I'm talking more positions than dollars, enlisted or not.

I'm just left a hearing where I think it was Congresswoman Nita Lowey who was introducing a bill that the medical professions' nurses who were formed in World War II, they don't get pensions as her bill was trying to get them pensions and make them a part of the military, which I strongly support. And, those who now commit their lives and follow the troops around and care for them and keep them safe and healthy. Talk a bit about health care as it relates to the mission in theater and overall Air Force.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Clearly, one of the great successes of this period of conflict that we've been in is how the medical community has performed. When I first came into the armed forces, we were in the midst of the Vietnam Conflict and I remember vividly how it took weeks to get wounded back from Vietnam to hospitals in the states. Maybe longer.

Now, it takes hours, literally and as you are aware, ma'am, the survival rate of our troops, our airmen, marines, sailors, who are wounded on the battlefield, is well in excess of 95 percent -- higher than it has ever been -- because of the casualty evacuation capability, of the field medical capability, and strategic efforts that we have to move folks from one theater to the next back to the U.S. for definitive care. I think it's a wonderful example of how the armed forces take care of their own.

This is not to say that there are not difficulties with respect to certain specialties in the medical area. One of the truths is, though, that we have had greater success in recruiting surgeons, of late, than perhaps we did before. We typically were a very healthy force in peacetime, so you only did geriatric surgery, if you will. But, this is the real deal now, and certainly trauma surgeons know that the armed forces are a place where their skills can be put to very good use. So, the bottom line is, we compete in the civil market for talent. We need to have incentives that allow people to have a fair standard of living along with the rewards that come with military service.

REP. KILPATRICK: (Off mike).

GEN. SCHWARTZ: An area where we have had difficulty because they are in short supply, is mental health.

For example, we hired a hundred mental health professionals in the Air Force and that is a relatively small number compared with what the Army has done. But, there is keen competition for mental health professionals.

REP. KILPATRICK: (Off mike).

GEN SCHWARTZ: Exactly and that's my point and so, you know, this is a difficult area and it's one where after folks return home, there is still mental health needs and, you know, that is an area where incentives, and so on, are certainly required.

SEC. DONLEY: Yeah, as the chief mentioned earlier, we have put about $645 million against incentives and bonuses for recruiting and retention, generally. Of that amount, about $88 million (dollars) or so is targeted at health care professionals. So, I think we have, as the chief suggested, I think we have addressed the requirement issues, and we've established where we need additional personnel positions. I mean, we've done that internally. The shortage is in the bodies, in getting them in and retaining them and that is a common problem across the armed forces right now.

REP. KILPATRICK: Fine. Then, finally, on that same line, are the wounded warriors who come home and their families. Adequate health care resources?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: For the Air Force, we do. Now, we've had far fewer numbers of casualties than have the other services, but we have been focused on this and we are okay with regard to assuring that our commitments to our wounded warriors are fulfilled.

REP. KILPATRICK: Families.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Certainly and their families, yes ma'am. Forgive me for --

REP. MURTHA: Let me ask you, on the ILOs, are they all volunteers?

SEC. DONLEY: Probably not all --

REP. MURTHA: Not all.

SEC. DONLEY: -- but a large proportion certainly are and we prefer it that way.

REP. MURTHA: Right.

SEC. DONLEY: For example, in the contracting area where we have a lot of our folks involved, they are on a one-to-one ratio as I indicated, somewhat like the security forces or the engineers and we have had to direct people to serve, and of course, that's what we sign up to do in the Air Force, or any of the armed forces, but we seek volunteers first and then deal with the remainder as we need to.

REP. MURTHA: Good. On the joint cargo aircraft, can you explain what is going to happen here? First, this was an Army program, then it was a joint program, and now, we understand, it's an Air Force program. That's rather magical. Recently, the Secretary of Defense has stated that the C-130 aircraft could and should be used to carry out the mission. So, tell us where we are on this and the Army's got eight of these planes, as I understand it. How are you going to get those back? What is the story here? And we hope this is the final chapter.

SEC. DONLEY: Sir, nothing happens instantaneously in this and it would be foolish to do so. The Army program office will remain in the lead until well into 2010. They currently have Air Force people in the office, but there will be more folks assigned and attached now that the transfer has been directed and that we will migrate the program from Army supervision and management to Air Force supervision and management over the next year.

A key factor in this is that there is a deployment of four aircraft that are required to go the Central Command's Area of Responsibility late in 2010 and so, that is the mark on the wall. We will fulfill that commitment and it may be with some Army crews and some Air Force crews. It will probably be a mix. We are getting the plan together now on how we will man this and likewise, you know, how we will operate this mission downrange. Still a lot of work to do.

I think, at the strategic level, Mr. Chairman, the issue was how many C-27s do we need. And I think that the secretary was concerned that perhaps we were not getting as much utilization out of our C130 fleet as he thought appropriate. Just, again, as background, about two-thirds of our C-130 fleet is in either the National Guard or the Reserve and because of availability, management issues related that they are not quite as available for deployment as our active duty. This is the nature of things.

We need to get the secretary settled on what the right mix is and clearly, that will be an outcome of the Quadrennial Defense Review. It might mean more than 38 JCAs. That is an open question. I think 38 is the floor. It could be more. We'll have to satisfy his inquiry related to the applicability of available C-130 capacity to do that mission.

REP. MURTHA: What I am having a hard time understanding is if the Air Force is going to take this program over. Why wouldn't it be Air Force crews? Why would you do mixed crews? Why wouldn't we just deal with this once and get it over with?

SEC. DONLEY: I agree, sir, and that will be the end game, but the problem is we have a near-term deployment requirement and to get people trained and certified, and so on, may require a mix before the total migration occurs and so, this is something we're working out. We probably won't have mixed crews, but it is conceivable that you would have coherent Army crew, coherent Air Force crew that would operate the aircraft using the same rules.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Just to follow up, Mr. Chairman. There are many moving parts to this. The program management piece, the training piece, the Guard, the basing issues, the deployment commitments that have been made. The Army, and the Air Force, and the Guard bureau together, are working this very hard. I think it's going to take several months before we get a real firm handle on how all the details of this will spin out. So, there's a lot of work here.

I think the strategic level decision that the secretary took is that the direct support mission can move, should move, from the Army to the Air Force. That was the strategic level decision, not just the JCA program. So, there's a lot of work that needs to be done and to the concepts of operations and how the Army needs to be supported and making sure that the Air Force prepares itself to do that correctly. So, many working parts. The clutch here will operate probably for a year or two as we make this transition. It is a significant one.

REP. MURTHA: One of the things that, going back to the KC-X competition, one of the things that really bothered me in this, was the fact that the Air Force leadership, as I understand it, by statute, is precluded from being involved in the decision-making. Is that accurate as it relates to the acquisition part of this program? That the acquisition people do this or is that inaccurate?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Source selection decisions are closely held and are limited to those individuals who've been assigned that responsibility, so we do not share source selection information outside of a select source selection team

REP. MURTHA: So, we have people in the source selection group who are going to take into account -- Who takes into account the industrial base issues? Who takes into account key issues that affect the country here, you know, in terms of industrial base and, you know, where this thing is going to be built? The whole thing, I mean who takes those kinds of issues into account?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Well, the Source Selection Authority is responsible for ensuring that --

REP. MURTHA: -- those things have been looked at.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: That those things have been looked at, that the law has been fulfilled in every respect, per government regulations, etc.

REP. MURTHA: There is a provision in Title 10 that says you have to look at industrial base. We don't think that was done on this program the last go-around. We raised this with Secretary Young before his departure.

So, we'd like you to look and make sure that we have looked at -- and that's supposed to be done to make sure we've evaluated the effect on the industrial basis. We can get you the citation. It's in Title 10.

The other thing is, there were some changes made in the model -- the CMARP -- that in order to allow the airbus aircraft, the EADS airbus aircraft, Northrop Grumman, to be able to compete. Now, when we start this process over again, are those same changes in the CMARP going to be allowed or are they going to be reevaluated or do you know?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: I can't speak to the specific issue you're raising here. All I can assure you is that we are going through this process with a fine-toothed comb to make sure that we have established all the requirements for the program in ways that can be understood and written into a good proposal, clear proposal, measurable requirements, and that we have good oversight of this program going forward.

We've made internal changes to the Air Force to strengthen that source selection process. We've increased the seniority of the team. We have done sort of remedial training, if you will. We've moved contracting responsibilities and oversight to a higher level in the Air Force. So, we have taken a number of steps since last summer to strengthen our preparedness to get back into this RFP this summer and to go through a fair and open competition and to make sure that we can withstand scrutiny that we know will come and should come from the Congress and those overseeing us.

REP. MURTHA: You know, we've had this discussion, but I want to say this on the record. I would hope that they would go back and reevaluate the changes that were made in the model -- the CMARP -- in order to make certain that that was in the best interest of the Air Force and the operation of the Air Force. I have doubts about that myself, that those changes should have been made. They were done so that one company would be able to compete because they said they were going to withdraw from the competition if changes weren't made.

The other thing is, in the GAO report, there were two requirements. Now, you have to meet the requirements. Two of the requirements were not met. One was having an organic maintenance site within two years and the other was the ability to refuel all Air Force aircraft. Those were not met and I want to know whether in the next go around, if a competitor doesn't meet the stated requirements, that they will be disqualified, which they should have been under the law.

And, those are two things that I think are fundamental. And, the third thing is to do a valid cost-comparison on life-cycle cost. You know, I think Congress wants to know the difference in life-cycle costs between the planes that are competing. And, that was not, in my judgment and the judgment of many others, properly evaluated in the first go-around. So, those three things we would like an answer to, how you're going to approach those things. Mr. Tiahrt.

REP. TODD TIAHRT (R-KS): Mr. Chairman, referring to Title 10, the U.S. Code, it's Section 2440, just to be specific. And if I might add, there's also some defense federal acquisition regulations, DFARs, that waive regulations for some of our allies, particularly the International Traffic in Arms Regulations, the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, along with other cost-accounting procedures that are demanded upon our American contractors and not our European allies that I think need to be reevaluated for a fair level playing field. I have an additional question, if we have time.

REP. MURTHA: Yeah, I yield to you.

REP. TIAHRT: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. In the process of every major program, there's a requirement for the Air Force to conduct an independent cost estimate and in that independent cost estimate -- which is a difficult task, by the way, with whether you use para- metrics or some similar programs, it's always hard to estimate what new technology's going to be and how you get there. But, once that's been established and there's some degree of confidence, there has been a tendency within the Air Force in the past, to under-budget those programs. They're trying to cram more program into the budget, by number of aircraft, by lowering the independent cost estimate or adjusting it downward and the result in doing that is that we end up later on with program overruns. And, then we go through these machinations of trying to catch up on the funding on very essential programs.

I assume you will have to keep continuing on the independent cost estimates, but I think it's important that we keep in mind, that once you establish a dollar figure for a program that it's fully included in the budget because the heartache that goes later on by trying to cram 10 pounds of sand in a five-pound bag, eventually it's going to spill out. And, it spilling out is where we run into a lot of troubles. Our budgeting process, our funding process, as well as you having to go through all these hearings and so I would encourage you in the future to, you know, when you get independent cost estimate, that's what you're budgetary number ought to be. Can I get some agreement on that?

SEC. DONLEY: The use of Independent Cost Estimate is a very important tool to the leadership -- (inaudible) -- no question. Inside the Air Force, inside the DoD leadership, this carries weight with us. As we look toward improving the acquisition work force, we are adding cost estimators. That's part of our plan is to beef up that part of our workforce that supports this aspect to the acquisition process. I would say, as Chairman and I, were discussing earlier, we've seen a lot of acquisition reform in our time here in Washington, over 30 years.

I would summarize it a little bit as you did, maybe perhaps a little bit more bluntly. Those who want to add capability to programs usually underestimate the cost and the impact on schedule. Those that want to take money from programs usually underestimate the impact on capability and schedule when they do that and we have people in this town for various programs. All of us are participating in this process. We want to add capability and we want to cut dollars from programs. It just depends on the program.

And, so we put our program managers in a very difficult situation. There are only certain aspects of programs that they really have control over because the leadership in the Pentagon, the Air Force, Secretary of Defense, many different competing pressures on programs, and also obviously in Congress, with multiple committees marking and funding programs at different levels with different goals, different objectives, different capabilities. We're all working around the edges of these programs, so maintaining stability both in content and in funding is a very significant challenge for all of us and continues to be going forward and requires a lot of discipline on our part to know when to intervene and when to leave it alone.

REP. TIAHRT: Well, I know that some people are always a little bit surprised that there's politics in Washington, D.C. Now, I know that it doesn't end at the Potomac. I know it occurs across the river, as well, but I think in this process, if we can have some stability in abiding by these independent cost estimates, it will help us avoid some future overruns which politically are difficult to live through for both you and ourselves. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

REP. BISHOP: Thank you, very much. As part of the FY 2010 budget development, Secretary Gates cancelled the next generation military satellite communications program (TSAT). TSAT would have provided anti-jam, high-data rate MILSAT communications and internet- like services to military users, such as the future combat systems and the Intelligence, Surveillance and Recognizance Assets.

With the cancellation of TSAT, the restructure of FCS, and the addition of 50 predator orbits, it's not clear whether or not the current satellite communications architecture is capable of supporting our force projection assets. And of course, last week, DoD issued the stop order on the TSAT program.

What are your plans, Secretary Donley, for the new military satellite communicate architecture and when will you make those plans available to Congress? And could you tell me whether or not you're going to migrate the TSAT capabilities onto the advanced, extremely high frequency satellite system? Would you address that for me?

SEC. DONLEY: As you indicated, the secretary made a strategic level decision to reduce the risk in our MILSATCOM programs that was perceived to be associated with the TSAT program. It had forecasts significant increases in capability across a broad range of functions and aspects for MILSATCOM.

Protected (com?) on the move, etc. These were viewed as very desirable by the combatant commanders, but also very high risk and potentially high cost.

Secretary's decision was to take risk out of our program, by continuing to add MILSATCOM capability by extending the Y-band global system on another two satellites by extending the AEHF system that you referred to by another two satellites. At the same time, the decision recognized that at some point in the future, we would want to continue the R&D work necessary to develop the advanced MILSATCOM capabilities that we hope would be available in the future from a TSAT-like capability and decide when those capabilities ought to be migrated into our MILSATCOM structure, so, we owe a plan to the office of the Secretary of Defense as part of the TSAT cancellation that develops a plan, Air Force working with combatant commanders and other users in the system to continue to evaluate the technology and to determine when that technology is ready to be inserted into the MILSATCOM, future MILSATCOM architecture. So that, the details of that have not been worked, but it is probably at AEH6 or beyond.

REP. BISHOP: How are you trading off the commercial lease satellite communication systems with the military satellite communications systems in your future architecture analysis?

SEC. DONLEY: We are big users of commercial SATCOM today and depend on our commercial partners to support ongoing operations in the theatre. They bear a significant part of our requirement today. I believe they will continue to be part of our MILSATCOM architecture in the future. We will have further internal debates about how much and what kind.

REP. BISHOP: Yeah, I was going to ask you what the balance was going to be.

SEC. DONLEY: Right. Right. And we will continue to work that going forward. There's no question in my mind that it is recognized within the space and MILSATCOM community that commercial partners are a part of our MILSATCOM, part of our SATCOM architecture going forward. They will be meeting part of our needs going forward, no question.

REP. BISHOP: Thank you very much, gentlemen, and, thank you, Mister Chairman. I would like to, at the close of the hearing, I'll have a moment with General Schwartz if you don't mind regarding a constituent matter. Thank you.

REP. NORMAN DICKS (D-WA): Thank you, Mister Bishop. Can you give me the kind of the newest update on the alternate engine on the Joint Strike Fighter, what the administration's position on this is?

SEC. DONLEY: Sir, the administration's position remains that the second engine for the F35 would not be in the best interest of the F35 program going forward, so, there is, at the moment, there is no change in the administration's position on that subject.

REP. DICKS: We understand that, you know, the Congress has added $2.5 billion. A lot of this comes from the, I think it's the F100. Wasn't it the F100 competition?

REP. KAY GRANGER (R-TX): 136.

REP. DICKS: Yeah. And our analysis up here is that over the lifecycle that even in the worse case, you know, this would only cost $300 million and that there, you know, with competition there, keeps both competitors prices down and so, anyway, I just want to make that point because, you know, I'm pretty confident Congress is going to stay with their position on this.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Mister Chairman, if I could just --

REP. DICKS: Yeah, go ahead if you have anything to say.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: -- if you'd allow me just to say that if, you know, I think we understand that argument. I would only ask that if that is the case, if we're going to proceed, the Congress directs that we proceed with the alternate engine, that we all do our best not to have that decision impact the production rate of our F35 platforms. If the trade is fewer airplanes for more engines, from an operator's point of view that is less than ideal.

REP. DICKS: That's a valid point and noted. Have you done this one?

REP. GRANGER: (Inaudible.)

REP. DICKS: On April 6 Secretary Donley announced the termination of the Air Force combat search and rescue helicopter program due to concern over the acquisition history and questions of whether the mission can only be accomplished by yet another single service solution with a single purpose aircraft. You further stated that you'd take a fresh look at the requirement behind the program and develop a more sustainable approach. Later in the month at Maxwell Air Force Base you stated, frankly, the notion of an unarmed helicopter going 250 miles by itself to rescue somebody did not seem to be a realistic operational concept. What is in the budget to address this critical capability? Anything?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Sir there is, the decision to cancel the CSRX solicitation did not remove all the dollars that were associated with that effort. In fact, there is a fair amount of money left in the personal recovery search and rescue line and what we will end up doing, I think, bottom line is, I think the secretary's view was that we had over-spec-ed (sp) the requirement and that there are less expensive capabilities that can help satisfy this mission and what we will end up doing is procuring airplanes currently in production that are either supporting the Army or the special operations forces.

REP. BISHOP: These airplanes run as helicopters?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Yes, Sir, helicopters.

REP. BISHOP: Rotary wing?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Rotary wing helicopters, yes, Sir. UH-60M variance.

REP. DICKS: What about the idea of purchasing two H2M helicopters, to be modified to a CSR configuration?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Sorry, can you repeat that?

REP. DICKS: What about the, there is one option of purchasing two H-60M helicopters to be modified to a CSR configuration?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Yes, that is the department's position, Sir.

REP. DICKS: That's what you're going to do.

MR. MICHAEL B. DONLEY: I don't think that's been completely decided. What I think you saw, have seen in the '10 budget, first of all, there are dollars, as the Chief indicated, there are dollars left behind from the CSR program cancellation that we intend to put into a different capability going forward. But, at the same time that decision was made, we also made what I would call some cleanup decisions, since we knew we were not going to have CSR procured in the near future to do some loss replacement for helicopters. We put in some dollars for MC-130 for additional tanking. We did some additional mod dollars on H-60's as well, adding flare capabilities and some other functions that would be helpful in the CSR, in the personnel recovery mission area. And these were, these were short term Band-Aid budget adjustments made to compensate in the immediate near term for the CSR cancellation. We need to reconstitute a future program that needs to be defined here in the QDR going forward.

REP. DICKS: Okay.

REP. BISHOP: Does the gentleman yield on this point?

REP. DICKS: Yeah, I yield.

REP. BISHOP: The CSR's that you have talking about, will they be armed so that when they go in on the missions that there is some protection? And if so, will that reduce the available space for MEDEVAC for actually and the number of casualty victims that can be extracted?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: They will be armed as ours are today either with light machine guns or 50 caliber weapons, is the typical configuration and, yes, there is a tradeoff between, you know, payload and space with regard to what you put on to protect the airplane, how much gas you carry, how far you can go versus how many people you can pick up in return and so on. But, the bottom line is that these aircraft do have self protection capability and, and the aircraft that's we're talking about procuring will likewise have that capability.

REP. DICKS: Mister Tiahrt.

REP. TODD TIAHRT (R-KS): Thank you, Mister Chairman. General Handy's been talking about a dual buy on the tankers and what is the plan on the KC-10 replacement? Is there a, is it in the, on the radar screen yet?

SEC. DONLEY: No.

REP. TIAHRT: Still a long term out? You were just talking about the lower cost aircraft, if you replace them upfront but it just doesn't seem there's room in the budget now, is that kind of the --

REP. DICKS: Would you yield on that just a second?

REP. TIAHRT: Yeah.

REP. DICKS: As I understood, what the Air Force's position was, we're going to buy 179 in the first tranche of medium sized aircraft, 179 of medium, in our second tranche, and another third tranche of 179 which could be a larger airplane. That was the original plan. That would take a long, long time. I know Mister Murtha feels that whatever we do, we should accelerate this to try to get the unit cost down and get these tankers sooner. But, is that not still the plan?

SEC. DONLEY: You're exactly right, Mister Chairman. The broad intent is to do this in three increments. We have over 400 tankers involved, KC-135 replacements, if you will, to effect over the next 15 to 20 to 25 years. This is going to change --

REP. DICKS: This says over 45.

SEC. DONLEY: Yeah, this is going to take time. This is going to take time. And we had not looked at the exact content of all that. The main purpose behind these increments was to give us way points, if you will, decision making points to understand where the future technologies and what the future commercial airframes might be --

REP. DICKS: Right.

SEC. DONLEY: -- 10 years or 15 years out. So that we don't commit to an airframe now that may be past in sort of, by technology advancements or new commercial aircraft available 20 or 30 years from now.

REP. DICKS: General, do you want to make a comment?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: I would just say that KC-10 was really KCZ. That was the third --

REP. DICKS: That's right. XYZ.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: -- it was the third increment and so, you know, notionally, conceptually, it's out there, but it's not programmatic yet.

REP. DICKS: But it's still the administration's position that you're against a split buy, isn't that correct?

SEC. DONLEY: Yes.

REP. DICKS: And, and, and can you give us some of the reasoning why you are?

SEC. DONLEY: Well, the split buy would require us really to fully develop two aircraft going forward. In addition to fully developing those aircraft, we'd end up with two logistics and support (trains ?) that go with those aircraft. A third consideration from our point of view is that the minimum buy to support two production facilities, if you will, is probably a minimum of about 12 each. So, our plan going forward assumed that the Air Force would be buying about 15 airplanes a year into the future. And that was roughly what we thought we could afford within our procurement accounts going forward. If we end up with a split buy, the minimum for each is 12, that means a buy of 24 airplanes a year. There's goodness in that if you, from one point of view, you know, it's a, sort of a more robust industrial base kind of situation, you get them faster, the KC-135's come out faster, however, it, we think it's probably more expensive in the long run to support that and it requires that instead of buying 15 per year, we'd buy 24 per year. So, the impact on our budget is significant. We end up spending a lot more on tankers and that crowds out other, other areas.

REP. DICKS: And there is a very definite increase in the development cost as I, as we understand it. I think Secretary Gates has said, or somebody, at least $7 billion more in development costs in the near term. So that also has an effect, would have an adverse effect on the Air Force budget. Mister Tiahrt.

REP. TIAHRT: You were, in your question, Mister Chairman, you were talking about a study of the requirements for the air lift capability.

REP. DICKS: Right.

REP. TIAHRT: And when we think of the current situation in Afghanistan, where it's pretty easy to be landlocked. We have the Russians trying to influence the northern side of it. We have Iran to the west. Pakistan's uncertainty to the east and south, and it really brings to high emphasis the ability to get equipment and supplies and personnel in and out of Afghanistan. And we don't, we've been using this link through Pakistan and we've had a lot of trouble with that. They have broken some of the containers, you can go down in the black market just outside the air base in, was it Bagram? And buy the seals that they put on the back of the cargo containers to show they haven't been broken into.

You can buy replacements for those and so they simply bust the seals, steal what they want, put the seal back on and then the manifest doesn't match the cargo. So there's been a lot of trouble going through Pakistan. Will this be part of the plan? It seems like a near term problem, and you're doing a long term study, but when it comes to handling cargo we could have a huge demand almost immediately with the instability in that area.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: We, Congressman Tiahrt, we certainly have contingency plans in, you know, that, to deal with either limitations on access through the southern routes, the Chaman or the Torkham Gates, as they're called in the east of Afghanistan or from the north, through any number of the stands. This really is in the transportation command lane but, fundamentally, you know, what we have done is establish relationships with a number of the governments, for example, in Kyrgyzstan we do have an agreement to, for continued access to Manas and that is, that's an important location because it allows us not only to do transload of personnel from commercial to military to go in country, but it also allows us to have tankers near or closer to Afghanistan to support day to day missions. If we had to fall back to other locations, we could do that, we have a plan, we have a backup. It's harder, it's more expensive, it's more asset intensive, but, we are not without options with regard to maintaining support for the folks that are on the ground there.

REP. DICKS: Alright. Let me ask you, Secretary Donley, has the irregular warfare DOD Directive 3000-0.07 been reflected in your 2010 budget request?

SEC. DONLEY: I believe it has. The work that the Air Force has done over the last several months has really helped to focus building partnership capacity in our international affairs as a core function in the Air Force.

So we have stepped out to recognize the importance of this work. As we have alluded to in a few different programs here today, if you package them together, we have looked carefully at, at how to further develop Air Force force structure and capacity for irregular warfare sort of at the lower end of the conflict spectrum and to develop capabilities that not only are useful to the United States in its work, but can be translated over to international partners who are not the same kinds of partners that we deal with in, for example, a NATO context.

So, building partnership capacity at the high end with NATO partners means F-35's and high end Rivet Joint kinds of capacity. Unmanned aerial vehicles. These are the kinds of issues that we work with the Brits, with the Germans, and with other partners. At the lower end, we need to have capabilities that are at the technological level, resource level, training level that fits partners facing different kinds of resource challenges, geographic challenges, so, building capabilities like the JCA, like the C-27 capability, building ISR capabilities in platforms like the MC-12 and potentially developing training airplanes like the T-6 or the Super Tucano or other kinds of aircraft in that class of airframe, can help us and it can help us teach and work with partners to build up their indigenous capability. So, we've been working the IW and partnership issues very hard and continue to do so. We have more work to do there.

REP. DICKS: Is the Air Force doing anything, general, to revise doctrine organization, training material leadership, personnel and facilities to reflect a sharpened focus on irregular warfare?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: We are, in fact, this will be a major topic for discussion at our four star conference here this weekend. And I think what you will see, for example, we have what we call Contingency Response Groups in the overseas theatres. They originally were conceived to be elements with lots of different disciplines from airfield management to engineers to services, personnel support kind of capabilities, to open airfields. It's an important function for us. If we're expeditionary, we need to have an airfield opening capability. But it turns out that these organizations also had, because they're multidisciplinary, the interesting capacity to engage other Air Forces in interaction related to the various disciplines, whether it's building a runway or whether it's air traffic control, whether it's medical support, and, and what we will probably do, and it's an example of several initiatives, is to dual role those organizations both to do airfield opening, but when they're not opening airfields, to build partner capacity with our partners like the Afghan Army Air Corps.

The truth is, is that we have capacity that may have been overly focused on a particular mission set, that we can expand their view and I think with minimal expense and minimal growth and manpower requirements, actually serve the irregular warfare mission very well. And that's, that is where we will start, Sir. There will be some new stuff, as the Secretary suggested, but, I think our first effort will be to make better use of what we already possess in that lower end of the spectrum.

REP. DICKS: Why is the air operations request for 2010, 50 percent less than 2009?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: I am not -- (audio interruption).

REP. DICKS: -- flying hours?

MS. : (Off mike.)

REP. DICKS: Yeah, basically, flying hours, we're talking about. How is the Air Force training curriculum for flying hours been substantially updated since the Berlin, well, when did it occur, yeah, when did it occur, on training hours, training curriculum?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Right.

REP. DICKS: Has the Air Force's training curriculum for flying hours been substantially updated since the Berlin wall came down?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Certainly it has. I mean, the most graphic example of that, Mister Chairman is the capacity in simulation. I mean we now, and to network simulation. Our simulators, and, of course, this is true in the commercial sector as well and as you well know, in the commercial business, aviators are no longer qualified in actually flying the airplanes. All that's done in high fidelity simulators. The same thing is true for our air crews. Now, there's some things you've got to do in the air and we certainly do that. But we are making better use of high fidelity simulation, of networking those simulators in a way that allows F-15's, let's say, to gaggle with F-16's in a virtual sense and it isn't a complete substitute, but it has reduced the, our need for flying in the air, sir.

REP. DICKS: Our staff is concerned that this may be an excuse to cut out some major programs. That we're moving to irregular warfare, therefore we need fewer F-22's, fewer C-17's, we're shutting down a lot of programs, next generation bomber, I mean, it is, you know, an then, what are you switching to, what is the, what does irregular warfare bring with it in terms of (regress ?)? Now, we know there's going to be Predators, Reapers, things you've, ISR, things you've talked about, but, you know --

GEN. SCHWARTZ: Some of this is human capital, Mister Chairman, I mean, the question is, I only speak one language and that's not a good thing. You know, in 15 or 20 years, the next Chief of Staff, you should expect to be conversant in more than one language. And that is one of those things that really is irregular warfare. We need to make sure that our folks in our Air Force, your Air Force, both can connect with other cultures, have the sensitivity and the awareness to do that well, can communicate and so on and so forth, so part of this is human capital. Yes, we are growing in some areas that we've talked about and shrinking in others.

I think this is the reality that we face, because the truth of the matter is that our budgets are limited and we're going to have to make choices. But I think what you hopefully will see is that at a strategic level, we have certain things that are single purpose. For example, the missiles in North Dakota and Wyoming and so on are single purpose. They serve the deterrent mission. They are not really very applicable at the, in the irregular warfare context.

REP. DICKS: Right.

GEN. SCHWARTZ: You have some things on the other end that are very mission specific that are not applicable as you move up the warfare spectrum, but that general purpose force in the middle, we need to make more versatile. So, we'll have some dedicated to this and some dedicated to that, but I think our way ahead is to build versatility into our force so that we can swing to the needs without doing these major fluctuations of discontinuing some programs and starting new ones.

REP. DICKS: No, but, just to follow up on that, what would be kind of the, in your vision of this, with the irregular warfare, what are the kinds of things that the Air Force will need in order to implement irregular, I mean, and equip itself for irregular warfare? What are, have we missed anything here? I mean, are we talking about helicopters? Are we talking about UAV's? We're talking about, what else?

GEN. SCHWARTZ: You're talking about mobility. You're talking about reconnaissance. You're talking about light strike and you're talking about the management capacity to orchestrate and sustain those resources. That's, in one of the things that the Air Force brings to the table here is to be able to train others, like the Afghan Army Air Corps, how to maintain and how to sustain these assets that they will have, largely non US made, some Italian air lifters, some Russian helicopters, a mix. But, our kids need to be able to train others to use those assets. And, that's something which requires, again, versatility. We build it into the force. We have people that are qualified on various platforms and that can teach. That's the way ahead, in my view.

REP. DICKS: Alright. Mister Secretary.

SEC. DONLEY: Just an additional couple of points, Mister Chairman. As the Chief indicated, the Secretary is not swinging in this budget, swinging a pendulum hard over to irregular warfare. He's asking the Department to look more carefully at how we can use those general purpose forces that we're building. We're still committed to JSF, for example, where our program for JSF is 763 airplanes and that's going to take a while and we're deeply invested in that and we hope to execute that. But the issues is as we build and maintain force structure going forward, making it as useful as possible across the spectrum of conflict. And the other thing that should be in our minds as we continue to work the irregular warfare issue is the effectiveness of our armed forces, jointly, both in Iraq, Afghanistan, across the board in any operation today, is our ability to network and work together.

So, it's the enabling capabilities, much of which the Air Force brings to the table in its space and ISR communications, these capabilities that are useful across the spectrum of conflict, and for which we are able to scale up and scale down to support irregular warfare, to support high intensity combat when necessary, these enabling capabilities are critical to all the armed forces. We bring a lot of that to the table and I see growth and demand in those areas. Cyber and space are three domains that we're focused on. Those are growth areas for, I think, the joint community going forward. And we've got to do, we've got to do the work necessary to continue to build capacity in cyber and in space.

REP. DICKS: Mentioning cyber, has the Air Force been a victim of attacks by other countries on --

SEC. DONLEY: Yes.

REP. DICKS: And has it, I know we can't go too far here, but has it gone beyond unclassified systems into classified systems?

SEC. DONLEY: It has and it is persistent. It is a regular part of doing business today. This is a warfare domain.

REP. DICKS: Any further questions? Alright. The committee will stand in adjournment. Thank you very much and we appreciate your testimony. And also, Secretary Donley, I want to thank you personally for meeting with a group of my constituents from Tacoma. They very much enjoyed the meeting.

SEC. DONLEY: Happy to do that, Mister Chairman.

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