New $625 Million Weapons Package for Ukraine Includes 200 More MRAPs

Oct. 4, 2022 | By John A. Tirpak

The U.S. will provide another $625 million worth of military items to Ukraine, to include 200 Mine-Resistant Ambush-Protected vehicles, more HIMARS rocket launchers and nearly 200,000 rounds of artillery, mortars, and missiles, the Pentagon announced Oct 4.

The total value of arms provided by the U.S. to Ukraine since Russia’s February invasion is now $16.8 billion.

Laura K. Cooper, deputy assistant secretary of defense for Russia, Ukraine, and Eurasia, detailed a list of new items to include four HIMARS (High Mobility Artillery Rocket System) launchers and ammunition; 16 M777 Howitzers with more than 75,000 rounds of 155mm ammunition; 1,000 anti-armor missiles; and the 200 MRAPs, nearly doubling the number pledged or provided so far.

The MRAPS “provide Ukraine with a resilient capability for transporting troops in heavily mined terrain,” Cooper said at a Pentagon briefing. The vehicles were rapidly developed during the Afghanistan and Iraq wars to deal with the threat of improvised explosive devices; after those conflicts ended, many MRAPs were declared excess to U.S. military needs.

“This package will provide the Ukrainian Armed Forces with additional capabilities and munitions that it needs to maintain momentum in the East and in the South, including additional artillery and precision fires,” Cooper said.

“Ukraine has demonstrated the ability to use these capabilities to degrade Russian logistics and command-and-control, creating opportunities for Ukraine to maneuver and to advance. This has created, as [Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III] said recently, a change in battlefield dynamics, even as the Russian government moves legislation today to claim parts of Ukrainian territory illegitimately.”

Cooper said Ukraine continues to “reclaim territory and to consolidate their gains.” The liberation of Lyman, accomplished in recent days, “was a significant operational accomplishment, and Ukrainian forces continue to make deliberate progress in the Kharkiv region, and also further south around Kherson,” she added.

The U.S. will continue to provide weaponry and equipment to Ukraine “to meet its urgent needs on the battlefield, while also building Ukraine’s enduring strength to defend its sovereignty over the long term,” Cooper said.

She also noted that Pentagon acquisition and sustainment chief William LaPlante participated in a meeting with 45 NATO and European Union armaments directors last week to make plans for the long-term provision of military aid to Ukraine during its fight against the Russian invasion.

While Congress has approved aid above and beyond what President Joe Biden has declared excess to U.S. needs and provided Ukraine, some members of Congress have raised the alarm that such transfers are cutting deeply into U.S. stocks. LaPlante said on Oct. 1 that NATO nations are making plans for sustained and “interchangeable” munitions production at a number of sites—likely to be in the U.S. and in Europe—to build weapons, but also to provide components critical for weapons.

LaPlante warned that the “long lead time” needed for components and materials means replacing weapons could be a lengthy process.

Cooper said the Pentagon is “looking very closely” at the rate at which Ukraine is consuming munitions and ammunition “to make sure that they have what they need for the counter-offensive and then the types of capabilities.”

The HIMARS have received a lot of attention “because you’ve seen how the Ukrainians can use these capabilities to take out critical Russian logistics nodes, command control nodes, ammunition depots, etc., and really weakened … the Russian forces’ ability to respond,” Cooper said. The additional HIMARS will give Ukrainian forces “flexibility in how they employ these capabilities…as they look for additional opportunities to seize the strategic advantage.”

A list of munitions and equipment provided to Ukraine since Russia’s invasion began in February, released by the Pentagon on Oct. 4, also noted 700 Phoenix Ghost tactical unmanned aerial systems; an unspecified number of aircraft-launched AGM-88 High-speed Anti-Radiation Missiles (HARMs); more than 8,500 Javelin anti-tank missiles, more than 1,400 Stinger shoulder-launched anti-aircraft missiles; “hundreds” of HumVee armored vehicles; eight NASAMS surface-to-air missile systems; electronic jamming equipment; cold weather gear and protective equipment for operating in a chemical/biological/radiological environment.

Cooper said the U.S. agrees that Ukraine need tanks, but stopped short of saying the U.S. would provide some of its M1 Abrams main battle tanks.

She also noted that the U.S. is not assisting Ukraine alone, but that many other nations are donating lethal and non-lethal aid, as well. Russia, by contrast, does not have such support, Cooper said.

“What is Russia doing? Russia is turning to North Korea for assistance. It’s turning to Iran. It doesn’t have that depth of support,” she said.

SDA Joins the Space Force as Agency Looks Ahead to Demos in 2023

Oct. 4, 2022 | By Amanda Miller

Having become a part of the Space Force on Oct. 1, the Space Development Agency expects little disruption—so to speak—to getting its initial constellation into orbit in time for military exercises next summer, SDA director Derek Tournear said recently.

SDA predates the Space Force, though not by much—both started up in 2019—and SDA became “this disruptive innovator” with its concept for an “architecture based on proliferation and spiral development,” Tournear told reporters at AFA’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference. The idea is to field numerous, comparatively lower-cost data transport and missile tracking satellites and to refresh the constellation by de-orbiting some and adding more in two-year cycles.

As a new direct reporting unit in the Space Force, SDA’s reporting structure now parallels that of the service’s two other acquisition-oriented bodies, Tournear said—Space Systems Command and the Space Rapid Capabilities Office—by reporting to the assistant secretary of the Air Force for space acquisition and integration for acquisition purposes, and to the Chief of Space Operations for administrative purposes.

In a separate event at the ASC conference, the first-ever assistant secretary of the Air Force for space acquisition and integration Frank Calvelli complimented SDA’s “approach to doing business” for “building small” and “delivering capabilities faster,” he said. “I actually think that’s a model that we can take advantage of and actually push out across the organization.”

Tournear anticipated no personnel changes from the transition. SDA’s 210 people include uniformed service members, civilian government employees, and contractors who are looking ahead to the launches, scheduled to begin in December, of 28 satellites dubbed “Tranche 0” to test the concept of SDA’s planned National Security Space Architecture in low-Earth orbit.

Tournear said all of Tranche 0—a combination of data transfer and missile warning satellites—should be operational for demonstrations in the summer of 2023: “That’s when you have Northern Edge and a lot of these [other] exercises.”

SDA’s disruption in the form of proliferation and spiral development—a departure from so-called “exquisite” conventional military satellites developed over long timelines—couldn’t have taken place from within the Space Force, according to a theory Tournear attributed to the book “The Innovator’s Dilemma.”

Because an organization with “a de facto customer base” is inherently set up “to give that customer base exactly what it needs and what it wants … that means that you will give them incremental solutions,” Tournear explained—“because that’s what they’re used to. That’s what they expect. And you will continue to build off of that.”

For the disruption to take place, “you have to have a completely different set of values that will drive different processes and will utilize different resources that will give you a completely different solution,” he said. “Now, once that disruption happens, and then you get a new customer base that says, ‘OK, this is the right way to do it,’ or the existing customer base buys into that new model, then you can start to get into this model where you provide updates.”

Even though he expects the new approach “to need a lot of advocacy within the department and externally to make sure that industry can perform at these scales in these timeframes,” he senses that the Space Force is already onboard.

“Look at what Space Systems Command is doing with the [medium-Earth orbit, or MEO] missile warning, missile tracking layer,” Tournear pointed out. “They’re following the model of spiral development and this two-year timeframe to get things up and operational.”

With three organizations in the Space Force now tasked with acquisition, Tournear laid out his “bumper sticker view” of the breakdown of responsibilities, describing SDA as best suited to highly proliferated constellations in LEO; Space RCO as “very well suited for rapid acquisition of the prototype-type of solutions, especially on the classified side”; and Space Systems Command for “making sure that the overall architecture fits together.” Exceptions include the likes of SSC’s responsibility for the missile warning constellation in MEO.

A combined program office will function as “a technical interchange working group … to make sure pieces and parts are going to fit together when you’re done,” Tournear said. “For example, we have a deputy program manager from SSC … here with SDA to make sure that what SSC is building in the middle layer is actually going to fit in with us,” particularly “getting data formats that match up.”

The Missile Defense Agency also has a role in the working group because “eventually you want those data to actually support fire control, and the bread and butter is being able to take data from a lot of different sensors … and fuse those together for fire control solutions.”

One noticeable change will be Vice Chief of Space Operations Gen. David D. Thompson’s co-leadership with Tournear of SDA’s “warfighter councils.” The next one in March will define the minimum viable product for Tranche 2 of SDA’s planned data transport constellation.

Air Force and Space Force Need to Modernize IT and HR Practices, Leaders Say

Oct. 4, 2022 | By Chris Gordon

The Air Force and Space Force are trying to make service members’ lives easier, with new information technology and human resource practices to ensure Airmen and Guardians can be more effective in accomplishing their mission and have a better day-to-day experience, leaders said.

“It starts with understanding where you are,” Wanda T. Jones-Heath, Principal Cyber Advisor for the Department of the Air Force, said during a discussion hosted by GovExec. “The environment has changed, and so we have to change. We have to modernize our legacy applications and systems. We have to think about our infrastructure. We have to think about our people.”

As the broader economy shifts towards a more flexible work-life balance for employees and the job market remains competitive, the services need to better attract and retain talent. While the Air Force and Space Force were largely on target with their recruiting goals in 2022, the armed services have become less appealing to the general public.

The Air Force and Space Force are implementing practical changes, such as offering a second chance to recruits who test positive for marijuana and are making broader efforts to be more accommodating of their workforce’s personal lives. That includes more mundane tasks, such as making computer systems more accessible.

“It touches your life in so many ways,” Jason D. Howe, chief information officer and deputy director of plans and integration for the Air Force, said during AFA’s Air, Space, & Cyber Conference. “It’s not about an IT system anymore. That’s cold and somewhat heartless.”

The Air Force’s IT practices have been the source of ridicule online. Service members and some civilian leaders have taken to Twitter and Reddit to complain simple tasks, such as checking their email, take an inordinately long time due to outdated hardware and software.

The Air Force must be more proactive in understanding what Airmen need to accomplish their mission before a system is implemented, rather than reacting to negative experiences after the fact, Howe said.

“Now we’re getting better at establishing relationships with people so that we know when we deliver capability, it’s the capability that they want and need,” Howe said.

Additionally, the service’s IT systems are often inefficient but also unnecessarily expensive.

“You’re spending your money on sustainment and you’re not investing towards the future anymore,” Howe said. He added that some of Air Force’s efforts to “digitally modernize” have shifted towards using existing systems used by the private sector.

As a new service, the Space Force has more room to create a new culture and implement new IT approaches.

“A lot of what we focus on in Space Force is how do we articulate where it makes sense to be different and where it makes sense to be the same,” said Katharine Kelley, deputy chief of space operations for human capital.

In drawing its workforce primarily from other services and industry, the Space Force has the advantage of getting people who are dedicated to its mission, not those who may not have many other options.

“That means finding pockets of people in this interest base with this technical skill, no matter what your background is, and no matter what your race and gender is,” Kelley said.

But if the Space Force is going to retain its new workforce, it has to deliver on its recruiting promises.

“Part of our strategy in Space Force is how do you employ that talent in a way that they don’t feel like they’re being underutilized or that the value proposition that brought them to the organization in the first place is not what they’re actually realizing and experiencing on a day-to-day,” Kelley said. “They want hands-on keyboards, and they want realized experiences that allow them to continue to grow and develop.”

Watch, Read: CMSSF Roger Towberman on the Guardians of Tomorrow

Oct. 4, 2022

Chief Master Sergeant of the Space Force Roger A. Towberman delivered a keynote address on “The Guardians of Tomorrow” at AFA’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference, Sept. 20, 2022. Watch the video or read the transcript below. This transcript is made possible through the sponsorship of JobsOhio.

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Voiceover

Good afternoon, please welcome to the podium the 18th Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force, Kaleth Wright.

Air & Space Forces Association’s Gerald Murray

Ken, I don’t think I’m Kaleth.

Voiceover

No, sir. I don’t think you are.

Air & Space Forces Association’s Gerald Murray

So is Kaleth coming or is it me?

Voiceover

Right now, sir, it’s you.

Air & Space Forces Association’s Gerald Murray

All right, ladies and gentlemen, it is good to be back with you. And yes, Chief Wright will be joining us just a little bit later this evening, but I have the great pleasure of making an introduction now that I look so forward to. We talked about, and of course, the Secretary yesterday, and I said it earlier about the founding father of our Space Force and that being of course, Gen. Raymond. Of course right beside of him is the second Guardian of the United States Space Force. And back a year or more ago and I turned to Chief Towberman, I said, ”Toby, you are going to be the Paul Larry of the United States Space Force.”

And I will tell you that the Space Force, the Guardians could have no greater Guardian to be the first Guardian to be able to lead the enlisted force of the United States Space Force. Ladies and gentlemen, it is just an incredible pleasure for me to be able to introduce after three decades of service of wearing Air Force Blue, Chief “Toby” Towberman. As I said, became the second member of the new Space Force in April of 2020. Since then, he has worked very closely with the Chief of Space Operations General Raymond, to build the brand new service from the ground up. His work is setting the stage for our future Guardians. And ladies and gentlemen, without further ado, please welcome the Chief Master Sergeant of this Space Force, Chief Roger “Toby” Towberman.

CMSSF Roger A. Towberman

Thank you. Sit down. We got work to do. Sit down. Stop it.

Thank you. I remember when Chief said that, and I’ve said this many times and I mean it: If the only thing they can put on your tombstone is your job title, you didn’t do your job. And so I hope however they remember any of us, and we’re all in this together, that it’s by our works, and it’s by the difference that we make in the world and the changes that we make in the lives of Guardians.

So thank you so much everyone for being here. Thanks Mr. Secretary, it’s great to see you as always. Thanks again for the [inaudible], you’re like the biggest rock star on social media right now. To get above Chief Bass in rock star status isn’t easy, so we really appreciate it. To AFA, thanks as always for a fantastic event. Thanks for embracing the Space Force. Thanks for embracing our enlisted leaders and giving us an opportunity to talk. We always truly appreciate it and don’t take it for granted. So thank you so much.

Gen. Brown, thank you, sir, for being such a fantastic teammate and hiring really my closest teammate. And thanks Jo, love you and glad you’re here and glad we get to hang out every day and bang our heads against the wall, it’s fantastic, I appreciate you.

Gen. Raymond, I remember that day I was working for Mr. Manasco and they said, “Hey, you got to go talk to Gen. Raymond down in… you know where they got the exec com?“ “No.” And that was the old visiting GO office, and I don’t know, a 15-minute conversation and my life changes forever. And I just really appreciate the opportunity still to this day and you and Molly welcoming Rachel and I. Thanks so much sir. I really appreciate it and thanks.

Now one story I’ll tell though. So Gen. Raymond calls me up to tell me that he’s hired me. And he talks about, “Hey Chief, this was such a difficult decision, and I really had to think through it.” And he tells you what… I know what’s coming. He didn’t hire me, he’s going on about how difficult this was. And so I go through all the stages of grief in my own head, in what was probably four actual seconds, but seemed like four minutes of you apologizing. And then he says, “So how’d you like to come work for me?” I’m like, “Wait a minute. That’s what you start with.” I felt like the guy on the Daily Show, like, “Why didn’t you lead with that? How’d you like to come work for me?” Life changed forever, sir. And I’m just so happy.

Mary, hi. I know Gen. Thompson had to go back to work, because that’s what he does. He keeps us afloat and I’ll give him a big old bear hug later. Anyway, happy birthday United States Air Force, we appreciate you. Give a clap.

On Sunday, the Air Force cycling team tried to kill me riding up from Quantico. Gen. Goldfein was there on some fancy rig and we rode with the team. And I would encourage anyone, it actually wasn’t that bad of a ride from Quantico, 54 miles or whatever we did, next year. This Monument to Monument thing that they did, raised a little bit money, great advertising, and public outreach for the department. What a fantastic event. So I’m really proud of them, and Air Force cycling team for putting that on and then to invite us to be part of it, really cool. So next year, if you feel like going down to Kitty Hawk and getting on a bicycle for a few days, it’s really worthwhile. So happy birthday.

And this morning, Gen. Raymond showed the photo and I was reminded—he showed the photo on the plane and the champagne, I mean there’s only a handful of us. It was just those of us that were in D.C. But what I remember, and some Guardians have heard this story before, but what I remember from that evening was you saw him opening the champagne. Well, there’s not glass on the aircraft, and so they have the old little plastic cups. That’s what we…I’m like, “Am I rinsing at the dentist? Or am I drinking champagne?” And so for me on the Space Force birthday and at Space Force banquets and such, I will always look for the plastic cup. That was our beginnings. There was no big cake, there was no big celebration. There was this humble and wonderful intimate beginning. And I will personally always remember it by toasting with a plastic cup. Plus it’s a cheap gift. So you can, one day when I retire, just give me a plastic cup, I’ll be happy. Not that kind. Not the red solo kind, just the little one that goes on the plane.

So we learned, two great things happen this morning. One, we swore in five new Guardians, which for us adds actually measurable difference to our end strength, so I was very excited to see them. Like, “Yes, we’re getting closer to 8,400, we’re going to get there, we’re going to get there.” And then we released a song. And it is really, except for this, there’s some sort of apparently really important dilemma the world is trying to solve involving chicken and cold medicine, which is really trending on social media. But except for that, we’re doing really well, sir, hundreds of thousands of people have seen the video and I know many people here have seen the video. And so I grew up in the Air Force being told that the commander gives you intent, the commander puts you on the mission, and the NCOs are supposed to rally your team and pull it off.

So we got the intent this morning, we got this song, we unveiled it. And if I look at [AFI 36-2618], what it tells me, is that Senior Airmen are the effective trainers of the United States Air Force, and that senior NCOs help them. And so Dr. Teachenor, when he still wore a uniform, was a Senior Airman. So Jamie, if you don’t mind coming up here, what we’re going to do is we’re going to learn, properly ,the Space Force song. And I’d ask you all to do this. We’re going to warm up with the Air Force song. So this is all inclusive, fun time. But we’re going to start, warm up with the Air Force song. I’m serious. I really am.

All right, here’s the truth. Here’s the truth. Maybe don’t stand up yet because the truth might take a second. But here’s the truth. So the public affairs guys came and they said, “Chief, I’m not sure you want to do this.” I said, “What do you mean? This is going to be great!” They said, “Well, we’re afraid it might not resonate with all groups.” And I said, “First of all, my brand is crazy so I literally can’t go off brand. I’m good. And second of all, come on, I’m not afraid of anything.” And they said, “Well, we’re afraid it might not resonate.” And I said, “What’s the secretary’s priority?” They said, “China, China, China.” And I said, “And how do you say afraid in Chinese?” “Pa.” P A. This is a coincidence, I’m sure. It’s a coincidence.

I was a Chinese linguist, I’m telling the truth. I said, “Well we’re not going to be afraid. People are going to get into this. It’s going to be fantastic.” I heard us sing the Air Force song in this very room last night and it blew the doors off. So Jamie, you know the Air Force song, right?

Jamie Teachenor

Yes sir.

CMSSF Roger A. Towberman

Yeah. So we’re going to sing the Air Force song. Stand up, we’re going to sing the Air Force song first as warm up. Y’all know the words, we don’t need to put them on the screen, right? We’re following your lead, Dr. Teachenor.

Jamie Teachenor

(singing)

CMSSF Roger A. Towberman

(singing)

That’s pretty good. We got the lyrics. Jamie’s going to walk us through one line at a time. Here’s what’s going to happen. He’ll sing the line, and then we are going to all repeat it back. We’re going to learn, we’re going to go through it, let’s see how it goes. Go ahead.

Jamie Teachenor

All right. First line, just one line.

CMSSF Roger A. Towberman

One line. Go.

Jamie Teachenor

(singing)

CMSSF Roger A. Towberman

(singing)

Jamie Teachenor

(singing)

CMSSF Roger A. Towberman

All right. Jamie and I are going to sing a one time through all the way through. Join in whenever you’re ready. We’re just going to do the first verse, right, next verse, same as the first. We’re going to do the first verse twice, one lyric sheet. Whenever you’re ready, jump in. By the time we finish the second time, it needs to be at least as loud as the Air Force song was. Fair? And then I will sign off all your JQSs and Jamie will help me, and we’ll all be certified. Fair enough? Because who knows? Tomorrow at an event we might have to sing this, right? So we got to be ready. Are you ready?

Jamie Teachenor

Yes sir.

CMSSF Roger A. Towberman

All right. Two times. We’re going through two times. Jump in whenever you’re ready to jump in. But by the time we’re done, got to sign you off, got to be loud.

Jamie Teachenor

Ready? (singing).

CMSSF Roger A. Towberman

(singing)

One more time.

Jamie Teachenor and CMSSF Roger A. Towberman

(singing)

Jamie Teachenor

Great job.

CMSSF Roger A. Towberman

Thanks brother.

Jamie Teachenor

Thank you brother.

CMSSF Roger A. Towberman

That’s great, right? It’s great!

Thank you. When your brand is crazy, you can’t go out of bounds. Thank you all. And see, PA was OK, everything was OK. So I’ll tell you the truth. This is actually what happened. I did my normal thing and I sat down with the PA guys and they said, “You can’t do any baby boomer jokes this year.” And I said, “But boomer jokes are super easy, why would you take those away from me?” And they said, “Nope, doesn’t resonate with all groups. No.” I said, “I have to make fun of someone.” They said, “Make fun of us or make fun of yourself.” So I wasn’t going to pick me. So I picked… So thank you for being great sports. … They rarely write stuff that I say, but they’re constantly crossing out the things I can’t say, right? Keeps me from getting fired. So I really appreciate them.

And to be perfectly honest, I was going to play this whole thing straight, nothing funny today, I’m totally going to be this very serious. And then I sat next to Gen. Hecker yesterday and he said, “Chief, are you talking tomorrow?” I said, “Yes sir.” He goes, “You’re so funny, I love it, I can’t wait!” Oh well now… So I’ve been directed to be funny, it’s not my fault.

So last year I stood up here, and I don’t see… I don’t think she’s here, but we talked about building an orange. We talked about how important it was for the Space Force, that I felt if we got into an apples to apples comparison to industry, to commercial space, to the other services that we might not fare well. That we needed to be unique enough while still being in the family, right? Because that way, not everyone had to like oranges, but some people could like oranges, and it was really important.

And afterwards the [undersecretary] came up and she said to me, she goes, “Chief, I want to be in orange.” And it was really so beautiful. And so what I’m hoping, is that we’re going to lay out some things and give you some updates. But of course, the goal is not really to get people to want to be part of what we’re doing, but to want them to continue to be part of what we’re doing. So hopefully we’ll give you some updates today and talk through some things and when we’re done, all of us that are already in this orange get to keep being the orange, and everyone else, they want a little bit.

Where do we start? So last year we talked about… We unveiled these. And people are wearing them, right? They look great. By the way, they tell me that we’ve been getting a lot of good feedback, and we’re going to start wear testing the uniforms soon-ish, right? Over the next year or so, we’re going to really start getting the testing done, so that over the next couple years we’ll be able to put this service dress on everyone. I would ask everyone to remember that Gen. Raymond and I are incredibly handsome men. So just because it looks this good on us, doesn’t mean you’re going to pull it off. So get on your Peloton because, I could wear a gunny sack, let’s be honest.

But these chevrons, which were still in design last year, are now being proudly worn by Guardians all over. We can’t keep them in stock, and we just couldn’t be happier. So thanks for you, thanks for coming up with the ideas, guys, and thanks for helping us go through the process. I couldn’t be happier.

So we also talked last year about talent management and some of the things that we wanted to do and I touched on why we thought we had to look in different places. And why you couldn’t necessarily predict outcomes based on qualifications. How do we really find the right people? And so we’ve been really tweaking our recruiting, and Gen. Raymond touched on a little bit of that this morning. And Gen. Lord said something this morning, he said ”who?” He said, ”Who are you?” And I thought that was so important, because one of the things that we’re doing in this central booking process, is that prospective Guardians tell us why they want to join the Space Force.

And in case you are wondering, if their why is to hunt down and kill aliens, we put them in this pile over here. And if their why is, “I want to be part of changing the world. I want do great things. I want to serve my country. I want to help people. I want to enable modernity itself because that’s what space does.” Well then we put them in this pile. But to be able to walk through with that kind of intimate look into who they are, is, we think, really important.

The other thing that we’re starting to do, he mentioned we bring in about 520 enlisted folks. We had 41,000, 42,000 people express interest last year. And that 42,000 ends up with the 500 that we selected. I think it’s important that we ask questions, not just about that 520, not just understanding who they are, but who are those 41,000 that we said no to? And why did we say no? And are we sure that none of them got put in the wrong pile accidentally or arbitrarily or automatically because of some predetermined rule set that we’ve laid down that maybe needs to be tweaked? So we’re trying to look not just at who we picked but who we didn’t pick, and why. And make sure that we know that and that we dial in that process.

The other thing that we talked about last year was that ever-present career field pyramid. And I get a lot of feedback on this chart because, I don’t remember now because I was dreaming last year, but I mentioned the mollusks on this chart, and now this is a really fun word for people to say to me. But this scholar naturae, which is how science used to believe things existed, like you could be a bell or you could evolve into a human being, this pyramid, we didn’t like it. We talked about how we could tweak it, and we’re working through that. And Gen. Raymond this morning talked about the tailoring that we think we can do with competencies and that’s a lot about both the individual and the opportunity.

But the entire environment is tailorable. So on the enlisted side, we don’t have key leadership duties anymore. We don’t have key leadership positions anymore. We don’t have stratifications anymore. We’re doing all we can to eliminate anything that could be used as a proxy for truth, that we should be able to learn and know about a human being, if we look hard enough. Because we believe if you look hard enough and you see truth, and you really know the size and shape of the human being, of the peg, if you will, then you’ll be able to find a size and shape hole for that person. Is that as soon as you label an opportunity as more important than another opportunity, why would I be motivated for the latter? And so we’re moving away from those things, and we’re saying, it’s not about the opportunity that you were given, it’s about what you do with the opportunity regardless of what it is.

We’ve let go of those proxies, of those labels, and that’s allowed us to do some pretty cool things. For instance, we’ve got a young lady, I think she might be here, is Sgt. Olavera here? I don’t know if she’s here, I can’t see anything. There you are. Hi. How are things? I’m going to clap for you. Nobody else knows why, but we’ll clap.

So there you were, out in Kadena. Sit down. It’s making me uneasy now that you’re standing up, sit down. But there you were out in Kadena, and you don’t fit. I don’t have a requirement anywhere. Your husband’s a two alpha, right? He is an Airman maintainer. We need our maintainers. It was important to us to keep the family together. We didn’t have a fit, but we did have this important intel job that needed to be done, standing up just this little thing called the National Space Intelligence Center.

So we take a Cyber Senior NCO that we believed in, because she’s a leader and she’s proven and her intentions are noble. She just wants to be a good family member, and a loving spouse, all of these things are wonderful. I know before I meet you that you’re a fantastic human being. And sure enough today at Wright-Patt, you’re killing it. And that never happens if we label you and ignore the human being that’s underneath those labels. And so thanks for letting us trust you and thanks for letting me talk about it. Because if you would’ve messed up, then I’d have nothing to talk about. Thank you so much. I appreciate you.

Oh man. So we got a couple other folks on the picture there. Sgt. Laughlin up in the top, another Air Force, Space Force mil-mil couple. Him and his wife, she was the first sergeant. But here’s an intel guy and we said, “Hey, why don’t you go help stand up this cyber squadron?” And Sgt. Mussick down there on the bottom, He’s a cyber guy and we say, “Hey, why don’t you go help us with ops for a little while?” We can do these things when we let go of the labels and they’re all killing it. And we see this over and over and over again in our new talent management system, that looks at human beings and really tries to find the fit that works.

In the bigger picture there on the right Sgt. Langat, he had this crazy desire to have his wife be with him. She was in Africa, she was in Kenya, and she was just about to move to the state so that they could be together and the process said, “Hey, we’re going to non-vol you to an unaccompanied tour because that’s how it works. Or you can quit.” I’ll talk about quitting later. But thankfully we had Senior Dempsey there, I think still wearing Master stripes at the time—now she’s got her senior stripes on.

We had leaders that raised their hand and say, “Hey, what about this? Is this really what we want to do?” And of course it wasn’t, right? They showed courage. One of our core values, we say let’s operationalize our core values. Let’s talk about the courage to say “Why?” Why would we let this happen? Let’s talk about the connection required to see it in the first place. So long story longer, Sgt. Langat is still with us. We didn’t make him separate, he just reenlisted last week in fact. We found a wonderful volunteer to go to the non-vol assignment and we’re moving forward.

We do these things because we put them out there, and we said “This is our ideal. This is what we believe.” My team gave me a little ‘Believe’, like on Ted Lasso, it’s in my office. If you haven’t watched Ted Lasso, there’s like 75 leadership lessons an episode, it’s fantastic. A little study in leadership and positivity and persistent optimism.

But we believe in the Guardian Ideal. And we believe that it’s important to remember that it literally is a standard of perfection. It is a principle to be aimed at, it’s not a goal to be achieved. We will never be done. That doesn’t mean we can move slowly. Doesn’t mean we can leave things undone. But it means that this is about continuously improving. This is about our commitment to mastery of ourselves, of our team, of our domain. That’s what we get from the Ideal and it’s why it was so important, it’s why it’s such a great book. Over the next few months we’ll release the handbook. If you have a better name than handbook, I would love to hear it. I don’t really like handbook. We went through all this work to give a Guardian Ideal, I’d love to follow it up with something better than handbook. So if you got ideas, send them our way.

But this will be the long text, if you will, that walk through our values, in this really neat way of “I will” statements. The entire book is “I will.” “This is what I will do as a team leader. This is what I will do as a team member.” These “I will” statements are important because they remind us many, many books that have been written to guide our lives that they’re written for us to use for ourselves, not for us to judge other people. To hold ourselves accountable. So these “I will” statements all put together will be released—It’s with me actually, it got to me this week. So we’re looking through that book. We appreciate everybody’s hard work on it. But I think that’ll come out here very soon. We’re in the final stages, and if you got a better name than handbook, I’m all ears.

The other thing we’re working on is the Guardian value proposition, and of course that’s part of what we’re talking about as well. What is it? Because it’s not just compensation. Man, we have to pay people enough to take money off the table. But like we’ve heard multiple times a day, it’s about mission, it’s about autonomy, and mastery, and purpose. It’s about being part of something that’s bigger than you. We’re collecting all that data from Guardians. We’re talking to them, we’re listening, well, what is it? Because everyone from the Secretary’s first words yesterday, all through every speaker, has talked about people. And people are everything.

So we do these things because we need you to keep wanting to be an orange. We do these things because that’s the greatest advantage we have. And in particular, to borrow some words that have already been said by all the leaders, but I would drill down a little bit, and I would say that the most decisive military advantage in the history of the world is the enlisted force of this nation. You could probably clap for that, I think, yeah.

I don’t believe the atomic bomb is the advantage over adversaries like the enlisted force of this nation. There is nothing, there is no greater delta than the enlisted force of this country and everyone else. And so we’ve got to be proud of that. We’ve got to lean into that. We’ve got to take care of people.

Chief Bass and I sat down with Mr. Wagner yesterday for actually quite some time, we talked about a lot of things. We talked about the barrier analysis working groups. And so since I’m talking about people and I knew I was going to be talking about people, last week, I had a couple wonderful young leaders come and talk to me. Col. Moon and Col. Salinas from the WIT team and specifically from the childcare line of effort. They came to me and they said, “Hey Chief, things are getting better. They’re not great yet. We’ve got work to do.” And it really made me think, and we talked and I said, “Hey, I promise you if you send me what you’re talking about, I’ll talk about it. I’ll be your champion.”

I think this is a great single example and there are many, many, many examples. But on the left, this is the steps to ask for childcare. And on the right are the steps to ask to separate. Now if we charted other things, EFMP, assignment change, ETPs for blah blah blah, and this is on the enlisted side, we don’t have to ask for separate. We do nothing and it’ll just go away. We live in a one-click world. In fact, we’re starting to live in a zero-click world. If I get on the right website and take one look at a fly rod, there’s a chat bot saying, “Hey, you want to buy a fly rod?” I’m like, “I always want to buy a fly rod. I don’t even know who you are and why you’re talking to me. I didn’t click on anything yet.”

We live in a one click world. And we must be retention focused. The technical expertise, the depth of experience, the phenomenal craftsmen that we need to stay ahead of China and to win, cannot be built in six months or a year or in four years. We have to be retention focused. And that means that no one has a reason to quit. It can’t be easier to leave than it is to get help. It can’t be easier to walk away than it is to stay on the team.

I get asked a lot about competition. The word drives me nuts. There’s only one competition. There’s two competitions. One, against our adversaries, and two, against ourselves. I’m not worried about industry, I’m not worried about commercial space, I’m not worried about other services. I’m worried about never giving a Guardian a reason to walk away. Moving towards meaning is always good for us. Moving towards something is generally healthy. Moving away from discomfort, moving away from stress, moving away from things I don’t like, personally or professionally, institutionally or individually, is no way to live. But as an institution, we’ve got to make sure there’s not a reason to do that.

So this really is about building an orange that continues to taste like the orange you wanted. Thanks for being on the team. The one team. And for the Guardians in the audience, I’m right there with you. I would do anything for any one of you, and we won’t stop. We use the startup analogy a lot, right? And you went on Kickstarter and you put a little dash in our company, you believed in us. We had a good idea, we had good talent, we were working pretty hard. I appreciate it. I’m glad you put a little in. We want you to get a good return on your investment.

This is what I promise you. I put everything in. I sold my house, like sold my business, quit my school. I was doing OK, job was doing OK, right? I do a pretty good Airman. I traded it all in for this. I will never leave you. I will do everything I can until my last breath to build a Space Force that you deserve. And for the Airmen in the room, and especially for the 10,000-ish Airmen that support our missions, we love you just the same. And we couldn’t be here without you. So thank you for being on the team. Thank you for being great teammates in the building. We absolutely have to continue to do this together. We can’t do it without each other. We can’t do it alone. I hope that the orange tastes good tomorrow, but certainly today I would say thank you. I appreciate y’all and from the bottom of my heart, Semper Supra. Thanks everybody.

Air & Space Forces Association’s Gerald Murray

Chief Towberman, thank you so much. It’s an absolute pleasure to be able with a token of our appreciation with the 75th coin that commemorates, our Air Force and your recognition, there of that. My old boss, Gen. Jumper said yesterday, and often talks about the vertical integration of air and space. And I will tell you, your comments and the talk and discussion with that, you and Chief Bass are working collectively together. Not only what you have taken from your years of experience in our Air Force, but what now you’re able to give back, and with your integration with Chief Bass that is making and will continue to make our great enlisted Force of Air and Space even greater. Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, Chief Towberman.

Pregnant Candidates Can Now Apply to Air Force Officer Training School Without a Waiver

Oct. 4, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

Pregnant candidates, both civilian and military, can now apply to the Air Force’s Officer Training School without needing a waiver, the Department of the Air Force announced Sept. 30.

If selected, the candidate will then have between six and 14.5 months after the pregnancy to either pass a physical fitness test or get a qualifying physical, depending on whether the candidate is an enlisted or civilian selectee, and then start training. Those wishing to start training less than six months after their pregnancy can apply for a waiver.

John A. Fedrigo, principal deputy assistant secretary for manpower and reserve affairs, authorized the policy change in an Aug. 17 memo. Prior to that, female Airmen, Guardians, and civilians who were pregnant and wanted to apply to OTS needed a waiver for up to 12 months postpartum.

Undersecretary Gina Ortiz Jones highlighted the policy to reporters this past March during the AFA Warfare Symposium as part of her push for a broader review of Air Force policies that are gender-biased and present barriers to female Airmen and Guardians’ careers.

“We’re in a race for talent, and our policies need to reflect that,” Jones said in a statement. “This policy change will ensure we’re able to fully tap into the talent amongst our force as well as those looking to join us.”

The policy change marks the latest effort by the Air Force to offer pregnant Airmen more opportunities. In 2019, the service cleared some pregnant aircrew members to keep flying without needing a waiver; and all pregnant Airmen to keep flying with a waiver. In 2020, it began testing a maternity flight suit.

Yet despite those changes, initial reports indicated that relatively few pregnant Airmen took advantage of the loosened restrictions, and earlier this year the Air Force sought to clarify and amplify the policy.

It is not yet clear how many women will take advantage of the new OTS policy, but Capt. Frances Castillo, a member of the DAF Women’s Initiative Team, said in a statement that the previous rules “kept or delayed hundreds of women from competing” for a commission.

The change comes as the Air Force is trying to boost its recruiting numbers, especially among underrepresented groups. In August, the department unveiled new “aspirational” goals for diversity in recruiting, calling for OTS and other officer commissioning sources to increase the proportion of female candidates to 36 percent.

According to data provided by the Air Force, commissioning sources such as the U.S. Air Force Academy and Air Force ROTC have typically averaged around 30 percent for female applicants. Data for OTS candidates was not immediately available.

The total USAF officer corps is 22.6 percent female, according to the latest data.

US Nuclear Posture Unchanged Despite ‘Concerning’ Russian Threats, Officials Say

Oct. 3, 2022 | By Chris Gordon

The U.S. has not seen anything that indicates it should adjust its nuclear posture, a senior U.S. military official told reporters Oct. 3. The official’s remarks came as the Biden administration has sought to calm tensions following Russian President Vladimir Putin’s hints that the country might consider the use of nuclear weapons.

After announcing the illegal annexation of four Ukrainian regions, Putin said he would use “all available means” to defend the territories, which Russia does not fully control. In comments that caused anxiety in the West, the Russian leader also said the U.S. had created a “precedent” for the use of nuclear weapons in warfare during World War II.

The senior military official declined to say whether the U.S. has detected any movement of Russia’s nuclear forces, citing the need to protect American intelligence. But the official’s overall assessment reinforced recent comments by Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III.

“To be clear, the guy who makes that decision, I mean, it’s one man,” Austin said in an interview with CNN that aired Oct. 2. “There are no checks on Mr. Putin. Just as he made the irresponsible decision to invade Ukraine, you know, he could make another decision. But I don’t see anything right now that would lead me to believe that he has made such a decision.”

Putin is reportedly in an increasingly precarious situation in Ukraine, with his forces in disarray as a result of Ukraine’s counteroffensive in the east and south of the country. In response, Russia announced a partial mobilization of around 300,000 troops, leading to some displays of unrest across the country.

Some of Putin’s most prominent and vocal supporters have blasted the country’s military leadership and have demanded tougher action, including the potential use of nuclear weapons.

Russia has around 2,000 short-range tactical nuclear weapons that analysts worry it could use on a battlefield or as a show of force.

Though the two sides are not currently engaged in arms control talks, Russia has adhered to the New START treaty, which limits the U.S. and Russian long-range nuclear arsenals, U.S. officials say. The treaty has been extended until 2026.

Another senior Defense Department official criticized Russia’s loose talk of nuclear weapons.

“Russia is a major nuclear power,” Celeste Wallander, assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs, said at an event Oct. 3 hosted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “It sets the tone for the global community along with other major nuclear powers in responsible stewardship of a nuclear capability. And that does not include saber-rattling and threatening small, weaker, non-nuclear countries on his border, specifically Ukraine.”

“This facile reliance on nuclear threats is really concerning,” she added.

Watch, Read: CSO Raymond, Google Cloud’s Kurian on ‘Digital Transformation—Unlocking the Cloud’

Oct. 3, 2022

Air & Space Forces Association President retired Lt. Gen. Bruce Wright led Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond and Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian in a discussion of “Digital Transformation—Unlocking the Cloud” on Sept. 20, 2022, at AFA’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference. Watch the video or read the transcript below. This transcript is made possible through the sponsorship of JobsOhio.

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Voiceover:

Airmen and Guardians. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to the stage the President of the Air & Space Forces Association, Lieutenant General Bruce Wright.

Lt. Gen. Bruce “Orville” Wright, USAF (Ret.):

Well, good afternoon, Guardians and Airmen. What an honor it is to be here today. And I would offer that in the front row. Secretary Kendall, Mr. Calvelli, Chief Brown, among others, thank you for your leadership. And now it truly is an honor to be here today with two digital giants to talk about innovation, leadership, and the lessons the defense industry and our new Space Force can learn from each other. As the first Chief of Space Operations, General Jay Raymond, has the monumental task of standing up a brand new service for the first time in 72 years. And what a magnificent job you’ve done.

Of course, with that responsibility comes enduring opportunities and General Raymond has set out to create the first ever digital service built to accelerate innovation. The new services, digital vision, highlights the need for cultural and technical transformation, to keep advantage over peer and near peer competitors in the increasingly contested digital domain. We’re also pleased and honored to have Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian here today and in the spaces here with all of us to talk about his own experience. Thomas took the reign as the Google Cloud CEO in November, 2018. And over the past quarter century, he has built enterprise software and deep ties with government customers, not only at Google Cloud, but also at Oracle. At Google Cloud, Thomas is now focused on helping to accelerate digital transformations. So welcome to both of you and let’s get started. General Raymond, please, can you tell us about standing up a new service from scratch and what kind of rapid transformation did that necessitate?

CSO Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond:

Oh, well thank you. And it’s a privilege to be back on stage. I’ve never been called a digital giant before, so that’s a good one. In fact, I would say a digital dinosaur is probably a better description for me. I largely tell a story about, when you’re in college, I didn’t see a computer with a mouse until I was a senior in college. And cyber attack back then was, when your college roommate mixed up your punch cards when you typed up. And so, to say I’m a digital giant is an overstatement, but I did recognize that if you look at the space domain, the way you experience that domain is through data. Unless you’re one of the lucky 600 or 700 ish or so folks that have had the opportunity to be in space, you experience that domain through data.

And I knew that if what was pacing us to innovate was not the standup of a service, it was the threat and the competition with both China and Russia. And so we had to move fast. And one of the things that I have long thought of is that we were too hardware focused rather than software focused. And that we needed to have the agility that we needed. And to be able to experience that, to harness that data, apply some analytical tools on top of that data, to solve some of our tough problems, this transformation was going to have to take place.

Lt. Gen. Bruce “Orville” Wright, USAF (Ret.):

Well, thank you sir. And if we could, Thomas, you’ve been at Google Cloud for over three years and after spending decades in leadership roles at Oracle, you’re overseeing the creation of thousands of new products and features across the digital domain. And could you please talk about how you balance innovation and growth? What has been the biggest challenge and what advice do you have for others?

Thomas Kurian:

We’ve been through a period of extraordinary change since I joined Google. When I joined Google, no one told us in 2018 there was this thing called the pandemic that would happen in 2019. At one point, more than 60% of our employees were new to the company and had never met their colleagues. They never met their clients and they were brand new. And so we were creating a digital organization through necessity, because it was our digital platforms that was letting us get all of our people to work together. It was our digital platforms that were helping us serve customers in what they were trying to do. And we translated everything that we were facing through three simple lenses. Challenge creates opportunity. It’s the fact that we were facing this challenge of having to make people work in a totally different way that created the opportunity for us to bring digital technology to make our people productive.

Innovation drives growth. We had to come up with new ways to solve technology challenges. Every one of those helped us grow and find new ways to serve customers. And lastly, we created a culture in our organization where people could work on missions that they cared about. And our view was, our mission was to bring technology to provide lasting transformation and lasting growth to organizations around the world. And so it’s been an incredibly fast paced three years, but all of these lessons that we take in many ways, speaking to General Raymond, and so many service men and women, we’ve learned that there are many commonalities that we share, in the kinds of problems we’re solving and the kinds of problems you’re all solving for.

Lt. Gen. Bruce “Orville” Wright, USAF (Ret.):

Thank you, sir. Well, General Raymond, you’ve already alluded to this, but you’re now leading an organization that is making a push to be the first fully digital service. What does that mean, again, in your own words and how are you going about working towards that goal?

CSO Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond:

Yeah, first of all, I don’t think it’s a goal. I would steal a word that Secretary Kendall use. It’s an imperative, if you have a service that has 16,000 folks and if you have a headquarter staff that has 600 folks, you cannot afford to do business the same way we’ve done business. We just don’t have the manpower to be able to make that happen well. So the way we have defined a digital service, and I’m not saying we have the patent on this, we looked at it in three ways. First of all, we wanted to raise the digital fluency of the entire force. And so we’ve partnered with digital university to give licenses to every single Guardian in the Space Force to be able to take classes and raise their digital literacy. I think that’s really, really important. The second thing that we wanted to do, the second line of effort on that, we wanted to have a digital headquarters that was data driven.

Our secretary talks about it all the time. I think he has a sign, bring data, over top of his office. We want to be a data driven, we want to be able to harness that data. And so we wanted to have a digital headquarters. And then the third thing, and I talked a little bit about this in my speech this morning, was we wanted to embrace digital engineering. And in our force design work that we did, we’ve actually done that all digitally and using model based systems, engineering came up with the digital models, both of the threat that we see and of the architecture design that we want to move to.

And then rather than just print out documents, we actually did the computer models and we handed that to industry and said, Here’s what we think. Let’s have this earlier conversation. If we do this right, then we can take everything from the force design, to then requirements, to then acquisition, acquiring the capabilities, then testing those capabilities, and then training our Guardians on those systems, all using that same digital thread. That’s nirvana. We’re not close to that, but we’ve taken a good step, we’ve taken a good first step. We’ve done the digital design work, we’re figuring out what a digital requirements process is, and I think it’s going to pay significant dividends for us as we move forward.

Lt. Gen. Bruce “Orville” Wright, USAF (Ret.):

Well thanks sir. And back to Mr. Kurian, I love your notion that challenges create opportunities. We thought 14,000 people were going to show up this week and somehow it’s 16,000, so we’ll build on that opportunity. So connecting to the challenges and the opportunities that General Raymond is going through, how do you align with what you hear from other national security counterparts, customers, across a wide range of customers? And what similarities and differences do you see?

Thomas Kurian:

Now, what General Raymond said struck me, we all experience the world today through digital tools. And Space Force is unique in the sense that, the entire domain that it faces the average person doesn’t experience it except through digital technology. When we look at the lessons we’ve learned as Google over the last many years, digitizing the entire world. And when I say digitizing the world, all the information in the world is indexed and served up every day through a search mechanism. Many of you probably use our maps, which is a digital representation of the whole world. There are large infrastructures, networks, computers in data centers in many, many different parts of the world that we deploy in order to support it. But our average person never sees or touches those machines. They’re seen as digital tools that we manage, secure and operate remotely. So when we look at what’s the experience we’ve had and how listening to General Raymond’s comments that, what’s the commonality?

I would say three things that are really important for lasting change. One is the tools and capabilities, whether that is protection with cyber machine learning and artificial intelligence to understand the large quantities of data, or third capability to build software that deals with large scale systems. That’s a common purpose we’ve had and we share with Space Force. Second, to help attract talent because eventually all these tools and technologies only work if it can attract the best people. And attracting the best people, the best people in the world are always attracted for the purpose of a mission. And what you have sir is a real purposeful mission in protecting the next frontier.

And the third is, making it possible for people culturally to learn from digitization. Digitization is a journey. If we all look at years ago, we would all go to a retail store not remembering or knowing if the product that we are looking for really was available in the store. We just drive down and say. Hopefully it’s there. Digitalization through Ecommerce made it possible to actually know the product was there before we got there. But all of that came through a process of learning and experimentation. And I think what we all conceive digital could be, is only the start of a journey. And so being open to experimenting and learning is the other thing that we’ve learned a lot from these past many years.

Lt. Gen. Bruce “Orville” Wright, USAF (Ret.):

Thanks sir. Well, General Raymond, shifting gears a bit, the defense department has always been innovative in its big ideas, but going from an idea to product can be a challenge, lots of ideas have died in what is called the Valley of Death. What are you doing and your team doing in your transformation efforts to bridge that technology Valley of Death or advanced technology Valley of Death? And how would you describe your relationship with industry to do so?

CSO Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond:

I think I feel very fortunate in that… There is a, and I jokingly say this all the time, a big explosion of commercial activity taking place in the space domain. And there’s lots of folks that are investing dollars to develop capabilities, because it’s a cool place to, cool mission to be focused on. We want to be able to leverage that and harness that. We want to expand the industrial base, so it’s not just the big primes, it’s others as well. And if you look at what we’ve tried to do, we’ve stood up a couple of significant efforts at Space Systems Command out in Los Angeles to be able to harness this and develop these partners. So the first thing that we did, we stood up a commercial front door at Space Systems Command. And for all the new companies that have come in, that might not have had the experience of working with a department, we provide them with a sponsor, if you will. Somebody that’s there, that can help them walk through the process and help us work better together.

We have leveraged AFT works and stood up a Space Works initiative as well, to get after the bridging the gulf, if you will, from having an idea, that capability. We have something called SpEC OT at SSC and we put a significant, there’s a significant amount of new companies that are involved in that initiative and provides us a way to get those capabilities onto contract faster. So we’re putting a lot of work on this. We think, if you come up with a new force design, we think there’s two big opportunities. We think there’s a big opportunity in our relationship with commercial industry and we think there’s a big opportunity with our relationship with our allies and our partners. And we’ve got to work together to be able to capitalize on this and harness the good things that are coming out of our industry. I would bet, as I say every time, I would bet on US industry every single day. We just need to make sure that, one, we all are kind of rowing in the same direction.

Two, that we all understand how to work together. And three, that we can develop capabilities and get them in the hands of our war fighters on a tactical timeline, that is important. I’ll tell you a quick story, and this is honest, honest against truth. It happened back in 2011 when I was stationed in Japan and there was a earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear reactor disaster. And we were having trouble coming up with a common operating picture for radiation. We were flying aircraft, Air Force was flying aircraft over Japan to measure radiation. There was sensors around Japan to detect radiation, but we didn’t have a way to display it, and it was really causing issues. And so I reached, I called Google and I said, “How would you do this?” And they said, “If you go up to Google Tokyo, they’ll be able to help you.” So I got a helicopter, flew to Google Tokyo, and in this little conference room, walked two engineers with a laptop. And I explained the issue and they… About 15 minutes later, less than that, here’s how we’d do it.

And I said, “Well, how would I do that?”

And they said, “Well, if you know somebody that knows the computer language, Python…” They didn’t even say that. “If you have anybody that knows Python, we can teach them.”

I said, “What’s Python?”

And they said, “That’s a computer language.”

I said, “Well, I don’t know if we have anybody.” But I got back on the helicopter, flew back to Yokota, and I put an all call out across Fifth Air Force. “Anybody know Python?” Our first lieutenant at Yokota and a brand new Airman, literally been in the Air Force for less than a month, Ed Kadina, we send a C12 down to pick that young Airman up and funny story, funny story, they can’t find him. I said, “What you mean you can’t find him?” Well, he showed up at the airport with 36 pounds of bags and the Air Force had a rule that you’re on space…

Or On that airplane you’re only allowed to have 35 pounds of bags and we sent him home. I said, “Listen, this Airman is the most strategically important Airman in the entire United States Air Force. He can PCS up here on this plane, just whatever he owns, get on the plane.” And literally that lieutenant and that Airman got on the helicopter next day, flew down to Google, and I think, don’t quote me on this, but within a couple days, we were up and running. I thought to myself at that time, man, we’d be lucky to get the TMT Tasker done by that time. And here we are with the capability. We’ve got to figure out how to harness this, if we’re going to get after the challenges that we face.

Lt. Gen. Bruce “Orville” Wright, USAF (Ret.):

What a compelling story. That really leads to the next question for Thomas. Just listening to that example, could you and your extensive experience across the IT world, talk a little bit about how we can build on such communications, responsive communications, with the technology industry that can move at a faster clip than the military acquisition cycle sometimes can traditionally keep up with. Your thoughts and advice building on that great story would be terrific.

Thomas Kurian:

First of all, I think many of the problems that the United States government, defense, Air Force and Space Force face have analogies or equivalent problems that the commercial industry has solved. Having, for instance, a global representation of cyberspace and being able to keep it secure is something that we as a company have to solve every day, because if it was compromised, people would not feel comfortable or trusting in searching, sending email, accessing maps and other services that we offer. So the first thing I would say is, there’s a lot more commonality in the kinds of problems that the commercial industry has solved and that the Air Force and Space Force needs to solve. The second is, in working together through partnerships, you can actually lower the cost to do many things, both in terms of physical infrastructure, computerized software, et cetera. And to some extent, because you learn from experience in technology, you can stand on shoulders of problems that have already been solved before, you don’t have to reinvent and resolve problems that have been solved many, many times before in other contexts.

The third is, the pace of technology is moving extremely quickly. And if somebody told you that today you have in your pocket a smartphone that has more than five times the power of the fastest computer in 1995, you’d have a hard time believing it. And it’s available for a few hundred dollars. The best thing that we can see is in helping the government, is to have procurement and standards adoption processes be able to use the pace of technology. The faster you can ride the technology curve, obviously with the appropriate procurement standards, certification processes, et cetera, the better. But when you are competing with adversaries, China, Russia, who are investing lots of money in equivalent programs, you want to be able to leverage the great capability that the technology industry in the United States brings to the government and the defense department.

Lt. Gen. Bruce “Orville” Wright, USAF (Ret.):

Thanks sir. General Raymond, back to building on your Japan story a bit. How can military services including the Space Force and companies such as Google Cloud, take advantage of their similarities and their differences to advance their respective goals and priorities? And I would add on, I thought your example really as a model for younger, mid-career, if you will, NCOs, officers and program managers and younger engineers to get together. So, I’d ask you to share your perspective in that context.

CSO Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond:

We’re trying. We’re working really hard to develop, again, digitally affluent Guardians and to not just be able to use apps, but to do more coding. We want to have more people than two that can do Python. And so, one of the things that we’re working on is, we have a program that we call Super Coders and we’re trying to build indigenous software experts inside of our service. I think today, we’ve got just shy of a hundred that have gone through this program, and we’ve got more being developed all the time. And then as we develop these super coders, we’re looking what’s the best place to put them? And so we’re putting them in software factories, for example, Kobayashi Maru out at Space Systems Command. We’re putting them in innovation cells in our deltas to be able to give them the tough challenges to work on, and see if they can write code to be able to help us.

And there’s been some really good examples of where we have made some progress embedding those folks with our operators. We’ve developed some apps that have been on our command and control systems. We had a young Guardian at one of our units build a digital representation of some equipment that we used to have to take offline to train on. Now you can train. It was all done in house. And so we, as I went a couple years ago to that software factory that I mentioned, Kobayashi Maru, what I saw was a lot of great folks really working hard in trying to get after some really hard problems, but it was all an additional duty.

It was like, “Hey, anybody out there know software? We’ll give you a little bit of training, you come work here and then you’ll go back home.” We’re trying to build a more… We’re not to the level yet where we can stand up a separate AFSC, if you will. It would collapse under its own weight. But we’ve got some identifiers out that we’ve put on their AFSCs to say that they’re a super coder, and then we’re purposefully assigning those folks at critical positions to help us harness the innovation that we think is out there, by becoming more digitally fluent.

Lt. Gen. Bruce “Orville” Wright, USAF (Ret.):

Thanks sir. Well, Thomas, listening to General Raymond, day to day, somewhat different missions and infact in some ways very different missions, but at the same time, again listening to General Raymond and some of his examples, what are some things that industry could learn insight, internal to industry, to make your own processes better? And could you provide some examples of, again internal challenges that you face and solutions that you work, that could give us some more insight, again in sharing information. And I would kind of cap that question with, could you just talk a little bit about the national security focus, internal to the broadly defined IT industry? So please.

Thomas Kurian:

So just listening to what General Raymond was saying, in the long term, the capability that Space Force needs to be a digital force is very similar to the capabilities that we’ve had to build in our own organization. The first one is, what are the key technology components you really need to be world class at? Software development, making sure as you develop software, you keep systems secure. Cyber, being able to process large quantities of data, being able to use algorithmic expertise. When we were talking about Python for example, being able to program in artificial intelligence, those are capabilities that are going to be critical to maintaining an enduring organization. The second is to attract people. We always think about at our organization, there are, every year from universities across the United States, there are young men and women graduating with great ideas and they are the people over the next five to eight years who are going to transform the technology industry, or the next five to 30 years transform the technology industry.

So the second thing we always look at is the best people work not just for money, but because they have a mission. And the mission is, needs to be a key factor in attracting people. And to retain them, you need to give them digital tools and culturally a rewards and recognition process that rewards them for what they’re doing. At Google for example, we have two examples of things we run internally, a process called OKRs, objectives and key results. One of the things we’ve had explicitly with our managers is to say, you can get to only 80% of the OKRs. You can define 20% to be aspirational that you may not attain and we’re not going to hold you accountable if you don’t attain them. So it recognizes that people want to stretch and you’re not going to penalize them for it. Similarly, when things go wrong, because in many cases we’re working on technology that’s really at the frontier, and you cannot be perfect in predicting how that technology will go.

So we have a process where when things fail, we recognize it as what do we want to learn from it, as opposed to who do we hold accountable for the failure? And so we run a process called Blameless Postmortem, to understand why did something go wrong, what could we have learned from it, and how do we get better because of it? So the second big piece is making sure culturally and enabling the young people who want to come to serve in Space Force, for example, to come knowing that they’ll have the right tools and the right culture, that will make them successful with their mission.

Lastly, we are at Google investing heavily in bringing, not just developing technology but bringing it to the government. We know that part of bridging the private sector and public sector is having people who specialize in understanding the needs of the government and how they use technology. How the Air Force, how Space Force will use technology? And we have specialists that we’ve hired to really understand deeply not just your needs, but how you apply technology to solve some of them. All these in our view, are part of finding a common purpose in bringing technology now as a key differentiator in the work all of you are doing.

Lt. Gen. Bruce “Orville” Wright, USAF (Ret.):

Thanks for both of you. And you’ve addressed this somewhat already, but in an opportunity to sort of reinforce your really the message of your leadership. General Raymond, some 30 years in the Air Force and now building a new service, a proven leader. And Thomas, very similarly a proven leader across the demanding corporate world information technology. As you continue to work on establishing a culture of growth, a culture committed to innovation and growth, can you both talk a bit more again about approaches you’re taking to continue to encourage a culture of innovation? You talked about blameless innovation in your own organizations, and I would just add onto that, my guess is, you see your organizations, it’s being flatter and flatter, more communications, sideways, up and down and less hierarchical, so General Raymond, please.

CSO Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond:

So we really felt when we stood up this service that we wanted to design us, for speed, innovation, and bold action. If you look at the domain that we operate in, it’s vast, things that operate in the domain are traveling at 17,500 miles an hour just to stay in the domain. And we thought that a hierarchical structure and a very large structure was not going to be what we needed. So we worked very hard to flatten the organization. We got rid of two layers of command to be able to reduce the distance, if you will, between the experts that are doing the work, largely the folks that are sitting out here, and the decision makers. And so that was one of the key tenants that we put in place to limit the bureaucracy. The second thing… Well I’d say first of all on the limiting bureaucracy, I think we’ve done that pretty well.

I think we’ve again completely flattened the structure. We’ve got our headquarters down to, as I mentioned up front, about 600 people. It’s requiring us to think through how do we develop people differently? How do we develop squadron commanders differently, that don’t have a group commander on top of them? How do you develop Delta commanders that don’t have the second layer of O-6 command? And so we’ve had to think through that. One of the things that we’ve thought about on culture is, we want to be a war fighting culture. We want to be innovative, we want to be bold. And as we started to orchestrate that, we’ve been waiting for people from other services to come in, so we could blend the culture from all the different services and build our culture of our own. One of the things that we’re going to do here in a couple weeks, when we go out about a month from now, when we go out to the Air Force Academy to host Corona, we’re going to actually do a session on culture.

And what we’re going to do is figure out, rather than just see where the wind blows us when we meld these cultures together, we’re going to look at how do we purposefully engineer the culture? What do we have to do? Things like flattening the bureaucracy, what are those other things that we should do to engineer, to get the culture that we want spitting out the other side. We’ve got work to do on that. And, it’s not something… People ask me all the time, “When are you going to get your culture?” Well, it’s not like you can order this online and get it delivered overnight. It’s going to take some time, but rather than just let it evolve and emerge, we’re going to work to figure out how best to engineer from where we are today to where we want to go. And that’s the work that the entire Space Force leadership team will be doing for pretty much most of half a day here at Corona to make sure that we’re moving in the right direction.

Lt. Gen. Bruce “Orville” Wright, USAF (Ret.):

Thomas, please continue on growth, innovation, a culture of growth and innovation.

Thomas Kurian:

Just a couple of examples to illustrate, the first thing when I listen to having a flatter organization, our view is one of the core elements of our organization is trusting those who are closer to the situation and closer to the data, to identify not just the problem but also the solution. We have, one of our core beliefs is that, if you really are hiring world class engineers, you have to trust that they will find a pattern in the data and they often will find a solution that senior management may not have thought about, and you need to trust them. One example, we’d run every time one of you uses our services, is being powered by computers in different parts of the world. And the computers take power in order to kind of run. And you need power also to cool the computers. So it’s something that we pay a lot of attention to, both because of cost reasons, but also because of our commitments to more sustainable environment.

One of the things that, a few years ago, one of the engineers was looking at the problem, he was a fairly junior engineer, he said, “Hey, I noticed that we’re spending more money cooling the coolant that’s used to cool the computer. And that just sounds crazy. Why don’t we just run the computers hot?” Now for 30 years it had been the theory in all of IT, that you ran computers at a certain high degree of temperature would cause damage to it. You had to run it in a certain level of… In a certain air condition, temperature controlled environment. He stood the theory on his head. We said, “He’s probably right, let’s experiment with it.” But the first thing I would say is, in order to empower a culture of change and a culture of innovation, you have to trust those who are recommending the change and we empowered him.

He was right. The data showed he was right and we gave him a shot to prove it. The second thing I would say is, we find that the best ideas come from collaboration. One example of something we did within Google, when you have a network of computation as wide as we do, almost every day we are pushing the boundary on something that has not been done before. So you can’t solve it purely based on past history. One of the things we did was build simulation, and we did large scale simulations. For instance, what happens if there’s an earthquake in the Western United States and we lose all of California, which means we wouldn’t have a management team, there would be no buildings. How would you handle a situation like that? And what systems and processes do you need to ensure that we would continue being operational?

All those principles, and not just the principles, but the technology behind it, now we bring to clients around the world. And so one of the things that we see a lot is, collaboration between our teams, helped us think through some of the solutions we encountered. And we always have asked our teams, because we serve a mission to keep all the people in the world who are accessing information safe and secure, we have to have them dream big because they will need to solve problems every day that we may not have encountered before.

Lt. Gen. Bruce “Orville” Wright, USAF (Ret.):

Thanks sir. And General Raymond, if you might just wind up. Recruiting STEM talent, recruiting engineers, certainly for the department of the Air Force, for industry, is a national security imperative. And even we constantly talk about our own STEM programs at AFA, Cyber Patriot, Stellar Explorers, being again a national security imperative. And by the way, our vice chAirman for aerospace education is an MIT graduate, Stephen Gurley. So we’re all in on the national security imperative, again for STEM education. And then, how do you go about recruiting? How can we help you go about recruiting?

CSO Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond:

One of the things that we’re doing, and I… Sir, I don’t know if you would agree with this, but when I go out and talk to universities, and I remember specifically talking to the Air Force Academy about a year and a half or so ago, and the entire class was there, and I started talking about software and how we were going to build… Heading towards an AFSC, but some first steps towards building organic software capability. There was a ton of excitement about that. I mean, cadets were turned around talking to another cadet, that’s what I’m doing. I think, it’s a little bit of what you said earlier, sir, that’s what attracts talent, this new cutting edge ability. So what we’ve done is we’ve gone out and partnered with, we’ve developed a university partnership program with 14 different universities from around the country focused on two things.

One, recruiting and developing the talent that we need, and two, doing research and providing some of our tough problems to those students. To help them think through it and get them excited when they get there. So that’s one thing that we’re doing to really attract that talent. It’s already paying dividends, as I mentioned in my speech, we’re getting a lot of good talent coming in off the street. But I listened with great interest, what you were talking about. That’s what attracts talent, these cutting edge tools and that’s what we’re trying to get after.

Lt. Gen. Bruce “Orville” Wright, USAF (Ret.):

Thanks sir. Well, let me again, thank both of you. You certainly have given us much to think about in a fascinating discussion. Such opportunities abound I think for an ever stronger department of the Air Force, Airmen and Guardian, and across our industry partners, a team to defend this nation. So please, thank you again. And if you would join me in a round of applause…

C-130Hs With Older Propellers Grounded Due to Cracked Parts

Oct. 3, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

Air Mobility Command and Air Combat Command confirmed that they have grounded their C-130H variants with older propeller systems after discovering cracked parts—and AMC is considering accelerating the production and installation of new propellers to replace them.

All told, up to 116 C-130Hs could be affected as AMC waits for field-level inspections of the aircraft to assess the scope of the problem, spokesperson Maj. Beau Downey told Air & Space Forces Magazine.

A “post-depot operation engine run check” at Warner Robins Air Logistics Center, Ga., first revealed the issue when a maintenance crew discovered a leak from one of the propellers, Downey said.

A further inspection found a crack in the propeller barrel assembly, and the same issue was subsequently discovered in two more propeller assemblies.

No safety incidents or issues have been reported as a result of the cracked propeller barrels, Downey said, but Air Mobility Command issued a safety time compliance technical order (TCTO) for all C-130Hs with 54H60 propellers.

After more analysis, AMC issued an immediate action TCTO on Sept. 27 “directing replacement of a variety of specific suspect propellers,” Downey said.

A timeline for when the aircraft could be back in the air hasn’t been established yet, with Downey saying AMC is working on a “multi-faceted recovery plan to resume safe aircraft operations as soon as possible.” That recovery plan will be an “incremental process,” he added.

In the meantime, “the Air Force has been able to mitigate operational impacts with other aircraft,” Downey said.

The TCTO does not cover C-130Hs that have already been upgraded to new NP2000 propellers, or any C-130Js.

The Air Force has been in the process of replacing the propellers on its C-130H variants for years now, seeking to swap out older propellers built before 1971. In 2019, USAF officials noted in a congressional hearing that some of those propellers were prone to cracking. Collins Aerospace, which produces the eight-bladed NP2000, noted in a 2021 release that the Air Force has ordered upgrades for 83 C-130Hs.

“Accelerating NP2000 production and installation is one of multiple avenues we are pursuing to resume operations as soon as possible,” Downey said.

The Air Force’s C-130H cargo aircraft are entirely in its Guard and Reserve fleets, according to the most recent inventory numbers. Some variants, however, are in the Active-duty component, including the MC-130H Combat Talon II and the EC-130H Compass Call.

A post last week on the popular unofficial Air Force amn/nco/snco Facebook page reportedly showed that several MC-130Hs and EC-130Hs were also affected by the propeller issue.

“Air Mobility Command, as the lead command, is working closely with affected units and technical experts across the mobility air forces to complete this action, while prioritizing available assets based on requirements,” Downey said in response to a query from Air & Space Forces Magazine as to whether AMC is working with other major commands that operate C-130H variants.

Air Combat Command spokesperson Capt. Lauren Gao said the command grounded its fleet of seven EC-130Hs and one trainer TC-130H and has completed inspections. ACC is currently complying with the TCTO and working with Air Mobility Command and Air Force Materiel Command’s C-130 System Program Office to “prioritize serviceable propellers based on requirements as quickly as possible while ensuring the safety of our aircrews,” Gao said.

Air Force Special Operations Command, which operates the MC-130H, did not immediately respond to a query.

Guardians Can Now Get the Good Conduct Medal and Other Awards

Oct. 3, 2022 | By Greg Hadley

Guardians in the Space Force are now officially eligible to receive honors such as the Good Conduct Medal, the Air Medal, the Bronze Star Award, and more, after President Joe Biden issued an executive order Oct. 3.

The order amends previous ones establishing various military awards by adding the Space Force to the list of services eligible to receive them. The full list of awards, many given for actions in a combat zone, that members of the Space Force can now receive include the:

Air Medal
Air Force Cross
Good Conduct Medal
Bronze Star Award
Silver Star Award
Presidential Unit Citation
Air Force Distinguished Service Medal
Defense Distinguished Service Medal

The change comes nearly three years after the Space Force was established in December 2019, and the executive order includes language for the Good Conduct Medal and Presidential Unit Citation specifically covering all actions and time since then.

That puts many Guardians in line for the Good Conduct Medal, which typically requires three consecutive years without disciplinary action, in the near future.

The Space Force has already finalized a design for its Good Conduct Medal, which leaked online in February and was confirmed by Chief Master Sergeant of the Space Force Roger A. Towberman. At the time, however, Towberman noted that the medal couldn’t be awarded until the President amended the existing executive order.

On the front, the medal shows a modified version of the Space Force seal, with the service’s trademark Delta in front of a Globe, encircled by an Elliptical Orbit and with the Polaris Star to its upper left. The seal is surrounded by “United States Space Force” and the motto “Semper Supra.”

The back has the same three words in a ring—Efficiency, Honor, Fidelity—that are on the Army and Air Force’s versions of the medal. It also contains the phrase “For Good Conduct.”

The ribbon is tan on its outer edges, with parallel stripes of black, dark blue, and light blue around a single white stripe in the middle.

“The expansion of military awards and medals eligibility to the U.S. Space Force and its Guardians is a big step toward legitimizing the essential role the service plays in National Defense and the hard work Guardians put into executing their missions each day,” Department of the Air Force spokesperson Capt. Tanya N. Downsworth told Air & Space Forces Magazine in a statement.

The introduction of the first service-specific award comes as the Space Force builds out its identity and culture on several fronts. The service’s dress uniforms continue to progress toward a rollout; Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond recently unveiled the new Space Force song; and transfers from other services continue to migrate into USSF.

Guardians can also still wear ribbons they’ve earned while serving in other services.