November 15, 2002

General Ryan: And you all thought you’d gotten rid of me.

I have to confess, I hadn’t planned on addressing this symposium until the Chief, General Jumper, asked me to fill in for him. You all know how difficult it is to say no to the Chief. As you can imagine, he’s got some pressing national security business to do in Washington and couldn’t be here. He sends his regards, but unfortunately, he didn’t send his speech. [Laughter]

I’ll give you my own opinions, enlightened by a year of retirement—and I speak for most of the people out there who have retired from the Air Force. It is amazing to see how brilliant you become in retirement. I’ll give you an example. Retirement is a pretty big transition for a lot of us. It certainly was for Jane and me. When you are the Air Force Chief, you receive a lot of help from a lot of people. You have the Air Staff, the staff group, front office and officer aides and some enlisted aides.

So, when I retired, I sat down with Jane and said "listen, you’ve been my bride for 36 years. I need to explain a couple things to you. There are a lot of things I haven’t done for myself for a long time. Like, laying out my clothes. Now, who is going to do that? Shining my shoes. Who is going to do that? And make sure I am dressed properly for the occasion. Who is going to do that? And then there is chauffeuring and honey, guess who will have to do all that for me?"

Jane thought about it for a minute and looked me right in the eye and she says, "I know who will do all of that for you. And it will be a one-time good deal: the undertaker." [Laughter]

Like Jane and I, the Air Force Association, the Air Force and indeed our industry brothers, have a long tradition of working closely together. It is terribly important that we keep that bond. Only by working together can we hope to solve the challenges and harness the opportunities for the future. It is some of these challenges and opportunities I’d like to discuss with you today.

For me, they fall into three broad categories: organization, resources and people. Before I begin with organization, I’d like to put behind us a discussion of terminology. This has to do with the bouncing back and forth of whether we are an aerospace force or whether we are an air and space force.

Most of you know where I come down on that issue. I was an advocate to use the word aerospace because I believed it was a descriptor of the medium from which the Air Force brought capabilities and effects to the battlefield. I saw it as a unifying thing for the Air Force to help solidify the ideas of integration, making sure to stave off the stupid ideas—correction, untimely ideas—of creating a separate service. By the time Secretary Roche and John Jumper took launch control, so to speak, things had changed. They were faced with a different set of circumstances.

The Space Commission had reported out to Congress and Rumsfeld had affirmed the Commission’s findings—go figure (he was its former chairman)—that the Air Force should be executive agent for space and that it was stupid—correction—that it was premature to set up a separate service for space.

Having those affirmations out there and faced with the fact that the Space Commission made no mention of aerospace, and given the expectations to other services of the U.S. Air Force supplying space capabilities to the joint community, I think John Jumper switched back to air and space for a good reason and I agree with that. I think he and I and everybody in this room believes that the principle needed here is to make sure we integrate space capabilities for warfighting. And he is also the Chief. Enough said.

Now, organization. Most of us here lived through the Space Commission, seeing it as both a challenge and an opportunity. I had thought they had brought a lot of issues to the table that needed a lot of discussion. I think that in general the Space Commission’s findings were helpful—not perfect, but helpful.

Amongst its recommendations were the consolidation of the NRO director’s position with the Under Secretary of the Air Force, Pete Teetes embodies that today. And the realignment of SMC under Air Force Space Command, Brian Arnold representing that today. And separation of the hats out at Space Command so we had a four-star in charge of Air Force Space and General Lord represents that today. Those are all positive moves.

What I’d like to focus on organizationally is what I think would have a profound and enduring challenge and opportunity for the U.S. Air Force and that is, how do we present ourselves as an Air Force in the alignment of space under U.S. STRATCOM? As most of us here know, the definition of the exact mission of U.S. STRATCOM is evolving. What is clear is that they will have a global mission, not just about space or ICBMs, but a global mission involving perhaps information and other issues that we have not yet actually addressed—although there is a lot of lip flapping about it right now in the joint community.

An organizational principle that we have always espoused in the Air Force is that only one Air Force component commander should be representing the Air Force to the combatant commander. That is how we are organized in the Air Force to support the joint world in most cases. When the PACOM Commander wants bomber capabilities, he turns to the PACAF Commander to bring that to him. PACAF neither has bombers permanently assigned, nor does he organize, train and equip them. Those functions are done by Air Combat Command in a centralized mode.

In a like vein, I believe that Air Force Space Command should be the only Air Force component to STRATCOM and be the conduit to provide air and space Air Force capabilities, including things like reconnaissance and bombers to the unified commander. Admiral Ellis should be able to turn to General Lord in the same way that unified commanders expect of their Air Force components elsewhere. That will require a broadening of scope and of expertise in Air Force Space Command and a maturation of the relationships with the other MAJCOMs, particularly ACC, but it is nothing more than we ask of our other Air Force components when it comes to Air Force capabilities not resident directly in their particular command, including space capabilities. I think it would be a great step forward in support of integration and it certainly would be full of challenges and opportunities galore.

Turning to resources, in my mind, making the Air Force the executive agents for space was a vote of confidence in the way the Air Force views and treats its space programs. It is also an acknowledgment that we put in about 90 percent of the resources that are involved in space from a military standpoint. Although there had been some carping that the Air Force was not putting enough resources against it compared to other programs, there is no evidence to support that allegation. The facts were, in truth, the opposite. While many of our vital Air Force programs were starved, the average age of our assets soared during the lean years of this past decade, space programs are better, comparatively. The Air Force recognized the critical reliance of all the defense entities on the space capabilities and I think we were good stewards.

While acknowledging the need for more money for space programs, it is interesting that the Space Commission completely avoided making any hard recommendations on that account. Go figure. It is too hard. Unfortunately, there are some who think, though, that the definition of "executive agent" means the Air Force foots the bill for all requirements. The whole issue of EA, I think, needs some clarity and definition.

There are huge challenges and opportunities here, but first we must acknowledge that we, the defense industry, the Air Force, are part of the problem. We have allowed for requirements across the board to not just creep, but leap. We have underestimated the cost and complexity of systems. And we continue to bail them out of their overruns, thus eating into our ability to fund new capabilities. I am trying to think of one space program that doesn’t fit that description in one form or another. I know I was a recipient of SBIRS, where we had to go through the FYDP and find another $2 billion to do SBIRS and we’ve just done that again. But it is a critical program and we must bring it on. We didn’t realize the complexity of it and we allowed the requirements to creep in a way that put a huge burden on industry.

In addition to the executive agency designation, the idea of compiling all space programs into one major force program, a virtual one, is a great step forward in obtaining insight into what is going on in all the DoD space programs and having that same insight into NRO is very helpful, under Pete Teets. That gives for better accountability, can avoid duplication, can bring best of breed as we acquire future systems and operate in present systems.

But I think the thing we have to guard against is taking one program and taxing it to bail out other programs across a fiscal line and a divide. For instance, bailing out FYA at the expense of say, SBIRS or the F/A-22, seems to be a fundamental foul. It makes no sense to break one good program or one bad program to fix another bad program.

The trade of space for space needs to get broadened. Given our past track record in space programs, I think we need a strategic shift in how we fund them. We had a great missed opportunity when we put up the GPS constellation. I recall going with a group of Air Force leadership to the golf course and there was a cart and in the cart was a GPS, one of the first in the United States. We were all appalled that we were charged $3 to use a GPS system. We should have charged them. In fact, we embarrassed them into letting us go for free. But had we added one tax dollar to every system out there just to be able to put the GPS into their particular unit, whether that was a hand-held, boat or car, if we had just done that, I would estimate that we would not have much of a funding problem when it came to GPS.

In fact, we brought that scheme up in the mid-1990s—Les remembers this—but there were those who said that was too business-focused after the system had already matured and there were also those who were afraid of a big bugaboo at the time and that was helping the cause of Galileo. Should we tax GPS?. . .then Galileo runs free.

Maybe it is time to revisit how we finance space systems to make a strategic shift and I’d call it requirements financing. That is, the agency or service that has a requirement for orbital systems capabilities helps finance the systems acquisition. We’ll run it , that’s what we do. But they ought to finance the acquisition. This is not a novel idea, but perhaps we could label it "transformational." That seems to work for everything else. [Laughter]

Unlike aviation systems, where the operating costs normally far outstrip the acquisition costs over the 30-plus year life cycle, space systems are the converse. Space systems acquisition costs are up-front kinds of costs. Normally, their life cycle is about a third for operating, and operating is not the expensive part of our space systems. But if somebody wants to add requirements to that, for instance, if a requirement for SBIRS is driven by a technical collection requirement, that agency or service ought to pony up. There should be no free bus rides; the Air Force must pay its freight for its requirements, but in space systems, we simply have to get a firm handle on additive requirements if we are going to be able to suppress the free-loaders’ appetites.

With that thought in mind, we must make every effort to highlight that space is not a welfare system. It is a national system and we must work together to find success. If the Army wishes to add requirements to advanced EHF, then they need to bring money to the table. If Department of Transportation wants to add capabilities to GPS, we should be all for it, but they need to bring money to the table. Or, if the Department of Commerce wants to add more weather forecasting capability to the NPOS, then again, they should bring money to the table.

The Air Force can’t afford to be the bank for all space systems. And neither should the NRO. We shouldn’t be forced to make very nationally corrosive trade-offs just within the Air Force air and space or in the NRO. We can’t continue to do this with unfettered requirements. DoD and the intelligence community should demand that requirements financing be part of business transformation within our government for the future.

A second resource-related issue is assured access to space. When we set up the EELV program, the economic conditions were much different than they are today. At its inception, it was supposed to be a competition for a down-select for best of breed. But we asked participating aerospace industries to fund about a half billion dollars in each of the programs to bring it on and I assure you that they spent a helluva’ lot more than that. Then, based on, I think, some flawed economic projections of both the commercial and governmental launches, and based on the need to hedge against assured access, both the EELV participants were asked to produce operational systems. Both had brought them close to operational capability. But the economics in the United States and in the launch business commercially are simply not there to support two launch providers.

Commercial demand is on its way down. Government systems/programs are slipping to the right. I suspect both companies will be stressed if they both keep their infrastructures up and active for a demand that isn’t there. The point is, is that if we are now in a kind of nexus, where, if we want to keep two avenues for assured access, we will eat up the savings promised by the reduced costs of the new systems. I just feel that one coming. In my mind, I think it is critical that we keep these two systems going. We must help keep the two systems active until we get a turnaround, on the commercial side, which I think will come, but not in the next five years. And also in the governmental programs, all of which need to be replaced in the next ten. How we do that—we’ll take the innovative minds represented in this room to match these great challenges and opportunities. It is real people like you here who make our ICBM and our space systems real capabilities for the warfighter and as warfighters.

Five years ago, we in the Air Force launched a program called "Developing Aerospace Leaders" to make sure we were consciously and, with some broadest of forethought, developing knowledgeable and broad leaders for the Air Force to meet future challenges. We now call it "force development." But the tenets are still the same: we need people who are deeply versed in their specialties to assure that we do the right and technically smart thing at a tactical level, whether that is in research, development, training, maintenance or operations. But we also need people who are broader than their specialty to lead their specialty at the operational level and these individuals must be schooled not just in their stove pipe, but recognize how their system capabilities fit in the overall scheme of the core competencies of the Air Force.

Next, we need leaders at a strategic level who understand and can apply these broad range of capabilities in the joint/combined/theater and global operations. Given that construct, the recommendations of the Space Commission on force development are very welcome. General Lance Lord has been tasked to come up with a Space Career Management Plan to help build, with the broadest of forethought, how we can assure that we have space professionals who are schooled not just at the tactical level and in their stove pipe, but in the operational and strategic level that we value dearly in this nation of ours.

Warfare is what it is all about. And it is not a threat that is on the horizon. It is here today. In Korea, peace terms have never been agreed to. In Afghanistan, where peace is so fragile. In the protracted war on terrorism—it is global. In Iraq, where every day is a combat day for the Air Force. Those threats are not likely to subside. It will take the combined efforts, the integrating efforts, of our forces in all the mediums of land, sea, air and space, working together for us to emerge victorious.

So, thank you for inviting me to participate today. I am humbled to be invited to substitute for the Chief and proud to be associated with you great professionals and patriots.

Q: How do you view our ability to handle the challenges of Operation Enduring Freedom/Noble Eagle and possible contingencies in Iraq with the current force that we have today? Do you see our force structure as being adequate for that?

General Ryan: Our combat force structure is probably adequate for that. Our intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance force is not adequate. It will never be adequate. Every force that you put out there never has all the combat commanders we want or need. We will always have a deficit, I think, in the ISR side.

The other place where we are challenged in a macro sense is in our capability to organize at the operational level with knowledgeable and schooled individuals to man our Combined Air Operations Centers to run operations. We have that spread right now about as thin as you can get it. We are scrambling—and John is working very hard—to make sure that we bring a professional group of people to the CAOC. I remember when I was a CAOC commander at Vicenza. We started off in a little room that wasn’t much bigger than probably the area I am standing in here, with one monitor and we were running an air operation. Well, with a lot of folks from a lot of folks, by the time we finished we ended up with a room almost this big or an area at least this big, by the time the operation showed up.

But all the individuals who came to us for that, because at the time, air operations centers were in their infancy, we had not turned them into a weapon system, so to speak, everyone who came had to be trained. And they only came, some for two months, some of our NATO allies only sent them for two months, so by the time you got them trained, they left. Most of our Air Force people were there for six months and that was just about enough time to make them very effective before they left.

So, I think the second challenge after the ISR assets, is knowledgeable individuals to integrate what we get out of ISR and put it together with our kinetic and IO capabilities to run the operations, and we are spread thin from Afghanistan to Europe. Bosnia is not over. Serbia is still there. Kosovo is still there. Korea is still there. And that is a great demand on our folks.

Q: In the future, should we operate our UAVs with Air Force pilots as we do today, or other Air Force members, or perhaps contract it out?

General Ryan: One of the nice things about retiring is you can any damn thing you want. I did that a lot while I was Chief but every now and then I got slapped around for it. [Laughter]

Just to make a comment on UAVs and then to answer your question, first of all, the Air Force is replete with UAVs. They are just not recognized as that. A lot of you have heard me say it before, but almost everyone of our smart munitions is a UAV; it just doesn’t come back. AMRAM is a UAV. It just doesn’t come back. All of these things allow you to stand further and further away from the battlefield. That is what UAVs are doing—allowing man to stand further and further away from the battlefield.

We have some nuts on UAVs in Washington who think they are the cure-all for halitosis and God knows what else. They are very useful. In fact, the Air Force has been into UAVs for years and years. Combat UAVs are the watchword right now, in the ISR UAVs. That is a great mission for an unmanned aerial vehicle. You get persistence out of it. You can preprogram it to do what you want it to do. You can change it in-mission and it is fairly simple to operate. You don’t have to integrate it with the rest of the force in any way. Most of them now, particularly the Global Hawk, have intercontinental ranges. That is a great, great mission for UAVs.

Combat UAVs that are the same size as fighters that do the same things as fighters, we wouldn’t even look at if they didn’t have a man in them. Why do we need that capability? We need something different on the combat side and it is not another fighter without a man in it. It is something different.

Can our folks in industry run the ISR UAVs? I think the answer is yes. I don’t think it is a necessity to have a uniformed officer doing this. When it comes to the combat side, there are things in law that require, I think, the blue suiter to be there, if you are going to produce effects on the enemy and they are indeed shooters, I think that is the place where you have the uniformed military operating.

Q: Do you see us getting ourselves prepared well enough to field the Space-Based Radar—the resources, the organization?

General Ryan: Having seen Space-Based Radar getting gonged twice before, I think we have to make a very good technical argument about why Space-Based Radar helps the operators. We are working really hard at that. The revisit rates of a space-based system right now, given the definition that you can get out of the radars, given the orbital planes, takes a helluva’ lot of them to have any kind of persistency.

That is really, I think, the issue—how can we get the persistency because we need the number we do to get the granularity we do and still do it affordably. No one questions that if we can get 24-hour-a-day persistency globally, that that isn’t a wonderful thing to have. It is just, can we afford it right now? There is competition to do it in other ways, too. In those areas that we have access, you can do what you normally do with orbital systems, with airborne systems and long-duration drones. The problem is the places where we don’t have access. That is where you need to focus this space-based capability to give us an idea, maybe even a strategic insight, into what the enemy is doing in the denied areas that we have neither the cross-border permission yet or that it is an area that we just don’t want to go in right now because it would stir the pot.

I think we still have work to do on Space-Based Radar. But I think what we really need to do is continue to absolutely fund the research and development that goes into it to make sure that we get a system on orbit which will be there for at least ten years on every system, that is reprogrammable, in some ways, steerable, and will give us the kinds of granularity we need for the future. Maybe that means that you have to do some of the processing on-board and some ground-side. There are just all kinds of issues here that I know Pete is working on very hard. What I don’t want to see happen is us be so inconclusive and waffle-y on this issue that we allow it to get gonged again and lose all the R&D that we are pouring into it to make sure it is a viable system for the future. Eventually, we are going to know how to do this and do it right.

Q: Do you see the JROC as an avenue for controlling the changes in requirements with the appetites we have among all the services?

General Ryan: The JROC is pretty good at the top level. What happens to us is—it is down below there—where we just have not had the discipline or the wherewithal to say "no." It is at that level, not at the JROC level, that it occurs. That is down in the program management level. I think the JROC is a great forum for deciding whether you are going to go forward with a system, but it is not a great mechanism for managing the system, given the requirements.

One other thing on that, it is a place that you could enforce the added requirements/added funding. It would be an enforcement mechanism, but it isn’t one to manage it.

Q: With our force becoming increasingly technologically oriented, how can we ensure that we keep the warrior spirit versus a corporate spirit?

General Ryan: A lot of the guys I deal with are pretty damn spirited out there in our corporate world. But there is the issue of making sure that we join our requirements/acquisition/development/testing and operational communities into a pile that has them working more as a team than in an adversarial relationship.

I think there is a lot to be said for having that mix, both contractors and blue suiters and our civilians in the Air Force proximate to each other. That sounds silly. We can do VTCs and we can do the rest of it. I think when you put people in the room together, communications amongst individuals on a direct eyeball-to-eyeball is so, so important to come and to understand the other person’s view and even maybe what their issue is. So I think there is some mechanical things we can do to make sure that we are all talking to each other in a better way. The technology has driven us a little bit away from that to save dough. I think in some cases, we spend a helluva’ lot more dough in the future by not getting together on a periodic basis to do that. I am never worried about the warrior spirit of our Air Force.

Q: What is your view on making publicly available commercial imagery sources without restrictions?

General Ryan: I think that is ok if you have a way to turn it off during war time. Right now, quite honestly, you can go out and buy overhead of just about any place in the world, down to less than five meters and in some cases one meter accuracy. You’ll never be able to prevent that. That is just going to happen out there. Which says that anybody who wants to geo-locate what is there now can do it. Heck, they can walk up, in most cases, where they have access with a GPS and just punch it in and they’ve got the GPS coordinates. I am not worried about the fixed stuff.

What I’m worried about is when it comes time to fight, how do we get these disparate organizations international capabilities together and black out a particular area so that there is nothing there? How do we make sure there are no cheaters when we cut those deals? How do we incentivize them to do that? Do we just buy it all up? If that is the answer, maybe we have to, to keep your operational and strategic surprise.

There is no question—we seldom have tactical surprise, but you want to keep your operational and strategic surprise. I think there are ways to do that and there are cooperative governments out there. We need the governments, really, first of all to be cooperative. Many say we don’t do that business—they do that business. Just as our government puts their fingers in that business, every government out there has a tendril right down into those kinds of space capabilities that are there. So, we need the governments to cooperate and then we need international consortiums that do this business to cooperate.

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