Ready for the Fight: Building the Air and Space Forces America Needs

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Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

Well, good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to our fireside chat with Congressman August Pfluger. He represents Texas’s 11th District. He’s also the only F-22 pilot in Congress, and he also flew another great fighter, the F-15, and we had the privilege of flying together back at Hickam Air Force Base many years ago, and he’s got a couple of good stories from that, but we’re gonna save that for the bar. So, Congressman, thanks very much for taking the time to be here today, and I thought we’d jump right in, and everyone here’s pretty well aware of the influx of resources that the president has put in the FY27 budget. Now, whether we get that all or not, that’s another question we’ll talk about later on, but could you share with the audience kind of the rationale behind why that substantial increase was required in funding our Department of War?

Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas):

Well, absolutely, and so good to see all of you. So good to be here. I got a chance to walk around the floor for just a second a few minutes ago. General Deptula, thanks for what you do, and I’ll answer the question, but you have the biggest advocate for air and space power literally in the world sitting right here on the stage. And General Deptula, day in and day out, writing, communicating, going on TV to talk about the Department of the Air Force and what you all do, you don’t have a bigger cheerleader, and I wanna thank you for that as well.

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

Appreciate it, thanks. I’ll give you the bottle of bourbon later.

Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas):

You know, we’re in a tough environment. Y’all all know that. I love the fact that we do have a president who has acknowledged that for many decades, three or four decades, probably since President Reagan was in office, that we have not made a real move to recapitalize our military. And what he has requested to get to $1.5 trillion, I think is a bold request. I think it’s an acknowledgment of the job that you all do. I think it’s an acknowledgment of each of the departments. But it’s also, I think, something that, we know what the environment is. We know that the threat environment is very complex. And what I have done in Congress is try to educate my colleagues on what the Department of the Air Force does and why we, as a department, are really carrying the load in each of the conflicts, whether it’s Epic Fury, Midnight Hammer, Absolute Resolve, or any of the previous conflicts, the Department of the Air Force has been there every single time, offers a tool to the president that is politically acceptable at times when maybe the other services don’t have that tool or the joint fight doesn’t allow us to use those different components. And so I’m proud that he has asked for that.

But we are in a tough fiscal environment. And that is the truth of it. That’s the reality of where we are. But I still have some hope that what he has asked for, and specifically our role in Congress- and we can get into the details of how we get there- will, at some point in the very near future, truly recognize and reward, through the budgetary process, what the Department of the Air Force has done. Because we are lifting more than our fair share, and yet the budget continues to be this peanut butter spread, equal parts that doesn’t, I think, recognize fully what you all are doing every single day.

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

Well, thanks for that. Let’s expand just a little bit. As they say, no bucks, no Buck Rogers. And everyone here is pretty much savvy to the point that the odds are high that we’ll be facing another long-term, continuing resolution, plus a wartime supplemental. And the defense reconciliation bills have yet to pass, and I think, in reality, are unlikely to pass. So how do we get to a more positive position to ensure that the administration’s Defense Plus Up succeeds in Congress?

Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas):

It’s a great question, and I’ll say this a couple of times. We need your help. Everybody here, we need your help. We need your help walking the halls of Congress, talking to your elected officials, explaining the story of the fact — and I know General Deptula will mention this — that we’re as small and as old as the service has ever been. And that is a fact. Politically speaking, the House of Representatives, we have done our job. We have passed, at this point in time, the appropriations bill for the defense bill, and also a reconciliation bill that would put almost $100 billion into the Department of War. So those have been sent to the Senate, and we expect those to move. We want them to move.

If any of you know Chairman Tom Cole, he represents a district in Oklahoma. He’s the appropriations chair in the House of Representatives. And this is a gentleman who has really brought back the spirit of appropriations. There’s 12 different buckets, congressionally speaking, that we put money into. One of those is defense. And for the first time in 30 years, we have passed all 12 of those bills in the House. Last year, not only did we pass them all in the House, but we sent them to the Senate, and 11 of the 12 passed the Senate. And that was literally the first time since the 1990s that that had happened. We have to avoid a CR. We have to avoid a long-term mentality of a CR.

And this is where politics gets hard. That’s why I need your help. We have to explain our story. As Airmen and as space professionals, we sometimes, you know, we’re humble, and we’re credible, and we’re approachable, and all of that. But we have to explain our story to the elected officials and really make the case that long-term CRs do a lot of damage to the military. They do a lot of damage to our warfighting capacity. But that’s the reality of where we are. And I wish I could sit up here and tell you that the political reality was a little bit different.

We are in a very divisive time. But if there’s one thing that can bring us together, it is acknowledging that the men and women right here in this room, all of you, the folks that are wearing the uniform, the folks that are in industry supporting the warfighters, that is a bipartisan issue. And we have bipartisan groups that get together. We’ve just got to get over the hump a little bit and get this done. And we’re counting on the Senate right now to pass what we have sent them.

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

Well, I don’t think it’s too big of a summary to say that that is a threat, the inability to provide resources and appropriations on time to the Department of Defense is just the biggest threat as some of our adversaries, which is sort of a lead-in to my next question. That’s how do you raise the awareness of your fellow members in Congress with respect to the significance of the threats that we’re facing? China, we’ve heard about China a lot. And we’ve seen the evidence from Russian aggression. We know about the Iranians. Then there’s North Korea. The combination of all of these threats facing the United States, I just don’t think the American public or many members of Congress understand the significance of the threats that are facing us. How do you work that?

Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas):

You know, I started out by mentioning just a couple of the operations that we have recently been involved in. I see my hometown commander here, Colonel Matt Norton at Goodfell Air Force Base, who trains, by the way, 14,000 professionals a year. Thank you for what you do to train Intel professionals, firefighters. You guys make it look easy, Matt. You literally make it look easy. And everybody in this room, even though it’s not, has made these operations look easy. Airpower– I mean, did y’all see the “60 Minutes” just a couple of days ago about the rescue? That was not an easy mission. That was incredibly difficult, very challenging. And maybe even some could say that the probability of success was pretty low at times during that mission. And maybe it went up and went down, depending on some of the conditions.

But honestly, I think that we, as a service, as a joint big Airman, big airpower, have made these missions, because of the professionalism, look easy. So it kind of cuts both ways a little bit, where when we ask for resources, they say, well, you guys can just go in and get this accomplished. I mean, airpower went into Venezuela and did something that has never been done before, a historic mission. Airpower went in early in Iran last year and executed a mission that I know, for a fact, had been thought about and rehearsed for many years and made it look easy, even though it’s not. But we have to make the case, and this is where I am the only fifth generation pilot in Congress.

I need some wingmen to come join me. If anybody’s looking for another job, come find me afterwards. We need help explaining this congressionally. We also need the help to make the case that, while we are the oldest and the smallest, it’s not too late. We can recapitalize. We can get the weapons systems that we need.

A couple of years ago, we started a Mach 1 caucus. And there’s a couple of F-18 pilots. And Senator Mark Kelly, he says, oh, that’s really cute. You guys went Mach 1. He’s an astronaut. I guess he went like Mach 20 or something. But we started that in a bipartisan way because we wanted to tell the story of what air power does. Last night, I was with the Speaker of the House at 9:15 PM before we took votes at 9:30, making the case for you all to say that the threat environment is complex, that the American public doesn’t necessarily understand. But it’s because the professionalism of our military, specifically of airpower, has done such a good job.

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

Thanks very much for that, for all you do. And I also subscribe to the notion that we need more Airmen in Congress. Let’s shift a bit to space. The Space Force has spent seven years since they were created. We’ve seen operations in Midnight Hammer, Epic Fury. And I think there’s greater and greater awareness, in some folks’ minds, of the vital importance of space. Do you sense that there’s an awareness of the significance of the importance of space with your fellow members in Congress? I mean, fortunately, the budget was appropriately plussed up this year. And so I think there’s a recognition of the Department of War. But how about your congressional friends?

Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas):

Absolutely. I do see that. I think there’s an acknowledgment of that. I think people understand that space as a domain has so many different uses. And I applaud the President in 2018 for developing the Space Force and for pushing. I mean, there was some resistance. And I applaud him for saying, no, this is a warfighting domain. And congressionally speaking, I think people have really embraced what space can do as a competitive advantage. And we all know that the pacing threat out there, the Chinese Communist Party is going to take advantage of this if we do not. And we have to compete. So very proud to see that the budget has acknowledged that. Obviously, I think that the Department of the Air Force needs more altogether. That includes space. But I think that the gains that we are making, and just very shortly on the floor 15 minutes ago, seeing some of the things that are happening in space is really eye-watering. So again, this is where I would ask for your help, that we need that message communicated. And a lot of it, I get it. It’s sensitive. It’s classified. Well, we can’t talk about that. Let’s find a way to talk about it and communicate that to elected officials that really understand we’ve got to go fast right now.

As a quick aside, one of the things I do in Congress is I chair a group called the Republican Study Committee. It’s a policymaking group. We focus on policy. We talk about policy. That’s what we do. We have 190 members. It’s the largest group in Congress. Proud to chair that. We had Jared Isaacman come and talk to us. And normally, our guest speakers are cabinet officials and people like Jared. Incredible discussion. Standing ovation at the end from 60 or 70 members who had questions and want to know what the direction on space is. And Jared is a good ambassador, even though that’s on the civilian side. It ties into what we are doing in the military. And I think there’s probably some very good dual use technology that exists out there that he’s working on as well.

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

Well, that’s good. And I think part of the way of getting your average citizen’s attention is to make them aware of what they wouldn’t have access to if we didn’t have space superiority. And I think Secretary Meink’s announcement earlier this week that we now have space control weapons on orbit starting to wake people up. I mean, the media is paying a lot of attention to it. And they’re going, oh my gosh, what’s going on? Well, it’s important to understand we didn’t turn the space domain into a warfighting domain. The Russians and the Chinese did. And oh, by the way, if we don’t protect it, you’re going to lose your smartphone. You’re not going to be able to buy gas with a credit card. You’re not going to be able to do your financial transactions. And you’re not going to have access to TikTok.

Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas):

Are you on TikTok?

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

No, I’m not. I’m not. I’m talking about the general populace or any of your other popular apps. I think that’ll probably get their attention.

Let’s jump in a little detail. We talked about space. And get into resourcing of the Air Force. The general overall top line Department of War budget went up about 50% over ’26. But the Air Force only went up 22%. What don’t they understand about oldest, smallest, and least ready in history? What’s it going to take for folks on the Hill to understand that? And what can the Air Force do better in terms of advocating its case?

Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas):

I’ll go right back to the recruiting message. We need more interaction. We need your help. We need that story to be told. And God bless my Navy SEAL friends. And they are dear friends. But we’ve got a lot of them in Congress. But what we don’t have is a lot of air and space expertise. And not to say that we have to have the elected side of it. I mean, it’s bigger than just that. But telling that story– and again, we make this look easy when it’s not. It’s years of training, and professionalism, and debriefs. And I’ve sat through these and led them myself. So I know the drill here.

But maybe the one aspect, General, that we could do better is our interaction with the Hill, with the Executive Branch Department of War at the top levels of leadership. President Trump loves the F-22. He thinks it’s the sexiest machine ever built. He thinks it’s beautiful. If you hear him, it’s beautiful. “ugust, it’s beautiful. It’s a beautiful machine.” We need to tell that story and put it in terms for these folks to understand what that means. They chose air power for a reason in these different conflicts because the strategic effects that a tactical action could have in a variety of locations was more than impressive.

But I’m worried at this point in time that we haven’t recapitalized. And we need Air Force leaders to be bold. We need you to be bold, to tell the truth, to say we’re underfunded, and to make the case that it might not be an equal split, 1/3, 1/3, 1/3. That might not work for us in the coming years. And I would argue that it’s not going to work for us.

If we really want to keep our competitive advantage in this environment, airpower and spacepower needs to be the first priority. We have two of the three legs of the nuclear triad. We have passthrough that hits us very hard every single year that goes to different agencies that we desperately need. But the Air Force, the Department of the Air Force, the Space Force take that on the chin when we don’t get the right resources to fund the things that keep our country safe and allow deterrence to really happen.

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

Well, thanks for that. Now, demand for air and space power continue to grow. And we talked about the budget challenges that we’re having. One of the things that we’ve seen recently- and we at Mitchell Institute and Air & Space Forces Association are huge fans of multi-year procurement. And we’ve seen that language. It’s in this year’s NDAA, especially as it ties to fighter munitions procurement. What were the tipping points that empower that action? And how do we expand on these sorts of provisions?

Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas):

I’m so glad you’re bringing this up. Congress will never be accused of acting swiftly or efficiently. That’s just not something that the public is going to accuse us of. But we have a couple of folks that have acknowledged how bad a CR really is for the military and for national security. And when we went through a government shutdown last year, it wasn’t the Department of War, but it was over DHS, we acknowledged and have made some real gains to get multi-year procurement. And I would like to see it for the entirety of the Department of War. I would like to see, let’s take off the table politically for leverage purposes for either party. Let’s take off our national security agencies, which include DHS, Department of War, a few others. Let’s take those off the table. And let’s make sure that we never have a CR again. And multi-year procurement, the Department of Navy has really pushed for shipbuilding to be multi-year procured.

I think the development of many weapons systems, if not all of them, need to be that way. Industry needs a demand signal that is predictable. Industry needs a demand signal that they can count on. That we know that the ROI, we’re going to get something quick, industry needs to go faster. And for those that are in industry right now, you need to go faster. You need to provide weapons systems faster, more on time, and maybe even below cost. And I think from the executive branch and the legislative branch, we can help with that by giving you a predictable environment, which includes multi-year procurement. I’m very convinced that we’re very close to getting some of these things accomplished.

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

That would certainly be good news. Let’s talk a little more detail about something you raised earlier, and that’s the fact that we’re seeing a defense leadership generational transition in Congress, both in the House and the Senate. We’ve seen some longstanding defense proponents who are departing, think of the impact of losing Senator Graham and Senators Inhofe. And on the positive side of the ledger, we’ve got folks like yourself rising through the ranks. Talk to us a little bit about how you see Congress cultivating its next generation of defense leadership.

Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas):

When I came in in 2020, I was elected for the first time in 2020, the percentage of Congress who had served in the military was 14% maybe, 15%. It was the lowest level since World War II. And that’s sad. That was a sad commentary. Veterans understand how to serve. We’ve served. You have done this professionally. And so it comes naturally then to come over to this new way of serving, representing your hometown or your district. That number has thankfully risen. And a lot of the people that we see that have really become the rising stars on advocating for the Department of War, advocating for our soldiers and sailors, Marines, Airmen, Guardians, they are veterans.

But I’ve been pleasantly surprised that in some places, the people that represent Whiteman Air Force Base or Dyess Air Force Base or a variety of places are actually not veterans. And they have taken it very seriously and become as effective using their business background. So it’s a combination of backgrounds. And I can point to a couple of people, especially in the Senate right now, that have really taken this mantle. Senator Kramer from North Dakota, fantastic advocate for air power. He loves airpower. He loves– he’s on the Air Force Academy Board of Visitors, which I’d like to talk about at some point during this discussion. But it’s people like that that are really rising up. And Senator Graham, the loss of Senator Graham, regardless of where you stand politically, this was a person who dedicated himself to standing up for the military. And really, that loss is going to be felt for a long time. And we need people to rise back up into those positions.

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

Thanks for that. Let’s turn to the reality of operating in modern battlespace today. The effects that we want to achieve are increasingly accomplished through teamed multi-domain assets coming together at the right time and the right place. Examples like an F-22, E-7, satellite, and a ship firing a standoff missile, they can equate to a team. It’s a lot different and a lot more complex than the way we used to conduct business. How do we help Congress understand this? Because the implications for policy and budget implementation are pretty big.

Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas):

I love the way y’all are thinking right now. I love the innovation that is happening. General Deptula took me down to the floor, and I got a chance to sit in a cockpit. It was a single engine cockpit, so I won’t get on the soapbox about two engines versus one. But they showed me the way that some of these targeting concepts are happening with CCA, or if it’s with an E-7 and satellites. How awesome is that, that you can help and have a collaborative wingman or have an asset in space or have other weapon systems around you that operate as a team, where it used to just be a formation or it used to just be a single weapon system that was firing for effect. Now it’s this whole team.

And you guys know this way better than I do. But this is the way of the future. And I’m impressed with what you’re doing. Again, we need to tell that story and let our folks know that whether it’s the high-end fight or whether it’s something that maybe we do have a high degree of air superiority in an area, and we need small, inexpensive drones or small, inexpensive weapons to protect against the counter-drone game. All of those things are now collaborating together and that they are working together as a system. Again, I’m just trying to keep up with the information and understand it. But if I flew the F-22 and I’m trying to keep up, imagine what my congressional colleagues are going through, that their understanding of how to operate in a joint, multi-domain environment, they’re starting from a starting point that — I mean, I spent my entire professional career doing this and walking on the floor earlier.

I’m just amazed at the gains that have been made since I was actually in the cockpit. So again, I’ll hit it one more time. We need everybody’s help in communicating this message.

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

Here’s one that I believe is more and more required because it’s been so long since we’ve done it before. We’ve seen over the last several decades mission overlap expand amongst the services. The Army, in particular, is expanding into the deep attack mission area of the Air Force, is building more ISR aircraft in the Air Force, and it’s expanding its roles into the Space Force’s mission area as well. Furthermore, we haven’t had an objective roles and missions review since the Space Force was established. Is it time for Congress to legislate a roles and missions review? Because the last one we had concluded in 1995, and none of the services are going to want it because of the potential threat. But if we’re going to get serious about proper allocation of resources, don’t you think we need one?

Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas):

If there’s media in the room, this next statement is not intended to garner headlines, OK? So this is a fireside chat. Absolutely.

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

Thank you.

Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas):

Goldwater Nichols needs to be looked at. It’s not just the roles and missions. I would go a step further, and that’s where I’m talking to the media directly right now, is let’s have a conversation. And those conversations only happen when the political environment pushes to a point where the demand signal is there where we have to have this. We need to discuss this. Every single dollar that we spend right now has to be tailored for an effect. It’s just like the effects that you all are generating every single day. You don’t want duplicative effects generated. We certainly don’t want duplicative intraservice fights happening for effects. So the roles and missions discussion is incredibly important. And I do think that Congress needs to look at that. I do think that Congress needs to look at the command and control aspect of this through Goldwater-Nichols. And what can we do? We’re $40 trillion in debt. The last time that we had a balanced budget was under President Clinton. Think about that for a second.

We have been at war since 1990. We have to spend these dollars wisely. And yes, some of this is on us, but some of it is also on the services to push for this, and to ask for this, and to come together and say, OK, we all have specialties, and we all have niches and stovepipes that we want to protect, but we’ve got to do it smarter. We have to do it more economically.

And the economics– if you ask me what one of the biggest threats is out there, it’s the economics of warfare. It’s what the Iranians are looking at right now. They have time and economics that they are using to leverage us and the Western world. The Chinese Communist Party is no different. And we have to respond in kind with effects that are generated at the lowest possible cost with the highest possible outcome.

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

Thanks for that. Here’s one that I don’t think a lot of people think about. But if you take a look at– think about five to 10 years in the future. What kind of metrics for success should we be using or thinking about in terms of measuring if we’re building a department of the Air Force that’s going in the right direction?

Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas):

What a great question. And I’m not– I’m probably not– I’m definitely not the most qualified one to answer that question. But as somebody that’s in Article 1 on the legislative side, I’ll go back to dollars. I mean, I think that the best metric for me as a lawmaker to ask questions is, what’s the return on the investment that we’re getting as a nation through the appropriations process to you?

And if we have weapons systems that can take out small, inexpensive drones that you can buy on Amazon, but those weapons systems are $150,000 a piece to take out a $10,000, $1,000 drone, then I would say that metric is failing. But if we can come up with ways to have economic parity or be under and still have defense, then I think the success is there. And I think that’s the roles and missions discussion. I mean, this goes right back to what you asked. We need bold, bold communication. Now is not the time to sugarcoat anything to Congress. If you’re a captain in the crowd, when you talk to the wing commander, tell the truth. Tell the truth about the economics of what your – whoever you’re leading and whatever mission you’re in charge of. If you’re a colonel and wing commander, tell the truth to the numbered Air Force commander. And when you get a chance to meet with the chief of staff, tell the truth. And we expect the flag officers to come to Congress and tell us the truth about what we’re doing.

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

That’s very good. I mean, if I may add, I would also suggest that we need to get away from just looking at the cheapest as the best alternative and think about cost per effect. Sometimes the most effective capabilities are more expensive than a unit cost basis, but it’s all about effects, not – you know, it’s cost effectiveness. For too long we focused on the cost piece. We need to also bring into the equation the effectiveness piece.

Well, Mr. Congressman, we’ve got a little bit of time left, and what I’d like to do is offer you the opportunity – you mentioned that you’d like to talk about the Academy, which is obviously an extraordinarily important subject in terms of bringing up our Guardians and Airmen. So over to you for whatever you’d like to chat about and bring up with the audience.

Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas):

Well, I appreciate it. I’ve had the opportunity in the last three years to lead the Board of Visitors at the Air Force Academy. You might ask, well, what is that? It’s like, you know, it’s this group of congressmen and senators, presidentially appointed positions that are there as a Board of Regents style organization that advocate for the Air Force Academy. And regardless of where your commissioning source was from, if you’re wearing the uniform, the Air Force Academy is a symbol and a foundation for the Department of the Air Force commissioning all across through ROTC units and it has been underfunded as well. So very proud to have recruited a good group of board members who are putting real effort, real resources back into making the Air Force Academy a top-notch institution and getting it to a point where we’re continuing to think outside the box, to lead, and that will translate through all the commissioning sources and it will help everybody who assesses into the Air Force to really understand what the challenges are going to be in the future.

Secondly, I want to tell you about a gentleman named Major Robert Lodge. Has anybody heard of Major Lodge? This is a Vietnam-era hero that I believe needs to be awarded the Medal of Honor, a weapons officer who, in one of the early missions throughout in the 1970s, pushed and had so much knowledge and planned for these missions, and to great success, but was shot down. And the heroism that I believe that Major Lodge displayed — and we know now because of information that has been presented to the Department of War, to the Department of the Air Force — we know that Major Lodge did something extraordinary. He understood, as the lead weapons officer, that he had more knowledge and more of the mission details than any other person at that time.

So when he was shot down, tragically and unfortunately, he did something that I think all of us can recognize as an incredibly hard decision, but he decided to stay with the aircraft. And did so — and we know this because he had communicated this to his wingman and to his colleagues and fellow officers in advance that if that were to happen, that would probably be his choice in order to preserve and to save the mission details and to keep them a secret so that there would be no chance of jeopardizing follow-on missions.

So in the past couple of years, the Department of War, the Department of Air Force has been presented with more information on this case and being able to piece it together, you know, the timelines that have happened and we’ve been able to really see that this was the case and that he did, he made the ultimate sacrifice to preserve the effectiveness of the missions that would follow on. So we are pushing very hard for Major Lodge to get the Medal of Honor and I want to bring it to the 30,000 foot level.

Why is this important? It’s important because in the art of warfare, both in the naval terms and on the land component, you’ve got a lot of witnesses that are out there that see these things. But in the air component and in the space component, that’s not always the case. But it doesn’t diminish the heroism that is displayed in air power. And our country continues to call on air power time and again. Major Lodge represents that type of heroism where he literally saved probably dozens if not maybe even hundreds of lives because of his sacrifice.

And even though it was only a short amount of time that in that battle, if you want to call it, in that air war on that day that it happened, he still deserves, in my humble opinion, to be recognized with our nation’s highest honor, which is why we’re pushing for the Medal of Honor. And I’m hopeful, guys, that on the State of the Union that happens in the spring of 2027, that this can become a reality.

And I want you to know that it’s for all of you. It’s for the sacrifices that you make time and again. And it’s for all of our fellow Airmen and Guardians who are doing this where you might not get the credit and you don’t do it for the credit. But it’s nice when it happens to be able to recognize somebody like Major Lodge. And I don’t know if you have any thoughts on it, but we are certainly pushing very hard for this.

Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, USAF (Ret.):

Well, the Mitchell Institute, as well as the Air & Space Forces Association are huge advocates and we’re doing everything in our power to do so, too. So thanks very much for those closing remarks. It’s a great way to finish up. And let me just take this opportunity to thank you for the service, the continued service that is so very important in increasing the awareness of the importance of air and space power to our congressional members. So, ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of the Mitchell Institute, thank you very much, Mr. Congressman, and wish you and everyone in the audience a great air and space power kind of day. Have a good one. Thank you.