AUSA Army Green Book Article
|
Leading Change | |
AUSA Army Green Book Article |
The Army has provided220 years of selfless service to our Nation. Millions of Americans have served in this great Army. They have accomplished a great deal and have made many sacrifices. Our Army -- America's Army -- has undergone -- and continues to undergo -- an important transformation. The Army of yesterday is not the Army of today. The Army of tomorrow will be very different from the Army we see today. Our core competencies have not changed but our methodology is changing. The uncertainties of the world we live in demand this.
Throughout our history, even in uncertain times, one thing has remained constant...the high quality of men and women serving in our Army. The great spirit, courage, selfless dedication, and commitment, so clearly demonstrated by American soldiers throughout history, have passed from generation to generation to the talented people that make up today's Army. Today's soldiers continue to make this the finest Army in the world.
On 23 June, I was honored to be the Reviewing Officer at the Sixth Army Inactivation Ceremony at the Presidio of San Francisco. It was an emotional experience to furl and encase the colors of a unit that had made history for more than half a century. During this final roll call for the Sixth Army, one could feel the strength and spirit of America's Army at this historic post, even while we ended a glorious chapter in the history of one of the Army's proudest units. This scene, of course, has been replayed many times throughout the Army in the last six years -- a testimony of the Army's strength and resiliency. A testimony of the U.S. Army changing to meet the challenges of today, tomorrow and the 21st century.
I am excited about the future and what it holds for America's Army. As we rapidly approach the 21st century, America's Army faces tremendous opportunities and significant challenges. The first and foremost of these, is making sure that the Army stays trained and ready. While current readiness is good, turbulence, high OPTEMPO, and funding shortfalls cause concern for our long term outlook. Second, we need to provide stability after the myriad of changes brought about by the drawdown. Finally, we have a window of opportunity to make changes that will make us more efficient and result in smarter ways of doing business. These challenges are mutually supporting, not mutually exclusive. How we deal with these challenges and opportunities will define the Army of the future. No one knows exactly what warfare in the 21st century will be like. However, one thing is certain, future battlefields will be far different and more complex than 20th century battlefields. We must be ready.
As we near the conclusion of an unprecedented drawdown, the Army remains trained and ready to fight and win our Nation's wars. This, in my opinion, is attributable to two things: first, to our senior leadership - past and present - for providing a sound framework for tailoring the force while maintaining a strategic focus on the 21st century; second, to the dedicated men and women that make up this great Army who, while serving during this turbulent time, were always ready to answer our Nation's call.
Quality soldiers have been and will continue to be the foundation of a trained and ready force. The focal point of the Army's leadership will continue to be recruiting and retaining quality soldiers--those possessing the intelligence and strength of character necessary to meet the challenges of defending our nation and furthering its peacetime security interests. The more our nation demands of our Army, the more pressing is our need for soldiers that have the abilities and desire to meet this challenge. We must continually emphasize the importance of quality young men and women and their development into the outstanding leaders the Army will need in the future.
As a smaller Army, it is more important than ever that we leverage the capabilities of the entire force (Active, Reserve, and civilian), our Nation's industrial base, and the academic genius of our learning institutions. We are one Army whose sum is far greater than any of its parts. We must maximize the unique capabilities and talents each component brings to the warfighting table. We have come far in integrating our training and capitalizing on the strengths of each component. The concept of Enhanced Readiness Brigades, Offsite agreements, and the restructuring of the Reserve components have streamlined operations, reduced operating expenses and improved our go to war readiness posture. What we need to do now is build on our successes, refine the missions of the active and reserve components, and continue to build our partnerships with industry to support our force projection Army. We will continue to perfect our premobilization and postmobilization standards for the National Guard and Reserve units. Equally important, we'll continue to look for greater training opportunities to enhance our warfighting capabilities.
The operational pace for our people is at an all time high. In fiscal year 1995, the Army saw an average of 22,200 soldiers operationally deployed to over 70 countries on any given day. In the last year, American soldiers helped the nation promote democracy in Haiti, deterred a new threat to regional stability in Southwest Asia, provided relief supplies to Rwandan refugees in Zaire, conducted peacekeeping exercises in Russia, reinforced peace in the Sinai, supported refugees in the Caribbean, protected United Nations operations in Somalia, treated wounded in Croatia, demonstrated resolve in Macedonia, and deterred aggression in Korea.
In addition to these operations, the Army reinforced and maintained US overseas presence with 125,000 troops based outside the continental United States in places like Europe, Korea, Japan, and Panama. Soldiers have also taken on disaster relief missions at home--providing earthquake relief in California, fighting forest fires in the west, assisting flood victims in the Midwest and south, and helping stem the flow of illicit drugs across the borders of the United States. We could never have accomplished this multitude of missions without the total team effort of active and reserve soldiers and their civilian counterparts.
For many soldiers this has meant back - to - back deployments and extended separations from their families. The average American soldier now spends 138 days a year away from home. I emphasize this point because I know we ask an awful lot of our soldiers and their families. If we want to retain these fine men and women, we must take care of them.
These missions also reflect the continued development of our joint doctrine. The Army is -- and always has been-- a strategic force, playing a central role in joint warfighting. The Commission on Roles and Missions Report has further emphasized the importance of our role in the joint war fighting community. I see us as an integral part of the Joint Team. The Army is the Nation's historical force of decision -- the force of necessity. We provide unique capabilities and staying power to the warfighting CINC's. Our superior land combat force, our logistical sustainability, communications, intelligence, tactical psychological operations, civil affairs, SOF capabilities and military police operations are critical in war and essential to win the peace. The Army will always fight as part of a joint and/or combined team. Therefore, we will continue to train in a joint environment with maximum participation in joint training exercises that foster our joint family relationships.
Today's global security environment remains complex and full of unknowns. No longer are we confronted with "a clear and present danger." Instead we find ourselves facing a wide spectrum of unpredictable dangers and threats. We find ourselves confronted with new challenges such as regional conflicts involving the use of advanced conventional weapons, ballistic missiles, and chemical and biological weapons as well as peace keeping, and peace making operations.
We recognize that warfare is changing and that America's Army must stay ahead of the changes. Force XXI is our process for managing institutional change and exploiting the revolution in military affairs. Right now Force XXI is underfunded. Much has been done but much remains. Our challenge is to define Force XXI in terms of our doctrine and focus our available resources to provide our soldiers with the best possible organization, training and equipment. This is done by capturing emerging technology and integrating it into a focused force with instant situation awareness. We must harness the capabilities of our weapon systems and coordinate employment through a seamless information system, thus dramatically improving our ability to focus combat power and conduct high tempo operations inside our adversaries' decision cycles. Finding ways to exploit our competitive advantages---quality people and advanced technology --- becomes our future readiness challenge.
In the midst of an era of change and turbulence, we must not lose sight of the continuity and stability required to preserve our long term readiness -- stability in terms of quality of life, stability in terms of expectations, and stability in terms of what the future holds for our people.
I join our senior leadership, Secretary of Defense William Perry, Army Secretary Togo West, and JCS Chairman General Shalikashvili in their efforts to revitalize the quality of life programs for our people. As the Chairman has said... "No single investment we make is more important than our people ... We will not continue to attract quality young people if incentives and benefits subside. If we don't take care of our people in uniform, our civilians and their families, we will not retain the career professionals we need to lead our forces into the next century." I am particularly concerned about the erosion of benefits for our junior enlisted soldiers. I pledge my very best efforts to improve quality of life programs particularly for housing, pay and health care...for single soldiers as well as married soldiers. I will continue to be a supporter of retired soldier benefits as well. I believe the fate of our retirees' benefits will have a long term impact on our recruiting and retention efforts. If we allow the benefits of our retired soldiers to erode, what confidence will our younger soldiers have that their benefits will not disappear after they've completed their service to our Nation?
We are a values based organization. Values are the foundation of this institution....always have been, always will be. Loyalty, duty, selfless service, courage, integrity, respect for human dignity, and a sense of justice are all part of the Army's identity. My experience is that three things are essential for success. First, we must empower our people to do what is right, every day, legally and morally. Second, we must create an environment where people can be all they can be. Third, we must treat others as we would have them treat us. If we do these three things, there are no problems too complex for us to handle. Furthermore, there will be no limit to the amount of good we can do.
One of my top priorities is to generate funds to resource America's Army into the 21st century. The Nation's resources available for defense are limited, but the uncertainties of today require a ready force capable of responding quickly and decisively to protect our Nation's needs. We must work hard at our reengineering efforts to help fund future modernization needs while maintaining our core competencies. This does not necessarily mean do more with less.
We have a window of opportunity to make changes that make us more efficient. We must demonstrate, in everything we do, that we are good stewards of the Nation's resources and the taxpayers' investment in us. This is everyone's responsibility. We must find new and innovative ways to help ourselves. My guess is there are considerable efficiencies out there - and we can harvest them if everyone focuses on this issue. This requires a major change in the way we've run our "business practices" for the past two decades. We must find smarter ways to do business, streamline our management processes, reduce overhead, leverage outside resources, and use what we have more efficiently in order to be more effective.
By eliminating dollars spent on non-value added programs, we can help close the modernization funding gap. Reengineering efforts are already underway. The tremendous reengineering efforts that are ongoing at the MACOM level are focused on improving quality of life without degrading readiness. Similarly, the logistics community is working to create efficiencies that save dollars and provide a tremendous capability to the warfighting CINCs. We need those dollars spent on non-value added programs to be reinvested in our future. We owe that to our soldiers. Bottom line is we will either become more efficient or smaller. We will be forced to become one or the other.
Thirty-three years of service have taught me simple truths about the Army. General Abrams taught us all, "The Army is not made up of people ----the Army is people." That is as true today as it was when he said it. It will continue to be true in the 21st century. The changes we make in peacetime must transition to war. They must serve us on the battlefield. The one thing that all leaders must never forget is that we will someday, somewhere, be called on to put our soldiers in harm's way. We must ensure that they are trained and ready for victory. In this we must not fail.
Return to Articles & Speeches
Last revision: 18 Aug 2008