 Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen and welcome to the Eisenhower presentation Please stand while Chaplain Brigadier General Green invokes the blessing and remain standing for the National Anthem Please bow with me Almighty God We give thanks to you for allowing us to come back together at a USA this year in Your wisdom you called us to a life of service and purpose much bigger than ourselves Be with us as we pause to honor the life and legacy of an exemplary soldier military leader and extraordinary statesman in the person of Dwight David Eisenhower Grant these exceptional non-commissioned officers awarded recipients continued excellence in service to continue to serve our grateful nation for the honor of the recognition bestowed upon them and for their outstanding service and accomplishment our Heavenly Father Make each of them continue to exemplify a winning spirit and may they encourage and influence others to do so as well We humbly ask that you continue to lead and guide each of us gathered here and around the world as we do our parts as Soldiers civilians and leaders to always be ready to support and defend America's ideals values and way of life and made the light of liberty Illuminate our path while in service to our grateful nation and the United States Army People first winning matters army strong Amen By the dawn Ladies and gentlemen the president and CEO of a USA General Robert Brooks Brown. Oh, welcome. It's great to be here. Welcome to the Dwight David Eisenhower presentation And the theme this year America's army and its people transforming for the future There's no other event like this in the world and no other place to learn from and enjoy For more than 650 exhibitors from around the world participating in this year's event along with many professional presentations and resources Available during your three days here. I would like to wreck recognize Several special guests in the audience. First of all our Medal of Honor recipient master sergeant Leroy Petrie Our army leadership. Thank you so much Secretary for being here Obviously the chief has to be here. He has no choice there and and Sergeant major of the army and then we have two former Chiefs of staff with us The 33rd Chief of Staff General Dennis Reimer. Thank you, sir for being here and the 34th Chief of Staff The general Erickson second. Thank you for being here. I would like if if all active Command sergeants major and sergeants majors would please stand the bedrock of the army, please stand up sergeants majors Come on. Don't be shy. There we go Unbelievable and if I do say so you look very sharp and those uniforms. It looks great makes me want to sign up for another 40 years just Unbelievable also like to welcome all of those individuals who have been selected as non commissioned officer of the year and Soldiers of the year at their home stations and all our drill sergeant of the year Recruiter and career counselors of the year and all the other outstanding soldiers with the outstanding NCOs and soldiers Please stand got to be so proud the best of the best here representing their commands But we also have Today very special guests to Olympians, so I'd love to recognize first first lieutenant amber English Gold medalist in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and women's ski and an army reserve soldier and A clutch performance if I do say so to win that gold's a fantastic job and then Staff Sergeant Sandra up to graph Olympian in 2020 Tokyo Olympics and also an army reserve soldier Thanks for joining us. We're really pleased to have all of you with us on this occasion and applaud all the hard work being done out there represented by those folks. We just recognized well traditionally the Army Chief of Staff and Sergeant Major of the Army have used this venue to make presentations of army awards to outstanding soldiers Once we just recognized so if at this time General McConville and Sergeant Major the Army Grinston Will you please position yourselves on the stage and let's recognize some well-deserving soldiers With the recipient of the Stephen Ailes Ralph Haines, Jr. Award, please come to the stage The Stephen Ailes Ralph Haines, Jr. Award is presented annually by the Department of the Army to the outstanding drill sergeant This year Outstanding drill sergeants representing all the United States Army training centers Competed in a headquarters U.S. Army training and doctor-in-command competition for this coveted award The 2021 Army drill sergeant of the year is Sergeant First Class Travis Burkalter with the recipients of the General Maxwell Thurman Recruiting Excellence Award Please come to the stage The General Maxwell Thurman Recruiting Excellence Award is given each year to the Army recruiters of the year During General Thurman's tenure as commanding commander of the U.S. Army Recruiting Command He significantly improved the quality of Army enlistees and helped create the professional Army of today He played a key role in fostering the public's positive perceptions of America's Army and its great soldiers His influence left a mark on Army recruiting and set high standards for today's Army recruiters The non-commissioned officers selected as the top Army recruiters for 2021 from regular Army Staff Sergeant Dungy Kim 6th Recruiting Brigade and from the United States Army Reserve Sergeant First Class Rigoberto Rodriguez Fernandez Metcom with the recipients of the Army Retention Excellence Awards. Please come to the stage The Excellence in Retention Award is given each year to the career counselors of the year Retaining the very best soldiers is critical to the Army's mission of growing and developing leaders for the future Career counselors support Army commanders by identifying and counseling soldiers and non-commissioned officers of their value to the force And potential to serve in positions of increased responsibility in today's and tomorrow's complex world The non-commissioned officers selected as the top Army career counselors for 2021 The Army career counselor of the year is Sergeant First Class Jackie Lord The Army active to reserve career counselor of the year is Sergeant First Class Morgan Smith. I know it's crazy. Can I get the band? Keep going. Hey, we did they're like sir major. It's got to be on script. You can't do anything improvise Yes, we can Sir major the army. This is the army. We can do anything Yesterday during the NCO lunch and we recognized the NCO of the year and You know classic move on off script anything I just wanted to announce starting up crawling. Please stand up the NCO of the year for the Army. I Know we recognize you at lunch, but just in case you missed the answer Everybody was at the NCO and then the soldier of the year specials earnhardt The best soldier we have right there Hey, wait a minute Sergeant Major the soldier of the year competed against hundreds of thousands of other incredible Soldiers in the army and he won Soldier of the year and winning does matter in the army. So Sergeant Major I think he's ready to be a non-commissioned officer or sergeants So you could come up here and in the powers vested me the Chief Staff the Army We're gonna promote you to sergeant right now How about a hand for the newest sergeant in the United States Army? Ladies and gentlemen, please join me in a round of applause for all of our outstanding non-commissioned officers Well, that's that's the best off script. I've ever seen Sergeant majors. Great job Congratulations, so today. We're very proud To have with us the 40th Chief of Staff of the United States Army Since becoming Army Chief of Staff more than two years ago General James McConville has been very clear about his top priority people first He's ensuring the army adjust its policies programs and procedures to take care of people The armor is also going through Significant modernization efforts to ensure our soldiers have the best equipment to win on future battlefields And at the same time maintaining a trained and ready force I'll tell you we're very fortunate. We have the right leader at the right time as our 40th Chief of Staff Gives me great pleasure and a real honor to present General James McConville Chief of Staff of the United States Army. Well, good. Good afternoon and welcome And welcome to everyone is live streaming right now America's Army and its people are Transforming for the future first a special thanks to General Bob Brown my West Point classmate and his team for putting together This fabulous event during a challenging time Bob who would have thought 40 years ago that we'd be here today? But before I begin I'd like to acknowledge the great loss that our army and nation suffered with the recent passing of our 38th Chief of Staff General Ray Odiano after a brave battle with cancer He was an incredible leader and a devoted husband father and grandfather and I considered him a personal mentor for me and always Cherished his sage council So please join me in keeping general low in his family and your thoughts in prayers You know, I'm privileged to work with a great leadership team led by Secretary warmeth and supported by our acting undersecretary Mr. Chris Lohman a vice chief of staff of the army general general Joe Martin Director of the army staff Lieutenant General Walt Piat and Sergeant Major the army Tony Grinston And I'd also like to recognize the army senior Warren officer advisor to the chief of staff of the army the chief's chief CW 5 Dixon Carter Into all the former secretaries our chiefs that are here Vices as well as all the general officers sergeant majors and distinguished guests. Thank you all for joining us today I want to acknowledge our one of our great American heroes master sergeant Leroy Petris. Thank you so much for being here and what you do every single day to continue to represent our army I'd like to thank our Gold star family members for being here today your loved ones gave all and we'll never forget their sacrifice Are yours? I'm pleased to welcome so many of our allies and partners Thank you for coming I'm proud to serve alongside you Finally, I like to recognize general Carter ham as he begins his next chapter in life General ham served his country with honor and distinction for 37 years in uniform and did then did a tremendous job leading this Association for five years his team did a fabulous job of putting on last year's virtual event but it wasn't quite The same as recording this speech in the Pentagon studio Something was missing and that's something was people and I'm so happy to be back here with you today You know the United States Army exists for one reason To protect this great nation from all enemies both foreign and domestic And we do this by being by remaining ready to fight and win the nation's wars as A member of the joint force This has been a unique uniquely challenging time for the army But each challenge in each crisis has only made us stronger and throughout it all We have never waived on our priorities people number one readiness number two in Modernization number three For me people always be The United States Army's greatest strength and most important weapons system our soldiers in the active Army the guard and reserve their families our army surveillance and our soldiers for life our retirees and veterans this past year Has reminded us time and time again Why people are our number one priority and why it's so important to get the right people in the Right place at the right time People like our army medical professionals Scientists and logisticians working to get our nation through this pandemic. It was an American soldier my friend general Gus perner who answered the call to lead the mass production and distribution of COVID vaccines under operation warp speed And it was American soldiers Active duty guard reserve who set up the alternate health the alternate care facilities It was American soldiers who deployed to community hospitals Across the nation and gave hope to exhausted local medical Professionals and it was medical and it was American soldiers Who stood up multiple mass vaccination sites across the country to put actual shots in arms people like Our guard and reserve soldiers in the incredible job. They have done this past year They came to the rescue of their neighbors during multiple natural disasters All the while continue to protect the nation and global operations the Army National Guard and Army Reserve have experienced Unprecedented demand at home and abroad and they are doing a fantastic job People like our army Olympians who we were recognized earlier and again I want to repeat lieutenant English holds distinction of being the first US service member to earn an Olympic gold medal people People like our soldiers from the 82nd airborne Division the 10th Mountain Division the Red Bulls of the Minnesota National Guard and our special operations forces and many other soldiers who supported one the largest evacuation efforts in our history these American soldiers helped evacuate over 120,000 people from Kabul today over 9,000 American soldiers are working with the interagency worldwide to help Afghan families transition to new lives an American soldier Along with 11 Marines and one sailor gave his very life ensuring thousands of others might live there's I had the honor of meeting staff sergeant Ryan Kenosas family and teammates and can I can say with absolute certainty that he represented the very best of Who we are in what we aspire to be as an army? Putting people first means continuing to build cohesive teams that are highly trained Discipline and fit that are ready to fight and win and where each person is treated with dignity and respect Putting people first means aggressively getting after a quality of life priorities Housing health care child care spouse employment and permanent change of station moves Putting people first means progressing with our 21st century Talent management systems initiatives. We are expanding our assessment programs after the success of BCAP battalion commanders in CCAP for kernels to now include sergeant majors acquisition leaders and chaplains This fiscal year will finish rolling out Ips a with all components Integrated into a single personnel system soldiers what will have what I call Component fluidity I can envision a future where soldiers will be able to serve across multiple components According to where they are in their careers and where they are in their lives We are providing opportunities for soldiers to hone and employ their talents that benefit the army the most Last April I visited I visited the newly opened army software factory in Austin, Texas The army needs soldiers who can code under pressure and in the dirt We believe that this talent already existed in the army and our soldiers did not disappoint We are finding hidden talent in the most unexpected places Like an e4 combat medic like an automotive maintenance warrant officer like a former baker Baker and these are self-taught soldiers with PhD level coding skills We are making sure that they keep these skills in the army Because we are aggressively seeking to recruit and retain the talent we need to remain the greatest fighting force in the world Putting people first means taking care of our people so our people can remain ready and Transform for the future Because the United States Army must be ready to fight and win as a member of the joint force in order to protect the nation That means fighting while being contested in every single domain If you look at the best combat units in history Everywhere in the world you'll find individuals in small units who are masters of their craft And so we will remain ready by focusing on foundational readiness That means building units from the soldier up. That means we give squad leaders Batoon leaders and company commanders the time and resources They need to build cohesive teams that are highly trained Discipline and fit so they can fight and win That means building our battalions and brigades upon that foundation to create an army that is ready for large-scale combat operations an army that is agile and adaptive in contested environments We are changing our radius model across the force effective this month We will officially adopt the originally aligned readiness and modernization model that we call Riyam Riyam regionally aligns our units with combatant commands to deepen institutional knowledge Riyam increases predictability for our people by getting our units in the cycles for training deployment and modernization Riyam will enable us to take care of our people without Sacrificing readiness for today and while transforming to stay ready for tomorrow because United States Army Must transform for the future and we are and I argue the army must transform About every 40 years in the 1940s. We transform for World War two under General Marshall 40 years later in the late 70s and early 80s General shy Meyer over sorrow what he called One of the most ambitious Transformations the army has ever attempted in peacetime to a large degree. That is the army we've fought with since General Maya was the chief of staff of the army when I when I came in to the United States Army and today We are following in his footsteps as we undergo our greatest transformation Since his time and it's fitting that we'll honor him tomorrow at Allington National Cemetery When he is laid to rest with honors The battlefield is becoming faster. It's becoming more lethal. It's becoming more distributed Overmatch will belong to the side that can make better decisions Faster and we are transforming to provide the joint force with the speed the range and the Convergence of cutting-edge technologies to gain decision dominance in overmatch We will need to win the next fight and when I say speed and range I'm not just talking about the speed and range of a single weapon system But of the entire process as some of you may know I used to command a division that had a lot of helicopters And when I learned it was great that a helicopters could fly a hundred miles per hour But if it took us 10 hours to plan an execute a mission our net speed was 10 miles per hour We might as well driven a truck at a lot less cost so We are transforming our doctrine In March we released chief of staff the army paper number one Army multi-domain transformation in the upcoming months. We'll update our capstone doctrine with a new FM 3.0 We are transforming our command control systems to support multi-domain operations in joint all-domain operations that means working with our sister services in the development of Combined joint all-domain command control or CJAD C2 And I will continue to add a C to JAD C2 because a joint force Never wants to fight alone. We are stronger when we fight alongside our allies and partners The army's contribution to CJAD C2 is convergence Projects convergences are in the dirt Experimentation to inform how the army will fight and organize in the future by linking all sensors to the best shooter Through the right C2 node and last year army futures command hosted the inaugural Project convergence 20 at Yuma proven ground and that was really about the army getting his all sensors and shooters integrated in right This year as I speak project convergence 21 PC 21 has expanded to include the joint force and the lessons we learn will inform the joint warfighting concept PC 21 incorporates over a hundred technologies across more than 20 sites with over 5,000 participants PC 21 will consist of seven scenarios what we call use cases Is that as an example one of those use cases is the joint air and missile defense? Something we're very concerned about if there's an incoming missile attack first We want our systems to be able to identify Then we want our systems to determine the best shooter and not just between army weapons systems But between services is the best shooter a navy sm6 or an army Patriot missile these are the kind of options We want to give our combatant commanders and these are the kind of dilemmas that we want to give our potential adversaries That's what the decision dominance is about being able to take a tremendous amount of data and Act on it at the speed of relevancy in tens of seconds instead of tens of minutes Next year for project convergence We'll expand again to include the combined force our allies and partners We continue to transform our organizations all six security forces system brigades are now operational All of our five active duty s-fabs are aligned with the combatant commands and our National Guard S-fab will support each of these these units are critical for developing partner capabilities and enduring Relationships because the United States Army never fights alone Last month in Germany. We activated the Army's second multi-demand task force the first of its kind in Europe Our MDTFs provide commanders with long-range precision effects including intelligence Information cyber electronic warfare and space operations and they will provide long-range precision fires capable of penetrating enemy a2 ad defenses sinking ships and establishing friendly a2 ad Defenses and we continue to transform our training to harness virtual and augmented realities our efforts are already paying off One world terrain one of our 31 plus 4 signature systems provides deep detailed 3d replicas of Locations throughout the world two months ago the 82nd Airborne Division used it to recreate the Kabul Airport and facilitate evacuations from Afghanistan that is amazing and we are transforming our equipment and I think of equipment modernization efforts in terms of three distinct categories legacy enduring in future Legacy systems equip the army of the past and we are the vesting of legacy systems Endurance systems equip today's army will play a key role in tomorrow's army Weapon systems like the Abrams tank the Apache helicopter the black Hawk helicopter pallet of PIM and Patriot missile systems. We're incrementally improving These enduring systems to keep them relevant to the future fight Future systems are necessary to equip the multi-domain army of tomorrow, and this is where we are transforming These are our six modernization priorities in 31 plus 4 Signature systems, and I'd like to give you a quick update on the great progress that we are making With long-range precision fires last month We failed at the first prototype of our extended range cannon artillery Urca for testing in an FY 23 We will field hypersonic missiles our ships sinking mid-range capability in our precision strike missile systems prism With next-generation combat vehicle this year We are building physical prototypes of the optionally man fighting vehicle We are testing eight prototypes for the robotic combat vehicle ahead of its original schedule This year soldiers are testing our next light tank mobile protective firepower in the first unit will receive the armored multi-purpose vehicle this year With the guards of future vertical lift the first prototype of fire our future attack reconnaissance aircraft will fly In the third quarter of FY 23 We accelerated our future long-range assault aircraft program and flora will choose a prototype later this year The army network, you know the army network may not be our Official number one priority, but it underpins all of our modernization efforts It must be resilient It must be reliable, and it must be able to operate in the dirt in a contested environment This is the heart of project convergence And when it comes to air and missile offense this year We will field the integrated air and missile offense battle command system last April We began fielding our first maneuver sure-rad air defense systems M sure-rad two weeks ago We awarded prototyping authority for the indirect fire protection capability and soon we will field prototypes of directed energy based counter uas systems because I believe that enemy Unmanned aerial systems are the IEDs of the future Last but certainly not least soldier lethality our soldiers are currently using in testing I vast the integrated visual visual augmentation system We continue to field the enhanced night vision goggle binocular system Which gives our soldiers better depth perception? Rapid target acquisition and augmented reality and all weather and all lighting conditions in this fiscal year We are failing our next-generation squad weapons systems all told All told we will have 24 and I say get 24 of our 31 plus four single systems in the hands of soldiers by FY 23 America's army and its people are Transforming for the future and I like to end with an update to a story. I told the last time I was on the stage Two years ago. I told you about an American hero named Jim Peewee Martin a member of the greatest Generation in a screaming eagle who jumped into Normandy on D-Day at the young age of 23 and he fought across Europe with his band of brothers And I had the honor meet Jim when he jumped back into Normandy for the 70th anniversary of D-Day at the ripe age of 73 years old and Two years ago. I told you jumped in again for the 75th anniversary of operation market garden It was 98 years old Wow This year. I'm happy to report that Jim is still going strong and last April. He celebrated his hundredth birthday Near his home in Ohio with Peewee's jump fest a mass parachute reenactment Celebrating Jim and his fellow 101st veterans Now we stand on the shoulders of heroes like Jim Peewee Martin and every one of us in uniform carries an obligation to live up to their legacies and To the men and women of the United States Army past and present You are doing just that And let me take a moment to speak directly to the soldiers and soldiers for life who served in Afghanistan over the past 20 years What you did matters and what you did made a difference and nothing will ever change that You did your job and you did it incredibly well And you can be proud of your service and combat because I in American people Certainly are and I could not be more proud to serve with the greatest soldiers in the world's greatest army And it remains my honor to be your 40th chief of staff Because in the army, it's about people first winning does matter and we do remain Army strong. Thank you. Well, thank you very much chief powerful words We stand ready to support you the secretary of the army and your team as you lead The army that's for certain before we conclude Let me encourage you to visit the military exhibits the contemporary military forums and the demonstrations as well as the Industry exhibits located in the convention center. It's a great chance to exchange ideas and learn something new So we'll see you down on the event in the exhibit floor. Thanks again for joining us