 That is an engineer's dream, too. Okay, thanks. Okay, do we have a question in the back there? Jim Rohachek from National Security and Space Solutions, and thank you for your service, sir. My question relates to space, and I would like, if you could, expound a little bit on your space programs and how we're going to allow them to be robust in a constrained budget environment. Maybe I should ask you how you're going to make them affordable. Sir, I did that. I know, I know. Well, no, the company that I worked for, I was the Washington rep, we delivered our products to within two to three percent cost and schedule. I understood. And that was unusual. Of course, we were a victim of our own success and we were bought out. I understand. And maybe if you can elaborate on things like operationally responsive space, GPS-3, and any other advance... Let me start big and then maybe get a little bit smaller. I think, Bob Kale, I am not the expert... Please sit down, sir. I'm not the expert on space. I meant that up front is, you know, you come to a job like this and you find you have lots of blind spots and, you know, working hard to become more familiar naturally with the space enterprise. But I think Bob Kale has one thing right here. We have had a temptation to design and try to build the most exquisite systems. And we've proven we can do that. And they have a place in certain instances. But I think my observation is we went way over to the right aiming limit on trying to build too many things on the same bus, too much capability into these billion-dollar platforms. And I think John Kale or the Commander of our Air Force Space Command has the right idea when we talk about being a little bit less ambitious. And I think that's the path we're on. And frankly, I think that's what happened with TSAT. You know, the demand signal for TSAT was probably legitimate, you know? But the truth is that TSAT was a $20 billion program. You know, you're going to get an exquisite platform to be sure with lots of IP capability and all that, but it was going to cost half the nation's treasury. And the question was and remains, was that affordable in the big scheme of things? The conclusion was it was not. And so the decision was to recycle back to proven platforms, AHF, WGS, that won't be as nifty and have some limitations, but are not bad. And so I think the first comment would be there's going to be a lot more of not bad than there is of wow. Okay. There's a question here, but I should remind just everyone that actually in general, the entire proceedings evening are on the record, so just to remind you and the working journalists in the audience, but this question. Good evening, General. Tom Bell with the Boeing Company. Disclaimer first, I was writing as fast as I can and I don't have my glasses. But I think you said that the enduring needs going forward for the Air Force are constant ISR, Connecticut, not a Connecticut distance, command and control in all domains, and then guaranteeing freedom of movement. I have a personal philosophy that every list portrays a priority. So I'd like to ask is that the priority list and if so, can you talk about the shift that that portends? I think it is. Are the fundamental tenants of an effective Air Force for the United States? Our priorities, as you were well aware, are a bit more pedestrian than that. Okay. We can talk sort of philosophically about it, but number one is get nuke right. You know, all of you here know that Mike Donnelly and I came to these jobs somewhat unexpectedly. And one of the first mandates was to make the nuclear enterprise right and we're doing that. Second thing clearly has to do with taking care of our airmen and their families and especially our wounded. In fact, some of you may know, you perhaps heard, we lost a first lieutenant in Afghanistan last night and she'll return to Dover this evening. I guess a 2006 grad from the Air Force Academy, an all-American lacrosse player, intelligence officer working outside the wire, an IED incident north of Kabul. That's all in, but to take care of them and their families. And the third piece of this naturally is the equipage part. And we can certainly talk about the each as if you'd like to, but ISR is a growth industry. Cyber is a growth industry. And I think the last thing to mention, and some of you have heard me perhaps mention this before, is the whole proposition of acquisition excellence and that's where the acquisition improvement plan came from. The reputation of our Air Force depends a lot on how well we acquire major systems. And some of the folks here in this room can help us with this. But the bottom line is clearly the one thing that wasn't mentioned but it was implied in those four imperatives that you talked about is reaching out and building partner capacity. This is another area that we have to have a greater presence. And that's not a whole lot of people. It's not a whole lot of money, but it is a whole lot of focus with the right skills and language and cultural orientation and the ability to relate to other Air Forces in a way that isn't just with F-16s or F-15s or F-22s. That's how I'd sort of cut it. Thank you, General Schwartz. Tim Davidson, Davidson Consulting Services. Last week, General Conway talked about developing AC-130s for the Marine Corps last year and a presentation at NDIA. General Wooster talked about AC-27s for the Air Force. Can you talk a little bit about that close air support from the Air Force standpoint in light of all the budget changes? Thank you. I think that the AC-27 was a good idea but got forced out in the larger scheme of trying to make things fit. And so the notion is, Tim, that Donnie Wooster is now going to have to use eight of his currently possessed platforms, eight MC-130Ws, which will be converted to gunship platforms with the same avionics and the same weapons that would have gone on the AC-27. It's simply an affordability issue, in my view. Now, he may give you a different answer, but that's kind of how I see it. The truth is, and you know that the Marines are organized in a way where they have come to believe that dedicated direct support aviation is integral to their success. And clearly, Jim Conway appreciates the value of long-dwell close air support platforms. Now, long-dwell close air support platforms aren't any time, any place machines, as you know. But certainly, in a permissive environment, they have great advantage, and that's certainly the setting which we are in at least for the foreseeable future. So he doesn't want a high-end machine. What he wants is something that's modular so he can use his airplanes to do lift or evacuation or whatever is necessary. But I think he's on to something when he wants to say that his Marine Corps needs a long-dwell close air support platform. General, let me take the privilege of the floor and ask you, you talked at one point about the demands that you're finding now for persistent intelligence and surveillance. Obviously, General Casey and his Army planners are talking a lot about a world of persistent conflict. As you look at your planning in the force structure and demands on personnel, what kind of stresses are you finding? I mean, obviously, we've heard some of them, but as you look at the out years and how that's affecting your planning, how is this notion of persistent irregular operations really, do you think going to affect your thinking going into this QDR and as you look at longer-term planning? I think the bottom line for us is money is tight. There's no question about it. But I must tell you that the really precious resource is manpower. And we may call the Reapers and Predators unmanned aerial systems, but they're hardly unmanned. We have, they're remotely piloted, perhaps, but there are lots of folks, both in terms of the immediate ops of these platforms and most importantly on the back end, processing the data feed from these platforms and transforming that into actionable intelligence. It's significant. So I think the real challenge for us is managing our human capital in a way that gives us the best possible capability. And an example is, at the moment, we fly one predator with one, or actually a crew, one crew, at one ground control station. Now, that is a very neanderthal way to operate, in my opinion. Ideally, we would be able to operate more than one pred from the same ground station with one crew. And that is achievable, I think. You know, the lesson I took, just quick vignette, I visited the Port of Singapore in another life. The Port of Singapore downloads container ships, maybe not right now, but when things were as busy as they were a couple of years ago. Seven cranes on a major container ship. It has done one operator in shirt sleeves and back in an office setting operates four cranes. And the way they do this is by, he only worries about the first four feet and the last four feet. So he gets the container up to four feet off the ship. It goes on automatic. When it gets back down from four feet away from the flatbed, he's back on it. And this thing is sequenced in a way that he can run those four cranes by himself from a shirt sleeve setting. Now, if you go to Long Beach, California, we have four longshoremen on every one of our cranes. Four. So it takes, and there's only four per ship. So there's 16 longshoremen associated with unloading a ship at Long Beach when there's two, when Singapore, and it's done twice as fast. This is not rocket science. We can do the same thing with operating unmanned aerial systems and we'll have to in order to meet the demands of the future as we see it. Pool, maybe we'll pool several of them if you could just tell them in the back, take the microphone. And shorter is better. Hi, General. Michael Bruno with aviation week. I heard you say this morning I've been a subscriber for 35 years if that helps. If you could put out a memo to the whole service that everyone else went to, we'd appreciate that. After I retire. Thank you, sir. I heard you say this morning we're at a turning point in regards to unmanned combat vehicles. I'm sorry, unmanned aircraft. And I was wondering if you could paint the picture of what that will look like in the future. Will they all have to be stealthy? Will they only be combat aircraft? Will there be transport unmanned combat? How would you say? We'll be just pool a few more and you can actually then answer the ones you like. Well, let me just hit this real quick. Let me just give you a quick vignette. If you were Fred Smith from FedEx, what would you be thinking about how to make your business even better? Maybe remotely piloted cargo aircraft. Is that that far-fetched? I don't think so. And even just he. However, would we ever get to the point where we would have remotely piloted passenger carrying aircraft? I doubt it. And so I think the point here is there isn't a single solution set. It depends. And it applies in the military context as well. I thought I saw another hand in the back there. Yes, I'll show them actually. Why don't we take those two questions and then we'll go to the panel. For example. Okay. Forgive me. For example. General would like to revise and extend his remarks. Yes. Thank you. I think we have to think seriously about if we have a nuclear capable bomber, would we be comfortable with a nuclear capable bomber being unmanned? It's a serious question. Thank you. General Cecil Blank of the Boeing Company. Thank you for your service as well as the service of all of which you lead. Mostly them. Julie. We are led to believe that there are quite a number of major decisions for the QDR. And you've got a little over 60 days counting nights and weekends before that process needs to come to a close. And I'm wondering if you could give us a feel for some of the kinds of major decisions that you believe can be brought to a decision at that time. One is long range strike. Clearly. The sector of defense was not comfortable with where we were on the next generation bomber. But I think that there is a consensus in the department that there is an enduring requirement for long range strike. The problem is how do we define it? And he wasn't comfortable with where we were. And you were at the hearing this morning. I mean it's a combination of things. It's range. It's payload. Is it low observable or very low observable? Is it manned or is it unmanned? Is it nuclear or is it non-nuclear? I mean the parameters need to be defined to his satisfaction. This is a vital outcome in my view of both QDR and NPR. An example. I don't know yet. I believe it needs to be VLO. I believe that we should not build T-SAT in the process. So it probably means a moderate range capability and a moderate payload. And I think that it's probably nuclear. Nuclear capable. And if that's the case, it's probably manned. Okay? But the Secretary is not there yet. And we'll have to work to persuade both him and the decision makers in the building on what the right thing is. Good evening, General. Doug Scott, Hawker Beechcraft. With respect to equipment and partners, when do you expect to see a funded program start for a concept like OAX to be visible in the budget? Sooner than you think. I think it's possible in 11 and certainly in 12. And this is not going to be sort of, you know, multiple, multiple squadrons, I don't think. But I think it is likely and will, the Air Force leadership will be meeting early next month to consider both the scale and the content of a capability that would allow us to build partner capacity with machines that are readily assimilated, that can be assimilated by our partners. And as I indicated, there are a couple of candidates out there for that sort of thing. One of them is yours, but it's not the only one. So work hard. Before we, and we're going to turn now to our panel discussion, General Schwartz has kind of agreed to stay with us on the least part of that discussion. I want to thank you very much, sir, for taking time to join us. This is a challenging time for all the services. And I know we do have a small token of our appreciation. One of your predecessors thought that when he was invited to the Rolls-Royce Forum, that he perhaps, there was something that came with it. And as generous as our sponsors are at Rolls-Royce, they have not provided us with vehicles provided by. However, they have come up with this very nice keychain, which has a nifty light on it. I thought I might get an alternate engine. And it does meet the ethics requirements. So we're not going to go over that. Thank you, sir. Thank you for joining us.