 Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. On behalf of the presiding officer, Major General Andrew Jibara, 8th Air Force and Joint Global Strike Operations Center, welcome to today's change of command ceremony, in which command of the National Airborne Operations Center and 595th Command and Control Group will pass from Colonel Brian Golden to David Lamont. I am Captain Bradley Watovic, now be your narrator for today's ceremony. Throughout the ceremony, you'll be given cues to stand and be seated at the appropriate time. Military members are reminded to stand at attention during the playing of the ruffles and flourishes and the National Anthem. During the National Anthem, we invite our civilian guests to stand and place their right hand over their heart. At this time, I would like to recognize the family of our official party. Colonel Golden's spouse, Dr. Jennifer Golden. Colonel Lamont's family, including his spouse, Mrs. Wendy Lamont, his brother, Lieutenant Colonel Walter Lamont, United States Army retired and sister, Joelle Kendrick. We are also honored to have the following distinguished guests in attendance. Honorable Paul Lambert, Mayor, City of Platsmouth. Chief Master Sergeant Steve Sennoff, Command Chief, 8th Air Force. Colonel Mark Howard, Vice Commander, 55th Wing. Chief Master Sergeant Brian Tuman, Command Chief, 55th Wing. Mr. Tim Burke, NAOC and 595th Command Control Group Co-Commander. Mr. Michael Cardoza, NAOC and 595th Command Control Group Executive Director. Captain James Zuleas, Deputy Commander, NAOC. Colonel Raphael Vargas, Team Chief 1, NAOC Operations. And finally, Colonel Jason Yates, Team Chief 2, NAOC Operations. In addition, we extend a special welcome to all Commanders, Directors and Chiefs for being here or joining us virtually to share in this special occasion. Ladies and gentlemen, please stand for the arrival of the official party, the playing of ruffles and flourishes and remain standing for the playing of the national anthem by the United States Heartland of America Band and the invocation. Gracious and mighty God, thank you for the countless blessings you have shown on our nation and for placing leader before us. As we gather here this morning to witness the changing of the National Airborne Operations Center, 595th Command and Control Group. Command from Colonel Brian Golden to Colonel David Laman. We ask your blessing upon all who are gathered here and pray that you will be with us as this transfer of responsibility. We pass and realize that all authority ultimately comes from you. Therefore, we give you thanks for the work and the faithful leadership of Colonel Golden and his wife, Dr. Jennifer Golden. As you have skillfully and faithfully served this group to both a great accomplishment as well as time that tried the better soul of man. From Colonel Golden, Infection Energy and Adages to Jennifer Cleming Smiling, this leadership team has been your faithful servant and a family who care about every person of this team and the community. Colonel Golden has challenged us in many ways to grow from the good to great and ask for your empowerment as the team continues on the journey to excellence. As Colonel Golden takes on the new responsibility as a new Judy Station, we ask you to continue to use him and his family to make as much of a positive difference in the community as they have in a new home. Please impress on him and the memory of the job well done. Grandfavorite and the smooth transition give insight for a new upcoming challenge. Bless them with the strength and endurance in obtaining and leading order to success. And now, Lord, we welcome our new command team, Colonel David Laman and his wife, Wendy Laman. We are blessed with the new leadership team who also care about people who understand all the mission of this team, who are ready and continues to lead the 595 Commander Control. Lord, we ask your blessing upon Colonel Laman as you take command of this outstanding team. May you grant him your wisdom and strength in understanding how to lead men and women of this group. Also, may we dedicate ourselves to support Colonel Laman as we accomplish this mission together, know that the best day is to come. And now, I ask for your continuous blessing and protection on the people of the United States, especially on those who are deploying and serving in the home way. Please help our visitor get home safely today. We ask all of this day and your holy name. Amen. Ladies and gentlemen, please be seated. Thank you to the Heartland of America Band for that beautiful rendition of the National Anthem and Chapin Quay for your inspirational prayers and blessings. It is now my pleasure to introduce to you the Commander, Eighth Air Force and Joint Global Strike Operations Center, Major General Andrew Jabara. He's a little taller than me. Good morning, everybody. That was pretty good, but we can do better. Good morning, everybody. It's a big day. It's a great day. What a great honor to join you all on such a great Nebraska day. It is so nice to be back in the good life. Chaplain, thanks for the invocation and for the thoughtful words. And I know we already thanked them, but we can't thank them enough. Let's hear it again for the Heartland of America Band. Pretty awesome. What a pleasure it is today to officiate the ceremony and take part in that time-honored tradition. As we say farewell to Colonel Brian Golden, the outbound commander, and welcome, Colonel Dave Lamont, the incoming commander. Before we do that, I do want to take a moment to take a special welcome. Mr. Mayor, thank you so much for joining us today. Colonel Howard, thank you very much. I think it speaks volumes of the relationship with the fight in 55th and the installation in the 595th that you're here today. Thank you very much. For Milton's wife, Wendy, wonderful to see you again. Thanks for coming out and being part of this, of course. Walter and Joelle, thank you as much for making the trip all the way from Kentucky. Not an insignificant amount of time. Thank you very much. Sergeant Major, did I see you sneaking back there? Thank you very much for joining us. I really appreciate it. You're a busy guy, and it means a lot to us that you're here today. Thank you very much. To all other family, to friends, the soldiers, the sailors, the Marines, the airmen, the guardians of the 595th and the NAACC, to those at Stratcom, to those at the Greater Off-It Air Force Base, thank you for attending this ceremony. One more thanks before we keep going to all those that made this ceremony possible, because these are not insignificant events. Thank you very much for all those people that made that happen. Jen, you good? All right. Awesome. I just want to publicly state how much we appreciate the sacrifices you and Brian have undergone in service. So we get paid for this, you don't. That's not lost on me at all, but you've given quite a bit to this group, and so thank you very much for doing that. It means a great deal to our country. Yeah, I think that is a clap. All right, today we do it again. We're about to repeat the ceremony that is so symbolic of both the adventure and the responsibilities of command. Now, we've done ceremonies like this before, but that doesn't make it any less of an honor today. And it is more than just symbolic, by the way. We are passing responsibility and accountability from one officer to another. If right now, five minutes before we pass this flag, just hypothetically, a 500-year flood devastated the region, and I'm just saying it might happen. I'm not saying it will happen. If that was to happen and we had to move the aircraft, the E-4, the E-6, and what are we going to do about sacks and all the rest, we would all look to Colonel Brian Golden to do what he's done so well over the last two years, to give us a path forward and get us to success. But if that same event happened about two minutes later, we would ask Brian to step aside and Milton would be, we would be looking to him for answers on what to do. And so it isn't just symbolic, it's actually extremely important. And it's very exciting to be part of that. Now, the 595th command and control group has a varied and fascinating history, and some of you are part of that organization, and you know that, but I'd just like to just kind of go over it for those of you that haven't. So, first airborne command and control squadron was actuated over 53 years ago in 1969, and the squadron operated what was then called the NECAP, the National Emergency Airborne Command Post out of Andrews. It moved off it in the late 70s, and during that time the Joint Staff Element was added. In 92 after the collapse of the former Soviet Union, Stratcom stood up, became the command and E-4 aircraft, and the mission set fell there. In 94, NECAP was renamed the National Airborne Operations Center, which was of course what we call it today, and the purpose of that renaming was to recognize that over time more and more missions had been added to that platform, and we wanted to recognize the entire range of national level responsibilities of that aircraft. But of course the missions didn't end just because we renamed it. We kept growing in mission set. The following year that E-4 was designated to do the primary means of providing sector travel and command and control during his or her overseas activity. Now in 2016, Air Force Global Strike Command took over that critical mission set from Air Combat Command. Commander of the NAAC was dual-hatted as the group commander of the 595th, and the group you know today was formed. Now, of course it does include first acts, but it has grown to include 625th Stoss, which provides our nation's only survivable means to launch ICBM Force, as happened just yesterday. Pretty cool. Very successful launch. As well as our retargeting capability, the 595th strategic comm squadron, which of course puts the C2 and C2G, and then of course the AMXS that has the not insignificant task of keeping these Cold War era platforms safe and reliable as well. And that persistent success all comes down to the hardworking men and women of these organizations. I will say they make it look incredibly easy, but of course we in this room know there's nothing easy about it. It's actually incredibly difficult, even under the best of conditions. Now Brian, you good? I know you are. You're great. You've been a tremendous leader for this organization at a critical time. You've set a course for Milton that's going to achieve, allow him to get to the next level by thinking critically about the future. You've scanned for opportunities. You've advocated for those critical needs. You've never been shy about picking up the phone and talking to me when you needed something for this group. You and your team navigated Lincoln operations, which is a huge feat in and of itself. You continued during COVID ops, and you brought on the first ever E4 simulator, which as DOD counts it in absolutely record time to be a game-changing training event. So well done. And that was in addition to the multiple modifications and the initiatives we've done on E4, on E6 for ALSI, and our NC3 assets. So again, well done. It wasn't easy, but nothing worthwhile ever is easy. Thank you for your efforts for the men and women. Their accomplishments are testaments to your leadership ability. Best of luck. Enjoy your time at Stratcom, and you'll be back in Air Force Global Strike Command before you know it. Now, welcome to Team Lamont. The choice of who to take command of the 595th and the NAOC mission was not a light decision. We're very fortunate to have Milton take over as commander. Her Lamont has most recently served as the Joint Staff as the Assistant Deputy Director for Nuclear and Homeland Defense Ops. In the parlance, it's the ADD of J36, which I'm here to tell you, having worked in that organization is a very, very difficult job. He was one of only two Joint Staff reps to the Nuclear Posture Review Development. He's a nuclear subject matter expert, which served him very well in the Russia-Ukraine conflict in the beginning days when we had a lot of uncertainty about what was going to happen, I'm sure. He's a B-52 weapons instructor. He understands NC2. He understands NC3. He understands unidentified aerial phenomenon, space control, understands Patriot missile defense allocation. He understands continuity of operations. Wow. We are very lucky to onboard that expertise into the group, and there's lots to do. So we're going to put you to work in that. For Wendy, just as I said for Jen, I want to thank you in advance for the sacrifices you're going to make for our country. It's not lost on me that we don't pay you to do this. You do this out of the kindness of your heart because you love your spouse and you understand the importance of the work, and it takes a special person to do that. So thank you very much for doing that. I know you've sacrificed a lot of time from your spouse for us. I am going to tell you we are going to ask a little bit more over the next two years, but I predict you guys are going to love it. Dave, you are hand-selected for your reputation, for tapping the mission with efficiency and tenacity. I know you're not going to just leverage and build on the solid foundation that Brian left you, but you're going to make it even better. You've been in the seat of command before, second OSS at Mark Steylor Force Base, so you know what it is to command. You understand the importance of the duties that you're going to embark upon, and how much the men and women of your commander are going to be counting on you to do the right things. Today we entrust the 595th and the dedicated airmen and families to you. I am absolutely confident in the choice and we're very excited for it. It's going to be awesome. Trust your gut, ask the tough questions, and sustain the culture of excellence. Good luck. Team Le Mans, today is a big day. Look around. All this is for you. A lot of people have put time into it because they want to thank you in advance. Enjoy this day. The change of command day is all about the commander and the family. The other 729 days are about the men and women of the organization. You ready? All right, let's do this. We've got people out there that need us. Thank you very much. Thank you, General Jabara. Ladies and gentlemen, please stand for the presentation of the Defense Superior Service Medal to Colonel Brian D. Golden. Attention to orders. To all who shall see these presents, greetings. This is to certify that the United States of America has on this day awarded the Defense Superior Service Medal to Colonel Brian D. Golden for exceptionally superior service from 9 July 2020 to 15 August 2022. Colonel Brian D. Golden, United States Air Force, distinguished himself by exceptionally superior service as commander, National Airborne Operations Center and 595th Command and Control Group off of Air Force Base, Nebraska from July 2020 to August 2022. During this period, Colonel Golden's leadership led to profound advances in enhancing synchronization with the executive branch of government, overcoming a global pandemic and runway closure. He led over 800 personnel executing nine presidential support missions and nine global command and control missions while restructuring his staff and proving unit effectiveness and garnering support from senior levels of government. Additionally, he guided modernization of the strategic automated command and control systems Cold War Air Equipment, the first of their kind. He procured the E-4B simulator, virtual airborne procedures trainer and satellite-based intercontinental ballistic missile targeting capability. Finally, he led efforts for the future survivable airborne operations center and transformed post-attack concepts, ensuring uninterrupted national level support. The distinctive accomplishments of Colonel Golden reflect great credit upon himself, the United States Strategic Command, United States Air Force and the Department of Defense. Ladies and gentlemen, please be seated. It is now my pleasure to introduce to you Colonel Brian Golden. General Gibera, thank you very much for your kind words and making eye here for this ceremony. It means a lot to Jen and I and the entire Mission 1 team for you to be here. To the co-commanders in the audience, thank you very much, Mary, Sue, Tim, and the others that weren't able to make it. We can't do our mission set without support of our community as well, so Mayor, thank you very much for that. As General Gibera talked about, for instance, able to get a simulator in Lovista in record time in 15 months is really unheard of, and why it's unheard of is because we reached out to the community and you guys took care of it for us, so that is great. So thank you very much for that that type of support as well, and thank you for the big fancy gala event that you helped us put on to honor all the men and women over the last six decades that supported the NICAP and NAAC and ex-cued those missions, so thank you very much. Katie and Chilly and Chief Thunman, thank you very much for all the support from the 55th Wing. Obviously can't get anywhere without you, and the Lincoln Ops is a testament to your team to work through all those things, and taking care of our men and women so we don't have to grunt through that, so thank you very much for doing that for us. The front office staff, when I got into the seat, I said we will be efficient, we will be effective, but what that meant is that they had to do a lot of work for the position, not for Brian Golden, but for the position of the commander, and that trickled down to the rest of the organization, so admin is not the crisis. I've been in enough admin jobs, you never want that to be the crisis, so we could focus on the mission and focus on taking care of our men and women, so when we were working on promotion packages or word packages like that, it went smoothly, make sure that we were able to recognize everyone, so thank you very much for that. Those are Jay-Z and all your processors as well, thank you very much for making this happen for the team. I mean there's been a lot of times I've been traveling and you guys just took it and ran with it, so thank you very much for that, and all the deputy group commanders and the squadron commanders as well, doing a great job of taking care of the men and women, so that is just an amazing mission set, and you heard the John DeBarre talk about how so diverse a mission set is, it's not just an aircraft-related mission set, there is nuclear command control, there are ICBM targeting, our team flies on the back of Stratcom's jet, we have the whole gamut of NC2 and NC3, so thank you very much for all your leadership as well for that. Chiefs couldn't do this without you as well, I'm blessed to have two chiefs and they do an excellent job of taking care of the men and women and also looking out for me, so thank you very much for looking out for Jenna and I and all the men and women. The key spouses can't do any of this work either outside the office without the support of our family and friends, and that also translates to the key spouse network, so thank you very much for taking care of us and our men and women outside of the workplace, and it's just, it's amazing when you have to go home and have a tough day, and just kind of working through that stuff, so thank you Dan, appreciate it, anybody knows me, I'm actually kind of pretty long-winded, but right now I can't because I'll just start bawling, because that's how much you mean to me and mean to the rest of the men and women mission one. And lastly, this is a testament that everyone was able to come out to celebrate the Le Mans on their next adventure, all the success, Wendy and Dave, that you guys are going to have. I came into this job and all I wanted to do is just leave it better than I found. It's all yours. Thank you Colonel Golden. A change of command ceremony is a military tradition deeply rooted in history. Dating back to July 3rd, 1775, when General George Washington drew his sword under an elm tree in Cambridge, Massachusetts, to assume command of the Continental Army. During the American Revolution, military units carried distinctive flags designed to match the color of their uniforms and emblazoned with their unit motto. When soldiers followed their leader into battle, this flag referred to as unit colors, provided a highly visible point around which members of the unit could rally. Because of its importance, the colors were used in the earliest change of command ceremonies to symbolize the commander's authority and that tradition continues today. Our flag bearers for today's ceremony are Chief Master Sergeant Robin Price, Senior Enlisted Leader, National Airborne Operations Center, and Chief Master Sergeant Joseph Krusek, Senior Enlisted Leader, 595th Command and Control Group. The passing of the NAOC and 595th Command and Control Group organizational flags symbolize the responsibility, authority, and accountability from Colonel Brian Golden to Colonel David Lamont. Ladies and gentlemen, please stand for the change of command. Attention to orders from headquarters Joint Global Strike Operations Center, Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana, Special Order Number Gulf 22-12 by direction of the President. Colonel Brian D. Golden will relinquish command of the National Airborne Operations Center and 595th Command and Control Group to Colonel David C. Lamont. Effective, 16 August 2022, signed Major General Andrew J. Jabara. Thank you. Please be seated. Ladies and gentlemen, it is my distinct pleasure to introduce to you the commander, National Airborne Operations Center and 595th Command and Control Group, Colonel David Lamont. Good morning, everybody. I didn't expect one thing to be mentioned this morning in General Jabara's comments. It's the unmanned aerial phenomena. I wasn't expected in this audience, and it brought up a funny story I thought I'd share to kind of break the ice. But Wendy told me, I don't care what you're told throughout your career, there's only one thing that you have to tell me. If you ever hear anything about aliens, you have to tell me. And so lo and behold, it became kind of awkward when I was on the joint staff. But hello, everyone. We're so happy to be here. And we live in Omaha, work in Bellevue, and traveling around through Plasmith, and seeing all of the people here, everyone is so nice. It reminds me of my hometown in South Carolina. And so it already feels like home. General Jabara, thank you for your comments, sir. Your kind words and your trust in your leadership. I look forward to looking to learning from you, as I work for you, sir. And leading this incredibly important mission set. Mayor Lambert, thank you, sir. It's nice to have you here. And Chief Sinov, nice to meet you today. Carl Howard, and Chief Tuman, and Tim Burke. It's kind of the home team here at Offit. And I look forward to working with y'all over the next several years. Also, I'd like to again thank Chaplain Cui. Thank you for your words. And for the Heartland of America band, Fantastic Job. And also for Captain Wetzvic and Lieutenant Kayton and your team for putting this together. It's a fantastic job. It's great to have family here as well. My brother Walt, my sister Joelle, as mentioned, already came all the way in from Kentucky. But we'll get to see each other that often. And it's great. I cherish every moment we have together. And then, of course, Wendy, my better half. You make everything that I do in my job possible. And you're so supportive. I love you. Also, thank you to commanders, co-commanders, chiefs, other senior enlisted leaders, team chiefs. Thank you all for coming. And of course, to Mission One, who makes up the majority of the crowd. I look forward to working with you. Wendy and I are very grateful and honored to be here. God's blessed us with greatly. And part of that blessing was coming to a unit that is so well led. And part of that blessing is the turnover that Coral Golden, that Brian's offered me. Over the last couple of weeks, I've gotten to spend a lot of time with a lot of the airmen and joint warriors. But I've also countless phone calls, countless VTCs. I got to come here and get training. So while I'm new to the unit, I've been introduced to a lot of it, which is fantastic. And not normal. So I wish you well at Stratcom. Thank you very much. And more so wish you well at Dias, because you're going to be a fantastic wing commander. So as I mentioned, I had immersions with a lot of the units already. And I learned quite a bit. While I knew the 625th Strategic Operations Squadron worked with the E6Bs, I wasn't aware of how critical a lot of the mission, the operational plans and how decisions that we made on the joint staff affected y'all. So I apologize that I also learned about the 595th Strategic Communication Squadron and how adept they're often brand new airmen are at coding and repairing and operating equipment that was put into the field about the same. Actually, I thought it was when I first was learning to walk, but it was actually about 10 years before that. I got to meet some of the fantastic airmen that maintain the E4B. And that was one of the biggest black boxes coming here is how just a squadron can keep four aircraft that are so old, airworthy and constantly on alert. The maintenance team here is phenomenal. And I got to spend time with the first Airborne Command and Control Squadron. As I met the front-end air crew, the flight attendants and the mission air crew, they showed great pride in operating the E4B. And one of a kind unit very much like the rest of the units here, but I like their motto is that there's no second axe. It's just the first axe. And last but not least, of course, is the National Airborne Operations Center teams. I got to fly and exercise with OT1 and OT2. And I look forward to doing the same with OT3, but they're, of course, on alert right now. So over the coming months, we'll continue to focus on our role in strategic deterrence and being an agile, back-to-basics command, focused on today's readiness while we, I think every unit has something on the horizon that is being upgraded. So while we're going to focus on being ready to fight today as the warriors that we are, we are also going to prepare that battlefield for the future and for the airmen and joint warriors that are going to come after us. Consider it a great honor to work with you and look forward to the greatness we can accomplish in the coming months. Thank you very much. At this time, Colonel Lamont will present his wife, Mrs. Wendy Lamont, with flowers as a welcome gift on behalf of the men and women of the NAAC and 595th Command and Control Group. Thank you, Colonel Lamont. Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of the commander of Aether Force and Joint Global Strike Operations Center and the men and women of the National Airborne Operations Center and 595th Command and Control Group, we are proud to have served with Colonel Golden and wish him and his family good luck in their new assignment. We are very honored to have Colonel Lamont and his family as he takes command of the NAAC and 595th Command and Control Group. We invite everyone to attend the reception in the Nebraska room behind you on your right immediately following the ceremony. Ladies and gentlemen, please stand for the departure of the official party, their families, and our distinguished visitors. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for attending our ceremony. Have a great day.