 General Odierno really needs no introduction. He's the Army Chief of Staff. And you've got a little bio of him in your programs. Beyond all of that, he's a very, very nice man, an intelligent man, a great soldier, someone all of us could be very proud of. And so we're thrilled to be able to have a good conversation with you. And this is going to be relatively simple. I'm going to ask a few questions. And then at some point, I'll open it up to your questions. Stand up. You've got a microphone. Introduce yourself. And you can ask the general a question, or two, or whatever. And hopefully, an hour from now, when we conclude this, we'll all be a little bit smarter thanks to you. We have X amount of knowledge right now. But we'll have X plus knowledge when we leave in an hour. So since I'm a news kind of guy, I'm going to start off with a few newsy questions. And then we'll move on to some more substantive future of war type questions. It's hard to believe it's almost 25 years since Operation Desert Shield and Operation Desert Storm. And you served in Operation Desert Shield, Operation Desert Storm, the liberation of Kuwait. I was then a CNN's Pentagon correspondent. So I remember it very vividly as well. Here's a quote from the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on January 23, 1991, General Colin Powell, right at the start of the air war. Quote, our strategy is to go after this army in very, our strategy to go after this army is very, very simple. First, we're going to cut it off, and then we're going to kill it. That's exactly what the US did. A few weeks, four weeks of an air war, four weeks of a ground war, whatever it took, Kuwait was liberated. Is that kind of talk still relevant today if you were told, go ahead and liberate Mosul from ISIS? Yeah. So no, it's not that simple. I think people have learned from not only Desert Shield, Desert Storm, but I'd even go back to 2003 when we very quickly were able to defeat the Iraqi army again and liberate Baghdad very quickly. So when we go against a conventional army against us, I think we're really successful. The problem is people have watched us do this, and so our adversaries understand that maybe they don't want to face us in that way. So we've seen war evolve, and so now it's much more complex, much more difficult. No uniforms, not sure what motivations are. So it is a much more complex, difficult solution set that is now needed. Now, could that happen again? You could make an argument that it could happen in some places around the world, but I believe even if there was a conventional threat against us, there would be asymmetric, a lot of asymmetric pieces to it. And Colin Powell also promised in that same speech, and I remember it vividly, he promised the United States was going to end its coalition partners, we're going to rip up the Iraqi Air Force in its entirety. It's hard to believe that kind of talk was then, but it's unlikely to hear that kind of talk right now. So if the president of the United States, the commander-in-chief, says to you, General Odierno, go ahead and get rid of ISIS in Mosul. What do you do? Well, we would go in and we would conduct significant ground operations supported by the other domain, space, cyber, air, sea, land, whatever we needed to go do this. But the problem is it's not an enemy that stands out with a uniform in an order of battle. It is an enemy that hides in the population that use suicide attacks, that uses techniques that simply are not conventional in any way. So we have to have a force that is able to combat that kind of thing. And so we have some experience in that. I think we would be able to do it, but it would be different than just defeating armored columns and air forces and other things. We'd have to go in and really defeat them among a population that is not part of ISIS. And that's what makes it difficult, because you want to separate the population. I always say you want to separate the reconcilables from the irreconcilables. And that makes it very difficult as you conduct operations. Because Mosul is a huge city of about 2 million people, the second largest city in Iraq right now. The ISIS fighters, they came in there and took it over relatively easily, the Iraqi Army, even though they had US equipment, US training, hundreds of billions of dollars in US taxpayer money that was spent building up that military, they simply threw their weapons away, they ran away, and the ISIS fighters took all those US weapons. It was a sad, deplorable moment. It was, I mean, it's about will. It's not just about having the capability to fight, it's about believing in what you're fighting in. And I think some of the political things that had gone on in Iraq, the movement of commanders, the changing of who was there and why they were fighting, I think if you don't have the will, you don't fight as hard. And so I think that's part of it. And so I think, as you said, it wasn't that they didn't know how to fight, they didn't fight, they left, and so that's problematic. And in a war such as this, or an operation such as this, it is gonna be difficult, it's gonna take time, and you need soldiers and leaders who are dedicated to finishing this, and that's probably one of the most important pieces as you begin an operation, such as liberating Mosul. Because this is gonna require not just street to street, but house to house combat. So if the US objective is to degrade and ultimately destroy ISIS, which the President says is the US objective, but he also says no US combat ground troops, who is going to degrade and ultimately destroy ISIS? Well, I think it has to be Iraqi security forces. To include the Peshmerga forces in the north. And they're gonna have to conduct the operations. And I think one of the lessons that I think we should have learned is that it's important to have indigenous capability involved in this, because this is really about their country. Now it's important to us because of the threat that ISIS, ISIL presents to our regional partners as well as us internationally. So it's important for us to assist in any way we can. But I think it's important that they do this. Now what we'll have to determine as we go through this is how much support do they really need? And as this goes forward, we'll have to make recommendations on how much support the US needs to give to be successful. But this is gonna take time. This is not gonna be a short term issue. It's gonna take a long time. We heard a briefing from US military central command the other day saying we're talking about March or April or in the spring, a spring offensive, Iraqi troops going in there basically, backed by maybe Kurdish troops. I assume the Shiite militias backed by Iran and some US and coalition air power are gonna go liberate Mosul. Is that the game plan? Well, I mean, I think the game plan is to have Iraqi security forces. You have confidence in that? Go into this. Well, I think what we're seeing great progress and over the last couple of days, last week we see them do some successful operations in Western Iraq and Ambar province. So they have made some improvements. What we'll have to see is wait and see. Now, we will wait and see what the timeline is and I leave that up to the commanders on the ground to determine working with the Iraqis, are they ready to do this or not? But this is not gonna be a three day, four day, five day effort. It's gonna be months upon months to do this because it's a very difficult, difficult situation. You can go in there and as you said, streets to street, house to house, identifying who's who, because what you don't wanna do is a problem is you don't wanna alienate the population that's there because then your operation will not be successful. So you've got to understand all of that as you go in. But these ISIS militants, these fighters, they have a lot of US equipment now. They could booby trap a lot of buildings, IEDs and all kinds of roads and bridges if they want. From a military standpoint, how good are they? Well, I would say first, a lot of the equipment they've got, they've since kind of lost and abandoned and we've been able to affect that. So they're- With air power. Yeah, the piece that I think is important to them is that frankly, they'll do anything. I mean, there is no limit to what they would do in order to survive. That's really what's different and we've watched this evolve over the last 10 years. They could have hundreds of suicide bombers. They could have booby trap buildings. They could have all kinds of things. And the suicide bombers are everything from men to old women to young children. And so this type of warfare is something that is despicable to us, but it's something that's very natural to them and that's what makes this challenging. And that's why you have to be prepared and understand and learn. A lot of this is about understanding how they're organized, where they're at, where their strongholds are. So it's about not only the active, aggressive, offensive action, it's about having the right intelligence, it's about understanding where they are and how do you cut off their money and how do you make it difficult for them to move inside a Mosul? So it's all those kind of things that you have to be able to do. And so it is a difficult operation. That's what's gonna take time. And this number that was thrown out the other day at this Pentagon briefing, 25 or 30,000 troops going into Mosul to liberate that city, is that a realistic number? I think so. I think it is a realistic number. I think what you're going to need is, their numbers, the numbers of ISIS vary. Some people say it's 5,000 in there, 2,000, 3,000. We're not sure. But again, what it goes back to is, it's not that there's 5,000 fighters lined up. It's three, two, three, four, 5,000 fighters intermixed among the population and who use incredibly unconventional methods in order to be successful. Because for them, it's about making this operation as long as possible. It's about inflicting as many casualties as possible. And it's about going after the will of the military forces that they're facing. So for them, it's not necessarily, you have to absolutely defeat. It is about stretching this out. It's about making the population suffer. It's about inflicting casualties on the enemy. So you gotta be prepared for that as you go in. And are they still successful in recruiting new members? So I think the one thing I'll say is their ability to use social media and promote on the internet is I think they are still recruiting. And I think they are recruiting from many different parts of the world. And so I do believe that's something that is going on. And I think that one of the reasons why it's important that we take this threat seriously is we wanna stop this now. We don't want this to continue to grow over time. And will the Arab countries in the region join in this operation? I know you want the Iraqi military and you think this new government of Hyder al-Abadi is better than Nurel Maliki and that they may be more secure, more a stronger government, right? Than the previous government. But will other Arab countries in the region actually get involved on the ground whether Jordan, UAE, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Egypt? So remember that when you're talking about ISIS and ISIL, it's really in two countries. It's in Iraq and Syria. And so it's not just defeating them in Iraq, it's defeating them in Syria. So I think where we've built the major part of the coalition and to support is in Syria. And I think that's a important part of this as well. So part of it is getting into Mosul, which I think should be done by Iraqi Security Force, a sovereign nation, solving a problem inside of their own country. So there's no indication Jordan's gonna go into Iraq. But I'm not sure we want that. I think we would rather have them focus, start as we begin to train the Syrian army, free army. I think that's where we want help from Jordan and other places that are willing to come in and help us because we're gonna have to also remember that you have ISIS operating in Syria. And we don't want them to have a safe haven. So if you defeat them in Mosul, they just run into Syria. And so that's an important part of this as we go forward as well. I ask the question, because as you know the president of Egypt, Al-Sisi, he wants to create this pan-Arab ground for us, if you will. Well, I think it's important. I think for the first time in the last couple of weeks, we've seen Jordan, not only, I mean the king has been very clear about this for a long time. But I think you've now seen the people of Jordan very clear that they wanna do something against ISIS. Now we have Egypt that's come out and said we gotta do something about ISIS. So we're starting to see the leaders in the Middle East starting to coalesce around, this is a problem that we have to deal with. I think that's important. And I think that'll be very important as we move forward because we need them all to be involved. So I think we wanna be able to build a coalition that wants to assist. Because that's, in my mind, without that it's always gonna be difficult to rid ourselves of this threat. A few technical points and then I'm gonna move on. The Peshmerga, the Kurdish fighters, they're friendly to the United States, they're loyal, they're fierce, but they don't have the weaponry they need. Sometime we've shown video, they're using World War II artillery pieces. The weapons the United States provides, the Kurds still goes through the central government and Baghdad and eventually some of it trickles up to the Kurds. Why not provide the weapons directly to the Kurds? Well again, I would just say, I think the Peshmerga part of the Iraqi security forces, we're honoring the sovereignty of Iraq by providing them the equipment so they can then provide it to the Peshmerga. We have paid a lot more attention to the Peshmerga in terms of training. We have a lot of European allies who are helping the Peshmerga as well. And so I think that's starting to show some progress and I think we're starting to increase their capability. Now the US has provided over the last couple of months a lot of military equipment to the Iraqi army, thousands of weapons specifically. Are you confident those weapons will remain in the hands of the Iraqi military that they won't wind up in the hands of ISIS as a lot of other US military equipment? I think as we're doing the training this time, we are very focused on making sure the units we are putting together are gonna stay together and stick together. Now I can never guarantee 100% that they will stick together but I think part of the training we're doing is ensuring that they build confidence in themselves and they have the confidence and will to conduct the operation. So you're upbeat about that. Here's what troubles me as a US taxpayer. The US taxpayers are paying for all these weapons that we're giving to the Iraqi military. Iraq is an OPEC member, an oil-exporting country. They've got money. Why aren't they purchasing these weapons? Why are we just giving them millions of millions of dollars worth of this? Well, first, they have purchased billions of dollars worth of equipment from the United States. But the most recent... No, I understand that. But they have spent billions of dollars of their own money purchasing equipment. The tanks and the artillery pieces that they had gotten... We're all purchased by their dollars. F-16s that they're still in the process of being purchased by their dollars. So this is not completely... We're giving them everything. Yes, at the time of emergency, we are providing them some additional weapons but they have in fact purchased and spent billions on weapons. Will we ask them to reimburse us? Well, I don't know. We'll work through that. I think at some time we'll have this discussion about that they will have to start paying for some of this stuff. I have a question on Syria, the Free Syrian Army. The U.S. is vetting a lot of these guys to go train whether in Jordan or Turkey or Saudi Arabia or some place. Any of them started training it or is the vetting process still... Very close. We expect March. We expect somewhere in March, April, timeframe, March, hopefully, that we will begin to train. And then how long will that training last? So they're still working through it but it'll probably be somewhere around four or six weeks. And then we're gonna form units and then we'll go from there. We'll develop this as we go, depending on how well they do. But there's a good plan in place and I think it's gonna start pretty quickly in the next few months. And these units, these Free Syrian Army units, are we training them to go after the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad, his military, or to go after ISIS in Syria? So our intention is, this is our initial problem is ISIS and ISIL. So these units are being built to help us to put pressure on ISIS. And we wanna put pressure on from multiple fronts and this allows us to open another front against ISIL. And so that's the intent of us training these forces. The other day there was a warning to all American citizens in Kabul, the Defense Secretary, the new word, Ashkard, he was just in Kabul. To basically be on the lookout, it's an extremely dangerous environment. Right now the Afghan capital, militants plan, this is from the State Department, warning, militants plan to conduct multiple imminent attacks against an unspecified target or targets in Kabul city. What's going on there? Well, I would just say this is something that we've seen over time. And what you're probably, there's probably some intelligence that says there are some large terrorist attacks getting ready to occur, attempt to be done in Kabul. So what this means is for the most part is the Taliban and associated organizations are frankly not moving forward the way they want. So what they wanna do is what they wanna, it's important for them to create the perception that the Afghan government is failing, that their security forces are not doing the job they're supposed to do. So that's when we start, my experience in both Iraq and Afghanistan tell me that's when you start to see these threats because they're worried because I think they're seeing the effectiveness of President Ghani and the government and how they're starting to form and coalesce and the relationship they're building with Pakistan. And I think this is all concern. So what they wanna try to do is disrupt that. And so I think you'll start to see potential threats of large attempt to conduct large terrorist activities inside of Kabul to make it look like the government is trying to destabilize the government. See, when I read that State Department advisory, it sounded to me like they were deeply concerned about the US Embassy. Well, I mean, I think it's all, I would argue it. And if you can get the US Embassy, again, that shows there's, they're not able to do certain things and it creates some doubt about the government. So that's why they try to attack those types of targets. The whole region, and I've studied the Middle East for a long time, North Africa, South Asia, Middle East, it seems to be on fire right now. Well, I think you have a lot of things going on. I mean, I think you have this idea of moderates versus extremists and however else you wanna define it that's going on, that underpin, you know, my experience over there tells me that 99% of Islamic faith are moderates, but you have a portion that is not. And so you have this conflict that's going on inside of that and then you're underlying all this, you have the Sunni Shia competition that's going on, some would say, for Hegemi in the Middle East. So I think it's a combination of all of those things that are happening. The other thing that's happened over the last five to six, seven years is with information being more readily available to the peoples of these countries, they are looking for more say in their governments and so you're having governmental issues which actually makes it easier for organizations like ISIS and ISIL and Al Qaeda and others to try to take advantage of this. So you're seeing this play out in front of us and I think that's why you're seeing all this turmoil inside of the Middle East. Because Yemen has turned out to be a disaster. Well, and you have, again, Shia Sunnis, Al Qaeda mixed in, a failing government or a government that does have complete control. And so it is a recipe for them to try to exploit that and we've seen that in other areas, you've seen it in Libya, you see it in Africa as well. So I mean, that's the kind of environment that they try to take advantage of. And that's why it's important that we understand and that we have a coalition within the Middle East to fight this kind of problem. The AQAP, Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula in Yemen, with the U.S. Embassy shut down, U.S. troops by and large gone, Americans out of there, too dangerous, what's gonna happen to AQAP in Yemen? Well, I think we're gonna have to watch and see. I mean, I think we're not completely out, we're still conducting some operations there and so we will continue to do that and we'll watch that very carefully. And again, for us, it's about trying to get a government in place that can stabilize Yemen and that's gonna take some work. So the U.S. Embassy shut down in Sana'a, Yemen. The U.S. Embassy shut down in Libya, right? That, the U.S. with a coalition got rid of Qaddafi amid high expectations, there's gonna be a new era in Libya, that didn't turn out so well. What happened? Well, I think first off, as you eliminate governments, you've got to have something that fills that void and I think one of the things we have to rethink as we do these operations is what happens after and we've got to, and that's a whole government problem. It's not just the U.S. Army. It's just not the military. It's gotta be a multinational effort, it's gotta be a inter-ANC effort, diplomatically, economically, militarily that helps to solve this and so, but we can't take on every one of these ourselves, we gotta have help for the international community as well and that's why it's important for us to build this coalition that can solve this problem. Because if you take a look at Yemen, Libya, Somalia, the U.S. Embassy shut down in Somalia right now, obviously in Damascus, Syria as well. When I say the region seems to be on fire, there's a potential there for this to simply further escalate right now, right? Not get better. I mean, there is, listen, we don't know what's gonna happen, but it certainly is, I tell everybody it's the most uncertain I've seen the environment in my almost 40 years in the Army, so I'm not saying it's the most dangerous, but certainly incredibly uncertain. A couple other areas in the world I wanna get your thoughts, Europe right now, Ukraine, how worried are you about what's going on in Eastern Ukraine and the potential revival of a Cold War? Yeah, so I mean, I think we all should be worried about what's going on in Ukraine. You know, I think we, I'm not sure how well we truly understand the devastation that's happened inside of Eastern Ukraine, the damage and the destruction that's occurred. And so, you know, that's not the kind of thing we want in Europe. I think it's important for us to understand the impact this could have on our NATO partners. And I think the one thing it does, is waking up NATO a little bit to understand that we have to be prepared. And so, what we wanna do is we wanna de-escalate, we don't wanna escalate, but it is something that is concerning to all of us that we've watched what's happened. And it's almost a new type of warfare. It's a mixture of asymmetric, cyber, conventional use of proxies that is being done here by the Russia. And is this a new way to conduct operations? And so, I think we have to watch this very carefully and learn from it, especially as we think about what we might have to face in the future. So, I think it's important for us to take a hard look at this. And I think, you know, for us, we have to pay attention to what's going on in Ukraine. And you know, we are having discussions. We do have military to military interaction with Ukraine, but it's, you know, at times of exchanging ideas and things like that. And I think we have to be watch this because it's gonna have an impact, it could have an impact on Eastern Europe specifically. NATO allies. NATO allies. And Article 5 stipulates that if one NATO ally is attacked, all NATO allies. So, we've been doing very aggressive exercise programs now for the last year in Eastern Europe. Last year. Yeah, for the last year in Eastern Europe. And we have, we now have, we're rotating forces in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland. We're working very closely with them. For the first time in 20 years, we deployed a heavy brigade for a period of time to help to do joint exercises with them in Eastern Europe. With tanks. Yes, with tanks. And so, and we're talking about pre-positioning those tanks over there, leaving them there so we can rotate forces. We'll see, we're working this within NATO. We have significantly increased our exercise program inside of NATO. Making sure we're increasing our inner operability. This is gonna go on. And I think we're gonna continue to build this capability. And it's important for us to continue to do that. Because the other day I was interviewing general George Jowan, the former NATO Supreme Allied Commander. And he pointed out the U.S. removed all its battle tanks from Germany with the end of the Cold War, is that right? Well, we did, but we left a small amount in storage. We've now set a whole brigade's worth of equipment. We're in the process of putting a whole brigade's of heavy equipment back over there that will keep there in case we need it and to rotate for training. And so we are, we have reacted to that. And we've been doing that actually for some time now. Because a lot of us are confused by Putin. I'm sure you are. Everybody who sees what he's doing. The other day, British Royal Air Force jets intercepted Russian bombers off the coast of Britain. I mean, what's going on? Well, I don't know. I will say, I'm like you, I don't understand exactly what President Putin is thinking. I would just say that we have to be, we have to understand that they have taken aggressive a stance in Ukraine, in Eastern Ukraine. We're not sure what their goals are in Ukraine. And we're not sure what the impacts could be on the other Eastern European allies. So we have to be working within NATO to be prepared. Now, I think also that again, I believe the future of all this type of warfare is something that's going to require joint inter-agency work and multinational coalitions. And I think this is an important part of this. And I think we have a standing coalition in NATO that we have to work together militarily. And then you have to have the diplomatic political issues being done by both NATO and the EU working in the United States working with them. And I think all of those are going to be important as we move forward here and we have to consider all that. Because what's a little concerning, I'm sure to you, as well is the disagreements. There's always been disagreements among NATO allies. But in terms of arming you, the Ukrainian military, some serious disagreements, let's say, between Germany on the one hand, the US maybe on the other hand. Yeah, but I would just say, I think, this is good discussion. I really mean that when I say that. I think this is a situation that we want to, what I always worry about in history, it's always about miscalculation. And so what you don't want to do is have a huge miscalculation that immediately escalates problems in Europe. And so I think it's important that we try different types of ideas. We listen to each other. And I think that'll help us to form where we need to go. But what you can't do is you got to be prepared. And so from a military perspective, what I want to make sure is we are increasing our preparedness within NATO in case that option is needed sometime in the future. All right, so we got a mess in the Middle East, North Africa. We got real serious tensions in Europe right now, potentially a revival of the Cold War. Let's hope that doesn't happen. What also worries me, and I'm sure you as well, is the Korean Peninsula right now, because the uncertainty there, people forget, the US still has what, almost 30,000 troops along the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea. And I noticed the other day, a Johns Hopkins analyst, Joel Witt, I went to Johns Hopkins, sorry, full disclosure. He pointed out that by 2020, North Korea could have, at his estimate, between 20 and 100 nuclear bombs. He believes they already have 10 to 16. Is that true? I have not seen that, so I'm not good, I would not verify that. But here's what I would say, is what you're, the thing we watch is the ballistic missile threat, because that's what gives you capability, if they ever happen to have the capability to have nuclear weapons, is their ability to deliver those. And so I think what you're seeing, is you can sort of see provocation from North Korea trying to show that they might have some capability. And so it is concerning. And I always worry when you have a nation that has other problems, significant economic problems, unable to feed its population, what it might be willing to do to survive. And so I think we always have to be very concerned about that. For us, it's important that we continue to build on the strong partnership we have with South Korea. It's important that we try to ensure that we, again, don't have miscalculation because of provocations that occur between North Korea and South Korea. And I think it's important for us to make sure we kind of keep that in the box. But we also have to make sure that we have the ability to respond very quickly. I mean, you know, the thing about Korea is the amount of people there are within artillery range of North Korea and Seoul, you know, millions upon millions of people. And oh, by the way, hundreds of thousands of Americans that are there. And so, you know, that's always a big concern. So we want to make sure that there's not overproverification that causes an initial exchange that we start seeing, which could then escalate. And anything, you know, that does escalate. And then you might just try to get involved. There's US, I mean, this is very serious business. So it's important for us first to continue to work with the governments within Asia to try to ensure, diplomatically, that North Korea, as best we can, try to influence them to not overprovocate and miscalculate. But it's also coming on us to ensure we have the right military capability there. And that's why we keep that many thousands of individuals on the peninsula. And they're staying there. Yeah, well, we're rotating capabilities. What we're changing is we're now going to rotate forces there, which I think is actually going to improve our readiness. So we used to have, so there was a brigade permanently assigned there. So what we're now doing is we're taking brigades from the United States and they will rotate there for a year at a time and replace each other. What that allows us to do is train them here and then make sure they're highly trained and capable and send them over there. And we'll do that with both our ground and some of our road-rilling aviation forces. But we're still going to keep about 30,000 troops. But the same amount of people will always be on the ground. Along the DMZ, I mean, I spent six days in North Korea four years ago. And what impressed me was, and I met with some of their military leaders, and they seemed to be pretty sophisticated. They seemed to know what was going on outside of North Korea. I listened to them. I thought maybe they were living in another world, but they weren't. They were pretty sophisticated. They monitor the international news media. They watch CNN. So they knew what was going on. But what worries me is I don't know that much about Kim Jong-un. I don't know what he's all about. I know he's thinking of going to Moscow in a few months, first-first visit as leader outside of North Korea. What can you tell us about it? Well, we don't know much about him, either. The workings of the senior leadership of the North Korean military is greatly known as we'd like it to be, obviously. So we don't know what they're thinking. We don't know who's part of the decision-making process. What we do know is, though, that they are sophisticated. They are working asymmetric issues. They have a large special operations force. They have large conventional forces. They're developing ballistic missiles. So they are a serious threat that you have to understand that they have developed capability over time. And they study this every single day. So this is not something that they take. They are focused totally on the Korean Peninsula. And so for many, many years, you gotta understand that they are fairly sophisticated in how they might conduct operations. And so we should not ever take the North Koreans lightly in terms of military capability. Well, we're talking about the future of war and one key aspect of the future of war is cyber warfare. North Koreans, I didn't think they had a very good cyber warfare capability, but I seem to have been wrong if, in fact, they did. What the US says they did to Sony Pictures. Yeah, well, if you think about it, cyber is a relatively inexpensive way to attack and influence outside of your borders. And so to invest in it and to develop expertise is something that you see many nations potentially trying to do. So I think it's something we have to take very seriously. And I think we are. You know, as we look to, as I think about the future, one of the real challenges that we have and what we have to focus on is what I call is synchronizing and integrating cross-domain warfare. What do I mean by that? That's about integrating and synchronizing effects from air, space, cyberspace, sea, land, and bring effects. So for the Army, it's our responsibility to integrate and synchronize that and be able to use that to bring effects on the ground. And it's both non-lethal and lethal effects and you should have different spectrums of this capability. So it starts out small and can grow and grow and grow. So you provide lots of options for our national security leaders. So for me, that's something that we have to think about. Now, cyber is a down, I would argue, it's a new form of maneuver in military terms. And so we have to be able to understand and do that. So our ability to develop cyber capabilities, national level cyber capabilities, operational and tactical cyber capabilities are very important to the future of warfare. And I think that we are doing that. We have reorganized ourselves in the Army. We now have an Army Cyber Command. We've now developed the Center of Excellence. We've created a new career field for cyber. We have a cyber institute at West Point that's dealing with educational institutions and private companies. So this is important and we are investing in this. Even with our budgets going down, we are investing in this cyber. So it's very important. Because they could shut us down if some cyber warfare activity. They potentially could go after our infrastructure. They could go after many things. And so I think we have to be very aware. Inside, I would just say from a military perspective, we are limited. We are limited by authorities. So part of this is a debate that we have to have here in this country and internationally on how you deal with this. Because there are limits because of freedoms and other laws that are in place. So that's an important discussion. It has to constantly go on as this thread evolves on how we might be able to respond. That's part of this as well as we go talk about the future. So because potentially if we're looking at a war in 10 years, an enemy, if the US Army were going to go into battle, they could launch some cyber attack and prevent you from doing any kind of battle, if you will. Right, so we have to be able to, I mean they could conduct a cyber attack which takes out all of electronic capability or takes out our ability to communicate or takes out radars or whatever. And so we have to be prepared Are we prepared for that? We have to be prepared, we work very hard on that regularly. We have to be prepared to defend that. And then we have to figure out, in my mind as we think about the future, I believe technology, we used to depend on a large technological advantage that we would always have great technological advantage. I still think we can build technological advantage but I believe the time that we have this advantage is gonna be shortened because of the proliferation of technology which is so much faster today. So for me, and it gets to cyber, it has to do with not so much do you have a technological advantage but how adaptive and innovative are we in using that technology? And for me, that's the important thing in the future, that we have to develop leaders and capability that allow us to be more adaptive and innovative in using technological advances as we develop new concepts for us to be successful. And that's what we're focusing on. And so I wanna develop leaders who are comfortable in being adaptable and innovative and flexible and being able to react and being able to use technology in new ways that enables us to sustain a significant advantage over our adversaries. And in terms of cyber warfare, threats, potential threats, who represents the biggest threat to the United States? And you can mention countries or you can mention non-countries as a terrorist organizations if you will. Well, I would just say, any one of our major adversaries, whether it be Russia, China, Iran, Korea, I would tell you that they're developing cyber capability. I will, how much and how good they are at it, I won't comment on that, but they are developing it. And clearly we watch ISIS today. And part of cyber is their ability, you watch how they use the social media in order to get their message out. It's quite sophisticated. And so that's the beginning, although that's not cyber attacks per se, that's the beginning of using technology in order for them to perforate their message to many different groups. Is the next step now developing some cyber capability? So we should assume that all our adversaries, whether they be state or non-state actors, are attempting to develop some level of cyber capability to come after us or whoever else they want to address. It raises a great question. ISIS, AQAP, Al Shabaab, they're very good in social media. They're recruiting, they're getting their propaganda out there. Has there been any evidence that they have attempted cyber warfare? I don't know, I don't want to comment on that. Because you only need 20 or 30 guys, 19, 20 years old. Here's what I would just say to that question. Is I would just say, I would assume they're trying to develop that capability. I mean, I think we should just make that assumption that they're gonna try to do that and they will try to use that if they think they can. It's, as I said, it's a cheaper, simpler way to go after somebody. So I think we should at least, whether they are or not, we need to believe they are trying to develop that capability. Why are they better in social media than we are? Well, I think first of all- We invented it. Yeah, but I would just say, so from a governmental standpoint, let me take it from a military standpoint, we are held to some higher standards of how you use social media. They can do basically, they do whatever they want. What they put on social media is it truthful? Is it not truthful? It doesn't matter. They are not held to any standard. And so for us, we are holding the very specific standards as we put things out on social media. And so I think that's the difference and it makes it a bit easier. Now, I'm not making an excuse. I think we can be much better in social media than we are. What's the future of the conventional U.S. Army? So I think a couple of things. I think warfare is evolving. I think when I talk about the Army of the Future, I talk about three things. We have to be able to prevent, shape, and win. So one of the first thing we gotta be able to do is prevent conflict. And we gotta help the combatant commanders around the world, whether it be in Asia, Middle East, Europe. We have to help them to prevent conflict. And so you need some level of capability and capacity conventionally that will help to turn, compel others from doing things. So I think that's the first reason you need it. The second piece in the future is that I think warfare is evolving in such a way. I'm not convinced that we're gonna have another war. We have 250,000 people. But what I do believe is because of the velocity of instability, as you said, is increasing. And what that means is a couple of things. We have to be able to respond quicker because the instability happens faster and reaction has to be quicker. So we have to be able to probably do simultaneous, smaller operations around the world. Today we have named operations on five separate continents going on today. So in the future, what we have to be able to do as an Army is move very quickly in order to provide a multi-cross-domain capability to provide effects on the ground. And so although it might not be 150,000 one place, it could be 15,000, 20,000, five different places. And I would argue that's actually more difficult because you have to understand the region that you're in. You have to understand five separate regions. You have to develop expertise in those areas. You have to have a force that can be capable of operating in several different environments. I often joke and you mentioned about the Cold War earlier. When I was a young officer in the 80s, 70s and 80s with the Cold War, in a lot of ways it was much simple. We knew exactly who our enemy was. It was the Soviet Union. We knew where we were gonna fight them in Europe. We knew what capabilities they had. We knew exactly where we were gonna be today and in the future, we're not gonna have that. We gotta be able to respond to many different places, not necessarily known. So that requires us to be more adaptable and flexible. We have to have organizations that are more adaptable and flexible. It makes the Army different than the Navy and the Air Force, I would say, with platform-centric is we are, the Army's about developing people who operate in organizations to gain effects on the ground. And so for us, we gotta develop our individuals, our leaders and our soldiers and then we gotta organize them in ways that enable them to be effective in gaining effects on the ground. And so we have to be able to do that maybe in Korea, maybe in Iraq, maybe in Syria, maybe in Eastern Europe, maybe pick your place around the world where we might have to use them. And so all of those are very different environments. So what we have to do is we have to make our soldiers more regionally astute. So we're starting to regionally align forces so they understand regionally what's going on. And they understand it's not just militarily, it's culturally, it's economically. So they understand all the second, third order effects. And I also believe that in the future that what we have to deliver is the ability to integrate and synchronize inter-agency effects and multinational effects. And so we have done that over the last 10 years, but we have to do it much better than we have. And so we have to not only be able to synchronize all our military capabilities, it's gotta be synchronized with other agencies, State Department, Treasury, FBI's, whatever. And then we got to, and we have to be able to work with our multinational partners. So we gotta be comfortable in that environment. And some of the things I talk about is we want to develop a network, a network of capability around the world, a land network that we have nodes that enable us to work with our multinational partners and that we understand what's going on in each region. We connect those to each other in order for us to conduct operations depending on where we might have to do. And that's, I'm talking about small amounts of people, but it enables us to understand that environment much better because we're gonna have to respond very quickly. So I see us doing many things at much, initially at smaller, with smaller capability. And then what we want to do is provide our national security leaders options, both lethal and non-lethal options in order to solve that problem. Because the U.S. Army, as you know, is shrinking. Right. Some numbers, during the Cold War, it was huge, obviously. But after 9-11, 579,000 U.S. Army active duty troops, right now 517,000, it's gonna go down if the forced budget cut sequestration fully goes into effect, 420,000 soldiers in the U.S. Army. That's pretty low, that's not good enough from your perspective. So we're actually at about 500,000 today. We'll be at 490 by the end of this year. Our plan is to be at 450 by the end of 18 and if sequestration goes into effect, we'd be at 420 by about 2020. So there's two problems we have right now. One is the near-term problem is that because the budget's going down, we're sacrificing readiness and modernization until we get the end strength to the level we need. And the reason I can't do it any faster is because we have a lot of commitments around the world still today. And then as you get to 2020, if we go to 420, I would argue that the problem is now capacity. And so do we have the capacity to do simultaneous operations on several continents in order to solve this growing instability that we're seeing around the world? So I think that's the concern with sequestration. I'll be, to be frank, I'm not into comparing numbers between now and in the 90s and 80s because our formations are much more capable than they were then. That said, I am concerned about where we're going and the size of where we're going. And I think we have said at 450, I believe we can execute the strategy the President has established at 450,000, but it's tenuous. And that's assuming that all the assumptions are right and we don't have unknown things happening. And so that becomes the challenge. And so we are concerned about that. But for me, as I look to the future, it doesn't, I can't be focused on just, okay, are we gonna be 550, 490, 450, 420? I gotta start thinking about how we're gonna, whatever size you are, how we're gonna use that force to be effective. So where does the National Guard and the Army reserve? Yeah, so today the National Guard, so the National Guard's about 350,000, the reserve's about 200,000. After sequestration, there will be 315,000 in the Guard and about 185,000. So you're talking about a significant reduction in the size of our army from 2011 to 2020 when this is finished. So is that gonna endanger national security? So I believe, again, it depends on what the environment is. And I would just say right now, the unpredictability of the environment, in my mind, raises the risk significantly to the security of the nation if we go to those small numbers. I know there's gonna be some questions from the audience. So get ready, we'll get you a microphone. You can identify yourself. But before I take some questions from the audience. You're a soldier, 38 years in the United States Army. Overnight we learned that in the American sniper trial, as it's called, the killer was convicted and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Two American soldiers dead, obviously. So when you hear that and you hear about post-traumatic stress and you hear about three military guys, two dead, one's gonna be now in prison for the rest of his life. And you wonder what was the impact of war on these three individuals? Yeah. What went through your mind? Well, I mean. When you want, I assume you saw the movie. I have not seen it, actually. But I'm very familiar with it. Here's what I would say. First, it's important for people to understand that warfare is difficult. It's not, it's chaotic, it's stressful. And there's two things I would take out of this. Again, I have not seen the movie. But first of all, think of the decisions that he had to make. Those are very difficult decisions. And those things were in here. So I think we should always understand that warfare is something that's very difficult. In fact, sometimes I get a bit frustrated. I have a lot of people tell me, well, you're in the military, you guys like going to war. If you've ever been to war, you never wanna go to war again. We know what it means. We know the sacrifice involved in it. That's why we're, the reason we have a military to prevent war, not to have a war. And so what I would say is it's important for people to understand that there are impacts on our soldiers as they come back. But what I worry about, Wolf, is that there's people think every soldier that comes back has big problems. Most people overcome these problems. A lot of them don't have them at all, but many of them overcome it. And what I would just tell you is we need to take care of them. But you don't take care of them by feeling sorry for them. You take care of them by giving them the opportunity to continue their lives. And we should go out of our way to make sure that they are able to continue their lives because I believe America owes that to these young men and women. And so that's what I think about. I worry that first of all, it's important for people to understand the stress that they're under and what it means to be at war. But secondly, it should be that people can recover from this, we have to invest in it, and that we have to give our soldiers opportunities because they can contribute greatly to our society as we move forward. I have no doubt that a lot of men and women who served whether in a rocker, they're still suffering today. Absolutely, and this is gonna go on for 10, 15, 20 years. This is not going to stop them. We have to recognize that and we have to invest in that. Okay, I agree. All right, please take out a microphone. I don't know if they're a microphone, yes. And just give us your name, a little identification. I'm Harlan Olman, a very old senior naval officer past. General, thank you for your comments. Well, if you are a great interrogator. My question has to do with your successor, General, and his successor. Some of us on the Defense Business Board in particular arguing that the biggest problem you may, your successor may face is a hollow force. Even if there's no sequestration, even if you keep spending at $600 billion, the inherent cost growth for pay compensation, retirement for old guys like me, healthcare, new weapon system, we have encountered a new bomber, et cetera, et cetera, are gonna be astronomical. And Congress is gonna be very reluctant for base closing or changes in compensation. What are you gonna recommend to your successor as how do you confront this to prevent the US military from becoming a hollow army that you and I recall when we were in it in the 70s and 80s? Thank you for that. I would just say this is a really important topic. And first off, there's two things I would tell the person following me is that on, we have to have the right paying compensation of all volunteer army. There's ways for us to do this where we can do that and reduce the cost. And we have to work very hard and we gotta continue to press and work with Congress to solve that. The other thing I would say is we have to become, when we develop new systems, they have to be more reliable. And what I mean by that is they have, they should require a lot less maintenance and a lot less cost. And that needs to be something that as we develop new systems that we insist upon. The other piece is we have to be able to invest in ways to train that are cheaper. So you gotta invest that. We've started all of these programs already, but we're not there. But the one thing I come down to is the number one thing we need to do is develop leaders. Because no matter what happens, if we are developing proper leaders and we are challenging them, I believe we can overcome almost any deficiency. And I think when I first came in the Army, I looked at the, we had some great leaders and we had some really bad leaders. And that's why we ended up with a hollow Army. And what we have to be able to do is make sure we're developing the right leaders who understand these issues, who are helping enable us to adapt and innovate as we go to the future. So the other thing I would say is we're at a very high level now because of the experience that we have and the kind of leaders we have. And we have to be able to keep them, which we are so far, we have to allow them to give them more responsibility, allow them to adapt and innovate. And I think that will help us to ensure we don't get to a hollow Army. But people have to realize that the costs are going up. And if costs are going up, you gotta invest more dollars. And I think people tend to focus on the top line number instead of what's the percentage that we're spending. And I think we should spend a little bit more time on this percentage of what we're spending on defense compared to the GDP. And I think we tend to forget that, which is lower now than it's been in a very long time. And I think in order, I call the military as like an insurance policy. And people don't like buying expensive insurance and policies until they have to use it. What I worry about is if we don't invest in it and we invest in a low cost insurance policy, when it comes to when we have to use it, they're not gonna be prepared. And when we're not prepared, that means we're sending the cost will be the lives of our soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines. And that's what I worry about as we do this. One way to make sure you ask a question is to grab the microphone. So thank you very much. I wanted to ask you to follow up on your description of a global network with our partners with multiple nodes. The people at my table smiled because I talk about networks constantly. But what I wanted to ask is how do we lead in that setting? Because you can't be out front. You're really leading from the center and it's a different way of leading. And I'd be very interested in your thoughts on how we do that. And your name and? Sorry, Anne-Marie Slaughter, CEO of New America. In case somebody didn't know. So first off, I think the thought process behind this is that because of the complexity of the world and frankly the world is becoming more interconnected that we have to be interconnected as well. And so the thought process is that we can, so NATO's an easy example but I like to start there. So we already have an alliance that's set in place. So what you do is as part of that alliance you now build a network of capabilities whether it's for counter-terrorism or whether it's for defending Europe or whether it's for using NATO outside of Europe. You develop relationships and you develop interoperability between your forces so you're capable of doing that. Let's move to Asia. So somewhere in Asia it's a bit different of a problem. You want a network there where we're building some capacity and some of our allies and partners. We are gaining, we have access, we are starting to gain access because we're building relationships. It might be access to deliver humanitarian assistance or disaster relief. But what that does, it helps build relationships. It helps to build familiarity so when you have to work together it enables you to do it. So what you do is you establish these networks where you are meeting regularly, you are setting goals for each other, you're getting familiar with each other and then it helps you to solve problems in a more quicker, faster-paced way. So that's kind of the thought process and I think we already have some of this in place but it's about making it, bringing it to the next step and bringing it forward that I think is really important. We got a microphone. Thanks. Yone Shimshoni from Israel. The US has led, historically, the development of combined arms warfare. And today you took it a step further to combined agency warfare. And I'd like you to, if you could, unpack that and tell us what you mean by that, who would lead that, who would quarterback it in American terms. How would it get analyzed, organized and executed? So let me, I don't want to overstate it because, but how I see this is let me use what's happened in West Africa as an example, Ebola virus. So there was a lot of non-governmental organizations and other things that were trying to solve the Ebola crisis in Liberia. Now what we did as a military, we were able to deploy a headquarters over there that was able to integrate all of the different work that was going on. And so we were then able to organize the local governmental entities, the non-governmental entities and our national entities together to help solve the problem. So now the rate of Ebola virus has plummeted. And so that's an example of, in a humanitarian assistance role, but in a military role. So let's, wherever we might go. So take, and it depends on what the environment is. There'll be times when the State Department could lead in this and there's times where the military would lead. Where we would lead is parts where there's instability and security is not strong. And so we're able to put in a military that's able to organize and bring together all the impacts of joint. So all the different military aspects. And then we're able to bring in and integrate military operations with our diplomatic efforts and our economic efforts. And we try to bring those together to gain the overall effects that are necessary to solve the problem. Because I believe there are very few problems in the future, they're just simply military problems. They're all socioeconomic and military. And so in order to solve that problem, you have to come at it with a more holistic approach. And I think that what we can help bring is help to organize that and start that and then hand it off as we make progress. So that's the thought process behind it. We call it GEM, Joint Interagency Intergovernmental Multinational Solutions. We have to have an acronym for everything. Take a question from this side too. Peter Singer with New America General. Thank you for joining us. Good to see you. Good to see you as well. So you took us on a tour around the world of the importance of our various training and advisory missions. But then also on the tour, we kept naming places where we had had training advisory missions that hadn't worked out, whether it's Iraq or Yemen or we used to talk about Mali as an example and then that didn't work out. So what isn't working and how do we fix it for the future given the importance of all of this to the American role in the future of war? Well, it's persistence for one thing. You can't, so in Iraq, we were making good progress and then we couldn't get an agreement left. So I think that's part of the problem. But it's also establishing the institution itself. So we're good at training the military. We're good at training squads, platoons, companies, battalions, brigades. But we forget about you have to have the institution that supports that. So you have to have the institution that supports leader training. You have to have an institution that supports sustainment. You have to have an institution that's, and so although we were working on that in Iraq, I'll use that exactly because I'm more familiar with that, they weren't ready yet. And so when you leave, it fails. And so they're no longer getting equipment. They're not doing the right training properly because they don't have the institutional ability to do it. And that's why in Afghanistan now, we're really focused on that part of, that's an important part of what's going on. We're trying to learn from our mistakes so that, and we have to stay engaged. It doesn't mean you have to stay engaged with thousands of people on the ground, but we gotta stay engaged because if you don't, it's very easy that they could wander away because of all the political inside issues. Corruption is a problem as well, and that's something you always have to take on in a lot of these nations is the incredible corruption that goes on. And so that takes away, and when we're there, it's kind of like a watchdog over corruption. It still goes on, but maybe not as much. And so it's about embedding those values and embedding the institution that helps solve these problems. And so I think that's why I think we've made mistakes, is that it takes time. I don't, it's not apples to apples when I say this, but everybody says, well, why were we able, why did you look at Germany today, look at Korea today, look at Japan today? Well, we invested in those countries and we're still invested in those countries today. And it doesn't have to be, again, with great military numbers, but you gotta be invested in them and help to bring them along over a long period of time because this doesn't happen in two or three years. It's a much longer, if we wanna develop a military capability that's gonna be long lasting, you gotta stay engaged with it. That's a quick follow-up on what you were talking about. So we're focusing on the Rockies, on the institution. It's coming along. We're working with some new players now with the new government, so we're continuing to work that. In Syria, we haven't even started. We're just, we're in the basics now in Syria, but that's something, as that progresses, we'll have to take that in and consider it, depending on how that turns out. And that's a different issue, because we're trying to develop them against ISIL. We're not sure what's gonna happen within Syria yet, but that'll be something we have to think about as we go forward. In Afghanistan, we are focused on that very much, and with this new government, that's why it's important for us. They gotta get those final pieces of the government in place, shit, it's not there yet. And then we can really start helping them build that institution. I know we have a question here. Con Kotlin from the London Daily Telegraph. General, you've spoken a lot about the importance of multinational partners. For the past 30 years, the British military has been a very valuable ally in the wars that we fought. Looking to the future, and given the very drastic defense cuts we've had in the UK, do you still see Britain as a reliable military partner in the wars of the future? And how important is it for the British government to commit to 2% of GDP for military spending? Yeah, well, I would say yes. Absolutely, I still see them as a wild part. We signed an Army to Army agreement about us continuing to work together, integrated as we move to the future. So we have a kind of a bilateral army agreement between our two armies to continue to work together. And I think what's happened is the, first it's about having a partner that has very close values and goals that we do. But more importantly, what's changed though is the level of capability. So it's not capability itself, it's more about capacity in the British Army. So what we're trying to do now is how do we readjust and fit? Because we used to, in the past, be a UK division next to a US Army division. Now it might be a UK brigade inside of a US division or a UK battalion inside of a US brigade. And so we gotta adjust our program to make sure we're still able to work together. And I think in all, as we look to the future of the army, we put out a new army operating concept. We work very closely with our UK partners in working this. So I think that relationship is very close. And I think it will continue to be close. But I would be lying to you if I didn't say I'm very concerned about the GDP investment, not only in the UK, but in all of Europe. Because we need multinational solutions. And the US is willing to participate and to some cases lead, but we need our multinational partners to help. So I would just say, as we look at these threats around the world, they are concerning to everyone. And I think we all have to be able to invest and work together to solve these problems. Because these are turning in because of the way information moves and how quickly it moves. It is becoming global issues. They're no longer just state to state or regional, they're more global. Counterterrorism is clearly a global issue. And we should be able to work closely together on that issue. We need everybody to help assist and invest. Yes. Nicholas Berry, Farm Policy Forum. One of the tasks of the military is to provide advice to national decision makers in the White House. That's basically for the military, the Joint Chiefs, but you're very much involved in that. I won't ask you how effective that is, but I will ask you about, are you happy or satisfied with the access that your council has with the White House? Yes. This is always a question. You know, I believe that we have, so as Chief of Staff of the Army member, the Joint Chiefs, by the way, I have the authority to anytime request a meeting with the president. You know, now we tend to work through the chairman because he represents our views and that works out frankly more efficiently and effectively. But I've met with the president quite regularly on a number of issues, whether it be budget, whether it be issues involving security. And so, I think the access and the ability to give advice is there. So, and that's important. And so, you know, I would just say, the way our system is set up, you want a process where the military can give their best military advice on how we believe a problem should be solved and how we should do it and how we should invest in it. And I would say we have that capability today. It's absolutely taking on a regular basis. And so, and it doesn't mean we always agree, but that's okay. You know, I was always taken by, I always tell the story, and I'll just tell it very quickly. When I first became the Chief of Staff, General Shaly Kashavili passed away. And we were doing his, we were at his funeral and we were at Fort Mayer and President Clinton came to speak. And he, as he was speaking, he was explaining his relationship with Shaly Kashavili. And he was saying that Shaly Kashavili would piss him off more than any other person he'd have because he'd tell him things he didn't want to hear. But he says, as he grew over time, he realized that he was giving him the best advice because he was giving him honest advice on the most difficult issues. And he really appreciated that. He goes, I didn't always follow it because I had to make, it was my responsibility to make the decision. But he appreciated the advice that he was giving him. And I think that's the point. And I would argue that absolutely we're able to give that advice to the President when we need to. Yes. Sheldon, Simon, Arizona State University. General, thank you very much for your comments and Wolf for your excellent moderation. Turning briefly to the Korean Peninsula. For some years now, the United States has been urging the Koreans to take over the combined command. But the Koreans keep on deferring. Can you tell us about the dynamics behind that? Well, I don't know the inner workings of that, but I would just say this. I would say that I believe that they simply don't think they're prepared to do that yet. And that they think it's important to have, still have US leadership. And so I think a lot of it has to do with they are, they want to ensure continued US commitment to South Korea and the Korean Peninsula. I think that's part of it. But I think they still believe that our ability to lead operationally a multinational, in a multinational environment, we just have more capability to do that than they do right now. But we are working closer and closer towards that. And I think there will come a time here where they will take that over. But I think for them, it's important that they want to continue to see us leading that for at least the next four or five years. Is the All Volunteer Army the future of the US Army or bringing back the draft? Is that a possibility? Well, I'm a big believer in the All Volunteer Army. I've lived, I came in the Army right when it first started. And I would tell you the quality and capability that we have. And because of the diversity, the missions we have to do, the All Volunteer Army just makes it easier to do. And I think the professional force that we've developed is the finest we've had. And I think it has to do with the fact that we've had an All Volunteer Army. Now, I will say, if All Volunteer Army's more expensive. But I think the investment that we put into it makes a huge difference in our capabilities. Okay, one last question. Sharon Burke with New America and former Assistant Secretary of Defense for Energy. But I'm not gonna ask you about energy. What I'd like to ask you, what I'd like to ask you about is you've talked about new challenges and you've talked about the fact that the Army is changing the way it's organized and the way it's training soldiers themselves that you're changing this. What about equipment? And I know that's been a tough thing for the Army in recent years. And I think it'd be great to hear you talk about what you're doing with the requirements process. Yeah, so it's a couple of things. Thanks for asking that question, very important question. So first off, as General Sullivan, one of the ex-Chief of Staff at the Army Army Respect, he always says that intellectual always proceeds the physical. And that's the case now. So intellectually, we're already making the adjustment. The next piece is how do we physically make that as we look at our requirements process and our equipment process? So the one thing that we are doing is we have now brought together all the different entities that are involved in the requirements process. And I am overseeing it and we are meeting regularly to make sure everybody understands our priorities and how we're developing requirements for the future. And the mistakes we've made in the past is what I would call utopian requirements. And what I mean by that is we would put things in there that we weren't even sure technologically we could achieve and what that would do is that would cause us to delay programs, to make them too expensive, and they wouldn't deliver what we wanted. So what we're trying to do now is make realistic requirements that leave room for growth. So the thought process is you can iterate improvements into your systems. So you might buy a system and the first time you buy it it has this capability and two years now you can input new capability so you continue to modernize and improve. And so I think that's important. The other important piece to this is as I've explained this very complex environment that we're gonna operate in, you have to develop, for the Army, we have to develop concepts and then use technology to help those concepts. You can't just say we're gonna go, we're gonna take whatever technology's out there and develop our concepts to support the technology. And so we've ensured that we've changed that. So part of this is us, as we look to the future warfare, here are the kind of concepts we wanna do, now here are the technologies that are available and then we adapt and innovate those concepts based on the technology. So for example, manned unmanned is one I would use as an example. So how are we using unmanned UAVs with manned aircraft? How are we gonna use unmanned ground systems with manned ground? And so the concept is how do we develop manned unmanned capability for the future and then what technologies to support it? Command and control. It's clearly, technology's exploding. I tell everybody, I get so frustrated, I can have my iPhone here or my cell phone and I can talk to every continent right here. I can dial up five numbers, I can have a conversation in any continent in the world. And yet right now for me, I gotta put 200 vehicles on the ground to talk to anybody. Why is that? So we've gotta develop a concept of what kind of communications do we need? How do we protect that communication and how do we use technologies that are already available to make that better? And so those are the kind of things that we have to do and I think we are now on the road to doing that. And because we don't have a lot of money right now for modernization, we're gonna have to make the best use of every single dollar that we have. Well General, I think the mission has been accomplished. We are all a little bit smarter now than we were an hour ago when we started this conversation, thanks to you. So on behalf of all of us here, thanks very much for joining us and we'll continue these conversations. Thanks. Thanks.