 As the Under Secretary, she is responsible for the affairs of the Department of the Air Force comprised of the U.S. Air and Space Forces to include organizing and training, equipping for the welfare of approximately 697,000 active duty guard, reserve and civilian airmen and guardians in their family worldwide. She oversees the Department annual budget for more than $250 billion directly strategic and policy development, risk management, weapons acquisition, technology investment and human resources management across the global enterprise. Ladies and gentlemen, the Honorable Ms. Jones. So I just came from the War College. And so I'm very excited to talk to talk to this group. And Chief, thank you for inviting me. Good afternoon. Congratulations to our newest E9s, right? We're in various phases of the orientation. It's really an honor for me to be here. And I'm going to share a little bit, like a little personal story of why I'm so honored to talk to this group. You know, I met my first Chief Master Sergeant ever when I was 14 years old. I am a product of Junior ROTC at John Jay High School in San Antonio, Texas. Hey, that's right. That's right. And hey, that's right. And there was a Chief Master Sergeant, Phil Larson there. And Chief was, he was firm. He was strict. But you know what? He demonstrated every single day that he cared about every single one of us. And while that, you know, he taught us drill and ceremony and uniform. He taught us about the core values, certainly. But you know what he taught me? He taught me that I could trust the chevrons. That I could and should trust the chevrons. So that was a very meaningful, he played a meaningful role in my life in those couple of years. And as to this day shaped how I think about this group and how I think about how important you are to the Department of the Air Force and making sure that our airmen and our guardians can serve to their full potential. So while that was just decades ago, you can see just how important that was for me. And I'm so thankful that I just across the hall from me now have the wonderful Chief Master Sergeant Joanne Bass give it up. Who is not shy about giving me a blue line check. Letting me know how that may be understood just a little bit differently in certain parts of the Air Force, which I very much appreciate. So look, it's a real honor again for me to be here. I'm going to share a little bit about where our Secretary of the Air Force is taking the Department of the Air Force, certainly from an operational standpoint and from the most important operational standpoint, how we are taking care of our people. And then I very much look forward to your questions. I have yet to meet a shy chief, right? So I look forward to your questions. So this is my desk and I don't know if everyone can read what it says here, but a couple of staff meetings ago, your Secretary of the Air Force challenged each of us to take out a sticky and write on there exactly what this says. War with China and or Russia is likely at any time, right? Don't be confused about the moment and time that we are in. Don't be confused about what has been. We need to focus on what could be. And so this was a way to make sure the Secretariat and the two services that we are all laser focused on ensuring that we are ready for a high-end fight which can frankly kick off at any moment. We are seeing right now what is happening in the UCOM AOR and the Secretary and I get an intelligence briefing every single day that only underscores the need for us to be ready for a high-end fight. Y'all, we are very lucky to have Secretary Frank Kindle as our Secretary at this point in time. Not only is he steeped in national security, knows it like few others do, knows the building like few others do, but that knowledge is really only matched by his willingness, his courage to frankly speak truth to power and be very clear about where we as a Department of the Air Force are in terms of being ready for that high-end fight, the risk that we are assuming by not making tough choices across the Department of Defense and how that impacts the Department of the Air Force. So we are really quite lucky to have him there. He has certainly brought an urgency, I think Chief Bass can speak to this, an urgency with which we again are making these tough choices based on the threat. But I think he probably has a tattoo on him somewhere, a language from Goldwater Nichols that talks about the Secretary's responsibility. The Secretary of the Air Force is responsible for and has the authority necessary to conduct operations, right? It's not conduct operations, but conduct functions of which organized train and equip, right? And so when we think about organized train and equip, the question is always, well, for what? And again, as the Intel continually highlights, it's very much the Indo-Pacific. And so when he says organized train and equip is once the staff focused on that, what does that mean in practice? Well, this is what it means. These are his seven operational imperatives. These are the things that he has asked the staff to focus on to ensure have we defined these capabilities right? Do we adequately know what we need? And if we don't have what we need, how do we get to where we need to be? So let me give you a minute just to read these. Secretary Austin has talked a lot about China being the pacing challenge, right? And we've got a number of strategic documents that are in various phases of completion, right? From the national security strategy, the national defense strategy, the national, excuse me, the nuclear posture review, the missile defense review, all of these strategic documents that we've got to be ready to make sure that the Department of the Air Force is delivering combat credible support for. And so when we think about what is needed, a lot of it, as you can see here, many of these start off with define, how do we understand kind of the scope of the challenge that we've got, right? So let me talk a little bit about some of these. And I know this is an Air Force crowd, but the first one we shouldn't be surprised is frankly talking about space. And this is talking about defining a resilient space order of battle and architectures. So what are some of those things, for example, that we certainly know we need in our space force to provide, but how are some of those things potentially going to no longer be done by the Air Force but done by the space force, right? So this is about what does that architecture need to look like? The second one speaks to advanced battle management system. So ABMS, the air contribution to JADC2, right? How do we do command and control in a high-end fight? What is the Department of the Air Force's contribution to that? The next one is more attack air related. So this is defining the next generation air dominance systems of systems. So right now NGED is a multi-hundred million dollar aircraft, which is one quite expensive. But when we look at what might be needed in a high-end fight in the Indo-Pacific, we need different options that provide us some range, some different capabilities. So this is looking at what that might look like, right? The next one is achieving moving target indicators and tracking at scale. This is important when we're talking about providing target quality data. This is an initiative, the space force is working closely with NRO, the National Reconnaissance Office, to figure out what are those requirements, how well are we meeting those, and how might the space force be able to help address that delta? Again, looking in the Indo-Pacific, it's about helping us ensure we can buy ourselves as much time as possible, and we do that by having a good understanding of where some of those targets may be moving or not. This next one, defining optimized, resilient, basing, sustainment, and communications in a contested environment. How are we going to do those very basic things that we need in an environment, again, in a contested environment? This is not the Middle East. You're not just going to go into a place that has been kind of well set up and resume those operations. Many of these are obviously quite austere. Many of you may have actually been to some of these small islands in the Indo-Pacific, where we're trying to build some type of presence, excuse me, that would be necessary for us to operate from. But it's not just where we operate from. It's how we do that. How do we logistically support this? What are the types of comms? Secure comms in particular that we need? I think it's actually pretty interesting that the third largest AFSC here are cyber defense operators. Do I have that right? Yeah, where are you? Are they skipping on class today? I think the top one, the top one is aircraft maintainers. Oh, okay. And then the second one is our defenders, if I have that right. Okay. They're here. The next one is defining the B-21 long-range strike family of systems. So this is not unlike the NGAD one. How do we pair these things, these platforms, rather with uncrewed platforms that can give us additional range, additional capacity based on what they're carrying? Again, because we've got to buy ourselves time in that type of engagement. And then lastly, as we do all these things, how well is the Department of the Air Force ready to transition to that posture? How well can we do all of those things that we just talked about? I mean, we make some assumptions about how much warning time we would have when we would know actually things are kicking off. But how, once we do have that understanding, how quickly can the DAF transition to a wartime posture against a peer competitor, right? A peer being the key piece of this. So this is how your Secretary of the Air Force has translated his responsibility to organize, train, and equip the force. We learned, I mean, I think we all learned a long time ago, there's a difference between what we want though and what we can get. And so let me articulate some of the challenges that we've got to realizing and frankly funding a lot of those things. So those 18 words on that first bullet there, maintaining legacy platforms and excess infrastructure is eating into our ability to modernize and address the pacing challenge. I must spend 75, the Secretary must spend 75% of our days saying that those 18 words in a different way based on the meeting that we're in. This is fundamentally the challenge of the Department of the Air Force right now. And so the Secretary and I and certainly the two Chiefs spend a lot of time on Capitol Hill helping those folks understand not only the delta between where we are and where we need to be, but also how wide that delta is, right? I mean, if we're going to pivot and focus on the pacing challenge and make sure we're ready to address that, then resources must follow. Resources must follow. And that requires some really hard choices about what we stop doing. But we've got to be, and so painting that picture of the cost of some of these legacy platforms that to be honest are not going to be what we need in a high-end fight. So not only is the platform legacy the excess infrastructure that we've got, right? I mean, you can see there in the numbers 30 years ago, since in the last 30 years 60% fewer fighter squadrons, 40% fewer airmen, but only 15% fewer installations. And I'm sure every one of you has served on a base where you've seen a building and said, you know what? That should probably be demolished, because it is frankly expensive to maintain in its current form. But there are a number of restrictions that are preventing us from doing that. So we're pounding the drum with folks that can help us with funding, certainly lifting some of the congressional restrictions that are affecting our ability to move as quickly as we need to. Let me talk a little bit about, frankly, as important we're fighting imperative, which is how we take care of our people. These next two slides were slides that the Secretary showed at a recent offsite that was hosted by the Secretary of Defense and his key leadership team. And the Secretary, Secretary Kindle, was asked to talk about how he is helping to realize Secretary Austin's vision of taking care of our people. And so what he did is he pointed, and again it's this slide and the next slide, which identifies a couple of key findings, but he pointed to the ways in which we are using these reports, the data provided frankly 100,000 pages, excuse me 100,000 comments, 17,000 pages of single-spaced text and really quite a bit of trust that you've been placed in us to take action and get after these things. And we are working hard to do so. I will call, I want to highlight a couple of them. The, when the Secretary and I got here in, not got here, got to the positions rather, in late July, early August, several weeks right after that was the outbrief for the second report, which looked at some of those disparities by race and ethnicity, and then separately by gender. And if you think those numbers are bad or not what we'd like them to be, you can imagine what they would be at the intersection of those three things, race, gender and ethnicity. However, that wasn't part of the report. So I asked RIG to go back, look at that exact same data, put on that other additional filter and help us understand how the story changes when you do that type of analysis. Because again, this is about being the best career force that we can be. And if we are not understanding the experience of 10% of the workforce, then what are we missing? What are we failing to understand certainly when we retain talent, but potentially is affecting our ability to recruit talent. And this is important. Secretary and I talk a lot about certainly propensity to serve, making sure we are able to tap into the nation's talent wherever it might be. And when we look at dealing with the effects of the 2008 recession, which is a smaller population, on top of the medical increasing percentage of our young people that are medically not qualified to serve, we've got to be ruthless in how we recruit and go after the nation's talent. And so again, part of that is understanding how we are communicating somebody's ability to serve to their full potential in the Department of the Air Force. We have a lot of commercials, right? We can have a flyover at the Super Bowl. But if somebody's understanding of the Department of the Air Force is the murder of specialist Vanessa Guillen or the murder of A1C, then that's a problem. And we've got to work to address that. And so again, this data helps us understand, make those data-informed policies to ensure everyone can serve to their full potential. This next slide are some of the key findings that the Secretary highlighted. And again, this is the exact slide that he showed to the Secretary of Defense. I'm going to let you read these and then just raise your hand when you're done. Raise your hand, keep your hand up when it's done. Thank you. Waiting on you, just kidding. Thanks, he thinks I'm kidding, right? Okay, thanks. Please put your hands down. But again, you know, the Secretary, we can talk operational imperatives, but he knows that our number one operational imperative is the trust. The trust that our people have in our commitment to their safety, to their ability to succeed, and their ability to serve to their full potential. Recognizing that anyone, again, courageous enough to raise their right hand, say that they are willing to protect and defend the Constitution, should have the opportunity to do so to their full potential. So these are the types of things that are contextualizing some of the data, the very clear data that we see in disparities in promotions, professional military education opportunities, as well as professional opportunities. So, look, we are working to do what we can do from the Pentagon, but I think we all know that the work to get after some of these things is going to happen in your operational units, and it's going to happen based on your words, your actions that now informed by not only these things, but the other data in the report, and how you take action on that, right? Because if we don't get after this, we are not going to have access to nation's best talent. We are not going to live up to our core values, integrity first, service before self, excellence in all we do. I mean, this is just an expression of that. I think moreover, I think, look, the one in four female respondents delayed informing their commander, they were pregnant due to the fear of being denied professional opportunities, that's an operational risk, right? So these are readiness issues that we have to treat them as such, and the secretary and I are committed to doing that. We've set up an office of diversity inclusion that is meant to advise the rest of the staff, the secretariat, as well as the air and space staff, on how do we ensure that our processes of looking at and making sure that we don't have any assumptions built into our processes that might be exacerbating some of these. We're actively actioning the recommendations that are coming out of the barrier analysis working groups. I really want to thank Chief Bass for her leadership on Fortify the Force. That'll be another critical barrier analysis group that flags for us the ways in which we can improve the resiliency across the force, and I got it. There's an idea, and now it's up to us leaders to go fund it, understood, understood. I hear you loud and clear. I would also ask that you frankly just do what I know Chiefs are good at doing, which is asking questions and making sure that we're taking care of our folks, asking why, asking why not, asking where is the data. I recently did that with the, well, one of the things I am very excited about whenever it comes across my desk is the opportunity to select folks for the commissioning program, the Schlepp program. I looked at an application recently, and in the waiver section, this woman had to submit a waiver for being pregnant. I just thought to myself, why does anyone have to submit a waiver for being pregnant for a commissioning program? It just doesn't make sense. It at least didn't make sense to me inherently. I asked MR, our manpower resources division for whom A1 kind of supports, right? Hey, what are all those gender specific policies? Because my concern, I'll be honest with you when I read that initially is that, you know what, I bet you someone didn't apply because they didn't want to submit a waiver. And if we don't even know why we need a waiver or we've just been doing this because it is the process and no one can explain, no one has yet to explain to me why that was there, to be honest with you, or the benefit of it, then we are not tapping into the talent and the force. Because we know that deters somebody potentially from applying. We also know that when, frankly, when somebody is looking at packages about which one to put forth, do they put the one that has a waiver or doesn't? They potentially put the one more often than not the one that doesn't because they want it to be successful and they think a waiver will be hard to overcome. So we've got to ask these questions about why, why do we do that, right? Help me understand why that is. And I think that's fair. I had a great lunch with a couple of airmen, actually about 10 folks. And I don't think anyone had been in for more than five years. And they were not shy either, honestly. They were all ready to be chiefs. And a lot of them actually had joined since COVID. So it was interesting to hear kind of their own experiences. Thankfully, they're all having a great time here at Maxwell, which is wonderful. But I also encourage them. You know, this is your time. This is your time. This is also your service. So ask questions, right? Ask questions to help us be a better department of the Air Force. So let me, if I want to highlight any other ones on here. I mean, this is fundamentally a readiness issue. This is fundamentally a leadership issue. And we need your help to get after this. So that is what your leadership team is up to. Your leadership team is focused on the high-end fight, making sure we are ready. And we are also making sure that all of our airmen and our guardians and our civil servants can serve to their full potential, right? We don't have time. We don't have talent to lose. And I think sometimes it's important to be reminded of the consequences of not living up to kind of what we all know we are capable of and not leading in a way that our airmen and our guardians all deserve and so you certainly know Specialist Vanessa Guillen. I hope you would also know A1C Natasha Pochen, talent that we lost needlessly and talent we should still have and leadership could have made a difference. All right. So with that, I wanted to get off the stage with just reminding you of how our work certainly is focused on the strength and the department of the Air Force is relying on your talents and your leadership. But also is, of course, lockstep with the Secretary of Defense and his priorities, defend the nation, take care of our people, succeed through teamwork. I'm remiss in that on the operational imperative slide, I did not hit as hard what I would have liked to in terms of the importance of the work that we do with our partners and our allies. One of the things that we're doing separately, the management initiatives, which is more kind of headquarters focus that I'm leading on behalf of the Secretary is looking at our international affairs capacity. How well can we do that? I'm really thankful that Chief Bass has helped inform how we think about our capacity to work with our partners and allies and the important role that our enlisted force and our enlisted engagements provide. So again, these are the SECDF's top priorities. As you all know, what interests your boss fascinates the heck out of you. So all of our things are certainly in support of the SECDF's priorities. If you hadn't seen those, good time to be refreshed. Okay. All right. With that, I am open to all of your true false questions. Just kidding. He's got some questions. I've been known to call on people too. So don't be shy. Oh, don't be nervous. Chiefs, come on, Chiefs. All right. I'm going to call them. Chief, I'm going to count to five. Oh, okay. Oh, there's a mic. Okay. Good afternoon, ma'am. Hi there. My name is C.Massard Aletta. I'm over from Langley Air Force Base. So my question is in regards to the competition with China and SECDF's priority number one and number three. We're talking about leverage and using our full capacity, not as a military, but as a nation. Has there been talks in leveraging the civilian world in regards to cyber capabilities when we're talking about Google, Apple, what they can bring to fight, if worst case scenario, to encourage to our nation? Yeah. That's a really good question. And I think you're thinking about this in exactly the right way, which is this is not only a military challenge. This is something that we've got to look holistically, certainly across the interagency, but also to your point, our international partners, as well as the commercial sector. One of the operational impaired, the first one actually talks about defining resilient space-based order of battle, excuse me, and architecture. A lot of that will leverage commercial capabilities, right? I mean, the advancements in the commercial sector of space are just frankly wonderful opportunities for us to take advantage of that, whether you're talking about SETCOM or you're talking about launch capability. So that's one way in which we can complement and certainly leverage, to use your word, some of the capabilities that already exist. And frankly, we don't have to spend a lot of time in our own resources developing that. I think you're also bringing up a really good point in terms of what are the other things that we can do to buy ourselves some time. We need to, this is kind of where we are versus where we need to be. We need some time to get there. As you saw in the operational apparatus, a lot of that is defining it, right? So you're even just kind of scoping, what do we need? How do we get after this challenge? On top of that, the process to bring on these capabilities, train with it, make it interoperable with our partners and our allies, and then make sure it's where we want it to be. Like, that doesn't happen overnight. So one of the ways in which we are looking at, ensuring we've got kind of the full gamut of capabilities is really leveraging our partners and our allies. So many of you may be familiar with AUKUS, right? This is a new partnership that the administration, President Biden announced. And this is between us, with Australia and with the UK. And this is really focused on developing capabilities together, leveraging each other's expertise, but also making it interoperable from the get-go, right? What are we focused on right away? We're focused on the first tranche is four things. So quantum, undersea capabilities, AI, as well as cyber, right? What are those things that we can focus on developed together to help, frankly, help save cost savings-wise, but also make sure, again, it's interoperable from the very beginning. And the next tranche is, and we're already focused on the next tranche, is hypersonics, counter hypersonics, electronic warfare, biodefense, as well as space. And so there are critical ways in which our commercial, we can leverage commercial technology and whatnot, but I think part of it is, based on the slide, kind of defining first what we need from an operational perspective and then how can we best leverage our partners and allies and what they bring to bear. Good afternoon, ma'am. I'm C. Massard and Tony Boston from Barsha Air Force Base. I know it's been a short time since the report was released back in 2020 for the racial disparity. It's only been a couple years, but my question is, have there been any data given to you or anybody else showing any improvements or anything that has changed since then to show that we are going in the right direction? Yeah. You know, some of this is, we have done a six-month kind of assessment of how well these things are going, and as you saw on the slide, this is something that we will continue to look at to your point and make sure that we are making progress. Is it happening overnight? Is it even happening in a year? Not as quickly as we all would like, to be frank, but we are continuing to look at how we can improve upon this. Some of this, frankly, goes back even to PME, right? How do we address, for example, unconscious bias? How can we, kind of, not only on the enlisted side, but on the officer side, how can we highlight some of these disparities, making sure that people understand these are a real thing, these are some ways in which we can address those things by asking, for example, why don't we look at the intersection of race, gender and ethnicity versus just looking at those two separately. So we're continuing to collect the data. We're continuing to ensure that we are really thinking through, for example, the recommendations from the barrier analysis group about ways in which we can address some of these disparities and ensure that our policies and our actions convey that we value everyone's service certainly equally and want to make sure people can serve to their full potential. It's not happening as fast as we would like, but your secretary and I are committed to doing so. Good afternoon, ma'am. Senior Mass Sergeant Blaine off at Air Force Base. My question is about recruiting civilian talent. Recently, I'll just give you an example from my squadron. We had been recruiting a college student, and they just graduated. They got approved for the job, but when they completed their SF-86, they were honest and said that they had partaken in recreational use of marijuana. That person was then declined the offer. So for, as a society, as we continue to transition, I think it's going to be very difficult to recruit young people. If one, their use of legal marijuana use at this point, because they're not even with us yet. But my question in general is what's the mindset on that? What are we doing in terms of understanding the changes in social norms, and how are we conforming to that within the DOD? That's a really good question. I mean, we think about talent writ large, right? As I talked about some of the challenges, certainly as you have a smaller population, but then also less people that are able to serve in the military, but your point is well taken, and it's something that we spend equal amount of time talking about is how are we ensuring that there's sufficient civilian talent, certainly in STEM, and so we've got to, I think to your point, ensure that we understand the ways in which current policies may be preventing us from accessing all of that. But as you know, as you well know, we are limited in what the Department of the Air Force can do on an issue that is, frankly, out of our hands. This is something that the Department of Defense, frankly, the U.S. government is, this is a U.S. government policy, and so this is, but I think your point is well taken. I think, you know, the other place where this comes up is also in mental health. The fact that you have a lot of young people that have been accustomed to leveraging mental health in a healthy way, right, and ensuring that they are utilizing that resource that is needed, and for that to potentially impact their ability to serve is also, I mean, I think a good example of the general point that you're raising, and so I can tell you, we're actively looking kind of at these things, but I don't have a specific kind of timeline for you right now on when something like that might change, just because, again, it is kind of several echelons above the Department of the Air Force. Yeah, Chief Washington, Luke Air Force Base. Concerning their relationship for big corporations here in America, how involved are they in the process? We talk about accelerated change of lose, China and Russia. How involved are they in the process as far as helping us defend the freedoms that they enjoy? Well, I think, you know, this is a, when I think, when I talked about some of those capabilities made, we're certainly not going to develop those internally within the Department of the Air Force, but it is about kind of scoping it and understanding what we need to do, and then working with research labs, with industry, to your question, about how something like that might be developed and by when, and does that address the threat as we understand it? So there's a, you know, a healthy understanding of the need to ensure that we are working and providing good feedback, good requirements to our, to industry, and leveraging those technologies that can help us bring meaningful operational capability as quickly as possible and put it into the hands of the warfighter. Hello, ma'am. I'm Sergeant Parrish from Joint Base San Antonio. Hey. Yes, ma'am. My questions is in regards to a policy that Air Education Training Command has in relation to diversity and inclusion. Specifically, ATC leaned forward after the disparity review and conducted analysis and research and created a policy to try to discourage the use of discrimination and other type of behaviors from the work center requiring a general court martial convening authority notification, similar to what's required for sexual harassment. So my question is in regards to what is DAF doing to try to also curb those type of destructive behaviors? Yeah, so I'd have to look specifically at what you're talking about. So forgive me for not being super specific on that specific ATC policy, but I will look into it. When we think about the... So I'm going to speak generally then because I can't speak exactly to what's included in that policy. The behaviors that are counterproductive to ensuring that everybody can serve to their full potential, I think there are perceptions and there is data to back that up. That is really the point of ensuring that we are asking the tough questions so we can collect the data so folks cannot say, oh, that's just somebody's belief. Well, I mean, somebody's belief is probably based on their experience, right? And it's important that we understand that. I mean, certainly the fact that we had to do an addendum to the experiences and disparities of 10% of the force shows a blind spot and I'm glad that we addressed it and looked at the data to ensure we are being as holistic and as effective in our approaches because the last thing that we want to do is put something in place that exacerbates, you know, a challenge or disparity that we've got. So I owe you some feedback on that AETC policy and what might be useful at a DAF level. Howdy, ma'am. Senua Davis here from Ramstein Air Base. Over here. So the topic du jour today has really been focused on China and a lot of the things that we've talked about today have highlighted China and our needs to get after that situation but going back to the sticky note that you had there leading off, it talked about Russia and or China and using the operative term of and, Russia and China, where are we at from an OT&E perspective with our ability to face that potential situation? About Russia? Both at the same time. Yeah. Well, at the same time. Yeah. So, yeah. Well, I mean, look, I think we're all, you know, we're all watching the news and are being kept up-to-date by the intelligence and how quickly that situation is evolving and frankly what that means for the Alliance and our partners and our allies in the region. So where are we in relation to a potential, having the capabilities to, if we were to be in a war with both of them at the same time, is that your question? Well, one, that'd be very difficult and the operational imperatives, those are not specific to an AOR. Those are types, those are the war-fighting capabilities that are necessary and so when we look at the threats in certain time frames, you know, and based on the region, the answer to that question is different and again, that time, space, purpose, right? Those are all things that really scope our ability to do what you just said. So in the near term, and this is actually something that we spent a lot of time helping to explain on the Hill, which is, you know, when you evacuate 120,000 people out of Afghanistan in about two weeks, that takes a significant toll on the workforce and certainly our platforms. And so helping them, for example, understand the time needed to make up for lost exercise time, for the wear and tear on the platforms, certainly on the effect on our personnel, helping them understand that, you know, doing these things, these aren't, I mean, it's not cost-neutral, right? Some of these costs are not as apparent as others and that is risk and readiness to get back to your question. So it would be a challenge to do that. We are defining what those operational capabilities would be and ensuring that we've got the, are as close to getting the right capabilities by that time as necessary. Hey, ma'am, I'm Chief Retire Kirk Patrick. I just want to ask this question really quickly. Hopefully you can hear me. I know you and the Secretary spent a lot of time, as you've mentioned, a few times on the Hill, advocating on behalf of air and space power and on behalf of all the airmen here. What can we do at our leadership level, at the leadership level of this room, to support the messaging, the activities, the things that you're doing to try to get after? What are some things that we can do to try to help support that? Yeah, thank you. What a good question. Well, look, I need you all to, one, keep us accountable, right? Keep us accountable. I mentioned earlier, things are not moving as fast as they need to, and I'm with you. Highlight ways in which we could expedite some of these things. Making sure that, again, we can make these programs and do these things from the Pentagon, but so much that rests on what you do in your unit, in your unit to show that we, as a Department of the Air Force, are committed to the success and safety of every single airman and guardian. When you are, I mean, I'll be honest with you, when you are working with your partners, your community partners in the area, and I know there are great resources, there are also great resources to help carry our message with these members of Congress. And, you know, they carry a lot of weight. Again, we just don't have time or talent to lose, so folks that will listen, and folks that will help us, help the country, we need to leverage those opportunities. So if you can engage with those civilians, I would encourage you to do so. But, you know, my ask is to make sure that we are taking care of our airmen. I mean, that's a pretty simple ask. I know that, but if there are ways in which we can do that better, please flag those, and we'll continue to work hard to address those. Chief, I'm standing in between y'all and happy hour, I think. Is that right? Any more questions? Okay. Well, good. Well, look, thank you again for the opportunity. I appreciate your very good questions, and I appreciate your help in getting after these things, and I know I can depend on y'all, because again, I learned a long time ago, so I can trust those chevrons, right? So thank you for what you do. It's an honor to serve with you. Thanks.