U.S. Air Forces in Europe in the 21st century

Thank you very much for that very humbling introduction and I'm always reminded of how we have to be humble in this profession. Congressman Peterson (John Peterson, R-Pa.), Congressman Perlmutter (Ed Perlmutter, D-Colo.), and Congressman Wilson (Joe Wilson, R-S.C.), fellow officers, members of the senior executive service, retired general officers, congressional staff members, the media, industry, government, ladies, and gentlemen, good morning and thank you for coming today, and let me say thank you also for your service to the nation and what you do for us.

I'm pleased to be here this morning to talk to you about this outstanding coalition team that I'm proud to be a member of and to lead, the team that I'm referring to as the U.S. Air Forces in Europe, and our NATO partners. Our team is really transforming to meet the challenges of the 21st century. Almost everyone's familiar with the old adage that those who ignore history are bound to repeat it, and I'd like to believe that U.S. Air Forces in Europe exemplifies a more upbeat assessment of that historical saying. We embrace the command's proud history that has repeatedly helped shape events since the command's inception during World War II, and we continue that legacy of transformation in our key role in the Global War on Terror today. The Air Force is engaged every single day in worldwide operations. Nearly 36,000 Air Force Airmen, including 2,500-plus from the U.S. Air Forces in Europe, are fighting the Global War on Terror, defending our homeland nearly 48,000 sorties this year, providing strategic deterrence, giving our nation unparalleled global vigilance, reach, and power. The Air Force is the second highest contributor of forces to the Global War on Terror after the Army. In support, an Air Force mobility aircraft takes off every 90 seconds, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.

We operate out of 10 major bases in 61 locations in the Central Command area of responsibility. We're engaged now in Southwest Asia, as we have been, and we'll likely be there for a long time. We are posturing ourselves to influence, deter, dissuade the next set of adversaries anywhere in the world. Air, space, and cyber power give America global tools to reach any part of the unstable strategic landscape we have today. With either kinetic actions or with non-kinetic actions, around the world the Air Force flies over 250 airlift missions and moves 1,000 tons of cargo and 2,500 passengers every single day. That's your Air Force.

Today, U.S. Air Forces in Europe, also known as USAFE, the Air Force's oldest major command, is at the forefront of ensuring freedom's future. I feel the same as many of my historic predecessors did. It's really a distinct honor and reward to lead the great Airmen that make up this command. In my current position, I have the unique privilege of having four roles. First, I'm the commander of U.S. Air Forces in Europe; in this role I have a responsibility to organize, train, and equip our assigned forces under the direction of the Secretary of the Air Force and the Chief of Staff of the Air Force. We provide Airmen to support ongoing operations such as Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom. USAFE Airmen provide a unique form of presence that supports these and other operations worldwide. Our Airmen are deployed today in location such as Guinea Bissau, where they're doing de-mining operations, in Kandahar, in Baghram, and other locations supporting Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom. Our bases have become more expeditionary.

Now, for as many years as our Air Force has been at war, plus one more, 17 years total, U.S. Air Forces in Europe has been transforming itself into a more expeditionary Air Force, and as a result, I'm commanding a USAFE that looks surprisingly different from about a decade ago. You know, after the Cold War the command transformed. At that time we had 750 aircraft, 66,000 people; we had 25 main operating bases. This is about 1990 time-frame. In its current state today, we have 250 aircraft, 28,000 people, and 15 installations, but only five main operating bases.

Now, although we've transformed, we still maintain support for enduring missions with our coalition partners that provide intelligence, communications, and mobility. U.S. Air Forces in Europe Airmen provide intelligence assessments; operate unmanned aerial and launch vehicles, everyday, in support of the Global War on Terror. We can be found providing intelligence and communications operations in the U.S. European Command Joint Analysis Center and NATO's Intelligence Fusion Center. In addition to maintaining Europe's largest military switchboard, USAFE Airmen are also operating the airlift gateway to Europe and beyond. As part of our post-Cold War transformation, we moved the traditional USAFE gateway to Europe from Rhein Main in Frankfurt to Ramstein and Spangdahlem. This consolidated mission set includes supporting mobility missions for Afghanistan and Iraq deployments and providing humanitarian assistance on a moment's notice, just like USAFE did during the Berlin blockade.

Now USAFE maintains a very strong relationship with our host nation. In Germany, the U.S.-German political relationship, I believe, has improved. That improvement translates into support in NATO and other venues. Germany, for instance, contributes forces to the International Security Assistance Forces in Afghanistan and provides training to Iraqi police and armed forces in the region. Of utmost importance to USAFE is that Germany continues to support our gateway missions from Ramstein and other locations. Now gateway missions are not only happening east of the Atlantic, they're also happening west of it. I can recall Hurricane Katrina relief, actually provided by European friends and allies. They used Ramstein as a staging area for all aid sent to the United States. During the Hurricane Katrina disaster, over 20 Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council nations offered assistance during America's time of need, and the NATO response force was there, critical, in bringing that Hurricane Katrina aid from the Ramstein-hub to the United States. Mobility and air power have always been key assets in the USAFE theatre of operations.

It's imperative that we continue to transform our mobility capabilities and modernize our fleet. We must ensure the continuation of our distinctive capabilities like air and space superiority, global attack, rapid global mobility, precision engagement, information superiority, and agile combat support, and we're going to do that by recapitalizing our aging air and space platforms and sensors. USAFE continues to right-size its force to enable these and other Air Force transformation efforts. As part of the right-sizing effort, we've recently closed Tuzla Air Base in Kosovo and Keflavik in Iceland. Now these closures highlight our commitment to transforming our force structure, but we must also transform how we do business. I see more closures coming, more efficiency. Places like Izmir, Turkey; Bitburg, Germany; and Sembach Air Base (Germany).

The key to this is Air Force Smart Operations, the 21st century initiative that we call AFSO 21 in our Air Force. AFSO 21 allows us to right-size the work for the future workforce, which will then be much lighter, leaner, and more expeditionary. It's really all about lean. I believe we're leading the Air Force in Air Force Smart Ops 21 events. Now, just consider our information technology and centralized help-desk switchboard initiatives: they've resulted in the elimination of 52 manpower positions and a savings of over $20 million across the future years of our defense program. We're also working Air Force Smart Ops 21 transformation plans in other key process areas. We're protecting our hard-dollar savings, cost avoidance, and we're doing manpower savings as a result of these efforts. Manpower reduction with a 440-billet savings so far in Air Force Smart Ops 21 events have occurred just in the first two years, just by smart non-commissioned officers looking at the way we store, maintain munitions, and do we really have to maintain that number? Can we reduce that number? And so, consequently, they are finding ways to be more efficient.

Change of this magnitude is a tremendous undertaking and all the while the flightlines of USAFE bases are in nonstop motion supporting the Global War on Terror. Our Airmen are unequaled and downrange in places such as Iraq, where USAFE pilots and maintainers have experienced the satisfaction of training their Iraqi counterparts in the C-130 aircraft. Recently, Airmen from 435th Contingency Air Medical Staging Facility at Ramstein (Air) Base, Germany, received their 68,000th patient. These caring medical professionals stabilize and safely transport wounded service-members from downrange, helping move them forward to the United States and on the road to recovery. (retired Lt. Gen.) John Bradley (former commander, Air Force Reserve Command) just reminded me this morning of a soldier that he'd seen with his legs blown off on Friday in Baghdad. By Tuesday, he was at Ramstein Regional Medical Hospital, and by Tuesday evening, he was at Walter Reed (Army Medical Center, Washington, D.C.) getting the world-class, best care that DOD provides. In fact, now 98 percent of all of the patients that make it through the air medical evacuation system today survive their wounds. The overall survival rate for operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom is 90 percent. Now, you compare that to Vietnam, where the survival rate was 76 percent.

The significant increase in survivability is directly attributable to the transformational issues such as Critical Care Air Transport Teams and the Total Force Air Medical Evacuation System that provide a fully integrated, experienced, and equipped patient-care team. Anchored by the Ramstein gateway and Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, these professional Airmen ensure injured Airmen, Seamen, Soldiers, Marines and civilians are treated and transported to hospitals in three days or less, compared to the 10 days it took during Desert Storm and 30 days that it took during Vietnam. Much like the "golden hour" in civilian trauma cases, this decreased transportation on the battlefield, off the battlefield, directly relates to patient survivability. This survivability has not just happened to the Airmen downrange, but also our joint and coalition partners as well.

This joint focus also plays a large role in the second capacity I have with commander of the U.S. European Command. As the air component to unified command, we provide air forces for commander-directed operations. In this role, USAFE falls under the command of (U. S. Army) Gen. Bantz Craddock. Clearly, as the air component, our number one priority is to provide expeditionary forces to the component commanders, to the combatant commanders, and provide for the strategic defense of our nation, now and in the future. For USAFE, the challenge encompasses an area that's more than 20 million square miles. It contains 92 countries and one-fourth of the world's population. USAFE is actively engaged in developing close partnerships to the east, with perspective on NATO expansion nations, such as Croatia, Albania, Georgia, and Ukraine, and further south into the African continent.

At that same time, USAFE, through 3rd Air Force, our component numbered air force, is actively engaged in theater security cooperation events that strengthen the alliance among NATO and partnering nations, such as Bulgaria and Romania, where USAFE F-15, F-16 and A-10 pilots train with Romanian, Bulgarian MiG-21s and MiG-29s. USAFE is leveraging our partners' open air space at locations like (Mihail) Kogalniceanu Air Base in Constanta, Romania. Kogalniceanu has training ranges that are larger than our Nellis (Air Force Base, Nev.) range and, currently, it's currently used for Red Flag exercises. These Romanian ranges are also co-located with ground maneuvering ranges, which increases our joint and coalition exercise capabilities and with our partner, U.S. Army Europe.

We can perform joint close air support training with U.S.-European command assets and increase our coalition training opportunities, while decreasing our coalition partners' costs. Now the traditional European civilian air traffic environment has drastically constrained our ability to train and encroaching on civil airspace use will only get worse as the European Union expands. As we might move our training locations eastward, we strengthen our coalition interoperability and we increase our in-theatre training opportunities. These transformation efforts reduce our reliance on expensive deployments to stateside locations. While beneficial, training in the continental United States is not optimum nor is it cost effective. By leveraging our partners to the east we are able to save money while increasing the types of quantity and quality of the training we have. These engagements also provide them with a valuable tool ensuring things for the future.

Our engagement efforts also extend to Russia. We're working to expand our partnerships with the Russian air force. While there are several major political issues between the U.S. and Russia, such as ballistic missile defense in Europe and energy security, we continue to build our military-to-military relationship. Russia recently ratified the Partnership for Peace status of forces-agreement, which will enable U.S. and Russian exercises and continue military-to-military engagement. Now I've hosted their air chief, Gen. Col. (Aleksandr) Zelin, in Germany. I've flown on his wing, in my aircraft, and he's hosted me in his country and I've flown on his wing in his aircraft. We've built a good relationship. I think that relationship will continue to foster better understanding between our countries and our armed forces.

Now, we're also transforming how we modernize our aircraft. USAFE has the unique distinction of being the only forward deployed major command in the Air Force, and as such, this allows us to leverage our allies in daily interaction, and daily interaction has built a foundation of trust and confidence. Six of the Joint Strike Fighter partner nations and 19 of 26, or 73 percent, of the coalition countries fighting the War on Terror are from the USAFE area of responsibility, which I am proud to be a part of. In fact, we're leveraging European capabilities to upgrade our F-16 aircraft. A recent contract secured support from Greece, in the form of F-16 Block 40 and 50 depot modifications over the next six years. Now this is a country that just spent $2.8 billion on buying 30 of our F-16s. Now, by leveraging our partners, we're saving money and performing the Block-updates more rapidly than sending them back to U.S. depot locations already supporting ACC (Air Combat Command) and PACAF (Pacific Air Forces).

Our focus is not only to the east but to the south. Africa continues to grow in strategic and economic importance in global affairs. Africa's resources, its people, its enterprise, its strategic alliances reflect its boundless potential. Africa is as diverse as it is vast, but it is also changing in profound ways. The demographics are shifting very fast with a tremendous and growing youth-bulge. The population is expected to almost double by the year 2025. Today's youth is on the move. Challenges include illegal immigration, complicated by well-documented prevalence of HIV and AIDS and emerging problems, like the Avian Influenza. We're proud to be opening 12 HIV/AIDS testing centers in Botswana, Africa, this day. At the same time, Africa continues to grow as a provider of many globally important resources and energy. The African continent is blessed with bountiful supplies of gas, oil, timber, minerals, and yet, regrettably, history proves that these important resources bring with them new and ever-increasing security issues.

Challenges are not limited to those on land. These are the reports of off-shore oil "bunkering," illegal over-fishing, and concerns over the inability to establish sovereign controls over their territorial seas and their airspace. Couple these other issues, with widespread poverty, like what we see in the Darfur region and you end up with a very low life-expectancy in many countries. These issues place emerging and developmental democracies in Africa under extreme stress, creating vast regions of instability.

The trans-Sahel region spans 10 African countries and runs from the Atlantic to the Horn of Africa. Over history, this region has been the home of some of the most advanced kingdoms benefiting from trade across the desert. However, the region has become one of paramount importance. This is an area of acute vulnerability due to its vast expanses of desert and porous landscape. Torn apart by war, disease, and poverty, and marked by vast ungoverned spaces, the Sahel area is emerging as a haven for terrorists. Now, across the entire region, many of the nomadic smuggling routes are still being used. Borders mean nothing to these groups, with a long history of being the center in which arms and other illicit traffic flow. It's becoming increasingly important as terrorists now seek to use these routes for logistical support, recruiting grounds, and safe-haven. That is why stability in Africa has emerged as a key goal of EUCOM's strategic plan.

Despite obvious problems, African nations are joining together and making progress in their quest to provide security and stability for Africans. We are focusing efforts on the system, our African partners, in building regions to combat these emerging terrorist problems. The new Africa Command, also known as AFRICOM, seeks to address and strengthen and partner with our African neighbors. Why? Because our interests are best served by helping nations lay or strengthen the foundations of good governance and civil society to address the conditions that breed instability. We want to increase the African continent's ability to develop infrastructure and fight famine and disease. We want to help regional organizations and African nations stabilize and strengthen their sovereignty. Partnerships with the African Union ensure that we work together, helping Africans deal with African issues.

Every year USAFE extends its humanitarian arm in the form of numerous medical exercises conducted in Africa. That helps local medical schools to help people in local communities. In only four short days last September, a medical team from Spangdahlem Air Base (Germany) treated more than 4,000 Ghanans in the West African city of Tamale during Med Flight 2006. Now, imagine this: we drive north from Accra, Ghana, to about 200 clicks north to Tamale, a primarily Muslim area, the drums beat, people come out of their villages by the thousands to see our doctors, our dentists, our technicians. In one story, I saw a grandfather supported by his grandson being assisted into the tent to see the doctor, the optometrist. He couldn't see. When he left the tent, he had a pair of glasses and was walking on his own, without the aid of his grandson. So, I tell you that there are ways to make differences in these areas and we're trying to do that every single day.

In a short period of time the USAFE Airmen will have logged more than 1,007 events--these are theater security operations in the past couple of years. Now, USAFE continues to work with AFRICOM transition team to develop our component requirements. We've made good progress in developing our Air Force component structure and will continue to refine our motto as the mission matures. We anticipate the Air Force component will consist of several hundred Airmen and focus on operational airlift support to AFRICOM and emphasis on continued theatre security cooperation events with our African partners. In this non-traditional focus, the new command requires a different mindset for the Air Force. U.S. policy and strategy in Africa directs efforts to strengthen African institutions through capacity building, working with the U.S. European Command. AFRICOM will be sure to get it right. The transformation of USAFE assets under Africa Command focuses on the unique challenges and requirements found after we go all the way to stabilizing and cultivating Africa's huge potential. We've already taken the first steps. Just in two short months, I've hosted the African air chiefs at my headquarters. Senior representatives from 13 African nations were in attendance to discuss the future of air safety and security across the African area of responsibility. The conference was an important beginning in building a coalition focused on assistance and capability-building across the entire continent.

I recently completed a rotation, also, as the Combined Air Forces Component Command for NATO Response Force. This is the lead of about 42 partner nations prepared to support strategic airlift and humanitarian missions. In the recent past, the NATO Response Force played a vital role in supporting earthquake operations in Pakistan; more than 73,000 people dead and 3.4 million homeless. These efforts helped deliver 4 million pounds of relief supplies to over 3.3 million people. In Afghanistan, USAFE Airmen are playing a vital role as part of NATO's International Security Assistance Force by providing security from the skies above to allow the people of Afghanistan the will to rebuild their nation. As a result, about 83 percent of Afghan citizens now receive health care, compared to nine percent just three years ago. More than 7 million children are back in school; at least 2 million of those are girls that never had the opportunity to go to school before. As members of the 26 International Security Assistance Force Provincial Reconstruction Teams, USAFE Airmen have helped complete over 29,800 military and civilian public-works projects, valued at over $1 billion. These projects include the construction of over 20,000 homes in Kabul; the reconstruction of 10 regional and international air fields; the teams have resurfaced more than 4,000 kilometers of roads, increasing the ease of access and quality of life for a large portion of the country. Now we've got a long way to go, but these are some of the encouraging signs.

USAFE and our coalition partners are working to increase airlift capabilities to support humanitarian missions, the Strategic Airlift Capability Partnership consists of 15 nations plus two Partnership for Peace nations. The Partnership is an effort to build an organic capability to support NATO humanitarian airlift operations. The initial operating capacity is slated for mid-'08 and the plan is to have three to four C-17s. Until then, USAFE remains the main airlift provider supporting NATO and U.S-led humanitarian efforts.

In the interest of time, I think I'm going to stop here because I'm showing that I'm running out a little bit. But, I do want to tell you that I think USAFE is architecting the strategic way ahead that's going to carry us in the future and help us as our coalition partners develop. Transformational plans are increasing our agility in addressing our future threats. Our adversaries worry about America's Air Force, and they should. Because when they target the risk, we're the only service that can strike any target, any where, any time, and at the speed of light. The one thing that makes this all a possibility is our Airmen, our active-duty, Guard, Reserve, and civilian Airmen are our most valuable assets. Our Airmen are a special breed--disciplined, with courage, innovation, flexibility, stamped into their DNA. I am proud to have America's Airmen on my wing; they are truly America's greatest resource.

So, let me close by saying thanks for the opportunity to address you this morning. I hope that you take away a better understanding of the unique challenges that we face in USAFE and how I see our transformations to meet the challenges of the 21st century. I appreciate your time and thanks for making these seminars a success. Thank you.

Gen. William T. Hobbins, Commander, U.S. Air Forces in Europe

Remarks given at the Air Force Defense Strategy Seminar, Washington, D.C., July 24, 2007

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