Through these transformational business initiatives and others, our Department will emerge with an optimal force structure; a healthy industrial base and an efficient and appropriately sized infrastructure.

V. THE WAY AHEAD: POSITIONING TODAY'S NAVY AND MARINE CORPS FOR TOMORROW's CHALLENGES

Although the global war on terrorism is closer to the beginning than the end, our Navy and Marine Corps, as members our Nation's joint battle force, have disrupted terrorist networks and freed the people of Afghanistan. Our Nation can take pride that, in 2002, the Navy-Marine Corps Team continued its record of combat excellence, improved operational readiness, and retained our magnificent people at historic rates.

Much has been accomplished, but much remains to be done. The Department's fiscal year 2004 budget request positions today's Navy and Marine Corps to support tomorrow's joint warfighting environment by sustaining hard-fought advances in personnel and operational readiness, investing in critical shipbuilding and aircraft programs, fueling transformational capabilities, and building a global, agile, and fully networked force. As our Navy and Marine Corps Team confronts a future with challenges already visible on the horizon, we thank you for your terrific support of our Naval Forces, and urge your continued support for the course upon which we have embarked to fight and win our Nation's wars while preparing to meet the demands of an uncertain tomorrow.

Chairman WARNER. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. For the Department of the Air Force, Secretary Roche.

STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES G. ROCHE, SECRETARY OF THE AIR FORCE

Secretary ROCHE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Senator Levin, members of the committee. It is my great honor to join my fellow Service Secretaries today and to represent some hundred thousand active, Guard, Reserve, and civilian airmen who are engaged in defending our Nation and serving our interests around the globe. I am very proud of their achievements this year, from combat operation to homeland defense, to their daily efforts that guarantee the readiness, health, security, and morale of our forces.

It has also been my distinct pleasure to serve for another year with a wonderful general officer named John Jumper. I enjoyed working with him; I enjoyed his background. We note in our travels around the Air Force, we have been impressed and humbled by the creativity, commitment, and professionalism of our airmen.

Mr. Chairman, Senator Levin, if the President decides that we should go into conflict, I want you to know we are ready. We have looked at all of the aspects. As some of you know, I carry each day the current list of preferred precision munitions and where we are in production. We review all that will be asked of us. We are ready; we want you to know this.

As we prepare for the future, we fully support the Department's continuing efforts to balance near-term readiness and operational requirements with long-term transformation of the Armed Forces. Our challenge is to fight the global war on terrorism while simultaneously transforming. We must do both. Although we face nearterm budget pressures, we nevertheless must invest in the future. Otherwise, we may be forced to pay more later in dollars and perhaps even lives.

A year of challenging operations, readiness improvements, and investments in our people provide us with many good news stories. In defense of the homeland, we flew over 25,000 Operation Noble Eagle fighter, tanker, and airborne warning sorties, made possible

only through the mobilization of over 30,000 airmen from the Air Force Reserves and Air National Guard. They have conducted over 75 percent of all Operation Noble Eagle missions.

In Operation Enduring Freedom, we flew more than 40,000 sorties in 2002, over 70 percent of all coalition sorties. We did over 8,000 refueling missions, 55 percent of which were for Navy and Marine Corps aircraft, which really made this a joint operation in a distant landlocked nation that we never thought possible that we would have to fight a long time ago.

In Afghanistan, our special operation teams developed new ways to bring air and space power to bear in a variety of engagements. Notably, our combat controllers integrated new technologies and precision weapons into close air support from 39,000 feet using the B-2 bomber; and Curtis Lemay probably is turning in his grave. We are now developing better processes to target and engage timecritical and moving targets, and the same combat controllers are working on the next generation of systems.

We have sustained a forward presence around the globe protecting our Nation's interests and assuring our allies. We now have over 35,000 deployed airmen serving in some 50 expeditionary bases in over 35 countries plus over 50,000 airmen permanently assigned overseas, not including Hawaii and Alaska.

In space, we continued the operation of a variety of satellite constellations that provided essential capabilities to warfighters and civil consumers. Last year, we launched 18 missions with a 100 percent success rate, including the first space launch using an expendable launch vehicle. But we are now facing some interesting challenges. For instance, we now note with undeniable reality that other nations are investing in American advanced military technologies, and fielding the best our aerospace industry has to offer in their air forces. This is unique in our history.

While investment of our good friends and allies is a great value for our alliance's industrial base, superior capabilities are now sure to be present in American-produced airplanes that do not fly the American flag. While other nations are modernizing, we continue to employ aging systems that are becoming more difficult to operate and more expensive to maintain. The average age of the operational Air Force fleet is 22 years old this day. Even with our planned aircraft procurements, the total average age is expected to increase to 27 years by the year 2020.

While our 2004 budget addresses a number of these challenges and supports the Department's priorities, it accelerates our modernization of joint capabilities, and maintains the gains of readiness and people programming achieved last year. Most important it gets money into our procurement programs and funds essential capabilities our warfighters need. I strongly request that you support stability in all of these programs.

Mr. Chairman, we are also working with Secretary Rumsfeld and our colleagues to assess, advocate, and implement a range of sensible management practices that we believe will help minimize bureaucratic obstacles in the path that affect the future administration of the Department. In particular, we are looking at measures to transform our personnel, acquisition, administrative, and range management practices and we have asked for your help.

༄།།།།།།།།།!་!!!!། སྐ

In order to be brief, Mr. Chairman, let me conclude there and thank you and your colleagues for investments you have made in our future and for the trust you have placed in our concerted effort to provide America with air and space dominance. [The prepared statement of Secretary Roche follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT BY HON. JAMES G. ROCHE

Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, the Air Force has an unlimited horizon for air and space capabilities. Our Service was borne of innovation, and we remain focused on identifying and developing the concepts of operations, advanced technologies, and integrated operations required to provide the joint force with unprecedented capabilities and to remain the world's dominant air and space force.

The Wright brothers' historic flight in 1903 ushered in the dawn of a dramatic era of scientific, cultural, and technological advances. As the Air Force celebrates this centennial of powered flight, we do so with the recognition that, despite the daunting challenges of a more dynamic security environment, the next hundred years will witness equally fantastic achievements. The 2003 Air Force Posture Statement reflects this optimism. In this report, we relate some of our accomplishments of 2002 as well as our vision of an innovative and adaptive force capable of guaranteeing American air and space dominance for the decades to come. Our successes are America's successes; they are the direct result of the selfless and unconditional service by men and women of the Total Air Force and their families.

During the past year, and in the midst of combat and a variety of contingency operations, we evaluated, implemented, and validated a host of technological advances, organizational changes, and concepts of operation. These enabled us to deliver desired effects faster and with greater precision than at any time in the history of warfare. Such adaptation is characteristic of our Service, as airmen continually strive to push innovation ever forward en route to unprecedented air and space capabilities for combatant commanders, the joint force, and our Nation. In the year ahead, we will move our expeditionary Air Force closer to realizing the transformational imperatives of this new era, machine-to-machine digital integration of manned, unmanned, and space assets, and joint command and control. Our concepts of operation leverage this integration, and expand our asymmetric advantages in air and space-advantages that are fundamental to defending America's interests, assuring our allies and coalition partners, and winning the Nation's wars.

We recognize the responsibility for America's security is not one we shoulder alone. We work tirelessly toward developing and training professional airmen, transitioning new technologies into warfighting, and integrating the capabilities of our sister Services, other government agencies, and those of our friends abroad to act in the most efficient and effective manner across all operations-from humanitarian to combat missions. At the same time, we pay special attention to the consolidating aerospace industry, our acquisition processes, and our critical modernization challenges, to ensure we will be able to draw upon our core competencies for decades to come.

Blessed with full endorsement from the American people, Congress, and the President, we will remain the world's dominant Air Force. We are honored to serve with America's airmen, and we sincerely appreciate the confidence in our commitment and capability to provide our great Nation with superiority in air and space.

INTRODUCTION

As America approaches the 100th anniversary of powered flight, the Air Force realizes that the Nation is only in the adolescence of air and space capabilities. Yet we envision a future that will manifest dramatic advances in propulsion, operational employment, weapon systems, information technology, education, and training for our air and space forces. It is a future of unprecedented, seamless integration of air and space capabilities with joint command and control at the operational level of war, and machine-to-machine integration at the tactical level. We are pursuing these changes-some elementary, others revolutionary-which will dramatically escalate the capabilities available to the joint forces of the United States; perpetuate American air and space dominance; and redefine the nature of warfare.

If there was any ambiguity about the nature of the security environment in this new century, the attacks of September 11, 2001, crystallized the setting. Just as the turmoil of the previous decade eluded prediction, the dynamic setting of the decades ahead poses even greater predictive challenges as centers of power and sources of conflict migrate from traditional origins. No longer will it suffice to prepare for real and perceived threats from nation-states. Instead, we must apply the sum of our

C. Shipbuilding

The fiscal year 2004 budget request provides funding for seven new construction ships, the final two of four planned SSBN-to-SSGN conversions, and the first ship in our Cruiser Conversion program. In all, our shipbuilding program includes $11.4 billion, a significant increase above last year. Additionally, we invest more than $1.5 billion for R&D in transformational shipbuilding programs such as CVN-21, DD(X), LCS, and SSGN (discussed later in this statement). The seven new ships include: • Three Arleigh Burke class (DDG-51) destroyers. These ships are being procured as part of a multi-year procurement (MYP) of 10 DDG-51 ships over the period fiscal year 2002 through fiscal year 2005. In addition to the cost savings from this MYP, the Navy and its two principal DDG builders successfully negotiated a workload swap arrangement in June 2002 in which General Dynamics' Bath Iron Works will transfer LPD-17 ship construction work to Northrop Grumman Ship Systems in exchange for additional DDG-51 work. This arrangement will optimize production efficiencies and stabilize workload at all shipyards building DDG-51 and LPD-17 class ships. • One Virginia class (SSN-774) fast attack submarine. The fiscal year 2004 ship marks the initial year of a seven-ship, 5-year MYP that will achieve significant savings while increasing submarine procurement to two per year starting in fiscal year 2007. The first Virginia class submarine (SSN-774) will deliver in June 2004.

• One San Antonio class (LPD-17) amphibious transport dock. The fiscal year 2004 budget provides full funding to procure the sixth ship of this class. The program is on track, and represents an urgently needed contribution to the Marine Corps' amphibious lift requirements.

• Two Lewis and Clark class (T-AKE) auxiliary cargo and ammunition ships. Fiscal year 2004 funding procures the fifth and sixth ships of this class to continue recapitalization of our support fleet. Delivery of the lead ship is expected in fiscal year 2005.

Beginning in fiscal year 2004, the Cruiser Conversion Program will provide selected Ticonderoga class Aegis-equipped cruisers with essential land attack, force protection, and Area Air Defense Commander capabilities, extending their missionrelevant service life to 35-plus years.

Beyond the new construction ships and conversions, the fiscal year 2004 budget request provides additional incremental funding for LHD-8, service life extension for three Landing Craft Air Cushioned, and initial R&D efforts on the LHA Replacement (LHA(R)), scheduled for procurement in fiscal year 2007. In LHA(R) the Department is pursuing a far more capable replacement for aging amphibious ships such as the LHA. While the initial stages of design move forward, LHA(R) will offer many improvements over the LHA it will replace, and will set the stage for further development toward a new design that could offer capabilities such as concurrent flight operations of helicopters and fixed wing aircraft.

D. Aircraft

The Department's fiscal year 2004 budget maximizes the return on aviation investment, primarily through the use of MYP arrangements for the F/A-18E/F (both airframe and engine), the E-2C, and the MH-60S. We also have agreed to enter a joint MYP contract with the Air Force to procure KC-130Js to replace the Marine Corps' fleet of KC-130F/Rs. In all, the fiscal year 2004 budget procures 100 new aircraft, including:

• 53 tactical, fixed wing aircraft (42 F/A-18E/F, 2 E-2C and 9 MV-22); ⚫ 28 helicopters (13 MH-60S, 6 MH-60R and 9 UH-1Y/AH-1Z);

16 trainer aircraft (15 T-45 and 1 T-39); and

⚫ 3 support aircraft (2 UC-35 and 1 C-40A)

The F/A-18E/F Super Hornet is the Navy's principal tactical aviation recapitalization program until we get to the JSF. The fiscal year 2004 budget includes $3.0 billion for 42 planes, which constitutes the final installment of a fiscal year 2000-fiscal year 2004 MYP contract. Deliveries remain ahead of schedule, and the first squadron of F/A-18E/F recently conducted combat operations aboard U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72). Of note, a variant of the F/A-18 airframe, the EA-18G Growler, has been selected as the Navy platform to replace the aging EA-6B Prowl. er. By using a common airframe, the EA-6B follow-on will deliver at lower co while providing growth potential for improved future electronic warfare syst The Marine Corps expects to fly the EA-6B (ICAP III) until approximately 2015 before transitioning to a new Electronic Attack aircraft.