Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton A. Schwartz told attendees at the first-ever Reserve Officers Association (ROA) National Security Symposium on Sunday that tight budgets and new threats demand a unified force to face future threats.
"We must continue to steer clear of pure-parochialism in favor of greater Total Force collaboration and integration, to reconsider the tendency for pure self interest and instead acknowledging and sharing the burden," he said.
One particular emphasis is the air-sea battle concept, which would bring Air Force and Navy capabilities closer together to face future threats.
"As it develops, the success of air-sea battle will hinge on the ingenuity of all the people in the Total Force to provide the technical detail and to create an operationally meaningful strategy in concepts of operation for the tactical maneuver of air and maritime forces," Gen. Schwartz said.
For the Reserve Component, he noted the need for more predictability, not only for those who serve, but for their families who also share heavy burdens during deployments.
Overriding all of these issues are budgetary constraints, which he said will require personnel to move forward, but with less.
He said officials continue to trim bureaucracy and overhead looking for up to three percent budget growth. Efficiencies are targeted to save about $100 billion over the next five years.
"Our challenge that is yours and mine is to squeeze as much capability out of every tax payer dollar as we possibly can," he said. "This will be a difficult balance between commitments to today's fight to which we are all in and tomorrow's contingency."
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