is our families. and this is what makes us army strong. thank you very much. and i look forward to your questions, mr. chairman. >> thank you very much. general, mr. secretary. last year, we passed the deficit reduction act that was the -- that took a two-pronged approach to attack the huge deficit problem that we've built over decades of making promises that would be difficult to keep, and spending money that we had to borrow to spend. the first prong was the almost $1 trillion that came out of -- was supposed to come out of discretionary spending. there was a call after the last election that everything should be on the table. and i understand that defense was a big target. and i've repeatedly said, if we could not find some savings

within a budget of $600 billion-plus, shame on us. and i think you've done a great job on that, beginning with $100 billion of efficiencies, and then the $78 billion, and then the -- what we find now is $487 billion. the second part of that, we had, through the legislation, assigned the super committee to come up with savings, hopefully, out of the entitlement programs. because if we don't address the entitlement programs, if we eliminate the total discretionary budget, we still run a deficit of about a half a trillion dollars a year. so we could totally wipe out the discretionary budget, and not solve the problem. not even really attack the real problem. but we're facing that now.

you've done a great job working for months on coming up with the strategies, and using the money that you have remaining after these cuts to get us through this problem. the second part of -- the second prong of that attack, when the super committee was unable to perform its work, is known as sequestration, and that will be another $1.1 million to $1.2 trillion that takes effect next january 1st. again, half of that comes out of defense. now, defense only accounts for 20% of our budget. but the first tranche, 50% of the savings came out of defense. the second tranche, another 50% of the savings is slated to come out of defense. so we could look out ten years and be talking about $100

billion a year cut on defense out of what had been projected in previous budgets. to me, the most pressing need right now is we need to fix the sequestration. if we allow that to move forward and hit us next january 1st, the way it is currently drafted, just across-the-board cuts, either 8%, 12%, depending on if personnel are taken out of the equation, thinking of all of the multiple contracts, i don't know how many contracts you have out, mr. secretary, but i'm sure it's in the hundreds if not thousands. that would have to be rewritten, renegotiated. i just see total chaos on january 1st of next year, if this has not been fixed.

i would like to ask you, general, what you're doing, what you're contemplating you're doing to prepare for the problem that may confront us if we do not address this issue before next january 1st. what will you be doing? >> mr. chairman, first, we'll continue to wait for guidance from the secretary of defense in order to move forward on very specific planning for sequestration. as i think through this, and as we think through the potential that this could have, what i would tell you is that it would result in -- it would result in us having to relook fundamentally how we do business. the reductions that would be required in both our active

component and reserve components would be significant. our readiness profiles would be affected. and so how would we be able to sustain readiness, so we could avoid task force smiths, would be critical as we move forward. and finally, it would significantly delay any modernization efforts we have that could fundamentally really keep us from providing what we believe is necessary to properly modernize the force. >> mr. chairman, may i just add a few words. the chief is absolutely right. we're not doing as yet any hard planning. that would probably happen later in the summer, would it go to that extent. but just back of the envelope math can tell you, if the army receives an apportioned share amongst the services of that cut, it would be about 26%, i think that's probably best case scenario for us, that's $134 billion through '17.

to take that kind of additional cut through the phip as the chief said, would leave virtually no activity the army undertakes untouched. you mentioned contracts. the army has open contracts totally since 2000, 96,000 in number at the moment. not all of those would be affected. but a great number of them would. in some cases, if we interrupt the program, we have to pay closeout costs on those contracts. i worry about, as i know you do, mr. chairman, what do the manufacturing interests, what do our industrial base interests do the further we get into the year? they have employees, they have to plan. some have shareholders. the uncertainty, i think, is something that the sooner it can be cleared up, the better it will serve all.

>> thank you very much. mr. smith? >> thank you, mr. chairman. i share your concerns, and these gentlemen's concerns about sequestration. i think it's imperative to avoid it for many of the reasons stated. the big problem is, there's three basic pieces of trying to deal with the deficit here. there's the mandatory spending, the discretionary spending and revenue, all the money that comes in. in all those areas, we've seen spending go up significantly in both mandatory and discretionary, and we've seen revenue go down significantly in the last ten years, by over 30%. in large part because of the sheer number of tax cuts we've passed over the last couple of years and ups and downs of the economy. all three of those pieces have to be on the table. unfortunately as the chairman points out, the budget control act only dealt with one, and then so on a wing and a prayer said, we hope the super committee will figure out the other two, which didn't happen.

i think the overall problem here is the depth of denial in this country, not just in this town, about where the deficit is at, and what is going to be required to respond to it is unprecedented. what we do is, every person, or elected official has their area of the budget that they care about. and they will fight to the death to defend it. and then say, yeah, the deficit's a problem, but deal with it someplace else. that's why we need a comprehensive approach that looks at revenue. mandatory spending and discretionary. and yet, you know, it's really not happening. all we're really hearing is, you know, defend our portion of the budget. we hear it on this committee, defense is our thing, we defend it of the you don't hear people saying here's what we ought to cut from mandatory spending, or this is what we ought to raise in taxes, i'm willing to raise those takeses in order to not do the cuts necessary. if we want to protect defense from sequestration, or even from

the size of the cuts that it's facing, then we have to put specific proposals on the table to either raise revenue or make cuts in mandatory spending. until we do that, we're going to be vulnerable. we've got a bill coming up here in about a half hour that's going to add another 100 some odd billion dollars to the problem. we're going in the wrong direction. and i share the chairman's concerns about the impact that that will have on defense. and it's our responsibility and not just to complain about the cuts that are happening to defense, but to look at those other two pieces of the equation. the revenue and the mandatory spending, to make sure the discretionary spending is protected. that's our responsibility, not yours. and it's one that thus far we are failing to meet. and if we really want to protect defense, we'd better change that. i want to ask quickly about some of the sexual assault language that has been in previous legislation. in your efforts in the army to step up and deal with what is a

sizeable problem, and concerns about how sexual assault charges are handled, we have passed in legislation in the leadership, miss davis, ms. sanchez and others on this committee to try to better address that issue. there are some proposals to go further. i think the biggest proposal is the idea of taking sexual assault outside the normal chain of command, in terms of charging. i know there are deep concerns within the military about that. so you can do two things, tell us about the progress being made with the changes we've done, and then explain your concerns about going outside the chain of command for sexual assault cases. but the big thing is to avoid that second one, we have to have some confidence that the first one is making a real difference. >> and we deeply appreciate the leadership that many members on this committee have brought to the issue. and i just want to assure you, having worked on this matter as personal subcommittee chairman and ranking member in my time here, there are few things that

are more in contrast to the basic army values, and few things that happen within our ranks that we're more concerned about, and that we're not trying every day to become better. as to our responses, as you know, mr. smith, we've taken a h holistic approach to this, from both the counseling, pre-counseling, encouraging victims to come forward, to report, trying to provide them the assurances necessary, both within their command and within the larger army, that they won't be victimized again, that coming forward and talking about these things will not be a career killer for them. but beyond that, what we're also trying to do is bring sensitivity to our youngest soldiers, and responsibility to our nco corps and our leaders. we've instituted constant training programs from the basic level training courses through

the drill sergeants course, through the basic officer leader course, we've instituted training programs through the j.a.g. school so our army attorneys understand the special way these matters need to be handled, both socially as well as legally. we've tried to, in fact, have greatly increased the resourcing that's necessary to provide lab examiners. we've hired more of those, to provide special investigators. we've hired six highly qualified experts in sexual assault and harassment to come into our ranks to guide us both in terms of program development, but also to help our prosecutors, and help our investigators make sure that they're up to the latest developments that come about. we have mobile training teams that go out and go to every unit in the army, conducting specialized training for our on-post camp and station investigators as well.

i think if you look at the data, they're still too high and they're unacceptable, but we do have some glimmer of progress. our report rate is 33%. i view that as abysmal. but in the u.s. sector the rate is 18%. we refer some 60% of all cases of actual rape and assault brought to our officials four court-martial. and our conviction rates have gone as high as 78%. not every one of those data points has a similar data point within the civilian sector, but we are doing better, in some cases better than the civilian sector. but better is not good enough. we have to get this to a point where one instance is one too many, and that's our objective. >> thank you very much. i appreciate that. and it is worth noting that this is not just a problem in the military. and i hope we do understand

that. general? >> i would just like to add that, as i mentioned in my opening statement, there's an institutional and operational capability that the secretary covered. the one thing i really want to focus on is the cultural institutional issues we have here. we get soldiers from all different parts of society, all different parts of the country. it's important for us as we initially bring them in to ensure that we foster a climate of trust and respect, that we expect within our own institution. and that will start early on. we now have courses, when you go through basic training, whether you go to your first officer courses, whether you're in officer development training, and it's going to be inculcated in everything we do. because that's how important it is. our female population plays an incredible role in our army. and we have to ensure that they have the environment that they can operate in properly. and so we take this very seriously. if i could make a short comment

about the uniform code of military justice. i think it's important we work carefully about the military code of justice, provides us incredible flexibility to operate across a wide range of sexual assault, sexual harassment initiatives that we do not want to lose. so it's important that we continue to have discussions about this. and i'm adamant that with hard work, we will ensure that the chain of command is able to use the administrative and ucmj authorities they have to help us to enforce this program. >> thank you very much. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you. mr. bart let? >> thank you. our chairman mentioned the task force smith, the lessons learned from task force smith, one of the reasons the army couldn't get enough soldiers and equipment into the initial theater, was there was a limited number of transport aircraft. i understand that the air force has decided to not procure any

more c-27 j aircraft and retiring some c-130s. i realize that you have recently signed a memorandum of understanding with the air force, but when it comes to providing support out to the last technical mile, are you convinced that the air force will be able to meet all of your needs, and if they don't, will the army have to increase its use rates for other assets such as the ch-47 helicopter? i think everybody knows that the air force was never very enthusiastic about the c-27 j. they didn't even want the plane. in a logic i had trouble understanding, the pentagon assigned the plane to the air force, and then asked them to be at the beck and call of the army when the army needed that support. i didn't think this was a prescription for a really effective military. and i understand now that because of limitations and air strips in afghanistan, that we don't have enough c-27 js, and one source said you're flying

the blades off the 47, to meet the demand there. if we're involved in conflicts like afghanistan in the future, are you confident are you the air force is going to be able to meet your needs? >> thank you, sir. first, in terms of our -- you're touching on our intra-theater lift in terms of strategic lift. we're confident in the c-5 mikes and the c-17s, they'll be able to help us move our forces strategically around the globe in order to meet our requirements. in terms of intratheater lift, which is the subject you focused on, it is important that we have the capability to move in intratheater. when i was the commander in iraq, we conducted the test for the c-130 that was then attached to the army, in order to meet its missions. and we found it to be an incredibly successful program. where we controlled where it went, we controlled the loads, and it enabled us to get what we

needed in intratheater lift where we needed it on time. and that's the basis of the memorandum of understanding that's been signed between us and the air force based on the tests we conducted in iraq. afghanistan, as you have said, has very difficult terrain. so it is a very specific case. and yes, we have had to fly a significant amount of ch-47 hours in afghanistan, in order to provide support to our desperate bases. but we've also done other things, like air drop. and we've significantly invested in our ability to more accurately air drop supplies and other things to remote locations, which has helped us solve some of these issues. the c-27 has performed very well in afghanistan. i visited them personally. they are at a high operational readiness rate. they have provided the capability that has been helpful in afghanistan. i would just say that i think

with the choices that have to be made, one of the choices the air force made was to reduce that capability. so what we're now trying to do is we'll continue to increase the use of the c-130 to support our intratheater lift, as well, as i pointed out, more precise air drop capabilities. and we'll continue to work on that as we move forward. >> another area of considerable concern to me is lightening the load on the soldier. general, in your opinion, do we need to shift the balance in from a higher priority to more emphasis on soldier focus? how can we help you to speed up the rapid innovation process for weight reduction in initiatives for individual soldier systems, in 120-degree temperature, they're carrying 150 pounds. that's just unacceptable, isn't it? >> we have actually made, in my opinion, great progress in this.

what we now look at as a squad, it's about what the squad can carry together in a load. now what has happened is we have made some significant improvements in reducing the weight of what they were carrying, but now what we're doing is we're finding more things. it gives them the capability to have more and provide more capability in the squad as it moves forward. so we have to now work through and understand what specifically we think a squad needs for it to be successful. because as we have lightened the load, we have added more things to the squad. so what we have to do is invest in deciding what are the absolute optimal loads that we have, and continue to look at the technologies to reduce body armor. we have made some good progress there. but we still want to continue to look at decreasing the weight of our body armor while increasing the amount of protection, as you mentioned. >> thank you very much. >> thank you, mr. reas. >> thank you, gentlemen. thank you for being here this morning. i know we talked about the

impact that these cutbacks can potentially have on the industrial base. i'm particularly concerned about the ground combat vehicle. this is a basic staple of the ability of the army to fight. the current plan, according to the budget submitted, calls for a total shutdown of the abrams, bradley and striker production lines for three or four years, which starts in fy '14. i just want to get it on the record. how can the army be sure that the production lines, and in particular the skilled worker -- because in a recent visit to my colleague mr. critz's district, that both chairman bartlett and i went to that is a very real

concern on behalf of industry that the skilled workers are not going to be there after such a lengthy shutdown. so after going cold for three to four years, how can we be sure that that capacity will be able to regenerate itself? >> well, it's a great question. it's one we're very concerned about and very focused on as well. what we have attempted to do rg approach. first of all, the department of defense is leading what is called the s2t2, a analysis of all of our industrial partners to try to assess those greatest vulnerabilities, the kinds of things that you mentioned, mr. reyes, and to figure a path forward for all the services jointly as to how we might lessen that challenge and burden on the individual locations. beyond that, the army itself is

doing an industrial baseline. our folks and our acquisition community are looking at those things as by way of example, you mention the abrams shut down in ohio. what we're doing with gdls, general dynamics land systems, the contractor on-site is trying to ensure that through particularly their fms sales, foreign military sales, which they are beginning to line up, and which the department of defense is them, provides that core abilit skilled engineer positions to retain employment until we begin our recapitalization program in 2017 of the m1a2 sub-v abrams. this is something that is of great interest. it's something that we're looking at very hard.

and there are no guarantees. but whether it's ppps, a partner, a public/private partnerships or other kinds of approaches as far as we're concerned, we're willing to pursue any reasonable path to ensure that those particularly critical jobs remain viable. >> i'm sure you have given it thought. but is there any way to keep some kind of a minimum production capacity for the army during these? >> well, every facility has a minimum sustained rate. for the abrams, it's 70 tanks a year which is not just beyond our fiscal ability, it's beyond our need. but as the minimum sustained rates are figured through, we try to meet them through other means. public/private partnerships, fms and any other way by which we can assist. so those are part of the calculation.

>> and i would just add that we are being aggressive with our foreign military sales programs in identifying potential shooters who need this type of equipment. so we think there is some potential there. that is something we'll work very hard, just to head to what the secretary said. for example, liam marks it would cost us $2.8 billion to keep that open. and our tank fleet is in good shape, and we don't need to -- because the great support we have gotten over the last few years, now we're not going to need to start recap or recenter that until '17. so we have to fill the gap between the end of '14 and '17, and we'll try to use fms to do this. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you, gentlemen. >> thank you. mr. forbes? >> thank you, mr. chairman, mr. secretary, general, it's on honor to have both of you here today. we appreciate your service. and as you know, we're often

here a very bipartisan committee. and i agree very much with the distinguished ranking member when he indicates that we simply as a congress can't spend $800 billion on a stimulus package, almost twice the cuts we're now placing in defense, or pass a massive health care act without having consequences. two of those consequences are that we either have to ask hard-working taxpayers in america to spend more of their money to help cover our spending problem, or we have to cut the defense of the nation that they love. and neither those consequences are good. if we could consider all of that in here, then the sign-outside would say house of representatives, but it doesn't. it says house committee on armed services. so i'm going to focus on our military concerns. and general, specifically for you, you've been working i know to articulate the role the army can play in our asia-pacific defense plans. when it comes to maintaining operational access in a heater where the threat of ballistic

missiles is growing, it seems to me the army could play a larger role in providing theater missile defense to our forward deployed personnel and facilities and provide a means of alleviating some of the burden of the missile defense on the navy. however, in the fy '13 budget there are cuts to the thad program and the patriot programs. and i'm concerned about the army in-strength reductions and how they could affect this mission. could you just tell us and discuss maybe a little bit the role of the army foresees for itself in providing missile defense in the asia-pacific regi region? >> first we do play a significant role in the asia-pacific air defense command. we have our major command is in hawaii, who manages air and missile defense for the region. we have patriot battalions forward deployed in the asia-pacific region. and we have tactical operations, strategic radars that are being deployed into the region to continue to supplement the

current air and missile defense capabilities that we have. we are very focused on foreign missile defense capability in our key theaters, both asia-pacific and other areas to include the middle east. and we will continue to do and fund that. and we have the capability to do that. we have the forestructure to do that. so i feel confident that we'll continue to be involved with that. i would also say there is many other roles that the army can play in anti-access capabilities as we look at ground opportunities for entry and for other things, and our ability because of the large influence that the armies have in the pacific region, we can help to develop systems and capabilities, multilateral systems and capabilities that would help news our anti-access operational access capability assessment that the joint staff is doing, the army will play a significant role in this as we

move forward to build on the capabilities of the navy and air force. and i think it's that joint concept, joint operational concept that will help us to have and work anti-access capabilities. >> mr. secretary? >> yes, thank you, mr. forbes. i think the chief laid down very well our current posture there. i would just say from a budgetary perspective, your observation is absolutely right, there are fund cuts in the funding line to the entire program. all of the accounts in the asia-pacific region for army were protected. we haven't diminished any of those. i get a little red behind the ears when i hear so many people -- you did not. but i hear so many people refer to the asia-pacific region as strictly naval and air. there is a lot of air there, and there is a lot of water there, but there is a heck of a lot of people there as well. and the fact of the matter is the army has long been a