we have delayed the ohio class based on costs and trying to make sure that we could control those cost overruns as we went through the process. i can assure you we're still committed to getting that online. you talk about the seven cruisers that are going to be brought out because of the cost of modernizing them to a platform. but you're also looking too at a fleet that has been really pushed. we're talking maintenance that has been put off. many ships, as far as their operational availability is really being pushed. if we're looking at that and a strategy that denotes more challenges there in the future, especially with our naval capability, and just having been to an exercise, a bold alligator and looking at our operational capability within the marine corps that is necessitated by

ships and looking also at our amphibious ship decline in numbers, i would ask too, how are we going to reconcile that with operational availability, with ship availability based on backlog of maintenance and our l-class ships essentially going down, yet we're going to be emphasizing that capability as part of our strategy. how do we fix or how do we address that, what i see as a conflict? >> if i could take a shout at that one, congressman. you're talking about a specific single service. in this case you're talking about the navy. i mentioned in my opening comment, we really need to think about this as a joint force. and what we're doing as service chiefs and as joint chiefs is looking at our war plans and determining how we meet the demands of the war plans innovatively, differently,

creatively, and integrate those capabilities that we didn't have ten years ago. so while it might -- it might seem that the navy as part of this joint force has actually benefitted from this new strategy has it has shifted to the pacific, but it hasn't been without cost to them at all. and the entire joint force has to be appreciated to understand how we meet the needs of the nation in terms of the new strategy. >> sure. and i certainly appreciate that. i guess my concern is that with that reemphasis in these areas and looking at this new strategy, while i understand the cross capability that is there, it still appears to me, though, where we're going to be calling on our navy, in many instances the capacity and capability there is going to be pushed to the absolute maximum. well look at the number of mavs that can be deployed and the things we're asking them to do in a joint atmosphere, it seems to me that they're going to be pushed in a situation where it may not be the most challenging of situations where we say wow, we can't do all the things that we need to do. so my concern is if this is

indeed being driven by strategy. and mr. secretary, you spoke of increased risk. my question is are these scenarios, is it an acceptable risk? in your mind, it an acceptable risk? >> i think it is an acceptable risk. we're going to be maintaining 285 ships. we've got 285 ships now. we'll have 285 ships in 2017. in that next five-year period, our hope is to increase the fleet to 300 ships. so our goal is to try to make sure that we have flexible, deployable and capable navy that is out there. >> thank you. mr. johnson? >> thank you, mr. chairman. and thank you, mr. secretary and general dempsey for being here today. i know that the development of a new strategy and related changes in the budget request were very

difficult undertakings. and someth have heard from some on the committee to your work has been unfounded criticism. there is no way a 1% reduction of the pentagon's base budget from 2012 to 2013 could mean the difference between the world's greatest military and a hollowed out force. and under the administration's proposal, the dod base budget will remain essentially constant between 2013 and 2017 after adjusting for inflation. i believe there is room for additional savings in the department's budget. and those may very well come when we can get some clean accounting statements. and i'm glad to know that that time period, mr. secretary, you have moved up to 2014 i believe, right? and i share your concern about the -- and your opposition to across-the-board cuts that would be mandated by sequestration. but before i ask any questions, i'd like to ask you a couple of

things. last october, there were records that i requested, and those records were not submitted until last week. can you be more prompt after this hearing with supplying any records or answers that are requested? >> congressman, i was not aware of that. but in the future, if you make a request for documents and you don't get them in an expedited way, i wish you would call me and let me know. we'll make sure you get them. >> all right. thank you. and also in that regard, mr. secretary, a dod report on rare earth elements was due in june of 2011, and it has not been completed as of yet. and we were also promised an interim report in december. but we've received no interim report. can this be gotten to us quickly? >> that one is coordination. i know it's late. i'm told it will be very soon. >> thank you. any time frame? >> i don't have a specific time.

let's get back to you with more specifics. >> all right. thank you. >> my legislative aide is saying a couple weeks. we hope that will be in that period. thank you. that's great. mr. secretary, i'm concerned that the pivot to the asia-pacific increases the risk of an increasingly adversarial military competition with china, and that is not in either country's best interests. how do we execute this new strategy without beginning a new cold war? and i might add that i definitely see a need for us to reposition our thinking in terms of tsiisiscussion with the vice president of china yesterday. we are, you know, we are a paci. they're a pacific power. and while we've had our differences, the fact is we've

had some common concerns that we need to confront. one is nuclear proliferation in that area. and it's as much concern to china as it is to us. secondly, it's the whole issue of ensuring that trade routes and commernothlo area that we he joint concern. thirdly, we have humanitarian needs in that area that we need to respond to. >> my legislative aide is saying a couple of weeks. we hope it'll be in that period. >> thank you. that's great. mr. second, i'm concerned that the pivot to the asia-pacific increases the risk of an increasingly adversarial military competition with china and that is not in either country's best interest. how do we execute this new strategy without beginning a new cold war, and i might add that i definitely see a need for us to reposition our thinking in terms of the asia-pacific region. >> i just had this discussion with the vice president of china yesterday. we are, you know, we are pacific power, they're a pacific power and while we've had our differences, the fact is we have some common concerns that we need to confront. one is nuclear proliferation in that area, and it's as much a concern to china as it is to us,

secondly, it's the whole issue of insuring that trade routes and commerce flows freely in that area. that's another area that we have joint concern. thirdly, we have humanitarian needs in that area that we need to respond to and they're as much concerned about that as we are. area after area there are some common areas that we have concerns that will help us improve the regional cooperation in that area. that's the kind of relationship we would like to have with china and that's what we hope to develop, but in order to do that, we have to do that from a position of strength, and that's why we have to maintain our presence in the pacific. >> thank you, mr. secretary. >> thank you. mr. hunter. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you all for your service

and time. let me start with this, this is a quote from secretary perry and general shalikashvili under president clinton. a dramatic reduction in the threat allowed for a significant reduction in the size of our military force, the most obvious benefit of force structure was a reduction in the defense budget. this peace dividend, i'm quoting, amounted to about $100 billion a year has been a major contributor to the balance budget our country enjoys. did the nation pay too high a price for this benefit, in particular, was the capability of the military forces reduced to the extent they cannot adequately protect american national interests? our answer to that question is an emphatic no. a year and a half later terrorist murdered 3,000 americans and off we went to war and as secretary rumsfeld went we went with the army we had not the one we wished for. how do you differentiate yourself from these two leaders in that time who were presiding

over what they would not call but look back and see was a hollowing out of the military? >> well, i differentiate from them because i think we each face our own different circumstances. i mean, you know, i mentioned earlier in response to another question that the fiscal reality of the '90s is different than the fiscal reality of this decade and it seems to me that as others have testified, that we can only remain a global power if we've got that balance, the aggregate of diplomatic, economic and military power and what you're seeing us do is try to reconcile a different set of circumstances from any -- that -- from any of our predecessors and to ensure that we do form a strategy and map the budget to it as opposed to just reacting to budget cuts and i can only assure you we did that and that this will have to be seen as having been effective over time. >> thank you, general. >> okay. moving on then, let me hit on a

few other things in no particular order here. one of the main points of the budget is calling for more capability in the guard and reserve, yet the national reserve account is zeroed out. there is no request for it at all. the national guard reserve modernization account reduced by 44%. navy reserve over the next 5 years goes down by 9,000 sailor based on current capability even though we'll have lcs, more fire scouts which we'll need to get them back for, shortsighted. air force is reducing it looks like two active and five reserve squadrons. it should be the other way around just from our point of view kind of common sense if you're there to save money you look at these reserve and national guard squadrons, they pulled a lot of weight in iraq and afghanistan and chairman klein had a statement on that matter.

it don't make sense. when you can support a lot more reserve for the cost of one active. drones and technologies, we're going -- we're going to ask for half as many reapers even though we say the strategy is so that we can rely more on technology we're reducing reapers in half and reducing the number of global hawks and canceled the next uav because the fire scout can do the job. that's fine if your argument wasn't we're going to rely more on this technology but you cut it at the same time. it doesn't make sense to me. third, asia-pacific, we fund ship repair at 100% which we know is 80% of what it needs. ships going out not close of being capable what they need to be doing. it looked like we cut seven cruisers. meaning you cut seven cruisers so that you can -- we don't want to have to fix the things that are expensive to fix so we just let them go. that's what's happening here.

navy refuses to down select on the lcs. that's congress' problem as well as dod's in my opinion. we should be able to at least down select on an lcs. i don't care which one it is. you can't train for the same class you're training different sailors to work on two different ships, different logistical tale, different modules or same modules but different command decks inside, you're going to have sailors trained for two totally different things, and lastly, something that i noticed, the joint light tactical vehicle, you'll have contracts go out in june of this year, ford came to us and said, hey, if you prolong this a year, ford will get involved and save you hundreds of millions of dollars and we said no. there is a some major problems with the budget. my main point is this, the strategy and the budget contradict each other. they do not go hand in hand, they don't fit and it looks to me like the things we're trying

to accomplish are not going to be paid for. anyway, that's my opinion and i'm sticking to it. gentlemen, thank you again for your service, thanks for coming in here. >> thanks for reading the thing. obviously you studied it quite a bit. >> gentlemen, time is expired. will you please answer those questions for the record. >> we'll be more than happy. >> thank you, mr. chairman and thank you for joining us today and for your service to our country. certainly i echo some of these concerned about the need to cut costs and that's the great challenge that faces you and we appreciate what the stress you're under to accomplish this, however, it does seem the more cost effective way to approach it is to continue standing reserve and guard units in a stronger capacity than has been announced thus far so we're asking for your consideration as a representative of the niagara falls air reserve station we are expected to if all goes according to as projected to lose 16% of the nation's guard. that's a big hit for an area like ours and as you were talking about and took to heart

what you said about the need to have jobs when our veterans come home, my part of the country sends a lot of people to war and they come back to our area and the jobs are just not there. we treasure these jobs as well as the proximity we have to the border with canada and believe you certainly understand the need to ensure we have a continued mission if not the c130s that the guard has but another mission to fall in its place and very important for a variety of reasons but again what you said about our military security being linked to our economic security and our industrial base and our manufacturing, do you envision a policy or do -- what are your thoughts on a policy whereby using our limited department of defense procurement dollars, that we actually give preferences to domestically produced materials? is that something under consideration? is that something you think could help our job situation back home to shore up our economy and industrial base, as well, sir? >> well, let me begin by saying,

you can't view the defense department budget as a jobs program. i know there are jobs that are dependent on it. i know we care an awful lot about the people that work under our department. but the bottom line is, what do we need in order to get the best defense for this country? and where can we get it? and, frankly, we do look at the u.s. industrial base as supplying, frankly, the biggest part of that, why? because i can't rely -- i don't want to rely on foreign suppliers for that. i've got to rely on u.s. suppliers in the event we have a crisis and we've got to respond. >> i agree with you 100% and i'd like your comments. >> yeah, thanks, thank you, ma'am. just on this active guard and reserve issue, we really got to be clear that i mean the active is active because they're full time, 24/7, 365 and fund them to be full time so they can be the most responsive ford. the guard and reserve if they were full time if they were ready on the same time line would cost exactly the same thing.

but yet, you know, on occasion we'll be told the guard and reserve are cheaper. they are because we only employ them for x number of days a year. once you bring them in and you want them to serve for 365, the fully encumbered costs are identical. the question for the nation that we're trying to answer is, how much active, because you need them right now, how much guard and reserve and within that, how many of them do you need within 30 days, 180 days a year? so believe me, we want to do what's best for the nation but this is not a -- the you know, the active guard/reserve -- it's not a dichotomy. it's a trichotomy. >> i take that to heart. i want to get back to the secretary's comments. is there anything this congress can do to assist in your stated goal which i share that we can do more for our industrial base, our local manufacturing and again our national security as opposed to relying on manufactured items from

countries that may turn on us and may not end up being our friends? is that something we can work on together? i think that's important. >> absolutely. i would have no problem working with you on that on that aspect. i want to be able to turn to our base in this country when we have to respond and mobilize. >> all right. thank you very much. mr. chairman, i give you back the balance of my time. >> thank you. mr. scott. >> thank you, mr. chairman. gentlemen, i appreciate you hanging around just for my question. and general you spoke about the isr capabilities. we have the jsors there and it's not appropriate here but would like to get some information. there is an efficient way to increase capabilities of that unit and those planes that would i think be a significant cost savings so i'll provide that information for you and work my staff to your staff. i will tell you i did not vote for the sequestration. i represent robbins air force base. i'm from georgia.

we have ft. benning, we have ft. gordon, we have ft. stewart. we have king's bay. i'll also as chairman would tell you, tell you i'm one of the ones that did not sign the letter saying no cuts to the military. i recognize that we are going to have to have some reductions. what i see happening, though, through the communities that have such a large military industrial base is the fear between sequestration and talk of brac. it's disrupting businesses whether it's a entrepreneur that wants to build a restaurant or city trying to determine what sewer capacity they need or water capacity or other types of farah they need. it's i think in the end causing us more unemployment because of that uncertainty. zell miller was one of georgia's

governors and was a u.s. senator and one of the things that he did and he received some criticism for it when he did it criticism for it when he did it. but in the end it worked. he went through a process called radio action where he asked every agency to deliver the 5%. that they would cut. it wasn't for any of the elected officials. so your base commander could take out the 11% that they were allowed to take out and then go back to the command where they would put 2.5%. the net result was a 2.5 reduction and spending, quite honestly, a more efficient

agency. i know that y'all have more experience with these issues but that's something that we did see. that worked. i'd also like to say, secretary, 89 of us are elected republicans. we very much enjoy a discussion with the president. that's something that we're not allowed. i wish we could. i wish that what was said about us working together could happen and obviously that means that you have those meetings. but i would ask, there's no talk about cutting food benefits but veterans benefits. the things that have been outlined to us are cuts to the military. and we need your help.

when fox news and cnn are on and i watch fox, i'll tell you, but cnn is a georgia company. we need you out there talking about what sequestration will do. those people work. they want to build an airplane. so i would just ask that, you know, we're going to do everything that we can to have your back and we need you out there outlining the damage that can be done for us. >> congressman, thank you for those comments. and obviously i'll continue to talk about the impact that sequester would have. and i agree with you, just having the shadow out there is a tremendous concern to communities across the country, to industries across the country and something that we really have to try to get rid of.

look, just to -- bottom line here, as we were handed a number for defense reductions, we stepped up to the plate but we met our obligations to try to do this in a way that would still preserve for us an effective force to deal with the threats. but you can't balance the budget on the backs of defense either. you've got to look at every other area in the budget in order to deal with the deficits that we're confronting and i just hope that congress ultimately makes the decision along with the president to do that. >> and mr. secretary, that's the statement that we need to hear from over and over again from those at the d.o.t. and others. you can't balance the budget on the backs of the gop or military. thanks. >> thank you for waiting to get your question out there. thank you very much, mr. secretary. general, thank you. mr. hale, we appreciate you

being here and the work you're doing. this hearing is now at an end. >> you have been watching the army's 2013 budget request.

it's a 1% decrease in nonwar spending over last year. the budget contains $88.5 million to fight wars and nearly $27 billion less than the previous budget. of course, the army is not the only service branch included in the overall defense budget. here's a brief look at the navy and air force budget presentations. this is just under 10 minutes. good afternoon. good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the fy-13 budget briefing. next slide, please.

today's air force is the tradition across the wide range of difficult and complex challenges. 2011, for example, we helped end the war in iraq and reduce sectarian violence and engage in a myriad of smaller operations around the globe. in addition, we provided the debt terns to underwrite global security. as it evolves, our fiscal environment has changed. it's clear that we need to renew our economic strength at home. the budget control act establishes caps in government security spending. the defense department shares on the result reduction as $487 billion for the next ten years with nearly 260 billion of those savings required over the next five years. we understand we must do our part to reduce spending and make

the difficult choices necessary to achieve those savings. we firmly believe this is not a choice between national security and fiscal responsibility and this budget starts the transformation of the air force in support a strategy constrained by limited resources. next slide, please. this will require us to respond quickly to deny and deter aggression. the new strategy emphasizes the asia pacific and middle east regions. we'll continue to meet our commitments in europe and other partnerships but we'll look for innovative ways to sustain our influence. the new strategy require ares a balanced risk by making difficult choices. we protect readiness, accept a smaller high quality force and focus our investments on key

modernization programs. finally, as always, we continue to take care of our most important resource, our people. next slide, please. although the environment and strategy has changed and during contributions the air force has provided the joint fight will remain. next slide, please. our fy-13 budget decisions reflect a difficult choice we've made to align with the new strategy. these decisions reflect a balanced approach across five broad themes. we've rebalanced our forestructure to maximize our capabilities and responsiveness. we've reserved readiness by reflecting fine hours. the fleet of over 5200 aircraft

by continuing to reduce the cost of operations wherever possible. in the area of modern eye zags, we've continued the most promising superior systems and maintained a quality of life for airmen and their families by increasing pay and allowances and providing first-class and poised support and strategy. >> good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. first slide, slide two, i'm not going to spend a lot of time on strategy. i think you heard last month them rolling out their view. i want to encompass that the review, the bottom line is that they are well positioned and part of the joint force 2020 and capabilities and funding provided in this budget we can