harassment remains our top priority. over the past year, the army has established more stringent screening criteria and background checks for those serving in positions of trust. army commanders continue to prosecute the most serious sexual assault offenses at a rate more than double our civilian jurisdictions, including many cases that civilian authorities refuse to pursue. we appreciate the continued focus of congress as we implement legislative reforms to enhance the rights of survivors and improve our military justice system. we continue to take this issue very seriously. i also know how much work remains to be done in this area. we are also aggressively and comprehensively attacking the issue of leadership. individually, organizationally, and through systematic reviews. we have initiated 360 assessments on all officers and especially commanders. we've implemented a new officer evaluation report to strengthen

accountability for our general officers, we conduct peer surveys and develop specific ethic focus as part of our senior leadership program. we have also implemented 360 degree assessments for our general officers. we will also appreciate help with two issues impacting our ability to maintain the right balance for our army. first is the base realignment and closure process. which is a proven fair, cost effective means to address excess installation capacity. with the reduction of over 200,000 soldiers from our army, the lower budgets, we need a brack to reduce unsustainability infrastructure, and we're grateful for the care and compensation provided to our soldiers. we have endorsed proposals that recognize their incredible service while allowing us to better balance future readiness and compensation. we must keep in mind that it's

not a matter of if but when we will deploy our army to defend this great nation. we have done it in every decade since world war ii. it is incumbent upon all of us to assure our soldiers are highly trained, equipped and organized. if we do not, they will bear the heavy burden of our miscalculations. i'm incredibly proud to wear this uniform, and represent the soldiers of the active army, the army national guard, and the u.s. army reserve. their sacrifices have been unprecedented over the last 13 years. we must provide them with the necessary resources for success in the future. thank you, mr. chairman. thank you to the entire committee for allowing me to testify here today, and i look forward to your questions. >> thank you both. secretary mchugh, do you have anything to add on the posture statement at this time? >> mr. chairman, i juwant to be respectful of the committee's time. i have a statement, but by and large, it tracks what the chief said. i fully indorse all of the

comments he made, and if it suits the committee and you, sir, i think, if you like, i could enter that into the record. >> we will enter that into the record. let's start with a seven-minute first round. secretary, first of all, let me thank you both for those very heartfelt comments about the events at ft. hood. the army stands as one. and i hope that everyone in that family knows that congress stands with them as one. and i mentioned anything we can do to be helpful in the aftermath of this, to help the grieving families and the installations, please just call on us. we will all be there for you. and for them. on the question of sequestration, this is one of the issues which i believe we've got to hit head on. it's going to affect not just

this year and it already has, despite a bipartisan budget agreement, which has reduced somewhat the impact of sequestration is going to have traumatic impacts as you just described, general, in 2016. in the '15 budget, however, the administration has requested, not requested so much as opened up the possibility, i guess, and i guess requested is accurate, an additional $26 billion. raising the cap by that much for fy '15 is indicated it's going to recommend additional revenues to pay for that additional $26 billion in spending above the budget control act caps. i believe that the army's share of that $26 billion would be, and correct me if i'm wrong, $4.1 billion for readiness.

$3.4 billion for investment accounts. does that sound about right? >> that sounds correct. >> can you indicate what priorities you would spend that share of those funds, if in fact we authorize and appropriate that additional funding? >> senator, briefly, and then the chief has submitted an unfunded requirements list that embodies the $7.5, and i would let him detail that, but as you noted, it's basically 60/40 with 60% going to try to accelerate our readiness to recapture, and also to some efforts with respect to srn and other modernization programs we view as vital to achieve. >> could you then submit the highlights, in your judgment, for the record? there is a request that we have already, i think, received now. is that correct? >> correct. >> and then within that, are

there highlights that you might want to mention? >> yes, chairman. first, again, about $1.8 billion of that would be directly related to operational tempo, which is training readiness dollars which would be invested in all of the components to immediately increase their readiness. we have taken a lot of risk in base operation support, and about $1.5 billion would be invested. what does that mean? that's our training facilities, our training ranges which we have had to reduce the ma maintenance of and sustainment of and building of which impacts our training. we also have not been able to keep up with our installation support structure. we're only funding that at 50%. we put almost about a million dollars back into that to help us sustaining the facilities that are necessary for our soldiers. we're also investing about $200 million in institutional training to continue to insure that we improve and sustain our ability to train our non-commissioned officers, officers and new soldiers at the

rates we think are appropriate to include initial aviation training and other things. and finally, we have -- it would go to high priority modernization programs such as the a-64, the ua-60, the great eagle intelligence platforms we have that are key for the future as well as engineer capability we have not been able to upgrade and update that we know is essentially based on our experiences over the last 13 years. in addition to that, i have submitted and it will come forward an initial $3.1 million that are not included in the number, and most of that is a carry over from the shortfall we had from the last few years that goes to more readiness. >> thank you. the budget request includes numerous personnel related proposals intended to slow the growth of personnel costs. among these are a pay raise below the rate of inflation. a one-year pay freeze for general and flag officers, reduction in the growth of the

housing allowance over time, a phase reduction in the subsidy for military commissaries, a series of changes at the tricare program. do you -- and this further reduction is in the end strength of the army and marine corps. general, do you personally support these proposals? >> i do, senator. >> and were the senior listed advisers consulted -- consulted during this process? >> we had several meetings that included the senior list of advisers. >> do they agree with these proposals? >> they do, sir. >> on the army aviation, there's restructuring which has been proposed, and i think you highlighted it in your written statement, and i think you may have made reference to it in your oral testimony. including the fact that the army national guard with transfer low

density, high demand ah-64 apache helicopters to the active army and the active army would transfer over 100 blackhawk helicopters to the guard. my question is, do all the service chiefs approve that recommendation? i'm asking you now as a member of the joint chiefs. do all the service chiefs approve that? >> in the meetings we had, we have all agreed to the budget allocation and how we would conduct the budget to include ari. >> and that is included in this. >> yes, sir. >> did the secretary of defense approve? i'm talking about that specific proposal, because that's going to be one of the issues which is going to be very closely debated here, very closely analyzed here. so i want to know if everybody approved that. secretary of defense approve that? >> yes, chairman. >> how about the chief of the

national guard bureau? did he approve that or at least have an opportunity -- >> he was in every meeting that we conducted when we had discussions both internal and external to the army and do drb. >> one quick last question. about six seconds left. i believe it would be helpful if the president would announce a specific troop level number for the u.s. military presence in afghanistan after 2014, as quickly as possible. and not wait for a bilateral security agreement to be signed by the next president. obviously is not going to be signed by this president of afghanistan. and i think it would be helpful in terms of steadiness and stability and certainty and confidence about an ongoing presence in afghanistan if our president would announce a specific troop level for that presence after 2014. my question, i guess it would be of you again, general. in your view, would that be

helpful for afghanistan security to the rest of this year? >> senator, i believe that the sooner we can come and provide them information that relays our commitment to them, i think it helps us as we move forward in afghanistan. >> thank you very much. senator inhofe. >> thank you, mr. chairman. the secretary mchugh, last night, we were together at an event where we had a lot of peop people's support. when you got the phone call of the tragedy that took place. i know that buzzing around the room there, was even though it's happened twice at ft. hood, it could just as well have happened at other places, is that right? from what we know now? >> from what we know now, we're viewing this as a threat across the entire army. >> i think it was kind of prophetic yesterday in the hearing, i think i mentioned

this in my opening stable that senator ayotte was kind of challenging that we haven't done enough and expressed a concern, and just coincidentally, hours after that is when it took place. i know that was -- meant a lot to all of us. since this happened just last night, do you have any immediate thoughts about this that you would like to share with us? >> well, i think senator ayotte is posing a statement that we question ourselves about every day, and certainly particularly this day. while i would suggest we have done a great deal since the tragedies at ft. hood in 2009, both across installation type measures to what we're doing to try to track insider threats and what we're trying to do to make sure we can identify those

soldiers who may have the kind of behavioral health challenges that could lend them to violence, we're doing things a lot differently, and as the chief has mentioned, as we watch some of these events unfold yesterday, we saw some of the benefits and gains made out of that ft. hood, first ft. hood experience. but something happened, something went wrong, and we need to know what that was, and if we failed in some way across our current policies, we need to be honest with ourselves and with you and hold ourselves accountable, but if we identify new challenges, new threats we hadn't recognized before, we have to put into place programs to respond to them. >> i appreciate that. general odierno, i wrote down one of the quotes that you made in your opening statement. you said that we could barely

sustain one long-term contingency operation. did i write that down correctly? and were you talking about with a force of 450,000? >> that was with a force of 420,000, and i said in my opinion it's doubtful we would be able to conduct one prolonged sustained multi-phased campaign. >> that's a strong statement. and this is a time for strong statements. people to have to understand the situation that we're in. now, with that, you would be -- you're probably assuming that would be with a trained and ready force, is that correct? >> that's correct, sir. >> and that would be to moderate to high risk. what risk level? >> high risk. >> already high risk. even with a ready and trained force? >> it has to do with the size. it's about the size, which is, you know, you reduce your active component, you reduce your

national guard, you reduce your reserve, and it has to do with assumptions. if it goes past one year, it will be very difficult for us to sustain that in the long term based on the capability and capacities we have. >> general, we never talked about this, but there are a lot of people out there who don't like it. and we've got a lot of countries that have great capability relative to ours now. this is something we haven't really had to live with before. and i know that they're aware, it's not just us in this room that are aware of that statement. that we can just do one. if we're in the middle of one long-term contingency operation, what do you think is going through their minds, potential adversaries out there? >> well, thing we talk about all the time, one of the things, the reasons we have an army and armed forces is to prevent conflict deterrence, and deterrence is a combination of capacity and comp tense. it's important to us that we have the capacity and competence

that compels them not to miscalculate. what i worry about is miscalculations that could occur. >> the whole thing back in the reagan administration was the deterrent offered by our strength, and our force. and i think we all agree with that. i did some checking, just this morning. we've gotten back as far as world war ii. you talked about the fact that we would, if we're having to go on down to sequestration, big problem is going to be the year 2016. you would be talking about 420,000 active. 315,000 army guard, and 185,000 army reserve. so the reserve component when you add those together is 500,000. i think -- are we overlooking something? because we went back as far as world waur ii, and we've never had the reserve component larger than the active component. do you think that's accurate? >> i would have to go back and

look. what i would tell you is over the last ten years or so, that has been the case where the reserve component is bigger than the -- the active component is bigger. >> do you have any thoughts or comments about that? >> it's a tricky combination. what i would say is it is, as i say all the time, we are very complementary. we need all three of the components. they're very important to our strategy. however, they bring different attributes. the attributes that the active components brings is a higher level of readiness and responsiveness. as we reduce the size of the active component, the responsiveness and ability to do that is significantly degraded and that's cause for concern. we still need the guard and reserve as levels because they provide us the depth and capability in order to execute longer term missions and they provide us a very unique capability that we don't have in the active component. >> well, let me compliment you. you have been outspoken. you have actually said things

that sometimes others don't. one of your quotes was if we don't have a legislative solution that provides our leaders with the time and flexible to shape our force for the future, we will create a hollow force. we'll very quickly go to extremely low levels of readiness in the next six months. then you had made a statement before the house foreign services committee if sequestration were allowed to occur, the army would begin to grow hollow within months. are we hollow now? >> we are in some ways because we cannot sustain the level of readiness that we think is appropriate. we are rebuilding it this year because the bipartisan budget agreement, so we'll make some progress in '14 and '15, but '16 as sequestration come s back in line, readiness will dip again. so a three to four-year period until we can get our forces aligned, we will not be trained and modernized the way we would like to be, which begins to create a level of hollowness. >> my time has expired, but for

the record, i would like to have you respond to the relative degree of hollow force that we had in the 1970s and that we're close to in the 1990s and where are we with that situation? you remember that very well, and i thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you very much. senator reid. >> thanks very much mr mr. chairman, and secretary and chief, thank you, too. this is a tragic situation at ft. hood, and a comment, one of the things that strikes me is that this is a particular situation i have no insight on, but you had an individual who had like so many others in the service, deployment. in fact, his deployment wasn't as extensive and as multiple as many people serving. he's already been identified as having mental health problems.

he was being treated, et cetera, so the army was doing its best for one of its own. yet we still have the tragic consequences. one of the great leaderships in the face of the next years is that there are other young men and women who have these issues who may even be treated, some may not even be identified. and we have to obviously get to the bottom of this and learn from it, et cetera, but this isn't a consequence of ten years of warfare from the army. and many things you have to do and think about are going to have to be in the context of how do we deal with soldiers who have these, some obvious issues and some not so obvious. it's a huge responsibility, and just, i know you understand this, but i think that should be explicit at this moment. >> general odierno, one of the principles of a reduced force is that it gets more readily

deployed, faster, quicker, with more lethality, better training, and you know, better not only -- i hate to use the word productivity, but a much more efficient force. and one of the points you just made, and i think bears reiteration, is that because of many factors, the active force can be faster out the door, better prepared as units, simple things like constant access to ranges, constant training. can you elaborate on that? >> senator, it has to do with complexity, and as complexity grows, it requires more of what you just discussed. for example, there are some things that aren't as complex. let me give you a example. port opening, that's not complex, so that can be done. as you get to complex operations such as brigade combat teams and what we might ask them to do, the amount of training is significant, in order to build

the collective capability that is necessary, the integration of company platoons, integration of air and ground, the integration of intelligence, of fires, all of that takes significant amount of training because that integration is very, very difficult and complex. and it requires our leaders to do much training. and that's why we need certainly capability in the active component, because they need to be ready. if we need to deploy them, they have gone through the training. they are prepared to do that. we can send them and they can immediately begin to do that. that's why it's so necessary to have that capability ready and prepared to go. as you get smaller, it becomes even more important because you don't have the depth that we once had. so that even becomes more important. >> is there a metric for this in the sense that every unit that's notified for deployment has to do pre-deployment training. my sense, and again it's a sense, and get your reaction, is

for an active force who has been continually engaged in all these complex operations you have talked about, day in and day out, that predeployment training is a certain number of days, weeks, but for units, in fact, they might have individual members with more expertise, et cetera, but in terms of the unit deployment, it's a longer period of time. do you have those metrics? >> we do. i can lay this out for you in detail, but what i would tell you is for active component units, in reality, they need to be prepared to immediately go out the door. and it has to do with personnel readiness as well as unit collective training readiness. and that takes a lot of effort to even sustain the right level of medical, dental, other readiness that is required for them to deploy. >> the recollection is that in a unit that was required to deploy, a company within hours, a battalion within a day or

less, and then the brigade within, you know, that same s t sort, the notion that it's different than other units even active units. so that's something i think has to be appreciated. the other issue here, too, with respect to size. it goes back to are there technologies that you need to compensate for the decreased size? put it another way, the soldier of 2014 has a lot more firepower effectiveness than the soldier of 1974, i can assure you that. are there things that you need, are there things that help sort of put in context this number and not just, well, back in 1976, we had a million, now we only have 500,000? >> i'm very aware of that. i don't like doing those comparisons because the capabilities that we have in our army today are much greater than

they have ever been. our individual soldier capability has, the way he is equipped with the weapons systems and technology we have given them makes them more capable. the systems we have that are integrated, whether it be a heavy, light, or medium capability is much better than it's been in the past, so you know, our investments have paid dividends, but our units are more capable than they were before, which allows us to get smaller. genl, there comes a point where you get too small and it's just a matter of numbers. that's what i'm worried about. >> i have a few seconds remaining, so more of a comment than a question. of course, looking at ourselves is interesting, but we have to look at the adversaries also. they're getting more sfusicated, particularly potential, and we have to take every range of potential engagement. some of them are getting very sophisticated in terms of their air power and others, where we

have since 50 years the army has fought with total air superiority, and we have to begin to think about maybe it won't be total. and so i think -- i hope that informs some of the issues in terms of your structural changes you're making because at times where you could rely on other platforms for support, you might have to bring your own. is that in your thoughts? >> if i could make a couple comments. i appreciate that. one is that we have really changed how we use our tactical helicopters. and we use it -- we use it much more in post-support, direct support to our ground forces in a variety of different scenar scenarios. we're also now going to have to use it as a reconnaissance surveillance platform which is critical to any success. that's becoming more critical, how you fight for intelligence and how you understand and

develop situations. so the only last comment i would make on modernization. the one thing we have to do that we have not done yet, it is this combination of mobility, survivability and lethality. over the last eight years, we have focused on survivability, but we have lost mobility and we have not increased lethality. as we go to the future, it is incumbent upon us we have to invest in better mobility, combined with better survivability with increased lethality. that's what we need to focus our modernization programs and have that connected to our reconnaissance and surveillance capabilities. that's what's going to provide us an advantage for the smaller force. >> thank you. >> thank you very much, senator reed. snore senator mccain. >> i'd like to add my voice to all of us in expressing my condolences to the families for

the tragedy that has taken place. first of all, john, i would like to associate my remarks with what senator read just stated. we also talk about how more capable we are. we are facing a much more capable adversary as well. and i think that it's interesting to note the efficiency of the recent russian movement into crimea, even though it was unopposed, it was a pretty impressive operation, wouldn't you say? >> it was. >> and they showed some capabilities and coordination of forces that maybe we hadn't quite expected. >> i look at another force, the one thing you look at is not only its technical capability but it's ability to coordinate, synchronize, organize, and what we have seen is some very sophisticated seek rnization, organization, integration. >> including the fact we did not

intercept any communications amongst those various branches, and in the execution of this operation. when did you first start serving in the united states army, general? >> my first -- i entered west point in 1972, started serving in 1976, sir. >> so you've had a chance to observe a lot of things happen in the world and a lot of engagements and a lot of activities the united states has been involved in. would you say that in your judgment that the world is more dangerous now in many respects since the end of the cold war or the same or less so? >> senator, the comment i made repeatedly, it is the most uncertain that i have seen it, in which in itself makes it somewhat dangerous because of

the uncertainty we're seeing around the world and the unpredictability we're seeing around the world, across many different areas. it's not just limited to one place. it's occurring on almost every continent. >> and one would argue it's not prudent to continue to reduce our defense capabilities, wouldn't that make sense? >> again, there is concern because of the uncertainty that we see. and that's what concerns me. >> we hear statements made by unnamed administration officials that this is, quote, the end of land wars. there are no more land wars. in your experience and background and knowledge, do you think that that's probably a good idea? plan for no more land wars? >> as i said, senator, in my opening statement, every decade since world war ii, we have had to deploy army forces. and we continue to have army forces deployed today. and so my opinion is, we want to

have a balanced joint force, which requires also the capability to deploy land forces. >> you know what i find interesting is that when general meyer came here before congress and testified that we have a hollow army, it got headlines all over the world. now, basically, what you're saying is that we're headed towards a hollow army. the chief of the u.s. military in korea testified here just recently that he had enough operational capabilities for the forces that are now in korea, but he does not have the sufficient or battle-ready units to re-enforce him in case of a crisis in korea. do you share that view? >> i know exactly what he said and what the context, so i feel uncomfortable commenting on

that, senator. what i would say is we are working very hard to build a readiness that we can do everything we can in our commitment to support our allies on the korean front. >> but a lot of those units are not combat operationally ready at this time. >> they are not at this time. >> they are not. so now we are presenting you with a two-year reprieve, and then sequestration kicks in again. one, i would be very curious how that affects your capability to plan. and two, what will further impact of sequestration be on the united states army in your view? >> one of the things i worry about the most is the reason we have been able to do the things we have been asked to do in the past is we had a sustained readiness capability. so in other words, we had consistent funding. we were able to contain to maintain a continuous sustainment of readiness

throughout the force. we have not been able to do that. so '14 and '15 helps us. we will rebuild hereadiness to some level, but in '16 we'll lose that readiness again. you need consistent readiness funding in order to sustain the level of readiness necessary for us to be able to respond the way the american people expect us to if we need it. >> so how do you plan? >> what we're doing is i've got to prioritize. i have to take part of the force and make sure they are ready to go. which means there's others part of the force -- >> i guess my question, sequestration, no sequestration. a dual plan. >> right now, i plan for sequestration. that's the law of the land, senator, and we try to build scenarios and give some recommendations on what funding we might need in order to -- in order to create a readiness level and the size of the army that is accessible, and that goes back to, as we said, we think the force should be about 450,000 and the active component

and the money to sustain the force that would be necessary. >> i'm hearing, general, and i know you are, too, and i would like to get your comment on the record. i'm hearing from a lot of very bright and talented young officers in all services that this kind of lifestyle where operations are canceled, where deployments, they don't know from one day to the next the degree of readiness and training and capabilities they expect to have are not becoming -- are not real. and many of them are questioning whether service in the military is a lifestyle that they want to pursue. are you hearing those same kinds of rumblings, especially amongst the best and the brightest? >> what i would say is, if we

continue along this path where we go up and down and uncertainty about what the size of the army will be, what the type of readiness will be, it will start to impact those who want. so far, it is not, and we're doing everything we can to sustain the experience we have in the force. but if this continues for ten more years, i would be very surprised if it does not begin to impact those who want to continue to serve. it is not about -- >> how about two more years? >> excuse me? >> how about two more years? >> it's unclear. i don't know. what i say often is i don't know what will be the thing that finally the straw that breaks the camel's back on this. we are working very hard to insure we keep our very best. and so far, we have been able to do that, but i don't know how much longer we'll be able to do that. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you very much, senator mccain. senator mccaskill. >> thank you. secretary mchugh, the defense

finance and accounting services was set up by the secretary of defense back in '91 in an effort to try to better manage the business systems at the department of defense. and since its inception, they have consolidated more than 300 installation-led offices and denying sites, reduced the numbers of systems from 330 to 111, and obviously, they work off a working capital fund where they charge their customers. there's not a direct appropriation. i was a little concerned when i saw you launched an army financial management optimization task force pursuant to your directive that would move from the dfas some functions directly in the army, and i worry about that and so what i need to ask you is why, and because what we're going to do is if everybody does that, we're back to where we began with a lot of duplication, a lot of one branch not knowing what

the other branch is doing as far as systems. as we're trying to get to an aud audit, it seems to me that decision you made, at least at a superficial level, looks like you're rowing the boat the wrong way. >> thank you for the question, senator. i know you understand full well the army does not control defense. so there's been a number of army that was going to close different places, and i have to tell you that's not true. we don't have that power, even if we choose to do so. as i know you understand as well, in the enormously difficult and challenging times, the army is looking at virtually everything we do to try to see where we can be more efficient, more effective, and frankly save money. over the past several years, we have deployed a number of erps,

including gfibs. those are systems by which we internally within the army track our bills, pay our bills, et cetera, et cetera. and those have to date been very, very successful. so what i asked our army folks, financial management folks to do, was to set up two hubs to take a look at how we might optimize our structure, and how we might indeed pursue auditability. you're absolutely right, we're under legislative requirement to be fully audible by 2017. we feel we are on track, and part of the pursuit of that auditability includes the deployment of these erps that enable us to, we think, become more efficient, but we haven't made any decisions or any choices. and we need to find out exactly what these systems look like and if there is opportunity to save money. i've had discussions, our army

fmno folks have had multiple discussions with the controller general of the department, at the moment, secretary bob heaal he's carefully watching this. so we don't have an intent one way or another to take business away from defast necessarily, but i think it's important for all of us to know, you correctly noted, it's run on a transactional basis, in other words, for every action, transaction they complete, they're paid by the service. as we come down in numbers, we're talking anywhere from 420 to 450, as the other services reduce, there's going to be fewer transactions, so i don't control this, but i think they're going to have to make some management decisions. >> i don't think there's any question about it. i guess my plea to you is, i would like to be as engaged in this process as much as possible, and i know bob hale is leaving and his replacement will

take this over, but i have sat on this side of the desk way too many times and found inefficiencies in business systems as it relates to the various branches working with and sometimes against each ot r other. if we're going to go in the omzt direction, we need to be very thoughtful and make sure we're not driving up the cost for the remaining branches if you all decide to take some of this internally, you're going to drive up kaush to the remaining branches and we may be robbing peter to pay paul. that's why i want to stay on top of it and make sure it gets thought out across the board. >> more than reasonable request, as always, and we'll send a team over at your convenience to brief you and make every effort to keep you informed. >> thank you. general odiernodierno, i know ye stood up for the special victims council in the army and i'm very proud of that. i know there are many, hundreds of victims that have gotten their own counsel as a result of you prioritizing that and all of

us appreciate it very much. i was very, very concerned about the immediate coverage around the sinclair case because it was so inaccurate, and i want to say very clearly for the records what happened in the sinclair case. the prosecutor wanted to drop the serious charges. the prosecutor wanted to say, i'm done. the special victims counsel, a captain who was working with that victim as a result of you standing up the unit so quickly, wrote a letter to the command saying this case should not be dropped. that special victims counsel was doing exactly what the senate and the house and the president signed into law. advocating for that victim in that environment. couldn't have been more correct in what she did, that victim's counsel. and somehow, that judge twisted that into undo command influence. well, that's a problem we're going to have to deal with, but i wanted the record to be very clear, and i want to get reassurances from you that the

message will be sent to victims' counsel that she did what she should have done, not in any way do anything that's inappropriate within the ucmj, and i don't know how the judge got to that interpretation, i don't know how the command is influenced by a captain who is writing a letter saying this is a serious case, and it should not be dropped. if it were not for that commander, that case would have been over. there never would have been a cay in court where that general would have had to take the stand and admit maltreatment of one of his subordinate officers or would he have ever had to even plead to the more serious charges that he ended up having to plead to. so as much as people were outraged about the sentence, i want to make very clear this was not an example where it should be some kind of mark on the side of the ledger that we should be doing away with command involvement in cases. just the opposite. and i want to make sure that you

understood what actually happened in that case and that from the very top, there is not a message that goes out to special victims' counsel that they should retreat in their obligations. >> if i could just make one comment, senator. i hold the advisory counsel i bring in victims and advocates from around the army, i held one last week. and the one message that was absolutely clear from everyone in that meeting was the importance of the special victim advocate and the difference that it's making with each and every one of our victims and survivors that goes through go through this. so we are absolutely dedicated to this. and we believe it's showing great benefit for us as we go through the process. >> thank you very much, general. thank you. >> thank you very much, senator mccaskill. senator chambliss, you got here just in the nick of time to ace out senator ayotte. >> we're probably both going to ask the same question.

secretary general, let me first express my sympathy to the army nation obviously for what happened yesterday and just know that you're in our thoughts and prayers. gentlemen, one of the proposals that's in the secretary's budget was the moving of the commissaries towards a more businesslike approach which i agree with. i think that we need to operate our exchanges, our commissaries on a business formula. but what we're doing is we're exacting some pain from particularly some of your enlisted personnel who depend on the commissaries and exchanges probably to a greater degree maybe even than the officer corps. and rather than exacting that

pain right now, senator warner and i have a stand alone bill that would delay the implementation of this until -- of the secretary's budget until the study that comes out the end of this year. we don't know exactly when, but it will certainly address the issue of the commissaries. and i'd just like you guys' comment on that as to where you think we are relative to moving towards a businesslike corm you la wi -- formula with the commissaries. >> so first off as we've taken a hard look at this, in general terms as we look at this commissaries provide about a 30% benefit on items that they buy in the commissary.

with the proposal to run a business that is one that runs and pays for itself, that goes down to about 20% savings. we think 20% savings is still quite significant. and we believe that savings legitimatizes the fact we make -- because as you mentioned improve the business processes of the commissary. we will still, though, provide additional funds for commissaries that are overseas that really it's almost impossible to run in an efficient way because of the movement of goods and things to get people the goods that are necessary. and maybe in remote areas. so for the most part this efficiency in my mind is essential. because we have to improve these business practices. and i think it still provides quite a significant benefit for all of our soldiers, sailors,

airmen, marines as we go through this process. >> any comment, mr. secretary? >> yeah, mr. chairman, i fully support what the chief said. we'd look very carefully at those operations where we had every reason to believe all soldiers, enlisted officers really had no other alternatives other than the commissary. as the chief said, particularly overseas, but also in our remote locations. but this is something that i know the congress through their nwr activities, oversight activities going back as far as my time on the hill had been looking at this and it's been long-held belief of many that there are significant savings to be made. and we think that we can do both. certainly in a way that does not unduly impact our junior enlisted soldiers. i would just note because of the

fiscal challenges we face, these kinds of efficiencies, economies have already been budgeted in. so if we have an order to stand down while some commission looks at it, we'll certainly respect that directive. but we'd have to find the money have else. generally for all of these kinds of initiatives, we have to go right back to the kinds of accounts that we've already hit hard over the last two years. so there will be significant challenges of not going forward. >> the a-10 sole usefulness is being of close support, discounting capabilities in forward air control roles. while there are without question other assets that can perform the cas mission, none can do so with the same maneuverability of the a-10.

could you give us your sense from an army perspective as whether or not the air force's decision to stand down the entire a-10 fleet is in the best interest of the national security? >> so as we talk to our sell jo -- soldiers, they will tell you that they support and have been getting great support from the a-10 aircraft. a lot of it has to do with the visual deterrence that it provides low-flying visible both to us and the enemy itself and the exacts that it has. so the a-10 is a great host air support aircraft. the close air support aircraft. however, as we've done in afghanistan, there is an amount of missions being followed by other platforms such as the f-15s and f-16s. the air force has come to us and told us that they believe this

will be able to meet our needs in close air support. so we are working with them in the future to develop those techniques and procedures that will be necessary to provide us the proper support of f-16s. so we have had several discussions about this. and we are supporting their effort. but a lot of it has to do with this visual piece. and we have to work with the air force in how we replace that once the a-10 goes away. >> was there a recommendation from the army with respect to retirement of a-10s? >> we did not make a recommendation to the air force to retire them, but they have worked with us to ensure us that they will continue to provide us the best close air support. >> okay. my time is -- has run out here. this is not in the form of a question, but just to let you know i do have a concern relative to competition or lack thereof on the bae bradley track

vehicle which i know there is consideration being given to as to how we approach that weapon system. i may submit a question for the record to you on that. thank you. >> thank you, senator chambliss. >> may i say one thing? i hope i get the opportunity to say something about another member who's dear to us. this is the last of army posture hearing for senator chambliss. i just wanted to express my personal appreciation for all that he's done. saxby and i go back quite a ways. we all wish you all the best in the future. thank you. >> thanks very much. been a great relationship. >> thank you both. i can't say that i'm going to miss saxby chambliss, because i won't be around to miss saxby chambliss. but if i were around, i would miss saxby chambliss.

senator udall. >> good morning, gentlemen. we all have heavy hearts this morning as has been discussed over and over again. in colorado our thoughts and prayers go out to you and our soldiers and all the army families at ft. hood. i think we've also been in all the heroes among heroes who responded to the tragic events of yet, the valor of those first responders comes as no surprise to many of us. my home state of colorado, we've just been in awe as our soldiers have deployed to combat over and over in afghanistan. they've trained our allies. they've tracked the enemies during the counter-resistance operations in africa. and they've saved many lives in much of what we hold dear in colorado while battling the wildfires and floods over the last year. they've been great neighbors and friends to say the least. we're just so lucky to have these heroes living amongst us.

we're forever grateful what they do day in and day out. i've got great respect for the brave men and women in your sister services and air and sea power. the simple fact is the missions i've just described require soldiers who bring boots onto the ground. and that's why i'm worried about the potential cuts in the armies and strength and effect that would have on our soldiers to project power in our very communities. i'm also increasingly disturbed between the active component and the national guard. if there's one thing we've learned over the last several years, it's that we need a well-trained, well-equipped multi-component army. we've also been talking about the situation for significant budget reductions if congress doesn't get its act together and we don't stop sequestration from kicking back in next year. in light of that, we literally

can't afford a delay in the critical decisions that are before us while a committee conducts months or years before conducting a study. if we free structures for the guard, we have to absorb cuts through different. in my mind that's not a responsible compromise. this is a complex and emotionally charged issue and we're not going to solve it by going to war with ourselves. i think of winston churchill, he said we're out of money it's time to start thinking. so with that in mind, i've got some questions. mr. secretary, let me start with you. i want to thank you publicly for agreeing to my requests to withdraw the army's requests for land acquisition waiver for the pinion canyon area. with that, we put to rest our soldiers will be able to continue the training they need

while farmers won't lose their land. it's our win/win scenario. i was honored to work with you and your team to make it a reality. i know the people of ft. carson will make good use of that training area. i know they will continue to protect the land for themselves and future generations. with all that in mind, would you describe the types of training that our soldiers need to conduct to prepare for full spectrum operations? and what are your main concerns about the threats facing the current and future force? and then if i could on that note, access to quality training areas factors into the assessment? >> first of all let me return the compliment to all of us in the army grately appreciate the leadership and courage you showed on resolving the pinion canyon issue.

it's win/win. and we can all get back to what it concerns us most. in our case training those soldiers in the case of farmers and ranchers doing god's work out on the land. so thank you for those efforts. as you noted, suggested in recent years our focus on training has really been on the counterterrorism initiative that's recently been switched to a train and assist mission. and that coupled with the fact that we just have had dwindling resources has really caused us to greatly diminish the complexity of our training and to by and large not have the funds to do decisive action training. we are utilizing our return of course out of iraq but also out of afghanistan to now return to decisive action training. a more complex training. the type of mission sets that

the chief spoke about earlier will have 19 ctc rotations this year, 17 of those will be for decisive action training. that is in no small measure thanks to the relief that congress provided through the bipartisan budget. but as the chief said, if we go back to 16, those buybacks will be immediately lost and we'll have to do the best training we can at a much lower level of proficiency and complexity. the chief went into some detail about how the more complex missions require larger troop formation sets. require the integration of fire and infantry, and overhead close support. and in the case of our attack platforms, for example, we are

integrating on manned aerial platforms of great eagle which adds more complexity. so the ability to do that kind of training, you need land. you need clear air space and while the major portion of those occurs at ft. folk and out of the ctc and california, obviously the training opportunities at pinion canyon have and remain vital. and the stability that the recent agreement brings, i think, will obviously be a consideration should we get to a point where we begin to evaluate bases for possible drawdown. as you know, it's a very complex system and it's interrelated, but every asset can bring to the table is something on their side. >> again, i think this is a great example of everybody sitting down and listening and working out a way forward. so again i want to thank you. general, let me direct a

question to you you can answer for the record because my time's about to expire. i want to return to the national guard structure comments i made. if the army were prevented from making those changes pending the finding of the independent submission, what would the ripple effect be? am i right in saying there would be active effects on the army reserve? >> there would be. up to $12.7 million over the entire period. >> you answered the question. we don't need to ask for the record. so thank you. thanks for your service and being here, gentlemen. >> thank you very much, senator udall. senator ayotte. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i want to thank you both for your leadership and service. yesterday and first of all i share the sentiments of all my colleagues in offering my thoughts and prayers to those who have been affected by the tragedy at ft. hood yesterday. and in the readiness

subcommittee yesterday in the morning we actually talked about the issue of insider threats. and there have been a number of reports, i know secretary mchugh, that you've been working on with other services and also the homeland security have been working on it. along with the secretary of homeland security jeh johnson. so it is my hope that we will all really get together, the work done that you're doing along with what homeland security is doing. to review not only yesterday's incident but the most recent incidents to make sure that you have the tools that you need whether it's reviewing security clearances and other issues. i look forward to working with you on that. general odierno, i wanted to

follow up. we were in afghanistan and i was glad to hear you say that you often hear feedback from those that serve underneath you in terms of their support for the a-10 because i wasn't even raising it with people on the ground and they were pulling me aside and saying to me the a-10 is very important to us. in fact, i had had a guy pull me aside and tell me a story about how the a-10 had helped our special forces on the night before on an incident they were dealing with in afghanistan. so i believe that there is a strong feeling on the ground towards the close air support mission of the a-10. and this was reaffirmed for me in afghanistan. and again, it wasn't an issue. people were actually pulling me aside telling me this. and one of the concerns i hear -- i appreciate what you said that the a-10 is the best close air platform we have.

in answer to senator chambliss you said you'd be working with the air force to develop the close air support tactics, techniques, and procedures for other aircrafts that the air force wants to use for this mission including the f-15 and the f-16. here's my concern. my concern is that we already have the ttps for the a-10, don't we? we don't have to develop procedures on how to deal with close air support for the a-10. and so, you know, when i hear talk about that it's the best close air support platform, we know that their pilots are very focused on the close air support mission. that they perform not only in afghanistan but in iraq as you know from your service. the very fact we have to develop new ttps for other aircrafts to really look at this issue, i worry about this in terms of our

close air support capability gap and that we're going to be putting ourselves in a risk situation. you know, we already have it in place and we know it works. so that worries me to think we would take this on. do you have a comment on that? >> senator, i would just say clearly the a-10 has been supporting ground force for a long time. as you said and i have said, we're incredibly confident. this is another example, though, of the impact that budget reductions are having on our military. >> right. >> we have to make hard decisions. and they're just really tough, difficult decisions. in fact, i know general walsh would tell you he flew a-10s. he's a big supporter. but we have to make difficult decisions. that's why we have to figure how to deal with multi-wall aircraft. and they have been providing close air support in afghanistan

with those platforms. but there's some things we have to adjust because it is not quite the same as the a-10 is with ground force. >> right. exactly. because the f-15 and f-16 they have to come in much faster. and one of the benefits you described is the visual but the ability to go at a slower pace because, you know, it's a huge -- we know. it's got much more survivability, just the nature of it. it's a beast. in a good way. but, you know, i worry about this because close air support to me shouldn't be a secondary function. it has to be a number one function when we think about our men and women on the ground. would you agree with me on that? >> it is critical to us. in fact, the army has made decisions in the past because of our reliance on close air support and kind of systems we develop. and so it's critical. we rely on it completely.

it's very important to us. >> well, i thank you. i wanted to ask you about, general, you spent years serving in iraq. i appreciate your leadership there and everything that you did in iraq. i wanted to get your thoughts on where we stand in regard to post-'14 force in afghanistan and our continues involvement in afghanistan. are there any lessons you see in terms of what's happening now in iraq that we should be mindful of as we look at our commitment in afghanistan? >> i would just say that as we have recommended, the joint chiefs have recommended that we believe it is vitally important that we have a force that remains in afghanistan. there's nothing that shows commitment like having people on the ground there every day. and i think that provides confidence not only to the military but confidence to the

political leaders that we are going to stand behind them as they continue to improve. and i think that's important. and i think not only that, it's important for us to be there in order for us to continue to build the institutional capacity that's necessary for afghanistan to sustain stability over the long-term. >> and don't we also -- we've seen unfortunately a resurgence of al qaeda in iraq. don't we face a similar risk in afghanistan if we don't have a follow-on commitment there? >> my experience tells me is when they sense a level of instability, they will do everything they can to exploit that instability. >> thank you, general. i wanted to add my support for the chairman's comments earlier having just gotten back from afghanistan, i believe it's very important that the president announce what our follow-on commitment will be in afghanistan consistent with general dunford's

recommendation. it's important that we do so now. obviously that would be c contingent on the signing of the bsa and more responsibly handling the detainee issues there. but the commitment now, we need to send that signal to the taliban. with the elections coming up this weekend with the fighting season beginning there, that we remain committed to ensuring the security of afghanistan in a way that will not allow the resurgence of al qaeda again to make sure our country is protected. and so i really appreciate the comments on that and i would like to support the president in his follow-on recommendations. and i look forward and hope he will make that announcement soon. thank you. >> thank you very much, senator ayotte. senator manchin. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and thank you secretary and general. again, my deepest sympathy to

all of our men and women in uniform and all of you that support the military directly. general odierno, i recognize and appreciate the need to modify the structure of the army to better fit the operational requirements and fiscal constraints. getting cost savings by retiring low priority are a good way of doing this. however, i'm less clear about the value of moving army national guard apaches in the duty. i think we've all identified and recognized that. here's where my concerns would come from to try to understand the cost of a guard apache battalion is $32 million a year. so that we know the cost, we don't know exactly what the cost

buys us. the difference of 32 to 75. and if any of you all -- general, if you could answer that. >> absolutely. it has to do with the amount of training. simple. with what we try to do with the national guard is we want to maintain proficiency which we do well. as i stated earlier, with apaches it's much more than that. it has to do with collective training. it has to do with doing reconnaissance surveillance missions. it has to do with conducting combined arms training at the company, squad, brigade level. and so the active component does more days of training in order to develop those more complex entities. where the national guard simply doesn't have the time to do that. and if we did it would be like an active component unit. the other thing that's happening here -- excuse me, senator. you probably want to ask another question. but remember is we're taking out all of our surveillance

reconnaissance equipment. we're taking the apaches to replace that. if we don't do that, we will not have a reconnaissance surveillance capability in the active component. and because of the amount of training it takes for us to be proficient at that, that's why we'd like to put it in the active component. and the bottom line is i would love to have a larger capacity of apaches where i could do both, but i can't. we don't have the money. we had to make the difficult recommendation. >> i understand. but there's a $43 million per battalion difference. so when we're looking from cost, i'd not heard when i was the governor or senator i've not heard from anybody in the military that the guard was not able to perform whatever mission you asked when they were in the active rotation. >> right. >> so that's a hard one for us. >> it's a time issue. there's nothing the guard can do about it. they do the best they can with the time and resources we give them. but this takes much more time.

and so when we use them, we have to give them -- we give them a lot of -- >> you're moving blackhawks over though, correct? >> yeah. again, the integration of apaches and the integration it takes to do that is a bit more complex than the blackhawks. the other issue is the blackhawk much better fits their homeland defense and state missions than the apache. and it will help them to improve that capability that they -- >> there's a possibility i can sit down with yourself or whoever you would put in that position on the front, me and my staff would be happy to be able to work through that. >> be happy to, senator. >> and maybe secretary, might direct this to you. we talk about the tooth to the tail ratio to say how many front line soldiers and back office guys. right now we've been talking about the front line. are we having the same rapid

reduction as far as our back line as we do the front line? >> proportionately, yes. you have fewer officers so you proportionately have fewer total numbers. we are very carefully and very closefully through howard bromburg to try to ensure that we're taking down all of our ranks in an appropriate way so that we have the right numbers in the right places. it becomes very, very challenging particularly when the president has asked us to try to protect a reversal, a surge, if you will, that requires us to look very hard at some of the nco, senior ncos -- >> if i may, my time is going to elapse -- >> yes, we're doing what i think

you would want us. >> the duck tail to that is the last time you told me one of the major issues is to diminish the number of contractors we employ. i've had a hard time finding out what that number really is and how much of a reduction you all have been able to make towards that reduction. do you have any numbers at all? >> you asked -- i'll defer to you. you asked me last year and i believe the year before that what was the number of contractors in afghanistan. i can tell you at the end of the first quarter fiscal year '14, there were approximately 78,136 dod contractors of which 70,161 were army contractor personnel. >> and how many men and women in uniform did we have at the same time? >> at that same time the army boots on the ground were about 52,000. >> so we have more contractors in afghanistan than we do boots on the ground. >> our fights force has been

less -- >> how much contractors are still in iraq, sir? >> we're not in iraq. >> i know. but i know we have contractors there. >> there are contractors -- i don't know the exact number, but there are contractors there that are supporting the equipment that the iraqi government is purchasing. and that's by fms contract. >> that means we're supporting that from dod budget? >> no. that is the dollars they pay. >> and my final one for you all is if you could provide me a list -- and we've talked about this -- we want to make your job the best we possibly can, but if we have lulls, redundancies, things strapping you and holding you back no different from any of us that are requiring you to buy weapon or other support from our state that you might not want or need, we've got to get serious about this. we're asking you all and i really appreciate the military department of defense, secretary

hagel, for putting a budget forward to try to address what the new modern defense department would look like. could you give me any list of any lulls you would like to see us try to help changes that will give you the ability to do your jobs? >> in fact, we're working on that right now. congressman thornebury from the state of texas has asked a similar question. he's asked us to identify legal and internal regulatory burdens we've put on ourselves awith programs. we'd be thrilled. >> absolutely very active. and i'll finish this up with saying i know it's difficult when we ask the question for you to be able to tell us i don't need this, i don't need this, i don't need this. it's being produced in this state, this state, and this state. but there's some of us here who

care about that. if there were something in my state that we're supplying that you don't need it, i'll be the first to say let's not do it. so i would appreciate, you know, the straightforwardness on that, too, sir. thank you. >> thank you. senator manchin, three things i'm going to make reference to senator manchin that you've raised appropriately. this last issue you raised, we've met with congressman thornebury as a matter of fact, and congressman mckeon. and there's a letter that has gone out signed by congressman -- the chairman mckeon, congressman smith, senator inhofe, myself, and representative thornebury on this exact subject you've raised. the reason that congressman thornebury signed it is he's the

likely successor to chairman mckeon. we will make a copy of that letter in the record. >> since i'm not a likely successor of you. >> at some point -- >> i appreciate the diligence on this. i think it's important for them to do their job. >> it's a very important point you've raised. next another issue you've raised on the apache issue and the question of the blackhawk and apache and the funding that's involved in that and what we'll need for the record is the funding issues on that. the impact of that. senator manchin, we've been told this is part of an integrated aviation restructuring package which saved $12 billion. so we're all going to need exactly how that works, what those numbers are, why -- how it's integrated, where the alleged savings are.

it's a very important issue. >> well, the cost of $43 million per battalion, and basically i've witnessed and basically seen the performance of the guard which has been great. >> we need to get these numbers. because that saving according to general odierno is because the training is much shorter period and it needs to be expanded when they're active duty. whatever it is, we all need that data for the record. i think all of us are going to be looking very closely at that issue. thank you very much for raising that issue. and senator vitter. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and thanks to both of you for your service and certainly my thoughts and prayers and condolences go out to all of the victims' families at ft. hood as

to all of ours. general, you've consistently testified that the minimum in your opinion to maintain any sort of adequate readiness for the army is the 450,000 active component, correct? >> that's correct, senator. >> and that is still, as i understand it and as you have identified, the lowest level in terms of army readiness since 1940. is that correct? >> the lowest number of soldiers. i have not said that, but that is, in fact, true. >> okay. i believe you have also said that that meets our minimum readiness requirement, but with a, quote, fairly high level, closed quote, of risk. is that correct? >> that's correct. >> in your army career, have you ever lived through a similarly fairly high level of risk?

>> i would say that my assessment is based on the uncertainty in the world and the fact that we're not sure when we'll be able to respond. i do have some concerns about the readiness of our force especially over the next three to four years as we're transitioning and losing strength and that our readiness is decreasing. i have some concerns. what keeps me up at night is will i have enough troops ready if asked to do that. >> i'm not trying to push, i'm just asking that fairly high level of risk, have you experienced that before in your army career to the same extent? >> no. >> okay. in light of this, general, can you speak to the benefit, necessity in my opinion of maintaining our joint training centers and the benefit they provide?

>> if they are absolutely essential to what we are trying to do now as we rebuild our readiness to conduct decisive action and do combined arms activity and rebuild that in our force. the way we do that is center piece our combat training centers. specifically the national training center. those are critical to our strategy moving forward and our training. we are investing in them. they will be the ones who certify and conduct that our brigade combat teams are trained in order for us to be prepared for future conflict. and they are critically important to us. >> thank you, gentlemen. i assume it's fair to say the nature of their training is particularly important and well suited to the types of conflicts we face today. >> we have, in fact, developed the scenarios there that represent not only the conflicts of today but the conflicts we will face in the future. it's a challenging development

place where our leaders learn to think, adapt to current and future operations that are absolutely krital to us as we look forward to our success. >> thanks, general. general, we just went through, of course, a environmental analysis for reductions in the army. that was very recent. given that rigorous process the army just went through, will the army use the same fundamentally the same process, the same metrics, the same considerations in the next round of analysis? >> yes. we did that analysis to get us down to 490,000 as we continue to reduce the size of the army we will do the same analysis. and although we have to have more, we believe the criteria used was pretty good the first time. >> we, in fact, have issue of the environmental analysis stage

two to the bases and we're beginning the process of collecting data. part of that frankly is because as we talked in a number of occasions this morning, sequestration remains the law of the land. and if we have to go down to the 420 that the active component would be directed toward under the bca, we have to know exactly where this structure and force lies to make the best structure we can. the requirements and the determinations, the inputs we used the first time seem to work pretty well. we'll remain flexible, but those are pretty much the tracks that we remain on. >> again, not to pre-judge anything, but the basic analysis, the basic metrics, the basic test you used the first time will continue? >> basically. but, again, you come to different conclusions as your

numbers change. >> yeah. i'm not saying where that leads, i'm just saying the basic criteria and metric should be the same. is that fair to say? >> it's fair to say. it's also fair to say at that point should we make additions or deletions or whatever, that obviously would be part of the public record and we allow the people to make comment on it. >> okay. just the last question. the dsc clearly states that risks should not be taken in the capability to rapidly respond with ready forces but rather risks should only be accepted in the ability to sustain large scale ground operations and the regeneration of forces. general and secretary, in terms of this fairly high level of risk you admit we're accepting at 450, is it limited to that ability to sustain large scale

ground operations versus to rapidly respond? >> i think the risk that we have is not for rapid response. the risk is not -- the risk over a couple years is readiness because it takes time to catch up as strength reduces to catch up. where the risk comes into play is in the size. and if we have to do multiple contingencies which is what they require, it really has to do with the size plus the readiness. we will still have the rapid deployment capability, but our ability to do a major contingency and another one clearly is at risk based on the size and capability we have inside of the army as a lower level. >> okay. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator vitter. senator donnelly. >> thank you, mr. chairman and mr. secretary, general. on behalf of everyone in indiana, our sympathies to the

entire army family, to those who were injured and lost their lives. please know our thoughts and prayers are with all of you in the army family. mr. secretary, as you know, dfas, the headquarters are in indiana. i know how hard those folks work, the excellence and quality of their work, the pride they take in it and in serving their country. and i would just ask you that you keep us in the loop and keep us informed as you move forward in the dfas process. we would appreciate you keeping us in the loop. >> certainly. that's a reasonable request. i would note it's not our intent to nor do we control the processes of dfas. we're just trying to ensure within the army we're doing what we control as well as we can. >> understood.

i was with ayotte when we were in afghanistan recently, and part of the discussion was about the equipment that's leaving afghanistan. and while we were in ukraine, the defense prime minister was talking to us about how desperately they need almost everything. communications equipment, other equipment. and i was just wondering if there has been any discussions about whether there's a matchup between some of the things that are heading out that we have in excess and the needs of friends like ukraine and other places in eastern europe? >> so senator, what we do is we've identified excess property. what the process is we identify that, that is available for other nations. they have to request it. and they request it through our government and then we would

make decisions and then provide that equipment. so we have identified all of that excess equipment. any country can ask for that equipment. the issue becomes if they have to fund it themselves or if we gift it. that would be a decision made based on the request that is presented to us. but we certainly have that list of equipment that anyone is welcome to look at. we have not specifically, we have not been asked so far to specifically look at what could ukraine use. >> the reason i mention it is because in effect they said they basically had been stripped of almost everything they had. their navy was taken from them. and so they have in their conversations with us told us how much they appreciate the friendship, how much they look forward to continue to working with us, and how much they look at the u.s. army as a model for where they'd like to be at some

point in the future. one of the areas i have been working on a lot over the past few years is jido, the impact it has had had on trying to figure out fertilizer formulas that are non-explosive. trying to figure out how to have your young men and women come home without one more ied occurring. as you know jido is going to a smaller footprint. and i just wanted to ask what your plans are as you look at this so that we're not in a place where we're back to zero in effect and have to start and ramp up all over again. what are your hopes for jido and what are the continuances you plan to have? >> as we look at the future

here, we all agree -- i'll speak for the army. the army specifically agrees we need it to sustain itself. because the threat of ieds is not going away. they are becoming more complex, more sophisticated. we need a process that allows us to constantly look at this so we can develop the tactics, techniques, procedures, and the -- and use the technology necessary for us to continue to move forward. so we absolutely agree with that. we also in the army have established the asymmetric warfare group that will connect to jido and help us to help them identify systems. for us it's critical for the way ahead. we agree it should remain under the department of defense. we think that's the best place because they can resource it through all the different capabilities. this is not a single service issue. it is a multi-service issue. >> it's just you have as the army taken such a significant

lead in this effort, and i remember some years ago when mr. mchugh and i were both congressmen that i had a constituent whose son was over there. he ran his own machine shop and he had had spent the last month and a half basically telling all his customers i'll get back to you when i can and created an extender who it can catch a line that it was 30 feet, 15 feet, 5 feet. and he said, look, if i can't get somebody else to do this, i want my son to come home safe. he said i came up with this all on my own at night. those are the kinds of things that jido has been able to help improve on, develop, take to ten degrees further. we certainly don't want to lose the capability that we have there. when we look at the mental health screening that's going on and the challenges that we face

in that area, do you think there's a way to try to have more mental health screening tools associated with the periodic health assessment that goes on every year? >> we're always looking, as i mentioned a number of times this morning, for ways in which we can do things better. the challenge we face particularly as we look at what occurred just yesterday at ft. hood is that we are doing everything we can to de-stigmatize in the soldiers' mind the reaching out for help before it becomes a larger problem. we've really increased our behavioral health encounters within the army over 900%. we view that as positive. folks are reaching out more. they're asking for help more voluntarily. but then sometimes things happen like happened yesterday that we

fail to understand. we have for a deploying soldier, five discreet points. within 90 days when they get to theater, 30 days after redeployment, 90 days after redeployment. then for every soldier regardless of your deployment status, we do have behavioral health assessment each and every year. so we're trying to keep as close a watch on our soldiers as we can. but clearly we believe there are more things we can do to identify problems in the more discreet stages of their development, try to get soldiers added help where under our current tool kit it may not be so obvious. >> i'll finish with this. on that trip we also met with the israeli defense forces. and one of their folks in this area said what they also try to do is have their platoon leaders

like they push it down so that they can help -- give them as much training as possible. so when they look they can try to pick something up, see something that's a little out of normal and report it back up. and i would hope we would take a look at that. >> absolutely the key. we didn't have that before. we've now done that. here's the biggest problem we have. it's really a dilemma. and the problem is sharing information. and how you protect an individual's rights with sharing information so the commanders and the people at the lower level understand that maybe there was a previous problem. and so the secretary and i are really doing the best we can to come up with processes that allow us to share information. because in a lot of cases that's the problem. there's some limitations to what we can do and we're tryi ining o the best we can.

that's one thing we should work together on is how we can better share information so that the chain of command as you have said has the ability to really understand when soldiers are having problems. and that's, to me, that's something we have to focus on. and i would make one comment. i know we're over time and i apologize, chairman. the other thing is behavior health, we've invested a lot in the army. but there's just some times when they want to be off post. we have to look at how we abide behavior health off post and how we're able to do that and the funding that allows them to do that properly. and it's a combination of all of those things i think would help us in this area. >> thank you both. and again our sympathies to the entire army family. >> thank you, senator donnelly. senator sessions. >> thank you. thank you, all. our hearts and prayers go out to those who suffered a loss. the army family at ft. hood and

the whole army family. mr. secretary, thank you for your leadership. you've been candid and effective leader, i believe. and general odierno, it's a pleasure to have you here again. i remember visiting you when you were doing some of the best work ever, i guess, was done in iraq. it was a very tough time and professionals credit you with changing around what the actions on the ground in a way that was positive for america. and i couldn't be more proud of you and your service. i am a supporter of defense department. i believe that it has been disproportionately squeezed in our budget process. but i am not unaware of admiral mullens told us that the greatest threat to our future is the debt. and we're told, secretary mchugh, by cbo a few weeks ago

that this week we pay $211 million in interest. and it will rise to 880 ten years from today. that's an annual increase in expenditure of our government discretionary spending by $650 billion. so i believe we need to maintain a vibrant effective mobile hostile military, but all of us, i think, acknowledge, do we not, that it means tightening belts and seeing how we can do those things at lower cost. i know you've been working toward that and, in fact, made progress. but you accept that notion, do you not? >> i don't disagree with a word that then-chairman mullens said. i think from the department of defense's perspective, we are not just willing, we're anxious to do our part.

we went through a first round of $487 million worth of cuts. and came in another cut. the thing that worries us now is not just the size of those cuts which becomes very sizable under the bca, under sequestration. but the rapid nature of the implementation of them. so we want to do our part, and we think we are, but there does come a point beyond which national security becomes -- >> i agree. i don't believe 420,000 is sufficient for the army. but i don't know why we'll have to go there. and i'm going to have to be shown that. because i'm ranking on the budget committee. and we're wrestling with these numbers. and you have to know -- i know you know the president will not allow any additional money for the defense department unless he gets an additional equal amount

decrease. and the ron murray bill this year did help. i know you agree. so what i can't understand is this. general odierno, you noted that fy-16 it kicks in again. but this is the way i read the funding levels. this year we're at $496 billion. is that correct? for the dod? do you have that number? >> i deal in army numbers. >> i'm sure that's true. and another thing, we want to be sure the army is fairly treated as you work through this process. but my understanding is in numbers i have is we're spending this year $496 billion for the defense department. next year 2015, defense will get 498.

the next year in '16 it will remain flat again. basically goes to 499. but the next year '17, it jumps 13 billion to 512 and increasing $13 billion each year for the next five years. that's under the sequester, under the budget control act. and they're not further cuts. staying flat at a time of low inflation, even low inflation is somewhat squeezing of your budget i acknowledge. but in the years to come, we're showing growth that actually exceeds cbo's projection of inflation. am i wrong about that? >> i don't have the dod figures in front of me, but as you know, senator, the army has already experienced significant cuts. we're coming down from a high of $144 billion in our base budget in fiscal year '10 to $121

billion roughly in the fiscal year '15 bba. and even at a flat line, our costs don't flat line. >> let me ask you this. how are you rueducting this yea? how many soldiers do you have this year? >> as of right now we're about 522,000 soldiers. we're not functioning, senator, that's the issue. we are not ready. we are not funding our training. we had to cut modernization programs. we are not functioning. >> if you reduce from 512 to 450, that'd be 60,000 soldiers. and if the other parts of the dod are tightening their belts,

why -- i've just got to be convinced that we're not able to sustain ourselves at a steady growth rate. so there's a predictability. if the budget control act does not change, there is predictability. we are flat for two more years and then we grow a half percent a year for five years. so you have certain predictability there. and i don't want to see the army disproportionately cut. and the danger to me always was this year and ryan murray helped. if we hadn't fixed the problem this year, it would really done it. so general odierno, my time's up, but i'll let you explain, isn't it true that the problems you're facing right now is you're having to make decisions to reduce costs that really won't pay off until the out

years and you have an additional burden on you right now to keep this army under control in a positive way. >> that's correct. it is -- we were not able because of operational commitments and other things we're doing now, we can't balance ourselves to down the road. that's exactly the issue. sequestration doesn't come into issue until '20. >> there's another consideration that goes beyond the base budget, senator. as you know, at the height of funding of funding, we in the army received $121 billion in the fiscal year 7 for wartime operations. those are coming down dramatically as well. and for example, last year's agreed upon budget, there was some $3 billion of base operations cost that the army incured that this congress allowed us to pay for out of

oco. so those are tens of billions of dollars that obviously when we come out of afghanistan, while we hope we can receive that money is gone, too. >> we were told last year that you were having to take base money for oco. did that happen? did you actually have to use some of your -- >> well, at the end of the day, when oco was approved, in fact, congress allowed us to pay for some of our base expenses out of oco. >> good. >> it's good until the money goes away and then you're stuck with base operation expenses without the funding to pay for them. >> thank you, senator. to senator blumenthal. >> thank you for being here and thank you for your service and to your families for theirs in

supporting the great work that you do. and i would like to join many of my colleagues in expressing my deepest sympathies and concern for the ft. hood community, and most particularly the families of the victims in that shooting. certainly this experience shows that no part of our country, no place is immune from gun violence. and whether it is a small school in sandy hook, connecticut, or an urban community in new haven, or one of the great military installations in the world, ft. hood, everybody shares in the tragedies that needless and senseless gun violence causes in this country today. and this experience i think also shows as number of my colleagues have observed the importance of mental health care. obviously in this instance, an investigation is ongoing.

i'm not going to ask you to comment on that investigation or this particular individual. but one of the questions that i've been asked in these brief hours since this tragedy is whether there is sufficient screening, put aside the health care issue, which is preeminently important. is there enough screening of individuals to know whether they are dangerous. and general, i know you've thought a lot about this issue and you've commented here and perhaps you can make some observations on it. >> in this case, the individual was screened, was receiving counselling. so in a lot of ways, the system worked. but obviously it didn't work completely, because in the end, he made some decisions that obviously cost other people's

lives. the amount of behavior health and the screening that we do and how off we do it has increased significantly over the last five years, especially with the help in congress, they help us in giving us the ability to do that. we have increased by 150% our behavioral health specialists. so we have made some really good progress here. but again, ultimately, as i said earlier, one of the issues we run into is the sharing of information. trying to protect individuals' rights, but also trying to ensure that we are providing them with the help necessary, and we also obviously continue to combat the stigma of coming forward with behavioral health issues. so those are the things we have to constantly and continually focus on. we do quite significant screening today, but it doesn't mean it's right, and it doesn't mean we can't improve it. we have to constantly evaluate this. this is something that we're going to have to deal with for a very long period of time.

that's the consequence of 13 years of war. so we're going to have to make sure we have the systems in place to do this. and we'll have to do constant evaluations of this. >> may i add, senator -- >> please. >> first, i'd like to -- i believe i may have misspoke earlier. i said our behavioral health and calendars in the army have increased by over 900%. i got enthusiastic there. >> i was going to ask you that. >> it's over 90%. still significant. the baseline being about 900,000 to almost double that. so we view that as a positive thing. and as the chief said, it's in no small measure due to the efforts we made to bring onboard to bring on significant increases in behavioral health specialist process provide them at a lower level so people feel more comfortable going forward. the challenge i think we have is we've discussed earlier is ensuring that we have the best possible tools to identify

problems after those encounters and those assessments occur. we do predeployment just prior to post deployment. periodic at 30 days and at 90 days after deployment, behavioral health screening face to face to try to make sure we see problems that may be emerging. and thereafter, every soldier is screened each and every year. clearly, we may have missed something yesterday. we need to work very hard to understand what that might have been, and if we can learn a lesson and improve the process, that's what we want to do. >> and i appreciate the kmecomms that both of you have made and i have no question about your determination to improve and upgrade the system, which -- police departments and all kinds of other organizations with a

similar -- not the same, but a similar mission that deal with firearms and the challenges that you do in even hiring situations. so i don't minimize the challenges that you face. i would respectfully suggest since you mentioned earlier, the call that you received from the general that part of the strategy has to be to increase the compatibility of records keeping. we have dwelled on this at length, as you know. i am sorry to once again belabor this point, but the sooner and better we can make those record systems completely interoperable and make the health care systems completely seamless, the better it will be, and so i just want to emphasize that point as strongly as i can and if i may ask a question since my time is very limited about the army

aviation restructuring initiative, i understand from my national guard units, and this concerns me as head of the subcommittee that has jurisdiction, that under the iri, blackhawk helicopters will be transferred from the active component to the national guard in very substantial numbers. the national guard has expressed concern to me that they will receive older anl model blackhawks instead of the new m model, which would, as a result, require a significant -- and right now nonexistent financial investment to modernize that force. is it true the guard will be receiving the anl model aircraft? >> won't be any as. it will be a combination of lnms that they receive from the active component. >> and is there a plan to

provide additional, even more modern blackhawk? >> over time, because they have a higher percentage of our ua-60s now. as we continue to modernize the fleet, they will become more modernized, just like the active component has modernized. the active component has lmns as well. it actually increases our modernization levels over the long run. >> thank you. i very much appreciate your testimony and thank you again for your service. >> thank you very much, senator blumenthal. in that act, we had a lot of provisions relative to increased interoperability. you raise a very critical question. we're going to ask for the record a update on the interoperability on these records. because it's critically important. we thought we had really taken a major step, and maybe we did hopefully with the wounded warriors legislation towards that goal. and so we'll ask the secretary if you can give us an update on

that question that senator blumenthal raised. >> yes, sir. >> for the record. >> we can do that. >> we'll ask both the v.a. and the d.o.d. to give us -- as a matter of fact, this will be a good test. we'll ask you to give us a joint report. >> me personally? >> no, i'm talking about the army and the v.a., give us a joint report signed by both of you on this question. that will tell us something about interoperability. >> you're the chairman. >> i'm sorry. it should be d.o.d. can you pass along our request to the d.o.d.? >> i'd be happy to. >> we'll make it directly to take you off something of a hook on that one. >> and if i may just add, mr. chairman, with very sincere thanks for that suggestion, that it be done within the next month, i don't want to put time pressure on you and i know i'm a little bit out of line -- >> no, not at all.

>> i can't speak for the department of defense, but obviously this is something the they've been working on diligently. secretary hagel immediately picked up the challenge from secretary panetta. so i'm sure they'll do it as quickly as they can. >> and we will pass that directly to the secretary of defense and send you a copy so you can follow what we're doing. >> thank you very much, sir. >> thank you very much. senator graham. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> to all of us, i think heartbroken, ft. hood going through this thing twice. so the whole nation is thinking about the army today, and particularly those at ft. hood. but as we move forward, dylan, with this problem, do you think the 1992 d.o.d. regulation prohibiting personal possession of firearms on installations should be revisited? push review about one way to deal with a tax like this.

is to have installations with people, are armed and can fight back. what's your view of that? >> i believe that we have our military police and others that are armed. and i believe that's appropriate. and i think that i believe that that allows us the level of protection necessary. although we carry arms quite regularly overseas on a regular basis, i believe in the united states, it's more appropriate. >> i would ask you to keep an open mind, because in a deployed environment, everyone has a weapon. it's a pretty stressful place in iraq and afghanistan. i think people have been responsible in the military. and as i remember, my last visit to the afghanistan, that you could not be served chow unless you presented your weapon. and i think the reason is you

want everyone to have their weapon because of the insider threat. is that correct? >> that's correct, sir. >> i think our military at home is very much a target of terrorism, but also this seems to be more of a individual who had a hard time coping. major hasan clearly was an act of terrorism. i think you can expect more of this back here at home. i just talked to attorney general holder and he said home grown terrorism -- and i'm not saying this was. it apparently wasn't. is getting to be a bigger threat. we've had several soldiers killed. i think one outside of new jersey. i just hope you'd revisit this policy because i think our military members are very responsible with firearms and we need to really look at having more capability, not less to deal with insider threats. now, as to the size of the army, i know we have a $17 trillion budget deficit.

and admiral mullen said something that got a lot of attention. the biggest threat to our national security is our deficit. there's some truth to that. but i'm not so much worried about our deficit blowing up the country as i am terrorists. i don't think people in south carolina are as safe as they could be given sequestration. and you have said very eloquently that you began the career in the ara hollow army, not want to end my career in a hollow army. if sequestration is allowed to continue, will we have ended that career in a hollow army? >> for the next -- from today through 2020 or so, until we get rebalanced based on taking the strength to a low level, our ability to stay in a level of readiness and modernization begins to hollow the army out. >> so the answer would be yes? thank you for your honesty.

and i think you're right. i think every service chief has told us that. and i hope we will act responsibly. now, within reason, knowing that money is always an object, would you agree that our military is being positioned based on budget concerns more than threat concerns? given sequestration. >> it's clear to me we developed it for guidance which was before sequestration. it does not allow us to meet that. so we're driving down structure based on budget. >> the world is just not safer. that's not why we're cutting the budget. we just decided for some reason to cut the budget in spite of the growing risk. within reason, what would be the appropriate size of the army? and if you can't give me an answer today, think about it, given all the threats that are reasonable that we're facing, and see if we can build a budget

to support the army based on the threats of the nation, do you have any ballpark figure? >> i do. and i'll repeat what i've said in the past. i believe in order to meet -- i testified last year and the year before that in order to -- at moderate risk, which i think is reasonable. force of 390, 350, and 202 and the reserve component is appropriate for that. let's say that we didn't want to accept -- we wanted to accept some risk, but less than moderate. what would you do? >> so then i would say i believe the floor is 450,000, 335,000. >> no, i want to go the other way. i want to give us a budget that gives us minimum risk. >> i see. >> call me old-fashioned. >> i've not fought my way through that. but for many years, most of us believe that the right size of the army is somewhere around 500

to 520,000. >> that would be the optimum army, given what we face as a nation. could you tell me the difference in terms of cost. not today, but over time. you don't have to do it today. between high risk, moderate risk and the optimum army? >> we can lay that out for you. >> and what i want the committee to look at is in terms of our budget deficit, how much, if we went to the high risk, could we remotely balance the budget. i think the amount of money involved is going to be within our power to gather if we could replace sequestration. >> now, about the a-10, the a-10 is being retired because you've got to make hard choices budget-wise. is that correct? >> that's what i believe. >> the f-35 comes online if everything goes perfectly, in 2021,