almighty god, we are here, and as we gather as a family, a fraternity of citizen warriors, our bodiesstates of america. as reservists and citizen warriors, we serve authority three times removed; country k community, family. but most of all we serve you collectively pursuing the highest ideals of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. blessed creator, pour out your holy unction upon this gathering, renew the selfless relationships that continuously bind us together and most importantly, allow us to hear and discern the wisdom from our distinguished keynote speakers here today. we finally ask your intersession in comforting the families of our colleagues who have lost loved ones that have served our great country. also strengthen those citizen warriors who serve in harm's way around the globe and never allow us to forget those sacrifices. and finally, motivate all of us to continuously grow in you as we strive continuously to be the leaders you desire us to be as servants of our great republic. we now uplift these requests to you, for it's in your holy name we pray, amen. [backgro

also strengthen those citizen warriors who serve in harm's harm's way around the globe and never allowquests to you and in your holy name we pray. amen. >> please be seated. welcome to washington d.c. for the next three days. you are in for an exciting national security symposium and reserve officers association convention. fasten your seatbelts and please direct your attention to the monitors on the side. ♪ video [inaudible] [inaudible] [inaudible] video playing. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [applause] >> did that get your heart pumping? as a reminder, please silencer cell phones and any other like tronic devices you might have and also because we are forward-looking, electronically capable organization, organization, for those of you who are tweeting this conference please use the hashtag barro it. r. o. a.. to kick things off i would let to introduce our national president air force reserve colonel walker williams. [applause] >> thank you general davis and good morning again. throughout this national security symposium the convention body will also convene. 90 years ago on october's the second 192

and as we gather as a family, a fraternity of citizen warriors, our body stands united in serving theh you have bestowed upon us, the united states of america. as reservists and citizen warriors, we serve authority three times removed, country, community, family, but most of all, we serve you collectively pursuing the highest ideals of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. blessed creator, pour out your holy unction on this gathering. we new the selfless relationships that bind us together and most importantly, allow us to hear and disstern wisdom from our distinguished keynote speakers here today. we finally ask your inner session on comforting our colleagues that have lost loved ones that have served our great country and strengthened those citizen warriors and never allow us to forget those sacrifices an finally motivate all of us to continuously grow as we strive to be the lead hears the you decyrus to be as servants of our great republic. we now uplift these rekuwait cities to you for it is in your holy name we pray, amen. >> please be seated. >> welcome to washington, d.c.

as reservists and citizen warriors, we serve authority three times removed.ou. collectively pursuing the highest ideals of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. blessed creator, pour out your holy unction on the gathering, renew the selfless relationships that bind us together, and most importantly, allow us to hear and discern the wisdom from our distinguished keynote speakers here today. we ask your help in comforting the fellow soldiers and their families. and finally, motivate all of us to continuously grow in you as we strive continuously to be the leaders as serve serb very vanities of our republic. in your holy name we pray. >> please be seated. >> welcome to washington, dc. for the next three days, you're in for an exciting national security symposium and reserve officer association convention. fasten your seatbelts and direct your attention the monitors on the side. [inaudible conversations] our challenges are great and our will is greater. [inaudible] [inaudible conversations] >> there's no way we can go forward except together. it does requi

on behalf of our departments, citizens advisory committee, all of our staff, i want to congratulate all of our youth warriorsor completing disfellowship. i also wanted knowledge the staff who has worked tirelessly to make this all happen. our youth department coordinator, nadia, peter -- who am i missing? with all the work, we have been able to make this a successful program. the program could not have been this successful, had it not been for the other members and the audience right now, the parents, caregivers, the adult allies, the friends, the cousin, and we also want to say thank you for supporting our warriors in making this monumental time in their lives. it is an honor for me to be able to be here to express my appreciation for the accomplishments that every one of these warriors has achieved. starting from helping pc y f -- dcyf informing our decisions, to helping us have a transparent and community-based project in the mission, to helping us advise the white house on what young people need in our country. i am sure each and everyone of you would agree it is such an inspiration to be in this room, i

we're really good at training them to become warriors, but we're horrible at helping them to become citizens again. ism know there's stuff going on in congress right now that might help that along a little bit. this is something the public and private sector has to partner together to make this happen. >> "usa today" offers some information about women unemployed saying there were nearly 22% unemployed as of december 2011, iraq and afghanistan female veterans. >> it's really tough to get good numbers on female veterans. on an average the number is about the same, 12% for women, 12.4 for women. that's averaged over a

citizens and we will treat you well. if you don't, we will string you up. he was stern, but fair. they created a code of warriors. it still stands in parts of new mexico and arizona called the kearny code, dislike the napoleonic code in places in louisiana. then he marched across this completely uncharted territory, got to california. the first he got into was an enormous fight with mexicans that almost wiped him out. almost two-thirds of his men were casualties. he was saved by the american battalion of there. really performed an amazing feat of getting these people across the territory. it did not know the rivers -- did not know what there were going to find out there. and in the end, the way i try to sum it up was this, 1846 was a remarkable year in the united states history, a year when a great number of people set themselves in motion. americans suddenly became agitated enough to haul across in such numbers that it began to shift and shake the national equilibrium. with every step the proviso echoed like the playing of a long sword. and it was something that some people learn about in school and some don't,

we are great at training people to be warriors but horrible at training them to be citizens again. know we are working on better transition assistance programs. there is some stuff going on in congress right now that might help that along a little bit. host: "usa today" offers some information about women, saying that there were nearly 22% of all unemployed, iraq and afghanistan female veterans. guest: is really tough to get good numbers on female veterans. on average, the numbers are about the same. the problem is the sample size is so small, when they collect data -- think about this. less than 1% of the population, iraq and afghanistan veterans. 11% of those are women. when they take sampling, a difference of two or three or four in a given month can swing it five or 10 percentage points. we need to get an accurate picture of what is happening with our female veterans because they are a critical sector of the veteran population and is a need services that are on par with their male counterparts. this is something that we have been very aggressive on. the next part is to try to f

warriors. to be diplomats, builders, trainers, advisers, service providers, economic developers and mediators to name just a few of their roles. citizen soldiers have performed these diverse tasks in particularly impressive fashion, and in so doing they have demonstrated the unique edge, the unique quality that reservists bring to every military endeavor. indeed, far from playing a supporting role to active component elements, our reserve components have been integral in the execution of each of our missions. one especially notable case with which i'm very familiar is from 2004 when it was clear that we needed to form and train a new iraqi army and iraqi police forces and to do so quickly. no small task in light of the challenges in iraq at that time or the fact that those elements had been disestablished less than a year earlier. now, some of you may recall i'd only been home a brief period of time after commanding the 101st airborne division in the first year in iraq when i was asked to return to lead the effort to train and equip the iraqi security forces. this was a particularly daunting task, one that we occasionally tribed as at

we're really good at training them to become warriors, but we're horrible at helping them to become citizens again. ism know there's stuff going on in congress right now that might help that along a little bit. this is something the public and private sector has to partner together to make this happe