gen. dunford: general dunford, can you speak to the readiness i could.spective, if you save money on base operating expenses, that money is available for other things. there is also operational flexibility, as well. the less reliant you are on fuel, the more operational you are. that is not only at the level of aircraft and ships and some of the other big programs, but also, if you look at the load of an individual infantryman -- batteries is an example. if you look at the weight our young men and women are carrying around, it is prohibitive. we spend a lot of time trying to reduce the load of individual sailors, airmen, and marines. we have been able to reduce the weight that they carry in batteries alone, which is one of the biggest things that an infantryman has to carry. from a readiness perspective, you save money with fuel. you are able to reinvest that money, and from an operational perspective, both at the platform level and individual service member level, there's a lot of utility to that. as the secretary said, it's got to make sense. sen. shah

gen. dunford: it is simply a function of geometry. they are designed to support forces in an area, and the camp provides effective fire support. this position was selected because the geometry necessary to support that particular location. in regards providing support for iraqi defensive capabilities, to me, there is no inconsistency between what the art hillary did and what our aviation support is doing every single day. i don't draw distinction. we are enabling support to iraqi forces as they conduct operations, exactly what the all -- artillery unit was doing. >> it is a common position now, that after a short. of time, -- after a short period of time, there are still all indications that the u.s. military is directly involved in the ground operations with the iraqis. gen. dunford: even since last week, as iraqis have consolidated their positions, the situation on the ground has changed in terms of where the iraqis are in terms of a relationship with defensive support they are providing to our artillery unit that is there. that has

gen. dunford: the resources issues to address issue, then readiness.he readiness challenges we are experiencing are a result of several years of unstable fiscal environment as well as extort ordinarily high operational tempo. it'll take us some years to get out of the trough we are in right now. we have met the requirements from a physical perspective that the services have identified for readiness. we can't buy our way out of the problem, service chiefs probably identified to you in the case of the army, the navy, and the marine corps it will be 20 before thed fy address their readiness challenges. it could be as late as fiscal .ear 28 part of that is operational tempo and resources. it is what you saw in your recent visit down to the second marine aircraft where the depo level maintenance has been backlogged. theould see this in all services. that same dynamic exists in each one of the services. is important for us, and you all, to continue to not only wants this issue but really understand what is happening. statistics are one thing, you ks eyeball

gen. dunford: i will start and ask the chairman to reinforce. you are right. mission of protecting the homeland, which we need to do at the same time we fight overseas to defeat isil, is one we share with the intelligence community, law-enforcement at all levels. and also with homeland security. we work very closely with them. through northcom, we have a command that has precisely that mission, which is to protect the homeland by working with other interagency partners. we have plans to reinforce that if they request it. in an incident. we support them all the time with equipment, technology, intelligence, and so forth. it is a two-way street. it is a smooth working relationship. the chairman can elaborate on that. one thing i want to ask him to elaborate on is your second point about transregional. one of the things i'm looking at in connection with the goldwater-nichols issue is strengthening the role of the joint chiefs of staff and chairman in precisely this way. we have combatant commanders. they are excellent but focused on particular regions. i look to

gen. dunford: we talk about momentum, and it is indisputable. we have made a dent in the resources, affected their control in a way. but there is a lot of work that remains to be done. at the same time, while isil has not seized ground in the last months, that has not stopped them from conducting terror attacks and guerrilla operations. i think momentum is in our favor. there are a lot of reasons for us to be optimistic in the next few months. but by no means, what i say we are about to break the back of isil, or that the fight is over. sec. carter: one final note that i would make, brussels reminds us that he central as the military effort is, and as confident as i am that we will be successful, it is necessary, but there is a critical law enforcement intelligence and homeland security ingredient to this. and there are partners in this fight here and in other countries. brussels is a reminder that that fight is necessary as well, both in european countries than any other country potentially affected by that. with the back, let me all thank you

gen. dunford: i can speak at the military level, i was speaking broader when i spoke to congress. intelligence agencies, military capabilities, law-enforcement, from a military perspective we have significantly increase our information and intelligence sharing over the last few months. we have specific locations where we bring together our coalition partners to do just that. we believe over 100 countries have fighters in syria and iraq, you see the numbers that exceed 35,000. i would not put it with a high degree of confidence, but it gives you an idea of the problem of the magnitude we are dealing with. those affected by the foreign fighters are cooperating on the law rc