general mckinley and general wyatt. as i indicated in my opening remarks, this past march, the air force announced structure changes and end strength reductions. and the greatest reductions were in the air guard. 5100 billets lost. my question is were you involved in reaching this final decision? were you consulted? what was your involvement? >> senator, i think i'll let bud talk to the tactical process by which the air force works its corporate process. and traditionally in the national guard, the two directors have been totally involved with their services in how the budgets are built and how they're briefed. i will tell you that as chief, i was involved in the final deliberations discussions in the december time frame at which time i expressed certainly our corporate view on behalf of the adjtants general, on the outcome that the air force was pursuing. and then following the holidays, a number of meetings with both secretary panetta, chairman dempsey, general schwartz, and secretary donnelly to continue to work out

and as general wyatt will tell you and i'm sure general stenner will tell you that our air force and its strength cascades to its reserve component, both air national guard and the air force reserve. so i'll let general wyatt cover account corporate process that you're alluding to with your question and then take any follow-up questions you may have about our involvement. about you. >> general wyatt? >> mr. chairman, the air force decision-making process as we put together budgets is commonly referred to as the air force corporate process and has several different steps along the way, beginning at the action officer going up to the one star, two star level which is the board level. council level at three star and then recommendations are presented to the chief and the secretary at the four star level. i was able to participate, my staff was able to participate, all along the way. we were encouraged to make our inputs and we did so, in fact, we exercised that encouragement rather vociferously inside the air force corporate process. we did present alternatives to the air force, alterna

i want to try to understand from you general wyatt, if i can, what the consequences of that are. specifically, the idea as you went through these difficult budget decisions was to replace the c 5 as which are expensive to maintain and which aren't mission ready much of the time with c-17s. the idea would be that would save a lot of money and produce a more efficient operation. now what does -- what happens to the -- what does this one-year delay do? what does it do in terms of cost of maintenance, for example, of these c 5 as that you know you're going to get rid of? what does it do for the scheduling of training for person snell? what does it do to the guard's readiness? >> those are great questions that we're wrestling with right now. the transition at memphis out of c 5s to c-17s was an fy 12 action that is supposed to begin, but it continues into fy 13 as we retire c 5 as out of memphis, the c-17s come in that requires training dollars to be spent to make the conversion. you're correct, the reason that i -- i applaud that move on behalf of the air force. it does bring the air

general wyatt. >> very similar situation to tennessee as with all the states. but a little bit different -- significantly different input from the air national guard. our input in corporate process was to suggest alternative ways to meet the emerging strategy with a-10s, which as you know play a crucial role in close air support iraq and afghanistan. in fact, we have air guard a-10s in theater right now as we speak. but some of those suggestions were not accepted by the air force as we went forward. alternatively missions were proposed for the unit at ft. wayne, indiana. and those are included in pb 13. the status of the negotiations between the council of governors and secretary panetta, i think have concluded. although at any point in time obviously the secretary has a prerogative with the counsel of governors a dialogue to reengage. i think a counterproposal was made that did not include anything related to the indiana air guard or the a-10s. my understanding is that the council of governors have respectfully declined the offer of secretary panetta to reach

i use that as a prelude and we work it through our corporate structure general mckinley and general wyatt mentioned in their testimony to come to the realization that we have in the fiscal 2013 projection that those were the kinds of things that need to be done to ensure we don't become hollow in other parts of this force as well. so we'll get back to you very soon. >> i'm looking forward to going down to the mississippi gulf coast for the christening of the "uss mississippi." the newest submarine that will be joining the fleet. that will be an exciting occasion for all of our state. identify very closely with the navy's presence down there and the ship building capability along that gulf coast and personally serving in the navy, i'm a little bias. about the importance of the u.s. navy. but what is the prospect of this budget we approve the schedule for ship construction and maintenance and adding new ships to the fleet. is it robust enough to take care of responsibilities for national defense that falls exclusively under the jurisdiction of the na navy? >> yes, sir, and i would respectfu

panel's remarks, especially those of general wyatt as he was discussing the same kinds of issues. as we look at downsizing some of the fleets that we have as a result of age or as a result of requirements. and that's the tricky part of this, is, how do we look at this across the systems? in the c-130s, in this example, and ensure that we meet the requirements of the combatant commanders, which if we do that, will allow us to reduce the numbers that we currently have. we did have a very rigorous process that we went through, and there are four very major tenants of kinds of things we looked at that include no negative impact to the combatant commanders. make sure the movements don't create any new bills, increase -- mission capable raises a requirement when we do this and look at all the locations we've got out there. apply that criteria and in some cases there is judgment that needs to go into it at the end. but we will certainly come back to you very quickly with questions that you asked. i use that as a prelude and we work that through our corporate structure that general wyatt

director of the army national guard, general ingram, and the director of the air national guard, general wyatt. our witnesses from the reserve include the chief of the army reserve, general stults, the chief of the navy reserve,ed a dirl debbinnk, steven hummer, and the chief of the air force reserve, general charles stener. and i would like to think all for joining us today as the committee reviews fy '13 budget for the components. this year's budget proposal significant force structure changes for the air national guard, reducing end strength by 5100 bill lets and aircraft inventory of 134 aircraft. this proposal has come under intense scrutiny from the members of congress, the council of governors, and many eyes and generals. and i'd like to hear from you on how involved you were in the deliberative products that preceded the announcement and what input you were asked to give. in addition, over the last several years, the guard and reserve have made important changes as they transitioned from a strategic to an operational reserve. this shift requires you to have deployment-ready units avail

it -- general wyatt. generalstultz, commander of the marine corps reserve, general stephen hummer, and the chief of the air corps reserve, general charles stenner. i would like to thank you all for joining us today as we review the fy 2013 budget for the reserve components. this year budget proposal for the air national guard, reducing aircraft inventory by 130 four aircraft. this proposal has come under intense scrutiny by the members of congress, council of governors, in many adjutant generals. i would like to hear from you on how involved you were in the deliberation process that preceded the structure announcements, and what input your asked to give. in addition, over the last several years, the guard and reserve have made important changes as they transition from a strategic to an operational reserve. this shift requires you to have deployment ready units available at all times. as we brought down our military forces in afghanistan, the department will need to figure out how to best utilize its new op

general wyatt, i want to ask you about the recent air force proposal which would move the 18th squadron from isleson down to joint basel men dorf-richardson. right now this proposal looks like it will have an impact on the 168th air refueling wing. to the extent that an operation that is currently a 24-hour-a-day operation, 365 days a week, that with this proposal, it may result in operations being diminished to effectively a 12-hour day, five days a week, not necessarily bankers' hours but certainly not the kind of hours that will be required, that are required for this pretty incredible intensive refueling wing up there. at isleson. general schwartz keeps reminding me of the significance of isleson and the fact that we have 23 million gallons of gas up there. it's pretty important to the overall mission. my question to you is, how would this proposal, which would effectively reduce the operations there at isleson, how will this impact the guard's mission there? >> senator, i've asked that same question. you know, when you stop and think about the importance of that refueling wing, the

. -- general wyatt talk about the equipment and the deployments. >> especially in the refueling awn,ssey d was an active component. the expeditionary wing was commanded by an air guardsmen out of pennsylvania. the three components are a model primarily because we are trained to the same standards. we use the same equipment. that is the way we fight. that the way we train to fight. as we go forward in the future, i think the key for the air force to maintain the capacity and capability and continued reliance on the reserve component, guard and reserve, is a couple of things. the guard and reserve at to be filled it with new equipment. at the same time, concurrently with the active component, so we can continue to be an operational force that can be called upon in a moment's notice. there was no mobilization of party available for odyssey dawn. one letter% of the guardsmen and reservists who showed up for the engagement were volunteers. the key is new equipment, fielded concurrently and a balanced, proportional fashion across the reserve components. in the baseline budget of the air fo