National Stategies and Capabilities
for a Changing World

The National Military Strategy and Joint Vision 2020

Address by General Henry H. Shelton, USA, Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff

Dr. Pfaltzgraff: Commander in Chief of the U.S. Special Operations Command. On October 1, 1997, General Shelton became the 14th Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In this capacity, as we know in this room, he serves as the principal military advisory to the President, the Secretary of Defense, and the National Security Council. So it is with very great pleasure that I welcome General Shelton to this conference. He was a speaker at our conference last year as well, but this time to speak on the topic, The National Security Strategy and Joint Vision 2020. General Shelton, great to welcome you here.

General Henry H. Shelton: General Shinseki, General Sullivan, General Cosgrove, CINCs, other distinguished general and flag officers, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you very much, Dr. Pfaltzgraff, for that very kind introduction and also for filling in for me last night. I just wanted to report I've got the controls now. I'd also like to extend my thanks to General Shinseki and those on the Army staff, the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, the Fletcher School at Tufts University, and the Office of the Secretary of Defense for Net Assessment who set up and organized this important conference. This conference, focusing on the security environment and the changes associated with it is extremely timely and of the utmost importance. We've all got our challenges and all of us are wrestling with some big ones.

This morning I would like to outline how I see the security environment changing over the next few years. I think that this environment will be especially challenging since it will be more complex, and the threats more varied, while at the same time our great Armed Forces won't necessarily have freedom of action. Since the operational challenge this environment will entail could far exceed our current capabilities. To address this challenge, we must develop and experiment with new operational concepts and transform accordingly. We are currently grappling with a strategy-force mismatch - wherein our current strategy places an unsustainable burden on parts of our force structure. But, at the same time, we also have to keep an eye on the changing nature of our security environment. For this evolving environment holds the key to what our strategic imperatives will be, and consequently what our capabilities must be.

So, with this in mind, what might the security environment look like in ten years or so? I've heard that in the 19th century, the state of New York imposed a $250 fine or 6 months in jail for persons pretending to forecast the future. Now, while no such penalty exists today, the costs are infinitely more significant if we don't get it right.

Well, for starters, events over the past ten years in such places as Southwest Asia, the Balkans, Haiti, Africa, and elsewhere provide a window into the future strategic landscape. Coupled with an analysis of other recent events, we can identify some general trends as well as some specific changes. For example:

• U.S. global interests continue to demand a broad range of military activities from engagement to warfighting. It is naïve to think that the military will become involved in only those areas affecting our vital national interests. The strategic environment will most certainly cause us to deploy forces to achieve limited military objectives.
• As a global power, I submit that we cannot retreat from any one activity to do another exclusively. And in this regard, a 2 Major Theater War capability - and let me stress this is a capability, not a strategy - has served us well. A 2 MTW capability allows us, to go in two directions at one time. It helps define us as a global power. And when we're committed in one area of the world, it deters opportunistic aggression in another; it helps us guard against being surprised. Moreover, it strengthens our coalition relationships - so important to how we will fight in future operations.
• The strategic "Flash to Bang" time is getting shorter. Instantaneous communications and information sharing such as the CNN and Internet effect combine to further compress the time period between finding out about events and responding to demands to "do something."
• Complexity will be the order of the day. And as the diversity of threats and non-state actors increase so will the complexity of military tasks.
• We can expect the range of conflict to encompass information warfare, with increasing reliance on space-based intelligence sensors and communications systems.
• The world remains a dangerous place and America's superiority generates envy, if not outright hatred. We will face clever, adaptive adversaries. People who take stock of our successes - and failures - will continue to seek and exploit our perceived weaknesses. And they will use asymmetric warfare to thwart us or sap our will. USS Cole is a vivid case in point.

Thus, we can - and we must - anticipate that our foes will employ anti-access strategies to deny us easy entry into a given theater of operations. Or, they even may extend the battlespace to our shores, either by attacking critical infrastructure or using WMD. Now, lest you confuse me with Chicken Little, I recognize that America has no peer competitor today. However, there is still the possibility of peer competition in the future. There is potential for the emergence of a single conventional power, or for one or more foes to mount a campaign against US interests, thus combining all these threats into a full spectrum effort. And in our business, we need to keep in mind that this environment may develop sooner than we think, or sooner than we can react.

Despite the changing security environment in which we find ourselves, our National Military Strategy will always remain that our Armed Forces exist is to fight and win America's wars. Our mission is to deter and if deterrence fails to decisively defeat challenges to American security - to our citizens, to our homeland, indeed to our interests. And, we must be able to do it decisively and overwhelmingly. The global interests, responsibilities, and obligations of the United States will, I believe, endure. And there is no indication - even though there may be a change in form - that the threats to those interests and responsibilities, or our obligations to our allies will disappear. This is the one place where clarity about the future is undeniable. And as I outlined, the range of the types of conflict we may fight will expand. We can expect non-state actors, asymmetric attacks, anti-access strategies, retreat to the lower ends of the conflict spectrum, all coupled with the potential for high intensity regional conflict or even threats to our homeland.

Given this emerging security environment and our broad interests, the forces we have must be capable to dominate across the full spectrum of military operations all at once. Not only able to dominate in one place, at one moment in time, but flexible and responsive enough to undertake multiple tasks, in multiple locations, simultaneously. That means we must be capable of rapid decisive operations.

Ladies and gentlemen, our biggest challenge today is not just to prepare our Army for the future, but to create a truly joint Total Force of which the Army is an integral part. The core military competency of our future capabilities will not merely be our great Army, or our great Navy/Marine Corps Team, or our great Air Force. No, the core competency will be a great joint force - a seamless and unparalleled force. That is Joint Vision 2020. Creating a truly joint force will require a joint transformation. This transformation means we have to combine the unique complementary capabilities of each of the Active and Reserve Components of our Services. We must leverage information and other technologies to enhance interoperability, to create a common picture of the battlefield, to improve the projection, lethality, protection, and sustainment of a Joint Task Force. Combat fusion - and not any single silver bullet - will be the key to success. The individual Service transformation efforts in progress are right and proper, and they are necessary, but only if they mesh fully with joint transformation. To do otherwise is pure folly. To accomplish this transformation we are moving out on three primary fronts.

First, we must invest in people encourage innovative thinking and leadership, develop new doctrine and organizations, and conduct experimentation and exercises. The training base and the forces dedicated to ongoing Service and joint experimentation are a fundamental requirement.

• As you know, what was formerly USACOM is now Joint Forces Command was first commanded by Admiral Hal Gehman and now commanded by General Buck Kernan. While retaining some of the regional responsibilities of USACOM, JFCOM's focus is on joint experimentation and transformation. Following the work of Hal Gehman, Buck's marching orders are to develop an operational concept to advance the tenets of joint warfighting, and his command is working to establish the joint context for Service concept development and experimentation. This effort is critical to the link between strategy and forces.
• JFCOM's primary transformation leadership vehicle is Rapid Decisive Operations or RDO. The RDO concept provides the joint context for major Service and CINC warfighting experiments. RDO is the tool to operationalize JV2020.
• MILLENNIUM CHALLENGE 2000 was the first and significant step in RDO, but we need to fully exploit this concept. To this end JFCOM has developed a Joint Experimentation Campaign Plan which includes important milestones such as Operations MILLENNIUM CHALLENGE 2002 and OLYMPIC CHALLENGE 2004.

These two events represent important milestones along the way to measure our progress in achieving our Joint Task Force core competency, achieving the vision outlined in JV 2020 and identifying where we are not keeping pace.

In another aspect of this transformation, JFCOM is also the lead CINC for the Global Information Grid, or GIG, an initiative to provide capabilities and functions to the warfighter to achieve Decision Superiority, a key component of JV 2020 vision.

Other efforts are also underway. Under the supervision of the Joint Vision and Transformation Division in the J7 Directorate, a number of initiatives are being taken, to include:

• Incorporate Transformation, Innovation, and Joint Experimentation into next year's QDR.
• Develop ways to provide joint training away from the schoolhouse, such as the Joint Force Employment War Game CD and a web-based approach called Advanced Distributive Learning.

Our second thrust is to take a hard look at technologies - technologies to enhance interoperability - to allow joint forces to make dramatic changes in organization and operations. Toward this end, we established interoperability as a key performance parameter for all major high dollar acquisitions. Let me be perfectly clear, this parameter is not waive-able, it is non-negotiable. To underscore the importance of this effort, we made significant modifications to the Joint Requirements Oversight Council (JROC) and Joint Warfighting Capability Assessment Process (JWCA).

Third, we created joint organizations to address specific emerging threats.

• America must be strong at home in order to be strong abroad. To this end we stood up Joint Task Force - Civil Support, whose mission is to provide support and assistance to Federal, state and local agencies responding to disasters caused by domestic acts of terrorism. And let me emphasize this is in support of the lead federal agencies.
• Last year, we also stood up Joint Task Force Computer Network Defense at US Space Command (SPACECOM), to lead the DoD effort to protect our vital networks. They have already been extremely busy and are providing magnificent support to the Department of Defense.
• And last month, we expanded SPACECOM's responsibilities to include Computer Network Attack, which, when directed by the National Command Authority, will allow offensive operations against an adversary's computer system capabilities.

But these initiatives are not enough. If we are going to make this leap from a group of single Service operations bundled - or more precisely cobbled together for single tasks - we face some difficult decisions about how we organize, equip, and train this force to execute the National Military Strategy, both today and tomorrow. Let me be specific in a few areas:

• I applaud each of the Services in their efforts to face these challenges, but we must closely coordinate these efforts. This means teamwork in areas such as the development of the Rapid Decisive Operations concept. Each of our Services has a vital role in developing a ready, responsive power projection force with decision superiority that can overcome anti-access strategies and sustain a high tempo of operations.
• To achieve this end we must seek the fusion of combat and intelligence. New systems capabilities must be designed with the joint fight in mind. As we move from Science and Technology, to Research and Development, and into procurement, we must bear in mind that if a system is not interoperable, it does not contribute to the joint fight.
• Doctrine, organizations, and training must evolve. We must push our Joint C4I capabilities to lower levels if we are to increase the flexibility and responsiveness of our joint forces. Joint Force Commanders and their staffs must understand not only what their own Service brings to the joint fight, but can adapt to "plug and play" with the other Services as well as coalition forces.
• The Services, I think, must capitalize on and experiment with existing joint capabilities. We have yet to realize the full potential of such opportunities as Joint Over-the-Shore Logistics, or JLOTS, for example.

Our goal is for joint operational concepts and architecture to guide Service transformation efforts - I believe that only then will we reap the warfighting benefits of "jointness." Only then will we be truly joint, only then will we be ready to face an uncertain future. Ladies and gentlemen, even as we adjust to face a changed security environment, our goals remain firm. We must protect America's interests, we must deter aggression, we must support peaceful resolution of disputes, and, most importantly, we must be ready to intervene or respond to a conflict and win decisively. In the long run an interoperable seamless joint force, ready to fight across the spectrum of conflict, will ensure that victory.

Thank you very much. And with that, I'll take your questions.

Dr. Pfaltzgraff: Thank you very much, General Shelton, for this outstanding presentation this morning as we open our proceedings. We now have an opportunity for questions from the floor. Who would like to be the first person to pose a question? Again, please identify yourself and wait for the microphone. Yes, right over here? Microphone I hope is on its way.
Audience: General, I'm Charlie Aldinger with Reuters. I'd like to ask you how you feel about the Bush camp's almost derisive attacks on peacekeeping and other non-combat missions as nation building and something that the U.S. military should not get itself involved in?

General Shelton: Okay, thanks Charlie. I knew I could count on you to start it off with a hard question. If they get any harder than that, I have a feeling my beeper is going to go off and I'll go running out of the room.

First of all, Charlie, as you know, I'm not in the business of responding to candidates' statements, per se, but let me address from my perspective. I do not see it as an all or nothing. First of all, I do draw a line between what I would call nation building and what I would call sustaining a safe and secure environment. When you get into nation building, and obviously in some of the places we've been, there is a lot of nation building to be done. I'll go back to Haiti, or we can go right over to the Balkans. I'm sure Monty Meigs would agree. There's a tremendous amount of things, institutions that have to be reestablished, etc.

But the soldiers, per se, do not do that. We can provide a safe and secure environment — but we don't do the law enforcement, we don't do the court systems, we don't do the set up to get commerce flowing again. Getting the civil institutions of government reestablished is, in my definition, what you're doing when you get into nation building. And there are many that have tried to push us in that direction, to which we have resisted. There are other elements of our government and allies that have some great capabilities in that regard and other organizations that are more appropriate for nation building, as we saw down in Haiti.

The military task, again, was a safe and secure environment. But everything within Haiti, just about, when we went in, was broken. And Admiral Paul David Miller, the CINC at that time, recognized that, and had a meeting here in Washington, got all the interagency together, and identified all those things that would have to happen for that government to start functioning again as a government that we would say was operating in an efficient and effective manner. And of course, that really never happened. That's the nation building piece that will enable you to sustain that really self-sustaining peace.

And that is one of the biggest issues, I think, that we have seen in recent years. The military can go in, we can establish a safe and secure environment, and whenever you've got genocide taking place, or you've got people being destroyed the way the Kosovars were by Milosevic's forces, that is an appropriate thing for the U.S. military to get involved in. But after that, there needs to be another mechanism that can come into place, and that's the piece that's missing today. We've got OSCE, we've got the EU, we've got NATO, and the U.N. We've got lots of organizations. But they just don't seem to be moving and are not as well organized in that regard as the NATO forces have been in Kosovo, as an example or as the U.S. forces were on the ground down in Haiti.

So I think that there is a medium here. I agree the military ought not to do nation building, but we can be used in areas where there's less than vital national interest as I indicated to try to help other nations and help other people.

Dr. Pfaltzgraff: Next question? Please, yes. Right down here? Please stand so that they know where you are. Thank you.

Audience: Thank you. Byron Callan, I'm an analyst at Merrill Lynch. Your discussion placed an emphasis on technology and the role it'll play in Joint Vision 2020. And yesterday we heard from a couple of speakers about the technology gap between the United States and our allies. Can you just share with us your thoughts on how that technology gap should be closed?

General Shelton: Well, thank you. And of course, that's one of the biggest challenges that we face today and there are numerous initiatives such as the Defense Cooperative Initiative in NATO. There is also the ESDI initiative. A lot of initiatives are ongoing. I think that we have to be concerned on two fronts. One is encouraging our allies to keep up the pace, so to speak, to not fall so far behind us that when we hit the battlefield in a coalition environment, as we did in Operation ALLIED FORCE, that we have this wide gap. That is particularly important in the C4I arena that we can interface. That says encourage them to spend an appropriate amount on their defense, and I would tell you that we have in fact been doing that within the NATO arena for sure, and also out in the Pacific. But that's just on the equipment side.

The other one I think we need to be concerned about is our doctrine, sharing the doctrine that we're using, making sure we're staying in synch and that we work within it. We've got General Cosgrove here today. Last week Admiral Denny Blair hosted the Pacific Chiefs of Defense Conference out in Hawaii, all of this designed to pull everyone together and get us operating on one sheet of music, so to speak.

Well, ultimately, it does require investment, either in terms of training, doctrine, or equipment technology in order to close that gap, or in order to make sure it doesn't get too wide, and it is a challenge. But I think we're doing about everything within the power of the United States right now to try to close that up. We've got initiatives to take place down at Joint Forces Command. Hal Gehman sponsored a series of war games and conferences designed to try to close the gap between them and us. And so a lot of the initiatives, but it still is one of our largest challenges.

Dr. Pfaltzgraff: Next question? Other questions? One over here, yes. Please stand and identify yourself?

Audience: General, Tony Capaccio with the Bloomberg News. You talked in your first couple of sentences about a strategy-force structure mismatch. What steps does the new administration have to take in its first year to address the mismatch? Is it strictly a money issue, or a reorganization of missions issue? Priorities? Re-juggling?

General Shelton: Okay, thanks Tony. I think that this will be addressed and can be addressed, must be addressed, as a part of the QDR with the new administration. I refer to a strategy force mismatch. We've got, I think, a great strategy, which is to carry out Shape, Respond, Prepare. The "Shape" piece of it, of course, the engagement as well as the "Respond" have resulted in creating about 32 Low-Density/High-Demand type of units. Now, these are units that are in such short supply in the areas where they are required that we have our people in those units operating at the very max rate of their service. And in many cases exceeding that max rate. For example, in the Army, we normally average being away from home about 180 days per year. Same thing with the Marines and the Navy. The Air Force runs on about 120 days. But we are surging above that on so many units right now, and that of course has an impact on our ability to retain people. It has an impact on a lot of families.

And so we need to look at our strategy. If we've got the strategy right, then where do we have the mismatch? The first thing I'd submit that needs to be done is - before we start talking about growing the forces, and that may be the right answer - we need to look internally in each Service and make sure that we're satisfied internally that we've got it balanced as best we can within the Service. Then, if we're going to stick with the current strategy, we need to go back and address where we've got the mismatch, where we're carrying out the strategy on the backs of our great soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, and make the adjustment so that we no longer do that. And that might mean increasing the numbers of some of those units.

We've been in some of the areas, for example, in intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance some of our most stretched assets and many of those, along with our special operations forces and a host of others. We've made some improvements. We've added things like EA-6Bs and other squadron to the force because we were running those pilots into the ground. The U-2 pilot issue is a big concern right now. But there are a whole host of concerns that we've got to address as a part of the QDR, and it will give us a great opportunity to do just that.

Dr. Pfaltzgraff: We have time for one or two more questions. Who would like to be next? Let's go back over here and then you'll have the second one here. So let's go right here.

Audience: Good morning, sir. My name is Bruce Stubbs. You mentioned a retreat to the lower end of the spectrum. Last year I had the privilege of listening to General Wilhelm, CINCSOUTH, brief at the deputy secretary level, that he had 31 navies in his AOR of which only three, Argentina, Brazil and Chile, are true navies. The remaining 28 he called Coast Guards. He said because the U.S. Coast Guard's unique status as an armed service was constabulary authorities and because of the nature of the threats, asymmetric principally, and because of the Coast Guard's resemblance to these navies in force structure and mission nicks, he wanted the Coast Guard to essentially act as the enabled component force commander. Is the Coast Guard in your joint transformation plans?

General Shelton: The short answer is "no" and of course the Coast Guard comes under the Department of Transportation. With their law enforcement or constabulary role, we normally do not have access to them. And if you talk to Admiral Jim Loy, I'm sure you know, his forces are already stretched carrying out their current missions. And so it would be unreasonable to think that we could add missions to Jim Loy's Coast Guard without growing the force. And if you, in fact, are going to grow it, then why not, if you've got a mismatch in your force structure, and if you need the smaller types of forces for certain missions. And, as an example, one of the ways that we've helped Charlie Wilhelm and now Pete Pace in SOUTHCOM is through the use of the patrol coastal boats out of the Special Operations Command, the smaller boats that go down to assist in that area. Needless to say, we don't have enough of them.

But those are the types of forces that are more appropriate for some of the navies down in that region of the world than the larger ships. But I think certainly the point that you raise is something we can look at, but I know from having talked to Jim at considerable length about some of these issues that his structure would not allow him to take on any more without having to grow the structure as well. And so there's no free lunch there, I'm afraid.

Dr. Pfaltzgraff: Now, our next question is from back here?

Audience: Dick Diamond from Raytheon. Your admonition that we should encourage our allies to keep up with us and close the technical gap is really good, but the devil is in the details, and we find that when they try to buy our equipment, when they try to get access, when they try to find out where we're going, we have archaic, Cold War rules that say you can't know, you can't buy it, you can't have access to the technology. So while the military is doing all that it can, what do you think needs to be done to the bureaucracy, to the outdated FMS system to the technical transfer laws based upon the Cold War that cripple all of American industry's efforts to sell this stuff to our allies?

General Shelton: Thanks, and I think you raise a very valid concern. And I'm not sure if you said it or not, but overly restrictive transfer rules also puts American industry at a real disadvantage in many cases. Trying to strike that balance between the sharing of technology and the proprietary or types of information that we feel is absolutely critical that we keep close hold creates a real dilemma. I do think, based on my travels within about the last year, and the issues that we've confronted, that we do need a very thorough review of our whole process at the top. And I have encouraged that. I will continue to push for that, because I do believe that as a nation, we have got to come to grips with this problem if we want to increase our interoperability with the allies. And of course in many cases, we have some great equipment that would compete very well in cost, performance, etc., the key parameters that they're looking for. And because of some of our laws, we are precluded from being able to meet their demands, so to speak, and share with them some of the information that they feel is critical before they would commit to buy it. And so we need a thorough review of that, but not necessarily as a part of the QDR because that's a little bit outside of the parameter of the QDR, but with the new administration a review would be appropriate.

Dr. Pfaltzgraff: We have time now for just one more question. So who would like to have the final question for General Shelton? Is there one final question? Please, right here? Young lady over here? Please stand so that they can bring the microphone to you.

Audience: Yes, sir. Linda de France from Aerospace Daily. The Chiefs have said continually that we're sacrificing tomorrow's readiness today. Would it be appropriate to accept more risk today in order to insure future readiness capabilities?

General Shelton: Okay, thank you. Well, I'll go back to my Moshe Dayan story. You either keep the eye on the road or on the speedometer. The Chiefs, of course, worry a lot, as do all of us, about tomorrow's modernization and what our sons and daughters or our grandchildren even will have available to them, particularly if American remains with a relatively small force. For example, our Army is now I think the eighth largest in the world. Technology is critical. That means modernization to try to stay one step ahead of potential adversaries.

And that's the dilemma. The war fighting CINCs, some of who are here today want to make sure they're ready to go today within the theater. And therefore you get into the balance. The re-capitalization of the current systems, which we're wearing out at a relatively fast rate right now, competes with the modernization funds. And when you look at some of our future systems, they are quite expensive. And so in order to get there, you either have to accept considerably more risk today because, as I think everyone in this room knows, as we've testified to, we're already at moderate risk in the first MTW, and we measure that in terms of ground given up, lives lost, time it takes to complete that mission. And we're high risk in the second. And so unless we're willing to say that we're not going to worry about one of these two major theaters, we are accepting a considerable amount of risk today.

So the question becomes one of how much more risk do we want to take? And that's the dilemma we are in. We obviously are going to have to be prepared to spend more. America is a very prosperous nation. We can afford whatever defense we feel is appropriate and certainly as we look to the future, if we want to maintain a robust, modern force that can respond to more than one crisis at a time, that means we'll have to spend more for modernization than we've been spending. And we certainly have got to re-capitalize the current force if we continue to use it at the pace we're using it now.

Dr. Pfaltzgraff: This is of course a very fitting note on which to end this portion of our conference because these are issues that we have been addressing and will continue to address in the sessions that lie ahead. So I know you will all join me in thanking General Shelton for taking the time to be with us this morning, to share his wisdom, his insights, perspectives, and to give us a great deal more to think about as we move forward with this conference. So many thanks for being with us.

General Shelton: Thanks, Bob. Thanks very much. Thanks to all of you.