TESTIMONY
OF
LIEUTENANT GENERAL RICHARD A. CODY
DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF, G-3
UNITED STATES ARMY
AND
LIEUTENANT GENERAL FRANKLIN L. HAGENBECK
DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF, G-1
UNITED STATES ARMY
BEFORE THE
UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
SUBCOMMITTEE ON TOTAL FORCE
REGARDING
ADEQUACY OF THE TOTAL FORCE
March
10, 2004
Introduction
Chairman McHugh, Congressman Snyder,
distinguished members of the committee, we
appreciate the opportunity, and it is our
privilege today to appear before you to
discuss the Army's plan to meet our current
sustained engagements around the world,
while simultaneously transforming to a more
flexible, capable, joint and expeditionary
force.
We thank the members of the committee for
their continued outstanding support to the
men and women in uniform who make up our
great Army. Soldiers in Iraq, Afghanistan,
Korea and in 120 countries around the world,
remain committed to meeting the requirements
of our national security strategy.
Current Posture
Since 9-11 our Army has been decisively
engaged executing the global war on
terrorism at home and abroad. Almost every
active component division has been deployed
or will deploy to Operation Iraqi Freedom or
Operation Enduring Freedom by the end of FY
04. Our reserve component has been equally
engaged with a cumulative mobilization of
46% of the total Army reserve component
since September 2001.
During the current transition of forces for
Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation
Enduring Freedom, eight of the Army's 10
active division and more than 120,000
reserve component Soldiers will be moving in
and out of the Central Command theater in
Iraq and Afghanistan. This massive
transition of forces is the largest movement
of our forces since World War II. It has
involved seamless coordination with our
Joint partners from the United States' Air
Force, Navy and Marines and has optimized
the capacity at our 15 CONUS based power
projection platforms and 12 power support
platforms.
Our Nation and our Army are at war. Our
active worldwide commitments have
highlighted stresses to our forces that have
existed for some time. To mitigate risk the
Army has embarked on a series of
initiatives. We are here today to address
several of these initiatives.
First is the internal rebalancing of both
our active and reserve component forces, to
improve the Army's strategic flexibility to
meet our current and future global
commitments. The second is the modular
reorganization of our formations that will
increase the number of combat brigades. The
third initiative is force stabilization,
which will reduce turbulence in our Army as
a whole, and make life more predictable for
our Soldiers, units and their families.
These initiatives will yield a ready an
accessible Army with the right mix of forces
that is strategically flexible to respond to
any future challenge.
Rebalancing the Army
Being an Army at war provides focus and insight as we rebalance and reset to meet the challenges of the emerging operational environment. We no longer need the massive heavy force structure of the cold war, nor will the next war be fought just like the last. We must provide the Nation with full-spectrum ground combat and support capabilities that can defeat an adaptive enemy. To enhance our ability to prosecute the global war on terrorism and fully resource high-demand capabilities like military police and special operations forces, we are restructuring over 100k spaces in our active and reserve component structure.
The challenge within the force structure has not necessarily been that we have too few soldiers, it has been the ability to take a "Cold War" structured force, and transform it to a force that matches the skill and unit sets required to execute the global war on terrorism and other operations, swiftly, and on a sustained basis.
While the Army has been rebalancing for
years, after 9-11, we accelerated the
process considerably to alleviate the stress
placed on the high-demand units. In
compliance with the Chief of Staff's
guidance to avoid involuntary mobilizations
within the first 30 days of a contingency,
resource high demand units, and reduce
under-resourced Reserve Component force
structure, we began planning over 80K in
force structure rebalancing actions in
2003. We are in the final planning stages
for these changes, which will be implemented
between 2005-2008.
Modularity
Parallel with rebalancing the Army, we are
creating a brigade-based modular Army to
enhance responsiveness and increase our
joint and expeditionary capabilities.
Webster's defines modularity as, "composed
of standardized units for easy construction
or flexible arrangements". Although this
may seem to be an over simplification of
what the Army is doing, it is precisely the
concept.
The modular Army, will be comprised of
brigades or units of action established as
the basic maneuver module for the Army. The
units of action will be smaller, flexible,
and self-contained units that are
full-spectrum capable.
With modularity our war-fighting
capabilities will increase from 33 active
component brigades to 43 modular active
component brigade units of action.
At the same time, we will restructure our
Army National Guard to provide 34 brigade
units of action, including a Stryker Brigade
and a higher density of infantry forces more
suited to homeland defense, stability
operations, and a variety of other missions.
Based on the Army's future level of
deployments, and the Geostrategic situation,
a decision may be made to increase to 48
active component brigade units of action.
Creation of additional brigade units of
action will not only preserve our capability
to execute the National Security Strategy,
but will also provide the strategic
flexibility and rotation base necessary to
conduct and sustain critical stability and
support operations. As the Chief of Staff
stated, "We're making very serious moves to
modularize the Army, standardize the Army,
developing an Army that's more lethal, more
agile, more capable of meeting the current
and future operating environment."
Simultaneous efforts are also underway to
modularize and transform Army Aviation,
Combat Support, and Combat Service Support
formations to increase flexibility,
capabilities, and to decrease logistical
support requirements. We are also working
to de-layer headquarters structure to
increase responsiveness and to meet joint
and combined command and control
requirements. The sum of our maneuver,
support, and headquarters restructuring will
be a force with improved interchangeable
capabilities, the ability to simultaneously
project combat power from our CONUS and
OCONUS bases, and headquarters that can be
rapidly configured to provide command and
control for joint and coalition forces.
The Chief of Staff has approved the initial
modular design of the 3d Infantry Division
and their transformation is already
underway. Following a rigorous train-up, to
include rotations through our combat
training centers at Fort Polk, Louisiana and
Fort Irwin, California, the division will be
trained and ready in its new configuration
for potential deployment anywhere in the
world as early as the 1st quarter
of fiscal year 2005.
Force Stabilization
Today's volunteer Army is engaged at a pace
unseen since the end of the draft 30 years
ago. The challenges associated with current
operational requirements place significant
stress on our existing forces, both active
and reserve. The approval of a temporary
authorized strength increase affords us the
opportunity to implement permanent changes
aimed at mitigating the stress on the
force. Paramount to this effort is
increasing our organizational capability
through force stabilization.
Force stabilization will consist of two
complementary strategies, home basing and
unit focused stability. Under the home
basing strategy, soldiers will remain on
their initial installation for six to seven
years, well beyond the current three-year
average. Their professional education will
be conducted as "attend and return" courses
reducing the challenges facing Soldiers and
their families when they permanently change
station (PCS) to a new installation and
attend these courses enroute. The second
strategy, unit focused stability, will allow
Soldiers to arrive, train and serve together
for roughly 36 months. This initiative will
enhance unit cohesion, improve training
effectiveness and create more deployable,
combat-ready units. During the unit's
operational cycle, Soldiers can expect to
complete an operational deployment rotation
of 6 to 12 months.
These initiatives will enhance unit
readiness and cohesion while improving the
quality of life for our Soldiers and their
families.
Future Focus
The Army and Office of the Secretary of
Defense continue to work to relieve the
stress on the force through a range of
ongoing initiatives that make better use of
our current forces and improve long-range
readiness. The Army is focused on
restructuring and stabilizing the force and
creating highly capable and deployable
modular units. To accomplish this, the Army
will temporarily exceed authorized strength
by up to 30,000 soldiers in Fiscal Years
2004-2007. Part of restructuring includes a
plan to civilianize up to 15,000 military
positions. We are planning on returning to
482,400 Soldiers by the end of FY09.
Included in an Annex to this statement are a
series of charts that lay out Army force
trends as requested by the committee. The
30k increase in strength results from
emergency authorities Congress has provided
the Secretary of Defense. It is not a
permanent increase, but authorized for the
duration of our national emergency. As this
increase occurs over the next few years, we
will continue to seek ways to resource high
demand units, improve capabilities, and make
the most effective use of soldiers within
existing Army strength.
These measures will ultimately reduce risk
and better posture the Army to provide the
capabilities required by the Nation. The
Army's ability to respond rapidly will be
enhanced by rebalancing our early deploying
capabilities, repositioning our forces
around the globe, and reconfiguring our
pre-positioned equipment stocks. We will
increase our infantry, military police,
special operations, and other high demand
forces that support Homeland Defense and the
War on Terror. At the same time, we will
retain a considerable capability to fight
and win major combat operations.
In conclusion, the end result of these and
other ongoing transformation initiatives is
increased capability across the entire
spectrum of operations. Increasing the
active component by approximately 6%
provides the necessary headroom to
restructure the Army while at war. This
temporary increase provides the depth
necessary to continue to meet operational
requirements while simultaneously
stabilizing and restructuring the total
force. This creates an Army that is more
ready and relevant for the future.
Thank you Mr. Chairman for the opportunity
to address the committee. I look forward to
your questions.
