WASHINGTON (Army News Service, May 13, 2015) -- Readiness and leader development are equal priorities as the Army drives to create globally responsive forces in a continually uncertain world, said Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Daniel B. Allyn, May 12.
Addressing readiness specifically, Allyn brought up the impact of the last sequestration on the Army, saying that within six months of the cuts, the service had less than 10 percent of its brigades ready for global deployment.
"Today, in our Army, we've got about 31 percent readiness … and that's after 18 months of rigorous work at every echelon of command across our Army … and that's not enough … that's just not enough as we get smaller," he said during the Association of the U.S. Army Institute of Land Warfare breakfast.
The goal is to have two-thirds of the Army's formations ready at any time, Allyn said. "But we've got a long way to go to get from 31 percent to two-thirds, so we'll stay after it and work diligently, particularly in the personnel realm to ensure we have available forces to fill every crew, squad, team and platoon across our total force," he said.
Allyn said the bill payer in the past two years, to maintain the appropriate balance of having a ready force at a moment's notice, has been the modernization program. He said the Army staff and major commands have been identifying candidates for divestiture so focus could be on the limited modernization dollars and how they are used to the greatest effect.
"An example of that is what we have done with our aviation restructure initiative, where we are divesting three complete air frames to include all of the sustainment tail, all of the recruiting tail and personnel and training tail that goes with it, because savings, when you divest fully, are in the B's… the savings when you divest partially is only in the M's, and frankly, for the modernization requirements that we have in the near term, we've got to find more B's to put at that effort," he said.
The vice chief said the Army equipment modernization strategy identifies where capability gaps are so the service would continue looking across its portfolios, tackling mid- and long-term objectives and starting with the combat vehicle modernization effort to ensure, "we get the most important capability the fastest."
"Now clearly all of this effort, all of this focus on leader development and modernization is put at risk in October if sequestration returns to the force, and while we are cautiously optimistic of work-arounds being discussed in Congress to tackle this problem, the bottom line is the president's budget is the minimum that is going to get us through the next year with sufficiently ready forces that are equipped properly for the global missions out there," he said.
Allyn said every time the Army takes funds from one entity to lift another, the action creates a gap for which overseas contingency operations, or OCO, funding is insufficiently flexible to meet the requirements for multi-year challenges.
"The current restrictions on the employment of OCO will not allow it to be a gap-filler that is currently being proffered to offset the reduction in our base budget that is driven by the current proposals that are before Congress," he said. "In order to meet the needs of our Army, it must have greater flexibility… it must be less restrictive and it must enable us to sustain and modernize as we go forward."
Turning to the next generation of leadership, in both the officer and noncommissioned officer ranks, Allyn expressed solid optimism and excitement by what he has been seeing in his travels.
"I see thirst and hunger in our leaders at all levels … their ability to take very uncertain situations at the combat training centers and develop innovative solutions… that is exactly what has described the American Soldier throughout our history," he said.
"Our young leaders today, not only have to maintain the mastery of tactical-level proficiency, they must be equally adept at transitioning into the operational- and strategic-level of contributions to national security and that puts huge demands on us as we develop these leaders to be masters in all of those areas," he said. "It's an exciting time to be a leader in the Army … it's an exciting time to be a leader at every level."
Related Links:
Vice Chief of Staff of the Army Gen. Daniel B. Allyn
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