General, this is part of a Program Sponsored by the science , technology, and Innovation Program here at the Wilson Center, led by elizabeth newberry, that also sponsors. General raymond is a native of virginia, but a very proud graduate of clemson university. When he graduated in 1984 and was commissioned as an air force officer, his first assignment was in north dakota, where he and his wife were recently both honored at the university of north dakota, where i was humbled to be president earlier. His last assignment in the air force was at Peterson Air Force base, now space force base. I got to work with him there were no was president of the university of colorado. He became the first need for the Space Command just three years ago, but soon after that, was assigned to be the first chief of space operations. We are thrilled to have him with us today and to learn more about the great things space force is doing to secure our country. Lets begin if we could, general , by talking about, why was it important that we establish a space force . What are the threats out there that the president and the nation decided that we need to have any branch for our military . Gen. Raymond first of all, thank you for the opportunity to be with you. It is always good to see you. I appreciate all the support you have given the Aerospace Forces over the years. It is a privilege to be here. Back in 2019, the United States decided to capitalize on an opportunity, an opportunity to elevate space to a level with its importance of National Security. Nothing we do as a nation or Coalition Force is not enabled by this. Over many decades, we have had been treating space as a given, that it is a benign, peaceful domain, and we can just operate there without any worries. Clearly, that is not the case today. We say that space has become more congested, more competitive, and more contested. The thought was, while we are still the best in the world in space, we elevate this to a service level, just like we have in all other domains. The United States army focused on the ground, the air force focused on the air domain, and the naval domain focused on the maritime domain. If you had a service that came to work everyday focused on this space domain, we could elevate its importance and accelerate ahead of the strategic environment. Pres. Kennedy not everybody fully realizes how important space is to us. We get up in the morning and we look at the weather, and we look at the time to commute. We dont realize how dependent we are on space. And, in turn, how dependent all the other branches in the military are on space. How do you explain just how important space is to us as individuals, as well as to the broader effort for the department of defense . Gen. Raymond i think i will even broaden it beyond that to start with, by saying it is really important for our nation. Space underpins every instrument in national power, whether it be diplomatic information, the military, or the economy. And again, as it underpins all of that, it is critical just as when you walk into a room and the lights are on the lights are always on, it is very important that space is always on as well. If you look at it from a National Security [no audio] pres. Kennedy we seem to have lost our signal from this line. I realize john deere is a data company that has transformed itself. The power of information to the Global Agriculture business is significant and it increases food supply and reduces pesticides. It is a significant force. It is also a force multiplier for the military. On the military side, all of our other services are all built around access to space. And again, without that, we dont have enough airplanes, enough ships. Space is a great deal for our nation and for our military, and that is what it is so important that we make sure that it is always there. It is also very important for every american, space feels our way of life. It is hard to understand that because it is hard to have a connection with space, machines orbiting thousands of miles overhead, going 17,500 miles per hour. It is hard to have that connection, but most people use space multiple times before they have their first cup of coffee. As you said, checking the weather on their smartphone, doing any kind of internet or electronic banking, they are using space. The list goes on and on. Gps satellites synchronize the central. So from big picture, every instrument focusing on the military part that is really critical, everything we do from the military to Disaster Relief to combat, has space integrated throughout. As american citizens, we use space each and every day. It is hard to have that connection, but it is there. Pres. Kennedy as tensions have been increasing throughout the world, the capabilities of other nations have been multiplying. Not just the weather or gps, but now increasing more intelligence as what is going on on the ground, in the air, and in maritime. Maybe you can talk about how your demand for other forces are increasing in line with the other tensions we are seeing globally. The importance to every american may not be as visible. On the inside of the pentagon, that conversation is easy. Everybody understands the criticality of space. Everybody says, here is what we need. With the establishment of space force, a couple of things happened that were beneficial. First of all, the secretary of defense has designated the space force chief as the forcedesign architect, if the department, do all the analytical work and then feed it to the secretary of defense for a decision of what that force design will be. The joint Requirements Oversight Council also has identified the space force as the lead integrator for space across the space integrated. For the first time, we now have a service who is leading that effort in the department to make sure we can provide those capabilities that our officers need. We are wanting to make sure we can provide uninterrupted access to critical Space Capabilities that our services and our joint forces and Coalition Partners have all come to rely on and all provide greater advantage to those folks. So, when i deployed back in 2006 timeframe, when i came home, a lot of folks asked me, what is the one thing war fighters need from space . When i came back from that, that is not what i took away, it wasnt one thing, it was multiple. It was everything we do as spaceports has space integrated into it. On the air force side, taking an aircraft to go on a mission, space provides the ability to figure out location, space provides communications to be able to command and control, it provides battle assessment. Throughout the entire portion of that mission, space is integrated throughout. One thing is multiple things. The interesting thing is as access to space, our various entries to space have been reduced and smaller satellites are more personally relevant. See Many Missions now that have a space element to it, if you will. Pres. Kennedy what are those increasing tensions one of those increasing tensions is china, who is also working very hard to gain expertise, if not dominance, in space, as they are in many areas of the military. How do you china, how is the spaceports working to make sure it stays a step ahead . Gen. Raymond first of all, it is clear that china is out pacing the challenge. We are focused on that challenge. We have got some great opportunities that we are working hard to leverage as we build the service, and it is being very collaborative. Race is a global domain. One of the big things we have been focusing on is developing partners. A key part of what we call integrated deterrence, which is a key tenet in our National Defense strategy. We have been working very hard in continuing to build and foster existing relationships and entering into new partnerships. That is one of the big wins i would say we have had, after establishing the space force. We have really upped our game in the International Collaboration piece. It provides us and our partners great advantage. We have been in the data sharing business historically, but today we operate and train together. When we set up u. S. Space command, we set up a combined command. We train and exercise together. We are building capabilities together. We had an opportunity in norway, a requirement to launch two communication satellites to cover the arctic. Norway was already building satellites. So he asked if we could just a loads on theirs good agreed and that saved us over 900 billion and will take three years faster. That is one example of where these partnerships are paying dividends. We see more of these and we are working on more of these as we speak and we think more of these will materialize in the future. Partnerships with allies is a key part of our competition. The other thing is one of the great advantages that i see is the u. S. Commercial industry. I would never bet against our industry. They are innovative, moving fast. We are working hard to develop a more fused relationship, if you will, with both traditional and nontraditional commercial partners. The other thing that we are doing and probably the most significant priority we have over the next decade or so, its focusing on resilience and making sure that the satellites that we have not only are the worlds best satellites, capitalizing on both commercial partnerships and international partnerships. We are doing forced design work to proliferate our architecture in our, just as with financial portfolios so that if one stock ticker hit, you wouldnt go broke. We are working to diversify our portfolio in partnership, again, with the commercial industry and our allies and partners. Those are three things i would highlight. The last one i would also highlight is, we are driving incredible talent in the space force. The biggest advantage we have had after establishing the spaceports is the talent we are attracting. We have a lot of people knocking on our door. We are being very selective, bringing back the air force academy. Two years ago, we had 116 folks commissioned directly into the spaceports. Last year we counted about 100. We only bring in several hundred year. We are bringing talent on the officer side go through the roof. We just had our first ever direct assessment from industry, where we brought a young officer , now an officer into the space force, brought her in as a First Lieutenant based on experience she had. We have identified five others that will come in everything from a First Lieutenant all the way to a Lieutenant Colonel and we will do more of that as we progress forward. Pres. Kennedy besides those great partnerships with our allies and commercial actors, to get that talent and make sure we are staying ahead on innovation, youve also done a great job of partnering with universities across the land. Gen. Raymond we have. That is another area that we are really proud of. We have a strong University Partnership program that we have established. We have about 16 University Partners that have signed mlas this year. Everything from universities like the university of north dakota, which is our first one, to m. I. T. , stanford, and others. Theres a strong University Partnership program. That is allowing us to do two things. One, it is allowing us to develop talent in those schools that have really strong stunnedrelated s. T. E. M. Related related attributes. Although we are not exclusively stem, a significant proportion of our force is. It is allowing us to develop talent. The other thing it is allowing us to do is partner for research. We now have a consortium of universities that can help us solve some of our problems that we are working on through Research Partnerships to be had as well. On both of those fronts, People Development and research, we think this partnership and network of universities that we have that spread across the country, is going to be something that is going to deliver an advantage for our nation. Pres. Kennedy i am pleased that the university of colorado is also part of that grouping as well. Gen. Raymond so am i. Pres. Kennedy another thing you have done in setting up space force in the beginning, you had a key focus on making sure that it was flat and responsive in a digital service, but you also focused from the beginning on the talent piece and established your guardian ideal to center that on. Maybe talk a little bit more about how talent was sort of at your center of attention as you established space force. Gen. Raymond we were given a significant opportunity, as i mentioned in the very beginning, to establish a service, to be able to move that speed, to make sure we can compete and win in the space, just like all the other services do. I saw two risks. One is that if we did not think old enough, and two is that if we had trouble getting that to fruition. Andrea in very successful we have been very successful on both fronts. I have learned that if you bring one person onto the space force, or if you bring a Million People who, you have to have the machinery, to be able to recruit, assess, develop and promote and retire folks. All of that had to be built for this new service. At the same time, we didnt want to just do business the way we have always done business, we wanted to take an opportunity to build this service for today. And so, the guardian ideal was our way of putting out a vision of a unique and fresh approach to talent management. One of the things we have an opportunity on is that we are a small service. So today, we have got just coming up on 8000 guardians. A little shy of that. But by the end of this year, we will have 8400 activeduty guardians. We have an equal number of civilians, a little less, but about an equal number. We have a force that has 16,000 folks in it, both active duty and civilians. You can apply a little bit more art than science when it comes to policies and professional development. Because you have the luxury that you are small enough and the machine doesnt have to take over to be able to manage that talent pool. We are looking for innovative ways to be able to have a connection with each and every guardian, give them more choices, and attract talent that traditionally might not have been attracted to come into the military. I get that a lot. I hear a lot from folks i would never join the military, but, boy, i would join the space force. I remind them that we are the military. But we have a vision that allows us to apply that art and develop our folks in our that we think is critical to the success of our service. We would like to give people opportunities to work in the work with commercial industry and come back to space force, work with the other industries in space and come back to work with us. We want to offer up opportunities if they are in certain times of their life where they go parttime for a while, then come back to fulltime. We are laying all of that out in this vision that we call the guardian ideal. And we are in the process now of working through the implementation of that each and every day. Everyone of the guardians that came to our service volunteered. So if you are a operator you had to volunteer to come in. If you were an acquisition professional or intelligence or cyber professional or an engineer, you had choices of whether you are going to stay in the air force or come into the space force. We also have now, coming up on 700 or 800 interservice transfers from other services. They had a choice and they made a decision to transfer to the service. So we want to make sure that we live up to their expectations, of those guardians who have volunteered to make a transition from what they were doing in the space force, and give them an opportunity to be part of something new and build something fresh from the ground up. Pres. Kennedy as part of building that talent and moving it forward, you worked hard on the culture. How do you establish an esprit dcorps . You are the youngest, starting out from the ground. It begins with the low row on the flag and the uniforms, but what efforts and what focus have you had in establishing that culture for the space force . Gen. Raymond that is the great question. I get asked a lot, when are you going to have your culture done . Its not something that i think just materializes, not something you can order on amazon prime and get overnight . We know that there are some significant First Principles we are trying to get after. One is we want a war fighting culture. Two, we want a culture that is bold and innovative and can move at speed. Three, we want to have a culture that is a connected culture. Again, with a small force, there is a connection where we can take care of our guardians in our, because of our size. So we looked at that, then, we started bringing people in from other services. We wanted to get them on board. We wanted to get the best of each of those services and mold this culture for us. One of the things that we are going to do here in an upcoming conference that we have in october, i think, now that we have the teams assembled and all the major muscle movements in place, and we know some of the First Principles that we want to get after, we are going to look at, how do we engineer that culture . What types of steps can we take to make sure that we dont just put this on autopilot and arrive somewhere, that we purposely move in that direction . Figure out what is important and then figure out how to engineer it. That is what we are going to do beginning this next month. Pres. Kennedy you mentioned that part of the culture was being a war fighting culture. It is sometimes hard for people to understand, what does warfighting mean in space . If i could address two questions, relative to the allies, what have you done to work on establishing the norms of Good Behavior in space . Also, help us understand that warfighting. Perhaps it is something we can talk about in the public setting , but we do know there have been antisatellite tests by both the chinese and the russians, and there are many other electronic means where we could face conflict in space. If you could help us understand on both the norms and the warfighting site, that would be great. Gen. Raymond first of all, i think it is clear that space is a warfighting domain just like all other domains, air, land, i think its clear its a war fighting demand. The newest of those, if you will. As it has shifted from a benign to the war frame. Things that other domains have. What is safer professional behavior. What are rules of engagement. What would you consider possible . What are the nerves the norms of behavior . All the things that have matured and developed over the years in other domains now have been formulated in this space. As it requires a new way of developing people, it requires new capabilities, tactics, techniques and procedures. All that is the work that the space forces doing to be able to provide capabilities that benefit our average americans, our nations and our joint Coalition Forces. There is a spectrum that is concerning. The jamming of gps satellites and indication satellites and directed threats that are very visible. For example, when china and russia launched a missile and loan up a satellite in multiple pieces of debris. Theres a whole spectrum of threats that we are focusing on to make sure that they capabilities that fuel our nation are always there. And that, with new technologies such as servicing satellites and extending their lives and having extra people up in space makes that job, im sure, more difficult. It does, but it gives us a lot more opportunities as well. Historically, ways to be commercially viable in space were very large communication satellites and commercial launch. Today, as i mention, or as the entry has been reduced and more objects are being launched into space, you now have multiple missions that are not commercially viable and i think that provides us great opportunity. Thats why the partnership with commercial industry is so important that we can leverage the Business Model that they have sue be able to make the transition from the exclusive capabilities that we have today to a more hybrid architecture thats more proliferated to be more resilient in the face of the capabilities and producers. So i think it is a very complex domain at an exciting time. A couple years ago we were talking i wouldve told you that we are tracking 22,000 objects in space. Today, that number is fear nearing 50,000 objects. I wouldve told you a couple years ago that of the 22,000 objects, 1500 were satellites. Today, that number is close to 5000. So, we are seeing a lot, and the projections are that that will increase. We think Cape Canaveral alone this year will probably do well over 60 launch is just out of Cape Canaveral. And we look at the manifest production projections, those will continue to increase. Pres. Kennedy those number of objects were multiplied and added to a satellite test, and we have received lots of questions here at the Wilson Center with concern about space debris and what are the paths forward to make sure we are managing that in the best way possible. I know you see a role for Congress Department in other areas outside of space for us, and maybe give us your view on space debris and how we keep it from being too much of a problem Going Forward . Gen. Raymond one of the ways that you help resolve this space debris problem is to not create debris in the first place. In the United States, back in april, i committed to not conducting destructive antisatellite tests. Again to act in a responsible way and not create debris. Reactive space Traffic Control for the world. We track every object into the analytical work on every object and make sure two things dont collide and if they do we provide warning and recommend that somebody maneuver those key satellites. We had a person back in 2008 timeframe with 3000 pieces of debris. So we ask is that space Traffic Control. We increased our engineering status so that when you do launch this you dont litter did litter the domain is the satellite comes off the rocket. When satellites reach the end of their life they dont break apart into meant multiple pieces of debris. All of those things that weve put in place are all getting after making