Im with the International Security program and pleased to have joining me the chief of staff of the army, general mcconville. It is great to be here. Host there are so many things we should be talking about but we have limited time. I would like to focus more than anything on the pacific. You come from the region relatively recently, the National Strategy is to prioritize the Great Power Competition especially china and russia but most people when they think of the army think of a ground incentive environment like europe and are not thinking about that. Is the pacific a priority for the army and what does this mean . Historically were focused on europe, a National Test strategy that puts the indo pacific as a top priority. We take a look, havent been in the pacific, those are my first overseas trip as a in september of 2019, my first trip with covid19 to the region. When you look at the region, Great Power Competition. The competition is about the people. The secret, the solution to the Great Power Competition is a joint force solution with allies and partners coming together. Host when you talk about the joint force, the outline, lets take it to those pieces starting with joint peace. What do you think are the priorities you are hearing from the joint boards about what the army needs to be delivering or able to deliver particularly in the context of the focus on what some have called the continuum, scaling all the way up to deterring significant work area. Guest we talk to the commander, how did we help the commander . The way we do this is we provide certain capabilities, those capabilities are like security force, they can advise, assist our allies and partners to help with the peace and we have other capabilities like a new organization, the main task forces, the longrange position effect that if we get to the ability to do longrange suppliers which will help deterrence but also enable other joint partners, enable Maritime Air Force maneuver against antiaxis air defense capability. Host what is the concept for how those Multidomain Taskforces what operate in the pacific . Is that something you are still working on . Something we are still working on as far as the exact positioning. We have extremely longrange decisions to make but the capability as far as that position is to be determined. Host the allies and partners peace, you have come from the region. You have been there previously. What are you hearing from your counterparts, in the pacific, from the United States and the army specifically. Guest what they want is a strong friendship, strong partnership, they want a free and independent indo pacific. No one wants to have Something Like that. So much trade going on for the global economy. It is in their interests to have a safe opening, that is what we want them to help with. Host there is a significant concentration of army forces in korea. Racking my name to think in other areas, appetite for more forces on the ground or is it more exercises and engagement at the senior level with your subordinates . Guest it is a range of activities with education and Training Programs where they come to our schools, some are interested in military sales, purchasing equipment, interoperability between what they are interested in, and enabling the equipment, some want us to train in their country, a variety of things we are doing to increase depending on what they are. Host china itself, north korea as well. Talk a little bit in the case of china, how you think us China Dynamics particularly as relates to the army and your mission, what does success look like in terms of what you are doing with allies as part of the joint force . There is some type of conflict, Great Power Competition does not mean a great conflict. To avoid that type of thing, at the same time, many of these countries do want, they need to have access, do the things they need to do for their economy. Their interest is instability in the region so it can prosper. Host china most recently for folks watching ground force efforts and the pla has gotten, what has happened or border disputes but they were deadly. India itself is a growing a lot of the security environment. Are you interested in the dynamic . Guest the Pacific Command, indo Pacific Command reflecting how important, india and a lot of common interests and as a result there are opportunities for that relationship and partnership, those discussions are possible in the future. Host what are the priorities you heard with regard to their Ground Forces and cooperation with the army. India and pakistan dynamic and it is very important to that. Are they still focused on Ground Forces . Guest i had to talk to the Ground Forces as we talk to the indian chief of staff of the army, certainly focused on Ground Forces, we are looking for common interests and improving relationships. Host you mess with your counterparts in a couple other countries in southeast asia. Speak about what you heard in the midst of covid19 and in the midst of this, between the United States and china. Many countries are concerned about covid19. Even in my travel i was tested many times on national television, and thailands to make sure as we move through the region covid19 is not spreading. All the countries were concerned about that. Working on some type of vaccine, very interested, and once we discovered we could share, they are very concerned, the limited capability to do what they need to do. That is the biggest concern. They dont need to choose within partners because they are all dependent on partners for the economy. And respect their interests. Host with chloroquine for being such a predominant factor, the influence Campaign Activity around it, are you looking at health diplomacy, that the army can help provide allies and partners that are looking for help on whether it is vaccine or therapeutics or logistics. Guest there are opportunities, we are doing some aggressive work with operation warp speed to get a vaccine and therapeutics to treat that. Once we have that capability we want we are doing some sharing in the region that working to do that but there is the capability. Host the National Defense authorization act, awaiting the end game with conference, the signature etc. And the national election, there is certainly pressure on defense. Are you concerned about the ability to deliver in the Pacific Related to defense top line or concerns in a different way . Guest we are in a major transformational effort. We need to transform, we did it in 1940, in 1980 and now we are in 2020 and we have major modernization efforts going on. Not just new equipment, new organizations, Talent Management program. All these things come together and set course for the next few years, allow us to have Great Power Competitions for these efforts, and these resources do that. Host what are the priorities you have . And then more broadly what are the priorities for that army trance formation . May be specifically thinking about the indo pacific competition dynamic . Guest transformation and modernization, much more with that and starts with a concept for how we are going to compete. At the joint level, the Main Operations concept, recognizes in the future we will be contested in every single domain on the land, in the see, on the air, insider stand in space. Our contribution, the Main Operations concept, very closely, to make sure we are synchronized with our concepts and from the concepts we are developing new units. The Multidomain Task force gives us a longrange decision affecting longrange decision we are standing up to Security FirstAssistance Brigades so we have this capability to advise and assist. And information operations, and we take a look at how we train and balance of the technology. And im in a reality to take advantage of that. Longrange precision fires a wind vehicle to replace two aircraft coming in. And retiring sensors and shootings together and air and missile defense, highpowered microwaves, sensors together to handle any type of threat and doing things to make soldiers more lethal with some assistance with the ground. Most importantly we are doing a lot, we talk about new stuff but it is moving Industrial AgePersonnel Management system to a Talent Management system. As far as transformation and getting the force ready for the next 40 years the most important thing we are doing his account management. With a Personnel Management system in place and moving to a 21stcentury Talent Management system that will allow us we no longer manage everyone as interchangeable parts. We managed by the knowledge, skills, behavior and preferences which is what we want to do and where we want to go but we think it is important, what we need in the right job in the right place so we are at that area. Host we are in a constrained budgets environment. What are the areas you feel you can gain more efficiency than you have in the past or it deep prioritizing to make room for major pushes. In funds and the attention of Senior Leadership and transformation of Human Capital takes enormous attention. What is allowed to be less prioritized right now . This can be challenges, the assistance we have for Something Like this to continue to purchase and i discuss that we cant buy new old stuff so to speak. We have to take a look at we cant have everything which is why we have modernization priorities, our number one priority, developing hypersonic capability, we will have midrange missiles, very important for the antiaccess denial capabilities. Tactical fires with extended range, also approach that. Some of the things that might be incremental, to invest in that. One more questions from me and for his audience questions, in light of the black lives Matter Movement protest and silver military, in the Lafayette Square incident. With the brand at home, come from the Indo Pacific Region they have influence in in europe and elsewhere. To make sure the legitimate brand itself to be influential without that brand overseas . In all circumstances, regular army troops, at the last resort, in this case did not figure on active troops, looking closely with law enforcement. Even the National Guard should only be employed as a last resort. To have that discussion to understand the purpose of the United States army to protect the nation, and leave policing the nation to law enforcement. Guest there have been a few diversity initiatives. Host these were brought up from secretary s per. Can you share, what the army should be doing in this regard. Guest a very Diverse Service not just about diverse city is number is. It is very important, 18 of limits, 180,000 women, 180,000 latinos, we put to gather, working quite a while. How we compete for a diverse army and how we make sure it is overthetop. We see programs in place of that but it comes to some of the programs looking at racism in the country, what are we doing to get after that . They only fly certain flags. On the systemic side, how do we make sure there is a fair chance. We actually took photos out of motion boards, some unconscious bias, the assessment program, and it is as fair as possible, systemic procedures to make sure everyone has a fair chance. Host let me get to the audience questions since we have a few here. The armys propensity to travel heavy. The question is what is the army vision, it doesnt rely on that. We have all types of forces, aerosol forces, each comes with a logistical trail until and ideally the lighter you go the less you have, brings less conduct. What we are doing is tailoring our units and logistics. The other thing is how we do logistics. Manufacturing, putting official Intelligence Systems on our weapon systems, until you absolutely need to get feedback, a system that brings parts that you need. We are doing more on efficiency when it comes to fuel, and hybrid type vehicles. The challenge of logistics, we would like, what we are trying to do and getting after that. Moving into the Information Age comes to logistics. Host a question on india. The us india australia and japan, the four nations working to gather, how india can contribute to a quad or broaden it to multilateral approaches with the us to neutralize the indo pacific. It is extremely important in the region. As we follow or believe diplomacy and the strategic relationships in the state department. The armies are very important in those regions so the chief of staffs, strong, with my counterparts and finding out where we have common interests and where we can work for rather. With those chiefs, they have good relationships. Host a question for the army times, can you please discuss your thoughts on rotational use of Army Personnel as it relates to partner nations in the first, second or third island chain. How critical is it to have us forces in the first island chain in partner nations like thailand . It is very important we have relationships for countries inside the first island chain. The exercise is very important, we think it is important to have advisors and allies. Take a look at since agreements, 7 in our country as a whole and five of those are in the region. Japan, the philippines, thailand and australia, new zealand. We think it is very important for each of those partnerships to be strong. Guest another question on the region. Host this is about india contributing to what is commonly called the quad, the notion of us, australia, japan, india, multilateral set of networks that work in the defense realm. Through the quad or otherwise, how india might be best able as the questioner asked to neutralize chinas influence in the indo pacific. It is an important country in the region, we recognize that is a country by defining the pacific as indo pacific, we have agreement with japan, india if they were willing, it is helpful in the stability in the region. Host basing arrangement, germany decision, the strategic approach in the Indo Pacific Region, how does this affect europe in the Fourth Season future, the decision to withdraw troops, some amount of troops and what kinds of capabilities to deterring russia. There has been some acknowledgments made today. The posture review we have enough forces in the pacific to do what we need to do. What was critical in the Multidomain Taskforces in the future to provide the capability is we think with longrange position in the region. Interested in what capabilities you would like to see europe developing in light of the fact the United States has indo pacific as its theater. What would you hope others can provide in support of the Common Security goals we having europe . We would like all the countries to work closely together as we take a look at competition. We have Great Power Competition going on in europe. To respond in the military that can Work Together to deter in europe. The interoperability, one thing i talked about, the future concept for command and control capability. As i talk to my european counterparts, they talk of working to gather, the command and control is very important, we are interoperable. Host we have one last question on intermediate range forces and the question is whether you would be supportive in the indo pacific landbased capabilities for strike that fit in that definition, why they are preemptive in nature or defense if. Guest what we want is to have capabilities i talked about before when it comes to longrange precision fires, we are adopting hypersonic which is longrange, mid range capabilities, we certainly want to bring to National Leadership options they can use if required for this capability and with a question that would be a decision that would come later. Host i just want to ask one last question to your earlier comment on concept and trends formation and all the concepts that go into it and you mentioned the joint concept being developed as well as the army efforts. Is there a timeline for the process at least the first iteration of the Concept Development and what we might look for for signs that the contests are beginning to influence organization, design and modernization . It is happening as we speak, a lot of experimentation going on even monthly, during covid19, over the next year. The concept is being development. And joined forces elements, and that will conduct multidoMain Operations. Longrange precision fires and all working to tie the sensors and shooters together and experimenting to make sure we can see that work and that is helping drive the conce