As Air Force Materiel Command consolidates its acquisition, sustainment, testing, and technology functions from 12 locations to five, it will reduce 1,051 acquisition positions at the management level, said AFMC chief Gen. Donald Hoffman Thursday at AFA’s Air Warfare Symposium in Orlando, Fla. The consolidation, announced last November, doesn’t run afoul of any potential new BRAC round, said Hoffman. “We’ve postured ourselves for efficiency, whether there’s a BRAC or not,” he asserted. There’s “no legislation that says, ‘don’t do it,'” but there is the 2011 Budget Control Act that demands that the Air Force “spend less money,” he said. BRAC 2005 “is history,” said Hoffman, and doesn’t “codify the future.”
Secretary of Defense Austin Lloyd III met with his counterparts from Australia, Japan and the Philippines to discuss bolstering defense ties on May 2. The discussion included plans for joint F-35 exercises with Japan and Australia in the coming years.