“We need our industry partners on board,” with the new budget plan, said Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz on Thursday at AFA’s Air Warfare Symposium in Orlando, Fla. He asked industry to get behind the service’s new budget proposal and help make it work by keeping program costs down and schedules on track. There can be “no bonuses for . . . cost creep,” said Schwartz, but the Air Force will also do its part by keeping requirements stable. “That’s my job,” he said. While he said the current budget request—which places the Pentagon on a course to reduce its spending by $487 billion through Fiscal 2021—is “manageable,” deeper cuts “would send us back to the drawing board” on national strategy. The 2011 Budget Control Act’s looming sequestration clause—with more steep spending cuts—would be “indiscriminate salami slicing” that would be devastating to Air Force plans and attempts to remain capable at a smaller size, argued Schwartz.
When Airmen eject, the mission is clear: America leaves no warrior behind. Airmen are trained to survive, evade, resist, and escape the enemy, and everyone from ground crew to rescue personnel and commanders are committed to doing everything necessary—and possible—to bring downed Airmen home.