Moseley: We Need A Failsafe To Human Error

Team Infidel

Forum Spin Doctor
Air Force Times
June 9, 2008
Pg. 12

A day after Defense Secretary Robert Gates asked for and received his resignation June 5, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. T. Michael Moseley gave this exclusive interview to staff writer Vago Muradian.
Q. What are the challenges or top four priorities that your successor will have to address?
A. Well, whoever the new chief is, I won’t give him priorities. The specific challenge that I have personally been working since the Minot incident is the notion of discipline and compliance, attention to detail and execution relative to tech orders, tech data, processes. Because that is really what some of these reviews have highlighted that we have fallen short in.
And that is why, in my statement, I said, if there is any notion of shortfall and failing, the honorable thing to do is to tender my resignation, since I’m the senior military guy in the service.
Since the incident, my focus with my staff and the major command commanders is on the notion of discipline, compliance and attention to detail.
And discipline is not just watching people. Discipline is a way of life, compliance with existing instruction is a cultural way of life in the Air Force, whether it is an aircraft checklist, a maintenance checklist, a munitions checklist, or a shipping process and checklist.
Q. And that was where the problems occurred?
A. That is where breakdowns apparently occurred, and in the case of the munitions, we know we had a breakdown in humans related to checklists and tech orders. So my guidance back to the major command commanders and the field commanders is to make sure that the processes that we have, the checklists that we have, the tech orders that we have, provide a failsafe or a firewall to human mistakes.
Because we are dealing with humans, there will be mistakes. So the adherence to checklists and the focus on compliance has everything to do with knowing the rules, knowing the process and holding yourself to the highest possible standards and then complying.
And then I’ve focused my commanders on an equally critical part of all this, inspection and evaluation — to understand how to evaluate and how to inspect relative to these things that we call compliance and disciplined execution, whether it’s flying an airplane, whether it’s building up munitions, whether it’s shipping parts and pieces, or maintaining an airplane.
There are processes we have that require fundamental understanding, and we hold ourselves to standards of excellence and the integrity to do it right, and we hold ourselves to the standards of compliance.
Following the Minot incident, I would say more than 95 percent of my focus has been about getting this right, and we had a commander-directed inquiry. I commissioned Maj. Gen. [Polly] Peyer to conduct a blue ribbon review, which gave us 120 or so specific things to address. My fundamental tasking to her was, “Is there something bigger here? Is this just an isolated case of a human frailty or are there systemic bigger issues that we have to find and fix?”
Q. So this was right after the Minot incident?
A. I started it right after. The secretary went out there and General Welch did an overall study. So those 120, I believe, is a start at getting at where general officers should be. What is the echelon of responsibility? Is there anything that has slipped or we have lost focus on? And there is another side of this that matches funding so it’s not just an odd after-action report. This [budget document] that is being formulated right now has $1.088 billion focused on this particular area.
Q. How big a role in this is due to the shrinking, reorganized and constantly deployed force?
A. We are into 18 years of this, solid, but I will tell you as the chief that is not an excuse for noncompliance. It’s not an excuse for inattention. It’s not an excuse for mid- and senior NCOs not to be present and engaged. It’s not an excuse for junior officers, squadron commanders who are supposed to be engaged and present.
Being busy is being busy. That’s not an excuse and so, as the senior airman of this country, if there is any criticism or doubt in our ability to execute, then I think it’s the honorable thing for me to do: tender my resignation.
Q. Secretary Gates has said the services, and the Air Force, are focused on “next-war-itis.” What’s your view?
A. I don’t have a critique of Dr. Gates, because I believe the services have to be able to do everything — across the entire spectrum of conflict. We have got to be able to fight a counterinsurgency, an irregular war scenario, all the way up to the high-end theater. And we have to be able to do that 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
You don’t get to pick when and where you do this. You have to be able to do it on a global scale. And I surely 100 percent support the notion that the bureaucracy is very, very slow at being able to capitalize on creative innovative opportunities. ...
I’m as frustrated as Dr. Gates with a bureaucracy that is very, very slow at adapting to things like this, whether it’s this war or the next, or whether this notion of the next war, I think we are going to have to do better on this.
Q. You have said you need cutting-edge capabilities like the F-22 not to fight the Russians or Chinese, but their equipment, right?
A. This goes back to the absolute reality of a service and a Department of Defense to deter and dissuade and, if that fails, to fight across the entire spectrum — cyber, space, everything. We have to understand this.
We have to think about this; we have to discuss this; invest in it heavily; test it to see what works and what doesn’t; and we have to have a much more robust understanding of warfare from counterinsurgency to irregular to high-end theater war.
I do not predict nor believe that we will have a nation-state versus nation-state conflict sometime in the near future. If we do the deterrence and dissuasion piece right, we will avoid conflict.
It is up to the theater and component commanders to be able to employ all these tools creatively to deliver in the quickest time with the fewest casualties the most strategically dislocating effect on the opponent.
Q. So you can achieve effects subtly, with a small shove.
A. Indeed, and it may not even be a shove. ... Perhaps it’s just presence that deters and dissuades, which is ultimately the best outcome for everyone.
While I believe there is an almost zero chance we will fight a nation-state, I believe there is a near 100 percent chance we are going to fight very sophisticated systems on the land, at sea and in the air.
I believe the best way to deter and dissuade is to be able to wholly dominate the land, sea, air, space and cyber domains.
But I can say without doubt, that we’ve got the finest Air Force in the history of this country and the best people we have ever had in the service and it has been an honor to have led them.
 
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