WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Ohio – The Air Force Life Cycle Management Center held its second annual Life Cycle Industry Days Sept. 13-15 at the University of Dayton River Campus in Dayton, Ohio.
The sold-out event drew hundreds of attendees from more than 30 states and from large and small companies as well as senior leaders from various Air Force organizations, to network, learn about and discuss future Air Force requirements and a variety of key acquisition issues.
Attendees were able to choose from a robust schedule of more than 60 interactive sessions that covered a plethora of important topics ranging from verifying cyber in weapons systems to emerging foreign air and space threats.
Lt. Gen. Robert McMurry, the AFLCMC commander, helped kick off the event by welcoming attendees and highlighting acquisition challenges.
During his presentation McMurry encouraged the audience to connect with each other and explore solutions for common challenges.
“We have a responsibility to take advantage of the opportunity to engage with each other and explore solutions for the challenges we have,” McMurry said. “The reality is if you have a problem, odds are, the people who are going to solve it are right here. Your job over the next couple of days is to find them.”
McMurry went on to challenge the group to think about ways for the United States to maintain its strategic advantage over adversaries, including where to invest limited resources.
“To think that our potential adversaries don’t have talented people, don’t have hard workers, don’t have people who are studying hard, who are trying to outdo is naïve,” McMurry said. We have to really think about what will give us lasting military superiority.”
Echoing McMurry, Maj. Gen. William Cooley commander of the Air Force Research Laboratory and one of the speakers at LCID, stressed the importance of keeping the technological advantage over America’s adversaries, who he said are spending a lot of money to try and catch up.
“The U.S. way of fighting conflicts has relied on a technological advantage and that technological gap is shrinking,” Cooley said. “The challenge that we collectively have is to figure out how we are going to ensure that we maintain that technological advantage.”
Cooley highlighted AFRL’s role in helping the United States maintain its tech dominance when he talked about areas of emphasis in the labs including experimentation, affordability and speed.
Throughout the event, LCID attendees were able to interact with acquisition experts including Sue Payton, former assistant secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition, who drawing from her experience in industry as well as her time as the top Air Force official for acquisition, provided her perspective on issues facing the acquisition community.
Other highlights during the event was the Heritage Panel, which featured a “Who’s who” of former Air Force leaders including Gen. Lester Lyles (ret), former commander of the Air Force Materiel Command, Gen. William Looney (ret) former commander of the Air Education and Training Command, Lt. Gen. Thomas Owen (ret) former commander of the Aeronautical Systems Center and Lt. Gen. C.D. Moore (ret) former commander of the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center, all of which provided very thoughtful insight into key issues facing the Air Force.
Together, the panel had more than 100 years of experience and expertise.
During the event, attendees were able to listen to experts from the intelligence and sustainment communities.
In addition they were able to engage with guest speaker Lt. Gen. Arnold Bunch, military deputy, Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition, who also served as the moderator for the PEO/CEO panel.
Gen. James “Mike” Holmes, the Air Combat Command commander, attended LCID as a guest speaker and talked about ACC’s mission and gave an operator’s perspective of current and future challenges.
“We sometimes tend to think of that [air superiority] as a birthright, but it’s not,” Holmes said. “We have to fight for it and win it time and time again with every generation of Airmen. We face determine, smart, capable adversaries who have spent years watching what we do, how we operate and have developed strategies to try and neutralize our advantages.”
Holmes highlighted areas adversaries have made significant progress, including improvement in conventional forces and the development of unconventional and irregular strategies designed to target our strengths and weak points.
He then went on to talk about his focus areas which are, ‘regaining the readiness of the squadrons to be able to compete against peer adversaries,’ ‘building leaders ready to win in joint war fights’ and third ‘bringing the future faster.’
Holmes concluded by thanking the audience for their support.
“The reason I’m here this morning is because everything we do depends on the people in this room,” Holmes said. “We can’t win tomorrow’s fights without your help.”
LCID wrapped up with a unique opportunity for one-on-one discussions with program executive officers representing Fighter/Bomber, Agile Combat Support, Mobility, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance and Special Operations Forces, Tanker, Propulsion, Presidential Aircraft Recapitalization and Foreign Military Sales.