{"id":9894,"date":"2023-05-10T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-05-10T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=9894"},"modified":"2023-05-11T06:53:51","modified_gmt":"2023-05-11T06:53:51","slug":"daf-senior-leaders-offer-dialogue-on-defense-innovation-amid-strategic-competition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=9894","title":{"rendered":"DAF senior leaders offer dialogue on defense innovation amid strategic competition"},"content":{"rendered":"
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WASHINGTON (AFNS) — \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Ash Carter Exchange on Innovation and National Security was held May 9, bringing together pioneers and champions of innovation from government, the private sector and scientific communities to examine how to advance collaboration in pursuit of national security.<\/p>\n

Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall<\/strong><\/a> and Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. CQ Brown, Jr.<\/strong><\/a> were among those gathered at the event named in honor of the late Ash Carter<\/strong><\/a>, former secretary of defense and a trained theoretical physicist, who is credited with leading change and innovation throughout his four decades of service in government.<\/p>\n

The Department of the Air Force and entire U.S. military is modernizing and refocusing to address strategic competition<\/strong><\/a> and the changing character of warfare.<\/p>\n

In remarks to the audience, Kendall highlighted that innovation doesn\u2019t happen alone and that the U.S. is leaning more heavily now on technology developed by partners and allies than it has historically.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a lot of very smart partners out there, and integrated deterrence isn\u2019t just about security relationships; it\u2019s also about relationships in development and interoperability,\u201d Kendall said. \u201cWe have very valuable partners, very capable partners, and we need to utilize them as much as possible. We\u2019re leaning forward more than we ever have before in terms of sharing technology, and we\u2019re also using more foreign technology.\u201d<\/p>\n

Speakers agreed that modernization efforts require collaboration with industry as well as the type of analytical rigor and decisiveness that were hallmarks of Carter\u2019s leadership style.<\/p>\n

Speaking on a panel about the future of innovation in defense moderated by Special Competitive Studies Project Chief Executive Officer Ylli Bajraktari, Brown and fellow panelists, Mich\u00e8le Flournoy, co-founder of WestExec Advisors and former undersecretary of defense for policy; Dr. Eric Schmidt, chair of the SCSP and former Google CEO; and former U.S. National Security Advisor retired Army Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, commented on the need for innovation, change and speed, as well as Carter\u2019s legacy and the projected role of artificial intelligence in future conflicts.<\/p>\n

The phrase \u201cvalley of death\u201d was used as a metaphor to illustrate the gap between innovation and adoption, whereby new processes or technology are not implemented or operationalized.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of innovation on one side of the valley, but there\u2019s not a lot of processes to get things into production and into the hands of our service members quickly,\u201d Brown explained. \u201cIt\u2019s how we take and nurture one of these good ideas and start to build it to scale.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brown also discussed the Air Force\u2019s implementation of artificial intelligence before calling on those in the audience to help the Department of Defense<\/strong><\/a> and the Air Force understand and harness this and other technological advancements.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think too often, you\u2019ll see \u2018AI\u2019 on a bunch of PowerPoint slides, and it\u2019s [described as] a panacea that\u2019s going to solve all our problems \u2014 and we don\u2019t fully understand it,\u201d Brown said.<\/p>\n

During his speech, Kendall described his professional relationship and personal friendship with Carter and the ways in which Carter helped mentor him to become a strategic thinker in force building and technological development.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was a friend \u2026 and someone I admired enormously and still do,\u201d Kendall said. \u201cAs I’m in my current position, one of the things I do fairly frequently is ask myself, \u2018What would Ash do?\u2019 … As I think about how to move forward, how to cut through the bureaucracy, how to move tactically supporting strategy and how to achieve big, big objectives by piling up small things that can lead to getting to where you want to go.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Ash Carter Exchange was organized by the Special Competitive Studies Project, a non-partisan, not-for-profit organization. Its primary mission and purpose is offering analysis and recommendations for strengthening America\u2019s long-term global competitiveness.<\/p>\n

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U.S. Air Force Logo<\/title><\/p><\/div>\n<\/section><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>WASHINGTON (AFNS) — \u00a0 The Ash Carter Exchange on Innovation and National Security was held May 9, bringing together pioneers and champions of innovation from government, the private sector and scientific communities to examine how to advance collaboration in pursuit of national security. Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall and Air Force Chief of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":9896,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9894","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9894","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9894"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9894\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9897,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9894\/revisions\/9897"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9896"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9894"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9894"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9894"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}