Source: United States Senator for Oklahoma James Inhofe
?U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC), today questioned the Honorable Christine Wormuth, Secretary of the Army, and the Honorable General James McConville, Chief of Staff of the Army, on how the budget supports the end-strength of the Army and on munitions preparedness.
Inhofe: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I always like to start off when we have General McConville here, an update on his three kids. I can remember when they were all three captains, and now they are all moving up and still very active. What’s going on there?
McConville: Well, they’re very proud to serve. They’re serving around the world in special operations forces and very, very proud of what they’re doing. And I also have a son-in-law that’s serving too.
Inhofe: We’ll count him too, yeah. That’s good. I know how proud you are.
Reed: Ask him about Patton.
Inhofe: Oh yeah, and Patton. Don’t forget.
McConville: We’re very proud to have our first grandson. His name is Patton James Nanzer. He’s six months old, and we’re real proud of him. He’s already got a hall named after him at Fort Myer. Patton Hall.
Inhofe: Ok. That’s great. Well, as noted in my opening remarks, the Army unfunded priorities [list] totals $5.1 billion, and I guess the first question I would ask you would be is everything on your list executable at this time?
McConville: Yes, it is, Senator.
Inhofe: As I highlighted in my opening statement, it’s my understanding that the Army’s reduced end-strength of [473,000], and it was talked about by both of you before, but it’s driven by recruiting challenges and I know that you’ve already talked about that a little bit. But, it’s something that’s more serious than any recruiting challenge that I’ve experienced in the years that I’ve been here.
In 2018, General Milley testified before this committee that we’re shooting to get north of 500,000, which was recommended in this document [the National Defense Strategy Commission Report]. That’s in the regular Army. And last year, you said, and this is a quote from you: “I think the regular Army should be somewhere around 540,000-550,000.”
And despite the difficulty we’re having right now, the biggest problem I think we’re having is recruiting at this time. And we talked about that a couple days ago in my office. And this is still, I believe, the most serious problem. In spite of the difficulty in recruiting the Army is facing right now, that we discussed just a couple days ago, is it still your best military judgement that we require an Army greater than 500,000?
McConville: Well, Senator, I think we need a bigger Army. I stand by the comments I made before.
Inhofe: I say that knowing full well the recruiting problem – everything you’re trying and the efforts there, and I understand that. But where does that leave us?
McConville: I also think quality is more important that quality. And what we have to do to get after this, as the Senator said, right now, 83 percent of the young men and women that are coming into the Army are coming from military family members and, you know, it’s nice that it’s the military family business. We need this to be an American family business. We need to attract others. We need to expose others to the benefits of serving their country.
Again, what we’re finding right now is 23 percent of Americans are qualified to serve in the military. So we have to do some work in our high schools and we have to do some work in preparing young men and women to come ‘cause I don’t think there’s any better way to serve and I think we need to have a call to service.
Inhofe: And I agree with that. And, Madam Secretary, I know my time is expiring, but the conflict in Ukraine has revealed serious munitions production challenges that we have at this time. And I know that there’s another member that’s going to ask you about that, but just as an overview, what should be done to fix what I consider to be the second most urgent problem we are dealing with right now?
Wormuth: Well, Senator, I think what we need to do is work closely with the defense industry to look at, you know, how we can help them address some of the supply chain challenges that they’re having, for example.
The money that Congress is providing through the supplemental will help us do that in terms of accelerating some of those production times. And the Army has actually invested considerably more in ammunition in its budget in the last couple of years, recognizing the criticality of the munitions issue.
Inhofe: Well, you’re going to have an opportunity to expand more on this urgent mission. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.