Moseley discusses past, plans for future

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman J.G. Buzanowski
  • Air Force Print News
BALTIMORE (AFPN) --  Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. T. Michael Moseley brought up several points of Air Force history at a three-day Air National Guard senior leader conference here.

He addressed generals, command chief master sergeants and adjutants general during the opening day of the conference as they prepared to discuss the future of the Guard.

The conference would give them all a “much clearer view of what the future looks like,” General Moseley said.

Air dominance is not a given, and the Air Force needs to prepare now for its fight in the future, he said.

“The last person killed from an enemy aircraft was in April 1953,” General Moseley said. “We have to be able to control air space.”

That control will come from several sources, such as unmanned aerial vehicles, pilots flying patrol sorties and satellites, General Moseley said.

“We’ve been at war for the last 15 years beginning when we deployed for (Operation) Desert Shield in 1990,” the general said. “We need to think about what we’ve learned. We need to ask, ‘What does the total force looks like in 10 years, in 15 years?’ If we don’t think about what the fight looks like 20 years from now, how do we prepare for it?”

He also discussed modernizing the Air Force, citing the 30-year-old airplanes the service uses on the front lines in Iraq.

“We need to look at what we need for the future,” General Moseley said. “We don’t need to explore redundant systems, but look at the tools that will help us accomplish our mission.”