Page 16 - Williams Foundaiton Air-Land Integration April 15

New Approaches to Air-Land Integration

Question: The deployment of your air task force the Middle East was the first time that you deployed a
completely integrated Air Force package such a long distance to engage in coalition operations.

How significant has this been in shaping your thinking moving forward?

Answer: Very significant.

It has been a long period of growth where we have added the capabilities to be able to deploy our own
forces to an area of interest for the Australian state. Prior to this, we could take key elements of an integrated
force package but needed to rely on others, most often on the USAF, to deploy to an area of interest.

It wasn’t good enough that as a sovereign nation in our region, we were reliant on somebody else to actually
get off our shores.

But adding our own strategic lift and tanking has created a new situation for us. The deployment to the
Middle East has been proof of concept for us with regard to our ability to project power and to provide for
our combat support.

The speed with which we deployed and the nature of the capabilities we deployed are a testament to the
work we’ve done to learn our lessons from the past two decades into our current environment.

And now we can build upon this deployment which deployed as individual components into a task group to
move forward and to learn how to integrate our force package into a true fused capability.

The focus going forward is that each of those platforms are contributing to the greater whole, particularly
with regard to the central focus on how to prevail as a connected force.

FIGURE 6 AIR COMMANDER AUSTRALIA, AIR VICE MARSHAL GAVIN TURNBULL (CENTRE), AM, CHATS WITH OTHER EXERCISE PARTICIPANTS
INCLUDING LIEUTENANT GENERAL JON DAVIS (RIGHT), DEPUTY COMMANDANT FOR AVIATION, UNITED STATES MARINE CORPS, AT EXERCISE
JERICHO DAWN 2016 FIREPOWER DEMONSTRATION AT PUCKAPUNYAL TRAINING AREA, VICTORIA, ON 18 MARCH 2016.

Question: The deployment of an integrated task force to the Middle East with lift and tanking built in has
clearly been a benchmark for you moving forward, but it is also about changing the culture and mindset
and innovating towards the kind of joint force which is the core work in progress for 21stcentury force
structure.

What is your sense of the culture change challenge?

Answer: It is central.

Second Line of Defense

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