UNITED STATES
PACIFIC COMMAND

I have long been a fan of the East West Center and your objectives. Of course, those of you who routinely participate in seminars such as these do much to effect our thinking and really bring fresh perspective to our collective effort every day in Pacific Command operations.

So it is a great pleasure to be here with so many who care so much for the security of this region.

Speaking of those operations, I thought this afternoon I could best contribute by discussing our effort to execute those policy points that Jim Kelly just discussed and that were recently articulated by Secretary Powell. Specifically, I’ll cover some of the priorities we have laid out at the Pacific Command to reinforce our policy in the region and some of the ongoing operations, efforts and observations from those endeavors.

Now I know you are all well aware of what we see as our critical concerns in the theater, so I won’t go into those in detail. But clearly, the things on my mind include the threat on the Korean peninsula, the potential for a regional instability caused by a failing nation or humanitarian crisis, a miscalculation between strategic rivals and I’m talking about China and Taiwan and India and Pakistan here, terrorism, and certainly, the need to keep U-S forces trained and ready, now and in the future. All of these concerns must shape my priorities at Pacific Command. So, I’ve set five for the near term:

• First, sustaining and supporting the Global War on Terrorism.
• Second, improving the readiness and joint warfighting capability of PACOM forces.
• Next, reinforcing what I call the "constants" in our region, like our important bilateral relationships and the forward presence of our combat forces. Also important is:
• Improving upon the quality of service for our servicemen and women. And while I won’t talk to this priority, I would mention that attention in this area has resulted in the highest retention since the advent of the all-volunteer military force – nearly 75 percent.
• And last, promoting the kind of change needed to improve our Pacific security posture for the future.

In the interest of time, let me talk about just three of these. First – supporting the war on terror. It’s no accident that I listed this first. A terrorist expert named Paul Wilkinson once said, "Fighting terrorism is like being a goalkeeper. You can make a hundred brilliant saves but the only shot that people remember is the one that gets past you." He said that in 1937, and to me, that sentiment defines the strategy we must employ today.

After all, there are essentially unlimited targets for international terrorists to attack. In fact, there are too many for any of us to simply reinforce and defend. So we are required to go after these terrorists – to take the "offensive."

And since these terrorists operate in the seams of international law, we are required to sift through a vast array of financial, intelligence, diplomatic and criminal information just to begin to piece together the "mosaic" that reveals terrorist planning and operations. And after that we must use the full depth and breadth of our government institutions – not just the military, but all of our ministries, agencies and departments - to stop them.

This is a fairly tall order. The recent arrests of the "17 November" group in Greece, for example, revealed a terrorist relationship based on family. It was small and intimate and bred the kind of loyalty that made it hard to penetrate and destroy.

So at Pacific Command, we are working on every one of the levels I just mentioned. First, we have formed a Joint Interagency Coordination Group for Counter Terrorism to close the seams where terrorists hide, plan and conduct their attacks.

This coordination group works in my headquarters and serves as the hub where our intelligence and law enforcement agencies, federal officials and military can bring together all the bits of intelligence and develop what we call "actionable intelligence." They are then able to work with the appropriate agency – the FBI or maybe Treasury, for example, or our country team – to disrupt the operation or target the terrorists, work with the foreign nation empowered to take action, or in some cases, take military action directly.

The JIACG/CT, as we call it, works closely with the governments of our friends and allies in the global war on terror as well. Pacific Command has counter-terrorist liaison teams with our embassies in the Philippines and Indonesia for starters, and we are coordinating liaison requirements with Malaysia, Bangladesh, Singapore, Thailand and India. We have ongoing intelligence relationships with most of the major governments.

Clearly, there are other regional relationships and agreements, like the counter-terror agreement signed this week amongst ASEAN nations that have the potential to make a significant contribution, as does the possible counterterrorism training center in Malaysia, mentioned by Jim Kelly.

We’ve already seen some dramatic arrests, enhanced border controls, and cooperative financial action, and I think we are beginning to make some of the "saves" the goalkeeper is seldom remembered for – disrupting terrorist operations, drying up the money terrorists need to operationalize their activities, and so forth.

In Afghanistan we have used direct military action against the regime that harbored the worst of our terrorist enemies, and the critical support of allies have helped disintegrate Al Qaeda and the Taliban, so far prevent them from executing their follow on plans.

In the Philippines, we have responded to the request of this treaty ally to advise and assist them in developing an effective counter-terrorist capability. We have helped create an intelligence architecture, and we are training the Armed Forces of the Philippines in the joint operations and tactics they need to eliminate the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG).

Their effort has been rewarded. The AFP has greatly diminished the number of Abu Sayyaf under arms due to combat action and surrenders. They are learning that to be successful, security must be complemented by civic action—an essential element in this process. The ASG’s senior leadership is being eliminated and we are seeing a return to stability on Basilan Island.

At the same time, the Armed Forces of the Philippines have dramatically reduced their own casualties and greatly improved their tactics. The ASG is both in disarray and on the run, unable to find the money or the time to eat, rest and re-supply, let alone operationalize their planning and activities.

And although Balikatan 02-1 ended this past week, we will stay -- albeit in somewhat smaller numbers -- and help the Armed Forces of the Philippines develop an enduring and self-sustaining counter-terrorist and counter-insurgency capability through our normal bi-lateral relationship. That is the fundamental mission. Make no mistake—this is their fight—U.S. forces are not in combat and in fact are precluded from doing so by the Terms Of Reference. But we are committed to helping them for the long haul.

I’m asked frequently when the Global War on Terror will end. As Secretary Rumsfeld has made abundantly clear, we still have a long way to go. After all, there are still key terrorist players associated with Al Qaeda and their surrogates, like Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) at large -- By the way, the JI is an organization we are focused on intently -- And I do think we’ve made significant progress in our efforts within the region specifically and in the larger Global War on Terror.

Let me move on to my third priority, what I call reinforcing the "constants" in the region, like our important bilateral relationships and the effectiveness of our forward-deployed combat forces.

In our view, the foundation of the U.S. security equation in Asia and the Pacific has been – and will continue to be – our long-standing bilateral alliances.

Australia remains our special partner in the Pacific. We have worked hard to eliminate the potential technology barriers between our forces. They have taken a lead role in East Timor’s security, as a rock solid partner in the Global War on Terror – and for that matter, every other significant military effort in my memory.

I was in Australia just last week and met with a number of government officials and old friends from several different organizations. They are our best resource on the issues surrounding the security and democratic development of nations in the South Pacific.

Jim Kelly talked about Indonesia and recent policy developments. We are working today to identify and match the right TNI officers to the proper courses of instruction for the TNI while encouraging both accountability and reform.

Our alliance with Japan is our most important relationship. This relationship has been fundamental to regional stability and security for almost 60 years. The Japanese clearly understand the strategic value of our presence there and its contribution to regional stability, and our relationship is really very strong. In my personal view, I think the military leadership under Minister Nakatani and General Takegouchi is both modern and forward thinking.

We have long asked them to participate to a greater extent militarily with respect to international security and they have made remarkable advances. They passed anti-terror legislation quickly and have made a significant contribution to the Global War on Terror. The JSDF has deployed both combat and service support ships to the North Arabian Sea and flown humanitarian relief missions over Afghanistan. Pretty remarkable.

It is tough for me to add a lot to the Korean discussion over what Ambassadors Hubbard and Bosworth will tell you. But from a strictly military perspective, we have not seen any evidence of the sort of confidence building measures that we would hope would lower the tensions along the DMZ. We are working through the salvage of the ROK patrol craft lost in the most recent naval clash along the Northern Limit Line.

General Leon Laporte, our Commander in Korea and I watch all this very closely. In fact, I have to say that Korea is still the place where the stakes are highest from a military standpoint – although the risk of confrontation may be lower, the loss of life on both sides would be significant. I do think our combat capability in South Korea transcends any sort of reconciliation on the peninsula, though probably in a modified form.

The Philippines and Thailand remain important allies and contribute to stability in Southeast Asia. I mentioned the Philippines in depth already; we’ll watch our counter-terror training effort closely and review the potential for continued training in a year.

Thailand has told us repeatedly that the effects of illegal activity in methamphetamine production in the region are among their top security issues. We continue to maintain an appropriate interagency and joint military liaison effort there to assist them in their counterdrug efforts.

Finally, I must add that we have important friendships with Malaysia and Singapore, and a new relationship with India that should also contribute greatly to the security of the region. In fact, the Indians are presently providing a combatant in the Strait of Malacca to escort and protect U-S military shipping and this cooperation is developing in positive directions at an appropriate pace.

As I said, there are missions where a multinational approach in the region makes great sense – particularly when our interests converge on a particular issue or effort. East Timor is a good example.

I mentioned the potential for regional instability caused by a failing nation or crisis. I think we agree missions like humanitarian assistance and peacekeeping serve to limit the potential for these instabilities and can be effectively conducted by coalition or combined forces.

I was very impressed with exercise COBRA GOLD this year, a combined Thailand – U.S. – Singapore exercise just completed in May. It included training in peace operations, counter-terrorist techniques, non-combatant evacuation operations and both humanitarian assistance and disaster relief. The Command Post Exercise was both sophisticated and relevant. Eighteen observer nations, including China, were able to see the civil affairs planning done by both the military and non-governmental organizations as part of the command post exercise.

At Pacific Command, we will continue to develop the kind of tools we need – like the Asia Pacific Area Network (or APAN) for web-based multinational military collaboration. And use our Multinational Planning Augmentation Team (or MPAT) workshops to train and educate foreign military officers in these kinds of multinational efforts and enhance our collaboration and interoperability for coalition operations.

The presence of U-S forces is the other "constant" in the region I mentioned. The most important element of this forward-deployed force is undoubtedly our combat capability. And while it will likely continue to evolve in shape and operating concepts as the threat and our technology allows, our forward capability brings great flexibility in our response to crisis and does much to deter and dissuade military competition in East Asia.

We are here to stay, and we are examining a myriad of operating constructs to help us leverage the amount of time we can keep our forces operating forward.

Finally, promoting change and improving our Asia-Pacific defense posture for the future is our final priority.

Some of this means adapting new capabilities that can speed the accuracy and precision of our power projection forces and enhance our deterrence.

I think we need land, sea and airborne theater missile and short-range ballistic missile defenses to accomplish that particular job. Newer, more modern submarines in the region also make undersea warfare advances essential to our ability to assist our friends and allies during times of crisis. We will work to ensure these capabilities keep both our forward deployed and U-S based forces, and our friends, prepared for every eventuality in every environment.

In the very near term, we will also develop new operating patterns, to include a more appropriate balance of time operating in the Western Pacific littoral – Northeast and Southeast Asia. I said at the outset that part of my job was to deter and dissuade military competition in East Asia, so quite frankly by "balance," I mean I’m looking for more time.

We will also mature our Joint Task Force operations – both U-S and multinational force – to ensure we can conduct the kind of operational missions we may be called upon to do.

Lastly, we will continue to foster a climate of experimentation and create a culture of innovation, with our allies, to take advantage of the capabilities that technology brings us; like a common operating picture, enhanced intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance networks, and advanced concept technology demonstrations that allow all of us to improve together.

Well I’ve shared with you the details of three of my "top five." Clearly, we could talk in more depth about any one of these issues and priorities.

I hope I’ve left you with the sense that, the battle against international terrorism - the presence of U.S. forces in the region - our important bilateral alliances and friendships - our ability to deal with regional threats both now and in the future - are critically important to our ongoing dialogue, the sharing of ideas about regional stability, and ultimately – that peaceful development, security and prosperity we are all interested in here in Asia and the Pacific.

I look forward to hearing your perspectives, and I’m happy to take any questions.

Thank you.