Education and the innovative airman.

Secretary of the Air Force Michael W. Wynne

Remarks to students and faculty, Air University, Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala., April 3, 2006

It is an honor to be here today in the cradle of Air Force education to address you; our next generation of military leaders. Getting back into the instructor mode means 50-minute classes, test to follow--and all that with no eraser to throw at people checking their eyelids for leaks. Well, we'll keep it less than that.

Maxwell has been producing top leaders since the Wright Brothers opened the first flying school here in 1910. Inspired by the ideas and vision of Billy Mitchell, giants such as Arnold, Chennault, Kenney, and LeMay developed innovative uses of airpower here at the Air Corps Tactical School.

It is interesting to note that the Army started the school to train Airmen to support ground troops which remains a major part of our role today. The leaders of the era had a radical vision of strategic bombing and altered warfare and the way airpower could be employed and produced our earliest doctrine. This 'prepping' of the battlefield, whether strategic or tactical remains on top of our doctrine today. So where are we going from here--this is your charge--and your adventure.

It is only fitting that you are here, at Maxwell Air Force Base, an institution steeped in a rich history of creative minds, to continue your education.

Today I'd like to talk a little bit about where our Air Force is going, and why it is critical you pursue advanced education throughout your career so you can continue this proud heritage of innovation.

But before I begin, let me step back for a moment and give you the framework as I see it for the entire education discussion. You must recognize that you are all here at Air University for one reason--to stretch your minds and thus become better equipped to lead our warfighters and win our nation's wars. This is the essence of knowledge enablement.

Right now, along with our Coalition partners, we are engaged in a bloody fight with a deadly enemy. It is going to take more than brute force to defeat him. The critical thinking that you develop here in the classroom will pay greater dividends in the long war than any other weapon we develop.

Those of you who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan know this. Let me take this opportunity to thank you and tell you how proud I am of what you've accomplished. More than 50 million people today are living in freedom due to your efforts.

I am pleased that you have one Afghan and one Iraqi student here at the Air Command and Staff College. We welcome you and are proud to stand with you in the cause for freedom.

The sacrifices of everyone here are leading to a better world. Your country thanks you for it, and I'd like to personally thank you as well.

As the most technologically advanced military in the world, America must continue its investment in education if we are to maintain our superiority. We need all Airmen to share a common understanding of history, doctrine, and air and space power.

The heroes of the past had a great appreciation for the history of warfare and understood the doctrine of their day. It was only with this foundation were they able to be creative with the new technologies of their time and leverage them into an entirely new way of fighting.

In fact, our shared heritage has always been about innovation. Our Air Force continually pushed the boundaries of technology into an unknown future.

When Curt LeMay took the doctrine of high altitude precision daylight bombing--developed here at the Air Corps Tactical School, and adapted it to low altitude night incendiary bombing in Japan--he was displaying the type of doctrinal flexibility that is an absolute must for all leaders.

If you look at our dominance in space today, you'll find it is due to another innovator, Bennie Schriever. Today's navigational, weather, intelligence and communication satellites, along with intercontinental ballistic missiles, owe their existence to Schriever and his tireless advocacy for space power--remember this was during a time when the bomber reigned supreme in the Air Force.

Today's Air Force mission shares common bonds with our heritage--the constants of continual change and adaptation. Our mission is dramatically changing. Unmanned air vehicles, cyberspace, and the growth of our missions across the spectrum of operations from humanitarian relief to base defense shows that our need for knowledge-enabled Airmen has never been greater.

Where are our Lemays and Schrievers of today? Who among you in the audience today will be our innovative leaders of tomorrow?

I rewrote our mission statement to better reflect the current array of capabilities our Air Force brings to the interdependent joint fight.

Providing sovereign options means our Air Force knows no boundaries in providing the nation with options ranging from diplomatic leverage to non-kinetic to kinetic. I ask you what other country can simultaneously fight two engagements in Afghanistan and Iraq, and then fly around the world to provide humanitarian relief to victims of the Southeast Asia tsunami, earthquake in Pakistan, and winter in Northern Afghanistan.

As an expeditionary force, we find ourselves deployed to foreign countries with increased responsibilities in these new mission areas. We need the ethic of accountability to ensure success.

Another shift that knowledge enablement has provided for the Joint Force is the ability to contribute to the domain of cyberspace.

From the Combined Air Operations Center in (Southwest Asia), the Air Force controls all aspects of air operations for both Afghanistan and Iraq. It is the epicenter of our technological advances and a showcase of the "seismic shift" called for in this QDR.

We have evolved from scheduled air offensives to on-call air operations that exploit the speed of communications in this information age. Instead of being forward deployed, our Airmen leverage reach-back technology to fly Predators from a world away at Nellis (AFB, Nev.). Our Air Force could not do these things unless we had Airmen who have become well versed in cutting edge technology.

Both of these capabilities are made possible due to cyberspace. I found out we have close to 7,000 Airmen working in cyberspace throughout the Air Force. They come from all different specialties in the Air Force--from intel to comm to security forces.

We now need to codify their efforts in our training, and education so that it will eventually find its way into doctrine. Establishing it as a mission was the first step in doing that.

Just like in the days of Arnold, LeMay and Schriever, the Air Force figures out how to use a new technology for mission accomplishment, and then goes back to formalize it as part of our way of doing business

We need innovative leaders who treat doctrine as stepping off places in this ever-evolving era of asymmetric warfare. We need leaders who remove barriers to mission accomplishment and encourage education, exploration, and innovation for their people. This is the essence of Air Force Smart Operations.

Our Airmen are increasingly engaged in non-traditional missions, working "outside the wire," and as result find themselves increasingly interacting with our coalition partners and people from different cultures

To ensure our continued success, we are changing developmental education to include language and culture studies. While this will not provide you a template on how to handle all situations, it will broaden your knowledge base and provide you with better situational awareness for the countries you deploy to.

In the final analysis, education gives a springboard for innovative ideas. You are all leaders--one day you will be called upon to make a tough decision, and you'll be armed only with your education, backed by your experience, and your Integrity.

Make education a priority throughout your career, and doors will continue to open.