I appreciate it. Thank you. Good afternoon to all. Thanks very much. First, I'd like to thank General Lawrence and Admiral Daly for putting together and hosting this consortium of great minds. I'd also like to thank all the sponsors who are all here that makes this possible too. I'd like to thank Chaplain Chou for that prayer and Admiral Harris was telling me, you don't want to have a chaplain that does a better speech than you and after that prayer, I've got to tell you. I was really ready to just, okay, speech is over. We're all properly inspired to get after the mission and let's eat and be on our way and start defending the way. So chaplain, thanks very much for that terrific prayer.

The richest part of our conversation today will come in the questions and answer session, and I'm at your service on that but before we do so, I would like to prime the pump a little bit taking us from the strategic to the operational, and even to some extent to the tactical level. In order to cultivate the thoughts that are going to inform the questions, through which we'll be able bring the collected intellect of all the people that are here in this room today, so that we can attack the challenges that are facing the nation right now, and they are profound challenges at this time. As we discussed in the earlier panel this morning, hosted by Admiral Moran, we seek the United States of America and our treaty allies and our partners to uphold the international rules based order. And we do so not out of a morality, although a morality it certainly a part of it, we do so because it is in the direct and visceral interests in terms of the security and the well-being of our nation and the entire solidarity of nations, who also fully support the international rules based order.

The international rules based order, it sounds like a fancy phrase that describes something, and it describes some really simple concepts and the first is sovereignty. And sovereignty is the fact that the international community of nations, and most especially the United States of America believe that nations do not change their borders with the use of force, and yes.

This is the heart of the Taiwan policy, the one China policy in the strategic ambiguity that we talked to before, and Taiwan represents an inflection point. If the PRC unifies Taiwan by force to the mainland, this will set in motion a cascade of events across the entire Indo-Pacific that will directly affect the United States of America and our allies and partners. Under the weight of that economy and under the weight of that military pressure, Japan, South Korea, all of the vibrant economies of the Indo-Pacific comprising seven of the world's 10 largest militaries, comprising 60 percent of the world's economy. All of those nation's are left with a critical choice which is either to submit to the economic and political control that will undoubtedly follow, or to arm to the teeth and go nuclear and neither of those scenarios is a scenario that's going to support the security and the well-being of our nation.

Those -- that is the visceral choice that the nation has right now. Other elements of the international rules based order, freedom of navigation, the United Nations conventions on the law of the sea and the concepts of territorial waters, the concepts of exclusive economic zones. And you can see with excessive maritime claims, as discussed earlier today's panel in the maritime militia, in China coast guard and their effects, their 9-line, their excessive claims in violation of the United Nations convention and in violations of the findings of the criminal court, are all of a piece to deliver on a design. That would reform the international rules based order, and would directly threaten our security and the well-being across 330 American citizens. Those whom, all of us, everybody if you're in this room it's because you're committed to supporting the nation and I thank you for your service whether you're wearing a tie or a uniform or a business suit.

I salute your service, but this -- these terms are visceral and they directly impact the United States of America. I have the incredible honor to follow in the footsteps of giants. Some of whom that are here as the Commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, and as the U.S. Pacific Fleet and as Colby discussed earlier today, the theater is primarily maritime, the maritime domain in accordance with Joint Pub 3-32. The seas, the seas below it, the skies above, the estuaries and all those areas in the littorals that can effect events at sea is the priority domain where we must defend this international rules based order. I have the honor of serving as the Joint Force Maritime Component Commander for that and I have an operational design that is designed to fly wing and support the objectives of my commander of U.S. INDOPACOM, Admiral Chris ‘Lung’ Aquilino.

And I have the twin responsibility of making ready a force to support my other boss, the Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Mike Gilday and this operational design which I will discuss very briefly, is designed to meet the objectives of both commanders. And within this, I hope for you to visualize the operational environment so that we can work together to find solutions to deliver on that very urgent, very exigent goal of defending the nation and its well-being and those of our treaty allies and our allies and partners throughout the world. And it begins with, and you may have read this in Matt Pottinger's paper, it is open source, but the idea we talked about earlier -- Rep. Luria was talking about operations in time and space, and so broadly, the nation and the allies and partners must deny the objectives inside the first island chain.

Those objectives involve two things. The first is to cement by convention, by excluding others from sailing and flying in international waters and international airspace in violation of the United Nation's conventions, and then the second is to rehearse and intimidate for the forcible unification issue of Taiwan to the mainland. This is a part of a design that support the rejuvenation of China end quote, and that is the continued delivery of double-digit economic growth. That is the continued military modernization and finally the resolution of the Taiwan problem by force or not, by force, by intimidation, however you like. This deny those objectives is a critical element of the strategy. The second is to defend our partners and allies along the first island chain. Japan, the world's third largest economy, 125 million citizens and our history before, during and after the second World War is inextricably linked in a rock solid treaty alliance which we are obliged to fulfill.

The Philippines, again, our histories are inexplicably linked. A treaty obligation that we are obliged to defend. Thailand, a treaty ally, whom we are obliged to defend. Australia, a treaty ally, with whom we are obliged to defend, as well as all of the partners throughout the Pacific, and again, seven of the world's largest militaries, 50 percent of the world's population, 60 percent of the world's economy, enormously vital to the security and the well-being of the United States of America. And the third is when operating outside the first island chain, to dominate and that is to demonstrate overmatch at all times, at all times. Our competitors should look out and say, and I've heard Admiral Harris say this maybe 1,000 times. Today is not the day. Today is not the day to upend the international rules based order, to do this by force. The temptation is to quick execute an action and then to de-escalate before the force that would do some punishment mission can arrive and to de-escalate the situation politically.

But, we have to execute a strategy of deterrence by denial, to fill the battlespace and to demonstrate that to upend this order entails the potential of instant costs that exceed that which can be gained by the use of force. Our lines of effort, when we talk about lines of operation, those are operations in time and space. When we talk about lines of effort, this is categories of activity.

The first is to build and demonstrate dynamic, combat power. Be confident in who you are, because the United States and its allies and its partners has a profound and a disorienting capability to impose costs. To build that combat power, no deterrence is going to be effective without the prospect of actual combat power. At the heart of any deception, at the heart of any cognition on the part of an enemy, there must be the actual and authentic capability to deliver overwhelming, timely, accurate and lethal fires against a competitor in order to determine on that day.

Today's not the day, and if it is the day, it's the worse day of their lives, and building that combat power and demonstrating it are key to executing deterrence. Deterrence is an enemy's knowledge that you possess the capability and the will to impose those costs. Each is -- each as important and you must be there, to build it means from a Title 10 standpoint is that in the places where we train to the high-end, we've got to have the capability. And to demonstrate means, that there must be a contact layer that can impose early costs and can be an on-ramp for other forces that can bring, quickly, those overwhelming fires.

The second line of effort that we have is to strengthen alliances and partnerships. I sometimes see this expressed as strengthen allies and partners, which has a paternalistic view, a patronizing view and that's not the INDOPACOM strategy and that's certainly not the U.S. Pacific Fleet strategy.

Each is a sovereign nation; in fact, it’s that sovereignty that we believe is so essential to our alliances, that's so essential to the order itself. So respecting that we are a come as you are team of a solidarity of nations, it’s that ability to plug and play with our partners per each nation's sovereign wishes to knit together that combat capability that will provide that deterrent effect.

A third element of the -- of my lines of operations is to improve theater posture, what posture is, this is my own definition so this may not be in according to Hoyle but this is my definition.

It's forces. It's bases. It's places. It's access. It's operation, activities and investments across the theater.

The posture for a U.S. Pacific Fleet and for INDOPACOM along northeast Asia is about just right. But where we're underinvested is through the southwest Pacific and in southeast Asia, in an arc of expanded maneuver and effects and an arc of contested logistics to be able to come at a competitor from multiple angles, and in multiple domains across a wide ranging geography.

In some cases, we'll find partners quite willing for full access including the origination of strike operations from soil, and in some cases it will be a gradation. But to be able to gain that space, that expanded maneuver space throughout the Indo-Pacific region, including the Indian Ocean is a key element of the strategy. And the fourth element of this is be more effective in info operations, that means the alignment of our top level key messages, including how we listen to those messages. That is our effecting the cognition of our competitors. In order for an adversary to know that they're deterred, they must know that you've got the capability and the will to impose those costs. Our own control of what we know ourselves, in terms of securing our networks and our assured C2, and the full range of how we communicate and at least one-half of communications is listening. You know, in your lives you should strive to be, as we say in the radar biz, less than duty factor point five. You know, you'd be in a good -- good shape too. Like they say, God gave you one mouth and two ears. That's a good ratio to start with, work from there.

We had a discussion earlier this morning about what we need and a number of folks have criticized the Navy for saying, you're not telling us what we need and I'll lay it out plainly. It's not a change from my predecessor and my current boss. It's not a change from anything that I've seen, but the first, the commoditization and the proliferation of long-range strike weapons means, that we're no longer safe just based on geography. This is at the heart of distributed maritime operations, is that, its not like the old days like when if they were outside of 40 miles you were safe and we could out stick them. Everybody can out stick everybody else right now, so our first priority is the ability to counter an adversary's ability to see, understand, decide and act through every single domain, to able to dazzle, to be able to deceive, to be able to destroy those components that allow an adversary to exercise decision superiority. For ourselves, we must have an immediate, targetable picture of the space that we're operating in and that ability to -- to bring to bear lethal, accurate, long-range fires and effects against those elements that are going to enable us to meet our objectives.

As my boss Lung says, a point and click picture that allows me to click and shoot, and then our priority is, in fact, those long-range fires specifically maritime strike Tomahawk, hypersonics, conventional prompt strike.

The list is long and glamorous of the capabilities that our great nation has brought to bear. We need them. We need more of them, and we need them faster and that's what we need. And then finally, oh forgive me, and then finally is that ability to sustain those capabilities under pressure, that consistent ability to sustain when an adversary is contesting that across eight classes of supply in terms of our medical capability, across the broad range of sustainment which is more than just beans and bullets. But across eight classes of supply, medical support, religious support, personnel support, that ability to sustain in this arc of contested logistics is absolutely vital. And then before we open it up to questions I'm going to leave us with one last thing, is that knowing what we know we must be confident and have faith in our nation, in our allies and our partners.

We get into this temptation to say, whoa is me, and why bother? This psychology of quit, I don't subscribe to it. I see what Sailors, Marines, Coast Guard, civilians can do every single day, you know, as Father Chou said. That's the key advantage, he said please bless us to build equipment but most of all let's support the innovation that's in this room, the values that underpin it. And if you didn't see that in action when we were talking about the performers of the quarter, the performers of the year, we're in the wrong biz. Let's remember who we are. Let's be confident in our capability. In my own duty position, I see what our adversaries do and can do and I see what we do and we can do.

And although the curves can sometimes be disheartening, you never, ever bet against the United States of America because we have a vote in this. This is an urgent challenge. Our nation has faced urgent challenges in the past, and has always shown itself to be up to the challenge. In this room and across the country, we have -- we would prevail today and we have the requirement among us all to ensure that we prevail tomorrow, and with that I'll open the floor to any question on any topic that is germane to my position. Thank you.