Secretary Mattis's Philosophy and Guidance

Secretary Mattis’ Leadership
Philosophy and Guidance H 2018

Secretary Mattis’
Leadership Philosophy and Guidance
Table of Contents
I. Select Overarching Documents

Secretary Mattis’ Leadership Principles................................................................................................... 1
Blueprint for America (Chapter 10: Restoring our National Security)..................................................... 10
2018 National Defense Strategy (Unclassified)....................................................................................... 24
II. Select Memorandums to the Department

“Day One” Message to the Force.............................................................................................................. 37
Recognition of Acts of Valor.................................................................................................................... 38
Congressional Testimony and Clearance Requirements............................................................................ 39
Preserving the Force.............................................................................................................................. 41
Dialogue with Industry......................................................................................................................... 42
Our Mission and Stewardship Responsibilities....................................................................................... 43
Ethical Standards for All Hands............................................................................................................ 45
Our Responsibility to Safeguard our Nation........................................................................................... 46
Guidance from Secretary Mattis............................................................................................................. 47
Guidance on the Government Shutdown................................................................................................ 49
III. Select Remarks

West Point Commencement, U.S. Military Academy, 27 May 2017......................................................... 51
Shangri-La Dialogue, Singapore, 3 June 2017....................................................................................... 55
National Defense Strategy, School of Advanced International Studies,
Johns Hopkins University, 19 January 2018........................................................................................... 63
Select Overarching
Documents
Secretary Mattis’ Leadership Principles
On Leadership
Leadership = Competence + Authentic Character

Attitudes are caught, not taught.
Organizations and institutions get the behavior they reward.
If you mix good people with bad processes, the processes will win nine times out of ten.
Command and feedback beats command and control.
Know what you stand for and what you will not tolerate.
Protect your mavericks.
Reconcile natural polarities.
Don’t resent the problems that come to you. Each one is a normal part of your job.
Decentralize decision-making to the lowest capable level.
Define the problem.
Reward initiative and aggressiveness.
Know when to apply non-quantitative analysis. Too early, you’re lazy. Too late, you’re mechanistic.
Do not permit your passion for excellence to destroy your compassion for subordinates.
As a second lieutenant, I realized my guys weren’t lying awake at night wondering, ‘How can I screw up
Lieutenant Mattis’ day?’
We are masters of our character. We choose what we will stand for in this life.
On Communication
Clearly convey your intent to unleash subordinates’ initiative and aggressiveness.

Data not displayed is data not acted on.
If you do not promote your values, someone else will promote theirs’.
When leading large organizations, use touchstones. Put a human face on the mission, convey your intent,
and reach your subordinates’ hearts and minds.
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Share your courage.
There are three types of information: housekeeping, decision-making, alarms. Of each, ask: what do I know?
Who needs to know? Have I told them?
On Fighting
Be ethically ferocious.
Be eager to close with and fight the enemy.
We have no God-given right to victory on the battlefield.
Combat can lead to post-traumatic growth.
Learn to fight without a C2 system.
Fight in accord with our values and you will win trust. Every child in every village you enter should be
able to look at you like a parent.
Every battlefield is also a humanitarian field.
In the U.S. military, we look forward to closing with the enemy.
Combat rubs off the thin veneer of civilization. Do not fall into the temptation to only work with those
who think, speak, and look like you.
When we commit our forces to action, it will be the enemy’s longest and worst day.
In my own command group, 17 of my 29 Sailors and Marines were killed or wounded in five months,
yet they never hesitated to move against the enemy.
On Ethics
Run the ethical midfield.

Know the difference between a mistake and a lack of discipline.
Keep a firing squad.
The unit with poor firing discipline in the field is the same with high rates of DUI’s and sexual assault in
the barracks.
The ultimate test of conscience is willingness to sacrifice for future generations whose thanks you will
never hear.
As long as we recruit from an America that objectifies women, this will also occur in the military. Work
hard to weed these people out. Recognize you cannot do this fast enough.
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On Teamwork
Our competitive advantage is our jointness – our ability to integrate across the services and coalitions.
Forge vicious harmony across your team.
If you cannot build trust, your leadership is obsolete, and you need to have the courage to go home.
The services should be integrated, not identical.
What counts most in war is what’s difficult to count.
I had the privilege to fight many times for America. I never fought in a solely American formation.
Even Jesus of Nazareth had one out of twelve go to crap on him.
Ride for the brand.
Loyalty only counts when there are a hundred reasons not to be.
On Military Service
The members of our military look past today’s hot political rhetoric and write a blank check to the American
people, payable with their lives.
Be sentinels for this nation.
We’re the good guys. We’re not the perfect guys, but we are the good guys.
We represent America’s awesome determination to protect herself.
Steady as she goes.
We represent the fundamental unity of our people.
I wasn’t in the Marine Corps for 40 years, I was in the U.S. Marine Corps.
We ensure the President and our diplomats always negotiate from positions of strength.
Our military is a national treasure built on the blood, sweat, and tears of patriots.
Tell our adversaries: better talk to the Department of State. You don’t want to fight the Department of Defense.
Our job is to keep the peace – one more year, one more month, one more day, one more hour.
Our military is unapologetic and apolitical.
Military service is a touchstone for American patriots of all races, genders, and creeds. It is not a life
insurance policy.
America is like a bank: if you want to take something out, then you must put something in. The
members of our military have, without doubt, put something into the nation’s moral bank.
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We will face nothing worse than Valley Forge, Shiloh, Belleau Wood, Ploesti, Midway, the Bulge, Iwo
Jima, Pork Chop Hill, Khe Sanh, or Falluja.
Hold the line.
On Strategy
Problem statement: how do we maintain a safe and effective nuclear deterrent, while at the same time
fielding a decisive conventional force and maintain irregular warfare as a core capability?
The paradox of war is the enemy will always move against perceived weakness.
There is nothing new under the sun.
We must not be dominant and at the same time irrelevant.
War is an open system. There is no ‘x + y = z.’
The surest way to prevent war is to be prepared to win it.
Define the problem to a Jesuit’s level of satisfaction.
Look to the future, knowing you won’t get it 100 percent right, but you must not get it 100 percent wrong.
Doctrine is the last refuge of the unimaginative.
An undefeated army can lose a war.
Culture trumps doctrine and tactics.
Operations occur at the speed of trust. HANDCON trumps OPCON.
Surprise will be your constant companion.
Never tell the enemy what we will not do.
We may want a war to be over. We may even declare it over. But the enemy gets a vote.
Be brilliant in the basics. Because from the Bataan Peninsula to Kasserine Pass to Task Force Smith, we
know too well the cost of not being ready.
On Alliances and Partnerships
History is clear: nations with strong allies thrive; those without wither.
Fight by, with, and through our allies and partners.
Be willing not just to listen, but to be persuaded.
Not all good ideas come from the country with the most aircraft carriers.
I never operated in an all-American formation.
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Accept caveats. Do not impose them. We sometimes expect perfection from other countries that we
don’t expect of our own.
Friends need tending, and we need friends.
On Humility
You can’t drink your own whiskey.

When I became a Marine, my aims were modest. I thought ‘Maybe I’ll make captain.’ It freed me up to
not worry about my next command and focus instead on doing the best job I could in the one I had.
Modesty: believe so completely in subordinates they have no choice but to believe in themselves; act
from integrity and authenticity, let your very goodness put ambition out of context. Be brave, honest,
humble – be a homerun of a human being.
On Affordability
Gain full value from every taxpayer dollar spent on defense. Earn the trust of Congress and the
American people.
From Others
If left unsung, the noblest deeds will die.
– Pindar
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a
building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders,
cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty
meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
– Robert A. Heinlein
We must uphold principles that have benefitted all of us, like respect for the rule of law, individual rights,
and freedom of navigation and overflight, including open shipping lanes. These principles create stability and
build trust, security, and prosperity among like-minded nations.
– President Trump
(delivered 11/10/17 in speech to
Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Danang)
If you have 60 minutes to save the world, spend fifty-five minutes defining
the problem and five minutes determining the solution.
– Albert Einstein
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You may fly over a nation forever, you may bomb it, atomize it, pulverize it and wipe it clean of life. But if you
desire to defend it, if you desire to protect it, if you desire to keep it for civilization, you must do this on the
ground the way the Roman legions did: by putting your young men in the mud.
– T.R. Fehrenbach
There is a unique dignity to those who serve in our Armed Forces.
– Senator John McCain
To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace.
General George Washington
In CENTCOM we don’t blindly follow service doctrine.
– General John Abizaid
Only thing tougher than fighting with allies is fighting without them.
– Winston Churchill
America is great because America is good. And if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be
great.
– Alexis de Tocqueville
The incommunicable experience of war.
– Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
Those who serve have hearts touched with fire. Having known great things… [they are] content with silence.
As life is action and passion, it is required of a man that he should share the passion and action of his time, at
peril of being judged not to have lived.
Combat is a test of character; it makes bad men worse and good men better.
– General Joshua Chamberlain
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Need officers with a keen sensitivity to human nature.
– General Creighton Abrams
We cannot adopt a singular, preclusive approach to war, because the enemy will generally gravitate to our
perceived weakness.
– Colin Gray
A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives.
– Jackie Robinson’s Epitaph
I believe in the human race. I believe in the warm heart. I believe in man’s integrity. I believe in the goodness
of a free society, and I believe that the society can remain good only as long as we are willing to fight for it.
– Jackie Robinson
Sometimes a man of war is the best ambassador.
– Oliver Cromwell
The better angels of our nature.
– Abraham Lincoln
Service meant that when your country called, you answered the call. It would never have occurred to anyone
to question it. If the president said he needed you, that was enough.
– Chuck Hagel
In leading soldiers you will have riotous excursions with privileged glimpses into the human Heart.
– F. Scott Fitzgerald
They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old / Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn / At
the going down of the sun and in the morning / We will remember them
– Laurence Binyon
It is not the places that grace men, but men the places.
– Plutarch
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Sleep soldiers, still in honored rest / Your truth and valor wearing
/ The bravest are the tenderest; / The loving are the daring
– Bayard Taylor, The Song of the Camp, 1856
Faced with two problems: first, how to reduce regional chaos; second, how to create a coherent world order
based on agreed-upon principles that are necessary for the operation of the entire system.
– Henry Kissinger
You, when you’re on the road, must have a code that you can live by… All on a road, all need a code.
– Crosby, Stills, and Nash
In great deeds, something abides.
– Colonel Joshua Chamberlain (Little Round Top, Battle of Gettysburg)
We Americans have many grave problems to solve… many evils to fight… and many deeds to do if – as we
hope and believe – we have the wisdom… the strength… the courage… and the virtue to do them. But we
must face facts as they are. Our nation is that one among all nations of the earth which holds in its hands the
fate of coming years.
– Teddy Roosevelt
What enables the wise sovereign and the good general to strike and conquer is foreknowledge.
– Sun Tzu
Ideals have the power to inspire… Discouraged people are in sore need of the inspiration of great principles.
– George Marshall
Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to
die. He must seek his life in a spirit of furious indifference to it; he must desire life like water, and yet drink
death like wine.
– G.K. Chesterton
That we totally defeated our enemies and then brought them back to the community of nations. I would like
to think that only America would have done this.
– Harry Truman (on the part of his presidency that made him proudest)
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If you can’t ride two horses at once, get out of the circus.
– Tony Blair
You should be satisfied with the way you have conducted yourself, with no remorse for the past, confident
regarding the present and full of hope for the future. When you retire to bed you should sleep
the sleep of the brave.
– Alexander Dumas
As in war you have been good soldiers, so in peace you will make good citizens.
– General William Sherman (1865)
There was no one better to have beside you when the chips were down than a U.S. Marine.
– Ernest Hemingway
Dear Lord/ Lest I continue/ My complacent way/ Help me to remember/ Somewhere out there/ A man died
for me today./ As long as there must be war/ I then must/ Ask and answer/ Am I worth dying for?
– Prayer that Eleanor Roosevelt carried in her wallet
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Summary of the
2 0 1 8
National Defense Strategy
of
The United States of America
Sharpening the American Military’s Competitive Edge
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NATIONAL DEFENSE STRATEGY
INTRODUCTION
The Department of Defense’s enduring mission is to provide combat-credible military forces needed
to deter war and protect the security of our nation. Should deterrence fail, the Joint Force is prepared
to win. Reinforcing America’s traditional tools of diplomacy, the Department provides military
options to ensure the President and our diplomats negotiate from a position of strength.
Today, we are emerging from a period of strategic atrophy, aware that our competitive military
advantage has been eroding. We are facing increased global disorder, characterized by decline in the
long-standing rules-based international order—creating a security environment more complex and
volatile than any we have experienced in recent memory. Inter-state strategic competition, not
terrorism, is now the primary concern in U.S. national security.
China is a strategic competitor using predatory economics to intimidate its neighbors while militarizing
features in the South China Sea. Russia has violated the borders of nearby nations and pursues veto
power over the economic, diplomatic, and security decisions of its neighbors. As well, North Korea’s
outlaw actions and reckless rhetoric continue despite United Nation’s censure and sanctions. Iran
continues to sow violence and remains the most significant challenge to Middle East stability. Despite
the defeat of ISIS’s physical caliphate, threats to stability remain as terrorist groups with long reach
continue to murder the innocent and threaten peace more broadly.
This increasingly complex security environment is defined by rapid technological change, challenges
from adversaries in every operating domain, and the impact on current readiness from the longest
continuous stretch of armed conflict in our Nation’s history. In this environment, there can be no
complacency—we must make difficult choices and prioritize what is most important to field a lethal,
resilient, and rapidly adapting Joint Force. America’s military has no preordained right to victory on
the battlefield.
This unclassified synopsis of the classified 2018 National Defense Strategy articulates our strategy to
compete, deter, and win in this environment. The reemergence of long-term strategic competition,
rapid dispersion of technologies, and new concepts of warfare and competition that span the entire
spectrum of conflict require a Joint Force structured to match this reality.
A more lethal, resilient, and rapidly innovating Joint Force, combined with a robust constellation of
allies and partners, will sustain American influence and ensure favorable balances of power that
safeguard the free and open international order. Collectively, our force posture, alliance and
partnership architecture, and Department modernization will provide the capabilities and agility
required to prevail in conflict and preserve peace through strength.
The costs of not implementing this strategy are clear. Failure to meet our defense objectives will result
in decreasing U.S. global influence, eroding cohesion among allies and partners, and reduced access
to markets that will contribute to a decline in our prosperity and standard of living. Without sustained
and predictable investment to restore readiness and modernize our military to make it fit for our time,
we will rapidly lose our military advantage, resulting in a Joint Force that has legacy systems irrelevant
to the defense of our people.
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STRATEGIC ENVIRONMENT
The National Defense Strategy acknowledges an increasingly complex global security environment,
characterized by overt challenges to the free and open international order and the re-emergence of
long-term, strategic competition between nations. These changes require a clear-eyed appraisal of the
threats we face, acknowledgement of the changing character of warfare, and a transformation of how
the Department conducts business.
The central challenge to U.S. prosperity and security is the reemergence of long-term, strategic competition by
what the National Security Strategy classifies as revisionist powers. It is increasingly clear that China
and Russia want to shape a world consistent with their authoritarian model—gaining veto authority
over other nations’ economic, diplomatic, and security decisions.
China is leveraging military modernization, influence operations, and predatory economics to coerce
neighboring countries to reorder the Indo-Pacific region to their advantage. As China continues its
economic and military ascendance, asserting power through an all-of-nation long-term strategy, it will
continue to pursue a military modernization program that seeks Indo-Pacific regional hegemony in
the near-term and displacement of the United States to achieve global preeminence in the future. The
most far-reaching objective of this defense strategy is to set the military relationship between our two
countries on a path of transparency and non-aggression.
Concurrently, Russia seeks veto authority over nations on its periphery in terms of their governmental,
economic, and diplomatic decisions, to shatter the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and change
European and Middle East security and economic structures to its favor. The use of emerging
technologies to discredit and subvert democratic processes in Georgia, Crimea, and eastern Ukraine
is concern enough, but when coupled with its expanding and modernizing nuclear arsenal the
challenge is clear.
Another change to the strategic environment is a resilient, but weakening, post-WWII international order. In
the decades after fascism’s defeat in World War II, the United States and its allies and partners
constructed a free and open international order to better safeguard their liberty and people from
aggression and coercion. Although this system has evolved since the end of the Cold War, our network
of alliances and partnerships remain the backbone of global security. China and Russia are now
undermining the international order from within the system by exploiting its benefits while
simultaneously undercutting its principles and “rules of the road.”
Rogue regimes such as North Korea and Iran are destabilizing regions through their pursuit of nuclear
weapons or sponsorship of terrorism. North Korea seeks to guarantee regime survival and increased
leverage by seeking a mixture of nuclear, biological, chemical, conventional, and unconventional
weapons and a growing ballistic missile capability to gain coercive influence over South Korea, Japan,
and the United States. In the Middle East, Iran is competing with its neighbors, asserting an arc of
influence and instability while vying for regional hegemony, using state-sponsored terrorist activities,
a growing network of proxies, and its missile program to achieve its objectives.
Both revisionist powers and rogue regimes are competing across all dimensions of power. They have
increased efforts short of armed conflict by expanding coercion to new fronts, violating principles of
sovereignty, exploiting ambiguity, and deliberately blurring the lines between civil and military goals.
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Challenges to the U.S. military advantage represent another shift in the global security environment. For
decades the United States has enjoyed uncontested or dominant superiority in every operating domain.
We could generally deploy our forces when we wanted, assemble them where we wanted, and operate
how we wanted. Today, every domain is contested—air, land, sea, space, and cyberspace.
We face an ever more lethal and disruptive battlefield, combined across domains, and conducted at
increasing speed and reach—from close combat, throughout overseas theaters, and reaching to our
homeland. Some competitors and adversaries seek to optimize their targeting of our battle networks
and operational concepts, while also using other areas of competition short of open warfare to achieve
their ends (e.g., information warfare, ambiguous or denied proxy operations, and subversion). These
trends, if unaddressed, will challenge our ability to deter aggression.
The security environment is also affected by rapid technological advancements and the changing character of war.
The drive to develop new technologies is relentless, expanding to more actors with lower barriers of
entry, and moving at accelerating speed. New technologies include advanced computing, “big data”
analytics, artificial intelligence, autonomy, robotics, directed energy, hypersonics, and biotechnology—
the very technologies that ensure we will be able to fight and win the wars of the future.
New commercial technology will change society and, ultimately, the character of war. The fact that
many technological developments will come from the commercial sector means that state
competitors and non-state actors will also have access to them, a fact that risks eroding the
conventional overmatch to which our Nation has grown accustomed. Maintaining the Department’s
technological advantage will require changes to industry culture, investment sources, and protection
across the National Security Innovation Base.
States are the principal actors on the global stage, but non-state actors also threaten the security
environment with increasingly sophisticated capabilities. Terrorists, trans-national criminal
organizations, cyber hackers and other malicious non-state actors have transformed global affairs with
increased capabilities of mass disruption. There is a positive side to this as well, as our partners in
sustaining security are also more than just nation-states: multilateral organizations, non-governmental
organizations, corporations, and strategic influencers provide opportunities for collaboration and
partnership. Terrorism remains a persistent condition driven by ideology and unstable political and
economic structures, despite the defeat of ISIS’s physical caliphate.
It is now undeniable that the homeland is no longer a sanctuary. America is a target, whether from terrorists
seeking to attack our citizens malicious cyber activity against personal commercial, or government
infrastructure; or political and information subversion. New threats to commercial and military uses
of space are emerging, while increasing digital connectivity of all aspects of life, business, government,
and military creates significant vulnerabilities. During conflict, attacks against our critical defense,
government, and economic infrastructure must be anticipated.
Rogue regimes, such as North Korea, continue to seek out or develop weapons of mass destruction (WMD)
– nuclear, chemical, and biological – as well as long range missile capabilities and, in some cases,
proliferate these capabilities to malign actors as demonstrated by Iranian ballistic missile exports.
Terrorists likewise continue to pursue WMD, while the spread of nuclear weapon technology and
advanced manufacturing technology remains a persistent problem. Recent advances in bioengineering
raise another concern, increasing the potential, variety, and ease of access to biological weapons.
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DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE OBJECTIVES
In support of the National Security Strategy, the Department of Defense will be prepared to defend the
homeland, remain the preeminent military power in the world, ensure the balances of power remain
in our favor, and advance an international order that is most conducive to our security and prosperity.
Long-term strategic competitions with China and Russia are the principal priorities for the
Department, and require both increased and sustained investment, because of the magnitude of the
threats they pose to U.S. security and prosperity today, and the potential for those threats to increase
in the future. Concurrently, the Department will sustain its efforts to deter and counter rogue regimes
such as North Korea and Iran, defeat terrorist threats to the United States, and consolidate our gains
in Iraq and Afghanistan while moving to a more resource-sustainable approach.
Defense objectives include:
 Defending the homeland from attack;

 Sustaining Joint Force military advantages, both globally and in key regions;
 Deterring adversaries from aggression against our vital interests;
 Enabling U.S. interagency counterparts to advance U.S. influence and interests;
 Maintaining favorable regional balances of power in the Indo-Pacific, Europe, the Middle
East, and the Western Hemisphere;
 Defending allies from military aggression and bolstering partners against coercion, and fairly
sharing responsibilities for common defense;
 Dissuading, preventing, or deterring state adversaries and non-state actors from acquiring,
proliferating, or using weapons of mass destruction;
 Preventing terrorists from directing or supporting external operations against the United States
homeland and our citizens, allies, and partners overseas;
 Ensuring common domains remain open and free;
 Continuously delivering performance with affordably and speed as we change Departmental
mindset, culture, and management systems; and
 Establishing an unmatched twenty-first century National Security Innovation Base that
effectively supports Department operations and sustains security and solvency.
STRATEGIC APPROACH
A long-term strategic competition requires the seamless integration of multiple elements of national
power—diplomacy, information, economics, finance, intelligence, law enforcement, and military.
More than any other nation, America can expand the competitive space, seizing the initiative to
challenge our competitors where we possess advantages and they lack strength. A more lethal force,
strong alliances and partnerships, American technological innovation, and a culture of performance
will generate decisive and sustained U.S. military advantages.
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As we expand the competitive space, we continue to offer competitors and adversaries an outstretched
hand, open to opportunities for cooperation but from a position of strength and based on our national
interests. Should cooperation fail, we will be ready to defend the American people, our values, and
interests. The willingness of rivals to abandon aggression will depend on their perception of U.S.
strength and the vitality of our alliances and partnerships.
Be strategically predictable, but operationally unpredictable. Deterring or defeating long-term strategic

competitors is a fundamentally different challenge than the regional adversaries that were the focus of
previous strategies. Our strength and integrated actions with allies will demonstrate our commitment
to deterring aggression, but our dynamic force employment, military posture, and operations must
introduce unpredictability to adversary decision-makers. With our allies and partners, we will challenge
competitors by maneuvering them into unfavorable positions, frustrating their efforts, precluding their
options while expanding our own, and forcing them to confront conflict under adverse conditions.
Integrate with U.S. interagency. Effectively expanding the competitive space requires combined actions
with the U.S. interagency to employ all dimensions of national power. We will assist the efforts of the
Departments of State, Treasury, Justice, Energy, Homeland Security, Commerce, USAID, as well as
the Intelligence Community, law enforcement, and others to identify and build partnerships to address
areas of economic, technological, and informational vulnerabilities.
Counter coercion and subversion. In competition short of armed conflict, revisionist powers and rogue
regimes are using corruption, predatory economic practices, propaganda, political subversion, proxies,
and the threat or use of military force to change facts on the ground. Some are particularly adept at
exploiting their economic relationships with many of our security partners. We will support U.S.
interagency approaches and work by, with, and through our allies and partners to secure our interests
and counteract this coercion.
Foster a competitive mindset. To succeed in the emerging security environment, our Department and Joint
Force will have to out-think, out-maneuver, out-partner, and out-innovate revisionist powers, rogue
regimes, terrorists, and other threat actors.
We will expand the competitive space while pursuing three distinct lines of effort:
 First, rebuilding military readiness as we build a more lethal Joint Force;

 Second, strengthening alliances as we attract new partners; and
 Third, reforming the Department’s business practices for greater performance
and affordability.
Build a More Lethal Force
The surest way to prevent war is to be prepared to win one. Doing so requires a competitive approach
to force development and a consistent, multiyear investment to restore warfighting readiness and field
a lethal force. Our aim is a Joint Force that possesses decisive advantages for any likely conflict, while
remaining proficient across the entire spectrum of conflict.
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Prioritize preparedness for war. Achieving peace through strength requires the Joint Force to deter conflict
through preparedness for war. During normal day-to-day operations, the Joint Force will sustainably
compete to: deter aggression in three key regions—the Indo-Pacific, Europe, and Middle East;
degrade terrorist and WMD threats; and defend U.S. interests from challenges below the level of
armed conflict. In wartime, the fully mobilized Joint Force will be capable of: defeating aggression by
a major power; deterring opportunistic aggression elsewhere; and disrupting imminent terrorist and
WMD threats. During peace or in war, the Joint Force will deter nuclear and non-nuclear strategic
attacks and defend the homeland. To support these missions, the Joint Force must gain and maintain
information superiority; and develop, strengthen, and sustain U.S. security relationships.
Modernize key capabilities. We cannot expect success fighting tomorrow’s conflicts with yesterday’s
weapons or equipment. To address the scope and pace of our competitors’ and adversaries’ ambitions
and capabilities, we must invest in modernization of key capabilities through sustained, predictable
budgets. Our backlog of deferred readiness, procurement, and modernization requirements has grown
in the last decade and a half and can no longer be ignored. We will make targeted, disciplined increases
in personnel and platforms to meet key capability and capacity needs. The 2018 National Defense Strategy
underpins our planned fiscal year 2019-2023 budgets, accelerating our modernization programs and
devoting additional resources in a sustained effort to solidify our competitive advantage.
 Nuclear forces. The Department will modernize the nuclear triad—including nuclear command,
control, and communications, and supporting infrastructure. Modernization of the nuclear
force includes developing options to counter competitors’ coercive strategies, predicated on
the threatened use of nuclear or strategic non-nuclear attacks.
 Space and cyberspace as warfighting domains. The Department will prioritize investments in
resilience, reconstitution, and operations to assure our space capabilities. We will also invest
in cyber defense, resilience, and the continued integration of cyber capabilities into the full
spectrum of military operations.
 Command, control, communications, computers and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (C4ISR).
Investments will prioritize developing resilient, survivable, federated networks and
information ecosystems from the tactical level up to strategic planning. Investments will also
prioritize capabilities to gain and exploit information, deny competitors those same
advantages, and enable us to provide attribution while defending against and holding
accountable state or non-state actors during cyberattacks.
 Missile defense. Investments will focus on layered missile defenses and disruptive capabilities for
both theater missile threats and North Korean ballistic missile threats.
 Joint lethality in contested environments. The Joint Force must be able to strike diverse targets inside
adversary air and missile defense networks to destroy mobile power-projection platforms. This
will include capabilities to enhance close combat lethality in complex terrain.
 Forward force maneuver and posture resilience. Investments will prioritize ground, air, sea, and space
forces that can deploy, survive, operate, maneuver, and regenerate in all domains while under
attack. Transitioning from large, centralized, unhardened infrastructure to smaller, dispersed,
resilient, adaptive basing that include active and passive defenses will also be prioritized.
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 Advanced autonomous systems. The Department will invest broadly in military application of
autonomy, artificial intelligence, and machine learning, including rapid application of
commercial breakthroughs, to gain competitive military advantages.
 Resilient and agile logistics. Investments will prioritize prepositioned forward stocks and
munitions, strategic mobility assets, partner and allied support, as well as non-commercially
dependent distributed logistics and maintenance to ensure logistics sustainment while under
persistent multi-domain attack.
Evolve innovative operational concepts. Modernization is not defined solely by hardware; it requires change
in the ways we organize and employ forces. We must anticipate the implications of new technologies
on the battlefield, rigorously define the military problems anticipated in future conflict, and foster a
culture of experimentation and calculated risk-taking. We must anticipate how competitors and
adversaries will employ new operational concepts and technologies to attempt to defeat us, while
developing operational concepts to sharpen our competitive advantages and enhance our lethality.
Develop a lethal, agile, and resilient force posture and employment. Force posture and employment must be
adaptable to account for the uncertainty that exists in the changing global strategic environment. Much
of our force employment models and posture date to the immediate post-Cold War era, when our
military advantage was unchallenged and the primary threats were rogue regimes.
 Dynamic Force Employment. Dynamic Force Employment will prioritize maintaining the capacity
and capabilities for major combat, while providing options for proactive and scalable
employment of the Joint Force. A modernized Global Operating Model of combat-credible,
flexible theater postures will enhance our ability to compete and provide freedom of maneuver
during conflict, providing national decision-makers with better military options.
The global strategic environment demands increased strategic flexibility and freedom of
action. The Dynamic Force Employment concept will change the way the Department uses
the Joint Force to provide proactive and scalable options for priority missions. Dynamic Force
Employment will more flexibly use ready forces to shape proactively the strategic environment
while maintaining readiness to respond to contingencies and ensure long-term warfighting
readiness.
 Global Operating Model. The Global Operating Model describes how the Joint Force will be
postured and employed to achieve its competition and wartime missions. Foundational
capabilities include: nuclear; cyber; space; C4ISR; strategic mobility, and counter WMD
proliferation. It comprises four layers: contact, blunt, surge, and homeland. These are,
respectively, designed to help us compete more effectively below the level of armed conflict;
delay, degrade, or deny adversary aggression; surge war-winning forces and manage conflict
escalation; and defend the U.S. homeland.
Cultivate workforce talent. Recruiting, developing, and retaining a high-quality military and civilian
workforce is essential for warfighting success. Cultivating a lethal, agile force requires more than just
new technologies and posture changes; it depends on the ability of our warfighters and the
Department workforce to integrate new capabilities, adapt warfighting approaches, and change
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business practices to achieve mission success. The creativity and talent of the American warfighter is
our greatest enduring strength, and one we do not take for granted.
 Professional Military Education (PME). PME has stagnated, focused more on the accomplishment
of mandatory credit at the expense of lethality and ingenuity. We will emphasize intellectual
leadership and military professionalism in the art and science of warfighting, deepening our
knowledge of history while embracing new technology and techniques to counter competitors.
PME will emphasize independence of action in warfighting concepts to lessen the impact of
degraded/lost communications in combat. PME is to be used as a strategic asset to build trust
and interoperability across the Joint Forces and with allied and partner forces.
 Talent management. Developing leaders who are competent in national-level decision-making

requires broad revision of talent management among the Armed Services, including
fellowships, civilian education, and assignments that increase understanding of interagency
decision-making processes, as well as alliances and coalitions.
 Civilian workforce expertise. A modern, agile, information-advantaged Department requires a

motivated, diverse, and highly skilled civilian workforce. We will emphasize new skills and
complement our current workforce with information experts, data scientists, computer
programmers, and basic science researchers and engineers—to use information, not simply
manage it. The Department will also continue to explore streamlined, non-traditional pathways
to bring critical skills into service, expanding access to outside expertise, and devising new
public-private partnerships to work with small companies, start-ups, and universities.
Strengthen Alliances and Attract New Partners
Mutually beneficial alliances and partnerships are crucial to our strategy, providing a durable,
asymmetric strategic advantage that no competitor or rival can match. This approach has served the
United States well, in peace and war, for the past 75 years. Our allies and partners came to our aid
after the terrorist attacks on 9/11, and have contributed to every major U.S.-led military engagement
since. Every day, our allies and partners join us in defending freedom, deterring war, and maintaining
the rules which underwrite a free and open international order.
By working together with allies and partners we amass the greatest possible strength for the long-term
advancement of our interests, maintaining favorable balances of power that deter aggression and
support the stability that generates economic growth. When we pool resources and share responsibility
for our common defense, our security burden becomes lighter. Our allies and partners provide
complementary capabilities and forces along with unique perspectives, regional relationships, and
information that improve our understanding of the environment and expand our options. Allies and
partners also provide access to critical regions, supporting a widespread basing and logistics system
that underpins the Department’s global reach.
We will strengthen and evolve our alliances and partnerships into an extended network capable of
deterring or decisively acting to meet the shared challenges of our time. We will focus on three
elements for achieving a capable alliance and partnership network:
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 Uphold a foundation of mutual respect, responsibility, priorities, and accountability. Our alliances and
coalitions are built on free will and shared responsibilities. While we will unapologetically represent
America’s values and belief in democracy, we will not seek to impose our way of life by force. We
will uphold our commitments and we expect allies and partners to contribute an equitable share
to our mutually beneficial collective security, including effective investment in modernizing their
defense capabilities. We have shared responsibilities for resisting authoritarian trends, contesting
radical ideologies, and serving as bulwarks against instability.
 Expand regional consultative mechanisms and collaborative planning. We will develop new partnerships
around shared interests to reinforce regional coalitions and security cooperation. We will provide
allies and partners with a clear and consistent message to encourage alliance and coalition
commitment, greater defense cooperation, and military investment.
 Deepen interoperability. Each ally and partner is unique. Combined forces able to act together
coherently and effectively to achieve military objectives requires interoperability. Interoperability
is a priority for operational concepts, modular force elements, communications, information
sharing, and equipment. In consultation with Congress and the Department of State, the
Department of Defense will prioritize requests for U.S. military equipment sales, accelerating
foreign partner modernization and ability to integrate with U.S. forces. We will train to high-end
combat missions in our alliance, bilateral, and multinational exercises.
Enduring coalitions and long-term security partnerships, underpinned by our bedrock alliances and
reinforced by our allies’ own webs of security relationships, remain a priority:
 Expand Indo-Pacific alliances and partnerships. A free and open Indo-Pacific region provides prosperity
and security for all. We will strengthen our alliances and partnerships in the Indo-Pacific to a
networked security architecture capable of deterring aggression, maintaining stability, and ensuring
free access to common domains. With key countries in the region, we will bring together bilateral
and multilateral security relationships to preserve the free and open international system.
 Fortify the Trans-Atlantic NATO Alliance. A strong and free Europe, bound by shared principles of
democracy, national sovereignty, and commitment to Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty is vital
to our security. The alliance will deter Russian adventurism, defeat terrorists who seek to murder
innocents, and address the arc of instability building on NATO’s periphery. At the same time,
NATO must adapt to remain relevant and fit for our time—in purpose, capability, and responsive
decision-making. We expect European allies to fulfill their commitments to increase defense and
modernization spending to bolster the alliance in the face of our shared security concerns.
 Form enduring coalitions in the Middle East. We will foster a stable and secure Middle East that denies
safe havens for terrorists, is not dominated by any power hostile to the United States, and that
contributes to stable global energy markets and secure trade routes. We will develop enduring
coalitions to consolidate gains we have made in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, and elsewhere, to support
the lasting defeat of terrorists as we sever their sources of strength and counterbalance Iran.
 Sustain advantages in the Western Hemisphere. The U.S. derives immense benefit from a stable, peaceful
hemisphere that reduces security threats to the homeland. Supporting the U.S. interagency lead,
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the Department will deepen its relations with regional countries that contribute military capabilities
to shared regional and global security challenges.
 Support relationships to address significant terrorist threats in Africa. We will bolster existing bilateral and
multilateral partnerships and develop new relationships to address significant terrorist threats that
threaten U.S. interests and contribute to challenges in Europe and the Middle East. We will focus
on working by, with, and through local partners and the European Union to degrade terrorists;
build the capability required to counter violent extremism, human trafficking, trans-national
criminal activity, and illegal arms trade with limited outside assistance; and limit the malign
influence of non-African powers.
Reform the Department for Greater Performance and Affordability
The current bureaucratic approach, centered on exacting thoroughness and minimizing risk above all
else, is proving to be increasingly unresponsive. We must transition to a culture of performance where
results and accountability matter. We will put in place a management system where leadership can
harness opportunities and ensure effective stewardship of taxpayer resources. We have a responsibility
to gain full value from every taxpayer dollar spent on defense, thereby earning the trust of Congress
and the American people.
Deliver performance at the speed of relevance. Success no longer goes to the country that develops a new
technology first, but rather to the one that better integrates it and adapts its way of fighting. Current
processes are not responsive to need; the Department is over-optimized for exceptional performance
at the expense of providing timely decisions, policies, and capabilities to the warfighter. Our response
will be to prioritize speed of delivery, continuous adaptation, and frequent modular upgrades. We
must not accept cumbersome approval chains, wasteful applications of resources in uncompetitive
space, or overly risk-averse thinking that impedes change. Delivering performance means we will shed
outdated management practices and structures while integrating insights from business innovation.
Organize for innovation. The Department’s management structure and processes are not written in stone,
they are a means to an end–empowering the warfighter with the knowledge, equipment and support
systems to fight and win. Department leaders will adapt their organizational structures to best support
the Joint Force. If current structures hinder substantial increases in lethality or performance, it is
expected that Service Secretaries and Agency heads will consolidate, eliminate, or restructure as
needed. The Department’s leadership is committed to changes in authorities, granting of waivers, and
securing external support for streamlining processes and organizations.
Drive budget discipline and affordability to achieve solvency. Better management begins with effective financial
stewardship. The Department will continue its plan to achieve full auditability of all its operations,
improving its financial processes, systems, and tools to understand, manage, and improve cost. We
will continue to leverage the scale of our operations to drive greater efficiency in procurement of
materiel and services while pursuing opportunities to consolidate and streamline contracts in areas
such as logistics, information technology, and support services. We will also continue efforts to reduce
management overhead and the size of headquarters staff. We will reduce or eliminate duplicative
organizations and systems for managing human resources, finance, health services, travel, and
supplies. The Department will also work to reduce excess property and infrastructure, providing
Congress with options for a Base Realignment and Closure.
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Select Memorandums
to the Department
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Select Remarks
U.S. Military Academy Graduation and Commissioning
Secretary of Defense James N. Mattis
27 MAY 2017
Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen:
What a day.
As the chaplain put it, what a happy day for our graduates here this morning; for the families that
have nurtured them and raised them to take on these challenges; certainly for these over to your
left flank here, the ones who want to be graduating, and for the class of 2018, you’re not getting
out a month early. By golly, if this class had to go through the full course of difficulty, so will you.
But it’s also a great day for the U.S. Army, Gen. Milley, Secretary, to have this reinforcement.
And it is a great honor to be here today at West Point, one of the foundational keystones of
our nation, and to join you on behalf of our Commander-in-Chief, President Trump, to pay his
respects, and the respects of the American people, to the military academy class of 2017.
I would never have imagined, ladies and gentlemen, when I joined the military at age 18, that I’d
be standing here, nor can you graduates anticipate where you’ll be many years from now.
By the time this class was in first grade classrooms in every state across our union, our country
had been thrust into a war by maniacs who thought that by hurting us they could scare us. Well
we don’t scare, and nothing better represents America’s awesome determination to defend herself
than this graduating class.
Every one of you could have opted out. You’d grown up seeing the war on ‘round-the-clock news.
There was no draft. Colleges across this land would have moved heaven and earth to recruit
you for schools that would never make such demands on you as West Point, starting with Beast
Barracks, an aptly named introduction to the Long Gray Line, creating American soldiers who
are at their very best when the times are at their very worst…
Today in honoring you graduates, in celebrating your achievements and giving thanks for your
commitment, we can see clearly your role in our world.
You graduate the same week that saw the murder of 22 innocent young lives. Manchester’s tragic
loss underscores the purpose for your years of study and training at this elite school.
For today, as Gen. Caslen said, you join the ranks of those whose mission is to guard freedom and to
protect the innocent from such terror, the innocent noted in your class motto, “so others may dream.”
We must never permit murderers to define our time or warp our sense of the normal.
This is not normal and each of you cadets graduating today are reinforcing the ranks of our army,
bringing fresh vigor, renewing our sense of urgency and enhancing the army’s lethality needed to prove
our enemies wrong. You will drive home a salient point: that free men and women will volunteer to
fight, ethically and fiercely, to defend our experiment that you and i call, simply, “America.”
You graduates, commissioned today, will carry the hopes of your country on your young shoulders.
You will now join the ranks of an army at war. Volunteers all, we are so very proud of you cadets,
for taking the place you have earned in the unbroken line of patriots who have come before.
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Your oath of office connects you to the line of soldiers stretching back to the founding of our
country…and in the larger sense, it grows from ancient, even timeless roots, reflecting the tone
and commitment of youth long ago who believed freedom is worth defending.
In terms of serving something larger than yourself, yours is the same oath that was taken by the
young men of ancient Athens. They pledged to “fight for the ideals and sacred things of their
city…to revere and obey the city’s laws and do [their] best to incite a like respect” in others, and to
pass on their city-state “far greater and more beautiful” than they had received it.
In that sense, it is fitting the cadet cover you wear today, for the last time, features the helmet of
the Greek goddess Athena, echoing respect of the civic duty that’s found in a democracy, and in a
nation, in President Lincoln’s words, of the people, by the people, for the people.
After four years at west point, you understand what it means to live up to an oath; you understand
the commitment that comes with signing a blank check to the American people, payable with
your life.
My fine young soldiers, a few miles northwest of Washington, D.C. where I work today, at
Antietam Battlefield Cemetery is a statue of a union soldier standing at rest, and overlooking his
comrades’ graves. It is inscribed with the words, “Not for themselves, but for their country.”
How simple that thought. So long as our nation breeds patriots like you, defenders who look
past the hot political rhetoric of our day and rally to our flag, that army tradition of serving our
country will never die.
To a high and remarkable degree, the American people respect you. We in the Department of
Defense recognize that there are a lot of passions running about in our country, as there ought to
be in a vibrant republic.
But for those privileged to wear the cloth of our nation, to serve in the United States Army, you
stand the ramparts, unapologetic, apolitical, defending our experiment in self-governance…and
you hold the line.
You hold the line…faithful to duty…confronting our nation’s foes with implacable will, knowing
that if there’s a hill to climb, waiting will not make it any smaller.
You hold the line…true to honor…living by a moral code regardless of who is watching, knowing
that honor is what we give ourselves for a life of meaning.
You hold the line…loyal to country and defending the constitution, defending our fundamental
freedoms, knowing from your challenging years here on the Hudson that loyalty only counts
where there are a hundred reasons not to be.
Behind me, across Lusk Reservoir, stands a memorial dedicated to the American soldier. On it are
inscribed the words: “The lives and destinies of valiant Americans are entrusted to your care and
your leadership.”
You have been sharpened through one of the finest educational opportunities in America, given to
you by the American people via General Caslen’s superb faculty, who expect admirable leadership
by example from you as soldier leaders.
My view of a great leader is the player-coach. We need coaches, men and women who know themselves,
who take responsibility for themselves, coaching their soldiers to be at the top of their game.
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Every soldier in your platoon will know your name the day you step in front of them. Your
responsibility is to know them. Learn their hopes and dreams. Teach them the difference between
a mistake and a lack of discipline. If your troops make mistakes, look in the mirror and figure out
how to coach them better.
And while we will never tolerate a lack of discipline in the U.S. Army, we must not create a zero-
defect environment, because that would suffocate initiative and aggressiveness, the two attributes
most vital to battlefield success.
In leading soldiers, you will have what F. Scott Fitzgerald called, “riotous excursions with
privileged glimpses into the human heart.” So recognize that you should never let your passion for
excellence to neutralize your compassion for the soldiers you serve, and who will follow you into
harm’s way.
Remember that when the chips are down, it will be the spirits of your often rambunctious soldiers
that will provide you the reservoir of courage you will need to draw upon.
Rest assured that nothing you will face will be worse than Shiloh. Nothing can faze the U.S.
Army when our soldiers believe in themselves.
The chips were down in the freezing cold days before Christmas, 1944, when the Nazi Army was
on the attack in the Ardennes.
A sergeant in a retreating tank spotted a fellow American digging a foxhole. The GI, private first
class Martin, looked up and said to the sergeant in the tank, “Are you looking for a safe place?”
“Yeah,” answered the tanker.
“Well, buddy,” the private said with a drawl, “Just pull your vehicle behind me…I’m the 82nd
airborne, and this is as far as the bastards are going.” And that is the army that is being entrusted
to your care.
On the battlefield, my fine young soldiers, no one wins on their own. Teams win battles, and if
you can win the trust and affection of your soldiers, they will win all the battles for you.
If you wish to be a credit to our nation and to your family, you must carry West Point’s ethos
everywhere you go and practice every day the integrity that builds your character.
For when destiny taps you on the shoulder and thrusts you into a situation that’s tough beyond words…
…when you’re sick and you’ve been three days without sleep…
…when you’ve lost some of your beloved troops and the veneer of civilization wears thin, by
having lived a disciplined life, you’ll be able to reach inside and find the strength that your
country is counting on.
Now you are privileged to be embarking on this journey because you’re going to learn things
about yourself that others will never know.
And we can all, in this stadium today, see the storm clouds gathering. Our enemies are watching. They
are calculating and hoping America’s military will turn cynical. That we will lose our selfless spirit.
They hope our country no longer produces young people willing to shoulder the patriot’s burden,
to willingly face danger and discomfort. By your commitment you will prove the enemy wrong.
Dead wrong.
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We Americans are not made of cotton candy.
You are a U.S. soldier, and you hold the line.
The class of 2017 now joins an Army that left bloody footprints at Valley Forge…an army that
defeated the Nazis’ last gasp at Bastogne…
Your class will certainly be remembered for an army football team that took to the field of
friendly strife and beat Navy… but you will also be remembered for the history that you’re about
to write, and when you turn over your troops to their next commander, they will be as good or
better than you received them.
Now, I may not have had the pleasure of knowing each of you personally, but I have very high
expectations of you…
Your country has very high expectations of you…
And we are confident you will not let us down because while we may not know you personally, we
do know your character, West Point character.
So…fight for our ideals and our sacred things …incite in others respect and love for our country
and our fellow Americans…and leave this country greater and more beautiful than you inherited
it, for that is the duty of every generation.
To the families here today, I can only say: Thank you. Apples don’t fall far from the tree. Thank
you for the men and women you raised to become soldiers.
And thank you too, old shipmate, General Caslen and your team, who coached these members of
the Long Gray Line. They will write the army’s story, and in so doing, they will carry your spirits
into our nation’s history.
For duty, for honor, for country…hold the line.
Congratulations, Class of 2017, and may God bless America.
-END-
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Remarks by Secretary Mattis at Shangri-La Dialogue
3 June 2017
Well, good morning. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, excellencies, fellow ministers. And
thank you, Dr. John, for having me here, the invitation. And thank you to IISS, which is always a
first-rate outfit, and runs conferences actually worth attending.
It is a privilege to be here at this excellent conference in Singapore and to be in the company of so
many senior defense officials from within and outside this region. Shangri-La, I think, provides
one of the finest opportunities available anywhere to broaden my perspective.
And Deputy Prime Minister Teo Chee Hean, Minister of Defense Ng, thank you for Singapore’s
unique and generous hospitality. We always gain keen insight into the strategic currents of
this dynamic region, from this outpost on the sea. And I would also tell you that I first visited
Singapore, it was in the last Millennium, in 1979. And I’ve remained an admirer of Singapore’s
leadership and the people ever since.
Ladies and gentlemen, my primary reason for being here is to listen. My goal is to walk away
with a more vigorous and more rigorous understanding of the challenges we face so we can jointly
craft solutions.
In that regard, I thought Prime Minister Turnbull last night brought clarity, sir, to the situation
facing our nations, setting the stage for our conversation today. And I must add, you gave us
reason for optimism in the face of some rather daunting challenges. And I think a dose of good
Australian pragmatic optimism is always in order. So, thank you, sir.
Five United States states, including my home state of Washington, have Pacific Ocean shorelines.
The United States is a Pacific nation in both geography and outlook.
And from my first trips as secretary of Defense and from Vice President Pence’s first trips,
Secretary of State Tillerson’s trips, the American administration is demonstrating the priority we
place on relationships in the Asia-Pacific region, a priority region for us.
Specifically, in Vice President Pence’s words during his trip to South Korea, Japan, Indonesia, and
Australia, we have affirmed the United States, what he called our, “enduring commitment to the
security and prosperity of the region.”
That enduring commitment is based on strategic interests and on shared values of free people,
free markets, and a strong and vibrant economic partnership, a partnership open to all nations,
regardless of their size, their populations, the number of ships in their navies, or any other
qualifier. Large nations, as the Prime Minister reminded us last night, large nations, small
nations, and even shrimps can all thrive in a rules-based order.
Such an order benefits all nations. America’s engagement is also based on strong military
partnerships, robust investment and trade relationships, and close ties between the peoples of our
countries; ultimately, we all share this mighty Pacific Ocean, an ocean named for peace.
We are proud so many young people from Pacific nations choose to come to American
universities to study. And we appreciate that many of our students attend universities in your
countries because they return home enriched by your cultures.
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These people-to-people ties highlight the depth and the breadth of America’s relationships with
Asia-Pacific nations, and the importance the U.S. has in terms of its role in the region.
This morning I want to focus on two broad subject areas, and hopefully make this time
worthwhile for you, and open to a number of questions afterwards.
The first area is America’s view of the region’s key security challenges. The second is the approach
we are taking alongside Asia-Pacific allies and partners to address those challenges.
I note up front that in the security arena, we have a deep and abiding commitment to reinforcing
the rules-based international order. This order, as we all know, is a product. It’s a true product
of so many nations’ efforts to create stability. And these efforts, we must remind ourselves so we
don’t take them for granted, these efforts grew out of lessons learned the hard way, from economic
depression and catastrophic wars.
The international order was not imposed on other nations; rather, the order is based on principles
that were embraced by nations trying to create a better world and restore hope to all.
Those principles have stood the test of time, like equal respect for the international law, regardless
of a nation’s size or wealth; and freedom of navigation and overflight, including keeping shipping
lanes open, for all nations’ commercial benefit.
These principles underwrite stability and build trust, security, and prosperity. The growing prosperity
of the people in this region gives proof to the value of institutions such as the United Nations,
ASEAN, the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund, all of which can spur economic
growth. They also remind us that each of us have a vested interest in each other’s security.
The United States will continue to adapt and continue to expand its ability to work with others
to secure a peaceful, prosperous, and free Asia, one with respect for all nations upholding
international law.
Because we recognize no nation is an island isolated from others, we stand with our allies,
partners, and the international community to address pressing security challenges and do so
together. As countries make sovereign decisions free from coercion, the region will gain increased
stability and security for the mutual benefit of all nations.
In our cooperative pursuit of that vision, we cannot ignore the challenges that you and I know we face.
As Vice President Pence stated, the “most urgent and dangerous threat to peace and security in
the Asia-Pacific is North Korea.” North Korea’s continued pursuit of nuclear weapons and the
means to deliver them is not new, but the regime has increased the pace and scope of its efforts.
While the North Korean regime has a long record of murder of diplomats, of kidnapping
innocent, killing of sailors, and other criminal activity, its nuclear weapons program is maturing is
a threat to all.
Coupled with reckless proclamations, the current North Korean program signals a clear intent to
acquire nuclear-arm ballistic missiles, including those of intercontinental range, that pose direct
and immediate threats to our regional allies, partners, and all the world.
President Trump has made clear “The era of strategic patience is over.” As a matter of U.S. national
security, the United States regards the threat from North Korea as a clear and present danger.
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The regime’s actions are manifestly illegal under international law. There is a strong international
consensus that the current situation cannot continue. China’s declared policy of a de-nuclearized
Korean Peninsula is our policy as well, and also that of Japan and the Republic of Korea.
All nations represented in this room share an interest in restoring stability. The Trump
administration is encouraged by China’s renewed commitment to work with the international
community toward de-nuclearization.
Ultimately, we believe China will come to recognize North Korea as a strategic liability, not an
asset – a liability inciting increased disharmony and causing peace-loving populations in the
region to increase defense spending.
As China’s President Xi said in April, “Only if all sides live up to their responsibilities and come
together from different directions can the nuclear issues on the Peninsula be resolved as quickly as
possible.”
I agree with President Xi’s words on this point. And those words must be followed by actions by
all of us.
North Korea poses a threat to us all, and it’s therefore imperative that we do our part, each of us,
to fulfill obligations and work together to support our shared goal of de-nuclearization on the
Korean Peninsula. We are coordinating with the United Nations, allies, and partners to put new
pressure on North Korea to abandon this dangerous path.
I reiterate Secretary Tillerson’s statement at the United Nations this last April. He said, “Our
goal is not regime change” and we do not want to “destabilize the Asia-Pacific region.” We will,
however, continue to increase diplomatic and economic pressure “until Pyongyang finally and
permanently abandons its nuclear and ballistic missile programs.”
Specifically, the United States will maintain our close coordination and cooperation with the
Republic of Korea and Japan, two democracies whose people want peace. Our commitment to
the defense of the Republic of Korea and Japan, to include the employment of our most advanced
capabilities, is ironclad.
Moreover, we will take further steps to protect the U.S. homeland, as demonstrated by this week’s
successful ballistic missile defense test.
While North Korea is an urgent military threat, we must not lose sight of other strategic
challenges to regional peace and prosperity.
And here I want to talk for a minute about China and the United States. Because of its growing
economic power, China occupies a legitimate position of influence in the Pacific. We welcome
China’s economic development. However, we can also anticipate economic and political friction
between the United States and China.
Yet we cannot accept Chinese actions that impinge on the interests of the international
community, undermining the rules-based order that has benefitted all countries represented here
today including, and especially, China.
While competition between the U.S. and China, the world’s two largest economies, is bound to
occur, conflict is not inevitable. Our two countries can and do cooperate for mutual benefit. And
we will pledge to work closely with China where we share common cause.
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We seek a constructive, results-oriented relationship with China. We believe the United States
can engage China diplomatically and economically to ensure our relationship is beneficial – not
only to the United States and China – but also to the region and to the world.
All countries should have a voice in shaping the international system. But doing so by ignoring
or violating international law threatens all that this inclusive global community has built together
during the last 70 years, an international system that grew out of the grim lessons of World War
II and the immense suffering of millions of people.
For example, the United States remains committed to protecting the rights, freedoms, and lawful
uses of the sea, and the ability of countries to exercise those rights in the strategically important
East and South China Seas.
The 2016 ruling by the Permanent Court of Arbitration on the case brought by the Philippines
on the South China Sea is binding. We call on all claimants to use this as a starting point to
peacefully manage their disputes in the South China Sea.
Artificial island construction and indisputable militarization of facilities on features in
international waters undermine regional stability.
The scope and effect of China’s construction activities in the South China Sea differ from those of
other countries in several key ways. This includes:
1) the nature of its militarization;
2) China’s disregard for international law;
3) its contempt for other nations’ interests, and
4) its efforts to dismiss non-adversarial resolution of issues.
We oppose countries militarizing artificial islands and enforcing excessive maritime claims
unsupported by international law. We cannot and will not accept unilateral coercive changes to
the status quo.
We will continue to fly, sail, and operate wherever international law allows and demonstrate
resolve through operational presence in the South China Sea and beyond. Our operations
throughout the region are an expression of our willingness to defend both our interests and the
freedoms enshrined in international law.
As Prime Minister Modi of India has stated so clearly, “Respecting freedom of navigation and
adhering to international norms [are] essential for peace and economic growth in the inter-linked
geography of the Indo-Pacific.”
China’s growth over these last decades illustrates that the Chinese people have, benefitted
enormously from these very freedoms. Where we have overlapping interests, again I say, we seek
to cooperate with China as much as possible.
In areas where we disagree, we will seek to manage competition responsibly because we recognize
how important U.S.-China relations are for the stability of the Asia-Pacific. And we believe at
this time China also recognizes this.
We will also continue to work together with our long-time, steadfast allies to maximize regional
security. We will ensure we have the military means to keep the peace. But we will not use our
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allies and partners, or our relationship with them, or the capabilities integral to their security, as
bargaining chips.
In addition to the challenges presented by North Korea and China, there is another situation we
must all work together to address for the good of our nations and to ensure a healthy future for
our peoples.
Violent extremist organizations, as was noted by the Prime Minister last night, including fighters
returning from the Middle East, and local individuals radicalized by malicious ideologies, seek to
gain ground in Southeast Asia.
Just last week, ISIS-linked militants in the Philippines attempted to seize part of Marawi City in
Mindanao, attacking innocents, killing police and military, and taking worshippers hostage.
ISIS also claimed responsibility for the brutal bombings that killed three police officers at a
Jakarta bus station. Now I’ll just say right now, ladies and gentlemen, that we Americans, we
stand in sympathy and support of those whose lives have been brutalized by such criminals.
Together we must act now to prevent this threat from growing, otherwise it will place long-term
regional security at risk and stunt regional economic dynamism. We need only look at the chaos
and violence that our friends in the Mid-East are contending with to see why we must swiftly and
jointly address threats to our region.
As President Trump emphasized during his first foreign trip in the Middle-East, we must defeat
extremist organizations wherever they attempt to establish roots. Not just in Iraq and Syria but
also here in Southeast Asia.
As such, the U.S. remains committed to leading the Defeat-ISIS Coalition effort – an
international team of 66 nations plus the Arab League, NATO, INTERPOL, and the European
Union – all fully committed at the political, military, and law enforcement levels to the
destruction of ISIS.
This heartbreaking attack we are observing right now on a city in Mindanao reminds us that
terrorists intentionally make battlefields where the innocent live; these are also humanitarian
fields, as we know, and we must all devote ourselves to ensuring a stable environment in which
violent extremist organizations wither and die, not our innocent citizens. And I know I speak
for all of us in this room today, that we stand with the Philippines and the fight they’re currently
engaged in.
For our counter-terrorism efforts to be successful, however, we must unify our efforts – strengthen
by moral clarity, political will, and implacable commitment to fully share the difficult and
dangerous work this will require.
In this effort we are partnering with a number of countries in the region, including Malaysia
and Indonesia, for example, to improve information sharing and maritime domain awareness so
regional leaders can deliver pragmatic protection for their people.
Information sharing is vital if we are to maintain law and order against a foe that intentionally
targets women, children, and the innocent in our countries.
I am confident in our collective ability to make this vibrant and diverse region safer without
sacrificing either its prosperity or its values.
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In light of these challenges, let me describe three ways in which Department of Defense, which I
lead, is pursuing our common objective of regional stability.
Our primary effort remains strengthening alliances. This protects and promotes the principles
we share with our steadfast allies. History is compelling on this point: Nations with strong allies
that respect one another thrive and those without allies stagnate and wither.
Alliances provide avenues for peace, fostering the conditions for economic growth with countries
that share the same vision, while tempering the plans of those who would attack other nations or
try to impose their will over the less powerful.
I can note just several examples:
I don’t want to talk too long, but let me just make note of the United States and Japan are implementing
the 2015 Defense Guidelines to enhance regional security across a wider spectrum of operations,
cooperating ever more closely in the Asia-Pacific. Japan is also contributing to the relocation of some of
our forces to Guam, which is a significant strategic hub for our regional operations.
We are working transparently in unison with the Republic of Korea to defend against the growing threats
posed by North Korea’s aggressive and destabilizing nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs.
For the last 100 years, U.S. and Australian forces, Mr. Prime Minister, have shared the battlefield
in every major conflict. President Trump and Prime Minister Turnbull recently commemorated
a key part of our shared history, when our allied efforts in the Battle of the Coral Sea took place.
Our alliance remains relevant to regional stability in the 21st century as well.
Our combined interoperability with allied forces – enhanced through force posture initiatives that
we are taking– ensures we are prepared to cooperate during real-world crises. Deterrence of war,
however, remains our ultimate goal.
We are helping to train, advise, and assist Philippine forces in their fight against violent extremist
organizations in the south. And I think we all owe that support to the Philippine government.
We also continue to support the modernization of the Philippine Armed Forces to address the
country’s security challenges.
During this challenging fight against terrorists, we will stand by the people of the Philippines and
we will continue to uphold our commitments to the Philippines under the Mutual Defense Treaty.
Our oldest ally in the region, Thailand, has been and will remain instrumental in in challenging
the wide range of regional threats.
Thailand has announced its intent to hold elections. We look forward to our long-time friend’s
return to democratic governance and the expansion of our military-to-military relationship
grounded in our everlasting confidence in the Thai people.
In addition to our bilateral alliance relationships, we are encouraging an interconnected region.
These linkages are expanding – including, but also independent of the United States, and that is a
development we welcome.
Besides strengthening our alliances, our second Department of Defense priority is to empower
countries in the region so they can be even stronger contributors to their own peace and stability.
The Pacific region countries represented here are obviously critical to strengthening and
transforming the underlying security structure that has enabled tremendous regional prosperity.
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For we don’t take that peace and prosperity for granted.
We call upon all countries to contribute sufficiently to their own security. At the same time,
we encourage them to actively seek out opportunities and partnerships with other like-minded
nations, and we do the same, to sustain and maintain the peace.
We will continue to engage closely with our partners, building on recent progress. We are
exploring new ways to address new challenges as well, from maritime security to the growing
threat posed by the spread of terrorism in Southeast Asia.
For example, we recognize India, the most populous democracy in the world, as a major defense
partner. We did so, in part, out of respect for India’s indispensable role in maintaining stability in
the Indian Ocean region.
We are also conducting the first-ever transfer of a Coast Guard cutter to Vietnam, and we just
completed the inaugural U.S.-Singapore air detachment in Guam, which will give an opportunity
to the Singapore Republic to build interoperability between our forces.
The Department of Defense remains steadfastly committed to working with Taiwan and with its
democratic government to provide it the defense articles necessary, consistent with the obligations
set out in the Taiwan Relations Act, because we stand for the peaceful resolution of any issues in a
manner acceptable to the people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait.
But we also know that a stable region requires us all to work together, and that is why we support
greater engagement with ASEAN. Because no single bilateral relationship can get us where we
want to go. Only working in concert can take us forward.
This year marks, ladies and gentlemen, the 50th anniversary of the birth of ASEAN, and the 40th
anniversary of relations between ASEAN and the United States. In America, we are proud of
our four decades of working together, and we believe that our best days are ahead. The future of
ASEAN is bright, and that is good for all Pacific nations.
Here I note Indonesian President Widodo’s statement at the 2016 East Asia Summit: “ASEAN
must protect our home and ensure sustainable peace and stability…Hence we need a strong and
comprehensive regional security architecture that could advance ASEAN centrality and more
effectively contribute to security and regional stability.”
Finally, our third effort at the U.S. Department of Defense is to strengthen U.S. military capabilities
in the region, because security is the foundation of prosperity, enabling the flow of commerce.
The United States seeks to integrate diplomatic, economic, and military approaches to regional
concerns, enabling Secretary Tillerson and our diplomats to address tough issues from a position
of strength.
It is the role of the military to set the conditions for diplomacy to succeed. The United States has
consistently endeavored to use its Armed Forces to support stability to the Asia-Pacific, and to
reinforce our diplomatic efforts.
In our Congress, Senator McCain, Congressman Thornberry, and other American legislators have
identified a need to strengthen U.S. operational capability in the region.
And I look forward to working with them to develop an Asia-Pacific stability initiative that
complements the ongoing, large-scale investment in our budget to improve and reinforce U.S.
military capabilities across the region.
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And to give you a snapshot, ladies and gentlemen, currently, 60 percent of all U.S. Navy ships, 55
percent of Army forces, about two-thirds of fleet Marine forces are assigned to the U.S. Pacific
Command area of responsibility. Soon, 60 percent of overseas tactical aviation assets will be
assigned to this theater.
The congressional initiative that is being brought forward will expand investment in the
Department of Defense, strengthening the rules-based order by better positioning us to support
regional stability in a changing region.
By further strengthening our alliances, empowering the region, and enhancing the U.S. military –
in support of our larger foreign policy goals – we intend to continue to promote the rules-based
order that is in the best interest of the United States and all of the countries in the region.
And I would just say to our hosts here today, this unique forum is only possible because of our
unique hosts. Singapore is a beacon to this region and to the world. Its openness, its mutual
respect that it engenders, and the prosperity of this city-state allows us all to be here to discuss
our differences in a positive environment. And for that I am grateful.
Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, and I look forward to your questions.
-END-
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Remarks by Secretary Mattis on the National Defense Strategy
19 JAN 2018
SECRETARY OF DEFENSE JAMES N. MATTIS: Well, good morning, and thank you all
for taking time to come and listen to us here.
Again, this is a National Defense Strategy, but what it really is, ladies and gentlemen, this is an
American strategy. It belongs to you. You own it. We work for you.
And I would just tell you, Dean Lewis, it’s a pleasure for hosting me here today. I owe you a great
deal. It’s a pleasure to be at a school named for the gentleman that this one is named for, Paul Nitze.
I would just tell you, he was so wise in how he could select people. He picked a young man once
and gave him a couch in his townhouse here in town to help him when he first got into national
security affairs. That young man he put on his couch was none other than George Shultz, which
says something about his ability to see talent at a young age.
And there’s a lot of talent that comes through here and it looks very good to me from this point
of view. You all look like promising young men and women, because you’re all young compared to
me. (Laughter.)
But he was also a great and avid scholar. He was someone who studied issues. You could agree or
disagree with him but would not find him flat-footed intellectually.
And I bring this up because National Security Council Document or Report #68 was a guiding
light during the Cold War. It guided many things.
Was it perfect in hindsight? No, it was not. We don’t look for perfection from you young people,
we look for excellence.
He also served as our secretary of the Navy, so we do have a sense of ownership of the man for
whom this school is named.
The background that you have here makes this a fitting place to introduce our unclassified
summary of the classified document. You know, parts of it are classified because we owe a degree
of confidentiality to the troops who will carry out this strategy.
It is, as was noted by the dean, our nation’s first National Defense Strategy in 10 years. I believe
it’s a moral obligation for leaders to lay out clearly to the subordinates in the Department of
Defense what it is we expect of them.
It is designed to protect America’s vital national interests. And this defense strategy was framed,
as was noted by the dean, by President Trump’s National Security Strategy. And just a couple of
words out of that to show you what I mean that it was framed; that it is inside the framework of
that National Security Strategy.
Specifically, where it states that we’re to “protect the American people, the homeland and the
American way of life.” And it goes on to say “and to preserve peace through strength.” Those
are words out of the National Security Strategy and we carry those themes inside the Pentagon,
where we say, “What does that mean for us?”
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Of course, national security is much more than just defense; this is our part of the responsibility.
Today, America’s military reclaims an era of strategic purpose and we’re alert to the realities of a
changing world and attentive to the need to protect our values and the countries that stand with us.
America’s military protects our way of life and I want to point out it also protects a realm of ideas. It’s
not just about protecting geography. This is a defense strategy that will guide our efforts in all realms.
The world, to quote George Shultz, is awash in change, defined by increasing global volatility and
uncertainty with Great Power competition between nations becoming a reality once again. Though
we will continue to prosecute the campaign against terrorists that we are engaged in today, but Great
Power competition, not terrorism, is now the primary focus of U.S. national security.
This strategy is fit for our time, providing the American people the military required to protect
our way of life, stand with our allies, and live up to our responsibility to pass intact to the next
generation those freedoms that all of us enjoy here today.
Adapting to today’s realities, this strategy expands our competitive space, prioritizes preparedness
for war, provides clear direction for significant change at the speed of relevance, and builds a more
lethal force to compete strategically.
This strategy makes a clear-eyed appraisal of our security environment, with a keen eye on
America’s place in the world. This required some tough choices, ladies and gentlemen, and we
made them based upon a fundamental precept, namely that America can afford survival.
We face growing threats from revisionist powers as different as China and Russia are from each
other, nations that do seek to create a world consistent with their authoritarian models, pursuing
veto authority over other nations’ economic, diplomatic and security decisions.
Rogue regimes like North Korea and Iran persist in taking outlaw actions that threaten regional
and even global stability. Oppressing their own people and shredding their own people’s dignity
and human rights, they push their warped views outward.
And despite the defeat of ISIS’ physical caliphate, violent extremist organizations like ISIS
or Lebanese Hezbollah or al Qaida continue to sow hatred, destroying peace and murdering
innocents across the globe.
In this time of change, our military is still strong. Yet our competitive edge has eroded in every
domain of warfare, air, land, sea, space and cyberspace, and it is continuing to erode.
Rapid technological change, the negative impact on military readiness is resulting from the
longest continuous stretch of combat in our nation’s history and defense spending caps, because
we have been operating also for nine of the last 10 years under continuing resolutions that have
created an overstretched and under-resourced military.
Our military’s role is to keep the peace; to keep the peace for one more year, one more month,
one more week, one more day. To ensure our diplomats who are working to solve problems do so
from a position of strength and giving allies confidence in us. This confidence is underpinned by
the assurance that our military will win should diplomacy fail.
When unveiling his national security strategy, President Trump said, “Weakness is the surest path
to conflict, and unquestioned strength is the most certain means of defense.”
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Ladies and gentlemen, we have no room for complacency, and history makes clear that America
has no preordained right to victory on the battlefield. Simply, we must be the best if the values
that grew out of the Enlightenment are to survive.
It is incumbent upon us to field a more lethal force if our nation is to retain the ability to defend
ourselves and what we stand for. The defense strategy’s three primary lines of effort will restore
our comparative military advantage.
We’re going to build a more lethal force. We will strengthen our traditional alliances and building
new partnerships with other nations. And at the same time we’ll reform our department’s
business practices for performance and affordability.
In doing this, we will earn the trust of the American people and Congress, if their defense dollars
are well spent.
But let me go through each of the lines of effort. And I want to start with lethality, because
everything we do in the department must contribute to the lethality of our military.
The paradox of war is that an enemy will attack any perceived weakness. So we in America
cannot adopt a single preclusive form of warfare. Rather we must be able to fight across the
spectrum of conflict.
This means that the size and the composition of our force matters. The nation must field
sufficient capable forces to deter conflict. And if deterrence fails, we must win.
We will modernize key capabilities, recognizing we cannot expect success fighting tomorrow’s
conflicts with yesterday’s weapons or equipment. Investments in space and cyberspace, nuclear
deterrent forces, missile defense, advanced autonomous systems, and resilient and agile logistics
will provide our high-quality troops what they need to win.
Changing our forces’ posture will prioritize readiness for warfighting for major combat, making us
strategically predictable for our allies and operationally unpredictable for any adversary.
Increasing the lethality of our troops, supported by our defense civilians, requires us to reshape our
approach that managing our outstanding talent, reinvigorating our military education and honing
civilian workforce expertise.
The creativity and talent of the department is our deepest wellspring of strength, and one that
warrants greater investment.
And to those who would threaten America’s experiment in democracy, they must know: If you
challenge us it will be your longest and your worst day. Work with our diplomats; you don’t want
to fight the Department of Defense.
The second line of effort I noted was to strengthen alliances as we build new partnerships, as well.
In my past, I fought many times and never did I fight in a solely American formation. It was
always alongside foreign troops.
Now, as Winston Churchill once said, the only thing harder than fighting with allies is fighting
without them. But we are going to be stronger together in recognizing that our military will be
designed and trained and ready to fight alongside allies.
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History proves that nations with allies thrive, an approach to security and prosperity that has
served the United States well in keeping peace and winning war. Working by, with and through
allies who carry their equitable share allows us to amass the greatest possible strength.
We carried a disproportionate share of the defense burden for the democracies in the post-World
War II era. The growing economic strength of today’s democracies and partners dictates they
must now step up and do more.
When together we pool our resources and share responsibility for the common defense, individual
nations’ security burdens become lighter. This has been demonstrated right now, today, for
example, by over 70 nations and international organizations of the Defeat-ISIS campaign that is
successfully conducting operations in the Middle East. And again, the 40-odd nations that stand
shoulder-to-shoulder in NATO’s mission in Afghanistan.
To strengthen and work jointly with more allies, our organizations, processes and procedures must
be ally-friendly. The department will do more than just listen to other nations’ ideas. We will be
willing to be persuaded by them, recognizing that all not – that not all good ideas come from the
country with the most aircraft carriers.
This line of effort will bolster an extended network capable of decisively meeting the challenges
of our time. So we’re going to make the military more lethal, and we are going to build
and strengthen traditional alliances, as well as go out and find some new partners – maybe
nontraditional partners – as we do what the Greatest Generation did, coming home from World
War II, when they built the alliances that have served us so well, right through today.
Our third line of effort serves as the foundation for our competitive edge: reforming the business
practices of the department to provide both solvency and security, thereby gaining the full benefit
from every dollar spent, in which way we will gain and hold the trust of Congress and the
American people.
We are going to have to be good stewards of the tax dollars allocated to us, and that means results
and accountability matter.
To keep pace with our times, the department will transition to a culture of performance and
affordability that operates at the speed of relevance. Success does not go to the country that
develops a new technology first, but rather, to the one that better integrates it and more swiftly
adapts its way of fighting.
Our current bureaucratic processes are insufficiently responsive to the department’s needs for new
equipment. We will prioritize speed of delivery, continuous adaptation and frequent modular upgrades.
We must shed outdated management and acquisition practices, while adopting American
industry’s best practices. Our management structure and process are not engraved in stone. They
are a means to an end, empowering our warfighters with the knowledge, equipment and support
needed to fight and win.
If the current structures inhibit our pursuit of lethality, I expect the service secretaries and agency
heads to consolidate, eliminate or restructure to achieve the mission.
Deputy Secretary of Defense Shanahan is leading this third line of effort: to leverage the scale of
our operations, driving better deals for equipping our troops.
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This national defense strategy will guide all our actions, aligning the department’s three lines of
effort to gain synergies. But we recognize no strategy can long survive without necessary funding
and the stable, predictable budgets required to defend America in the modern age.
Failure to modernize our military risks leaving us with a force that could dominate the last war,
but be irrelevant to tomorrow’s security. Let me be clear: As hard as the last 16 years have been
on our military, no enemy in the field has done more to harm the readiness of the U.S. military
than the combined impact of the Budget Control Act’s defense spending cuts, worsened by
us operating, 9 of the last 10 years, under continuing resolutions, wasting copious amounts of
precious taxpayer dollars.
Today, as our competitive edge over our foes erodes due to budgetary confusion, even with storm
clouds gathering, America’s military, as I speak, is operating under yet another continuing resolution.
For too long, we have asked our military to stoically carry a “success at any cost” attitude as they
work tirelessly to accomplish the mission with now inadequate and misaligned resources, simply
because the Congress could not maintain regular order.
That we have performed well is a credit to our wonderful and loyal troops, but loyalty must be a
two-way street. We expect the magnificent men and women of our military to be faithful in their
service, even when going in harm’s way. We must remain faithful to those who voluntarily sign a
blank check, payable to the American people with their lives.
As Speaker Ryan said yesterday, quote, “Our men and women in uniform are not bargaining chips.”
The consequences of not providing a budget are clear: Without a sustained budget, ships will not
receive the required maintenance to put to sea; the ships already at sea will be extended outside
of port; aircraft will remain on the ground, their pilots not at the sharpest edge; and eventually,
eventually ammunition, training and manpower will not be sufficient to deter war.
But I am optimistic that Congress will do the right thing and carry out their responsibility. I may
be in the minority in this room, when I say that – (Laughter.) – but I’m an eternal optimist.
And as Senator Reid said last November, “We need bipartisan investment in our troops to
enhance military readiness and help us meet evolving national security challenges.”
Under our Constitution, it is Congress that has the authority to raise armies and to maintain
navies. Yet as I stand here this morning, watching the news, as we all are, from Capitol Hill, we’re
on the verge of a government shutdown or, at best, yet another debilitating continuing resolution.
We need Congress back in the driver’s seat of budget decisions, not in the spectator seat of
Budget Control Acts’ indiscriminate and automatic cuts. We need a budget and we need budget
predictability if we’re to sustain our military’s primacy.
Now, many of us in this room were born free, here in America, completely by accident. All of us
can live here by choice, thanks to the veterans and the patriots who serve today in our military.
Yet we today have an obligation to pass intact to the next generation the same freedoms we enjoy
right now.
That’s an obligation that we have. That’s not something we can simply abrogate to someone else.
And I believe that this strategy, resourced appropriately, will ensure we live up to our
responsibility to our children’s generation.
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So with that, ladies and gentlemen, and the dean did say he was going to help me answer the questions.
So thanks very much for that – (Laughter.) – what I recognize is a slip of the tongue, but in this town
that can get you into a lot of trouble, and I speak with authority on that. (Laughter.)
So – but ladies and gentlemen, let’s see where we’re at. Let’s have a dialogue now.
Again, this is – we serve you. This is your strategy as much as it’s ours. We had a responsibility to
write it, and it’s up to us to be able to defend it intellectually, alongside you and in the face of any
questions you have. So let’s hear what’s on your mind.
Now, where’s Katherine at? She’s somewhere around here.
MODERATOR: Thank you for your remarks, Secretary Mattis. My name is Katherine
Standbridge. I’m a second-year M.A. student here at SAIS, and I’ll be reading the questions that
have been submitted by the audience.
So our first question: “Building capability and capacity are challenging to achieve at the same
time. Do you see one of these as being more important in the near term?”
SEC. MATTIS: Yes. Very good question.
So capabilities are what does the force bring? And you look at every capability in a force, you
look at changing times, what are the threats. We try to define the threats to what I would call a
Jesuit’s level of satisfaction, which is tough indeed. And at that point, we then determine, do we
need additional capabilities?
Then you have capacity. In other words, how big is the force that you have.
I believe, at this time, in this age, that emphasizing the capabilities that the force brings is
probably the predominant effort that you’ve got to make.
At the same time, capacity, the size of your force, makes a difference. There are nations that have
stood by us for years and to whom we look many times for support. And some of those forces
have been shrunk to a point that they no longer allow their diplomats to speak with strength.
So we have to make certain we keep a force of sufficient size. But my emphasis right now is on
building the capacity. Do we have the cyber troops in there? Do we have the intelligence analysts
in there that allow us to be at the top of the game when we make that grave choice to send our
young folks into the – into a fight?
MODERATOR: Thank you.
Next question: How does the NDS intend to modernize U.S. forces and prepare the U.S. for a
conflict with some of the world’s rising powers?
SEC. MATTIS: Well, what – first of all, you’ve got to accept the reality. You have to look – with
reality of what the world looks like, and what are those challenges to our way of life.
There is nothing in here that presupposes war. The whole point – and you saw it well
demonstrated with the NATO alliance. For how many years did NATO stand strong, all the
democracies together from Europe and North America? How long did we stand together? And
what was a Cold War never became a hot war on the plains of Europe.
So the point is, how do we create a military that is that compelling? And what you have to do
is you have to take the threats as they stand. You have to make certain you’re integrated with
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the State Department’s foreign policies, so we’re operating with very much a depth to our State
Department – not outside the State Department’s foreign policy, but inside it.
And so it starts with me having breakfast every week with Secretary of State Tillerson. And we
talk two, three times a day, sometimes. We settle all of our issues between he and I, and then we
walk together into the White House meetings. That way, State and Defense are together.
And this allows us, as we look at a military that must adapt to its times, we also are in step with
the foreign policy. You do not want to get detached from that and think that you’re just going to
automatically serve the needs of our country.
Then, when you get down to the discrete elements of military power, it’s a much more
straightforward process, to tell you the truth. You look at what capabilities other countries
have. You look at what technology is bringing on board. You put it together. You prioritize,
based on the threat analysis that is done both inside the Pentagon, but that is never enough; I
want an outside view as well, and that’s why we have a very close link with the CIA and foreign
intelligence services.
And then we also have officers assigned to other nations’ armed forces, or on duty in our embassies
around the world, and they are also feeding from our friends – they’re feeding more ideas in, and
certainly, they’re keeping us updated on what they’re seeing of potential adversary systems.
So you put it together in that manner, and then it becomes like a Rubik’s Cube. As you move
defensive and offensive capabilities together, you work with allies – I’m on my way to Brussels
here, in a couple weeks, to work with our allies again, as we look at what we call NATO capability
gaps. They’re not all going to be filled by us. Some of them are going to be filled by others, and
that’s the way it should be when democracies band together to defend the principles we stand on.
So it’s an analysis, and then it’s an assignment of priority, and then it’s an allocation of resources.
If you don’t get the resources – my closing words – then your strategy is nothing more than a
hallucination, because, without the resources, there’s just so much brave young men and women
can do.
Continuing in a similar vein, how well linked is the NDS to the budgets and activities of the
State Department and civilian agencies?
SEC. MATTIS: Yes, it is somewhat linked. Again, I do not take any – I’m leaving to visit
Indonesia and Vietnam this weekend, and before I go, I sit down with Secretary Tillerson, and
he actually sends to me in writing, at some point after we’ve talked, what are the foreign policy
parameters, what are the priorities he has while I’m visiting those countries.
I think that probably the most important thing is to ensure that, in everything we say and in
everything we do, we are reinforcing our diplomats. That’s the way it works when you’re doing
foreign policy, and we’re an instrument of foreign policy.
As some of our tough young men put it, we do the last 600 meters of foreign policy. And that’s a
fair statement in terms of – we’re there, first of all, to back up the diplomats. And then, you know,
if push comes to shove and we’re unable to avert – you know, basically avert war, or we end up in
one, then we carry it forward.
But our job, even then, is to develop something better for peace. It’s not just to fight a war. It’s
for a political reason. That’s established by State.
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We do work together. I have some development money that’s allotted to me by the U.S. Congress
because of where we operate around the world. When we spend that money, already at the
highest levels of State and Defense Department, we have sat down and prioritized that money
together. We don’t go off and spend that money without State Department helping with the pen
to say “what are the priorities that we have?”
And, again continuing on this track, how is the DOD working to encourage allies and partners to
build up their own defense capabilities?
SEC. MATTIS: It’s – that’s actually going better than I expected. I came here – I remember
flying out of Denver – I kind of was flying in here to go in to confirmation. And I was trying to
think of how do I put “America first” into, in my mind, an alliance framework.
And, as we were getting on – ready to take off, you know what happened. You all can recite
it from memory. The stewardess was standing there, and she said, “In the event we lose cabin
pressure” – you know what’s coming next, every one of you, don’t you? (Laughter.) “When the
masks drop, put your own mask on first, then help others.”
So what we’re going to do is restore America’s economic viability, because no nation in history has
maintained its military power that was not economically viable and did not keep its fiscal house in order.
So the first thing was, when I went into Brussels on my first meeting there with the most critical
alliance we have, which is the 29 nations of NATO, I said – I used that example, and I said, “But
I’ve got to tell you” – I said, “that I’m speaking from the heart.”
I knew many of them. I’d been a Supreme Allied Commander in NATO in a previous job, and I
said, “I know many of you here.” I said, “I have sat behind Secretary Rumsfeld, when he came here
and said you’re going to have to pay more, you can’t expect the Americans to keep doing this.”
I said, “I’ve heard Secretary Gates put his prepared remarks down and tell you he needs to lay this
on the line, that the American people do not want to continue to carry a disproportionate share.”
And I said, “You have heard it from President Obama’s administration. I’ve been here and I’ve
heard it said then. And now it’s manifested politically in America, so here’s the bottom line.
“Please do not ask me to go back and tell Americans that they – the American parents that they
need to care more about the safety and security and the freedom of your children than you’re
willing to care for, that you’re willing to sacrifice for.
“We’re all going to have to put our shoulder to the wagon, and move it up the hill.”
Surprisingly, I did not lose the rapport that I really – I would lose rapport with some of them. I
mean, that’s a – that’s a hard message. But I wanted to put it in human terms, because this is a
human situation we’re talking about.
I don’t think that the values that grew out of the Enlightenment are something that simply exist
in isolation and don’t need to be defended. And there’s enough other things going on in the
world. We can see this.
So the argument is made for itself. The argument is made for itself. The CIA briefed me, when I
came in, that my first crisis would probably be somewhere in the Korean Peninsula. My first trip
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overseas – went to Tokyo and Seoul, and I will tell you, there are two nations that are doing a lot
for their own defense, and we’re very tightly bonded. It’s a trusted relationship.
So it’s actually going well. The message has been received in positive terms. I do not have
antagonistic or adversary terms with any of our traditional allies. And we have new allies who are
eager to start working military-to-military with us at this time.
So, so far, it’s going okay. But, of course, these are all democracies, by and large, we’re dealing with,
and they have their own constituencies inside each country. That’s a political reality – all politics are
local, whether you’re in the United States, or you’re in, you know, Poland or anywhere else.
But, so far, I’m very encouraged by what I’ve seen, and we could not be better served than by
Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, there in Brussels, with our primary alliance. And the way he
leads that alliance is one where we all have to work together and do our fair share.
Next question: How can the military institutionalize and preserve counterinsurgency lessons from
Iraq and Afghanistan, as we shift to a greater focus on near-peer rivals, like China and Russia?
SEC. MATTIS: Yes. If I was to sum up the challenge that we have inside the department in
carrying out this strategy, it’s threefold.
It’s how do we maintain a safe and effective nuclear deterrent, so those weapons are never used?
It’s a nuclear deterrent. It’s not a warfighting capability, unless it’s the worst day in our nation or
the world’s history. So that’s the first one – priority – a safe and effective nuclear deterrent.
Number two is how do you field, in the modern age, a decisive conventional force? It’s expensive.
We recognize that. But it’s less expensive than fighting a war with somebody who thought that
we were weak enough that they could take advantage.
And the third is, at the same time as we field that conventional force, how do you sustain a
counterinsurgency capability inside your force? And why do I say that? I go back to the words of
the most near-faultless strategist alive today, Dr. Colin Gray of Reading University, who said, “The
paradox of war being” – and I said it in my – in my prepared remarks – “that the enemy will always
move against your perceived weakness, we cannot marry adopt one preclusive form of warfare” – say
we’re not going to do counterinsurgency, because you know what’s going to happen.
And so we are going to have to do it – I see it as a – it is, relatively, a training and education issue.
It doesn’t take a lot of specialized kit – there’s some – but it takes language skills. It takes young
men and women who want to join up and serve their country who have studied other nations,
who speak the language. It takes not just cultural appreciation, but it takes the kind of training
that puts an awful lot of authority in the hands of 20-year-old corporals and 24-year-old, 23-year-
old second lieutenants.
Now, those forces, in that labor-intensive kind of warfare, scatter among innocent people. And we
fight those wars so obviously among the innocent that it takes a very well-trained, well-honed force.
But it’s mostly training and it’s mostly education that allows us to keep counterinsurgency inside
the great power competition force that we are composing.
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With cybersecurity a rising concern in both public and private sectors, how does the NDS plan to
address strengthening U.S. cybersecurity measures?
SEC. MATTIS: Right. If you look back, put it in historical terms, ladies and gentlemen, we
began fighting on the ground, I don’t know, 5,000 years ago – about the first time somebody
envied something somebody else had, I guess.
We went to sea and went maritime probably about, I don’t know, 4,000 years ago. Then, about
100 years ago – a little over a hundred years ago, World War I, we went into the air domain.
And then – so we had a couple thousand years for a couple of them. We’ve had a hundred
years to incorporate air. And now, in a matter of a little more than a decade, really, we’ve added
cyberspace and outer space as potential warfighting – as warfighting domains. It’s the way we
must look at it, since we’re your sentinels, we’re your sentries who guard America. We have to
look at it that way.
In cyber, what we are going to do is reorganize. I told you we’re reorganizing the department to
a degree. You’re going to see reorganization of the fundamental organizations. The U.S. Cyber
Command and the National Security Agency – they will be organized along different lines.
We are going to have to, then, resource them in education, with training programs, recruiting
programs and mission statements so that the reorganized forces are working together, because this
is a Wild West right now. As you know, people in their bedrooms can be doing things that are
causing your bank account dire problems, at this point.
So I would just tell you, it’s going to have to look at this problem much more broadly than the
department has looked at problems in the past. And that means we have to be relevant to the
security of everyone who’s looking at me right now, not just relevant to our forces in the battlefield
in some overseas land.
What that means: I’ve got to get some really bright people in. And we’ve got them on our
Defense Innovation Board. They come out of places like Silicon Valley, and they are the top of
the line. And they are an enormous help as we craft the specifics to this.
But most of all it’s that we have got to absorb now, this is a mission, and we can’t say, “We’d just like
to have our airplanes and our tanks and our ships. We don’t want to get into that messy thing.”
Now, where this takes us, there’s a lot of things we have to look at. Our founding fathers,
on cyber, were very, very – (Laughter.) – they obviously anticipated things. And what is it?
Remember? Life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Think. They knew that, in protecting
life, we also had to be protecting liberty.
And how do we protect life, if cyber could shut down all the power in a part of our country that
would kill people in hospitals or paralyze economies that are required to keep people alive, and
that sort of thing?
How do we deal with that, when that’s not what you and I would call a military mission? Matter
of fact, we have laws that prohibit us – and we are proud of those laws – from doing certain things
in this country. You don’t see any military person arresting anybody in this country – not our –
not our authority under the Constitution.
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So what are we going to do in an area that was not addressed other than thematically, that we
must keep our constitutional rights alive even as we protect our people? And that’s going to be
something that I will not decide. You will all be helping us decide that, because we will need you
involved in this.
I mean, what do we do? Do we decide we’ll put up a domain, and if somebody wants to, they can
go inside it and we’ll have a military force trying to protect that domain? And if you put your
account and your bank account in there, you get protection? And someone who thinks that we’re
up to no good, says, “I’m not getting in that” – that’s okay – freedom of choice, right?
So where are we going to go with this? I need to get some more people in to structure this
thematically, so we lay out choices for you and see what our Congress decides is the right level of
military involvement or what we have to offer there.
It’s a very complex issue. For right now, I’m focused mostly on just making certain that our
military can fight, and supporting FBI and others when we spot a problem coming in from
overseas. We will pick it up, and we notify the law enforcement agencies now.
But there’s a lot more to be done, ladies and gentlemen, and I have not got that defined yet. Inside
the military, we’re good to go to; we know what we have to do. More broadly, I’m not sure yet.
MODERATOR: Thank you, Secretary Mattis.
One last question: Will a government shutdown have serious ramifications on military
operations? And, if so, what are your plans for mitigation?
SEC. MATTIS: Yes. (Laughter.)
Let me give you an example. This morning or last night, young guys and gals somewhere in
Wyoming were driving off to do their weekend duty. There’s any number of projects we have
underway that keep me at the top of my game, and our military at the top of our game, that are
handled by civilians. All these things are going to be disrupted.
Those troops who arrive there at their armories, by the way, and told, “Go home,” if there’s a
government shutdown, and they will then drive a couple hundred miles back home – these are –
these, again, are stoic young men and women.
They’ll suck it up, and they’ll say, “Okay.” If they’re Navy reservists, they’ll say, “Aye, aye, sir,” cheerfully.
And, when they get in their car they may not mutter something quite so positive. (Laugher.)
I would just tell you, there will be – our maintenance activities will probably pretty much shut
down. We will not be able to induct any more of our gear, our – that need maintenance.
Over 50 percent altogether of my civilian workforce will be furloughed, and that’s going to impact
our contracting. It will impact, obviously, our medical facilities. It’s got a huge morale impact, I’ll
just tell you.
How long can you keep good people around when something like this happens, is always a
question that’s got to hover in the back of my mind.
I would just tell you that we do a lot of intelligence operations around the world, and they cost
money. Those, obviously, would stop. And I would just tell you that training for almost our entire
reserve force will stop.
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And you must understand the critical importance of our reserves. They’re the only shock absorber
we have. It’s not like the old days, where you could draft somebody in and, 18 weeks later, have
them in combat with the skills they need.
Today’s infantrymen – they’re called infantrymen because they’re infant soldiers, young soldiers
– they still take a year to train in order to have them ready to use the gear they have on them and
make certain they have the ethical and tactical abilities to deal with the battlefield today.
So it’s got a terrible impact. At the same time, the submarine that was put to sea last week will
still be out for three months and, God bless them, the lads will not have any e-mail connectivity,
so they will not even know what’s going on as they cruise quietly out there, carrying out their
duties. The ships at sea will continue. The ones – our lads in Iraq and Afghanistan, who are in
the fight, will continue. The young ladies who are guiding the drones right now will stay at their
desks and keep them overhead.
So we will continue what we’re doing. But the value of the American military is grossly enhanced
by the sense that the American model of government – of the people, by the people, for the
people – can function and carry out its governmental responsibilities.
We’re not – I didn’t serve in the Marine Corps for 40-odd years. I served in the U.S. Marine
Corps – belong to you, accountable to you, as Speaker Ryan pointed out here. For those out there
right now, in the field, at sea, in the air, the ones sitting in the ready room over here at Andrews
Air Force Base, I’d just tell you that they deserve – they deserve full support. And we have got to
come to grips with this as a nation.
Why don’t we take one more? Katherine, you choose.
MODERATOR: Absolutely. This final question: How would the U.S. deter adversaries in
space, as space itself becomes (off mic)?
SEC. MATTIS: Yes, how do we deter in space? It’s philosophically – or basically in the same
way that we would deter anyone else. Don’t try it, because we can do more damage to you than
any benefit you could gain.
So it comes down to that. But what that means is we’ve got to have capabilities to deny them
what they want to achieve. In this regard, it’s not just about what you might think – of guns in
space shooting each other.
It could be nothing more than, “We have – for every satellite up, we have 100 more this big that
we could launch, so it’s just faster (inaudible) out. By the way, we’re going to take you down in the
United Nations and we’re going to get economic sanctions.”
In other words, there’s a way to raise – this is what I mentioned, expanding the competitive space.
There’s no nation that has a wider competitive space, in terms of its moral or ethical or economic
or military power, than we can amass, if we choose to use it wisely.
And so in space, we will do our best to deter. We’ll come up, I’m sure, with arms control
agreements at some point, and we’ll start getting this under control. But, for right now, it’s sizing
up the problem and making certain, again, that our diplomats will be negotiating from a position
of strength, when they negotiate on that.
Ladies and gentlemen, let me just say thank you for taking time, again, to hear me out this
morning. I hope it was of some value, and that the questions, especially – I thought were – by the
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way, Katherine, thank you for selecting however you did. I know you had more than that, but the
questions, I thought, were very good.
And I would just encourage all of you, if you think we’re missing something or on the wrong
track, by all means, notify us.
There’s ways to get a hold of us, through our public affairs, and I get those. It’s not all love mail, when I
get it, I assure you. (Laughter.) I didn’t realize my parentage involved that, at times. (Laughter.)
But I would just tell you this is a raucous democracy and our troops stand ready right now, as
we’re all sitting here enjoying freedoms we somewhat – even I – take for granted.
They’re out there, right now, ready to do whatever it takes to keep us – keep us safe. So please
keep them in your thoughts and prayers, and know that they represent the very best of us. They’re
wonderful, and they really did sign that check, payable with their lives – a blank check – to every
one of you.
So thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen. I look forward to hearing from you. (Applause.)
-END-
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Secretary Mattis&#39;s Philosophy and Guidance

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Secretary Mattis’ Leadership

Philosophy and Guidance H 2018

I. Select Overarching Documents

II. Select Memorandums to the Department

III. Select Remarks

Leadership = Competence + Authentic Character

Clearly convey your intent to unleash subordinates’ initiative and aggressiveness.

Run the ethical midfield.

On Alliances and Partnerships

Friends need tending, and we need friends.

You can’t drink your own whiskey.

If left unsung, the noblest deeds will die.

There is a unique dignity to those who serve in our Armed Forces.

– Senator John McCain

General George Washington

In CENTCOM we don’t blindly follow service doctrine.

– General John Abizaid

The incommunicable experience of war.

– Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

– Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

– Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

– General Joshua Chamberlain

– General Creighton Abrams

A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives.

– Jackie Robinson’s Epitaph

Sometimes a man of war is the best ambassador.

The better angels of our nature.

– Bayard Taylor, The Song of the Camp, 1856

– Crosby, Stills, and Nash

In great deeds, something abides.

– Colonel Joshua Chamberlain (Little Round Top, Battle of Gettysburg)

– General William Sherman (1865)

– Prayer that Eleanor Roosevelt carried in her wallet

Sharpening the American Military’s Competitive Edge

DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE OBJECTIVES

Defense objectives include:

 Defending the homeland from attack;

Be strategically predictable, but operationally unpredictable. Deterring or defeating long-term strategic

 First, rebuilding military readiness as we build a more lethal Joint Force;

Build a More Lethal Force

 Talent management. Developing leaders who are competent in national-level decision-making

 Civilian workforce expertise. A modern, agile, information-advantaged Department requires a

Strengthen Alliances and Attract New Partners

Reform the Department for Greater Performance and Affordability

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Secretary Mattis's Philosophy and Guidance

Secretary Mattis's Philosophy and Guidance