ALCOA, Tenn. – U.S. Air Force Maj. Gen. Duke Pirak, acting director of the Air National Guard, and Chief Master Sgt. Joshua D. Moore, command chief of the Air Guard, hosted Air Guard wing commanders and senior enlisted leaders from around the nation for the Wing Leader Fly-In event at McGhee Tyson Air National Guard Base, Tenn., April 23-24.
Wing Leadership Fly-In brought together senior leaders assigned to each of the 90 wings across the United States’ 50 states, three territories and the District of Columbia to collaborate on ideas and provide input on critical matters affecting the future of the Air Guard.
“We’re building an Air National Guard where all of our deployable combat wings will have the capability to autonomously pick up, go downrange, establish a base, support life for Airmen on that base, generate air power and defend the base all at the same time,” Pirak said. “That’s a huge leap [from supporting predictable, rotational deployments] and that means we have a readiness expectation that’s much more ambitious than we’ve had in the past.”
This year’s event, “ANG Ready 2027—Getting Units of Action Right,” emphasized that to maintain combat-ready forces capable of meeting today’s dynamic strategic environment, Air Guard leaders must be laser-focused on preparing Airmen for the fight.
As part of its new force presentation construct, the Department of the Air Force is transitioning how it deploys its forces from a crowd-sourced model to one in which Airmen from the same installation deploy together as part of a mission-ready Unit of Action. The change acknowledges the need for Airmen to train together and build team cohesion to arrive in theater as a lethal team ready to operate in environments that will likely be more contested than the past two decades.
“I am singularly focused on wartime readiness,” Pirak said when explaining his priorities. “There are three pillars to that. We must develop our people. We must modernize and recapitalize. We must unleash the innovative power of our Airmen.”
Pirak emphasized that empowering Airmen to make decisions at the lowest level during large-scale, multi-domain exercises alongside joint partners will prepare them for future fights.
“For very practical reasons, we often train on our own installations,” Pirak said. “However, that’s not enough. We must put our Airmen in situations where they’re working with their joint brethren to take risks together and make micro-tactical decisions in a very demanding environment. This is how we learn to survive and operate together in contested environments.”
During a leadership panel, the Air Guard’s senior enlisted leaders discussed using mission command when leading their formations in potentially contested, degraded or operationally limited environments.
“Mission command is an invitation for you to take your commander’s intent and decide what’s most important for your formation … and get prepared for what may come,” said Senior Enlisted Advisor John Raines, SEA to the chief of the National Guard Bureau, during a senior enlisted leadership panel. “In the worst case scenario: the war fight. When we’re there and the bullets are flying, you don’t have time to find your commander and say, ‘Here’s what I want to do.’ They’ve already given you that permission.”
Pirak emphasized the significance of honing Airmen’s seamless coordination and collaboration with the different branches of the military to successfully operate and fight as an integrated joint team across all domains.
“There’s no fight that won’t be a joint fight,” Pirak said.
With approximately 108,000 Airmen and 325,000 Soldiers in its ranks, the National Guard is accustomed to working side-by-side with its joint partners.
“The National Guard’s seamless integration across the Joint Force is critical to our success and part of what makes us stronger together and stronger tomorrow,” said U.S. Air Force Gen. Steve Nordhaus, chief of the National Guard Bureau. “Our nation faces persistent threats both in the homeland and abroad. The men and women of the National Guard collectively form an elite and lethal warfighting and response force that is postured to support the war fight and to defend our nation.”
While topics included implementing changes centered on developing Airmen, modernization and recapitalization, and unleashing innovation, conversations boiled down to one thing: We must move forward with a sense of urgency to maintain wartime readiness.
“At the end of the day, our ultimate job is to win our nation’s wars,” Moore said. “That aspect of what we do needs to be ingrained a little more. Our responsibilities as senior non-commissioned officers are to make sure our Airmen understand their role in a contested, combat environment, ensuring they are prepared and resilient through the challenges that will come, and leading them through that space.”
While speaking directly to the Air Guard’s commanders and senior enlisted leaders during the keynote address, Nordhaus and Raines emphasized the significance of preparing to fight and win should deterrence fail.
“Our nation is asking us to do the hard things,” Nordhaus said. “To be strong, ready and resilient. It starts in your local communities. It starts in your home units. It starts with you.”