The effects of sequestration on weapons systems sustainment and the Flying Hour Program will not disappear on the first of October with the new fiscal year.

I was encouraged to note that the F-35 program was fully funded in both the research and development and the procurement accounts for fiscal year 2014.

Like the Air Force, Naval air forces require inventories of precision air-to-air and air-to-ground munitions.

when you have the Commandant of the Marine Corps yesterday saying that with the President's direction to take our military strategy from two major contingency operations down to one...

the military that we have now and that we have been able to conduct operations with will not be the military that we have at the end of sequestration and the significant budget cuts if we allow them to all go into place.

What actions are the F-35 Joint Program Office and the Department of the Navy taking to reduce F-35 life-cycle costs?

The total Department of the Navy strike fighter shortfall is 18 aircraft in approximately 2023.

And if we continue down that road and focus on readiness only for today, then we will be, 10 years from now, we will be with the same equipment, 10 years older, in a lesser readiness level than we are now.

Turner, Hon. Michael R., a Representative from Ohio, Chairman, Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces.

the program still faces a number of challenges going forward, it has taken positive steps to address risk in these areas.

In your statement you describe a decreased fighter force structure of 1,900 total fighter aircraft as 'an increased risk' to carry out the National Military Strategy.

Your written testimony notes that the Marine Corps may experience elevated operational risk in the 2020s if the predicted strike fighter shortfall comes to fruition.

The sooner we can stabilize training, modernization, and munitions funding, the sooner we can ensure that we are on the track to fulfill our Nation's requirements now and in the future.

I have to worry about what the budgets and the outyear budget numbers will do to our ability to continue to ramp up our production on F-35 and replace some of these aging airplanes.

We really are looking what had always been identified as a critical path to both maintain current capabilities and obtain future capabilities to respond to emerging threats and capabilities of adversaries.

sequestration cuts to Air Force modernization will impact every one of the Air Force's investment programs, creating inefficiencies, raising unit costs, and delaying delivery of valued capabilities to warfighters in the field.

if I am a business person, I am not in business if I sell each of those planes at $90 million apiece.

In your statement you note that initial operational capability (IOC) dates have not been determined by leadership...

Throughout history, insurgencies have seldom been defeated by foreign forces. Instead, they have been ultimately beaten by indigenous forces.

I would like to emphasize the troubling effects of sequester that we have on our current and future readiness.

I think we all need to be mindful of one fact, and that is that one nation that plays very prominently in our defense strategy recently flew two new stealth aircraft within a 22-month period.

You noted in your written testimony that the majority of the $1.32 billion across the Future Years Defense Program for F-16 modernization will focus on the service life extension program (SLEP) and the combat avionics programmed extension…

I opposed the effects that this has on individuals and that there are people who have kids in college, house payments to make, family vacations that are being cancelled.

I want to commend General Harding. He has done an excellent job on the Special Victims' Counsel Program.

I want to echo the statements of Rob Bishop concerning the importance of the Air Force as we look to the crisis that we are currently in.