Defeating Threats in Indo-PACOM
-Lt. Gen. Kevin B. Schneider, Air Force Director of Staff
– Brig. Gen. Anthony J. Mastalir, Commander, United States Space Forces Indo Pacific
– Col. Sugiyama Kimitoshi, Commander, Space Operations Group, Japan Air Self Defense Force
– Col. Jongseo “Jay” Park, Air & Space Attache, Embassy of the Republic of Korea
– Moderator: Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg, USAF (Ret.), Executive Vice President, Air & Space Forces Association
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
refired in space. What you see on this panel is representative of the integration of air, space and allied power to challenge the destabilizing behavior of China, North Korea and Russia and a region that connects the economic powerhouse, the East Asia to the newer guide on vism of South Asia. Please welcome my guests. First to my left. And your right Brigadier General Anthony Chachi McAleer commander of the United States Space Forces Indo Pacific to his left. Thank you. To his left is Colonel Sugiyama Kimi Toshi, Commander of the Space Operations Group. Japan air Self Defense Force. To his left is Brigadier General select Colonel David Ajax Brooklyn, Pacific Air Force’s Chief of Staff and power. Phillip dance Dancing with the Stars already. To his left is Colonel Jamsil J. Park, Air and Space attache embassy of the Republic of Korea. Let’s get going. General Basler Chachi set the scene for us please sir, over the past decade, China’s rapidly developed into a major international space power, effectively multiplying its number of on orbit satellites tenfold. So first of all, how do you address the growing competition space? And with a second follow up question really? What measures are being taken to ensure space superiority? Hey, thanks,
Brig Gen Mastalir
Doug. I appreciate that. And first of all, congratulations to Air and Space Forces association because tripling in size in one year. Are you kidding me? I mean, that’s all that’s better than the POC. Where did he go? Yeah,
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
just hold on. He gets a free T shirt.
Brig Gen Mastalir
Now they say, oh, that’s Thank you. That’s all I had to do. All right. We’re gonna we’re gonna have a little fun, but this is a serious issue, as we’ve heard all morning, all day yesterday. This is a you know, some some of my folks asked me, What are we going to exploit should we expect when we talk about re optimizing for great power competition? And I said you you are part of the RE optimization for great power competition Space Forces Indo Pacific Space Forces Korea, and soon Space Forces Japan. This is part of bringing presenting forces to combatant commanders. And starting in the Indo Pacific, where the pacing threat is most acute. Now, when we when we stood up, it was very clear that we were not there. Let me put it this way. We were there to ensure a free and open Indo Pacific to uphold the rules based international order. And when you really think about it, what you know what does that mean this is this is the the rules based international order has underscored prosperity for every nation. That chooses to participate, including the PRC. When you think about the every positive growth metric, from you know, the life expectancy, levels of poverty, numbers of free democratic nations, from post World War Two today, that is the evidence of the power of the rules based international order. And that is why it is so critical that we alongside with our allies, come together and enforce this order and in in and speak out against malign behavior that looks to upset that awesome
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
Colonel like totally every so often that no Colonel gave me sorry for your audience. And from your perspective as a space group commander. You know what do you see as the current security environment surrounding Japan? Then I’m going to give you another question after that, but let me just tell you in advance what type of threats in the space domain do you think are the greatest common concern to the US, Japan and the Republic of Korea? Sure.
Col Sugiyama Kimitoshi
Thank you very much. It’s already had no luck. First of all, ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much for this opportunity. It’s my great honor to be here as a panelist on behalf of Kaku, JTAG Japan, so different spots but to your first question, the current security situation surrounding Japan is really severe and complex. We let go next. Remember that Asia is a most densely concentrated area of large military forces like China, Russia, North Korea, and so forth with nuclear weapons, so it’s very hot and complex. So, this is a really tough challenge. We look at this and also the activities are expanding, not even in the space domain. So we have to watch it closely. Above the second question. And greatest concern in space when we recognize it is attack against satellites because the Indo Pacific Area is so vast so the Space Systems is vitally important. So we have to ensure the security usage of satellites. Its wide, not only communication, best navigation and so forth, our society heavily rely on space capability. So we have to ensure the state so the attack against the satellites, interference is really young. So we have to closely watch it. That’s my
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
Ajax. Let’s go open up the aperture now it’s time to go wide from your vantage point leading the pack cache staff you know, particularly as the error component to pay comm. How does pacap Proceed the current security challenges in the Pacific region? I’ve got a follow up question then. Okay.
Brig Gen Berkland
As far as the scenario, the situation in the region we’re obviously very concerned with increasingly provocative and assertive behavior by the PRC primarily. In terms of you know, what we are doing a botnet attack at Pacific Air Forces. You know, everything we try to do in the Pacific is aimed at being joint all domain and multilateral. I think you could, you know, kind of get a glimpse of that just by looking at the panel up here today. This is kind of a snapshot of a day the life path we try to team up you know, if you go at it alone, pretty confident on your Pacific Air Forces capabilities right now to ensure that we maintain our overmatch. But when we couple what we have in Pacific Air Forces with the joint with the Joint Force capabilities, and then you leverage allies and partners on top of that, we really do have a serious, asymmetrical advantage in the Pacific. So that’s how we’re going about our integrated deterrence efforts in PAC AF is, is again, a snapshot of this panel being joint multidomain and multilateral in everything that we can do.
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
We have a new pack excavator with Gerald Schneider just coming on board on Friday. holistically, we’re now seeing combined Chinese and Russian aircraft formations and their probe in the Korean Air Defense Identification Zone. That’s been as recent as December unless you want to up the game on this one. But are we seeing an increase in Russia, China kind of joint exercising in the theater?
Brig Gen Berkland
You know, what we’re seeing is just an overall increase, I think in provocative behavior from the PRC, and whether it’s in the last couple of months or over just the past few years that that I’ve been in PAC AF definitely on the uptick in terms of that type of behavior. You know, I think it indicates as opposed to the discussion we’re having up here, and general Schneider had open dialogue with multiple members of the media this morning. That kind of stuff isn’t happening in Beijing, those conversations are not happening. And when it comes to choosing allies and partners, I don’t think they have a whole lot of options. So they choose those allies and partners out of out of necessity and pragmatism, whereas we choose our allies and partners out of out of shared values. Values that General masliah hit on in terms of, you know, freedom, basic freedoms and human rights and economic prosperity. We don’t want anyone to have to pick aside we really want to harness free and open Indo Pacific to let everyone benefit from from that scenario.
Brig Gen Mastalir
If I could just pile on the AJAX talked about the multilateral exercises and whatnot multidomain in quite frankly, from a space perspective, we kind of look to the air component because they’ve been doing this for a long time and in many ways, space is trying to, you know, trying to mirror what we see in the other domains in terms of flying together, steaming together, fighting together. And so to have Colonel Sugiyama and Colonel Park and by the way, congratulations to Colonel joy and finishing his his tour as the rock ass space through look forward to Colonel Chang coming on board but the these are the folks that are going to be fighting and exercising alongside of us in Space Forces Indo Pacific and Space Forces Korea and Space Force is Japan. And in many ways we have got to you know, cement these relationships make make this alliance even stronger than it is today. And we can look to our air partners as an example of how to do that.
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
Let’s be honest storage Greta is already launched for cruise missiles this year alone, each capable of causing significant harm to allied forces, the trilateral cooperation between the United States South Korea and Japan is critical to defeating cross border and regional threats. So directly asking you what is your country’s assessment in particular, of the North Korean threat? And then I’ll have another question to follow.
Col. Jongseo “Jay” Park
First of all, before diving into the questions you asked, I want to thank you for inviting me this very tremendous power discussions for me to very honor and great opportunity to talk about security issues. How many guys stationed in Korea? Yeah. Thank you for your service. So from the comment comments from Brigadier General, let’s talk about stellar, like you mentioned about the free Indo Pacific that is our country’s the evidence of the prosperity of free Indo Pacific, because from the ashes from after the Korean War, we just developed in one of the top 10 economic country and free very pro democratic country. So there is the evidence, a very strong, strong evidence and our thank you to establishing the space Korea in Africa but you know, Korea, so it is good your efforts to increase the earth posture in our country, so Tripoli about the self assessment of North Korea’s threat is is a very, very is getting bigger. I believe North Korean threats it’s become much more dangerous recently as you you take a look at and you mentioned about cruise missiles. But I’m concerned with the three aspects. First of all, they’re their capabilities. They’re improving and expanding. And diversifying their nuclear district capability and as well as the convention and capabilities. Second thing is their policy change. policy toward the South Korea they are thinking that Kim Jong Un would not consider South Korea as a same blood as same siblings and brother country. Just just a foreign country, the primary thing and they’re due credit policy. They just proclaimed that they were going to pursue the strike. They set the condition that is provoked, but there’s very great concern. And third thing is Russia, Russia North Korea, your ties going to now being struck strengthened provided a military support the sole Postimees missiles and the drones and any kind of artillery shells and in return the Russia is providing the military and economic capabilities. So tensions is rising. So we need to be much more prepared that right.
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
So follow up any of you other gentlemen today add to this but really, Jay what role do you see the current future Air and Space capabilities play in the trilateral agreement?
Col. Jongseo “Jay” Park
Yeah, Air and Space power forces is a Steel’s very important for deter deterrence. And if deterrence fails, we have to dominate the fight. So for ISR capabilities, air and space powers. The main role is for ISR capabilities, that’s we if the deterrence fails, we have to be dominant in air and space power as well. So in our country, very small country, and our air bases are the event may target from North Korea’s nuclear and missile capabilities. So as far as I understand that ace concept is, is not your product that concept because of the contested environment. We should apply it to our territory as well. So we do to cooperate from with just USFK in Korea, I heard that USFK started to exercise and apply to their own forces. So we need to work together bilaterally and we continue to expand it to the Thai try and narrow environments. So injects
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
on that bear that I’ll get to you general Basler so from a pack ass level, agile combat employment under the trilateral umbrella, a lot of work ahead, right.
Brig Gen Berkland
Absolutely. And you know, part of AES is a scheme maneuver, which which is a key deterrent. In and of itself. Allies and partners are critical to access basic and overflight. So we’ve made a lot of progress in that area. Not necessarily a concern, with the two nations represented here as much as it is with some of the other island nations in the Pacific. That we continue to, to work on and have had tremendous progress. One of Schneider’s comments this morning was you know, when he left the movie a few years ago and went to the building in DC you know, we’re in the early stages of, of agile comment employment, he’s really been impressed at the progress that we’ve been able to make in the Pacific and in the subsequent years. So, but absolutely allies and partners is not just critical to the a scheme of maneuver, but it’s also critical to that multilateral framework of allies and partners that is a deterrent in and of itself. Yeah, gentleman. Absolutely. Yeah.
Brig Gen Mastalir
And then kick it over to Kimi sign for comment. But one of the you know, the value of having having these these nations represented here exercising together, can’t can’t be overstated. The, the, you know, and we just went through the exercise with, you know, Japan and Australia. And we’ll get to the science perspective here in a second. But when you when you actually go through the exercise and you start to understand where you know, you have, where you’re like minded, and then what’s important to each sovereign nation and their defense force, right. And you come to you have an appreciation appreciation then for how you’re going to operate. So for example, homeland defense is going to be a high high the highest priority for both Japan and the United States. In this case, squat, for example. And then you look at the Southwest islands and you look at some of the other things that are going to be important to Japanese leadership, and you can work together to put together a plan that accounts for each nation’s desires in terms of what they need to accomplish. And that makes us so much more effective. The opportunity of the jazz Deaf Space Operations Group participate in this exercise. I thought it was absolutely remarkable, a lot of learning. And I don’t know Colonel Sugiyama if you have thoughts on what we just went through, from
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
your perspective,
Col Sugiyama Kimitoshi
thank you very much. text them from my perspective. Currently, as a commander of Space Operations Group, however, I spent almost 30 years as a product manager, so I changed the problem here domain to space domain. So I’m in the middle of crypto running. However, I strongly believe that multilateral cooperation is really important and very effective, especially in the Indo Pacific region, the country of freedom countries, work together and it’s very, very important and very effective, I believe. Last October, Japan, US and Korea conducted the trilateral exercise was a pastime. This kind of effort is vitally important for us and we’re for we’re in the right direction. I believe. This is my perspective. Thank you.
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
So Carol Basler. Let me carry on to what Jay brought up about the trilateral. So 2024 What are the trilateral exercises really going to look like and show us how the integration of aerospace is now being brought into the fall?
Brig Gen Mastalir
Yeah, so the, you know, on one level, we talked about learning from the air component in terms of how they’ve been flying together with other nations for years. And this agreement really allows us this. This is an information data sharing agreement. So for example, missile warning, which is so critical there you know, Kim Jong Hoon is launching him just north of up J and right over Colonel Sugiyama and this is a every, you know, every week occurrence and so being able to share that missile warning and increase the level of data sharing across the three nations is fundamental to building more complex integrated exercises going forward. So whether it’s you know, Freedom shield or freedom sword or pack sentry, or keen edge, being able to bring and share that level of information is critically important and it’s not something we have had to the level that we want or desire in the past. So I’m really excited about the agreement and moving forward
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
Ajax, anything to add on the trail? No,
Brig Gen Berkland
absolutely. I mean, your question, I think was, you know, we’re gonna continue to see more of these. From the pacap perspective, I would say absolutely, you’re gonna continue to see more of this because, you know, back to my original point about how we deter it’s through a multilateral approach to include as much trilateral efforts as we can incorporate so you’re gonna concede, continue to see more of those. I mean, we’ve got a laundry list of, of annual exercises and events that we hold every year. I mean, I go back to my time and I Olson as the Wing Commander and the red flag Alaska exercises you know, one of the premier high end major combat operation. Eric sighs that we do, and that is multilateral and trilateral prefer a lot of those exercises. Cope North Pacific Air rally, you know, the laundry list goes on and on. I think the only change you might see is you know, when you heard the some of the pre optimization for great power competition, words that were put out yesterday, you know, we’re going to start to build up to more complex kind of high order of magnitude type exercises. And so when you do that, you might not be able to count as many happening throughout the year. But the ones that we do are going to be bigger, more intense, and more valuable, I think for for getting us to maintain that level of overmatch at the at the high end of combat.
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
So, Jay, I’m gonna throw this question at you. It’s gonna be let’s go to the high ground for a second because it’s a very important topic, especially from North Korea. And that is, last November, North Korea launched its spy satellite, even though it appears to be kind of a rudimentary imagery, satellite. And I’m kind of blending this was a conversation about exercising and watching these exercises. But it seems to be the first reconnaissance satellite that the North Koreans have put on orbit. So this has resulted in restored reconnaissance surveillance ops, against North Korea, especially along the DMZ. So what significance does that change or the calculus in terms of being able to monitor the DMZ based on the fact that North Korea is now putting the beginnings of a proliferated constellation? Yeah.
Col. Jongseo “Jay” Park
Those careers, just service. Satellite Launch is very concerning to us our government because our comprehensive military agreement, we agreed to lower the tensions. So we limited our surveillance capability around the DMZ area so if we wanted to watch their activities, North Korea’s activities we couldn’t do that. I was a we are doing that with the other majors but is very limited in that situation. And those Korea launched surveillance radar us want to increase their ability to some surveillance over our territory, and us in Japan as well. So our government’s approach toward North Korea now we are not doing the same thing as previous administration. We’re doing the peace through strength. So we needed to act very, very, how can it say the activity to take a measure so we’re not we’re not going to stand at we are in a backoff we need to do something to protect and defend our people’s safety and our national security. So we’re continuing to do that. So to increase our readiness, okay, it’s the North Korea provocations. Yeah.
Brig Gen Mastalir
Yeah. So I think at that basic level, it’s a reminder that we are going to have to fight for space superiority. In this in this AOR just like the air component is gonna have to fight for air superiority. It’s not a given the it’s not that it’s not just trying to threats which we’ve we’ve kind of enumerated over the last 24 hours, but North Korean threats as well. And let’s not forget that in that fight, you know, for space superiority, which not only ensures that the combined force here has access to space capabilities, but that we’re able to deny the adversary the use of space capabilities to protect the combined force from space enabled attack. Let’s not forget the possibility of the third party intervention. opportunism should a should deterrence fail and competition, you know, transitions to crisis or conflict. China may understanding the capabilities that North Korea has, and the potential for that third party intervention is something that all the warfighters in the Indo Pacific region are watching very closely. So
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
So can we sign up last August 23, the leadership Japan Republic of Korea, the United States, convenient damn Camp David. What they inaugurated was really a new era of that trilateral partnership. But I’m going to dig in a little bit here and that is the President has emphasized space security cooperation, particularly threats in the space domain, National Space strategies and responsible use of space. So what significance does the Alliance serve in the Indo Pacific region and what role will Japan play in the Air and Space Force, assuring that regional stability
Col Sugiyama Kimitoshi
Thank you very much. I think there are two major periods that CO creator in Japan SF depends false us to pray. The one is to enhance the joint organization that capability to cope with the admission so so we have to increase deterrence with us and Korea and like minded countries. The second is yes, multilateral cooperation and to shaping the situation for Yes is the response capabilities. The second is channel cooperation. To that purpose, we are conducting exercise jointly and we share information sharing, we process the information sharing and so forth and in space doing as well, so, there’s no border in space. So we share the same outer space and so we are closely watching what’s going on in space. By doing that. It can lead to better determinants, I believe, so we have to do our best
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
jack so I’m gonna throw this at you because this is a questions that inquiring minds really want to know and obviously the Chinese intercepts continue to increase. We’re at 180 instances, just recently alone since last year into this year. So as you mentioned, you’re a prior Fighter Wing Commander. You really understand the intercept, challenges facing back out and Japan and the Republic of North Korea. Have we seen a change in Chinese intercept behavior?
Brig Gen Berkland
I guess it depends on the timeframe you’re looking at. We’ve seen over the past few months sort of a lull in that behavior. Over the past few years we’ve seen overall a significant increase in the aggressive and in many cases, unprofessional intercepts conducted by primarily the PLA Air Force. You know, we’ve seen them intercepting our aircraft operating in international airspace with excessive rates of closure, airspeed out of control, unsafe intercept geometry where sometimes they’re, you know, flying across the nose of our aircraft, very dangerously. So I can’t really say what the trend will will look like in the future. What I can tell you is that what our response is going to continue to be is that we will continue to operate in international airspace in accordance with international norms, and really to reinforce a free and open Indo Pacific in the air domain. In that case, our pilots and our crews are going to continue to do what they’ve done all along, and that is to conduct themselves professionally, to safely do everything we can to prevent dangerous escalation from occurring over international airspace and that’s really that’s really what our concern is with respect to those, those intercepts.
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
So gentlemen, I gotta build the question. So Jay, I’m gonna start with you, if you don’t mind, but I’m gonna shift it over to Terrell bachelor and that is the Republic of Korea, Japan developed their own as you develop your country developed space based capabilities. And in cooperation with the US Space Force. Do you see a need to continue to present potentially high risk air source operations along the DMZ?
Col. Jongseo “Jay” Park
Yes, we have assets. There’s DMZ area is most critical place in Korean peninsula. There’s some proven provocations or aggression happen. It’s going to be a dead area in space based intelligence is very effective is really provided to our country when something happens, but we need to visit equals and a real time surveillance activities around the DMZ area. So we need to still have to do that.
Brig Gen Mastalir
Yeah, so I think that’d be hard pressed to have any combatant command or give up capability, the state the space layer as as it grows and becomes able to deliver from missile warning missile track to space based sensing and targeting. You know, there’s there’s a lot of capacity to operate and warfighter space architecture, a lot of capacity that we can move to the space layer, but there’s always going to be a need for platforms in the other domains to do some of these missions. So I would, I would say we’re we’re not ready to walk away from any particular platform at this point, I wouldn’t say but we are certainly eager to see increased capacity in our low Earth orbit constellations in the coming years.
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
So we have about five minutes remaining. I’d like to kind of take it very quickly through a question and that is starting with you Ajax What do you think from pacap perspectives the most dangerous, consequential threats as a result of strategic miscalculation?
Brig Gen Mastalir
I mean, the region itself has got ultimate goals but our focus is pretty pretty singular on the People’s Republic of China, and what the regime in Beijing in their autocratic ways are, are thinking of doing. So that I think is really where our focus is, primarily, again, our approach to that we need to continue to to maintain our overmatch I see the shot clock runner down. So this would be kind of my my final comment. I think that that’s just once again, this panel up here, this is deterrence and it’s not a talking point. Although it’s often used this one but but this team up here, you know, with my my brother from the Space Force, and the jazz staff and the rockets is real detects and I can tell you that 20 years ago is F 16 pilot station that couldn’t sign we would do integration with air quotes with the rockets and with the COVID to tie in it was really just deconfliction that’s as general MASL we’ve clarified for me, we were sectoring off our operations and calling that integration we are not doing that anymore with with either one of these and I can tell you at the highest end and you have 35 that is not the way we are integrating now. We are overlapping sensors, and massing firepower together in that type of synergy is what really enhances our asymmetrical overmatch at this point, so I’ll close with that but it’s just really been an honor to be up here with my with my wingman today as a single seat fighter pilot right and never go anywhere alone. It’s awesome to be up here with with these women.
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
Again, closing remark and especially on the consequential threats of miscalculation.
Col. Jongseo “Jay” Park
Yeah. That consequential threat is now in a very short time period in our country. As North Korean nuclear missiles for now, as I mentioned the three aspects if it doesn’t meet their internal or external circumstances, it provoke in some point is going to be pressurized to any kind of aggression from North Korea. And it’s going to be a spend it to the other in the Pacific area. So to deter and defeat the threat. So our country has a very limited territory. And very the basis is is very, we cannot move away or we need a support from our allies partners. So our administration is doing that approach very actively after the trilateral summit. So ready spending, the military exercise and especially missile warning data is a very good approach and we try to make it very institution to generalize that exercise. So we have to keep doing it to increase our security and the Korean peninsula on and the other Indo Pacific.
Col Sugiyama Kimitoshi
Give me some well thank you very much that time is almost over okay. Finally, I’d like to mention that the space capability can be achieved using variables for a business to business calculation to meet the goals, space domain delays, all the domains not only see Medan, but also cyberspace and addictive vanity. So it can be a great body of books. So in Japan, we developed a new space capability very not injury. So and we will keep growing and we will keep cooperation with you. So we will make ensures a stable use of the space domain. And thanks so much.
Brig Gen Mastalir
Thank you, Gerald. Yeah, so it just piggyback off what Ajax said about, you know, D conflicting and sectoring versus truly integration, integrated operations. And, you know, we’re already starting to exercise that in the scope. And just with the last exercise in terms of being able to provide the electronic warfare fires to support various strike packages, being able to put the sense of space packages in place for our allies, you know, missions. So those are the kinds of things that need to continue to grow my, you know, my biggest concern and we have we monitor different periods of concern. Certainly the recent Taiwan elections was one of those. But my biggest concern is that some miscalculation in the South China Sea over a territorial dispute is and then it’s better now but the lack of communication between DC and Beijing between our military was was a that’s a dangerous proposition, to not have that communication and thanks to the chairman and other work, that the sector that is 30 We’re certainly and break that down a little bit and communicate but the risk of miscalculation and an unintended escalation would get us into a conflict that the US does not see. And that is that is the biggest risk right now and the biggest danger. So as as we continue to build our space, capabilities, being able to do that together with, you know, with components, both in Japan and Korea, will help ensure that we’re able to integrate and respond together should that worst case scenario.
Maj. Gen. Doug Raaberg
I’ll be honest with you, I’ve asked a lot of tough questions today, and you’ve demonstrated exactly what we came here to do. And that is the integration space. They’re an allied power, and we cannot thank you enough for them. Ladies and gentlemen, this has been a very, very interesting panel. I would ask General masliah to pull up that shirt again, if you don’t mind. This is my time for a shameless plug. Please go to the shopping
