Op-Ed: The Pacific Northwest - A Vital Defense Partner

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In August this year, Washington will be home to Air Mobility Command’s first-ever rapid global mobility exercise designed to prepare joint and allied forces to operate in dynamic threat environments.

Exercise Mobility Guardian is crucial, because no matter how the world acts, one constant remains - the need to reach any point on the globe quickly and with ready military forces.

Joint Base Lewis-McChord and Fairchild Air Force Base, along with the state’s McAllister Field, Yakima Training Center, and Moses Lake areas, provide ideal locations to train U.S. and international forces from more than 80 countries.

The exercise will include elements of joint forcible entry, aeromedical evacuation, airfield seizure, and humanitarian relief operations in a simulated unstable area of the world. It will be the U.S. Air Force’s premier mobility exercise focused on all Air Mobility Command core capabilities.

The goal is develop the world’s most realistic, real-world, scenario-driven exercises the command has ever undertaken. More than 1,000 people will travel to the state to train. This will require a great deal of community support and partnership.

Washington State and the Pacific Northwest play an absolutely critical role in U.S. national defense. Fairchild AFB KC-135s and Joint Base Lewis-McChord C-17s continue to ensure relief to those in need and enable the United States to provide the right effects at the right place and right time.

Fairchild remains one of the U.S. Air Force’s premier air refueling centers of excellence. Today, U.S. tankers provide 90 percent of the aerial refueling capability for the U.S.-led Coalition in Iraq and Syria.

Joint Base Lewis-McChord’s C-17s are delivering critical supplies and equipment to take the fight to ISIL in places such as Iraq, Syria, and beyond.

Today’s global dynamic is complex and volatile with growing threats. In peacetime and war, Mobility Airmen remain engaged 24-hours-a-day, seven-days-a-week, with aircraft taking off every 2.8 minutes somewhere around the globe.

Our Pacific Northwest bases are strategically located. They are well-positioned to provide timely response and stand as a testament of U.S. resolve and global reach to other worldwide nation-state actors.

Whether in response to a humanitarian or disaster relief missions in the Pacific or required military action anywhere around the globe, Mobility Airmen stand ready to serve when called upon.

The demand for U.S. airpower and the capability afforded by rapid global mobility is on a steady incline to include potential future mission growth opportunities in the state. We will increasingly rely on our partners in the Pacific Northwest. Fairchild and Joint Base Lewis-McChord are vital to ensuring continued support of U.S. defense and interests abroad.

Future uncertainties and constrained resources demand that we take actions now to ensure mobility enterprise success in the future.

There is one thing for certain: the communities of Fairchild Air Force Base and Joint Base Lewis-McChord will be key to the success of Mobility Guardian and our Nation’s defense. I want to personally thank you for your unwavering, continued support to our Airmen, their families, and America’s global mobility mission!

-Gen. Carlton D. Everhart II, Commander, Air Mobility Command, Scott Air Force Base, Illinois.