Today’s expeditionary warfare is sure to demand increased rapid global mobility. Specifically there is the need to support the joint force with both adequate airlift and aerial refueling. Maintaining the traditional U.S. advantage in ability to project and sustain forces will require deliberate leadership effort at multiple levels. A particular focus must be the Civil Reserve Air Fleet, without which DOD cannot meet its mission requirements. Leveraging commercial aviation capabilities brings more transport capacity at reduced cost as well as opening the possibilities of innovation residing in the commercial sector, which will help U.S. Transportation Command in its mission to get warfighters to the fight, sustain them, support rapid force maneuver and patient movement, and bring the troops home

Some see strategy as an art and others as a science. It is not exclusively either; sound strategic thinking draws on a balanced approach as befits the age’s complex issues. Both unhurried analysis and intuition contribute to creative approaches. The U.S. Army War College’s Strategic Thinking Framework provides a foundation for developing strategic thinking skills that are sharpened throughout the academic year. It offers an approach for guiding senior leader judgment aimed at developing strategies that align the organization’s vision of its future with the overall future environment to give America’s military leaders a competitive advantage. Schools of strategic thought can be combined to help teach emerging national security professionals what strategic thinking is and how to improve it.

Admiral Stavridis encouraged students to read, think, and write during their year at National Defense University during a convocation there. Given that “the quintessential skill of an officer is to bring order out of chaos,” he shared ways to “understand global politics and grand strategy, the importance of the ‘logistics nation,’ how the interagency community worked, what the levers of power and practice were in the world—in essence, how everything fits together in producing security for the United States and our partners.” Speed will be vital since opportunities are fleeting, and interested parties must share a vision of security built on trust and partnering. Planners must always be thinking of the next step in this era of out-thinking opponents.