Below is my exit memo to President Barack Obama outlining some of the many accomplishments of the Department of Defense over the last eight years, my vision for the country’s future, and the work that remains in order to achieve that vision. Each cabinet secretary has provided his or her own memo to the president as of today. All of them can be seen at go.wh.gov/CabinetInReview.

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A Record of Progress

As this Administration took office in early 2009, the country had just experienced another deadly year in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Department of Defense (DoD) was therefore necessarily focused on large-scale counterinsurgency operations to defeat extremist networks in those countries. In the years since, this Administration effectively adjusted its defense strategy, shifting from a focus on irregular warfare and counterterrorism to a return to full-spectrum combat readiness and directing a responsive and versatile military that can prevail across the full spectrum of operations. This shift was accompanied by an $800 billion reduction in planned future defense spending, following the 2011 Budget Control Act and subsequent automatic sequestration spending caps. The combination of these two circumstances has led to the pursuit of a smaller yet more technologically advanced and capable military that is ready for the threats of today and the challenges of tomorrow.

Today, the Department must prepare for and meet five major, unique, and rapidly evolving challenges. We’re managing historic change in the Asia-Pacific — the single most consequential region for America’s future. We’re countering the prospect of Russian aggression and coercion, especially in Europe. In the face of North Korea’s continued nuclear and missile provocations, we’re improving our nuclear and conventional deterrent capabilities. We’re checking Iranian aggression and malign influence in the Gulf, and protecting our friends and allies in the Middle East. And we’re conducting an aggressive global campaign against terrorists and other violent extremists, while accelerating the certain and lasting defeat of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), destroying its parent tumor in Iraq and Syria, and everywhere else it metastasizes around the world — even as we help protect our homeland and our people.

We don’t have the luxury of choosing among these challenges — we have to address them all. At the same time, we must contend with an uncertain future — ensuring that we continue to be ready for challenges we may not anticipate. America is today the world’s foremost leader, partner, and underwriter of stability and security in every region across the globe, as we have been since the end of World War II. But even as we continue to fulfill this enduring role, it’s also evident that we’re entering a new strategic era. Today’s security environment is dramatically different — more diverse and complex in the scope of its challenges — than the one we’ve been engaged with for the last 25 years, and it requires new ways of thinking and new ways of acting. As the world changes and complexity increases, we’ll have to change, too — how we invest, how we fight, how we operate as an organization, how we attract and nourish talent, and how we balance risk across the many competing threats the Department faces.

The Department has faced this new strategic era while dealing with significant impediments presented by Congress, including budget uncertainty, the first government shutdown in a generation, the repeated denial of reform proposals to make the defense enterprise more efficient, and efforts to micromanage the organization of the Department. Despite this, the Department has been able to manage its strategic priorities during eight consecutive years that began with continuing resolutions, albeit at increasing levels of programmatic risk. Nonetheless, one thing is certain: America’s men and women in uniform stand ready to meet the challenges of today and tomorrow, whatever they might be.

Below I highlight some of their many accomplishments of the past eight years, and the steps we need to take from here to build on this progress.

Adjusting to Strategic Change

Operationalizing the Rebalance to the Asia-Pacific Region

In a region home to nearly half the world’s population and nearly half the global economy, for 70 years the United States has helped underwrite a stable security environment that allowed the people, economies, and countries in the Asia-Pacific to rise and prosper. The region has made remarkable progress in this time, and that progress continues today. But not all change has been constructive — tensions in the South China Sea, North Korea’s continued provocations, and the dangers of violent extremism felt worldwide all pose challenges to the region’s stability and prosperity. Early in President Obama’s tenure, he made a strategic decision to increase focus on the Asia-Pacific, recognizing its vital importance to America’s political, economic, and security interests. In support of this rebalance, DoD has realigned forces in the region to be more geographically distributed, operationally resilient and politically sustainable, while also increasing investments in capabilities and technologies to counter the growing anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) challenge in the Western Pacific.

To do so, we are positioning 60 percent of our Navy and overseas Air Force assets in the Asia-Pacific region, including some of our most advanced capabilities. For instance, over the past eight years, DoD has deployed a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) battery to Guam; introduced additional ballistic missile defense-capable ships into Japan; replaced CH-46 helicopters in Okinawa with more capable MV-22 Osprey aircraft; established air-ground task force capabilities in multiple locations across the Pacific; introduced a continuous bomber presence in the region to bolster partner nations; and strengthened the capabilities of U.S. Air Force and Army forces in the Republic of Korea. We have also focused on building similar security capabilities in our many friends and allies. We’ve done this through recent efforts like the five-year $425 million Maritime Security Initiative, which has increased training, exercises, personnel support, and maritime domain awareness in the South China Sea and elsewhere.

The United States favors the development of an inclusive and principled security network that is open to all that seek to preserve and strengthen the rules and norms that have undergirded regional stability for the past 7 decades. We have invested in strengthening and modernizing our alliances: revising bilateral defense guidelines with Japan; moving to a conditions-based approach to the transition of wartime operational control with South Korea; establishing a rotational deployment of U.S. Marines in Australia; signing an Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement with the Philippines; and establishing closer defense ties with India, including by naming it a Major Defense Partner and establishing the Defense Technology Trade Initiative. We have supported multilateral forums, bolstering our ties with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and investing in strengthening trilateral ties, including through the Defense Trilateral Talks with Japan and Korea, and the Security and Defense Cooperation Forum with Japan and Australia. And we have also regularized military-to-military contacts with China at all levels, concluding two risk reduction confidence-building measures in an effort to improve transparency and reduce the risk of unintended incidents. Finally, over the course of this Administration, we have deepened our level of military-to-military engagement with Taiwan and executed over $14 billion in arms sales to strengthen its defenses.

America is a Pacific nation, and the future of the Asia-Pacific region is closely intertwined with our own. Looking ahead, the next Administration should continue to pursue additional force posture opportunities, forge closer partnerships with and among countries across the region, and look to protect and strengthen existing alliances and partnerships. Our investments must continue to protect our competitive edge in the region by extending the technological military superiority the U.S. and the world have relied upon for decades. Tensions in the South China Sea must be managed, as must the consequences of North Korea’s continued provocative actions. At the same time, the next Administration should continue to promote high-standards trade and investment, which will deepen partnerships in the Asia-Pacific region and underscore our strategic advantage in the region.

A Strong and Balanced Strategic Approach to Deter Russia

Early in this Administration, DoD established a Defense Working Group with Russian counterparts to promote the “reset” of U.S.-Russian relations. This period of engagement yielded several breakthroughs, including the successful negotiation and ratification of the New START Treaty, the use of the Northern Distribution Network to support Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan, and increased information-sharing to counter terrorist organizations.

Following Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014, the United States mobilized the international community in support of Ukraine. Since that point, DoD has taken a series of measures aimed at deterring further aggressive Russian actions and defending U.S. and allied interests. Under Operation Atlantic Resolve, we have also increased joint multi-national exercises in frequency and scale, and improved regional infrastructure. We created the European Reassurance Initiative (ERI), funding approximately $800 million in FY 2016 to support enhanced U.S. force posture through rotational deployments, preposition equipment and materiel, and further develop the capability and resilience of our NATO allies and partners. To further reinforce our allies and build our deterrence posture, we requested $3.4 billion for ERI in FY 2017, more than quadrupling our prior year request. Led by the United States, NATO recently agreed to establish an enhanced forward presence, including positioning four battalion-sized battlegroups in the Baltic states and Poland. In addition, the United States has worked to help build the capacity of Ukraine’s forces, with DoD leading efforts to enhance Ukraine’s internal defense capabilities through training programs and the provision of equipment.

To provide the defense resources vital to ensuring transatlantic security for the future, DoD secured a NATO Summit commitment to set concrete goals for defense spending on specified Alliance capability priorities; 24 NATO allies are now meeting, or on a path to meet, this goal. The United States must remain engaged with NATO — an alliance of principled and like-minded members backed by strength — to ensure continued progress and to deter and defend against Russian aggression in Europe.

Deterring North Korea

North Korea poses a longstanding challenge in the Asia-Pacific region, where it remains dangerous both to us and our allies — that’s why our forces on the Korean Peninsula remain ready. We have invested in capabilities necessary to deter North Korean provocation and aggression, ensure our forces on the Korean Peninsula remain ready and capable to “fight tonight,” if necessary, and defend against threats emanating from North Korea against the United States and our allies. This includes threats posed by North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs, against which DoD is fully capable of defending the U.S. homeland. Our position has been, and remains, that North Korea must abide by its international obligation to abandon its nuclear and missile programs and stop its provocative behavior.

DoD also remains fully capable of fulfilling U.S. treaty commitments to our allies in the event of a North Korean attack, and we’re working with our Republic of Korea allies to develop a comprehensive set of alliance capabilities to counter the growing North Korean ballistic missile threat. Together with South Korea, we have improved readiness and upgraded our capabilities. And in response to North Korea’s series of ballistic missile test launches earlier this year, including its satellite launch using ballistic missile technology and multiple launches of medium- and intermediate-range ballistic missiles, the United States and the Republic of Korea made an Alliance decision to deploy a THAAD system to the Korean Peninsula by the end of 2017.

Checking Iran’s Malign Influence While Strengthening Regional Friends and Allies

The Middle East presents a kaleidoscope of challenges, but amid this region’s complexity and uncertainty, we have interests of great importance: to deter aggression; to bolster the security of our friends and allies; to ensure freedom of navigation in the Gulf; to check Iran’s malign influence; and to deescalate regional sectarian tensions, which fuel regional conflicts.

The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which verifiably prevents Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, is an important step, and one that would not have occurred absent U.S. leadership. To strengthen the U.S. negotiation position, DoD developed advanced military capabilities to provide options should Iran choose to walk away from its commitments. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has confirmed that Iran is complying with its commitments, and it is in our interest to maintain the agreement to check Iran’s nuclear ambition. But despite this historic agreement, Iran and its proxies still present serious security challenges. Iran supports the Assad regime in Syria, backs Hizballah in Lebanon, and is contributing to disorder in Yemen.

As a result, DoD has maintained a robust regional force posture ashore and afloat, including tens of thousands of U.S. personnel and our most sophisticated ground, maritime, and air and ballistic missile defense assets. Through the process of Summits and follow-up meetings launched at Camp David in May 2015, we have extended unprecedented offers of security assistance and training to the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries aimed at helping develop their capabilities to address asymmetric threats, such as terrorism, cyber threats, and maritime challenges. We have also sold more than $100 billion in arms to our Gulf partners. For instance, the State Department in November 2016 informed Congress of its intent to sell F/A-18 fighter aircraft to Kuwait and F-15 fighter aircraft to Qatar valued at a combined $30 billion. These sales will provide tens of thousands of jobs in the United States and will enhance Qatar and Kuwait’s capability to provide for their national defense, increase their interoperability with U.S. forces, and allow them to take a larger share of regional security responsibilities. Finally, NATO has improved missile defense to meet the near-term threat to European allies and deployed forces in light of the increasing proliferation of ballistic missiles and against threats emanating from outside the Euro-Atlantic area.

We have also maintained an ironclad commitment to Israel’s qualitative military edge, including by providing Israel with some of our most advanced capabilities. Since FY 2010, the United States has provided over $21.75 billion in Foreign Military Financing (FMF) to Israel, the most to any country worldwide. Beyond FMF, since 2008 the United States has also invested over $3 billion in joint development and procurement of multilayered missile defense architecture for Israel, including over $1 billion for Iron Dome batteries and interceptors, which have saved countless lives. In 2016, the United States and Israel finalized a $38 billion 10-year security assistance memorandum of understanding, the largest such package in our nation’s history, which includes an unprecedented $5 billion commitment in missile defense assistance. Continued partnership between our two nations must be a priority for the next Administration.

Countering Terrorists and Other Violent Extremists

Over the past eight years, our men and women in uniform have remained vigilant to protect American lives and interests from the terrorist threat, with U.S. forces deployed around the globe to deny violent extremist organizations sanctuary. We have worked with partner nations to increase their counterterrorism capability and capacity, establishing the Counterterrorism Partnerships Fund (CTPF) to help them with the flexibility and resources required to deter and defeat terrorist threats as they evolve. We have taken direct action, when there is actionable intelligence, to capture known terrorists, or conduct strikes against terrorists in defense of our people and partners, including successful targeted operations in 2011 against Osama bin Laden, the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, and in 2016 against Mullah Akhtar Mansur, the leader of the Taliban. We’ve also undertaken numerous high-risk hostage rescue operations, such as the rescue of Captain Richard Phillips from the Maersk Alabama in April 2009.

At the same time, we have also focused on rebuilding our own capabilities taxed by years of war. For instance, since FY 2008, DoD has increased the base budget for Special Operations by $1.7 billion and added 15,000 personnel, growing SOF forces by 25 percent and expanding the capabilities of an already elite, rapidly deployable force. Our men and women are executing the counterterrorism mission every day around the globe, and below I describe their progress. In addition, as part of post-9/11 intelligence reform efforts, including the creation of the Director of National Intelligence and the significant organizational modernization of key intelligence agencies such as Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), National Security Agency (NSA), National Geospatial Intelligence Agency (NGA), and Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), the Intelligence Community and the military have invested in developing unprecedentedly sophisticated, agile and integrated operational capabilities.

Iraq and Syria

When President Obama took office, the United States had 140,000 military personnel in Iraq. He directed his national security team to undertake a comprehensive review of our strategy, with the goal of transitioning full responsibility to an Iraq that is sovereign, stable, and self-reliant. By late 2011, we had drawn our forces down as we transitioned from Operation Iraqi Freedom to Operation New Dawn. Since that time, we have worked with the Government of Iraq to take the fight to terrorists who threaten our country, while also maturing the long-term bilateral security relationship between our two nations.

Unfortunately, we continue to face a terrorist threat, and in recent years the terrorist group ISIL began to advance and gain territory across Iraq and Syria. In August 2014, the President directed DoD to take targeted military action to degrade and ultimately defeat ISIL — working by, with and through local partners. Since that time, DoD has spearheaded the assembly of a 68-member coalition to implement Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR) and to develop and support military capabilities of partner nations to defeat ISIL.

Following the Paris attacks in November 2015, we significantly accelerated the OIR campaign, with a broad appeal for increased contributions from existing members and new contributions by others, including from NATO. At least 34 countries, including the Government of Iraq, have provided forces or significant basing in support of the campaign.

Today this coalition continues to achieve results on the battlefield, pressuring ISIL in Mosul and wherever it seeks refuge in Iraq. I hope that the next Administration will keep up the pace of this counter-ISIL military campaign, but they must also ensure that Iraqi Security and Kurdish forces are able to sustain their gains and that reconciliation and effective governance continue. It must be local forces who deliver ISIL a lasting defeat, because only they can secure and govern the territory by building long-term trust within the populations they liberate.

In Syria, what began as peaceful protests against the repressive regime of Bashar al-Assad has turned into a tragic and brutal civil war. At the President’s direction, DoD has supported the moderate Syrian opposition and Syria’s neighbors, Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey, and Iraq — enabling local, motivated forces with a global coalition wielding a suite of capabilities — ranging from airstrikes, special forces, cyber tools, intelligence, equipment, mobility and logistics, training, advice and assistance. Early on, to reduce the threat of further chemical attack in Syria, DoD developed and employed a mobile capability to eliminate the most dangerous materials within Syria’s declared chemical weapons stockpile, destroying 600 metric tons of materials in only a matter of months. DoD-supported local Syrian counter-ISIL forces have cleared ISIL from over 30 percent of the territory the terrorist organization once controlled in Syria. At the same time, DoD is also committed to addressing the humanitarian crisis caused by the Syrian conflict — in FY 2015 alone, DoD provided more than three million relief items as part of a lifesaving assistance program.

Unfortunately, Russian support for the Assad regime and Russia’s entry into the civil war has made the situation in Syria more dangerous and violent, and potentially more prolonged. While the choice to intervene was Russia’s to make, and the consequences will be its responsibility, the next Administration must hold Russia to account in its promise to combat terrorism and end the civil war.

Ensuring Long-Term Stability in Afghanistan

As President Obama took office in 2009, the situation in Afghanistan had deteriorated, with the Taliban beginning to control additional swaths of territory while engaging in devastating attacks of terrorism across the country. Twice in 2009, he directed increased reinforcements to Afghanistan to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat Al Qaeda and its extremist allies. Since then, DoD has worked closely with our Afghan partners to reduce the terrorist threat and give the Afghan people the opportunity to succeed.

We have made significant gains. We assisted the Afghan government in establishing, enabling, and equipping the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF), which today total more than 350,000 personnel. In April 2014, Afghanistan held a presidential election and produced a government consistent with its laws and constitution. And by the end of 2014, the ANDSF’s increasing capability allowed for them to take the lead in providing security, and the United States shifted to a train, advise, assist mission, ending our combat mission in Afghanistan.

Today the United States has fewer than 10,000 military personnel in the country, but we continue to lead the way in international support for Afghanistan, leading a coalition of 41 allies and partners. The Bilateral Security Agreement and Status of Forces Agreement negotiated by this Administration provide the foundation for a long-term and enduring relationship between the United States and NATO with the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan. At the 2016 Warsaw NATO Summit, the international community committed to funding the sustainment of the ANDSF through 2020. My hope is that the next Administration will lead the way in advancing this relationship, because the Afghan people will need the partnership of the United States for many years to come.

Defeating the Global Terrorist Threat

The terrorist threat is continually evolving, changing focus and shifting location, requiring us to be flexible, nimble, and far-reaching in our response. Accordingly, the Department is leveraging the existing security infrastructure we’ve already established in Afghanistan, the Middle East, East Africa, and Southern Europe, so that we can counter transnational and transregional terrorist threats like ISIL and others in a sustainable, durable way going forward.

We are committed to combatting ISIL’s metastases everywhere they emerge around world. In Libya, the U.S. military provided support to the Government of National Accord and its aligned forces as they ejected ISIL from Sirte. In Yemen, we have conducted counterterrorism strikes against Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), in order to protect Americans, thwart its destabilizing effect on Yemen and deny it a haven from which to plan future attacks on the United States and our allies. Elsewhere in Africa, we have worked to enable African partners to reduce drastically the amount of territory controlled by Boko Haram, ISIL-West Africa, and Al Shabaab, including by providing advisory support, sharing intelligence, and implementing more than $460 million in train and equip programs funded primarily through the CTPF. In East Africa, DoD worked with the Department of State to build the capacity of troop-contributing countries in the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM). As a result, AMISOM was able to push Al Shabaab out of Mogadishu and provide security space for a Somali government to take hold. The United States also negotiated the renewal of an agreement to ensure U.S. access to Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti for the next 30 years, enabling continued support for counterterrorism and capacity-building efforts in the region. We have redoubled efforts to work with countries in the region to deal with emerging crises, through efforts like the African Peacekeeping Rapid Response Partnership, which builds the capacity of East African militaries to deploy peacekeepers rapidly in response to emerging conflict.

While significant progress has been made, to counter the movement of foreign fighters and ISIL’s attempts to relocate or reinvent itself, the United States and our coalition must endure and remain engaged militarily in the years to come.

Establishing an Alternative to the Detention Facility at Guantanamo

I remain convinced that the responsible closure of the detention center at Guantanamo Bay will benefit our national security. DoD has reduced the detainee population by nearly 75 percent, from 242 detainees in January 2009 to 59 today. To do so safely, we have developed a robust review process, which allows detainees to be transferred while keeping America safe by ensuring steps are taken to prevent reengagement. However, there are individuals remaining at the detention facility whom it would not be safe to transfer. For this reason, in February 2016 the White House submitted a plan to Congress for the permanent closing of the detention facility at Guantanamo and an appropriate, secure, alternative location for housing those detainees in the United States. The next Administration should act to continue this progress and achieve the responsible closure of the Guantanamo detention facility.

Promoting Transparency in U.S. Actions

In the midst of these and other global operations, the Department has made great efforts to promote transparency, consistent with our national security interests, particularly in communicating the legal and policy bases for our operations. Senior leaders have articulated the legal frameworks for our operations in a variety of public addresses covering such topics as the scope of the 2001 and 2002 Authorizations for Use of Military Force, counterterrorism operations, and the law of armed conflict as applied to targeting. Also, in 2015, the Department released the first ever Department-wide Law of War Manual, a significant public statement of the Department’s views on the law of armed conflict which will inform public debate and international discussions on these issues for years to come.

In addition, since 2014, the Department has been making available public information about U.S. airstrikes in Iraq and Syria and has also released information on the outcome of counterterrorism operations in Libya, Somalia, and Yemen. The Department has issued regular public reports regarding civilian casualties and engaged in public dialogue focused on reducing these incidents.

The Department also played a lead role in preparing the recently published “Report on the Legal and Policy Frameworks Guiding the United States’ Use of Military Force and Related National Security Operations.” That Report seeks to consolidate prior articulations of existing legal and policy positions in this area and to make public, to the extent feasible and consistent with the need to protect classified information, legal and policy frameworks that guide the U.S. Government’s counterterrorism operations and other uses of military force. The Report addresses many different topics, including overseas lethal operations, capture operations, and interrogation, detention, and prosecution of terrorism suspects.

Maintaining a Safe, Reliable and Effective Nuclear Deterrent

In this emerging strategic environment, nuclear deterrence remains a foundational mission of the Department of Defense. In the nuclear enterprise, the Department is committed to executing the President’s guidance to provide a safe, secure, and effective nuclear deterrent, while reducing the role of nuclear weapons in our national security strategy. In 2010, DoD committed through the New START Treaty to reduce the size of U.S. strategic forces to the lowest level since the early days of the Cold War. Since June 2013, DoD has been implementing President Obama’s nuclear employment guidance, which aligns U.S. nuclear employment planning with today’s strategic environment by focusing planning on only those objectives and missions that are necessary for deterrence in the 21st century. DoD is also implementing a host of recommendations to improve the health of the nuclear enterprise, such as increasing manpower; funding equipment, vehicles, and maintenance; and investing in technological efforts that improve sustainment of the force. Many of these recommendations emerged from a comprehensive internal and external reviews of DoD’s entire nuclear enterprise that Secretary Hagel initiated after a series of safety and personnel-related incidents in 2014.

Investing in our nuclear forces and supporting infrastructure is essential for maintaining a safe, secure, and effective deterrent. In addition, the United States has begun, and must continue, to invest in a modern physical infrastructure — consisting of the national security laboratories and a complex of supporting facilities — and a highly capable workforce with specialized skills needed to sustain the nuclear deterrent. To ensure the security and reliability of our nuclear arsenal, DoD is working together with the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) to refurbish aging weapons. To that end, the NNSA has begun a series of life extension programs for our nuclear arsenal, beginning with the W76 submarine-launched ballistic missile warhead and continuing with the B61 gravity bomb. At the same time, DoD has also begun the process of recapitalizing our aging nuclear triad. We initiated the program to build the Columbia-class nuclear ballistic missile submarine to replace the Ohio-class submarine. We selected a designer for the B-21 Raider long-range strike bomber, which will ensure that the United States maintains a penetrating bomber. We are developing the Long-Range Standoff (LRSO) cruise missile, which replaces the aging air-launch cruise missile. Taken together, the new penetrating bomber armed with an effective standoff missile will continue to provide an adaptable, recallable, flexible, and highly visible force to extend deterrence, demonstrate resolve, and signal commitment to allies and partners, even as adversaries continue to modernize their air defenses. We are continuing production of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter which will be updated in Block IV to assume the role of dual-capable aircraft and provide the U.S. and Allies a 21st century capability. Finally, we’ve begun the replacement of the land-based Intercontinental Ballistic Missile, the Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent, to continue to provide a stabilizing and responsive deterrent capability.

The nuclear enterprise will continue to require sustained focus, attention, and resources from the next Administration. Because many of these programs were deferred, recapitalization of all three legs of the Triad must take place nearly simultaneously. Over the next two decades, I expect the total cost of nuclear modernization to be approximately $270 billion. Although this presents a long-term affordability challenge for DoD, I believe we must fund the enterprise to ensure that our nuclear deterrent continues to provide the President options and remains as safe, secure, and reliable as it is today. We must also continue to work with our NATO allies to ensure that as long as nuclear weapons exist, the alliance will maintain the appropriate mix of capabilities, to include nuclear weapons, to protect its members.

Strengthening our Missile Defense

Given North Korea’s aggressive pursuit of the capability to delivery ballistic missile attacks against the homeland, U.S. forces and allies and partners, we’ve made the important decision to strengthen and improve our missile defense capabilities –particularly to counter the A2/AD challenge of increasingly precise and increasingly long-range ballistic and cruise missiles being fielded by several nations in multiple regions of the world. Instead of spending more money on a smaller number of more traditional and expensive interceptors, we’re funding a wide range of defensive capabilities that can defeat incoming missile raids at much lower cost per round, and thereby impose higher costs on the attacker.

We’re investing in improvements that complicate enemy targeting, harden our bases, and leverage gun-based point defense capabilities. We’re also committed to improving our homeland and theater defense systems, and those of our partners. For instance, we are working to increase the number of deployed Ground-Based Interceptors (GBIs) in Alaska from 30 to 44, and deployed an additional radar to Japan. We have also fielded multiple theater missile defense platforms, increasing the number of DDG-51 AEGIS destroyers capable of conducting missile defense, and procuring the PAC-3/MSE interceptor to give the Patriot Air Defense System longer reach. And we continue to expand missile defense cooperation with allies and partners around the globe, including by deploying four DDG-51s to Rota, Spain; and stationing THAAD batteries in Guam and the Middle East while working to conclude other THAAD deployments in concert with allies and partners such as South Korea.

Promoting Peacekeeping and Humanitarian Assistance

In addition to preparing for emerging and evolving threats, throughout this Administration, the Department has continued and strengthened our commitment to providing humanitarian support for nations in need. Over the past eight years alone, DoD has provided more than $1 billion in support of U.S. interagency foreign disaster response to more than 30 disasters worldwide. For instance, after an earthquake and subsequent tsunami that struck Japan in April 2011, U.S. military forces and assets were deployed to affected areas within 24 hours; 24,000 personnel, 189 aircraft, and 24 Navy vessels were ultimately involved in relief efforts. Similarly, in Africa, DoD provided $465 million and committed more than 2,000 military personnel on the ground to fight the Ebola epidemic in 2015, setting up a 25-bed hospital and 10 Ebola treatment units and providing the logistic backbone for the response that saved hundreds of thousands of lives. In 2014, after rigorous study by DoD, the Administration announced that the U.S. would cease to produce or acquire anti-personnel landmines, and that we would discontinue the use of antipersonnel land mines everywhere in the world except the Korean peninsula, policies that are paving the way for the U.S. to eventually accede to the Ottawa convention. DoD also responded to the President’s direction to enhance U.S. support to UN peacekeeping, working to double the number of U.S. staff officers serving in UN peacekeeping operations, providing training to UN staff and participating nations, and providing enabling technology and equipment. Moving forward, I hope the Department will continue to work with partner nations to increase the potential of peace operations, and will contribute when disaster strikes and friends and partners are in need.

Seizing Opportunities for the Future

Enhancing Conventional Deterrence

Despite the reduction of $800 billion in planned spending over FY 2012–2021 following the caps imposed by the Budget Control Act in 2011, the Department has made the investments necessary to ensure we can credibly deter any adversary conventionally. The starting point for this effort is the Third Offset Strategy, which is aimed to strengthen our military competitive edge and to bolster U.S. conventional deterrence, and primarily driven by Chinese and Russian military developments and actions. This is a program of programs with unclassified and classified elements that has the goal of maintaining the Joint Force’s conventional overmatch well into the future via technological, organizational, and conceptual innovation.

In the maritime domain, we have refocused on lethality in high-end conflict while continuing to grow the battle fleet. Our investments reflect an emphasis on payloads over platforms, and the ability to strike from sanctuary quickly so that no target is out of reach. We’ve maximized our undersea advantage, investing in important munitions, continually improving our Virginia-class attack submarines, and rapidly prototyping unmanned undersea vehicles in multiple sizes and payloads to ensure we continue to have the most lethal undersea and anti-submarine force in the world. To bolster the lethality of our surface fleet, we are maximizing production of our most modern and capable missiles, and we’ve reversed the precipitous decline in the size of the Navy by adding 30 additional ships to the planned battle fleet compared to the number in 2008, an 11 percent increase.

To ensure the U.S. military’s continued air superiority and global reach, we have made important investments in several areas, from hypersonics to a wide range of versatile munitions. We’re investing in stealthy, fifth-generation fighter capability by modernizing the F-22 and buying the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter — and since we established a new program baseline for the F-35 program in 2011, the program has delivered over 175 aircraft, on time and at decreasing cost. And we’ve invested in unmanned aircraft. Since 2008, the Air Force has nearly doubled its remotely piloted aircraft enterprise to 60 combat lines with more than 1300 pilots, who now outnumber pilots in manned aircraft. To put the unmanned enterprise on more sustainable footing, we’ve created a pipeline for new pilots and maintainers. We have initiated the B-21 bomber, which will provide a penetrating capability against emerging surface to air defenses even while meeting cost targets set in 2009, and have procured the KC-46A air refueling tanker to ensure our fighters, bombers, and cargo planes can reach all around the world even while holding to its original fixed price contract. To prepare for the next generation of tactical air capability we also funded the Aerospace Innovation Initiative.

To ensure our ground forces have the capabilities to counter emerging threats and the demonstrated ability to deter and if necessary fight and win a full-spectrum conflict, we are providing our Army, Marine Corps, and special operations forces with greater lethality in several forms. The Marines have now fielded in large numbers the revolutionary tilt-rotor MV-22 Osprey, the Army has initiated its Armored Multi-Purpose Vehicle, and both have started producing the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle, the replacement for the Humvee.

Addressing Emerging Threats in Cyber, Space, and Electronic Warfare

In the areas of cyber, space, and electronic warfare, our reliance on technology has given us great strengths, but also led to vulnerabilities that potential adversaries are eager to exploit. The Department of Defense has three missions in cyberspace — to defend our networks, systems, and information; to help defend the nation and our interests from cyberattacks of significant consequence, working with other departments and branches of government; and to provide options that can augment our other military systems. Over the last eight years, we have made tremendous organizational improvements in cyber policy. DoD established Cyber Command as a sub-unified command in 2010; named a Principal Cyber Advisor in 2014; and established all 133 teams of the Cyber Mission Force in 2016. In fact, in the last four years, DoD has increased its budget request for cyber activities by almost 50 percent, from $4.6 billion to $6.8 billion. We have built major military partnerships for cooperation in cyberspace with key partners and allies around the globe. Together, we’ve integrated offensive cyber operations into the counter-ISIL fight, targeting ISIL’s Internet messaging and recruitment operations. And we’ve moved to a culture of accountability in cyberspace, instituting a DoD-wide cybersecurity scorecard and improving knowledge about practical ways to defend against cyber intrusions. Under the auspices of the Defense Digital Service, DoD created “Hack the Pentagon,” the government’s first-ever bug bounty program. Most recently, we established its first vulnerability disclosure policy, providing guidance that encourages outside researchers to disclose vulnerabilities on DoD websites in a safe, secure, and legal way. Given the increasing severity and sophistication of the threats we see in cyberspace, I hope that the next Administration will continue these and other efforts to strengthen defensive cyber capabilities.

While at times in the past space was seen as a sanctuary, new and emerging threats make clear that’s not the case anymore, and we must be prepared for the possibility of a conflict that extends into space. Under the Administration’s National Space Security Strategy, DoD is meeting the challenges of an increasingly contested space domain. As the threat in space has matured, we have countered it with more than $22 billion in investments to defend and improve the resiliency of our assets in space and put potential adversary space systems at risk, helping ensure the advantages of space are available for U.S. forces in the future. Organizationally, we created the Joint Interagency Space Operations Center (JICSpOC) to integrate our space operations with other agencies. We designated the Secretary of the Air Force as the Principal DoD Space Advisor, strengthening the leadership of the space enterprise by sharpening authorities and responsibilities. The next Administration must ensure that we can provide capabilities like reconnaissance, the Global Positioning System (GPS), and secure communications that enable our operations in other domains, and must ensure and defend these capabilities against aggressive and comprehensive space programs of others.

Raising the Bar on Readiness

Even as we have made these investments in force structure, we are bringing our forces to a higher standard of readiness after many years where they were single-mindedly focused on the fights in Iraq and Afghanistan. While as recently as in 2010 over 50 percent of the Army had deployed in the previous four years, in the last six years we have capitalized on reduced operational demand in Iraq and Afghanistan to reset the entire force to meet a higher standard, ready for both fighting today’s conflicts and standing ready to deter, and if necessary, fight and win against advanced adversaries. In the Department’s budget requests since 2013, the sequester year, we have heavily prioritized readiness — funding readiness accounts to their maximum executable level, investing in training ranges and infrastructure, and sending more units to large-unit training to improve the collective skills needed to prosecute modern wars.

Building the All-Volunteer Force of the Future

While we have the finest fighting force in the world today, we can’t take that for granted in the 21st century. We have to earn it again and again, starting with our most enduring advantage — our people.

Over the past eight years, DoD has focused on caring for a force stressed by 15 years of continuous combat. We have supported our wounded warriors, to whom our commitment is and must remain as strong as ever, and renewed our enduring pledge to support the families of the fallen, whose loved ones made the ultimate sacrifice on behalf of our country. We have demonstrated renewed resolve to combat the preventable problem of suicide, developing a Strategy for Suicide Prevention to synchronize prevention efforts and invigorating efforts to share information and evidence-based best practices with the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). We have prioritized the eradication of sexual harassment and assault from our ranks, supporting survivors and working to eliminate retaliation. We have invested in a more agile and responsive electronic healthcare management system to provide state of the art support to our healthcare professionals, and we worked with the VA to meet interoperability requirements for the transition of electronic medical records between our two departments. We redesigned our approach to our transitioning military personnel, focused on a comprehensive Transition Assistance Program and proactive career readiness planning. And we supported the direct hiring of more than 30,000 Reserve Component members, helping lower the post 9/11 veteran unemployment rate from 12.1 percent in 2011 to 4.0 percent today.

To attract a new generation of talent, DoD launched “Force of the Future,” a series of initiatives aimed at shaping the force for the 21st century. We created on-ramps and off-ramps, expanding programs like the Secretary of Defense Corporate Fellowship program to allow military personnel to gain new skills, and creating opportunities for individuals outside DoD to contribute to our mission, such as through the Defense Digital Service, which is described in greater detail below. We’ve also focused on improving retention by supporting military families, expanding maternity and paternity leave, extending childcare hours on bases, and offering more flexibility in change of station moves. Supported by the First Lady’s Joining Forces initiative, DoD’s Military Spouse Employment Partnership has grown to more than 300 employer partners employing more than 100,000 military spouses over the past five years. We are also implementing a landmark reform of military retirement benefits, the largest since World War II, providing every service member who serves at least three years (over 85 percent of military personnel) access to government-funded retirement savings that were previously available to only a small percentage of the force.

We’re focused on talent management for our military personnel so that we can better compete for talent in the 21st century, proposing more flexibility in our merit-based system for promotion and establishing an Office of People Analytics. We are also implementing talent management programs for our civilians, such as direct hire opportunities for college students and expanding scholarship-for-service in science and technology fields. And we’re focused on communicating the value of military life, expanding our geographic and demographic recruiting access, returning ROTC programs to the Ivy League and similar institutions of higher education, and reinvigorating our ROTC programs overall to ensure we keep attracting the same high-quality participants.

As an All-Volunteer Force, DoD must be able to draw from 100 percent of America’s population, focusing purely on a person’s willingness and ability to serve our country. We can no longer afford to allow barriers unrelated to a person’s qualifications to prevent us from recruiting and retaining those who can best accomplish the mission. In 2012, then-Secretary Panetta directed a review of the remaining gender-based barriers to service, and after receiving the results of that review, I ordered that the military Services open all positions and units, including those involving combat, to women without exception. As a result, 213,000 positions and 52 military occupational specialties are now open to men and women alike who meet Service standards. In December 2010, President Obama signed into law legislation providing for the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” allowing gay men, lesbians and bisexuals to serve openly in uniform, and in 2013 DoD made the same benefits available to all military spouses, regardless of sexual orientation. This year, we lifted DoD’s ban on transgender service members, setting standards for medical care and outlining responsibilities for Military Services and commanders to develop and implement guidance, training and specific policies in the near and long-term.

We have made great strides, but changes to the force require a long-term implementation process. Moving forward, the Department must continue to proceed in a measured and responsible way that ensures the success of individual service members and preserves the unit effectiveness, readiness, cohesion, and quality of the All-Volunteer Force.

Acquisition Reform: Driving Smart and Essential Technological Innovation

Today’s competition is global, with other countries trying to catch up with the advances the United States has enjoyed for decades in areas like precision-guided munitions, stealth, cyber, and space. As we have in the past, DoD must invest to ensure America pioneers and dominates the technological frontiers related to military superiority. DoD is therefore pursuing new technology development to maintain our military’s technological superiority. How we do this is important, because while the Cold War arms race was characterized mostly by strength, with the leader simply having more, bigger, or better weapons, this era of technological competition is uniquely characterized by an additional variable of speed, such that leading the race now depends on who can out-innovate faster than everyone else. It’s no longer just a matter of what we buy; what also matters is how we buy things, how quickly we buy them, whom we buy them from, and how quickly and creatively we’re able to upgrade them and repurpose them to be used in different and innovative ways to stay ahead of future threats.

In order to meet the urgent demands of ongoing conflicts, DoD has focused on increased agility within the acquisition system. In 2010, we established the Warfighter Senior Integration Group, which is designed to bring together and bring to bear the full weight of DoD’s senior leadership on addressing our most critical operational needs, particularly in Iraq and Afghanistan. And we established a “fast lane” to rapidly field cutting-edge, much-needed capabilities. Overall, including efforts that pre-date this Administration, the Department fielded over 25,000 mine-resistant ambush-protected vehicles and 144 aerostat balloons equipped with cameras to help monitor the security of our forward operating bases, along with a variety of counter-IED equipment. Since its establishment, this group has expedited funding and the delivery of critical technologies and capabilities to U.S. and Coalition forces.

To meet the challenge of higher end threats, each military Service has since established a rapid acquisition organization modeled on the Air Force, and these are collectively beginning to pay dividends to the warfighter. And in 2012, I also created the Strategic Capabilities Office (SCO) to quickly demonstrate advanced innovative technologies and reimagine existing DoD, intelligence community, and commercial systems by giving them new roles and game-changing capabilities to confound potential opponents. Since that date, SCO has repurposed the SM-6 missile from air defense to anti-ship capability; demonstrated the swarming capability of surveillance microdrones; and is currently working on developing a cross-domain capability for the Army Tactical Missile System. These are just a few of their projects, and they are both innovative and rapid — with several projects already transitioned to the military Services.

Across the broader acquisition enterprise we have focused on strengthening our buying power, improving industry productivity, and providing affordable capability to our warfighters.

Since 2010, the Department has introduced three iterations of Better Buying Power initiatives, a program to continuously improve the performance of the entire defense acquisition system. Since implementing this program, we have seen a significant decline in the number of critical Nunn-McCurdy cost breaches, from a high of 7 in 2009 to 1 per year at present. Similarly, the growth of contracted costs for major programs has dropped from 9 percent in 2011 to a new 30-year low of 3.5 percent today.

One of our first legislative accomplishments was the passing of the Weapons System Acquisition Reform Act of 2009, and I am pleased to report the legislation has achieved the outcomes we hoped for. Where the Services’ cost estimates used to diverge on average from independent estimates by more than 7 percent, in the last seven years they are within 3 percent of each other. This greater rigor is reflected in the acquisition outcomes described above. Early on, we also cancelled or truncated troubled and unaffordable weapons platforms, including the Future Combat System, combat search and rescue helicopter, and the VH-71 Presidential helicopter, and made the hard choices to end programs that were no longer affordable including production of the C-17 aircraft and the alternate engine program for the Joint Strike Fighter. These decisions to cut underperforming acquisition programs left the defense program in better health, and have allowed the Department to pursue a realistic modernization program despite a constrained defense budget — investing in and operationalizing our security by leveraging advances in cyber, space, electronic warfare, neuroscience, biotechnology, robotics, artificial intelligence and autonomous learning systems, human-machine collaboration, advanced materials, data analytics, and other areas.

Staying ahead also requires leveraging the capability of current and emerging technologies, including commercial technologies wherever appropriate. When I began my career, most technology of consequence originated in America, and much of that was sponsored by the government, especially DoD. Today, not only is much more technology commercial, it is also global. That’s why we’re investing in building and rebuilding bridges with America’s vibrant, innovative technology community and forging more connections with our commercial technology base.

We’re doing that through efforts like the Defense Innovation Unit Experimental (DIUx), which identifies and does business with companies outside the traditional defense orbit; encouraging the adoption of Other Transactions Authority to partner with commercial firms; and through a pilot program with the independent, non-profit startup backer In-Q-Tel, leveraging its venture capital model to help find innovative solutions for some of our most challenging problems. We established the Defense Digital Service, which brings in talent from America’s vibrant, innovative technology community for a time to help solve some of our most complex problems, from speeding development of next-generation GPS to modernizing the Defense Travel System.

We’ve also led the way for the President’s Manufacturing USA initiative, establishing six Manufacturing Innovation Institutes (MIIs) over the past four years, focused on emerging technologies that hold strategic promise for both DoD and commercial industry, including digital manufacturing, photonics, and flexible hybrid electronics. Moving forward, DoD has plans to open two additional institutes focused on advanced tissue bio-fabrication and robotics in manufacturing environments, committing nearly $500 million in DoD funding for the MII program and achieving over $1 billion in matching funding from non-federal sources. DoD has also invested in our own DOD Research, Development, Test, and Evaluation (RDT&E) enterprise, the network of laboratories and engineering centers that help make our military the most innovative in the world. In FY 2017 alone, DoD is proposing to spend nearly $72 billion on research and development — for context, more than double what Intel, Apple and Google spent on R&D last year combined.

These investments and reforms will be the work of many more years, as we identify best practices in human capital, collaboration, and acquisition mechanisms and modify our core operations to exploit current technology tools, innovation methods, and communities of practice to better engage with the issues and opportunities raised by emerging technologies. It is my hope that the next Administration will continue this outreach — because just like GPS and the Internet later went on to yield great benefits for not just our security but also our society, the investments we’re making in some of these fields along with our partners in the technology industry will lead to incredible advances that today we can only imagine. The next Administration can also build on our progress in acquisition management by continuing to implement, monitor, and track the performance of acquisition organizations and programs and by strengthening the acquisition workforce. Throughout the Administration we have worked hard to build an acquisition culture of cost consciousness, professionalism, and technical excellence. It is clear from measured results that these efforts have paid huge dividends to the Department and the nation.

The Imperative of Reform

Reforming the DoD Enterprise

We have an obligation to the taxpayer to ensure that every defense dollar is spent wisely and responsibly. That’s why reforming the DoD enterprise is so important, and why DoD has been embarked on a reform path for much of the last eight years — from improving how we’re organized so we can best respond to the challenges and opportunities of the future security environment, to continuing to improve our acquisition and enterprise-wide business and audit practices, to reducing excess infrastructure and overhead, to modernizing the military healthcare system.

In 2011, President Obama challenged federal agencies to identify efficiencies in major administrative areas through the “Campaign to Cut Waste.” DoD exceeded the campaign’s 20 percent goal by cutting 33 percent in targeted areas compared to our FY 2010 baseline — resulting in approximately $8 billion in cost avoidance. As of the third quarter of FY 2016, our travel spending is down by an estimated 20 percent, printing reduced by 23 percent, and advisory services funding was cut by 36 percent. Other areas where DoD found efficiencies included reducing employee IT devices, tightening executive fleet services, better defining and controlling permissible conference attendance, and eliminating extraneous promotional items. Beginning in 2009, we reduced the number of senior executives and general and flag officers, and have been working with Congress to trim management headquarters staffs by 25 percent. In 2011, we eliminated a Combatant Command, closing Joint Forces Command and integrating some of its functions into the Joint Staff. In more recent years, we’ve proposed changes to the commissary system while being careful to preserve savings for patrons. We’ve also proposed cost-saving reforms to TRICARE, adjustments that will save billions while still providing the benefits our service members deserve. We acted to consolidate Cold War-era infrastructure in Europe, putting U.S. forces in Europe on a more sustainable and ready posture, and we sought authority to conduct another round of base closures and realignments to further reduce outdated and costly infrastructure here at home.

Lastly, the Department also remains committed to holding ourselves accountable for every taxpayer dollar. Over the last eight years, preparations have been made to allow us to begin an annual DoD-wide full financial statement audit. In 2008, only eight percent of total budgetary resources and 26 percent of assets were under audit; today those numbers are 87 and 40 percent, respectively. In a similar commitment to transparency, this Administration also fully funded its known Overseas Contingency Operations costs in each of our budget requests, clearly identifying wartime costs while reducing uncertainty for our warfighters and the readiness impacts on forces at home.

I appreciate the support received from Congress for some of these efforts to become more efficient — for instance, through statutory changes that enabled reform of the military retirement system. However, in other areas where DoD has continually submitted much-needed reforms to strengthen the efficiency and capability of our force –including by consolidating healthcare systems and improving incentives, shedding excess infrastructure, and divesting lower-priority legacy platforms — these have been repeatedly denied, either in whole or in part, at a cost for both taxpayers and our troops. This poses a real problem, because every dollar Congress denies us in reform is a dollar we can’t invest in security we need to deter and defend against today’s and tomorrow’s threats. I hope that with the focus on reform we’ve recently seen in the defense committees in Congress, we can continue to work together on reform in the future.

Support to Interagency Priorities

The Department published a Climate Change Adaptation Roadmap, focused on acknowledging and managing the risks inherent in climate change — both its nature as an instability accelerant in many parts of the world and the danger it poses to our own enterprise such as sea-level rise and flooding at coastal bases or drought in the southwest. As described in the President’s memorandum on Climate Change and National Security, the impacts of climate change may increase the frequency, scale, and complexity of future missions, including defense support to civil authorities, while at the same time undermining the capacity of our domestic installations to support training activities. Our actions to increase energy and water security, including investments in energy efficiency, new technologies, and renewable energy sources, will increase the resiliency of our installations and help mitigate these effects. Already, the Department has reduced energy usage at contingency bases by 30 percent, is on track to meet its commitment of 3 gigawatts of renewable energy purchases at our bases by 2025, and has executed more than $1.8 billion in Energy Savings Performance Contracts.

The Department contributed to the success of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 in creating and saving jobs to bring the country out of recession and strengthening the foundation for long-term economic growth. DoD invested in nearly 4,500 Recovery Act infrastructure projects at 650 DoD Active, Reserve, and National Guard sites in all 50 states, two territories, and the District of Columbia. These investments stimulated the nation’s economy and supported energy conservation, training, and operational requirements, while achieving national security goals, expanding energy research capabilities, and constructing two new world-class hospitals for our military community.

Conclusion

It has been the highest honor of my lifetime to lead this great Department and to serve the American people. Our men and women in uniform without a doubt represent the greatest fighting force the world has ever known, and I am mindful every moment of the day that they are carrying out their noble mission in each and every time zone of the globe.

While the next Administration will continue to be challenged by an evolving security environment, I am confident that our military is up to the task of protecting our nation in the years ahead. The President-elect can count on them to continue to execute all their duties with the excellence our citizens know they can expect; may God continue to bless them, and continue to bless the United States of America.

The discipline and commitment that have marked our military Services’ leadership of this change has been the keystone of our success. I’m pleased to announce that each of the military Services and U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) are on track with implementation efforts and seeing positive results and lessons that will make our force stronger.

In this first year of implementation we have witnessed many “firsts” making the policy change a reality. The Army has seen the fruits of thoughtful implementation as our first 10 women graduated from the Army’s elite Ranger school. We’ve seen the Army’s first female enlisted infantry soldiers, and this week 13 women graduated from Army’s first integrated Armor Basic Officer Course.

Navy selected the first 38 enlisted female sailors to serve aboard a submarine, USS Michigan, in June 2015. Subsequently, the first enlisted woman earned her submariner qualification and “dolphin” pin.

The Marine Corps has also seen positive results as the first enlisted female rifleman and machine gunner made lateral move requests to infantry jobs in May 2016. Additionally, the Marine Corps’ first female field artillery officers are assigned to operating forces after completion of the Field Artillery Basic Officers Leader Course.

Interest in the Air Force’s battlefield airmen career fields has increased, with 18 women attempting initial training. I am proud to say that the first woman has entered training to become a tactical air control party airman.

The military Services are making positive progress by continuing to apply transparent and objective standards to all career fields, ensuring that leaders assign tasks, jobs, and career fields throughout the force based on ability, not gender. We are continuing to use standards informed by today’s real-world operational requirements and experiences gained over the last decade and a half of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. As a result, our military will be even better at finding and training not only the most qualified women, but also the most qualified men, for all military specialties. While we’ve found that the standards are challenging for both men and women, I believe that this will make our force all the more ready to defeat new and emerging threats.

Now, the fact that we’re holding everyone to the same high standards may mean that in some cases, equal opportunity may not always equate to equal participation. Army and Marine Corps have assigned female leaders (officers and/or NCOs) to serve both as role models and guides for junior enlisted women and, as appropriate, advocates for the female perspective. We do this by assigning these female leaders to newly opened training opportunities in our schools and to units prior to assigning junior enlisted women to those same organizations. This helps ensure adequate female representation in key positions. The Army has accessed or transferred 75 female leaders into combat positions.

All of the military Services have focused on educating the force as a critical component of long-term success, including training to emphasize dignity and respect, instructor training on identifying and countering unconscious bias, and training in the prevention of sexual assault/harassment, hazing, and other adverse behaviors.

Over this last year we’ve seen women service members volunteer, train, and begin serving in ground combat roles with increased recruitment efforts by the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps. We have watched as our policy decisions were translated into real, meaningful action, breaking down previous barriers to military service are removed and offering new opportunities by encouraging both women and men to expand their horizons by seeking out and training for elite, challenging, and rewarding combat career fields. As we take steps toward continued excellence, I encourage each of you to share these unique opportunities with women and men alike. Let’s inspire and enable future generations to ensure that the fighting force of the future remains the finest the world has ever known.

As Secretary of Defense, my number one priority is making sure that the force of the future is just as great as the one today. That means we need to stay competitive and open to new ideas. And that is why one year ago, I created the Defense Digital Service (DDS), a group focused on bringing in talent from America’s most innovative sectors for a tour of duty at DoD to help us solve some of our most complex problems.

The team of technologists at DDS have achieved many important milestones, like improving data sharing between DoD and the VA, to make sure our veterans get access to their benefits. One of their most significant achievements to date was the launch of the Federal Government’s first bug bounty in April of this year.

Bug bounties are a widespread best practice in the outside world — and the concept is relatively simple. A company offers incentives to outside researchers — what most of us would call white-hat hackers — to test the security of its networks and applications, and report what they find, so the company can fix the vulnerabilities.

DoD’s first bug bounty, Hack the Pentagon, exceeded expectations. All told, more than 1,400 hackers were invited to participate in Hack the Pentagon and more than 250 submitted at least one vulnerability report. Of all the submissions we received, 138 were determined to be legitimate, unique, and eligible for a bounty.

By allowing outside researchers to find holes and vulnerabilities on several sites and subdomains, we freed up our own cyber specialists to spend more time fixing them than finding them. The pilot showed us one way to streamline what we do to defend our networks and correct vulnerabilities more quickly.

Because of the overwhelming success of Hack the Pentagon, I am pleased to announce two new initiatives:

New Vulnerability Disclosure Policy

Today I signed a vulnerability disclosure policy covering all Department of Defense websites. For the first time, anyone who identifies a security issue on a DoD website will have clear guidance on how to disclose that vulnerability in a safe, secure, and legal way. This policy is the first of its kind for the Department. It provides left and right parameters to security researchers for testing for and disclosing vulnerabilities in DoD websites, and commits the Department to working openly and in good faith with researchers.

The Vulnerability Disclosure Policy is a ‘see something, say something’ policy for the digital domain.

DoD is committed to being open, engaged, and accepting of skilled researchers who can help us improve our defenses — and to providing the legal avenues for these security researchers to do so.

We hope that this policy will yield a steady stream of disclosures, allowing us to find and fix issues faster. The net effect is that the Department of Defense, our service members, and the public will be safer and more secure.

Hack the Army & Future Bug Bounties

Although the new vulnerability disclosure policy covers all DoD websites, we also want to sponsor focused challenges on specific networks and systems, so we are also launching more bug bounties. Today we opened registration for the Hack the Pentagon follow-on, called Hack the Army, which was first announced by Secretary of the Army Eric Fanning on November 11th. This challenge is focused on Army websites that support the recruiting mission, and it is the first of many more bounties to come.

Just as we did with Hack the Pentagon, we have contracted with HackerOne so we can reap the benefits of crowdsourced vulnerability discovery and disclosure. All DoD Components have the ability to leverage this contract to host their own bounties in the future.

Hack the Army represents a significant step forward from Hack the Pentagon in that the Army websites offered up to hackers will be more dynamic, rather than simply static websites that aren’t operationally significant. These sites are critical to the Army’s recruiting mission, and as a result must be hardened.

The full list of Army websites and databases that bug hunters will be allowed to hack under the program will be provided to all invited participants soon after. Participants who take part in this bug bounty are eligible to receive thousands of dollars in rewards.

The Vulnerability Disclosure Policy and Hack the Army initiatives underscore the Department’s commitment to innovation and adopting commercial best practices. DoD has focused on efforts to modernize our security and find ways to tap into sources of talent across the country.

You can find more information about both of these programs at HackerOne.com/DeptOfDefense and HackerOne.com/HacktheArmy.

October 26th will mark the one-year anniversary since President Obama authorized a military campaign plan to accelerate the lasting defeat of ISIL.

In that year, our local partners in Iraq and Syria, backed by an international coalition of more than 60 countries, have tightened the noose around ISIL. With the coalition’s help, the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) have moved through Ramadi, Hit, Rutbah, Fallujah, Qayyarah, and Q-West. And in Syria, local partners there have moved through Shaddadi, Manbij, Jarabulus, and Dabiq.

In the last week, our local partners in Iraq commenced the military operation to retake Mosul. This battle has been a long time coming, but it was important for our partners to take the time to build their capacity, to plan, prepare, and posture the right forces, and to incorporate lessons learned from previous battles in the campaign.

Today, as our partners progress on their way to collapsing ISIL’s control over Mosul, French Defense Minister Jean Yves Le Drian and I held a defense ministerial with 11 of our counterparts — from Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Spain, and the United Kingdom — countries that, together with France and the United States, represent the core contributors to the counter-ISIL coalition military campaign.

This was the fifth time the coalition defense ministers have met and the third time in this small group setting. These more intimate meetings allow for more free flowing discussions, and provide an opportunity to help set direction for upcoming C-ISIL defense ministerials, which comprise a much larger group of all countries contributing to the military campaign.

During our last meeting in Paris, we rallied behind a common coalition military campaign plan, which was — and is — focused on three objectives. The first is to destroy ISIL’s parent tumor in Iraq and Syria, because the sooner we end ISIL’s occupation of territory in those countries — that is, the sooner we crush both the fact and the idea of an Islamic state based on ISIL’s barbaric ideology — the safer all of our countries will be.

That’s necessary, but it’s not sufficient. So the second objective is to combat ISIL’s metastases everywhere they emerge around world: in Afghanistan, Libya, and elsewhere. And the third objective is to work with our intelligence, homeland security, and law enforcement partners to help protect our homelands and our people.

At the same time, we also agreed on our strategic approach of enabling capable, motivated local forces — for that’s the only way to ensure ISIL’s lasting defeat. And we resolved to continue accelerating our campaign, taking advantage of opportunities generated by new intelligence, newly trained partners, and strikes against ISIL leaders, infrastructure, and finances — all of which generated more new opportunities, which we then seized, reinforcing success.

Every time we’ve seen opportunities to accelerate the campaign, the United States has stepped up, and so have every one of our partners — in critical ways. Because whether it’s strike aircraft, additional police trainers, or other enabling capabilities, all of these contributions have been vital to this fight.

Just this weekend, I was in Iraq, where I saw firsthand how our campaign is proceeding according to the plan we laid out throughout the last year.

While there, I met with Prime Minister Abadi in Baghdad and Kurdistan Regional Government President Barzani in Erbil. We could not ask for two better partners. And in a region rife with sectarianism, they’ve set aside their differences and united in shared resolve against their common enemy of ISIL. In fact, in Erbil on Sunday, I met Iraqi Army attack helicopter pilots who were flying missions against ISIL from Kurdish territory. Meanwhile, since the Mosul operation commenced, wounded members of the Iraqi Security Forces are being treated in Kurdish hospitals. And the ISF and Peshmerga have passed through one another’s lines.

This level of cooperation would have been unthinkable a year ago. So I want to commend both Prime Minister Abadi and President Barzani for achieving this unity, and for their leadership of the Iraqi Security Forces and Kurdish Peshmerga.

For the coalition’s part, we’re applying every capability we’ve contributed to the campaign — Apaches, HIMARS, airstrikes, logistical support, intelligence support, police training, training and equipping of our local military partners, and special operations forces that are advising, assisting, and accompanying them.

And the coalition is also eliminating ISIL’s leadership in Mosul — targeting more than 35 ISIL commanders there, including many of the highest, in the last 90 days.

As of now, our local partners’ artillery can range into Mosul, increasing the striking power we can bring to bear on the city. And the more territory that’s retaken from ISIL each day, the more geographic latitude coalition forces have to operate in, and the closer we get to the heart of ISIL’s power center in Mosul.

So overall, I’m encouraged by the results of the Mosul operation thus far — it’s been proceeding according to plan, with the Iraqi Security Forces and Kurdish Peshmerga each doing their part.

And while we know it will continue to be a tough fight — indeed, we’ll probably see more resistance as the fight goes on, and almost certainly as our partners approach the core of the city — I’m confident the Iraqi Security Forces will succeed.

Now, while Mosul may be in the headlines, and is of course an important operation, it’s not the only one underway. In addition to Mosul, there’s ISIL’s power center in Raqqa, Syria, where our local partners will certainly collapse ISIL’s control as well. We’ve already begun laying the groundwork with our partners to commence the isolation of Raqqa.

And as with Mosul, and as we’ve done throughout this campaign, the force that takes Raqqa will have to be a local force — that’s vital to dealing ISIL a lasting defeat.

Next, there’s the Turkish border region, an area where we’ve long wanted to get rid of ISIL, and the security of which I discussed last week in Ankara with President Erdogan, Prime Minister Yıldırım, and our Turkish counterpart, Defense Minister Işık.

This is important not only for the protection of our NATO ally Turkey, but also the security of all of Europe. Our goal there is to cut off the flow of foreign fighters that could threaten Turkey and all of our countries.

That’s why we’ve worked with our Turkish partners and, importantly, local forces to not only seal the Turkey-Syria border between Jarabulus and the Ma’ra line, but also retake towns like Dabiq, which ISIL had said would be the site of a decisive battle.

Then, there’s the territory in between Raqqa and Mosul, including in the Tigris and Euphrates River Valleys, where our coalition has and will continue to horizontally expand our identifying, generating, and enabling of local partners to defeat ISIL in those areas.

In terms of the future, while the collapse of ISIL’s control over Raqqa and Mosul will certainly put ISIL on an irreversible path to lasting defeat, there will still be much more to do after that, as well.

First, we will need to finish training and equipping the police, border guards, and Ninewah province Popular Mobilization Forces that will help secure and hold Mosul after it’s retaken from ISIL.

And it will be a big job for the Iraqi government to consolidate its control over the entire country. So the coalition should be ready to continue performing missions such as training, equipping and logistics, intelligence support, and counterterrorism support, should the Iraqi government request that support.

Second, there will be aid to provide, towns to rebuild, services to reestablish, and communities to restore. And there will need to be continued political support for a multi-sectarian Iraq. Those aren’t military matters, but they’re part of how, after winning the battle, you have to win the peace.

That’s why — as I emphasized when I met in Baghdad with representatives from the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq, and the Iraqi government coordinator for humanitarian and emergency aid — the international community’s stabilization, reconstruction, and governance efforts cannot be allowed to lag behind our military progress. That’s critical to making sure ISIL, once defeated, stays defeated.

It will therefore be important for our coalition to remain engaged militarily, even after the inevitable expulsion of ISIL from Mosul and Raqqa. This is not the time to lose focus.

Indeed, now that we know how this fight will end in Iraq and Syria, we must prepare to counter not only the threat posed by foreign fighters attempting to return home, but also any attempts by ISIL to survive by reinventing itself in some other shape or form. Whether it tries to mutate into a terrorist network that’s scattered across the globe, or a skeleton organization that lies in wait in the sands of the desert, or even a violent extremist movement that lives and lurks only in the darkest corners of the Internet, we cannot perfectly predict what will happen after our coalition defeats ISIL in Iraq and Syria, so we have to be ready for anything.

Meanwhile, beyond Iraq and Syria, we’re also continuing to counter ISIL’s metastases — in Libya, where ISIL’s presence in Sirte has been reduced to a single neighborhood — and in Afghanistan, where we’ve already undertaken two major operations against ISIL’s presence in that country. We’ve hit them hard and there will be more to come.

And all the while, of course, we’re working with our partners across our governments to help defend our homelands.

In this regard, I am pleased to announce that as a result of our meeting today, the coalition identified more ways to keep accelerating the certain and lasting defeat of ISIL, and the contributions we’ll need to do so.

And, we agreed to sustain the coalition, and our commitments to it — not only for the purposes of helping the Iraqis win the battle, but also to help them win the peace. After all, we cannot perfectly predict what will happen after our coalition defeats ISIL in Iraq and Syria…so we have to be ready for anything, and we have to keep working together. As long as we do so, I’m confident we will deal ISIL the lasting defeat it deserves.

On Friday August 26th, 2016 the Marines at Marine Barracks Washington — better known as the “Oldest Post of the Corps” — performed their final parade of the summer season.

General Robert Neller, Commandant of the Marine Corps, and his wife D’Arcy hosted my wife Stephanie and me for a reception in their garden before the start of the parade.

Friday Evening Parades at the Barracks began over a half a century ago with the kick-off of the Post’s first parade July 5, 1957, drawing a crowd of more than 3,000 spectators. The parades have become an annual summer tradition ever since.

Two days of each summer week are dedicated to these events. Tuesday Sunset Parades are performed at the hallowed grounds of the Marine Corps War Memorial in Arlington National Cemetery Va., and Evening Parades are showcased Fridays at the historic Marine Barracks.

The performance features sequences from “The President’s Own” U.S. Marine Band, “The Commandant’s Own” U.S. Marine Drum and Bugle Corps, the U.S. Marine Corps Color Guard, the U.S. Marine Corps Silent Drill Platoon and Ceremonial Marchers.

Nearly 5,300 guests were in attendance, making it this season’s most attended parade.

A regular part of the parade is the entrance of Chesty the Bulldog — the Marines’ mascot. Friday was National Dog Day so Chesty was greeted with extra enthusiasm from the crowd.

Thank you to the Marines who made the final evening parade of the 2016 season a huge success.

Today I announced some changes in the Defense Department’s policies regarding transgender servicemembers and I want to explain why. There are three main reasons — having to do with our future force, our current force, and matters of principle.

The first and fundamental reason is that the Defense Department and the military need to avail ourselves of all talent possible in order to remain what we are now — the finest fighting force the world has ever known.

Our mission is to defend this country, and we don’t want barriers unrelated to a person’s qualification to serve preventing us from recruiting or retaining the soldier, sailor, airman, or Marine who can best accomplish the mission. We have to have access to 100 percent of America’s population for our all-volunteer force to be able to recruit from among them the most highly qualified — and to retain them.

While there isn’t definitive data on the number of transgender servicemembers, the RAND Corporation looked at the existing studies out there and their best estimate was that about 2,500 people out of approximately 1.3 million active-duty servicemembers and about 1,500 out of approximately 825,000 reserve servicemembers are transgender, with the upper end of their range of estimates of around 7,000 in the active component and 4,000 in the reserves.

Although relatively few in number, we’re talking about talented and trained Americans who are serving their country with honor and distinction. We invest hundreds of thousands of dollars to train and develop each individual, and we want to take the opportunity to retain people whose talent we’ve invested in and who have proven themselves.

This brings me to the second reason, which is that the reality is that we have transgender servicemembers serving in uniform today, and I have a responsibility to them and their commanders to provide them both with clearer and more consistent guidance than is provided by current policies.

We owe commanders better guidance on how to handle questions such as deployment, medical treatment and other matters. And this is particularly true for small unit leaders, like our senior enlisteds and junior officers.

Also, right now, most of our transgender servicemembers must go outside the military medical system in order to obtain medical care that is judged by doctors to be necessary, and they have to pay for it out of their own pockets. This is inconsistent with our promise to all our troops that we will take care of them and pay for necessary medical treatment.

I and the Defense Department’s other senior leaders who have been studying this issue over the past year have met with some of these transgender servicemembers — they’ve deployed all over the world, serving on aircraft, submarines, forward operating bases, and right here in the Pentagon. And while I learned that in most cases their peers and local commanders have recognized the value of retaining high-quality people, I also learned that the lack of clear guidelines for how to handle this issue puts the commanders and the servicemembers in a difficult and unfair position.

One servicemember I met with described how some people had urged him to leave the military because of the challenges he was facing with our policies, and he said he just wouldn’t quit. He was too committed to the mission and this was where he wanted to be. These are the kind of people we want serving in our military.

The third and final reason for the change is a matter of principle. Americans who want to serve and can meet our standards should be afforded the opportunity to compete to do so. After all, our all-volunteer force is built upon having the most qualified Americans. And the profession of arms is based on honor and trust.

Army Chief of Staff General Milley recently reminded us of this, when he said, “The United States Army is open to all Americans who meet the standard, regardless of who they are. Embedded within our Constitution is that very principle, that all Americans are free and equal. And we as an Army are sworn to protect and defend that very principle. And we are sworn to even die for that principle. So if we in uniform are willing to die for that principle, then we in uniform should be willing to live by that principle.”

In view of these three reasons to change our policy, last July I directed the commencement of a study to identify the practical issues related to transgender Americans serving openly, and to develop an implementation plan that addresses those issues consistent with military readiness — because our mission, which is defending this country, has to come first.

I directed the working group to start with the presumption that transgender persons can serve openly without adverse impact on military effectiveness and readiness, unless and except where objective, practical impediments are identified.

It’s fair to say it’s been an educational process for a lot of people here in the Department, including me. We had to look carefully and deliberately at medical, legal, and policy considerations that have been evolving very rapidly in recent years, and we had to take into account the unique nature of military readiness and make sure we got it right. I’m proud of the thoughtful and deliberate manner in which the Department’s leadership pursued this review. I have been guided throughout by one central question: is someone the best qualified servicemember to accomplish our mission?

Let me now describe the process we used to study this over the last year.

The leadership of the armed services — together with personnel, training, readiness, and medical specialists from across the Department of Defense — studied the available data. We also had the RAND Corporation analyze relevant data and studies to help us with our review. And we got input from transgender servicemembers, from outside expert groups, and from medical professionals outside the Department.

We looked carefully at what lessons could be learned from the outside, including from allied militaries that already allow transgender servicemembers to serve openly, and from the private sector, because even though we’re not a business, and are different from a company in important ways, their experience and practices are still relevant.

It’s worth noting that at least 18 countries already allow transgender personnel to serve openly in their militaries. These include close allies such as the UK, Israel, and Australia, and we were able to study how they dealt with this issue.

We also saw that among doctors, employers, and insurance companies, providing medical care for transgender individuals is becoming common and normalized — in both public and private sectors alike. Today, over a third of Fortune 500 companies — including companies like Boeing, CVS, and Ford — offer employee health insurance plans with transgender-inclusive coverage. That’s up from zero companies in 2002. Similarly, non-discrimination policies at two-thirds of Fortune 500 companies now cover gender identity, up from just 3 percent in 2002. And for the public sector, all civilian federal employees have access to a health insurance plan that provides comprehensive coverage for transgender-related care and medical treatment. This represents a sea change from even just a decade ago.

Based on its analysis of allied militaries, and the expected rate at which American transgender servicemembers would require medical treatment that would impact their fitness for duty and deployability, RAND’s analysis concluded that there would be “minimal readiness impacts from allowing transgender servicemembers to serve openly.”

And in terms of cost, RAND concluded the health care costs would represent “an exceedingly small proportion” of DoD’s overall health care expenditures.

As a result of this year-long study, I’m announcing today that we are ending the ban on transgender Americans in the United States military. Effective immediately, transgender Americans may serve openly, and they can no longer be discharged or otherwise separated from the military just for being transgender.

Additionally, I have directed that the gender identity of an otherwise qualified individual will not bar them from military service, or from any accession program.

In taking these steps, we’re eliminating policies that can result in transgender servicemembers being treated differently from their peers based solely upon their gender identity rather than their ability to serve. And we’re confirming that, going forward, we will apply the same general principles, standards, and procedures to transgender servicemembers as we do to all servicemembers. What I heard from the transgender servicemembers I met with, overwhelmingly, was that they don’t want special treatment; rather, they want to be held to the same standards and be treated like everyone else.

As I directed, the study identified practical issues that arise with respect to transgender service. And it developed an implementation plan to address those issues.

Let me briefly describe that implementation plan:

These policies will be implemented in stages over the next 12 months — starting most immediately with guidance for current servicemembers and their commanders, and followed by training for the entire force, and then beginning to access new military servicemembers who are transgender. Implementation will begin today.

Starting today: Otherwise qualified servicemembers can no longer be involuntarily separated, discharged, or denied reenlistment or continuation of service just for being transgender.

Then, no later than 90 days from today: The Department will complete and issue both a commanders’ guidebook for leading currently-serving transgender servicemembers, and medical guidance to doctors for providing transition-related care if required to currently-serving transgender servicemembers. Our military treatment facilities will begin providing transgender servicemembers with all medically necessary care based on that medical guidance. Also starting on that date, servicemembers will be able to initiate the process to officially change their gender in our personnel management systems.

Next, over the 9 months that follow, based on detailed guidance and training materials that will be prepared, the services will conduct training of the force — from commanders, to medical personnel, to the operating force and recruiters.

When the training is complete, no later than one year from today, the military services will begin accessing transgender individuals who meet all standards — holding them to the same physical and mental fitness standards as everyone else who wants to join the military.

Our initial accession policy will require an individual to have completed any medical treatment that their doctor has determined is necessary in connection with their gender transition and to have been stable in their identified gender for 18 months, as certified by their doctor, before they can enter the military. I’ve directed that this accession standard be reviewed no later than 24 months from today to ensure it reflects what more we learn over the next two years as this is implemented as well as the most up to date medical knowledge.

I have discussed the implementation plan with our senior military leaders, including Chairman of the Joint Staff, General Dunford. The chiefs had specific recommendations about the timeline, and I made adjustments to the implementation plan timeline to incorporate those recommendations. The Chairman has indicated that the Services support the final implementation timeline that I’ve laid out today.

Overall, the policies we’re issuing today will allow us to access talent of transgender servicemembers to strengthen accomplishment of our mission, clarify guidance for commanders and military medical providers, and reflect better the Department’s and our nation’s principles.

I want to emphasize that deliberate and thoughtful implementation will be key. I and the senior leaders of the Department will therefore be ensuring that all issues identified in the study are addressed in implementation.

I am 100 percent confident in the ability of our military leaders and all our men and women in uniform to implement these changes in a manner that both protects the readiness of the force and also upholds values cherished by the military — honor, trust, and judging every individual on their merits.

I’m also confident that we have reason to be proud today of what this will mean for our military — because it’s the right thing to do, and it’s another step in ensuring that we continue to recruit and retain the most qualified people — and good people are the key to the best military in the world. Our military, and the nation it defends, will be stronger.

When I created the Defense Digital Service (DDS) earlier this year, I charged its Director Chris Lynch with bringing in talent from America’s most innovative sectors for a tour of duty to help us solve some of our most complex problems. In just a short time, they’ve helped us drill tunnels through the walls that too often separate the Pentagon from America’s wonderful and innovative technology base, one of our nation’s greatest sources of strength. The team of technologists at DDS has helped address some really important problems, like improving data sharing between DoD and the VA, to make sure our veterans get access to their benefits. Over the past several months DDS has worked closely with Defense Media Activity (DMA) — and several other dedicated components within the Pentagon — to achieve yet another important milestone, our first successful bug bounty, Hack the Pentagon.

Bug bounties are a widespread best practice in the outside world — and the concept is relatively simple. A company offers incentives to outside researchers — what most of us would call white-hat hackers — to test the security of its networks and applications, and report what they find, so the company can fix the vulnerabilities.

It’s a challenge for the white-hat hackers, which they like, and it’s a whole lot better for the company than learning the hard way, after the fact. And that is, that a black-hat hacker or a nation- state has exploited vulnerabilities to steal data or destroy data, or accomplish some other nefarious purpose.

While companies like Microsoft, Google, and Facebook have used this approach to crowd-source security for several years, no federal agency had ever offered a bug bounty. So we asked the question: why couldn’t we use this tool to complement the terrific work of our own in-house cybersecurity experts?

We face a competitive world — one that requires us at the Pentagon to think outside our five-sided box, and constantly challenge ourselves to do things differently. Through this pilot, we’ve found a cost-effective way to support what our dedicated people do every day to defend our systems and networks — and we’ve done it securely and effectively.

And the results exceeded our expectations.

All told, more than 1,400 hackers were invited to participate in Hack the Pentagon and more than 250 submitted at least one vulnerability report. Of all the submissions we received, 138 were determined to be legitimate, unique, and eligible for a bounty.

As these reports arrived, we worked to remediate them in real time with support from a contractor, HackerOne. Today, a little more than a month after the pilot finished, we’ve remediated each and every one of these vulnerabilities found.

In total now, this pilot cost $150,000. It’s not a small sum, but if we had gone through the normal process of hiring an outside firm to do a security audit and vulnerability assessment, which is what we usually do, it would have cost us more than $1 million.

Also, by allowing outside researchers to find holes and vulnerabilities on several sites and subdomains, we freed up our own cyber specialists to spend more time fixing them than finding them. The pilot showed us one way to streamline what we do to defend our networks and correct vulnerabilities more quickly. My focus on making our operations more efficient and cost-effective at DOD is one of the reasons why we’re investing so aggressively in innovation, from innovative people, to innovative practices, to innovative technologies. Through Hack the Pentagon, we’ve combined all three of these elements — and to considerable success

Beyond the security fixes we’ve made, we’ve built stronger bridges to innovative citizens who want to make a difference to our defense mission. Individuals from across 44 states submitted reports. You can see a full list of the successful hackers on HackerOne’s Hall of Fame but I will tell you about two of them: Craig Arendt and David Dworken. Craig is a prolific security researcher who helped us identify a number of vulnerabilities, and David is a high school student who lives just down the road from the Pentagon.

For them and many others, this was about more than a reward or bounty. It was about the opportunity to make our country safer.

Over the course of my own career, I’ve found that people in the most innovative parts of our economy and society are there because they want to do things that truly matter. They want to spend their energies on issues of consequence. There’s a sense of responsibility that comes with knowledge and technical expertise. That’s a lesson that was imparted to me by many of my mentors, and a lesson that many technologists and innovators appreciate today. While many of our nation’s innovators are clearly motivated by this spirit, too often they lack avenues to channel it. For instance, when it comes to the security of DoD networks and systems, there is no reporting mechanism or pathway for them to tell us where we might be vulnerable — and sometimes there are legal hurdles.

Next Steps

The Hack the Pentagon Pilot was so successful, we want to ensure that we continue to learn from these kinds of exercises. That’s why as a result of Hack the Pentagon, we are going to create a central point of contact for researchers and technologists to safely and securely submit information about DoD security gaps. The creation of a policy for vulnerability disclosure is long overdue and I’m committed to developing one for the Department in the coming months.

Second, we’re working to expand bug bounty programs to other parts of the Department, so that the security benefits DMA has worked to achieve through this pilot can be replicated in other parts of our enterprise. I am directing DoD Components to review where bug bounties can be used as a valuable tool in their own security toolkit.

Third, we will include incentives in our acquisition guidance and policies so that contractors can take advantage of innovative approaches to cybersecurity testing. For example, in some circumstances we will encourage contractors to make their technologies available for independent security reviews through mechanisms such as bug bounties — which will give them one more reason to make their code more secure from the start. By offering U.S. researchers an avenue — albeit with important safeguards — for reporting vulnerabilities and gaps, we’ve done more with this pilot than make our networks more secure for the short-term. We’ve built relationships and trust for the long-term. We’ve provided a roadmap for other government departments and agencies to crowd-source their own security.

When it comes to information and technology, the Defense establishment usually relies on closed systems. “Security through obscurity” is often our default position. For many of our networks and applications, there’s good reason for that. But the more friendly eyes we have on some of our systems, networks, websites, and applications, the more gaps we can find, the more vulnerabilities we can fix, and the greater security we can provide our warfighters.

We know that state-sponsored actors and black hat hackers want to challenge and exploit our networks. What we didn’t fully appreciate before this pilot was how many white hat hackers there are who want to make a difference and who want to help keep our people and nation safer. Thank you to everyone who participated in this program to make us stronger and more resilient.

Today I spoke at the 15th annual Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore about the growing security network in the Asia-Pacific. These are my full remarks.

For 15 years now, IISS has been fostering the discussions and debates that have shaped the dynamic Asia-Pacific’s security, stability, and prosperity in this still young century. Thanks for doing so.

And I’d also like to thank our national host Singapore for welcoming us again this year. This nation where we are right now — and its incredible rise — is the quintessential example of the remarkable progress in this region over the past 70 years.

Miracle after miracle has occurred here…Japan, then Taiwan, South Korea, Singapore and Southeast Asia rose and prospered, and now, China and India and others are rising and prospering.

And continued progress is being made daily — by young innovators in Hanoi, and at technology companies in Mumbai; by the transition in Burma, and by avid consumers in China; the universities in Seoul, and in the bustling Strait of Malacca that I flew over yesterday.

There are many who share the credit for this success. This region’s proud, industrious citizens first and foremost. The statesmen in this region’s past, including the late Lee Kuan Yew, whom we continue to honor, and the many statesmen among you today. The policymakers, business leaders, military officials, scholars, and non-governmental leaders who’ve worked to make this region stable and prosperous. And, in addition to all these individuals, it’s also to the credit of shared principles — principles that have long been accepted and collectively upheld.

All that progress has led to historic change in the Asia-Pacific. Most of the change has been positive: country after country is seeking to play a greater role in regional affairs, and that’s for the good. But not all change in the region has been as constructive. Indeed, tensions in the South China Sea, North Korea’s continued nuclear and missile provocations, and the dangers of violent extremism felt worldwide, pose challenges to the region’s stability and prosperity.

And so as the region continues to change, forward-thinking statesmen and leaders must once again come together to ensure a positive and principled future…one where everybody, and every nation, continues to have the opportunity and freedom to rise, to prosper, and to win.

Thankfully, this room is full of such statesmen and leaders, and so is this region. And I want to talk with you all about how we can come together: how we can continue to build a principled security network that will allow additional waves of miracles and human progress and ensure regional stability and prosperity for years to come.

You may recall that at the end of my remarks last year, I projected conversations we might have at a future Shangri-La Dialogue. If we continue to cooperate on security, I posited, we would one day be discussing a U.S.-China-India multilateral maritime exercise, a Japan-Republic of Korea joint disaster response in the South China Sea, and an ASEAN-wide security network.

Over the last year, we’ve made progress toward that vision. China and India will both participate once again in the U.S.-hosted RIMPAC naval exercise this summer. Japan and the Republic of Korea are engaging with each other in new ways. And, through and in addition to the ASEAN-centric security network that’s developing in Southeast Asia, nations across the entire Asia-Pacific are increasingly working together — and networking security together.

By doing so, our nations are making a choice for a principled and inclusive future, one as bright and miraculous as the recent past. A future where every country — no matter how big or small — is free to make its own political, economic, and military choices, free from coercion and intimidation. Where disputes are resolved peacefully; and the freedoms of navigation and overflight, guaranteed by international law, are respected. And where, as a result, every person and every nation has the opportunity to rise and prosper and win.

We all have an interest in realizing that future. And a responsibility to bring it about. Now, unlike elsewhere in the world, peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific has never been managed by a region-wide, formal structure comparable to NATO in Europe. That’s made sense for this region, with its unique history, geography, and politics, and where bilateral relationships have long served as the bedrock of regional security.

And yet, as the region continues to change, and becomes more interconnected politically and economically, the region’s militaries are also coming together in new ways. They’re building connections for a common purpose: upholding the security and stability critical to a principled and prosperous future.

And these connections are now helping our countries plan together, exercise and train together, and operate together, more effectively and efficiently than ever before.

Now, this growing Asia-Pacific security network includes but is more than some extension of existing alliances. It weaves everyone’s relationships together — bilateral, trilateral, and multilateral — to help all of us do more, over greater distances, with greater economy of effort. It enables us to take coordinated action to respond to contingencies like humanitarian crises and disasters; to meet common challenges, such as terrorism; and to ensure the security of and equal access to the global and regional commons, including vital waterways. You can see this networked approach in our collective responses to Typhoon Haiyan in 2013 and the Nepal earthquake last year.

Most importantly, this is a principled security network. It is inclusive, since any nation and any military — no matter its capability, budget, or experience — can contribute. Everyone gets a voice, and no one is excluded, and hopefully, no one excludes themselves. And as this security network reflects the principles our countries have collectively promoted and upheld for decades, it will help us realize the principled future that many in the region have chosen, and are working together toward.

By expanding the reach of all and by responsibly sharing the security burden, this principled network represents the next wave in Asia-Pacific security.

And the United States is fully committed to this principled security network and to the Asia-Pacific’s principled future. That’s because this region, which is home to nearly half the world’s population and nearly half of the global economy, remains the most consequential for America’s own security and prosperity.

So even as the United States counters Russian aggression and coercion in Europe; as well as checks Iranian aggression and malign influence in the Middle East; and also accelerates ISIL’s certain defeat, America’s approach to the Asia-Pacific remains one of commitment, and strength, and inclusion.

Last Friday, I spoke with the newest class of American Navy and Marine Corps officers as they graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy. These are some of the finest young men and women America has to offer. And I explained to them that the United States has long and enduring diplomatic, economic, and security interests in the Asia-Pacific. And their role in it.

As a result, the United States has for decades contributed to the region’s diplomatic, economic, and security affairs, including during the many other times when some wrongly predicted an impending American withdrawal from the Asia-Pacific.

In fact, decade after decade — in the 1970s, the 1980s, the 1990s, and the 2000s — we’ve heard that the United States would cede its role as the primary security provider in the Asia-Pacific. And indeed, decade after decade — day in, and day out — American soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines have worked here, most often with your nations, to help ensure this region’s security and uphold a common set of principles for all our countries to follow…so that every nation and everyone in this region could rise and prosper.

That’s been America’s objective and America’s practice for decades. Regardless of what else was going on at home or in other parts of the world — during Democratic and Republican administrations, in times of surplus and deficit, war and peace — the United States has remained economically, politically, and militarily engaged, as well as of course geographically located, in the Asia-Pacific. And as I told those new officers, they will be doing the same in the years ahead and over the course of their long careers.

That’s because U.S. engagement in the Asia-Pacific is in America’s interests. And the Congressional representation here today — including Chairman McCain, Senators Barrasso, Cotton, Ernst, Gardner, Graham, and Sullivan — demonstrates that America’s commitment to the region — and the rebalance to the Asia-Pacific in particular — is not transient. It is enduring. And that’s because the logic of, and the need for, and the value of American engagement in the Asia-Pacific is irrefutable. And it is proven over decades.

President Obama launched the rebalance to ensure the United States continued to approach this changing region with commitment, strength, and inclusion. Indeed, the rebalance is an affirmative investment in — and a U.S. Government-wide commitment to — the Asia-Pacific’s principled future.

Through the rebalance, the United States has reenergized our diplomacy in the region. Just look at the recent months. The President hosted the first-ever U.S. ASEAN Summit at Sunnylands. President Obama made historic visits to Vietnam and Japan just last week, his tenth trip to the region. I’m now on my fifth trip to the region — and it won’t be my last. And my colleague and friend John Brennan, our CIA Director, is also attending the Shangri-La Dialogue this weekend. Several of my Cabinet colleagues meanwhile will attend next week’s U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue. Prime Minister Modi will be in Washington next week, and Prime Minister Lee, as I said, will visit the next month. In other words, this is a busy month in a busy year but one that is representative of America’s increased attention and engagement in the region.

The United States is also strengthening economic ties with the region. For example, over the last seven years, U.S.-ASEAN trade has expanded by 55 percent. Since last year’s Shangri-La Dialogue, we’ve completed negotiations on the important Trans-Pacific Partnership deal, or TPP, which will bind the United States more closely together with 11 other economies, unlock economic opportunities for all of us, and guarantee a trade system of high standard.

And the Defense Department for our part is operationalizing its part of the rebalance, too — cementing it for the future. That means the United States will remain, for decades, the primary provider of regional security and a leading contributor to the region’s principled security network.

To do so, the Defense Department is continuing to send its best people — including some of those new Naval officers and Marines I spoke with last week — and also its most advanced capabilities to the Asia-Pacific. That includes F-22 and F-35 stealth fighter jets, P-8 Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft, continuous deployments of B-2 and B-52 bombers, and our newest surface warfare ships.

The Defense Department is also investing in new capabilities critical to the rebalance. We’re growing the number of surface ships and making each of them more capable, and we’re investing in Virginia-class submarines, new undersea drones, the new B-21 Long-Range Strike Bomber, as well as in areas like cyber, and electronic warfare, and space.

The Defense Department maintains its world-leading capabilities because the United States has made incomparable investments in it over decades. As a result, it will take decades or more for anyone to build the kind of military capability the United States possesses. This strength is not simply about dollar figures. We harness those dollars to America’s innovative and technological culture to develop revolutionary technologies. And that military edge is strengthened and honed in unrivaled and hard-earned operational experience over the past 15 years. No other military possesses this kind of skill and agility backed by this much experience.

The Defense Department is also developing innovative strategies, operational concepts. And the U.S. military is practicing these new ideas in training exercises, both on our own and with partners, none larger than this summer’s RIMPAC, which will bring together 27 countries for an opportunity to network.

As RIMPAC demonstrates, America’s defense relationships with allies and partners are the foundation of U.S. engagement in the Asia-Pacific, and those relationships are expanding, modernizing. While it would take me too long to go through every valuable partnership, you can see the breadth and depth of our bilateral efforts with some of the actions the United States and its allies and partners have taken just since last year’s Shangri-La Dialogue.

For example, the U.S.-Japan alliance remains the cornerstone of Asia-Pacific security. And with the new Defense Guidelines that Minister Nakatani and I signed last year, the U.S.-Japan alliance has never been stronger, or more capable of contributing to security around the region and beyond.

Similarly, the U.S.-Australia alliance is, more and more, a global one. As our two nations work together to uphold the freedom of navigation and overflight across this region, we’re also accelerating the defeat of ISIL together in Iraq and Syria.

America’s alliance with the Philippines is as close as it has been in decades. Through the new, landmark Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement, or EDCA, the United States is supporting the modernization of the Philippine Armed Forces. EDCA provides the opportunity for American and Filipino military personnel to regularly train, exercise, and operate together, including through new joint maritime patrols.

Another developing partnership, the U.S.-India military relationship, is as close as it’s ever been. Through our strategic handshake — with the United States reaching west in its rebalance, and India reaching east in Prime Minister Modi’s Act East policy — our two nations are exercising together by air, land, and sea. And there’s also a technological handshake: we’re moving toward deeper and more diverse defense co-development and co-production, including on aircraft carrier design and construction. Minister Parrikar and I will identify new ways to cooperate in advance of Prime Minister Modi’s visit to Washington next week.

Meanwhile, President Obama’s historic visit to Hanoi last week was the latest demonstration of the dramatically-strengthened U.S.-Vietnam partnership. Thanks in part to the leadership of Senator McCain, who is present here today, the United States has lifted the ban on lethal weapons sales to Vietnam. Now Vietnam will have greater access to the military equipment it needs.

Finally, the U.S.-Singapore relationship continues to grow. Just yesterday, I flew over the Strait of Malacca with my counterpart Minister Ng in one of the American P-8 surveillance aircraft that’s now part of a rotational deployment here. That rotation is one of the many examples, including Singapore’s hosting four American littoral combat ships, of how our two countries are working together to build cooperation, provide security, and respond to crises in Southeast Asia.

And it’s reflective of a growing trend. Indeed, even as the United States will remain the most powerful military and main underwriter of security in the region for decades to come — and there should be no doubt about that — those growing bilateral relationships demonstrate that nations around the region are also committed to doing more to promote continued regional security and prosperity. That’s why the Asia-Pacific’s principled security network is growing.

And as the region changes and the rebalance is solidified, the United States is and will continue using its unique capabilities, experience, and influence to enhance the region’s security network. — always contributing with commitment, strength, and inclusion.

For example, we’re moving out on the Maritime Security Initiative I announced at this Dialogue last year. This initiative represents a $425-million-dollar, five-year, American commitment to multilateral security cooperation that aims to establish a maritime security network in Southeast Asia.

In the Initiative’s first year, the United States is helping the Philippines enhance its National Coast Watch Center and improving reconnaissance and maritime sensors; helping Vietnam train to develop future unmanned maritime capabilities; providing Indonesia and Malaysia with communications equipment and training; and working with Thailand on processing information at fusion centers.

More than simply providing money or hardware, the United States is helping these five countries connect with each other and develop a networked approach to regional challenges. Those capabilities, those connections, and that U.S. partnership will allow these countries to see more, share more, and do more to ensure maritime security throughout Southeast Asia.

This initiative demonstrates the promise of a principled security network — nations building connections for a common cause, planning and training together, and eventually operating in a coordinated way. Throughout the Asia-Pacific, more and more nations are similarly coming together in three key ways.

First, some pioneering trilateral mechanisms are bringing together like-minded allies and partners to maximize individual contributions and connect nations that previously worked together only bilaterally.

For example, the U.S.-Japan-Republic of Korea trilateral partnership helps us coordinate responses to North Korean provocations. And I’m pleased to announce that the United States, Japan, and the Republic of Korea will conduct a trilateral ballistic missile warning exercise later this month.

And two other trilateral relationships — U.S.-Japan-Australia and U.S.-Japan-India — are also growing thanks, in part to exercises. We’ve agreed to hold, and begun planning on, additional U.S.-Japan-Australia trilateral exercises. And through joint activities like this year’s MALABAR Exercise, the U.S.-Japan-India trilateral relationship is starting to provide real, practical security cooperation that spans the entire region from the Indian Ocean to the Western Pacific.

We’re also seeing trilateral cooperation around other initiatives. For example, the United States and Thailand included Laos in a successful bilateral program, and now our three nations are training together on explosive ordnance disposal.

Second — and moving beyond trilateral relationships involving the United States — many countries within the Asia-Pacific are coming together on their own: strengthening and developing bilateral relationships, and also creating trilateral arrangements.

Japan and Vietnam, for example, are collaborating on new joint maritime exercises. Japan is also working to build the capacity of the Philippine maritime forces. And India is increasing its training with Vietnam’s military and coast guard on their common platforms.

The Japan-Australia-India trilateral meeting last June was a welcome development and addition to the region’s security network. And Indonesia has proposed trilateral joint maritime patrols with Malaysia and the Philippines, including counter-piracy patrols in the Sulu Sea. The United States welcomes and encourages…encourages these burgeoning partnerships among like-minded partners who share our vision of a principled regional order.

Third and even more broadly, all of our nations are creating a networked, multilateral regional security architecture — from one end of the region to the other — through the ASEAN Defense Ministers Meeting-Plus. At Sunnylands in February, ASEAN demonstrated again why it is a model for the principled future we all want for the Asia-Pacific. In the summit declaration, the region committed to maintaining peace, security, and stability and to upholding shared principles in the region, including the freedom of navigation and overflight.

ADMM-Plus fills the growing need for an action-oriented, ASEAN-centric regional institution that builds trust, facilitates practical multilateral security cooperation, and brings the region together to meet these commitments. I want to thank Laos for its leadership of ADMM-Plus this year.

And I’m pleased to announce that in September, the United States and Laos will co-host an informal defense ministers’ dialogue in Hawaii, with all of the ASEAN countries, to follow-up on Sunnylands commitments, discuss common interests, and find new ways to network regional security.

As we weave these bilateral, trilateral, and multilateral relationships together, it’s important to remember that this principled network is not aimed at any particular country: it is open and excludes no one. This means that as nations want to contribute to regional stability and security, they can work together with other nations in the network to do so.

The United States welcomes the emergence of a peaceful, stable, and prosperous China that plays a responsible role in the region’s principled security network. We know China’s inclusion makes for a stronger network and a more stable, secure, and prosperous region.

In all of our interactions with our Chinese counterparts, the United States consistently encourages China to take actions that uphold — and do not undercut — the shared principles that have served so many in Asia-Pacific so well.

The region will be stronger, safer, and more prosperous when all countries are working toward a common vision in which shared principles are upheld, all countries enjoy equal treatment irrespective of their size or strength, and disputes are resolved peacefully and lawfully.

Unfortunately, there is growing anxiety in this region, and in this room, about China’s activities on the seas, in cyberspace, and in the region’s airspace. Indeed, in the South China Sea, China has taken some expansive and unprecedented actions that have generated concerns about China’s strategic intentions.

And countries across the region have been taking action and voicing concerns publicly and privately, at the highest levels, in regional meetings, and global fora. As a result, China’s actions in the South China Sea are isolating it, at a time when the entire region is coming together and networking. Unfortunately, if these actions continue, China could end up erecting a Great Wall of self-isolation.

Now, the United States is not a claimant in the current disputes in the South China Sea. And we do not take a position on which claimant has the superior sovereignty claim over the disputed land features.

But, the United States will stand with regional partners to uphold core principles, like freedom of navigation and overflight, and the peaceful resolution of disputes through legal means and in accordance with international law.

As I affirmed here last year and America’s Freedom of Navigation Operations in the South China Sea have demonstrated, the United States will continue to fly, sail, and operate wherever international law allows, so that everyone in the region can do the same.

And the United States will work with all Asia-Pacific nations to ensure these core principles apply just as equally in the vital South China Sea as they do everywhere else. Because only when everyone plays by the same rules can we avoid the mistakes of the past, like when countries challenged one another in contests of strength and will, with disastrous consequences for the region.

The United States views the upcoming ruling by the UN Arbitral Tribunal on the South China Sea as an opportunity for China and the rest of the region to recommit to a principled future, to renewed diplomacy, and to lowering tensions, rather than raising them. All of us should come together to ensure that this opportunity is realized.

The United States remains committed to working with China to ensure a principled future. Our two countries have a long-standing military-to-military relationship. We recently completed two confidence-building measures, one on maritime rules of behavior and another on crisis communications. The regular U.S.-China Military Maritime Consultative Agreement talks were just held in Hawaii. And China will also be back at RIMPAC this year. In fact, the United States and China plan to sail together from Guam to Hawaii for RIMPAC, conducting several exercise events along the way, including an event to practice search-and-rescue.

And the United States wants to strengthen those ties. I plan, at President Xi’s invitation, to discuss this deeper cooperation as well as the concerns I’ve outlined here, when I travel to Beijing later this year. America wants to expand military-to-military agreements with China to focus not only on risk reduction, but also on practical cooperation. Our two militaries can all also work together, bilaterally or as part of the principled security network, to meet a number of challenges — like terrorism and piracy — in the Asia-Pacific and around the world.

After all, both our nations share so many interests. And we face many of the same global challenges. The United States expects and welcomes a China that plays a responsible role in world affairs commensurate with its wealth and potential influence. Together in a network represented by all the delegates in this room, we all can do so much. And the United States wants to work with China to find solutions for the global problems we’re both facing and seize the many opportunities before us.

By networking security together, the United States, China, and all others in the region can continue to ensure stability and prosperity in a dynamic region. We can become more interconnected; we can develop greater interoperability; we can innovate together on shared capabilities. And we can continue to ensure that this region’s historic change becomes historic progress…giving everyone and every nation in the Asia-Pacific the opportunity to rise and prosper and win.

Through a principled security network, we can all meet the challenges we’re facing together — whether it’s Russia’s worrying actions, North Korea’s nuclear and missile provocations, the threat posed by extremists groups, or the growing strategic impact of climate change. These challenges and others are real for all of us who live in the Asia-Pacific. But so are the opportunities: for nations, for militaries, and for the people of the Asia-Pacific. Across the region, there are economic miracles still to occur, military relationships still to strengthen, and populations still to educate, empower, and enrich.

To realize these opportunities, the Asia-Pacific will need continued stability and security. It is said of this region, that security is like oxygen. When you have enough of it, you pay no attention to it. But when you don’t have enough, you can think of nothing else.

For many years, the United States — along with its allies and partners — helped provide oxygen in this it. But by networking regional security together, we can all contribute more, and in different ways. In the years ahead, as we continue to realize this brighter, principled future, providing the region’s oxygen will more and more become a networked effort.

Through the region’s principled security network, all of us will provide that oxygen — Americans and Filipinos, Chinese and Indians, Singaporeans and Japanese, Australians and Malaysians, Koreans and Kiwis, and many, many more. Together, we will provide the security that enables millions upon millions of people all around the Asia-Pacific to continue to rise and prosper, to be safe, to raise their children, dream their dreams, and live lives that are full.

At a time of great change in this region, and in many of our home countries, all of us must defend the security, stability, and principles that have meant so much to the Asia-Pacific. To do so, we may change how we network, how we plan, and how we operate. But we can never change why we’re networking, and what we’re networking for: for our security and shared interests…for the principles that have benefited so many for so long…and for that principled future where everyone can continue to rise and prosper.

That is the future many of us in this room spend our days working toward. I thank you for that dedication. But we’re not finished yet. We have work still to do. And I look forward to collaborating, and networking, with each of you — in the days, weeks, and years ahead — to realize this region’s principled future.

One of my core goals as Secretary of Defense has been to build, and in some cases rebuild, the bridges between our national security endeavor in the Pentagon, and the wonderfully innovative, open technology community of companies and universities that comprise one of America’s great strengths.

We’ve had a long history of partnership, working together to develop and advance technologies like the Internet, GPS, and before that communications satellites and the jet engine — all to the benefit of both our society, and our security. But when I visited Silicon Valley for the first time in my current job, a little over a year ago, I discovered that I was the first Secretary of Defense to do so in almost 20 years. So today, it’s was a pleasure to be back for my fourth official trip to the Bay Area since then to speak at our start-up, the Defense Innovation Unit-Experimental, or DIUx, and to share some exciting news about how we’re taking DIUx to the next level.

When I announced that we were creating DIUx last April, I said it would be a first-of-its-kind unit, staffed by some of DoD’s best technologists, active-duty, and reserve personnel. We put our first outpost here, in the heart of Silicon Valley, to help us connect with leading-edge technologies and the entrepreneurs behind them. And we did it because we live in a changing and competitive world.

Changing World; Investing in Innovation

When I began my career, in physics, most technology of consequence originated in America, and much of that was sponsored by the government, particularly the Department of Defense. Today, we’re still major sponsors, but much more technology is commercial. And the technology base is global. Indeed, technologies once long possessed by only the most formidable militaries have now gotten into the hands of previously less-capable forces, and even non-state actors. And nations like Russia and China are modernizing their militaries to try to close the technology gap.

So to stay ahead of those challenges, and stay the best, I’ve been pushing the Pentagon to think outside our five-sided box, and invest aggressively in innovation.

One way we’re doing that is by pushing the envelope with R&D in new technologies, like data science, biotech, cyber, electronic warfare, and many, many others. In fact, in the budget I’ve been defending before Congress over the past few weeks, we’re proposing spending nearly $72 billion on research and development next year alone. For a little local context, that’s more than double what Intel, Apple, and Google spent on R&D last year combined.

That money goes to fund things like making DoD a leader in cybersecurity, and advancing our commanding lead in undersea warfare. It invests in new strategic approaches to preventing and winning conflicts against 21st century threats, like hybrid warfare, counter-space systems, electronic warfare, and anti-access, area-denial capabilities. It enables taking long-existing systems and giving them powerful new capabilities — like the arsenal plane, which takes one of our oldest aircraft platforms, and turns it into a flying launchpad for all sorts of different conventional payloads. And, among other things, those funds support our nationwide network of public-private manufacturing innovation institutes, where we’re working with companies, universities, and research labs to fund emerging technologies like 3D printing, advanced materials, integrated photonics, and digital manufacturing and design.

One brand new one we just announced last month is focused on revolutionary textiles, combining fibers and yarns with things like circuits, LEDs, solar cells, electronic sensors, and other capabilities to create fabrics that can see, hear, sense, communicate, store energy, regulate temperature, monitor health, change color, and much more. Another we announced last fall — at Moffett Field — is focused on flexible hybrid electronics, which will make it possible to seamlessly print lightweight, flexible structural integrity sensors right onto the surfaces of ships, bridges, cars, and aircraft. And those are just a few examples of how we’re intent on expanding the boundaries of what’s possible in technology.

Another way we’re investing in innovation is by building what I call on-ramps and off-ramps for technical talent to flow between DoD and the tech sector in both directions. That way, more of America’s brightest minds can contribute to our mission of national defense. And our outstanding military and civilian leaders and technologists across DoD, and in the innovative defense industry that supports us already, will be able to interact in new ways with innovation ecosystems like DIUx.

One example of this is our new Defense Digital Service, which brings in technologists ranging from larger companies like Google, to start-ups like Shopify for what we call a tour of duty. These are talented people who come in to DoD just for a year or two, or maybe a project, but make a lasting contribution to us and to our mission, and also experience being be part of something bigger than themselves. And they’re helping solve some really important problems. They improved DoD’s data sharing with the VA, to help our veterans get faster access to the benefits they’ve earned. They’re working with a team that’s developing a better and more secure next-generation GPS, to be used by billions of people around the world — military and civilian alike. They have a team right now improving our systems for tracking sexual assaults, so we can understand the data in a more meaningful way, and then do more to eliminate these crimes from our ranks, and ultimately be more transparent with advocates and others. And later this month, they’ll work with a team to pilot one of the largest deployments of a commercial cloud computing platform — to help streamline how we manage travel orders and reservations for DoD’s nearly 3 million military and civilian personnel, making it easier to use, and a more efficient use of taxpayer dollars.

The wizards at DDS also helped us invite vetted hackers to test our digital security under a pilot program called Hack the Pentagon. Sounds crazy, right? But as you may know, this is actually something we’re stealing from the private-sector. It’s similar to the “bug bounties” that many of the leading tech companies have, but it’s the first one ever in the entire federal government. And while it’s still ongoing, I can tell you it has already exceeded all our expectations — over 1,400 hackers registered, so far discovering more than 80 bugs that qualify for a bounty, all this helping us be more secure, and as you’ll see in the coming weeks, at a fraction of the cost.

Meanwhile, an additional way we’re investing in innovation is by developing new partnerships with the private-sector and technology communities here in Silicon Valley, and in America’s many other great innovation hubs. This, of course, is where DIUx comes in.

DIUx to Date

Since opening its doors eight months ago, DIUx has been a signature part of our outreach to the Valley. And even better, it’s made progress in putting commercially-based innovation into the hands of America’s soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines.

Already, the DIUx team has made connections with more than 500 entrepreneurs and firms. They’ve hosted several highly-attended forums, bridging the gap with cutting-edge commercial firms by connecting innovators with senior DoD leaders and a full range of Pentagon funding sources, fellowships, and rotation programs. And they’ve created a funding pipeline for nearly two dozen technology projects — spanning everything from wind-powered drones to data analytic tools — that will help address some of our most pressing operational challenges.

One of the most important things since starting DIUx is how much we’ve learned over the last eight months — not only about what works, but also what can make it work better by being agile and throwing out what doesn’t work. I believe that doing business with the tech industry forces DoD to look ourselves in the mirror, which is healthy for any organization. In this case, it’s helped us identify not only successes, but also some shortcomings, both in how we engage with tech companies in Silicon Valley, and in the tools we use to accelerate the uptake of technology into the department.

So, armed with this knowledge, we’re taking a page straight from the Silicon Valley playbook: we’re iterating, and rapidly, to make DIUx even better. As a result of all this great experience and in view of technology’s and the world’s imperative to stay agile, today we’re launching DIUx 2.0. And it has several new features I’d like to tell you about.

New Features of DIUx 2.0

The first new feature is that DIUx 2.0 will be a nationwide release — we’re not just iterating, we’re scaling. Since creating DIUx, it’s become even clearer to us how valuable emerging commercial technologies are to military systems and operational concepts. And because America has many places of technical excellence, we already intend to open a second DIUx office, to be located in an innovation hub in Boston.

Second, we’re upgrading DIUx’s processing power. In our budget for the coming year, we’ve requested $30 million in new funding to direct toward non-traditional companies with emerging commercially-based technologies that meet our military’s needs. With co-investment from the military services, that number may just be a starting point. And to channel these resources into systems that will give our future warfighters a battlefield advantage, DIUx will exercise all avenues to fund promising technologies, including merit-based prize competitions, incubator partnerships, and targeted R&D efforts.

The third new feature of DIUx is an operating system upgrade. Because the missions now assigned to DIUx are far broader than any one person can oversee, I’m establishing a partnership-style leadership structure for DIUx, one that includes technologists, investors, and business executives. Here, we’re taking yet another page from the Silicon Valley playbook, and making the leadership structure of DIUx as flat as any start-up here in the Valley.

Let me introduce some of them to you.

Leadership of DIUx 2.0

First is Raj Shah, the new Managing Partner of DIUx. Raj is a National Guardsman and an F-16 pilot, a combat veteran, and he’s also been co-founder and CEO of a successful technology startup.

Next is Isaac Taylor, who joins DIUx from Google, where he was head of operations for Google X, the company’s R&D facility. There, he’s worked on Google Glass, on Google’s self-driving cars, on virtual reality technologies, and on many other Google programs.

There’s also Vishaal Hariprasad, an Air Force Reserve captain, combat veteran, and Bronze Star recipient, who co-founded a successful cybersecurity start-up and served as head of threat intelligence at a large public company.

And there’s Chris Kirchhoff, who has served as a civilian advisor to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, as a lead author of the White House’s Big Data Report, and as Director of Strategic Planning at the National Security Council.

This impressive team of partners will be joined by an equally impressive team of reservists, who will serve at DIUx in a first-of-its-kind reserve unit. America’s reservists, our part-time soldiers, can provide unique value here, as they do in so many areas, given the fact that many of these citizen-patriots are tech industry leaders when they are not on duty for DoD. And I’m pleased to say that they’ll be led by Navy Reserve Commander Doug Beck — a decorated combat veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, and who in his civilian life is Apple’s Vice President for the Americas and Northeast Asia, reporting directly to Tim Cook.

I/O and Speed

As we move to this new leadership model, we’re also upgrading the I/O, so to speak, between DIUx and our operations back at the Pentagon. Going forward, DIUx will report directly to me. It will work in close coordination with our Deputy Secretary of Defense, Bob Work, and the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Air Force General Paul Selva. And to maximize the rapid uptake of promising technology, I’m directing DIUx to work closely with DoD’s rapid acquisition cells and R&D community.

DIUx will be a test-bed for new kinds of contracting with start-up firms. They’ll work quickly to execute time-sensitive acquisition programs. And they’ll move at the speed of business — we know how fast companies run here, and in other tech hubs around the country, and we expect DIUx 2.0 to run alongside them.

One Big Thank You

I have to say that DIUx wouldn’t be where it is today without George Duchak, its founding director. We’re grateful to him for helping launch such a path-breaking initiative getting DIUx 1.0 off the ground, trying a whole lot of new things, and identifying potential partners. As we look forward to his continued service at the Pentagon — where I’ve asked him to leverage his experiences here to help expand innovative practices in other areas of DoD — we also look forward to what will come from the service leaders and their teams that will continue on here at DIUx, as they advance the great work they’ve been doing, and take it to the next level.

Meanwhile, we’re committed to growing the circle of entrepreneurs and investors interested in our defense mission. And we will keep iterating together and learning from each other going forward.

That’s one reason that I recently created a new Defense Innovation Board, to advise me and future defense secretaries on how to continue building bridges to the technology community, and on how we can continue to change to be more competitive. I’m very pleased that Alphabet’s Eric Schmidt has agreed to serve as the board’s chair — stay tuned in the coming weeks for who else will be joining him — and I’m looking forward very much to what they’ll be doing.

Conclusion

As I’ve said before, this is an exciting time. For those interested in foreign policy and national security, there are lots of interesting challenges and problems to work on. And that’s also true for those interested in technology. But the intersection of the two is truly an opportunity-rich environment.

Let me explain what I mean by that — because there are opportunities for partnership in every challenge we face.

Right now, our men and women in uniform are working with our coalition partners from our worldwide coalition, in more and more ways and with more and more power every day, to accelerate the defeat of ISIL, which we will surely do. They’re training with our NATO allies in Europe to deter Russian aggression. They’re sailing the waters of the Asia-Pacific, ensuring that the most consequential region for America’s future remains stable, secure, and prosperous for all nations. They’re standing guard on the Korean Peninsula, and countering Iran’s malign influence against our friends and allies in the Middle East. And all the while, they’re helping protect our homeland.

In each of these missions, you can make a difference. Because whether it’s algorithms that help a self-driving boat track submarines or cyber defenses that guard our networks from intruders or biotech research into developing new materials that might be able to regenerate — something never seen before in human-made substances — or smaller electronics that lighten the load of our troops in the field or 3D printed microdrones that can be kicked out the back of a fighter jet moving at Mach 0.9, technology is a critical part of everything we do. And it’s critical to addressing every strategic challenges facing us today.

That’s why DIUx matters. It has to do with our protection and our security, and creating a world where our fellow citizens can go to school, and live their lives, and dream their dreams, and one day give their children a better future.

Helping defend your country and making a better world is one of the noblest things a business leader, a technologist, an entrepreneur, or young person can do. And we’re grateful to all who do so with us.

Three months ago, I announced that the Department of Defense would be opening all remaining combat positions to women. As I said at the time, to succeed in our mission of national defense, we cannot afford to cut ourselves off from half the country’s talents and skills. We have to take full advantage of every individual who can meet our standards.

At every stage in this process, I have emphasized that the implementation of this change must be handled the right way, because the combat effectiveness of the world’s finest fighting force is paramount. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dunford and I agree that implementation should be done in a combined manner, by all the military services working together. And to make sure we did this right, I asked the military services to incorporate seven guiding principles — transparent standards, population size, talent management, physical demands and physiological differences, operating abroad, conduct and culture, and assessment and adjustment — into their implementation plans.

Over the last three months, each of the military services and U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) have put a great deal of thought and effort into their plans to incorporate these guidelines. Having reviewed and approved their exceptionally thorough work, today I’m pleased to announce that each of them will be moving forward by the end of this month. While I encourage our men and women serving in uniform to read the implementation plans, which are publicly available from the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, and SOCOM, I’d like to provide a few key examples that illustrate how we will proceed in a deliberate and methodical manner that will make our force stronger.

Transparent Standards: My first and foremost guiding principle was that the services would need to continue to apply transparent and objective standards for all career fields to ensure leaders assign tasks, jobs, and career fields throughout the force based on ability, not gender. In this respect, the services have been able to leverage the great amounts of data they gathered over three years’ worth of studies to make their standards up to date and operationally relevant. We found over the last few years that in some cases we were doing things because that’s the way we’ve always done them. For example, previously one of the tasks to earn the Army’s Expert Infantry Badge required soldiers to move 12 miles in three hours with a 35-pound rucksack, but it turns out that the rucksack weight was based on a World War II-era airborne study. It was the minimum weight required to prevent the ruck sack from getting tangled in a jumper’s static line, and had nothing to do with the equipment required for paratroopers to fight with once they landed — let alone the modern equipment that infantry soldiers need to carry today. This process drove us to take a closer look at our training, too, and going forward, we will be using standards informed by today’s real-world operational requirements, informed by experiences gained over the last decade and a half of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. As a result, our military will be even better at finding and training not only the most qualified women, but also the most qualified men, for all military specialties.

Population Size: Second, the fact that we’re holding everyone to the same high standards may mean that in some cases, equal opportunity may not always equate to equal participation. Here, we’ll incorporate lessons we’ve learned in the past, like how the Navy has integrated women onto surface ships and more recently, submarines. The Army and the Marine Corps will integrate women officers and senior enlisted into previously-closed units before integrating junior enlisted women, and where they can, they’ll assign more than just one woman into a unit at a time. This will help ensure that women officers play a key leadership role, set the right example, and enhance teamwork wherever possible.

Talent Management: Third is talent management — integration provides equal opportunity for men and women who can perform the tasks required; it does not guarantee women will be promoted at any specific number or at any set rate, as adherence to a merit-based system must continue to be paramount. This has been a particular focus area for all the military services, and they’ll be paying extra attention to it as they pursue implementation, mindful that it will require sustained effort at all levels of leadership to ensure that when someone gets ahead or moves up a rank, they earned it. We have to remember that it takes decades to grow a general or flag officer, so it will take time to see these results.

Physical Demands and Physiological Differences: Fourth is the fact that, on average, there tend to be physical and other physiological differences between men and women. Accordingly, all the services have looked closely at ways to mitigate the potential for higher injury rates among women, and they’ve come up with creative methods to address this. For example, the Army intends to give all new recruits what they call an occupational physical assessment test, the results of which will help better match the recruits with jobs they either are, or with training could be, physically capable of doing. Likewise, the Marine Corps plans to use the extra time provided by their delayed entry program so that women who are interested in enlisting in ground combat arms can better prepare themselves for the physical demands of the job they want to serve in. And as we gain new insights as more women integrate into previously-closed positions, all the services will leverage that information to develop new approaches to reduce the potential for higher injury rates. All of this will help maximize effectiveness in the fight and increase readiness.

Operating Abroad: Fifth, while we know the United States is a nation committed to using our entire population to the fullest — as are some of our closest friends and allies who have already achieved full gender integration — we also know that not all nations share this perspective. Our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines have long dealt with this reality, notably over the last 15 years in Iraq and Afghanistan, and because of this, the military services have many lessons to draw on when it comes to operating in areas where there is cultural resistance to working with women. This is an area where we will always have to be vigilant, and the services are prepared to do so going forward across the force.

Conduct and Culture: Sixth, we must address attitudes toward team performance through education and training, including making clear that sexual assault or harassment, hazing, and unprofessional behaviors are never acceptable, and that everyone must be treated with the dignity and respect they deserve. Our core beliefs in good order, discipline, leadership, and accountability are foundational to our success in integration. The services will be using new educational resources to train everyone up and down the ranks to prepare for the integration of women, from the newest recruits to four-star admirals and generals. While each service is different and will do this in their own way, I know that all of them will continue to hold our people to the highest standards of honor and trust we associate with the profession of arms.

Assessment and Adjustment: Seventh, it is absolutely critical — and a core tenet of DoD’s character as a learning organization — that we embark on integration with a commitment to the monitoring, assessment, and in-stride adjustment that enables sustainable success. Every service is deeply committed to this. One example I want to highlight is U.S. Special Operations Command, which will continually measure and track a variety of categories for its personnel — including physical performance, injury rates, health, promotion, qualifications, and retention — to assess how integrating women into special operations forces can be further improved over time.

As I said in December, it’s important to keep all of this in perspective. Since then, we’ve already seen some changes — women servicemembers have started to volunteer for ground combat roles, and the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps are all beginning to step up their recruitment efforts. But even as we proceed with implementation going forward, it won’t all happen overnight, and while at the end of the day this will make us a better and stronger force, there will still be problems to fix and challenges to overcome. We shouldn’t diminish that. At the same time, we should also remember that the military has long prided itself on being a meritocracy, where those who serve are judged not based on who they are or where they come from, but rather what they have to offer to help defend this country. That’s why we have the finest fighting force the world has ever known. And it’s one other way we will strive to ensure that the force of the future remains so, long into the future. Today, we take yet another step toward that continued excellence.