[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 18]
[Senate]
[Pages 24212-24213]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




             TRIBUTE TO AIR FORCE SECRETARY JAMES G. ROCHE

  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, we have been paying a lot of tributes to 
retiring Members of the Senate, and I think it is appropriate to pay 
tribute to at least one of our retiring public servants, and I would 
like to do that right now for the Secretary of the Air Force, Dr. James 
G. Roche.
  I know Secretary Roche has been attacked from time to time. That goes 
with the job. It is a tough job. He knew that when he came. I think we 
can put that aside and pay tribute for the things he has done that are 
not as controversial but have been good for the Air Force and for our 
country.
  You have to keep in mind that Secretary Roche left a lucrative career 
in private life to take this job as Secretary of the Air Force. He 
brought a lot of savvy with him from his private business career. I 
remember so well when he was first confirmed, his first trip was to go 
with me to Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma. After visiting that base, 
he returned to Washington with Secretary Gibbs and immediately put in 
place a plan to revitalize the depots using the existing Air Force 
budget. This is something that previous administrations have never 
accomplished. They seemed to be more interested in letting the depots 
rust away.
  Secretary Roche invested money, time, and industrial know-how into 
the depots, and he did it in a partnership arrangement where he 
actually stimulated the communities to pass very large bond issues to 
exercise the private participation. He started a program where depots 
were benchmarked off similar commercial enterprises and started 
informal competition that drove maintenance days down ever lower. He 
brought LEAN manufacturing processes to the depots and other similar 
commercial practices that revitalized the workforce, decreased the 
failure rates, raised readiness standards, and decreased overall costs 
at the depots.
  I look at the record he had. In fiscal year 2003 alone, AMC reported 
that the mission-incapable aircraft part hours decreased by 37.6 
percent, the percentage of hours grounded. It bettered the goal by 
922,000 hours. The mission-incapable aircraft part incidents decreased 
by 23.4 percent, which bettered the goal by 4,400 incidents. Logistics 
response time was reduced 20.4 percent. Stockage effectiveness 
increased by 5.5 percent. It goes on and on.
  His record is there. He has done a magnificent job at applying his 
business practices in making our scarce dollars in the military go a 
lot further.
  I was very impressed with his focus on depots, but his ability to 
guide the Air Force through the troubled waters after 9/11 were equally 
impressive. He restructured the force and focused training to support 
new missions: homeland defense, renewed focus on Close Air Support, 
close partnering with the Army in joint operations and Space support to 
warfighters.
  He expanded the role and support for special operations. He 
accelerated the delivery to the battlefield of Armed Predators and 
Global Hawks, bombers in support of close air support, tactics enabling 
engagement or the Time Sensitive Targets, networked Intelligence, 
Surveillance, and Reconnaissance, and advanced Combined Air Operations 
Center capabilities.
  Secretary Roche and General Jumper have done a remarkable job. I 
remember, back in the late 1990s, after we downsized and downgraded and 
had done away with a lot of the modernization programs in our military 
under the previous administration, General Jumper had the courage to 
stand before our committee and say and admit we were going to have to 
do something about modernization, something about the F-22, something 
about the Joint Strike Fighter, because the Russians were making the SU 
series that was actually better than our best strike vehicles, which 
were the F-15s and F-16s. And this was done. This is the type of

[[Page 24213]]

courage that came forth during Secretary Roche's administration.
  The investigation into the tanker lease continues, and it will 
continue until all individuals who acted inappropriately are held 
accountable. That is appropriate. However, we must move forward on 
recapitalizing our tanker fleet, fighting the war on terrorism, and 
getting back to the business of supporting the warfighters, 
specifically, moving forward on confirmations of senior military 
leaders so our troops in the field have the leadership they deserve.
  I think it is time to allow the investigations to find out who is 
guilty of wrongdoing. Yes, it was wrong to take the tanker deal to the 
Appropriations Committee and skip the authorizers. But that was fixed. 
We held hearings. We compromised, and it looks like we have killed the 
tanker deal. We have investigations underway, some complete, and those 
who committed crimes are going to pay for their crimes. So let's not 
overreach this subject and bring innocent men and women under public 
attack.
  Let me say that Secretary Roche has been innovative. He has 
tirelessly pressed new ideas. I thank Secretary Roche for the very fine 
contributions he made to the U.S. Air Force and to the United States of 
America.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alabama.

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