00:00How about Olivia? Thank you. As you said, the Air Force and Space Force hit their recruiting goals three months early and the Navy announced that they did the same a month ago. What does Secretary Hex said attribute these increases to after the Biden administration saw drops in recruitment and failed to meet those goals?
00:16Well, I think, you know, we recently stood up a recruiting task force here a couple of weeks ago to analyze and look at just these types of questions. Recruiting is a constellation of different things. And one of the things that we recognize here at the department, I mean, to answer your question directly, I mean, I believe that with President Trump as a commander in chief and Secretary Hegseth at the helm here in the DOD, leadership matters and certainly their leadership and moral clarity as it pertains
00:46to certain issues, not just here within the department, but all around the world has inspired people to want to join and serve this country in great numbers. But, you know, as we stand up this recruiting task force, one of the things that I recognize right off the right off the bat was the idea of propensity.
01:02And what I mean by that is how we here in this department ask questions about people who might want to serve this country. And if you're an 18 year old kid, propensity essentially means like, do you see the U.S. military as a viable career path moving forward?
01:18And so in the late 1980s, that number was somewhere between 25 and 27 percent of of the country who believe that service was a viable path forward.
01:28After 9-11, we believe that number was somewhere between 25, 27 percent fluctuating in a couple of years thereafter.
01:34But in between, that number has steadily fallen to I think we're somewhere between only 7 percent and 11 percent of this country see military service as a viable career path moving forward.
01:46And so obviously at this department, we recognize that that number is probably unsustainable.
01:52And while we have great recruiting numbers now, it might not always be the case.
01:56And so one of the things that we're trying to achieve with this recruiting task force is answering the tough question about how do we how do we set the conditions here culturally in this country to have more kids want to serve this, serve the country and see it as a viable career path.
02:11One of the interesting things about that is the idea of the intersection between propensity and proximity and the idea that when people are exposed to and see somebody in uniform on a day-to-day basis, their desire to serve this country skyrockets, something we're up to 50 percent like that they see military service as a viable career path.
02:34And I think over the last 15 or 20 years, while much of the research is borne out that the U.S. military is largely a legacy force, in other words, like grandfather served, father served, more likely for son or daughter to serve, I think that's part of the reason why they're exposed to somebody in uniform.
02:50So part of the question I'd like to answer as part of this is that the department would like to answer as part of this recruiting task force is the intersection between propensity and proximity.
03:01And if we can get service men and women in every community in the country and involved in community events, exposed to our kids in their high schools, whatever, I think that will help us solve our recruiting problem.
03:11So I think the secretary is looking at a constellation of different things to sustain the momentum that we have now.
03:16But the reality is that leadership matters and the president and the secretary are inspirational leaders.
