AETC commander's statement to the press Published June 28, 2012 Air Education and Training Command WASHINGTON -- Let me begin by saying you are going to hear me use the word "alleged" numerous times today. This is because most of the cases I will discuss are still moving through the legal process and it is important that we not pre-judge any of these cases in any way and remember that each person we are investigating is innocent until proven guilty. Basic Military Training for the United States Air Force is conducted at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas. Each year, approximately 35,000 young Americans complete the intensive eight and a half week training program and become the newest Airmen in our Air Force. The training program is administered by a cadre of 500 Military Training Instructors, or MTIs who have been selected after undergoing a rigorous screening process and completing an extensive training program. The vast majority of these MTIs are great Americans who live up to the high standards we demand of those who are entrusted with the critically important and sensitive mission of turning ordinary citizens into Airmen. In the Fall of 2011, we discovered, to our great disappointment, that we had a number of MTIs who were alleged to have engaged in sexual misconduct with trainees. Some of this alleged misconduct occurred while the trainees where in Basic Military Training, and some of this alleged misconduct occurred after the trainees graduated from BMT but were still in what we call the technical training environment. In the former cases the trainees were under the direct supervision of the alleged perpetrator, in the latter cases they were not. That said, regardless of whether the activity occurred in Basic Military Training or in the Technical Training environment, personal relationships of any kind between trainees and instructors is strictly prohibited by our regulations and our instructions. As soon as we received the first allegation of misconduct, we aggressively investigated the matter and further tightened those protective measures that were already in place. For example, the training group commander and an interdisciplinary team, including the Judge Advocate, the Sexual Assault Response Coordinator and a Chaplain, brief all trainees within 72 hours of their arrival on their rights and responsibilities to report misconduct. The training group commander reads every urgent sheet from a trainee within 24 hours, it is a comment sheet we have, and any allegation of sexual misconduct results in immediate action including the MTI is removed from his or her flight, a no-contact order is issued and the "MTI hat" - which signifies and identifies that person as an instructor - is removed temporarily pending investigation. Our commanders at every level continue to aggressively work issues and to be as transparent as possible with the public. Moreover, we are working diligently to identify the victims and provide them care and support. We have trained professionals at all our bases to provide medical care and counseling for our Airmen. We are also reviewing a series of actions to address systemic issues such as expanded training for trainees, instructors and leadership; reassessing the instructor selection process; hiring more instructors; and other initiatives. These actions are designed to help us address the root causes of the issue. To help ensure we have left no stone unturned in this regard, I have also directed a review by a major general who is not assigned to Air Education and Training Command. This external review will examine all the actions we have taken thus far to address the issue and provide me feedback on what more we can do to prevent misconduct in our training environment and strengthen our training enterprise. In closing, I want to underscore again that the vast majority of our 500 Military Training Instructors are performing magnificently in a tremendously demanding environment. No one, no one is more angry and disappointed than they are that a relatively small number of their cadre has cast a shadow over the entire program. I am committed, as are they and as is everyone involved with the BMT program, we are committed to doing everything possible to investigate these allegations, take care of the victims, hold the perpetrators accountable, and fix any institutional problems that may have facilitated this completely unacceptable behavior.