Maj. Gen. Stephen Clark, a former officer stationed at U.S. Special Operations Command, has been assigned to the strategic plans director position in support of the U.S. Air Force‘s deputy chief of staff for strategic plans and requirements.

Clark will transition to the new position from his prior role as Socom’s director of force structure requirements, resources and strategic assessments, the Defense Department said Friday.

Clark has served as executive officer to both the Air Force Special Operations Command vice commander and commander, chief of SOF contingency plans and programs, senior USSOCOM liaison officer to the National Counterterrorism Center and deputy commanding general for the Joint Special Operations Command in his 28 years of active-duty service.

He is a command pilot with more than 3,300 hours of flight with 13 different aircraft and has flown in combat missions in Somalia, Bosnia, Haiti, Afghanistan and Iraq.

Defense Secretary Ashton Carter has said the commitment of all service members is key to achieve the Force of the Future initiatives to modernize the U.S. military, DoD News reported Friday.

Terri Moon Cronk writes Carter said at the Naval Station Great Lakes in Illinois that he welcomes insights from service members to help develop Force of the Future ideas.

Carter also discussed Force of the Future initiatives that address technology investments, force recruitment, personal development, parental leave policies and the participation of women in combat and other military specialties, the report said.

“It doesn’t mean that everybody meets standards, and everybody gets selected, but the principle of the all-volunteer force is we get to pick and choose,” Carter said.

The Defense Technical Information Center has released a new report that describes how changes to the conflict and warfare landscape would alter the operational approaches the future Joint Force must adopt.

The Joint Operating Environment 2035, released July 14, says challenges will define the future security environment such as contested norms, where adversaries challenge the rules that define the international order; and persistent disorder, where adversaries take advantage of a nation’s inability to function as a legitimate government.

DTIC’s report also predicts that six contexts of conflict will spell the future of warfare in 2035 such as violent ideological competition intended to overthrow established governments, a threatened U.S. territory and sovereignty, the antagonistic geopolitical balancing to challenge the U.S. over the long term, disrupted global commons, contested cyberspace and reordered regions.

JOE 2035 contains three sections that each describe events that DTIC says would change the security environment, explain how these changes affect the character of future war and explore how the Joint Force’s missions evolve over time.

Army Gen. John Nicholson Jr., commander of the U.S. Forces Afghanistan, has highlighted significant reductions in Islamic State group-held territories in Afghanistan since U.S. troops  there received counterterrorism authority in January, DoD News reported Thursday.

Terri Moon Cronk writes Nicholson told Pentagon reporters the militant organization’s regional affiliate in Afghanistan has decreased from 10 districts in southern Nangarhar to as few as three after President Barack Obama authorized the U.S. force’s operations in the country.

The Resolute Support mission commander added that Operation Shafaq, part of the Afghans’ security strategy against terrorism, has achieved success, according to the report.

“Overall, our mission in Afghanistan is on a positive trajectory,” Nicholson said.

The U.S. Forces Afghanistan also uses the counterterrorism authority to strike ISIL-Khorasan in southern Nangahar, Cronk reports.

“We are also partnered with some of the Afghan special forces as we conduct these operations,” Nicholson told reporters.

The U.S. military plans to return 4,000 hectares of land in Okinawa to the Japanese government once construction work on new helipads is completed, Reuters reported Friday.

Tim Kelly writes the planned land return comes as U.S. military faces increasing resentment from local residents after the arrest in June of Kenneth Franklin, a U.S. civilian worker at a U.S. base, in association with the murder of Rina Shimabukuro, a 20-year-old Japanese woman.

“We are respectful of the feelings of Okinawans that our footprint must be reduced,” said Lt. Gen. Lawrence Nicholson, U.S. commander on the island.

The tract to be handed over accounts for 17 percent of the land the U.S. military controls and is part of the U.S. Marine Corps’ Camp Gonsalves training base in Northern Okinawa, Kelly reports.

The report added protests over the helipad construction delayed U.S. military’s plan to return the land in 1996.

The U.S. and Japanese governments agreed to curb benefits and legal protections to some U.S. civilian employees hired to work for the military, while Nicholson declared a one-month mourning period in response to the murder, according to the report.

The U.S. Air Force has finished all preparations to issue an initial operating capability declaration on a first squadron of the F-35 fighter jet, , Defense News reported Wednesday.

Valerie Insinna writes the declaration for the Lockheed Martin-developed fighter aircraft could occur next week and 12 of the combat jets have received modifications to meet the requirements.

The report added 12 F-35 units have received modifications to meet requirements for the IOC and maintenance infrastructure is ready support the Hill Air Force Base’s 34th fighter squadron.

Gen. Hawk Carlisle, commander of the Air Combat Command, said in July the Air Force targeted the F-35 IOC declaration in the August-to-December window.