Bill Woolf: A few weeks ago, we had the privilege of sitting down with Colonel Alison Gonzalez at Space Symposium Colorado Springs recorded on the Redwire stage. Colonel Gonzalez commands Space Delta 13, which sits inside Space Training and Readiness Command, or STARCOM. Today we're talking about how the Space Force is learning because Delta 13 is responsible for the Space Force's education mission. Not training, education. And Colonel Gonzalez will tell you, those are two very different things. Training is the how, education is the why. Now, before we got into any of that, I had to ask her about something most people don't know. Colonel Gonzalez was the first guarding to actually demonstrate the Space Force service dress uniform, and I'll let her tell that story because it sets the tone for everything else in this conversation. I'm Bill Wolf, and this is Space Power. That was Colonel Allison Gonzalez, commander of Space Delta 13. education and training ⁓ are inextricably linked, but they're two completely things. Education, that's what people do on a daily basis to learn more about what's happening and how to do their job. Training is then... demonstrating that capability, that knowledge ⁓ the actual weapon system. So ⁓ good words from Colonel Gonzalez. less than 10 % of Americans know the Space Force exists, even fewer know what the Space Force does. That is part of the reason why I created SFA to begin with and why we love to produce this podcast. Thankfully, we're not alone. And leaders like Colonel Gonzalez and her team are working to change that, not just for the American public, but for the entire joint force, for our international partners, for industry and academia. And I think she's exactly the right person leading that mission. If you want to learn more about the Space Force Association and everything we're doing to support guardians and their families, visit us at ussfa.org. Help us get the word out. I'm sure you know someone who has no idea what the Space Force does. Share our show with them and be sure you yourself are following the Space Power podcast as we continue to learn together. We have a lot of great episodes coming up and even deeper dives, unique perspectives and insider content you won't want to miss. So be sure to turn on notifications. Have any questions? Want to suggest a guest? Let us know. Leave a comment or reach out to us at podcasts at USFAA.org. The Space Power podcast is produced by TIE Holiday. AV for this episode were provided by Redwire. Production support for this episode by Omar Mahmoud and Emily Honhardt. I'm Bill Wolf. We'll see you next time.

speaker-0: It is truly an honor be here with Colonel Alison Gonzalez, commander of Delta 13. Colonel, thanks so much being with us today. This is

speaker-1: Thank you so much for having me. I tend to think so I'm a little biased.

speaker-0: Well, not many people realize this because it wasn't very popular at the time, but you're the actual first model of the service dress. Can you tell us a little bit about that story?

speaker-1: Well my friend, I don't know if I'd use the term model. I definitely demonstrated it. So no it ⁓ quick story behind it was I was asked to demonstrate it and to do wear testing and just try and fit it just to see how we did and g being a part of the many that had to go through moo moo's and polyester and all the lovely constricting fabrics, I said sure I'll try it out. And one thing just led to another and I'm on a stage. at AFA and international rollouts and on CNN and everything, but despite all of that, I'm just so proud that I'm seeing guardians in the audience and here just it's incredible. It really was. Yeah. And I would do it all over again. I'm just so proud of how far and fast our service has come from uniforms to the organization structure, everything.

speaker-0: Seriously. History in the making. Speaking of organizational structure, before we get into Delta thirteen specifically, tell folks who don't understand how Space Force careers work a little bit about your Space Force career and how you kind of rose to the rank of colonel and our commander of Delta thirteen.

speaker-1: No, thank you. And I'll be the first to tell everybody my example is not the exemplar. I just was brought up, I started as a satellite operator for various military satellite communications satellites, and just always wanting to learn more. So I was an operator, an engineer, an instructor, an evaluator. And then I rapidly went into the National Reconnaissance Office and also weather satellite programs, the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program. And then within the National Reconnaissance Office. Office working various satellite programs. Again, same thing engineer, operator, special programs, and congressional, so just various assignments in the space community and the IC and in the Department of War, and just happened to encounter incredible mentors along the way. And now I'm here. I couldn't believe it. I really could not believe the road it was, but if I was to tell anything to anyone, it's really being authentic. being passionate and the absolute best you can possibly be at your job and a few mentors that I see in the crowd. Your job is to make your boss's life easier and it is also to come up and create new and innovative ways to doing your job and always breaking the status quo. So

speaker-0: Great words, Colonel Gonzalez. Really do appreciate that. And a lot of people don't really understand the Space Force structure, and there's a lot to understand with the amount of deltas that are out there. Yes. So could you explain the role of Space Training and Readiness Command or STARCOM and where your unit, Space Delta 13, fits into that picture?

speaker-1: Absolutely. Starcom is one of three field commands, and these field commands think of it as major mission areas. And Space Training and Readiness Command has five deltas underneath it in major mission sets. First is a sessions and training. So think of your ROTSI, your officer training school, recruiting, and your initial training when you come into the service. An incredible growing mission. The next you is the war game in Doctrine Delta. After that That is your advanced training. So after that initial training and getting into operations training, that is what Delta 11 does. Delta 12 is the test and experimentation delta, and then I wrap everything up with a bow with education that underpins everything.

speaker-0: Perfect. Thank you, ma'am. Yeah. And so why is a dedicated education command so critical for the Space Force right now?

speaker-1: So how long do we have for this? Because I can I I mean seriously, I can talk about this. No, honestly, ⁓ we in Delta 13 believe that you cannot have effective training without an education underpinning. And the bottom line up front is training is the how. I believe education is the why. And truly understanding why we are doing what we do, why the Space Force stood up, why is space so critical to national security and the part of training is the how. ⁓ I believe education is the why. And truly understanding why we are doing what we ⁓ why the Space Force stood up, ⁓ why is space so critical to national security ⁓ and part of The instruments of national power when we look at diplomacy, information, military, and economic. The instruments of national power when we look at diplomacy, information, military, and economic. So education is absolutely essential, and it happens at all levels throughout a guardian's career, and we are there from the very beginning of a guardian's career all the way to the most senior members for Guardians. But also an important note in that we don't just educate only Guardians, but we also educate the joint force and international partners. our allies and partners, industry and also academia as well. So it's a very broad and vast organization, but it's absolutely required so we can educate everyone from the United States government and the American population on Space Force.

speaker-0: Yeah, it's interesting you bring up the instruments of national power because ⁓ oftentimes we talk about guardians and their requirement to be able to be eloquent across all of those instruments and it's the first time we've asked a service to understand not only only diplomacy and information military, but also economy. And really when you talk about economy, the Space Force underpins a strong space economy. Absolutely. We're not gonna have a strong space economy without a strong space force. Exactly. So let's talk a little bit about the organizational structure of Delta 13 itself. So what's what are all the missions that are taking place within the Delta?

speaker-1: Again, I realize I'm under time, so I can talk about it for hours. But Delta 13 is headquartered out of Joint Base Andrews, and we originally were out of Maxwell Air Force Base in a very close and necessary partnership with Air University. But realizing we needed to create an education ecosystem for guardians and by guardians, we did have a basing action and now my headquarters is there. And so we have six institutions spread across seven different states. within the Space Force and within Delta 13 specifically. We have, when you look at the Delta 13 mission, there are three major mission sets. It's professional military education. So think of your squadron officer school type courses, enlisted professional military education, officer military education. There's also professional continuing education. This is our bedrock for how we educate guardians in all phases of their careers and I'll get into That. And then the third pillar is professional partnership education. This is our research and development programs, various fellowships, various almost deployment-like experiences with industry and academia, so we can send guardians with an operational problem set go into other organizations and ecosystems, and then they bring that problem set back and hopefully a solution to their leadership to solve those issues. Delta 13 and like I mentioned before, seven six to seven states, but then also an important piece of Delta 13 is that we have very close ties with every sister service institution across the Department of War, where we have guardians planted at those locations to ensure that the joint force also has space-centric and relevant curriculum at those institutions. But just that. Just that.

speaker-0: Thank you, Mary. Just just that. That is a lot of responsibility. Right. And it you definitely make it look easy. ⁓ Now my friend. That's right. How do you build that foundational knowledge that every single guardian needs to have?

speaker-1: Man, it really starts with a phenomenal training base that Delta One provides. Once you come into the Space Force, whether if you're an officer enlisted or civilian, you will go into a Delta One institution and get that foundational knowledge. Delta 13 comes in after that complements those training experiences with various educational opportunities throughout the career through those three mission sets I mentioned before, either through professional military education at one of our academies through professional continuing education through our NSSI who's also in the crowd and then also professional partnership education so that is through all phases of a guardian's career as I mentioned from the most junior specialist or lieutenant to our general officers.

speaker-0: Thank you, ma'am. Of course. The Space Force often highlights the importance of partnerships that you've been talking about. How does Delta thirteen's educational mission help cultivate collaborative culture?

speaker-1: ⁓ it's partnerships is the bedrock of Delta thirteen. We could not do our mission without the joint force, the interagency with industry and academia. ⁓ of course keeping war fighting at the foundation of everything we do, but we do have to look at the other instruments and how we educate and formulate those with our guardians at the appropriate level and at the proper time. In order to do that, we realize that we need to partner with ⁓ other Government agencies with other universities and leverage and harness that power of a world-class faculty, whether if it's at Texas AM or Arizona State or Purdue or other universities. But then also looking at industry best practices as well. Industry has a huge training and education ecosystem as well. So, where can we harness and leverage those best practices and do various program exchanges? There is an experience with industry that is Going on in the Air Force, but in Delta 13, we are also looking at other operational-centric experiences that we can get involved in as well, and that's also very relevant, and then we're gonna rely on industry for that. But again, partnerships is at the foundation of everything we do. Why? I have a very small Delta. They are small, mighty, and crushing it every day of the week, but we also have to leverage the talent that's out there as well.

speaker-0: That that is phenomenal. As you look ahead, five or ten years, what is your vision for the impact of Delta thirteen? Yes. What will success look like for the Space Force's education enterprise?

speaker-1: No, this is great, and I'm not going to get ahead of my leadership in any way because I do have a plan for world domination. But seriously, all the partners I mentioned before is my vision is regardless of where we are located, the type of building we have, and how many guardians, my vision for education is seamless execution, where you should not be able to tell a uniformed guardian from someone from another nation or from interagency. Integration should be seamless with all of our partners and just a part of our internal fabric within Delta 13. Likewise, tech as well. I am very ⁓ aggressively pursuing how we can rapidly integrate tech and data, AI, quantum, and other items into our institutions. But my vision is whatever the education. ecosystem it is integrated seamlessly with tech, it is tech centric and driven, and it is seamlessly integrated across a joint force, interagency and academia and industry.

speaker-0: Ma'am, that is phenomenal. What we do here at SFA is really take that message that you just were talking about and we expose that to the general public, realizing that the problem we're experiencing today is that less than 10% of the US knows that the Space Force exists. And I would say even less than that know exactly what the Space Force does. Pretty much. And so we'd look to ⁓ partnership potentially in the future such that we could look at some of that curriculum and share some of your curriculum. Absolutely. wider US audience and so that we can better educate folks about what the Space Force does.

speaker-1: That is so exciting. And then I look at SFA and really the culture of SFA and the evolution of it truly matches Delta thirteen. It is it was stood up relatively quickly, but with an imperative need to establish itself and just go fast and go forward and not being afraid, embracing risk, bringing on the best talent where you can, and then making mistakes, dusting yourself off and keep on moving. That is exactly what we're doing in Delta thirteen and that's why I think SFA is such a great exemplar.

speaker-0: Ma'am, I'm honored. I'm honored that you would compare our success to the rise of Delta 13 and its success. ⁓ my goodness. And I I can't thank you enough for taking time out of your extremely busy schedule to come over to the Space Symposium and spend time with us here on the Redwire stage and talk about all the important work that Delta 13 and Starcom and the Space Force is doing. ⁓

speaker-1: Absolutely. This is a family reunion, and our partnership and our organizations are absolutely essential to further our missions of educating the general public and also educating the joint force and our national security enterprise of the strategic imperative of space and the why we are here and the what we need to do collectively to go forward. This is my absolute honor. Thank you for having me.

speaker-0: Colonel Gonzalez, thank you so much. Thank you. Have a great Space Force Day.

speaker-1: Sempra Supra, love it. Thank you.