elliott carlson with his book, the honesty of a code breaker who out witted yamamoto and co-author of "shattered sword" and timothy orr, co-author of "never call me a hero," a legendary dive bomber pilot remembers the battle of midway. watch the battle of midway 75th anniversary special live from the memorial visitor center on june 2nd, beginning at 9:30 a.m. eastern on american history tv on c-span 3. next, a look at the united states military assets in space and potential national security threats. a housed armed services committee heard from the general who heads up the air force space

command. >> this is hearing of fiscal year 2018 priorities and national security space enterprise. we're honored to have a panel of expert witnesses in our space program to join us here today and before i introduce them, though, want to take a moment to acknowledge that while i can't imagine there being a better place to work and for the subcommittee on the house armed services committee, apparently somebody thinks there's a better job on washington, d.c. this will be the last hearing that steve can tell you will be in his current position. he's going to work for the secretary of defense, assistant secretary of defense for space policy. our loss is the secretary's gain. so we're going to miss him. he's been with us for a long time. i know he'll do a great job for our country in his next capacity as well.

so good luck, buddy. >> this committee does a great job for our country. lieutenant general david buck, betty sapp, director of national reconnaissance office and robert cardillo, spacial intelligence agen agency. say what? assistant secretary for defense space policy. and after we finish this unclassified testimony, we'll adjourn to a closed session in an appropriate fashion. in secretary mattis' confirmation hearing in front of the senate earlier this year, his official testimony stated, "while our military maintains capable air, land and sea

forces, the cyber and space domains demand an increasing share of our investment." and i fully agree with the secretary's statement. our military and intelligent leaders have been clear in their warnings, some going back many years, that our use of space could be taken away from us in the next military conflict. however, we have not moved with the conviction and urgency to respond to these warnings and it's left us with a growing crisis to confront in outer space. while i have the full faith in our witnesses today, i didn't have faith in the structure that they must work with. meanwhile, china, for example, is advancing rapidly in space and counterspace and has established a new military organization to focus its space cyber and electronic warfare capabilities. dr. john henry, former deputy secretary of defense stated in an earlier hearing to this subcommittee, quote, we are not well organized to meet with the

new challenges in space. the old structure may have been sufficient when space was an uncontested area of operations. that time has passed. again, i couldn't agree more. ladies and gentlemen, now is the least capable of our adversaries will be in space and now is the time for reform even if it's disrupted today. with that, i look forward to hearing all of your perspectives on space priorities and posture and thank you for being here and with us on this important topic. he recognize the ranking member mr. cooper. >> thank you, chairman. i'd add my note of congratulations to steve. well done. and i thank you for this hearing and appreciate your focus on strengthening america's space capabilities. there's no more important goal. many issues are before us and before the air force in particular but i'm glad we're addressing them and i have bipartisan and joint and substantive fashion. i look forward to the testimony of the witnesses. >> great. i now recognize our witnesses. the witnesses were asked to

summarize their prepared statements submitted for the record without objection. so ordered. if could you take your statements and keep them to five minutes or less so we could get to questions, that would be awesome. general raymond, you're recognized. >> thank you, general rogers, ranking member cooper and let me pile on and say congratulations to steve. we look forward to having you sitting here next to us next year. distinguished members of the subcommittee, thank you for the honor to appear before you. it's my distinct privilege to lead and represent nearly 36,000 professional and dedicated airmen providing resilient and affordable space and cyberspace capabilities for our nation. it's also a distinct privilege to testify with my friends and panel of experts and close partners. this is a very exciting year for both the air force and air force space command. in 2017, september of 2017, our air force celebrates 70th

birthday and air force space command celebrates 35th birthday, although as air force, we've been involved in space since 1954 and since the beginning. we've come a long way and done a remarkable job in bringing space cape lts into joint work fighting. there's nothing we do in a joint force that isn't enabled by space. integration has been our strength. nevertheless, we find ourselves at the intersection of high reliance and vulnerability the space domain. it's a air fighting demesne just like air, land, and sea. deny us access to and the benefits of the space domain. let me be very clear. we do not want a conflict that extends into space, but one way to keep that from happening is to make sure we're prepared for it and be able to fight and win that conflict. i think it shouldn't be lost on

anybody that our space program is the envy of the world. my near term priorities are four-fold. first in partnership with betty sapp, and proitd them with commanding control capability necessary to operate in a contested domain. secondly, we must improve space situational awareness transforming from cataloging focus to a fore fighting focus required of this domain. third provide resilient and capable for the strategic environment we face. and finally we need to professionally develop air force commander airman. i thank you for your support, thank you for your active leadership and look forward to continuing to work closely with you in the years ahead. i also look forward to your questions. >> thank you. chairman now recognizes general

book. >> members of the subcommittee, thank you for your steadfast support for your omen and women in unifoorm, the space center, and this nation. it's now widely acknowledged that space is critical to our way of life. this coupled with an understanding of the compelling and compounding threats to our freedom of action in space is the burning platform to evolve our national security space enterprise. we don't need a clean slate approach, but certainly an overhaul is necessary to guarantee our freedoms in, through, and from space. this is a challenge because our national security space architecture and processes were hrjly conceived to provide services or commodities during an era when our most significant coorbital threat was debris.

given our threats, we no larger approach space with a simple mentality. our foremost responsibility is to maintain space priority. this is a prerequisite to protecting and defending this space joint operating area and providing space combat engagement with joint forces across the globe. over the past year we've made substantial progress, especially with respect to all domain operations and our ability to protect and defend the national security space enterprise. we are better war fighters. there are, however, areas that continue continued focus and vigilance. we must continue to normalize operations across the enterprise. this includes space situational awareness as well as improving space intelligence and providing well and robust warning.

at the same time, we must review and update the associated authorities and rules of engagement for operations in space. and we must continue -- we must continue to push on, fielding required capabilities on operationally rel lnt time lines. looking forward we are focused on freedom of action in space. it is imperative on our joint force. as a learning organization we will continue to review our approaches and organizational structures. we can accept no less because the speed and complexity of future fights demands organizations. every challenge is an opportunity, and we have many opportunities in space. freedom of action in space is not a birthright. it must be secured, and it must be preserved. this requires cobstant vigilance, strong partnerships, and active participation.

i thank the committee. >> thank you, mr. buck. >> thank you, chairman and distinguished members of the community. thank you for the opportunity to be here from the national congress office, the nro. we are the foundation the u.s. global situational awareness. we contribute to global intelligence, military and homeland security operations while simultaneously assisting with the formation of national policy and achieving diplomatic goals. we provide director support to u.s. force fighters, help protect u.s. borders and contribute significantly to isis and other counter terrorism operations worldwide. our people are behind every mission success and provide the

support we provide to commands, their service components and deployed tactical units. the integral work force is not just dedicated to mission but empowered to innovate. invasion comes in many forms including using existing capabilities differently, developing new apps for our space and ground systems, and developing the new capabilities critical to closing intelligence gaps. we're also working with our mission partners to make sure we fully leverage capabilities. it's fully capable of delivering an increasingly capable integrated, ruzil i want and affordable architecture. we have control of every function required for the rnd that enables us to stay ahead of targets and threats to the acquisition of new space and ground capability to the

adaptations used to respond to capabilities to respond to new and changing mission imperatives in the field. we're performing extremely well. all 15 of our major acquisitions agree, meaning they're meeting or exceeding cost performance metrics. and we continue to improve our collection capabilities and the rusiliency to stay ahead of targets and threats. but staying ahead of the adversaries who threaten our space cape lts is a challenge. those adversaries are making space a priority, investing heavily and assessing the risk necessary for rapid progress. the u.s. has not been keeping pace. i believe we have not made the investment that indicates space priority are fundamental to the

u.s. u.s. national security space is a team sport, and everyone on the team those in the executive branch and in the kroeg must do all they can to advance its capabilities and improve its resilience to threats. we must have processes that are integrated, that move faster, and demonstrate a greater risk tolerance. we must commit to space as a national priority and imperative. this committally has been out in front trying to drive the changes required. -- required to advance national security space. the nro and the broader national space community have people with a talent, commitment, and passion necessary to take us forward. we only need to empower and

enable them to succeed. mr. chairman, and members of the subcommittee, thank you for your continued support of the national recognizance office its people, and it's mission. >> thank you. we now recognize mr. car delo for five minutes. >> thank you, ranking members of the committee. i too am pleased to testify before you today with my distinguished colleagues as a member of the national security professionals. mga is the primary provider of the space intelligence and the intelligence community. our support to military services, combat and commands and war fighters include safety to navigation, precise targeting, disaster recovery, and taylored support just to name a few. i also have the job of being the functional manager. and iing strengthen the overall enterprise by ensuring those

combatant needs are meant through future ventures. into the key capabilities and functions our analysts require. now, global persistent provides the architecture to manage these intelligence challenges and intelligence and early warning needed for decision advantage. it leverages the exwiset capabilities of the national recognizance office to hold strategic targets at risk. it also has the national capabilities. now the explosion of data has driven the by combining all the of the daya now available to us and with the use of alga rgtms,

automated processing, and machine to machine learning and artificial intelligence, we believe we can -- this will free our analysts to respond more time and focus on those hard intelligence problems. getting to that poept will require significant investments in our it architecture as well as in our research and development. not only is that data exploding. data predicts over 9,000 commercial satellites will be launched compared to fewer than 1500 in the last ten years. also we will partner with nro to mature and access. through it we will identify and evaluate emerging commercial data and services against those needs that we capture and maintain. in closing, the national security space enterprise and vital nga ability to provide war

fighter and policy makers, to give them the space and operation time they need to do their job. it's only possible through the combined efforts of the ic, the department of defense, the eurgmerging industry and allied partners. i'm happy to address any questions you may have, and i'm pleased to be here. >> thank you, mr. cardelo. >> thank you for the opportunity to testify here today with my distinguished colleagues. in the months ahead understanding and addressing the imications of the growing threats in space is critical as this administration prepares the president's new national security strategy and the national defense are strategy and as congress carries out its responsibilities for oversight and funding of the programs and activities necessary to realize those strategies. no less important strategic success requires increased

resources, an end to defense budget caps, an end to the years-long partner of extended continuing resolutions and a return to strategy-focused resourcing. today we consider space security in an era when russia and china provide access anti-raid strategies to prevent crises and conflicts to undercut our ability to secure our interests. diplomatic solutions remain our preferred option to settling the differences between divided nations. but america's space posture underwrites deterrence by enabling the usa military to project power globalally, respond to crises rapidly,

strike swiftly and precisely, and command forces in multiple theaters simultaneously. potential allies know well or many space systems that many perceive vulnerable. some have concluded in times of conflict, may make an irresistible and most tempting choice. disabusing them of such misguided notions is a strategic priority. that is why in the department of defense we are making such a concerted effort to strengthen the mission assurance of our space capabilities and to deny aggressors the benefits of attacks in space. we are changing our investments and operations and increasing our paerping with commercial entities and allies. more importantly, we are changing attitudes by recognizing that space is a war fighting domain and preparing ourselves to deter conflict in space and prevail if deterrence

fails. finally, i want to recognize this committee's priority on strengthening national security space, organization, management, and leadership. this question has the attention of the secretary and deputy secretary of defense. they expect to be presented with sound acknowledgement and a full rapg of operations and expect us to meet the deadline this june. in conclusion, i want to thank this committee for keeping the challenges of securing space before the public. i look forward to working together to ensure we have the right strategy and resources and the necessary programs, posture, and organizational structures to sustain deterrence, to prevail if deterrence fails and to increase the incentive nations have to settle their differences by peaceful means. thank you. and i would add as the person acting in the job mr. cutay will be doing, no one is happier to

have him than i am. >> thank you, mr. hill. i recognize myself first for questions. and this will be a question for anybody that's willing to swing at it. we passed a law about ten years ago that directed how the operationally responsive space office would be run. and i heard that instead of being streamlined, ors options are still forced to go through traditional pentagon forces, so rather than a small number of decision makers focused on moving fast with respect to operation requirements and acquisition the recent meeting had 60 attendees with 54 more than we envisioned. to me this example is indignitive of the space organization and the cudzu, my

word that comes in and strangles out the life. it's a situation where everyone can say no and no one can say that. how do we fix that? >> chairman, thanks for the question. 60 people were not involved in that decision. as you stated the ors common law is pretty clear. there's six members by law. the pdsa has the ability to designate others that are critical to that decision. in this case, i wasn't in the room. but my understanding is those six were the voting members plus two or three others. that was was it. the decision makers were the eight or nine person level, those were the voting members. >> well, i understand there were six voting members. but weren't there 60 people in the room? >> yes, there were 60 people in the room. but there's also some goodness and transparency of having

others there. they didn't vote, didn't influence the decision. and i'll tell youal after those feces make the decision, a lot of folks have to be the ones to execute that decision. it was a very small number of folks that was consistent with the legislation that was passed for a small tight decision. and i'm pretty comfortable it a pretty rapid decision. >> okay, so six people were the decision makers? >> as i mentioned to you, there were six that were by law and a couple of others that were added -- >> so there were eight people with in the decision? pretty sad. do you have to have six to eight people to make decisions? >> i have two people to make decisions one on the dod side.

again, there's a whole lot of staff on the csc staff and on the dod side. so a whole lot of people look at it before it even gets on the calender for the decision makers. >> the people who look at it, do they have the decision to stop it or say no? >> the authority to stall it. >> is that the case with ors, those other people can they slow it down or stop it? >> my understanding is they do not have a vote in that prauz. the six that are by law and then -- >> how about the lead up process to get to that room, before it gets to that room for decision making? >> it's done relatively routinely, relatively quickly and i didn't sense a slow down in this. >> anybody else want to swing at it? all right. chairman, i'll give you a comment as one of those

nonvoting people in the room. she used that to tee up the decision that is also necessary, which is the long-term solution. so ors is an important gap, that put forward and brought in the air force that went pretty quickly. the discussion also then said to everybody also moving on the requirements process for a longer term. she also used that in that respect. >> great. goldstein talked about the need toant great space. and the joint staff who is responsible for overall space integration sources, on that joint staff there are 11 air force general officers. of those 11 general officers how many space professionals are included? anybody want to guess? it'd be zero. you know how many are pilots?

it'd be nine. if we look at the specific combatant commander or command, according to u-comthere are over 28,000 sporting to u-comand how many dedicated to space issues? that would be two. we do need to integrate space with our land and sea and cyber obligations. that's what combatant commanders do, but they're also designed to win and fight wars in a -- manner. i'm interested in your perspective. >> well, thank you. i agree with you, lee, i would like to give more space officers, general officers on the joint staff. but the focus on developing joint officers, and i think that's a focus for us as well. when we look across the

enterprise you look at the nsa strategic command, weave two officers working in the joint forces strategic command. i'm in a joint myself. the way we -- i serve as -- they have reach back authority back to get those space effects out to theater. as far as developing developing operations, i think we're doing a pretty dp job. and that's a focus area as we go forward. i would say general, you bring up a great opponent. the challenges we face as a nation today are transregional if not global. they're not confined to a line on the map. it's not just one geographic kmapder's responsibility. it's pretty much all the

commander's responsibility. each combat want has what's called authority for space. and each of those have that. in air components around the gleb we probably have a senior space officer. we have a senior space officer called the director of space force. he has a staff of about five. and then every single division in the aoc we have space professionals embedded in those divisions. so what we have done is prioritized putting the weight of effort in those aoc's. and that's where we do that multidomain integration work. that's the hub of that multidomain integration work. >> you mentioned at one time

general -- was -- >> no, sir. in that role he delegates to him the space authority. it's that multidomain center that integrates air, space, and cyber into that. and that's where we focus osignificant portion of our space operators. >> i will say that probably in sen-comright now in the director space force office we probably have eight, maybe ten space officers and the drergt of space force officers there. but what's a real win for us when we don't just have a drergt of space officers there but with when we embed them, that's a

win. when we start not being a an add on but baked onto the processes over there. i think we're doing better. we're getting better across the board. >> thanks. the chair recognizes rank members. is there any question you may have? >> thank you, mr. theirman. i would like to focus my questioning on how crowd space is and how it's going to get more crowded. mr. cardelo mentioned on page five in the last ten years we've seen 15 satellites go up and in the next ten years something like 9,000. that is 2 1/2 satellites a day going up in space. that's amazing. but we've seen launches in israel recently, they've put up 100 sats just in launch. so as space gets more crowded, it gets more treacherous.

it used to be the main threat we faced was debris. now we face traffic, and we may face threats. so i'm particularly interested in this idea of the nonmilitary space traffic management. and i understand general raymond you've been mark said on a pilot program with the faa on that? >> we have a. as i testified before with this panel, the joint space is clearly contested and congested. but in this case on the congested sides the general take about 400 observations a day, keep track of that and keep the domain safe for all. it's very important. and i think general buck will agree that for national security purposes we have the ability to have raiders, to task those raiders that collects the data

for that radar. however, i don't think we need to be the organization that makes the notifications around the world and acts as the traffic cop. as i met with the faa administrator a couple of months ago and asked us if he would join us in developing a pilot program to see if we can form this going forward. david if you want to give an update on where we are. >> thank you. i'm really proud of the team and how far we have come. we have talked to begin that pilot program. i do agree with general raymond. there are the aspects of space traffic that are not inherently military. and we can low shed them to a civil agency. safety of flight, debris management, behavior, i think it's important to make a

distinction, too, between what is space management and what is space situational awareness for me as with war fighter what i need is space situational awareness. i need to know what it is, where it's going, what its capabilities are, what its vulnerabilities are, those types of things. thing yz don't need to be doing is notifications for assessment and i think that's suited for a civil agency. i kbrng that's where we're going, soir. >> let me add some comments to our remarks we had one who had we keep the space safe or something like that. and for that we get not even a thank you note. it's kind of amazing we provide this magnificent worldwide service and little appreciation.

plus as you said when we consider load shedding, it's a burden our folks that doesn't necessarily need to be borne by them. >> not all -- we want to keep space safe for others includesing us. it's our way of helping to make sure we can do that. >> but it's also an agency truth telling fukz. like if you look at the downing of the asian airliner over ukraine, there was worldwide debate and dispute about what caused that plane to crash. and even though we have excellent air-traffic control in most parlts of the world,thrust still significant dispute. and when comes to separating

news and fakes news from propaganda -- so we would know if it's debris, we would know if it was something less benign than that. well, i hope the pilot program gets off to a good start this summer. even with air traffic we're having difficulty isolating causes which it should be with all of our plane radars and things like that. so i hope we will get on that task. thank you, mr. clarman. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and thank you all for the great service you provide to our country. and general ri-mind, i'm going to follow up on a question we touched on in conversation

yesterday. which unfortunately led to huge scheduling and cost overruns. can i get your commitment that you will prioritize the utilization of commercial capabilities to the maximum extent practicable first and then fill in the government developments that are unique to the commercial marketplace? >> i'm a big proponent of commercial data. i've said for many years in this committee we need all sorts of data. and what our strategy is on the bottom end of the control system you reference is to do just that, to use commercial in a

consortium. we want to have open sources and open apps so all players can feed us that information quickly. therefore, what we did was we switched the program, and i gave that to the air force rabbit capabilities office, who has already done this. they have already taken the capability, built an architecative system, and has worked very well. so we're fast forwarding this ability. and what this will allow us to do is also get at that mult

domain. >> if i could just make a comment along that same lines. ranking member cooper stressed the importance of domain awareness. it's really important that we ingest nontraditional data into our space surveillance network as well. that's a hard thing to do, but we're making progress. and i think this summer sometime we're going to bring out a capability called the nonpredata processor that will begin to allow the conjestion. >> okay, thank you both. >> a changing gears, i've heard some rumors about insufficient foundfunding for gps 3, 18 requests. what are we doing to keep this important program on track? >> so congressman, we have not

submitted the 18 budget going forward. we have in my opinion pretty healthy gps constellivation in that we've got 31 operational satellites on orbit, actually 37. 31 are operational. we are moving forward the ucs program. many folks have testified previously would not be the model program we would hope up as the standard. and we are clearly not out of the woods yet. and i will not be capable -- so i'm pretty comfortable where we are with relatively hlty gps constuilation that's on orb utand progress weeg made on. >> what does that mean for the budget for next year? >> the budget is going to be released next week.

>> in 40 seconds i'm going to give you a huge question that you referred to, how we don't have the commitment we need for space going forward. what can we do better as a country to show that commitment and that resolve? >> i think we really need help on the budget side, not just investment ibspace but the ability to use investment. we're fielding new things. that is just slowing the pace of progress, even after we get it out of the executive branch, which is no mean feat. so you could help a lot on that front. >> thank you so much. >> i would oako that in the air force space command. >> i'm going to forego the usual

gps back up. i assume that's musing along, and if not there will be bej sla there are certain activities going on. i'm not sure we should be talking about them here, but i would like to take that up because i think it ind greats with most of what's being discussed here. just in general the integration of information from a variety of sources, i think this is something that is happening, just in general your views on that progress. >> in general i think it's going really bell. and in fact because largely the model that i use to make the decision to go with the approach we talk td about in the battle

management conversation we just had with born, i'd be more happy to talk more in the closed session with him. >> i think i'll let it go at that point. oh, no i have one more. we picked this up yesterday. a plan for the next decade of critical assets that need to be developed and deployed and the approximate cost of those, i think we need to have a long-term vision here of where we're going to deploy perhaps the most essential asof all except in the creurses. i have not seen a display since those things that you, the military in skreneral and specifically zwh the air force node, want, must have. and i think it's really essential that we look at it.

there will be insufficient money for avg, particularly if it cut cuts are real. is so we're going to need to make the tough discussions about prioritization. and that needs a long view, ten years main. to say okay these things are going to be fine or we're going to fund all of it and nut fund anything else. so mr. chairman, so could be move into that trekz? >> i'd welcome the opportunity to come back to you and walk crow thou the space prize enterprise. it's integrated vision. i want to take a moment that -- is a huge partner for us. >> that's eight seconds. gefor it.

>> but, i'd be happy to walk you through that and inform you on that. >> we heard questions about general goldstein about a different set of priorities for the future. much of it involves your work, so i wanted to get a fix on that and other that we may not put as a priority. thank you for that. >> i didn't mean to cut you off. >> no, i didn't want to take your time. i wanted to see if you had more questions. thank you. >> when you think about the can consortium, general remand that you talked about for the bo 2-piece of the national defense send

sender. in the meantime is there an ssa gap that needs to be filled that commercial could help with? and maybe general buck if you'd like to answer that as well. >> well, thank you, sir. good seeing you again. >> always. >> i mentioned the data processor. the ability to address some of those nontraditionalal -- that helps. in addition we have the sbss right now. the life on that has been extended and plus ors-5 gives us that gap capability as well. >> just as a general statement, more data is better. more data is better.

we need data across the full spectrum jeesh do get that across the full spectrum. the other thing we've done is develop partnerships. and we've got 50 or 60 different sssa sharing agreements with werns. there are two-way sharing pieces. i'd like to make that stronger when we get the new jms system up with more capacity and more ability to address that soldata. but more is better. >> more is better. i'd like to maybe continue on what ranking member cooper was talking about, this effort to create a partnership with the faa for space situational awarene awareness specifically. >> can you share with us how that is being funded and is it coming out of your budget, their

budget, something congress should do here to help? >> my understanding is there's fog to go aen fya team but i'm hesitant to say that because i'm getting into the faa's head a little bit. >> that's good to hear. again, i know that's not your lane. i don't want to get you in trouble, but i think this committee would be support. of that partnership. >> right now we have heard testimony and over again how we have provided free situational awareness to the world and to our partners. and at the same time the tasking it had been imposed in our fighters at the j-stock teb problematic that to the extent i her this from other members of congress that at the same point

to -- and i heard you use the word loach. i want everybody on this committee to know the air force was never fund today provide situational awareness to the world and not for free. and that's what you're doingmism you're doing it out of theigateness of your hearts. i say the goodness of your hearts, but the reality is we all need to protect our -- and if we need to an appropriation, i think that's something we should be advocating for. so with that, go ahead. >> i agree with everything he said. i also want to make sure that

the national security space mission need to make sure they have the spacesational awareness. absolutely. >> it's critical we maintain the capability to have that awareness. >> of course space defense, 100% agree with that. it's not just the conjunction analysis but the warning that takes a lot of the man power away from europe. >> i'm with you. okay, bethat mr. chairman, i audio back. >> thanks, mr. chairman, gfs going to jump in on this but given that i'm a ranking member i guess i'd be reluctant for the

satellite tracking to be dumped on the f pga as well. and your not saying that. i'm more concerned that the congress gets out with there are sips that without money or help, rather negotiating out a solution is abutter idea. because i think it is a better place for it, in fact. but one question is what advantage does the faa have -- what decan it get for it? >> they see this as a real opportunity to do things that are more like air centric, establishing norms of behavior, establish partners for safety, a night in space. so they -- not to speak with faa, but my conversations with them have head me to believe

they see some goodness in there. >> well, that's great. i look forward to hearing dr. neal and you at some point. we have, i wouldn't call it adult over sight on this, i would never accuse of doing that sometimes. but certainly some over sight. there's a lot of debyte going on right now about naa, reorganizing it overall. and tossing this into the mix, if it's going to get done, putting that into context of all the other things we're trying to doimate that's my main point. yield back. >> thank you, mr. chairman. general raymond, the air force has previously expressed that rocket system development is a better way to maintain our

dominance in space. therefore, it's still -- the air force is approached it fund a rocket system versus only rockict keimants. will you tell us how the government collaborates with industry, and what is your vision of how the industry should met the efforts and evaluation criteria? >> thank you for the question. the air force's stratsagy remains three-fold. first of all, it's critical you have assured access to space. the second come ponent is we would like to support competition. we see the benefits of competition in the launch industry. and the third aspect of that is we would like to get ouf the already 180 engine. that system has remained the

sls. >> i understand that price is an important consideration in any procurement effort, but ipmy experience other factors are also important. given the cost of other pay loads and hull essential they are in our national security, how do you discuss qualitative items such as reliability or maintaining the industrial base? >> all of that comes into nay. it is a pretty high bar we go through for certification. we would not put on contract a launch if we didn't think that was going to be sure to get hit on its face. it's a full range and by mission by mission. some missions are more complex than others. >> okay, anybody can answer this. it is my understanding that the space base infrared system is

the current and primary lesson to detect threats. and boof been dependent onthets sense the 70s. lm there other missions door contact -- how well, those sls that separate them, how vital are they to our face mission? well, let me just say it prids significant missile warning for our nation. it's probably one of the most critical systems we operate. the space wing led by colonel dave wheeler,iest just up there

doing great work. as we look to the future, we look to make conversations more vuzil wrnt i look forward to closed session to get into more specifics. >> you recognized training officers from a techination bissed taek s to a wartime -- you goal into detail regarding the training to counter these threats and the transition to a war fighter focus? >> right, what i was referring to is the space mission construct we have implemented in the wings. currently the 21st space wing and 50th space wing are undergoing the same transformation. what this does is for four

months of the time they're focused on the fight whale the other crew force is focused on this wing for the future fight and i'm really proud of the progress they've made. >> i would also add we're also ent grating our space operators in joint exercises and exercisers that are joint and international. we just wehelp aed a space war concept. it's developed in-depth. this isn't space or space air, it's integrating airspace and cyber. and we're ent grating on both

portions. >> thank you. >> we now recognize ms. hanabuso for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i've got to thing about missile defense as well as your role in the triad system. and reading your testimony, it raise said a different side of questions for me. what'll, what i couldn't get past this one paragraph. if you could explain this to me. in your time of three, your pushing of basically the cspc and the national recog itnizance mission was a new war fighting constrict. it's the frame recollect if turning the space enterprise precision into a reality. what time i'm is what is that

war fiending construct you're talking about in terms of space? >> thank you, and it's nice to meech you. it's the shared vision between us and the national reconnaissance office. and i'll pass this over to betty sapp as well. but it's the shared division for how do you make our architectures more resilient to be able to survive the contested domain. the war fighting construct really talks about several things we talked about this this morning. it make takes thatbition and build a framework. wave worked very closely with the nro to develop that counter. there's another layer that's also the part we just talked about opdeveloping and training our sources.

there's another layer on it is how do you develop the partnerships we need both with interagency and our allies to be able to respond to the strategic environment we face today 467. >> before you pass on, let me explain why my curiosity -- because in mr. hills' testimony, his testimony speaks about the quote, unquote, threats we hear all the time about on or, russia and dhooen choouna. he also speaks to adad and concerns he has. des hoos they will provide anti-satellite weapons as a means to reduce u.s. military effectiveness. so what i thought you were going to tell me about thatwer construct is that it was in line with -- for example, what we

think about the oceans and so forth, this another area of war that we have to be ready to fight -- this nice kind of cooperation we're all kind of talking about here, i'd really like to know to the extent you can tell me here today, what exactly does this all mean in terms of our military. and twhut do you need when you come to see us in order to fight that battle? first of all, we don't talk about a war in space. >> is that something that's unrealistic? i mean it is convivable we could actually have war in space. in other words, could our satellites be the first target? because once you take out our satellites you have basically

destroyed our effective communication. so do we not have a firstine against us? >> if you look at what our adversaryies are kruking about, their talking about a diverse range. our posture is we want to deter that. we have no interest in fighting that fight. as i said one way to do it as we prepare for it, it develops the partnerships, the plans, the training need today be able to respond. >> mr. hill, would you like to comment on it? >> i say there's scant evidence

anybody is looking for war in space. it is their conclusion if they want a military option, they have be able to acin space as well. and as you're suggesting, that could be early. >> thank you. >> chair recognizes hill. >> thank you, mr. chairman and thank you all the members. do you believe it's fair to say the space is weaponized? >> i believe it's safe to say it's a space domain just like air, land, and sea. do you believe be need a space sense rayer to adequately identify them in our assets?

>> i think it's imperative we have the assets required to operate in any war fighting domain. >> should we treat space as a war fighting domain? >> space is a war fighting domain, just like air, land, and sea, and we need to treat it that way. >> should the usa develop space capabilities in order to counter? >> it's imperative, in my opinion, that we develop resilient architectures to be able to operate in the contested environment we face toed. >> general buck, do you have any thoughts on that? >> space is a war fighting domain. and if you look at the other domains, air, land, sea, they have defensivive capabilities. they have air fighting capabilities. we can't afford to treat space any differently.

>> is it fair to say that some adversaryies have outperformed our capability to defend airspace? and i may ask the two of you. got you, didn't make sense. all right, i'll throw this out to the entire panel. do you see a value in having a capsize, a space event for space operators. >> we have had our first spaceflight this year. we're having the conversation and moving in the right direction. i see this first space flag is first of many to follow. general raymond. >> i agree. as i mentioned earlier, that's important. but there's the other aspect of it, that it's got to be -- how do you integrate air, space, and

cyber together and with the land and the sea. and so there's other opportunities in addition to space that provides that capability as are space specif had sleeper war games, the glober series. the g spock and nspc participated in north of 70 exercises last year integrating space into the larger fight so i'm proud of that effort. >> mr. chairman i think i'll probably leave the rest of my questions for the classified session. thank all of you so much and thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank the gentleman. gentleman from california, mr. casha hall is remember niegd for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman and thank you to all of you for being here today. i represent vanderburg air force base and recently had the great privilege of joining general buck on a tour of the facility. the j spock facility in addition

to other facilities there. i guess for my colleagues and just for me to -- for it to sink in you would never hear it enough. could you share, general buck, the contribution of the and havenburg air force base to our national space strategy and capability and perhaps close with how that relates or what the nexus is to the new j. spock in cal. >> thank yo-- colorado. >> we have two control centers. at van den birg we have a commercial partners on the ops floor or oural plooid lied partners on the ops floor. they're doing the day-to-day heavy lifting support to the terrestrial fight. when a combatant commander needs space support, spacy fects, they go to the j spock and they provide military satellite

communications, precision navigation and time, all those spacy fects and they do it better than anybody else. the national space defense center located at shrever air force base is responsible for looking up and protecting the joint airspace area if you will. so j spock and the current fight right now support to the terrestrial fight, the national space defense at the base in colorado responsible for protecting and defending the space joint operating environment. >> wind pile on that today the j spock is the operational dod space commanding control facility and they do spectacular work. i've had the privilege of being stationed there four times second lieutenant jay raymond showed up there in 1984 and they are absolutely wonderful airmen and joint -- not just airmen but joint partners that keep that domain safe for all, provide a critical capability to all of

the war fighters around the globe, and is the only operational d 0, d spa operational d 0, d space center we have today. >> it was extremely impressive and i want to thank general buck for being so hos. >> i ability and giving me an opportunity to meet many of the troops and your command teem e team there. it was a great visit and learning opportunity and i just really appreciate what you do. >> it was our pleasure. thank you for joining us there. >> i thank the with gentleman. chair would like to ask a few more questions before we go into closed session. talk a little bit about launch. general raymond, how long do you plan to maintain the delta 4 and i'd like four to differentiate between delta 4 medium versus delta 4 heavy and do you plan to keep the delta 4 heavy specifically until a new launch vehicle is certify fiedsed and if so, how? >> yeah, there's three dealtal 4

mediums that are left, the final launch that's for the delta 4 medium is scheduled in fy '19. we have seven four dealtal 4 heavies, six of those are national security space launches. one of those say nagsa launch and there's an option for one more final launch will be in fy '23 and we're comfortable that we will have a new capability online to be able to support the requirements going forward. >> you just heard reference to the national security pay loads. how important is it to your mission to have the delta 4 heavy or aye equivalent available? >> it's essential to my mission that they're available in the near term. >> i tell you general raymond's mentioned the partnership between us in the nsdc and in operations. we couldn't have better launch partners than we do in the air force. they have taken care of our mission were we buy on their

contracts, they made sure se we had delta 4 heavy coverage with a lot of transition margin to get to a new booster. so we have just been very satisfied with their support. >> you heard general raymond say that he believes that by 2023 we will have a replacement certified. i hope so too, but if we don't, do you believe that we should let the delta 4 heavy go before we have an alternative certified? >> i believe we have time to see how the new programs mature before we cannot go back on the delta 4 heavy. i wouldn't carry it in the near term. again, we've got them funded through launches in 2023, so we have some time here to make the right decision for the nation. >> that was a lawyerly response. as a lawyer, i appreciate that. separately, general raymond since the air force developed his instagram to invest in the commercially viable launch vehicles there's been another

vehicle in the smeshl launched market. earlier blue origin announce today started to get commercial cust merds for the new glen launch vehicle and maybe they will even compete for the launch service agreement funding. has this changed your strategy and do you think the government's role -- it's the government's role to build a new commercial launch vehicle if they're already being built by the commercial sector? >> chairman rothters doesn't affect our strategy at all. our strategy remains three things as i mentioned, assured space competition and get off the rd 180 engine. our acquisition strategy is flexible and it encourages multiple competitors for national security launch services. i don't see it affecting it at all and we're not building commercial launch vehicles. >> what do you know about the be 4's testing setback that we had in recent days? was its power pack completely destroyed and how does this impact your schedule? >> my understanding, chairman, is that blue origin has announced that they conducted a

test of that resulted in the loss of a power pack test hardware. obviously that mishap is regrettable but it is an unprecedented in the zrep e development of -- isn't uncommon in development efforts. i think this adds credibility to our tragic to make sure that there's multiple engines being developed. i think it -- we have visibility pretty significant visibility into ula's processes all those it's ula's final ultimate decision. and then once that decision is made obviously the air force as a significant customer of that launch service will do its own independent review. >> excellent. chair, i recognize the ranking member for any final questions he may have. >> thank you, mir chairman. general raymond, if your testimony on page 12 you mention that gps 3, svo 1 has been completed and is in storage with an initial launch capability date set to occur in spring,

2018. that struck me as unnecessary moth bawling of a perfectly good satellite. heig why the delay. >> there's a couple pieces we're working on. one making sure we can command and control the gps satellite with phase zero which will be up by then. and then also there's work to be done with the launch provider that will launch that satellite. >> is this customary to have a year or more delay in launching a satellite sbli there are satellites that have been in storage significantly longer than that, it's not uncustomary. we'll launch it in it's safe and when to do so and we can get it on orbit and then command and control it. on as i mentioned earlier in the hearing today we have a pretty significant gps on orbit as we speak. >> this is not an issue of assured access to space? >> it's an issue of making sure

that we can command and control the capability when it's an orbit and then working the final details of being able to -- for them to integrate with the launch vehicle provider that will launch it. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank the ranking member, the committee will now go into a brief recess as we move to a secure location for the cl classified portion of this briefing.

c-span, where history unfolds daily. in 1979, c-span was created as a public service by america's cable television companies. and is brought to you today by your cable or satellite provider. homeland security secretary john kelly testified earlier this week before a senate appropriations subcommittee. he talked about concerns of homegrown terrorism in the aftermath of the manchester