Hearing on Army Fiscal Year 2027 Budget Estimates and Justification

subcommittee will come to order secretary driscoll general LaNeve welcome to both of you i want to start by acknowledging the men and women of the us army working everyday to defend our country and confront our allies their jobs are very dangerous but absolutely essential and the sacrifices of two hundred and seventy two soldiers wounded and the seven who gave their lives in operation epic fury will certainly not be forgotten they are of course only the latest service members to be killed by iran in its decades long war against america hopefully this will be the last the subcommittee's job is to make sure the soldiers under your command are equipped to deter and if necessary defeat threats to our global interests wherever they arise and the substantial increase in top-line spending in the fiscal twenty-seven request certainly gives us the opportunity however the reliance of this budget request a one-time reconciliation spending is really quite a risky approach and the army's budget illustrates the risk pretty clearly majority of the funds the army requires for critical munitions have been requested by omb as mandatory spending instead of base discretionary spending twenty four billion of the thirty six billion the army spends on replenishing stocks of precision fires and interceptors would come as a one time slug of cash and that's assuming reconciliation passes at all east funds would have no protection against the short term continuing resolutions that have become the norm at the beginning of each fiscal year munitions are now ostensibly a top priority of the administration the deputy secretary has rightly devoted enormous attention and resources to the problem when we should all know look many years to create and it's gonna take years of consistent funding to solve and yet barely a third of the total munitions investments required by the army are built into the full baseline budget for all the talk about sending a clear demand signal to industry it strikes me as an unnecessary risk and i need to hear more from you about how this approach can possibly align with the long-term task ahead of us of restoring munitions in the industrial base in our country the nature of modern warfare is changing recent events in the middle east suggest the us military may not be adapting as quickly as necessary that said i appreciate the army's efforts to identify and apply the lesson learned from ukraine to the middle east so mr. secretary i appreciate your willingness to call it like you see it and i think you were absolutely right to identify the battlefield innovation taking place in ukraine the silicon valley of warfare likewise members of the subcommittee were recently briefed by general chris donahue and lieutenant general curtis bizarre it was clear they too understand the path the drone dominance runs through partnership with the world's foremost experts in drone warfare ukraine this fact is so clear that it's difficult to understand why more senior officials at the pentagon particularly those directly responsible for ukraine policy or military modernization have followed the example of you and general george said back in november by actually seeing the battle lab of technical and industrial innovation firsthand regrettably general george was recently fired and understood both of these innovating reform minded combat veterans sadly are set to retire pretty clear to me that america doesn't stand gain from opting out of the latest battlefield lessons or the sort of cooperation with ukraine on drone technology that our allies in the Gulf are urgently embracing. And making modest investments in this cooperation to ensure that US soldiers have access to the latest battle proven lessons in technology, as they forge new doctrine. Seems like money well spent to me. That's why I'm concerned that the vast majority of funds the department per drone and counter drone capabilities would once again come in the form of one off reconciliation which may not pass if adapting to this reality of modern warfare is a priority as department leaders say it is then we ought to prove it by making room in a full base budget i want to hear from you about how the army values ties with capable partners like ukraine and about what our troops get out of engagement with frontline nato allies as well these relationships repay us investments and then some but they're under strain unnecessarily threats to allies like denmark and surprise force posture changes that affect model host allies like poland are self defeating so m- as secretary general i look forward to hearing your views on these and other topics and we'll turn to you momentarily for opening your statements let me turn first to senator phillips

thank you chairman mcconnell uh and thank you secretary uh driscoll and uh General LaNeve for appearing here today. Um, the Army's total budget request for the upcoming fiscal year's two hundred fifty three billion dollars, a nearly thirty percent increase over last year. Um, let me um agree with the Chairman at the outset um that as we reflect on Memorial Day and the service and sacrifice of generations of men and women of the United States Army uh I too am grateful for those uh who fall in service to our nation. Uh, I'm from a family with a long tradition of Army service, uh my father, my uncles, One might ask what I'm doing on this side of the microphone, uh, as they often did. Uh, and I am, uh, eternally grateful for the role the United States Army has paid in fighting for and securing our freedom over the two hundred and fifty years, uh, of our republic. Um, as we as a subcommittee better analyze and try to understand this budget request, uh, I wanna, uh, focus on a few things. Um, the focus of senior leadership in the army, uh, our work with allies, and our posture in, uh, critical prayer. uh drone and counter drone technologies and munitions. In each of these areas in both budget and policy, I see reason to be encouraged and reasons to be deeply troubled, and I'll speak to both. Um as for leadership focus, Secretary Driscoll, you've brought real energy uh and new thinking to the army, uh and the imperative to adapt is palpable, and I commend you for that. Um at the same time, the Secretary of Defense uh has fired abruptly and without explanation and in my view without cause, uh, General Randy George, uh, a decades-long, uh, respected senior leader, um, and many others. Um, and my concern is that, uh, other effective senior officers seem on their way to retirement rather than further leadership. Um, to Acting Chief of Staff Leneve, I look forward to working with you in your new role. Uh, but my first point here is I'm deeply concerned that some of our most experienced uniformed officers are being forced out without cause or explanation, and that the senior ranks are constantly having to look over their shoulder, rather than being evaluated on the merits of their progress. Um, the recent firing of the chief of chaplains, Major General William Green, is something that also caused me great concern. I've had no explanation. Uh, this has never happened in our nation's history. Secretary Driscoll, I've been encouraged by your recent comments in other hearings about the centrality of Ukraine in shaping and determining the future of warfare, and I'm heartened to hear your on the importance of ensuring our military supports those innovations and integrates them into our arsenal our training and our doctrine. This is urgent in my view. Um, but cutting against those goals, the administration is pressing for Ukraine to surrender at the negotiating table, that which Putin can't achieve on the battlefield. I think we are undermining our own position of partnership with Ukraine. Um, in recent weeks our presidents continue to send damaging signals to our allies and worse yet encouraging signals to our adversaries. Um inexplicably the administration announced the abrupt withdrawal of five thousand troops from Germany, and followed this up with another announcement we would be halting the deployment of a rotational brigade to Poland a crucial partner uh in Europe's eastern flank that has dramatically stepped up its investment in our shared security. Congress was not consulted. According to some press accounts, neither was Poland. Um so We still do not understand whether these announcements are distinct or connected, and what the timing and posture was. I think most importantly it sends the worst possible signal to Russia about our commitment, our competence, and our combat power. And this isn't just a question of numbers. It's about capabilities. Uh, the army has also quietly turned off a long-range fires battalion scheduled to deploy to Germany this summer, a key element of our ongoing deterrence. You know as well as I do our presence in Europe. and our relationship with our European allies is crucial to deterring Russia. For anyone who questions whether Russia is our adversary, let me review some recent facts. Russia is actively aiding and abetting Iran in targeting and killing US service members, passing weapons, targeting assistance, intelligence, and broader support. Russia is giving North Korea critical lifelines and some critical technology. And we know that the degree of with our chief adversary, China, is steadily increasing. The administration has lagged in spending funding appropriated on a bipartisan basis to the Ukraine security assistance initiative. Uh, a week ago, I asked secretary Hegseth in this subcommittee for an update on the spend plan, was promised we would receive it within that week, and it hasn't happened. So, any update you can provide on this directed appropriation that on a bipartisan basis members of this committee have raised, over and over would be welcome. It is overdue. In the context of this administration's attacks on NATO, and with Russia's heightened threats to our interests, these decisions make no sense to me. Funding requests for drone and counter drone technology have increased, which I welcome. The army's recently launched a creative drone marketplace, and units are beginning to experiment with this vital new way of warfare. But most of the funding, as the chairman noted, is in reconciliation. outside of base budget, and I'm unclear how much of this new procurement uh is occurring. I look forward to learning how the army is going to use these funds to build a broader drone industry ecosystem and how it plans on quickly driving new counter drone UAS protections across its forces. I think this is one of our most urgent missions. Last on munitions, rethinking our approach to munitions has been a feature of this subcommittee since the early days of Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine. All of us support multi-year procurements, especially for the Patriot Pac-three Interceptor. But the request for these munitions in reconciliation is baffling to me. Why risk something so foundationally important in a partisan political process, the outcome of which is so uncertain? And in light of the high expenditure rates and our current conflict in the Middle East, how are we ramping production to accommodate our needs alongside those of our vital and trusted partners and allies? We also have to discuss the looming multi-billion dollar shortfall in army military personnel and O and M accounts excuse me operations and maintenance accounts. There's multiple reasons for this um and I look forward to talking through this. But last, the army's also been ordered to divert personnel for DH missions uh here at home. Um all of us who spend time here in Washington sea, guardsmen, uh they're performing as ordered but they're often doing nothing more urgent than picking up trash. I'd rather have them in Europe. making Putin second guess his strategy. The army's budget and its near future are full of contradictions, I find some puzzling, some troubling, alongside flashes of brilliance and decisions that give me confidence and optimism. Ultimately, the fiscal year twenty-seven request is just that, a request, and I hope this dialogue and the work of this subcommittee will help shape it in a way that meets our article one responsibilities for the year ahead. Thank you, Mister Chairman, and thank you, Mister Secretary.

now let's have a brief opening statements from both of you going first uh ms secretary

chairman mcconnell ranking member coons distinguished members it's a privilege to address you today after a year in this position i am prouder than ever to represent our soldiers and their families as all you as all of you know our soldiers are the very best in the world they're bold decisive and they can overcome anything when we properly enable them that's why i spent over a hundred and thirty days on the road across nineteen countries and twenty five states to hear directly from them i ate with them put hands on their equipment and had candid conversations with soldiers of every single rank what i heard was clear our soldiers are ready to innovate and win but our own bureaucracy and regulations are still holding them back getting what soldiers need to win and making the army budget actually work for them is definitely a bipartisan topic and i know all of you agree with that You have supported our army for decades and we wouldn't be here without you. But we know the system that should benefit soldiers remains broken. Quality of life and battlefield advantage aren't always the number one budget priority. It's a simple fact, and we need your help to continue to change it. We need a right to repair legislation, relief from pre-World War Two laws, and significantly more budget flexibility. Thank you so much for last year's progress, but if we're gonna win the next fight, we must go even further. Technological change is accelerating, warfare is evolving, and speed is absolutely critical. Your help to either help us lower barriers to innovation or stick to the decades-long status quo makes all the difference. I invite all of you to come see our transformation firsthand. We're partnering with private industry to adopt the best tech, talent and tradecraft. We're inviting those partners onto our bases to unlock dormant resources and offset federal budget delays. We're blazing a trail for our nation on nuclear energy, counter-train capabilities, and military AI. Despite red tape, we're delivering better dining, barracks, wifi, and three D printed barracks. Even though it can feel like the deck is stacked against us, the United States Army is an absolute beacon of transformation. For instance, as we speak at this exact moment, we're hosting the largest hackathon in human history. to retroactively jailbreak our siloed equipment. It's named Operation Jailbreak. Last month in Europe, soldiers showed me how our software systems are compartmentalized, isolated, and ineffective against modern threats. Meanwhile, Ukraine's Delta Common operating system, their modular open system architecture command and control system, is absolutely incredible. It fully integrates every drone, every sensor and every single shooting platform into just one single network. Ours does not. Unfortunately, for decades, our budget process incentivized companies to to protect their intellectual property at all costs creating walled gardens in our command and control infrastructure this has been the status quo for far too long it is no longer acceptable and industry is actually helping us to solve it right now. i contacted nine of our defense primes and other large partners who immediately agreed to send thousands of pieces of equipment hundreds of engineers and scientists to fort carson together we will force our way through the fire walls link every single system and achieve true right to integrate and this is just our first sprint we will do it again and again and again until we get it exactly right and i wanna be clear this is the perfect example of our army's potential no one else has the talent the drive and the obsessive work ethic like ethic like our soldiers to pull this off operation jailbreak is the first of many sprints to bypass red tape and bureaucracy what we're doing in colorado should be the standing standard operating procedure across the entire federal government it's the iterative process that makes america's tech sector the very best in the world but you would be amazed at the regulatory walls that stood in And we've expanded an absolutely sinful amount of energy just to do the right thing. Imagine what we can do if you continue to help us slash those restrictions. We can do more if you help us balance oversight with speed. We can maximize our budget if you help us partner with America's entrepreneurs. We can move faster if you help us shed obsolete equipment and invest in the future. And with your help, we can ensure our army remains the dominant land fighting force. for the next two hundred and fifty years. Thank you so much for having us, and I look forward to answering your questions.

General, go ahead.

General McConnell, Ranking Member Coons, thank you for the opportunity to appear before this committee today. The credibility of our army is defined by what it's prepared to do, not what it intends to do. So every decision I make enables our soldiers to be more lethal and ready to fight and win, and serve as the backbone of the joint force. In the Indo-Pacific, we're building a force postured to deter threats to the us national interest and designed to extend the operational reach and endurance of the joint force right now eighty-seven thousand soldiers are campaigning throughout the region our typhoon missile systems are forward deployed to the philippines and japan and we positioned ltams in guam and the ifpik unit in korea extending next generation air and missile defense against current threats in the region the first and third multi-domain task forces are now operational in the region and this fall the fourth multi-domain task Each of these MDTFs brings together long range fires, intelligence, electronic warfare, space and cyber, all integrated into a single theater level capability designed to support the joint force commanders across vast distances in the Pacific. Every one of these capabilities exists because of the investments this committee supported. In the Middle East, army forces continue to defend US personnel and partners while sustaining layered air and missile defense. long-range strike capability, and operational logistics across CENTCOM. And at home, we're preparing the force for future conflict at our combat training centers, where we train our soldiers to fight against an adversary in the mud, to solve complex problems, and to test our latest systems. But we cannot field modern kit while sustaining aging systems that consume time, money, and power. The Vesting Legacy platform reduces the maintenance demand that falls hardest on our jun- junior soldiers. and freeze resources to advance next generation systems. That's why we are restructuring how we acquire, design, sustain, and field equipment with a decisive focus on speed, the right to repair, and systems modularity. That thinking is already reflected in some of our next generation platforms, like the XM thirty infantry fighting vehicle, the M one E three Abrams, and the MV seventy five Cheyenne, which provides unprecedented speech, range, and flexibility. And because of our secretary, each of these systems are designed so the next operational upgrade requires integration, not a completely new start. But none of this matters if we can't produce and sustain at scale. And this is why we continue to modernize our OIB through advanced manufacturing, depot modernization, expanded partnerships with industry, including including enhanced use leases that accelerate infrastructure development and production capacity. And while industrial capacity is important, strength of our army is only as strong as our ability to retain experienced soldiers, and whether the force we're building reflects the standards we claim to uphold. That standard includes four billion dollars in infrastructure investments through twenty twenty six. We're rolling out campus style dining facilities as the secretary talked about. We're scaling our holistic health and fitness across the force. And soldiers are seeing the difference and so do American citizens. Our recruiting numbers are soaring, and we're on track to achieve this year's success and target well ahead of schedule. Because in the end, soldiers are the reason your army can do what it does. Your army delivers the intelligence and fires that enable us to maneuver, we sustain operations, we protect the force. And we provide the command and control architecture that allows a joint force and American's allies to operate together. Every component of the joint fight depends on our army's ability to do all those things simultaneously and exceptionally well. And we will not fail our country. this will defend and thank you for your continued support as we sustain the best army the world has ever uh uh ever seen thank you

thank you general obviously history indicates the strongest form of deterrence is to say things like reagan did on peace through strength but not just say it but back it up with your policies the administration's focus on pushing allies to increase their own military capacity would ostensibly enhance that sort of deterrence that's all good news general you helped assist the ukrainian military before russia's escalation in twenty twenty two would earlier and more rapid us assistance to ukraine have enhanced deterrence and defense against russia's full scale invasion and for both of you if the prc acts on its ambition to control taiwan it would threaten key american interests and disrupt the global economy this is why there's been a strong bipartisan support to improve taiwan's defensive capabilities and while i'm kinda worried after the trip recently to china that arm sales to taiwan are being delayed so do you agree that helping taiwan or the philippines better defend their territory actually enhances deterrence or there are lesson's learned and capabilities demonstrated in ukraine that are applicable to taiwan for the Philippines.

sir i first thanks for the question and and uh i know we talked before about uh you know my my participation um you know early on uh with the ukrainians i i think uh you know talking about deterrence anywhere that we have the ability to sustain campaigning across the pacific where we have our forces that can do access and presence where we can maneuver uh our forces in and out of the theater to show different um capabilities uh to not only our allies but to to uh display our capabilities and how fast we can be in a theater is always a form of deterrence uh for the enemy um we are taking sir uh and i and i i wanna make sure that uh this entire committee you know fully understands we are taking every single lesson learned as fast as possible from the ukrainian battlefield and from the battlefield that's going on in oef and cycling that into our formations. Uh, we're we're using the uh the lessons learned on our combat training centers. The secretary is pushing us hard on getting the capabilities down to our soldiers as fast as possible in order to uh get hands-on, uh, so they can be as prepared to protect themselves and to be able to uh engage the enemy with this new technology at scale.

And Chairman, um, what I would echo from uh General LaNeve is the the lessons we're taking are, speed maneuver matters more than ever um the dispersion if you look at ukraine the the the their ability to disperse their command and control to disperse their fires matters long range precision fires is something we as a nation are uniquely good at um and continuing to invest in that and then the very last one is if you look at contested logistics when we are six thousand miles from our home data matters more than ever and so when i was referencing project jailbreak or operation jailbreak those are the types of exercises that should set us up for success anywhere in the world but including the indo-pacific

we shifting to another part of the world uh uh european allies are all dramatically increasing their defense spending and traditionally we've directed their spending toward american made capabilities germany is on track to spend five percent of their gdp by twenty thirty five poland spends more as a share of gdp than anybody else in nato to what extent was the army consulted on the cancel of rotational deployment to poland it was announced last week how does surprising allies with abrupt changes to us force posture does that deepen or improve cooperation and what is the status of sales of long range strike capabilities which could serve to offset the capabilities of us rotational forces to germany or to poland

chairman um we're working with our allies particularly in europe um very tightly on as they increase their defense spending over the upcoming years uh particularly because of president trump's push we are standing up marketplaces for counter drone through our gianta four O one that is actually in concert with them and so we've come up with the the rules and the protocols for information sharing with the brits we're inviting twenty three other nations to this marketplace and then our hope is that we're going to be able to expand it to include providers of um supplies from all over the world and so they're going to be able to list their own companies we the united states army will function like consumer reports and this should be good for the entire industry globally but particularly small and medium american businesses

and and sure there is nothing wrong with uh improving our situation with regard to ukraine i mean we had difficulty confirming that the four hundred million that we spent in this year's appropriation is actually going. I hope so. Sehr gut.

Uh, thank you, Mr. Chairman. Uh, l let me just, um, extend the question you were just asked. Last year, the Pentagon requested zero for Ukraine and zero for our Baltic allies. And on a bipartisan basis, uh, this subcommittee put in hundreds of millions of dollars. The secretary was in front of us a week ago. He promised us to spend plan within the week. We haven't received one. Do you have any update for us on progress towards spend plans, uh, for our Baltic Assurance Initiative and our Ukraine Assurance Initiative, which was, as asked of the secretary in this chamber a week ago, the clear intention of this subcommittee?

Senator, I'll take the first swing if uh General Laneve has any additional information. Um, I think we know what

in in other words no we don't have a spend plan that we're gonna get this week either

sorry i can't answer for that uh uh osw um but as the secretary says uh we're

i mean i i'll just be blunt like we're here to talk about two hundred and thirty six billion dollars you share our perspective that Ukraine is the silicon valley of modern warfare, you're taking great steps to partner with them and to ingest their lessons and to deploy it. I don't know why this is something we've had to ask and ask and ask and we can't get the spend plan. So, please convey to the secretary uh our shared sense of urgency about this. Uh, let me just briefly ask about this forced posture change in Europe and why, to the extent you can answer it. My sense is that there was an abrupt announcement of the withdrawal of five thousand of our troops from Germany. And then shortly thereafter, um, an, uh, underway deployment of four thousand to Poland was changed in some way, and then a change in terms of pre-positioning stocks. What's happening with our forced posture in Europe, and why?

So we're continually looking at the forced posture across Europe when you, when you look at uh, our army pre-position stocks, we've been looking at that, uh, for years, um, across not only just Europe, across the globe and where we have pre-position stocks. We've been looking at the force posture across Europe, uh, based off of the surge, uh, of rotational units, uh, you know, couple of years ago, based off of the invasion. Um, in in consultation with, uh, uh, the UConn commander, we, we talked about what forces, uh, that he was you know, recommend a company.

Were the polls aware that this decision was being made?

So as a title ten, I'm talking the force structure that we were pulling it out. I am not part of the discussions with our our uh our allies and that that's a that's above a title ten requirement.

OK. So, um, I think what I'm hearing is nothing more than I've been able to get from press accounts. Congress was not consulted by press accounts, our allies were not consulted, and I'm concerned that the lesson our allies is learning is that Chancellor Mertz criticized um our operations in Iran and the President in a fit of peak announced withdrawal of five thousand troops that had not previously been planned. Please disabuse me of this notion and help reassure me that this is part of a long planned change in rotation. Um, as I think you know, my brother served in the second armored, it is really hard to get pre-positioned stocks to places, whether it's the Western Pacific or Eastern Europe, in advance, I don't understand why there's been some alleged change in long-range fires or in pre-position stocks uh i- in Europe in a way that really puts at risk, our deterrence of Russia.

Senator, um, one of the things under uh, and I mean this very sincerely and not sycophantically, under President Trump and Secretary Warhegset's leadership, we have been re-looking at pre-position stocks globally and how we think about when we send our sons and daughters to fight on our behalf, what tools and weapons can be in the theater for them and so one of the reasons we are so excited about the giant of marketplaces once you and this sounds esoteric but once you're able to have compatible equipment

yes

when our soldiers deploy they can fall in on equipment from our allies

ok

and the allies can either send their people and their things are just their things and so we are going after prepositions doctor

let me ask you about that uh as we have discussed before um i was at the dignified transfer of dover air force base for three army reservists who were killed in the

mmm

tower twenty-two attack in twenty twenty four i promised their families i'd take very seriously counter uas capabilities particularly for forward deployed americans uh soldiers um and we worked together to give you budget flexibility

mmm

um you're doing a lot in uh counter uas work the um jita four one that you referenced the open market i'm very encouraged by this but your your budget request for this effort is only a hundred and thirty six million out of two hundred and fifty billion and as i understand it The army is only buying one counter-UAS system when there's a wide range of possibilities. Help me understand why your FY twenty-seven request is focused on a single system. And of all the militaries in the world, the one most capable of intercepting Shahed drones seems to me to be the Ukrainians, we're in an ongoing war in Iran, where all of the civilian and military infrastructure of our partners and allies is at risk of Shahed drones. why not partner more closely with the Ukrainians on Shihet interceptors?

Senator, uh, to to the last bit of your remark, we we've purchased thirteen thousand Mirops since the start of the conflict.

Yep.

Our understanding, and I talk to the Ukrainians very frequently, is qualitatively, that is, if not their favorite interceptor, then one of the top two or three. Um, we have flew thirteen thousand into theater over the last couple of weeks. We've had ranger regiment in eighty second training, doing train the trainers. Um, if and when a conflict kicks back off we will have a number of new solutions in theater that all started from jada four oh one's kickoff nine months ago

thank you last question um your budget request reduces aircraft procurement uh by nearly half it doesn't request any new apaches any new chinooks i think only one blackhawk um and the army request uh invests in modifications and assumes fms sales i understand part of what you're trying to do is to rebalance legacy systems Um, but the Chinook is the only heavy vertical lift platform in the joint force, uh, and the MV seventy-five is, is not a replacement for this capability. Am I correct? The Army has very few Block-twos in the Chinook fleet mix. What are the advantages of those Block-twos and why stop buying Block-twos when we don't have uh a transition plan to an autonomous platform for this critical, heavy lift function?

Sure, you're you're correct, uh, you have very few inside the the inventory. Um, and I know that the uh Secretary Hicks had, you know, mentioned this uh uh last week, that he's taken a a overall look again at the uh our aviation strategy. We are as well uh taking a look at it, you know, the decisions that were all made on the side of angels, do they still hold, you know, as as we go forward. We know we need the Cheyenne. We know that the forty-seven, the Black Hawk and the Apache are not legacy equipment, they're enduring, they're gonna be in our in our uh fleet for many years so we're taking a hard look at this to make sure that we've done the the right uh you know decisions uh on on how we're looking at that and and we'll come back to you sir and and and what we come back out with

good cause i think future acquisitions of chinooks are key in order to sustain

you are very

see that we're doing this alright thank you very much

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Sure, go on.

Um, Mr. Secretary General, welcome. I just want to associate myself with the remarks of the Chairman and Ranking Member about Ukraine and the need for the spend plan, but also to learn the lessons from Ukraine's incredible success with counter-UAS and electronic warfare i think that's extremely important i want to refer to another lesson mister secretary from ukraine and that is that it the need for distributed autonomous systems operating alongside soldiers has become clear at the same time outside analysts in defense industry reporting now suggest that the army remains years away from fielding autonomous ground systems at an operational scale. The army has continued to publicly emphasize the autonomy, robotics, unmanned systems, human machine teaming, all of those are central to the future battlefield. And yet, last year, as you know from our conversation that the army made what i deemed to be a very short-sighted and unfortunate decision to cancel the robotic combat vehicle program including the ripsaw platform developed in the state of maine what where does the army's autonomous ground vehicle strategy stand today

um senator i agree with nearly all of your remarks on the future of warfare and one of the things the united states army has gotten wrong for a very long time is and this goes back to these closed systems systems that just can operate cannot share data outside of the system and the reason that is so important is once something is in in this instance drive by wire um we can take it and make it autonomous very quickly and so we met a new company last year about fourteen months ago called applied intuition and they had never a single an army vehicle and we asked them how long would it take to make it autonomous and they did it in eight days and so it's it's actually not a systematic problem within any of our future vehicles because their open architecture you can layer in software to control the vehicle very quickly it is a legacy problem of how we used to design systems and overspend and so specifically to what you're referencing senator what we cancelled the other big lesson we're learning directly from ukraine is we in everything we purchase have gotta be on the right end of the cost curve cause if an eight hundred dollar drone can destroy a thing very quickly and easily even as the wealthiest nation in the history of the world we just can't sustain it and so one of the things we're very focused on is everything we purchase going forward being closer to a tradable where we can afford it as a nation to lose it to drones

well i would say that it was the height of irony that when the army was having its parade last year of the future what do they have in it but the rip soft

when you made that remark senator last year i agree it was very ironic

so seems to me that suggests there is a lot of value there uh let me switch to a different issue general i'm going to address this to you uh the berry amendment was enacted to ensure that american troops are wearing american manufactured uniforms made in the usa that was originally passed in nineteen forty one it was permanently enacted in nineteen ninety four and we expanded it to cover athletic footwear um during my time in office so there still is a continued exception to the berry amendment for combat boots that are purchased by a service a service member. Every other major component of the uniform must be American-made, and yet we continue to allow an exception for optional combat boots. In practice, this is allowed a growing share of the market to shift to foreign manufacturers and foreign supply chains. That completely undermines the whole intent of the Barry amendment. Why are we continuing to allow for that exception? And can we work together to close this loophole and ensure that the combat boots worn with the US military uniform are made in America?

Ma'am, the simple answer is yes. I commit to working with you and the team, uh, on how do we close this gap.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Hello, and thank you, Mr. Chairman, uh, and welcome, uh, Secretary and General being with us today. For more than four years now, the Ukrainian people have bravely fought on the front line of democracy against Russian aggression. Today, Putin continues to bomb and kill innocent civilians while ignoring President Trump's call for peace. I want to thank you, Mister Secretary, for standing alongside Ukraine, for visiting the country, for highlighting its achievements on the battlefield, and for being a voice in support of security assistance. Uk- Ukraine has truly offered an incredible glimpse into modern warfare, with notable ingenuity and agility, developed with low-cost technology. Secretary Driscoll, can you Elaborate on the value of us ukraine cooperation and advancement. In emerging technologies to prepare our own soldiers for battlefields in the future.

Um, absolutely, Senator. And the chairman referenced it in his opening remarks. We consider. The Ukrainian battlefield, the silicon valley of war. The united states army has had through and other groups. A relationship with the ukrainians since the very beginning. Um, general was working with the ukrainians well, well. what i can say is nearly every single thing we do as an army we pressure test against the idea of will this work in the middle east could the ukrainians use this in their theater and if not why are we pursuing it there are different things about how we the army have to prepare for a future conflict at a future spot where we don't know about it so if that is in south kome if that's in the indo-pacific if that that's moving quickly through a urban area there are tools we will need like tanks that are valuable in different settings than the kind of flot of ukraine and so we balance out that that is not what all conflicts will look like but the ukrainians have done an incredible job of innovating at speed they've done an incredible job of getting their private industry and some of their smartest most talented people to come help their armed forces and their army and we are trying to mimic and model out how to do that with our industry too

mr. secretary the us currently is stationed and rotates forces through the baltic states and poland countries on the front lines of russian sabotage and belligerence countries that are also far exceed their obligations under nato they've been true partners to the united states and in fact i'll never forget last year mister secretary accompanying you to the dignified transfer at dover air force base of four american soldiers who died in a tragic training exercise in lithuania in vilnius the day before the lithuanian people came out and publicly mourned with us as these soldiers were returned home. This issue hit close to home as some of these soldiers were from my home state of Illinois. In fact, Poland is our partner in an Il Illinois National Guard, a relationship highly regarded. The US troop presence in these countries is a strategic decision, one rooted in shared values between our nations. I'm deeply concerned as I learn about the administration's plans to reduce forces in this theater and I wonder if you could tell me if we walk away from our allies in that region what is the plan for us forced posture in the world

i can start and then hand it to uh my colleague um i i just wanna echo your remark senator on the lithuanians um we still pray for those families of the fallen um it was devastating being at dover with him and their family or with their families and their friends but the lithuanians were incredible um everyone i have seen that i know of since i have thanked them they wrapped their arms around our soldiers and their leadership and took us into their community. Um, and so we are very grateful for that, General Laniv.

Mm-hmm. Yes, sir. I we've great relations with, uh, with our, uh, partners, militaries, you know, across across Europe. I, sir, I I I still think you'll see, um, you know, based off of the Commander Yukom's, uh, movement of forces, you'll still see, you know, forces that are actively, uh, participating, uh, inside of of Poland, uh, with our allies. It it it won't be the armor brigade but you still have you know the second uh two cr that's over there uh right now we still have another abct we still have a a division headquarters that's forward deployed that's part of the the surge that went forward we still have fifth corps uh that's that's in uh in europe so uh while one brigade is coming back we still have a pretty big force presence from the united states army uh in europe

thank you general uh mr. secretary i wanna thank you for visiting the rock island arsel last year i asked you to do it and you did it quickly so quickly i couldn't go with you but thank you anyway for visiting and for working with me over the past year to protect uh the arsenal uh team from job cuts that may hurt our organic industrial base can you commit to protecting our oib sites like recall and arsenal from further job cuts

um senator i can commit to we are um actively focused on honor president trump to strengthen our industrial base and secretary of warhead set had mandated that we do that

does that include rock island arsenal

rock island arsenal is uh the forefront of our advanced manufacturing push which will be the future of how we do fights in logistics all over the world and so absolutely

i'm glad i came to this hearing thank you for your statement

markowski then shudt and then kennedy

thank you mr. chairman gentlemen thank you for being here and for your leadership Uh, General, uh, Linev, I wanna, uh, address my first question to you. Uh, Senator Collins and I were talking about the boot issue and I was telling her, we're making or we're certainly testing, uh, bunny boots in in Alaska that are made in Alaska. So just putting that out. And when it comes to Arctic, you will have big bunny boots to fill. Um, I, uh, I remain a big fan of of General Randy George. Um, he was a guy who understood the Arctic. I think it says a lot that he chose to take his oath of office, uh, uh, as the forty-first chief of staff, not at the Pentagon but out there, um, at JABAR surrounded by the eleventh airborne. I thought that that was pretty cool. Um, but he, uh, he really demonstrated to me, we were out in the field at an Arctic, um, training exercise in, in February, uh, the commitment and an understanding as to what it took to be engaged in, in Arctic warfare. And he has said that the army had really, his words, really allowed our capabilities to atrophy in the Arctic, and now it was a catch up game. And, and he was all in on what are we gonna do with the level of innovation, how are we gonna move this at, at, at literally warp speed here. So, the question to you, um, uh, General L- Leneve is, is we're, we're looking at what Russia is doing, um, w- w- we see how China is accelerating. Experts, outside experts say that we are doing catch up in the Arctic. Does this budget, in your view, um continue the Arctic investment strategy that I think uh General George put in motion, or are we are we holding back here?

Ma'am, we're definitely not taking a step back. And in fact, if if I tried at all, uh there's a a a personal person that would kill me. My daughter's first assignment was in one two five. uh up in alaska and and thank you for uh your uh commitment and efforts to help us turn

there you go

uh those two brigades that you know always seem like they were separate and not part of an organization truly into a division that has a a shared focus a shared commitment and you can see this breather and what we're learning um from uh the the training that's going on whether it's an airborne operation or you know just trying to uh to maneuver uh during uh the winter uh is gonna help us throughout the army not not just in winter uh or uh you know uh the arctic conditions but if you look at batteries and how how fast batteries get depleted in the arctic that's the same thing that happens in in the jungle so there's a lot of uh corollaries too but really to answer your question we're not stepping away from it cause we know it's gonna be a critical battleground in the future

Well, they say that if you can figure out how to fight there, you can figure it out just about about anywhere, and I I I would certainly agree with that. I wanna follow on the chairman's comments as as well as that of the of the ranking member, when it comes to um uh this budget request and the fact that a quarter of the budget, uh thirty seven point seven billion depends on a reconciliation package. Um, that is yet to be defined, to be decided. Uh, it's already cued, um, in line behind other legislative priorities. Um, and there's important stuff in it, like in that thirty-seven point seven billion, eight hundred and thirty of the armies, eight hundred and fifty-seven requested THAAD interceptors. Um, we've got the PAC-three MSC Patriot interceptors. Um, uh, jumping nearly nine times from three hundred fifty-seven rounds to over thirty-two hundred. Um, so it, I mean, it's, it's important what is in that proposed reconciliation. But we're also waiting on the forthcoming Iran war supplemental, which we anticipate will have significant funding requests for munitions restock. So, kind of walk me through kind of the governing principle here, if you will. what what goes in the base budget, what goes in reconciliation, what goes in the supplemental, and and and is that distinction being driven by actually by actual military requirements or by what you think might be able to pass this legislative body?

Senator, um, I think as you and your colleagues know much better than us, um, we we work across the services hand in hand with OSW to come up with this plan. we agree wholeheartedly with all of you that the reconciliation portion, the supplemental portion, all of it is critical for our national security. And our personal commitment is to work with any office so that it is not a partisan exercise, but instead all of you can see the bipartisanship with which I think we put together this plan.

Do we have a plan B in in in the can- in the chance that there is not a third reconciliation?

Um, Senator, we can follow up with your office on the specifics.

OK. Cuz as I as I look to what's included, it's kind of important stuff. And so, helping us understand our role here uh on the Appropriations Committee and how this maps forward I think is important. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Sure. Um, Kennedy and then Murphy.

Thank you, Chairman. Um, Secretary, good to see you. I wanted to follow up our ongoing conversation about the lease negotiations i know you're in constructive dialogue with the governor and his administration uh i wanna just sorta set the tone here and make sure we're on the same page at least conceptually obviously deals have to be negotiated but i think the first thing is do you want a deal with the state government done in a collaborative fashion

unequivocally senator

ok And um there are couple of things that are happening right now. First of all, I think a deal is possible. I wanna say that. Um but the state of Hawaii up until now has provided state lands for army training uh for free. And that's just not a reasonable deal. And so it's true that the Department of War, the Department of the Army has a legal right to adversely condemn property that they deem in the national security interests of the United States. That is the kind of thing that sounds easy in Washington and would create lots of difficulty back home because what we have underlying this relationship is a cooperative attitude between state government, county government, and the federal government in this instance. And there are very few instances of the army or the department of war condemning state property. It happened in New York, it happened in Puerto Rico. In both instances, those were, I mean those are moments in history and they're not good ones. Right? And they weren't good for the department of war. And so I would just like to hear from you that you'd like to avoid that outcome. of adverse condemnation. Not that you take it off the table, I know that you um uh don't wanna take anything off the table uh when we're still in a negotiation, but I'd like to hear that that's not where you're sort of barreling towards.

Um, happy to, Senator, uh I first always try to say this and I mean it very sincerely, if you talk to any soldier, and I'm sure General Lanive could echo this, who has been stationed in Hawaii with their families, they get embraced by that community unlike almost anywhere else our soldiers go it's one of the most requested places not just because it's beautiful but because the community is so good to them and that that trust and relationships take decades to build up and so we are incredibly grateful um the second one is i don't want to underestimate the importance of that training land for our national security and how important it is for the indo-pacific when we reference alaska and how important it is for our soldiers to get to train there the triple canopy that twenty fifth id gets to do impacts how we create our t t p s and will make us stronger in the future uh but to your specific question senator um the governor's team your federal delegation have advocated incredibly tirelessly for the people of hawaii we want to come to the most fair resolution as quickly as possible so that we can continue to maintain the relationship with the community and have this national security asset

ok in in the interest of continuing the negotiation but as as as we say hard on the issues easy on each other i wanna just flag a couple of issues First, um, there's sort of chatter, uh, about a provision in the house mark of the defense authorization bill. And I think that that is very likely unwise, because we're talking about one chamber, one party. And if we're gonna do anything with the Hawaii congressional delegation, we've got two defense appropriators and two defense authorizers, we should all be in the room and know what the heck is being contemplated as led sort of uh transmitted back and forth and if it's not then we should know that that's not what's happening that's number one number two is as we think about the remuneration to the state government right it's a lease you got a less and a less or and the lessor should get something for the lease you agree with that now we have to talk about the details um it's just important to not move anything to the left on the mil con list on the unfunded priorities list so think of this as a proper community benefits package. As you know, I've been on this committee for a while now, and I'm happy to advocate for increased defense spending generally, army spending in particular, um, in the state of Hawaii. However, when you're talking about a lease negotiation, like us doing MilKon and moving it to the left, or you know, buying down the Ufer list, is not gonna be something that we can honestly convey is a community benefits package. So as we're contemplating how to make the community whole and maintain that level of cooperation, there are some people who believe the Department of Defense just doesn't belong in the state of Hawaii. Those people will never be satisfied. There are some people who think that uh the Department of Defense should not give anything to the state of Hawaii. Those people will never be satisfied. But the middle wants a fair deal, and that fair deal would not include just increased army spending on army stuff but rather uh a kind of compensation for the ability to use the lands at um at pta um and pmrf and elsewhere thank you

kennedy

gentlemen welcome um my my my biggest surprise from the summit between presidents trump and xi was how open and notorious president xi was with respect to his insecurity about taiwan i mean before during after the summit um he he basically said america president trump need to leave taiwan alone taiwan is ours and president xi has his reputation built up by many members of our media as being this master negotiator i found that surprising it's understandable america has learned how to fight again and i'm sure president xi is looking at what president trump did in in uh venezuela and cuba and iran and the sahel and yemen um be that as it may the mister xi has demonstrated and telegraphed his insecurities that gives us leverage doesn't that argue for us to go forward with an arms sale to taiwan and others after it general let me ask you first or secretary whoever wants to answer

um senator uh the the the portion of it that i would uh strongly and uh very vehemently disagree with is um that in any instance where president trump is he would concede anything unnecessarily and so i i

i i i didn't i didn't ask that i i if you can't answer tell me cause i i i don't want anybody to get fired It just seems to me I was surprised that President Xi was so, so uh obvious in his insecurity. He's worried about Taiwan. He's worried about America supporting Taiwan. If we wanna, if we want stability, we're not gonna get it by being nice to Xi. We're gonna get it by being making him respect our strength. Don't you think that argues for us to go forward with the arms sales to Taiwan?

Uh, Senator, I can say that under this budget, um, the this one point

I'm just not more than asking, Mr. Secretary. You're not? OK. Alright, well let me ask you. Mm-hmm. Let me shift direction. I look, I I I don't I don't think you have to be Einstein's cousin to figure out what we ought to do next in terms of establishing deterrence. But maybe that's just me. Um. is russia our friend

no

between ukraine and russia and the war they're fighting who do we wanna win

ukraine

ok um isn't it a fact well strike that what's the most powerful army in europe

sir i'd say anywhere the united states soldier is that's the most that's the most powerful army in the world

i understand other than the united states what's the most powerful european army

yeah it's it's probably uh between uh russia and uh you know some of our allies have some incredible army service some some incredible capabilities you you

ukraine isn't it it's ukraine isn't it

sir ukraine has a has has done an incredible job against a uh an

i mean don't you find it breathtaking general what they've done they started with nothing

i do find it breathtaking general

and and i just well they're producing two now two hundred drones a day in addition to cruise missiles to reach into russia they've taken out forty percent of russia's uh ability to export its oil i just find and they started with nothing i remember when all the experts who are almost always wrong. So Russia's gonna move in on Ukraine, they're gonna roll in like su- like thunder on a summer night, it'll be over in two days. And now Ukraine has turned the tide. Why don't we support taking those two hundred billion dollars of Russian assets in Europe that we have seized and getting that money to Ukraine, now let's win this thing. or at least get putin into a position where he'll negotiate a settlement. Would you support that?

Uh again senator my title ten authorities that that's a policy question outside of our lane.

I mean it just seems so i'm not talking about pet federal money. There's two hundred billion dollars sitting there. Heck there's there's the uk there there's thirty one billion dollars in the uk alone. France, Macron, President Macron, swell guy. He's always given us advice and and fussing at us. France is sitting on twenty two billion dollars. Why don't they give that to Ukraine? They'll use the money to buy some of our our our our weapons. It's just sitting there. If we wanna win, why don't we support taking the two hundred plus billion dollars and saying here, Ukraine, here's the money, go whip their ass. You're not gonna you don't wanna answer that, do you guys? I understand. I get it. I'm I went over. I'm sorry, Mister Chairman.

Shane, uh Capito, Baldwin and Botham.

Um, thank you, Mister Chairman, and let me begin by thanking both of you for being here and associating myself with the remarks of Senator Kennedy. with respect to Ukraine um and point out that if the administration would just put the sanctions back on the oil it would stop Russia from gaining four billion dollars a month that they're using to put into Ukraine and and I would just say secretary Driscoll that in fact as the secretary of the army you are a policy person and while you may or not wanna answer that question and I understand that if you wanna bump that to the president But to say that you're not responsible for policy, I think, is not an accurate description. Um, but I wanna ask you, because the last time you were both, um, we had an exchange, it was before the Armed Services Committee, and I asked you about the drawdown of the troops from Germany and then walked out of that hearing and heard that the administration had just decided to cancel a deployment of four thousand troops to poland and i just wondered if you or anyone in the administration contacted our polish allies about that troop withdrawal if they knew that was coming and if you um either of you were asked about your advice with respect to whether that um cancellation should be done

ma'am thank you uh for the question as i i stated earlier i i was in uh consultation the the ucom commander on on what force it would be as the title ten uh uh what would come out uh in in my recommendation to him uh as well uh but uh you know notification to our our partners um on the title ten uh that's not something that's in my purview of if general grinkovich did that as the ucom commander if that was done uh inside the the osw policy

and senator i would say uh the the services are a this is not intended to be an answer that's hiding the ball but instead very accurately that we are constantly and frequently talking about our forced posture all over the world throughout the year um with policy and osw leadership in the administration um and so we are regularly involved in conversations

um but it just struck me that we had just had an exchange about the fact that it would be ok to draw down those troops from germany because we were gonna be rotating um troops in and then there was no effort to um address what was happening in Poland it just it seemed like an a decision that was not thought through um so that's why I wondered if if you were ask and and I think it's it's the reason that in the NDAA last year um the Congress mandated consultation for the administration can remove US forces in Europe below seventy six thousand for longer than forty five days, because there is real concern about what um not with respect to what the two of you are saying, but about what this administration is planning in terms of the drawdown from Europe and and isn't it true that one of one of the important reasons to have pre-positioned equipment, we had this exchange at SASK as well, um, is because it allows us to have, um, more rapidly assembled, um, troops if we need to go into the Middle East or go someplace else if we have, um, the ability to have that pre-positioned equipment.

So, ma'am, uh, you know, the, we've been looking at our pre-position, uh, force structure for a while. Um, and, and really, uh, to, uh, the analysis to take a look at it is, Do you keep it as a preposition force, uh, that, you know, you you only break, uh, you know, when when you you break glass when you need to use it? Or do you you change the the way we look at that force as training sets that could be spread out that you could follow in which which breaks it up it it's a less of a target,

Right, which

you'll still be able to utilize them. But the most important part is you can continually upgrade those systems so they can talk to each other.

And and as we said at that SASK hearing, i think that makes sense but we're not doing that either as i understand

no ma'am we are taking a look at that um that that was part of

but

uh the overall look at the project

so we're studying it is what you're telling me

yes ma'am we are we're we're looking at how we can make these sets uh the ability as you and i talked before to be able to to get on them to be able to use them to to reduce the amount of money it costs to move equipment back and forth

well i look i look forward to hearing the outcome of that study i i wanna ask one more question before my time is over and that is um this came up at that sask hearing as well but secretary Driscoll us gar army in europe took a decrement of a hundred and fifty five million in fy twenty six funding because of non reimbursable support to the department of homeland security at last week's hearing you testified that um you had not been reimbursed for that i assume you still have not been reimbursed for that amount

um senator um i i was able to talk to uh secretary mullin yesterday at the white house in person he is with the pentagon leadership today this morning they're meeting on it um as of yesterday it i believe and i will commit to following up your with your office if this is not correct it is all on track for reimbursement soon

um can you get back to this committee relative to the timetable for when that reimbursement is gonna get done

yes ma'am

thank you

Capoteaux, Baldwin and Bozen.

Uh, thank you, Mister Chairman. Thank you, Secretary Driscoll, for being here. You stated in your uh opening statement uh that uh the army's combat training centers need to provide training that is tough realistic and relevant to modern threats. As you know, much of our current training infrastructure is dated, overscheduled and concentrated in western uh desert environments. That's why I supported the funding for the East Coast Warf- Warfare Center It it is in a former industrial sites in southern West Virginia to create a more agile, low overhead cost, government and industry accessible testbed in challenging terrain in our s- in our southern part of our state. Secretary Driscoll, will you commit to having the Army review how the East Coast Warfare Center could complement your combat training refor uh training center reform and how it could fill gaps in threat representative training mission rehearsal, counter UAS, and electronic warfare?

Yes, Senator.

Thank you. Can you describe where you think this would fill the gaps for you? This East East Coast W- Warfare Center?

Um, c- current training environments, um, like you said, Senator, are are inadequate for the risk and the threat. And if, if you look back to Ukraine and you look at how difficult it is to move and, um, to avoid being seen and to be dispersed enough, um, to survive, the the number and variety of training centers that we can create, where we can layer in things like electronic warfare and contested uh electromagnetic environments is crucial for our country and so um what you were describing as part of a constellation of new solutions would be i think from my understanding pretty impactful

yes general would you like to comment on that please

ma'am any any time we can uh provide a a spa for our soldiers to to see something new for the first time they innovate there uh to learn how how they would uh react in in different environments different settings is good for us in our readiness building I'd commit as well as the secretary uh to to reviewing that.

Let me ask you this, uh because everything's changing and has changed so quickly in terms of the type of warfare type of weapons being used the technologies that are uh required as that, does that mean that the training for these types of uh either on a defensive or offensive posture is uh is moving just as fast or does it take uh do you see what I'm saying? How long does it take to to re to re uh, position the troops in terms of skills.

ma'am, uh, i think you would be, uh, very, very happy with your army. um, we're taking the lessons learned not only from ukraine, we're taking the lessons learned on the current battlefield, and we're incorporating as fast as we can in our in our training scenarios at our combat training centers. that's the first one. the second one is we're continually look at our force structure. and we just had a session yesterday of inside of our brigade combat teams where do we wanna have the emphasis in in the capabilities you're gonna have protection at the lowest level um and and that's something that we owe our our soldiers but we're looking across the border where do we have the the ability to put assets into the formations that they can use for lethal and we're and we're looking at that based off of all the lessons learned i think you'd be really proud of your army

yeah mr. secretary do you have a comment

uh and senator i would say um our soldiers our talent is incredible where we and i say mean this as the civilians are getting in their way is not letting them procure commercially available solutions fast enough and so um i have frequently said and if you say it to a group of soldiers they'll nod immediately

mmm

that we should not ask them to step back in time twenty or thirty years when they put on their uniform the iphone in their pocket should not be more powerful than the tools we're giving them the drones that they're able to go buy at hobby lobby or whatever the place where they shop is should not be more effective and efficient than what we give them for military grade solutions.

Mm-hmm.

And the the systematic failures of our bureaucracy over the last twenty and thirty years still need to be broken down and I very sincerely mean um to thank this committee and your colleagues for helping us in the past year, but we can go a lot faster.

Yeah, so we're talking about technology. I think one of the things, and you and I talked about this, Mister Secretary, is the uh Catalyst Pathfinder program where the uh from the bottom up, so to speak, uh any innovative solutions uh can be created by the users of the technology or the users of the warfare. And uh, you know, soldiers always have really good ideas, because just like in in in private industry in manufacturing, uh there are improvements made at the lower level for, you know, stress fractures or whatever during during uh manufacturing of certain uh certain uh materials. So I I would like to talk about that last year's NDAA included language requiring the catalyst pathfinder program to be included in the army divisions and to be incorporated i mean you know things with three d printing and maker spaces do you have a comment on that uh mister secretary

um senator i think this is the future of um how we are going to learn the most is from our soldiers and i say this is somebody that got out of the military after three and a half years did the fancy um school thing worked in finance have been around talented people but i would bet on the american soldier every single time innovating us to the most successful outcome and so these maker spaces you're talking about we have done them um not haphazardly but with less of a strategic enterprise level plan than we should have

mmm

we're actively uh investing more time into creating a plan to scale across all of our divisions because i am in wholehearted agreement

thank you thank you very much thank you both

alright

thank you mr. chairman Secretary Driscoll and General uh uh Leneve, thank you both for being here today. On uh March first, an Iranian uh drone strike in Kuwait killed six soldiers of the one hundred and third sustainment command and injured dozens of others, including several from Wisconsin. Earlier this morning, CBS News reported that in the days prior to the March first uh, drone strike, uh, members of that unit requested additional medical supplies. S- uh, soldiers from the one hundred and third uh, sustainment unit said that request was denied by the army. These same soldiers then said that some of those medical supplies could have potentially saved the lives of some of the soldiers who had to be treated at civilian hospitals in Kuwait. because there was not adequate military medical care available to them. In February, uh, Secretary Driscoll, why did the army deny providing additional medical supplies to the soldiers of the one hundred and third sustainment command in Kuwait?

Um, Senator, I don't know the specifics of the CBS story you're referencing from this morning, uh, but commit to following up with your office.

OK. So, will you commit to looking into whether such a request was denied? and will you follow up uh both with me and my office and this subcommittee once you've done so

yes

ok the article also quotes soldiers from the unit who say that it they did not receive adequate training on how to respond to a mass casualty attack before march first did all army units receive such medical training prior to the beginning of operation epic fury

ma'am i i so we have we prepare our soldiers um before we deploy them and then there's rehearsals that are done uh in theater i i'd have to come back to you uh and i commit to doing that but that's a question for admiral cooper and sent calm and its subordinate commander there for the armory central uh to to go over what uh drills uh that they conducted um throughout the uh the theater uh but i'll follow back up with you and the committee

please Please do. Um I wanna turn to how the army has changed efforts to protect soldiers from drone attacks, like that in Kuwait, as a result of the war with Iran and the Russia-Ukraine war. With US assistance, the Ukrainians have become some of the best fighting forces in the world at shooting down drones. Yet when Operation Epic Fury began in February, our soldiers did not have the necessary equipment or training to stop the threat of Iranian drones. The army initially relied on advanced missile and air defense systems, but these systems are limited in number and cannot protect soldiers everywhere. So why were our soldiers unprepared for the threat of Iranian drones, despite our collaboration with Ukraine, and what lessons have you learned for the future?

um senator uh very sincerely i appreciate your line of questioning because this is exactly what we should all be caring about and what me in this role um do care about and um i'm through GIATA four O one the joint interagency task force the united states army was put in charge of the counter or the drone threat and counter drone solutions on the behalf of the pentagon and then because i was acting director of atf um for little over a year we we were able to sink very closely with doj and over the last eight months we have done um incredible work to get our nation to be able to capture the best practices from all over the world including ukrainians and so since the conflict uh kicked off we've been able to purchase at what i would say is lightning speed thirteen thousand mirops ten thousand bumblebees these are best in class systems and flow them into theater with ranger regiment training and eighty second helping to train Um, and so I am incredibly optimistic that our soldiers are getting what they need going forward

Hey, man, if if if I could add.

to mitigate risk.

The secretary's pushed us really hard and and and with, I hope, the support uh of you all, we can really take a look at our industrial base across the the board at all of our depots and how we can ramp this up as fast as possible based off of lessons learned from Ukraine and and uh oh yeah.

i i just wanna note um it it it's so important that we have the capabilities necessary to protect the smaller and less fortified installations like uh the facility uh that i mentioned in kuwait at the port of schweba uh from drone attacks do you believe that we currently have the capabilities necessary to protect those smaller

um senator um we as a human civilization or at an inflection point for how humans can inflict violence to each other. Um, they can use cell networks, if you look at operation spider's web, what happened deep into russia, the ukrainians were able to use about eighty thousand dollars worth of drones to um against a an adversary in the fight of our lifetime inflict eight billion dollars worth of damage. Um, and because you can do these things through cell networks and be thousands of miles away, and the cost of these drones and explosives is so low, this is a problem that all of humanity has to solve i think that the united states is absolutely under president trump and secretary of warhead says leadership at the forefront of doing this but this is not a problem that can be solved this is a mitigation of risk that we as humans have to continue to invest in um and we are moving as fast as any people in the world i believe

olivia moreno

Uh, thank you, Mister Chairman, and thank you all for being here and, um, Secretary Driscoll, I wanna thank you for your effort in, as you said earlier, uh, getting our, uh, men and women that are out there, uh, doing the job, doing a tremendous job, keeping us safe, trying to keep themselves safe, but again, giving them the technology that they need, uh, to get us into this century. And, uh, this is something that you've just from the very first day I met you, has been on your mind and every time i been around you either personally or hearing you testify it is the theme and i think it'll be a great legacy so again thank you for doing that also using all of the tools in your toolbox uh as the army looks to modernize uh the industrial base uh again using using our uh capabilities um with our uh various entities what can congress do to ease the process and speed up the agreement cycle for the army with the public-private partnerships uh enhance use leasing all of those kind of things that are they're new yeah they're kind of old but new and uh they're out there they haven't been used very often and they face all kinds of hurdles

senator um this is one of the things we're most excited about

That means it was a good question.

No, it was good. It's got me nervous. Um, the enhanced use leases is something we think we can do. The American taxpayer and all of you have um, eh have allocated to us millions of acres of land for our army bases, and we have historically underutilized them. And we have been far too reliant on congressionally um, legislated dollars for us to care for our army and the communities we're in. And so, what we wanted to do is go out to the best of private sector and say what would you do on these lands how can you benefit the communities the soldiers and their families and our first test case was a data center in texas and a data center in utah and we know how important compute is going to be and is for the modern fight and so uh we we should be finalizing those agreements i think any week but it may be this week but then what we did is we went out with an rfi and we basically said if you're an american company if you're an american uh fund what could you do to partner with us we've received two hundred submissions, about a hundred and twenty of them are viable, I would say fifty of them are brand name American companies. And we have partnered with secretary Besson at treasury, um, and Russ Vogt in OMP and they have lent us full-time people to go through these proposals. And so, what we are hopeful is in about eight to ten weeks, we will come back to all of you with twenty-ish proposals that we think we can execute on across the country, um, and a plan to work together to expand it.

Good, that's excellent, very good. Uh, General Laneve, uh, the Army's next generation squad weapon will give soldiers a lethal advantage. In fiscal year twenty-six, Congress allocated twenty-three point seven million dollars to improve the Army's ability to produce primer for the new six point eight milliliter, uh, ammunition, millimeter ammunition. Can we dis- can you discuss the advantages the next generation squad weapon will provide our soldiers?

yes sir and and thank you for the question sir i appreciate meeting you the other day

very much

um you know accuracy uh you know distance lethality uh will all uh you know uh benefit um our our soldiers we wanna give them the best piece of equipment that over matches anything that the enemy has our soldiers should never go into a fight and have to fight a fair fight we should always uh have the equipment uh that outpaces uh the threat and the capabilities that that the threat has and we appreciate the support we're we're uh we're pretty excited about the weapon system we are making you know some refinements we're getting it in a soldier's hands and we're getting as much feedback we can from soldiers to be able to continue to tweak it like we always have with our weapon systems as we're we're procuring them so they get the very best uh weapon system that we can get with american taxpayer dollars and we appreciate your support sir

it's good well thank you all and we do appreciate uh your service in so many different ways. Thank you Mister Chairman.

Senator Moran.

Chairman, thank you, uh, with uh Chairman Boozman uh in the room, uh, I'll ask my last question first. My colleagues and I have been working on legislation that would expand the use of inter- uh, agency support agreements for military construction, giving the army more flexibility to use options beyond the army corps of engineers, with the intent to reduce costs, accelerate time- delivery timelines, and invest in communities surrounding our installations. We've utilized this at Fort Riley in a very successful way. And uh, I, if we're successful in getting our legislation passed, I would ask each of you if you find that appealing, and it would be something that would be utilized by the army.

Um, Senator, I think this is one of the most impactful things this committee could do for us this year. Um, we were in North Carolina late last week, talking with North Carolina leadership. Um, and we think that there are all sorts of models where we could piggyback off the innovations of your state and meaningfully speed through projects much more cheaply to care for our soldiers

That's a nice answer.

Yeah,

Thank you.

sir, thank you, we appreciate and our soldiers appreciate this. We need it. Thank you.

Um, let me talk about FLORA for a minute. Uh, you, Mister Secretary, and I have had conversations about this topic, uh, this program and represents one of the Army's most critical modernization investments. Um, how does the Army plan to integrate the Cheyenne-two into future combat, uh, aviation brigades and um and it how are we doing on the necessary funding to get the the cheyenne to into that position

um i'll start first and then i can hand it to um general linev um i i my impression on the cheyenne and um somebody that the committee should pressure test this is we are actually doing this new project in the right way we are spending quickly but um very thoughtfully on behalf of the american taxpayer and our soldier this project is moving forward at lightning speed for a big lift and it is incredibly important because it is open architecture it can be flown autonomously it can do all it can integrate new technologies that we don't even know about yet and so if you think of manned aviation into the future almost certainly it will need autonomous um unmanned solutions in and around it and uh flora and the cheyenne are going to be able to do that and i talk to the ceos um regularly i'd say at least every six weeks we're having a check

sure i i think one of the uh the newest uh piece to the the giant so we're gonna get it in our formation uh a lot faster the first one um you know relatively relatively fast and then you know the the four uh following that but right now we have aviators that are training in the simulation so as soon as we receive the aircraft they can start flying in a right away so we're not waiting uh to receive you know the actual aircraft we're already uh learn it in here that's the first piece the second piece and this secretary now normally talks about this and i think it's the most important part about the entire system i talked about it in my opening you know uh we're gonna be able to upgrade this uh aircraft in stride uh just by you know simple using a usb port uh inside of this completely different than what we've done before when you've you know the you get the lifespan of the aircraft and you're like ok i gotta i gotta find something different it's a completely new restart we're really hoping that uh you know we can continue to upgrade this in stride but i think it's a complete change in how we look at things

generally your answer uh lends itself to my follow-up question uh or at least my next question represents this generational leap in vertical lift capability but the program uh i'm also supportive of is uh the black hawks uh there's a fleet of more than twenty one hundred black hawks and projected flora uh production rate is a full replacement a decoyed way. Uh, that's not a criticism, but it's a scale of what you're facing. And, um, the Army has the opportunity and is balancing this circumstance, uh, with the need to modernizie modernize and sustain the Black Hawk, uh, fleet. Um, what kind of transition do you see, and, um, I wanna have you confirm that you know that, uh, that what I'm talking about on sustaining the, the Black Hawk.

Sure. Uh, thanks for the question, and, and, uh, we had talked a little bit about this earlier so you know where we looking the whole uh aviation transformation initiative um all the decisions that got us to this point we're all on the side of angels but you know the

mmm

the landscape's changed a little bit i look at the the black hawk the forty seven uh the apache is enduring aircraft that are gonna be in our formations for a long time and we we have to continue to make sure that we we put our our soldiers and our pilots in the best aircraft that available and then we also have to have the ability to make a leap so where we looking uh of what those those numbers actually are in in uh really oh secretary of war has asked us to take a look at this as well

well one of the pride things i take pride in is that the the efforts that uh the national institute of aviation research at wichita state university has been a significant component in the defense department the military's capability of sustaining through digital training and then replication repair modification uh the fleet and uh secretary Driscoll you visited i would ask you to encourage uh the general to to join me sometime in kansas he tells me he's been there before and i'd like to have him come back

and they've been incredible partners and if you just think about um the concept of digitally twinning um that will fundamentally alter how we the army make our budget decisions it will fundamentally alter how we do um the organic industrial base and how we move things to our distribution centers and it will alter how we fight wars going forward this has been commonplace in the commercial sector for about ten to thirty years um we are just catching up but um what you're referencing is an incredibly valuable partner for us as we do that

to my question which was would you insist the general come join me

sure yes

thank you

thank you very much both of you for coming up today the members of subcommittee will have a week to submit additional questions For the record, senators may submit additional written questions and we ask that you respond to those questions within thirty days of receiving them. The subcommittee now stands in recess, subject to call the chair.