WATCH HEARING HERE
Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) – House Armed Services Cyber, Innovative Technologies, and Information Systems Subcommittee ranking member – delivered the following opening statement at a subcommittee hearing on "Department of Defense Electromagnetic Spectrum Operations: Challenges and Opportunities in the Invisible Battlespace."
Remarks as prepared for delivery:
The electromagnetic spectrum is "the invisible battlefield," and a domain in which the U.S. military's success depends. However, our dominance in this domain is no longer secure. The Department of Defense's "Electromagnetic Spectrum Superiority Strategy" lays out a path to reassert our overmatch within the electromagnetic operating environment, while also recognizing the important evolution of private sector spectrum use.
As the Department's strategy points out, this new dynamic in the spectrum environment will present opportunities, as well as challenges. However, the strategy is clear in its goal: "Freedom of action in the electromagnetic spectrum, at the time, place, and parameters of our choosing…" as a requirement for the continuation of our operations in any domain. It is difficult to understate the importance—and range—of spectrum operations undertaken by the Department. From critical command, control, and communications, to electronic warfare and weapons guidance, the ability to operate in spectrum is an existential capability for our armed forces.
Yet, spectrum is a finite resource that has become a congested, constrained, and contested environment. Actions by other countries and their militaries, the private sector and their operations, and various regulations all restrict our military's ability to operate within spectrum. It is within this framework that Congress and the Department must take concentrated steps to stay ahead of our adversaries and innovate new technologies to achieve the goals of the strategy.
One of the most concerning threats is our adversaries' decades of studying our reliance on spectrum to conduct every aspect of military operations. China and Russia, specifically, are testing and developing offensive and defensive capabilities to be used against our systems, all the while we have failed to transform our own capabilities to stay ahead of these near-peer competitors. Russia's employment of spectrum operations in 2014 to disrupt their adversary's capabilities in Ukraine and rapidly capture Ukrainian territory should serve as a stark example of our adversaries' evolving spectrum capabilities.
However, I am encouraged by the Department recognizing this problem, and Congress must be willing to support efforts to boost our competitive advantage as quickly as possible. We must also find solutions to balance DOD's need to access certain bands of spectrum with the private sector and rural communities' critical need to develop spectrum for modern communications and 5G capabilities. Our nation's private sector and civilian access to spectrum correlates directly with our economic competitiveness, and by extension our national security as well.
Our adversaries—especially China—recognize the inextricable link between spectrum development and national power. Going forward, we will have to determine how to most efficiently, and effectively, allocate spectrum to ensure both economic prosperity and military superiority. The benefits of correctly balancing these priorities are profound, while the consequences of getting this balance wrong could be disastrous.
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