U.S. Representative Doug Lamborn (R-CO), Chairman of the Strategic Forces Subcommittee, delivered the following opening remarks at a hearing on FY24 national security space programs.
Rep. Lamborn's remarks as prepared for delivery:
I would like to welcome the witnesses to today's hearing. We have Dr. John Plumb, the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space Policy back before the subcommittee. John, I think you win the award for most appearances this year. You should get a t-shirt for that – it would say "I testified at all these hearings and all I got was a lousy t-shirt."
Next, we have Mr. Frank Calvelli, the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Space Acquisitions and Integration in his first appearance before this subcommittee.
We also have Dr. Christopher Scolese, the Director of the National Reconnaissance Office. And finally Ms. Tonya Wilkerson, the Deputy Director of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, welcome back.
Thank you all for joining us and for your service to our nation.
We are here to discuss one of the favorite topics of the subcommittee – National Security Space.
I was encouraged to hear General Saltzman say just last week at Space Symposium in my home district of Colorado Springs that, "the old ways of doing business are too slow, too late to need, and too behind the times to meet the challenges we are facing today."
I could not agree more.
Those of us on this subcommittee know better than most that space is vital to how we fight and win wars.
Both China and Russia have seen the advantage we built in space over the last few decades to enable the joint force.
In response, they are now developing and deploying asymmetric counterspace systems meant to neutralize our advantage.
China also sees the benefits of space for its own deployment of forces. It continues to develop and field its own systems to support its long-range fire and standoff capabilities.
These threats are well known by this point. Discussions about the democratization of space by space-faring nations have become more commonplace in the past five years.
The result is more systems and more people operating in a domain that was only accessible by superpowers until very recently.
Today I would like to hear what you are doing to address the problem that General Saltzman identified. All of us on the subcommittee are interested in how you are changing the way you do business, going faster, and becoming more innovative.
The commercial space sector is setting the pace on putting inventive technologies on orbit.
I would like to hear from all of you how you are leveraging these developments in government programs, how you evaluate what is useful to buy versus build, and how you are coordinating with each other to maximize your efforts.
Specifically, I am interested in hearing how space acquisition organizations are working with small businesses as partners in these efforts.
Dr. Plumb, one area that you and I have talked about often is how the overclassification of space contributes to inefficiencies and slower processes.
Two years ago, we asked your office to report back after looking at highly classified space programs to see what, if anything, could be reclassified. We are still waiting for that report.
Meanwhile, classification of space is a pervasive problem. I believe it is impeding the Department's progress on space, specifically making it more challenging to collaborate with our allies and partners.
I am also interested to get your thoughts on the current state of space policy within the Department of Defense. There has not been an unclassified national security space policy document released since 2020, despite a requirement from Congress to produce one.
I think you'll agree that a lot has changed in those three years, and public discourse is essential to getting our space policy right.
Mr. Calvelli, we recently received a report from you that identified the five highest and lowest performing major acquisition programs in the Space Force. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like much has changed in this report.
The lowest performing programs are all ground systems lead by the perennial underperformer – the Operational Control System, or OCX. It's been said so many times at this point that its cliché, but ground systems always seem to be the after thought when it comes to space acquisitions.
Ground systems are the nuts and bolts that make our exquisite satellite capabilities function. We cannot have one without the other.
Today I would like to hear your specific plan to get programs like OCX on track and into the hands of the force. I would also like to hear about the policies you have implemented to make sure that we won't continue to see these issues on future ground acquisitions.
I am also interested in hearing from the panel how the Department of Defense and the intelligence community are collaborating on systems and operations to support the joint force.
As we come to terms with what it means for space to be a warfighting domain we are going to continue to bump up against the line between defense and intelligence authorities. We must make sure that good collaboration continues while also allowing the Space Force to mature into its role as a service.
There are many topics for us to cover today so I'll leave it there and turn it over to my Ranking Member for any remarks that he would like to make.
