U.S. Representative Jack Bergman (R-MI), Chairman of the Subcommittee on Intelligence and Special Operations, delivered the following opening statement at the full committee markup for the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2024.
Rep. Bergman's remarks as prepared for delivery:
Thank You Mr. Chairman,
I would like to begin by thanking Ranking Member Gallego for his support and contribution to the mark as well as the members of the subcommittee for their efforts as we developed this bipartisan subcommittee mark.
The ISO mark focuses the Special Operations Forces and the Defense Intelligence Enterprise to ensure they can support the Department's efforts in strategic competition and counter China. To accomplish this, the Intelligence and Special Operations community must have the appropriate authorities, force structure, flexibility and technically and tactically competent people to accomplish the mission. The subcommittee mark accomplishes this by supporting the Defense Intelligence Enterprise's continued efforts to focus resources to counter China in new domains; reforming the training and management of the security cooperation workforce in order to better support the Geographic Combatant Commanders' security assistance efforts to counter China and Russia; and by ensuring the Special Operations community is structured appropriately to ensure they can meet the demands of strategic competition, counter China, and counter violent extremist organizations simultaneously. And finally, the mark codifies the current section 1202 of the FY18 NDAA Support of Special Operations for Irregular Warfare to continue the United States efforts in strategic competition with partner nations to build the capability to resist and counter aggression from nations such as Russia and China.
I also want to take this opportunity to thank our tremendous professional staff of Craig Greene, Joe Bartlett, Mark Morehouse, Will Johnson, Katy Quinn, and Zach Calderon; without this team, the mark would not be possible.
