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  December 20, 2018 | International, Aerospace

  Trump’s new Space Force to reside under Department of the Air Force

  By: Valerie Insinna WASHINGTON — After months of deliberating how to stand up a Space Force, a sixth branch of the military proposed by President Donald Trump, Pentagon leaders have decided to funnel the new organization under the Department of the Air Force, Defense News has learned. “There is established a United States Space Force as an armed force within the Department of the Air Force,” states a draft of the legislative proposal due to be put forward alongside the fiscal year 2020 budget early next year, which was viewed by Defense News on Dec. 20. The new service will be overseen by the newly-created undersecretary of the Air Force for the Space Force and a Space Force chief of staff, who will sit on the Joint Chiefs. Although the version of the proposal seen by Defense News is still in draft form and thus subject to change, an administration official with knowledge of discussions said that there is alignment across the Defense Department on keeping the Space Force within the Department of the Air Force. The document has been circulating among top Pentagon and service leaders, with the intent to hand it off to the Office of Management and Budget next, said one Defense Department official who was not authorized to speak on the record. The decision is a major victory for the Air Force, which initially stood against attempts to carve out space operations from the service. Although Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson eventually declared her support for the president's Space Force initiative, keeping the new branch within the Department of the Air Force will allow Air Force leaders to continue to have a voice on military space. A spokesman for Deputy Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan, who is leading the department's efforts to create a Space Force proposal, declined to confirm the details of the draft. “In concert with White House guidance, we are moving forward with a legislative proposal for Space Force,” said Lt. Col. Joe Buccino in statement. The proposed structure of the new service — which retains the moniker of Space Force that is favored by Trump — most closely mirrors the Space Corps proposal originally offered by Rep. Mike Rogers, the Alabama Republican who chairs the House Armed Services Committee's strategic forces committee. Rogers and others in the House had advocated for a Space Corps that would sit under the Department of the Air Force, similar to the Marine Corps' existence as an independent service under the Department of the Navy. The measure was passed through the House as part of the 2018 defense policy bill, but failed to make it though the Senate. However, it was seemingly brought back to life stronger than ever when Trump directed the Pentagon to stand up a Space Force. Trump said this new, independent military branch would be “separate but equal” to the Air Force, leading defense wonks to speculate that a new Department of the Space Force would be created. It appears that, after doing its analysis, the Pentagon favors a more modest approach — one that allows the Air Force to retain a degree of oversight over the Space Force initially, with the idea that it could establish a Department of the Space Force later if the need presented itself. “The Space Force shall be organized, trained and equipped to provide for freedom of operations in, from and to the space domain for the United States and its allies” and “to provide independent military options for joint and national leadership and to enable the lethality and effectiveness of the joint force,” the legislative proposal states. The service, which consists of an active duty and Space Force Reserves, “includes both combat and combat support functions to enable prompt and sustained offensive and defensive space operations and joint operations in all domains.” The undersecretary of the Air Force for the Space Force will be responsible for “the overall supervision” of the new service, but is still subordinate to the Air Force secretary, the legislative proposal states. On the uniformed side, a chief and vice chief of the Space Force would lead the “Space Staff.” The proposal does not lay out the Space Force's relationship to the newly re-established U.S. Space Command or the Space Development Agency, which the Pentagon intends to form to organize the rapid procurement of space technologies. Nor does it spell out the cost of standing up a new space service, a topic that has been hotly debated within the Pentagon and beyond. In November, Defense One reported that the Defense Department was evaluating multiple ways of organizing the Space Force, including as a subordinate organization to the Air Force. This marked a change from its initial mandate to create a wholly independent department, one that Pentagon leaders saw as necessary to appeal to Congress, which gets the final decision on whether to establish a Space Force, the publication wrote. Last week, Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan told reporters that the Pentagon had finalized an answer to questions about the organization of a Space Force, and that Trump had been briefed on the proposal. “There were two primary options,” he told reporters Dec. 13. “We're now down to one option. I'm really not in a position to disclose what that one option is, but I can tell you that the legislative proposal itself probably tomorrow will start to go through the [Pentagon] for coordination.” Vice President Mike Pence was briefed on the way forward during a visit to the Pentagon on Wednesday, reported Space News. https://www.defensenews.com/space/2018/12/20/trumps-new-space-force-to-reside-under-department-of-the-air-force

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  November 9, 2018 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR, Security

  US defense industry pushes back on White House’s proposed $33B budget cut

  By: Joe Gould and Aaron Mehta WASHINGTON — The American defense industry is warning that defense cuts proposed by the Trump administration could undermine the Pentagon's efforts to modernize the military and address threats from Russia, China, Iran, North Korea and transnational terrorism. The Aerospace Industries Association, with the weight of the country's large and small defense firms behind it, issued a statement Thursday warning President Donald Trump and Congress “to provide steady and stable growth in defense spending in the fiscal year 2020 budget request and beyond” if they want to be able to meet those threats. The message comes as Democrats — expected to prioritize domestic spending and question record defense increases — won the House this week, and after White House budget director Mick Mulvaney ordered the Pentagon to prepare for a $700 billion national defense budget proposal for fiscal 2020. (For comparison's sake, the Pentagon is also continuing to prep the $733 billion budget it was expecting.) AIA argued in its statement that the last two years of budget growth have helped the Department of Defense and industry turn things around after years of war and budget instability, but not entirely. “As a result, military readiness is improving, and our industry is responding with more innovation and advanced capabilities,” the statement reads. “But the shortfalls of the last decade cannot be erased in the space of two years, and now the Administration has announced potential reductions in defense investment that could undermine the improvements that are just now materializing.” Last year, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis testified that the Pentagon needed 3 to 5 percent annual growth above inflation through 2023 to stay ahead of near-peer adversaries Russia and China. Congress responded with a $700 billion national defense budget for 2018 and $716 billion for 2019 — but also a $1 trillion tax cut that's grown the national deficit. National security adviser John Bolton said publicly, days before Tuesday's election, that the national debt is “an existential threat to society” and that Pentagon spending will have to “flatten out” in the near term. Deputy Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan had signaled in recent weeks that modernization programs like hypersonic weapons systems would take a hit if the budget falls. “It comes down to a judgment call, how fast do we modernize? And that's probably the biggest knob that we have to turn,” he said. Along similar lines, AIA argued that to achieve the Pentagon's National Defense Strategy — which "requires armed forces that are large and capable enough to meet multiple threats in multiple environments” — “we must continue to invest in the most effective technology and weapons we can provide.” “America's competitors and adversaries have made huge strides in their offensive and defensive capabilities, from submarines to cyberspace, and continue to develop advanced technology and sophisticated operational concepts,” the statement warns. Though it's unclear how sensitive the administration will be to this call, it has been vocal about its focus on the defense-industrial base in concert with Trump's emphasis on the American economy. A Trump-ordered study found roughly 300 gaps and vulnerabilities across America's network of defense suppliers; Pentagon officials are hopeful a third of those issues will be addressed in the next year. Whatever the administration does with its budget submission, it will be up to the new Congress to tweak it. Following the midterm elections, analysts have predictedlawmakers in next year's divided government will overcome gridlock to reach a budget deal that maintains flat defense spending. https://www.defensenews.com/industry/2018/11/08/us-defense-industry-pushes-back-on-white-houses-proposed-33b-budget-cut

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  October 23, 2020 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR, Security

  Battle Force 2045 could work — if defense leaders show some discipline

  By: Timothy A. Walton and Bryan Clark U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper is sprinting. With less than four months left in the administration's term, he unveiled a new vision for the Navy that would grow the fleet to more than 500 manned and unmanned vessels from today's 296 ships. Although some dismiss Esper's Battle Force 2045 concept as a political ploy shortly before an election, it could lead to a more effective and affordable future fleet — as long as Navy and Department of Defense leaders can avoid loading it down with expensive options. The Navy clearly needs to change its force design and operational approach. Even though naval forces are increasingly important to deter and defeat Chinese aggression, the Navy's previous plan to build a force of 355 ships lacked resilience and firepower, fell short on logistics, and was projected to cost 50 percent more than the current fleet. The Navy tried to adjust that plan with an integrated naval force structure assessment, but Esper rejected it, as it failed to implement new concepts for distributed multidomain operations and would be too expensive to realistically field. Instead, over the course of nine months, he and Deputy Secretary of Defense David Norquist led a study taking a fresh look at the Navy's force structure. The Hudson Institute contributed to the project by developing one of three fleet designs that informed the new plan. Hudson's proposed fleet is affordable to acquire and operate. Even though it consists of 581 vessels, more than 200 are unmanned or have small crews. The Hudson study's conservative estimates suggest it can be acquired for the ship construction funding in the Navy's President's Budget for fiscal 2021, adjusted for inflation, and would only cost moderately more than the current one to operate. The Hudson proposal becomes more affordable than the Navy's plan by gradually rebalancing the fleet to incorporate more smaller, less-expensive ships and fewer large multimission combatants. The proposed fleet would also constrain the size and cost of some large new ships, such as the future large surface combatant and next-generation attack submarine. Employing new operational concepts, the proposed fleet would outperform the current Navy in important metrics for future operations. First, the proposed fleet's groups of manned and unmanned vessels would generate more numerous and diverse effects chains compared to today's Navy, improving the force's adaptability and imposing greater complexity on enemy decision-making. Second, the fleet would deliver more offensive munitions from vessels and aircraft over a protracted period, and defend itself more effectively using distribution, shorter-range interceptors and electric weapons. Lastly, it enhances the fleet's amphibious, logistics and strategic sealift capacity. Overall, this results in a Navy that can help the joint force prevail across a range of potential scenarios, including the most challenging ones such as an attempted Chinese attack on Taiwan. The Hudson fleet is also achievable. Its shipbuilding plan relies on mature technologies or allows sufficient time to complete needed engineering and operational concept development before moving ships into serial production. The plan sustains the industrial base through stable ship-construction rates that avoid gaps in production and smoothly transition between ship classes. Even with this measured approach, however, the fleet can rapidly evolve, reaching more than 355 manned and unmanned vessels by 2030, and 581 by 2045. Although Battle Force 2045 focuses on ships, the Navy needs to spend more on improving repair yard infrastructure, growing munitions stocks, and providing command-and-control capabilities to the force. As the Hudson study shows, ship construction savings could help fund these and other enablers, but only if the Navy and the DoD have the discipline to avoid expensive new investments, such as building a third attack submarine every year, installing boost-glide hypersonic missiles on old destroyers or pursuing a significantly larger combatant to follow the Arleigh Burke class. Even if the procurement cost of these programs was funded through budget shifts within the DoD, each will incur a sustainment bill that is not factored into Navy plans and could accelerate the descent toward a hollow force. The Navy is now developing a new shipbuilding plan as part of its FY22 budget submission. Congress should carefully assess that plan and, in collaboration with the DoD, refine the budget. Esper may depart, but the results of this study can serve as a starting point for an operationally effective and fiscally sustainable fleet for the next administration. Timothy A. Walton is a fellow at the Hudson Institute's Center for Defense Concepts and Technology, where Bryan Clark is a senior fellow. Along with Seth Cropsey, they recently completed a study of future naval force structure. https://www.defensenews.com/opinion/commentary/2020/10/22/battle-force-2045-could-work-if-defense-leaders-show-some-discipline/