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24 Mar 24. The US and Japan are planning the biggest upgrade to their security alliance since they signed a mutual defence treaty in 1960 in a move to counter China. President Joe Biden and Prime Minister Fumio Kishida will announce plans to restructure the US military command in Japan to strengthen operational planning and exercises between the nations, according to five people familiar with the situation. They will unveil the plan when Biden hosts Kishida at the White House on April 10. The allies want to bolster their security ties to respond to what they view as a growing threat from China, which requires their militaries to co-operate and plan more seamlessly, particularly in a crisis such as a Taiwan conflict. While Biden and Kishida will herald the strength of the US-Japan alliance, the summit will come just weeks after the US president expressed his opposition to the Japanese group Nippon Steel acquiring US Steel. The intervention was designed to boost union support before the November election, but has partly soured the otherwise strong alliance. Japan has over the past couple of years dramatically increased its security capabilities, spending much more on defence, including plans to buy US Tomahawk cruise missiles. The Japanese military is also setting up a “Joint Operations Command” next year to improve co-ordination between the branches of its own Self-Defense Forces. But co-ordination between the allies is hampered because US Forces Japan (USFJ) has changed little from the days when the US and Japanese militaries did less together and has little command and control authority. Japan has to deal more with US Indo-Pacific command in Hawaii, which is 19 hours behind Tokyo and 6,200km away. Joe Biden, right, greets Fumio Kishida at the White House in 2023 © Ting Shen/Bloomberg “Japan’s new national security policy is the most positive security development in east Asia in this century. The recognition that our two nations’ defence strategies have converged makes improvement in our day-to-day command and control the logical next step,” said Philip Davidson, who retired as Indo-Pacific commander in 2021. Tokyo has long urged the US to give the three-star USFJ commander more operational authority, saying closer co-ordination on the ground was needed. One catalyst was the 2011 earthquake and tsunami when US and Japanese troops carried out a joint rescue operation. While it was a success, Ryoichi Oriki, then chief of Japan’s SDF joint staff, said it was inconvenient having to co-ordinate with Indo-Pacific command in Hawaii rather than the USFJ commander, his daily counterpart. Tokyo says there is an urgent need to put a more senior US officer in Japan as it takes on a bigger regional defence role. “It sends a strong strategic signal to China and North Korea and it’s meaningful from the point of view of deterrence to say that the US will strengthen the command structure in Japan,” Oriki told the Financial Times. One model the Biden administration is considering involves creating a new US military joint task force that would be attached to US Pacific Fleet, one of the component commands at Indo-Pacom in Hawaii. The fleet’s four-star commander would spend more time in Japan than at present and would have an enhanced support structure in the country. Over time, the task force, which would include different parts of the US military, would shift to Japan.
Christopher Johnstone, a former senior Pentagon and CIA official, said upgrading the US command would be a “big step in building a more credible bilateral military alliance”. “Co-locating these commands, at least partially, would move the US-Japan alliance closer to the ‘fight tonight’ mantra of the US alliance with South Korea — more responsive and credible in responding to regional threats,” said Johnstone, now at the CSIS think-tank. “This would make a major contribution to deterrence in the region.” James Schoff, a US-Japan alliance expert at the Sasakawa Peace Foundation USA, said the two allies needed to strengthen and clarify leadership and operational relationships for planning in both peacetime and times of crisis. “US leadership could potentially ‘commute’ from Hawaii to Japan for this in peacetime, but they’ll need some kind of full-time joint staff based in Japan to plan, facilitate, and build trust with Japanese counterparts for a practical set of bilateral missions,” Schoff added. People familiar with the situation cautioned that other models could also be considered, including the possibility of upgrading USFJ. The Pentagon is some way from making any decision, including on the task force idea, which was proposed by Admiral John Aquilino, the Indo-Pacific commander. Defence secretary Lloyd Austin also wants to give Admiral Samuel Paparo, who will succeed Aquilino in May, a chance to weigh in after he assumes the role. The US and Japanese foreign and defence ministers are also expected to discuss the issue together later this year. Recommended Global InsightKana Inagaki Will scandal imperil Japanese PM’s bolder defence policy? The White House, Pentagon and Indo-Pacom declined to comment. The Japanese government also did not comment. Whatever model is chosen will be complicated because of questions about resources and infrastructure and issues related to military hierarchy. There will also probably be turf battles between the different services in the US military. Tokyo has been pushing for a US four-star commander in Japan. But the idea faces resistance, including on Capitol Hill. Jack Reed, the Democratic head of the Senate armed services committee, recently told the Defense Writers Group that Aquilino had done a “superb” job in his contact with the Japanese and that the current structure was “adequate”. Asked by the FT if a four-star officer was necessary in Japan, Reed added: “Maybe in the future, but right now I think we have the command structure in place to carry out an effective response.” (Source: FT.com)
22 Mar 24. Pentagon Technology Officials Focus on Maintaining U.S. Edge.
The Pentagon’s senior technology officials provided an update to Congress today on the Defense Department’s steps to ensure warfighters maintain the information and technology edge into the future.
John Sherman, DOD’s chief information officer, Craig Martell, DOD’s chief digital and artificial intelligence officer, and Air Force Lt. Gen. Robert J. Skinner, director of the Defense Information Systems Agency, underscored the department’s focus on providing the joint force with the information and tools required to meet current and emerging warfighting demands.
“It is critical more than ever that we provide DOD personnel with secure and resilient software when and where they need it,” Sherman testified before the House Armed Services’ Cyber, Information Technologies and Innovation Subcommittee.
“We recognize the urgency of this issue and are working hard to ensure we are successful,” he said.
Sherman said cyberthreats continue to emerge, as seen across Asia and Europe, and network protection across DOD and defense industry networks is paramount.
To address the threat, he said DOD has remained “laser focused” on implementing a zero trust cybersecurity framework.
Once implemented, the zero trust framework will move the DOD beyond traditional network security methods with capabilities designed to reduce exposure to cyberattacks, enable risk management and data sharing, and quickly contain and remediate adversary activities.
Sherman said the department is also making progress on initiatives to modernize information technology with a focus on cloud computing and software.
“When I testified last year, the department was just beginning the enterprise cloud journey and I’m happy to report significant and successful progress,” he said.
He said that the Defense Information Services Agency, or DISA, has awarded more than 47 task orders aligned to the department’s Joint Warfighter Cloud Capability, or JWCC, contract and has 50 more in the pipeline.
“We also published DOD guidance to streamline cloud contracting and reduce contract sprawl across the department,” Sherman said.
The JWCC contract was awarded in 2022 to ensure warfighters can access the DOD’s cloud infrastructure throughout the globe.
Skinner noted that, in addition to the progress highlighted by Sherman, DISA has also deployed an initial overseas cloud capability in support of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command.
He said DISA also recently piloted an initiative to deploy hybrid cloud capabilities to remote locations around the world.
“t is critical that we ensure that DOD personnel have secure and resilient software regardless of where they are located,” Skinner said.
Martell said the Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office, or CDAO, is accelerating the adoption of data analytics and AI across the department “so that the DOD can make better decisions faster from the boardroom to the battlefield.”
Spotlight: Artificial Intelligence
In recent months, the CDAO has taken significant steps to realize this vision.
In November, DOD released its strategy to accelerate the adoption of advanced artificial intelligence capabilities to ensure U.S. warfighters maintain decision superiority on the battlefield for years to come.
The strategy prescribes an agile approach to AI development and application, emphasizing speed of delivery and adoption at scale.
The blueprint also trains the focus of the department on several data, analytics and AI-related goals, ranging from improving foundational data management within the department to investing in interoperable infrastructure.
Taken together, these goals will support the “DOD AI hierarchy of needs,” which the AI adoption strategy defines as quality data, governance, insightful analytics and metrics, assurance and responsible AI.
“This hierarchy of needs, combined with our agile approach, is how we’re going to drive this sustainable change through a virtuous cycle,” Martell said.
He said this approach has led to success when applied to the development of DOD’s Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control, or CJADC2, capability.
CJADC2 is the department’s approach to developing both material and nonmaterial solutions to deliver information and decision advantage to commanders.
The department aims to apply the CJADC2 approach across all warfighting domains to give warfighters the edge in deterring and, as necessary, defeating adversaries anywhere around the globe.
Last month, Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks announced that the department has delivered its initial iteration of CJADC2, noting CDAO’s critical role in getting it across the finish line.
In his testimony, Martell said that success was a result of close integration between developers and warfighters and quickly iterating solutions.
“We deliver by learning by doing, shipping fast and iterating quickly with warfighters and … developers sitting side by side” he said. (Source: U.S. DoD)
23 Mar 24. US senators from both main political parties reached a late agreement to avert a partial government shutdown over a $1.2trn spending bill, capping a brief budgetary stand-off that threatened to close non-essential operations of some federal agencies. The deal to proceed with a final vote on the spending legislation was announced by Chuck Schumer, the Senate majority leader, just before midnight on Friday. The progress in the upper chamber of Congress — which is controlled by Democrats — followed tumultuous passage of the legislation in the House of Representatives, which is led by Republicans — earlier in the day. It was welcomed by the White House, which said it had “ceased shutdown preparations because there is a high degree of confidence that Congress will imminently pass the relevant appropriations and the President will sign the bill on Saturday”. Although the House approved the spending bill with broad bipartisan support on Friday, it triggered a backlash from allies of Donald Trump within the Republican party who objected to the compromise. Marjorie Taylor Greene, the firebrand congresswoman from Georgia, launched a bid to oust Mike Johnson, the speaker of the House, who has been in the job only since last October. Greene did not say when she intended to follow through on the threat, but called it a “warning” for Johnson. The agreement in the Senate involved allowing Republicans in the upper chamber a vote on a series of amendments — including some tied to tightening immigration laws — as they try to use the surge in border crossings as a political weapon against Democrats in the 2024 election. Democrats had been resisting the pressure to allow the amendments. “Senate Democrats are shutting down the government rather than allow us to vote on things like deporting criminal migrants. Say what you will, but they’re committed to open borders,” JD Vance, the Ohio senator close to Trump, wrote on X before the deal was reached. Recommended US presidential election 2024 ‘Chaos’ in Donald Trump’s Republican party will boost Joe Biden, Democratic memo says The agreement on the spending bill will keep the government funded until the end of September, and sets the stage for a bigger battle in the coming weeks over the fate of aid to Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan, and humanitarian aid in Gaza, which has been stalled in Congress. Although the Senate passed the national security package backed by the White House earlier this year, it has languished in the House, where Johnson has resisted putting it up for a vote under pressure from Ukraine aid sceptics within his party — and Trump. Lindsey Graham, the Republican senator from South Carolina, has been floating a plan to offer Ukraine a loan instead, which some Democrats are warming to as a last resort, but most supporters of Kyiv in Washington are still hoping in a breakthrough on the aid package. Still, Greene’s move to threaten Johnson’s speakership could further complicate the effort to secure Ukraine aid since she is a staunch opponent of helping Kyiv. Meanwhile, Johnson’s majority in the House of Representatives looks set to narrow to just one vote, after Mike Gallagher, the Wisconsin Republican who has chaired the House select committee on China, said he would resign from his seat on April 19.
(Source: FT.com)
22 Mar 24. To Meet Security Challenges, DOD Makes Investments in Strategic Forces.
The Defense Department is making investments in strategic force capabilities in the fiscal 2025 budget in order to meet the security challenges posed by competitors, such as nuclear-capable China and Russia, as well as Iran and North Korea, a DOD official said.
John Plumb, the assistant secretary of defense for space policy, on Thursday, told lawmakers at the House Armed Services Committee that the FY 2025 budget request includes investments to modernize the nuclear triad. This includes land, air and sea-based nuclear capabilities and investments to ensure continued access to space and defense against missile threats.
“We have competitors who are modernizing and diversifying and expanding their nuclear arsenals,” Plumb said. “They are also rapidly fielding space and counter-space capabilities and developing and fielding advanced missiles in … greater numbers and greater diversity.”
Plumb told lawmakers that DOD, within the president’s budget request, has asked for $49.2 billion to modernize the department’s nuclear triad. Included in the request are investments for the Columbia-class ballistic missile submarine, the B-21 bomber and the Sentinel system, which is a modernization for the ground-based portion of the nuclear triad.
Also in the FY 2025 budget request, Plumb said, is $33.7 billion for space capabilities and $28.4 billion for missile defeat and defense.
“Across each of these portfolios, we’re investing not only in capabilities but in our network of allies and partners, both of whom provide advantages that our adversaries or potential adversaries, like Russia and China, can never hope to match,” Plumb said. “All of these capabilities — nuclear, space and missile defense — remain central to our ability to deter and also central to our ability to prevail in conflict if deterrence fails.”
Air Force Gen. Anthony Cotton, commander of U.S. Strategic Command, also reminded lawmakers that the U.S. is confronted by two nuclear peers: China and Russia, and that threat is compounded by missile developments in North Korea and the nuclear ambitions of Iran. With this threat, he said, it’s imperative that the U.S. press on with modernization of the nuclear triad.
“It is absolutely critical we continue at speed with modernization of our nuclear triad,” he said. “This includes the land-based , the B-21, the B-52J, the Columbia-class submarine, the nuclear sea-launched cruise missile, the long-range standoff weapon and numerous related systems.”
Also a focus, he said, is updating and modernizing the antiquated nuclear command, control and communications system, also called NC3.
“The most important message I want to deliver is this: While modernization will continue to be the priority, U.S. Stratcom and its component forces are ready to deter our adversaries and respond decisively should deterrence fail,” Cotton told lawmakers.
Space Force Gen. Stephen N. Whiting, commander of U.S. Space Command, said the command has a moral responsibility to ensure space capabilities remain available to the joint force, the nation and allies.
“The U.S. military services are sized with the assumption of always having access to space,” Whiting said. “And this is why U.S. Space Command must protect and defend our critical space systems to ensure they are available in the face of the growing threats now arrayed against us.”
Part of that responsibility, Whiting said, involves expanding the existing U.S. competitive advantage by leveraging assets of the interagency, the joint force and U.S. allies and partners. Also an asset, he said, is the U.S. space industry.
“I think one of our nation’s principal advantages is our commercial space industry,” he said. “It is moving at incredible speed with innovation, and it is outpacing commercial industry from the rest of the world. And so today, we partner with those companies in a number of ways.”
In testimony given earlier this year, Whiting discussed Space Command’s Commercial Integration Center, for instance, where the command partners with 10 commercial mission partners to improve on the ability to defend satellite constellations.
The joint commercial operations effort also includes eight commercial mission partners across the globe to provide space domain awareness information to the joint force, allies and partner nations
“We’re always looking at how we can better both share information and leverage the capabilities that commercial brings us because we believe that makes us more effective,” Whiting said.
Air Force Gen. Gregory M. Guillot took over as commander of United States Northern Command and North American Aerospace Defense Command in February. He told lawmakers that, upon assuming the role, he directed a 90-day assessment of both organizations to execute their missions and to also make recommendations on where the commands can do more.
“Once complete, I will share my findings and updated vision for how NORAD and Northcom will best execute the noble mission of homeland defense,” Guillot said. “The challenges facing our nation are real, but there should be no doubt about NORAD and Northcom’s resolve to deter aggression and if necessary, defeat threats to our nation and our citizens.” (Source: U.S. DoD)
21 Mar 24. Growing Lethal Drone Threat is a ‘Scourge,’ Says U.S. SOCOM Commander. The “secret sauce” for Special Operations Command in quickly closing capability gaps is its acquisition executive, its top general told a House panel Wednesday.
Army Gen. Bryan Fenton said “that’s first and foremost” the difference between SOCOM and other major commands. He added, “and [the executive] works for us” using the authorities given by Congress to the command in how it can spend money and cooperation with contractors.
“We bring industry forward with us into theater,” he told the House Armed Services Intelligence and Special Operations subcommittee.
To guarantee speed and agility under those circumstances, Fenton added, “we’re willing to work as fast as industry.” The example he used came from developing counter-unmanned aerial system (UAS) defenses.
The need for these defenses is urgent and growing as groups like the Houthis in Yemen use advanced unmanned systems in their attacks. Three American soldiers were killed in Jordan in late January in a drone strike on an outpost monitoring the Syrian civil war and the continuing presence of ISIS.
Fenton called UAS threats a “scourge,” and said SOCOM is partnering with Central Command in a layered defense across the Middle East to not only “sense” the threat, but also “to defeat and destroy.” He said the command has learned much on UAS offensive and defensive operations from the war in Ukraine.
In prepared testimony, he and Christopher Maier, assistant secretary for Special Operations/Low-Intensity Conflict, said the command “is a trailblazer for data-driven decision-making to both inform and execute our service-like and combatant command responsibilities, focused on the talent, architecture and processes needed to capitalize on data and Artificial Intelligence (AI)-related technologies.”
“AI and uncrewed systems” are key to the command’s transformation into a force ready to meet threats from China, Russia, North Korea, Iran and its proxies – terrorists and narcotics smugglers.
In his opening statement at the hearing, Maier said special operations forces “create dilemmas for adversaries” in 80 countries. Their prepared testimony added, “[i]rregular warfare is a critical tool for campaigning across the spectrum of conflict, enhancing interoperability and access, and disrupting competitor warfighting advantages while reinforcing our own. To further institutionalize irregular warfare across the Joint Force, SO/LIC is updating policy, informing doctrine, and modernizing irregular warfare education and training.”
When asked about the special operations work in the Caribbean and Central and South America, Fenton said the goal is “to strengthen allies who want to be associated with SOUTHCOM [U.S. Southern Command].” Those nations “also want to get a sense of our capabilities – equipment.” He stressed the importance of exercising together to show “we’re there.” He added SOF are “giving opportunities back to SOUTHCOM, Team Democracy and Team USA” to counter Chinese and Russian disinformation campaigns in the region.
Maier said a continuing challenge in SOUTHCOM is limited resources.
In the abbreviated open hearing, Maier and Fenton acknowledged physical and spiritual damage to service members and their families from repeated deployments.
“Over the past decade, USSOCOM has seen a steady increase across several mental health diagnoses, with a substantial rise in recent years, particularly with post-traumatic stress and traumatic brain injuries. We attribute this to an increased emphasis on mental health, brain health, destigmatizing care, and SOF utilization of available programs,” their prepared testimony stated.
The Preservation of the Force and Family (POTFF) and the Warrior Care Program are two internal programs created to address these issues. Seven thousand cases were treated under these programs to date. The prepared testimony said 70 percent of those wounded, ill or injured were retained.
In addition, the command reached out to institutions such as Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School to address blast injuries. On suicide prevention, “USSOCOM is modernizing suicide prevention by developing virtual reality training tailored to SOF-specific scenarios to help members of our formation identify and respond to teammates in crisis,” their statement said.
Both testified that destigmatizing seeking treatment for mental health issues is vital from the tactical to the strategic level of command.
“We’re also incredibly hungry to get better on suicide and brain issues,” Fenton said.
But Maier and Fenton said that the Defense Department can only do so much after a service member separates from military duty. (Source: https://www.sofx.com/)
20 Mar 24. Hicks Again Makes Case for Strengthening Industrial Base, Eliminating Continuing Resolutions.
“Production is deterrence,” Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks told the Reagan Institute’s National Security Innovation Base Summit today.
America’s military is unchallenged because of the quality of its people and because the American defense industrial base provides them with the weapons, systems and equipment that is ahead of anything a potential enemy could field.
But that equipment lead is in danger. “Today, America’s defense industrial base at a pivotal moment,” Hicks said. “The COVID pandemic revealed how fragile and brittle supply chains have become. The war in Ukraine has revealed how nation-state aggression is a real threat requiring information age ingenuity and industrial era capacity. And the need to modernize and stay ahead of our pacing challenge reveals how the has been affected by decades of yo-yo dieting, inconsistent funding and blinkered demand signals.”
The Pentagon, Congress and the industrial base must work together to deliver combat-credible capabilities to the warfighter at speed and scale to deter aggression and win if called on to fight. “But the truth is the engines of production never spin up from zero to 60 overnight,” Hicks said.
When Ronald Reagan was president from 1981 to 1989, the Soviet Union was the threat and America could tolerate years and decades-long equipment timelines because the Soviets, the pacing challenge of the 1980s, were relatively slow and lumbering. “However, this is not the Cold War or the post-Cold War era,” she said. “With, we are in a persistent generational competition for advantage, and we have to double down with urgency and confidence. That’s why the Biden-Harris administration’s focus on American innovation, manufacturing and production has been so important for national security, because our military strength depends in part on our overall economic strength here at home.”
DOD has made serious, significant and sustained investments across four annual defense budgets and multiple supplemental funding requests. The budget shows the department recognizes the threat and has asked Congress to strengthen the health, workforce, supply chains, viability and productivity of the U.S. defense industrial base, short term and long term, she said.
DOD has spent billions on the industrial base and sought to expand production. The department has also spent bns in research and development to ensure service members never go into a fair fight, Hicks said.
“All of these investments, and more, have been aligned with the needs of our National Defense Strategy and the National Defense Industrial Strategy that builds upon it,” she said.
The National Defense Industrial Strategy is new and is a “recognition that our defense industrial base is something we must actively and strategically shape to meet this generational strategic moment,” she said.
While the military is the customer of the industrial base, Congress and industry must work with the military. “While I believe we all agree on the urgency to innovate, I must say one of the most serious obstacles to doing so has been the lack of stable, predictable, timely funding,” Hicks said.
The current circumstances are a case in point. “For the 11th time since I became deputy secretary, DOD is operating under a continuing resolution: And we look to be headed toward a 12th time,” she said.
Hicks called the continuing resolutions “stopgap measures that are really half measures.” Under CRs, DOD cannot start new programs. CRs compress the time to do the acquisition work to award contracts. “They rob us of critical momentum forcing us to stand still, while Beijing, Moscow and Tehran move to modernize their militaries, coerce their neighbors and work to outpace us,” she said. ” shutdowns are even more damaging.”
Congress needs to pass the fiscal 2024 appropriations bill, she said. The department has already lost six months on the legislation. “It’s long overdue, and the delay has already been devastating,” Hicks said.
This is a problem that has grown. Again, she pointed to the process during Ronald Reagan’s term. “For all eight years of Ronald Reagan’s presidency … DOD spent, on average, 45 days a year under CRs about six weeks, not great, but doable,” she said. “But over the last three years, that number has more than tripled. DOD has operated under CRs for an average of 143 days a year.”
This amounts to almost five years where the department has operated under continuing resolutions. “No amount of money can buy that time back,” she said. “It’s impossible to compete and out-compete the PRC with one hand tied behind our back for six months of every fiscal year. Washington has to do better. And I know it is possible.”
Congress, industry and the Pentagon must “work together around our shared recognition that we are in a generational era of strategic competition with,” Hicks said. “And central to that competition is investing to take care of our troops and their families.” (Source: U.S. DoD)
20 Mar 24. U.S. Special Operations Officials Underscore Continued Role in Deterring Conflict. U.S. special operations forces continue to deliver critical advantages as the Defense Department confronts a changing national security landscape, top officials said today.
Army Gen. Bryan P. Fenton, commander of U.S. Special Operations Command said that in addition to honing key counterterrorism capabilities throughout the Global War on Terror, the special operations community has maintained its roots in deterring and defeating strategic threats.
He said the joint special operations communities’ experience in strategic competition and integrated deterrence will pay dividends as the U.S. faces increasing competition with China, Russia’s increasing aggression and Iran’s malign activities throughout the Middle East.
“To be clear, DOD’s main effort, integrated deterrence, is Socom’s main effort,” Fenton said in testimony to the House Armed Services Intelligence and Special Operations Subcommittee.
“Since 1942, your SOF has accumulated six decades of strategic competition experience, now combined with over two decades of hard-earned combat experience in the Global War on Terror,” he said. “These eight decades make your special operations tailormade for this era.”
Special operations forces provide the U.S. with strategic options to prevent great power conflict and ensure the joint force prevails should conflict occur, he said, adding that “integrated deterrence and strategic competition are in our DNA.”
Fenton testified alongside Christopher P. Maier, assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low-intensity conflict, who outlined before lawmakers the impacts special operations forces were having in the changing national security environment.
In the Pacific, special operations forces’ presence and engagement have produced tangible impacts aligned with U.S. efforts to prevent competition with China veering into conflict, Maier said.
He added that special operations forces remained aligned with partners from U.S. Space Command, U.S. Cyber Command and U.S. Strategic Command and are well positioned to “operationalize” integrated deterrence against China.
In Europe, Maier noted U.S. special operations forces’ ability to draw on “generational relationships with Ukraine in aiding its fight against Russian aggression.”
He added special operations forces are deepening integration with NATO’s newest member, Sweden, as well as with Norway, a founding member of the alliance.
“With these partners and others, SOF is ready for operations in the Arctic,” Maier said.
Fenton said to combat the range of threats the U.S. faces, Socom delivers “asymmetric and asynchronous advantage for DOD.”
Those advantages are enabled by the special operations community’s focus on its people.
“Your special operations attract the most talented men and women driven to solve the most complex problems and politically sensitive and contested environments,” he said. “And with them, we win by asymmetrically deterring our adversaries, tearing apart violent extremist organizations and rapidly responding to crisis.” (Source: U.S. DoD)
19 Mar 24. USMC hands lawmakers $2.4bn service ‘wishlist’ for next year. Barracks and facility upgrades top the US Marine Corps $2.4bn funding wish list for next year, but also included is millions for new watercraft and vehicle programs, and V-22 Osprey “health information.”
After the White House delivered its $849.8bn discretionary spending request for fiscal 2025 to Congress last week, service chiefs and combatant commanders have begun sending in their required “unfunded priority lists” to lawmakers. Breaking Defense obtained the Marine Corp’s list, and the service said it could use an additional $2.4bn next year with plans to direct $642m towards its top three “quality of life” priorities — barracks restoration and modernization, barracks base operating support, and service-wide facility upgrades.
An additional $492m, the USMC adds, could be funneled towards five military construction projects like an aircraft maintenance hangar, in Beaufort, S.C.
But it’s not just military construction and operating cost dollars the service is eyeing. A host of new and existing weapon programs, and force design initiatives are also included on the wish list that total $1.2bn.
If lawmakers could free up $250m in the FY25 budget, for example, the service could use that to purchase two additional CH-53K helicopters, or $341m could be used for the Amphibious Combat Vehicle 30mm Cannon (ACV-30) line.
On the water, the service outlines several initiatives it would like more funding for next year including $6m for development of its new Autonomous Low-Profile Vessel (ALPV), and $9m for its Enhanced Combat Rubber Raiding Craft (E-CRRC).
When it comes to munitions, the USMC told lawmakers an additional $90m for Long Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM) C-3 would be ideal, along with $16m for the Small Diameter Bomb II line.
The service also notes that an additional $90m would be helpful for V-22 Osprey.
“drive system safety and health information.” Following a deadly November 2023 crash, the aircraft was grounded for roughly three months before the Pentagon gave the services, including USMC, the greenlight to return to flight.
“We have high confidence that we understand what component failed, and how it failed. I think what we are still working on is the why and so that is still in the hands of the investigation,” Marine Corps Col. Brian Taylor, the program manager in the Pentagon’s V-22 Joint Program Office, told reporters ahead of the announcement. (Source: Defense News Early Bird/Breaking Defense.com)
19 Mar 24. Project Overmatch budget details too sensitive to share, Navy says. The U.S. Navy’s fiscal 2025 budget request for Project Overmatch, its effort to digitally link people, ships and sensors over vast distances, is too sensitive to make public, according to the service.
Asked for potential spending details, a Naval Information Warfare Systems Command spokesperson said the budget is considered controlled unclassified information, or CUI, “and as such, we are unable to provide the requested information at this time.” The Navy sought at least $192m in FY24 and secured $226m in FY23.
Project Overmatch represents the service’s contribution to the Defense Department’s multibillion-dollar connectivity campaign known as Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control. Military leaders have shared few specifics about its maturation since inception in 2020, citing Russian and Chinese monitoring. It was not clear why information could be distributed in past fiscal years but not the upcoming one.
Rear Adm. Ben Reynolds, the Navy’s deputy assistant secretary for the budget, previously told reporters at the Pentagon that Project Overmatch funding would be applied to software development and “some hardware that goes on our ships, goes into our numbered fleets, and then provides them the capability to operate distributed.”
“We remain committed to our Overmatch capabilities,” Reynolds added. “The ability to move information across a distributed fleet? That’s very important.”
At least three carrier strike groups already have Project Overmatch capabilities aboard, C4ISRNET previously reported. While a spokesperson at the time declined to the name the groups, the individual said rollout to carrier strike groups, amphibious ready groups and maritime operation centers was “way ahead” of an FY25 mandate from the chief of naval operations.
Navy officials have said Project Overmatch’s injection into the fleet will first focus on the Indo-Pacific region, where Washington may butt heads with Beijing and where interception and jamming jeopardize the network activities. Trials with the advanced technology kicked off last year with the Carl Vinson carrier strike group off California. (Source: Defense News)
19 Mar 24. Pacific force’s wish list seeks $11bn more than defense proposal. U.S. Indo-Pacific Command is asking Congress for $11bn more than the White House’s fiscal 2025 defense budget request, an amount that is three times greater than the wish list it submitted last year.
Much of the money requested in the annual list, obtained by Defense News, would go toward constructing infrastructure to host U.S. forces in the region, classified space programs, munitions and Guam defenses. The U.S. is aiming to bolster its presence in the region to deter China.
The largest component of the list by far is military construction in the Indo-Pacific region, with a $3.3bn request “to enable U.S. Indo-Pacom to develop and deliver footprint requirements in a timely manner.” The military construction amount alone is nearly equal to the total $3.5bn unfunded priorities list Indo-Pacific Command submitted to Congress last year, which was the largest wish list from any combatant command in FY24.
Indo-Pacific Command’s request to beef up military construction in the region comes after Congress recently renewed assistance to the Pacific island nations of Palau, Micronesia and the Marshall Islands, which provide military access for U.S. forces in return.
The unfunded priorities list requests another $40m for the Navy, specifically for activities in Micronesia to integrate “posture plans, military construction projects, land use negotiations and other joint support activities.”
Meanwhile, the Philippines is expected to begin work on numerous base upgrades this year after its recent agreement to enhance basing cooperation with the United States.
Another $580.7m on the list would go toward military campaigning in the region, with the bulk of those funds directed toward the Army.
Additionally, $1.4bn on the Indo-Pacific Command list would go toward classified space programs. Half of that requested amount would help accelerate the development of space-based sensors used to counter missile threats, while the rest would resource “space control and enabling capabilities.”
For munitions, the list asks for more than $1bn to accelerate development and procurement of the Maritime Strike Tomahawk cruise missile. It requests another $766.9m for the Navy to procure more of the Standard Missile-6 weapons and another $396.9m for that service to accelerate fielding Hammerhead mines, “designed to be delivered by unmanned underwater vehicles and surface vessels.”
It asks for $390.7m worth of Precision Strike Missiles for the Army. For the Air Force, it requests $298.4m to procure Joint Strike Missiles and another $105.1m to buy Long Range Anti-Ship Missiles.
Wargames conducted by the House Committee on the Chinese Communist Party last year found a U.S.-China conflict over Taiwan would rapidly deplete munitions stockpiles, including the Long Range Anti-Ship Missile.
The command’s wish list is meant to bridge the FY25 funding gap it reported in its annual assessment to Congress, which Defense News obtained last week. That report assessed the command needs $26.5 bn for FY25, $15bn of which was in the Pentagon’s base budget request.
The command is also asking for $430m to develop a missile defense system in Guam “against ballistic, hypersonic and cruise missile threats.”
It’s unclear how much funding Congress can provide for either the FY24 or FY25 wish list, as last year’s debt ceiling agreement imposed an $886bn defense spending cap for FY24 and an $895bn top line for FY25. Funding any defense wish lists would require Congress to take money out of other accounts.
Nearly six months into the fiscal year, Congress has yet to pass a full FY24 budget. Lawmakers are expected to release the text of the long-overdue FY24 Pentagon spending bill later this week.
Furthermore, the Defense Department had been relying on the Senate’s $95 bn foreign aid bill for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan to beef up global force posture and ramp up munitions production. That bill includes $542 m for Indo-Pacific Command to fulfill its $3.5bn unfunded priorities list for FY24.
The Senate passed the bill 70-29 last month, but it has stalled in the House amid opposition from Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and former President Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.
The military combatant commands and services are legally required to submit unfunded priorities lists to Congress every year. (Source: Defense News)
18 Mar 24. Special Ops Builds on Strengths as it Charts Future.
The strengths of the U.S. special operations community have always been agility, adaptability and innovation its service members demonstrated as they approached a mission. Special ops leaders are working to continue this process as the Defense Department drives forward, Army Command Sgt. Maj. Shane W. Shorter said.
Shorter, the senior enlisted leader of U.S. Special Operations Command, sees special operators playing key roles across the military spectrum and using new domains, new technologies and new processes to do their crucial jobs better.
Shorter accompanied Army Gen. Bryan Fenton, the Socom commander, to meet with Congressional leaders. Fenton will testify before the House Armed Services Committee on Wednesday.
He said many people are still unclear about the role special operations forces play in the National Defense Strategy. They do not understand what role these “quiet professionals” have in great power competition.
“I think there still folks that just relate SOF to counterterrorism,” Shorter said. The prominent role that Army Special Forces, Navy SEALs, Marine reconnaissance units, Army Rangers and more had in combat against terrorists in the years after the attacks on the U.S. after September 11, 2001, has skewed perceptions of the capabilities of these operators, the senior enlisted leader said.
“SOF was formed long before the global war on terror and long before 9-11,” he said. “Great power competition is in our roots from the in World War II.”
Special operators played crucial roles in counterinsurgency during the Vietnam War, but operators were also in Europe during the Cold War, filling gaps in that great power confrontation that conventional forces couldn’t fill.
Today, the National Defense Strategy calls China the pacing challenge for the department, with Russia an “acute threat.” Special operators are working throughout the Indo-Pacific, building partners’ military capabilities and working with allies to deter aggression.
In Europe, special operators worked with the Ukrainian military years before the Russian invasion. Shorter said the first teams worked with the Ukrainian military in the 1990s. The pace of training, obviously, picked up following Russia’s first invasion in 2014 when Russian President Vladimir Putin illegally annexed Crimea.
In addition to teaching Ukrainian forces about new technologies, new tactics and new procedures, special forces personnel worked with the Ukrainians to develop an empowered NCO corps in their military, an effort that was instrumental in stopping the Russian forces when they first moved into the nation in 2022, Shorter said.
Today, there are no boots on the ground in Ukraine, but special operators maintain contact with their Ukrainian friends and advise them remotely. “It’s not ideal,” Shorter said. “But it’s been working.”
The work with partners in the Indo-Pacific and Europe go back decades, Shorter said, and that demonstrates the first special operations truth; “Humans are more important than hardware and things.”
The relationships that special operators develop over these years pay dividends for all countries involved. But this takes time. “You can’t mass produce SOF in times of crisis,” the command sergeant major said. “It takes time to develop these skill sets.”
He said it is harder to build special operations forces today than in the past because “of the plethora of wide-ranging roles that technology plays.”
Shorter sees technology playing a key role, but not the key role for SOCOM. “It’s always going to come down to a special operator talking to a partner,” he said. “The special operator has to know the culture, the language, the likes and dislikes and more. It’s going to be relationships.”
In short, people will always make the difference in SOCOM, he said. “In SOCOM, we don’t think one more platform or thing is going to win the war,” he said. “I think that creative thinking humans with the ability to interact with our partners and allies will make the difference.”
Combining that with what he calls the special operations-space-cyber nexus “is going to be very, very important for the future fight,” Shorter said. “In the old days when a Special Forces went to Vietnam, they took their rucksacks, their weapons and their smarts.”
But today, deploying teams take the rucksack, the weapon, their smarts and 15 or 20 different computer systems, the sergeant major said. “Yes, the human is the most important, but if we can fold the technology around that individual, then that individual is much more proficient and that much more of a powerful weapons system,” he said.
This has changed training in the special operations community and changed the focus. “Does it mean that SOF will be less proficient in their weapons system, or less proficient in their physical capabilities or less proficient in their cognitive abilities,” he said. “Absolutely not. It just means that they need to be cloaked with the technology, and they need to train in that technology.”
Working with allies and partners is second nature to special operators, and that will continue in a world of integrated deterrence, Shorter said. “For the past 20-plus years, we did a lot of work with our partners and allies, and they helped us immensely. It got to the point where you could intermix some of our partners and allies with U.S. SOF forces on operations and you couldn’t tell the difference.”
Shorter said this experience is invaluable. “You can’t surge relationships, you can’t surge trust,” he said. “That’s just the human element. It’s constantly deploying to that same area. It’s understanding the culture. It’s drinking the cups of tea, eating the dinners, singing karaoke.”
In addition to its role in great power competition, the counterterrorism mission did not go away. Terrorists still operate in shadowy areas around the world, and SOF personnel must be ready to confront them. “We can’t drop the ball on the CT fight,” Shorter said. “What it means for us is that we have to modernize our CT efforts as well.”
For the CT fight, SOF personnel must continue to work with conventional forces, interagency partners and counterterrorism forces from other nations. The command sergeant major said U.S. forces have been able to fold in technology that wasn’t available three years ago. And it is making a difference. “It allows us to sense, see and strike anywhere on the planet,” he said.
U.S. special operations forces have a full plate, Shorter said, and they are approaching the various aspects of it with the same enthusiasm and morale that they have approached problems throughout their history. “It’s in our DNA,” he said. “We will do what the country asks of us. The DOD’s main effort has always been SOCOM’s main effort.” (Source: U.S. DoD)
18 Mar 24. US explored adding more cobalt to defence stockpiles, sources say. The U.S. looked into buying cobalt for defence stockpiles last year, three sources with knowledge of the matter said, adding the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) could consider purchases in future despite deciding against them in its latest plan.
Any increase in cobalt holdings would be aimed at reducing reliance on China, which dominates the processing of the material used to make missiles, aerospace parts, magnets for communication, and radar and guidance systems.
Cobalt is also used to make the batteries that power electric vehicles, a key plank of the energy transition.
The DLA’s stockpiling plans which run from October 2023 to September 2024 did not include, opens new tab cobalt, surprising the market, which had expected the 60% price drop to around $16 a lb since May 2022 to incentivise purchases.
DLA spokesperson Joe Yoswa said: “DLA … conducts critical material supply chain assessments biennially to determine NDS (National Defense Stockpiles) requirements. Cobalt is not currently presenting as a vulnerability requiring stockpiling.”
“Should that change in the future, DLA will reassess and make an appropriate recommendation on stockpiling to the Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment.”
Yoswa added the NDS is “for defense purposes and is not an economic stockpile” and that “the current price of a commodity cannot be used as justification to acquire materials”.
The unfavourable price backdrop prompted cobalt and nickel supplier Jervois Global (JRV.AX), opens new tab to suspend final construction of its Idaho cobalt operations in March last year, which would have been the only primary cobalt mine in the United States. It was expected to produce 2,000 metric tons a year.
Prices are likely to remain depressed due to slowing sales of electric vehicles which use cobalt-containing batteries, and new battery chemistries that don’t use it.
The sources said some of the impetus for the move to assess cobalt came from a letter sent by Congress in September 2022 to the Department of Defense (DoD) asking it “to direct” DLA “to prioritize the acquisition of domestically refined cobalt”.
The letter signed by lawmakers Byron Donalds, Don Bacon, Eric A. “Rick” Crawford, Kevin Hern and Markwayne Mullin cited “a heavy dependence on other countries’ refined cobalt, particularly China” as a reason to add to U.S. stockpiles.
Spokespeople confirmed Mullin and Donalds signed the letter, while those for Crawford and Hern did not respond to requests for comment.
“As indicated in his 2022 letter to Under Secretary of Defense (William) La Plante, Congressman Bacon believes the Department should move aggressively to secure domestic sources of critical minerals including cobalt,” a spokesperson for Bacon said.
Most of the cobalt mined in Congo, amounting to 77% of global supplies or more than 170,000 tons last year, according to Darton Commodities, was exported to China for processing into metal or chemicals for batteries.
The NDS “lacks sufficient cobalt reserves, endangering America’s critical mineral supply chain”, the letter said, adding that: “From approximately 13,000 tons during the Cold War, cobalt in the Stockpile is now estimated at 333 tons”.
“In practical terms, the total cobalt stockpile is only 5 percent of annual U.S. consumption.”
Yoswa declined to comment on how much cobalt DLA has in its stockpiles. “The National Defense Stockpile does hold 99.8% pure cobalt, but we won’t provide the amount that we hold for security purposes,” he said. (Source: Reuters)
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