Good morning. The committee today to consider the nomination of the lieutenant general. Thank you for your decades of service and willingness to serve in this a very important position. I would like to welcome your son, john and daughter, sarah and while not present but we acknowledge the parents randy and belinda. I am know they are very proud of your nomination. Recognizing the increasingar importance of the space domainm and growing threats to the critical space assets by china and russia, congress established the space force on the fiscal year 2020 National Defense authorization act. , legislatively transferring ino 2020. First of the space force must develop, train and equip guardians. Space is a remote domain that is contested and have to have thean ability to integrate digital digitalinto their advanced techs to accomplish their mission by a strongan background. The Space Training and Readiness Command i will want to know your views if confirmed how they will train future guardians in the space domain. Second, you will have to foster a Service Culture that can succeed in the dramatically evolving space environment often called news base. We are witnessing an enormous surge with some satellite constellations that a few years ago now are having thousands in low earth orbit all interconnected. Rockets that ones were disposable or reusable. Lowering the course of the launch to a fraction of what it used to be. The space force of today and tomorrow must adapt to this change in piece of innovation and utilize it to protect and defend our assets in space and on the ground. The organization and its guardians need to reflect the changing environment. Third, in response to the adversarial threat in space, congress not only created theth space force as a war fighting entity but it also reorganized the way we acquire Space Systems the way we formulate the policy and fight for the new combatant command. If confirmed youem will leave te space force in its defense enterprise. I want to know what you foresee as ifco she was you expect to fe and how will you will ensure it can respond to them. Most importantly, an integral part of the surface is the culture and mission when the space force was established most guardians unnecessarily transformed the surfaces and have had to adapt to be a new culture. I was pleased to learn in the meeting last week successful recruiting efforts have ends who wouldve had to sue and one third of the space force will never have served in another service. General, im interested in how you intend to create the unique culture with a blend of transfers and new recruits. Thank you for your willingness to serve the nation and i look forward to the testimony. Let me recognize member and a half. I would also like to extend a welcome to the general. I appreciate the time you spend with me giving you an idea but if you have in your mind and also you have your family here today. We appreciate that very much. The National Defense strategy isnt shy about the scope and scale and threat from china and the speed of the advances. There is no better example of that fan space. The United States has gone from the unquestioned leader in spac to one or two peers in a competition. There is a lot of china and russia are doing we can talk about today but even what we can is very concerning. For years weve kept noting everything in the military relies on space. So we have a different environment altogether. Thank you mr. Chairman. Thank you, senator you are recognized for your Opening Statement. If wese could bring the microphone as close as possible. I am honored and deeply humbled by the opportunity to be with your. This morning. Id like to begin by introducing my family. With me today are the most important people in my life first my wife, jennifer. Im proud to announce just yesterday we celebrated our 30th wedding anniversary. Jennifer has been steadfastly by my side for this entire journey through 15 moves nearly 200 overnight alerts, countless late nights and trips away from home and most recently in the years separatedes while i deployed to the middle east. Shes taken on all these challenges with a smile on her face and warmth in her heart but whthe most amazing accomplishme has been raising our two children and the fine young adults that you see here. Our son as a director of the social media content for the Sports Marketing firm and our daughter, sarah recently completed a masters degree in Public Administration with a perfect 4. 0 gpa. R jennifer and i couldnt be more proud. They followed mom and dad all over the country and have been successful at every turn. They meet the challenges head on and show optimism and a contagious weight. My home and family are my a bedrock and art at the center of any career success that ive enjoyed. I go all of that to these three and i will be forever grateful to the love and support theyve shown and sacrifices theyve made. I would also take the opportunity to offer a special thanks to general the families go back and weve benefited greatly from their mentorship and friendship. Concluded 38 years of service to the nation but the last three have been critical to the establishment of thehe space force. A passion, dedication and divisions set on a solid foundation. If i have the good fortune to e confirmed, jennifer and i will work hard to build on their success and continue to push to inew heights. I would also like to express my appreciation to the committee for your support and advocacy for the space force, its guardians and their families. For the last two years ive had ethe privilege of serving with thesend guardians and i can attt they are the finest men and women in america has to offer if confirmed it would be the honor of my life to lead them at the second chief Space Operations for the United States space force. Not quite three years ago congress established the space for us to provide freedom of operation for the United States and, from and to space to conduct operations and to protect the interest of the United States into space. In a few short years since the space force was established the number of satellites on orbit has doubled and the global space economy is approaching half a trillion dollars. Space is truly a critical demand for u. S. Interests so we must be d,ll clear in our understanding that our strategic competitors have invested heavily in Fielding Systems capable of disrupting, degrading and even destroying our Space Capabilities. If confirmed i will work to ensure the space force is ready to protect these vital interests from these threats. Its an honor to be nominated to serve as the next chief of Space Operations. Im excited about the opportunities ahead for the space force and if confirmed i look forward to working with the committee, other members to continue to ensure the space force fulfills its mission as part of americas joint force. I look forward to your questions. Thank you very much, general. Before i begin the questioning, there are a series of standard questions for nominees and you can respond. Havebe you adhered to applicable laws and regulations governing conflicts of interest . Yes. Have you assumed any duties or taken action that would presume the outcome of the confirmation process . No. Exercising that oversight responsibilities makes it important that this committee and subcommittees and other appropriate committees of congress receive testimony, briefings, reports, records and other information on the executive branch are in a timely basis. To do you agree if confirmed to appear and testify before the committee when requested . Yes. Do you agree when asked to aggive your personal views evenf your viewshi differ from the administration . Yes. Do you agree to provide records, documents and communications in a timely manner road when requested by the subcommittees or other appropriateag committees of congress and to consult with the requests regarding the basis for any goodfaith delay or denial providing such records . Yes. Will you ensure that your staff complies with the h deadlines established for the production and reports, records and other information including timely responses to hearing questions forit the record . Foyes. Will you cooperate providing responses to congressional requests . Yes. Will the witnesses be protected . Yes. In my comments i talked about the design the spaces . Force mut lead. The intent in congress is centralized and of the Senate Version of the 2022 National Defense authorization act deemed to be the first divine architect for space for the armed services. I know different in many ways as a designer for the navy. The conference bill required the secretary special operations as a force Design Architect and the august 17 letter sent to the wcommittee by the secretary dos indeed designate the chief as the Design Architect except for all of the other authorities the armed forces and secondary defense that are rather extensive. Do you think that this is a workable designation . And that it follows the intent of congress . Yes sir, i do. Ive had extensive discussions with the secretary and the general the current general of the spatial operations and its my understanding that the exemptions that yousi mentioned really are not about authorities associated with of the force Design Architect in fact the responsibilities the secondary defense gave to general as the chief of Space Operations is sufficient to accomplish the intent of congress and if confirmed to make the space force ase capable as possible. General, if confirmed, your job will be to present training and equip forces to u. S. Space command primarily but also you will have the duty to support others. Is there any distinction between the two were the different commands you will support . No, senator. The responsibility of the chief of Space Operations is to make sure they are ready forces that have the flexibility, agility, training and experience necessary to support all combatant commanders. I would noterc the u. S. Space command has primary responsibilities for that area of responsibility as well as key missions for the joint force and so while over 90 of the space force capabilities are presented to the Space Command if there are critical capabilities, regional capabilities that are also presented to the other to fulfill their missions as well. Thank you. General, the administration has sent a legislative proposal to createyo full and parttime spae force military personnel in lieu of a separate reserve element as other services and this i think originates because the space force is relatively small and the elements would be smaller still. Do you support this proposal . Senator, the most important aspect is that there are critical capabilities and expertise that currently reside in the air force reserves as well as the interNational Guard. The primary responsibility of course is to make sure we have complete access to that experience, the expertise and capabilities so from the readiness perspective i can tell you as the chief of operations currently that is high on my list to make sure that we have unfettered access toes the capabilities. We are also looking at the flexible and innovative ways to make sure that we have viable and flexible career paths for the guardians and its important that we retain the talent for an extended period of time to get the most out of them and having the ability to seamlessly and have a permeable way to move between fulltime and parttime capacityan inside the space fore we think is a tremendous benefit to the guardians and ultimately to the force to maintain that tr readiness, so if confirmed i would certainly welcome the opportunity to continue to work with members of this committee and other stakeholders to make sure we get the right organizational structure to take advantage of these capabilitiese thank you. Again one of the very challenges you have facing you is creating a culture in the space force as a fighting force and one that is highly technical and innovates constantly andon we find it soms cultures are more determinative than a lot of other factors so thats something i think you will be working on and we hope to Work Together with you. Now let me recognize the rankig member senatorrk inhofe. General, let me get the two required questions out of the way. What worries you the most and why do you intend to do about it and secondly what would be the first challenge that you go after . The most immediate threat in mywh opinion is the pace with which the strategic challenges first and foremost the chinese aggressively are pursuing capabilities that can disrupt, degrade and even destroy our satellite capabilities and disrupt overground infrastructure. Theyve watched how we perform the joint force operations and they know how critical the u. S. Spaceha capabilities are to the joint force. They learn from that and recognize its an asymmetric advantage of theirs to go after an hour Space Capabilities and deny them to the joint force and theyve invested heavily and demonstrated capabilities that can deny this, so its one of my earliest priorities to make sure that we are on track to build and a a field effective capabilities and train the guardians to operate in a contested domain so we can counter the activity by the strategic competitors. Thank you. Thank you very much senator. Senator shaheen. Congratulations, senator on yoursa nomination. Now i hope that for your 30th anniversary youre doing something other than bringing your wife to this hearing. [laughter] the pearls are the gift for the 30th anniversary so i hope thats on the list. Youre getting me in trouble i appreciate that. Seriously i appreciate the opportunity to meet with you and especially appreciated the conversation that we had about the risk thats involved with our Space Capabilities and i wonder if you could speak to how to have the is programs with our Small Businesses that are able to assume more ofo that risk and whats your assessment is if the programs are discontinued because we dont get to reauthorize this year the size of the space force and wecriticality of the missions means we have to innovate helping provide a some of those innovative and creative capabilities that we can leverage to build the full spectrum response to what the adversaries are trying to do. So i firmly believe we ought to lower the threshold to make it easier for Small Businesses to offer their capabilities to take into. So i assume you would agree with me that if we do not get the programss reauthorized, that its goingng to be a real loss n terms of the innovation the Small Businesses are providing to the Space Program and also to the military. If confirmed, i am certainly committed to any authorities, responsibilities that help pull the maximum numbers in as possible. Thank you. Can you also talk about the risk issue in terms of the procurement process . I think the general talked about the bureaucratic hurdles that impede the ability to procure the capabilities we need as we are looking at the adversaries in early china. So, what do you see in terms of policy changes that would help us address the procurement issues that we got . We have a very deliberative process to make sure we are using the taxpayer dollars. Did you bring up an excellent point is that the urgency, the sense of urgency that theyve imposed on us require us to move quickly to develop these capabilities. So i am certainly committed to making sure we streamline the processes. Congress has helped with the establishment of the architect in the cso and the chief of Space Operations and i think streamlining the requirements into being clear about what we need innovating to pull in as many ideas as possible to solve the problems will streamline the effortss and deliver operational capabilities faster. The m cultural piece of this sometimes we get focused on the fact that we need to purposely build capabilities to provide Space Capabilities for the nation. In the Space Systems command theyve adopted a mantra about exploiting what we have come a body and what wewe b p can and y building what we must. And i think having that opened the thought process and how best to bring the capabilities to bear will actually streamline the process and make us do a better job. Thank you. I appreciate that. During the meeting, you also talked about, and you did as you did in your Opening Statement the importance of the people and our space force and they will make a difference in our success or failure. One of the things i understand the space force may be rethinking is some of the requirements. Can you speak to what we ought to be thinking about as we are thinking about how to get more of those into service . They were brought in to do these missions for the space force. We also have an advantage by being small that we can sit on a casebycase basis precisely the right people, the right skill sets and diversity of thought in the space force to optimize the capabilities. So, by being able to consider this on a casebycase basis, i think we dont have to put a blankett restrictions on types f people and qualifications that bring the space force, so they have an opportunity because of the numbers that we need to bring in to be more individualistic and if confirmed i would want to expand that and actually broaden us out to as manyal people as possible. I look forward to continuing the discussion. You are well suited for that and having served ive heard it said by some that once any asset goes into space and becomes strategic intelligence and hshould therefore it would seem to conflict with the space for us, so could you explain how it should relate and how that showed a look and function . I learned to fly satellites as a commander, so i speak