The chair notes the presence of a quorum. Committee meets today to consider and mark up h. R. 2010, the National Defense authorization act for fiscal year 2018. For 55 straight years, under congresses and president s of both parties, and annual ndaa has been signed into law. Im certain that this you will be no different. The members of this committee have an overwhelming commitment to the duty placed on us by the constitution to support the men and women who serve our nation in the military. Every member of this committee has contributed to this legislation. Committee member suggested 1531 separate legislative provisions for consideration in the marks. Over 330 amendments were filed for today. But members also contributed by asking thoughtful questions at our briefings and hearings, by traveling to visit our troops at home and overseas, by sharing their personal experiences and insights, and by talking with one another about how to solve problems. And so first i want to express my appreciation to each of the members and to our staffs for your work, so far come in developing this years ndaa. This is a team effort, and i think its safe to say theres nothing else like it these days in congress. And i want to especially express appreciation to the Ranking Member, because is spirit of working together, even when and especially when we have different views, keeping in mind the security of the nation, is something that also is not common in congress but essential if we are to fulfill our duties. We began our hearings this you look at the state of the world and the nature of the threats we face. We went on to examine the state of our military after years of continuing resolutions in the budget control act. What we heard was alarming, and that was also reflected in secretary mattis testimony before us on june 12. I was struck by this paragraph of his testimony, quote, four years later i returned to the department and i have been shocked by what ive seen with our readiness to fight. For all the heartache caused by the loss of our troops during these wars, no any in the field has done more harm to the readiness of our military then sequestration know in any we both sustain our ability to meet americas commitments abroad because our troops have historically shouldered a much greater burden. End quote. This fy 2018 ndaa take significant steps towards repairing and rebuilding our military are continuing to reform the pentagon to make it more agile and capable in supporting our war fighters. Last fall i asked the Committee Staff to develop a plan to put our military on a better track to repair our planes and ships, to fill out our formations and to accelerate the development of new Innovative Systems and technologies. The conclusion was that we need a base Defense Budget of 640 billion in fy 18, steady growth thereafter. Today we will mark up a bill totaling 631. 5 billion or base requirements, and 65 billion for the overseas Contingency Operations account. Its the compromise to get all of the relevant house committees on the same page. The goal is not only to find the fence adequately this year, but to establish significant predictable growth in future years. I recognize that are a number of legislative steps to go before final authorization and appropriation bills are sent to the president and before changes are made in the bca caps. I also believe that time that place even more burdens on our troops is over. Its important to remind us all where we have been on defense spending in recent years from 20102015 total defense spending was cut 22 in constant dollars. Today even after the trump supplemental request was signed into law, fy 17 defense spending is 18 lower than it was in 2010 measured in constant dollars. And remember 2010, the year where measuring against, was before russia invaded crimea, before china built island in the South China Sea, before any of us had ever heard of isis, and certainly before north korea embarked on its crash missile program. The administration sent us a Budget Proposal for 603 billion, about 5 above current spending, and about 3 above the amount that the Obama Administration had proposed for fy 18. Their proposal would cut Missile Defense below current spending, cut shipbuilding accounts, at no additional soldiers to the army, et cetera, et cetera. While secretary mattis and general dunford testified that they support the administrations request, of course they also testified that they supported every one of the unfunded requirements submitted by the services. And so if you look at the difference between what the administration submitted and what is in the market before us today, it is that we find 21 billion of the 31 billion in unfunded requirements, plus we start moving toward the 350 ship navy with an extra 6 billion and shipbuilding. I think its important for us to remember also that under article section eight of the constitution its our responsibility to raise and support provide and maintain the military forces of the United States. Naturally where interested in the executive suggestion but its our job to decide. We all have responsibilities outside this room related to larger budget issues of taxes and spending, as i mentioned there many moving pieces to the broader budget picture that will develop over the year. But for today, and for our responsibilities as the House Armed Services committee, its important for us i think you put down this marker for what we need for National Defense. At the same time we continue reforms, the two driving priority of this bill as far as im concerned our rebuild and reform come some of the most significant reforms on subcommittee barks such as reform of the management of space and reform of the oversight of Cyber Operations. The cherry moon smart concludes another of acquisition reform focusing on online marketplace is that affect humans playing for service contracts, consistent across an intellectual property as well as data transparency. I introduced this bill more than a month ago, have gotten a number of suggestions, some criticism, and occasionally a little, even although prospective been some suggestions come some changes in the language from what i introduced at are reflected in this market as result of that feedback. I think as a whole these reforms will make a substantial difference. Let me just mention a few of the highlights of the bill. Chairman dunford made the point that Americas Center of gravity is our alliances. Provisions in this bill worked to strengthen our alliances in europe, in asia, in the middle east and elsewhere here it supports tried again. It supports increased in strength as requested by the army, air force and navy. Fully funds the pay raise to which the statutory formula says our troops are entitled. It tries to assist military spouses in being able to practice their vocation as they are forced to move from duty station to duty station. At significant funding to depots and other accounts to accelerate the repair of our weapons and equipment. And it makes some progress in repairing or tearing down old facilities that have long been neglected. Finally the bill supports the administrations request for the fight against terrorists in afghanistan, iraq, syria and elsewhere, but, of course, there are more questions that need to be answered and oversight conducted about the future course of those conflicts. Finally, before we weighed off into the details of this bill i want to offer a little historical perspective. I suspect most of us have not heard of robert paterson, he was the undersecretary of war during world war ii turkey was a lawyer, a Federal District court and civil court of appeals judge but he left the bench and 9040 to go to the war department. As one person described it, he oversaw all fronts of Domestic Production from laces for the gis issues to the production of the atomic bomb. He died tragically in a plane crash in 1952, but just three years ago some private memoirs of his were published, and there are two provisions come to paragraphs that really jumped out at me that he wrote about that apply to us. Judge patterson wrote the will of the nation is the final determinant of policy, the leaders of our arme armed forces cannot secure our safety less than nation wills it to be safe. Unfortunately up to the time of pearl harbor, our will was divided and uncertain. We had to constantly compromise between what technically we knew we needed and what had seemed likely the nation would grant as. Those compromises came close to being disastrous. The other paragraph, the breathtaking display of power with which we close hostilities in europe must not allow us to forget that we had a terribly close call at the start. Nor can we forget, for to forget that it took nearly five years from the moment when danger threatened until we reached the pinnacle of our strength in the field. Destiny was generous of time, more generous than we deserved. We cannot count on such generosity again. Ladies and gentlemen, we have a solemn duty. Its not abstract. Its real and concrete. Its a matter of life and death. Its a matter of our nation security. And as we go about our Business Today and possibly tonight, im confident that we will keep that solemn duty to the men and women who serve, and to our nation foremost in our minds. I yielded to the Ranking Member. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I want to begin by agreeing with you on the great work of the members of this committee and of the staff. And i think your summary of many of the things that are in the bill is an excellent example of some of that great work that was done. Certainly in the area of space particular. Ive worked quite a bit with chairman rogers and Ranking Member carper on different aspects, dentist any of the space court, gadgets understand how space is any futures reflective against our policy role as a committee. Its not just up to the white house and executive branch did so with mentor does. We tried a lot of policy that makes enormous difference in making us safer. Similarly, a past chairman, what was then the terrorism subcommittee, i want to thank them for their great work on focusing on that incredibly important part of hybrid cyber special forces defense, which is become so much a part of what we have to do, whether its facing isis are facing information, disinformation campaigns of russia. There is great work throughout this bill. I also agree with the chairman the necessity of passing it as were done i think 75 straight years, sorry i missed missed the point, 86 straight years, important for those policy reasons we make the policy that helps move us forward in a a positive direction in terms of National Security. There are two significant challenges before us better do want to mention, and at the outset is not the fault of this Committee Picked this committee has done a great job of trying to work on understanding what our National Security threats and the best to meet them. Number one is what the chairman led with, thats the money. We have in this bill 696 million, which include the oco in terms of defense spending. Unfortunately what we do not have in the house or the senate is a budget resolution. The first time in the entire time ive been in this congress that we reached this late date and we dont have a budget resolution. And the reason we dont have a budget resolution is because we cannot come to agreement on how to spend the money. But more important than that the reason is, as always, it seems we have vastly overpromise what were going to deliver versus what we actually have the funds to deliver the if youre keeping track of everything, we are very similar with the shortfalls in the Armed Services and the shortfalls within the military. We fired for the last six months a parade of generals and think tanks talking about all the shortfalls with a bunch of different places. Many of which i agree with, not all but many i do agree with. We also have a very strong call from many 4000 budget with a 20 20 trillion debt at the deficit to 7700. A number of members are on other committees, just about every of the committee you go to has a very similar list of needs and concerns, whether you talk about nih funding, transportation infrastructure, education, housing. Theres a laundry list of things. Ive come across a committee where their opinion is gone, youre giving us too much money, please stop. So we have this desire for a whole lot more resources than we actually have. The reason the budget resolution cant pass is there are not 218 votes for any budget resolution because there will be some number of people who will object and say it spends too much. There are many members who support the budget control act, want to keep it in place, would not want to lift that. And that by the weigh way is re. If the money that we have in this bill is to become law, the house and the senate will have to agree, and the president , to lift the budget caps. And there are many members who are unwilling to do that. Ironically, there are also a lot of numbers if you were not spending enough money in a bunch of different areas. So we have basically not been honest with the American People about the choices that we face. In october 1 is coming, and that is when this all comes to a head come when all of these promises that dont add up leave us in a very bad place. So while we mark this bill up, 696 billion, it is highly unlikely that at the end of this process we are going to 696 billion. Because first of all the house has been unwilling to vote for that budget resolution. Again the house has to vote to lift the budget caps. That alone is a significant lot but, of course, as always the even larger block is in the senate. It requires 60 votes in the senate to lift the budget caps. The budget cap number for this committee is 549 billion. That doesnt count oco which is 65, 70 billion but our base bill is 621 billion. As the chairman has noted there are a lot of things we feel are not find it within a 621 billion. Imagine where its that if we have to stumble all the way back to 549 billion which is whats going to happen if we dont vote to raise the budget caps. And in the senate they have a concern about other issues, and i was get myself in trouble when i do that on this committee because i know on this committee and i agree our primary responsibility is the funding of the military at our National Security. But there are other needs in this country and ive been told that the one thing does have anything to do with the other. But president trumps budget made it absolutely clear that thats not true. President trumps budget plus of defense by 54 billion to get us up to the 603 billion level and cut all other nondefense discretionary by exactly 54 billion. So the one thing very much it does have to do with the other, and included among staff was a 30 cut in the state department. When were talking about a National Security challenges that we face, and we need, and the need for the military response, theres an incredible need for increased diplomacy. We are looking at a 30 cut. If you look at the afghanistanpakistan working group in the state department which was just disbanded, we are renting at the number of troops apparent that we will send to afghanistan while getting rid of the one group of people that was supposed to be planning a strategy. The senate is very unlikely to accept that, the house is very unlikely to accept that level of cats. So we have to figure out that budget piece and i think the quote from mr. Patterson were spot on. The reason we didnt do it is we dont want to do it, its tough, its hard make choices, to decide what were going to cut. It is way past time that we make those choices. Personally i believe we need more revenue. I think the National Security needs that event outline and that it grown dramatically since 2010 are very real. I think the infrastructure needs in this country are very real and i think it is shameful we are not willing to provide the revenue to support what we say is so important to us. But if open to other ideas. What isnt going to work is what were doing in this bill. This isnt going to work, okay . We are not just going to after seven months of not doing it raised the budget caps. There is going to be some sort of agreement that recognizes the challenges i just outlined. Right now we are hoping, doing this, we hoping that between now and october 1 some have that at the moment is completely blocked, completely everything is going to emerge thats going to enable us to do this. We need to get past that. We need to actually on us and look at the money we have, and if we are committed to funding all of the shortfalls that were going to talk about today, then actually provide the money. Because absent a budget resolution what we are doing here today old emily does not have the force of law. And the second point i think is fairly important, six months into it we do not have a National Security strategy from the white house. All of the challenges that event outline we have heard about, but how they come together . How do we decide course were not going to have enough money to do everything we want to do. If you were to be keeping track of the various pieces that can be forced to testify before the shortfalls and Defense Budget, and attempted to add up what was that we would need, i dont know what that number is, but its way about 700 billion to meet all of those needs. In fact, one of the most disturbing conversations i had in the last several months was with the office of net assessment and which of the outlining again a as a chairman did all of the shortfalls that we have and then they said we had a strategy in 2012, we do not have enough money to fund that strategy. So i asked them how short are you . He looked at me kind of audits are reputed, how much money would you need to actually meet our national he had no idea. He had no answer. How can you have no answer to how much money you need and simply key thing that you need more . Thats not a strategy, and it matters in terms of the decisions that we make. Because just one quick stab at you, we appare