Have on our minds and in our prayers senator mccain. Hes going through some recovery right now and wont be able to come back this week. So that will change the way were doing business a little bit. But nonetheless, hell be back with us very soon. And our Committee Meets this morning considering the nomination i should say, the renomination of general sell have f selva. Since weve already been through this drill on the eight required questions, were going to forego that. Im assuming you havent changed your mind since the last time we asked you the eight questions. Is that correct . That is correct. Any family youd like to introduce . I do. Ill do that in my opening statement. Thats good. Your record of service to our nation is well known to this committee. Your first two years a the joint chiefs of staff have been marked by great challenges in our National Security, the advance of isis in the middle east, russian aggression in ukraine and actions against others in that region, north koreas pursuit of both nuclear and longrange missile capabilities. Meanwhile, our young men and women continue to serve in afghanistan ensuring that the court never again serves as a safe haven for terrorists. Moving forward, new leadership at the department of defense and military Service Presents renewed opportunities for our Armed Services as we prepare for the threats of the future crises around the world only continue to multiply. Our Service Members face the most complex and diverse array of Global Threats since the end of world war it. Leading our military during such challenging times requires strong leadership and this committee looks forward to your testimony about how you plan to guide our men and women. Senator reed . Thank you very much, chairman. I want to join you in wishing senator mccain a speedy recovery and rapid return to his responsibilities. In fact, this might be one of the first times that i can sincerely say go navy, because i certainly do. I want to see him back, as we all do. I might observe, though, it cant go unnoticed that the first three here on time were all three army. Yes. Thank you very much, mr. Chairman. I want to join you in welcoming general selva. Thank you, sir, for your service. As we consider your reappointment to the joints chief of staff we thank you for your many years of service to the nation and your willingness to serve and i want to recognize your wife ricky for her many years of support. The United States faces challenges around the world. If you are reconfirmed as the vice chairman, youll be an integral player in addressing these issues facing our National Interests. Russias activities have been aimed at undermining the American People on election process and furthermore russia continues to threaten its neighbors and our nato allies and ukraine complying with the ceasefire agreement. And north Koreas Nuclear missile capability is a National Security threat and the United States continues to grapple with the fact that theres no quick and certain options. China has not shown willingness in the asia pacific region. And by undermining the freedom of navigation. Iran continues an aggressive weapons activities, including Ballistic Missile efforts as well as destabilizing activities in the region. While we make progress towards isis, the administration has articulated a whole of Government Strategy that gave rise to isis in the first place. General selva, the aforementioned challenges are pressing and the committee looks forward to hearing from you on how the department of defense plans to address these issues. In addition, the vice chairman is assigned a number of specific responsibilities. For example, the National DefenseOrganization Act strengthened the role on the joint requirements oversight counsel jroc. And joint performance requirements. Given the important function of the jroc and acquisition programs to make sure that they are reasonable and necessary, i look forward to your thoughts about these new authorities and whether you believe new changes are warranted. This requires working closely with senior policy makers and on critical National Security issues. The committee looks forward to hearing from you on the effectiveness on the current interagency process. Finally, general selva, you have developed the Department Innovation strategy included socalled third officer of strategic capabilities office, the Defense Innovation office experimental and you will provide vital continuity between the last administration and the present administration. It is imperative that the department of defense and secretary mattis continue to leverage our economy and ways of thinking to solve a different and global challenges. Thank you again, general selva, for your willingness to serve our nation and i look forward to this hearing. Thank you, senator reed. Youre recognized, general selva. Thank you, senator inhofe. Id like to recognize senator mccain. On behalf of the joint staff, i look forward to him being back here soon. Distinguished members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you. To be considered for a second term as the vice chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. Im grateful to the president and secretary of defense for their continued trust and faith in my ability to serve. Id like to make three brief points before i continue and look forward to your questions. First, i want to commend those who wear the cloth of my nation. During my two years as vice chairman, ive visited Service Members around the globe and im continually impressed bymu th dedication, Selfless Service and their talent. Its been my distinct honor to serve as the vice chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and i will strive to keep faith with them. Second, as youve already mentioned, senator inhofe, its important to acknowledge the highly complex challenges that face our force today. Presented by adversaries and competitors, internal challenges such as readiness and modernization are all issues with which this committee is very familiar. Please know that i value the dialogue that i and other Senior Leaders have with this committee and i thank the committee for your work on behalf of this nations soldiers and sailors and coast guardsmen. I hope ive conveyed to you the seriousness with which i take my responsibilities as the vice chairman. Finally, id like to recognize my wife ricky, the love of my life, who is here with me and has shared my 37year career and our 37year marriage. She was a classmate when we attended the United States air force academy. Shes not only a lifelong friend and partner but she provides me with the counsel that only someone in her position can. And for that, i will forever be grateful. Senator inhofe, senator reed, members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to be considered for a second term as the vice chairman of the joints chief of staff. I look forward to your questions. Thank you, general selva. Id like to start off with one thats been foremost on my mind and i applaud the uniforms for being straightforward and honest about the threats that were facing right now and that would be north korea. They successfully tested a missile on the fourth of july. The country also completed a successful nuclear test earlier on may 14th. The experts consider north koreas missile test on july 4th to be the most significant advancement towards a Nuclear Capability intercontinental Ballistic Missile. Weve had a lot of witnesses talk about this prior to july 4th and what that will mean in terms of a threat to the United States. If you take that range, the projected range that would actually be somewhere around 5,000 miles, which would put parts of the United States into range. So its a scary thing. We had an Armed Services hearing on the asia pacific strategy on april tath. We had a panel of experts and they were good and they agreed with me that north korea currently represents the most imminent threat to a National Security. Id like to have you go ahead and start with three questions concerning that. One, do you agree with the experts who have come to that conclusion concerning our National Security and, secondly, north korea is known to other adversaries like iran. Do you believe that they are in the process of doing that, they have done that and then what other countries might pose a threat as a result of what theyre receiving from north korea and, thirdly, how confident what is your level of confidence in terms of the our intelligent communitys ability to monitor what is going on there. Those three things, if you could start off with. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I do agree in principle with the assessment that the north koreans are moving quickly to develop a intercontinental Ballistic Missile capability. I, however, am not saying the test on the fourth of july demonstrates that they have the capacity to strike the United States with any degree of accuracy or reasonable confidence of success. What the experts tell me is that north koreans have yet to demonstrate the capacity to do the guidance and control that they would be required to i was only referring to range. Yes, sir. On range, they clearly have the capability. And, you know, if they have the capability in range, the other improvements are perhaps not too far behind . Yes, sir. Well have to watch carefully with the ic, the developments on those particular capabilities. I do agree with the Intelligence Community and others that the democratic peoples republic of china that they have engaged in the Missile Technology but they have proliferated every other weapons system that theyve every invented. So its a pretty Clear Pathway to the potential proliferation of these type of systems. And the third question was the capability of our intelligence. Im reasonably confident in the ability of our Intelligence Community to monitor the testing but not the deployment of these Missile Systems. Kim jongun and his forces are very good at camouflage concealment and deception. We have a series of programs that id be happy to talk about in a classified setting that talk to the ability of our Intelligence Community, both military and civilian, to monitor those activities. And i think its been said outside of a classified hearing that the things that he has been doing make him the nicest thing i can say about kim jongun is hes totally unpredictable and the most unpredictable of anyone ive ever had any kind of experience with or even reading about. And thats whats been scary to most of the people, and i assume you agree with that . Yes, sir, i agree with that assessment. Okay. Now, getting down to our threats, this committee has received the testimony from the uniforms and from the experienced people outside of the uniforms that own a third of the Army Brigade Combat Teams and only a fourth are ready. We hear about the 62 of our f18s that the marines are using dont work and so we recognize that when we are going through what weve been going through in the last few years that the first thing to go is mant nebs and then, of course, modernization. So id like to have your assessment, whether or not you do agree with general wilson, for example, when he testified before this committee that fewer than 50 of the air force combat force are sufficiently ready for a highly contested fight against peer adversaries. So were getting down to our individuals. And then secretary wilson and general have told us that they will be short 1500 pilots, most of them fighters, by the end of this year. Do you agree with this assessment and do you want to elaborate on anything that they have said . Senator, i agree with both assessments. Both speak to the availability of funds and resources to do the highend training that is required to make our forces ready for highintensity combat against a peer competitor. The budget in 17 is helpful. The proposed budget for 18 will move us down the pathway of being able to restore much of that training but it will be a twoyear process beyond the initial insertion before you see the readiness improve. Yes. I agree with that. Senator reed . Thank you, general selva, for your service. One of the issues in terms of the third offset thats creating an issue is they are working Public Knowledge on sort of a very cheap satellites, inexpensive, i should say, and also exploiting them with Artificial Intelligence. Something that we need in many places, particularly korea. Were told that they are about to run our money further and we havent received the reprogramming yet and i would think this would be of urgent need and can you explain why they are in this distress and what we can do . Yes, sir, i can. We put tremendous demands on the defense Experimental Unit in the programs that they are working for us, we were notified early last week by director rasha that they have been cash flowing into two programs. We have a reprogramming proposal in staff, as we speak, that will address the balance of the requirements for the fiscal year. Well begin some of the funding for programs that will extend into the next fiscal year. Theyll be able to do that with yearend money. Thank you very much. One of the areas of concern, and there are many, is the situation in iraq. I was there about four weeks ago. Making progress on the ground, general townsend is doing a superb job as commander on the ground as well as when i was up at qs, the 182nd brigade was leading the advisory effort. But the issue now becomes as we reduce their effect as isis has a longterm presence there. Do you have views on that . Also, i heard there were claims at least by revolutionary guards for iran, that they are designated as a terror group, that they will retaliate against our forces. Sir, in iraq, the fighting is far from over. Isis has lost their sanctuary in mosul but they still have a handful of small towns that they control in and around the province. President abadi has a plan to begin a campaign with steve townsends help and consent to clear those towns and move into Anbar Province as that will deny isis sanctuary on both sides of the syrian iraqi border. I read about the iranian republic card maki republic guard making that statement and we will have to posture ourselves to be ready for that but i dont think we should take that threat and keep it from taking action against the kuds force. Thank you. In another area in your advance policy questions, you indicated, which is something that has been seconded by many that are adversaries and antiaccess technologies have eroded a tremendous overmatch by the United States and the question is, what are we doing to get back way ahead, not just a few inches ahead, metaphorically . Thank you, senator. You alluded to the work that weve been doing the last couple of years in the Concepts Development arena as well as working what former secretary deputy secretary called the third offset strategy. Those are concepts that would allow us to contest what we call the antiaccess area denial strategies that many of our adversaries have attempted to impose upon us by making our bases more resilient associated with the area denial strategies, particularly that china and north korea are attempting to impose upon us and allow us to project force into areas that will otherwise presume denied. Thank you. Finally and quickly, we have been working for several different congresses on acquisition reform. Weve passed legislation. We still have a long way to go. I think we both recognize that, honestly. And as chairman of jroc, youve been given additional responsibility, both actual and referential. But can you tell us what youre doing to help jumpstart acquisition and get it so we can deliver systems . The army is commendable for many things with their timing, et cetera, but theyve had a tough record of getting things from the drawing board into the field. Can you comment . Yes, sir. We are implementing the guidance that we received in last years nda ndaa. The deployment that supports readiness is a building relationship with the Service Chiefs and secretaries in their Acquisition Authority roles. So the jroc is providing requirements to the Service Acquisition authorities not only for the basic design and Integration Capabilities that go into systems but actual performance along the lines of buying systems. One really striking example of that capability was a piece of work that we did to move counter Unmanned Aircraft system technologies into iraq from idea to fruition measured in months, from delivery to deployment measured in weeks and those are numbers that are actually quite useful. Thank you. Senator ernst . Thank you, general selva and mrs. Selva for your support and service to our nation as well. General selva, regarding southeast asia, you suggest that shortterm stressors can be managed within the alliance construct and a few weeks ago, referring to the philippines specifically, secretary mattis testified that in 2014 we canceled our named counterterror opera