SPEAKERS       CONTENTS       INSERTS    
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64–891
2000
  
[H.A.S.C. No. 106–50]

HEARINGS

ON

NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT
FOR FISCAL YEAR 2001—H.R. 4205

AND

OVERSIGHT OF PREVIOUSLY AUTHORIZED PROGRAMS

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION
MILITARY PROCUREMENT SUBCOMMITTEE
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MEETING JOINTLY WITH
MILITARY RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT SUBCOMMITTEE
ON
TITLE I—PROCUREMENT
TITLE II—RESEARCH, DEVELOPMENT, TEST, AND EVALUATION

HEARING HELD
MARCH 14, 2000

  

MILITARY PROCUREMENT SUBCOMMITTEE

DUNCAN HUNTER, California, Chairman
FLOYD D. SPENCE, South Carolina
BOB STUMP, Arizona
JAMES V. HANSEN, Utah
JIM SAXTON, New Jersey
JAMES TALENT, Missouri
TERRY EVERETT, Alabama
J.C. WATTS, Jr., Oklahoma
MAC THORNBERRY, Texas
LINDSEY GRAHAM, South Carolina
JIM RYUN, Kansas
JIM GIBBONS, Nevada
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MARY BONO, California
JOSEPH PITTS, Pennsylvania
ROBIN HAYES, North Carolina

NORMAN SISISKY, Virginia
IKE SKELTON, Missouri
JOHN M. SPRATT, Jr., South Carolina
LANE EVANS, Illinois
ROD R. BLAGOJEVICH, Illinois
TOM ALLEN, Maine
JIM TURNER, Texas
ADAM SMITH, Washington
JAMES H. MALONEY, Connecticut
MIKE McINTYRE, North Carolina
CYNTHIA A. McKINNEY, Georgia
ELLEN O. TAUSCHER, California
ROBERT BRADY, Pennsylvania

Steven Thompson, Professional Staff Member
Roger Smith, Professional Staff Member
John Sullivan, Professional Staff Member
J.J. Gertler, Professional Staff Member
Jesse Tolleson, Staff Assistant

MILITARY RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT SUBCOMMITTEE
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CURT WELDON, Pennsylvania, Chairman
ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland
STEVEN KUYKENDALL, California
DONALD SHERWOOD, Pennsylvania
JOHN R. KASICH, Ohio
HERBERT H. BATEMAN, Virginia
JOEL HEFLEY, Colorado
JOHN M. McHUGH, New York
HOWARD ''BUCK'' McKEON, California
JOHN N. HOSTETTLER, Indiana
SAXBY CHAMBLISS, Georgia
VAN HILLEARY, Tennessee
JOE SCARBOROUGH, Florida
WALTER B. JONES, Jr., North Carolina
BOB RILEY, Alabama

OWEN PICKETT, Virginia
GENE TAYLOR, Mississippi
MARTIN T. MEEHAN, Massachusetts
PATRICK J. KENNEDY, Rhode Island
SILVESTRE REYES, Texas
TOM ALLEN, Maine
VIC SNYDER, Arkansas
JIM TURNER, Texas
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LORETTA SANCHEZ, California
CIRO D. RODRIGUEZ, Texas
ROBERT E. ANDREWS, New Jersey
BARON P. HILL, Indiana
JOHN B. LARSON, Connecticut

Stephen Ansley, Professional Staff Member
Brian Green, Professional Staff Member
Robert Lautrup, Professional Staff Member
Jean Reed, Professional Staff Member
William Natter, Professional Staff Member
Erica Striebel, Staff Assistant
(ii)  

C O N T E N T S

CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF HEARINGS
2000

HEARING:
    Tuesday, March 14, 2000, Fiscal Year 2001 National Defense Authorization Act—Navy and Marine Corps Investment Programs for Fiscal Year 2001

APPENDIX:
    Tuesday, March 14, 2000
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TUESDAY, MARCH 14, 2000
FISCAL YEAR 2001 NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT—NAVY AND MARINE CORPS INVESTMENT PROGRAMS FOR FISCAL YEAR 2001

STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS

    Hunter, Hon. Duncan, a Representative from California, Chairman, Military Procurement Subcommittee

    Pickett, Hon. Owen, a Representative from Virginia, Ranking Member, Military Research and Development Subcommittee

    Sisisky, Hon. Norman, a Representative from Virginia, Ranking Member, Military Procurement Subcommittee

WITNESSES

    Buchanan, Hon. H. Lee, Assistant Secretary of the Navy (Research, Development and Acquisition)

    Lautenbacher, Vice Adm. Conrad C., U.S. Navy, Deputy Chief of Naval Operations (Resources, Warfare Requirements, and Assessments)

    Williams, Lt. Gen. Michael J., U.S. Marine Corps, Deputy Chief of Staff for Programs and Resources
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APPENDIX

PREPARED STATEMENTS:
[The Prepared Statements Submitted for the Record can be viewed in the hard copy.]
Buchanan, Hon. H. Lee

Hunter, Hon. Duncan

Lautenbacher, Vice Adm. Conrad C.

Pickett, Hon. Owen

Sisisky, Hon. Norman

Williams, Lt. Gen. Michael J.

DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD:
[There were no Documents Submitted for the Record.]

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD:
[The Questions and Answers are pending.]

FISCAL YEAR 2001 NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT—NAVY AND MARINE CORPS INVESTMENT PROGRAMS FOR FISCAL YEAR 2001
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House of Representatives, Committee on Armed Services, Military Procurement Subcommittee, Meeting Jointly with Military Research and Development Subcommittee, Washington, DC, Tuesday, March 14, 2000.

    The Subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 1:00 p.m., in room 2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Duncan Hunter (Chairman of the Subcommittee) presiding.

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. DUNCAN HUNTER, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM CALIFORNIA, CHAIRMAN, MILITARY PROCUREMENT SUBCOMMITTEE

    Mr. HUNTER. The Subcommittee will come to order. The Subcommittees because we are doing this jointly with the R&D Subcommittee.

    This afternoon, we welcome witnesses from the Department of the Navy to receive testimony on the Navy and Marine Corps modernization programs. The fiscal year 2001 Navy and Marine Corps procurement budget request is $26.6 billion. Compared to the fiscal year 2000 appropriation of $23.4 billion, that is a 13.6 percent increase.

    However, this budget request is also about $400 million, or 1.5 percent less than the Administration told us it would be when the budget for fiscal year 2000 was submitted. A 13.6 percent increase in this procurement budget may sound like a boost, but as a result of diminished modernization budgets over the past seven years, it is not nearly enough.

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    Last month, the Chief of Naval Operations (CNO), Admiral Johnson, warned the Committee that while the Navy meets its commitments, it does not do so without increasing demands on its people and equipment. He told us ''There is growing evidence that our forces are stretched too thinly.'' He also said, ''The submarine force is no longer able to meet all the regional Commanders in Chief (CINCs') requirements due to the draw-down in force level.''

    Additionally, he mentioned that the Kosovo campaign placed an extraordinary demand for low density assets like the EA–6B which, he said, is accelerating the end of their projected service lives due to the unplanned additional operating tempo.

    General Jones, the Commandant of the Marine Corps, also appeared before our Committee last month. While he's justifiably proud of today's Corps, he also touched on a few reasons why today's budget is not enough. He noted the demand on the Marine Corps' F/A–18D fleet in the Kosovo operation because the F/A–18A fleet simply was not up to the task of combat.

    The F/A–18A currently has a limited weapons capability and is unable to operate under the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) air command and control system. So far, only 34 of the Marine Corps' 76 F/A–18As have been funded for upgrades that would have made them operationally employable. Six additional aircraft are funded for the upgrades in the fiscal year 2001 budget request before us today.

    However, according to the current plans, only 14 more F/A–18As will be modernized in the next five years, leaving 22 aircraft non-deployable. The Commandant also noted that the production of the MV–22, the replacement for the 40-year-old CH–46E and CH–53D fleets, is slated to increase to only 28 aircraft per year in 2003.
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    This production rate is down from the 38 aircraft per year envisioned just last year. Because this budget is not enough, both the Chief of Naval Operations and the Commandant of the Marine Corps have submitted a combined unfunded requirements amount of $6.5 billion in fiscal year 2001 alone. In the remaining years of the Future Years' Defense Program (FYDP) from 2002 to 2005, unfunded requirements in the Navy and Marine Corps total an additional $27.9 billion.

    With us today, for what I hope will be a candid discussion of Navy and Marine Corps modernization programs, are: Dr. Lee Buchanan, Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Research, Development and Acquisition; Vice Admiral Conrad Lautenbacher, Deputy Chief of Naval Operations, Resources, Warfare Requirements and Assessments. Thank you for being with us again, Admiral. You are a regular attendee at our hearings; and Lieutenant General Michael Williams, Deputy Chief of Staff for Programs and Resources, Headquarters, United States Marine Corps.

    As always, we are delighted to have all of you with us. Secretary Buchanan, before I turn the floor over to you, I first wanted to call upon our good friend Curt Weldon who is co-Chairing this hearing with me today. Although I know that Curt has several other critical meetings that he has to be at, I am going to place, without objection, his entire statement in the record.

    I did want to mention a couple of things that I want you to touch on, on Curt's behalf that I know were important. They are mentioned in his statement. He says, ''Overall, the Navy and the Office of Naval Research, in particular, should be commended for the way they have sustained the science and technology accounts that provide the basis for future capabilities of our Naval, Sailors, and Marines alike.
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    I am concerned, however, about our ability to sustain these funding levels in the out years when pressure on the budget may increase. I would like to hear from Secretary Buchanan and Admiral Lautenbacher their views on what will be required in the future. I am concerned also about what will happen in the future to the legacy systems that are in the fleet today, and new systems that are being fielded.

    Technology, particularly, information technology, is advancing at a rapid rate. What is the Navy going to do to ensure that systems in the fleet today and new systems that are entering the fleet in the next few years will keep pace with the advance of technology and ensure that both today's and tomorrow's sailors and Marines will be superior to any potential adversary.''

    So, those are two major points of concerns from Chairman Weldon. I hope, gentlemen, that you will address those in your testimony. So, before we go to Secretary Buchanan, let me yield first to the very distinguished gentleman from Virginia, and a strong and tireless advocate of the Navy and the Marine Corps, Mr. Sisisky.

    [The prepared statement of Mr. Hunter can be found in the Appendix.]

STATEMENT OF HON. NORMAN SISISKY, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM VIRGINIA, RANKING MEMBER, MILITARY PROCUREMENT SUBCOMMITTEE

    Mr. SISISKY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
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    There are probably a lot of places that some of us would rather be than in a Congressional hearing room today, but I will come to any hearing, any time to hear Admiral Lautenbacher talk about the need for 15 carrier battle groups. We met in this room two weeks ago, Mr. Chairman, if you remember, to discuss the ship building portion of the budget.

    The Navy witnesses, Admiral McGinn and Admiral Moore, who are both running fleets full-time, gave us a very challenging perspective. They said their sailors and ships are running hard. Of course, that is the Navy's job. But they also said the complex demands of doing more with less could be relieved if we provided more ships. That is pretty simple.

    It is like Nascar. If you run flat out all of the time, your engines let go. Today's Navy is running flat out, I might add, all of the time. What the Admiral said they need to do the job right is at least 350 ships, 14 amphibious readiness groups, 15 carrier battle groups, and at least 60 attack submarines.

    To get anywhere near those numbers will take at least $10 billion a year. In fact, one witness said the cost of the entire ship building program would be at least $16 billion. Deputy Secretary Hamre recently said he would like to see another $15 billion in the defense accounts. Well, that would certainly take care of the Navy's ships, but what about the air craft? What about pay increases? What about the other services?

    Mr. Chairman, it looks like the House Budget Committee, and I talked to you a little while ago, is going to increase the Administration's top line for defense programs by no more than a fraction of a percent. I know that you are working to increase that. That will give us about a billion or so dollars to work with.
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    Yet, the Navy and Marine Corps' unfunded requirements are around $6.5 billion for this year alone. So, on the one hand, we have a smaller Navy patrolling this same amount of water and surrounded by trouble spots. On the other hand, we have budgets that barely maintain an even keel. I guess what I am saying is that even though I realize this is the fault and responsibility of Congress, we are looking to you to tell us how you intend to make those numbers really add up.

    I hope you are up to the challenge because it seems pretty clear to me that we are not. I think you can tell that I am very frustrated with trying to reconcile real national security requirements with political penny-pinching. I am glad to say that is not the case with anyone here today.

    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    [The prepared statement of Mr. Sisisky can be found in the Appendix.]

    Mr. HUNTER. Thank you, Mr. Sisisky.

    Now, the other distinguished gentleman from Virginia, who is the Ranking Member on R&D, Mr. Pickett.

STATEMENT OF HON. OWEN PICKETT, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM VIRGINIA, RANKING MEMBER, MILITARY RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT SUBCOMMITTEE
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    Mr. PICKETT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    I welcome our witnesses here today and look forward to receiving their testimony on the Navy and Marine Corps fiscal year 2001 modernization plans. I am pleased that the Administration's Maritime Modernization Budget submission for fiscal year 2001 is several billion dollars over last year's appropriated level.

    While we are presently constrained by existing discretionary budget caps, the additional resources applied to maritime programs is a sincere attempt to replace rapidly aging weapons systems and is an acknowledgment of the need the Navy and Marine Corps' force structure. The $35.1 billion modernization plan for maritime programs contains several reasons for genuine concern.

    First, less than $8.5 billion is proposed for research and development, representing a drop of $580 million from last year's Congressionally appropriated level. Second, the level of Navy science and technology investment, the very source of innovation, fall more than 20 percent from last year; a one percent real reduction in investment.

    Third, in an effort to protect the highest of priorities, the maritime budget defers quantities and funding commitments of far too many key future programs. While it is encouraging to see a commitment to forward-leaning initiatives in some areas of the budget, such as the Technology Insertion Plan for the Virginia Class Nuclear Powered Attack-Submarine (SSN) Program, projected ship building rates remain at troubling low levels.

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    Re-capitalizing a 305-ship Navy is a daunting challenge, but it is one that will require a purchase rate of more than 10 ships per year. Plans to reconstitute the attack submarine force may also prove inadequate. Recent press reports of a joint staff study indicating that current levels to maintain a 50-boat force is far short of what the actual requirement will be.

    Other surface, sub-surface, and aviation matters require further examination. I remain eager to hear a review on the Navy's projected radar road map. Also, I would like to know when the report is going to be delivered to Congress that was required in last year's Defense Authorization Act on this subject?

    The investments in anti-submarine warfare capabilities are also inadequate. Most important, I am particularly concerned with affordability questions regarding the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF). In several areas of this program, there may be a considerable amount of technological risk. In view of this fact, I would like to know what the Navy and Marine Corp's plans are for this planned manned aircraft requirement. I hope today's panel could discuss those areas of the program that may contain high areas of risk and provide us their view about potential development problems.

    Mr. Chairman, we cannot forget that the Science and Technology (S&T) programs of the 1970s and 1980s produced the stealth and precision munitions of the 1990s. It follows that S&T investments made today will yield technological advantages in the year 2015 and beyond. Recognizing the fact that our Nation's military has pressing modernization commitments in the short-term, we must resist following our past practice of expanding procurement by short-changing R&D investment or of favoring development in management support at the expense of advanced technology and basic or applied research.
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    It is time that we reinvigorated the science and technology base. I hope our witnesses today can reassure us on this point. Thank you and I look forward to our witnesses' testimony.

    [The prepared statement of Mr. Pickett can be found in the Appendix.]

    Mr. HUNTER. I thank the gentleman.

    Secretary Buchanan, welcome. The floor is yours.

STATEMENT OF HON. H. LEE BUCHANAN, ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF THE NAVY (RESEARCH, DEVELOPMENT AND ACQUISITION)

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Thank you Mr. Chairman, Mr. Sisisky, Mr. Pickett, other distinguished Members of the Committees, the Joint Committees. I very much appreciate the opportunity to appear before you today. With your permission, Mr. Chairman, I have a lengthy statement that I would submit for the record.

    Mr. HUNTER. Without objection, your statement and all statements will be entered into the record.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Thank you, sir.

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    I would seek now only to mention a couple of highlights which are directed at some of the questions you have raised already. First of all, let me say that while our sister services, the Army, the Air Force, and the Coast Guard, do provide complementary assets, the defining characteristic of the Navy and Marine Corps team is that we accomplish our goal and exercise our influence readily and from the sea.

    We are expeditionary forces with virtually unlimited reach. We are most often able to avoid political issues associated with overseas basing and over flights. Our mobility, adaptability, and immense fire power make us an especially potent force. Mr. Sisisky, you are exactly right. We are a Navy that is running flat out. I would like to say that we are not so, but we are.

    In the past 84-month period, which ended in September, Navy forces participated in 80 contingencies; a little shy of one per month for the last seven years. In short, we continue to balance today's readiness with modernization and re-capitalization for the future. To do this, we are taking a strategy-based approach that is built upon two fundamental concepts: our enduring role of forward presence and knowledge superiority, an emerging aspect of our operations that is truly transforming the naval service.

    We are building on our tradition of expeditionary operations as we transform into network-centric and not knowledge-superior services. This is the achievement of a real time shared and understanding of the battle space by all warriors at all levels of command. To support this strategy and our forces, the President's fiscal year 2001 budget request increases the amount of investment critical to manning our Navy and Marine Corps team as the preeminent combat force in the world.
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    That budget reaches nearly $27 billion for our procurement programs. The ship building plan calls for 39 ships over the fit-up. Funding for the DDG–51 procurement continues into the last year of the four-year multi-year contract. At the fifth and sixth ships of the San Antonio Class, that is the LPD–17 amphibious transport dock ship, which will serve as the functional replacement for four existing amphibious ship classes, are also funded in 2001.

    You have already mentioned the F/A–18 Hornet, the Super Hornet, the Navy's top aviation program. This aircraft has just completed, successfully, its operational test and evaluation. It will enter full rate production under a five-year multi-year procurement. Our 2001 budget also requests procurement of 16 Marine Corps V–22 aircraft, and the advanced procurement of 19 aircraft in 2002.

    Mr. Pickett, you mentioned the Joint Strike Fighter. This, of course, is the Department of Defense's next generation strike aircraft for the Navy, the Marine Corps, as well as the Air Force and several of our allies. The Department of the Navy's 2001 budget request for JSF for RDT&E is $428 million this year. The program emphasizes affordability, reducing development costs, production costs, and the cost of ownership.

    It is, of course, in the middle of a very energetic competition, which will reach a crescendo this fall and early next spring with the flying of those prototype aircraft. The 1998 Appropriations Act approved multi-procurement for the AV–8B re-manufacture aircraft a year earlier than the planned Department of the Navy request for a multi-year program.

    The AV–8B fiscal year 2001 budget, for $226.6 million for the procurement of 10 AV–8B re-manufactured aircraft, reflects the fourth procurement year of a four-year multi-year program. You mentioned the EA–6B. That aircraft is being utilized to its very fullest. It is the sole airport support jammer of the Department of Defense. These aircraft are operated by the Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force crews.
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    Currently, these aircraft are being modified to a common configuration and equipped with the new improved jamming parts, which they will begin receiving in the form of an improved capability III, improved capabilities (ICAP) III, upgrade in fiscal year 2002. I have already mentioned briefly the MV–22 Osprey. This is, of course, the highest priority for our Marine Corps aviation.

    It is critical to the implementation of their OMFTS concept. The MV–22 Osprey is designed to replace, as has been mentioned, the CH–46E and CH–53D, as well as Special Operations Command TH–53A, 53J, and 47–D. The Navy's fiscal year 2001 budget requests $1.1 billion for procurement of 16 of these aircraft.

    In munitions, and I know this has been of particular concern to this Committee and to you, Mr. Chairman. In the Standoff Land Attack Missile, this is the Expanded Response, SLAM–ER. It is an air-launched air-to-ground missile employed by the Navy for Standoff Outside Area Defense. This missile did complete its operational evaluation in January of this year.

    It is scheduled for Milestone III decision of May of 2000. It was both operationally suitable and operationally effective. Due to the demonstrated performance far exceeding current capabilities of the baseline SLAM missile, ER has been deployed operationally since September 1999. This fiscal year 2001 budget requests 30 SLAM–ER missiles, bringing the total number of tactical missiles procured to 257.

    The Navy continues its effort for fiscal year 2001 to replace the man-in-the-loop features with automatic target acquisition in the Joint Standoff Weapon (JSOW), Unitary Variant. The goal is to provide the fleet with an effective and affordable Standoff Outside Point Defense Capability. Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM), full rate production continues in fiscal year 2001.
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    We have mentioned the current year ship building programs. Of course, our new emerging ship is the DD–21. This year's request includes $550 million to continue development of this Land Attack Destroyer. Armed with an array of land attack weapons, DD–21 will provide offensive, distributed, and provides fire power at long ranges in support of our new mission that is to project power and support forces ashore.

    Mr. Sisisky, you talked about the carrier program. Of course, our new CVNX Class aircraft carrier would use evolutionary multi-ship process for inserting new technologies. You did mention that. That will enhance our war fighting and enable critical features for future flexibility and, very importantly, dramatically increase the total cost of ownership.

    As you know, CVN–77 is the first step towards CVNX. It will receive a new integrated combat system with CVNX–1 to receive a new nuclear propulsion plant, electrical system, and the Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS), which would provide immediate war fighting capabilities and, again, substantially reduced costs.

    The second phase of the conversion to the new carrier CVNX–2, will receive restoration of service life allowance, balance survivability, and other war fighting enhancements. Our budget also includes $20 million to fund procurement of so-called Smartship upgrades for five CG–47 Class cruisers. These upgrades are designed to vastly reduce workload on our sailors.

    There is a complementary program which we call Smart Carrier, which is a similar initiative to reduce shipboard workload on our carriers through industry standard process re-engineering, and the insertion of enabling technologies. Smart Carrier funding is $12 million in fiscal year 2001. It includes advanced planning and procurement for technology insertion as well.
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    There is high interest on this Committee, and has been for some time, in mine warfare. I would like to spend just a second talking about where we have come in that important war fighting area. Last year, the Department of the Navy embarked on a new effort for our fleet to counter the sea mine threat; an effort that will result in decreased response time to commence mine workers' operations and will expand the overall Mine Countermeasures capability of the Navy.

    Termed as ''Organic Mine Countermeasures,'' that which does not need to be called in from outside the fleet, but a capability which resides within the fleet, we look forward to providing that capability with a system of systems. There are five systems operated from the CH–60S helicopter. They include the Airborne Laser Mine Detection System, AQS–20, and the Organic Airborne and Surface Influence Sweep.

    There is a surface component, the Remote Mine Hunting System, which would be installed into the DD–21, and the sub-surface component, the Near Term Mine Reconnaissance System launched from a Submarine IV Clandestine Reconnaissance of mine fields. I talked a minute ago and introduced this talking about information, superiority, and the way we intend to build on that. I would like to mention as well that we are embarked on a new project called the Navy/Marine Corps Internet (NMCI). We initiated this Internet to improve support to our war fighter commanders by changing our approach to acquiring and managing information technology infrastructure.

    In the new approach, this is part of a larger effort to realize Joint Vision 2010 by increasing the speed and security of information sharing among users. An essential feature of the NMCI is maximum reliance on commercial business models rather than the traditional military business model, replacing Government-owned and operated infrastructure with a contractor responsible for providing a complete range of services.
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    There are two reasons for this emphasis; one, very much more important than the other. The lesser important is the savings of money. The savings is going to be substantial. More important than that is the assurance that in procuring in this way we will continue to refresh our technology on a time scale that is appropriate to commercial businesses and not the slower traditional military insertion process.

    In terms of Navy theater-wide, I would like to mention only that recent Department of Defense (DOD) upper tier strategy decisions have resulted in restructuring of our Navy theater-wide (NTW) program within the new funding constraints, which preserves both NTW and Theater High-Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) upper tier programs, as they are both necessary elements of the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization (BMDO) family of systems. Finally, all of the distinguished Members have dwelt a little bit on science and technology transition.

    This, of course, is a subject that is very important to me, given my previous background. I would mention that the Department of Navy's acquisition strategy depends on the fact that the Department of Navy is a smart buyer and, just as importantly, a smart investor for the future. This year's budget request for $1.46 billion will be invested in programs from basic research through advanced technology development, and further leveraged through our $60 million investment in manufacturing technology to deliver technologically superior capabilities for many decades to come.

    I am sure Admiral Lautenbacher will want to talk about his future enabling capabilities process that I think you will find most interesting. To maximize the importance of our science and technology portfolio on our forces, I have established two new offices that report directly to me. The first of these is a Chief Technology Officer, specifically assigned, not for doing research and development, not for managing systems, but for accelerating the transition of technologies already developed into programs that are a part of the acquisition process.
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    Second of all, I have established the Office of Chief Engineer, not to do research and development, or to worry about technology insertion, but specifically responsible for inter-operability, as this is becoming an increasingly critical demand on our new systems as we operate with ourselves, with our sister services, and very importantly with our allies.

    Mr. Chairman, the Navy and Marine Corps acquisition team is continuing to work very hard to build a blend of acquisition programs that maximizes our current benefits, while buying smart for the future. We appreciate the support provided by this Committee and by the Congress, and look forward to working together with this Committee towards a secure future for our Nation.

    Thank you, sir.

    [The prepared statement of Secretary Buchanan can be found in the Appendix.]

    Mr. HUNTER. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.

    Admiral Lautenbacher.

STATEMENT OF VICE ADM. CONRAD C. LAUTENBACHER, U.S. NAVY, DEPUTY CHIEF OF NAVAL OPERATIONS (RESOURCES, WARFARE REQUIREMENTS, AND ASSESSMENTS)

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    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. Thank you, sir.

    Mr. Chairman, Mr. Sisisky, Mr. Pickett, distinguished Members of the two Subcommittees, and staff, it is a great privilege to be here today. I appreciate the opportunity to be able to answer questions in support of our fiscal year 2001 budget in procurement and R&D. Dr. Buchanan has given you an excellent run down of the procurement programs; if I could just take a minute to emphasize the requirements part of our program.

    Today the Navy is stretched thin, as the Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) and others have testified. As we sit here today, 46 percent of our ships are underway. Thirty-four percent of them are deployed in support of national defense needs. That means right today there are 48,000 Sailors and Marines on station around the world. It is a great privilege for me to be able to be here today to represent them.

    We, in the uniformed Navy and Marine Corps, appreciate the support of this Committee and of the Administration in providing the best possible equipment that we can give to our sailors and Marines when they go in harm's way. They deserve the best and we are working to give them the best. The pace of operations has been such in the past that it has almost tripled from where it used to be, in terms of meeting contingency responses in the Cold War. These contingency responses range from things like Kosovo, to relief for earthquake in Turkey, the earthquake disaster in Turkey, to East Timor, and a variety of other situations around the world.

    I might mention that for those who may not realize the benefit of Naval forces, as we go to the gasoline pumps today and pay $2 a gallon for gasoline, one might speculate on what would happen without naval forces in the right places in the world. So, they do a great service to stabilize the world, and stabilize our economy, and to provide the opportunity for all of our people to grow in our traditions and in our values.
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    Let me just emphasize that we are pleased that there is an increase in our budget for procurement. It is very important to us. Our recapitalization for the future has been mentioned in the beginning. It is vital, as well as the transformation of today's force into one that will be more efficient and more effective in the future.

    Of particular importance to us are programs such as the DD–21, which will allow dramatic reductions in the numbers of crew members and operating costs, as well as being highly relevant in the littoral and power projection into the future, the Naval Surface Fire Support Programs that we have, all of our Information Technology (IT) programs that will help network-centric warfare.

    This is the guts of what the future will look like. We need to be mindful of our modernization programs. We have fallen behind and more work needs to be done there as well. The new carrier program is very important to us. The new aircraft programs are important to us, such as the JSF and our CVNX Programs. These are critical to us for the future and for the future of this country.

    In closing, let me again thank the Committee for their strong support. We appreciate very much all that you have done for our sailors and Marines. I look forward to answering your questions.

    [The prepared statement of Admiral Lautenbacher can be found in the Appendix.]

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    Mr. HUNTER. Thank you, Admiral.

    General Williams, thank you for being with us today, sir.

STATEMENT OF LT. GEN. MICHAEL J. WILLIAMS, U.S. MARINE CORPS, DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF FOR PROGRAMS AND RESOURCES

    General WILLIAMS. Thank you sir. Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee, it is an honor to be here to represent the Commandant and the 172,000 active and 39,000 reserve Marines in our Corps. Fiscal year 2000 was a watershed budget. For the first time in seven years, we actually increased the rate of procurement and we increased the rate of experimentation.

    In 2001, we are continuing the momentum, both in our procurement accounts and in research and development. We continue to have to make difficult choices between day-to-day readiness and modernization. Especially to answer the concern in research and development, we are pushing hard on our war fighting lab and we have seen some positive results, actual commercial off-the-shelf things that we have been able to field as the result of experiments.

    In trying to get closer to the Office of Naval Research, the Vice Director of Naval Research is now a Marine Brigadier General. We are finding a lot more doors opening to us in Naval research than were opened before. So, that is a good news story for us. In short, the fiscal year 2001 budget is a good news story, but there is a lot more to be done. We are going to need your continued interest and support if we hope to reach our goals.
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    Thank you, sir.

    [The prepared statement of General Williams can be found in the Appendix.]

    Mr. HUNTER. Thank you, General, and thanks gentlemen for your opening statements. I am going to reserve my questions and go to Mr. Sisisky.

    Mr. SISISKY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Admiral Lautenbacher, did you say 15 carrier battle groups?

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. Yes, sir. If you were to meet the requirements that are laid on us by our CINCs, which is to cover the three major hubs of instability that we have around the world on a continuous basis, that being the Mediterranean, the Arabian Sea or Arabian Gulf, Southwest Asia, and Southeast Asia. In Northeast Asia and the Pacific Theater, the CINCs require one carrier battle group and one Oregon Station continuously.

    The force that provides that requirement would be 15 carrier battle groups and 14 Amphibious Ready Groups (ARGs). Today, we do not have that level of force structure. Therefore, that means that some of the theaters will be without coverage when it is needed.

    Mr. SISISKY. Dr. Buchanan, you talked about smartships. Of course, you oversee the naval research. Broadly speaking, are there any developments or technologies coming along that will allow the current Navy Fleet to effectively cover more ocean?
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    Secretary BUCHANAN. Yes. There are a number of technologies. Interestingly enough, we get the greatest yield of our research and development dollar in many ways when we not develop new technologies, but appropriate existing technologies that have already been developed from the commercial sector.

    Those technologies which are sometimes most important are some of the least mundane. That decreases the requirement for maintenance; that which decreases the time and increases the efficiency for logistics. These are all technologies which are already applied, in many cases in the commercial sector.

    We are now adopting to the new reality that in many cases, we cannot keep up with the technological development pace of the commercial industry. So, we are looking outside rather than inside. All of these will contribute to an increased availability for our fleets and an increased at-sea time with the obvious downside that, that means that more people with finite ships will be deployed longer and have more time to serve at sea.

    Mr. SISISKY. Admiral, again, back to you. We have got a lot of deck space to fill, a lot of aging aircraft. The F/A–18E and F/A–18F seems to be coming along fine. The Joint Strike Fighter, however, has been having a rougher time. Do you expect it to be ready on schedule or are we going to be doing life extension on a lot of current aircraft?

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. Well, I think it is hard to predict that far into the future. As you look at the program today, I think it is going through the normal throws of an early program so far. I will let Secretary Buchanan answer more about the details of it. But from my perspective, it has been staying on track.
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    Now, that has not been without having to do some modifications to it, but basically we are doing the right things to build this type of an airplane. Whether it will show up on time five or six years in the future, I think we will have to monitor year-to-year.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Mr. Sisisky, if I might add, of course, the aircraft is being built for the three services: Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps. It is the Marine Corps that has the greatest and most urgent need for that aircraft, since that will be the variant, the Vertical/Short Take-off (V/STO) variant, that will first be deployed, the Marine Corps, and I will let the General talk about this in detail, but of course, the JSF is intended to be that which replaces the aging AV–8B, which I spoke about in my opening statement. If there is a hazard there, that is where the hazard will be most urgently felt.

    General.

    General WILLIAMS. At the current schedule when the first deliveries of the VSTOW variant in 2008; we already we are going to be short airframes. Should the JSF slip in any considerable degree, that is just going to exacerbate a problem that we are going to face anyway. In fact, that is why we are trying to finish re-manufacturing all of our AV–8s so we can keep them in the fleet as fresh as we can until the Joint Strike Fighter arrives.

    Mr. SISISKY. How many AV–8s do you have?

    General WILLIAMS. Sir, I know we are trying to re-manufacture 88 of them. That is not the whole number. I will have to provide that number for the record, sir.
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    [The information referred to can be found in the Appendix.]

    Mr. SISISKY. The Joint Strike Fighter was to replace?

    General WILLIAMS. It will replace the Marine Corps' F/A–18s and the AV–8s.

    Mr. SISISKY. I thought it was the F/18s, the C and V models?

    General WILLIAMS. Yes, sir. That is correct, but also the AV–8.

    Mr. SISISKY. At the Committee's request, as you know, the CNO, Admiral Johnson, sent over his unfunded requirements list. From today's view, are any items on that list more important to the Navy than things that made it through the funding process? I know he has told me personally that ship repair is very high on his list. If you cannot answer, then you can get the answer to it, but are there any changes you would make?

    General WILLIAMS. There has been no changes, Congressman Sisisky. We believe that our unfunded list is extremely important. That is the next place where we would spend another dollar, should we be able to obtain it. What we have in our program though is absolutely essential to us. We ask for your continued support of those items.

    Mr. SISISKY. Thank you.
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    Mr. HUNTER. I thank the gentleman.

    I might add for the benefit of the Members of the Subcommittees that we will have a fairly extensive hearing on the Joint Strike Fighter on Thursday. That will include, I think we are going to have the GAO, which is just issuing a report with respect to the prospects for the JSF. We will have the program leadership on Joint Strike Fighter. So, it should be a very interesting hearing. Mr. Stump.

    Mr. STUMP. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Thank you gentlemen for your testimony. Mr. Chairman, I have no questions at this time. I will reserve my time for later.

    Mr. HUNTER. Mr. Pickett.

    Mr. PICKETT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Secretary Buchanan on the issue of missile defense, are you satisfied with the existing funding profile for the Navy, theater-wide program? With that existing profile that is being presented, number one, are there risks that could be eliminated with additional funding? Number two, will this program be resource constrained?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. This is a very difficult technical problem. It would be wrong ever to say that no risk remains at any level of funding. However, I am satisfied that at the current level of funding, we will be able to demonstrate the efficacy of a sea-based approach that can be then, with funding that is not ours and not in our budget, deploy an at-sea capability.
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    The burden is on us now to demonstrate that our concept is efficacious and will be effective at sea. I am satisfied that we have the funding to show that. Once that is demonstrated then we will, of course, require money that we do not have in order to implement.

    Mr. PICKETT. Tell me the situation on the radar. I mentioned in my opening remarks the radar study that was to be submitted to the Congress. What provisions are you making to upgrade the Navy radars in order to be able to adequately provide the radar system for the Navy upper tier, Navy theater-wide?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Admiral Lautenbacher has been the most intimately involved in the Radar Road Map Study, if I may defer to him.

    Mr. PICKETT. Sure, of course. Admiral.

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. Yes, sir. We have been working hard looking at the technical issues with radars for the future. We have put together a paper now which is very technically oriented. It is under review. We expect to be able to submit this very shortly to the Congress to look at.

    We do not believe it is the final answer. We have more work to do, and have setup another group, Secretary Buchanan along with his folks and our folks, to work on it. We are planning. We are working hard to get something out of the Defense Department to send over here very quickly on the radar road map.

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    Secretary BUCHANAN. If I may add, the approach that the Admiral is talking about is one in which, and it is a joint effort among the requires, the users of a radar, to define those functions that will be required in the future. The technology developers and the acquirers are on my side to determine what technologies will be available at what time in order to put into these systems.

    It turns out that in this particular area, the interplay is especially important. That accounts for some of the delay in getting the report to you. Rather than be too hasty, we wanted to be fully complete.

    Mr. PICKETT. Have you set a time when the final decision is going to be made about the requirements, both for the S-band and X-band radar?

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. We are reviewing it now. We do not have a time line on this. This was based on the follow-on cruiser and the next family member of the CG–21 family or the Surface Combatant 21 family. Right now, we are working on DD–21. The next logical ship to be bought would be CG–21. That would be a ship that would be full up of totally modern NTW and any other capabilities that may come in at that time.

So, that decision does not need to be made today. That is a decision that we have to make sure that we have the right technology in place, which is what this road map will help us do. Ensure that when that decision time comes, which should be towards the end of this fit-up period, not now but towards the end, as to what that radar looks like. That we will have the right pieces in place. That is what the road map is designed to do.

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    Mr. PICKETT. Are additional radar configurations going to be required in order for the cooperative engagement capability to be perfected?

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. The radar configurations that we have today will work very well with the cooperative engagement concepts. As you go into the future, you look at cooperative engagement as being kind of the network about which you join all of these sensors. The cooperative engagement is being developed so it can enfold new sensors as we move into the future.

    The sensors that we have today and the radars that we have today are built to be compatible with it and are working well in our testing program.

    Mr. HUNTER. Would the gentleman yield?

    Mr. PICKETT. I would be happy to, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. HUNTER. This is a great line of questions and I appreciate the gentleman from Virginia. Could you, Admiral, tell the Subcommittee Members a few things about the pluses and minuses of the XBAND versus SBAND? Practically speaking, what you get out of each type.

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. An XBAND radar is a much higher frequency radar than an SBAND. So, it has a smaller beam. It is good for discrimination. It is good for determining small targets. We call it a fire control radar, generally speaking, in the Navy. It is something that once you have found the piece of sky where you want to look for a target, an XBAND radar is very good at that.
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    An SBAND radar, on the other hand, is better for volume search. It also is a high enough frequency so that you can pinpoint targets to a reasonably small area. That is why our Aegis system is so successful because it is able to, it takes an SBAND, which is kind of a medium-range frequency. It allows you to do volume search as well as to get a small enough area so you can put a fire control solution on it. So, the issue is discrimination versus coverage in kind of a very basic way.

    Mr. HUNTER. So, SBAND, if you look at your Aegis as a little less the eye system basically, looking to detect and shoot down hostile missiles coming in, anti-ship missiles, having the big picture is an advantageous thing.

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. Absolutely.

    Mr. HUNTER. Whereas, there are aspects of missile defense, theater missile defense, that the XBAND lends itself to.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. If I may, traditionally, one, in viewing these tradeoffs concludes that you need both. The SBAND you can think of as a spotlight. The XBAND you can think of as a laser. I order to acquire the target with the narrow beam, I need first to apply the big wide beam. In order to use a target, once acquired by the big beam, I need a narrow beam. So, normally they are employed together.

    To choose one over the other and demand a single wave length system requires a very intricate set of trades to depend on power, bandwidth, and all sorts of parameters that are technically-based. That is why I was saying a moment ago that much of this decision that you are looking for has to be based on the results on technology developments that are yet incomplete. So, this is not a secret. It is really a mystery at this stage. We hope to eliminate that in the road map that you will be furnished.
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    Mr. HUNTER. I thank the gentleman.

    Mr. PICKETT. Just one final matter. You mentioned, Mr. Secretary, in your remarks that you had I think established a Chief Engineer to try to make sure that you were utilizing the available technology, and someone in another position that you had made reference to, along this same line, about trying to be able to coordinate complicated activities. Another area that I think some Members of this Committee are concerned about is the way in which we manage the software.

    The numbers that have been given to me indicate that some $42 billion was expended by the Defense Department in 1999 in the development of new software. Yet, there does not seem to be any consistent program across the military to properly manage how software is developed. The Navy has a program that they are running called the Software Program Managers' Network. I believe it is SPMN, or something of that nature, that is supposed to be really trying to coordinate software development across all of the services.

    Can you tell us anything about that program and what you plan to do in the Navy to more effectively spend the dollars and manage the dollars for software development?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Congressman, you are exactly right. The program to which you refer is exactly and precisely a program to trade information. The problem in this area is, of course, that software management is a new science. It is a new discipline. It is not very well-developed. Even in the commercial sector, the management of software is problematic. It has to do with the fact that for the first time, we are having to manage immensely complex things. Namely, that with enough features that it cannot be held in the head of a single person at any one time. It is very new.
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    It is more severe, interestingly enough, in the military than it is in the commercial sector. The commercial sector gets the benefit of very high volume. At Microsoft, for instance, a single software product will sell 10-to-the- fifth, 10-to-the-sixth, 10-to-the-seventh copies. So, they can afford to be very inefficient.

    Because the use of the software is by consumers like you and me, the quality of that software can be relaxed somewhat. We cannot do that in the military. So, this is a developing science. The particular software, the Program Managers' Network, that you referred to has proven to be an effective way of trading information back and forth. Regrettably, it is not information that yet exist. So, there will have to be a complement to that to make the science more science and less an art.

    Mr. PICKETT. This is just a follow-up question here. Is it a problem where this program is located? Does the program get adequate funding to even approach doing the job that it is charged with doing?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. In its role as a broker of information, yes, sir, I believe it is adequately funded. As I say, it would become more relevant were there a far greater body of information to share. That, regrettably, is not the case. I hope it will be in the future.

    Mr. PICKETT. At the present time, it is my understanding that this service is being provided through the Navy.

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    Secretary BUCHANAN. Yes, sir.

    Mr. PICKETT. Would it be more effective if this activity were managed through the Office of the Secretary of Defense?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Of course, it would be less efficient for the Navy because we would receive proportionally as benefit, but the movement of it to the broader defense perspective might well have advantage. Let me take that for the record and get back to you on that.

    [The information referred to can be found in the Appendix.]

    Mr. PICKETT. Thank you, and thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. HUNTER. Absolutely. I thank the gentleman for his questions. They were an excellent line of questions.

    Mr. Bateman, another great leader and promoter of our Naval forces and a gentleman we are going to sorely miss here.

    Mr. BATEMAN. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Admiral, I appreciate your testimony. I am certainly appreciative of the increasing recognition that the size of the Navy, as we see it, and it is a reality, and as we project into the future, is woefully inadequate. The build rates will not sustain the Navy we have got to have. We, again this year, are going to worsen that problem because we have not increased the build rate sufficiently in this fiscal year budget.
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    There is little likelihood, as anyone is presently planning or talking about it, of doing something about it next year. So, we are compounding the problem the longer we forestall doing something about it. I think you made reference to you were glad to be here to support or to defend this budget. It is a better budget than last year's and the ones before it.

    I think we have got to do better than defend this year's budget. One of the things you and Secretary Buchanan and others, when you come before the Committee and when you have an opportunity to get a message to the American people, you need to be talking about how can we maximize? How much we can do to augment the size of the Navy to diminish this problem of the shrinkage of the Navy by different ways of budgeting and financing what we have built so that we have more stability in Naval ship building programs?

    We have got, I think, to do some fundamental things about how we go about budgeting and financing that which everyone who seems to know anything about our requirements admits needs to be done. The longer we defer doing that, the more we help toward the aggravation of the problem.

    So, I would like very much to have the Navy report to us on the Navy's view on what could be done to maximize the attainment of our ship building objectives, if we made some changes the way in which we here in the Congress go about budgeting and financing Naval requirements.

    I think that will be very useful to the Committee and hopefully useful to the Navy. I hope you would agree that there are things that might be done which would create that stability and enhance the building rate, if we would just change the way that we finance them and budget them.
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    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. Yes, sir. I agree anyway that there are other ways to finance ships than we do it today. We have suggested in the past things like building charter. We continue to look for more suitable ways of evening the workload, evening the amount of money that is required, stabilizing the industrial bases. So, there are other ways to do that and we would be delighted to answer with some suggestions.

    [The information referred to can be found in the Appendix.]

    Mr. BATEMAN. I would seriously urge that you give some emphasis to this. It does things about solving your problem. It makes it so much easier, or at least easier, to solve your problem which all of us seem to recognize, but we do not seem to be getting very far along in solving it when we still have not enhanced the building rate.

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. Sure.

    Mr. HUNTER. Mr. Bartlett.

    Mr. BARTLETT. Thank you very much.

    I have but a single question at this time for General Williams. General, what equipment on your unfunded priority list is most mission essential?

    General WILLIAMS. Sir, let me answer this way. When we put that list together, the great majority of the procurement on that list are accelerations in order to push modernization out of the Marines as quickly as we can. In that respect, I would have to say that those things that we are buying, very unglamourous things, like HMMWVs, which are high maintenance intensive items in the fleet, would offer the quickest relief if they were to get out sooner.
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    So, I would put the importance on taking the workload off of the backs of the Marines and knocking down the operational support costs as we carry this old equipment forward.

    Mr. BARTLETT. Thank you very much. I do not have any more questions at this time, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. HUNTER. I thank the gentleman.

    Mr. Taylor.

    Mr. TAYLOR. Gentlemen, on page 8 of your testimony you make reference to the benefits of the long lead multi-ship procurement, 13 ships with the DDGs which expires this year. I am curious if the Navy is going to request another multi-ship procurement for all of the reasons that you espouse that the previous one was a good idea?

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. We believe that it is very efficient and a good way to go about the business. This has been a good procurement for us. We have money reserved for economic order quantities. We are looking at the most efficient way to buy the remaining DDGs and certainly a multi-year is a strong possibility. It is premature to say right now what we will decide, but that is where we are looking.

    We are looking at some sort of way to block buys or multi-years; some way to take advantage of efficiencies and leveling the workload for our industrial base.
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    Mr. TAYLOR. General, I am going to ask this to all three of you. I happen to have attended parts of the ship building conference last week. I am painfully aware that we are not building enough ships to maintain a 300-ship Navy. I see the Marine Corps UH–1s and 56s with the V–22, which is a great platform, but also very expensive.

    I see the Navy replacing aging fighters 14s with 18E/Fs. What I do not see is how you ever get there. I do not see any plan in the out years to where you purchase enough of anything to fill the gaps of what you have now. I do not really hear anyone ever coming before this Committee and saying, at some point we fall off the cliff.

    At some point, we are going to have a very small force of new planes, of new ships, of new whatever, but it in now way is as capable as what we had before simply because of a lack of numbers. That goes back to the lack of a request. I would like to hear your thoughts on that.

    General WILLIAMS. We, as I have testified before, the ship building program that we have this year is just reaching the edge of adequacy. We have not gotten to the point where we can say we can re-capitalize the force that we have.

    Mr. TAYLOR. But if I may Admiral, that is after five years of inadequacy.

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. Yes, sir.

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    Mr. TAYLOR. So, if you are only breaking even one out of every five years, you do not get there. You do not even come close.

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. And I agree. If we continue to buy the numbers of ships and airplanes that are in our program, the Navy will get inevitably smaller. We can lay those numbers out. It is not a mystery in the sense that, that is a fact. What you have said is absolutely correct.

    Mr. TAYLOR. Mr. Secretary, because the General and the Admiral will be a little reluctant to answer this, let me make it a political question. At what point does the Administration say that $30 billion worth of additional procurement is more important than $30 billion worth of tax breaks? This Congress has given away a heck of a lot more than $30 billion worth of tax breaks in the past couple of weeks.

    The President did not ask for them. They just did it. At what point does the Administration step forward and say, okay guys, I am going to challenge you to do what is best for the Nation and not what is best for a couple of your big contributors?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Well, of course, the problem is two-fold, I mean, as you point out and has been said by several smarter than I am. Quantity has a quality all of its own. Much of our strategy in providing, and I would not agree with your equation that a reduced quantity always leads to a reduced capability. The trick in this is to get more for the dollars invested.

    The Congressman a moment ago alluded to ways in which we can budget in order to get maximum efficiency out of every dollar that we have put down. We have fewer ships now than we had in every previous year. We are on a monotonic decline. When I came into the Navy in 1971, we had as I recall 1,400 ships. That is a far cry from today's force. Every ship on which I served was much less capable than any ship that is currently in the fleet.
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    Where we have chosen to take advantage is, again, with the tradition of using technology for which this country has a great strength to advantage in our military. I talked about it in my opening statement TADCX, which was a ship designed and effective at replacing four different classes of vessel with one hull. That is a way to retain the capability that we had.

    DD–21 is going to be a marvelous ship for land support, much more than any several ships our previous years. I do understand and agree that numbers are important. So, it is the balancing act that we are trying to do here in an acquisition sense, and a requirement sense in order to keep the capability high. We are on the raged edge of effectiveness now. We are trying to stay there through all of the means that we have discussed here.

    Mr. TAYLOR. Back to the political question. At what point, since I hear many of my colleagues well the President has not asked for this defense program and the President is not asking for enough of that. Well, they sure as heck have passed a couple of tax breaks without asking the President's thoughts on it. So, at what point does the Administration step forward and call their hand and say, okay guys, if you are serious, if you really have $30 billion lying around that you do not know what to do with, let us build a couple of carriers. Let us replace some of those old UH–1s with V–22s. Let us build a few more E and Fs to make up for the fact that yes, they are more expensive, but they are more capable. At what point are you all willing to step forward and call some of these people's hands?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. I cannot answer you directly.

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    Mr. TAYLOR. Well, you are the Secretary. Do you have to go back and talk to the President?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. I do not talk to the President, no sir.

    Mr. TAYLOR. How about speaking to Secretary Cohen?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Well, the challenge that is before us from the White House is to fulfill their expectations. That in fact, with a prudent investment of funds, we can fund a military that will have battle capabilities at the current level. That is the charge that I have and the one that we are trying to fulfill.

    Mr. TAYLOR. Secretary Buchanan I have got to tell you. I wonder if someone in late 1949 did not make a very similar statement to the United States Congress, saying we have everything that is adequate. We do not see any problems. Then something horrible happened in Korea to remind us that we were not adequate. I have got to tell you that I have a sinking feeling in my gut that we are getting to that point where somebody could sure as hell surprise us. I would sure as hell hate to have a bunch of dead Americans happen because we did not do our jobs.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. I have the same queasiness, sir. As I say, my charge is to turn the amount of funds that is available into the most capable Navy that we can possibly support. That is my job. To the extent that I am mortally able, that is what I intend to do.

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    Mr. HUNTER. Will the gentleman yield?

    Mr. TAYLOR. Sure.

    Mr. HUNTER. Mr. Secretary, I think that is a good line of questioning. That leads to the question that obviously you folks, the White House depends on you to develop requirements. What Admiral Lautenbacher told this Committee here a couple of weeks ago, along with several operational Naval leaders, was you cannot get to there from here, from where we are going.

    If you will look at the numbers, and that has followed a series of testimonies by Congressional Budget Office (CBO), for example, which said that to replace, just to maintain existing force, you are going to need to have a procurement budget of $90 billion. Former Secretary of Defense Schlesinger appeared with one think tank which recommended actually an additional $100 billion a year, just to maintain the force that we have got.

    One point that he made was it did not take a rocket scientist to look at this fleet of old taxi cabs that we have got, add up their projected lives and the rate of replacement, and determine about where you have to be and where we really are. I think the point that Mr. Taylor is making is he wants to know if you have been pounding the table, sending back up through the chain of command that we cannot get the job done with the numbers that they are sending down to us?

    You cannot maintain as first Admiral Lautenbacher testified, along with the operational commanders from 3rd and 5th Fleet who were here this last week. You need a 350-ship Navy to be able to carry out operational assignments as required by the CINCs. So, you cannot do that if you are building a 200- or a 300-ship Navy. Secondly, we are not even building a 200- or a 300-ship Navy.
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    So, is there anybody in the building who is sending up urgent messages to the White House that we need more?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. I can assure you there is no one in the Navy, either on the uniform side or the civilian side, that is satisfied, completely satisfied, with the budget that we have.

    Mr. HUNTER. Okay. But I am not asking about self-satisfaction or how you guys feel about it. I think you have a duel role. One role ultimately is to take the dollars that you are given and use them as effectively as you can, when you say that is your job. The other role is to report to the White House as to whether or not you are ready for war and whether or not you can handle your assignments with the force structure that they are building you to.

    Now, the answers that have come in the last couple of weeks have been no, you cannot do it. Is anybody giving the White House that message, you cannot do it, we need more?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Absolutely. You have unfunded lists that come from both the CNO and the Commandant.

    Mr. HUNTER. Yes, but those have been requested by Congress. So, they are coming to us. Are they going up the other way?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. They are the mechanism by which we demonstrate to the White House, with precision, that these are the things, these are the equipments that we believe we need in order to satisfy the requirements. Yes, absolutely, we are making that message clear. There are, however, always trade-offs. The White House has to make those hard decisions.
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    We can make the case as clearly as we can. We are also under the obligation to make do with the budget that we have in the most efficient way. We believe there are still efficiencies to be reaped in the current budget. All of that is a part of daily discussion, I can assure you.

    Mr. TAYLOR. Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. HUNTER. Sure, Mr. Taylor.

    Mr. TAYLOR. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Secretary Buchanan, to follow-up on what the Chairman has said, at what point do you use the bully pulpit that comes with your job to go, not just to a room down in the basement of the Capital that is already full of true believers, but to get out to the different groups in corporate America and make the pitch that something has to be done and something has to be done now, and that, that is more important than other priorities in the budget?

    Who is doing it because I really do not hear anyone, I am say to say, in the Administration do it? If I do it, I am tainted. I come from ship building country. They are going to say, oh, he is looking out for his shipyard. If someone from, again, one of the secretaries does, it is a little bit different. A little bit more prestige comes from it.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. I am actually sad to hear that you do not hear that message.
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    Mr. TAYLOR. I do not hear word-one, sir.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Well, from me, certainly, at every chance that I get to make that point to industry and to the citizenry of this country. Secretary Danzig, it is almost his full-time job to make that point. I think we are portraying it as factually and as accurately as we can to the extent we can compete with other priorities. So, I am sorry that you do not hear us. That means I must need to yell louder.

    Mr. TAYLOR. I am asking.

    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. HUNTER. I thank the gentleman.

    The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Thornberry.

    Mr. THORNBERRY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Admiral, I want to continue a semi-automatic we were having a couple of weeks ago. You testified a little bit earlier today that there is a requirement to have a carrier battle group in each of several difficult regions of the world. My understanding is that a part of that requirement is to have a certain number of Tomahawks there ready to go.

    If those Tomahawks can be available through some other sort of platform, like a converter Trident, or if something like that can help fill in the gaps where you do not have a carrier available, does that not help, at least a little bit, relieve some of the pressure and tension that you have talked about so much today.
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    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. Obviously the more weapons that you can have on station, the better off you are in responding to contingencies. The use of a converted SSBN to an SSGN would add to the Tomahawk count with battle groups.

    Mr. THORNBERRY. In fact, it could supply the Tomahawk count for a certain theater; can it not?

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. Remember that the global Naval force presence ''requirements'' that we have are not real requirements. They are an allocation of the weapons that we have. In other words, they are an allocation of shortfall. If you ask the CINCs what their real requirements would be, it would probably be higher.

    I do not want to speak for them today because I am not in that capacity. You could indeed use those missiles to help with responses and to help with deterrence on stations. There is no question about that.

    Mr. THORNBERRY. Mr. Secretary, I want to shift a little bit. You have mentioned several times in answers to questions the need to make sure that we have inter-operability, the importance of testing things out in a joint world making sure that everything works together. Have you looked at taking some of the funds available to you and going down to Joint Forces Command and their joint experimentation center and see if they cannot help conduct some of these experiments in a joint environment?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Surely we have. Let me preface this, and it is a good question. Let me preface this in the following way. I look at inter-operability in three distinct levels. The way that Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) looks at it, most specifically, is inter-operability with our allies. Now, that is a problem for the reason that our allies are, first of all, not so technologically advanced as we are because their budgets are lower. Second of all, even in the sense of current technology, they are behind us in the addition of new equipments to their armed forces. So, there legacy system problems.
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    That is an inter-operability that is different from the inter-operability the next level down, which is an inter-operability with our sister services. There, the Navy has this problem more than the other services themselves because we have the Navy and the Marine Corps both to integrate together. Those processes, I think once refined, and we are working very hard on those with the Marine Corps War Fighters Lab and the Navy War Fighting Lap up in Newport, can be expanded.

    The level below that says that systems, even on a single ship need to inter-operate. That is a very different problem even from the other two. There, we are trying to address the problem by what we call a land test facility in which we wire together boxes that would be on a single ship all over the country. So, that while the problem of inter-operability has the same name in each of those domains, it is a very different problem with very different solutions all together.

    Mr. THORNBERRY. And I do not see why we would ever even think about buying something that is not inter-operable within the Navy itself, for example. My question really is when we take, not so much inter-operability, but jointness and working together, not just being able to talk to one another, but how we are going to work together and accomplish missions together, it seems to me that something could be gained for the money that would be expended by making use of that capability down there. Do you think so.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Absolutely. Of course, the competition for funds is as we have been talking about this morning, that which would have to come from acquisitions. Now, the long-term strategy is that a smart initial investment is going to have a long-term yield. But always the initial investment is the one that is most dear. So, again, the trade-off is important.
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    Mr. THORNBERRY. Well, let me follow-up on that point. When I look at your background coming out of the labs and Defense Advanced Research Programs Agency (DARPA), obviously you have spent your career dealing with key technologies and have a better appreciation than most about what it takes to be ready for the future. Then we look at the first page of the summary of the request coming in for the Navy this year.

    We see reductions in R&D requests. We see low amounts for S&T funding. Taking off your Navy hat for just a second, how do you think we are doing, as a country, in being able to prepare for the challenges that we are going to have in the future. Where are we at finding technologies and finding ways to use them, and actually incorporating them? Frankly, I get more concerned about that than I do about how many ships we have got out there on the waters these days.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. I am no less concerned. The model of 20 years ago when I was a junior officer was that this country, this military, even this Navy had a technological superiority that was able to sustain it merely because of its internal R&D. That is when R&D budgets, specifically science and technology (S&T) and the early 61 became so very important. Office of Naval Research (ONR) took on the character that you have now.

    We had a Cold War. In that Cold War, we ended up coming out ahead. The commercial sector, during that same period of time, exactly the same period of time, had its own war, not with the Soviet Union, but rather with Japan and some of its commercial competitors. They won as well. As a result, what has happened is that in very many areas, some very important to us, and particularly in information technology, the commercial sector is very far out ahead of anything we have developed in the military in the Navy.
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    Now, we could do two things. We could either increase R&D budgets a lot to try to catch up with commercial industry and stay internally focused, or we could change our method of operation and begin to do as many large corporations are doing, and look outward to bring technologies in. That is a different mechanism. That is not an R&D mechanism. That is not something that comes out necessarily of the NRO that we have today. We are going to have to change the way we think about it. We are doing that slowly, far too slowly in my estimation. I appreciate your concern.

    Mr. THORNBERRY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. HUNTER. Mrs. Sanchez.

    Mrs. SANCHEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    My questions will be for General Williams. I, too, am concerned, as my colleague Mr. Taylor spoke about a decrease in our R&D budgets, and our requirement to really take a look at what is going on, and someone speaking up. Of significant interest to me, as the Chairman of this Committee knows, is the Joint Strike Fighter.

    At our last R&D Subcommittee meeting with Dr. Gansler, he spoke about the program, talked about the need for it in particularly with respect to the Air Force changing out some of the planes that were built for a 15-year life. Now, we have been using them for 20 years. Of course, if the program goes on as we anticipate for the Joint Strike Fighter, it will be probably 30 years before we replace some of the F–16s and some of the other aircraft that the Air Force has.
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    I would like to hear from you, General, the impact to the Marine Corps's modernization with a delay in or a lack of the Joint Strike Fighter present, as it is anticipated right now in the scheduling.

    General WILLIAMS. When the Marine Corps decided not to buy the F–18, E and F, but to wait for the Joint Strike Fighter, we took a conscious operational risk. That risk was that we would have a fleet of aging aircraft. In fact, we will not buy one tactical aircraft in the Marine Corps from fiscal year 2002 to fiscal year 2008. I am not sure that has ever happened in the Marine Corps before.

    We currently have a shortage in our attack aircraft, not a large shortage. It is manageable, but it is a shortage. We at one time had our Harrier squadrons, our AV–8 squadrons were 20-aircraft squadrons. They are now 16-aircraft squadrons. We believe that, that is manageable as long as the Joint Strike Fighter appears in 2008. We will be able to maintain the 16-plane squadrons, and maintain our F–18s, and maintain our current capability.

    Almost year-for-year after that, if the Joint Strike Fighter does not appear, then we are going to be a trident aircraft. At some point, our 16-plane squadrons will go to 12. There will simply be less aircraft on the flight line. So, it really is a direct relationship from the initial deliveries of the Joint Strike Fighter to the Marine Corps tactical aircraft capability.

    Mrs. SANCHEZ. The reality is that in your planning you have been planning for the JSF to be online as predicted.
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    General WILLIAMS. Yes, ma'am. That is correct.

    Mrs. SANCHEZ. You have not purchased others, let us say, more F–18s, in the hopes that this would be online and coming forward.

    General WILLIAMS. Precisely. The short vertical-land takeoff technology (STOVL), that is promised in the Joint Strike Fighter variant is really critical to the way we believe we will fight in the 21st Century. We believe that the operational risk was reasonable. That the gain to be had by getting the Joint Strike Fighter was worth it.

    Mrs. SANCHEZ. That is the only question I had. It is my intention, of course, when Dr. Gansler was speaking about the program the other day, he talked about the budgetary concerns and some of the cost problems that were seen on that side. As the Chairman knows, Mr. McCain and I are working on an effort to try to lower the cost and maybe have the production of that in Factory 42 that we have in California. So, we will continue to work on this. I appreciate your comments, General.

    General WILLIAMS. Thank you.

    Mrs. SANCHEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman for the time.

    Mr. HUNTER. I thank the gentle lady. Just one question, Secretary Buchanan; you had the Boeing strike. Has that affected JSF to-date?

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    Secretary BUCHANAN. This is a very heated competition. The fact that one of the competitors is burdened with a strike now is going to have an affect. We have not diminished our vigor in pursuing the program. We have expectation for a down-select on schedule. Obviously, if the strike continues much longer, we are going to have to factor that in.

    It is awkward to give either team dispensation for some factor specific to that team. We have had factors on both sides. We are holding to the current course. We expect that to be resolved. We are hopeful for resolution and a flight fly-off on time. Let me point out that the down-select of the two concepts does not in and of itself require flights of either aircraft. So, we can do that on time, regardless of near-term engineering delays.

    Mr. HUNTER. But you do anticipate flights.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Absolutely. Of course, each competitor is going to have a much easier time promoting his entry once flight data becomes available. We will not delay. We have no plans to delay the program now to accommodate a strike or a schedule slip on either side.

    Mr. HUNTER. Okay. But you are not ruling out that eventuality.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Certainly not, Mr. Chairman. The idea here, from an acquisition sense, is to get an excellent JSF for the Marine Corps, the Navy, and the Air Force.

    Mr. HUNTER. And you need a real competition to do that.
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    Secretary BUCHANAN. Absolutely. We would hardly be in a position of cutting our nose to spite our face if that was going to be to our benefit. However, we value greatly, and Dr. Gansler does as well, the benefits, the very tangible benefits of competition that we have seen already. To interrupt that now or to modulate it is probably not to our advantage.

    Mr. HUNTER. Thank you.

    Mr. Larson.

    Mr. LARSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    I want to thank both you and Representative Sanchez for your line of questioning with respect to the Joint Strike Fighter. Let me try then to piggy back on the line of questioning that Mr. Thornberry was pursuing, but from this perspective. It is my assumption that the defense of the Nation, its economic prosperity, and security are inextricably tied and linked to our education system.

    With respect to research and development, we have witnessed on the Hill in the last year and a half some interesting going ons from my perspective. We have many CEOs coming to Congress asking us to lower immigration quotas so that they can import, from abroad, people who have the technological expertise to continue to fuel the fire of our commercial enterprises. By the same token, we also have those same CEOs and corporations tapping into our military, our well-trained, highly skilled individuals who man the most sophisticated and technologically advanced military ever assembled.
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    My question is, are we running without a pipeline of skilled workforce, and digitally fluent, and well-trained students coming from our education system? Are we in jeopardy of having to recruit technological mercenaries to maintain the most sophisticated military?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Technological mercenaries is an interesting way to put it. There is no question that international competition in science and technology is increasing. We are no longer the preeminent science and technology force in the world. That is due a lot less to our own deficits than it is the emergence of the realization of the rest of the world that it is economically driven.

    Most of the large software houses do a lot of business and even most business of development of software in India. Bangalore is a hotbed of software production because they are good at it. Some of the finest theorists in the physical sciences came out of the Soviet Union largely because they will say they did not have the computers to slow them down. They had to do it theoretically; fine minds.

    What you are seeing is a huge upheaval of technology that is driven by advanced telecommunications; even the Internet, an ability to exchange information and ideas that we never saw before. We need to run faster. We cannot be protective. We need to actually engage and look outward. That is why I was mentioning to the Congressman that the S&T budget, while it is extremely important is in itself a poor indicator of the extent to which we value science and technology.

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    If we have to develop it all ourselves, we cannot keep up. So, we have to do things in new ways. Most of industry has now regarded this as the rule and not the exception. The military, because of its tradition and largely because of its need, rightful and proper need for security, is coming to the table less quickly. We need to change that and we need to do it now.

    Mr. LARSON. With respect to a portion of my question, the corporate America coming to the military, recognizing that there is a pool of resources there to be tapped, I have spoken with just in the last several months, people who are only three, four, five years into their military commitment, who are being plucked out. They are the brightest and the best. Has there been any critical thinking about we need to do to cope with that?

    Do you think that there is an adequate pipeline coming either from our community colleges or high schools of digitally fluent or technically capably trained students?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. There is never an adequate sense. I mean, this is a recruiting problem that we discuss in the Navy daily because it is so very important to the perpetuation of our capable workforce. What we are finding is that kids these days are motivated. I am a little bit out of my depth, but since I have been party, I can sort of portray some of the ideas.

    We are finding that in a recruiting sense, especially among the very technical, kids are responding less to the traditional motivations of money and advanced education and more towards a sense that the work is important and challenging. So, we are having to rethink the way we portray the military as something that is exciting and worthy, as a way to retain the very high quality people that we need. It is a challenge.
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    Mr. LARSON. Should we be sinking more money into pots, so to speak, or pilots across the nation where R&D specific science and math focus technologically, militarily adoptive strategies are developed?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Please let me defer there. I am not an educator. At one time, I was a technologist. That is even past. I can tell you that what I find is that in very many areas, technology development is very vigorous, very important outside the military. It is the harvesting that I think is more important rather than the growing.

    Mr. LARSON. Well, I thank you for your comments. I thank the Chairman. I realize that it is an R&D question, but it does have overlap too with respect to readiness and recruitment.

    Mr. HUNTER. I thank the gentleman.

    Mr. Bartlett had a follow-up question here.

    Mr. BARTLETT. My question is both for General Williams and Admiral Lautenbacher. When was the last time you had a look at how much of your war fighting capabilities would remain after a robust nuclear EMP lay-down, and what did you find?

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. I have to admit, you have asked me that question before. So, I have looked at it. I am not happy with the answers to it. I think we have a risk in that area. We have various requirements processes that look at the cost of Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) hardening versus the benefits gained in a number of our systems, our communications systems, and our receivers, and our shipboard and aircraft carried equipment, radios and that sort of thing.
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    We do not have a large number of systems which I would call totally EMP robust. Obviously, I do not want to get into—

    Mr. BARTLETT. Is it not true that you are now waiving EMP hardening on most of your new procurement?

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. I am sorry?

    Mr. BARTLETT. Is it not true that you are now waiving EMP hardening on most of your new procurement?

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. I would have to take that for the record. I do not know whether it is a specific waiver or not.

    [The information referred to can be found in the Appendix.]

    Mr. BARTLETT. Let me ask a question. If the first thing that a sophisticated enemy would do is an EMP lay-down, which would deny you the use of the sophisticated equipment, then why are we developing this sophisticated equipment? It is the first thing a sophisticated enemy is going to do because he could do the most damage to us with the least effort on his part by doing an EMP lay-down.

    We do not need this sophisticated equipment to defeat Saddam Hussein. We can do that quite well with World War II kind of equipment. We do it better with this kind of equipment, but we do not need it. Why are we procuring equipment which will not work after an EMP lay-down, if that is the first thing that a sophisticated enemy is likely to do?
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    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. I think that when you look at the across-the-board spectrum of potential reactions, and you mentioned Saddam Hussein, for instance. I would not think of an EMP lay-down as the first thing that he might lay against us. Now, maybe something in the future will tell me that, that is wrong.

    We take a look at the risks involved with the types of conflicts and involvements that we get into today. Certainly, if a peer competitor were to develop with enough resources to develop the kind of debilitating attack you discussed, then we would need to significantly revise the way we think about it. It is a cost versus risk on the basis of what we have to do today for our mission. That is about the best answer that I can give to you at this point.

    Mr. BARTLETT. Let me give you a scenario that the Runsfeld Commission found. Rogue nations are now developing the capability of simply putting a launcher on a sea-going vessel. They found that they were just carving a hole in the deck. You do not even need to do that with a Scud Launcher. Put that on the deck, cover it with a canvas, and you do not know whether it is a bunch of containers on the deck.

    A crude nuclear weapon, a Scud Launcher, and Saddam Hussein could shut down the whole Northeast United States. Now, a major power in North Korea will soon be one of those powers, could shut down the whole United States by detonating a weapon of one megaton or more. China's weapons are now 4.4 megatons on each of their 20-odd long march missiles. One of those detonators 300 miles high over Nebraska would produce an EMP lay-down at the margins of our country of 10,000 to 20,000 volts per meter.
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    It is my understanding that, that is an adequate force to upset or destroy most of our micro-electronics. So, this I think is a real and present danger, even from rogue nations like Saddam Hussein. My concern is that after that EMP lay-down, we would have little capability remaining. My question is, why would we develop equipment that is going to be denied us in any serious attack from a sophisticated country, or even a not very sophisticated country in the case of a sea-going vessel with a Scud Launcher and a crude atomic weapon that somebody like Saddam Hussein could wield?

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. We are developing systems that would defend against missile attacks. That is a lot of our area in theater-wide and national missile defense programs that hopefully would be able to combat some of the scenarios that you are talking about. In terms of the overall impact on an entire force, an entire country, or a nation, I would like to provide that for the record or get more classified material to talk about that.

    [The information referred to can be found in the Appendix.]

    Mr. BARTLETT. This last summer, to kind of put this in context, I was sitting in a hotel in Vienna with Members of our Congress and Members of the Duma developing a framework agreement for ending the Kosovo Conflict, which was five days later adopted by the G7. One of the Duma members there was Vladimir Lukeim who was the Chairman of their Foreign Affairs Committee and was an Ambassador here at the end of the Bush Administration, and the beginning of the Clinton Administration.

    He said during those two days that we spent there, if we really wanted to hurt you without any fear of retaliation, we would launch an submarine landed ballistic missile (SLBM), detonate a nuclear weapon at a high altitude over the center of your country, and shut down your entire power grid and your communications system for a month or two. Now, I think he is a little optimistic about how quickly we might recover.
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    But, that was Vladimir Lukeim who is not an inconsequential person in Russia. This was his comment; a totally gratuitous comment. There was nothing in the conversation that should have lead up to that because we were talking about resolving the conflict in Kosovo. So, this is not simply a science fiction kind of thing. It is something that is clearly on the minds of our potential adversaries. When will we take a look at that so that we can answer this question?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. If I may, Congressman, and I am drawing on some experience that is now quite dated, but it may have some relevance here. I will speak for the Navy here. A one megaton detonation, 300 miles over the country is going to yield a significant EMP of several hundred volts per meter. That may or may not have a sever effect on the infrastructure of the country, in terms of the commercial power grid, and telephone, telecommunications structure, which by the way is increasingly underground, not for that reason, but coincidently it is. That is a good thing.

    From the Navy's point of view, however, I will tell you that EMP, from that kind of level, is likely to have not much effect on our units at sea for different reasons. It has to do with the fact that, and we talked about this a minute ago, inter-operability and electromagnetic capability, the process of protecting many of our systems on ships from radiations also from our ships, the very powerful radars that we talked about developing a moment ago, has already yielded significant immunity to that sort of attack.

    Now, I will not speak to systems that are deployed by our sister services in the Air Force and the Army, but from the Navy, I am employing electromagnetic countermeasures, electromagnetic protection in every acquisition sufficient to be of a great protection against that kind of attack; not immune, but very much protected. It is very much on our minds even now.
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    Mr. BARTLETT. How much do you rely on satellites for your communication?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Significantly.

    Mr. BARTLETT. Only two of those will survive that attack. Those are the two Millstar Satellites. We will lose $50 billion worth of satellites from this country alone; from prompt effects for those who are line-of-sight, and the van allen belts are pumped up, and the others very quickly decay, and we have lost their capability.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. I cannot deny what you say. EMP, as you are obviously well-aware, is directed downward because it is generated in the upper atmosphere through gammas that propagate downward. The prompt effects of gammas and neutrons of course are what destroy satellites in orbit. That is a different sort of shielding.

    Military satellites work to a very rigid specification. As you point out, however, commercial satellites are not necessarily protected in that way and may have a vulnerability that is much larger.

    Mr. BARTLETT. They are probably the softest part of all of our communication grid.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Agree.

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    Mr. BARTLETT. Thank you.

    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. HUNTER. I thank the gentleman. I thank him for his work on EMP. He has done a lot of work on that and that definitely is something that this Committee is very concerned about.

    Mr. McIntyre, do you have any questions?

    Mr. MCINTYRE. Not at this time, thank you.

    Mr. HUNTER. Okay, thank you.

    Any other panel Members have any questions?

    Mrs. Sanchez.

    Mrs. SANCHEZ. No, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. HUNTER. Mr. Taylor.

    Mr. TAYLOR. No, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. HUNTER. Okay. Mr. Thornberry, are you okay?
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    Mr. THORNBERRY. Yes, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. HUNTER. Let me just ask a couple here, gentlemen. First, one thing that we have looked at is your supply of Tomahawk missiles for the next number of years; understanding that you have got the new Tactical Tomahawk coming onboard and it is going to be cheaper and maybe a little more efficient. The facts are you are going to be almost half loaded for Tomahawks for the foreseeable future.

    Why do you think that is an acceptable risk? We could fire-up the Tomahawk lines. The same company that is making them make the Tactical Tomahawk. We could get the numbers so you do not have to change these things out of ships as you bring them back. Why is that desirable?

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. It is not desirable to have less weapons than we have in our requirements list. I have to fully agree with that. The issue is balancing the budget that we have today and ensuring that we have the right numbers of platforms, the right amount of readiness, the pay in compensation, et cetera, all of the things that make our military great.

    We have tried to provide for enough weapons in order to bring us through this period where we are going to transition to the Tactical Tomahawk. It is not a comfortable position, but looking at the numbers we have fired and the potential for the future, we before it is an acceptable risk. It is not a comfortable risk. With the level of resources that we have today, it looks like what we have to do to maintain the right balance.
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    Secretary BUCHANAN. Mr. Chairman, if I may add, because this is an area in which I am very proud to say that the requirements side and the acquisitions side have worked very closely hand-in-glove in looking at this problem. I know of your interest, continued interest. I appreciate it because it is a rather significant question. The Tomahawk line is cold. So, we would have to restart that line.

    There would be, as nearly as we can figure in a business sense, about a two-year delay before we could get up and running again. That would have to be balanced by the procurement of the Tactical Tomahawk that is currently being developed and will shortly be fielded. So, any expense in the near term to reactivate that line is going to mean fewer weapons of the Tactical Tomahawk.

    Mr. HUNTER. Why is that, Mr. Secretary? I mean, your question presumes that we are not willing to put the resources into having this very critical item. There is no law that says that we are going to have to forego the Tactical Tomahawk, or a number thereof, simply because we want to have a full bin of Tomahawk missiles.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Only the law of conservation of dollars. That is the one we are working towards. In other words, the business case, which is not an entirely cost case, the business case said, what do we have to produce, at what time, at what expense, that we can then free-up and build more ships or put into more aircraft?

    Mr. HUNTER. We understand all of that. It is just that the Tomahawks are extremely critical. They are a very important part of your power projection scenario. At the same time, you have got these F–18 aircraft that are being catapulted and trapped at fairly high speeds. You are putting a lot of miles on your aircraft. You may have to come up. That is another question we have for you. Are you looking at that? Where are you at with respect to building a scenario that may include at some point, some significant service life extension for those aircraft?
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    You have got E/A–6Bs that are stretched thin. Here you have this great standoff system that obviates a need to send aircraft over a target and send people in those aircraft. You do not have a stealth aircraft on your ships. So, you still have the prospect of having somebody from a third world nation shoot you down with a pretty simple system.

    We have decided that we need a certain number of Tomahawks and you have decided you are not going to have them. I understand if that was a multi-billion-dollar decision, it might be worthwhile. But you have the same company that makes those Tomahawks is going to make the Tactical Tomahawk.

    In fact, the lines would literally be side-by-side. You could probably get the line up and running a lot quicker than two years. I would think that you would want to have a full bin of Tomahawk missiles and have Tactical Tomahawk as soon as possible. I think Congress would agree with you, if you told us that. I think we would find the money to do it.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. As I say, the calculation was based on the maximum number of missiles we could get for the minimum number of dollars in the time allotted, and the trade that Admiral Lautenbacher refers to. The ultimate decision reflected that analysis, which I am very proud of, in the sense that it was an optimum business decision among both the requirements and the acquisition part.

    Mr. HUNTER. Well, I did not notice the requirement people, they did not cut the requirement in half. I mean, their requirement stands where it was. We have decided to have the half load out of Tomahawk missiles for a long time. There was not a coming together or a changing of the requirements. That was a decision not to meet them; right?
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    Secretary BUCHANAN. It was a business decision based on the dollars available and what requirements we could satisfy.

    Mr. HUNTER. I have had some of those coming together meetings myself. You have 321 tactical anti-ship missiles (TASMs). They are available for re-manufacture to the Block-3 configuration at a cost of $260 million. That had been discussed by the Navy as an option to try to come up to some degree to come up and be a part of the shortfall. What happened there?

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. It still remains an option. If our consumption rate changes of the Tomahawks, then we are going to have to revisit it. There is no question about it.

    Mr. HUNTER. Tell me a little bit about this high tempo in terms of catapults and traps with your carrier aircraft, and the fact that you are putting more miles on these babies than you expected. Where are we going here?

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. We have had aging of certain types of our aircraft to a greater degree than we expected. The S–3 is one of those airplanes. The S–3 service life will end sooner than we had originally expected because of that. If we are going to extend the S–3, we would have to slept it or we are going to have to take on those missions with other aircraft. We are working on that internally in the Navy right now.

    The E/A–6B has obviously been used quite heavily. We have done what we can to extend that life. We are re-winging the airplanes. We have put center box sections in them. We have now more airplanes online than we had before, which should help reduce the ones that are out there because they can spread the load more.
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    In the end, on the E/A–6B, the answer is to buy a follow-on airplane. We are going to run out of service life on that aircraft in ten years. We are starting now to figure out what that follow-on should look like.

    Mr. HUNTER. You mentioned, and I think Secretary Buchanan, I think you mentioned the work on the jammer, the new jammer pods that are going to be going on the E/A–6B. Obviously, you did not talk about the airframe, but the airframe is taking a beating right now with this increased usage. Is that a part of this program?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Yes, sir, Mr. Chairman. That is a part of the same upgrade program. The replacement of all of the center sections of the wing will bring all of those airframes back up to, not zero time, but certainly give them much more time left on the airframe.

    Mr. HUNTER. Thank you very much for your participation today. We are going to go over JSF. General Williams, give us a little preview looking at the JSF right now. You are aware of the fact that GAO has a report that notes some deficiencies in the program. What are your general thoughts on JSF in terms of where it is right now with respect to your expectations, Marine Corps expectations?

    General WILLIAMS. I think that for the Marine Corps, we are very, very anxious to see the first flight of the STOVL model. We expected and we got what we expected with JSF, which are problems at the front-end of the program. As you know, we have a Marine Program Manager and he keeps in close touch with us.
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    Until the strike started at Boeing, we had hoped that we would get the first flight of the conventional model in June. Shortly, be followed by the STOVL. I am hoping that still happens. I think we have used up about all of our schedule slop at the front-end now. We are going to be going into sort of a day-for-day delay with every day this strike goes on.

    We anticipate that the STOVL model will fundamentally change the way we do business in tactical air in this century. We have great expectations for it. Almost 90 percent of the fire power of the Marine expeditionary force comes from our air wing. JSF will take that to 20/50 or 20/60. So, we have got very, very high expectations and hopes for it.

    Mr. HUNTER. Are you personally on top of this program; spending a lot of time looking at it?

    General WILLIAMS. Yes, sir. I spend a lot of time worrying about it. It is a joint program. So, the Program Manager reports, not to me, but he reports, I believe, to the Air Force, the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force.

    Mr. HUNTER. We have got some shifting hats here. Are you going to be here on Thursday?

    General WILLIAMS. No, sir.

    Mr. HUNTER. Okay. Well, we should have an interesting discussion with respect to JSF. Thank you. I agree with you. The Marines have banked a lot on this aircraft. A possible slowdown is not a happy thought here with respect to what you folks have done.
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    The Maritime Pre-Positioning Force, I have got a series of questions on that. I want to offer those for the record. We are going to have to come up, Secretary Buchanan, with a new force here at some point in the future. You folks looked at the blue print of that force in constructing it.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Yes, sir. We will certainly respond to your questions. The Maritime Prepositioning Force-Enhanced (MPFE) Force is under constant review. We have some solutions or some approaches we would like to offer.

    Mr. HUNTER. Okay. I have a series of questions that we will give you for the record there, if we could.

    [The information referred to can be found in the Appendix.]

    Mr. HUNTER. So, thank you very much.

    Any other Members have any other questions here before our gentlemen leave?

    Mrs. Sanchez.

    Mrs. SANCHEZ. I just had a quick question back to the line of questioning that you had with respect to the Block-3 versus Tactical Tomahawk. The price on the Block-3 is $1.2 million, depending on the production run. The price that I saw on the Tactical is a little bit over a half million dollars. Is that unit pricing that you did? If that is so, how many were you anticipating with that number?
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    Secretary BUCHANAN. Yes, it is a unit price. I do not know the number upon which it was based.

    Mrs. SANCHEZ. Could you get that to us?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Surely.

    [The information referred to can be found in the Appendix.]

    Mrs. SANCHEZ. I just found it an interesting contrast.

    Secretary BUCHANAN. I mean, that was a part of the discussion of a moment ago that lead to the calculation that said it is a lot more advantageous for us to be buying Tactical Tomahawks at a half million each than it would be, and my numbers are $1.4 million each for resurrection of the line.

    Mrs. SANCHEZ. A new product?

    Secretary BUCHANAN. Right.

    Mr. HUNTER. If the gentle lady will yield, though, I have had this same conversation, Mr. Secretary, with your leadership. So, my response was fine. Let us get all of the Tactical Tomahawks we can get. The answer was well, we cannot quite get them. Well, then fine. Where are we going to be in terms of meeting the requirement that we have said we have to have? The answer was well, we will be about 50 percent loaded.
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    Well, for how long? Answer: for a long, long time. So, the point is, to the gentle lady, it is not simply a matter of getting the less expensive Tomahawks, with respect to the expensive Tomahawks. We all know that $600,000 is less than $1.2 million. We all know that, but you are not going to have that.

    What you are going to have is a few Tactical Tomahawks, quite a ways off in the future, if everything goes according to plan. What that is going to do is leave us vulnerable, in my estimation, to a real shooting in a real shooting war, vulnerable to the potential of running out of bullets. As one great Marine General told me when he looked at this thing. He said, you know one thing you do not want to do in today's wars is run out of Tomahawks.

    Now, we have decided we are going to take that risk. I think it is a risk we should not be taking. I think it is a risk we should be paying to eliminate.

    Mrs. SANCHEZ. Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. HUNTER. Yes.

    Mrs. SANCHEZ. Reclaiming my time. I would agree with what you have said. That is why I think the question of how many Tactical Tomahawks are we talking about and over what time? That would give us the indication of where we are going; whether we would be half full, or up-to-line, or when it is that we will come into compliance of what you and I would think we would need in order to be capable.

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    Mr. HUNTER. I think the profile, and I have had the briefing on it. I think the profile of the Tactical Tomahawk is classified exactly what it comes in. Is that right, Admiral Lautenbacher? It is classified, but I can tell this to the gentle lady. For many years in the future, if Tactical Tomahawk comes on exactly when it is supposed to, we are going to be far below the requirement, in terms of number of Tomahawks.

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. The requirement remains the same.

    Mr. HUNTER. Yes.

    Admiral LAUTENBACHER. We have to buy back to the requirement.

    Mr. HUNTER. If the requirement remains the same, and you see a little-biddy wedge way out in the future where Tactical Tomahawk is made first in very small numbers and then in increasing numbers. So, in the year 2020, we will be fine. So, as long as we do not have a war until 2020, I think we can hold on.

    Anyway, thank you for bringing that subject up. I think it is one of great importance. I thank the gentle lady. I would hope we could look at that one again. I do not care where these things are made. I do not care who gets a contract. In fact, you got exactly the same company that is going to build these lines. You mentioned, Secretary Buchanan, you thought it would take a couple of years to get this thing up and running.

    In my conversations, I think if we put a press on, and I understand you have a lot of vendors that you have got to get back into line to do this. I think we could do it in a year. I mean, I think we could get the Tomahawk line up and going in a year and start bringing these things off the line.
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    Secretary BUCHANAN. Mr. Chairman, you correctly point exactly to the problem. I was surprised too. You are right, the prime contractor can do it much quicker than that. It is the vendors, the small vendors, that many of whom are out of business all together that would have to be reconstituted. That drives the major bulk of the time.

    Mr. HUNTER. Well, those Tomahawks save a lot of lives. They give us enormous leverage. Of all of the systems that I can think of trying to have, wanting to have, or needing to have a robust load-out, that is one where you want a robust load-out and we do not have it. Anyway, we will work that problem along with lots of others.

    I thank all of the Members of the Subcommittees for sticking around. We appreciate you gentlemen and what you are doing for the country.

    The Subcommittees are adjourned.

    [Whereupon, at 3:00 p.m., the Subcommittees were adjourned.]

A P P E N D I X

March 14, 2000
[The Appendix is pending.]