[Senate Hearing 116-404]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]



                                                        S. Hrg. 116-404

                     DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE SPECTRUM
                  POLICY AND THE IMPACT OF THE FEDERAL
                   COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION'S LIGADO
                     DECISION ON NATIONAL SECURITY

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               before the

                      COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
                          UNITED STATES SENATE

                     ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION

                               __________

                              MAY 6, 2020

                               __________

         Printed for the use of the Committee on Armed Services






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              Available via: http: //www.govinfo.gov

                               ______
                                 

                 U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE

56-584 PDF                WASHINGTON : 2024











                      COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES

                  JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma, Chairman

ROGER F. WICKER, Mississippi	     JACK REED, Rhode Island
DEB FISCHER, Nebraska		     JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire
TOM COTTON, Arkansas		     KIRSTEN E. GILLIBRAND, New York
MIKE ROUNDS, South Dakota	     RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, Connecticut
JONI ERNST, Iowa		     MAZIE K. HIRONO, Hawaii
THOM TILLIS, North Carolina	     TIM KAINE, Virginia
DAN SULLIVAN, Alaska		     ANGUS S. KING, Jr., Maine
DAVID PERDUE, Georgia		     MARTIN HEINRICH, New Mexico
KEVIN CRAMER, North Dakota	     ELIZABETH WARREN, Massachusetts
MARTHA McSALLY, Arizona		     GARY C. PETERS, Michigan
RICK SCOTT, Florida		     JOE MANCHIN III, West Virginia
MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee	     TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois
JOSH HAWLEY, Missouri                DOUG JONES, Alabama
                                     
                                     
                  John Bonsell, Staff Director
             Elizabeth L. King, Minority Staff Director




                              (ii)

  








                         C O N T E N T S

                         _______________

                           May 6, 2020

                                                                   Page

Department of Defense Spectrum Policy and the Impact of the
  Federal Communications Commission's Ligado Decision on
  NationalSecurity...............................................     1

                           Members Statements

Statement of Senator James M. Inhofe.............................     1

Statement of Senator Jack Reed...................................     5

                          Witnesses Statements

Deasy, The Honorable Dana S., Chief Information Officer,              7
  Department of Defense.

Griffin, The Honorable Michael D., Under Secretary of Defense for    10
  Research and Engineering.

Raymond, General John W., USSF, Chief of Space Operations, United    14
  States Space Force, and Commander, U.S. Space Command.

Allen, Admiral Thad W., USCG, Ret................................    19

Questions for the Record.........................................    56

Appendix A--
  Letter from National Defense Industrial Association............    69

Appendix B--
  Background Paper...............................................    76

                                 (iii)









 
                     DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE SPECTRUM
                  POLICY AND THE IMPACT OF THE FEDERAL
                   COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION'S LIGADO
                     DECISION ON NATIONAL SECURITY

                              ----------                              


                         WEDNESDAY, MAY 6, 2020

                              United States Senate,
                               Committee on Armed Services,
                                                    Washington, DC.
    The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 3:05 p.m. in room 
SD-G50, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Senator James M. Inhofe 
(Chairman of the Committee) presiding.
    Committee Members present: Senators Inhofe, Wicker, 
Fischer, Cotton, Rounds, Ernst, Tillis, Sullivan, Perdue, 
Cramer, McSally, Blackburn, Hawley, Reed, Shaheen, Blumenthal, 
Hirono, Kaine, King, Peters, Manchin, Duckworth, and Jones.

          OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR JAMES M. INHOFE

    Chairman Inhofe. Our meeting will come to order.
    Before starting the agenda, since a quorum is now present, 
I ask the Committee to consider a list of 2,807 pending 
military nominations. All these nominations have been before 
the Committee the required length of time.
    Is there a motion to favorably report them?
    Senator Reed. So moved.
    Chairman Inhofe. Second?
    Senator Shaheen. Second.
    Chairman Inhofe. All in favor, say aye.
    [Chorus of ayes.]
    Chairman Inhofe. Opposed, no.
    [No response.]
    Chairman Inhofe. The ayes have it. I do not have a pen. So 
I have to sign this. Thank you.
    [The information referred to follows:]

 MILITARY NOMINATIONS PENDING WITH THE SENATE ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE 
  WHICH ARE PROPOSED FOR THE COMMITTEE'S CONSIDERATION ON MAY 6, 2020.
     1.  In the Marine Corps there are 2 appointments to the grade of 
major (list begins with Jeffrey T. Jones II) (Reference No. 1366)

     2.   In the Air National Guard there are 13 appointments to the 
grade of brigadier general (list begins with Michael W. Bank) 
(Reference No. 1390)

     3.  In the Army there are 965 appointments to be major (list 
begins with William P. Abbott) (Reference No. 1463)

     4.  In the Army there are 628 appointments to be major (list 
begins with Davis M. Abt) (Reference No. 1464)

     5.  In the Army there are 628 appointments to be major (list 
begins with Jamie E. Abel) (Reference No. 1465)

     6.  In the Army there are 40 appointments to be major (list begins 
with Adesola O. Adepegba) (Reference No. 1466)

     7.  In the Navy Reserve there is 1 appointment to be captain 
(Daniel M. Wiegrefe) (Reference No. 1482)

     8.  In the Marine Corps Reserve there are 6 appointments to be 
colonel (list begins with Matthew S. Breen) (Reference No. 1487)

     9.  In the Marine Corps there are 395 appointments to be 
lieutenant colonel (list begins with Brett D. Abbamonte) (Reference No. 
1488)

    10.  In the Army there is 1 appointment to the grade of major 
(Jamal D. Snell) (Reference No. 1522)

    11.  MG Gary M Brito, USA to be lieutenant general and Deputy Chief 
of Staff, G-1 (Reference No. 1542)

    12.  In the Navy there is 1 appointment to the grade of commander 
(Katherine L. Jaudon) (Reference No. 1570)

    13.  In the Navy there are 3 appointments to the grade of rear 
admiral (list begins with Carl P. Chebi) (Reference No. 1626)

    14.  Capt. Rick Freedman, USN to be rear admiral (lower half) 
(Reference No. 1629)

    15.  In the Navy there are 2 appointments to the grade of rear 
admiral (lower half) (list begins with Susan Bryerjoyner) (Reference 
No. 1630)

    16.  In the Navy there are 2 appointments to the grade of rear 
admiral (lower half) (list begins with Mark A. Melson) (Reference No. 
1633-2)

    17.  In the Army there is 1 appointment to the grade of colonel 
(Kelly L. French) (Reference No. 1640)

    18.  In the Navy there is 1 appointment to the grade of captain 
(Paul D. Sargent) (Reference No. 1654)

    19.  In the Navy Reserve there is 1 appointment to the grade of 
captain (Christopher C. Supko) (Reference No. 1657)

    20.  In the Marine Corps there are 106 appointments to the grade of 
colonel (list begins with Joshua D. Anderson) (Reference No. 1658)

    21.  RADM Eugene H. Black III, USN to be vice admiral and 
Commander, SIXTH Fleet/Commander, Task Force SIX/Commander, Striking 
and Support Forces NATO/Deputy Commander, US Naval Forces Europe/Deputy 
Commander, US Naval Forces Africa/Joint Force Maritime Component 
Commander Europe (Reference No. 1695)

    22.  In the Army Reserve there is 1 appointment to the grade of 
colonel (William A. Forbes) (Reference No. 1696)

    23.  In the Navy there is 1 appointment to the grade of lieutenant 
commander (James G. Buckley) (Reference No. 1697)

    24.  In the Navy there is 1 appointment to the grade of lieutenant 
commander (Michael G. Matson) (Reference No. 1698)

    25.  In the Navy there is 1 appointment to the grade of lieutenant 
commander (Kevan M. Mellendick) (Reference No. 1699)

    26.  In the Navy there is 1 appointment to the grade of lieutenant 
commander (Andrew S. Morris) (Reference No. 1700)

    27.  In the Navy there is 1 appointment to the grade of lieutenant 
commander (Andrew D. Cordey) (Reference No. 1701)

    28.  In the Navy there is 1 appointment to the grade of commander 
(Nicholas R. Leinweber) (Reference No. 1702)

    29.  In the Navy there is 1 appointment to the grade of captain 
(Sean A. McKay) (Reference No. 1703)

_______________________________________________________________________
                                                                    
TOTAL: 2,807

    Before the opening statement, let me just observe something 
here, and this comes from the heart. I have been around here a 
long time. I served in the House for 8 years. I started in the 
Senate and was on the Senate Armed Services Committee starting 
in 1994. I do not think I have ever seen a more impressive 
group of witnesses on a specific subject who are better 
qualified than this in all that time. I really mean it.
    I mean, we talk about Mr. Deasy, who is the Department of 
Defense Chief Information Officer. He was also the CIO of J.P. 
Morgan Chase, the British Petroleum Company, and General 
Motors. I mean, we have not had one like that before.
    Dr. Griffin. Certainly he knows this issue as well as 
anyone anywhere. He has been our NASA Administrator.
    Then we have Admiral Thad Allen. He has been the chairman 
of NASA's Space-Based Positioning, Navigation, and Timing 
National Advisory Board. That is GPS [Global Positioning 
System], so he is the authority on that.
    Then, of course, obviously the chief of our space 
operations, General Jay Raymond.
    It is a privilege to have you guys here, to have this much 
quality here, this much authority because what we are going to 
be talking about is an issue that could be really damaging to 
our country if something is wrong.
    I would say good afternoon to the Committee, and I 
appreciate your being here.
    Now because of the unusual circumstances, there is a new, 
little required thing that we have to go through, so bear with 
me.
    Before we begin, I want to thank all of you for being here.
    It is required that we are abiding by guidance from the 
Office of the Attending Physician, Sergeant at Arms, and Rules 
Committee as we hold this hearing today. Many steps were taken 
to minimize the risk to our Members, our witnesses, our staff, 
and the public. That means we are all 6 feet from one another. 
You have also got cleaning supplies at your seats, and if 
maintaining 6 feet of separation becomes a problem, then I 
encourage you to use your masks. That we are here today under 
these circumstances underscores the importance of the subject 
that we are addressing today.
    What we are going to do, we are going to have our opening 
statements and then proceed on with 5-minute questions, and we 
are going to have a second round of questions too.
    This is a complex issue, but it ultimately boils down to 
risk. I do not think it is a good idea to place at risk the GPS 
signals that enable our national and economic security for the 
benefit of one company and its investors.
    After extensive testing and analysis, experts at almost 
every Federal Agency tell us that Ligado's plan will interfere 
with our GPS systems. This will certainly affect our 
warfighters who rely on GPS for navigation, logistics, and 
precision guided munitions, whether in training or on the 
battlefield.
    But this is about much more than risking our military 
readiness and capabilities. Interfering with GPS will hurt the 
entire American economy. We will have some good witnesses talk 
about that and elaborate on that. Our farmers rely on GPS to 
harvest their crops. Our truckers and airlines rely on GPS to 
move supplies and people. Our banks rely on the GPS timing 
function. Every American uses GPS every day, and at the end of 
the day, economic security is national security.
    Now, we all agree that we need to compete with China in the 
5G development. No one is disputing that fact. We have been 
working on that for months with the Department of Defense and 
the telecom industry cooperating with each other and 
accomplishing that very thing. That is not the issue.
    Ligado's proposal is not tied to that work whatsoever. Now, 
we are talking about the 5G, the competition with China. They 
have tried to conflate their proposal with other mid-band 
spectrum sharing discussions, but in reality, these two issues 
are completely separate, completely separate from each other.
    In answering the argument that GPS would be disrupted, the 
Federal Communications Commission (FCC) says Ligado will be 
forced to pay for any disruptions its service causes to GPS. 
Now, the reality is that the FCC order only requires Ligado to 
replace government-owned devices. That does not accomplish--if 
it were doable. Ultimately, the burden of mitigating harmful 
interference will be placed on the Department of Defense and 
the American taxpayers would end up, as normally is the case, 
having to pay for it.
    A few powerful people made a hasty decision over the 
weekend, in the middle of the national crisis and against the 
judgment of every other agency involved, and without cluing the 
President in on any of this. I have had conversations with him, 
and I can assure you that is the case.
    The FCC may not be in this Committee's jurisdiction, but 
the effects of its decision really are. I think we all 
understand that. I hope our witnesses will speak to the 
enormous risk this decision has for everyone who relies on GPS 
in America. With the technical and important nature of this 
topic, we will structure this hearing with a consolidated 
opening statement from the three Department of Defense 
witnesses, followed by the fourth witness. This will allow a 
detailed explanation of the national security implications of 
the FCC's decision and what steps the military will need to 
take to mitigate these effects.
    The Department of Defense has provided materials to 
accompany their statement that are available in front of you 
and on display for the public view.
    Now, this is very significant because some people are 
familiar with this organization and some are not, but those who 
are know that this is where all of the defense people are.
    I plan to submit for the record a letter I received from 
the National Defense Industrial Association, which is made up 
of 1,700 businesses and 70,000 individual members, stating 
their strong opposition to Ligado's proposal, along with a list 
of 71 companies and associations that are opposed as well. The 
FCC was fully aware of this. They received the letter from this 
organization a week before their weekend vote.
    [Please see Appendix A on page 69.]
    You must believe that it could not get worse, but it is. 
Ligado took over a bankrupt company in 2015 and has been trying 
to obtain FCC licensing ever since. They waited until the whole 
world was distracted by the virus, and when everyone was 
looking the other way and unannounced to the public--and it was 
not announced--in total secrecy on a weekend passed the most 
controversial licensing bill I think in the history of the FCC. 
I say this because the Federal Agency opposition was unanimous. 
You never see that. We had all organizations, all Federal 
Agencies opposing this, not just the military, but all of 
government and the private sector, including the airlines, the 
farmers, the truckers, the maritime manufacturers, opposed the 
licensing and the FCC knew it. Hence, we had the weekend rushed 
vote.
    Senator Reed?

                 STATEMENT OF SENATOR JACK REED

    Senator Reed. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. I also want to 
thank the witnesses for appearing here today. This is a 
critical issue for the Defense Department and our Nation, and 
it is important that we learn from these witnesses.
    We are holding this hearing in unusual circumstances. There 
has been a great deal of discussion about whether we should be 
here in person with risks not only to Senators, but to all the 
support personnel who are needed to keep this institution 
running. In addition, the compelling point is made that if the 
Senate is in session, its predominant focus should be combating 
the pandemic. But this is a hearing I think that is essential.
    I want to commend Chairman Inhofe for establishing and 
holding a weekly call so that Committee Members can be briefed 
by Defense Department officials and ask questions regarding the 
coronavirus. The Chairman ensured that we were able to conduct 
oversight even in difficult circumstances. But phone calls 
cannot replace a hearing, so when we plan future hearings, as 
consideration of the annual defense bill allows, I would 
certainly request that we consider these hearings in the 
context of both physical and virtual participation. We also 
should focus on the effects of the pandemic on the Department 
of Defense and on threats that face the Nation.
    Let me now turn to today's hearing about the decision by 
the Federal Communications Commission, or FCC, to permit the 
company Ligado to operate a land-based network that by its own 
admission will interfere with DOD GPS systems, as well as those 
in other Federal Agencies and the civilian sector.
    Over 10 years ago, Ligado's predecessor, LightSquared, 
applied to the FCC to permit a satellite-based 4G system with a 
secondary land-based network in areas where satellite reception 
could not be obtained. The application was denied because of 
interference with the GPS system, and LightSquared was forced 
into bankruptcy.
    LightSquared and its spectrum license was then bought in 
bankruptcy and reorganized as Ligado. In 2016, Ligado 
resubmitted an amended licensing application to the FCC to 
build a new ground tower-only transmission system. Ligado's 
switch to a system of closely spaced, powerful ground tower 
signals threatens to interfere with GPS. Despite jeopardizing 
GPS and ignoring the scientific view of many Federal Agencies, 
the aviation industry, and GPS-dependent companies, the FCC 
granted the license without a public rulemaking to change from 
a satellite-based network to one that is totally land-based.
    I believe the FCC's decision to grant the license is 
problematic for several reasons.
    First, the Commerce Department's National 
Telecommunications and Information Administration is supposed 
to form a consensus among executive branch stakeholders like 
the Defense Department and FCC, an independent commission. In 
this case, the Department of Defense and other executive 
departments, like the Department of Transportation, objected to 
the application because of the interference with the GPS 
signal. Yet, no consensus was reached before the license was 
granted.
    Second, the FCC license does not recognize the complicated 
nature of the Defense Department's weapon systems. Ligado 
maintains that DOD can simply replace affected GPS cards. But 
there are hundreds of thousands of GPS chips embedded in DOD 
weapon systems, and each chip is not only tuned to GPS, but 
embedded with interconnected electronics, each tuned to each 
other. Replacing a GPS card will also impact other features of 
a weapon system. How many weapon systems are affected, how they 
can be fixed, and the time and cost of the remedy is unknowable 
at this point, but the process will be lengthy and expensive.
    For a sense of what the FCC's decision could mean, we have 
a real life example. In 1992, an FCC spectrum repurposing 
decision eliminated the B-2 radar band for DOD. Moving that 
radar to a new band took 30 years and $3 billion due to depot 
cycle rescheduling and operational demands.
    While the FCC order states that the onus is in Ligado to 
fix problems, in reality the burden is actually on the Defense 
Department to find which weapon systems are affected, how 
severe the impacts are, and then negotiate with Ligado to get 
them fixed. Clearly, such a process will compromise military 
readiness.
    The Defense Department is working on a new set of hardened 
GPS chips called military grade user equipment, or MGUE, which 
are jam-resistant to the power levels of the Ligado towers. 
However, these chip sets will not be installed in our weapon 
systems until the 2030s. The best course of action for national 
security would be to stay the license application and 
periodically review it until such time as the new chip sets can 
be installed in critical weapon systems.
    Finally, I have only discussed the problems the Defense 
Department is facing as a result of the FCC decision. I have 
not discussed the myriad of problems that will be faced by 
literally everyone who uses GPS. I do not believe that the 
FCC's decision to grant this license is in the best interest of 
our national security or our Nation.
    I look forward to today's discussion about the issue.
    I again thank the witnesses and my colleagues for appearing 
at this hearing in these unusual and demanding times.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Reed.
    We are going to have opening statements by our witnesses. 
Before we do, without objection, I will ask unanimous consent 
that we enter into the record the National Defense Industrial 
Association. I have already referred to that--the industry 
coalition letter with 68 signatories that strongly oppose it, 
the Aerospace Industry Association letter on behalf of 300 
leading aerospace and defense manufacturers and suppliers who 
oppose the FCC's decision, the Air Line Pilots Association 
International letter asking the Senate Armed Services 
Committee, this Committee, to take action and stay this FCC 
ruling, and the Transportation and Construction Coalition 
letter stating that they oppose Ligado's proposed network, and 
of course, the letter from Ligado. Without objection, they will 
be made a part of the record.
    [The information referred to can be found in Appendix A on 
page 69.]
    Chairman Inhofe. We will start with our opening statements, 
with you, Mr. Deasy. You have been a great contributor to 
everything that we do around here and that we stand for, and we 
appreciate your taking the time to be here and really getting 
involved in this issue. You are recognized.

  STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE DANA S. DEASY, CHIEF INFORMATION 
                 OFFICER, DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE

    Mr. Deasy. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member, and 
Members of the Committee. Good afternoon. I am Dana Deasy, the 
Department of Defense Chief Information Officer.
    Sir, as you stated in your opening, with me today on behalf 
of the Department are Dr. Griffin, the Under Secretary for 
Research and Engineering; and General Jay Raymond, Chief of 
Space Operations, United States Space Force.
    In place of reading individual opening statements, we have 
prepared a short overview where Dr. Griffin will briefly 
explain the technical issues associated with FCC's ruling to 
allow Ligado to repurpose spectrum. Next, General Raymond will 
then explain the military mission impacts of that order on the 
Department's operations. I will briefly cover 5G and what 
actions the DOD is taking to leverage this important 
technology, as well as cover briefly how we are pursuing 
sharing mid-band spectrum. Finally, I have a chart where I will 
summarize the key takeaways.
      

[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

   
      
    With that, I would like to turn to Dr. Griffin to begin.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Deasy follows:]

                    Prepared Statement by Dana Deasy
                              introduction
    Good afternoon Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member, and distinguished 
Members of the Committee. I am Dana Deasy, the Department of Defense 
(DOD) Chief Information Officer. Thank you for the opportunity to 
testify on the national security risks posed to Global Positioning 
System (GPS) operations resulting from the Federal Communications 
Commission (FCC) decision to authorize Ligado's license modification to 
begin terrestrial wireless operations. Before we begin, I would like to 
thank the Committee's leadership for the concerns you raised to the 
President over the likely harm to military capabilities, particularly 
for the U.S. Space Force, resulting from this decision.
                       unacceptable risks to gps
    On April 19, 2020, the FCC unanimously adopted an Order that 
approved Ligado's license modification to launch a nationwide, cellular 
network by repurposing a portion of spectrum adjacent to the spectrum 
segment used by the GPS L1 signal. Throughout this proceeding, the 
Department made it clear that approving Ligado's plans would cause 
harmful interference to millions of GPS receivers across the country, 
both civilian and military. DOD senior leadership engagement on this 
matter has been long-standing and consistent, as part of a coordinated 
interagency approach for assessing the impact to reception of the GPS 
L1 signal. The National Space-Based Positioning, Navigation and Timing 
(PNT) Executive Committee (EXCOM), representing nine Federal agencies 
who use GPS, began raising concerns to National Telecommunications and 
Information Administration (NTIA) about earlier versions of Ligado's 
proposal and the harmful interference impacts for GPS in 2012. The PNT 
EXCOM's nine Federal agency members, including DOD and the Department 
of Transportation (DOT), also signed a joint letter in December 2018 to 
NTIA, unanimously and unambiguously objecting to the latest Ligado 
license modification request.
    Starting in 2012 and spanning across several administrations, 
multiple Secretaries of Defense have raised GPS interference concerns 
about the plans of Ligado and its predecessor companies. In letters in 
April and June 2019, the then Acting Secretary of Defense Patrick 
Shanahan sent letters to request that the FCC not allow the deployment 
of the proposed Ligado system. The current Secretary of Defense Mark T. 
Esper also sent a letter to the FCC Chairman on November 18, 2019, 
requesting that the Commission not allow the terrestrial wireless 
system proposed by Ligado to move forward.
    In line with these concerns, on December 6, 2019, NTIA leadership 
informed the FCC that they did not support the approval Ligado's 
license modification request. On March 12, myself and Dr. Michael 
Griffin, Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering, wrote 
to NTIA to further reinforce DOD's conclusion that the FCC's approval 
of Ligado's license modification request would cause unacceptable 
operational impacts and adversely affect the military potential of GPS. 
We asked NTIA to forward that letter to the FCC to be included in the 
record of the Ligado proceeding. As recently as March 24, Deputy 
Secretary of Defense David Norquist reiterated the Department's strong 
opposition in a letter to the Department of Commerce.
    After reviewing the details of the FCC's decision, DOD concludes 
the final Order still does not ameliorate these serious concerns or 
alter our findings that the Commission should have denied Ligado's 
license modification request. Congress directed, under 10 U.S.C. 2281, 
that the Secretary of Defense ``may not agree to any restriction on the 
GPS'' proposed by the head of a U.S. Department or agency that would 
adversely impact the military potential of GPS. Based on the tremendous 
risk to GPS, DOD does not agree with the FCC's decision.
    A key area of disagreement is the FCC's justification that the 
Order placed ``stringent conditions'' on Ligado's network deployment 
plans to ensure that GPS users would not experience harmful 
interference. However, these conditions will not protect GPS receivers 
against harmful interference and are thus unrealistic and unacceptable 
to the Department. DOD already assessed these requirements during the 
interagency review process, including evaluation by the PNT EXCOM. In 
addition to the work of the PNT EXCOM, extensive and technically 
rigorous testing and analysis was conducted over the past nine years by 
DOD, the National Space-Based PNT Engineering Forum, the DOT Adjacent 
Band Compatibility (ABC) Assessment and Air Force testing of eighty 
(80) GPS L1 receivers in 2016. These efforts all reached the same 
conclusion, which is that the Ligado proposal will disrupt GPS.
    Testing supported by the nine Federal agency users of GPS receivers 
who make up the PNT EXCOM concluded that the risk is far too great, and 
far too many questions remain, for Ligado's proposal to be approved. 
The DOT ABC Assessment highlighted the much lower power levels and 
significant separation distances needed to effectively protect GPS 
operations under the Ligado proposal. In the aggregate, these test 
results clearly showed that the conditions in this FCC Order will not 
prevent impacts to millions of GPS receivers across the United States, 
with massive complaints expected to come. In fact, the Department 
believes this FCC ruling increases the risk that American families and 
businesses may turn to foreign space-based navigation and timing 
systems like China's BeiDou and Russia's GLONASS, to replace the 
functions of GPS if it becomes unreliable due to interference from 
Ligado operations. This is fundamentally a bad deal for America's 
national and economic security.
    Unfortunately, the ``stringent conditions'' of the FCC's Ligado 
Order fall short in many critical respects, including:
      Guard Band: The Order includes the 23 MHz ``guard band'' 
to protect GPS L1 receivers from Ligado's terrestrial based network. 
GPS receivers are designed to receive signals from space and would be 
overpowered by this terrestrial network regardless of this protection. 
Despite this guard band, many varieties of GPS receivers would still 
suffer interference. To be clear, Ligado's proposal is to field a 
terrestrial-based network. GPS has a satellite-based space segment that 
transmits radio signals to users. This means that GPS L1 receivers are 
designed to tolerate interference from space systems in adjacent 
spectrum, but not to tolerate interference from terrestrial systems in 
the adjacent band.
      Power Levels: Another FCC condition is to require Ligado 
to limit the power levels of its base stations significantly compared 
to its original proposal to the FCC. However, even these substantial 
reductions fail to meet the power levels that can be tolerated in bands 
adjacent to GPS L1 signals that were studied by the DOT.
      Coordination: The Order's conditions also include 
coordination procedures, such as requiring Ligado to continuously 
monitor the transmit power of base station sites and follow procedures 
for responding to reports of interference. Coordination and 
notification requirements normally work well with spectrum sharing and 
DOD often champions such measures. However, there are millions of GPS 
receivers in use by Federal agencies, industry and general consumers 
that are mobile. Given the massive scale, there is no way to protect 
those mobile operations. This challenge is compounded by the fact that 
most GPS users would never know if Ligado disrupted their equipment in 
the first place or who to call about a problem.
      Government GPS Receivers: The FCC Order expects Ligado to 
protect U.S. Government GPS receivers and to repair or replace affected 
receivers identified before Ligado terrestrial operations commence. But 
this overlooks the classified nature of military GPS use and the sheer 
number of government receivers and military platforms affected. The FCC 
expectation is unreasonable and could never be employed in real 
practice. To avert significant mission impacts, the government would 
need to undertake unprecedented accelerated testing, modification and 
integration of new GPS receivers on existing platforms. This is cost 
and schedule prohibitive and would significantly degrade national 
security.
    The inability of Ligado to meet these stringent conditions in order 
to protect GPS is why the FCC should have rejected the Ligado proposal, 
based on the extent that no practical solution or mitigation is 
available that would permit Ligado to operate without high likelihood 
of widespread interference. The bottom line is that there are too many 
unknowns and the risks are too great to allow the proposed Ligado 
system to proceed in light of the operational impact to GPS.
                      importance of protecting gps
    A 2019 report sponsored by the National Institute of Standards and 
Technology estimated that in the United States, GPS generated about 
$1.4 trillion in economic benefits since the 1980s, with most benefits 
accruing in the last decade because of the rapid growth in information 
technologies, including advanced wireless services. DOD has a 
responsibility to ensure the protection of GPS, including when 
regulatory changes are contemplated (i.e., Ligado's request for license 
modification). DOD is committed to a ``whole of nation'' approach to 5G 
pilot experimentation. In February, President Trump signed an Executive 
Order on ``Strengthening National Resilience through Responsible Use of 
PNT Services.'' The Executive Order stated that it is U.S. policy ``to 
ensure that disruption or manipulation of PNT services does not 
undermine the reliable and efficient functioning of its critical 
infrastructure.'' This national policy directive recognizes that 
ubiquitous availability and reliability of GPS has made it an integral 
part of the fabric of our society, ranging from the location features 
in cell phones to navigation for vehicles and aircraft to routine 
banking transactions. GPS allows us to pinpoint 911 calls, launch 
precision airstrikes, prepare our forces for combat, and engage in many 
other actions foundational to protecting the American public at large. 
Furthermore, the Department utilizes GPS to protect and serve the 
public by tracking national security and terrorist threats and building 
readiness to protect the Homeland and our interests abroad. It is for 
this reason that the DOD strongly opposes the Ligado license 
modification request as not being in the best interest of our Nation.
                  united states and dod 5g leadership
    DOD recognizes the importance of 5G as it relates to the economic 
and national security of the Nation. Ligado portrays their solution to 
be 5G, but because there is no evidence that they have a technically 
viable 5G solution, they are misrepresenting their offering. The band 
in which Ligado operates is not part of the FCC's 5G FAST Plan, which 
is the Commission's blueprint for advancing U.S. interests in 5G.
    The non-contiguous bands that Ligado could bring to market are 
fragmented and impaired. Furthermore, Ligado's plans only target a 
small subset of 5G specifications, mainly limited Internet of Things, 
rather than the full range of high data rate, ultra-fast 5G services 
needed to reach the full promise of 5G benefits for businesses and 
consumers.
    DOD recognizes the need to share spectrum where and when it makes 
sense and wants to improve both technology and policy innovations to 
advance 5G objectives. One example of why this approach works is our 
success in advancing the FCC's 3.5 GHz Citizens Broadband Radio Service 
sharing decision. This sharing framework for 3.55-3.65 GHz, which is a 
vital air search radar band for Navy operations, is paving the way for 
the FCC's first mid-band 5G spectrum auction in July 2020. This 
``whole-of-nation'' approach is DOD's commitment to 5G pilot 
experimentation. This work brings together government, industry and 
academia to solve tough problems facing the Nation with regard to 5G, 
spectrum access and sharing.
                                summary
    DOD has conducted a balanced approach to assessing the risks and 
benefits of new wireless industry proposals. This is why DOD applied 
technical rigor and vigorous assessment to its conclusions on the 
Ligado plans. The Ligado proposal and the risks posed to GPS 
demonstrates that the FCC decision is misguided. Instead, the Ligado 
solution causes more harm than good to the Nation's spectrum use. The 
Department supports the President's 5G goals, however, we need to 
ensure that regulatory decisions that increase wireless industry access 
for cellular networks do not do so at the expense of GPS user 
requirements. The FCC's Ligado decision is flawed and must be reversed. 
As the Committees has so clearly expressed, this is a bad deal for 
America.
    I want to emphasize the importance of our partnerships with 
Congress in all areas, but with a particular focus on protecting the 
warfighter and ensuring the integrity of GPS to operate without harmful 
interference. I look forward to continuing to work with Congress in 
this critical area. Thank you for the opportunity to testify today and 
I look forward to your questions.

    Chairman Inhofe. Dr. Griffin?

STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE MICHAEL D. GRIFFIN, UNDER SECRETARY 
            OF DEFENSE FOR RESEARCH AND ENGINEERING

    Secretary Griffin. Thank you. I would like to take this 
chart in clockwise order and first key off of the point Senator 
Reed made, which is that GPS is, although designed originally, 
developed, deployed, and sustained by the DOD, that GPS is now 
a public utility. It services, of course, our national security 
needs, as General Raymond will address, but it also services 
the requirements of first responders navigating to a particular 
address. Every time you use an ATM [Automated Teller Machine], 
you are using the GPS timing signal. You are not asking where 
the ATM is. You are using the timing signal that is provided in 
order to conduct an encrypted transaction. Civil aircraft, 
military aircraft, commercial shipping, our deployed troops, 
credit card swiping machines, all of these things are, in one 
way or another, dependent upon GPS.
    It is forecast to be a $140 billion-plus industry by 2025. 
It is over $100 billion today in economic value. A Department 
of Commerce study estimated--and it is cited in my testimony--
$1.4 trillion of economic benefit generated by GPS since the 
system was first deployed. So that is what is at risk.
    How is it at risk? If you go to the upper right quadrant, 
you can see on your chart that the fundamental aspect of the 
GPS infrastructure, space and ground, the entire GPS 
infrastructure, was designed under the assumption that GPS 
radio navigation systems would be placed in a very quiet band 
of the radio spectrum, that ground-based transmitters would not 
be allowed in that spectrum because they would drown out the 
very weak signals that come from satellites.
    At this point with the FCC's decision, the goalposts have 
been moved. Now receivers meant to detect the extremely weak 
signals from satellites have to cope with very loud signals in 
the band next door.
    The practical effect of this, irrespective of who pays for 
the changes in equipment that would have to occur--and again, I 
will make Senator Reed's point for emphasis, that the Ligado 
proposal proposes only to fix Federal receivers, whereas by far 
the majority of use is in various aspects of the civil and 
commercial sector. The replacement of that equipment, 
regardless of who pays for it, provides a market niche 
opportunity, a refreshing of equipment, that will be available 
to our competitors. So rather than the installed based of 
United States equipment holding sway, our competitors who have 
their own global navigation satellite systems will be arguing 
why, since the United States has damaged its own system--why 
should we not buy from China or Russia. That is not an argument 
I want to have.
    Moreover, today GPS is the world standard for satellite 
navigation. If we damage our own world standard, earned through 
decades of investment and hard work, we should only expect that 
users worldwide will find other standards. That will not be to 
our benefit.
    It is very difficult to give you an accurate technical 
comparison of just how loud the Ligado signal is in comparison 
to GPS, but on the lower right, I have tried. So the decibel 
scale is what we use to measure loudness, if you will, whether 
radio noise or acoustic noise. So the quietest possible sound 
that can be heard might be represented by rustling leaves, 
which are quoted at 0 to 10 decibels (dB) in the literature. On 
the other hand, a jet taking off will create a sound 140 to 150 
decibels. If you are standing right next to it, it will blow 
out your eardrums. So if 0 decibels is barely audible and 140 
or 150 decibels is a jet takeoff, then what we are trying to do 
with GPS is to hear the sound of leaves rustling through the 
noise of 100 jets taking off all at once. That is a comparison 
that is actually favorable to Ligado. I could not put more than 
100 jets on my chart. That is what we are trying to do here.
    Finally, in the lower left quadrant of the chart, moving 
clockwise, there are a number of myths that have been 
promulgated in the media about the Ligado proposal. I chose 
three of them to debunk, the first of which is the claim that 
Ligado--a recent claim--is critical to the build-out of U.S. 
5G. In fact, my number here is not quite right. In fact, Ligado 
has about 3.5 percent of the sub-6 gigahertz spectrum in use 
today, if we count that portion of the spectrum allocated to 
the Citizens Broadband Radio Service, CBRS. 5G is about 
capacity, latency, and scale. The Ligado proposal has 
absolutely nothing to do with latency and scale, and its 
capacity is on the order of 3.5 percent of the total spectrum 
capacity. Ligado's existence, plus or minus, makes absolutely 
no difference to the involvement of U.S. in the so-called 5G 
race.
    Second, the myth is that the Department of Transportation 
testing, which is quoted in I think all of our testimonies--the 
myth is that that testing was flawed, that it did not assess 
receiver performance against the Ligado transmitter. That is 
true, but that is not the right test. The right test is the 
test to determine whether the band for satellite navigation has 
been protected, and the DOT testing addressed protection of the 
assigned GPS band in the most thorough manner I could have 
imagined. We will talk more about that later. But it protects 
the entire band and not just one transmitter and one receiver 
in an artificial scenario.
    A third myth that has been bandied about is the Ligado 
stations are like a 10 watt light bulb. How can they possibly 
interfere with GPS? Well, in case my jet noise analogy did not 
get across, let me talk to you about something for which I used 
to be responsible, the Hubble Space Telescope. The Hubble Space 
Telescope was designed to detect extraordinarily dim objects, 
so dim that on my decibel scale, a 10 watt bulb is 350 decibels 
brighter. If you shined a 10 watt bulb down the barrel of the 
Hubble Space Telescope, it would see nothing. It would be 
completely blinded. That is exactly the situation that we have 
with the GPS receiver trying to listen to GPS signals that are 
170 decibels weaker than this 10 watt bulb. That is not a game 
that we can win in GPS. We will have to redesign and redeploy 
equipment, and the cost will be hundreds of billions of dollars 
and decades of deployment time.
    Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Dr. Griffin follows:]

              Prepared Statement by Dr. Michael D. Griffin
    Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Reed, and Members of the Committee, 
thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today and offer 
testimony on the necessity of protecting the radio spectrum used by the 
Global Positioning System (GPS). GPS is not just a critical pillar of 
our national security, it is the foundation on which much of the United 
States', indeed the world's, current and future economy is built. To 
that point, if the recent decision of the Federal Communications 
Commission (FCC) to approve Ligado Network, LLC's license modification 
petition is allowed to stand, it will undermine both our national 
defense and economic security.
    GPS was designed, built, operated, and is sustained by the 
Department of Defense for the core purpose of providing precise 
positioning, navigation, and timing information to our forces on land 
and sea, in air and space.
    But beyond its original purpose, GPS has proven to be so valuable 
for civil and commercial applications that the military is now actually 
a minority user. According to a recent study by Grand View Research, 
GPS will be a $146.4 billion commercial industry by 2025, growing at 18 
percent annually. In 2019, the Department of Commerce released a study 
estimating that GPS has generated $1.4 trillion in economic benefits 
since the 1980s. \1\
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    \1\ ttps://www.space.commerce.gov/doc-study-on-economic-benefits-
of-gps/
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    When you use the mapping app on your smartphone, swipe a credit 
card to execute a secure point-of-sale transaction, or board an 
airplane, you are relying on GPS. Just as with other parts of our 
critical infrastructure, such as electric power, indoor plumbing, 
railways, highways, gas stations, and the air traffic control system, 
it has become a public utility--an almost unnoticed feature of the 
civilized world that we take for granted, and can no longer do without.
    GPS depends for its ubiquity and accuracy on more than two dozen 
satellites in precisely known positions 12,500 miles above the Earth. 
These satellites broadcast signals to earthbound and airborne receivers 
which, knowing where the satellites are, can determine their own 
positions, just as navigators in an earlier era used the known 
positions of stars to determine their positions at sea. The GPS 
satellites are essentially ``stars'' that shine with radio rather than 
with visible light.
    But signals from GPS satellites, as from all satellites, are 
extremely weak, and earthbound GPS receivers must be highly sensitive 
in order to use them. For this reason, they are assigned to portions of 
the radio spectrum--frequency bands--reserved exclusively for their 
use. Any nearby transmitter operating in or close to the frequency 
bands that have been set aside for GPS would overwhelm their signals. 
Such interference has been prevented by rules that have protected GPS 
and the entire space communications band surrounding it for decades, 
allowing it to become an integral part of the global economic 
infrastructure, used literally by the entire world.
    But the radio spectrum is valuable property, worth many billions of 
dollars when portions of it are placed for auction by FCC. Thus, 
unfortunately, some have proposed dismantling the rules that protect 
GPS in order to allow earthbound operators to use frequency bands 
previously reserved for space communications in general, and those 
adjacent to GPS in particular.
    The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) conducted a testing 
program developed over multiple years with stakeholder involvement, 
evaluating 80 consumer-grade navigation, survey, precision agriculture, 
timing, space-based, and aviation GPS receivers. This test program was 
conducted in coordination with DOD testing of military receivers. The 
results, as documented in the DOT ``Adjacent Band Compatibility'' study 
released in March, 2018, demonstrated that even very low power levels 
from a terrestrial system in the adjacent band will overload the very 
sensitive equipment required to collect and process GPS signals. Also, 
many high precision receivers are designed to receive Global Navigation 
Satellite System (GNSS) signals not only in the 1559 MHz to 1610 MHz 
band, but also receive Mobile Satellite Service (MSS) signals in the 
1525 MHz to 1559 MHz band to provide corrections to GPS/GNSS to improve 
accuracy. With the present and future planned ubiquity of base stations 
for mobile broadband use, the use of GPS in entire metropolitan areas 
would be effectively blocked. That is why every government agency 
having any stake in GPS, as well as dozens of commercial entities that 
will be harmed if GPS becomes unreliable, opposed the FCC's decision.
    There are two principal reasons for the Department's opposition to 
Ligado's proposal. The first and most obvious is that we designed and 
built GPS for reasons of national security, reasons which are at least 
as valid today as when the system was conceived. The second, less well-
known, is that the DOD has a statutory responsibility to sustain and 
protect the system. Quoting from 10 USC 2281, the Secretary of Defense 
`` . . . shall provide for the sustainment and operation of the GPS 
Standard Positioning Service for peaceful civil, commercial, and 
scientific uses . . . '' and `` . . . may not agree to any restriction 
of the GPS System proposed by the head of a department or agency of the 
United States outside DOD that would adversely affect the military 
potential of GPS.''
    Leaving entirely aside the national security implications of 
jamming our own military navigation system, if Ligado moves forward 
with establishing its network, we in the United States will have 
imposed a self-inflicted wound on GPS. Though other nations are 
building or upgrading their own satellite navigation systems, ours is 
the present world standard and the basis of hundreds of billions of 
dollars in economic advantage for our Nation. While we set out to 
redesign and refresh hundreds of millions of GPS receivers in our 
installed national security and industrial base, others, especially 
Russia and China, will be quick to take advantage of our mistake by 
offering replacement systems that are not vulnerable to Ligado's 
interference. A weakened GPS system offers our adversaries the 
opportunity to replace the United States as the world standard for 
satellite navigation. Both Russia and China will jump on that 
opportunity.
    The Department is not opposed to sharing the airwaves. Indeed, as 
part of the DOD's 5G-to-Next G initiative, we will be working alongside 
industry to test spectrum sharing technologies at military bases around 
the country, while promoting collaboration across the interagency, 
academia, and allies to develop, test, and deploy innovative solutions 
for spectrum sharing. But, as the Chairman and Ranking Member rightly 
noted in recent statements, Ligado has little to do with 5G. Although 
Ligado portrays their solution as 5G, there is no evidence that they 
have a technically viable 5G solution, and they are therefore 
misrepresenting their offering. Denying Ligado's petition will not 
affect the pace at which the Nation rolls out 5G technologies and 
service.
    We have built strong relationships across the government and 
industry to ensure that the U.S. remains at the cutting edge of 
communications technology. We must not allow this issue to cloud our 
progress. We must not put the security and economic advantage of the 
United States and its partners and allies at risk by allowing Ligado to 
put forward a false choice between the protection of GPS and the 
promotion of U.S. 5G competitiveness. One has nothing to do with the 
other, and we can have both if we are smart enough to recognize that. 
In light of the facts the choice is clear. The FCC must reverse its 
decision on Ligado, and deny any similar future petitions which would 
repurpose the radio spectrum adjacent to that assigned to GPS.

  STATEMENT OF GENERAL JOHN W. RAYMOND, USSF, CHIEF OF SPACE 
  OPERATIONS, UNITED STATES SPACE FORCE, AND COMMANDER, U.S. 
                         SPACE COMMAND

    General Raymond. Chairman Inhofe, Ranking Member Reed, and 
Members of the Committee, it is a pleasure to speak before you 
today on a matter of national importance: the protection of the 
GPS signal for use by our joint and coalition forces and the 
whole Nation.
    As both the Chief of Space Operations for the United States 
Space Force and as the Commander of the United States Space 
Command, I have the responsibility to the Secretary of the Air 
Force for organizing and training and equipping forces to 
provide GPS for the world and to the Secretary of Defense for 
operating, integrating, and protecting GPS for our Nation. I am 
proud to represent the airmen, soldiers, sailors, marines, and 
space professionals who conduct these missions with such 
expertise.
    The very first GPS satellite was launched in 1978, and it 
was integrated into warfare for the first time in Operation 
Desert Storm. You all remember in early 1990s, 1990-1991 the 
left hook. That was enabled by a GPS constellation that was not 
even fully up and operating at the time. How do you navigate 
through a featureless terrain at night in the desert? You do it 
with GPS.
    Now today--25 years ago last week, it became fully 
operational. Today it represents the Department of Defense's 
largest constellation where 31 satellites operating over 12,000 
miles above the earth's surface provide precision positioning, 
navigation, and timing services to 4.5 billion users and 
warfighters globally. It is three times more accurate than it 
was when it was first launched in the late 1970s.
    However, this critical capability is irrelevant if the 
signals coming off the satellite cannot be processed by the 
receiver on the ground. These signals, after traveling 12,000 
miles from space to reach earth, arrive very weak, less than a 
millionth of a billionth of a watt. It is hard to get your head 
around that small of a number. For receivers to be able to pick 
up such faint signals, these signals have to operate in a 
noise-pristine environment in that part of the spectrum. For 
those that ride the Amtrak train--and I experienced this last 
year--it is the quiet car. It is where people do not talk. It 
is where emitters do not make noise because that signal is so 
faint.
    It is recognized globally as a zone reserved for satellite 
signals coming from space, not for emitters operating on the 
ground approximately a billion times more powerful than the GPS 
signal. These ground emitters will interrupt, reduce the 
accuracy of, or jam the GPS signal. We must preserve this 
spectrum for space-to-ground signals. It is the global 
standard, and it puts our space capabilities, which are the 
gold standard, as Dr. Griffin talked about, at risk.
    As we compete with China and Russia, we should not cede our 
operational advantage.
    Because of the magnitude of the power overmatch between the 
ground antenna and the GPS signal, the mitigation steps the FCC 
has required will not retire all of the risk. Specifically, the 
23 megahertz buffer zone will not mitigate all the risk of 
interference. We have a buffer zone today. It is the mobile 
SATCOM services band at which this ground emitter is being 
placed. What this 23 megahertz buffer zone really implies--it 
is about a half of the buffer zone that we have today.
    I have spent most of my military career integrating GPS and 
other space capabilities into everything that we do as a joint 
force, and today there is absolutely nothing that we do as a 
joint force that is not enabled by space and specifically GPS. 
In the Department alone, we have over a million GPS receivers. 
They are integrated into our space launched vehicles. They are 
integrated into our aircraft, our tanks, on ships, on 
communication networks, and on our most important weapon 
system, our people. GPS allows us to shoot, move, and 
communicate with speed, precision, and over great distances. It 
has revolutionized military operations, and it is employed in 
every step of the kill chain to defeat our adversaries.
    Some might ask what is the impact on the force if the 
emitters are only located in the continental United States. In 
my opinion, the impact is significant and it is unacceptable. 
DOD mission areas that would operate under increased risks 
include our most important mission, Homeland defense. Assured 
GPS is critical to Homeland defense. It could impact military 
and commercial space launch. We use GPS to safely launch those 
rockets, and if they go astray, we blow those rockets up to 
protect public safety. We do most of our training and building 
of our readiness in United States (CONUS) to be able fight the 
fight overseas. Most specifically, in our defense support for 
civil authorities, like we are doing today with Covid or like 
with wildfire suppression or hurricane relief or earthquake 
relief, our forces rely on GPS to accomplish that critical 
mission. These ground emitters could have multimodal impacts to 
transportation hubs, airfield, seaports, and airports. Finally 
these emitters could impact overlapping defense critical 
infrastructure and key resource sectors like the defense 
industrial base, transportation, emergency services, energy, 
and communications.
    The best advice I could give is to strongly oppose the use 
of this spectrum that is reserved for space signals for 
terrestrial emitters. In doing so--if we do not, we increase 
the risk to our ability to conduct our critical Homeland 
defense missions, we erode the gold standard of our space 
capability, ceding advantage to Russia and China, we set a 
dangerous precedent for repurposing this spectrum reserved for 
space signals, and we go against the volumes of testing that 
has been done, which indicate that these ground-based emitters 
will impact the GPS signal.
    I will now turn it over to Mr. Deasy to talk about the 
spectrum.
    [The prepared statement of General Raymond follows:]

             Prepared Statement by General John W. Raymond
    Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Reed, and Members of the Committee, 
thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today with my 
esteemed colleagues and to reiterate the importance of the Global 
Positioning System (GPS) to national security, public safety, and our 
economic well-being.
    As the Chief of Space Operations for the United States Space Force, 
I am responsible to the Secretary of the Air Force for organizing, 
training, and equipping the forces that provide GPS services to our 
military forces, allies, and others who use it around the world. The 
Space Force is designing, building, and deploying the satellites and 
ground systems; operating the constellation; establishing and 
maintaining standards for all civil and military GPS signals; and 
developing the critical components for military GPS receivers. As the 
Commander of United States Space Command, I am responsible for 
directing daily GPS operations and ensuring the positioning, 
navigation, and timing (PNT) services provided by the system are there 
and available for use to our warfighters under all conditions.
    From the launch of the first GPS Block I satellite in 1978, through 
the accelerated fielding of GPS IIA satellites to support Desert Storm 
in 1990, to today, the performance of the system and the services it 
provides have continuously improved. On April 27, 2020, when we 
celebrated the 25th anniversary of GPS at full operational capability, 
today's GPS constellation delivers PNT accuracy three times as precise 
as was required by the original military specification.
    The next-generation of satellites we are deploying, GPS III, and 
the new, more resilient and cyber-secure ground control system to 
operate these new satellites, will improve that performance even 
further. The first GPS III was successfully launched in December 2018 
and the second in August of last year. In addition, this block of 
satellites includes a new civil signal that increases the system's 
international interoperability while protecting national security use--
evidence that our Nation sees GPS as global good and instrument of 
national power that far exceeds its military utility.
    GPS has long been the gold standard for the world for PNT and 
provides military, civil, and commercial benefits previously 
unimagined. The GPS enterprise helps fuel a $20 trillion economy that 
depends on it not just for positioning but to synchronize financial and 
cellular networks; enable robotic and autonomous systems; and create 
unbounded economic opportunity.
    In my role as the Commander of U.S. Space Command, I am also 
responsible for protecting the GPS system, and the services it provides 
to our military forces, from the threats any adversary might pose to 
its use. For many other military space systems the Nation relies on for 
its security and defense, this increasingly involves the need to 
protect our systems from physical attack. Our adversaries are now 
building counterspace weapons to kinetically attack our satellites from 
the ground and in orbit.
    This, however, is not the primary threat to GPS. The primary threat 
to GPS, both in the past and for the foreseeable future, is electronic 
attack or jamming of GPS receivers. Since the GPS
    signal originates from 12,000 miles in space, it is incredibly weak 
by the time it reaches the receivers that decode and process the 
complex signal on the Earth's surface. Adversaries understand this and 
build jammers in an attempt to deny our use of this signal in military 
operations. In response, we train to recognize this threat, employ 
special tactics to defeat the jammers, and operate sophisticated 
systems to maintain our use of GPS services in conflict. This requires 
great skill and comes at some risk to our forces, as they are required 
to defeat these electronic weapons to execute their missions.
    Here at home, anything that degrades the effectiveness and 
reliability of GPS has the ability to prevent military forces from 
training effectively to maintain readiness; and worse yet, keep us from 
protecting and serving the public by responding to natural disasters 
and providing humanitarian assistance, tracking national security 
threats, and defending the Homeland.
    Transmitters adjacent to the GPS spectrum have significant 
potential to disrupt and degrade the operation of the approximately 1 
million GPS receivers in the Department of Defense (DOD) inventory, and 
therefore bring harm to military training, readiness, and DOD's ability 
to conduct operations. Without solid data about the location of ground-
based transmitters and antennas, DOD cannot begin to fully understand 
and work to mitigate the impact to existing systems, if any mitigation 
is possible. Changes necessary to combat potential interference from 
systems operating near the GPS signals could delay the development and 
deployment of new GPS capabilities for years--and cost billions in U.S. 
taxpayer investment.
    GPS has also long been a critical technology that has supported the 
Nation's public safety, law enforcement medical and medical responders. 
It literally saves lives. While Americans at home are typically not 
under threat of purposeful electronic attack, the GPS services they 
depend on every day for life and livelihood are also threatened if the 
GPS signal and its environment are not protected from disruption. As 
with military forces conducting our critical Homeland Defense mission, 
or training for combat in the United States, degradation of GPS signals 
can affect safety of flight for aircraft and other segments of the 
national transportation system; prevent first responders from finding 
their way to emergencies or communicate when they arrive, and affect 
the economic activity of every American.
    By law the Secretary of Defense must raise concerns regarding 
anything that would adversely affect the military potential of GPS. He 
has done so. As the Commander of U.S. Space Command, I have been 
assigned a Unified Command Plan mission of protecting and defending our 
space capabilities. I cannot take direct action to protect America's 
use of GPS in the Homeland, but I can provide awareness of the threats, 
the impacts of those threats on our joint military forces, and strongly 
advise against emitters that can negatively impact our ability to 
operate our critical space capabilities that fuel our American way of 
life and our American way of war.

    Mr. Deasy. I am going to start by saying that DOD fully 
supports the U.S. needing to be leaders in 5G, and there is a 
right way we can go about it and there is a wrong way.
    Ligado does not provide a 5G solution. It is not offering a 
solution to be a 5G leader in America. The band in which Ligado 
operates is not even part of the FCC 5G fast plan, which is the 
commission's blueprint for advancing U.S. interests in 5G. The 
non-continuous bands that Ligado could bring to market are both 
fragmented and impaired.
    DOD clearly recognizes the huge value of 5G not only for 
commercial use but across the U.S. military as well.
    As you will see up here on this chart, we are getting ready 
to undertake a number of experiments to learn how best to 
utilize this technology. If you start on the far right of this 
slide, I point out some of the experiments we are getting ready 
to work with: augmented virtual reality, distributed training, 
smart warehousing and logistics, and eventually in a future 
phase, we will even start looking at how to make smart ports 
and bases.
    The part of this chart I really want to draw your attention 
to is in the middle. We have established a dynamic spectrum 
sharing pilot and are examining methods to facilitate sharing 
between 5G and DOD airborne radars in mid-band spectrum. Let me 
simplify this for you.
    What we need to be able to do in 5G is to ensure that when 
civilians are using their car for 5G or in their home or using 
it in the factory or an individual person is carrying it 
around, that the work we do and the operations we run in the 
military will not interfere, and vice versa. So that is what 
the 5G experimentations are all about. We will be doing these 
experimentations in conjunction with the National Spectrum 
Consortium, which is partnering with government, industry, and 
academia.
    Finally, the last most important thing is one of the most 
important areas of 5G is what is called the mid-band spectrum. 
What is important here for all of you to understand is how do 
we need to learn how to share that spectrum and make it 
available for both DOD use as well as commercial use.
    Next, in front of you on your very last chart, you have 
what I like to call the key takeaways. If there is the one 
chart today that you should keep with you to fully appreciate 
what we have all shared with you, it is this chart.
    First of all, Mr. Chairman, as you stated, this is about 
risk. This is risk to the resource that is America's economic 
engine and the vital nature of it for national security. The 
repurposed license is a classic case of bait and switch. FCC 
and Ligado want to move the goalpost by following terrestrial 
transmitters in a space communications band despite unanimous 
and unambiguous Federal opposition.
    DOD and DOT both performed extensive testing and studies 
evaluating the potential impact to 80 military and commercial 
GPS receivers. Those studies concluded that Ligado's solution 
will cause harmful interference to both.
    The stringent conditions imposed by the FCC are inadequate 
to protect GPS, impractical, and could never be employed in 
real practice. The required guard band and reduced power levels 
do not sufficiently protect GPS receivers, as you have heard 
today from Dr. Griffin and General Raymond. Coordination 
requirements are simply impractical. There are millions of 
mobile GPS receivers in use, and there is no way to protect 
those from their mobile operations. Notification of the event 
of interference simply does not work. None of you would even 
know in this room today if Ligado disrupted your individual GPS 
device, nor would you know what to do if they did. FCC 
expectation for Ligado to repair or replace affected receivers 
is unreasonable and could never be employed in practice.
    The American public and military rely on GPS to support a 
wide range of critical applications and missions from 
protecting our national security to our economic prosperity. We 
have always been world leaders in GPS, and we never want to see 
our country be forced to turn to foreign GPS providers.
    As General Raymond clearly articulated, the FCC decision 
will impact warfighter exercises, testing, training, and 
Homeland defense.
    GPS must remain a reliable service and always be available 
when you need it most; a simple example we can all appreciate: 
emergency services for a 911 call.
    Ligado and 5G simply do not go together. They portray their 
solution to be 5G. This is not how the U.S. will lead in 5G. 
They only target a small subset of the 5G specifications.
    In the next several months, DOD will be executing on 
important 5G experiments with government and industry.
    I will close by simply saying it is clear to the DOD that 
the risk to GPS far outweighs the benefits of this FCC 
decision, and the FCC needs to reverse their decision.
    Thank you for your time. We look forward to your questions.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you very much, Mr. Deasy.
    We now recognize Admiral Allen for any comments.

         STATEMENT OF ADMIRAL THAD W. ALLEN, USCG, RET.

    Admiral Allen. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Reed, and 
Members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to 
provide testimony today with my distinguished colleagues from 
the Department of Defense. My full testimony is submitted for 
the record.
    I am testifying today in my private capacity as a citizen 
and the views expressed are mine. They are not intended to 
represent any government agency or private firm. My testimony 
is based on publicly available information. My views represent 
my concerns and those of GPS civil users. I will try not to 
repeat points previously made.
    I have been involved in radio navigation and operations and 
policy for more than 50 years. Fourty five years ago, I was the 
commanding officer at Loran Station, Lampang, Thailand as the 
war in Vietnam ended. Ten years ago as the Commandant of the 
Coast Guard I personally turned the switch that decommissioned 
the final Loran C operating chain in the United States.
    My fellow panelists have presented a unified testimony 
regarding the impact of the FCC order and authorization to 
allow Ligado Networks to deploy a low-power terrestrial 
nationwide network and the associated impacts on the Department 
of Defense and national security. I endorse their 
recommendations.
    My purpose here today is to speak on behalf of the hundreds 
of millions of civil users of GPS. From the timing of financial 
transactions to power generation, synchronization of 
telecommunications, high precision agriculture, intelligent 
transportation systems, and air navigation and airspace 
management, GPS has become vital to the Nation's general 
welfare and common defense.
    The risk to military systems, so clearly stated by this 
panel, is also shared by civil GPS users. However, unlike our 
military forces who have the ability to reduce risk through 
encryption and other tools, civil users are a separate user 
segment with greater receiver diversity and fewer risk 
reduction options. The single point in government where the 
interests of the civil GPS users are integrated with the 
Department of Defense and brought into a consensus process is 
through the position, navigation, and timing (PNT) Executive 
Committee (EXCOM) and its supporting PNT Advisory Board. The 
PNT Advisory Board approach for reducing risk to the civil 
users has been a three-pronged strategy: protect the signal, 
toughen the receiver, augment GPS with backup or complimentary 
PNT services.
    The impact of disruption or loss of a GPS signal varies 
with the type of receiver. This could manifest itself in 
anything from an ATM malfunction to the loss of navigation in 
an intelligent transportation system, interference with an 
unmanned aerial system, or disruption of electrical power 
distribution. The uses of GPS range from a simple FITBIT to the 
provisions of coarse timing for highly refined, parsed timing 
services for financial transactions.
    While there are a host of issues raised by the FCC Order 
Authorization (OA), my written testimony addresses them 
specifically. I wanted to hit five things here today.
    The administrative process for this decision has never been 
made public to gain comment on the allocation of spectrum of 
the ancillary terrestrial component of the service or the 
earth-based transmitters.
    The lack of a transparent process to look at the competing 
criteria as to how to measure disruptions in the GPS adjacent 
band.
    Third, the density of terrestrial antennas and the impact 
on mobile devices moving through those fields.
    Four, the OA shifts the performance burden to the receiver 
rather than protecting the spectrum, as has been stated.
    Finally, the assertion that the Ligado plan will 
significantly accelerate or enhance the deployment of 5G 
technology. There are no 5G standards for the spectrum as it 
has not been used for 5G anywhere else in the world.
    The concept contained in the OA that the impacts of 
adjacent band interference can be measured and identified by 
Ligado as they occur and then mitigated in a timely and 
effective manner without prior testing strains credibility. 
Tests that were utilized by the FCC were funded by Ligado, were 
not conducted in a transparent fashion, and not widely 
supported.
    Further, the failure of the FCC to accept the standard 
floor for tolerance of noise that was used by the Department of 
Transportation in the adjacent band compatibility study is 
equally quizzical and its summary dismissal is troubling. This 
is a neutral guardrail for the spectrum. This approach rejects 
the concept of first do no harm and replaces it with 
consequence management after the event has occurred.
    In closing, I would like to use the words of those close to 
this issue in the air and on the ground. My good friend, 
Captain Sully Sullenberger, and I spoke this morning about the 
concerns of the aviation community. He said putting the narrow 
commercial interest of one company ahead of our national 
security and the needs of the country is wrong-headed and 
dangerous. Wishful thinking and hoping that things will work 
out is not an effective strategy and cannot repeal the law of 
physics.
    Closer to earth during a visit to my wife's family in 
Illinois, I spent some time talking to corn and soybean farmers 
who depend on GPS services for precision navigation. I asked 
what happens when you lose GPS. I got a two-word response: we 
quit. While you can reboot and begin planting again, if you are 
flying a medevac helicopter or responding to a wildfire, it is 
a much different problem. Spectrum is a national asset, a 
precious asset, and it should be protected, not subject to 
arbitrary and capricious decisions.
    I look forward to your questions.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Allen follows:]

                  Prepared Statement by Thad W. Allen
    Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Reed, and Members of the Committee, 
thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony today with my 
distinguished colleagues from the Department of Defense.
    I am testifying today in my capacity as a private citizen and the 
views expressed by me are not intended to represent any government 
agency or private firm. My testimony is based on publicly available 
information. My views represent my concerns and those of the GPS civil 
user community.
    While my CV has been provided to the Committee, I would like to 
note that I have been involved in radio navigation operations and 
policy for more than 50 years. Forty-five years ago, I was the 
Commanding Officer of a LORAN C Transmitting Station in Lampang, 
Thailand as the war in Vietnam ended. Ten years ago, as the Commandant 
of the Coast Guard I personally turned the switch that decommissioned 
the final LORAN C chain operating in the United States.
    My fellow panelists have presented unified testimony regarding the 
Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) Order and Authorization (OA) 
to allow Ligado Networks LLC ``to deploy a low-power terrestrial 
nationwide network . . . '' and the associated impacts on the 
Department of Defense and national security. I endorse their testimony 
and recommendations.
    My purpose here today is to speak on behalf of the hundreds of 
millions of civil users of GPS and Global Navigation Satellite Systems 
(GNSS) in the context of the Committee's concerns regarding national 
security. It is premised on a broader concept of national security that 
extends to all elements of national power. The ubiquity of GNSS and GPS 
specifically, make the provision of positioning, navigation, and timing 
(PNT) services critical to the economic wellbeing and Homeland security 
of the Nation. From the timing of financial transactions to power 
generation, synchronization of telecommunication, high precision 
agriculture, intelligent transportation systems, and air navigation and 
airspace management, GPS has become vital to the Nation's ``general 
welfare'' and ``common defense.'' As stated in a 6 December 2019 letter 
from NTIA to the FCC, ``The accuracy and ubiquitous availability of the 
Global Positioning System (GPS) is fundamental to the Nation's economy, 
national security, and continued technological leadership.'' The letter 
further states, ``A recent study sponsored by the National Institute of 
Standards and Technology (NIST) estimated the economic benefits of GPS 
for private sector use at a range between $903 billion and $1.8 
trillion as of 2017.''
    The risk to military systems, so clearly stated by this panel, is 
also shared by civil GPS users. However, unlike our military forces who 
have the ability to reduce risk through encryption and other tools, 
civil users are a separate user segment with greater receiver diversity 
and fewer risk reduction options. The single point in government where 
the
    interests of civil GPS users are integrated with Department of 
Defense and brought into a consensus process through the PNT Executive 
Committee (EXCOM) and its supporting PNT Advisory Board (PNT AB). The 
general approach for reducing the risk to civil users has been a three-
pronged strategy: Protect the signal, Toughen the receiver, and Augment 
GPS with backup or complimentary PNT services (PTA).
    The impact of disruption or loss of a GPS signal varies with the 
type of receiver. This could manifest itself in anything from an ATM 
malfunction, to the loss of navigation in an intelligent transportation 
system, interference to an unmanned aerial system, or disruption of 
electrical power distribution. The of uses GPS range from simple FITBIT 
watches to the provision of coarse timing for highly refined, parsed 
timing services for financial transactions.
    While there are a host of issues raised by the FCC OA, I would like 
to address five specific issues:
     1.  The administrative process by which this decision was made
     2.  The lack of a transparent process to resolve competing 
criteria as to how to measure disruptions to GPS by adjacent band 
interference
     3.  The density of terrestrial antennas required to provide the 
anticipated service and associated impact.
     4.  GPS Spectrum Protection
     5.  The assertion that the Ligado plan will significantly 
accelerate or enhance the deployment of 5G technology.
                                overview
    The concept contained in the OA that impacts of adjacent band 
interference can be measured and identified by Ligado as they occur and 
then mitigated in a timely and effective manner without prior testing 
strains credibility. Tests that were utilized by the FCC in the OA were 
funded by Ligado, were not conducted in a transparent fashion, and not 
widely supported. Further, the failure of the FCC to accept a standard 
floor for the tolerance of noise that was used by the Department of 
Transportation in the Adjacent Band Compatibility study is equally 
quizzical and its summary dismissal in the OA is troubling. This 
approach rejects the concept of ``first do no harm'' and replaces it 
with consequence management following the event.

1. Administrative Process
    An example of the normal process to convert satellite service 
spectrum to terrestrial mobile broadband spectrum was the 2 GHz MSS 
spectrum licensed to Dish Networks. In that instance, FCC proposed an 
allocation for Fixed and Mobile Services (Notice of Proposed Rulemaking 
(NPRM) 7/15/2010, Report and Order 4/4/2011); developed service rules 
to use the allocations (NPRM 3/21/2012, Order 1/30/2013); then modified 
the Dish Network license after a public comment period to comply with 
the service rules (4/3/2013)). Consistent with the 2000 Orbit Act, 
which prohibits FCC from auctioning satellite service spectrum, Dish 
Network's spectrum was not auctioned, but conversion of Dish's MSS 
spectrum was conditioned on Dish bidding at least 1.564 billion dollars 
in the H-block spectrum auction (which it did).
    In contrast, conversion of Ligado's spectrum to provide terrestrial 
wireless services is essentially free and, as wireless expert Tim 
Farrar noted in 2011, could result in a multi-billion-dollar windfall 
for the company with no recompense to the American taxpayer. In the 
case of Ligado Networks, FCC did not follow the normal regulatory 
process for reasons that remain unclear. Rather than following the 
example of the Dish Network's process, and making an allocation to the 
Mobile Service, FCC instead seems to have made a de facto allocation to 
the Mobile Service without the normal public process being followed. 
Specifically, Condition 2 of the attached conditions to the March 26, 
2010 Memorandum Opinion and Order and Declaratory Ruling (DA 10-535) 
required: ``Without regard to satellite service, SkyTerra shall 
construct a terrestrial network to provide coverage to at least 100 
million people in the United States by December 31, 2012; to at least 
145 million people in the United States by December 31, 2013; and to at 
least 260 million people in the United States by December 31, 2015.'' 
As evidenced by the past nine-plus years of the Ligado waiver request 
and subsequent license modification proceeding, it is apparent to me 
the use of the MSS L-band satellite service spectrum for terrestrial 
wireless broadband service should have been the subject of a NPRM as 
normally would be required under the Administrative Procedure Act 
(APA). The only terrestrial service allowed in Ligado's spectrum is 
satellite augmentation service (MSS Ancillary Terrestrial Component 
(ATC), which is terrestrial fill-in for areas of poor satellite 
reception such as urban areas subject to building blockage and other 
impairments). FCC made it clear in 2003, when it adopted the original 
MSS ATC rules, that stand-alone terrestrial service was not intended 
for the MSS band. In that 2003 MSS ATC Order, FCC stated: ``We do not 
intend, nor will we permit, the terrestrial component to become a 
stand-alone service.'' Rather than go through the normal process of 
making an allocation to the Mobile Service, which is the broad radio 
service category under which terrestrial mobile broadband would 
normally be provided, and then developing service rules to use that 
allocation so that harmful interference isn't caused to other spectrum 
users in the same or adjacent bands, the FCC avoided the public process 
of making an allocation to the Mobile Service and the separate public 
process of developing service rules to use that allocation.

2. Measuring Disruptions
    Of note, harmful interference is defined in the International 
Telecommunication Union (ITU) Radio Regulations as interference which 
`` . . . endangers the functioning of a radionavigation service or of 
other safety services or seriously degrades, obstructs, or repeatedly 
interrupts a radiocommunication service operating in accordance with 
[the] Radio Regulations.'' This definition is consistent with the 
definitions appearing in the FCC rules and the Federal Agency rules set 
forth by the NTIA. However, what is not well understood is that the 
requirement that one radiocommunications service not cause harmful 
interference to another radio service is a last resort or capstone 
requirement when rules that are designed to ensure compatible 
operations between different radio services, and prevent harmful 
interference, fail. The rules that ensure compatible operations are 
normally developed in an FCC rulemaking process as noted earlier.
    Because of the irregular process the FCC used, the public debate 
over whether the FCC should make a terrestrial Mobile Service 
allocation in the MSS L-band never occurred and, as a result, the 
service rules proceeding (e.g., rules for use of the allocation), where 
mechanisms and criteria to ensure compatibility between Ligado and GPS 
would have been debated in a public comment process, never occurred. 
Instead of a NPRM for service rules to use an allocation to the mobile 
service that the FCC never made, FCC conditioned a 2011 Waiver for 
LightSquared (now Ligado) so that it could not commence commercial 
terrestrial operations until ``harmful interference concerns have been 
resolved''. FCC likewise issued an April 2016 Public Notice and limited 
the discussion only to showing harmful interference. Interference 
protection criteria, such as a 1 dB drop in carrier-to-noise density 
ratio (C/No), or equivalently an interference-to-noise ratio (I/N) of -
6 dB, on which the government test and analysis was based and which are 
designed to prevent harmful interference, were completely ignored by 
the FCC.
    The National Advanced Spectrum and Communications Test Network 
(NASCTN) testing on which the FCC relies tested only 14 receivers in a 
total of 20 configurations, testing none in the important classes of 
certified-aviation, non-certified aviation, space-based, cellular, and 
military grade. The NASCTN tests did not consider the multiple 
simultaneous stresses to receiver operation (e.g. motion, multipath, 
limited view of the sky, other sources of interference), did not test 
for reception of all GNSS signals even though most modern receivers can 
receive all of them, and did not test all modes of receiver operation. 
NASCTN admitted the limitations of its testing, indicating that its 
objective was only ``to establish a test methodology,'' and ``testing a 
set of devices that represents the comprehensive market in a 
statistically complete manner is not practical in the timeframe of this 
testing.''
    As noted earlier, in limiting the considerations for Ligado's 
proposed network to not cause harmful interference to GPS, the FCC 
negated all test and analysis performed at significant expense and 
effort by the U.S. Government and relied exclusively on testing funded 
by Ligado.

3. Antenna density and mobile receivers
    The OA also focuses on the impact of receivers in relation to fixed 
towers and testing has been based on the distance of the receiver from 
the tower. The density of antennas to provide the proposed service is 
not clear. As a result, there is no clear path to assess the impact on 
mobile receivers, those embedded in handsets or mobile platforms such 
as aircraft, vehicles, unmanned systems, and emergency services that 
may randomly come in close proximity to Ligado base stations. This 
would also apply to Department of Defense resources deployed for 
Homeland defense (HD) or defense support to civilian agency (DSCA) 
missions. As the former Principal Federal Official for the response to 
Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and the National Incident Commander for the 
Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, I can personally attest to the need for 
fully capable military forces when the situation dictates. The current 
Defense support to the coronavirus pandemic response underscores the 
domestic need for an effective and reliable military force.

4. GPS Spectrum Protection
    The FCC's action in permitting the proposed Ligado network to 
proceed apparently fails to recognize that permitting incompatible uses 
of spectrum adjacent to that in which GPS operates destabilizes and 
degrades the overall spectrum environment for GPS. This is contrary to 
National Space Policy (June 28, 2010) and the October 25, 2018 
Presidential Memorandum on Developing a Sustainable Spectrum Strategy 
for America's Future, both of which provide direction to ``sustain the 
radiofrequency environment'' in which critical U.S. space systems 
operate. FCC engineers undoubtably know that all receivers take in some 
power from adjacent band signals and if the adjacent band interfering 
power is sufficiently strong, as is the case with Ligado's terrestrial 
system, it can overload the receiver (in this case GPS) and result in 
disruption of the received GPS signal. This is called receiver overload 
or receiver blocking. It seems to me, given the importance of GPS to 
the overall national interest, consideration should have been given to 
protecting and sustaining the overall spectral environment in which GPS 
operates.

5. 5G
    Finally, much has been said about the potential to use Ligado's 
spectrum to advance United States 5G objectives and enable a 
competitive advantage against China in the ``race to 5G''. However, 
Ligado's spectrum is not allocated to 5G or terrestrial services 
anywhere in the world and, given the incumbent global satellite 
operations (e.g., Inmarsat, Thuraya), will not be allocated for 5G. 
There are no Third-Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) standards for 
5G in the band nor any equipment available to use the band. Despite 
Ligado's stated intention to start development of these 5G standards, 
the reality is the use of Ligado's spectrum for 5G will create an 
isolated market in the U.S. with almost no possibility of expansion for 
global use. So, it is far from clear to me how our competitive position 
relative to China would be enhanced by the FCC approval of the Ligado 
license modification. In fact, since many telecommunications networks 
rely on GPS for network timing, degradation of GPS could result in 
greater reliance on foreign GNSS systems, such as the Russian 
Federation's GLONASS or China's Beidou system, to the detriment of the 
United States global competitive posture overall.
                           concluding thought
    In March of 2016, General John E. Hyten testified before the House 
Armed Services Committee, Subcommittee of Strategic Forces, and 
described the importance of GPS to the military and to the Nation. In 
his testimony, General Hyten stated: ``I don't think that we should 
infringe on the GPS spectrum. That is a critical capability, not just 
for the military security of the Nation but for the entire economic 
well-being of this Nation. We can't allow that to happen.'' GPS has 
become more important and more ubiquitous since General Hyten 
testified. Today, General Hyten's testimony is as relevant and 
important as the day he testified. The overall national interest is 
best served by ensuring that the national and global utility that is 
GPS is not disrupted or degraded.
    That is my personal commitment as well.

    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you very much, Admiral.
    We are going to have a 5-minute round. Senator Reed and I 
are going to recommend a second round of questioning because 
there is a lot of stuff to cover here. I am going to take my 
first 5 minutes with Director Deasy and General Raymond and 
Admiral Allen and then save my other question for Dr. Griffin 
for the second round.
    Now, Director Deasy, the reason I bring this up is this is 
the one thing that is mentioned more than anything else when 
they are trying to defend what happened in the action of the 
FCC. So I would ask you, even though it has been touched on, 
can you describe the interagency process that caused the 
Department of Defense to conclude that Ligado's proposal was 
likely to interfere with GPS, and did the FCC consult you and 
did they take your concerns seriously?
    Mr. Deasy. So, sir, the way I would start that is when a 
company, in this case Ligado, wants to repurpose the spectrum, 
they submit that request to the FCC. The FCC, in turn, turns it 
over to the National Telecommunications and Information 
Administration (NTIA). Sometimes those go through what is 
called the Independent Radio Advisory Committee, the IRAC, 
which has 19 members. In the case of evaluating Ligado's 
request for repurposing the spectrum, it was turned over to the 
PNT EXCOM which is made up of nine Federal Agencies. I co-chair 
that along with the Department of Transportation.
    The EXCOM--what they did was they, in turn, asked the Air 
Force to conduct a series of independent studies and testing to 
determine whether or not the request that Ligado had put forth 
was reasonable and could be accepted. The testing took place 
and was completed in about April of 2016, as I had mentioned in 
my opening remarks. What that testing did was take a number of 
commercial and military receivers, approximately 80, and they 
tested them over a long, extensive period of time, and they 
tested them to determine the levels of noise in which they 
would see interference. They used the requirements of what 
Ligado was specifying as acceptable, and in running those 
tests, they clearly indicated that the results of the tests 
caused interference in all cases.
    So what was done with that information? In turn, that then 
was turned back over in a form of a letter that I co-signed 
with Department of Transportation in December of 2018. That 
letter clearly cited the testing that was done by the Air 
Force. In that letter, we say that it was unambiguous and 
unanimously agreed across nine Federal Agencies that this could 
not move forward.
    Given that there was still concern raised and the fact that 
our letter was not being acknowledged, we felt compelled to 
follow up with four additional communications. One was back in 
June of 2019 from then-Deputy Secretary Shananan to the FCC 
stating the opposition. Secretary Esper in November of 2019 
forwarded a letter also stating our concerns and opposition. 
The IRAC sent to the NTIA on February 20th a letter from 12 
agencies that were signed expressing concerns. Dr. Griffin and 
myself furthermore sent an additional letter to NTIA in March 
of 2020. Finally, Secretary Norquist sent a letter in March of 
2020, of which the final letter went from NTIA to the FCC on 
April 2020. Each of those letters made clear and cited the 
testing that was done by the Air Force that this could not be 
accepted, nor should it be recommended to move forward, sir.
    Chairman Inhofe. The second part of that question was, were 
you consulted by or asked by the FCC for your opinions, and did 
they take them seriously?
    Mr. Deasy. Sir, I will tell you that historically we have 
had a very good working relationship with the FCC when it comes 
to collaboratively studying requests like this. In the case of 
this particular request, no, sir, there was not a give and 
take, a back and forth that we typically go through. At the end 
of the day, we were completely caught off guard when over that 
weekend in April the decision was taken by the FCC to go ahead 
and move forward.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you, Director.
    Lastly, General Raymond, you did touch upon this in your 
opening statement. Is there anything you wanted to add in terms 
of the impacts on the warfighter?
    General Raymond. Thank you very much, sir.
    The way I couch GPS, it is the DNA of our way of war. It is 
systemic in everything that we do, and it is clear, without 
question, that putting a ground emitter in with the space 
signals will cause an eruption. I think that will increase risk 
to force and risk to mission, and I outlined in my opening 
statement the mission areas of Homeland defense, our most 
critical mission, defense support of civil authorities, and 
building the force, the training and the readiness that we 
need. I think it is a risk that we should not accept.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you, General.
    Senator Reed?
    Senator Reed. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
    Let me first commend all the panelists for their very 
cogent and coherent and compelling testimony. Thank you all.
    Mr. Deasy, following on a thread that Admiral Cochran 
introduced, under the Administrative Procedure Act, as I 
understand it, is a significant action by a government agency 
must be accompanied by a public rulemaking, which includes a 
public comment period, response to those comments, and a 
publication of an order, which is then subject to judicial 
review. I consider the repurposing of the satellite program 
initially licensed to LightSquared for a satellite spectrum and 
then changed to a land-based system to be a very significant 
public action.
    Was there any kind of rulemaking proceeding prior to the 
Ligado license of only a land-based network?
    Mr. Deasy. No, sir. As I stated earlier, typically, as you 
point out, something of this nature--there was a very formal 
process that the FCC goes through. It is a very good process, 
and they have used it for years, and in this particular case, 
we did not see that process being followed. As a matter of 
fact, I would go so far to say that to the best or our 
knowledge--and I have talked to many people inside the DOD 
about this--we think this is the first time ever where the FCC 
has taken an arbitrary and independent decision where it 
unanimously and unambiguously opposed by multiple Federal 
Agencies.
    Senator Reed. Well, thank you.
    As you have pointed out, the National Technical Information 
Administration, the NTIA, objected numerous times to the 
decision. Three Secretaries of Defense, Secretary Carter, 
Secretary Shananan, and Secretary Esper, have all written about 
their opposition using the spectrum as the order directs.
    So, Mr. Deasy, you would say this is a very unusual 
process?
    Mr. Deasy. I would go as far as to say that it is unheard 
of and the first precedent of its kind.
    Senator Reed. Thank you.
    Admiral Allen, you know the civilian sector very well. From 
your perspective, you would also describe this as highly 
unusual or, as Mr. Deasy said, unheard of?
    Admiral Allen. I would concur with his remarks. The 
original process should have been the allocation for the mobile 
satellite service spectrum. If it was reallocated to 
terrestrial antennas for re-broadcast, that should have been 
subject to a notice of proposed rulemaking and public comment.
    Senator Reed. Thank you very much.
    One of the concerns that I have, because the spectrum is 
always in play, if you will, is that this will set a very 
dangerous precedent; i.e., as we look at 5G in the mid-range 
spectrum, if the FCC operates in the same way by disregarding 
expertise within the Federal Government, we could have a 
situation where, instead of trying to reach a consensus, we 
have the FCC basically assuming and determining everything 
according to their own intuitions.
    Admiral Allen, could you give a comment on this process, 
this consensus process, which up until now worked but seems to 
be breaking down?
    Admiral Allen. Well, the current relationship is based on 
an memorandum of understanding between the FCC and NTIA.
    I would just offer this comment. The FCC was created--their 
remit goes back to the 1920s and 1930s regarding radio and 
television spectrum. We moved into a vast new era of 
technology, and now there are decisions being made that impact 
on spectrum and space operations and so forth. Independent 
regulatory agencies were created to create an unbiased 
representation and make decisions in the public interest.
    The process we have right now is guided by National 
Security Presidential Directive 39 that requires that the 
equivalent of a deputies meeting, which the EXCOM is, to be 
subordinated to the Department of Commerce and NTIA for 
transmission to the FCC. I would submit to you that process 
needs to be looked at.
    Senator Reed. Thank you.
    Finally, General, as I understand the FCC order, Ligado 
must provide an 800 number to call and have a stop button once 
severe damages are detected. That is the remedy. So what does a 
warfighter in the middle of a war zone do when he discovers his 
system is going down? Does he get on the phone and dial an 800 
number and make a complaint?
    General Raymond. Sir, the warfighter is the 800 number that 
the Nation calls for us to do our Nation's business. We do not 
want the warfighter to have to call an 800 number to report 
interference as they are doing our Nation's work.
    Senator Reed. I concur entirely. But I think this might 
underscore the absurdity, more than anything else. If this is 
the remedy that the FCC is proposing for interference, which 
would impact thousands and thousands of men and women deployed 
overseas, this is--we will just stop it. It is highly unusual 
and probably ineffectual.
    General Raymond. I agree, sir.
    Senator Reed. Thank you.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Reed.
    Senator Fischer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to 
thank you and the Ranking Member for having this hearing today 
and also compliment both of you on keeping this Committee 
informed and active during the past several weeks. So thank you 
very much.
    Mr. Deasy, there is a number of mitigation proposals that 
are included in the FCC order, and it is my understanding that 
the Department has expressed quite a few reservations on them. 
There is a process that is being, I think, contemplated where 
Ligado is going to work with agencies to identify potentially 
affected devices for upgrade, repair, or replacement.
    Can you walk us through some of the practical steps of how 
this is going to work? I would also ask Secretary Griffin and 
General Raymond to jump in on this question too.
    To get it started a little bit, if you could maybe address 
what sort of time, resources, personnel are going to be needed 
to carry it out? Do you see any classification restrictions or 
limits on proprietary data being an issue? Are GPS devices 
easily removed or replaced? Are these integrated systems? I am 
asking you to generalize on these, but if you could maybe walk 
us through some of this and how you see it working or the 
challenges that it would face?
    Mr. Deasy. I will be happy to start. Then I think Dr. 
Griffin is well placed to carry on this conversation.
    I think the easiest way to break this down is to look 
specifically at the order that FCC issued and, quote, the 
stringent requirements they put in place. There are really four 
that I would like to call out, and I think, Senator, these 
touch upon what I think you are trying to get after.
    The first one is what they call the guard band. It is this 
23 megahertz. The idea is so Ligado has always recognized that 
they know that their solution does cause interference. I mean, 
I think that is something I think we cannot lose in this 
conversation, which is why they have continued to figure out 
how to lower their power and why they have created what is 
called this guard band. They state because they are 23 
megahertz away that that in itself clearly should be sufficient 
to allow them to operate. I think Dr. Griffin gave some 
compelling testimony today that clearly showed it simply will 
not work and the noise that will be created.
    The second thing they talk about is lowering the power. 
Now, if you go back to the original LightSquared to the early 
days of Ligado, they have continued to lower the power, and 
they are doing that because they know that their solution will 
cause interference to GPS. They tried to make this, quote, 10 
watt light bulb sound so insignificant, but I think Dr. 
Griffin's comment about the Hubble telescope was really quite 
compelling. So it is unrealistic to think that they are ever 
going to get to a power level that would make ground-based 
terrestrial communications acceptable.
    They talk about coordination. Now, what they are really 
saying there is that as they stand up their terrestrial based 
solution, they are going to, quote, coordinate and that if we 
say there is a problem, they will address it. Well, this is how 
you tell if there is a problem. They install a terrestrial 
ground-based solution. They turn it on, and then we have to 
report back to them what that interference is, where that 
interference is causing problems. Think about the civil side of 
that. How will that coordination actually take place? On the 
military side, we will have a difficult enough time given the 
millions and millions of GPS receivers. To your point, when you 
start to talk about embedded receivers and assets that we have 
inside the military, it is not like you can pull that asset out 
and simply install a new one that will not cause interference. 
This will cost--I cannot tell you specifically, ma'am, what the 
dollars or the people requirements would be because we would 
have to look at that on an asset-by-asset basis.
    Then finally remediation. Simply put, if you read the order 
carefully, the burden is actually on the Department of Defense. 
We have to call out what the problem is and then, quote, once 
we clearly identify the problems, they will remediate. Well, 
remember, many of our assets are highly classified, and so the 
very point of being able to go in and articulate what those 
problems are and how they should go about remediating them is 
simply not practical.
    Senator Fischer. Mr. Secretary, do you or the General have 
anything to add?
    Secretary Griffin. I will be brief. What is not being 
addressed when one talks about repair and replace, even among 
the Federal receivers which Ligado promises to replace, is the 
expense and the down time of doing so. Let me give you a 
comparison.
    Aviation-grade receivers are designed, because of the 
cruciality of those--and, Senator Inhofe, like you I am a 
pilot. The aviation-grade receivers in my airplane cost $10,000 
or so apiece. They are much more cumbersome. They are larger. 
They consume more power in order to produce a hardened design 
to just this type of interference. The GPS receivers that go on 
someone's tractor or first response vehicle or in the 
automotive navigation system in your car or in a routine piece 
of military hardware are not hardened like that, and the 
expense of introducing new designs to make them so is not even 
being discussed. It should be.
    Senator Fischer. Also, we are talking about disruption, but 
we are also talking about national security, which is a 
definite threat that there is not time to address. Thank you, 
sir.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Fischer.
    Senator Shaheen?
    Senator Shaheen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you to you 
and Senator Reed for holding this timely hearing. I appreciate 
the testimony of all of our experts today.
    I guess this question is for you, Mr. Deasy. Was DOD 
surprised by the FCC decision?
    Mr. Deasy. The simple answer is yes. We had been in 
communications with FCC back and forth over this matter for 
some time, including the NTIA. Along this whole journey, if you 
kind of go through that timeline I gave earlier, we are clearly 
of the belief that they understood. They had received our 
letters. They had received the NTIA letters and clearly knew 
that there was a unanimous view across Federal Agencies not to 
move forward. So I have to admit when I first read and heard 
about this, I was very surprised, and as I talked to other 
senior leaders across the DOT, likewise they have been just as 
surprised.
    Senator Shaheen. So reports had suggested that the FCC was 
actually moving in a different direction, that they were going 
to deny Ligado's request. Was that your expectation before the 
turnaround?
    Mr. Deasy. Yes. The head of C3 inside of my organization, a 
gentleman by the name of Mr. Fred Moorefield, has been in 
constant communications over a number of months, actually years 
on this with both the NTIA and FCC. One of his responsibilities 
was to give me weekly updates as to how the conversations were 
progressing with FCC and NTIA. Every time we had the 
conversation, it was all FCC and NTIA clearly understand our 
position, and at no time did he suggest that he had an 
indication or belief that it was going to move forward.
    Senator Shaheen. The decision, as you have described and as 
I have read, was made very unexpectedly, very hurriedly without 
the kind of process that Senator Reed raised that is usually 
expected. Is that correct?
    Mr. Deasy. Yes, ma'am.
    Senator Shaheen. So what do you think the motivation of the 
FCC is in making this decision? You must have some speculation 
about that.
    Mr. Deasy. Actually I do not. I would not have been 
surprised if I had felt I clearly understood what the 
motivations were because I frankly did not see this coming.
    Senator Shaheen. Admiral, do you have any thoughts about 
why the FCC would have made this decision so unexpectedly?
    Admiral Allen. It is quizzical. If you look at the order 
that was issued--I think it is 74 pages long--you do not write 
that overnight. It had to be in preparation for quite a while. 
The footnotes are extensive. You can agree or not agree with 
the report. What astounded me was that had to be in the works 
for quite a while and it happened suddenly. In my view, that 
was a breakdown of communications and building a consensus 
around proper rulemaking in a regulatory agency.
    Senator Shaheen. So how does a decision like this happen? 
When you have got virtually every other Federal Agency that is 
concerned about this issue saying this is the wrong direction 
to take, how then does one agency--and I appreciate it bills 
itself as independent, and there are certain agencies that we 
want to view as independent within government. But one would 
also hope that we are all trying to move in the same direction 
as part of government. So can anybody speculate on how this 
happened and why this agency would have taken this position 
given that, according to all of the research you all cited, 
they are not a significant part of an effort in this country to 
move to 5G?
    [No response.]
    Senator Shaheen. Nobody has any ideas.
    Admiral Allen. It would appear to be a good topic for the 
Committee of original jurisdiction.
    Senator Shaheen. I would certainly agree with that.
    So the next question is then what would you like to see 
happen. What would you like to see this Committee do, and what 
would you like to see Congress do to address this decision 
which seems clearly against the interests not just of the 
Department of Defense but of all of the commercial interests 
that are involved here?
    Mr. Deasy. I will start by simply saying it is on my key 
takeaway chart. It is the last bullet that said that FCC needs 
to reverse their decision.
    Senator Shaheen. But has that happened before, and how 
realistic do you think that is that the FCC on their own 
motivation will reverse their decision?
    Mr. Deasy. There is a petition that NTIA can file 
requesting that the FCC go back, revisit that decision. We 
would need to, obviously, present for the NTIA the necessary 
information for that petition to be filed, but there is a 
process that one can go through for them to reconsider their 
decision. I believe we do need to go through that process.
    Senator Shaheen. Well, thank you.
    Mr. Chairman and Senator Reed, I look forward to joining 
you on your letter.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Shaheen.
    Senator Rounds?
    Senator Rounds. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me also add my 
thanks to you and the Ranking Member for organizing and 
allowing us to stay informed during the time in which we were 
in our work periods at home. Thank you also for organizing this 
full Committee discussion on the issue of spectrum and in 
particular the issue in front of us today concerning the Ligado 
application.
    Mr. Deasy, I would like to spend my time with you today 
focusing on the other spectrum issues that we have got.
    Last year, in the National Defense Authorization Act, this 
Committee had proposed section 214, which has become popular 
all by itself in terms of the fact that it was not operational 
by the time we got done. It had to do with allowing for 
spectrum sharing. We recognize that DOD has a critical need for 
spectrum and that only on an organized effort can we allow for 
sharing of that mid-level of the spectrum.
    This brings to light an area in the lower spectrum, but 
most certainly the rest of the spectrum is also at risk as 
well. We had proposed creating a tool last year--and we did not 
realize the type of opposition we would find--creating a tool 
so that we could fairly share spectrum which was critical in 
our national defense.
    Can you discuss a little bit with the Committee the need 
for a tool that would allow us to appropriately share and at 
the same time safeguard extremely critical portions in 
geographic locations as well, but basically an opportunity to 
share what is a very, very valuable resource, and that is that 
mid-level spectrum?
    Mr. Deasy. So I would start. I will be happy to comment on 
section 214 and then possibly Dr. Griffin to talk about what it 
is we are doing as far as moving forward with 5G from 
experimentations.
    You know, you make a very good point on section 214. The 
Communications Act was passed back in 1934. There have been all 
kinds of addendums to that act, and yet, throughout this, if 
you look at the policies, the processes, the tools that have 
been used where we go through in government to look at 
repurposing spectrum, they are antiquated.
    One of the reasons I was so excited about 214 was the 
opportunity for these processes, these procedures, and the 
tools to be updated. We need these tools because not only does 
it help us to look at how do you repurpose spectrum, but allows 
us to manage and incorporate how you actually have to operate 
the spectrum.
    For us to get to faster spectrum repurposing decisions--and 
the key word there is ``faster''--we cannot do that without 
moving towards dynamic spectrum sharing. To do that, 214 
provided us the opportunity to modernize the tools, to 
modernize the processes on how we go about doing this, sir.
    Senator Rounds. In terms of national defense, would you say 
that this particular discussion concerning the Ligado 
application is perhaps just a shot over the bow as to how 
serious these issues are and the need to revisit what we were 
trying to do in 214 last year?
    Mr. Deasy. I would say when it comes to the discussion of 
national defense, I would defer to General Raymond to discuss 
the views on that.
    Senator Rounds. General Raymond?
    General Raymond. I am not an expert on 214, but I will tell 
you the use of spectrum is critical to our force. It is our 
maneuver space. It provides us strategic operational and 
tactical advantage. When you look at what kind of capabilities 
we have, we have to be able to operate in that spectrum. We 
have to be able to detect, characterize, and geolocate 
interference. We have to be able to operate in that spectrum 
that we train to do so every day, and it is absolutely critical 
to our joint force.
    Senator Rounds. Thank you.
    General, one more question. With regard to the amount of 
data that we are collecting right now with the platforms that 
we already have within our system today, we are collecting huge 
amounts of data, and the need for 5G is critical. Would it be 
fair to say that the Department of Defense is looking at 5G as 
a way to collect and to make our platforms even more capable 
than what they are today and that the Department of Defense is 
very interested in the deployment of 5G and not trying to stop 
it, but rather, it is necessary and it just simply has to be 
done correctly?
    General Raymond. I agree wholeheartedly. You know, I go to 
work every day, and the folks that I am privileged to lead go 
to work every day trying to implement the National Defense 
Strategy that says we are going compete, deter, and win. That 
is what we do, and 5G is going to be critical to us. But I will 
also tell you GPS is also critical to us in being able to 
compete, deter, and win.
    Senator Rounds. Yes, sir. Thank you.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Rounds.
    Senator Hirono?
    Senator Hirono. I would like to ask a very brief, non-
Ligado question because we do have the DOD's Chief of 
Information Office here.
    So DOD has seen a significant spike in cyber attacks and 
misinformation directed at servicemembers and personnel as the 
Pentagon shifts toward telework during this pandemic. Mr. 
Deasy, what additional measures are being instituted in the 
Department to combat the increased phishing and hacking that 
has occurred during this current Covid-19 pandemic?
    Mr. Deasy. So a couple things on that. You know, we 
actually measure how often our network is probed, how many 
spams we get, how many types of interference we get on our 
network. We have clearly seen an uptick. One of the upticks we 
have seen most is spear phishing, and that is specific Covid-
related emails that are coming in where the adversary is trying 
to take the opportunity to use Covid as the topic to get people 
to actively engage on.
    However, with that said, when we look at other types of 
activities that U.S. Cyber Command sees--I have a task force 
where we meet every week, and in that task force, we discuss 
the very things that you are bringing up--we are not seeing an 
abnormal amount of other types of activities that our metrics 
would suggest go above and beyond what we normally see other 
than specifically in the spear phishing area. We are seeing an 
uptick specifically related to Covid.
    So what have we been doing? Because now we have moved to 
teleworking and we are using technology known as VPN and other 
types of tools that allow people to communicate from home, I 
would say a couple things have been really important here.
    Within the first week after we started moving to 
teleworking, my office issued a letter, a memo that went out to 
all employees. It included a small card--I do not have it with 
me here today--that actually clearly listed the dos and don'ts 
of what you should do from your home when you are teleworking 
and what were the additional things to be thoughtful and 
mindful of now that you are working from home.
    Additionally, U.S. Cyber Command did stand up additional 
task force teams to specifically look at the network and 
traffic activity that was occurring because of teleworking, 
ma'am.
    Senator Hirono. So have you been able to identify whether 
the spear phishing and some of these other cyber attacks are 
emanating from any particular country?
    Mr. Deasy. All I would say is to get into specifics of 
where those attacks are coming from and what the motivations 
are probably go beyond the classification of this discussion 
today.
    Senator Hirono. That is right. I understand.
    So let us move on to some of the questions that are 
relevant to this hearing.
    The National Advanced Spectrum and Communications Test 
Network, NASCTN, a multi-agency charter partnership that seeks 
to provide a neutral forum for testing, modeling, and analysis, 
performed a study to determine the impact of Ligado's proposed 
networks on GPS. The FCC relied on the results of this study in 
approving Ligado's application. I understand that DOD takes 
issue with the NASCTN study. As an initial matter, Ligado 
claimed in a filing made with the FCC that the tests it 
commissioned at the NASCTN were done at the request of the DOD 
Chief Information Officer's office. Is that true?
    Mr. Deasy. There was a test and request made from my 
predecessor that asked to look at what Ligado was proposing at 
the time, and at the time, that testing was based on the 
assumption that Ligado was still going to use satellite-based 
communications towards the earth and only on exception would 
they use terrestrial-based. So when we agreed to that, it was 
agreed on the premise that their solution was still going to be 
a primary satellite-based solution and not a terrestrial 
ground-based solution.
    Afterwards, the expression we have used today is they 
changed the goalpost. They said they now wanted to go to a 
terrestrial based. So basically the rules changed in the 
process of how that test was originally conducted to what 
Ligado wanted to do going forward, ma'am.
    Senator Hirono. So in your view with the goalpost being 
changed and the tests that NASCTN did were really not on point 
to the giving of the license.
    Mr. Deasy. I guess you would say they were on point for 
what was assumed at the time, but where we are today was no 
longer on point.
    Senator Hirono. So you say that the FCC needs to reverse 
its decision, and there is a process for asking for 
reconsideration or reversal. Has that process begun?
    Mr. Deasy. So what we have done from the DOD standpoint is 
we have had communications on a regular basis with the NTIA. I 
am actively getting engaged with the NTIA making a formal 
request for them to do a file for re-petition.
    Senator Hirono. What is the time frame for reconsideration 
or reversal by the FCC?
    Mr. Deasy. I, ma'am, would have to get back to you with the 
specific dates. I do not know what those dates are.
    Senator Hirono. Anyway, you are not going to let that time 
expire before you take action.
    Mr. Deasy. Absolutely not. I believe it is somewhere 
towards the end of May that we have to have communicated that 
re-petition.
    [The information referred to follows:]

    Mr. Deasy. After the hearing on May 6, 2020, the National 
Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) filed 
a petition for reconsideration on the Ligado Order on behalf of 
the Executive Branch on May 22, 2020. Petitions had to be filed 
within 30 days of the Order. Under Section 405 of the 
Communications Act, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) 
must take action on petitions for reconsideration within 90 
days of their filing. This would include denying or granting 
the petitions in whole or in part. The FCC is expected to 
conclude on the matter by no later than August 20, 2020.

    Senator Hirono. Thank you.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Hirono.
    Senator Cramer?
    Senator Cramer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Senator Reed as 
well. I just echo everyone's sentiment about what a great job 
you have done keeping us engaged and involved and 
communicating.
    Thanks to each of you. I am sitting here a little bit--
well, I am curious. It is a good place to sit when you are 
curious when you have four really smart people to ask questions 
of. But some of the questions I have you are going to have to 
speculate about because I want to ask you about what people 
that support this, why they would have supported it. That may 
seem a little bit unfair, but you are all I have.
    One thing I want to get straightened out because I have 
heard it said that the NTIA objected, but I have also read that 
the NTIA did not recommend or could not recommend. Is there a 
distinction there between not recommending and objecting, given 
the NTIA's authorities? I do not know which one of you--maybe, 
Mr. Deasy, you would know the answer to that. I used to be on 
the Energy and Commerce Committee in the House. I was a 
communications telecom regulator for 10 years. So I think there 
is a distinction there. I just want to be sure.
    Mr. Deasy. Yes. I am not sure I could legally tell you what 
those distinctions are, but I will say that clearly what NTIA's 
role is is to represent back the agency's view on this. So in 
this case, you have a Position, Navigation, Timing EXCOM, which 
is made up of nine Federal Agencies. Their job was to take our 
view, put that in a formal letter, and then submit that view 
back to the FCC. So I can tell you that their job in that case 
was to submit the view of the PNT EXCOM.
    Senator Cramer. Does the NTIA ever recommend a yea or a nay 
to the FCC?
    Mr. Deasy. I will have to ask other colleagues if they 
know.
    Senator Cramer. Does anybody know? All right. We will find 
that out. I am curious about it because it does seem to me here 
the process matters. You are all too smart for me to ask 
technical questions of, so I am going to focus on process a 
little bit.
    The other thing that sort of perplexes me a little bit is 
that, first of all, somehow five commissioners came to some 
version of the same conclusion. That is another thing that just 
because they either voted yes or did not object, it does not 
necessarily mean they have the same degree of enthusiasm for a 
decision. But nonetheless, it was 5 to 0. My reading tells me 
NTIA did not object, nor did they recommend. I think they can 
recommend.
    But there are some other fairly important administration 
folks that are concerned about national security that seem to 
have supported the decision unless they have changed their 
minds. That would be, of course, Secretary of State Pompeo and 
Attorney General Barr. Does anybody know if they have changed 
their minds or why they feel differently?
    [No response.]
    Senator Cramer. Okay. I will ask them. I guess that would 
be the best thing to do.
    The one other process question I have is how long was this 
application in. Does anybody know when the application was 
made? Because my sense is that there are volumes and volumes 
and volumes and hours and hours and hours dedicated to this, 
and we know about yours obviously. I would just be interested. 
It just helps me to satisfy my curiosity. I have no doubt that 
everything you have said is absolutely 100 percent accurate and 
true. Do not get me wrong. But it does help me balance my 
thinking when I hear a little more from someone else. I know 
that is not your objective, but it is just kind of mine.
    So with that, Mr. Chairman, I will ask some questions other 
places. Thanks for doing this. It is really important 
information. What is really important is that other people hear 
it.
    Chairman Inhofe. Let me shed a little light on that. They 
took over that bankrupt company in the year 2015. I have 
reason, having looked at this quite a bit, to believe that they 
had been working on their licensing for quite some time, and 
while they have been looking at it, none of us that I know of 
were aware that that was going on. So I just think there is a 
level of security that they had among themselves. I am saying 
that as nice as I can.
    Senator Cramer. I understand, and I am sure you are right.
    Chairman Inhofe. Yes. Thank you, Senator Cramer.
    Senator Kaine?
    Senator Kaine. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Again, I echo my 
comments that I said to you personally yesterday. This was the 
only Committee that I serve on--I serve on four--that had 
weekly telephone conferences during the time we were away, and 
they were really valuable. We had some spirited debate, and 
sometimes I got an answer to a question I liked and sometimes I 
did not. But this was the only Committee that was doing that 
every week, and I really applaud the leadership of the chair 
and ranking for that.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you.
    Senator Kaine. You have made some really persuasive points, 
but you have not persuaded me. The reason you have not is we 
have only heard one side of the case. I tried a lot of cases in 
my day before I got into this line of work, and I would never 
make a decision and agree, yes, the FCC needs to reverse their 
decision when the FCC is right in town and could have been at 
this hearing or Ligado. If Ligado knew that we were concerned, 
they would want to come and make their case. All of the 
questions and concerns and the speculation is completely 
unnecessary. There are two sides to this. The FCC reached a 
unanimous decision, which is not that common for that body on 
matters of controversy. They would have something to say about 
all these questions. Because of your testimony, which has been 
great testimony, I would have really tough questions for them. 
But it is hard to convince an Armed Services Committee member 
to reverse a decision based upon the presentation of one side 
of the case.
    Let me ask you a couple of questions. My understanding from 
the timeline is that the EXCOM--is it the PNT EXCOM--looked at 
testing that had been done beginning in 2016 and made a 
recommendation in March of 2018 to oppose the Ligado proposal. 
Is that basically right, that the PNT EXCOM unanimous decision 
opposed the proposal that was made in March of 2018?
    Mr. Deasy. Sir, I am personally not familiar with that 
particular date. I am familiar with the date of December of 
2018 in which we formally documented to NTIA the view of PNT.
    Senator Kaine. I am reading from materials that have been 
provided by the DOD. But it looks like testing was earlier. The 
PNT EXCOM reached a unanimous decision in March, and then it 
was communicated, Mr. Deasy, as you say, in December.
    Was the proposal as tested and as opposed in March of 2018 
and then communicated in December of 2018--was that exactly the 
same proposal that the FCC ruled upon on April 20th?
    Mr. Deasy. Throughout this process, there have been 
multiple amendments to what Ligado had to propose.
    Senator Kaine. You mentioned a couple. You mentioned the 
idea of the buffer that they created and lowering power. So my 
surmise is that the objection that was done in 2018 was based 
upon a version of the Ligado proposal, but the FCC approval in 
April of 2020 was based upon a proposal that had changed in 
some ways. Is that correct?
    Mr. Deasy. Well, the proposal, as far as I know--and, Dr. 
Griffin, maybe you can speak to specific testing that was done. 
The proposal in 2020 that was just recently approved with those 
restrictions, when we go back and look at what was done on the 
testing against those restrictions, nothing has changed.
    Senator Kaine. Well, but that is not my question. So my 
question is a real precise one, which is, is the proposal that 
the FCC ruled on the same proposal that the PNT EXCOM 
unanimously decided to approve--disapprove in March of 2018, or 
were there changes? You were suggesting to me that there were 
changes along the way.
    Mr. Deasy. There have been changes along the way of which 
we have continued to communicate and evaluate those. The letter 
of 2018--I have to go back and----
    Senator Kaine. Okay. Let me ask this. The April 2020 ruling 
of the FCC had some conditions in it. Now, that was 16 days ago 
that they reached that conclusion. Have you with the 
significant testing capacity at your disposal--have you gone 
back and rerun tests against the version of the FCC--that the 
FCC approved with the requirements, the, quote, stringent 
requirements they put on it? So have you done any more testing 
since April 20th?
    Mr. Deasy. I am not aware of any specific tests that have 
been done, and I think the reason is those particular guard 
bands, power levels, coordination, and remediations were all 
the same that we had looked at previously.
    Senator Kaine. Okay. I will want to get that in writing 
because I want to make sure that the opposition in March of 
2018 in fact applied to the proposal as it existed and was 
approved in April 2020.
    Senator Cramer indicated that he thinks the Attorney 
General and Secretary of State are now in support of the Ligado 
proposal before the FCC. Is that correct?
    Mr. Deasy. That is what I had heard in the public.
    Senator Kaine. Have you then sought to find out why that 
would be the case?
    Mr. Deasy. I have not personally, no, sir.
    Senator Kaine. Are either of those members of this nine 
member PNT EXCOM are State and DOJ, or are they not members of 
that nine member task force?
    Mr. Deasy. They are. The Department of State is a member of 
that.
    Senator Kaine. How about the Department of Justice?
    Mr. Deasy. The Department of Justice is not a member of 
that.
    Senator Kaine. All right. I have exceeded my time. Thank 
you, Mr. Chair.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Kaine.
    Senator Cotton?
    Senator Cotton. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Senator Reed. I 
want to add my voice to what Senator Kaine said. Thank you for 
your commitment during our long break from Washington during 
this pandemic for holding regular weekly conference calls, and 
thank you for putting together this very important hearing.
    I will associate myself with Senator Kaine's remarks again, 
the second time, in that I think you make a pretty compelling 
case. I have read through all these materials that we have had 
for the hearing. But it is really important that we hear from 
the unanimous FCC and from Ligado as well for us to make a 
reasoned conclusion.
    I will associate myself with Senator Kaine for a third 
time. He is probably beginning to get anxious about this.
    [Laughter.]
    Senator Cotton. About the Attorney General and the 
Secretary of State. Senator Cramer has asked this. Senator 
Kaine has asked this. Let me just ask Mr. Deasy and Dr. Griffin 
directly. What do you see that Attorney General Barr and 
Secretary Pompeo do not see? You oppose this proposal. They 
support the proposal. So what is it that you see that they do 
not see?
    Mr. Deasy. Sir, you know, as a technologist for almost 40 
years now, I see the science. I see the studies. I see the 
results of what has been done, and the science clearly shows 
everything we have talked about today in terms of the 
interference. So that is what I see. I cannot speculate on what 
Secretary Pompeo or Secretary Barr see.
    Senator Cotton. So Senator Kaine raised this as well about 
the testing. Has there been specific, realistic testing done 
under the conditions proposed by the FCC in last month's order? 
I have read a lot of the materials here. I have got Secretary 
Esper's letter here, and there are a lot of conditional verbs 
in that letter. There are a lot of conditional verbs in the 
other material I have read here, things like ``may jeopardize 
the effectiveness and reliability of GPS.'' It has the 
potential to disrupt commercial GPS receivers. Has there been 
testing on specific, realistic conditions of the FCC's order 
that we can say, yes, it will interfere?
    Secretary Griffin. There has not been any testing since the 
order was issued 16 days ago. The testing that was done was 
done not by the Department of Defense but by the Department of 
Transportation, and it is as exquisitely well done as anything 
that I think I have ever seen. They tested 80 receivers. They 
tested them against the power levels that Ligado is claiming 
today to use, and in answer to Senator Kaine's question, the 
power level is the most significant single attribute against 
which one would test.
    The DOT tests, as I said in my earlier testimony, were 
designed to elucidate what was necessary to protect the GPS 
band. The issue of testing one transmitter against one receiver 
and substituting one receiver after another in specific 
scenarios is frankly a fool's errand. I can always put together 
a different geometry, a different scenario, and then ask the 
question again, would Ligado interfere with that? That is not 
the way to go about it. The way that the Department of 
Transportation did in its adjacent band compatibility test is 
the way to go about it. Those results were unambiguous and they 
were compelling. At the power levels that Ligado chooses to put 
forward for its ground-based transmissions, GPS receivers 
broadly speaking will be compromised.
    Senator Cotton. I have one final set of questions here, and 
Dr. Griffin, I will direct these towards you. They are on a 
related matter.
    In January, numerous media outlets, to include The 
Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal, reported that the 
Pentagon was going to block a set of rules that would have 
limited the export of semiconductors, computer chips, and other 
kinds of advanced microelectronics to Huawei. Is it correct 
that the Department of Defense initially ``non-concurred,'' to 
use the technical term, with these rule changes?
    Secretary Griffin. I do not know if the Department of 
Defense non-concurred. The Research and Engineering Under 
Secretariat, my organization, non-concurred. We do not believe 
that those particular restrictions were going to be beneficial 
and we believed that they would hurt the United States semi-
conductor industry more than they would hurt China. If the goal 
is to damage China, that is not the tool to use.
    Senator Cotton. But Secretary Esper did not agree with 
that.
    Secretary Griffin. That is correct.
    Senator Cotton. So this is just another concern that I 
have, is that the Department of Defense could have an 
exaggerated sense of scientific and technological certitude 
that is not appropriately balancing the strategic imperatives 
or the geopolitical challenges we face. I am not saying that 
that is the case, but in light of that decision and in light of 
the case I see here in front of me, much of which is 
contingent, I think we at least need to continue to explore 
that.
    Thank you.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Cotton.
    Senator King?
    Senator King. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Again, thanks for 
the work during the break and the time that we had talking 
about the coronavirus response at the Department.
    What was the power level that was used for the DOT testing 
please?
    Secretary Griffin. DOT provided results for the original 
Ligado power level I believe of 1500 watts and specifically to 
the present case in the present FCC order, 10 watts.
    Senator King. Can you put that in terms of deicbel-watts 
(dBW)?
    Secretary Griffin. dBW would be 10 dBW for the 10 watt 
transmitter----
    Senator King. So Transportation did--so the study did 
include the 9.8 dBW analysis?
    Secretary Griffin. Correct.
    Senator King. That did find clear evidence of interference?
    Secretary Griffin. Exactly so, sir. In fact, they published 
carefully the power levels required to cause the suite of 
receivers that were tested to lock up.
    Senator King. Could you supply that data to this Committee?
    Secretary Griffin. Absolutely.
    Senator King. I would appreciate that.
    I share some of the concerns that have been raised. The FCC 
is--they are capable people. I do not always agree with them. 
It is one of the few unanimous orders I have seen them 
undertake. It is a 74-page order with 444 footnotes. It strikes 
me that some serious thought went into it.
    They have two concerns, as I understand the order. One is 
the development of the Internet of Things. That is an important 
part of the future development of 5G technology and, indeed, 
the technology of the country. The second is efficient use of 
spectrum.
    What is the shadow cast by the GPS band? In other words, 
how much spectrum are you seeking to tie up beyond the band 
that is now specified as the GPS band?
    Secretary Griffin. Neither the Department nor any Federal 
Agency, of which I am aware, is asking for any additional 
spectrum to be set aside for global navigation satellite 
systems, of which GPS is one. What we are saying is that the 
spectrum already set aside for those functions should be left 
for those functions and not repurposed for terrestrial 
transmitters.
    Senator King. How wide is that? Because the chart that was 
with my background shows a band between, it looks like, about 
1552 and 1610.
    Secretary Griffin. It is 1559 to 1610 megahertz, sir.
    Senator King. Okay. So that is the band that you--that is 
the inviolate band that you want to protect. Correct?
    Secretary Griffin. Correct, sir.
    Senator King. But the band that Ligado wants is, it looks 
like, about 1522 to 1530. That is not within the band you just 
defined.
    Secretary Griffin. It is within the larger mobile satellite 
services band, and this is the point----
    Senator King. Well, that is my question. What is the, 
quote, larger mobile services band? Because you told me a few 
moments ago that the band you were interested in was 1559 to 
16-something. Which is it?
    Secretary Griffin. In order to protect--it is both. I am 
sorry. I am not trying to obfuscate. There is a specific radio 
navigation satellite services band that is housed within the 
larger mobile satellite services band.
    Senator King. What is that?
    Secretary Griffin. I do not have that in my head.
    Senator King. I am not trying to be argumentative. I am 
just trying to understand this because I start with the premise 
that an independent agency that reached a unanimous conclusion 
on something that has been extensively litigated had some basis 
for doing so. If your chart here of trying to hear rustling 
leaves over 100 jets taking off is accurate, I just find that 
hard to believe that they would have issued such an order if 
that is in fact what we are talking about.
    Secretary Griffin. I find it hard to believe too, which is 
why we are here.
    The reason that the satellite services are grouped together 
is because all of the radio signals coming from satellites in 
space are quite weak. So all of the weak signals are grouped 
together. Not all of them are navigation signals. Some of them 
are mobile satellite services of other kinds, but they do not 
interfere with one another. If you put a ground-based 
transmitter in the middle of a mobile satellite services band, 
it has the capability of interfering with other services. In 
this case, we are here talking about the interference with 
navigation.
    Senator King. Well, I think it is important that you 
specify for us how wide the band you want to protect really is 
because that then becomes a major policy question about access 
to scarce spectrum. In other words, I accept your statements 
and realize how important this is to the country and 
particularly to the Department of Defense, but I just want to 
understand the policy decision that we are being urged to take 
here in terms of how much bandwidth are we being asked to 
protect. If you could submit some response to that for the 
record, that would be----
    Secretary Griffin. I will give you those specific numbers, 
but broadly speaking, we seek to protect the services reserved 
for satellite communication.
    Senator King. I understand that, but that goes beyond the 
band that is defined, the 1559. The question is how much of a 
buffer do you need to protect yourself from a relatively low 
power terrestrial signal. We can talk about the physics. But I 
want to know how much bandwidth you want us to protect. That is 
all. I am not saying you should not do so, but I think we need 
to understand that in terms of what it means for other 
potential uses of that bandwidth.
    Secretary Griffin. We will provide that number for the 
record.
    [The information follows:]

    Secretary Griffin. Ligado's use of L-band spectrum would 
cause significant harmful interference to GPS. The Department 
does not seek for the entire 200 MHz to be unoccupied in order 
to protect GPS. In fact, there are several mobile satellite 
service (MSS) providers that operate in this frequency range 
and provide service, such as Iridium. For example, Iridium's 
portion of the L-band spectrum is 1617.775 - 1626.5 MHz and 
consists of both uplink and downlink transmissions. The 
Department continues to emphasize that GPS already coexists 
with the satellite users in the range of spectrum dedicated to 
satellite uses, including MSS (1525 - 1559 MHz) and the GPS/
Global Navigation Satellite Systems (1559 - 1610 MHz) 
allocations. The FCC Order changes the conditions by allowing 
terrestrial usage in this band range, which will create 
interference for GPS users.

    Senator King. Thank you. I appreciate it.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you, Senator King.
    Senator Perdue?
    Senator Perdue. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    I appreciate your forbearance, guys. It is a big Committee 
and a long afternoon, but I appreciate it.
    General Raymond, as I understand it--and I want to be sure 
I am clear on this--the GPS receivers are designed to tolerate 
interference from space systems in general, but they are not 
designed to deal with interference from terrestrial systems, 
which by nature is generally much stronger. Is that correct?
    General Raymond. The signals come down from space, and they 
reach the ground at a very low power level. What is critically 
important on this, as was just discussed on this, what I called 
in my opening statement the quiet car, that having that noise-
pristine environment is to allow the GPS receiver on the 
ground, whether it is handheld or in a weapon system, to be 
able to pick up that faint signal and process it.
    Senator Perdue. Right. This Ligado system is some 10 
billion times stronger at the 1530 megahertz spectrum.
    So the follow-up on that question is it looks to me like 
1559 to the 1591 megahertz spectrum is what has been allocated 
for GPS, but it looks to me like just commercial purposes bleed 
over from as low as 1475 all the way up to 1675, that people 
are getting signals outside of the band of GPS just by the 
nature of bleeding of the GPS signal. Is that correct?
    General Raymond. Again, as Dr. Griffin stated, that mobile 
SATCOM services band is designed specifically for signals that 
come from space to the ground. It is not just GPS. It is 
commercial communication satellites and other types of 
satellites that bring signals down, and that buffer is meant to 
allow those signals that have to travel from space to ground to 
be able to process by receivers.
    Senator Perdue. But again, the point I am trying to make is 
it is a broader spectrum that we are actually using in GPS than 
what has been allocated just by the nature of the signal. Is 
that correct?
    General Raymond. Where you are using the GPS spectrum, part 
of that spectrum, but the critical part of that is where we 
embed that into the mobile SATCOM services to provide the 
buffer needed to be able to protect the receivers to be able to 
pick up that faint signal.
    Senator Perdue. So if a commercial land-based terrestrial 
emitter can cause this sort of interference that would cause 
imprecision, as well as maybe even the loss of signal--and I 
fully appreciate when you have precision weaponry that are 
using GPS coordinates, those have to be precise. I get that. So 
the question is, do we have defenses against an adversary? If a 
commercial user can cause this sort of imprecision, obviously 
an adversary can do the same thing with a land-based emitter. I 
know this is not a classified environment, but if the answer is 
classified, then I will accept that and take it offline and we 
will try to do that.
    General Raymond. I would say that we train for this. We 
plan for this. We have tactics, techniques, and procedures to 
be able to respond to this. In a combat environment, we can 
drop a bomb on a receiver. There is a whole spectrum of things 
that we can do, and in another room, I would be happy to share 
that with you and provide more.
    Senator Perdue. Yes, sir. Thank you.
    Secretary Griffin, how do you propose maintaining our 
technological edge that we have got today? I think most of us 
believe that militarily. But how do we then compete with--and 
let us talk about it--China in terms of the technological 
leadership that they are beginning to develop in 5G, given that 
their immense investment in this, their vertical nature between 
their commercial and their military development over there, 
their lack of privacy requirements and so forth, and obviously, 
Huawei's recent advancements in developing 5G networks around 
the world? How do we balance those two together? I mean, I 
think that is the real question here, even bigger than this 
Ligado decision.
    Secretary Griffin. Well, sir, I will start out by saying I 
do not think we as Americans will prevail by trying to become 
more like China.
    Senator Perdue. Agree.
    Secretary Griffin. We are the Nation that other people want 
to come to, to send their students to. We are the Nation from 
whom others are trying to steal intellectual property. We got 
to this position by being the best innovators, by being the 
people who knew how to get innovations into the marketplace.
    We, the DOD, are, as Mr. Deasy pointed out earlier, 
conducting a wide range of experiments at a variety of military 
bases designed specifically to help advance the technology of 
5G in company with our commercial telecommunications providers 
by unleashing the market to do what they do best. I believe 
that in the long run the United States will prevail in 5G.
    Senator Perdue. I concur.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Perdue.
    Senator Duckworth?
    Senator Duckworth. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Mr. Deasy, at the conclusion of the 2017 U.S. Air Force 
white paper on the 1 decibel standard, it states that the 1 
decibel interference protection criterion is the only 
appropriate IPC for protecting GPS and other global navigation 
satellite system receivers. Does the Air Force stand by this 
conclusion?
    Mr. Deasy. I am probably not the expert to answer that 
particular question. Yes, Dr. Griffin?
    Secretary Griffin. Thank you for that courtesy.
    Senator Duckworth, the 1 dB, so-called 1 dB carrier to 
noise standard, is the appropriate standard and, in fact, was 
recognized as such by the FCC itself back in 2003. I can quote 
from that if desired. Well, actually no. I will just take it 
for the record. The point being that the FCC itself endorsed 
that standard in multiple rulings back in the early 2000s as 
the appropriate way to protect radio navigation systems.
    Senator Duckworth. Thank you.
    [The information follows:]

    Secretary Griffin. To the best of my knowledge, the 1 dB 
standard was the sole metric used in assessing interference 
levels in the satellite navigation band. This protection 
criterion, which limits additional noise to a 25 percent 
increase over existing background noise levels, protects the 
satellite navigation band as a whole, regardless of the source 
of the increased noise. This is the most appropriate method of 
protecting the satellite navigation band, because it is not 
possible to assess the potential for inference by Ligado's 
proposed operations on the millions of individual GPS receivers 
in use on a case-by-case basis. The best approach is to protect 
the band; with that, all users are protected.

    Secretary Griffin. The point was made earlier that the 
Communications Act of 1934 began in a world of radio and TV, 
not in a world of satellite navigation services, and the same 
methods which are used traditionally to protect existing 
licensees from a new service are not applicable in a world of 
radio navigation. So the 1 dB criteria is the one that I would 
endorse.
    Senator Duckworth. Thank you.
    Mr. Chairman, I request unanimous consent to include this 
white paper for the record.
    Chairman Inhofe. Without objection.
    [The information referred to can be found in Appendix B on 
page 76.]
    Senator Duckworth. Thank you.
    Mr. Deasy, Secretary Griffin, General Raymond, stakeholders 
who support Ligado's efforts have suggested that as early as 
2016, the FCC--this is following up on the Chairman's question 
earlier. Following the conclusion of this hearing, can you 
provide me in writing a timeline and list of correspondence the 
Department submitted to the FCC and/or NTIA on the Ligado case?
    Mr. Deasy. Yes, we can, ma'am.
    Senator Duckworth. Thank you.
    This next question is for all the witnesses. What are the 
potential national security implications if Ligado decides to 
turn around and sell their spectrum band to another company? To 
what extent will the Department be able to weigh in with its 
future concerns? This is for the entire panel.
    Admiral Allen. I will start. It is not a matter of 
spectrum. It is a matter of the power. We keep talking about 
spectrum. It is what you do inside the spectrum. I am a simple 
sailor. I am not a technical person. If you have a ground 
transmitter, it is a matter of how much power is transmitting 
and whether or not it is going to affect the adjacent spectrum. 
So I do not know what the intended use would be if there was a 
resale. Right now, the intended use is to rebroadcast from a 
terrestrial antenna at power that will bleed over and affect 
GPS. It is not the spectrum. It is the power in the spectrum. 
But I would defer.
    Senator Duckworth. Thank you.
    Anyone else?
    General Raymond. I agree. It depends on how the spectrum 
would be used.
    Senator Duckworth. But they could sell it.
    General Raymond. Yes, they can sell it.
    Senator Duckworth. How does that affect your ability to 
weigh in on this in the future?
    General Raymond. It would depend upon the proposal which is 
made, as my colleagues have said.
    The more compelling concern, though, in that regard is that 
if this is approved for Ligado, then what is to stop its 
approval from other companies seeking to repurpose spectrum 
that they own that would be in these satellite communications 
bands, which are reserved, as we have said, so that all of the 
weak signals are grouped together. If Ligado is permitted to do 
this, why should another company be denied?
    Senator Duckworth. Thank you.
    Finally, Admiral Allen, DOD has publicly stated that an 
assessment of 80 GPS receivers conducted by nine departments 
and agencies concluded that Ligado's proposal would, indeed, 
cause harmful interference to military and commercial GPS 
users.
    How do you determine an acceptable level of risk for the 
commercial expansion of spectrum bands adjacent to the GPS 
spectrum used for military operations, emergency services, and 
by commercial users? In your assessment, is that level 
acceptable in the Ligado case? I guess this goes back to the 
power issue that you were talking about.
    Admiral Allen. Again, I am not going to try and get 
technical here. There is a tension between the acceptable power 
level and trying to protect the spectrum. Each individual 
receiver will react differently based on the power that is 
being transmitted. The position Ligado is taking is let us see 
what the power transmission does and how we might mitigate 
that. The presumption of the PNT EXCOM and the folks who have 
been involved in this is we need to protect the spectrum, not 
an individual receiver. That is the dynamic that has to be 
resolved.
    Senator Duckworth. Thank you.
    Admiral Allen. I would ask for comment.
    Senator Duckworth. Thank you.
    I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Duckworth.
    This does conclude our questions from those who are here. 
We have a second round, so we will make time for Senator 
Blumenthal when he gets here. I thought we would go ahead and 
start a second round while we are waiting for Senator 
Blumenthal.
    The question I was going to ask you has already been 
adequately answered, but I do have two questions that have come 
from the Ligado spokespeople that I just would like to throw 
out maybe to you, Director Deasy.
    The first would be they state that the NTIA submission 
relies on irrelevant and misleading data to support their 
claims. Could you respond to that?
    Mr. Deasy. So for them to make that claim would suggest 
that the process that has been used for a very long time on 
evaluating all repurposing requests is at fault. Simply put, it 
is not. It is the process that has worked. It is the process we 
have used for years in repurposing. So I am not sure why all of 
a sudden now the process that has served the agencies well, FCC 
well, and NTIA well, would suddenly now be in question.
    Chairman Inhofe. All right.
    The other question that has come from the other side with 
some frequency is they state that the FCC order does not impact 
DOD or Federal spectrum. Would you agree with that? This is 
what they have stated.
    Mr. Deasy. No, clearly disagree. I mean, by the fact that 
we are sitting here today and you have General Raymond here 
representing the military----
    Chairman Inhofe. I understand that.
    Mr. Deasy.--would clearly suggest that it definitely 
impacts the military operations.
    Chairman Inhofe. That is good.
    Senator Wicker, we have finished our first round, but you 
are here in time for the first round and the second round if 
you want.
    Senator Wicker. Okay. Well, as you know, I have been one 
floor up chairing a Commerce Committee hearing, and I did not 
know if I would be able to make it or not. I appreciate the 
witnesses sticking with us this long.
    Let me ask--is it Mr. Deasy? Where are you? Did I pronounce 
that correctly?
    Mr. Deasy. You did, sir.
    Senator Wicker. There has been some discussion about a test 
that was conducted by the National Advanced Spectrum and 
Communications Test Network. I suppose, Mr. Chairman, we have 
had some discussion about that already today. I will try not to 
cover too much ground that has already been covered.
    This is a network that is administered in part by the 
Department of Defense. Is that not correct, sir?
    Mr. Deasy. When you say ``administer,'' I assume you are 
meaning that we are users of that and have a responsibility to 
coordinate our use of that with civilian. Yes.
    Senator Wicker. Okay.
    Apparently this NASCTN network has come up with some data 
that is at least to an extent supportive of the FCC's action. 
Is that fair to say?
    Mr. Deasy. I particularly cannot comment on that. I am not 
sure if others here on the Committee can.
    Senator Wicker. Okay. Well, let me just ask the question 
for any member of the panel. It has been suggested that this 
National Advanced Spectrum and Communications Test Network, 
NASCTN--it came up with a flawed conclusion. I just wondered. 
Does anyone on the panel suggest that this network is somehow 
compromised by the fact that the FCC is the one that requested 
the study and that Ligado paid for the study? Does anyone make 
that claim?
    Mr. Deasy. I think I can go back and answer your earlier 
question.
    Senator Wicker. Okay, all right.
    Mr. Deasy. It was similar to a conversation earlier that we 
had.
    So there was a request that the former CIO made for the 
study to be done in conjunction with Ligado. At the time that 
that study was done, Ligado's primacy was that they were still 
going to be primarily a satellite-based solution with only on 
an exception as an as-needed basis a terrestrial based 
solution. So under those assumptions, the study said that if 
indeed you are going to communicate from satellite down to 
earth, we could see where we could work in acceptable 
solutions.
    What changed was Ligado then changed the rules and said 
actually what we want to do is not be primarily from out of 
space satellite, but instead we want to move to a primary 
terrestrial based solution.
    Senator Wicker. At what point was that?
    Mr. Deasy. I, sir, would have to take that for the record 
and get back to you with what specific point that was. I do not 
happen to have that in front of me. But it was when that change 
occurred that that then changed the fact that we obviously no 
longer could say their solution was acceptable based on testing 
that had been done.
    [The information referred to follows:]

    Mr. Deasy. Ligado originally proposed to use this spectrum 
as a Mobile Satellite Service with an Ancillary Terrestrial 
Component (ATC) that required the terrestrial network to only 
serve as a supplement to a main satellite-based network when 
the satellite is not in view. The Federal Communications 
Commission (FCC) stated in a 2003 Order: ``We do not intend, 
nor will we permit, the terrestrial component to become a 
stand-alone service.'' The Department of Defense (DOD) 
supported the FCC Order. However, the FCC in 2010 required 
Ligado's predecessor to deploy a nationwide terrestrial mobile 
service, contrary to rules that prohibit this use on a 
standalone basis. Subsequently, DOD began to conduct tests 
based on the impact of the Ligado terrestrial network. The 
National Advanced Spectrum and Communications Test Network 
(NASCTN) worked with Ligado to do testing but because of time 
only a limited number and types of receivers were tested, for 
which the results were inconclusive. By the time the NASCTN 
study was completed in 2017, the Department of Transportation 
(DOT) assessment was already under way of a wider array of GPS 
receiver types. DOD supported the findings of the 2018 DOT 
report, which evaluated power levels that can be tolerated by 
GPS devices. The findings of the Ligado-funded tests were not 
sufficient to determine the impact to the wide range of 
affected GPS receivers. This resulted in DOD reaching out to 
the FCC to reaffirm that the Department objections to the 
granting of the license modification request to Ligado.

    Senator Wicker. Okay.
    Is it your opinion, sir, that there is such a thing as 
harmful interference on the one hand and an acceptable level of 
interference with GPS on the other hand, or is all interference 
unacceptable in your view?
    Mr. Deasy. Simply put, all interference is unacceptable 
because you do not know at the point in time that the 
interference occurs, the nature of that receiver that is 
impacted. If the nature of that receiver impacted at the time 
of that interference is one that is used for emergency 
services, for example, I think we would all say that is 
completely unacceptable that emergency services could not be 
always dealt with in a reliable manner. So the nature of your 
question is it depends on what it is we are talking about and 
the type of receiver.
    Senator Wicker. Well, there is a term that is used by the 
experts called ``noise'' in this regard, and it has been 
likened to me if I am on an airplane and I am listening to a 
movie on my tablet, if I hear a buzzing from the fan or some 
other noise that I can hear but still listen to the movie, that 
that is an example of non-harmful interference. Am I getting 
anywhere? Does that make any sense to you? Is that an argument 
that carries any weight at all?
    Mr. Deasy. I think the analogy that Dr. Griffin used 
earlier describing the 100 jets and the rustling leaves is 
getting at to what you are pointing out. Sir, did you want to 
cover that?
    Secretary Griffin. I think the point being made is the 
level of the noise. So if the level of the noise is a fan 
overhead while you are trying to listen to a movie and the 
movie is comparable to or louder than the fan, yes, you can 
hear the fan but it is not going to ruin the movie for you.
    Senator Wicker. Is there such an analogy in this subject?
    Secretary Griffin. Yes, sir. The analogy I gave earlier 
while you were up chairing the Commerce Committee hearing--and 
I understand that--is the levels we are talking about here is 
listening to GPS is quite literally like listening to the 
rustle of leaves through the noise of 100 jet engines at 
takeoff power. So in this case, the noise is enormously 
stronger, incomparably stronger than the signal we are trying 
to hear, and so the noise must be kept out of the band we are 
trying to protect, which is the navigation services band.
    Senator Wicker. Well, if it is that level of intensity, I 
would agree.
    Let me ask you. If these issues could be resolved between 
the FCC and DOD to your satisfaction, is there something to be 
said for our economy, for our society in having the use of this 
L-band of spectrum for low power 5G network, or are we talking 
about something that basically would be of no service to the 
public?
    Secretary Griffin. Well, sir, all spectrum is useful.
    Senator Wicker. So we can resolve this in a way that would 
be sufficient to you, that would be satisfactory to you----
    Chairman Inhofe. Senator Wicker, I am going to interrupt 
for a moment because we have one member who has not had his 
first turn.
    Senator Wicker. Okay. I am sorry. I thought I was the last 
show.
    Chairman Inhofe. We will get back to you.
    Senator Wicker. That concludes my questions, Mr. Chairman, 
and I appreciate the indulgence of the chair.
    Chairman Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Wicker.
    Senator Blumenthal?
    Senator Blumenthal. Thanks so much, Mr. Chairman. I 
apologize for my absence, but I was at the same committee 
hearing that our colleague was chairing.
    I have just a few questions, and I think I can probably lay 
claim to the perhaps most layman-esque, I think is maybe the 
most charitable way to characterize them.
    But I am thinking as a member of the Commerce Committee 
where we have just been having a hearing, and normally the FCC 
is considering consumer issues. To come here and find that the 
FCC has approved a license for a system that you regard as a 
grave national security threat leads me to wonder, well, the 
Russians and the Chinese do not need FCC licenses. Do they? So 
is this discussion not a sign that our GPS system is hugely 
vulnerable to malign interference if something as obvious as 
the Ligado application approved by the FCC poses this grave 
danger? Are there not other dangers?
    General Raymond. If you do not mind, I will jump in on this 
one.
    I think there is a full spectrum of threats to space 
capabilities, everything from low-end reversible jamming in 
this case all the way up to high-end direct ascent ASATs. As 
the U.S. Space Command Commander responsible with the Unified 
Command Plan (UCP) mission of protecting and defending those, 
we are concerned about all those.
    As I mentioned earlier--and I would be happy to take this 
offline and come talk to you in another setting--we have 
tactics, techniques, and procedures that we use to be able to 
mitigate the risk and to fight through this in certain 
conditions. I would love the opportunity to share that with 
you.
    Senator Blumenthal. Well, I would welcome that opportunity. 
Thank you, General. Because I will tell you just as kind of the 
layman here I am wondering how the FCC can open this grave 
national security threat, and yet the Chinese and the Russians 
have access to the same kind of technology and they do not need 
anybody's permission to interfere.
    Let me go to the next question. Why are you here? What do 
you want? I know that others on the panel have asked General 
Raymond and others. Senator Shaheen asked the question. Let me 
just put it very bluntly, what do you want us to do? I 
understand the FCC can reconsider its position. I will tell you 
from my many years of experience with the FCC, that kind of 
reversal would be highly unusual. But anyway, we cannot 
petition for reconsideration. So maybe you can tell us what you 
would like us to do and why. General Allen?
    Admiral Allen. Just repeating what I said earlier, 
recognizing this is not the Committee of original jurisdiction, 
it would be a referral to them to consider appropriate action.
    Senator Blumenthal. A referral to the----
    Admiral Allen. Commerce.
    Senator Blumenthal. To the Commerce Committee. I am on the 
Commerce Committee. You have the Chairman sitting here. I do 
not know that you need a referral. We are both hearing you. But 
there would have to be legislation. Is that what you are 
saying?
    Admiral Allen. Again, I am with you as far as being a 
layman on some of these things. It occurs to me that it is 
either a reconsideration, a court action, or legislation.
    Senator Blumenthal. So you are not asking that we have an 
amendment in the NDAA.
    Admiral Allen. Oh, no. I am just raising the possibilities. 
That is all, sir.
    Senator Blumenthal. Of an amendment in the NDAA or 
something in the Commerce----
    Admiral Allen. I am not here to represent the Department of 
Defense. I am here to represent the civil----
    Senator Blumenthal. I understand.
    By the way, thank you for your service, your wonderful 
service in the Coast Guard and all of your service.
    But I do not know, Mr. Chairman. I am kind of at a loss, 
assuming that we are alarmed and outraged, where do we go from 
here. An amendment in the NDAA?
    Chairman Inhofe. I can answer your question. Since you 
mentioned my name, it is perfectly appropriate to do so.
    You talked about something being unprecedented in terms of 
the FCC, and that may be true. But also unprecedented is a 
decision that was made, brought to the FCC by Ligado in a form 
that was immediately objected to by everyone--everyone, without 
one exception--coming to the military, to DOD, and we are 
addressing those who are responsible for this. All of them 
objected in a very strong way. We have a letter with 19 
Senators' signatures that objected the same way after they had 
heard the evidence. This thing--and this is unprecedented too.
    The decision that was made by the FCC was made on a Sunday 
night. I went back and checked. I have never found a case at 
least in the history that we could find of the FCC, number one, 
that has been done on a weekend. It has never been done on the 
weekend before. Number two, that was done without any public 
participation or knowledge that it was being made. To be 
specific, I took the initiative to find out why to make sure 
that no decision would be made until we got back into session. 
On a Thursday, there was a letter that came from the group that 
represents all of the defense industry a week before and the 
weekend before all this happened. Yet, they went ahead and did 
that. That is unprecedented. I talked to the administrator on 
that Monday after it happened and pointed this out to him.
    So in answer to your question, what I would want to do from 
what I have heard--and I have been in this issue for quite a 
while and certainly for all the time that Ligado since 2015 
became involved because of their purchase of----
    Senator Blumenthal. LightSquared?
    Chairman Inhofe. Yes. That we wanted to get this thing 
reversed. I am absolutely convinced that we do.
    So they came, after they had been invited by this 
Committee, to come and review the decision that was made and 
the comments by not just--this is interesting--not just DOD but 
also the private sector, airlines and others coming forth. I 
covered this in some of my opening statements. But that is the 
genesis of the presence of these witnesses.
    Senator Blumenthal. Well, I appreciate that, Mr. Chairman. 
I do not want to prolong the hearing. But I look forward to 
talking to you about the potential remedies and how we square 
them with the license that has already been issued by the FCC. 
But I do understand and appreciate the national security 
difficulties that have been raised here, and I think that a 
bipartisan approach here is well merited. Thank you for having 
this hearing.
    Chairman Inhofe. This has been bipartisan I want you to 
know. You were not here but it has been, equal numbers on each 
side.
    Senator Blumenthal. I followed it from afar, and I actually 
heard your opening statement. So I thank you.
    Chairman Inhofe. Very good. Thank you.
    Now, we did announce at the very beginning that we would 
have a second round of questions, which we will do and we will 
get to you again, Senator Wicker. But I have already had my 
second round of questions. Senator Reed?
    Senator Reed. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Again, I think we have reached a point where we have 
explored practically everything, but just a point that I keep 
coming back to is that had the FCC followed what is the norm, 
which would be to publish a proposed rulemaking under the 
Administrative Procedure Act, that would have given every 
stakeholder the opportunity to comment on the mitigation 
proposals, question the science, indeed suggest by doing some 
testing that their scientific conclusions are wrong. Is that 
accurate, Mr. Deasy?
    Mr. Deasy. Yes, sir. That is accurate. The process is 
clearly one of give and take. The public has a chance to weigh 
in. Agencies can weigh in. I think it is really important. 
Though we keep talking about the DOD here, this is all agencies 
that are sharing this view just not the DOD.
    As I have studied this and have asked the question, how 
does this typically work--so you have what I said earlier. You 
have the request that FCC makes over to NTIA that involves 
Federal Agencies' equities. In this case, obviously Ligado 
clearly does, and then we have a chance to work with the 
various agencies to express our views. We have the science that 
we bring into it. There is typically a give-and-take period 
back and forth between FCC and the various agencies that are 
impacted by this to try to reach a conclusion. That give-and-
take period has not taken place.
    Senator Reed. Another way to look at this. You had some 
clues that something was happening at the FCC. I presume that. 
But you did not have, before you even in sort of an informal 
information-only sort of--the substance of the proposal and the 
timing of the decision. That was a complete surprise to you--
not just you. When I speak of ``you,'' I speak of every Federal 
Agency. Is that accurate?
    Mr. Deasy. Yes. As I stated, I had been tracking this 
literally every week inside of my own organization who has been 
in constant communications with both the FCC and the NTIA. The 
last what I had heard was it was still under review but no 
final decision had taken place until it became announced 
publicly.
    Senator Reed. The final decision was taking place.
    Again, as you point out very appropriately--this is DOD-
focused obviously, but the impacts go to the banking community, 
go to FITBIT users--I do not want to go too far beyond my 
technological base, which is very narrow. But we are talking 
about most citizens are so totally dependent upon GPS that they 
do not even think about it any longer. The directions from the 
cell phone as they are driving to someplace they have not been 
before, all that is GPS-related, and that could be affected.
    Mr. Deasy. Yes. It is interesting. I just happened to write 
down just a few of the industries just to give you a breadth, 
that are impacted by this: aviation, safety and operational 
problems, satellite communications providers, defense 
providers, FedEx, UPS, Iridium, weather information companies, 
ability to use helicopters, low/high altitude aircraft, UAS 
devices. So the list goes on, and I know that the week of that 
decision when it was released was the same week that a very 
large number of companies inside the transportation and 
aerospace industry had written their objection as well. But 
yes, to your very point, it is very broad number of industries 
that are impacted by this.
    Senator Reed. Just a final point of clarification too. As I 
understand it--again, I will be happily corrected--the real 
impact will come where they place their towers, which, the plan 
would be principally in the United States unless they go 
overseas. This will not have an affect on areas outside the 
United States basically. Is that fair?
    Mr. Deasy. Yes. The proposal was to repurpose CONUS or 
inside of the United States.
    Senator Reed. Right. So for the specific warfighter 
effects, which would be located in the United States, but this 
is where we train. If systems do not work here, then what is 
the sense of deploying them anyplace else? Is that a fair 
statement, General?
    General Raymond. Yes, sir.
    I would add one other thing. We have talked at length about 
the spectrum and the quiet part of that spectrum. This is a 
globally recognized standard. I mean, across the globe, 
countries do not put ground-based emitters in that part of the 
spectrum. So the other thing we need to be concerned about is 
the precedent-setting that this might have, and if other 
countries then go do that, it could have more global impacts.
    Senator Reed. Thank you very much.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Senator Blumenthal. Mr. Chairman, just one more question if 
I may?
    Chairman Inhofe. Well, yes. I know that for a second 
round----
    Senator Blumenthal. Oh, I am sorry. I apologize.
    Chairman Inhofe.--Senator King has made a request to be 
heard.
    Senator Blumenthal. I apologize.
    Chairman Inhofe. He is here.
    Senator King. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Will autonomous vehicles--is GPS what tells autonomous 
vehicles where they are and who they are passing and where they 
are on the road? Is that a GPS function?
    Secretary Griffin. Yes.
    Senator King. So a minor perturbance in GPS could have 
catastrophic consequences for an autonomous vehicle. Is that 
correct?
    Secretary Griffin. As autonomous vehicles are developed, 
yes. They would want to be completely certain that GPS was not 
being interfered with.
    Senator King. It would not take much of an interference to 
go from one lane to the other at a bad moment.
    Secretary Griffin. It does not.
    Senator King. Additional question about the testing. The 
testing showed actual interference. In other words, this is not 
the precautionary principle at work. It is not we are worried 
about interference. We found interference. Is that correct?
    Secretary Griffin. The Department of Transportation testing 
to which I referred examined the level of power that would 
actually cause receivers to lose lock. So yes, sir. That is 
interference. It is not hypothetical. It is not propositional. 
It is they actually lost lock.
    Senator King. They lost lock at 9.8 dBW.
    Secretary Griffin. Or no, much lower levels. The only 
receivers tested which did not lose lock were those that go in 
cell phones for a couple of reasons which are interesting to 
note. First of all, the cell phone transmitter frequencies that 
are--the cell phones themselves are located in different bands. 
But the filters in cell phone receivers are very narrow-banded 
for what they want to do. So it is a special design that does 
not exist in most of the rest of the installed base. You have 
asked a very good question there.
    The certified aviation receivers that one buys, when I was 
talking earlier, the $10,000 receiver that you buy for your 
certified airplane--those were just barely capable of dealing 
with the 10 watts. For all the other classes of receivers, the 
common, garden variety receivers that were being discussed a 
moment ago that are in your automobile, those die at factors of 
100 or more below the 10 watt level.
    Senator King. As I read the order, did the receiver 
manufacturers not end up expressing that they were all right 
with this decision? Did Ligado not effectively make concessions 
that they ended up getting a sign-off from those companies?
    Secretary Griffin. Ligado says that they got that sign-off, 
but when you talk to the companies, the companies are on the 
list of those that Dana Deasy was just providing that have 
objected to this order. So none of us, of course, have been in 
the deliberations between these various companies and Ligado, 
but I think it says something when they have together and 
separately objected to this decision.
    Senator King. Thank you.
    Mr. Chairman, I suspect because this is an adjudication and 
not a rulemaking that the Congressional Review Act would not 
apply, but I do not know the answer to that.
    Chairman Inhofe. I have heard suggestions that it might and 
it might not, and I do not have an answer to that.
    Senator King. I assume somebody has appealed, has requested 
reconsideration before the commission. Is that true?
    Mr. Deasy. Yes, that is what we are currently discussing 
with NTIA. They are the ones that would have to issue the 
appeal, and there is a date that that has to occur by. That is 
a current conversation we are in with them is that process and 
what is it that they will need to put that appeal into effect.
    Senator King. Thank you.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Inhofe. Let me suggest where I think we are right 
now. Senator Blackburn has not been heard. Senator Blackburn, 
we have all been through the first round and we are on the 
second round now. Is that all right if she goes ahead? Why do 
you not go ahead on your first round?
    Senator Blackburn. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I had to 
go preside.
    I was disappointed to have to leave the hearing because 
this is something that I have followed. The LightSquared/Ligado 
issue is something that I followed since I was in the House. I 
do think it is a decision that the FCC lingered with for a 
longer time than we had expected, and we may not all agree with 
where they arrived at the decision.
    I really wish, Mr. Chairman, we had somebody from them here 
that would provide us a little bit of insight into this. 
LightSquared started on this years ago. So this is not a new 
issue, and it was an issue that I think they almost fought 
their way to a resolution on it. I do wish we had heard from 
the FCC today.
    I think there are a couple of things that are significant 
as we look at this issue. As we had the NDAA conference 
committee last year and as I handled and worked with Chairman 
Wicker on the section 214 language, we looked at how we move 
forward. I think we would all agree or I would certainly 
agree--you all--General Raymond may disagree with me--I do not 
think that DOD needs more spectrum. I will tell you that. I 
think you have plenty of spectrum. Indeed, I think that you 
need to give some of that back for commercial entities.
    I think we need a reconsideration of how you work with 
commercial entities as we talk about how you develop uses for 
21st century approaches for 5G, for supercomputing, for 
artificial intelligence. As we talk about the Space Force and 
the utilizations that are going to be there, it is going to 
require an enormous amount of partnership. It is going to 
require brain power that we are going to need to bring in from 
the outside to complement what we have. So we have to be very 
attentive to this.
    With that said and as we look at the transition of what was 
LightSquared and all their baggage and issues that they brought 
with them into Ligado, my question--and, Mr. Deasy, I guess it 
is best coming to you. Do you trust Ligado? Do you trust them 
to keep their word? Do you trust that they are not going to 
interfere with GPS? Do you trust that they are going to fly 
below your system and not be a source of interference?
    Mr. Deasy. So trust in this case all comes down to the FCC 
order and the mitigations.
    Senator Blackburn. Do you yourself? Do you at DOD trust 
that Ligado is going to be true to what they have told the FCC?
    Mr. Deasy. I have seen no evidence that they will be able 
to achieve what is in the FCC order.
    Senator Blackburn. So you look at the legacy of baggage 
that they have had throughout their history and feel that it 
will affect what we have to have work. We do not have room for 
error when we talk about 21st combat systems. Would you agree 
with that?
    Mr. Deasy. I would.
    Senator Blackburn. Making certain that this works 
appropriately is going to be an imperative. It is not an 
option. It is an imperative. Would you agree with that?
    Mr. Deasy. I would.
    Senator Blackburn. Thank you. I yield my time.
    Chairman Inhofe. All right. Thank you, Senator Blackburn.
    Let me just make a comment here. It has come up, you know, 
why were not other people invited? It is quite appropriate. 
First of all, the FCC is not in our jurisdiction, but what is 
in our jurisdiction, something that is called to our attention 
that is a real threat to our Nation. I mean, that is what we do 
here. So it is very appropriate to have people who are experts 
analyze the threat and inform us so that we can get answers.
    Now, the proper jurisdiction is the Committee that is 
chaired by Senator Wicker, and he may decide to have a hearing 
and that would be a different type of hearing altogether. We 
are here analyzing the threat to our country, and that is what 
I think we should be doing.
    Now, we have gone through now--and I know that there has 
been a request from Senator Blumenthal to be heard and you are 
recognized.
    Senator Blumenthal. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Just very briefly. I noticed looking at the parties on one 
side and the other, there are private parties who oppose this 
license and the decision by the FCC. From what I have heard 
from my colleagues, there are serious questions about the 
regulatory propriety. In fact, listening to the Chairman, the 
procedural legality of how this license was granted, and I sort 
of had a flashback to my days as a State attorney general when 
I actually did some agency challenges. One went all the way to 
the United States Supreme Court, and I recall well arguing that 
this rule was adopted in the dead of night without the proper 
comment period.
    I guess my question is, is it not likely that this action 
by the FCC will be challenged in the Federal courts based on 
possible procedural questions if it was adopted with all of the 
kind of irregularity that has been cited here? I can tell you 
from my own experience when there are challenges in the courts, 
they take years sometimes to resolve. So are we here somewhat 
prematurely?
    Mr. Deasy. I would say this. I cannot speculate what 
industry will do in terms of whether there will be lawsuits 
pursued out of this. I can tell you that there is a process 
that I understand we need to follow in objecting to this, which 
is done through the NTIA. I cannot speak personally. I am not 
an expert enough to know the legal approaches that would need 
to be taken here outside of our approach to go back and get 
this appealed through the NTIA, sir.
    Senator Blumenthal. Are you aware of any groups or 
companies? I mean, I presume they would be aggrieved. They 
would suffer a harm. They would have a legal right to be heard. 
Since they were not given a comment period or any other 
previous right, it seems to me they would have a pretty 
colorable case in court. So I wonder whether you have heard 
about any effort in that regard.
    Mr. Deasy. I have only heard that there are companies that 
also provide other forms of satellite communications that come 
up against the spectrum here that we are talking about that 
have reached out and expressed concern that if this request 
goes through, that it will cause harm to them.
    Senator Blumenthal. Thank you.
    Thanks, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Inhofe. Others? Senator Wicker?
    Senator Wicker?
    Senator Wicker. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Let me just say I think Senator Blumenthal and Senator King 
and Senator Blackburn have at least raised a number of issues 
that need a further look.
    I have information here that this has been pending for some 
years at the FCC and that in April of 2016, the FCC asked 
Federal Agencies with concerns about the proposal to submit 
specific technical information to support those concerns and 
that a draft order was provided to all concerned by the FCC in 
mid-October of last year. So we need to find out if that is a 
fact.
    We need to look at this guard band, 23-megahertz guard band 
between the proposed Ligado band and the GPS band, and see if 
that is helpful, if it solves a problem. We need to look at the 
fact that Ligado reduced its power levels by over 99 percent to 
get to this stage of the game. Senator King is right. I believe 
that some folks have signed off on this. My information is 
NovAtel, TopCon, Leica Geosystems, Hexagon, Deere, Garmin, and 
Trimble have notified the FCC that they did not oppose the 
granting of Ligado's application to modify its license.
    I think this panel consists entirely of Americans of good 
will. I have to believe the unanimous decision of the FCC was 
arrived at by Americans of good will. To me this has been a 
very valuable 3 hours, Mr. Chairman, but I would agree to the 
extent that other Members have said that there are some things 
we still need to get to. Unlike Senator Blackburn, who was 
involved heavily in this in the House, this is a matter of 
fairly recent--that has recently come to me. I do not recall 
having wrestled with this in the past.
    So I would just make those observations. If anybody on the 
panel wants to respond to the statements that I have made, I 
would be happy to hear that. But I would just make that 
observation, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Inhofe. Okay. There has been an invitation for 
comments from the panel. Let me make a couple comments first.
    Senator Blumenthal, when I was making my comments, I had 
never looked to see what rules and laws the FCC operates under. 
I was talking about past history and talking about what is 
normally appropriate. When an organization such as the National 
Defense Industrial Association with 1,700 businesses, 70,000 
individual members, and they have strong opposition to the 
proposal, along with some 71 companies, and then all of the 
groups--we have a long list. I do not have it in front of me. I 
was looking for it--of all the airlines and everybody else who 
is objecting to this, with that type of objection, it seemed to 
me, as the Chairman of this Committee and as just an 
individual, that the FCC was adequately warned of this 
opposition, this strong opposition--I have never seen such 
united opposition to any proposal--that they would not go ahead 
and do something and particularly do it on a weekend. This has 
not happened before.
    So I was thinking really of what is right and what is 
wrong, not what is legal and what would stand in court. To me 
that was just a no-brainer. It should not have happened, and I 
told that to the director of the FCC when I was surprised to 
find on a Monday morning that it had been done on the weekend.
    Now, Senator Wicker, I have said several times this is not 
our jurisdiction. It is your jurisdiction in the Commerce 
Committee, and I think you have voiced a lot of things. This is 
not a hearing on this. This is in response to the threat that 
has been posed and become obvious to us. But obviously, if you 
want to hold a hearing on this, it would be certainly within 
your purview to do that.
    Any other comments? You know, we could wear ourselves out 
on this thing.
    Senator Blumenthal. I would just comment, Mr. Chairman. I 
was not in any way questioning your version of what happened 
here. I was just thinking that it sounds like a court challenge 
waiting to happen, and I guess it is on us to try to ask some 
of these questions of the private parties. That was the reason 
for my question.
    Chairman Inhofe. That is very fair, very fair.
    If nothing else, we are adjourned. I wanted to go ahead and 
get adjourned before somebody else came in.
    [Laughter.]
    Chairman Inhofe. But let me just say to you folks and make 
sure--I ask unanimous consent it be on the record. I thank you 
very much, all four of you. You offered a level of expertise 
that I do not think many of us really understand. I know I do 
not.
    But I do know that when you get so many people in 
opposition to something with the veracity of that opposition, 
it is something that does concern me. There is nothing more 
important going on than a threat to this country. You know, I 
have got 20 kids and grandkids that are going to be here a lot 
longer than I am that are equally concerned.
    So thank you so much for the time that you have taken and 
thank you for being here.
    [Whereupon, at 5:44 p.m., the Committee adjourned.]

    [Questions for the record with answers supplied follow:]

              Questions Submitted by Senator Dan Sullivan
                           iridium questions
    1. Senator Sullivan. Mr. Deasy, Dr. Griffin, Admiral Allen, and 
General Raymond, the global satellite operator Iridium Communications 
runs a key command-and-control facility in Fairbanks, Alaska. Iridium 
has supported the Department of Defense (DOD), warfighter, and Federal 
agencies with secure, critical and reliable satellite communications 
for nearly 20 years. Iridium operates in a spectrum even closer to what 
Ligado is seeking to repurpose than Global Positioning System (GPS). 
What is your assessment of Iridium's support to DOD, and could the 
Federal Communication Commission's (FCC) decision undermine Iridium's 
network? How specifically?
    Mr. Deasy. Yes, the Federal Communications Commission's decision 
would likely undermine Iridium's satellite communications services. The 
Department of Defense (DOD) relies on Iridium for secure, hand portable 
communications solutions, such as unlimited unclassified and classified 
voice, data, paging, broadcast services and push-to-talk combat 
networking capabilities through a secure DOD-owned and operated ground 
infrastructure. Iridium also offers a positioning, navigation and 
timing capability that is complementary to GPS. The out of band 
emissions from Ligado will potentially affect all Iridium's services, 
including positioning, navigation and timing capabilities. We assess 
the deployment of Ligado's planned network will put the over 130,000 
Iridium devices used globally by warfighters and Federal and coalition 
partners at significant risk of degradation.
    Secretary Griffin. I defer to Mr. Deasy.
    Admiral Allen. Like GPS, Iridium operates in a spectrum band 
adjacent to Ligado's. Iridium's low earth orbit constellation of 
satellites supports a broad spectrum of critical communications based 
services for the military, civil government and private sector. In 
addition to support for the warfighter, the maritime transportation 
systems relies heavily on their service for distress and calling, asset 
tracking, telephony, and machine to machine data transfers. Aviation 
safety systems also rely on these services. Iridium and the Satellitte 
Safety Alliance are opposed to the FCC action and have made numerous 
filings on the FCC docket.
    General Raymond. Iridium has been supporting the DOD with 24/7 
resilient global coverage satellite communications for over 20 years 
and was recently awarded a seven (7) year, $739 million fixed-price 
contract to continue the delivery of global Iridium services to the 
warfighter. DOD's Iridium service operates independently of Iridium's 
commercial service via the use of a dedicated gateway station in Hawaii 
and secure handheld portable communications devices. Today, there are 
over 130,000 devices in use by globally deployed warfighters, Federal, 
and coalition partners. Additionally, through a separate investment 
between the Enhanced Mobile Satellite Services (EMSS) Program, the U.S. 
Army, and the Department of Energy, the EMSS Program delivers Iridium-
unique position, navigation and timing (PNT) services as a compliment 
to GPS. The FCC Ligado decision could potentially impact both Iridium's 
commercial services and EMSS services. Specifically, the upper end of 
Iridium's spectrum (1626.5 MHz) is directly adjacent to the Ligado 
Uplink spectrum (1627.5 MHz) and there is a very real chance Ligado's 
new 5G network could directly interfere unacceptably and substantially 
with Iridium's own functions. Testing is required to assess negative 
impact.

    2. Senator Sullivan. Mr. Deasy, Dr. Griffin, Admiral Allen, and 
General Raymond, how critical is Iridium's satellite network as 
reliable back up for GPS and in what ways does the FCC's decision 
endanger GPS' only proven substitute?
    Mr. Deasy. The Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) decision 
to approve the Ligado license modification request will impact 
Iridium's capability because the Ligado signal will cause interference. 
The FCC Order imposes power limits, guard band and coordination 
requirements for repair and mitigation of harmful interference that 
fall short of protecting Iridium's adjacent band operations. Iridium 
satellite positioning, navigation and timing is available today as one 
of the few reliable commercial alternatives or companions to 
traditional GPS. Iridium provides an ``on-demand'' capability that is 
robust and demonstrates the ability to meet the timing requirements for 
U.S. critical infrastructure, to include the uniformed services. For 
example, DOD and the U.S. Coast Guard rely on Iridium position accuracy 
to support mission tracking requirements. Ligado's out of band 
emissions would likely cause a negative impact.
    Secretary Griffin. I defer to Mr. Deasy.
    Admiral Allen. Iridium is not currently used as a backup for GPS, 
its communications services are critical in passing GPS data to safety 
and other systems. Their satellite constelation and infrastructure 
offer complementary PNT services.
    General Raymond. Iridium satellite PNT is available today as a 
commercial alternative or companion to traditional GPS. The Space Force 
is partnering with the U.S. Army and the Department of Energy to expand 
the use of this capability. While Iridium's service is not equivalent 
to GPS, it provides a PNT capability that is robust and has 
demonstrated the ability to meet the timing requirements for U.S. 
critical infrastructure in a nationwide exercise. For example, position 
accuracy has been demonstrated to meet the tracking requirements of the 
U.S. Coast Guard. For applicability to other U.S. Government agencies 
as compared to GPS, additional classified details can be provided. The 
Iridium PNT channel is immediately adjacent to Ligado's Uplink spectrum 
that starts at 1627.5 MHz. Therefore, adverse impact to Iridium's PNT 
service may be significant, potentially neutralizing its usefulness. As 
the DOD continues to develop the next generation of PNT capabilities, 
we cannot ignore the availability of a viable alternative PNT source to 
ensure operational flexibility.

    3. Senator Sullivan. General Raymond, I understand the Space Force 
is responsible for managing the Iridium partnership with DOD and other 
Federal agencies. How do you do characterize the threat posed to 
Iridium by the FCC's decision?
    General Raymond. There is a very real possibility that the Iridium/ 
Enhanced Mobile Satellite Services (EMSS) downlink can be degraded or 
even jammed, adversely impacting EMSS users who operate globally. There 
has been no significant testing for potential interference in those 
regions where repurposed Ligado spectrum will be used for 5G services. 
This is a knowledge gap that needs to be better understood.
 missile defense priorities--hypersonic and ballistic missile tracking 
                              space sensor
    4. Senator Sullivan. Dr. Griffin, section 1683 of last year's 
enacted National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), states that the 
development of the Hypersonic and Ballistic Missile Tracking Space 
Sensor (HBTSS) is primarily assigned to the Missile Defense Agency for 
development. It appears the funding for this capability has been moved 
over to the Space Development Agency. If true, this disregards the law 
enacted in the Fiscal Year 2020 NDAA. Please explain, in detail, why 
you made this decision and exactly how you plan reverse it, in order to 
ensure that the Department fully complies with the law?
    Secretary Griffin. On May 29, 2020, the Department of Defense 
delivered letters of certification to the heads of the Congressional 
Defense Committees in response to section 1683(a) of the National 
Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020 (Public Law 116-92) 
noting that we are in compliance with the direction that the Secretary 
of Defense to assign the Director of the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) 
with principal responsibility for the development and deployment of a 
hypersonic and ballistic tracking space sensor (HBTSS) payload. 
Additionally, my team is developing a memorandum of understanding 
between MDA and SDA to formalize their roles and responsibilities in 
this effort. This represents a best possible case for delivering needed 
capabilities to the warfighter on the fastest timeline possible.
        missile defense priorities--next generation interceptor
    5. Senator Sullivan. Dr. Griffin, in his testimony before SASC 
earlier this year, General Terrence O'Shaughnessy, Commander, U.S. 
Northern Command, stated, ``Eroding military advantage is undermining 
our ability to detect threats, defeat attacks, and therefore deter 
aggression against the Homeland. This is emboldening competitors and 
adversaries to challenge us at home, holding at risk our people, our 
critical infrastructure, and our ability to project power forward.'' In 
your view, how does the Request for Proposal (RFP) for the Next 
Generation Interceptor (NGI) specifically address General 
O'Shaughnessy's concerns about schedule in order to continue to pace 
the threat and protect our Homeland?
    Secretary Griffin. Yes, the NGI acquisition strategy provides for: 
Joint Requirements Oversight Council-approved threshold and objective 
requirements to provide trade space allowing Offeror's to balance 
performance and schedule; NGI evaluation criteria to provide for 
assignment of strengths to proposed designs that deliver prior to the 
threshold operational need date of fourth quarter fiscal year (4QFY) 
2028; incentive fee for accelerated successful development, test, and 
successful flight test over baseline proposal; and the carrying of two 
NGI contractors through Critical Design Review.

    6. Senator Sullivan. Dr. Griffin, given the decision to cancel, 
what is the likelihood that the Next Generation Interceptor (NGI) will 
deliver within the next 10 years?
    Secretary Griffin. Based on previous kill vehicle and interceptor 
development timelines, the Missile Defense Agency is highly confident 
in successful delivery within 10 years. In addition, responses provided 
by industry to Government Requests for Information indicates the mean 
first article delivery is up to 12 months earlier than the baseline (or 
objective) date proposed.

    7. Senator Sullivan. Dr. Griffin, what specifically is included in 
the NGI RPF to ensure the deployment of new interceptors as soon as 
possible?
    Secretary Griffin. The NGI RFP includes the following to ensure 
deployment of new interceptors as soon as possible: Joint Requirements 
Oversight Council-approved threshold and objective requirements 
allowing Offeror's to balance performance and schedule; NGI evaluation 
criteria to allowing proposals to be awarded strengths based on designs 
that deliver prior to the threshold operational need date of fourth 
quarter fiscal year (4QFY) 2028; incentive fee for accelerated 
successful development, test, and successful flight test over baseline 
proposal; and provisions to allow two NGI contract awards to maintain 
competition through Critical Design Review.

    8. Senator Sullivan. Dr. Griffin, what is the earliest NGI will be 
positioned at Fort Greely?
    Secretary Griffin. The NGI Top Level Requirements and solicitation 
establishes a threshold first article delivery date of fourth quarter 
fiscal year 2028. Offerors may propose an objective date that is 
earlier than this threshold date. In addition, the NGI Incentive Fee 
Plan provides incentives for successful delivery of the first article 
up to 12 months earlier than the baseline (or objective) date proposed.
                               __________
             Questions Submitted by Senator Martha McSally
                  scope of order's mitigation attempt
    9. Senator McSally. Mr. Deasy, how do you interpret the FCC's use 
of the term ``installations'' and, in your opinion, does that include 
ranges and proving grounds as well?
    Mr. Deasy. In my opinion, the FCC use of the term ``installations'' 
does include ranges and proving grounds, consistent with national 
policy frameworks. However, that is not sufficient. Notably, most 
military GPS receivers are not restricted to only specific defined 
areas of operations such as installations and are often used on 
airborne and mobile platforms that operate in the United States. The 
Department of Defense (DOD) believes that the FCC Order failed to 
recognize the broad usage of GPS by DOD.

    10. Senator McSally. Mr. Deasy, how would the placement of towers 
impact ranges like the Barry M. Goldwater Air Force Range or the Army's 
Electronic Proving Ground in Arizona?
    Mr. Deasy. Any GPS military receiver on a military installation 
would be at risk if a tower were placed in or around the range. Such 
interference from higher powered Ligado terrestrial operations would, 
for example, cause military GPS receivers not to be able to lock onto 
the relatively weak signals from GPS. The Commission's conditions that 
were placed on Ligado would not prevent this from occurring to those 
receivers.

    11. Senator McSally. Mr. Deasy, is it clear how DOD and the FCC 
will be able to mitigate those issues?
    Mr. Deasy. No, the mitigation techniques outlined in the Federal 
Communications Commission (FCC) Order do not protect global positioning 
system (GPS) receivers from harmful interference. The FCC highlights 
specific reductions in power levels, a 23 MHz guard band and conditions 
for repair and mitigation that are intended to mitigate issues with 
GPS. These will not be sufficient to protect military GPS usage, 
particularly in light of the large number of embedded systems on 
complex platforms and classified mission usages. From a DOD 
perspective, the results of the PNT EXCOM study, which was based on 1 
dB protection criteria, underscore that the only thing that can protect 
GPS is to reduce the power to a level that Ligado has chosen not to 
accept. The Department of Transportation assessment on Adjacent Band 
Compatibility also verified that the mitigation approach imposed by FCC 
will not protect a multitude of GPS users.
                        satellite communications
    12. Senator McSally. Dr. Griffin, a lot of the discussion related 
to the Ligado spectrum has rightly focused on GPS, but GPS is not the 
only incumbent service operating in the L-band, there are also 
satellite voice and data services. Can you provide some real-world 
examples of what interference to satellite voice or data service might 
actually look like, and their implications on DOD operations?''
    Secretary Griffin. I have no data to assess the impact of Ligado's 
operations in the L-band spectrum to other than users of satellite 
navigation services. However, based on the fact that voice and data 
services operate at much higher power levels that GPS signals, I 
strongly doubt that there will be any significant impacts on such 
services from Ligado's operations.
                               __________
                Questions Submitted by Senator Jack Reed
           technical information relating to gps interference
    13. Senator Reed. Mr. Deasy, in the fall of 2019, the Federal 
Communications Commission contacted Federal agencies, providing the 
draft order and asking concerned agencies to submit specific technical 
information to support those concerns. Did the Department of Defense 
respond to that request and if so, can the Department provide a copy of 
the correspondence?
    Mr. Deasy. On November 22, 2019, 11 Interdepartment Radio Advisory 
Committee (IRAC) members, including the three Military Departments, 
signed a response to the FCC draft order. The joint response strongly 
opposed the FCC's granting of the license modification to Ligado, 
citing unresolved technical and regulatory issues that require 
resolution. The IRAC review began after the FCC provided the National 
Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) a draft of the 
Ligado Order in October 2019. As this is a pre-decisional document, DOD 
would defer questions about its release to NTIA.
                               __________

           Questions Submitted by Senator Richard Blumenthal
                         coast guard operations
    14. Senator Blumenthal. Admiral Allen, aviation groups have 
expressed concerns that Ligado's plans would interfere with helicopter 
GPS receivers and satellite communications when operating within one of 
their towers. The U.S. Coast Guard's Homeland defense and search and 
rescue missions requires its helicopters to fly in dense urban areas 
and in proximity to cell towers deployed on our coasts. Under what 
conditions could the Ligado proposal, with the mitigations approved by 
the FCC, impact the Coast Guard's use of helicopters in Homeland 
defense and search and rescue missions?
    Admiral Allen. This answer is my personal opinion and should not be 
interpreted as the position of the Coast Guard. Coast Guard operations 
and the operations of all emergency response organizations at the 
Federal, State, and local level will be impacted by the FCC action. 
Coast Guard helicopters and other aircraft that use Traffic Terrain 
Awareness and Warning Systems that detect and warn of physical 
obstacles rely on certified GPS receivers when path deviations occur. 
Ligado has stated in their application which has been approved in the 
FCC action that the requirement for aircraft ``operating within 500 
feet of an object require flight by visual reference rather than 
relying on instruments, including GPS.'' In other words, the FCC order 
assumes that it is ``good enough'' for pilots to use visual references 
in lieu of certified systems that use the GPS signal. As stated in the 
Petition for Reconsideration filed by the Airline Pilots Association, 
International (APAI) on May 20, 2020, ``Certified aviation GPS 
receivers must continue to reliably operate at the edge of, below or 
outside of obstacle clearance zones. Such would be the case when 
vertical or lateral airline flight path deviations occur during 
instrument approaches to landing in conditions such as wind shear, 
turbulent or rough weather, high winds, during emergency situations 
such as an engine failure on takeoff, or during collision avoidance 
maneuvers near an airport at a low altitude.'' They further state, `` 
In any of the cases mentioned above a proper aviation risk assessment 
would require accounting for situations where compromised GPS 
navigation guidance or a false or missed Terrain Awareness and Warning 
System alert associated with Ligado's interference would present a 
severe hazard to safety of flight such as an increased risk of 
collision with the ground or another aircraft.'' So, in my opinion, 
whether is it a Coast Guard aircraft or anyother aircraft operating 
under similar conditions, the risk is unacceptable. As noted by the 
APAI, the FCC created and relied on ``an ad hoc standard for harmful 
interference . . . this is an arbitrary and unacceptable way to go 
about analyzing any threat to the Nation's air transport system.'' 
Accordingly, it is hard to see how Coast Guard and Homeland defense and 
search and rescue missions will not be put in jeapordy.
     federal aviation administration operations and civil aviation
    15. Senator Blumenthal. Mr. Deasy, Dr. Griffin, Admiral Allen, and 
General Raymond, letters entered into record from aviation experts have 
raised serious concerns about the impact that Ligado's operations will 
have on Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) certified GPS receivers 
when aircraft are operating within 250 foot of a Ligado tower. Aviation 
GPS is critical for position reporting for FAA surveillance and pilot 
coordination between aircraft flying at a low level, and any potential 
disruption is profoundly concerning. Where did the model of a 250 foot 
radius of concern with respect to Ligado originate, is the model 
correct, and what impact would the Ligado tower have on aircraft in 
that area?
    Mr. Deasy. DOD CIO would defer to the Federal Aviation 
Administration and their expertise in addressing the rationale behind 
the 250 foot radius model and the impact on aircraft.
    Secretary Griffin. I defer to Mr. Deasy.
    Admiral Allen. The 250 foot radius was proposed by Ligado to the 
RTCA (formerly the Radio Technical Commission for Aeronautics), an 
aviation group that develops standards for the FAA. RTCA analyzed the 
proposal but did not reach consensus or agreement on the proposal. See 
RTCA Paper No. 333-16/SC159-1055 at this site https://www.rtca.org/
sites/default/files/sc-159--wg6--response--ligado. pdf
    General Raymond. While the DOD operates numerous FAA-certified 
aircraft with GPS receivers, the Space Force defers to the FAA for 
official responses about FAA operations and civil aviation.

    16. Senator Blumenthal. Mr. Deasy, Dr. Griffin, Admiral Allen, and 
General Raymond, what aircraft and GPS receivers are of particular 
concern with respect to potential interference from Ligado, and why?
    Mr. Deasy. DOD CIO would defer to the Federal Aviation 
Administration and their expertise in addressing the rationale behind 
the 250 foot radius model and the impact on aircraft.
    Secretary Griffin. I defer to Mr. Deasy.
    Admiral Allen. There are many filings on the docket regarding 
impacted receivers. However, the most critical in my view are aviation 
receivers, especially non-certified receivers used in helicopters, 
general aviation, and unmanned systems.
    General Raymond. Space Force defers to the FAA for official 
responses about FAA operations and civil aviation.

    17. Senator Blumenthal. Mr. Deasy, Dr. Griffin, Admiral Allen, and 
General Raymond, what requirements has the FCC imposed on Ligado with 
respect to its towers and civil aviation requirements?
    Mr. Deasy. The Federal Communications Commission Order states that 
Ligado shall be prohibited from operating any base station antenna in 
its lower downlink band, 1526-1536 MHz, at a location less than 250 
feet laterally or less than 30 feet below an obstacle clearance surface 
established by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) rules.
    Secretary Griffin. I defer to Mr. Deasy.
    Admiral Allen. The FCC Order and Authorization imposes several 
requirements on Ligado; however, the measures imposed do not mitigate 
the interference threat to GPS reception. They constitute after the 
fact consequence management when a receiver is impacted and do not 
protect the GPS signal.
    General Raymond. Space Force defers to the FAA for official 
responses about FAA operations and civil aviation.

    18. Senator Blumenthal. Mr. Deasy, Dr. Griffin, Admiral Allen, and 
General Raymond, do you believe that Ligado's mitigation plans are 
adequate to ensure that aviation safety and traffic management are not 
negatively impacted? If not, what are the specific shortcomings of 
these mitigations and what additional measures are necessary for FAA 
GPS operations?
    Mr. Deasy. DOD CIO would defer to the Federal Aviation 
Administration (FAA) and their expertise in addressing the impacts to 
aviation safety and traffic management and the specific additional 
measures necessary for FAA GPS operations.
    Secretary Griffin. I defer to Mr. Deasy.
    Admiral Allen. No, I do not. Even at the reduced power levels 
proposed by Ligado, the DOT Adjacent Band Compatibility Study 
indeicates the levels are still execeedingly high relative to the weak 
GPS signal. It is a matter of physics, there isn't a realtistic way to 
accommodate terrestrial broadband in a band adjacent to GPS. Since the 
issue can't be mitigated, to establish a process whereby users notify 
Ligado of interference after it has occurred is consequence management 
and not a responsible mitigation measure.
    General Raymond. Space Force defers to the FAA for official 
responses about FAA operations and civil aviation.
                               __________

             Questions Submitted by Senator Mazie K. Hirono
                   global positioning system impacts
    19. Senator Hirono. Mr. Deasy, Dr. Griffin, Admiral Allen, and 
General Raymond, what types of activities do the military and civilian 
populations rely on GPS for and how will the interference from Ligado's 
network impact those activities?
    Mr. Deasy. From a military perspective, GPS is essential for a wide 
range of activities, such as readiness training, emergency response, 
operations, and support of homeland defense. GPS capabilities are also 
heavily integrated throughout Department of Defense operations and 
applications, including precision weapons, air, land, and sea 
navigation, communications and network synchronization, command and 
control, civil engineering, and surveillance applications. Many of 
these military missions are in direct support of civil authorities, 
which would impact the ability to provide assistance to the civilian 
population. Ligado's network impacts poses unacceptable risk of harmful 
interference to GPS which could disrupt any of these military 
applications. Specifically, each GPS satellite contains multiple atomic 
clocks that contribute very precise time data to the GPS signals. 
Precise time is crucial to a variety of capabilities, such as 
communication systems, and electrical power grids.
    Secretary Griffin. I defer to Mr. Deasy.
    Admiral Allen. I would defer to my DOD colleagues regarding 
impacted military activities. Regarding civilian populations, as stated 
in my written testimony, global navigation satellite services (GNSS) of 
which GPS is the US service, are ubiquitious in all aspects of civil 
life, from personal devices to critical infrastructure to aviation 
systems to intelligent transportation systems. Notable examples include 
emergency service vehicles, low flying aircraft including search and 
rescue aircraft, precision agriculture, power transmission, cell phone 
network operations, and the timing of financial transactions.
    General Raymond. The military and civilian populations rely on GPS 
for nearly all aspects of everyday life, to include agriculture, 
construction, package delivery, synchronizing networks to include 
banking and ATMs, weather forecasting, drones, emergency response, and 
more. GPS is a critical to a multitude of U.S. military operations 
which include homeland defense, training and building military 
readiness, and humanitarian and disaster relief efforts. Interference 
from a ground-based network would degrade GPS users' ability to get 
accurate location and time, putting all of these activities at risk. 
The FCC's decision places the economic burden on businesses and 
government agencies to assess and mitigate the risk to public safety 
and productivity.

    20. Senator Hirono. Mr. Deasy and Dr. Griffin, what efforts, if 
any, did the Department of Defense make to work with Ligado to allow 
its proposed network to co-exist with the Department's GPS 
applications?
    Mr. Deasy. The Department of Defense began assessing the impact of 
Ligado and its predecessor companies since the start of this proceeding 
17 years ago and continued to express its concern with the viability of 
their proposed network to operate without adversely impacting GPS. 
Throughout this process, the Department engaged with policymakers and 
other stakeholders to address these issues, including by providing 
feedback regarding key concerns. DOD met with Ligado on multiple 
occasions, evaluated their proposals and recommended that they reduce 
their power levels in order to protect GPS. Like other Federal agency 
stakeholders, the Department was surprised by the timing of the Federal 
Communications Commission decision, and understood there would be a 
continued dialogue regarding the parameters of the proposed license 
modification. In addition to the Air Force testing, the Department 
agreed to set up testing at the National Advanced Spectrum and 
Communications Test Network (NASCTN) to try to further advance our 
understanding of whether the Ligado proposed network would impact GPS. 
As a result, all testing completed to date show there will be 
interference to GPS receivers.
    Secretary Griffin. I defer to Mr. Deasy.

    21. Senator Hirono. Mr. Deasy and Dr. Griffin, a number of major 
GPS manufacturers, including Garmin, Trimble, and Deere, entered into 
agreements with Ligado to allow their GPS receivers to co-exist with 
Ligado's network. What is different about the Defense Department's GPS 
receivers that won't allow them to work once Ligado's network goes 
live, while Garmin's, Trimble's, Deere's receivers will continue to 
operate?
    Mr. Deasy. Several major GPS manufacturers, including Trimble, 
Deere and Garmin, have informed FCC that their GPS receivers cannot co-
exist with Ligado's network. They dispute Ligado's characterization 
that they reached ``co-existence'' agreements and are raising concerns 
about major interference problems posed by the FCC Order and Ligado's 
planned network in their latest filings to the FCC. For example, Garmin 
told the FCC that their settlement agreement with Ligado reflects its 
concern about certified aviation devices, preserves its ability to 
petition the government for protection of these devices, and maintains 
its ability to advocate for the use of a standard based on a 1 dB 
interference protection metric. Given the Department's diverse use of 
GPS for missions critical for national security, we agree with the 
manufacturers that the risk of interference is too high and that all 
the mitigation techniques in the FCC Order are not sufficient to 
protect the operation of GPS receivers.
    Secretary Griffin. I defer to Mr. Deasy.

    22. Senator Hirono. Mr. Deasy, Dr. Griffin, and General Raymond, I 
understand that Ligado has committed to upgrading or replacing 
government GPS receivers that are susceptible to interference. What 
would it take--in terms of cost, schedule, and operational impact--to 
upgrade or replace Defense Department GPS receiver's that are 
susceptible to interference from Ligado's network?
    Mr. Deasy. There are approximately 1 million GPS military specific 
receivers in the Department of Defense inventory. Many of these are 
embedded in weapons systems and platforms that will make replacement 
impractical given the time it would take to recertify and requalify the 
systems. This is cost and schedule prohibitive and would significantly 
degrade national security. Simple ``in-kind equipment replacements'', 
even if authorized, will result in non-reimbursable testing and 
integration costs. This includes additional time and effort related to 
tracking the particular assets and taking the systems off-line in a way 
that does not disrupt mission-critical operations.
    Secretary Griffin. I defer to Mr. Deasy.
    General Raymond. As stated in the February 14, 2020 Interdepartment 
Radio Advisory Committee (IRAC) Memo on National Security Impacts, 
there are approximately 1 million GPS receivers currently in the DOD 
inventory. Since the FCC order does not protect GPS services as a 
whole, but only GPS receivers proven to be susceptible to interference, 
the DOD would need to spend taxpayer dollars to test and analyze 
platforms with GPS equipment in order to determine which equipment 
would need to be replaced. ``Modification or replacement of GPS 
receivers within DOD has historically taken approximately a decade due 
to the sheer receiver numbers, complications with how receivers are 
integrated in thousands of platforms and systems, depot and scheduling, 
and global operations.'' Military operations would be impacted as 
assets would be taken out of service for testing and evaluation, and 
warfighters would be distracted from the mission of national defense. 
[Reference: IRAC Memo on National Security Impacts, Feb 14, 2020]
                               __________

             Questions Submitted by Senator Martin Heinrich
                            testing methods
    23. Senator Heinrich. Mr. Deasy, the Department of Defense and 
other Federal agencies used an internationally accepted method to test 
for GPS interference while Ligado tested for interference using another 
standard. The FCC ultimately agreed with Ligado's findings. Can you 
highlight for us the differences between the international accepted 
testing model and the one used by Ligado?
    Mr. Deasy. The internationally recognized interference protection 
criteria of 1 dB is the approach the Department used. Both the 
Department of Transportation (DoT) Adjacent Band Compatibility 
Assessment and Air Force testing were based on this protection criteria 
and demonstrated that Ligado will cause harmful interference to GPS 
operations. Ligado's performance-based metric approach is new and 
untested. Specifically, Ligado, as part of their tests, relied solely 
on varying the power until they saw a change in the performance of the 
receiver. Given the variance in all the different types of GPS 
recievers, this is not a sufficient methodology to determine the impact 
to the wide range of potentially affected capabilities. Further, the 
Ligado approach does not correlate with the definition of ``harmful 
interference'' defined by the telecommunications regulators. Ligado 
tested a limited amount of GPS receivers to determine if the power 
levels actually affected performance. The government tested 80 receiver 
types, while Ligado only tested 14. The government-supported test 
results (i.e., DoT, Air Force testing) developed an ``interference 
tolerance mask'' for categories of receivers based on a 1 dB 
degradation in the reception of the GPS satellite signal. An 
interference tolerance mask defines, for a particular receiver, the 
maximum received aggregate interference power that can be tolerated to 
protect GPS. This approach is recognized and established based on years 
of study domestically and internationally.

    24. Senator Heinrich. Mr. Deasy, why is the DOD and interagency 
method more reliable?
    Mr. Deasy. The Department of Defense considers a standardized 
interference protection criteria based on internationally agreed-upon 
protection criteria is the correct approach. To this end, the 
Department supports the use of the 1 dB interference protection 
criterion (IPC) for GPS. Use of this IPC is consistent with protection 
afforded by other radiocommunications services and is the only reliable 
mechanism to ensure adequate protection for civilian and military GPS 
receivers.
           impact on continental united states dod operations
    25. Senator Heinrich. Mr. Deasy, what would the everyday impact be 
on training operations, electronic warfare test ranges, disaster 
response, and other DOD operations here in the United States if this 
proposal went forward?
    Mr. Deasy. The impact of harmful interference caused by Ligado's 
planned operations would include disruptions to the wide range of 
activities supported by GPS capabilities, including safety of aircraft 
flight and training operations. Such interference would put at risk our 
ability to test electronic warfare capabilities and create impediments 
to first response and disaster relief operations. The Department cannot 
accept negative operational and mission impacts to our warfighting 
capabilities.
                           air force testing
    26. Senator Heinrich. Mr. Deasy, it is my understanding that the 
Air Force conducted a thorough series of tests on several dozen 
receivers and concluded that the type of signal proposed by Ligado 
would result in significant GPS interference. The Air Force's memo on 
this study is classified--but can you discuss, in general terms, the 
findings of that memo?
    Mr. Deasy. The Air Force tested 80 different receivers and found 
that Ligado would still interfere with GPS operations. The Department 
will provide a classified briefing on the results of these tests if 
requested.
                              way forward
    27. Senator Heinrich. Mr. Deasy, Ligado has claimed that their 
proposed use of L-band spectrum would cause no harmful interference to 
GPS whatsoever, while on the other side, DOD and other entities appear 
to be arguing that an entire 200MHz wide swatch of spectrum should 
remain completely unoccupied in order to protect GPS. Is there any 
middle ground?
    Mr. Deasy. Ligado's use of L-band spectrum would cause significant 
harmful interference to GPS. The Department does not seek for the 
entire 200 MHz to be unoccupied in order to protect GPS. In fact, there 
are several mobile satellite service (MSS) providers that operate in 
this frequency range and provide service, such as Iridium. For example, 
Iridium's portion of the L-band spectrum is 1617.775 - 1626.5 MHz and 
consists of both uplink and downlink transmissions. The Department 
continues to emphasize that GPS already coexists with the satellite 
users in the range of spectrum dedicated to satellite uses, including 
MSS (1525-1559 MHz) and the GPS/Global Navigation Satellite Systems 
(1559-1610 MHz) allocations. The FCC Order changes the conditions by 
allowing terrestrial usage in this band range, which will create 
interference for GPS users.
                    impact of similar systems on gps
    28. Senator Heinrich. Mr. Deasy, I have read that Iridium's mobile 
system is just as close to the GPS spectrum band as is Ligado, with 
terminals physically located next to the GPS receivers, with no GPS 
interference. Is this true, and if so, can you explain how the Iridium 
and Ligado systems are different?
    Mr. Deasy. Mobile satellite service (MSS) and GPS can co-exist and 
have done so for decades. Iridium is only providing a satellite-based 
service (i.e., MSS) without any terrestrial component. Conversely, 
Ligado is primarily seeking to deploy a terrestrial-only offering in 
spectrum set aside for satellite use (e.g., MSS.). The fundamental 
difference between the two is the change from satellite to terrestrial, 
which creates the risk.
                               __________

            Questions Submitted by Senator Elizabeth Warren
                           scientific studies
    29. Senator Warren. Dr. Griffin, the Department of Transportation 
(DOT) study examined fluctuations in noise level using an interference 
threshold of 1db, while the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) 
chose instead to look at key performance indicators. The FCC relied on 
these indicators as being more closely tied to actual degradation. The 
National Advanced Spectrum and Communications Test Network (NASCTN), a 
multi-agency partnership of which the Department of Defense (DOD) is a 
member, found through testing that GPS recognition of interference of 
1db is not correlated to the performance of that GPS device. Please 
explain why your agency relies on the DOT methodology for interference 
rather than the FCC's key performance indicators, despite this finding 
from NASCTN.
    Secretary Griffin. The 1 dB protection criterion (previously 
embraced by the FCC, as noted in my testimony) has been adopted 
nationally and internationally because it protects the satellite 
navigation band, without regard to particular transmitter-receiver 
combinations, geometrical arrangements, transmission paths, weather 
conditions, and other case-specific situations. The NASCTN testing was 
designed to assess the performance of specific receivers under specific 
test conditions. It was not designed to assess the effect of strong 
adjacent band signals on the noise floor within the satellite 
navigation band. The latter approach is the most appropriate in 
situations where hundreds of millions of users in as many case-
dependent situations must depend upon the reception of very weak 
signals in a frequency band where protection from external interference 
had previously been promised.
                                process
    30. Senator Warren. Mr. Deasy and Dr. Griffin, the FCC's order: (1) 
requires Ligado to lower power levels to 10 watts; (2) ensures the 
company will repair and replace government devices in the event of 
potential harmful interference; (3) mandates that the company reduce 
power levels further in the case of potential harmful interference to a 
specific GPS receiver operating on a military installation; and (4) 
includes an agreement between Ligado and six private GPS companies. 
These concessions show a potential willingness to adopt safeguards for 
the protection of GPS receivers. Did DOD propose additional safeguards 
and requirements that, if adopted, would satisfy its concerns for the 
safety of GPS equipment? If so, did Ligado adopt these recommendations?
    Mr. Deasy. The Department of Defense (DOD) evaluated the reduction 
of power, the repair and replacement conditions and the guard band 
requirements in the Order and found them to be unacceptable. Given the 
vast number of weapon systems that utilize GPS and the classified 
nature of the missions, these conditions do not address what is needed 
to protect military equities. The Department of Transportation (DoT) 
Adjacent Band Compatibility (ABC) study, which was supported by the 
Space-Based Positioning, Navigation and Timing National Executive 
Committee (PNT EXCOM), identified an acceptable power level to protect 
GPS, which Ligado chose not to implement. DOD is a co-chair of the PNT 
EXCOM and fully endorses the results of the DoT study. Additionally, 
the GPS manufacturers that Ligado reached agreements with are on record 
at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) as stating that Ligado 
and the Order mischaracterized the nature of those agreements. The 
manufacturers continue to assert that the 1 dB metric is appropriate to 
protect all GPS receivers. Further, DOD recognizes that the potential 
for interference will not be limited to specific installations, given 
the nature of the Department's missions and operations, such as 
airborne capabilities and operations throughout the US&P. The 
Department supports the GPS manufacturers' assertion of protection 
needed to prevent harmful interference to protect GPS and does not 
believe the Order's mitigation methods are sufficient.
    Secretary Griffin. I defer to Mr. Deasy.

    31. Senator Warren. Mr. Deasy and Dr. Griffin, non-Federal spectrum 
rests entirely within the jurisdiction of the FCC. The FCC received 
input from the National Telecommunications and Information 
Administration (NTIA), DOD, the United States Air Force (USAF), and the 
Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). The FCC also relied on neutral 
testing by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), 
assessments by the FAA, and analysis by engineers and experts. Please 
explain the specific concerns, unaddressed by the FCC, that necessitate 
the unusual step of subverting the FCC's clear authority in these 
matters.
    Mr. Deasy. In 2011, the Department of Defense (DOD) expressed its 
concern about the impact of the Ligado network to GPS via traditional 
interagency coordination procedures established through the National 
Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) and Federal 
Communications Commission (FCC). Furthermore, the government testing 
indicated that the power levels of Ligado were too high and would cause 
harmful interference to GPS. None of the mitigation conditions, which 
Ligado proposed and the FCC accepted, were effective for DOD use of 
GPS. As part of the interagency coordination, the views of DOD and 
other agencies were communicated via the Space-Based Positioning 
Navigation & Timing National Executive Committee (PNT EXCOM) and 
correspondence submitted by NTIA, including letters written by the 
Secretary of Defense, the Deputy Secretary of Defense and the DOD CIO. 
DOD inputs to the interagency process were submitted per 10 U.S.C. 
2281, which provides that the Secretary of Defense may not agree to any 
restriction on GPS proposed by the head of a department or agency of 
the United States that would adversely affect the military potential of 
GPS. Specific concerns were consistently communicated as part of the 
process, including that the power levels are too high to be protective, 
the guard band is insufficient and the mitigation and coordination 
measures fall far short of needed protections.
    Secretary Griffin. I defer to Mr. Deasy.
                               __________

               Questions Submitted by Senator Joe Manchin
                potential impact on military operations
    32. Senator Manchin. General Raymond, the FCC order requires Ligado 
to work with DOD, but it fails to require Ligado to adjust their 
deployment if DOD does not agree with it. What do you believe would be 
the most dangerous results to military capabilities and readiness if 
the Ligado plan is allowed to continue?
    General Raymond. The FCC order would put critical stateside 
military operations at risk and impact the military's ability to 
``train like we fight.'' This risk to military operations include our 
ability to defend our Homeland, training necessary to build our 
military readiness, and conducting humanitarian assistance/disaster 
relief campaigns. In addition, the DOD integrates and tests weapon 
systems, including ground and aerial vehicles within the United States. 
FCC's order will deter the DOD from focusing on its mission in order to 
test, evaluate, and replace affected GPS equipment in its inventory. 
FCC's order also threatens critical civilian infrastructure that DOD 
relies on - our warfighters need us to protect these capabilities, so 
they can focus on the mission.
                      satellite time and location
    33. Senator Manchin. Dr. Griffin, Satellite Time and Location could 
be a potentially alternate way to provide reach for GPS signals into 
hard-to-reach areas such as large buildings and constricted streets 
within urban environments. What is your opinion on using Satellite Time 
and Location to supplement GPS, and would the Ligado plan pose a risk 
to these capabilities as well?
    Secretary Griffin. I am sorry, I am not familiar with ``Satellite 
Time and Location''.
                   air force memo on ligado concerns
    34. Senator Manchin. Mr. Deasy, from the Department's view, where 
is the White House on this decision and has there been further 
communication since the hearing between DOD and the White House and/or 
DOD and the FCC? If so, please describe the details of those 
communications.
    Mr. Deasy. The Department of Defense has been closely communicating 
with the National Telecommunications and Information Administration 
(NTIA) as they filed a petition for reconsideration on the Federal 
Communication Commission's Ligado Order on behalf of the Federal 
Agencies. NTIA has oversight for Federal spectrum management issues and 
is the principal advisor to the President on telecommunications policy 
issues.
                       opening of the 6 ghz band
    35. Senator Manchin. Dr. Griffin, currently, in the 6 GHz band, 
there are nearly 100,000 critical infrastructure fixed microwave links 
providing mission critical communications to our Nation's electric 
grid, oil and gas networks, water and wastewater systems, railroads, 
and public safety and law enforcement communications, including 911. 
Given the U.S. military's reliance on the Nation's critical 
infrastructure for mission assurance, does DOD have concerns with the 
FCC's Final Report and Order to open the 6 GHz band to unlicensed 
operations?
    Secretary Griffin. I am not familiar with the FCC Final Report and 
Order opening the 6 GHz band to unlicensed operations, and am not able 
to comment.

    36. Senator Manchin. Dr. Griffin, has DOD discussed the 6 GHz band 
with other Federal agencies or the White House National Security 
Council? If not, does it plan to?
    Secretary Griffin. I don't know.

    37. Senator Manchin. Dr. Griffin, does DOD have concerns regarding 
no real world testing of unlicensed devices prior to the band opening 
up?
    Secretary Griffin. I don't know.

    38. Senator Manchin. Dr. Griffin, does DOD have specific concerns 
with unlicensed devices operating in the band without an Automated 
Frequency Control system?
    Secretary Griffin. I don't know.
                               __________

             Questions Submitted by Senator Tammy Duckworth
                          2020 air force memo
    39. Senator Duckworth. Dr. Griffin, paragraph 46 of FCC's Order 
references a February 2020 U.S. Air Force (USAF) memorandum that was 
endorsed by the Department of the Army, Department of the Navy, 
Department of Commerce, NASA, Department of Interior, Department of 
Justice, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Energy, the 
National Science Foundation, DOT, U.S. Coast Guard, and FAA. With 
regard to this memo, ``Ligado states that the claims of threats to 
military use are unsupported, inappropriately rely on a 1 dB metric for 
its interference analysis, and ignore Ligado's amended 2018 license 
modification application in which Ligado reduced its proposed operating 
power levels from 32 dBW to 9.8 dBW . . . '' Was the 1 dB standard the 
only metric used to test interference and, if so, why?
    Secretary Griffin. To the best of my knowledge, the 1 dB standard 
was the sole metric used in assessing interference levels in the 
satellite navigation band. This protection criterion, which limits 
additional noise to a 25 percent increase over existing background 
noise levels, protects the satellite navigation band as a whole, 
regardless of the source of the increased noise. This is the most 
appropriate method of protecting the satellite navigation band, because 
it is not possible to assess the potential for inference by Ligado's 
proposed operations on the millions of individual GPS receivers in use 
on a case-by-case basis. The best approach is to protect the band; with 
that, all users are protected.

    40. Senator Duckworth. Dr. Griffin, did the range of power levels 
tested for interference include the current agreement's power levels of 
9.8 dBW and the former requested power levels of 32 dBW?
    Secretary Griffin. Yes, the DOT testing to which the FCC refers did 
address Ligado's proposed reduced power level of 9.8 dBW.

    41. Senator Duckworth. Dr. Griffin, was there interference at the 
lower levels tested?
    Secretary Griffin. The DOT report to which the FCC referred showed 
that interference would occur at the lower 9.8 dBW level, and indicated 
the ranges from Ligado base stations at which such interference would 
occur.

    42. Senator Duckworth. Dr. Griffin, is there anything in the 
amended agreement that has not been tested and would offer reason to 
believe that interference can be mitigated?
    Secretary Griffin. I know of no economically and operationally 
viable approach to mitigating interference to GPS receivers from Ligado 
base stations.
                         high-precision devices
    43. Senator Duckworth. Dr. Griffin, paragraph 91 of FCC's Order 
states, ``Our analysis should not be construed to say that there is no 
potential for harmful interference to any GPS device currently in 
operation or in the marketplace. Indeed, the RAA testing shows that 
there is potential for harmful interference to some devices, 
particularly high-precision devices.'' What systems would you 
categorize as containing High-Precision GPS Devices?
    Secretary Griffin. As a ``term of art'' in connection with GPS 
devices and systems, ``high precision'' usually refers to survey-
quality receivers, where extreme accuracy is necessary.
                               __________

               Questions Submitted by Senator Doug Jones
           federal communications commission-ligado decision
    44. Senator Jones. Mr. Deasy, according to your testimony, at one 
time, the Air Force agreed to Ligado's request for a waiver because the 
proposal was primarily using satellite transmitters. That suggests that 
there might be some terrestrial transmissions that could be acceptable. 
Please explain what the Air Force contemplated accepting at that time 
and whether that would still be acceptable.
    Mr. Deasy. In 2008, the Air Force agreed to the waiver before 
Ligado pursued its terrestrial network in a meaningful way. In 2011, 
Ligado, then under the name of LightSquared, began to pursue a 
nationwide terrestrial network proposal that no longer met the agreed 
upon conditions with the Air Force. It also increased the potential for 
interference to GPS. There was never a Memorandum of Understanding or 
formal position agreed to by the Air Force, as alleged by Ligado.

    45. Senator Jones. Mr. Deasy and Dr. Griffin, is there any power 
level Ligado could use that would be acceptable to the Department of 
Defense?
    Mr. Deasy. The Department of Transportation (DoT) Adjacent Band 
Compatibility study recommended a range of tolerable power levels (-29 
to -40 dBW range) needed to protect GPS. The output of Ligado 
transmitters is expected to continue to be substantially larger than 
what was proposed by the study. Ligado is proposing a system based on 
+10 Watts. The range of acceptable power limits was endorsed by the 
National Executive Committee for Space-Based Positioning, Navigation 
and Timing (PNT EXCOM), of which DOD is a member.
    Secretary Griffin. I defer to Mr. Deasy.

    46. Senator Jones. Dr. Griffin, could a wider guard band provide 
sufficient protection against interference, and if so, how wide would 
it need to be?
    Secretary Griffin. I do not know. To the best of my knowledge, 
testing has not been performed to assess how wide a guard band would 
have to be to keep the noise threshold in the GPS band within the 1 dB 
protection criterion. It is certain that Ligado's proposed terrestrial 
base station operations within its allocation in the satellite 
communications band will violate that criterion.

    47. Senator Jones. Dr. Griffin, what action is required or 
authorized by the Department of Defense's statutory obligation under 
title 10 U.S.C. 2281 not to ``agree to any restriction of the GPS 
System proposed by the head of a department or agency of the United 
States outside DOD that would adversely affect the military potential 
of GPS.''
    Secretary Griffin. I cannot comment on actions the DOD should, or 
is authorized, to take based upon 10 USC 2281.

    48. Senator Jones. Mr. Deasy, when DOD submitted its objections to 
Ligado's request, was it responding to the version of the proposal 
which was ultimately approved by the FCC?
    Mr. Deasy. No, the final version of Ligado's proposal approved by 
the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) was not shared with the 
Department of Defense (DOD) or the National Telecommunications and 
Information Administration. DOD remains concerned with the version 
approved by the FCC, as there have been many iterations of the Ligado 
proposals regarding impact to GPS.

    49. Senator Jones. Mr. Deasy, Dr. Griffin, Admiral Allen, and 
General Raymond, Ligado says that high precision receivers should be 
able to co-exist in adjacent spectrum; that GPS receivers in 
helicopters and other certified aviation are protected; that 9.8.dBW is 
the relevant safe power level to protect certified civilian aviation, 
and that the modifications to their proposal also protect military 
aviation applications. If you disagree, please explain why.
    Mr. Deasy. The Department of Transportation Adjacent Band 
Compatibility test results have shown that high precision GPS receivers 
are most vulnerable to the Ligado network. High precision receivers are 
very sensitive and are used for a multitude of applications, both 
government and civil.
    Secretary Griffin. I defer to Mr. Deasy.
    Admiral Allen. The publicly available DOT Adjacent Band 
Compatibility Study concluded the power level of the Ligado 
transmission is too high. In addition, the April 10, 2020 NTIA letter 
to the FCC mentions the numerous times Ligado has admitted in publicly 
filed comments that there would be harmful interference to GPS 
receivers, including high precision receivers. Commerce Department 
studies on the value of GPS to the Nation clearly indicate that the 
relative value of Ligado's network pales in comparison.
    General Raymond. The Ligado signal is a billion times more powerful 
than our GPS signal once it leaves the earth. Extensive testing by 
multiple agencies over the past decade has shown that 9.8 dBW does not 
protect all types of GPS receivers. This is especially true of high 
precision receivers. Space Force defers to FAA on the impacts to 
certified aviation receivers for civilian use.

    50. Senator Jones. Dr. Griffin, Ligado says there is a long-held 
understanding between FCC, NTIA, and the Air Force that GPS receivers 
are not entitled to protection outside their designated band. How do 
you respond?
    Secretary Griffin. I know of no such understanding. But as noted in 
my testimony, the goal is not to assess the protection level for 
individual receivers, but to protect all GPS receivers by protecting 
the satellite navigation band. The long-established 1 dB protection 
criterion does that.

                           APPENDIX A

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                           APPENDIX B

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