[House Hearing, 119 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.A.S.C. No. 119-14]
MISSILE DEFENSE AND MISSILE DEFEAT PROGRAMMATIC UPDATES
__________
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON STRATEGIC FORCES
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED NINETEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
HEARING HELD
APRIL 30, 2025
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
64-293 WASHINGTON : 2026
SUBCOMMITTEE ON STRATEGIC FORCES
SCOTT DesJARLAIS, Tennessee, Chairman
JOE WILSON, South Carolina SETH MOULTON, Massachusetts
MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio JOHN GARAMENDI, California
DON BACON, Nebraska SALUD O. CARBAJAL, California,
DERRICK VAN ORDEN, Wisconsin GABE VASQUEZ, New Mexico
MARK B. MESSMER, Indiana GEORGE WHITESIDES, California
JEFF CRANK, Colorado WESLEY BELL, Missouri
ABRAHAM J. HAMADEH, Arizona
Peter Schirtzinger, Professional Staff Member
Maria Vastola, Professional Staff Member
Austin Richards, Research Assistant
C O N T E N T S
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Page
STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS
DesJarlais, Hon. Scott, a Representative from Tennessee,
Chairman, Subcommittee on Strategic Forces..................... 1
Moulton, Hon. Seth, a Representative from Massachusetts, Ranking
Member, Subcommittee on Strategic Forces....................... 2
WITNESSES
Yaffe, Andrea, Performing the Duties of the Assistant Secretary
of Defense for Space Policy.................................... 5
Guillot, Gen Gregory M., USAF, Commander, United States Northern
Command and NorthAmerican Aerospace Defense Command............ 6
Collins, Lt Gen Heath A., Director, USAF, Missile Defense Agency. 7
Gainey, LTG Sean A., USA, Commanding General, U.S. Army Space and
Missile Defense Command........................................ 8
APPENDIX
Prepared Statements:
DesJarlais, Hon. Scott....................................... 31
Yaffe, Andrea................................................ 34
Guillot, Gen Gregory M....................................... 46
Collins, Lt Gen Heath A...................................... 71
Gainey, LTG Sean A............................................... 93
Documents Submitted for the Record:
[There were no Documents submitted.]
Witness Responses to Questions Asked During the Hearing:
Mr. Carbajal................................................. 113
Questions Submitted by Members Post Hearing:
Mr. Wilson................................................... 117
Mr. Turner................................................... 117
Mr. Bacon.................................................... 120
Mr. Bell..................................................... 120
MISSILE DEFENSE AND MISSILE DEFEAT PROGRAMMATIC UPDATES
----------
House of Representatives,
Committee on Armed Services,
Subcommittee on Strategic Forces,
Washington, DC, Wednesday, April 30, 2025.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 3:01 p.m., in
room 2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Scott DesJarlais
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. SCOTT DESJARLAIS, A REPRESENTATIVE
FROM TENNESSEE, CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON STRATEGIC FORCES
Dr. DesJarlais. Today's hearing will come to order.
Pursuant to committee rule 4(b), three members of the House
Armed Services Committee who are not members of the
subcommittee are allowed to participate in today's hearing and
will be recognized after all subcommittee members have had an
opportunity to ask questions.
Good afternoon, and welcome to the Strategic Forces
Subcommittee's hearing on missile defense and defeat programs
of the Department of Defense.
Testifying before the subcommittee today, we have Ms.
Andrea Yaffe, who is currently performing the duties of the
Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space Policy; we have
General Gregory Guillot, Commander of U.S. North Command and
North American Aerospace Defense Command; Lieutenant General
Heath Collins, Director of Missile Defense Agency; and
Lieutenant General Sean Gainey, Commander, U.S. Army Space and
Missile Defense Command and Joint Functional Component Command
for Integrated Missile Defense.
Thank you to our witnesses for being with us today.
We recognize the fiscal year 2026 budget is still being
finalized and this limits our ability to discuss funding levels
for the upcoming fiscal year. However, we look forward to
hearing from you on the policies, programs, and priorities for
the Department for missile defense and missile defeat
activities. Your testimony today will help set the stage for
our review of the President's budget when it is submitted.
We also forward to hearing an update from our witnesses on
the Department's work to develop the Golden Dome for America's
architecture.
Today's hearing comes at an important moment for missile
defense. Despite the growth and increasing complexity of
missile threats in recent years and the value of missile
defense capabilities being demonstrated in the skies over
Israel, the Red Sea, and Ukraine, budget requests for missile
defense funding in recent years have declined.
Last year's budget, in particular, prematurely eliminated
competition in two key missile defense programs, the Glide
Phase Interceptor and Next-Generation Interceptor, and also
proposed to terminate procurement of the Navy's Standard
Missle-3 block Intermediate-range ballistic missile
interceptor. Each of these decisions added risk and sacrificed
capability for the sake of reducing funding on missile defense.
Now, a new administration has taken office, with a new
vision for investment in missile defense capabilities and
defending the homeland that is long overdue.
Missile threats to the homeland are growing and becoming
more dynamic as our adversaries develop and deploy new
capabilities, such as hypersonic weapons, long-range cruise
missiles, new ballistic missiles, and even Fractional Orbital
Bombardment System, or FOBS.
These capabilities enable our adversaries to strike the
United States and coerce U.S. leadership in the event of
crisis, and our ability to defend against them has not kept
pace. Sustained underinvestment and outdated policy limitations
have left our homeland vulnerable.
In its 2023 report, the bipartisan Congressional Commission
on the Strategic Posture of the United States, led by Madelyn
Creedon and former Senator Jon Kyl, noted our homeland's
vulnerability, stating: ``Russia and China are deploying
missile defense systems designed to protect critical assets
against U.S. offensive strikes. To date, the United States has
chosen not to build homeland missile defenses against major
powers. U.S. homeland integrated air and missile defense
capabilities do not adequately protect the critical
infrastructure necessary to project power and avoid coercion in
light of growing Russian and Chinese nuclear and conventional
strike threats.''
The Commission went on to recommend the deployment of a
comprehensive integrated air and missile defense system capable
of deterring and defeating coercive attacks from Russia and
China as well as rogue states. And it argued doing so would
strengthen deterrence and reinforce strategic stability by
complicating adversary planning and reducing incentives to
conduct coercive attacks.
While I expect we will see significant partisan debate
about the Golden Dome, it is important to remember the common
sense, bipartisan elements at the core of the President's
vision, and I look forward to seeing the Department's plan for
carrying it out.
I now recognize the ranking member, my friend Mr. Moulton,
for his opening remarks.
[The prepared statement of Dr. DesJarlais can be found in
the Appendix on page 31.]
STATEMENT OF HON. SETH MOULTON, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM
MASSACHUSETTS, RANKING MEMBER, SUBCOMMITTEE ON STRATEGIC FORCES
Mr. Moulton. Thank you, Chairman DesJarlais.
And thank you, again, to all our witnesses for your
testimony today. This is esoteric but unbelievably important
work, and we appreciate your dedication to our Nation's
strategic defense.
As I have said repeatedly, missile defense has a mixed
legacy, but let's start with the vast areas where my colleagues
and I and most experts agree. And I am fortunate--because this
is so esoteric--to be accompanied this afternoon by this nifty
chart I developed.
We have pursued robust investments in sensing and tracking,
the foundational basis of missile defense, including the Golden
Dome idea. And we are doing more. That is level one.
We have also matured reasonable missile defense
capabilities that are truly miracles of engineering--Patriot,
Aegis, THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense)--that have
real battlefield benefit today to our allies and partners under
attack. Level two.
We have sought to defend fully against the strategic threat
posed by rogue nations, such as North Korea, who may not be
deterred by mutually assured destruction. That is level four.
And I am skipping over level three very quickly, but that
is because it is essentially similar to level four, which is if
one of these nations or a Russia or a China simply has an
accidental launch.
In either case, we are talking about a small number of
missiles that can be defeated by existing missile defense
systems and missile defense systems that have been developed
since Bush pulled out of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.
However, we have relied on our nuclear deterrent or the
concept of mutually assured destruction when it comes to the
huge, complex threats posed by Russian and Chinese
Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles, hypersonic, and other
systems that are specifically designed to evade our missile
defense. That is level five.
So, as the chairman correctly pointed out, there are a lot
of areas of bipartisan agreement here. And the question is,
what do we do about level five? Because that is what the
President is proposing changing.
Now, as stated in the 2019 Missile Defense Review authored
by the first Trump administration, and I quote, ``The United
States relies on nuclear deterrence to address the large and
more sophisticated Russian and Chinese intercontinental
ballistic missile capabilities as well as to deter attacks from
any source consistent with longstanding U.S. declaratory
policy.''
To be clear, Golden Dome completely upends this policy,
which is credited with keeping us safe from nuclear attack for
the last 70 years.
Do we believe that the fundamentals of the strategic
landscape in the past 6 years have shifted so dramatically that
we require a monumental shift in our strategic defense policy,
a shift from every prior Democratic and Republican
administration, including the first Trump administration?
If so, I am more than happy to hear why and entertain that
debate. But, so far, we have not heard why. We have not heard
any rationale. We have not heard any plan.
And here is why this could be dangerous. The goal of
missile defense, of course, is to keep us safe. But,
paradoxically, more missile defense is not necessarily better
if it upsets strategic stability, the equilibrium that deters
any nation from launching a nuclear attack that could explode
into a nuclear war.
Most people don't know how close we have come to nuclear
war by accident in the last 70 years, but we have had 13, at
least 13, close calls, like the time when the Soviet systems
detected a massive U.S. attack and a lowly Russian major only
averted a nuclear holocaust by suspecting it was a false
indication and deliberately disobeying a standard order to
launch a retaliatory attack.
Part of why he relied on his intuition in that instance is
knowing that his own people, his own family, would be
obliterated if he got that wrong. That is why mutually assured
destruction, an assuredly frightening concept, actually
promotes stability. If nations know that they will, themselves,
get obliterated if they use nuclear weapons, they are unlikely
to use nuclear weapons.
The potentially devastating problem with Golden Dome is
that it upends this strategic stability. And if Russia or China
believes, instead, that the United States is not so vulnerable
to a retaliatory strike, it makes them less likely to think
twice about acting quickly, acting first, or using novel
delivery methods to get around our defenses, including Golden
Dome itself, before we do anything to them. And that is why,
even though Golden Dome sounds good, it could actually make us
less safe.
I fear that some of my colleagues who tout their fiscal
responsibility want to spend billions of taxpayer dollars
without a plan and, worse, on something that could actually
make those very taxpayers less safe and our Nation less secure.
That is neither fiscal nor strategic responsibility.
Sadly, as with most complex national-security issues, the
President understands neither the history nor the implications
of these plans. He just wants to one-up one of his friends with
a gold-plated version of something they have.
So, as we continue to evaluate DOD missile defense
programs, I will ask these questions: How will expanding U.S.
missile defense today impact our strategic stability tomorrow?
Does it raise the incentive for our adversaries to strike
first? We are already in an arms race; will this accelerate it?
Do these choices make our Nation and our world more or less
safe?
These are the questions we must ask ourselves on this
subcommittee, not just with an eye to this year's budget and
the National Defense Authorization Act but with a view towards
how our decisions will impact the world we leave for our
children.
Let me be clear once again: It is the job of this committee
to have this debate, to investigate whether something has
changed with technology or our adversaries or otherwise, and
provide the oversight that we are constitutionally required to
provide. What is not our job is to fund a fantasy, especially a
dangerous one.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
Dr. DesJarlais. I thank the ranking member for his comments
and would agree that this is a good subject for debate today.
You speak that, 6 to 8 years ago, how things have radically
changed or not changed. And, as we know, fielding these
defenses takes time and you have to be also looking into the
future. So, I think those are fair questions, and we will get
through those today.
We will now move to the opening statements from our
witnesses.
I would note that your prepared statements will be made
part of the record, but you will each have 5 minutes to make
opening remarks.
Ms. Yaffe, let's begin with you. And after you, I will
recognize General Guillot, General Collins, and General Gainey.
You are now recognized.
STATEMENT OF ANDREA YAFFE, PERFORMING THE DUTIES OF THE
ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF DEFENSE FOR SPACE POLICY, OFFICE OF THE
SECRETARY OF DEFENSE
Ms. Yaffe. Thank you.
Chairman DesJarlais, Ranking Member Moulton, and
distinguished members of the committee, thank you for inviting
me to testify on the Department of Defense's missile defense
and defeat posture. I am grateful to appear alongside my
distinguished colleagues.
Missile defenses are a vital element of our strategic force
posture, both as a means of deterrence as well as defending the
U.S. homeland and our security interests abroad.
As we see nearly every day in conflicts worldwide,
offensive missile capabilities are becoming a central feature
of modern warfare. China, North Korea, Russia, and Iran now
deploy advanced missile systems to coerce and intimidate
opponents, inflict tactical damage, or to carry out strategic
campaigns. Our adversaries are investing in the next generation
of offensive capabilities to hold the United States homeland at
risk, coerce our allies and partners, and threaten our deployed
forces.
China, Russia, and North Korea are fielding more advanced
missiles with greater ranges and in larger numbers to provide
the means for strategic-level attack against the homeland,
including nuclear and conventional options. These adversaries
are rapidly modernizing, expanding, and diversifying their
missile forces, incorporating technological advances into
warheads, delivery systems of all types, and supporting command
and control systems.
Iran, meanwhile, has the capability to strike targets
throughout the Middle East and continues to arm its proxies in
the region.
The President's Golden Dome for America executive order
underscores this point. The threat of attack by ballistics,
hypersonic, and cruise missiles and other advanced aerial
attacks remain the most catastrophic threat facing the United
States. To counter these growing threats, we need next-
generation missile defense and missile defeat architectures
that can complement our existing nuclear and conventional
offensive capabilities.
The President has directed that the United States will
develop and field a next-generation missile defense shield to
provide for the common defense of our citizens and the Nation
and deter, defend against, and defeat any foreign aerial attack
on the homeland. We will also guarantee our secure second-
strike capability.
Golden Dome is a top priority for the Nation and will
include the development of cutting-edge domain awareness
systems, kinetic and non-kinetic missile defeat capabilities,
and advanced command, control, and battle management systems to
integrate and augment existing U.S. missile defense
capabilities.
The Department of Defense remains committed to making the
necessary investments in our posture to deter our adversaries
and, if deterrence fails, to prevail in conflict. The Office of
the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy is working together
across the Department, including with my colleagues here today,
to make good on these investments to defend our homeland and
our forces.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify, and I look
forward to answering your questions.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Yaffe can be found in the
Appendix on page 34.]
Dr. DesJarlais. Thank you.
General Guillot, you are recognized.
STATEMENT OF GENERAL GREGORY M. GUILLOT, COMMANDER, U.S.
NORTHERN COMMAND AND NORTH AMERICAN AEROSPACE DEFENSE COMMAND
General Guillot. Good afternoon, Chairman DesJarlais,
Ranking Member Moulton, and distinguished members of the
subcommittee. Thank you for holding this important hearing.
Both North American Aerospace Defense Command and the
United States Northern Command have critical roles in defending
North America from missile attack, and we appreciate the
subcommittee's continued support of our efforts.
I would also like to recognize the tremendous work being
done by Lieutenant General Collins, Lieutenant General Gainey,
and Assistant Secretary of Defense Yaffe. As the supportive
commands for homeland missile defense, North American Aerospace
Defense Command and United States Northern Command are
fortunate to have such strong and committed partners in our
shared, no-fail mission.
Defending North America from missile threats is
increasingly challenging, as global competitors rapidly develop
and field advanced missile capabilities and delivery platforms,
aided by increasing cooperation and technology-sharing between
the competitors.
To counter such adversary cooperation, North American
Aerospace Defense Command and United States Northern Command
rely on realistic planning, targeted investments, timely
deliveries, and forward-looking policies that ensure the
commands' ability to detect, track, and defeat potential
threats in all domains.
Establishing a layered domain awareness network to detect
and track threats approaching North America from seabed to
space remains our top priority, because you can't defeat what
you can't see. That network is central to the current and
future North American Aerospace Defense Command and United
States Northern Command requirements, which certainly include
the Golden Dome for America construct.
Along with improved domain awareness, we must also improve
our capability and capacity to defeat missile threats. On-time
delivery of the Next-Generation Interceptor is necessary to
counter North Korea's growing Intercontinental Ballistic
Missile fleet. And innovation and investment in advanced defeat
mechanisms, which could include directed energy, left of
launch, and boost-phase intercept, are needed to defeat cruise
missiles, hypersonics, and other advanced threats.
There are significant challenges ahead of us, but North
American Aerospace Defense Command and United States Northern
Command's capability and resolve to deter aggression and defeat
threats to our Nation remains unshakeable.
Thank you again to the subcommittee and my fellow witnesses
for your continued support. I look forward to your questions.
We have the watch.
[The prepared statement of General Guillot can be found in
the Appendix on page 46.]
Dr. DesJarlais. Thank you, sir.
General Collins?
STATEMENT OF LIEUTENANT GENERAL HEATH A. COLLINS, DIRECTOR,
MISSILE DEFENSE AGENCY
General Collins. Thank you.
Good afternoon, Chairman DesJarlais, Ranking Member
Moulton, distinguished members of the subcommittee. Thank you
for this opportunity to talk about missile defense and thank
you for your continued support of missile defense and the
broader missile defense enterprise.
The Missile Defense Agency is moving quickly to provide
effective defenses against a dangerous missile threat to defend
the U.S. homeland, our deployed forces, and our allies and
friends. The Agency is transforming itself, its enterprise, and
its industry base in order to develop and deliver capabilities
to the warfighter at speed and scale.
As we move with urgency to deliver the next-generation
missile defense system, we intend to leverage the performance
efficiencies found in an integrated, layered missile defense.
We also will continue to exploit the space domain to support a
missile defense posture that is more effective, resilient, and
adaptable to known and anticipated threats.
Missile Defense Agency is laser-focused on improving our
U.S. homeland defenses. We are enhancing the performance and
capability of the fielded Ground-Based Midcourse Defense
system, along with developing and testing of the new Next-Gen
Interceptor.
In support of regional defense, we are working with the
Navy to improve Aegis ballistic missile defense capability and
enhance hypersonic defenses and with the Army to make
investments in the future development of the Terminal High-
Altitude Area Defense system, Terminal High Altitude Area
Defense.
In support of the Nation's missile defense enterprise,
Golden Dome for America, and reestablishing deterrence, Missile
Defense Agency remains focused on delivering advanced,
reliable, and resilient capabilities on accelerated timelines
to meet the warfighters' needs.
I greatly appreciate your continued support of Missile
Defense Agency and the missile defense mission, and I look
forward to answering your questions. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of General Collins can be found in
the Appendix on page 71.]
Dr. DesJarlais. Thank you.
General Gainey?
STATEMENT OF LIEUTENANT GENERAL SEAN A. GAINEY, COMMANDING
GENERAL, U.S. ARMY SPACE AND MISSILE DEFENSE COMMAND
General Gainey. Thank you.
Chairman DesJarlais, Ranking Member Moulton, and
distinguished members of the subcommittee, I am honored to
testify before you as the Commander of U.S. Army Space and
Missile Defense Command and Joint Functional Component Command
for Integrated Missile Defense.
In these roles, I am representing an incredible
organization of 2,300 soldiers and civilians spanning 13 time
zones and 19 locations worldwide. The ``one team'' of
professionals, along with this Army and joint air and missile
defense forces, provide credible combat capability so important
to our peace-through-strength deterrence approach and support
to three combatant commanders.
I also serve as the senior commander for Fort Greely,
Alaska, and senior responsible officer for U.S. Army Kwajalein
Atoll--two strategic locations, remote sites that are
experiencing challenges with facilities and we must continue to
address with priority.
Additionally, I also serve as our Army's lead enterprise
integrator for air and missile defense. As the Army air and
missile defense enterprise integrator, just as I did last year,
I want to highlight the strain on our Army Missile Defense
force. High deployment operation tempo and frequent deployment
extensions not only create challenging conditions for our
soldiers and their families but place the Army's modernization
plans at risk, as continual extensions jeopardize critical
upgrades.
The deployment-to-time-at-home ratio for Army air and
missile defense units is nearly one-to-one, well below the
Department of Defense goal. Air Defense Artillery is the most
deployed force in the Army.
In response, the Army leadership has increased military
occupational specialty recruiting flexibility through the 14
Uniform military occupational specialty pilot program and added
critical skill bonuses, increased training opportunities, and
built-in station-of-choice incentives, essentially improving
accessions.
Further addressing the operation tempo challenge, the Army
Integrated Air and Missile Defense is undergoing the most
significant modernization in history, fielding the Integrated
Battle Command System. This will fundamentally change the way
sensors and shooters are integrated across the battlefield,
increasing capacity and depth to achieve an outsized effect.
And, finally, the Army Air Defense Artillery force structure
will increase by 39 percent by fiscal year 2030.
You have already heard much about the dynamic, evolving
threat. It is clear we are now entering a new air and missile
age. With these threats in mind, Space and Missile Defense
Command is advancing an air and missile defense strategy for
tomorrow while continuing to develop outsized value today.
Our Space and Missile Defense Command Center of Excellence
supports the training, lethality of--the schoolhouse for our
space and missile defense soldiers.
Our Technical Center is advancing cutting-edge technologies
in directed energy, space, high-altitude and hypersonic
testing, enabling domain dominance and non-kinetic alternatives
within a comprehensive missile defeat framework.
It also manages the Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Defense
Test Site, which is critical for testing and domain awareness,
ideal in location and unmatched in precision instrumentation.
Joint Functional Component Command for Missile Defense
conducts transregional missile defense planning and operational
support, capability assessment, and joint education training,
all aligned under the U.S. Space Command.
I will focus my final point on the holistic air and missile
defense approach. Simply put, Space and Missile Defense Command
is already engaged. We man, train, and equip the soldiers
providing protection against intercontinental ballistic
missiles right now, and we are actively managing network
architecture for the air defense in place over the national
capital region.
However, we must continue to leverage technology to
transform our missile defense capabilities to address the
current and future threat, and Space and Missile Defense
Command has the expertise and experience to add even more value
in the future. We must also invest in left-of-launch
capabilities in a holistic missile defeat approach.
In conclusion, I have seen firsthand how every member of
our ``one team'' at Space and Missile Defense Command
contributes to the security of our homeland. Every day brings a
new challenge and opportunity. From our missile defense battery
in United States Central Command to our Fire Direction Center
in Alaska, our team is globally lethal, always ready.
And I look forward to addressing your questions. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of General Gainey can be found in
the Appendix on page 93.]
Dr. DesJarlais. Thank you all for your very sobering and
important opening statements.
I will now turn to member questioning that will recognize
each member for up to 5 minutes, and I will start by
recognizing myself.
While I understand that the final architecture for Golden
Dome remains under review, it would be helpful to hear from
each of you how your organizations have contributed to the
plans so far.
And, General Guillot, let's begin with you.
General Guillot. Chairman, thank you.
As you mentioned, we still don't know the final
configuration, but North American Aerospace Defense Command and
United States Northern Command, as separate commands, provided
input to both the Office of the Secretary of Defense and Joint
Staff in terms of, as the supportive command, what capabilities
we would need from a Golden Dome approach.
And what we provided, sir, were three separate layers.
First is a domain awareness layer that detects all threats from
seabed to space, to include the air and terrestrial layers in
between, that are integrated to feed two defeat layers, the
first being an intercontinental ballistic missile defeat layer,
which largely exists today with the ground-based interceptors
that can defeat a North Korean threat, and then an air layer
that would defeat cruise missiles and air threats.
The challenge, I think, is the hypersonic, which at
different parts of their flight profile could be in the
intercontinental ballistic missiles phase or the air phase. And
so making sure that the detect and track capability was
flexible enough to handle hypersonics.
And then, of course, the defeat mechanisms as well.
Dr. DesJarlais. Okay.
General Collins?
General Collins. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
So the Missile Defense Agency, as you can imagine, we have
been working on a national missile defense architecture for 42
years. And so we certainly have been a big part of playing--and
as the integrated missile defense tech authority as well, we
were a key part of the team supporting what it takes to put
together an integrated missile defense system.
And both what we have been doing, the analysis that we have
conducted over many decades--and we are at the core of helping
support and inform the Department in putting together an
architecture that is comprehensive, that covers all pieces and
parts, and could be executable.
Dr. DesJarlais. General Gainey?
General Gainey. I, as the Commander of Space and Missile
Defense Command, have not personally been involved with the
architecture build. I am more of the operational side when it
comes to implementation.
However, our team continues to man the ground-based
interceptors and are prepared to support United States Northern
Command in any capacity moving forward.
Thank you, sir.
Dr. DesJarlais. Thank you.
And Ms. Yaffe?
Ms. Yaffe. Thank you.
Given the whole-of-Department nature of this problem set
and the expansive vision, the Office of the Secretary of
Defense for Policy joined with Joint Staff early in the days of
receiving the executive order to try to convene the core
elements of the Department, the experts, the stakeholders, to
help frame it in terms of what the Department would need to do,
lay out the requirements, make sure that we understood the
guidance from the White House, and start building out different
options. We certainly turned it to the technical folks to dig
in and build the architecture from there. But this is an all-
encompassing problem, and the Office of the Secretary of
Defense for Policy helped in the early days to coordinate it.
And once we have a decision on the architecture, the
intention is to go to phase two and to lead and conduct a
theater missile defense review, as that will be important, as
well as just broader considerations of strategic requirements.
Thank you.
Dr. DesJarlais. Thank you.
General Guillot, can you talk about how the threats were
considered in this process?
This isn't just building capability for the sake of
capability; this is based on evolving threats to the homeland.
And I think it is interesting, we talked about what it was 6
years ago, what it is today, and what you expect it to be. And
from your opening statements, you know, obviously, there is
great concern.
So can you just talk about how you went about this?
General Guillot. Chairman, we did use the threat as the
basis for our requirements that we put forward, certainly
starting with the intercontinental ballistic missile threat
that we see from North Korea and that we could potentially see
from Iran should they decide to take their space-launch vehicle
and turn that into an intercontinental ballistic missile.
Then the hypersonic threat, which, as I mentioned a moment
ago, kind of goes through both the intercontinental ballistic
missile portion, depending on how it is launched, all the way
through a terminal phase challenge for us.
And then the air threat, which certainly over the last 6
years, as you mentioned, has increased, as we look at both
Russia and China and their doctrine which says they will use
cruise missiles to hit various points of critical
infrastructure for us.
And making sure that those were all tied together with a
sensing grid that could detect and track and feed the defeat
mechanisms. And then ensure that we have the right command and
control system where we could seamlessly go from one of the
layers to another with one operator to make sure we are
defeating those threats.
Dr. DesJarlais. Okay.
My time has expired, and I will now recognize the ranking
member, Mr. Moulton, for 5 minutes.
Mr. Moulton. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
General Collins, given what we have heard from industry, is
it accurate that space-based interceptors would be deployed in
low Earth orbit?
General Collins. Sir, we have not finalized what the space-
based interceptor architecture would be. We are going to open
it up to industry. I fully expect that part of that would be in
the low-earth orbit environment, sir.
Mr. Moulton. Okay. It is hard to imagine where else that
would be.
General Guillot, would you agree with that assessment?
General Guillot. Yes, sir, I would.
Mr. Moulton. Okay.
Ms. Yaffe, have Russia and/or China publicly or privately
expressed concerns with U.S. missile defense systems posing
strategic stability concerns with regards to second-strike
capabilities?
Ms. Yaffe. Sir, I think the Russians are on the record for
many years expressing concerns about missile defense, at the
same time as they build their own capabilities.
Mr. Moulton. Yeah. The Chinese have as well.
So, given General Collins's response regarding a space-
based intercept architecture being placed in low-earth orbit,
as General Guillot affirmed, would it be susceptible to effects
of a nuclear detonation in that orbit?
Ms. Yaffe. Sir, were there to be a nuclear detonation in
low-earth orbit, then perhaps it would be. Obviously, all the
folks involved in the architecture discussions are tracking the
threats--
Mr. Moulton. Yeah. So, with what we know about Russia's
efforts to develop and deploy a nuclear weapon in space and
their fear of U.S. missile defenses, has there been an
assessment done on the likelihood or increased chance that
Russia would employ such a weapon in conflict early on to take
out our space-based intercept layer?
Ms. Yaffe. Sir, that sounds like an intelligence
assessment, and I would defer that to the intelligence
community.
Mr. Moulton. No, no, no. It is an operational question. You
are going to spend billions of dollars of taxpayer money
building things that could inspire the Russians to say, ``Oh,
we need to take them out before they get used.'' You better
figure that out if you are going to spend a lot of taxpayer
money on this.
Ms. Yaffe. Sir, I understand the question. I think we have
seen that Russia is pursuing its capabilities in any case given
the threats that they see broadly. However, they also continue
to counter these threats with their own missiles, which is--
Mr. Moulton. Well, I will tell you what; you better figure
it out. If you are going to build this whole thing, at the cost
of tens of billions of dollars in taxpayer money, and then the
Russians just plan to take it out with their space-based nuke,
that is not going to work too well for anybody, because, of
course, it is going to take out all the rest of our satellites
as well.
Ms. Yaffe, you also used a word today that I have not heard
before when describing Golden Dome, ``aerial.''
Is it, indeed, the President's vision to only defend
against aerial threats, like the Iron Dome system where he got
this idea? So, in other words, all China needs to do is develop
the kinds of sea-based delivery systems Russia started
developing after we pulled out of the Anti-Ballistic Missile
Treaty just to get around Golden Dome?
Ms. Yaffe. No, sir. The executive order calls for the
defense of the United States against ballistic, hypersonic,
advanced cruise missiles, and other next-generation aerial
attacks. The earlier part of--
Mr. Moulton. Aerial attacks.
Ms. Yaffe. Correct. Other next--
Mr. Moulton. So not sea-based.
Ms. Yaffe. I mean, a sea-based ballistic missile would be
part of this.
Mr. Moulton. As we all know, there are other ways you can--
you can run a boat up into Los Angeles Harbor, right? It is
clear that Golden Dome is not designed to defend against that.
Is that your understanding as well, General Guillot, since
``aerial'' is in the executive order?
General Guillot. Yes, it is.
Mr. Moulton. Okay. That seems like another big hole we
should investigate before we spend a lot of money on this.
General Guillot, given your responsibilities as the
Commander of Northern Command, do you believe that the
strategic landscape has significantly changed in the past 6
years such that the second Trump administration would
dramatically change its strategic defense policy from the first
Trump administration?
General Guillot. Congressman, I do think that the landscape
has changed significantly, with the number of countries that
are either possessing or pursuing intercontinental ballistic
missiles, the hypersonics--
Mr. Moulton. Are you talking about China? Because we knew 6
years ago that China was doing this.
General Guillot. No. I am talking about Iran's pursuit and
Pakistan's pursuit.
Mr. Moulton. Okay. Well, Iran and Pakistan have been
pursuing those things for a long time.
General Guillot. Well, yes, sir, but they are certainly
more advanced now than they were 6 years ago.
Mr. Moulton. Well, apparently we are going to get rid of
Iran's nuclear capabilities with a deal, so I guess they are
going to be off the table. Of course, we have had a way of
dealing with Pakistan for a while.
General Gainey, what is our pacing threat right now
according to the National Defense Strategy?
General Gainey. The North Korean threat.
Mr. Moulton. Actually, it is the Chinese threat.
So, given that we are conducting a shift to the Pacific,
how does moving Terminal High Altitude Ariel Defenses and
Patriot batteries out of the Pacific into the Middle East help
support our National Defense Strategy?
General Gainey. Any movement of any of our Patriot or
Terminal High Altittude Ariel Defense systems are taken under
careful consideration. And we also have additional assets at
home station prepared to deploy and fill those voids, if
necessary. But every deployment is carefully considered as part
of our Global Force Management Allocation Plan.
Mr. Moulton. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Dr. DesJarlais. The chair now recognizes the gentleman from
Nebraska, Mr. Bacon, for 5 minutes.
Mr. Bacon. Thank you, all four of you, for being here.
I was fortunate to do missile defense in Israel in 2009 and
2010. We worked with the Arrow missile team, put in a radar
satellite support. And I would never have thought that we could
shoot down 99 percent of 110 ballistic missiles and then,
later, 180 ballistic missiles at a 99 percent probability of
kill.
So thank God for missile defenses. Israel has seen the
impact of a system that works. And, granted, we have a
different problem set; we are a lot bigger. But I think our
country will be well-served to have a strong missile defense as
well.
My first question is to General Guillot.
I am a little worried about some of the cuts in our
National Guard. Your predecessor had some concerns, too, about
having enough aircraft to do the alerts.
How does the air portion of this mission fit in with Golden
Dome? I mean, is it--you would think it would be more radars
and interceptors, but I think aircraft play a role too.
General Guillot. Congressman, I think you are exactly
right. As we envision the entire network, it would include
space-based AMTI, airborne moving target indicator, which would
detect and track aircraft and cruise missiles; a land-based
capability, such as over-the-horizon radar; and certainly
fighter aircraft with capable interceptors, missiles, to defeat
cruise missiles.
Which, in addition to the ranking member's question that I
answered on intercontinental ballistic missiles, I think cruise
missiles is probably the biggest advancement that we have seen
--
Mr. Bacon. Yeah.
General Guillot. --over the past 6 years, and that needs to
be a part of this integrated system.
Mr. Bacon. Do you get a voice when the services are looking
at reductions? Because your predecessor had expressed concern
on the reductions with the Air National Guard, and they are the
ones who are providing the alert capabilities. Do you feel well
enough coordinated with? And is your comfort zone good right
now with what we have?
General Guillot. Yes, sir, to both. I do get a voice, and I
am very comfortable with the Air National Guard's presentation
for our alert force.
Mr. Bacon. Okay. Thank you.
General Collins, yesterday, we voted on a $150 billion
plus-up to our defense spending. We want to get us to about 4-
percent-of-GDP spending, which is the norm. Right now, we are
at 2.9 percent. That is inadequate for all systems we want to
field plus taking caring of our troops. So I am excited about
what we are going to be able to do this next year to right-size
our defense spending.
I think we are going to be spending $5.6 billion on missile
defense with the money that we apportioned. What do you think
are the first steps for you, and what do you need to field for,
like, space inceptors and things like that? What is your first
priority with this influx of money?
General Collins. Thank you for that, Congressman. We
certainly do see the opportunity of a reconciliation to begin
quickly and bring much-needed resources into the missile
defense enterprise.
It really is probably not just one thing. I think there are
really, I think, two lanes to look at when we look at the
missile defense enterprise.
And number one is making sure we have the capability/
capacity with the kit we have today to improve the defense
posture today or as quickly as we can. We can make a difference
today with systems that we have.
And then the second piece would be really looking at the
disruptive technology piece and pushing on that development
piece and getting into an agile prototyping construct as
quickly as possible, whether that be directed energy, non-
kinetics, or space-based interceptors. And I think we would
look to do a very heavy cyclical prototyping phase to get after
that and mature that capability as quickly as possible.
Mr. Bacon. But it would seem to me you would have to have a
really good sensor system first before you can intercept. And
that is something we have talked about before. Obviously,
ballistic missiles from the sea, from the continent, but the
hypersonics are very hard to track. And so I would see a real
need there to really work on the sensor problem first.
General Collins. Yes, sir. Much of the kit that we have
today, we certainly have proven sensor architectures to track
ballistic missiles today, ground-based.
And we are 1 year into our prototyping experiment with the
HBTSS, the Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor,
which has been going very well and showing very positive
performance against the hypersonic threat. And so, as part of
that, we would look to then expand that.
The Space Force and the Space Development Agency already
had a plan to integrate the hypersonic and ballistic tracking
space sensor into the proliferated warfighting space
architecture. We would look, with additional resources, to
accelerate that as much as possible to bring that capability to
bear.
Mr. Bacon. Thank you so much. And even if we have differing
opinions on the actual missile defense, it seems like the
sensor stuff is something we could all agree to and we need.
With that, I yield.
Dr. DesJarlais. The gentleman yields back.
The chair now recognizes the gentleman from California, Mr.
Whitesides.
Mr. Whitesides. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thanks for your service and for being here today.
General Gainey, I was struck by your comments about the
challenges on the deployed folks. And I recently got back from
the Middle East, from a trip. We went to Iraq and various Gulf
nations and met with troops who are working on some of these
missile defense things over there. They are doing heroic work.
What could Congress do to help this challenge for these
deployed folks? You referred to one program in your testimony,
but I just wanted to give you the chance to elaborate a little
bit further on this issue.
General Gainey. Yes, sir. Thanks for asking that question.
The air and missile defense force is a very resilient
force. And we have asked a lot of our force, and they continue
to respond, as you saw in the Middle East.
Where Congress can support is continue to support the
funding of our air and missile defense modernization. Our
modernization is going to allow us to not completely rely on
our Patriot system as the system of choice but also field out
our Integrated Battle Command System, which will integrate our
counter-cruise-missile capability into our common C2 construct,
and so, therefore, the Patriot system is not the only system
that we will have to rely on for the range of threats. It will
give us the portfolio to have the appropriate shooter for the
appropriate threat set.
Mr. Whitesides. Okay. Thanks.
So, actually, building on that, you know, one of the things
that we heard throughout the Middle East was, everybody is just
super-eager to get more of our missile defense equipment, you
know. And they are frustrated, honestly, by how long it takes
for our American industrial base to produce that stuff.
This is a question for maybe General Collins, or, I don't
know, General Guillot, you may have comments as well.
What is going on? How could we improve that? You know, we
are talking about folks taking 10 years to get systems that
they have, you know, ordered, or, you know, 5 to 10 years. What
are the underlying challenges? How could Congress help? What
does American industry need to do to do better on that
production side?
General Collins. Thank you, Congressman, for that question.
It is certainly a challenge that we continue to face with,
especially, new developments, developments of capability that
starts from scratch, that does not exist. And some of those do
take a considerable amount of time.
There are certainly activities to focus on more mature
technologies as you start the program, to focus on more open
systems and modular systems so that the solution--the first
solution may not be the perfect solution. It is capability to
bring to bear, and then evolve it and grow it over time--what I
would call more of an agile approach to bringing capability to
bear. I think that is really important.
I think some of the delays in, like, the interceptor
production lines and the munitions production lines, one, I
think there are improvements we could make to stabilize the
funding and the demand signal on the munitions line. I bought
munitions for the Air Force, I buy munitions now, and the yank
up and yank back, invest to expand lines, then don't fund
production on those lines--I think a stabilization of that
could actually help us to increase the cadence and the
availability of the needed weapons that we require going
forward. I think that is probably a very key item where we
could look at.
And, potentially, even how we procure munitions. We procure
munitions with a lot of the same rule sets that we do as from
larger weapon systems. There may be a more agile way to get
after how we buy the parts and set up the production lines to
support more agile weapons development and delivery.
Mr. Whitesides. Thank you so much.
Ms. Yaffe, last question. I have about a minute here. I am
the new guy here, so what I don't really get is--you know, we
were doing missile defense before, and now we have this Golden
Dome thing. What were we not working on before that we now are
working on? Or is Golden Dome sort of like a rebranding of what
we had before under a new executive order? Like, is there some
requirement that we didn't do before that we now have?
And we have about 45 seconds.
Ms. Yaffe. Sir, thank you for the question.
The basic answer is that, until now, missile defense has
been focused on rogue-state intercontinental ballistic missile
threats, so essentially North Korea. The direction in the
Golden Dome executive order is to focus on the whole range of
missile threats--the ballistic, hypersonic, cruise missile,
advanced aerial threats--from all nations. And that is a
significant shift in both policy and direction.
Mr. Whitesides. So we were doing that before, but you are
talking about, like, maybe numbers? Like, we are now going to
be able to intercept hundreds or thousands of things that are
heading towards us or something?
Ms. Yaffe. Sir, I can't comment on what the architecture
will be and the kinds of numbers it will be set up against.
But, ultimately, the homeland missile defense was focused on
leveraging the ground-based interception interceptors for the
North Korea threat, which was, of course, much smaller in
number.
Mr. Whitesides. Thanks.
I yield back.
Dr. DesJarlais. The gentleman yields back.
The chair now recognizes the gentleman from Indiana, Mr.
Messmer, for 5 minutes.
Mr. Messmer. Thank you, Chairman.
General Collins, thank you for our conversation earlier
today.
Your predecessor testified that the Glide Phase Interceptor
program schedule, which is anticipated in 2032, roughly, in his
words, didn't meet the threat. Is the Missile Defense Agency
developing options to accelerate the program?
General Collins. Congressman, thank you. And thank you for
your time this morning.
Hypersonic missile defense is a key area that does need
additional focus. The Glide Phase Interceptor program was--due
to priorities and resourcing decisions last year, we were
driven to make an earlier selection and to down-select years
earlier than planned. That has actually delayed the program,
and the funding line and profile that we have in the budget
that you all received last year will actually push that
delivery to 2035.
We are pursuing and evaluating acceleration options. It is
primarily a resourcing at this point. There are some technology
things that need to happen in the next 3 to 5 years, but then
there is a resourcing and alignment issue that could accelerate
that.
We believe we could recover to 2032 with no increased level
of programmatic risk across the program. But that is about the
fastest we could do today.
We are looking and exploring other alternatives and options
to potentially bring residual capability or partial capability
from other weapons systems we have. But, as it stands today,
the only hypersonic maneuvering target defense capability we
have is in the fleet with the Standard Missile-6 and the sea-
based terminal capability.
Mr. Messmer. Okay. Thank you.
What is the status of the Next-Generation Interceptors?
General Collins. Yes, sir. The Next-Gen Interceptor, as
briefed last year as well, due to a funding decision and
priorities, we did down-select to a single contractor last
year, a year and a half earlier than expected.
So that program still continues on and is our largest and
highest-priority program for homeland defense.
We have made significant progress at the system level. The
next generation interceptor is the booster, the interceptor,
but the broader weapon system is also now fully aligned and
synchronized with the next generation interceptor program,
which is a major feat for the enterprise.
Last year, I briefed that our number-one issue and risk
going forward with either of the vendors at that time was the
solid rocket motor effort and development. This is a new
booster, a new development, and we have experienced delays and
issues with that development and are expecting an 18-month-or-
more delay into the delivery of that initial capability.
We have taken actions to shore up that development as well
as bring in an additional source to help buy down the schedule
risk of the development as we move forward.
It still is the foundation for the future of
intercontinental ballistic missile protection of the homeland,
and we are 100 percent committed and focused on that program.
Mr. Messmer. Okay. Thank you.
What do you see as the space-based interceptor's role in a
layered defense to ballistic and hypersonic threats?
General Collins. Thanks, Congressman.
We are certainly taking a close look. The executive order
has opened that up for us to take a closer look and move
forward on developing that. We will work through the technology
piece to better understand and move that as quickly as
possible.
If anything that we have learned over the last year, 2
years, in Israel, eastern Med, and Ukraine is that a layered
missile defense approach and design is paramount to the large
rate sizes that we expect, that we have seen last year and that
we would expect in the future. And adding another layer, a
space-based intercept layer, to that certainly looks to
increase the performance of the overall architecture.
Mr. Messmer. Okay. Thank you.
As a follow-up to that, General Guillot, you have
previously stated support for a layered missile defense
approach with a space component. Could you go into more detail
on how that would fit into Northern Command's perspective from
a defense standpoint?
General Guillot. Congressman, having a layered approach,
from the North American Aerospace Defense Command and Northern
Command perspective, is essential to make sure that we can
identify, track, and guide on all threats.
Mr. Messmer. Okay. Thank you.
General Collins, as you know, Iron Beam is an Israeli-
developed directed-energy defense system designed to defend
against short-range rockets, drones, artillery, and mortar
bombs. Can you discuss where things stand with our Iron Beam
procurement and any funds set aside for this?
General Collins. Yes, Congressman.
On the U.S. side, there are no funds at this point set
aside for Iron Beam.
As part of the Israeli supplemental from last year, there
is a portion of that that we are working with our Israeli
Missile Defense Organization partners to execute and bring that
money to them to continue the development and fielding of Iron
Beam.
One thing that we have negotiated in that agreement,
though, was that 50 percent of that investment is a payback
into the U.S. economy. So, while it goes to Israel, they have
to have half of the contracts--half of the money comes back
into building our industry base. And so that supplemental
actually will serve to increase the industry base skill set and
capability that will pay back into our directed-energy efforts
as we move forward.
Mr. Messmer. Okay. Thank you.
I yield back my time.
Dr. DesJarlais. The gentleman yields back.
The chair now recognizes the gentleman from California, Mr.
Carbajal.
Mr. Carbajal. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And thank you to all the witnesses for being here today.
We hear a lot about Golden Dome, but there doesn't really
seem to be a whole lot of clarity on what the point is. You
know, it reminds me of that commercial, that Wendy's
commercial, ``Where's the beef?''
And so it seems that, you know, a concept has been thought
of, which has been thought of before in the past, and it seems
that we are going about it in a way-backwards way to field the
system eventually.
Generals Guillot, Collins, and Gainey, how is the concept
of Golden Dome different than our current missile defense
architecture? And did any plans exist to develop space-based
capabilities for both missile tracking and missile interception
prior to January 2025?
General Guillot. Congressman, I think the big difference
that you will see is, Golden Dome takes all of the existing
requirements that we had but, for the first time, integrates
multiple layers into one system that allows us to detect,
track, and defeat multiple types of threats that affect us in
different domains with one system.
So, while a lot of the components and the requirements were
there in the past, this is the first time that it is all tied
together in one system.
And, yes, there were certainly space-based ability to
detect and track prior to this.
General Collins. Congressman, to build on General Guillot's
response, the architecture plan that Missile Defense Agency had
before January of 2025 included a space layer for hypersonics
and ballistic missile tracking and discrimination as we move
forward, and most of the other components and pieces/parts of
what the executive order included were part of the architecture
plan that we were going to get after.
I think maybe the biggest impact of this activity is, it
will accelerate many of those options. Quicker resources. The
schedule is pretty long to get to some of these activities.
The space-based interceptor piece was not in the
architecture plan before January 2025.
Mr. Carbajal. Great.
General Gainey. And, Congressman, the only point I will add
that wasn't covered by General Guillot and General Collins is,
the executive order also called out left-of-launch missile
defeat.
I think that is an important aspect of missile defense that
has been neglected to date. And focusing capabilities and
efforts towards the attriting of a missile force prior to
launch is an important aspect of the holistic missile defeat
program.
Thank you.
Mr. Carbajal. Thank you.
General Collins, can you give us an update on the
Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor, HBTSS, program
and what we have learned from the prototype demonstrations?
What is the current plan to develop an operational
constellation beyond the prototype stage?
And how do adversaries' growing counter-space capabilities
influence the Missile Defense Agency's view of the appropriate
mix of space-based and ground-based sensors in missile defense?
General Collins. Thank you, Congressman.
So, first off, Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space
Sensor, it was launched in February last year, on Valentine's
Day. We quickly had our first hypersonic testbed test in June,
and then we had one later in the year, and both of those were
very successful.
The three main objectives of the Hypersonic and Ballistic
Tracking Space Sensor prototyping were to show that we could
have the appropriate sensitivity in orbit to see a hypersonic
vehicle throughout its entire flight; to be able to have the
quality of service, the accuracy of a track to be able to close
a fire control loop; and for that data to come down and enter
the command and control system fast enough, so latency.
And we have had two hypersonic testbed flights. As well,
coincident with another flight test that we did just a month
and a half ago taking a look at Standard Missile-6, we also had
Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor in view, and it
tracked that new hypersonic target that was used in that test
very well. And so we have proved out the capability to get
after the accuracy, get after the latency. We are tweaking the
algorithms to improve our quality of service, but we see it as
a very successful demonstration of that capability.
We have been partnered with the Space Development Agency
all along. They have been tracking and were part of our
Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor development. And
they have our requirements and plan to integrate that
capability, that level of requirement and tech, into the
Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture and build that up
over the coming tranches to give us eventually a global
capability to track hypersonic weapons.
Your last question, sir, was?
Mr. Carbajal. I am out of time.
Dr. DesJarlais. The gentleman's time--
Mr. Carbajal. If you could answer that for the record, that
would be great, afterwards.
General Collins. Will do, Congressman. Thank you.
[The information referred to can be found in the Appendix
on page 113.]
Dr. DesJarlais. Thank you.
The chair now recognizes the distinguished gentleman from
South Carolina, Mr. Wilson.
Mr. Wilson. And thank you very much, Dr. Chairman
DesJarlais.
And we appreciate all of your service. And what an
important time in history, what a great opportunity, I believe,
we have in history to protect the American people. And we thank
you all for being here today.
And, sadly to me, we are in a conflict we didn't choose,
and that is, dictators with the rule of gun invading
democracies with the rule of law. It began February 24, 2023,
the invasion by war criminal Putin of Ukraine; October 7, the
invasion, I consider, of Israel by Iran, its puppets. And so we
have just got to be prepared.
And we know that, earlier this month, Russia launched over
70 missiles to the capital of Kyiv against civilian targets
that had catastrophic effect on--35 people killed on a bus.
Over and over again, just war crimes that should never occur.
And then Tehran has directly fired missiles, itself,
directly from Iran and with its puppets, against civilian
targets in Israel.
And then we have the Chinese Communist Party continuing to
expand their arsenal of medium- and intermediate-range
ballistic missiles, posing a significant threat to the United
States and our allies across the Pacific.
And it is my view that we must be prepared to strengthen
our capabilities to deter the adversaries so that we can
establish peace through strength.
And, General Gainey, as we modernize to deter and defend
ourselves against the adversaries with increasingly deadly
capabilities, we are moving towards setting up a revolutionary
new missile defense system, the Golden Dome, which has been so
advocated and appreciated by President Donald Trump.
With that in mind, General Gainey, as the service
representative on the panel with the, quote, ``organize, train,
and equip'' responsibilities, are you providing input on the
personnel and training requirements that would be associated
with the options under consideration for Golden Dome?
General Gainey. Congressman, thank you for that question.
I have not been part of the architecture work to date, so,
therefore, I have not had any input on the organizational/
training aspect of it.
But what I can say is, I have significant input into the
Army's organization, modernization, and way forward, and any
elements of the Army that may be part of that architecture will
have already been vetted.
And as the potential operational component for Northern
Command doing the Ground-Based Midcourse Defense system, as we
ingest additional technology into the architecture, my team
will be prepared to advise Northern Command and assist as
necessary.
Mr. Wilson. Well, we certainly have faith in you and your
colleagues.
With that in mind, too, General Gainey, with war criminal
Putin's unprovoked invasion, which is to actually reestablish
the failed Soviet Union, we see the axis of evil of the Chinese
Communist Party, war criminal Putin, Democratic People's
Republic of Korea, North Korea, and the regime in Tehran
continue to build up their missile capabilities, with the
threat against the United States and our allies continuing to
grow.
And, General, what is the Army's position on foreign
military sales for the Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense
Sensor? Does the Army support partner nations' purchasing the
system as a standalone item?
General Gainey. Again, Congressman, thanks for your
question.
The Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense Sensor radar is an
exportable system currently, and it is currently part of our
foreign military sales system. And Poland has purchased the
system already.
And, yes, it is available as a standalone option. However,
we continue to encourage it to be purchased as part of the
Integrated Battle Command System, because that promotes the
interoperability between our allies and the U.S. as we move
forward.
Mr. Wilson. And that is exciting. It is so exciting to see
Poland come to life and be free.
And, Secretary Yaffe, I am very concerned about the
weaponization of space by war criminal Putin and the Chinese
Communist Party and with the potentiality of overriding or
evading the ground- and sea-based missile defense systems.
How can this be addressed, the weaponization of space?
Ms. Yaffe. Sir, thank you for the question.
I think we are tracking China and Russia's developments in
space very closely. They have both put up a number of
capabilities of concern designed to hold our critical space-
based assets at risk, and that is part of the discussion.
At the same time, we hope to leverage space to enable our
sensors to be most effective in the future Golden Dome system.
Mr. Wilson. Well, thank you again for your service.
I yield back.
Dr. DesJarlais. The gentleman yields.
The chair now recognizes the gentleman from Wisconsin, Mr.
Van Orden.
Mr. Van Orden. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I just want to clear up a couple things here.
This is the ``Missile Defense and Missile Defeat
Programmatic Updates'' hearing. So we are here to talk about
these, right? I took the liberty of having my crack graphics
team draw up some of these. So we are here to talk about this
stuff, right?
So, if this happens and we don't stop it, this is going to
happen, right? Mushroom cloud. No more America.
So we are not here to talk about these, correct?
Okay. I am a retired Navy SEAL senior chief. We know how to
take care of boats.
All right. I just wanted to clear that up.
General Guillot, when was the Iron Dome first developed?
General Guillot. Congressman, I am not exactly sure, but it
has been a couple decades.
Mr. Van Orden. Okay. Has it been improving, would you say?
General Guillot. The Iron Dome, the--
Mr. Van Orden. Yeah.
General Guillot. --Israeli system?
Mr. Van Orden. Yes.
General Guillot. Yes, it has been improving.
Mr. Van Orden. Okay.
So they started without a missile defense system, and then
they had an idea, and then they started building on it, and
then they got to initial operational capability, and now they
are continuing to improve it.
So could we logically say, like, we could extend our--do a
thought experiment here, like, an Einstein thought experiment?
Could we say that we, as the United States of America, who has
been intimately involved in the development of the Iron Dome
system, could we say that maybe we could apply that here in the
United States and that it will work?
General Guillot. Sir, we have been involved with the
development of the Iron Dome. I think General Collins could
attest to that.
Mr. Van Orden. Uh-huh.
General Guillot. The--well, first, I want to confirm.
General Collins. Yes, sir. So we have been partnered with
Israel Missile Defense for two decades. And we actually were
not part of the development of Iron Dome. We helped co-produce
that. But we have--their upper tiers, David's Sling and Arrow--
Mr. Van Orden. Yeah.
General Collins. --we have co-developed with them. And so
we have helped partner, design their architecture and are
intimately integrated. Our system and their system are
integrated together to work, yes, sir.
Mr. Van Orden. Okay. So we could say that there is a
functioning of a pretty darn--General Bacon pointed out, you
know, 99 percent of these things. That is functioning in Israel
right now.
We have a larger industrial base than Israel. We have a
greater Gross Domestic Product than Israel. And we have a
larger population than Israel.
So can we say that if we applied the same type of thought
process, the development of Iron Dome, and we put it here in
the United States and we called it, like, Golden Dome or
something, could we reasonably assume that that will function
at some point in the future to protect the United States of
America against these threats?
General Collins. Yes, sir.
Mr. Van Orden. Okay. Well, I am glad we cleared that up.
Now, listen, I am not of the mind that we should be shaping
our defense policy on whether or not it is going to provoke
Russia. I think that is a straw-man argument and I think that
it is a politically derived argument that potentially puts the
United States of America in jeopardy.
So what we need to do is make sure that we robustly--and I
trust you guys to do this. How long have you been doing this
job?
General Guillot?
General Guillot. I have been the Commander since--
Mr. Van Orden. No, I mean, like, the Air Force--
General Guillot. Oh. Thirty-six years, sir.
Mr. Van Orden. Thirty-six years.
General Collins, how long have you been doing this?
General Collins. Thirty-two.
Mr. Van Orden. General Gainey?
General Gainey. Thirty-four.
Mr. Van Orden. Ma'am, they have all been doing the job
longer than you have been alive. I am just saying. How long
have you been in this--in the defense position like this?
Ms. Yaffe. In this position, for a few months. I have been
in the Office of the Secretary of Defense for 15 years.
Mr. Van Orden. Okay.
So we have got, what, 100-and-some years of whatever
experience, like, dealing with defense policy and anti-missile
machinery, equipment, policy, deployment, right?
Okay. That means that you guys are a tableful of subject-
matter experts. And because we sit behind this dais with a
microphone doesn't make us experts in these types of fields.
And so I would just want to make sure that we are leaning
heavily on the experts and understand that you have done this
before, we are using integrated anti-missile defense systems in
Israel, and that they can work.
And this is the last thing before my time expires. I
represent Volk Field and also Fort McCoy. I am giving you an
open invitation to--when this Golden Dome gets done, I would
like a battery of whatever it is going to look like at Volt
Field or Fort McCoy in the State of Wisconsin to help protect
the Upper Midwest.
That is an open invitation. If you guys haven't been there,
I want to invite you. I will give you some cheese curds. But I
want your soldiers and airmen and Space Force people or
whatever they--Guardians--at some point in my district to help
protect the United States of America.
So thank you very much.
And, with that, I yield back.
Dr. DesJarlais. The gentleman yields back.
The chair now recognizes the gentleman from Colorado, Mr.
Crank.
Mr. Crank. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you to our witnesses.
You know--and it is interesting, as I am listening to this
discussion, I had a colleague come to me not long ago after I
was talking about Golden Dome and my support for it, and that
colleague said to me, essentially, you know, ``That is a pipe
dream. It is just never going to work.''
And I got to thinking about it, because I have maybe a bit
of a unique perspective. I worked as a staff member on Capitol
Hill 30 years ago. I look across these pictures, and Les Aspin
was chairman, Ron Dellums, Mr. Spence. And I remember Mr.
Dellums, specifically, was an outspoken opponent of ballistic
missile defense. This was in the 1990s, and we had arguments on
the House floor about how this would never work, missile
defense would never work. Argued against the Terminal High
Altitude Area Defense program. ``It will never work,'' they
said.
And, you know, today, as I was talking to that colleague, I
would ask, ``Well, maybe we should ask the Israelis if it would
work.''
And I guess I would ask you this. We have these arguments
about whether we--if this is a technical problem or whether
this is a problem of political will. And America does great
things, but every great thing we have ever done has been
difficult. There were people at the time who said we couldn't
land a man on the Moon, and we did it, but there were naysayers
back then who said, ``We can't do this.''
I would ask, General Guillot, your thoughts. Is this a
technical issue, or is it a political-will issue? Can we do
this technically?
General Guillot. Yes, Congressman. There are certainly
technical challenges with the integration of all these
capabilities into one, but it is certainly possible.
Mr. Crank. Yeah.
General Collins, your thoughts?
General Collins. Sir, we have demonstrated over the last 2
years that these systems can work, the ground-based systems
that we have today.
We have some understanding to do, to General Guillot's
point--the technical integration to bring a space-based
interceptor to work, the understanding of what a lifecycle cost
of maintaining a constellation is and what that brings to the
fight. All those things need to be worked through as we move
forward.
But we certainly believe in layered missile defense. And we
have shown throughout the last 2 years that those systems work
and bring capability and they save lives.
Mr. Crank. Yeah.
General Gainey?
General Gainey. Thank you, Congressman.
Yeah, I agree. And in a previous job where I worked
counter-unmanned-aerial-system technology, pushing the envelope
on technology, whether it is directed energy, non-kinetic--it
is amazing what industry can come up. Yes, there are
challenges, but there are always opportunities.
Mr. Crank. Yeah. It seems to me that there are some people
on Capitol Hill who are just so invested in mutually assured
destruction that we can't shift our paradigm a little bit.
And we better hope, if that is what we are going to rely
on, is mutually assured destruction, is that our adversaries
don't figure out a way to have ballistic missile defense, that
they don't figure out a Golden Dome. Because then mutually
assured destruction will be a thing of the past, and we will be
left in the dust on that. So I think that is very important.
With the remaining time I have, General Collins, the
Missile Defense Agency has been a strong advocate for the
importance of space-based sensors that collect fire control
quality data. Can you talk about why that level of fidelity is
so important to missile defense operations?
General Collins. Yes. Thanks for that, Congressman.
Certainly, we do see a future--as I mentioned, our
architecture did include a number of different sensing
capabilities in space, one being the Hypersonic and Ballistic
Tracking Space Sensor to look down and pick up the maneuvering
targets and hold them under custody through the entire time of
flight.
Closing the fire control loop, is what we call it--fire
control, the kill chain for missile defense. To get our
interceptor to work, we need to get it into the right location
and looking in the right space to find the missile when it
comes time to intercept. And without the appropriate level of
sensitivity, track quality, and timeliness, we do not get that
information to the interceptor in time, and, therefore, we
cannot consummate the intercept and we will miss.
And so that is going to be very important. Whether that is
a hypersonic interceptor, whether that is a ballistic missile
that we intercept in boost phase, midcourse phase, or terminal
phase, we need to get that cue really tied in and to the
interceptor--to the command and control system and into the
interceptor as quickly as possible to be able to close that
chain and actually do the intercept.
Mr. Crank. Yeah. Thank you, General. I appreciate that.
I would just say, Mr. Chairman, I mean, these are hard
discussions, but we sit in this committee room and we hear
about the threat from China day-in and day-out, we hear about
the threat from Russia day-in and day-out, and then we sit up
here from this dais or out on the House floor and we make
excuses about why we can't fund these things.
I would yield back. Thank you.
Dr. DesJarlais. I thank the gentleman.
And I would like to thank all of our witnesses on behalf of
Ranking Member Moulton and all the committee members for your
thoughtful testimony.
That will conclude the open portion of this hearing. We
will now move into the closed session upstairs.
[Whereupon, at 4:10 p.m., the subcommittee proceeded in
closed session.]
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A P P E N D I X
April 30, 2025
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PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
April 30, 2025
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[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
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WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING
THE HEARING
April 30, 2025
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RESPONSE TO QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. CARBAJAL
General Collins. MDA is fully considering adversarial
counter-space capabilities, which is why MDA has advocated for
dual-phenomenology, birth-to-death tracking of missile threats.
Space-based and ground-based sensors are both necessary, with
each focused on the areas that provide the best performance.
Spaced-based sensors are ideally suited for visible/infrared
passive sensing that requires limited power, whereas satellite
solutions can economically provide worldwide coverage (Space
Based Infrared Systems, PWSA, DSS, etc.) Ground-based sensors
are ideally suited for power-intensive active radar systems
that can provide all-weather capability along expected threat
corridors (LRDR, UEWR, AN/TPY-2, etc.).
MDA will defer to the U.S. Space Force on resilience
methods and techniques planned for critical space-based
sensors. The Missile Defense System is designed to gracefully
degrade with the loss of space-based capabilities. For example,
the ground-based radars can use space-based tracking data as a
cuing source to increase raid capacity, but they can implement
autonomous surveillance fences if the space-based tracking data
is unavailable. Similarly, while the Missile Defense System
benefits from having both space-based and ground-based tracking
data, the system can engage threats if tracking data from only
one source is available. [See page 20.]
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QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING
April 30, 2025
=======================================================================
RESPONSE TO QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. WILSON
Mr. Wilson. The next generation missile defense shield cannot be
approached with the same old thinking and practices that have governed
legacy systems.
Can you tell me about novel approaches, concepts, or authorities
being evaluated for missile defense?
General Collins. The peer/near-peer threat continues to proliferate
in capacity and complexity, expanding a robust strike capability
designed to outmatch our defenses. To combat this trend, MDA is using
rapid prototypes with short sprints to develop and demonstrate
disruptive, game- changing asymmetric capabilities, with incremental
capability off-ramps to the warfighter.
MDA is evolving the Next Gen system attributes to include: agility;
flexibility; multi-domain operability; continuous birth-death tracking;
low cost per defeat; distributed, intelligent command, control, battle
management, and communications; resilience; compatibility of any sensor
with any effector; success despite discrimination; space-enabled
communications; kinetic and non-kinetic missile defeat; and integration
of the timeline's left and right of launch.
MDA is accelerating the acquisition timelines, leveraging its
unique acquisition authorities. MDA is leveraging a variety of
authorities and acquisition approaches, including traditional and non-
traditional partners, including Other Transaction Authority, Multiple
Announcement Authority, Commercial Solutions Openings, Broad Agency
Announcements, Procurement for Experimental Purposes, Pilot Program to
Incentivize Contracting with Employee-Owned Businesses, and Pitch Days.
Additionally, MDA is transitioning to a digital engineering model
that will expedite the evaluation, requirements, testing, and
qualification processes, resulting in faster capability delivery. The
approach includes an advanced modeling, simulation, and analysis
laboratory that provides element/component-level performance assessment
up to mission-level analysis at all classifications. The lab is on a
growth path, repeating the models across the DoD enterprise, providing
an integrated approach to missile defeat. The capabilities will
integrate into the National Integrated Air & Missile Defense Center
(NIC) and provide an initial capability in 2026.
Mr. Wilson. General Gainey, there are 15 US Patriot Air Defense
Battalions in the Army, with plans to grow to 16 battalions soon. These
Air Defense Artillery (ADA) forces are currently forward-deployed
supporting combat operations throughout the CENTCOM area of
responsibility, and forward-stationed in EUCOM and INDOPACOM for Army
Integrated Air and Missile Defense contingency operations.
Last month two additional Patriot batteries were reportedly
deployed overseas in support of Israel. Do you believe that we need to
increase the Patriot force structure?
General Gainey. Yes. ARSTRUC has approved additional Patriot
battalions and the Guam composite battalion, therefore increased force
structure is already moving forward.
______
RESPONSE TO QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. TURNER
Mr. Turner. Directed energy systems, including high-energy lasers
and high-power microwaves, have been touted as potential game-changers
for missile defense due to their speed-of-light engagement and deep
magazines. Can you provide an update on the Department's progress in
developing and fielding directed energy systems for missile defeat
roles? Specifically, what are the current technical and operational
challenges, what timelines are realistic for operational deployment,
and how is the Department ensuring these systems are integrated into
existing and future layered missile defense architectures? Missile
Defense Agency has explored directed energy concepts for several years
as a potential cost-effective layer in the missile defense
architecture. Can you provide the Committee with an update on MDA's
current investments and progress in directed energy for missile defeat,
particularly for boost-phase and cruise missile defense? What are the
key technical hurdles still facing these programs, and how is MDA
coordinating with the services and industry to ensure directed energy
is integrated into the broader missile defense system of systems?
General Collins. The Missile Defense Agency (MDA) is prioritizing
the integration of directed energy systems into the Missile Defense
System, significantly reducing the burden on kinetic interceptors and
augmenting the way we fight.
High-energy laser (HEL) technology has matured and is on a path to
demonstrate the initial airborne capability at lower HEL power levels.
While the HEL effort will have technical integration challenges to
resolve, funding is the greatest challenge to delivering a directed-
energy weapon. The plan includes a series of two-year sprints of
increasing power, with a demonstration and potential off-ramp of
operational capability to service partners as early as 2027. As the
power levels increase, the HEL will progressively provide capability
against more challenging aerial and missile threats on the path to an
objective capability.
In 2024, MDA initiated work on a phased, airborne long-range
detect-and-track HEL rapid prototype, coupled with a kill laser. The
HEL could thin the herd, lower the cost per kill, and provide a nearly
unlimited magazine, with mission sets including unmanned aerial
vehicles, cruise missiles, ballistic missiles, and hypersonic threats.
MDA is on a path to demonstrate progressively higher HEL power levels,
with incremental capability off-ramps to Service partners on the path
to an objective capability. The Office of the Under Secretary of
Defense for Research and Engineering (OUSD(R&E)) High Energy Laser
Scaling Initiative has demonstrated HEL power levels in the kilowatt+
range, on a path to megawatt+.
MDA is supporting a joint OUSD(R&E) Probability of Weapons
Effectiveness Experiment (PWEX) effort to determine the effectiveness
of HEL weapon systems against a series of dynamic targets. In 2024-
2025, PWEX successfully engaged and negated a series of dynamic targets
in crossing and head-on profiles. The High Energy Laser for Regional
Airborne Defense effort is exploring the application space for state-
of-the-art directed-energy systems as they apply to future MDA
architectures, identifying opportunities for Diode Pumped Alkali Laser
and fiber lasers in MDA's future directed-energy programs.
Mr. Turner. One of the critical enablers of effective missile
defense, particularly against advanced threats like hypersonic glide
vehicles and maneuverable reentry vehicles, is persistent global
tracking. Space-based sensors are essential to closing that gap. Can
you describe how the Department is integrating space-based sensor
programs-such as the Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor
(HBTSS) and the broader Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture-into
the missile defense enterprise? Who has lead responsibility for this
integration, and how are MDA, Space Force, and SDA coordinating to
ensure seamless tracking, data fusion, and operational responsiveness?
General Collins. The Missile Defense Agency (MDA) agrees space-
based sensors are essential for persistent global tracking. The Missile
Warning/Missile Tracking/Missile Defense Combined Program Office,
jointly staffed by MDA and the U.S. Space Force's Space Development
Agency (SDA) and Space Systems Command), integrates Hypersonic and
Ballistic Tracking Space Sensors (HBTSS), Proliferated Warfighter Space
Architecture (PWSA), and Medium-Earth Orbit Track Custody (MTC) sensors
into the Ballistic Missile Defense System Overhead Persistent Infrared
Architecture (BOA) and Command and Control Battle Management and
Communication (C2BMC), to deliver fire-control data to the Missile
Defense Enterprise.
MDA is closely coordinating with the SDA and U.S. Space Force to
deliver persistent global tracking and discrimination of multiple
threat types from space. In 2024, MDA delivered two prototypes of the
HBTSS on orbit. These prototypes will inform SDA plans for the PWSA,
which will provide fire-control quality tracks on hypersonic threats
and boosting ballistic missiles. Integration of track data from all
current and future space sensor assets will be done by BOA, who will
send the collected data as a single source set to C2BMC as the system-
of-systems integrator for integration with ground sensors. Following
what has been an extremely successful HBTSS program, MDA plans to
deliver future space sensor demonstrations such as Discriminating Space
Sensor (DSS). Like HBTSS, fielding of a DSS capability will be
accomplished by SDA as part of the PWSA.
Although space-based sensors are essential in closing the gap on
persistent global tracking and discrimination; we cannot rely solely on
space. For resilient, robust sensing of incoming missiles, both
terrestrial and space-based sensing are required, using complementary
sensor types. To that end, MDA is also collaborating with the USSF and
U.S. Air Force to expand and improve terrestrial sensing.
The MDA's C2BMC program office is leveraging its many years of
experience incorporating data from OPIR sensors into the BOA, to inform
how new data is integrated into the Missile Defense Enterprise. Data
from new sensors such as HBTSS and the PWSA tracking satellites and the
MTC satellites will be integrated through BOA and C2BMC. These systems
ensure seamless tracking, data fusion, and responsiveness is maintained
to support the Missile Defense mission.
Through prototype and experimentation efforts, BOA has already
demonstrated successful fusion of HBTSS data as PWSA Tranche 0 Tracking
Layer data. Additional details regarding coordination and integration
will be forthcoming from the Department of Defense following approval
of the Golden Dome for America architecture.
Mr. Turner. One of the critical enablers of effective missile
defense, particularly against advanced threats like hypersonic glide
vehicles and maneuverable reentry vehicles, is persistent global
tracking. Space-based sensors are essential to closing that gap. Can
you describe how the Department is integrating space-based sensor
programs-such as the Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor
(HBTSS) and the broader Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture-into
the missile defense enterprise? Who has lead responsibility for this
integration, and how are MDA, Space Force, and SDA coordinating to
ensure seamless tracking, data fusion, and operational responsiveness?
General Gainey. Defer to MDA.
Mr. Turner. The Department of Defense Directive 5134.20E, which
became effective on April 25, 2025, updated key responsibilities and
authorities related to the Missile Defense Agency and its acquisition
framework. Can you outline for the Committee the most significant
changes in this updated directive and explain how they are expected to
impact the development and fielding of missile defense capabilities?
Additionally, while this directive was approved under Secretary Austin,
can you speak to whether Secretary Hegseth intends to continue this
policy as written, or if there are any changes directed-particularly
those that may affect how missile defense systems are acquired,
integrated, or managed across the Department?
Ms. Yaffe. The Department recently issued two DoD Directives
regarding the Missile Defense Agency (MDA):
The MDA Charter, DoD Directive 5134.09, "Missile Defense Agency,"
April 25, 2025, which updates the mission, organization and management,
administration, responsibilities and functions, relationships, and
authorities of MDA; and
DoD Directive 5134.20E, "Missile Defense System Acquisition
Policy," April 25, 2025, which establishes policy, assigns
responsibilities, and prescribes procedures for the acquisition of
missile defense system elements. These directives incorporate changes
designed to maintain agility while reducing program risk. Significant
changes include:
Establishes Milestone Decision Authority for Missile Defense System
(MDS) elements as follows:
The MDA Director is the Milestone Decision Authority for all
Milestone decisions except for hardware-intensive programs that either
exceed the RDT&E dollar threshold for an acquisition category (ACAT) I,
or are designated as a special interest program. For MDS elements in
those categories, the Milestone Decision Authority is the MDA Director
for the Technology Development Decision (TDD or Milestone A), and the
Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment (USD(A&S))
for the Product Development Decision (PDD or Milestone B) and the
Production Decision (PD or Milestone C).
For Hardware intensive elements that exceed the RDT&E dollar
threshold for ACAT I programs or that are designated as special
interest, the USD(A&S) is the Milestone Decision Authority for Product
Development Decisions (PDD or Milestone B) and Production Decisions (PD
or Milestone C). USD(A&S) may delegate this authority.
Designates the MDA Director as the Executive Agent for Hypersonic
Defense and states that the MDA Director will serve as the DoD
technical authority for integrated air and missile defense activities
and programs.
Updates the Ballistic Missile Defense System to the MDS to reflect
inclusion of hypersonic missile defense along with the ballistic
missile defense mission.
Incorporates Independent Cost Estimates, Independent Technical Risk
Assessments, and Capability Utility Assessments at Product Development
and Production decisions. These may be delegated and, in some cases,
waived.
All changes were coordinated in accordance with 10 USC 5502. The
Department has certified in writing that these changes will not impair
the missile defense capabilities of the United States.
The Department is following this policy as written. Additional
changes may be needed in the future to develop and deploy advanced
missile defense capabilities at the necessary speed to achieve the
President's plan for Golden Dome for America.
______
RESPONSE TO QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. BACON
Mr. Bacon. As the NORAD commander, one of the primary capabilities
that you rely on is the tactical air forces from the US Air Force and
Air National Guard. These forces are generated from our alert units and
their support, fighter aircraft, airborne command and control, and
tankers. Can you provide the committee details on your minimum force
requirements to accomplish your Aerospace Control Alert or ACA mission
for homeland defense?
General Guillot. Aerospace Control Alert (ACA) - 1 represents the
minimum force requirements to accomplish the steady-state NORAD
mission. A change in the geopolitical environment or adversary activity
could lead to a requirement for an elevated NORAD response (ACA-2 or
higher).
I am also providing a more detailed classified response, as the
resources associated with each of the NORAD response postures is held
at a higher classification.
______
RESPONSE TO QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. BELL
Mr. Bell. How have NORTHCOM and MDA participated in the development
of Golden Dome for America architecture?
General Collins. MDA provided recommendations, analysis, and input
as requested by Office of the Secretary of Defense in support of the
development of the Golden Dome for America architecture. General
Michael Guetlein was confirmed by the United States Senate on July 17,
2025, as the Golden Dome for America Direct Reporting Program Manager
(DRPM), with responsibility for all activities to deliver the next-
generation missile defense shield. I defer to the DRPM for further
details concerning the development of the Golden Dome for America
architecture.
Mr. Bell. The United States has been at the forefront of advancing
regional integration through research and development with Israel,
contributing to the joint development and procurement of highly
successful defense systems, including the Iron Dome, David's Sling, and
Arrow systems.
Last year, we witnessed the first two direct attacks from Iran
targeting Israel. While these operational defense systems played a
crucial role, we also saw significant support and cooperation from our
regional allies.
General Collins: Could you please provide details on the additional
assets deployed to the region and assess their performance so far?
General Collins. The response contains sensitive information and
will be provided to the requestor by other means.
Mr. Bell. In 2024, the President's supplemental aid request
included significant funding for the procurement of Iron Beam, an
Israeli-developed directed-energy air defense system designed to
counter short-range rockets, drones, artillery, and mortar bombs.
Could you provide an update on the current status of the Iron Beam
program and explain how these funds are being utilized? Additionally,
how do you envision the future of the U.S.-Israel cooperation in
directed energy missile defense?
General Collins. The response contains sensitive information and
will be provided to the requestor by other means.
Mr. Bell. How have NORTHCOM and MDA participated in the development
of Golden Dome for America architecture?
General Guillot. USNORTHCOM has remained in close coordination with
MDA throughout the initial Golden Dome for America (GDA) development
process. USNORTHCOM provided input to the Department of Defense during
reference architecture development and are currently, in coordination
with USSPACECOM, drafting additional operational requirements. NORAD
and USNORTHCOM continue to provide operational perspectives to various
agencies throughout the Department as GDA continues to mature.
Mr. Bell. Are you confident that our homeland missile defense
system remains ahead of evolving threats posed by North Korea and
China?
General Guillot. While I remain confident against the current
intelligence-assessed threat, North Korea remains eager to transition
their strategic weapons program from research and development to serial
production and fielding. That process could rapidly expand North
Korea's inventory and would challenge our missile defense capacity.
The President's "Iron Dome for America" executive order clarified
and expanded missile defense policy to include peer, near-peer, and
rouge adversaries. Current U.S. Ballistic Missile Defense capabilities
were designed and deployed to defend against rogue nations and provide
limited conventional cruise missile defense. USNORTHCOM is working
across the Department of Defense to ensure the capabilities of the
Golden Dome meet policy objectives against the full spectrum of current
and future intelligence-assessed threats.
[all]