Opening Statement (As Prepared)
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Thank you, Chairman Waltz.
This group of witnesses was before us two months ago to testify on the Department’s aging infrastructure. A conversation that will continue as we work through the myriad of issues facing this portfolio. We must ask ourselves whether we have the right balance between COCOM requirements and service priorities. As the subcommittee with oversight over both military construction and the majority of the operations and maintenance budget, we must ensure that service requirements such as new barracks construction, renovating unaccompanied housing, and modernization of our nation’s research, development test and evaluation infrastructure do not continue to be sacrificed to so called higher priorities. Our investments in the Pacific will be worthless if we can’t recruit and retain talent. How can we expect to do that when we continually send the message to our most precious resource, our people, that they are our last priority.
Resiliency is another area where this committee has been focused for years. Whether it be ensuring our installations are resilient to hurricanes, wildfires, ice storms and earthquakes, or building resilience into our installation’s power sources to guarantee that the bases from which we execute critical missions and project power can perform those missions in the event of a power interruption whether natural or manmade. To date, these efforts have been overwhelmingly bipartisan. Another area of bipartisanship has been the Department’s operational energy programs. These programs seek to increase range and on-station time by lowering fuel consumption and provide more survivable weapons systems less dependent on contested logistics lines. We learned that lesson in Iraq and Afghanistan, we’re watching it play out in Ukraine, and it will absolutely be a factor in the Pacific.
That is why I was so disappointed that the FY 24 Defense appropriation contained a significant mark against what it characterized as “wasteful climate change projects.” Some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle may welcome this mark on ideological grounds but like most things we do, the devil is in the details. Because the cost avoidance and increased on-station time of our operational energy programs also has the ancillary benefit of lowering greenhouse gas emissions, those programs can be targeted by these cuts. That microgrid that was going to allow your installation to island for 10 days, continuing the installation’s critical missions uninterrupted, may be cut too if it happened to update old inefficient diesel generators. Over the years this subcommittee has endeavored to dismantle the false and ultimately dangerous idea that programs can either be good for readiness or good for the climate. These resiliency programs do both. Ultimately, this mark may have scored a political win, but it will be a net readiness loss, and one that we will have to try to help dig ourselves out of in the FY 25 NDAA.
Finally, I would be remiss if I didn’t note the significant continuing investments in the Sentinel ground based strategic deterrent system that are contained in the President’s budget request, despite the ongoing Nunn-McCurdy process. It’s no secret that I have been skeptical about this program since its inception. However, I find it particularly galling that the President’s Budget Request continues to invest billions, including $700 million in military construction funds, when we are only midway through the statutorily mandated review process tasked with determining the program’s very future.
With that, I yield back Chairman Waltz.
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