Yv States Government is a cash flow budget. And the recapitalization of the Nuclear Triade is a capital investment. We are talking 40 and 50year assets. One of the problems we are facing in our budget is it all comes out, it looks like its in the Defense Budget. I call it the pigon. There is this bulk of nuclear phodendization that should be considered capital investment. I think thats important for people to realize when you look at the Defense Budget there is a piece of it that is really something that probably should have been done over the past 30 years that we are trying to do in a hurry. Is that your reading . General cotton it is, sir. The way like to describe it is am responsible for maintaining and the components under me are responsible for maintainin on behalf of the president of the United States. Senator king general whiting you talked about we have the best Space Capabilities and have for many, many years. Thats the good news. The bad news is, the dependency that we have on space, which makes us vulnerable in terms of the relationship with these potential adversaries. What are we doing to think about alternatives to space . For example, i understand recently they are now teaching see lesstryial navigation at annapolis. We need to think how do we reduce our reliance on space assets given the development of capabilities of our adversaries. Talk to me how we mitigate this risk. Gone to space because of the advantage it brings us. It allow us to operate globally intetherred to senator king w unopposed for years. General whiting yes, sir. To your point, i know all the services are thinking about this what do we do when our pry primary capability may be not available. In Space Command its to make sure it doesnt happen. The service vs. Their secondary plans are and all of them have those plans in place. And to your point are tra several of the services, such as the army, navy, and marines also have relatively small but dedicated cadres of space personnel to help their commanders understand the benefits and vulnerabilities of space so they can understand when those times might be they have to go to those secondary plans. Senator king im going to talk about those gaps i mentioned at the beginning that i dont want to overemphasize. You have partial responsibility for Missile Defense. It bothers me that we have been very slow on the issue of directed energy. We are using 2 million, or 5 million missiles to knock down 200,000 or 300,000 drones. This should be a task for directed energy. I hope thats part of Missile Defense, missile awareness and all branches not you necessarily, but all the branches should be working on two things. Missile defense and hyper sonic defense. Those ar strategic Game Changers that i think we have been slow to develop. Is directed energy going to be part of the future . General whiting two weeks ago i was in huntsville meeting with the mi defense agency. We talked about directed energy. I know that is something they are looking a i agree with you. I think it needs to be part of the future. Senator king i want more than looking at. I want development and soon. I think we should be having a capability in the red sea right now. This is an opportunity to use that capacity. Finally, i want to associate myself with my cochair, senator fischer, on nc3. That is part of the triade. I congratulate you on the work you are doing. But urge you to accelerate and continue. The whole idea the cornerstone of the defense of this country is deterrence. The adversaries adversaries detect a weakness, we are vulnerable. I congratulate you, but want to prod you to keep going ernestly earnestly and accelerate the progress. Chair reed senator cotton. Senator cotton thank you for your testimony and thanks to alt men and women who serve under you. General cotton, since deping took power over a decade ago, Chinas Nuclear paragraphsal more than 100 . By 2035 the Department Anticipates that Chinas Nuclear arsenal will have increased by 500 . How would youthe threat posed to the United States by chinas rapidly growing Nuclear Arsenal . General cotton as my predecessor said i love this term tpho tkpweu terminology, the breakout that we saw and the advancements and how quickly the advancements that we are seeing on china to rapidly create a viable triade is breathtaking. Senator cotton unprecedented . The pace at which they are expanding . General is. Senator cotton your statement says they have a triade today. Is that correct . General cotton that is correct. Senator cotton may not be the most cutting edge. They are working on stealth bombers. General cotton correct. Senator cotton do you think a nation that multiplies its Nuclear Arsenal as rapidly as china does, especially when governed by communists, is doing so with peaceful intent . General cotton i think the minimum deterrent strategy that we used to hear that china unlinks themself with as far as their that their Strategic Policy i find hard to believe that that can still be a policy with the way they are building out there. Senator cotton for years china deterrence, but they also are wellknown for a policy called hide and bide, hide your strength and bide your time. Do you think its fair china is shedding that strategy . General cotton senator, they are showing us their capability and how fast they can grow. Senator cotton they also have had a long declared, formal, policy no first use. Does it make sense to expand your Nuclear Program by 500 and retain the no first use policy . General cotton i go back to using that as the opening for a minimum deter strategy. That probably is in alignment. What we are seeing not so much. Senator cotton big investment of Natural Resources to expand by Nuclear Weapons if you plan to keep a no first use policy. Wouldnt you say . General cotton even though we havent heard them say that. You are correct. Senator cotton it will shock everyone to hear the chinese communists have a history of lying. Not just aboutheir Nuclear Weapons. The tibetans would probably have something to say about that. Lets look what we are doing to counteract this threat. First, lets stay on the threat. Chinas Nuclear Arsenal compare to ours today . General cotton today we are still superior. But like i said, i think the reality is we are going to have to continue to modernize our current system. We are superior today. Senator cotton today. If china continues on the pace which the Department Projects by 2035, will they have parity with the United States . General cotton in the realm of their land basis thames yes. Combined the total forces of china and russia by 2035, would those two countries combined have nuclear overmatch against the United States and the current pace . General cotton weapons count would be larger than our weapons count. Senator cotton what we are tkoeg. Is the b21 moving quickly enough to meet your future deterrent requirements . General cotton the limited production rate of the b21 is the only thing i wish we could do quicker. The fact that that is an incredible sixth generation platform all indications are that that weapons system is moving along at a great pace as far as delivery. The ability for production. As a war fighters id love to have it. Senator cotton be nice to 100 . General cotton yes, sir. Senator cotton lets look at, i guess, a first generation aircraft, the b52. I think its 79 years old now . General cotton 70. Senator cotton a as old as some senators. We often hear criticism like, well, were flying aircraft that are older than general cotton. We are flying aircraft that these generals grandparents for flying. Im of the if it aint broke dont fix it philosophy. Its highly effective. Why is it critical that the air reengine b52 for your needs . General cotton thank you for that question. It gets picked on quite a bit on its age but as we look at what the capacity and what the capable is of that weapons system that platform its amazing. And what that will be able to do for us, and i said earlier, we need to think about thible for it to carry lrso. This is the platform thawill carry lrso. Its the platform that has a lot of mass as far as capability. I want it to have a longrange strike standoff capability even greater than it has. Senator accountton if its wellmaintained, it seems like a big part of our weapons. Senator warren . Senator warren Strategic Command is responsible for Strategic Deterrence including Nuclear Weapons. We were already planning to spend 2 trillion to modernize and maintain those weapons over the next 30 years. Now we are learning that the cost for those programs are going to be even higher than we anticipated. General cotton, i know you are not responsible for managing these programs, but we turn to your command for your best military advice on what these programs will mean for our National Security. General cotton, do you a decisions about how to build our Nuclear Posture should be based on the most Accurate Information we have athe time . General cotton senator, can you rephrase senator warren should we base our decisions based on the most Accurate Information weve decisions . Kip absolutely. Senator warren ok, good. D. O. D. Did motte do that for the Sentinel Program which will replace all landbased intercontinental ballistic sses. They havedy concluded that the base assumptions for the cost quote quote, werent particularly valid. When i requested d. O. D. Contract with a respected group of outside experts in 2021 to determine the technical feasible of extending the minuteman 3 missile program, instead of buying expensive new weapons, i was told they didnt have contract authoty to do so. That was not true. They Just Department want an honest assessment of the real risks of sentinel. And since then, the cost of the program has we initially thought the price for sentinel would be about 95 billion. Now the air force reports that it will be 132 billion. Nearly 40 more. By law, that kind of increase triggers a mandatory revie of the programs viability. Now im glad that this review is happening. But we need i experts people who will ask hard questions. We need to ask about the Sentinel Program, taking a look as well. Yen cotton. Would you oppose generalan cotton, would you oppose an outside review of the program if it advances our National Security . Senator warren, i agree with the previous assesth the last three administrations in regards to where we are in replacement of the minuteman program. As i said comments what i cannot endure as a Combatant Commander that has to provide cotas, i cannot endure having a gap or drop in the reliability of the current platform that we currently have thats part of the triad. I appreciate that. What we are going to be replacing it with has been fully vetted and is the right direction for us to go. Even before this latest cost breach there were bright ng warnings that this program was not on track. The air forces aggressive schedule meant they were relying on Immature Technology the time created additional risks of Cost Increases and schedule delays. Best practices for budgeting these complex programs is to develop what is called integrated master schedule, and analysis to break down the project into steps, resources and budget needed to complete it, budgeting one hundred one. Sentinel did not have that. General cotton, you warned of the complexity of the Sentinel Program, i am quoting challenge air force and Industry Partners in ways not seen for a generation. Let me ask. Do you think its important to have basic Program Management guard rails in place to help us prevent delays and cost overruns . The rest of that statement was you are absolutely right. I said it numerous times, that was going to be a megaproject we havent seen since the onset of the minuteman real placement in the early 60s. Ima taxpayer as well and i want to ensure that we, i have a Weapon System that can deliver the capabilities i need to deliver. I also need to make sure that we dont create a larger gap in having assessments that would drive us to now question one leg of the triad in regards to how to produce or have forces go to it. And i appreciate that, general, but weve got to have a plan thats going to work, we cant just keep burning money and say, at some point we hope we can deliver this thing. I am very concerned pentagon officials are already saying, already saying, quote, they will make the trades it takes to keep the Sentinel Program funded, analysis be damned. I will be watching closely to see if the dod takes this review thats required by law because of cost overruns, looking to see this review seriously or if it is just another paperwork exercise to justify throwing more money at more expensive Nuclear Programs. Thank you, general. Thank you, senator rounds please. Thank you, mister chairman. First of all marchese to both of you thank you for your service to our country and to your teams as well. Today we are talking about the most strategic Weapons Systems our country has. Our conventional forces are critical. Our convtional forces are only effective because we have the Nuclear Deterrence and strategic Weapons Systems to support th general whiting, china and russia both understand how vital our space capably czar to the joint force and they have been developing capabilities to counter our space assets for years which are we currently postured to win a conflict that begins or extends into space . When we take a look at this right now, i really appreciated senator kings comments with regard to the fact that we are ready to f but can we win that battle, what about 5 and 10 years from now on the current trajectories . Thank you for the question. Today, i am completely clear in saying we have the worlds best military Space Capabilities, i will use the same or general cotton used when we look at what china and russia are doing with their counterspace weapons, they are moving breathtakingly fast and so we must ensure that the investments that have been made the we thanknts continue, those programs continue to execute and we continue to invest to make sure that we keep pace with that breathtaking pace. Part of that i suspect you provided and you will provide on the priorities list that will likely be sent to congress over the next month or so. If we were to fully fund that unfunded priorities list, how would that impact your readiness in the nearterm . The priorities i expect will be on our unfunded priorities list are about improving our posture for the contested domain and to move ahead of the pace that russia and china are moving, that will give us the capacity and capabilities that we believe we need in 3, 5, and 10 years. I understand by law the department of these Defense Services cannot invest funds into a program thats going to be retired within 5 years. This is known as the sunset provision. You have concerns about your legacy systems being to vested too early, and the Service Secretaries can offer a waiver but are not required but replacement programs dont start to come online until the 2030s if they are on time. If this policy is not changed, how will that impact Strategic Deterrence . Thank you for that question youre referring to title 10, us code 224 alpha. Imagine you were waiting for that. Talk about you, and schedule for time and its dispersal. Youre absolutely right. Weve been talking about it all morning. You always have plans that show overlap between legacy systems and new modernized systems. As i stated earlier, when it comes to Strategic Deterrence, ional to that and credibility is insuring the transition from legacy system, that theres no gap between the transition between legacy system and modernized system. We are talking about modernizing specific parts of the triad right now theres going to be a time that we need to have both systems, the legacy system and the new system operating at it may be more than 5 years. That is correct. Right now that law would stipulate that you wouldnt modernize components of the legacy system if you are within 5 years of what you initially saw as a transition to the new system and that could be troublesome. The Sentinel Program is critical to our deterrent capability, correct . And modernized replacement of the minuteman system is foundational to the triad. Can we afford to delay the implementation of the Sentinel Program . We need to be late to the triad. What do you mean by that . I would much rather and i think my colleagues would agree, i would write rather not have to have a transition of legacy system to modernized systems that are already past their service dates. I know my time is r