Cyber espionage. The hack of opm is the latest example. Do the chinese steal our Naval Technology and apply it to their navy, and as a corollary to that, are you aware of any evidence concerning china stealing u. S. Civil Nuclear Technology and diverting it to its nuclear navy . Sir, im not personally aware of any instances of another nation stealing our Nuclear Technology and applying to their navy, including china. That may be happening, im not briefed on any intelligence that would implicate that. I think its wellunderstood that there is Cyber Espionage that occurs. We have concerns from time to time about our cleared defense contractors for example in their Cyber Security. I think Frank Kendall and at l is working hard to tighten that up as best we k. I was reflecting on this earlier we talk about Nuclear Matters. As a sort of graduate of the Navy Nuclear Propulsion program. One of the things that has intrigue said me intrigued me over the years, the element of Human Performance that program inculcates into its people is applicable to protecting ourselves in the cyber world. And were investigating how we can go about inculcating some of those principles in our work force so we can stop or at least minimize the amount of Cyber Espionage we experience. For any of our witnesses, do you have any suggestion,s of steps we should take to insure china cant take our intelligent and update their Navy Nuclear Reactor technology . I think youre reefingferring to the china, one two three provision. We want to make sure that any agreement that we have in this regard is not used to allow them to have a quieter plant, for example. But as of this point, i know of no chinese espionage that is looking is trying to specifically on this aspect of it. But i defer to secretary on the china one two three if there is anything on there. Thank you, mr. Forbes. Our judgment is that the agreement protects our interests and it also provides opportunity for our industry to have markets that are very significant for the United States. And allow us to advance the kinds of safety and performance standards that we want to see other countries adopt in their Civil Nuclear programs. Thank you. Thank you all for your service and for being here. With that, mr. Chairman, i yield back. Thank you. Thank you mr. Chairman i want to thank our witnesses for your testimony today. Admiral, as the chairman noted this may be your last appearance before the committee. I just want to thank you for your service to our nation. Youve made great contributions to our men and women in uniform and our National Security. And our nation isgreatly in your debt. Madam secretary if i could start the question with you. In the category of Good Better Best given the fact our adversaries are modernizing their nuclear programs, how do you assess our program is the Refurbishment Program adequate enough . Is it best . Or would we be serving our nation better by designing a new Nuclear Warhead with all the modern safety features and surety features we could build in given how far technology has advanced or are we is best doing what were doing in just refurbishing . Thank you, mr. Lynchman. We together with the department of defense through the Nuclear Weapons council set the requirements for modernization of our stockpile. And it is our judgment that what we have committed to doing in the three plus two strategy for modernization insures we will retain the deterrent capability we need to defend the United States and the allies and partners around the world. Were confident in this work. We believe the requirements that are presented in the three plus two strategy will enable us to deter any adversary. It enables us to reduce the stockpile in a way that makes it safer and more secure. And, therefore, we judge that this is the right strategy Going Forward and are working very hard to implement it. Thank you. I also would like to ask its a question about nonproliferation programs. Can you describe the technology designed to prevent additional states and activists from requiring Nuclear Materials . Thank you for giving me the opportunity to answer that question. The radiation portal monitors are part of what we have previously called a second line of defense program. And that is a critical part of our efforts to insure that the movement of material across borders does not go undetected. As we know the most important part of a country or a groups ability to build a Nuclear Weapon is getting access to that material. And so what we want toods do is insure we have Detection Capabilities in vulnerable places to allow us to know in real time when somebody may be moving so it can be interdicted and secured against acquisition by those who would do us harm. Secretary or madam secretary, how would you characterize the Cyber Security measures in place to protect Nuclear Enterprise and how resilient are our systems . The threat of cyber attack on all our systems we take very seriously sir. Obviously on Nuclear Issues we take that the most serious. Its some of the as we said its the most Important Mission we have. We are doing a wide variety of reviews on all of our systems all of our plat forms. We have concerned about our cyber vulnerabilities everywhere. We continue to really look at it closely. Right now i would judge it to be satisfactory. I think we need to continue to Pay Attention to that. Something im concerned about in particular. Thank you, secretary. Admiral winnefeld does the new start treaty remain in the u. S. National interest then i had some other follow up questions if time allows. Yes, sir. We believe this new start treaty does remain inside our national interests. We monitor continuously other nation and their behavior. We believe that russia is adhering to the new start treaty as far as we can tell. The principal value to me is our ability to verify what it is were doing. Wed love to have complete transparency but we believe the verification measures are adequate for us to have a better understanding of what theyre doing. We believe the new start treaty is still in our interest. Thank you. To all witnesses on the issue of verification how important are verification detection to detect cheating . 2014 defense Science Board concluded much work remains to be done on verification and Detection Technologies. And interagency cooperation. Do you agree and what gaps remain . That one you may have to do for the record. If yall dont mind, supplying that answer for the record, well try to keep moving with our limited time and some more votes coming up. But i appreciate the gentleman. Mr. Turner . Thank you mr. Chairman. As we look back over the recent events that have been happening with russia, there is no good news. Things keep getting worse. We have dangerous and aggressive Nuclear Threats and exercises directed against the United States. Nato allies and its neighbors. We have putin himself conducting Nuclear Weapons exercises. Imagine if our president conducted a Nuclear Weapons exercise what International Criticism they would be. They defy that criticism. And go to the next step of adopting openly discussed doctrine that russia intends to use Nuclear Weapons early in a conflict to deescalate and get the United States to back down, which is just inconceivable in my mind that someone would think the use of Nuclear Weapons is a deescalation because our doctrine is it is an escalation. Russia continues to violent the inf treaty as well as other arms control obligations. Without a response from the u. S. And the inf treaty. Not to mention the invasion and occupation and annexation of crimea. So admiral, what message would you want to send to the American Public and our allies and in contrast directly to putin about the dangerous path that russia is taking . Thank you for the question. You made a fairly kngood message for yourself. Its very important that the russians understand that far from being deesclatory. First use of weapons in a conflict like that risks escalation. They should consult chaos theory that its almost impossible to predict what the outcome would be of such a use of Nuclear Weapons. They need to understand were not falling for this trap. We are determined to protect and defend our allies within the commitments weve made to the nato alliance. And we will do that. And bluster and threats of Nuclear Weapons as deputy secretary work said in his Opening Statement are destined to fail. We will not let that deter us. I appreciate the strong words. When you look at russias actions, hybrid warfare, aggressive behavior occupying crimea. Threatening nations with military action if they participate in nato or Missile Defense deployment and then with the buzzing of ship and aircrafts in the approaching and aggressive manner, both our nato allies, what do you believe the risks are of conflict in europe with russia and with russias docktric docktric doctrine of Nuclear Weapons as deesclatory, what do you see of the resk of a conflict escalating to a Nuclear Exchange . I want to defer to an intelligence person. In my nonintelligence role the risk is certainly not smaller than it used to be based on all the rhetoric and all the actions that president putin and russia have taken. I do think they understand that we have a red line there. I do think they understand we have considerable capability to frustrate any moves that he might make in europe. And at the end of the day i believe that they will take that very seriously. We cant let down our guard in that regard in any way, shape or form. Thats why were investing more. Our very capable commander of the european command who also happened to be secular is very active in reassuring our allies and taking the right steps we believe to make sure that reassurance is backed with actual capability. I appreciate that. I think in the rhetoric from russia hybrid warfare that is undertaken, its aggressiveness, threats to neighbors, its deployment of new and threatening systems, and in the exercises that its undertaking, they need to hear those words from the United States that our military is strong and that we view our obligations to our allies as absolute. Thank you, admiral. Mr. Courtney. Thank you mr. Chairman and to the winstnesses. I want to focus on your comments on the Ohio Replacement Program which, again, you say all the right things about the fact theres going to be this short relatively short period of costs that is going to capsize the normal levels of the ship building account. Somebodys been on c power for the last eight years. Weve had that testimony over and over again. And there are many times i sympathize with the administration talking about sequestration. Thats our job to fix that. In this case i would like to observe what we have done on this side in terms of ohio is actually set up a mechanism to try and provide a positive solution to the problem. And so we set up the account last year. This year were talking about activating the account and empowering the navy through incremental, you know, purchasing authority multiyear purchasing authority to give them to tools to deal with this very challenging cost issue. Which everybody, again says the right things, that its the highest priority for our nation. Al if we dont do it t werewere going to drain the other forces. This morning general dun ford spent a large portion orphhis remarks that we need to deal with this. We had a surface hearing last year. Same thing. The conversation just always migrates to this issue. And so there were two high profile profile amendments on the floor of the house others on a bipartisan basis led the charge to protect this upgrade of the fund. 321111, 74 in the House Democratic caucus. People are starting to get to the point where we, your comments are we need to think about this. Were past that, very frankly. Were ready to act. And what im asking you is if you dont like the Sea Based Deterrence Fund fine. But come back to us with something. You just get the impression that the budget planners at the pentagon and the administration are just spectators here in terms of us trying to come up with a fix to this that will avoid all of the negative fallout, which again you described very powerfully here this morning. I was just wondering if you could share what your thoughts in terms of our work that were doing on this. In terms of whether at some point youre prepared to embrace it and help us advance what i think is a solution. That has precedent in the past in terms of the sea lift fund and ground based Missile Defense. Thank you sir. This is our number one mission. Were going to pay for it no matter what. In the past, congress has added money for strategic modernization during periods of these times. We hope that is going to happen again. We very much appreciate the theory of the case behind the fund. We believe there is going to have to be Something Like that to help us through. As i said up until this time, it has been theoretical. In 2021 the first ohio replacement we paid for. If we paid it in that single year it would be a 7 billion add to the navy. They average only about 16 billion in their entire account. It would be destructive to the navy to have to fit that in within their top line. So its we want to work with you and we are anxious to work t how to do this. But i just wanted to foot stomp something that the vice chairman said. Its one thing saying that we would eat it within a fixed top line, its that would cause enormous disrupgztion to our program not just in the navy but across all of our services. Were anxious to work with you, sir. We need to do it. Well, id like to tease out a little bit from you. What weve done is created a mechanism within the budget process, again giving, i think the incremental authority, you know all the tools that we know worked with virginia and carriers and i hope at some point, you know the powers that be will spit it out here in terms of whether or not theyre willing to use this fund. Which, obviously, the huge vote in Congress Shows that were ready. And in fact were moving forward. And we hope that the administration is going to help us solve this problem. I yield back. Thank you. Mr. Rogers. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I thank all the witnesses and admiral, thank you for your service. Congratulations on your retirement. Upcoming retirement. Two weeks ago this Committee Received a state departments second straight compline nonCompliance Report about russias violation of the imf treaty. For many years prior to this two years reports wed had evidence of their noncompliance. Its against that backdrop i want to ask this, the committee learned december the joint staff was conducting an assessment of possible military responses to russias noncompliance. And my understanding is that those that assessment you briefed us on that assessment by the way, in march. We appreciate that. Its my understanding that chairman dempsey has forwarded proposed responses to the president. Admiral, do you have a timeframe that you can suggest to us that you will get some direction from the white house as to military response to russias continued voilgzs . I dont have a specific time line for you. I know its something interagency policy committees are looking at consulting with allies on. I dont think that we want to necessarily rush into a definitive move because we would like to bring russia back into this treaty. There is no question we have options at hand that i cant really discuss in an unclassified hearing. Those options are available for use. Some of them are expensive. None of them contribute to rzs russia. They need to understand that. Were not rushing into anything. This has been going on for years. Its the last two years the administration has recognized it. Hes played us along and were just letting him. I dont understand why it continues to go on. I know youre not the president and you cant tell him what to do. But we need to be making some decisions and doing something proactively. Which leads me to my next question, im really worried about, you know, secretary work talked about the provocative statements. I think you made a reference to it that the Russian Military leadership has made toward our nato allies. Trying to jar their resolve. And im worried about them fracturing nato. I guess my question is, what is the u. S. Doing to alert our nato allies to the seriousness of russias violation and threat they pose. And what are we doing to reassure them well be there and everythings going to be okay . Sir weve had very close consultationwise our nato partners on the nature of the russi