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HASC passes $733 billion defense authorization bill
**unedited, do not publish**
The House Armed Services Committee passed its policy bill on party lines, 33-24, authorizing a Defense Department budget of $733 billion with top Republicans voting against it.
The committee debated into the early morning hours, pushing the 20 hour mark before voting on the contentious topline budget amendment at sunrise. That amendment from HASC ranking member Mac Thornberry (R-Texas) sought to bump the topline $17 billion, which included 5G and artificial intelligence research. It was defeated 27-30.
Many committee Republicans, including Thornberry, voted against referring the bill to the full House.
“Everybody, without exception, wants to get to yes on the House floor,” he told reporters following the vote. “I think we’ll have to regroup and analyze...Get ready for another day.”
The amendment set out to match the Senate-approved $750 billion authorization bill that passed in May. But defense committee chairman, Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), maintained that anything more than the planned out and justified $733 billion would likely lead to waste.
Smith said granting the increase for the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act would be “irresponsible” and even at $733 billion, the bill would be the largest defense budget the HASC has ever authorized, Smith said during the marathon markup session.
“The Pentagon still can’t perform an audit. They can’t tell you what they spent money on last year. They can’t tell you how many buildings they have,” the chairman said. “There is always more money that can be spent at the Pentagon.”
Thornberry maintained the additional monies would've been spent on specific capabilities.
Tech provisions glide through unscathed
Debate (and votes) often fell along party lines and grew more quarrelsome as the night, and morning, pressed on. The committee debated for hours on nuclear power provisions, emergency contraception, sexual assault, Guantanemo, and Space Corps -- the latter of which was added as an amendment.
But tech provisions sailed through the markup with little to no contestation, and included funds and directives pertaining to 5G, artificial intelligence, robotics, cybersecurity (operations and training), and software.
The most surprising was Rep. Matt Gaetz’s (R-Fla.) amendment to spread success of the Air Force’s prized software factory, Kessel Run, across the service. Tucked in one of the early en bloc amendment passages, the HASC calls for the Defense Department to lay out a plan for how Kessel Run can be scaled across the service’s programs of record. The program has gained notoriety for quickly developing and fielding software capabilities.
DOD would have to brief the committee by Sept. 1 on the Kessel Run program and how the commercial capabilities developed can be wed with other Air Force acquisition programs.
That briefing would include Kessel Run’s current priorities and compliance with current acquisition authorities, as well as how the technologies Kessel Run creates can be transitioned to established programs of record and use of commercial technologies.
Adopted amendments to the mark included using AI-run robotics in chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear environments and additional personnel management authorities for the Joint AI Center.
The draft bill adds a directive for assessing cybersecurity posture of Defense Department entities involved in the development, storage, processing, and transmission of data related to biothreats and pathogens. It also requires DOD to submit a quadrennial cyber posture review, and “assess the value of establishing a Cyber Force as a separate uniformed service,” according to amendment text.
Supply chain has been a major theme with the markups and a couple of new amendments continue that trend. According to the text, DOD would have to report on the strategic and operational consequences of using Huawei or ZTE in their 5G wireless networks and provide a list of Russian and Chinese academic institutions with predilection for intellectual property theft, cyber espionage, improper technology transfers, or take direction from armed forces or intelligence agencies.
For science and tech personnel, the bill establishes a DOD fellowship program for national security professionals with STEM degrees and requires a report on how expanding the hacking for defense program to 25 universities by fiscal 2022 can be sustained.
About the Author
Lauren C. Williams is a staff writer at FCW covering defense and cybersecurity.
Prior to joining FCW, Williams was the tech reporter for ThinkProgress, where she covered everything from internet culture to national security issues. In past positions, Williams covered health care, politics and crime for various publications, including The Seattle Times.
Williams graduated with a master's in journalism from the University of Maryland, College Park and a bachelor's in dietetics from the University of Delaware. She can be contacted at lwilliams@fcw.com, or follow her on Twitter @lalaurenista.
Click here for previous articles by Wiliams.
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