During a House Armed Services Committee hearing prior to the congressional recess, Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA) spoke about President Trump's tariffs.
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00:00For that, I yield to the ranking member for his questions.
00:03Sort of building on that last question, Admiral Paparo and General Brunson,
00:07as I mentioned in my opening statement,
00:09what capabilities, just focusing for the moment on what the U.S. could do,
00:14do you most need, do you think would have the most deterrent effect?
00:19I know, obviously, everyone wants more ships, more planes, more everything,
00:22but if you could narrow it down to here are some of the most crucial things
00:26that could help you, just focusing on U.S. needs to deter.
00:31Both of you could give us an answer on that.
00:34Rankin, member, the most critical need to focus on is our counter C5ISR&T capability,
00:39which gives us freedom to maneuver, freedom to operate at lower risk
00:43throughout the area of responsibility.
00:46Secure communications, basically.
00:48The ability to dazzle, deceive, destroy the adversary's ability to see and sense,
00:54and then hardening our own ability to give a high-fidelity common operating picture
01:00to units to unlock their ability to operate tactically.
01:03Yeah.
01:04Any piece of that in particular where you see the greatest need right now,
01:08understanding that I'll ask you this in the classified session as well
01:11and get into more detail.
01:13Posture hearings are different this year.
01:14We haven't got the budget yet, so it's a little weird.
01:16But as we lead up to the budget, hopefully we'll come in about a month,
01:21what would be most important to be in there to meet that need?
01:24Leveraging the United States' ability, having 90% of the spacelift in the world
01:30to bring counter space capability, and then to continue to enhance our cyber capability,
01:37and many others in the form of long-range weapons,
01:40in the form of unmanned and AI systems that affect air denial and sea denial
01:46in enclosed places, such as the Taiwan Strait, augment these.
01:50Yeah.
01:50I'm just going to ask this.
01:53So General Hawk got fired.
01:54He's the head of NSA cyber.
01:56How has that impacted your ability to work with NSA and cyber
01:59on those very critical issues that you just outlined?
02:02I say we're ready to work with whatever competent individual is in place,
02:08and we'll continue to try to enhance that ability.
02:11Did you think General Hawk was a competent individual who you could work with?
02:15Yes.
02:17General Brunson, on the first question about capabilities,
02:20what would you most need in your command?
02:23Sir, as I had the opportunity to mention yesterday in the Hack D closed session,
02:29all my requests are inhabited within the IPL of Indopaycom.
02:34I would tell you that as I look at the more ephemeral domains of cyber, EW, and space,
02:39I'm looking to be engaged in a more fulsome manner.
02:43And I think that that's where we can talk in closed about some of those particular capabilities
02:48that we need to bring to bear on the peninsula.
02:51But to an earlier question that you mentioned, ranking member,
02:56I'd like to say that if we were trying to project strength,
02:59one of the things that we're continuing to work on right now is the assailable flank
03:03that is United Nations Command.
03:07There are 18 total nations there, and so I see the KTO as being a bit wider,
03:11and being able to leverage those other nations in the Republic of Korea and beyond
03:16is a way for us to continue to sort of underpin the things that we're doing on the peninsula with legitimacy.
03:23I'm running out.
03:24That's really important.
03:25I want to get to that, but I want to ask Mr. Note those questions.
03:28So as I mentioned in my opening statement, we are alienating every single partner in the region,
03:31and you made the statement, you know, America first doesn't mean America alone.
03:36I'm puzzled.
03:37What are we doing to enhance relationships?
03:40I think we've all seen on display what we're doing to sort of make those relationships more problematic.
03:45But what is the administration doing to try to strengthen partnerships
03:49when they're launching a trade war against all of our partners?
03:54Ranking member Smith, so as you know, Secretary Hex says,
03:58just came back from his first trip to the Indo-Pacific, where he visited both the Philippines and Japan.
04:04He had a chance to reaffirm our commitment to those important alliances with—
04:09What is that commitment?
04:11I mean, we could all go on vacation to Japan and say how much we love the country.
04:15But what is that commitment?
04:17Because there doesn't seem to be any commitment other than threats and bullying.
04:20It's reaffirming our commitment—our treaty obligations to both the Philippines and Japan.
04:27He announced a number of things that the department is currently doing to work with both the Philippines and Japan
04:33to accelerate and strengthen our relationships in the Philippines, for example.
04:38He made an announcement about bilateral soft—I'm sorry, special operations forces training that we're conducting.
04:45Just one last question.
04:46How much damage do you think the trade war that has just been launched does to all of what you just said?
04:53Ranking member Smith, in all the engagements and the personal engagements I've had,
04:57in all the engagements that I've seen the Secretary has had,
05:02our relationships with our allies and partners in the region are strong and remain strong.
05:07It's—this only started a couple days ago, so we'll see where it goes.
05:11I yield back.
05:12Thank you, Mr. Chairman.