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  • 5/29/2025
During a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing last week, Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD) spoke about a proposed plan to relocate the Air Force to a different band of spectrum.
Transcript
00:00you've been asked to meet. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
00:03Thank you, Senator King. Senator Rounds.
00:07Thank you, Mr. Chairman. First, let me just say thank you to all three of you for your service to our country.
00:13Secretary Mink, I know that you're drinking out of a fire hose right now,
00:17so I'm not going to get into all of the current situation with regard to the Air Force.
00:22But I would like to discuss something that I think is critical, and I know that you've got a background in it,
00:26and that is, and it'll come to no surprise to the rest of the committee,
00:29I want to talk about Spectrum for just a minute.
00:32We've heard from, I know, no surprise, right?
00:36We've now heard from 24 senior DOD officials in hearings over the last two years,
00:40including every service chief and eight combatant commanders,
00:44that vacating the 3.1 to 3.45 gigahertz band of the Spectrum
00:49would have extremely serious and negative consequences for our warfighting capabilities.
00:54In fact, the Department of the Navy alone has estimated that relocating their systems
00:58to a different part of the Spectrum band would cost them approximately $250 billion.
01:07How would forcing the Air Force to vacate the 3.1 to 3.45 gigahertz
01:13and other critical bands of the electromagnetic spectrum
01:16impact the service's warfighting capabilities?
01:20First off, Senator, thank you for the support on this particular issue.
01:27As you mentioned, we've been discussing this for quite some time.
01:31And for other members of the committee and other parts of Congress and support in this area,
01:37one of the things we'd discuss a little bit is what would it cost to do that
01:41and what would be the impact?
01:43I think that one of the things we're struggling with a little bit is that
01:47just due to the nature of physics of how these systems operate
01:51and how the atmosphere absorbs energy, that's a pretty special band.
01:56And it's difficult and maybe in some ways almost impossible just to move to other bands.
02:02So in some cases, it may be very difficult, if not impossible,
02:08to totally replicate some of the capabilities we have in that band.
02:12And it would take quite some time to do so even if we could.
02:15So I think that's what we're struggling with now, Senator,
02:17is how do we do that analysis to figure out what we could do
02:20and how we would move and what spectrum we'd move to.
02:22So it's difficult to quantify.
02:24Our near-peer adversaries know that, don't they?
02:27Oh, of course, Senator.
02:28And the impacts would be pretty significant.
02:29They would love to see us voluntarily abandon that particular part of the spectrum
02:34from what we use it for, which is radar.
02:37Fair to say?
02:38I would agree with that, Senator.
02:40It would be an unforced error for us to ever give up that part of the spectrum
02:44for one of its highest rated uses.
02:47The physics involved in it means that this is the place where radar really works.
02:51Without a much better transition plan and understanding of how we would do that,
02:56it would be a mistake, Senator.
03:01Do you have any kind of an estimate as to what it would cost if we could migrate someplace else
03:06even if it would not provide us as good of capabilities?
03:09Any idea yet at all?
03:11I think we actually had this discussion last night.
03:14I actually don't think just because of that we don't have a coherent plan of where
03:19and how we would maneuver or move, we actually don't have a good number for you, Senator.
03:25General Salzman, based on what you know, the potential paths forward for building out
03:34President Trump's Golden Dome, is it possible to make it work if the Department of Defense
03:40were forced to vacate portions of the 3.1 to 3.45 GHz band and other unnamed critical bands
03:48of the spectrum that the Space Force currently uses as well?
03:53Senator, as we evaluate the sensors that are going to be necessary to pick up hypersonics,
03:58to pick up cruise missiles, to pick up ballistic missiles, the radars are essential in that area.
04:05And that 3.1 to 3.45 is, as the Secretary mentioned, the physical properties of that spectrum range are ideal for that kind
04:13of detection using radar, and so the sensing part of the Golden Dome would suffer if we had to vacate.
04:19This is a tiered system.
04:20It's not one which is totally space-based.
04:22There are certain assets in space that will help us to detect incoming weapon systems,
04:26but it is critical that it is tiered with other systems that are based on the terrain
04:34and in the area of the targets that we're protecting, correct?
04:37Most of our space domain awareness, which is what's required to close that kill chain
04:41as things transit through space, most of those sensors are ground-based.
04:46The system that we're building, the dark system, lives in this particular spectrum band as well
04:51and is critical to space domain awareness.
04:54I'm just going to very, very quickly.
04:56General Alvin, we're contracted right now for 100 B-21s.
05:00Anywhere close to the number that we're going to need?
05:04Senator, if we could snap our fingers right now, I'd take as many as we could get right now.
05:10So as we look to the path of how many we get into the future and we look at opportunities,
05:14we also need to look at what this B-52 modernization program, if it goes worse than we hope,
05:20then we would need more, if it goes better than we hope.
05:23I would say right now I'll take all I can get with the funding, but it's an incredible capability
05:27that turns out right now it's testing pretty well.
05:30So the 100 minimum is certainly something we can stand behind.
05:33When we look at what the maximum is, I really want to look at the risk over time and opportunities over time.
05:37Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
05:40And thank you, Senator Peters.
05:42You're recognized.
05:43Thank you, Mr.

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