Lieutenant Colonel Adam Scher: Thank you very much for coming. My name is [inaudible] I am the JIATF 401 spokesperson. I'll be the moderator for all of us this morning. General Ross is here with our Deputy Director for Acquisitions; Colonel Tony Lindh, that’s spelled L-I-N-D-H. And our Deputy Director for Science and Technology; Colonel Scott Humr. That’s spelled H-U-M-R.
Before we get started, I just want to remind everyone a little bit of the ground rules and set us up for a very worthwhile and fruitful 30-minute discussion. We'll be speaking on the record today. The scope of today's discussion is on the industry day and opening remarks. We will not talk about any operational missions or concerns. So, I’ll please ask you to gear the questions to the kinds of things that have been presented on industry day. My team is here. We've got representatives from the Army as well. If there are any other additional questions or things outside of the scope of what industry day is about that you really feel you want to talk about.
We are on the record. These comments can be attributed to General Ross, senior leaders in JIATF, Colonel Lindh and Colonel Humr in Acquisitions and Science and Technology. I will moderate and just ask you to introduce yourself to the panel with your name and what affiliation you represent. I'll ask for everybody--we will have time for everybody to get a question. I'm just going to go down the line. There's no special order. You have one follow-up and please allow everybody else to ask their own questions. If there’s time at the end, after everyone gets one question and one follow-up. [inaudible] Does anyone have any questions before we begin?
Cal Biesecker: Cal Biesecker, Defense Daily. So the enterprise-wide command and control contract is, I guess, being wrapped up, and you're about to award a contract here. And a critical part of that, apparently, is the tests and standard protocols. How is this coming together in terms of, like, when you award this contract, when are we going to see this capability roll out? Are there people on the marketplace already ready to support that? It sounds like a huge undertaking.
Colonel Tony Lindh: Yes, it's a huge undertaking. I think you understand why it's so compelling based on the boss's opening comments. Really quickly, we realized that was the biggest gap in the operational world. And that gap isn't just homeland. It proliferates across anybody that's executing counter-UAS. So marketplace, really good question. We have some capabilities on the marketplace that, I hate this term, but will be plug-and-play because they're already integrated into several different C2 systems, and whatever we land on, there will be products that are already integrated ready to go.
There's also, I think in the opening comments, you understood the message to let everybody in the industry know that if they have capability ready today, the fastest way for us to get in the warfighter standards is for it to be integrated and compatible with the common C2 system. And the data standards is a really large part of that. If someone in industry has to put a whole bunch of time and effort and money into becoming compliant with that, it means they're slower. So we want industry to understand and be transparent like that's the direction we're going in for this massive undertaking.
Brigadier General Matt Ross: And I'll add just a little to that, Cal. So the way you worded your question, talking about the data, and this data undertaking, and I talk about our capacity. What we have done, and this is not a JIATF thing, this is a Department of War effort. And so up to the undersecretary of war for Army, we have full support across the Department of War to pursue this enterprise-wide license and heavily leveraging CDAO to make sure that we get it right on not only where the data is being maintained, but how we structure the contract. So DIU, CDAO, ANS, Army Contract and Command, HRB, and we've pulled in all of the services and our interagency partners as part of JIATF to say what are your concerns or requirements with an enterprise-wide license. Of course they're going to have some concerns, and they want to pursue--some people have concerns. It's only by understanding what those concerns are up front that we can end up with a solution that actually works for everybody and how quickly, once you have a selection made [inaudible]
CB: What are your thoughts on this enterprise-wide C2 solution that you think might be able to work in the pods and eDOCs?
CTL: I don't know if we have a precise answer to your question because there are already installations in places that are using a similar capability and so it could be instant. So, you know, in terms of a more deliberate building plan for some of the strategic sites that we're focused on, I think you'll see it in the next two, three months. But it may be sooner. So I don't, you know, I'm not quite sure if that's precise enough answer to the question.
Dan Schere: Dan Schere from Inside Defense. Thanks for doing this. Brigadier General Ross, I know you had mentioned the JIEDDO during your talk. Just maybe give me a sense of, in terms of the scale of JIATF, is this going to be sort of budget-wise on a bigger scale than JIEDDO? I know there was something like $3.6 billion allocated for JIEDDO in its first year. Given that, you know, you all have said, you know, the drone threat is sort of akin to what the IED threat was 20 years ago, what is the scale in terms of dollars that JIATF is going to need? Are we going to exceed what we saw for JIEDDO? Just maybe talk to me about that.
BGMR: That's a good question. So I don't know exactly what the resources were for JIEDDO, so I can’t do a relative comparison. What I can tell you is it the challenge of unmanned systems--the threat posed for unmanned systems is going to far exceed the threat that we saw in [inaudible]. The IED problem, while we made some progress, we never really got it in front of us. That's a weapon for which there's no commercial application. And we're going to see proliferation of unmanned systems into our commercial airspace. It's going to be very common in the next few years.
And what that means is that our ability to manage that airspace safely and then protect critical infrastructure that must be protected, whether it's formations or locations, that market's just going to continue to grow over time. I don't think that means that JIATF will continue to grow over time. Like I said, we're small. We want to stay small. We want to do as much good as we can for our warfighters, and we want to make sure that any solutions we develop are sustainable, which means we get them into the services of who are responsible for manning, training, and equipping their formations inside of the department. And with interagency partners, we take those solutions and get them into their ecosystem so the way that they recruit new talent, train new talent, and employ systems, those countermeasures are baked into their internal processes.
DS: Where do you think the resourcing is going to need to come from for ‘27? I mean, there's been talk about a second reconciliation bill. Will you all rely heavily on that?
CTL: Rely heavily on reconciliation? I don't think so. I think the budget that the president sends over will account for the magnitude of the problem, but we don't have the specifics.
LTCAS: Drew?
Drew Lawrence: Good morning. Thanks for doing this. My name is Drew Lawrence. I'm with Defense Scoop. General Ross, in your panel, you mentioned going to Ukraine. I'm wondering if you could give us kind of the five W's on that trip. Why’d you go? What was the purpose? And how does that trip inform the broader counter-UAS effort for the U.S. military?
BGMR: So I did go to Ukraine, and I went to understand the technology that they're using to protect their sites and their people from the threat of unmanned systems, and I did go to understand the TTPs, the tactics, techniques, and procedures that they're employing very effectively to protect their forces. One of the things we're responsible for is the counter-UAS portion of the drone deal. And so as we look at transferring new TTPs or technology from the most contested environments into the Department of War, we are the lead for that counter-UAS. So I wanted to see it first hand. What it did for me is it confirmed the direction we’re headed in the counter-UAS. It confirmed that we have to start with a network, and that's what they have in Ukraine, is they have an integrated network of [inaudible] sensor that allows them to see threats before they come to the East or to the South and you can see it in the depth of the inter-related forces and effectors to be able defeat those threats before they hit the target.
We need to do the same thing. So that confirms for me the direction we’re headed with common C2. It confirmed that there was no silver bullet. The threat posed by unmanned systems requires a whole bunch of different capability and the capability they require on the borderline troops is different from the capability they require to keep. The same will be true for us. The systems, the TTPs, and the architecture may look different on the southern border than it does in the national capital region. And that’s okay. But that was a perfect trip and those are my big takeaways.
DL: And for my follow-up question, this is a broad one, but is the U.S. military for counter-UAS both domestically and for overseas use where it needs to be? And if not, or if so, where are the big-picture items that need to happen moving forward?
BGMR: Yeah, I'll tell you, from a counter-UAS perspective, we have very effective systems. We’ve got them proliferated across the Department of War and other agency partners. However, with a threat that's evolving this quickly, we've got to keep pace with the threat. So we've got to consistently be investing in new technology and proliferating that as quickly as we can to our warfighters both at home and abroad. I don’t know if that answers your question.
DL: [inaudible] for counter-UAS.
BGMR: We have very effective capability and we’re working diligently to improve it every day.
DL: Thank you.
Meredith Roaten: Hi, this is Meredith Roaten with Janes. I wanted to ask you, given the heightened security that U.S. installations domestically and abroad are under right now, have you been given any directives to accelerate the timeline of your work for counter-UAS in terms of force protection and to accelerate the work that you talked about on the panel today?
BGMR: So, we work in support of the combatant commanders and in support of the services. To your question, you’re talking about the combatant commanders and current environment. And so, without talking about current operations, the operational security, I would tell you anywhere we face new threats, we try to be well sited on those threats and deliver capability commensurate with what our service members are facing. That sounds very general. What it means is that we're paying attention to what's going on and making sure that we’re getting them everything they require to protect themselves, both at home and abroad. And so, I wouldn't say this is exclusive to the Middle East right now, but we're absolutely thinking about Department of War partners and allies locations globally that could come under threat to make sure they’ve got the equipment they need to protect themselves.
MR: Do you assess that there's kind of a greater need to get protection to domestic installations, given the heightened security that they're operating under right now?
BGMR: That is something that we are always looking at. We have counter-UAS equipment across the United States today. It doesn't get a lot of publicity because people just say they don't know it's there or they don’t know the locations that we have. We have incursions at the Department of War installations globally [inaudible] and our countermeasures do a good job of protecting those sites. Do we need to continue to expand our counter-UAS posture? Yes. That's exactly what we're doing. And we're doing so to ensure that we're prepared to defend against those most likely and most dangerous threats, which are just different in the homeland than they are overseas, where they face the state adversary.
LTCAS: Courtney?
Courtney McBride: Courtney McBride with Bloomberg News. Thanks for doing this. I mean, you mentioned some of these incursions at installations, and I'm curious, General Ross, during your opening remarks, you talked about the interagency partnership and about FAA specifically as being a key partner. I'm curious. There have been some incidents that resulted in NOTAMs, and I'm just wondering what kind of steps are being taken by the interagency to ensure better coordination. I know that there's been some congressional concern about this as well. So what kind of assurances can you provide leaders, the lawmakers, everyone about that?
BGMR: First, I'd say we're partnering closely with the FAA. I’ve talked to the FAA administrator. We've done multiple iterations of testing and evaluation hand-in-hand with the FAA. This is going to be used inside of the national airspace to keep our service members, our airports, and our critical infrastructure safe. And so there's no space there. The threat in the national airspace is the illegal use of unmanned systems in restricted airspace. That is a threat. And so sometimes people want to talk about it as if the threat is poor coordination or stiffness in a certain direction. What we should not allow anywhere around these DOW installations or around commercial airspaces restricted to ensure the safety of the ask, we should not allow illegal flights of drones. And that's what we're tracking there.
CM: Right. I mean, I think the area of concern was that counter-UAS systems are being operated without proper coordination with FAA so that potentially, you know, that there could be a risk to somebody physically. I think that was the question that was----
BGMR: Yeah. So every system we use inside NORTHCOM is coordinated with the FAA. And we've got ongoing additional evaluation of specific directed energy systems with the FAA and that's taking place today.
LTCAS: Mike?
Mike Brest: Hi, I’m Mike with Washington Examiner. You mentioned earlier, General Ross, how there might be different systems in place in the southern border versus D.C. I'm hoping you can address given how expansive the United States and your priorities and targets and defending different types of areas and how you’re going about trying to cover the continental United States.
BGMR: Can you ask that one more time?
MB: Yeah. You mentioned how the systems you may use in the southern border versus, say, Washington, D.C. could be different. Can you just sort of talk about how, given that the United States is so large, you know, we need different types of systems and why some systems may be used some places versus others?
BGMR: Yeah. So defense of the homeland, we work in support of NORAD and NORTHCOM and so General Leo and I talk about the threat of unmanned systems where he has concerns and where we need to prioritize our efforts. At Department of War installations, the services have a responsibility for counter-UAS kits and outfits that they need there. If there's an incursion, we look for or we try to assess the threat and identify if we have a gap capability and if we have the ability to reinforce those areas based on the identified gaps. Really, the crux of it though is why we think different in the southern border than we do in the National Capitol Region and it’s because of the intelligence picture. And so there's still a tendency to think about counter-UAS from a defensive perspective. And it's like a castle defense. If I'm inside the castle, I've got something coming at me, how do I stop it? And don’t believe that counter-UAS begins and ends at a fenceline.
I think we have to be partnering closely with federal and local law enforcement to understand indicators and warnings. It's important because, number one, you can prevent the attack before it happens and that's always the goal. But if it does happen, you’ve actually optimized your counter-UAS systems based off the most likely threat. And I think it's different because across most of the United States, if the threat is either an inspired, enabled, or directed actor who’s in touch with a foreign adversary, or it's a radicalized person, they're most likely to try to weaponize a small drone that's affordable and doesn't draw as much scrutiny as opposed to trying to buy it cheap. And we have good tripwires for that, right? And so that's why our counter-UAS systems don't work exactly the same in each place.
But that's what we're talking to installation commanders about across the homeland to make sure they have the training and the expertise to do that analysis. What is my most likely threat, and how can I get after it? How can I partner with the law enforcement that's outside the gate? If I'm at a period of time where there's an elevated threat posture, should we put more guards at the gate or should increase the number of patrols that local police are doing outside the gate. We should understand from an installation that may be several thousand acres, which portion of that installation really needs to be protected because that's where we should array our resources. And so that's what we're trying to do with installation commanders.
It's really important to me that they all have the ability to tailor their solution based off their anticipated threat, how they’re going to man their systems and how they're going to sustain them over time. In some places, we have service members that man the systems. In some places, we rely on contractors. In some places, it's air defense soldiers. In some places, we call it borrowed military manpower. It's a tank unit that is tasked to provide 10 soldiers for six months. And so you have people that may have less training on that type of a system, and we've got to be able to ensure that whatever we field to those installations takes all of those things into consideration and the ability to sustain it over time. And so if I gave an installation commander--one of the biggest concerns they had is that I'm going to give them a really exquisite system. And I would say congratulations. You just got the best counter-UAS system we got. It cost me $15 million, but now it's yours. But if now that costs them $500,000 a year to sustain it, and it takes 20 service members to run it every day, they can't really use it. And so we didn’t really solve their problem, we just made it look good on the acquisition chart. That's a really long question to your question, but----
LTCAS: Any follow-up?
MB: Is there anything you can sort of combine what you just said with the question earlier about the current threat level domestically? Have you had conversations with base leaders within the recent weeks or within this week or so about what they're seeing about potential new threats or additional threats?
BGMR: Yeah, I'm constantly in contact with our commanders in the field. They have the responsibility, but what they do is they call me and say, hey, what initial capability do you have on hand? Here's the problem I’m facing. I've been dealing with that daily since last Saturday, which is not new for us. We actually do this really well. We prioritize resources really well based off threats. And so it may not be a situation where I can go to Tony and say, hey, we need to buy new systems and deliver it to this location because it will take too long. But we can take existing systems that are located at another site that's a lower priority and we can ship those along with the people to operate it to increase the protective posture in the near term.
CM: Is that just a regular cadence----
LTCAS: Sorry, Courtney. We’ll get a chance to go back, but Ellie’s turn.
Eleanor Watson: Hi, Ellie Watson with CBS. You mentioned in your remarks that the urgency since February 27th has increased tenfold as the lessons have been entering the national conversation. What about the deadly attack in Kuwait leads into those lessons?
BGMR: So I'm going to talk about the operational--current operations inside of CENTCOM. What I would tell you is that I believe one of the reasons we stood up JIATF 401 to surge against this problem is because we didn’t want to wait for a 9/11 event inside the United States to address the threat of unmanned systems. And what has happened since the--over the past week in the Middle East is we have elevated the sense of urgency against getting a lot of attention in terms of how we maintain the capability and capacity to deal with the threat of these systems. We knew it was there. We've been working against the problem. This has just elevated the conversation nationally here at home.
EW: And then you mentioned in your opening remarks about the commercial off-the-shelves capabilities, but with things like the Shaheds, is that a new problem? Would you characterize that as a new problem or something that already has defenses from the Pentagon?
BGMR: Shaheds is not a new problem. And so when the JCO was stood up in 2020, I was 100% confident we were dealing with Shaheds [inaudible]. But working with General Gainey then, we've put much effort into developing a capability to counter those systems, and our countermeasures are good. So it's not a new problem. But if you reframe it and say, well, we're going to change the way we think about counter-UAS, it's more than shooting the Shahed, it’s the disposition of forces. It's protective posture. It's physical infrastructure and physical barriers that increase survivability. It's that layered defense partnered with host nation if you’re working in another country or with federal and state law enforcement that we've been working with here in the homeland. It's making sure that you've got the ecosystem set up for indicators and warnings in an environment where we're fighting the same adversary. Indicators and warnings are one thing. We actually want greater detail on what are their most likely targets because that allows us to partner with commanders in the field to make good decisions on how to increase survivability.
Miko Hoto: So you talked a lot about Ukraine informing this work. Are there any other conflicts or AORs that you are following closely or have visited or would like to visit in order to keep pushing this along?
BGMR: So I'm looking globally at anywhere that people are using unmanned systems to do harm. And I want to understand what they're doing and get the lessons learned from our partners and allies there. So yes, we're absolutely looking at Ukraine. We’ve been looking at the lessons that Israel learned over the past several years. We're looking at the Western Hemisphere. It doesn't get as much media attention, but we have threats in the Western Hemisphere that should be informing our investment in new capability and the disposition of our forces. So we're absolutely looking at that.
MH: Is there anywhere else you'd like to get out to?
BGMR: Thanks. That was part of your first question I didn't answer.
MH: That's okay.
BGMR: I didn't answer it. I actually want to get out to places across the United States to see what we have available today to better understand the gaps that may be present. And so I've done that a lot with the FIFA World Cup Task Force. I've talked to every host city for the World Cup to understand their capabilities, their posture. We provided, as part of the notice of funding opportunity for FEMA where they were providing additional resources for the World Cup to build out additional defenses, we ensured that each of those cities had access to the DLA, so that they could access defense, develop, test, and validate the counter-UAS capability. I was down with the NCUTC, the National Counter-UAS Training Center that the FBI is running in Huntsville. I was down there a few weeks ago, talking with their team about what they're doing. They have responsibility for a couple of the games themselves.
I'm monitoring the NSSEs, the National Special Security Events, where we seek requests for assistance from the Department of War to help and other federal agencies for counter-UAS, focused on that for the World Cup. Also focused on America 250 here at the National Capital Region. And what I meant in my opening comments about the threat and elevating this discussion is that if you thought that you were potentially susceptible at these widely attended gatherings, if you thought that two weeks ago, and you could draw a line between somebody and say, hey, there's a threat here, there's an intent, and there's a capability, I think that threat has just increased. At a minimum, we should think about it that way. And so we should be trying to consistently improve our posture. And I was able to [inaudible]
Unknown reporter: Hi, my name's [inaudible] I was wondering if you could talk a little bit more about the actual structure of the contract for the marketplace, whether on ramping will remain open, where the funding is, what type of funding the contract will provide and if it's a multi-agency contract.
CTL: You don't want to take this one? No, I'm happy to. So it's an IDIQ contract. It's open to the entire federal government, including our interagency partners. The funding comes from any customer that wants to use the contract. Some of it could be JIATF efforts, some of it could be interagency efforts, and then the list goes on and on. The mechanics of it, in terms of on-ramping and off-boarding, it's immature at the moment. But we have JIATF-approved capabilities on there, so things that have been tested and are fielded in the hands of warfighters today. We also have things that are under assessment that we procure through the marketplace. And then anything that's a customer-generated demand will facilitate on-boarding onto the marketplace so that it can be procured on that contract. The real benefit of the contract is speed. It's an IDIQ that says you can on-board capabilities very quickly and get them into the hands of the warfighter.
LTCAS: We've got time for about two more questions. Any follow-up? Go ahead.
Unknown reporter: I was going to ask about what type of vendors would be targeted for this, or if it’s commercial off-the-shelf technology offers, or if there's space for [inaudible] and other startup tech companies.
CTL: Good question. Say it one more time.
Unknown reporter: Who is the vendor base for this contract?
CTL: Yeah, everybody. But that's really complicated, because if it's a capability that we're interested in that works, they can offer proposals through our commercial solutions opening. That's one way we'll identify capabilities that we might transition to the marketplace for larger procurements. But it's not exclusive in terms of counter-UAS capability.
EW: I'll just be real quick. The FAA piece in the opening remarks, you said joint testing with the FAA at their sites, was that happening before the two incidents in Texas, and has it increased since?
BGMR: Yes, it was happening before. Excuse me. What I want to provide is the entry point for the FAA and the Department of War for these types of test events. So instead of being coordinated with every service, they're all pursuing different technologies and a lot of cases it’s emerging technology where we can gather additional data. I just want to pull all that together and make sure that if the Air Force has something they’re not always using the same system, that we're transferring that information. And I want to make sure that the FAA has access to all of the engineers and expertise that we have internal to the Department. We all want the same thing, and so we should work together as one.
MR: I just wanted to clarify something about the Replicator 2 funding, which I know is being renamed to e something else. But is it capability--does it go on the marketplace, and then those funds can be used to buy it? Or do you buy it through the Replicator 2 funds and then it goes on to the marketplace? Like, what's the link between those two I guess?
CTL: It's--so the JIATF has the funding that was Replicator 2 planned. We would get capabilities on the marketplace, and then that funding is applied to the contract to procure the capabilities.
MR: But then customers could also use their own funding to procure outside of those?
CTL: Yes, for whatever their unique needs are.
BGMR: I actually want to add a little bit. So if you think about it, one question I would ask is why do we need a marketplace? Well, we started with unmanned systems, and we started building drones, big drones, they were very expensive. They were centrally managed and then prioritized at the highest levels of the Department. And then over time, the technology changed, so people started producing smaller drones for lower cost. And we realized that there's some balance between centrally managed systems and distributed systems that should be able to be purchased by our formations. Small system, they should be able to buy it, integrate it, and help them do their job. I believe the same thing is true of countermeasures. The same thing is true for countermeasures for counter-UAS. So historically, we have centrally managed these systems because they're like air defense systems. And so they're exquisite. They're expensive. They require service members who are specifically trained to do that.
As that technology changes and there's lower cost solutions and solutions that require less of a training permit, there's going to be some level of assistance that can be procured locally, whether it's in 5th Fleet or 5th Corps, they can procure that locally. And we want to make sure that as that change happens in technology, we're giving them access to be able to do so and make informed decisions with the benefit of testing the signals across the department.
CB: Now, just getting back to the Kuwaiti example, I know there's only so much that needs to talk about operations, but it seemed like there was a gap there. A low-level threat came in, and unfortunately, it caused a tragic incident. So is there a lot of those gaps when you look across the force where this just wasn't--I don’t know if it wasn’t thought of or just didn't have the resources because they couldn't afford them, but I would imagine that is a big takeaway, is just like, hey, you know, we were expecting this. We weren't expecting that here. How are you going to address that?
BGMR: [inaudible] the details of current operations. I haven't heard any specific questions there for OSW. What I can tell you is that in our layer of defense, we should account for all of that. And in terms of gaps, we're consistently developing a new capability that provides greater effectiveness at lower cost because that allows us to stay on the right side of the cost curve on interceptor versus threat. So as threats become less expensive, of course our interceptors are going to become less expensive as well. That's not new information, but it's elevated in the discussion today compared to what it was last week. So we have absolutely been driving at this problem and confident that we can protect our forces. They have fantastic capability. Admiral Cooper has fantastic capability inside of SITCOM. I just won’t talk about any specifics.
LTCAS: Courtney, you have the last question.
CM: Thanks. Just to follow up on your conversation about installations and providing systems to help them, I'm just curious, is there a regular venue or kind of cadence for those conversations with installation commanders or unit commanders about what their needs are and making sure that you're taking into consideration those geographic and manning differences across the force?
BGMR: The answer is yes. But it won't be a simple answer because a simple answer would be, hey, there's one forum, and we do it with everybody. But there's so many people out there, and all the use cases are different that requires us to have more use than just one. So we've met with all of the installation commands for their services. As we've clarified authorities for installation commanders, we’ve pulled them all together and said here’s exactly what you can do. The services have routine touch points with their installation commanders. We have installation planner courses run from the counter-UAS university, which were responsible. We have planner courses that allow installation commanders to understand how they will rate this equipment to be effective.
We're always open in answering questions from the field. We have people contact us on a very consistent basis asking questions. We're trying to be really responsive to them there. And then we’re looking at integrating that training and expertise into existing pipelines for professional military education across the department. And so, as an example, the Army runs an installation commander pre-command course. And so if somebody's going through that course, we should talk to them about the threat posed from unmanned systems just like we talked to them about the security guards. And we talk to them about the infrastructure, maintaining roads, and child development centers. This is now something that they need to be armed to deal with and we want to provide that expertise.
LTCAS: Ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much for your time. I appreciate you being here with us for Industry Day. Please come see any of us for a follow-up. Thanks.
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