Political Quotes

“Mr. Chair, as noted by Secretary of Defense Mattis: Space is a contested domain by our strategic competitors just like air, land, and sea. This dangerous amendment would place our country at a disadvantage with our strategic competitors by limiting the work that can be done to continue our efforts in protecting our dominance in space, and, further, from protecting our homeland from intercontinental ballistic missiles. With the significant advances being made today by our adversaries in key areas, such as hypersonic weapons and expanding nuclear weapon proliferation, we must not restrict the Defense Department from pursuing options to deploy directed energy in space or any other capability that would result in the possibility of boost-phase capability that could be deployed from space. This amendment, Mr. Chairman, is against even the possibility of investigating and going down this road. House authorizers and appropriators understand the importance of employing a layered missile defense capability, and this dangerous amendment would significantly constrain options for developing critical defensive capabilities in a gap of our current ballistic missile defense system. A proponent of boost-phase missile defense, General Hyten, the commander of Strategic Command testified this year that: The day you can actually shoot a missile down over somebody's head and have that thing drop back down on their heads, that will be a good day.…”