Rob Wittman

If Congress is to address the obstacles that successive cuts in defense spending have posed, we need a clear, unadulterated view of the challenges our forces are facing.

Every service branch we know today is suffering from readiness deficits

Readiness as a term of art has traditionally represented training, operation, and maintenance.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

That is why I think it is incredibly important to have something like the National Sea-Based Deterrence Fund.

I think those are important points.

I do want to conclude with one final question, and that is concerning our amphibious force structure requirements.

There is nothing worse for a Navy family, then, to say, 'Hey, listen we are planning on a 7-month deployment' and, guess what, it turns to 8 months or 9 months or 10 months.

The Optimized Fleet Response Plan, I think, is critical to make sure that that is followed.

Sequestration, in your words, is the 'greatest threat to our future readiness. It has a ripple effect for us through the years.'

I think that that is the way to do it, and it doesn't interfere with other long-term viability of other shipbuilding programs.

What we, I believe, need to be looking at is, what do we do to mitigate that?

If the Maritime Security Program's effectiveness is minimized and U.S. flag is reduced, what would be the impact on our military's ability to fully activate, deploy and sustain forces?

Do you agree that the 60 Maritime Security Program ships provide USTRANSCOM with assured access to an effective, national defense sealift capability?

I think it is extraordinarily important, so definitely an issue we have to talk about.

I think the Jones Act has a tremendous amount of utility, especially in situations as we face potentially with capacity within our sealift ability.

We need to have some soul-searching conversations about what--both capacity and capability we need to build for the future.

I believe it is vital to moving military goods and hardware.

To what extent are you looking at the program--not just today in the capability but what the program needs to provide in the future, understanding the challenges that the industry faces both with capacity that is in the ships but also…

I think yours is a unique situation and one that we want to make sure that you have the tools necessary to defend your systems as well as understanding where the threats are from your customers and also from the industry that you work with.

We deeply appreciate all of your valuable information you provided for us today to make sure we give the proper direction in this year's NDAA to provide for the resources for the Marine Corps to continue on the path to restore readiness.

We don't do tiered readiness.

Will you commit to taking into consideration the continued broad bipartisan support for offshore energy production in the Atlantic Ocean?

Yes, I will tell the gentleman from California that we will indeed work with you in looking at the future of the duck stamp program, making sure that it is managed in the proper way, making sure that, indeed, is getting dollars to where…

I thank the gentleman from Nevada. I urge my colleagues to strongly support this amendment.