Hearings to examine the posture of the United States Transportation Command in review of the Defense Authorization Request for Fiscal Year 2026 and the Future Years Defense Program; to be immediately followed by a closed session in SVC-217.
Senate Subcommittee on Readiness and Management Support
2025-03-05
Source: Congress.gov
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This hearing will come to order. The Readiness Subcommittee today meets to receive testimony on the posture of the United States Transportation Command, U.S. Transcom. And I want to thank our witness this afternoon, General Reid, for being here today. Sir, it was good meeting with you earlier. In the week, I want to say up front, Transcom is a very, very important combatant command. It's not the one that you always hear about, but it's really critical to our military, our readiness, and our ability to win wars, and our ability to project power and sustain our forces. As a senator from Alaska, I'm keenly aware of the unique challenges and strategic opportunities Our state presents in the broader national security landscape, but we are also operating in an area where logistics and sustainment are no longer a given in any potential conflict. What used to be an asterisk or an incorrect assumption or what they call in the military, fairy dusting away a problem, On DoD's part, with regard to sustained and contested logistics has allowed our adversaries, such as China and Russia, to actively develop capabilities aimed at disrupting our mobility and sustainment operations across multiple domains. Current theaters from the Indo-Pacific region to the Arctic to the European theater in the Middle East all present significant, unique challenges in military contested logistics. Our military must ensure that pre-positioned stockpiles, robust transportation networks, and hardened infrastructure are available to sustain forces in high-end conflicts. I'm particularly interested in how Transcom is addressing contested logistics,
through enhanced resiliency in sea lift, air lift, and overland transportation. I would also like to hear your thoughts, General, on how we can better leverage infrastructure, our ports, and airfields to strengthen our power projection capabilities in both the Arctic and the Indo-Pacific regions. As the Air Force looks to the KC-46 and other next-generation programs for its air refueling needs, we cannot forget about the programs that are actually doing today's missions. The KC-135 has been a cornerstone of the U.S. Air Force's air mobility and refueling capabilities since the 1950s. That's not an incorrect statement, since the 1950s. But it needs advances in technology to evolve with military needs. While this is not a budget hearing today, I hope General Reid to hear about how Transcom has informed the Air Force's tanker strategy moving forward, especially in light of the long delays in KC-46 deliveries and recent reports about cracks in certain components of the aircraft. Air refueling tankers play a vital role in extending the range and endurance of fighter aircraft, bombers, surveillance planes, enabling them to perform long-range missions without relying on forward operating bases. They are crucial to America's Fight Tonight mandate, and as we talked about earlier, General, This morning, they're actually very crucial in my home state of Alaska where Russian and Chinese incursions into our aid is over the last year have spiked. The men and women who fly these intercept missions from Alaska do nearly 2,000 mile round trips to intercept Russian and Chinese strategic bombers.
And they, of course, rely heavily on transcom tankers to get them to the intercept and to get them home safely. We also want to hear about the challenges with regard to shipbuilding and military sea lift command, which is another element of what Transcom does and does so well. Modernization of our sea lift capacity must be a top priority if we are to maintain our ability to surge forces anywhere in the world in a crisis. The recently initiated tanker security program is a natural progression, but broader efforts are needed to ensure that we do not face a mobility crisis in the coming decade. I'm particularly interested in hearing about the status of sea lift recapitalization efforts, including any challenges Transcom faces. is encountering so that when the FY26 president budget is released, we can follow up to see if funding support is needed to accelerate modernization efforts. The well-being of our troops and their families is obviously a top priority of this committee. We must ensure that the different changes that we've seen in the global household contract goods challenges are made in a way that provides seamless transitions during permanent change of station moves. General Reid, I look forward to getting an update on this program in light of the challenges. Finally, I want to thank the men and women of US Transcom for the critical work they do every day to sustain our military forces and project power globally. Again, this is an incredible combatant command that not enough Americans know about understand and appreciate in this hearing is in part to help change that with that I want to Recognize ranking member senator Hirono for her opening remarks
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and General Reid, it's good to see you. Thank you very much for your service. Senator Sullivan, it's good to continue our work on this subcommittee, this time you as chair and me as ranking, so we will continue our efforts together. General Reed, thank you for your service to our nation, and I thank the service members under your command around the globe conducting missions even as we speak. Transcom plays a critical role in the movement of people, supplies, and equipment anywhere in the world. Your command remains the backbone of our military to ensure the joint force remains agile and responsive. However, as the landscape for logistics continues to evolve, we must adapt to the new reality and full spectrum of emerging threats. ranging from cyber attacks to kinetic strikes on ports and airfields, and we need to recognize that contested logistics will be a battlefield in itself. Fortunately, the Air Force is currently taking steps to modernize its aerial refueling fleet, shifting toward a new tanker design that can operate in contested environments.
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