 Consent, Joe, that the chair be authorized to declare recess at any time without objection, so ordered. Good afternoon and welcome to today's C-Power and Projection Forces Subcommittee hearing. This hearing will examine the state of the shipyard industrial base and its ability to support the goals of the AUKUS partnership, particularly Pillar 1, which culminates with a sale of Virginia-class submarines to Australia in the early 2030s. I can tell you I've had discussions with our senior senator from the state of Mississippi, Senator Wicker, who is also the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee, and this is of great importance to him also. I support the AUKUS framework. It holds generational opportunity for partnership with the UK and Australia through technology sharing and integrated deterrence in the Indo-Pacific. Most importantly, it sends a strong statement of unity against a growing threat in the region. The 2022 National Defense Strategy describes the People's Republic of China as our most consequential strategic competitor for the coming decades. Just this weekend, intelligence leaders from all the five eyes appeared on 60 Minutes to warn that China is one of the greatest threats democracy has ever faced. But of course, we have known this for quite some time. China's unprecedented military buildup and continued threats against sovereign territory throughout the Indo-Pacific are destabilizing the global rules-based order. AUKUS will serve as a critical tool for continued deterrence against the PRC. The U.S. network of alliances and partnerships is a strategic advantage that competitors cannot match. Preparation for future conflicts or deterring them from occurring in the first place will rely on our ability to expand and enhance military partnerships. Today's hearing will examine the shipyard industrial base's ability to support the eventual sale of Virginia-class submarines to Australia. To be frank, the industrial base has been challenged in recent years. Labor and supply chain issues, two years of COVID, have strained our ability to construct two SSNs and one Columbia-class submarine per year as planned. Additionally, over one-third of SSNs are stuck in maintenance backlogs, reducing the number of operationally-ready SSNs to meet day-to-day mission demands. In order to course correct, the Navy spent $2.3 billion from FY18 to FY23 to build and strengthen submarine industrial base capacity. Moving forward, the administration initiated an additional five-year $2.4 billion investment. The Navy is also leveraging concepts like strategic outsourcing, an example of which I saw firsthand at Austro-USA and Mobile, Alabama. In partnership with Electric Boat, they are now constructing submarine modules on the Gulf Coast. Looking forward, it's critical to secure Australia's commitment of an additional $3 billion investment through the successful passage of AUKUS-enabling legislation. Their financial input will complement our efforts hastening the recovery process. This subcommittee worked to add several measures in the Haas Pass NDAA to support the AUKUS framework and our industrial base, including additional SIB money and authorization of up to 13 attack submarines over the next multi-year contract. Congress plays a key role, and I will continue to work to ensure that this year's NDAA contains language to meet the objectives set forth in AUKUS. In sum, AUKUS will lead to a more integrated defense ecosystem that counterbalances the threats of strategic competition by harnessing collective capabilities. But we cannot accomplish this without a strong and stable industrial base. I look forward to hearing today why it's so important to pass AUKUS legislation, the Navy's assessment of current and future submarine construction, and what plans the Navy has for smart strategic investments to accelerate timelines. With that, I yield to my friend and my partner on this C-Power Committee, former chairman and one of the most knowledgeable people about the industrial base and submarines probably in this nation, Joe Courtney. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I really just want to note at the beginning here your really intense focus on this issue. I've seen it here in the committee room, where, you know, this AUKUS has been discussed numerous times. But I've also seen you down in Austin, Alabama, at the Austal Shipyard in Alabama, you know, really talking about the strategic outsourcing, which I think we're going to discuss here today. And I've seen it actually when you were over in Australia. Actually proudly representing our nation in terms of, you know, talking about how this is such an important step forward for our alliance with Australia and the United Kingdom. This, I believe, is actually the first hearing where there has been a, you know, real central focus in terms of AUKUS and Pillar One, which I would argue is the centerpiece of the agreement. And having, again, a great lineup of witnesses here today, I think, is really going to be important to flush out a lot of issues. And again, just very quickly, I'll be brief, it's been over two years since the AUKUS Security Agreement was formally announced based on a shared commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific fortified by three-way enhancement of critical defense technologies. The centerpiece, as I indicated earlier, was the recapitalization of Australia's undersea fleet. I would note the announcement on September 24th was very clear. It should be executed at, quote, the earliest possible date. Immediately following the September 2021 announcement, David Ignatius, the long-time journalist covering foreign policy in the Washington Post, described AUKUS as, quote, the most important strategic move by the United States in decades. As we have seen a constantly evolving environment in the Indo-Pacific, I could not agree more with that statement. I had the opportunity to travel with some of our witnesses here today to Naval Base Port Loma in San Diego for the announcement of the optimal pathway back in March of this year where three heads of government and three navies laid out the roadmap to implement AUKUS, again, using, quote, the earliest possible date target. Since then, the administration and Congress have had various conversations to craft legislative proposals to enable the success of this agreement specifically to authorize the transfer of submarines to Australia, accept Australia's $3 billion investment into the U.S. submarine industrial base, and provide training for Australian personnel in the field of naval nuclear propulsion. So far, we have seen in each chamber some action on these requests, providing a framework for inclusion in this year's National Defense Authorization Act. I reiterate, as the chairman did, that it is critical that we get these proposals wrapped up and folded into NDAA and pass this year to implement those authorities. I look forward to hearing all the testimony here today and continued engagement on this issue, and with that, I yield back. Now we'll introduce our witnesses and what an A list of witnesses we have today. We have Dr. Mara Carlin performing the duties of Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Policy, Undersecretary Eric Graven, Undersecretary of the Navy, Vice Admiral Houston, Commander Naval Submarine Forces, and Rare Admiral Rucker, Program Executive Office, Attack Submarines. And with that, I will recognize the Secretary Raven or whoever you see fit to start. All right, Chairman Kelly, Ranking Member Courtney, Distinguished Members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today on our submarine industrial base and its ability to support this historic AUKUS partnership. Today I hope to reinforce three points. First, the defense ecosystem is a critical enabler of our 2022 National Defense Strategy. Second, AUKUS contributes to building a more robust defense industrial base ecosystem that contributes to integrated deterrence. And third, the submarine industrial base can and will support AUKUS. The 2022 National Defense Strategy describes the need to act urgently to build enduring advantages across the defense ecosystem. And as a subset of this, strengthening the submarine industrial base is a critical aspect of achieving our objective. This provides an important means to build a more robust, resilient, and dynamic defense industrial base that contributes to our nation's integrated deterrence. Today I am joined by my esteemed Navy colleagues who can speak to efforts to ensure readiness of the submarine industrial base to support U.S. undersea requirements as well as our AUKUS commitments. The Department of Defense is acutely aware of the challenges we must address in the submarine industrial base to meet U.S. and AUKUS commitments and ensure we are postured to provide our warfighters the necessary capabilities to defeat any nation that would threaten the security of the United States or our allies and partners. To that end, on October 20th, the President transmitted to Congress a request for more than $3 billion in supplemental funding intended to support the submarine industrial base, funding that will accelerate submarine production and sustainment. Now since the announcement of the Optimal Pathway in March, members of the newly formed Australian Submarine Agency observed submarine maintenance operations at Pearl Harbor Navy Shipyard, trilateral working groups collaborated on critical industrial base readiness issues, and the USS North Carolina became the first Virginia-class submarine to visit Australia as part of the Optimal Pathway. We are proud to have seen the first three Australian naval officers graduate from U.S. Nuclear Power School and the first eight Australian sailors start their nuclear training. These milestones mark our commitment to this effort, but we know there is still much to be done. We look forward to collaborating with Congress to ensure we have the vital legislative authorities in place this year, as outlined in the legislative proposals put forth to the Congress to realize this generational opportunity. The U.S. network of alliances and partnerships is a decisive strategic advantage that competitors cannot match. AUKUS has provided a lens into not only what military capabilities our closest allies need, but also what barriers exist, which hamper pursuit of our collective security and how we need to adapt our approach to meet our national security objectives. Through the continued support of Congress to invest in our submarine industrial base, the close collaboration with our partners to leverage industrial capabilities and Australia's historic investment into our submarine industrial base, we are ensuring the readiness needed to deliver on the full potential of our unrivaled partnerships. AUKUS will strengthen our military, boost our defense industrial capacity and help us achieve our national defense strategy objectives. Together, AUKUS will fortify our combined capabilities and promote our shared goal of a free and open Indo-Pacific. We appreciate the continued support of Congress to enable us to implement the Optimal Pathway. Mr. Chairman and distinguished members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to meet with you today, and I look forward to answering any questions you may have. Chairman Kelly, Ranking Member Courtney, members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify on one of our most sophisticated and integral national security programs, the Submarine Industrial Base. I'm excited to be here in partnership with my colleagues to illuminate the progress we have made in the SIB and to provide an update on the pivotal and complex AUKUS program with two of our closest allies, Australia and the United Kingdom. The subcommittee knows well that our nation leads in undersea technology, and with your support, the Navy has made incredible advancements in guaranteeing that we and our closest allies retain warfighting supremacy beneath the waves. Mr. Chairman, I think there's no better way to illustrate this than a chart that you have at your desk, and if you take a look at where we are today in terms of the tonnage of construction at private yards for submarines, we are about at 100,000 tons today. That is double what we were just a few years ago, and in just the next couple of years, we will be doubling again. That is a clear commitment to our capabilities in the undersea. Without objection, I'm going to put this in the record. Thank you, sir. Our plans are ambitious because the needs are demanding. The Columbia Ballistic Missile Submarine remains our top acquisition priority. Our attack submarines serve a multitude of roles for our joint force. And bringing two of our closest allies into a historic military and technology sharing program is a bold stroke at just the right time. We know that there is more work to do. Admiral Houston and Admiral Rucker will expand upon our construction and sustainment efforts that go hand in hand with this aggressive agenda. But I also wish to highlight just a few points. First, the submarine industrial base is more than our large shipyards. The Sibs spans 16,000 suppliers in all 50 states. Navy investments in 194 suppliers in 31 states have already increased production, increasing capacity by 10% and adding 1,000 jobs. We have trained 4,000 Americans to build submarines and more are in the pipeline. Second, as Dr. Carlin noted, the President last week asked Congress to approve a $3.3 billion supplemental to speed improvements in the Sib. This is on top of the $2.3 billion invested over the last six years and the $1.6 billion already budgeted in the next four years. Early approval of this supplemental will speed the results we need to support U.S. and AUKUS submarine programs. Finally, fiscal year 2024 congressional approval of all four AUKUS, DOD, and State Department legislative proposals is essential to the success of this program. Let us remember that at its core, executing AUKUS is about changing the way we do business. Delays in moving out on AUKUS not only, Mr. Chairman, thank you again for the opportunity to testify before the subcommittee. I look forward to your questions and continuing to work with you on this important issue. Chairman Kelly, Ranking Member Courtney, and Distinguished Members of the subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today and discuss the readiness and sustainment of our submarine force and support of AUKUS. Your support will contribute to the enduring overmatch of an undersea force ready and able to defend freedom around the globe. As Under Secretary described, AUKUS provides a generational opportunity to deepen diplomatic security, defense cooperation in the Indo-Pacific. Our alliances and partnerships remain our key strategic advantage. I would be remiss if I fail to tell you of the exceptionally close bond our navies and our undersea forces already share. We have a well-established and robust exchange program and the in-depth integration with our partners in Australia and the United Kingdom is unmatched. Multiple British and Australian and American officers and sailors have served on each other's submarines for decades. I, myself, qualified for command in 2007 on the Australian Submarine Rankin. We coordinate water space, core submarine missions, and conduct joint exercises. AUKUS expands access in the Indo-Pacific and builds on our existing partnerships with our strongest allies. Since May 2023 this year, when former CNO, Admiral Gilday, assigned me as a accountable commander for submarine availability completion in public shipyards, we've increased submarine operational availability from 6.0 percent to 6.6 percent. And we're continuing to reach our goal of 8.0 percent. We are focused on improving production, procuring materials and efficiency in planning to increase submarine readiness. Strong, resilient, and skilled maintenance capability is foundational to a robust and capable submarine force and our national defense. The undersea represents a strategic advantage for us and our allies. Working together we will only strengthen that advantage Our nations are committed, our navies are committed, and our submarine forces are committed to further trilateral collaboration. We are leading the way in integrating the best that each nation has to offer for design capability and technology to develop state-of-the-art submarines ready to execute missions promoting free and open Indo-Pacific. I want to thank the subcommittee for your steadfast, bipartisan support for the submarine industrial base and AUKUS. Thank you, and I look forward to your questions. Chairman Kelly, Ranking Member Courtney, and distinguished members of the subcommittee. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today. Your continued support remains instrumental in helping the navy and our industry partners with the needed improvements to deliver and sustain the submarines our nation needs. As Dr. Carlin, the Under Secretary and Vice Admiral Houston described, AUKUS provides a generational opportunity to deepen diplomatic security and defense cooperation in the Indo-Pacific. In support of this, our submarine industrial base is supporting the largest submarine recapitalization effort in nearly 50 years of submarine production. The current once-in-a-generation submarine construction rate, coupled with systemic challenges facing our industrial base, has resulted in the annual production rate of 1.2 to 1.3 Virginia-class per year, compared to our goal of 2 per year. This rate, coupled with the Columbia-class serial production and FY26, bending congressional authorization and appropriation is what we call one plus two for the one Columbia and two Virginia-class per year. This one plus two cadence increases the demand on our submarine industrial base. With the improvement efforts we have ongoing between the navy and our industry partners, we are tracking to achieve this one plus two rate by 2028. The navy must sustain its submarine force while also building those new construction submarines. We developed a 15-year submarine maintenance strategy for our tax submarines, which includes key investments in FY2024 budget. As Vice-Admiral Houston mentioned, we are driving improvements in all aspects of sustainment, specifically planning, modernization, material, and execution. With leadership and support from Congress, in fiscal year 2018, the navy began infusing funding into the industrial base to increase capability and capacity. We are executing a holistic strategy by investing in six key areas, supplier development, strategic outsourcing that you mentioned earlier, sir, shipbuilder infrastructure, workforce development, new technologies, and government oversight. In addition, our domestic industrial base will benefit from the industrial capabilities of our AUKUS partner nations. The navy began executing these submarine industrial base efforts several years ago as building facilities, growing workforces, and increasing the production rate takes time. Our dividends have not fully matured yet, but we are already seeing benefits with much more to come. I want to thank the subcommittee for your steadfast bipartisan support to the navy, our AUKUS teammates, and our industrial base partners. Thank you, and I look forward to your questions. I now recognize myself for questions. Dr. Carlin, it's interesting you mentioned the USS North Carolina being in Australia. I was there at that rotational base and got to visit with the captain and crew and what a tremendous job they're doing. So to the navy, as you noted in your testimony, it's been 50 years since we've ramped up submarine construction and infused equivalent volumes of complexity and work into the industrial base. It is no secret that currently we are not where we should be. Getting our production rates up to two Virginia class per year, then further accelerating above two is an ambitious task. How confident are you that we're on the right path to stabilize and grow our industrial base over the coming years to support our requirements at AUKUS? Mr. Chairman, thank you for that question. And you are correct. This is an ambitious plan, but we need to meet this rate both for our U.S. requirements and to support our two key partners. What you've seen with the submission of a probably unprecedented supplemental to support our defense industrial base that was submitted by the president just last week is a sign of the serious commitment that we take to improving where we are to deliver on both our national capabilities and our partners. So we are taking this extremely seriously. I believe we do have the right plan tackling the areas that Admiral Rucker noted just a few moments ago that we have circled in on these key areas as what we need to do to meet the production rates that we require. Also, as I noted in my testimony, we're currently experiencing maintenance backlog and you talked a little bit about this. Vice Admiral Huston, if you can expand a little bit, what do you envision the mix of submarine maintenance will be between the private and public shipyards? Do you agree that a stable maintenance flow at the private yards is imperative to properly capitalize the expertise that their workforce has to offer? Yes, thank you, sir. It requires both the public and private mix as you discuss. We cannot afford to sideline the private capability we have experienced that before where it's very difficult to reconstitute that private capability to maintain and serve as submarines. So it needs to be a clear balance and this is not just private yards doing entire submarine availabilities. This is private shipyards and private sources in local industry that can support the public shipyards with individual jobs and packages on those submarines. And it is absolutely critical. As Admiral Rucker outlined, those pillars that we're going after with material, outsourcing, planning, modernization, those are all critical and the private industry public partnership is absolutely critical to keeping us on track and maintaining the momentum we're achieving. Undersecretary, do you have any comments or is that good? I think he said it exactly right, sir. And this question went on my list, so it's always dangerous. I met with the British ambassador to the US recently and we talked about the August as it relates to the UK. We often talk about it as it's a two-legged stool, but it's a three-legged stool and I've committed in the near future to go and visit their industrial base and see how we can help and what problems and issues we have there. Can you talk about the UK part of the August as the, it's not phase one, but you know, tier one of the August agreement? Sir, both UK and Australia are incredibly important partners and as I think Admiral Houston can elaborate on, our partnership with the UK has been extremely close over the past 70 plus years. Again, what August represents is more than just one acquisition program or a series of acquisition programs. It is about fundamentally changing and integrating three industrial bases in different parts of the world to produce maximum effect to serve our mutual national security efforts and the UK and Australia are absolutely key parts of that. Thank you so much and I think this is well articulated as I've heard it. Admiral Houston, did you have any comments? I concur it's as well articulated as I could but I would say if you look at the history of the undersea forces from the United Kingdom and the US partnership with Dreadnought for their first nuclear powered submarine to the Polaris sales agreement to our partnership with Australia where they share a combat system or heavyweight torpedo, they are contributing partners and because of that exchange with all partner members we are stronger as an undersea and that is why it's our inherent advantage across these allies and partners. Thank you and with that I yield my time and I now recognize the ranking member, Joe Courtney. Right, thank you Mr. Chairman and thank you again to the witnesses for your opening remarks. Dr. Carlin, I'd like to go back again to your comments regarding the legislative proposals that are pending right now here and again you itemized the authorities to transfer Virginia class submarines to Australia to accept Australia's $3 billion investment into our industrial base and to train up Australia's shipyard workers into this new sort of proficiency in nuclear naval propulsion work. Again, these proposals which came over after the March event in San Diego are sort of spread out in different committees but again some of us who've been very close to this know that some of them have actually made impressive steps forward House Foreign Affairs Committee approved 48 to zero for the submarine transfer and the other proposals also are very much alive and well and NDAA certainly is available to be sort of a vehicle to sort of move them forward. In my opening remarks I mentioned again how back in 2021 the earliest possible date sort of target was thrown out there and that was sort of reiterated again in March. Can you talk a little bit again about the pace of this enterprise in terms of just what's happening in terms of the strategic environment particularly in the Indo-Pacific? Absolutely, thank you for that. You know it's a serendipitous that we're having this hearing during the one year anniversary since the unclassified 2022 National Defense Strategy was released and as you know very well that strategy is very clear in terms of prioritization. The urgent need to sustain and strengthen deterrence focused on the People's Republic of China. What is so historic and so generational about this AUKUS effort is that we are bringing together a very close ally from the Indo-Pacific, a very close ally from Europe. We're bringing together, we're making sure all three have the most capable undersea capabilities and are going to be able to operate together to help ensure a secure and safe Indo-Pacific. And I will say that when we look around the Indo-Pacific, we see that there are some who don't want security and stability, right? We have seen for example, a number of kind of dangerous operational behavior. In fact, by the People's Republic of China, I think it's something like more than 250 or so unprofessional activities since 2021. That's really problematic and knitting together these three countries to really show how much we care about security and stability in the region is crucial. It's hard, it requires a whole lot of effort by the executive branch and a whole lot of support by the Congress, but we can do big and bold things. Well, your description of serendipitous I think is also additionally sort of highlighted this week with the Australian Prime Minister visiting Washington where again, this is obviously a big topic of conversation I know with the executive branch and tomorrow there's gonna be an opportunity for him to meet with a lot of members in the House and the Senate to talk about this as well. Admiral Houston and Admiral Rucker, I mean, shipbuilding is a long game as you both know very well. And again, in terms of the need for Congress to enact these enabling authorities is I think relevant to that whole process in terms of sending out a demand signal. And maybe one of you or both of you could talk about, again, that piece of the fact that Congress really needs to again, you know, authorize accepting the investment Australia is about to make into our, or wants to make into our industrial base as well as send out a signal to the submarine industrial base that the horizon for work is very strong and investment in people and capital is definitely a secure decision. And again, maybe you could comment. Yes, I'll start and then I'll have Admiral Rucker finish up on that. But I would just say that the message we send to our allies and the negative message that would be sent if we didn't enact these legislative proposals would be significant for us in the Indo-Pacific. It's absolutely critical that we execute on this. It's gonna uplift our industrial base. It's gonna uplift our undersea forces. It uplifts all nations ability to defend and have a stable Indo-Pacific region that's open for all countries. And so the continued support we get be these legislative proposals which are absolutely critical to training, to accepting money, to do the information transfers we need are absolutely critical to benefiting all three countries. Admiral Rucker. Yes, sir, thanks for the question. What I would say is it's an industrial base, a workforce and a reiterate the timing as well. If I look at the industrial base today to answer the chairman's question earlier as well, we already have multiple UK companies supporting our Columbia and Virginia construction providing parts that are vital to be able to build those ships. We have an Australian company that's already part of our consortium for doing additive manufacturing. So we're already making those leaps forward. Getting these legislative proposals across allow us to continue to strengthen and partner with their industrial base with our US as well. In addition, if you look at the timeline on the optimal pathway, pillar one, when we'll look into transfer the first submarine based on the agreements in the early 2030s, being able to get that Australian workforce trained in how we do maintenance so they can be as effective as we are. You back off the timeline of the maintenance availability for that submarine, which takes a few years and the planning takes a few years and then you put the foreign military sales in place. We actually have to start that process no later than late next year or early 25 for them to be part of that entire maintenance path to get the proficiency. So from a workforce perspective, getting them integrated from the joint industrial base uplift that will occur and then everything Admiral Houston said from operations, those legislative proposals and the timing of them are critical to support the needs of all three partners. Great, well thank you for, I mean, I think that really kind of foot stomps the need for us to really, as we go into conference, do as much as we possibly can to get these through. Secretary Raven, I really appreciate the fact that you brought the graph which I put up on the screen here to talk about the metrics of shipbuilding. Again, there's a lot of different ways that this gets calculated and a lot of different ways, frankly, it gets reported but I think based on my time and visiting shipyards tonnage is kind of when you boil it all down, it's really, I think, certainly as reliable if not the most reliable measurement of volume of output and throughput that's happening in shipyards. So again, the graph that you showed and with the arrow that shows where we are today shows that we're not starting this process in 2023. I mean, there's been efforts made to already expand capacity both in terms of job training and facility, supply chain and again, just in terms of the way the graph shows how we, as you pointed out, have really doubled tonnage in a relatively short period of time. Where the supplemental investments will help, again, accelerate the process so that we'll get up to a higher point? Yes, sir. Again, sometimes the picture says a thousand words. There's one other view that I can add to this. If you go back to the 1990s where we're on cadence to build one Virginia-class submarine per year getting into the late 1990s, where we need to go in building two Virginia-class a year for U.S. needs plus one Columbia is approximately five times the construction capability that we need. And this supplemental is one key part along with the investments that Congress has already made and the investments that are planned to getting up on that ramp. But it is a significant ramp. We understand the challenges and I think we have a strategy to get after it. If I could just add one more comment to the discussion that you just had on the urgency of the legislative proposals. If there's any perception that AUKUS is something that starts after passage of those legislative proposals, I want to address that right away. The execution of AUKUS pillar one started seven months ago with the announcement of the optimal pathway. We are heavily engaged with our partners today and for the past several months on making the moves necessary to execute pillar one in the most efficient way possible. If there's one message that I get from the partners especially on the ability to train Australians, bring them into our shipyards, whether it's maintenance or new construction, it's basically, I think the legislative proposals are catching up to where we need to be. So there is a case for urgency because we are deeply involved in execution today and we need these authorities to be able to move forward. Great, well thank you for clarifying that point. And my last question is gonna be again about the supplemental request that came over. Admiral Houston, again, you focus for a moment in your testimony about the repair and maintenance challenge that the Navy faces here. Again, it wasn't that long ago that some news outlets like Bloomberg News and Wall Street Journal were reporting that the turnaround was 60, or that the availability of submarines was at 60%. Again, you clarified that even in the short period of time since some of those reports in late spring that number has moved in the right direction. The supplemental request includes a number of items very much focused on repair and maintenance in terms of funding parts, public shipyards for maintenance, but also moving forward some of the investment in the public shipyards in the SIAP program here. And again, if you could sort of describe how that supplemental fits in with your goal to get to 80% availability of submarines. Yes, Rink and Member, thanks for the question. So the key thing is that we've gone from 6.0 to 6.6%. The only reason why we've fallen off 6.7 is we were both at the commissioning of Rickover, which actually pulled us down because we added to the numerator and denominator at the same time. The thing I would add is that it's roughly $700 million that we're gonna put in parts, infrastructure, and all the things that we need to do. One of our key bottlenecks or one of our key delays, which the Navy has already invested in to get after is Virginia class parts. This will help with getting after that part backlog. Also, as far as being able to outsource more work to private companies in the area, it's a tremendous uplift for us. Some of the infrastructure in the shipyards needs to be modernized. It's part of the Navy SIAP plan. We're modernizing dry docks, which we have dry docks that are no longer 100 years old, but it's absolutely critical and we will be on path to reach 80% in late 2027, beginning of 2028, 80% operational availability. And I believe we're on track and the supplemental certainly helps reinforce that and without it, it puts it in jeopardy. Great, thank you Admiral. He'll be back. I now recognize one of the key partners in the August relationship and one of the best friends of Australia who spent quite a bit of time there, Representative Gallagher. Thank you. First, a sort of a clerical issue. My understanding is the submarine industrial base 2025 study is done. I think some of our staff may have been briefed on it, but do we have access to the report or rather can we have access to the report? Indeed, I believe that some briefings have occurred and some additional briefings will occur to you and you and your staff. I think folks are just scheduling those right now. Could we get the actual report though itself? I believe that they will be briefing you on the actual study and I think their plan is to brief you on the cost estimates from the study and to walk through the substance of it. Wait, so, but presumably the study is like instantiated in like a physical document, right? Like could we just get the physical document at some point to read it and we're assessing the health of the submarine industrial base. I think that'd be like very helpful. I believe the plan is to sit down with you and your staff and walk through materials related to it. And I would note that that did inform the numbers that were in the supplemental. Okay, I guess in addition to me walk through the material, could I just have the material to read the material? I can take that back. I think as of now, the plan was to brief you all using materials to be clear. If you could, if you could take back that we would like the actual report. I think that's very helpful. Yeah, I don't speak for the rest of the committee. I understand things through like reading them as opposed to the briefing. So again, I think it would be in all of our interests to have the actual document and read it. And it could be like a controlled, classified, whatever form. Okay. Thank you. I've no wasted a minute and a half on that. The Chinese military power report released just last week, projected that China's sub-force would grow to 80 boats by 2035. Under our current planning and execution assumptions, how many American subs will be in the fleet by 2035? I don't know if that's for Mr. Raven or by Sharon Mulhuston. Sir, I'll have to look up exactly that year. Yeah, Representative Gallagher, my approximation would be about 55 by that time. 55 by about that time. Yes, sir. And we'll validate that number for you. 55 relative to 80, you could argue that ours will still be far more capable at that time. But still that's a concerning trend. Representative Gallagher, there's no comparison between our submarines in China. It's a totally different power projection. Majority of Chinese submarines are diesel. Ours are all nuclear, highly capable, multi-mission. Our submarineers are world-class. It is not a comparison. I completely take that point. I guess this is a broad argument that's made with you just look at the overall PLA Navy, which is already bigger than ours. The rejoinder is that ours is far more capable, which is true, but at some level, like the numbers do matter, right? Or at least if you analyze the empirical record going back to the last 2,000 years, no technologically superior, but numerically inferior Navy has ever defeated a technologically inferior, but numerically superior Navy. So that's the concern at the heart of the question, if our fleet size continues to shrink. That's more of a statement than a question. We are here talking primarily about pillar one of August today, right? Which is incredibly important, not the centerpiece of the whole effort, but even in the most optimistic scenario timeline, I mean, when would Australian subs come online under pillar one? Sir, it's a commitments-based process whereas Australia advances in its capability to maintain, train, and support submarines. We're looking at the 2030s for a sovereign capability for Australia. 2030, so if we're worried about a near-term deterrence crisis, right? If we think this is the sort of window of maximum danger in the 2020s, and we don't know, admittedly, we don't know what lurks in the mind and heart of Xi Jinping, I think the opportunity really in the short term is under pillar two of August. And obviously undersea capabilities is one of the working groups under pillar two. Maybe Dr. Carlin, could you talk a little bit about what you see as the biggest opportunities under pillar two, the specific capabilities you're championing, and what are the roadblocks to fully realizing the promise of pillar two? Absolutely, thank you for that. So just on pillar one, I would note, particularly in light of the earlier questions on the urgency of the legislative proposals, there's a crawl-walk-run effort on making sure this optimal pathway is a reality. And as you know very well, there are some countries who want AUKUS to fail. They are doing what they can to sow disinformation into the environment. There's at least one country that wants it to fail, yeah. And they are trying to divide us from our allies and partners and wondering if we can do bold and ambitious things like AUKUS. So that's, of course, pillar one, pillar two, I think you're exactly right. Pillar two has perhaps gotten a bit less attention than pillar one, but it is indeed just as important. It's really looking at how you are knitting together these three countries, including their industrial bases, and making sure that we are delivering capabilities for the warfighter in a timely way. We have already seen some important exercises and activities to date. What I would say, though, is our ability to knit together our industrial bases, our ability to really encourage innovation, that is going to be dependent on our ability to have an export control system that is as dynamic as possible. And that's part of the reason for that fourth legislative proposal. As you know, it's really not a zero-sum game anymore. Our innovation ecosystem will learn as much as the Australian and UK innovation systems from one another, and that collaboration will work in all of our interest. I've gone over my time. I tie reform, I tie reform. I gave your time back that you lost. I now recognize the gentleman from New Jersey, Mr. Norcross. Thank you, Chairman, and I'd like to thank everybody for being here today. We seem like we're going to get back on track and forgive my tardiness, but I just want to follow up where ranking member Courtney had started, and this is about a workforce capacity. Now, when we start looking at what we have done over the course of the last half-thousand years to build up the capacity, and I love the chart showing the eps and flows. The one thing that I'll point out, forget the industrial base who hates the eps and flows the worst are the men and women who go to work each and every day to build these. And it is what concerns us most for two reasons. One, the ability to attract the next generation, which is difficult at best, and I know we're getting at that. But you have a construction site of how to build these, and certainly bringing in a new partner, they have to build up that capacity. We were last August down in Canberra and further south to Adelaide to see what the capacity is now. We're all challenged, but certainly the Australians understand where they have to go, where they are today to the facilities to build a nuclear sub. And then you have the maintenance, which we heard about, and all the readiness that goes with this. So when we talk about predictability, whether it's domestically sending out the right signals that we're not just gonna be here for a year and drop back down, those eps and flows kills the industrial base from a business standpoint, but also trying to attract the next generation. And if I think I only have six years of production and then are gonna start laying off, I might not be looking here. So as we look at this, Dr. Cohen, and I think this would go to you, when we assess what Australia's workforce looks like today and where they need to be in order to build them but maintain them, what is our assessment of where they are and where they need to be at those dates? Thank you very much for that. And I'll offer some thoughts from my colleagues may wish to add. Not long ago, Australia's government put out its defense strategic review. So that's kind of like a national defense strategy and AUKUS was at the heart of it. And I think that that was a real kind of manifestation of just how seriously they are taking this. I was in Perth earlier this summer, saw a lot of the infrastructure investments they are making and was able both in meetings in Canberra and in Perth to meet with the kind of local and the state government. And you can hear just how seriously they are looking at the workforce investments and how much they realized that they have got to make sure that that is a reality. You know, AUKUS was designed to be kind of a crawl, walk, run effort. And it's why it's so important to make sure that we've got as much movement as possible so that these investments can come together by all three countries at the right time so they can bear fruit. If you don't mind, sir, I might also see if my colleagues want to add to that. Thank you. Yes, absolutely. The building of these capabilities fundamentally comes down to people to do the work. And we've had challenges on our side and Australia is at the beginning of their journey in building a skilled workforce. The good news is that they can learn from us, especially as it comes to the legislative proposals. Australia has, we have a plan with Australia to take hundreds of their workers, bring them over here, be able to train them so they can go back and build the disciples in Australia so they can meet not only the quality but show that AUKUS is something that is changing the security landscape in the Undo Pacific for Australia and spread that word. So there is work to do, but I have a lot of confidence that Australia is on the right track to tackle those challenges. If you could just touch base on a bit of a twist that when we step up to the nuclear facilities, classification and being able to clear a workforce, which Australia has a certain level but certainly know we're close to where it has to be. The challenge is that they're gonna face from a domestic workforce and then their challenge like us, they're bringing in many others from around the world to be part of that workforce. How are they going to address that challenge? We're working very closely with Australia and the UK to make sure that there's a common set of security principles that governs all the AUKUS security work. We're deeply engaged with also NCIS is establishing presence in Australia to manage a lot of the counterintelligence and other concerns, but certainly part of AUKUS again is going towards an integrated industrial base so that when we talk security, we're speaking the same language. Sir, if I just might add, it's making sure that all three countries are at the right level on that security piece that Under Secretary Raven was highlighting. We're looking forward to it and it's even easier when we almost speak the same language. With that, I'll yield back. Gentlemen, time's expired. I just wanna be real clear and I don't think it's been said enough, but it's really sensitive. They're nuclear-powered, conventionally armed submarines that are going to Australia, correct? Yes, sir. And I now recognize Lieutenant General Bergman for five minutes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Raven, saw in your bio that you went to Khan College? I did. Across the street from that other school where people wear uniforms? Yes, sir. Well, it's a small world because in 1965, 66, I spent my swab year at the Coast Guard Academy and my first visual on a Navy sub was when we were doing sailing lessons on the river in a 10, 12-foot dinghy trying to chase the subs up and down the river. So it seems like just yesterday in some ways that you kinda dusted off some memories here. My question, when you're trying to do, to build something with other countries involved, no matter what it is, could be ships, could be airplanes, could be, you know, whatever it happens to be, the coordination among the countries and the information sharing of best practices when it comes to that. And I guess I would just like to hear from any of you about how we have set up, even if it's just a framework right now, that to ensure the sharing of best practices so we don't waste two things, time and money. Whoever would like to respond to that, but how we're gonna coordinate that sharing. So let me offer a strategic level perspective and then turn to my colleagues. This is Australia and the UK. We have literally stood shoulder to shoulder with them over the last 70 years. They have joined us in just about every conflict we have waged over the last 70 plus years. And our cooperation is exceedingly, arguably unprecedentedly intimate. Hold on, I don't wanna interrupt you. I'm kinda like Mr. Gallagher, only he reads better than I do. I'm a kinda guy that walks around the shop floor and wants to see if the parts department's coordinating with the service department, coordinating with R&D. I'm not worried about the history, it's there. What I'm worried about is the future as we design and build things is that we're looking forward, we got the history. What have we put in place, if anything, even if it's just a straw man right now to ensure that as we get into this, the sharing occurs. Absolutely, we have twice a year the Defense Minister's meeting from all three countries to be able to talk about what's working with AUKUS. Can I break it down a little closer? It's one thing for the Defense Ministers to get together. It's another thing for the people doing all the welding to get together. Can I put it down to that level? Yes, sir, I can probably answer that question. Okay. The AUKUS Integration Office is in my building, one floor below me, about a month ago we put in the first Australian flag officer. There's Australian people in that staff already. The, going back to additive manufacturing, the consortium that we stood up, I think some of you have been down to Danville, Virginia where we've stood up the Center of Excellence. One of the Australian companies, it's called AML3D, is part of that consortium. They're already trading and coordinating on how they go about the technical data packages to improve how we actually do additive manufacturing, leveraging the lessons learned they have. In addition, I was the Columbia program manager prior to this job. And we set up software systems with the UK as we were building the Columbia and their Dreadnought class to integrate and interface both the design, how we build them, and then the workers from Electric Boat and the workers from BAE in the UK. We have several hundred of Electric Boat over at BAE. They have an office in several hundred over with us and they're fully integrated on how we weld, how we do non-destructive testing and how we actually build the summaries. The intent is to do the same thing with the UK as the Under Secretary said, when we bring their workforce over, fully integrate in our procedures, processes in the public yards, as well as how we build the summaries at new construction. Good, well, again, I'm the guy that walks around the shop floor, so if there's something I can see in Danville or anywhere else, don't need to go to the UK, don't need to go back to Australia, but I would be more than appreciative to talk to your line guys. With that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back. I now recognize the gentleman from Pennsylvania, Mr. DeLuzia. Thank you, Chairman. Good afternoon, I think that's the time of day. Good to see you all. I want to continue some of the discussion on supply chain and additive manufacturing in particular. Pleased to see the Navy standing up, the Additive Manufacturing Center of Excellence. Think it recognizes the need to expand the additive manufacturing supply chain if we're going to meet production goals of one Columbia-class, two Virginia-class submarines per year. I think the August-related production makes strengthening the industrial base even more urgent, and so my question to each of you, we're not meeting those goals yet. Do you agree that adding the addition of the August-related efforts means we ought to have a broader additive manufacturing supply chain strategy? So if no, love to hear why, and if yes, love to hear strategy about integrating and scaling additive manufacturing supply chain beyond the center of excellence. Just to appreciate your question, the answer is absolutely we need additive manufacturing. Our normal, I would say, if you look across components on the ships, forging, castings, fittings, valves, fasteners, we cannot meet the demand to be able to support building the submarines we need as well as supporting sustainment without going to additive manufacturing. We've estimated out we have six materials that make up about 75% of our late material, both new construction and sustainment. Those are the six materials we're going after. Already this year, we put the first part, additive manufacturing on a ballistic missile submarine to ensure they could make their schedule. The second part, we have a critical valve that's needed. That valve was gonna be two years late. We have reverse engineered it. It is being additive in manufacturing as we speak, and it will make it on that submarine by January to support its schedule. Right now, we have 10 academic partnerships already, four industry partners that are already learning how to make the parts for the submarine. With the money in the supplemental, we'll increase that to 12 industry partners. And with the money in the supplemental, we'll be able to get up to at least 100 parts additive manufacturing on submarines. And by 2025, our goal, the big sub-safe ones that are the hardest to be able to put those on submarines by the end of 25. So to your question, sir, your spot on, we absolutely need the additive manufacturing technology. Are there headwinds or problems that this committee or the Congress needs to address to expedite the embrace of that part of the supply chain? I would say there's no obstacles other than support the supplemental. In that supplemental, one of the areas, I think the undersecretary said earlier, kind of splitting out, there's a portion of the funding. About 2 billion of that, 3.3 billion is for going out to the supplier base. And a large chunk of that, about 300 million of that, goes to directly developing technologies. It's not just the additive manufacturing. It's also the non-destructive testing, how you inspect a part, so that we can get that done more efficiently. So that supplemental continues to jumpstart. When we did the study back a couple of years ago, that was one area. We underestimated the opportunity that was there. It's not science, it's engineering and just getting scaling to be able to support the work we need to do. Anyone else have any thoughts they want to add on that? Sir, I completely agree with everything that Admiral Rockard said. It's not just about strengthening the supply chain. It's not just about workers. It's also looking for those next generation opportunities to improve shipbuilding efficiency. Okay, thank you. Mr. Chairman, I'll yield back. I thank the gentleman who yields back. Now recognize the gentleman from Tennessee, Mr. Desjardins. Thank you, Chairman. Excuse me, Dr. Desjardins. Thank you, Chairman. First question will be for Secretary Raven and Admiral Houston. The Australian government has offered to invest $3 billion in submarine industrial base to the United States as part of the AUKUS agreement. The funding would be in addition to billions in investments the Navy has already made. To what extent has the Navy and nuclear shipbuilders established a plan for how an influx of the industrial base investments would be used and how well positioned is the Navy to conduct oversight of these funds? And then finally, what is the Navy's strategy for ensuring such investments achieve their goals and objectives? Thank you for the question, sir. In terms of the state of the plan, we are having discussions with the Australians on the details of that plan, but in broad strokes, it largely mirrors our priority investments across workforce, supplier development, supply chain, looking for these technology opportunities. And so we expect that those investments will help take us from the 2.0 Virginia class production rate that we need for US national needs to the 2.33 that we need to support AUKUS. And I'll defer to Emma Rucker, but I know Emma Rucker has a detailed plan that he's worked out with PEO AUKUS and he can tell you exactly where all those outlays are. What I would say, sir, echoing what the undersecretary said, if you look across those categories, supplier development, strategic outsourcing, workforce, technology, under mention those, but I'll say on the oversight that you mentioned, sir, we started increasing oversight back in 2018 when we increased personnel at the supervisors of shipbuilding. The supplemental continues with that. As we go to Austin, we have a memorandum of agreement that was signed between the supervisor for Groton and the supervisor that oversees Austin to ensure we had the right manning on the deck plate in partner with Austin to uplift them to be able to do submarine production. So that allows the Groton people to come down and teach our partner with the Gulf Coast supervisor, teach them how to do submarine, and then scale up as we scale work at Austin. So we have a detailed plan on how to do that around the country. Okay. Secretary Raven, is the plan frustrated to handle all the spent nuclear fuel requirements for both US subs, transferred Virginia class subs, and ultimately their own indigenous nuclear powered subs? And if so, do you believe they'll be able to meet the timelines associated with each one? Yes, sir, stewardship is an incredibly important part not only to work out the details of the nuts and bolts of what activities need to occur, but we really do view it as part and parcel of the responsibility to safely operate and maintain a nuclear powered fleet. And to both admirals, AUKUS will require the production of at least three additional Virginia class summaries adding both halls and management responsibility to the Navy shipbuilding portfolio. How has the Navy been prioritizing and resourcing AUKUS related efforts to meet this challenge, and what additional steps of any need to be taken to be prepared for implementing AUKUS? Yes, sir. First of all, with the announcement that occurred earlier this year, the preparations in the 18 month study already started looking at the manpower that we need here in the US. That office was stood up. The team was already in place. As we made the announcement, that team was stood up. In addition, working with the shipbuilders, we've partnered as always with them, received their input on what they need as part of that supplemental to ensure they have what they need to support both near term and also support the AUKUS. The Australian team has been very great working with our team to ensure their expertise and the benefits that they bring in some of their industrial base in terms of certain minerals as well as capabilities can then augment ours, and then we can work with them to uplift all three countries at the same time. Admiral Houston, did you have anything to add? All right, that's all I have. Chairman, I yield back. Thank you all. I now recognize the gentleman from California, Mr. Gear-Mandy. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for the hearing. There is little doubt in my mind that the submarine fleet is the most important of all of our boats for a variety of reasons and numerous hearings and the like. And the maintenance and availability of those subs has been a constant issue for the readiness subcommittee over the last several years. And I'm looking at the 3.4 billion in the supplemental here. I'm going, okay, these are all things we've talked about, including the ramp up of additional throughput of new subs as well as the maintenance of the older subs and the questions that my colleagues have put forth are certainly pertinent. But my mind is troubled. I just left the house floor not more than an hour ago, and I heard the new speaker go on about the deficit. Which was one of the principal points he raised in his opening speech and his first statements as speaker and about the necessity of reducing government expenditures. So my question really is why were these expenditures, 3.4 billion, not in the base budget sent to the Congress? Why is this supplemental? Sir, yes sir, thank you for that question. As you're well aware, the optimal pathway was announced in March of this year. And that is the point at which we understood better the path that we are on to help provide support for SSN AUKUS in the longer term to support both the UK and Australia's national defense needs. Over the intervening months of the Navy and the cost and CAPE in OSD, having been engaged in a variety of studies to better understand the stresses on the submarine industrial base and how best to execute not only the AUKUS program, but where we need to be for our own Virginia class and Columbia programs. The result of that is a study which is being briefed to the hill and looking at the priorities of undersea capabilities and the challenges of where we find ourselves today. It was the judgment recommended from the Navy to the secretary of defense and to the president that our AUKUS and undersea commitments required an acceleration of those efforts. And that all stems from the outputs of the studies that we conducted over the spring and summer. I think we're going to hit a wall here pretty quickly. If the new speaker is determined to reduce the deficit by cutting programs, the question will arise for this committee and the appropriations committee, how do these supplementals which add over and above the existing Department of Defense budgets and appropriation, how does it fit or what choices must we make? More of this and less of something else? We are, presumably, I think, if I'm to take the speaker at his word, we're going to come into a very serious discussion about cuts. Now, we can go on and on, but I won't, about how long you have known that there was a problem in the submarine section of the Department of Defense. In fact, everything that's on this list has frankly been known for a long time and using AUKUS as the reason for this new supplemental is, in part, in my view, disingenuous because every single one of these we've discussed in previous years, let alone this year. So I'm just curious about the choices we're gonna make and the determination of the Department of Defense, those of you here and others, to make choices. What are you willing to give up, if anything? I'll let it hang there, I'll yield back. Sir, if I might just add one comment. We also do have substantial investments in our base budget. There is approximately $2.4 billion that's been provided by Congress over the last several years and another about $1.6 billion planned in the FY24 and future budgets that get to exactly these sorts of investments. In addition to that, within the budget, there is a plan for $2.2 billion in additional sustainment funding over the next several years. So this is not a matter of simply seeking a supplemental to replace what is in the base budget but our intention is to accelerate because of not only the capabilities that are essential to security in the Indo-Pacific but also to be better positioned to execute this very important international agreement and we are fully prepared to discuss the details of this proposal with you or your staff or anybody who will make the time. Very quickly, I'm very, very much aware of what we have done over the last few years. Most of it done in the readiness committee and in this committee. The gentleman's time's expired. I now recognize the gentleman from Guam, Mr. Moeland. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Secretary Kiran. To support the AUKUS framework, the International Virgin Class Submarine Fleet will require harbors in the Western Pacific where they can surface for maintenance and resupply. Considering that Guam currently homeports for Los Angeles class attack submarines, do you expect Guam to become more strategically important as a result of the AUKUS agreements? And how would an ill-prepared Guam undermine our deterrence posture? Thank you for raising that important issue. As you know, of course, Guam is a key node in the network we have in the Indo-Pacific in which we've tried to establish kind of diverse, resilient basing across the region. So Guam is currently a critical hub for our operations to project power, deter aggression, and provide warfighting advantage across the Indo-Pacific. We've got to have it. It has been very important. It will continue to be exceedingly important as we prioritize Indo-Pacific security and stability of which AUKUS is a key element. I appreciate that. Thank you. And if I could add, Guam is absolutely critical for submarine operations. It provides us immediate access to areas of concern in the Indo-Pacific. And to answer your question, the current plan is to have a Virginia-class submarine base there in 2025. We're improving maintenance. Pearl Harbor's designated as lead maintenance activity. We're improving shore-based maintenance there. We have increased trainers. We are fully committed to Guam because of the importance that it has for our region, for our Navy, and our national defense. I totally agree. Thank you. Next question, Admiral Rucker. A priority of mine is to build a resilient power grid on Guam. So that's the civilian community receives reliable access to power in the wake of all these typhoons that we have. It is my understanding that Guam's power grid is also a priority of the Navy. Can you please explain why a resilient power grid on Guam is necessary to bring online the Virginia-class attack submarine and how a resilient power grid impacts force readiness? Yeah, sir, I'll defer to Admiral Houston who's involved with the operations and I'll add anything he has to say, sir. Yeah, reliable power is absolutely key for our warships to maintain them, to be able to train, to be able to deploy them on time. That's why we're fully committed to the reliable power grid there. It's absolutely critical for us. We're looking forward to working very closely with you and I appreciate the commitment. Thank you. Yes, sir. Also, Admiral Houston, I've been working on to re-establish Guam as a hub for ship repair in the Western Pacific because this would both create jobs, well-paying jobs on Guam and improve America's deterrents posture. In what ways would you improve shipyard capabilities, capacity on Guam, booster deterrents and stimulate a local economy? That's our plan to stand up the land-based IMA there, the intermediate maintenance activity. Currently with Pearl Harbor is the lead shipyard to train and develop personnel, but I would envision long-term that they would be primarily personnel who live in Guam, just like in Pearl Harbor, they're all from Pearl Harbor and from the Hawaiian operating areas where the workers come from. So I think that will transition and provide very, very well-paying jobs. And that's experience we've had with Pearl Harbor, the retention of workers at the Pearl Harbor shipyard is very high and they're very capable and I think we'd have that in Guam as we continue to develop it. I'd be very important and good for our community. So I appreciate it. Thank you very much to the panel. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The gentleman that yields back, I now recognize the gentle lady from the state of California, Ms. Jacobs. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you all for being here today. I was in San Diego earlier when President Biden formally announced the submarine deal and his commitment to reinforcing alliances with the UK and Australia. I can't think of a better place for the announcement and we are always happy to welcome you back to San Diego. I wanted to ask a question, Dr. Carlin. You've mentioned that the DOD Indo-Pacific Strategy is centered on three ideas, capable forward and together. You also mentioned that our allies and partners are a center of gravity in the broader national defense strategy. And we've heard a lot in this hearing about how Australia's investment in our defense industrial base can help with some of our own current gaps. But I was wondering if you can elaborate on what you meant specifically when you said capable forward and together. And can you also discuss some of the challenges and successes working with our partners and allies in the region in developing a sophisticated undersea capability? Absolutely, thank you for all of that. So our frame really has been thinking about what we've been doing in the Indo-Pacific as you know, to be more capable, more forward and more together. More capable, that means we've got a combat credible military with appropriate operating concepts given the challenges we see particularly in the Indo-Pacific. More forward, that means we've got to have a dispersed resilient presence all across the Indo-Pacific. And in fact, over the last year or so, we've had historic agreements with Japan, Papua New Guinea, Australia and the Philippines to help with that resilient and diversified posture. And the more together, right? We are stronger with our allies and partners. Of course, AUKUS is a fantastic case study here as well. And the path that we are on means that we will have Australia, the UK and the United States with tremendously capable undersea warfare capabilities, operating together our industrial bases, working together. And that really is a game changer when we think about Indo-Pacific security and stability. Ms. Jacobs, if I could jump in. Besides just saying San Diego, where I commanded USS Hampton out of Point Loma is the most beautiful place to operate out of. So it's every Submariner's dream there. I will say that we are so tightly aligned with our foreign partners in the Indo-Pacific from Australia where I complete my command calls. We go down there every two years and operate our submarines with their submarines command calls integrated with our heavyweight torpedo combat system. But just pure operations. We operate with them, we do exercises, sensitive submarine reconnaissance missions. The Japanese, we have our primary operating base out of there with our submarine force CTF-74, Group 7 operating out of there. And for instance, we just pulled USS Kentucky, our strategic submarine into Busan and Korea. So our ability to operate with those navies and work with them is really our asymmetric advantage. Thank you. I appreciate that, that's really helpful. I also wanna talk about undersea capabilities and I know there's been some talk about budgets and everything associated with that and making sure we're spending tax dollars wisely. And obviously our main focus here is today and the traditional undersea deterrent. But I wanna know how that fits in with some of the more forward-looking initiatives we've heard about recently coming out of the Pentagon. In particular, balancing this long-term strategy between crewed vessels and autonomous or AII driven vessels. So could you share some insights on how the department is considering this balance not just for undersea operations but across various domains and how this project replicator that WD-STEC-DEF has talked about fits into this strategy. Thank you for that excellent question. Where the Navy is going is a robust capability spread across both manned and unmanned platforms operating in all domains of which the undersea is one area where we hold a critical advantage. Where I see AUKUS fitting in is not only the advancement of our undersea capabilities by teaming even closer with our UK and Australian allies, but also the pillar two opportunities to advance technologies such as many of those that you have referenced in terms of unmanned but also getting into areas such as quantum computing, other undersea technologies. And so the AUKUS partnership is key to advancing much of what you just spoke about. Great, well thank you. I look forward to continuing to welcome you all to San Diego to celebrate this great partnership. And with that, Mr. Chair, I will yield back with a note that the AUKUS working group should really be called the AUKUS Caucus. The gentlewoman finally yields back a little bit early one time and I don't have to gavel her down. I now recognize the gentlewoman from the great state or the Commonwealth of Virginia, Miss Kiggins. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. And thank you all for being here. Over one third of the Navy's 51 attack boats are in maintenance right now due to backlogs and repair in all four of the Navy's public shipyards. So the Navy's submarines are spending more and more time and are going maintenance due to our lack of industrial capacity and spare parts. Spare parts inventories have been cut below critical levels, forcing delays in yard exits while ships wait for parts and skilled workers look for other employment. So what is Navy leadership doing to increase the flow of spare parts to the waterfront to support maintenance availabilities? And how are we alleviating the U.S. repair backlog and getting our subs back to sea? It's a primary effort for the Navy. We've increased significantly over $600 million to buy Virginia class parts to address that backlog that's been programmed in. We've increased public shipyard wages, especially in the Norfolk area to ensure we assess and retain the most skilled labor possible. We are outsourcing significantly. We're doubling the amount of outsourcing resource days we do across the public shipyards. We generally average about 100,000 resource days per year across the four public shipyards. We will double that to over 200,000. And then we are also continuing, as you know, to outsource entire availabilities that we've outsourced, both Columbus and Boise in HII Newport News. And we have also outsourced the entire availability at Electric Boat with Hartford. So we are using every lever we can to get at that backlog. That backlog represents seven submarines that once we address that by 2027, 2028, that will return to the fleet and be able to meet our operational needs. Okay, good. And the Hampton Roads area, which I represent in Virginia Beach plays a critical role in construction of the Virginia class submarines at Newport News Shipbuilding. I'm glad to hear the Commonwealth will continue to support the AUKUS agreement through the Navy's Additive Manufacturing Center of Excellence in Danville, Virginia, tapping into our rural workforce. We've got extreme workforce challenges associated with AUKUS, Electric Boat plans to hire our most 20,000 workers over the next 10 years in Australia needing to build up their submarine, just repair and building workforce. And I read the Navy's testimony that in order to meet the increase in demand associated with the proposed annual construction rate of one Columbia class and two Virginia class submarines by 2028, the workload equivalent will have to be five times what it is today. So I guess, just a simple question, where are the people gonna come from? And I know we have a group of people in Pearl Harbor that you mentioned, and it's roughly around 90, is that correct, that are there? And we need a lot more than that. So are they coming from Australia? Are they coming from domestically or just how are we incentivizing? Because that's a lot of people we're gonna need. Yeah, so for the public shipyards, Pearl Harbor is about 6,000 workers at Pearl Harbor Shipyard. Norfolk Naval is about a little over 10,000, 10,500. To get to the new construction question, which is I think is what you're asking, what we are doing is we are outsourcing large components and large amount of work outside just the Groton Electric Boat Area and Quonset Point and Newport News. We have a goal to reach 6 million. Admiral Rucker will go ahead and explain more, but we're up to over 4 million resource days per year being outsourced. And the way you do that is you outsource to the Gulf Coast and they build entire modules that can be shipped. And that's what it is because you're exactly right. You can't just rely on certain areas. It's gotta be across the nation. And we have more than 30 states involved in the industrial base, and it's absolutely critical. Yes, ma'am, great question. So starting with your area in the Hampton Roads region, we have these, in addition to what you talked about at Danville, we have what's called state pipeline, training pipelines. Hampton Roads in partnership with Newport News and BAE and other companies in the area, we established that. We've already seen an uptick in the number of people that are willing to come in and want to come into that specific thing. The other states, Virginia is one of our top states where we have critical suppliers, along with Pennsylvania, New York, Massachusetts, California and Ohio. Looking at what we're doing with those state pipelines, we've already seen over 1,000 people just since we started them a little over a year ago already come in. They have a 92% retention and placement rate once they come in and go through our training systems. Right now in the region, in addition with Newport News, some of the funding is helping to increase their apprenticeship school. With that outsourcing of work, the combination of the workers around the area, and we've looked at expanding the radius from which they look, as well as the demographics in which they look. I'm sure you probably have seen billboards around their commercials during football games, or other things, buildsummarines.com. We have since translated that into Spanish, and we're going after a population that frankly we did not look at as well before, and we're expanding that up near electric boat. There's a whole region that we think those people can come have good high paying jobs, and then also in the Hampton Roads region, we're looking to expand that as well. So a lot of things I would say from a national marketing perspective, that regional training center in Dandle, and with the supplemental, we intend to not only finish outfitting that, we broke ground a little about a week or two ago. That'll increase the capacity there, but we'll establish other ones of those around the country, and then with those state pipelines, bring together and reconnect the critical technology education centers, the CTEs, vocational schools, build those links that used to exist, we're re-establishing those to be able to reach out and touch all the way down to the elementary school to bring those people in and help with the workforce. Thank you, and I hope targeting our veterans as well, and I'm out of time, so I yield back. Thank you. The general ladies' time has expired. I now recognize the gentleman from the Commonwealth of Virginia and former chairman of this subcommittee, Mr. Whitman. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'd like to thank our witnesses for joining us. Redmore Rucker, I wanted to drill down a little bit specifically about workforce. Listen, we can talk about resources, supplementals, all that stuff. That's great. But the bottom line is you have to have people in the yards to build these boats. We know that we need 10,000 workers annually if we're gonna get to a rate of building one SSBN and two SSNs a year. To me, we have to do that. In fact, I think you have to be in a cadence of two, three, two, three for SSNs because that's where we enjoy such a significant advantage now in what we can do to maintain that in the future. The thing that's disturbing to me are the workforce numbers that we've seen both last year and this year. In 2022, we added 4,855 tradesmen while losing 3,384. This year, we saw marked improvement by recruiting 7,193 tradespeople, but we lost 3,313. The question becomes, we can't do addition by subtraction. We cannot continue to lose individuals at that rate. So the question is, is what do we do to retain the workers we have? What do we do too in the world where recruitment, especially based on wage, becomes significant? When I was at Electric Boat, I drove by a Chick-fil-A that had a sign out that said $18 an hour will give you a stipend for your education. You have health benefits, paid time off, and you're inside serving chicken sandwiches in a nice, comfortable environment. And then you drive down to the yard, there at EB, where you're outside, where it's cold, it's windy, you're working with steel, you're in a fairly severe environment, and there you're being paid less than that. And we expect to be able to recruit folks from that realm to go work at the shipyard. Now, EB's credit and others, we're building facilities where we're putting people inside, trying to make it more comfortable, but still, we are not at a competitive level on recruitment, and we certainly aren't there by these numbers on retention. Tell me, tell me, how do we solve that problem? Because that's the first problem you have to solve. We can throw all the money we want to at the problem, but if you don't have the people there in the yards to build these submarines, I don't care what else we do, this enterprise fails. Yes, sir, appreciate the question, and I know you have the data that we worked to get to yesterday. So as you mentioned, sir, since we kind of amped up our workforce efforts, you kind of talked about the numbers where those numbers you talked about this year, that 7100, that's through September 1st. So we're on track to get close to that 10,000 by the end of the year, after last year only getting about 5,000. So we've already seen the benefits from the efforts that we're doing. When I talked about earlier, the population where Electric Boat and Newport News to get the people, they only looked at a certain radius. That radius is expanded up into Providence and some other areas where, as I mentioned, that Hispanic population, there's a high propensity there. That's why we translated into Spanish and we're looking, that distance is really only about a 30-minute drive. The wages as well, I think you're familiar, sir, that Electric Boat raised their wages at Kwanzaa Point last October. Since they did that, they've exceeded their hiring rates. So that takes kind of what we're doing to get after hiring. It's not just Electric Boat and Newport News, I'd be remiss to say it's the whole country, which is why we have this national marketing campaign in those areas where we have critical suppliers and everywhere. From a retention perspective, I agree with you. That is something that we've brought outside consultants in. Electric Boat and Newport News have had the benefit over the years, picking them to where they didn't have as much competition as you mentioned, sir. It is a different world now. The data from before COVID-19 to after, where we really are seeing the challenges in that first to second year, where our attrition at the shipbuilders and some of the suppliers has over doubled. So what we're doing is we're going after some of those wages, retention bonuses, engagement of supervisors to feel increased job satisfaction, and then also as they come in there, be able to reduce the supervisor to worker ratio so they can get that mentoring early on, become part of the team, and then make meaningful work where they recognize the mission is bigger than just themselves. So I'll say it's a soft touch, in addition to that wages and everything else, sir. Let me ask too, I think there are other things that we have to do. We have to be able to look beyond just the yards themselves. Yards have a finite capacity. We also have to look at the suppliers. We talk about building the supplier base. It's not just doing that, it's getting suppliers closer regionally to the places where they're supplying the parts for these submarines and making sure that we expand the production base by having others that are building component parts that can be assembled at other places and then these panels put together and then sent to the yard. I mean, we already do that modularly, to me being able to spread workforce out because at some point you reach a critical mass where people can't park if it becomes less convenient for them to go to a massive center where there are tens of thousands of people coming into a yard. That's also another issue with retention. So I know I'm out of time, but I think those things the Navy has to look at. And I think too, the Navy has to have conversations with local governments about what they will do and their plans for development around these shipyard areas because it's not just the things that the Navy can do, it's also quality of life things for shipyard workers. Is there a place for them to go eat? Is there a convenient place for them to park? I mean, those things have to be part of this because I can tell you wherever else they go, they have these nice bright shiny cafeterias with lots of food choices, easy parking, all those things matter in today's workforce. Mr. Chairman, I yield back. The gentleman's time's expired. I'll now recognize another representative from the Commonwealth of Virginia, Ms. McClellan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'd like to follow up on questions from Representative Whitman about how we are addressing some of the workforce issues. But I want to ask if you could go into some detail about how you might be using new technology to improve capacity of the workforce that we already have. Yes, ma'am. As Representative Whitman said, when he talked about quality of service, quality of life, those are huge benefits. And in Virginia right now, we're already working with Newport News and others. It's kind of already a great news story of the things we're going after, the food and everything else. Part of that also is how we improve technologies. So we are looking at robotics and some of the technologies with data analytics within the yard. Right now, up at Electric Boat, we've already been employing robotics down at Newport News, also employing robotics and some of how they go through cutting, forming, welding, and then eventually being able to scale that to the larger stuff. As an example, down at Newport News, one of the things they determined is they were having some quality issues with making the whole structures. It was because they were manually checking the dimensions after they welded it. They will bring in a track system with a robot that could automatically check it in situ as they were going. It increased their efficiency by over 30% and reduced their quality from 10% defects down to less than 1%. So we're seeing the benefits of that automation, repeatability, not only increasing quality, but also improving efficiency. Thank you. And following up on earlier questions you received, can you provide a little more specific information on how you can increase build rates and use the Navy's plans to use funding from the supplemental if we pass it to help increase build rates? Yes, ma'am. A good portion of the supplemental, about 2 billion of it, is stuff that's going out to supplier development, strategic outsourcing, some of that workforce development national. When you look across to, as Representative Whitman said, in some cases it's bringing the work to the people, in other cases where you get saturated, it's take the work to where the people are. In the case of the strategic outsourcing, we have about 20 to 25 main vendors that are doing that large structural fabrication. Vendors located in different states. Some of the money that the Congress already provided before back in 19 to 20, today if we had not had that money, there are portions of the submarine that we would not be able to build some of the large porgings that would go into the missile tubes and Virginia payload tubes. The superstructure that goes on top, those, the money that Congress provided allowed us to facilitate those vendors to be able to do that larger capability. That is something we're doing around the country. I think as the Undersecretary said, and Admiral Houston said, today we're at about 4 million man hours annually that we've now pushed out. Our goal is to get up over 606, sorry, apologize, 6 million by 2025. That's essentially a half of Virginia-class submarine that will be pushing outside the yards annually to ensure that we disperse and take advantage of the workforce around the country. Thank you for that. One of the things I've heard from the Virginia shipyards is that the department can be slow in dispersing funding for submarine construction in the industrial base account to suppliers and contractors. What is the Navy doing to ensure this funding can go out more quickly? Yes ma'am, I think it was said earlier by some of the representatives that when we understand the stability of the work and the prediction, we have economic order quantities when we do multi-year procurements. We have one of those coming up as we move forward into the next block of Virginias as well as Columbia. We actually have a joint team from my organization and the Admiral that owns the Columbia class where they're working together with the shipbuilders to push out the largest volume ever that we've done in shipbuilding at one time to establish large stable contracts so that the stability with the workforce out there can understand, they can facilitate, hire the workforce and get that stable credible demand over time. As we go to do that, working with the supplier base, we worked with E.B. and Newport News, they have a quarterly supplier bulletin that they put out and the Navy has helped with them to put information in there to better communicate with all of the suppliers. We have about 350 critical suppliers, 16,000 total, that we push that information out so they have better visibility and transparency of the timing of what's coming so we can communicate and make sure we maintain that partnership. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I yield back. The gentleman who yields back I now recognize the gentleman from Missouri, one of the bright new stars on this subcommittee, Mr. Alford. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And thank you, ranking member Courtney. Isn't it good to be back at work for the American people? Hey, thank you all for being here today. I really appreciate that. You know, the DOD recently issued a military report estimating the Chinese have more than 500 operational nuclear warheads that are on pace to 1,000 warheads by 2030. I'm not telling you anything you don't know. China continues to build towards this Type 096 ballistic missile submarine. I think we're all increasingly concerned about China's ability to ramp up its nuclear program. I'm hopeful, along with the rest of this committee, that AUKUS continues to form into a powerful deterrent against China. Vice Admiral Houston, I was very much impressed with our meeting a couple of months ago in another setting. You, sir, have a great passion, a level of knowledge you have impressed me more than anyone I've met in this building and I've got a question for you. Is our submarine fleet ready today to take on China if we needed to? Thank you for the compliment and thank you for the question, sir. We are absolutely ready. We are prepared. We train and we practice for all contingency operations and the submarine force, our priorities are warfighting people and safety and I can tell you down to the day, every one of my operational submarines, when it'll be ready to deploy if called upon. What's the biggest challenge we face? The biggest challenge I currently face is what we've been talking about with our maintenance backlog. It's getting those seven operations, those seven submarines that should not be in maintenance, getting them back to the fleet and with the support that we have for the industrial base, the uplift that we can get from the Australia additive money here will help reduce that backlog and by 2027, 2028 we should be have those seven submarines back and be at 80% operational readiness. That's the key Davidson timeline. That is our goal and that is what we are focused on on the undersea force right now. Well, again, thank you. Secretary Raven, the FY24 House NDAA included a provision requiring the Navy to provide a report on the industrialization efforts and investments it's making into the next gen nickel zinc submarine battery. The recent supplemental appropriations requests from the administration asked for approximately $3.4 billion from investments in the submarine industrial base. Out of these funds, can you please tell us what the planned investments are specifically for the submarine battery industrial base to ensure the Columbia class submarines are delivered on time? Or would that be better addressed to someone else? We're Admiral Rucker. Admiral Rucker, can you handle that? Yes, sir. Today we have two main submarine battery vendors. The money that's in the supplemental has more than $20 million to be able to go after and continue the uplift of production at those submarine battery vendors. In addition, the nickel zinc, my office, one of my offices owns that, we have transitioned that from, I'll say proof of concept into technology development as we look to when we should be able to integrate that technology onto the Virginia class. So it's kind of moved from the early stage of kind of tinkering with into actual technology development to integrate. Well thank you again, thank you for your time and attention and your candid answers and I appreciate your service to our nation. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I yield back. Gentlemen yields back, I now recognize the final person to ask questions, ranking member Courtney. Great, thank you. And before I do just really quickly, I do want to follow up on a mention that Admiral Houston made that a week ago last Saturday, the 22nd Virginia class submarine USS Hyman G. Rickover was commissioned and added to the fleet and really months were away from the USS New Jersey, also being commissioned and there are 13 Virginia class submarines in the queue that again are in various stages of production at the two major shipyards. But again, with the boost I think that's coming through with the industrial based funding over the last few years or so, we're gonna see that tonnage chart pickup speed and we're gonna see again, I think the sort of post COVID production cadence get back on track that's here. I'd also just sort of note that in terms of the wage rates up in Southern New England, the Metal Trades Council just signed an agreement with Electric Boat two weeks ago, five year contract starting wage is $23 an hour. And again, there's a really solid package in terms of retirement benefits and help, which is far exceeds anything that a fast food or hospitality employer in the region is gonna be able to offer. Not to speak of the fact that there's a really fast track for promotion for people who make that choice. And that's why they're at about 4,500 hires this year, which is the highest number ever in the 120 year history of that company that's there. One last point I just wanna make because it was in the press, Wall Street Journal again had a piece which talked about that maybe it's time for us to sort of just go back to diesel electrics as a way of sort of expanding the size of the fleet, which again, has been asked about here today. And I think the last diesel went offline in the early 1990s maybe, but maybe Admiral Houston, if you could just sort of address that issue as long as we've got you here today. Yeah, thank you, ranking member. So after World War II, Chester Nimitz, the fleet Admiral, the Pacific Fleet Commander who happened to be a submarine officer was approached by Admiral Rickover 75 years ago and we embarked on nuclear propulsion submarines. It gives an unmatched capability in the undersea. We have shifted solely to nuclear power because it gives that incredible capability. And as we talk about countries that could you go to diesel submarines, Australia is larger than the continental US with a larger coast surrounded by the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean. It's very large distances. Nuclear propulsion gives undersea forces asymmetric advantages. That is why countries that have the most capable navies have shifted to nuclear power submarines. It gives you unmatched stealth, unmatched sustainment, unmatched combat capability. It is not a fair comparison. So when you look at Nautilus underway from 55 to 1968, we had built more than 60 submarines crewed more than 100 nuclear crews. And we did this on the backs of a nation that had essentially won the Pacific War with 2% of the Navy, which was diesel submarines. So clearly the commander in chief of the Pacific, Amal Nimitz, knew the benefit of nuclear propulsion. And it gives you that unmatched capability that we have today. And that is why it's so important for Australia as they sought out for their national defense to have that asymmetric capability for the free Indo-Pacific region. I've told my ranking member he used to be known as Two Sub Joe. He's gonna have to re-change his name to Three Sub Joe in order to get to where we need. Listen, you witnesses did an outstanding job of painting a picture for America and for our colleagues here in the house and over in the Senate of the benefits of these things. And I thank you for your time and I thank you for your professionalism. And with that, this hearing is adjourned.