THE VICE PRESIDENT: Secretary Mattis, Deputy Secretary Shanahan, General Selva, General Goldfein, users of the Armed Forces regarding the usa, and all sorts of the gents and ladies for the united states of america Department of Defense whom every day oversee the best military into the reputation for the planet: many thanks for many you will do every single day for the US individuals. (Applause.)
And allow me to start by bringing greetings from your own Commander-in-Chief, who’s got through the extremely earliest days for this management proved himself become a fantastic champ associated with the military regarding the united states of america, focused on strengthening security that is american in the world as well as in area. We bring greetings through the President that is 45th of united states, President Donald Trump. (Applause.)
In the Inaugural Address to your country, President Trump proclaimed that the usa appears, in their terms, “at the delivery of a millennium that is new willing to unlock the secrets of room.”
And since time certainly one of our management, this President has held his vow to bring back America’s proud legacy of leadership in area, thinking that room is important to the nation’s protection, success, and our extremely life style.
Just last year, after it had lain inactive for pretty much a quarter-century, President Trump revived the nationwide area Council to reinvigorate and coordinate room tasks across our federal government.
It really is my great honor, as Vice President, to act as the Chairman for the nationwide area Council. And I’m happy to report that President Trump has finalized three brand new area policy directives to reorient our room system toward human being research, unleash America’s burgeoning cheap write my paper commercial area organizations, and safeguard our vital area assets with brand brand brand new room traffic administration policy.
But as Commander-in-Chief, President Trump’s greatest concern may be the security and protection associated with American individuals. And even though, many times, past administrations all but neglected the security that is growing appearing in area, President Trump reported obviously and forcefully that space is, inside the terms, “a warfighting domain, just like…land, and atmosphere, and ocean.”
And merely as we’ve done in ages past, the usa of America, under their leadership, will meet with the rising threats with this new battlefield with United states ingenuity and power to guard our country, protect our people, and carry the explanation for freedom and comfort to the next great frontier that is american.
In 1939, in the beginning of the 2nd World War, the U.S. Army Air Corps had been nevertheless a fledgling company. But as Nazi air forces bombed their method from Warsaw to London, our army commanders took decisive action then to satisfy that new threat mind on.
By 1945, the US military had almost 30 times the sheer number of planes, and 85 times the sheer number of pilots and help teams when compared with simply six years previously.
America and our allies emerged victorious from World War II due to the power of y our forces that are armed and because our armed forces adapted to meet up the appearing threats for the time. We knew that airpower had forever changed the character of war, therefore we marshaled the resources and also the will to create the absolute most powerful air force the whole world had ever seen.
And simply couple of years from then on terrible conflict, our nation produced a unique branch of solution to secure American dominance into the skies for generations in the future with all the creation of the usa Air Force.
Now the full time has arrived to publish the second great chapter in a brief history of y our military, to organize for the following battlefield where America’s best and bravest should be called to deter and beat a brand new generation of threats to your individuals also to our country. The full time has arrived to establish the usa area Force.
And that is just exactly what brings us here today. Seven weeks hence, President Trump directed the Department of Defense “to instantly start the process essential to establish an area Force once the branch that is sixth of armed forces.”
The President managed to get clear which our objective that is ultimate is produce a brand new branch of y our armed forces that is separate from, and corresponding to, five other branches.
Today, the Department of Defense will launch a written report outlining the very first phases of our administration’s want to implement the President’s guidance and turn their eyesight into a real possibility.
This report ratings the nationwide protection area tasks in the Department of Defense, and it also identifies tangible actions which our management will require to lay the inspiration for an innovative new Department associated with area Force.
Now, to be clear, the room Force will never be built from scratch due to the fact males in addition to ladies who run and protect our nation’s area programs today are usually top in the field. And since the dawn regarding the area Age, America has remained the very best in room. (Applause.)
Within the last 60 years, the usa has put together the biggest and a lot of advanced constellation of armed forces and intelligence satellites on earth.
We’ve pioneered the technology to leverage American energy in room right here on the planet, and present our warfighters the intelligence which they require, and provide our cleverness community the information and knowledge they have to keep a strategic benefit anywhere our warfighters are running.
Across this Department and our cleverness agency, you can find literally thousands of armed forces workers, civilians, and contractors working and supporting our area systems, and together they’re the eyes and also the ears of America’s warfighters around the world. Plus they perform an extraordinary task.
I’ve seen their work firsthand. I’ve traveled around the world to meet up with with all the both women and men who are fighting for America’s future in room in my own year that is first and half about this task, through the airmen regarding the 50th area Wing at Schriever Air Force Base, whoever fleet of surveillance, navigation, and communication satellites raise the agility, accuracy, and effectiveness of our armed forces; to your engineers of this Missile Defense Agency at Redstone Arsenal in Alabama who will be forging the new generation of rockets to bolster our missile protection; to your other bases and facilities around the world where our both women and men in uniform come together with this intelligence community and our allies to guard our individuals, our country, and our passions all over the world.
And in the last eighteen months, President Trump and our whole management took decisive action to strengthen US energy in space too.
President Trump recently finalized the investment that is largest in our national defense considering that the times of Ronald Reagan. (Applause.) And therefore Defense that is new spending plan new resources for just two cutting-edge armed forces communications satellites and almost $1 billion for the area protection programs. And after this, we renew the President’s turn to the Congress of this united states of america to spend one more $8 billion within our area protection systems within the next 5 years.
The gents and ladies with this Department also have taken historic steps to secure leadership that is american area. The Department of Defense is fielding a new generation of jam-resistant GPS and communications satellites and new missile-warning satellites that are smaller, tougher, and more maneuverable than ever before at the direction of Secretary Mattis.
Even though these actions have now been imperative to our national protection, they’re actually only a new. They’re only a new of meeting the increasing protection threats our nation faces in space today plus in the near future. As President Trump has stated, in the words, “It is certainly not adequate to simply have a presence that is american room; we ought to have American dominance in room.” And thus we shall. (Applause.)
And that’s the key reason why we’re beginning the entire process of developing an area Force since the sixth branch of your military. In the same way within the past, as soon as we created the Air Force, developing the area Force is a notion whose time has arrived.
The room environment has basically changed within the generation that is last. The thing that was when calm and uncontested has become crowded and adversarial. Today, other countries are searhing for to disrupt our space-based systems and challenge US supremacy in room as nothing you’ve seen prior.
For several years, nations from Russia and Asia to North Korea and Iran have actually pursued weapons to jam, blind, and disable our navigation and communications satellites via electronic assaults through the ground.
But recently, our adversaries have now been trying to bring new tools of war into area itself. In 2007, Asia established a missile that tracked and destroyed one of their very very very own satellites — a very provocative demonstration of Asia’s growing capacity to militarize room.
