WASHINGTON, D.C.— In a hearing of the Strategic Forces Subcommittee focused on America’s space defense systems, Chairman Senator Angus King asked Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Space Acquisition and Integration, Frank Cavelli, and General Michael Guetlein, Vice Chief of Space Operations, about the importance of both collaborating with allies and prioritizing deterrence as a cornerstone of America’s national defense. The hearing comes as the Space Force submitted its Defense budget authorization request for Fiscal Year 2025 and the Future Years Defense Program (FYDP). The FYDP projects DOD funding, manpower, and force structure needs over a five-year period.

To begin the conversation, Senator King asked General Guetlein about how the United State Space Force is collaborating with our allies on technology development – receiving confirmation that it remains a component of America’s space posture.

“General, you have talked about working with allies. That is one of our asymmetric advantages. Are we working with allies in terms of development of these technologies?” Senator King asked. “In other words, all wisdom on technology does not necessarily reside here. We have allies like Japan, the EU, Scandinavia that we could get more out of our dollars if we were working jointly with these close allies.”

“Yes, Senator, we are. We are building collaborative projects, for example, SATCOM with Luxembourg and SATCOM with Norway, PNT with Japan so we are broadening out those partnerships on a daily basis. Building ground-based radars in Australia as well as in the U.K., collaborating a launch with New Zealand so we are across the board trying to embrace our allies and I will give kudos to our folks in policy that were able to break down those classification barriers that once we put those into place, it will also allow us to have broader conversations with our with some of our allies,” General Guetlein replied.

Senator King then asked General Guetlein and Cavelli about the importance of deterrence against our adversaries, hearing that the General considers strategic reveals an effective method of keeping foes at bay.

“All of what we have been talking today about in terms of defense has been largely about resiliency and proliferation. The cornerstone of our defense strategy for 70 years however has been deterrence. That is the adversary fears the consequences of an aggressive action against this country. Is deterrence part of our strategy in space?” Senator King asked.

Calvelli responded, “Absolutely, yes, but one of the challenges is the classification levels.”

“But it’s not deterrence if the adversary doesn’t know about it,” Senator King interjected.

Calvelli replied, “You are correct. I will defer to General Guetlein with the Space Force on deterrence.”

“Senator, Integrated deterrence is a foundation of our strategy. We do balance on a day-to-day basis what capabilities we decide to reveal and conceal to make sure the adversary knows we are intent on maintaining that capability gap of protecting and defending our capabilities on a day to day basis. So deterrence is the cornerstone of everything we are trying to do. If you think back to one of the core themes, it is competitive endurance,” General Guetlein concluded. “Under competitive endurance, we would rather be in a state of constant competition and to deter aggression than be in a state of conflict.”

A member of the Senate Armed Services Committee and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Senator King is recognized as an authoritative voice on national security and foreign policy issues. As the Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee Subcommittee on Strategic Forces — which oversees the United States’ strategic forces and missile defenses — Senator King has been a steady voice on the need to address the growing nuclear capacity of our adversaries. Senator King recently expressed concern about the emerging threats of Russia and China’s development of “nightmare weapon” hypersonic missiles, which he has described as “strategic game-changers.”

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