Lamborn mentioned areas of focus for the subcommittee embody hypersonic weapons and DoD house packages
WASHINGTON — Rep. Doug Lamborn, a Republican representing Colorado Springs, was named chairman of the Home Armed Providers Committee’s strategic forces subcommittee.
HASC Chairman Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), on Jan. 25 announced the committee’s seven subcommittee chairs for the 118th Congress.
The strategic forces subcommittee oversees missile protection, nationwide safety house and Division of Power nuclear weapons packages.
Lamborn instructed SpaceNews that he has laid out a number of key priorities the strategic forces subcommittee will deal with this 12 months.
One is hypersonic weapons, together with DoD’s development of offensive hypersonic missiles and defenses against enemies’ hypersonic weapons.
“We really want to meet up with hypersonics,” mentioned Lamborn. “China and to some extent Russia are far forward of us … and I’m not satisfied that the Biden Administration has a effectively thought out plan to handle the Chinese language risk.”
A second precedence is House Pressure acquisitions of next-generation applied sciences. “We have to streamline house acquisition,” he mentioned. “A serious thrust for why the House Pressure was created was to streamline house acquisition and ensure the proper investments are made in superior house capabilities.”
Additionally on Lamborn’s watch checklist is the House Pressure’s procurement of nationwide safety launch companies and efforts to develop responsive launch capabilities. “The underside line is we have to have a sturdy capability to get our property into house each time the necessity arises,” he mentioned. “So we’ll proceed giving quite a lot of consideration to that.”
Lamborn mentioned he has met a number of occasions with the brand new chief of the U.S. House Pressure Gen. B. Probability Saltzman. “We’re undoubtedly working collectively,” he mentioned.
The subcommittee will proceed to analyze choices to establish a reserve component for the House Pressure, which has been a “thorny subject” for the previous two years, he mentioned. “We definitely will hold taking a look at it.”
On missile protection, Lamborn mentioned, the main target will likely be on making certain the U.S. is protected against North Korea’s long-range ballistic missiles.