00:00Thank you. The senator had very similar questions to the ones I had about what are the trade-offs of these cuts, right?
00:08And for me, it's hard to miss that Space Force got excluded from having to take cuts.
00:14And I'm happy for them. That's a mission that's extremely important,
00:18but just would hope that if there's someone who's picking and choosing missions that are going to be cut versus protected,
00:25that I know you're advocating, but that sort of we realize that the units that are in highest demand
00:33should not be taking the same haircut as everybody else across the force.
00:39So hope that that's happening, and thank you for illustrating some of those trade-offs that you would have.
00:44I do want to understand what missions you have been tasked to do in recent months.
00:53I am, as someone who is a CIA officer and a Middle East specialist and did three tours in Iraq,
00:58I am 100 percent with you that just because you don't hear about threats in the news every day
01:03doesn't mean they're still, doesn't mean they're not still out there plotting to kill Americans,
01:08attack the homeland, and do really devastating things.
01:12And we, of course, have nation states that are causing all kinds of problems.
01:16But I did see that the president designated Mexican cartels, a number of named cartels,
01:23as foreign terrorist organizations, restricting in a positive way American citizens from providing
01:28support, materiel, leadership in any way to those organizations.
01:33Can you describe what, if any, guidance you've been getting and giving on lethal force against cartels
01:40on the southern border given the buildup of about 10,000 U.S. forces down there?
01:45I can begin with that, and then we can talk the details.
01:47The designation of foreign terrorist organizations does not grant us any new authorities as a DOD entity.
01:55What it really does is it helps us unlock the doors to whole-of-government approach.
02:00Our threat finance analysts can now better provide their target packets to our counterparts
02:06in the whole-of-government approach.
02:08But what we do, what we are doing now is making sure that we provide options,
02:13that we can be ready, lethal, and prepared should the president need us to continue to seal and protect the border.
02:21But to answer your question directly, it does not grant us any new authorities to take direct action or so forth.
02:26So you would need commander-in-chief authority to go, for instance,
02:31and pursue drone attacks inside Mexico against cartels.
02:36I'm just asking, Mr. Musk said publicly that that foreign terrorist designation authorizes drone strikes
02:43against Mexican cartels inside Mexico.
02:46I'm just trying to understand fact from fiction here.
02:50Do you believe you have that authority today, understanding the designation alone may not give it to you,
02:56do you believe you have the authority today to cross over the Mexican border
03:00and use drone strikes to go after cartels?
03:03No, ma'am. The designation of FTO does not grant us any new authorities.
03:07But separate from the FTO designation, do you, as the service secretary, believe you have that?
03:12I'm just trying to understand. I'm not, I have no problem with them being designated.
03:16I have no problem going against them and their financing, right?
03:19Their materiel.
03:20But I think certainly as part of this committee, we want to understand use of lethal force in a neighboring state.
03:26So is there in any way, separate from FTO designation, do you currently have the authority
03:32to shoot down, shoot at Mexican cartels over the border right now?
03:37No, ma'am.
03:38Okay. Thank you for clarifying.
03:40And then, you know, we, I think a lot of us on the committee are very worried about Taiwan
03:46and a potential problem with China over the next few years.
03:52I'm the co-chair of the Taiwan caucus, so we think about this a lot.
03:57Can you give me your best assessment of, you know, what our security assistance activities there,
04:05our training, maybe we have to go into classified session,
04:07but would appreciate, you know, your role in deterrence understanding the role you're playing in that issue.
04:14Senator, I would, we'll absolutely have to go into a closed session to provide details.
04:22What I would offer is that in support of Indo-PACOM,
04:25you would see your special operations forces doing many of the missions you described earlier,
04:30certainly always being prepared for crisis response inside that AOR through our theater,
04:36Special Operations Command, Special Ops Command Pacific.
04:39That is a sacred obligation.
04:41I think you would also see us in a counterterrorism way, making sure that any CT threats,
04:48in this case ISIS East Asia, we're doing in a partnered way with teammates in that region.
04:54And then I think you would see us certainly in deterrence.
04:57And the way we present ourselves is presence is placement and access.
05:01It builds relationships and partnerships and capability and all that,
05:05I think is very valuable to San Pabarro, any COCOM commander,
05:10because it provides options and opportunities they wouldn't otherwise have
05:13and dilemmas and challenges to the adversary.
05:16And I yield back.
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