Mikie Sherrill Asks Military Official: If The War In Ukraine Ended Today, Would Russia Still Be A Threat?

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During a House Armed Services Committee hearing held before the congressional recess, Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-NJ) questioned Military officials about the threat Russia poses to the U.S.

Transcript

00:00The gentleman is back, Chair, and I recognize the gentlelady from New Jersey, Ms. Sherrill.

00:04Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good afternoon, and I want to thank our witnesses for being here today.

00:09General Cavoli, you said in your opening statement that Russia is in the process of significantly

00:15rebuilding its military by recruiting more soldiers, building more vehicles, and creating

00:20more munitions than we've seen before. So if the war in Ukraine were to end today,

00:24do you believe that the Russian military would continue to represent a significant threat to

00:29the U.S., Ukraine, and our European allies in the coming years? Yes, ma'am. It would take them a

00:34little bit of time to reorient their conventional force and reposition it, but not that much time,

00:43and then they could pose a conventional threat. Very important for me to add, however, that they

00:49have never stopped having their strategic capabilities. Their nuclear submarines, their

00:56long-range aviation, their cyber, their space, all of that is alive and well and largely unaffected by

01:03the war in Ukraine. Thank you. And if Russia was able to retain and control significant portions of

01:10Ukrainian territory once the war ends, do you believe Russia would consider that a victory and consider

01:15launching a similar invasion of Ukraine or another European country in the future? It's hard for me to

01:23predict the future, ma'am, but I think it's very safe for all of us to say that wouldn't prevent them

01:30from doing it in the future. It would certainly leave the door open for them. Yeah. Thank you. And as

01:40the Trump administration chooses to abandon Ukraine and let Russia rebuild its military,

01:44they're also considering cutting the U.S. military presence in Europe. So General Cavoli, how would cutting

01:50U.S. forces from UCOM impact your ability to respond to a crisis or potential conflict with Russia?

01:58Ma'am, it would reduce, it would increase the amount of time it took to respond. It depends, of course,

02:04on what forces were hypothetically to be removed. It depends on what kind of action were required to

02:10counter Russia. But clearly, moving things to the other side of the Atlantic increases the time-space

02:17challenge. Other than that, I don't want to be evasive, but it's really a very situation-dependent

02:22question. And would removing, I guess to be more clear, our brigade combat team from Poland or having

02:30our forces stationed in Germany or Italy slow your response to a Russian assault on our Eastern European

02:36allies? Yes, I've consistently testified to that. Thank you. So, as we move forward, can you just talk

02:47a little bit, too, as you mentioned, about what you think the key strategic aspects are of Russia's military?

02:58So, in the broadest sense, ma'am? That provide the biggest threat to the United States.

03:03Yeah, their nuclear arsenal. What about their cyber capabilities?

03:08I believe their nuclear arsenal poses a bigger threat. Their cyber capabilities

03:13are more likely to be used, but in most cases wouldn't have the catastrophic effect that the

03:20nuclear threat would have. But, of course, that again depends on what nuclear weapons we're talking

03:26about, what cyber attacks. But in general, I would say the nuclear capabilities, and then I would say

03:32the space and cyber, sort of on a level. But conventionally, their strategic advantage continues

03:41to be mass that they can put in direct proximity to NATO forces that challenges us to respond in time

03:52across the spaces required. So, basically, they can put a force into place that would cause us to have

04:01to react in a timely fashion. And that time-space problem is really the essence of conventional

04:07deterrence on the continent. And given the recent conflict in Ukraine, what has been kind of,

04:13what will be the hardest for Russia to rebuild in the aftermath of that?

04:22I'd like to answer that in closed session, because it goes into some technical stuff. What I can say

04:29is I don't think it's that hard to rebuild their mass. They have manpower available. They demonstrate

04:37the willingness to conscript it. And it doesn't take that long to reconstitute the size of their

04:45old force or even to increase it. They still have equipment and storage that they could pull out and

04:52renovate. And they have increased their ability to produce legacy hardware, tanks and armored personnel

04:58carriers and things like that. So, there are some things that are easy. The things that are hard,

05:03it'd be better to answer in closed session, ma'am. Thank you. And I yield back.

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