Soldiers are heading to a new battlefield: space

The Army is taking a big step by creating a space branch

So why is there a need to establish this? What is left to do and on what timeline to establish this

And walk me through how the space branch will grow and take shape in the early years, because you're getting close to that

We started, we introduced the space vision that laid out the roadmap to really get there with the long-term objective of the space branch, but incrementally

And really, the Space Vision laid out why it's important that all the way down to the tactical edge, everybody understands space and how to employ space

We followed that up with our space MOS, 4D Delta. And we felt that was the first critical step, you know, because we have been borrowing from air defense, MI, and Signal

training those soldiers, keeping them for two, maybe three years, and then releasing them back

And so we never really grew the non-commissioned officer professional corps. We were never able to rely on the soldier expert to become experts in their craft

And then they would go back to their branch and go back to doing their branch

so we weren't able to build that depth. So doing that and, again, going live in 50 days or so

We will now have the soldiers and non-commissioned officers that make the components of the branch

We've already had the F-A-40 officers from a functional area component at a certain point in their career

They transition. So the pieces are all coming together. So the next natural step was the branch

And the reason a branch is so important now you building a career path for these non officers soldiers and officers to be able to flow through a branch and provide the army what the army needs

And so that's what's great about the army. The army realizes the environment, realizes the technology and the change in warfare

And we're seeing it in real time through some of the current conflicts in Ukraine and in the Middle East

and the reliance on the adversary leveraging technology from, you know, we talk a lot about the missile piece

but levering some of the space capabilities and an Army branch as a natural progression

to be able to keep up with the changing warfare environment and being able to leverage those next-gen type technologies to be able to put our soldiers in an advantage on the battlefield

OK. I wanted to ask, you know, you mentioned earlier that the First Space Brigade is very busy and now has a very high uptempo and you have them maxed out

You recently announced that, you know, air and missile defense is actually going to grow by about 30 percent

Do you see an opportunity to, you know, as you build things like the Space Branch and grow

Do you see an opportunity to grow, you know, beyond maybe having a First Space Brigade, just, you know, other units

Do you see a potential for that? Or are you envisioning, recommending a growth

I'm always looking at opportunities to grow our empire. Our team, you know, as we look at the future of First Space Brigade, we're excited that we're growing the TSEG in USURPAC because we're getting capabilities forward

But I believe as we move forward and we look at more

prioritization towards the homeland, there can be opportunities to grow us more space capabilities to focus on the homeland missions So we have First Space Brigade that assigned to Space Com with a global mission

So as the Army moves forward and looks at other opportunities for space

and prioritization of space, there may be opportunities there in the future. Okay, okay

You've mentioned the space vision a few times that came out, I believe in early 2024

So has that space vision evolved for you at all? And if so, how

I believe so. I believe the premise of this space vision was to all the way down to the soldier leader levels to understand space

You know, I look back at my own personal career and when it came to space, I didn't know a whole lot about space

I knew I had a PSC-5 SATCOM radio that would, you know, be able to pick up and call

And we were excited about, hey, we can call further than, you know, 20 kilometers and we can go over the horizon and call

And so we all wanted one of those, especially in being in an air defense Patriot battery when you were autonomous and having something like that

And that's, you know, and then theater early warning. Right. But not really understanding the boundaries and where we could go with Army space

And so as you look at what the vision is, I think it's brought more awareness to the entire Army

The Army is now understanding more as we work closely with the training centers, the schoolhouses, getting Army space involved in the early education part

I think it's starting to you know, at least everybody's understanding that hey, there's base

Potentially denied environment now here are some of the things I can do without space capabilities just by understanding the environment Now if I was able to have some of the capabilities that being developed out there we can now start taking it to the next step And so we starting to see that we need we need to continue to push that envelope But it more of not just SMDC but all the formations out there understand space and we have a lot of we have our space support elements inside of most of our

larger MACOMs, and they're helping driving that space vision all the way down to the battalion

and company level. Okay. Okay. What role does commercial space technologies play in Army

operations, or how do you see sort of a potential expansion for more commercial space technologies

Yeah. So if I look at air and missile defense, we see great opportunities

with leveraging commercial space, and we're already experimenting with some of the commercial space elements

That's the biggest thing, that technology is helping us push the envelope

on how we can pass data across our formations. And so I would tell you that we're definitely looking

at tapping into that, and as we move forward, we'll see the best way to be able to do that

What are some of the challenges or hurdles in being able to do that

Do you see any or are some of those clearing away? So many opportunities

There are several opportunities, and I'll tell you, our soldiers will tell you there's no hindrance

Let's do it now. Let's go now because they're so technical savvy and they see the opportunities there

But as we work through, you know, ensure cyber protections and we're able to pass safe communications unit to unit

that will help us clear the path