The Insider

The Senate Intelligence Committee today approved John Brennan to be CIA director by a 12-3 vote, sending his nomination to the full Senate.

"The vote came one day after Committee Chairman Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) reached an agreement with the White House to provide legal opinions on the targeted killings of Americans," according to a panel statement.

"I hope the Senate acts quickly to confirm" Brennan, committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) said in the statement, adding:

He draws on a deep well of experience -- 25 years as a CIA analyst, chief of station, manager, head of counterterrorism efforts and White House homeland security advisor. John was straightforward with the committee, answering all of our questions, and I believe he will be a candid partner at CIA and a strong leader of that critically important agency. No one is better prepared to be CIA director than Mr. Brennan. The CIA needs a confirmed director, and Majority Leader Reid is committed to moving quickly to schedule a vote.

Two issues unrelated to John Brennan delayed this vote -- additional details on the Benghazi attack and access to OLC opinions on targeted killings of American. I believe both of those issues have been addressed. The information I requested with Vice Chairman Chambliss on Benghazi has been or is being delivered, and just last night I reached an agreement with the White House to review all OLC opinions on targeted killings of Americans. It was unfortunate these issues delayed the process, but I am confident that they have been resolved.

Army leaders have sent out a service-wide message urging soldiers and civilians to remain focused on their missions and preserve their “espirt de corps” despite the $18 billion fiscal crisis barreling toward them.

The message, which was signed by Secretary John McHugh, Chief of Staff Gen. Raymond Odierno, and Sergeant Major of the Army Raymond Chandler, was distributed via email and the service's website yesterday evening.

“As you are aware, sequestration went into effect on Friday, March 1st,” the message begins. “This fiscal year alone, we face the potential of at least an $18 billion dollar shortfall in our Operations and Maintenance accounts, due to the combined impacts of sequestration, the continuing resolution and contingency funding. These are the funds that allow us to support operations, maintain readiness and pay our civilian workforce.”

The Army is referring to the current fiscal challenge as the “6-6-6” budget crisis. Those numbers stand for the $18 billion operation and maintenance funding shortfall the service faces in FY-13: a $6 billion gap brought on by sequestration, a $6 billion shortfall attributed to a congressional continuing resolution, and $6 billion in greater-than-expected warfighting expenses in Afghanistan. Another $6 billion would be cut from other accounts due to across-board sequestration, but the Army is not using that amount in its "6-6-6" messaging, as Inside the Army reports this week.

The service-wide message encourages soldiers and civilians to “remain focused on the fundamentals” as Army leaders handle the fiscal situation in Washington.

“Develop your soldiers, civilians and our future Army leaders; conduct tough, realistic mission-focused training; maintain and account for your equipment; be good stewards of your resources; and sustain the high level of esprit de corps in your organization,” the message states. “Our top priority is to ensure that our forces defending the homeland, those in Afghanistan and Korea, and those next to deploy and rotate into theater, have the resources required to execute their missions. We also recognize that along with risks to readiness, sequestration will also bring particular hardship to our civilian workforce.”

The Army leaders write that they will share information as it becomes available and that soldiers and civilians can expect to be updated at their various installations in the months ahead to “facilitate a dialogue and listen to your concerns and those of your family members.”

The authors close by urging soldiers and civilians to see the current challenge as “an opportunity to demonstrate, once again, our commitment to selfless service and our profession. . . . Army Strong!”

One day after the law imposing sequestration kicked in, Navy Secretary ray Mabus laid out how the service will take immediate action in response to that law and the prospect of a yearlong continuing resolution.

Next month the Navy will shut down a carrier air wing and begin preparations to stand down at least three additional air wings, with two more slated to be reduced to minimum safe flying levels by the end of the year, he said in a March 3 message to the service.

The service will defer the deployment of the hospital ship Comfort to Central America and South America, will cancel or defer the deployments of up to six ships to various theaters around the world, will lay up four combat logistics force units in U.S. Pacific Command and will bring some ships home from deployment early, according to Mabus' message.

Mabus directs the Navy to begin negotiating contract modifications for any investment programs where the remaining unobligated balance will be insufficient after the sequestration reduction is applied. Major programs affected include Virginia-class submarine advance procurement, reactor power units and the Joint High Speed Vessel.

The Marine Corps will begin final planning to slow depot maintenance activities including reductions in non-permanent workforce. Also, the service will cease new enrollments in voluntary education tuition assistance, he wrote. On March 2, Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Amos sent out a similar sequestration letter covering his service's planned sequestration actions.

The March introductory flight screening for future pilots and naval flight officers is canceled. The Navy will also cancel Blue Angels shows scheduled in April, which include MacDill Air Force Base, FL, Naval Air Station Corpus Christi, TX, Vidalia, GA and Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort, SC.

Navy recruiting media support is canceled in March and the service will reduce the majority of advertising contracts under contractual conditions.

“Navy department leadership understands the uncertainty that these and other decisions create both amongst our people and in the defense industry upon which we rely,” Mabus wrote. “The lack of legislative solution to avoid sequestration is deeply regrettable.

“That said, we must endeavor to deal with the situation as we face it, not as we wish it could otherwise be,” he added.

The Defense Department announced today that Germany-based elements of the Army's 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team will relocate within Germany and to Italy in summer 2013, and also detailed a number of units that will be inactivated and returned to the United States by 2015.

A total of four battalions will be relocated.

“Two battalions will relocate from Germany to Italy; the brigade’s headquarters battalion and one infantry battalion will relocate to Caserma Ederle in Vicenza, Italy, and to the Army’s new facility in Del Din [formerly known as Dal Molin] in Vicenza,” according to DOD's announcement. “The other two battalions will relocate from Schweinfurt and Bamberg, Germany, to Grafenwoehr, Germany.”

The notice also states that, along with the previously announced inactivation of V Corps Headquarters and the 170th and 172nd Infantry Brigades, other forces will also be inactivated:

In 2013:

535th Engineer Company, Warner Barracks, Bamberg, Germany – Inactivates

12th Chemical Company, Conn Barracks, Schweinfurt, Germany – Inactivates

V Corps Headquarters, Clay Kaserne, Wiesbaden, Germany – Inactivates

172nd Infantry Brigade, Grafenwoehr, Germany – Inactivates

Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 391st Combat Service Support Battalion, Warner Barracks, Bamberg, Germany – Inactivates

B Detachment, 106th Finance Company, Katterbach Kaserne, Ansbach, Germany – Inactivates

42nd Engineer Company, Warner Barracks, Bamberg, Germany – Returns to the United States.

99th Movement Control Team, Aviano Air Base, Italy – Returns to the United States.

In 2014:

Headquarters, 18th Engineer Brigade, Conn Barracks, Schweinfurt, Germany – Inactivates

243 Engineer Detachment, Conn Barracks, Schweinfurt, Germany – Inactivates

54th Engineer Battalion, Warner Barracks, Bamberg, Germany – Inactivates

370th Engineer Company, Warner Barracks, Bamberg, Germany – Inactivates

7th Signal Brigade, Ledward Barracks, Schweinfurt, Germany – Inactivates

72nd Signal Battalion, Ledward Barracks, Schweinfurt, Germany – Inactivates

Headquarters and Headquarters Detachment, 95th Military Police Battalion, Sembach Kaserne, Kaiserslautern – Inactivates

630th Military Police Company, Warner Barracks, Bamberg, Germany – Inactivates

464th Military Police Platoon, Camp Ederle, Italy – Inactivates

511th Military Police Platoon, Livorno, Italy – Inactivates

541st Engineer Company, Warner Barracks, Bamberg, Germany – Returns to the United States.

In 2015:

230th Military Police Company, Sembach Barracks, Kaiserslautern, Germany – Inactivates

3rd Battalion, 58th Aviation Regiment (Airfield Operations Battalion), Storck Barracks, Illesheim, Germany – Returns to the United States.

In 2016:

69th Signal Battalion, Grafenwoehr, Germany – Inactivates

525th Military Police Detachment (Military Working Dogs), Baumholder, Germany -- Returns to the United States.

1st Battalion, 214th General Support Aviation Regiment structure is reduced at Clay Kaserne, Wiesbaden, by 190 soldier spaces and at Landstuhl Heliport by 50 soldier spaces.

The Defense Department today awarded Lockheed Martin a contract worth more than $300 million to buy long-lead parts for Lot 8 of the Joint Strike Fighter program, hours ahead of sequestration's implementation date. The award will fund materials and components needed to build 35 F-35 jets, among them 29 aircraft for the United States Air Force, Marine Corps and Navy. The remaining six aircraft funded here will belong to the United Kingdom and Norway.

The DOD contract announcement:

Lockheed Martin Corp., Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co., Fort Worth, Texas, is being awarded a $333,786,000 fixed-price-incentive (firm-target), advance acquisition contract to provide long lead-time parts, materials and components required for the delivery for the 35 Low Rate Initial Production lot VIII F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter aircraft: 19 conventional takeoff and landing (CTOL) aircraft for the U.S. Air Force; six short takeoff vertical landing (STOVL) aircraft for the U.S. Marine Corps; four Carrier Variant aircraft for the U.S. Navy; four STOVL for the United Kingdom; and two CTOL aircraft for the Government of Norway. Work will be performed in Fort Worth, Texas, and is expected to be completed in February 2014. Contract funds in the amount of $333,786,000 are being obligated on this award, none of which will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract combines purchases for the U.S. Air Force ($155,190,000, 46 percent); the U. S. Marine Corps ($85,380,000, 26 percent); and the U.S. Navy ($27,470,000, 8 percent); the United Kingdom ($45,037,000, 14 percent); and Norway ($20,709,000, 6 percent). This contract was not competitively procured pursuant to the FAR 6.302-1. The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Md., is the contracting authority (N00019-13-C-0008).

In a statement released late this afternoon, Lockheed spokeswoman Laura Siebert said:

Lockheed Martin is pleased to be awarded long lead funding for the eighth F-35 Low Rate Initial Production contract, known as LRIP 8, by the Department of Defense. This award provides our supplier base the stability needed to properly execute on our future production commitments. We will continue to drive down costs for these future aircraft as we have done on every previous LRIP contract.

A new Congressional Research Service report predicts that "there may be a renewed focus" in the new Congress on how far Congress can go to legislate limits on the president's ability to conduct military operations in places like Afghanistan, Yemen or Somalia, among others.

The Feb. 19 report -- originally obtained by Secrecy News -- notes that "controversy continues over the appropriate role that Congress should play in regulating U.S. military operations against foreign entities. U.S. action against Libya reignited consideration of long-standing questions concerning the President’s constitutional authority to use military force without congressional authorization, as well as congressional authority to regulate or limit the use of such force."

CRS states:

This report begins by discussing constitutional provisions allocating war powers between Congress and the President, and presenting a historical overview of relevant court cases. It considers Congress's constitutional authority to end a military conflict via legislative action; the implications that the War Powers Resolution or the repeal of prior military authorization may have upon the continued use of military force; and other considerations which may inform congressional decisions to limit the use of military force via statutory command or through funding limitations. The report discusses Congress’s ability to limit funding for U.S. participation in hostilities, examining relevant court cases and prior measures taken by Congress to restrict military operations, as well as possible alternative avenues to fund these activities in the event that appropriations are cut. The report then provides historical examples of measures that restrict the use of particular personnel, and concludes with a brief analysis of arguments that might be brought to bear on the question of Congress's authority to limit the availability of troops to serve in ongoing military operations. Although not beyond debate, such limitations appear to be within Congress's authority to allocate resources for military operations.

View the full report.

View InsideDefense.com's extensive trove of defense-related CRS reports.