National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2016

Floor Speech

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Mr. COURTNEY. Mr. Chairman, again, I thank the chairman who, it is true, over the last 3 years, we have worked together, as well as our predecessors going back to Gene Taylor and Roscoe Bartlett, who started this discussion about the challenge of funding the Ohio replacement program.

Mr. Chairman, when President Obama signed the New START treaty on April 8, 2010, after ratification by the U.S. Senate, one thing became crystal clear: the U.S. Navy's nuclear strategic mission became even more critical than ever.

Why? Because, as the chairman said, the implementation of a nuclear arsenal in the post-New START era will rest even more heavily on ballistic submarines--in fact, two-thirds of the triad in the post-New START era will be sea-based, and that is why every strategic review going back to Secretary Gates has identified construction of the Ohio replacement program as one of the top--if not the number one--defense priority of the country.

Let's be clear, the Ohio program will be built. That is not in debate. The question for Congress is whether we will let this once in a multigenerational cost suffocate the rest of the Navy shipbuilding account. The Seapower report in the underlying bill provides a solution to this problem, which will provide help both for our fleet and the industrial base.

The underlying bill activates the national sea-based deterrence fund passed last year on a bipartisan, bicameral basis to fund the design and engineering work for the Ohio replacement program and is a responsible way to support construction of the Ohio replacement fleet.

Sponsors of this amendment call the fund a gimmick and a shell game. It is not a gimmick, and there is a clear precedent for this. In fact, Congress has supported the construction of defense and Navy sealift ships through a similar fund called the national defense sealift fund, which was created in 1993, and to this day pays for construction of new oilers, troop transport ships, supply ships, and the like outside of the Navy shipbuilding account. We have done it before to protect recurring upgrades to our fleet, and we should do it again.

Vote ``no'' on this amendment to protect our shipbuilding fleet and account and also to protect America's shipbuilding industrial base.

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