The Defense Department is halfway through a cross-government review of the national security industrial base and expects working groups to come up with draft recommendations this month, Breaking Defense reported Monday.An administration official said Peter Navarro, a White House adviser, and his staff will analyze, synthesize and assemble those recommendations into a report that is slated for submission to the president by April.
DoD’s office of manufacturing and industrial base policy led by deputy assistant secretary Eric Chewning and principal deputy chief Jerry McGinn oversees the review in collaboration with the departments of Commerce, Homeland Security, Interior and other federal agencies.
The official noted that the industrial base review will cover vaccine production, shipbuilding, strategic minerals, microchips and the U.S. workforce.
The review is part of an executive order Trump signed in July that seeks to evaluate the U.S. manufacturers’ capacity to support the defense industrial base and assess the availability of skilled labor to keep factories running.
