The Senate Armed Services Committee has approved a budget for the Pentagon’s proposed space-based sensor layer to detect and track high-speed threats from Earth’s orbit, C4ISRNet reported Thursday. Funding for the project was added to the panel’s version of the $750 billion National Defense Authorization Act for 2020, which now heads to the full Senate for confirmation. 

In March, the Missile Defense Agency told lawmakers that it marked the sensor layer as its top priority that lacked funding. Lt. Gen. Samuel Greaves, director of MDA, said the space infrastructure would include two constellations of satellites that will serve different roles. One system will track ballistic missiles, while the other will focus on hypersonic missiles.

“The threat is moving fast and faster, and the reason I include it as my top priority in the unfunded list is that I believe that as time is the enemy, let’s not waste it, and if additional funding is provided, that’s where it would go,” Greaves said. 

DoD did not include extra funding for sensor layer in it’s formal budget request for FY20. 

Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson said that congressional authorities for rapid technology prototyping and testing helped the service meet its Century Challenge milestone to cut 100 years from ongoing weapons development programs. The service said Thursday it started streamlining processes in May 2018 through the authorities provided by the Fiscal 2016 National Defense Authorization Act. Wilson said the Air Force created guidelines that helped program managers with decision making to test and bring technology platforms to the field. 

“We’re able to dismiss things that don’t add value to our programs while remaining exceptionally disciplined on things that do,” said Will Roper, assistant secretary of the Air Force for acquisition, technology and logistics.

The areas that showed accelerated development include communications and defensive systems for fighter jets, satellites, hypersonic weapons, intelligence and cyber. The Air Force issued a science and technology strategy to guide the service to maintain technological advantage through 2030 and beyond.

The Senate Armed Services Committee approved the Trump administration’s proposal to establish a Space Force as part of the panel’s fiscal 2020 National Defense Authorization Act, the Hill reported Thursday.

The $750 billion NDAA earmarks $72.4 million to establish the new military branch to operate under the U.S. Air Force and mandates the appointment of a Space Force commander. The commander will concurrently serve as head of the U.S. Space Command until separate commander roles for the two entities are created following a one-year period.

According to senior committee aides, the Senate panel advanced the Space Force proposal because of the military branch’s goals to consolidate government operations, establish the space warfighting domain and address acquisition issues. 

“Our strategy will set the Space Force up for success now and in the future, minimizing bureaucracy in the force,” said the committee’s chairman Jim Inhiofe, R-Okla., in a statement.

Christopher Krebs, director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency and 2019 Wash100 awardee, said CISA’s volunteer border patrol work will not affect operations during a Georgetown University Law Center conference, Cyberscoop reported Wednesday. 

Ten of the Department of Homeland Security agency’s almost 3,500 employees have volunteered for temporary deployment at the southern border and an additional 10 will join the group. The move comes after Matt Travis, deputy director of CISA, sent an e-mail to CISA employees asking them to spend 30 to 45 days at the border to address “an ongoing surge in migrants”. 

Krebs noted that a maximum of 33 CISA volunteers must be sent to the border and only one to two of the already deployed volunteers are responsible for cybersecurity.