Congress has established a 12-member advisory committee that will be responsible for the assessment of the country’s defense strategy that covers force structure, missions, risks and force posture, Defense News reported Friday.

The House and Senate armed services panels formed the Commission on the National Defense Strategy for the U.S. in compliance with the 2017 National Defense Authorization Act.

The commission will oversee review of military readiness, strategic environment, resource allocation and national security threats and submit a report to the president, defense secretary and Congress about threats facing the U.S. and measures to address such threats.

The advisory panel’s members include:

• Andrew Krepinevich, head of the Washington-based think tank Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments
• Anne Patterson, former assistant secretary of state for near-eastern affairs
• Christine Fox, former acting deputy defense secretary
• Eric Edelman, former ambassador to Turkey and Finland
• Gary Roughead, retired U.S. Navy admiral and former Chief of Naval Operations
• Jack Keane, a retired U.S. Army general and the service branch’s former vice chief of staff
• Jon Kyl, an adviser with Covington & Burling
• Kathleen Hicks, director of the International Security Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies
• Michael Morell, former CIA deputy director
• Mike McCord, former Defense Department comptroller
• Roger Zakheim, a partner at law firm Covington & Burling
• Thomas Mahnken, president and CEO of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments

HASC Chairman Mac Thornberry (R-Texas); Rep. Adam Smith (D-Washington), HASC ranking member; SASC Chairman John McCain (R-Arizona); Jack Reed (D-Rhode Island), SASC ranking member; each named three members to the panel.

Lt. Col. Steven Power, product manager of soldier weapons within the U.S. Army, has said that the service branch will field new Sig Sauer-built modular handgun systems in November.

The service branch said Friday that the 101st Airborne Division at Fort Campbell in Kentucky will field the first batch of 2,000 new XM17 handguns which feature interchangeable grips designed to offer comfort for the users along with external safety and self-illuminating sights for use in low-light conditions.

Soldiers at Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland tested modular handgun systems including the XM17 and XM18 in the spring then provided feedback that deemed the weapon as step up from current M9 pistols.

“The specific performance improvements from MHS over the M9 are in the area of accuracy, dispersion (and) ergonomics,” said Power.

XM17 and XM18, the Army’s versions of the Sig Sauer-developed P320 weapon, use different ammunition requirements from commercial 320 pistols.

The Army plans to distribute the MHS to all units of the service branch throughout a 10-year period.

The U.S. Air Force has unveiled a new program that would allow universities, small businesses and entrepreneurs to pitch “emerging” technology ideas and innovations to the service branch.

The first “storefront” that will connect potential proposers to the Air Force under the AFwerX program will be launched in early 2018 near the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, the Air Force said Friday.

Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson told Las Vegas Review-Journal in a report posted Friday that the service branch expects to spend $7 million during the first three years of AFwerX, including $2 million on the first year.

Wilson said the flagship location will be opened at UNLV’s Center for Entrepreneurship and the Air Force plans to add at least two more storefronts later this year.

AFwerX is based on the U.S. Special Operations Command‘s SOFWERX initiative, which was launched in Tampa, Florida in partnership with the Doolittle Institute to help solve problems facing USSOCOM.

Senior leaders from the U.S. Air Force and European nations have discussed ways to integrate and operate the Lockheed Martin-built F-35 Joint Strike Fighter aircraft in the European theater during a two-day forum.

The F-35 leadership forum at the Ramstein Air Base in Germany aimed to give future F-35 users a common vision on force projection, theater integration and interoperability, the Air Force said Friday.

Lockheed also provided a program update for forum attendees, which included officials from Denmark, Israel, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Turkey and U.K.

Bob Dulaney, a Lockheed aeronautics representative, said Lockheed plans to bring down the cost of F-35 aircraft to $85 million per copy in 2019, Stars and Stripes reported.

The report said the U.S. government will spend approximately $400 billion to acquire about 2,443 F-35s.

The Air Force plans to hold a multilateral symposium in October to continue discussions on F-35 interoperability, including operations, maintenance, logistics and intelligence.

A Nimitz-class aircraft carrier has departed the U.S. Navy‘s facility in Portsmouth, Virginia, to undergo sea trials following the completion of a 10-month planned incremental availability.

The Navy said Friday it was preparing USS Harry S. Truman, also called CVN 75, for multiple training exercises that would involve damage control, flight deck operations and simulated combat at sea.

“Truman is ready to tackle the next stage of doing what carriers do – conduct prompt and sustained combat operations from the sea,” said Capt. Ryan Scholl, commanding officer of CVN 75.

Huntington Ingalls Industries‘ Newport News Shipbuilding division helped the service branch modernize the Truman carrier under a $52.4 million contract awarded in August 2016.

The PIA effort covered updates to the vessel’s internal and external communication network along with the installation of more than 3,000 Consolidated Afloat Networks and Enterprise Services assets and the service branch’s tactical afloat network.

Navy and contractor personnel also collaborated to maintain, repair and update approximately 4,500 reactor material items along with shipboard systems, crew living spaces and berthing spaces.

USS Truman will dock at its homeport at Naval Station Norfolk after it completes the sea trials.

President Donald Trump signed Friday an executive order for a cross-government review of U.S. manufacturers’ capacity to support the defense industrial base and the availability of skilled labor to maintain the operations of factories, Nextgov reported Friday.

Peter Navarro, a presidential adviser and director of the White House’s office of trade and manufacturing policy, said Friday in a press briefing that the Defense Department will spearhead the review in collaboration with the departments of Homeland Security, Energy, Commerce and other federal agencies.

The Commerce Department and DHS, for instance, could launch an investigation on “dual use” limitations on exports and imports and their impact on defense readiness under the executive order, Navarro noted.

The EO would require DoD to submit to the president an unclassified report that assesses civilian and military materiel and other products that are critical to national security as well as determines contingencies that may affect the supply chains of goods, according to a White House news release.

The report with a classified annex should be provided within 270 days.

The order also aims to assess gaps in domestic production capabilities related to national security and the defense industrial base’s capacity to undergo modernization in support of future needs.

U.S. Navy Adm. Michael Rogers, head of the U.S. Cyber Command and National Security Agency, has said a national dialogue is needed to determine whether the government should have access to digital communications to support signals intelligence activities against terrorism, DoD News reported Saturday.

Rogers told the Aspen Security Forum in Colorado he observed technology is accelerating the rate of change in signals intelligence and has placed various areas of communications outside the legal boundaries of government intelligence officers.

“Traditionally, within our legal construct there has been mechanism for the government to access communications with an appropriate court order,” said Rogers, an inductee into Executive Mosaic‘s Wash100 for 2017.

“Our challenge as a nation is we are now in a position in the digital age where technology has outstripped our legal framework.”

Rogers said citizens must discuss the level of risk and access the government should have; circumstances that call for the use of digital communications for signals intelligence; and the oversight of such activities.