Senate sends Trump the $717B NDAA Presented by Northrop Grumman

With Eleanor Mueller and Connor O’Brien

TOP NEWS: Senate sends the $717 billion NDAA to Trump at a historic pace — Trump thanks North Korea’s Kim for returning war remains


ON POLITICO: Shelby says the Senate will consider defense appropriations later this month

HISTORIC PACE — SENATE SENDS THE NDAA TO TRUMP: “The Senate on Wednesday easily cleared and sent to President Donald Trump a compromise $717 billion defense policy bill aimed at building up the military and blunting Chinese foreign investment and telecommunications technology,” reports our colleague Connor O’Brien.

“The final vote on the fiscal 2019 National Defense Authorization Act was 87-10. The president is expected to sign it. ...

“The final defense policy bill is the product of brisk talks between leaders of the House and Senate Armed Services committees, who are finishing their work in historic fashion. If the NDAA is signed soon, as expected, it would be the first time in more than two decades a defense policy bill has become law before the Oct. 1 start of the new fiscal year.”

— ROLL CALL: Seven Democrats and two Republicans were among the 10 votes against the bill in the Senate. Of the Democrats, Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand and Elizabeth Warren, members of the Senate Armed Services Committee, voted against the bill. And Sen. Dick Durbin, the ranking member on the Senate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, also voted no.

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) voted against the bill after negotiators stripped a provision from the final bill reinstating sanctions against the Chinese telecommunications company ZTE.

“A fine, when you're backed by the Chinese government, a multibillion-dollar fine is nothing,” Rubio said ahead of the vote.

The bill would also give the Defense Department greater authority over national security tariffs, writes our colleague Adam Behsudi.

— TURKEY TROUBLES: The NDAA would also bar the delivery of F-35 Joint Strike Fighters to Turkey until a report is issued on Turkey’s behavior, including an assessment of its participation in the F-35 program as well as the risks that would be posed by the country's purchase of the Russian S-400 missile defense system.

Also Wednesday, the Treasury Department sanctioned two senior officials in the Turkish government over the continued detention of American pastor Andrew Brunson, a rare rebuke by the U.S. to a NATO ally, add POLITICO’s Colin Wilhelm and Nahal Toosi.

And Turkey’s Foreign Ministry says it will retaliate against Washington for taking a “hostile stance," urging the administration to “walk back from this wrong decision,” via Reuters.

HAPPY THURSDAY AND WELCOME TO MORNING DEFENSE, where we're always on the lookout for tips, pitches and feedback. Email us at [email protected], and follow on Twitter @greg_hellman, @morningdefense and @politicopro.

NEXT UP IN THE SENATE — DEFENSE APPROPRIATIONS: Senate Appropriations Chairman Richard Shelby says it won't be long before the Senate takes up that much-discussed duo of the Defense and Labor-HHS-Education funding bills, report our colleagues at the Budget and Appropriations Brief.

“Shelby told reporters that he was personally assured in a meeting with McConnell that the massive two-bill package (S. 3159 (115) and S. 3158 (115), respectively) would hit the floor when the Senate returns from its one-week break, around Aug. 14. And it could be over quickly: Shelby hinted that if all goes well, debate, amendments and final passage could all happen in a week.”

At the White House, Trump is still mulling whether to shut the government down before or after the midterm elections, writes POLITICO’s Louis Nelson.

ON NATO — SENATORS REASSURE EUROPEAN ALLIES: “A bipartisan group of senators used a private meeting Wednesday to reassure diplomats from NATO and other European nations of the Senate’s support for the alliance,” reports The Associated Press.

“The meeting came as President Donald Trump has repeatedly challenged the value of the trans-Atlantic coalition and shown a warming toward its chief adversary, Russia.”

Durbin who helped initiate the meeting, said lawmakers wanted to “reassure these countries of our commitment to NATO and our commitment to their security.”

Meanwhile, Georgia’s president denounces Russia for illegally occupying part of his country at the start of U.S.-led war games, via Reuters.

Sweden is set to buy Patriot missiles, when it signs a $1 billion deal with Raytheon this week, also reports Reuters.

And Secretary of State Mike Pompeo won’t meet this week with his Russian counterpart at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Singapore, adds Reuters.

KOREA REPORT — ‘OUR BOYS ARE COMING HOME’: “Vice President Mike Pence on Wednesday credited North Korean leader Kim Jong Un with fulfilling a promise to return the remains of some U.S. troops killed during the Korean War, a step that he said showed ‘tangible progress’ toward easing tensions on the Korean Peninsula,” via The Wall Street Journal.

“Mr. Pence spoke at a ceremony marking the return of the remains, which were handed over by North Korea last week and then flown to an air base in South Korea before their arrival on Wednesday at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam.”

Trump also thanked Kim in a tweet for keeping his word on returning the war remains, adding “thank you for your nice letter - I look forward to seeing you soon!”

Now that the remains are back in the U.S., the painstaking identification work begins, adds the AP.

STRAIT OF HORMUZ TENSIONS RISE: “The United States believes Iran is preparing to carry out a major exercise in the Gulf in the coming days, apparently moving up the timing of annual drills amid heightened tensions with Washington, U.S. officials told Reuters on Wednesday,” via Reuters.

“Iran has been furious over U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to pull out of an international nuclear deal and reimpose sanctions on Tehran. Senior Iranian officials have warned the country would not easily yield to a renewed U.S. campaign to strangle Iran’s vital oil exports.”

And Israel warns Iran of a military response if it tries to block a key Red Sea strait, also via Reuters.

SPACE FORCE REPORT EXPECTED IN THE ‘NEXT FEW WEEKS’: “Gen. John Hyten, head of Strategic Command and former head of Space Command, said this morning that the long-awaited space reorganization should be out in the next few weeks,” via Breaking Defense.

“Hyten’s comments come after Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan canceled a press briefing, originally scheduled for this morning, to discuss the Pentagon’s congressionally-mandated plan for a space force of some kind.”

ARMY AIMS TO FILL RANKS: “Under the gun to increase the size of the force, the Army is issuing more waivers for past drug use or bad conduct by recruits, and pouring an extra $200 million into bonuses this year to attract and retain soldiers,” reports the AP.

“According to data obtained by The Associated Press, nearly one-third of all the waivers granted by the Army in the first six months of this fiscal year were for conduct and drug problems, mainly involving marijuana use. That number is significantly higher than the other three military services, and represents a steady increase over the past three years.”

The Defense Department is also exempting wounded warriors from its new policy to “deploy or get out,” adds Military Times.

WAR REPORT — AFRICOM PREPARES TO STEP BACK: “Hundreds of American troops in Africa would be reassigned and the number of Special Operations missions on the continent would be wound down under plans submitted by a top military commander, a response to the Trump administration’s strategy to increasingly focus on threats from China and Russia,” reports The New York Times.

“The plan by Gen. Thomas D. Waldhauser, the leader of United States Africa Command, follows an ambush in Niger last fall that killed four American soldiers and an attack in southwestern Somalia that killed another in June.”

INDUSTRY INTEL — INDUSTRIAL BASE STUDY TO FOCUS ON NEAR-TERM FIXES: “The defense industrial base study that President Trump ordered a year ago is nearing completion, a well-informed administration source told Breaking Defense. But the Executive Order 13806 study may come as a surprise: Instead of a sweeping agenda to restore America’s high-tech lead for future decades, the study will recommend near-term fixes to more mundane problems that could lose the US a war if one broke out tomorrow,” reports Breaking Defense.

MAKING MOVES — TRUMP TAPS A NEW DEPUTY CIA DIRECTOR: The president intends to appoint Vaughn Bishop to be deputy director of the CIA. A 30-year veteran of the agency, Bishop served multiple posts related to Africa. And he was the ombudsman for analytic objectivity during the CIA’s modernization effort.

SPEED READ

— The fight over Trump’s cyber strategy: The Fifth Domain

— Leaked chats show an alleged Russian spy seeking hacking tools: AP

— The controversial idea posed by the Defense secretary’s task force adviser: Marine Corps Times

— The Army increases its investment on a counter-drone program: C4ISRNET

— The Air Force may replace three types of aircraft with a single platform: Defense News

— The Air Force’s future ISR architecture could feature drone swarms and hypersonics — with AI underpinning it all: C4ISRNET

— Special operations forces are getting a long-awaited silent weapons upgrade: Task & Purpose

— The VA hospital in Washington has continued to deteriorate in quality during the first six months of this year: Stars and Stripes

— An agreement ensures that Iran-backed forces withdraw from the Golan frontier, Russia says: AP

— Kashmir’s war gets smaller, dirtier and more intimate: NYT

— At least three are dead after military opens fire on post-election protests in Zimbabwe: The Washington Post

— Here’s why the Armed Forces Retirement Home is slowing down its planned fee hikes: Military Times

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