House and Senate negotiators charged with writing the final version of the fiscal year 2018 defense authorization bill plan to have their first formal meeting on Wednesday.
While the session will occur behind closed doors, leaders of the House-Senate conference committee are scheduled to brief reporters beforehand.
The House and Senate passed their versions of the bill in July and September, respectively. Informal talks aimed at resolving differences between the two bills have already taken place.
A key sticking point is that the House legislation would form a space corps within the Air Force Department, while the Senate measure would block the creation of such an organization. Pentagon leaders have been urging Congress to drop the House proposal.
Rep. Mac Thornberry (R-Texas), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said Oct. 5 that he hopes to produce the final bill by month’s end.
The House bill authorizes more than $14 billion in funding for the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) for the budget year that began on Oct. 1. The Senate’s NDAA would authorize up to $14.5 billion for the Department of Energy’s semiautonomous nuclear stockpile steward in fiscal 2018.
Both measures support ongoing construction of the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility at DOE’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina, which would convert 34 metric tons of surplus nuclear weapon-usable plutonium into commercial reactor fuel. The Trump administration, like its predecessor, prefers a “dilute and dispose” alternative it says would be much cheaper and faster.
The House NDAA would create a new “program of record” for a missile capable of hitting targets in the range prohibited by the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, which the U.S. says Russia has violated. The House bill would condition further U.S. adherence to the treaty on Russia’s own compliance. The Senate’s NDAA authorizes $65 million for a research and development program for a dual-capable, road-mobile, ground-launched missile system within the range prohibited by the treaty.
