{"id":1428555,"date":"2022-04-11T08:46:04","date_gmt":"2022-04-11T12:46:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1428555"},"modified":"2022-04-11T08:46:08","modified_gmt":"2022-04-11T12:46:08","slug":"key-defense-officials-confirmed-by-senate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/key-defense-officials-confirmed-by-senate\/","title":{"rendered":"Key Defense Officials Confirmed By Senate"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">12<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fkey-defense-officials-confirmed-by-senate%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1428555&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><\/div>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 jQOUvm body-paragraph body-paragraph\">WASHINGTON \u2014 The Senate on Thursday unanimously confirmed two key Defense Department officials, one for the Navy\u2019s No. 2 civilian role and another to lead the office of acquisition and sustainment.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 jQOUvm body-paragraph body-paragraph\">Erik Raven, who has served as the majority clerk for the Senate\u2019s defense appropriations subcommittee, will now serve as Undersecretary of the Navy. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.defensenews.com\/air\/2021\/11\/30\/white-house-taps-former-air-force-official-to-run-pentagon-acquisition\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Bill LaPlante, the former Air Force acquisition chief from 2013 to 2015<\/a> who most recently has served as chief executive of Draper, will assume the role of the Pentagon\u2019s top weapons buyer.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 jQOUvm body-paragraph body-paragraph\">Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Jack Reed, D-R.I., told LaPlante during his confirmation hearing one of his top priorities must be \u201cstreamlining and expediting the acquisition process.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 jQOUvm body-paragraph body-paragraph\">\u201cWe need to field equipment to our warfighters quickly while also ensuring acquisitions remain on budget,\u201d said Reed. \u201cAlthough some progress has been made in recent years, the Defense Department\u2019s acquisitions process still remains on the Government Accountability Office\u2019s \u2018High Risk List.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 jQOUvm body-paragraph body-paragraph\">During his confirmation hearing, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.defensenews.com\/air\/2022\/03\/22\/dod-acquisition-nominee-pledges-to-push-advanced-tech-small-business-opportunities\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">LaPlante advocated for an aggressive approach to hypersonics testing<\/a> along with other emerging technologies like quantum sensing, artificial intelligence, autonomous devices and directed energy.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 jQOUvm body-paragraph body-paragraph\">\u201cA failed test is one where you don\u2019t learn,\u201d LaPlante told the committee.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 jQOUvm body-paragraph body-paragraph\">He pointed to the Defense Department abandoning plans to develop a hypersonic glide vehicle after two failed tests in 2010 and 2011.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 jQOUvm body-paragraph body-paragraph\">The Biden administration has faced significant delays in filling the crucial position to head the acquisition office after the previous nominee, Michael Brown, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.defensenews.com\/congress\/2021\/07\/14\/bidens-nominee-for-top-dod-weapons-chief-withdraws\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">withdrew his nomination<\/a> last year over an inspector general investigation into his hiring practices as head of the Defense Innovation Unit.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph-sc-1tqpf5s-0 jQOUvm body-paragraph body-paragraph\">Upon nominating LaPlante last year, the White House praised him as \u201ca seasoned national security leader with nearly four decades of experience in acquisition, technology, sustainment and the defense industrial base.\u201d<\/p>\n<div class=\"default__Wrapper-cy7r53-1 gEopBn\">\n<p class=\"default__BioWrapper-cy7r53-0 jmAmdA a-body2\">Bryant Harris is the Congress reporter for Defense News. He has covered the intersection of U.S. foreign policy and national security in Washington since 2014. He previously wrote for Foreign Policy, Al-Monitor, Al Jazeera English and IPS News.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>WASHINGTON \u2014 The Senate on Thursday unanimously confirmed two key Defense Department officials, one for the Navy\u2019s No. 2 civilian role and another to lead the office of acquisition and<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":489,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1428555","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1428555","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/489"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1428555"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1428555\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1428555"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1428555"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1428555"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}