Price for Space Force unknown

WASHINGTON – The Pentagon does not yet know how much the nascent Space Force will cost, but nonetheless is working with Congress to write legislation creating the new military branch proposed by President Donald Trump, Defense Secretary James Mattis said Tuesday.

“We have not done the costing estimates (on Space Force), that’s underway right now,” Mattis told reporters during a rare on-camera appearance in the Pentagon’s briefing room.

Earlier this month, Vice President Mike Pence announced the administration’s decision to create a Space Force as a branch of the military by 2020. While Congress had considered and rejected this idea over the last two years, the Trump administration laid out an ambitious agenda for the development of the first new military department since the Air Force was moved out of the Army in 1947.

As part of the fiscal 2019 defense authorization bill, Congress instructed the Pentagon to create a unified space command, replacing the current Space Command that is part of the Air Force. Mattis, flanked by Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that effort was already underway.

“Now we are implementing the National Defense Authorization Act and its provision for unified space command, in line with the president’s vision for a needed Space Force, while revising our vision for defending our assets in space and revising antiquated space acquisition processes,” Mattis said. “We are working now with Congress on our way ahead with regard to needed legislation for a separate department.”

Dunford said team leaders for the unified space command effort met on Monday.