OFFICIALS LEGISLATION INTEREST GROUPS PUBLIC STATEMENTS COMMITTEES VETOES

Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2016

Floor Speech

Date: May 19, 2016
Location: Washington, DC
Issues: Defense Government Budget and Spending

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Ms. HIRONO. Mr. President, as ranking member of the Seapower Subcommittee, I could not agree more with the Senator from Mississippi's views concerning the importance of the MSP program. The 60-ship MSP program is the most prudent and economical means to address the U.S. military's current and projected sealift requirements. A 2006 report prepared for the Military Sealift Committee of the National Defense Transportation Association concluded that ``the likely cost to the government to replicate just the vessel capacity provided by the MSP dry cargo vessels would be $13 billion.'' In addition, the U.S. Transportation Command, TransCom, has estimated that it would cost the U.S. Government an additional $52 billion to replicate the ``global intermodal system'' that is made available to the Department of Defense, DOD, by MSP participants. In contrast, MSP participants now provide DOD with the same vessels and global intermodal system at a fraction of what it would cost our government to do the job itself.

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Ms. HIRONO. I strongly agree with Senator Wicker. Despite the clear benefits the MSP program provides, the MSP commercial fleet is under extreme economic pressure from reductions in government-impelled cargoes and foreign competitive factors. I completely share the concerns expressed by the then-TransCom commander, GEN Paul Selva, in his March 2015 testimony before the Armed Services Committee, where he stated that the ``reduction in government impelled cargoes due to the drawdown in Afghanistan and reductions in food aid . . .are driving vessel owners to reflag to non-U.S.-flag out of economic necessity . . .With the recent vessel reductions, the mariner base is at the point where future reductions in U.S.-flag capacity puts our ability to fully activate, deploy and sustain forces at increased risk.''

Accordingly, to ensure that this essential U.S. commercial sealift capability provided by the MSP program remains available to meet America's national security requirements, the MSP program needs to be fully funded as authorized by the Congress.

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