Hearings
Hearing Type:
Open
Date & Time:
Tuesday, September 27, 2016 - 10:00am
Location:
Hart 216
Witnesses
Full Transcript
[Senate Hearing 114-618]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 114-618
OPEN HEARING WITH HON. ROBERT CARDILLO,
DIRECTOR, NATIONAL GEOSPATIAL-INTELLIGENCE AGENCY
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE
OF THE
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 2016
__________
Printed for the use of the Select Committee on Intelligence
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SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE
[Established by S. Res. 400, 94th Cong., 2d Sess.]
RICHARD BURR, North Carolina, Chairman
DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California, Vice Chairman
JAMES E. RISCH, Idaho RON WYDEN, Oregon
DANIEL COATS, Indiana BARBARA A. MIKULSKI, Maryland
MARCO RUBIO, Florida MARK WARNER, Virginia
SUSAN COLLINS, Maine MARTIN HEINRICH, New Mexico
ROY BLUNT, Missouri ANGUS KING, Maine
JAMES LANKFORD, Oklahoma MAZIE K. HIRONO, Hawaii
TOM COTTON, Arkansas
MITCH McCONNELL, Kentucky, Ex Officio
HARRY REID, Nevada, Ex Officio
JOHN McCAIN, Arizona, Ex Officio
JACK REED, Rhode Island, Ex Officio
----------
Chris Joyner, Staff Director
Michael Casey, Minority Staff Director
Desiree Thompson Sayle, Chief Clerk
CONTENTS
----------
SEPTEMBER 27, 2016
OPENING STATEMENTS
Burr, Hon. Richard, Chairman, a U.S. Senator from North Carolina. 1
Feinstein, Hon. Dianne, Vice Chairman, a U.S. Senator from
California..................................................... 2
WITNESS
Hon. Robert Cardillo, Director, Central Intelligence Agency...... 3
Prepared statement........................................... 6
OPEN HEARING WITH HON. ROBERT CARDILLO,
DIRECTOR, NATIONAL GEOSPATIAL-INTELLIGENCE
AGENCY
----------
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 2016
U.S. Senate,
Select Committee on Intelligence,
Washington, DC.
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:04 a.m. in
Room SH-216, Hart Senate Office Building, Hon. Richard Burr
(Chair of the Committee) presiding.
Committee Members Present: Senators Burr, Feinstein, Coats,
Rubio, Collins, Blunt, Lankford, Wyden, Warner, Heinrich, and
King.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. RICHARD BURR, CHAIRMAN, A U.S.
SENATOR FROM NORTH CAROLINA
Chairman Burr. I'd like to call the hearing to order. I'd
like to welcome our witness today, Mr. Robert Cardillo, the
Director of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, or
NGA. Robert, we on this committee hear from your organization
frequently. We read your products daily. We value the insights
and assessments that NGA brings to the table.
As you well know, we typically hold our hearings in a
closed setting so that we can discuss freely classified
programs. Today, however, I want to offer this open hearing as
an opportunity to let the American people know more about the
NGA, the mission your workforce is tasked with and the unique
value your organization brings to bear.
The NGA arguably has the broadest customer set of any
organization within the intelligence community. It includes the
warfighter, the policymaker, all-source intelligence agencies,
foreign allies, the Federal Aviation Administration, the
Federal Emergency Management Agency, state and local first
responders, and others. The NGA's products range from highly
classified intelligence assessments to unclassified maps. The
NGA supports the warfighter and policymaker on a daily basis.
Less well known, though, are your other missions. NGA has
supported disaster relief operations such as the response to
hurricanes here at home, earthquakes in Haiti and Japan, forest
fires in the western U.S. You support special events like the
Superbowl, presidential inaugurations, as well as provide
advanced data for global positioning systems, a capability that
touches every American's life.
As we've discussed previously and you reference in your
statement for the record, the explosion in publicly available
information and commercial imagery systems means the
intelligence community no longer has a monopoly on access or
insights.
You had previously stated your intent to leverage these new
realities by encouraging NGA to operate more in the open. I'd
welcome your assessment today of how that's progressing.
Robert, you're designated as the functional manager of the
Nation's geospatial-intelligence enterprise, an important
function. I hope during your testimony you can discuss progress
you've made in exercising your authorities to better coordinate
the collection, analysis, and dissemination of GEOINT across
the entire intelligence community.
I'd like to remind members that we're in an open hearing.
While the Director may be able to describe how GEOINT is
applied to a number of intelligence topics and perhaps provide
his agency's assessment on certain topics, he may not be able
to get into detail on some issues. If you're uncertain about
the classification of your question, I would advise you to talk
to staff.
I'd like to note that the NGA will be celebrating its 20th
birthday--that would be wonderful for us, wouldn't it?
Vice Chairman Feinstein. Yes, it would.
Chairman Burr. On October 1st, 1996, the NGA predecessor,
the National Imagery and Mapping Agency, was established by the
Fiscal Year 1997 National Defense Authorization Act. The world
certainly has changed dramatically in those 20 years, but I
believe your organization, your capabilities, and your
tradecraft have evolved along with it.
Thank you again for appearing today. I look forward to your
testimony. We thank NGA employees for the crucial mission they
carry out every day, and I turn to the Vice Chairman for any
comments she might have.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. DIANNE FEINSTEIN, VICE CHAIRMAN, A
U.S. SENATOR FROM CALIFORNIA
Vice Chairman Feinstein. Thanks very much, Mr. Chairman.
Director Cardillo, thank you for joining us this morning,
and happy 20th anniversary next month.
I want to recommend your very thorough statement for the
record to all members and to the public as well. You begin by
stating the motto of your agency, and that is ``Know the Earth,
show the way, and understand the world,'' individually and
collectively. The written statement is fascinating and I think
everybody would gain by reading it.
NGA's core mission is to provide geospatial-intelligence--
now, that is images, maps, analysis, and similar data--in
support of national security missions. NGA's customers, which
includes the Intelligence Committee, warfighters, policymakers,
and others, then use these products for a multitude of
purposes.
For example, showing changes in North Korea's missile
program by taking many images of key installations over time;
providing that imagery that can help map ISIL's defenses around
the cities in Syria; and monitor activities to ensure Iran is
not engaging in prohibited activity at its nuclear sites. Those
are three good examples.
NGA has also become an important supplier of products that
support a host of other government activities, like, believe it
or not, fighting forest fires or responding to flooding.
Imagery has become a core requirement of many missions.
The government has not been alone in increasing its use of
imagery, and demand in the private sector has increased
substantially. This increased demand has led to the creation of
companies, like Terra Bella and Planet, both from California,
my state, which launch their own satellites and provide imagery
and related services for a fee.
Some of these companies may soon be able to take an image
of every spot on the Earth every day. That's an unprecedented
amount of information. Taking advantage of the data that can be
provided by these commercial suppliers is a key challenge for
the U.S. Government and for the NGA going forward.
So I commend you, Director, for understanding the magnitude
of this challenge and your willingness to pursue new sources of
intelligence collection. In the future we'll all have to work
together to best position your department and the entire United
States Government to use as much commercial imagery as
possible, while ensuring that we continue to maintain and
improve the traditional--excuse me--the truly exceptional
capabilities offered by our government's satellites.
I'm also interested in the new NGA office you have opened
in Silicon Valley. The NGA is not the only part of the IC or
the United States Government to realize the potential of having
an office positioned to work more directly with the tech sector
in California. I'd like to understand more about what this
office will do and how it will interact with other efforts,
like In-Q-Tel.
Finally, I'd appreciate an update on the construction of
your new facility in St. Louis. Now that the decision has been
made regarding that location, we would all appreciate an update
on cost and schedule and if they're all within budget and time.
Thanks, again, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Director, for
being here.
Chairman Burr. Thank you, Vice Chairman.
At this time I would inform members I think what they
already know, is that we will recognize individuals in order of
seniority for a five-minute round, and we'll loop back as we
need to.
With that, Robert, the floor is yours.
STATEMENT OF HON. ROBERT CARDILLO, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL
GEOSPATIAL-INTELLIGENCE AGENCY
Director Cardillo. Thank you very much, Chairman Burr, Vice
Chairman Feinstein, and all the distinguished members of the
committee. On behalf of the women and men of the National
Geospatial-Intelligence Agency and the National System for
Geospatial-Intelligence, it's my honor to be here to represent
them before you here today.
As the Vice Chairman noted, NGA's motto is ``Know the Earth
and show the way and understand the world.'' That motto uses
both new and exciting opportunities to deliver geospatial-
intelligence to our customers and our partners in ways that no-
one thought possible. Every day we grow in our ability to know
the Earth, as we gain access to an ever-broadening pool of
foundation data that includes commercial and allied, electro-
optical, open sources, and direct user input from the field.
Now, to be clear, National Technical Means from my mission
partner at the National Reconnaissance Office provides
exquisite and peerless capabilities to meet our hardest
challenges. But for NGA to provide the most value possible to
our customers, we must be able and open to leverage all
geospatially enabled content as a component of our daily
operations.
Over the past decade, NGA has partnered with the commercial
imagery industry to dramatically improve delivery of commercial
GEOINT to all mission partners. Our EnhancedView contract with
Digital Globe provides a diverse set of phenomenology to
support 90 percent of our foundation mapping efforts, our
disaster relief efforts, and our intelligence requirements. Its
unclassified nature makes commercial imagery a mainstay for
U.S. and allied customers in virtually every mission worldwide.
Now, we've also expanded outreach and coordination over the
last year to the most mature of what we call the ``new space''
providers, such as Planet, formerly Planet Labs, Terra Bella,
BlackSky Global, to assess mission utility and access to
operational data and services. Over the coming months and
years, we'll look at more of these new space providers and
constantly assess the state of the industry to enable us to do
more than we thought was possible.
Our mission partner, the NRO, also has a vested interest in
these companies. Together, we stood up what we call the joint
``Commercial GEOINT Activity,'' whereby NGA and NRO work more
closely than ever before to identify, consider, and evaluate
emerging commercial GEOINT data and services against our
customers' needs. Through this CGA, we and the NRO will assess
future investments and capabilities to make development
decisions, both for commercial and for national, on how we
match those user needs to the optimal mix of government,
partner and commercial space capabilities.
As the functional manager for geospatial intelligence, my
most important responsibility is to capture and represent the
user needs to those that depend upon us. As such, I'm uniquely
positioned to show the GEOINT enterprise how we can and must
succeed in the future by operating in and with the open.
Earlier this year, I called on the community to focus attention
on three priority areas: professionalization, interoperability,
and unity of effort.
I've also mandated professionalization by requiring that
all GEOINT personnel at NGA and the services be certified--this
includes me. The DOD components have been directed to finish
this effort by 2019. We've also developed a groundbreaking
agreement with industry partners to recognize functional
equivalence between our certification program and theirs.
To promote interoperability, we're developing standards
that provide the vocabulary, the grammar, and the interface
rules to ensure that a product is interpreted as the author
intended and that the end users interpret the product in the
same way.
To demonstrate our unity of effort, I've invested fiscal
year 2016 funds to support my partners' capabilities. This
includes U.S. Special Operations Command's efforts on human
geography in parts of the Middle East and North and Sub-Saharan
Africa, and the U.S. Department of State's Secondary Cities
project that generates data on urban food, energy, and water
nexus in non-primary cities.
Similar efforts are underway by our Commonwealth allies. In
the past several months, we've aligned structures, functions
and resources, identified efficiencies through mission-sharing
and collaboration, and produced a blueprint to tackle
scientific and technological challenges and speed the
transition and adoption of mature and operational capabilities.
National decisionmakers, military commanders, scientific
researchers, and first responders all look to our agency to
help them understand what's happening at any given place and
time, and anticipate what may happen next, whether that be a
military operation, a response to a flood or a forest fire, or
understanding the changes in Alaska and the Arctic.
To answer this demand signal, NGA must capture the right
knowledge from the wave of national, commercial, and open
source data. We've embarked on Activity-Based Intelligence,
which will use the big data analytics and methodologies to find
adversarial threats inside the noise and the volume of these
disparate data streams.
In short, NGA must go wherever the data exists and apply
that data wherever the mission demands. We must embrace open
content with the same fervor as classified content; and in many
cases we must use open content first, then augment it with
classified sources to confirm, reject, or increase our
confidence in analytic judgments. And we must find new ways to
get the data to the user, whichever system they may be on, from
the most classified of networks to the world wide web.
In closing, the agency I'm privileged to lead will
celebrate its 20th anniversary next week. In 1996, the National
Imagery and Mapping Agency was established. Congress, with
exceptionally strong support from this committee, was largely
responsible for its creation. I sincerely and deeply thank this
committee and all of Congress for your continued support.
Now, while we may be the youngest agency in the intel
community, I can proudly and confidently report that the agency
and the GEOINT discipline are more relevant than at any point
in our 20-year history. Our future is rich in opportunities,
exceptionally bright, and we will build the needed tools to
harness the opportunities that arise. We're committed to be the
NGA that the mission demands and our Nation deserves.
On that note, I ask that my full written statement be
entered into the record, and I'm pleased to answer any
questions you may have.
[The prepared statement of Director Cardillo follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairman Burr. Director, thank you for that testimony. Your
full statement will be a part of the record.
Let me point out to members: To the best of my research,
this is the first time that the Director of the NGA has, in
front of--in an open hearing, been asked to testify about what
NGA does, why the American people should care, and, more
importantly, what a vital component of our intelligence
community this is. So, Director, I thank you for your
willingness to do it.
I would also remind members that this is the seventh open
hearing we have had this Congress. I think we made a commitment
that we wanted to try to bring a little bit more light to why
the American people should care about 17 agencies and the work
that they do in keeping America safe and keeping the American
people safe and hopefully having an impact around the globe on
stability.
I'll recognize myself first.
Director, in March you sent a letter to the Vice Chairman
and you stated it was your goal for the NGA to be positioned
for a clean audit in fiscal year 2016. How are we doing?
Director Cardillo. We are making progress. I will not make
the fiscal year 2016 objective. I do know that we will make
progress on the material weaknesses that have been identified.
Our new--and I'm quite confident that we can make this goal--is
fiscal year 2018. It's going to take us two more years to work
off some of the issues that we have with property
accountability and our bookkeeping.
But I will--I'm proud to say the progress is positive. It's
just more work than we knew we had. But we're confident we will
make this new target.
Chairman Burr. I want to thank you, because when Senator
Blunt was nice enough to invite me out to St. Louis to visit
NGA, you made sure that your team there was willing to show me
the good, the bad, and the ugly. And it gave me a unique
perspective about, unless you've got a physical facility that
accommodates the work that you do, it makes it difficult to
impossible to accomplish it as effectively as you can and on
the time line that you need to.
So I can understand, because I saw different financial
pieces scattered around the facility that really should be
collocated, but can't under the physical constraints that the
facility provides you. So, as the Vice Chairman highlighted,
we're anxious to see the new building start, we're anxious for
its completion, and we have an unbelievably talented workforce
there that will take advantage of it, and hopefully it will
address some of these things like the audit.
Director, the distinction between geospatial-intelligence
and all-source intelligence may seem to be a mundane topic.
However, efficient use of intelligence resources is one of the
key priorities of this committee. We do not want to needly fund
activities outside of an organization's mandate or duplicate
efforts of other agencies. Nor, however, do we wish to curtail
analytic efforts of any organization if there is a unique value
being provided to the intelligence community and to its
customers.
My staff tells me that many of the products from NGA are de
facto all-source intelligence products, even if they are
claimed to be substantially based upon geospatial-intelligence.
Given that, is it time for the Administration and Congress to
reexamine the roles and responsibilities of the agency, or do
you feel comfortable that its mandate is stated clearly today?
Director Cardillo. Chairman, I appreciate the question and
it, ``it'' being how do we most efficiently apply finite
resources to the greatest effect, is an issue we deal with
every day. I think this committee is aware that, while I'm
currently the Director of NGA, I have been in other positions
through the IC, so I have had many views on your question.
As Director of NGA, I commit all of our output to all of
our customers so that they can use them in the way that best
serves their mission. That includes my colleagues at the
Central Intelligence Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency,
and State's INR, who are responsible to provide the Nation the
coherent all-source assessment of threats and opportunities.
At the same time--so I post everything that we do so that
it can be used most efficiently by any user. I also do that
posting so that, should we come up against a duplication that's
unwarranted, in case we're not making the most efficient use,
that we can deal with that as well.
So I think I have plenty of opportunity today to engage
those customers and to provide them that access. At the same
time, when and if we do find an inefficiency, I think we also
have the wherewithal to deal with that.
Chairman Burr. Last question: Do you have authorities,
resources, and personnel you need to effectively exercise your
functional management mandate?
Director Cardillo. I do. What I owe you is a better flexing
of the muscles you have given me. I spoke to some of that in my
statement for the record. I'm happy to speak to more of that,
but I would ask the committee to compel me, as you have in the
past, to use what you've given me before I come and ask you for
additional authority.
Director Cardillo. Great.
Vice Chairman.
Vice Chairman Feinstein. Thank you.
Director Cardillo, I'd like to confine my questions this
round to pages 4 and 5 of your written comments. Let's begin
with the comment having to do with Russia's occupation and
attempted annexation of Crimea and aggression in Eastern
Ukraine. You say you have ``aggressively applied myriad sources
and analytic strategies to track traditional military
operations, the flow of supplies, irregular forces, and the
ethnic, economic, and geographic backdrop to document the flow
of the conflict.''
Tell the public exactly what this means and what GEOINT has
found?
Director Cardillo. Thank you. We have been able to expose,
identify, and document the geospatial component of the Russian
aggression in and around Ukraine. Some of that we've done
through our more traditional capabilities: the establishment of
new permanent bases on the proximate border with Ukraine. These
are the movement of Russian forces that used to be there in a
temporary status and now they're moving to a permanent status.
What that obviously does is it gives Russia more opportunity to
effect a next step in a very short period of time.
Vice Chairman Feinstein. You're speaking of Ukraine now?
Director Cardillo. I'm speaking on the border of the
Ukraine, in the Russian border of Ukraine.
To answer the other part of your question, about the non-
traditional aspect of the Russian aggression, it's more
difficult for us to use those traditional sources, because by
their very nature they're more subtle indicators, they're less
identifiable. That's a case in which you need me to use the
other part of the spectrum that I speak of, the non-traditional
sources. This is everything from social media to open source to
press reporting to identifications that we get from allied
partners.
Vice Chairman Feinstein. Let me just say where I'm going
with this, because there is a certain denial by Russia that
they do have forces in Ukraine and in Crimea. How would you
answer that from the position of your technology?
Director Cardillo. It's really two questions, if you don't
mind me breaking it up.
Vice Chairman Feinstein. No.
Director Cardillo. Crimea is different because Russia is in
fact in Crimea. Obviously, it's against the policy interests of
this country, the way they've staked their claim. But their
military is quite active and quite present in Crimea and it's
very visible. There's no hiding it there.
In Eastern Ukraine it's quite different. As you said, their
narrative is that this is a local uprising, that this is
indigenously produced and that they have no involvement. In an
open session, what I'd like to just be able to assure you and
American people, that we are applying non-traditional
capabilities to expose that to you and to our customers. I'd
rather not go into detail here because if I explain that to you
then I'd be explaining it to the Russians themselves.
Vice Chairman Feinstein. And what have you found with
respect to Tehran's compliance with its initial nuclear
obligations?
Director Cardillo. We're pleased to be part of the IC's
effort to monitor Iranian compliance. We have supported the
DNI's team leadership here, and we have to date received the
accesses that we expected and we've received the cooperation
that was assured. But I will finish by saying that this is a
day-to-day campaign that we're on and so we remain vigilant to
monitoring that adherence.
Vice Chairman Feinstein. You mentioned the South China Sea,
with the Chinese building war-like development on the atolls.
What does NGA tell us about that?
Director Cardillo. One of the key questions we have is
what's their intent with the development of these new land
features in the South China Sea? Part of the Chinese narrative
has been that they're commercial, even tourist-related, etc. We
have identified indications that there is more to that story,
and the more that we've identified are military-related
structures and equipment that at least give the Chinese the
option to permanently post military forces in and on these
islands.
So our job, obviously, is to warn about that possibility
and of course identify it when we see it.
Vice Chairman Feinstein. One final one, and that's my great
interest, the big wildfires burning in California. What
information do you provide with respect to those?
Director Cardillo. First of all, I just need to remind,
since I'm speaking to the American people as well: The only way
I'm authorized to apply my resources domestically is if I have
a lead Federal agency request those services. This is nothing
that we do as an intelligence community.
But in this case, with the forest fires, we do have
requests from the National Foreign Service and the local and
state fire-fighting services. In that case we're able, because
we have that request, to provide them, one, with a better
understanding of where the--not just where the fire is, but how
it's progressing, where are the hottest spots in that fire, so
that if you're seeking to contain it from jumping to an even
greater disaster how you would combat that.
So we apply both optical capability on the expanse of it,
but we also have the capability to sense temperature and heat,
and that way it can steer and guide the fire-fighters to employ
their resources in the most effective way.
Vice Chairman Feinstein. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Burr. Senator Coats.
Senator Coats. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Robert, thank you for coming before us. I always get a
little nervous on these public hearings because I'm afraid that
I thought I read something in The New York Times and therefore
it's been published and I can ask the question, then I can't
remember whether I read that in The Times or I heard it in a
classified setting. So if I breach anything here with a
question, feel free to just say: Let's talk about that in a
classified area, if you would.
Director Cardillo. I understand.
Senator Coats. Two areas that I'd like to just pursue here.
The recent article that came out on the Nextgov.com web site
was published, so it is public, was titled ``Spy Agency to
Pilot Insider Threat Hunting Technology.'' It noted that ``The
NGA is investing in sentiment analysis technology intended to
help identify insider threats.''
This is an ongoing issue. Obviously, we've seen the public
exposure of classified material coming from inside various
agencies. Can you give us a little bit of non-classified
information as to how this works and how it will be shared with
other agencies, and what your participation is within the 17
communities of the intelligence services?
Director Cardillo. Absolutely, Senator. The committee
should be confident that I take the counter-intelligence
mission of mine as seriously as I take the intelligence
mission, because if I can't protect the service that I provide
today I won't be able to do it tomorrow.
So you're asking about a real threat, the insider threat,
and we can talk about external threats as well. But in this
case, how do I ensure that my team is staying on my team? The
pilot that you describe is one that we're doing in cooperation
with the intelligence community, we're doing it in cooperation
with the Director of National Intelligence and his Counter-
Intelligence Center. What it seeks to do is to understand,
through access to internal and, as necessary, external
communications, to identify indicators where it might be worth
taking another look.
Just so you know, every time I log on to my computer at
work the first screen I see is a declaration: ``This is a
government computer. You are authorizing access to it.'' So
we're very careful about provision of privacy, etc., but as a
Federal employee and as a member of the intelligence community,
when I do my log-in I also know that I'm logging in to provide
access to others who may seek to protect our capabilities.
So, as you said, it's a pilot. We will share lessons
learned as we go through the project with the committee as well
as with our colleagues in the IC.
Senator Coats. Thank you. That's a very relevant answer to
some of the issues that are being discussed on a more national
basis. I won't get into that.
Secondly, I noticed here that there's been an effort to
work with our foreign partners for more information-sharing. I
think there was recently an agreement with the German
government relative to that. Two questions here: one, is there
financial contribution among our allies in terms of this joint
project; and could you describe a little bit of what you gained
from this agreement with the German government?
Director Cardillo. Indeed. The German government made the
decision to invest in satellite technology. It's called
synthetic aperture radar, so think radar signals from space.
They flew these satellites in tandem. So as they flew together
they would send signals down to the Earth and get elevation
data, depending on the amount of time it took for the signal to
come back.
But they did it at such resolution that we had never mapped
the elevation of the Earth at that level before. As a matter of
fact, Director Clapper again gets credit. He effected the
agreement with the Germans to provide that data for common use.
So now there's a consortium of nations that are getting
together to process the data.
Think of elevation maps. We're now preparing elevation maps
around the planet in a way that we've never had before. The
last time we had measured the planet this way was with a
Shuttle mission back in the late 1990s. So who will this
advantage? It will advantage anybody who needs to move an
aircraft from one place to another, anybody that needs to
understand the science and the evolution of the planet, anybody
who needs to understand the safety and security of a mission.
We're in the early stages of processing that data now, and
we'll begin to roll out those outcomes, those maps, in the next
few months and years.
Senator Coats. The question about the contributions of
nations that we'll be sharing this information with?
Director Cardillo. The way it works is that you--that what
you get out of the consortium depends what you put in. So if
you invest a lot of effort, a lot of computers, a lot of
manpower and expertise, you get to take back an equivalent
amount. So it's really up to the nations how much they want to
commit to contribute, and that's what they'll get back.
Senator Coats. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Burr. Senator Wyden.
Senator Wyden. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Cardillo, first of all, I appreciate your comments on
audits. I have a bipartisan bill to audit the Pentagon. I think
that is long, long overdue. You cannot explain to taxpayers how
it is that this is the one part of government that is
essentially impregnable when it comes to getting an audit. So I
think your comments on that are instructive.
I want to turn for just a moment to this issue about
commercial imagery. Fifty years ago, nearly all satellite
imagery came from big, secret, expensive government satellites.
Today it's obvious that you can save taxpayers real money by
relying on commercially available imagery instead.
The challenge, of course, is big institutions with a long
history may be a challenge in getting them to adapt. In March
2016, the NGA's advisory group stated that a culture of
favoring the status quo--and I quote here--``undermines
rewarding innovative solutions and the use of nontraditional
acquisition strategies.'' Do you agree with the assessment that
was made by that advisory group?
Director Cardillo. I do. Would you like me to speak to what
I'm doing about it?
Senator Wyden. Yes. Yes, that's exactly where I'd like to
go. A, I'm glad you agree; and obviously, the challenge of
making your acquisition workforce more open and more inclined
to be receptive to new innovations is exactly what I'd like you
to talk about.
Director Cardillo. Senator, one, I certainly understand the
premise and the history as you described. I've lived through a
good portion of that, as I sit in my 34th year in this intel
community. The era of multi-year, multi-billion dollar awards
for decades' types of service had their place and their time.
As the commercial industry evolves--and it's evolving very
quickly day to day--we have to become more agile or we'll not
be able to leverage it.
So my direction to my team is to not just engage and
explore, but let's revisit some of the fundamental tenets of
our acquisition strategy. We have been able to, well within the
rules, obviously, and well within the regulations, create some
flexible approaches.
Let me give you one example. We're setting up now with the
General Services Administration a contract vehicle that we
expect to begin executing in early 2017, in which I'll be able
to go to some of these small companies, not with a ``let me
contract with you for the next three years with this multi-
million dollar contract vehicle,'' but ``let me swipe,
essentially, my government credit card to do some testing and
some evaluation, some exploration of the interfaces and the
opportunities.'' And as those swipes turn out to show utility
and benefit, we can then turn the dial up and say: Okay, I need
more of that service. I may not need any more imagery, because
that's again thinking--that's the thinking that we had in the
prior decade. But what I will need is answers, data that I can
put into my models and simulators, etc.
So that's just one example where I think we will be able to
become more agile and we will be able to take advantage of this
growing industry.
Senator Wyden. That certainly sounds constructive to me. I
know a lot of colleagues are waiting to ask questions. I think
my point really is, this is an area where, apropos of your
language, I'd really like to see you turn the dial way up on
innovation.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Burr. Senator Rubio.
Senator Rubio. Thank you.
Thank you for being here and for your service to our
country. In your statement for the record, you say that ``The
NGA is uniquely positioned to help the U.S. Government and our
allies understand developments in the South China Sea because
of the interaction between physical and human geography.''
That's a quote. What did you mean by that? Can you elaborate a
little bit more?
Director Cardillo. In that case, in that condition, I think
my responsibility is to shed light where those seek it to stay
in the dark. What I mean by that is that there's some physical
geography things happening. They're actually developing
islands. They're creating land that didn't exist before.
Then the question becomes, what's the intent behind that
creation? There's an obvious claim that goes with those
developments or those islands. But beyond that, the question is
intent and use.
So we're able to use more specific and exquisite
capabilities to say, ah, that feature is associated with this
mission set. One could be safety of navigation; think aircraft
control, etc. But another, weapons handling, aviation fuel
storage. It's those kinds of indicators that you should count
on this agency to be able to tell you what's behind the
development. So we take both the geography and those indicators
to create an assessment.
Senator Rubio. In that context, how is NGA supporting
efforts by our government and other foreign partners to monitor
China's--because I think we're largely talking about China
here--their activities in the South China Sea? How is that
interaction playing out?
Director Cardillo. Fulsomely. What I mean by that is that
just about--because of the advent of commercial imagery, I'm
able to have conversations in fora like this, but also in
instances where we have multiple countries, and we can put
facts on the ground, so that--okay, the debate usually gets
really interesting when you go to intent, what's the why behind
the geography.
We're able to put the framework on the table that says:
Here are the facts on the ground; here's what's happened over
time; here's who's being most aggressive or most provocative in
the development. And then one can have a more informed debate
about what's the purpose behind that island.
Senator Rubio. The NGA has important foreign relationships
from its role in the Allied System Geospatial-intelligence, or
ASG, which brings together the U.S. and Commonwealth countries
to advance the mission, including the U.S.-German agreement
signed last year to share global digital elevation data. So do
we receive now at this point, would you say we receive as much
as we give with our foreign partners?
Director Cardillo. No, Senator. The United States is still
the premier provider. But I will say what this committee should
think about when you mention those foreign partners, is think
force multiplier, whether it's their data or ours, and when we
have a sharing agreement it's both. But they also have analysts
and geographers and human terrain analysts, etc. Those get
added to our pool of expertise and create a greater effect.
But to be very clear, the United States is still far and
away the largest provider.
Senator Rubio. One of the core missions of NGA is the
provision of foundational geospatial data to the warfighter.
Our committee hears from combatant commands and other
warfighters that this is an area they could use some more help.
However, you're still experiencing some gaps in global coverage
of foundational geospatial data.
So what steps are being taken to better avail ourselves of
commercially available data?
Director Cardillo. We are seeking to employ more and more
of this. I call it the ``new space.'' These are the companies--
Digital Globe's a traditional partner; Planet, formerly
``Planet Labs,'' is our newest partner now. Terra Bella, a
piece of Google, we're also partnered with.
But we're in the research, development, test, and
evaluation phase with these new companies. We need to seek to
understand what kinds of questions can we answer the warfighter
with these more frequently revisiting, but lower resolution,
types of coverage?
Look, I think the potential is very high here. We're
leaning in very heavily because, two things: One, the data's
unclassified. Now, we can use it for classified purposes, but,
boy, the fact that it starts unclassified, I can move it to
places that before might have been difficult for me to get to
because of the classification level.
But, two, when I add that assessment on top of it, I think
we're able to provide some of the insights that fill some of
the gaps that you recognize the military still has.
Senator Rubio. Well, just in that realm, I know we've
spoken in the past about the University of Miami Center for
Southeastern Tropical Advanced Remote Sensing. We know it as
``CSTARS.''
Director Cardillo. Indeed.
Senator Rubio. It's a compliment for our technical means.
It's supported Southern Command, the U.S. Navy. I'd encourage
you and your staff to visit them in Florida to learn more about
the types of capabilities they can provide. Have you considered
working with CSTARS or any similar organizations to utilize the
capabilities offered from foreign commercial satellites and the
imagery they provide, they can provide the U.S. Government?
Director Cardillo. The answer is yes, and just yesterday I
received another paper from my colleagues down in Florida.
We're digesting that paper now. It's a proposal to further our
engagement. And, Senator, I look forward to continuing to work
with them.
Senator Rubio. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Burr. Senator Warner.
Senator Warner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Great to see you again, Director Cardillo, and thank you
for your great work. Senator Blunt and I have actually got a
joint resolution recognizing your 20 years as an entity.
Director Cardillo. Thank you.
Senator Warner. I know you're going to have your
celebration next week. Good luck on that.
I want to build on both the comments of Senator Wyden and
Senator Rubio. Obviously, we've got to keep our Nation's
technical means and our exquisite capabilities above everyone
else's ability. But I think, as you so accurately stated last
year in one of your statements, because of the explosion
amongst commercial activities, foreign activities, you're
seeing the democratization--your terminology--of GEOINT.
I hear repeatedly from combatant commanders the need for
this unclassified imagery to be able to share with our
partners. So oftentimes that again is going to push us toward
more commercial. I heard what you said in response to Senator
Wyden, which I again thought was good, with this whole notion
of a swipe, rather than buying the whole dataset, on a rent
rather than buy basis.
Do you feel, though, that you've got enough flexibility in
your acquisition activities to kind of balance off the
challenges from your partners at NRO, who still wants to build
hugely costly, billion-dollar exquisite systems, so that you
can not only continue this experimentation, for example, with
Planet, this swipe rather than buying the dataset, but also
where you can use some of your budget to kind of promote
innovation in the commercial sector?
Director Cardillo. At this point, Senator, I think the
answer is yes. I haven't yet come up against a wall that, boy,
if only I could have this more authority or this much more room
to explore. I think what you need to look to me to do and
expect me to do is to continue that interaction that I
described some here today.
But there's more that we can and should do. So what I'm
seeking to do--I mentioned the new GSA approach and I mentioned
our new contract with Planet. But we're also working with
academic institutions. We're working with CRADA's, research and
development grants, with even more companies, because we need
to even understand the art of the possible here. As you might
imagine and I think you appreciate, any large bureaucracy
that's had many years of a certain experience, it's a little
difficult to turn it away from that, I'll call it, that comfort
zone of the past.
But I'm very confident that as we begin to have these small
wins, turn into medium-sized wins, turn into answers to that
military commander's questions, there will be a momentum that
will build.
Senator Warner. That's what I just want to make sure,
because the pressure to continue within the established
incrementalist approach, as opposed to how you make sure your
customers have got that ability to occasionally have some risk
capital, in effect to noodge innovation forward, I think is
terribly important.
I've got two other questions I want to try to make sure I
get in. I asked you this for the record last time and you said
there were no such plans. But I want to reiterate again:
There's no plans to move NGA's EnhancedView contract to the
NRO, is there?
Director Cardillo. That's correct, there are no plans.
Senator Warner. Well, there continues to be scuttlebutt
around that.
Director Cardillo. We just renewed it about two weeks ago
for our seventh year.
Senator Warner. We talked about this off-line. I was
interested to see the idea that, around commercial activity,
you, NGA and NRO, have set up this joint activity center. On
one level I'm very excited about it. On another level, I'm: Oh
my gosh, is this an attempt by NRO to kind of take back the
innovation side, and is there any kind of inherent conflict as
this activity center takes place, since NRO's primary mission
is to make sure we maintain those National Technical Means at
the highest, most exquisite level?
How do you work through that conflict? How do we make sure
that this activity center is not captured and keeps its
forward-leaning innovation and leaning into the commercial
sector?
Director Cardillo. I really appreciate the question. This
commercial GEOINT activity, as we call it, literally stands up
this week. We notified the committee a few months ago of our
intent to do so, but we will stand the committee up I think on
the 30th--the activity.
The way you should think about this, this construct, is a
place where myself and my mission partner Betty Sapp will put
some key individuals together to have the right conversations
about the opportunities that are in front of both of us. I'm
not sending any of my authorities to that activity. Neither is
Betty Sapp. I'm sustaining my role and responsibility as the
protector of and defender of the needs of our community.
I certainly am protecting my analytic output and services
responsibility, as well as Betty Sapp is doing. But what you
should expect us to do in that is to challenge one another to
either individually or as a team take on some of these
opportunities that you've just described.
So I appreciate that there's some anxiety here, but I guess
I'd like you to turn some of that anxiety to the positive and
challenge us to take advantage of these new space capabilities.
Senator Warner. I want to thank you for your work, and I
particularly want to thank the Chairman and the Ranking Member.
I know at times I have been insistent on this subject, but I
very much appreciate the Chair and the Vice Chair's willingness
to kind of push this sector to take a fresh look. I think under
Director Cardillo we're seeing real progress made, and so many
of the members have kind of come at this question in a
different way.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Burr. Senator Collins
Senator Collins. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Director, as the Vice Chairman's question suggests, we
along with policymakers throughout government and the rest of
the intelligence community rely on your agency for ground
truth, and that's why the Vice Chair brought up the issue of
the Russians' activities and the South China Sea as well.
I'd like to turn to Syria and try to get the ground truth
of what's going on in Syria. It's been more than a week since a
ceasefire was supposed to hold in Syria. Yet, according to
press reports, the fighting in Aleppo in the last few days is
at near highs, for a war that has already killed more than
400,000 people and forced millions more to flee their homes.
Does the intelligence that your agency is collecting and
analyzing support the conclusion that the ceasefire is not
holding and that Aleppo is under some of the most intense
bombardment since the war began?
Director Cardillo. Senator, if you'd allow me not to
provide details, I can answer the question positively. Yes, the
geospatial-intelligence that we have does support the finding
that not only is the cessation of hostilities not holding, but
the conflict is in fact intensifying.
Senator Collins. Thank you. I think that is an excellent
example of why the work that your agency does is so important.
I want to turn to a different issue. Having previously
served on the Homeland Security Committee as its chair and
ranking member, as well as on the Armed Services Committee, and
now serving on this committee, one of my top concerns has been
the threat to our Nation's most critical systems posed by cyber
attacks from our adversaries. Your statement for the record
describes the critical technical support provided by the NGA to
the global positioning system--we all call it ``GPS''--which is
widely used in a range of both military and civilian
applications. How secure is GPS from cyber attacks from our
adversaries?
Director Cardillo. First let me say, one, we don't fly GPS,
we don't build GPS. But what we do is we provide the science
and the math required to make sure GPS is working as it's
intended, everything from civilian uses obviously to military
uses. So we're a quality control factor.
Because I don't run the architecture and because I don't
man the system itself, I'm really not capable to answer your
question about what the risk is, because I'm a contributor to
that service rather than an owner of it.
Senator Collins. Does it personally concern you?
Director Cardillo. Anything that moves digitally concerns
me. So yes, I have concerns.
Senator Collins. As you know, during this week we are
desperately trying to ensure that government keeps functioning
and that we do not have any kind of government shutdown, which
would represent a real failure to govern. I am hopeful that we
can avoid that kind of outcome.
Could you describe for the committee what a government
shutdown--what kind of impact it would have on the NGA; and
even a longer-term continuing resolution, why that is a
negative for your intelligence agency?
Director Cardillo. The impact of a shutdown is really in
two categories. There's the mechanical impact. I have people
working today preparing for the eventuality that we may be shut
down. They're not doing NGA's work today; they're doing
preparing to shut down work today. But as a government leader,
you would expect me to be ready for that. So that's a
distraction and it's costly.
On the other hand, I'd like to talk about the mental
effect. As a matter of fact, we have to begin printing letters
that, if we're going to make Saturday in case it does shut
down, I have to inform my teammates about their essential
nature of their work or their non-essential nature of their
work.
Now, we've already done that. Unfortunately, we've had
practice here before, so we know how to do it. But I have to
tell you, it is not an encouraging, rewarding experience to
have somebody hand you a letter and say, you're a non-essential
part of my team and you may be required to stay home on
whatever date. And I will tell you, it affects those that don't
get those letters, because we're one team. So there's both a
physical impact and a mental impact.
The last question you asked, about going forward with the
continuing resolution, quite frankly, it would inhibit some of
the things I just heard from Senator Warner, a new start or a
new engagement. Obviously, I could continue what I've started,
but it inhibits me from beginning new projects, I think as you
well know.
Thank you.
Senator Collins. Thank you.
Chairman Burr. Senator Heinrich.
Senator Heinrich. Thank you. Mr. Chair.
Director Cardillo, as we all know, we've got a lot of
inertia built up in this U.S. satellite acquisition strategy
that has existed for a long time, focusing on big bucks and
exquisite capabilities, very long time lines. I really want to
applaud your willingness to put NGA resources into supporting
smaller satellites, a more distributed approach, that I think
we all believe can make our overhead architecture a lot more
cost-effective and agile in a quickly evolving environment.
I had a chance recently to visit Los Alamos National
Laboratory in New Mexico, where they're doing very advanced
research and development on cubesats, and it's my impression
that these technologies may be game changers, both for the
public sector and the private sector, for that matter.
I think you said back in 2015 that we're at a bit of an
inflection point here and you think that in the next five years
more than a dozen constellations, hundreds of small satellites,
will launch and continuously scan the Earth; and that NGA's
analysis of world events is going to as a result be more
holistic and persistent.
Can you just tell us a little bit about, within this
setting, the investments that NGA has made to make that real,
in particular around evolving technologies like cubesats and
other small, responsive satellite approaches?
Director Cardillo. I'd be happy to, Senator. We recently
engaged a contract with a company that used to be called
``Planet Labs.'' They're now called ``Planet.'' This is
allowing us access to their datasets. Now, they have dozens of
very small satellites up in space now that are scanning the
globe. They're employing more and more over time.
But for the time period of the contract, that will give us
access to that dataset to do a number of things. We can do some
test and evaluation just on some interfaces. We can accept the
data, use it in our library. More importantly, what I'm excited
about is beginning to apply algorithms and models against that
dataset to find out, not just what you can image, but what can
you sense.
Again, I'm a creature of this profession, so I've been
staring at imagery for a long time as an analyst. Sometimes
that frame of imagery can be a prison. It locks you into
whatever you see within that image. What I'm excited about this
new venture with Planet is it's going to give us the
opportunity to get beyond the frame, get to activity, get to
change. Think of a service that we could subscribe, rather than
a pixel flow.
That's just one example. We're pleased to be partnered with
Terra Bella, which is a subsidiary of Google; of BlackSky
Global, another new company. We have a CRADA with a company
called Earthcast, and others.
Of course, I don't want to leave out my most long-term
customer, Digital Globe, which is flying, yes, large
satellites, but they, too, are moving to smaller architectures,
because that's where the market's going and as a commercial
company they want to be viable in the future. Digital Globe's
also moving to services as well and I want to be a beneficiary
of their move to algorithms and models, etc.
So I think, even though it was only a year ago, I think the
statement's holding up and I think we're seeing that reality
come into play.
Senator Heinrich. Yes, it feels like we're moving from a
focus on data points to a focus on trends that tell us what is
happening, and I think that's a very important distinction.
Also last year, in 2015 in August, NGA launched the GEOINT
Pathfinder Project. I was hoping that you could--a project that
was to explore techniques to answer key research questions
using only unclassified tools and data and social media. Can
you give us just a little bit of an update on how this project
has fared and where you see it going in the future?
Director Cardillo. We're finishing up what we call our
second sprint. We call it Pathfinder 2. The first one was 90
days. This one was 150 days, and we're literally wrapping up
our lessons learned now. And by the way, we will provide those
to the committee as soon as they're available.
Let me just describe my last visit to my Pathfinder team.
Just to recall Pathfinder 1, it was so difficult for us to set
up this WiFi, world wide web, commercially available facility
in our building. We had to move outside. We were literally a
couple miles away. Now, as you come into my front door, into
our very nice facility in Springfield, Virginia, you turn
immediately to your left and you'll find my Pathfinder 2 lab.
So it's not exactly in the building--I mean, not in the center
of the building, but it's on the campus, so that's an
improvement.
I went to visit them the other day to see how things were
going. Their real emphasis this sprint was about how do we
employ updates to our customers in between our classified
briefings. We see them at 10:00 o'clock when they can come into
our secure facility. We might send them a classified report
late in the afternoon. But the world is going on all day long.
So they call it our ``coffee strategy''; how do you keep them
informed in the appropriate way?
So we've been moving to mobile. These are smartphone and
tablet developments. As I was getting an update on the coffee
strategy, across the table there was a young man on a computer
coding, building the app that I was using. And they introduced
him to me, and I shook his hand. They said: By the way, he's an
intern.
I said: Oh, that's wonderful, because we're very proud of
our interns. And he said: But he's not from college; he's from
Thomas Jefferson High School. I went: Oh my goodness; how old
are you?
Now, by the way, we're following all rules. There's no
child labor violations, etc. But it was just so exciting. I
said: You are our future; frankly, you're living the world that
we're talking about.
So I was thrilled that--and by the way, they didn't come
ask me, can we use an intern from a high school? Again, we
followed all the rules. But what I want to let the committee
know is that I've truly given them a lot of room to explore,
and I'm very excited about what they're finding out.
Senator Heinrich. Fantastic. Thank you very much.
Chairman Burr. Senator Blunt.
Senator Blunt. Thank you, Chairman. And, Chairman, thank
you again for the time you spent talking to the NGA team at the
St. Louis facility. That facility's been there in one form or
another for about 70 years, but only 20 years ago did it
transition from oceanographic mapping and other things it had
been doing for a long time to the geospatial assignment when
Geospatial was formed officially.
Senator Warner mentioned that he and I and Senator
McCaskill and the Chairman and Vice Chairman joined us in a
resolution recognizing that 20 years of service. I want to talk
a little bit about--and why Warner and Blunt on this committee,
Virginia and Missouri.
I want to talk a little about how those facilities work
together, the significant number of people working at
Springfield, Virginia, but the Missouri facility, the St. Louis
facility, NGA West--I think back in the winter you and I were
talking at one after there was a government shutdown here
because of weather, not budgeting, and what happened when
people didn't come to the Springfield facility, Springfield,
Virginia, facility? Where was that work done and how's that
plan working for two facilities that are mutually supporting?
Director Cardillo. It's a great question. Let me just set
the context before I get to the specifics. In 1996 when the
agency stood up, that was the Defense Mapping Agency or a key
component of it on September 30th, 1996. On 1 October it became
part of the National Imagery & Mapping Agency.
But, as Director Clapper found out when he joined us in
2001, that ampersand between ``Imagery'' and ``Mapping'' was
really keeping us apart. So in those days mapping happened out
West, imagery happened in the East, and we were really not one
agency.
But over the past 15 years, Senator, we've moved mission,
we've moved expertise, we've moved capability. So think of our
IT architecture and our operational flow. It is now one agency.
So to your point about when we had the weather incident
here and people had great difficulty getting to our
headquarters, it was just a flip and we just said: Okay, 7 by
24 operations--which, by the way, support transportation, so
safety of navigation; they support targeting, so when the Air
Force needs help on putting a weapon on a precise point; or
when they need intelligence analysis--that all went to the West
and seamlessly was picked up. So it was a great example of how
we've become one agency and how interdependent we are.
Senator Blunt. And the idea is that one agency fully backs
up the other one if anything happens--a power outage, a weather
event, or anything else?
Director Cardillo. And it works the other way. When we had
the recent flooding in St. Louis, some of our teammates had
difficulty getting to work as well, we were able to back them
up. So it's a wonderful setup.
And by the way, it's a significant investment. About a
third of my workforce is there. This isn't just a few hundred
people. It's 3,500 government employees between our campus
downtown and our campus in Arnold, Missouri.
Senator Blunt. And you're hoping to see that new facility
started, planning-wise at least, in the next fiscal year; is
that right?
Director Cardillo. Well, we're heavily planning now. We
obviously need some help from the Congress in fiscal year 2017
to authorize and appropriate the military construction dollars
that would effect the property change, so that we with the Air
Force could acquire the property. That would allow us to break
ground in 2018, really build 2019, 2020, 2021, and move in in
2022, maybe early 2023.
Senator Blunt. Another thing I want to talk about while
I've got another minute here is, in terms of workforce
preparation and attracting a new workforce, what are some of
your strategies there as you're working with colleges,
universities, Silicon Valley, training, in St. Louis and here?
Director Cardillo. I just briefly mentioned our intern
program. We were able to bring on board about 200 college
interns last summer, both in the East and the West. We end up
offering about 80 percent of those interns full-time employment
at the end. The even better news is 90 percent of those 80
percent accept our offer. So it's a great entry point.
I'd also say, though, that, while that's a great stream for
talent--obviously, young and highly educated--but as a combat
support agency, too, I recruit strongly from those that are
separating from the military. We have a Wounded Warrior
Program. We take on discontinued vets, because--for two
reasons. One, it's the right thing to do; but two, that
experience is an immediate benefit to my workforce, because
right now, because of the way that the Defense Department can
support me with uniformed officers, I'm only about 5 percent
military today. So I have to get that experience another way.
Then finally, these private partnerships. You don't have to
be an NGA employee for me to benefit. We could have an academic
relationship, we could have a contractual relationship, or a
think tank. So we're looking at those different ways to get
access to talent without having to become a Federal employee.
Senator Blunt. Thank you, Chairman.
Chairman Burr. Thank you, Senator Blunt.
Before I go to Senator King: Director, let me just say this
to you. I've said this to you privately and publicly. I think
our expectations need to be to finish this facility faster than
2022. Challenge us as a Congress to come up with the money,
continual funding, so that we can do this like the private
sector would build a facility.
It's hard for me to believe that an agency that understands
the transition we've got to make wouldn't push us to show that
that agency can meet their facilitation needs in the same short
term of many of the things that you're helping to design and
express your needs. I ask you for that.
Senator King.
Senator King. Mr. Chairman, since this is probably our last
open hearing of this year--and, Director Cardillo, you
mentioned Jim Clapper. I just want to publicly acknowledge a
career that has spanned more than 50 years, extraordinary
vision, capability, competence, and will be coming to a close
probably in January. I just want to acknowledge what I think
has been absolutely one of the most outstanding records of
service to this country, not very widely known. But people
should know what he has done. So I just wanted to make that
comment.
You're a data business in many ways. Silicon Valley, the
commercial side, is using all kinds of crowdsource data. I have
an app on my phone called ``Waze'' that sees where cars are. I
use it principally to see if my brother-in-law is headed for my
house. But it has--the point is there's an enormous amount of
data coming from all over the place.
Are you making--are you utilizing this, this source of
data? For example, I think there's a program called ``NOAM''
where you're getting data from troops abroad. Is this something
you're looking at?
Director Cardillo. It is indeed. We're the government, so
we created an acronym. We call it ``VGI''; it's ``Voluntary
Geographic Information.'' GNOME is one example. Most people
know about Wikipedia. There's a map equivalent of that. One of
the best known is called ``Open Street Map.'' It's a reflection
of the reality of our life that every one of us, just about
every one of us, now is a sensor.
Now, we use our sensors for different reasons and purposes,
but I think I would be derelict in my duty if I were not
appropriately--key word, ``appropriately''--leveraging the
potential from that kind of contribution.
Senator King. So this is a conscious strategy to take
advantage of this enormous amount of data that's out there?
Director Cardillo. Right, a strategy, but, Senator, it's a
recognition of the reality. Now what we're doing, again, is
appropriately working what's the left and right bounds of how
you use that, where it is appropriate, and how to stay within
those bounds as we do so.
Senator King. I also just want to note, you gave out this
excellent presentation on the Arctic as an example of the work
you do. Interestingly, you have the progression of the
diminution of Arctic ice. It goes from 2010 to a projection in
2030 of 4.5 million square kilometers. Actually, in 2015 it was
4.4. This year, two weeks ago 4.1, and it's accelerating. I
just think it's interesting we're already well below your
projection or the projection for 2030. Now, you know, obviously
one or two years is not a trend, but I was in Greenland
recently and everybody up there is seeing an acceleration of
this trend over historic averages.
In any case, let's get back to satellites. To follow up on
Senator Warner's question, can we look to a future architecture
where we're talking about many, many smaller satellites than
the large, big ticket, more vulnerable satellites?
Director Cardillo. Well, my answer is yes. I don't even say
that that's future. I mean, presently yes, I have access to
many large satellites that my mission partner provides me, but
almost every day we're gaining access to more and more medium
and small-sats.
Senator King. How much input do you have to NRO about what
is going to go up in the air?
Director Cardillo. I have total input. By that I mean it's
my responsibility to access, document, and represent the needs
of those that I serve. That needs statement drives everything
that we purchase. So that's what I mean--when I say total, I
mean----
Senator King. So you're the principal customer or certainly
one of the principal customers?
Director Cardillo. I represent the customers, you know what
I mean? I speak with the commands and the services and the
agencies and the departments to make sure: What is it that you
need from Geospatial-Intelligence to do your job? And then we
capture those and we represent those.
That then becomes the target against which any architecture
or any satellite is judged.
Senator King. A yes or no question: Does NRO listen to you?
Director Cardillo. Yes.
Senator King. Good.
Final question, quick one: On the NGA West facility, almost
a $2 billion facility, are you going to invite other
intelligence community members to utilize that facility? I hope
that that could be a central intelligence----
Director Cardillo. The answer is yes. To date the most
interest that we have is from the FBI. So they're looking now
at an opportunity to be collocated with us.
Senator King. Great. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Burr. Senator Lankford.
Senator Lankford. Thank you.
Thanks for the conversation and for bringing all that
you're bringing. It's quite a bit of change that's happening
right now and we appreciate all the engagement on this.
Talk to me a little bit about price tag? Obviously, nothing
in government ever gets less expensive. But using the
commercial imagery that you're using and some of the available
resources, as the shift occurs on that does that allow
investment in other areas and where does that investment go if
so?
Director Cardillo. It does. I think a great example is the
contract that we've had with Digital Globe. We just entered our
seventh year. It's a year to year contract of 10. That price
point over time, what the U.S. taxpayer gets back on the return
on our investment, even if you think of per square kilometer of
Earth surface, continues to go down. It's a great value.
But, as proud as we are of those results, we negotiated
that eight years ago. Boy, today our conversations with these
new space providers, there's very little about square
kilometers. It's more about datasets and algorithms and what
kind of filter can I put on that stream to understand what's
happening.
Earlier I explained that we're setting up a GSA-like model
so that we can pay by the--think of a credit card--swipe,
versus a long-term contract. I think all of that will add to us
getting more efficient and create smaller--less price points
over time.
Senator Lankford. You're using a lot of social media now to
try to use--basically, creating the algorithms to anticipate
hostile actions and such. What you're doing in that work, how
is that different than some other agencies are using social
media to do some anticipatory work as well.
Director Cardillo. It's a great question, and it's one that
we work on all the time, because there's a crossover.
Senator Lankford. Right. The issue is overlap and lanes.
Director Cardillo. Absolutely. My answer to that is to do
it openly, and when I say ``openly,'' not on the world wide web
necessarily, but so that if I'm exploring a social media stream
in eastern Ukraine because we're trying to find out what's
really going on inside that opposition-held territory, I'm
going to do that with the Defense Intelligence Agency, with the
Central Intelligence Agency, with the Army, to make sure that
we're not all doing the same thing at the same time.
I won't kid you, though. This is an evolving tradecraft and
under this tradecraft John Brennan has the--he has the
community responsibility. I just went to one of his board of
governors meetings to make sure we are in fact sharing, so that
we're not inefficiently or redundantly applying our assets.
Senator Lankford. But right now that's the spot that's
actually the traffic cop basically to make sure that we're not
overlapping on it, or if at times we're overlapping it's with
purpose?
Director Cardillo. That's correct, we're doing it
knowingly. ``Transparently'' is the way I like to phrase it.
Senator Lankford. Give me some ideas, just as we're dealing
with personnel issues and investment and hardware. You have a
lot in your opening statement just about using different
algorithms and computer-generated analysis of looking at images
to be able to help track there. That's extremely helpful with
the amount of data that's coming in.
Give me a good comparison on machines versus people in this
process and what people are picking machines aren't or machines
are and people can't?
Director Cardillo. I am disappointed today in whatever the
percentage I would give you on the machine side. It needs to be
more. Some of this is technology, some of this is the actual
science of that. I think a broader inhibitor to my team today
is mind set. We're quite comfortable with that human path. We
all know it, we've lived it, we've learned it, etcetera.
Turning over, if you will, to an algorithm gets us a little
anxious.
So part of my mantra has been to establish pilots and test
beds so that we can some, obviously, technical experience, but
also that cultural experience that I like to build. We just
recently--I just recently got a briefing. It was classified, so
I won't go into details. But it resulted in my analysts
spending time counting buildings in a town physically. How many
buildings? 25,000. I said: Please tell me you didn't count
those on your own. Oh, sir, I did. And he was very proud of his
work.
But think of the hours he had to spend to do that. Now, I
turned to my head of research and I said: Don't let that happen
again. You know what I mean? I want to move that number up
quickly and we're on a number of paths to do that.
Senator Lankford. Last question. All the work that's
happening right now on Iran is extremely important to all of
us, and compliance with the nuclear agreement the President
made. How confident are you that we're able to see into the
places we need to see to be able to evaluate their movement and
clandestine operations?
Director Cardillo. I'm the geospatial component of that
team that adds up to the confidence you asked. From my seat,
I'm very confident that we have the access and that we have the
tradecraft to expose activities that could be an indicator that
are in variance with the agreement.
Senator Lankford. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Burr. Thank you, Senator Lankford.
I want to follow up with what Senator King said, Director,
just very briefly, and that's about Jim Clapper. Jim brought to
the DNI an incredible amount of experience throughout the
community--a very difficult thing for us to replicate when Jim
leaves. But it has served this country well and I think it has
brought some confidence to each of the agencies knowing that
there was an individual that not only tasked them, but
understood the challenges that they were up against.
Jim's had a wonderful career that will end at the end of
this year and a richly deserved retirement. The next choice
will be extremely tough, to find somebody with the talents and
the experience that he had.
I want to commend the members. It's not always easy to go
into an open hearing and mistakenly not cross the line. Some of
you got right up close to it and I thought I was going to come
out of my seat. But you didn't cross the line and I am grateful
to you for that, because I see value to these hearings being
open.
I inherently believe that the public wants to know what
oversight looks like. They want to know how and why the IC
community does what they do and, as much as they can, how it's
done and, more importantly, why it's important to them. I think
this hearing covered it.
I might say, it was a little dry. But when you've got to do
it in open session it's that way. Perhaps, since both of us
know about oversight, it's not too exciting. I think today we
did cover the nuts and the bolts, but I think only the agencies
that we have jurisdiction over understand that from the
standpoint of this committee we're an extension of the IC
community. We ask the tough questions, we ask them when it's
appropriate to do, and we work to find a solution if there's a
problem. We don't just leave them out hanging. I hope,
Director, you feel the same way I do: We're partners in this.
The last thing I want to say is to you. I thought your
testimony was great. I think that your written testimony is
incredibly thorough, and for anyone who would take the time to
sit down and read it I think they would be impressed at the
fact that we've got you as the Director of the NGO.
So we are grateful to you. We are grateful to the employees
that 24-7 do an unbelievable job of really leveraging the
technologies that are available to us and in a lot of cases
pushing what's possible to become reality and give us the edge
in a very unstable and dangerous world. For that we're
grateful.
This hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:28 a.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
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