President Trump will sign a directive Tuesday to establish the Space Force as the newest branch of the military, but plans to keep it under the purview of the Air Force, the administration announced.
The new plan is less ambitious than the “separate but equal” military branch Trump first envisioned for a Space Force, but it is more likely to get the backing of Congress that it needs to become a reality.
“The president has directed the secretary of Defense to draft a legislative proposal that, if enacted, would establish the U.S. Space Force as the sixth branch of the Armed Forces within the Department of the Air Force,” a senior administration official told reporters on a background call. “This is a step toward a future, separate military department for space.”
The president is scheduled to sign the directive at 2 p.m. Tuesday.
Trump first called in June for the Pentagon to create Space Force as a separate branch of the military, followed in August by Vice President Pence outlining the administration’s plans for it to become the sixth branch of the military by 2020.
“We are going to have the Air Force and we are going to have the Space Force: separate but equal, it is going to be something so important,” Trump said last year.
But the idea landed with a thud on Capitol Hill.
The administration and lawmakers broadly agree the Pentagon needs to improve its operations in space to compete with Russia and China, but lawmakers in both parties questioned whether an entirely separate branch of the military is the most cost effective way to do so.
A widely leaked Air Force estimate in September placed the cost of standing up a Space Force at $13 billion over five years. Supporters of a Space Force argued the Air Force inflated the costs to drive opposition.
Putting the Space Force under the control of the Air Force is closer to a plan that passed the House on a bipartisan basis in 2017.
Under the directive to be signed Tuesday, the Space Force would have its own four-star general chief of staff who sits on the Joint Chiefs of Staff, but its top civilian would be a Senate-confirmed under secretary for space within the Air Force.
All of the military and civilian personnel working on space in the Pentagon would be folded into the Space Force. Nonmilitary agencies that deal with space, including NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the National Reconnaissance Office, would remain separate.
Administration officials estimated the initial cost for Space Force headquarters will be less than $100 million with the exact cost to be included in this year’s budget request.
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JUST IN: Trump to direct Pentagon to establish Space Force within Air Force, not separate military branch https://t.co/xu6rrjxIVB pic.twitter.com/0O9fSczJoH
— The Hill (@thehill) February 19, 2019
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