COLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado — Department of the Air Force leaders are fiercely defending a legislative proposal to bypass state governors in order to move certain Air National Guard units into the active-duty Space Force,
In response to a Military.com question during a press conference at the Space Symposium in Colorado on Wednesday, both Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall and Gen. Chance Saltzman, the Space Force's chief of space operations, said the impact to states would be minimal.
“The impact is really, I think, negligible. Governors may have a different view, but I don't see a reason why a state needs a Space Force militia,” Kendall said. “The reason these units exist in the states is kind of an artifact of history, somewhat. I'd really like to get this resolved.”
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Last week, Military.com reported that Air Force officials had submitted a draft legislative proposal to Congress titled “Transfer to the Space Force of covered space functions of the Air National Guard of the United States” that would change the status of such operations “from a unit of the Air National Guard of the United States to a unit of the United States Space Force; deactivate the unit; or assign the unit a new federal mission.”
Air Force officials are seeking to waive Section 104 of Title 32 and Section 18238 of Title 10 of the U.S. Code, which state, respectively,…
