On April 19, 2007, the Senate Committee on Armed Services Subcommittee on Strategic Forces held open and closed hearings on military space programs in review of the defense authorization request for fiscal 2008 and the Future Years Defense Program. The 1958 National Aeronautics and Space Act specified that military space activities be conducted by the Department of Defense (DOD). The Undersecretary of the Air Force is DOD's executive agent for space. The intelligence community makes significant use of space-based intelligence collection capabilities. The National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), an agency within DOD, builds and operates intelligence-collection satellites and collects and processes the resulting data, which are provided to users such as the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) and the National Security Agency (NSA). NRO, NGA, and NSA are all under the oversight of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI). DOD and the intelligence community manage a broad array of space activities, including launch vehicle development, communications satellites, navigation satellites (the Global Positioning System—GPS), early warning satellites to alert the United States to foreign missile launches, weather satellites, reconnaissance satellites, and developing capabilities to protect U.S. satellite systems and to deny the use of space to adversaries (called "space control" or "counterspace systems"). The 1990-1991 Persian Gulf War is dubbed by some as the first "space war" because support from space displayed great improvement over what was available during the previous major conflict, Vietnam. These systems continue to play significant roles in U.S. military operations. How to organize DOD and the intelligence community to work effectively on space programs has been an issue for many years. Congress established commissions to review the NRO in the FY2000 intelligence authorization act, P.L. 106-120 ; NGA (then called NIMA, the National Imagery and Mapping Agency) in the classified annex to the FY2000 DOD appropriations act, P.L. 106-79 ; and overall U.S. national security space management and organization in the FY2000 DOD authorization act, P.L. 106-65 . The NRO, NGA/NIMA, and "Rumsfeld Space Commission" reports are discussed below. Although U.S. military and civilian space programs are separated organizationally, the functions performed by satellites and the vehicles that launch them are not easily divided. Both sectors use communications, navigation, weather, and remote sensing/reconnaissance satellites, which may operate at different frequencies or have different capabilities, but have similar technology. The same launch vehicles can be used to launch any type of military, civilian, or commercial satellite. DOD uses some civilian satellites and vice versa. After the Cold War, interest in space weapons to attack satellites (antisatellite, or ASAT, weapons) or ballistic missiles declined initially, but was rekindled beginning with the 104 th Congress. Using satellites to attack ballistic missiles has been controversial since President Reagan's 1983 announcement of a Strategic Defense Initiative to study the viability of building a ballistic missile defense system to protect the United States and its allies. The Clinton Administration changed the name of the Strategic Defense Initiative Organization to the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization to reflect a new focus on theater missile defense in the wake of the Persian Gulf War, rather than national missile defense. The George W. Bush Administration changed the name to the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) to reflect its interest in broad missile defense goals. The concept of placing weapons in space, as part of a missile defense system or otherwise, remains controversial. A May 18, 2005, New York Times article reported that the new national space policy being developed by the Bush Administration would "move the United States closer to fielding offensive and defensive space weapons." Then-White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan, responding to questions at a White House press briefing, stressed that the new policy, still being developed, does not represent a substantial shift in U.S. policy. The same day, Representative Kucinich introduced a bill ( H.R. 2420 ) that would have banned weapons in space and the use of such weapons to damage or destroy objects in orbit. The House rejected (124-302) a Kucinich amendment to the Foreign Relations Authorization Act ( H.R. 2601 ) on July 20, 2005, that was similar to his bill. The issue of using weapons to destroy satellites has received renewed attention after the Chinese successfully destroyed a defunct weather satellite on January 11, 2007. Since the orbit of that satellite was approximately where the United States has many of its reconnaissance satellites, China's actions have caused a great deal of concern. Space is not a line item in the DOD budget and DOD's annual budget justifications do not include a figure for "space activities"; therefore, DOD funding figures must be used cautiously. DOD sometimes releases only partial information or will release without explanation new figures for prior years that are quite different from what was previously reported. A breakdown by program acquisition costs for individual weapon systems in the DOD budget request for FY2008 is available online at http://www.dod.mil/comptroller/defbudget/fy2008/fy2008_weabook.pdf . The FY2007 authorization and appropriations bills contain the authority and funding for DOD space activities, but, as mentioned, do not specify figures for those activities. The House and Senate passed conference agreements on both the FY2007 national defense authorization bill, H.R. 5122 , and the FY2007 defense appropriations bill, H.R. 5631 . The President signed the appropriations bill into law, P.L. 109-289 , on September 29, 2006, and he signed the authorization bill into law, P.L. 109-364 , on October 17, 2006. For many years, questions have arisen about whether DOD effectively manages its space activities, and several commissions and task forces have studied the issue. Congress created a commission in the FY2000 DOD authorization bill to make recommendations on the overall management of national security space programs. Chaired by Donald Rumsfeld, the commission released its report on January 11, 2001, shortly after Mr. Rumsfeld became Secretary of Defense. The "Rumsfeld Space Commission" made sweeping recommendations for management of DOD and intelligence community space programs. According to two reports by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), DOD intended to implement 10 of the 13 organizational recommendations, although no additional updates have been provided. Several DOD space programs have experienced significant cost overruns and schedule delays, raising concerns about DOD's acquisition process for space systems. The Defense Science Board (DSB) and Air Force Scientific Advisory Board (AFSAB) commissioned a task force chaired by retired Lockheed Martin executive Tom Young to review DOD space program acquisition because of significant cost increases in several programs; its May 2003 report was publicly released in September 2003. Four key findings of the report were that cost has replaced mission success as the primary driver in managing acquisition processes, creating excessive technical and schedule risk; the space acquisition system is strongly biased to produce unrealistically low cost estimates; government capabilities to lead and manage the acquisition process have seriously eroded; and there are long term concerns about the space industrial base. According to press reports, the task force produced an update in August 2004 that concluded that some of the space programs it criticized were making progress but still required close review, and that better coordination is needed between the military and intelligence agencies in setting requirements. On April 6, 2006, the Senate Committee on Armed Forces held a hearing on space acquisitions. At that hearing, Cristina T. Chaplain, GAO's Acting Director of Acquisition and Sourcing, testified that DOD's space acquisition programs continue to face substantial cost and schedule overruns. In some cases, according to Ms. Chaplain, cost growth has come close to or exceeded 100%, causing DOD to nearly double its investment with no corresponding increase in functionality. Additionally, many programs have experienced significant schedule delays—as much as six years—postponing delivery of promised capabilities to the warfighter. SBIRS-High is designed as a constellation of five satellites above the equator in geostationary orbit (GEO) plus sensors on two other satellites in highly-elliptical orbits (HEO). DOD still plans to launch the sensors on the two HEO satellites, but will procure, at most, three of the GEO satellites. The funds that would have been spent for the fourth and fifth GEO satellites reportedly will be used instead to design an alternative system using state-of-the-art technologies. Launch is scheduled for 2009. SBIRS-High will eventually replace the DOD's Defense Support Program series of early warning satellites that alert the National Command Authority to foreign missile launches; however, the program has encountered significant schedule delays and cost growth, breaching "Nunn-McCurdy" cost-growth limits several times. The May 2003 report of the Defense Science Board and Air Force Scientific Advisory Board criticized early program management of SBIRS-High and took a cautious attitude concerning whether the restructured program would succeed. An October 2003 GAO report concluded the program remained at "substantial risk of cost and schedule increases." Even though test delays and technical difficulties have become commonplace within SBIRS-High, Congress has continued to acknowledge the program's importance, and has therefore maintained high levels of funding. The President's FY2008 budget request of $1.07 billion represents a total increase of $400.9 million from FY2007, with $587 million reserved for RDT&E and $483 million for procurement. The proposal provides for the continued assembly, integration, and testing of the first two SBIRS geosynchronous (GEO) satellites as well as to the procurement of one SBIRS GEO satellite and two highly elliptical orbit (HEO) satellite payloads.