S.Amdt. 4463

SA 4463. Mr. SCHUMER submitted an amendment intended to be proposed
by him to the bill S. 2943, to authorize appropriations for fiscal year
2017 for military activities of the Department of Defense, for military
construction, and for defense activities of the Department of Energy,
to prescribe military personnel strengths for such fiscal year, and for
other purposes; which was ordered to lie on the table; as follows:

At the end of subtitle C of title I, add the following:

SEC. 128. TESTING AND INTEGRATION OF MINEHUNTING SONARS FOR
LITTORAL COMBAT SHIP MINE HUNTING CAPABILITIES.

(a) Findings.--Congress makes the following findings:
(1) The Department of the Navy has determined that the
Remote Minehunting system (RMS) has not performed
satisfactorily and that the program will be restructured to
accelerate a less capable variant on the RMS into the
Littoral Combat Ship.
(2) On February 26, 2016, Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus
stated that new testing must be done to find a permanent
solution to the mine countermeasures mission package and that
the Navy wants to ``get it out there as quickly as you can
and test it in a more realistic environment''.
(3) Restructuring a program the Department of the Navy has
determined will be discontinued is not the best use of
taxpayer dollars.
(4) There are several mature unmanned surface vehicle-towed
and unmanned underwater vehicle-based synthetic aperture
sonars sensors (SAS) in use by navies of allied nations.
(5) SAS sensors are currently in operation and performing
well.
(6) SAS sensors provide a technology that is operational
and ready to meet the Littoral Combat Ship minehunting area
clearance rate sustained requirement.
(b) Report to Congress.--
(1) In general.--Not later than September 30, 2018, the
Secretary of the Navy shall--
(A) conduct operational at-sea testing and experimentation
of those currently available and deployed United States and
allied conventional side-scan sonar and synthetic aperture
sonar;
(B) complete an assessment of all minehunting sonar
technologies that can meet the mine countermeasures mission
package (MCM MP); and
(C) submit to the congressional defense committees a report
that contains the findings of the at-sea testing and
experimentation and market survey of all capable technologies
found suitable for performing the Littoral Combat Ship
minehunting mission.
(2) Elements.--The market survey and assessment required
under paragraph (1) shall include--
(A) specific details regarding the capabilities of current
minehunting sonar and in-production synthetic aperture sonar
sensors available for integration on the Littoral Combat
Ship;
(B) an assessment of the capabilities achieved by
integrating synthetic aperture sonar sensors on the Littoral
Combat Ship; and
(C) recommendations to enhance the minehunting capabilities
of the Littoral Combat Ship minehunting mission using
conventional sonar systems and synthetic aperture sonar
systems.
(c) Assessment Required.--The Secretary of the Navy shall
perform at-sea testing of conventional side-scan sonar
systems and synthetic aperture sonar systems to determine
which systems can meet the requirements of the Navy
minehunting countermeasure mission package.
(d) Sonar System Defined.--In this section, the term
``sonar system'' includes, at a minimum, conventional side-
scan sonar technologies and synthetic aperture sonar
technologies.
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