Lawmakers Pave the Way for Space Force to Dissolve SDA, Space RCO

Tucked into the Senate Armed Services Committee’s annual defense policy bill is the legal backing the Space Force needs to dissolve the Space Development Agency and the Space Rapid Capabilities Office as part of its acquisition reform efforts.

The committee approved the bill June 10, just weeks after the House Armed Services Committee cleared a similar provision in its own draft legislation. Sign-off from both chambers indicates the provision will likely make it into the final National Defense Authorization Act, though it is not yet signed into law.

The committee’s provision would eliminate separate statutes that established both agencies, a move that lawmakers say supports the Space Force’s broader push toward more flexible, less stovepiped acquisition processes. Both offices currently operate outside of the service’s typical acquisition structures and have had success developing and fielding space systems on faster timelines than typical program offices.

Space Force officials have said the goal is for all program offices, now called Portfolio Acquisition Executives, to operate like SDA and the Space RCO. In a system like that, they say, it makes more sense to integrate those flagship rapid development offices than to keep them separate.

“The way the SDA and the RCO have been structured, to be honest, those are kind of the models of how we’re actually going to structure all the PAEs,” Air Force Secretary Troy Meink said in April at the Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, Colo. “The goal is, pretty much the way SDA operates, most of the PAEs would be operating in a very similar fashion.”

The service plans to create nine PAEs and has, to date, has announced the following six:

Space Access
Space-Based Sensing and Targeting
Infrastructure
Battle Management, Command, Control, Communications, and Space Intelligence
Satellite Communication and Positioning, Navigation, and Timing
Missile Warning and Tracking

The Space Force’s new acquisition structure comes at the direction of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who rolled out a slate of reform efforts last November that instructed each of the services to implement new, more flexible program management teams that value speed and scale over rigid requirements.

In a briefing with reporters following the bill’s passage at the committee level, a congressional official said the Senate committee has “really been pleased” with the Pentagon’s quick work of implementing these reforms.

“Across the board, it has been fantastic, fast-moving, and I think it’s been immediately effective,” the official said.