Two weeks ago, the House of Representatives passed its version of
a National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for 2027. This “must-pass”
legislation, which sets policy and authorizes annual funding for the
military, is usually a relatively uncontroversial affair. This year’s
NDAA process, however, has seen intense criticism directed at one
particular part of the bill.
This is Section 219,
a provision intended to consolidate and expand the defense relationship
between the United States and Israel. More specifically, it mandates
the creation of a single executive agent tasked with “synchronizing
cooperative efforts between the United States and Israel to expand and
accelerate bilateral defense technology research, development, testing,
evaluation, integration, and industrial cooperation.” These efforts will
cover broad areas, including the integration of Israeli technologies
into U.S. weapon systems and supply chains, cooperative research,
development, and acquisition programs, licensing agreements and
manufacturing partnerships with Israeli arms companies, and joint
exercises and information sharing with the Israeli government.
The
sweeping scope of this provision has led some media outlets and
political commentators to describe it as “merging” the U.S. and Israeli
defense industrial bases, which could—as this magazine observed earlier
this month—give Israel additional leverage over our defense and foreign
policy. In the House itself, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) and six other
Republicans defied their party to vote against the NDAA and Section 219,
which Massie denounced as
“a betrayal of our sovereignty.” (All but six Democrats also voted nay,
though many appear to have done so more out of opposition to the Iran
War than Section 219 specifically.)
These concerns have increased the pressure on the Senate, which has yet to pass its own version of
an NDAA for 2027 (a vote to advance it earlier this month failed due to
near-unified Democratic opposition). The Senate’s bill contains a
provision—Section 1217—that,
though worded differently, is fairly similar to the House’s Section
219. Although historically Senate Republicans have been strongly
pro-Israel, the controversy over this provision has already led at least
one GOP Senator to oppose defense industrial integration. Sen. Bernie
Moreno (R-OH) told Drop Site News last Thursday, “I don’t think we should integrate our military with anybody, not even the Bahamas.”
But
Democratic leadership has not come out against this provision, nor have
they attacked the broader expansion of U.S.-Israel defense industrial
ties. Both House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) and Senate
Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) have preferred to frame their
opposition to the NDAA around the Iran War and avoided talking about
Israel in this context, even as their voters increasingly question the
U.S. relationship with Israel.
The American Conservative reached
out to the offices of Jeffries and Schumer to inquire whether they
would ask Democratic lawmakers to oppose the inclusion of Section
219/1217 in a final NDAA. Neither returned requests for comment.
The refusal of Democratic leaders to take a definite stance on this issue has frustrated critics such as Glenn Greenwald, who suggested in
a post on X that House Democrats coordinated with the GOP to ensure the
passage of the NDAA earlier this month. “When something [Democrats]
pretend to oppose ‘must pass,’ (like the NDAA)” Greenwald wrote, “they
ensure there are just enough Dem votes for it to pass, even if it's just
by one vote. Then they tell all other Dems: feel free to vote NO so our
followers think we really oppose it, and we almost sunk it.”
One
of the other unique aspects of this debate has been the relative
absence of specific defenses of Section 219 by supporters. When pressed,
they have tended to respond with broad denials and pivoted to accusing
critics of anti-semitism. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) insisted,
despite the provision’s direction regarding cooperation and
integration, that “we are not merging anything,” while Rep. Mike Lawler
(R-NY) accused those who used the term “merger” of “stoking Jew hatred.”
And
when defenders have addressed the provision with any specificity, they
have described it as merely a reification of the status quo. It just
formalizes “something we’re already doing,” Secretary of State Marco
Rubio said recently.
“I mean, that’s something that already exists.” Even Democrats who
voted against the NDAA as a whole—such as Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA), the
Ranking Member of the House Armed Services Committee and one of the most
powerful House Democrats on defense matters—said the provision would
only apply to a handful of discrete programs, such as Iron Dome or
David’s Sling, which the U.S. already coproduces with Israel. “We would
have three, four, maybe five or six programs that we were co-developing
with the IDF,” Smith explained in a recent appearance on Breaking
Points.
But
such assurances do not provide the full story. As detailed above, the
text of Section 219 directs the Pentagon to create a new position with a
broad mandate that transcends specific programs. This mandate
encompasses R&D, acquisition, production, information-sharing, and
joint exercises. It includes cooperation in a vast array of areas,
including artificial intelligence, quantum technology, biotechnology,
cyber, and directed energies. The provision even leaves open the door
for work with “other Department of Defense entities, as appropriate,”
which could cover essentially any cooperative program imaginable.
“These
categories cover all the most important tech from which the most
important weapon systems will come,” the influential conservative
commentator and activist Steve Bannon said in
a recent conversation with this author. Bannon added that “Section 219
is the equivalent of China’s Made in China 2025 strategy... AGI, quantum
computing, advanced chip design, biotech. The top sectors get you to
the singularity, to Homo sapiens 2.0. They’ve laid out every crucial massive segment, not a weapons program.”
Perhaps most revealing are the words of Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu himself. In a recent Fox News interview,
Rachel Campos-Duffy asked Netanyahu whether, if direct financial aid
from the U.S. were to end, “Israel [would] be compensated by the
proposal to have a merging of some sort between our Pentagon and your
military.”