WASHINGTON - U.S. Senator Roger Wicker, R-Miss., a senior member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, today attended a hearing to examine worldwide threats as identified by the U.S. intelligence community. Wicker brought attention to recent actions by the United States to counter hostile actions from Russia, China, and North Korea.

Wicker asked Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and the Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Lieutenant General Robert P. Ashley, about the U.S. government’s recent decision to sell Javelin anti-tank missiles and launchers to Ukraine as they continue to battle Russian-backed fighters in Eastern Ukraine.

Lieutenant General Ashley called the decision a “good faith measure toward our partner in Ukraine.”

Wicker highlighted a recent RAND Corporation report that argued it would be possible for the United States to lose the next war. The report included a claim that China and Russia could be nearing technological parity with the United States military, and may eventually surpass American abilities.

“There is a competition, there is a race, and the world is changing. Conventional warfare probably changed when we prevailed in Desert Storm,” Director Coats said. “No country is going to line up tanks, or line up infantry against us given our abilities that were demonstrated there, and so we’ve seen a lot of asymmetric types of threats and the use of technology to achieve those threats. It’s a different kind of warfare that we’re engaged in.”