Anniston Army Depot may be about 1,000 miles away from Capitol Hill, but Wednesday it was front and center for Sen. Tommy Tuberville.
The senator discussed the facility with Gen. Randy George, the nominee for Chief of Staff to the Army, during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing.
“You know, tomorrow (Thursday), I’ll be meeting with General Hamilton, the commander of the Army Materiel Command (at Redstone Arsenal),” said Tuberville (R-Auburn). “Anniston Depot is a designated center of industrial and technology excellence for vehicles such as the M1 Abrams tank and the Stryker. The depot has teammates deployed around the world in direct support of our nation’s warfighters providing service and repairs in the field, especially in this time of the conflict we’re having in Europe.”
“General, what’s being done to ensure that the depots around the country can meet the current forecasted workload to replenish what we’re losing now?”
George praised the Anniston facility and Huntsville’s Redstone Arsenal for their roles in the nation’s defense.
“Senator, first, as I mentioned to you, I think we’re super proud of Anniston,” George said. “A lot of what ends up in Ukraine has been touched by the great workforce that’s down there at Anniston. And also helping with all of the logistics is also coming out of Redstone.”
He also discussed planned updates for Anniston.
“We are in the process of updating the industrial base that is critically important to the Army, really to the joint force and to our nation,” George said. “We have a long-range plan to do that, and we’ve kind of broken it up into interim increments to prioritize what we can do. We had spent $1.5 billion out of our budget. Thanks to Congress, we got an additional $1.6 billion.”
“I think, you know, we’re continuing to look at that and what we need to do to pull it left. It’s often times not as easy as just going out and fixing everything all at once, because we also have to continue to do what we’re doing at Anniston. So, you have to figure out how you’re upgrading it while continuing the mission.”
Tuberville also congratulated George on his new position.
“Congratulations to you, your family and I look forward to going to Redstone and Fort Novosel, and Anniston in the near future,” Tuberville said .
Austen Shipley is a staff writer for Yellowhammer News.
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