The Army has whittled down to five a list of locations for new command dedicated to force modernization and readiness, and Maryland is not one of them.
Multiple reports identify Minneapolis, Philadelphia, Boston, Austin, Texas, and Raleigh, North Carolina, as the five finalists and one of them will be selected by the end of the month.
Gov. Larry Hogan and Maryland federal lawmakers sent letters to the Pentagon in April urging leaders to locate the Army Futures Command in the Free State, pitching its “unmatched research, development, test and evaluation (RDT&E) enterprise” and its “vibrant academic and defense-focused entrepreneurial ecosystem.”
That includes 150,000 civilian and military employees working in high-tech fields, Maryland’s congressional delegation wrote in a letter to Army Secretary Mark Esper, as well as a wealth of aerospace and defense companies.
The Army announced last October at the Association of the U.S. Army’s annual conference in D.C. that it was standing up the command. The Futures Command will be run by a four-star general with a plan to realign the Army’s modernization priorities under a new org chart underscoring six priorities: long-range precision fires, next-generation combat vehicle, future vertical lift, the network, air-and-missile defense and soldier lethality.