Overnight Defense: Esper fires back at Senate criticism | Joint Chiefs of Staff chair says evidence suggests coronavirus occurred naturally | DOD identifies casualty

Happy Tuesday and welcome to Overnight Defense. I’m Ellen Mitchell, and here’s your nightly guide to the latest developments at the Pentagon, on Capitol Hill and beyond. CLICK HERE to subscribe to the newsletter.

THE TOPLINE: Defense Secretary Mark Esper shot back Tuesday at a group of Democratic senators who last week panned him for what they described as a failure to sufficiently respond to the coronavirus pandemic.

“I am very disappointed that members of Congress, particularly those who sit on the Armed Services Committee and who receive weekly updates from us, would write a letter that includes a number of misleading, false or inaccurate statements,” Esper said during a press briefing at the Pentagon.

Esper added the department provides lawmakers with “complete, accurate and timely information,” and said he has spoken to the chairmen and ranking members of the Armed Services committees multiple times.

“We recognize Congress has an important oversight role, but it should be an informed oversight role, and we are committed to doing that to address any members’ concerns,” he said. 

The letter he was reacting to: Esper was responding to a letter from Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), a Senate Armed Services Committee member, and nine Democratic senate colleagues in which they expressed “grave concern” about how the Pentagon has handled the crisis. Fellow Armed Services members Sens. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) were among the co-signers.

“Civilian leadership of the department has failed to act sufficiently quickly, and has often prioritized readiness at the expense of the health of servicemembers and their families,” the senators wrote. “This failure has adversely affected morale, and, despite the department’s best intentions, undermined readiness.”

The eight-page letter cited a laundry list of examples, including the coronavirus outbreak aboard the USS Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier, Esper pushing decisions on implementing social distancing and other guidance to local commanders, varied decisions across services such as the Marine Corps’ decision not to relax grooming standards while other services do and the decision to stop publicly releasing installation-specific data on infections.

Response coming: Esper said the department “will be responding” officially to the letter, but in the meantime listed several grievances during Tuesday’s press briefing.

“I don’t think it really recognizes all the Department of Defense has done, particularly at a time we have 62,000 Americans out there on the streets of America who are in many cases risking their own health to protect the American people,” Esper said, referencing assistance the U.S. military is providing to local communities responding to the coronavirus.

The letter does address the assistance U.S. troops have provided to local governments fighting the coronavirus, but Esper argued “the statements in that letter don’t match what I’m hearing from the governors,” who he said have thanked him for the Pentagon’s help.

In other coronavirus news…

Not likely from a lab: The Pentagon’s top uniformed official on Tuesday maintained that available evidence indicates the virus that has caused a global pandemic was naturally-occurring and not man-made or released purposely from a Chinese lab.

“The weight of evidence — nothing’s conclusive — the weight of evidence is that it was natural and not man-made,” Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Army Gen. Mark Milley said of the coronavirus.

“The second issue is, was it accidentally released, did it release naturally into the environment or was it intentional? We don’t have conclusive evidence in any of that, but the weight of evidence is that it was probably not intentional,” he told reporters at the Pentagon.

Milley added that “various agencies, both civilian and U.S. government, are looking at” the issue of where the virus originated.

Trump admin looks for blame: The Trump administration this month stepped up efforts to blame China for the pandemic, with top officials including President Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo pushing the unverified theory that the virus was created by Chinese researchers or accidentally released by a lab in Wuhan, China, where it was being studied.

Trump, who has come under consistent scrutiny for his own slow response to the virus domestically, has repeatedly accused China of covering up the outbreak and claimed there is significant evidence that the virus emanated from a Wuhan lab — though he has not actually provided any evidence.

But Milley since last month has maintained that while the U.S. intelligence community was taking “a hard look” at the theory, it’s inconclusive, and “the weight of evidence seems to indicate natural [origin].”

And Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert and a member of the White House coronavirus task force, has dismissed theories the virus was man-made or released accidentally from a Chinese lab. He said available research indicated the virus evolved naturally.

Milley on Tuesday did push for the Chinese government to “open up and allow inspectors and investigators” to go into Wuhan “so that the world can know the actual original source of this [virus] so that we can apply the lessons learned and prevent outbreaks in the future.”

DOD IDENTIFIES ARMY CASUALTY: The Defense Department on Tuesday announced the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Inherent Resolve in Iraq. 

Sgt. Christopher Wesley Curry, 23, from Terre Haute, Ind., was killed Monday in Erbil, Iraq, from a non-combat-related incident, according to a Pentagon statement.

The statement noted that incident is under investigation.

Curry had been assigned to 3rd Battalion, 21st Infantry Regiment, 1st Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division, from Fort Wainwright, Alaska.

ON TAP FOR TOMORROW

The International Institute for Strategic Studies will host a webinar on “New Missile Technologies: Old Arms Control Solutions,” with William Alberque, director of NATO’s Arms Control, Disarmament, and Non-Proliferation Center; and Rear Adm. John Gower, former assistant chief of defense staff (nuclear, chemical, biological) in the UK Ministry of Defense at 7 a.m. https://www.iiss.org/events/2020/05/new-missile-technologies-old-arms-control-solutions-webinar

Air Force Secretary Barbara Barrett and Chief of Space Operations Gen. Jay Raymond will speak at an online event hosted by the Space Foundation on “America’s Space Force: Building the Future Today,” at 11 a.m. https://register.gotowebinar.com/register/2686325016510420495

The Hudson Institute will host a webcast on “Analyzing the Impact of the ‘Maximum Pressure’ Campaign on Iran Amid Coronavirus,” at 12 p.m. https://www.hudson.org/events/1806-video-event-analyzing-the-impact-of-the-maximum-pressure-campaign-on-iran-amid-coronavirus52020

The Women’s Foreign Policy Group will host a webinar on “COVID-19’s Long Shadow: National and Global Security Challenges,” with former CIA Deputy Director of Intelligence Carmen Medina at 1 p.m. https://wfpg.memberclicks.net/covid-security

The Senate Armed Services Committee will hold a hearing on “DOD spectrum policy and the impact of the FCC approval of Ligado’s spectrum proposal on national security,” with Dana Deasy, DOD chief information officer; Michael Griffin, undersecretary of defense for research and engineering; retired Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen; and Chief of Space Operations Gen. Jay Raymond at 3 p.m. in Dirksen Senate Office Buildoing, room G-50. https://www.armed-services.senate.gov/hearings/20-05-06-department-of-defense-spectrum-policy-and-the-impact-of-the-federal-communications-commissions-ligado-decision-on-national-security

Former Principal Deputy Director of National Intelligence Sue Gordon will speak at a Intelligence and National Security Alliance webcast at 4:30 p.m. https://www.insaonline.org/event/wednesday-wisdom-with-the-hon-sue-gordon/

ICYMI

— The Hill: Army looking for wearable early COVID-19 detector

— The Hill: Senate Intelligence gets its chance to grill John Ratcliffe

— The Hill: Ratcliffe refuses to say whether Russian election interference favored Trump

— The Hill: Venezuela says two US ‘mercenaries’ captured in raid

— The Hill: Opinion: More women in government roles leads to greater national security