MAKING THE NDAA CUT: It’s no surprise that a $717 billion must-pass defense policy bill would be a magnet for amendments. Lawmakers have filed more than 560 they hope to debate on the House floor as the chamber prepares to vote on the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act this week. The number is a record for the House Rules Committee, said Rep. Rob Woodall, who was sitting in as chairman Monday night for an initial hearing on the NDAA. The committee meets this afternoon at 3 to begin choosing which amendments are worthy of floor debate on Wednesday or Thursday. Many of the amendments will not make the cut. “I’m not sure 500 amendments are totally necessary,” senior Republican committee member Rep. Tom Cole joked. “I guess everybody’s entitled to have an opinion whether it’s informed or not, so we’ll struggle through it.”

HAPPENING TODAY: Trump meets with South Korean President Moon Jae-in at the White House with the planned Singapore summit between Trump and Kim Jong Un just three weeks away. Moon, who brokered the rapprochement that led to the U.S. president agreeing to meet face-to-face with the North Korean dictator, will be conferring with Trump about how to proceed now that North Korea has pivoted from conciliation back to confrontation.

Moon is scheduled to arrive at the White House at noon, have a “working lunch” with Trump and then leave just before 2 p.m. There’s no formal news conference planned, but the two leaders may make remarks during the traditional photo op in the Cabinet room.

SOUTH KOREA DISINVITED: One sign the bloom is off the rose: North Korea says that while it still plans to shut down its nuclear test site this week, South Korean journalists are no longer invited to be among the foreign witnesses. This follows the North’s abrupt cancellation of high-level talks with the South over objections to U.S.-South Korean military exercises. South Korea’s government expressed regret, but said it still hopes the North’s dismantling of the site proceeds as planned and proves to be a genuine step toward denuclearization, according to the AP.

ONUS ON CHINA: Trump tweeted yesterday that China must keep the pressure on North Korea. “China must continue to be strong & tight on the Border of North Korea until a deal is made,” Trump said. “The word is that recently the Border has become much more porous and more has been filtering in. I want this to happen, and North Korea to be VERY successful, but only after signing!”

AND THERE’S A COIN FOR THAT: Among the preparations for the summit, the White House has already minted a military-style challenge coin to commemorate the historic meeting. The presidential travel coin depicts Trump face-to-face with the “supreme leader” under a banner saying “peace talks” with each country’s flag as a backdrop, according to photos posted by news outlets on Twitter Monday.

MCCAIN’S INFLUENCE: The Senate Armed Services Committee pushes ahead on writing its NDAA throughout the day, though without its chairman. Sen. John McCain remains in Arizona where he is battling brain cancer, facing an uncertain future and getting his affairs in order. However, McCain has still been very involved and the NDAA that Armed Services is expected to finalize this week will largely reflect his priorities, a committee aide said.

On Monday evening, senators held a closed Airland subcommittee hearing. Beginning at 9:30 a.m. they will tackle all the remaining subcommittee markups of the bill: Seapower, readiness, personnel, cyber security, emerging threats, and strategic forces. A final bill will be sent to the Senate floor after the full committee markup, which could wrap up as early as Wednesday.

FIGHTING FOR SPACE FORCE: It has been nearly a year since Rep. Mike Rogers went head-to-head with the Air Force and seemingly lost the initial Capitol Hill political battle over creating a separate military service for space. But Rogers has continued to raise an alarm over an Air Force that he says is leaving the U.S. vulnerable in space to adversaries such as China. And with Trump weighing in on his side, Rogers has new hope the idea will become reality.

Rogers spoke to the Washington Examiner as the Pentagon is preparing a new outside study that could be crucial for the Space Force proposal, and as the House is considering a new set of reforms in the 2019 budget that could lay the foundation for the service.

PUTTING OFF BRAC: A new policy paper by Frederico Bartels, a defense budget policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation, finds that the House’s NDAA could put off shuttering unneeded military facilities for years. The bill “contains language that would effectively delay any action on the Pentagon’s excess infrastructure until 2021, saddling taxpayers with the cost of the operation of unnecessary defense infrastructure,” Bartels writes. That is because it requires an infrastructure capacity study before any closures under the Base Realignment and Closure program. You can read the full paper here.

COUNTERING IRAN: Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced yesterday what amounts to a full-court press against all of Iran’s “malign behavior” in a speech at the Heritage Foundation that was heavy on demands, and laden with promises to crush the Iranian economy with what he called “the strongest sanctions in history.”

“Iran will be forced to make a choice: either fight to keep its economy off life-support at home, or keep squandering precious wealth on fights abroad. It will not have the resources to do both,” Pompeo said.

Pompeo declared there will be no return to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, better known as the Iran nuclear deal. “We will not repeat the mistakes of past administrations, and we will not renegotiate the JCPOA itself,” he said. “No more wealth creation for Iranian kleptocrats. No more acceptance of missiles landing in Riyadh and in the Golan Heights. No more cost-free expansions of Iranian power. No more.”

He listed 12 demands of Iran that included “permanently and verifiably” abandoning its nuclear weapons program, allowing more intrusive inspections, ending the production and proliferation of ballistic missiles, the release all U.S. citizens, ending support to terrorists, stopping interference in Iraq, withdrawing all forces from Syria, and ending support for Houthis in Yemen and the Taliban in Afghanistan.

A ‘JUMBO’ TREATY: Britain, which is one of the signatories to the now moribund Iran deal, thinks the U.S. is making a mistake walking away from the agreement, instead of negotiating new restrictions on top of it. “The advantage of the JCPOA was it had a very clear objective, it protected the world from the prospect of an Iranian nuclear bomb and in exchange gave the Iranians some recognizable economic benefits,” said British Foreign Minister Boris Johnson.

“I think if you try now to fold all those issues — ballistic missiles, Iran’s behavior, Iran’s disruptive activity in the region, nuclear activity — if you try to pull all of those into a giant negotiation, a new jumbo Iran negotiation, a new treaty … that seems to be what they envisage and I don’t see that being very easy to achieve in anything like a reasonable timescale.”

NO MILITARY THREAT: While Pompeo’s searing indictment of Iran’s “malign behavior” sounded a lot like a declaration of war, the Pentagon stopped short of making any military threats. “We are going to take all necessary steps to confront and address Iran’s malign influence in the region,” Col. Rob Manning told reporters at an off-camera briefing. “We are assessing if we are going to double down on current actions or implement new actions.”

No decisions have been made to take any new actions, but “it’s on the table,” Manning said. “I mean we are not going to rule out anything that is necessary in order to address Iran,” but he stressed, “We are part of a whole-of-government approach.”

FIRST COMBAT USE OF THE F-35: Israeli Air Force commander Maj. Gen. Amikam Norkin claims Israel is the first nation to employ the F-35 in a real world “operational attack,” according to Haaretz. Speaking at a conference in Israel, Norkin said the fighter did not participate in the most recent strike in Syria but did in two previous ones.

‘MINIMAL’ PROGRESS IN AFGHANISTAN: The Pentagon’s top watchdog for overseas operations is citing “minimal progress” in Afghanistan over the first three months of the year, in a report contradicting recent upbeat assessments from U.S. commanders. “The percentage of the population living in areas under the control or influence of the Afghan government showed little positive change this quarter,” said the report to Congress issued yesterday.

“This quarter the Taliban continued to hold territory and launched devastating terrorist attacks in Kabul and across the country. The United Nations also reported that civilian casualties during the quarter were at near record high levels, and U.S. intelligence officials predicted that the overall security and economic situation in Afghanistan would deteriorate modestly this year,” wrote Glenn Fine, principal deputy inspector general, in a preface to the report.

“In addition, Afghan officials again delayed the country’s parliamentary elections, and Pakistan showed no clear signs that it is eliminating safe havens for the Taliban and other militant groups. Although both the Taliban and the Afghan government made overtures toward a peace process, significant gaps exist between negotiating positions, and the two sides have not agreed on how to move forward with a reconciliation process,” Fine wrote.

‘PROFESSIONAL SHREWDNESS’: Gina Haspel isn’t the only top intelligence official to be sworn in this month. In a statement yesterday, Dan Coats, the director of national intelligence, noted he administered the oath of office last week to Michael Atkinson, who as inspector general of the intelligence community, will serve as an internal watchdog.

“Michael moved from private law practice to public service following the September 11 attacks, and he brings professional shrewdness and dedication to an oversight mission that must operate with integrity, accountability, and objectivity,” Coats said in a statement.

THE RUNDOWN

Military Times: Indo-PACOM? Pentagon May Rename US Pacific Command

New York Times: Trump-Kim Summit Meeting Is A ‘99.9% Done Deal,’ South Korea Says

CNBC: Putin claimed a new nuclear-powered missile had unlimited range — but it flew only 22 miles in its most successful test yet

Defense News: See what stood out at the special ops expo in Jordan

Air Force Times: Air Force Global Strike orders command-wide inventory after weapons losses at Minot

Breaking Defense: The US Needs A ‘Coast Guard’ For Space: Semper Paratus Exteriores Spatium

Army Times: Only a third of the Army’s BCTs are ready to deploy. Here’s how the service plans to fix that.

Defense One: America’s New Stealth Bomber has a Stealthy Price Tag

Wall Street Journal: Afghans Aim Anger At Leadership

USNI News: Arleigh Burke Guided-Missile Destroyer Program Marks Key Milestones

New York Times: Syria Regains Control of Damascus, After Seven Years of Fighting

Defense News: Here’s How House Lawmakers Plan To Fix The US Military’s Hypoxia Problem