Though furloughs begin July 8 for Defense Department civilian employees, 37 out of 66 overseas commissaries will remain open in Europe and the Pacific region, announced Joseph Jeu, the director of the Defense Commissary Agency, in a June 18 release. “DeCA is committed to doing everything possible to minimize the impact of any budget decisions on its patrons,” he said. “We’re doing just that at overseas commissaries; where we have sufficient local national employees to (remain) open during furloughs.” International agreements exclude local national employees from the furlough, states the release. Overseas commissaries include both DOD civilian employees and local employees. Most of the international commissaries to remain open are in Germany, Italy, Japan, and South Korea. To check which commissaries are open, customers can go here to find their local store. (See No-Shop Mondays)
The Space Force is playing midwife to a new ecosystem of commercial satellite constellations providing alternatives to the service’s own Global Positioning Service from much closer to the Earth, making their signals more accurate and harder to jam.