Defense budget looks to modernize, sustain force
Base budget of $481.4 billion is slightly above average annual spending during the Reagan administration buildup of the 1980s.
The White House on Monday proposed $716.5 billion in new defense spending, including $481.4 billion in the Defense Department's base budget for fiscal 2008 and $235.1 billion essentially to cover war costs for the remainder of this fiscal year and all of next year.
Not included in this amount is a proposed $50 billion "allowance" to cover war-related costs in fiscal 2009, the White House said. The amount sought for fiscal 2008 alone, including $141.7 billion in emergency wartime appropriations, would surpass defense spending at the peak of the Vietnam War by $130 billion, adjusted for inflation, according to the independent Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.
Meanwhile, the $481.4 billion base budget, which is $17.2 billion higher than what the administration projected for fiscal 2008 when it released its fiscal 2007 budget a year ago, is slightly above average annual spending during the Reagan administration buildup of the 1980s.
The Pentagon request "will make the necessary and strategic investments" to modernize, recapitalize, sustain and reset the force, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said during a Pentagon briefing Monday.
Defense spending "should be at a level to adequately meet the challenges" now confronting the United States, he added. The fiscal 2008 budget includes a $7.6 billion request to reorganize Army combat brigades into more modular and easily deployable units.
Defense officials also want $8.9 billion to develop, test and field ground-based and sea-based missile defense systems in the Pacific, as well as $310 million to deploy a missile defense site at an unidentified location in Europe. The Pentagon wants $14.2 billion for Navy shipbuilding, including money for the first CVN-21 aircraft carrier and three Littoral Combat Ships.
The budget also provides $315 million for a new Air Force tanker and $175 million for conventional Trident missiles. Additionally, the Pentagon wants $1.6 billion to develop and procure medical countermeasures and warning systems that protect against bio-engineered threats and non-traditional agents.
Meanwhile, the wartime spending bills include $13.9 billion for the remainder of fiscal 2007 and $37.6 billion in fiscal 2008 to repair and replace equipment lost or damaged in Iraq and Afghanistan. Last year, Congress approved $23.6 billion for what the military calls equipment "reset" efforts.