The Senate Armed Services Committee released its version of next year’s defense budget, which embraces President Trump’s Space Force proposal while rejecting a White House plan to avoid spending caps by shifting almost $100 billion into a war-fighting account.
The National Defense Authorization Act cleared the Senate Armed Services Committee yesterday on a vote of 25 to 2.
“Our NDAA provides for $750 billion for national security, providing the resources our military needs to maintain our superiority,” Chairman James Inhofe, R-Okla., said in a statement accompanying the bill’s release. “It ensures our service members — all volunteers— and their families have the training, resources and equipment they need to complete the mission.”
The legislation now goes to the full Senate and will have to be reconciled with the House version if passed. Democrats in the House are more skeptical of the Space Force plan, but the Senate National Defense Authorization Act gave it a full-throated endorsement.
“To meet growing threats in the space domain, the NDAA establishes a U.S. Space Force as a new component of the Air Force,” the executive summary of the bill stated. “Our adversaries have Space Forces — we are behind. This new force will focus on cultivating a space warfighting ethos, unify command of space operations and activities, and improve acquisition policies for space programs and systems.”
The Senate bill grants the Trump Pentagon almost everything it asked for, but rejects a funding scheme designed to skirt mandatory caps under the 2011 Budget Control Act and allow the White House to increase military spending without coming to a compromise with Democrats on increased domestic spending.
The bill moves the $97.9 billion the White House proposed shifting to the overseas contingency operations account, meant for one-time war-fighting expenses, back to the base budget.
Members of both parties are working on a two-year deal to raise the caps and avoid another potential government shutdown.
The $750 billion authorization bill includes $642.5 billion for the Pentagon, $23.2 billion for nuclear weapons and other programs at the Department of Energy, $75.9 billion for overseas operations, and $8.4 billion for defense-related activities.
It also authorizes $10 billion for 94 Lockheed Martin Joint Strike Fighter aircraft, 16 more than the Pentagon asked for, as well as $24.1 billion for 12 new battle force ships.
The bill requires that the Navy refuel the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman, which at one point the Pentagon planned to retire 25 years early.
