The Pentagon’s weapons are quickly losing their technological edge, the deputy defense secretary said Monday as the Defense Department rolled out its fiscal 2016 budget request.
After 13 years of war operations that largely focused on ground forces, the Pentagon’s modernization needs are “unlike anything I’ve seen” since the end of the Cold War, Deputy Defense Secretary Bob Work said Monday.
Those needs are reflected in the fiscal 2016 budget that the Pentagon announced Monday. More than 60 percent of the growth in the Defense Department’s $534 billion budget request is to fund new and ongoing construction of its weapons systems.
The department’s space capabilities need funding to make them more resilient to tampering or outright attack. Its missiles, aircraft and ships need enhanced capabilities to counter evolving capabilities from potential foes — if Chinese fighters, carriers and missiles evolve to the point that U.S. aircraft carriers cannot safely enter the Sea of Japan, for instance. Every area needs spending, and the Pentagon on Monday was firm that there is no room for tradeoffs.
For example, one of the major new “asks” will be the start-up money for a sixth-generation fighter — one capable of stopping an adversary from interfering with U.S. air and sea forces in a contested area. But this year’s request also asks for $11 billion for 57 new Joint Strike Fighters, the Defense Department’s fifth-generation fighter, which is expected to be ready for the Marine Corps later this year and already faces criticism that it will not be adequate to handle the world’s growing threats.
The Pentagon says the new fighter is not a tradeoff. “It’s not an alternative to the Joint Strike Fighter but what follows the Joint Strike Fighter,” said Defense Comptroller Mike McCord, noting that it was still too far in the future to know if the next-generation platform would be manned or unmanned.
The new platform “will be beyond a fighter aircraft,” said Lt. Gen. Mark Ramsey, director of force structure at the Joint Staff. “It really is the future of air dominance.”
But both the current Joint Strike Fighters and the future aircraft will be fighting for money amid a long list of new weapons that includes a new long-range strike bomber, a new nuclear ballistic submarine, a new presidential helicopter program, new satellites and even a new Air Force One.
As Work noted in his briefing to reporters Monday, “all of this money has to come from somewhere.”
Where the money will come from is likely to be an uphill battle. Even though the Pentagon is planning to draw down its forces in Afghanistan to 5,500 troops, it’s asking for an overseas contingency operations request of almost $40 billion just for Afghanistan operations. The Pentagon noted that the fund contains far more than just war funding for Afghanistan, but given the sequestration cap requirements, “it’s not possible to shove all of those things back in the base budget,” McCord said.
Adm. James Winnefeld, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the Pentagon’s intent is to put spending on non-war operations back into the regular budget next fiscal year.
“Too much has crept into that account,” Winnefeld said. “We’re determined to fix that.” But the Pentagon, he said, “can only do that if the caps are lifted.”
Pentagon officials were quick to emphasize that they based their funding request on the president’s 2012 defense strategic guidance to conduct one major campaign in one theater while deterring a regional opponent in another, saying that any cuts to the budget request would require changes to that strategy.
