Senate Committee Aims To Boost Pentagon’s Budget By $24B With Eyes On China

WASHINGTON: The Senate Appropriations Committee is proposing to boost the Pentagon’s fiscal year 2022 budget by $24 billion with a focus on countering China, improving facilities and infrastructure across the services and advancing technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning.

The bill’s big plus ups come with $2.5 billion of additional investments with an eye toward America’s rival in Asia, such as funding specific to Marine Corps Force Design 2030 efforts, accelerating INDO-PACOM missile tracking capabilities, funding for the Homeland Defense Radar-Hawaii and Guam Defense System as well as $100 million to establish the Rapid Defense Experimentation Reserve to “accelerate real-world demonstrations of innovative technologies,” according to a summary published by the committee.

The bill also provides various increases for artificial intelligence, cyber and microelectronics capabilities which includes a $500 million program in increase adoption of AI at combatant commands.

It would provide the still nascent Space Force with $17.9 billion for military personnel, operations and acquisition accounts, a 16% increase over last year’s enacted budget.

The fourth big focus area in the SAC’s bill is $1.6 billion of additional funding for infrastructure and facilities sustainment across the services. The Navy’s shipyard revitalization program, for example, would see its $280 million request increased by $480 million total, $180 million for facility renovations and $300 million for additional equipment.

The majority of the Pentagon’s topline is included in the SAC’s new bill, which provides the military with $725 billion. However, Senate appropriators funded military construction and veterans affairs in a separate bill that includes roughly $10 billion. That brings the SAC’s total Pentagon topline to around $735 billion, including $24 billion in additional funding. The three other congressional committees overseeing the Pentagon’s budgets have made similar proposals coming in at around a $740 billion topline.

Some of the major cuts include eliminating $3.3 billion that would have gone to the Afghan Security Forces Fund, an obvious result of the US withdrawal from the country and subsequent collapse of the Afghan government’s army.

There is a $433 million cut from the Space Force for “overhead persistent infrared satellites, which are being developed on fixed-price contracts, yet funding is requested in excess of the contracted value.”

The bill also contains a “rescission of $436 million in unobligated prior-year funds from production of Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAM), due to lengthy manufacturing delays,” according to a statement from the committee.

By comparison, the House Appropriations Committee in July moved forward with a bill cutting the Pentagon’s total budget request by $258 million, Breaking Defense reported at the time. In contrast to the Senate’s bill which touts adds for INDO-PACOM, the House bill moves to cut funding for a Guam-based missile defense program, a major blow to the combatant command.

Other big budget items in the Senate committee’s bill include $1.7 billion for an additional DDG-51 destroyer, $1.8 billion for 16 C-130J aircraft destined for the Air National Guard and $1 billion for “urgent requirements” for Israel’s Iron Dome system.

The House and Senate authorizing committees are both moving forward with bills that add approximately $25 billion to the Pentagon’s request.

It should not be a surprise to military observers, but consistent with the Pentagon’s latest request, the committee also noted this is the first military budget request lacking an overseas contingency operations account since 2010.