Less Procurement in Bush Defense Budget

[unhappycamper]

Less Procurement in Bush Defense Budget
Aviation Week's DTI | John M. Doyle | February 05, 2008

The Pentagon's procurement request for Fiscal 2009 is down nearly 6 percent while research, development, test and evaluation is up slightly in the Bush administration's defense budget released today.

Modernization dollars declined while operations and maintenance and military construction were up. Programmatic details are expected to emerge during separate briefings later today with top budget leaders at the Pentagon.

The administration's topline request of $515.4 billion, plus a $70 billion placeholder for an emergency supplemental to continue funding the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, had been expected. It was the 11th straight year the U.S. defense budget request has increased, according to budget analyst Steven Kosiak of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.

For FY 2009 the Bush Administration is asking Congress for $104.2 billion for procurement, down 5.7 percent from Fiscal 2008's $110.6 billion. And RDT&E was up about 3 percent, $79.6 billion, from $76.5 billion in 2008. The Fiscal 2009 request seeks $17.3 billion to recapitalize aging Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps aircraft; $7.5 billion for mine-resistant vehicles for the Army and Marine Corps; and $5.7 billion for Special Operations Command.

The White House Office of Management and Budget reports that among the procurement highlights are funds to continue "investments in the aerial refueling and cargo airlift fleets," as well as $1.8 billion "to continue development and procurement of major unmanned aerial vehices to conduct a wide variety of combat and military support missions, thereby significantly reducing the risks to U.S. forces." There's also $12.7 billion to continue work on the CVN-21 aircraft carrier, Virginia-class submarines and DDG-1000 destroyers.


Rest of article at: http://www.military.com/features/0,15240,161452,00.html



uhc comment: There's PDFs of the various budgets at bottom of link.