Without stable, predictable funding the United States military risks losing its ability to project power overseas and meet commitments to allies in other parts of the world, both of which are potent deterrents to catastrophic war, according to Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Joseph Dunford.
“As a result of unstable budgets and operational tempo, while we have been focused on violent extremism, while we have delayed modernization programs from the nuclear enterprise to our shipbuilding program, our potential adversaries haven’t had to suffer through that same experience,” Dunford said June 19 during an appearance at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.
“What they have been on is a very consistent pattern of capability development designed specifically, again, to limit our ability to project power and as Americans we should be concerned about that because our ability to project power is a critical element of conventional deterrence,” Dunford added.
The nation’s most senior military officer sent the same message to Congress during nearly 20 collective hours of testimony on Capitol Hill last week. That is, lawmakers’ inability to pass annual appropriations bills could cost the military its multifaceted advantage over potential adversaries like Russia, China, Iran and North Korea.
“At the turn of the century, 2000, we had a decisive competitive advantage in our ability to project power when and where necessary to advance our interests and meet our alliance commitments,” Dunford said. “We could do that.”
The U.S. has two sources of strategic power, Dunford said. The first is the network of allies and partner nations built up since World War II. The second is the nation’s ability to project power from the U.S., he said.
U.S. competitors have studied the military’s capabilities closely since Desert Storm, particularly the development of precision munitions. China, Russia and Iran have developed technologies specifically aimed at blocking U.S. power projection and countering its technological advantages, Dunford said. Those capabilities are collectively know as anti-access, area-denial, or A2/AD.
“What that simply means is develop a wide range of capabilities that keep the United States from moving into Europe, in the case of Russia, moving into the Pacific and meeting our alliance commitments and then operating freely within Europe or the Pacific,” he said.
Specific “areas of concern” are anti-ship cruise missiles, anti-ship ballistic missiles, electronic warfare capability, anti-space capability and offensive maritime and undersea capabilities, he said. The U.S. military must invest in technologies that keep its abilities in those areas superior to those devised by competitors, Dunford said. Continuing resolutions limit new investments because they allow no funding growth even to account for inflation.
“As a result of continuing resolutions every year, as a result of the Budget Control Act, we haven’t been able to properly prioritize and allocate the resources the American people give to us for the nation’s defense,” Dunford said. “If we don’t lift the budget caps, if we don’t repeal the Budget Control Act and we don’t get back to regular order – that is passing a budget every year – we will not get out of the trough we have found ourselves in as a result of seven or eight or nine years. It’s going to take us some time to get out of that trough.”