The Air Force’s more than 50-year-old ICBM command and control (C2) structure will be funded, even the military receives funding at the Budget Control Act level, a top Air Force nuclear official said Wednesday.
“The good news is significant investment in the president’s budget to get at this, and even at the BCA level, we’re going to make significant investment in it,” Maj. Gen. Garrett Harencak, Air Force assistant chief of staff for strategic deterrence and nuclear integration, said at a Peter Huessy breakfast event on Capitol Hill. “I’m excited about it, because it’s overdue. It’s not as sexy, it’s not as cool as bombers and missiles and all that stuff, but of course, it’s vitally, vitally important, and we’ve just got to get more agile faster, but the main thing is we’ve just got to make the investment. The decision has been made to make those investments.”
The House Armed Services Committee’s version of the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2016 matches President Barack Obama’s request of $287 million for nuclear command and control.
Maj. Gen. James Martin, Air Force assistant secretary for budget, warned in February that BCA level funding could jeopardize nuclear C2 modernization. The Senate last week passed a framework that established a Pentagon topline of $523 billion in base defense spending, plus about $90 billion for Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO).
Obama requested $561 billion for base defense spending and $51 billion for OCO. Defense Secretary Ash Carter this week said Obama could veto the budget, expressing opposition to the OCO boost. After peaking in FY 2016, Air Force budgeting for nuclear C2 is expected to trend downward, as the Future Years’ Defense Program (FYDP) shows the amount tumbling to $80.1 million in FY 2017, $37.8 million in FY 2018, $14.8 million in FY 2019, and $14.9 million in FY 2020.