House Republicans released a budget plan for fiscal year 2015 and beyond that keeps defense spending with partial sequester in ’15 but eliminates it completely in FY ’16 and beyond–at the expense of domestic spending, which would see its sequestration cuts more than doubled.
The Republicans’ budget blueprint document, released Tuesday, notes that “the first job of the federal government is to protect the country from threats at home and abroad,” and therefore restores “defense budgets to the levels dictated by the national-security interests of the nation.”
Defense spending in FY ’15 will remain at $521.3 billion, the amount agreed to in the Bipartisan Budget Agreement signed into law last December. But unlike the longer-term outlook in the BBA, this budget plan “brings defense spending back to ‘pre-sequester’ levels so that we will not need to, for example, reduce the Army to the smallest it’s been since before World War II or to reduce the number of carrier strike groups” in the out-years, according to the budget blueprint.
After receiving $521 billion next year, DoD would jump to $566 billion in FY ’16 and continue seeing more and more money each year until reaching $696 billion in FY ’24. The department would get $54 billion more in most years than it would under the BBA, and it would see $483 billion more from FY ’15-’24 than it would under the BBA.
Funding for the Overseas Contingency Operations account would remain untouched compared to current law, with $53 billion allotted next year and tapering down to just $2 billion by FY ’24.
The budget document notes that personnel costs account for more than a third of DoD’s costs and that an upcoming Military Compensation and Retirement Modernization Commission report, due out early next year, would recommend actions to curb those costs.
“In future years, serious consideration must be given to the Commission’s recommendations if this defense program is going to be realized within existing budgets,” the document reads. “Nonetheless, this budget does not assume any savings from accounts providing for the compensation (including health care) of military personnel. The budget fully reflects the amendments made to the Bipartisan Budget Act to exempt all service members who first joined the military before January 1, 2014 from the temporary reduction in cost-of-living adjustments for working-age retirees.
The budget plan includes additional funding that could be used to keep force structure from facing the steep declines the Army and Marine Corps currently have planned, because, “while the ground component should not continue to be sized for prolonged counterinsurgency operations, the level of reductions contemplated by the President’s request entails significant risk in an environment that, as has been noted, is extremely challenging and uncertain.”
It also recommends that the additional funding help keep 11 aircraft carriers in the Navy’s fleet, whereas the Navy has said it would have to inactivate one of the ships if sequestration cuts kick back in in FY ’16. “The flexibility and capabilities provided by carrier strike groups are integral to the rebalance of our security posture toward Asia and to our security commitments in the Persian Gulf,” according to the document.
And the document notes the serious acquisition challenges the services face throughout the rest of the decade. “A decade of war and years of delayed and failed acquisition programs have resulted in an impending need to simultaneously procure replacements for a range of weapons systems in each of the services,” the document reads. “For example, the services have programs in place to begin replacing during this budget window: (1) the air-superiority and strike-aircraft fleets of the Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps; (2) a substantial share of the Navy’s surface combatants; and (3) the bomber and submarine legs of the nation’s nuclear-deterrent force. These programs represent only some of the more prominent defense capabilities that will make claims on the defense-acquisition budget within the budget window.”
The document references the ongoing efforts by both the Pentagon and the House Armed Services Committee to tackle meaningful acquisition reform, and adds that the additional funding will only help DoD if the acquisition programs can be completed in a cost-efficient, responsible manner.
House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon (R-Calif.) said Tuesday afternoon that “I’m thankful to Chairman Ryan for recognizing our critical military shortfalls and his hard work to fix them. The Budget Committee’s work moves us in the right direction, and, for that, I am grateful for their efforts. Given our readiness shortfalls and the current threats it is an essential step, but it must be carried all the way through our appropriations process with the Senate and signed into law by the President. Otherwise, as we learned with the budget last year, it is just a number on paper.”
Despite the much-needed relief for defense spending, the fact that the budget plan more than doubles the sequester cuts to non-defense discretionary spending makes it a non-starter for House Democrats.
Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), ranking member of the House Budget Committee, said Tuesday afternoon that “this is the worst budget for America we’ve seen.”
“The president has put forward a proposal for how to address this issue. He’s got his [Opportunity, Growth and Security Initiative] fund–$58 billion, half for defense, half for non-defense,” Van Hollen said. “So that’s the proposal we put forward, and that’s based on the Murray-Ryan [BBA] approach, where you have an agreement that restored equal amounts to defense and non-defense. I mean, this moves in the exact opposite direction.”
Van Hollen noted that for every dollar that was restored to defense spending, more than a dollar was taken out of non-defense to go towards reducing the national debt. He made clear the Democratic leadership would not support anything that favors defense spending over domestic spending, instead wanting to see any funding cuts or boosts be equal between the two categories.