With all four defense committees having submitted their versions of the defense authorization and appropriations bills, Congress must now meet in conference to hash out their differences and put a bill on President Obama’s desk. In this series we will be covering the major battles you can expect between the committees before this fiscal year comes to a close.
Ohio-class, DDG-51 and the looming threat to the shipbuilding budget
It’s the giant, dark cloud hanging over the Pentagon: what to do about the Ohio-class submarine replacement program that is sure to suck the life out of the shipbuilding budget. With construction set to begin in a matter of a few years, Congress is starting to show some signs of making some movements on the issue, but lawmakers in the House and Senate appear to have very different ideas on what to do about the situation.
Authorizers in particular disagreed on the correct approach, with House authorizers approving the controversial proposal to move all $971.4 million of the money set aside for research and development into a National Sea-Based Deterrence Fund, in the hopes that this fund will not cannibalize the already stretched shipbuilding budget. But critics argue that this is nothing more than an accounting trick, and that the Pentagon or Congress may opt to grab money from this fund for other purposes anyway at a future date. And so the Senate authorizers proposed a different idea: move up the production of a DDG-51 destroyer, so that even though the shipbuilding budget will swell greatly in the coming years, at least it can be evened out a bit so the increase isn’t so jarring.
These are just the initial salvos of what will be a years-long tug of war over funding for this mammoth program.
Congress still has an appetite for JHSVs
Last year’s fiscal 2015 spending bill added $200 million for another JHSV, and Senate appropriators are pushing to do the same thing in this year’s budget — even though House appropriators are not.
However, it was the Senate appropriators last year who similarly pushed for the construction of an 11th JHSV, noting that the Navy had originally planned to buy 18 of the vessels before truncating the program to 10 ships, and pointing out that the JHSVs are extremely useful in the Asia-Pacific region conducting intra-theater sealift and supporting disaster relief activities, to name a few uses.
Likewise, in last year’s budget, House appropriators made no adjustments to the JHSV program in its mark, but eventually caved to the Senate’s desires and approved the additional funding. Of course, the Pentagon’s budget situation is certainly getting worse and not better, but it does indicate that only last year the Senate got its way, and it could happen again.
Accelerate LHA-8?
Both Senate authorizers and appropriators are eager to field LHA-8 as soon as possible. Neither committee on the House side touched the president’s budget request of $277.5 million for advance procurement to buy a ship in fiscal 2017, but on the Senate side, lawmakers want to add another $199 million to help “expedite delivery of this ship enabling the Navy to reach the force structure assessment objective of 11 large deck amphibious ships as early as fiscal year 2023,” Senate authorizers’ report language reads.
Lawmakers are certainly very concerned with the Marine Corps’ amphibious ship shortfall, which affects its ability to maintain the kind of presence it wants. The move would potentially have the additional benefit of moving more money up in the budget to make way for the Ohio-class replacement program.