By Emelie Rutherford
Whether Defense Secretary Robert Gates’ latest calls for defense-spending austerity will sway congressional support for pet Pentagon programs remains to be seen, with some lawmakers standing firmly behind contested weapon systems.
Gates delivered a wide-reaching address on Pentagon spending reform at the Eisenhower Library in Abilene, Kan., last Saturday, when lawmakers already were critiquing his speech questioning naval programs at a Navy conference in National Harbor, Md., early last week.
Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.) said yesterday he remains a strong supporter of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter’s second and alternate engine. Gates reiterated on Saturday his opposition to the General Electric [GE]-Rolls-Royce F136 engine effort, arguing it would achieve “marginal potential savings but heavy upfront costs.”
Over Pentagon objections, lawmakers in recent years have funded the alternate engine, a backup to the primary F135 engine built by Pratt & Whitney [UXT].
Levin said he told Gates last week he remains behind the alternate engine, and noted a high percentage of its development already has been funded.
“This is…sunk capital, this is money already invested,” Levin told reporters at the Capitol. “And I believe in competition.”
Levin declined to predict if the SASC will include the second engine in the fiscal year 2011 defense authorization bill the panel will mark up in two weeks. SASC Ranking Member John McCain (R-Ariz.) opposes the engine and supports Gates’ call for President Barack Obama to veto legislation supporting the F136.
Levin suggested the engine effort’s authorization could hinge on House support. The Senate did not approve the alternate engine last year in the FY ’10 defense authorization bill, but the House did; House lawmakers then prevailed in keeping the engine in final legislation crafted by a House-Senate conference committee.
“The key issue (this year is) likely to be in the House, which last year had it,” Levin said. “We did not have it when we came out of the Senate, and it ended up as a conference-able item.”
The House Armed Services Committee will mark up its FY ’11 bill next week, after its subcommittees do so this week.
Levin said Gates’ Saturday speech does not make him fear Obama would actually veto the defense authorization bill over the second engine. The senator noted a recent Pentagon analysis– from the Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation (CAPE) office–stated continuing development of the alternate engine would cost roughly the same as pursing one engine. (The CAIG, though, advised against continuing the second engine, noting it would not save money.)
That assessment “shows it’s break even,” Levin said. “Break even. Do I think the president will veto a bill that has an item in there which is 50-50 arguable on the merits? I mean I just don’t see it.”
Levin predicted Gates won’t receive “an automatic approval of everything” from Congress. Last year, Gates successfully shot down congressional attempts to continue an array of weapons systems including Lockheed Martin‘s [LMT] F-22 fighter jet.
“He probably got 80 percent of what he wanted last year,” Levin said. “I don’t know what his batting average will be this year, but I’m sure it’ll be pretty good because he’s very persuasive and he’s a very serious secretary.”
Lawmakers and aides appear to be less optimistic that Boeing‘s [BA] C-17 once again will be funded over Pentagon objections in FY’11. Gates also singled out the C-17 in his Saturday speech.
Sen. Jim Webb (D-Va.) was among the Navy-minded lawmakers who have criticized Gates’ May 3 speech from the Navy League conference. The defense secretary questioned the need for 11 carrier strike groups, noting no other nations come close to that capability, and for the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle General Dynamics [GD] is developing for the Marine Corps.
“I had some real concerns with Secretary Gates’ comments,” Webb told Navy officials May 6 during a Senate Armed Services Seapower hearing.
“When someone says that there is a massive over-match between our Navy and other navies around the world, I think that’s a misstatement of why we have navies, or how different countries field military forces,” said Webb, a former Navy secretary. “You don’t field a navy to fight another navy. You field military forces to protect your essential national interests.”
Webb argued “it would be a very serious mistake to cut back the defense budget or to alter the defense budget in order to fund ground forces that are in Iraq and Afghanistan, hopefully temporarily,…and at the same time, do that at the expense of these vital shipbuilding programs that take years and years to put into place, and are the envy of every other country.”
SASC Seapower Ranking Member Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) dubbed Gates’ comments “confusing.”
“Right now, we spend $15.8 billion on ship construction,” Wicker said. “According to the Navy’s 30-year shipbuilding plan, we need to spend $17.9 billion per year to sustain current submarine and service ship construction levels. So what does this mean for the future of the Navy if the secretary of defense does not think additional funds will be available to meet the Navy’s own plans?”
SASC Seapower Chairman Jack Reed (D-R.I.), meanwhile, said the subcommittee will accept Gates’ challenge from the Navy League speech to “be willing to re-examine and question basic assumptions in light of evolving technologies, new threats and budget realities.”
“The world and technology are changing rapidly, and the Navy must adapt to those challenges,” said Reed, who this session took over chairmanship of the subcommittee previous chaired by the late Massachusetts senator Ted Kennedy.