Gates to report on cost-shuffling 

moves

By CQ Staff

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates will travel to Capitol Hill on Thursday to reveal privately to lawmakers the results of an effort to reallocate resources within the Pentagon to boost force readiness in wartime.


Gates announced in June 2010 that he wanted to cut about $101.9 billion between fiscal 2012 and fiscal 2016 through a series of organizational efficiencies, support activities and overhead reductions. Gates is also expected to announce some weapon program terminations.

But instead of putting the money toward reducing the deficit, it would be redirected to more urgent needs. All of these proposals will be incorporated into the Pentagon’s budget submission, which should be released to Congress in early February.

One program that is expected to be terminated is the Marine Corps’ Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle, a landing craft that government auditors have called unreliable and not adequately designed for current threats.

Likely targets for reductions or production delays include the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program, which has suffered enormous cost growth, among others.

Gates’ effort is seen as a way to head off attempts by the White House and some in Congress to cut defense spending in a time of extreme budget pressure.

Appropriations bills for fiscal 2011 in both the House and Senate last year, which were not passed into law, would have allocated more than $8 billion less than was requested for the Pentagon.

But with Republicans, who now control the House, promising to exclude defense from spending cuts, Gates gains new, powerful allies in shielding the Defense Department from large, unplanned reductions. House Armed Services ChairmanHoward P. “Buck” McKeon, R-Calif., has made it clear that he does not want Gates’ cuts to affect the overall Pentagon budget.

“Mr. McKeon doesn’t want to see any savings generated with the military services harvested for other spending outside of the Department of Defense,” said John Holly, a spokesman for McKeon. “Due to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and the need to develop a force structure capable of meeting future threats, he wants any savings to be reinvested into higher national security priorities.”

Gates will meet with the chairmen and ranking members of the Armed Services and Defense Appropriations panels. One senior congressional aide noted that because of the timing of the announcement, some of the details Gates will share could be incorporated into a spending bill that would fund the Defense Department for the final seven months of fiscal 2011. The current continuing resolution (PL 111-322) funds government operations, including the Defense Department, through March 4.

In fiscal 2012, the military services — the Army, the Air Force and the Navy, which includes the Marine Corps — must find $2 billion in efficiencies, while Defense agencies would be required to come up with another $1 billion.

The savings for reallocation would increase annually, peaking in fiscal 2016 with the services coming up with $10 billion and the agencies $7 billion.

Nonetheless, the entire savings of $101.9 billion over five years is a fraction of the roughly $2.5 trillion in base defense spending expected over that time.

Gates has directed that the military departments may keep the savings and apply them to critical areas such as personnel in units, force structure, readiness to fight and investment in future capabilities.

In August 2010, Gates announced plans to eliminate the Joint Forces Command, which is responsible for setting training requirements and doctrine for multiservice operations.

The command, which is located in Norfolk, Va., employs about 5,800 people, but some of the jobs would be moved elsewhere in the military. He is expected to again make the case for termination of the F-35 alternative engine program, the General Electric-Rolls Royce-built F136 engine.

Just as Virginia lawmakers have offered stiff resistance to the closing of the Joint Forces Command and others have fought the termination of the F136 engine, lawmakers with parochial interests likely will resist efforts by Gates to achieve some of the efficiencies he will outline Thursday.

But Gates has argued forcefully in the past year that the war fighters must be the Pentagon’s top priority.

Frank Oliveri writes for CQ.