$ I
n the current daunting budget environment of uncertain and le- gally mandated spending reductions, Robert F. Hale, Under Secretary of
Defense (Comptroller), outlined some of DoD’s plans—including necessary cuts, how fiscal constraints will affect acqui- sition, and the importance of auditing financial statements—Nov. 1, 2011 at the PEO/SYSCOM Commanders’ Confer- ence, hosted by the Defense Acquisition University at Fort Belvoir, VA.
“We’re living in a Nation that’s in eco- nomic crisis, and Secretary [Leon E.] Panetta has said we need to do our part to reduce what is a huge federal defi- cit. At the same time, we’ve got to meet national security needs in an environment where there are substantial threats to our national security,” Hale said.
BUDGET CUT CONCERNS Holding down the deficit and cutting the budget involve several areas of DoD. Congress’ passage of the Budget Control Act of 2011 in August 2011, raising the debt ceiling, sets specific caps on national security funding.
Hale explained that the law did not
“actually control defense, but it will be interpreted to, and will end up resulting in more than $450 billion out of the defense budget over the next 10 years and about $250 billion over the five-year planning period from FY13 to FY17.” Those cuts are roughly 8 percent more than the FY12 budget plan calls for, Hale noted.
“You may say, well, for a Nation in eco- nomic crisis, 8 percent doesn’t sound like that much,” he said. “And it would be a lot easier to do if we didn’t also face substan- tial threats to national security that, in our view at least, make it difficult to make deep cuts in force structure, modernization, and other aspects of what we are doing.”
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To make the necessary cuts, DoD is focus- ing on additional efficiencies in areas including support activities and military compensation, Hale said.
In addition, DoD will have to look for ways to cut force structure and slow modernization, Hale said. “We will try to do that with a strategy—not through mindless across-the-board cuts, [but] a strategy that looks at whether we can slow [modernization] or accept some risk,” he explained. This will call for decisions on areas to emphasize, he said.
Hale said DoD’s budgetary outlook is complicated by Congress’ creation of the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduc- tion, a 12-member group tasked to find $1.5 trillion in deficit reduction over the next 10 years.
PROTECTING NATIONAL SECURITY
Hale cautioned against “mindless” automatic DoD budget cuts that could put national security at risk by preventing DoD from having a well-trained, well-equipped force that is ready to win on the battlefield. Here, SPC Seth A. Ankrom, PFC Matthew J. Barrie, and PFC Sebastian E. Ampiah, personal security detail Soldiers assigned to the 37th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, demonstrate clearing rooms for their instructor before entering the Shoot House during training at Camp Shelby Joint Forces Training Center, MS, in November 2011. (Photo by SGT Kimberly Lamb.)
The committee failed to identify cuts and called it quits Nov. 21, triggering a process whereby DoD will get automatic budget cuts, or sequesters. Sequestration “would take that $450 billion in budget cuts I talked about earlier and roughly double it. We’d be looking at a trillion dollars in reductions, compared to our current plan over the next 10 years. And in FY13 at least, they have to be applied in a manner I think best described as mindless,” Hale said.
EFFECTS ON ACQUISITION The budget cuts, no matter what the final number, will force DoD to review all of its acquisition programs and either slow or terminate some of those programs.
“We’ll do this recognizing that we’ve got to modernize this force if we’re going to maintain readiness, especially ‘big R’
EFFICIENCIES
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