11 janvier 2024 | International, C4ISR
Soldiers build nuke-detecting backpack
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29 mai 2020 | International, Naval
Support Swells For New Indo-Pacom Funding; Will Money Follow
The National Defense Strategy called the Indo-Pacific the DoD's priority theater. “But all of us also recognize that strategy is budget and budget is strategy, and the budget numbers have not supported, to date, the Indo Pacific's role as the primary theater.”
By PAUL MCLEARYon May 29, 2020 at 4:01 AM
WASHINGTON: Two prominent senators and a top Pentagon official have come out in support of a new fund aimed at boosting the Indo-Pacific command's logistic, training, and missile-defense missions. The Pacific initiative will have to contend with the federal government's massive COVID-19 response and an exploding federal debt, however, some of which may be countered by the increasingly acrimonious relations with China.
The idea of a funding package that would build training ranges across the Pacific and beef up missile defense systems in Guam and Hawaii was proposed in April by Indo-Pacom commander Adm. Philip Davidson, who sent a plan to Congress for $20 billion in funding between 2021 and 2026 to bulk up the US presence in the region.
The plan received some bipartisan support on Capitol Hill, and will now find its way into the debate hammering out the 2021 budget markup this summer, Sen. Jim Inhofe, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee said Thursday. In a joint op-ed with the top Democrat on the committee Sen. Jack Reed, the duo wrote that “with the stakes so high, the time for action is now. That's why this year we intend to establish a Pacific Deterrence Initiative in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2021.”
The fund will “focus resources on key military capabilities to deter China. The initiative will also reassure U.S. allies and partners, and send a strong signal to the Chinese Communist Party that the American people are committed to defending U.S. interests in the Indo-Pacific.”
In a Thursday video conference hosted by the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, Heino Klinck, deputy assistant Secretary for East Asia said he also supports the idea, while acknowledging that “it'll be a slog” to get the enhanced funding through Congress while so many other funding priorities are competing for federal dollars.
“Obviously, when the National Defense Strategy came out it very clearly stated that the priority theater is for us the Indo-Pacific,” he said. “But all of us also recognize that strategy is budget and budget is strategy, and the budget numbers have not supported, to date, the Indo Pacific's role as the primary theater.”
Part of the reason for that has been the Trump administration's inability to extricate itself from ongoing wars in the Middle East, including the fight against ISIS and ongoing tensions with Iran that led to thousands more US troops, aircraft, and aircraft carriers heading to the Middle East over the past year.
There have been some signs that the Pentagon is looking to shift focus, however.
On Thursday, the USS Mustin destroyer sailed within 12 nautical miles of Woody Island in the Paracel Island chain, where China maintains an airfield although the island is claimed by two other countries and has landed bomber aircraft in the past.
The Mustin's pass by was the third time in the past month that American ships have challenged Chinese claims to the Paracel and Spratly islands, and the third since March.
US B-1 bombers have also flown over the South China Sea recently, and earlier this month, two Navy ships sailed into the middle of a simmering dispute between China and Malaysia in the South China Sea, while being trailed by a shadowing Chinese warship.
The Littoral Combat Ship USS Montgomery and supply ship USNS Cesar Chavez sailed close to a Malaysian drillship, the West Capella, a signal to Chinese warships who spent weeks harassing the vessel in international waters illegally claimed by Beijing.
These and “other organic decisions that have come out of the [Pentagon] have demonstrated that we're putting more and more resources into the Indo-Pacific,” Klinck said.
“I think the president's intent of reducing our footprint in the Middle East and in Central Asia will also lead to additional resources being available for the Indo-Pacific,” he added, “so I think the trend lines are positive, but it will be a slog particularly now in this COVID environment as resources are even tighter.”
Davidson's original proposal called for $1.6 billion in the fiscal 2021 budget submitted earlier this year, and $18.4 billion between 2022 and 2026.
The biggest funding recommendation is $5.2 billion over the five-year projection for investments in 360-degree air and missile defense systems, long-range precision fires, and ground- and space-based radars. Davidson also identified as “my number one unfunded priority,” the Homeland Defense System-Guam.
It's not clear what the overall contours of the Inhofe-Reed plan might be, but they suggest it will have “the aim of injecting uncertainty and risk into Beijing's calculus, leaving just one conclusion: ‘Not today. You, militarily, cannot win it, so don't even try it.'”
House Armed Services Committee leaders have also expressed bipartisan support for the idea, with chairman Adam Smith publicly backing the idea, though he hasn't disclosed any detailed plans. Ranking member Mac Thornberry has suggested finding $6 billion in the 2021 budget on things like air and missile defense systems and new military construction in partner countries.
That kind of new spending would likely face an uphill battle finding approval across parties and committees with their own priorities, and with flat budget projections going forward, money will be tighter than in previous years.
https://breakingdefense.com/2020/05/support-swells-for-new-indo-pacom-funding-will-money-follow
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20 juin 2019 | International, Autre défense
House passes $983 billion spending package 226-203, bucking White House
By: Joe Gould WASHINGTON ― The Democratic-controlled House passed a $985 billion appropriations package for fiscal 2020 that aims to fund national security at $17 billion less than the White House requested, end the post-2001 war authorizations after eight months, pull military support in Yemen and defund the W76-2 nuclear warhead. The vote was 225-203, with seven Democrats voting with the Republican minority. Zero Republicans voted for the bill. It's a salvo from Democrats in FY20 budget negotiations with the GOP-controlled Senate and White House, and the White House has threatened that President Donald Trump would veto the massive bill. Beyond the above provisions and others, the administration strongly objected to language meant to block Pentagon funds being applied to a wall on the southern border. The threat foreshadows pushback from the Senate and the White House, in part because both advocated for a $750 billion national defense budget, while the House-passed bill is consistent with a $733 billion national defense budget. (The House bill would fund the Pentagon alone at $8 billion less than the White House request.) The four-bill “minibus” contained the two largest of the 12 annual appropriations bills; the Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies bill and the Defense bill. For the defense, it totaled $645.1 billion in base-defense funding, and $68.1 billion in the budget-cap-exempt wartime funding account. House Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Nita Lowey, D-N.Y., emphasized the package's investments outside the Pentagon, including a 4 percent increase in State Department funding. “This bill rejects the administration's unacceptable budget request and irresponsible policies and, rather, strives to uphold many bipartisan congressional priorities,” Lowey said when the bill was introduced. “America's foreign policy is strongest when diplomacy, development and defense are well-funded and equally prioritized, as many of today's global challenges cannot be addressed by military intervention alone.” Republicans have opposed the minibus as an empty exercise because Congress lacks a bipartisan deal to ease spending caps and avoid across-the-board sequestration cuts. Nor does the bill contain border wall funding sought by conservative Republicans. “Moving these bills as-is is a wasted opportunity because the bills are far from what the president has requested and will support,” said the House Appropriations Committee's ranking member, Rep. Kay Granger, R-Texas. “Defense spending does not meet the request while nondefense spending greatly exceeds the request in current levels. This could lead to a veto and another government shutdown, something both [parties] agree would be devastating ― in addition to these funding concerns.” The White House issued a veto threat last week that spelled out its objections to provisions in the bill that would end the post-2001 war authorizations after eight months and pull military support in Yemen―and because the House parked less defense spending in the budget-cap skirting war fund. The language surrounding the authorization for the use of military force, Granger said, could jeopardize the Pentagon's ability to conduct military operations worldwide. “It's a bad policy that will force the DoD to unwind counterterrorism operations overseas if the Congress and the president cannot agree on a new authorization,” she said. To avoid another government shutdown, 12 appropriations bills must pass Congress and get the president's signature by Oct. 1. Negotiations between the White House and lead lawmakers on a deal to ease budget caps has been ongoing, according to a statement last week by Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala.. (The Senate Appropriations Committee hasn't yet moved any of its bills.) Another likely sticking point in budget talks with the GOP-controlled Senate and the White House is the minibus' bill's prohibition on the Defense Department spending funds to implement its policy on open transgender service. The vote to approve an amendment that contained the prohibition broke mostly along party lines, 234-183. The amendment targets a March 12 memo that would largely bar transgender troops and military recruits from transitioning to another gender, and require most individuals to serve in their birth sex. The House defeated Republican amendments that would have added back $19.6 million for the W76-2 low-yield submarine-launched nuclear warhead and would have added back $96 million for “conventional missile systems” in the range of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. However, it also defeated a Democratic amendment that would have barred funding for research on the Long Range Standoff weapon. The bill was passed out of committee with language to restrict the Pentagon's authority to transfer money between accounts to $1.5 billion ― a response from Democrats to the administration's use of defense funds for Trump's proposed border wall. Next week, the House is expected to take up a separate minibus that contains the Department of Homeland Security spending bill, which was at the heart of last year's 35-day government shutdown. https://www.defensenews.com/congress/2019/06/19/house-passes-983-billion-spending-package-226-203-bucking-white-house/
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13 septembre 2022 | International, C4ISR
US Army customizing communication gear for regional challenges
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