Pentagon Gets Approval for Modest Growth in Budget Plan for Fiscal 2012

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Pentagon Gets Approval for Modest Growth in Budget Plan for Fiscal 2012
By Tony Capaccio - Wed Jan 05 05:01:00 GMT 2011

U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates has won White House approval for modest growth in the base Pentagon budget in the fiscal 2012 budget, according to officials and analysts.

Gates, who plans to brief congressional leaders tomorrow, has received guidance from the White House that about $554 billion for defense, not including war spending, will be part of the budget that the administration will submit to Congress for the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1. That figure is $12 billion less than what the Pentagon planned, yet still allows for real growth over the fiscal 2011 budget, an analyst said.

If implemented, the five-year cut would represent about a 2.67 percent reduction to what is a $2.99 trillion defense plan, not including war spending, according to Office of Management and Budget long-range figures released last February.

The White House-directed cuts come as a new Congress arrives in Washington to debate defense spending in the context of federal deficit reduction.

Gates has committed to reducing overhead and inefficiencies by about $102 billion through 2016. He is seeking to forestall deep cuts in weapons and research while holding the line on overall defense spending. The Pentagon’s base budget has doubled since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.