The Pentagon could be placing itself at further risk by refusing to plan for the draconian spending cuts mandated by the 2011 Budget Control Act’s sequestration clause, said Todd Harrison, a senior fellow for defense budget studies at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. Harrison outlined four options for tackling the issue during a budget briefing with reporters in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, just days before the release of the Pentagon’s Fiscal 2013 spending proposal. The first is to simply let sequestration happen—DOD’s current path. The second option specifically targets cuts through a budget amendment that Congress would have to approve before the January 2013 deadline for sequestration taking effect. The third option—a short-term approach—is to utilize war funding to soften the blow. Finally, Harrison proposed backloading the spending cuts by reducing the budget 2.2 percent each year over the next 10 years. Continue
Members of the House Armed Services Committee say the AIM-260 Joint Advanced Tactical Missile program has been set back three months due to the ongoing government shutdown. The comment is noteworthy because the JATM's status has been kept tightly under wraps.
