Defense Budget Alert

U.S. Special Operations Command has sent Congress a nearly $200 million list of unfunded priorities, highlighting the need to counter unmanned aerial systems, according to documents obtained by Inside Defense.

Acting Defense Secretary Pat Shanahan said today the Pentagon fully understands the "downsides" to overturning decades of precedent to reprogram $1 billion in Army personnel funding to construct 57 miles of fencing on the southern border without the approval of Congress, especially since lawmakers have warned that could lead them to eliminating the Pentagon's funding flexibility altogether.

Despite a $600 million cut to the European Deterrence Initiative, the head of U.S. European Command is not seeking specific funding increases to the fiscal year 2020 budget.

The Air Force has sent Congress a $2.7 billion unfunded priorities list for fiscal year 2020, the bulk of which would be used to procure additional KC-46 tankers and F-35 Joint Strike Fighters, according to a document obtained by Inside Defense.

The Army has sent Congress a $2.3 billion list of unfunded priorities, including more than $1 billion for readiness requirements, $403 million in weapon system "lethality" upgrades, $247 million for modernization and $564.5 million for infrastructure requirements, according to documents obtained by Inside Defense.

The Pentagon has submitted to Congress a list of military construction projects from around the globe that could be delayed to finance the construction of a wall on the southern border.

The Army has lifted the veil on its plans for a Strategic Long Range Cannon, outlining a $228 million, three-year funding project that aims to mature technologies for both weapons and munitions in order to one day dramatically increase the reach of its artillery forces and advance a key leadership priority to bolster the punch of the service's long-range precision fires inventory.

The Army is seeking to slow-roll procurement of the Armored Multi-Purpose Vehicle, its personnel carrier replacement, to save money for other modernization projects, cutting the number of vehicles it was projected to buy in fiscal year 2021.

The Navy's new force-structure assessment, slated for release later this year, will "validate" the service's decision to retire a Nimitz-class nuclear-powered aircraft carrier early, according to the Navy's deputy assistant secretary for budget.