Record-Breaking Pentagon Budget Plan Boosts High-Tech Weaponry

Feb. 6, 2006 — -- The Pentagon has unveiled a record budget request of $439.3 billion for the coming year, a 7 percent increase over last year's budget and the fifth year in a row the defense budget has increased. The increase will help fund new fighter jets, destroyers, hundreds of unmanned aircraft, as well as 14,000 additional Special Forces personnel seen as vital in fighting the war on terror. This year's budget seeks $84.2 billion for weapons programs, about an $8 billion increase.

Despite the big price tag, the budget request does not include funding for the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which the White House usually seeks from Congress in separate budget requests. Recently, the White House said it anticipates it will need an additional $120 billion to fund the war on terror for this calendar year -- $70 billion of that amount will be requested in two weeks time. Since Sept. 11, 2001, the Pentagon calculates it has spent $251 billion on the war on terror.

Unveiling the budget, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld steered reporters away from the "temptation in Washington to view everything in terms of winners and losers."

That said, it's clear some big-ticket weapons programs were winners in this year's budget process as they emerged unscathed from anticipated cuts in weapons programs that did not materialize.

The military's Special Operations Forces are definitely winners in this year's budget as their numbers will increase by 14,000 personnel, a 33 percent increase over current levels. Pentagon planners believe the Special Forces are vital to fighting future conflicts against terrorists and insurgencies.

This year's defense budget is a mix of programs for conventional war fighting as well as the Pentagon's focus on new "irregular conflicts" like the insurgency in Iraq. For example, there's a request for $3.3 billion to fund the Joint IED Task Force whose sole mission is to combat the roadside bomb, the biggest killer of U.S. troops in Iraq. Pentagon officials said today they'd already spent $2 billion in the fight against IEDs and expect additional requests for funding.