With budget sequestration just a few weeks away, Congress and the White House don’t appear any closer to reaching a compromise. Congressional Republicans on Feb. 6 offered up the “Down Payment to Protect National Security Act of 2013,” as a means of staving off the dreaded across-the-board defense cuts slated to take effect on March 1. The down-payment plan would prevent additional cuts to the Pentagon’s budget in Fiscal 2013 beyond the $46 billion already cut over the past two years under President Obama’s “budget-driven defense strategy,” states a House Armed Services Committee fact sheet. That’s in contrast to the President’s proposal to avoid the sequester by cutting $21 billion from the Pentagon’s budget for the remainder of the fiscal year in addition to more tax hikes and some lesser non-defense spending cuts, according to the HASC’s analysis. Click here to continue to the full report.
The rate of building B-21 bombers would speed up if the fiscal 2026 defense budget passes. But it remains unclear how much capacity would be added, and whether the Air Force would simply build the bombers faster, or buy more.
