Congress and the Pentagon must
substantially slow skyrocketing military personnel and infrastructure costs or
the Defense Department’s procurement accounts will suffer deep cuts, say more
than two dozen analysts.
Unless US lawmakers and Pentagon
officials find a political solution that allows them to shutter bases at home
and abroad while also cutting compensation programs, “it will be a lopsided
drawdown,” said Gordon Adams, a former White House defense budget official.
The ongoing downturn in US defense
spending would be “lopsided,” Adams said at an event on Capitol Hill, because
without infrastructure and personnel reforms defense officials and lawmakers
would have no choice when making required budget cuts than to raid acquisition
coffers.
In fact, unless such reforms are
enacted soon, the Stimson Center’s Adams predicts “funds for forces and
procurement [will] dry up.”
To read the full story, click here.