Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel told members of both the Senate and House Budget Committees yesterday that he’s looking at early results of a review he mandated to help the Defense Department consider its plans in light of continued fiscal uncertainty and cuts.
“I have received the initial internal results of the SCMR (Strategic Choices and Management Review) and am reviewing them now,” Hagel separately told both committees. “The results will inform our planning for FY 2014 as well as our FY 2015 budget request, and will they be the foundation for the Quadrennial Defense Review due to Congress in February 2014.”
Hagel testified during Budget Committee hearings on both sides of the Hill on the president’s $526.6 billion fiscal year 2014 defense budget request.
The SCMR was ordered earlier this year in light of the 2012 Defense Department strategy pointing toward a reemphasis on the Asia Pacific after more than a decade of conflict more focused on the Middle East.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Army Gen. Martin Dempsey and Pentagon Comptroller Robert Hale joined Hagel to testify before each committee yesterday, emphasizing the DoD’s need for “time and flexibility” to make wise and informed cuts to reach budget goals.
Hagel told each committee that modest reform proposals of the past were met with “fierce political resistance” and were not implemented, one reason some very hard choices will have to be made.
Defense budget cuts are not new, but Dempsey said never have they been this deep and steep. He told senators the FY ’14 budget was “purpose-built to keep our nation immune from coercion,” and replace sequestration.
The SCMR assesses the potential impact of further reductions up to the level of a full sequester, or $500 billion reduction, over 10 years. “Everything is on the table during this review–roles and missions, planning, business practices, force structure, personnel and compensation, acquisition and modernization investments, how we operate, and how we measure and maintain readiness,” Hagel said.
The review is offering him various options under different levels of budget cuts, which will likely turn into recommendations for action that will require working with Congress.
The budget committee chairs: Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) offered a view of Republican-Democratic budget impasse in their opening statements.
“We could be well on our way to a compromise budget resolution, but it has now been 81 days since the Senate passed our budget resolution,” Murray said as the hearing began.
Since then, Senate GOP leadership and a minority of senators have held the process hostage, according to Democrats. Senate Democrats have been foiled by Republicans 12 times in requesting a move to conference to replace the sequester.
“Let’s be clear,” she said. “Their (Republican) obstructionism not only defies common sense, but it is dangerous.”
House Budget Committee Chair Ryan said the House budget provides the same defense funding the president requested last year, but the president opposes it. “The president is holding the defense budget hostage for higher taxes and more spending.”
Regarding Hagel’s SCMR to develop a new strategy for a smaller budget, Ryan said, “a cheaper strategy isn’t necessarily a better one. The Defense Business Board offered a number of ways to improve the department.”
Ryan also said differing budget figures and now the the SCMR make it seem as though the budget is driving the strategy, not the other way around.
Hagel said the department is dealing with the law and the prospects of continued sequestration.
DoD must prepare to deal with what might come to pass. Hagel said, “You can’t turn this big ship around in a month or so.”