Congress has allocated $858 billion to defense spending as part of its annual funding bill. The allotment provides for a 9% increase in defense spending, compared to a 4.3% budget increase the last two years. “This was not a ‘Christmas gift’ in the sense that defense industry pressure or an insider military-industrial complex led to the defense spending increases,” said University of Notre Dame professor and former senior Pentagon official Eugene Gholz.
From The Daily Caller:
Since President Joe Biden submitted his initial funding request in March, Congressional appropriators estimated the industry would require an additional $1 billion to meet the same procurement thresholds. The National Defense Authorization Act and follow-on funding bill decreases the size of the U.S. army but adds funding for weapons, setting aside $162.2 billion for the defense industry, or roughly $17.2 billion more than Biden’s request, Inside Defense reported. ... Spending on weapons for the Army would jump 55%, while the Navy would see a 47% boost for 2023, the NYT reported. That includes $2.2 billion beyond what the DOD requested for a Navy ship and $1.8 billion to stave off a funding shortfall for F-35 fighter jets.
