Conferees OK $16 Billion in Defense Cuts

House and Senate negotiators reached agreement Friday on a defense budget of about $296 billion, a $16-billion reduction from President Reagan’s request and the third consecutive year of real cuts in defense spending.

Several cherished Administration programs--including the “Star Wars” initiative, the MX missile and the B-1B bomber--were substantially cut, while Congress added funds for conventional warfare items, such as tanks and helicopters.

Military spending is on a downward slope after five years of steep increases. The Pentagon will now be forced to make tough choices on how to ration limited funds after getting nearly everything it wanted in a seven-year Reagan defense spending program totaling nearly $2 trillion.

Aspin Predicts ‘Bust’

“The decline is a direct result of excessive increases early in the Administration,” said House Armed Services Committee Chairman Les Aspin (D-Wis.). “The Administration sowed a boom, and now it will reap a bust.”

The defense spending bill for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1 is now complete, except for several controversial provisions on arms control that led Reagan to threaten to veto the entire measure. Under a compromise reached earlier this week, however, Congress will defer until next year decisions on testing of the Administration’s “Star Wars” missile defense system and U.S. compliance with the unratified 1979 strategic arms limitation treaty.

The arms control compromise was designed to defuse a simmering feud between Congress and the White House that threatened to erupt during the December visit to Washington of Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev.

The Administration agreed to limit “Star Wars” testing and observe SALT II limits because it “didn’t want fights with Congress on these issues when the Soviets are in town to negotiate” treaties on intermediate- and long-range nuclear missiles, Aspin said.

The Administration also agreed to continue its ban on testing of U.S. anti-satellite weapons, while congressional negotiators dropped a demand for a virtual ban on underground nuclear testing.

The arms control compromise will be announced early next week, congressional sources said.

However, Reagan will find many other reasons to dislike the spending plan approved by the House-Senate conference committee. His $5.7-billion spending request for the “Star Wars” program--formally known as the Strategic Defense Initiative--was cut to $3.9 billion. His proposal for 21 new mobile MX intercontinental missiles was trimmed almost in half. And the authorized spending for the troubled B-1B bomber program was cut by 44%, from a requested $680 million to $380 million.

‘The Party’s Over’

“I think the party’s over, period,” said Joshua M. Epstein, a military budget analyst at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank.

A Pentagon spokesman said the agency will have no comment until it studies the budget document.

The final military budget figure depends on the negotiations now under way between Congress and the White House on a deficit-reduction package, which may include tax increases.

The conference committee came up with two different spending levels. One proposes to authorize about $296 billion in Pentagon spending while the other proposes $289 billion. Aspin said the ultimate number would probably be between $290 billion and $293 billion.

If the negotiators fail to reach agreement, however, military spending could be substantially lower. Under the terms of the Gramm-Rudman deficit reduction law--which will make reductions automatically if no agreement is reached by next Friday--even more cuts would be made in 1988 defense spending.

Military Pay Hike

The bill approved by the House-Senate conference committee calls for a 3% pay increase for uniformed personnel and an increase of about 20,000 troops.

However, Frank C. Carlucci, President Reagan’s choice to replace outgoing Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger, said during confirmation hearings Thursday that he would prefer to see smaller numbers of military personnel rather than shortchange training, housing and equipment funds.

Other provisions of the bill include:

--Continued funding for two new nuclear-powered aircraft carriers.

--Increases in the Administration’s requests for Apache and Blackhawk helicopters and Abrams tanks.

--A 25% cut in funding for the Army’s new LHX helicopter.

--Elimination of three requested Aegis-type destroyers for the Navy and the addition of two Aegis-type cruisers, bringing the total authorized to four.

--A resolution prohibiting the use of American combat forces in Nicaragua.

“I think this bill is a harbinger of things to come,” Aspin said. “We’re going to have to look at closing down some production lines completely and other really unpleasant alternatives.”

Conventional Forces

He said the budget conferees agreed to give priority to conventional forces, particularly battlefield equipment the Army has been denied while the other services spent lavishly on ships, bombers and missile systems.

Thus the committee increased the Administration’s request for 128 Apache and Blackhawk helicopters to 152 and authorized the building of 720 Abrams M-1 tanks, instead of the Administration’s requested 600.