Clinton Calls for Defense Spending Hike

President Clinton on Saturday proposed the first significant increase in defense spending in a decade and said he would ask Congress for an additional $12 billion as a down payment on a multiyear effort to ensure the nation’s military continues “as the world’s most powerful fighting force.”

Over six years, his plan would add roughly $100 billion to the nation’s military budget, which now totals $251 billion.

While such a sustained expansion would represent the biggest real jump in defense spending in a decade and the largest increase since the Cold War buildup in the mid-1980s, the incoming chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee indicated that it does not go far enough.

“The president is very clever today in getting out front on this story,” Sen. John W. Warner (R-Va.) said in an interview. “He’s on the right track; he’s just short of the dollar mark that’s needed.”

At a hearing of his committee scheduled for Tuesday, the members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff will “testify to the critical needs of the military,” Warner said.

While Clinton’s proposal for more military spending represents a marked shift in a president who has focused almost exclusively on domestic programs, he is unlikely to get much political credit for it.

Warner’s comments and those of a leading House Democrat on Saturday set the stage for what could be a fierce battle between Congress and the White House over just how much to increase defense spending.

Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.), ranking Democrat on the House National Security Committee, said that even a $12-billion increase in the fiscal 2000 budget would not be enough.

This amount would not “be sufficient to take care of the needs of the troops plus modernize our forces,” he said.

Warner noted that in their last appearance before the Armed Services Committee, the Joint Chiefs asked for minimum annual increases of $17.5 billion, a figure that did not include the cost of pay raises for military personnel or the closing of certain military bases. Warner, who last spring killed a proposal for another round of base closings because he was dissatisfied with Clinton’s defense budget, declined to say how much he believes military spending should be increased.

“I predict the Congress will top the president,” he said, “and reach a total more in line with [what] the Joint Chiefs” recommend.

Any large spending hikes would have a wide effect on California, where 1 in 6 defense dollars is spent. Pressure for a major increase in military spending has been building significantly since the Joint Chiefs’ recommendation in September. In addition to asking for annual increases of $17.5 billion to $27.5 billion, the chiefs acknowledged that post-Cold War cutbacks went too far.

Additional pressure was later applied by Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.), who endorsed annual increases of $20 billion to $25 billion.

In his weekly radio address on Saturday, Clinton said: “We want our forces to remain the best equipped in the world into the next century, and that is what this effort will assure.”

Citing recent military strikes against Iraq, Clinton said: “Our troops continue to execute complex and dangerous missions far from home with flawless precision. . . . Our challenge is to retain the ability to do this as we carry out our entire defense strategy.”

The president is scheduled to submit his proposed budget for fiscal year 2000 to Congress early next month.

Lawmakers and observers expect many political fights this year over how to spend the federal budget surplus, now estimated at $70 billion.

Under the balanced-budget agreement, Congress is able to increase military spending only if it finds offsetting domestic spending cuts or designates the spending to be for an unforeseen “emergency.”

Clinton said the increase he seeks would come through a combination of new spending and budgetary savings.

Warner declined to specify sources of funding for a larger spending increase but said “the Senate will take the leadership” in the effort, working “hopefully in a bipartisan way.”

Clinton’s proposed increase combines $4 billion in new money and $8 billion from the existing Pentagon budget made available by lower-than-expected inflation and fuel prices. His overall Defense Department request for the budget year beginning Oct. 1 would bring total military spending to $268.2 billion, a $10-billion increase over levels planned for this year, administration officials said.

It would be the first time since 1991, the year of the Persian Gulf War, that defense spending exceeded the level of inflation.

In recent months, Clinton has heard directly from military commanders who have been critical of the nation’s preparedness and have called for improved equipment, more spare parts, higher salaries and better housing to maintain current personnel and attract recruits.

In recent years, defense spending has dwindled, largely in response to the end of the Cold War. But the changes have left Clinton vulnerable to criticism that he has allowed the nation’s military to decline.

Clinton said his proposed increase supports the next generation of ships, planes and weapon systems, enabling the military to effectively meet new threats to America’s security, such as terrorism and weapon proliferation.

“It will help us to do right by our troops by upgrading and replacing aging equipment, barracks and family housing,” he said.

His budget proposal also includes a 4.4% military pay raise, the largest since 1982.

That won praise from John DeCrosta, a spokesman for Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-S.C.), the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

“We’ve been calling upon the Clinton administration to increase defense spending from Day One,” he said.

“For years, we’ve been funding things like Bosnia out of operations and maintenance accounts, and recruiting and retention have suffered. We’ve not had enough money to keep good people in the military,” DeCrosta said.

“We need to modernize and pay our men and women what they deserve to keep a good morale.”