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thedrifter
10-03-06, 12:30 PM
October 09, 2006
Lawmakers slash funds for some big-ticket items

By Christian Lowe
Staff writer

It’s going to be a bit longer before leathernecks are gunning ashore at 30 mph in a high-tech new amtrac after Congress slashed millions from one of the Corps’ most prized programs for the coming year.

Congress pulled $230 million for the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle from the Corps’ fiscal 2007 procurement budget, putting in jeopardy the 15 vehicles the service had hoped to build next year. Corps officials have jokingly called the program the “Bank of EFV” because it is the annual target of budget crunchers looking to find money for urgent needs.

However, lawmakers did insert $155 million in research funding for further testing, but it is unclear how that money will be used.

The EFV cut contributed to a $370 million drop in procurement funds that the Corps said it needed to buy weapons, vehicles and other gear for day-to-day operations and training, as congressional appropriators doled out $894 million for next year.


Appropriators included $15 million for the Corps to purchase armor kits for its Jeep-like Internally Transportable Vehicle, which will tow the new Expeditionary Fire Support System 120mm mortar; $7.8 million for night-vision equipment; $21 million for radios, including $3.5 million for miniature multiband beacons; and $7.4 million for explosive ordnance disposal gear.

The budget figures are outlined in the fiscal 2007 appropriations bill, which was released Sept. 25 and has been passed by the House and Senate.

The Corps will also lose $120 million for advanced procurement of two F-35 Lightning II fighter jets, with lawmakers allocating $125 million to purchase six of the Corps’ vertical-takeoff version of the high-tech fighter. Congress appropriated $1.3 billion to fund the MV-22 Osprey program but slashed $70 million from the Corps’ replacement for the UH-1N Huey and AH-1W Super Cobra helicopters. Lawmakers also cut $126 million from the KC-130J Hercules program, slashing two aircraft the Corps had hoped to buy to replace its Vietnam-era KC-130F and R-model transports.

While appropriators cut funds in many areas in the Corps’ annual budget, they mostly answered pleas from top Marine Corps officials to replace vehicles and equipment destroyed in combat.

Marine officials asked Congress this summer for $8.6 billion outside of the fiscal 2007 budget to finish its plans to reset the service’s equipment stocks after four years of war. But Congress inserted only $5.8 billion of the Corps’ tab to buy the Humvees, radios, optics and weapons Marine officials say are needed to fill stocks depleted by combat and to boost unit equipment levels for the continuing fight.

The Corps had asked for $13.7 billion to purchase the needed gear in 2006 and 2007, arguing the service couldn’t buy all the equipment in one year. This spring, the Corps was given $5.1 billion of its request in supplemental funding.

So the new funding plan leaves the service $2.8 billion short of its $13.7 billion reset goal. Corps budget officials say they will ask for that remaining figure in future budget requests.

The latest $5.8 billion agreed to by defense appropriators for Marine reset costs is part of a $70 billion “bridge fund” to help pay for the Pentagon’s war tab in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Army received the full amount of its requested $17 billion in reset funding.

For the last several years, Congress has funded the services’ wartime operations in supplemental budgets rather than including the money in yearly budgets — which cover day-to-day training, operations, maintenance and pay at peacetime levels. Recently, lawmakers have included the so-called “bridge funding” to tide the services over until the midyear supplemental is passed. The Corps’ reset money is only part of the service’s extra “bridge fund” cash Congress doled out to help pay for wartime operations.

The funding bill notes the reset totals were reached after working “closely with the Army and Marine Corps to examine reset funding requirements and the services’ capacity to execute those funds and accomplish the reset mission as quickly as possible.”

Though lawmakers were inclined to provide the added reset funds to the services’ overall yearly budget, they didn’t want it to become a habit.

“This critical funding has been provided without a formal request from the administration,” the funding bill notes. The lawmakers “urge the Department of Defense to include funding in future budget requests to address reset requirements and ensure that readiness goals are achieved.”

In all, appropriators approved about $4.9 billion in total procurement in bridge funding for the Corps, including nearly $113 million for assault amphibian vehicle and light armored vehicle modifications; $210 million for night-vision equipment; $855 million for radios; and nearly $558 million for up-armored Humvees.

The wartime funding measure also includes $1.3 billion to pay for Marine operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, $471 million for depot-level maintenance and $87 million for pre-deployment training. The extra funds will pay for a $3.2 million boost in foreign language proficiency stipends and $88 million in other Marine Corps pays and allowances.

Lawmakers also added another $1.9 billion to develop and field systems to counter roadside bombs.

Ellie