2024-02-22 07:16:59
The US Department of Defense will reduce rearmament spending by approximately $10 billion in fiscal year 2025 in order to comply with agreements reached in 2023 to raise the United States debt ceiling.
As Day.Az reports with reference to TASS, the Politico newspaper reported this with reference to sources.
As the publication explains, US President Joe Biden in June 2023 signed a bill previously approved by Congress to increase the national debt ceiling, which also provides for a 1% reduction in spending by federal departments. The Pentagon is expected to submit a funding request in March for the agency’s 2025 fiscal year (beginning Oct. 1) of just under $850 billion.
The publication emphasizes that this figure reflects a reduction in defense spending by approximately $10 billion (about 1%) compared to the forecast for the next fiscal year contained in the budget request submitted in March 2023. As follows from documents on the Pentagon website, at that time the department expected its budget for the 2025 fiscal year to be about $859.7 billion.
Politico emphasizes that the department is not ready to cut spending on employee benefits. Thus, the budget reduction will be carried out by reducing the costs of rearmament of the American armed forces.
Thus, the Pentagon intends to reduce the cost of purchasing F-35 fighter jets by 18%, request funds for the production of one, and not two, as previously planned, submarines with a nuclear power plant of the Virginia class, abandon plans to replace outdated OH reconnaissance helicopters -58 Kiowa with modern FARA (Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft) machines, as well as curtail the modernization program for UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters.
In early January, the US national debt exceeded $34 trillion. In 2023, it grew by more than $4 trillion. Biden signed a bill previously approved by Congress to increase the national debt ceiling in 2023. The limit will now be reached on January 2, 2025.
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