Defense Secretary James Mattis has asked Congress to put an end to sequestration and pass the proposed defense budget for fiscal year 2018 to prevent another continuing resolution that he said hampers military readiness, modernization and innovation, DoD News reported Monday.
The Trump administration proposed to allocate a topline defense budget of $639.1 billion that includes $64.6 billion in funds for overseas contingency operations and $574.5 billion in base budget for the Defense Department.
Mattis, an inductee into Executive Mosaic’s Wash100 for 2017, told lawmakers during a House Armed Services Committee hearing Monday that Congress should consider several concurrent external factors that affect budget deliberations.
These factors include the involvement of the U.S. military in war, technological changes, adversaries that contest U.S. capabilities in various military domains and challenges posed by Russia, China, North Korea and terrorist groups to the U.S. government.
He said the FY 2018 budget request seeks to show five defense priorities and these include the need to build up readiness, support for OCO and ramp up military capabilities.
