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Congress Could Shift Missile Defense Funding
Congress is set to shift some missile defense funds for fiscal 2005 to near-term efforts, Inside Missile Defense reported today (see GSN, May 21). The defense authorization bill passed in the House last week and the Senate Armed Services Committee’s bill — on which debate will continue after the Memorial Day holiday — include budget reductions that would reformulate some missile defense projects into short-term efforts, Capitol Hill staffers said. The Senate panel proposed a $200 million cut to the Kinetic Energy Interceptor, but otherwise largely approved the Bush administration’s $9.2 billion missile defense budget. However, the KEI cuts in the Senate version of the bill are substantially deeper than the $177 million House reduction across the board on Missile Defense Agency programs. The two versions of the appropriations bill will have to be reconciled, and some sources say an agreement is unlikely until perhaps late summer. The Defense Department is also expected to present its appeals to the reduction proposals (Jeremy Feiler, Inside Missile Defense, May 26).
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