Coast Guard Beating Drum for More Resources.

• Author: Harper, Jon
• Position: BUDGET MATTERS

* The Coast Guard and its supporters are trying to make their case to a new administration and Congress that the sea service is under-resourced to carry out its missions and support the U.S. military.

The Coast Guard, which is part of the Department of Homeland Security, protects the nation's territorial waters, but also assists partners throughout the world including the Defense Department. It performs a wide variety of missions including upholding international maritime law, providing situational awareness and counter-drug operations. It also supports all U.S. military geographic combatant commands, Commandant Adm. Karl Schultz has noted.

The Coast Guard is looking to add more platforms such as National Security Cutters and icebreakers known as Polar Security Cutters, and recruit more personnel. It is also pursuing upgrades to its IT networks and other assets, and establishing a team to examine requirements for a variety of new unmanned systems.

The omnibus appropriations bill for fiscal year 2021 provided the Coast Guard about $12.8 billion, according to the Congressional Research Service.

"To close the Coast Guard readiness gap, we need sustainable annual budget growth--I would say 3 to 5 percent over the next five years," Schultz said at the Surface Navy Association's annual symposium. "We need a booster shot of sorts, about $900 million to $1 billion dollars to address our most pressing needs."

Coast Guard leaders aren't the only officials calling for more funding for the organization.

"I've grown concerned that the Coast Guard is not sufficiently resourced to conduct its own missions, much less support what seems to be a growing demand for having Coast Guard units supporting DoD missions" for military combatant commands, Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., said in March during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing.

U.S. Southern Command Commander Adm. Craig Faller told lawmakers that "we do not have sufficient Coast Guard ships...to meet the [Southcom] requirements. We need additional ships and planes."

Seth Cropsey, director of the Center for American Seapower at the Hudson Institute, noted that the need for more assets in the Arctic and the Western Pacific is increasing as the United States engages in great power competition with Russia and China. In this geopolitical context, Schultz's request for a boost in...