Leverage Budget Agreement to Boost Defense.

• Author: Boozer, James C.
• Position: NDIA Perspective

* Everyone at the National Defense Industrial Association cheered when Congress not only delivered a fiscal year 2018 budget topline but also took the opportunity to build a small level of predictability into Defense Department resourcing by passing a two-year bipartisan budget agreement to establish funding levels through 2019.

NDIA wants to grab this small crack in a window of predictability, leverage it fully open, and use it to address other deficiencies that weaken our defense industrial base and thus national defense.

Long-term budget stability and predictability coupled synergistically with regulatory reform and small investments to strengthen the defense industrial base will amplify the two-year budget increases and help deliver decisive combat power when the nation needs it.

As highlighted in our January issue, NDIA has built a strategic plan centered around six priorities: advance budget stability; gain acquisition agility and regulatory efficiency; promote innovation in technology and process; strengthen the defense industrial base and workforce; foster small business success; and expand international security cooperation and interoperability.

The staff deliberately developed synergistic priorities that can build upon the success of the others. We will endeavor to report to the members on all six priorities with clearly defined objectives and metrics.

The agreement increases defense funding to $700 billion in 2018 and $716 billion in 2019. We believe thoughtful, strategic application of these new resources will help reverse the chronic underfunding of the military's modernization caused by the 2011 Budget Control Act.

Additionally, the increase can help provide short-term predictability in funding streams to allow the government and its partners in the defense industry to plan, program, execute and evaluate. However, it's not enough.

Despite the appreciation for short-term predictability, to make every dollar of Congress' recent increases count, there must be a long-term return to normal order for the Defense Department budget cycle. For 10 years, lawmakers failed to provide stable budgets for national defense. And while the bipartisan increase in funding should drive improvements in service modernization and readiness, late delivery of the fiscal year 2018 appropriations could result in hasty spending plans that fail to maximize the resources provided to the department.

A steady, long-term resource profile allows industry to...