The Pentagon could hold onto its crown jewel weapon systems even though looming automatic federal spending cuts would inflict a $54 billion gash in the 2013 defense budget, military budget analysts say.
Instead of terminating weapons, the Pentagon could trim its projected spending under the Budget Control Act, which calls for a nearly $1.2 trillion reduction in federal spending over 10 years and mandates a 10 percent across-the-board cut in its first year, beginning Jan. 2.
While painful, the indiscriminate chopping would offer a silver lining: If a newly elected Congress next year can reach a compromise to scale back cuts in 2014 and beyond, the military would be able to save its cherished big-ticket items, such as the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter jet, a new Army troop carrier and 11 active aircraft carriers, because they would have survived the law’s first year.
“For the most part they would not terminate programs in the first year,” said Todd Harrison, an analyst at the Center for Budgetary and Strategic Assessment. “They would just slow them down and scale them back. They don’t spend the money as quickly.”