Publications

The battle lines over defense spending in the Trump Administration are already being drawn. Senator McCain has staked out a broad vision of restored readiness, targeted investments in advanced capabilities, and thoughtful growth in military capacity. In this budget brief, CSBA Research Fellow Katherine Blakeley lays out the details of Senator McCain’s proposed defense investments with accompanying interactive visualizations.

At the outset, I would like to commend you for Restoring American Power, which is a thoughtful and much needed contribution to the debate over defense strategy and resources. CSBA’s diagnosis of the situation and recommendations accord with those detailed in the paper in many respects.

Now more than ever, the United States needs to formulate an effective defense strategy to preserve U.S. interests in a strategic environment characterized by looming international and domestic challenges.

What should the U.S. and its close allies do about China’s strategic expansion into the South China Sea?

Twenty-five years after the end of the Cold War, the United States once again faces the need to prepare for great power competition and confrontation. Russian aggression along the eastern front of NATO presents military challenges to European security not seen in decades. China’s military modernization and coercive behavior toward U.S. allies and partners threaten stability in the Asia-Pacific region. Both nations are disrupting an international order that has long provided relative peace and prosperity for the United States, its allies and partners, and much of the rest of the world.

The 2017 fiscal year once again began with an interim continuing resolution—the eighth year in a row that Congress has failed to pass a budget for the federal government by the start of the new fiscal year. This continuing resolution maintains the 2016 levels of funding for the Department of Defense (DoD) until December 9, 2016. With the Republicans maintaining control of the House and Senate and taking the White House, increases in defense spending would likely appear sometime after the new Congress and President take office in January. DoD might have a fiscal year (FY) 2017 spending bill in February or March if the defense hawks and the deficit hawks within the Republican caucus can come to terms.