House Armed Services Committee
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Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) says "bipartisanship is not extinct" in his farewell speech to Congress. Wastebook author Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) says oversight is a duty that many senators continue to ignore.
December 15, 2014 -
The House and Senate Armed Services committee members agreed to keep a pared down version of the Federal IT Acquisition Reform Act in the final National Defense Authorization Act.
December 03, 2014 -
House Oversight and Government Reform and Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs committees agree on trimmed down version of the Federal IT Acquisition Reform Act (FITARA). Now it's up to the armed services committees to keep FITARA in the Defense Authorization bill.
November 05, 2014 -
The Defense Department's overseas contingency budget might survive the end of military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Wednesday, two of the Pentagon's top civilian and uniformed leaders asked the House Armed Services Committee to keep authorizing an OCO budget even after the U.S. finishes the draw-downs in the region. DoD's latest OCO request came late in the year, and it's less than Congress anticipated. The House set aside $79 billion for OCO funding when it passed DoD's baseline budget for fiscal 2015, but now the Pentagon is only asking for about $59 billion. Todd Harrison is senior fellow for the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. He explained how the budget deliberations on Capitol Hill might unfold on In Depth with guest host Jared Serbu.
July 17, 2014 -
Robert Work, the new deputy defense secretary, told members of the House Armed Services Committee that the Defense Department will experience a two-year trough in readiness as it resets its force,
July 16, 2014 -
The size of DoD's civilian acquisition workforce has grown by some 20,000 employees over the past five years and now numbers about 135,000 personnel members, according to Stephanie Barna, acting assistant secretary of Defense for Readiness and Force Management. That's thanks to an effort by DoD begun in 2009 to recapitalize its acquisition workforce. But the department's focus on the acquisition workforce has been strained by a slew of competing priorities and congressionally-mandated belt-tightening, Barna said.
July 10, 2014 -
House Armed Services Committee Vice Chairman Mac Thornberry is in the middle of a bipartisan effort to reform defense acquisition policies. The goal is to save money and inspire new technology development in the defense industrial base. But plenty of ideas to reform DoD acquisition have floated around Washington for years. Steve Grundman is former Deputy Defense Undersecretary for Industrial Affairs and Installations and George Lund fellow at the Atlantic Council. He shared a list of principles to finally turn those ideas into action on In Depth with Francis Rose.
June 16, 2014 -
Inside the DoD's Reporter's Notebook is biweekly feature focused on news about the Defense Department and defense community as gathered by Federal News Radio DoD Reporter Jared Serbu. Submit your ideas, suggestions and news tips to Jared via email.
May 19, 2014 -
The House Armed Services Committee releases a blueprint of the National Defense Authorization Act. The $601 billion measure hardly resembles the Pentagon's wish list. It rejects most of the department's ideas for saving money. Staff writer Martin Matishak has been following this closely for the Hill Newspaper. He provided insight for Federal Drive with Tom Temin and Emily Kopp.
May 06, 2014 -
Howard "Buck" McKeon (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, has released a $601 billion spending plan that saves the Cold War era U-2 spy plane from the chopping block and also would force the Pentagon to keep the A-10 Warthog in storage. It's all a part of a plan resulting in smaller military budgets after 13 years of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Ironically, though, the plan also denies the Pentagon's request for another round of military base closures to get rid of unnecessary facilities and save $1.4 billion.
May 06, 2014 -
The House Armed Services Committee will soon mark up the National Defense Authorization Act. But all the subcommittee markups may be for nothing. The Obama Administration says it can't submit an Overseas Contingency Operation budget until it knows the results of the election in Afghanistan and some leaders in the House say the NDAA doesn't mean much without the OCO budget request. Roger Zakheim is counsel at Covington and Burling and former general counsel and deputy staff director of the House Armed Services Committee and former deputy assistant secretary of Defense. He tells In Depth with Francis Rose the next round of defense spending negotiations might not mean anything.
May 01, 2014 -
Military officials say overseas contingency operations dollars are vital to ongoing operations around the world, even after the wars end. All the services tell the House Armed Services Committee that OCO funding is helping with readiness and maintenance challenges.
March 28, 2014 -
The Army says it is now replacing funds in its readiness accounts that were depleted when cuts under sequestration first kicked in a year ago. But last year's readiness problems are likely to repeat in 2016 and beyond if Congress allows the automatic Defense cuts in current law to persist.
March 26, 2014 -
Air Force officials say their service already was facing readiness issues because of the high operational tempo of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. But sequestration worsened the problems, and continuing the budget caps will set back a readiness recovery.
March 17, 2014 -
The Pentagon's 2015 budget request includes sharp cuts in funding for construction and maintenance on military bases, which congressional appropriators immediately denounced. But Defense officials say they could do a better job of maintaining military bases if they were allowed to close they ones they no longer need.
March 13, 2014