It's coming. US Debt is on the verge of wrecking our defense budget...

via Breaking Defense.

A senior Pentagon official said Thursday he expects some belt tightening in upcoming defense budgets as the national debt eats up more and more of Washington’s money.

Alan Shaffer, deputy under secretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment, said at the WEST conference here that he’s “not terribly optimistic” about future growth. Some hard choices lay ahead, he warned, on what programs will push forward and which ones die off.

“We’re going to have enormous pressure on reducing the debt which means that defense spending — I’d like to tell you it’s going to keep going up — [but] I’m not terribly optimistic,” he said.

Federal debt payments are expected to be larger than the entire defense budget by 2025, the Congressional Budget Office estimated just last month. As a result of that pressure, the Pentagon will have to make a “stronger effort” to identify which programs it simply cannot cut or scale back, while making hard choices elsewhere.

Story here. 

This.

This is why!

This is why I post stories about the economy!

Defense guys.  Guys interested in the military and all things with regard to the military, international affairs etc....MUST BECOME AT LEAST a bit associated with economic issues.

What does this mean?  It means hard times ahead for our defense procurement and even our force structure.

That 6th gen jet to replace the F-35?  Expect that to be pushed out because there will be no money.  The F-35?  Expect numbers to be cut.  The CH-53K? 200 is a joke.  we'll be lucky to get 150 to replace the CH-53E on a one for one basis.  The list goes on.

Tough times ahead...and the Pentagon (even though this has been shouted about since at least 2010) isn't ready.