Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) said the House and Senate Budget Committees would be on frontlines of the expected deficit battles and that the defense budget would not be shielded from budget cuts.
Calling for a smaller military apparatus, Frank said “the Pentagon should not be the world’s military,†according to a report on Defense News.
Frank’s remarks came at a forum sponsored by the libertarian think tank The Cato Institute.
According to Defense News, Frank said budget committee chairs from both parties would likely consider cutting the defense budget because of the nation’s dire economic portrait, which has caused the national debate about the deficit to “turn a corner.â€
As Defense News notes, earlier this year, President Barack Obama supported excluding defense budget items from cuts. But that position was rebuffed by the White House’s high-profile deficit commission, which blindsided the administration when it released its report calling for deep cuts in spending across the federal government, including what Defense News called “the termination of big-ticket weapon programs.â€
The Lexington Institute’s Loren Thompson said many of the panels calling for cuts to big weapons systems don’t understand the implications of their actions. But, “cutting some obscure weapons system,†is likely politically easier to do than cutting benefits, he explained.
