Defense Spending “Gusher Has Been Turned Off” Defense Secretary Robert Gates is taking aim at support services and a top-heavy Pentagon bureaucracy as he launches a new push to rein in military spending. Pointing out that the defense budget has nearly doubled since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks—not counting supplemental appropriations for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan—he warned, “Given America’s difficult economic circumstances and parlous fiscal condition, military spending on things large and small can and should expect closer, harsher scrutiny. The gusher has been turned off, and will stay off for a good period of time.” He spoke May 8 at the Eisenhower Presidential Library in Abilene, KS. Gates said he has directed the military services and defense agencies to cut spending on overhead and support services by 2% to 3% in the 2012 budget, so the money can be reallocated from the “tail” to the “tooth.” He said spending on operations and maintenance has roughly doubled in the past decade, to $200 billion a year. According to Pentagon estimates, the broad category of “overhead” accounts for 40% of the budget. “The one area of real decline in overhead was in the area where we actually needed it: full-time contracting professionals, whose numbers plunged from 26,000 to about 9,000,” he said. “We ended up with contractors supervising other contractors—with predictable results.” Gates previously announced plans to hire nearly 20,000 new DOD employees in 2010 and ’11 to replace contractors. Now he says, “The changes we have made in the procurement arena represent an important start. But only a start. More is needed—much more.” The secretary has ordered budget planners to re-examine every aspect of spending. “Simply taking a few percent off the top of everything on a one-time basis will not do.  These savings must stem from root-and-branch changes that can be sustained and added to over time.” Gates also targeted the military bureaucracy, urging changes “where two-star deputies become one-star deputies, assistant secretaries become deputy assistant secretaries—to create a flatter, more effective and less costly organization.” He said five four-star headquarters had to approve an order to send a single soldier and a dog to Afghanistan. He warned that some of the changes may anger “powerful people,” including members of Congress. While Congress has resisted some of his moves to cut major weapons systems, he said lawmakers have also refused to allow increases in health insurance premiums for service members and retirees. “Health-care costs are eating the Defense Department alive,” he said, now costing $50 billion a year compared to $19 billion a decade ago. Speaking to reporters on his way to Kansas, Gates added, according to the official transcript, “I’ve proposed [premium increases] for the last three years, and the Congress—(makes raspberry)—wouldn’t hear of it.”