U.S. Marines Send Congress ‘Wish List’ for 2006

[Batgirl]

The U.S. Marine Corps has sent Congress a wish list of nearly $3 billion in ammunition, troop equipment and aircraft that the service was forced to omit from its 2006 budget request.

The so-called “unfunded priorities list” was sent to the House Armed Services Committee on Feb. 15 at the request of its ranking member, Ike Skelton, D-S.C. An annual budget exercise initiated by the committee’s top minority member, the unfunded lists allow the service chiefs to plead for congressional largess outside the formal Pentagon budget wrangling.

The 2006 list “reflects a coherent, long-term strategy for ensuring the Navy/Marine Corps team has the necessary resources and sustains the ship-building industrial base to accomplish our varied missions in an era of new national security challenges,” wrote Marine Corps Commandant, Gen. Mike Hagee, in a Feb. 15 letter that accompanied the list.

The extra $2.8 billion would be added to the $17.7 billion already requested in the Marine Corps’ portion of the 2006 Navy budget. It includes $154 million for operations and maintenance, $1 billion for the procurement of vehicles and communications gear, and $210 for military construction. The list also includes more than $33 million for Reserve equipment.

The Marine Corps also forwarded an emergency supplemental funding bill to Capitol Hill last month for the current fiscal year, requesting $5.2 billion to pay for wartime needs. Marine budget officials say the baseline yearly budget is intended to address training, equipping and manning a “peacetime” force, while the yearly supplementals fund operations and gear for the global war on terrorism.

Service officials have faced strong criticism from Congress for relying on supplemental bills to pay for wartime needs, with lawmakers arguing the “emergency” nature funding makes oversight much less stringent.

The Corps’ fiscal ’05 supplemental request asks for more than $2 billion in additional operations and maintenance funds, including $752 million for fuel and spare parts, $3.2 billion to procure new Humvees and other weapons and $279 million to purchase aircraft upgrades and counter-measures systems for Marine helicopters.

Adding On

The unfunded priorities list is packed with a variety of small programs and construction projects deemed necessary by the Corps, but that, when balanced against other priorities throughout the Navy, lost out in the 2006 budget give-and-take. The request does not, however, seek to make up for major funding cuts to key Marine Corps programs, including more than 18 Expeditionary Fighting Vehicles, six MV-22 Osprey transports, and 12 KC-130J Hercules refueler-transports slashed from the 2006 budget.

Congress usually includes some of the requests when it draws up the final yearly Pentagon spending bills.

The Marines’ list includes $268 million for aircraft and related systems, including $74 million to buy four UH-1Y Huey light transport helicopters. The additional Hueys are intended to make up for program cuts initiated last year due to testing delays with the UH-1Y and AH-1Z upgrade program that resulted from “unexpected difficulties with engine ingestion of rocket gasses” during missile tests in 2004, the Corps’ request shows. The Corps also asked for $50 million to begin buying 40 new AH-1Z Cobra attack helicopters through 2008 due to war-related losses of its current Cobra fleet.

The Corps asked for $417 million in advanced procurement funds for the LHA (R), a new aviation-only assault ship program that is considered a key component of the Corps’ future “Sea Basing” strategy.

Marine budget officials are requesting $104 million to purchase 48 Light Armored vehicles in various configurations to outfit two new reserve Light Armored Reconnaissance companies and more than $20 million for ammunition to equip two new active-duty infantry battalions established as a result of the Corps’ year-long Force Structure Review group, which created new units out of old ones to better fight the ongoing war on terrorism.

The Corps is asking for more than $78 million to build nearly 420 new family housing units at Camp Pendleton, Calif., and Camp Lejeune, N.C., in part to “support increased base loading due to Force Structure Review Group realignment,” and $7.9 million to improve training facilities and accommodations for a new LAR company at Camp Pendleton.

The list also includes a request for $108 million in extra research and development funds, including $11 million to develop a guided 120 mm mortar round for the Corps’ new Expeditionary Fire Support System and $14 million to test a new shoulder-fired rocket system to replace the Shoulder-launched Multi-purpose Assault Weapon.

Defense News

[jmwsf]

only 6 MV-22s? Sorry to see that, would be happier if it was 16 or more, can't wait till that gets into the fleet.

[cincymarsdad]

Does anyone have any idea how much it costs to train a Marine 0311 through SOI?

It must be a piece of change.