[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 6]
[House]
[Page 8881]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                   MORE VALUE FROM DEFENSE DEPARTMENT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer) for 4 minutes.
  Mr. BLUMENAUER. Mr. Speaker, yesterday in the Budget Committee 
hearing, we had Secretary Hagel and Joint Chief of Staff Dempsey walk 
us through the impossible position that the Department of Defense has 
been placed in.
  Now, I'll be the first to admit--as I think they would; in fact, they 
said as much in the hearing--that there are areas of opportunity for 
additional savings, and that the Department of Defense can itself do a 
better job.
  When you have almost half of the world's military spending by the 
United States, even though we are only 5 percent of the world's 
population and less than a quarter of the world's economic might, we 
can and should be able to squeeze more value. But the problem is not so 
much that the Department of Defense isn't willing to come forward with 
changes that need to be made; a great part of this problem is Congress 
itself.

                              {time}  1100

  I have proposed, from the Department of Defense, that we actually 
close bases, that we reform compensation and health care, that we don't 
force weapons systems on the Department of Defense that the military 
doesn't want or need. These are things that gets Congress weak in the 
knees. It's time for us to step up to make sure that we are having the 
world's most powerful military, but that we are squeezing more value 
out of it.
  One critical area that needs greater attention is our nuclear 
deterrent. We have far more nuclear weapons than we'd ever want, need, 
or could use. It's been 68 years since the United States used a nuclear 
weapon in war; and no matter what you do in terms of deterrence, 
there's no question that we don't have to blow the world up hundreds of 
times over to have that deterrent work. Yet, sadly, we are poised to 
spend almost three-quarters of a trillion dollars over the next 10 
years.
  The administration was forced by former Senator Kyl, as a concession 
for the START Treaty, to invest even more in weapons modernization. We 
need to step up and change that.
  There are other details that need attention. When the military looked 
at a proposal to streamline the PX operation, where military families 
shop, there was a proposal by major retailers to provide exactly the 
same service, in many cases, equally convenient, saving a billion 
dollars; and yet the political pushback was such that the Pentagon 
turned away.
  Now, dealing with things like military bands and the PX and NASCAR 
sponsorship are appropriate, but that's rounding error. Those are small 
items.
  We need to deal with reforming the military, to deal with the new 
threats and challenges that are more serious and immediate and largely 
impervious to the major military footprint we've got. We need to start 
now, in partnership with the Department of Defense, to reduce the 
footprint, to restructure the force, and reform pay and benefits.
  We were told yesterday that we can either reform TRICARE over the 
next 5 years, or we'll have 25,000 more troops to lay off. These 
proposals are stark, but they are immediate and they are real; and we 
should take advantage of them.

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