US military pushes for boost in 2027 spending on drones, air defences used in Iran war

US military officials on Tuesday called for spending tens of billions of dollars in the next budget year on drones air defence systems and fighter jets that have been a key part of fighting the Iran warAs part of President Donald Trumps push to boost defense spending to USD 15 trillion in the 2027 budget the Pentagon wants to triple spending on drones and related technology to more than USD 74 billion and invest over USD 30 billion into more critical munitions including missile interceptors whose stockpiles have become critically low during the Iran warMilitary officials said the spending blueprint was developed before the conflict in the Middle East They also did not discuss how much they will request in additional funds for the war which would be on top of what the White House is seeking to boost defense spending in the next budget yearThe overlap youll see is the request for munitions which is something we always need Jules Hurst III acting undersecretary of defense and the Pentagons comptroller told reporters at a briefing We always need to increase our magazine depth But outside of that there arent any operational costs in here from IranHeavy investment in drone warfareThe missile interceptors whose numbers are under the most strain are the Patriot and the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense or THAAD air defense systems The THAAD system is designed for defeating mediumrange ballistic missiles while the Patriot system is for taking down shortrange ballistic missiles and crewed aircraft However they both also were used to shoot down cheap Iranian dronesThe USD 30 billion budget item also would aim to purchase longrange Precision Strike Missiles and MidRange Capability missile systems used by the US Army The budget proposal would allocate nearly USD 54 billion for military drones and related technology as well as USD 21 billion for weapons systems designed to take down enemy dronesDrones and other unmanned vehicles have emerged as a key weapon in the wars in Ukraine and Iran and top Pentagon officials say the US must significantly increase its funding of both drones and counterdrone systems Drone warfare is rapidly reshaping the modern battlefield Hurst said This budget is the largest investment in drone warfare and counter drone technology in US historyAs part of the 2027 budget the Pentagon also intends to grow the military by 44500 troops or more than 237 spend more than 2 billion on operations on the USMexico border and make the largest shipbuilding request since 1962Dramatic increase in the Navys Tomahawk missilesWhile officials said the budget was developed before operations began in Iran it featured major jumps in many of the missiles that have been used in the conflict One of the most dramatic increases was in the choice for the Navy to increase of its purchase of the Tomahawk cruise missile from 55 missiles last year to 785 in this years budget The longrange cruise missile was heavily used in Iran and led to concerns from experts that the military was using it much faster than it could replenish its stocksVice Adm Ben Reynolds the Navys budget boss wouldnt say if he expected all 785 Tomahawk missiles to be delivered within the year He acknowledged that weapons production capacity is absolutely the challenge and in the case of the Tomahawk he said the Navy expects Raytheon the company that makes it to invest very heavily now to be able to ramp up productionThe services also are addressing the difficulty in producing the advanced munitions favored by the military by slowly shifting toward more basic weapons Major Gen Frank Verdugo the Air Forces budget chief said the Air Force wants to invest USD 600 million to develop affordable munitions as part of an effort to move away from small numbers of exquisite weapons toward a future where we can overwhelm an adversary with sheer volumeTrumpendorsed battleship is missingThe Navy said it would be buying 18 more warships using more than 65 billion a 4637 increase from the previous year However the Trumpendorsed battleship that was announced to great fanfare last year is not in this years budget according to the briefing Instead the Navy is planning to pay for the first battleship in next years budgetThe militarys spending proposal also lacked money for repairing US bases in the Middle East which Hurst said would be part of a future requestxPart of it is we would assess what our posture should be in the Middle East Hurst told reporters We have to make sure we understand what we want to construct in the future We might change how we build bases in the Middle East based on this conflictBudget echoes Bidenera priorities expert saysIf approved by Congress the budget would provide the largest level of defense funding in inflationadjusted dollars in US history said Todd Harrison a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute a conservative think tank Harrison said the spending appears more aligned with former President Joe Bidens national defense strategy than TrumpsThis is a budget that is trying to build a force capable of sustaining US presence and security commitments around the world a force thats capable of fighting major wars against countries like Russia and China Harrison said The Trump administrations strategy document put the priority on homeland defense and was largely silent on Russia and did not say much about China Harrison saidThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever