Military Review English Edition January-February 2015 | Page 15

DEFENSE ENTERPRISE

(DoD photo by Glenn Fawcett)

Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel looks out the window of a Marine helicopter at the Pentagon as he returns from delivering the commencement address at the United States Naval Academy, Annapolis, Md., 23 May 2014.

ability to plan, invest, and reform. As I have reminded Congress several times, no institution can
be run effectively on continuing resolutions, especially the institution responsible for the security of
this country. We need actual budgets—budgets that
give DOD long-term certainty and predictability—
and the flexibility to make the internal management choices about what is required to deal with
current and future threats for this country.
We must also undertake critical cost-savings
measures, especially reducing excess basing and
facilities. Despite numerous efforts, and almost 10
years since the last round, DOD has been unable
to secure another round of base realignment and
closure from Congress. Today, DOD has 24 percent
excess capacity in our basing and facilities—excess
capacity that is costing us billions of dollars every
year that could otherwise be invested in maintaining our military’s edge. We need Congress to help
end this excess spending.
MILITARY REVIEW  January-February 2015

We also need Congress to support proposed
reform to military pay and compensation. No one
who wears our nation’s uniform is overpaid for
his or her service. But since 2001, DOD’s pay and
benefits for service members have outstripped
private-sector compensation growth by about 40
percent. For military personnel, DOD has proposed continued but more moderate pay increases,
continued but more moderate growth of tax-free
housing allowances, and modest increases to insurance co-payments. Congress has agreed in part with
some of these proposals, but we must act on all of
them. The longer we defer the tough choices, the
tougher they will be to make down the road—and
the more brutal the outcome.
Without the ability to make programmatic
adjustments such as retiring aging aircraft, and
without base realignment and closure, the Defense
Department will face a bill of about $30 billion
over fiscal years 2016 to 2020. Denying DOD the
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