Department of Defense budget request is profiled

Continuing the fiscal year 2004 budget analysis that was started in last month's Washington Hotline, the president's fiscal 2004 budget request for the Department of Defense (DOD) is profiled.

The fiscal 2003 appropriations bills can be found on the Library of Congress Web site at http://thomas.loc.gov.

The administration proposes to increase the DOD Research and Development budget to $62.8 billion, an increase of $5.3 billion over fiscal 2003, with all of the increase going to the development of weapons systems. Funding for the missile defense program, a high priority for the Bush administration, would increase to $8.3 billion. Funding for other big development programs would also increase, including a $4.4 billion development request for the Joint Strike Fighter.

DOD Science and Technology funding would fall from $10.8 billion to $10.2 billion in fiscal 2004. Basic research would decrease 7.7 percent to $1.3 billion, applied research would fall 14.4 percent to $3.7 billion, and advanced technology development would decrease to $5.2 billion. Funding for research and development for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency would increase $264 million, to $3 billion, an increase of 9.8 percent.

ASME's DOD Task Force of the Inter-Council Committee on Federal Research and Development recently endorsed the Fiscal Year 2004 funding statement of the Coalition for National Security Research, urging the administration and Congress to strengthen U.S. investments in science and technology programs at the Department of Defense. The coalition is a broadly based group united by a commitment to a stronger defense science and technology base.

The fiscal 2004 funding statement supports the findings and recommendations of the Defense Science Board and the Quadrennial Defense Review to provide 3 percent of the total Defense Department budget, or $11.4 billion, for the DOD basic (6.1), applied (6.2) and advanced technology development (6.3) accounts, which make up the Science and Technology program. The coalition's funding statement is available online at http://www.asme.org/gric/ps/2003/03-07.pdf.

Additional information on the DOD fiscal 2004 budget request is available
online at http://www.asme.org/gric/ICCFRD/DOD.html. ASME members who are interested in defense research issues are urged to contribute their expertise to ASME's DOD Task Force. Contact Kathryn Holmes in ASME's Washington Center at holmesk@asme.org for more information.

— Melissa Murray
ASME Government Relations

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