Defense Industry Sustainability

According to experts, for the defense industry to sustain itself it needs the pentagon’s budget to grow at an annual rate of 5%. This rate is necessary to sustain the prime vendors and it is unknown how the smaller ones will be affected. President Trump, via executive order , set up a task force which will seek to determine manufacturing capability and the supply-chain integrity of the American Defense Industry. The findings have yet to be made public. The group which conducted the report mentioned initially, the Aerospace Industries Association, will follow up their initial conclusions with a series of war games to estimate the surge capabilities of defense industries in a breakout war scenario. The predictions are grim.

All of this is coming on the heels of the the White House and House Republicans flirting with budget rescission.The lack of proper budgeting has forced the military to cancel training exercises and has hindered long term planning. It has also fostered the degradation of America's defense industry. The inability of Congress to pass a budget over the past several years has prevented the Pentagon's budget from meeting the needs of the defense industrial base. Given the public statements of the White House, the stability and security which came from this budget is called into question. And it is America's defense industrial base which will suffer for it. However, stability and security are overrated, and, in fact, it might be good to keep the defense industry on its toes. I can think of no higher cause than to save a buck or two. Besides, when has under preparedness at the beginning of a conflict ever been a problem anyway?