Transformation, Take 2

摘要

With its new $402 billion defense budget, the Bush Administration reaffirmed its oft-stated conviction that advanced technologies hold the key to future US military power. And the Air Force benefits the most this time around. The new 2005 spending blueprint continues the Pentagon's push toward transformation by selectively funding the procurement of advanced new systems and the upgrading of older ones. The plan for next year emphasizes systems that offer stealth, precision, range, a capacity for multiple missions, and the ability to feed useful data into a military information network. It also provides significant funds for new military space systems. The Pentagon allocated $121 billion to the Air Force, the most of any military service. That figure represents a one-year, after-inflation increase of 7.1 percent, also the most of any branch of the armed forces. The money would finance, among other programs, 24 of the premier F/ A-22 fighters and additional development of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. Also included in the spending plan was money for unmanned surveillance aircraft, unmanned combat air systems, and advanced air-lifters. The Air Force would get three V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft in 2005.