During the DOD budget cuts of the 1990s, the Services would sometimes resort to their own form of the game "Jeopardy." The strategy was simple: request funding for those programs that were vulnerable to budget cuts and reduce or eliminate funding for programs that were "must haves" for the warfighter. The idea was to gain funding from OSD or (more often) Congress for the "must haves" while attempting to ensure funding for the other, more vulnerable programs. The reason this ploy often worked was that combatant commanders, industry and congressional offices would rally around a threatened program, sometmes in the form of a "unfunded priorities" list, and urge OSD or Congress to "restore" the program's funding.
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