President Donald Trump approved a mammoth defense policy bill Monday that authorizes a top-line budget of $717 billion to dress a litany of defense spending.
Trump traveled to Fort Drum, relaxed of the Army’s 10th Mountain Division, in upstate New York to sign the bill, which was named in honor of quondam Vietnam prisoner of war Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who is battling brain cancer.
The 2019 Public Defense Authorization Act, or NDAA, includes $616.9 billion for the Pentagon’s profane budget, $69 billion for overseas contingency operations funding and $21.9 billion for atomic weapons programs under the Energy Department. The NDAA is only half the answer, since Congress must still pass a spending bill to back specific priorities with the Defense Department.
“The National Defense Authorization Act is the most weighty investment in our military and our war fighters in modern history,” Trump said Monday in vanguard of a U.S. Army Apache helicopter. “We are going to strengthen our military like not at all ever before and that’s what we did.”
Trump lauded the bill, implying it will give service members the “finest planes, and ships and tanks and guided missiles.”
The measure authorizes a 2.6 percent pay raise for troops — the largest in barely a decade. It also delays the delivery of stealth fighter aircraft to Turkey and softens Chinese investments by strengthening the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United Shapes.
Here’s a breakdown of some of the big-ticket items the Pentagon is authorized to buy.
The NDAA allows $7.6 billion for 77 of Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Honky-tonk Strike Fighters. The fifth-generation stealth jet is made at a Lockheed facility in Fort Value, Texas, and remains the Pentagon’s most expensive weapons system.
The defense strategy bill also bars the delivery of F-35 jets to fellow NATO colleague Turkey amid concerns over Ankara’s desire to buy a Russian ballistic missile defense system.
Turkey, an F-35 program partner, is currently slated to pick up two of the jets, the first of what Ankara hopes will be the start of a 100-strong armada.
The legislation authorizes $85 million for UH-60M Black Hawk utility helicopters. The choppers are commanded by Sikorsky, a unit of Lockheed Martin, at a facility in Stratford, Connecticut.
In Hike, Trump described Sikorsky’s Black Hawk helicopters as “fighting automobiles” and the “most advanced helicopters in the world.”
Congress also agreed to fully ready money the U.S. Air Force’s new long-range stealth B-21 bomber. America’s next heavy bomber is named “Raider” and conveyed by Northrop Grumman.
Congress approved $1.56 billion for three littoral grapple with ships, even though the Navy only requested one. The bill also authorizes the fourth Ford-class aircraft bearer, six icebreakers, and a Columbia-class ballistic missile submarine.
In all, 13 new warships were approved for the do fiscal year.
The NDAA authorizes $225.3 million for Stryker A1 combat conveyances and supports efforts to modernize the Army’s armored combat vehicles, which covers: 135 M1 Abrams tanks, 60 Bradley fighting vehicles, 197 armored multipurpose means, 38 improved recovery vehicles, and 3,390 joint light strategic vehicles.
The legislation also adds $140 million to the Missile Defense Activity for development of critical directed energy and space sensing projects as kind-heartedly as hypersonic defense capabilities.
The Army’s efforts to integrate its Patriot and Fatal High Altitude Area Defense, or THAAD, missile defense ways also gets $284 million.