Senator Roger Wicker emphasizes the need for substantial defense investments to address growing threats

The Department of Defense needs to increase its defense spending significantly to meet current and future global threats, according to a new plan from Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS), the ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

The senator argues that the U.S. defense industrial base is underfunded and unprepared for future conflict, and in order to correct this course of action, the annual defense budget should grow to 5% of the U.S. gross domestic product. The current figure is around 3%.

Wicker’s report, which is titled “21st Century Peace Through Strength: A Generational Investment in the U.S. Military” and released on Wednesday, provides several recommendations across the services and domains with a focus on the Indo-Pacific region.

He calls for the modernization of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command command and control, improving interoperability with key allies and partners, accelerating the procurement and employment of asymmetric capabilities for Taiwan and the Philippines, and for the Pentagon to consider new nuclear-sharing agreements in the Indo-Pacific and potentially the redeployment of U.S. tactical nuclear weapons in the Korean Peninsula.

The Pentagon considers the Chinese Communist Party to be its “pacing challenge” and believes it is the only U.S. adversary with the desire and capability to transform the world order in its favor.

U.S. Space Force should accelerate fielding of layered, networked satellite architecture across capability areas to counter China’s space program, harden ground stations and underlying infrastructure, and procure at scale classified programs in development.

Wicker also believes the industrial base should be built up to deliver a 355-ship fleet and the purchase of at least 340 more aircraft in the next five years.

Wicker’s plan is not the first time he has vocalized his belief that the military was not adequately prepared or preparing for what a future conflict could entail.

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President Joe Biden submitted to Congress a proposed fiscal 2025 budget request of $849.8 billion for the DOD last month, and Wicker argued it was “ignoring today’s very real challenges.”

As the administration worked through its 2025 budget request, it was handicapped by last year’s Fiscal Responsibility Act, which required it to be about a 1% increase from the fiscal 2024 request. But, due to inflation, the department effectively cut about $10 billion from last year’s plan.