Well, it looks like the DoD is ready for their next war, this one against the American tax payer:

As President George W. Bush prepares to leave office in three months, his budget writers at the Pentagon are planning to dump a giant budget increase on the team that replaces them.

Bradley Berkson, the Pentagon’s director of program analysis and evaluation, confirmed that defense budget officials are preparing spending plans for the next six years that add about $60 billion a year to the “base” military budget.

That would push the planned 2010 “base” defense budget to $587 billion, up from the previously proposed $527 billion. It would add $360 billion to Pentagon spending over six years.

In addition to the base budget for 2010, the Defense Department will need “supplemental” funding to keep fighting the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Berkson said during an interview on the television show “This Week in Defense News.” The interview is slated to air on Oct. 22

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I guess that this is because with the US responsible for over hall of the world’s defense spending, they need more money.

Here is the money quote:

By adding $60 billion a year to the long-range defense spending plan, the outgoing administration could put pressure on the new administration to boost military spending that was scheduled to level off after a decade of substantial increases. Any defense spending proposal that is lower than Bush’s 11th-hour bulked-up budget could be assailed as a defense spending cut.

This at a time when we are spending more on defense as a percentage of GDP than at any time since the end of WWII. More than Korea, more than Viet Nam, and more than during the invasion of Grenada.

Luckily, the tax payers have Dem. Barney Frank on thier side, and he’s proposing a 25% cut in military spending, which would be a good start.

We need boots on the ground, and M4/M16s. We don’t need the JSF, DDG-1000, EFV, FCS, etc.

I would also add that there are currently 5 enlisted men per 1 officer….For most of the existence of the military, it has been 10:1. It is a good place to save money, though some of that should go back into retaining the senior NCO corps who are leaving in droves.