Including the development of "hypersonic" missiles and space forces ... Biden is requesting a defense budget of $ 753 billion

The administration of US President Joe Biden has submitted to Congress the draft defense budget for the fiscal year 2022, which provides for an increase in expenditures to $ 753 billion and focuses on confronting the capabilities of Russia and China.

The draft budget, which was presented on Friday, includes the expenditures of the US Department of Defense (Pentagon) of $ 715 billion with an increase in salaries for its cadres by 2.7%, and other expenditures of $ 38 billion on programs related to the defense sector for the FBI, the Department of Energy, and other government agencies and agencies.

The total expenditures for the proposed budget are $ 753 billion, which is 1.7% more than the 2021 budget.

Next Generation systems

The draft budget provides for allocating funds for the development and testing of "hypersonic" weapons (that is, missiles that exceed the speed of sound by several times that fly along the upper atmosphere towards their targets) and other "next generation" weapons systems, as part of efforts to develop military capabilities aimed at confronting Russia and China .

More than $ 5 billion is planned to be spent on the "Pacific Deterrence" initiative, which aims to deter China and focus on competition in the Pacific and Indian Oceans by developing capabilities of radars, satellites and missile systems.

Specifically, the Pentagon plans to increase expenditures on Tomahawk missiles and anti-missile defense systems.

The defense budget presented by the administration of US President Joe Biden focuses on developing "next generation" weapons systems (Al Jazeera)

Aiming to re-equip the forces with more modern systems, the draft budget provides for spending $ 112 billion on research.

It is also scheduled to reduce funding for some purchases, including reducing purchases of "Abrams M1" tanks from 102 to 70 tanks in the next fiscal year, and the purchase of 8 new warships against 12 under the previous plan.

In general, $ 2.8 billion will be saved for other needs, thanks to reduced purchases of some types of equipment.

Among the Pentagon's priorities are the purchase of 85 modern combat aircraft, "F-35" (F-35), and an increase in funding for space forces from two billion dollars to 17.4 billion dollars.

The Biden administration will invest $ 27.7 billion in modernizing the "American nuclear triad," meaning ground-launched missiles, submarines equipped with nuclear missiles, and strategic bombers.

The budget also includes spending $ 617 million on fighting climate change, which Biden declared as one of his policy priorities during his election campaign.

The fight against the Islamic State

A striking item in the budget was the "training and equipping" program that was launched in Iraq and Syria as part of the fight against ISIS.

Although regulation has been largely eliminated, the allocation of funds for the program, which was first included in the defense budget in 2017 by former US President Barack Obama, has not been overlooked.

The project requested the allocation of $ 522 million for the aforementioned program, including $ 345 million for the Iraqi security forces, and $ 177 million for “appropriately screened Syrian individuals and individuals,” including Kurdish fighters.

In addition, under the item "Supporting the security of the Syrian borders and neighboring countries," an amount of 370 million dollars has been allocated, of which 150 million are for Jordan and 220 million are for other countries.