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US President Seeks More Funds to Develop NMD
US President George W. Bush Wednesday proposed a US military budget increase to 310.5 billion US dollars for fiscal 2002, including a major spending boost to accelerate development of a National Missile Defense (NMD) system.
The 2002 Defense Department budget called on Congress to give troops a 1.4-billion-dollar pay raise and better housing, speed research on hi-tech weapons for 21st century warfare and close additional domestic military bases to save money for other defense needs.
The 4.8 percent boost over the current Pentagon budget of 296.3 billion dollars included an additional 2.6 billion dollars for military research and development in the year beginning next October 1. The Pentagon is spending 42 billion dollars on arms research this year.
Bush Administration officials said that as much as 1 billion dollars or more of those additional research funds could be used to increase the 2.2 billion dollars being spent this year on the NMD program.
Despite opposition from the international community, Bush has vowed to develop an NMD to protect the United States and its allies from missile attacks by other countries.
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