A Quick Roundup of the Pentagon’s Proposed Budget Cuts

Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta outlined on Thursday the first major step — he called it a “down payment” — of shrinking the Pentagon after a decade of war. Included in the proposal: limit pay raises for troops, increase health insurance fees for military retirees and close bases in the United States. Of those proposals, our colleagues Elisabeth Bumiller and Thom Shanker write that pay-raise limits, though modest, “are certain to ignite a political fight in Congress, which since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks has consistently raised military salaries beyond what the Pentagon has recommended.”
For more on the exact budget reductions, as well the political challenges the changes may present to the Obama administration, the effects on military benefits and the changing nature of the United States’ force presence throughout the world, read their full article here.
You can read the Pentagon’s proposal in full here.
And to see how readers like you would cut the defense budget, check this out