nuclear-news

The legislation — which authorizes but does not appropriate funds for military-related items — includes two related amendments offered by Representative Dan Kildee (D-Minn.). Together they would cut $7.5 million out of the $643 million that the Obama administration requested for controversial efforts to extend the life of B-61gravity bombs, many of which are stationed in Europe.

The two provisions also would take $7.5 million out of projects to refurbish the Navy’s W-76 nuclear warhead — more than half of the funding boost that the Republican leadership of the House Armed Services Committee had sought to authorize for the program. The bill would allow up to $266.3 million in spending on W-76 refurbishment, still $7.1 million more than the Obama administration requested.

 The money — along with $15 million that would be cut from the Navy’s shipbuilding budget — would fund two initiatives: One would create “a training program to increase and improve financial literacy and training for incoming and out-going military personnel,” according to the legislation. According to a statement Kildee provided to Global Security Newswire, this would help address a problem of “unscrupulous lenders” targeting service members.

 The other would require the Pentagon to commission a third-party study meant to “identify deficiencies in the treatment of wounded warriors and offer recommendations to the secretary of Defense and Congress to improve such treatment,” the measure states.

The House approval of Kildee’s amendments comes amid furor on Capitol Hill over revelations about former service members who died while on a Veterans Affairs waiting list for medical appointments in Phoenix. According to Kildee’s staff, “at a time when our wounded service members are not getting the adequate care they deserve, it is a misplaced priority to spend more money on such nuclear refurbishment programs for outdated weapons systems, especially when the Pentagon has not even asked for it.”

The House also approved, by a 224-199 vote, an amendment offered by Representative Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) that would require the Congressional Budget Office to update its report on the projected costs of U.S. nuclear forces on an annual basis. The move follows a report earlier this year by the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies arguing that the current plan for modernizing the arsenal is too costly to implement……… http://www.nationaljournal.com/global-security-newswire/house-bill-would-tap-into-nuclear-weapons-fund-to-aid-veterans-20140523