Some people are going to begin complaining wildly about the cuts, he said. But Gates said he drew up the budget without considering politics of who would get mad at which cuts. He said he did what he thought was right for the country.
He also said he's canceling the presidential helicopter project and coming up with a new copter program.
During the Q&A portion (not in the video below), he called the NATO summit a significant achievement because European countries pledged troops and trainers for Afghanistan.
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
NYT: The decisions represent the first sweeping overhaul of American military strategy under the Obama administration, which wants to spend more money on counterterrorism and less on preparations for conventional warfare against large nations like China and Russia.
Mr. Gates announced cuts in missile defense programs, in the Army’s expensive Future Combat Systems and in Navy shipbuilding operations.
But he proposed, as he has before, spending an extra $11 billion to finish enlarging the Army and the Marine Corps and to halt reductions in the Air Force and the Navy. He also announced an extra $2 billion for intelligence and surveillance equipment, including more spending on special forcers units and new Predator and Reaper drones, the unmanned vehicles that are currently used in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq for strikes against militants.
More broadly, Mr. Gates signaled that he hopes to impose a new culture on the Pentagon, particularly the way it chooses and buys weapons.
“The perennial procurement and contracting cycle, going back many decades, of adding layer and layer of cost and complexity onto fewer and fewer platforms that take longer and longer to build, must come to an end,” he said. “There is broad agreement on the need for acquisition and contracting reform in the Department of Defense. There have been enough studies, enough hand-wringing, enough rhetoric. Now is the time for action.”
