DOD seeks $28.7B for IT

As promised, the Defense Department's fiscal 2005 budget splits the military's information technology budget into business and warfighting categories.

The department submitted to Congress a $28.7 billion fiscal 2005 IT budget request March 5 that included $14.8 billion for shared infrastructure and information assurance, $7.8 billion for warfighting IT and national security systems, $5 billion for business IT and $1.1 billion for technical activities, said a document from the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Networks and Information Integration and Chief Information Officer.

DOD CIO John Stenbit said in September he would break the fiscal 2005 IT budget request into warfighting and business categories to better explain to Congress how the military spends its IT dollars.

The IT budget comes six weeks after the department submitted a $401.7 billion 2005 budget request for all of DOD. Last month, the White House's summary for all federal IT spending requests in 2005 included $27.4 billion for Defense IT, although military officials said that number wasn't the final one.

In the March 5 request, the Navy topped the services' fiscal 2005 IT budget requests with $6.6 billion, followed by the Air Force at $6.4 billion and the Army at $5.5 billion. Departmentwide IT activities accounted for $10.3 billion, said the DOD CIO's document.

The military's $28.7 billion fiscal 2005 IT budget request represents a $500 million increase from the $28.2 billion submitted last year. The Air Force's $6.4 billion fiscal 2005 IT budget request also rose $700,000 from its $5.7 billion submission last year, the document said.

But the Army, Navy and departmentwide fiscal 2005 IT budgets decreased compared to 2004. The Army and Navy budgets dropped slightly because of net decreases in their IT infrastructures while the Air Force budget rose somewhat due to adding more tactical data links, the document said.