Despite its adverse effects, the current budget constraints will also help drive the growth of innovation in the U.S. military to maintain the U.S. status as the world's leader, a senior Pentagon official said on Wednesday.
"We have objectives for the United States as a leader in the international environment that are aggressive," said Kathleen Hicks, deputy undersecretary of defense for strategy, plans and forces, in an interview with the Pentagon Channel TV.
To achieve such objectives, U.S. forces and other instruments of national power must think through innovative approaches for executing their mission, Hicks said.
"I think you'll see an era of real innovation -- a transformation," she said.
Innovations are under way in the cyber domain and in space, as well as in the Navy-Air Force air-sea battle concept, in which air and naval forces integrate capabilities across domains, Hicks said.
"They're also taking place in missile defense, and in leveraging advantages in undersea warfare and in prompt global strike -- an effort to develop a system that can deliver a precision conventional weapon strike anywhere in the world within an hour," she added.
Other new approaches acknowledge realities of the recent defense budget preview on spending cuts, delivered on Jan. 26 by Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Hicks said.
Under the new budget plan, the U.S. military will produce a smaller, more agile and technologically enabled force by 2020, while putting stress on developing advanced military technologies to ensure the U.S. supremacy in its military might.
The plan was aimed at implementing President Barack Obama's defense strategy guidance, which includes cutting force structure, drawing down ground forces, maintaining the current focus in the Middle East and increasing the commitment in Asia.
Partnerships and smaller footprints will take up the slack for the U.S. military in places such as Africa and Latin America, where the new budget control plan has curtailed growth in military capacity building, Hicks said.
In areas of increasing importance, such as Southeast Asia and the Indian Ocean region, the U.S. military "is seeking new ways to partner," she said, noting that there will be a rotational deployment of U.S. troops in Australia and an agreement with Singapore will base four U.S. littoral combat ships there.
"That will really be the hallmark of our approach going forward," Hicks said. "These seemingly small investments are incredibly beneficial in terms of what we get and what the partners get in terms of engagement and stability."
