What to watch as a house, Senate defense calculations for the Senate

The Senate Committee this week published the complete text of its version of the Law on Defense Policy 2026 – often as a national law to approved the national defense authority – that would enable the Air Force and the Space Force to spend billions of dollars more than the services for the next year were sought.

The $ 915 billion legislation, which begins in the financial year on October 1 E-7-Wedgettail-Airbors-Target-Tracking-Target-Tracking-Target-Tracking-Target-Sperb-Jet-Track Parliament, which with the E-7-WEDGETAIL-TARGLE-Tracking-Jet-Breis-Binssen-Jet-Jet-Jet-Jet-Jet-Jet-Jet-Jet-Binsen-Jet-Jet-Jet Auf-Auf-Auf-Auf-on the basis is initiated. Retirement certain work horse aircraft.

The total amount is probably 46 billion US dollars higher when it comes to troop remuneration and other personnel financing that did not break through the service in legislation.

Due to the typical annual financing process, the Air Force and Space Force are looking for 211 billion US dollars as part of the budget of the previous year as part of an increase in the previous year. The services secured the rest of their application of $ 250 billion for 2026 by the extensive tax and expenditure package, which is known as “a large, beautiful bill”, which was signed in the law on July 4th.

The senators saw this year's defense policy as a springboard to build on what critics claim, an anemic annual financing plan that is too strong on the one -off money in the one large, beautiful bill. For example, the committee approved almost 61 billion US dollars for the procurement of Air Force and 57 billion US dollars for its research and development initiatives -3 billion US dollars or $ 5 billion more than the Trump management.

In contrast, the House Armed Services Committee offered fewer increases than its counterpart in the Senate – and in some cases shrinking programs. The draft of the house would enable the Air Force and Space Force to spend 211.3 billion US dollars before adding military personnel.

According to an analysis by the consulting firm Capital Alpha Partners, senators are pushing a 6 percent larger development budget and 12 percent larger procurement budget for the Ministry of Defense than the legislator of the house.

The legislator on both sides of Capitol Hill must agree on a final dollar amount, a process that could provide the more expensive expectations of the Senate.

Byron Callan, a defense analyst at Capital Alpha Partners, suggested on July 17 that there is a chance of 25 percent that the proposed increase in the Senate is right.

“Despite the cross-party support for higher defense spending, which was demonstrated in the SASC votes of 26: 1 in favor of his breakdown output, the defense continues to increase without exposing expenses for non-defense,” wrote Callan in a newsletter. “Regular means that contain the potential use of cloture and the need for 60 votes will be a factor in the Senate.”

Here are some provisions that you can observe when the two invoices progress.

E-7 Wedgetail

The support among the legislators seems to grow in order to continue the pursuit of an e-7-wedgetail air warning fleet through the Air Force. The Senate's legislation would add $ 700 million for E-7 prototypes and the financing would increase a total of $ 900 million next year-more than four times as much money as the Air Force projected last year in 2026. The house invoice added almost as much to $ 600 million.

The senators also lowered $ 1.5 billion that the Pentagon tried to buy more marine-e-2D hawkeye aircraft to carry out the mission for the Airborne target track instead of buying a new fleet of 26 Wedgetails. Defense officers have proposed that five Hawkeyes could fill out for the dwindling air force and combat fleet of the Air Force until the satellites are ready to take on the job, while critics argue that the Hawkeyes cannot provide the command report provided by Air Force Assets.

fighter

The text of the two invoices offers an insight into the vision of each committee for the Air Force Fighter fleet. Senators are pushing the Air Force, 34 F-35A Lightning II-Jets in 2026-a plan that is not reproduced in the house-the 24, which the service demanded. The legislator also wants to see a plan for the government in order to have more of the proprietary data of the F-35 so that they can communicate more easily with older aircraft such as the F-22 raptor and future fighter such as the F-47 of the next generation.

The committee approved another $ 500 million for the development of the F-47 and quoted a “incorrectly oriented budget application” to increase the budget of the JET to $ 3.1 billion next year. The house didn't.

And the invoice adds 678 million US dollars for a total of almost 790 million dollars to accompany the collaborative Combat Aircraft program to accompany the drone wing men for fighter planes. It is unclear whether the boost should reflect the same amount that the project received at the beginning of this month. The house did not contain the same plus-up.

The senators also try to revise the restriction of how many F-15e Eagles can retire the Air Force, which indicates the sale of up to 34 jets by the end of the 2027 fiscal year and not up to 68 two years later.

Both the Senate and the house would limit how many A-10 Thunderbolt II attack aircraft could also take off. The house bill requires the Air Force to keep at least 162 of the “warthogs”, while the Senate's draft law would keep 103 or more.

Rocket

Since the legislator introduces more insight into the costs of the latest US military operations in the Middle East, the Senate of the Air Force would give 1 billion US dollars to fill up the weapons that were used to strike the Iranian nuclear facilities in June, as well as those in the campaign against Houthi Rebels in Yemen used ammunition. This sum would also help restore the willingness to strengthen the power after these missions, Midnight Hammer and Operation Rouge. The house bill does not offer the same.

The Senate pours more money into other initiatives for the procurement and development initiatives for rockets that have been issued by the house. For example, the Senate's draft law adds $ 149 million to accelerate the design of the new air force's new weapon and create a conventional version of the rocket.

And the Air Force's Air-to-Ober-Ober-Ober-Ober-Ober-Verspatt rocket, a program that she shares with the Navy, could spend another $ 322 million above its request if the Senate sets its way. The procurement of Air Force Jassm would be 650 million US dollars next year for a non -mentioned number of weapons in accordance with the SASC calculation in total.

Nuclear powers

Air Force Global Strikkommando began the administration of the nuclear company of the service in 2009. Almost two decades later, the congress wants to codify the role of the organization and protect them from other commands that could go into their work.

The senators would change the Air Force from the employees, compositions or responsibilities of global strike, since the service provides a new command for integrated functions in order to monitor future hardware and software development via force. In addition, the Senate Act holds a quarter of the Air Force financing in 2026 until the secretary of the Air Force reverses these changes to the command based in Louisiana.

The language is a partial idea of rationalizing the efforts of the service, as new functions designs instead of eating up these projects via several commands, which they monitor in different phases.

Some critics have argued that strategic platforms are too complicated to be managed by civil servants outside the nuclear company, especially because the Air Force wants to update its entire nuclear arsenal at the same time.

The House Armed Services Committee also describes the four-star global strike commander as the sole civil servant who is responsible for the leading development of the requirements for the nuclear and long-distance strike mission, budget proposals, investment plans and employment concepts.

The Senate also wants to do a greater supervision of the secret new B-21-Raider-Stealth bomber and the Sentinel Intercontinental rocket programs, both of which fall under the global strike responsibility area when entering the operations.

The senators want to demand that the B-21 can use nuclear gravity bombs within 180 days after the fleet can be set up for the first operations, and the long-distance weapon reaches the first operations within two years after the B-21 or the rocket.

Both chambers supported the 5.7 billion dollars -Budget request from the new aircraft for 2026 in addition to the 4.5 billion US dollars that the program received at the beginning of this month to accelerate production. The Senate would also urge the Air Force for further details about how it is transferred to its bomber forces to a mixture of airplanes that carry nuclear and conventional weapons, including at least 100 B-21, no later than 180 days after the conclusion of the law on defense policy.

The Raider, who, with recent stealth technology as a B-2 spirit of enemy air defense, is going to go into operation as the most advanced bomber in the US inventory by the end of the decade.

The Senate's draft law also stipulates that Sentinel rockets must be in operation by October 2033 and that the Air Force should have no less than 400 ICBMs on alarm at a certain point in time, except if there is a transition between the current Minuteman III rockets and the new Sentinel fleet.

For the problem with a total of 2.6 billion US dollars, the senators would approve an additional 2 billion US dollars for a total of 4.6 billion dollars. The house version of the invoice would only add a total of $ 400 million in the amount of US $ 3 billion in the next year.