Sputnik News:
Despite receiving a record-high $11.5 billion budget in 2018, the US Missile Defense Agency is poised to receive an extra $50 million in 2019 for a missile defense program that it did not ask Congress to fund: one that would mount lasers on drones.
Congress is set to allocate $50 million for the MDA to advance an effort to build a robust interceptor that can thwart a missile during its “boost phase,” the missile’s initial flight, according to a July 23 conference version of the National Defense Authorization Act (or NDAA, a bill that is passed every year authorizing, but not appropriating, funds for defense programs).
The agency did not ask for any funding to study “laser scaling for a boost phase intercept capability,” according to Jen Judson, writing for Defense News. The Senate pushed for $80 million towards the study to get a boost-phase interceptor up and running, but the House’s proposal to put $50 million toward the effort “won out” in conference, Defense News noted.
