DoD to Request 1.6% Troop Pay Raise, A-10 Lifeline, Cash to Fight ISIS

Defense Secretary Ashton Carter previewed a nearly $583 billion Pentagon budget for fiscal 2017 that includes a 1.6 percent pay raise for the troops, a lifeline for the A-10 attack plane and major boosts in spending to counter threats from ISIS, Russia and China.

The budget will also include proposals for developing new weaponry such as an "arsenal plane" and swarming "microdrones." The arsenal plane concept would take an existing "large platform" aircraft, such as a B-52, stock it with a variety of munitions, and have it led into battle by an F-35 Joint Strike Fighter to provide targeting.

The proposals will be fleshed out next Tuesday after President Barack Obama unveils the last federal budget of his term in office at the White House. The projected budget was also the first solely developed by Carter -- and likely his last since he is expected to step down next year with the inauguration of a new president. All of the proposals will be subject to congressional review.

Carter never mentioned pay in his 27-minute speech to the Economic Club of Washington, and the issue didn't come up in a lengthy question-and-answer session that followed, but the proposed increase was expected to be in the range of 1.6 percent.