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Bush's budget would up missile defense spending

News-Miner Washington Bureau
http://www.news-miner.com/Stories/0,1413,113~7244~3238946,00.html

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WASHINGTON--The Bush administration wants to boost spending on missile defense systems by more than $1.6 billion in the coming fiscal year, according to budget documents released earlier this month.

As of late December, eight such (experimental) ground-based interceptors sat in silos at Fort Greely. The Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency is installing more silos but will no longer announce when it drops more interceptors into them.

The current fiscal year spending on the ground-based midcourse element of the system, from which the Fort Greely work gets its funding, is about $2.44 billion. The administration wants to push that up to $2.88 billion, an increase of about $435 million.

The entire missile defense program, which includes other interceptors designed to catch enemy missiles in both earlier and later stages of flight, would cost $10.4 billion under Bush's budget.

Primary contractors on the missile defense work include Boeing, Lockheed and Raytheon.


http://www.news-miner.com/Stories/0,1413,113~7244~3238946,00.html