Pentagon Budget 2026: Reconciliation law adds USD15 billion to accelerate production of low-cost weapons

The Anduril Barracuda-500 boasts a range greater than 500 n miles. The munition is designed for high-scale production, and could be an example of a low-cost cruise missile that Congress is seeking to fund. (Anduril)

The budget reconciliation bill that President Donald Trump signed into law on 4 July provides USD15 billion to scale low-cost weapons into production. This includes funding for Department of Defense (DoD) offices involved in accelerating technology, industrial base improvements, and artificial intelligence (AI), among other technologies.

Industrial base

The budget law provides USD4.9 billion for industrial base initiatives, including USD1.4 billion to expand the small unmanned aircraft system (sUAS) industrial base.

Another USD1 billion expands and accelerates qualification activities and technical data management to increase competition in the defence industrial base, and USD400 million to expand the defence manufacturing technology programme, the law said.

There is USD2 billion to expand the Defense Innovation Unit's (DIU's) scaling of commercial technology for military use, according to the law.

USD100 million funds the development of “shared secure facilities for the defence industrial base”. This is likely intended to help small companies that cannot afford their own secure facilities to work on DoD projects.

Command-and-control

Some USD1.4 billion is earmarked for command-and-control (C2) and related technologies. This includes USD400 million for the “development and deployment of the Joint Fires Network (JFN) and associated joint battle management capabilities”, according to the budget law. JFN is a prototype effort intended to address combatant command requirements and inform Combined Joint All Domain Command and Control (CJADC2) long-range fires needs, Janes reported in March 2024.

Another USD400 million is provided to expand advanced C2 tools to combatant commands and military departments, according to the law.