Defense spending cuts in big-ticket procurement programs are inevitable, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates warned.

The Department of Defense can’t continue indefinitely the spending increases of recent years, and Pentagon leaders must be forced as well to fund smaller-outlay programs to address counterinsurgency and terrorism types of attacks, rather than focusing mainly on confronting major military powers, Gates wrote in the current January-February issue of Foreign Affairs, the magazine of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Many military analysts, as well, are warning that Democratic President Obama won’t provide the level of funding for military procurement programs that they received from Republican former President Bush, including missile defense programs that could be slashed as a "bill payer" for domestic programs important to Democrats.

However, some lawmakers in Congress have stressed that with the U.S. economy in a tailspin, and the output of goods and services shrinking at a 3.8 percent rate during October through December, unemployment is beginning to skyrocket. So this wouldn’t be a good time to slash defense spending and throw thousands of highly skilled military hardware producers out of work.

But Gates said the Pentagon is going to have to tighten its belt.

"Given the types of situations the United States is likely to face — and given, for example, the struggles to field up-armored Humvees, Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles (MRAPs), and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) programs in Iraq — the time has come to consider whether the specialized, often relatively low-tech equipment well suited for stability and counterinsurgency missions is also needed."

The U.S. military "must not be so preoccupied with preparing for future conventional and strategic conflicts that we neglect to provide all the capabilities necessary to fight and win conflicts such as those the United States is in today," he cautioned.

He tempered his conclusion, however, by noting that the United States must not lose the ability to take on and dominate other major military powers, if a large conventional conflict occurs.

And, he noted, many far smaller nations, such as rogue regimes, are obtaining the advanced, staggeringly lethal weapons systems once the monopoly of leading nations such as the United States.

Some lawmakers asked Gates whether some military procurement programs could be seen as supporting and stimulating economic growth during difficult times.

He said the Pentagon supplied a list of projects that could meet economic-stimulus criteria, such as being ready to start work soon, or already being underway. But those programs he listed included construction jobs for military health facilities, child care clinics, and the like, rather than weapons platform procurement programs.

As Gates testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee, one senator warned that cutting defense acquisition programs means cutting employment for Americans.

Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.) observed that if the Pentagon shuts down the F-22 Raptor strike fighter aircraft line at Lockheed Martin Corp. [LMT], that would kill 95,000 highly-paid jobs with the company, its subcontractors and suppliers.

"If we truly want to stimulate the economy, there’s no better place to do it than in defense spending," Cochran said. "And when you look at specific programs that are in place, you’re not only talking about maintaining jobs, but increasing jobs."

The question is how many of the planes should be built. While originally 750 aircraft were envisioned, that was slashed to a still-prevailing Air Force requirement for 381 planes, which was cut to 277, then to 179, and now 183, with a possibility of going to 203. Some lawmakers want to build the 381 the Air Force requires.