Last summer’s $156 billion defense spending boost through the reconciliation bill is likely “only just the beginning,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told an audience at the Reagan National Defense Forum in California on Saturday.

“We need a revived defense industrial base. We need those capabilities. We need them yesterday. And so, resource-wise, I think this room will be encouraged by what we'll see soon. But I don't want to get too ahead,” Hegseth said in his keynote address.

Context: U.S. defense spending has risen in recent years from $812 billion in fiscal year 2017 to $870.7 billion in fiscal year 2021 to $895.2 billion in 2025, Defense One ’s Lauren C. Williams reports from Simi Valley.

“We received a historic boost in funding last year, and believe that is only just the

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