“As long as we get an appropriation by the beginning of the calendar year, I think we’ll be okay,” the Army’s chief of budget planning said.

A junior GOP congressman will challenge the Democratic House leadership to restore $96 million in funding for intermediate-ranged conventional missiles, cut by the Democratic majority for fear the new weapons would reignite an arms race that ended in 1987.

The battery of eight missiles, while primarily meant to test out tactics, will be capable of combat. So will a prototype battery of lasers entering service in 2021.

The US could develop more than a dozen different land-based weapons for $7 to $12 billion, thinktank CSBA estimates.

“You want to kill a swarm of things — whatever that thing is — lasers are not really a swarm-killing tool. They can kill things fast, but they can’t kill a swarm of things fast enough.”

The Army must take risks to modernize, the Futures Command chief said, and the modernization effort will survive the inevitable failures along the way.

But modernizing the Army will take decades and tough decisions about everything from online propaganda to the National Guard.

A new Army unit will hack and jam enemy networks and provide targeting data for both long-range missiles and missile defense.

The defense budget may be caught between doves on the left and budget hawks on the right, but so far Army Secretary Mark Esper isn’t ceding any ground.

We explore the possibilities, from cutting-edge hypersonics and 1,000-mile cannon to repackaged Tomahawk cruise missiles and updated Pershing ballstic missiles.