HR 1540 Introduced – DOD FY 2012 Appropriations

Yesterday the GPO finally made available a copy of HR 1540, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012. The bill was introduced by Rep. McKeon on April 14th and outlines the Defense Department programs that would be funded for the next fiscal year.

Interestingly, there is no specific mention of cyber defense programs in this bill. The spending numbers proposed in this legislation do not get down to the program level so the lack of spending numbers is not unusual. Because of the discussion about the role of the military in cyber defense, I would have expected to see some mention of the programs in the bill.

I do expect that the issue will be addressed in the hearings and final committee report on this bill.