U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta is telling Congress that the debt-reduction agreement President Barack Obama signed into law this week includes a “doomsday mechanism” that could lead to dangerous cuts in military spending.
Speaking at his first Pentagon news conference yesterday, Panetta focused on so-called sequestration, the procedure that could force lawmakers on Capitol Hill to enact across-the-board budget cuts if Congress rejects the recommendations for slashing U.S. debt from a “super-committee” authorized by the new law.
