Defense News reports that US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Monday that “the Pentagon must ‘fundamentally reshape’ itself to adapt for a future of strategic and budgetary challenges.”

“Speaking at the national convention of the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Louisville, Ky., Hagel laid out four principles ‘that will guide these efforts to realign and reshape our military’: prioritizing DoD’s missions and capabilities around the core responsibility of defending the US; maximizing the military’s combat power; and preserving and strengthening military readiness and honoring the service and sacrifice.”

“DoD was hit with a $37 billion reduction to its 2013 budget, which has sharply cut training and led to the furloughing of hundreds of thousands of civilian employees. Sequestration mandates about $500 billion in defense spending cuts over a 10-year period beginning this year.”