Budget Cuts Will Mean Delays for Burials at Arlington Cemetery

The cuts to the military budget scheduled to take effect for Friday can seem abstract ' or even, sometimes, breathless. But one impact will be a somber one: The cuts will mean delays for veteran funerals at Arlington National Cemetery.

There's currently an average of 31 funerals a day at Arlington, the nation's most prestigious resting place for war veterans. But the Army expects that under the automatic budget cuts known as sequestration, that average will drop to 24. As first tweeted by CNN's Barbara Starr, that works out to 160 fewer funerals every month.

The Army says Arlington's top priority is to bury troops killed in action in Afghanistan. That is not going to change under sequestration. Arlington representatives say that such burials typically take place within two weeks of receipt of the bodies of the fallen.

'We are working to reduce what we can without impacting funerals, and will, no matter what, bury those killed in action in accordance with current policy,' Army spokesman George Wright tells Danger Room. 'However, there is no question cemetery operations ' as well as our ability to accommodate visitors ' will be seriously impacted.'

Veterans of older conflicts are likely to experience longer wait times. Those currently range from 30 days for burials without honors, to three months for full honors. After burying those killed in action, others scheduled to be interred will do so on a first-come-first-served basis.

Unless Congress and President Obama can agree to a package of tax increases and spending cuts before Friday, the Pentagon expects to lose as much as $46 billion from its current budget through the rest of the year. The sequestration cuts will take approximately $600 billion from the military budget over the next decade, applied by about 9.4 percent to nearly every military program except for troop pay.

The longer sequestration continues, the greater the likelihood that the Defense Department's civilian workforce will have to be furloughed, losing a day each workweek. Arlington will be no exception. The reduction in civilian staff at the cemetery is one of the drivers of the estimation of fewer burials and longer wait times, as fewer staff will be available to arrange burials, chapel time, military bands, caissons and some of the other ceremonies that often accompany such burials. Those who opt for simpler funerals are likely to be buried quicker.