NEW YORK, December 3. /TASS/. The United States is carrying out the largest modernization of its defense industrial base in the past few decades, US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin told the Reagan National Defense Forum.

"We've launched what the Army calls ‘the most ambitious modernization effort in nearly 40 years’ for our defense industrial base," Austin said, adding that some $50 billion from the US administration’s supplemental budget request are to be allocated for the purpose.

"And that will create or support tens of thousands of good American jobs in more than 30 states," the US defense secretary added.

In his words, this includes missile production in Arizona; vehicle production in Wisconsin and Indiana; and production of artillery shells in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Texas.