It all depends on what the word "Defense" means

Spreading the cuts over more of the government will at least make the pain a little easier. Personally, I think that the Republicans got taken here. Both the defense cuts and the cuts to Medicare providers are done the way that the Democrats like to cut things. This has left the Democrats holding all the cards. From The Hill newspaper:

A supercommittee failure would trigger at least $500 billion in cuts to national security spending, but there is no consensus on just where they will be made.

Lawmakers included the automatic cuts in the debt ceiling deal as an incentive to get Congress to agree to shave at least $1.2 trillion from the deficit.

But the language also gave policy makers plenty of leeway.

The cuts do not begin to take effect until January 2013, which gives Congress a full year to adapt them before they are implemented. There are also disagreements over language in the debt deal, which have led to different interpretations over what could be cut.

All of this has led to predictions of huge lobbying fights on K Street and the halls of Congress, as well as dire warnings over the consequences of the cuts for both the nation’s security and economy.
“I don’t even want to contemplate what will happen next year,” House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Peter King (R-N.Y.) said in a telephone interview.

“I’m really trying to head it off now,” King said. “It’s going to be lobbying, political, regional, ideological, philosophical — the whole range of divisions are going to be there.”

House Armed Services Committee aides interpret the debt-ceiling deal’s mandatory cuts as putting only the Defense Department in the cross hairs. But House Foreign Affairs aides said the provision groups the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI and all international affairs spending with the defense budget, meaning they could also face cuts.

One former congressional aide said the flap reflects a longtime debate in Washington about just what falls under the national defense spending umbrella. . . .