Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered senior military and Defense Department officials to draw up plans to cut 8 percent from the defense budget over each of the next five years, officials said on Wednesday.

In the memo, Hegseth outlines cuts that are twice as severe as the sequestration budget reductions imposed in 2013 — the last major cuts to the Defense Department — and equivalent to double the amount that congressional Republicans had planned to add to the Pentagon budget.