The Obama administration in its 2016 budget requested $534 billion for the Pentagon, a funding level that would untether the Defense Department from automatic spending cuts known as sequestration and usher in an era of increased spending, even as the uniformed force is pared down. While Republicans on Capitol Hill are expected to block many of the key initiatives the White House put forward in its proposed budget, there appears to be bipartisan support for giving the Pentagon a bigger budget, as it tackles challenges that include the bombing campaign against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, Russia’s expansionist moves and the proliferation of cyberattacks.

As the military emerges from an era of protracted ground wars, it should not only be allowed to consolidate and shut down outmoded installations; it should be encouraged to do so. Congress has authorized five rounds of a process known as Base Realignment and Closure, or BRAC, since 1988, to align the Defense Department’s real estate holdings more closely with its current priorities. The Pentagon has some 562,000 facilities worldwide, which collectively take up 24.7 million acres, or nearly the size of Virginia.

The first four rounds of BRAC were sequenced a few years apart. The most recent one, in 2005, was done amid a military buildup, as the Pentagon was fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. That consolidation process, which included building new facilities, ended up costing $35 billion, having run wildly off budget. But in the end, it still resulted in savings of nearly $4 billion dollars per year, according to the Pentagon.

“BRAC is the single biggest way to achieve efficiencies in the Department of Defense,” said Robert Hale, who served as the Pentagon comptroller until last year. “Congress has been unwilling to provide the necessary authorization, and it is in the interest of the taxpayer that they do.”

Last year, Representative Adam Smith, a Democrat of Washington State, was promptly shot down by his colleagues on the House Armed Services Committee when he introduced legislation that would have authorized a new BRAC. “I think it’s parochialism that stops folks from wanting to do it,” Mr. Smith said in an interview. “We all have our interests, but one ought to be what’s in the best interest of the Department of Defense.”