WASHINGTON - US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Wednesday the Pentagon would not pursue budget cuts in a hasty, ill-conceived way that undermined the military's capabilities.

In a message to all Defense Department personnel one day after President Barack Obama signed a debt ceiling deal that includes massive deficit reduction and budget cuts, Panetta said defense spending cuts would be and must be part of the solution to the nation's spending problems.

"We expect that the responsible transitions in Iraq and Afghanistan will help reduce total U.S. defense spending over the coming years," said Panetta, adding he would do everything he could to ensure that further reductions would be done responsibly.

Obama has already ordered the Pentagon to identify 400 billion dollars of cuts in 12 years, and the debt deal explicitly ordered 350 billion of baseline defense cuts in 10 years. The Pentagon receives over 600 billion dollars annually for baseline budget and war-fighting expenses.