US will take 2 years to bring military back to readiness

Tide1986

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Color me skeptical in general when it comes to protestations about military readiness. They'd rather we throw an ever-growing pile of money at them rather than make reasonable choices among the branches. I see this behavior in the microcosm of a corporation and its various functions and departments, so I can only imagine how out of control this siloed behavior is within the individual branches of the military.
 
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TIDE-HSV

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Color me skeptical in general when it comes to protestations about military readiness. They'd rather we throw an ever-growing pile of money at them rather than make reasonable choices among the branches. I see this behavior in the microcosm of a corporation and its various functions and departments, so I can only imagine how out of control this siloed behavior is within the individual branches of the military.
I think you're right. However the measuring stick for how patriotic you are has become how much money you're willing to throw at the military, particularly multi-billion dollar boondoggles. I'm heartened to here that another round of BRAC is apparently back on the table. The biggest rat hole in the military are all of the functionless "Camp Swampys," zombie bases. Of course Congress will block it...
 

Tidewater

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I think you're right. However the measuring stick for how patriotic you are has become how much money you're willing to throw at the military, particularly multi-billion dollar boondoggles. I'm heartened to here that another round of BRAC is apparently back on the table. The biggest rat hole in the military are all of the functionless "Camp Swampys," zombie bases. Of course Congress will block it...
I have to say, I was shocked when the USAF kept Maxwell off the BRAC list, especially since they could move Air Command and Staff College, the Air War College and OTS to Eglin in the Redneck Riviera and improve everyone's quality of life. Maxwell is a nice base, but it is a bad part of town.
 

crimsonaudio

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'Military readiness' - ready for what?

We already spend roughly as much annually as the next eight largest defense budgets of the world combined. What exactly do we think we need to be prepared to fight - everyone at once?

Beware the military-industrial complex indeed...
 

seebell

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A new round of base closures could be coming in 2019


http://www.waaytv.com/redstone_alab...cle_6ce0909c-e80a-11e6-a57b-3ba7166d79c5.html[FONT=&quot]

The Pentagon has said for years that the military has more infrastructure than it needs, but has been prohibited from doing any work on reducing that infrastructure. In 2016, they released a study, saying that their infrastructure was 22% overcapacity. Broken down by service, the Army was found to be 33% overcapacity, the Navy and Marine Corps 7%, the Air Force 32% and the Defense Logistics Agency 12%.

National defense as a jobs and economic program.[/FONT]
 

selmaborntidefan

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There was a time I would have believed this even BEFORE my time as a soldier. I highly doubt it anymore.

In the 1976 election, Jimmy Carter went into Florida to try and end George Wallace's candidacy but got popped by Senator Henry Jackson for Carter's proposal for defense spending cuts. Carter, in his typical fashion, said Jackson was lying without actually saying he was lying (he also suggested he lost the Mass primary to Jackson because of racist reasons). Carter, in 1975, proposed a 5-7 percent Defense spending cut but was then informed by Paul Nitze (LBJ) that the defense budget would probably have to go up by 20-30 million bucks.


In the second debate of the 1976 election, Jimmy Carter said the following:

Well I think this Republican administration has been almost all style, and spectacular, and not substance. We've uh - got a chance tonight to talk about, first of all, leadership, the character of our country, and a vision of the future. In every one of these instances, the Ford administration has failed, and I hope tonight that I and Mr. Ford will have a chance to discuss the reasons for those failures. Our country is not strong anymore; we're not respected anymore. We can only be strong overseas if we're strong at home; and when I became president we'll not only be strong in those areas but also in defense - a defense capability second to none. We've lost in our foreign policy, the character of the American people. We've uh - ignored or excluded the American people and the Congress from participation in the shaping of our foreign policy. It's been one of secrecy and exclusion. In addition to that we've had a chance to became now, contrary to our long-standing beliefs and principles, the arms merchant of the whole world. We've tried to buy success from our enemies, and at the same time we've excluded from the process the normal friendship of our allies. In addition to that we've become fearful to compete with the Soviet Union on an equal basis. We talk about detente. The Soviet Union knows what they want in detente, and they've been getting it. We have not known what we've wanted and we've been out-traded in almost every instance. The other point I wanna make is about our defense. We've got to be a nation blessed with a defense capability that's efficient, tough, capable, well organized, narrowly focused - fighting capability. The ability to fight, if necessary, is the best way to avoid the chance for, or the requirement to fight. And the last point I wanna make is this: Mr. Ford, Mr. Kissinger have uh - continued on with the policies and failures of Richard Nixon. Even the Republican platform has criticized the lack of leadership in Mr. Ford and they've criticized the foreign policy of this administration. This is one instance where I agree with - with the Republican platform. I might say this in closing, and that is that as far as foreign policy goes, Mr. Kissinger has been the president of this country. Mr. Ford has shown an absence of leadership, and an absence of a grasp of what this country is and what it ought to be. That's got to be changed. And that's one of the major issues in this uh - campaign of 1976.



He got zinged by Democrats as early as 1977 because he wouldn't cut defense spending and then in the 1980 debate he tried this:

CARTER
The fact is that this nation, in the eight years before I became President, had its own military strength decreased. Seven out of eight years, the budget commitments for defense went down, 37% in all. Since I've been in office, we've had a steady, carefully planned, methodical but, very effective increase in our commitment for defense. But what we've done is use that enormous power and prestige and military strength of the United States to preserve the peace.

But Reagan knew the facts behind the facts better than a lot of folks wish to admit:

Well yes, I question the figure about the decline in defense spending under the two previous Administrations in the preceding eight years to this Administration. I would call to your attention that we were in a war that wound down during those eight years, which of course made a change in military spending because of turning from war to peace. I also would like to point out that Republican presidents in those years, faced with a Democratic majority in both houses of the Congress, found that their requests for defense budgets were very often cut.

(Roughly translated, Reagan is saying, "Well duh, LBJ pumped a bunch of money into Vietnam and Nixon and Ford reduced it, so you hardly get credit for this.")


But then Reagan himself - it's never been certain why - spent the campaign talking about an alleged "window of vulnerability" in the so-called "missile gap" with the Soviets, blamed Carter for it...and then wound up as President spending more money for fewer missiles solely because he didn't want to approve a system that had been first approved by Carter (speaking of petty). It was then left to Bush to basically go along with a ten-year old bad idea because he was stuck with it due to prior stupid decisions.


This is just an example and this goes on and on. I liken a lot of this to whole "that college football team cheats" narrative. It's rhetoric, no evidence necessary. The Defense Department will ALWAYS say we're vulnerable because if they don't then the funding gets cut....of course, everyone does this but not everyone has the responsibility to shield us from a mushroom cloud, either.


In 2000, Governor Bush proposed a defense spending increase of $256 billion over ten years...which would have been a bargain for what he wound up spending just in Iraq.

Not to be mean but.....do we REALLY need Navy pilots AND ** pilots (for example)? It wasn't covered (Conway told me) but the service branches all got into it with one another over who was doing what in Desert Storm. There's a lot of replication of tasks.


Besides - how many more ground wars do you really think we're going to do?


I've seen this whole fear tactic before - everyone uses it. If there's ANY restriction of ANY kind on abortion then the cry is they'll overturn Roe v Wade. If there's ANY handgun restriction, same thing. Same thing here.
 

selmaborntidefan

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A new round of base closures could be coming in 2019


http://www.waaytv.com/redstone_alab...cle_6ce0909c-e80a-11e6-a57b-3ba7166d79c5.html[FONT="]

The Pentagon has said for years that the military has more infrastructure than it needs, but has been prohibited from doing any work on reducing that infrastructure. In 2016, they released a study, saying that their infrastructure was 22% overcapacity. Broken down by service, the Army was found to be 33% overcapacity, the Navy and Marine Corps 7%, the Air Force 32% and the Defense Logistics Agency 12%.

[I]National[/I][I] defense as a jobs and economic program.[/I][/FONT][/COLOR][/QUOTE]

But they're gonna lose jobs!!!!!

Btw - in 1999, [URL="http://www.mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=90e0e1be-6b2f-4b15-bdbd-f1b7a664da27"]Senator McCain supported another BRAC[/URL] and got zinged by Bush for it.


And let there be no mistake: Congressional opposition to another round of base closures is not predicated upon specious arguments about the supposed lack of cost savings and operational requirements that defy simple economics and common sense; this opposition grows solely out of the desire on the part of members of this body to avoid the politically painful process of defending hometown installations. As one who saw a major installation in my state closed during the 1991 BRAC round, I can sympathize with that reluctance to undertake an unpleasant task. As one who also saw the rejuvenation of a community previously dependent upon that military installation after it was turned over to local authorities, and as one more than a little concerned about our inability to fully address vital readiness and modernization problems, I must respectfully disagree with those who oppose another round of base closures. The elimination of excess infrastructure is vital to allow the Department of Defense to focus resources on necessary support facilities rather than base structure from the Cold War era. Savings from previous BRAC rounds have been validated in the billions of dollars by every conceivable research foundation. There is just no excuse for continuing to require taxpayers to pay for infrastructure we do not need.


This is ACTUAL in action conservatism....and yet so-called conservatives would actually argue this makes McCain a liberal who is "weak on defense."
 

selmaborntidefan

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And btw - Bush actually tried this in the wake of 9/11 and ran into the pigs at the trough.


September 25, 2001

Despite pressure on Congress to rally behind the president as the nation mobilizes for war, sharp debate broke out in the Senate on Monday over a Bush administration plan to close military bases it deems unneeded. Seeking to protect their home-state bases, several senators of both parties argued that in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, any steps toward cutbacks should be postponed.


Yet by Monday afternoon, at least 17 senators had joined a movement to remove a Bush-backed provision in a defense bill that would allow the administration to start a new round of base closures in 2003. If the senators follow through with their declared intent, it would be the largest statement of congressional opposition to an administration policy since the terrorist attacks. Scarcely any vote of substance over the last two weeks in the House and the Senate has yielded any dissent.

Among those signaling their intent to vote against the administration on base closures were such senior Republicans as Minority Leader Trent Lott of Mississippi, Pete V. Domenici of New Mexico, Larry E. Craig of Idaho, Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas and Ted Stevens of Alaska. They were joined by several Democrats, including Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, Kent Conrad of North Dakota and Max Baucus of Montana.

============

Bush wasn't the only one to hide crap behind 9/11 - he was just the most prominent and egregious offender.
 

81usaf92

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Unless he is planning for an end war with someone that isn't a third world country, I just don't see any logic for boosting military numbers. Wars are more fought by bombs, tanks, and planes. So unless we are boosting numbers in those three I don't see his logic.
 

Tide1986

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Anybody here think the republicans will insist on actually paying for the 'rebuilding'?
They appear to be insisting on paying for corporate tax reform with the addition of a border adjustment tax to offset some of the revenue loss from lowering the corporate tax rate.
 

TIDE-HSV

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A new round of base closures could be coming in 2019


http://www.waaytv.com/redstone_alab...cle_6ce0909c-e80a-11e6-a57b-3ba7166d79c5.html

The Pentagon has said for years that the military has more infrastructure than it needs, but has been prohibited from doing any work on reducing that infrastructure. In 2016, they released a study, saying that their infrastructure was 22% overcapacity. Broken down by service, the Army was found to be 33% overcapacity, the Navy and Marine Corps 7%, the Air Force 32% and the Defense Logistics Agency 12%.

National defense as a jobs and economic program.
If they would just admit this! But it would be embarrassing, because some of the most vociferous Camp Swampy defenders are also trying to carry the contradictory label of "budget hawks."
 

TIDE-HSV

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They appear to be insisting on paying for corporate tax reform with the addition of a border adjustment tax to offset some of the revenue loss from lowering the corporate tax rate.
If the American public falls for a "border adjustment tax" as Mexico paying for the wall, instead of the American public, then I'll be sure that the country has lost its collective mind...
 

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