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The Defense Budget Debate, Part 2

In the House, Rep. Mac Thornberry, (R-Texas) outlined his disagreement with the Democrat’s military spending plan:

“The Armed Services Committee heard repeated testimony, from Acting Secretary Shanahan, former Secretary Mattis, General Dunford, and others, that the military’s budget must grow between three and five percent through 2025 in order to restore readiness and maintain our competitive edge against Russia and China. The Chairman’s Mark does not meet that standard. In pursuing an arbitrarily lower budget, the proposal reduces or eliminates vital programs, including emergency funding to restore installations damaged by extreme weather, military requirements identified by the Services, funding to maintain our nuclear deterrence and ensure its safety, and missile defense.”

Rep. Thornberry unsuccessfully sought to have several items added to the Democrats’ legislation, emphasizing:

Modernizing to Deter Russia and China: The Chairman’s Mark makes a number of unwise cuts to modernization programs that will hamper America’s ability to maintain our competitive edge over Russia and China. These include reductions to the F-35 request, the Air Force NextGen Air Dominance Program, hypersonic development, LCS programs, 5G efforts, DIU activities, the Rapid Innovation Fund, aircraft carrier construction, and other programs validated by the Services that have earned bipartisan support. The Chairman’s mark also makes unsafe and unwise cuts to nuclear modernization programs, including NNSA programs, designed to keep our deterrent credible and safe. The nuclear deterrent is the cornerstone of our national security and nuclear modernization efforts have been a priority for Republican and Democrat Administrations. 

 
Readiness Restoration: Between 2013 and 2017, military aviation accidents rose 40%, and military aviation deaths hit a six-year high in 2018. Following sustained, focused oversight from the Armed Services Committee and a significant targeted increase in resources, the Committee received testimony that the degradation in readiness has been arrested and accident rates have begun to decline. The Chairman’s Mark makes significant cuts to readiness programs- including to infrastructure and facilities funding- that Ranking Member Thornberry believes could slow recovery efforts. These include over a billion in cuts to military personnel accounts, significant cuts to training programs, and cuts to ammunition stockpiles. The Chairman’s Mark does not support DOD’s request for emergency funding to restore Tyndall AFB, Offutt AFB, Cherry Point MCAS, or Camp Lejeune MCB. Additionally, while many Members are concerned over the Administration’s diversion of construction projects to border barriers, Ranking Member Thornberry does not believe that our troops should pay the price for political discord in Washington. His amendment would backfill funds expected to be reprogrammed from important military projects.

The increase in financial support for the Pentagon is a So, make sure to change the filters cialis cheap no prescription on time with the help of a contractor. If you look like best price vardenafil you just fell out of bed, plan on going back there, alone. There are a generico cialis on line buying here lot of reasons of having the erectile dysfunction issues. It is also termed as viagra for erectile dysfunction. significant departure from the Obama years, when funds were stripped from defense even as the threats from Russia, China, Iran and North Korea grew.

 Mackenzie Eaglen and Rick Berger, writing for the American Enterprise Institute note that the very uncertainty of budget levels has led to major problems for America’s military:

“Former Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis said a year ago that military had operated under 1,000 days of debilitating continuing resolutions (CR) over the past decade. Yet another continuing resolution looms again this fall. Even as Congress moves ahead with its spending bills for the Defense Department, the odds remain low that both parties can agree to an overall spending level by the start of the fiscal year still…federal agencies, including the U.S. military, will almost certainly begin another year under a spending freeze at last year’s budget levels. The result? The military’s advantages continue to shrink. According to Mattis, “I cannot overstate the impact to our troops’ morale from all this uncertainty. The combination of rapidly changing technology, the negative impact on military readiness resulting from the longest continuous stretch of combat in our nation’s history, and insufficient funding have created an overstretched and under-resourced military.”

The Report Concludes Tomorrow

Photo: The guided missile destroyer USS William P. Lawrence travels in the South China Sea, June 4, 2019, while deployed to support security and stability efforts in the Indo-Pacific region. (DoD)

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Defense Budget Addresses Major Challenges

For a number of years following the fall of the Soviet Union, the United States faced comparatively weak opponents.  Washington’s armed forces were far more advanced than any opponent.

That began to change when China, its technology developed through both its own efforts and the intellectual property theft and outright espionage it successfully engaged in, and the vast financial resources it brought to bear, resulted in a vast, first-rate military. Recently, China has fielded its first aircraft carrier, demonstrated its ability to shoot down satellites, continued to field short, medium, and long-range missiles,  successfully tested hypersonic glide vehicles,  and modernized and expanded its nuclear capabilities.

Vladimir Putin dramatically upgraded and modernized Russia’s conventional armed forces, as well as fielding the planet’s most potent nuclear arsenal.  In the second decade of the 21st century, Moscow engaged in a $723 billion modernization program that included procuring 1,700 warplanes, including cutting edge fighters and new air defense batteries. The Voice of Russia reported that Moscow revamped its air force with many new craft. In 2016, Spacewar reported that “A total of eight Borey-class submarines are planned to join the Russian Navy by 2020 to be the backbone of Russia’s marine nuclear forces. The first three have been launched, and another three are currently under construction. By 2020, the Russian Navy also plans to operate a total of eight Borei-class nuclear-powered ballistic-missile submarines, which will become the mainstay of the naval component of the country’s strategic nuclear deterrent.” Russia is upgrading other subs with Kalibr cruise missiles…Moscow’s innovative undersea fleet is getting a further upgrade through the development of ‘fifth generation submarines,’ unmanned  nuclear vessels with advanced stealth, noise-reduction, automated reconnaissance and warning systems.”

In the far east, The Associated Press noted,  the Kremlin’s military will deploy state-of-the art Bal and Bastion anti-ship missile systems and new drones will be deployed. The Arctic region is also receiving substantial attention.

The Beijing and Moscow developments are all the more troubling since the two military giants are virtually united in their opposition to the United States. Russia, the planet’s geographically largest nation, and China, with the world’s largest population, have combined their strengths in an alliance clearly aimed at the United States. The two enormous states have engaged in extensive joint military exercises across the globe, have engaged in sales of military equipment, and have covered for each other’s military misdeeds in diplomatic forums.

In their study of this extraordinary alliance, Douglas Schoen and Melik Kaylan in their book “The Russian-China Axis” described the cooperation between the two giant states: “Militarily, the two nations are cooperating and collaborating like never before…Put simply, this coalition has the potential to permanently and fundamentally alter international relations.  It was envisioned as,  and it has functioned as, a counterweight to liberal democracy generally and the United States specifically…The Russia-China alliance—we call it a new Axis—already possesses extraordinary power, as it is clear not just with new economic and trade agreements and military cooperation but also in the areas of nuclear proliferation and cyber warfare.  Individually and together, Russia and China seek to undermine the social, economic, and political framework of democratic societies and our alliances in a way that has yet to be fully understood. Their efforts to do so are emboldened immeasurably by a United States that is losing the confidence and trust of its allies and partners around the world. “

Counter-intuitively, while this was occurring, the United States actually reduced military spending during the Obama Administration. The resulting danger is undeniable, and the Pentagon is forced into a catch-up position.

Deputy Defense Secretary David L. Norquist   worries that “erosion of our competitive edge against China and Russia continues to be DOD’s central problem. To preserve peace, we must prepare for the high-end fight against near-peer competitors. While counterterrorism will continue as a core challenge, future conflicts with other nations will likely be radically different than wars fought since the collapse of the Soviet Union.”

In response, the Pentagon’s proposed 2020 $718 billion budget, according to Norquist, provides funding for several key areas, according to Norquist, including:

  • It significantly increases the investments in space and cyberspace as warfighting domains.
  • It makes investments in the air, land and sea domains to modernize the force and includes the largest shipbuilding request in 20 years.
  • It puts emphasis on innovation, such as artificial intelligence, hypersonics and unmanned vehicles.
  • It invests in developing and experimenting with and prototyping to build out and prepare for future conflicts. The research and development program has a significant funding increase.
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Photo: Chinese Defense Ministry

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Overcoming Obama’s Defense Funding Mistakes

Will The House of Representatives’ National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) (passed yesterday)  be sufficient to both address rising threats from abroad as well as make up the significant loss of funding during the Obama Administration? The $686.6 billion (which exceeds President Trump’s request of $603 billion; the Senate seeks to add another $14 billion) goes over the $549 billion limit established by the 2011 Budget Control Act by about $72 billion, so further work would have to be done for the House, Senate or Trump funding figures to be established.

Despite the unprecedented arms buildup and aggressive acts by Russia, China, Iran and North Korea, the Obama Administration chose to slash defense spending, and Congress, which had agreed to the sequester in response to the doubling of the national debt during the former president’s tenure, failed to respond.

America’s military is in a sharply deteriorated state. It had its last major upgrade during the Reagan Administration over three decades ago, and has been sharply reduced over the past 27 years. Its equipment has been worn down from repeated conflicts in the Middle East and Afghanistan; the same can be said for its personnel.

While all branches of the armed forces have been affected, the latest examples of damage have come the Navy and the Marines. Marine aviation has recently experienced a rise in “Class A Mishaps,” which are incidents that cause death or result in more than $2 million in aircraft damage. House Armed Services Chairman Mac Thornberry pointed out at a hearing last year that the rate for the Marine aviation community has “been increasing significantly.”

The Wall Street Journal recently noted that “Marine aviation has recently experienced a rise in ‘Class A Mishaps,’ which are incidents that carry a body count or result in more than $2 million in aircraft damage. House Armed Services Chairman Mac Thornberry (R-Texas) pointed out at a hearing last year that the accident rate for the Marine aviation community has ‘been increasing significantly’…One hypothesis that deserves to be examined is a combination of old equipment and the fact that pilot hours have been reduced in recent years because of funding cuts. Planes like the F/A-18 are stretching past their lifetimes.”

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“Through 2009, the Department’s Strike Fighter force was relatively healthy. Several events transpired since 2009, however, which drove our current Strike Fighter inventory shortfall. The Budget Control Act of 2011 started multiple years of reduced military funding and F-35B/C fielding plans were delayed. As a result, the [Navy] decided to extend the life of legacy F/A-18A-Ds…Sequestration led to furlough and a hiring freeze of a skilled government civilian artisan workforce at aviation depots, significantly impacting depot throughput and fleet readiness along with other factors such as high utilization rates, lack of aircraft procurement and lack of spare parts. Throughout this period, the operational demand for Naval Aviation forces remained high and accelerated the consumption of existing fleet aircraft. In essence, consumption of aircraft exceeded new and re-work production capacity of aircraft causing an increasing shortfall… years of underfunding cannot be corrected in one budget year and will require stable, predictable funding over multiple years to achieve positive results. This shortfall will take time and likely require several years to correct…”

An unclassified study by the Mitre organization found that the “Navy’s budget is insufficient to fund required force levels. The Navy’s budget is insufficient to develop, procure, operate, and sustain all the forces need to meet the revised defeat / hold scenario force structure. In addition, budget instability forces the Navy to make acquisition decisions that undermine affordability initiatives…for the last four years, the Navy has been operating under reduced top-lines and significant shortfalls. There will likely continue to be increasing pressure on the procurement accounts, which in turn threatens the near-term health of the defense industrial base.”

Testifying before the House Armed Services Committee, Adm. William F. Moran painted a dismal picture of a Navy that has been strained to the limit. Moran told committee members the ongoing demand for U.S. Naval forces far exceeds its long-term supply. And, he added, the Navy is the smallest it’s been in 99 years, making it urgent to “adequately fund, fix and maintain the fleet we do have.” The U.S. Navy has never been busier in a world of global threats, Admiral Moran said. While the Navy is getting the job done the unrelenting pace, inadequate resources and small size are taking their toll.

The House Armed Service Committee noted, following the vote, “Today, we have too many planes that cannot fly, too many ships that cannot sail, too many Soldiers who cannot deploy, while too many threats are gathering. We have come to a key decision point. For six years, we have been just getting by – cutting resources as the world becomes more dangerous, asking more and more of those who serve, and putting off the tough choices. The Chairman and members of the committee believe that we cannot keep piling missions on our service members without ensuring they have all they need to succeed.”

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Defense budget cut again

Congress and the President appeared to have reached an agreement  on the 2016 defense budget. According to our preliminary calculations, the fiscal year 2016 budget is at a near-historic low, representing about 14 percent of total federal discretionary and nondiscretionary outlays. The 2016 defense budget is $177 billion lower than its 2010 counterpart.

According to a report just filed by Defense News , the 2016 defense bill has been slashed  by $5 billion to comply with the budget deal between Congress and the president, including $2.6 billion in “adjustments” to acquisition programs. The total package now comes in at $607 billion, down from the original $612 billion for the 2016 fiscal year.

Breaking Defense outlined the cuts, which run the gamut from mundane items such as fuel purchases to yet another blow to America’s shrunken navy, and cost-cutting on strategic weapons programs as well as on force readiness.  Research into new weapons appears also to have taken a hit.

The cuts come at a time when spending by Russia and China has increased dramatically, and increased threats are presented by Iran, North Korea, and terrorist organizations. Russia has, for the first time, a lead over the U.S. in strategic nuclear weapons, and a ten to one advantage in tactical nuclear weapons.  China already has more submarines than the U.S. Navy, and will have a larger force overall within five years. Beijing also has sophisticated anti-ship missiles that America does not, and which the American fleet has no defense against.

The cuts continue the dramatic shrinking of America’s armed forces, which are barely at a shadow of the strength possessed as recently as 1990. The Navy is the smallest it has been since before World War 1, the army, which by the end of the year will be smaller than North Korea’s, is the smallest it has been since before World War 2, and the Air Force is the smallest it has ever been.  In the past, the drastic cuts were attributed to the downfall of the USSR, but under Putin, Russia has returned to cold war strength.  China has become a major superpower. North Korea possess nuclear weapons and will soon mount them on missiles that can reach the U.S.  Terrorist groups control more territory, money and influence than ever. Russia, China, and terrorist organizations have become active in Latin America.

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A total of $690 million in cuts to the Air Force long range bomber program is illustrative of how U.S. forces are being challenged by antiquated equipment. Currently, the Air Force only has 20 truly modern bombers.   It should be remembered that the B-52’s are so old, the grandfathers of some of today’s pilots flew the very same aircraft—not the same model, the very same plane- their grandchildren now occupy. The B-1 program of the 1970’s was cancelled before many were built, and the Reagan-era  B-2 purchase was slashed from over 100 to the current 20.

A unique feature of the 2016 defense appropriations was the threatened veto by President Obama over the Guantanamo Bay issue.  The White House has threatened to veto the defense appropriations bill if Congress didn’t submit to his plans to close the on-site prison that houses terrorists, some of whom have been released and now again engage in terrorist activities. This marks the very first time that any President has used his veto power over a defense bill on an issue that has nothing to do with defense spending. It is an indication of the lack of importance the current White House attaches to national security.

The Navy has received the fewest cuts.  While there has been very little coverage in the media about the shrinking American armed forces, China’s aggressive maritime policy and the spectacular growth of its navy, which will be larger than America’s within five years (and currently has more submarines) and its advanced weaponry (including the DF-21 missile, with technology the U.S. hasn’t yet attained) has made the public conscious of the growing threat.  However, the American Navy remains at a dangerously low level, down from 600 ships in 1990 to the current 254, and there is nothing in the new budget that demonstrates any determination to return to a safe level.