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Related: About this forumSuck It Up, Proles
http://breakingdefense.com/2015/09/grim-world-may-help-ease-grim-army-budget/Grim World May Help Ease Grim Army Budget
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr. on September 11, 2015 at 12:11 PM
WASHINGTON: Alice in Wonderlands White Queen could believe in six impossible things before breakfast. The Army may not be that nimble but its leaked budget plan for 2017-2021 (first reported by Inside Defense) does make a whole string of assumptions:
* Budget Control Act cuts wont happen, despite the lack of encouraging signs of a sequestration deal.
* Cuts to Guard helicopters and personnel benefits will happen and deliver savings, despite both initiatives being politically painful for Capital Hill.
* Overseas Contingency Operations funds will continue to carry $6 billion to $7 billion of enduring activities that the base budget cant absorb.
(For the cherry on top, the plan mentions the Army could, like, really use a round of base closures, although it doesnt count on that happening because it wont).
Even under these optimistic assumptions, the Army budget will be outpaced by inflation, losing $2 billion in real dollars over the five years. As the document says, the Army will have perpetual capacity shortfalls.
Worse, those shortfalls are measured against the 2012 Defense Strategic Guidance, which made a lot of its own optimistic assumptions peace in Iraq, for example, and peace in Europe that no longer hold true. Demand for Army forces is up in the Pacific, Middle East, and Europe. But the Army wont have enough troops trained and ready for high-intensity decisive action combat (say, with Russia) until at least 2022.
--
America's Forever War continues.
And while it does, we keep spending ridiculous amounts on weapons.
- $14 billion dollars for an unfinished aircraft carrier.
- $600 grand Joint Light Tactical Vehicles to replace $250 grand Hummers.
- A new heavy bomber (our last one cost $3 billion dollars a pop.)
- $5.6 billion dollar destroyers. One of these bad boys costs more than what Nimitz-class aircraft carriers usta cost.
And that just the tip of the iceberg.
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Suck It Up, Proles (Original Post)
unhappycamper
Sep 2015
OP
daleanime
(17,796 posts)1. Aaaaaarrrrrggggggg.........
Scuba
(53,475 posts)2. If we can't afford to educate our children, to heal our sick or care for our elderly ...
... just what is it the defense budget is defending?
Wellstone ruled
(34,661 posts)3. Got to love this Neo-Con Budget
and the Lobbying of all those Military-Industrial-Complex folks that made it happen. Oh,forgot,it's the GOP Jobs Program.
historylovr
(1,557 posts)4. K & R
Rev. Lowery got flack for saying, "For war billions more, but no more for the poor" at Coretta Scott King's funeral, but he was right. And it never ends.