The Department of Defense has continued to cry wolf about the possible results of sequestration. But before making serious claims about not being able to promote our soldiers, or move them to new locations, or attend military schools essential for career advancement, they should probably take a closer look at what the Pentagon is spending taxpayer dollars on.The Daily Caller is a conservative publication.
In an attempt to persuade congress from letting sequestration happen again next year, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel recently sent a letter to Congress stating that the DOD would have to inflict “an extremely severe package of military personnel actions including halting all accessions, ending all permanent change of station moves, stopping discretionary bonuses and freezing promotions,” in addition to cutting weapons programs and other actions that will hinder military readiness and weaken national security.
Well, that just sounds terrible doesn’t it?
Before you panic, thinking our military has no money to conduct business, consider the following expenditures that are currently a priority to the Pentagon in the wake of sequestration.
The military recently spent $34 million on a construction project in Afghanistan. The money was spent building a headquarters for planning U.S. military operations. Unfortunately, the structure is unoccupied and will most likely never be used. It will either be demolished or handed over to the Afghans.
Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington State received $3.5 million from the Department of Defense to purchase land around the base to protect gophers that inhabit the area. The DOD also gave Eglin Air Force Base in Florida $1.75 million to save a tortoise habitat.
Less known, but even more wasteful is the military’s acquisition process. The U.S. Army has been attempting to find a replacement for the current light attack/reconnaissance helicopter, the OH-58D Kiowa Warrior for over 3 decades. First came the Comanche helicopter program, but after 21 years and $6.9 billion the program was cancelled.
Next the Army developed the ARH-70 (Armed Reconnaissance Helicopter) program which was cancelled after 4 years and cost the taxpayers $3 billion. Most recently, the U.S. Army decided to put on hold their $6-8 billion Armed Aerial Scout helicopter program.
30 years and $10-15 billion of taxpayer dollars later, the U.S. Army only has an updated version of the original OH-58D helicopter they’ve sought to replace. The Kiowa Warrior (as aged as it is) was an essential aircraft through out the war on terror in Iraq and Afghanistan and maintains the most successful mission capability and readiness rate of any other helicopter in the Army’s fleet.
What this comes down to is uncontrollable waste. The Pentagon’s spending priorities are disheveled in addition to their fiscal mismanagement and decision-making abilities. Spending millions on gophers and vacant buildings is a classic example of fraud, waste, and abuse of not only military assets, but taxpayer dollars as well. The Department of Defense even has a hotline people can call for waste like that. And wasting billions on mere attempts to improve military equipment shows a completely broken system that must be addressed.
For this article to be part of my daily updates tells me one thing. Republicans have abandoned the Pentagon and the ground is subtly being laid for sequestration to continue. Democrats won't save the day because they don't like military spending and they have other priorities.
Hagel is running around the country sounding the alarm bells on sequestration but the message is falling on deaf ears. No one is listening and those that are don't believe.
I'm preaching to the wind, but the cuts coming will be much more dramatic than is being told. The service chiefs WILL cut personnel to pay for programs and the only programs that are protected is one. The F-35.
Winslow Wheeler was right.
The F-35 is gobbling the Pentagon. This is turning from a conversation about capability to one concerning affordability. Necessary weapon systems are now threatened to support one airplane.
BTW, since the Armed Aerial Scout was mentioned in there, I thought it's worth noting that Kazakhstan is inducting (with local production or at least assembly) the armed EC645 T2, i.e AAS-72X+, and German Special Forces just purchased EC645T2 (not sure if armed or not).
ReplyDeleteinteresting. if the Marine Corps had opened up the UH-1Y upgrade to new designs at similar costs i could see the AAS-72 winning. it fits more into the light utility attack function rather than a pure scout helicopter. the Army just doesn't use its scouts for anything but light attack and recon. all isn't lost though. i can see the helicopters they sold to the National Guard all getting weaponized in the future and basically getting the capabilities of the AAS-72 without the competition.
DeleteMakes you wonder how many billions have truly been lost in black projects as well. Also when will they ever come up with a program with set goals and leave the goals alone. How much has it cost the tax payers in changing the end goals alone over the past few decades. Could that be a reason why some programs have gotten to costly like the VH-71?
ReplyDelete"Winslow Wheeler was right."
ReplyDeleteLOL Wow Sol how does THAT kool-aid taste!?
The Joint Base Lewis-McChord gopher story is PR to keep the Greens happy. The real reason is to keep housing developments and the like away from the base boundaries, primarily as a noise buffer. Same thing with Eglin.
ReplyDeleteAnd it is land. It can always be re-sold if the price is right. The money is recoverable.
Did you know most of the acreage at Cape Canaveral is a wildlife refuge? Again, a noise and explosion buffer.
While we like to bash the politicians, we need to realize that the Pentagon, both civilian and military have been shooting themselves in the foot for so long on procurement that they think that its both normal and that nobody else will notice.
ReplyDeleteFor example the Army had its Future Combat System which was so badly thought through that they could not decide between a vehicle of less then 16 tons to fit on a C-130 and one over 60 tons with the protection of an M-1 tank. After years and billions of dollars they cancel it and replace it with Ground Combat Vehicle which is also drifting and wasting billions
The Marine One replacement took a new larger more powerful helicopter and so overloaded it that it could not fly and cost billions to cancel. This blog has documented many more Marine screwups
The Air Force tanker replacement was a huge mess both money wise and reputation of everyone involved
The Navy started the LCS program as an experiment but instead of waiting to get results back from the experiment decided to base a major part of the USN shipbuilding plan on it. The Navy also cancelled the Burke DDG program and waited just long enough for the contracts to run out so that when they restarted the costs almost doubled
There are plenty more of these disasters out there and while the politicians had some hand in them, it was mostly the military and civilian leadership in the Pentagon who screwed up. And since nobody gets punished for these screw ups they keep on happening. And then they complain that the don’t have any money and they don’t have any new equipment.
extremely WELL said!
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