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Gates Readies Big Cuts in Weapons
Battle looms with Congress
WASHINGTON - As the Bush administration was drawing to a close, Robert M. Gates, whose two years as defense secretary had been devoted to wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, felt compelled to warn his successor of a crisis closer to home.
Two defense officials who were not authorized to speak publicly said Gates will announce up to a half-dozen major weapons cancellations later this month. More cuts are planned for later this year after a review that could lead to reductions in programs such as aircraft carriers and nuclear arms, the officials said.(AFP/File/Wojtek Radwanski) The United States "cannot expect to eliminate national security risks through higher defense budgets, to do everything and buy everything," Gates said. The next defense secretary, he warned, would have to eliminate some costly hardware and invest in new tools for fighting insurgents.
What Gates didn't know was that he would be that successor.
Now, as the only Bush Cabinet member to remain under President Obama, Gates is preparing the most far-reaching changes in the Pentagon's weapons portfolio since the end of the Cold War, according to aides.
Two defense officials who were not authorized to speak publicly said Gates will announce up to a half-dozen major weapons cancellations later this month. Candidates include a new Navy destroyer, the Air Force's F-22 fighter jet, and Army ground-combat vehicles, the offi cials said.
More cuts are planned for later this year after a review that could lead to reductions in programs such as aircraft carriers and nuclear arms, the officials said.
As a former CIA director with strong Republican credentials, Gates is prepared to use his credibility to help Obama overcome the expected outcry from conservatives. And after a lifetime in the national security arena, working in eight administrations, the 65-year-old Gates is also ready to counter the defense companies and throngs of retired generals and other lobbyists who are gearing up to protect their pet projects.
"He has earned a great deal of credibility over the past two years, both inside and outside the Pentagon, and now he is prepared to use it to lead the department in a new direction and bring about the changes he believes are necessary to protect the nation's security," said Geoff Morrell, the Pentagon press secretary.
Gates is not the first secretary to try to change military priorities. His predecessor, Donald H. Rumsfeld, sought to retool the military but succeeded in cancelling only one major project, an Army artillery system.
Former vice president Dick Cheney's efforts as defense chief under the first President Bush, meanwhile, are cited as a case study in the resistance of the military, defense industry, and Capitol Hill. Cheney canceled the Marine Corps' troubled V-22 Osprey aircraft not once, but four times, only to see Congress reverse the decision.
"There are so many people employed in the industry and they are spread across the country," William S. Cohen, former Republican senator from Maine who was Defense secretary in the Clinton administration, said in an interview. "Even though members of Congress may say, 'It's great that you are recommending the termination of X, Y, and Z,' they will also say 'that means 4,000 jobs in my state. Frankly, I can't go along with that.' "
Major weapons cuts could be an even tougher sell now, he added. "When you start talking about an economy that is in a state of considerable turmoil it becomes even more difficult," Cohen said.
Yet even some of the Pentagon's fiercest critics, such as Winslow Wheeler of the liberal Center for Defense Information, believe the Obama administration may have a unique opportunity with Gates at the helm.
Wheeler, a former Capitol Hill defense aide, noted that Gates has shown a unique toughness, including removing the Army secretary and the civilian and military heads of the Air Force for lapses on their watch.
"That demonstrates there is a spine there," said Wheeler.
Such dramatic moves were easier for Gates because he spent much of his career as an intelligence analyst warning about the threats of Soviet Communism. Now, as a Cold War veteran in an administration perceived to be lacking in defense experience, he is perhaps the only person capable of pushing through big cutbacks.
"He obviously has huge credibility as something of a hawk," said James Shinn, who worked for Gates as assistant Defense secretary in the Bush administration. "No one can even remotely challenge Gates in terms of his well-informed and conservative approach toward threats and the weapon systems associated with threats."
In between briefing books and intelligence assessments, Gates recently read "Agincourt," a novel about the medieval battle in which the British Army routed a much larger French force with a new weapon, the longbow, that was able to penetrate French armor. A turning point in the Hundred Years War, in 1415, the battle could serve as an analogy for the changes Gates believes are necessary to pursue terrorists.
Today's security threats, Gates believes, are far different from when, during his first week on the job as a CIA analyst in 1968, the Soviet Army invaded Czechoslovakia.
"Let's be honest with ourselves," Gates told the National Defense University last September. "The most likely catastrophic threats to our homeland - for example, an American city poisoned or reduced to rubble by a terrorist attack - are more likely to emanate from failed states than from aggressor states."
Gates has said it would be "irresponsible" not to plan for the possibility that another nation could threaten US military dominance, but he pointed out that the US Navy is larger than the next 13 navies combined, 11 of which are American allies.
"US air and sea forces have ample untapped striking power should the need arise to deter or punish aggression - whether on the Korean Peninsula, in the Persian Gulf, or across the Taiwan Strait," he wrote in the latest issue of Foreign Affairs magazine.
As for fears of a resurgent Russia, Gates said, "As someone who used to prepare estimates of Soviet military strength for several presidents, I can say that Russia's conventional military, although vastly improved since its nadir in the late 1990s, remains a shadow of its Soviet predecessor."
Gates's budget plans remain closely guarded, but aides say his decisions will be guided by the time he has spent with soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan.
One aide who has traveled with Gates more than a dozen times said the secretary "is particularly keen and aware of the urgent operational needs on the ground."
That likely means greater investments in intelligence-gathering systems such as pilotless drone aircraft, special-operations forces and equipment, and advanced cultural training for military personnel, aides said.
Girding for a showdown with Congress, Gates took the unusual step of making the Joint Chiefs of Staff and other participants in budget deliberations sign nondisclosure agreements to prevent leaks.
But already lawmakers and defense contractors are preparing to fight back. Lockheed, maker of the F-22 jet, recently launched an ad campaign to protect its fighter. Northrop Grumman, which could face cutbacks to its ship-building programs, has hired consultants to write op-eds. Unions are raising alarms about job losses.
Even his closest friends acknowledge Gates is in the bureacratic fight of his life.
- Posted in
43 Comments so far
Show All""US air and sea forces have ample untapped striking power should the need arise to deter or punish aggression - whether on the Korean Peninsula, in the Persian Gulf, or across the Taiwan Strait," he wrote in the latest issue of Foreign Affairs magazine."
Finally, they realize we have more than enough firepower to wipe out any country on the planet. Stop building more damnit!
Thank you, President Obama.
Oh? And just what is on the drawing boards at foreign design bureaus? Nothing. The F14/16/17 despite being 30+ years old are still, and will remain, the best fighters in the air for many years to come.
Get a clue. There are no other military superpowers, not even close. The F22, like the B2, are antiquated and offer nothing in the new age of a sole superpower.
Like air superiority has demonstrated its self to be useful against failed states. Not! I will admit that it has proven useful for shooting fish in a barrel like Gaza.
The Cold War is dead. Ain't ever going to happen again. The Russians and Chinese know better than that and are refining other tools.... economic tools. The US needs to wake up and realize that military response is so 20th Century.
I'd like to see the new subs and carriers canceled.
Never criticize a man until you've walked a mile in his moccasins - Native American proverb.
The F-14 was canceled recently, the new F-18s replaced it...and the F-15 pretty much remains the best fighter in the world, hands-down. I'd also call for canceling the subs, but carriers can be used for aid missions too.
The F-15s superiority is subjective. It has only fought against third world air forces.
I hear you. I subscribe to the notion of pulling all our forces home, and developing defensive technologies for a defensive military. So unless we go to war with Mexico or Canada, air-superiority and fighter aircraft are irrelevant. The fighters we have developed (and deployed) have all been used for fighting a foreign "enemy" on their turf, and we all recognize the folly in that.
Frankly, Hellfire/Phoenix-equipped Cessna 172's would be more than adequate for taking out the Canadians and the Mexicans. LOL. Ya gotta watch the South Park movie.
Never criticize a man until you've walked a mile in their moccasins - Native American proverb.
There's the F-35 too, as a multirole fighter. The F-22 is just an interceptor, mostly good for long-range bomber interception and air-to-air.
The F-22 and F-35 are two of the worst projects in the Pentagon. Pilots hate them; they are unsafe, unreliable, and way too expensive. Here's some military-friendly sources on why these programs should be cancelled:
http://images.military.com/Audio/FTED29.mp3
http://www.military.com/NewsContent/0,13319,131905,00.html
The first is an MP3 panel debate, which is very worth listening to, for some background on why the procurement process is so broken.
"Though they do suffer from a recurring problem we have always had of trying to make a plane that is all things to all people instead of making a plane that is really, really good at a few tasks."
The newest versions of the F-15 seem to be excellent in all roles..the problem is replacing what's already the best.
The F-22 is already obsolete in its intended role. There was a risk of cancellation due to that but thanks to the lobby it survived. The F-35 is an accident waiting to happen. The Russians with their current fleet of modernized SU-27 and variants plus the updated Mig-29s have made the F-22 a giant waste of money despite whatever the Military Industrial Complex says.
You said that its role is to be superior that the Su27, Mig. And I am telling you that it fails in that regard with the newer variants of both, the Sukhois and Migs. Stop watching the Military Channel. It is just the military's propaganda channel.
What facts do you want? Discovery channel or the local magazines? neither of those have any facts that are not biased. But you can believe what you want.
Dude, you can't comprehend can you? BTW, I do work in the industry. So you can take it for whats it worth. If it makes you feel better sleeping at night then so be it.
Are you one of those that claims everything made in the USA is the best in the world? I mean really? I suggest you go educate yourself with publications that are not US based. You might learn a thing or two.
I bet you really believe that the NBA champion are WORLD champions, or baseball teams in the US are WORLD series champions....
The F-22 was designed to compete with a Soviet design that was canceled probably before I was born. And again, it's an interceptor, not an air superiority fighter...the roles are similar, but a little different. The F-16 and F-15 can both fulfill the air superiority role.
Agreed.
I have been waiting for intelligent news about weaponry. Mr. Gates is "right on" about downsizing and illiminating some weapons systems. How many nuclear weapons do you need?
Our defense department needs to work with the intelligence community to find old weapons from the Soviet Union and other countries that are on the market and purchase and destroy these old weapons. Often they leak radioactive material and are very unsafe in themselves or in the hands of "terrorists". This is a very good move on the part of Defense and the Obama administration.
"Finally, they realize we have more than enough firepower to wipe out any country on the planet. Stop building more damnit!"
Good comments to this article. It is time to start thinking about when enough is enough.
One step at a time.......
Agincourt, "A turning point in the Hundred Years War" - ROFL!
Let's review today's history lesson - before the war the English controlled some territory in France. After the war the English controlled no territory in France, despite victories such as Crecy, Poitiers and Agincourt.
The English won almost all of the battles but lost the war. Actually, a pretty good lesson for today.
Yeah, and that was when the overseas front was just a couple dozen miles away.
Too bad the Bush regime blew the national treasury on murdering a million Iraqis who had nothing to do with attacking the WTC.
One does not have to be stupid to be a US citizen . . . but the US boss class sure appreciates it.
Cut them all already. None of them have proven anything successful other than creating more terrorists and funerals of the innocent with them. Divert that money towards paying down a great deal of our debt and providing single payer !
To be honest, fuck the debt, I'd prefer to see the US default...then the super-rich owners of the Fed and China will be out a buttload of money...then we can create a government bank to create credit, instead of borrowing it from the Fed.
Retaining Gates at defense to cut military spending might be a brilliant move by President Obama. We'll see how it all shakes out.
Because Obama can point to Gates and say "Bush's Defense Secretary is the one pushing for weapon program cuts, blame Bush" when the Republicans fight to keep them.
What better way to make the cuts than to have a "hawk" make them? How can the hawks in congress say no?
Wow Sanity has returned! Check out the thirty tridents- a huge waste! Put these guys to work building positive things like space age infra-structure. It will not happen unless he gives the arms manufacturers a new tit to suck. Time to rid the world of aircraft carriers too. The savings will be immense.
Eh, I think carriers are one big thing we'll need for the future, in case there are any future global aggressors (besides us, hah). It's definitely our biggest advantage.
... and who are all these countries we are defending against?
Global Warfare and Nuclear Warfare is obsolete. The End Game of it is Planetary Annihilation, the End of Life as most life forms on the Planet experience it, with the exception of a few insects, such as roaches, which seem to be inured to radiation and other poisonings. ...
It's still all about the money made to continue all these mini-wars with more clever items, e.g., drones, to kill impersonally. Casting ourselves ... AGAIN ... as the Control-of-Other-Nations Police with the shadow side as Rapists-of- Other-Nations'-Resources Dough Boys is the continuing movie saga, usually starring White Colonialists or Colonially-derived peoples with some form of the Christian or Hebrew religion in the background.
Electing Barack Obama has been a big step, as a racially mixed person. But he was essentially raised and schooled ... in elite schools ... by White Colonial derivatives with Comfortable Christianity lurking in the background. Lip service to CC's teachings and a few pious appearances at houses of worship are good enough. If you're from Harvard or Yale or other elite schools, no one really expects you to take your religion all that seriously.
We really do need, however, a transformation/evolution of consciousness or perhaps more aptly a return to the ancient wisdoms of Interconnectedness and Harmony with the Earth and all its Life Forms and looking ahead to the possible effects of our actions on the 7th generation past ours. Excellent way to view the future.
Obama is certainly an improvement over the last eight years, but the breadth of his visionary vocabulary is still short on World Peace and recognizing that Militancy and Corporatism is not the way to go, and continue to go to set our Nation and our constant partner, Great Britain, apart as something special within this 600-Billioned and-still-counting Galaxies of this one Universe.
I perceive Obama more and more as another conditioned Yuppie in the I DESERVE IT crowd that came in with Ronald Reagan's ME, MYSELF, and I generation, despite his stint as a Community Organizer. He loves his adorable little girls so much, but I've yet to hear him acknowledge or see anything resembling a bit of heartache in his eyes at the news of other little girls having their skin peel off or their limbs disappear as White Phosophorus and bits-of-steel bombs burn them and cut them to pieces, whether in Gaza or anywhere else.
Maybe that is an unfair assessment, but if Obama continues to promote the United States as the BE-ALL and END-ALL of National Good in the world, along with Might Makes Right, then despite his very obvious intellect and talk of returning to our original marvelous morality [his former friend and pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, speaks uncomfortable Truth about that], he is not the man many of us originally thought he was and is.
Yes, our compassionate, honorable morality has shone at particular times within particular groupings and in the actions of particular individuals, but it is disproved by an honest study of our own history as a nation and our actual intentions. [Howard Zinn is one of several authors whose books say it best.]
Robert Gates, the President, and Congress should be commended if military spending is cut and a few trillion dollars is shaken out of the budget to help our current economic woes. However, there's still that 2.3 TRILLION dollars not accounted for that former Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, was announcing on the newscasts on September 10, 2001, as "disappeared" monies. Wherever could those TRILLIONS be? Haven't heard a thing about it from any official sources since September 11, 2001. How convenient.
What if we really cleaned up our act and those who are responsible for International Crimes Against Humanity no matter how high in the government they were or are were brought to justice? What if President Obama re-signed and ratified The Rome Statute, which provides the clout to try individuals for War Crimes and Violations of Human Rights in the International Criminal Court at The Hague?
GWBush as well as Ariel Sharon denounced their respective nation's presidential (Bill Clinton)/prime ministerial (Ehud Barak) ratifying signatures of December 31, 2000, in May 2002. Further, GW's administration did everything possible to change other nations' minds about signing up or renouncing their signatures. But The Rome Statute was ratified by the required number of nations and it came into force in July 2002. Again, how convenient for the U.S. and Israel to withdraw from that treaty. Makes one wonder, doesn't it, what was up their sleeves that they had to protect themselves and their respective nations?
What if we gave a War and nobody came? What a Day that would be. What if Annual Peace Conferences with all Nations with an agenda whose intention was to solve just one or two world-wide problems [e.g., clean water and enough food for everyone], by true and committed cooperation with and helpfulness to each other, were held instead of the annual, secret Bilderberg Group meetings of the richest, most powerful people of the world whose bent seems to be the control of money and people. ... What a change that would be in the Race Against Time we are in.
The Transformation of Hearts and Minds toward a peaceful, harmonious, benevolent human civilization, respectful of and celebrating our cultural differences, is not yet here.
But it can be if that is what we all REALLY want.
/cm
ADDENDUM TO MY LAST COMMENT:
[Cee Miracles: The Transformation of Hearts and Minds toward a peaceful, harmonious, benevolent human civilization, respectful of and celebrating our cultural differences, is not yet here.
But it can be if that is what we all REALLY want.]
What if our powerful computer technologies were used in one cooperative International Organization with input from regional computers to a master computer to redesign our earthly civilization in terms of green energies, buildings, cities, and who needed what, and what resources are on the brink and how and where and what do we redesign, stop doing or do to be able to feed everyone, provide for everyone, what weather factors or earthly/oceanic changes are important for future planning, etcetera.
This grand design, which I've just touched on, has been introduced on www.thezeitgeistmovement.com site, and is available for download.
www.thezeitgeistmovement.com/A-DesigningtheFutureE-BOOK-small.pdf
The Zeitgeist Action manual is there too in pdf.
To me, it is a brilliant approach to solving the earth's and humanity's most pressing problems. The computer technology is already here to parse information, do the math and figuring, and come up with positive, workable solutions.
Many of you who have commented seem quite knowledgeable about weapons and probably are quite expert on computers. Thus, you might find Designing the Future, as above, based on the enormous capabilities of current computer technologies intriguing as an idea that perhaps could go far to bring us through from this dark, narrow place we are in to something Bright, Do-able, and Across-the-Boards Benevolent.
Will look forward to your responses if you read it.
/cm
Nah, I just was fascinated about WW2 battle since I was 4 or so and read about military hardware ever since, up until a couple years ago. And I'm definitely no expert in computers. Took me months to figure out how to stop overwriting on MS Word.
STOP THE WEAPONIZATION OF SPACE.
Everyone will be safer. American weapons in space will be expensive, and will greatly destabilze the world. It is time all countries get together and figure this thing out, and not for America to act unilateraly. With climate change, failed states, terrorist organizations, and just plain old human error tragedy will certainly ensue. We have to get rid of all nuclear weapons before the unthinkable happens.
China, Iran, G.B., France, Israel, India, Russia, Pakistan, N. Korea, and everybody need to sit down and figure out how we are going to live together in this world. This is madness - what we are doing to ourselves. Who is this enemy we are fighting?
Air power has largely been used only to terrorize civilians. What little other uses it has do not justify the expense. Modern wars are largely terroristic in nature anyway - civilians are the real target. This has been the case since WWII - it is how WWII was prosecuted, by terrorizing civilians. That doesn't work - especially in wars of aggression, which are the onlly kind of wars being prosecuted in modern times. Same goes for nukes - it's all about terrorism, not defense.
Guaranteed a lot of the money that is cut out of the budget off of big ticket items, will be spent on robot attack jets like the x45. I read a few years back that the bombs they're making for the x45 to carry are very cheap. They're guided, precision weapons. The x45 can outfly any plane that has a pilot, because the pilot is restricted by G force from turning too hard, otherwise he'll pass out. So the declining military budget is no good sign. It's a measure to prevent there from being so much military hardware for the resistance to exploit. The demonic leaders are still going to have what they need to maintain their dominance, for sure.