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General: Expect War for 5-10 More Years
For the next "five to 10 years," the military likely will remain engaged in the same kinds of conflicts it has been fighting since 2001, said Marine Corps Gen. James Cartwright.
"There is nothing out there that tells us we won't be wrapped up in these conflicts for as far as the eye can see," Cartwright said at the Center for Strategic and International Studies-sponsored forum. (AFP/Getty Images/File/Chip Somodevilla) The vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs on Thursday told a conference in Washington that "no one I know thinks we'll be out of" these kinds of conflicts any time soon.
"There is nothing out there that tells us we won't be wrapped up in these conflicts for as far as the eye can see," Cartwright said at the Center for Strategic and International Studies-sponsored forum.
In coming years, however, the military might be tasked with fighting these kinds of wars "in different places and at different levels," Cartwright said.
He did not point to specific nations into which U.S. forces or assets might be deployed over the next decade beyond Iraq and the Afghanistan-Pakistan region.
His comments come several days after Defense Secretary Robert Gates told reporters traveling with him to Kansas that he doubts Washington will soon launch another "protracted" operation like the ones in Iraq and Afghanistan. One reason, Gates said May 7, was the high cost of such missions, especially amid the ongoing economic crisis.
Meantime, the vice chairman echoed Gates in saying the Defense Department must change how it goes about buying weapon systems.
The duo's message is simple: If DoD continues pursuing expensive weapons packed with countless advanced subsystems, it will be able to afford only a handful of each platform.
Cartwright said this approach, unless corrected, has the military on a path toward lacking enough ships and aircraft to be in all the many places American presence is required.
"We need quantity more than quality," he said to a silent audience.
Cartwright panned a military-industrial complex that "thinks we must have the best capability."
That kind of approach, he said, is unaffordable, meaning the Pentagon must begin working more with U.S. allies to develop costly weapon platforms.
"We cannot do it," Cartwright said. "We cannot afford to do everything ourselves - we are not an island."
Further, the Pentagon must think beyond which weapons it must buy for current and future operations.
Asked about civil affairs troops, Cartwright said many more are needed for the kind of conflicts America is in and will be in for the some time.
"We have been growing that in onesies and twosies," he said, but faster growth and more robust numbers of such troops are needed.
"The question is, how many bomber squadrons do we need versus how many troops expert at stability operations," Cartwright said.
He did not answer his own question directly, but reiterated his belief that he doesn't see the United States moving away from the current kinds of conflicts "any time soon."
Cartwright drove home his point by adding: "People want to buy high-end" platforms, like bombers, "but the low-end is the war we're in."
- Posted in
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10 more years minimum at what? Outside the weapons procurement operational costs for these wars are around 20 billion a month...Thats two trillion dollars down the tubes at minimum. For what? To build stable democracies like Iraq?
>>The duo's message is simple: If DoD continues pursuing expensive weapons packed with countless advanced subsystems, it will be able to afford only a handful of each platform.
So....it is cheaper to stop buying weapons and use more troops and involve oneself in more wars instead? What the heck is this guy saying?
Stop buying expensive weapons so that we can afford more wars?
It's not like we can resell them Srsly whens the last time you saw a fanatic terrorist with an M16 no the world mostly uses Kalishnikofs and simpler to maintain weapons.
I feel much safer with the seawolf submarine out there... Keeps the Whales from getting uppity.
Course the Japanise do the same with three ships all the whie being chased by Greenpeace.
>^^<
The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 brought an end to the Cold War and presented the US with an opportunity and a problem. The opportunity was for the US to secure the gas and oil fields of the Middle East and Central Asia which hold 70% of the world’s oil and natural gas reserves. The problem was that the collapse also deprived the Military Industrial Complex of an enemy to justify its $700 Billion per year franchise, and US public was clamoring for a peace dividend.
The problem was resolved in 2001 with the 9-11 Incident. The 9-11 Incident provided the Military Industrial Complex with a new enemy. President Bush used the 9-11 Incident to enact the Patriot Act, drastically scaling back civil liberties, allowing wider surveillance of citizens, and detention of suspects, and used the incident to establish military bases in Iraq and Afghanistan which secured US access to Middle East and Central Asian gas and oil.
Let's not forget that it was Bill Clinton who first reneged on the peace dividend that he promised as a result of the end of the cold war.
Our militarist empire is a bi-partisan affair.
Specifically, how did Clinton "renege" on the promise of the peace dividend?
q
By not slashing the 'defense' budget by 50%.
Why do you need a 500 ship navy when the rest of the world keeps a few dozen small ships per country?
Why do you need to spend more on the military than the rest of the world combined?
Saturnalia
Bingo! Very well said.
Clinton reneged by actually increasing defense spending rather than reducing it.
So true, but come on. Repiglicans have been pushing alot harder than Dems. The only resistance has been coming from some Dems (and now a Paul, a libertarian)
The small number of disssenting Dems are ineffective. Regardless of which major party is in power, we get war and increased defense spending war.
Obama's Defense budgets are billions more than previous Bush budgets. We have more troops in combat than under Bush.
Yes, as of now. However, at least the Dems have not been the leaders in the US decline since Reagan. At least the Dems do not have a party ideology of death, destruction, and deregulation. That is a fact. Don't tell me about Clinton signing dereg laws - that is way, way besides the point.
Cicero: "Freedom is participation in power."
Bullshit. Clinton's signing of NAFTA and the WTO which gutted our middle-class manufacturing base like a fish; his deregulation of the Telecomm industry in 1996; his deregulation of the banks (including his gutting of the highly effective Glass-Steagall Act) and his deregulation of derivatives were at the very core of America's social and economic decline. His "welfare reforms" were a knife in the back of the poor. Bush piled onto the damage Clinton began with unprecedented war-time tax cuts for the rich and escalated war spending through the stratosphere, but Obama has been absolutely gutless on the subject of raising taxes on the super-rich and is increasing war spending levels over those of Bush. Don't hand me your chicken shit Democratic Party apologism. The Democratic Party is as soulless, fascist and even more politically pointless than the GOP whom it aids, abets and emulates at every step. The reason there have been no serious Congressional hearings on or investigations of Bush II era war crimes (and they are legion and many of them well documented) is because senior DLC Democrats in Congress at the time (David Rockefeller, Pelosi, Harmon, Edwards, Reid, etc.) were complicit with most of those crimes and helped cover them up throughout Bush II's maladministration. Nancy Pelosi is the wife of a former Vice President of the multi-billion dollar DOE and DOD defense contractor Bechtel. She knows who butters her bread.
Right-wing Democrats worked with Republicans starting in the very early 1980s to help collectivize family farm land into corporate agri-giants (via CED policies) and pass more laws legalizing predatory lending and usurious interest rates than any other government in world history. The Democratic Party betrayed the working-class starting in the 1980s so it could avoid a difficult fight over true campaign finance reform and abet the GOP in comforting and protecting the upper-class and the upper-middle-class professionals who support them and keep the rest of society docile and brainwashed.
The problem - need for an enemy - was resolved in 1990, when Saddam Hussein was suckered into an invasion of Kuwait.A U.S. admiral at the time was quoted as saying "if you're looking for the peace dividend, it just left on a carrier headed for the Gulf." Permanent military presence in the Mid east started then, quickly followed by NATO's gradual encroachment into the Baltics. 9-11 kicked already existing trends into hyper-drive.
Glaspie was accused of having given tacit approval for the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, which took place on August 2, 1990. It was argued that Glaspie's statements that "We have no opinion on your Arab-Arab conflicts" and that "the Kuwait issue is not associated with America" were interpreted by Saddam as giving free rein to handle his disputes with Kuwait as he saw fit.
Glaspie prefaced her remarks by stating something along the lines of "I have been instructed to tell you that this (we have no opinion/not associated with America) comes to you directly from (Secretary of State) James Baker". It was Iraq who released the transcript of this meeting. Glaspie and the State Dept, other than confirming the meeting took place, have never commented or clarified what that was all about.
Glaspie's meeting followed an Arab summit at which Iraq's problems with Kuwait (slant drilling into Iraqi territory) were discussed but not resolved. King Hussein of Jordan was incensed at a lackadaisical approach to the issue from both Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. When he complained that failure to resolve this might lead to military action, he was blown off by the Saudis, who - he suspected - were acting deliberately in helping to provoke such an event. King Hussein said that the Saudis and Kuwaitis seemed to know something that the others at the summit didn't (this was reported by James Ridgeway in the Village Voice in the autumn of 1990).
Cicero: "Freedom is participation in power."
Peak Cold War annual budgets for the Pentagon under Reagan & Bush Sr. never exceeded $300 Billion dollars. Obama's last Pentagon budget was $740 Billion, give or take a few tens of billions being periodically voted on as supplementals.
John T. Bennett: "(General) James Cartwright drove home his point by adding: 'People (i.e. The War Department and other warmongers at the Pentagon) want to buy high-end' platforms, like bombers, 'but the low-end is the war we're in.'"
But General, if the Amerikkkan government buys "low-end" products from the military industrial complex, how will the CEOs of the defense contractors get their fat bonuses and be able to give bribes, er, I mean campaign contributions to our so-called representatives in The White House and Congress?
You better be careful, General, President Barry might fire your ass for not toeing the fascist party line.
Cicero: "Freedom is participation in power."
He's speaking in purely fiscal terms but it remains to be seen whether Obama, being the flaccid tool that he is, has the spine to do ANY cuts in the Pentagon budget, let alone significant ones. I don't want to offend female posters on CD, but Obama is the biggest limp-wristed pussy I've EVER seen in U.S. politics, let alone read about as having occupied the White House. We've had our share of stiffs and zombies as presidents in the 19th and 20th centuries. But never a skinny little girl who always looks like he's about to bust out crying like this preening, oreo, neo-liberal walking diarrhea, Ovomit.
Cartwright is going to find that revolving door locked when he leaves the Pentagon.
Still, it's something of a relief to see someone in the military pushing back against the industrial part of the MIC.
q
Dumbass' rule the world
US wars of imperial aggression are going to continue for the next 5 to 10 years? Try the next fifty to one hundred years. The US military has been intervening in third world countries, off and on, here and there, for the last one hundred and twelve years. The US military and the CIA are the biggest terrorists in the world: at least six million residents of third world countries have been murdered since 1898. Right now we are killing residents of Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan, to protect and enhance American corporate greed.
I really wish the littler, weaker kids on the playground where this 'great game' is unfolding would gang up on the bully and stomp the shit out of him, beat his ass to within one inch of losing his arrogant worthless life.
Kent,
Afghans rise UP!
Chelsea
It might work best if ALL the playground (Earth) kids stand together and face down the bullies; it should be less about labels and nationalities, more about unity for peace and human rights and the proper progress of the human race (the only real 'race'). Bullies are actually out-numbered at all times and usually are secret cowards, too.
Cicero: "Freedom is participation in power."
It would be best if enough American progressives would unite and stand up to their own country's fascists.
It's a good thing the general doesn't know much about economics. If he did he'd have mentioned what happens to nation states that spend too much on wars that go on for too long. I think Sun Tzu might have mentioned something about that in 'the Art of War' a few centuries ago, but it was written in Chinese and it's ancient military history so we can excuse the jarhead from knowing about it. After all, he's just a general...
Cicero: "Freedom is participation in power."
Our country ceased to be democratic when the Rehnquist Supreme Court issued its arbitrary and unprecedented ruling equating free speech with money for the purposes of political campaigns. The current Court's ruling in Citizens United vs. FEC granting corporations full "legal personhood" to include free speech rights equivalent to those of flesh and blood citizens drove the final nail into the coffin. We are living under a fascist oligarchy who is operating our economy as a plutonomy for the increasingly exclusive service of themselves.
Sun Tzu: "There is no instance of a country having benefited from prolonged warfare."
Sun Tzu also said that the greatest victory is won without fighting. Think China.
"We need quantity more than quality," he said to a silent audience.
silent and braindead..
Cicero: "Freedom is participation in power."
They were silent because most of them either already have a career or plan a career in the current, limitless, big money high-tech, top-dollar weapons system addicted military-industrial complex whose braindead "strategies" have helped cut their own fiscal throat as well as that of the entire country. They are living in denial of what that means for many of them: No MIC sugar tit like daddy, granddaddy and great-granddaddy took for granted. Some of them might have to actually figure out how to make a living doing a real job in the civilian world and that's a sobering thought indeed these daze.
It's a joke. General: "no one I know thinks we'll be out of.." yeah, no kidding. No one he knows.
Whether it's Brawn (G.W.Bush) or Brains (Obama) not much has changed.
Most of us are STILL getting screwed.
Brains and brawn? Dubya was an opportunistic coward and so is ... oh, wait, I repeat myself.
the brawny cheerleader
The U.S. Government; the U.S. Defense Industry; and the Pentagon love wars and do not want to see them ever,ever,ever end! No General James Cartwright, not 5 or 10 more years but many, many years because these people love endless wars and even if the wars ended tomorrow in Iraq and Afghanistan, the MIC would have to invent a new enemy and a bogeyman because the Government; the war profiteering, Defense Industry; and the military love wars.
Ahhh time for a little Motorhead:
I am the one, Orgasmatron, the outstretched grasping hand
My image is of agony, my servants rape the land
Obsequious and arrogant, clandestine and vain
Two thousand years of misery, of torture in my name
Hypocrisy made paramount, paranoia the law
My name is called religion, sadistic, sacred whore.
I twist the truth, I rule the world, my crown is called deceit
I am the emperor of lies, you grovel at my feet
I rob you and I slaughter you, your downfall is my gain
And still you play the sycophant and revel in your pain
And all my promises are lies, all my love is hate
I am the politician, and I decide your fate
I march before a martyred world, an army for the fight
I speak of great heroic days, of victory and might
I hold a banner drenched in blood, I urge you to be brave
I lead you to your destiny, I lead you to your grave
Your bones will build my palaces, your eyes will stud my crown
For I am Mars, the god of war, and I will cut you down.
--L Kilmister
excellent!
Cicero: "Freedom is participation in power."
The "orgasmatron" was an artificial orgasm generating booth in the Woody Allen sci-fi movie Sleeper.
You need to be a little more original than that.
A better title for the article would have been:
"Expect War for 5-10 More Years": General Electric
Hello everyone, we would not be in this mess if it were not for Isreal. We would not be in Afganistan nor would we be in Iraq. Americans do not need to fear Arabs. But Isreal does, and thats why we are where we are. Corp-Gov can paint it any way they want. Only a fool would accept the Corp-Gov story on what happened on 9-11-01. Now I agree that the way we turn the other way when Isreal is so unkind to the Palistinians pisses off the Arabs but come on, this is the USA. I get by with a little help from my friends, gonna try with a little help from my friends. No way they did it alone. WAKE UP PEOPLE!!! Step away from the TV. Think for yourself. But you know, what would our young people do without war, jobs are scarce?!
I think the oil and gas have a little something to do with it...
Lucky,
Indeed.
REMINDING THE READERS OF "THE CARLYLE GROUP" and their plans and hopes to reduce the population of humans on this planet to ONE BILLION.
remember, remember eleven september
ever remember the 5th of November! trechery, treason, and madness in the air!
Perpetual war for perpetual profit
If this General were a sane man, he realize that current failures are evidence of a failed strategy.
And what does the General think he'll have after another decade of killing civilians, bombing and shooting up the country?
A depopulated, hostle landscape with no civilian infrastructure and a list of war crimes as long as his arm, unsupportable debt and a depleted military is the likely outcome.
Whereas speedy withdrawal would mean money in the bank, the gratitude of the Afghan people and the American people and a return to sanity.
I don't think our teenaged president and the military he is letting push him around, know the difference between winning and losing.
Cicero: "Freedom is participation in power."
It's not about any of them or that. It's about the Unocal pipeline route through Afghanistan and its other mineral wealth.