WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE —And that ladies and gentlemen is how a politician rolls out a cut in procurement.
The Air Force will have fewer airmen and civilian employees and entire fleets of aircraft may be pulled out of the air because of sequestration reductions, the service’s top civilian leader said.
“If the sequestered numbers are the new normal, we’re too big of an Air Force,” said Acting Secretary of the Air Force Eric Fanning. “The military is too big for the budget so we’ll have to reshape, resize.”
In an exclusive interview with the Dayton Daily News, Fanning said sequestration has impacted “everything” in the service branch. The Air Force may buy fewer fifth generation F-35 Joint Strike Fighters, and pilots may be grounded periodically two to three months in rolling rotations of a tiered-readiness model if the sequester persists, he said. The automatic cuts amount to roughly 10 percent reductions a year for a decade.
Not with bang, but with a whispered statement.
We "might" buy fewer....
Once again the punch is being telegraphed. 150K or fewer Marines is a done deal. 398K Army. And now we know that the F-35 is in a full fledged death spiral due to its largest customer having to cut orders.
My thoughts that the S. Korean, Japanese (and I'm willing to bet the full court press is on the Singaporeans) and Turkish orders were being pursued with gusto was because the US purchase was going to be lower and they needed to get those sales just to maintain numbers is now proven correct.
The problem now? Costs will increase, numbers further reduced by allies and the biggest ponzi scheme in history will become apparent to all...Not just the early adopters of the idea, not the late arrivers like myself, but to everyone.
