via Defense One.
Best case scenario? Sequestration continues. Worst case. Cuts are even deeper.
The Republicans will not save the defense budget which means that if it isn't flowing now, it will be difficult to get that program later.
What does that mean for the USMC?
We're fucked. Amos dithered with the ACV/MPC programs, pushed forward the F-35 and the MV-22 at the cost of everything else and I am seriously questioning the wisdom of it all.
All you airpower zealots better be right because if you're not history and future Marines will curse you and todays JCS.
A group of Republican lawmakers are proposing to slash the civilian workforce at the Defense Department by 15 percent, a move they estimate will save $82.5 billion over five years.Lets see. The defense hawks on the republican side are the like of McCain, Graham, and a few others that escape my memory. Fiscal hawks are being led by the odd couple of Rand Paul and Ted Cruz.
The Rebalance for an Effective Defense Uniform and Civilian Employees, or REDUCE, Act would cut nearly 115,000 jobs from the department, from the current 770,000-person workforce down to about 655,000. Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Calif., who introduced the measure, said the Defense workforce has become unnecessarily bloated over the last decade.
Best case scenario? Sequestration continues. Worst case. Cuts are even deeper.
The Republicans will not save the defense budget which means that if it isn't flowing now, it will be difficult to get that program later.
What does that mean for the USMC?
We're fucked. Amos dithered with the ACV/MPC programs, pushed forward the F-35 and the MV-22 at the cost of everything else and I am seriously questioning the wisdom of it all.
All you airpower zealots better be right because if you're not history and future Marines will curse you and todays JCS.
sad they want to cut civilians but they force the military to buy tanks they dont want! *facepalm*
ReplyDeletefuck civilians. i never understood why a civilian SES rated the same as a flag officer but the fuckers do. besides they're kicking out Marines, Soldiers, Sailors and you didn't say squat about that but you cry for DoD civilians??????
Deletewhy? they useless.
well i am not for downsizing military so i am not defending force reductions and theres alot of things that need to be changed at the pentagon but civilians do alot for DoD and if you cut civilians the work will be done by contractors which concerns me for outsource our defense issues, civilians and uniformed personnel complement each other not conflicting each other.
DeleteNone of the services win in this, it's just about who get fucked less.
ReplyDeleteIf we remove the civilians from the pentagon/DOD, whom are overpaid in my opinion, you can replace them with military personnel, which is the way that it use to be. If a civilian would like to have a military position then they need to follow the same career track as all of the men and women in our military branches. These jobs were originally done by the military anyway, but in the waning Clinton years as they further drew down the military the numbers were off set with these civilian positions, to keep from cutting combat MOS's. Now, today the majority of the slots in the army and Marine Corps are all loosely tied to combat arms rolls, so any cuts to the military will be at its heart. Cut the civilian bull shit so we can keep the core of our military strong. Please don't argue that the civilians are highly trained, I have met many of them and I believe that our young men and women can be taught the same skills, it will just take proper management from the officer corps, big "if" here.
ReplyDeleteexactly right! from what i can tell the civilian DoD are simply overpaid hacks that do jobs better done by servicemembers.
DeleteIt is not a good idea to have parochial military officers running the DoD - particularly acquisition. Look what Amos has done. He has squandered the land force for the sake of gold-plated aviation programs. Flag officers are used to running fiefdoms, not working/leading in the real world where collaboration is important. They frankly have too much autocratic power - which is fine for war fighting - but not so good for long term planning/decision making. Top civilian career professionals - and fewer second-career retired service members - should populate the Pentagon upper echelons, and empowered to make decisions without the brass doing various endarounds. We need dispassionate program managers and auditors run programs without interference, and to ferret out wasteful spending too often justified by services' whims.
ReplyDeleteyou're spot on but let me hasten to add that before Amos, the USMC was well served by its Commandants. only since the arrival of Amos has that position been seen to be detrimental to the Marine Corps.
DeleteThe politicians continue to destroy our military and country it seems.
ReplyDeleteConsidering the fate of the EFV after 20 something years of work the airpower advocates are right if you want to get marines ashore quickly. The Navy isn't willing to go in close with their ships and battle it out against all of the anti-ship missiles.
thats what air sea battle is all about. defeating anti-access threats. additionally the EFV was a 10 year at max development not 20. if you want to count high then i could say that the F-35 has been in development for 30 plus years.
DeleteI need to do some reading in the history of the AAAV. I can't fault the ambitious concept but it just seemed impossible to do very well with today's level of technology, all of those years ago.
DeleteEven presuming the USMC's ACV program works out I doubt it will achieve a large increase in swimming speed/range over the current AAVP-7A1. It won't be able to swim the distance that the Navy will initially want to keep their ships at. With that in mind I think the USMC needs to put more effort into our next generation of hovercraft to succeed the LCAC.