Applause for Secretary Gates

Posted on 04/08/2009 at 10:06 am by Bob Cesca

If you’ve read anything about the power of the military-industrial complex, or if you’ve watched the brilliant documentary Why We Fight, the following summary of Bob Gates’ approach to the Defense budget will make you smile:

First, defense contractors and their Capitol Hill allies are alarmed at how Gates has shut them out of the the decision-making process about the Pentagon budget as he has publicly warned, in vague terms, about making “hard choices” that will place defense systems and weapons programs beloved by the armed services and their contractors on the chopping block. And second, Gates has adopted a strategy for his budget that presumes that most of the defense industry is an obstacle at best and an adversary at worst.

Of course it doesn’t hurt that Gates’ boss is setting the policy.

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  • KenCo

    Unfortunately, as NPR reported yesterday, even though the secretary can cut a program, the Congress can override and reinstate it.Thus, we need to keep Congress under pressure on this.

  • http://nanotyrnns.blogspot.com/ Nanotyrannus

    Exactly, KenCo. Already a Blue Dog Dem from OK is crying about the cuts, even going so far as to say that Obama is endangering national security. Those guys know where the money comes from and will do anything to protect it.

  • http://tarackian.deviantart.com J M Ashby

    Im glad to see they are shit-canning the F22 project. The F22 is a cold war dinosaur and the F35 is the future. The F35 is way more bang for the buck because of its design to be produced in 3 different models to match all three military services. Not only that, but the f22 has been over grossly overbudget from the get-go and has been kept going this long because of politics.

  • GItheJOE

    This is huge. I hope Congress supports the President. There are many in the military who believe that there are endless funds for dumb shit. I call them Battle Ships, Bombers, Submarines, thousands of fighter planes, the Air Force(should return to the Air Corp of the US Army instead of its own branch).

  • http://tarackian.deviantart.com J M Ashby

    Submarines and fighter planes are useless? That may be going a bit far. China’s subs will soon outnumber ours 3 to 1 if they don’t already. If by fighter planes you mean strictly interceptors, then sure they arent much use, but fighter bombers are what saves butts on the ground. This is why the F18 and soon the F35 will remain mainstays for a long long time. Versatility.What is really dumb shit, is the navy having to consider lowering our number of aircraft carriers (which are what keep a lot of regional powers in check) because of huge decades-long overbudget weapons programs that never produce anything useful. Finally thats coming to an end.

  • http://nanotyrnns.blogspot.com/ Nanotyrannus

    I was glad to hear about the F22 as well. Most of what I’d heard was not good, add to that the incredible price tag. Something I think should be considered with any fighter is the difficulty in replacing them. If we were really to engage in some sort of conflict that resulted in the loss of a couple dozen, it would take years to replace them. Gone are the days when you can roll a fighter off the assembly line once per minute.The F22 issue was one that kind of soured me on Ed Schultz a little. He would gush and gush about how awesome it was as if he was selling the plane himself. He made it sound like it was performing exactly as designed and was vital to the war on terror. Neither was true. When has any weapons system worked exactly as designed?

  • NorCalNative

    I agree with you Bob, that this is certainly significant and a smarter way to look at defense. One of the things that always struck me as odd is the way defense spending on certain military materiel is spread out among every one of the fifty U.S. states.I guess the thinking is when jobs can be taken away from every state in the union that Congress then becomes more reluctant to halt or dramatically change the programs.Anything that creates a check on the MIC is a good thing in my view. Putting the expanded powers of the Presidency (unitary executive) back into the bottle remains my primary objective for this administration.So far, Obama has failed to repudiate ALL of the secret laws that Bush/Cheney used to expand power. Kind of makes me think any positive changes at DoD will be cosmetic at best. I hope I’m wrong.

  • brutlyhonest

    First, ensure no one else talks about a defense budget cut: There is more money this year than there was last year, but less than DoD asked for.

    Second, as has been mentioned DoD can only spend money as congress allows. The entire budgeting system (PPBS – google it) is a huge cluster-fuck, that feeds on itself. Ever hear the term self-licking ice cream cone? It never stops.

    I had to fight for every dime I could scrounge to equip the combat unit I commanded, then in my next job I was yelled at by a senior civilian for not spending money fast enough on something far less important (It was a Congressionally mandated program so it had priority).

    That’s the bureaucracy that made me decide to retire rather before my O-6 board. I couldn’t imagine fighting that system another 4 years (1 to put it on and 3 in grade to retire at the new grade).

    PS, the only US battleships are museums. Also, the F18 is a piece of crap. Always has been, always will be – but it “won” the competition over better aircraft in order to keep another defense contractor viable.