Why Does Military Suffer These Budget Cuts
Feb 24, 2014 Military
Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel has recommended cutting the military from 520,000 to 450,000. He has also recommended closing some bases in the US and reducing benefits for military members.
Hagel said that after the prolonged wars in Iraq and Afghanistan the planners are not planning on conducting long and large stability operations. Basically, there are no plans to have a big, drawn out conflict.
I hope America’s enemies got this memo because they will not hesitate to fight a long and drawn out war.
Why is it that government, when run by Democrats, cuts the military to solve money problems? Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, and now Barack Obama cut our forces. It looks great on paper but when the stuff hits the fan we need boots on the ground. Former Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld was blasted when he said you go to war with the military you have but that is true. It is also true that the military we had when he said it was given to us by Clinton.
How will America respond when some big military event takes place (like say WWIII) and we have to have a draft to get enough people to fight the long protracted war the planners are not planning to conduct?
Why are member of the military having their benefits cut when this nation has many multiples of our military strength on welfare? Why do we not talk about cutting welfare and other social programs? Hell, they could probably make up the defense budget shortfall by getting rid of the Obamaphone program.
If our planners are not planning on a big long war why do we need to cut military bases in the US? We have plenty of military bases in other nations that we can close and save a ton of money. We really don’t need to project our strength forward if we are not going to have big long wars. We can respond to hotspots from bases in the US.
Hagel said the focus will be on protecting the homeland so let’s do it by keeping the bases in our homeland open and closing those bases in other nations.
Let’s cut welfare and ensure our warriors get the benefits they deserve, they earned and that we promised to them.
I agree with the plan to phase out older equipment but when we get rid of aging equipment we need to replace it with modern stuff or we will be severely behind the power curve. When the day comes that we need to go big it will be too late to start modernizing our armed forces.
The military is a necessary part of our country. It is there to protect us and keep us free. Part of that is being big enough and lethal enough to deter those who would attack us. The recommendations of Secretary Hagel weaken us as a nation and that is a position that we cannot and should not tolerate.
Yes, the military is an expensive part of government but it is a small part of the pie. Social welfare programs and unfunded liabilities are multiples of the Defense budget. We get the best bang for our buck (pun intended) with a strong well funded military.
It is much more valuable to the nation than welfare programs and spending programs that are not called for in our Constitution and are not helpful to the nation.
I hope that Congress makes the right decisions or one day in the future we will regret these cuts.
Source:
AFP
Cave canem!
Never surrender, never submit.
Tags: cuts, defense budget, weakness, welfare
Hiding History At The War College
Dec 18, 2013 Commentary, Military
The US Army War College in Pennsylvania has been around for a long time. It teaches high ranking Army officers about military history and they learn battle tactics. It is one of those tickets senior officers get punched to get promoted. I know many officers who have attended and they say it was a valuable experience for them. Any time someone can learn it is good.
So long as the students are learning accurate history.
This is America and we have blemishes because we have a flawed past. We held human beings as slaves and we discriminated against them when they were no longer slaves. We fought a war amongst ourselves and we put Japanese Americans in internment camps solely because they were Japanese.
But as a nation we have learned along the way and we look at those blemishes and try to make today a better day than yesterday. We no longer have slavery and most people think that is a good thing and wonder how we could have ever had such an institution. We look at how Japanese Americans were treated and wonder how our government could have done that and then we realize the government could do it again.
And don’t get started on how Native Americans were treated after we got here and TOOK their land from them.
Through it all we retell those stories and we keep that history as a reminder of a less than perfect past that our nation lived. It teaches us that we were not perfect then and we are not perfect now. We have gotten better and we are still the greatest nation on this planet BUT we are far from perfect.
The Army War College is reportedly considering removing statues and paintings of Confederate Generals. It seems that some folks are upset that we have these things honoring men who fought against this nation. I believe the term was enemies of this nation.
The men who fought in the Civil War for the Confederate states were enemies on the battlefield only. They fought for state’s rights (not slavery though slavery was ONE of the issues concerning state’s rights) and they tried to remove themselves from a union as they were promised they were free to do when they willingly joined the union. That promise was ignored and they became an enemy.
Many of those generals went to West Point and attended classes with the generals of the Union that they would eventually battle in war. They were American citizens (until they seceded) who stood up for what they believed to be right.
No matter what one thinks of them or the war the reality is they are a part of our history and a part of what made this nation what it is today. After the war they were treated badly even though they swore allegiance to the nation and agreed that with the war over they needed to work to reunite the nation.
They are a part of our history and they have a place in it. Some of these men were the finest tacticians of their time and some of their tactics are still used today.
Hiding their pictures or statues in a corner or closet does not change the history of this nation. It only demonstrates a weakness in our military and nation at large. This weakness is the inability to learn from the past and to teach all of our history no matter how painful it is.
I guess we can always honor real men who deserve it instead…..
Cave canem!
Never surrender, never submit.
Tags: army war college, civil war, generals, hiding history
Justice For Tevin
Oct 8, 2013 Military
A 20 year old soldier named Tevin Geike was stabbed to death near Joint Base Lewis-McCord in Washington early Saturday morning. Geike, a white man, was walking with two other white soldiers when a car with five black men drove by and yelled something racist at the three.
One of the three yelled something about this being how combat veterans were treated. The car turned around and the occupants got out and surrounded the three. A verbal confrontation started but when the driver of the vehicle realized that the three were veterans he called his friends off. One of them appeared to have bumped into Geike and then they all got in the car and sped away.
Geike was on the ground bleeding badly from stab wounds. He died at the scene waiting for an ambulance.
The man who stabbed him is a coward and should get the death penalty for what he did.
We need justice for Tevin.
Fortunately, it looks like we might get justice. The UK Daily Mail reports that three men have been arrested for the murder and two more are being sought. The three arrested are soldiers from the same base as Geike. The Daily Mail reports they served in the same unit as Geike. That could just mean they served in the same Division and likely did not know each other.
In any event, 23 year old Jeremiah Hill, the alleged murderer, is in custody along with Cedarium Johnson and Ajoni Runnion-Bareford.
These fellows are in a world of trouble because the military still has the death penalty.
I do not know if they will seek that penalty but even the possibility of life in a federal prison is not a good prospect for such young people.
The interesting thing is that this is not being called a hate crime. Five black men used a racial slur toward three white men and then one of those black men stabbed a white man to death. How is that not a hate crime?
Don’t get me wrong, I think the whole concept of hate crimes is ridiculous for many reasons among them the concept of punishing what a person might have been thinking or that his motivation is believed to be hate. All violent crimes are rooted in one form of hatred or another.
But since this society has determined that hate crime is a valid crime to punish people for and since this society goes out of its way to ensure whites are punished for racially motivated hate crimes when blacks are victims it is only fair we apply the same standards.
I know that Eric Holder and his Just Us Department is not in line with equal prosecution and that he racially discriminates against white people but I also know the military will be handling this case.
And the military does not really care what Holder thinks.
Still, the Army is not likely to go after it as a hate crime since it already has the mechanisms in place to put these animals to death or place them in cages for the rest of their lives.
It is bad enough that they murdered someone but it is worse that they knowingly murdered a brother in arms.
If Obama had another son (besides Trayvon) he would look like the murderer.
If Mitt Romney had another son he would look like Geike.
Rest in peace young soldier. If justice is served your attackers will be in hell before too long.
Whether that hell is in a prison or in the afterlife is yet to be determined…
Cave canem!
Never surrender, never submit.
Tags: army, death penalty, hate crime, joint base lewis-mccord, murder, tevin geike
F-22 Raptors Are Birds Of Prey
Sep 20, 2013 Military
Back in March a US pilot flying an F-22 Raptor, and doing his best Maverick impersonation, scared an Iranian pilot flying an F-4.
The Iranian F-4 was flying near a US drone flying in international airspace on what appears to be an intercept mission. The US pilot flew under the Iranian to check out the weapons load of the F-4. This was done without the Iranian knowing the Raptor was there.
After the weapons check the Raptor emerged off the left wing of the Iranian F-4 and radioed to the pilot.
The message?
“You really ought to go home.”
I would love to have seen the look on the Iranian’s face as that aircraft appeared from seemingly nowhere. It had to be priceless and I bet that guy was ready to fill his pants.
I am reminded of a scene from the movie Star Trek: The Voyage Home where the crew of the Enterprise (ironically flying a cloaked Klingon Bird of Prey) puts the spaceship between whales and a whaling vessel just as the harpoon launches. The harpoon bounces off the cloaked ship which baffles the crew of the whaling vessel.
The Bird of Prey uncloaks and the whaling vessel’s crew goes into full panic trying to get out of there.
I imagine that Iranian felt much like that whaling crew when the US Raptor appeared out of nowhere.
The Iranians like to scream about how many of us they will kill if they are attacked or if we bother them in some way. While I don’t think we should be attacking them without cause I do think they might want to rethink their strategy.
I can’t imagine there are too many aircraft in their air force. If they were forced into battle they would lose them pretty quickly.
Hats off to the US Air Force!!
And a change of pants for the Iranian.
Cave canem!
Never surrender, never submit.
Tags: f-22, iranian pilot, raptor, stealth, top gun
What Is The Threat To The US?
Sep 4, 2013 Military, Political
Some entity in Syria used the nerve agent Sarin in the ongoing civil war. The United States claims that the government used the nerve agent and the UN says the rebels used it. The US report on the issue is full of caveats including one that we do not have assets on the ground. There is even some doubt as to whether Sarin was used or if chlorine was the gas that killed all those people (some report smelling chlorine). The Obama regime wants to attack Syria as a punishment for using the chemical weapons.
Is our military supposed to be used to punish other nations?
Regardless of the reason for the use of force the US Congress is the body given the power to authorize the use of force. There is a law (50 USC Chapter 33, ss 1541) called the War Powers Resolution. The purpose of this was to give presidents the ability to respond to an emergency requiring military force when the response was needed before Congress could act to authorize it. There are three items listed that allow the use of force and they are:
(1) a declaration of war,
(2) specific statutory authorization, or
(3) a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces.
There has been no declaration of war and there is no statutory authorization (such as a treaty or UN Resolution), and there is no national emergency created by an attack upon our country, its territories or possessions or our armed forces.
Given these facts there is no authority for the use of force under the War Powers Act. Barack Obama and his sock puppet John Kerry claim Obama has the authority but he clearly does not.
The US Congress must authorize the use of force and that is being debated at this time. Keep in mind during the debates that saving face for an American president is NOT one of the reasons that use of force is allowed.
The UN is unlikely to authorize the use of force as that body contends the rebels used the nerve agent and given that Russia has a veto vote and is a strong supporter of the Syrian government they will likely veto. This leaves it to the US Congress (unless, of course, Obama decides to strike no matter what) to allow or disallow the use of force. That body should think long and hard before it commits the use of our nation’s military and it should look at what threat is posed by the use of chemical weapons in Syria as well as the likely ramifications of the use of force.
If we attack Syria what will happen? Syria and Iran will attack Israel as punishment for the attack. We will condemn such acts but is their use of force for punishment any worse than ours?
The attacks on Israel will draw a huge military response form that nation and many other countries will be drawn into the conflict. World War Three will begin.
What happens if we attack Syria and hit the chemical weapons storage sites and those agents end up killing untold numbers of people? We claim we will not attack the storage sites but how do we know where they are and what is to say that Assad (or the Rebels) will not move the agents to places we are likely to hit in order to have such a release? How will we be viewed if our acts cause death by chemical agent?
What happens if we attack the Syrian Government and it turns out the Rebels used the nerve agents? If Obama thinks he needs to save face now what will he do if he attacks and was wrong all along? There will be no face saving measure in the world if he attacks and is wrong about it.
As far as I am concerned the nerve agent attacks in Syria took place in a civil war and their use did not affect us in any way whatsoever. Our property, our nation and our people were NOT attacked so there is no reason to shoot at anyone involved in that conflict.
If we decide to use force against the Syrian Government we will be helping al Qaeda (the Rebels) and these people are our enemy. These Rebels have been filmed murdering children at a firing squad and cutting out the heart and liver of a soldier and eating them. Are these the people we want to help?
Why in the name of all that is good would we want to help either side in this conflict? Both sides have animals in them but right now those animals are fighting each other. We should sit back and watch the fight and not get involved unless we are attacked.
Obama is foolish and inexperienced. It was his mouth that backed him into this corner and that is his problem. We should not use our military to help him save face.
We will end up looking like fools.
Any member of Congress on the left who screamed all those years about Bush lying to get us into war should remember all the things they said about Iraq not attacking us before they vote on Syria. Obama should remember he said he would not have voted to authorize force (yes Bush went to Congress and got approval regardless of what anyone thinks of the reasons) and John Kerry should remember what he said about Vietnam not posing any threat to the US when he was an anti war protestor oh so many years ago.
Republicans, you better sack up or you will face backlash on election day.
As for Democrats, who knows what they will face. Their party has mind numbed drones with short memories who follow the collective.
Say no to attacking Syria…
Related:
Will Rand Paul Filibuster?
Syria hiding weapons and moving troops
France now wavering
Putin warns US
Cave canem!
Never surrender, never submit.
Tags: assad, constitution, john kerry, Obama, rebels, Syria