Monthly Archives: April 2010

Army Budget Share Will Grow

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Greg Grant. DoD Buzz, 09 April 2010.
http://www.dodbuzz.com/2010/04/09/army-budget-share-will-grow/

Excerpt:

In DOD’s funding forecasts, future costs to fight the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are vastly understated as are personnel and healthcare costs. “Reset” costs for Army and Marine equipment returning from Iraq are also vastly understated, as all are new aircraft programs, e.g. F-35, tanker. The shipbuilding plan is also underfunded. Cost overruns in the F-35 and satellites continue due to immature technologies, the analysis says, and risks shifts to existing platforms.

The biggest future growth areas will be in networked communications and overhead surveillance, followed by repair, maintenance and training. The future requirements process will be driven more by combatant commanders than service bureaucracy, more joint and fewer overall contracts and programs. There will be further monopolization of large platform primes, e.g. one tank builder, one aircraft tanker builder and one shipbuilder.

Treaty Signings

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Michael Krepon. Arms Control Wonk, 08 April 2010.
http://www.armscontrolwonk.com/2690/treaty-signings

Excerpt:

Despite claims to the contrary, New START does not inhibit the growth of U.S. conventional power projection capabilities that, unlike nuclear weapons, are militarily useful on battlefields. Nor will New START impede ballistic missile defense programs…

Editor’s Comment:
… and that is why, despite the rhetoric of the moment, this treaty doesn’t do much to advance us toward the goal of abolishing nuclear weapons. Unbounded conventional military power and missile defenses for Western rich nations are not compatible with the establishment of a global international security regime sufficiently reliable to support the abolition of nuclear weapons.

For more on this problem see my comments on Vice President Biden’s speech at the National Defense University, 18 February 2010.