A Decade of War Coming Home to Roost
This should come as no surprise – that nearly a decade of war has left our ranks stretched so thin, that the Army would have few available reserves if a major crisis occurred on another front.
Via Spencer Ackerman at The Washington Independent today:
If President Obama orders an additional 30,000 to 40,000 troops to Afghanistan, he will be deploying practically every available U.S. Army brigade to war, leaving few units in reserve in case of an unforeseen emergency and further stressing a force that has seen repeated combat deployments since 2002.
According to information compiled by the U.S. Army for The Washington Independent about the deployment status of active-duty and National Guard Army brigades, as of December 2009, there will be about 50,600 active-duty soldiers, serving in 14 combat brigades, and as many as 24,000 National Guard soldiers available for deployment. All other soldiers and National Guardsmen will either be deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan already or ineligible to deploy while they rest from a previous deployment.
There has been a lot of speculation about what Obama plans to announce (by the end of the month?) regarding the future military strategy in Afghanistan. A lot of backroom action, an avalanche of informed and not-so-informed blog posts and op-eds, but little in the way of “meat and potatoes” on which to base a sound prediction. Funny, 55 percent of those surveyed in the most recent Washington Post poll say they are “confident” Obama will “come up with a strategy that will succeed.” One wonders how they came to that conclusion. Of course the responses for all of the questions fall predictably on party lines. Like the 35 percent of (mostly) Republicans who say Obama isn’t giving the military “a big enough role” in developing the strategy. Give me a break. Short of Obama replacing Jim Jones with Dick Cheney as his National Security Advisor, there is nothing the White House can do right without the military holding the leash, at least in the eyes of these unreflected Republicans.
Interestingly, a full 52 percent of those polled said the war in Afghanistan has not been “worth it,” a data point that has not wavered in some time. Perhaps Obama is thinking twice about escalation. Maybe not. But if Ackerman’s report is to be taken seriously, it seems the question as to whether we can escalate this war effectively, at least without destroying what is left of the U.S Armed Forces, has already been answered.
Whose going be around to fight in Iran then?
I say, sit Pakistan and Afghanistan down together around the table, and ask them to draw up a 1 year timeline – asking them what they need – and then holding them to it, with everything completely turned over to the UN within 364 days.
But the whole BS thing about our military’s “ranks stretched thin”, is liberal code for this administration has been cutting their budget and asking them to do more with less, over the last year, the same way Clinton did to the CIA and the Military.
Remember all the pseudo-outrage about how Bush wasn’t providing the very best armor to our troops? Prolly not.
You know, I could have sworn that the current Administration actually increased the military budget. And , y’know, when I think about it, I also seem to remember that Clinton did something similar over his two terms.
That reality thing sure does have a ‘liberal bias’, though. Best not to trust it over what you feel in your gut.
On a more serious note, the truth is that Georgie Boy took America’s military and broke it, but a lot of people who voted for him don’t feel it would be politically productive to take that little factoid into account.
That, and blaming a Republican for – anything – makes them cry.
My first thought was you ought to read more, come up to speed, and join the conversation.
Clinton’s “No-Win” Defense Budget
http://www.heritage.org/research/nationalsecurity/em467.cfm
Negligence: The Clinton Legacy On National Defense
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/805476/posts
Obama’s penny-wise, pound-foolish defense budget
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columns/jamescarafano/Obamas-penny-wise-pound-foolish-defense-budget-42891982.html
But then I realized, you probably only read the Huff Post or Daily Kos, or Kelley Vlahos, et al, so, your chances of “coming up to speed” might be negligible.
Heh, sorry Barney, but I find HuffPo too wannabe-MSM for my tastes, never have been to the Great Orange Satan, and I read Vlahos’ opinions in the same place you do.
Turning to your links, Freeperville, really? Heritage? Good God, man, how low can you go?
Let’s boil this down. You don’t want to admit that America’s ability to respond to current and future threats has been severely curtailed by the massive damage that the previous Administration’s policies have inflicted on the US military’s capabilities. Even though that’s what everyone outside the far-right wingnutosphere thinks, including the US military. So you wrap yourself in the comforting old blanket of ‘Democrats are worse!’ and insist that anyone who disagrees is obviously a liberal, even if they’re writing on Pat Buchanan’s website.
And people wonder why the conservative movement has jumped the electoral shark? It’s because of lazy, knee-jerk stuff like this.
Facts won’t slow the haters, but for the rest of us:
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Features/BudgetChartbook/Obama-Budget-Would-Return-Defense-Spending-to-Pre-911-Levels.aspx
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Features/BudgetChartbook/Defense-Spending-on-the-Decline-Despite-War-on-Terror.aspx