Last post in this series, I read Tom state: "I suspect the next 10 years will see a major revamping of the military establishment, in ways we hardly suspect now"

I think he is spot on for certain. I've been paying attention to all things Defense budget for awhile now and it amazes me that this discussion is just now starting to really take off. Last year, former SECDEF Gates railed against some of the Pentagon "fat" that all military folks witness throughout their careers: Generals with massive entourages, $40K paintings hanging on the wood paneled walls of the PNT of all the various leaders gone by, end-of-year expenditures by military units for gear they dont need just so that "they dont take our budget away next year" etc etc...the list goes on.

Further, anyone who's mucked around Capitol Hill quickly realizes the impossibility of not "salami slicing" the military budget. Any scalpel cuts that are made to close down a unit negatively impact somebody's district...and those "somebody's" know how to rally folks to their cause...take the recent decision to keep funding the Abrams tank line. Eventhough its arguable how useful tanks have been in the last 10 years...or say, the F35 alternate engine debate as another example.

So Tom's prediction will likely come true because no one can solve the dilemma of how to not hollow-out the force. The hollowing allegedly follows the minute you start topline "salami slice" cuts. Thus, the inner workings of Capitol Hill and the DoD are at an impasse.

As the budget crisis gets worse...and more and more strong lobbies (like AARP) hear about the "fat" in the defense budget, they will prevail...and defense will come down hard. The only way to convince a member of Capitol Hill to embrace the pain is if all embrace it equally....and Defense is a ripe target for that kind of talk.

Unable to come up with $80B/yr cuts?? Utterly ridiculous. Total yearly defense expenditures, adjusted for inflation, after a $80B cut would still be higher than any time in the last 50 years except for FY52.

Even assuming he's ignoring the likely continuing resolution for funding ongoing operations and is just going on the base defense expenditures, it's still more than we spent during FY48-50, FY54-65, FY70-81, & FY91-02.

Gates has left a wonderful legacy. DOD is still clipping toenails and claiming it's an amputation.

Like other Real Americans, I am appalled at Senator McCain's apparent willingness to even consider any cuts to our military budget. Furthermore, I am stunned at Dempsey's milquetoast "very high-risk" characterization of the impact of those hypothetical cuts. The General has been wasting time with Einstein when he should have been reading Mahan.

With the imminent launch of China's pre-owned carrier Varyag, our advantage in this area will have been reduced to an indefensible 11:1. Obama and his Marxist Islamist cabal have clearly put Our Homeland at risk by allowing this dangerous narrowing of our once-favorable Carrier Gap.

...of the US military posture.

Any cuts would in fact lead to the reduction of insecurity.

Cuts would also cut into the employment numbers and the defense economy, and reduce the amount of Congressional meddling and pork.

DoD could make some cuts that would not hurt readiness too much but Congress won't let DoD do that. Congress will continue to use the budget for pork and won't let DoD do the best we can.

Americans expect the Navy to do a lot besides fight other Navies. Every time we have to run a NEO using a chartered Greek Ferry or something, We The People ask what the DoD/Sea Services are good for? We expect our Carrier Battle Groups to project force and be able to whip mid-sized Air Forces. That may be a good idea or a bad idea but it is THE IDEA. If we want to save the bucks we need to come up w a strategy.

The carrier battle groups have not had a near peer since about Midway. They have still had lots of work to do off and on. I guess the other question is: The big deck carriers were transformational in 1920s-40s, what is the next big thing?

understanding the essential investment requirements for the defense, than using it to answer John McCain' question ie if removing $800 billion over 10 years from DoD is drastic. Think that would be one of the General's answers in the next blog posting on his wisdom achieved from the Iraq experience.

If Dempsey had really understood what he claimed to have learned, he wouldn't have given John a high and inside soft ball pitch to keep the Arizona welfare subsidy going.

If the point is to cut 10 percent (or any other arbitrary number politicians want to make up so they can look like they are doing something without actually tackling the really serious problems like healthcare and the solvency of social security) then seems to me you have to take a really hard look at just what it is you want the military to do. Do we really need a presence in South Korea when the RoKs have over 500,000 man standing army, 3 millions reserves to call up, and a huge qualitative edge in weaponry over their primary adversary? Do we really need a large Army presence in Germany when the Cold War ended 20 years ago? What about all those enormously expensive STRATCOM facilities to fight WWWIII without a commensurate enemy? Do we really even need a large campaign style force when a rapidly mobile deterrant force with great fire power will suffice? Do we still need to cling to large ground divisions when lighter units with superior weaponry will give any other conventional force in the world think twice about messing with the US? Or are we still just going to cut around the edges so what we wind up with are cumbersome forces with outdated equipment and a lack of airlift to get them anywhere in a timely manner? What's the best combination between mass, efficiency of effect, and mobility? Everything needs to be on the table and we need to deeply consider just what it is we want from our forces before we start cutting off more slivers.

Yes, that is the Tacoma Bridge Collapse of high school science fame.
Cheers,
Tom

That is far too broad a question to be answered well, or at least in any kind of comprehensive sense. RIO Quite frankly, given the time of year, tone and vague nature of the question, the answer is You Should Have Done Your Damn Homework BEFORE FINALS!!!!.