[House Prints 112-3]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
112th Congress
1st Session COMMITTEE PRINT No. 3
_______________________________________________________________________
THE FUTURE OF THE U.S. MILITARY
TEN YEARS AFTER 9/11 AND
THE CONSEQUENCES OF
DEFENSE SEQUESTRATION
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prepared for the use of the
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
of the
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
----------
NOVEMBER 2011
Printed for the use of the Committee on
Armed Services of the House of Representatives
112th Congress
1st Session COMMITTEE PRINT No. 3
_______________________________________________________________________
THE FUTURE OF THE U.S. MILITARY
TEN YEARS AFTER 9/11 AND
THE CONSEQUENCES OF
DEFENSE SEQUESTRATION
__________
prepared for the use of the
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
of the
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
__________
NOVEMBER 2011
Printed for the use of the Committee on
Armed Services of the House of Representatives
HOUSE COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
One Hundred Twelfth Congress
HOWARD P. ``BUCK'' McKEON,
California, Chairman
ADAM SMITH, Washington ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland
SILVESTRE REYES, Texas MAC THORNBERRY, Texas
LORETTA SANCHEZ, California WALTER B. JONES, North Carolina
MIKE McINTYRE, North Carolina W. TODD AKIN, Missouri
ROBERT A. BRADY, Pennsylvania J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia
ROBERT ANDREWS, New Jersey JEFF MILLER, Florida
SUSAN A. DAVIS, California JOE WILSON, South Carolina
JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island FRANK A. LoBIONDO, New Jersey
RICK LARSEN, Washington MICHAEL TURNER, Ohio
JIM COOPER, Tennessee JOHN KLINE, Minnesota
MADELEINE Z. BORDALLO, Guam MIKE ROGERS, Alabama
JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut TRENT FRANKS, Arizona
DAVE LOEBSACK, Iowa BILL SHUSTER, Pennsylvania
GABRIELLE GIFFORDS, Arizona K. MICHAEL CONAWAY, Texas
NIKI TSONGAS, Massachusetts DOUG LAMBORN, Colorado
CHELLIE PINGREE, Maine ROB WITTMAN, Virginia
LARRY KISSELL, North Carolina DUNCAN HUNTER, California
MARTIN HEINRICH, New Mexico JOHN C. FLEMING, M.D., Louisiana
BILL OWENS, New York MIKE COFFMAN, Colorado
JOHN R. GARAMENDI, California TOM ROONEY, Florida
MARK S. CRITZ, Pennsylvania TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania
TIM RYAN, Ohio SCOTT RIGELL, Virginia
C.A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland CHRIS GIBSON, New York
HANK JOHNSON, Georgia VICKY HARTZLER, Missouri
BETTY SUTTON, Ohio JOE HECK, Nevada
COLLEEN HANABUSA, Hawaii BOBBY SCHILLING, Illinois
KATHLEEN C. HOCHUL, New York JON RUNYAN, New Jersey
AUSTIN SCOTT, Georgia
TIM GRIFFIN, Arkansas
STEVEN PALAZZO, Mississippi
ALLEN B. WEST, Florida
MARTHA ROBY, Alabama
MO BROOKS, Alabama
TODD YOUNG, Indiana
Robert L. Simmons II, Staff
Director
C O N T E N T S
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Page
Note from the Chairman........................................... v
The Future of National Defense and the U.S. Military Ten Years
After 9/11: Perspectives from Former Chairmen of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff, September 8, 2011............................. 1
1General Richard B. Myers, USAF, Retired, 15th
Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff deg........................ 5
General Peter Pace, USMC, Retired, 16th Chairman,
Joint Chiefs of Staff deg.................................. 7
Admiral Edmund P. Giambastiani, Jr., USN, Retired,
7th Vice Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff deg............. 9
The Future of National Defense and the U.S. Military Ten Years
After 9/11: Perspectives from Outside Experts, September 13,
2011........................................................... 15
Mr. Jim Thomas, Vice President and Director of
Studies, Center for Strategic and Budgetary
Assessments deg............................................ 19
Dr. Michael E. O'Hanlon, Director of Research and
Senior Fellow, The Brookings Institution deg............... 28
Mr. Thomas Donnelly, Director, Center for Defense
Studies, American Enterprise Institute deg................. 33
Mr. Max Boot, Jeane J. Kirkpatrick Senior Fellow in
National Security Studies, Council on Foreign
Relations deg.............................................. 39
The Future of National Defense and the U.S. Military Ten Years
After 9/11: Perspectives from Former Service Chiefs and Vice
Chiefs, October 4, 2011........................................ 45
General John P. Jumper, USAF, Retired, 17th Chief of
Staff, United States Air Force deg......................... 49
General Richard A. Cody, USA, Retired, 31st Vice
Chief of Staff, United States Army deg..................... 52
Lieutenant General H. Steven Blum, USA, Retired,
25th Chief, National Guard Bureau deg...................... 54
The Future of National Defense and the U.S. Military Ten Years
After 9/11: Perspectives of Former Chairmen of the Committees
on Armed Services, October 12, 2011............................ 57
The Honorable John W. Warner, Chairman, Senate
Committee on Armed Services (1999-2001, 2003-2007) deg..... 61
The Honorable Duncan L. Hunter, Chairman, House
Committee on Armed Services (2002-2006) deg................ 63
The Honorable Ike Skelton, Chairman, House Committee
on Armed Services (2007-2010) deg.......................... 66
The Future of National Defense and the U.S. Military Ten Years
After 9/11: Perspectives of Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta
and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Martin
Dempsey, October 13, 2011...................................... 69
The Honorable Leon E. Panetta,23rd Secretary of
Defense deg................................................ 73
General Martin E. Dempsey, USA, 18th Chairman, Joint
Chiefs of Staff deg........................................ 76
Economic Consequences of Defense Sequestration, October 26, 2011. 79
Dr. Martin Feldstein, George F. Baker Professor of
Economics, Harvard University deg.......................... 83
Dr. Stephen Fuller, Director, Center for Regional
Analysis, School of Public Policy, George Mason
University deg............................................. 87
Dr. Peter Morici, Professor of International
Business, Robert H. Smith School of Business, University of
Maryland deg............................................... 92
The Future of the Military Services and Consequences of Defense
Sequestration, November 2, 2011................................ 99
General Raymond T. Odierno, USA, 38th Chief of
Staff, United States Army deg.............................. 103
Admiral Jonathan W. Greenert, USN, 30th Chief of
Naval Operations deg....................................... 105
General Norton A. Schwartz, USAF, 19th Chief of
Staff, United States Air Force deg......................... 108
General James F. Amos, USMC, 35th Commandant of the
Marine Corps deg........................................... 111
Additional Views................................................. 121
Additional Views............................................. 123
Additional Views of Representative Roscoe G. Bartlett........ 125
Additional Views of Representative Robert E. Andrews......... 128
Additional Views of Representative Niki Tsongas.............. 130
Additional Views of Representative John R. Garamendi......... 132
Additional Views of Representative Hank Johnson.............. 159
List of Acronyms and Abbreviations............................... 161
NOTE FROM THE CHAIRMAN
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As our Nation marked the 10-year anniversary of the
September 11, 2001, attacks on our country, the Committee on
Armed Services embarked on a series of hearings to commemorate
that day and reflect on the lessons learned from this
generational struggle. We sought to remember the lives lost and
to honor the sacrifices made every day by our military and
their families--as our Armed Forces have taken the fight to the
enemy to ensure our continued safety at home.
Yet, we were also keenly aware that the current debate in
Congress regarding the national deficit has significant
implications for the military. As our service men and women
return home from multiple tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, they
find a military with an uncertain future: Will our country
sustain a force that continues to project power, deter
aggression, defend the homeland and will we keep faith with
veterans? These are questions that came into high relief when
the President proposed $400 billion in cuts to national defense
in April 2011 and Congress passed the Budget Control Act of
2011 (BCA) on August 2, 2011. Therefore, the committee also
sought to examine the future of the U.S. military, the
consequences of further cuts in defense spending, and the
enduring strategic implications of decisions political leaders
will soon make about the future of our force and the strategic
direction of the Nation's defense.
At the decade mark, our Nation finds itself at a strategic
juncture--Osama bin Laden is dead; Al Qaeda is severely
weakened as a global terror network, far less capable, but
still functioning; the Taliban has lost strategic momentum in
Afghanistan; key Al Qaeda propagandist Anwar Al-Awlaki has been
killed in Yemen; and Iraq is an emerging democracy. We are
winning this war; but just when our strategic goals are within
reach, some would choose to cut military capabilities vital to
this critical fight. Unfortunately, with our hard-won tactical
success comes the danger of complacency. Faced with serious
economic challenges, too many Americans are slipping back into
the September 10th, 2001, mentality that presumes a solid
defense can be dictated by budget choices, not the hard reality
of our vital national interests and national security strategy.
As Members of Congress, we will each be responsible for the
votes we cast to balance the Federal budget and rein in the
Federal deficit. Hard choices will have to be made among many
Federal programs and priorities. But as Chairman of the
Committee on Armed Services, I fervently believe that the
committee's duty is to ensure that Members of Congress and the
American public are informed about the threats our country
faces and the cost to our Nation if we fail to provide the
resources for a robust national defense.
As pressure mounted in the summer of 2011 to pass
legislation to raise the debt ceiling, many argued that Federal
spending should be reduced across the board and that defense
cuts should ``be on the table.'' I agree that the military
cannot be exempt from fiscal belt-tightening; in point of fact,
defense has contributed more than half of the deficit reduction
measures taken to date. The BCA cut nearly half a trillion
dollars from the projected defense budget through 2021. In
addition, title III of the BCA established a trigger mechanism
that implements additional defense cuts, known as
sequestration, should Congress fail to pass an additional $1.2
trillion in savings by December 23, 2011. In the worst-case
scenario, national defense would be cut by $1.029 trillion from
fiscal years 2013-2021, should sequestration take effect. This
represents not simply a cut to growth, but the lowest levels of
defense funding, as a share of Federal budget authority, since
before the Second World War.
While the future budget picture remains uncertain, we are
confident that further cuts are detrimental to our current and
future national security capabilities. As the committee is well
aware, the United States has sought a ``peace dividend''
following every major conflict our Nation has faced in the last
century. In every instance, the prevailing wisdom has assumed
that the threat environment was low and our enemies were
contained. History tells us that it is difficult to predict
where the next threat will originate, but that it will. We
predictably fail to anticipate contingencies, leading to loss
of blood and treasure. This is why we must remain vigilant and
ready.
The committee sought to better understand the tangible
consequences of these cuts. Over the course of 2 months, the
committee held six hearings to evaluate the lessons learned
from the last 10 years of operations against violent extremists
and apply those lessons learned to determine the impacts to our
national security should sequestration occur. We received
perspectives of former chairmen and vice-chairmen of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps;
former service chiefs, vice chiefs, and commanders of the
National Guard Bureau; former chairmen of the Senate and House
Armed Services Committees; outside experts; the current
Secretary of Defense and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff;
and the four current service chiefs. The committee also held
one hearing with a panel of economists to examine the economic
consequences of defense sequestration, because although we do
not invest in defense to create jobs, there will be significant
impacts to the economy if the budget of the Nation's largest
employer is cut by nearly 20 percent.
This committee print is a lasting record of what we
learned. It contains the prepared statements of each of our 22
witnesses. Although much more was discussed during the
hearings, these statements capture the sentiment shared by all
who testified before us--further cuts to the Department of
Defense (DOD) would create irrevocable harm to our military and
be disastrous for our national security. Secretary of Defense
Leon Panetta has stated that sequestration would lead to the
smallest ground force since 1940, the smallest number of ships
since 1915, the smallest Air Force in its history, and the
smallest DOD civilian workforce ever. Every procurement and
sustainment program would be affected, including our fighters,
nuclear deterrent, space assets, rotorcraft, and ships.
Our military has proven that the enemy cannot defeat us on
the field of battle. But budgetary cuts of this magnitude could
do what no army in history has been able to accomplish--break
the U.S. military. We cannot forget that our military remains
at war. As members of this committee travel throughout the
country speaking to military families, we are often asked
questions such as, ``How can you consider cutting our benefits
after we have sacrificed so much?'' ``How could you vote to
shrink the equipment, leadership, and training that keep our
spouses alive?'' Or ``Are our retirement and health benefits
we've earned in danger of being eliminated?''
We must keep the human side of national defense in mind as
we slog our way through this budget debate. It seems like
whenever the Nation has our back against the wall, whenever we
are cornered, and whenever we look to be down for the count, a
special class of citizens frees us from uncertainty and doubt.
It happened during the Revolution. It happened during the Civil
War and World War II, and it is happening today. The 9/11
Generation is this Nation's great hope. They will lead the
Nation forward--their energy and optimism are our salvation
from the fatigue of war and our economic woes. As they hang up
their uniforms, they will go into business, government, and
other professions, bringing their selflessness, commitment to
service, ingenuity, and integrity with them. We must not
dishonor their service and sacrifice with further reductions to
the training, tools, benefits and care they need to succeed in
the great Nation they helped to defend.
It must be noted, that balancing the books on the back of
the military does not decrease the security challenges we face.
In a networked and globalized world, the Atlantic and Pacific
Oceans are no longer adequate deterrents to keep America safe.
September 11, 2001, taught us that. But, the converse is also
true. Military atrophy comes with an economic cost, as programs
are eliminated and service members are involuntarily separated
from duty. Currently, the unemployment rate for young veterans
is over 20%. While it is true that our military power is
derived from our economic power, we must recognize that this
relationship is a symbiotic one. It is the military that
protects the global commons, ensures free trade, and stabilizes
every corner of the economy.
Finally, paraphrasing one of our witnesses, Congress must
answer the following fundamental questions before cutting
defense further:
1. LIsn't our primary constitutional duty to defend our
Nation?
2. LIs the world suddenly safer today?
3. LIs the war against terrorism over?
4. LHave our vital national interests changed?
The U.S. military is the modern era's greatest champion of
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It is time we seek
solutions to our fiscal woes from the driver of the debt,
instead of the protector of our prosperity.
It is with heartfelt gratitude that on behalf of the House
of Representatives Committee on Armed Services, I thank our
witnesses for participating in this hearing series. May God
continue to bless the United States of America.
Howard P. ``Buck'' McKeon,
Chairman, Committee on Armed Services,
U.S. House of Representatives.
THE FUTURE OF NATIONAL DEFENSE AND
THE U.S. MILITARY TEN YEARS AFTER 9/11:
PERSPECTIVES FROM FORMER CHAIRMEN
OF THE JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF
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COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
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HEARING HELD
SEPTEMBER 8, 2011
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WITNESSES
General Richard B. Myers, USAF, Retired
15th Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff
General Peter Pace, USMC, Retired
16th Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff
Admiral Edmund P. Giambastiani, Jr., USN, Retired
7th Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
?
=======================================================================
PREPARED STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY WITNESSES
September 8, 2011
=======================================================================
STATEMENT OF GENERAL RICHARD B. MYERS, USAF, RETIRED, 15TH CHAIRMAN,
JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF
Thank you Mr. Chairman and committee members for the
opportunity to appear before you today. First, I would like to
thank you for your unwavering support of our service men and
women as they dedicate their lives to our freedom.
This country has been at war for the last ten years. The
burden of our conflicts and engagement around the world has
fallen predominately upon the shoulders of our U.S. Military
and their families. The resilience of our active duty and
reserve troops has been remarkable; however, as our efforts in
Iraq and Afghanistan wind down and it presents the opportunity
for fewer people forward deployed, now is not the time to
lessen the support for our fighting force. The best thing we
can do for our men and women in uniform as they strive to
protect us is to provide them with good leadership, robust
training, and world class equipment. For the last ten years
we've done this. Given our fiscal concerns the question is,
``what support is America willing to provide going forward?''
Even though our forward deployed troops are predicted to be
fewer in number in the near future, the threats to our security
are still very great. Let me mention just three of these
concerns. I believe that violent extremism continues to
represent the biggest threat to our way of life. While al Qaida
is badly wounded, they and their ilk are not finished in their
quest for a different world--a world dominated by their extreme
brand of Islam and little tolerance. Living as we do in a free
society, we will always be at risk to those who wish us ill,
who are willing to die for their cause, and who consider
innocent men, women and children legitimate targets in their
fight. The actions of the last ten years have made us safer
than we were on 9/11, but we are not free from this scourge. It
will take many years, a comprehensive multinational strategy,
and the focus of all instruments of national power (including
our military) to make this world safe from this threat.
The nexus between violent extremism and the proliferation
of weapons of mass destruction is another concern for our
security. There is no question that if terrorists could obtain
WMD, they would use them to maximum advantage for their cause.
In this regard, Iran is particularly troubling. Iran's quest
for nuclear weapon capability is disturbing for several
reasons. Chief among those is the proliferation threat from
Iran's newly acquired nuclear capability. If fissile material
or a nuclear weapon were to fall into the hands of a terrorist
group the impact could be much greater than the tragedy of 9/
11. The fact that we have little apparent leverage over Iran's
actions makes this threat all the more concerning. And if Iran
does develop a nuclear weapons capability, that would
dramatically increase the potential for the development of
nuclear weapons in the region. Obviously this would be
destabilizing. Regardless of the solution to the Iranian
problem, a strong military will be necessary for any successful
outcome.
Finally, the Asia-Pacific region has experienced
unprecedented economic prosperity over the last several
decades. As a Pacific nation, we must realize and remind
ourselves that the prosperity of the Asia-Pacific nations
contributes significantly to our prosperity. The U.S. military
has played an important role in helping ensure the security and
stability of this area. The forward stationing of our land,
sea, and air forces has served us well, but our influence in
the region is now being challenged by China. We will need
highly capable sea, land, air, and space forces to deal with
China's anti-access and area denial efforts in this region
that's so vital to our security and economic well being.
In addition to these and many other security concerns, we
must realize the impact that reductions in defense spending
will have on our force structure. History tells us that during
reductions in defense spending, despite our best intentions,
the procurement and research and development accounts take a
disproportional share of the cuts. This leaves our services
without the modern equipment they need to replace old,
outdated, and worn out equipment. As a nation we've always
taken great pride in the fact that our military is the best
equipped in the world. Deep budget cuts to defense would bring
that fact into question.
And finally, we must be able to provide world class care to
those who have been wounded in our current conflicts. As you
know well, some of these wounds are visible and some can't be
seen. Nevertheless, our obligation is to provide the best
health care we can to those who have put their lives on the
line for us. Health care is not cheap, but any reduction in
health care resources would be breaking faith with those who
willingly go in harm's way.
In my view, the world is a more dangerous and uncertain
place today than it has been for decades. The three security
concerns issues I've outlined above are all different in
nature. However, they all will require a strong military to
deal with them. Our historic lack of ability to predict where
and when the next big threat to our security is coming from is
well known, but we can be certain that a security surprise is
in our future. What stands between these threats and our
freedom is the U.S. military.
Our fiscal difficulties are serious indeed. So are the
potential security challenges facing us. We don't need to be
the world's policeman, but we do need to provide leadership in
this uncertain world. Our military must remain strong with the
best leadership, superior training, and the best equipment. In
doing so our men and women in uniform will help keep us free
and provide the stability that ensures our prosperity.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I look forward to the committee's
questions.
STATEMENT OF GENERAL PETER PACE, USMC, RETIRED, 16TH CHAIRMAN, JOINT
CHIEFS OF STAFF
Good morning, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for this
opportunity.
I have appeared before this committee many times before,
but every time in uniform. This is my first opportunity to be
here as a private citizen. It is a uniquely different
perspective, and I appreciate the opportunity.
Although I don't have the privilege of representing the
incredible men and women who serve in our Armed Forces anymore,
I do take pride and privilege in joining you in thanking them
and their families for the sacrifice they have made in keeping
us free. It has been a long 10 years, and they have really been
taking good care of us.
As you know, the economy and defense are two sides of the
same coin. To the extent that you strengthen one, you
strengthen the other. To the extent that you weaken one, you
weaken the other. But I think we need to be very careful when
we get into the budget discussions, which are necessary, that
we do not look at defense from a dollar and cents perspective.
It is a unique entity of what our government provides to its
citizens, which is security. It should be strategy-based. What
do you want your military to do for your country? Is it what we
are doing today plus one other thing? What is it?
If we know what the strategy is that we want our military
to execute, then the folks across the river in the Pentagon who
do this for a living can tell you how many planes, how many
ships, how many troops they need to execute the combatant
commander's war plans. You can then apply budget numbers to
that, and you will most likely come up with numbers that are
bigger than we can afford. Fair enough.
But once we have the strategy and we know what it would
cost to implement that strategy, then we can talk about
additional risk by spending a little bit less here, a little
bit less there. So I would simply urge this committee to please
insist on a strategy-based approach to how you fund your
military.
Next, there has been an incredible strain on our force.
Less than 1 percent of the Nation has been defending the other
99 percent for 10 years. There are volunteers to do it. God
bless them. They are doing extremely well. They are not
complaining. But we have got troops and their families who have
sustained 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, or more deployments in the last 10
years. We have moms and dads who are deploying away from their
families every year or every other year. As we look at how to
balance the budget, the message that Congress sends to the
military and how you determine pay, benefits and retirement
will have significant impacts on the men and women who serve
today.
Even today, as I walk through and I see active duty folks,
the question they ask me, as they did when I was on active
duty, is: are the American people behind us? And it has been
the absolute belief that even though some of our fellow
citizens prefer that we not be fighting where we are, almost
all appreciate the fact that we have warriors who are willing
to put themselves in harm's way. That message has come across
loud and clear, both from our fellow citizens in the way they
have treated our returning soldiers and service members in
airports around the country, and in the way that Congress has
allocated resources.
We need to be careful not to be premature in cutting back
on the resources that we are allocating to our Armed Forces.
This is 10 years into a war where, unfortunately, our enemies
have a war plan that calls for a 100-year war. That does not
mean we need to be in Afghanistan or Iraq or doing that size
operation for 100 years, but it does mean that we have a
tenacious enemy. And even though we have had great success, it
can quickly be overturned if we are not vigilant. So the
allocation of resources will be very important, not only to the
standpoint of our troops and their families and their ability
to fight, but also in how our industrial base is able to raise
to the challenge.
We don't know where the next challenge is coming from, but
we have always had the ability to bring all of our strength to
bear, which includes our industrial base. As we start
allocating fewer resources, the impact on our industrial base
must be looked at very carefully. We are very, very thin as a
Nation in some of our capabilities, some of which could
literally disappear overnight if we are not careful.
Lastly, the challenge of which I am most concerned is not
one of another nation, where we might have to deploy forces.
You can go around the globe and talk about all the hot spots,
and I know that our military today, if told to go do something,
is capable of doing it. It is simply a matter of deciding
whether or not we want to apply what we know how to do, except
in one area, and that area is cyber attack and cyber defense.
The more anything is dependent on computers, the more
vulnerable it is. And I know what we can do as a Nation as the
attacker in cyber, and I know that we cannot defend against
what we can do as a Nation. And therefore, as a military man, I
have to presume that my enemies can either do the same thing,
or they will be able to soon, or they may very well have
something that we haven't thought of yet.
So as we look at the budget and we look at strategic places
to apply it, certainly the growing concern of cyber must be
taken into account. Cyber is having and will continue to have
an impact on the relations between nations similar to that of
the advent of nuclear weapons, the difference being that
nuclear weapons have been used and thank God have not been used
again. Cyber weapons are being used thousands of times a day
every day, and we are uniquely vulnerable.
Mr. Chairman, thank you for listening, and I look forward
to your questions.
STATEMENT OF ADMIRAL EDMUND P. GIAMBASTIANI, JR., USN, RETIRED, 7TH
VICE CHAIRMAN OF THE JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF
Chairman McKeon, Ranking Member Smith, and Members of the
committee, thank you for inviting me to testify today. I would
like to compliment you for holding these hearings.
Not only are we here to remember the event that led to a
pivotal change in our national security strategy ten years ago,
we are here to undertake an important discussion of where we go
from here. This discussion of our national security strategy is
urgently needed--and has been sorely lacking in the recent
debate about the greatest economic crisis our country has faced
in the past eight decades. Our national security and economic
health are inextricably linked and interdependent. They must be
considered together and addressed as an integral whole.
As you know, there are those who believe that drastic cuts
should be made to our defense spending to help offset our
nation's debt. If the new Joint Select Committee on Deficit
Reduction does not reach its targeted level of cuts,
unprecedented automatic cuts to defense will be triggered. Huge
cuts to defense spending, combined with little to no analysis
of their impact to our overall national security, would have
devastating consequences--something akin to performing brain
surgery with a chainsaw. Further, I would characterize this
debate as nothing less than determinative of what our role in
the world will be in the future--will we continue to be a
global superpower and force for good? Or will we allow
ourselves to become one amongst many, forfeiting both the
freedom of action and leadership role in the world which has
done so much for our citizens and for free people everywhere?
Providing for the national defense is the most fundamental
responsibility of our federal government. There are certainly
ways to be more cost effective and it is unrealistic that the
Department of Defense will be spared from shared sacrifices,
but it is critical that we analyze our spending levels in the
proper context. Our national security is the one area for which
our federal government is solely responsible. There is little
room for error.
Our national security strategy must drive any debate over
the level of resources that the nation should devote to
national defense. And the ability of the American economy to
generate these resources must inform our strategic thinking. A
failure to do either is likely to cost the United States more
in the long run, in both dollars and lives. A lack of
discussion and agreement about strategy will ensure that any
cuts in our security budgets will be driven by at best
arbitrary budget targets rather than reasoned strategic goals,
rational operational concepts, and executable investment plans.
Objectives and Threats to Them
Before discussing our strategy--that is, how we achieve our
national objectives--we need to understand what those aims are.
I also believe that in thinking about the future, we must study
and learn from the past. For the better part of a century, the
United States has pursued a consistent set of aims. These
include protecting U.S. territory from attack, defending our
allies against aggression, and preventing a single power from
becoming so strong that it threatens to dominate the Eurasian
continent. Beyond these core interests, the United States has
repeatedly used force in the service of the common good,
whether to alleviate suffering, provide relief from natural
disasters or guarantee global public goods such as unfettered
freedom of navigation on the high seas.
For the foreseeable future, I believe we will face three
primary challenges. The first is the ongoing war with Al Qaeda
and its affiliates: a protracted conflict with irregular
adversaries using unconventional means that spans the globe.
The second is the threat that the proliferation of weapons of
mass destruction--and especially nuclear weapons and associated
delivery systems--by hostile regimes, such as North Korea today
and prospectively Iran in the future, pose to the U.S., our
allies and the stability of key regions. The third, and
potentially the most consequential, challenge is the rise of
China. Chinese military modernization, financed by a burgeoning
Chinese economy, promises to reshape the balance of power in
Asia. As that occurs, we need to ensure our ability to defend
our territory, assure our allies, and maintain full and free
access to the Western Pacific.
Although each of these challenges is very different,
meeting each successfully will require the United States to
formulate and implement a long-term strategy. Further, each
demands a comprehensive response. Military capabilities have a
role to play in meeting each challenge, but so too do other
instruments of statecraft and elements of national power. Nor
should the United States meet these challenges alone. America's
allies, partners and friends can and should play an important
role as well.
In addition to these long-term challenges, the United
States must be prepared to respond to any number of disruptive
events that could destabilize the international system, ranging
from the outbreak of a virulent pandemic, to the collapse of a
strategic state, to the use of nuclear weapons.
While successive administrations have framed these
challenges differently or have ranked them differently in terms
of likelihood and impact, I believe that there is a consensus
spanning administrations that these are the challenges that we
face today and are likely to face in the future. The adequacy
of our forces needs to be measured against our ability to meet
these challenges--specifically, to assure our allies and
dissuade, deter and, if necessary, defeat our adversaries.
Matching Ends and Means
Each administration attempts to match ends and means within
economic constraints. I have been involved in every such
effort, at increasing levels of responsibility, since the fall
of the Berlin Wall in 1989 until the 2006 Quadrennial Defense
Review (QDR). The 2010 QDR represents the most recent
administration's attempt to match ends and means. As a
complement to this QDR, the 2010 QDR Independent Panel,
commissioned by Congress and co-chaired by former Secretary of
Defense Bill Perry and former National Security Advisor Steve
Hadley, identified a number of shortfalls in the ability of the
United States to protect its interest against the threats that
I have outlined. These included the need to counter anti-access
capabilities, defend the homeland, and bolster our cyber
capabilities.
It is worth noting that neither the 2010 QDR nor the 2010
QDR Independent Panel anticipated the current budgetary
environment. Both counted on real budget growth to be able to
bridge the gap between our commitments and our capabilities.
Yet, the current situation is such that the debate is not about
how much growth there will be in security budgets, but rather
how extreme the cuts will be to those budgets.
Defense cuts, if too deep or too hasty, will open up
further and perhaps unbridgeable gaps between our commitments
and our capabilities. In this situation, the United States
will, in theory, face two broad alternatives: either to reduce
our commitments or accept greater risk. Such a choice is
largely academic, however, because neither the President nor
the Congress can determine U.S. commitments on their own in our
ever more interconnected world. Moreover, reducing commitments
is something that is easier said than done. In my view, for
example, it would be extremely unwise to skimp on defending
U.S. territory or maintaining the fundamentals of nuclear
deterrence. It is also difficult for me to imagine, let alone
recommend, that the United States abrogate any of our mutual
defense treaties that commit us to the defense of allies across
the globe.
As a result, defense cuts will force us to accept greater
risk. In concrete terms, that means a reduced readiness to wage
war and, should we go to war, in conflicts that will go on
longer and cost more American lives than would have been the
case if we were better prepared. As terrible as the loss of any
life is, our men and women in uniform face the lowest casualty
rates in our nation's--or the world's--history. This is largely
due to investments that have been made in precision weapons;
intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance; personal and
vehicle protection; strategic airlift; and military medicine.
Should Congress or the Defense Department make major cuts
without thinking them through, I fear that we will face far
higher casualties in the future.
Reducing readiness and increasing risk applies to times of
peace as well as war. It also amounts to a decreased ability to
reassure allies, partners and friends and deter competitors.
Our day-to-day military posture and global presence are
responsible for more of our security and freedom than we know
or consciously appreciate. When, beginning with the 2006 QDR,
we began to portray seriously the demands of day-to-day
operations on our forces, we realized that the demands of
presence, engagement and responding to small scale contingency
operations require considerable forces. This is a demand that
will continue even as we draw down in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Cutting back on our engagement with our allies, partners and
friends threatens to undermine their confidence in us, and
reducing our presence in key regions could tempt potential
adversaries.
In addition, we cannot always determine when and where we
will be required to fight, and recent experience shows us that
it is difficult to fix capability shortfalls rapidly. We all
know the difficulties the Defense Department experienced in
fielding up-armored Humvees and later MRAPs. In fact, the only
armored Humvees that we had in the U.S. force posture ten years
ago were few in number and were procured for example to protect
our nuclear ballistic missile submarines and their nuclear
weapons.
The Defense Department and American industry cannot
generate capabilities overnight. This is particularly true of
naval and aerospace platforms, which often take more than a
decade to field and are expected to last for decades. In these
areas, stability in programs is extraordinarily important.
Requirements need to be realistic, reasonable and stable over
time to allow for effective acquisition strategies. And
investment budgets must be stable and consistent. Swings in
funding cause problems and often yield systems that take longer
to acquire, cost more, and underperform. Even worse,
instabilities in requirements, acquisition programs or
procurement funds can lead to billions of dollars wasted on
programs that never deliver any capabilities to our men and
women in uniform.
Generations to come will inherit the force structure that
results from your deliberations, just as we inherited decisions
made by those who came before us. It is worth remembering that
many of the weapon systems that our men and women in uniform
are using to fight today's wars were the product of the defense
buildup of the 1980s. Many of these platforms are rapidly
approaching the end of their lifespan, and failure to modernize
the force will lead to significant shortfalls in the U.S. force
posture. Our industrial base has been drawn down to such an
extent that in a number of areas, such as shipbuilding, solid
rocket motors and naval nuclear propulsion, we are down to the
bare bones; marginal cuts may very well eliminate an entire
defense industrial sector. As a result, any cuts need to be
thought through very carefully indeed.
Let me offer an anecdote to illustrate the need for patient
long term investment to generate needed capabilities. In
September 2002, the senior civilian and military leadership
identified as a top priority making the Defense Department an
organization capable of tracking down and capturing or killing
Al Qaeda leaders. This began a process of developing
capabilities, some of them quite sensitive, which allowed us
earlier this year to find and kill Usama Bin Laden. It didn't
happen overnight; it took time and required a lot of work. But
it did have a big impact.
In this regard, I would like to comment on a trend that I
find particularly worrisome. The United States invests
considerable sums in highly sensitive capabilities. In recent
years, it has become all too common to reveal, for a variety of
reasons whether advertent or inadvertent, some of these
sensitive capabilities. As a submariner, I learned at an early
age that exposure of sensitive U.S. operational capabilities
squanders painstaking and often expensive work and jeopardizes
American lives.
The Department of Defense should be credited with beginning
the process of seeking greater efficiencies, and I believe that
process can and should continue. Underperforming or unrealistic
programs should be terminated. Excess infrastructure should be
shed. Needless bureaucratic layers in the Pentagon and other
defense organizations should be eliminated. I also believe that
it is worthwhile to look at the area of military benefits,
including retirement. Any such review should be conducted in a
very careful, systematic and fair manner; one which recognizes
the gratitude our Nation owes to those who sacrificed their
lives or well-being in our defense.
Before I end, I would like to re-emphasize what I said in
the beginning, and that is that it is both urgent and vitally
important to the nation that a discussion of strategy precede
any attempt to institute major cuts in the defense budget.
Accordingly, I would like to offer the following
recommendations.
First, that the Congress, working with the Administration,
commission an independent, bipartisan panel of experts to
examine our strategy, explore alternatives, and make
recommendations for future strategic options. This panel could
be modeled on the 2010 QDR Independent Panel or the 1997
National Defense Panel.
Second, I believe that Congress, working with the
Administration, should stand up a panel to carefully examine
military benefits, to include compensation, health care and
retirement. As I noted previously, I believe that there is room
to examine benefits. Such an examination should be
comprehensive, thoughtful and employ significant grandfathering
of provisions with the ultimate aim being to preserve the
vitality and sustainability of the All Volunteer Force, a key
American asymmetric advantage. As one who served both during
the draft era and the All Volunteer Force, our military today
is by far the best we've ever fielded.
Third, I believe that any cuts to defense must preserve our
ability to recapitalize our forces. We must make sure that we
bequeath to future generations the world's most capable, most
effective military. Only that will allow us to ensure that we
can protect our interests against threats we cannot even
imagine today.
Thank you again for giving me the opportunity to testify
before you today. I will be happy to take your questions.
THE FUTURE OF NATIONAL DEFENSE AND
THE U.S. MILITARY TEN YEARS AFTER 9/11:
PERSPECTIVES FROM OUTSIDE EXPERTS
----------
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
----------
HEARING HELD
SEPTEMBER 13, 2011
----------
WITNESSES
Mr. Jim Thomas
Vice President and Director of Studies
Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments
Dr. Michael E. O'Hanlon
Director of Research and Senior Fellow
The Brookings Institution
Mr. Thomas Donnelly
Director, Center for Defense Studies
American Enterprise Institute
Mr. Max Boot
Jeane J. Kirkpatrick Senior Fellow in National Security Studies
Council on Foreign Relations
?
=======================================================================
PREPARED STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY WITNESSES
September 13, 2011
=======================================================================
STATEMENT OF MR. JIM THOMAS, VICE PRESIDENT AND DIRECTOR OF STUDIES,
CENTER FOR STRATEGIC AND BUDGETARY ASSESSMENTS
Chairman McKeon, Ranking Member Smith, and Members of the
Committee, thank you for inviting me to testify today. On
September 11, 2001, I was working in the Pentagon as part of a
small team drafting the 2001 Quadrennial Defense Review. The 9/
11 attacks were a watershed event for me personally and for the
Department of Defense. The attacks immediately reduced the
peacetime bureaucratic processes of the day, including the QDR,
to trivialities, as the Department--and the Nation--unified in
their intent to vanquish the Islamist terrorists who
perpetrated the attacks and to prevent future attacks on the
United States.
This week, it is appropriate that we remember those who
were murdered by al Qaeda on that sunny Tuesday morning in New
York, Washington, and Pennsylvania. We also remember those who
serve in our intelligence and military services, and their
families, and have made such extraordinary sacrifices in Iraq,
Afghanistan, and other operations around the world. We honor
especially the more than six thousand American Service Members
who have died and more than 45,000 who have been wounded while
fighting since 9/11. While we are thankful that in a decade's
time al Qaeda has never succeeded in conducting another major
terrorist attack on American soil, we also remember that
America is not alone in facing al Qaeda and its affiliates'
indiscriminate acts of terror. Allies and friends around the
world--nowhere more so than in the Muslim world--have also lost
countless lives to al Qaeda's acts of barbarity.
In my testimony today, I will outline some of the pertinent
lessons to be drawn from the past decade, the security and
fiscal challenges we face looking ahead, and how we might
reconcile them in the years ahead.
Lessons Learned Since 9/11
Looking ahead, it is important to draw the right lessons
from our experiences over the past decade:
First, we criticized ourselves in the aftermath of the 9/11
attacks for ``failing to connect the dots.'' Although we have
made significant improvements in our intelligence enterprise to
prevent future attacks, we should not kid ourselves: Despite
our best efforts to anticipate and prevent strategic surprises,
we must also be prepared for future shocks and inevitable
surprises. We must develop the resiliency to minimize them and
the agility to adapt rapidly and respond appropriately. We
should avoid the mistake of the 1990s, where we over-optimized
U.S. general purpose forces for the wars we preferred to fight
that resembled OPERATION DESERT STORM. Instead, we must ensure
our future forces organize, train, and equip themselves to
fight in ways that defy our preferences: when our satellite
communications are jammed; regional airfields are bombarded
with rockets and missiles; ports are mined so that transport
ships cannot enter their harbors; and anti-ship missiles force
naval and amphibious forces to operate from greater distances.
Second, over the past decade the U.S. military has come to
embrace a modern version of what B.H. Liddell Hart called the
strategy of the indirect approach. By enabling and working with
and through allies and partner security forces in Iraq,
Afghanistan, and elsewhere in the world, the United States has
been far more effective in defeating al Qaeda and other
irregular forces than if we had fought them unilaterally. As we
look ahead, the United States should continue to employ
indirect approaches that leverage the advantages of others with
whom we share common security interests. Especially in an age
of austerity, we will need to encourage and enable our allies
and friends around the world to do more for their own defense,
while the United States maintains principal responsibility for
securing the Global Commons of the high seas, the skies above,
space, and cyberspace.
Third, we have seen the enormous costs that a non-state
adversary with limited means has been able to impose on the
United States. For less than a million dollars, al Qaeda
organized and executed the 9/11 attacks. Conservative estimates
reckon the financial impact of the attacks and America's
response to be more than $1 trillion. As we enter an age of
austerity we must not only think about how we can save money
and where we can take risk; we must also think more about how
we adopt cost-imposing strategies to turn the tables on those
who would pose threats to our security. Especially when
resources are limited, we must think harder about increasing
our competitors' costs while minimizing our own.
At the same time, we must avoid drawing the wrong lessons
from the past decade. While it would be a mistake for the
United States to turn its back on irregular warfare and all
that we have re-learned about counter-insurgency in the past
decade, future wars may look very different. For example, we
have seen the incredible impact that unmanned aerial vehicles
have had in locating and targeting terrorists and insurgents
and we have greatly expanded our fleets of non-stealthy
Predator, Reaper, Shadow, FireScout, and Global Hawk UAVs.
Future adversaries, however, may possess air defenses that
limit the use of high-signature aircraft. Simply acquiring
future capabilities based on their effectiveness in the past
decade could leave U.S. forces less prepared and more
vulnerable as they encounter more capable adversaries.
Principal Security Challenges Ahead
Ten years on from the 9/11 attacks, America finds its
military forces still engaged in Iraq, Afghanistan, and
conducting other combat and non-combat operations around the
world. While al Qaeda has been greatly weakened over the decade
and the United States has been successful in hunting down its
leadership and keeping it on the run, it remains determined to
visit violence on the United States, its friends, and allies.
Consequently, the United States must remain vigilant.
At the same time, the United States simply does not have
the luxury to focus only on the clear and present danger posed
by al Qaeda. As a global power, and indeed as the free world's
security partner of choice, the United States faces a range of
foreign threats. Even while we have checked the evil of al
Qaeda, other dangers are growing. Three challenges in
particular will require greater attention over the next several
decades, and preparing for them represents the most prudent
course of action to ensure the appropriate portfolio of
military forces and capabilities to confer the flexibility and
fungibility needed to deal with the widest range of inevitable
surprises and unforeseen contingencies:
The Rise of China. It is instructive that the United States
planned for war with Great Britain up to the eve of World War
II. The United States did not see Great Britain as the most
likely threat, but the potential danger posed by the Royal Navy
to hemispheric defense was the most consequential. Similarly,
China today has the greatest potential to compete with the
United States militarily. China is not an enemy, but the course
that it will chart in the next several decades is far from
clear. China's spectacular economic growth over the past
several decades has contributed positively to the global
economy. Its thirst for overseas commodities and unsettled
maritime claims, however, are cause for concern. Even more
worrisome has been its sustained military build-up, including
the development and fielding of so-called anti-access and area-
denial capabilities that appear intended to take on the
American military's traditional approaches to transoceanic
power projection and forward presence in distant geographic
theaters. China's A2/AD network includes growing inventories of
medium- and intermediate-range missiles; state-of-the-art
integrated air defenses; submarine forces; anti-satellite
systems; and computer network attack capabilities.
Regional Nuclear Powers. Nuclear threats are not new; the
United States has lived with the threat of nuclear weapons in
the hands of hostile powers since the Soviet Union tested its
first nuclear weapon in 1949. New nuclear powers, however, are
emerging and threatening regional military balances. North
Korea has not only tested its own nuclear weapon, but has
proliferated nuclear and missile technology. It has brandished
its nuclear capabilities vis-a-vis South Korea and Japan, and
in the event of an internal power struggle following the death
of Kim Jong Il, its nuclear capabilities could be up for grabs.
The most likely nuclear exchange scenario, however, may involve
Pakistan and India. Should Islamist terrorists repeat a Mumbai-
like attack against India, or if tensions should escalate
resulting in the conventionally superior Indian Army making
incursions into Pakistan, Pakistan could resort to the use of
nuclear weapons. Increasing instability in Pakistan, moreover,
holds the possibility of the army losing control over its
dozens of distributed nuclear weapons and specter of them
falling into the hands of Islamist terrorists. Finally, and
perhaps most consequentially for the United States and its
friends in the Middle East, Iran is continuing efforts to
acquire nuclear weapons. Should Iran acquire nuclear weapons,
instability would characterize the strategic balance between
Iran and Israel, with both sides potentially having incentives
to pre-emptively attack the other. Iran's possession of nuclear
weapons would also likely compel other regional states,
including Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Turkey, to acquire their own
nuclear capabilities, further destabilizing an already unstable
critical region of the world.
Transnational Non-State Actors. Even after the killing of
Osama Bin Laden by U.S. SEALs, al Qaeda and other non-state
groups may continue to threaten U.S. security interests. While
al Qaeda has weakened over the past several decades, affiliated
groups have emerged in Europe, Africa, the Middle East and
Southeast Asia. Other non-state actors including insurgent,
terrorist, and criminal groups are continuing their attempts to
destabilize fragile strategic states around the world. The
lethality of violent extremist groups would increase
dramatically should they acquire nuclear or biological weapons.
Within our own hemisphere, narco-cartels continue to threaten
the stability of key partners such as Mexico and Colombia. In
the future, transnational non-state actors may grow in
importance. The threats they pose will increase as great powers
arm them with more sophisticated weaponry and employ them as
proxies in peripheral contests to impose costs on their state
rivals and bleed them, rather than opposing other great powers
more directly.
Cumulatively, these challenges suggest a more dangerous
world--one in which traditional forms of American power
projection will become prohibitively costly; nuclear dangers
will become more common in distant theaters and as threats at
home; and irregular warfare will remain an enduring feature of
the security environment.
The geographic nexus of these challenges is the Indo-
Pacific region, stretching from the Persian Gulf to the Strait
of Malacca and up to the Sea of Japan. Although the U.S.
military does not have the luxury of focusing on a single
theater, the greatest tests our armed forces will face in the
coming decades are likely to emanate from this region. Just as
military planners focused their attention upon Europe and
Northeast Asia as principal theaters during the Cold War, it is
the Indo-Pacific region that will dominate the attention of
planners over the next several decades as they wrestle with
these challenges.
In confronting these security challenges, the United States
is also likely to face multi-dimensional access and operational
problems. Future adversaries may:
1. LDeny the United States the ability to generate sorties
from theater bases and aircraft carriers within range of their
missiles, necessitating both carrier- and land-based air
operations from far greater ranges;
2. LPossess more sophisticated air defense than recent
adversaries in Libya, Iraq and Kosovo with mobile passive
target acquisition radars that are more difficult to locate and
longer-range surface-to-air missiles, resulting in the
increased vulnerability of non-stealthy manned and unmanned
aircraft;
3. LEmploy systems to jam GPS signals and deny
communications links to aircraft, requiring the United States
to develop alternatives to GPS for positioning, navigation and
timing, as well as local communications schemes such as
airborne line-of-sight relays if satellite communications are
unavailable;
4. LDevelop their own fifth generation fighter aircraft,
challenging U.S. localized air superiority;
5. LEmploy over-the-horizon maritime ISR, long-range anti-
ship missiles, supercavitating torpedoes, and mines to hold off
U.S. naval surface and amphibious ships;
6. LThreaten regional air and sea ports of debarkation
with conventional, chemical, biological, or nuclear attacks to
impede the insertion and staging of large ground forces in
neighboring countries;
7. LAttack U.S. ISR, communications, or GPS satellites
using radio-frequency interference, direct ascent anti-
satellite missiles, co-orbital anti-satellite weapons, or
directed energy systems;
8. LAttack U.S. and allied military computer networks used
for command and control, logistics and mission control, or
civilian networks related to critical infrastructure;
9. LTarget civilian populations in the United States or
allied cities; and
10. LExploit civilian populations to provide sanctuary from
attacks.
Overcoming these problems will require forces and
capabilities that can respond to threats on a global basis
rapidly; operate from range; carry sufficient payloads; evade
detection, penetrate into denied areas and persist to strike
elusive targets; operate in small, highly distributed
formations autonomously; and survive and operate effectively in
extreme WMD environments.
America's Fiscal Predicament
Compounding these dangers, Admiral Michael Mullen, the
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has justifiably
characterized America's fiscal predicament as a national
security threat. Unlike previous periods in our history when
the United States ran large deficits and increased its debt, it
is unlikely simply to ``grow'' its way out of debt this time
around. The rate of increase in the national debt is projected
to exceed by a wide margin even the most optimistic estimates
of U.S. economic growth rates.
Given this reality, Congress faces difficult choices about
raising taxes, curbing growth in entitlement programs, and/or
cutting discretionary Federal spending, including National
Defense. Should the Joint Committee fail to reach agreement on
a deficit reduction plan as directed by the Budget Control Act,
the sequestration trigger could result in an additional $500
billion reduction in defense spending beyond the $350 billion
already envisaged over the next ten years. Such draconian cuts,
especially if level-loaded across the ten-year period, would
compel Defense programmers and budgeteers to identify ``quick
cuts'' rather than ``smart cuts,'' thereby stretching
procurement programs and reducing operations and maintenance
spending to generate immediate savings.
Some believe that it would be relatively easy and painless
to cut $500-800 billion from defense over the next decade. Many
cite the defense build-up since 9/11 and suggest that with the
drawdowns of forces from Iraq and Afghanistan, we can reduce
defense spending as we have after other major buildups in
history. It is true that defense spending, including war costs,
increased from slightly less than $400 billion in FY01 to
around $700 billion in FY11 (in constant FY12 dollars). This
build-up, however, is markedly different from defense build-ups
of the past. In the aftermath of previous build-ups, budget
cutters could count on reducing end-strength and paring back
procurement. In the post-9/11 build-up, though, end-strength
changed very little; Active Component end-strength has hovered
around one-and-a-half million, while recapitalization and
modernization plans for large parts of the forces were largely
deferred, continuing the so-called ``procurement holiday'' of
the previous decade.
America cannot afford to balance the budget on the back of
defense. Reductions beyond the $350 billion in cuts over ten
years already anticipated will be difficult for the Department
of Defense to make, especially while U.S. forces are still
engaged in wars overseas. If the sequestration trigger were
pulled, it could result in even more drastic reductions placing
the United States at great peril. At the same time, it is
increasingly unlikely that Defense will be spared from some
reductions in the years ahead. The challenge will be in making
adjustments to DoD to develop and maintain those forces and
capabilities that are most relevant to the security challenges
ahead and capable of operating in non-permissive conditions,
while finding efficiencies and reducing those forces and
capabilities that are least relevant and most dependent on
relatively benign operating conditions.
Making Changes to Meet Security Challenges in an Age of Austerity
The security challenges we face in the decade ahead are
greater than they have been at any time since the Cold War,
while the resources to deal with them are becoming more
constrained. Together, the dual imperatives of preparing for
new security challenges and reducing defense spending are
likely to drive changes in the military over the coming decade.
Ideally, DoD should revise the Defense Strategy to explain how
it will reconcile the changing security environment with
reductions in defense spending.
Akin to the Nixon Doctrine in 1969, a revised Defense
Strategy might call on allies and partners to do more in their
own defense, with the United States serving as a global enabler
rather than a ``first responder'' for regional crises. As part
of a new bargain with its allies and close partners around the
world, the United States might redouble its efforts to police
the Global Commons--the high seas, air, space and cyberspace--
beyond the sovereign control of other states for the benefit of
all, while expecting its allies to do more at home. Just as the
United States may find it more difficult to project power in
the future, it might once again serve as an ``Arsenal of
Democracy'' to arm allies and friendly states with their own
anti-access and area-denial capabilities to defend their own
sovereignty from regional hegemonic aspirants.
Emulating President Eisenhower's New Look strategy, a
revised strategy might place emphasis on particular elements of
the U.S. military to foster deterrence. Just as the New Look
emphasized nuclear weapons to deter aggression, the United
States today might emphasize special operations forces and
global strike capabilities--including cyber, conventional and
nuclear--to deter aggression or coercion. In its divisions of
labor with allies and friendly states around the world, special
operations, and global surveillance and strike capabilities
represent unique American military advantages that are beyond
the means of most states and are thus complementary rather than
duplicative. Special operations and global surveillance and
strike capabilities, moreover, are among the most fungible
capabilities in the U.S. arsenal as they can be applied across
a range of theaters in a variety of military operations. Such
capabilities may also be among the least vulnerable to anti-
access/area denial threats.
DoD should revise its force planning construct to move away
from preparing to conduct concurrent large-scale land combat
campaigns focused on conducting or repelling invasions. It
should consider a wider range of contingencies, including the
elimination of a hostile power's WMD capabilities. At the same
time, it should assume that the United States would conduct no
more than one large-scale land combat campaign at any given
time. To deal with opportunistic aggression by a third party if
the United States is engaged in war, the United States should
maintain sufficient global strike capabilities, including a
deep magazine of precision-guided weapons, to halt invading
forces and conduct heavy punitive attacks over extended periods
of time.
DoD should also reconsider military roles and missions. It
should reduce duplication across the services, including in
combat aircraft, armored forces, and cyber capabilities. Rather
than having all Services equally prepared for all contingencies
across the spectrum of conflict, it should explore greater
differentiation between the Services. For example:
1. LThe Marine Corps might reinvigorate its role providing
forward presence and optimize itself as the Nation's premiere
on-call crisis response force on a day-to-day basis. In a state
of general war, the Marine Corps might perform two main roles:
first, small teams of highly distributed/highly mobile Marines
could conduct low-signature amphibious landings and designate
targets ashore for bombers and submarines as a vanguard force
in the early stages of a blinding campaign; and second, Marines
could play an instrumental role seizing key bases and maritime
chokepoints, particularly in peripheral theaters, to enable
follow-on operations of the joint force.
2. LThe Army might focus on security force assistance to
foreign security forces steady-state. In a general state of
war, it should be prepared with a Corps-sized capability to
conduct a large-scale WMD elimination campaign as its most
stressing case.
3. LAs the Army and Marine Corps expand their capacity for
security force assistance and foreign internal defense in semi-
permissive environments, special operations forces could shift
their emphasis toward unconventional warfare, foreign internal
defense, counterterrorism, special reconnaissance, direct
action, and special WMD elimination in denied environments.
4. LThe Air Force and Navy might reduce their forward
presence while focusing more on delivering globally available
capabilities to penetrate enemy anti-access/area-denial
networks, providing persistent broad area surveillance and
attack as well as mutually assured air and sea denial in
contested zones, while maintaining control of the Global
Commons.
Beyond changes in the strategy and design of forces, we
should explore ways to gain efficiencies in the institutional
functions of the Department and reduce headquarters staffs.
Over the past several decades almost all headquarters units in
the Department have grown significantly while operating forces
have remained level or declined. Large headquarters staffs,
including the staff in the Office of the Secretary of Defense,
do not improve military effectiveness and, arguably, reduce the
Department's agility to deal with lean adversaries such as al
Qaeda. Congress might consider reducing legislative reporting
requirements to facilitate staff reductions.
We must also act to arrest personnel cost growth lest DoD
follow the path of large American corporations that have run
into trouble in recent years as their healthcare and pension
costs have made them less competitive. U.S. military pay
raises--in excess of the employment cost index (ECI)--and added
or expanded benefits have increased the cost of military
personnel on a per person basis by 46 percent in real terms
since 9/11. Military healthcare is another significant
contributor to the growth in personnel costs, having risen by
85 percent in real terms over the past decade. Congress should
consider an overhaul of military compensation, healthcare, and
retirement pensions to bring them more in line with private
sector best practices.
DoD should develop new operational concepts such as AirSea
Battle that address the types of security challenges outlined
earlier. Such concepts serve a vital function as the connective
tissue between strategic objectives and the types of forces and
capability investments that are needed. DoD should evaluate its
R&D and procurement programs and prioritize them in light of
its operational concepts. Capabilities that are fungible across
theaters and combine multiple attributes described earlier--
global responsiveness and range; payload; survivability;
endurance; autonomy; and counter-WMD--should receive high
priority. Those that lack such attributes or make only niche
contributions should he accorded lower priority.
Finally, DoD should draw a lesson from the past. Between
the First and Second World Wars, the War and Navy Departments
faced far graver budgetary austerity than anything currently
being contemplated. Their forces were dramatically reduced
following demobilization after World War I. Field-grade
officers such as Dwight Eisenhower had trouble making ends meet
and considered leaving the Service. But despite terrible
funding conditions, the Army, Navy and Marine Corps protected
their intellectual capital. They used their limited resources
to experiment with new capabilities like the airplane, aircraft
carrier, and the tank. They conducted a series of wargames,
developed a wide range of Color Plans, and they developed
operational concepts like Amphibious Warfare that would prove
so crucial in the Second World War. Likewise, it would be
prudent to protect DoD's intellectual capital in the current
environment.
Conclusion
Despite the conventional wisdom that America is in decline,
the United States continues to enjoy unrivalled strategic
advantages. We are blessed with insular geography and friendly
neighbors. America is rich in natural resources and fertile
land. It enjoys deep and enduring alliances and access to a
global portfolio of bases. It has a culture of assimilating
immigrants and promoting innovation. The United States enjoys
the most favorable position relative to all of the other great
powers. With ample political will and shared sacrifice, I am
confident the United States can get its economic house back in
order, while safeguarding the country from those who would harm
us.
STATEMENT OF DR. MICHAEL E. O'HANLON, DIRECTOR OF RESEARCH AND SENIOR
FELLOW, THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION
In a stunning change in American policy and politics, it
now appears possible that the military budget may be cut by up
to a trillion dollars over a decade. This would be far more
than the $400 billion in 12-year savings that President Obama
had proposed in his April 13, 2011 speech that signaled the
White House's full engagement on the deficit issue. That is
above and beyond savings that will result naturally, and indeed
are already resulting, from troop drawdowns in Iraq and
Afghanistan.
And these will be real cuts. The administration's earlier
plan, as seen in President Obama's February 2011 budget
proposal to Congress for Fiscal Year 2012, had already taken
away most of the growth in the longer-term military budget,
reducing it to around 1 percent a year in inflation-adjusted
terms. But most military costs rise about 2 percent a year
above inflation. That is a well-established historical tendency
due to the fact that many areas of defense activity--health
care, environmental restoration, weapons purchases, pay for
troops and full-time civilians--do tend to rise in cost
slightly faster than the inflation rate. So it will be
necessary [to] cut forces, weapons, and operations.
Defense cuts are appropriate, even above and beyond the
$150 billion or so in annual spending that will naturally go
away as forces come home from Iraq and Afghanistan. Our nation
is in economic crisis, exacerbated to a large degree by a huge
budget deficit and unhealthy level of accumulated debt. This
dilemma also constitutes a national security challenge for the
United States; no great power can remain great if the economic
underpinnings of its strength erode, as history and common
sense both counsel us. And to attack the deficit in a serious
way, defense must be on the table--just as all other major
elements of federal spending, as well as the tax code, must be.
But before we ask the Pentagon to provide a
disproportionate share of spending reductions, as some would
counsel, we need to sit back and think. Issues of war and peace
are too fundamental to our nation's well-being to be guided by
emotional reactions to an economic downturn that, however
important, is nonetheless still a temporary phenomenon. We have
spent decades building up the best military in the history of
the planet and also helping establish an international system
of alliances and other security relationships that has
prevented another major power war for almost 70 years. Care is
required in changing it. Yes the defense budget is huge--at
nearly $700 billion it is one-fifth of all government spending,
and nearly the equal of all military spending by all other
countries on Earth combined. But it is not particularly huge in
historic terms as a percent of our economy; it clocks it at
about 4.5 percent of gross domestic product, in contrast to
levels of 6 percent under President Reagan and 8 to 10 percent
under Johnson, Kennedy, and Eisenhower. Nor is America
currently a militarized society that needs to reorient its
economy or culture. Even if one counts the National Guard and
Reserves, only 1 percent of the population is in uniform,
compared with more like 2 percent in the latter decades of the
Cold War and even higher figures before that. Modern America is
more notable for the distance between the average citizen and
its all-volunteer armed forces than by any overmilitarization
of its society. And the defense budget is a bargain if the
alternative is a higher risk of war.
Making national budgetary decisions with huge strategic
impact cannot be done as an arithmetic exercise, or as part of
a grand deficit bargain in which some parties trade away
several chips' worth of defense spending in exchange for so
many tax cuts or entitlement cuts like bargaining chips in a
poker game. While it is reasonable, and right, to rethink
defense spending in light of our economic straits, we must also
ask what is our military for, and what role do we as Americans
want to play in the world of the 21st century?
My bottom line is conditionally supportive of the idea of
cutting $350 billion over the next decade--as has already been
agreed in the first round of the August, 2011 debt deal between
President Obama and the Congress. Cumulative reductions of $350
billion to perhaps $500 billion over that ten-year window can
probably be achieved. Some can be found by eliminating pure
waste. Some can be found by steps like asking non-deployed
military personnel and non-wounded veterans to pay health care
insurance premiums more in line with what the rest of the
country considers standard, and to accept a new retirement
system. The bulk of it will, however, have to be found by
cutting real military capability and as a result accepting real
additional risk to the country's security. I detail my
calculations in the long Brookings paper noted above (at
www.brookings.edu) and will develop the arguments further in a
forthcoming book.
Some cuts are eminently reasonable, even on narrow national
security grounds, given how much the deficit has become a risk
to the nation's long-term economic and military strength. But
to argue that cuts of this magnitude can be made risk-free, as
some purport, is not consistent with the realities of the
situation. And to cut more than half a trillion dollars,
relative to the earlier plan laid out by the President in his
February 2011 plan, would be unwise. Unfortunately, there are
budget plans that would do so. Most worrisome is the default
plan. As part of the August deficit and debt deal, the new
Fiscal ``Supercommittee'' is due to present a plan before
Thanksgiving for an up-or-down vote by Congress before
Christmas. If such a plan is not approved, defense and national
security will automatically suffer another $500 billion or so
in ten-year cuts, making for a grand total of about $900
billion. Such draconian cuts would jeopardize irreducible
requirements in American defense policy--winding down current
wars responsibly, deterring Iran, hedging against a rising
China, protecting global sea lanes vital for commerce,
attacking terrorists and checking state sponsors of terror, and
ensuring a strong all-volunteer military as well as a world-
class defense scientific and industrial base.
Behind these specific recommendations is a broader premise.
Not only the United States, but the world in general, benefits
from the current international order in which America is the
strongest power and helps lead a broader alliance system
involving most of the world's other major powers. World peace
would not be served by U.S. disarmament or even a trend towards
the emergence of multiple, comparable power centers. I do not
mean Americans should want to dominate others. Nor should the
United States do other countries' fighting for them. But if the
United States were to stop playing a global leadership role,
competition and conflict would be the likely result. In such a
``multipolar'' world, countries would often be less confident
of their own security, and sometimes inclined to take matters
into their own hands by engaging in arms races, building
nuclear weapons, or even attacking their neighbors.
We Americans get lots of things wrong, but we usually get
around to the right policy after trying all others as Churchill
famously remarked. In the end most peaceful democratic states
do not fear us and want to ally with us. As such our power is
stabilizing, and desirable. Perhaps someday a world made up
just of democracies will, as ``democratic peace theory'' would
predict, be inherently stable on its own, without a strong
leader.\1\ But the world is not there yet.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ For a good discussion of democratic peace theory, see John M.
Owen, Liberal Peace, Liberal War (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University
Press, 1997).
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Put differently, we have to be careful about cutting
defense so much that we have to give up some current overseas
missions and responsibilities. It would be nice if some parts
of the world had become less important, some missions that were
previously very important obsolescent, some allies that had
previously been too weak to carry much of the burden of
maintaining international stability much stronger and more
inclined to use their power in productive ways. But the world
does not offer many such easy options. One place might be
Russia; despite Moscow's prickliness on many issues, it has
become more security partner than adversary of the United
States, and any threats it might pose to NATO are minimal.
However, our force planning already downplays the possibility
of scenarios involving Russia, as it should, so there are no
big further savings to reap. Some might think that Korea would
offer a more promising case where American security commitments
could be reduced. And it is true that South Korea's military is
stronger than before, North Korea's less strong. But the last
time we tried to ignore the Korean threat, back in 1949 when
Secretary of State Dean Acheson infamously declared it beyond
America's security perimeter of key overseas interests, what we
got was an emboldened North Korea and a full-fledged war.
Today, North Korea is ruled by the same fanatical regime as
before, and while the conventional military balance on the
peninsula now strongly favors the Republic of Korea and United
States, North Korea now has nuclear weapons.
For reasons I develop further in the pages that follow, we
would be unwise to draw back from the world or take a big
gamble on simply deciding to forgo certain types of military
responsibilities. To be sure, we may choose not to carry out
the next ``war of choice.'' But we may not always have a choice
about when and where to fight; in a world with proliferating
nuclear arsenals, transnational terrorists, and other threats
that can reach out and touch us even from far away, what
happens in other regions can affect Americans much more
directly than we might prefer. In his retirement ceremony
speech of August 31, 2011, the greatest general of his
generation, David Petraeus, warned us that as a nation we do
not always get to choose the wars we fight, and it was good
advice. Rather than retrench, our primary focus in cutting the
defense budget should be to look for ways to be more
innovative, cost-effective, and brutally efficient in how we
prepare for most possible contingencies and maintain existing
obligations. It is not the time for America to come home from
the world.
Military budget cuts should not be, and cannot be, our main
means to reducing the deficit. Cutting $350 billion over 10
years, or perhaps up to $500 billion, would entail some risk to
America's global interests. As such, it can only be justified
on national security grounds if the nation's economy is
strengthened substantially in the process. Nations with hollow
economies cannot be secure indefinitely, so it is legitimate to
view the debt as a national security threat, and economic
renewal as a national security imperative. However, this idea
only works if projected deficits are reduced enough to make a
notable difference in America's economic prognosis. And that is
only possible if broad-based deficit reduction occurs. As big
as the defense budget is, moreover, it is only one of five big
components of the federal budget of roughly comparable size--
the others being Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and the
sum total of other domestic programs ranging from science
research to infrastructure development to federal support for
education. In short, big defense cuts are only sound policy if
they are accompanied by entitlement revisions and tax reforms
that reduces spending and increases revenue.
There is no exact point at which defense cuts become
excessive and unwise. But make no mistake about it: we will
have to cut into muscle, and not just fat or waste, to achieve
even the $350 billion to $500 billion ten-year cuts that are
now being taken as a given. Such reductions would constitute
almost 10 percent of planned spending, above and beyond
reductions that will occur as the wars end. This book attempts
to develop a plan for accomplishing such reductions without
jeopardizing the country's security interests. But I hope to
show that even cuts of this size would be risky, and that
deeper cuts would be too much. I reach this conclusion not as
some superhawk or member of the ``military-industrial complex''
that Eisenhower warned us about, but as a Democrat, former
Peace Corps volunteer, scientist by training, budget specialist
by background, and independent scholar. And I agree with
deficit hawks that we must look hard, in uncomfortable ways,
for means of scaling back. But it is equally important not to
be reckless in the effort. This book's argument is equally
passionate about two points--that the military budget must play
a major role in deficit reduction, but also that the process
must not go too far and must be grounded in a sound national
security strategy for the United States.
There will be pain enough in carrying out the defense cuts
already now mandated. My estimates are that the following kinds
of changes would be needed:
1. LA return of the size of the ground forces to Clinton-
era levels;
2. LFurther reductions in some parts of the Navy and Air
Force force structure, winding up for example with a Navy of
about 250 ships (but making greater use of crew rotations by
airplane to keep ships on forward deployment longer and more
efficiently);
3. LNo large-scale replacement for the Army's Future Combat
System and a reduction in the size of the planned F-35 program
by at least 40 percent;
4. LSerious consideration of eliminating one leg of the
nuclear triad and taking one nuclear weapons lab out of that
business; and
5. LFundamental redesign of the military retirement system
broadly in line with the recent suggestions of the Defense
Business Board and perhaps an increase in Tricare premiums for
middle-age retirees as well as serious consideration of the end
of military commissaries and exchanges.
Such changes will hurt. And they will pose certain
strategic risks. They are in my judgment acceptable nonetheless
given the nation's economic plight, if done as part of broader
federal deficit reduction and tax reform. But deeper cuts would
not be.
STATEMENT OF MR. THOMAS DONNELLY, DIRECTOR, CENTER FOR DEFENSE STUDIES,
AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE
Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Smith, for the opportunity
to testify today. I know we ``outside experts'' are an
imperfect substitute for the former secretaries of defense who
you had planned to hear from today, but given the gravity of
the moment--I believe that the future health of the U.S. armed
forces and the security of the United States may well be in the
hands of the members of the ``Super Committee'' and, generally,
in the consideration of our government's finances.
That is not to say that I concur with Admiral Mike Mullen's
view that our deficits and debts are the greatest security
challenge we face. Quite the opposite: I am worried that our
future prosperity depends first and foremost on our future
security. I cannot imagine that today's global economy, itself
a manifestation of American power and international leadership,
will be nearly so fruitful absent the guarantees we provide.
The fiscal problems of the federal government are neither the
result of military spending, nor can they be cured by cutting
military spending. And, of course, as a percentage of American
wealth and federal spending, Pentagon budgets have been
constantly cut since the 1980s. And during this administration,
the Department of Defense has been the bill-payer of first and
almost only choice, coughing up hundreds of billions of dollars
while other agencies have been fed a diet rich in ``stimulus.''
But rather than focus on the finances or even the
programmatic consequences of the cuts in prospect--which are
severe and, should Super-Committee ``sequestration'' or the
equivalent come to pass, debilitating to our armed forces--I
would like to talk a bit about the likely strategic
consequences. It has become fashionable to talk about American
``decline'' in the abstract, or to describe ``strategic risk''
in an anodyne fashion. And so I will take a quick tour of the
strategic horizon, looking at particular global and regional
balances of power that can only become more volatile with the
diminished presence of American forces or the diminished
capabilities that they may bring to bear.
I derive the framework of this tour from the work of the
Quadrennial Defense Review Independent Panel, the bipartisan--
nay, ``nonpartisan''--effort that was essentially the creation
of this committee. The panel quickly discovered that the formal
process of defense strategy-making in the QDR had become
bankrupt, and thus was thrown back upon its own long experience
and knowledge about the persistent patterns and habits of U.S.
security strategy; that is, not what we have said we would do,
but what we actually have done in the course of the post-World
War II decades, during the time where America has come to its
position of global leadership. This I offer also as the most
reliable benchmark about what would be different about the
world to come, the world without American leadership.
The panel deduced four consistent U.S. national security
interests:
1. LThe defense of the American homeland;
2. LAssured access to the ``commons'' on the seas, in the
air, in space and in ``cyberspace'';
3. LThe preservation of a favorable balance of power across
Eurasia that prevents authoritarian domination of that region;
and
4. LProviding for the global ``common good'' through such
actions as humanitarian aid, development assistance, and
disaster relief.
Carrying out the missions associated with securing these
four fundamental interests have been the raison d'etre of U.S.
military forces under presidents of both parties in times of
conflict, of Cold-War competition, and in moments [of] relative
stability and peace. Taken together, they define America's role
in the world. I will consider how each might be affected by a
loss of American military power.
Defense of the American Homeland
The tenth anniversary of the September 11 attacks, if
nothing else, provided a reminder of the primacy of the mission
of defending the American homeland. That there has been no
repeat of those terrifying attacks is both a surprise--
certainly I anticipated that there might be more to come--and a
testament to the efforts made. The al Qaeda organization which
conducted those attacks has been badly punished and our
defenses vastly improved, indeed to the point where
complacency, not ``overreaction,'' is as big a concern. The
role of the Department of Defense has often been a supporting
and secondary element in the immediate defense of the United
States proper, but it nonetheless has brought immense
capabilities to bear in that support; the military's
intelligence-gathering contributions amount to tens of billions
of dollars annually.
Second, the distinction between homeland defense and
foreign operations is very slim in the case of international
terrorist groups. Homeland defense must not begin at the
borders, and, if it is to continue to be effective, must be
tactically and operationally offensive, preventing and
disrupting attacks, not merely responding to them. September 11
shattered our belief in ``strategic depth,'' that physical
distance was sufficient to protect us against otherwise weak
enemies.
Lastly, we should not forget the full meaning of America's
``homeland.'' The term traditionally is meant to incorporate
all North America and the Caribbean Basin; it is something we
share with our neighbors. Over the past decade, our
neighborhood has become more dangerous, particularly to the
south, where criminal gangs and criminal regimes are
increasingly enveloped in a kind of syndicate--one that can
include terrorist groups--that preys upon fragile democracies
and which makes for violent acts even within the United States.
One measure of the consequences of defense cuts is likely
to be that the Defense Department's ``homeland commands''--
Northern and Southern commands--are prime targets for
reductions, consolidation, even elimination under various
``reform'' proposals that treat these headquarters, which are
truly combatant commands, as ``overhead.'' But NORTHCOM is
still in its infancy while SOUTHCOM has constantly been a
neglected child and a source of ``savings'' in the post-Cold-
War years. Yet these two commands reflect our oldest and most
critical security interests.
Access to the ``Commons''
Describing the maritime, air, space and cyberspace
``realms'' as ``international commons'' is an imprecise term--
there are, for example, sovereign waters and air space--but
nonetheless these domains are critical components of
international security and also commerce. And assured access,
and in terms of war, dominance and supremacy, to these realms
is a critical element of U.S. national security strategy.
To observe that Americans are seafaring people or to
describe the United States as a ``maritime power'' is hardly a
controversial point. Even the most isolationist elements of the
domestic political spectrum will support the power-projection
posture of the U.S. Navy, despite its British imperial
overtones. And the importance of secure sea lines of
communication--particularly the shipping route that stretches
from the Persian Gulf through the Red Sea, Indian Ocean to the
Malacca Straits and South China Sea to Northeast Asia, which
carries an immense and growing volume of the world's trade--
remains critical to international security. But a smaller Navy,
even one with more-capable ships but fewer overseas bases, is
less frequently present in places such as the South China Sea,
where who ``rules the waves'' is open to doubt and a matter of
potential conflict. Likewise, new technologies are allowing
China and others to develop a range of ``anti-access'' and
``area-denial'' capabilities that are shifting the naval
balance. The U.S. Navy is as small as it has been since World
War I; force reductions would both encourage adversaries and
discourage allies or would-be strategic partners.
But the cardinal virtue of U.S. military power--and, in the
age of the aircraft carrier, even of naval power--has been the
quality of American air power. Two decades ago, in the
aftermath of the first Gulf War, U.S. air supremacy reached its
zenith, fabled not only for its firepower but its unprecedented
precision; war from the air was a uniquely American way of war.
At the core of this mystique was the ability to mass and
synchronize large swarms of tactical aircraft. This method of
operations built a mountain of effects out of a molehill of
airplanes, relying on access to bases in the theater of
operations. The same technologies that threaten surface ships
now hold these air bases at risk--but also, the swarms of
``fourth generation'' F-15s, F-16s and F/A-18s are aging and
their numbers are shrinking. The cuts in view could result in a
fighter force half the size of the ``Desert Storm''-era armada.
And the generation-long failure to modernize is felt most
directly in the tactical air forces: the F-22 program was
stopped at 187 Raptors when 750 were once planned, and the F-35
would certainly be the prime target of future cuts.
Access to space--which has long been ``militarized'' much
to the advantage of the United States--is no longer a sure
thing. And even where access might be retained, military
dominance and supremacy are uncertain. This is a critical
vulnerability for U.S. forces, whose weapons, operations,
communications and more depend [on] it. As observed above,
intelligence satellites are essential in even the smallest,
most irregular operations against the tiniest terrorist groups,
but the loss of larger networks in a conflict against a more
sophisticated foe--and China is at the forefront in developing
and recently testing anti-satellite systems--would be
catastrophic.
Strategic and operational thinking about ``cyberspace'' is
still being developed, but the best analogies and precedents
are to be found in regarding this realm as similar to the
maritime domain. The Internet is indeed much more a venue for
commerce and civilian communication than a military asset,
though it is that; sharing information has been a key to the
process of ``transformation.'' It has already been a domain for
private ``pirates'' and used, notably by Russia, as a
battlefield. No one is quite sure what it means to ``secure''
cyberspace, but suffice it to observe that the failure to do so
in a significant way would be a critical test of international
politics and an easily imaginable provocation to war.
In sum, even as the ``common'' realms where commerce,
communication and security intersect are expanding and the
burdens of ``securing the commons'' or ``assuring free access''
to them appear to be growing, the U.S. military is already at
full stretch. A fading of American power would inevitably
result in a contest to control these commons.
Continental Balances
The corollary of the commonplace observation that America
is a ``maritime power'' is that U.S. strategic posture has
been--and should return to--that of an ``offshore balancer,''
intervening only in conflicts across the Eurasian landmass to
prevent a ``hostile hegemon'' from dominating Europe or the
Middle East or East Asia. But, as quickly became clear to the
members of the QDR Independent Panel, close attention to these
continental balances has been the core of American strategy-
making for decades.
The most obvious example and most obvious success is to be
found in Europe--a continent that has been intertwined with the
American security since the discovery of the ``New World.'' The
pursuit of a ``Europe whole and free'' was the central goal of
the Cold War, but even that was a recognition that World War II
left the situation across the continent dangerous and unstable.
Conversely, the end of the Cold War appears to have put a
punctuation mark on centuries of conflict; it is hard to
imagine a large-scale war in Europe, and that is a direct
result not only of American ``offshore balancing'' but American
presence and alliance-building since 1945. U.S. military
presence in Europe is a shadow of its former self, though it
remains critical as a ``lily pad'' for deployments elsewhere--
Libya is the most recent example but all the recent operations
in the Middle East were enabled by Europe-based forces. And the
unprecedented peace of Europe is itself a great blessing that
comes at low cost.
Likewise, the American commitment to the ``Middle East''--a
very loose term--has grown even as we have been able to draw
down in Europe. In 1979, U.S. Central Command did not even
exist; the Carter Administration cobbled together a ``Rapid
Deployment Joint Task Force'' in the aftermath of the Soviet
invasion of Afghanistan that could neither deploy very rapidly
nor bring much force to bear. Every president since then has
found reason to take a larger hand in a very volatile but
important region, from the 1987 reflagging of oil tankers to
Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya. In particular, we have come to see
the region as many theaters in one. The focus of most efforts
of the last generation has been on the Arab world, but it is
increasingly clear that South Asia is a problem unto itself; we
walk away from Pakistan only at extreme peril.
Finally, our engagement in East Asia, north and south, on
Pacific islands and ashore, is as long-lasting and, over time,
as large as that in Europe. But no event is of greater
geopolitical import than the rise of China; how we respond to
that--and the course of China itself--is the salient issue of
the moment and for the future. We have treaty allies in Japan,
South Korea and elsewhere, whose safety, prosperity and--
perhaps surprisingly but assuredly--democracy depend upon our
regional posture and our military power. What is not surprising
is that China is lately making the most mischief in the South
China Sea and Southeast Asia, where we were once constantly
present and supremely powerful. Ironically, the one nation to
resist U.S. force, Vietnam, is leading the call for [America]
to return to the scene.
The Global Good
One of the supreme reasons why the American exercise of
military power attracts even former adversaries is that, at
least in contrast to others, we can and do use our forces not
only to deter, punish and defeat but to relieve, aid and
develop. Be it a response to a humanitarian crisis--a tsunami,
a nuclear meltdown or a combination of the two--or an uncertain
and open-ended attempt to replace what John Quincy Adams called
``derelict'' states with legitimate government, contributing to
a common good beyond the strict national interest has been and
ought to remain an important mission for the U.S. military.
To protest that, especially in tough times, we must
conserve our strength only for those occasions that demand
``warfighting'' capabilities or the kind of sophisticated
operations and high technologies only possessed by our armed
forces is, if experience counts for anything, to expect too
much--or too little. Given the character of our political
principles and the extent of our power, the kind of hard-nosed
``realism'' of the international relations professoriat is a
theory that American strategic practice is unlikely to fulfill.
It is not realistic to expect the United States to be like
Bismarck's Prussia.
Moreover, the failure to act in pursuit of a global and
common good would make the practice of harder power more
difficult. The rest of the world sees how we behave--indeed,
they spend most of their own strategy-making energy in first
trying to figure out what we will do--and behaves accordingly.
If the United States falters in its attempts at making the
world a better place, if we think we can ``lead from behind,''
we will find it harder to make it a very safe place.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I look forward to the committee's
questions.
STATEMENT OF MR. MAX BOOT, JEANE J. KIRKPATRICK SENIOR FELLOW IN
NATIONAL SECURITY STUDIES, COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
Chairman McKeon, Congressman Smith, members of the
Committee:
Thank you for inviting me here to talk about the future of
the American armed services. That future is very much in doubt
at the moment. The armed forces face the most formidable
enemies they have encountered in decades. These enemies do not
carry guns and they do not plant IEDs. Rather they wear green
eyeshades and wield complex spreadsheets. But make no mistake:
the impact of budget cuts has the potential to devastate our
armed forces. It will, in fact, do more damage to their
fighting capacity than the Taliban, Al Qaeda, or any other
external foe could possibly inflict.
Already this year the budget has been cut by approximately
$478 billion--$78 billion in cuts announced in January by the
administration, and another $400 billion under the Budget
Control Act this summer. Now we face the prospect of
sequestration this fall--which could mean another $600 billion
in cuts, or more, over the next decade. Hundreds of billions
more will be lost assuming the disappearance of funding for
Overseas Contingency Operations as we wind down operations in
Iraq and Afghanistan. Todd Harrison of the Center for Strategic
and Budgetary Assessments estimates that in all the defense
budget could decline by 31 percent over the next decade. That
compares with cuts of 53 percent after the Korean War, 26
percent after the Vietnam War, and 34 percent after the end of
the Cold War.
Some might argue that there is nothing wrong with this--
that we always downsize our military after the conclusion of
hostilities. Leave aside the fact that hostilities have not yet
ended--our troops are still in combat every day in Afghanistan
and they still face the constant prospect of attack in Iraq.
Moreover they continue to conduct military operations against
Somalian pirates and Al Qaeda terrorists which put them in
harm's way on a regular basis. It is beyond bizarre that we are
rushing to spend the peace dividend at a time when we are not
actually at peace. But, again, leave that aside for a moment,
and simply consider the consequences of past drawdowns (as I
laid out in the Washington Post last year).
After the American Revolution, our armed forces shrank from
35,000 men in 1778 (plus tens of thousands of militiamen) to
just 10,000 by 1800. The result was that we were ill-prepared
to fight the Whiskey Rebellion, the quasi-war with France, the
Barbary wars and the War of 1812--all of which might have been
averted if the new republic had had an army and a navy that
commanded the respect of prospective enemies, foreign and
domestic.
After the Civil War, our armed forces shrank from more than
a million men in 1865 to just 50,000 in 1870. This made the
failure of Reconstruction inevitable--there were simply too few
federal troops left to enforce the rule of law in the South and
to overcome the ruthless terrorist campaign waged by the Ku
Klux Klan and other white supremacist groups. Segregation would
remain a blot on U.S. history for another century.
After World War I, our armed forces shrank from 2.9 million
men in 1918 to 250,000 in 1928. The result? World War II became
more likely and its early battles more costly. Imagine how
Hitler might have acted in 1939 had several hundred thousand
American troops been stationed in France and Poland. Under such
circumstances, it is doubtful he would ever have launched his
blitzkrieg. Likewise, Japanese leaders might have thought twice
about attacking Pearl Harbor if their homeland had been in
imminent danger of being pulverized by thousands of American
bombers and their fleet sunk by dozens of American aircraft
carriers.
After World War II, our armed forces shrank from 12 million
men in 1945 to 1.4 million in 1950. (The Army went from 8.3
million soldiers to 593,000.) The result was that ill-trained,
ill-armed draftees were almost pushed off the Korean Peninsula
by the North Korean invasion. The very first American ground
force to encounter the invaders--Task Force Smith--was routed
and decimated because it did not have enough ammunition to stop
North Korean tanks. Kim Il Sung was probably emboldened to
aggression in the first place by the rapid dissolution of
America's wartime strength and indications from parsimonious
policymakers that South Korea was outside our ``defense
perimeter.''
After the Korean War, our armed forces as a whole underwent
a smaller decline--from 3.6 million men in 1952 to 2.5 million
in 1959--but the Army lost almost half its active-duty strength
in those years. President Dwight Eisenhower's New Look relied
on relatively inexpensive nuclear weapons to deter the Soviet
Union and its allies, rather than a large, costly standing
army. As a result the Army that was sent to Vietnam was not
prepared to fight guerrillas--an enemy that could not be
defeated with a hand-held Davy Crockett nuclear launcher.
After the Vietnam War, our armed forces shrank from 3.5
million personnel in 1969 to 2 million in 1979. This was the
era of the ``hollow army,'' notorious for its inadequate
equipment, discipline, training and morale. Our enemies were
emboldened to aggression, ranging from the anti-American
revolutions in Nicaragua and Iran to the Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan. We are still paying a heavy price for the Iranian
Revolution, with Iran on the verge of going nuclear.
After the end of the Cold War and the Persian Gulf War, our
armed forces shrank from 2.1 million personnel in 1989 to 1.3
million in 1999; the Army went from 769,000 soldiers to
479,000. The result: an Army desperately overstretched by its
subsequent deployments. Part of the reason too few troops were
sent to stabilize Iraq in 2003 was that senior officials
thought there simply weren't enough to go round.
We are still suffering the consequences of the post-Cold
War drawdown. The Navy, down from 546 ships in 1990 to 284
today (the lowest level since 1930), is finding it hard to
fight Somali pirates, police the Persian Gulf and deter Chinese
expansionism in the Western Pacific. The Army and Marine Corps
are forced to maintain a punishing operational tempo that
drives out too many bright young officers and NCOs. The Air
Force, which has been reduced from 82 fighter squadrons in 1990
to 39 today, has to fly decades-old aircraft until they are
falling apart. The average age of our tanker aircraft is 47
years, of strategic bombers 34 years, and some older fighter
aircraft are literally falling out of the sky.
The bipartisan Quadrennial Defense Review Independent Panel
led by Stephen Hadley and William Perry found last year ``a
growing gap between our interests and our military capability
to protect those interests in the face of a complex and
challenging security environment.'' The panel further noted:
``There is increased operational tempo for a force that is
much smaller than it was during the years of the Cold War. In
addition, the age of major military systems has increased
within all the services, and that age has been magnified by
wear and tear through intensified use. . . . The Department of
Defense now faces the urgent need to recapitalize large parts
of the force. Although this is a long-standing problem, we
believe the Department needs to come to grips with this
requirement. The general trend has been to replace more with
fewer more-capable systems. We are concerned that, beyond a
certain point, quality cannot substitute for quantity.''
The Hadley-Perry commission recommended that ``as the force
modernizes, we will need to replace inventory on at least a
one-for-one basis, with an upward adjustment in the number of
naval vessels and certain air and space assets.'' It also
recommended maintaining the size of our current ground forces
because ``the increased capability of our ground forces has not
reduced the need for boots on the ground in combat zones.''
Both of those recommendations are absolutely right. And
both are increasingly difficult to carry out given the
magnitude of defense cuts already agreed upon. They will become
an utter impossibility if sequestration occurs. You have heard
the services say that they can deal with the current level of
cuts but that's only because they're being good soldiers. In
reality even the current cutbacks are already cutting into
muscle; sequestration, if it were to occur, would be akin to
lopping off entire limbs. In either case American power will
not survive in its present form.
Those who argue in favor of cuts point out that defense
spending has doubled in real terms since 9/11. That's true but
much of the spending has gone to current operations, personnel
costs, ballooning health care costs, and other necessities--it
has not been used to recapitalize our aging inventory of
weapons systems or to substantially expand a ground force that
was cut by a third since the Cold War.
Instead, even as we continue to fight in Afghanistan and
Iraq, the Defense Department has been eliminating or reducing
one system [after] another. Defense Secretary Bob Gates closed
headquarters, eliminated general-officer slots, and even shut
down the whole U.S. Joint Forces Command. He cancelled or
capped 30 procurement programs that, if taken to completion,
would have cost more than $300 billion. The cancellations
included the Army's Future Combat System, the Marines'
Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle, the VH-71 presidential
helicopter, the Navy's CG(X) next-generation cruiser, the Air
Force's F-22 fighter and C-17 cargo plane, and the Airborne
Laser. Other programs, such as the Navy's new aircraft carrier,
were delayed, while the planned buy of F-35 fighters, Littoral
Combat Ships, and other systems was reduced.
And it's not just weapons systems, we're losing--it's
personnel. Before leaving office, Gates announced that he was
whittling down Army and Marine end-strength by 47,000
personnel, reversing the increase in the size of the ground
force that he had pushed through to deal with the wars in
Afghanistan and Iraq. Further cuts in end-strength are
undoubtedly coming as a result of greater budget cuts, thus
throwing out of work--at a time of already high unemployment--
tens of thousands of men and women who have signed up to serve
their country.
That may make sense if you assume we will have no need of
large numbers of ground combat forces in the future, but as
Gates himself said earlier this year: ``When it comes to
predicting the nature and location of our next military
engagements, since Vietnam, our record has been perfect. We
have never once gotten it right, from the Mayaguez to Grenada,
Panama, Somalia, the Balkans, Haiti, Kuwait, Iraq, and more--we
had no idea a year before any of these missions that we would
be so engaged.'' That's absolutely correct, and because the
world is such an uncertain, dangerous place we need the
deterrence and flexibility provided by a large ground force.
But maintaining soldiers in an all-volunteer force is
expensive, and you can bet that they will be sacrificed to
achieve arbitrary budget targets.
This points to a larger issue: What strategy are we
following here? Is there any strategy at all? None is apparent
from the outside--or, from what my friends in the Pentagon tell
me, from the inside either. It has been said this is a budget
in search of a strategy, but we will be hard-put to achieve
all, or even most, of our strategic objectives with a third-
less money. The Hadley-Perry commission identified four
enduring security interests for the United States: ``The
defense of the American homeland; assured access to the sea,
air, space, and cyberspace; the preservation of a favorable
balance of power across Eurasia that prevents authoritarian
domination of that region; providing for the global common good
through such actions as humanitarian aid, development
assistance, and disaster relief.'' None of those interests will
change no matter what budget decisions are made in Washington;
all that will change will be our ability to defend those
interests.
Certainly there has not been--nor is there likely to be--a
decreased demand for the armed forces. They are constantly
having new missions thrown their way, from defending our
nation's computer networks to deposing a dictator in Libya and
providing relief to Japanese tsunami survivors. Those who call
for austerity in our defense budget do not suggest which
missions, which specific operations, they will willingly
forego. And when they do the suggestions are usually
insufficient to achieve serious savings. For instance I have
heard it suggested that we could save a lot of money by pulling
our forces (currently 80,000 strong) out of Europe. But in
fact, as Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld discovered, that
is simply a prescription for incurring higher short-term costs
because we have to recreate in the United States the base
infrastructure that already exists in Europe. And of course
troops based in the U.S. will be farther away from where they
are likely to deploy: the Middle East, Africa, and Central
Asia. By not having them forward-deployed, we will lose
significant strategic flexibility, political influence, and
deterrence capacity.
Don't get me wrong. It is impossible to deny that there is
waste, fraud and abuse in the defense budget. The problem is
that, as you know, there is no line item for waste, fraud, and
abuse, and hence no way to pare only wasteful spending. Indeed
it is hard to agree about what constitutes wasteful spending
since every defense program has its passionate defenders,
especially here on the Hill, and it is possible to make
compelling arguments in favor of them all. We all know that the
procurement process is bloated, but I have never [heard] anyone
suggest in a compelling or realistic way how to reform the
procurement process so that we can buy substantially more with
less. Indeed as we pare back our programs we increase unit
costs and only heighten complaints about runaway acquisitions
programs. At the end of the day, less money results in less
capability.
And less capability is something we cannot afford at a time
when we face so many actual or potential threats: threats from
a rising China, a nuclear North Korea, an Iran on the verge of
going nuclear, a Pakistan that is threatened as never before by
jihadists, and by numerous terrorist groups, ranging from the
Afghan and Pakistani Taliban to the Shabab in Somalia and Al
Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, all of whom continue to pose a
significant threat despite Osama bin Laden's demise. These
groups threaten not only vital U.S. interests abroad but also
increasingly the American homeland itself, as seen from AQAP's
attempt to mail parcel bombs to the U.S. and from the Pakistani
Taliban's sponsorship of an attempt to set off a car bomb in
Times Square. Both of those attempts are recent--they occurred
last year. As the more recent frenzy over a possible terrorist
attack on the 10th anniversary of 9/11 makes clear, such
threats are not going away, despite all of the counter-
terrorism success we have enjoyed.
China presents a particularly worrisome long-threat: It is
in the midst of a rapid defense buildup which has allowed it to
field a stealth fighter, an aircraft carrier, diesel
submarines, cyberweapons, ``carrier-killer'' and satellite-
killer ballistic missiles and numerous other missiles. Even as
things stand China is increasingly able to contest the US
Navy's freedom of movement in the Western Pacific. As long ago
as 2008, Rand predicted that by 2020 the U.S. would not be able
to defend Taiwan from a Chinese attack, and that was before the
surprise unveiling of China's J-20 Stealth fighter or its new
aircraft carrier; the timeline for American dominance being
threatened is only accelerating. The safety of U.S. bases in
Okinawa, Guam, and elsewhere in the region can no longer be
assured, creating the potential for a 21st century Pearl
Harbor. That trend will be exacerbated--leading to a
potentially dangerous shift in the balance of power--unless we
build up our shrinking fleet. But given the budget cuts being
discussed here we will have trouble maintaining the current
size of our fleet much less expanding it.
We have already cancelled the F-22 and cut back the
procurement of the F-35. Is the F-35 to be cancelled altogether
or cut back to such an extent that we will have no answer to
the fifth-generation fighters emanating from Russia and China?
If that were to come to pass, it would signal the death knell
for American power in the Pacific. If our power wanes, our
allies will have to do what they need to do to ensure their own
security. It's easy to imagine, under such a scenario, states
such as Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan acquiring their own
nuclear weapons, thus setting off a dangerous and destabilizing
nuclear arms race with China.
Even given the dire consequences, it might still make sense
to cut the defense budget--if it were bankrupting us and
undermining our economic well-being which, we would all agree,
is the foundation of our national security. But that's not the
case. Defense spending, including supplemental appropriations,
is less than 5 percent of gross domestic product and less than
20 percent of the federal budget. Both figures are much lower
than the historic norm. That means our armed forces are much
less costly in relative terms than they were throughout much of
the 20th century. Even at roughly $550 billion, our core
defense budget is eminently affordable. It is, in fact, a
bargain considering the historic consequences of letting our
guard down.
The United States armed forces have been the greatest force
for good the world has seen during the past century. They
defeated Nazism and Japanese imperialism, deterred and defeated
Communism, and stopped numerous lesser evils--from Slobodan
Milosevic's ethnic cleansing to the oppression perpetrated by
Saddam Hussein in Iraq and the Taliban in Afghanistan. I cannot
imagine a world in which America is not the leading military
power. It would be a brutal, Hobbesian place in which
aggressors rule and the rule of law is trampled on. And yet
Congress will be helping to usher in such a New World Disorder
if it continues to slash defense spending at the currently
contemplated rate.
THE FUTURE OF NATIONAL DEFENSE AND
THE U.S. MILITARY TEN YEARS AFTER 9/11:
PERSPECTIVES FROM FORMER
SERVICE CHIEFS AND VICE CHIEFS
----------
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
----------
HEARING HELD
OCTOBER 4, 2011
----------
WITNESSES
General John P. Jumper, USAF, Retired
17th Chief of Staff, United States Air Force
General Richard A. Cody, USA, Retired
31st Vice Chief of Staff, United States Army
Lieutenant General H. Steven Blum, USA, Retired
25th Chief, National Guard Bureau
?
=======================================================================
PREPARED STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY WITNESSES
October 4, 2011
=======================================================================
STATEMENT OF GENERAL JOHN P. JUMPER, USAF, RETIRED, 17TH CHIEF OF
STAFF, UNITED STATES AIR FORCE
What threats to our homeland can we anticipate as we look
forward?
As we attempt to anticipate future threats it's important
to remember our track record on successful predictions. Any
objective assessment must begin with the fact that we are lousy
predictors. Before the first Gulf war (Desert Shield, Desert
Storm) we had no idea how the likes of Saddam Hussein, Slobodan
Milosevic, or Osama bin Laden, would perpetrate aggressions and
atrocities that dominated US policy and shaped military actions
for the next 20 years.
We are safe in assuming two things.
1. LThe terrorist threat will continue to pose the greatest
threat inside our borders and to US forces and interests
overseas. This danger becomes more serious as we consider that
nuclear weapons get ever closer to the hands of irresponsible,
rogue leaders throughout the world.
2. LWe must be prepared for more than counterinsurgencies.
As nations gain the power to resist US policy in ways that
could include aggressive action, our ability to deter and then
react rapidly with substantive capabilities is as important as
ever.
The argument is not whether aggressive foreign nations
harbor ambitions of invading the US. I believe it's more a
matter of reacting to, or being dragged into, conflicts
perpetrated by frictions or atrocities that compel us to react.
In Bosnia and Kosovo we led a NATO force that reacted to
ongoing genocide. What should we be prepared for if frictions
arise that involve allies in Asia or South America?
We have been able to react to the spectrum of conventional
warfare (Iraq, Serbia) as well as counterinsurgency operations
in Afghanistan because the US military forces were equipped
with needed capabilities, were able to modify or adapt existing
technology, or were able to rapidly field necessary
capabilities quickly. All the while we have maintained a
nuclear deterrent and kept a watchful eye on nuclear
proliferation and must continue to do so with focused attention
on nuclear safety, reliability and security.
What are appropriate roles and missions for the US
Military?
The roles and missions carved out for the military are time
tested and well understood. I believe that a certain amount of
overlap and redundancy is necessary for absolutely critical
functions. In the field, you find the military services falling
all over themselves to do what it takes to get the mission
accomplished. Joint-minded operations are being carried out
every day. Behind the scenes of any major military operation
you will find that very little is done by one service alone.
We could do much more to allow the services to better
define the limits of necessary overlap and to further
interdependence on one another's capabilities. There is
absolutely no doubt that this could best be done by development
of Joint Concepts of Operation that requires services to think
through how we plan to deploy and fight in various situations,
and to define and limit the areas of necessary overlap. This
process would force new ways of deriving requirements and
reshape the acquisition process by demanding that we describe
how we are going to fight before we decide what we will buy to
fight with.
The lessons we are learning in this new age of warfare must
be applied with due respect for lessons of the past. The key
word is balance. As we build capabilities in counterinsurgency
we must be respectful of the very traditional and conventional
capabilities that are emerging from potential adversaries who
have watched and learned from US military successes over the
past 20 years. The common understanding of asymmetrical
advantage is the use of low technology to defeat high
technology. We easily forget that the asymmetrical advantage of
the United States is our technology multiplied many-fold by the
ingenuity of our Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines to
rapidly shape our technological advantage in the course of
battle.
The military also has a role as responsible stewards of
nuclear weapons. As we reduce our nuclear posture it must be
with the full support of Congress to maintain funding for the
safety, reliability and security of the weapons that remain; to
include relentless attention to counter proliferation.
As we enter the cyber age it will be necessary to do much
more than to defend networks and data sources. We will need to
develop the necessary weapons to fight back in a cyber-
engagement. As the services and agencies develop the doctrine
of cyber intelligence preparation; forensic and predictive
analysis; and, doctrine of defense and offense, Congressional
support for the weapons and tools of this new type of warfare
will be critical.
What are the consequences of further cuts to the military
over the next decade and what choices do we have to make?
It will be extremely difficult for the services to
implement even the currently projected cuts. If the Joint
Select Committee fails to reach consensus the resulting
additional cuts to the defense budget would lead to dramatic
loss of capability and the adverse impact on morale of a force
that has served the nation so well for the decade of the war on
terror.
It is unfortunate that when the services are faced with
large budget cuts the easiest targets are, in many ways, the
most damaging. We tend to hit training, readiness and research
& development first as we attempt to save force structure. If
all of the projected cuts are implemented, all of these budget
categories will be impacted. Thus, our ability to repair and
reset the force; to recapitalize the force; to recover lost
training; to have the spare parts to keep current systems
operating; and, to retain our technology advantage through
Research and Development would be simultaneously and severely
impacted.
Indeed there is much that can be done to realize greater
efficiency with current resources. If significant force
reductions eventuate, they must be done with proper balance
between Active Duty, National Guard and Reserve forces. All
must share in eventual drawdowns and all must share
responsibility for all assigned missions and the operational
tempo demanded by these missions. This cannot be done without
the support of the Congress as our military leadership makes
difficult recommendations.
I also believe that enormous savings are available in the
logistics functions if the full power of best business
practices and competition can be brought to bear. Again, the
Congress must stand behind our military leaders as they
struggle to find solutions.
In any case our Nation's Military Leadership will be asked
to recommend reductions more severe than any I have seen in my
career. They cannot do so alone.
What are the impacts of reducing force structure and end
strength?
Reductions in end strength and force structure must be tied
to a realistic strategy and deliberate policy decisions that
can still be supported in the face of cuts. Our current
policies of support to alliances, forward presence and
stationing, rapid global response, credible deterrence and the
ability to sustain operations will all be called into question.
In many cases a proper balance for the United States may
call for the redefinition of our alliances and reconsideration
of our fair share of defense relationships. These decisions may
permit prudent reductions in permanent commitments overseas.
However, as an American and a former member of the world's
greatest military I believe it is our obligation to maintain a
force able to react with authority to instabilities and
atrocities in the world when so directed, and to be able to do
so rapidly and effectively.
What are the implications of changes in global force
posture/increasing US isolationism?
In a world that is on a slippery slope of instability,
ungoverned pockets of terrorist growth, rogue leaders in
control of nuclear weapons and growing disparity between the
world's richest and poorest, it is unreasonable that the
world's only great benign superpower should drift into
isolationism.
As stated earlier, the time is appropriate to reassess our
alliances and our commitments to them, however, it does not
seem reasonable to back away from nations who struggle to
implement political structures that support self-determination
and the liberties promoted by our own policies.
There is no doubt that US military basing and presence has
been a force for stability in the world. Even if redefined and
deliberately reduced our forward partnerships are important
pillars of our credibility and visible signs of our commitment
and should not be abandoned.
STATEMENT OF GENERAL RICHARD A. CODY, USA, RETIRED, 31ST VICE CHIEF OF
STAFF, UNITED STATES ARMY
On 8 April 2008 I testified before this Committee as the
Vice Chief of Staff of the Army. Then, I was honored to
represent the Nation's one million plus Soldiers, nearly
600,000 of whom were serving on Active Duty and over 250,000 of
whom were deployed worldwide, most on 15 month combat tours, as
I testified on issues critical to the current and long term
readiness of the U.S. Army. Today, I am again honored to
testify before you as a private citizen, a retired Soldier, but
one who continues to do what I can to support our outstanding
Soldiers, Marines, Sailors and Airmen.
Many things have changed since April 2008. The surge in
Iraq has ended and the Army is on course to withdraw the
remaining 45,000 Soldiers by the end of the year; we have
surged more forces into Afghanistan. The end strength growth of
65,000 additional Soldiers that we started in 2004 is complete,
though now there is movement to reduce the Army's active duty
strength by significant numbers. The Army has completed the
restructuring of the force and just finished the largest BRAC,
MILCON and global repositioning of our Army since World War II;
all while fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. Today our U.S.
economy is in crisis mode, and probably most importantly, we
have now been at war for over 10 years.
That said, many things have not changed. In 2008 I reported
to you that the world we live in is exceedingly dangerous.
Recent events in Southwest Asia, the Pacific, and the Arab
Spring only highlight this fact, in spite of courageous efforts
of our service men and women. I also reported that our Army was
out of balance, that repeated tours of 12 months in combat with
only 13 months back before deploying again was putting
tremendous stress on the All Volunteer Army and their Families.
Today that stress is still there as the Army continues to
deploy Soldiers on 12 month combat tours with less than 24
months between tours. I testified then that we were consuming
our strategic readiness, people and equipment, with repeated
tours in the harshest environments we have ever fought in. And
most importantly, that our ability to man, equip and train for
full spectrum operations somewhere else in the world, while
fighting the current battles in Iraq and Afghanistan, was not
possible.
In 2008 I reported that the cumulative impact of 6 years of
Continuing Resolutions was causing significant problems within
the Services' ability to run their programs, prepare our
Soldiers for their next rotation and to reset the equipment;
equipment that has been in combat for over 6 years. Today we
enter another Fiscal Year with a CR while at war. It is one
thing to have to deal with the uncertainty of our enemies and
what new threat to prepare for. But it is entirely another to
have to deal with uncertainty of year to year budgets and what
resources will be available to sustain today's fight and reset
an Army that has been at war for over 10 years for the next
fight.
As Congress, the Pentagon and the Executive Branch wrestle
with the budget reduction required by the Budget Control Act,
the real questions with regard to the Services' budget is
simple: What missions do you want our military to continue to
perform? What threats do you want our military to counter? What
level of readiness do you want the military to sustain? History
has taught us that we have not been very good at predicting
where, when and against whom, the U.S. military will have to
fight to protect the national interest and the security of this
nation and its 315 million citizens. Simply put, when we size,
scope and resource our military for the peaceful and U.S.
friendly world we hope for, and not the dangerous, hostile and
unpredictable world we live in, it is the American service men
and women, and our nation, that we put at risk.
During my six years in the Pentagon as the Army's G-3 and
as Vice Chief, the Congress has always responded to the
critical needs of our force, especially during the early years
of operation Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom. It is well
documented that we entered this Global War on terrorism
woefully short of equipment, resulting from the defense budget
cuts in the late 90's after the first Gulf War, especially for
our Guard and Reserve forces, and Congress responded. That
spirit of support by this Congress is still needed today.
Thank you and I look forward to answering your questions.
STATEMENT OF LIEUTENANT GENERAL H. STEVEN BLUM, USA, RETIRED, 25TH
CHIEF, NATIONAL GUARD BUREAU
Thank you for the opportunity to testify today before the
House Armed Services Committee on the Future of National
Defense and the U.S. Military Ten Years After 9/11. Throughout
my 42 years of service in uniform to this nation, I have found
that the House Armed Services Committee has always been able to
provide outstanding non-partisan support. It has taken the
often difficult, but always necessary, actions to ensure that
our men and women in uniform have the resources and policies
that make it possible for them to accomplish their myriad
missions.
Today, we face a security environment that may be the most
complex and dangerous in our nation's history. The
international security landscape shifts literally every day. As
a result, our nation requires more than ever of its armed
forces. At the same time, fiscal realities force constraints on
current and future defense budgets. To state the obvious and
this challenge faces not just the military but every sector of
our society--we must find ways to do more with less. To do this
job right, we should establish the National Security Strategy
independently of budget constraints. Strategy must come first.
Only then can we make meaningful decisions, based on informed
dialogue, to determine how best to accomplish our strategy
within existing fiscal constraints.
Let us recognize that today we have the most experienced,
professional and capable military force ever to serve our
nation. We must maintain this peerless military readiness and
capacity to protect our nation against often uncertain and
sometimes unpredicted threats. We also must avoid repeating
past mistakes when numbers and parochial interests, rather than
geopolitical realities, drove decisions and produced unexpected
and undesirable second and third order effects.
As this committee considers and deliberates the tough
choices our nation faces, I ask you to consider the strategic
approach being embraced today by many of the most successful
for-profit corporations around the world. They are responding
to difficult market conditions by sizing their fulltime
professional work force to handle the lowest expected level of
business activity. At the same time, they are building a part-
time workforce designed to handle the largest expected surge
requirements. With this strategy, these excellence-focused
companies can focus deployment of capital on cost-effective
modernization, profit-enhancing expansion, and research and
development. They avoid committing themselves to pay, benefits
and entitlements commitments that inexorably diminish
performance now and in the future.
Does not this enlightened strategy argue for increased
reliance on the National Guard and Reserves? History would
suggest that this task will fall to this body. When it
inevitably does, remember this.
The performance of the National Guard and Reserves in the
decade following 9/11 has been nothing short of stellar. They
have consistently met and exceeded all mission requirements
both overseas and at home. Their truly exceptional service and
sacrifice argues forcefully for consideration of an expansion
of their role and significance in our National Security
Strategy. I respectfully commend to the members of this
committee a white paper entitled ``The National Guard: A Great
Value Today and In the Future'' by General Craig R. McKinley,
current Chief of the National Guard Bureau, published March 31,
2011. It is a work worthy of your time when considering cost
versus force structure options. It is a fact that when you call
out the Guard and Reserves, you indeed call out America. The
value of such a powerful national capability? Priceless!
Thank you for what you do for our nation, and for the
opportunity to appear before this committee and hopefully
contribute to resolving the very serious issues at hand.
THE FUTURE OF NATIONAL DEFENSE AND
THE U.S. MILITARY TEN YEARS AFTER 9/11:
PERSPECTIVES OF FORMER CHAIRMEN OF
THE COMMITTEES ON ARMED SERVICES
----------
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
----------
HEARING HELD
OCTOBER 12, 2011
----------
WITNESSES
The Honorable John W. Warner
Chairman, Senate Committee on Armed Services (1999-2001,
2003-2007)
The Honorable Duncan L. Hunter
Chairman, House Committee on Armed Services (2002-2006)
The Honorable Ike Skelton
Chairman, House Committee on Armed Services (2007-2010)
?
=======================================================================
PREPARED STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY WITNESSES
October 12, 2011
=======================================================================
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE JOHN W. WARNER, CHAIRMAN, SENATE COMMITTEE
ON ARMED SERVICES (1999-2001, 2003-2007)
I am deeply privileged to accept the Committee's invitation
to testify in this very important series of hearings regarding
the future of our nation's defense posture.
I am joined today by two highly valued colleagues Duncan
Hunter and Ike Skelton. It's interesting to note that each of
us had a very long period of service on our respective Armed
Services Committees and each served, at various times, as a
Chairman and as a Ranking Member. Likewise, we alternated over
many years being the Chair of the House-Senate Conference
Committees and never failed in getting an authorization bill--
on behalf of the men and women of the armed forces--to be
signed into law by a sequence of Presidents.
Working with our Committee colleagues during our tenure, we
strengthened the foundation of laws that today supports our
nation's defense posture and provides for the needs of our
brave uniformed personnel and their families.
Today, the citizens of our nation rank members of the armed
forces at the very top of public esteem.
That leads me to the first of several points I will offer
today.
The concept of an all-volunteer force had its origins
during the period--1969 to 1974--when I was privileged to serve
as Undersecretary, then Secretary of the U.S. Navy. A very
serious, costly war was in progress to preserve freedom for the
people of South Vietnam. There was substantial controversy
among elements of our population; and, month by month, the
controversy became more intense. I well remember appearing to
testify, time and time again, before the Committees of
Congress.
This history you know well but out of this cauldron emerged
the law, regarded by many, upon passage, a big ``gamble'' which
Congress thrust onto the military.
As you know well, the concept has worked exceptionally
well; indeed well beyond any expectations.
The challenge facing Congress today, is not just to
preserve what we have, but make it even stronger.
I say most respectfully, every action the Committee takes
must keep that challenge in mind.
My next concerns are the proliferation of weapons of mass
destruction and how rogue elements, and persons participating
in violent extremism, can interact to threaten our way of life
and that of other nations.
As you make your programs and other budget decisions, place
emphasis on how we can increase and support new ideas in the
fields of intelligence and surveillance. In these areas spend
wisely; and, accept a level of risk with new innovations. Our
military will always do their best, at whatever sacrifice; but
every citizen must help in their own way.
As you look to future programs I urge your support for
innovations to come in the unmanned systems. About a decade, or
more, ago I introduced legislation directing each of the
services to place greater emphasis on such programs, with
specific benchmarks and dates for each service to meet. There
was strong opposition from all Department of Defense; but, with
the strong support of the two House leaders sitting with me
today the language survived in Conference and became law.
Within but a few years thereafter each of the Services needed
no inducement to move out way ahead of the benchmarks with the
many systems operational today. Now it's an international race
and we must stay well ahead.
As I closed out my 30 years in the Senate I worked again
with the bipartisan team to write a new G.I. Bill. Again, the
Authorizing Committees did it; and, wherever I go service
persons step forward to thank us for including as beneficiaries
families as alternates for the educational benefits earned by
the uniformed member.
May I share a personal story? I was privileged to speak
just months ago at the Navy Post Graduate School at Monterey,
California. As guests were filing past me to say good-bye a
proud husband and wife stopped to say we are soon to be blessed
with our first child, whereupon her hands dropped, and she said
``you made it possible for this child to have my husband's G.I.
Bill.'' Having advanced my career largely because of the old
G.I. Bill, I shall always remember this young happy family.
All of us who have had the good fortune to serve in
Congress must remain ever mindful of the needs and hopes of
others.
I thank you for this opportunity.
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE DUNCAN L. HUNTER, CHAIRMAN, HOUSE COMMITTEE
ON ARMED SERVICES (2002-2006)
Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, good morning.
Thanks for allowing me to give my views on America's security
challenges and the adequacy of our present force structure, as
well as that which is projected under the massive automatic
cuts that would occur should the Joint Committee on Deficit
Reduction deadlock or should the contingency plan requested of
DOD by OMB, which requires 10% cuts, be carried out.
Bluntly, these massive cuts disserve: 1) the present war
against terrorists; 2) the difficult build-up of the Army and
Marine Corps in which this committee has played such a
significant role; and
3) the constitutional obligation of this government to defend
its citizens.
In the last century, World War I, considered to be the
``war to end all wars'' was followed by a period of neglect for
America's defense apparatus. In 1941, jolted by the Axis Powers
and particularly the attack on Pearl Harbor, we mobilized
massively, aided by a robust industrial base and a secure
homeland, and saved the world. Only a few years after World War
II, America stacked arms to such a degree that a third-rate
military power drove our defenders down the Korean Peninsula
and almost into the ocean before we managed to hold the Pusan
perimeter and push north, weathering a Chinese intervention and
stalemating the communists into a divided Korea that continues
to this day.
After Vietnam, America's defenses declined precipitously,
resulting in the so-called ``hollow army'' of the late 1970's,
a period in which fewer than 50% of our tactical fighters were
fully combat mission-capable and a time when more than 1,000
petty officers a month were leaving the Navy due to inadequate
pay and support.
In 1981 we commenced to rebuild defense, with President
Ronald Reagan partnering with this committee to enhance our
ground forces, build the Navy toward a goal of 600 ships,
initiate a missile defense program, and increase airlift,
sealift, and sustainability.
With this new muscle we stood up to the Soviet Union,
which, disassembled by American strength, released hundreds of
millions of its people from its tyranny into the sunlight of
freedom.
The 1990s found the U.S. dominating the First Gulf War with
an array of conventional weapons from the build-up of the
1980s. Then, in the mid-1990s defense was cut substantially.
The Army was reduced from 18 to 10 divisions and only about
fifty percent of our aging weapons systems were adequately
replaced. Administration budget cutters went after defense.
This committee lead the Congress in adding back over 40 billion
dollars during this period. It wasn't enough.
In 2001, spurred by the 9/11 terrorist attack, our nation
went into a period of rebuilding aging systems, increasing end
strength and moving ahead on missile defenses. While the build-
up was not as robust as that of the Reagan years, we did fill
many of the short-falls of the 1990s.
Today the Iraq War is won, with Iraq's elected government
enduring and the military that we built from the ground-up
holding. Iraq is now an ally thanks to the one million American
volunteers who served in uniform in that war. The Afghanistan
mission continues, complex, but winnable.
China is emerging as a military super-power, stepping into
the shoes of the former Soviet Union, developing high
performance missiles, aircraft and ships, outproducing the U.S.
in key areas such as attack submarines (5 to 1), and ballistic
missiles.
Iran, having failed to defeat America with its interference
in the Iraq War, is continuing apace with its program aimed at
producing a nuclear weapon. Its path over the past five years
is littered with failed sanctions, imposed by the allies and
blunted by China and Russia. Iran is following the model of its
fellow nuclear weapons aspirant, North Korea which talked,
wrangled and lied until it had produced a nuclear device.
Russia, shorn of its captive nations, retains an immense
strategic strike capability.
This, Mr. Chairman, is the state of the world, the backdrop
against which America is poised to massively cut defense.
To assess the huge cuts that are projected, I use the
committee's calculation on the numbers: 1 trillion dollars cut
from the Presidents FY 2012 FYDP, counting 465 billion dollars
in cuts already enacted.
The enormity of these cuts will almost certainly result in
large reductions in the size of the Army and Marine Corps.
A few years ago, we began correcting the downsizing of our
land forces. Remember that we cut the Army almost in half
during the 1990s.
During the height of the Iraq war our troops felt the pain
of the downsizing as multiple deployments and 15 month tours
stressed the force. We stressed the force. We policy makers
swore ``never again'' and increased the Army to 569,400 and the
USMC to 202,000.
Now we are poised to repeat the mistake of the 1990's
downsizing.
People costs are ``right now'' expenditures the projected
cuts cannot be carried out without slashing end strength.
The cuts will also disserve the Navy in multiple ways. The
288 ships will face an unprecedented threat in the near future.
China has clearly moved to implement a new strategy to
handle the U.S. Navy in a ``Taiwan scenario.'' They are
building the capability to destroy American warships. Including
carriers, at long ranges, before U.S. Naval projection can
reach the straits.
China's ship killers are ballistic missiles, tipped with
anti-ship precisely targetable warheads.
Never before has the US Navy had such an immense
survivability challenge.
The projected budget cuts will preclude the Navy from
fielding missile defense systems of necessary robustness to
defend against sustained anti-ship ballistic missile attacks.
Also, the Navy's ``leverage weapon,'' its fleet of attack
submarines, will be reduced substantially. Meanwhile, China's
submarine program accelerates.
Our heavy bomber force is already at its historical low
point of 135. A two war contingency involving heavy Armed
Forces will require a ``swinging'' of bombers from one war to
the other, with a risk that substantial casualties will be
taken without the fist of immediate air power.
Today, the U.S. has less than 70% of the airfields
available worldwide that we had in the 1960's. Yet our
strategic and tactical airlift is comprised of only 651
aircraft.
In this age of quick flare contingencies, tactical aircraft
are high leverage. Today the Air Force has only 1990 fighters,
half of what we had at the end of the Cold War.
The questions this committee must ask the President and
your colleagues are these:
1. LIs the world suddenly safer to the degree that we can
let our guard down and cancel the insurance policy that a
strong defense has given the U.S.?
2. LIs the war against terrorism over?
3. LDo we want to ``unlearn'' the lesser of the ``too
small'' Army and Marine Corps, and reduce them again?
4. LShould we concede space competition to our potential
adversaries?
5. LDoes it still make sense to stop incoming missiles?
6. LDo we want our Navy to have fewer than 250 ships?
7. LDo we want to cede military dominance in this century
to communist China? All these questions stage this greater
question for every Member of Congress:
8. LIsn't our primary duty to defend our nation?
The defense cuts already made should be restored and any
new reductions soundly rejected.
These cuts, should they be attended, along with China's
military ascendance and growing industrial base, guarantee that
China will become the world's dominant military power in this
century.
Thank you Mr. Chairman.
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE IKE SKELTON, CHAIRMAN, HOUSE COMMITTEE ON
ARMED SERVICES (2007-2010)
Chairman McKeon, Ranking Member Smith, members of the Armed
Services Committee, it is a signal honor to return to this
chamber where I served three decades in support of our men and
women in uniform to discuss a matter of great importance:
whether the United States will continue to have the finest
military force in history. I am deeply concerned with the
prospect of cuts to our defense budget while our sons and
daughters are still at war in Iraq and Afghanistan and still
fighting Al Qaeda around the globe. Our pilots are often
younger than the planes they fly, and our Navy is not growing
even as China builds a fleet that may threaten our ability to
preserve freedom of navigation in the Western Pacific. And yet
significant cuts are being contemplated to our defense budget.
In fact, the Budget Control Act could lead to defense cuts
that would be downright devastating. I concur with the past
statements of Admiral Mullen and Secretary Panetta that the
cuts to the defense budget that could occur under sequestration
would imperil our nation. Should sequestration cuts happen, in
10 years our country will be relegated to the sidelines of
history.
The Congress has the sole power to raise and maintain our
military under Article 1, Section 8 of our Constitution. Thus,
my message to the Congress is: don't scuttle the American armed
forces. Our military is the best ever. I implore the Congress
to pursue cuts to the defense budget with the utmost care. I
recommend to the committee the report ``Hard Choices'' released
by the Center for a New American Security (or CNAS), where I
serve on the Board of Advisors. CNAS's report outlines some of
the significant consequences of cuts on American combat
capabilities. I echo the warning of this report that budget
cuts beyond the $480 billion dollars already designated will
endanger our national security.
Cuts of this magnitude will jeopardize our ability to
uphold our vital interests. Our future military must have the
capacity to deter potential aggressors and quickly and
decisively defeat any direct threats. This means maintaining a
strong ground force that can defeat the Taliban in Afghanistan
and then transfer security responsibility to our Afghan
partners. Yet any responsible defense budget must also
prioritize the Navy and the Air Force. This is especially
important in South and East Asia where rising powers such as
China and India increasingly serve as fulcrums of global
economic and political power. They could serve to bolster, or
challenge, the security of the global commons.
For this reason the United States cannot degrade our naval
and air capabilities. Cuts to the Navy and Air Force will limit
our power projection capability, make our allies and partners
question our commitments to them, and give China a free hand in
the Western Pacific. The Army and Marines are also critical for
this theater. The ground forces must support our Asian allies,
improving American ties with those countries and discouraging
China from bullying them.
The new strategic situation means that in the spirit of
Goldwater-Nichols, which had its genesis in this Committee, we
must embrace a joint vision for our future military. An
interdependent military will more effectively protect our
national interests through greater cooperation, thereby making
more intelligent battlefield decisions. Already we have seen
our past attempts at this policy bear fruit: the Navy and the
Air Force have made major strides through their evolving ``Air-
Sea'' Battle concept. Any future strategic concept must
envision how a combined arms approach on Air, Sea, and Land
will deter threats, and defeat them if deterrence fails.
Significant defense cuts could also endanger the vitality
of our services by compromising our ability to keep and train
excellent officers, especially if personnel cuts degrade our
officer training institutions. The strength of the U.S.
military flows from the dedication and skill of our All-
Volunteer Force. Indeed, the new defense budget must maintain
our nation's security by keeping the ``Profession of Arms''
professional. The American military's most important edge over
our adversaries comes from the unparalleled professionalism and
training of our men and women.
However, this edge is fragile: when just over fifty percent
of service academy graduates remain in service after ten years,
our military loses its best and brightest. We must combat this
by incentivizing retention of officers in the military. The
Quadrennial Defense Review Independent Panel last year
recommended new bonuses for high-caliber soldiers, regardless
of rank, and reforming the up-or-out system. By completing
these imperative reforms, we will significantly improve the
quality of our officer corps.
We must complement these reforms by continuing our
commitment to our professional military education; in the words
of Admiral James Stavridis, we will prevail by ``out-thinking
the enemy.'' Our military's service academies and ROTC programs
are the best in the world, yet learning must continue as
soldiers remain in the service. Warriors matching the strength
of a Spartan hoplite, the flexibility of a Roman legionnaire,
and the brilliant tactical mind of a Hannibal or Scipio are
commissioned every year. As we face new domains of warfare in
space and in cyberspace, officers who understand the past and
anticipate the future will be well prepared to adapt the
world's finest military to new ways of war.
Deep defense cuts could endanger Professional Military
Education programs needed to prepare our officers and enlisted
personnel for this future. Indeed, if the military hopes to
adapt to the ever-changing nature of warfare, we must commit to
fully funding Professional Military Education and providing
scholarships and support to those individuals pursuing higher
education. Doing so will broaden the expertise of soldiers and
prepare our men and women for the threats of the future. Doing
otherwise will turn our military into a profoundly moribund
organization.
Any defense budget must also not break faith with the men,
women, and families who comprise our All-Volunteer Force. We
must honor the sacrifices of our soldiers and their families by
preserving their hard-earned medical, pay, and retirement
benefits. We also must ensure that we provide the resources to
confront a lethal crisis affecting our military: suicide. In
light of rising suicides since 2001, especially amongst the
Army and the Marines who have served so faithfully in Iraq and
Afghanistan, we must continue to pursue innovative ways to
ensure mental wellness in the armed services.
I would like to conclude by emphasizing how important it is
to get this right. It is no longer question of if, but when,
the cuts will fall: already the Defense Department is looking
at cuts of about $489 billion over the next ten years. Our
future force must be able to quickly defeat threats all over
the world and to respond properly to the growing importance of
Asia. Our Congress must remain vigilant that budget cuts do not
irreparably damage our military forces. It must fight to
preserve the education, training, and health care that make our
military the best in the world. We must not break faith with
those who have sacrificed so much over the past decade.
Thank you again for this opportunity to address this
committee, Chairman McKeon.
THE FUTURE OF NATIONAL DEFENSE AND
THE U.S. MILITARY TEN YEARS AFTER 9/11:
PERSPECTIVES OF SECRETARY OF DEFENSE
LEON PANETTA AND CHAIRMAN OF
THE JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF,
GENERAL MARTIN DEMPSEY
----------
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
----------
HEARING HELD
OCTOBER 13, 2011
----------
WITNESSES
The Honorable Leon E. Panetta
23rd Secretary of Defense
General Martin E. Dempsey, USA
18th Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff
?
=======================================================================
PREPARED STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY WITNESSES
October 13, 2011
=======================================================================
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE LEON E. PANETTA, 23RD SECRETARY OF DEFENSE
Chairman McKeon, Congressman Smith, members of this
committee, it is an honor for me to appear before you for the
first time as Secretary of Defense. I'd also like to join you
in recognizing General Dempsey, a brilliant soldier and leader
who I'm delighted to have alongside me in his new capacity as
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
On behalf of the men and women of the Department of
Defense, I want to thank the members of this committee for your
determination to join me in doing everything possible to ensure
that they succeed in their mission of protecting America. I
really do believe that Congress must be a full partner in our
efforts to protect the country. In that spirit, I've had the
opportunity to consult with many of you about the challenges
that the Department faces, and I will continue to do so.
I'd also like to thank you for convening this series of
hearings on ``The Future of National Defense and the U.S.
Military Ten Years After 9/11,'' and for giving me the
opportunity to be here today to add my perspective to this
discussion.
September 11th was a defining moment for our country, and
for the military. We have been at war for ten years, putting a
heavy burden on our men and women in uniform to defend our
nation and our interests. More than 6,200 have given their
lives, and more than 46,000 have been wounded, in the wars
since 9/11. The conflicts have brought untold stresses and
strains on our service members, and on their families. But
despite it all, we have built the finest, most-experienced,
battle-hardened all-volunteer force in our nation's history.
These ten years of conflict have transformed the military,
with our men and women in uniform showing their adaptability
and versatility in the face of a new combination of threats and
operating environments. Our forces have become more lethal, and
more capable of conducting effective counterterrorism and
counterinsurgency operations. New or enhanced capabilities,
including the growth of special operations forces, unmanned
aerial systems, counter-IED technologies, and the extraordinary
fusion between military and intelligence, have provided the key
tools we need to succeed on these 21st century battlefields.
And make no mistake, we are succeeding. Ten years after 9/11,
we have significantly rolled back al-Qaeda and are closer than
ever to achieving our strategic objectives in Afghanistan and
Iraq, although significant challenges remain to ensuring
stability and security in these conflict zones.
These conflicts are nearing a turning point--and so too is
the military as a whole. As the current mission in Iraq ends,
as we continue to transition security responsibility in
Afghanistan, and as we near our goal of dismantling al-Qaeda,
the Department is also facing a new fiscal reality at home. As
part of the debt ceiling agreement reached in August, the
Department must find more than $450 billion in savings over the
next decade. Our challenge is taking a force that has been
involved in a decade of war, and ensuring that we build the
military we need to defend our country for the next decade even
at a time of fiscal austerity.
We have a strong military, but one that has been stressed
by a decade of fighting, squeezed by rising personnel costs,
and is in need of modernization given the focus the past decade
on capabilities for the current wars. Meanwhile, we face an
international security environment that is growing in
complexity and uncertainty. We continue to deal with the threat
of violent extremism. States like Iran and North Korea continue
to pursue nuclear capabilities. Rising powers are rapidly
modernizing their militaries and investing in capabilities to
deny our forces freedom of action in vital regions such as the
Asia-Pacific. We also face the prospect of cyber attackers who
could inflict great damage on our nation's infrastructure while
operating with relative anonymity and distance.
We need to build a force that can confront this growing
array of threats even as we meet our fiscal responsibilities.
We should also recognize, however, that the military has to
constantly adapt to meet changing security demands and
threats--and that is what we will continue to do even in the
face of serious budget constraints. That will require setting
clear strategic priorities, and making tough decisions. Working
closely with the Service Chiefs, Service Secretaries and
Combatant Commanders, I intend to make these decisions based on
the following guidelines.
First, we must maintain the very best military in the
world--a force capable of deterring conflict, projecting power,
and winning wars. After all, America has a special role in the
world--we are looked to for our leadership, values and
strength.
Second, we must avoid a hollow force and maintain a
military that, even if smaller, will be ready, agile and
deployable.
Third, we must take a balanced approach and look to all
areas of the budget for potential savings--from efficiencies
that trim duplication and bureaucratic overhead, to improving
competition and management in operating and investment
programs, to tightening personnel costs, and re-evaluating
modernization efforts.
Finally, we cannot break faith with our men and women in
uniform--the all volunteer force is central to a strong
military and central to our nation's future.
If we follow these four principles, I'm confident that we
can meet our national security responsibilities and do our part
to help this country get its fiscal house in order. This will
not be achieved without making difficult choices, but those
choices are essential if we are not to hollow out the force and
meet the threats we confront.
To achieve the required budget savings, the Department also
must work even harder to overhaul the way it does business, and
an essential part of this effort will be improving the quality
of financial information and moving towards auditable financial
statements. Today DoD is one of only two major agencies that
has never had a clean audit opinion on its financial
statements. While the Department's systems do tell us where we
are spending taxpayer funds, we do not yet have the details and
controls necessary to pass an audit. This is inexcusable and
must change. In order to achieve fiscal discipline, we need to
have the strongest possible financial controls in place.
The Department has made significant progress toward meeting
the Congressional deadline for audit ready financial statements
by 2017, with a focus on first improving the categories of
information that are most relevant to managing the budget. But
I want us to do better--and we will.
Today I am announcing that I have directed the Department
to cut in half the time it will take to achieve audit readiness
for the Statement of Budgetary Resources, so that in 2014 we
will have the ability to conduct a full budget audit. This
focused approach prioritizes the information that we use in
managing the Department, and will give our financial managers
the key tools they need to track spending, identify waste, and
improve the way the Pentagon does business as soon as possible.
I have also directed increased emphasis on accountability
and a full review of the Department's financial controls, with
improvements put in place where needed. I have directed the DoD
Comptroller to revise the current plan within 60 days to meet
these new goals, and still achieve the requirement of overall
audit readiness by 2017. We owe it to the taxpayers to be
transparent and accountable for how we spend their dollars, and
under this plan we will move closer to fulfilling that
responsibility.
The Department is changing the way it does business and
taking on a significant share of our country's efforts to
achieve fiscal discipline. We will do so while building the
agile, deployable force we need to confront the wide range of
threats we face. But I want to close by cautioning strongly
against further cuts to defense, particularly with the
mechanism that's been built into the debt ceiling agreement
called sequester. This mechanism would force additional cuts to
defense of about $500 billion, or roughly $1 trillion in
total--cuts that in my view would do catastrophic damage to our
military, hollowing out the force and degrading its ability to
protect the country. I know you share my concern about both the
extent of such cuts and the process of sequester. It is a blind
formula that makes cuts across the board, hampers our ability
to align resources with strategy, and risks hollowing out the
force.
I do not believe we have to make a choice between fiscal
security and national security. But in order to succeed in this
effort, I am going to need your support--to do everything
possible to prevent further damaging cuts, and to help us
implement a coherent strategy-driven program and budget that we
will identify in the months ahead as critical to preserving the
best military in the world. I pledge to continue to work with
you closely as we confront these challenges and thank you once
again for your tireless efforts to build a stronger military
for our country.
STATEMENT OF GENERAL MARTIN E. DEMPSEY, USA, 18TH CHAIRMAN, JOINT
CHIEFS OF STAFF
Chairman McKeon, Ranking Member Smith, members of the
Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify on the
future of national defense and the U.S. military ten years
after the attacks of September 11th. As this is my first time
testifying before this committee in my new position as Chairman
of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, I want to note that I look
forward to continued cooperation with you. I take seriously our
shared responsibility of maintaining a military that provides
our leaders with a wide range of options to counter the threats
and crises we face and that preserves the trust placed in us by
our citizens. I believe we can sustain this trust while also
being good stewards of our nation's resources. In that spirit,
I thank the Committee for engaging in this important discussion
of the future of our national defense.
Last month marked the tenth anniversary of the September
11th attacks. It is appropriate to reflect on what we have
achieved, what we have learned, and where we see ourselves
going forward.
In the past decade, over two million men and women have
deployed overseas in support of operations in Afghanistan,
Iraq, and elsewhere. Our Joint Force, along with our
interagency and international partners, has remained resolute
and resilient throughout a decade of hard combat in hard
places. We have demonstrated initiative, we have demonstrated
strength, and we have demonstrated resolve. We have met our
sacred obligation to protect our nation and our fellow
citizens.
There remains work to be done in achieving our objectives
in the conflicts in which we are currently engaged and against
the threats we currently face, and we will get it done.
Our military has learned and adapted to a shifting security
landscape. Among the many lessons we have learned, a few stand
out.
First, we live in an increasingly competitive security
environment. Military capabilities proliferate more quickly and
are no longer the monopoly of nation states. The distinction
between low and high intensity conflict is blurred. This
requires us to prevail in the competitive learning
environment--we must learn faster, understand more deeply, and
adapt more quickly than our adversaries. Our systems and
processes must be far more effective, efficient, and agile if
we are to keep pace in this environment.
Second, we must continue to value allies and partners.
Coalitions and partnerships--with other countries and with
other government agencies--add capability, capacity, and
credibility to what are shared security responsibilities. As
fiscal constraints become more binding, the importance of
partnering will only grow. As a consequence, we are committed
to expanding the envelope of cooperation at home and abroad.
Third, we must continue to value joint interdependence. Our
Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard combine to
field an unmatched team. We still need our Services to be
masters of their core competencies and stewards of their
cultures. But, modern conflict is fought across multiple
domains. Operating as a single, cohesive team is the
imperative. Therefore, we must continue to advance the
interoperability of people and equipment.
Fourth, we must value innovation even more than we have in
the past. Our forces have expanded many of our previously low-
density capabilities and fielded many new technologies. We have
found ways to expand our special operations forces, our
intelligence systems, and our cyber capabilities. And, our
units have combined these capabilities in innovative ways to
the great benefit of the mission, our troops, and non-
combatants on the battlefield.
Finally, we must always value leadership above all else.
Leadership is the core of our military profession. It has been
the key to our ability to learn, adapt, and achieve results
over the past decade. Modern counter-insurgency and counter-
terrorist operations drive us to push combat power and decision
making to the edge of the battlefield. Continued development of
adaptive leaders will be our nation's decisive advantage in a
competitive security environment.
Even as we successfully transition today's conflicts, we
are preparing for tomorrow's. The way we recover from combat
and reconstitute our capabilities will shape our future
military. We are building today the Joint Force we will have in
2020. Joint Force 2020 must be powerful, responsive, resilient,
versatile, and admired. It must have the capability and
capacity to provide options to our national leadership. It must
account for the capabilities we have now to include the
relatively new capabilities we have grown. And, it must
preserve our human capital. Above all, we must get the
``people'' right and keep faith with our Military Family.
Developing the Joint Force our nation needs is complicated
by known and potential fiscal constraints. Be assured, we
understand that our nation needs us to be more affordable. We
are fully committed to reducing costs without compromising the
capabilities our nation also needs. But, becoming lean and
efficient will only get us so far. We will have to make hard
choices that balance risk across our global commitments and
across time. We will have to consider reforming pay and
benefits as well as reducing end strength. If we fail to put
everything on the table, we risk hollowing the force by gutting
modernization and readiness. Most importantly, we need to be
precise. Indiscriminate, across the board cuts would wreak
havoc on our plans and programs. Together, we need to avoid
self-inflicted wounds to our nation's security.
I look forward to cooperating with the members of this
Committee and the rest of Congress. We will need your help in
making the tough choices and in supporting the service members
we send into harm's way. They deserve the future they
sacrificed to secure.
ECONOMIC CONSEQUENCES OF
DEFENSE SEQUESTRATION
----------
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
----------
HEARING HELD
OCTOBER 26, 2011
----------
WITNESSES
Dr. Martin Feldstein
George F. Baker Professor of Economics
Harvard University
Dr. Stephen Fuller
Director, Center for Regional Analysis
School of Public Policy
George Mason University
Dr. Peter Morici
Professor of International Business
Robert H. Smith School of Business
University of Maryland
?
=======================================================================
PREPARED STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY WITNESSES
October 26, 2011
=======================================================================
STATEMENT OF DR. MARTIN FELDSTEIN, GEORGE F. BAKER PROFESSOR OF
ECONOMICS, HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am very pleased to have the
opportunity to testify to this Committee. Although I have
testified to Congressional committees for more than 30 years,
this is the first time that I have appeared before this
important committee.
In your invitation you asked me to comment on the effect
that reductions in defense outlays will have on total economic
activity, i.e., on the GDP of the United States. I am happy to
do that but I want to begin with a few words about the larger
subject of the national security consequences of reductions in
defense spending.
Defense Spending and National Security
In considering the appropriate size of the defense budget,
it is of course important to recognize the immediate threats to
the United States and to our allies from Iran, from North
Korea, from rogue states and from various terrorist groups.
There is also the current challenge in cyberspace from
espionage directed at industrial and national security targets
and from the risk of cyber attacks on our basic infrastructure.
But defense spending today must also relate to the more
distant risk from China's future military policy. China is now
a poor country with per capita income less than one-fifth of
our own. But since China has more than four times the U.S.
population, China's total GDP will equal that of the United
States when its per capita income reaches only one-fourth of
the U.S. level. Even if China's growth rate slows significantly
from its current level, its total GDP will exceed ours in less
than 15 years.
A country's total GDP determines its potential military
budget. The current Chinese political leadership is
concentrating on promoting economic growth to raise the
standard of living of its people and to deal with the very
large inequality that exists between different groups within
China. But China is also developing every aspect of its
military capability.
The quality of China's military force is not currently up
to U.S. standards. But China's defense budget will grow with
its GDP. It is important for the United States to recognize
that future generations of Chinese leaders could use its larger
GDP to pursue more aggressive policies.
America's defense policy and our defense budget should
therefore focus on the future generations of Chinese civilian
and military leaders and should recognize the virtual certainty
of China's growing economic power. The United States should
maintain a military capability such that no future generation
of Chinese leaders will consider a military challenge to the
United States or consider using military force to intimidate
the United States or our allies.
China's future military spending and its weapons
development will depend on China's perception of what the
United States is doing now and what we will do in the future.
If we show a determination to remain invincible, China will not
waste resources on trying to challenge us in an arms race. But
if we keep cutting defense budgets, the Chinese will see this
as an indication of U.S. weakness now and in the future.
China is in many ways a resource-poor country that depends
on imports of oil, iron, and other raw materials as well as on
imports of food to feed its people. That is not likely to
change. China is therefore now buying oil in the ground around
the world and arable land in Africa to grow food for the
Chinese people. Some countries in the past have used military
force to gain secure access to such materials. China's future
leaders should not be tempted to follow that path.
It is important that our allies and friends like Japan and
Korea and Singapore and Australia see the commitment of the
United States to remain strong and to remain present in Asia.
Their relations with China and with us depend on what they can
expect of America's future military strength.
The Navy has a particularly important role to play in this,
including the Navy's presence in international waters to
enforce freedom of the seas, naval visits to Asian ports, and
joint exercises with the navies of other governments.
We cannot postpone implementing a policy of future military
superiority until some future year. We have to work now to
develop the weapon systems of the future. We have to maintain
the industrial and technological capacity to produce those
weapon systems. We have to make it clear by our budgets and by
our actions that we are the global force now and will continue
to be that in the future.
While reducing fiscal deficits is very important, that task
should not prevent the federal government from achieving its
primary responsibility of defending this country and our global
interests, both now and in the future.
Defense Spending and GDP
I will turn now to the narrower economic question of how
cuts in defense spending affect U.S. GDP.
Since government spending on defense is a component of GDP,
the immediate direct effect of a one billion dollar reduction
in domestic defense spending is to reduce our GDP by one
billion dollars. The resulting reduction in pay to military
personnel and in compensation to the employees of defense
suppliers then cause their spending as consumers to decline. If
defense suppliers expect the reduced level of defense spending
to be sustained, the defense suppliers will also cut their
demand for equipment. The total effect of the one billion
dollar reduction in defense spending is to reduce GDP by more
than a billion dollars, perhaps about two billion dollars.
I based this calculation on a reduction in domestic defense
spending. To the extent that some of the reduced defense
spending is overseas and on locally purchased goods and
services, the impact on U.S. GDP will be proportionately less.
But since about 90 percent of defense spending is domestic, the
calculation of a two dollar reduction in U.S. GDP for every
dollar reduction in defense spending is probably a good
estimate.
Any reduction in future budget deficits and in the
resulting level of the national debt will also raise the
confidence of businesses and households, leading to increased
consumer spending and business investment, thus raising current
GDP. Since a similar effect would result from legislated
reductions in future deficits achieved by cutting any form of
government spending or by raising revenue, we can ignore this
``confidence effect'' in comparing the impact of reductions in
defense spending with the effect of other spending cuts or tax
increases that have the same effect on future deficits.
The direct effect on GDP of changes in defense spending is
larger than the corresponding effect of most other potential
changes in government outlays. For example, outlays for
unemployment benefits are not in themselves a component of GDP.
They lead to increased GDP only by raising the consumer
spending of the individuals who receive those benefits. While a
high percentage of those cash benefits will be spent, it will
certainly be less than a dollar of spending for every extra
dollar of unemployment benefits. Some of the consumption
purchased with the unemployment benefits would otherwise have
been paid for out of reductions in household savings. And of
course some of the consumer spending would be on imports,
further reducing its effect on GDP.
A change in unemployment benefits also affects GDP by
altering the incentive to remain unemployed. Reducing the
maximum number of weeks of unemployment benefits will induce
some individuals to find work sooner, thereby raising GDP. The
resulting increase in total employment is difficult to estimate
at a time when total employment is limited by the weakness of
aggregate demand. Some of those who are induced to find work
because of reduced UI benefits may just prevent others from
finding work. The overall effect on GDP of reducing UI benefits
will be the net effect of the reduction in consumer spending
and the increase in weeks worked. The direct impact on GDP of a
one billion dollar reduction in unemployment benefits will
certainly be less than the direct effect of a one billion
dollar reduction in defense outlays.
Transfers from the federal government to state and local
governments are also not a component of GDP. Reducing such
transfers only alters GDP to the extent that doing so causes
those governments to reduce their spending or raise their
taxes. If cutting a billion dollars in transfers to state
governments causes them to cut their domestic spending by one
billion dollars, the immediate effect on GDP would be the same
as cutting one billion dollars of defense spending. But if the
state governments offset some of the reduction in funds from
Washington by using their ``rainy day'' funds or temporarily
running a deficit, the effect on GDP would be less. Similarly,
if the states raise taxes to pay for some of the outlays that
had previously been financed by transfers from Washington, the
effect on GDP would be smaller.
My comments this morning about the effect on GDP of changes
in defense spending and other forms of government outlays focus
on the direct effects on demand for U.S. goods and services as
measured by GDP. That is the appropriate focus in the short run
at a time when unemployment rates are high and we are far from
full employment. Over time, the American economy will return to
full employment, or, more technically, to the level of
unemployment that can persist without causing a higher rate of
inflation. Changes in defense spending in the context of full
employment must be balanced by changes in other components of
GDP.
I hope that these remarks are helpful to you and your
colleagues as you consider the important tasks of deficit
reduction and of protecting our national security.
STATEMENT OF DR. STEPHEN FULLER, DIRECTOR, CENTER FOR REGIONAL
ANALYSIS, SCHOOL OF PUBLIC POLICY, GEORGE MASON UNIVERSITY
Chairman McKeon, Ranking Member Smith, members of the
Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify on the
potential economic consequences of reductions in Department of
Defense spending as these impacts would affect the economies of
states and regions across the United States. I have conducted
research relating to this issue for the Commonwealth of
Virginia that examined the economic and fiscal impacts of DOD
spending. This research was undertaken in 2009 in response to
early concerns regarding the Commonwealth's economic
vulnerability to changing DOD spending policies. More recently,
I was asked by the Aerospace Industries Association to
calculate the economic impacts of reductions in DOD outlays for
military equipment on the U.S. economy and the states that
represent the home base for major aerospace and military
equipment manufacturers and suppliers. I am submitting both
reports for the record as they contain findings relevant to
your deliberations on this important topic.
The economic impacts that occur at the state and regional
levels are similar to those that have been reported at the
national level and are evident in changes in economic
activity--gross regional product (GRP), changes in employment,
and changes in personal earnings. Collateral impacts also will
occur in the local business base as the loss of sales for
single-market businesses could result in the failure of these
business establishments--the nature of their business (size and
product line) may make these firms more vulnerable to changes
in sales due to DOD spending reductions or reductions in
civilian or uniform personnel. These latter effects are
particularly evident around military installations as witnessed
recently here in the District of Columbia among the retail and
other commercial businesses having previous served the staff of
and visitors to Walter Reed prior to its closing in September.
These ``BRAC effects,'' where installations have closed or
substantially downsized, provide a good measure of the
potential ranges of economic impacts that may result from
reductions in DOD spending. All too often these local effects
are lost in the impersonal numbers that are used to measure the
economic impacts of changes in public spending patterns.
State-Level Economic Impacts of DOD Spending
One approach to understanding the potential impacts of DOD
spending reductions is to examine the importance of DOD
spending to a local economy. An examination of DOD spending on
the Commonwealth of Virginia economy provides a good measure of
what could be the impact of reductions in these spending
levels.
Spending by the Department of Defense in support of its
activities--defense installations, uniform and civilian
personnel, retirees, and federal contractors--represents a
major source of jobs and income within the Commonwealth of
Virginia and generates significant direct and indirect economic
activities throughout all sectors of the State's economy.
Additionally, DOD spending and the jobs and payroll this
spending supports generate a significant surplus of state-level
revenues relative to the demands placed on state-funded
services. These economic and fiscal impacts are summarized as
follows.
1. LIn FY 2008 DOD spending in the Commonwealth of Virginia
contributed $57.4 billion to the State's economy accounting for
15.6 percent of the total value of the goods and services
produced in the State--its gross state product;
2. LDOD spending and its re-spending within the State's
economy supported a total of 902,985 jobs (both directly funded
and supported indirectly by the re-spending of DOD funds within
the State) representing 18.9 percent of the state's total job
base;
3. LDOD spending generated $44.4 billion in personal
earnings accounting for 17.4 percent of the total personal
earnings of all workers residing within the State;
4. LThe fiscal impacts of DOD spending and the workers it
supported generated a significant net revenue benefit for the
State in FY 2008. On average, for each job associated with DOD
spending, the revenues generated exceeded the expenditure
demand placed on the State's budget by $1,848.52; that is, for
each $1 in expenditure demand, $2.85 in state revenues were
collected for each employee (including military retirees) and
these employees related business spending.
5. LThe total fiscal benefit accruing to the State from
DOD-supported economic activities in the State in FY 2008 was
$1.1 billion.
6. LDOD spending in the Commonwealth totaled $54.5 billion
in FY 2008 and ranked first among all states on a per capita
basis ($6,713.06) representing a funding advantage of $4.26 to
$1.00 compared to the U.S. average.
This DOD spending is an important source of economic
activities, personal earnings, jobs and fiscal benefits for the
State. In the absence of this spending, the economy would be
15.6 percent smaller, support 18.9 percent fewer jobs and face
a budget gap of $1.1 billion.
Summary of Economic and Fiscal Impacts
DOD Spending in the Commonwealth of Virginia, FY 2008
(in billions of 2008 $s)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Personal
Source GSP(1) Earnings(2) Jobs(3)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Economic Impacts
Direct Payroll $22.4 $19.3 339,941
Contracting 33.6 23.9 537,258
Construction 1.4 1.1 25,786
Totals* $57.4 $44.4 902,985
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sources: EMSI, GMU Center for Regional Analysis
*sum of the individual values may not add to the totals due to rounding; $118 million in DOD grants were not
included in this analysis.
(1) Contribution to gross state product; (2) income accruing to workers residing in Virginia; (3) total direct
and indirect jobs supported by type of DOD spending in the State;
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fiscal Impact Revenues Expenditures Net Benefit
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Per Job (Actual $s) $2,849.22 $1,000.70 $1,848.52
Totals ($s in millions) $1,689.38 $593.34 $1,096.04
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sources: Urban Analytics, Inc.; GMU Center for Regional Analysis
Economic Impacts of DOD Spending Reductions for Military Equipment
Acquisition
An analysis of DOD spending reductions for the acquisition
of military equipment that has already been approved (BCA 1)
totaling $19.324 billion for FY 2013 and the potential
additional reduction of $25.686 billion in procurement of
military equipment, also impacting FY 2013, illustrate the
breadth of these effects on jobs, payroll and GDP as these
effects cycle through the economy at the local level. This
total reduction of $45.01 in DOD spending for the acquisition
of military equipment in FY 2013 would have the following
economic impacts:
1. LLost sales throughout the supply chain and induce sales
losses through the broader economy would total
$164,059,027,945; that is, for each $1 in DOD spending
reductions for military equipment, an additional $2.64 in sales
losses will be experienced by other businesses;
2. L71% of these lost sales would occur as a result of
decreased consumer spending by workers directly and indirectly
affected by these DOD spending reductions--workers having lost
their jobs and/or experienced salary reductions--affecting
local businesses serving local demand;
3. LThe loss of 1,006,315 full-time, year-round equivalent
jobs with only 124,428 of these jobs being lost directly or
indirectly from the prime DOD contractors for this equipment
and their suppliers while 881,887 jobs or 87.6% of all job
losses would come from the induced spending effects across all
sectors of the economy as a result of changes in payroll
spending within the aerospace and military equipment industry;
4. LThis total job loss would add 0.6 percentage points to
the current U.S. unemployment rate (raising today's 9.1% rate
to 9.7%);
5. LWage and salary would decrease by a total of $59.4
billion with $48.4 billion of these losses occurring among
workers working in businesses outside of the military equipment
manufacturing supply chain--retail, construction, professional
and business services, health and education, leisure and
hospitality construction, financial services and others;
6. LLost non-wage income--spending for operations, capital
investment, retained earnings, profits--would decline by $27.05
billion with 63.4% of this lost income being experienced by
non-DOD prime contractors and their suppliers; and,
7. LReduced U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) growth of
$86.456 billion representing an amount equal to 25% of the
projected annual increase in GDP for 2013; this loss would
reduce currently projected growth for 2013 from 2.3% to 1.7%
(IHS Global Insight September 2011 forecast).
The State Level Impacts of DOD Spending Reductions
While the economic impacts of DOD spending reductions would
affect all 50 states, ten states would account for 58.5 percent
of the job and income losses projected to occur in 2013 as a
result from a $45.01 billion reduction in military equipment
acquisitions. In total, these spending reductions would result
in employment decreases of 588,700 jobs in these ten states and
generate losses of $34.7 billion in personal income. These
decreases in economic activity would reduce these states' gross
state product by a total of $50.6 billion in 2013. One-third of
these impacts would occur in California, Virginia and Texas.
Economic Impacts of DOD Spending Reductions
for Military Equipment in FY 2013: Top Ten States
(jobs in thousands, GSP in billions of 2013 $s)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
State Job Losses Lost Earnings Decrease GSP*
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
California 125.8 $7.4 $10.8
Virginia 122.8 $7.3 $10.5
Texas 91.6 $5.4 $7.9
Florida 39.2 $2.3 $3.4
Massachusetts 38.2 $2.3 $3.3
Maryland 36.2 $2.1 $3.1
Pennsylvania 36.2 $2.1 $3.1
Connecticut 34.2 $2.0 $2.9
Arizona 33.2 $2.0 $2.9
Missouri 31.2 $1.8 $2.7
Totals-Top Ten 588.7 $34.7 $50.6
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sources: GMU Center for Regional Analysis, EMSI
*gross state product
Summary of Findings
Reductions in DOD spending, whether it involves uniform or
civilian personnel, the operations of military installations,
the maintenance or acquisition of military equipment or goods
and services provided by private contractors, will have
widespread impacts extending well beyond prime contractors and
their direct and indirect suppliers. Each of these prime
contractors and their suppliers (direct or indirect) employ
large numbers of workers and also make substantial purchases of
goods and services from suppliers to support their business
operations and the loss of this payroll and business purchases
(largely non-manufacturing suppliers) will spread the economic
pain of these cutbacks to a far larger population and business
base than generally appreciated.
Each $1 decrease in DOD equipment purchases will generate
an additional $2.64 in lost sales elsewhere in the economy with
71 percent of these losses resulting from decreased spending by
workers having lost their jobs. The employment effect is even
greater, with job losses associated with only a $45.01 billion
reduction in DOD spending for military equipment acquisition
generating a total loss of 1 million jobs of which 88 percent
would be on ``Main Street'' and only 12 percent directly within
the aerospace and military equipment industry. This job loss
would add 0.6 percentage points to the U.S. unemployment rate.
Beyond the loss of jobs there is the loss of earnings and
spending that further would undermine state and local tax
bases.
Spending reductions have consequences and these
consequences disproportionally impact workers and businesses
that appear to have little connection to the target of the
spending reduction. The breadth and reach of this collateral
economic damage should be fully measured and assessed as
decisions to reduce DOD spending are debated. Besides the
impacts on the nation's military readiness and ability to
respond to international crises, the impacts of any proposed
DOD spending reductions on local economies, their workers,
their incomes, and on local businesses need to be fully
assessed and their consequences understood and minimized or
mitigated.
Thank you.
STATEMENT OF DR. PETER MORICI, PROFESSOR OF INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS,
ROBERT H. SMITH SCHOOL OF BUSINESS, UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND
My name is Peter Morici, and I am an economist and
professor of international business at the University of
Maryland. Prior, I served as Director of Economics at the
United States International Trade Commission. I thank you for
this opportunity to testify on Economic Consequences of Defense
Sequestration.
Today, I would like to discuss with you the broader
economic consequences of further cuts in U.S. defense spending,
as opposed to specific industry or regional impacts. These are
largely systemic.
Should the United States fail to maintain military strength
necessary to meet its international security responsibilities,
as well as those that may be posed by a surging Chinese
presence in the Pacific, the international economic
institutions that define the rules of the game very likely will
change in ways more hostile to American economic institutions,
political culture and values, diminishing prospects for U.S.
economic success and independence.
The United States offers the world a clear prescription for
economic prosperity and the protection of human rights--free
markets and democracy. Yet, with the U.S. economy withering and
the U.S. ability to project power prospectively diminished,
U.S. prescriptions appear increasingly less efficacious abroad.
China offers the world a very different model for economic
development and personal security. Its autocratic government
intervenes considerably in economic decisions to promote wide
ranging development goals, and it limits personal freedoms to
ensure domestic order and stability. ``Occupy Wall Street''
would almost certainly not be tolerated in China and would
likely not be permitted to emerge with Beijing's tight
censorship of internal communications. Suppression of such
movements supports its strategy for tight economic management,
quite in addition to maintaining the Communist Party's grip on
political power.
China openly flaunts the letter and spirit of international
economic rules intended to foster free and open markets, and
severely limits intellectual dissent. With its state-directed
economy growing at breakneck speed and America struggling, a
U.S. failure to maintain a military adequate to meet China in
the Pacific will almost assuredly result in other emerging
nations embracing, albeit reluctantly or enthusiastically and
in varying measure, China's model for economic development and
governance.
International institutions--like the WTO--are consensual,
and interpret and make new rules by consensus. Perforce, those
rules will follow the tide of sentiment among more successful
nations, and the United States and its Atlantic allies will
become more isolated and somewhat marginalized. History teaches
power balances do change, and often losers are preoccupied with
internal squabbling and chaotic dysfunction, and ultimately
surprised.
Without a strong economy and military capable of meeting
the emerging challenge posed by China in the Pacific, American
values and the U.S. economy cannot succeed.
Origins of Budget Challenges
During the closing days of World War II the United States--
in partnership with Britain, Canada and others--crafted an
international economic system intended to promote democracy and
economic globalization. The premise was clear--democracies,
integrated by trade and investment, would be much less inclined
to war. Military competition would be replaced by economic
competition.
On the economic side, the United States encouraged the
formation of the European Community, which grew into the
European Union, and promoted globalization through the WTO,
IMF, World Bank, and regional and bilateral trade and
investment agreements. The West--as defined by the OECD
economies--is so intensely integrated today that the notion of
armed conflict among those nations is absolutely absurd.
On the political/security side, the United States became
the de facto global defender of free markets and democracy by
forcing the permanent disarmament of the third and fourth
largest economies--Japan and Germany--leaving only stalwart
foes--China and Russia--as potential challengers on the global
stage.
Victory in the Cold War--without comparable contributions
from the Japanese and German economies--came at a heavy price.
And now, dealing with global terrorism and a more muscular
China poses new perils and costs that Americans, weary of
leadership, seem unwilling and perhaps unable to bear.
Successive rounds of GATT/WTO negotiations substantially
liberalized trade among the OECD nations, and granted
preferential market access in advanced industrialized countries
to developing regions. Through special and differential
treatment the latter economies have generally obtained open
access to the United States, Canada and EU but are permitted to
maintain high tariffs and administrative barriers to western
exports, and subsidize domestic industries in endlessly
imaginative ways.
Through the 1990s, the North American and European
economies were so much larger and stronger that they could
afford to give away industrial activities and jobs, even when
the dictates of sound economics and comparative advantage would
indicate wiser choices, to promote development in less
fortunate areas of the world. However, the emergence of China,
and to a lesser extent India, Russia and Brazil, has changed
all that. By virtue of China's size and ambitions to exert
greater influence in the Pacific and to change the rules of
international competition, this calculation about the
relationship between western and developing nations becomes
patently false and foolish.
China abuses the WTO system and flaunts free-market
principles with high tariffs and domestic institutions that
systematically block U.S. and EU exports, aggressive subsidizes
for domestic industries, intervention in currency market to
ensure an undervalued yuan and artificial cost advantages for
its goods, and unfair rules for foreign firms that establish
production in China to sell there.
All of this has imposed a large and growing bilateral trade
imbalance that destroys millions of U.S. manufacturing jobs,
transfers valuable U.S. technology cheaply to China, greatly
diminishes U.S. R&D, educational attainment and potential
growth, and makes the United States less capable of maintaining
defense capabilities necessary to meeting its security
obligations and accomplishes its legitimate security goals.
Successive Administrations have tried diplomacy to open
Chinese markets and end currency manipulation and mercantilism
more generally, but when rebuffed, they have cautioned Congress
against concrete action, and pursued more ill-fated diplomacy.
Large American multinationals, which have invested in China
to serve the market, have become clients of Beijing's
protectionism. Invested in Middle Kingdom mercantilism, they
council Presidents and Congressional leaders against taking
concrete measures to counter China's unfair practices--to the
point of even denying members of Congress the opportunity to
vote on such measures. Those actions of self-directed
capitalism have broad consequences for the health and vitality
of the U.S. economy and ultimately national security.
On the global stage, failure to meaningfully confront
Chinese mercantilism, after diplomacy has failed over and over
again, makes the United States appear foolish, weak and inept,
a civilization overtaken by one with a better economic model
and a more competent government.
Domestically, the United States has needlessly increased
its dependence on expensive foreign oil by failing to develop
abundant domestic resources and implement more effective
conservation measures. Failure to develop domestic energy
creates no environmental benefits. It merely shifts the
drilling to the Persian Gulf and other unfriendly venues where
environmental risks are no better managed, and helps finance
global terrorism. It is a fool's journey into the darkness.
Economists agree: the U.S. economy can't get out of its
funk and grow robustly, not because Americans can't make things
cost effectively and well, but because demand for what they
make is inadequate.
There is no mystery about it. The trade deficit with China
and on oil account for nearly the entire $550 billion U.S.
trade deficit, this deficit poses a significant drain on the
demand for U.S. products and is the single largest barrier to
economic recovery.
President Obama has said on more than one occasion China's
currency policy hurts the U.S. economy and slows its recovery.
The reasoning is simple. Every dollar that goes abroad to
purchase Chinese consumer goods that does not return here is
lost purchasing power that could be creating jobs. The same
applies to high priced oil.
Cutting the trade deficit in half would jump start the U.S.
economy, create up to 5 million jobs and lower the unemployment
rate to about 6 percent. Without confronting Chinese currency
manipulation and broader protectionism with concrete actions
and without raising domestic oil production from less than 6
million barrels a day to 10, the U.S. economy won't grow fast
enough, and taxes will be inadequate to finance an adequate
defense and vital domestic services.
Simply, the trade deficit--China and oil--is as much
responsible for the U.S. budget crisis--through slow growth--as
overspending and other cost issues.
Cost Issues, Overspending and Popular Myths
The U.S. economy and government faces cost issues too. The
U.S. health care system is more expensive and provides less
favorable outcomes than more cost effective private systems
abroad, for example in Holland and Germany. Much the same may
be said for U.S. education.
Health care and education are hugely uncompetitive by
global standards, and account for huge portions of combined
U.S. federal, state and local spending. Most recently rising
health care costs, coupled with a shrinking private sector and
tax base, is now crowding out education spending.
Together with rising Social Security outlays, mandated by
an unrealistic retirement age fixed at 66, the outsized cost of
health care and education have required curtailing basic
government activities and targeting for cuts spending
categories the United States simply must undertake to compete.
Funds are lacking to adequately maintain roads, bridges and
waterways, and to replace National Weather Service satellites
essential to monitoring and forecasting severe weather. And,
the United States has ceded manned space flight to China and
Russia.
Advocates of the burdensomely inefficient health care and
educations systems have perpetuated the myth that too much
defense spending is the problem--that is simply not the case.
In 2007, with two wars raging and the Bush tax cuts in
place, the deficit stood at $161 billion, while in 2011, it
will be about 1.3 trillion. Total government outlays are up
about $847 billion, when no more than $62 billion are necessary
to accommodate inflation. How can defense spending--with a
baseline budget of $553 billion in 2011--be responsible? It
only accounted for about 11 percent of the $847 billion
increase.
Moreover, if Congress would simply cut by half the
additional spending since 2007, it would accomplish a total of
more than $4 trillion in budget reductions over ten years.
The myth also persists that the United States spends too
much on defense and winding down the wars in Iraq and
Afghanistan will create great dividends. It won't. Congress may
have appropriated funds for those wars, but it is clear those
wars, as well as other conflicts, have been even more expensive
than those budget outlays indicated.
U.S. defense systems are aging and becoming less functional
and effective. Examples have been cited of sons manning
fighters once flown by their fathers. Ask yourself how
effective your staffs would be with 15 year old computers and
if you would want to fight a cyber attack with such antiquated
hardware.
And defense capabilities are thinner. The number of USAF
fighters is down from 3602 in 2000 to 1990 today, and will be
reduced to 1739 at current funding levels. Navy ships are down
from 316 to 288, and will have to be reduced to 263 at current
funding levels. Sequestration would require cutting these
figures even further and reducing the number of Army maneuver
battalions by 30 or 40 percent.
Changes in the nature of threats and the global economic
power balance--who will have economic power--will require more
not fewer resources to protect U.S. strategic interests and
preserve the influence of U.S. values--democracy and free
markets--in the world.
Cyber warfare and arming China, which is building a blue
water navy to challenge the United States in the Pacific, do
not shift U.S. security challenges from one venue to another
but rather add to those challenges. For example, U.S. and
allied dependence on Middle East oil will continue for at least
another generation--even with best efforts to develop domestic
fossil fuels and alternative energy resources--and U.S. naval
assets cannot be depleted in the Gulf Region to counter a
Chinese buildup in the Pacific. Moreover, economic and
political upheavals in Europe and North Africa will make the
U.S. naval presence in the Mediterranean and North Atlantic
even more vital.
The myth persists that China will not be able to challenge
the United States anytime soon. After all China's reported
military expenditures--at current exchange rates--is only about
17 percent of U.S. baseline outlays, but China does not have
troops, aircraft and naval assets tied up around the world with
established commitments. Moreover, China's currency is widely
acknowledged to be undervalued, making comparisons of spending
at current exchange rates deceptive.
Using IMF Purchasing Power Parity exchange rates, China's
reported military spending in 2011 becomes $148 billion or 27
percent of the U.S. base budget. Based on the growth of
spending over the past two years, with sequestration, China's
military spending would be 37 and 43 percent of U.S. levels in
2013 and 2015, and 66 percent in 2021. Without sequestration,
it would still be 60 percent of U.S. levels in 2011 and could
effectively match U.S. spending in the late 2020s.
Also U.S. budget problems are much worse than Congress
anticipates. The President's February budget assumed economic
growth in the range of 4 percent for 2011 to 2016. Even in the
more euphoric days of 2010, private sector economists were not
assuming those kinds of figures.
Even if the Joint Select Committee reaches a consensus on
budget cuts acceptable to both chambers, slow growth will
compel another budget crisis after the 2012 election and then
others further down the road.
Hard Realities
America must address the world as it finds it, not as
intellectuals and advocates tell us it should be.
Hard reality number one is the interactions between the
health of the U.S. economy and these budget discussions are
disquieting.
The United States is not in a Greek spiral--at least not
yet--but cuts in defense and nondefense spending will slow
growth at a time when demand for what the private economy
produces is weak and a second recession that could thrust
unemployment into the teens threatens. Most certainly, budget
cuts will breed slower growth, lower tax revenues and the need
for more cuts, until Washington finds ways to get the private
economy growing.
If Washington can't find a way to instigate private sector
growth--specifically, if it can't muster to challenge Chinese
mercantilism and unleash development of domestic energy
resources--and the nation continues on the assumption that
budget deficits can be tamed with large contributions from
defense, real effective Chinese defense spending will surpass
U.S. defense spending in the next decade.
The United States has many established assets--ships,
planes and such built in the past--that will continue numerical
superiority in the ability to project power, but those will be
increasingly old assets or the numerical superiority will
decline more rapidly from retirements of assets. China's assets
will be newer and growing in number.
The myth persists that China's military will be
technologically inferior for a long time. Don't bet on that if
the U.S. industry and R&D keeps moving to China through
investments by GE and others, and the U.S. hollows out its
defense industrial base through program cuts to meet
unrealistic budget targets.
Slashing defense spending because the Congress can't agree
to confront Chinese mercantilism and develop domestic energy to
rekindle economic growth, and to cut and reform the domestic
spending that has built up over the last four years, and the
tables will turn in the Pacific sooner than you think.
Then, China's violation of the norms and rules of the
economic system put in place by the United States and western
powers after World War II will spread like an epidemic through
the developing world, troubled places in Southern Europe, and
so forth.
China's mercantilism, anti-democratic values and soft
approach to civil and human rights making will be seen an
attractive comprehensive package, necessary for ensuring
economic prosperity and personal security. The rules of the
game, as defined by international institutions, will follow
those broader sentiments, and Americans and their values and
institutions will become isolated and unable to compete.
America will be more isolated and dramatically weakened.
Marginalized, it will resemble Italy or Greece. Charming and
quaint but hardly able to independently sustain its standard of
living or ensure its own security, or worse bankrupt and at
China's doorstep for a bail out.
THE FUTURE OF THE MILITARY
SERVICES AND CONSEQUENCES OF
DEFENSE SEQUESTRATION
----------
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
----------
HEARING HELD
NOVEMBER 2, 2011
----------
WITNESSES
General Raymond T. Odierno, USA
38th Chief of Staff, United States Army
Admiral Jonathan W. Greenert, USN
30th Chief of Naval Operations
General Norton A. Schwartz, USAF
19th Chief of Staff, United States Air Force
General James F. Amos, USMC
35th Commandant of the Marine Corps
=======================================================================
PREPARED STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY WITNESSES
November 2, 2011
=======================================================================
STATEMENT OF GENERAL RAYMOND T. ODIERNO, USA, 38TH CHIEF OF STAFF,
UNITED STATES ARMY
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Congressman Smith, and members of
the committee.
Since this is my first time to appear before you as the
Chief of Staff of the Army, I want to start by telling you how
much I appreciate your unwavering commitment to the Army and
the Joint Force. I look forward to discussing the future of the
Army and the potential impact of budget cuts on our future
capabilities, readiness, and depth. Because of the sustained
support of Congress and this committee, we are the best
trained, best equipped, and best led land force in the world
today. As we face an uncertain security environment and fiscal
challenges, we know we will get smaller, but we must maintain
our capabilities to be a decisive force--a force trusted by the
American people to meet our future security needs.
Over the past 10 years our Army--Active, Guard, and
Reserve--has deployed over 1.1 million Soldiers to combat. Over
4,500 Soldiers have made the ultimate sacrifice. Over 32,000
Soldiers have been wounded--9,000 requiring long term care. In
that time, our Soldiers have earned over 14,000 awards for
valor to include 6 Medals of Honor and 22 Distinguished Service
Crosses.
Our Army is and always will be about Soldiers and Families.
Throughout it all, our Soldiers and leaders have displayed
unparalleled ingenuity, mental and physical toughness, and
courage under fire. I am proud to be part of this Army--to lead
our Nation's most precious treasure--our magnificent men and
women.
Today we face an estimated $450 billion plus in DOD budget
cuts. We cannot afford to repeat the mistakes of previous
reductions. I respectfully suggest that we make these decisions
strategically, keeping in mind the realities of the risk they
pose, and that we make these decisions together, unified, to
ensure that when the plan is finally decided upon, all effort
has been made to provide the Nation the best level of security
and safety.
Our Army must remain a key enabler in the Joint Force
across a broad range of missions, responsive to the Combatant
Commanders, and maintain trust with the American People. It is
my challenge to balance the fundamental tension between
maintaining security in an increasingly complicated and
unpredictable world, and the requirements of a fiscally austere
environment. The U.S. Army is committed to being a part of the
solution in this very important effort.
Accordingly, we must balance our force structure with
appropriate modernization and sufficient readiness to sustain a
smaller, but ready force.
We will apply the lessons of ten years of war to ensure we
have the right mix of forces. The right mix of heavy, medium,
light, and Airborne forces; the right mix between the Active
and Reserve Components; the right mix of combat, combat
support, and combat service support forces; the right mix of
operating and generating forces; and the right mix of Soldiers,
Civilians, and contractors. We must ensure that the forces we
employ to meet our operational commitments are maintained,
trained, and equipped to the appropriate level of readiness.
As the Army gets smaller, it is the ``How we reduce'' that
will be critical. While we downsize, we must do it at a pace
that allows us to retain a high quality All-Volunteer Force
that is lethal, agile, adaptable, versatile, and ready to
deploy with the ability to expand as required. I am committed
to this, as I am also committed to fostering continued
commitment to the Army Profession, and adapting leader
development to meet future challenges.
Although Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) funding will
be reduced, I cannot overstate how critical it is in ensuring
our Soldiers have what they need while serving in harm's way,
as well as the vital role OCO funding plays in resetting our
formations and equipment, a key aspect of our current and
future readiness. Failing to sufficiently reset now would
certainly incur higher future costs, potentially in lives.
Along with the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary of
the Army, I share concern about the potential of sequestration,
which would bring a total reduction of over a trillion dollars
for DOD. Cuts of this magnitude would be catastrophic to the
military and--in the case of the Army--would significantly
reduce our capability and capacity to assure our partners
abroad, respond to crises, and deter our potential adversaries,
while threatening the readiness of our All-Volunteer Force.
Sequestration would cause significant reductions in both
Active and Reserve Component end strengths, impact the
industrial base, and almost eliminate our modernization
programs, denying the military superiority our Nation requires
in today and tomorrow's uncertain and challenging security
environment. We would have to consider additional
infrastructure efficiencies, including consolidations and
closures, commensurate with force structure reductions, to
maintain the Army's critical capacity to train Soldiers and
units, maintain equipment, and prepare the force to meet
Combatant Commander requirements now and into the future.
It would require us to completely revamp our National
Security Strategy and reassess our ability to shape the global
environment in order to protect the United States.
With sequestration, my assessment is that the Nation would
incur an unacceptable level of strategic and operational risk.
Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, I thank you again
for allowing me the opportunity to appear before you. I also
thank you for the support that you provide each and every day
to our outstanding men and women of the United States Army, our
Army Civilians and their Families. The strength of our Nation
is our Army. The strength of our Army is our Soldiers. The
strength of our Soldiers is our Families. This is what makes us
Army Strong. I look forward to your questions.
STATEMENT OF ADMIRAL JONATHAN W. GREENERT, USN, 30TH CHIEF OF NAVAL
OPERATIONS
Chairman McKeon, Ranking Member Smith, and members of the
Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify on the
future of the military services and consequences of defense
sequestration. This is my first time testifying before you as
Chief of Naval Operations, and I am proud to represent more
than 625,000 Sailors and Civilians serving their country in the
United States Navy. It is through their courage and commitment
to country that the Navy continues to be at the front line of
our nation's efforts in war and peace. I look forward to
working with you to ensure our Navy remains the world's
preeminent maritime force--providing America offshore options
to advance our national interests in an era of uncertainty.
Through innovation, adaptation and judiciousness, I believe we
can sustain our contribution to defense and be good stewards of
our nation's resources.
As it has for more than 200 years, our Navy continues to
deliver credible capability for deterrence, sea control and
power projection to contain conflict and to fight and win our
nation's wars. We remain forward at the maritime crossroads to
protect the interconnected systems of trade, information and
security that enable our nation's economic prosperity while
ensuring operational access for the Joint force to the maritime
domain and the littorals.
Since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the Navy
has been an integral part of our nation's combat, counter-
terrorism and crisis response operations. Currently, Navy's
aircraft carriers and air wings account for about 30 percent of
the close air support for our troops on the ground in Iraq and
Afghanistan, and an even larger share of the electronic support
missions that ensure the safety of our troops against IED
attack. Navy SEALs led a joint force to capture Osama bin Laden
and also rescued the M/V ALABAMA's crew. USS FLORIDA, a guided
missile submarine, and the USS SCRANTON and USS PROVIDENCE, two
attack submarines, launched over 100 Tomahawk land attack
missiles at military targets in Libya at the outset of
Operation ODYSSEY DAWN. Earlier this year, our aircraft carrier
USS GEORGE WASHINGTON and several of our cruisers and
destroyers aided the Japanese after a Tsunami decimated
portions of Honshu Island. To conduct warfighting and be ready
to respond to such crises, on any given day more than 40,000
sailors are at sea and about 40 percent of our ships are
deployed away from home.
Over the past 10 years we stretched our ships, aircraft and
people to meet the growing needs of Combatant Commanders for
Navy forces with a smaller Fleet. Since 2000, the number of
ships in the Fleet decreased by about 10 percent. Yet, in the
last four years alone, demand for carrier strike groups
doubled, and requests for amphibious ready groups grew by 70
percent. As a result, each ship is underway about 15 percent
more per year than in 2000, lengthening deployments and making
deployments more frequent. Because deployments now cut into the
time available to conduct maintenance on ships and aircraft and
to train our crews, we have to tailor the readiness of some
units to only those missions they will likely be tasked to do
instead of the whole (design) range of missions they might be
tasked to do. Less time for maintenance decreases the service
lives of our ships and aircraft and makes maintenance more
expensive because it is now less efficient and more emergent.
In turn, growing maintenance costs offset the funds available
for procurement and modernization, making it that much more
difficult to recapitalize the Fleet.
Going forward, I expect the importance of Navy forces will
grow as compared to today as we draw down ground forces in the
Middle East and reset them. Nations like Iran and North Korea
continue to pursue nuclear capabilities, while rising powers
are rapidly modernizing their militaries and investing in
capabilities to deny our forces freedom of action in vital
regions such as the Asia-Pacific. To ensure we are prepared to
meet our missions, I will continue to focus on my three
priorities: 1) Be ready to fight and win today; 2) Build the
future force to fight and win tomorrow; and 3) Take care of our
people and create a motivated, relevant and diverse force. Most
importantly, I will work to ensure we do not create a ``hollow
force'' that is unable to do the mission due to shortfalls in
maintenance, personnel, enablers or training. We will not erode
the support we provide to our Sailors, Civilians, and their
families that sustains our all-volunteer force.
To pursue these priorities in a constrained fiscal
environment, we will have to be effective and efficient. We
will maintain our warfighting advantage against new threats
using new technologies and operating concepts. We will use
innovative ways to affordably operate forward, where we are
most effective and can provide our nation options for influence
and response. Additionally, we will be judicious with our
resources (people, money and time) by more efficiently
scheduling maintenance and adapting our Fleet Response Plan.
We must remain the world's preeminent maritime fighting
force. In particular, our Navy will continue to dominate the
undersea domain with sustained investment and effort in a
network of platforms and sensors. The Joint force relies on us
for assured access to deter conflict, fight wars, protect our
allies and partners and advance our interests. We will sustain
access below, on and above the water with new maritime and
joint operational concepts such as Air-Sea Battle, and by
operationalizing the electromagnetic spectrum and cyber domain.
The budget reductions we are currently addressing as part
of the 2011 Budget Control Act will introduce additional risk
in our ability to meet the future needs of Combatant
Commanders, but we believe this risk is manageable. Some
strategic changes will be required in the Department of Defense
to posture our forces, prepare for conflicts, and conduct
combat and stability operations. We are currently working
through an emerging strategy as we complete the fiscal year 13
budget submission.
However, if the efforts of the Joint Select Committee on
Deficit Reduction do not result in agreement and sequestration
occurs, the Department of Defense and the Navy will have to
rethink some fundamental aspects of what our military does. The
current law does not allow the military to manage these
reductions, but rather applies the cuts uniformly to each
program, project and activity. Our readiness and procurement
accounts would face a reduction of about 18 percent, rising to
approximately 25 percent in the event military personnel
funding is exempted from full sequestration. The size of these
cuts would substantially impact our ability to resource the
Combatant Commander's operational plans and maintain our
forward presence around the globe.
Some of the actions we would need to take under
sequestration could have a severe and irreversible impact on
the Navy's future. For instance, we may need to end procurement
programs and begin laying off civilian personnel in fiscal year
2012 to ensure we are within control levels for January of
2013. As a capital-intensive force, we depend on consistent and
reliable production from the shipbuilding and aviation
industries to sustain our fleet capacity. If we end programs
abruptly and some of these companies shut down, we will be
hard-pressed to reconstitute them. And each ship we don't build
impacts the fleet for 20-50 years.
I look forward to working in partnership with the Committee
to ensure our Navy will remain able to deter aggression by
operating forward and being ready to fight and win our nation's
wars. By maintaining our current course and judiciously
applying our resources, I am confident we can come through this
challenge and remain the world's most lethal, flexible and
capable maritime force. Thank you for this opportunity to speak
with you on the Navy's behalf.
STATEMENT OF GENERAL NORTON A. SCHWARTZ, USAF, 19TH CHIEF OF STAFF,
UNITED STATES AIR FORCE
Ten years after 9/11, Airmen and their Army, Navy, Marine,
and Coast Guard teammates continue to serve the Nation with
distinction, performing admirably across a broad spectrum of
operations. In particular, our service members have honed their
skills to a fine edge after more than a decade of effectively
conducting counterterrorism and counterinsurgency operations.
As we evaluate our strategy for the future, we must protect
the progress that we have made by addressing the undeniable
stresses and strains on our service members and their families,
as well as the tremendous toll on our battle-worn equipment,
resulting from more than a decade of sustained global
operations. This is particularly true for the Air Force, which
has been in sustained combat operations for more than two
decades, dating back to Operation DESERT STORM.
We also must recognize and prepare for the ongoing
evolution of a highly dynamic, increasingly complex
geostrategic environment in which the proliferation of
technology is allowing more and more actors to exert influence
and effect desired outcomes. In order to attain a full-spectrum
portfolio of capabilities that is prepared to address wide-
ranging security threats, we must internalize the hard-fought,
hard-learned lessons of the past decade of operations against
primarily terrorist and insurgent elements, as we judiciously
prepare for the possibility of future higher-end contingencies
involving potential near-peer actors.
Because our Nation's debt crisis has a direct bearing on
our national security, the U.S. military will also tighten its
fiscal belt, and be a part of the solution to find our way back
to a vibrant national economy. To this end, the Department of
Defense began by identifying more than $100 billion in
efficiencies, shifting the savings from overhead to operational
and modernization requirements. In the Air Force alone, nearly
$33 billion were reallocated to support required capabilities
more directly. Moreover, we found an additional $10 billion in
savings to contribute to deficit reduction as we completed work
on the 2012 budget. The Air Force continues to review all areas
of the budget--including force structure, operations and
investment, and personnel--for further savings.
But to sustain the military's ability to protect the Nation
against wide-ranging threats in a very dynamic strategic and
fiscal environment, we will have to make extremely difficult
decisions--for example, reducing investment in many areas, but
also enhancing capabilities in others in order to compensate.
These choices must be based on strategic considerations, not
compelled solely by budget targets. A non-strategy-based
approach that proposes cuts without correlation to national
security priorities or core defense capabilities will lead to a
hollowed-out force, similar to those that followed every major
conflict since World War I--a U.S. military with aging
equipment, extremely stressed human resources, less-than-
adequate training, and ultimately, declining readiness and
effectiveness. We must avoid repeating this scenario by
steering clear of ill-conceived, across-the-board cuts, which
do not allow us to deliberately accept risks, to devise
strategies to mitigate those risks, and to maintain a capable,
if smaller, effective force. Instead, sweeping cuts of the sort
in the Budget Control Act's sequester provision would slash our
investment accounts; raid our operations and maintenance
accounts, forcing the curtailment of important daily operations
and sustainment efforts; and inflict real damage to the
effectiveness and well-being of our Airmen and their families.
Ultimately, such a scenario gravely undermines our ability to
protect the Nation.
But beyond the manner in which potential budget cuts are
executed, even the most thoroughly-deliberated strategy may not
be able to overcome dire consequences if cuts go far beyond the
$450 billion-plus in anticipated national security budget
reductions over the next 10 years. This is true whether the
cuts are directed by sequestration or by Joint Select Committee
proposal, and whether they are deliberately targeted or across-
the-board. From the ongoing budget review, the Department is
confident that further spending reductions beyond the more than
$450 billion that are needed to comply with the Budget Control
Act's first round of cuts cannot be done without damaging our
core military capabilities and therefore our national security.
From the perspective of the Air Force, whose ``real'' total
obligation authority is already only 20 percent of the
Department of Defense top-line--the lowest of any military
service since World War II--further cuts will amount to:
1. LFurther reductions to our end strength, both civilian
and military, despite the fact that the Air Force already is
substantially smaller than it was ten years ago;
2. LContinued aging and reductions in the Air Force's fleet
of fighters, strategic bombers, airlifters, and tankers, as
well as to associated bases and infrastructure;
3. LAdverse effects on training and readiness, which has
seen a decline since 2003; and
4. LDiminished capacity to execute concurrent missions
across the spectrum of operations and over vast distances on
the globe.
A smaller Air Force, as a result of anticipated budget
cuts, still will remain an unmatched, superbly capable force,
but as a matter of simple physical limitations, it will be able
to accomplish fewer tasks in fewer places in any given period
of time. Therefore, while the Nation has become accustomed to
effective execution of wide-ranging operations in rapid
succession or even simultaneously--for example, the Air Force's
concurrent response to crisis situations in Japan and Libya,
which ranged more than 5,500 miles in distance and the
operational spectrum from humanitarian relief to combat
airpower, all the while maintaining operations in Afghanistan
and Iraq--it will have to accept reduced coverage in future
similar, concurrent scenarios if further large cuts to the
national security budget are allowed to take effect. Also, our
Airmen and their families, throughout the Total Force, would
face intensified deployment schedules, and our equipment would
become aged and worn more quickly, because fewer resources
would be available to commit to the Nation's emerging needs.
As part of our strategy to mitigate the effects of
decreased capacity, we will continue to strengthen our
international partnerships, especially where common interests
and shared security responsibilities are involved. More
importantly, we will continue to promote efforts toward
advancing Joint interdependence, as the Chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff testified before this committee last week. This
will require each military service ``to maintain and be the
masters of their core competencies and their unique service
cultures, but . . . [to] operate as a single cohesive team.''
To meet the Chairman's intent, the Air Force will continue to
make vital contributions to the Joint team's portfolio,
integrating airpower's four unique, enduring qualities: (1)
domain control; (2) intelligence, surveillance, and
reconnaissance; (3) air mobility; and (4) global strike. These
four core contributions--plus our unparalleled ability to
command and control air, space, and cyber systems--will sustain
the Joint team's advantage, and inform our analysis as we
prioritize our efforts in each of the most critical dimensions:
materiel, personnel, training, and readiness.
Reducing any of these core contributions, in addition to
potential diminished capacities as discussed earlier, will
fundamentally alter the complexion of your Air Force. We
therefore are focused on sustaining and strengthening these
core functions. Moreover, specific systems such as the F-35A,
the centerpiece of our future tactical air combat capability;
KC-46A, the backbone of our worldwide power projection
capability and thus our Nation's global expeditionary posture;
and the Long-Range Strike ``family of systems,'' all represent
substantial elements of our overall suite of capabilities and
thus must all be pursued through disciplined--and certainly
efficient--modernization efforts. Even though we are
responsibly drawing down in Afghanistan and Iraq, we know that
historically, as U.S. forces withdraw from active combat, the
relative requirement for airpower typically increases. By
focusing on our core contributions, we are preserving the
character of your Air Force--ready to continue responding
effectively to the Nation's airpower and global power
projection needs.
In short, Airmen remain fully committed to executing
current missions effectively while building a future force
according to operational risk, capability and capacity
requirements, personnel and materiel needs, and prudent, if
frugal, strategies for investment in modernization,
recapitalization, and readiness. We do not have to forsake
national security to achieve fiscal stability. If we undertake
a strategy-based approach to necessary budget cuts, and keep
those cuts to a reasonable level, we can assure our full-
spectrum preparedness in providing our unique capabilities,
affording a wider range of options for rapid, tailorable, and
flexible power projection--Global Vigilance, Reach, and Power--
on which our Nation's security and strategic interests rely.
STATEMENT OF GENERAL JAMES F. AMOS, USMC, 35TH COMMANDANT OF THE MARINE
CORPS
In an increasingly dangerous and uncertain world, the
Marine Corps continues to provide capabilities our Nation needs
to retain its status as the only credible remaining superpower.
As we face inevitable difficult resource decisions, we must
also consider how we can best mitigate the inherent risk of a
reduced defense capacity. Like an affordable insurance policy,
the Marine Corps and the Navy's amphibious forces represent a
very efficient and effective hedge against the Nation's most
likely risks.
The current fight. We will continue to provide the best
trained and equipped Marine units to Afghanistan. This will not
change. This will remain the top priority for as long as we
have Marines in harm's way. We have made great progress in
Afghanistan; our fellow citizens expect no less of us for the
duration of the war. We remain committed to achieving success.
We will ensure that we draw down in Afghanistan in a way that
responsibly transfers authority to our Afghan partners, and
maintains pressure on the enemy. Our forward-deployed Marines
have all that they need with regard to training, equipment, and
leadership to accomplish the mission. The cost of ensuring that
they have all that they need has been felt by those units back
at home station. This fact impacts our ability to deal with
another large scale contingency.
Future Security Environment. Our Nation and world face an
uncertain future; we cannot predict where and when events may
occur that might require us to respond on short notice to
protect our citizens and our interests. In the past, there have
always been times when events have compelled the United States
to become involved, even when such involvement wasn't desired;
there is no doubt that we will have do this again as we face an
uncertain future. As we look ahead, we see a world of
increasing instability and conflict, characterized by poverty,
competition for resources, urbanization, overpopulation and
extremism. Failed states, or those that cannot adequately
govern their own territory can become safe havens for
terrorist, insurgent and criminal groups that threaten the U.S.
and our allies.
Already pressurized by a lack of education and job
opportunities, the marked increase of young men in
underdeveloped countries are swelling the ranks of disaffected
groups, providing a more pronounced distinction between the
``haves'' and ``have-nots.'' Over the last year we watched as
the momentum of the Arab Spring toppled long-established
governments, and re-shaped the political and military dynamics
of an already troubled region.
Increasing competition for scarce natural resources like
fossil fuels, food and clean water continue to lead to tension,
crisis and conflict. The rise of new powers and shifting
geopolitical relationships will create greater potential for
competition and friction. The rapid proliferation of new
technologies, cyber warfare and advanced precision weaponry
will amplify the risks, thus empowering state and non-state
actors as never before. These trends will exert a significant
influence on the future security environment and, in turn, the
ever-changing character of warfare. In the words of one of our
former general officers, ``two parallel worlds exist on this
planet--a stable progressively growing, developing world and an
unstable, disintegrating chaotic world. The two worlds are
colliding.'' This is the world in which your Marine Corps must
operate. If we are to do our part to forestall future wars and
conflicts we must remain engaged and involved.
Crisis response. Like it or not, America must maintain the
ability to respond to crises--especially in unexpected places
at unexpected times. History has shown that crises usually come
with little or no warning, and often in conditions of
uncertainty, complexity, and chaos. A full understanding of
what is occurring, and what the best response should be, takes
time. There remains an imperative for a force that can respond
to crisis situations immediately and create options and
decision space for our Nation's leaders. An on-scene force that
can respond immediately reduces the risk that a situation will
spin out of control as our nation's leaders attempt to
determine a way ahead. America's ability to respond in the
manner required is increasingly complicated by the fact that
since the 1990s our nation has significantly reduced the number
and size of our bases and stations around the world.
Crisis response must sometimes be measured in hours, if not
minutes. When Marine forces rescued the downed Air Force F-15
pilot in Libya earlier this year, they did so from amphibious
shipping in the Mediterranean, arriving and completing the
rescue within 90 minutes of notification. Imagine how the
dynamic in Libya might have changed if Quadafi had captured a
US air crew. Within 20 hours of notification forward deployed
Marine forces arrived in tsunami-devastated Japan and began to
conduct search and rescue and humanitarian assistance and
disaster relief missions--at times within the radioactive
plume. Crisis response can't be done from the United States. It
takes too much time to get there. Even if adequate
infrastructure is available near the crisis site to support
deployment of a crisis response force by air, maintaining and
sustaining such a force by air is extraordinarily difficult.
It is imperative that our Nation retain a credible means of
mitigating risk while we draw down both the capabilities and
capacities of our forces. This is best done by forward deployed
and positioned forces, trained to a high state of readiness,
and on the scene. The Marine Corps was specifically directed by
the 82nd Congress as the force intended to be ``the most ready
when the Nation is least ready.'' This expectation exists
because of the costly lessons our nation learned during the
Korean War when a lack of preparedness in the beginning stages
of the conflict very nearly resulted in defeat. Because our
Nation cannot afford to hold the entire joint force at such a
high state of readiness, it has chosen to keep the Marines
ready, and has often used them to plug the gaps during
international crises, to respond when no other options were
available.
Forward presence. Although the world is continuing to
change and budgets continue to fluctuate, America's requirement
to maintain a forward based force-in-readiness remains.
Physical presence matters. It shows our economic and our
military commitment to a particular region. It deters potential
adversaries. It assures our friends. It permits response in a
timely manner to crises.
Our nation has already significantly reduced the number and
size of our force presence, our bases and stations around the
world. U.S. Forces based in the continental United States are
challenged to respond quickly due to the tyranny of distance.
The national blessing of being located between two great oceans
bears the expense of having to traverse those oceans in order
to respond to crisis in other parts of the world. If we are to
maintain our status as a global power, we have a responsibility
to respond to crises quickly.
Speed enables swift and certain projection of power and
influence. When we respond from a forward posture, our response
time is almost immediate--often before an adversary can
position its forces optimally, or accomplish his objectives.
Only when we are positioned forward can we provide the backing
to diplomatic efforts that give our nation's leaders time to
develop options and build coalitions. Often, U.S. citizens in
other lands are put at risk if we are slow to respond or to
evacuate them.
Maintaining a presence helps provide stability to areas of
strategic importance. We can build partner capacity through
direct contact; increase our own awareness of dynamic
developments and potential response options; control key
objectives like ports, airfields, and chokepoints to ensure
their safe and continued use should they become threatened;
demonstrate resolve; assure our allies and partners; and
provide relief and assistance quickly in the case of natural or
man-made disasters.
Your Marine Corps remains forward deployed--particularly in
the critical Pacific region. It is widely acknowledged that the
Pacific is the future of our country from both an economic and
a military perspective. We also recognize that for many years
to come we will have security challenges in the Central Command
area of operations. But even as we agree on the importance of
these two critical regions, we can't ignore the rest of the
world. History has shown that crises, conflicts, and challenges
never occur where we want them to . . . we're not very good at
predicting the future. Right now, Marines are engaged in
multiple regions around the world such as Eastern Europe, Latin
and South America, Africa and the Pacific Rim, conducting
theater security cooperation activities and building partner
capacity with our allies and partners. The goal of our
engagement activities is to minimize the conditions for
conflict and enable host nation forces to effectively address
instability as it occurs. Engagement activities also provide
our Nation with a stance for crisis response and quick footing
for action when the need arises. As we look ahead to times of
reduced manning and restricted access to overseas basing,
Marines must be forward deployed and engaged on a day-to-day
basis, working closely with our joint and allied partners. When
crises arise, these same Marines will respond--locally,
regionally or globally--to accomplish whatever mission our
Nation asks of us.
Our maritime role and amphibious and expeditionary
operations. As we consider the future, we do so with the sure
knowledge that America is first and foremost a maritime nation.
Like so much of the world, we rely on the maritime commons for
the exchange of commerce and ideas. The sea dominates the
surface of our globe (70% of earth's surface). 95% of the
world's commerce travels by ship. 49% of the world's oil
travels through six major choke points; on any given day 23,000
ships are underway around the world.
Many depend on us to maintain freedom of movement on those
commons; we continue to take that responsibility seriously. The
world's littoral regions--where the land and sea (and air)
meet--are equally critical when securing freedom of movement.
The littorals are where seaborne trade originates and enters
its markets. The littorals include straits, most of the world's
population centers, and the areas of maximum growth.
The Navy and Marine Corps team remain the solution set to
fulfilling our global maritime responsibilities in these
critical areas. Naval forces are not reliant on host nation
support or permission; in the conduct of operations, they step
lightly on our allies and host countries. With the increasing
concentration of the world's population in littoral areas, the
ability to operate simultaneously on the sea, ashore, in the
air, and to move seamlessly between these three domains is
critical. The Marine Corps' requirement to deploy and respond
globally, engage regionally, and train locally necessitates
that we leverage every form of strategic mobility--a
combination of amphibious ships, high speed vessels, maritime
preposition shipping, organic tactical aviation and strategic
airlift.
Amphibious forces, a combination of Marine air ground task
forces and Navy amphibious ships, remain a uniquely critical
and capable component of both crisis response and meeting our
maritime responsibilities. Operating as a team, amphibious
forces provide operational reach and agility, they ``buy time''
and decision space for our national leaders in time of crisis.
They bolster diplomatic initiatives by means of their credible
forward presence. Amphibious forces also provide the Nation
with assured access for the joint force in a major contingency
operation. That same force can quickly be reinforced to assure
access anywhere in the world in the event of a major
contingency; it can be dialed up or down like a rheostat to be
relevant across the range of military operations. No other
force possesses the flexibility to provide these capabilities
and yet sustain itself logistically for significant periods of
time, at a time and place of its choosing. There is a reason
why every Combatant Commander wants the presence of forward
deployed amphibious forces on a routine basis, and each of them
ask for that. They know that such forces mitigate risk, and
give them the capability to deal with the unknown.
The inherent usefulness, capability, and flexibility of
amphibious forces is not widely understood, as evidenced by the
frequent, and incorrect, assumption that forcible entry
capabilities alone define the requirement for amphibious
forces. The same capabilities that allow an amphibious task
force to deliver and support a landing force on a hostile shore
enable it to support forward engagement and crisis response. In
fact, the most frequent employment of amphibious forces is for
engagement and crisis response. The geographic Combatant
Commanders have increased their demand for forward-postured
amphibious forces capable of conducting security cooperation,
regional deterrence and crisis response. In an era of declining
access, this trend will likely markedly increase. Over the past
year, amphibious forces have conducted humanitarian assistance
and disaster relief efforts in Pakistan, they have supported
combat operations in Afghanistan with ground forces and fixed
wing aviation, they have responded to the piracy crisis on M.V.
Magellan Star, they have supported operations in Libya, and
assisted our allies in the Philippines and Japan. Modern
amphibious assaults, when necessary, seek to avoid enemy
strengths by exploiting gaps and weaknesses. An example is the
TF-58 assault that seized key terrain south of Kandahar 450
miles inland in 2001 shortly after the 9/11 attacks.
The Marine Corps defines itself as an ``expeditionary''
force. ``Expeditionary'' means that we're capable of operating
in austere environments. When we deploy we bring the water, the
fuel, the supplies that our Marines and sailors need to
accomplish the mission. ``Expeditionary'' is not a bumper
sticker to us, or a concept, it is a state of conditioning that
Marines work hard to maintain.
Right-sizing in the face of new fiscal realities. The
Marine Corps is fully aware of the fiscal challenges facing our
Nation, and stands ready to further critically examine and
streamline its force needs for the future. We continually
strive to be good stewards of the public trust by maintaining
the very best financial management practices. The Marine Corps
remains the first and only military service whose financial
statements have been deemed audit-ready. We are proud of our
reputation for frugality, and we remain one of the best values
for the defense dollar. During these times of constrained
resources, we remain committed to refining operations,
identifying efficiencies, and reinvesting savings to conserve
scarce public funds. When the Nation pays the ``sticker price''
for its Marines, it buys the ability to remain forward deployed
and forward engaged, to assure our partners, reinforce
alliances, and build partner capacity. For 7.8% of the total
DoD budget, our Nation gains the ability to respond to
unexpected crises, from humanitarian disaster relief efforts,
to non-combatant evacuation operations, to conduct counter-
piracy operations, or full scale combat.
As Congress, and this Committee, work hard to account for
every dollar, the Marine Corps is working to make sure that
every dollar is well spent. In the end we know we're going to
have to make cuts. As we provide our input we need to address
three critical considerations--strategy, balance, and keeping
faith.
In an effort to ensure the Marine Corps was best organized
for a challenging and dangerous future security environment,
last fall we conducted a comprehensive and detailed force
structure review to identify all dimensions of rebalance and
posture for the future. The results of this effort have been
shared with this Committee in the past. This effort
incorporated the lessons learned from ten years of combat. We
affirm the results of that strategy-driven initial effort, but
we have also begun to readjust certain parameters of it based
on the realities of spending cuts outlined in the Budget
Control Act of 2011.
When we went through the force structure review effort, we
built a force that can respond to only one major contingency at
a time. It has been opined that one effect of sequestration
might be to put a Marine Corps below the end strength level
that's necessary to support even one major contingency. At the
potential end strength level resulting from the sequestration,
we're going to have to make some tough decisions and assume
significantly more risk. We will not be able to do the things
the Nation needs us to do to mitigate risk, or to meet the
requirements of the Combatant Commanders. We won't be there to
reassure our potential friends, or to assure our allies. And we
certainly won't be there to contain small crises before they
become major conflagrations. A Marine Corps end strength level
that could result from the sequestration presents significant
risk institutionally and for the Nation. Responsiveness to
Combatant Commander requirements such as contingencies and
crisis response will be significantly degraded.
With regard to strategy, the Marine Corps is participating
in the ongoing rewrite of national security strategy. Once this
effort is concluded, we'll evaluate the resources available
against the mission, then build the most capable force
possible. We'll use what we learned during the force structure
review effort as our point of departure, and make
recommendations on how to best reshape the Marine Corps.
We cannot make cuts in a manner that would ``hollow'' the
force. We have learned this lesson before during previous draw
downs. The term ``hollow force'' refers primarily to the lack
of readiness of U.S. forces to accomplish their missions.
Readiness is the aggregate of the investment in personnel,
training, and equipment to ensure that units are prepared to
perform missions at any given time. The Services have varying
approaches to readiness. In order to manage investment and O&M
costs, some Services judiciously reduce the readiness status of
selected units during interim periods between scheduled
deployments. This concept is referred to as ``tiered
readiness.'' In this concept, resources are limited and non-
deployed units pay the costs to ensure that deployed and next-
to-deploy units have sufficient personnel, equipment, and
training. Over time, non-deploying, or rarely-deploying units,
may be held at reduced readiness levels for indeterminate
periods of time. Given our mission to be America's
Expeditionary Force in Readiness, a tiered readiness concept is
not compatible with the Marine Corps' missions because its non-
deployed units are often called upon to respond to
unanticipated and varied crises on a moment's notice.
The Marine Corps strives to maintain a high state of unit
readiness and logistical self-sustainment capability. Even when
not deployed, Marine units maintain higher levels of readiness,
so they can deploy on short notice. This readiness posture
allows the Corps to:
1. LMaintain most of its operating force ready to respond
quickly to crises and contingencies;
2. LCycle battalions, squadrons and other units through
rotations rapidly;
3. LRoutinely build and deploy coherent, effective task
forces without extensive work-ups; and,
4. LMaintain significant amounts of equipment in theater
vice rotating most of it with each unit, thus reducing the
costs of doing our Nation's bidding.
Organic logistics capabilities are vital to this practice.
Too often, service logistics units fall prey to cuts that
forfeit their ability to respond to crises. Naval forces--in
particular, amphibious ships--are also essential to readiness.
We must continue to invest in this highly utilized capability.
Finally, lower budget levels, end strength, and investment
accounts will significantly affect contingency plans over time.
Many of these plans depend on concurrent and/or sequential
operations. Less capacity removes the capability for such
operations. Operational plans, will necessarily be adjusted to
accommodate the longer timelines required to achieve desired
objectives. Longer time to accomplish objectives in war can
easily translate into increased loss of personnel and materiel,
and ultimately places mission accomplishment at risk.
My promise to this Committee is that at the end of the day,
we will build ``the best Marine Corps'' that our Nation is
willing to afford. I intend to ``keep faith'' with our people.
This term has deep meaning to the leadership of the Marine
Corps. We expect much from those we recruit, and we remind them
constantly of their obligations of honorable and faithful
service. In return we must be faithful to the obligations we
make to those who serve honorably. We must not break the chain
of trust that exists. Precipitous personnel reductions are
among the worst measures that can be employed to save money.
Our all-volunteer system is built upon a reasonable opportunity
for retention and advancement; wholesale cuts undermine the
faith and confidence in service leadership and create long-term
experience deficits with negative operational impacts. Such an
approach cannot be quickly recovered from.
Redundancy. In the interest of austerity, there are many
who try to argue that the Marines provide capabilities that are
redundant when compared with other Services. This is not the
case. ``Redundant'' means that no replacement is required if
something is discarded. This is not true of the Marine Corps
capabilities sets or of the way we have adapted to the future
security environment and modern warfare. If the Nation lost its
amphibious capability, it would have to pay for another Service
to provide it. In short order the Nation would require a
sustainable air-ground force able to operate from the sea--to
respond to crises and contingencies. A force that comes from
the sea requires specialized equipment and training. No savings
would be gained because there is no redundancy. The nation
would have to pay--and likely pay a higher price--to gain back
what had been given away.
In any future defense strategy, the Marine Corps will fill
a unique lane in the capability range of America's armed
forces. A Middleweight Force, we are lighter than the Army, and
heavier than SOF. The Corps is not a second land army. The Army
is purpose-built for land campaigns and carries a heavier punch
when it arrives, whereas the Marine Corps is an expeditionary
force focused on coming from the sea with integrated aviation
and logistics capabilities. The Marine Corps maintains the
ability to contribute to land campaigns by leveraging or
rapidly aggregating its capabilities and capacities. Similarly,
Marine Corps and SOF roles are complementary, rather than
redundant. Special Operation Forces contribute to the counter-
insurgency and counter-terrorism efforts of the Combatant
Commanders in numerous and specialized ways, but they are not a
substitute for conventional forces with a broader range of
capability and sustainability.
Marine air is similarly not redundant. The US Air Force
cannot come from the sea; nor are most of its aircraft suitable
for expeditionary missions. The Navy currently does not invest
in sufficient capability to operate their aircraft ashore once
deployed--a requirement that has risen often in the past in
support of both naval and land campaigns. If Navy aviation were
to buy the capability to deploy effectively to austere ashore
bases from their ships, they would find it would cost as much,
or more, than it costs them currently to do so on behalf of the
Marine Corps.
Reset and modernization. Reset is distinguishable from
modernization. There will be a cost when the Marine Corps comes
out of Afghanistan. It is necessary to reset the force by
addressing equipment shortfalls, and to refresh equipment worn
out or degraded by years of combat. We currently estimate that
bill to be about $3 billion. A few years ago that bill was in
excess of $15 billion. With the help of Congress we have been
able to reset the force for some years now, even as we
continued to support operations both in Iraq, and Afghanistan.
As we look to the future, we must address our deficiencies and
replace the equipment that is worn out from operations in
Afghanistan. Secondly, we must continue to modernize to keep
pace with the evolving world.
The Marine Corps is currently undertaking several
initiatives to modernize the Total Force. The programmatic
priority for our ground forces is the seamless transition of
Marines from the sea to conduct sustained operations ashore
whether for training, humanitarian assistance, or for combat.
Our ground combat and tactical vehicle strategy is focused on
the right mix of assets, balancing performance, payload,
survivability, fuel efficiency, transportability and cost. In
particular, the Amphibious Combat Vehicle is important to our
ability to conduct surface littoral maneuver and seamlessly
project Marine units from sea to land in permissive, uncertain
and hostile environments. We remain firmly partnered with the
U.S. Army in fielding a Joint Light Tactical Vehicle that lives
up to its name while also being affordable.
Marine Corps Aviation, which is on the cusp of its
centennial of service to our Nation, continues its
modernization that began over a decade ago. The continued
development and fielding of the short take-off and vertical
landing (STOVL) F-35B Joint Strike Fighter remains the
centerpiece of this effort. The capability inherent in a STOVL
jet allows the Marine Corps to operate in harsh conditions and
from remote locations where there often are few airfields
available for conventional aircraft. It is also specifically
designed to operate from amphibious ships--a capability that no
other tactical aircraft possesses. The ability to employ a
fifth-generation aircraft from amphibious shipping doubles the
number of ``carrier'' platforms from which the United States
can employ fixed wing aviation. Once fully fielded, the F-35B
replaces three legacy aircraft--F/A-18, EA-6B and AV-8B--saving
the DoD approximately $1 billion per year in operations and
maintenance costs.
This program has been performing notably since January with
more than 260 vertical landings completed and 98% of its key
performance parameters met. It is ahead of schedule in most
areas. The F-35B also recently completed a highly successful
three-week, sea trial period aboard the amphibious assault
warship USS Wasp (LHD-1). DoD has already purchased 32 of these
aircraft. Delivery is on track, and we look forward to
receiving them at Marine Corps Air Station Yuma just ten months
from now.
The MV-22B Osprey continues to be a success story for the
Marine Corps and the Joint Force. To date, this revolutionary
tilt-rotor aircraft has changed the way Marines operate on the
battlefield, giving American and Coalition forces the maneuver
advantage and operational reach unmatched by any other tactical
aircraft. Over the past four years since achieving Initial
Operational Capability, the MV-22B has flown more than 18,000
hours in combat, carried more than 129,000 personnel, and 5.7
million pounds of cargo. The MV-22B has made multiple
deployments to Iraq, four with MEUs at sea, and it is currently
on its fourth deployment to Afghanistan. The unprecedented
operational reach of an MV-22B, embarked aboard amphibious
shipping in the Mediterranean, was the sole reason for the
rescue of a downed American aviator in Libya. Our squadron
fielding plan is well under way as we continue to replace our
44 year old, Vietnam-era CH-46 helicopters. We must procure all
required quantities of the MV-22B in accordance with the
program of record. Calls by some to reduce MV-22B procurement
as a DoD cost savings measure are puzzling. Their arguments are
ill-informed and rooted in anachronisms when measured against
the proven record of performance and safety this force
multiplier brings to today's battlefields in support of Marines
and the Joint Force.
Conclusions. The American people continue to believe that
when a crisis emerges Marines will be present and ``invariably
turn in a performance that is dramatically and decisively
successful--not most of the time, but always.'' They possess a
heart-felt belief that the Marine Corps is good for the young
men and women of our country. In their view, the Marines are
extraordinarily adept at converting ``un-oriented youths into
proud, self-reliant stable citizens--citizens into whose hands
the nation's affairs may be safely entrusted.'' An investment
in the Marine Corps continues to be an investment in the
character of the young people of our country.
The Marine Corps will only ask for what it needs, not what
it wants. As Congress and DoD move forward with tough decisions
on the future of our Armed Forces relative to the Budget
Control Act of 2011, the crisis response capabilities the
Marine Corps affords our Nation must serve as the compass in
determining its ultimate end strength, equipping and training
needs. Through it all, the Marine Corps will make the hard
decisions and redouble its commitment to its traditional
culture of frugality.
The Marine Corps has evolved over many years, many
conflicts, and at a significant price in terms of both blood
and treasure; we have served the Nation well time and time
again. For a comparably small investment, the Marine Corps
continues to provide the protection our Nation needs in an
increasingly dangerous and uncertain world, and to preserve our
Nation's ability to do what we must as the world's only
credible remaining superpower.
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ADDITIONAL VIEWS OF MEMBERS OF
THE COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
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ADDITIONAL VIEWS
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ADDITIONAL VIEWS
Over the past several months, the House Armed Services
Committee embarked on a series of hearings designed to examine
the future of the defense budget in light of our nation's
fiscal reality. We believe this action to have been fully
appropriate--our committee members should understand the impact
of the budget cuts contained in the Budget Control Act (BCA),
particularly in light of the changing threat environment. As
part of that discussion, we found these hearings useful.
We also agree with the Chairman that sequestration would
clearly and unquestionably threaten our ability to meet our
current national security needs. Congress, through the BCA, has
imposed spending caps on security spending that will force the
Department to reduce its current budget plans by more than $450
Billion over ten years. These already-enacted cuts to planned
spending present a significant challenge for the Department to
implement, and further large, indiscriminate cuts, such as
those that would be imposed by sequestration, would be nearly
impossible for the Department to absorb without real and
serious damage to our ability to protect our national security.
This hearing series was helpful in building this case as well.
National security is, however, defined by more than just
the level of funding provided to the Department of Defense.
Deficits matter. Our national debt matters. Over time, these
have real and negative impacts on our national well-being.
While Secretary Panetta and some of the other Administration
witnesses discussed possible areas of savings, this extensive
series of hearings offered little discussion on how to better
spend defense dollars or how to spend less. As members of the
House Armed Services Committee, and Congress, our
responsibility is not to ensure that the Department of Defense
spends as much money as possible, but rather to ensure that
enough funds are provided for our national defense and that
they are spent wisely and well.
We were pleased to see the hearings provide a forum for the
Committee to express its broadly-held concerns about
sequestration. Unfortunately however, the Committee did not
follow this expression with suggestions of how to responsibly
cut the deficit sufficiently to avoid sequestration. Some
members did take the opportunity to express their views on this
subject--many of the signers of this document, for example,
have expressed the belief that increased revenues have to be
part of the solution. We were disappointed that our majority
colleagues did not agree to put this on the table as a position
of the Committee to avoid defense sequestration.
Again, we found this hearing series to be useful in many
ways. Ultimately however, the situation remains the same at the
end of the series that it was at the beginning--we simply must
find savings in our national budgets, we must ensure that
defense and non-defense dollars are spent well, and we must
have a budget that makes sense by broadly balancing revenues
with spending. Simply put, as members of the House Armed
Services Committee, we must remember that our responsibility to
national security is more than just our responsibility to the
defense budget.
Adam Smith.
Silvestre Reyes.
Loretta Sanchez.
Robert A. Brady.
Susan A. Davis.
Rick Larsen.
Madeleine Z. Bordallo.
Joe Courtney.
David Loebsack.
William Owens.
Mark S. Critz.
Hank Johnson.
ADDITIONAL VIEWS OF REPRESENTATIVE ROSCOE G. BARTLETT
There are those who argue that with our current national
strategy, additional deep cuts to our military, as would occur
under sequester, would be catastrophic. We agree. But it seems
clear to most that our financial plight and the realities of
the world we live in require a new national strategy. Until we
have completed that exercise we have no way of knowing how much
more might be cut without risk to our national security. The
thoughts contained herein address that decision making process.
I am on the House Armed Services Committee and am deeply
concerned that we continue to support a military adequate to
the security needs of our country. But there must be a
rationalization between the magnitude of our military might and
the necessity to develop a financial policy that avoids
bankruptcy of our country. With a debt that grows another $1
billion every six hours with no plateau in sight, this is a
daunting challenge. These two demands, an adequate military and
the avoidance of national bankruptcy, must share risks
equitably.
Our deficit is hundreds of billions of dollars larger than
all of our discretionary spending. Thus, if we had no
Department of Defense, no Department of Homeland Security, no
CIA or FBI or any of the other myriads of government agencies
and programs, we would still have a deficit of hundreds of
billions of dollars.
Defense is more than half of all discretionary spending.
These numbers reflect two fundamental realities: First, we
cannot balance our budget without controlling the explosive
growth of entitlement programs. Second, if we're ever going to
balance the budget, we need to cut all discretionary spending
programs including defense.
But how can we cut further the defense budget without
putting our nation at risk?
In large measure, the factors that ultimately determine the
size of the defense budget are beyond the practical control of
the congressional defense committees and our military. Our
foreign policy has our troops in more than 100 countries,
driving up defense costs. Wars, and especially protracted wars
like Iraq and Afghanistan, drive up the cost of defense.
Nation-building projects--in which we depend on our troops to
carry out functions related to the economic, social and
political development of Afghanistan and Iraq that fall far
outside of our military's core mission--drive up defense costs.
In addition, defense costs are driven skyward because there
really is what President Eisenhower termed a ``military-
industrial complex'' comprising a powerful trifecta--the
military, the defense industry, and Congress. Congress supports
increased spending because the defense industry intentionally
spreads its industrial base over as many states as possible, in
part to build a political machine for procuring defense
dollars, in partnership with the Congress. If all politics are
local, then it is understandable that Congressmen and Senators
will vote their districts interests, and convince themselves
that they are voting for the national interest. And so the
defense budget grows.
Now that the Cold War is long over, is it really necessary
for the United States to maintain a military presence in so
many nations, and so many far-flung military bases over the
globe, in order to support its role as ``world policeman''? The
U.S. spends almost as much money on defense as all the rest of
the world. We spend more on defense than the next eleven
countries combined, and nine of those countries are allies of
ours. Surely our national interest would be better served by
policies that encourage our allies to bear the burden of their
own defense so that they have the military capability to police
their own neighborhoods. We are the first ``empire'' in history
where imperialism operates in reverse--all of the economic
benefits flow to our allies, or to nations we have defeated,
emptying our coffers.
We must learn to be more parsimonious with our wars,
reserving military force as a last resort, and undertaking
grave consideration of the human and financial costs that will
be incurred before we begin the effort. We must recognize that
the cost of wars does not end when the shooting stops. Recent
history has shown that extraordinary costs continue at home
with veteran services, and these expenses continue to empty our
national treasuries long into the future.
There are also cost savings to be found in baseline
Department of Defense budgeting. Is it really necessary for the
United States to procure costly new generations of weapons
systems, mostly legacies from the Cold War, when existing
weapons will suffice for the conflicts of today? Rather, our
precious defense dollars should be invested in research and
development so that America is ready to face modern threats.
For example, an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) or cyber-attack
could collapse the critical infrastructures that sustain the
lives of millions of Americans. The Department of Defense
should work cooperatively with the Department of Homeland
Security to be ready for these kinds of unconventional threats.
We also must recognize that some of the most fundamental
dangers to our national security may fall beyond traditional
military threats. Our dependence on fossil fuels makes us
tremendously vulnerable. The worldwide demand for oil is
increasing at such a rapid rate that it will eventually pass
available oil production, resulting in sharp price spikes. From
a national security perspective, it is time to cut our
addiction to foreign oil, and to transition to domestic,
cleaner and renewable energy sources. Some of the resources
currently devoted to protecting the supply of oil must be
redirected to advancing renewable and clean energy.
The decline of America's industrial base also undermines
our national security. We must have national policies that
create a ``Make it in America'' economy, producing state of the
art transportation and clean energy systems. We have known for
decades that the strongest manufacturing sector is the key to
economic and military security. To keep our country safe and
prosperous, we need to remain on the cutting edge of
technological innovation and production, ensuring our
leadership in the global economy.
With the right national strategy for the use of our
military, we might significantly cut the defense budget without
putting our nation at risk. Indeed, it is long overdue that we
re-think some of the fundamentals driving our defense budget.
We might find that we can significantly cut the defense budget
and improve our national security with an appropriate national
strategy for use of our military in the defense of our country.
Roscoe G. Bartlett.
ADDITIONAL VIEWS OF REPRESENTATIVE ROBERT E. ANDREWS
This committee print is the product of a months-long
investigation by the committee into the future of the United
States Military, ten years after the terrorist attacks of
September 11th. We live in a far different world today, and I
thank Chairman McKeon and Ranking Member Smith for holding
these hearings.
In his note, Chairman McKeon rightly acknowledges the
pivotal strategic moment. 2011 alone has seen US forces kill
Osama bin Laden and Anwar Al-Awlaki, greatly weakening Al
Qaeda. In Afghanistan, the efforts and sacrifices of US and
coalition forces have the Taliban on the run, and the Afghan
people are beginning to stand up and defend themselves. And in
Iraq, the country has been stabilized, and we are preparing to
honor our commitment by withdrawing all troops by the end of
calendar 2011.
Admiral Mullen and others have correctly recognized the
debt as our greatest threat to national security. Already,
Congress has cut over $300 billion from the base defense budget
over the next decade. Some have said that this is enough.
Respectfully, I disagree. The entire Federal government should
be forced to demonstrate that tax dollars with which it is
entrusted are spent responsibly, and the DOD should not be
exempted.
Cuts should be made on the basis of what is needed to
provide our brave men and women with the tools and training to
do the job and get home safely. We should be focused on our
strategic goals, not on arbitrary levels. I believe a targeted
DOD cut of $600 billion over 10 years can be achieved without
jeopardizing America's military might. Baseline military
spending, not accounting for war costs, has nearly doubled over
the past decade. It is time to reverse this trend.
Accelerated withdrawal from Afghanistan can provide massive
savings. With the death of Osama bin Laden, I believe we can
depart Afghanistan by June 2013, consolidating our gains in the
region and saving hundreds of billions of dollars. We should
also close overseas military bases which once served to deter
the Soviet Union, focusing instead on our current and future
threats.
Further savings can be found by ending the purchase of
costly unnecessary weapons systems. One such example is MEADS,
the Medium Extended Air Defense System, which costs billions
and is redundant. The highly successful Patriots fill the same
strategic role, and have been used by America and its allies
since 1995.
Cost overruns from repetitive R&D also cost the taxpayers
billions. Incentivizing contractors to meet budget and testing
requirements on time is a common-sense, market-based solution
which will provide competition and produce dramatic savings.
Lastly, I also believe the DOD can look at stateside bases for
additional savings. Although BRAC has reduced the domestic
footprint of the DOD, facilities maintenance costs have not
declined concurrently. Indeed, on a square footage basis, these
costs have increased almost 20% over the past decade.
I am confident that these and other common sense cuts to
the defense budget can be made without harm to our national
security and will produce a leaner, more efficient military.
However, we cannot put our fiscal house in order solely with
cuts to defense. All policy options must be considered,
including increased revenue. We were elected to make difficult
decisions. With the country at a budgetary and strategic
crossroads, cutting the defense budget by prioritizing our
actual needs is one such decision we can and should make.
Robert E. Andrews.
ADDITIONAL VIEWS OF REPRESENTATIVE NIKI TSONGAS
I want to thank Chairman McKeon and Ranking Member Smith
for holding a series of hearings this fall that have allowed
the Committee to reflect upon the challenges our nation has
faced since the terrible attacks of September 11, 2001 and to
confront the challenges we face moving forward.
Testimony before this panel has rightly noted that our
nation's fiscal crisis represents a threat to our national
security. As discussed during these hearings and as I stated
earlier this year in a letter to the Joint Committee on Deficit
Reduction, making the additional and severe cuts required by
the Budget Control Act sequester has the potential to undermine
our military in an uncertain world. In my letter I reaffirmed
my support for the initial round of deep cuts made in the BCA
to both defense and non-defense spending because I recognize
the need to phase in cuts over the next ten years, but stated
that ``allowing the sequester to make far deeper cuts on top of
those already enacted risks putting our economy and our people
at great harm.'' I believe this to be true but I also recognize
that recent proposals to repeal the sequester and do nothing in
its place to address our national debt are just as dangerous to
our long-term survival. As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
and former Secretary of Defense Bob Gates both noted last year,
our rising debt has implications for both our influence around
the world and our ability to project strength.
In the words of one expert witness before this Committee,
our nation cannot afford to ``balance the budget on the back of
defense'' while we face ongoing threats from international
terrorists and dangerous foreign regimes. But neither can we
continue on the unsustainable path of responding to those
threats without paying for our defense. The threats outlined by
this Committee are very real, but for the last decade--and for
the first time in our nation's history--we have responded by
cutting taxes on the wealthiest few and allowing multi-billion
dollar corporations to shirk their social responsibilities even
as they benefit from the global security our nation provides.
Last August, this Congress made a commitment to the
American people to reduce our annual deficits by an additional
$1.2 trillion over ten years. Stepping away from that
commitment risks a costly downgrade of our nation's credit and
undermines our ability to deter would-be aggressors. To protect
our national security, we must use this next year to agree on a
balanced deficit reduction plan that makes a real down payment
on our national debt, prevents deep cuts from undermining our
fragile economic recovery and harming our national security,
incorporates broadly shared sacrifices, and protects the
guarantees of Social Security, Medicare, and veterans'
benefits. This is both just and pragmatic. To return our
deficits to the surpluses we ran in the late 1990s and pay down
our long-term debt will require a sustained commitment from the
entire nation, a commitment that will only come if a deal is
seen as fair. Finally, a balanced plan will ensure that we are
all contributing to our nation's defense.
I look forward to working with the Committee on these
issues in the year ahead.
Niki Tsongas.
ADDITIONAL VIEWS OF REPRESENTATIVE JOHN R. GARAMENDI
The House Armed Services Committee rarely produces
committee reports other than those accompanying the National
Defense Authorization Act or other such legislation. The
majority provided little advance notice to the members of the
intent to produce this report. Furthermore, the report was not
subjected to a markup. If this report were simply a compilation
of the testimony provided by the witnesses, the only objection
to widely distributing a hard-copy printing of information
already available on the committee's website would be the
unnecessary cost in times of limited budgets. Unfortunately,
the Chairman has elected to place a partisan and often
hyperbolic statement from him at the beginning of the report,
only including statements of other members as ``additional or
dissenting views'' at the back of the report and making it
appear as if the committee as a whole has endorsed his message.
We have not.
A primary responsibility of the House Armed Services
Committee is to engage in serious analysis and debates about
defense-related decisions that will impact our financial
stability and our national security for decades to come. Viable
alternatives for assuring our nation's security and careful
consideration of the costs of comparative strategies should be
considered. Unfortunately, the series of hearings presented
over the past months, which are reported in this document, have
largely served to silence rather than stimulate debate about
the critical challenges we face. Dissenting views were not
genuinely considered and alternative options were not laid on
the table. The result is the artificial ``consensus'' presented
in this report, reflecting not bipartisan agreement, but rather
a pre-ordained conclusion that nothing dare be touched in
defense spending lest the safety and security of the American
people be placed in peril.
Yet, our nation faces serious financial challenges which
also threaten our security, as indicated by several defense
experts. Like it or not, spending for national defense will be
reduced. It has to happen, and it can be done without reducing
our security. This committee should have spent this time
examining the options and developing strategies to do more with
less. We ask that of all other levels of and components of
government, and the same standard must also apply to defense.
It is important to put the issue of defense budget in
perspective. The Department of Defense baseline budget,
excluding funding for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, has
increased by 48.5% in real numbers over the past decade, rising
from $361 billion in FY2001 to $536 billion in FY2011. War
spending, paid for largely through supplemental budgets, has
added an additional $1.2 trillion to these costs, resulting in
a more than doubling of annual total defense spending over the
last ten years. Even excluding war funding, defense spending
has contributed more than twice as much to the deficit as non-
defense discretionary spending over the past decade. While
expenses have skyrocketed, revenues have fallen. The Bush tax
cuts for the rich have allowed millionaires to avoid paying
their share, meaning that rising defense budgets have been paid
for with borrowed dollars.
In the face of rising defense costs and pressures to reduce
the federal budget deficit, some Members of Congress and
defense budget experts have engaged in critical analysis to
determine how to reduce defense expenditures while ensuring
America's national security and economic vitality. I asked my
staff to prepare a matrix comparing six such defense savings
plans, prepared by think-tanks, Members of Congress, and other
entities whose positions span the political spectrum. The
matrix identifies areas of consensus among the left, right and
center, and it serves as a starting point for well-informed
analysis and debate leading to reasonable policies. I also
continue to advocate for an approach to defense savings that is
grounded in a forward-thinking strategy, such as that outlined
in A National Strategic Narrative, prepared by respected
members of our military. This document offers a nonpartisan
blueprint for ensuring America's security and prosperity in the
unique environment of the 21st century.
This kind of critical thinking was not represented in HASC
hearings on defense cuts. On the contrary, in many cases the
witnesses testifying before the committee had large, and
undisclosed, conflicts of interest. Almost all of the retired
military officers the committee heard from are employed by
major defense companies, hedge funds, or holding companies with
significant amounts of defense industry investment. Other non-
military witnesses work for think tanks, lobbying groups, and
other organizations whose major funding sources or clients are
also major US defense companies. The witnesses quoted here have
a direct financial interest in seeing defense budgets
maintained at current levels or increase.
These undisclosed conflicts of interest reveal the close
links between incomes of former members of the national
security establishment and the current Department of Defense
budget, a concern that President Eisenhower raised in his 1960
speech:
In the councils of government, we must guard against
the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether
sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex.
The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced
power exists and will persist. We must never let the
weight of this combination endanger our liberties or
democratic processes. We should take nothing for
granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can
compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and
military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods
and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper
together.
America's security is not limited to deterring and
defeating military threats. The vitality of our economy, the
solvency of our financial system, the health and education of
our population, and the sustainability of our resources are all
critical components for keeping America safe now and into the
future. In determining how to decrease our budget deficit, we
must adopt a whole of government approach to security,
recognizing the interdependency of each of our federal agencies
and the functions they serve.
As we make difficult choices about how to prioritize our
spending, another quote by President Eisenhower reminds us of
the tradeoffs we face:
Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every
rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft
from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are
cold and not clothed. This world in arms is not
spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its
laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of
its children. This is not a way of life at all in any
true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is
humanity hanging from a cross of iron.
As Chairman McKeon rightly notes, we find ourselves at a
``strategic juncture'' and we are responsible for the votes we
cast. We are also responsible for engaging in the careful
research, critical analysis, and open debate that will help us
to make the best decisions for our nation. The series of
hearings included in this report and the nontransparent and
biased way in which the report was prepared hinder rather than
help this deliberative process. I remain hopeful that as
Members of Congress--and as Members of the Armed Services
Committee in particular--we will fulfill our duty of engaging
in meaningful, well-informed discussions about how to best
utilize scarce resources to ensure America's security. Our
continued failure to do so would indeed be ``disastrous.''
John R. Garamendi.
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ADDITIONAL VIEWS OF REPRESENTATIVE HANK JOHNSON
This committee report includes testimony from seven
hearings over the last several months. These hearings were
convened to consider the potential impacts of large budget cuts
on the ability of the U.S. military to meet the national
security challenges faced by our nation.
I agree with Chairman McKeon, Ranking Member Smith,
Secretary Panetta, and many of the witnesses at recent hearings
that the approximately $1 trillion in cuts to defense spending
over nine fiscal years (2013-2021) imposed by the Budget
Control Act could threaten U.S. national security.
To contextualize these possible cuts, it is worth noting
that the Department of Defense's budget has grown from
approximately $316 billion in 2001 to more than $680 billion in
2011 (of which roughly $159 billion are for Overseas
Contingency Operations). Even if the full measure of
sequestration is imposed through 2021, the Department of
Defense's annual base budget would remain larger than it was a
decade ago.
However, Secretary Panetta and others have expressed
serious concerns regarding the potential impact of $1 trillion
in cuts to the defense budget for fiscal years 2013 through
2021, and I share those concerns. We face an array of demands
and challenges that require us to sustain serious investment in
our armed forces: a worldwide counterterrorism mission, our
obligations to service members, evolving security challenges in
the Asia Pacific region and the Arctic, instability in the
Middle East, the need to reset equipment after more than a
decade of combat in harsh environments, the need to modernize
our military and expand our naval and air forces, and a host of
emerging threats.
I cannot agree, however, with those who argue that there is
no room in the budget of the Department of Defense for
additional reductions over the next ten years, particularly as
we complete our withdrawal from Iraq and draw down forces in
Afghanistan. It will be the task of the department's leadership
and Congress to find additional savings by making hard choices
with regard to military programs, eliminating waste, and making
acquisition affordable. With or without cuts to the defense
budget, the catastrophically flawed acquisition system at the
Department of Defense is a strategic vulnerability and a key
cause of waste.
I fully agree with Ranking Member Smith when he states in
his contribution to this volume, which I have co-signed, that
``[a]s members of the House Armed Services Committee, and
Congress, our responsibility is not to ensure that the
Department of Defense spends as much money as possible, but
rather to ensure that enough funds are provided for our
national defense and that they are spent wisely and well.'' I
further agree with his contention that any serious effort to
address long-run fiscal imbalances without unwise cuts to
defense requires a budget that sensibly balances revenues and
spending.
Finally, in response to Chairman McKeon's preface to this
volume, I will dissent from his characterization of the last
ten years of military operations.
The decade since September 11, 2001, has been marked not by
a highly effective and strategically prudent application of the
U.S. armed forces to defend the United States against violent
extremists, as Chairman McKeon argues. The use of force in Iraq
did not reduce the threat of terrorism and was a strategic
error. Our campaign in Afghanistan--a war of self-defense--was
deprived of resources while we focused on an elective
expeditionary mission in Iraq. The result of this mismanagement
was deteriorated Afghan security that threatened regional
stability and jeopardized victory.
In Iraq, our men and women in uniform performed their
duties with characteristic professionalism and courage. Their
effectiveness in the latter half of the decade has enabled us
to bring our forces home. But the fact remains--and future
generations of Americans will likely assess--that the Iraq War
needlessly depleted our forces and was a distraction from the
global counterterrorism mission and the mission in Afghanistan.
In Afghanistan, not until President Obama's inauguration in
2009 did our effort receive the focus and attention necessary
for victory in one of the least forgiving environments on
earth. President Obama, former Secretary Gates, Secretary
Panetta and their team have subsequently laid the foundations
for gradual transfer of responsibility for security to Afghan
National Security Forces and a responsible drawdown of the
International Security Assistance Force scheduled to be
completed by the end of 2014.
Although this historical record is not the focus of this
report or of recent hearings, in a document purporting to
represent the views of the House Armed Services Committee I am
compelled to present a more accurate account of recent history
than that presented by Chairman McKeon in his preface.
Hank Johnson.
LIST OF ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS
A2/AD Anti-access/area denial
AQAP Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula
BRAC Base closure and realignment
CR Continuing resolution
EU European Union
FYDP Future Years Defense Program
GATT General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
GDP Gross domestic product
GPS Global Positioning System
IED Improvised explosive device
IMF International Monetary Fund
ISR Intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance
MEU Marine Expeditionary Unit
M/V Merchant vessel
MILCON Military construction
MRAP Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle
NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization
NCO Noncommissioned officer
NORTHCOM U.S. Northern Command
O&M Operation and maintenance
OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
OMB Office of Management and Budget
QDR Quadrennial Defense Review
R&D Research and development
ROTC Reserve Officers' Training Corps
SEALs U.S. Navy Sea, Air and Land teams
SOF Special Operations Forces
SOUTHCOM U.S. Southern Command
UAV Unmanned aerial vehicle
USA United States Army
USAF United States Air Force
USMC United States Marine Corps
USN United States Navy
WMD Weapon of mass destruction
WTO World Trade Organization