Gates To Navy: Anchors Away

Investors.com ^ | May 7, 2010 | Investors Business Daily staff

[Leisler]

They’ve had three carriers on the way for thirty years. They have hardly any support ships, no supply ships and no experience.

[Leisler]

Was the Stark or the Cole prepared? Was the Army prepared for after the fall of Baghdad? We we prepared at the start of the Korean war? How about GI wearing starched uniforms and white undershirts at the start of Vietnam? We we prepared to meet Rommel in North Africa?

When were we ever prepared for the war that came?

[lentulusgracchus]

He is a member of all three one world order social clubs: Bilderberg, CFR and TriLat.

Sounds right. He's fully multi-but-not-your-culti: At Texas A&M University, he showed some cadet the Full Frown of Majesty for having a 1" x 1" Confederate-flag sticker on his footlocker. Either that sticker goes, or you go!

Way to man up, Gates!

[lentulusgracchus]

Sen. Lindsey Graham Senator Eyeing Sec Def Appointment?

Well, Obama has said he's all for gays in the military.

[lentulusgracchus]

It would be far cheaper to build new, destroyer sized ships.

I thought we had a buttload of '70's and '80's-production Spruance and Perry types laid up. Not to mention a bunch of '70's-era 1052-class (Knox class) FFG's, which were the immediate predecessors of the Perry class.

Plus all the big DLG's re-rated CLG from the 60's and 70's -- the Belknaps and Dahlgrens and Harry Yarnalls; what happened to them?

[Halgr]

The NWO needs to limit the Navy. (and the military in general)

Haven’t folks figured out why Gates was kept on.......?

[Gay State Conservative]

Gates is just another RAT whore...no different than Pelosi,Sphincter,”Reverend” Wright or Bill Ayers.Gates’ current appointment is Hussein’s way of telling our enemies “you need not fear us”.

[Bryanw92]

>>If Obama says crap. Gates says where and how high.

Two Leftists and a cup??

[MSF BU]

Interesting. I wonder how Graham will ‘evolve’ his position on introducing homosexuals into the military.

[MSF BU]

We are trillions in the whole but the Military in general and the Navy specifically has not much to do with it. On a national level we no doubt waste far more money on federally subsidizing liberal arts ‘education’ than we do on procurement and maintenance of the fleet.

[MSF BU]

The last time I was up the James River, about four years ago, ALL of those ships looked in pretty rough shape. Do we have the yards to repair them and the crews to man them?

[MSF BU]

We were certainly prepared for the Gulf War, but that was Reagan’s military.

[lentulusgracchus]

I certainly hope so!

[NFHale]

“...In the 1940’s, when the Japanese caught America flat-footed in both Pearl Harbor and the Phillipines...”

Gee..we had a democrat socialist President in office then, too.

What a coincidence...

[Prole]

Gates, like the rest of these self-important @ssholes, is going to get a lot of great people killed needlessly.

Without the US Navy, Allies like Taiwan and Israel may be in considerable danger.

[Polybius]

Was the Stark or the Cole prepared?

No. There was a definite command failure in those two incidents.

The USS Stark was complacent. The CO had identified an unknown aircraft and, after it failed to answer to his hails, the CO kept on hailing it instead of immediately preparing for possible action. He was recommended for court-martial but, instead, got away with a reprimand and early retirement.

In any case, how well did being unprepared turn out?

The USS Cole was an example of idiotically placing a valuable military asset out of its element where it was as vulnerable and helpless as a tiger in the open ocean or as vulnerable helpless as a beached killer whale.

In the open ocean, a ship is in it's element such as an M1A2 Abrams battle tank is in its element in open tank country. Anchoring such a warship in a hostile port surrounded by water traffic is like driving an M1A2 Abrams tank into a narrow, Old City alley where it is at the mercy of any teenager with a Molotov cocktail within an arm's throw of the ventilation system.

Was the Army prepared for after the fall of Baghdad?

Was the occupation of Baghdad a time critical situation against an enemy that could destroy your entire fighting force or merely a bothched mopping up operation after the decisive battles of the war were won? If the answer is the latter, then it costs a few hundred or a few thousand lives, and not the entire war, when you pull that Homer Simpson.

We we prepared at the start of the Korean war? How about GI wearing starched uniforms and white undershirts at the start of Vietnam? We we prepared to meet Rommel in North Africa? When were we ever prepared for the war that came?

No, we were not.

My point is that, in terms of military history, those examples are the equivalent of the Age of the Dinosaurs.

Back in those ancient wars, the U.S. Navy had uncontested control of the sea lanes and if the U.S. had its clock cleaned in the first few land battle, you had the luxury of a "Mulligan". In terms of projecting power to the North American continent in 1942, Nazi Germany may as well have been located in Mars. If the U.S. screwed up,it had the luxury of leisurely building up its forces until, well into 1944, you finally launched a decisive invasion force against Germany.

Those days are over.

In all of America's wars, only Great Britain ever dominated the U.S. Navy. (In spite of annoying American frigate victories, the Royal Navy kept U.S. shipping tightly blockaded in the War of 1812.)

After the war of 1812, only the Imperial Japanese Navy in the Pacific ever seriously challenged the U.S. Navy in war.

Ten or twenty of twenty five years from now, the challenge to the U.S. Navy will not be mid-20th Century carriers with propellor-driven aircraft or armed Somali teen-aged pirates in skiffs taking advantage of the squeamishness of the West to sink their skiffs and their mother-ships on sight.

The challenge will be a robust, 21st Century ChiCom Navy that will be ready.

When and if the balloon goes up, that battle will be brutal, short and DECISIVE.

In the future of the 21st Century, against China, the ancient days of screwing up and then taking a Mulligan will be over. The U.S. will get only one chance to get it right.

[Polybius]

“...In the 1940’s, when the Japanese caught America flat-footed in both Pearl Harbor and the Phillipines...”

Gee..we had a democrat socialist President in office then, too. What a coincidence...

Well, to be historically fair, we must remember the pro-defense Republican Party of 2010 is not the same Republican Party of the 1930's.

Party philosophies change and, with the changing philosophies, comes a change in membership.

In the 1930's Ronald Reagan was a Democrat and the Republicans were the George McGoverns of their day.

Because most peace activists believed that the sheer size of the armed forces in the years leading up to World War I had been an important cause of the war's outbreak, one of the most consistent aims of the antiwar forces in the United States was the conclusion of arms control agreements. In this they were often able to make common cause with conservative Republicans who sought to decrease government spending of all types.

Today, with 20/20 historical hindsight, Republicans believe, "Cut spending but, for survival, we need a strong defense."

In the decades leading up to World War Two, the Republicans believed, "Cut spending, including defense. The only defense that Fortress America needs is the Pacific Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean. They have kept us safe from foreign powers sing the War of 1812."

[yefragetuwrabrumuy]

That’s all well and good, if you have a bottomless treasury. But as things stand now, the US will have to cancel Social Security, Obamacare, Medicare and Medicaid, and slash Defense by a good 50%.

Russia ruined its navy after the collapse of the Soviet Union by trying to keep too many ships afloat. It ended up with rusting fleets incapable of service. The US could easily get caught in that trap, so the navy needs a graduated plan now, of what it will do when economic push turns to shove.

It could even be put into blunt terms. In FY 2009, the USN Budget was $150B. Plan ‘A’ is if their budget is reduced to $140B. Plan ‘B’ is if it is reduced to $130B. It probably ends up around Plan ‘J’, if the Navy only gets $50B in FY 2012, and Plan ‘K’, only $40B in 2013.

It is that bad. And the Navy will probably do a lot better than the Air Force or Army.

There will likely be a massive contraction of US military forces, from the about 100 countries they are now stationed, to a critical 4 or 5 locations.

So the USN can forget about new aircraft carriers, and its new combat ships will be cheap and cheerful. But they will be doing most of the work, as the high quality ships will be too valuable to deploy, too expensive to operate and maintain, and too important to be put in harms’ way, unless they know they are headed into a fight.

No more routine patrols. No more petty missions. If a US aircraft carrier fleet shows up, something is going to get the pluperfect snot blown out of it.

[raptor22]

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