Posted on 07/15/2011 12:09:08 PM PDT by sukhoi-30mki
Navy Department could face $10 billion in budget cuts
By John T. Bennett - 07/13/11 08:43 PM ET
The Navy could be forced to slash its annual budget by $10 billion as the Pentagon pares its spending, defense insiders tell The Hill.
White House officials have ordered the Pentagon to begin slashing its budget starting in 2013 to meet President Obama’s goal of $400 billion in national security cuts.
Pentagon and Navy Department officials have yet to make final decisions about how much the department (which includes the Navy and Marine Corps) will trim from its annual budget, or about what to truncate or eliminate.
But multiple industry sources with ties to the department said it has been told to expect a $10 billion funding cut for 2013. And department officials are seriously mulling options that would alter shipbuilding plans and naval operations for years, according to those sources and lawmakers.
“The Navy is anticipating a $10 billion cut to its fiscal 2013 budget request that will necessitate major program changes,” said Loren Thompson, a defense industry insider and chief operating officer of the nonprofit Lexington Institute think tank.
“That’s what I’m hearing,” another Navy insider said when asked about the $10 billion amount.
The Navy Department requested $161.4 billion in baseline funding for 2012. The House-passed 2012 defense appropriations bill proposed a $1.7 billion cut to department procurement accounts.
With the department facing a possible cut approaching $12 billion, weapons program cuts are on the table.
“One option under active consideration for most of the year has been to delay construction of the second aircraft carrier in the Ford class from 2013 to 2015,” Thompson said.
Rep. Randy Forbes (R-Va.), chairman of the House Armed Services subcommittee on Readiness, said the Navy Department also was considering removing another aircraft carrier from its long-term shipbuilding plan.
That won’t sit well with lawmakers from districts and states that are home to U.S. carriers and their related industries. The so-called shipbuilding caucus would no doubt make a lot of noise if such plans were included in the department’s 2013 budget plan.
Two senior Navy officials testifying at the session did not directly respond to Forbes’s questions about either alleged change in aircraft carrier plans.
The carrier moves, if enacted, would “severely impact” defense firms that build the big warships and their many subcontractors and parts suppliers, Thompson said.
But, he added, because aircraft carriers are so expensive, delaying one and canceling another also would “save significant funding in the near term.”
How much savings? Tens of billions of dollars.
The second Ford class carrier is projected to come with a $10.3 billion price tag, with the third carrier in that class expected to cost $13.5 billion, according to the Congressional Research Service.
The Navy Department has been in cost-cutting mode for months.
Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus told reporters during an April breakfast that officials had been eliminating ships deemed too costly and working with Pentagon leaders and industry executives to drive down the costs of ones they will buy.
Mabus said the department must be more “realistic” about how much ships should cost, and how much shipbuilding funding Congress will approve.
As Obama administration officials and Congress look for ways to trim the Pentagon budget, defense insiders expect a fight over shipbuilding.
The coming battle was previewed last week during a House Budget Committee hearing when differing views about Navy spending needs were offered by former Sen. Jim Talent (R-Mo.) and Gordon Adams, who oversaw national security budgeting for the Clinton administration.
On one hand, Talent called for sustained or bigger annual Navy budgets, due largely to the fact that ships were being retired because the cost to maintain them was being deemed too steep.
On the other hand, Adams said a well-managed defense “build-down” would still leave the U.S. with the most capable naval fleet — as well as ground and air forces — in the world.
Tell the Navy to make a second plan - because hopefully in 2013 Obama will be in jail, Kenya, or hopefully both.
Then we can tell Acorn and other septic tank dwelling scum to go to work for a change.
Good news! The EPA and HUD will be be doing out “Obama’s Stash” to all good Commies in lieu of defense spending.
Currently the US has 16 Intelligence Agencies, and over 50 federal police agencies. It needs three, the CIA, the FBI and the US Marshals. And I’ll throw in the Secret Service, but with its authority reduced to a personal protection service. The FBI can easily handle counterfeiting for Treasury.
Start with reducing the TSA by 90%. This can be done with a federal law exempting passenger and border security services from laws prohibiting “racial profiling” in the course of their duties. This is how it is done in Europe, and it works, so let’s stop fooling ourselves that non-Muslim toddlers need to be pat searched. And yes, the vast number of Muslims are evidently Muslim in their appearance and behavior.
Next, the federal government can save VAST amounts of money by just reinterpreting two expressions to MEAN WHAT THEY SAY THEY MEAN.
The first is that “Interstate Commerce” clause of the constitution means just that, NOT “Intrastate Commerce” as well. If it is not the constitutionally authorized job of the federals, they shouldn’t be doing it.
The second is that the “General Welfare” clause of the constitution means benefiting every single person in the US at once, NOT largess to individuals, unevenly given for individual problems or benefits.
Wow, that was not hard at all, except that it would cause 50% of the federal workforce to be laid off, saving the taxpayers a vast amount of money, and would be like injecting “super syrum” into our economy.
Welfare for 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011:
$262.1 billion, $322.3 billion, $415.1 billion, $502.3 billion, $495.6 billion.
Yikes ! Just the increases in welfare spending
- $686.9 billion under nObama
- COULD HAVE BOUGHT ABOUT 110 AIRCRAFT CARRIERS LIKE
USS George H.W. Bush (CVN-77) WHICH COST ABOUT $6.2 BILLION.
If our nation completely collapses as a world power - it will be because we wasted trillions of dollars on insanely idiotic social spending free-money government giveaways.
Is ACORN still going to get $8 billion dollars?
Well, it’s about time. Look at all those federal government GS employees laid off during the Clinton years as part of the peace dividend. Oh, that’s right, he just hired more of them so they’ll vote Democrat.
Good post again.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.