Posted on 07/23/2013 9:20:54 AM PDT by SkyPilot
Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel warned on Monday that U.S. troops are “close to the breaking point,” after many deployments — and Congress risks worsening the situation if it doesn’t help the Pentagon with its budget.
“Our people are strong and resilient after 12 years of war, but they are under stress — and so are the institutions that support them,” Hagel told the Veterans of Foreign Wars at the group’s annual convention in Louisville, Ky.
“Last week at Fort Bragg’s Soldier and Family Assistance Center, I met a first sergeant who told me that in Afghanistan, he froze up and became overwhelmed by anxiety. He couldn’t command. He had lost his ability to command,” Hagel said. “I asked him how many deployments he had. He told me he was on his fifth consecutive combat tour when this happened. When you push human beings this hard, they break. Some people have been pushed beyond the breaking point.”
(Excerpt) Read more at politico.com ...
He called from his aircraft over Afghanistan to "congratulate" homosexual activists on the SCOTUS decision, and immediately ordered benefits in the Billions to be paid to homosexual "spouses."
He is destroying the DoD civilian workforce, which is composed of 44% military veterans. The furlough is finanically ruining the lives of mechanics, teachers, nurses, cops, engineers, and every other profession that directly supports our military.
Hagel should be standing on the desk of Obama and screaming at the top of his lungs in the halls of Congress - demanding Sequestration stop harming our military - now.
Hagel should immediately suspend millions on gopher research, a $455 million upgrade to Gitmo (including a new audio visual entertainment room), and Billions to the Muslim brotherhood.
No on in American even cares remotely about our uniformed military either, and what they have been through.
Commercials like this one are soooooo 2006.
One wonders to what extent this unhappy situation is due to the knowledge that they’re working for a dickhead president....
Dittos to that.
Hagel is managing the DoD right into the ground.....
Hey... hagel has a little hole in the top of his head too!
“One wonders to what extent this unhappy situation is due to the knowledge that they’re working for a dickhead president....”
Darn—I tought it was going to be about the troops overthrowing him ala Morsi style. Our own little coup..
Sorry, this guy has to have a severe ‘angle’ to say something like this. What is he up to?
Thanks for your post. I wasn’t aware of how much the DoD civilian workforce was affected.
A few hundred million more for well-connected contractors to provide Racial Sensitivity Training to the troops.
yeah, THAT’LL fix it!! /sarc
Change our “goal” in each theater to deicmating the enemy, not Nation building.
Change our ROE to “smash everything flat if attacked”, regardless of local collateral.
In the next 3 months, plan on bringing everyone back as there will be nothing left to destroy.
What could go wrong for them?
“hagel has a little hole in the top of his head too!”
That’s beside the point!
The lowly paid GS-05 mechanic is furloughed. These people work for this nation - they are not like the Food Stamp and SSDI takers. Yet, they are the ones punished.
There is also a huge, massive "brain drain" that has already occurred in the defense industry. Very skilled researchers and engineers have either left or are leaving.
The overall effect on the economy will be profoundly negative, not to mention the immorality of all of this.
Sequestration exempts Entitlements, but steals from those who get up each day and work for a noble cause.
Cut their rations again. Maybe it’ll work this time.
Yeah well, being forced to surrender to terrorists and celebrate sodomy will depress you......
:-)
Exactly. My son said he refuses to join the reserves even for the bennies he could get simply because he cannot stand the president and his policies toward the military. He was a 3 tour combat Marine in Helmand province so he was no slacker either and has more insight on our military that anyone in the white hut or SecDef.
Our military has been ridden hard since Desert Storm. Then there was the Bosnia/Kosovo rotation, and then the focus on Iraq, and then the transition of focus to Afghan. So, we go all the way back to 1990. That is 23 years of a tough optempo.
What has made it so rough? I would argue for downsizing the military during the Clinton era to 10 divisions, and then in the Obama era to the brigade equivalent of about 8 divisions. And now they want to make it smaller.
There was a 2 simultaneous wars strategy primarily to fight 2 wars if necessary. Alternate reasons for that manpower level would be what we see now. An extended war, and especially one we’re not particularly concerned with winning quickly, would tap the strength of those who serve.
What’s the best answer?
Increase back to 13 divisions, rid ourselves of the brigade focus, and put a warrior in the White House. That plan is, of course, listed backwards.
Obama should resign due to incompetence.
It would also help quite a bit if we stopped being the world’s police force. There was a time when the military wasn’t spread all over the globe on one deployment after another. Leadership needs to learn how to set priorities. If it isn’t directly related to national defense, then maybe we shouldn’t go. Of course, this is way, way too much to expect from President Obama and his ilk. Like all leftists, they hate the DoD. I’m not saying we need to be isolationists, but we could certainly be a little less expeditionary.
“Sequestration exempts Entitlements, but steals from those who get up each day and work for a noble cause.”
And you will not hear one peep on MSM about this either. Just like how the glazed over Congress exempted themselves from NObamaCare too.
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